Let me start with a question: is it possible to criticize
the Presidential administration of George W. Bush and still love America? Does criticizing American foreign policy
mean that the critic hates all Americans and wants to see them killed? I think most reasonable people can see that
not only is it possible to criticize America with love, but that it is necessary
to criticize the American government in order to save it, when its policies are
detrimental to its own people or those of the rest of the world.
Why then do reasonable people not see that criticizing Israeli policy is not Anti-Semitic?
Yet the reaction from the Democratic party, in the days before the recent election, to Former President Jimmy Carter’s new book Palestine: Peace not Apartheid, shows that even the mainstream left in America is quick to deflect any substantive criticism of Israel—and cast it as extremist rather than address it. Here is the response of Nancy Pelosi, a few days before the election: “With all due respect to former President Carter, he does not speak for the Democratic Party on Israel,” she replied. “It is wrong to suggest that the Jewish people would support a government in Israel or anywhere else that institutionalizes ethnically based oppression, and Democrats reject that allegation vigorously.”
Who, in the Democratic Party, or elsewhere, has the moral courage to recognize Jimmy Carter as an honest truth speaker—Honest Jimmy, our Honest Abe—as one of the voices of our conscience, our public, social, national conscience? Jimmy Carter is not a racist, nor an Anti-Semite. Who in the Democratic party is willing to admit, at least, that Jimmy Carter is not a Racist? Okay, then. If Jimmy Carter clearly does not speak from a position of racial hatred against anybody, then we must take seriously his opinions about what is going on in the world. Jimmy Carter was a President of the United States, involved in brokering peace deals in the Middle-East. Since his presidency, he has been involved in humanitarian work all over the globe. We can therefore expect that he possesses a great deal of knowledge and experience about many parts of the world—and he speaks from this position. A generous, humble man, who has seen much of the world, who loves that world, and who genuinely wants to see it improve. If I can imagine seeing into his heart at this moment, I think that he truly wants to feel that his legacy will be leaving the world a slightly better, happier, more peaceful place as a result of his little contribution to it. If Jimmy Carter, Honest, Humble Jimmy, feels the need to raise his voice about some issue, then he probably feels that it is a pretty important issue, especially if he raises his voice against a tidal wave of silence. If he goes against the prevailing consensus, and risks his neck, his reputation, MAYBE EVEN HIS LIFE!!!, to speak out, —then perhaps we should listen to him!
What is Jimmy Carter saying? He is saying that Israel practices Apartheid. For many people in this country, this is a bitter pill to swallow. And I mean bitter! But for people who don’t want to look this statement in the face, what motive could you possibly ascribe to Jimmy Carter for saying it? That he is a raving Anti-Semite Nazi who wants nothing more than to see the Jewish People wiped out before he dies? That he is a Mel Gibson-esque closet Anti-Semite who made that statement while on a drunken spree? This is what I take to be the implication of statements made by Democrats like Nancy Pelosi (and I’m sure Hillary Clinton, if pressed)—that Jimmy Carter in no way represents the opinion of the Democratic Party.
But Jimmy Carter is the Voice of Conscience of the Democratic party (if not the whole country). He speaks for the Base of the Democratic party—that is, he speaks for the People. He speaks in their favor, as their Advocate. He speaks for our deepest held values. And Democrats treat him like he is a Goehring or a Gibson, some mad lunatic we mustn’t listen to, and whose opinions we must publicly denounce for fear of appearing to have been tainted by them in some way. Jimmy Carter is more like a Mother Theresa or an Abraham Lincoln than like a Mel Gibson, and what he says is much more like the truth, than what comes out of the average Democrat’s mouth. Jimmy Carter was not the first Democrat to speak up against President Bush (as he did so eloquently at the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr.’s successor in activism, Coretta Scott King, last year). But even there he was speaking against the tide, against the consensus in the Democratic party against speaking out about what is going on in the White House, in Iraq, in the media, in Guantanamo bay and in secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe, where human rights are being deprived, civil rights and protections are being taken away, and where an ever more powerful government uses its power to rule us by terror, and paralyze us from even speaking out about how unspeakably EVIL it is acting.
Based on its name, one would expect the “Democratic” party to be the voice of the people. The party whose mission it is to advocate for the rights of people, of all people equally. But the Democratic party advocates for the rights of elites, and doesn’t stand up when basic liberties, fundamental freedoms, are at stake.
I say that Jimmy Carter, in speaking out against President Bush before many democrats or other politicians did, spoke for the people. He spoke for the American people, who want their freedoms protected and their sons and daughters safe. He spoke for the Iraqi People, who deserve better than military occupation and civil war. He spoke for people of the whole world, who want a cessation of wars and violence, who want peaceful and just government, and who want to be able to put food on the table without having to resort to prostitution. He understands that the vast majority of violence in this world comes from above—from those on top and in power—and not from below; and that those in power use the violence of those below them for their own purposes.
Jimmy Carter knows that the moral responsibility for stopping wars rests with the most powerful. He knows that, even if weak countries, or tribes, or gangs, or mobs, start violence, then it is the government’s job to contain, rather than spread, that violence, to stand up against that violence in favor of peace for all people. If the United States is the most powerful government on earth, then the moral responsibility rests even more with it. So when that government starts, rather than contains, violence, Jimmy Carter knows that that government is acting irresponsibly with its power. In calling that government on its abuse of power, its abuse of the power we supposedly gave it to act in our interest, its perversion of the moral and democratic authority it claims to have, Jimmy Carter has spoken for the people, in the interest of the people.
When Jimmy Carter speaks out against George Bush, should we assume that he hates all Texans? Should we assume that he (a Baptist) hates all Christians? Should we assume that he would like to see all supporters of the Republican Party be put to death? Or should we assume, instead, that he wants to see all Americans governed by better men and women and better policies? I think we should assume the latter, that Jimmy Carter wants to protect our people, our constitution, and the ideals enshrined in our founding as a democratic nation. That he has a moral and ideological clarity on the human and civil rights deserved by all people. I’m sure he also believes that George Bush is entitled to those same basic rights and protections as are the rest of us; in other words, I’m sure that Jimmy Carter does not advocate the imprisonment & torture of George Bush at Guantanamo Bay.
Just as Jimmy Carter does not hate all Texans, he does not hate all Jews, just because he spoke out against Israeli government policy. We can legitimately criticize government policy, without that criticism implying racism against those governed. We can criticize Milosevic, without intending that ordinary Serbians be massacred. We can even criticize an ideology—communism, dictatorship, fascism—without intending that people ruled by such ideologies should be summarily executed. We can point out that one group is committing genocide or apartheid, without that pointing-out meaning that we believe the group practicing genocide should be wiped out. We did not seek to end apartheid in South Africa in order to install a new apartheid state where the white Afrikaners were ruled or enslaved by the Black native Africans.
Therefore, a criticism of Israeli government policy does not mean that the one who criticized is Anti-Semitic. Advocating for a change in that policy is not the same thing as advocating another holocaust of the remaining Jews on the planet. Yes, there may be some people who intend racial hatred when they criticize Israeli policy—just as I wouldn’t be surprised if some Albanians harbored racial hatred against the Serbians. But that doesn’t mean that it is not possible to criticize Israel without being Anti-Semitic. Eliminating the quadruple negative from that sentence: In fact, it is possible to criticize Israel while being Pro-Semitic. Which is to say, it is possible to speak in the interest of the Jewish people while still criticizing Israeli policy, just as it is possible to speak in the interest of the American people while criticizing American government policy. In fact, if a government is behaving poorly enough, it is necessary to criticize it, in order to speak for the people.
This is what Jimmy Carter has done. He knows that in order for the Jewish and for the Palestinian Arab people to live peaceful, full lives, there must be justice and a protection of rights for all. ALL PEOPLE are entitled to a defense against aggression and violence. All people equally deserve life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Now, if there is some violence or injustice, we must speak about it, search for it, analyze it, try it fairly in the court of public opinion, or in a court of law, before we can correct or punish it.
One of the subtle rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights, and in the American Ideal, is the right that any point of view, position, accusation, claim, or statement be 1) heard, 2) respected, 3) if necessary, investigated thoroughly and impartially. In the American Marketplace of Ideas, no expression from any citizen shall be suppressed, censored, or denied fair investigation. Even expression we find hateful—such as making racist statements—is legally permitted, even if it is not endorsed. Imagine if we lived in a society where accusations against you would lead to your immediate disappearance and execution! In order to protect all of our rights, we demand that a dispute be investigated before it is settled. We demand that a claim of criminal behavior be subject to the test that 1) the behavior is in fact criminal and 2) the accused was the perpetrator. We also demand that if there is some problem, and people contact authorities in order to inform them of what they know, the statements made by these people should at least be considered, and in some cases elaborated on or investigated. If someone claims that they witnessed criminal activity, police (and hence government) must take that claim seriously enough at least to check it out.
Therefore, before we solve any problem, we must speak about it. We must investigate and examine all of its aspects. We must be impartial, fair, and honest about what we uncover. And we must pursue any avenues that come up. We cannot just expect that the problem between the Israelis and Palestinians will just disappear, or that people will be able to solve the problem at the top level and just expect everyone to suddenly change their behavior, any more than we can force Iraq into being more democratic and peaceful by occupying it. We cannot expect that the CIA, or some secret government decision, not revealed to the public, will be able to solve the problems of the Middle-East. We cannot expect that applying more violence to the region will make things more peaceful. So, in order to solve the problem, we must discuss it openly, honestly, and fully. And we must do so in the spirit of advocating for the rights of both peoples. Yet again, this is what Jimmy Carter has been doing. Seeking a solution to that problem through the forum of open, public discussion.
Now, more and more people are coming out to try this, in our court of public opinion. I applaud Alan Dershowitz for his recent book The Case for Peace, in which he says, right from the start, that options for peace are on the table, and that the sensible middle ground should ignore extremists on both sides, and work towards implementing it. He presents a very reasonable case for solving the problem in a pragmatic, rather than ideological, way. However, Dershowitz has two blinders up which cloud his argument:
The first is the idea that the responsibility for peace rests in the hands of the Palestinians. Indeed, if the Palestinians were oppressing Israelis, that would be the case. If the Palestinians were fighting an equal war with the Israelis, that would partially be the case. However, the Israeli Army, the most powerful military of any middle-eastern nation, is occupying the land of people without a state, without a government, without a military, without access to roads, without access, in many cases, even to nearby villages. Frantz Fanon, discussing the Algerian resistance to French colonialism in his landmark book The Wretched of the Earth, argues forcefully that the violence of occupiers fosters, foments, even creates violence in the occupied. The occupiers use violence and force, because, as they put it, “it is the only language they understand,” and in speaking that language, those occupiers in fact create a dynamic where a response is only possible in that language. The occupied are violent because they want to be free of occupation. They are not violent in seeking out others to kill; rather the violence has been brought to them, to their land, and it is inevitable that they will feel it is their only recourse. Most readers must by now see that our debacle in Iraq was an entirely predictable tragedy: adding violence to an unstable situation can only inflame it more. We cannot bring war to a country and then expect it to be peaceful. The same is true of the Palestinians. They have no democratic say in whether Israeli tanks demolish their homes or missiles kill their children. They have no way to resist it except violence. And because they do not have a military, they use what means they can. This is not to excuse Palestinian violence—I believe strongly that all parties must work toward eliminating violence—but we must understand where that violence comes from—above—before we try to solve the problem. Understood correctly, we can see that an oppressed Palestinian people are not the root causes of the violence that they themselves perpetuate, but its victims. The power rests in the hands of the Israeli occupation—and in missing this, Dershowitz fails where Jimmy Carter succeeds.
But from a pragmatic point of view, he misses the fact that peace requires we abandon this mode of judgement of other peoples in the world. Neither the Israelis nor Americans are in the moral high ground to treat the Arab peoples like naughty children who need to be taught lessons. But, for a moment, imagine how a child would react if treated that way: he misbehaves, and you offer him a candy bar. He keeps misbehaving and you offer him three quarters of a candy bar. Predict the result: will the child realize his mistake & accept the three-quarters of a candy bar? Or will he become even more angry and belligerent? Now imagine we are dealing with an adult, rather than a child. You give an adult an offer he doesn’t like, and he rejects the offer. Do you offer him less, or more? Any idiot can see that sensible negotiation—even if it doesn’t involve offering more, certainly cannot involve offering less than previously offered. So what is the reasonable, pragmatic sense in treating the Palestinians like naughty children? Does he not realize that Palestinians are human beings—and that such treatment will only anger them more, rather than making them more docile?
That “we must not reward bad behavior in the world” is in fact a common neoconservative argument about how we should deal with the world community, and a good example of how that has played out for us is North Korea. “Punishment” for “bad behavior”—such as refusing to negotiate, or imposing sanctions—only makes the nation/person behave more badly. And a number of commentators in recent weeks have begun to acknowledge that Kim Jong Il got worse as a result of George Bush placing him in the “Axis of Evil,” and suspending negotiations and diplomatic ties. Things would have been better if we had open channels of diplomatic communication earlier.
Therefore, no matter how sincere in their intentions people like Dershowitz are, their efforts will not lead to peace unless they also seek truth and reconciliation (as South Africans have) as well. They will miss the key element of justice—that the truth be spoken, that the claims of wrongdoing be fairly investigated. Which, if left undone, will leave an aggrieved, resentful, bitter people, with wounds apt to burst at the wrong moment.
Jimmy Carter, as a mainstream national figure, has tried to
lead us towards this recognition & realization. To have a true and lasting peace, we, the Americans, the world
community, the Palestinians and the Israelis, must seek truth and
reconciliation. Peace cannot come
without a full exposure of wrongs committed on all sides—partly because without
such an exposure, wrongs may be perpetuated, and partly because without it,
feelings of bitterness and resentment may be cultivated. As American power-brokers in the region, we
have the responsibility to thoroughly and fairly investigate all claims of
wrongdoing from both sides. If
we have power, we must use it justly rather than partially. Jimmy Carter calls us to be honest in our
dealings, which we cannot do if we stand in unequivocal support of one side, as
the Republican and Democratic Parties alike stand. Jimmy Carter demands that we be more impartial, and that we
investigate seriously the claims made by Palestinians, the United Nations, and
human rights organizations all over the world (such as Amnesty International).
What of those who say that we must not play the “blame game”? (I think Dershowitz would fall in this category, when it comes to potential blame being laid at the foot of the Israelis.) This is usually the call of those who were negligent or wrongdoing. Think of how often the negligent Bush administration said, after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in 2005, that we mustn’t play the “Blame Game.” It’s not a “blame” game—it’s a “responsibility” game. In dealing with problems, we must find out who or what is responsible for them, in order to find appropriate solutions. This doesn’t mean that an accusation automatically means the accused is held accountable—it means that the claim must be investigated (like a probe into government incompetence in the face of Katrina.) It doesn’t mean that those who were wrong or negligent will be summarily executed—it means that the process of fair and rational analysis will be applied to determine their responsibility, as well as the appropriate action in response.
So what about the Democratic Party? Like the Republicans, they refuse to see any but the Israeli side in this conflict. Jimmy Carter is calling them on their basic core values and principles: human and civil rights. If Palestinians are human beings, and they have those rights, then Israel is practicing apartheid against them, whether Jews or Democrats want to admit it or not. Jimmy Carter says we must not be hypocritical in calling for those rights for some, and denying them to others. The Democratic Party’s denial of his statements—like Peter’s denial of Jesus three times in the night—is a demonstration of their moral weakness. Carter gives Democrats, who might not have stood up before him, the chance to stand up behind him, and take cover under his obvious moral unimpeachability—and instead they cast him out! Democrats, in abandoning Carter, are like Jews who abandon Chomsky, and those like him, to the imaginary realm of “self-hating Jew”-hood. In fact, Jews like Chomsky, who have the moral courage to stand up to oppression that their own race is committing, deserve the highest respect from their own people as well as from all peoples of the world. Chomsky does not hate himself; he loves himself and loves Jews, along with all people—and he speaks out against Israeli and American Imperialism for that very reason. Carter is not a “Self-Hating Democrat” or a “Self-Hating American;” he is a gentle old man full of love for the world, and he is, today, one of our greatest heroes. For his courageous stance against the entire American political machine in its endorsement and support of Israeli Apartheid, Carter deserves our celebration rather than our denial. Who will stand up for him?
I've always been amazed at how fast the words "anti-Semite" are flung at anyone in the US who dares criticize Israeli policy, and unquestioning American support of the same. And if the person doing the criticizing is Jewish, we also get accused of being "self-hating Jews". Excuse me? Am I a self-hating American because I don't agree with my own government's current foreign policy? Am I a self-hating dancer if I state that some, not all, dancers aren't very nice people?
It's often said that there is much greater diversity of opinion expressed in Israel itself. I wouldn't be surprised - Jews love to argue. They're also actually living there. American Jews are not, by and large. I usually feel despair at the ignorance I see here, among my fellow Jews and non-Jews alike, about the Arab and Muslim world, about the history of the region, about our shared history. Example: I was talking to a cousin of mine, a reasonably educated man, about the former Soviet Union (where his wife is from). I mentioned that there are a lot of Uzbek Jews in New York now, and he said, "Well, of course - Uzbeks are Muslims so they hate Jews". I just shut down the conversation at that point; there was no use in my schooling my cousin in the truth, which is that Central Asian Jews are a different people with a different history, that they left because the fact of their being Jewish gave them the opportunity to do so when the USSR collapsed, that the instability in that region came not from hatred of Jews but from complex political changes, and that there are still plenty of Jews in Azerbaijan. I'm sure that there is plenty of actual anti-Semitism there, but that's common in Russia and the FSU, has been there for centuries, and has nothing to do with the Israel-Palestine issue. He believes Jews and Muslims are matter and anti-matter, OK, I'm not gonna get into it with him because...AARGH!
I'll stand up for Jimmy Carter, even though no one in this world gives a crap what a bellydancing small-b buddhist/atheist illustrator thinks. I'm glad people are beginning to have the courage to use the A word in this issue. It's apartheid in all but name. Let's call it what it is.
Are you familiar with Dove's Eye View's blog?:
http://bedouina.typepad.com/
and this:
http://www.breakingthesilence.org.il/index_e.asp
Maybe if we blog hard enough, everything will be OK!
Posted by: Leela | November 19, 2006 at 03:23 PM
Excellent commentary. I would like to add though, that part of the problem is that the mainstream American media RARELY gives an accurate portrait of what is happening in Israel/Palestine. It's easy to turn a blind eye to what hardly seen...It's easy for to say it's not happening, if it's not being shown to you in realtime.
I have heard the same thing--that many Israeli's are actually more liberal and disturbed by their government's actions than American Jews, and I bet that is because they live with it everyday and know the real story. Both sides.
Perhaps if WE (all Americans, not just Jews) were given a real dose of "truthiness" things would change. But as long as there is a vested interest in this country (by both Republicans and Democrats) of having Arabs be "the evildoers" that is unlikely.
Nevertheless, I will keep my fingers crossed.
Posted by: friend of the family | November 20, 2006 at 12:35 PM
Yes, there are things one will never hear in the American media. When I was living in Europe, BBC World Service ran a 3-part series about the founding of Israel, and were very balanced in the telling. I remember one Palestinian man describing the way that Jews from Europe (this was immediately after WW2) gathered all the men in his town and told them to return the next day with the keys to their houses, so that they could confiscate them. I just put my head in my hands and wailed, because of my own family history: my grandfather returned from mandatory Polish Army service in 1939 to find that the Germans had shot or carted off his entire family, and that the Polish family next door to them had taken over his family home. Years later, when the documentary "Shoah" was broadcast on 13, he called my mother and said, "Look at the screen right now! That's our house, and that man in the window is our neighbor - he always wanted our house!"
That people who had just had this done to them could go and do it to someone else, and then lie to subsequent generations about it ("When we arrived, there was nothing here but barren desert, and we made it bloom!"), confounds me utterly. Sometimes I think that Israel was founded on a pathology. They were so traumatized by the Holocaust that they were blinded to all but their own victimhood, and many still use that as a reference point, so everyone who disagrees with them is a potential Hitler, and they see all threats as an extension of the Holocaust and of the European anti-Semitism that preceded it, rather than a response to their own current policies. It's pretty messed up. I could go on and on but I'll save it for another rant!
Posted by: Leela | November 20, 2006 at 08:27 PM
I had just finished my own article (web page) when Jimmy Carter announced his book 'Peace Not Aparthied'. My study and research had arrived at the same conclusion, with one difference. Unless I misunderstood, Carter does not see anything wrong with the secular Zionist minority who control Israel, and this to me is the greatest cause of the Aparthied and other very serious problems.
To be fair to the Jewish people, there are two divergent groups involved (beside the secular majority now in Israel), and the True Torah Jew has spoken out in warning about the Zionist organization since it began in late 1800 or early 1900's. Their warning proving correct, that Jewsih suffering would result, and no where on earth do Jewish people now suffer more than in Israel.
My second issue is that Carter gave no warning to the Zionist Christian in this matter, these I believe are leading many American Christian astray with their foolishness or ignorance in backing the Zionist error's in Israel.
I have found that we Americans in majority are seriously ignorant regarding Israel and the Middle East today, and that our leaders with their intellectual dishonesty are only prolonging the inevitable, that if not brought to their senses, the Zionist's of Israel will bring disaster on many.
Posted by: DeWayne Benson | February 15, 2007 at 09:52 PM
We must maintain a strong military. We can't afford to cut the budget like Carter did, like Clinton did. It makes us weaker and vulnerable.
Like it or not, we are a strong country for several reasons, one is we are a super power and must remain so. Too many nutcases would like to bring us down - some on our own shores.
Clinton so damaged our military by the cuts he made (it is also how he claimed to reduce the size of government - he cut the miliary so badly which was how he made the claim - employees in beauracratic areas increased.) that we've yet to fully recover.
Remember during the Carter years our troops had trouble geting spare parts for planes, ships, arms, etc., and sometimes couldn't even train to protect us using real weapons.
Posted by: David Thum | June 26, 2007 at 04:01 AM