When the Right Is Right About the Left

[Valin]

Forward:

 

Against War, or More? And once the occupation is ended, is there a next target for a protest?

 

Jay Michaelson

July 30, 2012

 

 

Let me start with my bona fides. For several years, and at significant personal cost, I have spoken out about Israeli policies in the West Bank, in particular the settlements and the route of the separation barrier, which I deem to be generally illegal, immoral and harmful to both Israelis and Palestinians. I am also a longtime activist for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, and have supported those in my community who protest Israel’s policies — including by calling for boycotts, divestment and sanctions, which I do not support — on the basis of a shared solidarity with those who are oppressed. And an essay I wrote in these pages a few years ago on my wavering love for Israel still gets plenty of airtime and plenty of nasty comments.

 

I begin with these left-wing credentials because my aim in this column is to call out my liberal colleagues on certain of our blind spots and try to communicate to fellow progressives when, in my view, their criticism of Israel becomes deeply problematic — even, dare I say it, anti-Semitic. I do so because, just as I am uncomfortable in Jewish nationalist circles where people routinely make racist, violent and ethnocentric remarks (and where those remarks support real-world policies with real effects on real people), so, too, I am uncomfortable in left-wing circles where some people evince a casual disregard for the legitimate concerns of Israelis and Jews, for the very real and very deep problems on the Palestinian side, and even for the truth.

 

(Snip)

 

This is a shell game, and it’s dishonest. Just as I call out my right-wing friends to tell me their endgame (per Benjamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon, this involves Israel wearing down the Palestinians for decades so that they will be willing to accept a deal; per Avigdor Lieberman, it involves population transfer), so I call out my left-wing friends to do the same. Tell me what the endgame is. Is it the end of the Jewish state entirely? Is it the return of Jewish “colonialists” to Europe and North Africa, from whence they fled under the shadow of anti-Semitic violence? Or, perhaps, is it an immediate, unilateral withdrawal — in which case, what is to prevent the West Bank from becoming the next Gaza, with rockets falling all over Israel? I am absolutely on board with criticizing many Israeli policies, but I also want to know where my partners stand on “final-status” issues. Otherwise, I’m being co-opted.

 

In addition to betraying liberal allies, the radical-left shell game also causes conservatives to be rightly suspicious of anything the left says. J Street, for example, consistently and regularly repeats that it supports the existence and security of the State of Israel. Yet because its further-left allies do not make the same assurances, the whole progressive enterprise is viewed with suspicion by the right (which includes most funders of American Jewish institutions).

 

(Snip)