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We consume the land and the water behind walls and steel gates forcing out all others. What kind of place are we creating? Are we fated to be an intruder in the dust to borrow from Faulkner, whose presence shall evaporate with the shifting sands? Are these the boundaries of our rebirth after the Holocaust?

I have come to accept that Jewish power and sovereignty and Jewish ethics and spiritual integrity are, in the absence of reform, incompatible, unable to coexist or be reconciled. For if speaking out against the wanton murder of children is considered an act of disloyalty and betrayal rather than a legitimate act of dissent, and where dissent is so ineffective and reviled, a choice is ultimately forced upon us between Zionism and Judaism.

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For my mother and father Judaism meant bearing witness, raging against injustice and refusing silence. It meant compassion, tolerance, and rescue. In the absence of these imperatives, they taught me, we cease to be Jews.

Many of the people, both Jewish and others, who write about Palestinians and Arabs fail to accept the fundamental humanity of the people they are writing about, a failing born of ignorance, fear and racism. Within the organized Jewish community especially, it has always been unacceptable to claim that Arabs, Palestinians especially, are like us, that they, too, possess an essential humanity and must be included within our moral boundaries,

...We speak without mercy, numb to the pain of others, incapable of being reached-unconscious. Our words are these:

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On the first, she reminded me of Arendt's attempts to clarify the confusion of power/strength/force/authority/violence. Their confusion/conflation was not only a problem of linguistic (im)precision but of great political importance. (http://www.fsmitha.com/review/arendt.html)

The media, through simple oversight, have failed to bring this item to our attention. I'm certain they will cover it like white on rice, upon conclusion of their "Britney Spears melts down in Vegas" frenzy.

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Originally posted by Buddy Kat:
Sounds like they have imprisoned themselves ..much like how we are heading. So I guess if we want an example of what could be in store for us ..just look there.

Right now it's OJ that's more important in the media...britney has left building.

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Originally posted by unionist:
If anyone understands the last three posts, please provide me with an explanation. I'm way too old to appreciate such subtleties.

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And HUAC if you disagree with unionist here,at least try to be coherent about it. I'm not sure why you seem to feel that what unionist is saying is undeserving of any respect on your part.

[ 22 September 2007: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

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Originally posted by unionist:
A Jewish Plea

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For if speaking out against the wanton murder of children is considered an act of disloyalty and betrayal rather than a legitimate act of dissent,

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Speaking out against crimes such as this should never be considered a betrayal. Many causes instrumentalize the truth, so that only politically useful truths get articulated, while politically damaging truths get suppressed.

[ 23 September 2007: Message edited by: HUAC ]

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Originally posted by Ken Burch:
Eloquent post, unionist.

And HUAC if you disagree with unionist here,at least try to be coherent about it. I'm not sure why you seem to feel that what unionist is saying is undeserving of any respect on your part.

[ 22 September 2007: Message edited by: Ken Burch ]

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Originally posted by HUAC:
That is why I made the remark and I am very sorry if it was misconstrued.

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Apology accepted.

What I found less comprehensible was this remark:

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They trot this tear-jerk bullshit out periodically, simply to pacify the hand-wringers for a day or two, while they re-arm and re-fuel. The slaughter of innocents will resume forthwith.

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At the Great March for Jobs and Freedom in 1963, I heard Rabbi Joachim Prinz proclaim that silence is a crime. What is breeding silence now? The same old demons: Fear of the wealthy, deference to the powerful and a desire not to alienate "friends," merely to prevent thousands of deaths and maimings--so long as the dead are in someone else's family. Why should this decade be different from any other decade?

When that Jewish antiwar ad appeared in the Times back in 2003, I called my daughter in Chicago to tell her it was there. She and my son, who had been children in the 1970s, had bravely walked in antiwar demonstrations then, and they had signed the new ad. In the midst of our conversation, I burst into unexpected tears. I told my daughter that I felt like apologizing to them for my generation's failure. I had thought that what we did in the late sixties and seventies had made another war like that one, like this coming one, impossible. Yet--here we were.

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At the very least, silence shows moral weakness and dishonesty.

But it is important not to claim that "silence is a crime" about Israel, and not extend the same concept to other places where things fall far below decent standards of behaviour.

If "silence is a crime" when it concerns Israel, but not when it concerns Hezbollah, for example, one is simply using a different, more severe standard of judgment for Israel.

That's what discrimination is; to judge one group differently than another, without any articulable basis.

And presumably, you saw that the idea "silence is a crime" was recommended for use against "the children of the Holocaust", in other words, Jews.

So, I certainly don't think people should be punished by the state just because they deny the holocaust or the crimes of Stalin.

But I do think it speaks volumes about their ethics.

Selective silence about the crimes of your side, whether it be Bush, the Communist Party, or the Burmese Junta, is always a moral crime.

The US Constitution, and the Canadian Constitution too, refer to the right to silence when there is testimonial compulsion. That means that when you are placed under oath and questions are asked which have LEGAL consequences, one may invoke the right to silence.

You seem to think that you are addressing an issue of balance. It is this very imbalance that they are addressing.

When was the last time you caught Benjamin Netanyahu, carefully articulating a "balanced" perspective on the Lebanese crisis last year? When was the last time you raised this complaint by demanding that someone balance their condemnation of Hezbollah, by also critiquing Israel's treatment of Palestinians?