Up until now and while leading Democratic and Republican
elites debate �managing� Iraqi lives (orientalist racism at its worst), some 4
percent of Iraqis were killed and 17 percent made refugees/internally displaced
in the past four years. This would be equivalent to killing 12 million and
displacing over 50 million US citizens.
I discussed elsewhere the role of the Israel lobby in
pushing for the war on Iraq [1].
This lobby represented by the Israel Hasbara (propaganda)
Committee is now fretting about Jewish intermarriage and lack of identification
with Zionism or the state of Israel [2]. As someone who is "intermarried,"
I ask what is wrong with assimilation and intermarriage?
This reminded me that Yaakov Herzog, close advisor to four
Israeli Prime Ministers, wrote: �We are not a normal people, we are not free
from the Galut (exile) burden and we are not accepted by the world . . . Political
Zionism maintained that the concept of �people who dwell alone� is, in fact, an
abnormal condition. In reality, the concept of �people who dwell alone� is the
natural condition of the Jewish people.� [3].
He was wrong in characterizing political Zionism because
most political Zionists believed in segregation and that was the whole idea of
a "Jewish State." He is also wrong to blame the whole world for the
Zionist tribalistic mentality which exists out of its own desires to be separate
and treat any non-Jew with contempt. It is the same idea that lets Zionists
express that the world is always "against us" and privately claim to
each other that any support they get is because of their might and muscle.
Howard Friedman, president of AIPAC, titled his letter of
July 30, 2006, to friends and supporters of AIPAC "Look what you've
done." He explained: "Israel is fighting a pivotal war for its life .
. . the expected chorus of international condemnation of Israel's actions . . .
only ONE nation in the world came out and flatly declared: Let Israel finish
the job . . . That nation is the United States of America -- and the reason it
had such a clear, unambiguous view of the situation is YOU and the rest of
America's Jewry. . . . How do we do it? . . . decades of long hard work which
never ends."
Whether Jewish or not, if you are human and is concerned
with human rights, you would reject ideas of segregation/separation (Hafrada in
Hebrew) and adopt ideas of coexistence, assimilation, and justice. To do that
you would recognize things being shielded by censorship (by Zionists in many
media outlets). Here are just some more recent and relevant news and writings
on the subject of the lobby and censorship.
1) A chair of a history department writes on the attempts to
use the card of anti-Semitism to silence debate on campus. He titles his
article On Being Called an Anti-Semite in Montana: "Is booking a critic of the Israel lobby to speak on your
campus anti-Semitic?."
Prof. Richard Drake concludes: "In a democratic
society, all government policies must stand for public inspection. This is true
whether liberal Democrats or conservative Republicans are in charge. With both
of our political parties and the media sharing the same basic ideas about foreign
policy, especially in the Middle East, we need a place where the assumptions of
the status quo encounter a stern testing, not a happy-faced tribute. The
university should be that place." [4]
2) Hillary Clinton wants to get Jewish votes and money and
to do that, she thinks she has to court the right-wing fascist elements of the
Zionist movement. So she emphasizes her strong support of apartheid Israel:
�Hillary Clinton believes that Israel's right to exist in safety as a Jewish
state, with defensible borders and an undivided Jerusalem as its capital,
secure from violence and terrorism, must never be questioned.�
I urge everyone to write to remind her that Jerusalem is
illegally occupied and that no state has a right to be Jewish (or Muslim or
Christian). Human rights demand that states be states of the citizens who live
in them regardless of their religion.
3) George Bisharat explain that there is "A double
standard on academic freedom in the Middle East" and how the lobby tries
to silence debate in Academia [5].
4) Dick Cheney, who was and may still be a board member of
the "Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs," is pushing for
a war on Iran just as he, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Douglas Faith, Michael
Ledeen and other neocon Zionists pushed for a war on Iraq (See 6). Ledeen just
published a book vilifying Iran.
5) A college student was asking questions of Senator Kerry
and was tackled, attacked and Tasered by police. The media did not tell you
that he spoke only for 1 minute, 20 seconds of his allotted 2-minute time. They
also did not tell you that only when he asked if Kerry was a member of the
secret Skull and Bones Society that he was tackled. The video is posted here: www.attytood.com (continued segment where
he asks police not to taser him is here www.breitbart.tv/?p=5692). They were
worried where he might be going with a line of questioning that started by the
fact that Kerry let Bush steal the 2004 election.
Here is what Bush said at the AIPAC convention just before
the 2004 presidential election (a talks made while Israel was committing war
crimes and crimes against humanity): "The United States is strongly
committed, and I am strongly committed, to the security of Israel as a vibrant
Jewish state . . . Israel is a democracy and a friend and has every right to
defend itself from terror."
Kerry said exactly the same at AIPAC and here is what Joe
Lieberman said of Kerry: "John Kerry has always stood with our crucial
ally, Israel. During his 20-year Senate career, John has compiled a perfect
record of pro-Israel votes, through his votes on economic aid, military
security or the location of the U.S. Embassy. And John Kerry has had the
courage to face down leaders who promote anti-Semitism. He has flown with the
Israeli Air Force and seen from the cockpit how vulnerable Israel is. Simply
put, Israel can rely on John Kerry."
6) The Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish
Organizations is pushing for Iran confrontation just as they did with the Iraq
confrontation before 2003 [7].
7) Congressman Moran is being targeted by the lobby for
speaking the truth. The Washington Post headlined its article Moran Upsets
Jewish Groups Again: U.S.
House Democrat Said Pro-Israel Lobby Promoted War. He was attacked by the lobby but defended by Rabbi Lener of
Tikkun. Moran stood his grounds stating, "I think Mr. Halber is being
disingenuous in suggesting that the AIPAC board has not been strongly
supportive of military involvement in Iraq and now in Iran" [8].
The 19th century notions of oppression, separation, and the
use of propaganda to hide the facts led to atrocities of WWI, WWII, and many
others. It has no place in the 21st century.
References
1) The
Israeli lobby and the Iraq War
2) Now
Make it a Full-Time Job, with Real Resources
3) Yaakov Herzog, "Am Levadad Yishkon-A People Who
Dwells Alone-" Tel-Aviv: Sifriat Maariv, 1975, pp. 58-59, Cited in MIDDLE
EAST JOURNAL M Volume61, No. 1, WINTER 2007
4) On Being
Called an Anti-Semite in Montana
5) A
double standard on academic freedom in the Middle East
6) Bush
setting America up for war with Iran
7) NATIONAL
RALLY TO END THE THREAT NOW!
8) Moran
Upsets Jewish Groups Again
Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh is author
of "Sharing the Land of Canaan: Human Rights and the Israeli-Palestinian
struggle" (Pluto Press). His website is qumsiyeh.org.