Divide and Conquer Re: Cockburn: Israel and "Anti-Semitism"

Micheal Ellis onyxmirr at earthlink.net
Sat May 18 11:45:38 PDT 2002



>
>How do we win in a war of positions concerning Israel and Palestine
>and end the occupation? By emphasizing *political divisions* among
>American Jews as well as Israeli Jews (among the latter especially
>vocal critics of the occupation within the ranks of IDF reservists).
>The Zionist strategy has always been to equate support for Jews with
>uncritical support for Israel. Our strategy should be to falsify the
>equation by highlighting and foregrounding Jewish dissenters,
>*whatever* the nature or degree of dissent, from Michael Lerner to
>Norman Finkelstein.
>
>Divide and conquer. Make your enemy look smaller in appearance,
>which helps to make it become smaller in number. The Right is very
>good at this. Leftists should learn from the Right. There is
>nothing leftists can gain by adding to the Zionist propaganda that if
>one is a Jew, one should support Israel (noting the "Jewish identity"
>of a media owner when criticizing media biases against Palestinians,
>for instance, implies that it is the owner's "Jewishness" -- not any
>other factor -- that is the primary determinant in his bias against
>Palestinians).
>--

but does that put more importance on jewish critiques?...... there is still an inherent contradiction with that....you are making the issue about "jewishness". making "jewishness" relevant only when it suits your purpose.....as a "strategy" of the left i find that hypocritical. if we are to commit ourselves to the strategy of hypocrisy in order to be more "successful" then what is it worth? personally i'd rather commit to my policies complete "failure" or whatever.

~M.E.



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