--- Michael Pollak <mpollak at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Sat, 16 Aug 2003, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>
> > [A racist state is one in which one group defined
> by descent is
> privileged in law and practice.]
>
> The main problem with the "Israel is a racist state
> argument" IMHO is that
> it's politically and theoretically
> counterproductive. If you make the
> same arguments without the racial language they will
> be much more
> effective.
>
> I think the main goal of American critics of Israel,
> modest but very
> important if it could ever be reached, should be to
> convince a large
> majority of Americans that Israel bears a lot of
> blame for the current
> impasse, and that it is directly causing a lot of
> suffering. That would
> provide the background needed for cutting off
> military aid and applying
> real pressure. That would be a very important thing
> to accomplish, and
> nobody but American critics can accomplish it.
>
> Objectively, it doesn't seem like this should be so
> hard. For one thing,
> it's true. And in the second place, American
> citizens do not profit by
> aid to Israel, they lose.
>
> But the biggest obstacle to getting Americans to
> accept that everything
> the media and government tell them about Israel is
> wrong -- besides the
> dizzying break that implies, which is no small
> thing, and the intellectual
> effort it demands, which ditto -- is that they are
> afraid they will be
> making common cause with nutcases and anti-semites.
> They want to have a
> secure reply to the charge that they are being
> anti-semitic themselves.
> And because of that the first thing they want to
> reassure themselves of is
> that the dominant mass in the coalition criticizing
> Israel is made up of
> concerned and reasonable people with a developed
> sense of justice like
> themselves. And of course this all goes double for
> the scribbling classes
> that are your pivot point in changing opinion.
>
> Calling Israel a racist state is exactly the way not
> to do this. Instead
> it's exactly the way to do the opposite: to convince
> most Americans that
> you do represent the racist nutcase view, just like
> they feared. And to
> convince those of us who know you're not one that
> you have a very tin ear.
>
> Rather than arguments which proclaim that everyone
> who defends Israel is
> defending racism -- which rather puts off anyone who
> accepts common wisdom
> from listening to another word (because accusations
> of racism are dead
> conversation stoppers) -- I think we need to
> brandish arguments that
> engage and unveil the complexity and confusion that
> shroud Israel's
> policy. That explain why so many people of good
> intentions and average
> education are so completely wrong about policies
> that are truly appalling
> once you understand them. And that could explain
> how they could be so
> completely wrong other than that they are a racist
> or a fool or a victim
> of a conspiracy. I think arguments like those
> contain the memes of
> propagation.
>
> I have marginally more patience for this Israel is a
> racist state argument
> when it's put forth by Israelis arguing with
> Israelis or American Jews
> arguing with American Jews because that at least if
> done right it implies
> a claim of joint self-reproach. But if you want to
> convince Americans,
> 97% of whom are not Jews, I think this is exactly
> the wrong tack. It's
> only a good tack if you love being a lonely
> Jeremiah, making people hate
> you more the more you're convinced you're right.
>
> I sympathize with what I think are the underlying
> motivations of this
> argument: the desire to express enormous, almost
> unbearable outrage, not
> only at how people are being made to suffer, but at
> all the lies and
> distortions and complete reversals of reality that
> justify that suffering
> and make it seem not only invisible but even
> righteous to many people. I
> can understanding the desire to simplify all this
> complexity into a black
> and white reality where we would be obviously right
> and our opponents
> obviously wrong.
>
> But politically it backfires badly.
>
> I also think intellectually that it doesn't work --
> that in the interest
> of imaginary sound bites (which would be telling in
> an alternate universe)
> *it actually obscures the things that are most wrong
> with Israel law and
> policy*.
>
> Lastly I think its use of comparative citizenship
> law is risibly selective
> and tendentious. Between Israel and Nazi Germany
> there are hundreds of
> other states whose citizenship laws and level of
> racist discourse are more
> comparable. These things are not rare. Blood right
> is the rule in
> citizenship law, not the exception. To mention only
> these poles as if
> they stood out from all the rest as equals is just
> absurd.
>
> But the political objection is probably sufficient
> in itself. You can
> make any objections you want against Israel,
> including the strongest ones,
> without ever using the word race, and they will be
> more effective.
>
> Michael
>
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