"Because, as my friend Joel Schalit put it, the contradictions of Morris' position are "very very Israeli." How can one really be a leftist and advocate an ethnically based state?"
Not even ethnic really. I'd say, by the 20th century, it was a mythic ethnicity, and the founders of Israel attest to the difficulty of bringing together very heterodox groups. Note that the "arab" jews have remained a distinct population, requiring special economic programs; that a language had to be invented and forced upon everybody; that the Russian "jews" coming in right now have to invent Jewish grandmothers...etc.
Yes, the contradictions are very, very "Israeli."
Joanna