I suspect the kicker here is the "consensus of Palestinian civil society," which Blankfort and perhaps some others want to equate, without evidence, to their own views. --CGE
On 7/21/10 7:35 PM, Joseph Catron wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 21, 2010 at 3:18 PM, Joel Schalit<jschalit at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Eric, pardon me, but you misunderstood me. My point was that problematizing
>> the American Jewish left, this way, at this point in time, is clueless, in
>> addition to be prejudiced. Blankfort's position betrays an increasingly
>> anachronistic outlook, demonstrating how unfamiliar he is with this
>> monolithic Jewish bloc, as well as how much it has changed.
>>
>
> I'll admit to a relative ignorance of Blankfort, who may very well be a dick
> and worse things than that. But I liked this article because it demonstrates
> how flippantly Chomsky will dismiss the consensus of Palestinian civil
> society. It's also telling how many of Blankfort's accusers here skip right
> over this main point of his thesis in their headlong rush to defend Chomsky.
> How is it that, "factually speaking, he couldn't be more wrong"? Did he make
> up his Chomsky quotes from whole cloth?
>
> Also, I see no indication that he believes in anything so farfetched as "the
> American Jewish left" (as if such a thing could exist in the absence of a
> broader left), or that his aim is to "stir up resentment against American
> Jewish progressives" (unless that category consists of Chomsky).
>