[lbo-talk] [Pen-l] Gar Lipow: Local action in protest of Israeli occupation is crucial

[Gar Lipow]

On Thu, May 10, 2012 at 12:50 AM, Joseph Catron <jncatron at gmail.com> wrote:
> Kudos to our own Gar on a nice introduction:
>
> "As former President Jimmy Carter and South African anti-apartheid leader Archbishop Desmond Tutu point out, Israel currently is an apartheid state. In Gaza, bombing of water and sewage and an Israeli blockade preventing rebuilding ensure that less than 10 percent of available water is safe to drink, leading to hepatitis, kidney disease and cancer. In the West Bank, Palestinian homes are bulldozed while illegal settler homes are subsidized.In Israel itself, many homes are subject to racially restrictive covenants that exclude Palestinians, like the similar covenants that once excluded African Americans in the United States. Beatings, window-breakings and other types of violence against Palestinians are often tolerated. These war crimes  and other human rights abuses are well-documented by such groups as Amnesty International and Jewish Voices for Peace.
>
> "In response to a universal call from Palestinian civil society, the international community seeks boycott of Israeli goods, divestment from  Israeli businesses, and sanctions against the government of Israel until Palestinian rights are respected. BDS is the same tactic that helped bring down apartheid in South Africa ..."
>
>
> Read more here: http://www.theolympian.com/2012/05/10/2099183/local-action-in-protest-of-israeli.html

Thanks for the kind words Joseph.   I wish I could have gone into more
detail, but a combination of limited space and the fact that I had to
use much of that limited space to respond to smears prevented that. It
is an interesting dilemma that leftists often have to face. When we
are given space in the corporate press, one reason may be that an
attack on us overstepped the norms even of that corporate media. So on
the one hand, maybe the thing to do is ignore the whatever false
charges were made against us and concentrate on the issue being
distracted from. On the other hand, ignoring that kind of thing
reinforces it and leads people to believe it true. I at least led with
the issue of Palestinian rights.  But I'm not at all sure that I got
the balance right. For future reference I'm curious how others would
have handled the same opportunity, given the 600 word limit,  the
one-time nature of the opportunity, and the nature of the piece being
responded to. Discussion of how to handle such opportunities might be
useful to many on this list.

My piece: http://www.theolympian.com/2012/05/10/2099183/local-action-in-protest-of-israeli.html

The smear piece it was responding to.
http://www.theolympian.com/2012/05/02/2089483/local-actions-target-israel-but.html


> --
> "Hige sceal þe heardra, heorte þe cenre, mod sceal þe mare, þe ure mægen
> lytlað."
>
> _______________________________________________
> pen-l mailing list
> pen-l at lists.csuchico.edu
> https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
>

-- 
Facebook: Gar Lipow  Twitter: GarLipow
Solving the Climate Crisis web page: SolvingTheClimateCrisis.com
Grist Blog: http://grist.org/author/gar-lipow/
Online technical reference: http://www.nohairshirts.com