Sunday, September 04, 2011

The Self-Indulgent Corner in the Intellectual Mind

According to
GĂ–KHAN BACIK at the Turkish daily Zaman:

"Is Israel on the list of losers? This might surprise some, but the answer is no. Despite the fragmentation of its domestic politics, the Netanyahu government has been successful at keeping Israel's profile low during the Arab Spring. Israel has carefully refrained from attaching itself to any authoritarian Arab leader, even to its former ally Mubarak. Yet Israel's critical homework is clearly set: It must work out a way of adapting to the post
Link-Arab Spring Middle East. Its successful completion of this task is germane to the survival of the Jewish state."

According to M.A. Hoare, at Great Surbiton,:

" Our friendship and solidarity should rightfully go to the state and people of Israel, not to the current Israeli government, whose continued settlement-building activity reveals it to be an obstacle to peace unworthy of any solidarity, and which has further disgraced itself by its support for the Mubarak dictatorship earlier this year."

"disgraced itself" ??

Here is what happened:

"Political commentators expressed shock at how the United States as well as its major European allies appeared to be ready to dump a staunch strategic ally of three decades, simply to conform to the current ideology of political correctness.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told ministers of the Jewish state to make no comment on the political cliffhanger in Cairo, to avoid inflaming an already explosive situation. But Israel's President Shimon Peres is not a minister.

"We always have had and still have great respect for President Mubarak," he said on Monday. He then switched to the past tense. "I don't say everything that he did was right, but he did one thing which all of us are thankful to him for: he kept the peace in the Middle East."

Why does the blogger at GS have to formulate his argument in such a sneering manner? Couldn't he make a case for supporting Palestinian statehood without the mandatory demonization of Israel? The vast majority of Israelis, including its PM and President support the idea of two states for two peoples and are willing to make the necessary sacrifices to make this happen. It has been declared often enough. So why this attempt to de-legitimize Israel's position through such distortion of Israel's conduct and public expressions? This is the kind of language and distortion I expect from my favourite Arab blogger, not from a truly thoughtful scholar who knows what an evidenced-based, reliable argument is.

To paraphrase Irving Howe's sorrowful acceptance about warm hearts and cold corners: Even the most disciplined mind has a self-indulgent corner for Israel bashing, when it comes to that beleaguered country Israel.

1 Comments:

At 9:59 AM EDT, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I totally agree. Nice insights.

 

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