...I, like you, have significant moral and political misgivings about the occupation, which we both understand to be an existential threat to Israel's status as a Jewish and democratic state.
But that's the point, gentlemen.
Which is more important: Israel as a Jewish and democratic state (which those two above would argue about as to what is Jewish and what is democratic - after all, Finkelman represents the very 'democratic' Hareidi world and the very different Jewish world from liberal US Jews) or Israel's very existence?
Bandying about the term "existential" is really denying the reality of Israel today.
P.S. And this from Einat Wilf:
...[Beinart] is willing to hurt fellow Jews and to speak of "systematic oppression" and "nondemocratic Israel" in the vain hope that it will serve "the greater cause" of a democratic Israel that is accepted and recognized west of the Green line. This distinction is of no consequence to the Arab world and the anti-Israel left. The Arabs in Palestine have repeatedly forfeited the dignity of statehood and systematically oppress their own people in refugee camps to avoid lending even a shred of legitimacy to the Jewish claim to Israel. No Palestinian is a partner to the idea that Zionism is legitimate as long as it stays west of the Green line.^
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment