I'll be concise (as many are commenting) and to the point about her moral failure and political duplicity when it comes to Israel and Zionism. And her hypocrisy.
Four excerpts of her in italics and my comments:
1.
When you talk about feminism you’re talking about the rights of all women and their families to live in dignity, peace, and security. It’s about giving women access to health care and other basic rights. And Israel is a country that continues to occupy territories in Palestine, has people under siege at checkpoints—we have women who have babies on checkpoints because they’re not able to get to hospitals [in time].
Checkpoints exist because Arab terrorism exists. Remove the latter and no former. Ghandi led a non-violent protest movement but ever since 1920, at least, the organized anti-Zionist Arab movement has been only violent and primarily directed to kill Jews and prevent any form of Jewish national identity.
No system is 100% successful - both in preventing suicide-intent female bombers who seek to kill and maim innocent children, women and men in their terror attacks and in assuring that innocent Arabs are not caught up in unfortunate situations that are not intended.
2.
[women in Palestine] are oppressed in many ways, including lack of access to health care and poverty. These are women who have to figure out ways to feed their children. They have limits on their travel. These are all things that women around the world want and many of us have the privilege of having access to in the United States. Women in Palestine are women that require other women around the rest of the world to stand with them. There are some [Palestinian] women who are denied access to scholarships. There have been Fulbright scholars banned from leaving the country to pursue higher education. There are just so many levels of oppression that all Palestinian people experience, but in particular, women.
And she ignores the internal societal problems women face that has no connection to the "occupation" as reported here in 2013:
Twenty-seven women are thought to have been killed last year in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip by family members claiming reasons of “honor” — more than double the 13 cases documented in 2012. The age-old rationale can serve as a cover for domestic abuse, inheritance disputes, rape, incest or the desire to punish female independence
and in their recent report, even Amnesty made a
"brief comment on “violence against women... particularly within Palestinian communities in Israel.”
and this month we read the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) documentation that:
On the Palestinian internal level, women's suffering continues due to the ongoing state of gender-based discrimination and increased as well due to the poverty high rates and domestic violence. PCHR documented the killing of 6 women in security chaos incidents; two of whom were killed on grounds of the so-called “family honor”.
The situation of oppression is worse, however:
Palestinian women's rights groups are demanding the revocation of an article of Palestinian Authority law that they say allows criminals to get away with murder. According to Article 99 of Penal Law No. 16 of 1960, the family of a murder victim is permitted to "waive its personal right" to justice and forgive the crime. In such cases, the length and severity of punishment is significantly reduced.
However, given that the vast majority of violence against Palestinian women is domestic, the family of the murder victim is often the family of the murderer as well. Thus, the Palestinian Director of the Women's Courts Project in the TAM organization Victoria Shukri explained, "In 95% of the murders of women in Palestine, the [victim's] personal right is waived."
and
Palestinian Media Watch reported on upsurges in Palestinian "honor killings" in 2012 and 2014. According to the official PA daily, 53% of Palestinian women have suffered from violence. In 45.9% of the cases, the violence was perpetrated by the victim's father, while in 25.5% of the cases it was perpetrated by her brother. [Official PA daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 28, 2014].
3.
You’ve probably seen that any visible Palestinian-American woman who is at the forefront of any social-justice movement is an immediate target of the right wing and right-wing Zionists. They will go to any extreme to criminalize us and to engage in alternative facts, to sew together a narrative that does not exist.
Well, criminals should be treated as criminals. But here's a response from someone who makes a good point:
You yourself said in your now famous Women’s March speech, “When we fight for justice, we fight for it for all people”. Apparently, you meant for all people except for Jews who believe that they also deserve a state that protects them. Your statement that a woman cannot truly be a feminist if she is a Zionist excludes people and makes them feel unwelcome and unwanted in your version of feminism. It also shows your true colors and your true hate, your true discrimination and your true exclusiveness. I hope the world opens up their eyes and sees this and stops shining its spotlight on you as a feminist to follow and to emulate.
4.
You can’t be a feminist in the United States and stand up for the rights of the American woman and then say that you don’t want to stand up for the rights of Palestinian women in Palestine. It’s all connected.
Yes, it is all connected but isn't it amazing how many feminists, okay, let's be clear, Jewish American feminists support Arab women in Israel and in the territories? Doesn't that tell you something about the value and quality of Jewish/Zionist feminism?
I blogged previously about your effort to raise funds for a desecrated Jewish cemetery in St. Louis. Excellent. I thank you even from Shiloh. But what about the Jewish cemetery in Jerusalem, ,more than 2500 years old, desecrated and vandalized by Arabs? It started during the 19 years Jews were banned from Jerusalem under the Jordanian illegal occupation and continues.
Where was/is your voice on that?
Does your feminism sensitivity for injustice stop at that because you are Palestinian?
Are you hypocritical?
Can I discount your feminist credentials because all you are doing is manipulating and exploiting feminism to deny Zionism?
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More 'good' stuff.
And here's Mayim Bialik.
And will Sarsour answer these questions:
where those feminists and John Kerry were when millions of Egyptian women needed their support when they marched against the Muslim Brotherhood, asking for America's help. Where were they when thousands of Syrian and Iraqi women were enslaved and raped by radical ISIS militants?
UPDATE
Sarsour responds to a FB comment by Sarah Tuttle-Singer and I picked out some of the conversation:
Avi Eisenman I'd be interested to hear Linda Sarsour directly respond to Sarah's question about condemning "violence and acts of terror that slay mothers inside their homes and little girls in their bedrooms "
Iris Richman Chiming in here, Linda Sarsour and I had a bit of a twitter discussion a couple of days ago. As a person who really wants us to be able to work together- and as a rabbi - I'd be happy to convene a meeting in NYC. The meeting is for those who want to work together and not for anyone who has prejudged. Linda, would you come?
Tiffany Loria My question as she affirms that you "...cannot be a supporter of Israel and not criticize and call for an end to the occupation...." ...so my question then Linda Sarsour....do you do the same and criticize the horrors that Hamas and the PA inflict
Noam Besdin Linda, on the off chance the trolls here haven't chased you away: I understand that you are particularly sensitive to Palestinian suffering, but do you see that when you say you are fighting for womens' rights all over the world (and more power to you ...
Linda Sarsour It's simple. It's because Israel receives the LARGEST US military aid package by far so our tax payer dollars pay for the oppression of Palestinians including Palestinian women. We help fund the occupation. It is our responsibility as Americans to demand that our government not aid the oppression of any groups. We do not fund Boko Haram who are a horrific group of people terrorizing women and communities, we do not fund Hamas, or Al Qaeda, etc.
Noah Ben Yes, please ignore the trolls. They're deplorable. Could you please just answer my very basic question however. There's a closed group of over 1500 people watching / waiting for a response.
David Seidenberg The truth about Linda Sarsour's interview in The Nation is that the Nation distorted her position to get more clicks. Here's what I wrote about it, before I saw Sarsour's confirming letter to Sarah Tuttle-Singer: "Sarsour and the left-right conspiracy: Did The Nation lie?"
"The actual question Sarsour asks, and answers in the negative, is this one: “Is there room in the movement for people who support the state of Israel and do not criticize it?” That’s a pretty important question....
"We are getting sucked into a trap. The funny thing is that the trap is not being laid by the right-wing but by people on the left...
"Here’s a final question to challenge anyone else who may think you can’t be a Zionist and a feminist. Do you think you can be an observant Muslim and a feminist? If radical leftists want to measure Islam in the same way that they measure Zionism, the answer has to be no. But if you recognize that what it means to be a real change agent for others is to also be a change agent for one’s own community and culture, then you will know that the answer has to be yes."
And I added this:
Sarah Tuttle-Singer Is this Linda Sarsour's comment? "...It's because Israel receives the LARGEST US military aid package by far so our tax payer dollars pay for the oppression of Palestinians including Palestinian women. We help fund the occupation. It is our responsibility as Americans to demand that our government not aid the oppression of any groups. We do not fund Boko Haram who are a horrific group of people terrorizing women and communities, we do not fund Hamas, or Al Qaeda, etc." Well, she's lying. (See here) and actually they were funding Hamas through tax-exempt societies and more (See) (and also)
All Sarsour knows is anti-Zionist lies and calumnies and she covers for terror groups.
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And Annika Hernroth-Rothstein
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