Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Hannibal]

When did a mainstream media outlet write an investigative journalism hit piece on Michelle Obama or Cindy McCain?

Hillary was legitimate fair game because she made it clear from the beginning that she was going to be part of the political process, and she was. That's different from typical first ladies, who cut ribbons, talk about cooking recipes on the Today Show, and adopt some sort of nonthreatening cause.

[froot loops]

Yes cankles was a legitimate thing to attack her for.

[SeattleLionsFan]

Hit piece? How was it a hit piece?

[Dr. Strangelove]

I think the source matters. If it's an arab student launching into an anti-Israel tirade that is obviously anti-semitic or if it's a question -- "Are you smelly?" -- kind of thing. It gets minor play.

Jews remain the runaway leader for victims of hate crimes. Yet, I doubt those crimes receive a fraction of the coverage of alleged hate crimes/hoax hate crimes against others and other religions.

Right-wing anti-semitic commentary is, of course, a big deal. But if it comes from Husam El-Qoulaq then, eh, understanding is in order.

Put very simply, I think "Islamophobia" receives gads more press than "anti-semitism" despite the fact that the latter happens way more frequently. And I think that accurately reflects the values of, at least, progressives.

Well, on that note, here's some heavy criticism of Israel from Jewish novelist Michael Chabon who recently visited the West Bank (he's visited Israel multiple times before) and is writing about his experience

You said you had not dealt with the topic of occupation in your writing until now. You have a large Jewish readership. Are you concerned about alienating them?

I?m not so worried about that. All I?m really doing is going to try to see for myself. Once you see for yourself, it is pretty obvious, I think, to any human being with a heart and a mind, it is pretty clear what to feel about it. It is the most grievous injustice I have ever seen in my life. I have seen bad things in my own country in America. There is plenty of horrifying injustice in the U.S. prison system, the ?second Jim Crow? it is often called. Our drug laws in the United States are grotesquely unjust. I know to some degree what I am talking about. This is the worst thing I have ever seen, just purely in terms of injustice. If saying that is going to lose me readers, I don?t want those readers. They can go away and never come back.

Read more: http://forward.com/culture/books/339...#ixzz47JuFBd8E

[Dr. Strangelove]

Germany beginning to reconsider its policy of unequivocal support for Israel as Netanyahu pushes to see how much he can get away with and still enjoy their backing

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/germany-begins-to-look-critically-at-support-for-israel-a-1090044.html

[lineygoblue]

Okay, I'll bite. I'll probably regret it later, but what the hey ..

What is it exactly that Israel and Netanyahu are getting away with?

I see the Palestinians with Abbas and Hamas getting away with a lot, but not much criticism is directed toward them. And then there's Hezbollah, Iran, and Syria to consider as well.

??

[Dr. Strangelove]

Okay, I'll bite. I'll probably regret it later, but what the hey ..

What is it exactly that Israel and Netanyahu are getting away with?

I see the Palestinians with Abbas and Hamas getting away with a lot, but not much criticism is directed toward them. And then there's Hezbollah, Iran, and Syria to consider as well.

??

The continual expansion of settlements in the West Bank. Every international body regards the settlements as illegal but far right religious radicals in Israel highly support them. And they have grown in strength and number under Netanyahu. The US govt under just about every administration has stated the settlements and the creation of new ones is a hindrance to a peace solution. Somewhere between 25-50% of the settlements have been built on land seized from private Palestinian landowners by the Israeli military.

Part of the Camp David accords in 1977 included Israel giving control of the Sinai Peninsula back to Egypt. They had begun a program of settlements there and were forced to remove all of them as part of that peace agreement. If the West Bank settler population keeps growing its going to make it politically more and more difficult to ever do the same thing there. The bigger the settler population becomes, the harder it will ever be to see a two-state solution.

But Israel also has a demographic problem. And they ultimately have a ideological clash between wanting be both a democracy and a "Jewish State". If Israel were to annex the West Bank, Golan Heights, and Gaza overnight, Palestinians and other Muslims would make up a majority of the population. For Israel to survive as a "Jewish State" they have to grow their population faster than the Arab population is growing (and that's proven very difficult) or essentially takes away the rights of Arabs living in Israel in some way, shape, and form. Israel also relies heavily on Jewish expatriates relocating to Israel because the domestic birth rate is inadequate.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Meanwhile the Iraqi government is close to toppling

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-36176910

[iam416]

Chabon should get out more if he's talking in those extreme terms.

But in any event I'm not sure what that has to with my post you quoted. At all.

[hack]

Hit piece? How was it a hit piece?

I think it was borderline, and only b/c of the tone. But it's a crazy world when a reporter gets death threats for a story in which there are no disputed facts.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Chabon should get out more if he's talking in those extreme terms.

But in any event I'm not sure what that has to with my post you quoted. At all.

That was sort of the end of the conversation for "can you criticize Israel without being anti-Semitic?" so I just picked up there. And wanted to supply a Jewish critic of Israel. There are plenty more.

[hack]

Of course there are plenty more -- we're Jews and therefore must disagree with each other. The last two Jews of Kabul: Yitzhak Levy, 60, and Zebolan Simanto, 41, live in the same courtyard on the same city street. Each looks after his own synagogue, from which the other is banned.
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...t-and-dog.html)

Anyhow, I thought talent's point about hate crimes was very interesting.

[iam416]

I'll readily concede and have conceded you can be anti-Zionist w/o being anti-semitic. What I said was that the former often becomes the latter. However, if folks - namely progressives - carefully limit themselves to Zionist Jews, then so be it.

I mean, afterall, progressives are very understanding of the term "Islamic Jihadist" or "Islamic Terrorist" and ardently argue that use of those terms is not a condemnation of the entire religion.

Or maybe it's just another example of a double standard.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Are progressives in the habit of blaming all Jews everywhere for when Israel commits unjust acts? Or even all Israelis? I don't doubt there are some. I just question your characterization that it's more the rule, rather than the exception.

[hack]

The soft bigotry of low expectations. Palestinians cannot be expected to act peacefully, but Israel must be held to a higher standard than any other. Even the main sources of the criticism -- US, France, UK, Belgium -- have and will never meet the standards Israel is expected to meet. Some of that even started in the late 60s when France and Belgium were still holding on to their African colonies. There is nothing more hypocritical on this planet than your typical pro-Palestinian Belgian. Often they don't even know what their own country did in the Congo.