http://www.counterpunch.org/

“Awakening the Resistance

By JENNIFER LOEWENSTEIN

Thousands of Lebanese, Palestinians and others made a kind of pilgrimage to Fatima’s gate in the summer of 2000 to celebrate the end of Israel’s 22 -year occupation of south Lebanon. ‘Fatima’s gate’ denoted a stretch of land on the Lebanon-Israel border newly controlled by Hizbullah after it pursued the retreating Israeli forces back into Israel. Yellow Hizbullah flags flew everywhere. The atmosphere was festive and light. People set up souvenir stands selling Hizbullah memorabilia – flags, key-rings, postcards, pens – to commemorate the historic event. Families strolled up and back along the road pa! rallel to the border, pointing out the Israeli towns in the distance. Friends strode along together talking politics and stopping to stare at the last wreckages of the event, the burned out jeeps and cars, the bullet holes and shrapnel wounds in the facades of the walls and buildings left behind by the retreating Israelis. Parents and children alike gazed at these remains; some took pictures posed next to them. Others passed by more solemnly, wary of disturbing the near-sanctity of these symbols of struggle and of the years of adversity they recalled. “

I do not “criticize” AL for his naivety. Naivety can be charming. It is hardly a character flaw.

What claims of antisemitism?

You criticise AL for his naivity, yet what fascinates me is how naive Israel’s amen corner when they espouse the comments highlighted in teh Haaretz article Ant linked to:

It is this psychology that allows our spokespeople to say, with a straight face, that Israel is not a nation which kidnaps people, that in no way do we target civilian populations [though we are greatly pained at the deaths of civilians, the terrorists who operate in their midst bear the responsibility for their deaths], and that our army is the most moral fighting force in the world.

This is either delusion or naivity. Israeli appolgists flip from being highly knowledgeable abotu the Middle East to making absrudly simplistic statements abtou their critics being anit-Srmitic, or biased against Israel. It reminds me of an adolescent child who get’s caught cheating and blames the teacher for haivng it in for them.

But there is absolutely nothing “fresh” in the book apart from AL’s very revealing extreme naivety about the world. There are hundreds of books like this and thousands of articles that have been published since 1990.

no, I don’t pick it apart. I think it is very good – for what it is. It is not a book about the Jewish Lobby or even the Middle east. It is a book about AL. And MUP did a painstaking job in fixing up his prose.

I just think that non-Jewish voices have as much to contribute to this debate in Australia.

I could not agree more, but until now, there is no doubt it’s been a lob sided issue for non Jewish people to debate. Those supportive of Israel are typically accepted as reasonable and mainstream, while non Jewish who are critical have been readily dismissed as anti-Semites, Israeli haters or Al Qaeda sympathizers.

In that regard, people like Ant have played an invaluable role in opening up the subject to the mainstream and for that, he has my deepest respect. One no longer needs to be an expert in the subject to offer an opinion. It’s become acceptable to not know all there is to know on the matter. I see young people all around me being pro-active in becoming informed and that has to be a good thing, for both sides of the debate.