Antony Loewenstein

(Thank you Richard Silverstein and Michael Levin)

One of its authors, Steve Walt, reflects on a tumultuous period and his work’s undoubted influence.

One of the great personal successes, in my view, has been the increasing number of Jews who recognise the devastating result of simply allowing the pro-settler, anti-Palestinian Zionists solely taking the floor. Judaism simply cannot be about backing never-ending colonisation of Arab land.

Here’s Walt:

When we wrote the book, we also hoped that our work would provoke some soul-searching among “pro-Israel” individuals and groups in the United States, and especially those found in the American Jewish community. Why? Because interest-group politics are central to American democracy, and the most obvious way to shift U.S. policy on this issue would be to alter the attitudes and behavior of the interest groups that care most about it and exert the greatest influence over U.S. behavior.

Indeed, we explicitly said in the book that what was needed was a “new Israel lobby,” one that would advocate policies that were actually in Israel’s long-term interest (and would be more aligned with U.S. interests too). The problem, we emphasized repeatedly, was not the existence of a powerful interest group focused on these issue; the problem was that it was dominated by individuals and organizations whose policy preferences were wrongheaded. A powerful “pro-Israel” interest group that favored smart policies would be wholly desirable.

It is therefore gratifying to observe the emergence of J Street, to see groups like Americans for Peace Now and Jewish Voice for Peace become more vocal, and to see writers like Peter Beinart and David Remnick take public stances that are substantially different from ones they might have expressed a few years ago.

Needless to say, these shifts weren’t our doing. Events in the region — especially the 2006 Lebanon war of 2006, the 2008-2009 Gaza war, the continued expansion of Israeli settlements, and the worrisome rightward drift in Israeli domestic politics — also inspired the effort to create a “pro-Israel” organization that would favor smarter policies and be more representative of American Jewish opinion than hard-line groups like AIPAC, the Israel Project, or the Zionist Organization of America, to say nothing of Christian Zionist organizations like John Hagee’s Christians United for Israel.

Our greatest disappointment, however, has been the lack of movement in U.S. Middle East policy.

Michael Massing asks a key question that most in the media are ignoring; Arab people. Don’t worry journalists; they won’t bite:

On Wednesday, I went to hear Ayman Mohyeldin, the Cairo correspondent for Al Jazeera English, speak at the office of the Committee to Protect Journalists. His subject was the risks and realities of covering the Mideast, and at one point he was asked to reflect on the current situation in Libya. In his answer, he said something that stunned me: The vast majority of Arabs support the no-fly zone.

Despite all their suspicions about Western intervention in the region and all their doubts about U.S. actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, “nobody in the Mideast would denounce the U.S. military intervention in Libya,” Mohyeldin said. Muammar Qaddafi had baldly stated his intentions of carrying out a bloodbath, he explained, and most Arabs were delighted to see the West act to prevent it.

In the vast outpouring of coverage of Libya and the no-fly zone, I’ve seen little discussion of what ordinary Arabs think about the situation. As much reporting as there’s been on the position of the Arab League, there’s been next to nothing about opinion on the Arab street.

With all the talk about Marrickville council embracing BDS in Sydney, Palestinian voices have been largely absent. Like in so many debates about the Middle East in the West, all we hear are Zionists and Zionists.

Well, let’s change that right now.

Here’s Australians for Palestine public advocate Samah Sabawi and the group’s founder Sonja Karkar (wonderful photo courtesy of them):

It appears that once again the pro-Israel apologists have decided to single Israel out by making boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel a leading issue for the Marrickville electorate in the lead-up to the NSW state elections. Not surprisingly, the Palestinians are rendered invisible again as right-wing groups, politicians, the pro-Israel lobby and the Murdoch Press attack the Marrickville Council for their resolution to support BDS. That Palestinians living under Israel’s 43-year-old occupation are being ethnically cleansed on a daily basis from their land, their neighbourhoods and farms seems to be of no concern to our Liberal and Labor candidates who are vying for seats likely to favour the Greens.

There would be no BDS campaign if Israel was not denying the Palestinians their basic human rights: the right of return, the right to citizenship, the right to equality, the right to self determination, the right to live free from occupation, the right to education, the right to freedom of movement, the right to security, the right to fair trials, and much else besides.

The call for BDS was initiated in 2005 by Palestinian Civil Society as a form of non-violent resistance that is rooted in international law and the universal declarations of human rights.  It aims to empower individuals to take action to end the conflict. Since 2005, BDS has had a steady rise in popularity amongst Palestinian and Jewish peace groups only to accelerate in 2009 when Israel attacked the Gaza Strip. The deliberate sidelining of the Goldstone report in the UN after the evident savagery of the assault, galvanized organizations and individuals around the world to join the BDS campaign and call for an end to Israel’s criminal impunity and disregard for international law.

In the run up to the NSW elections, none of the politicians gave a thought to Israel’s new round of attacks on Gaza.  Nor did the media, despite Israel’s opposition leader Tzipi Livni calling for another “Operation Cast Lead” with the same chilling indifference she showed when she defended the earlier offensive as “necessary”.

Instead, a smear campaign was waged against the increasingly popular Greens for their principled support of BDS, a call coming now from numerous mainstream organisations around the world, including a good number of unions here in Australia.  Besmirching the good character of Greens’ candidates like Marrrickville Mayor Fiona Byrne, who is standing for the seat of Marrickville, as well as distributing false and sensationalist propaganda for political advantage, ought to sound warning bells for the local electorates and Australians generally.

If Ms Byrne is indeed an “extremist” then she is in illustrious company.   Nobel Peace Laureates Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela, as well as former US President Jimmy Carter, were also labelled “extremists” by blind supporters of Israel, for daring to criticize Israel’s systematic discrimination and violations of International Humanitarian Law.

Nevertheless, as Israel expands its Jewish-only colonies, pushes its indigenous Palestinian population behind razor wires and tall cement walls, and strips them of any shred of freedom or dignity, our politicians continue to reward Israel.  A resolution moved by Liberal Senator Fifield condemning Marrickville’s decision to implement a boycott was just passed in the Federal Senate.  The Greens were the only ones who opposed it.

The resolution acknowledges the friendship between Australia and Israel and this is no surprise at all since successive governments here in recent times have bent over backwards to embrace Israel.

Notwithstanding our politicians’ blind support, Australia’s relations with Israel have caused many Australians to question what business we could possibly have with a state that is entrenching its occupation of another people.   There is a growing recognition amongst Australians that Israel simply does not live up to its tired and discredited mantra of “the only democracy in the Middle East”.

The idea that Israel is a democracy like Australia is simply not valid.  You cannot deny the rights of half of the people living under your control and still be called a democracy.  As if that is not enough, Israel has now made it illegal to hold events or ceremonies commemorating Israel’s Independence Day as a day of catastrophe or “Nakba” for the Palestinians dispossessed of their homes and land in 1948.  And the Israeli Knesset has just passed a segregation bill, which prohibits Palestinian Israelis from living in Jewish localities built on land confiscated from them.

In light of such blatant discrimination, the call for BDS is neither extreme nor unrealistic.  More and more people around the world see it as a morally sound strategy for holding Israel to account. If anything, the spectacle of fear-mongering and name calling in Marrickville has shown how incapable some politicians are of having a rational conversation on Israel/Palestine, despite its importance to world peace and security.

Samah Sabawi is a Palestinian-Australian writer, playwright, producer, political analyst, commentator and public speaker on human rights and is the Public Advocate of the Australian advocacy group Australians for Palestine.

Sonja Karkar is the founder of Women for Palestine and the editor of the Australians for Palestine news website.  Her articles have been published in Australian and overseas publications.

Gideon Levy in Haaretz:

About two weeks ago, I was invited to the Jewish Book Week in London, following the publication in English of my book “The Punishment of Gaza.” The Jewish establishment in Britain threatened to boycott the event, the organizers considered hiring security guards, and roughly 500 people, mainly middle-of-the-road Jews, filled the hall, asked questions and mainly, in their modest way, expressed great sympathy. I spoke, as I always do, against the occupation, the injustices and the damage it does to Israel and to the Palestinians, against the attacks on Israeli democracy as I have written in the hundreds of articles that have been published in Haaretz in Hebrew and in English, and as I did at the London School of Economics and Trinity University in Dublin.

As on previous occasions, a “spy” from the Israeli Embassy was sent to Trinity – this one, an Israeli student who was asked to write down what I said and convey it to the embassy. The embassy quickly dispatched a report to the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem, and the Foreign Ministry quickly leaked it to a well-known newspaper, which published only my harshest statements, without context – and there you have it: the indictment of a dissident.

One can ignore the way the embassy spies on journalists, evoking dark regimes. I would be glad to see a government representative at my lectures who was not under cover, if they have any interest. But one cannot ignore the message conveyed by such conduct – that of a witch hunt against a journalist whose opinions diverge from the party line.

Bradley Burston in Haaretz:

This is the message of the new self-hating Jew: There is no place for the likes of Gary Rosenblatt in the new Zionism. Nor J Street. Nor the New Israel Fund. Nor Jews who oppose the occupation. Nor Jews who believe that non-Orthodox Judaism is valid and important.

A people which hates its own. A people which dwells alone. We are Zionism, the new article of faith has it. We don’t need anyone. And we certainly don’t need you. You, you liberal Zionists, you progressive Zionists, you leftists who for some reason still care about Israel, you’re the new Palestinians. You have no right to your ancestral homeland, the place your people came from. Because we’re here now, and we’re not going anywhere.

It’s one day before the New South Wales election.

Sydney’s Marrickville council embraced BDS late last year and since then we’ve seen a litany of hysterical attacks by the Zionist lobby, Liberal Party, Labor Party and Murdoch press.

The main “issues”? The Greens are anti-Semitic, want Israel destroyed and hate Jews. That’s the kind of predictable drivel pushed by Labor MP Michael Danby (who never saw an Israeli war he didn’t like).

Anything to avoid discussion about the Zionist treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

In the Australian, Bruce Loudon writes that Israel is nothing like apartheid South Africa because the Zionist state is a thriving democracy with rights for all. Palestinians? Well, there are “restrictions on people living in the occupied territories”:

South Africa’s apartheid was an indefensible system based entirely on race in its basest and most outrageous form, on whites believing they were superior by virtue of their skin colour, and insisting that blacks should be condemned to a life of servitude for white masters.

There is simply no basis for any similar condemnation of Israel. Yes, there are restrictions on the flow of people to and from Gaza – hardly surprising given Gaza’s role as a hotbed of anti-Israeli ferment and violence and the power base of the murderous, Iranian-backed Hamas militants. How could Israel reasonably be expected to do otherwise?

Loudon is just the latest in a long line of old dopes who have no idea or don’t care what Israel is doing in Palestine. Leading Israeli writers are despairing at the corrosive effects of the occupation but a Murdoch columnist in Australia thinks the Jewish state is praise-worthy. Good to hear.

Palestinian civilians are being murdered in Gaza, non-violent resistance to the West Bank occupation is growing and mainstream Israeli politicians are desperate to damn even American Zionists (like J Street) who don’t embrace every Israeli policy.

That’s why BDS is so essential. Everything else is just white noise.

The Australian Jewish News write these stories like Israel is about to destroyed by the mere mention of Palestinian rights. Insecure much?

The leader of the Government in the Senate, Chris Evans, has denied that he refused to condemn an anti-Israel boycott this week.

Senator Mitch Fifield accused Evans of failing to speak out against Marrickville Council’s Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) resolution when asked to do so during Question Time on Tuesday.

“The Labor Government’s refusal to condemn Marrickville Council’s anti-Israel boycott is shameful,” Senator Fifield said.

“Israel is a legitimate state and a good friend of Australia. That the Government is not willing to stand up to intolerance and hatred of Israel is a sad indictment on Labor’s support for Israel.”

But Evan’s office said Fifield’s question on Marrickville was not legitimate in that it contravened the rules of the Senate, as it had no relevance to his initial question on climate change. A spokesperson for Evans said on Wednesday that Fifield’s assertions “are nothing more than a attempt to play silly political games”.

“Mitch Fifield’s claim that the Senator Chris Evans … refused to condemn the Marrickville Council is complete nonsense,” the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson added that in an attempt to move the session along and avoid time wasting, Evans restated his Government’s position on support for the State of Israel and its right to exist.

“We have always condemned extremist views and those include views that encourage anti-Semitism. That has always been our position,” Evans said in Parliament. “I think all members of the Parliament ought to think about the contributions they make to questions of race and religion in this country.”

Earlier this month, The AJN requested the Federal Government’s stance on the Marrickville boycott. A spokesperson from Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd’s office said, “Local councils are entitled to express their views, but they do not represent the Australian Government and do not determine Australian foreign policy.”

I’m sure the great former Australian leader will talk to the Zionist state about the best ways to kill Arabs under occupation:

Former prime minister John Howard will visit Israel as a guest of the Israeli government.

The trip is being treated as a state visit and will include a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The unusual honour for a former head of government reflects Mr Howard’s reputation as an ”unapologetic friend of Israel” – his own description while prime minister.

It contrasts with the snubbing of former US president Jimmy Carter and former Irish president Mary Robinson, both vocal critics, on repeated private visits.

Mr Howard said yesterday he would be travelling as a guest of the government to meet senior people, including Mr Netanyahu. He had previously visited in 2000 as prime minister, with two earlier trips in 1964, and 1988 as opposition leader.

Leading Australian academic Scott Burchill has some thoughts about Libya:

1. Military intervention like this can make the humanitarian crisis worse, as it did in Serbia in 1999. Milosevich’s attacks on Kosovars only escalated after NATO’s bombing campaign begun. So even though the West controls the skies over Libya, expect ground attacks by Gaddafi loyalists to intensify. Eg Misurata today.

2. Clinton had to bomb for 3 months before Milosevich gave up. Would Obama have the stomach for that? Would public opinion in the West? Whilst more Americans currently support the NFZ than oppose it, the figure is substantially below 50%.

3. NATO’s bombing campaign against Serbia did not produce regime change in Serbia. That happened later. Is there any example of an air campaign (alone) producing regime change?

4. Wars are unpredictable and rarely go to plan. Sometimes attacks like this galvanise nationalist opposition, something Gaddafi is trying to exploit.

5. Without Western “boots on the ground”, neither Gaddafi nor the rebels are likely to be able to defeat the other.This will probablyproduce a stalemate, followed by a partition and a protracted civil war. Most of Libya’s oil in the east where the rebels are trying to extend their reach.

6. Why no protection (or UNSC resolutions) for citizens currently being attacked by US allies in Bahrain and Yemen (to say nothing about Palestine)?

7. Obama was clever to let France and the UK take the lead, even though the Pentagon is directing the operation. He wants to minimise anti-Americanism in the Middle East and is already overstretched in Afghanistan. He is adamant there will be no US foot soldiers, as Clinton was in 1999. Better to have encouraged Turkey and Egypt to lead and to have told the UAE and Qatar to put heir money where their mouth was.

8. Who are the rebels we are supporting? What type of government would they install? Most seem to be former Gaddafi acolytes with no history of supporting democratic processes. This doesn’t bode well.

9. I think David Gardner in the Financial Times is right. Washington actually has very little interest in North Africa despite Libya’s oil. I think this partly explains Obama’s reluctance to get involved, limitWashington’s contribution, refuse to deploy troops and encourage Europeans to run the campaign. It is, however, desperately worried about the Gulf stateswhere it has vital strategic and commercial interests. It worries that Saleh’s successor in Yemen will not play ball in attacking Al Qaeda there (estimated at no more than 300). It worries about Bahrain, which plays host to the 5th fleet and what the Saudi’s will do there and possibly in Yemen. Despite the rhetoric, it knows that Iran has little if any leverage in either place. Washington is also concerned about Jordan, has no idea what is happening in Syria, and knows Israel is increasingly isolated (if that is possible). In other words, for Washington Libya is a sideshow.

UPDATE: Burchill has updated this piece and it’s published today on ABC Unleashed.