Journalist Andrew West interviews me in this week’s New Matilda:
I suspect that what really enrages the largely Right-wing Australian Jewish leadership is not Loewenstein’s attack on Israeli defence policy. For years they have dealt with similar criticism by simply using crib sheets issued by the Israeli Foreign Ministry, joining a chorus of apologists in Washington, London and Ottawa.
No, I suspect their loathing — and maybe even fear — lies in the fact that My Israel Question challenges the biggest taboo of all. ”˜Not being religious, I do not believe that Jews are Chosen People,’ says Loewenstein, ”˜But then I do not believe that any people are “chosen.”’
Far from being divisive, his book is, in fact, something of a good, old-fashioned call to recognise the shared humanity of Jew and gentile.
The online magazine also publishes an edited extract from My Israel Question that details my experiences in the occupied territories.
Meanwhile, the Australian Jewish News publishes a review of the book that contains nothing of note except this exquisite paragraph:
Obviously the hundreds of Jews and non-Jews that have written me supportive emails, the mainstream media that has covered the book and its message and the positive reviewer in the Australian are all signs of a latent anti-Semitism in the Australian community. These individuals are probably also terrorists just waiting for the order from Bin Laden himself.
Once again, the leadership of the Jewish community prove utterly irrelevant beyond their parochial little patch.