Regular readers of Ruminations will be aware that one of my main themes is the attempt to figure out what makes Israel's harsher critics tick. Yet I do make a distinction between individuals with blogs, and establishments such as The Guardian, which has been around for generations, has some 700,00 subscribers and a larger number of readers, and can plausibly be seen as representing a segment of society. The individual bloggers may reflect corners of society, but I don't think they're as significant for outlining social or historical trends. Or better, they are, perhaps, in the aggregate, but not individually. Which means I've got to look at a diversity of them.
So, here's hoping, Insha'allah, that I have the character not to waste any more time on Juan Cole, about whom I've satisfied myself that he's an ideologically-driven misrepresenter of facts and an embarrassment to rational intellectual inquiry, in addition to offering a haven to antisemties in his moderated comments section. Previously to him I had looked at others and then moved on; it's time to move on from him also.
A possible new candidate is Glenn Greenwald, who blogs at Salon. His present post is shrill and repugnant, but perhaps he had a bad day and got carried away, something that can happen to anyone; even I've had such days. Greenwald is a lawyer and author; I don't think I've focused on any lawyers so far. He's noticeably Jewish, by name, picture and content; I don't remember having focused much on anti-Israeli Jews so far, assuming that's what he is. Or isn't: let's follow him for a while.
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3 comments:
Greenwald is a leftist.
That is more important than any particular issue and colors his views on Israel.
Ultimately, he sees Palestinians as poor brown people and Jews as rich white people, and a leftist will always side with poor brown over rich white. The particular issue doesn't matter - just figure out who is on which side and then you will know his opinion.
I think he's on to something. We have lost the argument. Foxman does sound shrill, tin-eared and monotonous.
The exposition of the antisemitism of people like Moyers should be enlightening, even entertaining to read. Smart people on the left should find the analysis compelling. They should come away knowing history better and feeling their place in it more acutely.
This doesn't happen very often. Even Dershowitz, who is about as articulate as people on our side of the argument get, usually falls short of that standard.
I wish Sharansky would come be US ambassador. He might raise the bar a bit.
I agree with anonymouse. Greenwald isn't even consistent. He believes that Israel and the United States should honor Hamas because it was democratically elected and that Israel should be shunned because it apparently voted Netanyahu as PM.
Worse, though, having read too much of Greenwald is the feeling that he believes that Israelis should be shelled. Many of Israel's critics imply such a belief, he's one of the few who's explicit about it.
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