Response to Walton Pantland

I started responding to Walton Pantland’s post, Telling the truth about Israel, on his blog, but then I ran against the limitations of HaloScan (word count, “too many links”), so I’m posting the response here.

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Hi Walton,

First, it was very nice of you to leave the important bit that came after what you quoted from me: “By that, I do not mean assassination as the Muslims do in their lawless way, but I will pray for the rise of the Sanhedrin that will carry that out, at least on the more high-profile among those who are opposed to the Jewish State.”

Now for some things here:

It is very common for Zionists to brand all criticism of Israel as anti-Semitic.

No, I did not brand all criticism of Israel as Jew-hatred. But I insist most vehemently that anti-Zionism is a form of Jew-hatred, indeed it is the form of Jew-hatred in our day and age. Statements against Jews that were common 70 years ago are today acceptable again just if you take care to say “Zionists” instead of “Jews”.

The logic is that Israel is a Jewish state, therefore if you criticise it you criticise Jews, and are an anti-Semite.

The logic is that if you single the state of Israel for condemnation, then there cannot be any other reason for it than Jew-hatred. The perfunctory tributes the modern Left gives to Tibet and Darfur are nothing in comparison to the zeal it has for the Israel/“Palestine” conflict, even though the oppression and atrocities going on in the former two are far, far worse. The zeal, it’s all about the zeal: zeal is what reveals where your heart truly lies. A fraction of the energy you devote to “Palestine”, if you devoted it to Darfur, would go a long way in saving lives. But you choose an easy target instead.

That’s because the great powers of the world […] provide cover for Israel, and pretend there is nothing wrong. This is why many Muslims see the West as an enemy.

So there you have it, straight from the horse’s mouth: it’s all about appeasing the Muslims’ wrath.

Let me spell it out for you loud and clear:

You will not appease the Muslims on our expense.

I don’t believe in a national state for the Scots or the English or the Zulus or the Afrikaners – unless you expand your definition of ‘Scot’ to include anyone living in Scotland, regardless of race or religion.

Again, you do not show the same zeal for the condemnation of all nationalism as you do for Jewish nationalism.

There is absolutely no denying that Israel’s behaviour is despicable. Even if I supported the idea of a Jewish state, I would still oppose Israel because of its actions.

There is denying it; Israel’s actions are pretty mild considering the ruthlessness of the Middle East. And Israel’s actions, again, are tame in comparison to that of so many other states. Ever condemned Russia for leveling the Chechen town of Grozny? I thought not. As Eric Hoffer said, the Jews are demanded to be the only true Christians of the world!

So for these two reasons I don’t believe the Jews should have an exclusive state of their own.

But that is the Jewish dream, dating 3,000 years, based on the entire canon of Judaism. By opposing that, ipso facto, you’re an enemy of the Jewish nation. That is another reason why anti-Zionism (opposition to the Jewish dream of sovereignty on the Land of Israel) is a form of Jew-hatred.

I believe that the best option for peace in the Middle East is a single state of Israel-Palestine, with equal rights for all (also known as the binational solution).

You read my post, The Binational Delusion, and you still can’t see how your vision is a pipe-dream?! My, you are dense. Once again: how do you implement the One-State Solution without it resulting in either genocide or apartheid? You just conjure ideas without thinking whether they could work out at all.

So much for free speech – no such thing when you criticise Israel.

I will point out again that anti-Zionism is dangerous because it gives the “Palestinians” the moral right to murder Jews (God forbid), as “resistance to colonialism”. Jews have no command to turn the other cheek; on the contrary, we are commanded to counter what we perceive as threats.

One of the things he critiques is Jewish exceptionalism – the idea that the Jews are the Chosen People, or different or special in some kind of way.

Jewish exceptionalism is, first, something we hold out of belief that it is true, not out of spite, and second, contrary to the popular misconception, it does not give the Jewish people anything in the way of obscene perks. “Greater Israel” is still a modest-size chunk of land on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. The Muslims, in contrast, want the whole world under their feet.

The answer is to take that uniqueness and contribute to the human project, not retreat into tribalism.

Like it or not, Jewishness is tribal. “Jew” is an ethnicity (an ethnicity that spans multiple races, by the way, so the accusation of “racism” doesn’t hold water) as well as a religion. And look at this: you can support the tribalism of the “Palestinians”, but you cannot support that of the Jews. Very suspicious, isn’t it?

In fact, the opposite is true – as a South African schoolboy, I was force fed Zionist propaganda, which I uncritically lapped up.

Everything is propaganda; you just substituted ours with that of the “Palestinians”.

It took more than a year to realise that the problem was with Zionism itself, rather than with a particular manifestation of Zionism, and that the solution lies in the dismantling of Zionism and its replacement with democracy.

OK. But to us Zionist Jews, the ancient dream of a Jewish State is non-negotiable. There is no possibility of compromise, then; we are enemies.

There’s no one in the world that I want dead.

It may not be your intention, but you’re bringing to it. By propagating the lie of Zionism as a “settler-colonialist movement”, you tacitly give the “Palestinians” the moral right to “resistance”, which means murdering Jewish men, women and children (God forbid).

Last summer, Israel invaded Lebanon, and started bombing innocent people out of their homes.

Resultant of the Muslims having no compunction about hiding their jihad combatants among the civilians. You show they achieved exactly what they intended: propaganda points. They kill their own, they raise their own kids to be suicide bombers, and then go crying out to the world about “oppression”.

The injustices being visited on people in the Middle East by Israel and the US are far more important than my hurt feelings, my fear of offending, or my concern about my reputation.

Please. Stop putting on that mask after you put it off some paragraphs back with your statement, “This is why many Muslims see the West as an enemy”, and later, “This injustice fuels terrorism”. It’s not injustice you care about, it’s your own sorry behind, the one you wish to save from those who tend to blow stuff up on every trumped-up occasion—a few silly cartoons are all they need, but you insist on thinking it’s all about Israel/“Palestine”.

The gloves have been off since then. I say what I think about Israel, […]

I agree, the gloves are off. And I say what I think about you anti-Zionists.

A Jewish state on the Land of Israel. Non-negotiable. The ancient Jewish dream, a dream that trumps the machinations of that fictive nation called, “the Palestinian nation”. A dream that trumps John Lennon’s “Imagine” as well. The Jewish nation will not stay passive in the face of adversity this time.

And again:

You will not appease the Muslims on our expense.

Keep that in mind. Always.

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To those who respond to this post: in a few hours, it will be the Jewish festival of Sukkot; Jewish festivals have almost the same rules as the Jewish Sabbath, meaning my computer will be off for 25 hours, so don’t take my lack of response as evasion. I’ll be available again, HaShem willing, after that.