New Wine in Old Wineskins
Emerging truths vs tired Zionist arguments
Seven months on
If a week is a long time in politics then 7 months is an age. One more day and it will be 7 months since the Hamas breakout and the debates over Israel’s genocide and Hamas attrocities are getting tired. I’m now reading articles that, rather than defending Israel, are attacking the student protests, mainly insisting that they aren’t peaceful and are, indeed, antisemitic. It’s a pretty flimsy argument given that a good proportion of students protesting are themselves Jewish.
Some recent Jewish/Israeli authors I’ve read, insist on being reasonable and attempt to ‘both sides’ the argument when there clearly are 2 massively disproportionate sides, one of which is a genocidal occupier massacring the other. One article cites Israeli necklace charms in the shape of Israel’s recognisable borders dominated by Israeli insignia as opposed to those displaying the Palestinian flag. The presumption is that these are both symbolic of exclusive domination — hence both perpetuating the ongoing dispute over land — when the Palestinian flag mostly represents the living reality that the land occupied both Israelis and Palestinians was, until quite recently, called “Palestine”.
Last week I questioned someone claiming empathy with Palestinians when she clearly had no clue what…
