Jeffrey Goldberg finally gets it, then quickly loses it again by Vic Rosenthal

...In any divorce, one of the ex-spouses has to move out. Goldberg, like Obama and like other American and European diplomats, can’t shake the idea that it should be the Jews – possibly because he thinks they can be more easily pushed around. But that is unjust as well as impossible. The Jews hold the deed to all the property, in moral, historical and legal senses. And the abusive partner can’t be trusted to continue living in the next room.

Vic Rosenthal..
Abu Yehuda..
10 November '15..
Link: http://abuyehuda.com/2015/11/jeffrey-goldberg-finally-gets-it-then-quickly-loses-it-again/

It’s not enough to start thinking clearly. You need to finish as well. You need to follow your logic to where it goes, even if it is uncomfortable. Apparently Jeffrey Goldberg hasn’t done that yet:

Unlike Obama, several of his predecessors, and most American diplomats who specialize in the Middle East, I no longer believe that a reversal of the settlement project would necessarily set in motion a process that culminates in the conflict’s end. The 100-year conflict between Arab and Jew was not initiated by the 48-year-old occupation of the West Bank. As the latest round of Palestinian terrorism directed at Israelis suggests, the conflict is about something more than settlements. For many Palestinians, and certainly for many Palestinian leaders, Israel is an illegitimate state, and the Jews are not a people. There will be no permanent end of the conflict until Palestinians bring their understanding of Jewish history into line with reality.

But: There will certainly be no progress toward a possible two-state solution—there will certainly be no chance that the Palestinian narrative will ever soften—if the settlement movement continues apace. And more to the point: There will be no hope for Israel as a democratic state that is home to a Jewish majority—the one place in the world in which Jews, after 2,000 years of exile and persecution at the hands of Christians and Muslims and fascists and communists, can take control of their own destiny—if the West Bank is absorbed into Israel proper. The separation of two warring tribes is the actual goal of “peace” negotiations; a reversal of the settlement project is a necessary step in these divorce proceedings.

The first paragraph correctly recognizes that the conflict cannot be about settlements because it preceded them and because of the implacable “Palestinian narrative” that insists that Jews have no place in the land of Israel.

The second then says that the way to change this – to ‘soften’ the narrative – is to surrender a piece of the land (which just happens to be the traditional heart of the land of Israel) to these ‘Palestinians’ who do not accept any Jewish presence between the Jordan and the Mediterranean.

There are three reasons that this analysis is wrong.

Jeffrey Goldberg and the struggle to defend administration nonsense

...The possibility of a sovereign Palestinian state has been foreclosed by the triumph of the uncompromising Palestinian narrative over any moderate forces that may have existed. Combined with the rise of Islamism in the region, some form of the status quo looks pretty good — for Palestinian Arabs as well as Jews. Goldberg is a smart guy, and to read him regurgitating the nonsense the Obama administration cynically peddles in order to justify its support of Israel’s enemies is simply depressing.

Vic Rosenthal..
Abu Yehuda..
02 November '14..
Link: http://abuyehuda.com/2014/11/goldberg-struggles-to-defend-administration-nonsense/

Jeffrey Goldberg, the journalist who broke the ‘chickenshit‘ story, tried to put a good face on the Obama Administration’s pretense of frustration with PM Netanyahu. Let’s see why his — and the administration’s — position doesn’t make sense.

The Israeli government doesn’t seem to understand that the status quo is unsustainable. As I’ve written (over and over again), I am not arguing for an immediate pullout from the West Bank; the times are too dangerous, and the Palestinian Authority too weak and corrupt and cowardly, for such a move.

First of all, exactly what is the ‘status quo’? I would describe it as follows: Israel controls the borders and airspace of Judea and Samaria, and Israel treats all of Jerusalem as its indivisible capital. It does not control the lives of the 95% of the Arab population of Judea and Samaria that are in areas controlled by the PA. It isn’t that this is unsustainable, but rather that the Palestinians and their friends in Washington and Europe would like it to be different.

But as he admits in the next sentence, there is no alternative. The Palestinians won’t and can’t offer an acceptable deal, and anyway it’s too dangerous. So if there’s no alternative, then we’d best find a way to sustain the allegedly ‘unsustainable’.

But in the meantime, Israel could help create conditions so that a Palestinian state could one day be born. What this means is simple: Netanyahu should take no steps that further entangle Israel in the lives of Palestinians.

What makes him think that there will ever be a situation in which a sovereign Palestinian state in Judea/Samaria will be desirable? The geography of the region won’t change. The strategic necessity for Israel to control the high ground above its population centers and airport won’t go away, nor will the steep sides of the Jordan Valley.

The willful collaboration in corrupting the discourse on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

If integrity is a necessary quality for reputable journalism, Jeffrey Goldberg’s recent column is a disgrace to his profession – and an insult to Israelis’ intelligence.

Martin Sherman..
Into the Fray/JPost..
17 January '13..

The [E1] construction project is of great significance for Israel’s interests. I would like to see the entire neighborhood, encompassing thousands of housing units, completed in order to ensure contiguity between Jerusalem and Ma’aleh Adumim. – the late Gideon Ezra, public security minister in Ehud Olmert’s government, March 14, 2006

It is unthinkable that we would talk about Ma’aleh Adumim as part of the State of Israel and leave it as an island or isolated enclave. It is absolutely clear that there will be built-up continuity between Jerusalem and Ma’aleh Adumim – Ehud Olmert, then acting prime minister, in a pre-election interview, March 10, 2006

And these are the main changes, not all of them, which we envision and want in the permanent solution: ... First and foremost, united Jerusalem, which will include both Ma’aleh Adumim and Givat Ze’ev – as the capital of Israel, under Israeli sovereignty – Yitzhak Rabin, in his last address to the Knesset seeking ratification of Oslo II, October 5, 1995

I apologize to my readers if the tone of this column is more abrasive that usual. But Jeffrey Goldberg’s column this week (January 14) published by Bloomberg titled “Obama: Israel Doesn’t Know What Its Best Interests Are,” is so infuriatingly impudent, so deceptively disingenuous, so maliciously misleading, so pretentiously pompous that it strains the bounds of civility to almost impossible limits.

Corrupted discourse

I urge you to read Goldberg’s recent rendering of blatantly biased bile, not because of the heights of journalistic standards it attains but for the depths of duplicity and deceit that it plumbs.

In many ways it is a seminal example of how the mainstream media has willfully collaborated in corrupting the discourse on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

An overly harsh accusation? How’s this for Exhibit I?

Goldberg (hereafter referred to as JG) alleges that it was Israel’s announcement that it would “advance plans to establish a settlement in an area of the West Bank known as E1” that ignited the recent spate of Barack Obama’s wrath and despair with regard to Binyamin Netanyahu and his alleged “obstructionism.”

According to JG, “A large settlement in E1, an empty zone between Jerusalem and the Jewish settlement city of Ma’aleh Adumim, would make the goal of politically moderate Palestinians – the creation of a geographically contiguous state – much harder to achieve.”

Leaving aside for the moment the question of what comprises “politically moderate Palestinians,” and who – if anyone – fits the bill, it is more than a little exasperating to read JG’s characterization of the E1 area and its alleged political significance.

Even a cursory glance of the map would reveal that not only is E1, in fact, an “empty zone” between Jerusalem and the 50,000-strong city of Ma’aleh Adumin, but also that it is an area of little more than 11.5 sq.km. and that its impact on a “geographically contiguous state” is marginal.

Yet, JG persists in purposely perpetuating the fabricated fiction of it being a crucial impediment to peace, leaving us to wonder whether he is being willfully misleading or merely woefully misinformed.

Israel’s “Best Interests” and Obama

Seth Mandel..
Commentary/Contentions..
15 January '13..

The headline writers at Bloomberg knew exactly which part of Jeffrey Goldberg’s column would prove juiciest to those perusing the web today: “Obama: ‘Israel Doesn’t Know What Its Best Interests Are’”. The quote from the president will bother Israel’s defenders for the same reason Obama is usually able to push their buttons: Obama’s lack of knowledge about Jewish history, his decision to take potshots at the Likud party as a way to win over those hostile to the Jewish state during the 2008 election, and his refusal to learn basic facts about issues before throwing temper tantrums about them make him among the least credible public officials on the issue of what is in Israel’s best interests.

Goldberg’s access to Obama’s inner circle has made him an excellent source on the Obama administration’s perspective on Israel, though stories like this don’t exactly paint the president in a particularly positive light–especially the president’s belief that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a “coward.” But childish name-calling aside, the president, according to the column, seems to have given up on Netanyahu. He can’t muster outrage at Israeli actions that elicit rage from leftist activists and cartoonishly biased and inaccurate “news” stories. (The New York Times deserves special mention here for publishing an article on the E-1 corridor around Jerusalem and then publishing a “correction” noting that the entire premise of the article was wrong, having since consulted a map.) But the president seems unwilling to admit how he has contributed to the situation that upsets him so.

Tobin - If Obama’s Rhetoric on Syria is a Joke, Why Trust Him on Iran?

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary/Contentions..
08 May '12..



On most issues, Jeffrey Goldberg has been a dependable cheerleader for the Obama administration. But the president’s feckless stand on the ongoing slaughter in Syria has caused Goldberg to write one of the best takedowns of the president’s inaction I’ve read. The piece, published yesterday in Bloomberg, is a comic gem as it describes how “Obama Hits Syria With Brutal Blasts of Adverbs.”

Some critics say the U.S. has shamed itself by not intervening aggressively on behalf of Syria’s rebels and dissidents.

They’re wrong. The Obama administration hasn’t helped to arm the rebels, nor has it created safe havens for persecuted dissidents. But it has done something far more important: It has provided the Syrian opposition with very strong language to describe Assad’s various atrocities.

The administration’s unprecedented verbal and written sorties against the Assad regime have included some of the most powerful adjectives, adjectival intensifiers and adverbs ever aimed at an American foe. This campaign has helped Syrians understand, among other things, that the English language contains many synonyms for “repulsive.”

This is great stuff, and Goldberg goes on from there to note the absurdity of administration officials repeatedly speaking of their patience being “exhausted” and wonders how worried Bashar al-Assad will be when Washington’s patience is “completely exhausted.” But one wonders why the author of this wonderful riff on Obama’s meaningless tough talk on Syria thinks the president’s equally meaningless verbal assault on Iran is credible?

Richman - The Unmaking of Palestine

Rick Richman
Commentary/Contentions
20 November '11

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2011/11/20/gorenberg-book/

In today’s New York Times Book Review, Jeffrey Goldberg reviews Gershom Gorenberg’s The Unmaking of Israel (which is also reviewed at American Thinker today by Jerold S. Auerbach). Goldberg notes several issues that Gorenberg, “like many on the left, pays scant attention” to:

…the Arab states that provoked the Six-Day War and then, after their defeat, remained defiant and mainly uninterested in a quick exchange of territory for recognition of Israel. Nor does Gorenberg waste much ink crediting various Israeli governments with trying, over the years, to reach an equitable arrangement with the Palestinians … Nor does he grapple in any serious way with a subject of some relevance — the civil war among Palestinians …. Moreover, the corrosive anti-Semitism that long ago infected parts of the Palestinian polity (not to mention other parts of the Muslim world) is dismissed rather blithely.

Goldberg nevertheless concludes: “Still, it is the Jews who created many of the problems the Jewish state faces today, and it is Jews who must fix them.” He describes as reasonable the suggestions to “disentangle religion from the state” and “return thousands of settlers to Israel proper” — but suggests Israelis may not be ready to adopt them.

Maybe that is because the latter step was already tried in Gaza and did not work out so well. Perhaps there is an even more reasonable requirement: if Arabs can be 20 percent of the Jewish state, there is no reason Jews cannot be a single-digit percentage of a Palestinian one – and Palestinian willingness to accept that fact may be the best way to judge their readiness for a state.

Elder - Should Israel's policies be dictated by fears of becoming a "pariah"?

Elder of Ziyon
29 July '11




In my Twitter exchange with Jeffrey Goldberg yesterday, he pretty much admitted that Israel's giving up the West Bank would very possibly not bring Israel peace anyway. But he fell back to a second argument for Israel's withdrawal from the territory:

I believe, however, that Israel will become a pariah if the Palestinians aren't granted statehood, or the vote in Israel.

My point was that a Palestinian Arab state could exist while Israel still holds onto parts of the territories deemed necessary for security as well as areas that already have large Jewish communities.

But the issue he brought up, that Israel would become a pariah if it didn't act in certain ways, is worth exploring.

What makes Israel unpopular?

I would argue that it has almost nothing to do with Israeli policies. While certain Israeli actions cause Western opinion to temporarily go in one direction or another, the general trend of opinion is independent of Israeli actions.

The Western world liked Israel in 1967 and after Entebbe in 1976. It liked Israel immediately after the peace agreement with Egypt but that disappeared soon after. It liked Israel after the Gaza withdrawal but that disappeared when Israel acted to stop the rockets that still rained down. The world liked Israel a little after the withdrawal from Lebanon but that disappeared as well. It liked Israel after the Oslo agreement was signed but it was silent when suicide bombings flared up in years afterwards. In other words, world opinion is mercurial and the world has a short-term memory, driven by the most recent news.

(Read full "Should Israel's policies be dictated by fears of becoming a "pariah"?)

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Jeffrey Goldberg's latest anti-Glick meltdown

Caroline Glick
carolineglick.com
15 October '10

Yesterday one of my readers forwarded me a blog post written by the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg and asked me to comment on it. In truth, I rarely find much point in reading Goldberg's self-absorbed writings.

Goldberg has carved out a little niche for himself. Many years ago he wrote two stupendous pieces for the New Yorker about Hizbullah and ever since he has been paying the ideological price. The Left, which Goldberg clings to for dear life isn't particularly interested in hearing about the dangers of jihad. So to prove that he is okay in spite of the fact that he reported on jihadists, he's been attacking Israel - and particularly non-post-Zionist Israelis -- ever since.

Goldberg is a disillusioned Zionist. He moved here, served in the IDF, couldn't make a go of things and went back to America to write about how horrible Israel is. He regularly divides Israelis into two categories: the "good" Israelis and the "bad" Israelis. The good Israelis are his friends in post-Zionist political circles. The bad Israelis are the other 90 percent of the country that remains Zionist and devoted to the country and doesn't care what they say about us on the BBC or write about us in the Atlantic.

(Read full article)

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Blumenthal Lets It Slip

Jennifer Rubin
Contentions/Commentary
27 October 09

Jeffrey Goldberg catches Max Blumenthal telling a nugget of truth at J Street about the authors of the Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. Blumenthal at the J Street fest declared:

I personally think they provided cover for J Street to be able to exist to fill this void but Jeremy capitulated, he sort of prostrated himself before the serious man, Jeffrey Goldberg, and he said yes, it’s true they wrote the modern version of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, they’re anti-Semites. And to me, when you call Stephen Walt and John Meirsheimer anti-Semites — first of all it raises the question: if you’re going to capitulate before Jeffrey Goldberg, if you can’t stand up to Jeffrey Goldberg, how can we trust you to stand up against the settlers, how can we trust you to stand up against the government of Netanyahu and Lieberman?

Just think, the book that made it onto Osama bin Laden’s list also provided “cover” for J Street.

As an aside, it is remarkable that the villains in the J Street drama are Goldberg, Netanyahu, and Lieberman. Hmm. You’d think a pro-Israel group would think of the “enemies” as being those who hide behind women’s skirts and use baby carriages as barricades. But no, the focus of J Street’s ire is the Jews who disagree with J Street and criticize its grab bag of Israel-hating friends and allies. They are not, it seems, “pro-Israel” but “anti-pro-Israel.” Or maybe they should be renamed in honor of their intellectual godfathers: W and M Street.

Elie Wiesel Mocked at J Street Conference

Michael Goldfarb
The Weekly Standard
26 October 09

The "independent" blogger panel at J Street's conference can only be described as clownish. The panel consisted mostly of crackpots and self-described anti-Zionists and "one-staters" (J Street director Jeremy Ben-Ami calls the one-state solution a "nightmare," but it seems to be the dream of many of the organization's supporters). Though J Street tried to distance itself from the panel by describing it as an "unofficial" and "independent" event, the bloggers used one of the rooms otherwise reserved for conference events, a podium in the front had a J Street placard on it, and a J Street banner hung on the back wall of the room. Ben-Ami came in to "check up" on the panel, and a J Street flack ejected someone from the room at the behest of one of the panelists. If this wasn't an official event, I don't know what official means.

At the event, Helena Cobban, who describes herself as "agnostic" on a two-state solution, said that blogging had "changed international relations" because now the world could get real-time reaction from the people "underneath U.S. and Israeli bombs."

Another panelist, Max Blumenthal, attacked Ben-Ami for having "capitulated" in an interview with Jeffrey Goldberg last week. Most of the media at the conference were pleased with Ben-Ami's interview with Goldberg -- it was proof, they said, that J Street was indeed a reasonable organization. But that was not the view among the average conference participant. There was "a lot to be troubled with in this interview," Blumenthal said. Ben-Ami had "prostrated himself before this 'serious man.'"

Blumenthal really doesn't like Goldberg. He called him the "Chief Rabbi of a one man island," and then, with respect to Ben-Ami, asked, "if you can't stand up to Goldberg, how can you stand up to Netanyahu?" Blumenthal was upset that Ben-Ami had, under pressure from Goldberg, denounced Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, authors of The Israel Lobby, as anti-Semites. Among the rank and file at the J Street conference, Walt and Mearsheimer are revered. Matt Duss, another panel participant who writes for John Podesta's Center for American Progress, said "the idea of attacking [Walt and Mearsheimer] as anti-Semites is outrageous."

Blumenthal went on to trash Elie Wiesel for speaking this past weekend at the Christians United for Israel conference in San Antonio. After mocking Pastor John Hagee, the founder of CUFI, Blumenthal said "the last time Elie Wiesel trusted someone so much it was Bernie Madoff." Wiesel admitted earlier this year that he lost "everything" he had in Madoff's ponzi scheme. The audience erupted with laughter at Blumenthal's tasteless joke.

Finally, we heard from the proprietor of the blog GazaMom.com, a hijab clad Palestinian woman who said she doesn't consider Mahmoud Abbas to be the legitimate president of the Palestinian Authority. Does she support Hamas? Who knows. "Whenever I hear two-state solution, I shake my head," she said, "I'm a one-stater." Again the room erupted with applause. Philip Weiss, another blogger participating in the panel, looked around and said "there are many Zionists in this room, there are also some non-Zionists and anti-Zionists." I would say that's a pretty good description of the J Street conference as a whole.

One other note: I didn't see a single member of Congress at the conference today. That's not to say there were none there -- there was an afternoon panel featuring Reps. Boustany, Schakowsky, and Filner -- but I didn't see any wandering around. I did see Jonathan Tasini, who is running a primary against New York Democrat Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand in 2010 and has tried to make an issue out of Gillibrand's decision to pull her support for the J Street conference.

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