Making common cause with those who seek the Jewish state’s destruction.

...But what is at stake here is not a dispute about where Israel’s borders should be, the wisdom of settlements or whether you like the people Israeli voters have put in office. It is whether the Jewish community is willing to stand up against those who wish to ostracize Jews, demonize Israel and wage war on it.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary/Contentions..
17 April 13..

We don’t normally pay much attention to what is published in Tikkun magazine, let alone what its editor Michael Lerner disseminates through his email list. But occasionally Lerner’s tirades shine a light on the positions of the far left that illustrate exactly where some of Israel’s critics stand in a way that makes clear how they have made common cause with those who seek the Jewish state’s destruction.

In his latest email to readers, Lerner highlights what he claims is the latest instance of pro-Israel activists seeking to suppress free speech in both academia and the Jewish community. The Tikkun guru cites the protest against the decision of San Jose State University to have an Iranian professor who is a bitter opponent of Israel’s existence to teach a seminar on “Israel/Palestine.” According to Lerner, the attempt to stop Professor Persis Karim from being the sole person in charge of teaching on this subject was unfair since he claims her only goal was to help students see both sides of the issue. But even a cursory examination of the record, which Lerner helpfully provided by including the protest letter organized by the Amcha Initiative, shows that Karim is an advocate for Israel’s destruction and supports the exclusion of Israelis from academic forums as well as the boycott of Israel. Lerner’s backing of Karim gives the lie to his effort to pose as merely a liberal supporter of the Jewish state.

It should be conceded that within the ranks of the far left universe in which he travels, Lerner has always been treated as somewhat suspect because of his refusal to join with those who explicitly call for Israel’s destruction and engage in anti-Semitic agitation. This is a point on which he takes great pride and he has often engaged in disputes with comrades who have sought to merge opposition to American foreign policy initiatives or hyper-liberal domestic causes with explicit anti-Zionism, if not open anti-Semitism. But even if we give him a bit of credit for that, the Karim protest exposes just how ridiculous his attempt to differentiate his brand of criticism of Israel from that of its open enemies has become.

JFools and JKnaves

Fresnozionism.org
28 April '10

I don’t know how many posts I’ve written about anti-Israel Jews — J Street, Israeli intellectuals, leftist anti-Zionists, etc. I even thought about creating a special category called “With Jews like these, who needs Arabs?”

The inimitable Michael Lerner of Tikkun Magazine, for example, recently gave an award to Richard Goldstone because… get ready for this — “the peace community both in Israel and around the world see Justice Goldstone as upholding the best ethical values of the Jewish community”. Ethical values?

It doesn’t work anymore to say “Oh, Michael Lerner (or Chomsky, or Finkelstein, or half the faculty of Tel Aviv University, etc.) is crazy. If the problem is mental illness, it’s an epidemic.

The latest is a new European organization called “JCall“. Like J Street, JCall claims to be “unfailingly” committed to the Jewish state, but nevertheless holds that “Systematic support of Israeli government policy is dangerous and does not serve the true interests of the state of Israel,” and calls for the EU and the US to “put pressure on both parties” to achieve a “solution” to the conflict.

I suppose it’s worth saying again why ‘putting pressure on both sides’ won’t end the conflict (a more complete argument is here):

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Tikkun’s Jewish ‘Ethics’ — Honor Goldstone for Libeling Israel

Jonathan Tobin
Contentions/Commentary
27 April '10

With the rise of groups like the left-wing lobby J Street and the presence of a critic of Israel in the White House, it’s hard for a magazine like Michael Lerner’s Tikkun to get much attention these days. But Lerner is doing his best (or is it his worst?) in an effort to recapture the focus of Jewish leftists. To that end, as Jennifer has pointed out, the magazine has announced that it is giving its 25th annual “ethics” award to Richard Goldstone, the author of the biased and inaccurate United Nations report on last year’s war in Gaza that slandered Israel.

The Jewish Telegraphic Agency reports that Lerner says he decided to give his dubious prize to Goldstone before the brouhaha over whether the South African jurist would be prevented from attending his grandson’s bar mitzvah because of the anger of his fellow Jews at his presence in synagogue. But, Lerner says, he decided to announce the award now as an answer to Goldstone’s “outrageous” treatment.

The controversy over the Goldstone bar mitzvah is regrettable for two reasons. First, because a child’s rite of passage ought to be allowed to proceed without political demonstrations against one of his relatives, no matter how odious that relative might be. Second, because the threat of a demonstration against Goldstone at the synagogue enabled him to pose as a victim of Jewish intolerance rather than owning up to the fact that he allowed the anti-Semites at the UN to use him as a front man for a vicious libel against the Jewish state.

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