Let’s Keep Criticism Honest
I submitted this to the Brookline TAB in response to Skip Sesling’s attack on my column last week about Joel Kovel’s talk. The editor declined to publish it. So here it is.
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Skip Sesling’s op-ed last week recycles old personal attacks about my efforts to make sense of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Unfortunately, he’s not alone. Some of the comments under my recent column on the TAB website also resort to character assassination, stereotype, and smug sefl-assurance. I don’t mind criticism of what I actually write, but it seems unfair to attack me for things I didn’t say and don’t believe.
Sesling is right about one thing, though. I no longer think the state of Israel can ever be both officially Jewish and substantively democratic. This painful awareness, which began to nag at me even when I was a young Zionist four decades ago, was central to my seminar at Ben Gurion University in 2006, when my students described with much regret their country’s inability to make democracy meaningful.
It is a very big leap, however, from my pessimism about Israeli democracy to Sesling’s absurd insistence that “Fox rejects all that is Jewish, which he calls self-enlightenment.” There is nothing in my column or anything else I’ve ever written to justify this mocking claim.
There is also nothing to justify his statement that “the one state Fox advocates is strictly a Muslim Arab state.” I would object to any outcome legitimizing official supremacy of one religion over another or denying the legitimate rights of Israelis and Palestinians alike.
The most mystifying part of Sesling’s column is his accusation that “Fox finds that Israel, Jews, Judaism and Zionism are all one entity.” He continues: “He should know better. Instead, he chooses to paint everyone who does not agree with his anti-Israel views as evil.”
Sesling has it backwards here: It is the Zionist movement that insistently conflates Israel, Jews, Judaism, and Zionism, as illustrated by the title of his own op-ed, “Anti-Zionism equals Anti-Semitism.” Zionists repeatedly claim that the Israeli state is an essential aspect of Judaism and that its actions are carried out in the name of the Jewish people. Indeed, Israel, which defines itself as the nation of the Jews, does not even recognize “Israeli” as a nationality.
In contrast, it is Israel’s critics, especially perhaps its Jewish critics, who insist that Jewishness and Zionism are not identical. Whether Jewish identity, Jewish culture, and Jewish safety are inextricably linked to Jewish statehood is an important question deserving discussion rather than dogma.
Sesling is also wrong when he says I paint those who disagree with me as evil. I rarely ascribe evil motivation or character just because someone sees the world differently than I do. Perhaps reflecting my training in social psychology, generally I think most people try to do the right thing given their understanding of the world and the circumstances in which they find themselves. The problem is that sometimes we’re wrong.
Our motives and assumptions do not always stem from the sources we ascribe them to. We find ways to justify beliefs and actions that neutral outsiders might think are erroneous or simplistic. We may distort or overlook even the meaning of words to avoid obvious inconsistencies. How else could we call Israel democratic despite the Jewish state’s refusal to endorse the principle of legal equality for all citizens? What does democracy mean, as my Israeli students understood, if not that?
And, sometimes, even decent motivations and accurate perceptons lead to bad outcomes. Israel’s domination of Palestinians is a bad outcome.
Although Sesling’s personal nastiness is annoying, more troubling is that his latest historical account is no more accurate than his similar attacks several years ago. That’s when he ridiculed my proposal that Brookline residents with differing viewpoints meet to talk things over. If you don’t share Sesling’s distaste for learning about alternative views, you can easily find lots of sources. One place to start is this Q&A: html://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/publish/101conflict.shtml.
My column two weeks ago urged Brookline residents to hear what Joel Kovel had to say. From what I could tell, few who protested outside the Coolidge Corner Theatre bothered to go inside. That did not surprise me. But Kovel’s articles are available online. You might find his analysis interesting. You might not. But please — don’t let Skip Sesling tell you what’s worth thinking about.
Technorati Tags: Israel, Joel Kovel, Skip Sesling, social psychology, Zionism
January 25th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
[…] dennisfox wrote an interesting post today on Letâs Keep Criticism HonestHere’s a quick excerptPerhaps reflecting my training in social psychology, generally I think most people try to do the right thing given their understanding of the world and the circumstances in which they find themselves. The problem is that sometimes we’re … […]
February 1st, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Your blog and Joel Kovel remind me of those Jews in Germany not that long ago, who thought that they were more German than the Germans. Many of them havd even converted. They disdained this “Jewish Tribalism” that you claim to despise as well. Much to their dismay, the Garmans saw them just as much a parasitic Jew as the ones in the Shtetel with payis and shtreimel. You and Kovel and that rat Finkelstein are “learned academics” but you know NOTHING about history and human nature. If we Jews depended on people like you we would all be up in smoke, just like my mothers extended family did in Auschwitz.
Unlike you, I chose to move to Israel, joined the army in the paratroops and served 7 years in military/security related work. I do not live in an Ivory tower where one thinks that if we just ask nicely and do whatever the Arab/Muslim world wants us to do, there will be peace and harmony in the Middle East and in the World. What is really galling however, is that you and Kovel and the likes walk hand in hand with those who would butcher us. In fact, often you lead these people in their vilification of Jews/Israelis. That is the behaviour of either a deluded individual with no sense of the real world or a Kapo. You deserve nothing but contempt.