Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Is Beinart A Bit of a Racist?

Judith Eisner, in The Guardian, on Beinart:
Personally, I think his version of "Zionist BDS" is both impractical and dangerous for Israel. As the Forward has reported, the practical effects of this type of targeted boycott may be no more than a dramatic, empty gesture.

And my comment left there:

Besides impracticality, the other issue, one which Beinart would be expected to hold dear to a person like him who gives primacy to his political ideology - liberalism - and a form of rule - democracy - above all else, is: whether BDS directed specifically against Jews, predicated on a policy that would deny them the right to reside in a territory - and moreover, a territory that is part of their historic homeland (as defined not by them but by the Supreme Council of the League of Nations back in 1922, after San Remo Conference in 1920 and after the Versailles Peace Conference in 1919 before that) - is actually racism.  In other words, for goals of political conflict resolution, Beinart would void the right of Jews to residen somewhere.

Of course, given this, can one then suggest that Arabs should be turned out of Israel not only as a mirror-image approach (what's fair is fair) but pragmatically, less Arabs, less problems, even of demograqphic threat inside pre-67 Israel?

If Beinart could be forgiven for being intellectually provocative, I am sure the discssion on this aspect will be respected.


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1 comment:

NormanF said...

You know as well as I do when Rabbi Meir Kahane, zt"l raised the topic of the transfer of Arabs from Israel, the Israeli Left moved to ban him and his party as "racist."

Now Peter Beinart and American Leftists are talking about the transfer of Jews. That's evidently NOT "racism."

You can't make this stuff up!