December 30, 2008

Opinion: Where's the Academic Outrage Over the Bombing of a University in Gaza?

By Neve Gordon and Jeff Halper

Not one of the nearly 450 presidents of American colleges and universities who prominently denounced an effort by British academics to boycott Israeli universities in September 2007 have raised their voice in opposition to Israel’s bombardment of the Islamic University of Gaza earlier this week. Lee C. Bollinger, president of Columbia University, who organized the petition, has been silent, as have his co-signatories from Princeton, Northwestern, and Cornell Universities, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Most others who signed similar petitions, like the 11,000 professors from nearly 1,000 universities around the world, have also refrained from expressing their outrage at Israel’s attack on the leading university in Gaza. The artfully named Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, which organized the latter appeal, has said nothing about the assault.

While the extent of the damage to the Islamic University, which was hit in six separate airstrikes, is still unknown, recent reports indicate that at least two major buildings were targeted, a science laboratory and the Ladies’ Building, where female students attended classes. There were no casualties, as the university was evacuated when the Israeli assault began on Saturday.

Virtually all the commentators agree that the Islamic University was attacked, in part, because it is a cultural symbol of Hamas, the ruling party in the elected Palestinian government, which Israel has targeted in its continuing attacks in Gaza. Mysteriously, hardly any of the news coverage has emphasized the educational significance of the university, which far exceeds its cultural or political symbolism.

Established in 1978 by the founder of Hamas — with the approval of Israeli authorities — the Islamic University is the first and most important institution of higher education in Gaza, serving more than 20,000 students, 60 percent of whom are women. It comprises 10 faculties — education, religion, art, commerce, Shariah law, science, engineering, information technology, medicine, and nursing — and awards a variety of bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Taking into account that Palestinian universities have been regionalized because Palestinian students from Gaza are barred by Israel from studying either in the West Bank or abroad, the educational significance of the Islamic University becomes even more apparent.

Those restrictions became international news last summer when Israel refused to grant exit permits to seven carefully vetted students from Gaza who had been awarded Fulbright fellowships by the State Department to study in the United States. After top State Department officials intervened, the students’ scholarships were restored — though Israel allowed only four of the seven to leave, even after appeals by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. “It is a welcome victory — for the students,” opined The New York Times, and “for Israel, which should want to see more of Gaza’s young people follow a path of hope and education rather than hopelessness and martyrdom; and for the United States, whose image in the Middle East badly needs burnishing.”

Notwithstanding the importance of the Islamic University, Israel has tried to justify the bombing. An army spokeswoman told The Chronicle that the targeted buildings were used as “a research and development center for Hamas weapons, including Qassam rockets. … One of the structures struck housed explosives laboratories that were an inseparable part of Hamas’s research-and-development program, as well as places that served as storage facilities for the organization. The development of these weapons took place under the auspices of senior lecturers who are activists in Hamas.”

Islamic University officials deny the Israeli allegations. Yet even if there is some merit in them, it is common knowledge that practically all major American and Israeli universities are engaged in research and development of military applications and receive money from the Pentagon and defense corporations. Weapon development and even manufacturing have, unfortunately, become major projects at universities worldwide — a fact that does not justify bombing them.

By launching an attack on Gaza, the Israeli government has once again chosen to adopt strategies of violence that are tragically akin to the ones deployed by Hamas — only the Israeli tactics are much more lethal. How should academics respond to this assault on an institution of higher education? Regardless of one’s stand on the proposed boycott of Israeli universities, anyone so concerned about academic freedom as to put one’s name on a petition should be no less outraged when Israel bombs a Palestinian university. The question, then, is whether the university presidents and professors who signed the various petitions denouncing efforts to boycott Israel will speak out against the destruction of the Islamic University.

Neve Gordon is chair of the department of politics and government at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and author of Israel’s Occupation (University of California Press, 2008). Jeff Halper is director of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. His latest book is An Israeli in Palestine: Resisting Dispossession, Redeeming Israel (Pluto Press, 2008).

Comments

1. “it is common knowledge that practically all major American and Israeli universities are engaged in research and development of military applications and receive money from the Pentagon and defense corporations.”

   I have to admit that my (American) university, even when involved in Department of Defense sponsored research, is not storing weapons on its premises.

   — Mark de Goz    Dec 30, 04:07 PM    #

2. Not to hijack this thread, but how about the media bias? Today’s New York Times national edition featured a frontpage picture of an old woman who was frightened because a Hamas rocket had landed somewhere in her town, and pushed to the inside a very compelling photo of a mother holding her bloodied 15-month old son as she grieved over the body of her young daughter, who, along with 4 other siblings, died in bed as a result of an airstrike. That 15-month boy will undoubtedly grow up with hatred in his very marrow, and will likely be a good candidate for a suicide mission in about a dozen years. When will the killing stop?

   — Brian    Dec 30, 04:26 PM    #

3. Mark: Not relevant to the main point of the column. To be fair, there has as yet been little time to organize such a response during what is a holiday break in the US and UK. However I doubt this makes any difference. The double standard on this issue is all too obvious, and has been from the outset. University Presidents, like politicians, are ever mindful of their donors. Courageous positions are not donor worthy ones, alas.

   Regarding Brian’s point, the Israelis are spawning a generation of Palestinians whose rallying cry will be, “Never Again.”

   — David O.    Dec 30, 04:34 PM    #

4. When a university is used as a site to assemble rockets to kill civilians, it ceases to be a university, and becomes a military asset. Gaza cannot have it both ways: Enjoy the protections of civil society while it wages war from civil institutions.

   — Jeff Schantz    Dec 30, 04:36 PM    #

5. David O: I thought it was obvious I was making the same point as #4.

   But look at the suggested outrage from another perspective. Suppose 450 or similar number of college presidents express outrage now. Later, Israeli tanks enter Gaza, dig into the University rubbles and open storages of rockets to the journalists. Well, tell me, how would they look then, those 450 quickly outraged presidents?

   — Mark de Goz    Dec 30, 04:48 PM    #

6. It is not only appalling that a Military Industrial Complication such as Israel can get away with such a grievous, blatant attack against any opportunity for well-being and cultural cultivation by bombing the Islamic university in Gaza, but it is even more appalling and extremely hypocritical, cowardly, and pathetic that no one in the West, at least anyone with a significant amount of public influence, particularly in higher education, is willing to take a strong stance against what Israel is doing. What is Israel doing? They are committing genocide in every respect of the term across the board against the Palestinians. The Gaza Strip is one of the worst concentration camps in the world abundant with mass poverty, lack of infrastructure, clean water, economic stability or opportunity, and gross lack of any sense of freedom. The Palestinians living in the Gaza are prisoners that are tortured repeatedly by a usurping almighty milataristic killing machine defending the rights of ethnocentric privilege. There is nothing valorous about a bully pummeling someone that is already standing on their last leg. There is nothing heroic about the powerful terrorizing and destorying the powerless. It is more symbolic that Israel is allowed to get away with bombing a building representing higher education, which harbors severe implications and perhaps repercussions for everyone, than the alleged symbolism of the university representing Hamas. In all truth, it is disgusting. Hitler had the same disregard and disrespect for higher learning and anything that had to do with the edification of intellect and culture. It seems as though things have changed…then again they seem quite the same. Peace To The War Machine That Controls Everything!

   — Angelo Jaramillo - Author: Psalms of Anarchy    Dec 30, 04:55 PM    #

7. Mark: Suppose Israel were blockaded and surrounded, its food, electricity and water only intermittent, its children suffering from lack of food, water, sanitation and medical care. Would you blame any Israeli for shooting rockets from anywhere, including the Weizman Institute? The sheer inability to put oneself in someone else’s shoes amazes me. We in the US did this after 9/11 and see where it got us.

   Israel wants a “stable” nation on its borders but then does everything it can to destroy any emerging leadership. They are now strengthening Hamas, just as they did Hesbollah. The US is not the only country with a George Bush and neocons.

   — David O.    Dec 30, 05:01 PM    #

8. David O: If I had intermittent food, electricity and water I wouldn’t be “shooting rockets from anywhere, including the Weizman Institute”. Know why? Because I would have spent money on food, electricity and water. Do you really believe rockets come free???

   — Mark de Goz    Dec 30, 05:11 PM    #

9. Where is academic outrage? A group of Radical Caucus members of the Modern Language Association mounted a show of public outrage yesterday, as a response to the bombing of the Islamic University; This latest stepped-up Israeli violence coincided with the annual convention of 9000 Literature, writing, and language scholars in San Francisco.

   Jeff, surely you recognize that many US universities “assemble” weapons, design weapons, are entangled with the technology of death? By your logic, it would be fair for these universities to be bombed by those attacked by US forces today? Surely this is not the world you want to see.

   — Margaret Hanzimanolis    Dec 30, 05:13 PM    #

10. The Palestinian Authority showed in 2006 that Hamas uses the Gaza Islamic University for military purposes: “Officials from Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party claimed in February 2007 they captured seven Iranian military trainers – including a general of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards – inside Gaza City’s Islamic University, which they said was being utilized as a Hamas military training ground.
    The Fatah officials said at the time they also found about 1,000 Qassam rockets and equipment to manufacture the rockets inside the university. They previously suspected kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was being held for a time on the university grounds.”

    — R. Kargon    Dec 30, 05:32 PM    #

11. Angelo, I am sure that you feel it is pathetic that no one in the West, at least anyone with a significant amount of public influence, particularly in higher education, is willing to take a strong stance against what Hamans is doing.

    Hamas lobs missles at Israel, and not a word is said about this aggression. What do you expect Israel to do, just take it? Your opinion would have more credibility if you criticized Hamas as you do Israel.

    — Samuel    Dec 30, 06:03 PM    #

12. “Academic outrage” is inappropriate in this instance (though I don’t doubt that we’ll see plenty of it regardless). As posters above have correctly said, when an academic facility is being used for paramilitary purposes, it ceases to be an academic facility.

    As for the notion that Gaza is “blockaded and surrounded,” it should be noted that if true, Israel is not alone in doing the blockading and surrounding. Gaza shares a land border with Egypt (and, indeed, was Egyptian territory until 1967). Ought some “academic outrage” not to be spared for the Egyptian refusal to open the frontiers? President Mubarak seems curiously reluctant to rush to the aid of his fellow Moslems: perhaps there is a reason for that.

    — Gustave    Dec 30, 06:24 PM    #

13. The outrage that appears in these messages is understandable. However where was this outrage when it was Jews and Israeli’s targeted. There is a double standard both in the media and on university campuses. The vast majority are apologists for the Palestinians. It is horrible that the University was struck. But the PA noted it was used for activites that were not appropriate. Iranian Military advisors are not equivalent to ROTC instructors. They teach how to randomly kill Jews. But yes of course there is that double standard most of my left leaning colleagues have nothing but support for when a terrorist tortures and kills a Jewish student on the streets of Paris. Or they kill students at a Jewish school. There should be outrage that this act occured. However where was the outrage for the behaviors and actions that led to this action.

    — Ivan    Dec 30, 06:40 PM    #

14. Let’s see now, Angelo. Israel is closing (with Egypt) the borders of Gaza. Why? Because when they are open, Hamas smuggles in weapons which it uses to fire rockets and kill Israelis. What nerve those Israelis have, not wanting to be killed. Here’s a simple solution—stop firing the missiles, and when the borders are opened, stop taking that as an opportunity to commit more terrorism. See what happens then.

    The borders have been opened several times, and each time more terrorism is the result.

    The loss of civilian life is always deplorable, but the fact is that Hamas places its weapons in civilian areas. People who criticize Israel are amazingly silent on what its other options are to deal with an enemy that doesn’t recognize its right to exist, and that takes every opportunity to kill Israelis.

    As stated in several posts, when weapons are stored at a University, it is no longer a place of learning. The argument that people at American universities work on military matter is a non-starter—American universities are not used as weapons caches.

    — b11-man    Dec 30, 06:47 PM    #

15. Please someone start a protest petition. I’ll sign it. Israel is way, way out of line.

    — GailB    Dec 30, 06:59 PM    #

16. To GailB: I will sign also, and that’s because Israel is IN its line, for over a century.

    My own point is that it is appauling that everybody is repeating the same lie, about civilians and militants. In fact, of course, they are all civilians, the Arabs, they just took arms as this genocide (started, to be sure in the ’40s) was not tolerable. That’s what you call – “provoked beyond human endurance”.

    — Michael Pyshnov    Dec 30, 07:22 PM    #

17. The people of Gaza are trying to defend themselves from daily incursions, humiliations and an illegal occupation. If someone occupied your state by force, penned you in behind a wall, cut off your water, food, and education, prevented you from travel outside these walls even when you needed medical care, even if you are a pregnant woman about to give birth…wouldn’t you fire back anything you could? Israel’s actions are wrong, and have always been wrong, and are done with explicit approval of the US.

    — reality check    Dec 30, 09:00 PM    #

18. Israel has been using these kinds of allegations to justify its attacks on civilian targets. During the current attack, its has bombarded hospitals as well as mosques. What is the justification for not allowing medical aid to Gaza? Israeli navy today attacked a boat carrying medical supplies and volunteers from Europe , fired on it, and then one of its navy boat struck it. Were all of these genuine military targets. The killing of scores of civilians, including children and women, by an occupying army can not be justified or defended under any circumstances.

    — syed    Dec 30, 10:17 PM    #

19. Syed, Israel Navy firing on that boat is a fruit of your imagination.

    — Mark de Goz    Dec 30, 11:41 PM    #

20. Jeez-louise, why don’t you Palestinians stop complaining about genocide??? 6 million Jews were murdered 63 years ago, therefore 5 million Jews have earned the right to murder 2 million Arabs any day of the week!!! What is it about “entitlement” that you people can’t understand???

    — Diogenes of Sinope    Dec 31, 04:56 AM    #

21. Well, it’s now 12 hours later, and we have an additional 5 snarky comments, not one of which bother to suggest what the alternative is in dealing with a group (Hamas) that refuses to recognize your right to exist and that purposefully fires missiles and mortars at civilian targets, and that uses any opening of the border as an opportunity to smuggle in more weapons and commit additional acts of terrorism.

    Hmm, let’s see. I’ve got it. Withdraw all Israeli forces from Gaza, and withdraw the Israeli settlements too? Oops forgot—already did that. And look at the fine results, both for Israel and for the Palestinian Authority, which was removed by force of arms by Hamas.

    — b11-man    Dec 31, 09:19 AM    #

22. Until the fundamental issues of establishing peace within secure borders for both parties are solved, we will, unfortunately, have nothing but more violence to look forward to in the years ahead, depspite what pathetic pleas the educational community makes about the destruction of educational facilities in Gaza or on the West Bank. Our best hope is lies with the Obama administration. Once peace is established (and enforced), universities will be secure.

    — John    Dec 31, 10:32 AM    #

23. b11 – The issue is Palestine, not just Gaza. The common-sense solution, the withdrawal of Israeli settlements and military to behind the 1967 borders and the introduction of multinational peacekeepers, is precisely what has not been tried.

    If world history shows us anything, it’s that one cannot bomb one’s way out of a terrorism problem.

    — Patrick    Dec 31, 10:36 AM    #

24. Hey everyone – just to give you some perspective on this. Not all Palestinian people are terrorists. Not all are even Muslim. My parents are of a Christian minority there. They lost their homes, their money, their lifestyles, their families, EVERYTHING, in the aftermath of the Balfour Declaration c. 1947-48. Jews and Palestinians had been living in Palestine (that was its name, by the way) for hundreds of years, side by side, without problems. The problem came with Zionism, with the US and UK interfering, with thousands upon thousands of European Jews going to Israel to flee persecution (remember, it was the US that turned Jews fleeing Hitler away from its shores during WWII – the US didn’t want them here, so they sent them to my parents’ country – Palestine). My parents and their families were of the highly educated, upper classes – they’re more educated than most of your parents and grandparents, I’d wager. They were able to get out and start all over again, with nothing, in the US. So, yes, the Palestinians who could not get out, who remain there, are in their own country but are treated as second class citizens. Yes, they will use any means possible to defend themselves from daily murder on the part of the Israeli army and settlers. And yes, I know that Palestine was a British mandate – basically a colony or protectorate – and before that was part of the Ottoman Empire….and a long time ago a Roman territory. It was land, at the time of my parents family, that was owned by individual Palestinian families. It was all taken, never compensated. Never to be returned. No, the Holocaust – terrible as it was – does not justify the Jews doing anything they want then to other people.

    — a first-generation American, child of Palestinian parents    Dec 31, 10:56 AM    #

25. There was a “double standard” when major attacks were repeatedly launched from North Vietnam from 1968-1975 against a South Vietnam that just wanted to be left alone, with predictable horrific resutls that included a “one state” solution. And there is a double standard now. So what’s new?

    — mindful of history    Dec 31, 10:56 AM    #

26. A lot of people are up for Patrick’s “common-sense solution.” Unfortunately, Hamas is not. As Art. 13 of its 1988 charter states, “the so-called peaceful solutions, and the international conferences to resolve the Palestinian problem, are all contrary to the beliefs of the Islamic Resistance Movement.” During the past twenty years, it has not budged from that position one iota.

    Presumably even Patrick does not believe it ever will, inasmuch as he considers the open-ended “introduction of multinational peacekeepers” to the region will be necessary even after Israel’s withdrawal.

    — Gustave    Dec 31, 10:59 AM    #

27. Glossary:

    Israel pulls all its forces and citizens out of Gaza, leaving that region completely in the hands of its Arab residents, with every opportunity to develop its social and economic infrastructure.

    This is called “Israeli occupation”.
    ———————————————-

    Hamas and Islamic Jihad turn the entire Strip into a military staging area, firing rockets into Israel on a daily basis for several years.

    This is called “resistance to occupation”.
    —————————————————

    Hamas calls for a complete end to Israeli occupation of all Arab territory as the price for ceasing its rocket attacks.

    By Hamas’s definition, every square inch of Palestine is Arab Territory, including pre-1967 Israel, which is, perforce, “occupied”.
    ————————————————-

    Israel uses economic means to try to dissuade Hamas from bombarding Israel.

    This is called “Israeli aggression”.
    ————————————-

    Economic measures having failed, and with Hamas vastly escalating its rocket attacks, Israel fights back with military force.

    This is called “criminal behavior” on the part of Israel.
    ———————————————-

    Hamas sympathizers weep bitter tears over Gaza children said to have been incidental victims of the Israeli bombing. They ignore the deaths of a couple of young Gazan girls, a few days earlier, from an errant Hamas rocket that was really meant to kill Israeli children.

    This is called “humanitarian outrage”.
    ———————————————

    Israel’s bombardment of Hamas facilities causes casualties, the overwhelming majority of which are Hamas operatives.

    This is called “genocide”.
    ————————————————-

    The curiously-named “Islamic University”, used as a Hamas weapons development center and as a Hamas ammo dump, is bombed by Israel, after all personnel, civilian and military, evacuate.

    This is called an “intolerable violation of academic freedom”.
    ————————————————-

    Would-be western intellectuals express no end of sympathy for a Hamas movement that is murderously hostile to all creeds but its own, viciously misogynistic, medieval in its notions of law and justice, and indiscriminately homicidal.

    This is called “progressive left-wing politics”.
    ———————————-

    “Orwellian” just doesn’t cover it. This goes far beyond Newspeak.

    — Fossil    Dec 31, 11:09 AM    #

28. Fossil – yes – this is called occupation. It is called walling in refugees, cutting off food, water, medical supplies, education, jobs, health. It is called hopelessness and desperation. It is called prejudice. It is called Zionism and entitlement. It is called ignoring the elected representatives of a people. It is called self interest. It is called US self interest. It is “Israel”.

    — child of Palestinian parents    Dec 31, 11:18 AM    #

29. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7805558.stm

    — child of Palestinian parents    Dec 31, 11:30 AM    #

30. You arrogant Palestinians, with the nerve and audacity even to speak about how your families have lived in Palestine since the Roman Empire!!! Don’t you people know that the Good Lord God Himself gave “Palestine” to the Jews (in 1500 BCE)??? It says so in the Torah. Therefore, as you are unlawfully trespassing on Israeli property, the rightful owners are under no obligation “to recognize your right to exist” and may further use any measures necessary to extract you (including “purposefully firing missiles and mortars at civilian targets.”) I mean really, what is it about “property rights” (and “entitlement”) that you Palestinians can’t understand???

    — Diogenes of Sinope    Dec 31, 12:04 PM    #

31. First Generation American (#24) should review some basic history of the region. The Balfour Declaration came during World War I, not World War II. It called for the creation of a Jewish State in the area called Palestine, which at the time included what we now call Israel, Gaza, the West Bank, as well as Jordan. Britain was awarded the Mandate to this area by the League of Nations (an earlier version of the UN) expressly to establish a Jewish state.

    The British then backed off of this committment, first by sepating Trans-Jordan (as it was then called) from the mandate as a separate Arab state with a Hashemite king. Jewish immigration to the mandate (which had begun on a large scale around 1880, when it was part of the Ottoman Empire) was more and more severely curtailed by the British, and cut off completely in 1939 through the issuance of the so-called White Paper.

    After World War II, in the face of increasing uprisings by Jews in the mandate and demands for a Jewish state, the British took the matter to the UN, who recommended a second “partition” of the mandate. The Jews agreed, and the Arabs rejected this solution. When Israel declared its independence, it was invaded by several Arab armies. After the war, the majority of the Arab part of the partition was occupied by Jordan (the West Bank) and by Egypt (Gaza), with a small portion becoming part of Israel proper. Thus, the Palestinian State, such as it ever was, was predominantly occupied by Arab states and never became an independant entity.

    I am sorrier than I can express for the Palestinian people. They have been ill-served by everyone, including their own leaders. I remain hopeful that compromise can ultimately be reached, but compromise seems to be in short supply.

    Hamas needs to simply stop the missiles and the mortars, and stop acts of terrorism. The borders can then be gradually opened. And until Hamas recognizes Israel’s right to exist, and backs off of the idea that Israel proper is occupied Arab land that must be returned, no real negotiations are possible. No country can be expected to commit suicide, yet this is the exact Hamas position.

    — b11-man    Dec 31, 12:24 PM    #

32. Gustave, then it’s up to the Palestinians to ditch Hamas, which is very plausible as Hamas did not get much more than 40% of the vote in the 2006 legislative elections. That is, unless Israel’s bombing raids fans the flames of reaction (which is altogether likely).

    A multinational peacekeeping force would be quite useful in the few years after such a withdrawal, to protect Israel from Palestinian attacks, and Palestine from Israeli attacks. After such a long and bitter feud, they would need a much more neutral dispute arbiter than either could supply.

    — Patrick    Dec 31, 12:42 PM    #

33. By accident of birth I was not born in Poland but rather NYC or I would not now, at age 75 be alive.
    By accident of birth I am a Jew.
    and which I acknowledge with some pride of heritage and some disgrace at how Israel has sometimes behaved and treated Palestinians I am but decidedly secular since I reject the absurdity of “fear thy god”,
    consuming symbolic flesh and blood and obeying an old man in a weird hat when he tells me how to run my health and sex life or waving your ass 5 times a day when some old fart howls from a minaret. Nor do I see this entity as loving but and at best has a great but warped sense of humor given what He allegedly has created and the attrocities committed in his name – be it Jesus, Allah or Yahweh.

    Start with the Conquistadores,
    Torquemada, the Crusades, and those fine folk settling in New England to escape persecution only to raise up their own. And what is this “Trail of Tears” I hear about? And who runs the State of Utah here in the USA?
    The Goodness of America.

    History is full of how rotten and evil people have been towards each other and, at present, the Middle East seems to be the major case in point.

    Just now it is Hamas thugs who mindlessly throw missiles and bombs at Israel and I cannot deny Israel the right to retaliation and an attempt to wipe these bastards out – except too many innocents suffer. Thus it has always been., regardless of how mean and nasty they have been to Palestinians with their damned wall and the “settlers“and extreme Orthodox that throw stones at people driving on the Sabbath.
    BUT when some gang of thugs who wave their asses in the air 5 times a day when some old fahrt howls from a minaret and who stone women for not keeping their ear lobes covered, throw randomly throw explosives in my direction I would tend to get very pissed.
    Even though I am an academic, I do not believe for one friggin’ minute that that University held nothing but a library and a lab for teaching young Muslims how to dissect a frog.

    — arthur Wegweiser    Dec 31, 02:33 PM    #

34. The bombing of the Gaza university is simply an unfortunate example of the collateral damage associated with armed resistance to a better armed state. A statement denouncing this violence seems pointless given the history of violence between the Palestinians and Israelis.

    When will we learn that an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth will leave the world filled with blind and toothless people? If, instead of serving as the arms manufacturer and merchant to the world (the USA has certainly served in that capacity for Israel), the USA placed its vast resources in service to developing non-violent responses to injustice, maybe within a generation or two the world would witness a significant decrease in the killing of Israelis and Palestinians. Who knows, maybe even rational persons with legitimate political agendas could work out a truly just peace agreement that recognizes the humanity, and therefore the right to exist, of Israelis and Palestinians.

    The idea that violence, whether by Palestinians or Israelis, can successfully resolve this conflict is sheer idiocy. Since at least 1948, the world has seen that violence between the Palestinians and Israelis has failed to produce an equitable resolution to this conflict. How much more collateral damage must be experienced before both sides renounce violence as their primary means of resolving their dispute?

    — A weary observer    Dec 31, 02:43 PM    #

35. Patrick:-

    I agree that political progress of any meaningful kind is vanishingly unlikely until (i) the Gazans ditch Hamas; or (ii) Hamas abandons its exterminationist objectives. But I don’t think Israel is under any kind of obligation to hunker down underneath a hailstorm of ordnance launched across the border until such time as one of those two things happens.

    — Gustave    Dec 31, 02:55 PM    #

36. Thanks for the notes re. history, #31. The “history” is personal for me and my family. As it is for Jews and millions of others who lost family in the Holocaust. The truth is that Israel’s abusive tactics encourage extremism among a desperate and hopeless Palestinian population, and thereby justifies further abuses on Israel’s part. A very clever strategy, really. It makes a moderate Palestinian position impossible to maintain. Yes, the Palestinian people have been ill-served by everyone, including their own leaders. But I get pretty sick and tired of the world, partcularly my country, to whom my tax dollars go, standing by doing nothing while this genocide continues. But, hey, that’s nothing new. The US also stood around doing nothing during the Holocaust and during Darfur. It’s in the US interest to keep Israel in place, and keeping Israel in place means allowing it to torture the captive Palestinian population in Gaza (and in parts of the West Bank) using fear of the Other to justify their atrocities and maintain a fascist government that will do the US’s bidding in the Middle East.

    — child of Palestinian parents    Dec 31, 05:27 PM    #

37. The real issue is Zionism, the expansionist and militant Zionism of the kind espoused by Jabotinsky that flowers in Israeli politics. That there will be widespread outrage against Israel is understood, but the large number of comments in favor of Israel in forums like this have to do with an online technology deployed by Israeli supporters. They have all installed a softwate product called Giyus that mobilizes them to post comments in forums such as these. Check it out at http://www.giyus.org and stop arguing with these select burnch whose whole mission is to derail serious converstation. Sam

    — Sam    Dec 31, 06:47 PM    #

38. I was just reviewing a protester’s poster which screamed, “Death to all Palestinians.” No, wait, wait. If I recall correctly, the sign read, “Death to all Arabs.” No, no, that wasn’t it. Let’s see, it said, “Death to all moslems!” Hmm. I think I’m confused; perhaps, it was more like “Death to Iran.” I can’t quite remember — oh, wait, yeah, that was it, the protesters who all seemed to be of an islamic bent were screaming and chanting “Death to the Jews!” Question to “child of,” is that just the Jews in “Palestine,” or any that might be living anywhere in the world? And also, while we are on this topic, do you know what exactly they were teaching at the “islamic” U in regard to “Death to the Jews”? Thank you for your firsthand clarification of this confusing poster. Yeah, and maybe you can clarify whether sam is a clown or a clone of some former world-war-two leader.

    — steve    Dec 31, 07:01 PM    #

39. The Israeli’s have learned well from their former Nazi masters.

    — jon    Dec 31, 07:06 PM    #

40. jon: you are confused; you meant to say the islamic barbarians have learned well from their collaboration with their nazi masters during WWII. Or perhaps you just meant to ensure we all understood that not only do you not know when and when not to use an apostrophe, you also don’t know jack (as in jon) about history or current events because you are a) an anti-Semite; or b) an islamic sympathizer who can’t wait for sharia law to come to a university near you soon. We suggest you review Fossil’s Glossary (# 27) as you are obviously a victim of “newspeak” or seek to perpetuate it.

    — steve    Dec 31, 08:03 PM    #

41. Steve, can you clarify why I am clown or a clone. Calling up people like you on the racist ideology that underpins your thinking and your state is grounds to be called a clown or a clone?

    — Sam    Jan 1, 12:10 AM    #

42. I am sorry that I have not followed this most recent fighting closely. So people need to help me out. Didn’t the government of Gaza and Isreal have a no fire agreement? If someone in Gaza started firing missles into Isreal, isn’t it an act of agression and Isreal has the right to attack. Even if those attacks kill civilians. Isreal can’t target civilian populations, but they can attac and civilians may/will be killed in the process.

    The wacko comments in here about universities being protected is crazy talk. Sorry, in times of war, education facilities are used to train, educate soldiers and are targets. Rest assured, if Japan or Germany could have reached US territory, your little happy college would have been levelled as a military target. This will become less of a crazy leftist issue when one of the various crazy groups in the world blows up a major university here in the states. Just wait, it will happen. Then the leftist of the universities will want to talk about their anger or some crap like that.

    — midwest    Jan 1, 01:13 AM    #

43. Sorry, midwest, no such luck. The lefties will take it as an opportunity for more passive-aggressive self-flagellation, and rant about how the world justly attacks us for denying it student visas and free tuition.

    — anonanonanon    Jan 1, 04:12 AM    #

44. Patrick (#23), I thank you for your reasonable comments, unlike some of the nonsense I see posted here. That the final answer to the Palestinian-Israeli situation—that Israel will withdraw from the overwhelming majority of the west bank and gaza and a palestinian state declared—has been obvious for a long time.

    However, and this is a big however, Israel has offered to do this twice now—once when Barak was president and once earlier this year with Olmert. In both cases, the offer even included parts of East Jerusalem. Here’s the thing—in both cases, the offer was met by refusal on the palestinian side. President Clinton wrote up the first time in his biography, putting the blame squarely on Yassir Arafat. And of course, Clinton was there.

    You say Palestine is the point, not Gaza. I think you’re wrong—at the time Israel withdrew from Gaza, it also said the next step would be withdrawal from the northern quarter of the west bank. The results of the Gaza withdrawal (more missiles, more mortars, more terrorism, the destruction of all facilities left behind by Israel that could have been used by the Palestinians for economic good) shows why Israel has now abandoned the idea of unilateral withdrawal as a failure.

    Patrick, yours has been the only post that has even the glimmer of an alternative strategy, albeit one that I don’t believe will work. Every other criticism has come with no proposed alternative strategy. Why? Because, of course, with a group like Hamas, there is no alternative strategy. But Israel’s critics don’t want to mention that.

    — b11-man    Jan 1, 11:43 AM    #

45. Child of Palestinian Parents (#36), you say that Israel’s abusive tactics have led to Palestinian extremism. Will you not concede that Palestinian extremism has led to Israel’s tactics? And that because they come after terrorist acts—acts designed to be terrorist acts—that Israeli’s don’t see their tactics as abusive, but necessary?

    In my dream, the Palestinian people come to the realization that the current strategy is self-defeating, both militarily and morally. Instead, they turn to non-violence, and then say to Israel—“We’ve removed all excuses. Your turn. Show us what you’re prepared to do for true peace.” But then I wake up, turn on the news, and another missile has been fired.

    — b11-man    Jan 1, 11:53 AM    #

46. This thread seems to confirm my fear that the academe has been captured by Zionist thinking, much the way the policital process and the MSM have.

    This has not, and will not, ultimately serve the interests of this country or those of Israel.

    We have moved beyond McCarthyism.

    — dismayed    Jan 1, 12:37 PM    #

47. Sam: it’s real simple. No. 1, I am not a Zionist nor a follower of Judaism, but unlike you, I can certainly comprehend that there has not been any expansion of Israeli territory, but a desire to give up land to Palestinian antagonists as a peace offering. The comments made in No. 44 show that this has not worked because you fail to realize or choose to ignore the militant and expansionist policies incorporated into the theology of islam. 2. You also fail to recognize that a rational thinking person has outrage, not against Israel, but against hamas, hezbollah, iran, and all other islamic fascists who want to take away the freedom of any nation, not just Israel, in order for their theology to dominate the world and force you into submission. 3. the absurdity of your comment that “online technology” “mobilizes” “Israeli supporters” “to post comments in forums such as these” is a wonderful view into your paranoid mind. Yes, hold on one second while I dial in to that “software” to ensure my comments are approved. So, sam, since the “real issue” is not Zionism, but islamic theology, and you do not seem to be outraged by terrorist acts committed by hamas and their masters in Tehran, you can maturely understand why I think your comments are either proving your are a “clown” who cannot comprehend reality or a “clone” formed at islamic U from hitler’s nose to espouse paranoid garbage against those world-dominating Zionists, such as you try to stir up in your so-called “software” expose. Thank you for allowing me to clarify why I think you are a clown in your thinking as opposed to the less likely alternative of a clone. It seems you have a “friend” in No. 44; therefore, you can both live in dismayed’s fantasy world that Zionists run academe and this forum.

    — steve    Jan 1, 02:00 PM    #

48. Some points worth considering:

    (1) Hamas operates multiple services, cultural, political, athletic, educational, etc., and is, by virtue of Gaza’s density, “among the civilian population.” Everywhere in Gaza is near a civilian population…where would you have them (as the democratically-elected government) operate?

    (2) As Nelson Mandela once said, “Only free men can negotiate.” Gazans aren’t free…that’s why they’re fighting. Israel will not allow them the freedom that is a necessary precondition for negotiation.

    (3) On any given day, one is in greater danger of a violent death in Baltimore or Philadelphia than in anywhere in Israel…where is this existential threat that justifies a 100X retribution rate on Israel’s part?

    (4) In all likelihood, Hamas will emerge stronger at the end of this particular round of violence, as Hizb’Allah did after Israel’s attack of ’06. Israel’s apartheid government will in all likelihood go down in the pages of history alongside the apartheid governments of South Africa, another body of wealthy whites living illegally on stolen land, who subject the local population to racist laws and occupation.

    (5) Criticism of Israeli policies is not anti-Semitism…Israelis criticize their own government all the time…let’s be adults and not fall back on facile name calling.

    (6) The world, with few exceptions, is in consensus on this issue…either everyone is wrong, or there is some truth to the outrage being expressed across the world at Israels disproportionate response to the Hamas rockets that have claimed four Israeli lives as of the writing of this comment.

    — concerned Jewish-American    Jan 1, 02:40 PM    #

49. From Ynet, Israeli’s leading online source of news: http://www.ynet.co.il/english/articles/0,7340,L-3281619,00.html

    GIYUS calls Jews of world to web duty

    Want to support Israel online? Just download Megaphone from WUJS website and get all needed updates

    Linda Harel
    Published: 07.27.06, 00:08 / Israel Jewish Scene

    When Giyus.org noticed a poll on Albabawa.com, a popular Arabic website, asking whether the current violence in Lebanon is an Israeli provocation, they decided to help balance the results.

    A message with a link to the poll popped up on the desktops of GIYUS’ Israel-loving members and soon, the poll results jumped from an overwhelming yes to an over 80 percent no.

    GIYUS (Give Israel Your United Support) is a new project that has recently been released by the World Union of Jewish Students (WUJS) in order to balance anti-Israel sentiment expressed on the web and influence public opinion.

    To accomplish this, they created Megaphone, a free tool that can be downloaded from their website. Megaphone allows alerts to pop up on users’ desktops every time it finds an attention-worthy article, poll or forum on the internet. Students and members of pro-Israel organizations are encouraged to visit the sites and express their opinions.

    In addition to making users aware of problematic biased articles and anti-Semitism, GIYUS encourages them to write letters of approval to the editors of sites that publish positive articles to help increase their popularity.

    The project is designed to be interactive. Megaphone users can contribute to its growth by reporting both biased and commendable websites and polls for consideration.

    To attract users from around the world, GIYUS translates polls into English, French and Hebrew, and soon Spanish.

    — Sam    Jan 1, 02:54 PM    #

50. Contributors to this discussion thread who have expressed support for Israel’s genocidal attacks upon the civilian population of Gaza should be ashamed of themselves. Ever since the people of Gaza elected a governing party of which Israel and the United States disapprove, Israel has subjected Gaza to an unrelenting siege, depriving its people of food, medical supplies and fuel, shutting down Gaza’s economy, preventing the delivery of relief and humanitarian supplies sent by international agencies, and engaging in repeated military provocations to ensure that peace should not break out. Whatever fatuous claims about ‘withdrawal from Gaza’ may be made by propagandists and pundits, Israel remains, under international law, the occupying power; the Israeli leaders who have been responsible for the economic siege of Gaza and now for military attacks upon its population are guilty of war crimes. I shall urge the president of my own university to denounce the Israeli bombing of the Islamic University of Gaza.

    — Michael Keefer    Jan 1, 03:13 PM    #

51. 1. I would prefer they not operate their rocket launchers from civilian houses.

    2. Yes, Gazans are not free because they are prisoners of their own terrorist government who will kill you (or apparently as of late “crucify” you) if you do not follow their mandates.

    3. Is this even a point of debate? Governments are supposed to protect their citizens no matter how many are murdered by another government, whether the number is 1 or a million. When would you have your government intervene if a foreign government caused the death of any of our citizens because it was launching rockets from their territory onto our territory? Would you wait for the number to exceed 1 million before you think it necessary to defend? Remind me not to elect you as our commander in chief.

    4. Once again, one has to be amazed at how you are blind to the racist laws and occupation of lands that were once Christian in the hands of islamic fascists. Or as I see it: “another body of wealthy ARAB/BROWN MEN living illegally on stolen land, who subject the local population to racist laws and occupation.” Have you tried being a Christian in any of these nations or are you just good at pointing the finger at one side? Why don’t we just have a good ol’ church burnin’ or machete-wielding party against people worshiping in a church. Somalia, anyone?

    5. It is not criticism of Israeli government policies that I consider to be antisemitism, but that which claims their are secret software programs that are revved up to defend Israel or other such nonsense that makes it seem that “zionists” are in control of some conspiracy action somewhere. Yes, Sam, GIYUS is an “evil conspiracy” designed to take over the minds of those who dare criticize Israel on the net or just want to be zombies supporting its apartheid policies. By the way, can you tell me just how many Jews were telephoned the day of 9/11 to get out of there before Mossad hit the WTC?

    6. You need to expand your reading more. The consensus that I get is that more people are fed up with islamic fascists than they are with Israeli warplanes bombing hamas hideouts. And if the civilians don’t want to be part of it, then they shouldn’t have voted the militants in and, by the way, attend a rally by the thousands just days before Israel’s military took action as Gazans glorified their rocket attacks. I, for one, would take seriously the calls for my nation’s destruction by a neighboring state that reins destructive rockets down on our territory whether no one was killed, only four, or a million. Get real, man. This is war and war is not pretty. Just ask the Japanese who finally fully understood that they were not going to Paradise in the cause of their emperor because, ultimately, they had had the s..t bombed out of them. It’s what’s called a wake-up call and it is time for islam to get one from one end of the Middle East to the other. I would rather have Israel as my neighbor than any islamic state run by brown men who oppress the local population forcing all to submit to their beliefs. That’s apartheid in the 3rd Millennium. You guys need to stop living in the 2nd.

    — steve    Jan 1, 03:17 PM    #

52. First, that was one poorly-worded article. WHen you look at the authors’ credentials, it includes previous anti-Israel books. So it comes as no surprise that the article has a bias.

    The article itself states that the university reportedly was used to research (read: create) arms and, its believed, the university was also used to stockpile arms. I doubt any US or Israeli university stockpiles arms. Also, the different between Islamic U and other universities: their weapons were clandestine weapons used for TERROR. not for defense, but to TERRORISE Israelis.

    people forget (read: choose to ignore) Hamas’s charter. it calls for the destruction of Israel. It also mentions that Jews run the world economy and laughably references “Protocols of the ELders of Zion”. There is no occupation of Gaza, other than Hamas occupying it and choking the life out of Gazans. It doesn’t matter that they were democratically elected – they are a murderous, terrorist organization that has ZERO intentions for peace with Israel and calls for the destruction of all of Israel. they are hateful and incite murder. they dared Israel to attack, Israel did and now they and their supporters are crying.

    i hope innocent Palestinians don’t die or get injured in these attacks, but if they do, blame Hamas. rockets don’t launch on their own from residential areas. Hamas wanted to dictate where the battle field was, and Gazans may suffer due to their choice and lack of desire for peace.

    — Richard S    Jan 1, 05:54 PM    #

53. To Concerned Jewish American (#48): Taking your five points in turn:

    (1) Despite the fact that Gaza is a small place, there are parts that are aren’t very populated. But that’s really not the point. When it is said that Hamas strikes from among the civilian population, it’s talking about keeping weapons and firing missiles from schools, universities, mosques, apartment houses, and other “normally” civilian locations.

    (2) If indeed Nelson Mandela said this, his own life and history are a refutation of it. Blacks in South Africa were hardly free. Yet, Mandela did successfully negotiate an end to Apartheid in South Africa. Could you possibly not know this?

    (3) What kind of inane argument is this? So long as the killing is below a certain threshold (a city with a large murder rate), then it’s OK? There were 579 murders in New York in 2006. By your argument, the Gazans have nothing to complain about, because it’s less safe in New York.

    (4) The oldest trick in the world is to accuse one’s enemy of what one is guilty. So let’s check out the human rights situation—which countries in the middle east afford people living there the greatest level of freedom? On the basis of religion (try to function as a Christian in Saudi Arabia or Iraq etc., as Shiites in Sunni lands, or v.v., as B’hai in Iran, etc.), ethnic/racial background (Kurds in Iraq, blacks in Sudan or Mauritania), gender (what is the status of women in most Arab nations?), sexual orientation (guess why Palestinian gays move to Israel when they can), and so forth? Israel is hardly perfect, but compared to the rest of the middle east neighborhood…

    (5) Criticism is not anti-semitism. Agreed. But when one (not you in this case) holds Israel to a standard one does not hold its adversaries or any other country to, it is.

    (6) What is the proportionate proper response to an enemy (Hamas) whose own organizing principles call for your destruction?

    — b11-man    Jan 1, 06:02 PM    #

54. To b-11 man (#53):

    First, thank you for your thoughtful responses. I appreciate your sentiments and would like to respond, in turn:

    (1) I agree that using schools and universities to store weapons places the civilian population in an unfair position of danger. That said, where is the elected government of Hamas supposed to house its defensive capabilities? Where did the FLN in Algeria hide the arms that allowed them to free themselves from the French? Where did the IRA of Michael Collins hide their weapons that allowed them to free themselves from the British? Hamas doesn’t have a system of sophisticated underground bunkers and defendable military bases…they have only the crowded streets of Gaza from which to resist an overwhelmingly more powerful jailor/oppressor.

    (2) The full Mandela quote is “Only free men can negotiate; prisoners cannot enter into contracts.” He spoke these words while imprisoned and used this position to convince his jailers that he needed to be free before the forming of a majority-rule government in South Africa. Only when he was freed (because of resistance from within his country from all sides of the color line and from the international community) was he able to properly lead his people to majority-rule. This was my point.

    (3) My point in comparing rates of violence in US cities and the threat level faced by Israelis was not to minimize the trauma of either. Residents of Philadelphia and Baltimore should not tolerate high murder rates, but the citizens of those cities don’t bomb the population centers from which such violence often originates. Responsible actors in those cities try and treat the cause of urban violence (poverty, economic injustice, racism, etc.) rather than the symptom (gun violence, drug addiction, etc.). I guess I was challenging the “urgency” of Israel’s dramatic and exponential retaliation given the ability of large populations to thrive even amidst the occasional loss of a few of its citizens. And I am somewhat confused by the NYC comparison, as New York City has about eight times the population of Gaza and your figure was for one calendar year, not a 6-day period.

    (4) Your human rights analysis negates the long history of peaceful coexistence between Jews, Christians, and Muslims in places as diverse as Lebanon, Iraq, and the Maghreb, in pre-colonial times. There is no innate inability of Arab and Muslim societies to exist peacefully with minority religions – what friction exists today is the sad legacy of a colonial past that categorized and used divide and conquer strategies to exert power over the local population, and frustration over Israeli and US policies linked (albeit unfairly) to Judaism and Christianity. This is true of sexual minorities as well (see Joseph Massad’s /Desiring Arabs/ for a more lengthy discussion of colonialism’s role in creating homophobia), though I have gay friends in Morocco and Turkey who would challenge the notion that they cannot live openly where they are. I might also add that in the US, gay men sometimes find themselves tied to the backs of pick-up trucks and dragged through the streets.

    (5) Perhaps I hold Israel to a standard you call “different” because as a Jew, it hurts me to see violence committed in my name. My great grandfather chose not to move to Israel because the sight of families having to pack their belongings, forced from their homes, and marched to camps was eerily reminiscent of his own experience in Poland. As a nation founded in the recent past on the highly offensive “land without people for a people without land” fallacy (Israel Zangwill, speaking in 1901), it is different.

    (6) Hamas’s calls for Israel’s “destruction” are unfortunate, but to a Palestinian, Palestine has already been destroyed, so the notion of “destruction” carries a different significance.

    While we clearly disagree, I am pleased that you did not succumb to the facile name calling that some contributors to this thread have resorted to. Indeed it is only through discussion that any forward progress toward peace will take place, I believe. I hope, nevertheless, that you join me in mourning the deaths of people on both sides of the border and, in the context of this article, the assault on an institution of higher learning, whatever the politics of that institution may be.

    — concerned Jewish-American    Jan 1, 08:39 PM    #

55. To Concerned Jewish-American,

    I too appreciate your thoughtful comments, which allow us to discuss this issue in a more subtle way than many of the more bombastic posts. So, here are a few further comments on what you wrote:

    (1) I think your comparison to the FLN and IRA would be more apt to the West Bank (which Israel still occupies) than to Gaza (which it doesn’t, per se). Nonetheless, I would question the morality of both the FLN and IRA in having done what they did. While the IRA certainly fought the British, they killed hundreds of innocent civilians (often their own co-religionists). A similar story can be told of the FLN and the French. Both invited retaliation by the British and French, which caused even more civilians to be killed. The IRA might be the more instructive comparison—after all, haven’t they finally decided that the military struggle wasn’t getting them to their goals, and disarmed, in order to enter into the government of Northern Ireland? Hopefully a similar thing could happen among the Palestinians, and lead to the creation of a peaceful Palestinian state.

    (2) Regardless, Mandela did preach non-violence, and did negotiate with the Apartheid regime prior to being released from jail. And with extraordinarily good results, I might add. Again, a useful model.

    (3) Hamas has been killing hundreds of Israeli citizens over the past decade. In many cases (including quite recently), Israel showed a lot of restraint in its response. There are limits to anyones restraint under constant provocation. The crime analogy is flawed, to my thinking, in that the criminals often kill other criminals in the murder rates you cite (and civilians sometimes get caught in the crossfire). Hamas is targeting civilians. That’s different.

    (4) While there is no innate inability of Arab and Muslim nations to live in peace with minority religions, in practice there is a huge problem, especially recently, in the cases that I noted and many others. Glad to hear that gays can live openly in Morocco and Turkey, but this is not the norm in the Arab world.

    It is quite true that in the past, Jews and other minorities were able to live in a much more unmolested way in Islamic countries than in Christian Europe, Moorish Spain being the best exemplar (though there were many others). An interesting question is why this relative tolerance seems to be less in evidence today. There has certainly been a rise in Islamic fundamentalism, which has led to bad outcomes for religious minorities (Iraq and Iran being the worst cases). Turkey, Morocco, and Tunisia are examples of more moderate outcomes. If you’ll forgive a flawed analogy, Japan was actually well known for its hospitality and kindness to western prisoners of war during World War I. Things changed horribly for the worse in World War II, because of the rise of a militaristic government that taught the Japanese people to hate the “others”. Some similarities here, I think.

    (5) I don’t think that most Palestinians were forced to leave their homes at gunpoint, and marched to camps like Jews were in Poland—even the most radical Palestinians don’t claim that. Many Palestinians fled during the 1947 war, most simply wanting to get out of harm’s way, some at the entreaty of other Arab nations, and some would have seen themselves as “forced”, due to threats (real or perceived). Not a good analogy, I think.

    The “land without people for a people without land” statement needs to be looked at from a 1901 perspective—Palestine was largely depopulated, with poor soil, and little infrastructure. Without looking it up, my memory says the total populations was in the neighborhood of 500,000 or less at the time. Many Jews came in via immigration after 1901, and many Arabs as well due to enhanced opportunities.

    (6) Palestine has already been destroyed, but it is the Arab states (Jordan and Egypt) that destroyed/occupied it between 1948 and 1967, prior to Israel’s occupation. It is Israel that has offered to give back the large majority of this land, including portions of East Jerusalem, an offer that has been rejected twice now by the Palestinians.

    Of course I join you in mourning the loss of Palestinian and Israeli life.

    Both the Mandela and recent actions by the IRA examples that you cited provide some hope for forward progress. The Palestinians need to reject violence, especially toward civilians, as a strategy, and THEN demand their rights to live as a free people in an independent state in peace with Israel. That’s really the only answer here. And that’s something that is antithetical to Hamas’ organizing principles.

    — b11-man    Jan 1, 10:42 PM    #

56. Concerned Jewish-American (#54),
    While I apreciate your linguistic discourse into redefining the word “destruction”, could you still please answer the question b-11 asked you:
    “What is the proportionate proper response to an enemy (Hamas) whose own organizing principles call for your destruction?”
    With the emphasis on WHAT.

    — Mark de Goz    Jan 1, 10:42 PM    #

57. The bombing of the Islamic University is an abomination. But senior academics like Neve Gordon and Jeff Halper (ex-Beersheva anthropologist), and their progressive colleagues, should perhaps be working to change Israeli academe even more than they do, upping the ante.

    The fact is that all Israeli universities are prime centers for close cooperation with the military, in R&D of sophisticated weaponry. What have Israeli academics done about that? Why aren’t Israeli researchers doing more against their own academic colleagues, in Beersheva, in Tel Aviv, Haifa, at the reactionary Bar-Ilan University, and in Ariel —- fighting the military-academic complex in which they are academic workers?

    For example: like mounting a real offensive to isolate and shut down the Ariel University Center in the illegal settlement of Ariel, with its National Strategic Assessment Center (where aspects of murderous attacks like that on Gaza are blueprinted). Prof. Gordon’s counterpart Alexander Bligh, head of Political Science at the university center in Ariel, heads the NSAC. The Homeland Security R&D Center at Ariel ‘University’ is also one of the think tanks of the Occupation.

    What have Israeli academics done to help create an Arab university in the Galilee? Almost nothing. Are they campaigning to address the huge lack of Arab staff, especially at higher ranks, in universities across the state, fighting the obvious discrimination in hiring that is part of the apartheid system? No. Why isn’t there a clear link, for example, between the University of the Negev in Beersheva and the Islamic University, forged in fury against the will of the Israeli ruling class? What will it take to begin to create that? Why aren’t university lecturers shutting down the Israeli universities in the midst of these state atrocities, building a real strike?

    And in Beersheva, why aren’t they finally abolishing the name of Ben-Gurion University, a national ‘hero’ in whose image Israeli militarism is cast. Of course, only a name. But one all Palestinians despise. Why aren’t they pressing en masse to restore the great mosque in downtown Beersheva, now derelict, one of the oldest buildings in southern Israel, to the large Bedou Muslim community in al-Naqab, a longstanding demand?

    Silence is complicity. But so is inaction. The personal price of course can be great. But the time has come for Israeli academics of conscience to walk the talk where they work, hard as that may be. Basta, khalas.

    — abu rashid    Jan 1, 11:52 PM    #

58. Abu Rashid:-

    When we see Iranian, Syrian and Egyptian researchers “fighting the military-academic complex in which they are academic workers” in their respective countries—indeed, when civil society there reaches the point where such a thing is even imaginable other than at the immediate forfeit of their liberty and their lives—we might very well see the things you’re asking for, as well.

    I quite take your point, however, that if those researchers had the courage of their convictions they should take this action regardless. The personal price of course can be great. But there again, as you say, inaction is complicity. The time has surely come for Iranian, Syrian, Egyptian etc. academics of conscience to walk the talk where they work, hard as that may be…

    — Gustave    Jan 2, 12:20 AM    #

59. This entire post is proof positive that discourse will solve nothing. Everyone seems to have willingly gone off-topic, much like the “peace” talks we hear about. How horrifically, unproductively sad.

    — anniegirl    Jan 2, 12:55 AM    #

60. To The Editors

    Neve Gordon and Jeff Halper, both Hamas apologists and polemicists with Gordon from Ben Gurion University in Beersheva where Hamas rockets have reached, have decided to exercise their right of free speech.

    Unfortunately they are wrong.

    Scholars for Peace in the Middle East released a press release on Israel’s right to defend itself from Hamas. We sent out a press release to over 400 news outlets and have it posted at our website http://www.spme.net. We believe this statement covers their concerns and ours. It has been posted at our website since December 28, 2008. When scholars make statements in error, as Gordon and Halper have done, it is important corrections be made.

    So that there is no misunderstanding here is the statement:

    Scholars for Peace in the Middle East supports Israel’s right to live within safe and secure borders at peace with her neighbors and able to recognize their peaceful aspirations.

    Since turning Gaza over to the Palestinian rule two years ago, Israel has suffered nearly 6000 rocket attacks into its internationally-recognized sovereign borders, even during the six-month Hamas initiated-cease fire.Israel has been remarkably patient and restrained, with the understanding of trying to avoid civilian casualties. Israel has even, until now been willing to open checkpoints to allow material goods into Gaza.

    With Hamas’ decision to end the cease fire, accompanied with a sharp increase in the number of rocket attacks launched against her, Israel has been left with no choice but to stop the military aggression initiated by Hamas aimed at southern Israeli cities such as Sderot, Askelon and Beersheeva.

    The intent of the Hamas rocket attacks is to drive Israelis out of Israel.

    The intent of the Israeli preventative strikes this weekend against military targets in Gaza is to put an end to Hamas’ unacceptable deadly ongoing relentless violence against Israeli citizens.

    Contrary to Geneva rules of engagement, Hamas insists on using human shields by hiding their deadly military centers in civilian populated areas making civilian casualties unavoidable.

    Israel has made it absolutely clear that when the rockets from Gaza and other deadly incitements against Israel cease, there will be no need for these necessary acts of self protection.

    Adopted by the SPME Board of Directors, December 28, 2008.

    For Further information contact:

    Edward S. Beck, SPME President Emeritus, SPME scholarsforpeace@aol.com or,
    Peter Haas, SPME Vice President for External Relations, peter.haas@case.edu or,
    Judith Jacobson, SPME Vice President for Internal Relations, jsj4@columbia.edu
    http://www.spme.net/cgi-bin/articles.cgi?ID=4821

    Dr. Edward S. Beck
    President Emeritus
    Scholars for Peace in the Middle East

    — Dr. Edward Beck, President-Emeritus SPME    Jan 2, 04:24 AM    #

61. Could anyone defending the destruction of Gaza’s largest academic facility provide a single piece of evidence that the Islamic University is being used as a ‘weapons facility’. No I didn’t think so. There is nothing ‘curious’ about a university being called ‘the islamic university’ and in any case thats not a reason to blow it up.

    — johng    Jan 2, 05:34 AM    #

62. #61
    How about Mahmoud Abbas Fatah party statement from 2007?

    — Mark de Goz    Jan 2, 09:06 AM    #

63. To Steve #40

    Sorry about the apostrophe. I do not proofread well.

    As for the other stuff: It is clear that you do not understand the difference between an argument and an ad hominem.

    Moreover, given the US policies in the Middle East—which are clearly sympathetic only to the Israelis point of view—it would seem to be you that is << obviously a victim of “newspeak” or seek to perpetuate it.>>

    — jon    Jan 2, 12:14 PM    #

64. To Jon (#63, #39),

    One of the most outrageous things one can do is to compare Israel with the Nazis. The Nazis’ goal was to systematically murder every Jew. Do you honestly think that Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians in general, or toward Gaza in particular, come within miles of that? Or was that just a bit of particularly offensive hyperbole?

    Now, just to identify the party whose policies do come close: Whose organizing principles do call for the elimination of a population from the middle east? Isn’t that Hamas?

    — b11-man    Jan 2, 12:47 PM    #

65. The real issue is Zionism, which copied European colonialism when it was founded at the turn of 19th century. The real name for Scholars for Peace in the Middle East is Scholars for Zionist Colonialism in the Middle East. Your Zionist apologia is clearly visible even when you try to hide under neutral acronyms.And Edward Beck you are a Zionist apologist.

    — sam    Jan 2, 02:17 PM    #

66. As has been said many times before…the first casualty in war is the truth.

    — Larry C Wilson    Jan 2, 02:36 PM    #

67. Sam (#65),
    Where did you get that European colonialism was founded at the turn of 19th century? Ever heard of Columbus, Cortez, Pisarro, about American Revolution? Even Wikipedia traces the beginning of European colonialism to the early 15th century. Back to History 101?

    — Mark de Goz    Jan 2, 09:37 PM    #

68. I notice that many commenters assume that the Islamic University has been used as a site for the storage of weapons. A careful reading of the quoted statement suggests that this may not be the case. The statement says: “the targeted buildings were used as a research and development center for Hamas weapons, including Qassam rockets. … One of the structures struck housed explosives laboratories that were an inseparable part of Hamas’s research-and-development program, as well as places that served as storage facilities for the organization. The development of these weapons took place under the auspices of senior lecturers who are activists in Hamas.”

    The spokeswoman asserts that buildings were targeted that were used as “a research and development center for” weapons including rockets. But she avoids asserting that the storage facilities were in fact used to store weapons.

    — Cleanth Brooks    Jan 3, 02:03 AM    #

69. The main issue for me is who is occupying who? Who has not been recognized by its neighbors? Israel was established on the land of Palestine 60 years ago. Ethnic cleansing took place by tens of massacres. Then the Israeli aggression continues and then in 1967 occupied the West Bank and Gaza strip. Those are enough reasons for any Palestinian to have the right to fight occupation in any means inside or outside the occupied territories.If Israelites were in the same place of the Palestinians we would be outraged and doing everything in our power to change the situation. Since the media and our presidents except Carter have dehumanized the Palestinian people, we have accepted the Israeli argument regardless of its validity. The Israeli aggression has never stopped for 60 years. I am convinced that security of Israel is not in its military might but by its ability to establish the peace based on sound principles. Peace is the only means to Israel security. So, peace has to be made with the Palestinian people, all of the Palestinian people. The world can not choose who in the Palestinian we make peace with. Hamas has been elected by the Palestinian people and the world should accept that. Since the world praise the Israeli election and democracy with all its aggression, the world should accept the Palestinian decision as well. At any rate, we are watching the death of the Palestinian authorities and the rise of Hamas regardless of the destruction. Thus, the Israeli aggression has strengthen the Islamic radicals all over the Islamic world. Is that what the world want?

    — Bob Youssef    Jan 3, 11:38 AM    #

70. Bob (#69), Bob, Bob…Same old tired arguments that ignore reality and get one nowhere.

    First, Israel has diplomatic relations with two of its neighbors (Eqypt and Jordan) and several other Arab states—don’t they count? It is the rejectionist states (Syria) and the terrorist organizations (Hezbollah and Hamas) that still haven’t accepted Israel’s existence after 60 years, which is a reflection on them.

    To call the Palestinians who left Israel an “ethnic cleansing” is both an anachronistic use of the term and an inaccuracy. Palestinians left/fled for several reasons: to avoid being caught up in a war, at the behest of other Arab states to clear the way for their invasion, and yes, in a few cases, due to pressure by the Jewish community, who was fighting for its survival against several invading Arab armies. As I’ve stated in several previous posts, and that no-one has contested because it is a simple fact, there is no Palestinian state because the land identified by the UN for that state was mostly occupied by Jordan (West Bank) and Egypt (Gaza) between 1948 and 1967.

    Again, as you do not deny, Israel has offered to establish a Palestinian state and give up the overwhelming majority of the occupied territories twice now, both times rejected by the Palestinians. Israel has unilaterally withdrawn from Gaza as well.

    The Palestinians indeed made their bed by having an election in which Hamas won a plurality of the vote. It then used its power to throw the PA out of any power in Gaza, a foreshadowing of what is to come if it takes power elsewhere.

    To say that the Palestinians “have the right to fight the occupation in any means inside or outside the occupied territories” brands you as a terrorism supporter—you are advocating that they can kill any civilian, do anything anywhere, and it would be justified. This is a view that is absurd on its face, but sadly held by many Palestinians who are unable to look beyond their own situation to try to understand the opposing viewpoint.

    Actions have consequences, Bob, and the election of Hamas has had lots of them. When a people choose to throw in their lot with a terrorist organization, it says something to the world, and it has consequences. Firing missiles and mortars at Israel has consequences. The simple point is, you want to be able to do any insane thing (elect Hamas, carry out terrorism, etc.) and have there be no consequences to it.

    Yes, peace has to be made with the Palestinians. But for that to happen, there have to be Palestinians to make peace with. Israel has been in negotiations with the PA. Hamas has done its best to scuttle those negotiations, and in any event, has stated that reaching a true permanent peace with Israel is not possible.

    I take them at their word. The obstacle to peace is Hamas, not Israel.

    — b11-man    Jan 3, 12:23 PM    #

71. I believe the US should stop aid to Israel now and take back all military equipment we have given them for the reasons outlined in my book “Was Israel a Big Mistake?. See wasisraelabigmistake.com

    — alex hale    Jan 3, 01:15 PM    #

72. B11-man, This is the language that I do not accept nor do I appreciate that by stating the principle that “people have the right to fight occupation by any means inside or outside the occupied territories” brands me a terrorism supporter. In the same token, I would say since you support Israel as a state that was established by terrorism (Begin and Shamir were considered by the British as terrorists and now you support this Israeli aggression in killing civilians, innocents, children, etc, brands you terrorism supports as well. No one can convince me that what Israel is doing or has done in its history of wars and military operations is not terrorism. It is the ultimate terrorism. Only, the Palestinian people know the degree of the Israeli terrorism. Building settlements on Palestinian land, establishing checkpoints and limited time to cross checkpoints, limiting the freedom of the people to move within their country, is the ultimate terrorism. Occupation is the ultimate terrorism. Israel does not represent the Jewish conscious. One day the Jewish conscious will wake up and stand up against this aggression and realize that what Israel is doing is a black point in the history of the Jewish people. The majority of the Arabs consider Israel as a terrorist state so, according to such label this brands you a terrorism supporter. This language has to be cut out of our vocabulary. The main issue is who is occupying who?

    Occupation is the root cause of all military aggression regardless who is doing it. So, ending the occupation is the basis of peace.

    — Bob Youssef    Jan 3, 01:37 PM    #

73. First of all, I think that as academics, we ought to be as distressed by the bombing of homes and mosques as we are by educational institutions, but I don’t think that diminishes Gordon and Halper’s argument any. I do find objectionable the arguments made by b-11man and Beck and others that seem to absolve Israel of any responsibility for the starvation and desperation that have driven many who would ordinarily oppose Hamas on ideological terms to support it or at least sympathize with their more immediate aims. For many years, moderate Palestinian grassroots organizing was suppressed by the Israeli authorities, while Hamas was encouraged, so it is a bit rich to hear the pious denunciations of their “creed” and their popular appeal, after both clandestine and overt efforts to undermine any viable multi-denominational Palestinian leadership. Hamas provided an alternative infrastructure within Palestinian comunities whose institutions were more often than not strangled or eroded by Israeli policies. Many Palestinians and others have made these arguments while simlutaneously acknowledging Palestinian responsibility for the current situation, so to claim that Palestinian sympathizers are not self-critical is disingenuous to say the least. As with the questions of the Israeli use of force and the armed resistance, the question of proportion is crucial. With one of the best-equipped and most sophisticated military forces in the world, and other resources at their disposal that far surpass anything the Palestinian population has, the claims of “violence on both sides” , as though every Israeli action is met with an equal and opposed Palestinian reaction (or vice-versa) are ludicrous in their distortion of the facts on the ground.
    Further, do policies and practices inherited from the Nazis need to mirror their history exactly for our vocal opposition to them to be justified?

    — Victoria    Jan 3, 01:54 PM    #

74. Victoria: your last line regarding the “policies and practices inherited from the nazis” is obviously a reference to the fact that you will stand in “vocal opposition” to the genocidal statements of islamic people around the world, especially since screaming for the “death of the Jews” is as nazi as one can get. You will also raise your voice against the murder of those, such as Theo van Gogh, whose “crime” was to speak out against the theology of facist muslims who tell us every day that they just don’t seek the “death of Israel,” but also the “death of America” and anyone, such as Salman Rushdie, who opposes their insane beliefs. Isn’t that what what you meant about opposition being “justified,” or have we missed the last few years of history or so? You will also decry the fact that mosques are used to hide weapons and that homes are used by islamic terrorists to ensure civilian casualties cannot be avoided. Of course, once children have outlived their purpose by being paraded dead in the streets, the islamic terrorist can then don his third of fourth wife’s burqa so he can escape justice in it. In fact, in regard to the headline to this article, where’s the “academic outrage” against these crimes against humanity?

    — simeon    Jan 3, 02:57 PM    #

75. Bob (#73):

    Please read what you wrote. You said (and then repeated) “people have the right to fight occupation by any means inside or outside the occupied territories”. Do you not see the import of your own words? Any means. Not any reasonable means. Not any means within the realm of morality. You said any means. And you said any place, both within and outside the territories. Thus, the 9-11 bombings in New York were, by your statement, justified. The downing of the Pan Am flight was justified. The killing of the old man in a wheelchair on the cruise ship justified. The killing of the Jewish journalist in Pakistan, justified. The bombing of the Chabad House in Mumbai a few weeks ago, justified. Get it now? I know you can’t possible mean that, but that’s what you said and I therefore had no choice but to say that such a statement brands you as a terrorism supporter.

    And to state “Building settlements on Palestinian land, establishing checkpoints and limited time to cross checkpoints, limiting the freedom of the people to move within their country, is the ultimate terrorism. Occupation is the ultimate terrorism.” as you did is to illustrate my point that many Palestinians cannot see beyond their own situation in a clearer way than I ever could. Equating settlements, checkpoints, and restrictions on movement with deliberate targeted murder of civilians. Can’t you see what you’re saying?

    — b11-man    Jan 3, 03:54 PM    #

76. What many do not understand is that each side is certain that the other side is out to exterminate it. Many in the states who have no experience outside the fuzzy womb of America have no understanding of these peoples’ fears—nor how reasonable there fears can be.

    Simeon: Your comments about Muslims are simply racist, as are others who express the false sentiment that Muslim = intolerant + evil + cowardly.

    B11-man: I suppose it would be ok if some vagrant were to pitch a tent on your front yard? (Assume that there are no police around to force the removal of that tent.)
    Moreover, your argument fails to distinguish between the morally justified and the psychologically explainable. There is no contradiction in the proposition that a cause just, but the means used to achieve that cause is to be abhorred.

    — jon    Jan 3, 04:21 PM    #

77. Jon (#76), I like your analogy.

    If a vagrant pitches a tent on my front yard, and I respond by firing a missile at him and try kill him (or perhaps at the house next door and try to kill them), and when the police come by, say to them “Well, hey—he was on my land—thus any action I took was justified”, how far will I get? Who would say that the two actions could be equated?

    By the way—when did I say that Hamas’ actions weren’t psychologically explainable? I said they couldn’t be morally justified.

    — b11-man    Jan 3, 04:40 PM    #

78. b11-man

    So, let them stay there. You missed my point because you ignored my condition that there was no impartial judge to mediate—the police were explicitly excluded from this thought experiment. So what would you do if there were no police to call?

    If you understood that the Palestinian actions were psychologically explainable then you would want to consider how to mitigate or alleviate the perceived source of the aggravation.

    — jon    Jan 3, 04:56 PM    #

79. Jon (#78),

    I didn’t ignore your condition of not calling the police to force the vagrant away. I didn’t call them—I fired a missile, remember? And asked, implicitly, was it justifiable for me to have done so, and how would police respond when they came afterwards, perhaps long afterwards.

    How to mitigate or alleviate the perceived source of the aggravation? Hmm….well, to alleviate it, I would have withdrawn from Gaza and seen what happened. If the results were good (i.e., people working to build a state), I might have withdrawn from the northern third of the west bank and seen what happened next. Oh yeah, I forgot. Isn’t that what Israel did?

    If the results were bad (missiles fired at my civilians, etc.), I might not be inclined to continue the exercise.

    — b11-man    Jan 3, 05:09 PM    #

80. Let me make it clear:

    It was assumed that the police did not exist at the time of the incident. Thus, you and the squatter were in a state of nature— i.e there was no one to appeal to in resolving the dispute between you and the squatter.

    The police, or magistrate, has no legitimate authority to pronounce judgments about incidents that occurred before the institutions establishing that authority were established. I am taking about ``ex post facto’‘ laws.

    To get your head wrapped around this—look at the writings of Hobbes and Locke.

    Hamas has made it clear about their conditions for stopping the rockets—open the borders. As you should know, the economic welfare of those in the Gaza is based in part on this factor.

    This is my last post on this—
    I am wasting my time as I did when arguing with WWII veterans about the justifiability of the Viet Nam War

    — jon    Jan 3, 05:34 PM    #

81. You show me a knee-jerk, anti-Israeli, anti-jew Palestinian apologist, and I’ll show you a person who is being greatly influenced by Satan. Satan hates Israel too.

    — Red State University    Jan 3, 06:31 PM    #

82. to 81: As if Satan Exists

    — jon    Jan 3, 06:32 PM    #

83. Simeon,

    Your assumption that my criticism of Israeli policies and practices somehow disables me from criticizing any other genocidal or fascist statement is simplistic and silly. What makes you think that any critic of Israeli policies and practices (this latter is important, as these go way beyond rhetoric) is necessarily hypocritical, or worse, a cheerleader for those who call for the “death of Israel”? Many human rights activists within Israel and in the international community would find this logic laughable, but for the fact that it is so often used to silence any constructive dissent or criticism.

    — Victoria Sams    Jan 3, 08:06 PM    #

84. Israel is founded on a racist ideology: Zionism. Read What Price Israel? by Alfred M. Lilienthal, a wise jewish scholar. Israel justifies its existence for jewish people by creating anti-semitism against diaspora jews, so that they can leave western societies and come back to Palestine. This explains the logic of endless war that the Israeli state pursues against its weak Arab neighbors.

    — Sam    Jan 3, 08:21 PM    #

85. Sam (#84), let me see if I have this straight. Israel carries out some action that a citizen of Pottsylvania abhors. That citizen then burns down the home of some local Pottsylvanian Jew. By your reckoning (or perhaps yours and Lilienthal’s), Israel is responsible for creating the anti-semitism (by having carried out the action), and thus responsible for the Pottsylvanian’s action? Or are you saying that Israel somehow paid off our Pottsylvanian pal to do this to further their nefarious goal of getting Pottsylvanian Jews to move to Israel? The argument really doesn’t make sense either way, does it? Or do you somehow see Israel’s actions as being the equivalent of “entrapment” for the Pottsylvanian—he just couldn’t help himself, and never would have done such a thing if Israel didn’t exist?

    — b11-man    Jan 3, 09:12 PM    #

86. Victoria: then let’s see you open your mouth and decry the racist ideology of islam, or are you afraid to do so, or only find it “laughable.” What is your comment regarding this statement by hamas (or are you afraid to comment for fear of reprisal)?

    “For the Palestinian people, death has become an industry

    In which excel the women and all the people of this land:

    The older people excel, the jihadists excel

    And the children excel

    Consequently, [the Palestinians] created a human shield of women, children

    Older people and jihadists

    Against the Zionist bombing machine

    That is telling the Zionist enemy

    We want death just as much as you desire life.”

    Since you claim to not be “disabled,” let’s hear you decry this sickness as much as you “criticize Israeli policies and practices.” Or,Victoria, is it just too “simplistic and silly” for you to lend your academic voice against the culture of death called islam? Where is your “constructive dissent or criticism” here? Or are you just silent and a hypocrite in the face of how women are treated in islamic society? Let’s see, when do you plan to bring your enlightening “criticism” to iran, saudi arabia or other cultures that decry Israeli “policies and practices” as you do? Let’s hear your voice for the freedom of women in oppressed countries where female mutilation is a practice of hindus, catholics, buddhists, jews; oh, I’m sorry, they don’t practice female mutilation. It seems the only place this occurs is in a culture where islam is embraced. But don’t worry, Victoria, your sisters in the islamic world love that you condemn Israel while they suffer humiliation at the hands of islamic supremacists. Yes, Victoria, your focus is on life; life for those who suppress anyone who does not believe their insanity. You go, girl!

    From a firsthand observer, unlike you Victoria:

    “I’ve been to a Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank, where children are born into abject poverty and hopelessness. Forget what’s taught in their “schools,” it’s the refugees that do most of the dirty work. They are pawns of their own people with no real chance of an education or escape; their lives spent immersed in chilling anti-U.S. and anti-Israel, anti-Semitic propoganda. The culture of victimhood there makes our own “victims” look like amateur pretenders. They are taught to believe they are chosen by God and that he unequivocally does NOT value all of his children equally, and to act out through violence is their only answer and only resort. They learn not to fear death, but to embrace it and welcome it as a release from the circumstances in which they live. Listening to a refugee tell us why the U.S. is pure evil and Israel must be destroyed while she held her little boy on her lap was one of the most eye-opening and chilling experiences of my lifetime. I was in college at the time – it was one of things that pushed me right. Peace “talks” will never work. I knew then what I know now, that you cannot “talk” to people and come to some sort of accord or agreement when the core philosophy of their psyches is so diametrically opposite of ours in the West. How do you “talk” with people who don’t have a single shared value, one common core interest, and who don’t value life, theirs or anyone else’s, and who have nothing to live for except to be a continual pawn in some sort of sick game? How do you really live in peace with mothers and fathers who hope that their children will bring glory to their family by becoming suicide bombers?”

    I hope I am not silencing “any constructive dissent or criticism here” on your part, am I Victoria? Because, surely Victoria, you could “assume” that you can openly make any statement you want in an islamic society, correct; or am I “assuming” too much?

    And jon, I’m glad you made your last comment (#80 vs. #82); how many do you intend to make? And I find it “racist” that you do not believe in “satan”; after all, the islamics do.

    — simeon    Jan 3, 09:14 PM    #

87. Well, it didn’t take long for the Satan-inspired to make themselves known. Jon is in Satan’s hip pocket and Sam is parroting his influence beautifully.

    Who you support in this conflict has a lot to do with your general spiritual disposition. It filters what you believe and what you ignore about the facts. For example, Since Islam is a satanically created and maintained religion, I would expect the majority of their practitioners to hate Israel and to ignore all of Israel’s very good reasons for defending itself.

    — Red State University    Jan 3, 09:24 PM    #

88. The main question here is how do we, as academics, feel about a military organization bombing a university. Based on the overall tenor of these comments, it appears that we can be quite understanding of military bombing of universities, if said destruction of university property is put into proper context. It’s great that we academics can be so open-minded.

    — Back to the subject    Jan 4, 12:38 AM    #

89. The real question is Zionism. Here is Alfred M. Lilienthal“s book What Price Israel? on the Internet: http://tinyurl.com/77b3kw

    — sam    Jan 4, 01:19 AM    #

90. Where was the outrage by Nave Gordon and Jeff Halper on the bombing of Sapir college in Sderot, and the attempted bombing of Ben Gurion university, two places where I teach? (appropriately named grads fell all around the main campus. Perhaps they merely meant to kill non-students, who knows?)
    The two authors are so pro-Palestinian that they will turn a blind eye to anything, if done from their adopted camp. I don’t understand their psyche at all, but there you are.
    I am happy that their claim was discussed cogently by so many on this list – thank you.

    — David    Jan 4, 12:10 PM    #

91. Simeon,

    I really do not like the personalized bent that this conversation is taking, but as you’ve replied to my response to the statements in your post by constantly directing your remarks to some version of myself that you have concocted in your fevered imagination, then I must try, somehow, to bring this exchange back to reality. I do not think that the discussion of Israeli conduct in Gaza (the focus of this thread) demands the kind of response that you suggest. As critical as I am of anti-Semitism or misogyny or racial injustice or homophobia, I do not conflate the invocations of Islam or Catholocisim or Hinduism marshalled in defense of such views with the spiritual beliefs or with all adherents of those religions. I won’t raise my voice in criticism of such rhetoric and practices here simply because you demand that of me in ignorance of what I have done and said in my life. I do not make assumptions about your background or perspective, and I will not resort to emotionally manipulative arguments based on uneducated guesses as to what you have experienced in your life, or for that matter to those based on what I have experienced in mine. The arguments stand or fall on their own merits. I don’t celebrate the fact that Hamas’ hand is only being strenghthened by the policies of Israel and the US that led to these attacks and by the ferocity of this latest Gaza invasion, much as Hezbollah’s was strengthened in Lebanon. This is not something in which I take delight, and I don’t think that criticizing Israeli actions precludes one from working for reform and social justice within Palestinian institutions or elsewhere in the Arab world. It’s called multitasking, and it’s not ethically inconsistent. My criticisms of Israeli government policies do not take the form of attacks on Judaism as a religion, nor do they deny the admirable work being done by many Israeli NGOs and individuals. By the same token, acknowledging the rights of Palestinians to elect their own government (and election widely supported by the international community) without immediate economic/political reprisals and military intervention is not the same as embracing all tenets of Hamas’ ideology.

    — Victoria    Jan 4, 12:28 PM    #

92. Victoria: the reason you don’t like the personalized conversation here is because you can’t seem to come to grips to publicly decry the evils inherent in islam and the very charter of hamas itself. You seem only capable of boring rhetoric. Your statement that you don’t “think the discussion of Israeli conduct in Gaza demands the kind of response you suggest” shows how incapable you are of bringing to the debate the reasons for this war, since it is not the conduct of Israel that is the cause but the conduct of islamic believers who wish to subjugate the entire world and destroy Israel. While you close your eyes to their conduct and condemn the victim, which is Israel in this case, you are causing more harm and giving aid and comfort to an enemy of us all. You think you can have it your way, Victoria, but you can’t. To criticize one action, the invasion of Gaza, one must get to the root cause and that root cause is the actions of hamas, its charter and islamic terrorist acts. So if you can’t publicly criticize them, then don’t bother to give us your one-sided junk and then claim in some other world you are fair and balanced and then cry about the “personalized bent” because someone dared to challenge your viewpoint and point out its bias. And don’t forget, Victoria, the people of the Confederate States elected their own government just before the Civil War; so did the German people just before World War II. These elections also saw support of the international community for their own political and economic purposes. Therefore, the Palestinian “people,” have the right to elect their own government, demonstrate in support of it in large rallies as they did the Sunday before Israeli military action, and then, which is something you fail to understand, they also have the right TO SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES for supporting that government, as did the South and nazi Germany.

    — simeon    Jan 4, 04:40 PM    #

93. Simeon,
    If you consider your response a “challenge” to my argument, then I can live with that. Sorry to bore you with my rhetoric, but I really was not hoping you’d be entertained. Your rhetoric, on the other hand, is not only predictable but also hateful. You seem to ascribe evil motives to everyone who disagrees with you. We disagree about root causes and about justice, which apparently makes me blindly uncritical and you omniscient. You want me to confirm your opinion of the “evils inherent in Islam” and blur the distinction between statements made in the name of Islam and the religion itself. I won’t do that, any more than I would blur the distinction between the racist actions of Jewish settlers and the religion of Judaism. I’m not crying, I’m just disagreeing with your remarks. Deal with it.

    — Victoria Sams    Jan 4, 05:38 PM    #

94. Interesting that you find my rhetoric “hateful,” but only see a “blur” in the “distinction between statements made in the name of islam and the religion itself.” It shows you obviously are not aware of islam’s teachings. So I will easily deal with your disagreement as long as you can deal with the consequences the Gazans have to deal with because of their government’s and religions’s hateful rhetoric.

    — simeon    Jan 4, 06:40 PM    #

95. Victoria,
    I am confused by your position. Please understand that I am opposed to ALL support of Isreal as I am opposed to ALL support of all foreign governments including Egypt. (Forgive me, I actually read the Constitution and don’t support most forms of Federal Taxation). All of that said, I think we would both agree that (1) the Hamas is an elected government of Gaza. (2) Hamas has rejected/abdicated previous agreements made by the PLO/Fathwa faction when it ran Gaza that recognized Isreal’s right to exist (3) Hamas began launching or allowing the launching of rockets towards territory of Isreal.

    In all seriousness, what do you expect Isreal to do? I hate the fact that my tax money is supporting Isreal’s aggression. That said, if Mexico allows idiots to launch rockets into Dallas, rest assured, Baark Obama will leave every village destroyed and no factory functioning or he will be the ex-president of the USA. What is your proposal?

    Steve.\

    — Steve    Jan 5, 12:28 AM    #

96. Concerned Jewish-American, Vitoria and Child of Palestinian parents,
    I laud your sensitive and balanced comments. It is people like you who can give peace a chance.

    Steve, your comments are baffling. Do you really mean that if someone in Mexico launched a rocket towards Dallas, you want the US to kill every child, women and men in Mexico (as well destroy all those US owned factories there?). You definitely sound like a believer in arbitrary punishment rather than in individual justice…

    — Kati    Jan 5, 11:22 PM    #

97. In the real-world, being anti-Jew is not politically good because of the Jewish vote. No civil servants from the CIA analyst to the State Department countyr desk officer is going to tell to the policymakers for Israel to stop this or that. Historians and political scientists need to understand that ideology and politics is more involved in the real-world in DC than I-can-said-whatI want-to academia.

    — Michael    Jan 6, 10:30 AM    #

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