Why Max Blumenthal's video is important
Tons of people have commented on Max Blumenthal's video from Jerusalem. It's about time that Adam Horowitz and I, who run Mondoweiss, offer our views of the matter. My response is bound to be positive, because it created more traffic for our site than anything in our history (certainly anything I've posted!). That said, here is why his video is important journalism: because it reveals an essential component of Israeli and Zionist society that has largely been covered up.
You can argue about Blumenthal's method all night long. I won't be there for that argument. Is the video somewhat sensational? Of course. But the views expressed are shocking, and, while they are obviously cherrypicked, they are representative of a real current in Israeli society; and a journalist who is on to something important should have the freedom to highlight shocking stuff. That's how journalism works. You don't show readers your out-takes.
Does drunkenness matter? Not really. It didn't exonerate Mel Gibson. And as to the comparison to the frat boys that Sacha Baran Cohen set up on his bus in Borat, plying them with liquor, imagine if Cohen had been touring the south during the days of segregation and had produced such film, would anyone have objected? Of course not. Jim Crow needed to be explained by exploring the underlying racist attitudes. The cruel Israeli occupation, which is so utterly contemptuous of Palestinian existence, must also be explained; and these attitudes explain it.
As to the revelation, Americans have been in denial about Israel's character for decades now. Bob Simon pulled the veil back in his 60 Minutes report on the hateful occupation earlier this year; and of course Gaza demonstrated utter disdain for Palestinian life on the part of the Israeli military. Blumenthal has now done his part to show that murderous racism is a real current in Israeli society, and among the American Zionists who rally to Israel. The shocking quality of his video may be a rhetorical necessity: in bringing the news home to Americans in a way that so many reasonable blogposts have failed to do. Blumenthal may even be a game-changer.
The rage at the video is evidence of the denial about Israeli extremism that has pervaded the American discourse forever. I am reading Benny Morris's One State, Two State, published by Yale Press. It includes endless descriptions of Arab violence, Arab assassinations. The fact that a rightwing settler killed Yitzhak Rabin, amid a festival of threats toward Rabin from the right, is glossed; and while Chaim Arlosoroff, an early Zionist, is cited by Morris for his binationalism, the author declines to say that Arlosoroff was murdered by rightwing Zionists. As he fails to say that the Stern Gang took out UN negotiator Folke Bernadotte in 1948. Or that rightwingers killed Jacob de Haan, a Dutch anti-Zionist who met with Arabs.
So the murderous feelings in Blumenthal's video have a long pedigree.
A friend objected that these are kids from West Orange and Bethesda. I don't see the point. Zionism has always depended on Americans; and if you look at Netanyahu's braintrust, there are many Americans who were called to Israel: Ron Dermer, Dore Gold, and Michael Oren. And who are these Americans who are called to Israel? They are Americans who don't especially believe in minority rights, but like Oren, speak of the demographic threat that Arabs pose to the Jewish majority in Israel. They are Jewish nationalists.
That seems to me the largest point of the video. Who is Israel calling to in the age of Obama? To creeps. Watching this video, even I have sympathy for Israel. We're a long way from '67, when idealistic Jews were mobilized by Israel. Now it's purely the ethnocentric. A Jewish anti-Zionist friend of mine says he has a policy, No Jew left behind. He means that even as he opposes Israeli policies, he wants to look out for the Jews. I feel the same kind of tribal loyalty. Jews have made a terrible error in Israel by fostering racist policies; and it will require the vigorous efforts of enlightened American Jews to save them. Blumenthal's video is a wake-up call.
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Read Mondoweiss here.
"It's about time that Adam Horowitz and I, who run this site, offer our views of the matter."
When did you guys start running this site?
June 11, 2009 12:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Crossposting/RSS feed flaw. Thanks for catching and pointing it out - fixed!
June 11, 2009 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Because of the overwhelming responses to the Blumenthal video on mondoweiss, Phil and Adam have had to change tactics and moderate comments.
They had a flood of comments that mirror the vocalizations in the video and worse.
Given the time involved in sorting through the piles of vile shit that can become the lingua franca when it comes to discussions of this nature, the failure to edit properly may have been overlooked.
June 11, 2009 3:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's about time that Adam Horowitz and I, who run this site, offer our views of the matter. My response is bound to be positive, because it created more traffic for this site than anything in our history (certainly anything I've posted!)
If someone offers you space on their website to copy posts from your own, common courtesy would be that you edit the post to make that clear to the readers. Your method of "let's just slap a copy onto TPMCafe," without any recognition that this ia a separate audience, is kind of insulting to the audience here. The message is that we are not worth a few minutes editing so that your post makes sense.
June 11, 2009 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is happening more and more around here. I'd really prefer it if the featured posters were really trying to reach us and not just... well... anyone who will listen.
June 11, 2009 12:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Artappraiser,
Trust me when I say that Mr. Weiss regards the Cafe audience very highly. We have automatic feeds set up so that every post does not have to be cross-entered manually. This one (obviously) went up before I had a chance to catch the mistake - but it's fixed now. Thanks for pointing it out, and please don't feel insulted!
June 11, 2009 12:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, nevermind, I see it was in the process of being edited; apologies for the quick trigger.
June 11, 2009 12:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
I mostly agree, but have two quibbles. First, while this kind of thinking needs to be exposed, making it seem more common than it is will merely replace one kind of stereotyped thinking with another. Second, who says idealistic Americans aren't called to Israel anymore? We know that certain currents in Israel call to the creeps - which they always have, believe me - but that doesn't exclude different aspects of Israeli society calling to other kinds of people. Are the American supporters of Meretz USA, Peace Now, the New Israel Fund, the Abraham Fund and similar organizations not called? Is it not a calling to recognize the ideals of Israel along with its flaws and to fight to make it conform to those ideals? We should certainly not deny the murderous racism - we should fight it with every fiber of our being - but should also not deny the call to humanity.
June 11, 2009 12:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jonathan, I think many or most of us would be happy if groups like my own favorite--B'Tselem--received much more publicity than they do. I'd also like publicity given to peaceful protests conducted jointly by Israelis and Palestinians.
I think, though, that the ugly sentiments on display in this video also deserve much more attention in the US, if only because most people already know that anti-semitic feeling is widespread in the Arab world. It's only fair for people to realize there's plenty of racism on both sides of the divide.
June 11, 2009 1:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree totally with what you say. My problem was with Philip Weiss' statement that Israel called to the enlightened Jews in 1967 but calls to the racist creeps now. The fact is that it called to the creeps even then, and still calls to the idealists now. The parts of Israel that have fostered both callings have always been there.
I object to the kind of compartmentalized thinking that says "pre-1967 Israel good, modern Israel bad." In fact, I find that thinking especially ironic given that Israel is in many ways a more just society now than in 1967. Back then, the Arab towns and urban neighborhoods had only been out from under military administration for a year, the courts were supine about protecting minority rights, and there were no laws against racial discrimination. Now, Arab towns and cities elect their own administrations, there are laws on the books against discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodation, and since the Aharon Barak judicial revolution of the 1990s, the courts have vigorously enforced the rights of minorities. Moreover, in contrast to the quasi-Kemalist attitudes of the 1950s and 1960s which sought to forge all Jews into a new society remade in the Ashkenazic image, there is now much more tolerance and recognition of differences between Jewish communities.
There are of course other trends in Israel that aren't so good - the rise of Lieberman and other race-baiters in mainstream politics, the subversion of the welfare state by Thatcherite economics and diversion of funds to the settlements, and of course the overriding issue of the occupation. But let's not pretend that the trends are all one way or that Israel has fallen from some lost golden age. There was never a golden age, there was always racism and division, and there were always - and still are now - those who battle against same.
June 11, 2009 1:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here's the thing... it isn't shocking.
The hatred between Palestine and Isreal and Isreali's disdain for the US is not 'shocking' it's been going on for 'ages'. So this video is really isn't introducing anything of value in my perspective. We could show film all day long of the hatred on both sides and find some hatred for the U.S. and mix it in there... it isn't informing us of anything new. And I don't find the way the video was created.. in asking people coming out of bars etc. to express their feelings about something that had not taken place yet... really worth a lot of attention.
June 11, 2009 12:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Anti-Zionism and "No Jew Left Behind" are mutually exclusive.
Any attempt to coddle the needs/desires of supremacist, religious fanatics will require a softening/surrendering of anti-Zionist actions.
Around here, we already see a desire to soften the "Halt all settlement activity immediately" stance taken by Obama, because fellow tribe members are already freaking out.
People rationalize this giving in to Yahu by saying, "Let's take this fight off the front pages, and include these discussions as part of a larger framework where final borders are included."
It's just another cop out, and spineless progressive Jews in America have been as large an impediment to M.E. peace as the American Zionist mentality shown in the "feeling the hate" video.
Dragging the settlers to anything remotely resembling the 1967 borders will incite a civil war.
If you, Phillip Weiss, convince yourself that Israel shouldn't settle with the Palestinians because of that civil war among Jews, you ultimately will have Palestinian blood on your hands.
You ultimately can't be pro-peace and anti-Israeli civil war these days, and convincing yourself you can teach coddled fanatics not to act like vicious, spoiled children is a major delusion.
Why does the religion of murderous supremacists trigger more tribal instincts in you than courageous just peace supporters of all creeds and ethnicities?
Anti-Semites assume that all Jews look out for their own, regardless of the ethical ramifications of doing so, at the expense of the rest of humanity.
By placing a high value your "tribal loyalty," and convincing yourself that "enlightened American Jews" can convince fanatics to disobey a God that wants them to re-claim land by any means necessary, is very bad.
It sets you up to not fight 100% for a just peace as fast as possible, and everybody seems to believe that the window of opportunity is small.
Do the global community a favor and please reconsider your tribal alliances. And convince as many "Enlightened American Jews" as you possibly can to do the same.
June 11, 2009 1:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Who said "The middleground is where the two extremes fight their battles."
Though I'm sure you're advocating for purity of purpose, I fail to see the diffrence between an 'extreme' peacenik wanting all 'extreme' warmongers dead.
Boolean logic often mascerades as a mechanism for truth, but ultimately it denies all the contradictions and shades of gray that are the essence of humanity -- human instinct is illogical.
To my mind, it is because of tribal loyalties that people will eventually free themselves from mindless bigotry, and find their tribal interests best served as part of the fabric of humanity.
June 11, 2009 2:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
In the spirit of enlightenment about just how representative Max Blumenthal's video actually is, here is an article in The Nation by Neve Gordon describing Netanyahu's staged media manipulation of the difficulty of dismantling the settlements. In particular, a settler leader is interviewed on Israeli television about dismantlement of the settlements:
When the reporter inquires what the settlers will do if a nearby outpost is dismantled, Araleh exclaims that they (the government) will not destroy it, and then adds "they might destroy a little shack in the outpost to send pictures to the nigger in the United States."
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090629/gordon
June 11, 2009 2:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
"the freedom to highlight shocking stuff"
Is it that shocking in this case?
While I support editing, the freedom to edit comes with a responsibility to put the highlights in a proper context. This is a significant failure of what passes for journalism in the modern age (not that it wasn't significant otherwise). People take sensational or "shocking" sound bites and video clips and build a case to support an agenda. Those agendas are seldom close to pure, unless we mean "pure" in the sense of "pure bullshit" (not that the video here was pure bullshit even if some of the actors in it were bullshitting for their own reasons).
The video aired some dirty laundry. I think you have a point about the negative reactions being a sign of aggressive denial. But we don't really know just how prevalent (breadth and depth) what is expressed in the video really is. So it's fair for some to reject it as superficial sensationalism.
June 11, 2009 6:05 PM | Reply | Permalink