My friend and once-in-a-while journalistic collaborator, Larry Cohler-Esses, has just accepted the number 2 job of assistant managing editor at The Forward. He’ll be leaving Jewish Week and starting his new position on December 1st.  This is part of the changing of the guard at the Forward, which involved J.J. Goldberg stepping down recently to be replaced by Jane Eisner.

Larry is one of the truly great Jewish investigative reporters (there aren’t many).  Unlike the writing of most Jewish journalists, his stories are deeply sourced and reported.  He probes the big issues and doesn’t pull punches as so many do (take that, JTA!).

This is a wonderful promotion for Larry.  And it will make a good newspaper even better.

To be perfectly candid, I criticize The Forward along with other Jewish publications when their journalism is lacking.  The former isn’t perfect.  In fact, sometimes it drives me around the bend (a case in point is its acceptance of Republican Jewish Coalition anti-Obama smear ads).  But despite this, The Forward is one of the best national Jewish papers.  And Larry will make it even better I expect.

So mazel tov, Larry. You deserve it.

In an otherwise disdainful and painfully partisan profile of Norman Finkelstein written by Jewish Week reporter Stewart Ain, Norman Finkelstein reveals that he plans to meet with Israeli consular officials in September to get an undertaking from them that he will be allowed to enter Israel should he attempt to do so (he was recently deported by Israel due to his outspoken criticism of its policies):

Finkelstein is preparing for what may be his biggest fight, albeit one he doesn’t relish. He plans to go to the Israeli Consulate in New York in September to seek an assurance that he will be admitted in December. Such assurance, he said, would allow all concerned to “avoid the spectacle of me applying under the Law of Return [which gives every Jew the automatic right to acquire Israeli citizenship]. … It’s hard to see which side will find that more ridiculous.

“I don’t incite riots,” he continued. “I’m just going to see a friend in the occupied Palestinian territories. I’m not there to see Israel. I do not need for every facet of my life to be politicized. If Israeli authorities would just grant me a visa, I’ll move on.”

Finkelstein said he hopes to visit a Palestinian, Musa Abu Hashhash, who lives with his wife and children near Hebron. They first met in 1988 when Finkelstein went to Israel with a delegation from the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee and Finkelstein dedicated one of his books to the man, who works for B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group.  He stressed that his visit to Israel would be a “private” affair and that he had “no interest in turning this into a political issue. … I don’t think they can deny me, and I don’t want to turn it into a test case for the Israeli High Court.”

If they refuse, and Finkelstein invokes the Law of Return and takes Israeli citizenship, it would no longer be possible to prevent him from visiting the country. I just wonder whether the IDF, in a fit of pique, will call him up for miluim (reserve duty). Then you’d have the added spectacle of the Israel critic refusing to serve and then being jailed as a seruvnik (refuser). Of course, all of this is doubtful since I don’t believe the army calls you for duty unless you’re physically in the country; and as someone who never served in any army I can’t see that he’d be much use to the IDF, even as a mere reservist.  But I’d never underestimate the willingness of the IDF and intelligence establishment to punish its critics.

There would be a delicious irony here: the Shin Bet attempts to make Finkelstein persona non grata in punishment for his outspokenness against Israeli policy toward the Arabs.  Finkelstein then one-ups them by becoming an Israeli citizen, a prospect that’s got to fill them with revulsion.  So which is worse: allowing Finkelstein to visit his friend in the West Bank unfettered?  Or standing on sordid principle and forcing your worst nightmare to become one of you?

Returning to the issue of Ain’s antagonism for his subject.  Let’s take but a single sentence out of an entire diatribe concealed as a piece of journalism:

No more loyal students, no more lectures to prepare, no more radio debates with his arch-enemy, Alan Dershowitz, no more national spotlight; Finkelstein is the man no one wants, and perhaps for good reason.

Just because Finkelstein doesn’t currently teach doesn’t mean he has no “loyal students.”  In fact, he has thousands of students he has taught who feel tremendous loyalty to him.  And while he may have no more college lectures to prepare, Finkelstein continues to lecture around the country.  In fact, he just spoke here in Seattle at the University of Washington Hillel.

It is yet another presumptuous statement to claim Finkelstein “has no more national spotlight” since his books are as relevant and as quoted as ever.  He continues to be an important part of the Jewish discourse on all the subjects about which he’s written including the Holocaust and Israel.

If Finkelstein is the “man no one wants,” then why did Ain want to interview him?  Why did a documentary filmmaker spend several years making American Radical about the former college professor; a film which promises to make a big splash when it is released.  The very statement is ludicrous.

I find it demeaning that Ain would ask Finkelstein whether, in his inability to secure college teaching work, he considered becoming a high school teacher; and it is unconscionable that Ain repeated the scurrilous Dershowitz charge that Finkelstein’s mother, an Auschwitz survivor, was a kapo.  How can Ain or his editors countenance such calumnies?  Did the reporter not research the collaboration charge by visiting Finkelstein’s website to see the powerful rebuttal he wrote?  And if he had, how could he possibly have found asking such a question to be in good taste?

Reading the profile I felt deeply embarrassed for Finkelstein that he should be treated so shabbily by the Jewish press.  This is yet another example of the parochialism and partisan nature of Jewish communal journalism in the face of controversial subjects related to Israel.

It’s not often one gets mentioned in The New Yorker as my blog did today, so I’m wearing a small intellectual glow. I used to read the magazine religiously back when I was a literature major in college and grad school. I read it from cover to cover. I can still remember vividly profiles by John McPhee and Pauline Kael’s remarkable film reviews. I’m trippin’.

Jane Kramer writes a long article, The Petition: Israel, Palestine, and a Tenure Battle at Barnard, about Nadia Abu El Haj’s ultimately successful battle for tenure at Barnard College. It profiles her anthropological research and the pro-Israel detractors who made her tenure process a cause celebre for the Israel-First crowd. Many of you know that I devoted considerable time, energy and words to this subject before she earned tenure. I thought a gross injustice was being perpetrated by the Campus Watch-Frontpagemagazine crowd and that the Barnard anthropologist deserved someone monitoring the campaign against her, which was what I did.

Kramer notes that this blog was one of the first to take up the cause, something of which I’m very proud:

Stern’s facts were wrong. Within a few months, she was exposed in the progressive Zionist blog Tikun Olam and in the Jewish press–most notably in the Jewish Week…

She goes on to credit Larry Cohler-Esses’ work there in unmasking Stern’s vilification and falsehoods. I’m also proud of the teamwork between myself and Cohler-Esses which advanced this story, though I want to make clear that Larry did all his own research and drew his own conclusions. Hell, he even spent 10 days wading through Facts on the Ground for which he deserves a medal since it is a VERY DENSE text. Even I didn’t do that.

Kramer doesn’t note the critical role played by Jesse Walker of Reason Magazine. While I was already interested in Abu El Haj’s battle, Jesse first brought to my attention the deliberate misquotations of the academic’s work by her opponents. This in turn opened up the subject in a way it might not have otherwise done. Jesse published his research in his publication.

The New Yorker story is interesting not just for its recap of the tenure battle, but because the author puts that battle in the context of a furious tug of war taking place in higher education over academic freedom and the right of third party advocacy groups to intervene in the tenure process and inject political considerations into scholarly discourse.

I never thought of this analogy until just now, but it appears to me that what Campus Watch and Paula Stern did was akin to the Terry Schiavo circus. In the latter case, a group of religious fanatics with a vested interest attempted to intervene in both a personal family tragedy and a medical process out of which they should’ve kept their noses. Their effort demeaned the family involved and dragged the field of medicine into a political arena in which it had no business being. I’d argue that the Schiavo fiasco contributed significantly to the Republican defeat in the 2006 elections.

The Abu El Haj detractors have paid no such price. In fact, they’ve gone on to new targets of opportunity in their propaganda battle on behalf of Israel. But articles like Kramer’s and efforts like mine help shine a light on such smearmongering so that it may be discredited even more firmly the next time it rears its ugly head.

I thought one particular section of Kramer’s essay was particularly evocative and helpful in understanding the political motivations of Abu El Haj’s opponents. Here she quotes Jonathan Boyarin, an Orthodox Jewish academic and friend of the Barnard professor:

Sometimes, I think the Jews who attack Nadia are really grasping at the idea that Israel is THE standard of Jewish life and faith–so, for them, defending Israel, even against scholarly debate, becomes the way to express Jewishness. I haven’t advanced much in my understanding of this kind of anxiety. But I know that if you’re looking for a reasoned, progressive scholar who’s on the same side as those guys, you’re not going to find him.

This is an important epiphany. The mission of Campus Watch and Paula Stern has everything to do with Jewish identity (and a narrowly defined identity at that) and little or nothing to do with academics. That is why their efforts should be derided and disqualified by the academy.

Pipes reinforces the intolerance and extremism of his approach in this passage:

…I very much dispute the notion that academics cannot function freely and be accountable at the same time. It doesn’t come free, this very special set of privileges they have, and there’s nothing to be said for the abstracted position that they can disdain the public, the students, and only engage with each other. They are financed by the public and are thus accountable in some way to the public. They say, No, only we can judge and evaluate each other’s work. Well, that’s not how things work in this country.

This is a profoundly important distillation of Pipes’ anti-intellectual philosophy. The academy is not to be trusted with decisions affecting itself. The public and its representatives like Pipes are the best judges of what is best for the academy since they take into account not just academic needs, but society at large’s needs. I can’t think of a much more pernicious approach, one that is more inimical to the very foundations of scholarly inquiry and academic freedom, than this.

While I tend to think that Kramer bent over backwards to portray Abu El Haj in the most favorable light possible, in this passage she finds a weakness in the latter’s work which bothered me during my entire time writing about this. Kramer notes:

…a tendency to reduce the complexities of Zionism to colonial terms…

I think this idea deserved amplification because it does deeply inform Facts on the Ground and renders it a less persuasive critique than it might otherwise have been. There is too much dismissive ideological grandstanding and speech that trumpets an academic anti-colonial approach that detracts rather than amplifies.

There were a few moments in reading the New Yorker piece when I thought the author stretched too far in portraying Abu El Haj as a mainstream academic figure:

[Virginia] Dominguez [Abu El Haj's dissertation advisor] says that Facts on the Ground was received by Israeli social scientists “not as a scathing critique but as right in line with what they were doing there.”

In fact, I have read no Israeli social scientists who defended Abu El Haj’s work. I’m not saying there aren’t any since I don’t read Israeli academic publications. I AM saying that there were many Israeli academics, especially archaeologists, who reacted with high moral dudgeon to her attacks on them. Again, I’m not saying their views were correct or justified. But I believe we should call a spade a spade and not ignore the academic uproar her work caused in certain Israeli circles, as both Kramer and Dominguez seem to do. [NOTE: Ms. Kramer informs me that the Columbia Spectator does feature comments by Israeli academics who support Abu El Haj's work, so I stand corrected on that score.]

A tidbit: those of you who follow the Jewish right will enjoy Charles Jacob’s (founder of the David Project) description of himself as a “classic liberal.”

I wish there had been a little more in Kramer’s article about the mysterious “Hugh Fitzgerald” who wrote the Frontpagemagzine-Campus Watch article which helped fuel the tenure battle.  Personally, I don’t believe that Fitzgerald is a real person. I would love for Kramer to have gone back to that original story and researched its origins further, including Fitzgerald’s real identity.  [NOTE: Ms. Kramer informs me that she made a considerable effort to do just that and was ultimately unsuccessful.]

A note about the New Yorker cartoon above: I thought it was an interesting and powerful evocation of the conflict. It portrays the lone academic standing on the steps of Columbia’s Low Library (precisely where the Alma Mater statue normally sits), battling against political forces outside herself and the campus. In that sense it conveys well some of the issues involved. But it also misses something important. While Abu El Haj may see herself as purely an academic and scholar, in her work she does take a political position. She is engaged in the debate though perhaps in a more nuanced way than Pipes or Stern. If she was not engaged, then she would have used a different set of rhetorical tropes to describe Israeli archaeological practice than she did. Again, I’m not saying there is anything wrong with her being engaged in this way. But I think that everyone needs to put all their cards on the table and in this battle none of the parties have fully done so, though Abu El Haj has done so much more transparently than her enemies.

Thanks to Seth Flaxman and Dan Sieradski for almost simulateneously notifying me about my 20 seconds of New Yorker fame.

One of the constant themes repeated ad nauseum by right-wing Islamophobes like Daniel Pipes, Alan Dershowitz and their supporters is that Muslims are uniformly extremists filled with hate. There are no “Muslim moderates.” No imams denounce terror. They all support Al Qaeda, etc. etc.

Walter Ruby in Jewish Week brings yet further evidence of the utter falsity of such claims. He writes about the new interim imam of New York City’s largest and most influential mosque, the Islamic Cultural Center, the Indonesian-born Mohammed Shamsi Ali. The interview with him is wide-ranging, candid and impressive:

[He] declared in a dialogue with Rabbi Schneier at the New York Synagogue earlier this month that it “cannot be accepted to deny the existence of Israel” or to deny the Holocaust. Appearing last week at the Jewish Theological Seminary, Imam Ali delivered a special sermon during Mincha services in which he urged Jews and Muslims to revisit “problematic” passages in the Koran and Torah. Those passages buttress bellicose stances against other religions by understanding them as having been written in earlier times, and not necessarily relevant to today’s world.

Imam Ali also urged his listeners to “look beyond what is presented in the media” about Jewish-Muslim relations in order to create “real connections” based on trust and affection. “Once you get to know Muslims,” he said, “you will ask them, ‘Are you really the people I see portrayed [negatively] on Fox News?’”

Key Muslim leaders in New York praise the Indonesian-born Ali as a charismatic and compassionate leader whose embrace of interfaith dialogue represents “mainstream” opinion within the Muslim community.

It is sad, but somehow reassuring that those in both the Muslim and Jewish communities who reach out to the other side are rebuffed by their respective extremist right fringes:

A shadowy Queens-based militant group known as the Islamic Thinkers Society has attacked Imam Ali on its Web site as an “FBI mouthpiece” and “moderate Uncle Sam Muslim” who has corrupted young people at his mosque in Jamaica by allowing them to have “access to guitars and drums.”

Imam Ali…makes no apology for his cooperation with the FBI and New York City police. “We understand the job of law enforcement [in the post-9/11 situation),” he said. “I myself have said publicly that if anyone [in the Muslim community] sees something suspicious, he has an obligation to report it to the police. At the same time, law enforcement must be careful not to overreact and create a situation where there is an interruption of basic American values when it applies to Muslims.”

This reminded me of one of my own personal experiences on that score. I was the western director of New Jewish Agenda in the 1980s during a time when Alex Odeh, then director of the Arab American Anti Discrimination Committee, was assassinated by a letter bomb probably orchestrated by members of the Jewish Defense League. I received a voice mail message from the JDL’s Earl Krugel threatening our group and reported this to the FBI and agreed to meet investigators in my office. I was excoriated by some Agenda members for doing so. My view is that when my life is threatened I’m going to have to trust somebody. While I don’t see the FBI as necessarily my friend, they sure know a lot more about the JDL and the threat they pose than I do. It was trust them or trust no one. And when I’m in danger I have to trust someone. That’s why I allowed them into my office.

The Muslim religious leader’s views put him squarely in the mainstream of American religious life. This is a man who Jews should be able to “do business with” to quote Maggie Thatcher’s infamous phrase about Gorbachev:

Imam Ali believes that American Jews and Muslims should build a relationship “that is more influenced by religious commonalities than by political differences. We cannot deny the emotional impact of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, yet we need to ensure that our relationship is not determined only by that.” He added, “We also should remember that there have been bright times in our relationship as well, such as the cooperation between Muslims and Jews in Andalusia during the Middle Ages.”

I’m pleased that Jewish academic institutions like the Jewish Theological Seminary and HUC-JIR have hosted talks with him and are reaching out to him.

Unfortunately, as I’ve documented here the N.Y. Jewish federation has not taken as forward-thinking a role. In fact, it has backslid into fear and mistrust of the local Muslim community. Federation rabbis have been directed to withdraw from interfaith dialogue projects. Rabbi Michael Paley was once a member of Debbie Almontaser’s support committee and listed as a keynote speaker at one of Rabbi Schneier’s conferences. He backed out of both projects mysteriously.

Also, after enthusiastically endorsing the Other Israel Film Festival devoted to Israeli Arab cinema, the Federation executive Jon Ruskay, abruptly told the festival organizers that they must remove the Federation’s logo from publicity brochures. Festival founder Carole Zabar was taken aback by Ruskay’s change of tack. An ill wind apparently blows through the Federation when it comes to Muslim-Jewish relations in New York.

Unfortunately, the Jewish communal group is missing out on an important opportunity to engage local Muslims in dialogue and debate about issues that divide and link us. Events in the Middle East are too bloody and too catastrophic to miss such possibilities when they arise. To the Ruskays of the Jewish world I say (paraphrasing Hillel): if you will not be for peace, who will be for it? If you are only for yourself, what are you? If not now, when?

Word is beginning to leak out about the imminent launch of J Street, the new liberal Israel lobby being founded by Jeremy Ben Ami and Daniel Levy. I reported on Gershom Gorenberg’s essay in Prospect Magazine yesterday. Today brings James Besser’s story in Jewish Week which provides a few more details:

…The new project kicks off with a hush-hush fundraiser next Monday hosted by former Clinton administration official Jeremy Ben Ami and Daniel Levy, director of the Prospects for Peace Initiative of the Century Foundation. The group will be publicly launched around the middle of April; organizers said they will not speak publicly about the group until then.

“For too long, the loudest American voices in political and policy debates have been those on the far right — often Republican neoconservatives or extreme Christian Zionists,” according to the invitation. “J Street aims to change that. We are the first and only lobby and PAC (political action committee) dedicated to ensuring Israel’s security, changing the direction of American policy in the Middle East and opening up American political debate about Israel and the Middle East.”

While sources say the structure and initial goals of the new group are still in flux, it is expected to raise money for congressional candidates who advocate a stronger U.S. leadership role in ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and multilateral solutions to the region’s problems.

The group will be headed by Ben-Ami, who served as deputy domestic policy adviser in the Clinton administration and later as a media consultant. Ben-Ami has worked with several Jewish peace groups, including the Center for Middle East Peace and the Geneva Initiative-North America.

Unlike similar attempts in the past the board of directors of J Street seems to have the Jewish “gravitas” and fundraising clout to make it a success. It includes leaders of the three main liberal Jewish peace groups (APN, Brit Tzedek and IPF), major Democratic fundraisers, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel, and perhaps most importantly, Mort Halperin, George Soros’ major domo. I’m hoping that Halperin’s participation implies at least Soros’ tacit support for the group.

Keep your eyes peeled for attacks from the Jewish right which will come as sure as the spring rains in the Pacific Northwest.

It’s about time. Rabbi Eric Yoffie, leader of the Union of Reform Judaism, America’s most populous Jewish denomination delivered a ringing affirmation of solidarity with this nation’s Muslim community at this week’s Islamic Society of North America conference. Not only did he endorse common bonds that tie Jews and Muslim like the fight against discrimination and our quest for spirituality in a secular world; he also directly attacked Jewish extremism that singles out Islam as a global threat. Frankly, I would’ve preferred that he come out swinging and named a few more names. It’s high time we take it to them. As it is, he only mentioned Dennis Prager by name. He left out the groups I’ve been battling here over the past few months like Campus Watch, Frontpagemagazine and the David Project.

I found it instructive in his speech where he discusses a mutual propensity to violence among extremists in both religions. Here is the ‘money quote’ in which he denounced the Jewish rabble-rousers among us:

The overwhelming majority of Jews reject violence by interpreting these texts in a constructive way, but a tiny, extremist [Jewish] minority chooses destructive interpretations instead, finding in the sacred words a vengeful, hateful God. Especially disturbing is the fact that the moderate majority, at least some of the time, decides to cower in the face of the fanatic minority — perhaps because they seem more authentic, or appear to have greater faith and greater commitment. When this happens, my task as a rabbi is to rally that reasonable, often-silent majority and encourage them to assert the moderate principles that define their beliefs and Judaism’s highest ideals. My Christian and Muslim friends tell me that precisely the same dynamic operates in their traditions, and from what I can see, that is manifestly so. Surely, as we know from the headlines, you have what I know must be for you as well as for us an alarming number of extremists of your own — those who kill in the name of God and hijack Islam in the process. It is therefore our collective task to strengthen and inspire one another as we fight the fanatics and work to promote the values of justice and love that are common to both our faiths.

This is a theme that I return to again and again here when pro-Israel nationalists attempt to paint Muslims as bloodthirsty fanatics and paint Israelis as reasonable people who merely want peace. Yoffie is precisely right in declaring that we each have violent elements within our respective traditions. Making peace means not only coming to terms with our enemy, it means overcoming the hatred within our own ranks as well.

Here again Yoffie tells his Muslim audience that Israel is a bedrock principle of American Jews in precisely the same way that Palestine is one for them:

American Jews have a deep, profound, and unshakable commitment to the State of Israel. We see assuring the security of Israel as one of our community’s most important accomplishments, and we see maintaining her security as one of our most important priorities. At the same time, we understand the ties of Muslim Americans and Arab Americans to the Palestinian people. The challenge that we face is this: Will we, Jews and Muslims, import the conflicts of the Middle East into America, or will we join together and send a message of peace to that troubled land? Let us choose peace. Let us work toward the day when a democratic Palestinian state lives side by side, in peace and security, with the democratic State of Israel.

Here I would’ve preferred more specificity from the Reform leader about what precisely American Jews must come to accept in order to fully recognize Palestinian rights. You’ll note there is no mention of a state, the issue of return or Jerusalem–all of which must be part of the solution for both sides:

The basic outline of such a peace has been clear for a long time. For peace to be achieved, territorial compromise will be required of Israel. Unconditional acceptance of Israel as a Jewish state will be required of the Palestinians. Jews will need to accept the reality of Palestinian suffering, and understand that without dignity for the Palestinians, there can be no dignity for Israel.

Here Yoffie again makes a significant point about maintaining the conflict as a political, rather than religious one. But again he only notes the danger of Arab anti-Israelism but not the equal danger of Jewish Islamophobia which is no less potent an enemy of peace:

Second, if the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is seen in religious rather than political terms, resolving it becomes impossible. If Israel is portrayed as “a dagger pushed into the heart of Islam,” rather than a nation-state disputing matters of land and water with the Palestinians, we are lost. As religious Jews and religious Muslims, let us do everything in our power to prevent a political battle from being transformed into a holy war.

As he concludes, Yoffie saves his most important admonition for last, telling us that in each of our traditions we must renounce holy war and terror as a means to protect religion or advance our interests:

And finally, to all those who desecrate God’s name by using religion to justify killing and terror, let us say together: enough. No cause in the world, and surely no religious cause, can ever justify murdering the innocent or targeting the uninvolved. You cannot honor a religion of peace through violence; you cannot honor God if you do not honor the image of God in every human being; and you cannot get to heaven by creating hell on earth. If we can agree on nothing else, let us agree on this, and let us remain united on this point, come what may.

My only criticism is Yoffie’s lack of specificity. He holds back from denouncing sufficiently strongly those in our community who preach hatred and violence. Why shouldn’t it be time to name the Daniel Pipes, David Horowitzes and Mort Kleins of the world as the obstacles to peace that they are?

For that reason, I’m glad to read that Jewish Week, in an article which otherwise stokes the fires of mistrust, did provoke a more particular debate between Yoffie and Pipes. Here Pipes does his usual ranting about Muslim hatred of Jews. You’ll note that Stewart Ain gives Pipes the dubious distinction of being a “counter-terrorism expert” when the only thing he is “expert” in is fomenting mistrust of Muslims and Jews insufficiently supportive of Israel:

Daniel Pipes, founder and director of the Middle East Forum and a counter-terrorism expert, called Rabbi Yoffie’s outreach to ISNA “well-intentioned but very misguided.”

“There needs to be an acknowledgment that ISNA is an Islamic organization, Wahhabi in outlook, which is deeply problematic,” he said.

Wahhabi Islam is said to be the primary religious movement behind extremist Islam.

“Beyond ISNA’s own character is the question of Jewish-Muslim relations and whether this can be fixed through ‘Kumbaya’-like sessions such as Rabbi Yoffie’s,” Pipes said, “or whether there needs to be a frank acknowledgment that there is a deep current of anti-Semitism among Muslims in the United States that needs to be addressed.

“It is not a mutual situation,” he continued. “You don’t see mosques and Muslim schools being surrounded by security as you do synagogues and Jewish schools. There is no parallel. And what Rabbi Yoffie did was to build his base on a parallel — saying that there are problematic texts in the Jewish Old Testament as there are in the Koran, and saying that each side has its extremists. I think that is a flawed analysis and one that will have mischievous consequences if it is widely accepted.”

Yoffie, for his part, finally engages Pipes and refutes his partisan animus against Islam:

“The perspective that [Pipes] represents begins from the premise that the Muslim-American community is a dangerous community filled with anti-Semites,” the rabbi said. “There is a big difference between saying there are elements of anti-Semitism in a community that is basically moderate and well educated and middle class, and suggesting that the entire community is somehow dangerous. If you see the community in that sense, it does not make sense to engage in dialogue.”

Rabbi Yoffie insisted that the Muslim community is “conceivably the best educated minority in America” and that there “are significant elements of that community who are untouched by extremism and who are anxious to cooperate with us and with others.”

He said that at the ISNA convention he heard ISNA’s American vice president, Ingrid Mattson, speak three times and she repeatedly called for Israeli-Palestinian peace and to “stop the tie between Muslims and extremism.”

“She gave a speech Jewish leaders would give,” Rabbi Yoffie insisted.

I’m afraid that Yoffie will have to do much more to combat the hatred promoted by the Pipes’ of our community. We cannot assume that peace will just happen between Israel and the Arabs, nor that Jews and Muslims will somehow learn to get along. Besides reaching out to the other side, we must set our own house in order as well. The Plauts, Neuwirths, Pipes, Kleins and even Hoenleins and Foxmans of our community must be firmly rebutted in order for tolerance to grow.

I take strong exception to this passage from Ain’s article in which he attempts to question Yoffie’s tolerance project by noting INSA’s involvement in the Holy Land Foundation federal case:

what makes the effort problematic is that the Muslim group Rabbi Yoffie has chosen to dialogue with is an unindicted co-conspirator in the Dallas trial now taking place against the Holy Land Foundation. The foundation is accused of raising funds for Hamas, the terrorist organization that has vowed to destroy Israel.

What especially distresses me is that the Jewish press seems to accept lock, stock and barrel that the Holy Land Foundation is a supporter of terror and that the unindicted co-conspirators have somehow done something illegal in abetting the Foundation’s terror agenda. First, the government has by no means proven its case. In fact, many legal observers feel it has an especially weak one. Second, the categorization of INSA as “unindicted co-conspirator” has no substantive meaning in terms of associating the group with any tangible nefarious activity. And if it has, let Pipes and his crew tell us what INSA has actually done that is against the law or even remotely tainted. He can’t because they haven’t. It’s as simple as that.

Tikun Olam has been in the news today in no less than three publications and I’m delighted. First, after hocking everyone I could think of including The Forward about the Bishara story for some time, they assigned their Israeli correspondent, Orly Halpern to write about it. She did an estimable job though she didn’t report on the substance of the alleged charges.

The Forward also ran a short account of my reportage on the case:

Although Israel-based journalists are barred from publishing the particulars of the Azmi Bishara case, some details have been reported in Arab media outlets and in the blogosphere. One of the most explicit and seemingly reliable accounts appeared in the Tikun Olam Web site of Seattle blogger Richard Silverstein, who is a frequent critic of Israeli policy and is sympathetic to Jewish causes.

This quotation in the piece from my blog notes:

“…Getting approval of the Supreme Court…indicates that the charges against him are serious and perhaps credible, since they have been vetted by Israel’s highest court.”

But it omits the following:

Though how credible these charges are is again anyone’s guess.

It makes it appear that I accord more credibility than I really do to the charges.

Also, The Forward said that my Israeli informant believed that Bishara is being charged with accepting money from a foreign government for his personal use:

The $5 million, whose original source remains unclear [ed., actually my blog noted the funds are claimed to have come from Syria], is believed to have been taken by Bishara for personal purposes, not political ones, suggesting that the authorities are seeking to build a case of corruption.

I would’ve changed the phrase “is believed” to “is alleged.”

The Seattle Post Intelligencer technology columnist, Monica Guzman, wrote her NetNative column about Tim O’Reilly’s blogging code of conduct and my blog impostor:

Seattle blogger Richard Silverstein has a similar case, but a tougher issue. He advocates for peace in the Middle East on his political news blog and says he likes the code because it could give him more ammo against angry commenters who toss up the immature accusation that he’s violating their freedom of speech when he deletes needlessly nasty posts.

Detractors created a fake blog for the sole purpose of attacking him and his beliefs, using everything from religious insults to photos of his 6-year-old son.

I had a few quibbles here as well. First, she didn’t link to my blog (though she did mention its name). Second, she didn’t mention Blogger.com as the host of the fake blog. I had really hoped that she would name Blogger publicly so I could point to this when I lobby the company to take the site down. However, there is a Computerworld article by Mary Brandel coming out just after April 26th on my fake blog and in my interview I tried to emphasize what I view as Blogger’s responsibilities as a host and its shirking of those responsibilities.

Third, Jim Besser just published a terrific Jewish Week story about the AIPAC spy trial and included an interview he did with me earlier this week:

On the other side of the political spectrum, the case has become a marker pointing to what activists say is an out-of-control Israel lobby.

For many on the Jewish left, the case highlights “the hubris of AIPAC,” said Richard Silverstein, a persistent critic of U.S. and Israeli policy and editor of the Tikun Olam blog. “It goes to an issue of an organization that believes it has such hegemony over the Israel issue in the American Jewish community that it can act as it wishes.”

…Activists on the left still insist the case tarnishes AIPAC itself. To Silverstein, the case demonstrates that “AIPAC gets so wrapped up in advancing Israel’s interests that it has lost sight completely that there might be different perspectives in the American Jewish community.”

Many on the far left are portraying the case as “proof” Israel and its American supporters are distorting U.S. policy to suit Israel’s leaders.

“For many, the case confirms that AIPAC is operating contrary to U.S. interests,” he said. “There are anti-Semites out there; it just confirms the worst attitudes these people have about AIPAC being a foreign agent. And it harms the reputation of the American Jewish community for people to be engaging in this kind of borderline behavior, or over-the-line behavior.”

Other than being characterized as “on the far left” I was happy with Besser’s characterization of our interview. The AIPAC trial is very important stuff and I’m glad he’s writing about it using terms like “hubris” which it certainly warrants.

After four years of slogging through the blogosphere in virtual anonymity (well, not quite but almost), it’s good to be recognized for one’s work. May it continue.

George Soros, after writing a blistering NY Review of Books essay slamming AIPAC’s pernicious influence on U.S. Mideast policy, disappointed liberal Jews by announcing he would not fund a project simmering over the past six months to create a Jewish counter-lobby to AIPAC:

Billionaire George Soros has no plans to put his money where his mouth is, a spokesman said Tuesday — two days after the philanthropist and political advocate assailed the pro-Israel lobby as a threat to Israeli and U.S. interests.

Rumors, rife since last October, that Soros would fund a dovish alternative to the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee, quickened when Soros published a blistering attack on the lobby in the New York Review of Books this week. But Soros spokesman Michael Vachon rebutted the notion he would bankroll such an effort.

“He considered it,” said Vachon. “Many people wanted him to fund the effort. In the end he decided he should not be involved.

“On the other hand,” Vachon added, “Who can predict the future?”

That last statement is impossibly coy for me. I say, if you’re in get in; if you’re out, get out. Don’t do a Mario Cuomo Hamlet soliloquy. There’s already more than enough vacillation among key players in this conflict. We don’t need more of the same from Soros.

I can’t say that I’m surprised since on the day Soros’ NYRB essay was published I asked an inside DC source what role the essay played in his strategy regarding the counter-lobby project. The reply came back: “He’s out.”

Soros’ supposed reasoning for dropping out also isn’t fully convincing:

Vachon cited Soros’ lack of prior involvement in Jewish life as the prime reason for his decision. The 76-year-old Jewish hedge fund manager and prominent donor to liberal and Democratic causes has not been a major player in Jewish affairs over his long career, he said.

“He feels he would not have the necessary standing in the community,” said Vachon. “Some people might even be put off by his involvement in such an effort.”

It is certainly true that Martin Peretz will use this argument against Soros and others as well. But since when do we act according to what our enemies say? Since when do they determine the agenda? I’m guessing that Soros himself doesn’t feel the personal commitment to getting as deeply involved in internal Jewish communal politics as he would have to in order to really make the kind of impact that is necessary to take on AIPAC. I can’t say as I fully blame him. How many times can one bear being called a Hitler sympathizer because at the age of 12 you pretended to be a Christian and were sheltered by a government official who confiscated Jewish property?

But still, Soros’ withdrawal is terribly unfortunate. Many of us have that commitment but not the wherewithal to back it up. That’s what Soros would’ve brought to the table.

All I can say is that I somehow hope the initiative continues and proves viable and that somehow Soros is persuaded that it is the right thing to do and that he gets on board. “Ride on the peace train,” George.

I find Larry Cohler Esses’ work in Jewish Week to be impeccably incisive and lacking in the cant one can find in Jewish media outlets like JTA. But this passage, which followed his list of liberal writers who’d recently attacked AIPAC seemed oddly snarky and churlish:

Still, the cottage industry of criticism in the public square by these writers raises oxymoronic questions about their claims of suppression.

Besides the imprecise use of the term oxymoronic without clearly noting what he was referring to, he seems to say that the plethora of criticism of AIPAC gives the lie to the liberal complaint that the Israel lobby suppresses speech it views as anti-Israel. What this ignores is the clear evidence of multiple recent incidents of intimidation to silence or punish Israel critics chronicled here at this blog (Judt, Beinin, Kushner, Khalidi, Massad, Cole, etc.) and elsewhere online. It also neglects the possible explanation that perhaps liberal writers and those media which publish them are becoming less intimidated by the lobby’s reach and are showing some willingness to buck their wrath.