Tikun Olam-תקון עולם: Make the World a Better Place

The following is the Comment is Free article published last Tuesday when J Street launched. Before you read it, if you haven’t already visited the J Street site to join its mailing list, please consider doing so. And even more important, consider making a generous donation so J Street can begin to make a difference in Congress by promoting candidates who will engage with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and pressure our next president to make every effort to promote peace, not war. Now is the time for all good people to come to the aid of their country if we are ever to see peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

Recently, I attended a private Seattle dinner featuring J Street co-founders Daniel Levy and Jeremy Ben Ami. On April 15th, J Street will launch. It will be the first American Jewish PAC dedicated to promoting Israeli-Palestinian peace:

For too long, the primary and often only voices policy makers and politicians have heard regarding American policy toward Israel and the Middle East have been those of a vocal minority at the far-right of American society.

…Neoconservative, right-wing Jewish leaders and radical Christian Zionists have turned their definition of “pro-Israel” into a driving force in the American political process…

These voices do not…represent the mainstream of American Jews or the broader community that cares about Israel or American interests in the Middle East. Their efforts have skewed American policy, undermined Israeli and American interests, and constrained the domestic political and public debate about American foreign policy.

It is time for the mainstream of Americans–Jews and others–to establish a bold, political voice that advocates for the best interests of the U.S. and Israel, including a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict based on the 1967 borders with agreed reciprocal land swaps, and for American policy that will lead to real security for Israelis, Americans and the entire Middle East.

J Street proposes an overarching U.S. approach to the Middle East that eschews military conflict and embraces diplomatic negotiation; that advocates multilateralism over unilateralism; and dialogue over confrontation. It proposes negotiation with Syria and Iran rather than diplomatic isolation and threats. And it will advance these goals both in the legislative and electoral process as well as the media.

Daniel Levy is a British Jew and son of the leading fundraiser for Tony Blair’s Labor Party, Lord Levy. The younger Levy made aliyah to Israel in 1991, where he worked on the peace process with Labor governments. He moved to DC two years ago to become a senior fellow with the Center for American Progress, where he writes the well-respected blog, Prospects for Peace. Levy is the passionate, thoughtful, philosophical member of the duo. He is the deep thinker who ponders the big questions. Ben Ami, a former deputy domestic policy advisor in the Clinton administration is the operations chief. He knows the campaigns and the politicians. He is inside the political process. They make a good team.

J Street plans to do two things. First, it will be a traditional PAC raising funds to support a limited number of candidates for Senate and Congressional races. Second, it will lobby for and against Israel-related bills and legislation. Regarding the PAC portion of its mandate: in its first year (the current election cycle), it hopes to raise around $300,000 to funnel into three to five races in which it can make a significant impact in swing districts. According to the co-founders, it sees no benefit in going after long-serving Democrats who take doctrinaire pro-AIPAC positions because they are too entrenched. Rather, J Street sees its best efforts devoted to choosing races in which there is a weak incumbent with an anti-peace agenda running against a candidate who is open to J Street’s political agenda. Norm Coleman is someone high on the group’s list since he is such a weak incumbent and is opposed by Al Franken, who is already sympathetic to a pro-peace agenda regarding the I-P conflict.

In the following (2010) election cycle, J Street hopes to raise several million dollars and target a slightly larger number of races. Ben Ami noted that he and Levy had studied two critical AIPAC campaigns against Cynthia McKinney and Earl Hilliard. By cross-checking the donor lists they discovered that AIPAC wields an enormous amount of clout with a rather limited amount of donations (in the low millions).

However, it should be noted that AIPAC has a reach that extends far beyond merely punishing those it deems hostile to Israel. After all, it has a $60 million annual budget along with a deep volunteer base. Its power flows in many directions. In this sense, J Street really has its work cut out for itself.

The new group is studying AIPAC’s example and plans to use its tactics while turning them inside out on behalf of peace. Both co-founders reinforced that this effort is not meant to oppose, criticize or attack AIPAC. The idea is that there is room for AIPAC in this political debate while there is also room for a variety of other voices, including J Street.

Ben Ami, who was deputy domestic policy advisor in the Clinton administration, said they’d sounded out scores of politicians and their staffs about how J Street would be received. He is convinced that its message is welcomed with open arms almost universally. Of course, there will be some dyed in the wool Old School holdouts. But he believes that J Street is something the DC pols have been waiting for for a long time. They’ve been eager to break away from heterodoxy but needed the political cover to do so. J Street would help provide it for them.

In talking about what J Street planned to do differently from the mainstream Israel lobby organizations, I was heartened that it planned to pay lots of attention to voices of young people especially those represented by bloggers like Ezra Klein and Matt Ygleisias and others. Ben Ami sees the younger generation as the hope for the future as they haven’t yet bought “their father’s Oldsmobile” in terms of embracing the stereotypes and accepted wisdom of the established groups. The Israel lobby groups are heavily populated and led by the older generation and Jewish opinion surveys show that the younger generation is both more liberal on Israeli politics and more turned off by the Israel-centric issues dear to the heart of the Old School.

The J Street leaders also addressed their relationship with the three existing Jewish peace groups: Israel Policy Forum, Americans for Peace Now and Brit Tzedek. They said that J Street would not duplicate their efforts nor was it meant to replace them. Rather, J Street is the next logical step in the development of a pro-peace political agenda in which candidates would be encouraged to take an independent look at the I-P conflict and throw out old orthodoxies.

Levy, in his talk to the dinner group, emphasized that while Israelis realized that they were primarily responsible for resolving the conflict, that they also needed a good swift kick in the rear end from an energized American Jewish community and U.S. president. An Israeli prime minister like Olmert might welcome pressure coming from America to adopt a more forthcoming approach to the idea of compromise. He could then turn around to the Liebermans (Avigdor, not Joe) on his right and say: “If you want to buck our American friends, be my guest. But where will you turn once you do and they’ve abandoned you?” Levy believes that this narrative will resonate in Israeli political circles.

In fact, the group has recruited a group of distinguished Israeli academics, political analysts and former senior military officers to sign a letter of support for J Street. Among others, it includes former IDF chief of staff Amnon Lipkin Shahak, former foreign minister Shlomo Ben Ami, and former directors general of the foreign ministry David Kimche, Alon Liel, and Uri Savir.

It’s always important with efforts like this to examine the board member names. There are of course leaders of the main American Jewish peace groups. There are rabbis and academics. But most important there are heavy hitter political donors (Alan Solomont), policy wonks (Rob Malley), U.S. ambassadors to Israel (Samuel Lewis), high level political operatives (Eli Pariser of Moveon), Hollywood liberals (Robert Greenwald), business leaders, George Soros’ top aide (Morton Halperin), and even a former Republican senator (Lincoln Chafee) and former Congressman (Tom Downey). The major political donors and business leaders are critical to provide the funding necessary to have an impact on political campaigns.

The group founders believe that Barack Obama and his staff “get” J Street’s perspective while they believe a Clinton candidacy might not advance J Street’s mission as aggressively. In particular, Ben Ami mentioned Tony Lake, Obama’s chief foreign policy advisor as someone who was probably responsible for the candidate’s bracing Cleveland speech in which he admonished American Jews not to believe that a pro-Israel presidential candidacy need also be pro-Likud.

I came away from the dinner heartened by the J Street effort. Trying to be a realist after feeling burned by previous similar efforts, I’m not yet firmly convinced it will succeed. But it is bold, ambitious, well thought out, and doable. Many other dovish political efforts in the past had one or even two of those qualities going for them, but few have had all of them. That is in J Street’s favor.

One big question will be how AIPAC responds to the new initiative. As the big kid on the block it has the most to lose from J Street becoming a major success. So it’s got to feel threatened in some way. My only question is whether it feels defensive and threatened enough that it would take on J Street in its infancy. Already, AIPAC’s former director Morris Amitay has denounced J Street in the pages of the Jewish Forward. Amitay seems to be a surrogate for the group, which doesn’t want to lay down a marker in public yet on the matter. It remains to be seen how the big guns of the right-wing Israel lobby like Malcolm Hoenlein and Abe Foxman will react. If they do, they will only be endorsing the idea that J Street is a force to be reckoned with.

tags aipac, daniel levy, israel, israel-lobby, j street, jeremy-ben-ami, Mideast Peace, norm coleman, palestine, political-lobbying, tony lake

Lately, I have not found much in the progressive media about the Israel divestment debate being waged largely within the mainline Protestant denominations, especially focussing on the Presbyterian Church. Thankfully, The Nation has weighed in with a comprehensive, subtle and balanced analysis of the issue, The Israel Divestment Debate. I’ve used a non-Nation (Agence Global) site since you can’t access the full article from The Nation site unless you are a subscriber.

What astonishes me is the rabidly hostile reaction of otherwise “progressive” Jewish groups (at least regarding their approach to the Israel-Palestine conflcit) to divestment. You’d think the Presbyterians had just called for Israel to be thrown into the sea. Here’s Rabbis for Human Rights:

Rabbis for Human Rights — a participant in EAPPI [the Ecumenical Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel recruits church members to "accompany Palestinians and Israelis in non-violent actions and concerted advocacy efforts to end the occupation] that has engaged in civil disobedience to prevent Israeli authorities from demolishing Palestinian homes and orchards — excoriated the Presbyterians for singling out Israel while ignoring “the homicidal ideologies that have so sadly taken hold among some of our Palestinian neighbors” and the “attempts to destroy our country that transcend the Occupation and precede it by decades.”

And here’s Rabbi Eric Yoffie of the Reform Movement:

“What we saw emerge very dramatically following the divestment decision of the Presbyterians is a certain mentality that says the occupation is the root of all evil,” says Yoffie. “We just don’t agree with that.” More fundamentally, says Yoffie, that mindset often minimizes terrorism. “They are very quick to use the word ‘evil’ when they apply it to the occupation, but they didn’t apply the word ‘evil’ to terror…. There’s simply no moral calculus that could reasonably lead to that conclusion.”

Yoffie should know better. The Occupation IS the root of all evil in the I-P conflict. If he wasn’t so ticked off by Christians assaulting Israel (at least in his own mind) he’d recognize that. And how can it possibly be that the Protestants don’t “apply the word ‘evil’ to terrorism.” That seems a preposterous assertion & I’m certain it is false. Just goes to show you that even erstwhile progressives like Reform Jews are bellowing like a gored ox.

Two progressive groups I otherwise believe in & admire–American Friends of Peace Now & Brit Tzedek–apparently turned thumbs down on divestment. I’m sure they did so because they’re frightened that it will entirely destroy their credibility to lobby within the mainstream Jewish community.

That being said, I do have some problems w. pro-divestment Jews quoted in the article:

For Jeff Halper, head of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions and an American-born Israeli Jew…even liberal Jews like Yoffie and groups like Americans for Peace Now are obstacles to peace, he says. “Both the liberals and the super-pro-Israel people see themselves as the gatekeepers of Israel. They resist criticism of Israel and of course criticism from Christians, even progressive Christians…. Liberal Jews are critical of Israel in a general way, but when it comes to taking a real stand, for example with divestment — saying, ‘Look, this occupation is evil’ — they tend not to go there.”

While I’m certainly critical of progressive Jewish responses to divestment–to say that they are “obstacles to peace” is ridiculous overstatement. They are certainly wrongheaded, but there’s a difference bet. being wrongheaded & being an obstacle to peace.

I do however, agree with the mainstream Jewish community’s criticism of the Palestinian allies of the Presbyterian church:

Sabeel’s “Principles for a Just Peace in Palestine-Israel” does state that “the ideal and best solution has always been to envisage ultimately a bi-national state in Palestine-Israel.” PC(USA) Middle East liaison Victor Makari shares this vision, telling the Jerusalem Report that his “preferred solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a shared democratic state.”

Divestment proponents say that for Jewish leaders to cry foul over alliances with Palestinian Christians who allegedly reject Israel’s legitimacy and a two-state solution is hypocritical, given their own alliance with Christian Zionists who reject the legitimacy of Palestinian claims to any part of what they consider Jewish land. “The institutional alliances with groups both Jewish and Christian, from the Zionist Organization of America to Pat Robertson, that reject out of hand the right of Palestinians to have their own state, are simply never questioned,” says Surasky.

It does the Presbyterians’ cause no good to be affiliated w. any Palestinians who do not support a 2-state solution. Neither the Jewish community nor most of the rest of the world support a one-state, or bi-national solution to the conflict. And trying to throw back in the Jewish community’s face that it makes alliances w. evangelicals who detest Palestinians just muddies the waters.

Take me for example, I support divestment. I oppose the Zionist alliance w. Christian Zionist evangelicals. I also support a 2 state solution. So what do the Presbyterians have to say to me on this score? Nothing, it appears.

tags eric-yoffie, israel-divestment, israeli-occupation, palestine, presbyterian-church-divestment-policy, progressive-jews, reform-judaism, sabeel

Gershon Gorenberg notes in The Forward that Ehud Olmert has decided to speed up his timetable for the “major” West Bank settlement withdrawal he touted during the recent election campaign. He plans to complete it within 18 months. According to Gorenberg, Olmert had two considerations in mind. One is that he believes he may have a volatile coalition which might implode if he waits too long to act (i.e. strike while the political iron is hot). The second is U.S. politics. Olmert knows he has a friend in George Bush and he’d rather stick with the Pharaoh he knows than the future one he doesn’t, fearing that a new president will arise who “knows not” Olmert nor approves of his unilateralism:

The simplest explanation is that Olmert regards Bush as critical to his plan because of the president’s hands-off approach to the Israeli-Palestinian problem…Bush has put little diplomatic muscle into pushing either Israelis or Palestinians to follow that map…

Bush’s approach is ideal for Olmert. Since Olmert’s dramatic political conversion two-and-a-half years ago, when he declared that Israel needed to give up land to preserve its Jewish majority, he has favored unilateralism: Israel would draw its own borders, retain major settlements such as Ma’aleh Adumim and Ariel, and count on America for international backing.

Given the rising criticism Bush faces at home over his foreign policy record, there’s no reason for Olmert to expect continuity under the next president, especially when it comes to the Middle East. From Olmert’s perspective, therefore, it makes more sense to reshape the border quickly.

This is how the Wall Street Journal characterized his views in a recent interview given, no doubt, to set the stage for his upcoming visit to the States which will include his first meeting as head of state with Bush:

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says he intends to finalize plans for a large pullout from parts of the occupied West Bank within the next 18 months, and that he will travel to the U.S. next month to try to secure Washington’s support as he sketches the plan’s contours.

In an interview yesterday at his Jerusalem office, Mr. Olmert said his planned meeting with President Bush in Washington will mark the onset of efforts to secure international support for the pullout, including financial assistance. Under his plan, Mr. Olmert intends to evacuate as many as 70,000 Jewish settlers from their homes — a move that some rough estimates say could cost more than $10 billion — while annexing large chunks of disputed Palestinian territory.

The goal, Mr. Olmert said, is to establish permanent, internationally recognized borders that will ensure Israel retains its Jewish majority for decades to come. Though he expects to carry out the plan without Palestinian input, he believes it will help create conditions that could lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state and a negotiated peace settlement someday. “The State of Israel will change the face of the region,” Mr. Olmert said of his plan. “I will not miss this opportunity.”

Of course, Olmert is in cloud cuckoo land if he believes that the world will sign off on such heavy-handed Israeli unilateralism. And Bush too will share cloud cuckoo land with Olmert if he affirms Israeli delusions that they can both fix their borders beyond the Green Line and without Palestinian acquiescence. For this reason, what happens in Washington during Olmert’s visit is very important. Bush certainly will not turn down Olmert flat. But will he give Olmert the cover he covets to set final borders? Or will Bush try to give him half a loaf and hope that will suffice? Here’s more about Bush’s quandary from WSJ:

The Bush administration also might find itself in a bind. So far, Mr. Bush has voiced support for a West Bank pullout, but his administration will face tough decisions as the plan takes shape. Mr. Olmert, for instance, said Israel will need U.S. financial assistance to implement the evacuation.

Yet if it finances the pullout, the U.S. will likely be seen throughout the Middle East as assisting Israel’s bid to take permanent control of large settlement blocs and Jerusalem. The fear is that this would add to regional anger toward the U.S., complicating efforts to stabilize Iraq and promote democracy in other countries.

In the interview, Mr. Olmert called for broad international support, saying his plan was the only alternative to continued fighting. Once it is complete, he said, physical separation from the Palestinians will reduce daily friction and violence and leave Palestinians with land that could someday become a viable state.

This is yet another delusion on Olmert’s part. Of course, establishing international borders with Bush’s approval will sit quite nicely with the Israeli public. But it certainly will do nothing whatsoever to hasten the day when a Palestinian state is established. In fact, if Olmert could guarantee Israeli security through such borders along with the Separation Wall this would eliminate ANY incentive for him to negotiate regarding the creation of such a state. My guess is that if Bush gives away the store to Olmert on this trip (and I don’t expect him to do so) that we could kiss off the idea of a viable Palestinian state in our lifetimes.

As part of his discussion of Olmert’s coalition-forming strategy, Gorenberg provides a paragraph about Avigdor Lieberman’s brushes with the law. As with most right-wing Israeli politicians, Lieberman appears ethically-challenged:

A resident of Nokdim in the West Bank, Lieberman was convicted in 2001 of assaulting a 12-year-old boy from another settlement who’d beaten his son. The State Prosecutor’s Office is currently weighing the results of a police investigation into allegations of dealings with Russian organized crime and of campaign finance violations. Lieberman says he’s a victim of persecution. He also says the country is rife with crime, and he ran this year on a law-and-order platform, demanding his own appointment as minister of internal security — in charge of the police.

This is a man who on election night said he anticipated joining a coalition government with Kadima, adding that after the following election he expected to be leader of the coalition, i.e. prime minister. Lot’s of ambition, lots of moxie, and lot’s of baggage–both ethical and political.

tags george-bush, israel-unilateral-borders, israeli-settlements, marwan-barghouti, palestine, the-forward, u.s.-mideast-policy, wall-street-journal, west-bank-withdrawal

Haaretz reports today that Bill Clinton was interviewed on BBC TV this weekend (why no link at the BBC site??) speaking of U.S. Mideast policy and specifically about our approach to the new Hamas government. He brought a breath of fresh air to the table compared to the stale stuff the Bush Administration and Olmert government have been expelling on this subject (quoting from the Pakistan Daily Times:

Asked if he would shake hands with Hamas in the name of negotiation as he did with Arafat in 1993, Clinton said: “If they made the same assurances that Arafat did.

“He had made private assurances, and he made public assurances, that he did not support terror any more and would try to restrain it.

“So if Hamas would say, suppose they say, OK, look, we can’t change our theory, we can’t change our document, we can’t change our history, but we’re in government now and the policy of the Palestinian government is no to terror and yes to negotiations. As long as we’re in government, we’ll honour that policy.”

There is one problematic aspect of Clinton’s quote. Arafat DID assure Clinton he would renounce terror. And perhaps he did for a time. But it is clear that sometime after that 1995 handshake Arafat renounced his commitment and pursued terror and other forms of violent resistance through the first and second intifadas. Israelis have every reason to doubt whether Hamas, making such a similar commitment, should be believed considering its history of terror attacks against Israel.

All that being said, I commend Clinton for having the most realistic appraisal of Hamas I’ve read from just about any international leader since Hamas won the election. We should test Hamas’ resolve on issues like this (renunciation of violence, recognition of 2-state solution, etc.). Why can’t Olmert, Bush and Rice see the merits of this approach as well?

Fayyad at Kabobfest has his own view on Clinton’s sentiments that diverges from my own:

If they did that? I guess the president with the newly-found intelligence still does not read the news. Did he hear about Hamas’ offer for a 10-year extended truce Hamas made as part of becoming the ruling party? Or even better, the 30-year truce offer of 1997?

Demands of more than a halt to military action by all parties must not be preconditions for negotiations. One need not make peace with friends, peace is always sought after with enemies. It would be rather foolish to expect both Hamas and Israel to agree to a series of condition that in effect would, if applied, solve the conflict. Now let’s hope the new Israeli government agrees to respect and acknowledge the treaties previous governments reached with the Palestinians.

To which I’d point out that Clinton’s conditions demand that Hamas say “no to terror and yes to negotiations.” So I must be missing something, because Fayyad seems to be agreeing with Clinton when he (Fayyad) accepts (if I read him correctly) the need for negotiations and a halt to military action “by both sides.”

But I might add that Hamas attached its own conditions to such a “10 year extended truce” which included a return to 1967 borders (a policy I approve of by the way). Israel certainly is nowhere yet near supporting ‘67 borders as a consensus position. So that means Hamas has essentially put forward a non-starter condition. If Hamas can put an end to terror then I have no doubt that Israelis will come around to accepting ‘67 borders. But they will not do so as long as terror continues unabated.

tags bbc, Bill-Clinton, haaretz, hamas, israel, kabobfest, Mideast Peace, pakistan-daily-times, palestine, two-state-solution

Today is the third anniversary of the murder of Rachel Corrie, the pro-Palestinian activist run over by an IDF bulldozer during an attempted Palestinian home demolition. So James Nicola of the Theater Workshop picked an odd date to make yet another feeble attempt in the NY Times to explain to the world why he reneged on his commitment to produce My Name is Rachel Corrie this month:

In an interview this week James C. Nicola, the workshop’s artistic director, and Lynn Moffat, its managing director, insisted that they wanted only to postpone, not cancel, the show — despite declarations by the authors and the Royal Court Theater, the London troupe that initially produced the award-winning play, that the workshop pulled the plug on a done deal.

I find several things distressing about Nicola’s behavior in this matter. First, he agreed to produce a play about a very controversial subject, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Yet he seemed utterly unprepared to deal with that subject matter in producing the play. When you’re talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict of course you need background, discussion and research in order to carefully frame the discussion. But Nicola, in his protestations makes it seem like the process needed to be a slow, painstaking one before the New York theater community would be “ready” to see such a play. This is ridiculous. I’ve been studying and living this conflict since 1967. Sure it’s complicated. Sure it’s emotional. Sure it treads on difficult terrain. But what subject important to the human race doesn’t? There ARE ways to present such a play to a potentially polarized audience without having riots in the aisles or streets. The fact that Nicola couldn’t seem to envision a way to do this speaks volumes to his inadequacy as a producer of a play about this conflict.

The other disturbing element of his defense is that he won’t tell us who he consulted with about the play, nor will he tell us what they told him. He won’t tell us precisely why these consultations convinced him that he needed to delay the production. Until he is more candid and forthcoming he can have no credibility on this subject. This is what he IS willing to say about this:

Neither Mr. Nicola nor Ms. Moffat…would say exactly who they spoke to before they decided to delay the show. Mr. Nicola originally said that he had spoken to “religious leaders” in making his decision; this week he said that the workshop did a “wide reaching out into the complexity of the community of New York” that included reading Palestinian views on Web sites. Mr. Nicola did say he had had a conversation with one board member who said that his rabbi had concerns about the play. An old friend, who is Jewish, also questioned the play’s message.

Ms. Moffat said that she and Mr. Nicola — who are not Jewish — took advice from members of their in-house artistic staff, as well as “colleagues and colleagues of colleagues.”

He based on his decision on a board member’s rabbi who didn’t like it?? And an “old friend” who “questioned the play’s message?” Wow, that’s a really scientific and compelling survey of opinion on which to base such a decision, now isn’t it? If I consulted someone’s rabbi and an old friend about every post I write here about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict I’d never write a damn thing. No wonder Nicola pulled the plug on the show.

How about some more cluelessness:

…how the workshop, an artistically bold and popular company, found itself in such an embarrassing public jam still baffles Mr. Nicola and Ms. Moffat…

If the response to what they did baffles them it only serves to prove their absolute inadequacy as producers of plays about politically-charged material.

I found this passage in the NY Times article especially ironic:

Mr. Nicola said that he read the play in December and was impressed.

“I read what I think the authors intended for me to read, which was that this life, in her own words, was an example to Americans, who are in some fog of avoidance right now,” Mr. Nicola said, adding, “I thought that this, in the voice of this young, pure, innocent woman, was a very powerful thing to say right now.“

Apparently not, if he decided to abandon the play as he did. Or was it just too powerful for his theater to handle??

More cluelessness:

Meanwhile in January, the political situation in the Middle East intensified after a stroke suffered by the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, and electoral victories by Hamas, the militant Palestinian group. At the same time, Mr. Nicola said his company’s dramaturge raised some red flags about the symbolism of Ms. Corrie’s tale.

Said Ms. Moffat, “As we went deeper and deeper into it, we discovered what we didn’t know was getting to be too great a burden.”

I’d rephrase this: when they got deeper into it they discovered they were ignorant and clueless. As I’ve already written here before, it is absolutely pathetic to say that Ariel Sharon’s stroke or even the Hamas electoral victory prevents you from mounting this play. When is there not an incendiary incident happening in the Mideast? If you allow such events to immobilize you you will never take a position on anything.

tags israel, james-nicola, my-name-is-rachel-corrie, new-york-theater-workshop, new-york-times, palestine, political-theater

Relative mourns death of Palestinian killed in Israeli targeted assassination (photo: AP) Haaretz reported yesterday that Israel assassinated two Islamic Jihad militants with an airstrike which also killed three young Palestinian civilians: The military operation took place in Gaza City at about 5:30 P.M., when IAF jets fired two missiles at an ice-cream van in which Munir Sukar, 27, and Ashraf Shaluf were traveling. According to the security services, Sukar is responsible for numerous Qassam launches at Israel, as well as an attempt to send a suicide bomber to Jerusalem last month, while Shaluf is also a Jihad operative. However, the strike also killed Raad ...

Robert Rosenberg reports in Ariga.com that senior Kadima security official, Avi Dichter, is calling for the imprisonment or assassination of Hamas' legislative leader, Ismail Haniye: Avi Dichter, Kadima security adviser or gangster? (photo: Ariel Jerozolimski/Jerusalem Post ...Former Shin Bet chief Avi Dichter promise[s] to either arrest the designated Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniye, ‘or send him to meet with Sheikh Ahmed Yassin,’ the Hamas founder who was assassinated by Israel... Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz has joined in according to Haaretz: Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said Tuesday that the pace of Israeli assassination operations would continue, and that Israel could even target Palestinian prime minister-designate Ismail Haniyeh if Hamas renewed terror attacks on ...

Thanks to Sol Salbe for informing me about this disturbing Haaretz article by Aluf Benn. It's one of those annoying articles you read in newspapers at times, in which the journalist serves as willing mouthpiece for a national leader. Judith Miller excelled at this sort of sycophantic unquestioning regurgitation. At any rate, Olmert or his minions appear to have summoned Benn in order to unburden themselves of their current thinking about the much-talked about Israeli unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank. There is much to question and even disbelieve in this account, but it is worth studying so as to understand Olmert's devious thinking: Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is planning to enlist international support for ...

Those aren't my words, they're the words of Amira Haas, Haaretz's Ramallah correspondent (and the only Israeli reporter who actually lives in the Palestinian Territories) in her Los Angeles Times article, Palestinians Are Being Robbed by Israel. In the article, she describes why Israel has come to collect $50-million a month in Palestinian excise duties. It's quite arcane: According to the Oslo accords (and by any standards of common sense and basic justice), the revenues should serve the people who ultimately buy the goods. These tax receipts are not donations of goodwill from Israel; they are not charity...These are tax revenues that are due to the people in the territories where the goods are headed, and the Israelis ...

Don't believe the phony denial issued by the White House and State Department a few days ago after the NY Times exposed a plan by State and Israel to bring Hamas and any Palestinian government it creates to its knees in order to prove to Palestinians that Hamas can never bring them anything other than economic ruin and chaos. Tonight's news in Haaretz that the U.S. has demanded the return of $50-million in aid it provided last year is the real proof of where our policy lies regarding Hamas. That is, we're right in line with those Israeli hardliners who delude themselves into thinking that even harsher policies toward the Palestinians are all it will take ...