MJ Rosenberg

Maybe I’m old school. But I was brought up to be grateful to the United States for being the best and safest home Jews have ever had.

My grandparents were immigrants who knew how lucky they were that they escaped Europe back at the beginning of the 20^th century especially after their siblings, and their siblings’ families who stayed behind, died in the Nazi death camps (one survived and made it to Israel after the war).

My parents were typical Americans of the World War II era. They loved this country, they loved Roosevelt and although Israel played a big part in their lives, this was their country just like English was their language and Judaism was their faith.

How patriotic were they? My dad taught me the presidents in order when I was 9. I did the same with my kids and now with my grandkids.

In fact, during the 2012 election, my then four year old grandson asked what we would do if Mitt Romney won “because we aren’t for him.” I told him that he’d be our president just like President Obama.” He was reassured. He wants to like the president.

In our family, we respect the institutions of our country, including the presidency, even if we didn’t vote forthe particular holder of the office. My wife’s family was even more patriotic. Her parents survived the Holocaust and she was born in a Jewish refugee camp in Germany. Criticize America and my father-in-law would say, “go to Stalin then.” No matter Stalin was long dead!

In other words, we are nothing like Alan Dershowitz.

I just read that the Harvard law professor is having an hysterical fit because Yeshiva University’s Cardozo Law school is presenting an award to former president, Jimmy Carter. Yeshiva is a Jewish university, as is Brandeis, about which Dershowitz also wept and gnashed molars when it invited Carter to speak.

Dershowitz told Ha’aretz why the former president should not speak at Jewish schools:

He cited a long list of Carter’s offenses, saying that the former U.S. President “stood idly by” during the Pol Pot massacre in Cambodia, “never met a terrorist he didn’t like”, was beholden to Saudi Arabia and bore “partial responsibility” for the carnage of the second intifada because he “encouraged” Yasser Arafat at Camp David not to reach a peace deal.

And then, in the egomaniacal style that has made him the The Donald of lawyers, he demanded that “someone like myself” speak along side the former president. He said that Carter “should be made to regret that he ever agreed to accept the award.”

Forget the part about Pol Pot. Dershowitz, as everyone knows, is only concerned about Carter’s criticism of Israel and, in particular, about Carter’s accurate description of conditions on the West Bank (not in Israel itself) as like “apartheid.” Criticizing Israel is verboten in Dersh’s world. And that is why he hates Carter. Israel is Dershowitz’s City On The Hill, shining perfection.

That is why Dershowitz supports all prime ministers of Israel. He may like some more than others but he believes that Israel and its leaders, unlike the United States and its leaders, must be respected. You know, he feels about Israel the way we feel about the United States. (Imagine. This guy teaches about the United States Constitution at Harvard whose students apparently are more tolerant of bigoted fools than they were in the 1960′s).

The president of Yeshiva University, a guy named Richard Joel, is almost as bad. He defends the invitation to Carter but then falls all over himself apologizing.

At the core of Yeshiva University¹s expressed mission and sacred mandate stands an unwavering and unapologetic commitment to the legitimacy, safety, and security of the State of Israel,” Joel wrote. “President Carter’s presence at Cardozo in no way represents a university position on his views, nor does it indicate the slightest change in our steadfastly pro-Israel stance.

Joel is not appreciative that a former president is honoring Yeshiva with his presence because the primary mission of his university is “unapologetic commitment” to Israel. Really. I’m sure the students who attend Yeshiva to become respected doctors, lawyers, teachers and rabbis in America might not see it that way. But Joel is a Jewish organizational professional not any kind of educator; defending Israeli policies is his mission along with raising big bucks from lobby-affiliateddonors.

The good news is that Dershowitz and Joel represent a tiny fraction of Jewish Americans. To say that Jews are loyal Americans is almost embarrassing. Of course, we are. But we are also a tiny minority and, historically, a vulnerable one. Dershowitz and Joel increase our vulnerability by sending out the message that we aren’t Americans at all, that our loyalty is not to this country but to Israel. That may be true about them, just not the rest of us. (Note: Dershowitz hates me for calling people like him and Joel Israel Firsters. Uh, ok.)

It is also worth noting that no president has done as much for Israel as Carter who saved countless Israeli lives by personally negotiating the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty. How many Israeli parents have their son, how many kids their fathers, how many wives their husbands thanks to Carter?

After all, just five years before Carter produced Israeli-Egyptian peace, 2800 Israeli boys were killed in the Yom Kippur War. But, thanks to Carter, not a single Israeli has died fighting Egypt since.

Is that what really offends Dershowitz? Could it be that the great professor wants to see Israel embattled forever? Is that why he hates Carter? Does he prefer his Israelis as martyrs, to be used as fodder in his never ending war against Muslims and Arabs.

Alan Dershowitz is appalling.

NOTE TO THE SECRET SERVICE: Some alumni of Yeshiva University have issued physical threats against the former President.

Enraged alumni have threatened to physically block Jimmy Carter from entering Yeshiva University’s Cardozo School of Law, where he is due to receive a peace award on April 10.

Daniel Rubin, 62, said about a dozen former alumni are planning an act of civil disobedience to prevent Carter, a harsh critic of Israeli policies on the occupied West Bank, from picking up the International Advocate for Peace Award, given annually by Cardozo’s Journal of Conflict Resolution.

Rubin said former alumni would use their knowledge of the building layout to outmaneuver any attempts to stop them.

“Mr. Carter ain’t going to get anywhere,” Rubin said.

Catching up on some of the news stories I missed about President Barack Obama’s visit to Israel and Ramallah, it struck me how offensive his words and gestures must have been to Palestinians.

At every stop, he made clear that the United States is 100% on Israel’s side. Almost in so many words, he said that the United States and Israel are one.

Just read what Obama said upon his arrival in Israel last Wednesday. This is no mere statement of U.S. policy; it is America’s embrace of the Zionist narrative, right down to the references to the Biblical Abraham and his Israeli progeny (via his wife Sara), without reference to the Arabs who the same Bible tells us descended from Abraham (via his other wife, Hagar).

More than 3,000 years ago, the Jewish people lived here, tended the land here, prayed to God here.  And after centuries of exile and persecution, unparalleled in the history of man, the founding of the Jewish State of Israel was a rebirth, a redemption unlike any in history.

Today, the sons of Abraham and the daughters of Sarah are fulfilling the dream of the ages — to be “masters of their own fate” in “their own sovereign state.”  And just as we have for these past 65 years, the United States is proud to stand with you as your strongest ally and your greatest friend….

This except was no more effusively pro-Israel than any other Obama remark or gesture doing the trip, whether at Herzl’s tomb, or Yad Vashem, at the dinner hosted by President Shimon Peres or anywhere else he spoke. Yes, as I noted in an earlier piece about the trip, there were also strong references to the necessity of establishing a Palestinian state and even to the legitimacy of non-violent protest against  the occupation, but, looking back, it is clear that these were drowned out by the overall tone of the trip.

In essence it was an unprecedented embrace of Israel by a United States president almost as if he was apologizing for not being pro-Israel enough in his first term, a myth propagated by the right.  (Israel has received more aid under Obama than under any of his predecessors). In fact, it was almost one of those mythical Obama “apology tours” Republicans like to yell about although they were, of course, silent about this one.

Particularly striking was Obama’s obsequiousness toward Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who worked so hard to elect former Governor Romney in 2012. Just read the transcript of the Obama-Netanyahu press conference and note the 10 times the President specifically invoked “Bibi,” as if the two were not leaders of their respective countries but buddies since childhood. (Imagine if Obama stood on a platform here with Speaker John Boehner or Majority Leader Eric Cantor and, to show bygones were bygones, smothered them with that kind of feigned affection). It was embarrassing.

But more than that it did significant damage to America’s ability to play the role of honest broker between Israelis and Palestinians if negotiations ever begin. Obama made clear which side he is on, going so far as to embrace the whole Biblical Jewish claim to Eretz Yisrael. How could Palestinians ever trust him?  The umpire is not supposed to wear the uniform of either team.

Obama must know all this but he obviously thinks that Palestinians have no choice but to go along with anything he proposes. After all, they have nothing. He seems not to understand that because of that fact, they have, as the song goes, nothing left to lose. A Third Intifada or massive non-violent resistance could turn Israel upside down and Palestinians know it. Obama apparently doesn’t; he thinks, as Netanyahu clearly does, that the hungry are always grateful for crumbs.

MJ Rosenberg is Special Correspondent for The Washington Spectator where this originally appeared.

The second day of President Barack Obama’s visit to the Middle East is shaping up as very different from the first.

Yesterday was a love-fest with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. During their joint press conference, each of the two leaders tried to outdo the other with jokes and witticisms demonstrating that they like each other and that Obama loves everything about Israel. Obama even spoke in Hebrew at several points. In short, yesterday was a party and Obama seemed to be having the time of his life.

The party ended in Ramallah. Maybe it was his view of the separation wall from his helicopter or maybe the fact that he was away from the Israelis but the face he presented at President Mahmoud Abbas’ welcoming ceremony was utterly different. He looked miserable. Was it because he just didn’t want to be there or because he is ashamed that his administration has decided to parrot the Israeli line on pretty much everything? No matter the reason, he seemed sad and his words were halting.

He didn’t offer the Palestinians much of anything though, other than the stricken look on his face. Yet, there were signs that the times are changing. He repeatedly referred to a Palestinian state, using the strongest formulation for that concept, “State of Palestine.” (Of course, he knows that his administration stood with Israel against any UN recognition of such an entity last year.) Nonetheless, his references to Palestinian statehood were utterly unambiguous and clear.

And, in words that must have shook Netanyahu, Obama referred to “the moral force of nonviolence” to resist the occupation. Coming out of left field, this was probably an indication that Obama read The New York Times magazine cover story on non-violent resistance in the West Bank by Ben Ehrenreich. Obama compared the Palestinian struggle to the civil rights movement in America, invoking his own daughters as beneficiaries of that struggle. This presidential encouragement of the one form of protest that Israeli officials fear most as threatening their hold on the West Bank was significant. It is easy to imagine Palestinian protesters now marching against the settlements, waving photos of Obama along with his words endorsing non-violent resistance’s “moral force.”

On specifics, though, it was all boilerplate. Asked at his press conference about settlement expansion, Obama made clear that he opposed it but also that he did not accept the Palestinian view that it should halt during the course of negotiations. Obama, like Netanyahu, demands unconditional negotiations which, in reality, means that Palestinians be willing to negotiate while Israel gobbles up more of the land. Abbas made clear in response that he wasn’t having it.

Upon returning to Jerusalem, Obama delivered his speech to Israeli students at the Jerusalem Convention Center. It was mostly standard stuff (lots of praise for Israel,Zionism, empathy over Jewish suffering, etc.) but also included repeated and emphatic calls for peace and the establishment of a Palestinian state. The most significant part came when Obama referred to the Palestinians’ right to justice, specifically referencing settler violence that goes unpunished.

But the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination and justice must also be recognized. Put yourself in their shoes- look at the world through their eyes. It is not fair that a Palestinian child cannot grow up in a state of her own, and lives with the presence of a foreign army that controls the movements of her parents every single day. It is not just when settler violence against Palestinians goes unpunished. It is not right to prevent Palestinians from farming their lands; to restrict a student’s ability to move around the West Bank; or to displace Palestinian families from their home. Neither occupation nor expulsion is the answer. Just as Israelis built a state in their homeland, Palestinians have a right to be a free people in their own land.

I don’t think any president previously has used the language of justice in discussing Palestinian rights, which is, of course, how Palestinians rightly see it.

It is telling that this part of the speech was met with prolonged applause. In fact, every reference to Palestinian statehood was received with the kind of ovation both AIPAC and the United States Congress reserve for bashing Palestinians, not for discussing their rights. Although many will dismiss the Jerusalem speech as milquetoast, no one would say that if Obama had delivered it in Washington, where only pro-Likud pieties are permitted. That might be considered ironic if we weren’t all accustomed to it by now.

The lobby does not control the discourse in Israel. It does here. But that is no reason to downplay the significance of Obama’s unequivocal endorsement of a “State of Palestine” and justice for the Palestinian people as prerequisites for security for Israel.

Obama accomplished what he had to. He reached over Netanyahu’s head and spoke directly to the Israeli people, explaining why peace is in their own best interest and why justice for the Palestinians cannot be denied. And he was cheered. Loudly.

When negotiations begin, and I am optimistic that they will, the capital he earned today will be viewed as a smart investment indeed.

This is crossposted with The Washington Spectator where it originally appeared. I am its Special Correspondent On The Middle East

On Tuesday, March 19, Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD) released the text of a letter which AIPAC drafted and which he circulated to his colleagues telling Pres. Obama not to deviate from the lobby’s line during his upcoming trip to Israel.

The letter’s main point is to again warn the Palestinians not to dare taking their grievances to the United Nations which, in true AIPAC-speak, the senators deem a unilateral move.

Palestinian efforts to bypass direct negotiations with Israel by taking unilateral steps for international recognition are, in our view, unacceptable.  When you meet with Palestinian leaders, you should make clear that the pathway for peace is through unconditional direct negotiations between both the Israelis and Palestinians and that the United States vigorously opposes any Palestinian efforts to circumvent direct negotiations.

The senators also urge the President to identify and promote policy solutions (sic) , such as Iron Dome, that address the urgent and important security challenges facing both Israel and the United States. “We also hope that you will reiterate the United States’ support for Israel, her right to defend herself, and the Iron Dome project.  In such a tumultuous region of the world, and during such challenging times, a strong relationship between our two countries has never been more important.”

Here is a list of the Democrats who joined Cardin in again selling their souls to AIPAC   in signing the letter : Senators Menendez, Boxer,  Casey,  Shaheen,  Coons, Murphy, Schumer,  Stabenow, Mikulski,  Klobuchar,  Whitehouse,  Mark Udall,  Hagan,  Landrieu, Bennet, Gillibrand, Manchin, Wyden, Blumenthal,  Tester, Heinrich, Schatz,  Hirono, Franken, Baucus, McCaskill, Merkley,  Begich, Donnelly,  Pryor, Tim Johnson, Lautenberg, Sherrod Brown, King, Warner, Hoeven,  Reed (R.I.)

It is worth noting that Carl Levin (D-MI) did not sign it while Rand Paul (R-KY), like most Republicans, did.

Below is the full text of the letter:

Dear Mr. President:

We applaud your decision to travel to Israel so early in your second term as president.  Your upcoming trip will offer you the opportunity to meet with the leaders of Israel’s new government and to reaffirm the unshakeable bond between our two nations. In your meetings in Jerusalem and Ramallah later this month, we hope that you will reaffirm your commitment to working closely with the new government of Israel.

As you may know, in May 2011, the Senate passed S.Res.185: a resolution reaffirming the commitment of the United States to a negotiated two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  The bipartisan resolution was cosponsored by 90 Senators.  Palestinian efforts to bypass direct negotiations with Israel by taking unilateral steps for international recognition are, in our view, unacceptable. When you meet with Palestinian leaders, you should make clear that the pathway for peace is through unconditional direct negotiations between both the Israelis and Palestinians and that the United States vigorously opposes any Palestinian efforts to circumvent direct negotiations.

It is important to re-emphasize that the United States will not tolerate efforts to isolate or delegitimize Israel. During your first term, you and your administration actively stood by Israel at the UN and other agencies to try to block such efforts.  It is critical that you now make clear that our relationship with Palestinians will be jeopardized by seeking action against Israel at the International Criminal Court.

We encourage you to also stress the importance of the Palestinian Authority’s close security cooperation with Israel.  If peace is to be possible, the Palestinian Authority also needs to confront the recent surge in violence on the West Bank, cease all anti-Israel incitement and renounce Hamas until it unequivocally meets the three Quartet requirements.

We believe that by espousing these principles during your historic trip, you will reaffirm the United States’ commitment to enhancing Israeli security, improving the prospect for peace with the Palestinians and furthering our own interests in this troubled region of the world.

We are strongly committed to the restart of the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians. However, we also recognize that the violence and chaos that have sprung up in Syria, North Africa, Egypt, including insecurity along the Sinai Peninsula, and Yemen are not related to the peace process.

As you pursue peace in the Middle East in the long-run, we hope that your agenda will identify policy solutions to address the urgent and important threats facing Israel and the United States today.  We also hope that you will reiterate the United States’ support for Israel, her right to defend herself, and the Iron Dome project.  In such a tumultuous region of the world, and during such challenging times, a strong relationship between our two countries has never been more important. Israel has challenging times ahead. Israel needs our unwavering commitment now more than ever.

###

On Sunday, the New York Times ran an extraordinary magazine piece (it was the cover story) on West Bank Palestinians who are resisting the Israeli occupation through non-violence. For those who follow the issue closely, the extraordinary aspect of the piece was not so much anything author Ben Ehreneich revealed as it was that the article appeared in the New York Times at all.

You just don’t expect to find this type of reporting on Israel in the Times which, ever conscious that it is the New York Times, is always cautious about its reportage on Israel. Most of its coverage is either extremely balanced (“the Palestinians say this, the Israeli government says that”) or slavishly supportive of the Israeli line. (Columnists Tom Friedman and Nick Kristof both consistently deviate from the line, but they are columnists, influential columnists to be sure, but opinion columnists nonetheless).

Ehrenreich’s piece neither adhered to the Israeli line nor was it balanced. It had a clear point of view: the occupation is a terrible thing that should not continue.

Does that make it biased? It would, if there was another side to the argument. But in the case of the occupation there isn’t. Imagine Ehrenreich’s counterpart on the right explaining that the 45-year occupation is a good thing which should continue forever.

Other than West Bank settlers and their supporters on the far right of the Israeli and American political spectrum, no one makes that case. The United States government is committed to the “two-state solution.”  Prime Minister Netanyahu has also endorsed it as has every Israeli prime minister since Yitzhak Rabin signed the Oslo agreement with Yasir Arafat.  As for the lobby here in the United States, it too supports the two-state solution.

It hardly needs to be said that endorsing the “two state solution,” by definition, means opposing the occupation. After all, there is no place where a Palestinian state could be created other than the West Bank (including east Jerusalem) and Gaza. That is if you favor two states. The “one state solution” would include the land that is now Israel in a single state for all the people who live there.  But that, obviously, is something different than the “two state” framework.

Of course, neither the Netanyahu government nor the lobby here really want the occupation to end. If they did, they would not, in the case of the Israeli government, keep expanding settlements or, in the case of pro-Israel organizations here, support Israel’s right to do so. Nor would they use their influence to prevent any pressure from the United States on Israel to end the occupation. In short, both Israel and its lobby here nominally oppose the occupation while actually supporting it.

The reason they can’t say they support occupation is the same reason that the New York Times will never run a major piece that takes the opposite point of view from Ehrenreich’s. That is because in the year 2013, it is no longer possible to defend occupation and the denial of rights to the native people that goes along with it. Like defending colonialism or segregation, defending occupation is beyond the pale of civilized discourse.

And that is why hardly anyone defends it. It survives because those who favor it, do not engage on that issue directly, saying “of course, I oppose the occupation but….”

And it is the arguments that follows the “but” that allow an institution universally believed to be wrong to continue.

The words that invariably follow the “but” rarely, if ever, defend the occupation itself. Instead they attack the people whose land is being occupied, the Palestinians in particular and sometimes Muslims in general.

The arguments are (1) that the Palestinians do not accept Israel’s right to live in peace and security (they have since 1993), (2) that they are terrorists (the Palestinian Authority which governs the West Bank not only opposes terrorism, it works with the Israeli authorities to thwart it, (3) that Palestinian schools teach their children to hate Jews (which has been proven false), (4) that Israel has no Palestinian partner with whom to negotiate (Mahmoud Abbas is so friendly to Israel that many Palestinians consider him an Israeli puppet) and (5) that the Palestinians have rejected Israeli offers of to remove the settlements and exchange the occupied territories (it has, in fact, never been offered).

In other words, supporters of the status quo, knowing that the occupation is indefensible, simply change the subject to one that they would rather discuss. And that is the nature (as they see it) of the Palestinians (and, in the case of the Pam Geller’s of the world, the nature of all Muslims).  In short, knowing they cannot win the argument by discussing the issue that prevents peace (the occupation), the Israeli government and its lobby here chooses instead to attack the Arabs. And it works. Forty-five years after it began, the occupation not only survives, it has become more impregnable as settlements expand, the number of settlers increase and Israel’s system of roads, walls, and law defends the settlers at the expense of the local population.

[It should be noted that in the first years of the occupation, it was defended as strategically necessary to defend Israel itself. But that was disproven in 1973 when Israel, holding all the territories it does now plus the Sinai Peninsula, was attacked by the combined forces of Egypt and Syria and only prevailed after three weeks of fighting and the loss of 2,688 soldiers in contrast to the 776 it lost in the 1967 war, when it held none of the occupied territories and defeated Egypt, Syria, and Jordan in six days.]

The best news about the Ehrenreich piece is that he simply describes the occupation in all its ugliness, forcing the reader to forget for a time all the propaganda about Palestinians and instead focus on the conditions Palestinians are subjected to simply because the settlers (and the Israeli government that supports them) wants their land. And, beyond that, he defends non-violent resistance to the occupation as the one means that can end it. (He quotes one Israeli army official saying that he prefers dealing with resisters who shoot, “you have the enemy, he shoots at you, you have to kill him.” But he is confounded by non-violent resistance. Another is quoted as saying, “We don’t do Gandhi very well.” In short, Ehrenreich eviscerates the occupation and describes how it can be ended.

No, that is the second best news about the piece. The best news is that it appeared in the New York Times. Most definitely, the Times, they are a changing.