On the unbearable lightnness of (not) being Israeli

The adjective 'Israeli' is a magician's trick. but whereas the common magician makes coins and pigeons vanish and reappear, 'Israeli' can disappear a whole people, only to pull it back from the ear of an assistant when the show requires it. Let's see how it's done.

Technically and legally, the adjective 'Israeli' refers to all citizens of the state. Palestinians of 48, the land's indigenous people, are thus technically 'Israelis.' Indeed many in Israel call them 'Arab-Israeli,' with the convenience of eliminating Palestine a side benefit. One would expect however that, logically and linguistically at least, an Arab-Israeli is an Israeli, just like one would say that a tea cup is necessarily a cup. Surprise! When the adjective is used in normal discourse, 'Israeli' refers to the Jewish citizens of Israel alone. 'Israeli' public opinion in what Jews in Israel think. Israeli history is the history of establishing a Jewish state in Palestine. Israeli culture is Amos Oz and Marcel Ianco. It is not Mahmoud Darwish. Israeli economy, as Netanyahu recently quipped, insightfully, does quite well if you just don't count those who don't count. etc. etc.

Palestinians with Israeli citizenship have basically two possible responses that are both embedded in the adjective. They can accept it or reject it. Whichever they choose, they are like the audience member who is invited on stage to 'participate' in the magician's show; the choices are scripted into the performance. If they want to adopt the adjective, recognizing that it includes them, they soon discover that they have adopted the adjective in the second sense, as one that excludes them, thus recognizing and affirming their own erasure and Jewish domination over them in return for dubious and illusory "fitting in." If however they reject it, it turns out that what they reject is the adjective in the first sense. Namely, they reject the democratic state, the will of the majority, their (second class) civil rights, etc. And thus they become grist to the Israeli propaganda mill ('the Arabs understand only force,' etc.) and trigger the famous mechanisms by which as everybody knows "democracy defends itself against those who abuse its democratic means to try to destroy it." la-di-da, la-di-da.

The video below, on an Al-Jazeera show, and if you watch the whole episode, (you will probably wince a lot), you will see the magician at work, and also the incredible racism that Palestinian must contend with regularly. You will also see Stav Shafir, a leader of the #J14 protest movement from a year ago, discovering her inner career politician (she is now running to parliament on the most wretched party ticket in Israel, the labor party). Here you can see her mastering the Obamish art of platitudes, 'change' and 'yes we can' and a few others, all in the Israeli inflection.  I find her viscerally repellant; but your mileage may vary. My prediction, in a few years she will be under investigation for corruption.

Bonus, the remarkable presence, trapped as she is by the magician's tricks, of Hanin Zoabi.  Shlomo Sand also acquits himself decently, to some extend by a few of the things he says and to an even greater extent by the feeling that he is just short of rupturing a vein.

Opposition to Sand book goes apoplectic

Goodness gracious, coincidentally I had just been discussing, not so much the Khazar hypothesis itself, but if it has any genuine or valid ramifications for, well anything at all really. Then I get this email linking to a Jerusalem Post article headed TAU historian accused of anti-Semitism about how the Board of Deputies and its provisional wing, the Community Security Trust, are saying that the book by Shlomo Sand taking issue with the idea that the Jews of today are the direct descendants of the Israelites of biblical times is actually antisemitic.

Jewish community figures questioned Sand's work and noted that no opposing view or contextualization was offered at his events.
"Sand's agenda is to sever the historic link between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel," said Jonathan Hoffman, co-chairman of the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland. "To promote that agenda his book ignores archeological and genetic evidence. At none of his three London appearances was there a historian or Jewish history expert on the platform to counter his distortions, evasions and sensationalism. The result will contribute to anti-Semitic discourse and incidents in the UK, already at a record level."

Now, have I got this right? According to Jonathan Hoffman, the zionist movement's biggest embarrassment in the UK (according to various zionist sources including the BoD), Jews are going to be attacked because of our DNA. People who were otherwise quite well disposed to Jews because they thought we were direct descendants of Israelites from 2,000 years ago are now going to attack Jews because we are perceived to be mere 1,000 year old youngsters? I swear, if Jonathan Hoffman didn't exist I might have to invent him.

Anyway, to continue:

A guest on BBC Radio Four last week, Sand told presenter Andrew Marr that he compares Israel's birth to "rape"

Whereas everyone knows that the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians was consensual.

"I'm not a Zionist. I don't define myself as an anti-Zionist... but I'm not a Zionist... I don't put into question the existence of Israel," he said. "I compare when I am speaking before Arab students the birth of the Israeli state to an act of rape. But even the son that was born of the act of rape... you have to recognize him... the existence of Israel I don't put in question today, you understand me?"

Not good enough for the zionists I'm afraid. You have to support every assertion even if you don't believe it and if evidence might point elsewhere.

"Sand's book represents another step towards the mainstream for replacement ideologies," said Jon Benjamin, chief executive of the Board of Deputies of British Jews. "Our history of exile and ghettoization has meant that the Jewish people are remarkably cohesive, genetically, culturally and religiously, and through the centuries the countries in which we have lived have had no compunction in designating us as Jews. It is Sand's theory that is the upstart, rootless and incredible, not the history and collective memory of the Jewish people and our connection to Israel."

Notice how the guy isn't saying that Sand has got anything wrong, just that there are long standing Jewish communities. I haven't read the book but at a guess I'd say that Sand doesn't actually dispute the antiquity of many Jewish communities. He is just saying that we don't all come from the same place and nor did that BoD spokesperson.

So much for the BoD, what about the provo wing? Here's Mark Gardiner:

Gardiner said there was nothing wrong with genuine historical inquiry about Jews or any other facet of history.
"However, that is neither the core purpose, nor the core impact of Sand's book. It can be summed up very simply as: No real Jews = no need for a really Jewish state.

He didn't say there are no real Jews and he explicitly stated that he is not opposed to the State of Israel. Can't these provos read?

But the zionists should stop digging. Whether or not Jews are a direct line from Palestine 2,000 years ago to now is irrelevant to whether or not Jewish supremacy should characterise the governance of Palestine. Jewish supremacy is wrong no matter where Jews are from. If Jews are entitled to ethnically cleanse and otherwise exclude non-Jews from various aspects of public life because they can trace their descent from the site where the supremacy is effected then what does that mean for the majority of Jews, who according to this zionist biological racial purity argument, cannot trace our origins to the various countries in which we live. If you need to show that your DNA matches DNA in the same area from 2,000 years ago in order to qualify for human rights then this means the majority of Jews should, according to this racial purity argument, lose our rights. Actually many zionists would be quite happy with that as their various historical and current collaborations with antisemitism have shown. I don't think most Jews would be happy with that. I hope not anyway.

Oi! I might have to break the habit of a lifetime and read the book that I'm talking about. Just kidding. You don't have to read the book, though you might well want to. I have no doubt in Sand's integrity. It's just this logic of the zionists is so dangerous, as I outlined just above. They are not concerned for culture, not for language nor for any subjectivity. They are concerned with a perception of biological racial purity. And they don't seem to see how disgusting the obsession is nor where it leads, logically if not in practical terms, for the majority of Jews that inhabit the world at large, mostly safely and as equals, unlike the case for the Jews in Palestine.

UPDATE 1/5/2020. I just lengthened the word "zios" to "zionists" because for some time now, it has been up to racists to decide what anti-racists are allowed to call them.  http://jewssansfrontieres.blogspot.com/2016/06/zios-with-attitude.html I don't want to give the Zionists too many bones to chew on.