Fred (Facebook friend, who was responding to a timely piece
in Salon
about how when it came to the war in Gaza, everybody
suddenly is a Middle-East expert, not to mention a strident critic of Israel),
Yep. and isn't it interesting these critics of Israel
crawling out of the woodwork are whole hog: they don't just focus on Israeli
overkill, as in Gaza, or on West Bank settlements. Nooo. They think the whole
idea of Israel stinks. The very existence of the Jewish state bothers them no
end. They act as if the very existence of Israel might, unless they act quick,
cause cancer.
Nor, it should be said plainly, do they betray any sense of
why such a Jewish State came into being, what drove it into being, and, in
addition, why it ain't going away.
Such critics stand with Omar Barghouti, founder and boss of
BDS, when he screams and yells about Pope Francis visiting Herzl's grave, what
an insult that was to the Palestinian people, to their cause, on the same trip
the Pope visited with Mahmoud Abbas, clearly signaling his support for a
Palestinian state.
So let me go whole counter-hog (why not, since I don't keep
kosher, and have never chowed down on a counter-hog, though look forward): BDS
— no, not everybody in it, it's not a centralized organization, and yet there
is a leadership, namely Omar Bargouti — has damned George Soros on account of
how he bought stock in Sodastream.
Sodastream, remember, the carbonated water maker Scarlett
Johansson touted? Sodastream, built on West Bank land, which I still believe
should not have happened. Sodastream, which nevertheless does in fact gainfully
and respectfully employ some 500 Palestinians. . .
Sodastream: so who do you love, Scarlett Johansen or Omar
Barghouti? Ok, not fair.
Who do you love, George Soros or Omar Barghouti.
That's more like it.
George Soros is a great liberal lion of a billionaire. The
best really big money can buy.
Omar Barghouti would like to dig up Herzl and cast him out.
Soros? Barghouti?
Soros? Barghouti?
And the answer is!?
(Spoiler, not Barghouti.)
These facebook fights get wild. I have invested too much
energy in them. But they have clarified certain things for me as to where I
stand with regard to many critics of Israel (the staunch stalwart and
uncompromising critics not only of Netanyahu and his works but of Herzl and
his.)
Sodastream or not.
Soros or
Barghouti.
Went to my local hardware store, to look into Sodastream.
They had been leafleted by opponents of Sodastream,
proponents of Barghouti.
I had been waffling about this for a long time.
Arguments on facebook helped me make a decision, and in the
end, a purchase.
Soros v.
Barghouti.
Give me a break.
At the risk of sounding simplistic I think that the farther in time we get from the Holocaust--and the more people who are young enough to have no connection to it beyond, perhaps, a history class--factors into how people feel about the existence of a Jewish state.
ReplyDeletetrue. my only defense is there's only so much you can do in one post.
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