Julia Carrie Wong: I found this moving. — Subium • Bluesky web client

I found this moving.

We need an exodus from Zionism | Naomi Kleinwww.theguardian.com We don’t need or want the false idol of Zionism. We want freedom from the project that commits genocide in our name

I grew up in a secular Jewish and Chinese family, and for whatever reason (books, mostly) latched on to the idea of Israel as a child and teenager. It was a childish attachment, largely rooted in fantasy and ignorance, but it was very important to my sense of who I was.

As I grew older and developed my own politics, eventually getting involved in political movements, my feelings about Israel began to conflict with what people I trusted on other issues were telling me, and with the steady stream of news revealing an ugly reality.

My initial reaction was denial. Sometimes there was anger. I would avert my eyes from news of what was happening in the occupied territories. When comrades expressed pro-Palestinian views, I told myself that they didn’t understand how antisemitism undergirded their ideas.

It took years, and patient discussion and prodding by fellow Jews and non-Jews, for me to open my mind enough to see that the story I was so attached to about Israel was a fantasy, that the reality violated all of my values, and that I could still think of myself as Jewish.

I think about this all the time these days, because I see so many other Jews lashing out in fear and anger against the reality of what is happening in Gaza, and I truly feel empathy for them, even as I’m frustrated and angry.

It is *exhausting* to keep the reality of what is happening in Israel and Palestine from disturbing your deepest beliefs. I know this because I did it for years! It takes so much energy to refuse to see a starving child, a mass grave, a poet killed in his bed, a teacher struck down.

I think what you’re describing is a very common experience and you should write about it if you’re so inclined

Naomi Klein, whose work I generally respect, is a captive of her own ideological cohort. While she accurately describes aspects of the Seder, she misses entirely the story in the Hagadah, in particular where four of the smartest Rabbis in Jewish history meet and reasoning their way from God visiting

10 plagues on the Egyptians to 250 plagues. Her history of Israel is equally one sided. She cites the Nakba, but fails to mention that Jews have been in the region since before the time of that famous Jewish revolutionary, Jesus. Jews bought land from the Ottomans before the state was declared.

The British divided and ended the Mandate based on respective ownership. Three Arab countries attacked at the declaration of statehood with the idea of murdering all of the indigenous and immigrant Jews. Since they were Muslim ethnostates they were unremittingly hostile to Jews. Three additional

wars of extinction followed in 1956, 1967, and 1973. Following that, terrorism: the Munich Olympics, bus bombings, cafe bombing, much of it as proxies of bigger countries. It is easy to judge Israel from our American experience so long as we think of ourselves on as the good country that defeated

Nazi Germany and forget our own history. Israelis are not like us because we did not grow up under the daily threat of annihilation following the Holocaust, an event that defined the modern notion of genocide. None of these protestors have suggested a solution to this long conflict other than

8 million Jews, surrounded by Muslim ethnostates, should find some other place to live. Like here? Lol. Or they should let themselves be ruled by a Muslim minority, a significant portion ( but not all) want to kill all the Jews. I am a great admirer of the Lennon/Ono song Imagine. But realizing

orinocotribune.com/an-extension...

An Extension of Nazism: How Did Zionism Collaborate With Hitler to Establish ‘Israel’?orinocotribune.com By Mohammad Ali Fakih – Dec 8, 2023 One of the more significant outcomes of the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation is that it has forced researchers in the history of the Zionist movement to confront …

Raven, in 1956 Israel joined with the U.K. and France in an invasion of Egypt, so I don't think there was anything "extinction" about it except they were trying to extinguish Nasser. Admittedly, America committed most of its genocides in the 17th, 18th, & 19th centuries, so understand the envy.

Uh huh. “Envy.” Anyway not engaging any longer on this thread. The original poster’s thread was heartfelt, I hijacked it perhaps inappropriately, and am now going elsewhere. Be well.

ignoring the fact Jews made up 30% of population at the time and were given 60% of land, and that the Nakba was already well under way and many atrocities had already been committed by Israel before any of the Arab countries intervened

If you really respect her work, I think you owe her (and yourself) a more critical interrogation of the history you try to cite here, which is largely still animated by vicious propaganda and ethnic hatred.

Or vice versa.

No, not really, hahahahha

It is easy for her to say, she is speaking about abstract idea for her, living in another country, but the state of Israel is actually made from people, living there, having homes and families, been born there now for third generation. What should they do?

Stop killing their neighbors and stealing their land.

But that isnnot what the text speaks about, right? The text speaks about disbanding the idea of Israel as a state, right?

And? There are many arguments for doing so, none of which involve displacing the people who live there. Unlike the founding of Israel, which did, making Palestinians stateless.

And that's a serious international crime against humanity. Jesus.

The really amazing thing is that people like this imagine they are helping. What they could do is encourage both sides to make peace. Instead it's this kind of fantasy sports version of geopolitics that will lead to nothing but more conflict and suffering for the side she claims to care about.

Atrocity.

Literally you would make Jews stateless.

How many Jews were deported from Arab ethnostates like Egypt, Tunisia, Syria? Where did they go?

How does that justify ongoing genocide in Gaza?

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unwatch.org/the-strange-...

The strange, enduring rage of Naomi Klein - UN Watchunwatch.org National Post (Canada), ISSUES & IDEAS; Pg. A19 September 15, 2009 Tuesday The strange, enduring rage of Naomi Klein When it comes to Israel, she has always acted out of intense emotion, hysteria and ...

Holy shit.

I found it scary. She's saying in quite contemporary fashion, lets say economical, that, oh noes, the Phenix is burning, lets move for an other bird, lets fluctuate, let us take another guess, let us wear out brand new clothes.

But, as she's ensnaring her vision in religious speech, have we forgot how the biblical story goes? The phoenix from the ashes?