Paul Woodward doesn't read The Blue Voice?

That would be Paul Woodward of the very useful "War in Context" blog. He complains today, after writing about the neocons' spinning of the Israel-Lebanon War:

And is all of this of interest to the American liberal blogosphere - an arena that never used to tire of neocon-bashing? Apparently not. The pressing issue of the day is not neocon-inspired mayhem burning up the Middle East; it is whether Joe Lieberman loses his primary.

Well, shoot, we've been talking about it here at The Blue Voice since July 13. Even Billmon, a liberal blogger (or maybe he considers himself "left" and not liberal, I don't know, and today's Republicans don't even know the difference anyway) who's been writing a lot about the Israel-Lebanon War, grumbles today about "the uncomfortable and awkward silence descend on most of Left Blogistan once the bombs started falling in Lebanon".

For a guy like me who named his personal blog after Andrew Jackson, one of the patron saints of the Democratic Party, I always feel a little strange when I'm really out of step with the Democrats on something. And, at least on the surface, my critical attitude toward Israel's actions in the current war with Lebanon is more in line with traditional Republican attitudes (pre-Cheney/Bush Presidency anyway) than with Democratic positions.

I'm not sure how you measure degrees of silence in the blogosphere. Since I've been following that war daily, my thought on seeing those comments about the silence in Left Blogostan about this event was, really? Is that true?

Without passing judgment on how much relative blog-silence there has been on the Isreal-Lebanon War, comments like this made me think a bit about why I felt maybe a little more comfortable getting out there and commenting on the topic than some other bloggers whose general outlook I share.


One thing that may inhibit some people from commenting about matters related to Israel - and in many cases it's probably best that they *do* fell inhibited - is concern about sounding anti-Semitic. I'm not so worried about that because I've spent time looking at that issue and trying to understand the history of that ugly phenomenon. And I've focused on it from several angles.

One is the history of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust in Germany. I've dug into that subject enough to be familiar with the various historical interpretations of the Holocaust, including of course the poisonous Holocaust-denial pseudohistory.

Want to talk about the relationship of Christian religious hostility to Jews to the "scientific" anti-Semitism picked up by Nazis? Or whether Richard Wagner's anti-Semitism taints his music? The Historikerstreit? Nietzsche and his sister? The ideological variations in understanding the Dresden bombing? The complicity of "ordinary Germans" in the Holocaust? The buzzwords Austrian policians use to indicate "brown" sympathies? "Intentionalism" vs. "structuralism"? The "uniqueness" of the Holocaust? The reception of Holocaust survivors in Israel? The Eichmann trial? Kurt Waldheim and war crimes? The "ehemalige" (ex-Nazis) in the German Free Democratic Party? The ideological uses of the Holocaust? The relation of the Turkish genocidal acts against Armenians to the Shoah? Daniel Goldhagen? The Holocaust as an issue for Jewish and Christian theology?

Pick one and we'll talk. The point is not that I'm a geek who spends too much time reading stuff that I'm not likely to make money from, though that might be a fair inference. The point is that if I hear of a dispute over whether the Jewish councils (Judenräte) under the Third Reich were more forms of Jewish resistance or of collaboration with the Nazis, I know that's part of a real historical dispute, and not just some crackpot Holocaust-denier weirdness. (I tend to agree more with the postion of Raul Hilberg in The Destruction of the European Jews than with the "resistance" view of Lucy Dawidowicz in The War Against the Jews or the extreme "collaborationist" view of Hannah Arendt.)

Another reason my view of Israel's wars is maybe not the typical Democratic position is that I'm aware of some of the contemporary issues between Israel, on the one hand, and Germany and Austria, on the other. Being aware that the German Social Democrats, Christian Democrats and Greens are supportive of good relations, aid and military sales to Israel without thinking it requires uncritical support of Israel's settlement policies in the West Bank or every aspect of every war Israel fights. And seeing how the Free Democrats tried (unsuccessfully) a few years ago to win votes by emphazing an anti-Israel stance, I have some sense of how that can be gamed in various ways by politicians.

Other factors that frame my view of Israel-related issues would include the Jewish-Catholic "dialogue" and Catholic ecumenical theology, my understanding of the anti-Jewish attitudes underlying the Christian Right's superficially "philo-Semitic" position toward Israel, some familiarity with the more balanced positions that all US administrations from Truman through Clinton took toward Israel (compared to the current administration's), and the influence of Israel's experience on US military doctrines and practice. For a bit on the latter, see Doctrine That Works by Douglas Johnson II (US Army War College Strategic Studies Institute [SSI]) 08/02/06.

So, having worked my way previously through some of these ideological minefields, I'm not as worried about saying something that could be easily misinterpreted.

Also, 9/11 changed everything, right? After 9/11, I began to try to learn more about current issues in the Middle East. So, I was aware that Ariel Sharon's policy of disengaging from Gaza was not a peace policy, but rather one aimed at facilitating permanent seizures of major blocks of occupied territory in the West Bank. It tended to be portrayed in the US press as a step toward peace. But the Israeli press was far more skeptical.

One of the Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 1881-2001 by Benny Morris. Morris is known for his frank historical writing that talks realistically about the often brutal means used on both sides of the Arab-Israeli conflict over the decades. He was considered one of the "New Historians" in Israel who have been more willing to discuss the darker side of Israel's founding heroes. But, in a somewhat bizarre turn, the conclusion he has drawn from that more recently is that brutal and illegal measures are appropriate for Israel in dealing with their Arab enemies. He has become pretty much of a neoconservative, in other words.

Morris gave a somewhat notorious interview to Ha'aretz a couple of years ago Survival of the Fittest 01/09/04. It can also be found in Counterpunch 01/16/04 and also at this Web site. (More on Morris in No More Tears: Benny Morris and the Road Back from Liberal Zionism by Joel Beinin Middle East Report Spring 2004.)

I'm convinced that the United States need to back Israel with aid and weapons sales and political support in negotiations and international forums. I'm also convinced that the US needs to push Israel to come to meaningful permanent settlements with its neighbors. That's certainly in American interests, to defuse Arab and Muslim hostility to the US and Israel. Tom Segev (another Israeli "New Historian") argued this week that a more balanced American approach is very much in Israel's interests, as well, in Between Two Friends Ha'aretz 08/03/06:

During the past 39 years since the Six-Day War, the United States did not force Israel to pull out of the West Bank, but more than once acted to block Israeli military actions. Over time, we have grown accustomed to the Americans saving us, not only from the Arabs, but from ourselves too. Not in this war. It is still unclear whether this war was coordinated with the United States; only the release of government records of the past three weeks will shed light on this. Whatever the case may be, the impression is that the Americans are linking the events in Lebanon to their failing adventure in Iraq.

One of the big problems the Cheney-Bush administration caused by its more-or-less unquestioning support of Israel (except on arms sales to China) is that it completely changed the long-standing "good cop/bad cop" position that the US had been able to play on diplomatic issues affecting Israel. And that seems to be what Segev is getting at.

I realize the politics involved are complicated. But a more sensible position for the Democrats would be to find to state a position saying that while military and political support should continue to Israel, that the US also should be serious about getting permanent settlements of the outstanding territorial issues with Israel. And about bringing Israel into the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Because the United States badly needs a Middle Eastern policy that's based on more than military threats and the Napoleonic fantasies of the neocons and nationalists of the Cheney-Bush administration that they will bring democracy to the Middle East through a succession of "wars of liberation" there.

| +Save/Share | |