Pink Eye

Both Schulman and Kirchick have it wrong. There are 2 Israels: the liberal-minded, ethical one that it was founded by, and a fundamentalist, tribal strain that are johnny-come-latelies, but are wards of the state, and are slowly turning back the tide of progress created by the former.
Kirchick mentions the LGBT faction of Labor, curiously without mentioning that Labor is on a steep decline. Its replacements in Knesset share far more of their values with the fundamentalist, tribalist Palestinians they spend much of their time bashing.
I am no fan of the BDS movement, and I don’t believe the government is involved in a sinister campaign to “pinkwash” its crimes, but rather it is trying to explain that the situation in Israel is complex.
Sadly, that complexity is gradually reversing itself. When the settlers have infiltrated most of the West Bank, and when fundamentalist, tribalist values have infiltrated the Israeli psyche, then those hoping for a singular binational state will have paved the way for their dream. And, HaShem, which spends most of Leviticus imploring Israel to set itself apart from its neighbors, might very well grant it to them.

It’s not just gays who get a one way ticket out of Palestine. It is also democracy in Aza. All it took was one election to see how Islamists view democracy. Where as in Israel people continue to be able to vote and change course, 1,5 million Azan’s ( willingly ? ) gave up that right when they voted in Hamas. btw. the Nazi’s also were voted into the Reichstag and the declared the process obsolete.
Now, where is my K-Y ? I feel like shafting myself.

Best response to the Schulman piece I’ve read yet. Bravo.

Hasn’t Massad been out there promoting Assad and the Syrian regime? I’m just sayin’.

The denial of basic human rights in one sector of a society is not ameliorated by the granting of basic human rights to another sector of a society. Rather, all peoples in a society, including the privileged and “mainstream,” as well as those who are marginalized and “othered,” lose.

I actually looked forward to a spirited response to this debate but about halfway through this, found myself saying “can’t you do any better?” Kirchick chooses beginner-level rhetorical devices as rebuttals and gives himself one easy break after another, hurriedly ignoring all the nuance of Shulman’s piece and perhaps assuming that we readers won’t notice. just a few examples: 1. “schulman said all gay rights progress = pinkwashing.” Duh – no. reread the article and keep your knee-jerk in check. 2. “Politicians who are homophobes are incapable of machinations that involve exploiting gay rights to justify bad policy.” No, i’ve never heard of a politician capable of hypocritical political machinations. 3. “raising this issue reflects Schulman’s- and other people’s – all-consuming hatred of israel.” I really expected more from tablet than paper-thin “all critique of israel = hatred” argument. I’m disappointed in the argument, disappointed with the author for betraying a genuine, deep need for reflection within israeli society and offended by his insult to the readers’ intelligence. And disappointed in Tablet for not insisting on stronger thinking from its contributors. Anyway, Ellen Rovner’s comment here is so obviously spot-on that I don’t need to repeat it.

The fact that Sarah Schulman’s article appeared in the highly coveted editorial section of the Times demonstrates just how craven the editorial staff is in its knee jerk hatred of Israel. At least once a week there is an article criticizing Israel from the likes of Roger Cohen or Nicholas Kristoff or Thomas Freedman. At least these articles are about politics. Sarah Schulman on the other hand fails to recognize the most obvious fact…the Palestinians HATE gays and would almost certainly treat them worse than any treatment conceivable in the state of Israel. Its as if a murder is being committed right next to a boxing match and the writer chooses to focus on the boxing match! The editorial staff has an unlimited number of topics to choose from when it decides which editorial to run. That it chooses to make even this issue into an opportunity to advance an anti-Israel agenda is sickening and hypocritical in the extreme.

Dahlia – while you may not have thought Kirchik’s piece was as articulate as your colleague Joseph Dana’s unhinged rantings and ravings against “Zionists” in +972, I for one thought it was excellent.

a big problem with the rhetoric used by kirchik and others (esp. at TNR and commentary) is that it refuses the recognize the difference between critique of a belief or position and that critique of a culture.
in his quoting of morcos’ problem with the language of “backwards,” kirchik conflates that with a lack of recognition of palestinian gays’ suffering. that is not the same statement. to call palestine backwards is a racist discursive maneuver than imposes a cultural norm as defined by (some proposed) western morality. to refrain from that kind of claim still leaves plenty of room to (legitimately) criticize palestinian society as dangerous and harmful to gays as well as to empathize with the suffering there.

ironically, kirchik’s article is precisely an example of this phenomenon of pinkwashing, which he refuses to acknowledge. to identify with the queer community and, from leveraging that position, to criticize palestine en masse and to lionize israel en toto is precisely the issue at play.
to be a pro-gay country, on the whole (which it is, and for which it deserves credit) does not exempt israel from other moral quandaries. to be a dangerous region for gays (which it is, for which it deserves critique) does not delegitimize palestinian national aspirations.

mr. kirchik, i am proud of your decision to march in the pride parade in jerusalem. when i lived in that holy city, i was active in the open house there, a wonderful institution.
your actions testify that you care about gay rights. if that is the case, then you, too, will stand against its manipulation and use to trade off on one part of a human rights agenda (queer inclusion) for the sake of another (minority rights, national aspiration).

Dahlia: when you link your name to 972mag.com (and not to your own contributions), it is reasonable to assume that you represent 972. You specifically chastized tabletmag not just for printing Kirchik but “for not insisting on stronger thinking from its contributors.” Consequently, it is fair game for you then to answer for the deficit of “stronger thinking” by Joseph Dana and your colleagues at your 972mag which makes no attempt to present the variety of viewpoints that can be found at tabletmag.
Yehuda: I’ve read your post 3 times and still can’t figure out if you are sincere or are writing a witty parody of pompous, pseudo-academic jargon.

IS it something intrinsic within our Jewish character that so many of us — on the left and right — can find no good in our own community that can not be neutralized or even turned into a negative by finding something bad (worse, of course). Schulman’s twisted — and in my view, often disjointed — opinion piece makes an extreme reach to find a cloud surrounding the silver lining. She strives to connect some Scandinavian gay right-wingers with the entire gay movement of Israel, merely by mentioning them in the same essay. There is no real relationship, merely an association in Schulman’s perverse world view. Israel has had a bona fide pro-gay public policy that has spanned decades, under all political parties’ leadership. The general population of Israel has among the most positive attitudes towards gays of any country in the world. When the monstrous 2009 anti-gay attack in Tel Aviv took place, the entire nation of Israel publicly expressed outrage and solidarity with the LGBT community, including PM Netanyahu.
One does not need to whitewash Israel’s mistreatment of Palestinians and Arab citizens to acknowledge the world leadership Israel has demonstrated when it comes to LGBT rights. The truth is, when all is said and done, Israel still stands tall in the Middle East when it comes to human rights. This truth does not diminish either the wrongs Israel commits, nor abate (my own) genuine concern about the erosion of these rights and other freedoms in Israel’s current political climate. But Schulman’s voice does nothing to advance human rights anywhere, nor provide any succor or support for progressive Israelis and their supporters in the U.S.

It’s remarkable how these Jewish “progressives” become unhinged when anyone dare find a single redeeming value in Israel. It throws them into inner turmoil: they cannot countenance an Israel that is anything but the epitome of racist colonialism, castigated by all decent people. They have to resort to the faux-academic jargon and Orwellian doublespeak exemplified by Yehuda above to turn black into white and vice versa to restore their outraged equilibrium. Schulman and Scheindlin remind me of the leftist researchers a few years ago who complained that the IDF, unlike all other occupying militaries, did NOT commit widespread rape against civilians under their control. They rationalized that this was the case, not because of any moral compass among Israelis (G-d forbid) but precisely because Israelis are so racist against Arabs that they view them as not “worthy” of rape. http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/124674
I’m also reminded of the Oxford student interviewed on Sarah’s voxtablet program last year who attacked Israel for its progressive fertility programs: in her view, the fact that these programs benefitted Arab women equally, did not absolve the government of the de facto racist intent behind the programs to promote Jewish birth.
Of course all these examples are from Jewish academicians. They carry on a stream of self-abasement and insinuation with our enemies that has plagued a portion of our people for two thousand years.

DRW,
Dahlia Scheindlin is no Schuhlman that is for sure.
I do agree however with the rest of your comment, something I alluded to in a previous post. One of Tablets issues and basically all others is that it publishes largely articles written by non Israeli’s. The gap between the reality of what Israeli’s do, feel and think and what is written about them is HUGE. Wether it is from the far left or the far right, what we read in EU or US publications has very little to do with reality.
As the far left bitches about a supposed concerted “news black out” by dark forces manipulating and Islamophobia so it has itself morphed into polemicists. From vicious viral campaigns, outright lies ( Joseph Dana & Co. ) to a non grasping of the nuances of the situation. Many of course hold dual citizenship and so have the much vaunted “luxury” of being able to decamp when they are emotionally worn down ( Lisa Goldman of +972 recently could not take it anymore and just f’ed off back to Toronto ). On top of that many have not served in the IDF. For those Israel becomes a place where they can try out their Martin Buber whom they read back in Cincinnati when they were 16 years old. The diaspora Jew makes it to a conflict zone and gets middle-class-helper-syndrome. Others head for Africa, teaching cute little black kids how to read and write or build a school on northern Thailand for Shan refugees.
The result of this utterly distorted picture is that Israeli’s feel misunderstood by both sides. The disconnect becomes even greater. The conflict is so complex and so deep that 1500 words in a warm safe apartment somewhere in NYC, LA, East Bay or London just fail it. Simple really. But you need to have seen a little of the world to be aware of this. The Middle East isn’t a sand box where I can collect credit for my creative writing course in a second class university. If it were that simple we would not be in this mess.

its true that giving rights one oppressed segment does not justify harsh oppression of another. Ergo, to me, the full response, which unfortunately Kirchik did not make, must involve once again noting realities about the Israeli position that BDS ignores. IF Israel were expelling the Arabs from the West Bank – IF they were eagerly oppressing the Arabs and building new settlements all over – then talking about gay rights might be a distraction. But that is not the case. The debate now is about expansion of existing settlements, and about building of neighborhoods in Jerusalem that Israel does not consider settlements (And that do not impact the feasibility of a Pal State). Israel under Kadima was willing to negotiate seriously toward a Pal State, and even Bibis willingness has not been truely tested as the PA sets conditions that give him an excuse to delay. Those are things BDS tends to ignore. I do not agree with Bibis approach to the peace process, but I do not think it constitutes something so egregious that the genuine liberal accomplishments of Israeli society, including wrt LGBT, can be dismissed.

Dahlia,
I have no problem with Buber what so ever, I too read him and love him. I have an issue with people who choose him to take Israel off its hinges in a selective manner and use him as a tool, after he fled the Nazi’s, as did Gershon Sholem. So Judith Butler likes to do, living in SF. It is a tad to easy quoting spiritual giants from 8000 miles away.

Regarding the passports, the point is not wether we have one or three. The point is more the ( mental ) luxury of being able to sidestep the problem in Israel. Especially if you have spent your childhood here and therefore do not have family/possibilities outside of Israel and can “culturally” leave. I know plenty of Sabra’s who could get a second passport but see their place in Israel what ever happens. When we have no choice but to actually face the problem, we approach it with a different mindset. As compared to the goody goos. The thought of especially North American ( SA and Oz olim see the world differently usually ) olim getting off the bus with their frankly naive ideals ( post reading Buber at Hebrew School in some suburb ) and then getting hit in the face with a war scenario makes me cringe. Unpacking Martin Buber as a anti-Zionist tool from your suitcase at 21 in Israel and than going on to lecture Sabra’s who have lost family and friends in more then one war and suicide bombings shows that you don’t really understand Israeli’s imo. Talk about cultural insensitivity. I prefer to stick to Sabra’s when discussing Israel in detail. It is they who have always lived here. The cultural gap is too wide otherwise. That’s why 972 is mainly for foreigners. And Dana & Co gives talks in the USA catering to a crowd that is so biased it disqualifies him as an agent for change. Lisa Goldman is in Toronto and Dana now lives in Ramallah. What’s up with that ? And these people wish to be a catalyst for understanding and change ? Or Schulman on L.I. ? Ask a Sabra in the street what she thinks of this?….better not.

Andrew R: I know I read Schulman’s op-ed three times, and I see no evidence that Kirchek and other critics glossed over her words. I would turn your argument on its head — Schulman and her cohorts prefer to bash Israel and not credit the nation and its people for a long-standing progressive LGBT public policy record. Her only tribute to Israel is to its LGBT population, deliberately ignoring that the overwhelming majority of all citizens support full LGBT inclusion in society. Shulman gives more props to the nascent Palestinian LGBT movement, without noting the deep and abiding hatred of gays that continues to permeate many Arab and Islamic cultures.

Schulman’s first three paragraphs deal with condemnation of specific anti-Muslim statements/actions by gay Europeans and Americans. She then illogically equates those issues with Israel’s outreach efforts promoting it’s gay rights record, and gay-friendly tourist zones. There’s no equivalence, merely an attempt to associate these two separate phenomena by placing them in proximity on the page.

As for your assertion that most of the criticism of Schulman proves her/your point, that is absolute nonsense. Most of the critics, including myself, are appalled by Israel’s lurch to the right — religiously and politically. But this is an issue to be dealt with on its own merits, not by concocting a phony relationship between gay rights in Israel and the issues of occupation and anti-Palestinian policies. She wants LGBT Israelis to hate their own country as much as she does, and patronizes them as patsies of their government in her attempt to do so.

Bringing waring religions through hatred.

A very good response to the op-ed from last week, thank you.

You have explored a very charged issue with sensitivity and subtlety. Is that even allowed any more?

The bone-headed tactics you describe have become part and parcel of what can only be very loosely called a “debate” on the Israel/Palestine conflict. The “rules” are very simple. (1)Anything that Israel has done, is doing, or will ever do, is, by definition, malevolent. Anything that doesn’t obviously fall into that category, such as more enlightened treatment of gays, in this case, is to cover up for something that falls under Rule (1).

(2)Arabs, in general, and Palestinians in particular, are hapless and helpless victims of forces entirely beyond their control, such as “MSM”,”Western Imperialism”, “American Oil interests, or supported strongmen”, “CIA/Mossad/Al Quaida” “elitists/banksters/NWO-ists”, etc., etc. They are totally incapable of having their own legitimate political oppositions, desire for fundamental political change, even if the direction of that change isn’t what some in the West would prefer. So any time they grow weary of decades of tyranical family rule, agitate politically, or simply act violently to kill off potential enemies, either internal or external, this can’t possibly be due to their own wishes, or due to religious inclination. It is, again by definition, the fault of any combination of the above actors. Anyone who argues this with entirely factual information is simply indulging in Hasbara.

The hare-brained logic is akin to a child who brings home a report card that shows he is doing well in literature but poorly in Math. Most parents would congratulate the child on his language skills and work to shore up arithmetic deficiencies. But in the bizarro world of the “debate”, the parents of this child would accuse the child of deliberately doing well in writing in order to hide their poor math performance.

This article is excellent. Especially, its ultimate conclusion vis a vis the political left. I read Ms. Shulman’s “Pinkwash” in the NY Times. While I am a regular reader of Tablet, I would have preferred to see this article in the New York Times, a more public domain as a direct reply to Ms. Shulman’s vitriol and a place where the Left justifies itself daily.

…and here is another link to some Israeli reality,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MqhwvGWTPg&feature=related

I’m a late comer to this response to the NYT op-ed. Good response. Would be
even greater if it or part of it was published as a response in the NYT.
I hope you will at least try to get it in.

I am a gay Israeli living in Berlin. I am sooo tired of people using Israel as a symbol of oppression and clinging to it like a rottweiler locking its jaw onto a poor child’s arm. enough! It’s like using holocaust to shut germans up. It’s cliché and keeps minds and discourse narrow.
Israel is a country that consists of new and old immigrants, sabras, arabs (both Christian and Muslim), secular people of all religions and ultra orthodox fanatics, Extreme settlers/palestinians …
IT’S WAY TOO COMPLEX for a NY writer to understand i guess… you need to grow up there (i grew up in Jerusalem of all places), live in a few places in the world (USA-3 years, Italy-3 years, Germany-1.5) to understand how much others outside the country (and some inside) have no clue of what the hell is going on.
every time i read an article, i say to myself – god, these people have no damn clue! would love to visit that fictitious land they write about one day… i guess it’s the same one being “designed” by Television editors on CBS, ABC, Fox, El Jezeera and BBC to fit their viewers’ minds accordingly.
if they knew how complex it is to live in such a chaotic country. take brazil’s diversity, south african tension, US diseases (religious fanatics, economic gaps between rich/poor), soviet bureaucracy and put in a blender. then add cultural gaps between christians /muslims, jews and arabs, sepharadic/ ashkenazi jews (sadly still exist…) and secular/religious/ultra orthodox.
Please Sarah – go ahead, dissect us. write polished articles about this fictitious country of Is-ra-el. feed your readers stories about how is-ra-el “really is”. for me, it’s just pathetic. it’s like throwing rocks at a tank.
Gays have fought a lot for their rights in israel. Netanyahooo uses it to make his fanatic government look good to the world. NYT writer took the bate and reacted. boring. react to reality, not political hocus pocus. take on assignments you understand and do some research. wow.

Gays have no rights and maybe murder.
Under the Palestinian Authority’s. you must be kidding. Christians have rights?
Would Jews have rights. Would liberal Moslems. If there was such a thing in the Palestinian area. Hell they has fun murdering Muslims lots of luck with gay rights