Israel/Palestine
Related: About this forumTo Save Israel, Boycott the Settlements
By PETER BEINART
Published: March 18, 2012
TO believe in a democratic Jewish state today is to be caught between the jaws of a pincer.
On the one hand, the Israeli government is erasing the green line that separates Israel proper from the West Bank. In 1980, roughly 12,000 Jews lived in the West Bank (excluding East Jerusalem). Today, government subsidies have helped swell that number to more than 300,000. Indeed, many Israeli maps and textbooks no longer show the green line at all.
In 2010, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel called the settlement of Ariel, which stretches deep into the West Bank, the heart of our country. Through its pro-settler policies, Israel is forging one political entity between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea an entity of dubious democratic legitimacy, given that millions of West Bank Palestinians are barred from citizenship and the right to vote in the state that controls their lives.
In response, many Palestinians and their supporters have initiated a global campaign of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (B.D.S.), which calls not only for boycotting all Israeli products and ending the occupation of the West Bank but also demands the right of millions of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes an agenda that, if fulfilled, could dismantle Israel as a Jewish state.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/19/opinion/to-save-israel-boycott-the-settlements.html?_r=3&pagewanted=all#h[]
aranthus
(3,385 posts)1. Prepare a statement of principles of this new boycott emphasizing equally, the right of a Jewish state to exist within roughly the Green Line, the Right of the Palestinians to their own state, and rejecting the settlements, and the Right of Return. In other words, the basics of the two state solution he endorses.
2. Get the leadership of the current BDS movement to sign on to it.
3. Then take that agreement to America's Jews.
Otherwise, I can't see many Jews agreeing to his proposal.
aranthus
(3,385 posts)If he could do what he needs to do to get a meaningful BDS movement started, then he wouldn't need a BDS movement.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)Im amused by Beinarts call for what can only be called a reverse boycott. Instead of only boycotting goods from the settlements, we should deliberately buy goods from the good Israel. This will somehow encourage Israel to reject settlements and turn to the angels of its better democratic nature. Methinks, this is a deliberate attempt by the author to stick his finger in BDS eye: you guys want to hurt Israel. Well, Ill go with you half way and support a settlement boycott. But Im going to make my line in the sand and show you Im as pro-Israel as they come because by God, Ill buy Israel. He calls it by the horribly inapt term, Zionist BDS. Lets call this BDS Lite, very lite.
http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2012/03/19/beinarts-buy-israel-reverse-boycott/
aranthus
(3,385 posts)He's not going to get supporters of the current BDS to join him because they really do want Israel gone (or at least they support the foundation of Israel's destruction). Silverstein, is a case in point. He opposes Beinart's plan precisely because it excludes the Right of Return. Most American Jews recognize that the Palestinians and Leftists who are driving the BDS train have the destruction of the Jewish state on their agenda. Why would we support Beinart's boycott when the other side isn't interested in meeting us halfway? Put another way. Why should American Jews do anything that might weaken Israel when the other side is still intent on destroying the Jewish state?
Further on reading some of the comments. Most of the people posting on Tikun Olam seem to be deeply morally confused. Silverstein in point again. Apparently, according to him, the Nakba is Israel's fault because the Israelis knew that the Arabs would go to war if the Jews declared their state. What, the Arabs didn't have a choice? There was some irresistible force that made them respond to the Jews with war? Are they subhumans with no will, conscience or moral understanding? Are they children with no responsibility? As long as disgusting people are proposing perverse moral inversions like this, Beinart is howling in the wind.
LeftishBrit
(41,208 posts)Boycott the settlements, not Israel.
It's always seemed the sensible solution; but I don't know how any people will get on board with this. Many of the BDS types make no distinction between Israel and the settlements.
aranthus
(3,385 posts)However, it was always intended to not differentiate between the settlements and Israel. Or as Omar Barghouti (one of the co-founders of the BDS movement) has put it, BDS is first and foremost about enforcing the Right of Return. Which is why no one would sign on to Beinart's boycott unless the real boycott changes its goals.