Nidra Poller
JCall : The European Echo to JStreet, Part II
Paris 3 May 2010
Taking up where I left off, here is a brief summary of the “Be Reasonable” petition--launched by a non-sectarian organization in formation--that you can read in full, in English on the site [www.dialexis.org]. “Be Reasonable” rejects the pretentions of intellectuals and personalities who use their Jewish label as proof of objectivity. Contrary to those pretentions, the Appeal to Reason is neither democratic, moral, nor an expression of Diaspora solidarity with Israel. Israel is held as solely responsible for the impasse, whereas opinion polls consistently demonstrate Palestinian rejection of a peaceful solution of the conflict with recognition of Jewish rights to Jerusalem. Creation of a Palestinian state in the context of enduring hostility in the Arab world would leave Israel in a condition of’ “lethal strategic weakness. “ The “Appeal to Reason” forgets that the Oslo agreement led to an unprecedented wave of terrorism, the retreat from Lebanon to the establishment of Hezbollah, the Gaza withdrawal to a Hamas coup d’État and rocket attacks. If Hamas took control of “East Jerusalem” and the Palestinian state, would those who signed the Appeal to Reason say they’re sorry?
The Appeal to Reason is partial and partisan; it aids and abets the forces that promote anti-Israel boycotts and delegitimization of the State of Israel.
In the face of the existential threat to Israel “Be Reasonable” intend to build a genuine movement within the EU to defend the legitimacy of the State of Israel and combats growing anti-Semitism.
The debate inspired by the JCall initiative cuts across every line of my own crisscrossed itinerary at a point that could be described by my favorite line from Dante: in mezzo camina della vita, sparita… I lived to the age of 37 years in the land of my birth, the United States, with a 3-year interval in London, and have been living in Paris for 37 years. My life is a living debate! Debating with family members in the U.S. who think voting with Israel as a priority is single-issue narrow mindedness and voting for abortion rights and gay marriage is enlightened. With Zionists in France who thought George W. Bush was a lying warmonger. With Zionists in the U.S. who believed cross my heart and hope to die that Obama loves Israel. With French friends who thought Obama was the key to transatlantic reconciliation.
American friends and colleagues were eager to hear me report the evils of anti-Semitic Europe. Then Obama snatched our vast powerful country like an apple on a pushcart. I don’t think the American way—grassroots, talk shows, backing candidates and winning elections—is going to work this time. Something “old world” has happened to the land of my birth, something so heavy, so tragic, so foreign that it calls for a kind of thinking you have discarded. “Make it short and simple” was fine when things were going well and that youthful energy we all admire set things in motion at a dizzying pace. Alas, the dizzying pace is no longer ours. It has been handed over to our enemies.
The reaction to JCall is thunderous and the princes of reason who issued it have deftly integrated that reaction into their discourse: Didn’t we tell you that the problem with Jews is that they get all excited and think you’re trying to exterminate them every time someone … uh… threatens to exterminate them?
I watched the video on the JCall site. Urbane, distinguished, at ease facing row upon row of European parliamentarians this evening they presented and defended their Appeal. Ahmadinejad at the UN, Reasonable Jews at the EU, the wild jihadi addressing the travesty of international understanding, the ultra-rational Jews asking for spiritual guidance from the Eurabian EU.
Latest tally: JCall 3946 signatures Be Reasonable 5081.
In Nîmes today a 78 year-old Jewish man was attacked by three men who sprayed teargas directly into his eyes. He had come out of the synagogue, which is near the train station, to put a package in his car, and was on his way back when they fell upon him. Immediately after the incident members of the congregation saw that an insult had been spray painted on the façade. In gold! It said, in illiterate French, “Nike lé Juif,” meaning “f__k the Jews.”
If the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians were a territorial conflict, and if the EU and the US were as wise as Solomon, the Appeal to Reason would fly like an angel straight to the heavens and return with an inextinguishable olive branch. But if, as I believe, it is not a territorial conflict, it cannot be resolved by a peace process, there will be no demilitarized Palestinian state living side by side in peace with Israel, the performance this evening by Maurice Szafran, Elie Barnavi, Avi Primor, Ze’ev Sternhell, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, and Bernard Henri-Lévy was theater of the absurd.
The message delivered with such elegance, such beautiful phrasing, was too simple for words: give “back” the territories, end the Occupation. It’s the same message the EU has been pounding into our heads for decades, the same message that blares on green banners that fly over keffieh-clad enraged Arab-Muslims stomping through the streets of Western Europe, and the same message that has been endlessly formulated, reformulated, packaged, whistled, sung, cajoled, and repeatedly offered to the Palestinians. Who systematically reject it.
The high point of the presentation this evening before the EU Parliament was offered by Green Eurodeputy Daniel Cohn-Bendit, who began by saying he is a bad Jew who is not circumcised, did not have a bar mitzvah, and doesn’t really care much about Israel. But Cohn-Bendit cares enough to say that Israel has to get out of the territories and the Palestinians have to give up the right of return. Each side has to trim its dream to size so both can realize their dreams. Like France and Germany (Cohn-Bendit who is Franco-German, lives in Germany now). Weren’t we enemies? And now look, we’re friends.
This logic is the very essence of the fallacious Appeal to Reason! How did France and Germany get to be friends? Don’t tell me it’s because Germany finally listened to reason and withdrew from the territories.
[to be continued]
Nidra Poller
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