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Today's
Stories
January 17 / 18, 2003
Joe Quandt
Suicide
Bombers: The Clash of Absurdities
January 16, 2004
Kathy Kelly
A Visit
to Umm Qasr Prison
William S. Lind
More
Thoughts on 4th Generation Warfare
Gillian Russom
So.
Cal Grocery Strikers Speak Out: "We Need Action!"
Ari Shavit
Survival
of the Fittest? An Interview with Benny Morris
Adi Ophir
Genocide Hides Behind Expulsion: a Response to Benny Morris
Dave Lindorff
The General's Henchman: Michael Moore Smears Kucinich
Steve Perry
Iowa Death Trip 2
January 15, 2004
Veteran Intelligence
Professionals for Sanity
Memo
to the President: Your State of the Union Address
John Chuckman
Dry
Hole in the Oval Office: President from Podunk Drilling, Inc
Chris Floyd
Mind Over Matter
Gil-Scott Heron
Whitey on the Moon
Gary Leupp
The
Silk Road: Random Thoughts on the Bam Earthquake and Satan
January 14, 2004
Greg Moses
Happy
Birthday, Dr. King: To Write Off the South is to Surrender to
Bigots
Kurt Nimmo
Bush and the Supremes: Amputating the Bill of Rights
Dave Lindorff
Preview of Iowa? Pennsylvania Straw Poll Spells Trouble for Traditional
Dems (and Dean)
Jason Leopold
O'Neill Claims Backed by Rumsfeld / Wolfowitz War Letters to
Clinton
Alexander Cockburn
Bush,
Oil and Iraq: Some Truth at Last
January 13, 2004
William S. Lind
How 2004
Looks from Potsdam
M. Junaid Alam
Do Iraqis Have a Right to Resist?
Mickey Z
Snipers:
No Nuts in Iraq
Adolfo Gilly
Chonchocoro:
The Prisoner and the Presidents
Steve Perry
You Love God, Right?
January 12, 2004
Ben Tripp
No Stan
for the Kurds
Norman Solomon
The
Dixie Trap: Democrats and the South
Mike Whitney
O'Neill's Revenge
Jason Leopold
From the Very First Instant It Was About Iraq
Uri Avnery
Syria's
Peace Proposal
January 10 / 11, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Bush
as Hitler? Let's Be Fair
Susan Davis
Dangerous Books
Diane Christian
On Lying and Colin Powell
Lisa Viscidi
Exhumations: Unearthing Guatemala's Macabre Past
Daniel Estulin
Destroying History in Iraq
Saul Landau
Homeland Anxiety
Elaine Cassel
Who's Winning the War on Civil Liberties?
Bruce Jackson
Making the Shit List
Christopher Brauchli
Baptizing Hitler's Ghost
Francis A. Boyle
The Deep Scars of War
Lee Ballinger
Cold Sweat: Sweatshops and the Music Industry
Patrick W. Gavin
Hillary's Slur: Mrs. Lott?
Ramzy Baroud
What Invaders Have in Common
Michael Schwartz
Inside the California Grocery Strike
Gary Johnson
An Interview with Former Heavyweight Champ Greg Page
Dave Zirin
An Interview with Marvin Miller on Unions and Baseball
Mark Hand
A Review of Resistance: My Life for Lebanon
Poets' Basement
Thomas, Daley, Curtis, Guthrie and Albert
January 9, 2004
David Lindorff
The
Misers of War: Troop Strength and Chintzy Bonuses
Kurt Nimmo
Saddam's Defense: Summon Bush Sr. to the Stand
Mike Whitney
Orange Jumpsuits for the Bush Clan?: The Carnegie Report on Iraq's
Non-existent WMDs
Deb Reich
Palestinians and Israelis: This War is Unwinnable
David Vest
Disabled
Vets Fire Back at Rumsfeld
January 8, 2004
Neve Gordon
Israeli
Refuseniks Sentenced to Jail
Lenni Brenner
Dr.
Dean and the Godhead
Ray McGovern
Bush: Driving Without Breaks
Mark Scaramella
Inside
the DA's Office: Lies, Errors and Tedium
Yves Engler
Bush's Mexican Gambit
James Hollander
Journalists
Under Fire: the Death of José Couso in Baghdad
January 7, 2004
Democracy Now!
Uncharitable
Care: How Hospitals are Gouging and Even Arresting the Uninsured
Greg Weiher
The
Bush Administration's Ongoing Intelligence Problem
Ben Tripp
The Word of the Year, 2003
Dave Lindorff
Dean and His Democratic Detractors
Michael Leon
The NYT Does Chomsky
Bob Boldt
God Talk
Ramon Ryan
Small
Victories and Long Struggles: the 10th Anniversary of the Zapatista
Uprising
January 6, 2004
Dave Lindorff
RNC
Plays the Hitler Card: MoveOn Shouldn't Apologize for Those Ads
Ron Jacobs
Drugs
in Uniform: Hashish and the War on Terrorism
Josh Frank
Coffee and State Authority in Colombia
Doug Giebel
Permanent Bases: Leave Iraq? Hell No, We Won't Go
John Chuckman
Sick Puppies: David Frum's New Neo-Con Manifesto
Rannie Amiri
The Politics of the Iranian Earthquake
John L. Hess
A Record
to Dissent From
Thacher Schmid
A Cheesehead's Musings on the Sunday NYT
David Price
"Like
Slaves": Anthropological Thoughts on Occupation
January 5, 2004
Al Krebs
How
Now Mad Cow!
Kathy Kelly
Squatting
in Baghdad's Bomb Craters
Jordy Cummings
The Dialectic of the Kristol Family: Putting the Neo in the Cons
Fran Shor
Mad Human Disease: Chewing the Fat Down on the Farm
Fidel Castro
"We Shall Overcome": On the 45th Anniversary of the
Cuban Revolution
Gary Leupp
North
Korea for Dummies
January 3 / 4, 2004
Brian Cloughley
Never
Mind the WMDs, Just Look at History
Vice Admiral Jack Shanahan
The Wrong War at the Wrong Time
William Cook
Failing to Respond to 9/11
Glen Martin
Jesus
vs. the Beast of the Apocalypse
Robert Fisk
Iraqi Humor Amid the Carnage
Ilan Pappe
The Geneva Bubble
Walter Davis
Robert Jay Lifton, or Nostalgia
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft vs. the Left
Mike Whitney
The Padilla Case
Steven Sherman
On Wallerstein's The Decline of American Power
Dave Lindorff
Bush's Taiwan Hypocrisy
William Blum
Codework Orange!
Mitchel Cohen
Learning from Che Guevara
Seth Sandronsky
Mad Cow and Main Street USA
Bruce Jackson
Conversations with Leslie Fiedler
Standard Schaefer
Poet Carl Rakosi Turns 100
Ron Jacobs
Sir Mick
Adam Engel
Hall of Hoaxes
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert & Curtis
January 2, 2004
Stan Cox
Red Alert
2016
Dave Lindorff
Beef, the Meat of Republicans
Jackie Corr
Rule and Ruin: Wall Street and Montana
Norman Solomon
George Will's Ethics: None of Our Business?
David Vest
As the Top Wobbleth
January 1, 2004
Randall Robinson
Honor
Haiti, Honor Ourselves
David Krieger
Looking
Back on 2003
Robert Fisk
War Takes an Inhuman Twist: Roadkill Bombs
Stan Goff
War,
Race and Elections
Hammond Guthrie
2003 Almaniac
Website of the Day
Embody Bags
December 31, 2003
Ray McGovern
Don't
Be Fooled Again: This Isn't an Independent Investigation
Kurt Nimmo
Manufacturing Hysteria
Robert Fisk
The Occupation is Damned
Mike Whitney
Mad Cows and Downer George
Alexander Cockburn
A Great Year Ebbed, Another Ahead
December 30, 2003
Michael Neumann
Criticism
of Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
Annie Higgins
When
They Bombed the Hometown of the Virgin Mary
Alan Farago
Bush Bros. Wrecking Co.: Time Runs Out for the Everglades
Dan Bacher
Creatures from the Blacklight Lagoon: From Glofish to Frankenfish
Jeffrey St. Clair
Hard
Time on the Killing Floor: Inside Big Meat
Willie Nelson
Whatever Happened to Peace on Earth?
December 29, 2003
Mark Hand
The Washington
Post in the Dock?
David Lindorff
The
Bush Election Strategy
Phillip Cryan
Interested Blindness: Media Omissions in Colombia's War
Richard Trainor
Catellus Development: the Next Octopus?
Uri Avnery
Israel's
Conscientious Objectors
December 27 / 28, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
A
Journey Into Rupert Murdoch's Soul
Kathy Kelly
Christmas Day in Baghdad: A Better World
Saul Landau
Iraq
at the End of the Year
Dave Zirin
A Linebacker for Peace & Justice: an Interview with David
Meggysey
Robert Fisk
Iraq
Through the American Looking Glass
Scott Burchill
The Bad Guys We Once Thought Good: Where Are They Now?
Chris Floyd
Bush's Iraq Plan is Right on Course: Saddam 2.0
Brian J. Foley
Don't Tread on Me: Act Now to Save the Constitution
Seth Sandronsky
Feedlot Sweatshops: Mad Cows and the Market
Susan Davis
Lord
of the (Cash Register) Rings
Ron Jacobs
Cratched Does California
Adam Engel
Crumblecake and Fish
Norman Solomon
The Unpardonable Lenny Bruce
Poets' Basement
Cullen and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Activism Through Music
December 26, 2003
Gary Leupp
Bush
Doings: Doing the Language
December 25, 2003
Diane Christian
The
Christmas Story
Elaine Cassel
This
Christmas, the World is Too Much With Us
Susan Davis
Jinglebells, Hold the Schlock
Kristen Ess
Bethlehem Celebrates Christmas, While Rafah Counts the Dead
Francis Boyle
Oh Little Town of Bethlehem
Alexander Cockburn
The
Magnificient 9
Guthrie / Albert
Another Colorful Season
December 24, 2003
M. Shahid Alam
The Semantics
of Empire
William S. Lind
Marley's
List for Santa in Wartime
Josh Frank
Iraqi
Oil: First Come, First Serve
Cpt. Paul Watson
The
Mad Cowboy Was Right
Robert Lopez
Nuance
and Innuendo in the War on Iraq
December 23, 2003
Brian J. Foley
Duck
and Cover-up
Will Youmans
Sharon's
Ultimatum
Michael Donnelly
Here
They Come Again: Another Big Green Fiasco
Uri Avnery
Sharon's
Speech: the Decoded Version
December 22, 2003
Jeffrey St. Clair
Pray
to Play: Bush's Faith-Based National Parks
Patrick Gavin
What Would Lincoln Do?
Marjorie Cohn
How to
Try Saddam: Searching for a Just Venue
Kathy Kelly
The
Two Troublemakers: "Guilty of Being Palestinians in Iraq"
December 20 / 21, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
How
to Kill Saddam
Saul Landau
Bush Tries Farce as Cuba Policy
Rafael Hernandez
Empire and Resistance: an Interview with Tariq Ali
David Vest
Our Ass and Saddam's Hole
Kurt Nimmo
Bush
Gets Serious About Killing Iraqis
Greg Weiher
Lessons from the Israeli School on How to Win Friends in the
Islamic World
Christopher Brauchli
Arrest, Smear, Slink Away: Dr. Lee and Cpt. Yee
Carol Norris
Cheers of a Clown: Saddam and the Gloating Bush
Bruce Jackson
The Nameless and the Detained: Bush's Disappeared
Juliana Fredman
A Sealed Laboratory of Repression
Mickey Z.
Holiday Spirit at the UN
Ron Jacobs
In the Wake of Rebellion: The Prisoner's Rights Movement and
Latino Prisoners
Josh Frank
Sen. Max Baucus: the Slick Swindler
John L. Hess
Slow Train to the Plane
Adam Engel
Black is Indeed Beautiful
Ben Tripp
The Relevance of Art in Times of Crisis
Michael Neumann
Rhythm and Race
Poets' Basement
Cullen, Engel, Albert & Guthrie
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
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Weekend
Edition
January 17 / 18, 2004
Desperation and Drastic
Measures
The
Use and Abuse of Martin Luther King Jr. by Israel's Apologists
By FADI KIBLAWI and
WILL YOUMANS
In formal logic, Argumentum Ad Verecundiam
refers to arguing a point with an appeal to authority. This
type is categorized as a logical fallacy. Citing one seemingly
authoritative source is simply not conclusive evidence, even
if the authority is seen as an expert on the given subject.
For the sake of clarity, there are three
degradations of this maxim enumerated in this essay. First, it
is especially fallacious as proof when the quoted authority demonstrates
no special knowledge on the subject. Second, when the
authority who is not an expert on the given subject is also quoted
out of context, the argument is even weaker. Third, the lowest
violation of this formal logic principle is when an advocate
uses a false rendition, or a fabricated quote, by the
same authority who can claim no expertise.
This is the best framework for understanding
how various exponents of Israel have used Martin Luther King
Jr. to promote their cause.
Dr. King's expertise as a non-violent
civil rights leader and visionary are unparalleled in U.S. history.
However, that does not make him an informed commentator on Middle
Eastern affairs or on the ideological facets of Zionism. As impressive
as the references to his views on Israel may seem, this is a
textbook example of Argumentum Ad Verecundiam.
Finding direct and published utterances
by Dr. King about the modern Middle East and Zionism is extremely
rare. A cursory review of dozens of books on and by the civil
rights leader turned up nothing.
Nonetheless, defenders of Israel often
refer to a letter by Dr. King. This letter is reprinted in full
on many web pages and in print. One example of a quotation derived
from this letter is:
"... You declare, my friend; that
you do not hate the Jews, you are merely 'anti-Zionist' ... And
I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountain tops,
let it echo through the valleys of God's green earth: When people
criticize Zionism, they mean Jews... Anti-Semitism, the hatred
of the Jewish people, has been and remains a blot on the soul
of mankind. In this we are in full agreement. So know also this:
anti-Zionist is inherently anti-Semitic, and ever will be so."
Antiracism writer Tim Wise checked the
citation, which claimed that it originated from a "Letter
to an Anti-Zionist Friend" in an August, 1967 edition of
Saturday Review. In an article on January, 2003, essay
he declared that he found no letters from Dr. King in any of
the four August, 1967 editions. The authors of this essay verified
Wise's discovery. The letter was commonly cited to also have
been published in a book by Dr. King entitled, "This I Believe:
Selections from the Writings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr."
No such book was listed in the bibliography provided by the King
Center in Atlanta, nor in the catalogs of several large public
and university libraries.
Soon afterwards, CAMERA, a rabidly pro-Israeli organization,
published a statement declaring that the letter was "apparently"
a hoax. CAMERA explained how it gained so much currency. The
"letter" came from a "reputable" book, Shared
Dreams, by Rabbi Marc Shneier. Martin Luther King III authored
the preface for the book, giving the impression of familial approval.
Also, the Anti-Defamation League's Michael Salberg used the same
quotes in his July 31st, 2001 testimony before the U.S. House
of Representative's International Relations Committee's Subcommittee
on International Operations and Human Rights.
The bogus letter was further quoted by
writers in prominent publications one would imagine armed with
fact-checkers capable of spending the short amount of time needed
to verify the primary source. Mort Zuckerman, the editor-in-chief
of the U.S. News & World Report quoted the letter
in a column (9/17/01). Warren Kinsella followed suit in an article
for Maclean's (1/20/03). Commentary, which is known
more for its ideological zeal than any appreciation for factual
scruples, ran a piece by Natan Sharansky. He quoted the false
passage as a block--some ten months after CAMERA declared it
a hoax.
More recently, the Scholars for Peace
in the Middle East (SPME) featured excerpts from the letter prominently
on its website. Despite its name, SPME is an advocacy group seeking
to bolster Israel's image on campus--a mission it claims promotes
peace in the region. Ironically, right under the false Dr. King
quotation is an announcement of the formation of a task force
"dealing with academic integrity with respect to fabricating
and falsifying data when discussing the Middle East."
After one of the authors of this article informed SPME's director
of the quotation's discredited status, he replied with hostility
despite the simple verifiability of the claim that the citation
is incorrect. After several exchanges he replaced it with another
seemingly far-fetched quote:
Martin Luther King addressed the issue
in 1968, in a speech at Harvard when he said: ".. You declare,
my friend, that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely 'anti-Zionist.'
...When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews... And what
is anti-Zionist? It is the denial to the Jewish people of a fundamental
right that we justly claim for the people of Africa and freely
accord all other nations of the Globe...When people criticize
Zionism, they mean Jews--make no mistake about it."
When a citation for this new quote was
requested, he refused to provide one, leaving visitors only with
its claim that Dr. King delivered it in a 1968 Harvard "speech."
However, the language of SMPE's new posting strongly resembles
their original one -- on account of the fact that it too comes
from the same discredited "Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend."
The first time the fake letter was quoted,
it could have been a mistake, but to draw on different lines
from the same fictitious letter is strikingly unscholarly --
as is the false citation of it to a 1968 "speech" at
Harvard. Either this citation was invented or taken from another
unspecified source--classic plagiarism, whether intentional or
out of gross negligence.
SPME's reference to a 1968 "speech"
at Harvard mirrors the details from a published account that
appeared in two sources: First, it was in right-wing and ardently
pro-Israeli sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset's 1969 article
in Encounter. Second, it was in a January, 2002 San
Francisco Chronicle op/ed by Congressman John Lewis, who
knew Dr. King personally.
Lipset wrote in his essay "The Socialism
of Fools: The Left, the Jews & Israel" about a "dinner"
for Dr. King he attended. When one black student made "some
remark against the Zionists," Dr. King "snapped"
back, "'When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews.
You are talking anti-Semitism'."
The piece by Congressman Lewis also quotes this same remark though
it is not clear if it is gathered from Lipset's essay.
Congressman Lewis claims Dr. King made
this comment "shortly before his death" during "an
appearance at Harvard." Lipset states it was "shortly
before he was assassinated" at a "dinnergiven for him
in Cambridge." This quotation seems on its face much more
credible. Yet, SPME presents snippets from the fake letter while
apparently citing this statement (a 1968 "speech" at
Harvard).
There are still, however, a few reasons
for casting doubt on the authenticity of this statement. According
to the Harvard Crimson, "The Rev. Martin Luther King
was last in Cambridge almost exactly a year ago--April 23, 1967"
("While You Were Away" 4/8/68). If this is true, Dr.
King could not have been in Cambridge in 1968. Lipset stated
he was in the area for a "fund-raising mission," which
would seem to imply a high profile visit. Also, an intensive
inventory of publications by Stanford University's Martin Luther
King Jr. Papers Project accounts for numerous speeches in 1968.
None of them are for talks in Cambridge or Boston.
While these points raise some
doubt, let us assume that the quote is accurate.
This is where context comes in. One of
the principal arguments of Lipset's 1969 article is that the
split between blacks and Jews "stems much more from the
American situation than from the Middle East Conflict."
He identifies Jews as a dominating force within the civil rights
movement. Black nationalist leadership wanted to distance themselves
from Whites in the movement, Lipset argues. In Lipset's own words,
he summarized what Black nationalists were saying: "We don't
want whites, but we particularly don't want Jews, and we are
expressing antagonism to Jews in the form of opposition to Israel."
Few of the articles that cite Lipset's
essay mention this crucial context. One individual who did explore
this, albeit crudely, still managed to contrive another Dr. King
quote unimaginatively. Dr. Andrew Bostom, a medical professor
at Brown University, wrote an article for Front Page Magazine
(1/20/03) that was reprinted on former Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu's website. In it, he claimed that Dr. King
had the "moral courage" to confront the anti-Jewish
rhetoric of black left-wing and Muslim organizations. This is
not to say that Dr. Bostom is a reliable source. Central to
his article is a 347 word passage which he attributes to Dr.
King. He fails to cite a source for the outlandish tirade. A
quick google search determined it was lifted entirely from original
material on the homepage of www.yahoodi.com (which has a copyright
date of 2002), plus healthy portions of the fake "Letter
to an Anti-Zionist Friend." Dr. Bostom's article featured
the least creative and perhaps most fraudulent doctored script
yet: a patchwork of plagiarism.
Taking the context described by Lipset
and Dr. Bostom to be generally correct for the sake of argument
would shed light on the credible Dr. King quotes. If the movement
he figured so prominently in was facing such a rift, his response
was only natural. To borrow Lipset's analysis then, Dr. King's
statement also "stems much more from the American situation
than from the Middle East Conflict." Given his local political
anxieties, Dr. King was hardly the kind of disinterested authority
worth quoting on the subject.
As a note: the actual validity of Lipset
and Dr. Bostom's views of that context is beyond the scope of
this essay. While it is true that black nationalists, such as
SNCC's leadership, became increasingly critical of Israel after
1967, it is not convincing that the motive was to alienate American
Jews even if that was the foreseeable effect. An ardent internationalist
for example would care more about linking oppressed people's
struggles across the globe than they would about the relatively
mainstream political movement for equality in the American polity.
Back to the main point: if the forged
quotes reflecting Dr. King's views on Israel were accurate, citing
him would still be classic Argumentum Ad Verecundiam.
Where is the proof that Dr. King studied the region or its modern
history? The dearth of then-publicized comments and writings
on the region by Dr. King shows that it was probably not a subject
he was well-versed on, nor did it appear to be a priority of
his throughout his career.
Even the statements Congressman Lewis
attributes to him are low in substance and high on flourishing
rhetoric. For example, Dr. King stated that Israel is a "marvelous
example of what can be done, how desert land can be transformed
into an oasis of brotherhood and democracy." Referring to
it as "marvelous" and an "oasis" sounds rather
uninformed given the realities of military occupation and the
forced exile the Palestinians have witnessed since Israel's foundation.
They surely do not sound like the words of someone familiar with
both sides of the story.
More significantly, as Tim Wise pointed
out, Dr. King's supposed statements on Zionism came before the
more than three decades of crippling Israeli occupation of the
West Bank and Gaza, and the 1987 intifada that grabbed
the world's attention. The Palestinian narrative was sparsely
conveyed in the United States up to that point. There were few
Arabs or Palestinians in the U.S. and fewer Arab academics, policymakers,
and activists working with Dr. King. Wise also suggests that
application of Dr. King's principles logically give way to more
sympathy to the Palestinian side given the systematic inequality
it faces.
That advocates of Israel have relied
on fabricated and out-of-context quotations from a leading moral
figure of yesteryear only underscores the absurdity of the general
point that all opposition to a Jewish state in a diverse
land is anti-Semitic. There are obviously many legitimate ways
to critique Zionism. One quite reasonable observation is that
after more than a half-century of conflict, the Zionist project
has failed to bring the Jews of Israel peace and security--its
raison d'etre. One might counter that this is due to Arab
intransigence; the Palestinians should accept their dispossession.
However, Palestinian opposition to this fate is an indisputable
fact, and security was and is Zionism's key goal. This necessarily
was an analytical failure on the part of the Zionists who assumed
the Palestinians would blend in to other Arab countries while
the later generations forget their past. To dismiss this argument--one
that evaluates Zionism by its own goals--and every other critique
of Zionism as anti-Semitism is not only dishonest but a cowardly
evasion of meaningful debate.
This is not to say that all opponents
of Israel are not anti-Semitic. Of course the Palestinian cause,
like all movements, is exploited by those with other agendas,
such as David Duke and Osama Bin Laden. Blanket statements in
either direction are inaccurate.
The main reason why critique of Zionism
persists is that whether Israeli officials like it or not, history
as it is written and the actual land are still disputed by the
millions of Palestinians who are refugees as a result of Israel's
birth, the 3.5 million Palestinians living under Israel's direct
military rule, and the Palestinians who compose 20% of Israel's
citizens in second class status. If Israel was founded and developed
on uncontested terrain then arguments against its existence would
more likely be out of hatred against the Jewish people. For supporters
of Israel to wipe away all critics of the methods and outcomes
of Israel's foundation with the "anti-Semitic" label
denies completely the legitimacy of the Palestinian narrative--the
experiences and perspectives that never show up in Dr. King's
imagined "oasis."
Dr. King, though long-passed, is still
monumental in the continuing movement for civil rights in the
United States. His legacy should be celebrated, and also critiqued
constructively; it should not be falsified or stretched to accommodate
a different agenda today. The context behind Dr. King's authentic
statements on Zionism was unique to a particular domestic political
moment in order to sustain a fragile political coalition. Beyond
that, Dr. King never claimed any expertise on the subject, nor
made it a frequent topic of his speeches or writings. Claiming
that all critiques of Zionism are anti-Semitic based on the force
Martin Luther King Jr.'s words on the matter fails as an argument
on many different levels.
Fadi Kiblawi
is a law student at George Washington University and can be reached
at fkiblawi@umich.edu.
Will Youmans,
who contributed an essay to The Politics of Anti-Semitism,
can be reached at youmans@boalthall.berkeley.edu
Weekend
Edition Features for January 10 / 11, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Bush
as Hitler? Let's Be Fair
Susan Davis
Dangerous Books
Diane Christian
On Lying and Colin Powell
Lisa Viscidi
Exhumations: Unearthing Guatemala's Macabre Past
Daniel Estulin
Destroying History in Iraq
Saul Landau
Homeland Anxiety
Elaine Cassel
Who's Winning the War on Civil Liberties?
Bruce Jackson
Making the Shit List
Christopher Brauchli
Baptizing Hitler's Ghost
Francis A. Boyle
The Deep Scars of War
Lee Ballinger
Cold Sweat: Sweatshops and the Music Industry
Patrick W. Gavin
Hillary's Slur: Mrs. Lott?
Ramzy Baroud
What Invaders Have in Common
Michael Schwartz
Inside the California Grocery Strike
Gary Johnson
An Interview with Former Heavyweight Champ Greg Page
Dave Zirin
An Interview with Marvin Miller on Unions and Baseball
Mark Hand
A Review of Resistance: My Life for Lebanon
Poets' Basement
Thomas, Daley, Curtis, Guthrie and Albert
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