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CounterPunch
November
9, 2002
Demonstrating
a Genteel Reticence
by MICHAEL NEUMANN
In March, 2002, A.N.S.W.E.R. (Act Now To Stop
War and Racism) condemned Israeli oppression of the Palestinians
and demanded that the U.S. stop supporting Israel. In their statement,
they called for a demonstration in Washington on April 20th to
protest this. But here's the catch--it wasn't specifically a
demonstration against America's Israel policy. It was a demonstration
against US imperialist and racist policies generally. That muted
the issue quite tastefully. Like a well-trained horse, these
radicals pull right up to the line: don't protest against Israel
too loudly, and don't demand anything too drastic. Tell the US
to stop sending money and arms, then sit back and watch the fun.
What exactly do these people expect to
happen? That Israel, deprived of US aid, will stop its race war?
Is that how it usually works? Is that what they would have advocated
in Rwanda? stop the aid, then sit back and watch? Or do these
apostles of political correctness feel that Israel, being white
folks, would not behave with the uncivilized abandon of those
dark-skinned tribesmen down in Africa? Do the marchers realize
that Israel, forced to make do without the convenience of US
aid, would immediately destroy the Palestinians? Afterwards,
to be sure, the Israelis would make peace with the world and
thank God for His gift to the chosen people, the whole of "Judea
and Samaria".
Then on October 26th, 2002, this same
group sponsored, with others, a very impressive demonstration
against war with Iraq. It was twice as large as the previous
one. No doubt that's because people saw a real chance of preventing
US intervention, of a specific, very valuable and tangible accomplishment.
In other words, the first march was smaller because, even with
its umbrella of causes, it was asking either for things that
everyone knew would not be obtained, like the purification of
US foreign policy, or for things that would change nothing, like
stopping US aid to Israel.
So it seems that the organizers of these
protests don't want the US to do anything about Israel. They
just want to stand on the sidelines and complain. Kind of like
the left does, in fact. Why is that? It can't be because the
US is too weak to do anything, because these activists never
seem to stop going on about US power. Their big thing now is
a fight to get US universities to divest from Israel. I can just
hear the talk in the corridors of the Knesset: "Gee, Harvard,
Columbia, Princeton are pulling their support? We're lost! Let's
hope we can make some kind of a deal before the Palestinian armies
roll through Tel Aviv!" Oh, but I forgot. By the time these
campaigns succeed,--not that anyone really expects this--the
Palestinians will be about as ready to roll as a pile of bloody
rags.
It almost gets funny. What did those
October marchers want? Well, they found nothing wrong with disarming
or overthrowing Saddam Hussein. They hate him. They just don't
want the US to do it. The reasons are sort of understandable:
the US throws its weight around too much; the US violates international
law; the US will destabilize the region; the US will make a mess
in Iraq. So I guess that means that, if the US really worked
some nice deal out with the UN and some NGOs, then the UN and
the NGOs would invade Iraq, which would basically mean that the
US would do so, and that would be fine. If you substitute "Vietnam"
for "Iraq" in the previous sentence, you can see that
this isn't exactly the antiwar movement all over again. But I
suppose something is better than nothing.
Both demonstrations, of course, also
involve opposition to 'Bush's war on terror'. This is a bit like
the opposition to invading Iraq. Whenever they protest the war
on terror, the demonstrators deplore the Taliban, Bin Laden,
and so on. Here again, they want these people suppressed. They
just don't want the US to do it. I mean, they do want the US
to do it, but under orders from others. They want American troops
marching in and killing the enemy; they just want them to do
it under the banners of Oxfam and UNICEF, with a delegation of
international jurists in the sixth tank back from the front.
What we have here is genteel modesty,
like the reticence of a well-brought up young man in the 1890's
who has to describe, say, a woman masturbating. He wouldn't of
course be explicit about anything. He would keep approaching
the subject, almost find some way to describe it, and relapse
into a vagueness that never quite got the message across. In
current radical statements, the forbidden subject is broached,
parenthetically and obliquely, in some standard critique of US
action in Afghanistan or Iraq: "blah blah blah ...while
the US continues to fund Israel's brutal repression of the Palestinians...blah
blah blah", with the blahs referring to US crimes a safe
distance away from Israel itself.
Well, what, in our sophisticated political
discourse, is the counterpart of the masturbating woman? It's
the notion that the US should--don't read on if you're easily
shocked--actually do something about Israel, which would
require acting out that most hard-core of political fantasies,
an alliance with the Arab and Muslim world. Utter these words,
and everything, uh, comes together. If the US were really fighting
for the Palestinians, ready to go to war on their behalf, in
daily consultation with America's staunch allies the Syrians,
Jordanians and Egyptians, with Bush ready to go on his third
goodwill tour of Iran, no one would be worrying about invasions
of Iraq or Afghanistan and no one would be bitching about too
much US power. There would be no question of violating international
laws or agreements, because the UN would be solidly behind US
policy, and US policy would amount to little more than following
UN orders. And of course there would be no more talk of US racism
against Arabs and various other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups.
But our demonstrators are clean-minded
folks, too decent to entertain such fantasies. They apparently
do want to the help the Palestinians, but they can't bring themselves
to ask for the only thing that could help: not an America that
stands on the sidelines with the ever-wimpy Europeans, scowling
at Israel, but an America that is out to--let's say it in 'American'--kick
some Israeli ass. Why are they so inhibited?
Many people will answer, the demonstrators
fear being called antisemitic. No. Their moral cowardice is quite
selective. They do not hesitate to make strong criticisms of
Israel. Many of them are Jewish, and more or less immune to the
accusations; many others have long ago defied the label. Why
then?
One reason, I suspect, is that, 'non-Western'
demonstrators aside, they pity the Palestinians, but don't really
regard them as quite normal. The Palestinians are not just ordinary
men and women reacting as ordinary men and women would. They
are ordinary men and women who... gosh ...go kind of nuts and
react with a violence that the good people of the left cannot
quite condone. Not that the violence isn't 'understandable':
the Palestinians aren't monsters, just people driven crazy by
their oppression. And, driven crazy, they can't quite be trusted:
if they had the power of the Israelis, why, there's no telling
what sort of massacres might result. The idea that Palestinian
terrorism might be a rationally calculated strategy based on
a correct assessment of the facts is something the demonstrators
just cannot assimilate. They make up for it, sometimes, by saying
that the Palestinians are not terrorists, which is obviously
false, or that others are also terrorists, which is irrelevant.
All this so they don't have to say what millions of reasonable
and well-informed people in the non-Western world don't fear
to say: that Palestinian terrorism is justified and something
we are morally obligated to support. Now do you see what the
genteel young man felt like?
In some cases, the demonstrators' semi-racist
musings may be an effect, not a cause. Perhaps it is not racism
that makes them unable to imagine the US fighting for the Palestinians.
Perhaps it is the inability to imagine the US fighting for the
Palestinians that produces racist attitudes. Presuming that the
Palestinians couldn't possibly be US allies, the demonstrators
may half-consciously search for reasons why the Palestinians
don't deserve that status. Yet it would not be illegal for the
US to switch sides, and it is not unimaginable. Certainly the
world would not stand in its way. Economic imperatives would
not stand in its way either: the US would feel much more secure
in its oil supply if it were firmly allied with all the oil-producing
countries, and guess who they are? Nor should the pro-Israel
lobby be considered unbeatable: opposing Zionism is not exactly
like smashing capitalism or the ruling class or imperialism,
or ending war or racism or exploitation or any of the other things
demonstrators demand. If the American people wanted to switch
sides, they could do so. The oil would still flow, Bill Gates
would still get rich, and GM would still sell cars. America,
including its corporate elites, would survive very nicely, thank
you. The left is not afraid to take on big oil, the media, the
government, and the Christian right; it certainly doesn't need
to cringe before the Bronfmans of this world.
I can only guess about what the big problem
is. Maybe the demonstrators know what would happen if they--as
our baseball-capped selves would say--'did the right thing' and
screamed for an active, armed US-Arab-Palestinian alliance. All
those wonderful, courageous Jewish marchers who weep for the
children of Palestine would pack their bags, go home and bolt
the door behind them. They wouldn't call; they wouldn't write.
And just as the Jewish left can't face up to the tribalism in
its soul, so the American left simply can't face up to the tribalism
in its midst. So Israel can kill and starve Palestinians to its
heart's content, secure in the knowledge that no one will do
anything to help them. The louder the world roars its disapproval,
the more contentedly it will go back to watching the Simpsons,
basking in the warmth of its own hot air.
Michael Neumann
is a professor of philosophy at Trent University in Ontario,
Canada. He can be reached at: mneumann@trentu.ca
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October 26
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