Comments on Bernard Avishai Dot Com: American Jewish Power: A Clarification

Mr Taming Korach- You have to understand that Dr A...

2009-10-28T20:38:16.878-04:00

Mr Taming Korach-
You have to understand that Dr Avishai realizes that he has lost the argument in Israel. The party that is closest to his views, HADASH, has 4 seats in the Knesset out of 120 and has never been included in a governing coalition and receives the majority of its votes from Arab voters who have a very different agenda than he does.

Thus, he has given up trying to influence Israel from within, so he is taking his "Hebrew Republic" and his plans for creating a split in Israel between the "Judeans" (including the Orthodox you mentioned) and what he calls "the Israelis" (the secular Ashkenazi elite) to America in order to try to get the US goverment and American Jewry to support his plans to threaten the "Israelis" in order to mobilize them to move against "the Judeans", which as Dr Avishai has stated, they won't do unless faced with punitive sanctions. This will never happen, of course, but I hope this clarifies things.

Mr. Avishai, I saw some of your statements on the...

2009-10-27T19:55:15.913-04:00

Mr. Avishai,

I saw some of your statements on the J Street broadcast and I was a bit angered that you arrogantly dismissed the large numbers of haredi and srugi Jews who live in Jerusalem. I myself am an American who converted and live in Jerusalem. You forget that it is because of the Holocaust that secular Jews are the defacto representatives of the Jewish People today. It is from lack of appreciation and understanding from which you belittle the religious population of the most significant city in the world.

I think you should take up that idea about the rol...

2009-10-26T11:20:21.042-04:00

I think you should take up that idea about the role of minorities with Joe Feagin. It strikes me as the sort of illiberal view of organizing politics that makes Zionism vital.