Akiva Eldar on Max Blumenthal's book "Goliath": Introducing American Jews to the real Israel

 
No Longer David: The State of Israel As Goliath

By Akiva Eldar for Al-Monitor Israel Pulse
September 25, 2013

Whenever you speak with an American Jew about Israel, you always end up at the same point. The conversation starts with Israel, but rarely ends there. It almost always ends with “them.” So begins “The American Jewish Cocoon,” a lengthy article by Peter Beinart published Sept. 4 in The New York Review of Books. [Reposted by JfJfP as How Americans defend themselves from knowing about Palestinians, Sept. 3rd, 2013.]
“Them,” of course, refers to the Palestinians. “They” are that same monolithic entity, faceless and devoid of a clear identity, that provides the wranglers with the ultimate response to any criticism of Israel: “They” teach their children to hate and kill; “they” don’t accept Israel’s right to exist; and why don’t “they” criticize their own society as Israelis criticize their own?
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