In response to a recent discussion on Galus Australis relating to the ethical and moral issues that arise if one chooses to serve in the Israeli military, Larry Stillman has submitted the following article.

The key issue relates to the view that the Israeli Army is an army of occupation in the Occupied Territories and the occupation has little to do with defence imperatives but a huge amount to do with expanding Israeli territory well beyond any strategic necessity.  I am not questioning the fight against terrorism, or the principle of self-defence under fire, but the fact is that ‘defence of Israel’ has been extended to institutionalised maltreatment of civilians under the Occupation of the West Bank in situations that have nothing to do with armed resistance.

These acts often occur to people (including children), not even engaged in acts of violence or minor acts of resistance in which the response has been disproportionate.    The kinds of activity that Israel is engaged in have been well debated in discussions about just and unjust wars under the influence of such writers as Michael Walzer.  Thus, Raymond Kou has written that The Israeli Army considers the situation as an ‘armed conflict short of war’.  However, this imprecise definition also creates a legal and moral hole: the Palestinians are undefined individuals who fall between civilian and combatant categories, but with shifting guidelines on their treatment by the IDF” [“Occupation and the Just War” International Relations 22 (2008), p. 305].

Over the years, it has been revealed that Israeli commanders have been consistently loose with the rules of engagement and many human rights abuses occurred, though these claims encounter predictably strong official opposition. Soldiers are thus in breach of Israel’s own Code of Conduct called The Spirit of the IDF, particularly point 6. “Soldiers must accord dignity and respect to the Palestinian population and those arrested”, as attested in the work of such organizations as Mahsom Watch, which, for example demonstrate the Israeli army does little to protect Palestinians from settler violence.

The result of this undeclared occupation are consistent breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which covers the treatment of civilian populations under occupation, including issues such as harassment, forced transfer of populations, transfer or theft of property (including land for settlements, also known as colonies), restriction of movement, collective punishment, or infringement on the rights of children.  Israel is a signatory to the convention.

However, even if Israel claims that its acquisition of territory is ultimately benign, and leads to increased living standards and so on (as it often claimed in defence of the Israeli presence), there is another question and that is, as Walzer says, “What do the inhabitants want? The land follows the people. The decision as to whose sovereignty was legitimate … belonged by right to the men and women who lived” [In Just and Unjust Wars, p. 55].  Palestinians don’t want an Israeli presence, benign or otherwise, and the longer the Occupation continues, the more difficult a bilaterally acceptable agreement will be to establish.  The Oslo failure is an indication that Israel needs to make much more real concessions in response to the overtures and opportunities made through the Arab (Saudi) Peace Plan and so on.

Because Israel is so linked to many of our lives—and claims to represent our interests—we also have every right to insist that it holds itself true to democratic, legal and ethical principles,  Jewish or universal.

If we cannot question how the force of arms is used, or the ‘justice’ of its occupation then democracy is threatened because the principle of ‘might is right’ prevails.  This is the view taken by many Israel progressives, including for example, Gershom Gorenberg-who considers himself an orthodox Jew and a Zionist—who states that  ‘settlement project’  as part of the occupation has turned occupation territory into a realm where, ultimately, there [is] no law’ [The Unmaking of Israel, p. 88].   The soldiers are there to project the settlement project, not defend Israel. The settlement project has been expanded over the years from a tiny of number of people to 300,000 residents, but these numbers do not excuse Israel from its legal and ethical responsibilities.

One result of this ethical and moral slide from the ideal of ‘tohar ha-neshek’, or purity of arms,  as well as ‘havlagah’ (restraint) was the the ‘Combatants’ Letter in 2002—a statement of refusal to serve in the Occupied Territories was . Significantly, their letter stated:

“ We shall not continue to fight beyond the 1967 borders in order to dominate, expel, starve and humiliate an entire people. We hereby declare that we shall continue serving the Israel Defence Force in any mission that serves Israel’s defence. The missions of occupation and oppression do not serve this purpose – and we shall take no part in them.”

Unfortunately, a response that justifies militarism and occupation appears to come out of two trends in Jewish religious nationalism.  The first, to use the words of the philosopher Emil Fackenheim in his To Mend the World)  , is that we are  commanded to do everything to deny Hitler a posthumous victory.  Harold Schulweiss, making critical remarks about Elie Wiesel, said that the danger with this kind of thinking is that it become a ‘cudgel’ against recognising  others ‘who have their claims of suffering’, and this becomes linked to constant cries of an ‘existential crisis’  in Israel’s existence, to justify almost all and any activity in its defence.

Second, as an extension of the teachings of Rav Abraham Isaac Kook, his son, and others, the sacredness of the land of Israel has become a predominant doctrine in religious nationalist and Zionist haredi thinking. Anyone or thing that stands in the way should be removed or has no rights. The worst case of this kind of thinking is found in a stream of thinking which justifies the killing of Palestinian women and children found in works such as ‘The King’s Doctrine’ written by a settler rabbi. Increasingly, this ideology is having an effect in the Israeli army, where many of those command positions actually live in the Occupied Territories and thus have an interest in preserving Israeli rule, whether or not the Israel government continues to want to hold on to them.

Thus, when we have young people in Australia being indoctrinated about a ‘greater Israel’ in which Palestinians have no place or are a nuisance, and such people join the Israeli military they are in grave danger of becoming ethical and moral abusers or worse.  The excuse cannot be made that we do not know about such matters or they are irrelevant for young people who make aliyah.  Eighteen is legal adulthood, and the law for an adult includes the assumption that one is able to make an informed choice. The fact is that the Occupation has been with us for over 40 years now and I find it hard to believe that any young Jewish person is unaware that the Occupation is not benign.

Choices can be made.  Many Israelis choose not to serve in the Occupied Territories by either refusing service there, or undertaking alternate forms of conscription.  The same choices are available to Australians who commit themselves to a life in Israel.

For more reading, see the following:

Norman Solomon, ‘Judaism and the Ethics of War’  International Review of the Red Cross 87 (June 2005)

Yeshahayhu Leibowitz, ‘Heroism.’ In Cohen and Mende- Flohr (eds),  Contemporary Jewish Thought.

Larry Stillman would like to stress that this article is written from a personal capacity.

We're surprised that this bully used the correct form of "You're"

By Larry Stillman

In an article I wrote in Galus Australis (November 2010), I said that “Hate speech is often characterized as ‘words that wound’, words that are deliberately intended to cause severe discomfort, stigmatization, a feeling of being sullied, and humiliation in the face of others.”  I also said that “Whether in the case of Jews slandering each other, others slandering Jews, or others slandering others (indigenous Australians, gays), what are the limits to free and particularly hateful speech in today’s environment when language and symbols are in endless play in different contexts?”

Now we have an episode that affects the reputation of the Jewish community because of who has said it (the son of Zelman Cowen), a highly educated Orthodox Jew with a Chabad background and a very modest association with Monash University.

Four years ago, The Age reported that Cowen spoke on behalf of a coalition of conservative Christians, Muslims and Jews saying that government “is indulging in social engineering in giving lesbians and single women access to fertility treatment, giving lesbian partners legal recognition as parents and allowing surrogate mothers.”

In the past week, more intolerant comments have come to light from an article Cowen has published about the Safe Schools Coalition Victoria program to prevent bullying of gay children in schools. Cowen has launched into a jeremiad against what he sees as modern secularism, liberal religion, and materialism resulting in the promotion of homosexuality.

According to those with much greater theoretical and practical insight into these matters, he is dead wrong on many counts, and I accept their counsel after having read his tendentious argument.

His opinions have been widely reported in the gay and lesbian media, as well as in MX daily (the freebie on trains), with a front page story.

I understand that thankfully, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) has distanced itself completely from his remarks.  The problems of the Jewish Orthodox community with diverse sexuality can probably be better dealt with by those with more expertise in sexuality, bullying, religious prejudice, and institutionalized child abuse in Orthodox communities. This is something that Cowen should have addressed in his remarks if he was serious about morality.

But what has particularly angered gays and lesbians is the use by Shimon Cowen of his association with Monash University to provide credibility for his screed.  The byline to his article states that “Rabbi Dr Shimon Cowen is Founding Director of The Institute for Judaism and Civilization, and is an Associate in the School of Philosophical, Historical and International studies at Monash University.”

Such is the concern over Cowen’s viewpoint that the Vice Chancellor of Monash University, Ed Byrne, when alerted, quickly distanced Monash from Cowen’s comments, while asserting the principle of academic freedom.  The Star Observer (a gay and lesbian newspaper) also reported a statement by Monash that “Dr Shimon Cowen is not employed at Monash. He holds an adjunct/honorary role (unpaid) in his field of research expertise – Jewish philosophy and theology – which is why he is listed in the staff directory”.

I have also raised the issue with the National Tertiary Education Union, and while the matter still has to be considered at a committee level, I know that the leadership would be appalled by Cowen’s stance, but at the same time, would also stand up for the principle of free speech.

As well as this, a group of academics in the Education faculty at Monash have condemned his views. I also understand that some academics want all ties between Cowen and Monash cut.

Monash University (and other universities) has a very large number of people in what are known as adjunct (what used to be called honorary) positions. These are provided to people on the basis of their qualifications or academic status, on the recommendation of faculties, as a means of providing them with some access to university resources (often the library), rather than the bowl of porridge or beer as was customary in medieval times. At one time, he had an adjunct association with the Australian Centre for Jewish Civilization. I understand that he no longer has that association with the Centre, but he does have adjunct status attached to the Faculty of Arts.  I don’t know when this expires.

I have searched the Monash Research Profile directory to see the status of his research but as far as I can see, there is nothing, unless I am mistaken. Perhaps his work, such as the article that has caused controversy, has not been reported to Monash.   This lack of productivity may be taken into account when his appointment comes up for renewal.

Thus, it appears, as an act of generosity, Cowen, like many other people, has been given a leg-up to his professional career (though the website of his Institute has almost no content). Perhaps he has now overplayed his cards by publishing this dreadful article along with his Monash association. What can be done?

The terms and conditions of being an adjunct at Monash also include reference to Equal Opportunity and Human Rights legislation.   I suspect that any case brought against him would fail because he would claim that he was engaged in academic argument in good faith. Moreover, some people use their academic association to impress those who naively think that their views are officially ‘endorsed’.  Modesty is often absent in academia.

This is painful news for gays and lesbians, and others outraged by his comments. However, as far as I am concerned, the principle at stake is much the same as dealing with hate speech coming out of people like Frederick Tobin of the anti-Semitic Adelaide Institute, or for that matter, the right of SBS to broadcast the political drama, The Promise.   In the same way, while I think that Students for Palestine and some in the BDS movement a menace, I  have to defend their right to free speech, as I do to Joe Gutnick’s politics in Hebron with which I strongly disagree.   In a desire to censor or pull the rug on disturbing opinion, we can endanger everyone’s freedom of expression; because the problem is that it is very, very hard to draw the line correctly.

Thus, it is all too easy to turn people like Shimon Cowen into a martyr, particularly as he would become a pin-up boy of the conservative forces in this country who are engaged in a culture war against what they view as evil modernity.  It would also strengthen the forces of intolerance in the Orthodox community.

We also have to defend Cowen’s right to free speech, because next time “they could come after you.”  The Senate Inquiry of a couple of years ago into alleged leftist bias in higher education showed how little the principle of free speech is understood by those who see a left conspiracy in every lecturer’s class.  The danger is that those accusations of one sort or other could all too easy result in suppression of free speech and thought.  We should not forget until very recently, Australia and its States were renowned for their censorship zeal.

The solution to Cowen’s bigotry is more free speech, and at the same time a vigorous challenge to his views in a way that will educate the public, including the religious community.  He is welcome to defend his pompous assertions, but he will have to deal with people who are educationists, not specialists in Jewish philosophy and theology, as is Cowen. Peer review would be very cruel if he submitted his work to a respected educational journal, or even a moderate rabbinical school in the US or Israel.

And then, there may be Orthodox and more liberal Jews locally who are prepared to challenge him on religious grounds.  Cowen has clearly gone out of his area of expertise, covering his prejudices with a academic ‘gloss’ and that is his real weakness.

Show his ideas up for what they are –prejudiced rubbish, but don’t blame Monash University for supporting the principle of free speech by someone with a very modest, and possibly tenuous link to it.

Larry Stillman was a Committee member of Liberty Victoria for a number of years. He is on the Executive of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society, and is also a Senior Research Fellow at Monash in the Faculty of IT and with the Monash Oxfam Partnership.    However, these views are absolutely his alone.

And purely by chance – or is it destiny? – because of a cousin’s marriage to a relative (by marriage) of a member of the Windsor clan, I can lay claim that but for certain legal impediments such as the Act of Settlement (1701), if all members of the royal family and their descendants and relatives by marriage to the nth degree were wiped out, I too could be King. I know it works because when I last visited Spencer House in London, I said, “I am related to the Queen by marriage you know,” in a not so particularly quiet way to my friend. The serious reaction of the ladies at the postcard till was immediate.

Now stop laughing. This is serious. I am concerned about ‘the aristocratic embrace’, that odious habit of loving a couple of letters after your name to set you apart from the hoi polloi and impress the impressionable.

Rather than honouring those rare and society-changing individuals who deserve special public recognition that might only occur once in a generation (John Monash, Weary Dunlop, Oodgeroo Noonuccal, Eddie Mabo), the honours lists continue to be a vehicle for snobbery, status games, political payback, and a means of working over other people about how important you are with that little badge on your bespoke golf jacket.

I say this in part because I know how easy it is to play the nomination honours game if you are rich, well-connected, or know how to write a nomination letter. As part of a political payback game, I’ve been involved in a successful nomination. Others have observed how the honours list overwhelmingly reflects a particularly heterogeneous group: either the old WASP elite or others who have become part of the dominant elite, though of course there are exceptions. The Jewish elite have played this status game to the core.

Out of the eight people named as key commitee  or staff members of AIJAC on their website, five have some form of Australian honour. Likewise, of the 28 or so members of the ECAJ Executive, including life members, 18, that is nearly 65% have an Australian honour. The Zionist Federation of Australia lists no honours but that is fitting, because they are on about Israel, not about Australia, I suppose.

By way of comparison, according to the ACTU website, none of the members of their executive have a gong (or they keep it quiet), despite the important role they play in Australian life.  Of the 12  members of the Federation of the Ethnic Communities Council of Australia only 2 are named as having an honour.  If we look at another specific community, of the 20 or so members of the Greek Orthodox Community of Victoria board, none is named as having a gong. And even that bastion of the elite, Geelong Grammar, does not mention that any of the members of its school council have an honour.

Now what is going on here?

Even accounting for false modesty on elite organisations like Grammar who don’t add the sacred letters after people’s names, there appears to be massive gradeflation and a bit of a nomination industry at the top end of the Jewish community. I am sure it is happening elsewhere but it is harder to reveal through the internet. Perhaps spotting lapel pins at in the Long Room at the MCG would be a good comparative test.

I think it is time to rethink the abuse of the honours system.  Other than having me as King (yechi ha-melech! we would cry), we need something much more restricted, which is not open to game-playing.

The Palestine Papers, as revealed by Al-Jazeerah and the Guardian, are explosive evidence about the state of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, leaning over backwards to break a deal—a deal that never went ahead and has even less chance of doing so with Netanyahu still in power.

What has been talked about for years on the left, and vigorously denounced by the Israeli government and its foreign agents, has been confirmed by cold hard facts.   Israel has not negotiated in good faith. A state of war has been an easier option than a just two-state solution for Palestinians.  The latter would require Israel’s leaders to take some extraordinarily challenging political decisions and undertake territorial sacrifices that shake some of Israel’s core beliefs to the core.

But something very strange is going on at a time when many voices should be heard both about the situation in which Israel now finds itself.  All the machers and fixers, from the well-funded Diaspora lobby groups, those who never seem to lack a comment, who to act as an ‘amen corner’ for Israel at every opportunity, have fallen strangely silent.

Why?

The Palestine Papers show that, contrary to all the public protestations over the years by Israel and its hardline supporters, Israel did in fact have a willing partner for peace, even, if, tragically, in my opinion, the Palestinian Authority offered a solution that is out of tune on several issues with the Palestinian public. 1) The right of return. 2) Proper evacuation of settlements as well as some neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem that have been unlawfully appropriated since 1967. 3) The status and administration of holy places.   This means that if the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli government are to be real partners for peace, each of these issues needs to be dealt with much more generously by Israel to the point that the solution is acceptable to most Palestinians (perhaps affirmed through a plebiscite like that held for Sudanese around the world).

Additionally, the papers show the extent of collusion between the Palestinian Authority and Israel on security matters (including the Gaza Invasion, rather than a state of mutual antipathy).  In the long term, this would result in an authoritarian and unrepresentative regime in the State of Palestine, which while useful to Israel, would be along the lines of other authoritarian Arab regimes (and we can see what’s happening to them right now).   Any future relationship between the Palestinian Authority and Israel needs to be based on civil society principles, not authoritarianism.

The papers also demonstrate that both Israel and the Palestinian Authority are in something of a fantasy land if they think that they can keep the screws on Hamas, whose prestige is only going to be advanced through these revelations. This doesn’t automatically mean that Hamas supporters are all supporters of the despicable Hamas covenant with its anti-Semitic calumnies, or that they are Islamic ideologues. Hamas is seen as taking a more just and moral stand than the secular Fatah.  In one way or another, Hamas and Gaza are part of the story.

Finally, without internal constitutional and structural reform that again demands a rethink of Zionist tenets, an Israel-Palestine deal will never gain the support of Israeli Palestinians whose status as equal citizens needs to be absolutely established in a way that does not lead to their situation of being in a kind of citizenship limbo – yes you are equal, but…not absolutely equal.

Now, in the major Jewish Diaspora communities, my bet is that the machers don’t quite know what to spin because nothing makes much sense anymore. None of the old justifications for a poor, weak, massively threatened Israel make sense.  A deal with a supine Palestinian Authority will last five minutes and Israel is seeding the roots of another revolt if it thinks it can get away with it.

It gives me no pleasure to have to take such a critical view of the whole episode, and I am not happy that the Palestine Papers will make Israel haters delirious.  Back in the early 1990s I believed that the Oslo Accords were a first step towards a long-term peace, and I was angry at Palestinian critics such as Edward Said who said in 1993, that it was all a fraud, ‘an instrument of Palestinian surrender’. Sadly, he has been proven correct.

There appears to be no other way around it.   International intervention is desperately required, certainly more than the one-sided and in many ways ineffectual approach taken by US administrations. Israel’s leaders, for all the think tanks and experts it appears to have on board, have not proved that they want much more than an enforced peace with a local Bantustan, without any pain, or apologies for deep injustices over the years.

Trumpeted exceptionalism to the rules of international law and peace-making curry little favour for Israel these days.  Israel’s justifications are looking very thin and will get very little support as the Middle East erupts with new states, some democratic, some not, but most of which will not necessarily play ball with the non-resolution of a problem that has simmered, with increasing fervour, for not just 40 years, but ever since Zionists became political.

And no wonder so many of the local lambs are playing very quiet to their guiding fox these days.

The author is writing purely in a personal capacity.

The Winklevoss twins

By Larry Stillman Some films are best understood by insiders, and The Social Network is a case in point.  This is not to say that its story and message cannot be greatly enjoyed by outsiders, but The Social Network, written by Aaron Sorkin, who also wrote The West Wing, left me reeling for its insider depiction of Harvard undergraduate life and its intersections with electronic age.  Throw in the subculture of Jews at Harvard and it is a cerebral experience.  The mostly cracking script draws upon the semi-fictional book, The Accidental Billionaires, by Ben Mezrich (also a Harvard graduate). When I saw the film in Pretoria recently, it was obvious from the silence that the Afrikaans-speaking audience was missing a lot of the rapid-fire subtlety of the film (it should have been subtitled), particularly from the opening scenes where the asocial and nasty Zuckerberg (played by Jesse Eisenberg), has an argument with his girlfriend whom he subsequently calls a bitch in a blog post that helped promote his notoriety.  The film cuts betweens scenes of drunken hacking, social-climbing, lawsuits, sex with Asian-American girls, Boston Brahmin accents, Zuckerberg’s house of code-writers on the West Coast, and the crazy guy behind Napster.  This is all packaged as a kind of war between Zuckerberg, the asocial egocentric code writer and inventor of Facebook, and the elite private clubs at Harvard. Having been a very poor postgraduate student at Harvard, the film gripped me because of the accuracy of its depiction of the affected habits and mannered culture of this island of privilege. The film (and the book in particular), also has a strong Jewish angle, because Mark Zuckerberg and the Brazilian, Eduardo Saverin, the cofounder of Facebook (see his own review of the film) are of privileged Jewish background; although Saverin comes across more as an exotic foreigner than Jewish in the movie. In the film, they are presented as outsiders challenging insiders such as the as the twin WASP  Harvard Olympic rowers, Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (look them up on Google). At one point, in faux Latin, Zuckerberg refers to them as the Winkelvī.  One critic suggests that Zuckerberg is “the Harvard Jew at war with Harvard’s WASP decorum.” I’d argue that Zuckerman is at war with Jewish decorum as well.  Mannered and Jewish Harvardians resembling WASPs have been around the place since the 1880s, with a numerus clausus (restrictive quota) during the first half of the twentieth century. Zuckerberg managed to get up other Jews’ (reshaped) noses as well by not sitting down for genteel tea, rather than coffee (to paraphrase Tom Lehrer). With such an establishment (which now incorporates elite African-Americans, Hispanics and Asians), the Winklevī think that they can tell the Jewish Larry Summers, the most arrogant of Harvard Presidents in recent times, what to do because Zuckerberg hasn’t played by gentlemen’s rules. Summers basically throws them out of his office to let them settle the problem as undergraduates, rather than corporate giants. He was mistaken, because the Winkelvī got Daddy’s lawyers involved. The Winkelvī and others, including Saverin, subsequently pursued Zuckerberg for financial compensation for intellectual property theft. A good part of the film comprises of excruciating interviews and confrontations in law offices between Zuckerberg and others. By the end, Zuckerberg is alone, trying to reconnect with an ex-girlfriend on Facebook. He is an unlikeable billionaire and a social failure.  You can’t tell if he knows or cares what damage he causes to other people, and you also can’t tell whether he is honest with himself about how rich and powerful he has become.  Even interviews with the real Zuckerberg that can be seen on YouTube still don’t let us know if he has a soul at all.  Perhaps in his genius he has created something whose implications he doesn’t fully understand. So what’s the Australian or Australian Jewish connection to the film?  Not much.  But in comparative terms, it is interesting to think about what Harvard represents as compared to the undergraduate experience in Australia. Harvard is not Melbourne University, nor is it Monash or anywhere else in Australia.  The residential colleges at Melbourne University (and I went to one) are a pale imitation of what goes on at Harvard.  The intense collegiate experience of the Ivy League, with the exception of Oxford and Cambridge, is probably unique in the world, as are the resources, whether intellectual or material. Significantly, at Harvard there are endowed chairs in all aspects of Jewish studies.  American Jewish philanthropy has supported all aspects of scholarship and study at Harvard.  And this is the case across the United States.  It is not just about being Jewish, but being American (in the best sense of the word), and academics work on the basis of such support in total freedom.  There is also an expectation, at least at the elite colleges, that students get something of that experience. Therein lies a big difference between the two Jewish cultures, one very large, extraordinarily diverse, and culturally confident, and the other, relatively peripheral, small and defensive, still finding its own particular path.  I thus wonder if creative people like Zuckerberg could ever arise in Australia. Finally, and as an aside, my take on why Facebook is such a phenomenon as a social networking platform: Facebook takes advantage of what Mark Granovetter  (not just another Princeton and Harvard alumnus, but another Hebe), in a famous sociological article, called the ‘strength of weak ties’. It lets us maintain our strong relationships, but also take advantage of weaker ties for information, fun, and a million other things, some of which haven’t even been thought up yet.

This article is a response to Deborah Stone’s recent piece in Galus Australis and her summary of the ADC special report, “Antisemitism on Campus. Contemporary Jewish experience at Victorian universities”. The article has now been circulated internationally, which may make ADC happy because it’s up there in the propaganda war; but in fact, I received a puzzled query from a professor of Jewish Studies in Canada.

As a preface, let me say that there is a problem with Australian anti-Semitism, and particularly virulent anti-Zionism that crosses into anti-Semitism. Recently I took a Palestinian organization to task for using vile materials produced by the bizarre Gilad Atzom, an Israeli now in the UK. On another occasion I have berated Palestinian protesters for marching with posters taken out of pages of Der Stuermer. I have also gotten into long online ‘discussions’ with well-meaning Anglo advocates whose stereotyping and typecasting are contemptible. I also resent simplistic and stereotypical representations of Jewishness, which the media seems to thrive on (sounds of Fiddler on the Roof).

But there is a problem with misstating or exaggerating the problem of ‘anti-Semitism’ and presenting the ‘evidence’ as authoritative. This is the case with the ADC report. As Deborah Stone says in her report, 50 students who were members of the Jewish students’ organization out of a number we actually don’t know, self-selected to respond online, and that they perceived anti-Israelism or anti-Zionism as direct anti-Semitism. These were students who were motivated and WANTED to respond.

From the start, I will admit that I am primarily a qualitative researcher who understands the ins and outs of that sort of work, but I also know a bit about statistics and validity in social science. There is a basic flaw with the methodology. For the survey to have any credibility whatsoever, it has to be constructed in such a way that the various hypotheses put forward on the basis of the evidence are defensible. The only way to do this is to construct a valid scientific poll, what is known as a random sample of a total population. Usually, in polling, you want at a 95% confidence that the results are valid with a 5% margin of error. For example, with a population of say 3000 Jewish students, you would want a poll of at least 341 students. This can be constructed for example, by phoning a sample of male/female students assuming that everyone has a phone, spread across different age groups and suburbs, as well as faculties and universities. This is the kind of methodology used in the Monash Centre for Jewish Studies 2008-9 Population Survey where it says (p. 39), “A ‘scientific’ sample is only as reliable as the database from which it is drawn”. Thus, a self-selected ‘sample’ of only 50 Jewish students, all of whom are members of the Australian Union of Jewish Students is bound to have an inherent bias because it excludes other Jewish student and working with relatively small numbers and thus making extrapolations is misleading and erroneous.

In addition, the report makes all sorts of assertions without empirical data. As an example, the causal suggestion that Latrobe is more anti-Semitic because it is in the Northern suburbs of Melbourne and closer to Muslim populations and has a training program for Muslims is made without any evidence. Could it not also be due to a strong presence of fringe leftists of Anglo or other persuasions who dominate campus politics? If the ADC’s conclusion is not true, then the ADC could be guilty of stigmatizing the Muslim/Arabic community. I see many Muslim students at Monash and if anything, they are too studious and apolitical.

It can also be argued that the poll had leading questions, because it asked, for example, whether students had seen ‘anti-Semitic’ acts (as distinct from anti-Israeli acts). A cleverer poll would have investigated student’s understandings of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism and their relationship to campus politics. It would have closely examined the types of acts that were considered anti-Semitic or anti-Zionist and scaled their perceived and if possible, actual severity. How do you compare ‘Fuck Jews’ on a toilet door to a nasty banner at a rally?

Thus, the survey resembles push-polling, which results in self-fulfilling and confirming answers for the polster. Since anti-Semitism/anti-Zionism are difficult and contested terms, there is a need to unpack the terms in research and get some insight into how students, a) perceive the relationship between the two, b) see the responses of non-Jews, and particularly political antagonists in terms of the distinction, and c) if possible, deal with some real facts (the very hard stuff).

The survey has another problem, because it doesn’t look at how students perceive Israel’s actions (good, bad, ugly) and how actions at particular times lead to activity on campus. Instead, the survey works from an unproblematicized picture of Israel, that is a ‘Zionist approach’, which again, excludes or marginalizes legitimate and /or extreme critique.

Another issue that the survey fails to address adequately is that of identity on campus. The report claims that students live in fear on campus and that they play down their identity. But again, the survey only looks at the responses of the most highly motivated of students who responded to the survey. I suspect that on campus, many Jewish students who come from a relatively cloistered and privileged existence are somewhat shocked to be in contact with the rest of the population. Unquestioned Zionism comes into strong conflict, and assertive and not very polite debate with very different sorts of people with elements of a culture clash. But again, this is just a hypothesis that has to be tested through much more careful forms of research.

The ADC report is a very sloppy self-fulfilling report that should not be called research. Yes, there is a problem with ultra leftists and a few others on campus and over-enthusiastic embrace of the Palestinian cause at all costs, but the effects of what they do (and what Jewish students do in response) are not well analysed.

Reading

Anthony Lerman, Sense on Anti-semitism

Free speech vs. hate speech - a delicate balance

By Larry Stillman

Hate speech is often characterized as ‘words that wound’, words that are deliberately intended to cause severe discomfort, stigmatization, a feeling of being sullied, and humiliation in the face of others.”

Within the Melbourne Jewish community, there appears to be a well-established tradition of encouraging public hatred through the denunciation of people, mostly for political sins, some of which may be true, more often than not (in my opinion) fabrications.

Recently,  on  Galus Australis, I was accused by an observant Jew of being part of a group of “whores who would let their own nation perish,”  with a suggestion that a tree and rope as  part of the solution for dealing with people with opinions such as mine. Others used the word ‘traitor’.  The president of the JCCV has now said that the AJDS is engaged in ‘vilification’ against Israel, and a number of brave pseudonymous individuals continue to regularly interrupt reasonably polite online conversations  on this site with the intent of causing discomfort and stigmatization. Alex Fein suffered such a fate on ‘Sensible Jew’, with simply appalling behaviour by a number of people who clearly delighted at inflicting pain and hurt.  Someone associated with AJDS has been called a ‘capo’ in the pages of the Jewish News, and the list goes on and on and on of insults which are clearly examples by hate speech.

Of course, many Jews and Jewish organizations such as the Anti-Defamation Commission are highly critical of what they claim are expressions of hate speech by artists or actors, Palestinians activists, politicians such as Julia Irwin, Antony Lowenstein (who I think is often wrong), and even journalists (at the Age and Sydney Morning Herald in particular). Getting close to the bottom of the anti-Semitic sewer, there are people like the truly horrible egomaniac known as Frederick Toben, of the Adelaide ‘Institute’ a promoter of neo-Nazism and holocaust revisionism, and self-martyrdom for his cause.  For his sins, he has spent time in a German prison, and been pursued in the courts by the ECAJ. The ECAJ has also pursued the obscure Tasmanian Olga Scully as well as Muslim extremists.

We also know that manifestations of hatred of Israel which at times melt into anti-Semitism are manifested in chants of ‘Israel out of Palestine’, and the Israeli flag has been burned on the steps of Parliament by Palestinian extremists.  Fortunately, more intelligent Palestinian advocates deplore and have nothing to do with such material, but in an environment of strong political anger, things do go awry (as we see with settlers burning Korans).   And of course, there are plenty of people who hate other minorities such as Muslims, with a hate pamphlet being circulated in Elwood recently.

Locally, in 2004, Joseph Gutnick won a landmark lawsuit for libel for material published online in the US but available in Australia, albeit to very few people.  The magazine article made a connection between his business and religious associations that Gutnick particularly objected to.  While there were no grounds to bring suit in the US, a judgement was sought in Australia because of tighter libel and defamation laws.  The case has major free speech implications because it is made it possible to sue for online materials published in one place and read in another.  There is now a case before the courts in which Andrew Bolt, the nasty and quite vindictive Herald Sun commentator has complaints made against him by a number of indigenous Australians, and the judgement when made, could also have significant implications for free speech.

Whether in the case of Jews slandering each other, others slandering Jews, or others slandering others (indigenous Australians, gays), what are the limits to free and particularly hateful speech in today’s environment when language and symbols are in endless play in different contexts?   I understand that a very recent case has ruled that a swastika graffiti done in a workplace was not necessarily offensive—but just graffiti. In fact, it is getting harder and harder to draw a boundary between critical remarks and hate speech, given the free use of swear words, and a culture of confrontation in the media and politics.

My solution is that in the age of the internet, we increasingly need thick hides and ear-plugs, and at the same time, deal with invective as rationally as possible, thereby isolating those who write or speak drivel from their supporters.  Pursuing such people legally only gives them oxygen, and banning their material only sends them onto another website.

The Gutnick case, and potentially the Bolt case, are warnings about the dangers of bringing about lawsuits for viewpoints and statements that disturb people, because they can limit free speech.

Thus, in the case of the Jewish community, which has by and large supported strong legislation against hate speech, I do not think that it has been considered that members of the community could in fact be guilty of encouraging hatred, yet Jews as much as anyone else can be vitriolic haters.

What is the solution?

I think we need to err on the side of free speech rather than censoring people.  If they rant, there is no need to lie down and play the victim, because the new media allows us to hit right back.  We need to counter with rational argument and public excoriation that shows what fools the haters are.   We also need to educate the community, particularly kids about the dangers of prejudicial thinking and action.

By Larry Stillman

I’d like to argue the moral case for supporting a selective boycott of products from the Occupied West Bank. I take the view that it is illegally held territory in which its prior and current non-Jewish inhabitants (Palestinians, whatever their citizenship) live under a form of military rule and control system which completely privileges Jewish settlers and Israeli businesses and abuses human rights.

There are a number of ways to approach the problem of the occupation and the denial of the right of self-determination from a moral point of view.

This first is a universal human rights approach, reflected in UN principles and international law which is opposed to such things as military occupation or land seizures, of the denial of affective legal remedies against oppression, and second, from the position within the Jewish tradition.

Second, the Jewish social justice view can be summarized as the principle of Tikkun Olam derived from the Mishnah, which is the struggle to repair or install righteousness in the world, as well inspirational mottos like “Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof” (Justice, Justice you shall persue”, Devarim 16:20). This also relates to the concept of ethical mitzvot, for both religious and non-religious Jews alike; obligations to make the world a better place, including challenging authority, which traditional Judaism appears reluctant to do. Unfortunately, this tradition barely exists in Australia, with attempts to stomp out dissent on issues relating to Israel going back many decades.

In the US, where I lived for many years, there is a tradition of speaking out and being pro-active for the greater good by rabbis and ordinary people alike, because sometimes, speaking out, even in a symbolic way brings about change. Here are some examples of people (sorry, all middle-aged men) who have supported dissent, including boycotts:

• Rabbi Michael Lerner, the editor of Tikkun magazine, has written for many years about the need to combine a inclusive spiritual dimension into both everyday life and social justice from an inclusive approach. His first major book, Surplus Powerlessness (1986), had a strong influence on my own thinking about contemporary forms of social justice at that time.
• Rabbi Samuel Korff of the Boston Beit Din developed halachic rulings to support boycotts to support the rights of underpaid farm workers in the 1960s and 1970s.  He was also responsible for the denunciation of Jewish slumlords in Boston.
• Rabbi Joshua Heschel, who is revered by many Christians and Jews in the US his activity in the Civil Rights movement in the US, was close to Martin Luther King, and he supported the boycott movement of segregated facilities in the South, along with many other Jews. He also opposed the war in Vietnam.
• More recently, Rabbi Arthur Waskow, of the Philadelphia-based Shalom Center, has supported the establishment of a Mosque at ‘Ground Zero’ in New York, and he has also taken a strong stand on Israeli politics.  Waskow has been active in the Reconstructionist movement for decades.
• Saul Alinksy, who came from an Orthodox background, developed powerful and highly influential organizing techniques including non-violent grass-roots community action and boycotts.
• Other American Jews have been active in many other causes including the labour movement and anti-racism movement.

Returning to the current excoriation of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society for suggesting the most modest form of boycott—against products from the West Bank. I suggest that people in AJDS who are supporting a limited boycott are coming out of the moral position and tradition I have outlined and are no one’s stooges, nor exploitable by extremists.

AJDS has been dumped in with the ‘deligitimizers’ by the so-called official leadership even though AJDS has indicated its disagreement with many elements of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) campaign and the positions it takes within the Green Line. Thus, those who have seen the countless of posts by me in Facebook of late know that I have been vigilant in attacking anti-Israel extremists, whose views are Judeophobic, and AJDS on its website and elsewhere, has clearly distanced itself from extreme positions.

I do not endorse a BDS position that crudely blocks economic, social and cultural exchange between Israel and the rest of the world.  Tactically, the BDS is engaging in erroneous tactics, creating a gulf with the Jewish community. The position that AJDS supports is a far cry from some of the rhetoric and actions taken (not always with the nicest of motives) by the BDS Movement, including a number other Jewish organizations that support a full boycott.  I hope that supporters of BDS ask us why we have taken our position, and I will argue the case. To claim that the moral position we take threatens Israel, or that it delegitimizes the country or that we are mates with crass anti-Semites is an insult to the intelligence of thinking people who care about the future of Israel.

Furthermore, the tactic of Jewish community ‘leaders’ that claim that proponents of boycotts are no more than ‘delegitimizers’ is in fact a way of turning attention away from the Occupation—that is, what is causing the problem in the first case: the Occupation itself and Israel’s consistent behaviour of playing for time at the expense of others’ liberty.

I care deeply about the future security of Israel, but I know that its future cannot be linked to a continuation of 43 of its 60 years as an occupier and thief of another’s birthright.  Saying that putting a ‘Made in Israel’ label on something from the West Bank is morally wrong and asserting that we should not buy such products is the right thing to do.

Larry Stillman is a member of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society Executive, but is expressing his own and not anyone else’s opinion.

In July, Coteret, an Israeli news site, reported that Australian young people were taken on a tour of central Hebron by Birthright/Talglit, a program that has brought hundreds of thousands of young Jews to Israel.  The video featured interviews with some of the participants and an Orthodox, American organiser.   The tour was run by Chabad, who have a long history in Hebron, in conjunction with Israel Express and the Zionist Federation of Australia.

The video, which is still available on Coteret even though it was removed from it’s original source at WeJew.com, probably when it twigged that the visit was controversial, is particularly scary because of the naïveté of the young people – who think they are in Israel. The interviewer and organiser share a pumped up view of eternal rights in Hebron, despite the reality of extraordinary injustice to others to achieve this. I’d love my son to go on ‘Birthright’, but not on such propaganda tours that dehumanize Palestinians.

That ‘downtown’ Hebron, around the Tomb and Mosque of the Patriarchs or the old Casbah is a flashpoint, is an understatement.  Of course, Hebron has a sorry history in modern times, going back to the massacres of 1929, but this is no excuse for current behaviour by ‘settlers’. The Goldstein massacre in 1994 only intensified the tensions between the communities. The Israeli army has to maintain a very large presence to secure the safe passage and complete dominance of a few hundred settlers who make life hell for the Palestinian residents and have no compunction in taking over homes.  Economically, the locals have suffered enormously. Acts of vandalism and violence by settlers including their children are well-documented. Checkpoint abuses are frequent and monitored by organizations such as Mahsom Watch.

The tour was conducted in clear breach of  ‘Birthright’ policy.  Their website has the following stipulation: ” Our tours do not travel to or through areas of the West Bank, Gaza or East Jerusalem, other than the Jewish Quarter of the Old City (changes are possible when permitted by the security authorities).”   It’s pretty scary that these tours are being hijacked for pumping kids full of the most extreme form of  ‘birthright’ Zionism. Alignment with current Israeli politics of repression or an absolutist view of religious history are not a very good example of respect for the rights of other people.

It also appears that Birthright kids have done other exciting things like visit an outpost overlooking Gaza and use it as a ‘photo opportunity’.  How nice. Nothing like an Arab refugee encampment in the background. Of course, technically, such visits are within Israel, but it gives the impression that Birthright is about short-term brainwashing of young people with the hope that they become strong converts and unquestioning supporters of Israel.

Palestinians are real people whose rights are trampled on, and an example that has hit the headlines has been the   destruction of a  ‘unrecognized’  shantytown of  very poor Bedouin in the northern Negev.  High school volunteers took part in this destruction.   A hard line is being undertaken towards such settlements to make way for JNF forests and later on, Israeli housing  ( some call this ‘greenwashing’ of Palestinian presence). One Israeli critics calls such actions ethnic cleansing and forced urbanization .  I find that kind of language painful to use, but it appears accurate.

It needs to be remembered that the Australian JNF has a special association with the Negev as well, and supports community development for the Bedouin, though the effects of such community development are disputed.  Whatever the case, we are vicariously linked with what goes on.  Of course, I am not associating Taglit-Birthright or the Australian JNF with such extremism, but they are all part of a disturbing pattern that can be no longer ignored as Israel embarks on an all-out campaign to ‘explain’ itself.  Such things can’t be easily explained away.  We should stand up for the underdog in Israel.

My opinion of the presence of young Australians in Hebron and others having photo ops over a community in a state of siege, or the presence of Israeli kids in the destruction of a village may make you very angry because I take the view such acts they are antithetical to human rights by Israel and in the Occupied Territories.

Of course, vehement anti-Zionists argue that these activities and attitudes are inherent in  Zionism.  I actually think that Zionism is far more heterogeneous but it is undeniable that something is fundamentally wrong in the examples I have cited.

Where do we go from here?  If the solution is ultimately to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinian people, then what should Birthright be doing to promote peace making and the fulfilment of a peaceful and democratic dream for all communities?  There are many other organizations in Israel (and even on the West Bank) which could both provide impressionable young people with exposure to identity the meaning of  human rights and democracy for both communities.

“In recent years, Israeli groups have put forward several constitutions for the state of Israel. However, these proposals…have been preoccupied with the question of, ‘Who is a Jew?’ and have neglected the primary constitutional question of, ‘Who is a citizen?’” Quotation from the preface to the ‘Democratic Constitution’ proposed by Adalah, 2007.

The position taken by Adalah, the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, intrigues me because it argues for the transformation of Israel within 1967 borders.  Adalah is an organization that has been funded by the New Israel Fund and the fact that it has produced such a document has been used to bash the NIF but here I want to address the Adalah proposal, rather than re-hashing issues with the NIF. The proposal comes from sober-minded, well-educated, middle class Palestinian Israelis, different to the stereotypes that many have about Palestinians.

To reject Adalah’s proposal and to say that it is a cover for a  ‘Greater Arab State of Palestine’, endangering Jews, or naïve ultra leftist solutions for ‘secular democratic Palestine), is a simplistic rhetorical scare. It ignores the very sober nature of the proposal, which is about the nature of citizenship in a country for all its citizens founded on “distributive justice” rather than specific ethnic rights.

The proposal is thus far from a call for a dhimmi (traditional, second-class) status for Jews in an Arab country but it also confronts the notion of the special (legal) Jewish character of Israel, preferring a constitution in which all communities are equal in a legal sense. It can be seen as an important positional document for a practical way forward.  I interpret the document as supporting a ‘two state’ solution, though others, in the current environment, may see it as a ‘one state’ answer. I am more focussed in this article on ‘Israel’ than whether there are one or two states.

It is interesting that a number of Israelis on the  left including Meron Benvenisti in a recent Haaretz essay, and now Yehuda Shenhav in a new book (not yet in English),  have been suggesting similar proposals for a new, democratic state to break the current  impasse,  though these seen as highly controversial, being tagged as anti-Zionist, a form of suicide and so on, but it is clear that the issue is going to re-enter the discussion-sphere in Israel, as it has abroad.  I also understand that even some in the settler movement are considering the possibility of citizenship in a Palestine as a quid pro quo for continuing settlements.

Adalah sees no justice to the fact that the actual rights of Arab/Palestinian Israelis are for all practical purposes, like those in the pre-civil rights USA for African Americans, theoretically equal but practically, separate and unequal. Despite the many exceptions, e.g. members of the Knesset, Israeli Palestinians do not get their civil or taxpayer’s worth of benefits (see this) and legal discrimination is endemic.

Notwithstanding arguments over legal philosophy, the proposal also needs to be taken seriously for other, practical reasons:

• Arabs within the 1967 boundaries constitute at least 20% of the population with a rapid rate of natural increase.
• If the proposal would be widely supported by the different Arab communities in Israel (and surveys show they do mostly identify with the country), then it represents a ‘coming to terms’ with the existence of a State called Israel with a Jewish majority, and a desire for the end of belligerence.
• If the proposal was accepted by Israeli Arabs, then there would be strong pressure for Arab countries to accept it, and this of course, would pull the rug from under rejectionists—those who oppose Israel in any shape or form, including some elements of the western left.

In addition, the massive subsidies provided to Israel will eventually end, or be seriously reduced and the country will have to stand on its own two feet.  While this may cause heartache to Diaspora Zionist organizations who would lose much face, the ontological needs of American and Australian Zionists, should not alone determine the status of Israel.

While according to the proposal, the ‘Jewish community’ would lose its politically privileged position, cultural rights for self-determination of Jews (a key principle of Zionism), would not be abrogated.   As an example, the Adalah document speaks of the preservation of Jewish and Arab school systems, religious and cultural institutions and so on.

A new bi- or multi-cultural Israel would be able to engage economically with its neighbours, but at the same time, it would mean the end of the ‘special relationship’ with the USA, something which only began after 1973 when the country became increasingly important to US global strategy (and which may be changing, see my blog piece).

The potential is for a return the kind of Zionism espoused in the 1920s by Judah Magnes, who supported “a binational state in which the two peoples will enjoy equal rights as befits the two elements shaping the country’s destiny, irrespective of which of the two is numerically superior at any given time”.

Of course, this picture of the future has some enormous challenges. The democratic constitution is the death knell for the Law of Return of 1950, and by implication, the end of the legal, rather than cultural connection, between Jews in Israel and Jews in the diaspora. Instead, like other countries, immigration quotas would be set. Jews could not expect dual citizenship automatically.

There also is the danger of a multi-party ‘confessional’ or ‘consociationalist’ society, strongly linked to guaranteed representation for ethno-religious blocs, which is inherently unstable (Lebanon, Belgium, Quebec). Thus, Adalah proposes a veto vote for Arab parties on issues affecting Arab rights.

Other than an outright rejection of anything which limits Zionist (and for the other side, Palestinian nationalist) ideals, fear of violence and terror is probably the strongest reason why many people will oppose the New Constitution. Because of militant Islam and nationalism in many parts in the world, the task of building trust will be enormous.

Given that the past 60 years have presented such traumatic experiences for both communities, is it time to consider a Democratic Constitution seriously? Perhaps for the sake of the security of Jews in Israel, the health of its relationship with Jews  abroad, and a new form of Zionism.

Larry Stillman is a member of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society Executive, but is expressing his own and not anyone else’s opinion.