Benjamin Netanyahu gave his speech. Now people can analyze what he said and what impact it will have. Personally, I didn’t watch it. Too much crap has gone on in my personal life over the last week, and I didn’t need to add any stress. I’m doing just fine in that department, thank you.
Of course, this means that I don’t have much to say about the particulars of Netanyahu’s performance or the congressional reaction it received.
What I know, I knew before he ever spoke a word. I’ve never seen it so respectable to voice denunciations of Israel on the American left. I’ve never seen an American administration this angry with an Israeli administration.
There is always a danger of lumping. Just like George W. Bush didn’t speak for all Americans, Netanyahu doesn’t speak for all Israelis. And, Netanyahu’s rhetoric notwithstanding, being a Jew is not the same thing as being an Israeli. And, opposing Israel’s policies is not the same thing as opposing or have ill-will towards the Jewish people.
Netanyahu, however, does his best to conflate all of these things so that if you oppose him, you oppose Israel, and if you oppose Israel, you’re an anti-Semite. He makes it harder for people to maintain these barriers between how they feel about each area. So, the result, I think, is that a lot of people respond to Netanyahu by becoming very angry with Israel, and then take his invitation to displace this anger onto all Israelis, and then all Jews.
Now, I’m not Jewish, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t worry about anti-Semitism. Most of my closest friends are at least half-Jewish. And I think they get stressed when they listen to Netanyahu. It’s probably better for people in their situation to talk about how this makes them feel than for me to try to explain it for them. But I sense their discomfort. I know it’s real.
As a Jew, and even–gasp–a Zionist, I can’t think of a more greater existential threat to Israel than Netanyahu and all he represents.
It’s hard to imagine an Israeli prime minister more out of step with mainstream American Jewish thought than Bibi.
My sister asked me recently why the Democratic Party has become so anti-Israel. I explained that there are now more Muslim voters in the USA than Jewish voters. Politicians, from ANY party, would bring back the death camps if it brought them political power.
The recent justification by Democrats of the killing of unarmed teens in Israel by terrorists and the justification of the murders at Charlie Hebdo have taught me a bitter lesson. When I was a boy, Germans were condemned as heartless racist monsters because of the Holocaust. One of my uncles, the son of ethnic German immigrants from Hungary (my grandparents) as an American Army 1st Lieutenant was an interpreter for an official Army investigation into the death camps. My Aunt told me that often had terrible nightmares and was soul shaken by the thought that these atrocities were committed by his people whom he had been raised to be proud of. The common feeling in America was that Germans were intelligent but evil. Now I realize that politicians of any ethnic group can support genocide. Indeed, the word genocide is trivialized to mean the denial of political power instead of mass murder.
Republicans are no better. They despise Jews but support Israel and Israeli politicians partly in reaction to the shift in Democratic sentiment and partly to support the arms industry.
None of the above should be construed as support for Likud or the bombastic Netanyahu.
Not every political party is based on ethnic supremacy.
if the rating goes below 1.0 the whole thread will be hidden!
Thank you, Oui! You always stand for open discourse and against censorship. I know you disagree with me on this, but nevertheless you support my right to answer Booman’s question without fear of censorship.
I want you to know that even if I don’t always comment or recommend your diaries, indeed lately I rarely agree with them, I nevertheless always read them and I appreciate your efforts.
Agree! I just rated it a 4 for that reason.
Voice is a long-time member of the frog pond here and has written scores of posts that I found enlightening. Yes, I disagree with this post, as I point out below, but this is not a troll – this is an honest disagreement. I know that kind of thing isn’t common much anymore on the internet, but when it happens we shouldn’t suppress it.
“The recent justification by Democrats of the killing of unarmed teens in Israel by terrorists and the justification of the murders at Charlie Hebdo have taught me a bitter lesson.”
Was the bitter lesson that LSD is a hell of a drug?
I think he means “By condemning Israel’s bombing campaign, a few Democrats excused the killing of Israeli teenagers. There is no support for this ridiculous argument, but Israel can never be wrong.”
I was going to say pretty much what you said, but you said it better than I would have so just sign me on in support of Seabea’s comment.
No I did not. I meant comments like “they got what they deserved” and “the killings are understandable because they made very offensive remarks”.
Who said the teenagers got what they deserved?
“they got what they deserved” and “the killings are understandable because they made very offensive remarks” are not equivalent statements. But the fact that you think they are says a lot about how you see things.
Your saying they are different says a lot about how you see things. Are you a lawyer by any chance?
No, I’m not. I’m a historian.
Wtf are you talking about? Israel is a country that treats my country with no respect and does a lot of nasty things to people who can’t stop them. Our support of them negatively effects the national interest more than it helps.
Why should I like them?
Didn’t say you should like them. I said, in effect, that you shouldn’t aid and abet their murder.
By the strict definition of “aid and abet”, you are essentially claiming that members of the Democratic party are providing aid to groups like Hezbollah or Hamas. If so, that’s news to me.
I think you’re going for a much looser (meaningless) definition of “aid and abet” then. In that case, the United States aids and abets all sorts of murders, in China, Russia, and elsewhere. Economic and geopolitical interests are paramount. I don’t think this argument holds much water.
Don’t we actually send humanitarian stuff to Gaza?
So instead we help Israel murder the Palestinians? Because that’s what happened under Netanyahoo. Israel is a grown up country. Is it in our national interest to support them the way we do? I don’t think so.
The Independent Leaked footage shows Israeli soldiers ‘setting dogs on Palestinian teen’
At one time in America, most of the public condemned such practices — at least after they saw the horrifying pictures.
What country is that? Are you referring to the USA?
“They despise Jews but support Israel and Israeli politicians partly in reaction to the shift in Democratic sentiment and partly to support the arms industry.”
First of all, something like 25-30% of American Jews do vote Republican. Politically they are themselves a Jewish version of the more familiar RWNJ. A lot of would-be antisemitism today is channeled as anti-Democratic Party. We have lots of minorities to choose from in this country.
Your point about Muslim voters is just wrong. While 70% of Jews voted for Obama in 2012, 85% of Muslims did. And in fact, overall, Democratic Muslims and Jews tend to get along fine. The voting bloc you ought to be looking at here is Right-wing Christians, not Muslims.
“Politicians, from ANY party, would bring back the death camps if it brought them political power.” This is a strange combination of “both sides do it” and Godwin’s law. Sure there are people like that, they’re called sociopaths, and they tend to congregate in the GOP these days. But what I mostly get from it is that you despise “politicians” as such, which does not show a great deal of political discernment.
It is not true that all RW Republicans despise Jews. But for a lot of them “Israel eight or wrong” is and always has been a compensated form of antisemitism, like the old lady my family and I encountered in a Texas dentist’s office, who could tell we were Jewish and couldn’t prevent herself from asking why we hadn’t moved to Israel yet and when we were fixing to go, which is just a nice way of saying “Why don’t y’all go back where ya belong, you’re holdin’ up my personal salvation.” Their salvation depends on the vast majority of Jews being destroyed in Armageddon, which they support because (according to them) it’s in the Bible. Which, by the way, it isn’t.
Manifesting their support for Israel through the Republicans IS a reaction to the shift in Democratic sentiment, but much more it is simply agreeing with the “second coming” religious or pseudo-religious framework.
In effect, they do represent a great support to the arms industry, but I don’t believe that is what primarily motivates them, except for the Wall STreet types, and in that case it has nothing to do with religion or ethnicity.
A NY Jew that I once worked with told me his family voted Republican “but only for the money”, i.e. they were Rockefeller Republicans. That might explain the 25-30% number that you quote.
“It is not true that all RW Republicans despise Jews.”
Perhaps, but every one I know does and most look down on African-Americans, Latinos, and Asians as well. I’ve heard plenty of comments about “Micks” and “Pollacks” from them, so I surmise that they just don’t want to say “Dago” to my face. Pretty much they look down on everyone that isn’t WASP. That doesn’t necessarily mean hate. I said in another thread that many of them have sympathy for the Dreamers. That doesn’t mean they think they are equal, far from it. They do feel superior. They just don’t hate them. Others do, like the guy who seriously proposed machine gunning all illegals at the border, including women and children.
“In effect, they do represent a great support to the arms industry, but I don’t believe that is what primarily motivates them, except for the Wall STreet types, and in that case it has nothing to do with religion or ethnicity. ” I’ll agree completely with that. It was the politicians like Cheney that I had in mind.
There is a difference between being anti-Israeli actions and being anti-Israel, just as being against the Iraq war did not mean one was anti-US.
I don’t know anybody (I am sure there may be a few, but they are outside my social circle) that justified the killing of any innocent Israelis, though there were some that talked about how they could understand it happening.
I do know a lot of RWers who justified the killing of hundreds of innocent Palestinians and the continued stealing of their land.
And the comment about death camps was way over the line.
My sister asked me recently why the Democratic Party has become so anti-Israel. I explained that there are now more Muslim voters in the USA than Jewish voters. Politicians, from ANY party, would bring back the death camps if it brought them political power.
The recent justification by Democrats of the killing of unarmed teens in Israel by terrorists and the justification of the murders at Charlie Hebdo have taught me a bitter lesson.
What???? This is just strange.
First, I question the premise. WHAT Democrats justified those murders? Yes, a lot of people opposed the wanton bombing and slaughter of hundreds in Gaza and Palestine. Yes, the Israeli government said that that destruction was in response to the murders of Israelis. But it does not follow that criticism of the latter act implies approval of the former.
This would be like saying, during the lynching era, that if you opposed the lynching of some black men accused of raping a white girl then you were endorsing rape of white girls.
In terms of the Democratic party becoming anti-Israel, well, I’m sorry, but if you see it that way then you are blinded by severe biases of your own. Over 3/4 of Jews vote Democratic and the party has long been the home of those who oppose discrimination of any kind. Regarding Israel, even as late as 2008 all Democratic presidential hopefuls had to prostate themselves in front of AIPAC if they are to be considered serious candidates – and we’ll probably see that again in 2016. Many Jews saw Obama’s choice of Rahm Emmanuel as his first appointee an attempt to quell fears that he wasn’t sufficiently pro-Israel.
I think what you are witnessing, however, is that the left in the US has become as tired for the policies of Israel as has the rest of the world. You won’t find many on the left questioning Israel’s basic human rights to exist and to do so without peace. But you will see the left questioning the extremely violent and inhumane policies that have been enacted – allegedly to protect the safety of Israel but in practice such policies invariably create backlash – and that backlash is then used in a cycle to enact even more brutal policies.
The left is also extremely tired of the way AIPAC has come to dominate US politics. You will rarely hear a US politician voice the kind of concerns about Israeli policy that are common even in newspapers in Israel for fear of backlash. Famously, two congresspeople who did so in the early 2000s were both ousted in Democratic primaries in which their opponents received lavish funding from wealthy Israeli sources.
Most of us can distinguish between the different factions in Israel and between what it means to be Israeli and what it means to be Jewish. Most of us despise discrimination of any kind, of course including antisemitism, and of course are horrified at mass atrocities, including the holocaust. We see what the right wing leaders of Israel, and their supporters, are doing and are aghast – but we are able to do that without thinking all Israelis or all Jews think the same way or support those actions. At the same time we are also aghast at how countries such as Saudi Arabia treat their own people – we understand that being against the current Israeli government doesn’t mean automatic support of those opposed to Israel.
In other words, we’re not right wingers. We understand these kind of complexities. And despising Netanyahu and his evil cohorts doesn’t mean we despise Israel or the Jewish people.
I agree with all of your comment, except this. It depends how we define “Israel’s right to exist”. Are we accepting it as a “right to exist as a Jewish ethnocracy”? If so, I do not accept its “right to exist,” just as I wouldn’t accept Alabama circa 1950’s “right to exist” under Jim Crow.
Besides, as Chomsky has argued, this is a flawed concept in and of itself:
“No state has a right to exist, and no one demands such a right….In an effort to prevent negotiations and a diplomatic settlement, the U.S. and Israel insisted on raising the barrier to something that nobody’s going to accept….[Palestinians are] not going to accept…the legitimacy of their dispossession.”
Back to the how we define Israel’s “right to exist” comes back to the “demographic problem”, which is insinuated by all Zionists, especially the liberal set. Most liberal Zionists have the biggest paradox here: they know apartheid is wrong, but many of the same liberal Zionists also insist on defining Israel as a “Jewish State”. How do you accomplish that? A two-state solution, which means you have to ethnically cleanse certain parts of the region, and then deny the right of return to those who were kicked out previously. The conservative and hard-right Zionists don’t have this paradox; apartheid means nothing to them. Treat the Arabs, Palestinians, African refugees, and Ethiopians as lesser people? No problem. Annex all of it into Greater Israel, and kick them to the curb. Maybe they leave, maybe not…bothers the righties none.
As I’ve pointed out on this blog before, the liberals would rather do the ethnic cleansing. It’s that ugly spot in their head that won’t go away…so let’s just make it go away.
~Max Blumenthal
Didn’t the massive ethnic cleansing of central Europe post ww2 actually do a lot to keep the peace?
This is a fair point. (As an aside, I’ll note my quote had an error. I meant to say “with peace”, not without. Oh well, I think everyone got that.)
To answer what you wrote, I meant that Israel has a right to exist with peace in the sense that very few of us on the left would argue for a policy of eliminating Israel entirely, despite the sketchy history of the founding and early years of Israel.
At the same time, I agree with your point that “right to exist” does not mean “right to exist with all of the present horrible anti-human policies that are in place”. No, the citizens of Israel have a right to continue to live in peace, but so do the millions of people living in Israel and its occupied lands who aren’t citizens.
And, yes, that means that we have to reject the notion of a Jewish state the same way we have to reject race-based Apartheid and Jim Crow.
More than blinded, there is no excuse for these warped remarks. Netanyahu’s bombing campaign had absolutely NOTHING to do with the criminal act of the murder of three Yeshiva students near Hebron. It was a highly provocative act by local extremists, fueled by decades long tension between Palestinians living in Hebron and the occupying power called Israel. Yes, the German Nazi boots of oppression and occupation are similar to any occupying force in recent history: Soviets in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, US/UK armed forces in Iraq and the Israelis expanding settlements for immigrants from California, New York, Western Europe and Russia. Netanyahu’s Zionist mission in the West Bank is doomed for failure. All the rest is kabuki theatre by master actor Netanyahu. May he burn in hell, just like a number of previous Israeli prime ministers aka terrorists before 1948. Why was Rabin assassinated? Why is his murderer lauded by Jewish extremists? Why are goyim worthless in the eyes of Shas rabbis? What is the role of women? Why are Israeli-Arabs discriminated?
One hell of a generalization, typical of biased and racist views. The Dutch in The Netherlands were under Nazi boots for 5 years, the Dutch colony of Indonesia felt the wrath of Japanese occupying power and its atrocities/war crimes. There are many genocides in recent history, there is nothing compared to the Shoa and the bestial murder of 6 million Jews in extermination camps in Germany, Poland, Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova, Hungary and Austria.
Perhaps you have noticed, to avoid war in Europe, the former enemies have formed an economic union. France and Germany live side by side. They even cross borders, have cultural exchange and joint sporting events.
The Jewish people are spread and live across the globe, they are not concentrated on that small biblical strip of land where PM Netanyahu reigns. No chance the Jewish people will undergo another Shoa.
Well, he was there. He saw it. If you think he was racist to have been proud of the German people before that, well I don’t have an answer. I do know that he would never countenance a racist remark in his presence, not just anti-Semitic remarks.
I’m not Jewish, but my wife and son both are. We regularly attend services at a reformed synagogue, and we observe shabbat every Friday night. I say that so you know that my wife and son’s identities as Jews are very important to us; it means a lot to our family. I also have relatives who were killed in the holocaust.
I’m not sure you realize it, but from where I am sitting what you just wrote is pretty bloody offensive.
I’m sorry you are offended. Perhaps you misinterpreted what I wrote. What statement specifically offended you?
Oh, I don’t know. Maybe it was how you equated criticism of Israel’s policies with genocide? Given that my family is strongly critical of Israel’s actions that sort of rubbed me the wrong way.
I would never equate criticism with genocide. What I did equate with genocide was cutting off military support or even dropping recognition of Israel as a state as some (not here, however) have suggested.
I’m sorry that my words were poor and caused you upset.
I’m going to have to deconstruct this comment in order to fairly answer it.
1. “My sister asked me…”
You moved rapidly past that without giving an idea of where your sister is coming from with this comment. That in itself can set up a whole lot of misunderstanding.
2. “more Muslim voters than Jewish voters”
If that is supposed to make it easier on Muslims, where is the evidence of that easier treatment? Three Muslims were murdered execution style in Chapel Hill a week or so ago. I didn’t see a whole lot of specifically pro-Muslim sentiment from the politicians.
3. “Politicians, from ANY party, would bring back the death camps if it brought them political power.”
In spite of the impunity for the police and for torture and for drone killings, I’m not seeing any Congressional Tea Party folks going there yet, despite the sentiments of the shock jocks and the people who parrot them. We are going in a dangerous direction, but in my pessimistic opinion even, we’re not over that cliff yet. (I hope)
The issue that Israel faces is not Muslims, it is guaranteeing the political and economic rights of people in a territory that Israel has occupied for over 48 years in accordance with the Geneva Conventions, which are still after over 60 years the best, if still flimsy, guarantee against genocide by national governments. When states fail to observe the niceties of international law, it makes is all the easier for non-state actors to do all of those things that those laws a proscribing. In fact, state failures are what has gotten us into the situation of having genocidal non-state actors.
I saw those comments right here on this blog!
Israeli occupation has been called genocide here. Firing back at cowards firing rockets while hiding behind innocent civilians has been called ‘genocide’ right here.
Yes. Do you then assert that the United States has no right to exist?
I have no idea what incidents you are referring to.
No argument there. I assume you are referring to my final paragraph. I only added that to head off the inevitable claim that I am excusing Likud or Netanyahu. I’m not. I think Likud are extremists that hurt their country. I think Netanyahu is an Israeli Cheney.
No, you didn’t. That was your interpretation while wearing your pro-Israel lenses to filter out all knowledge, complexity, and nuance in those comments.
This comment from you indicates that your thinker-clinker wrt Israel is worse than even I previously recognized. A shame really that you have such a huge blind spot on this issue and a couple of others because it does preclude you from being able to fully embrace notions of fairness, equality, and egalitarianism as a guiding principle. Absent that one can’t be an authentic liberal/progressive, but only a cafeteria liberal. Cognitively/emotionally not so different from cafeteria religious and political conservatives.
“Netanyahu, however, does his best to conflate all of these things so that if you oppose him, you oppose Israel, and if you oppose Israel, you’re an anti-Semite.”
The sad irony of this position is that it enables bona fide antisemitism. Perhaps that’s intentional.
I hope it’s just political. Today I watched a 2.5 minute bio of Netanyahu on CNN. The key fact: Bibi made a peace deal with the Palestinians and got voted out of office for it. It’s like George Wallace and civil rights; doing the right thing was a political loser for him, and he’s determined never to get out-hawked again.
Must have been CNN’s bullshitter and shill reporter Wolf Blitzer
“Throughout his term, Netanyahu was opposed by the political left wing in Israel and lost support from the right because of his concessions to the Palestinians in Hebron and elsewhere, and due to his negotiations with Arafat generally. Netanyahu lost favor with the Israeli public after a long chain of scandals involving his marriage and corruption charges. In 1997, police recommended that Netanyahu be indicted on corruption charges for influence-peddling. He was accused of appointing an attorney general who would reduce the charges …”
Netanyahu as prime-minister managed to lose seats in every election … through smart political deals he came floating to the top to become PM once again. Polls are inconclusive, seems his decision to speech in Congress was a Barnum & Bailey tight-rope act.
○ Netanyahu’s colossal failure as prime minister .. declaring war on America | YnetNews Op-Ed |
Look-up Rabin assasination and incitement to hatred from Bibi! Netanyahu is no peacemaker!
The point is that Netanyahu (substitute any other extreme individuals or factions) explicitly claims to speak in the name of all Jews (substitute the corresponding larger community).
Put yourself in the place of a member of the larger community, to whom the statements of the extremist(s) are not merely wrong, but, in principle, unacceptable and, in practice, discreditive of the larger community.
What is such a person to do? No: back up a step: why? Is the goal to counteract the extremists’ message, or is it merely to say “not in my name”? That is hard enough; but then: how? Leave (quietly or noisily) the larger community? Any of the long list of lesser options that have all been shown not to work? The position is an impossible one.
How many of us find (or have found) ourselves in such a position?
This is a fatal error on his part.
I’m the cusp of the millenial/genX divide, and one thing I notice is that opposition to Israel is the standard of younger liberals. Israel is viewed as a racist, theocratic, apartheid state. Direct comparisons to South Africa are common, as are assertions that Israel is a rogue nation. In general, most people favor either shutting off all aid, or a vast majority of it.
Whatever sympathy there was for “Jews as victims” out of WW2 is gone. Instead it’s Israel being South Africa level bad and not learning it’s lesson about genocide and repeating it on the Palestinian population. Frankly, Democratic support for Israel was always going to get weaker as the older generation died off.
For people like me who really don’t give a flying fuck what happens to the people of Palestine it’s trickier. We have economic ties to Israel, military as well, and those are worth ignoring the suffering it causes from the pragmatic angle. On the other hand if the Israeli government is willing to screw with our parties power and position, then it is an enemy and should be treated like one.
No amount of dead children, over reaction, or land grabs would have caused me to say this but… fuck’em, yank support, let whatever happens happens, make an example out of the state on the world stage.
I’m half Jewish, my fathers family was wiped out down to two survivors in the holocaust. He has pictures of the death camps, he was liberated by American troops. I don’t really feel any attachment to all of that. I’m not religious, and the nation is at this point a pest and problem.
Bibi might have just made condemnation of, and opposition to, the state of Israel a majority position in the Democratic party. And let’s not forget other Democratic identity groups have a history of hostility towards it in general.
I wouldn’t be shocked to see “a firm stance against Israeli aggression, apartheid, with a goal of divestment” be part of the party platform in a few generations.
Conservatives aren’t united on Israel either, and Bibi has given remarkable credibility to “jews interfering with American government for their own ends” on a level that Alex Jones never could have.
This stunt was about the dumbest thing Bibi could have done.
Not just dumb…but the only thing Bibi could do. He gave this speech at the UN last year and a year later the only people who wanted to hear it again were the 500 republicans in DC. Bibi has a very limited audience.
Bibi has turned Israel into our North Korea.
is being used to quash debate.
Really this is the worst thing about liberals: apologizing about being right.
I have an 18 year old son. If Bibi gets his way he will use boys and girls like my son to make war.
I am over Israel. Done.
You don’t get to try and use my son as a weapon in your fucking war.
And I don’t lose a second of sleep caring that that might be perceived as anti-Semitic.
Accusations of bigotry of all types are used to squash debate in this country. It’s the most fool proof way to do it. It defines the person as so evil, subhuman, and dumb, that nothing they say has any value.
But they cut both ways, and are the best counter when you are attacked.
Here’s what you respond with…
Bibi is a racist and a bigot. This is why he engaged in this act against the first African American president. He’s no different than the tea party, and his bigotry and hatred of the president is the reason he disrespected the first black president like this and it has never happened to a white president.
Support for Bibi is just like supporting David Duke or Kevin McCarthy, you are siding with a racist. And Bibi is a dangerous racist. Unlike David Duke and the Tea Party Bibi has power to act on his racism. You can see how it influences his policy of stealing land, genocide, and apartheid. His racist policies towards the Palestinians are similar to the treatment of blacks under south Africa, and we have already seen how he treats Americas first black president.
Supporting Israel constitutes supporting these racist policies. It is no different than supporting the KKK, or South Africa.
So if you support Israel, sorry but you’re not a liberal. And we aren’t going to be socializing with you, nor will our children be around you. Because we don’t want to expose them to bigots.
….
That’s how you start turning it around.
Well put. I said the same about my granddaughters a ways back when Krauthammer demanded an American nuclear umbrella for Israel and Hillary was immediately all in.
And for a more human take on the whole thing, remember that Nancy Pelosi was almost in tears when Netanyahu spoke. You can only wonder what chord he struck with her.
P.S. Would everyone please…oh pretty please…stop referring to the PM of Israel as Bibi as if we’re on first name terms with him and his bestest Barbi Doll Friend.
This is how Nancy explains it
link
Seems a strange reaction if she was in fact angered.
Btw, her father the MD congressman and New Dealer was a strong backer of the Bergson Group’s efforts in WW2 to rescue European Jews and to establish a Jewish state in Palestine, contra the FDR admin.
Well, she was saddened, not angered; she’s not a self-perpetuating politician for nothing. The bit about her father is interesting, enlightening…if nothing else.
Well, she says she was saddened, but in this context is that the kind of saddening that results in tears? We’re saddened to tears over the loss of a loved one, but by being condescended to? Does not compute with me.
This was an immediate real-time reaction most likely produced by the occasional stirring nature of the speech in its appeal to defending Izrul coupled possibly with the warm memory of her father’s ties to these issues.
I think she got caught up in the emotion of the moment, then later had to backtrack and produce an alternative plausible explanation.
Just my two cents. Haven’t seen the video, but will look for it, and see if my suspicions are confirmed.
Openly doubting Pelosi’s explanation of her emotional reaction to Netanyahu’s speech is bizarre and completely unproductive.
Crying is a frequent human physical reaction to strong emotions of all kinds: sadness, joy, anger, and others.
On Pelosi’s reaction: Binoy Kampmark, ‘Signalling for War’ Counterpunch, March 4:
All could “agree” that “a nuclear armed Iran is unacceptable to both countries.” Israel stood “as the greatest political achievement of the 20th century,” with which the US would “always have an unshakable commitment” to.
But the Israeli prime minister’s speech was dripping with “condescension toward our knowledge of the threat posed by Iran and our broader commitment to preventing further nuclear proliferation.” All bases, in other words, had to be covered. — So far Kampmark.
I really need to think long and hard about the nuclear proliferation bit in relation to rogue Israel. These people are so deep into doublespeak they can’t tell black from white anymore (or maybe never could). And the greatest political achievement of the previous century: NOT South Africa, for instance, YES Israel. When it comes to Israel no one, absolutely no one, ever gets a break. Power, Rice, Kerry and Obama are already penning the next UN Security Council veto. It’s as if the US has a thick file of ready-made vetoes at hand to cover any possible contingency
I have no friends in israel. The whole concept of a special relationship between americans and israelis is silly. You might as well say I have a special relationship with space aliens. I don’t know any israelis, will never visit israel, and long ago gave up caring what happened to them or just about anyone else outside of america.
We need to stop allowing ourselves to be manipulated by people we don’t know half way around the world. I’m pretty sure the average israeli doesn’t give a crap about me, BooMan, or anyone commenting on this article.
It’s all just preening, posturing, and fake outrage.