In fact, what is most irritating is that it is this very kind of one sided, simplistic analysis Abraham employs is what keeps geo-conflicts like the Palestinian/Israeli one alive. What has become highly disappointing recently is that as both sides work towards final settlement and peaceful co-existence (so many events before, during and after both Intifadas that Abraham shows no knowledge of), closet activists like Abraham work as hard as possible to keep the conflict alive. Is Abraham that naïve or that simplistic to not know what goes on day to day? In some ways, I think so. A good deal of academic readings of global conflict is quite naïve. I know such folks feel quite pleased with their so-called enlightened politics, but often they have no idea what they are talking about; they have just grabbed on to the latest hip position.
But I also think that this kind of politics must sustain itself even as its own ideology has shown terrible failure in recent years, even as it misjudged and mis-took its heroes who have turned out to be no better than those it rallies against. This politics depends on the false-ness of binary division the way that all ideologies cling to their foundations even when the support is missing. Once folks like Abraham realize that the world is not divided into right and wrong, their politics and reason to be collapses. The binaries of cultural studies collapse. Without a real answer to geo-conflict, this kind of political reading clings to binary divisions when the world is made up of networked connections that, at times, unite, but that at other times, disconnect, overlap, and contradict.
maybe more later....
Replies: 28 comments
Whatever dude. You've shown your hatred. Next time you publish it, I'll respond again. You can leave ten comments or zero. There won't be any sharing of beers. There will just me showing your hatred and ignorance.
Posted by jeff @ 11/30/2005 07:01 AM EST
Interesting, Jeff. I seem to remember you making reference to something called an Arab "cult of personality" in the wake of Arafat's death. That isn't racist? Can pull up the reference if you need a refresher. As far as what you said or didn't say during the Pretext discussion, I can present that to you again as well. Your remarks went well beyond my choice of language. I seem to remember you departing the scene after your hasbara about the reasons for Israel's '82 invasion were exposed as completely without basis. Can send you Cheryl Rubenberg's account in PDF if you'd like. Ever read Zeev Schiff's Israel's Lebanon War?
Thanks, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/30/2005 01:37 AM EST
Btw
You might also recall my intervention on Pretext last year was not about Chomsky and Finkelstein but about you and the language you use. You do a good job deflecting that critique by pointing elsewhere or by denying specific historical moments or by turning the critique into a "what's wrong with critiquing Israel debate." But my deal with you is that you borrow racist language and use it quite explicitly as part of a long tradition in academia, but mostly in the political scene. Since you ignore this critique by looking for other excuses ("but I read scholarship!"), I assume you accept its premise.
I do have a problem with you then. I have a problem with all usages of racist discourse. I did not belittle or deny anybody the right to any state or any nationalism or use racist terms. You cannot say the same.
Posted by jeff @ 11/29/2005 08:45 PM EST
the only thing that angers me is your hate.
your response shows you did not read my post.
good luck with your hate.
Posted by jeff @ 11/29/2005 08:31 PM EST
Jeff Rice wrote: "While you're there, read up on everything I've pointed to you so far (I feel like you are a student in first year writing: "Teacher, how do I do research?")" Actually, Jeff you've never pointed me to anything in terms of reading. Why do you have to become so angry in responding to me? "Idiot"? "Holy crap!" Is all of that necessary? I have nothing against you, as you know. I have checked your blog frequently in the last week because of the outlandish things you have posted about me and my work. I respond whenever I see flat out lies and misrepresentations. Am I to understand that Victor Vitanza is also an enemy of Israel in allowing me to use the Pretext list last year for the Chomsky and Finkelstein debate? Is Logos, which ran my review, an enemy of Israel as well, even though its editors are Jewish? Where does this campaign of abuse end?
Good luch in dealing with your anger-- it reveals something.
Cheers, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/29/2005 08:29 PM EST
Holy crap.
Are you that much an idiot?
Go back yourself and look to the reports coming out at the time period. Go back and read yourself news about PLO border crossings and attacks. You obviously haven't done that yet because you are too busy reading Chomsky. While you're there, read up on everything I've pointed to you so far (I feel like you are a student in first year writing: "Teacher, how do I do research?")
In other words:
Do your own f*king research.
Here's a few towns to keep you busy while you are making up history as you go along: Metulla, Misgav Am, Nahariya, Netanya. While you are there, look up the date the PLO was founded. Oh yeah, and while you are there, make a note to yourself who "occupied" what in 48. Oh yeah while you are there look up the PLO charter. Oh yeah while you are there, look up the concept of "Dihimi" and the role it plays in certain parts of the world, oh yeah while you are there, do some homework on the rise of nationalisms in the 19th century and the eventual rise of Palestinian nationalism during the British Mandate and then after WW II, while you are there read about the...oh but wait. You want "scholarship." So you don't really care about what goes on, only how you justify your "writing" to be popular in a certain circle by attaching yourself to a cause you don't know much about and that makes you feel good and mighty...maybe you'll pass out another one of your mighty online petitions?
You are a typical revisionist. No wonder you are so fascinated with denying the discourse that surrounds the Holocaust (as opposed to denying the discourse that surrounds other genocides).
Dude - you are pathetic. All you see is the X vs Y debate (thus, you love the dead concept of "debate.") You don't hear one thing I say to you. My point is not - and wasn't - that there exists a country in this world which has done nothing wrong. No such country exists (all these asides are to put you back on track regarding the many causes of Middle East conflict; how it is more like a network than a binary of events...even if blog space is not much to do so). My point - and here we return to your crappy writing - is that you use the very specific language of racism to write about Israel and the Holocaust. Thus, I point you out as a racist. Even if you don't want to do research on your own on the history of the Middle East, do some research on how the way you use words like "Zionism" and how the very specific ways you phrase the Holocaust are straight out of racist discourse.
Thus, I tell you to start "THINKING" and to stop "PAROTTING."
Btw - don't be so obsessed with me. I only reported on your decision to publish your racist ideology. Which, I add, I will do the next time you write in such a way. According to my logs, however,you come here several times a day from your campus and aol account. Probably checking in to see if the "debate" is still alive.
Posted by jeff @ 11/29/2005 07:48 PM EST
Jeff:
A simple challenge: Cite a single legitimate scholar who attributes Israel's '82 invasion of Lebanon to Palestinian "aggression and border infiltrations that led to the invasion (and the PLO attack on Jordan that pushed them into Lebanon in the first place or Arafat's undermining of regional security or Syrian's role in all this including THEIR PRIOR invasion of Lebanon and occupation, etc. "?
Thanks, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/29/2005 07:19 PM EST
Abraham
You are really an idiot. I feel so sorry for you.
You don't even know how the Lebanon war started. But you know Chomsky. So you copy him. It all goes back to the agency issue. Somehow, only Israel has agency in regional conflict (JEWS CONTROL THE WORLD). You ignore the aggression and border infiltrations that led to the invasion (and the PLO attack on Jordan that pushed them into Lebanon in the first place or Arafat's undermining of regional security or Syrian's role in all this including THEIR PRIOR invasion of Lebanon and occupation, etc. - back to the issues of regional conflict's complications in terms of who is on which side against which side - but one sentence here will not even come close to dealing with that). Nice simplistic thinking. You're quite the thinker, dude. Oh wait, you're not. But you do a good job with Jewish conspiracy theories.
As for being against Palestinians, I never wrote anything here that even resembles such thinking. Nor did I reject their right to statehood. My problem is not with a two state solution or a Palestinian state. My problem is racists like you.
You only know the cliches, knee jerks, and binaries. So that is why you respond accordingly. Like I said, learn how to think.
You, on the other hand, have been completely racist regarding Jews, Jewish history, the Holocaust, and your hatred of Israel which is based on crap, not scholarship. You parrot textbook racist rhetoric. You are not a scholar by any means. You return here over and over looking to engage in a debate, but what debate? Your racism? Hardly a debate. Give it up. When you write, I will expose you. That's what will happen. I doubt you will change; few racists like you do.
Hate away pal. I know your kind very well. People like you don't give a damn about Palestinians. You care about your own self-righteousness. You use groups like the Palestinians to advance your own agendas of hate. We see it all the time in the Islamic world where leaders and countries abused the Palestinains, treated them as proxies, kept them in poverty on purpose, only to keep strife alive for other agendas (read up on Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Pakistan here - their imperialist motives or local issues). You quote revisionist historians (again your usage of Israelies is old South racist rhetorical tactic) and dumb asses like Chomsky. But you have no understanding of how the conflict is kept alive by people like YOU. It makes you feel good. You don't even have any understanding of the levels of co-operation already in play.
But you feel good about being a "scholar," right?
Posted by jeff @ 11/29/2005 06:15 PM EST
Bob:
What exactly was right on target in Rice's post? Jeff launches an ad hominem attack against me, demonstrates zero knowledge of the books discussed in my review essay, refuses to engage in rational discussion, and accuses me of being a racist. I have repeatedly asked Jeff to cite a single legitimate scholar who supports his silly views. I have asked Jeff to read books (written by Israeli historians, military figures, and prime ministers, e.g. Benny Morris, Illan Pappe, Israel Shahak, and Yeshohat Harkabi, Ben-Gurion) with me so that we can discuss the circumstances leading to Israel's creation and the circumstances governing Israel's illegal military occupation. Israel's leading military figures have long admitted that it's been Israeli military policy, since the founding of the state, to attack Palestinian civilian targets. Jeff knows this. I have asked Jeff to co-author articles with me about the conflict within Rhetoric and Composition journals. To each of these proposals, Jeff balks. It's not that he doesn't want to-- he can't. If he were to study the conflict in a scholarly way, he'd soon have to admit the nonsense he spouts is just that--nonsense. That's the real reason he fears rational discussion. Of course, Jeff's own racism against Palestinian Arabs never comes up. In his Orientalism, Edward Said rightly recognizes that anti-Semitism and Orientalism are two sides of the same coin. What are Palestinian Arabs other than the "new" Jews? It's doesn't take a scholar with profound insight to figure that out. Jeff is simply continuing the Hasbara Project which began in 1982 in the aftermath of Israel's invasion of Lebanon and the death of nearly 20,000 Palestinian civilians. The problem, it was concluded then, was that Israel didn't have good enough public relations in the U.S. The problem persists into the present.
Best, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/29/2005 04:42 PM EST
Thanks for the post, Jeff. Right on target.
Posted by robert @ 11/29/2005 12:46 PM EST
Jeff:
It's never occurred to me that you might actually believe the things you write. The link in my previous post leads to a review of Finkelstein's book, Beyond Chutzpah. It's written by a professor at Texas A & M. So, I have no idea what you mean by "I already said two crappy writers you are fascinated by don't mean anything to me. They have no ethos for me because they both are bad." Did you actually look at the link? In any event, let's get a beer at the next R/C conference and talk about something unrelated to these exchanges. Fair enough?
Best, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/26/2005 09:59 PM EST
Oh right. You are racist and a bad reader.
I already said two crappy writers you are fascinated by don't mean anything to me. They have no ethos for me because they both are bad.
But you, my friend, are a good parrot. Do you want to come to my fyc course next semester and learn some "critical thinking" skills? Maybe how to do research? Most racist thinking is based on not knowing.
Cheers to you too!
Posted by jeff @ 11/26/2005 07:40 PM EST
See: http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/pdf/amconrev/TACChutzpah.pdf
Is this review, in your estimation, also spewing hate?
It reaches conclusions similar to mine.
Best, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/26/2005 07:07 PM EST
When we see hate like yours, we call it out. I know you don't want to be called out, but alas it will happen each time I see your junk.
Posted by jeff @ 11/26/2005 07:10 AM EST
Jeff:
Who's obsessed with whom? You're the one who features me and my writings on your blog. Whenever I'm alerted to you doing so by friends, I naturally respond to your lies and vilification of my positions. The last time I did so was nearly a year ago when you misrepresented the Pretext discussion I guest moderated with Chomsky and Finkelstein. Whenever you obfuscate, I ask you for sources, citations, information, etc. Still haven't received any answers. Not a surprise. Happy Holidays.
Best, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/25/2005 06:07 PM EST
Abraham
You may think you aren't a racist, but you use the same language of racism (in fact, your understandings of Zionism are pure Soviet propaganda from the '70s. Are you that dumb?). You want to read something? Go read Hamas doctrine. Read double meanings of "peace" and "occupation" in oficial propaganda written by Jihad, Hamas, and Fatah. Read Arafat arguing for the staged conquest. Read Saudi clerics who've never met a Jew nor an Israeli calling them the sons and daughters of pigs and monkeys. Read Iran's latest call for "wiping Israel off the map."
Quoting idiots is your style but not mine. I don't care if you like Dershowitz or Finkelstein. I find them both boring. And I find you fairly racist, but boring as well.
I do know one thing. You don't know much about regional conflict. You have no idea what you are talking about. You are a good parrot, though. All hail your masters. They have trained you well.
This is no tantrum. I will fight your hatred any time any place. You are a man of hate. It's clear. Of all the issues to deal with, only Jews interest you as the great demons. That's hate, pal. I've seen it first hand in the Middle East, the place you've Never been.
Funny how you keep coming back here too.
Posted by jeff @ 11/25/2005 02:13 PM EST
Jeff:
I think it's pretty obvious as to why you don't want to look at scholarship about the conflict. The challenge is pretty simple: name a single legitimate scholar or study who supports what you write/say? It shouldn't be that difficult if what you claim is so obvious. Throwing your temper tantrums is a lot easier than doing the hard work of reading books written by Israeli scholars such as Benny Morris, Illan Pappe, Neve Gordon, Yossef Grodzinksky, and Tom Segev--who support what I'm claiming. Is Raul Hillberg also a racist by your lights? It's interesting that you portray me as an extremist. It's the famous "Thief, thief" technique: when you can't win an argument and have been pegged as a charlatan, point in the other direction and cry "Thief, thief." Your rhetoric would have pleased the Soviet commissars during a darker period of intellectual history.
Cheers, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/25/2005 12:24 PM EST
Geoff:
I seem to remember Finkelstein posting this final message to the list (see below). I don't recall anyone rising to the challenge. I take it you've read Finkelstein's _Beyond Chutzpah_, particularly noting Finkelstein's critiques of Dershowitz's _Case for Israel_? Again, the question no one seems to want to take up is this: How could Dershowitz's book pass as serious commentary on the U.S.-Israel-Palestine conflict? If you come up with an answer to that question, please let me know. Mourning Derrida seems like a useful pretext for avoiding discussion of serious factual matters about the U.S.-Israel-Palestine conflict.
Cheers, Matthew
Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2004 08:11:02 -0500
Reply-To: Scholarly Book Review List <PRETEXT@LISTSERV.UTA.EDU>
Sender: Scholarly Book Review List <PRETEXT@LISTSERV.UTA.EDU>
From: "Vitanza, Victor" <sophist@uta.edu>
Subject: nf (PRE/TEXT)
Content-Type: multipart/alternative;
Date Sent: Wednesday, October 27, 2004 01:21 AM From: Norman Finkelstein
ALL THIS DELETED. You can look it up in Pre-Text archives if you desire.
Abraham - take your racist crap elsewhere
The more you try to stand up for yourself, the more you come off as straight up racist. Your obsession with critiquing discourse which surrounds a genocide is disturbing. Be a racist elsewhere. Everything you write here is directly borrowed from the worst racist discourse in circulation when it comes to either Israel or Judaism. It's not scholarship nor is it "the right to critique." It's purely borrowed propaganda. You can say: HEY READ THIS, but so what? Read the Protocols of Zion. Is that, then, a source of knowledge? Fallacy is you.
Maybe instead of your book reporting of propoganda you should start thinking. To quote Funkadelic: THINK. It ain't illegal yet.
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/24/2005 10:13 AM EST
Not that anyone cares given the heat of the exchange here, but insofar as Finkelstein is concerned, I can't help but think of him in "the aftermath of the Pretext discussion" that Matthew alludes to.
That discussion blew up over Finkelstein's dismisal of a question by David Beard and a comment directed at the passing of Jacques Derrida.
Finklestein wrote: " I have no idea what David Beard is talking about - although it reminds me why a friend sent me an obituary for Derrida under the subject line - 'Finally, some good news.'"
The timing and serverity of this comment were simply amazing, particularly given posts by Davis and Vitanza a few messages prior.
----
As to Beard: He was making an inquiry into Finkelstein's thoughts on the peer review and non-peer review venues.
Of course this very question seems to be part of the basis of Dershowitz's difficulty with
Finkelstein ...
But, whatever ...
----
For me what was most telling was how Finkelstein hooked up his reaction to Beard's question to the passing of Derrida.
Even if we grant that Finkelstein made the link out of Beard's comparison of Finkelstein's publishing strategy that resembled the Derrida-Searle exchange (where Searle responded in a non-peer review venue of New York Review of Books), the sense that news of someone's death as "finally, some good news" can't help but throw this guy's ethos into serious question.
-----
In saying this, again, I am commenting more on Matthew's post of "aftermath" of the pretext discussion, not *this* discussion/argument per se.
Obviously in recalling Finkelstein into question, it will appear that I am siding with Jeff rather than Matthew.
Really, tho', whatever ... all this must pass ... and, in passing, I will add that I'm more interested in some calm, than creating more qualms. Or, --more specifically-- in the space between qualm/calm: QALAM
As Agamben notes (--and others have noted--) in -the coming community- and -potentialities-, in the Arab tradition there is an angel named QALAM [or, Pen] who "writes" (reads?) w/ Bartleby's sense of "would prefer not to":
"Qalam, Qalam, Qalam ..."
----
Posted by gvcarter @ 11/23/2005 05:18 PM EST
Maybe we can discuss how you often borrow the language of hatred popular in the Islamic world - language which creates scapegoats and demons in order to divert attention to the internal conflicts and problems of their countries.
Your Israeli brother
Posted by jeff @ 11/23/2005 02:30 PM EST
Jeff:
I know you're busy, but when you have a moment, please read Baruch Kimmerling's "Israel's Culture of Martrydom" at http://www.thenation.com/doc/20050110/kimmerling
Peace and Love, Matthew (Your Indian brother-- I mean that)
p.s. I still believe we will be able to discuss the relevant issues pertainig to the conflict through the use of legitimate sources. Am looking forward to it.
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/23/2005 11:22 AM EST
I'm sad for you too. But as long as you spew hate, I will respond.
Posted by jeff @ 11/22/2005 04:10 PM EST
Jeff:
I take it from your response that we won't be reading any books together. Just as I thought. I happen to believe that this issue can be discussed in a dispassionate and scholarly fashion, which is precisely why I have written about issues pertaining to the conflict in scholarly venues. As you know, I have been recognized for this work by legitimate scholars in our field, including some people with whom you have worked closely. Will you now trash them as well? I'm sad for you. With respect and without rancor.
Cheers, Matthew
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/22/2005 09:48 AM EST
Interesting that you have insight into what I've read or haven't read. Magic.
But the real issue is how you circulate classic racist tropes. You offer no understanding of regional conflict and deny agency to every group in the region except - of course - the Jews. Somehow they are the only ones who do wrong.
And the old Zionism equates racism trope? That, like I said at first, is the racist move. You give nationalism to one group, but deny the other's right to have it.
Why your massive obsession with Israel, Abraham? What's your complex? My problem with you is not that you disagree with Israeli policies - name me one country on this planet which does not do things we disagree with including discriminate against minorities - my problem is how you use the tropes of anti-Semitism so easily and how you fixate on a country and region whose politics you show no knowledge of. Your responses to me are total knee jerk and prove my point. There is nothing new in your hatred. The only real surprise is how you still cling to such tropes in light of what happens regionally, in light of various groups' efforts to overcome the small-mindedness you continue to love.
So when you want to publish such rubbish, I will critique you.
Posted by jeff @ 11/22/2005 07:45 AM EST
Curious, Jeff. I write a review for an online journal of Finkelstein's book, which you clearly have not read, that critiques Alan Dershowitz's The Case for Israel, which you have also not read. You conclude that my review, which discusses books that you have not read, shows signs of racism. Against Jews I take it? So to critique Israel and Zionism is to demonstrate racism toward Jews? If that's what you're claiming, I'm afraid you are the classic anti-Semite, not me. In fact, anyone with the remotest biblical knowledge or understanding of Jewish history knows that those who claim that Israel speaks on behalf of all Jews are the real anti-Semites. No one with any historical knowledge would ever claim that Zionism equals Judaism. In fact, most Jews denounce the crimes Zionism commits in the name of "the Jewish people." Here's the challenge: read Herzl's _Alteneuland_, as well as Regina Scharf's _Non-Jewish Zionism_, then tell me that I'm the one showing signs of racism. In all the time we've been corresponding, you have yet to name a single book or article that supports your outlandish views. Next thing I know you'll be claiming that you're living in exile in Detroit. If you want to have a serious discussion about Israel, let's read some books about Israeli history by Israeli historians. Everytime I suggest this, you balk. Why?
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/21/2005 11:27 PM EST
Matthew
Your argument has little basis in reality. I suggest you do some homework. You obviously haven't yet. But your review shows signs of racism. Maybe you need to be more reflective of your own beliefs.
Want to find something to crtique? The Holocaust? Highly suspicous. Let's discuss Arabs treatment of Palestinians. Strange you don't.
P.S.
I think your work is repulsive. You want to discuss ethnic cleansing? Look elsewhere where it really happens, not the imaginary you built. Start with Darfur. Moselms killing Moslems.
Posted by jeff @ 11/21/2005 10:35 PM EST
I have to say that your review of Abraham's work seems to suffer from the very "binaries" that you accuse him of. That is, it strikes me as a very one-sided and stubbornly unsympathetic reading.
A few examples. You claim that he makes a racist comparison of Jews to Nazis. Where exactly does this take place? I was unable to find it in the review.
Likewise, you say that the charge of ethnic cleansing "has no relationship to reality". That's a remarkable claim! Do you honestly maintain that there have not been any attempts to shift populations, to make certain regions Jewish? Are the illegal settlements, for instance, merely mirages? It would be one thing to say that Abraham is exaggerating the point, but to claim that it has no bearing on reality strikes me as preposterous.
Rather than simply lobbing these cheap accusations at Abraham, why not engage in a more serious (and accurate) analysis of his work? For instance, although I agree with much of what Matthew says, one claim in particular struck me as, well, bizarre. Abraham writes:
"When the historical record confirms that the PLO and the Arab states have overwhelmingly been in favor of peace [...] one then gains insight into the devastatingly true old bromide, 'The strong write history.'"
What is striking about this claim is it's failure even to mention Hamas, a group which continues to oppose the very existence of Israel and one that is arguably more popular than the PLO among Palestinians. An even-handed and thoughtful criticism of passages such as this one would have been helpful. Your assaults on his character are not helpful and, in my opinion, reflect poorly on you.
(I'll just note for the record that my own view is that there are few heroes on either side of this conflict. But I'll be the first to admit that this is little more than an intuition on my part.)
Posted by Nathan Bauer @ 11/21/2005 05:02 PM EST
Jeff:
Two quick questions:
1) Have you read Finkelstein's _Beyond Chutzpah: The Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History_?
2) Have you read Alan Dershowitz's _The Case for Israel_, the object of Finkelstein's critique?
As I suggested last year, in the aftermath of the Pretexst discussion, we should read some books together. I believe you declined the invitation. We can try again.
Cheers, Matthew
p.s. I have no hard feelings toward you. Your antics prove the points made in my review. When it comes to discussing Israel's treatment of the Palestinians, elementary rationality can't enter the debate. In fact, some people dedicate their lives to seeing that it won't.
Posted by Matthew Abraham @ 11/21/2005 04:37 PM EST
