Gil Troy is an American academic. He received his undergraduate, graduate and doctoral degrees from Harvard University and is a professor of History at McGill University.
The author of eleven books, nine of which concern American presidential history, and one of which concerns his own and others' "Jewish identity," he contributes regularly to a variety of publications and appears frequently in the media as a commentator and analyst on subjects relating to history and politics. Twitter: @GilTroy. Website: www.giltroy.com.
[url=http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/047146502X/ref=pd_bxgy_text_1/102-2183639-9560124?v=glance&s=books&st=*]The Case for Israel[/url]
By Alan Dershowitz John Wiley & Sons, 272 pages, $29.95
By Gil Troy
The Montreal Gazette
October 18, 2003
An old question, once thought buried, is being resurrected by many Jews, from right and left: "why do they hate us?"
Phyllis Chesler, a feminist with impeccable leftist credentials, wonders how anti-Semitism became politically correct. She recoils from her comrades’ special fury against Israel and Jews who support the Jewish state, which leads them to distort, demonize and dissimulate. "From 2000 on, every feminist listserve group that I’ve been on has been inundated with petitions against Israel and with anti-Zionist propaganda," she reports. "It’s almost as if the feminist world has become a wholly owned subsidiary of the PLO" while "many feminists have either consciously or unconsciously muted their critiques of Arab and Muslim misogyny."
Similarly, Alan Dershowitz, a human rights lawyer, cannot fathom "why peace-loving people committed to equality and self-determination should favor the side that rejects all the values they hold dear and oppose the side that promotes these values." He asks how non-violent Quakers can support Palestinian terrorism, how civil libertarians committed to the rule of law can "tolerate the lawlessness of the Palestinian authority." He wonders why his allies on the left couple this "uncritical support of the Palestinian cause" with "a visceral dislike ˆ sometimes hatred ˆ of Israel."
This is especially surprising to Dershowitz, considering that "no other nation in history faced with comparable challenges has ever adhered to a higher standard of human rights, been more sensitive to the safety of innocent civilians, tried harder to operate under the rule of law, or been willing to take more risks for peace."
Both authors are better at posing the question - and detailing the problem - than providing a comprehensive answer. Chesler, the author of the feminist classic Women and Madness, veers toward the psychological -- and the psychopathological. Dershowitz veers toward the political.
To answer this question fully, an author would have to range even more widely, tackling questions such as the symbolic role of the Jew in the West, and the blind spots of the left, explaining why some get demonized, and others, lionized.
Anger alternates with anguish in both these books. Chesler and Dershowitz each acknowledge Israel’s mistakes and imperfections, making room for legitimate, proportionate criticism of Israel, like all nations. Both authors support the "legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people," emphasizing that, despite feeling betrayed, they remain liberals. And both demonstrate that what they object to is not merely criticism of Israel, not merely anti-Zionism, but what truly is "anti-Semitism." How else to explain the irrational "anger," the distorting obsession, the ease with which anti-Semitic images have been integrated into the attacks on Israel in mosques and in the Arab press, as far away as Durban, South Africa, and as close as Concordia or Harvard?
The two books approach the questions in different yet complementary ways. Chesler’s book is more speculative, an essay identifying the "four simultaneous Intifadas" threatening Jews today: in the Islamic world, in Europe, on North American campuses and a "fourth directed at America and the West by Al Qaeda." Although she begins with the notion that "9/11 was a direct hit on democracy, modernity, religious pluralism and women’s rights," she focuses on the "third intifada," the one mounted by intellectuals ˆ her cronies.
"What’s new about the new anti-Semitism is that acts of violence against Jews and anti-Semitic words and deeds are being uttered and performed by politically correct people in the name of anticolonialism, anti-imperialism, antiracism and pacifism," she writes. "What’s new about the new anti-Semitism is that the new anti-Semite may be Jewish and female."
By contrast, Dershowitz has written more of a handbook, advancing a "proactive defense of Israel." The outspoken Harvard Law School professor tackles 32 questions ranging from "Is Israel a colonial, imperialist state" ˆ and thus offering a primer on the legitimate origins of Jewish nationalism -- to "Why do so many Jews and even Israelis side with the Palestinians -- an ironic tribute, he says, to Israeli democracy. Dershowitz rests his case for Israel on the Israeli willingness to risk for peace as demonstrated at Oslo, on the nihilism of Palestinian terrorism which targets innocents and rejects compromise, and on the vitality of Israeli democracy, boasting that "Israel is the only nation in the world whose judiciary actively enforces the rule of law against its military even during wartime."
The result is more than a well-researched and powerfully argued digest of pro-Israeli arguments. Dershowitz delivers pithy, authoritative discussions on the roots of Zionism, the origins of the refugee problem, the various wars, international law, and the current situation.
Still, Dershowitz feels compelled to break the format and try to explain in a more speculative essay why so many people in the world single-out and "demonize" Israel. Chesler also ends her essay by offering shorter answers to 15 key questions. Both call for action as well as education.
Representing the best of the progressive tradition, these two books do not just identify the problem of double standards and irrational anger, through their eloquence, passion, insight, and sense of justice, they seek to be a part of the solution.
Gil Troy is a professor of history at McGill University.
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Although I have not read either book and doubt that I will (Dershowitz because I haven't yet forgiven him for O.J.), this brings up something for me regarding Chesler that just makes me want to spit!
Twenty years ago, Letty Cotten Pogrebin (also a Jewish, left-wing woman) wrote the same type of material for Ms. Magazine! It was in response to the campuses...naturally...but especially to a worldwide feminist gathering (sorry, forget the location) where it soon became apparent that all the women were there to demand the end of Israel as well as to throw around enough anti-Semitism that 'Ms.' allowed Pogrebin to write a piece on it.
It was from that very piece that I pinched a line I used quite often for years: "In a perfect world there would be no need for Israel, in THIS world it is a necessity".
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