Thank you for this courageous analysis! This is a very good model to study the sexist/racist inhumane US domestic and foreign policies too!

He lost me a little on this one with the philosophical underpinnings of his subsequent point, however the thrust of it, namely that the Zionist Imperators do not properly perceive ‘other’, is reasonable and born out by policies pursued for many decades now.

That said, my little pop psychology theory goes something like this: Jewish communities originated from nomadic tribes which developed societal traditions involving dynamics that maintained group identity whilst functioning in other cultures and nations. Historically they only held established fixed-territory nations, such as Judea, for very short periods of time - a couple of centuries only according to some historians - which is why some of the oldest Jewish communities in the world, such as the one in Tehran, exist outside the ‘historical homeland’ - and have done from well before the time of Christ and the recently debunked forced ‘exodus’.

So the Jewish sense of ‘we the people’ or ‘the Chosen Ones’ as Gilad reference is one born not out of philosophy or theology, but simple societal dynamics which context itself engendered the resultant myths and beliefs which therefore reflect in meaningful, even profound, ways the underlying dynamic of such communities which manage to preserve their own bloodlines and culture even whilst essentially living in other peoples’ lands and cultures.

I think this is the cultural background of Jewish culture. One result of this has been that they tend to function most often in service-based occupations since, especially in feudal times or traditional cultures which still exist today, they were neither the landowners nor the peasants, both of which are bound to particular terrain within the national hierarchy, be that a monarchy or a constitution. At the same time, especially during fiercely religious periods in Europe which lasted from about the 7th to the 17th century, they fostered extensive study of root texts like the Torah and so forth which are highly complex intellectually speaking and form the basis of their superior genetic capabilities in cognitive and societal organization. Similar to buddhist madhyamikha scholars, they can argue any point from four different opposing point of view and win.

The problem with Zionism as a practical enterprise is that you are trying to transpose a nomadic or non-territory-based culture and people into a traditional territory-based one. And given the cultural history of existing as ‘we the chosen people’ living amongst larger, established cultures - which involves by definition the ability to maintain clear separation of ‘us’ and ‘them’ even whilst using the cultural resources of ‘them’ to provide the means to provide livelihood for ‘us’ - they find themselves ill-equipped to suddenly be Gilad’s ‘Masters’. They do not even want the Palestinians to be slaves as he says, I think, rather they simply want them to be the next ‘them’, however in this case finally they are the ones running the joint and ‘they’ are the ones not running the joint.

However, culturally they are used to being a highly intelligent minority existing within a larger country, not the majority population responsible for all classes of society from top to bottom. This is why they continue to milk European and American peoples for vast sums of money through their international diasporic connections. It is not so much that they need the money per se, although money is always helpful, rather than they need the position of milking larger established power networks in order to keep their place as milkers, only in this case the reason they need the sustenance is not for themselves as families and small communities living within larger ones in a national context, but rather to support and nourish the enterprise of establishing their own traditional nation - which is a small, albeit influential and important one as they believe and manage to engender - as a small nation within the context of the larger international community.

It is interesting in this context how they cannot work towards establishing themselves as a ‘normal’ nation not dependent on manipulating the financial and political systems of other larger nations such as the UK, France, US, Germany and so forth. Their national model seems to be based on milking these Powers for huge injections of cash and international political influence simply because that is the way they have always functioned as minority - and often unwelcome - communities within larger ones. They are not trying to establish Israel as a normal, independent national community based in a particular geographical territory in the Middle East, including establishing normal, healthy relations with their neighbours, let alone the indigenous population.

Apart from the tragedy, cruelty, injustice and so forth of the undertaking, the passive aggressive dynamic of how they continue to be dependent upon larger powers whilst insisting they are the One True Democratic Force for Decency and Progressiveness in the region etc. is very revealing of how their underlying nomadic and often dependent cultural history continues to play out today even though in theory - though not in practice - they now have their own ‘nation’ in a particular territory.

The main reason they cannot come to terms with the Palestinian peoples is simply because they need them as a local ‘them’ to function as a dangerous, hostile enemy in order to justify their continual meddling in and manipulation of Foreign Powers in whose Courts and Constitutions they have for so many centuries insinuated themselves as ‘nomadic elites’, if you will.

Ultimately, there is no solution to this mess until they dissolve entirely the whole notion of being ‘Chosen People’ and in fact let go of being Jewish as such altogether.

I am not holding my breath!

Tony Greenstein is a convicted shoplifter and credit-card fraudster, whereas Gilad Atzmon is a world renowned artist who also writes on history and philosophy (though, imho, he might be intoxicated a bit more than is wise with the worldview of slippery thinkers such as Weininger and Hegel). More importantly, he has something worthwhile to say on a five century old debate whose resolution has some far reaching implications for all of us on spaceship Earth. Not only must we resist those who are out to silence his voice, but we also need to avoid the temptation toward lazy moralizing along the lines of “a plague on both your houses” without educating ourselves first on the relevant historic facts.

Your View, May 8th 2008, 9:28 am

(This is a guest post by Mikey)

Six months ago, I posted Jews and Jew Haters: The Anti-Zionist Jewish Squabble. It was about the nasty feud between Tony Greenstein, an anti-Zionist British Jew, and Gilad Atzmon, an anti-Zionist Israeli. Greenstein wants “the state of Israel to be destroyed” and claims that Hamas and Hizbollah are not antisemitic. Atzmon says that burning down a synagogue is a “rational act.” I wasn’t sure if a sane person could support either side, but I concluded: “this argument is set to run and run.”
And so it has turned out. The Tony Greenstein camp has established its own blog, Anti-Zionists against Anti-Semitism, to “opppose [sic] that small current around Israel Shamir and Gilad Atzmon who wish to introduce the ideas of racism and anti-Semitism into the Palestine solidarity movement.” A large proportion of the posts are attacks on Atzmon, described as “a holocaust denier” who is “fundamentally racist and reactionary.”
The blog is very dull and only masochists will enjoy it. Apparently even Greenstein finds it boring, which may explain why he is anxious for the excitement of a court case. He has initiated legal proceedings against Atzmon in respect of:

False allegations of serious criminal conduct and fraud. concerning alleged offences over 20 years ago, contrary to s.8 of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.
False allegations of violent crimes, in particular against Jewish people
False allegations of race hate crimes against Jewish people
False allegations of vandalising church property

In full litigation mode, Greenstein has also threatened to sue Google for hosting the website of Atzmon’s main defender.
In the Nazi mind, the ultimate evil is being a Jew. In Atzmon’s mind, the ultimate evil is being a Zionist. This is worse than being a Nazi:

there is no room for comparison between Israel and the Nazis. If a comparison is to be made, then it is the Israelis who win the championship of ruthlessness… Israel and Zionism endanger our world… We have to admit that Israel is the ultimate evil rather than Nazi Germany… We should never compare Israel to Nazi Germany. As far as evilness is concerned, we should now let Israel take the lead.

Since it is the worst insult he can imagine, Atzmon has taken to calling the Greenstein camp crypto-Zionists. Since it is the worst insult he can imagine, Greenstein throws the same accusation against the Atzmon camp, whose ideas “can only lead in one direction – to the strengthening of Zionism.” But Greenstein is more promiscuous with his abuse. Not long after the BNP’s legal adviser attacked the Board of Deputies as “a clique of self serving Zionist racists” and a “Zionist-Nazi organisation” and the Jewish Chronicle as “the mouthpiece of the same clique of Zionist parasites and crooks,” Greenstein wrote that the BNP is “pro-Zionist.” Perhaps he was trying to enliven his blog by making it hard for his readers to keep a straight face.

It may become a double-act. Both Gilad Atzmon and Tony Greenstein despise Anthony Julius for his criticisms of anti-Zionism. Greenstein recently dismissed Julius as “quite a simple fellow” under a headline that screamed, “Gilad Atzmon Joins with Anthony Julius to Attack Jewish Anti-Zionists.” That was shortly after Atzmon attacked Julius for his role in “the destruction of history revisionist David Irving’s career.”

Meanwhile the Trotskyist Alliance for Workers’ Liberty has rallied to Greenstein defence. This is in spite of Greenstein’s boast on the very same webpage that he

would lose no sleep if they [AIPAC], the Bush White House, the leadership of the Republican Party, New Labour’s cabinet and any other warmongers I can think of, were vaporised.

As Paul Bogdanor commented:

Previously I exposed Greenstein’s thoughts on vapourising as many as 100,000 American Jews in AIPAC, along with the inhabitants of the White House, as well as his endorsement of the IRA atrocity at the Brighton hotel. Greenstein now extends the list to the leadership of the Republican Party, New Labour’s cabinet “and any other warmongers I can think of.” Thus Greenstein’s “anarchist wishful thinking” encompasses the mass murder of the entire democratically elected leadership of America and Britain, and, apparently, anyone at all who supported the Iraq war. That would presumably include everyone from Iraqi voters who support Coalition forces to those he has elsewhere described as “the racist warmongers of Harry’s Place”!

Greenstein’s troubles go beyond allegations of serious criminal conduct and the exposure of his “wishful thinking” about terrorism. While coping with the tedium of his own blog, he faces the humiliation of a spoof blog by a supporter of Atzmon. The unidentified blogger has even started posting videos mocking a certain “Mony Gripstein” and his comrade, the irreplaceable Roland Rance.
Watching the farce of the Jewish anti-Zionists, you may think that the lunatics have taken over the asylum. I prefer to say that the clowns are now running the circus.