In These Times

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• • 24 Jun 09
  • 2:52 pm

  Fleshler's book corrects this mistaken notion that Mearsheimer and Walt advanced about dovish pro-Israel organizations. Americans for Peace Now actually supported US financial sanctions against settlements expansion during the George H. W. Bush administration. APN raises money for Peace Now's "Settlements Watch" program, that monitors settlement activities with the view of ending them. Most of the other dovish Jewish groups did not yet exist when Bush senior was president, but their opposition to settlements is a core principle for all of them.

  Posted to The Israel Lobbies: Left, Right and Center

• • 25 Jun 09
  • 12:24 pm

  I appreciate Imran's polite tone. All strategies for peace over the past 40 years have failed. BDS is not likely to work either; it has only marginal political support and it is one-sided. For example, BDS does nothing to address Hamas and other violent Arab groups that have contributed to making the quest for peace so difficult.

  Posted to The Israel Lobbies: Left, Right and Center

• • 27 Apr 09
  • 12:58 pm

  That word "balance," is not in the article. It was an editor's choice in summarizing the article at the top. The book's author, Alan Johnston, leans toward the Palestinians in his sympathies. But he is "fair-minded," a quality we generally want in a journalist. He notes with sadness that both sides are flawed in how they relate to the other. This is not a game to him in which there's one team that he roots for and the other side that he hates. He understands the complexities of this conflict, which according to Imran is a bad thing.

  Posted to ‘Kidnapped’ in Gaza

• • 10 Mar 09
  • 3:14 pm

  Mr. Atkinson is a talented writer, but this seems to be more of a temper tantrum than a review. Schindler's List, Defiance and Valkyrie are all true stories that are Hollywoodized -- although Schindler's List is by far the most successful and artful as a movie.Yet all three are true and honorable stories. Von Stauffenberg was a genuine hero who died in a noble cause. My understanding is that it was the Holocaust and other crimes of the Reich that drove him into the ranks of the German military conspirators at least a year or two before his famous attempt on …

  Posted to Always Look on the Bright Side of Genocide

• • 23 Feb 09
  • 9:04 am

  I agree with Ken Brociner. Israeli governments can be fairly criticized for not doing enough to ensure a viable Palestinian state alongside Israel. But this conflict is a two-way street. None of us should ignore how Hamas and other terrorist attacks on Israeli civlians over the years-- even after Israel withdrew from most West Bank population centers early in '96 and enirely from Gaza in 2005-- have undermined Israeli good will and reversed political support among Israeli voters for further dovish moves. The point of a constructive left-wing position on this issue would be to examine how bad faith and extremism …

  Posted to Israel, Gaza and the Left