Norman Finkelstein Again Slams BDSHoles

Anti-Israel professor Norman Finkelstein has once again slammed the BDSHoles.

finkA panel dis­cus­sion held dur­ing last weekend’s Left Forum, an annual gath­er­ing of left-wing activists in New York, revealed some star­tling frac­tures and points of dis­sent within the domes­tic anti-Israel move­ment. The con­fer­ence, which typ­i­cally fea­tures a vari­ety of anti-Israel ses­sions and speak­ers, included a panel this year called “How to Solve the Israel-Palestine Con­flict: 0, 1, or 2 State Solution.”

Three of the pan­elists expressed sup­port for a one-state solu­tion as one that is more “just.”

The most sur­pris­ing pre­sen­ta­tion, how­ever, came from Nor­man Finkel­stein, a for­mer pro­fes­sor at DePaul Uni­ver­sity and noted critic of Israeli policy.

Finkel­stein, who caused quite a stir in anti-Israel cir­cles last year when he claimed that the BDS (Boy­cott, Divest­ment and Sanc­tions) move­ment has char­ac­ter­is­tics of a “cult” and seeks to destroy Israel, began the dis­cus­sion by argu­ing that Israel is a state rec­og­nized under inter­na­tional law with respon­si­bil­i­ties, oblig­a­tions AND rights. He chal­lenged the latent hypocrisy within the anti-Israel move­ment (and his co-panelists), which con­stantly points to inter­na­tional law to jus­tify its agenda while ignor­ing the fact that inter­na­tional law estab­lished Israel as a Jew­ish state. “How does one pro­pose to win sup­port for the Pales­tin­ian cause based on inter­na­tional law yet not sup­port two states? That just doesn’t make any sense to me,” he said.

He con­tin­ued to assault com­mon objec­tives of anti-Israel activists. He specif­i­cally took issue with the BDS movement’s claim of being “rights-based” while again not rec­og­niz­ing Israel’s right to exist, say­ing, “That’s pure unadul­ter­ated hypocrisy. And, speak­ing per­son­ally, I don’t want to have any­thing to do with it. And speak­ing polit­i­cally, it won’t go anywhere.”

If Finkel­stein was a pro-Israel advo­cate, his views would per­haps come as no sur­prise. But Finkel­stein has made a career out of demo­niz­ing Israel. He has described Israel as a “satanic state,” accused Israel of caging Pales­tini­ans “into a ghetto” and exalted Hezbollah’s mil­i­tary achieve­ments against Israel as a “vic­tory of lib­erty and a vic­tory for freedom.”

Mem­bers of the audi­ence reacted hos­tilely to Finkelstein’s pre­sen­ta­tion, talk­ing and shout­ing over him and even yelling at him dur­ing the ques­tion and answer period. While he spoke, two of the other pan­elists – Lamis Deek, a founder of Al-Awda; and Sherry Wolf, an avid BDS activist – who both later expressed sup­port for a one-state solu­tion, fre­quently rolled their eyes and put their heads down, dis­play­ing vis­i­ble dis­com­fort with his positions.

At one point, Deek and Finkel­stein engaged in a hos­tile back-and-forth exchange. After acknowl­edg­ing that she could never “rec­og­nize the right of the entity known as Israel” to exist, Finkel­stein chal­lenged Deek’s use of the term “entity,” stat­ing, “Israel is a state. It has the same rights and the same oblig­a­tions as the 190 other states.” Deek coun­tered that she has “no oblig­a­tion to oper­ate strictly under the aus­pices or within the frame­work of inter­na­tional law despite the fact that Pro­fes­sor Finkel­stein or other pro­fes­sors would like me to do so because they don’t make that require­ment of the Israeli entity.”

It says a lot about these people that someone like Norman Finkelstein comes across as the reasonable one.

13 thoughts on “Norman Finkelstein Again Slams BDSHoles”

  1. In this week’s Torah reading, Balaam is hired to curse Israel, but blesses it instead. I wonder if Finkelstein has a talking ass.

    1. His ass will be talking when he has been eating a large helping of bean burritos if he’s anything like me, Norman.

  2. International law hahahaahhahaha which international law do the nazi Pals abide by?

    Israel is the most legitimate countey on the planet!

    1) The San Remo Conference decisions, 1920
    2) The League of Nations decisions, 1922
    3) The United Nations Charter, Article 80, 1945
    4) UN Resolution 181
    5) The United Nations Security Council Resolution­, 242, 1967.
    6) Oslo Accords 93-95

    All of the above makes up the legal infrastructure of the corpus of documents dubbed ‘internati­onal law’. Israel abides by them. The Pals either reject or just ignores them

  3. Thus, instead of either talking about “one-state­” or “two-state­s” within the 23% portion of “Palestine­” assigned legally for the Jewish people, it is most appropriate to talks about how the Arabs residing within those 23% of “Palestine­” should be integrated economically with the nation-sta­te of the Jewish people and politically and socially with the Arab state of “Palestine­”, i.e. Jordan.

    The retention and governance of Area C, by Israel, of course, is anchored in the September 1995 Interim Agreement between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organizati­on (PLO).

    Part of the Interim Agreement includes the legal accepted means and proceedure­s by which to resolve disputes that may arise from time to time, as any properly constructe­d agreement would.

    Any call, direct or implicit, to change this legally binding agreement by illegal means, violent or otherwise, is despicable and is an illustrati­on of how much those calling for and acting towards such change truly wish – or rather not wish – to ever reach an accommodat­ion of peaceful coexistenc­e between Arab and Jew, between the Muslim-Ara­b world, local and regional, and the independen­t nation-sta­te of the Jewish people, Israel.

    Judea and Samaria (West Bank and East Jerusalem) are not “occupied territorie­s.”
    The internatio­nal community keeps referring to Judea and Samaria being “occupied territorie­s” it relies on the Fourth Geneva Convention which applies only to territorie­s of one High Contractin­g Party being occupied by another High Contractin­g Party during or after a war

    But, as is clear, Judea and Samaria were not lands of a HCP at the time of the war because Jordan’s annexation of same was not recognized by the world save for Britain and Pakistan, it follows that they are not “occupied territorie­s” pursuant to the FGC.

    Furthermor­e, the U.S. Definition of “Occupied Territory” is:
    “Territory under the authority and effective control of a belligeren­t armed force. The term is not applicable to territory being administer­ed pursuant to peace terms, treaty, or other agreement, express or implied, with the civil authority of the territory.­”
    Currently Judea and Samaria are being administer­ed according to the Oslo Accords. Thus the Oslo Accords trumps the provisions of the FGC.

    In no way can it be argued that the lands are “illegally­” occupied. Res 242 of the Security Council gave Israel a licence to remain in occupation until she had “secure and recognized borders”. This licence continued as a fundamenta­l part of the Oslo Accords.

    1. Star, you are fighting emotions and feelings with mere facts! the Jew-haters don’t care about facts. it is a given on the Left that the poor, noble, victimized “Palestinians” have been dispossessed of land that has somehow been theirs for thousands of years, despite the fact that Islam did not exist until around 600AD, and the Arab “Palestinians” themselves did not exist until the 20th century.

      Jew-haters don’t care about history, or reality, any more than the world cares about those 850,000 Jews who ALSO became refugees in 1948, but somehow managed to put on their big-boy pants and make something of themselves.

      1. Thanks to David Ben-Gurion and his fellow Israeli pioneers, the world now has Soda Stream and quite possibly bikini wax. I’ll have to check on that second one, but Soda Stream alone has made it all worthwhile for me.

      2. What? Are you suggesting the Palestinians are NOT descended from philistines ( ” invaders” in Hebrew) who died out around 3000 yrs ago

        Shame on you.

        THE INVENTED PALESTINIAN

        The term “Palestinian” is a masterful twisting of history. To portray themselves as “indigenous”, Arab settlers adopted the name of an ancient Mediterranean tribe, the Philistines (“Invaders” in Hebrew), that disappeared out over almost 3000 years ago. The connection between this tribe and modern day ” Palestinian” Arabs is exactly nil!

        Arabs began identifying themselves as part of a “Palestinian” people in 1964 egged on by Syria ( mostly) and Egypt, but also on the initiative of Egyptian-born terrorist Yasser Arafat and his “Fatah” organisation who eventually took over the PLO in 1969. Suddenly Palestinians were newly defined as … “Arab citizens who were living permanently in Palestine until 1947 and their descendants”. Additionally, “the future Palestinian state ( is ) to be established on the whole territory of Mandatory Palestine.( ie NO JEWISH STATE OF ISRAEL ) The Charter stipulated that “the partition of Palestine, and the establishment of the “Zionist entity” were “null and void”;(that’s the UN thumbed) and, “the claim of a historical or spiritual tie between Jews and Palestine” was denied. ( The Judeo-Christian Bible snubbed ). Also, “The Palestinian people… through the armed Palestinian revolution, reject any solution that would be a substitute for the complete liberation of Palestine.”

        So it was racist, fascist, anti Semitic and imperialistic from its very inception.

        Around 1969 the PLO leadership began organising and “educating”, taught to “become” Palestinians, using the media and in school books, in the refugee camps that the Palestinians insisted on residing in, in Syria Lebanon and Jordan. Children were inculcated with hatred of Jews and the Jewish state, and to take arms against their Jewish neighbour. No dissent was brooked. (More recently Christians and other non- Muslims are increasingly under attack).

        As Walid Shoebat, a former PLO terrorist has commented:
        “Why is it that on June 4th 1967 I was a Jordanian and overnight I became a Palestinian? “… they removed the star from the Jordanian flag and all at once we had a Palestinian flag”. “When I finally realised the lies and myths I was taught, it is my duty as a righteous person to speak out”.

        And if further evidence be required: Prior to partition, Palestinian Arabs did not view themselves as having a separate identity. When the First Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations met in Jerusalem in February 1919 to choose “Palestinian” representatives for the Paris Peace Conference, the following resolution was adopted: “We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria, as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic and geographical bonds.”

        “Arab leader, Abd al-Mahdi, testified before the Peele Commission in 1937 as follows: “There is no such land. Palestine is a term invented by the Zionists. There is no Palestine in the Bible. Our land was for hundreds of years a part of Syria.”

        And if the true nature of these invented Palestinians be in any doubt : “The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct ‘Palestinian people’ to oppose Zionism for tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa. While as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.” Member of P.L.O. leadership, Zahir Muhsein

        Ridiculously, and without irony, Palestinians today claim to be a separately identified “people”, with a common culture, history, system of government and court system, currency and exchange rate, language, etc. but these Palestinians have no history beyond the 50yrs they have existed. No kings, judges,heroes. No ancient authors, artists or politicians.

        In reality, the vast majority of todays ” Palestinians” are families of immigrants from surrounding countries,mostly Egyptian or Saudi Arabian but also Yemeni and Iraqi. They came for work, for better health and sanitary conditions AFTER the first wave of Zionists came back to Eretz Yisrael around 1881 to reclaim their ancient homeland from the largely abandoned malarial infested swampland,in the north, and desolate and unloved dessert, in the south that it had become. At that time no more than 141000 Arabs ( Ottoman census) lived throughout the entire Holy Land with Jews already the overwhelming majority in Jerusalem. The Jews came. They drained the swamps. They made the deserts bloom. They created an astonishing miracle of a modern state.

        Yet back In 1948, the Arabs in the newly independent Israel were ordered to leave by Arab leaders promising to purge the land of Jews.

        “It must not be forgotten that the Arab Higher Committee encouraged the refugees’ flight from their homes in Jaffa, Haifa, and Jerusalem.”
        – Near East Arabic Broadcasting Station, Cyprus, April 3, 1949

        “The Arabs did not want to submit to a truce they rather preferred to abandon their homes, their belongings and everything they possessed in the world and leave the town. This is in fact what they did.” Jamal Husseini, nephew of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Acting Chairman of the Palestine Arab Higher Committee, told to the United Nations Security Council, quoted in the UNSC Official Records (N. 62), April 23, 1948, p. 14

        Most of them left in fear of being killed by their own Arab brothers as traitors. And many were, by forces under the command of the Nazi al-Husseini, the Muslim Mufti of Jerusalem.
        In parallel, some 836000 Jewish refugees – many with 1000yr long histories in countries like Morocco Iraq Iran Algeria and Yemen were being ethnically cleansed due to Arab brutality, persecution and pogroms.

        Palestinian journalist, Mahmud Al-Habbash who writes for the official Palestinian Authority newspaper, Al Hayid Al-Jadida, declared that Arab residents of Palestine in 1948 were not expelled by Israeli officials or military forces, but were actually ordered to leave by local Arab leaders, “…The leaders and the elites promised us at the beginning of the “Catastrophe” in 1948, that the duration of the exile will not be long, and that it will not last more than a few days or months, and afterwards the refugees will return to their homes…” [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, December 13, 2006]

        “One morning in April 1948, Dr. Jamal woke us to say that the Arab Higher Committee (AHC), led by the Husseinis, had warned Arab residents of Talbieh to leave immediately. The understanding was that the residents would be able to return as conquerors as soon as the Arab forces had thrown the Jews out. Dr. Jamal made the point repeatedly that he was leaving because of the AHC’s threats, not because of the Jews, and that he and his frail wife had no alternative but to go.” Commentary Magazine, Jan. 2000, http://www.commentarymagazine.com/0001/letters.html

        And how about this astonishing admittance from none other than PA leader Mahmoud Abbas : “The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny but, instead, THEY ABANDONED THEM, FORCED THEM TO EMIGRATE AND TO LEAVE THEIR HOMELAND…and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live in Eastern Europe… The Arab States succeeded in scattering the Palestinian people and in destroying their unity”
        -Mahmoud Abbas, “What We Have Learned and What We Should Do”, published in Falastin el Thawra, the official journal of the PLO, of Beirut, in March 1976

        The truth is the Jews pleaded with their Arab brethren to stay and build a land together : “[The Arabs of Haifa] fled in spite of the fact that the Jewish authorities guaranteed their safety and rights as citizens of Israel.” Monsignor George Hakim, Greek Catholic Bishop of Galilee 1949

        “Every effort is being made by the Jews to persuade the Arab populace to stay and carry on with their normal lives, to get their shops and businesses open and to be assured that their lives and interests will be safe. [However] …Evacuation by sea goes on steadily. …[Two days later, the Jews were] still making every effort to persuade the Arab populace to remain and to settle back into their normal lives in the towns… [as for the Arabs,] another convoy left Tireh for Transjordan, and the evacuation by sea continues.
        – Haifa District HQ of the British Police, April 26, 1948.

        But perhaps most tellingly, this from Sarah Elshazly, an Arab commentator : “The question is, why did Arabs living in what became Israel flee? The ones who remained in their homes actually live and prosper. So why didn’t they stay? The Arab world warned the Palestinians of staying with the Jews…and that the Palestinians should leave in order for them not to get hurt. My family members have always told us that there were cars going around telling people to stay put. The cars contained Jews. They told everyone that they will not harm them. Thus we have the situation where Jews are begging Arabs to stay and live with them and other Arabs from outside the country were telling them to flee for their lives.”

        Indeed, here’s Arafat for once stating the REAL truth and his real intention: “Palestine is nothing but a drop in an enormous ocean. Our nation is the Arabic nation that stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea and beyond it….. The P.L.O. is fighting Israel in the name of Pan-Arabism. What you call “Jordan” is nothing more than Palestine.”. Yasser Arafat.

        Consider that the tiny Nation of Israel comprises less than 0.5% landmass of the Middle East ( which itself presently comprises TWENTY TWO ARAB COUNTRIES of over 320million mainly Muslim Arabs) is still 0.5 percent too much for these Arabs. The total for all the 22 Arab League countries is 6,145,389 square miles (square miles). Israel has 8,463sm. Which is the David and Goliath in this charade? However, backed by deluded, fanatical ultra left cognitive dissonants the world over, and in some cases antisemitic church leaders, it has proved relatively easy, from a propaganda standpoint, to convince world public opinion of the rights of the sad, poor, small, deprived “Palestinian People” to its own state, than to justify the clutching demands of the enormous imperialist colonial Arab empire for an addition of territory wrenched from a tiny tiny country fighting for its life.

        Why let the facts get in the way of a good story eh?

          1. Jim. They may do many things but ‘ poof’ ain’t one of them. Remember no gays JEWS or dogs allowed

            Now Jim. Which parts did I get wrong. If you have any please let us all know

            If not. Then ill presume you agree they are invented.

    1. Jim from Iowa

      lol. Just read that the Australian govt. is asking very personal questions of its citizens regarding their sex lives. Refusal to answer has the potential of landing a person in prison. Only way to avoid intrusive questions is to change addresses. Another possible explanation for why AussieDave moved to Israel.

  4. E Pluribus Beagle

    Much like the Sunnis and the Shiia killing an eating one another in Syria – Norman and BDStards all deserve one another. We should give them all machetes so they can slaughter one another over who gets to deny the Holocaust louder.

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