http://www.alternet.org/story/142546/why_is_jane_fonda_being_accused_of_an_%22attack_on_the_heart_and_soul_of_israel%22?page=entire
Why Is Jane Fonda Being Accused Of An "Attack On The Heart and Soul Of Israel"?
By Ira Chernus, AlterNet. Posted September 10, 2009.
Artists protesting the Toronto International Film Festival's
commemoration of the 100th anniversary of Tel Aviv are being
demonized.
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You know how those flamboyant Hollywood types like to exaggerate. And
when people anywhere talk about the Israel-Palestine conflict,
moderate words are usually in short supply. Put the two together, and
it's not surprising to find heated language flying on every side. But
if, as William Blake said, the road of excess leads to the palace of
wisdom, we might learn a lot about the Middle East tragedy from
excessive words coming out of Hollywood.
Actually, right now, they're coming out of Toronto, the latest place
where Hollywood has met the Middle East -- appropriately enough,
perhaps, since Toronto has huge active Jewish and Muslim communities
as well a very creative film scene.
This year the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) is honoring
the 100th anniversary of the founding of Tel Aviv by spotlighting 10
Israeli films. That has sparked a protest (not a boycott, contrary to
some rumors) by more than 60 artists, including Danny Glover, David
Byrne, and Eve Ensler.
But the big catch for the protest organizers was two-time Oscar-winner
Jane Fonda (Best Actress: 1971 for Klute, 1978 for Coming Home). When
she signed the protesters' "Toronto Declaration: No Celebration of
Occupation," she put the whole controversy even more firmly in the
headlines.
The Declaration declares that Tel Aviv cannot be looked at in
isolation from the suffering of the Palestinians; the TIFF program
"ignores the suffering of thousands of former residents and
descendants"; the festival's claim to encourage diversity is "empty
given the absence of Palestinian filmmakers in the program."
John Grayson, the Canadian filmmaker who initiated the protest,
further charges that TIFF, "whether intentionally or not, has become
complicit in the Israeli propaganda machine." "We're not protesting
the Israeli films or the filmmakers," he says. "Our target is TIFF's
Spotlight on Tel Aviv itself, and specifically its connections to the
'Brand Israel' campaign [a campaign supported by major Canadian media
companies to polish Israel's image] and the Israeli Consulate, which
make the spotlight look and feel like a propaganda exercise. We're
telling TIFF that eight months since the Gaza massacre, this is no
time to be uncritically 'celebrating' Tel Aviv."
Those are generally measured words, though it does seem unfair to call
the focus on Tel Aviv a "celebration of occupation"; an "obfuscation
of occupation" would have made the point more precisely. And in fact
TIFF will show two Palestinian films along with the Israeli films.
But whatever bit of exaggeration the protesters may engage in is
dwarfed by the sharp retort they've elicited from another two-time
Oscar-winner, Rabbi Marvin Hier. He's not quite as famous as Jane
Fonda, to say the least. But he does indeed have as many of those
golden statuettes as she has on the mantelpiece (Best Documentary,
Features: 1997 for The Long Way Home,1982 for Genocide). And he is an
ordained rabbi. Hier produced his award-winning documentaries as part
of his better-known work: He's founder and dean of the Simon
Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles.
Rabbinical Nonsense
Rabbi Hier blasted the TIFF protest in overheated language, as "an
attack on the heart and soul of Israel. … People who support letters
like this are people who do not support a two-state solution. By
calling into question the legitimacy of Tel Aviv, they are supporting
a one-state solution, which means the destruction of the State of
Israel. "
He went on to say, "If every city in the Middle East would have the
cultural diversity, the freedom of expression, and treat its citizens,
Jews and Arabs, the way Tel Aviv does, peace would have come to the
Middle East long ago."
Well, there may be some truth in that. In fact, if every city, town,
and village in Israel were as liberal as Tel Aviv, Israeli Jews would
have agreed to a genuinely independent and viable Palestinian state
long ago.
But nothing else the rabbi says makes any sense. The starting point of
his argument -- that the Toronto Declaration "question[s] the
legitimacy of Tel Aviv" -- is a subjective interpretation of the text.
I don't read it that way; neither does Fonda, who wrote: "The letter
certainly did not call for the destruction of Israel or call into
question the legitimacy of Tel Aviv as a city." But I can see how
someone might read it that way. Hamas leader Khaled Meshal, for
example, might be inclined to question the legitimacy of Tel Aviv.
But Meshal has accepted the existence of the state of Israel (and,
presumably, its largest city). That doesn't mean he likes it. It
simply means that -- as the Toronto Declaration suggest -- there are
realities that we accept as givens, even though they are built on
tragic historical legacies. But those legacies deserve to be carefully
remembered.
So even if some of the protesters view Tel Aviv's founding as
illegitimate, to jump from there to the claim that "they are
supporting a one-state solution, which means the destruction of the
State of Israel," is what philosophers call a "howler," an argument
totally without logic. The Toronto Declaration says nothing like that;
not even close.
Jane Fonda made this clear in her response to Hier: "I, in no way,
support the destruction of Israel. I am for the two-state solution. I
have been to Israel many times and love the country and its people."
It is perfectly consistent for Fonda to sign the Declaration as a way
to pressure Israel to move more rapidly toward a two-state peace
agreement, as she says: "It is out of love for Israel and all that it
promised to be that I protest the use of art (which is meant to search
for truth) in this branding campaign. The greatest 're-branding' of
Israel would be to celebrate that country's robust peace movement by
allowing aid to be delivered to Gaza and stopping expansion of the
settlements. That's the way to show Israel's commitment to peace, not
a PR campaign. There will be no two-state solution unless this
happens."
To accuse Jane Fonda of "an attack on the heart and soul of Israel" is
just plain silly. It would make as much sense to say that anyone who
talks about the theft of native American land is promoting the
destruction of the United States.
How did an educated rabbi miss this obvious point? Most likely,
because he wanted to miss it. He's been trained to miss it. Everyone
he counts as a friend or colleague would probably miss it too. People
who call themselves "pro-Israel" because they support a right-wing
anti-Palestinian agenda tend to hang out with each other and reinforce
each other's narrow-minded perspective.
Though the rabbi does have his Oscars and his Hollywood connections,
I'm quite sure his penchant for exaggeration about Israel comes much
more from his Jewish connections. I say that having grown up in the
Jewish community, having read and heard Jewish views on the Middle
East for over half a century, and having endured similar extremist
criticisms directed against myself for many years.
The unfortunate reality is that too many Jews are as intemperate and
unreasonable in their views as Rabbi Hier. Too many thrive on
discovering new criticisms of Israeli policy and treating each one --
no matter how thoughtful or how minor -- as if it were a threat to the
very existence of Israel.
A rabbi with such close links to Hollywood, the world's most
image-conscious city, should know better. Shrill, hysterical responses
to mild (and usually quite legitimate) criticism does nothing to help
the image of "Brand Israel" or its Jewish supporters. On the contrary,
crying "wolf" when there is no wolf tends to invalidate everything
else the crier says. It looks like an attempt to manipulate people in
the service of a hidden agenda. And it raises disturbing questions
about what's going on inside the hysteric's mind.
Unreasoning, Unjustified Terror
I don't know Rabbi Hier. But I've known plenty of people who were just
as quick to turn any critique of Israeli policy into an attack on
Israel's existence. It was pretty clear to me what was going on in
their minds: fear. And not just any old fear, but "nameless,
unreasoning, unjustified terror," as Franklin D. Roosevelt put it in
his first inaugural address. A mind filled with that kind of terror
can easily interpret a difference of opinion or a minor slight as a
life-threatening assault.
FDR said fear was the only thing we have to fear. Well, it's certainly
not the only thing Palestinians have to fear. They deal every day with
teenaged soldiers licensed to kill them, settlers free to attack them,
roadblocks manned by soldiers or bureaucrats determined to grind them
down, and an endless array of insults and assaults on their basic
human rights.
But the irrational terror that haunts too many Jews when it comes to
Israel is the greatest threat to Israel itself, because it's the
strongest factor preventing Israel from agreeing to a fair and just
two-state solution. Why so many people would cling to just
self-defeating terror is a vexing question. I've got a few ideas of my
own, but perhaps no one will ever really understand it.
Terror, whatever its source, is a bad basis for policy. It breeds
hysteria, which prevents clear thinking. By now, the "pro-Israel"
hysterics have been at it in so many places, for so long, and with
such powerful effect that much of what they say gets taken seriously,
as if it were sensible and worthy of thoughtful discussion. Once they
win that point, really thoughtful discussion is no longer possible.
And without thoughtful discussion, the peace that Israelis and
Palestinians need to make them secure is not possible either.
The unreasoning cries of alarm raised by the likes of Rabbi Hier are
far too common in the Jewish community. They distort public perception
of the Middle East conflict, creating a huge emotional cloud that
blinds people to the very real possibility of rational solutions. And
their obvious, even ridiculous, tone of hysteria hurts everyone. Even
right-wing Jews who are out to prevent a Palestinian state would serve
their cause better by creating a more reasonable image. An
Oscar-winner from Hollywood certainly ought to know that.
Perhaps, if they would just calm down and at least pretend to be
reasonable for a few minutes, they will begin to understand why they
should listen to the thoughtful criticisms coming from pro-Israel
peace-lovers like Jane Fonda. No one can think constructively about
security -- which is presumably what Rabbi Hier wants for Israel --
until they can first distinguish between real and unreal threats to
security.
Whether a nation with over 200 nuclear weapons and the world's fourth
of fifth most powerful military, vastly more powerful than any of its
neighbors, can have any real security threats is an open question.
Whether a nation that acts out of fear and refuses to make compromises
for peace can ever be secure is an equally challenging question. To
think about these questions in any fruitful way, the first step is
just to be able to think, rather than responding with unreasoning,
unjustified terror.
You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot
build up a nation, you cannot build up a morality. Anything that you
will build on the foundations of caste will crack and will never be a
whole.
-AMBEDKAR
http://venukm.blogspot.com
http://www.shelfari.com/kmvenuannur
http://kmvenuannur.livejournal.com
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