A brief reply to Professor Vera Schwarcz’s Wespeak of Jan. 10

, by Richard Ohmann,

She is critical of my having appeared on a “Modern Languages [sic] Association panel united by a passion for boycotting Israel.” Professor Schwarcz proposes an end to our friendship–“a final splitting of the ways”–unless I find “the courage to dissent from the pack” of Marxists who endorse “lies about Israel,” the “one and only democracy in the Middle East.” The boycott movement is not about the political structure of Israel but about Palestine: about Israel’s taking of Palestinian land and water, its bulldozing of villages, its restriction of movement, its military reprisals and collective punishments, and so on through the endless list of oppressions, privations and indignities inflicted on people of the West Bank and Gaza during more than 45 years of occupation. I learned much from Vera, years ago, but do not regret my public unfriending by one who can omit all this from a comment on the BDS movement and a defense of Israeli civility. Three smaller points: 1. There are several democracies in the Middle East. 2. On the MLA panel, I argued against the academic boycott, though I support the economic boycott. 3. I credit Michael Roth with speaking out on many issues, but to praise him for the “courage” it took to write his Los Angeles Times op ed condemning the American Studies Association’s boycott resolution is (I think he would agree) a bit much. Around 150 college and university presidents and other high officials put out statements deploring the ASA vote. Many did so in response to pressure from alumni and donors, some of whom in turn were responding to a vigorous campaign by organizations close to the Israel lobby. (I have no reason to think Michael Roth was so motivated.) I’ve not heard of any college president who spoke in support of ASA or the BDS movement. Where is the “pack,” and where is the bold dissent, in this picture?

Ohmann is a Benjamin Waite Professor of English, Emeritus.

  • Senior ’14

    Thank you

  • Anonymous

    There are several democracies in the Middle East…so claims or esteemed English professor which begs the question: What does he know about democracy?

    In fact his entire retort begs the question: What does he know about Israel other than memes and hyperbole?
    ……………

    Democracy, Professor Ohmann, is more than just voting. It includes trivial details (or, apparently trivial for you) like individual rights. Why don’t you tell us about a country – other than Israel, that is – where people have the right to free speech, freedom of the press, freedom to choose their religion.

    • Ariel Sharon

      Rain of Fire: Israel’s Unlawful Use of White Phosphorus in Gaza. Israel’s repeated firing of white phosphorus shells over densely populated areas of Gaza during its recent military campaign was indiscriminate and is evidence of war crimes, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. – Human Rights Watch, http://www.hrw.org/fr/node/81821

      [Israel’s military occupation is] in gross violation of international law and has been from the outset. And that much, at least, is fully recognized, even by the United States, which has overwhelming and, as I said, unilateral responsibility for these crimes. So George Bush No. 1, when he was the U.N. ambassador, back in 1971, he officially reiterated Washington’s condemnation of Israel’s actions in the occupied territories. He happened to be referring specifically to occupied Jerusalem. In his words, actions in violation of the provisions of international law governing the obligations of an occupying power, namely Israel. He criticized Israel’s failure “to acknowledge its obligations under the Fourth Geneva Convention as well as its actions which are contrary to the letter and spirit of this Convention.” […] However, by that time, late 1971, a divergence was developing, between official policy and practice. The fact of the matter is that by then, by late 1971, the United States was already providing the means to implement the violations that Ambassador Bush deplored. […] on December 5th [2001], there had been an important international conference, called in Switzerland, on the 4th Geneva Convention. Switzerland is the state that’s responsible for monitoring and controlling the implementation of them. The European Union all attended, even Britain, which is virtually a U.S. attack dog these days. They attended. A hundred and fourteen countries all together, the parties to the Geneva Convention. They had an official declaration, which condemned the settlements in the occupied territories as illegal, urged Israel to end its breaches of the Geneva Convention, some “grave breaches,” including willful killing, torture, unlawful deportation, unlawful depriving of the rights of fair and regular trial, extensive destruction and appropriation of property not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly. Grave breaches of the Geneva Convention, that’s a serious term, that means serious war crimes. The United States is one of the high contracting parties to the Geneva Convention, therefore it is obligated, by its domestic law and highest commitments, to prosecute the perpetrators of grave breaches of the conventions. That includes its own leaders. Until the United States prosecutes its own leaders, it is guilty of grave breaches of the Geneva Convention, that means war crimes. And it’s worth remembering the context. It is not any old convention. These are the conventions established to criminalize the practices of the Nazis, right after the Second World War. What was the U.S. reaction to the meeting in Geneva? The U.S. boycotted the meeting [..] and that has the usual consequence, it means the meeting is null and void, silence in the media.”

      Noam Chomsky, “On West Asia” at UC Berkeley, March 21, 2002 [85]

  • Anonymous

    Maybe our esteemed professor given his obvious innate wisdom and sense of fair play will help me understand the following conundrum.

    Why is it Muslims are free to violently conquer lands
    anywhere and everywhere without a word of protest from Professor Ohmann, but if Jews have a legally established homeland liberal professorswill never stop protesting against it? Why is this do you suppose? What explanation can be given other than as the Qur’an states repeatedly that
    Islam’s goal is to establish a worldwide caliphate in which all non-Muslims are
    subjugated.

    For instance, Mohammed was born around 571 AD thousands and
    thousands of years after Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism existed. But within a few centuries of Mohammed’s birth Islam had violently conquered vast sections of Asia, all of North Africa and smaller sections of Southern Europe.

    Now Muslims tell us that all this land belongs to them even
    though, for instance, in Afghanistan they killed every last Buddhist who
    once lived there.

    According to Muslim logic per Israel shouldn’t this land
    belong to the Buddhists and not to Muslims? Why is this Professor Ohmann?

    Or in North Africa all the Berbers have been forcibly
    converted to Islam or have been killed. Now we’re told all of this vast landmass belongs to Islam.

    That’s interesting, if not completely hypocritical don’t you think so Professor Ohmann?

    And what about Southern Thailand? Did anyone know that during the last several years something like 5,000 Buddhists have been killed by Muslims because, or so we’re told, the land the Buddhists are on belongs to Islam.

    And Southern Russia? Muslims are relentlessly waging a slow reign of terror in Russia because, you guessed it, Russians are treating Muslims poorly and they should give up the Southern section of that country to Muslims.

    Eurkea! Is there a pattern developing here Professor Ohmann?

    Or, let’s take Sudan as another example. How many millions
    have been killed in Sudan? How many babies and children have starved in Sudan while Islamists steal the food from aid compounds? How many women have Muslims gang-raped in Sudan all because that land belongs to Muslims and only Muslims. All other people can go somewhere else to live, I guess.

    And Kashmir? The same. Despite Hindus having lived there for
    3,000 years – something like 2,000+ years before Mohammed was born –
    Muslims tell us Kashmir belongs to them. Amazing logic isn’t it?

    And that brings us to Israel. Israel also belongs to Islam.
    Did you know that?

    It’s true. Even though it’s no bigger than a small pimple on the caliphate’s
    ass it is still their land and they will fight to the death to prove their point.

    Doesn’t the logic here make a lot of sense. Isn’t it as
    clear as day Professor Ohmann?

    Of course it is. The world belongs to Islam and we’re mere players on
    their stage.

    • Isaiah

      The Jews of Islam by Bernard Lewis [http://www.questia.com/read/99502293/the-jews-of-islam]

      A READING of medieval and modern Jewish history would seem to suggest that Jews in the Diaspora can only flourish, perhaps even only survive in any meaningful sense, under the aegis of one or the other of the two successor religions of Judaism—Christianity and Islam. Virtually the whole panorama of Jewish history, or rather that part of it which is ofany significance between the destruction of the ancient Jewish centers and the creation ofthe new Jewish state, is enacted either in the lands of Islam or in the lands of ChristendomThere were occasional Jewish settlements in areas dominated by other civilizations andreligions, such as India and China, but—despite the very large measure of tolerance theyenjoyed—they did not flourish. They had no great share in the life and culture either ofthose countries or of the Jewish people, and appear to have produced nothing of any realimportance for the one or the other. In India it was only with the advent of Islam that thesmall Jewish communities of that country received a modicum of attention and played asmall part. In the realms of Hinduism, Buddhism, and the religions of the Far East, theJews remained few and inactive, attracting neither persecution nor favor nor evenattention. In Hindu India and in China, Judaism atrophied. When Arnold Toynbee usedthe term “fossil” to describe the Jews and some other minority groups that survived fromthe ancient world, he was vehemently criticized. Indeed the term “fossil,” applied tosomething as vibrant as Jewish life in the Middle East, in Europe, and in the Americas,seems an absurdity. It is less absurd when applied to the isolated and immobilized Jewishcommunities of southern and eastern Asia.

      The main centers of Jewish life and activity since the early Middle Ages have always beenin the lands of Islam and Christendom. It seems that these two religions share some quality

      that is conducive to active Jewish life and that is lacking in societies dominated byHinduism, Buddhism, and other faiths, to which perhaps in our own day we should addcommunism. Under Christian or Muslim rule, Jewish life has not always beencomfortable. Jews may be slighted or hated; they may be despised or oppressed orslaughtered, but they are never ignored. For both Christianity and Islam, and therefore forboth Christians and Muslims, the Jews and Judaism have a certain cosmic stature. Theyare known; they have a place, and indeed an important place, in both the theological andhistorical scheme of things. For good or for evil, they are seen as significant. TheChristians even adopted the Jewish scriptures. The Muslims, though they did not go thatfar, were prepared to recognize the Jewish scriptures as a corrupt relic of an authenticrevelation. For the Christian and the Muslim alike, the Jewish religion was neither aliennor absurd. It was a faith of the same kind as his own, but in an earlier and outdatedversion. He might punish the Jew for not catching up with his own, final version of God’s message; he would not brush him aside as a votary of one minor sect or cult among a multiplicity of others. For the believer, persecution is easier to endure than disregard.

  • Anonymous

    Professor Ohmann,

    I wonder who Isaiah had in mind when he penned this? Any guess?

    …………………..

    Woe to those who call evil good and good evil,

    who put darkness for light and light for darkness,

    who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.

    Isaiah 5:20

    • Isaiah

      “The Zionists indeed learnt well from the Nazis. So well that it seems that their morally repugnant treatment of the Palestinians, and their attempts to destroy Palestinian society within Israel and the occupied territories, reveals them as basically Nazis with beards and black hats.” – Norman Finkelstein

      “…in my opinion, they [the Zionists] have erred grievously in seeking to impose themselves on Palestine with the aid of America and Britain and now with the aid of naked terrorism.” – Gandhi

      Israel uses sophisticated attack jets
      and naval vessels to bomb densely-crowded refugee camps, schools,
      apartment blocks, mosques and slums to attack a population that has
      no air force, no air defense, no navy, no heavy weapons, no artillery
      units, no mechanized armor, no command in control, no army and calls
      it a war. It is not war, it is murder. – Noam Chomsky

      • Anonymous

        Finkelstein and Chomsky are the core of the Fifth Column.
        Might as well quote Goebbels as far as I’m concerned. They’re made of the self-same stuff.
        Oh yeah, Chomsky’s the guy who supports Chavez and the Ayatollahs while setting up million dollar trusts for his children. He’s a real socialist tried and true.

      • Isaiah

        “Thou shalt not kill.” – God, Exodus 20:13

        “Israel may have the right to put others on trial, but certainly no one has the right to put the Jewish people and the State of Israel on trial.” – Ariel Sharon

        “God is dead.” – Nietzsche

        It is rotten and dismal that a world of so many hundred million people should be ruled by a single caste that has the power to lead millions to life or to death, indeed on a whim…This caste has spun its web over the entire earth; capitalism recognizes no national boundaries…Capitalism has learned nothing from recent events and wants to learn nothing, because it places its own interests ahead of those of the other millions. Can one blame those millions for standing up for their own interests, and only for those interests? Can one blame them for striving to forge an international community whose purpose is the struggle against corrupt capitalism? Can one condemn a large segment of the educated Sturmer youth for protesting against the greatest ability? Is it not an abomination that people with the most brilliant intellectual gifts should sink into poverty and disintegrate, while others dissipate, squander, and waste the money that could help them? … You say the old propertied class also worked hard for what it has. Granted, that may be true in many cases. But do you also know about the conditions under which workers were living during the period when capitalism “earned” its fortune?

        Letter to Anka Stalherm (14 April 1920), quoted in Ralph Georg Reuth, Goebbels (Harvest, 1994), pp. 33-34.

        Avram Noam Chomsky (/ˈnoʊm ˈtʃɒmski/; born December 7, 1928) is an American linguist,philosopher,[20][21] cognitive scientist, logician,[22][23][24] political commentator and activist. Sometimes described as the “father of modern linguistics”,[25][26] Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy.[20] He has spent most of his career at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he is currently Professor Emeritus, and has authored over 100 books. He has been described as a prominent cultural figure, and was voted the “world’s top public intellectual” in a 2005 poll.[27]

        Chomsky has been a highly influential academic figure throughout his career, and was cited within the field of Arts and Humanities more often than any other living scholar between 1980 and 1992. He was also the eighth most cited scholar overall within the Arts and Humanities Citation Index during the same period.[28][29][30][31] His work has influenced fields such as artificial intelligence, cognitive science, computer science, logic, mathematics, music theory and analysis, political science, programming language theory and psychology.[30][31][32][33][34]

      • Anonymous

        Herr Goebbels Wannabe,
        Nice job with the Neo-Nazi websites.
        You’re right 5 million Jews (that’s the approximate number of adult Jews living) rule the world. Makes sense to me Herr Goebbels.

      • Isaiah

        “The real menace of our Republic is the invisible government, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation. To depart from mere generalizations, let me say that at the head of this octopus are the Rockefeller–Standard Oilinterests and a small group of powerful banking houses generally referred to as the international bankers. The little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes.

        They practically control both parties, write political platforms, make catspaws of party leaders, use the leading men of private organizations, and resort to every device to place in nomination for high public office only such candidates as will be amenable to the dictates of corrupt big business.

        These international bankers and Rockefeller–Standard Oil interests control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.”

        John Francis Hyland, Mayor of New York City, 1917-1925

      • Anonymous

        Isaiah,
        You’re funny.
        There are 1.5 billion Muslims and their core tenets demand followers fight to build the worldwide Caliphate.
        And right before your eyes they are doing it. Their caliphate spas from Indonesia to Morocco and from Pakistan to the Caucus.
        And you’re all freaky-deak about Jews who control a sliver of land and number 5 million adult people.
        Did you remember to take your pink pills this morning?

      • Isaiah

        “I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.” – Thomas Jefferson, 1802 3rd president of US

        “This [Federal Reserve Act] establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President [Wilson} signs this bill, the invisible government of the monetary power will be legalized….the worst legislative crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency bill.” — Charles A. Lindbergh, Sr. , 1913

        “We have, in this country, one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board. This evil institution has impoverished the people of the United States and has practically bankrupted our government. It has done this through the corrupt practices of the moneyed vultures who control it”. —Congressman Louis T. McFadden in 1932 (Rep. Pa)

        “History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and it’s issuance.” — James Madison

        “The Federal Reserve System is a legal private monopoly of the money supply, operated for the benefit of a few, under the guise of protecting and promoting the public interest.” – Anthony Sutton, PhD Stanford Economics

      • Anonymous

        Whoa mama! Did you take your yellow pills today?
        While Muslims control lands from The Maldives to Turkey and from Algeria to the Philippines you are telling us we need to worry about a people who control a land that is nine miles wide.
        Your analytical abilities rival those of Adolph Hitler which is to say you’re one sick puppy motivated by paranoia and hate.

      • Isaiah

        “The financial system has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That Board as ministers the finance system by authority of a purely profiteering group. The system is Private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people’s money” — Charles A. Lindbergh Sr., 1923

        “The Federal Reserve bank buys government bonds without one penny…” —Congressman
        Wright Patman, Congressional Record, Sept 30, 1941

        “We have, in this country, one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board. This evil institution has impoverished the people of the United States and has practically bankrupted our government. It has done this through the corrupt practices of the moneyed vultures who control it”. —Congressman Louis T. McFadden in 1932 (Rep. Pa)

        “The Federal Reserve banks are one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever seen.
        There is not a man within the sound of my voice who does not know that this nation is run by the
        International bankers — Congressman Louis T. McFadden (Rep. Pa)

        “Some people think the Federal Reserve Banks are the United States government’s institutions.
        They are not government institutions. They are private credit monopolies which prey upon the people of the United States for the benefit of themselves and their foreign swindlers” — Congressional Record 12595-12603 — Louis T. McFadden, Chairman of the Committee on Banking and Currency (12 years) June 10, 1932

        “It is well that the people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.” — Henry Ford

      • Anonymous

        Isaiah,
        Good thing the Jews control the internet too. Otherwise a**holes like you would have access to it.

      • Isaiah

        “Foreigners (Gentiles) shall rebuild your walls, and their kings shall minister to you …Your gates shall be open continuously; day and night they shall not be shut; that men may bring to you the wealth of the nations, with their kings led in procession. For the nation or kingdom that will not not serve you; shall perish; those nations shall be utterly laid waste….” – Isaiah 60:10-12

        “You shall suck the milk of nations, you shall suck the breast of kings; and you shall know that I, the LORD, am your Savior and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.” – Isaiah 60:16

        “And strangers [Gentiles] shall stand and feed your flocks, strangers shall be your plowmen and vinedressers; but you shall be called the priests of the LORD, men shall speak of you as the ministers of our God; you shall eat the wealth of the nations, and in their riches you shall glory.” – Isaiah 61:5-6

      • Anonymous

        Isaiah,
        Good thing the Jews control the internet.
        Otherwise freakshows like you might gain access to it.

      • Isaiah

        I will show you, but not for now, for these things will only come to be at that time, some after time and some in the Days of KingMashiach. “A star has gone forth from Jacob …” (Numbers 24:17). This teaches us that in the future, the Holy One, Blessed is He, will build Jerusalem, and one star will spark within seventy pillars of fire and seventy sparks will receive light from it in the middle of the sky. The other seventy stars will be swallowed within it. It will give off light and blaze for seventy days. At the end of the sixth day it will become visible at the beginning of the twenty-fifth day of the sixth month. It will be gathered in at the end of seventy complete days and be visible in the city of Rome, and on that day, three great walls will fall and a great hall will fall, and the power of that city will die.(Zohar, Balak, 212b)

      • Anonymous

        Earth to Isaiah….Houston calling…Are you for real?

      • Isaiah

        The Zohar can inspire us to return to G-d:

        The Prophecy of Elul 23 5761 = Sep 11th 2001

        http://www.kabbalaonline.org/kabbalah/article_cdo/aid/380391/jewish/Great-Walls-Will-Fall.htm

        http://magog.web-site.co.il/gog/e_terror.shtml

        The sixth day of the count always falls out on the 23rd of Elul. In the year 2001, the 23rd of Elul corresponded with the secular calendar date of September 11th. Thus, the exact date of this event is named precisely in the Zohar.

      • Anonymous

        Earth to Isaiah…
        Come in please….
        The mental ward has a bed available.

      • Isaiah

        The Zohar (Hebrew: זֹהַר, lit Splendor or Radiance) is the foundational work in the literature of Jewish mystical thought known as Kabbalah.[1] It is a group of books including commentary on the mystical aspects of the Torah (the five books of Moses) and scriptural interpretations as well as material on Mysticism, mythical cosmogony, and mystical psychology.

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