#1084 10/31/21 – Tell Me: Will You Be a Jewish Homeland Word Warrior?

WHILE YOU STAND ON ONE LEG:  Most of the readers of this remember the Six Day War.  More than a few have childhood remembrance of WW II, the Holocaust, ingathering of the Exiles, and the 1948 struggle for Israel’s rebirth.  We stand in awe of Israelis and the IDF, but there’s a front, fighting Jewish homeland-delegitimizing terms used in America, where it’s us Diaspora Jews, not Israelis and the IDF, who are on the front lines.  Here’s a way to be part.

Tell Me:  Will You Be a Jewish Homeland Word Warrior?

There’s a front in contesting delegitimization of our Jewish homeland of Israel on which those on the front lines aren’t Israelis but us, and that front is the twisting of terminology in America.

If you believe:

[1] that “West Bank … East Jerusalem … 1967 borders … captured by Israel in 1967 … occupied Palestinian territories … 1948 creation/founding of Israel … Palestinian refugee issue … Zionist entity … settler-colonial project … apartheid … etc., etc.,” aren’t just randomly coined Arab-Jewish conflict-describing common terms, but are all part of a coordinated loaded lexicon of delegitimizing dirty words, pixels which combine to paint a false portrait of an historic Arab Palestine invaded and usurped in 1948 and 1967 by alien European Jews;

[2] that this loaded lexicon pervades not just mainstream western media reporting on Israel, but American public discourse on the conflict, including alas that of many American Jews and our lay and religious institutions; and

[3] that grassroots American Jews should not meekly avert our eyes from this loaded-language onslaught aimed at undermining American public support for our people’s homeland of Israel,

then

on your own, but backed with information we may be able to give you that you’re not uninformed and not alone in so doing, take a Jewish homeland Word Warrior pledge:

I will not myself use pejorative terms deliberately designed to delegitimize my Jewish people’s historic homeland of Israel;

When an organization to which I belong drafts a Jewish homeland-affecting statement, I’ll object to inclusion therein of delegitimizing terms and expressions;

 In my conversations and dealings with fellow grassroots American Jews and others, I will seek to correct their use of any Jewish homeland delegitimizing terms and expressions; 

 I’ll append corrective reader comments to internet articles containing Jewish homeland delegitimizing terms and expressions;

 I’ll share my activities in these regards with fellow Jewish homeland Word Warriors.

 Recent Delegitimizing of Our Jewish Homeland By American Jews

It’s not that hard to find usage of Jewish homeland delegitimizing terms by non-Jews.  Indeed, such terms are not even considered pejoratives.  Take, e.g., “occupation.”  A couple years ago, when in a former incarnation now Israeli PM Bennett objected to CNN’s Christianne Amanpour saying “occupation,” she responded, surprised:  “It’s an international term, Mr. Bennett.”  “But I still object to it.”  And take “West Bank,” coined in 1950 by invader Jordan to disassociate Judea and Samaria, with their Hebrew-origin names, from Jewish connection.  The media tells readers “Judea” and “Samaria” are “the biblical names for the West Bank.”  Indeed, but those biblical names remained in use for three millennia, including by the UN in its 1947 partition resolution.  Not to mention, btw, the UN’s 2016 statement in UNSC 2334 as, ho-hum, simple fact, that “the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, has no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law and a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-state solution and a just, lasting and comprehensive peace.”  (Never mind that “the Palestinians” have never ruled any of it.)

So let’s focus on such terminology twisting by American Jews.

[a] Jewish Google & Amazon Employees:  An October 24 World Israel News article reported 90 Google and 300 Amazon employees wrote their employers seeking termination of a cloud data project with Israel, quoting Jewish Google employees: “Others Can’t Criticize Israel [really?] – but we can.”  It was followed next day, reported Washington Free Beacon, by activation of a website, NoTechForApartheid.com, a joint project of “Jewish Voice For Peace” and another BDS supporting group.

[b] Jewish Congressmen’s Two-State Solution Act:  A September 23 JNS article reported that a Jewish U.S. Congressman had introduced a “Two-State Solution Act” so restrictive and hostile to Israel that “two states for two peoples” supporter Prof. Dershowitz wrote a Gatestone article calling it a bill “endangering Israel.”  A September 24 Times of Israel article had a photo caption: “Rep. Andy Levin speaks at a press conference introducing his ‘Two-State Solution Act’ on Capital Hill, Sept. 23, 2021.  He is flanked by, from left, Hadar Suskind, the president and CEO of Peace Now, Rep. Alan Lowenthal, Rep. Sara Jacobs, Rep. Peter Welch, and J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami. (Ron Kampeas/JTA).”  TOI:  “The legislation says the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip are all occupied territories ….”

[c]  Ben & Jerry’s Boycott of “Occupied Territory”:  And then there’s Ben & Jerry, self-proclaimed “Men of Ice Cream, Men of Principle” (title of their recent NY Times op-ed), declaring “it’s possible to support Israel and oppose some of its policies.”  Indeed, but there’s a bigger-than-policy gulf between a Jew calling for a “two-state solution” along the 1949 lines and his calling every Jerusalem and Judea-Samaria inch beyond those old lines “occupied territory.”

[d]  Jewish Reform and Conservative Movements’ Letter to Trump: By me, this is the Mother of All Self-Disgracing American Jewish Performances.  In 2019, the American Jewish Reform and Conservative movements, along with other major Jewish organizations, addressed an open letter to President Trump calling for a two-state solution with borders that would “hew precisely to the 1967 borders” save for any agreed “territorial adjustments” thereto.  They further called on Trump to oppose “annexation by Israel of any territory in the West Bank.”  But those terms – “1967 borders,” with legal status rubbed in by referring to possible agreed “adjustments” to them; “annexation” [“to take over territory and incorporate it into another political entity, e.g., a country or state” – Encarta], and “West Bank” – are all of course delegitimizing.  A shanda!

[e]  2334:  And now for the Grandmother of All Jewish homeland-delegitimizing Dirty Word documents, that UNSC 2334, with its illegality of “establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem.”  Yes, the U.S., with Obama and Kerry on their way out the door, merely abstained (if not helped instigate) this, but 2334 makes this Jews-flogging-themselves list because Kerry had two Jewish grandparents and should appreciate that a Jewishly meaningful and militarily secure Jewish homeland has some significance to someone whom the next Hitler will likewise condemn as a Jew.

Ok, Will YOU Take the Word Warrior Pledge? 

I don’t think that in any of these now one thousand and eighty-four weekly emails I’ve asked You-Who-Put-Up-With-Me-Weekly to click “Reply” when you’ve read this.  I do so this week.  TELL ME whether you’ve taken the Jewish Homeland Word Warrior pledge.

Here’s the small help we can give you so you won’t feel ammunition-less and entirely alone.  We have a small 501c3, factsonisrael.com, inc.  We say on our www.factsonisrael.com:  “If you forfeit the language, you forfeit our heritage and history.”  Go there and look at our pages “A-Z Facts ,,, Toxic Terms … Dirty Words.”  Under “Videos,” click on “10 Misleading Expressions 1-5” and “6-10.”  They were professionally recorded at one of the Powerpoint talks Lee, of blessed memory, said we gave over fifty times to area men’s clubs, sisterhoods, Hadassah and the like chapters, a couple Christian groups, a cigar club (really), and at The House That Mort Built.  We have this weekly email in which I’m itching to include instances of yours in which you’ve done something it says in the Pledge.  We’re working on a pamphlet with a checklist of dirty words, with brief explanations, which we hope to disseminate to and through you to our reachable fellow grassroots American Jews.  There’s some skepticism among my FactsOnIsrael.Com,Inc., cohorts that I’ll hear back from you.  But I have faith in the grassroots American Jewish street.  Should I?