Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume LXXXI: Migrants from Morocco

On Thursday, a large influx of migrants (reportedly 60,000) crossed from Morocco into Ceuta, a Spanish exclave on the mainland African coast. This has led to a lot of far-right chirping and no small number of conspiracy theories. And where there are conspiracy theories, well, you know what's going to follow -- it's a Zionist plot, done to "punish" Spain for its pro-Palestine advocacy.

At first it was just the usual assortment of Twitter randos, notable only for giving us the never-before-uttered phrase "Zionist-occupied Morocco". But it has definitely broken containment. Al-Jazeera has a "just raising questions" column that doesn't allow a complete lack of evidence to interfere with a "[w]hether Israel is indeed involved ... remains to be seen" conclusion. Then Javier Bardem got in on the action, with a profoundly weird Instagram post implying that actually Morocco is a European power invading African Spain (with the same "we don't know who engineered this crisis", but we sure feel confident suggesting it's Israel!).

One thing this particular incident inspired me to do is reflect on how I deal with statements blaming "Zionists" or "Israel" in this series. It's called Things People Blame the Jews For, and as approximately three million BlueSky users are quick to remind us, "Jew" is not a synonym of "Israel" or "Zionist". And of course, I do not contest that Israel does any number of things for which it can be "blamed" for (and which it would never occur to me to put into this series). So what does make a "blame the Zionists" post TPBTJF-qualified?

The basic answer is that I'll include an incident if it's clear that "Israel" or "Zionist" is standing in for the role Jews have historically occupied in conspiracy theories -- as a ready-available source of blame for generic bad things that have no significant connection to Israel or Jews at all (beyond the normal connections that can always be found between one significant social group and another). People race to that explanation not because it's objectively all that plausible, but because it will always feel plausible to those for whom "it's the Jews fault" always has an above-baseline ring of truth to it.

If one buys into the "punishment" argument, one could basically say that any bad thing that happens to any country which is critical of Israel can be plausibly suggested to trace back to Israeli malfeasance (see also: Egypt suffered from some controversial World Cup calls because Israel). This is very convenient for the leaders of said country, but not very convenient for people actually interested in the true sources of said bad thing.

Permanent Hypermilitaristic Suppression of Palestinians Hasn't Failed Because It's Never Been Tried?

In a recent blog post, Nachum Kaplan claims that the shift in Israel's security orientation post-10/7 stems from its rejection of "the West's most dangerous illusions." It begins as follows:

October 7th was a catastrophic security failure for Israel and an intellectual demolition.

In a matter of hours, assumptions that had governed Israeli strategy for decades were exposed as manifestly inadequate.

So far, so good. Indeed, immediately after the attacks, I said something to this effect:

Hamas' operation represents an explosive repudiation of the notion that Gaza and Hamas could be besieged into obedience. The right-wing fantasy-nightmare that Israelis could (only) be kept safe through ever-greater oppression of Palestinians has been finally and completely falsified. From an Israel security standpoint, the rightwing playbook has only accomplished an unprecedented endangerment of Israeli lives in service of the furthest right-wing fringe. At what point do we say these policies are leading to nowhere but universal damnation?

Except, somehow, these aren't the "assumptions" Kaplan has in mind. In his telling, the policy structure that was exposed as inadequate is a brainchild of liberal internationalism inspired by post-war Europe, centered around shared economic prosperity and political integration. What is replacing it is a "harder" view of power, one that rejects the belief "that every conflict is a misunderstanding, every enemy a potential partner, and every murderous ideology an unmet socioeconomic need waiting for a development grant to address."

This makes me want to scream. I simply do not understand how someone can look at Israeli policy towards Gaza over the decade or so leading up to 10/7 and think it was characterized by economic interdependence under the umbrella of diplomacy and a rules-based international order that would keep everyone safe. That's just not what the policy was. It borders on delusion to assert that's what the policy was. The policy was that Gaza could be kept under indefinite conditions of besiegement and economic isolation, and Israel could successfully avoid significant security blowback because of its vastly superior military and intelligence apparatus.

That's the policy that was in place on 10/7. That the policy that failed on 10/7. It is maddening that the political faction that was in power on 10/7, and for virtually all of the preceding twenty years leading up to 10/7, and whose political raison d'etre was to savagely dismantle any semblance of this liberal, diplomatic, Oslo-inspired policy because it was not sufficiently "realist", can invert reality on this. It was not the liberals who set the policies or priorities that prevailed on 10/7. So why are we acting as if their outlook is what failed? Why are we acting as if "diplomacy and political resolutions are dead ends; the only thing that matters is the size of our tanks" is a strategic pivot, as opposed to returning to the same dry well?

If you want to be skeptical of political resolutions, I don't begrudge that skepticism. It's entirely understandable to imagine a future where there is a decisive political resolution imposed to "settle" the Israel/Palestine conflict, one which at least purports to protect the political, economic, and security interests of all parties, and it still ends up collapsing back into terrible violence and mayhem and oppression. But if you are going to be skeptical of that imagined, as-yet-unattempted future, then surely one must be at least as skeptical of the very real, absolutely-attempted past and present that fervently asserted military might was the only thing that truly mattered. One you are imagining to fail, the other already actually has failed.

Again, the inversion of who has to explain themselves to who is infuriating. Kaplan concludes by demanding that "those promising coexistence, deterrence through prosperity, or security through international guarantees must now answer a more brutal question. What happens when you are wrong?"

To which I want to reply, what if you're wrong? No, check that: you already were wrong! Kaplan's belief is that a "harder" view of Palestinians, one that is less concerned with diplomatic niceties or economic development (to say nothing of political equality) and one that relies on "military capability, credible deterrence, intelligence competence, and the willingness to use force" will keep Israel safe. That view is not a departure from the one that governed on 10/7, it is the view that was in force on 10/7 and which failed on 10/7. In a sane world, we who supported political equality and diplomatic resolution would not need to restore our credibility to the militarists, they would need to restore their credibility to us.

Perhaps Kaplan wants an "but even more so" version of the preceding years militarism. But we still, we can ask "what if you're wrong?" What if, it turns out, the near-exclusive reliance on military might, and the belief that Palestinians can be subjected to political subordination and economic devastation in perpetuity, does not prevent October 7ths from occurring? We have powerful evidence from experience on this point. And even if Kaplan wants to contest that his version of military power über alles is different from the prior iterations, "[w]hat cannot seriously be disputed is that the burden of proof has changed."

But people like Kaplan seem to genuinely not see this. And that is wild to me.

Avoiding the Obvious

Rabbi Seth Winberg, executive director of Hillel at Brandeis, has an interesting/infuriating essay up on JTA about the growing number of young Jews who express preference for a single, binational democratic state in Israel/Palestine. Winberg specifically is focusing on a subset of these Jews, those who are not true anti-Zionist believers but who remain supportive -- at least in concept -- of Israel as a Jewish, democratic state. What explains their support of this plan?

To this question, Winberg gives a summary that is, more or less, exactly correct.

The first, two states for two peoples, looks dead after the peace process has repeatedly failed to deliver that outcome for their entire lives. It’s certainly not an option according to the Israeli consensus, with only 15% of Israeli Jews currently supporting two states. 

The second, in which Israel annexes the West Bank and Gaza and rules millions of Palestinians who cannot vote, seems to be the vision of Israel’s current government.

The third option, one democratic country, imagines equal rights for everyone. To a young American of decent instincts and thin knowledge of the region, schooled to see the conflict as a matter of racial equality, the last sounds like simple justice: one person, one vote.  

This, broadly speaking, is exactly correct (if maybe a bit patronizingly put). There are three possible solutions to the conflict: some form of a two-state solution, a one-state solution without equal rights (i.e., apartheid), or a one-state solution with equal rights. If the apartheid option is viewed as unacceptable, and the two-state solution is viewed as unfeasible, that leaves door #3. It's really not that complicated. And if you're aghast at young Jews picking door #3, then your options are either to make apartheid sound acceptable (hopefully not) or make a two-state solution seem feasible. Again, not that complicated.

But here is where things fly off course. Instead of accepting the obvious point, Winberg veers off into a long digression about connections to Jewish peoplehood and imbrication in Jewish texts and patriotism and distinguishing between country and government. It's long and meandering and frankly I had trouble following it, but more importantly it just has nothing to do with the problem he accurately identified above.

Let's say a group of the young Jews in question takes on Winberg's ideal course of study. They spend a year in his dojo, burying themselves in Jewish text and ritual. They emerge with a genuine, emotive connection to the entirety of the Jewish people -- in Israel, in America, and around the world. They know full well the difference between country and government. They are proudly part of a live and living Jewish tradition.

They then return to the above trilemma: two states, one apartheid state, or one equal binational state. What's changed? Do they now find apartheid attractive? I hope not! Do they now see two-states as more feasible? I don't see why. Nothing has changed, and so nothing will change. The basic trilemma is identical to what it was before, and so the outcome will be the same as it is before.

Everything Winberg is suggesting about cultivating Jewish connection and peoplehood and authentic bonds may be good for its own sake. None of it changes the dynamics of the problem he's accurately identified. And the most maddening feature of all is that the answer to that problem actually is obvious. If you don't like the binational one-state option, and you're not willing to endorse the apartheid one-state option, then the only move is to do whatever you can to make a two-state solution viable. Actually viable, not just a talking point. That should be the full-court press move of Winberg and all the other Jewish organizations fretting about this problem. Do whatever it takes to bring a two-state solution to fruition, no matter who's standing in the way.

Of course, framed that way, it's obvious why the obvious solution is resisted. In the present moment, genuine, material, full-throated support for a two-state solution puts one in sharp opposition to the Israeli government (and a pretty wide swath of the Israeli Jewish populace too). That opposition is not just rhetorical, it'd be material too -- the government would actively be sabotaging your proposed initiatives, and so many of your initiatives would be directly antagonistic to the government (anything from sanctioning price tag terrorists to imposing boycotts on settlement goods to recognizing a Palestinian state on 1967 borders). For all the talk about separating the concept of Israel-as-a-Jewish-state from a particular suite of government policies, this is what Winberg and his ilk recoil from. They cannot bring themselves to occupy the position of clear and vocal opponents of the Israeli government.  They also cannot bring themselves to endorse either of the two alternatives to the two-state solution. So they start spinning out long complex essays with long complex proposals that sound attractive except for the part that they change nothing about the fundamental problem, which is that you have to back either two-states, one-state with apartheid, or one-state binationalism.

I'm picking on Winberg's essay not because it is unique, but because it is of a type. The trilemma above is a variation on the trilemma we've known about for years: Israel can be Jewish, democratic, or in control of the West Bank and Gaza -- pick two. You can pick any two, but you can only pick two. And everyone kind of knows this, but also resists actually picking the two. They say "it's essential for Israel to be a Jewish, democratic state." Okay, then you must support ending the occupation? "Well," they hem and haw, "I'm not sure about the timing, and there are genuine security needs, and after 10/7 Israel can't be expected to cede control over Palestinian territories." Okay, so if Israel has to stay in control over these territories, democracy means that the Palestinians who live there must get equal voting rights, yes? "No -- that would mean the end of Israel as a Jewish state!" "So control of the territory but no equal rights ... apartheid then?" "How dare you! Israel must be Jewish and democratic." Round and round we go.

There's a lot about Israel/Palestine that is complicated. But this part of it is not complicated. Winberg is right that even among young Jews, there is not a wholesale rejection of the idea of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. What is there is a wholesale rejection of apartheid and a fatalistic sense that a two-state solution is unfeasible. That leaves one equal state. If one doesn't like being left there, your choices are to make apartheid okay again or to make a two-solution viable again. There isn't another move.

DMFI Yields To Rahm-Bo

As you may have heard, former Chicago Mayor (and Obama White House Chief of Staff) Rahm Emanuel went to Israel and delivered a tough love address: lambasting "Greater Israel" and calling for an array of sanctions on Israeli politicians, businesses, and other figures who support violence against Palestinians or illegal West Bank settlements.

To me, this matters only in terms of "which way the wind blows". Despite often seeing Rahm's name next to the words "2028 presidential candidate", I don't see any universe where he's viable in the Democratic primary. Nonetheless, it's clear that Rahm views taking a stance like this as crucial to having any future in Democratic politics (which is not to say he doesn't believe what he's saying -- I'm actually very confident he does -- only that it matches up with his raw political calculation). And, whatever one thinks about Rahm in general, it is absolutely a good thing that someone who still holds certain cachet in certain circles is talking like this. Rightly or wrongly, when he speaks in these terms, it koshers certain discourses and positions in a way that a generic replacement Democrat couldn't do.

And in similarly meteorological-but-not-practical data, I was very intrigued to see that Democratic Majority for Israel issued a statement praising Emanuel's speech. Again, that matters not because I see DMFI as an especially relevant or influential institution (it's in fact been impressively inept throughout its existence), but because Emanuel's jeremiad was of the sort one would have expected DMFI to be appalled by (Sanctions? On Israel? Heavens to Murgatroyd!). And a few years ago, had a speech like this been given, I bet they would have expressed apoplexy -- but then, a few years ago, Rahm Emanuel would not have delivered this speech. The significance here, I think, is that DMFI can no longer hold the line on unblinking support for Israel in Democratic Party politics in a world where even folks like Rahm Emanuel are challenging it. DMFI may be dim, but they're not so dim as to think that they could retain any practical relevancy as Democrats in a universe where they're trying to throw Rahm Emanuel out of the tent.

Hillel International Forbids Middlebury Chapter From Staying, Leaving

The Jewish students involved in Middlebury College's Hillel want to disaffiliate from Hillel International, citing (among other things) disagreement over implementation over the latter's "partnership policies."

Middlebury College’s Hillel student board made the decision last week after a yearlong consultation process with active participants in the campus organization, university administrators and Hillel International leadership, according to the student group’s co-presidents. The board also voted to disaffiliate from Hillel International, but were told by Middlebury’s administration that they lacked the authority to take that action, the co-presidents told the Middlebury campus newspaper.

The student group, renamed to Jewish Association of Middlebury, will continue to perform similar functions as Hillels do on hundreds of campuses around the world — holding events around Shabbat and Jewish holidays and other Jewish religious and social programming. The board says it will maintain an on-paper link with Hillel without adhering to its guidelines, and it will not receive any funding from the organization.

The response from Hillel International has been ... interesting:

Hillel International, which does not employ a rabbi or any professional staff at Middlebury, said in a statement that it was currently reviewing Hillel’s affiliation status with the college to confirm it will ensure that JAM “adheres to our mission and standards.”

“Hillel is committed to supporting all Jewish students — from all types of backgrounds and with a diversity of views and beliefs on a range of issues including Israel,” the statement in part read. “At the same time, we are a proudly Zionist organization, and do not provide a platform for programming that denies Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish and democratic state within secure borders.

“All campus Hillels — even those that are just a student group without dedicated professional Hillel staff — are expected to operate in line with our mission, vision, values, and policies.”

[....] 

At the university’s behest, the students then met virtually with Hillel International, whose representative reiterated that the board members must universally adopt Hillel International’s political views and values about Israel, according to the Campus. But the representative also conceded that it couldn’t stop the students from changing the organization’s name.

“We said we want to disaffiliate, and they said you can’t. And we said, well, we’re going to change the name anyway. And they said, we can’t stop you,” Jaffe said.

So to recap: the Middlebury Jewish students object to following the partnership guidelines. Hillel says campus chapters have to follow the partnership guidelines. So the students say they want to disaffiliate from Hillel. They're told they can't. So the students say they won't follow the partnership guidelines. And Hillel says ... they're reviewing the chapter's affiliation status?

Forgive me, but what exactly is Hillel's endgame here? Disaffiliation? That's what the students wanted to begin with! It's just a farce at this point: "We're leaving" "You can't leave" "Well we're not following your rules" "Then we'll kick you out!"

I'm a general opponent of campus witch hunts targeting Hillel, which often does essential work as a center for Jewish life on campus. But it is the case that the national office of Hillel has a tendency to forget that it ultimately serves Jewish students, not the other way around, and this is yet another instance of Hillel resisting its badly needed dose of democracy. The reason why Hillel constantly steps in it when it comes to applying the partnership guidelines (among other issues) is that it lacks meaningful democratic accountability to its students. If the Jewish students of Middlebury involved in Hillel want to raise money for World Central Kitchen's relief efforts in Gaza (the incident which apparently set this whole train in motion), that's their prerogative, and it's outrageous that the national body thinks it should be entitled to intercede against it. 

Finally, it would be easy to connect the Middlebury students' decision with broader campaigns aimed at boycotting or rejecting Hillel as a "Zionist" or "Israel-connected" institutions. However, while their problems with Hillel International are certainly related to that organization's narrowness on Israel and Zionism, it's important to stress that the Middlebury students are very much not framing their decision as a general rejection of "Israel" or "Zionism":

“Let us be clear: this decision is not a rebuke of Zionism, Zionist students, or the importance of Israel to many in the Jewish community,” a Dec. 2025 email to JAM membership read. “Rather, it reflects a desire to create the most welcoming and pluralistic space possible.”

This choice, in other words, was not made by a group of radical purists who couldn't countenance brushing up against anything associated with the "Zionist entity." Rather, it was forced by a national office made up of, well, radical purists who couldn't countenance brushing up against anything associated with support for Palestinians. The latter category includes many Jews who most certainly do not see Israel as a dirty word, but nonetheless find themselves personae non gratae in too many Jewish spaces.

Prosecuting Our Military When It Murders

The United States military continues to carry out illegal strikes on civilian boats allegedly engaged in drug trafficking.

The case that this is criminal is, in my view, not close. Contrary to the President's assertions, there is no serious argument that we are in the midst of an armed conflict with ... who exactly? Drug traffickers? Their behavior (if indeed the boaters are engaged in wrongful activity at all, which is hardly assured) is the epitome of criminal misconduct, which must be dealt with via criminal proceedings. We do not get to fire rockets at the vehicles of suspected criminals. And even if one could strain to argue that this falls under a military engagement, the follow-up strikes on shipwrecked sailors violates longstanding rules in the law of warfare. We literally sentenced Nazis to death for doing this.

There is a lot of enthusiasm for "prosecutions" amongst Democrats now. I share that enthusiasm. We must make clear that, if and when Democrats retake power, there will be consequences for the criminal activities that have run rampant through this administrative. And in many ways, this represents both an easy and an important case. 

It's easy because not only is the law incredibly clear, but there's no difficulty identifying the responsible party. This isn't a situation where we have to track down a masked unknown grunt who stood out for particularly brutal aggression (as in many of the ICE cases), or alternatively, where we have to do difficult work in tying said grunt's actions to specific orders from higher-ups. Here the military context makes command responsibility obvious, and the commanding General, Francis Donovan, is named in the Pentagon press releases bragging about the "operations".

It's important because restoring the applicability of law of war principles to the U.S. military is of absolute existential importance for a nation with the most powerful military on the planet. Without downplaying the many, many breaches, there is a huge difference between a military that is internally committed to law of war rules and one that from the top decides to openly flout them. The latter situation is how you do start seeing what Trump wanted to do, but couldn't, in term 1 -- deploying the full might of the American military apparatus against the American citizenry to retain a dictatorial grip on power.

And on top of all that, of all the potential criminals one might find harbored by the Trump administration, General Donovan is probably among the most vulnerable. The president's pardon power does seem to extend at least partially into the realm of military justice (and in fact, Trump has already pardoned several war criminals). but it seems clear to me that the pardon power cannot completely obstruct a future Commander-in-Chief's power to drum out of service an officer whom the CinC lacks faith in as a legitimate holder of rank and service. Of everybody implicated in Trumpist crimes, those in the military are, formally speaking, probably the least insulated from facing accountability from a future administration.

But in spite of all that, I suspect that prosecuting General Donovan and his compatriots responsible for criminal actions on the high seas will be much more fraught and less popular than essentially any other prosecution a future administration might bring. The political gravity pulling against prosecuting members of the military -- regardless of the context -- is just going to be too strong. Rightly or wrongly, I suspect it will be insurmountable for any junior officers or enlisted men involved in the operation. And even for the senior leadership, I can't imagine it going over well even in a context where there is a significant demand to prosecute, say, ICE leaders or Trump associates found to have embezzled money.

I don't have a good answer for this because, again, the need to restore deterrence here is nothing short of existential. We've seen in the Israeli case -- it barely managed to limp across a conviction in 2016 when IDF soldier Elor Azaria shot an unarmed Palestinian, and just doing that nearly tore the country apart. That set the stage for the non-prosecution decision for soldiers accused of sexual abuse of Palestinian detainees ten years later -- a decision that again came on the heels of widespread government intervention (including joining in outright rioting) in support of the abusers. The culture of impunity that's developed in the intervening years no doubt plays no small role in the brutal devastation the IDF has wreaked against civilian infrastructure in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon (the soldiers punished for vandalizing a Jesus statute had every reasonable expectation of assuming they'd be let off scot-free were it not for the  bad fortune of angering one of the few foreign constituencies the Israeli government still cares about appeasing). As disastrous as that trajectory has been in the Israeli case, I don't think they're in any way unique -- most countries (and certainly our country) blanches at holding their uniformed military personnel accountable for misdeeds.

So I don't know. It might that these prosecutions, or other retributive measures, have to be a little less media-forward than others. They might not be political winners (and to be clear, I do think that going after corrupt Trump apparatchiks will, in general, very much be a political winner in addition to being the right thing to do). But it still needs to be done.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume LXXVIII: Lack of Pedophilic Incest Options

There is a paradox at the heart of this series. Its core premise is that if one looks hard enough (and honestly, not too hard), one can find someone blaming the Jews for anything. But precisely because of that, it is almost uninteresting when the blamer is some complete internet rando. It's more "fun" when it's someone of at least marginal import or influence.

Our character today does have an X blue check, but that doesn't mean anything nowadays -- it's literally just an indicator that your content is paid promotion. So it probably is a complete rando. But some complete randos manage to transcend their humble origins and deserve their moment of spotlight. And so here, I present a man earnestly complaining that if it weren't for Israel, he'd have a baby sister he could groom.

Blech.

This also demonstrates one of the oddities of this series, which is that sometimes the Jews are falsely "blamed" for something that's actually good. Way before this series ever started, I remember finding a quote by the President of Sudan blaming Jews for ... causing people to protest against the Darfur genocide. Probably not entirely attributable to us, but also, I wouldn't ashamed if it was. Likewise, I actually don't think the Jewish State is why this man can’t be an incestuous pedophile, but if you're going to give away the credit, hey, I'm not going to object too loudly.

Iron Dome and the Leveraging of Civilian Death

While there is by now a relatively large contingent of Democrats opposing the sale of offensive weaponry to Israel, we're also seeing a growing push to try and forestall the sale of defensive weapons to Israel as well (most notably, the Iron Dome missile defense system). Iron Dome intercepts missiles and rockets being fired at Israel by groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, and in doing so has saved countless civilian lives. Unsurprisingly, the endeavor to strip Israeli civilians of these protections is far more controversial than the effort to bar the sale of additional offensive weapons to Israel -- it seems to demarcate a clear difference between wanting to preserve Palestinian life versus wanting to extinguish Israeli lives.

So what is the argument against providing Israel with Iron Dome? This article in +972 provides an illustrative example of the case, which runs basically as follows: the existence of Iron Dome enables Israel to engage in military aggression without having to internalize the costs. Israel feels free to engage in military attacks basically at will, secure in the knowledge that any attempted reprisals will be blocked. By contrast, if Israel was more vulnerable to military attacks -- if it had to reckon with the reality that "the other side" really can hurt them too -- it would be more judicious about electing to commence its own military operations. An Israel which was forced to more tangibly endure the costs of the wars it started might be forced to consider other approaches to solving its various diplomatic (or even security) dilemmas beyond just bombing the problem away. And the hope is that, where all parties face real risk of injury or destruction, all parties will be more reluctant to resort to militarism in the first place.

There is a logic to this argument. But it isn't as straightforward as it sounds, and there is both a strategic and a moral objection one could level against it.

Start with the strategic objection. The above logic assumes that a country which is more vulnerable to external security threats will be less inclined to commence its own military operations (since doing so would risk triggering reprisals which, by stipulation, might cause it serious injury). Again, this logic is not implausible. But neither is it incontestable. Another story one could tell is that a country which faces substantial security vulnerabilities may become more aggressive, because the reality of a substantial security threat makes certain risks which might otherwise be tolerable become intolerable. If one gets intelligence that a militant group on your border is accumulating missiles, the way you respond if you're confident those missiles can be intercepted without causing significant harm is very different from the way you respond if those missiles pose a severe and substantial threat to your civilian population. The latter nation may be far more likely to attack preemptively in circumstances where the former country may not feel the need for an immediate proactive response.

In Israel's case, after all, the most concrete recent instantiation of Israel having to reckon with a significant security vulnerability -- a severe threat to its civilian population that it was unable to stop -- was October 7 itself. And no matter how one characterizes what happened next, the one thing that I think is entirely indisputable is that Israel reckoning with real and genuine security vulnerability did not cause it to pull back from militarism due to being forced to account for the possibility that the other side can really hurt them. Much the opposite: the concrete illustration of an acute security vulnerability made Israel lightyears more aggressive and more militaristic than it was before. A security situation it had previously thought it had "managed" now had revealed itself to be incalculably more dangerous than they realized, and the result of that realization was, to say the least, not a sober reassessment of the merits of military action.

Now, to be sure, I don't want to say that this argument is necessarily "right" either. Again, the initial critique has a logic to it as well; my suspicion is that the actual play-out will not vindicate either narrative without qualification. The point is simply to say that it is not self-evident, as it is sometimes presented to be, that taking away Iron Dome will yield a more cautious and less belligerent Israel.

But now let's go ahead and accept the premise. If we don't provide Israel with Iron Dome, it will be less militaristic, to the greater good of all. If one is in fact persuaded by this premise, I still think it is important to be very clear on what the core logic of this approach is. Clear away the rhetorical fog, and the argument here is simply this:

If more Israeli civilians were endangered or died, things would be better.

Again, I will reiterate: I accept there is an instrumental logic to this. The argument is not that Israeli deaths are good for their own sake, it's that they will prompt Israel to be more cautious and restrained, and ultimately reduce the net amount of conflict and warfare in the reason. My challenge above notwithstanding, this argument is not transparently absurd.

Nonetheless, we shouldn't obscure the point. The argument against Iron Dome is, by its nature, consciously attempting to leverage the endangerment of civilians for (noble) strategic ends. It is by no means the only argument that takes such a form: one need not venture far from Israel proper to hear other renditions of such a claim, that permitting greater endangerment of civilians will ultimately bring about peace faster. And all I will say to this is that there are good reasons why, bloodless strategic logic notwithstanding, progressives might want to draw a redline around arguments like this, and that if we do not draw such a line ourselves we cannot act too appalled when others don't draw redlines against other attempts to leverage the endangerment of civilians for good policy ends. For my part, I fully admit I lack the stomach to put innocent civilians at greater risk for the greater good, and I'm proud of my shortcoming in that respect.

I'll be honest though -- my gut sense is that the driving force behind those who want to take away Iron Dome is not any sort of assessment of the strategic debate I outlined above at all. It is a more primal rebellion against the perceived unfairness of it all: that Israel can wreak so much death and destruction on its neighbors and face comparatively little in return. I don't doubt that, for most of these people, the genuine hope really is a reduction in violence and death for everyone. But my strong suspicion is that, if that doesn't come to pass, a tolerable second-best outcome would be if Israeli civilian deaths rose to approach those of their neighbors. If it turns out that the elimination of Iron Dome does nothing other than get a bunch more Israeli civilians killed -- it does not make Palestinians safer, it perhaps even puts them in more immediate peril -- well, we still have a karmic retribution if nothing else, and that's worth it on its own. And while I guess I can wrap my head around the egalitarian sentiment behind this, once again, I lack the stomach to engineer greater civilian death, even under as noble a rubric as "fairness".

Of course, not everybody is me. But if you are inclined towards opposing Israel having the Iron Dome based on the sketch provided above, I would ask that you have the courage to own your conviction. You are okay with leveraging civilian endangerment in order to achieve your desired policy ends. You of a kind with many other people, of many other ideological persuasions and of many other partisan loyalties across many other conflicts, that hold similar beliefs. Take note of the company you keep.

Leader Cannot Fail, He Can Only Be Betrayed

Almost as soon as America began its latest round of military strikes on Iran a sizable number of GOP officials have sought to frame Trump's decision as coming at the behest of Israel. From the outset, it seemed obvious to me why the GOP was taking this approach -- "it gives them a ready-made escape hatch if things go south".* It is impossible for Republicans concede that Trump did wrong. But it is possible to argue that he's been misled or betrayed. And so it struck me as inevitable that "[w]hen, in however many months/years, the GOP tries to run from this calamity, the line they will take about where they went astray will 100% be 'we were dragged into this by the Jews.'"

One should obviously read the Joe Kent resignation letter -- which contends that the Iran War (and the Iraq War, and America's intervention in Syria) all occurred at the behest of "Israel and its powerful American lobby" -- in this light. It gives Kent far too much credit to treat him as an isolationist naif who foolishly believed the "Donald the Dove" talk. Kent has no history of non-interventionism (he has a well-known history of bigotry and neo-Nazi associations). But as petroleum prices skyrocket, global trade routes are snarled, and the war labors under massive domestic unpopularity, the number of conservatives looking for a parachute is rapidly rising even as conspiratorial antisemitism is rapidly becoming the dominant force in conservative politics. Kent's resignation is not principle, it is opportunism -- he's looking for how best to flee his sinking ship.

But how can one do that, without committing the one absolutely unforgivable sin in conservative politics? Well, if one reads the letter, it is very careful not to blame Donald Trump. He is still wonderful. He is still a great man. Alas, he has been coaxed against his better judgment into this disaster by (((them))). They lie, they deceive, and Trump was caught in the middle. This framing was inevitable; it's the only way to metabolize viewing the war as a disaster while retaining the MAGA cult of personality. After all, if Trump is a God-like figure, who could possibly sway him off the righteous path other than those practiced in deicide?

And of course, what goes for his lackeys goes infinite for Trump. He will never admit error and misjudgment. There always must be someone else to blame. And Israel, for a host of reasons, makes for a very attractive "someone". We're already seeing a marked shift in Trump's tone on Israel, criticizing the latter's strike on the South Pars Gas Field in Iran. To my ears, that's laying groundwork. The worse things get, or the more this war gets blamed as an anchor on the economy or GOP polling numbers, the more we can expect to see Israel become the prime villain in a stabbed-in-the-back narrative. Anyone who thinks Trump is incapable of or even reluctant to turn on his erstwhile friend and ally isn't paying attention. As always, the notion that Israel would come out ahead in a world where liberal democratic values were supplanted by ethno-nationalist authoritarianism was fanciful.

None of this, to be clear, means that Israel shouldn't be accountable for its own choices. It also made a choice to go to war with Iran, and it can't hide from responsibility for the ensuing fallout. Israel is responsible for Israel's choices, and America is responsible for America's choices. But of course, the defining feature of MAGA-era conservativism is a complete and absolute refusal to take responsibility for anything. It must be someone else's fault. And when the time comes to stop claiming credit and start assigning blame, you can be very sure that Israel and those associated with it (i.e., Jews) will be top of the list. It can't go any other way.

* As I also observed, it is less clear -- by which I mean it is entirely clear -- why certain Democrats also acceded to this framing, as if the prospect that Donald Trump might make reckless warmongering decisions was some sort of bizarre anomaly only explicable via external intervention.

Malinowski Warns About AIPAC Malinowski-ing Other Malinowskis

A few weeks ago, there was a shock upset in the Democratic special election primary for New Jersey's 11th congressional district. The frontrunner, former U.S. Rep. Tom Malinowski, was long regarded as a pro-Israel moderate. But he faced an avalanche of AIPAC-funded opposition because he signaled willingness to condition aid to Israel.

As is AIPAC's wont, its spending against Malinowski did not generally relate to Israel -- they funded ads attacking him from the left (as allegedly pro-ICE), for instance. But the result of their intervention was perhaps unexpected -- it did not elevate a more orthodox pro-Israel contender to the top of the polls, but rather resulted in a further-left and far more Israel-critical Democrat (Analilia Mejia) surging to victory.

I've written quite a bit about this outcome on Bluesky, of which the basic summary is that AIPAC's conduct will have the effect of (and may be intended to have the effect of) squeezing out moderate pro-Israel Democrats who nonetheless find Bibi-or-bust to no longer be tenable, and the main beneficiaries of that squeeze-out will be more Squad-like progressive critics like Mejia. That AIPAC has defended its spending spree in the NJ-11 notwithstanding this result suggests that they are actually fine with sacrificing mainstream pro-Israel Democrats in favor of more sharp Israel critics. 

Why? My speculation is that someone like Malinowski represents a more immediate threat to AIPAC's monopoly over "pro-Israel" politics. A Jewish individual who is very attached to Israel, but is repulsed by the extremism that typifies the current Israeli government, is more likely to be willing to defect from AIPAC to a Malinowski type than to a Mejia. Way back in my Tablet Mag days I wrote about how Jewish conservatives had an incentive to shrink the pro-Israel tent if it meant solidifying its control over the content of that tent, and this is an example of that. So while I don't think AIPAC believes the NJ-11 outcome is a positive, exactly, it isn't as much of a negative as one might think. More than anything else, AIPAC wants to sabotage the emergence of any political movement that couples care and concern for Israel, its legitimate security needs and democratic prerogatives, with care and concern for Palestinians, their legitimate democratic aspirations and human rights entitlements.

And so my ultimate takeaway was pretty simple: "[I]f you at all think of yourself as in the lane of 'I care about Israel but they, and we, need to change course substantially to align with basic liberal values', AIPAC is your mortal enemy trying to destroy your movement." And while they "will not succeed in stemming the tide of Democrats who no longer are willing to kowtow to any and all Israeli abuses," they "may succeed ... in ensuring that the new Democrats who win elections don’t have any residual affinity for Israel at all."

Anyway, that was my perspective. But I was pleased to see today that Malinowski has published an essay suggesting he basically endorses my view.

Late last year, an AIPAC official told me that the organization was concerned by a statement I had made that the United States should make case-by-case judgements about Israeli requests for military aid, based on what is happening on the ground (a standard I would apply to all U.S. partners, including Ukraine and Taiwan). He added: “Some of our members are also concerned you’ll be influential in Congress” because of my past foreign policy experience.

The implication was that AIPAC considered a small challenge to its hard line of unconditional support for the current Israeli government from someone like me to be scarier than electing a person hostile to the very concept of Zionism, but to whom Democrats might not listen.

But if AIPAC’s definition of “pro-Israel” now demands blind a embrace of and funding for policies that even most Americans with a lifelong commitment to Israeli security cannot in good conscience support—like the violent expulsion of West Bank Palestinians from their homes—and if it requires smearing even the most moderate elected officials who ask questions about those policies, the number of Americans (and the number of members of Congress) who pass its test will be too small to sustain any kind of relationship with the Jewish state.

And he also suggests what I suggest, which is that Democrats need to be explicit in treating AIPAC as what it is -- part of the opposing MAGA coalition. 

But Democrats are not without leverage here, if they have the guts to use it. For one thing, these special interest organizations need to maintain at least the illusion of bipartisanship. AIPAC is a case in point. Its biggest donors are pro-Trump billionaires, but most of its members are Democrats. If Democratic leaders collectively were to refuse its support, instead of letting it pick off candidates one by one, AIPAC would face a crisis of identity and legitimacy. Democrats running for Senate and for president, who will have the resources to match whatever super PACs throw at them, should lead the way in rejecting endorsements and telling these groups they don’t want their help.

On that note, retiring Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) -- another venerable Jewish Democrat occupying the pro-Israel, pro-Palestine, pro-peace lane -- has pulled her endorsement of a fellow Democrat running for a (different) Illinois House seat because she's accepted AIPAC money. It's taken a couple cycles, but AIPAC's brand is increasingly toxic amongst Democrats -- and that's a problem wholly of their own making.

Why Should We View the JDL as a "False Equivalency"?

A few weeks ago, there was a protest in front of a New York City synagogue which was hosting a real estate event featuring, in part, properties in Jerusalem. Pro-Palestine protesters, notably, chanted their support for Hamas ("Say it loud, say it clear, we support Hamas here."), the internationally-recognized terrorist organization responsible for (among other crimes) the massacres on October 7. A smaller group of pro-Israel protesters affiliated with the far-right Jewish Defense League chanted their own racist slogans, including "death to Palestine."

The next day, NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani released a statement condemning the pro-Hamas chants: "Chants in support of a terrorist organization have no place in our city." There was some consternation about the supposed delay (of one day), but it appears that time lag occurred because Mamdani was consulting with high-level members of the Jewish community to ensure he got the statement right.

I noticed at the time, though, that the ultimate statement rightfully condemned the pro-Hamas chanting but not the equally appalling that came from the JDL. "We support Hamas here" is a despicable thing to say anywhere, but especially in front of a synagogue. No person of conscience should defend it (it is not surprising that there are several notable left-wing figures who lack any such conscience). But "death to Palestine" is equally rancid and should be equally indefensible. So why was it not included in Mamdani's condemnation?

I suspected at the time that it was left out because some factions of the Jewish community would have denounced its inclusion. Many of these figures would claim that they do not, of course, defend the JDL or chants like "Death to Palestine". But they would present including it in Mamdani's statement as "both-sidesing" or "all lives mattering" or in some other way diluting of the message condemning the pro-Hamas chants. And it seems the reporting bears my intuition out. An earlier draft of the condemnation was going to condemn the Jewish Defense League, but it was removed following protests by Jewish leaders who viewed it as a "false equivalence."

This is rotten. It's not just that complaints about "both sidesing" lack legs when both sides really did chant despicable things. It's also the choice -- and it is a choice -- by certain Jewish leaders to decide that condemnations of pro-Palestine extremists are in some way "diluted" or are less sincere when they come tied to calling out pro-Israel extremists present at the same event. Why should we feel that way? I don't feel that way. In fact, I feel rather ill at the notion that someone might think my equal standing as a Jew is threatened by condemning phrases like "death to Palestine." What does that say about ourselves? What does that say about what we are saying about ourselves, that we make such demands?

This is, I think, the end result of the tremendously destructive road too many Jewish leaders have committed to trotting down, where we have become obsessed with "all lives mattering" or "us too-ism" to the point that anything that even purports to tie Jewish safety to any sort of political universalism or solidarity is presented as an affront. It is not unrelated to the bone-jarringly stupid choice by the ADL (among others) to self-consciously cut itself off from historic allies because antisemitism must be fought alone or not at all. I don't mean to suggest that there are not serious challenges in the relationships Jews have with other communities, historic allies included. But in all of these cases, we are choosing to isolate ourselves. These are not instances where we are being forced out of coalitions or compelled to go alone. We are choosing to believe that the entire concept of allyship is a form of disrespect.

We don't have to think like this. Nobody is forcing us to hear "chants of 'death to Palestine' have no place in our city" and decide it means "Jews are lesser." There's no reason to make that inference, and there are many reasons not to make that inference. And so while at one level I am glad that Mamdani was consulting with and attentive to Jewish community concerns in the wake of the synagogue protest, it is a very bad thing that we've decided our "concerns" compel him not to condemn obviously despicable and indefensible rhetoric from the likes of the JDL. That Jewish leaders -- especially Jewish leaders who do recognize how wretched the JDL is -- think in those terms speaks to rot in our own psyche that we need to address, and quick.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume LXXVII: The Maduro Abduction

It's 2026, and I can't think of a better way to ring in the new year than a fresh edition of "Things People Blame the Jews For."

Today's entrant comes from Venezuela, still reeling after America unlawfully abducted President Nicolas Maduro. At one level, it's understandable that people are trying to figure out exactly what happened. On another level, it's really obvious what happened: America unlawfully abducted President Nicolas Maduro.  Nobody is hiding the ball. There aren't a ton of layers to unpack here.

But if you're the new acting Vice President of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez, is it enough to state the obvious: America unlawfully abducted Nicolas Maduro? No -- there's got to be another angle:

“The governments of the world are simply shocked that it is the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela which is the victim and subject of an attack of this nature, which has, without a doubt, a Zionist tint,” said Rodriguez in a televised speech, according to the Mexican public broadcaster.

[...]

There was no evidence to suggest Israel had any role or even knowledge of the American plan to capture Maduro.

Unsurprisingly, it is Venezuela's beleaguered Jewish community that is going to bear the brunt of this, and they're already bracing for the worst:

Jewish community leaders ... reported that all Jewish institutions, including synagogues, had been ordered closed, and Jewish people were instructed to remain at home. Additionally, security around Jewish institutions had been heightened.

(The copy here is ambiguous as to whether the "order" came from the government or from Jewish community leaders as a safety precaution. Either way is bad; the former obviously would be much, much worse).

It's a little difficult to write about this, since it feels like such a side issue against the far greater problem that America invaded a sovereign nation to unlawfully abduct its head of state. Of course, there's little question that Maduro is a schmuck, and Venezuela would be better off without him at the helm. But speaking as the resident of a county currently led by a schmuck and which would be far better off without him at the helm, this doesn't license random foreign nations going in and unlawfully abducting the head of state. And one reason why doing that is bad is that the knock-on effects -- even for populations which may have very good reason to detest said head of state -- are very hard to predict and do not tend to redound well either to occupier or occupied. The United States, of all countries, should know that by now.

"Pro-Palestine" is a "They", Not An "It"

There is no doubt that one major development in American politics over Israel/Palestine over the last two years has been a dramatic expansion and mainstreaming of pro-Palestine political advocacy. It's no longer a given that all or nearly all politicians will ritualistically intone "I am pro-Israel." It's no longer the case that self-identified "pro-Palestine" actors are confined to a tiny fringe leafleting outside UC-Berkeley.

One upshot of this growth is pluralism. As a movement gets larger, it encompasses a wider range of perspectives. Social movements, I've long argued, "moderate as they mainstream", and this moderation effect often frustrates the original "hardcore" of the movement, who may view the newcomers as engaging in coopting or even selling out. The moderates, for their part, may well view the old guard as hidebound, extremists, or simply unrealistic. It's a common pattern, and it's pretty clear it's being replicated here as well.

That said, there are a lot of people with strong incentives to downplay this pluralism and instead treat pro-Palestine as a monolithic thing.

Consider the reports that, in the wake of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza, Hamas has launched a bloody crackdown on dissidents and rivals, including public executions of those they are accusing of being "collaborators". Given that this by all appearances is an extra-legal terror campaign against Palestinian civilians, one would expect it to be condemned, and one need not search far to find various pro-Israel voices running lines to the effect of "now that Israel isn't involved, 'pro-Palestine' groups are silent -- or even support it!" On the latter point, they're not making things up: the National Students for Justice in Palestine organization, following these reports of Hamas' killings, called for "death to collaborators" in apparent endorsement. As awful as it is to see, it appears there are prominent, non-fringe elements of the pro-Palestinian movement who more or less support Hamas engaging in violent terror not just against Israel (we knew that) but against Palestinians as well.

Yet, on another level, the pro-Israel voices I mentioned above are making something up, because the NSJP is by no means the only "pro-Palestine" organization out there, and in fact it is not at all difficult to find pro-Palestinian voices who are horrified by Hamas' rampage of terror. The Palestinian Authority lambasted Hamas' killings as "heinous crimes"; a Palestinian human rights NGO similarly accused Hamas of "extrajudicial executions" which "constitute a legal and moral crime that requires immediate condemnation and accountability."

In the abstract, there isn't anything especially odd or complicated here. "Pro-Palestine" is a "they", not an "it"; it contains a wide range of different groups and outlooks. Under that broad umbrella, why would it be hard to grasp that there might be some people who flatly support Hamas and others who find them risible?

But it's also not hard to see why many players in this drama are so enthusiastic on sweeping that pluralism under the rug. The pro-Israel commentators want the NSJP's pro-murder posts to be the paradigm example of what the pro-Palestinian movement stands for. "This is what this movement really is." In doing so, they can discredit all of the other members -- including those who are rightfully horrified by Hamas' brutality -- by association. And on the other side, obviously groups like NSJP have an incentive to present themselves as the sole and authentic representation of what "pro-Palestine" means. They want the broad, inchoate energy behind "pro-Palestine" to be channeled through them. Groups which take a softer or moderate tone are not allies, they are threats. And with strength in numbers and in unity, there is a lot of tacit pressure to defer to the leadership of established organizations and not disturb their decrees regarding what views "count" as pro-Palestine and what do not -- even if those decrees are often based more on internal political considerations than any healthy respect for pluralism and disagreement.

Yet incentives aside, we would all do better not to indulge in this game. One theme I've been returning to over the past several months is that many pro-Palestinian activists are speedrunning a realization many pro-Israel activists have also had to start grappling with: the reality that many -- not all or even potentially most, but many -- of the people who march under your flag really are exactly as extreme and nasty and blood-thirsty as your worst enemies describe them as. We like to think of these attacks as smears, and often they are insofar as they present sweeping and general guilt across the whole movement. But on the pro-Israel side, it actually is the case that there are many non-negligible figures whose outlook towards Palestinians is one of simple, naked racism; who do not remotely "just want peace"; who absolutely openly endorse human rights violations of the most vicious kind in the name of "security" or "greater Israel". And likewise, on the pro-Palestine side, it actually is the case that there are many non-negligible figures whose outlooks towards Israelis and Jews is one of simple, naked antisemitism; who do not remotely "just want peace"; who absolutely endorse human rights violations of the most vicious kind in the name of "decolonization" or "freeing Palestine." I and many other Jews who identified with Israel had to work through that reality, and so too must the pro-Palestine community work through the reality that it is not a slur or a slander or a bad-faith attack: groups like the NSJP really are right now endorsing Hamas' murder spree targeting Palestinian civilians.

However, this realization is not an accuse to swing all the way in the other direction. Those who endorse Hamas' murder spree are not an inauthentic, fringe, or fake part of "pro-Palestine", but neither are they the authentic, true, or sole representative of it either. The notion that every person who sat at a pro-Palestine campus encampment is now elated to see Hamas executing Palestinians in the streets is simply not credible. Pro-Palestine is a they, not an it. It is irresponsible to deny the presence of this particular faction; it is equally irresponsible to cede it the status of being the only relevant faction.

Grieving Choices Not Made

The big diplomatic news of the week is the rush of longtime Israel-supporting countries -- Canada,  France, Australia, and the UK among them -- announcing their formal recognition of Palestine as a state. Israel and its supporters have sought to discredit this move as "rewarding" Hamas for its 10/7 terror initiative. To that, my semi-sardonic response has been to say that it is indeed very important that initiatives like these not be presented as "rewarding Hamas" -- they must instead be framed as "punishing Israel". Punishing Israel for its intransigence, for its hyper-aggressiveness, and for its brazen acts of sabotage towards the possibility of a two-state solution.

In all seriousness, I think that is a more plausible description of what is going on. These countries have no interest in elevating Hamas -- indeed, they've presented their recognition as in explicit opposition to Hamas (and the PA, for admittedly self-centered reasons, affirms the same). What has motivated them to action is a complete (and completely justified) collapse in any faith that Israel is operating in good faith -- that it harbors any serious commitment to securing a just peace with the Palestinians, that its campaign in Gaza is remotely compatible with the laws of war or even is (at the point) significantly motivated by a desire to see the hostages return, and that the far-right racist extremists in Netanyahu's government aren't entirely running the show. This collapse in confidence is reflected here too -- a dramatic shift in public opinion against Israel, not just amongst Democrats but (younger) Republicans as well, that threatens to leave Israel as a super-Sparta Hermit Kingdom.

I think there are a lot of Jews who look at these developments, look at how they are the bitter harvest of Israel's own choices, and think "I wish they would have chosen differently." Why did they have to go down this route? Why did they have to choose the path of the most bloodshed, the most extremism, the most intransigence, the most of everything awful?

And "choose" is critical here. Anyone who has spent time in Zionist circles is familiar with the old complaint that the world acts if the Palestinians lack agency -- as if none of the current situation is the result of their decisions, it's all just thrust upon them by the big bad Israel. Yet right now, I think it is the Israel apologists who are refusing to reckon with the concept of agency -- they act as if there was nothing (or only the most marginal tweaks) that Israel could have done differently post-10/7: it had to fight Hamas this way, it had to use starvation as a weapon of war, it had to kowtow to settler extremists launching pogroms, it had to publicly announce that blocking the formation of a free Palestinian state was the government's raison d'etre.

No. It did not have to do anything of these things. It chose them, and what we are seeing is the consequence of choices that could have been made differently.

"Choose" critical here. The very first post I wrote after 10/7 was titled "Ghouls, Failure, Fatalism, and Responsibility." The "fatalism" portion of that post read as follows.

Finally, there is almost no chance that the fallout from this assault has any consequence other than catastrophe for innocent Israelis and Palestinians alike. And yet, we must resist the sort of fatalism about that seeming inevitability that leads to an abdication of responsibility. Too many voices I've seen today have, in one way or another, expressed sentiments to the effect that the events of today and/or those to come are the inevitable consequence of history's weave. How could you expect Hamas wouldn't seize an opportunity to massacre Israeli civilians en masse? How could you expect Israel won't respond with zero regard for Palestinian life?

No. There is agency here. The word of the day I'm already growing to hate is "(un)provoked", as in an emergent discourse which wants to be absolutely sure we all know that whatever hideous crime Hamas just committed or whatever overwhelming military incursion Israel may be about to launch, there is a reason behind it -- it didn't just happen out of air. Which -- no kidding. In the context of a conflict that's resulted in a half dozen international wars in the space of less than century, nothing is ever "unprovoked". But that doesn't absolve anyone of agency. Hamas made a choice to launch this attack -- a brutal, violent, targeted assault on a civilian population whose only tactical objective was the sowing of terror. They are not the passive receptacles of historical forces beyond their ken. And Israel's choices too (both those that preceded today's events and those that will follow) are choices -- they are not the inevitable consequence of some immutable historical arc.

And what I want to say right now is, it's okay to grieve the choices not made. One need not and one should not indulge in the fatalism of those who said that this was all inevitable -- a fatalism that is ultimately identical regardless of whether it speaks in critical or exculpatory language. In fact, I feel incandescent rage towards those who portray any of this as an inevitability -- that the bloodshed and the massacres and the abuses and the torture and the kidnappings had to happen. They did not have to happen, people chose for them to happen, and different choices could have and should have been made. It is okay to grieve the choices not made.

It is okay to grieve the choices not made. But one still has to acknowledge the choices that were made. Israel made choices that caused it to lose the confidence of erstwhile stalwart defenders, that made large swaths of Americans view it as foe rather than friend, that made not just the "usual suspect" critics but very sober observers take seriously the most serious and severe charges against it as a brutalizer, ethnic cleanser, even genocidaire. We can wish that it made different choices. But it didn't, and for all our grief we must still live in the world that was made by the choices that were made.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume LXXV: World War I

CNN reports:

TikTok this week removed an inflammatory anti-Israel video posted by celebrity beauty mogul and influencer Huda Kattan.

I've never been so happy to be unable to relate to any part of a sentence.

But what were the "anti-Israel" sentiments being expressed? 

Kattan, the founder and face of the billion-dollar brand Huda Beauty, shared a video to her more than 11 million followers on TikTok, accusing Israel of orchestrating World War I, World War II, the September 11 terrorist attacks and Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7.

[....]

“All of the conspiracy theories coming out and a lot of evidence behind them — that Israel has been behind World War I, World War II, September 11, October 7 — they allowed all of this stuff to happen. Is this crazy?” Kattan said on camera in her since-removed TikTok post, which included other unfounded claims about Israel. “Like, I had a feeling — I was like, ‘Are they behind every world war?’ Yes.”

Alert readers might immediately notice that some of these events occurred before Israel was established. Perhaps the more forgiving among us might overlook that problem for World War II -- Israel was founded only three years after its end, and it was such a Jewy war after all.

But World War I? That's a new one on me. We didn't even have the Balfour Declaration at the start of World War I! Roping Israel into it is really an extra special stretch.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't flag the interesting language "allowed all of this stuff to happen." What I like about this is that it takes for granted that Israel and the Jews control the entirety of global affairs, and is only mad at their non-interventionist mindset. I suppose once you've decided that Jews are like all-powerful gods, theodicy becomes our problem too.

All this talk of global Jewish domination does remind me of a thought I once had, though. Among all the people who think the Jews run the world, there must be somebody who thinks we're doing an okay job of it, right? I'm just imagining some guy in a Peoria bar, overhearing grousing about the damn Jews who run our society, slamming his beer down and yelling "Hey! They're trying their best, okay? I'd like to see you juggle running the banks and the media and the universities and Hollywood and the United Nations!"

And honestly? That guy would be right. It's hard managing all of that at once, and nobody gives us an iota of credit for it.

Israel is How Europe Can Stick It To Trump

Over the past few days, we've seen a spate of hitherto solid Israel allies in Europe announce they'll be recognizing the state of Palestine. France kicked things off, and it was swiftly followed by the UK and Canada. (There also has been an interesting wave of Arab states calling on Hamas to demilitarize and relinquish power).

I'm not going to comment here on the substance of the decision. Briefly, it is obvious that Palestinians deserve self-determination in a recognized state, and I'm unpersuaded by those who are arguing the move will backfire against the Palestinians. As for those who claim that recognition "rewards Hamas", I say that, if we are to think of this decision in those terms, it's better to see this as not as rewarding Hamas for 10/7, but as punishing Israel for its conduct after 10/7.

But that's not what I want to focus on here. Rather, I want to explore a different question: Why now? What made these countries take this step now?

Obviously, there is not one single answer to that. But in addition to some of the obvious factors -- increased sympathy for the Palestinian cause and increased frustration with Israeli intransigence chief among them -- I suggest an additional cause is that stepping out on Israel is a comparatively cheap and insulated way to symbolically repudiate Trump and Trumpism.

The Trump administration's pivot away from our traditional allies and alliances has been met with a justified mixture of alarm and fury from those we've abandoned. From escalating trade wars to threats of annexation, Trump has done unprecedented damage to America's global standing. People want to see their leaders punch back. But many of the most obvious avenues for retaliation come with substantial risks of their own. As idiotic and self-destructive as tariffs are for the United States, it remains the case that European countries must be careful and adroit in their own trade negotiations. Symbolism has its place there, but it can't be the whole story; missteps can exact real and serious tangible damage on one's own people.

But sticking it to Israel offers much of that same symbolic flouting of Trump, at a much lower risk. Most of the "damage" there, if there is any, will be externalized, not internalized. To the extent some countries might have been reluctant to step out against Israel for fear of alienating the United States, that ship has sailed; today these countries are looking for opportunities to signal they're standing up to the American madman. And while the Trump administration might make noises about retaliation, I think they're fighting on too many fronts for protecting Israel diplomatically to be a serious priority -- and that's even if one believes that Trump's Israel policy is based on sincere ideological commitment, which I don't. If one thinks Trump is just using "Israel" as an excuse to enact various forms of domestic repression, the ultimate disinterest can be doubled. In essence, Europe recognizing Palestine (a) looks increasingly justified and sensible given recent Israeli conduct and (b) offers an opportunity to be seen as standing up to Trump, in a context where tangible blowback is likely to be minimal. No wonder it's looking more attractive!

None of this should be seen as warranting any sympathy for Israel of course. They've chosen their course -- lashing themselves to the most extreme and vicious iteration of global rightwing ultranationalism -- and they have to live with the consequences. That's the risk of hitching your wagon entirely to a single powerful but widely loathed patron -- if daddy gets distracted, you're on your own and you've made yourself an awfully tempting target. Once again, when the right is done finding Israel useful, it will leave it in the wreckage.

The Impossibility of Bibi Agreeing To Peace

A hypothetical question for Israel supporters.

Suppose Israel was asked to craft the contours of a peace deal in Gaza. And suppose they were allowed to put any conditions they wanted into that deal, subject to just two limitations:

1. Palestinians cannot be compelled, directly or indirectly, to leave the Gaza Strip;
2. Palestinians must be given full citizenship and democratic rights in whatever sovereign nation agrees to control Gaza.

The first is essentially a rule against ethnic cleansing, the second a rule against apartheid.

Beyond those stipulations, Israel is allowed to put any conditions it likes into the deal.

I do not claim, to be clear, that so long as these conditions are met any agreement between Israel and Palestine would necessarily be just. Rather, I present these as the absolute, barest-of-the-bare minimum redlines that must be respected no matter how one-sided the remaining conditions are in Israel's favor. And the point of the exercise is that, so long as these minimums are acceded to, Israel can load up the "deal" as favorably as it wants.

Given that, my question is simple: could this Israeli government come up with a deal that meets these parameters?

And my suspicion is no, it couldn't. The "unthinkable thought" of 2019 is now a reality. And the impossibility of Israel agreeing to a peace deal that abides by even this extraordinary minimums is a large part of why Israel drags this war on and on and on.

Start with the second proviso. The framing is a requirement of equal citizenship in "whatever sovereign nation controls Gaza", and that ambiguity is intentional: it could encompass an independent Palestinian state, or it encompass Israeli annexation. But of course, this makes the dilemma apparent: Bibi and his coalition are dead-set against allowing an independent Palestinian state to exist, but they are also implacably opposed to incorporating Gaza Palestinians into the Israeli state (at least, on equal citizenship).

This (for Bibi) conundrum inspires increasingly desperate and fanciful efforts to escape the impossible bind -- for example, proposing that some other Arab state assume control of Gaza (for obvious reasons, nobody seems interested in stepping up). The increasingly open gestures towards full ethnic cleansing also can be understood through this "dilemma" -- the fewer Palestinians who remain in Gaza, the less daunting annexation looks.

And ultimately, the impossibility of resolving this problem makes all the other conditions we sometimes talk about moot. Questions about return of the hostages, demilitarization, right of return, reparations, recognition of Israel as a Jewish state -- I don't want to say they're unimportant, but while Bibi is in charge they're epiphenomenal. Even if Israel got what it says it wants along all these fronts (immediate return of the hostages, a demilitarized Palestinian state, rejection of right of return, compensation for 10/7, recognition), I genuinely don't think that this government could say "yes" to the deal if it meant either accepting an independent Palestinian state or incorporating Palestinians into Israel as full and equal citizens. Maybe if you loaded up some comically evil and implausible conditions ("reparations to the tune of $1 trillion/year") -- but that would just emphasize that the response of the Israeli government to this hypothetical would be to search frantically for a way to not make the deal.

For what it's worth, this toxic feature of Bibi and his cronies does I think mark out a tangible and meaningful difference between the current Israeli governing coalition and its realistic rivals. It's become popular to denigrate the belief (or "fantasy", as Ezra Klein said) among liberal Zionists that "Bibi is the problem" by observing that a core hostility to Palestinian rights and equality is shared among a much broader segment of Israeli society (including leading opposition figures) than many would care to admit. There is, regrettably, something to this critique -- but the hypothetical I'm pursuing here does I think suggest how it might be overstated, because I do think that the main opposition would be substantially different along these lines. They have no eagerness to create a Palestinian state, but it is not an immovable object for them; opposition to it does not lie at the center of their entire ideological being. It's not guaranteed or even easy, but given the right conditions, one can imagine them making a deal. With Bibi, one can't -- and that's a big difference.

But in the meantime, it is Bibi in control of Israel, and with Bibi in charge of Israel the impossibility of resolving this problem is a critical reason why the war continues. Agreeing on the contours of a peace deal only is relevant when peace is at hand. So long as Israel remains at war, it can delay having to decide an impossible choice. (The fact that once the war ends Bibi probably has to reckon with his criminal charges is also a factor, and a related one -- it goes to the point that Bibi wants the war to continue and is endangered by the prospect of it ending, no matter what the terms are).

In a different context almost 20 years ago, Ehud Olmert mocked those who obsessed over the exact acreage of a peace deal as having supposedly existential stakes for Israel's existence. 

“With them, it is all about tanks and land and controlling territories and controlled territories and this hilltop and that hilltop,” he said. “All these things are worthless.”

He added, “Who thinks seriously that if we sit on another hilltop, on another hundred meters, that this is what will make the difference for the State of Israel’s basic security?”

The hills don't matter, but pretending like the hills do matter, and matter so much that we couldn't possibly make a deal unless we are absolutely guaranteed to control these hills is a way of forestalling having to make a decision on the deal. And the same thing feels true in Gaza. All the talk about needing to destroy one more Hamas battalion, root out one more tunnel network, take out one more "second-in-command" -- who seriously thinks that is what will make the difference? They're delaying mechanisms -- so long as Israel can say "we still must do these military things", they can avoid having to commit to a choice on peace they're fundamentally unwilling to make. Like "airstrikes while you wait", it's something to do while you can't think of what else to do.

All that said, I open to being persuaded otherwise. Tell me a set of provisions -- I wouldn't even demand that they be realistic, so long as they aren't utterly absurdist -- that comports with the above two limitations that you think Bibi would accept, and I'll consider it. But I'm skeptical they exist.