Responding to Joely Cohen

Sar Shalom

If for no other reason than the potential for her ideas to infect an even larger portion of Jewish youth today, Joely Cohen's blog post at the Times of Israel needs a response. Many responses focus on the myriad peace offers that Israel has accepted and the Arabs refused, the fact that the Jews would have been annihilated if they had lost, or that the real tragedy for the Palestinians is that the Jews are no longer dhimmis. It is altogether proper that such sentiments should motivate opposition to Cohen's case, but we must not confuse what motivates us for what might convince others.

Take as an example the fact that we accepted compromise and the Arabs did not. Good little dhimmis like Cohen could turn around and craft a parable of someone who completed medical school and scored in the top 5% on the board certification, but was then told "Because of your ethnic background, you're not fit to be a doctor. You can be a nurse, however." Very few people, certainly not from Cohen's target audience, will accept an argument that someone put in that position should accept the compromise. We should not waste our time arguing that such a compromise should be accepted, we need to demonstrate that the compromise offers to the Arabs are different.

One response would be to take seriously her request at the end of her post.

Invite an uncensored Palestinian speaker into your youth movement...

My suspicion is that Cohen does not want Palestinians coming to speak without censorship. What she want is Palestinians coming to speak without Zionist censorship. However, for the likes of Cohen the only authentic Arab is an Arab who parrots the Palestinianist narrative, thus requiring that the Palestinian national movement (PNM) censor any Arab voices that might address the impressionable children. In the interest of exposing Jewish youth to Palestinian voices without other-than-Zionist censorship, here are a few speakers who could address them:

• George Deek. The grandson of Arabs who left Israel during the 1948 and returned. Currently works in the Israeli foreign service.
• Alaa Waheeb. Major in the Israel Defense Forces.
• Mohammad Zoabi. Cousin of anti-Israel MK Hanin Zoabi, but staunch supported of the State of Israel.
• Khaled Abu Toameh. Journalist who started in Palestinian media but left to work for the Jerusalem Post because Palestinian media only allowed him to produce propaganda.
• Christy Anastas. Arab-Cristian born in Bethlehem who faced death-threats after making pro--Israel arguments.

This does not mean that the children should be shielded from PNM voices such as Maysoon Zayid, George Ibish, or Hanan Ashrawi. Aside from the moral dimensions of censorship, if it becomes clear that there is censorship, some of those receiving the censored information will conclude that it indicates something to hide and thus assign more validity to such arguments when they do finally hear them. Hearing PNM-voices along with Arab dissidents from the PNM could provide an innoculative effect against being persuaded by Palestinianist arguments when they grow up and are on their own. I am confident that if they hear both Arab perspectives that they would make a fair evaluation. Is Cohen?