Corbyn 23: Hail Discorbia

[pancreas]

is a view, although not a terribly helpful one.

The practical issues of using the word 'Zionism' remain such that in the eyes of vast swathes of people it marks you out as a nutter at best and a Nazi nutter at worst.

(Which I think is part of the reason why people in the pro-Palestine movement continue to use it, because for them it's marker of belonging to that movement and sharing knowledge of the real meaning.)

Vast swathes of certain right-wing Jewish people, yes. And I suspect only in the last 10 years. You're admitting that the Israeli propaganda machine has won—perhaps you're right.

If we're no longer allowed to say Zionism in deprecatory terms in order to point out the de facto and now de jure racism explicit in Israeli politics, what do you propose we say instead? We can move onto 'Israeli apartheid' for a while, I suppose.

[Buelligan]

is a view, although not a terribly helpful one.

The practical issues of using the word 'Zionism' remain such that in the eyes of vast swathes of people it marks you out as a nutter at best and a Nazi nutter at worst.

(Which I think is part of the reason why people in the pro-Palestine movement continue to use it, because for them it's marker of belonging to that movement and sharing knowledge of the real meaning.)

What word do zionists use to describe themselves?

[Jakey Chesterton]

Apart from all the other problems with dropping the term 'Zionism'... it's the term Palestinians use to describe their own situation (colonisation).

If you retreat from the term as unacceptable, what are you going to do if you republish Palestinians on the topic here? Translate all the references to what their colonisers call themselves and claim as their impetus to some British middle-class liberal friendly euphemism that would likewise end up forbidden anyway? And Palestinians would continue using the term, so they'd end up hung out to dry as bigots for wrongspeak. It would inevitably drive a wedge between Palestinians and the Palestine solidarity movement in Britain, and divide that movement itself.

[Buelligan]

Let's be honest, the people who are creating this situation are the same people who are oppressing the Palestinians.  The whole point of all of this is to make it impossible for any politician, any person, to criticise that.  It's a way of making any conversation, comment or discussion of this matter impossible.  Not just impossible but making it crystal clear to everyone, that anyone who even tries talking about it is committing social suicide.

[Zetetic]

We can move onto 'Israeli apartheid' for a while, I suppose.

Yup. (Which for all its imperfections also suggests a course of action.)

What word do zionists use to describe themselves?

In Britain? They mostly reject the label, because of its associations with the current government of Israel.
In Israel? They mostly don't have to call themselves anything, do they? 'National xists'?  "Committed to Israel's security?" "Dedicated to Israel (as a nation state)?"

In the mouths of Jewish people (as Jewish people), I suspect it sustains a distinct jargon anyway.

That's an interesting point Jakey Chesterton. I note that Hamas (to pick an example of an organisation that I would imagine would be disinclined to let go of 'Zionism') already uses 'Israeli occupation' on their English 'About Us' page while sticking with "الاحتلال الصهيوني،" on their Arabic one.

(But, to be honest, I think I've underestimated the extent to which Hamas have seen the opportunity that adopting the language of popular identity politics and emphasising similarities with previous movements in history has. Apologies for underestimating them.)

(I suspect, regardless, in the quoted, translated accounts of Palestinians, the term doesn't have the same force as when it's used by British middle-class campaigners trying to convince other British middle-class people directly.)

[pancreas]

Yup. (Which for all its imperfections also suggests a course of action.)

In Britain? They mostly reject the label, because of its associations with the current government of Israel.

Nope.

https://fullfact.org/news/are-majority-british-jews-zionists/

[Zetetic]

It's a fair cop, I'd nudged the numbers in my memory of the 2015 City study.

About 59% of those surveyed said "Yes, I am Zionist" in response to "Although there are different opinions about what the term Zionism means, in general, do you consider yourself to be a Zionist?" (in an anonymous survey), while about 90% expressed views that would be termed 'Zionist' as the term has been used in this thread.

So (probably) about a third of the latter group rejected the label, and not a majority. I apologise for the mistake.

Nevertheless, I note that a large proportion did seem to reject the label in 2015.

[Jakey Chesterton]

Let's be honest, the people who are creating this situation are the same people who are oppressing the Palestinians.  The whole point of all of this is to make it impossible for any politician, any person, to criticise that.  It's a way of making any conversation, comment or discussion of this matter impossible.  Not just impossible but making it crystal clear to everyone, that anyone who even tries talking about it is committing social suicide.

Absolutely. Particularly obvious in this case.

[pancreas]

I think if asked, (Jewish) people would say 'No' to 'Do you think Israel should be governed exclusively for the benefit of Jews?' but would say 'yes' to 'Do you believe Jewish people should have the right to self-determination?', since it sounds good, and no-one really has interrogated properly what that might mean. It's a clever piece of wording, since it's presented as a 'right', and we all like rights and think everyone should have them. But in reality, it turns out to be the right to shoot Palestinian protesters. A similar piece of bullshit going on with the 'Does Israel have the right to exist?' (about which I have semantic/ontological issues, as you know).

[Zetetic]

Or '... right to exist as a Jewish state' (which the City survey did ask).

[Zetetic]

BDS don't use 'Zionism' in their English or Arabic About Us pages, instead emphasising occupation, colonisation (well, " الاستعمار-الاستيطاني" in Arabic) and - in English - the relationship to South African apartheid.

I'll confess clearly lacking the skills for a proper survey, not least because often there is discussion of "Zionism" in a historical contexts ("Zionist militias" in 1949, for example).

[Replies From View]

" الاستعمار-الاستيطاني" in Arabic

Famously.

[pancreas]

Or '... right to exist as a Jewish state' (which the City survey did ask).

Still an example of queering the pitch. Should be 'right to operate as a Jewish hegemony'.

[king_tubby]

So yeah, this prick can fuck off out of Labour forever.

[jamiefairlie]

I think if asked, (Jewish) people would say 'No' to 'Do you think Israel should be governed exclusively for the benefit of Jews?' but would say 'yes' to 'Do you believe Jewish people should have the right to self-determination?',

The root source of all these problem is the three way conflation of 'The Jews' as a religious group, as an ethnicity and Israel as a nation state. You should be able to freely criticize the actions of Israel without it reflecting in any way on either the Jewish faith or people who are ethnically Jewish.

[pancreas]

What's interesting is the extent to which the sloganising has been so effective at creating the confusion between the three clearly different things you state. To a degree, this has been possible amongst Jews, I hazard, by cynically appealing to their reasonable shared worry about when will be the next time they will be persecuted. Project Fear, run by the Jewish Chronicle and others. No different from the Daily Mail and its target audience.

[greencalx]

So yeah, this prick can fuck off out of Labour forever.

I thought publicly declaring an intention to vote for another party was one of the few things that was actually an expellable offence...

[sponk]

I thought publicly declaring an intention to vote for another party was one of the few things that was actually an expellable offence...

He was expelled from Labour about 15 years ago. When asked if he would let Galloway back in Corbyn dodged the question and said he wouldn't be allowed back for five years because he stood against Labour at the last election. I wish he'd took the opportunity to say "no I won't let him in because he's a cunt" because it's not like that would alienate 1% as many potential supporters as it would attract.

[jobotic]

Guarantee Hoey's voting the same way.

[blackcockerel]

So yeah, this prick can fuck off out of Labour forever.

AND the silly bastard has accidentally tagged a spoof account that ridicules Farage!

[king_tubby]

Guarantee Hoey's voting the same way.

She can fuck off and all.

[Johnny Yesno]

If we're no longer allowed to say Zionism in deprecatory terms in order to point out the de facto and now de jure racism explicit in Israeli politics, what do you propose we say instead?

The Israeli far right.

[canadagoose]

The Israeli far right.

I'd go with that. "Zionism" has definitely dodgy overtones nowadays that are associated with the three-brackets brigade and it doesn't do anyone decent any favours to keep using it.

[honeychile]

Yes, i'd also go with "jewish supremacists", or "israeli ultranationalists", or "colonialists", or "segregationists"... loads of applicable terms which crucially can easily be understood by the public at large as we try to fight back against Israel's perpetual propaganda offensive.

I've argued before that no matter what zionism means to you - and to a great many people who regard themselves as pro and anti-zionist, it most certainly does mean a quite deliberate anti-palestinian racism - it still does mean different things to different people. Cos you know, so does anti-zionism. Some of those people calling themselves anti-zionists... well they're not talking about the rights of palestinians, they are actually using it to mean jews. The israeli lobby isn't the only direction which tries to conflate zionism with jews, actual anti-semites do that too.

I can't work out why so many people are so precious about being able to use it - i don't see what practical value it has today beyond academic study of politcal history and linguistics. The only thing i can think of is a fear of being seen to give ground to the israeli propaganda machine. And i don't see how giving up imprecise language is giving ground to anyone.

Lest we diverge too much from the thread topic, Richard Burgon's initial remark:

"The enemy of the Palestinian people is not the Jewish people. The enemy of the Palestinian people are Zionists, and Zionism is the enemy of peace and the enemy of the Palestinian people."

wasn't the least bit anti-semitic, and his explanation:

"I received no reply, so I believed it was inaccurate to have claimed that I had used that phrase. It is now clear that I did and I regret doing so [...]  As I have subsequently said on numerous occasions when asked about this, I do not agree with that phrase [...] The terminology has different meanings to different people and the simplistic language used does not reflect how I now think about this complex issue and I would not use it again today".

is utterly reasonable, and i hope is something people start to get on board with (Corbyn seemed to already share this view a couple of years ago). The same cannot be said for this tripe:

"For nearly two years, Richard Burgon has deployed half-denials and weasel words to escape responsibility for his appalling suggestion that Zionism is the enemy of peace. Now that we've all seen exactly what he said, it's time for Mr Burgon to apologise both for this slur on the Jewish people's right to self-determination and for seemingly misleading the public about it".

"Richard Burgon's denial and the subsequent revelation of his 2014 incitement against Zionists encapsulate the total sham of Labour's approach to anti-Semitism."

[pancreas]

I don't see any version of Zionism—even the cuddly version—which doesn't imply Jewish rights trump those of non-Jews in Zion (wherever that is). So I don't see how it can be anything but a racist ideology, au fond.

Eventually we want to live in a world in which such divisive thoughts are seen for what they are, even while we may regard them as historically understandable. How we get to a non-racist world is more up for debate. But I don't think a policy of appeasement of racist thought is likely to be the right strategy.

It is not enough to talk about the Israeli Far Right or Jewish supremacists etc., all of which terms would imply incorrectly that apartheid in Israel is some sort of fringe movement. And in the UK, at least, Zionism seems to be an increasingly accepted doctrine.

Honeychile seems to talk of 'Zionist' as if it amounts to an antediluvian term like 'negro' which is being reclaimed by the oppressed. But I'd reiterate Buelligan's point: Zionists have no trouble talking about the merits of Zionism themselves, often in the most fascistic terms, cf. Netanyahu.

I think you have to decide whether you want to combat this racist ideology, or whether you want to appease it. And I don't think shying away from using >>THE WORD FOR IT<< is going to get you very far.

[BlodwynPig]

but "it's not helpful" or "it's problematic" are the new shackles by which we are bound by our righteous and all-knowing masters.

[pancreas]

aye. Already echoing round the world of politics like a cat meme.

[BlodwynPig]

aye. Already echoing round the world of politics like a cat meme.

the comfort blanket of the intellectually haughty, morally bankrupt Neo-human.

[Twed]

I think we should support Zionism and then finally when they think they've won reveal that we meant the Ethiopian Zion.

[greenman]

I think you have to decide whether you want to combat this racist ideology, or whether you want to appease it. And I don't think shying away from using >>THE WORD FOR IT<< is going to get you very far.

I suspect that very quickly you would say the line of attack shift to "Labour hiding its anti-Semitism behind new words".