MESSAGE
| DATE | 2024-10-07 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
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| SUBJECT | Subject: [Hangout - NYLXS] The New Republic and Jew Hate
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newrepublic.com
The Appalling Attack on Ta-Nehisi Coates Is a Massive Media Failing
Meredith Shiner
13–16 minutes
The Jewish high holidays—the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom
Kippur—are built on the paradigm of “On Rosh Hashanah, your fate is
written. On Yom Kippur, your fate is sealed.” In these 10 days, we are
supposed to pray, repent, and commit good deeds to bolster our chances
for the privilege of another year on earth—whatever we would say that
privilege is at this point.
For all my life, I viewed this paradigm as a personal moral framework, a
mandate to reflect on the past year, to take accountability for my
failings, to consider how I could have contributed better or more to the
community, which we are taught to view as the people who create the
context of our lives: colleagues, friends, neighbors, and fellow
citizens. What I loved about Judaism was this annual opportunity to take
stock, not necessarily because I thought there was some greater being
out there keeping tabs on me but because I felt my Judaism required that
I reevaluate myself and recommit to continuous and just improvement.
That’s why as we approach this high holiday season, which in 2024
contains the one-year anniversary of the October 7 attacks on Israel and
falls one month before the U.S. presidential election, I have never felt
more alone, more upside down or more fearful for the next year.
To recognize Palestinians are human has become a flashpoint, a red line
to not be crossed in Washington discourse, an invitation to be tagged as
an antisemite, whether by your cousin at a Passover seder or by a
network morning news anchor on live national television (more on that
later). The Discourse tells us there is a “Palestinian-Israeli conflict”
and that it is “complicated.” But somewhere in this word soup we have
simmered long enough to deflect attention from how power works, who
benefits from it and who loses everything, the remaining goop to be
scraped from the bottom of the pot can no longer be accurately conveyed
as “conflict” but instead a stark, wrong binary between Palestinian
existence and a broad definition of antisemitism, which if we choose as
a society to accept, will only serve to drive us deeper into the void.
This week, I was horrified to witness one such attempt to drag a
reasonable and humane person into this toxic abyss, in the form of what
was supposed to be an interview of award-winning writer, thinker, and
journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates by CBS Mornings’ Tony Dokoupil. Whatever
promise of reasoned discourse producers may have made to Coates when
they booked him for the show instantly vanished for the audience the
moment Dokoupil started questioning the author. Dokoupil opened his
questioning with a bizarrely aggressive monologue that patronized Coates
by calling his book extreme and positing that it only could have been
produced by someone who harbors ill will toward Jewish people.
“No country in this world establishes its ability to exist through
rights. Countries establish their abilities to exist through force, as
America did,” Coates told Dokoupil. “Israel does exist. It’s a fact. The
question of its right is not a question I would be faced with, with any
other country.
“There’s nothing that offends me about a Jewish state. I am offended by
the idea of states built on ethnocracy, no matter where they are,”
Coates continued.
To me, Coates’s calm in the face of the anchor’s aggression and willful
misinterpretation of his work reminded me of the Passover parable of the
four sons. In it, we are instructed on how to explain the story of the
journey from Jewish enslavement to freedom to a son who does not even
know how to ask a question, and our clear articulation to him of the
meaning of freedom is what opens up our deepest understanding of the
truth.
But what really struck me about this moment is that Coates’s treatment
does not exist in isolation but rather as part of a pattern that
systematically targets those who want to affirm the humanity of
Palestinians or defend those who are fighting for that affirmation. Is
this the price we must pay for just having a shred of humanity? Who
among us has the power to challenge what needs to be challenged to set
the conditions of possibility for progress? Who, ultimately, will bear
the cost of silence?
It is extremely disorienting to find yourself in the season of personal
accountability described above while also reckoning with the total
abdication of accountability from the institutions that hold the actual
power to grapple with and correct the utter destruction this past year
has wrought—from establishment Judaism to American politics and the
mainstream media. We have watched Israel kill civilians, parents,
children, doctors, aid workers, journalists, and many more, ostensibly
in the name of Judaism but more likely in the furtherance of Benjamin
Netanyahu’s craven political career—and ultimately in the abandonment of
every value our religion and basic human rights should uphold.
We have witnessed antisemitism get stripped of its meaning and used as a
tool to silence legitimate criticism of these very structures and their
failure to stop the killing. We are told consistently that there is no
right way to speak out against a clear wrong because systematically
every method of protest, from campus demonstrations to essays to books
to social media posts to peaceful marches on the streets, is framed as
an amorphous attack on Jews everywhere as opposed to focused critiques
of a specific wrong being perpetrated by a few powerful individuals.
Coates is back in the news lately because his new book attempts to offer
just such a focused critique of power: The Message, which in part
detailed his travels to Israel and Palestine, what he witnessed there,
and what he learned about how Palestinians were treated. As he even told
CBS, he never set out to write a detailed dissertation on every moment
in the history of Israel but rather provide a testimonial to give voice
to those who have been overlooked, ignored, or erased from our discourse
on the Middle East. When pushed on why it didn’t include more history on
Israel, bombings of Israeli civilians, or the Intifadas, Coates
(rightfully) pointed out: “There’s no shortage of that perspective in
American media.”
In an interview with New York’s Ryu Spaeth, Coates broadly hints that
The Message was not likely to endear him to everyone. But even he seemed
blindsided when Dokoupil stated—with all the authority bestowed on an
anchorman by his coif—that Coates’s book would “not be out of place in
the backpack of an extremist” and not-so-subtly hinted that Coates is
antisemitic, pressing him with loaded question after loaded question:
“What is it that so particularly offends you about the existence of a
Jewish state that is a Jewish safe place and not any of the other states
out there?”
It is hard to imagine another author, especially a white author, on any
other topic, being summarily and unapologetically questioned and
dismissed in this way on national television. The interview was biased
(Dokoupil never disclosed his ex-wife and two children live in Israel)
and racist (sorry, the presence of two other anchors who happen to be
Black but said nothing does not change this interpretation). We’ll wait
forever for CBS’s apology.
We’re waiting for similar reparations from another television news
outlet that engaged in similar slander. A week prior to Coates’s on-air
mugging, Representative Rashida Tlaib was baselessly smeared on CNN,
with anchor Jake Tapper fabricating comments from Tlaib to frame a
“gotcha” question for Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, trying to get
Whitmer to condemn Tlaib as antisemitic for something she never said.
When Whitmer wouldn’t, another CNN anchor, Dana Bash, did a very special
segment where she stated antisemitism is a both-sides problem and then
refused to apologize for having mischaracterized Tlaib, in a follow-up
segment to address the widespread criticism of her first.
CNN harmfully distorted a legitimate critique: Tlaib, in an interview
with a Detroit news outlet and in alignment with the position of the
American Civil Liberties Union, opposed Michigan Attorney General Dana
Nessel’s decision to charge peaceful pro-Palestinian protesters at the
University of Michigan, saying, “This is a move that’s going to set a
precedent, and it’s unfortunate that a Democrat made that move. We’ve
had the right to dissent, the right to protest. We’ve done it for
climate, the immigrant rights movement, for Black lives, and even around
issues of injustice among water shutoffs. But it seems that the attorney
general decided if the issue was Palestine, she was going to treat it
differently, and that alone speaks volumes about possible biases within
the agency she runs.”
But on a deeper, darker level, CNN’s refusal to interrogate why it is
allowed to comb every word Tlaib says for antisemitism while never
having to confront whether wrongly and constantly accusing Tlaib of
antisemitism—a serious accusation!—is Islamophobic is part and parcel
with our society’s refusal to recognize Palestinians as full people.
Because if Palestinians do not get to exist fully in the world, then
certainly the first Palestinian woman elected to Congress cannot enjoy
the full benefits and privileges afforded to every other member of the
House of Representatives.
We need to be clear that policing who gets to make criticisms, how and
when, is not a hallmark of a functioning democracy, and again, that
using claims of antisemitism to subvert legitimate critiques of
government—in this case, Nessel’s decision to prosecute peaceful campus
protesters—cheapens antisemitism and threatens everyone’s freedoms.
Which brings me to my final, and perhaps most important, point: One of
the reasons CNN was so set on baselessly attacking Tlaib in this fashion
was because she criticized Nessel the same week former president and
current Republican nominee Donald Trump preemptively blamed “the Jews”
for his potential loss in November. Trump said “a lot of bad things will
happen” if the Jews, held by Democrats in a “curse” to oppose him,
succeed in getting Vice President Kamala Harris elected. That special
segment from Bash? By design, it treated Whitmer and Republican Senator
Tom Cotton, who refused to denounce Trump’s comments, as equal.
In our current media landscape, threats to civility must be presented as
a dysfunction equally held by both major American political parties if
they’re to be discussed on broadcast news at all. This is dangerous and
dissonant, especially given what happened in the 2020 election. We know
the result of Trump’s preelection threats and theories in 2020: an
actual attack on the United States Capitol by those convinced by Trump
that they could just “hang Mike Pence” so Trump could take back the
White House.
What might happen in January 2025 with these overt threats to Jews in
2024? Why are we downplaying this, and who is served by it? Why are we
pretending that Tlaib’s generalized complaint about the right to dissent
is the same thing as Trump’s constant incitements to political violence?
The effort expended on bothsidesing us into meaninglessness inoculates
those in power from criticism and simultaneously emboldens a reckless
wannabe dictator.
My biggest fear is that we are on the verge of losing what’s left of
American democracy because Netanyahu—who was indicted for corruption in
his own country and facing International Court of Justice charges on war
crimes for his actions in the past year—is pushing the Middle East into
a wider war with one eye on America’s electoral calendar, and that Jews
will be blamed no matter how the election goes: either by Trump, who is
preemptively holding them responsible for another “rigged” result, or
more indirectly, if Harris loses firewall states like Michigan because
Democrats did not show up to vote after being legitimately disillusioned
by our government’s role in what is unfolding in the Middle East. What
will we make of antisemitism then? Who will defend us?
If you believe in freedom and justice, there is no sanitized
whataboutism that can erase war crimes from history’s ledger, no matter
how much our out-of-touch cable news talking heads, keyboard warriors,
and clout-chasing politicians try. There is only what we do now, what we
pursue as the truth, and how we, as a society, treat the people with the
courage to stand up to powerful institutions that are not oriented
toward the faithful protection of human rights.
I am not afraid of Ta-Nahisi Coates chronicling Palestinian life. I am
not afraid of Rashida Tlaib asserting that the state should not be
prosecuting protesters. I am not afraid of the discomfort that will
inevitably come when we allow Palestinians to be seen and grapple with
our complicity in dehumanizing them. Instead, I am afraid that those who
have championed Israel at all costs will soon get to live at home in the
kind of theocracy they covet abroad.
For the high holidays this year, I am choosing the radical good deed of
saying so out loud, despite how much more isolated that might make me
within my own faith community. One should not have to be Jewish to call
out wrongs in plain sight, whether they happen on the relatively
comfortable couches of morning television or in the streets of Gaza,
without fear of widespread retribution. But in this media and political
landscape, it is incumbent on Jewish Americans who see these wrongs to
use their voices and create the permission structure for legitimate
criticism and debate.
Right now, as Jews, Americans, and citizens of the world: We are writing
our fate. And I worry we are running out of time to change it, before
that fate is sealed.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I love this kicker. They at least admit they are partial and bigoted
media:
IT’S CRUNCH TIME IN THE MOST CONSEQUENTIAL FIGHT OF OUR LIVES.
The New Republic has covered a slew of elections in its 110 years, but
the stakes have never been higher than they are now.
With an archconservative Supreme Court and presidential immunity, a
second Trump term will be a wrecking ball aimed at abortion rights,
government regulation, environmental law, and our civil rights.
And yet, it’s still a neck-and-neck race!
From now until Election Day, The New Republic will do everything we can
to prevent a second Trump presidency, presenting targeted reporting,
influential analysis, and livestreams of topical events.
But we can’t do all this without your help! We desperately need to raise
$75,000 to help prevent the damage Trump’s MAGA politics will wreak on
our country.
If you agree Trump must be stopped, please help us.
--
So many immigrant groups have swept through our town
that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological
proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
http://www.mrbrklyn.com
DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002
http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software
http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/resources - Unpublished Archive
http://www.coinhangout.com - coins!
http://www.brooklyn-living.com
Being so tracked is for FARM ANIMALS and extermination camps,
but incompatible with living as a free human being. -RI Safir 2013
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