Even I’ve grown tired of the Andrew Sullivan/Leon Wieseltier thing, but I’m still following it because every now and then something amusing comes up:
One more thing: what universe is Chait living in when he claims that what chunks of Israel have endured lately is anything like the London Blitz?
43,000 Londoners alone were killed in that event in a few months – let alone the carnage in Coventry and the rest of the country. My own family lived in houses that were assailed from the skies – and a million homes were demolished. In one day, in the last assault, 1,364 people were killed and 1,616 were seriously injured. My own mother as a child was knocked unconscious; my great aunt was blinded; my grandfather was permanently disabled. Is Chait seriously suggesting that unaimed, largely useless Qassam rockets from Gaza that killed around a score of Israelis, however indefensible, are anything like the terror that Londoners faced in 1940? Or the human toll?
Did Jonathan Chait really compare what’s happened in Israel the last few years to the London Blitz? Yes, apparently he did. And he’s supposed to be one of the reasonable ones at TNR (I like his stuff on domestic policy a lot).
When it comes to Middle Eastern policy, the entire staff of TNR is as crazy as a shithouse rat.
J.W. Hamner
As a corollary to the Goodwin thing maybe we should ban comparing regional conflicts to any wars that get to put “World” in front of them? ‘Cuz otherwise we’ll get “But… but… Palestinians also wore clothes, so…” No. Just stop. It’s not similar.
Morbo
Oh come on, Chait nailed this one. Gaza is a part of Israel, after all.
Svensker
The thing is, anything that happens to us — i.e., Israel and the U.S. — is unbelievably terrible, insupportable, awful, the worst that’s ever happened. Anything that happens to anyone else is “shit happens.” Because we (and the Israelis) are Special.
MikeJ
If the only requirement for being like the blitz is that civilians get hit is Chait ready to compare the US military to the Nazis?
Don’t get me wrong, I think that’s a moronic comparison. But I didn’t start the moronic comparisons.
Dave S.
I wonder if Chait is thinking about the later V-1 and V-2 attacks on London? Still wrong but less spectacularly so.
DougJ
@Svensker:
I would define “us” more stringently. In the US, “us” only means middle and upper class white people. Other people can have THEIR ENTIRE FUCKING CITY FLOODED and it’s no biggie.
Robert
Israeli Math:
1 Zionist life =10,000 Goyem Londoners
1 Zionist life = 25,000 Gazan Palestianians
They’ve got plenty of killin’ to do to achieve proportionality
Brick Oven Bill
Ill intent plus a metallic society equals The Blitz.
Ill intent plus a non-metallic society equals the attacks on Israel.
Here is my proof.
Thus the Palestinians teach us that similar intent does not result in similar outcomes.
Svensker
@DougJ:
It depends. If New Yorkers are under attack by Al Queda, then ALL AMERICA IS UNDER ATTACK and it is the worst thing ever. Otherwise, New Yorkers are scum. Same with New Orleans — if the levees had been blown up by mooslin terrists, ZOMG! But since it was just mother nature punishing them for being poor and sinful, no big deal.
We’re all just props for the neocon merry-go-round.
DougJ
@Svensker:
True.
ellaesther
As someone who’s been living, studying, and writing about, blah blah blah, this conflict for more than 25 years, one of the things that makes me CRAZY is the desperate desire everyone has to compare themselves to those who suffered in World War II. Meaning, of course, that the other guys are the Nazis.
This allows everyone on the side that opposes you, and anyone else with half a brain, to complete disregard what you’re saying, because it’s nonsense. It’s disrespectful, ahistorical nonsense.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is horrific enough as is — if we were to start actually dealing with the reality, rather than continue to toss invective-filled “no you’re a Nazi!” bombs at each other, then perhaps we might stop, you know, dying.
Fucking hell.
Toast
Could not agree more. Love TNR on domestic politics, but I completely ignore what they have to say about foreign policy generally and the middle east in particular.
ajr22
As a jew who reads sully, I’m getting a little sick of this. I am not one who is proud of some of the things Israel has done, and I would like to see a two state solution. I don’t think Sully is anti-semitic, but I feel like being accused of it has turned his focus towards Israel. He has 8 posts a day ripping Israel for war crimes, ripping netanyahu, and making some accusation about Israels plot to screw Obama etc.. Today he was talking about how that assassination was some message by Netanyahu, and that Netanyahu was giving a big brazen fuck you to the entire arab world by killing this guy in front of cameras. If I want to see people rip on Jews all day i’ll just go to reddit. Bottom line no more reading sully for a while.
John Cole
The other real weakness of TNR is that they simply do not handle criticism well. They completely blew the Beauchamp affair, and didn’t do anything to go to the bat for the guy, and then when Jeffrey Rosen writes that idiotic nonsense about Sotomayor, they all go crazy in defense of the indefensible.
geg6
I can’t even deal with this stuff. I started following it ages ago when they were calling Matt Yglesias and Sully and Joe Klein anti-Semites and/or self-hating Jews. And this whole thing with Sully and Wieseltier and now Chait has just made me more sad.
I’ve had problems with Israel for a while and the Gaza thing just horrified me. And it pains me because I had always been a huge fan of Israel. I hero worshipped Golda Meir as a young girl and felt that the world had such a responsibility for Israel because of the Holocaust. The turnaround of my feelings for Israel has been quite painful to me. It seems to me that we are witnessing a country, one that I had always found admirable, commit suicide. And at this point, I’m rooting for the suicide. And I don’t want to; I really don’t. But I cannot stomach what they have done to the Palestinians. With their history, I can’t fathom how they can do what they do to those poor people. The whole thing is just too depressing. And I’m seeing too many parallels in what has been happening in America, politically and internationally, over the last decade or so to feel in any way superior. We’re not quite where I see Israel (in the midst of suicide), but I can see us getting there.
bayville
Since Kirkchuk’s activity calendar has filled up lately and since Beinart is off fighting another war (via his keyboard) – against Iran, I guess Peretz has turned to the ol’ reliable backup Houseboy – Chait – to launder out his “Anti-Semitic” sewage.
Chait has always been/will always be, one of the biggest useful idiots in American punditry for the neocon crowd.
No suprise here about his ridiculous claims in this matter.
Maxwel
“When it comes to Middle Eastern policy, the entire staff of TNR is as crazy as a shithouse rat.”
I suspect it’s a job requirement.
adamchaz
@ajr22:
I’m curious you aren’t disagreeing with Sully’s assertions you are just mad that someone is taking the time to rip Israel. I’m not sure if Sully is right or wrong bur not willing to have the debate because it makes Jews look bad seems unhelpful.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I read that paragraph where he says “London-blitz like” and I got the impression he was talking about people living with the idea that someone might bomb them from the air at any time. While the scale of what Israel is feeling is not close to London, I really cannot think of another historical comparison to make that people would understand.
Chuck
I think “X compared Y to Z”, or even “X said Y is like Z” is a source of way too much outrage. Forbidding that sort of comparison, or requiring that people extensively qualify exactly in what sort of way Y is like Z, would make it a giant pain to say anything. If people like DougJ are going to be like the Gestapo kicking in your door every time you make a comparison that contains some degree of inequality, surely our society is that much closer to the fate of Babylon. Or something very much like that.
The point was that it sucks to have to deal with explosive things falling from the sky at any time, and this is an anxiety that could illustrated by thinking of this other event you might already have a concept of — since we in the US don’t have a clear comparison in our own experience. Clearly the comparison to the Blitz is disproportionate, but then, pretty much any comparison we make to anything WWII-related is disproportionate.
Failing to point out the lack of proportion can be considered a mistake and poor taste, but I don’t think that comparing Chait’s mentality to that of a shithouse rat is an appropriate response.
thomas Levenson
You are seriously unkind to shithouse rats. They may be unsanitary (which I imagine Chait is not), but the TNR evokes a whole different level of crazy amongst those who dwell there. After all — look how long it took Sullivan himself to recover (mostly) from the experience.
ajr22
@adamchaz: I concede that some of the things he says are true. I’m sure alot happened in Gaza that I and many jews should not be proud of. I’m just saying I don’t want to read every theory sully has on why Israel and its leaders are bad people. Especially from someone who was cheerleading the U.S. into Iraq. If he want’s to advocate for peace I totally support that, but he has been on a crusade to make Israel into a bugiman and I don’t think that’s fare or useful.
thomas Levenson
@Svensker:
Not even.
Anya
@Svensker: This.
patroclus
It wasn’t just the German bombing; it was also the unrestricted submarine warfare, the destruction of the British Expeditionary Force at Dunkirk and the repeated threats of invasion by a very credible German military that had just taken over virtually all of Europe with which the U.K. had to deal. Israel’s adversaries, while menacing, don’t seem to have the military might of the Wehrmact or the Luftwaffe or Das Boots.
I saw Bibi make almost precisely the same point as Chait on Bill Maher a few years ago. But he presented it better than Chait, focusing on the amount of missiles and the duration of time Israel had to endure it (rathen than, as Sullivan does, on the actual destruction and loss of life) and he coupled it with an emotional plea to Americans asking do you expect us not to respond at all??!!
I agree with Netanyahu that Israel should have the right to respond and to ask the U.S. for help in responding. Permit me to disagree with the methods Israel chooses to do so. I think he’s missing chance after chance to pursue peaceful methods of conflict resolution.
RICKM
ajr22-
Why shouldn’t Sullivan highlight Israel’s war crimes?
Ruckus
@geg6:
The whole thing is just too depressing. And I’m seeing too many parallels in what has been happening in America, politically and internationally, over the last decade or so to feel in any way superior. We’re not quite where I see Israel (in the midst of suicide), but I can see us getting there.
I feel this way as well.
I think we are headed in the same direction, but I think we have been going slower but have been at it longer, but we, like Israel, are gathering speed towards that proverbial cliff. And unfortunately I have no clue as what to do about it. For either country. The power has shifted towards gathering speed in the wrong direction and I feel powerless. Maybe it just takes a lot of us standing in the way to stop the downward motion, but even that feels useless, because I don’t see anyone with enough voice to organize the necessary numbers.
I wonder if some thought that Obama was that voice.
AhabTRuler
Bibi isn’t “missing” chances at peace, it’s just that sometimes you gotta keep on walking.
And Another Thing...
@Chuck: Thanks for another cheap shot example of Godwin’s Law, “…like the Gestapo kicking in your door…”
Maybe you ought to read @ellaesther: comment.
Jerk.
Kyle
The problem is when they called it The New Republic (A Wholly Owned Subsidiary of AIPAC), you thought the republic they were concerned with was the USA. And these are the same people who scream that non-insane, non-neocons “aren’t patriotic”.
Chuck
@And Another Thing…: Seriously? How far over the top do I have to go to make it obvious the Gestapo/Babylon thing was a joke? In an otherwise-measured comment about overreacting to overstatements.
Pococurante
Ignore Sullivan until Spring. Photons always seem to perk him up. RLY.
As far as Gaza, get back to me when anyone can post a comment that reflects a memory of more than a year.
celticdragonchick
@patroclus:
I would point out the side in this that uses German made submarines is…wait for it…
Israel!
Yep. The Dolphin Class submarines with the sooper speshul modified cruise missile launch tubes (for those HAVE NAP POPEYE cruise missiles carrying the 200kg plutonium core warheads) are made in Germany!!
Batocchio
Chait is normally great on economic/domestic issues, but was sometimes downright disingenuous in his attacks on opponents of the Iraq War. (I think this one is delusional and this one is defensive dishonesty, but YMMV. I think John Cole’s right about the TNR criticism thing.) Nobody’s perfect, and we all have our blind spots, but I’ve always been troubled by the crew that declares, “We agree on everything but unnecessary war, which is awesome!” It shouldn’t be hard to get that right. Such attitudes call into question a pundit’s fundamental judgment, values and understanding of the world. If a war is actually necessary, then those who support it must make a persuasive case, because going to war is a decision of major consequence, literally life-and-death, and should not be treated lightly just because it’s fashionable in the Beltway.
ruemara
@Svensker:
HAH! As a NYer, if that attack happened in Spanish Harlem or South Bronx projects, then it would be as DougJ said.
ellaesther
@Pococurante: My pleasure: This will take you all the way back to 1948, but perhaps more to the point, it’ll take you back to the start of the current seige on Gaza, which began in 2006.
ellaesther
Oh, and SPEAKING of answering criticism of Israel with cries of “anti-Semite!”:
Americans for Peace Now has launched a campaign protesting the recent violent attempts to stifle peace advocacy/any non-right-wing opinion in Israel.
And I would add that we need to take on the folks in the American community who have gotten pretty McCarthy-ite as well.
Comrade Kevin
@Kyle: Don’t be stupid. The New Republic was founded in 1914.
DougJ
@ajr22:
When he gets going on something, he beats it into the ground. Even when I agree with him, I get tired of it eventually. This is no different.
DougJ
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
Maybe Belfast? I’m sure there are lots.
Tax Analyst
@geg6:
Well put. I agree. I despise that Israel has turned into a major-league oppressor and just can’t get themselves to take their foot off the Palestinian’s necks. Are they blind to history? Was the Warsaw ghetto only bad because it happened to Jews? No, the Palestinian situation does not equal Warsaw, but where is there a sign that Israel will ease off? I haven’t seen any for quite some time.
Josh
Robert @7: What’s a “Goyem”? And were Jewish Londoners warned in advance not to go to work?
Just wanted to point out that there’s been an antisemite in this conversation.
Boney Baloney
If you’ve played Battlefield 1942, and who has not, one (1) Qassam-2 rocket equals one (1) Katyusha rocket fired from the back of a Lend-Lease heavy truck. Yes, the weak-ass ballistic rockets that draw more fire than they can possibly send downrange. The one nobody bothers to spawn-camp. That one.
Except that Q-2 rockets are fired blind over short range and at largely unpopulated areas of desert. And they’re constructed of plastic, not steel, and the payload has been traded for extra fuel in the hope of clearing one’s own settlement before detonation. And a pack of Boy Scouts with rocketry badges would slap the ass off anyone who set up a clown parade like the documented anti-Israeli Q-2 batteries.
In the end, it’s a lot of time and effort to drop two flashbang grenades almost totally at random in the middle of B.F.E. in enemy territory. If this is the casus belli certain people are soiling themselves about, well, it’s hard to pretend that F-16 air strikes are a proportionate response.
DS
This is almost as ridiculous as a writer at The Nation comparing the Gaza offensive to the so-called “rape of Nanking” by the Japanese army during the Second World War. Ummmm, yeah. Can we please talk about the Congo now or even the India-Pakistan conflict? You know, something that could kill millions and millions of people and result in nuclear war. There are more pressing issues in the world, a fact I’m sure the partisans on both sides of the conflict will be surprised to learn.
Mary
@DS: Israel wants the US to engage in a preventative strike on Iran and is threatening to do it themselves. The potential to kill millions of people is there. As well, military action against Iran will probably result in the collapse of the United States, not that the Israelis appear to care.
I’ll never get tired of Andrew Sullivan talking about these issues. Very few of Sullivan’s stature have the nerve to do it because they are afraid of the exact same character assassination that was attempted on him.
I’m with Sullivan. I think that the world is going to have to impose the peace on the intransigent Israelis and the Palestinians. I believe that day is coming.
I feel exactly like Geg6 on this issue. She must have been reading my mind.