November 29, 2007
Posted by yaman
Israel MTV comes to campus!
The MTV version of Israel is coming to campus tonight in the form of Israel 360, a way cool presentation with cool facts about Israel!
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“Israel 360†is a dynamic multi-media presentation about Israel from A-Z. “Israel 360†is designed to engage students who know very little about Israel by highlighting exciting components of Israeli history, geography, and culture. In addition to providing tons of information, “Israel 360†will show students that Israel is a unique and inspiring place that must be seen. Bring “Israel 360†to your campus! We will provide funding for a top-notch location, advertising, food, recruiters and door prizes to create an Israel experience your campus will never forget.
And don’t forget to watch our dynamic PowerPoint presentation about Israel!
Oh, wait, do you think this is a totally neutral and apolitical presentation to show you other cool sides of Israel that you probably never knew about? Think again, because we also offer factsheets and publications for your campus on the following:
* “The ‘Occupation’ Myth,” where we explain alternative ways of understanding over 500 Israeli military checkpoints in the West Bank!
* “A Palestinian State Would Not Bring Peace,” where we explain why the Palestinians should continue to live under The Occupation Myth!
* “The Myth of Oppression,” where we question the legitimacy of Palestinian suffering!
* “Israel’s Humane Army,” where we show you the humanitarian side of M-16 assault rifles!
and our personal favorite, “The Legality of Israeli Settlements!”
Hope you’ve enjoyed this dynamic multi-media introduction to Israel, the only democracy with PR-firm field offices on a college campus near you!
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| Free, courtesy of IsraelActivism.com, where all unoriginal Israel supporters can learn how to become successful Israel activists MTV-style! |
16 Comments
November 29, 2007
Wow…I never knew occupation could be so hip.
November 30, 2007
the cynicism of these presentations is twofold: on the one hand they try to silence any discussion of the occupation and of the suffering of Palestinans in the territories and within Israel. On the other hand they take every suffering and discriminated-against group within the jewish population and coopt them to serve this propaganda. So here we have picture after picture of ethiopian Israeils, presumably demonstrating how tolerant and diverse Israel is. Not a single word about the widespread and well-known discrimination against them.
In other cases we get told about the happy GLBT community (don’t mention how people were barred from properly marching in Jerusalem for two years in a row; how in a previous year a protestor got stabbed; don’t talk about the frequent police violence against them).
And then there are the happy Mizrachim (middle eastern jews) who serve to counteract claims of Israeli expropriation of Palestinian property. The government of Iraq “also” expropriated the property of Iraqi jews, so the Palestinians shouldn’t be complaining – “the arabs” got some property and “the jews” got some porperty, so we’re all even now.
And whenever these minorities acheive something, it isn’t because they fought for it – it just had to happen, because Israel is such a great place. Trust the government and israelactivism.com, the people who are busy profiting from these struggles.
December 5, 2007
let me just say, that as an American Jew and a supporter of Israel, I find this event embarrassing.
I got the invitation on facebook, and as much as I am proud of my Israeli heritage, I could not bring myself to click the “attending” button.
I had a bad feeling as soon as I saw the sanitized, childish logo for the event, which looked like it came straight out of a corporate design firm. For me, the ipod giveaway was the final straw that made me decide not to attend.
I really think these groups do more harm than good when they appeal to the lowest common denominator to promote their cause.
For me, this is just confirmation of what I had previously suspected, that Jews are politically incompetent. (contrary to popular belief.)
December 5, 2007
aj, I hesitated to approve your comment because the last remark is border-line racist. I don’t think that kind of generalization for any group is really called for–in this case if you state it in the affirmative it sounds like an anti-semitic conspiracy theory; in the negative, sounds like you’re degrading and insulting a group of people. I decided in the end to approve your comment (despite this little note) because it conveys the so-far unique position in this thread of supporting (it seems to me anyway) the message of this event but not the commercialized tactics it assumed. Another sort of criticism, I suppose.
December 5, 2007
Tom-
I don’t understand what kind of twisted agenda you possibly have in making such claims.
When I was in Israel last summer, I saw an Ethiopian woman walking down the street with a large cross tattooed on her forehead. Actually, I saw more than one woman with this condition. I can only imagine what kind of mutilation she suffered on other parts of her body, just for being a Jew in Ethiopia. You cannot convince me that the Zionist project was a bad thing for these people.
December 5, 2007
Yaman-
Your use of political correctness in this argument is an incredibly cheap tactic. If you disagree with me, argue based on merits and facts.
December 5, 2007
aj, I wasn’t really arguing with you or against you, I was just offering my thoughts on something I was uncomfortable with in your comment. I wasn’t accusing you of being ill-intentioned, and I certainly am not being superficially “politically correct” for the sake of saying something. There’s a substantial practical difference between “positive” and “negative” racism, but analytically they both suffer from the same problem of essentialization, and both have dangerous ramifications.
As for arguing on merits and facts, I’d love to do that, but you only voiced your discomfort with the Israel 360 event (and I agreed with your criticisms of it) and your “support” for Israel, which was not clarified or explained so I don’t know what it means or why you feel that way, so I can’t argue about it.
What I can comment on, though, is your response to Tom. Tom alleged that there is discrimination in Israel against Ethiopian Jews as well as other minorities. Supposedly in response, you stated that Ethiopian Jews were discriminated against in Ethiopia. Well, that is not properly a response, and both comments are almost certainly true.
The only response you gave Tom was an allegation that he had a “twisted agenda”–which you didn’t explain, unless you are denying the factual accuracy of the things he’s pointed out. I hope you don’t actually believe that Israel is a perfect place for Ethiopian Jews, among other minorities; a haven, comparatively, probably. But is there really no room for criticism here? I hope that if you are sincerely concerned with the fate of Ethiopians in Israel, you would opt to investigate their conditions rather than accede to using them as a cheap propaganda tool, like the Israel 360 program and many others (BlueStarPR comes to mind).
December 5, 2007
Yaman,
I come to admit that I admire your nicely designed blogs. And I admire such informed political, and historical views from a technically advanced man. Oh and I am now reading on the bottom that your blog was designed by someone else.
Although, I do have a hard time with your deconstructionist ramblings. I prefer to operate in the realm of historical and polictical events, instead of deconstruction, and use of hip intellectual, revolution terminology.
December 5, 2007
The theme on this blog is a derivative of the NetWorker theme here. That’s never been a secret. There’s a link at the bottom. Duh?
December 6, 2007
aj,
first of all, I know you’re not being serious but I wouldn’t say jews are politically incompetant – I’m very proud of plenty of jewish groups and individuals here and in Israel.
About ethiopian jews, I think you’re making a variation on the well known “it could be worse” argument. As I hear regulalry, Israel could easily kill every Palestinan, man, woman and child – it could be worse. And Israeli Arabs (/Palestinian citizens of Israel) would have even fewer rights if they lived somewhere else. And some Mizrachi jews would probably be worse had they stayed in the countries of origin. etc. etc.
So I agree, ethiopian Israeli could be worse: at least in Israel they are not forced to covert to christianity.
Having said that, as a minority in Israel they are not currently doing so well. There aren’t enough statistics on this because the state doesn’t systematically collect data on them, but here is some info on their housing, employment and education
http://www.adva.org/search.asp?lang=en&query=ethiopian
I’ve seen several reports on TV about well-qualified students not being able to get jobs because of racism; they have separate clubs for teenagers since there are sometimes not admitted to the regular ones; they still have problems with the religious establishment not recognizing their jewishness and their religious leaders.
I am not saying all of this to “attack Israel”. A lot of countries have problems with absorbing immigrants and we didn’t invent racism. But here’s the thing – I would like the state to first of all improve their situation, to make them feel truely accepted, and only after that to use them as poster children for diversity. When we have true diversity we should advertise it, but to pretend the situation is better than it is, in order to sell a twisted agenda that denies the occupation, is a bit cynical. That’s what I was trying to say.
December 6, 2007
here’s more
December 7, 2007
Tom-
I think that I agree with the main idea of your post above: Injustices committed by others don’t excuse or change the reality of our own injustices.
Israel as a society has its share of racism, crime, poverty, a nonfunctioning education system, and other things that the government should focus on (instead of pointless conferences).
My problem is the cynical (possibly paranoid) nature of your original comment. Are you suggesting that Israel rescued the Jewish communities of Ethiopia and Yemen just so that they could improve the cheesy presentations they make for American college students? That they brought Jews from Iraq in order to counteract Palestinian claims for compensation?
The issues that you mentioned are completely legitimate, but they do not change the fact that Israel IS a diverse country, ethnically, culturally and linguistically. The fact that this presentation raises awareness of minorities should be to their credit, not something to use against them.
I guess what I have trouble understanding is who the real villain is, given that Mizrachim, Falashim, FSU immigrants, holocaust survivors, and gays are all being used as pawns for someone else.
December 7, 2007
I don’t think that that is what Tom was saying (that Israel “rescued” [itself a problematic term] Ethiopian and Mizrahim Jews to produce propaganda). I think he is saying that the PR firms who use the presence of African and Arab Jews in Israel to prove that Israel is a nice pluralistic utopia, are typically not the ones who are documenting systematic discrimination against those communities, or doing anything to try remedying that problem. In fact, they often deny it (“Arabs in Israel are equal to non-Arab Israelis”).
December 8, 2007
Yaman said it for me. I’m talking about people’s presence in the country, not how they got there. All I’m saying is that some people are getting pretty well paid to do this PR, instead of spending the same money on actually improving the situation of each community. And again, the aim of this “positive” PR is to deflect criticism of the occupation, as Yaman correctly notes.
The confiscation of Iraqi jews’ property by the gov’ of Iraq is being used regularly as an excuse for appropriating Palestinian property. Read this -
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=329736
I think “falashas” is pretty derogatory, it means “strangers” in Amaharic.
December 9, 2007
I am starting to find this discussion boring and repetitive, so this will be my last comment.
If you want to criticize Israel’s policies towards Arabs, go ahead, but please stop pretending to care about one group or another just to sow divisiveness among Jews.
This is a strategy that will not succeed, because sectarian differences are less important in Israel than they are in places like Iraq, Lebanon, etc.
There was a time (40 years ago) when the slogan of the “oppressed Mizrahi” had some resonance, but that is really a thing of the past, especially since the rise of Mizrachi political parties like Shas, and the end of Labor dominance.
Also, I did not try to draw an equivalence between Palestinians and Iraqi Jews. Palestinians fled as a result of a war that they themselves instigated. Jews left Iraq because they were treated poorly (understatement) by a Nazi-sympathetic government and population.
I will also add that being a “stranger” does not necessarily have negative connotations for Jews. After all, Jews tell themselves every year, “we were strangers in the land of Egypt”.
December 9, 2007
aj, for goodness’ sake, please don’t keep making accusations that are not based on anything I wrote.
I am not trying to “sow divisiveness among jews”. I wrote several times that the GOVERNMENT is not treating all populations equally. This is about as “divisive” as saying the US government doesn’t treat whites and blacks equally.
Also, I was saying the GOVERNMENT and its propaganda try to draw equivalences between Palestinans and mizrachi jews in order to avoid paying compensation to Palestinians.
Inequality within the jewish population in Israel is far from being a thing of the past. Here is some data on current inequality in income
http://www.adva.org/UserFiles/File/income-types.pdf
and on current inequality in occupation
http://www.adva.org/UserFiles/File/occupation-continents.pdf
I don’t know if you read Hebrew, but I can try to find references to articles on inequality in housing, in education etc. There’s been a lot of research done on this in Israel. It’s a staple component of any basic sociology course.
I do agree, though, that the public discussion of these differences is less prevalent than it was in the past, especially in comparison to the late seventies and early eighties.
The comparison you make to other forms of sectarianism is, yet again, the “it-could-be-worse” argument, which is almost always true, but doesn’t disprove anything I said.
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