Reading List 9-29
Five Essays and Articles from the Week to Help Understand the Moment
These are some of the essays and articles I found most interesting this week. First, Shaul Magid, a rabbi who teaches at Harvard, comments on the canard that all criticism of Israel stems from antisemitism or anti-West sentiments. It doesn’t.
Other pieces focus on the war, the election, and the anti-trans Trump/GOP agenda. I’ll post without comment, but invite readers to respond to particular articles on this list.
Shaul Magid. "Is ‘Western Self-Hatred’ the Problem in the Gaza War Protest Movement?” Religion Dispatches, 26 Sept. 2024.
It’s a sad irony that the State of Israel was founded as a state of the oppressed and has now become a state of the oppressor. As a Jew, and an Israeli citizen, that is painful to me as it is to many of us. But that doesn’t make it untrue. History is nothing if not a deep pool of irony where the unexpected often becomes the law. It’s not antisemitic to oppose those who dominate others, or to resist those who claim that they are the real victims of those they dominate.
There were 1,200 murdered victims of October 7 and hundreds of hostages—some still alive, many tragically not. This is unconscionable, but Israel is not the victim in the larger conflict. Israel is the hegemon. Whatever one thinks of it, that was precisely what Zionism was supposed to accomplish—the end of Jewish victimhood. If Israel sees itself as a victim, then Zionism has failed.
Apara Gopalan. “After the Encampments.” Jewish Currents, 26 Sept. 2024.
Omar Hamed Beato. “Nagorno-Karabakh Bears the Scars of Azeri Control.” Jacobin, 26 Sept. 2024.
Marc Cooper. “Israel Becomes a Rogue State and Widens the War.” The Coop Scoop. 27 Sept. 2024.
Sam Levin. “Republican state lawmakers are already targeting trans people with discriminatory policies.” The Guardian, 24 Sept. 2024.