SALON

Tuesday, Jun 1, 2010 2:45 PM UTC

American mandate in Palestine is coming to an end, and about time

For 62 years, the U.S. government has signed off on every action Israel has taken, no matter how destructive

By

Topics: Israel

American mandate in Palestine is coming to an end, and about timeHamas security officers patrol on Gaza's seaport, Tuesday, June 1, 2010. Palestinians in Gaza declared a general strike and a day of wrath following Israel's deadly naval raid on an aid flotilla bound for the blockaded Gaza Strip on Monday. (AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)(Credit: AP)

This was originally published at Mondoweiss:

My wife, who pays very little attention to these issues, said this morning, “I think we should all get on boats and go over there.” She looks on Israel/Palestine as complicated, but this one’s easy. “People should keep going and going and going.” Do you know about the underlying conditions? I tested her. “Gaza.”

I have to believe that her human response to the besieged and humiliated people of Gaza is widely-shared today, around the world. And this is a challenge above all to American governance.

The Ottoman Empire, the Turks, controlled Palestine for hundreds of years. This was followed by the British Mandate of 1922-1948; and the British established a Jewish homeland in Palestine but walked away from the Mandate because Jewish terrorism in the wake of the Holocaust was too much for them to deal with. Since 1948 we have been under the American mandate, more or less. Everything that Israel has done since Suez the Americans have signed off on, dispossession, colonization, and so forth.

Today the Turks are leading the international moral challenge to Israel, on an issue that should be easy for anyone to judge. Hillary Clinton is in a panic. Read this say-nothing State Department statement. Obama is as stymied as he was during the Gaza slaughter– which is when the Turks assumed their leadership role. But Obama’s Democratic base is not in any doubt about the right and wrong of this one, c.f., my wife.

Another Obama supporter, Steve Walt challenged the lobby last night, to say, What crosses your line? The International Crisis Group also condemned the attack. And how illuminating, that in that key interval yesterday when North American Jews were called upon to speak out, J Street and Americans for Peace Now failed the challenge and– though both groups said the blockade of Gaza must end, for which I congratulate them– both failed to condemn Israeli actions in international waters. It was a test of leadership. JVP and Naomi Klein didn’t fail. Klein said, We have very few facts from last night, but that didn’t stop her from condemning the “carnage.” And Amira Hass on Democracy Now today said the action represents an abandonment of “common sense” in Israeli society regarding the occupation and the military actions undertaken to protect it.

The tide has turned. A new global generation demands new leaders.

More Philip Weiss.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 26 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Paul Krugman’s right: Austerity kills. "In an economy where we’re all in the same boat, one person’s spending is another person’s income. So when the government cuts spending, it reduces people’s income, leading to less business, more unemployment, and a vicious spiral of slowing down the economy."
384 points385 points | 412 comments
vote
Paul Krugman’s right: Austerity kills -- radical cuts destroy economies and lives, and the honest numbers and economics keep proving it
185 points186 points | 27 comments
vote
Virginia state Sen. Mark Obenshain wants to send women to jail who don't report their miscarriages to the police
168 points169 points | 22 comments
vote
Corporate greed is poisoning America — literally
133 points134 points | 17 comments
vote
Facebook “like” on trial in Virginia
30 points31 points | 6 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations