toast 2

To continue to peruse Rev Wright's remarks:

"Louis said 20 years ago that Zionism, not Judaism, was a gutter religion. He was talking about the same thing United Nations resolutions say, the same thing now that President Carter's being vilified for and Bishop Tutu's being vilified for."

It's interesting (if not surprising) that Carter is 'lumped in' with Farrakhan.... Accepting that the conduct of Israeli foreign policy has a tendency to belligerence (which may or may not be entirely rational given the tendency of its neighbours to belligerent activities in relation to Israel), I'm fairly sure 'Zionism' is not a religion at all. It might be best to be certain of what we're talking about.

Zionism is a political movement basing itself on the establishment and defence of a Jewish homeland state, specifically in Palestine. Essentially what this is saying then is that there is no reason for a Jewish homeland state, which may or may not be a valid argument, but isn't based on the political realities. The merit of the so-called 'two state' plan has been around for almost a full century (the British attempted it), but Palestinians/and or Arabs will have none of it. They invaded after a UN mandate in 1948 (which sort of nips the edge off the UN part of Wright's argument, most of the 'UN rhetoric' comes from the neighbouring Arab states, Iran, and whatever allies they have), and promptly lost several wars, some closer than others. It should have been possible for diplomatic resolution to find a way to purchase, partition or otherwise distribute land between Jews and Palestinians (who had been living alongside one another in one form or another in the area for many years prior). Diplomacy has completely failed as a result of perceived aggressions/injustices followed by active aggressions by both sides. Israel has legitimate security concerns posed by the persistence of hostile agents on its borders (Hez'bollah, Hamas notably), but it also persists in aggravating those concerns with belligerent and ineffectual posturing of its own. None of this means that Zionism is by itself 'a gutter religion'. It merely defines the impetus for the line of thinking that Zionism is wrong, generally associated with a pro-Palestinian viewpoint (though this is problematic as well). The essential assumption means that Jews have no stake in providing for themselves a nation state, which recent history may show is rather unremarkable in context. Nations are constantly balkanizing in many areas of the world, or at least dividing into autonomous regions, between ethnic and religious groups. If we were to presume that Jews have no rationale for this behavior, we would have to examine why other ethnic/religious groups have found reason to do so and question those assumptions as well (and they are indeed often questionable). It is possible, maybe even preferable, that "Zionism" be abandoned in favor of things like "Israeli/Palestinian-ism" (whichever one you want to call it), essentially a nationalistic/democratic viewpoint rather than a preference for a Jewish state. The impetus for a 'Jewish state' within Israel itself really kicked off after the successful occupation of Jerusalem and the establishment of that as the capital, along with the subsequent migration of more orthodox Jews. So really it all stems from those aforementioned wars, not some long standing political movement that differs only in the nature of the people involved from other similar regional issues (namely the breakup of Soviet-stans and other Eastern bloc states).

Looking over the history of black anti-semitic remarks, it is curious to find that the very agency (NAACP) at which Wright made this speech endorsed the Zionist movement and the foundation of the state of Israel. And yet now, it is entirely popular to make anti-Jewish commentary in black communities? Why? I have no idea, other than the sociological explanation that minorities are often more bigoted than the norm. It must not have always been so. In point of fact however, it must not always have been so that vociferous persons among those communities were so lacking in inspirational thinking and so willing to point fingers elsewhere to account for problems. It is interesting to note that such thinking is not only not unique to America, not unique to blacks, and generally always associated with a culture of economic or industrial failure (and accompanying political movements which insists on racial motivations, including ironically the KKK).