After Friday night's Real Time show on HBO, Rep. RashidaTlaib called for a boycott of Bill Maher to punish him for calling the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement a "bullsh*t purity test" and daring to point out that BDS's origin and purpose is the goal of dissolving Israel into a single Palestinian state.
In an email post to friends about Tlaib and her fellow BDS advocate Ilhan Omar, I speculated about Tlaib and Omar's district constituents' satisfaction with the way their House reps are spending their political capital. I thought BDS might not be at the top of their priority list for their House members, but I acknowledged that I was only speculating.
So, it turns out that Tom Friedman had already written an op-ed column asking the same question regarding Omar's district, except that he is not just speculating. Coincidentally, Friedman grew up in Omar's district. He is in touch with what's happening there, what people in the district perceive their most urgent problems to be and what their hopes had been for Omar to serve as a unifier of the diverse elements in the community rather than a divider.
It's rare that I ever read a Friedman column wherein I find myself in greater harmony with his thinking with each successive paragraph. In this one I think he's writing more from the heart than from the head. Nowhere is that more evident than in this penultimate line of the column, which resonates so profoundly with my own feelings and apprehensions:
I love Israelis, Palestinians and Arabs — but God save me from some of their American friends. So many of them just want to exploit this problem to advance themselves politically, get attention, raise money or delegitimize their opponents.
Finally, segueing from that very important observation, I conclude with the e-letter I just sent to Democracy for America in response to DFA's appeal for a donation so that the organization could continue its campaign of support for Reps. Omar and Tlaib. The DFA alignment with Omar and Tlaib is a stark and timely example of Friedman's observation above, and it validates concerns of Democrats concerned about 2020 unification and advocates of a strong U.S.-Israel alliance that this past week's events are damaging to both.
Dear DFA:
As a supporter of Israel who is as disgusted by and opposed to
the policies of Netanyahu as I am to the policies of Trump, I condemned
Israel's refusing entry to Omar and Tlaib at the behest of Trump. My
condemnation was not in the slightest informed by support for the positions of
the Congresswomen, it was a reaction to a very high-profile series of actions
that damage the U.S.-Israel alliance.
DFA's support for Omar and Tlaib, absent a disclaimer that your
support does not encompass their support for BDS, suggests to me that DFA
supports BDS. I'm all for their freedom to express their views, including
Tlaib's view that Israel ought not to exist as an independent nation that
serves as the lone refuge in the world for Jews after two thousand years of persecution
and disenfranchisement.
However, my opposition to censoring or banning people for
disagreeable political activism does NOT translate into material support for
that activism. BDS is founded on the ultimate goal of eliminating the
state of Israel along with stated goal of ending the Israeli military presence
in the PA territory, so people who support BDS are either ignorant of that or
in agreement with that ultimate goal. Based on their statements, I believe Omar
and Tlaib are in agreement with the goal of a one-state Palestine that entails
the end of Israel.
One last thought for you: should we promote a world-wide boycott
of the United States until the inhumane Trump treatment of Central American
refugees and the rejection of the climate accords and the Iran deal all
end? Those policies are putting all of humanity at significantly greater
risk, exponentially more so than any of Israel's policies.
All best, HD
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