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‘Palestine’ and the Energy of Colonization
Pro-Hamas and anti-Israel activists march to the White House and demand a cease-fire in Gaza. Photo: Allison Bailey/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
JNS.org – In what can only be considered as an ironic twist of intention, it has become apparent that not only has the idea of a free Arab state of Palestine become an agenda item of the first degree for the United Nations, human-rights NGOs, and other similar bodies and institutions, but it has become the ideal of these bodies as well. The slogan “Palestine must be free” has literally colonized the minds of intellectuals, academicians, diplomats and university students, thus assuring, at least for the short term, it being a constant of discussion, debate and involvement.
In what I have termed as the rhetoric of obversity—that is, the orchestration of language to mean not what was originally intended, as well as the expanding of their meaning to include new definitions—the normative definition of settler colonialism has been modified. Settler colonialism is when invaders occupy a territory to permanently replace the existing society with the society of the colonizers so as to enjoy metropolitan living standards and political privileges. It has been applied, wrongly and falsely, to Zionism.
This allows news items, such as one from Dec. 20, “Illegal Israeli Colonizers Raze Land,” to hammer the term into the heads of Jewish youth who should know better as it more easily does into the thinking of others.
Implicit in applying the “settler colonialism” terminology is to suggest that the goals of Zionism were and are the elimination and exploitation of the “native” population. However, that never happened, nor was it the intention of the Zionist enterprise. In fact, it’s the opposite.
Cary Nelson, is his magnificent “Israel Denial” on the faculty campaign against the Jewish state, notes on pages 120-123 how the older claim of Zionism as a colonialist movement has now been linked to the false assertion not only of a supposed Arab Palestinian identity but an Arab Palestinian indigeneity as well, thereby interlocking the core forces that drive the anger and involvement of college student even while this causes a racialization format.
In an academic treatment, Sai Englert quotes Fayez Sayegh who described the core of Zionism’s ideology as one of “racial self-segregation, racial exclusiveness and racial supremacy” on p. 22 in a 1965 PLO booklet. Sayegh, the Syrian-born founder of the Palestine Research Center of Beirut, is held to be a pioneering analyst in the field. Perhaps one of the more illustrative examples of language rape practiced by the proponents of pro-Palestine propaganda is the one used at the March 2011 Seventh Annual Conference of the London’s SOAS Palestine Society. It would have us believe that “[f]or over a century, Zionism has subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new colonial Israeli society.”
To give but one example of the relative primitiveness of the approach in its early period is to quote from Sayegh writing: “The frenzied ‘Scramble for Africa’ of the 1880s stimulated the beginnings of Zionist colonization in Palestine.” Jews at that time were a permanent feature for centuries in Jerusalem, Safed, Tiberias and Hebron. Leading up to 1740 and in the following decade, thousands immigrated to Eretz Yisrael expecting the Messianic era to evolve, including Rabbi Moses Haim Luzzatto and Kabbalist Rabbi Haim ben Attar.
Indeed, in all the previous centuries, Jews were moving to reside in Eretz Yisrael, including hundreds of rabbis and some of the greatest luminaries of Jewish scholarship. In the mid- to late 18th century, hundreds of Chassidim, many with families, were immigrating to the country. By the early 19th century, the pupils of the Vilna Gaon, too, were making the move. Not antisemitism but religious motivation was the force behind this.
To borrow a phrase from Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), how did this theorizing warp the minds of young people?
As can be expected, one of the very first to spread the theme was a Jew, Maxime Rodinson, whose “Israel: A Colonial Settler-State?” (originally appearing in French in early July 1967) did much to take it out of the category of PLO propaganda. He provided a Marxist and even anthropological framework that allowed the idea to settle into academia in tandem with the success of the growth of race theory and the north/south model.
Nevertheless, there was a problem for Zionism is one of the most genuine, and most successful, repatriation movements in history. Jews came from what the world calls “Palestine.” Antisemites throughout the centuries demanded that Jews “go back to Palestine.” Most recently, even an extreme leftist such as Uri Misgav, in Haaretz, has written: “Zionism is not colonialism, despite the efforts of the politics of blame and identity to place it under this heading.”
There is, perhaps, a psychological element working here.
As Lee Smith asserts, in advancing the cause of the Arab Palestinians, they created “the prototype of ‘Third World man’ which “served the narcissism of Western elites.” To what purpose? Smith explains: “Removed from the apex of their strength, and their will to defend a civilization built by better men long depleted, Western elites’ self-image is sustained by Third World man.” Indeed, “Palestine … [is] not a place, it’s a spiritual principle guided by the inversion of reality and governed by the equation 2+2=5.”
A recent example of the progress of Palestine’s colonization process was the attempted protest by Doctors Against Genocide to take place at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. It went too far and aroused too much pushback, and was walked back. But the idea was to invade the public representation of the Jewish Holocaust—a quite specific and unique event—rob it of its meaning, harvest its emotional value, and ultimately, to take it over as property of “Palestine.”
As Tafi Mhaka wrote in Al Jazeera this month: “The time is ripe for the end of Western colonization in Palestine.” It should be made clear that the time is overdue to end the colonization by pro-Palestine proponents.
The post ‘Palestine’ and the Energy of Colonization first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Social Media Personality Who Explores Food: ‘Only Time I Get Real Hate Is When I Show Love to Jewish People’
Social media influencer Chris Caresnone, otherwise known as the Babka King. Photo: Screenshot
The popular social media personality Chris Caresnone, known by some as the Babka King, said in a recent post that he has received “real hate” and threats for featuring Jewish food and culture on his pages, lamenting an online wave of antisemitism that has targeted him among others.
“I’m not here to feed conflict — I’m here to feed connection. And here’s the truth from my actual lived experience,” Caresnone, whose real name is Chris Campbell, wrote in a message to his social media followers last week. “I’ve made content showing love to so many cultures — Mexican, Polish, Filipino, Palestinian, Black, White, Honduran, Jewish, etc. … and the only time I consistently get real hate is when I show love to Jewish people.”
(@chriscaresnone)Campbell has amassed a large following with his social media content, which focuses on bringing people together through food and culture. He has just under 640,000 followers across TikTok and Instagram.
He started trying Jewish foods after being sent a Babka in June 2024. Since then, he has tried many other Jewish foods and even went on a Jewish food tour in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with Yaakov Langer — who runs the successful Jewish social media and podcasting company Living L’Chaim.
However, Campbell said he has received significant antisemitism over his Jewish-related content. “That ain’t some political stance. That’s just me telling the truth,” he wrote. “I have received threats only when I showed love to the Jewish culture.”
Campell explained that seeing the antisemitism as someone who is not Jewish gives him a different perspective. “As someone who’s probably not in my space, especially if you’re non-Jewish, and then you see it, it’s different when you see it from an outsider’s perspective. It’s crazy. There’s only 14 million Jewish people on earth, y’all, and they’re the most, I can see why they’re always in fear.”
Campell also emphasized that the Jewish community has greatly appreciated his content showcasing its culture and food.
“The Jewish culture has embraced me in ways that others haven’t. They’ve sent me products, flown me out, paid me, supported me in my inbox, and shown me love. Asked for help And when someone shows love — I show love back. It’s called the law of reciprocity,” he wrote. “I started showing love FIRST to the Jewish Culture and all Cultures for that matter and all cultures have embraced me to be fair but the Jewish culture REALLY embraced me and then they showed me love. Understandably.”
Despite the negativity he sometimes receives, Campell wanted to make it known that “99 percent of the comments I get are pure love.” However, he continued, “this message is for that 1 percent who can’t stand to see a Black man showing love to Jewish people. I see you. But I don’t live in your energy.”
The post Social Media Personality Who Explores Food: ‘Only Time I Get Real Hate Is When I Show Love to Jewish People’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Jordan Foils Muslim Brotherhood Plot to Stage Attacks in Kingdom
Murad Adailah, the head of Jordan’s Muslim Brotherhood, attends an interview with Reuters in Amman, Jordan, Sept. 7, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Jehad Shelbak
Jordan said on Tuesday it had arrested 16 people linked to the Muslim Brotherhood who were trained and financed in Lebanon and had plotted attacks on targets inside the kingdom involving rockets and drones.
Authorities said at least one rocket was ready to be launched as part of an operation that had been under surveillance by security forces since 2021.
A security source said the suspects were connected to the Muslim Brotherhood, the country’s largest opposition group, while the head of the cell who trained some of its members was based in Lebanon.
The Brotherhood have been accused of instigating anti-government street protests in Jordan, which has a large Palestinian population.
Security forces found a rocket manufacturing facility alongside a drone factory, according to a statement by the General Intelligence Department released on state media.
“The plot aimed at harming national security, sowing chaos and causing material destruction inside the kingdom,” the statement said.
The suspects were referred to the state security court for trial.
“We are talking about new tactics, rockets and drones. This means a complete change in the way the Muslim Brotherhood are dealing with Jordan and targeting its security,” Amer Al Sabaileh, a prominent security analyst, told Reuters.
Government spokesperson Mohammad al Momani told a press briefing the government would be airing full confessions from the suspects, some of whom had been trained in Lebanon.
The rockets found in a secret hideout on the outskirts of the capital were being manufactured with a 3 to 5 km range for use against targets inside the kingdom, Momani added.
A security source said dozens of rockets were found.
Over the past year, Jordan has said it has foiled attempts to smuggle weapons by infiltrators linked to pro-Iranian militias in Syria and Lebanon-based radical Palestinian groups.
They said some of the arms were bound for the neighboring West Bank, adding that they have arrested several Jordanians linked to Palestinian terrorists.
Security officials said the incidents were terrorism-related based on the quantities of explosives found.
They said the plot was linked to Iran and its allies’ clandestine efforts to recruit agents to carry out acts of sabotage within the kingdom to destabilize one of Washington’s allies in the region.
Jordan has over 3,500 American troops stationed in several bases and, since the war between Israel and Palestinian terrorists in Gaza erupted in October 2023, it has been increasingly targeted by Iranian-backed groups operating in neighboring Syria and Iraq.
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Hamas Says Lost Contact With Group Holding Israeli-US Hostage Alexander
A Torah and a photograph of Edan Alexander, the American-Israeli and Israel Defense Forces soldier taken hostage during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, sit in his home during a family interview with Reuters in Tenafly, New Jersey, US, Dec. 14, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Stephani Spindel
The armed wing of Hamas said on Tuesday it had lost contact with a group of terrorists holding Israeli-American hostage Edan Alexander in the Gaza Strip.
Abu Ubaida, the armed wing‘s spokesperson, said on the social media platform Telegram that it lost contact after the Israeli army attacked the place where the terrorists were holding Alexander, who is a New Jersey native and a 21-year-old soldier in the Israeli army.
Abu Ubaida did not say where in Gaza Alexander was purportedly held. Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that has controlled Gaza for nearly two decades, later released a video warning hostages’ families that their “children will return in black coffins with their bodies torn apart from shrapnel from your army.”
Hamas has previously blamed Israel for the deaths of hostages held in Gaza, including as a direct result of military operations, while also acknowledging on at least one occasion that a hostage was killed by a guard. It said the guard had acted against instructions.
There was no immediate response from the Israeli military to a request for comment on the Hamas statement about Alexander.
US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff told reporters at the White House in March that gaining the release of Alexander, believed to be the last living American hostage held by Hamas in Gaza, was a “top priority for us.”
The Tikva Forum, a group representing some family members of those held in Gaza, had said earlier on Tuesday that Alexander was among up to 10 hostages who could be released by Hamas if a new ceasefire was reached, citing a conversation a day earlier between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the mother of another hostage. There was no immediate comment on that from Netanyahu’s office.
On Saturday Hamas released a video purportedly showing Alexander, who has been held in Gaza since he was captured by Palestinian terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023.
The release of Alexander was at the center of earlier talks held between Hamas leaders and US hostage negotiator Adam Boehler last month.
Hamas released 38 hostages under a ceasefire that began on Jan. 19. In March, Israel’s military resumed its ground and aerial offensive on Gaza, abandoning the ceasefire after Hamas rejected proposals to extend the truce without ending the war.
Israeli officials say that offensive will continue until the remaining 59 hostages are freed and Gaza is demilitarized. Hamas insists it will free hostages only as part of a deal to end the war and has rejected demands to lay down its arms.
The post Hamas Says Lost Contact With Group Holding Israeli-US Hostage Alexander first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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