Whataboutist Zionism
Selective outrage and disproportionate scrutiny
The decades-long Israel-Palestine conflict is a complex and costly mess of epic scale, opinions about it usually based on association with one tribe or another through birth, or other ad hoc circumstances. Irrational and zealous as a fan cheering their local sporting team, hot hearts almost always triumph over cool minds when it comes to choosing sides.
I’ve posted 60+ blogs on this topic, and have done my best to remain as objective as possible. Central to my point of view are values I’ve peppered throughout, my core beliefs remaining implicit in everything I write about the agonizing subject: 1) The history is complicated, but irrelevant, and 2) What’s good for Israel is good for the Palestinians, and vice versa.
Regardless who did what to whom, who feels justified in this or that, the past remains the past, the present is a disaster, and the future is what Israelis and Palestinians make of it. That sounds obvious, and is, yet defenders and aggressors from both teams continue to cite precedent, if only to justify beliefs and behaviors that exacerbate the ongoing turmoil.
A few equally obvious facts remain equally obvious: Israel isn’t going anywhere, and the Palestinians aren’t going anywhere; both populations are compressed within a plot of worthless yet coveted land the size of New Jersey; and if they can’t figure it out, the past seven decades of continuous violent attrition, punctuated by major wars, will inevitably lead to chaos.
Take a look at the regional demographics: the Jewish and Arab populations of Israel and the occupied territories are about equal, while growth curves reveal a steady increase in two segments diametrically at odds: Orthodox Jews, and Palestinians. Doesn’t take a math genius to see that staying on this sombre path will inexorably hurl Israel toward complete annihilation.
That helps explain why I think Bill Maher, Sam Harris, and other ostensibly brilliant commentators get this mess all wrong — and likely why I end up pissing off all tribes with my simultaneous criticism of Netanyahu and his extremists, Sinwar and his asymmetrical death strategy, and the Biden adminstration and their meek, hypocritical, and ineffective policies.
Since Israel isn’t going anywhere, they will continue to defend themselves; since the Palestinians aren’t going anywhere, Israel will have no choice but to eventually give them self-determination; and since these two points are true, Israel needs to stop abusing Palestinians and illegally settling the West Bank, and the Palestinians need to accept max 22% of the land and Israel.
Still with me? I bring all this up to frame my next argument, which otherwise might come across as biased, or even apologist. Ready? Here goes: Despite the region’s horrific history and excruciating current events, Israelis are correct in asserting that they are treated unfairly in the court of worldwide public opinion, which continues to make them a special case.
I call this pushback “Whataboutist Zionism,” in that the logic involves responding to an accusation with a counter-accusation, usually meant to distract and deflect, similar in style to an ad hominem attack. For example, the technique goes something like “Trump got impeached for foreign interference!” then countered with “But what about Hunter’s laptop?”
In this specific instance, the variant of such a tu quoque strategy sounds like “the ICC just issued a warrant for the arrest of Netanyahu and his former defense minister Gallant for war crimes in Gaza!” countered with “But what about Assad killing half a million Syrians? What about MBS killing a quarter million Yemenis? What about Xi taking out the Uyghurs?”
Such whataboutist logic seems sketchy, in most contexts certainly is, within this context remains on point — Israel is singled-out and called-out among the world’s nations, many other countries and their leaders committing far worse crimes and for sketchier reasons. Jews are always news, to a degree that begs the question of antisemitism and other factors being at play.
Selective outrage, disportionate focus, and silence regarding even more egregious human rights’ abuses are puzzling. Anti-Zionists point to Israel’s preferred status as unconditional bipartisan US ally far as arms sales, aid packages, and UN resolutions go — but where were the campus protests during the Rwandan genocide, Syrian civil war, or gassing of the Kurds?
No, I’m not saying that criticizing Israel is antisemitic — and no, I’m not saying that Israel, Netanyahu, or the IDF should be absolved of their excesses and abuses because their actions are de facto considered in a different light than most other nations. Instead, what I’m expressing is the observation that anti-Zionism is in vogue — and with a sheek — that is odd.
Israelis further compound this selective and disproportionate global scrutiny and outrage to mask and justify their excesses and abuses. Round and round it goes — Israel concluding the whole world hates them anyway so they do whatever they want, the whole world hating them for doing whatever they want, which they then go ahead do with impunity anyway.
The negative feedback loop is striking even here on Medium, where my daily feed explodes with people who ostensibly have zero direct connection to Israel or Palestine railing against the Zionists. I understand the outrage, have written about fissures within the American Jewish community, too, but am often astonished by the levels of selective vitriol and bombast.
Why might a former truck driver or elementary school teacher dedicate themselves to criticizing Israel and defending Palestinian statehood, while the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) reports over 120 other ongoing armed conflicts worldwide, including major confrontations in Sudan and of course Ukraine? Blame the media, or antisemitism, or both?
So, fellow bloggers, please explain. Given all the turmoil in the world, why do Jews continue to be news, and Israel the target of such rancor — even and especially if much of that rancor is well deserved? Why is Israel dismissed as the guilty imperialist aggressor, while Palestinian leadership has done little more for their own people than turn them into “human shields”?
I’m not looking for the usual garbage-strewn tsunami of who’s to blame in the Middle East arguments, I’m simply trying to understand why, say, an LGBTQ+ person supports Hamas, when their ideology is the most homophobic on the planet? Or why Gaza experienced “genocide,” and not Syria, Yemen, Sudan, or the dozens of other hot spots across the globe?
Don’t get me wrong, in no way do I belittle the plight of the Palestinians, or get the IDF and their 100x retaliatory strategy off the hook. Instead, I ask because even once-liberal, “Haaretz” Israelis are increasingly turning inward — while Trump soon starts his second term, Mike Huckabee already appointed ambassador, prepping the land for Jesus’ Second Coming.
But whatabout the Muslim-Americans in Dearborn, Michigan giving Trump a +7 victory? Anger at Biden for his fickle and feeble foreign policy is understandable, but the next administration’s vision for the Middle East leaves little room for the Palestinians. Seems the more the world hates Israel and the Jews the less they listen, and the more vicious they fight.
What do you think? Perhaps with calm deliberation peace is actually possible…
