Ze'ev Sternhell: The obligation of a true patriot

[LeftishBrit]

...In Israel a crude and multifaceted campaign is being waged against the foundations of the democratic and liberal order. On the first line of fire is the attempt to carry out a targeted assassination against judicial review of the Knesset's general legislation. In a democratic regime the judicial branch restrains and checks the other two branches and is the only one responsible for upholding individual rights. After Israeli society cast off the view that reigned during the days of the pre-state Jewish community and in the Israel of our first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, we are now moving backward.

It's true that in the early days the prevailing attitude was that whoever won the majority won the entire jackpot, and nothing could prevent him from doing whatever he wanted. During that period the concept of "human rights" was not very familiar. Only after the liberalization, which began in the late 1960s and matured with the legislating of the basic laws and the Supreme Court's assumption of responsibility for individual rights, did Israel align itself with the Western countries. Now the regression is beginning: Even in France, where the judicial branch was previously considered part of the executive, a special judicial institution has been established in the past generation to preserve the rights entrenched in the constitution. This would prevent individual rights from being undermined by the other two branches.

But to the neoconservatives, protecting human rights is considered a subversive act, which is anti-patriotic by its very nature. This is also the reason for the violent slander campaign against the New Israel Fund, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel and the other nonprofit organizations that are all guilty of the same unforgivable sin: protecting the weak from the strong....



Israel is rapidly changing its face, and the true patriotic obligation is to conduct a stubborn and fearless struggle against the most extreme right-wing government in the country's history...


http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1150938.html

[IndianaGreen]

1. Nothing like rich Americans to corrupt the place! Here's is interview with Sheldon Adelson.

Sitting down with Sheldon Adelson

By Jacob Berkman · December 17, 2009

In Israel, your political involvement is well known …

What political involvement? I am not involved politically in Israel. Period. And everybody thinks I started the newspaper Israel HaYom purely to benefit Bibi. Nothing could be further from the truth. I started the newspaper to give Israel, Israelis, a fair and balanced view of the news and the views. That’s all. It is not “Bibi-ton.” It is not a newspaper started for and operated for Bibi. And this is the propaganda of our competitors to say to their customers, “Don’t take Israel Hayom seriously because all it is is a promotion for Bibi. …”

All it is is just competitive propaganda. I am not involved politically whatsoever.

So why do you think people outside of the newspaper business have latched onto this idea?

Because they read it in Yediot and Ma’ariv. Because (Arnon) Mozes, the publisher of Yediot, is the most powerful man in the State of Israel and all he wants is to maintain his power, and he manipulates the government.

Do you think he plays into fears that Israelis might have of Americans’ involvement in Israel at a high level?

There are extremists everywhere. Resonating with some people doesn’t mean resonating with the vast majority that it reflects the mainstream of opinion. He tries to mold the opinion. It is his opinion that appears in his newspaper. He controls the intellectual thought and the current thinking -- he doesn’t control intellectual thought -- he controls current-events thinking. He treats the government of Israel right. He claims that he has had a deal with every prime minister -- except Bibi. That is why they keep dumping on Bibi, because he couldn’t reconcile with Bibi to control him.

http://blogs.jta.org/philanthropy/article/2009/12/17/1009794/sitting-down-with-sheldon-adelson

If you have trouble loading the page, as I did, try the Google cache:

http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:f9yZtgmE1ZAJ:blogs.jta.org/philanthropy/article/2009/12/17/1009794/sitting-down-with-sheldon-adelson+Sheldon+Adelson&cd=11&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

[aranthus]

3. Okay, this is laughable.

How gullible does he think people are? He runs a newspaper and he isn't involved in politics? Please.

[IndianaGreen]

4. 'I started the newspaper to give Israel, Israelis, a fair and balanced view...'

Who else do we know that gives us a "fair and balanced" view of the news?

:think:

[aranthus]

5. No one gives a fair and balanced view of the news.

At least in Europe, they don't pretend to.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

6. Some people try.

Here in the UK, the BBC and the Times both have a decent stab at "fair, balanced" news coverage, although obviously neither achieves 100% success.

On the other hand, the papers I actually read are the Guardian, the Economist and the Daily Telegraph, all of which have clear, strong political agendas/biases/slants and make no bones about it. Which, I think, is the best one can hope for - the BBC and the Times are "fair and balanced" in that their slant is near the centre of the UK political spectrum, not in that they have no slant; everyone is standing somewhere.

What I find utterly contemptible about Fox News is what I think you are hinting at - not that it is a right-wing news outlet, but that it pretends not to be. There's nothing wrong with journalism with an agenda, but promoting that agenda *must* be kept separate from reporting the facts, and Fox appears not even to try to do that.

[aranthus]

7. Yes, that's it.

However, I think you can say the same about all US media. The Economist is at least as conservative as Fox, but they don't pretend to be anything else. In the US almost all of the news pretends to be "fair and balanced" and almost none of it is. And let's be honest, most of the news cones from a left wing slant in the states. Sure, we've got Fox, and the Washington Times, and most talk radio is conservative. The truth is that most broadcast and print news is Liberal or further to the Left.

[LeftishBrit]

10. I would disagree on the Economist...

It is right wing by *my* standards; but it is well to the left of Fox News IMO. It is conservative on economic issues, within the British context - though it still accepts more government economic regulation and funding of public services than most American Republicans would. It is on the whole liberal on social issues. It has supported both Labour and Tory candidates here, and both Democratic and Republican candidates in the USA - if there's anything consistent, it seems to be an anti-incumbent bias.

As a left-winger, the Economist certainly doesn't speak for me; but I would say it is (sadly!) to the left of much of our print media here, especially of the wider-circulation papers.

I am surprised to hear that 'most of the news comes from a left wing slant in the States'. Of course, we don't get all the American news media readily in the UK; but I certainly get the impression that the news sources that the *largest number of people* access are right-wing, even if there may perhaps be a larger number of very low-circulation sources that are left-wing.

[aranthus]

11. Fair enough on the Economist.

My intent was not to specifically place them on the political spectrum. Rather, it was to point out that they don't hide their political leanings. Neither does the Guardian, Le Figaro, and a host of European newspapers. In the US the news sources make a greater pretense of not coming right out and saying that they are either left or right wing.

As for the news in the States. Most of the newspapers are left of center, especially the majors. New York Times, LA Times, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Washington Post, to name a few. Time, Newsweek, and to a lesser extent US News and World Report are also left of center. So are the major network news casts from CBS, NBC, and ABC. By contrast, the major conservative news sources are more limited. Washington Times, and the Wall Street Journal in print, and Fox on the airwaves. Talk radio is thought to be conservative, but I can only discuss the Los Angeles region. We have had two major liberal/left wing talk stations in town: KPFK and the Air America affiliate. In contrast there are at least two conservative radio stations: KABC and KRLA. What is true, is that conservative talk radio is far larger and more powerful in the states. In Los Angeles, I would not be surprised if either KRLA or KABC had more listeners than both the left wing stations combined. There may be more conservative stations in LA, but even if there aren't, the existing stations have far more listeners than Left wing talk. My guess is that in the smaller markets, if there is a single talk radio station, it's conservative. So I don't know if it is a factor of conservatives trying to take over a particular niche, or simply that the radio stations are going with what sells.

[shaayecanaan]

8. I think that most people conflate "fair and balanced" with "centrist"

and that the definition of "fair" is being scrupulously equidistant from the viewpoints of the two main political parties - which ends up being the most pervasive bias of all.

In the lead up to the Iraq war, most right wing news outlets agreed that Iraq held weapons of mass destruction. Centrist papers such as USA Today agreed that there were weapons of mass destruction. Even palefaced "liberal" papers such as New York Times and Washington Post agreed that there were weapons of mass destruction. The Arab media was openly sceptical as were left-wing rags such as the Morning Star. They may not have been "fair and balanced", but in this case they turned out to be correct.

I have no real animus against Fox News, either - and I agree with you that the best solution is to at least attempt to have a media outlets with varying political viewpoints.

[Ken Burch]

9. "Fair and Balanced" is the slogan of Fox News here in the U.S.

To those of us in the States, the phrase has become code for "relentless right-wing bullshit with a lavish budget".

[aranthus]

12. I understand that.

My point is that every news source has a bias. In Europe, they're more open about it than in the States.

[aranthus]

2. Isn't he conflating two different things here?

On the one hand, he makes passing mention of an attempt to destroy judicial review. That's a very serious thing and you'd think it would warrant some explanation and details, except that he doesn't give any. Instead what he really wants to talk about is the "slander" of human rights organizations for, "giving testimony." Two points. First, the actual claim against those groups is that they gave false testimony, not merely that they gave testimony. Second, in a country with free speech, people, including the government, have a right to complain about such behavior. If the human rights groups think that the charge is false, then their response should be to meet the false speech with speech of their own. In any event, complaining about the human rights groups isn't even in the same league as trying to destroy judicial review, and the author has unfairly linked them.

[ProgressiveMuslim]

13. You rarely post OPs, LB. What's the significance for you? nt

[LeftishBrit]

14. Just that I basically agree with the points in the article

But it's true that I rarely post OPs. The reason that I did this time, if anyone is terribly interested, is that I read a thread about AIPAC's comments on Obama, and was looking on the Peace Now site in order to see if they had any response that I could quote. I found this article on their site and thought it was interesting enough to post.