I've become somthing of a "Clickactivist" - yes, one of those who sits in the comfort of his livingroom and enters his email address and "click" - hey presto (or press-to) - off goes my "signature" on this petition or that. Sometime ago, I joined an organisation called "Avaaz" (you may have heard of it - if not, well "Google it"). I also joined an American organisation called "Jewish Voice for Peace". There are others, too, but these two will do for now. That's largely because it is they that have both sparked these musings. Both are assiduous in promoting the causes they believe in: and don't get me wrong, the causes they promote are, for the most part, very worthy.
Let's begin with Jewish Voice for Peace. Recently, they sent out a petition (to go to the Israeli Ambassador to the US) about something called the Prawer Plan. This according to JVP is designed to remove 40,000 Bedouin from the ancestral homeland. So I signed the petiton, and posted an appeal for others to consider signing to Facebook (some of my FB friends may have seen this: in fact, I've just revisited the post to check on some details, and I see at the bottom of the JVP post a note asking those not in the US to sign a petition put up by Avaaz - oh, well - so the two organisations are together on this).
Anyway, I mention this because my action prompted a reply from an Israeli source - a newsletter called Israel Hayom (dated Sunday, June 30th) in which a David M. Weinberg defends the Prawer Plan. The article is headed "A win-win for Bedouin and the Negev". He writes:
"In the coming years, the Negev Desert is expected to enjoy great growth and prosperity, and the Negev Bedouin should be part of that bonanza. Indeed, the government plans to invest more than 10 billion shekels ($2.75 billion) over the next 10 years upgrading Bedouin communities in the Negev, including magnanimous settlements of Bedouin land claims. So what could be bad about this?" Nothing that Mr Weinberg can find: and it seems, according to him, to have cross party support in the Knesset.
However, Mr. Weinberg reports that this government "blueprint for Bedouin life in the Negev has set off a firestorm..." He goes on: "Some feverish contraption called 'Rabbis for Human Rights' has circulated across North America a wildly over-the-top attack video called 'It Hurts'. Actor Theodore Bikel (who starred as Tevye in the 'Fiddler on the Roof' stage show more that 2,000 times) complains in the nasty video that 'it hurts that the descendant of Anatevka may expel 40,000 Bedouin, just as the czar did to the Jews of Russia". I watched that video: it was very moving. It helped persuade me to sign the petiton. But who is right?
Mr. Weinberg's next paragraph made somewhat ironic reading, I thought. He says, "About 200,000 Bedouin live in Israel's south, making up 30 percent of the Negev's populaton, sprawling uncontrollably and illegally across ever-greater tracts of land in the northern Negev. Every year, 2,000 illegal structures go up." Hmm... I think elsewhere in the Palestinian territories they're called "Settlements", and are complicitly if not actively supported by the Israelis Government. But that's another story.
Mr. Weinberg's piece garnered a riposte from JVP. Sydney Levy, the Director of Advocacy, who noted the article's reference to "the well-respected NGO Rabbis for Human Rights" as "'some feverish contraption'" and stated that the article "falsely calls the Prawer Plan 'magnanimous'". Ms Levy goes on, "It is nothing of the kind. Bedouins are not asking for Israel's charity. They are demanding what is rightfully theirs." She calls for us to keep on going with the petition: the Israeli ambassador she opines "doesn't think the catastrophic transfer of tens of thousands of Bedouin people is worth more than right-wing talking points". Who is right?
You might guess that my sympathies are with the opinions of JVP. But hearing the opinion of the other side does give one pause. Though the track-record of the Israeli Government on rights for the Arabs does not inspire confidence. But let's turn to Avaaz. Its latest petition is to ask us to "Stand with Democracy" and send a message to Obama and others to oppose the recent military coup. "President Morsi was [after all] elected in a free and fair election...Democracy has spoken in Egypt--it chose President Morsi, knowing the moderately religious nature of his political party, and it has called on Morsi to govern inclusively."
Should one sign the petition? I confess to being confused on this one, and so far have avoided clicking. Morsi appears to be very unpopular with a large number of Egyptians. Morsi and his government, it seems, bungled the process of governing. They have not helped the economy improve, and Morsi has failed to be inclusive. But one of the fears is that having been ousted as a democratically elected government, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Islamists, will conclude that taking the democratic route is not for them: and, indeed, will be denied them.
Being a "clickactivist" is not easy.
Let's begin with Jewish Voice for Peace. Recently, they sent out a petition (to go to the Israeli Ambassador to the US) about something called the Prawer Plan. This according to JVP is designed to remove 40,000 Bedouin from the ancestral homeland. So I signed the petiton, and posted an appeal for others to consider signing to Facebook (some of my FB friends may have seen this: in fact, I've just revisited the post to check on some details, and I see at the bottom of the JVP post a note asking those not in the US to sign a petition put up by Avaaz - oh, well - so the two organisations are together on this).
Anyway, I mention this because my action prompted a reply from an Israeli source - a newsletter called Israel Hayom (dated Sunday, June 30th) in which a David M. Weinberg defends the Prawer Plan. The article is headed "A win-win for Bedouin and the Negev". He writes:
"In the coming years, the Negev Desert is expected to enjoy great growth and prosperity, and the Negev Bedouin should be part of that bonanza. Indeed, the government plans to invest more than 10 billion shekels ($2.75 billion) over the next 10 years upgrading Bedouin communities in the Negev, including magnanimous settlements of Bedouin land claims. So what could be bad about this?" Nothing that Mr Weinberg can find: and it seems, according to him, to have cross party support in the Knesset.
However, Mr. Weinberg reports that this government "blueprint for Bedouin life in the Negev has set off a firestorm..." He goes on: "Some feverish contraption called 'Rabbis for Human Rights' has circulated across North America a wildly over-the-top attack video called 'It Hurts'. Actor Theodore Bikel (who starred as Tevye in the 'Fiddler on the Roof' stage show more that 2,000 times) complains in the nasty video that 'it hurts that the descendant of Anatevka may expel 40,000 Bedouin, just as the czar did to the Jews of Russia". I watched that video: it was very moving. It helped persuade me to sign the petiton. But who is right?
Mr. Weinberg's next paragraph made somewhat ironic reading, I thought. He says, "About 200,000 Bedouin live in Israel's south, making up 30 percent of the Negev's populaton, sprawling uncontrollably and illegally across ever-greater tracts of land in the northern Negev. Every year, 2,000 illegal structures go up." Hmm... I think elsewhere in the Palestinian territories they're called "Settlements", and are complicitly if not actively supported by the Israelis Government. But that's another story.
Mr. Weinberg's piece garnered a riposte from JVP. Sydney Levy, the Director of Advocacy, who noted the article's reference to "the well-respected NGO Rabbis for Human Rights" as "'some feverish contraption'" and stated that the article "falsely calls the Prawer Plan 'magnanimous'". Ms Levy goes on, "It is nothing of the kind. Bedouins are not asking for Israel's charity. They are demanding what is rightfully theirs." She calls for us to keep on going with the petition: the Israeli ambassador she opines "doesn't think the catastrophic transfer of tens of thousands of Bedouin people is worth more than right-wing talking points". Who is right?
You might guess that my sympathies are with the opinions of JVP. But hearing the opinion of the other side does give one pause. Though the track-record of the Israeli Government on rights for the Arabs does not inspire confidence. But let's turn to Avaaz. Its latest petition is to ask us to "Stand with Democracy" and send a message to Obama and others to oppose the recent military coup. "President Morsi was [after all] elected in a free and fair election...Democracy has spoken in Egypt--it chose President Morsi, knowing the moderately religious nature of his political party, and it has called on Morsi to govern inclusively."
Should one sign the petition? I confess to being confused on this one, and so far have avoided clicking. Morsi appears to be very unpopular with a large number of Egyptians. Morsi and his government, it seems, bungled the process of governing. They have not helped the economy improve, and Morsi has failed to be inclusive. But one of the fears is that having been ousted as a democratically elected government, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Islamists, will conclude that taking the democratic route is not for them: and, indeed, will be denied them.
Being a "clickactivist" is not easy.
