I put no trust whatsoever in Finkelstein as a source, and anyways nothing there does anything more than cast doubt. It comes down to how much do you trust the IDF. I happen to know a lot of people who've served in the IDF, quite a few of them in the public relations unit. They're honest, upstanding people. As a result I don't instinctively discount anything coming from an IDF source, as it would appear that you do. Like I said, nothing to respond to.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
I don't give a flying fuck how the homes were paid for. I actually think these guys families are probably pieces of shit, based on how their kids turned out, but that doesn't mean it's justified or a good idea to raze their home.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Israel may destroy the homes of jailed Palestinian terrorists. The country’s domestic security agency has suggested razing two houses to deter other Palestinians from violence – a move supported by Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
In 2011, two cousins, Hakim and Ajmad Awad of the Palestinian town of Awarta, were found guilty of murdering an Israeli family. A few months prior they had attacked the home of Israeli couple Udi Fogel, 36 andRuth Fogel, 35, in the northern West Bank town of Itamar.
They killed them along with their three children: the two kids aged 11 and four were stabbed to death as well as the third victim – a three-month-old baby girl. Three other children were not discovered by the murderers, thus being orphaned by the massacre.
The men are serving five life sentences for the crime. During the court proceedings, both called what they had done a “deed committed for Palestine’s liberation” and said they are proud of it.
I guess there is some legal stuff to deal with but damn, proud killers they are. Razing homes won't stop violence but it's a nice "fuck you" to the evil-do'ers!
Norman Finkelstein - Beyond Chutzpah - On The Misuse of Anti-Semitism and The Abuse of History
P.175-177
To be sure, It's rather easier to apply moral principles to others than to oneself. In the case of Israel, [Professor Alan] Dershowitz justifies the resort to sanctions such as house demolitions on the grounds that, judging by poll data, Palestinians overwhelmingly "supported continuing terrorist attacks" and, accordingly, are "themselves complicit" in these attacks (pp. 168-69; 'Why Terrorism Works, pp.174-75). Indeed, he advocates not only individual house demolitions, but also "the destruction of a small village which has been used as a base for terrorist operations" after each Palestinian attack. "The response will be automatic." Such massive destruction, he concludes, will further the "noble causes" of reducing terrorism and promoting peace.
...When Israel attacked Lebanon in in June 1982 in order to "safeguard the occupation of the West bank" (Yehoshafat Harkabi's phrase), the popularity ratings of Defense Minister Ariel Sharon and Prime Minister Begin soared, while more than 80 percent of Israeli's held the invasion to be justified. When Israel's battering of Beirut in August 1982 reached new heights of savagery, more than half of Israeli's still supported the begin-Sharon government, while more than 80 percent still supported the invasion - which in the end, left up to twenty thousand Lebanese and Palestinians, almost all civilians, dead, and which the U.N General Assembly condemned by a vote of 143 to 2 (United States and Israel) for inflicting "severe damage on civilian Palestinians, including heavy losses of human lives, intolerable sufferings and massive material destruction." Only when the costs of the Lebanon aggression proved too onerous - initially, from the worldwide outcry against the Sabra and Shatila massacres and, later, from the escalating military casualties - did Israeli's turn against it.
When Israel's violent repression of the first Intifada reached new heights of brutality in 1989, more than half of all Israeli's supported the deployment of yet "stronger measures" to quell the largely nonviolent civil revolt (only one in four supported any lessening of the repression), while "an overwhelming 72 percent...saw no contradiction between the army's handling of the uprising and 'the nation's democratic values.'"
Operation Defensive shield (March - April 2002), although wreaking devastation on Palestinian society and culminating in the commission by Israeli forces of "serious violations" of humanitarian law and "war crimes" in Jenin and Nablus, was supported by fully 90 percent of Israeli's.
Beyond the emotional support that Israeli's have lent to crimes of state, it bears emphasis that Israel relies on a citizen army to implement policy: the collective responsibility of the Israeli people accordingly runs much deeper than "moral complicity." Finally, Israel couldn't commit such crimes without unconditional political and economic support from the United States, and it's the likes of Dershowitz who, through shameless apologetics and brazen distortions, crucially facilitate this unconditional support. What if Dershowitz's home were subject to the "benign form of collective accountability" he urges for Palestinians?'
I put no trust whatsoever in Finkelstein as a source, and anyways nothing there does anything more than cast doubt. It comes down to how much do you trust the IDF. I happen to know a lot of people who've served in the IDF, quite a few of them in the public relations unit. They're honest, upstanding people. As a result I don't instinctively discount anything coming from an IDF source, as it would appear that you do. Like I said, nothing to respond to.
It has nothing to do with 'instinctively discounting' anything. The IDF have never produced any evidence for the misuse of ambulances, 'not even in response to petitions filed in the Supreme Court.'
In the section I posted above, Finkelstein quotes Amnesty International, B'Tselem, and Physicians For Human Rights. Do you dismiss all of these sources out of hand too?
No, but I'd want to actually see their reports for myself before I put any faith in them. That aside, however, the quotes he provided, as I said, do nothing more than cast doubt. Given what I've seen with regard to what terrorists are capable of, I have not trouble believing in this instance.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
, judging by poll data, Palestinians overwhelmingly "supported continuing terrorist attacks" and, accordingly, are "themselves complicit" in these attacks'
That's horseshit. You don't punish someone for who they like. If someone actually gives material aid to a terrorist then they deserve some sort of punishment. Being happy about acts of terrorism may make you a terrible human being, but it doesn't make you guilty of any crime deserving of punishment.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
No, but I'd want to actually see their reports for myself before I put any faith in them. That aside, however, the quotes he provided, as I said, do nothing more than cast doubt. Given what I've seen with regard to what terrorists are capable of, I have not trouble believing in this instance.
A Legacy of Injustice: A Critique of Israeli Approaches to the Right to Health of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories
November 2002
Attacks on Ambulances
On March 4, 2002, a Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) ambulance carrying three crew members and a physician set out for Jenin refugee camp with the goal of evacuating injured persons. The departure of the ambulance was coordinated with the Red Cross and the Israeli Civil Administration.Despite the coordination, the security forces opened fire on the ambulance,which exploded. Dr. Khalil Suleiman was trapped in the ambulance and burned to death. The other occupants of the vehicle were able to jump out,thus saving their lives. All three sustained serious burns. There was no-one in the ambulance other than the medical personnel. The announcement of the IDF Spokesperson that the explosion was caused by hidden explosives was contradicted by a later announcement by the IDF Spokesperson claiming that the explosion had been caused by an oxygen tank. Following this attack, PHR-Israel appealed to the High Court (HCJ 1985/02), demanding that the passage of rescue teams be ensured. As interim relief, PHR-Israel asked the Court to instruct the Commander of IDF Forces in the West Bank to halt the attack on Jenin refugee camp. Since the IDF withdrew from the camp, the petition was withdrawn.
A few days later, on March 8, 2002, the securities forces opened fire on an UNRWA ambulance in the Tulkarem area. As a result of the firing, the driver Kamal Muhammed Salem was killed and two crew members were injured.At the same time, a Red Crescent ambulance also came under fire; the driver Ibrahim Muhammed Sa’ada was killed and two crew members were injured.In these cases, too, the departure of the ambulances had been coordinated in advance. PHR-Israel again petitioned the High Court (HCJ 2117/02), asking that the IDF be ordered to explain why it shot at ambulances and why it was preventing the evacuation of injured persons in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.This time, the interim relief requested from the Court was to instruct the IDF to halt immediately all shooting at ambulances. During the hearing, the judges asked the parties to support their positions with affidavits. While PHR-Israel collected affidavits from people injured in Jenin and Tulkarem, the State failed to produce affidavits from the soldiers who had shot at ambulances in these locations.“[I feel] betrayed by the behavior of the IDF, which has willfully and brutally trampled on the rules of the Geneva Convention… I was shocked by the fear I saw in the eyes of the ambulances drivers. It is sad.” The Head of the ICRC Delegation to the Occupied Territories and Israel, René Kosiernick ( Ha’aretz , March 20, 2002), when asked to speak of what happened to the [Palestinian] crew members hit by the IDF, stated that they had been murdered.In order to avoid attack, Palestinian ambulance crews must coordinate their departure to collect patients, deliver food, and treat injured persons. The coordination with the Israeli security forces is effected via the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). This is a protracted process, and effectively prevents any possibility for urgent and efficient evacuation. During Operation Defensive Shield, however, not only did the coordination delay evacuation, but even after coordination ambulances were still shot at and detained, either at the checkpoints or by tanks, and were delayed for many hours and even days. Ambulance crews were subject to humiliating and violent treatment, and every time they left to undertake their work, they did sounder the shadow of this threat
The apologies offered by the security forces for their attacks on ambulances during this period were shameful, and placed the blame on the alleged use of Palestinian ambulances to carry wanted persons and ammunition. Israel has provided evidence of such abuse in one single case (see below), which occurred after the killing of medical personnel in Jenin and Tulkarem. PHR-Israel believes that such offenses, insofar as they occurred, cannot justify deliberate attacks on an entire network of ambulances performing their medical function and enjoying legal protection. Complaints presented to the Israeli military forces following attacks on Palestinian ambulances were answered in a partial manner. The authorities did not see fit to take steps against those responsible for any of these attacks.
Attacks on ambulances were typical of the actions of the forces during the so-called “Operation Defensive Shield”, and were therefore among the issues raised in our general petition.
The Unlawful Use of Ambulances
Two cases of the unlawful use of ambulances have been documented in the media. PHR-Israel stresses that all sides must act decisively to prevent such violations, which threaten to drag the conflict into areas that all must seek to avoid. We call for the dissemination of international humanitarian law among the combative forces. A Palestine Red Crescent Society ambulance was examined at Rama checkpoint north of Jerusalem in the early morning of March 27, 2002. During the search, an explosive belt was found underneath a stretcher on which a sick child was being transported. The ambulance was also carrying medical personnel and additional patients, some in a serious condition. The driver was arrested and accused of receiving the explosive belt from a senior figure in the Al-Aqsa Brigades. The other occupants of the ambulance were released.The ICRC and the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) condemned the incident. The PRCS called for an independent investigation of the events. The IDF Spokesperson claimed that this was not the first time that a Red Crescent ambulance had been used to transport explosives and wanted persons, but despite requests from the ICRC and PHR-Israel, no proof was provided of any other cases of this kind. During the arrest of Marwan Barghouti in Ramallah on April 17,2002, Israeli soldiers from the Duchifat infantry regiment took part in the operation. “The Duchifat soldiers were crammed into a bullet-proofed ambulance in order to get as quickly as possible to the house where Barghouti was hiding and to surround him on all sides.”
In acting in this manner, Israel used ambulances unlawfully, in a manner that is reminiscent of its own allegations regarding the use of ambulances to transport Palestinian armed personnel while exploiting the immunity afforded to the ambulances. Despite repeated requests, the Minister of Defense has not answered these claims.
Amnesty International - Shielded from scrutiny: IDF violations in Jenin and Nablus
Date Published: 4 November 2002
P.35 Amnesty International knows of one, widely publicized occasion, when, on 27 March 2002, a
suicide belt was found in a PRCS ambulance from Nablus. There are several suspicious circumstances
about it. The ambulance passed through four checkpoints on the way to Jerusalem without being
searched (which is abnormal) and then was delayed for more than an hour before being searched to
allow TV cameras to arrive (which suggests that the IDF had, at the least, prior knowledge of
something hidden there). The doctor and passengers in the ambulance were immediately released;
Amnesty International asked the IDF for information as to the legal status of the ambulance driver but
has received no reply. See also “The ICRC calls for the respect of the medical mission”, 27 March
2002; and PRCS statements on 27 and 28 March 2002.
Ok, well the first report would appear to substantiate the claims of Palestinian misuse, while the other seems skeptical without ruling it out. Again, it comes down to who you trust, and what you believe. Given what I've seen, in this case, I'm a believer.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
That's horseshit. You don't punish someone for who they like. If someone actually gives material aid to a terrorist then they deserve some sort of punishment. Being happy about acts of terrorism may make you a terrible human being, but it doesn't make you guilty of any crime deserving of punishment.
Tell that to Alan Dershowitz.
P.175 -Beyond Chutzpah - Norman Finkelstein
Arguing against the "bright line separating civilians from combatants," Dershowitz maintains in 'The Case For Israel' that there exists a "continuum" of responsibility. Those who morally abet a criminal act bear "some moral complicity" in it and accordingly are liable to punitive sanctions. He adduces Nazi Germany as an illustration: "It was right for the entire German people to suffer for what their elected leader unleashed on the World...The vast majority of Germans should have been held accountable for their complicity with evil...That is part of what it means to be a nation or a people. Those who start wars and lose them often bring suffering to their people. That is rough justice" (pp. 168-71).
"Everybody in the nation takes accountability for the actions of it's leaders. To be part of a nation, to be part of a group is to be in part accountable." - Alan Dershowitz speaking at a 2003 symposium in Israel
Ok, well the first report would appear to substantiate the claims of Palestinian misuse, while the other seems skeptical without ruling it out. Again, it comes down to who you trust, and what you believe. Given what I've seen, in this case, I'm a believer.
Yep, nothing at all suspicious about the ambulance having passed through 4 checkpoints without being searched, before being made to wait for one hour for a t.v crew to arrive. Nothing suspicious about that at all.
Because, if like the widely accepted dictionary definition it involves deliberately targeting civilians, then, considering this discussion involves Israel-Palestine, I think you may not have much of a leg to stand on.
Also, numbers do not prove intent. It is perfectly clear that every Palestinian terrorist who has killed a civilian meant to do so. That is not at all the case, and most likely not the case, for the vast majority of Palestinian civilian deaths.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
Also, numbers do not prove intent. It is perfectly clear that every Palestinian terrorist who has killed a civilian meant to do so. That is not at all the case, and most likely not the case, for the vast majority of Palestinian civilian deaths.
Seriously, I did actually laugh out loud at this one.
When you shell civilian residential areas, then civilians will be killed. It's not rocket science. When you drop white phosphorous on densely packed civilian areas, civilians will be killed. To pretend otherwise is incredibly naive, or just outright blinkered.
Book Review: The Case Against Israel - Michael Neumann
As for “terrorism”, which he defines as “random violence against non-combatants”, he distinguishes it from “collateral damage” with the assertion that the latter “involves knowingly killing innocent civilians” while “Terrorism involves intentionally killing innocent civilians”, concluding that “the moral difference is too academic even for an academic.” Why, then, is “terrorism” considered to be particularly morally repugnant, while “collateral damage” tends to be taken in our moral stride?
“Imagine trying to make such a claim. You say: ‘To achieve my objectives, I would certainly drop bombs with the knowledge that they would blow the arms off some children. But to achieve those same objectives, I would not plant or set off a bomb on the ground with the knowledge that it would have that same effect. After all, I have planes to do that, I don’t need to plant bombs.’ As a claim of moral superiority, this needs a little work.”
It may surprise you to learn this, but I don't spend all my time on this site. I hope it's not the case that you can't go 24 hours without checking out what's going on here. As for Finkelstein's honesty, he had a claim in one of his books (I believe that it was Beyond Chutzpah) that Dershowitz hadn't written his own books and was guilty of plagiarism. Dershowitz called him on it, but Finkelstein refused to delete the claim, even after Dershowitz sent the publisher the hand-written first draft of his manuscript as proof. As I understand it, the publisher, rightly fearing a lawsuit for slander, had to force Finkelstein to delete the claim.
Yes, you're right, when you're fighting in densely populated civilian areas civilians will be killed. That is an unavoidable fact, which is why the laws of war do not categorically consider civilian deaths to be unjustified. I would've expected you to know that already given how much you rant about international law. The difference between justifiable (though tragic) collateral damage and terrorism is this: collateral damage is the result of an attack on a legitimate military target; terrorism is an attack on a target that is categorically illegitimate. But again, I'm sure you already knew that.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
It may surprise you to learn this, but I don't spend all my time on this site. I hope it's not the case that you can't go 24 hours without checking out what's going on here. As for Finkelstein's honesty, he had a claim in one of his books (I believe that it was Beyond Chutzpah) that Dershowitz hadn't written his own books and was guilty of plagiarism. Dershowitz called him on it, but Finkelstein refused to delete the claim, even after Dershowitz sent the publisher the hand-written first draft of his manuscript as proof. As I understand it, the publisher, rightly fearing a lawsuit for slander, had to force Finkelstein to delete the claim.
No, this isn't what happened at all.
According to Frank J. Menetrez in his article 'Dershowitz Vs Finkelstein: Who's right, and who's wrong?' http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/dersho ... hos-wrong/
'Neither Dershowitz not Harvard [...] has identified the specific issues or arguments that Harvard allegedly investigated and rejected. In particular, neither of them has ever said whether Harvard investigated the identical errors issue [in Dershowitz's book 'The Case For Israel' and in Joan Peter's 'In Time Immemorial'].
Despite repeated requests from Menetrez for some clarification of the plagiarism allegation, he received no answer, other than some abusive and 'not entirely coherent responses from Dershowitz'.
'Not only did Dershowitz improperly present Peters's ideas, he may not even have bothered to read the original sources she used to come up with them. Finkelstein somehow managed to get uncorrected page proofs of The Case for Israel in which Dershowitz appears to direct his research assistant to go to certain pages and notes in Peters's book and place them in his footnotes directly.'
On the basis of Finkelstein's comparisons of Dershowitz's sources, Alexander Cockburn supported Finkelstein's conclusions that Dershowitz was guilty of "wholesale, unacknowledged looting of Peters' research" and mocked Dershowitz's intellectual integrity.[36] Noting a footnote in which Dershowitz referred to the controversial status of Peters' book and stated that he did not "rely" on it for "conclusions or data," Cockburn charges that Dershowitz was in effect—if not intention—lying.[36] In echoing Finkelstein's charge of plagiarism, Cockburn called on Harvard to take action against their professor, Dershowitz.[36]
Oxford academic Avi Shlaim had also been critical of Dershowitz, saying he believed that the charge of plagiarism "is proved in a manner that would stand up in court."[37]
See the independent analysis of the Dershowitz Dossier of allegations against Finkelstein, by Dr Frank J Menetrez Phd, JD (UCLA): [2] and the email correspondence between Menetrez, Finkelstein and Dershowitz during Menetrez's study: [3] In a longer follow-up analysis Menetrez concluded that he can find 'no way of avoiding the inference that Dershowitz copied the quotation from Twain from Peters' From Time Immemorial, and not from the original source', as Dershowitz claimed.[38] Dershowitz has replied briefly to this charge, in an exchange with Menetrez.[39]
Yes, you're right, when you're fighting in densely populated civilian areas civilians will be killed. That is an unavoidable fact, which is why the laws of war do not categorically consider civilian deaths to be unjustified. I would've expected you to know that already given how much you rant about international law. The difference between justifiable (though tragic) collateral damage and terrorism is this: collateral damage is the result of an attack on a legitimate military target; terrorism is an attack on a target that is categorically illegitimate. But again, I'm sure you already knew that.
Funny, but I never thought of Dresden as being a military target.
Come to think of it, I also didn't realize that the U.N safe-houses, schools, hospitals, and chicken farms in Gaza were military targets either.
As for Finkelstein's honesty, he had a claim in one of his books (I believe that it was Beyond Chutzpah) that Dershowitz hadn't written his own books and was guilty of plagiarism. Dershowitz called him on it, but Finkelstein refused to delete the claim, even after Dershowitz sent the publisher the hand-written first draft of his manuscript as proof. As I understand it, the publisher, rightly fearing a lawsuit for slander, had to force Finkelstein to delete the claim.
'...In Beyond Chutzpah, Finkelstein argues that in the first two chapters of The Case for Israel Dershowitz plagiarized Peters by lifting numerous quotations and citations directly from Peters’ book without acknowledging that he found them there. (Beyond Chutzpah, p. 230)
Dershowitz counters that although he was led to some primary sources by seeing them cited in Peters’ book, he always tried to check them before citing them. If he could not find the primary source himself, he cited Peters. If he was able to check the primary source, he cited it directly, without mentioning Peters. He claims that his failure to cite Peters in such circumstances is proper. (Case Study, p. 182)
Finkelstein’s principal response is that Dershowitz’s quotations and citations of primary sources (where Dershowitz does not cite Peters) contain obvious errors that Dershowitz could not have made if he had checked the primary sources himself, and that Dershowitz’s errors are identical to Peters’ errors concerning the same primary sources. (Beyond Chutzpah, pp. 230-231) Finkelstein infers that Dershowitz copied the quotations and citations from Peters rather than checking the primary sources himself.
Dershowitz has never, to my knowledge, responded to Finkelstein’s argument concerning the identical errors in The Case for Israel and From Time Immemorial. He wrote the List, for example, one year after publication of Beyond Chutzpah, but in it he expressly declines to address the plagiarism issue. Dershowitz has not argued that the alleged errors do not exist, or that his errors are not identical to Peters’, or that the identity of the errors is just a coincidence and the errors are easy to make even when one checks the primary sources.
Finkelstein’s argument concerning the identical errors strikes me as persuasive, and Dershowitz’s failure to respond to the argument strikes me as telling. But I expect that reasonable minds could differ.
The entire plagiarism issue, however, seems to me to be of relatively little importance. If Dershowitz had uncovered a little-known but true and important piece of scholarship on the Middle East and had plagiarized it, passing off the original author’s work as his own, he would surely have been guilty of a serious breach of academic integrity and would have done an injustice to the original author, who would have been deprived of deserved credit. At the same time, however, Dershowitz would have been doing a substantial public service by bringing the original author’s true and important insights to a much wider audience than they had previously received. If that were what he had done, on balance I would probably be glad he had done it.
But that is not what he did. Instead, he relied upon a bestselling book that has been condemned by the international scholarly community. Even if his citations to Peters were impeccable–even if he is right that they are in fact impeccable–it is still true that he repackaged material from Peters’ discredited bestseller, From Time Immemorial, and added to it his own imprimatur, as a Harvard law professor, in his bestseller The Case for Israel.
On this issue, Dershowitz has only two potential lines of defense. He could argue that he does not really rely on Peters’ book in The Case for Israel, or he could argue that, contrary to the international scholarly consensus, Peters’ book really is a legitimate source on which a serious scholar can reasonably rely.
To some extent, Dershowitz pursues both defenses. In The Case for Israel, for example, Dershowitz writes that “Peters’s conclusions and data have been challenged. . . . I do not in any way rely on them in this book.” (p. 246, n.31) Likewise, in his Case Study, Dershowitz writes, “I disagreed with some of [Peters'] conclusions and said so in my book The Case for Israel.” (pp. 175-176) As proof that he had “said” he “disagreed with some of her conclusions,” Dershowitz notes that in The Case for Israel he wrote, “Palestine was certainly not a land empty of all people. It is impossible to reconstruct the demographics of the area with any precision, since census data for that time period are not reliable.” (The Case for Peace p. 229, n. 60, quoting The Case for Israel, p. 24) The quote does not mention Peters, so it is not in fact an example of Dershowitz having said that he disagreed with Peters’ conclusions. Moreover, to my knowledge not even Peters ever claimed that Palestine was “a land empty of all people” before Zionist immigration.
Despite Dershowitz’s attempts to distance himself from certain aspects of Peters’ book, the fact remains that by his own admission (Case Study, p. 182) he relied upon Peters at least for some primary sources that he was unable to locate himself. Given the scholarly consensus concerning Peters’ book, no serious scholar would have done that.
As regards the legitimacy of relying on Peters, Dershowitz writes in his Case Study that, although From Time Immemorial has its flaws, it “was supported by evidence and contributed an important new element to the debate.” (p. 176) To support that claim he cites reviews of Peters’ book that appeared in the Washington Post in 1984 and the Financial Times in 1985. (p. 229, n. 61) Regardless of what those reviews do or don’t prove about Peters’ contribution to scholarly debate in the mid-1980s, they prove nothing about whether Peters’ book was considered a reputable scholarly source in 2003, when Dershowitz published The Case for Israel.
Dershowitz further states that “[a]ll Finkelstein . . . managed to show was that in a relatively small number of instances, Peters may have misinterpreted some data, ignored counterdata, and exaggerated some findings–common problems in demographic research that often appear in anti-Israel books as well, including those of Chomsky.” (p. 177) He cites no authority for that assessment, and he never sets forth or engages with Finkelstein’s arguments in detail. (Readers who are curious about Finkelstein’s critique of Peters can find it in his Image and Reality of the Israel/Palestine Conflict (2d ed. 2003) and judge for themselves.)
I take it that Dershowitz has not succeeded in refuting the international scholarly consensus that From Time Immemorial is neither a serious piece of scholarship nor a source on which a serious scholar would reasonably rely. Moreover, Dershowitz’s weak disclaimers–e.g., certain aspects of Peters’ book have been “challenged,” and the book suffers from “common problems in demographic research”–actually make matters worse. They create the misleading impression that the book’s flaws are common in other reputable works in the field, and that the book is merely the subject of scholarly controversy. It is not. Serious scholars no longer debate Peters’ book–they dismiss it.
There is consequently no way out for Dershowitz here. Either he knew that Peters’ book was discredited or he didn’t. If he did know it, then he intentionally used a thoroughly disreputable source. If he didn’t know it, then he was too ignorant of mainstream scholarly work on Israel/Palestine to deserve to be taken seriously. Either way, by relying on Peters in The Case for Israel and expressly defending her in The Case for Peace, he took himself outside the realm of serious, informed discussion of the topic on which he was writing.'
I believe that I've said on these threads that Dresden wasn't justified. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I said that in response to a comment you made that implied that Dresden was justified because it served the just end of defeating Nazism. Funny how you so easily can take two opposing sides on the same issue depending on how it serves your argument. Always a sign of intellectual honesty.
As for Gaza, you should really read the NY Times article I posted above on the subject. It explains that legally, if Hamas used such facilities to launch attacks on Israeli forces, they made those facilities legitimate targets. It's no secret that Hamas made a point of storing weapons and ammunition in mosques and private homes, and made a point of launching attacks from inside civilian compounds, or immediately adjacent to them. The reasons why they did this is obvious; either Israel would choose not to strike these targets, fearing civilian casualties, or they would strike these targets, which while legal under international law, would result in a PR windfall for Hamas in the event that civilians were killed. From your comments it seems pretty clear that at least in one case Hamas' PR goals were met.
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
As for Gaza, you should really read the NY Times article I posted above on the subject. It explains that legally, if Hamas used such facilities to launch attacks on Israeli forces, they made those facilities legitimate targets. It's no secret that Hamas made a point of storing weapons and ammunition in mosques and private homes, and made a point of launching attacks from inside civilian compounds, or immediately adjacent to them.
That would be convenient if any of it were true. Though according to every investigation carried out by all of the main human rights organizations - Amnesty, Human Rights Watch, e.t.c, - along with the findings of the Goldstone report, there were no instances of Hamas launching rockets from hospitals, schools, or U.N safe-houses.
But then I suppose we could go on all day with you, on the one hand, just making stuff up as it suits you, and myself, on the other hand, having to then find the factual evidence and source material to refute your made-up claims.
And as for Norman Finkelstein being dishonest, one of Israel's most staunch apologists went out of his way to try and rebuke Finkelstein's book 'Beyond Chutzpah'.
Read on...
http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/dersho ... hos-wrong/
According to a document posted on Dershowitz’s web site ( www.alandershowitz.com), in June 2006 the chairman of Finkelstein’s department wrote to Dershowitz concerning his charges that Finkelstein “is guilty of various forms of intellectual dishonesty.” The chairman asked Dershowitz to direct him “to the clearest and most egregious instances of dishonesty on Finkelstein’s part[.]” Dershowitz’s lengthy response, dated September 18, 2006, is contained in the same document on his web site. It begins by stating that “the ugly and false assertions that I will discuss below are not incidental to Finkelstein’s purported scholarship; they are his purported scholarship. Finkelstein’s entire literary catalogue is one preposterous and discredited ad hominem attack after another.” Dershowitz goes on to list a number of alleged lies or fabrications by Finkelstein. He also provides a link to an online copy of chapter 16 of his book, The Case for Peace (2005). That chapter, entitled “A Case Study in Hate and Intimidation” (hereafter “Case Study”) deals exclusively with Finkelstein’s critique of The Case for Israel.
Consequently, the most striking feature of Dershowitz’s List is that not one of the numbered items on the List is taken from Beyond Chutzpah.
...in his List of the “clearest and most egregious instances” of Finkelstein’s dishonesty, Dershowitz’s sole attempt to refute any of the claims in Beyond Chutzpah (plagiarism aside) appears to be based on a deliberate misrepresentation of what Finkelstein wrote. And note that the foregoing discussion seems to tell us something about just how “clear and egregious” some of the instances on the List are.
From these facts it appears reasonable to conclude that, with the possible exception of the plagiarism issue, Dershowitz has been unable to find a single false statement in Beyond Chutzpah. And it follows that, as far as Dershowitz himself can now determine, his own book The Case for Israel is full of falsehoods concerning Israel’s human rights record and the history of the Israel/Palestine conflict, while Finkelstein’s book contains none.
I'm actually pretty certain that Amnesty, HRW, and Goldstone all found that Hamas had committed war crimes in the conflict, so I'm not quite sure what you're referring to, and as I said, "within or adjacent to."
Noticed that you didn't respond to the Dresden bit. Embarrased to be caught with your pants down?
you couldn't swing if you were hangin' from a palm tree in a hurricane
I believe that I've said on these threads that Dresden wasn't justified. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I said that in response to a comment you made that implied that Dresden was justified because it served the just end of defeating Nazism. Funny how you so easily can take two opposing sides on the same issue depending on how it serves your argument. Always a sign of intellectual honesty.
I've not taken two opposing sides. I merely pointed out that Dresden was not a military target. Therefore the term 'collateral damage' doesn't apply. Dresden was attacked in order to, according to Bomber Command, weaken the will of the German people.
I'm actually pretty certain that Amnesty, HRW, and Goldstone all found that Hamas had committed war crimes in the conflict, so I'm not quite sure what you're referring to, and as I said, "within or adjacent to."
Noticed that you didn't respond to the Dresden bit. Embarrased to be caught with your pants down?
They were accused of committing war crimes due to their indiscriminate firing of rockets into civilian areas. No evidence was found of any Hamas operatives firing rockets from hospitals, schools, U.N safe-houses, or such like.
Comments
Should Bernakes family get to keep those I'll-gotten gains?
Just sprayin'
Norman Finkelstein - Beyond Chutzpah - On The Misuse of Anti-Semitism and The Abuse of History
P.175-177
To be sure, It's rather easier to apply moral principles to others than to oneself. In the case of Israel, [Professor Alan] Dershowitz justifies the resort to sanctions such as house demolitions on the grounds that, judging by poll data, Palestinians overwhelmingly "supported continuing terrorist attacks" and, accordingly, are "themselves complicit" in these attacks (pp. 168-69; 'Why Terrorism Works, pp.174-75). Indeed, he advocates not only individual house demolitions, but also "the destruction of a small village which has been used as a base for terrorist operations" after each Palestinian attack. "The response will be automatic." Such massive destruction, he concludes, will further the "noble causes" of reducing terrorism and promoting peace.
...When Israel attacked Lebanon in in June 1982 in order to "safeguard the occupation of the West bank" (Yehoshafat Harkabi's phrase), the popularity ratings of Defense Minister Ariel Sharon and Prime Minister Begin soared, while more than 80 percent of Israeli's held the invasion to be justified. When Israel's battering of Beirut in August 1982 reached new heights of savagery, more than half of Israeli's still supported the begin-Sharon government, while more than 80 percent still supported the invasion - which in the end, left up to twenty thousand Lebanese and Palestinians, almost all civilians, dead, and which the U.N General Assembly condemned by a vote of 143 to 2 (United States and Israel) for inflicting "severe damage on civilian Palestinians, including heavy losses of human lives, intolerable sufferings and massive material destruction." Only when the costs of the Lebanon aggression proved too onerous - initially, from the worldwide outcry against the Sabra and Shatila massacres and, later, from the escalating military casualties - did Israeli's turn against it.
When Israel's violent repression of the first Intifada reached new heights of brutality in 1989, more than half of all Israeli's supported the deployment of yet "stronger measures" to quell the largely nonviolent civil revolt (only one in four supported any lessening of the repression), while "an overwhelming 72 percent...saw no contradiction between the army's handling of the uprising and 'the nation's democratic values.'"
Operation Defensive shield (March - April 2002), although wreaking devastation on Palestinian society and culminating in the commission by Israeli forces of "serious violations" of humanitarian law and "war crimes" in Jenin and Nablus, was supported by fully 90 percent of Israeli's.
Beyond the emotional support that Israeli's have lent to crimes of state, it bears emphasis that Israel relies on a citizen army to implement policy: the collective responsibility of the Israeli people accordingly runs much deeper than "moral complicity." Finally, Israel couldn't commit such crimes without unconditional political and economic support from the United States, and it's the likes of Dershowitz who, through shameless apologetics and brazen distortions, crucially facilitate this unconditional support. What if Dershowitz's home were subject to the "benign form of collective accountability" he urges for Palestinians?'
It has nothing to do with 'instinctively discounting' anything. The IDF have never produced any evidence for the misuse of ambulances, 'not even in response to petitions filed in the Supreme Court.'
In the section I posted above, Finkelstein quotes Amnesty International, B'Tselem, and Physicians For Human Rights. Do you dismiss all of these sources out of hand too?
Here you are then:
http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.in ... -02dec.pdf
A Legacy of Injustice: A Critique of Israeli Approaches to the Right to Health of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories
November 2002
Attacks on Ambulances
On March 4, 2002, a Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) ambulance carrying three crew members and a physician set out for Jenin refugee camp with the goal of evacuating injured persons. The departure of the ambulance was coordinated with the Red Cross and the Israeli Civil Administration.Despite the coordination, the security forces opened fire on the ambulance,which exploded. Dr. Khalil Suleiman was trapped in the ambulance and burned to death. The other occupants of the vehicle were able to jump out,thus saving their lives. All three sustained serious burns. There was no-one in the ambulance other than the medical personnel. The announcement of the IDF Spokesperson that the explosion was caused by hidden explosives was contradicted by a later announcement by the IDF Spokesperson claiming that the explosion had been caused by an oxygen tank. Following this attack, PHR-Israel appealed to the High Court (HCJ 1985/02), demanding that the passage of rescue teams be ensured. As interim relief, PHR-Israel asked the Court to instruct the Commander of IDF Forces in the West Bank to halt the attack on Jenin refugee camp. Since the IDF withdrew from the camp, the petition was withdrawn.
A few days later, on March 8, 2002, the securities forces opened fire on an UNRWA ambulance in the Tulkarem area. As a result of the firing, the driver Kamal Muhammed Salem was killed and two crew members were injured.At the same time, a Red Crescent ambulance also came under fire; the driver Ibrahim Muhammed Sa’ada was killed and two crew members were injured.In these cases, too, the departure of the ambulances had been coordinated in advance. PHR-Israel again petitioned the High Court (HCJ 2117/02), asking that the IDF be ordered to explain why it shot at ambulances and why it was preventing the evacuation of injured persons in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.This time, the interim relief requested from the Court was to instruct the IDF to halt immediately all shooting at ambulances. During the hearing, the judges asked the parties to support their positions with affidavits. While PHR-Israel collected affidavits from people injured in Jenin and Tulkarem, the State failed to produce affidavits from the soldiers who had shot at ambulances in these locations.“[I feel] betrayed by the behavior of the IDF, which has willfully and brutally trampled on the rules of the Geneva Convention… I was shocked by the fear I saw in the eyes of the ambulances drivers. It is sad.” The Head of the ICRC Delegation to the Occupied Territories and Israel, René Kosiernick ( Ha’aretz , March 20, 2002), when asked to speak of what happened to the [Palestinian] crew members hit by the IDF, stated that they had been murdered.In order to avoid attack, Palestinian ambulance crews must coordinate their departure to collect patients, deliver food, and treat injured persons. The coordination with the Israeli security forces is effected via the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). This is a protracted process, and effectively prevents any possibility for urgent and efficient evacuation. During Operation Defensive Shield, however, not only did the coordination delay evacuation, but even after coordination ambulances were still shot at and detained, either at the checkpoints or by tanks, and were delayed for many hours and even days. Ambulance crews were subject to humiliating and violent treatment, and every time they left to undertake their work, they did sounder the shadow of this threat
The apologies offered by the security forces for their attacks on ambulances during this period were shameful, and placed the blame on the alleged use of Palestinian ambulances to carry wanted persons and ammunition. Israel has provided evidence of such abuse in one single case (see below), which occurred after the killing of medical personnel in Jenin and Tulkarem. PHR-Israel believes that such offenses, insofar as they occurred, cannot justify deliberate attacks on an entire network of ambulances performing their medical function and enjoying legal protection. Complaints presented to the Israeli military forces following attacks on Palestinian ambulances were answered in a partial manner. The authorities did not see fit to take steps against those responsible for any of these attacks.
Attacks on ambulances were typical of the actions of the forces during the so-called “Operation Defensive Shield”, and were therefore among the issues raised in our general petition.
The Unlawful Use of Ambulances
Two cases of the unlawful use of ambulances have been documented in the media. PHR-Israel stresses that all sides must act decisively to prevent such violations, which threaten to drag the conflict into areas that all must seek to avoid. We call for the dissemination of international humanitarian law among the combative forces. A Palestine Red Crescent Society ambulance was examined at Rama checkpoint north of Jerusalem in the early morning of March 27, 2002. During the search, an explosive belt was found underneath a stretcher on which a sick child was being transported. The ambulance was also carrying medical personnel and additional patients, some in a serious condition. The driver was arrested and accused of receiving the explosive belt from a senior figure in the Al-Aqsa Brigades. The other occupants of the ambulance were released.The ICRC and the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) condemned the incident. The PRCS called for an independent investigation of the events. The IDF Spokesperson claimed that this was not the first time that a Red Crescent ambulance had been used to transport explosives and wanted persons, but despite requests from the ICRC and PHR-Israel, no proof was provided of any other cases of this kind. During the arrest of Marwan Barghouti in Ramallah on April 17,2002, Israeli soldiers from the Duchifat infantry regiment took part in the operation. “The Duchifat soldiers were crammed into a bullet-proofed ambulance in order to get as quickly as possible to the house where Barghouti was hiding and to surround him on all sides.”
In acting in this manner, Israel used ambulances unlawfully, in a manner that is reminiscent of its own allegations regarding the use of ambulances to transport Palestinian armed personnel while exploiting the immunity afforded to the ambulances. Despite repeated requests, the Minister of Defense has not answered these claims.
http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset ... 2002en.pdf
Amnesty International - Shielded from scrutiny: IDF violations in Jenin and Nablus
Date Published: 4 November 2002
P.35 Amnesty International knows of one, widely publicized occasion, when, on 27 March 2002, a
suicide belt was found in a PRCS ambulance from Nablus. There are several suspicious circumstances
about it. The ambulance passed through four checkpoints on the way to Jerusalem without being
searched (which is abnormal) and then was delayed for more than an hour before being searched to
allow TV cameras to arrive (which suggests that the IDF had, at the least, prior knowledge of
something hidden there). The doctor and passengers in the ambulance were immediately released;
Amnesty International asked the IDF for information as to the legal status of the ambulance driver but
has received no reply. See also “The ICRC calls for the respect of the medical mission”, 27 March
2002; and PRCS statements on 27 and 28 March 2002.
Tell that to Alan Dershowitz.
P.175 -Beyond Chutzpah - Norman Finkelstein
Arguing against the "bright line separating civilians from combatants," Dershowitz maintains in 'The Case For Israel' that there exists a "continuum" of responsibility. Those who morally abet a criminal act bear "some moral complicity" in it and accordingly are liable to punitive sanctions. He adduces Nazi Germany as an illustration: "It was right for the entire German people to suffer for what their elected leader unleashed on the World...The vast majority of Germans should have been held accountable for their complicity with evil...That is part of what it means to be a nation or a people. Those who start wars and lose them often bring suffering to their people. That is rough justice" (pp. 168-71).
"Everybody in the nation takes accountability for the actions of it's leaders. To be part of a nation, to be part of a group is to be in part accountable."
- Alan Dershowitz speaking at a 2003 symposium in Israel
Yep, nothing at all suspicious about the ambulance having passed through 4 checkpoints without being searched, before being made to wait for one hour for a t.v crew to arrive. Nothing suspicious about that at all.
What's your definition of terrorism?
Because, if like the widely accepted dictionary definition it involves deliberately targeting civilians, then, considering this discussion involves Israel-Palestine, I think you may not have much of a leg to stand on.
Example:
Gaza 2008-2009
Palestinian civilians killed: approx 1000
Israeli civilians killed: 4
I disagree. I don't think that a dishonest little weasel like Alan Dershowitz can be criticized enough.
Though you've read nothing of his, and it took you 24 hours last week to think of a reason why you think he's 'wrong'.
When you shell civilian residential areas, then civilians will be killed. It's not rocket science. When you drop white phosphorous on densely packed civilian areas, civilians will be killed. To pretend otherwise is incredibly naive, or just outright blinkered.
http://electronicintifada.net/content/b ... srael/5955
Book Review: The Case Against Israel - Michael Neumann
As for “terrorism”, which he defines as “random violence against non-combatants”, he distinguishes it from “collateral damage” with the assertion that the latter “involves knowingly killing innocent civilians” while “Terrorism involves intentionally killing innocent civilians”, concluding that “the moral difference is too academic even for an academic.” Why, then, is “terrorism” considered to be particularly morally repugnant, while “collateral damage” tends to be taken in our moral stride?
“Imagine trying to make such a claim. You say: ‘To achieve my objectives, I would certainly drop bombs with the knowledge that they would blow the arms off some children. But to achieve those same objectives, I would not plant or set off a bomb on the ground with the knowledge that it would have that same effect. After all, I have planes to do that, I don’t need to plant bombs.’ As a claim of moral superiority, this needs a little work.”
Yes, you're right, when you're fighting in densely populated civilian areas civilians will be killed. That is an unavoidable fact, which is why the laws of war do not categorically consider civilian deaths to be unjustified. I would've expected you to know that already given how much you rant about international law. The difference between justifiable (though tragic) collateral damage and terrorism is this: collateral damage is the result of an attack on a legitimate military target; terrorism is an attack on a target that is categorically illegitimate. But again, I'm sure you already knew that.
No, this isn't what happened at all.
According to Frank J. Menetrez in his article 'Dershowitz Vs Finkelstein: Who's right, and who's wrong?' http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/dersho ... hos-wrong/
'Neither Dershowitz not Harvard [...] has identified the specific issues or arguments that Harvard allegedly investigated and rejected. In particular, neither of them has ever said whether Harvard investigated the identical errors issue [in Dershowitz's book 'The Case For Israel' and in Joan Peter's 'In Time Immemorial'].
Despite repeated requests from Menetrez for some clarification of the plagiarism allegation, he received no answer, other than some abusive and 'not entirely coherent responses from Dershowitz'.
Also:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dershowitz ... inkelstein
In his book review of Beyond Chutzpah, echoing Finkelstein's criticisms, Michael Desch, political science professor at University of Notre Dame observed:
'Not only did Dershowitz improperly present Peters's ideas, he may not even have bothered to read the original sources she used to come up with them. Finkelstein somehow managed to get uncorrected page proofs of The Case for Israel in which Dershowitz appears to direct his research assistant to go to certain pages and notes in Peters's book and place them in his footnotes directly.'
On the basis of Finkelstein's comparisons of Dershowitz's sources, Alexander Cockburn supported Finkelstein's conclusions that Dershowitz was guilty of "wholesale, unacknowledged looting of Peters' research" and mocked Dershowitz's intellectual integrity.[36] Noting a footnote in which Dershowitz referred to the controversial status of Peters' book and stated that he did not "rely" on it for "conclusions or data," Cockburn charges that Dershowitz was in effect—if not intention—lying.[36] In echoing Finkelstein's charge of plagiarism, Cockburn called on Harvard to take action against their professor, Dershowitz.[36]
Oxford academic Avi Shlaim had also been critical of Dershowitz, saying he believed that the charge of plagiarism "is proved in a manner that would stand up in court."[37]
See the independent analysis of the Dershowitz Dossier of allegations against Finkelstein, by Dr Frank J Menetrez Phd, JD (UCLA): [2] and the email correspondence between Menetrez, Finkelstein and Dershowitz during Menetrez's study: [3] In a longer follow-up analysis Menetrez concluded that he can find 'no way of avoiding the inference that Dershowitz copied the quotation from Twain from Peters' From Time Immemorial, and not from the original source', as Dershowitz claimed.[38] Dershowitz has replied briefly to this charge, in an exchange with Menetrez.[39]
Funny, but I never thought of Dresden as being a military target.
Come to think of it, I also didn't realize that the U.N safe-houses, schools, hospitals, and chicken farms in Gaza were military targets either.
http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/dersho ... hos-wrong/
Dershowitz v. Finkelstein
Who’s Right and Who’s Wrong?
04.30.2007
By Frank J. Menetrez
PLAGIARISM
'...In Beyond Chutzpah, Finkelstein argues that in the first two chapters of The Case for Israel Dershowitz plagiarized Peters by lifting numerous quotations and citations directly from Peters’ book without acknowledging that he found them there. (Beyond Chutzpah, p. 230)
Dershowitz counters that although he was led to some primary sources by seeing them cited in Peters’ book, he always tried to check them before citing them. If he could not find the primary source himself, he cited Peters. If he was able to check the primary source, he cited it directly, without mentioning Peters. He claims that his failure to cite Peters in such circumstances is proper. (Case Study, p. 182)
Finkelstein’s principal response is that Dershowitz’s quotations and citations of primary sources (where Dershowitz does not cite Peters) contain obvious errors that Dershowitz could not have made if he had checked the primary sources himself, and that Dershowitz’s errors are identical to Peters’ errors concerning the same primary sources. (Beyond Chutzpah, pp. 230-231) Finkelstein infers that Dershowitz copied the quotations and citations from Peters rather than checking the primary sources himself.
Dershowitz has never, to my knowledge, responded to Finkelstein’s argument concerning the identical errors in The Case for Israel and From Time Immemorial. He wrote the List, for example, one year after publication of Beyond Chutzpah, but in it he expressly declines to address the plagiarism issue. Dershowitz has not argued that the alleged errors do not exist, or that his errors are not identical to Peters’, or that the identity of the errors is just a coincidence and the errors are easy to make even when one checks the primary sources.
Finkelstein’s argument concerning the identical errors strikes me as persuasive, and Dershowitz’s failure to respond to the argument strikes me as telling. But I expect that reasonable minds could differ.
The entire plagiarism issue, however, seems to me to be of relatively little importance. If Dershowitz had uncovered a little-known but true and important piece of scholarship on the Middle East and had plagiarized it, passing off the original author’s work as his own, he would surely have been guilty of a serious breach of academic integrity and would have done an injustice to the original author, who would have been deprived of deserved credit. At the same time, however, Dershowitz would have been doing a substantial public service by bringing the original author’s true and important insights to a much wider audience than they had previously received. If that were what he had done, on balance I would probably be glad he had done it.
But that is not what he did. Instead, he relied upon a bestselling book that has been condemned by the international scholarly community. Even if his citations to Peters were impeccable–even if he is right that they are in fact impeccable–it is still true that he repackaged material from Peters’ discredited bestseller, From Time Immemorial, and added to it his own imprimatur, as a Harvard law professor, in his bestseller The Case for Israel.
On this issue, Dershowitz has only two potential lines of defense. He could argue that he does not really rely on Peters’ book in The Case for Israel, or he could argue that, contrary to the international scholarly consensus, Peters’ book really is a legitimate source on which a serious scholar can reasonably rely.
To some extent, Dershowitz pursues both defenses. In The Case for Israel, for example, Dershowitz writes that “Peters’s conclusions and data have been challenged. . . . I do not in any way rely on them in this book.” (p. 246, n.31) Likewise, in his Case Study, Dershowitz writes, “I disagreed with some of [Peters'] conclusions and said so in my book The Case for Israel.” (pp. 175-176) As proof that he had “said” he “disagreed with some of her conclusions,” Dershowitz notes that in The Case for Israel he wrote, “Palestine was certainly not a land empty of all people. It is impossible to reconstruct the demographics of the area with any precision, since census data for that time period are not reliable.” (The Case for Peace p. 229, n. 60, quoting The Case for Israel, p. 24) The quote does not mention Peters, so it is not in fact an example of Dershowitz having said that he disagreed with Peters’ conclusions. Moreover, to my knowledge not even Peters ever claimed that Palestine was “a land empty of all people” before Zionist immigration.
Despite Dershowitz’s attempts to distance himself from certain aspects of Peters’ book, the fact remains that by his own admission (Case Study, p. 182) he relied upon Peters at least for some primary sources that he was unable to locate himself. Given the scholarly consensus concerning Peters’ book, no serious scholar would have done that.
As regards the legitimacy of relying on Peters, Dershowitz writes in his Case Study that, although From Time Immemorial has its flaws, it “was supported by evidence and contributed an important new element to the debate.” (p. 176) To support that claim he cites reviews of Peters’ book that appeared in the Washington Post in 1984 and the Financial Times in 1985. (p. 229, n. 61) Regardless of what those reviews do or don’t prove about Peters’ contribution to scholarly debate in the mid-1980s, they prove nothing about whether Peters’ book was considered a reputable scholarly source in 2003, when Dershowitz published The Case for Israel.
Dershowitz further states that “[a]ll Finkelstein . . . managed to show was that in a relatively small number of instances, Peters may have misinterpreted some data, ignored counterdata, and exaggerated some findings–common problems in demographic research that often appear in anti-Israel books as well, including those of Chomsky.” (p. 177) He cites no authority for that assessment, and he never sets forth or engages with Finkelstein’s arguments in detail. (Readers who are curious about Finkelstein’s critique of Peters can find it in his Image and Reality of the Israel/Palestine Conflict (2d ed. 2003) and judge for themselves.)
I take it that Dershowitz has not succeeded in refuting the international scholarly consensus that From Time Immemorial is neither a serious piece of scholarship nor a source on which a serious scholar would reasonably rely. Moreover, Dershowitz’s weak disclaimers–e.g., certain aspects of Peters’ book have been “challenged,” and the book suffers from “common problems in demographic research”–actually make matters worse. They create the misleading impression that the book’s flaws are common in other reputable works in the field, and that the book is merely the subject of scholarly controversy. It is not. Serious scholars no longer debate Peters’ book–they dismiss it.
There is consequently no way out for Dershowitz here. Either he knew that Peters’ book was discredited or he didn’t. If he did know it, then he intentionally used a thoroughly disreputable source. If he didn’t know it, then he was too ignorant of mainstream scholarly work on Israel/Palestine to deserve to be taken seriously. Either way, by relying on Peters in The Case for Israel and expressly defending her in The Case for Peace, he took himself outside the realm of serious, informed discussion of the topic on which he was writing.'
As for Gaza, you should really read the NY Times article I posted above on the subject. It explains that legally, if Hamas used such facilities to launch attacks on Israeli forces, they made those facilities legitimate targets. It's no secret that Hamas made a point of storing weapons and ammunition in mosques and private homes, and made a point of launching attacks from inside civilian compounds, or immediately adjacent to them. The reasons why they did this is obvious; either Israel would choose not to strike these targets, fearing civilian casualties, or they would strike these targets, which while legal under international law, would result in a PR windfall for Hamas in the event that civilians were killed. From your comments it seems pretty clear that at least in one case Hamas' PR goals were met.
That would be convenient if any of it were true. Though according to every investigation carried out by all of the main human rights organizations - Amnesty, Human Rights Watch, e.t.c, - along with the findings of the Goldstone report, there were no instances of Hamas launching rockets from hospitals, schools, or U.N safe-houses.
But then I suppose we could go on all day with you, on the one hand, just making stuff up as it suits you, and myself, on the other hand, having to then find the factual evidence and source material to refute your made-up claims.
Read on...
http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/dersho ... hos-wrong/
According to a document posted on Dershowitz’s web site ( www.alandershowitz.com), in June 2006 the chairman of Finkelstein’s department wrote to Dershowitz concerning his charges that Finkelstein “is guilty of various forms of intellectual dishonesty.” The chairman asked Dershowitz to direct him “to the clearest and most egregious instances of dishonesty on Finkelstein’s part[.]” Dershowitz’s lengthy response, dated September 18, 2006, is contained in the same document on his web site. It begins by stating that “the ugly and false assertions that I will discuss below are not incidental to Finkelstein’s purported scholarship; they are his purported scholarship. Finkelstein’s entire literary catalogue is one preposterous and discredited ad hominem attack after another.” Dershowitz goes on to list a number of alleged lies or fabrications by Finkelstein. He also provides a link to an online copy of chapter 16 of his book, The Case for Peace (2005). That chapter, entitled “A Case Study in Hate and Intimidation” (hereafter “Case Study”) deals exclusively with Finkelstein’s critique of The Case for Israel.
Consequently, the most striking feature of Dershowitz’s List is that not one of the numbered items on the List is taken from Beyond Chutzpah.
...in his List of the “clearest and most egregious instances” of Finkelstein’s dishonesty, Dershowitz’s sole attempt to refute any of the claims in Beyond Chutzpah (plagiarism aside) appears to be based on a deliberate misrepresentation of what Finkelstein wrote. And note that the foregoing discussion seems to tell us something about just how “clear and egregious” some of the instances on the List are.
From these facts it appears reasonable to conclude that, with the possible exception of the plagiarism issue, Dershowitz has been unable to find a single false statement in Beyond Chutzpah. And it follows that, as far as Dershowitz himself can now determine, his own book The Case for Israel is full of falsehoods concerning Israel’s human rights record and the history of the Israel/Palestine conflict, while Finkelstein’s book contains none.
Noticed that you didn't respond to the Dresden bit. Embarrased to be caught with your pants down?
I've not taken two opposing sides. I merely pointed out that Dresden was not a military target. Therefore the term 'collateral damage' doesn't apply. Dresden was attacked in order to, according to Bomber Command, weaken the will of the German people.
They were accused of committing war crimes due to their indiscriminate firing of rockets into civilian areas. No evidence was found of any Hamas operatives firing rockets from hospitals, schools, U.N safe-houses, or such like.