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rfmcdonaldOver at The New Republic, Martin Peretz has an article up, "Trying Times", criticizing the coverage of the Gaza withdrawal by the The New York Times. He makes some convincing arguments about poorly-sourced arguments. He also completely fails to miss the point about Gaza, for instance, with paragraphs like this.
Leaving aside the very dubious question of whether backwardness justifies colonial occupation, what sort of regime is it that allots a quarter of the land area of a densely populated territory to a population of settlers amounting to a fraction of a percent of the total? Peretz, I fear, fails to take the broader context into account. Whether he is capable of doing this is another question entirely. It's worth noting that a disproportionate number of the settlers were foreigners, immigrants to Israel presumably equally unaware of just what was going on. Diasporas' views are always askew.
UPDATE (5:05 PM) : Accidentally dropped final two sentences added.
"Gaza represents the worst side of Israel's settlement movement." It is actually a very diverse movement, even among the relatively small number of the 8,500 Gaza settlers, perhaps 60-70 percent of whom are children. In fact, most of the Gaza settlers are thoroughly committed to farming the land and have produced fruitfully from it: as much as 15 percent of Israel's agricultural produce. Let's admit it: The Arabs had Gaza for a thousand years. There were no Zionists to blame for its backwardness. Why did they make exactly nothing of Gaza? We will see what they will make of the hundreds of acres of greenhouses the Israelis have left behind. Anyone taking bets?
Leaving aside the very dubious question of whether backwardness justifies colonial occupation, what sort of regime is it that allots a quarter of the land area of a densely populated territory to a population of settlers amounting to a fraction of a percent of the total? Peretz, I fear, fails to take the broader context into account. Whether he is capable of doing this is another question entirely. It's worth noting that a disproportionate number of the settlers were foreigners, immigrants to Israel presumably equally unaware of just what was going on. Diasporas' views are always askew.
UPDATE (5:05 PM) : Accidentally dropped final two sentences added.
