Jewish Americans Break Silence on the Israeli Apartheid State

The deafening silence of any criticism of Israel by Jewish Americans has been broken following the slaughter of hundreds of innocent Palestinians, the destruction of their hospitals, their power plants, their water and sewage plants, leaving over 70,000 people homeless. The assault has provoked the conscience of many to speak out. Many Jews joined the many rallies over the past weeks against the mass bombing. On Monday, the nationally broadcast National Public Radio presented a program under the title “Why is it so hard to talk about the Israel-Palestine conflict?” with one guest from CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) and the other a Jewish journalist from the Philadelphia Inquirer, Abraham Gutman. While the CAIR spokesman offered the expected Islamic arguments, Gutman spoke to the changing view among American Jews. He insisted there is a difference between Israel and Judaism, such that criticisms of Israel, such as calling it an aparthied state, cannot be called anti-Semitic, especially if they are true. He said he was born in Tel Aviv and was taught that “the Jews were a people without a land, and Palestine was a land without people,” but later learned that indeed there were people in Palestine who were driven from their land, and that the process continues.