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The trials of Norman Finkelstein
A weekend in the Big Apple has much to offer especially to the serious traveler who wants to swim in the intellectual,...
The writer is a professor at Montclair State University in New Jersey, US (fawzia.khan@tribune.com.pk)
A weekend in the Big Apple has much to offer especially to the serious traveler who wants to swim in the intellectual, political and artistic currents of the city. My friend and I began ours by going to see a new documentary film called American Radical, based on the life of a scholar dedicated to the cause of justice for Palestinians, Norman Finkelstein. I have long admired this man. But many have called him a polemicist and a Jew-hater. I find such arguments amazing — for one thing, Finkelstein is the Jewish son of Holocaust survivors of Aushwitz and Majdanek, so how could he be a Holocaust denier?
American Radical explains the origins of such scurrilous attacks on Finkelstein. He is a scholar who became notorious with the publication of his book, The Holocaust Industry (Verso, 2000), and was denied tenure at DePaul University when a powerful pro-Israel, pro-Zionist law professor at Harvard University, Alan Dershowitz, denounced his work as Israel-bashing and non-scholarly. Never mind that at the time Finkelstein was already an established author with several books translated into over 40 languages. The film is not a hagiography by any means, since it includes the viewpoints of many of his critics, including those of Dershowitz. Instead, we get a picture of a real human being in all of his principled complexity, not some caricaturish self-hating Jew. He claims – and rightly in my opinion – that Jewish suffering in the Holocaust does not justify their inflicting similar injustice and suffering on others i.e. the Palestinians. On the contrary – as his mother always told him, it is the special duty of Concentration Camp survivors, of Jews everywhere — to help those who are oppressed. And it is this call to justice, to help ensure the end of suffering to others, especially at the hands of his fellow-Jews, that makes Norman Finkelstein the committed schol-activist that he is. I was moved to tears when I watched him recall his late mother who said to him: “You have taken my lessons too literally.” His mentor Noam Chomsky, a fellow anti-Zionist, says that one cannot fight all battles all the time. You cannot make an enemy of someone as powerful as Dershowitz by calling him a falsifier of history and a plagiarist — and expect that there would be no retaliation.
My friend agreed with these sentiments, but I heard the message in Finkelstein’s extraordinary stand: I am not naïve, I knew exactly what I was doing at all times. That is to say, he decided to fight those battles, while knowing he would probably lose the possibility of ever being hired and tenured by academia. How many of us can do that? To this day, now in his fifties, he lives in a small apartment in Brooklyn, surrounded by shelves of books and a computer which is his best weapon against an unjust world.
Reader Comments (7)
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Mr. N.Finkelstein is indeed the very best example of a Jew which is impossible to hate even to those who are called anti-Semites. He cares about people who are oppressed by Nazi Jews which unfortunately constitute a majority of Jewish people today. The same could be said about N.Chomsky and Mr.Goldstone. Even though the Nazi Jews are enemies of peace and all other peoples on Earth it is impossible to condemn the whole Jewish nation only because such people as N.Finkelstein share the burden of all swindled and persecuted,killed and violated by the rest of that strange self-inflated nation.Recommend
I have been waiting for “American Radical” ever since it was announced, wil be nice to see Normans life up close. Indeed he have been one of the most vocal supporters of the Palestinian cause and I tend to agree with him as long as Israel is not thought a less in humility it wont mend its way that is why organizations such as Hizbullah need to exist who can counter the Israeli threat unlike the Arab Armies.
Norman went face to face with Alan on a show at “Democracy Now” 2 years back where he totally owned Alan. Google it worth the watch.Recommend
the 1st comment talking about nazi jews is not appropriate in my view.
why can’t you be critical about israel’s policies without always bringing the nazi comparison it it. this is meant to hirt all jews everywhere but it’s is doing little to change israel’s policies in my view. it actually has the opposite goal and tends to bring liberal and right wing jews close together. why not use the word crimes, horrendus, brutal, terrorist, unacceptable, horrible, despicable, barbaric etc…. why use the word nazi when the whole world knows perfectly well that there is no comparison possible. it’s just not productive in my view and even id there is a million trolls repeating this stupidity it will never help the situation on the ground. grow up!!Recommend
Jews lived in Israel more than 3,000 years ago. They never left. This predates Muslims by at least 1,000 years and Palestinians by at least 1,500 years. Only Canaanites lived there 3,000 years ago, and they have no living descendents. So, Israel clearly belongs to the Jewish people. They owned it long before Muslims or Palestinians arrived; and they never left it. Still, Israel desires peace.
Unfortunately, the charters of Hamas and Hezbollah call for the total destruction of Israel and the death or expulsion of all Jews. Hamas and Hezbollah have publicly stated that they will NEVER accept the Jewish State of Israel. Their proctor, Iran, vows to “wipe Israel off the map.” How does one conduct a peace treaty with enemies that will only accept your destruction? Should Jews approve the death of their children and the destruction of their ancestral homeland, just for the sake of peace? Would you leave your legal home, just because someone new desires it, or launches rockets at it?
When Palestinians decide to allow Israel to exist, there will be peace. Until then, Israel must defend itself from destruction. The current Gaza blockade is implemented by both Israel and Egypt. If Palestinians don’t like it, all that they need to do is allow to Israel to exist (as a Jewish nation). When they do that, there will be two separate nations – one Jewish and the other Palestinian. But, Palestinians prefer the death of all Jews over having their own homeland.
Zionists (constituting virtually the entire Jewish community) desire only to keep their ancient homeland. Jews lived in Israel dozens of centuries before Palestinians came into being. They have a right to defend their legal and ancestral homeland. They must do whatever it takes to protect Israel from an enemy sworn to exterminate all Jews living in their legal homes.
If Jews have learned anything in the past 3,000 years it’s that when the enemy vows to murder every Jew, they mean it. That is why Israel MUST always exist as a Jewish state. There must be one safe place for every Jew in the world. Had there been one 75 years ago, the Holocaust might today be spelled with a lower case “h.”
Charles Weinblatt
Author, Jacob’s Courage
http://jacobscourage.wordpress.com/Recommend
Hello!
If you are interested in learning about and watching the film, visit the official site located here. Thank you for the review!Recommend
The film was very moving. My hat to the producers who got the balls to make it.
A film like that can only heal the few or maybe still too many anti semites left in the Muslim world.Recommend
Hi Alex
Please point me to an anti-semite in the muslim world. I have lived there for many years,
and found Muslims and Arabs to be least racist when compared to Americans or Europeans.
In years of living in America, I heard countless very offending and completely racist remarks
about Arabs and Muslims, in Europe some. Your comment itself, has racist motivations
that hide behind the typical anti-semitism accusation.Recommend