Saturday, August 21, 2010

A Moderate Zionist

From Australian sociologist Sol Encel's obituary in the Sydney Morning Herald:

"Encel was a broadly educated and deeply scholarly liberal intellectual who cared mightily about public ethics. He believed that a society is only as good as the way it treats its minorities. For his whole life he fought for social justice, inclusion and honest dealing. Never an orthodox socialist but an unflinching progressive social democrat, he was for many years a member of the ALP and an activist in organisations including the Council for Civil Liberties, the National Health & Medical Research Council, the Australian Association of Gerontology and a range of public bodies on age discrimination, science policy, education, support for the unemployed, multicultural issues, science policy and human rights. He was also a prominent member of the Jewish community, a moderate Zionist and member of Academics for Peace in the Middle East who defended the national right of Israel to exist within a larger concern for peace, internationalism and universal human rights."(Fighter for the poor & oppressed, Michael Pusey, 19/8/10)

What's a moderate Zionist?

Is it someone who aims for Palestinian knees, rather than Palestinian heads? Is it someone who thinks it's enough to pull out of the occupied territories and ignore the plight of the refugees of 1948? Is it someone who fights for the poor and the oppressed - provided they're not Palestinian?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

what does this mean:
'who defended the national right of Israel to exist within a larger concern for peace, internationalism and universal human rights.'

national right?? Is this wishful thinking on Sols part? Because a casual glance at israel shows peace is NOT its profession!

Fighter for the poor and oppressed...many jews are like this..except when israel is concerned...

Brian