Befuddled

Submitted by Martin Schulberg (United States), Sep 3, 2003 at 17:32

As a lifelong liberal, I am completely befuddled. If liberals have rallied to the side of the Palestinians for ideological reasons (downtrodden, underdogs, Israeli Arabs being treated as second class citizens etc.), why are not these same liberal detractors of Israel not shouting from the rooftops about the conditions in Saudi Arabia? No freedom of religion, second class status of women, no democracy etc.)? It cannot be simply an ideas clash. It reminds me of the support for the Communists by many intellectuals, especially Jewish who jumped unto the bandwagon and refused to see past the end of their nose. At least in that instance they were backing a theoretically novel idea that was supposed to bring on a utopia. As for the other non-Jewish backers of the Palestinians, I believe it adds up to latent anti-Semitism. There is nothing in the traditional liberal idea arena that would attract a traditional liberal to the Palestinians and to the Arab states. As I said, I consider myself a liberal and it gives me the willys to have to share my bed with the likes of Tom DeLay and other far right supporters of Israel.

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