1. The Labor Party government of Ariel Sharon has agreed to "peace talks", to be held in Berlin, a place long associated with unambiguous intentions regarding the Jews that are consistent with the Oslo definition of "peace".

   In any case, Arafat will be there, representing the Palestinians; Joshka Fischer will be there, representing the Trotskyites; and Shimon Peres will be there, representing the Palestinians. Israel will not be represented there at all.

2. We have had many an occasion to comment on that strange species of mammal known as the "Post-Zionist". In particular we have spent many a posting discussing the "New Historians" and the "Revisionist Historians" among the Post-Zionists. These are the moral equivalent in Israel to the Holocaust Deniers overseas. They are people who intentionally fabricate history and distort politics. They are Jewish anti-Semites, who despise Jews and seek to see their own country destroyed.

   Among these "New Historians", one of the most extreme is Professor of Sociology at Hebrew University, Baruch Kimmerling. Kimmerling is a doctrinaire Stalinist, a party member and leader in the HADASH Arab Stalinist Party. He - like the most extreme Post-Zionists - is decidedly pro-violence. He supports PLO atrocities. He thinks the Palestinians do not engage in ENOUGH violence. Last year he wrote a column in Haaretz saying just that and then - a few hours later - a PLO bomb went off not far from the Hebrew University campus. I am sure you were all relieved to hear Kimmerling was not injured.

   Kimmerling makes no attempt to hide his contempt for Jews nor his desire to see them killed. He has also long been a Button Man for Haaretz. Whenever Haaretz wishes to trash some book written by a non-leftist, they recruit Kimmerling to review it. This is a bit like asking Noam Chomsky to review a disk of patriotic July 4 songs by the Boston Pops.

   Anyhow, Kimmerling was recruited to trash the great book about the Post-Zionists written by Yoram Hazony of the Shalem Center. And in today’s Haaretz, he is recruited to trash the new excellent book by Arieh Stav, "Israel and a Palestinian State: Zero Sum Game", Zmora-Bitan Publishers, 529 pages, 280 NIS. It goes without saying that Kimmerling despises it, what with Stav thinking Israel has the right to exist and defend herself and all. Kimmerling does have some problems though cause he is used to ranting about the Orthodox settler Untermenschen who are preventing peace with the Palestinians, whereas Stav is a total secularist.

   In any case, the interesting news about Comrade Kimmerling (whose followers by the way are called Kimmerdingalings) is that he has now written the official history book on the Middle East used by the PLO. The book is called "The Palestinians - a Nation in Formation" and it has been translated faithfully by the PLO terrorists into Arabic. It is now being officially distributed by the PLO as its official history book on the Middle East conflict, as it tells the PLO’s version of history far BETTER than anything any ARAB has ever written. No doubt will be the standard textbook in all those Palestinian classrooms, in between explosives training. It can be purchased from PLO headquarters in Ramallah for a mere 40 NIS, and may be on the PLO’s web site.

   Kimmerling has also been appearing in some US newspapers, such as the Seattle Times this week, whenever Jew-baiting Israel-bashing newspapers need a good representative Israeli to explain why Israel should be destroyed. (Mikey Lerner of Tikkun is ALMOST as good, but is not an Israeli.)

   Finally, any of you who knows anyone who donates money to the Hebrew University might wish to mention to such person how his/her money is being used, in support of the anti-Jewish shenanigans of people of the ilk of Baruch Kimmerling.

Copyright © 2001 by Steven Plaut.
All Rights Reserved.

-Published with permission