With regards to the boycott, many people boycotted South Africa due to apartheid. This seems appropriate, even if innocent people were harmed. Nelson Mandela is on record as saying that Israel is an apartheid state. If we accept his word on it, a boycott of Israel would be appropriate.
This is in large part why I officially went atheist. Jews are somehow expected to support Israel blindly, and I can't get behind a country whose internal policy is increasingly run by religious fundamentalists who have no relation to the Judaism I prefer. On the other hand, the Palestinians aren't particularly saint-like either. A plague on both their houses.
And I'm really interested to see what will happen if a genuine non-violent Palestinian resistance rises up, as is happening now in glimmers. Will Israel be the (reasonably) civilized British Empire dealing with Gandhi's followers... or will fundamentalist dogma triumph over decency.
I think your position on the boycott is entirely reasonable (and Mandela's word means a lot for me, because he's come out so strongly against simple revenge). I might even espouse it myself, if doing so wouldn't also mean boycotting my grandmother. And there's the nub of the problem for me - I can't think about this place in a disinterested way, even though it doesn't have the resonance for me that it does for many Jews.
In terms of beliefs, I've called myself an atheist for as long as I've understood the concept, because the whole idea of God just doesn't make sense to me. But I still self-identify as a Jew, because that's my roots and one of the important strands of my culture. It does make people-more often other Jews than non-Jews, ironically-assume wrong things about me, but if anything I think it's a good thing to confront those assumptions and show people they're wrong. Incidentally, once I naturalise I think I'm going to join J Street, not because I agree with everything they espouse but because the counterweight to both
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I also self-identify as Jewish. But being culturally Jewish doesn't have nearly the "my Israel right or wrong" context that being religiously Jewish does. Or at least I have not found it to be so.
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This is in large part why I officially went atheist. Jews are somehow expected to support Israel blindly, and I can't get behind a country whose internal policy is increasingly run by religious fundamentalists who have no relation to the Judaism I prefer. On the other hand, the Palestinians aren't particularly saint-like either. A plague on both their houses.
And I'm really interested to see what will happen if a genuine non-violent Palestinian resistance rises up, as is happening now in glimmers. Will Israel be the (reasonably) civilized British Empire dealing with Gandhi's followers... or will fundamentalist dogma triumph over decency.
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In terms of beliefs, I've called myself an atheist for as long as I've understood the concept, because the whole idea of God just doesn't make sense to me. But I still self-identify as a Jew, because that's my roots and one of the important strands of my culture. It does make people-more often other Jews than non-Jews, ironically-assume wrong things about me, but if anything I think it's a good thing to confront those assumptions and show people they're wrong. Incidentally, once I naturalise I think I'm going to join J Street, not because I agree with everything they espouse but because the counterweight to both ( ... )
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