“Democrats For Israel OC” respond to Ivette Xochiyotl’s “#FreeLouFromKaren”

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Vern here.  A group calling itself “Democrats for Israel OC” was real upset with the piece we published last month by Ivette Xochiyotl entitled “#FreeLouFromKaren,” which was a response to an anti-Hamas piece in the Voice of OC by Karen Gaffe entitled “#FreeGazaFromHamas,” which was itself a response to a May 20 pro-Palestinian Voice piece entitled “OC Residents Rally, Hold Vigil for Palestinians Amid Global Demonstrations,” and they asked us to print the following piece of theirs in response, and we said “Okay.”

Personally I don’t really like it when someone accuses someone else of all kinds of “blatant inaccuracies” but declines to say what those are, and I wish these folks would have responded in the comments section of Ivette’s piece.  Also, that long indented section is not, as I first thought, a statement from Congressman Correa, but a statement from … Democrats for Israel.  But without further ado, here’s Democrats for Israel OC:

Blatant inaccuracies, slogans, and deceptive theories designed to demonize and delegitimize Israel and Zionism (#FreeLouFromKaren) were followed by conspiracy theories about Jews through which guest blogger Ivette Xochiyoti attacked Representative Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana) for his support for the Jewish state.

Israeli political leaders Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid), Naftali Bennett (Yamina) and Mansour Abbas (Ra’am) have forged a new government that has brought an Israeli Arab party into the government for the first time in the nation’s history.

While we will not be drawn into arguments tinged with antisemitic tropes used in the article, we are grateful to Congressman Correa for his understanding of a complex and nuanced conflict for which he seeks a just resolution. Like us, he knows that:

Israel is a democracy, notwithstanding internal and external challenges that constantly threaten to knock it (and many other democracies) off its course. Yes, there is racism everywhere in the world, including in Israel and the United States, but the strength of democracies is that racism can be confronted through the electoral process, and in this case the citizens of Israel responded by removing a prime minister from power who had used race, ethnicity and division to retain power for twelve years. The participation of an Arab party in Israel’s current governing coalition and the restoration of appointments of Arab ministers for the first time since 1977 are just the most recent, important steps toward full inclusion of its Arab citizens.

Women Wage Peace is one of many grassroots groups of Israelis, Palestinians, Jews and Arabs, in the Middle East seeking to bring about a viable peace agreement. (photo credit: Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Israel, a true friend and partner to the United States in an unstable region, is constantly threatened, along with other countries, populations, and interests in the Middle East, by Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, and others that not only have targeted Ba’hai, Zoroastrian, Christian, and Jewish minorities with violence, but also target, torture, and jail their citizens who are LGBTQ, dissenters, and members of the independent press.

Zionism is not a settler-colonialist scheme, but the ideology and movement of national sovereignty and Jewish self-actualization, in at least part of their homeland, of a people whose existence has been threatened for two millennia. Essentializing the entire story of Israel and turning it into a morality tale of white oppressors against people of color misrepresents the history of the Jewish people. It ignores the hundreds of thousands of Jews who resided in the Ottoman Empire Sanjaks of Jerusalem (where they were the majority), Acre, and Nablus prior to 1880 and the Jewish refugees from European antisemitism, violence, and colonialism in Europe and North Africa. It disregards the targeting of Jewish people by Arab nationalist anti-immigration extremists from 1919 to 1948. And it requires overlooking 850,000 Jewish people of color from Middle Eastern countries who fled antisemitic persecution from totalitarian regimes from 1948 to 1980. It also creates an inaccurate and dangerous lens through which to view the conflict, which at its core is a struggle between two indigenous peoples destined to find a way to live in the land that is central to their identities.

A two-state solution is the only viable solution to a conflict that has claimed too many lives and produced unthinkable suffering, including the profound privation of Palestinians, many of whom have lived their entire lives under occupation. And yet the promotion of anti-Zionism and antisemitism, and the targeting of those who support Israel, masked as Palestinian advocacy, does not move the parties towards resolution. Rather, it inflames tensions here in the U.S. and prevents those of us who care the most from finding common ground which would encourage investment in real and lasting peace.

Congressman Correa’s actions vis-à-vis Israel reflect an understanding of all of this and for that the people of Orange County owe him thanks.

[DFI-OC supports the platform and values of the California Democratic Party and the Democratic Party of Orange County. It focuses on working to elect Democrats in Orange County and to inform Democrats on issues pertaining to the State of Israel.]

Democrats for Israel Orange County