Finkelstein: Hizbullah represents hope

Norman Finkelstein has stumbled upon hope in southern Lebanon.

An outspoken American critic of Israel has met with Hizbullah's commander in south Lebanon, Nabil Kaouq, and visited villages that witnessed heavy fighting in the 2006 war between Hizbullah fighters and the Jewish state... "After the horror and after the shame and after the anger there still remain a hope, and I know that I can get in a lot of trouble for what I am about to say, but I think that the Hizbullah represents the hope. They are fighting to defend their homeland," the Brooklyn-born Finkelstein told reporters.

Finkelstein will next visit Palestinian refugee camps and give lectures to Lebanese youths, presumably about how foreign funded Islamist militias spread hope in the lands they illegally occupy. For someone who spent his career criticizing the "holocaust industry", it's remarkable how he missed the martyrdom industry, and the dictators who kill young men and women seeking freedom from persecution and occupation.   

Comments

[Abilama]

Finkelstein is an assehole. Hizbullah loves him because like Noam Chomsky he is a self hating Jew. They also love racist David Duke.
You can't make hay with these characters.

[Abilama]

Finkelstein is an assehole. Hizbullah loves him because like Noam Chomsky he is a self hating Jew. They also love racist David Duke.
You can't make hay with these characters.

[Ethylene]

What an idiot. I actually used to believe he had some sense, but no longer. It turns out he thinks "hope" and "defending their homeland" equals raining rockets down indiscriminately on Israeli towns. Hezbollah started that war for no good reason, and a main part of their planned strategy was terrorist rocket attacks.

This will be clear proof for his opponents of what he stands for. He will now lose all credibility. That's certainly how it is with me, and I was broadly sympathetic with him before this!

[Abilama]

Campus anti-Israel activists copy many of their arguments from two main sources – MIT professor Noam Chomsky, and his acolyte Norman Finkelstein, a DePaul University political science professor who never misses an opportunity to inform readers that his parents were Holocaust survivors. For example, following the Palestine Solidarity Movement's conference in October 2004 at Duke University, the student paper published a column that included anti-Semitic slurs such as "Jews must own up to their privilege in America, and use it more wisely" and " the Holocaust Industry' uses its influence to stifle ... the Israeli-Palestinian debate." The student supported these canards by citing Finkelstein's book The Holocaust Industry.

Anti-Zionists and anti-Semites often reference Finkelstein's books despite the fact that they are marred by factual inaccuracies, omissions and selective mention of fact. Much of his work is seemingly shaped by his antagonism toward the Jewish establishment and his avowed anti-Zionism. Thus, he routinely accuses pro-Israel writers of being "frauds" and "plagiarists," and labels their work "hoaxes."
Just as inaccurate as the Holocaust Industry is Finkelstein's book Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict. Dedicated to the proposition that Israel and Zionism are illegitimate, the book relies largely on anti-Israeli secondary sources and virtually ignores contrary evidence.

For example, Finkelstein's chapter "Born of War, Not by Design," about the 1948 Palestinian refugees, relies almost exclusively on Benny Morris's book The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, which has been seriously challenged by mainstream historians for selectively using Israeli archival material. Finkelstein relies on information found in The Birth, but often distorts already questionable material.
The man is a fraud. So is his "Scholarship".

[Abilama]

Campus anti-Israel activists copy many of their arguments from two main sources – MIT professor Noam Chomsky, and his acolyte Norman Finkelstein, a DePaul University political science professor who never misses an opportunity to inform readers that his parents were Holocaust survivors. For example, following the Palestine Solidarity Movement's conference in October 2004 at Duke University, the student paper published a column that included anti-Semitic slurs such as "Jews must own up to their privilege in America, and use it more wisely" and " the Holocaust Industry' uses its influence to stifle ... the Israeli-Palestinian debate." The student supported these canards by citing Finkelstein's book The Holocaust Industry.

Anti-Zionists and anti-Semites often reference Finkelstein's books despite the fact that they are marred by factual inaccuracies, omissions and selective mention of fact. Much of his work is seemingly shaped by his antagonism toward the Jewish establishment and his avowed anti-Zionism. Thus, he routinely accuses pro-Israel writers of being "frauds" and "plagiarists," and labels their work "hoaxes."
Just as inaccurate as the Holocaust Industry is Finkelstein's book Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict. Dedicated to the proposition that Israel and Zionism are illegitimate, the book relies largely on anti-Israeli secondary sources and virtually ignores contrary evidence.

For example, Finkelstein's chapter "Born of War, Not by Design," about the 1948 Palestinian refugees, relies almost exclusively on Benny Morris's book The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, which has been seriously challenged by mainstream historians for selectively using Israeli archival material. Finkelstein relies on information found in The Birth, but often distorts already questionable material.
The man is a fraud. So is his "Scholarship".

[Andre]

Looks like Ahmadenijad has more company now in using self declared "anti-israeli" jews that want to get together to deny that the Holocaust ever happened and to top it off that Iran's proxies represent "hope." So after all of this, it looks like Finkelstein alongside Chomsky will be given the seat of honor at Ahmadenijad's table during the next conference in Iran to dig deeper into more pretend stuff that no one believes but serves Ahmadenijad's own twisted facts and the idiots that buy into it.

[danny]

We'll see a lot of these flunkies on Manar in the next few months...No further comment warranted.

[different Danny]

Norman Finkelstein is a known fraud. He failed to get tenure and only got his phD when he threatened to sue his university for "discrimination". He is currently unemployed hence, I assume, his lecture tour.

As for his "work", they are basically glorified book reviews and the cited review of Benny Morris's book is a real eye-opener to read for it's brazen mendacity. As mentioned here, it is a bit rich that he criticises the "Holocaust industry" given that is how he has made his name and money and that his main claim is his parents are "holocaust survivors". He has done absolutely no primary research, prefering to attack other people for "bias"[the man has no shame] and to my mind he is the apotheosis of Said destruction of Middle East Studies.

[Prefer not to say (not everyone in Lebanon respects freedom of speech)]

Hi AK:

I do not know who you are but it is a damn shame that you do not have a wider podium such as a newspaper or some sort of access to a mass media vehicle to publish your excellent editorials.

Nobody does these backwardly, regressive, despotic, fanatic, obtuse, illogical idiots like you do!

I just wish you would post more often. Anyway, God bless you.