by Philologos
Since reading the front-page profile of Richard Falk in the July 29 issue of the Forward, I’ve been thinking about the phrase “Jewish self-hatred.” Falk, for those of you who missed the article, is a retired professor of international law who has pilloried Israel repeatedly in different places and capacities, among them that of a United Nations investigator in the Palestinian territories, and recently posted on his blog site a cartoon of a dog with a yarmulke urinating on a blindfolded female figure of Justice. He also, it so happens, is a Jew — one who has been called a “self-hating” Jew by some people, and “nothing of the sort” by others.
Is he or isn’t he? The author of the Forward profile, Naomi Zeveloff, came down delicately on the side of “he isn’t” when she wrote, “To call Falk ‘a self-hating Jew’… would imply that Falk harbors a deep discomfort with his Jewish identity, and that this anguish manifests itself as anti-Semitism in his personal life and academic work.” It’s an implication, her piece suggested, that has no basis, since Falk, although having had little contact with Jewish life, says he is comfortable with his Jewish identity and is acting in the spirit of Judaism’s concern for social justice by helping to lead the international assault on Israel as a human rights violator. Read more »
