Ali Abunimah on History & Culture
by Gilad Atzmon
Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012
In the above clip I elaborate on Ali Abunimah’s attitude towards history and culture.
I contend that since Israel defines itself as the Jewish State and its tanks are decorated with Jewish symbols, we are entitled to ask ourselves who are the Jews and what is Judaism and Jewishness? In my work I try to grasp the role and the impact of Jewish culture on Israeli and Jewish politics – something I believe necessary to bring peace to the region and beyond.
But Ali Abunimah doesn’t agree. In reference to a talk I gave at the Stuttgart One State Conference (Dec 2010), he suggested that history and politics are detached from culture – an unusual approach which contradicts all recognized, intellectual and philosophical understandings of humanity, history, politics as well as culture.
Abunimah says “Talking about Jewish culture, is wrong because such arguments can be made about anyone. We could blame German culture for the history of Germany…”
Someone should tell Abunimah that this is exactly what intellectuals, historian and political scientists do. They search for the origin of political thoughts in culture, ideology, religion and heritage. For instance, those who study the Nazi eratry to comprehend the impact of Wagner, the German symphony, Protestant culture, German philosophy, Martin Luther’s “The Jews And Their Lies”, Hegel and the German Spirit, German Early Romanticism, Lebensphilosophie, Heine, Athens vs. Jerusalem and so on.
It is obvious to me that, Abunimah didn’t think it through. However, it is never too late to admit a mistake and get it right.
To view Atzmon’s Stuttgart presentation follow http://youtu.be/MlvaN2c-Oto
Posted by Gilad Atzmon
on April 3, 2012. Filed under Culture,History.
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8 Responses to Ali Abunimah on History & Culture
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ariadna
April 3, 2012 at 2:40 pm
Genius. Comprehensive summary of a complex issue in less than 12 minutes (2nd video).
Overly generous and kind speculation here:
“Abunimah didn’t think it through”
Gilad Atzmon
April 3, 2012 at 3:02 pm
The question is whether people out there still remember how think through…this is the role of deLiberation,,, we are there to raise questions rather than providing (ready made) answers…
Leif Erlingsson
April 3, 2012 at 9:47 pm
Exactly, historians and sociologists study culture to understand history.
Simorgh
April 4, 2012 at 2:31 am
fascinating.
“For instance, those who study the Nazi eratry to comprehend the impact of Wagner, the German symphony, Protestant culture, German philosophy, Martin Luther’s “The Jews And Their Lies”, Hegel and the German Spirit, German Early Romanticism, Lebensphilosophie, Heine, Athens vs. Jerusalem and so on.”
In other words, to learn about Germany we study everything EXCEPT the (very real) victimization Germans experienced and endured for >70 years and to which Germans reacted, but when it comes to Jews, ONLY the “victimization” they claim to have experienced and NOT the cultural, mythical, liturgical (ie. Estherine), attitudinal and rabbinical impulses within their own, self-constructed culture may be addressed.
Jonathon Blakeley
April 4, 2012 at 8:21 am
In this clip Ali Abunimah reveals himself to be intellectually and ethically bankrupt.
ariadna
April 4, 2012 at 5:33 pm
He comes to play chess with Atzmon but the only game he knows is checkers and as if that were not pathetic enough, he cheats too
searching
April 4, 2012 at 1:52 pm
Culture has a big influence on the way societies operate. Culture creates certain mindset, touches heart and soul of individuals being a part of society.
In Communists Russia the major brainwashing took place through the culture. Bolsheviks made sure that all remnants of pre-1917 times (and culture) were removed. What about so called Cultural revolution in Maoist’s China?
Now in western societies we have so called “pop-Culture” as a dominating one.
The negative effects of this , I call it “anti-culture” ,are clearly seen.
“Pop-culture” is a culture of the lowest common denominators, it aims to bring all its fans down.
The real culture should give, each of us, independent wings to fly high, the pop-culture makes us waddle in the collective, bright-colored,noisy mud.
searching
April 4, 2012 at 6:54 pm
one can not seperate the interwinded connections of culture, history, religion, politics etc that, especially in fairly homogenous societies
like Israel,influence each other tremendenously. Israel is quite a unique nation because of its “official” ideology of supremacy,precious “Chosennes” discriminative of other races, ethnic, religious groups.
THis rather claustrophobic, hostile attitude towards the rest of the world alienates Israel and makes it even more prone to feed its people on dellusions nad paranoia.