On Palestine, the American People is not Stupid

Yesterday I read Thomas Friedman’s New York Times article which was critical of “the most diplomatically inept and strategically incompetent government in Israel’s history”. Then I decided to read the comments on that article. As usual, I sorted the comments by “most recommended by the readers”. I often do that to get the general pulse of the readers’ reception of an article.

The thing that struck me most is that not one -not one!- of the top twenty comments was supportive of Israel. The comments thread had the intensity of an online consumer forum where everyone is agreeing with everyone that the product they all bought is a ripoff. The product, in this case, being America’s policy of unconditional support for Israel.

Here’s the comment that got the most votes. It was written by Tom in Chicago:

Israel is no friend to the United States. It is our unqualified support of them that has garnered nothing but justifiable hatred and disgust from a very large chunk of the world’s population. It exposes our double-standards toward freedom and justice and makes hypocrites of us all. I’m sick of having my hard-earned tax dollars be sent to Israel so they can slaughter children and steal land that everyone, including the US government, agrees isn’t theirs. Enough is enough!

It is simply wrong to say — as many do — that the American population is clueless vis a vis the injustice done in their name. Of course, we’re talking here of an informed minority of the general voting population of the U.S., but this doesn’t make the “revolt” any less interesting..