Amitai Etzioni David Katz Harsh Pant - Middle East Forum

lege of New York, purports to present the manbehind the myth, a devotee of Savile Row tailorswho, at the same time, allegedly chastised theWest and the Palestine Liberation Organization(PLO) with equal gusto.To his credit, Veeser unmasks several contradictionswithin the character of his icon, acknowledging,for example, that despite his wishto “preserve a distance” from the PLO, Saideventually supported it. The author sees thissomehow as a “political error” in which Saidstole “victory from youthful fighters” and, bycooperating with the PLO, mistakenly handedit to “corrupt old men.” Never mind that these“youthful fighters” were financially and morallysupported in their butchery of Israeli civiliansby the “old men”; Said’s change of heartwas a “tragic irony” that came a “decade toolate.”Veeser dilates upon Said’s magnum opus,Orientalism, but critical examination is absent.Throughout his life’s work, Said substituted onestereotype for another. Indeed, European influencein the Middle East and North Africa didexist for a few hundred years, but before, during,and, to some degree, after the influence ofEuropeans began to be felt, it was the OttomanEmpire, another active and aggressive colonialpower, which had the greatest influence in theregion.Thus Said’s true legacy is one of defendingIslamic imperialism and indulging in politicizedrhetoric heavy with accusations and resentment,an appraisal not shared by Veeser.Said’s work was intellectually shallow and severalof his assertions about his background areapparently fraudulent. 1 One is never quite surewhether his support for Arab violence was dueto tribalism, insecurity about his origins, or tohis undoubted capacity for self-pity, an unattractivecharacteristic not rendered invisible bythe cut of a Savile Row suit.Reut R. CohenVan Nuys, Calif.1 Justus Reid Weiner, “‘My Beautiful Old House’ and OtherFabrications by Edward Said,” Commentary, Sept. 1999.The Goldstone Report: The Legacy of the LandmarkUN Investigation of the Gaza Conflict. Editedby Adam Horowitz, Lizzy Ratner, and PhilipWeiss. New York: Nation Books, 2011. 480 pp.$18.95, paper.Ever since its release in September 2009, theGoldstone “Report of the United Nations FactFinding Mission on the Gaza Conflict” has beenthe catalyst for contentious debate over the legitimacyof the Jewish state. With the overwhelmingthrust of the report condemning Israelfor war crimes and crimes against humanity,it is invoked by the boycott, divestment, andsanctions (BDS) movement against Israel anddrives a lawfare campaign against the country’sleaders, using the law and legal systems for strategicpolitical ends. Supporters of Israel fromacross the political spectrum have criticized themission for its biased mandate, lack of objectivity,and duplicitous methodology. With the reportalready thoroughly scrutinized and dissected,is there anything significant to add?There is, but readers will not find it in thisbook.There is nothing, for example, about the challengesto the assumption that the vast majorityof Gazan fatalities were civilian. The authorsnever mention reports indicating that many ofthose killed in Gaza were young men who fit theage and gender profile of combatants. Indeed,Hamas’s recent revelations confirming manycombatants among the fatalities underscorethese findings, confirm Israel’s original estimates,and invalidate the Goldstone report’s centralthesis that Israel was intentionally targetingcivilians.But the authors, all journalists, find no roomfor facts that might undermine the underlyingassumptions of the report. Instead, they devotethe bulk of the book to reprinting large sectionsof the report, interspersed with excerpts fromwitness testimonies although this material isreadily available in its entirety online. There isno serious attempt to probe the report or analyzeits shortcomings. The last quarter of thebook consists of eleven selected essays, writtenby prominent anti-Israel activists or emotionalpro-Palestinian advocates, with one ex-92 / MIDDLE EAST QUARTERLY SPRING 2011