The Kennedys weren't the only ones to disavow family this weekend.
My only chuckle is the cousin claiming Netanyahu deviated from Jabotinsky, ideological precursor to today's Likud. I wrote about him a few months ago: he fell out with other Zionists in the 1920s because he allied with Ukrainians who'd committed pogroms, against Soviets whose communism he felt was a bigger threat to Jewish nationalism.
I think he and Netanyahu would've gotten along well!
https://m.jpost.com/opinion/article-816140
Most of my older posts are behind paywall, but I've switched this one, from April, back to free-to-read.
There's so much ahistorical nonsense floating around even here, so if you're interested in the history of Jewish debate around this set of political positions, this piece contains excerpts from source texts of relevance to wide-ranging Jewish and Zionist political thought a century ago.
(And yes, Jabotinsky's writings are wild. He was an extremist.)
https://mlclark.substack.com/p/we-have-always-lived-with-extremism
That's a good one! I've written on regional histories in a few ways now, and one of the most crushing parts of the rise of secular militantism is that it expressly destroys the richness of Jewish discourse that has *always* been part of the faith (3 rabbis, 4 opinions!) in favour of political ends. Midrashic thinking has been in short supply amid recent warmongering, and polite antisemitism abounds among people who go along with the idea that there is only one "correct" Jewish POV.
It (my UNISPAL link) is very "legal" and "diplomatic"... in my years in Switzerland (1997-2010) I had a strong circle of ME colleagues and friends... and the utter inhumanity of Netanyahu hurts my attempts at "sympathy" for that country.
Action >< Reaction
In my view, Israeli Actions provoke Palestinian Reactions, and the Media sees the opposite.
Netanyahu's been like this for decades - from participation in a rally boasting coffins & nooses ahead of the assassination of Rabin for achieving the Oslo Accords, to boasting in 2001 of how he personally subverted them, to the open secret in Israel of his support of Hamas to sow division with the PA and advance WB settlements.
My only caution is that Israel didn't become this way on its own. US Evangelicals have blood on their hands too, for propping up extremism the whole time.