Dr. Devorah Brim teaches undergraduate psychology and lives in Jerusalem with her family, which proudly includes one very brave IDF paratrooper (may he return safely to his family).
If you are a Jew living in Israel and were able to stomach viewing the recent debate between Fleur Hassan and Norman Finkelstein until its bitter end, you now know that, according to the Fink (Forgive me, Norman), you are a colonizing genocidal Arab-hating aggressor who has forfeited the right to defend yourself against the likes of an October 7th massacre.
The evidence? Well, to begin with, according to Fink, the fact that my son and his beautiful and brave hareidi paratrooper unit are alive and looking forward to coming home and picking up the pieces of their lives after more than a year spent in Gaza and the North, risking life and limb to prevent future October 7ths, proves genocidal intent. You see, according to Fink, evidence of Israel committing genocide in Gaza is directly linked to the number of IDF deaths per day relative to ”normative” war-related death tolls. In other words, there are not enough dead Israeli soldiers to conclude that this war is a war of self-defense. Ergo, Israel must be committing genocide.
Furthermore, (remember: this is the Fink’s perspective; don’t shoot the messenger!), slanderous accusations of the targeted killing of Arab babies by the IDF, the alleged bombing of IDF-designated civilian safe spaces in Gaza by the IDF, and the egregious withholding of chocolate via a “medieval blockade” from the "starving Arabs" in Gaza indicate a “discriminate, indiscriminate“ brutal plan to “liquidate” Gaza of its entire population for reasons unknown.
Apparently, Finkelstein believes that Jews just can’t hold themselves back from killing innocent people, especially Arabs. According to Norman Finkelstein, the latent meaning of the Jewish tradition of blessing L’Chayim is a death wish on every non-Jew, and in particular, Gazan Arabs.
In addition, again according to Fink, the voicing of “Death to Arabs” by a small group of rowdy inebriated Israeli sports fanatics in Amsterdam somehow proves that all Israeli children and Jews in every country across the globe “have become more and more enthusiastic and relish more and more” each time a massacre of Arabs unfolds. Thus,the microaggressions perpetuated by Jews in Amsterdam warranted the subsequent macro-aggression, in the form of a medieval pogrom.
According to Fink, Hamas may be a terrible terror organization, but Israel is way worse: larger, more powerful, and more threatening to Western civilization. According to Norman Finklestein, obtaining justice in the aftermath of the October 7th massacre means holding Israel accountable for the quote-on- quote holocaust in Gaza.
All this shockingly absurd and banal evil emanating from this unfortunate, ignorant, irrational and self-destructive has-been academic. So, why do I even care about poor Norman Finkelstein and his apparent intergenerational Stockholm Syndrome, his visceral Jew-hatred, the vicious anti-Semitic lies he spews, his unconscious projection, gaslighting, and delusional hope that perhaps, if he blames the Jews for being Nazis, maybe they will be safe from the real Nazis?
Because I believe he poses a danger to himself, Israel, and Jews all over the world. And even if I give him the benefit of the doubt that under layers of defenses, of rationalization, reaction-formation, and the denial of reality is a frightened little boy, the damage that he does in the media toward Jews and Israel is unacceptable.
His libelous agenda should be recognized and refuted wherever he goes. By all the people who know what Norman Finklestein doesn’t. That the rational way to pursue Jewish survival is to continue to build a strong, fortified home for the Jewish nation where Jews are permitted to defend themselves, at all costs, against the forces of Amalek that seek to exploit their vulnerabilities, and chalila, destroy them for once and for all.
We, the Jewish nation, now and forever, choose life. L’Chayim.