Natalie Portman Strikes Back (Kickin' Harvard Crimson Butt)

The Washington [Com]Post ^ | 04/19/2002 | Lloyd Grove

[mattdono]

On Wednesday, the Jerusalem-born actress objected tartly in the Harvard Crimson to law student Faisal Chaudhry's April 11 essay on U.S. policy concerning Israel and the Palestinians.

Portman continued: "Outrageous and untrue finger-pointing is a childish tactic that disregards the responsibility of all parties involved."

[SlickWillard]

---

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=204991

 
Published on Thursday, April 11, 2002
An Ideology of Oppression
Opinion

By FAISAL CHAUDHRY

As the cruel Israeli invasion of the occupied territories continues, atrocities emerge daily. White Israeli soldiers destroy refugee camps of the brown people they have dispossessed for decades. The army rounds up civilians by the hundreds with new evidence of point blank executions. Troops invade hospitals, preventing staff from treating their own patients. Journalists are intimidated to prevent them from bearing witness to these crimes, and an entire population continues to be suffocated and assaulted. Never before has the veil concealing the true nature of the prevailing relationship between Israel and the Palestinians seemed thinner. Once again, as during the first intifada, the racist colonial occupation stands naked, paid for with U.S. aid and purchased over decades at the expense of Palestinian life, land, and identity and Israeli security and life. As the violence escalates, the profound disparity between the occupier and the occupied becomes ever clearer. Nearly three times more Palestinians than Israelis have been killed in the last 19 months. Now more than ever, decent people must question the talk of violence on both sides that is increasingly ill-equipped for concealing that Israel is a state occupying a dispossessed and defenseless people.

As this relationship grows unbearably vivid, it is not surprising that some of the educated classes in the U.S. grow more desperate to reconstruct the ideological framework needed to justify the country's determining role in maintaining this disparity, much to the misery of Palestinians and Israelis. Overall, this ideological task is transparent. First comes the staid narration of the fall of Oslo because the Palestinians inexplicably refused the magnanimous Barak Plan giving the Palenstinians 90 percent of the West Bank. Obscured are the actual terms of the plan inexplicably rejected. A more accurate picture comes from Barak's chief negotiator at Camp David, Shlomo Ben-Ami. Just before he joined the government he noted that in practice, the Oslo agreements were founded on a peace resulting in almost total dependence on Israel, creating an extended colonial situation that was anticipated to be the permanent basis for a situation of dependence. When the former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered a vaguely specified, geographically trifurcated state split into several West Bank bantustans isolated from the Gaza strip, it is hardly surprising that it could not be accepted by the Palestinians or likely anyone who would not be content with what Ben-Ami describes.

The second ideological task of U.S. policy makers is to appropriately narrate unfolding events, beginning with the motivation for the invasion: the grotesque Palestinian terrorist atrocity on Passover. Thus, early on in the Israeli assault the New York Times reminded us that [t]here is no moral equivalence between the indefensible evil of suicide bombings and Israel's military actions to defeat terror, somehow forgetting to ask how proportionality and institutional capacity for oppression bear on such considerations. More crucially, it forgot to ask whether the ongoing siege is simply an action to defeat terrorism. The systematic nature of the savage assault suggest other explanations, as the prominent Israeli scholar Ze'ev Sternhell observes, writing that the government is no longer ashamed to speak of war when what they are really engaged in is colonial policing, which recalls the takeover by the white police of the poor neighborhoods of the blacks in South Africa during the apartheid era.

In keeping with this second task, we can also expect a certain trajectory for the diplomatic narrative, as America's long-awaited intervention begins today when Secretary of State Colin Powell arrives in Jerusalem. As an example of the one-sided, disingenuous role America has played, take retired Marine General Anthony Zinni's cease-fire plan that was presented on March 25 and recently leaked. The plan put off negotiations on a political settlement and allowed Israel to continue to attack the institutions of the Palestinian Authority. This plan was unacceptable because if another suicide bombing were to occur, the Israeli assault would escalate as a response to terrorism and intransigence. The Israelis would continue their calls for Arafat to do more despite his eroding power as the siege progresses.

With the situation in the occupied territories likely to grow even more intolerable for the Palestinian population, observers in the U.S. not so invested in the task of ideological reconstruction need to question the policies of our own country. Therefore, before we put the discourse of parity to rest, we should realize that Israel carries far too much of the blame in these matters. As we look in the mirror, especially as tax day approaches, it should be obvious that more than enough of it might better be laid at our own doorstep, should we continue to let Washington persist in its support of Israel's racist colonial occupation.

Faisal Chaudhry is a second-year student at Harvard Law School.

---

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=205143

 
Published on Wednesday, April 17, 2002
Israeli Diversity Shown Even Among Leaders
Letter to the Editors

By NATALIE [PORTMAN]

To the editors:

Faisal Chaudhry writes of the American and Israeli desire to “reconstruct the ideological framework” of the Middle East situation, while creatively framing the same article with a conversion into a “white” vs. “brown” struggle (Op-Ed, “An Ideology of Oppression,” April 11). At one point, Chaudhry even compares the situation to apartheid. This is a distortion of the fact that most Israelis and Palestinians are indistinguishable physically.

The Israeli government itself is comprised of a great number Sephardic Jews, many of whom originate from Arab countries. The chief of staff of the army, the minister of defense, the minister of finance (who is the new leader of the labor party) and the president of Israel are all “brown.” One might have an idea of the physical likeness between Arabs and Israelis by examining this week’s Newsweek cover on which an 18-year-old female Palestinian suicide bomber and her 17-year-old female Israeli victim could pass for twins.

Israelis and Arabs are historically cousins. Until we accept the fact that we are constituents of the same family, we will blunder in believing that a loss for one “side”—or, as Chaudhry names it, a “color”—is not a loss for all human kind.

Outrageous and untrue finger-pointing is a childish tactic that disregards the responsibility of all parties involved, including Europe, the Arab nations and the United States, along with Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

We must be ashamed of every act of violence and mourn every child as if they were our own. I pray for the safety of all those in the region and hope that we may someday use our unique human assets of language and empathy rather than military technology or propaganda to resolve this conflict.

Natalie [Portman] ’03

April 12, 2002

[KneelBeforeZod]

well too bad we can't post the European style beach photos.

[hchutch]

Her response wasn't bad, although I don't think you can negotiate with folks who send young people with jackets from Skoda. The only thing they understand is violence.

[Robert_Paulson2]

Actually the brits do their "sucking up" because by and large, they consider us STILL their colonies, grown up, very strong and influential, but we and our kids, are seen by them generally as "the grandkids".

Like most grandparents, they will do almost ANYTHING to get to the grandkids (generally) but do get tired of them, and need to take frequent naps... I was going to say nappies in the afternoon.. but to them, that is a baby diaper.

We threw out king george, and cornwallis... not the language or their parliamentary form of government... to their way of thinking, we are like the teenager who threw a fit about mom going through his or her drawers, left home, got a job, and now is living four blocks away from mom and dad in a nice apartment complex.

AND another reason they usually stick with us in military ideological struggles... the brits as a people, LOVE to fight. They are glory hogs on the field of battle. If there is a fight that they COULD engage, and WIN... they often feel it is their duty, to at least join with us to share in the glory, prestige and honor that comes from winning...

They really are, for many of us, physically our not so distant cousins, uncles and aunties (with very crooked teeth, of course). They are family. AND, they are rich family to boot.

[Dan from Michigan]

Yes....... Pachino's kid or maybe just his wife's

That's right, his wife's kid. I haven't seen that movie in awhile. One of my all time favorites.

[Lee'sGhost]

"She still sides with the gun grabbing Nazis."

Not that I don't believe, it just seems so counter to the reality that is Israel. Someone answer a dumb question for me. What IS the gun law in Israel. I would think that just about every man, woman and child would carry. Damn sure wouldn't want to live there WITHOUT one.

[Inkie]

Maybe she'll have a rethink about guns. If Rosie can do it, so can Natalie.

[Robert_Paulson2]

I don't think they "detest" guns. I DO think they are terrified of them. My female family members, NOT MRS P, LOVE that I have guns, but the sight of the guns on my rack, terrifies them, as does opening the cabinet, wherein my "pro gun" rights family members of the female gender, get sick and run into the pottie.

Its like arachniphobia.

They think guns kill people.

Mrs. P does NOT fear guns AT ALL.. this is the rest of my otherwise EXTREME right winger family...

[xp38]

Meanwhile this little item from the IMDB...

Producer: 'Star Wars Fans Are Deranged'

Star Wars producer Rick McCallum has stunned fans of the Sci-Fi epics, by branding them "deranged". As devotees prepare for next month's release of Episode II: Attack Of The Clones, McCallum - who has worked on all five movies - has spoken out about followers of the cult classic. He says, "There is a group of people who are seriously deranged and who we love dearly. That's what makes Star Wars work, in a strange way."

[montag813]

Jew. Because DeNiro is half Jewish. And the director, Michael Mann, 100% so.

I meant is Ms Portman Jewish? (I feel like we are playing that SNL skit "Jew, or Not a Jew")

[DrDavid]

[DrDavid]

[mattdono]

Cool.

[amused]

Have you ever seen Leon...the european release on the movie? That took the whole lolita thing to another level. But it did have some better scenes with Natalie's character going on her first hits.

[dennisw]

Mommy I Can't Find my Barret!!!!!!!!!!!!!

____________________________

That must be one of Natalie's lines in "Heat"

[Sloth]

For the record, I subscribe to a theology which rejects the concept of "rapture" and does not take a position on Israel. Nevertheless, I support its right to exist and defend itself for purely secular reasons.

Me, too -- and for that reason I find a lot of the Israel-related FR threads tiresome, as though it's somehow impossible to discuss foreign policy without wading hip-deep in misunderstood apocalyptic prophecy.

[PfromHoGro]

I was scared to death at the initial Drudge headline. "Oh God, here we go again another Hollywood nutcase" I'm thinking as the article down loads. She is one of my remaining favorites and now I'll have to shun her work too. Worse yet, any lefty rant would have quenched my enthusiasm for 'Clones'.

WHAT A FANTASTIC SURPRISE!! How incredibly refreshing. Natalie has made my day.

Her selection as Amidala again shows Lucas's genius. It must be hard to tell how a teenager will develop over the years of filming. He bet on the right actress, and we are all better for that. Thanks again Natalie: Bush/Portman '06 anyone?

P.S. I love this site!

[codebreaker]

[codebreaker]

[AuntB]

Yes! And only a few days until the new one is out