The problem with our public intellectuals today is that they are writing for readers who already exist, as they exist.
Reminds me of Stuart Hall, writers who are writing for an audience that already exists are staying within the "one meaning" or "one audience" limit. They are sticking to a reality already created. Writing for audience that does not exist yet, you are creating their own meaning/reality.
Unlike the ordinary journalist or enterprising scholar, she is writing for a reader she hopes to bring into being. She never speaks to the reader as he is; she speaks to the reader as he might be. Her common reader is an uncommon reader.
Sounds like we are not only occupying our own niche but also our own territory.
The transformation she seeks may be a far-reaching change of policy, an education of manners and morals, or a renovation of the human estate. Her watch may be wound for tomorrow or today.
Wow. Emphasizes the power of public intellectual writing. Sounds like there should be boundaries to what you present to world as a public intellectual writer no matter its complexity.
Bernard-Henri Lévy.
French public intellectual. Frequently writes on the subject of anti-Semitism.
that of the scholar and that of the statesman. Neither academic nor activist but both, the public intellectual is a monkish figure of austere purpose and unadorned truth.
Very interesting statement. I agree and I think it is difficult for many to be able to portray both characteristics.
The residents of Gaza are bombed by cutting edge F-16 fighter jets and drones, yet they do not have bomb shelters, and they have nowhere to flee. Israel's residents are bombed mostly by makeshift rockets, many of which have been intercepted by Iron Dome missiles. The majority of the population in Israel has access to shelters and can flee out of the rocket's range.
This is huge. Israel has access to way more advanced weaponry while Palestine is fighting with stones. Nothing can justify the claims the author is stating that Israel is making.
When all civilians are potential human shields, when each and every civilian can become a hostage of the enemy, then all enemy civilians become killable.
WHAT?!?
Again, the logic is clear. All civilians in Gaza are being held hostage by Hamas, which is considered a war crime and a gross violation of international law governing armed conflict.
How can one possibly know if "all civilians in Gaza are being held hostage by Hamas"? I believe that even if this claim is justified, attacking homes, mosques, hospitals, and schools will still result in the loss of thousands of innocent lives.
they have to provide moral justification for their action in order to preserve their standing in the international arena;
The problem is are these "justifications" are valid?
Consequently, the permeation of war into cities inevitably transforms their inhabitants into potential human shields.
I really like language used here, "human shields" really emphasizes the negative effect war has on its civilians.
Zochrot has worked to remind Israelis of the Nakba by including trips to destroyed Palestinian villages, and hanging signs in Arabic and Hebrew over them, identifying these sites according to their pre-1948 Arabic names. Artists Without Walls, an ad hoc group of Israeli and Palestinian artists/activists, meanwhile, was formed in 2004 at the height of the construction of the Wall, deploying diverse forms of cultural activism to dismantle it and produce an alternative Israel/Palestine space.
These are the good/positive stories that we do not hear about Israel & Palestine.
B’Tselem has placed cameras in the hands of Palestinians who have recorded settlers’ abuses, images that have become a significant source of information for local and international media, its footage broadcast in major media networks.
Very interesting, I wonder if this has caused any issues?
Revisionist cinema forms a significant component of a changing Jewish-Israeli ideological landscape. (The] Documentaries… attempt to write an alternative history in a way that links past and present
Also another very important issue/conflict that is commonly misunderstood by many people around the world.
but on another level, they form the core argument, as the visual documentation of agricultural landscapes and urban spaces, as well as public events and private scenes—all offer evidence of a vital Palestine that contradicts the idea of an “empty land.". . .
I agree and also believe that it is very important that visual media has begun to illustrate the truth of Palestine, relaying a positive message to the public/world.
For instance, digital symbols and pictures have been used, sometimes viciously, in European production so as to essentialize and vilify Islam, as in the case of the ]yllands-Posten cartoons discussed in Christiane Gruber's study.
Why have these images been used to vilify Islam?
In other words, / image can become perceived reality, and reality may turn out to be nothing but projected image, conflating both viewing systems into a cyclical circuit of ontological repartees.
This idea is very similar to Stuart Hall's lecture and the fact that we sometimes forget that every image we see is not the truth or the whole truth. Images becoming our reality has made us become ignorant to learning more or asking questions of our own. We have let the images/media do the talking for us.
I think it's a prescription for war.
Exactly! War has never been a solution.
West must do to continuewinning,
This claim makes the goal of the Western civilization sound just as ridiculous as the so called intention of the religion of Islam to take over the world and force Islamic practices onto everyone. These two ideologies, both made by extremists and therefore have no true religious background, are obviously not the correct way to mend this "clash of civilizations."
Huntington's claim of keeping "it's opponents weak and divided" is not an efficient plan to keep the Western civilizations strong. Wanting to inflict division onto other nations is a problem that will divide the entire world rather than unifying the world, which is what we should be working on.
I agree with Huntington that the great division amongst humankind will be and has proven to become cultural. The old political conflict has merged into issues of religion not only at the global level but also within the western civilization.