I’m seeing the DSA everywhere. That’s because is is everywhere. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it. More about that later.
Yesterday I read two sobering things. One is the indictment of eight U Mich students for threatening university officials.
The second is Sam Harris’s Substack, Why I Won’t Debate Critics Of Israel.
I don’t like mealy-mouthed weasel word writing so I’ll say out loud: I’ve always despised Sam Harris. Not disliked, despised, because his noisy atheism struck me as the very definition of grifter. For the record, I’m a doubter. My honest opinion of “God” is: I don’t know. That’s about as far as I’ll go. But I hate professional atheists.
That said, this was a true revelation. He’s not just saying the usual stuff about Israel being different from its neighbors blah blah blah. He’s saying: I’m not debating this. I’m drawing boundaries.
I will give you the parts I vibed to with reax in the footnotes. They’re all direct quotes so no need of quotation marks. (Just go read it!!)
drawn from a growing cast of scholars, grifters, and moral lunatics who have made that beleaguered country their professional or psychiatric obsession.1
I’m not interested in exploring all the ways that Israel has missed the mark—from Prime Minister Netanyahu’s corrupt alliance with the far right, to the many crimes committed by settlers in the West Bank, to the deaths of innocent noncombatants in several wars—because none of these failings, however grave, will alter my sense that (1) the ethical difference between Israel and her enemies remains vast, and (2) the global preoccupation with the Jewish state, as though it were the worst villain among nations, is contemptible, being the product of perennial lies and delusions.2
I think militant Islam is ten times worse than you think it is. [He’s addressing followers who want him to debate Israel-critics.] When I talk about “jihadists” and their various groups—Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, the IRGC, etc.—I’m talking about people who I consider to be worse than Nazis (jihadists being, essentially, Nazis who are certain of Paradise). My views about the conflict in the Middle East will not fundamentally change unless my critics produce evidence that Israel has become as evil as her enemies.3
—if, in other words, the Israelis begin to resemble the Palestinians, then I won’t care who wins this war. Short of this, there remains a world of difference between the two sides,4
The problem in the Middle East is not, and has never been, the existence of the state of Israel. The problem is jihadism, Islamism, Islamic extremism, Islamofascism, militant Islam—or whatever words you want to use to describe the belligerence and triumphal lunacy of those who take the most pernicious doctrines of Islam too seriously.5
The truth is, I have never known how Israel should have responded to the events of October 7th. I only know that they, along with every other free society, must ultimately defeat militant Islam. How we should do this is genuinely debatable.6
This obsession with Israel, and the double standards to which its people are held, now forms the center of mass of that shapeshifting moral affliction widely known as “antisemitism.”7
I’ve lived most of my life believing that dangerous antisemitism was behind us, at least in the West. Unfortunately, the response to October 7th has put that assumption very much in doubt.
Final quote, and here’s where Harris really comes into his own:
Many of you have written to tell me that you’ve lost respect for me over this issue (or that you still value my work and are giving me “a pass” on Israel). I reject this framing, and you should too. No one should be a part of Community just because they agree with me. I’m not running a political party, and there is no line for me, or for anyone else, to toe. If I’ve fallen off a pedestal because I said something you don’t agree with, the pedestal was the problem, not the disagreement.8
Upshot:
“Debating Israel” is antisemitism in action.
Debating antisemites is a futile, degrading, loser’s game.
If you think I’m great otherwise but not on this, buzz off.
I’m impressed. By the toughness, the rigor - and the humility. He admitted that he didn’t know something, and that’s OK. None of us knows how to handle this. But some of us know the problem. I won’t say that’s half the battle because it isn’t. It’s not even a tenth of the battle. Or a sliver of the war. But it’s the necessary first step - seeing the problem and admitting you don’t know what to do about it.
You must read this.
DETROIT – Eight individuals associated with the University of Michigan were indicted for their alleged roles in conspiracies to threaten University of Michigan leaders, law enforcement, and businesses, including the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Detroit, announced U.S. Attorney Jerome F. Gorgon Jr. Special Agent in Charge Jennifer Runyan of the FBI Detroit Field Office joined Gorgon in the announcement.
A federal grand jury returned an indictment against Zainab Aliasgar Hakim (Canton, Michigan) (age 23), Amatullah Aliasgar Hakim (Ann Arbor, Michigan) (age 21), Paige Elizabeth Feyock (Ann Arbor, Michigan) (age 26), Ahmet Kerem Korkaya (Milwaukee, Wisconsin) (age 28), Jonathan Hongru Zou (Ann Arbor, Michigan) (age 22), Alexander Matthew Sepulveda (Chicago, Illinois) (age 23), Mariam Muhammed Odeh (Dearborn, Michigan) (age 24), and Colin Hunter Weger (Ann Arbor, Michigan) (age 24).
This is serious, horrible stuff.
They also discussed methods by which to harm the targets and their families, including poison, bombs, and psychological torture. For example, on May 21, 2024, Feyock and then-medical student Korkaya agreed to “kill,” “torment,” and “terrorize” their targets and families. Referring to one victim, Korkaya stated his “entire family” was on his “hit list” Feyock added that they should “get” the “kids” of two victims. Korkaya, referring to another victim, stated, “I’m gonna be the dirtiest f------- doctor ever / I’m gonna be [victim’s] doctor / poison her a-- slowly.” Feyock agreed, “We need people following [victim] / get into that house then burn it down.”
In the actual indictment it looks almost as if this was “just talk” — ugly, bad talk, but just talk. But indictments are only highlight reels for a grand jury. It's likely that the government has massive amounts of evidence that this group was obsessed with doing violence to the victims and their kids. It's quite likely that this was a leitmotif that moved from “bad talk” to actionable threat.
So, per Sam, what can we do?
Enforce the damned laws. Mercilessly. Relentlessly. Use every means available to bankrupt their trust fund sugar daddies, infiltrate their groups, and throw every book in the library at them.
The problem is that we’re so half-hearted and episodic about this. I suspect that this is mostly institutional inertia but also because Democratic administrations are staffed by people who basically sympathize with these Jew-hating terrorists.
I came across this article, whose headline reads:
Pro-Palestine advocacy….Well, in a sense that’s correct. But not the way the author meant. The article thoroughly omits the tidbit about killing Jewish kids.
“I’m sure in 50 years, the (University of Michigan) will be putting statues up to (the protestors) and saying how much they appreciated their courage in retrospect, but right now, they’re being very cowardly at the very least,” said James Johnson, a 29-year-old university student.
In 50 years, there will be no University of Michigan if this guy gets his way.
Democrat administrations are staffed by guys like the above. No wonder we don’t go after them.
There is no debating these people.
Go after the leaders and let the followers stew in their own drug-induced shit. If their leaders told them the sea was beer they would drink it. They’re trash. Their ringleaders and funders are a menace.
Nitpick, Sam: the “scholars” who’ve made Israel their obsession never do so as scholars but as activists. “Intellectual bankrupts” would have been better here.
I am, but context matters. In the context of debates on Israel, these issues, while real, are bad faith. I could throw a dart at a map of the US, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and find as bad or worse. Singling Israel out for having shitty politicians is to cooperate in its delegetimization.
100%. If Islam wins, a Bronze Age collapse happens. Simple as that.
100%. I note that most Israel-haters get their ammo from Haaretz. They’re aware of the irony. Their gullible followers are not.
200% - and this is the heart of the “debate” - you can’t argue with people who don’t grasp this.
THE BEST PART OF THE PIECE. I was shocked; it showed genuine humility. I don’t know how Israel should have responded to October 7. I don’t think anyone knows. If we were back in pre-Bronze Age days, Gaza would simply have been wiped out. Yeah, there would have been utter obliteration - which I will not call “genocide” because wiping out Gaza doesn’t mean wiping out a people. But we’re not, so here we are. I don’t know. Israel is in a Zugzwang. They had to do something and in doing something had to do something after that. I applaud Sam Harris for admitting he doesn’t know something.
I applaud Harris for going there.
I hope Harris takes this further. If you disagree with him on something as fundamental as this, then maybe you never agreed with him in the first place. You just wanted to be part of a gang.
Very good. Thanks for taking the time to publish it.