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Four Comments on Tom Friedman's Column

In today's Times, Thomas Friedman writes from Tel Aviv. Following is my reaction to his column:

1. Friedman compliments Israelis who are "gripped with routine" following suicide bombings and points out that "the radios used to stop playing upbeat music after a bombing; now they don't hesitate."

There's a difference between resilience and apathy, and I'm not sure that Friedman understands it. Going on with one's life despite the pain caused by Israel's enemies is resilience. In the Jerusalem Post, Natan Applebaum (son of David Applebaum and brother of Naava Applebaum, who were buried yesterday on what was to be Naava's wedding day) is quoted as saying that "We are not a family that is afraid. We go to cafes and take buses, and we will continue to do so. We do not live for the moment, we live for the future." That's resilience. Going out for a party before the dead are even evacuated is not. At best it's cognitive dissonance, or denial.

2. Friedman writes: "I was in a trendy Tel Aviv sandwich shop the other day and my young Israeli waitress had a fun little tattoo on her shoulder. Jews with tattoos — you don't see that every day. Message to Hamas: You may think these suicide bombers will drive Israelis to leave. But they're just digging in, and clinging to normality. The Jews are getting tattoos."

In his book, from Beirut to Jerusalem, Friedman lambasted Menachem Begin for supposedly being obsessed with the idea of Jews who can fight. Apparently Friedman is obsessed with the idea of Jews who get tattoos.

3. Friedman essentially equates Prime Minister Sharon and Hamas, and blames Sharon for Hamas (and presumably Fatah, though he doesn't say so) mass murders of Jews: "In three years, some 850 Israelis have been killed under your strategy. Yours and Hamas's are two failed strategies that add up to a human meat grinder."

In fact, Sharon has not been prime minister for three years, and the mass terror endured by Israel was well underway before he was elected, even as former Prime Minister Barak egregiously offered to divide Jerusalem and give up almost all of Judea and Samaria.

Friedman, however, demands that Israel make unilateral concessions, without any promise that the Palestinians will reciprocate.

4. Friedman writes: "Suicide bombing is becoming so routine here that it risks becoming embedded in contemporary culture. America must stop it. A credible peace deal here is no longer a U.S. luxury — it is essential to our own homeland security. Otherwise, this suicide madness will spread, and it will be Americans who will have to learn how to live with it."

So instead of supporting Israeli steps to uproot the terrorist groups, Friedman calls on the U.S. to impose a peace agreement, and sacrifice Israel as Chamberlain sacrificed Czechoslovakia.
posted on 9/11/2003