The below was posted to the e-list of Critical Geography Forum on Thursday 25th April 2024. These words of the Anonymous Geographer deserve amplification and the fullest academic engagement. Avanti.
Dear colleagues
I feel the need, after months of observing from the sidelines of some of the debates on this forum, by colleagues on social media and elsewhere, and some experiences in universities, to email this list serve. I’m doing this anonymously, because quite frankly, I don’t feel safe saying this in my own name, knowing that I’ll be working with people on this list-serve, sitting next to them in conferences.
Firstly, before anyone misunderstands, I’m resolutely pro-Palestinian. I’ve signed the letters of protest, written to politicians and university leaders about this issue. And I’m not comparing my discomfort to the experiences of students and faculty who have been arrested at recent demonstrations on campus. My discomfort is as nothing compared to the horrors going on in Gaza. But beyond letters and protest, I can’t really do anything about those situations (this Jew hasn’t even been to Israel), but I can do something about discussions going on in geography.
Geography, and this forum, has a problem with denying anti-Semitism. It just frequently pops up, from the usual suspects, and they won’t stop despite careful critique. Most recently, and the thing that prompted me to write this email, is that people on this forum were denying that people were holding all jews responsible for the actions of Israel. This is probably the most common form of anti-Semitism we see today. The people who posted such sentiments in this forum were apparently UK academics – here, are just a few examples of precisely this conflation happening on UK university campuses, where individual Jews and Jewish student groups have been targeted in ‘anti-Zionist’ or similar protests, irrespective of their individual views on Zionism and Israel.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leeds-68256983
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/nov/16/antisemitism-uk-universities-jewish-students
Let me be clear – there are many, many over-exaggerated claims of anti-Semitism that have been used to shut down necessary criticism of Israel. But there are also many, many instances where this kind of anti-Semitism has taken place. The truth lies between the two extremes of everything being anti-Semitic and nothing being anti-Semitic. Sometimes I feel welcome at pro-Palestinian protests, other times I feel very uncomfortable, and have had to leave some protests when someone says something totally racist.
At this point, it is probably worth noting that as geographers, we are supposed to be reflexive of our positionality. It is deeply discomforting to see people who I’m 99% certain are not Jews discussing what is, and is not, anti-Semitism, policing the boundaries of what is or is not anti-Jewish racism. I’m not saying that non-Jews can’t have a view (in my view, for example white people are allowed to have an opinion on anti-Black racism), but more that it requires some level of reflexivity.
Another key, and very worrying trend, is the tendency to downplay historical or current Jewish suffering. A statement on solidarity for Palestine circulated earlier had hundreds of words on the terrible suffering in Gaza, yet neglected any mention of the killing, rape and kidnap of innocent civilians (Jews – including peace activists – as well as Arabs and international guest workers) on 7th October. Even a short sentence that killing, raping and kidnapping civilians is bad would have changed everything. We have statements explaining that the creation of Israel is down to colonialism, but neglect a rather obvious history of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust that drove it (to be fair, at least some people involved have apologized). Some feel is appropriate to play thought experiments about what might happen if we ‘sent back’ Israel’s Jews to where they came from. Others deny the fact that Jews arrived in Israel throughout the 20th century fleeing antisemitism, in Europe, North Africa, and the wider Middle East. Maybe you think that by downplaying Jewish suffering, it helps emphasize Palestinian suffering, and supports the cause. It frankly has the opposite effect.
I think that related to this is a tendency to over-simplify what Zionism is, and has been, as exemplified by the many posts that simply say “Zionism is…”. I absolutely abhor the racist, violent form of Zionism that we see today, but Zionism hasn’t always meant that. As I understand my family history, prior to the 1940s, my family were a mix of assimilationist Jews and mild, secular, peace-activist Zionists, who favoured not an exclusionary state where non-Jews were evicted or not granted equal rights and treatment, but the original meaning of Zionism as a place of refuge. Where they could stop running from anti-Semitism, but where Jews had equal rights and privileges to others, neither more nor fewer. Frankly, the ones that survived the 1940s were deeply messed up, but still remained peace activists. Personally, I’m a post-Zionist – Zionism has come to mean a horrid exclusionary nationalist state, and it has lost any potential meaning for liberation and survival. My grandparents’ generation might have needed a refuge from anti-Semitism to survive, somewhere they could stop running, but my life is not under the same threat as theirs.
The very worst example though, and the main reason I have not engaged previously in this forum on this matter, and the reason I stay anonymous, is that critical geography has started to support violent fascism. This is not something I say lightly. We see academics saying that they don’t judge Hamas for who they are, refuse to criticism them. But this is an organisation that is founded on the most vile racist theories, as per their founding documents. More recently, we have seen support for the Houthis, another deeply racist, violent organisation. Both organisations see Jews everywhere as the enemy. They would kill me, and my family, simply for being Jews. Not to mention what they would do to the many other people on crit-geog-forum – of the 6,000 people on this forum, how many would be subject to a death sentence by the Houthis or Hamas because of their race, religion, or sexuality? Since when did we, as critical geographers, support violent racists? How can I, and many other colleagues, feel safe in geography departments hearing support for these organisations?
I propose a few solutions
Firstly, we must continue to support the legitimate claims of the Palestinian people, and their right to peace, dignity and self determination.
Secondly, we must be conscious of the anti-Semitism in our midst
Thirdly, if you are going to mention Zionism, say what you mean by it
Fourthly, we must oppose violent racists, be it in Israel, Yemen, Gaza or elsewhere.
Yours
Anonymous Geographer
(Image from Wikimedia Commons: “The Geographer” by Hanno Karlhuber)
Anaemic On A Bike 