Norman Finkelstein: Build a Majority for Palestine
JVL Introduction
We republish here a Jacobin magazine transcript of Norman Finkelstein’s speech in solidarity with the Columbia campus protesters because of some of his important strategic insights, honed over a lifetime dedicated to the Palestinian cause.
Though the transcript meanders and could have benefitted from restructuring we believe the questions Finkelstein raises are fundamental.
Finkelstein draws attention to the fact that the precise formulation of the slogans demanded by a popular movement at a particular historical juncture is of crucial importance if the movement is to succeed.
He warns against regarding this as a trivial matter – though some left activists may treat it as such because in ‘normal’ times much of the left is marginalised into sectarian cults which individually are accustomed to adopting any slogans their cult chooses, since the external resonance is so limited.
But we are now in exceptional times and the movement must respond to “the new political reality that there are large numbers of people, probably a majority, who are potentially receptive to [our] message”.
So the movement needs to choose slogans which are (1) clear and unambiguous (2) honest and (3) “have the biggest likelihood at a given political moment of reaching the largest number of people”.
There is a tension between these three demands which must be carefully debated. Finkelstein insists that in resolving this tension political activists must always keep in mind the question: what are we trying to accomplish at this particular moment?
GW
This article was originally published by Jacobin on Wed 8 May 2024. Read the original here.
Norman Finkelstein: Build a Majority for Palestine
Holocaust scholar and pro-Palestine activist Norman Finkelstein expresses his support for the student protests, insisting on the importance of free speech and uniting the majority of Americans around solidarity with Gaza.
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I’m glad he suggests the amendment ‘Palestinians will be free’ not least ‘cos I posted that myself here months ago. But it’s not sabotage-free, eg ‘OK so they’ll be free but what about the Jews?’ (There’s another possible rhyme that ends ‘driving the Jews into the sea’ for instance.)
I don’t agree with Norm F on refusing to compromise with people’s expressed hurt feelings. There was a video clip of him addressing, I think, students at some USA university. A young woman questioner, clearly very upset, asked a question, although perhaps it was more a position statement. She was in tears. He was quite brutal with what he called her ‘crocodile tears’ and although I’m a big admirer of NF, I had a very negative reaction to how he dealt with her. He might have had (I don’t know) some privileged information about the student and thought it was OK to address her thus in a lecture theatre, but to my mind it did not look good on a video gone viral.
But Norm has never been one to care about compromising his integrity, his valiant-for-truth stance, or ‘how to make friends and influence people’.
To be honest (this is personal) I’ve always felt mindless when I’ve tried to shout slogans at demos. Jessie Jackson, many years ago, once tried to get one going (in England!), even demonstrating the rhythm like an orchestral conductor. I just felt silly and couldn’t sing to that music.
https://youtu.be/3qnU6cdcI9Y?featurex=shared
An interview/discussion with Finkelstein about the speech was published by the Guardian on Friday, 17 May:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/17/university-protests-gaza-norman-finkelstein,
He’s right about slogans. A Jamaican friend gave me the unforgettable advice “Don’t give them anything to work with”.
How about: From the river to the sea, everyone will be free?
Or, could be free!
I like Finkelstein’s approach to free speech and I also like the small but important tweak to ‘river to the sea’– from country/nation to people. Palestinians.
I was chanting ‘from the river to the sea’ for many months and still see it as truthful and not antisemitic, but recently I’ve stopped calling it (or the equally true ‘Israel is a terror state’) because my focus has become how to build the largest possible movement. That includes not only the tens or hundreds of thousands of us on each march, but all the people looking at us and hearing us – for once directly and not through the lens of the UK media. We’ve all got to be , dare I say it, ambassadors for every minute we’re on these protests.
Tania Ali’s ‘Jamaican friend’ is dead right. ‘They’ like to keep prodding for soundbites that they can remove from all relevant context. The Cambridge students’ response to the devious Suella Braverman makes the point well.
I’ve read all the rationales for ‘from the river to the sea’ and still don’t like shouting it, mainly because it doesn’t make sense to those hearing it (who don’t necessarily know the geography of the place, and neither, often, do those saying it) and those are the people we need to make sense to, as NF and others have said. I tried ‘Palestinians’ at the Nakba demo I went to and felt happier, but mine was a lone voice. Our slogans are very important and need to be simple to be heard eg ‘Occupation no more’, ‘stop the bombing now’ – I think these work as they are unarguable by most humans.
As Finkelstein writes, we should change “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” to “From the river to the sea, Palestinians will be free.” The current version is a gift to misreadings by Israel supporters and in any case is meaningless: only people can be free (or oppressed & subjugated) not a country. JVL and the Jewish Bloc generally on the Palestine solidarity marches could lead the way to making this simple but significant change. As Finkelstein states, having the right slogans is important.
I think Professor Finkelstein is correct when he says a movement the students have started can succeed provided the demands are not over the top and that no responsible University could agree with them. I am reminded of the Professors knowledge of M Ghandi who would never ask his followers to do things he knew would not be liked, horse race betting and such like, something his followers loved doing, rather like asking workers to stop going to the pub for a pint at weekends.
Bravo Professor.