Academics From The United States

"Dialogue is really aimed at going into the whole thought process and changing the way the thought process occurs collectively. We haven't really paid much attention to thought as a process. we have engaged in thoughts, but we have only paid attention to the content, not to the process. Why does thought require attention? Every thinking requires attention, really. If we ran machines withinout paying attention to them, they would break down. Our thought, too, is a process, and it requires attention, otherwise its going to go wrong."

"During the past few decades, modern technology, with radio, TV, air travel, and satellites, has woven a network of communication which puts each part of the world in to almost instant contact with all the other parts. Yet, in spite of this world-wide system of linkages, there is, at this very moment, a general feeling that communication is breaking down everywhere, on an unparalleled scale..."

"The ability to perceive or think differently is more important than the knowledge gained."

"Consciousness is much more of the implicate order than is matter . . . Yet at a deeper level [matter and consciousness] are actually inseparable and interwoven , just as in the computer game the player and the screen are united by participation."

"Deep down the consciousness of mankind is one. This is a virtual certainty because even in the vacuum matter is one; and if we don't see this, it's because we are blinding ourselves to it."

"The point about dialectic is the ultimate identity of the universal and the individual. The individual is universal and the universal is the individual. The word "individual" means undivided, so we could say that very few individuals have ever existed. We could call them dividuals. Individuality is only possible if it unfolds from wholeness. ... Ego-centeredness is not individuality at all."

"The weekend began with the expectation that there would be a series of lectures and informative discussions with emphasis on content. It gradually emerged that something more important was actually involved — the awakening of the process of dialogue itself as a free flow of meaning among all the participants. In the beginning, people were expressing fixed positions, which they were tending to defend, but later it became clear that to maintain the feeling of friendship in the group was much more important than to hold any position. Such friendship has an impersonal quality in the sense that its establishment does not depend on a close personal relationship between participants. A new kind of mind thus begins to come into being which is based on the development of a common meaning that is constantly transforming in the process of the dialogue. People are no longer primarily in opposition, nor can they be said to be interacting, rather they are participating in this pool of common meaning which is capable of constant development and change. In this development the group has no pre-established purpose, though at each moment a purpose that is free to change may reveal itself. The group thus begins to engage in a new dynamic relationship in which no speaker is excluded, and in which no particular content is excluded. Thus far we have only begun to explore the possibilities of dialogue in the sense indicated here, but going further along these lines would open up the possibility of transforming not only the relationship between people, but even more, the very nature of consciousness in which these relationships arise."

"We have reversed the usual classical notion that the independent "elementary parts" of the world are the fundamental reality, and that the various systems are merely particular contingent forms and arrangements of these parts. Rather, we say that inseparable quantum interconnectedness of the whole universe is the fundamental reality, and that relatively independent behaving parts are merely particular and contingent forms within this whole."

"Of course, we must avoid postulating a new element for each new phenomenon. But an equally serious mistake is to admit into the theory only those elements which can now be observed. For the purpose of a theory is not only to correlate the results of observations that we already know how to make, but also to suggest the need for new kinds of observations and to predict their results. In fact, the better a theory is able to suggest the need for new kinds of observations and to predict their results correctly, the more confidence we have that this theory is likely to be good representation of the actual properties of matter and not simply an empirical system especially chosen in such a way as to correlate a group of already known facts."

"Human beings do not live in the objective world alone, nor alone in the world of social activity as ordinarily understood, but are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has become the medium of expression for their society. It is quite an illusion to imagine that one adjusts to reality essentially without the use of language and that language is merely an incidental means of solving specific problems of communication or reflection. The fact of the matter is that the "real world" is to a large extent unconsciously built upon the language habits of the group. No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached … We see and hear and otherwise experience very largely as we do because the language habits of our community predispose certain choices of interpretation."

"Getting down to brass tacks, how in the Hell are you going to explain general American n- 'I' except genetically? It's disturbing, I know, but (more) non-committal conservatism is only dodging, after all, isn't it? Great simplifications are in store for us. … It seems to me that only now that is American linguistics becoming really interesting, at least in its ethnological bearings."

"Human beings do not wish to be modest; they want to be as expressive — that is, as immodest — as fear allows; fashion helps them solve that paradoxical problem."

"Fashion is custom in the guise of departure from custom."

"Language is a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and desires by means of a system of voluntarily produced symbols."

"Were a language ever completely "grammatical" it would be a perfect engine of conceptual expression. Unfortunately, or luckily, no language is tyrannically consistent. All grammars leak."

"It would be naïve to imagine that any analysis of experience is dependent on pattern expressed in language. Any concept, whether or not it forms part of the system of grammatical categories, can be conveyed in any language. If a notion is lacking in a given series, it implies a different configuration and not a lack of expressive power."

"Cultural anthropology is not valuable because it uncovers the archaic in the psychological sense. It is valuable because it is constantly rediscovering the normal."

"I'm delighted to hear that I'll be followed shortly by Norman Finkelstein and would very strongly advise you to come listen to him. Not only [is he] an old personal friend but a person who can speak with more authority and insight on these topics than anyone I can think of. So that should be a memorable occasion and I urge that you not miss the opportunity."

"For the past 20 years the people of Gaza, half of whom are children, have been immured in a concentration camp. Today they breached the camp's walls. If we honor John Brown's armed resistance to slavery; if we honor the Jews who revolted in the Warsaw Ghetto — then moral consistency commands that we honor the heroic resistance in Gaza. I, for one, will never begrudge — on the contrary, it warms every fiber of my soul — the scenes of Gaza’s smiling children as their arrogant Jewish supremacist oppressors have, finally, been humbled. The stars above in heaven are looking kindly down. Glory, glory, hallelujah. The souls of Gaza go marching on!"

"I don't see the reason to get excited about Holocaust deniers. First of all I don't know what a Holocaust denier even is. People say if you deny the centrality of the six million Jews being killed and you try to bring in other groups of people you become a Holocaust denier. Other people say if you deny the centrality of the gas chambers you become a Holocaust denier."

"David Irving was a very good historian – I don't care what Richard Evans (the historian who was a key player in the Lipstadt libel trial) says. He produced works that are substantive ... If you don't like it, don't read it. In the case of Irving, he knew a thing or two – or three."

"Speaking as a devout atheist, thank God in his Almighty wisdom that he made us mortal."

"Whenever Israel faces a public relations debacle such as the Intifada or international pressure to resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict, American Jewish organizations orchestrate this extravaganza called the 'new anti-Semitism.' The purpose is several-fold. First, it is to discredit any charges by claiming the person is an anti-Semite. It's to turn Jews into the victims, so that the victims are not the Palestinians any longer. As people like Abraham Foxman of the ADL put it, the Jews are being threatened by a new holocaust. It's a role reversal – the Jews are now the victims, not the Palestinians. So it serves the function of discrediting the people leveling the charge. It's no longer Israel that needs to leave the Occupied Territories; it's the Arabs who need to free themselves of the anti-Semitism."

"Since completing this memoir in 1995 I've returned to Palestine every year. In fact, apart from traveling abroad to lecture, Palestine is the only place I've been since I first journeyed there 15 years ago. I sometimes fantasize vacationing in Greece or Italy but never do. If I have time and cost isn't prohibitive, I always return to Palestine. I do so mostly from a sense of duty - do I have a right to be elsewhere? - relieved by the authentic affection I've developed for friends. I cannot say I enjoy going back. From the moment I arrive, even before arriving, I count the minutes left before I depart. The eminent Hebrew University sociologist Baruch Kimmerling has described Gaza as "the largest concentration camp ever to exist." The West Bank ranks only a mite less awful. Once the Israeli wall currently under construction is finished, the West Bank will replace Gaza with top honors. Bordered on both sides by four meter deep trenches, fortified with guard towers at regular intervals, and topped with barbed wire, this massive barricade will stretch across fully 347 kilometers - twice the size of the Berlin Wall."

"My parents -- we lived in Brooklyn, NY, we owned a house -- my parents were difficult people, they didn't get along with anyone. Actually, they didn't even get along with each other. So, on the one side were the Golds and on the other side were the Kasslers and they did not get along with the Golds and they did not get along with the Kasslers, so they built a fence. And it was within their right to build a fence. But, as everybody knows, when you build at fence, at any rate in New York, you first have to hire a surveyor. That's a fact, I'm not joking. You have to hire a surveyor and you have to make sure that fence is right down the line on your property because if that fence is literally one quarter of an inch on the Golds' side or on the Kasslers' side, they have the right to tear it down. Under law, that's it. Now, let's take Israel's wall. What happens if my parents decide to build a fence that's not only on the Kasslers' side but goes right around their swimming pool? Well, some people will begin to wonder "are Mary and Harry Finkelstein trying to protect their property? Or are they trying to steal the Kasslers' swimming pool?""

"To my thinking the honorable thing now is to show solidarity with Hezbollah as the US and Israel target it for liquidation. Indeed, looking back my chief regret is that I wasn’t even more forceful in publicly defending Hezbollah against terrorist intimidation and attack."

"There are a large number of claims circulating about rampant anti-Semitism on college campuses. When you go actually go through the records, talk to the schools, speak to the deans and so forth, all of these claims turn out to be fraudulent. There’s just no record of this so-called rampant anti-Semitism on college campuses. The most striking example is Columbia University where [...] pro-Israel outsiders were disrupting the classrooms of these professors [falsely accued of anti-Semitism], secretly video-taping their lectures and being turned, as the Columbia Report put it, into informers for the pro-Israel lobby. The real story was the harassment of professors who were critical of Israeli policy."

"That said, sometimes I feel that Israel has come out of the boils of the hell, a satanic state."

"What were the offers being made on each side of the Camp David and in the Taba talks? And the standard interpretation, which comes — which is — you can call it the Dennis Ross interpretation, which, I think, unfortunately Dr. Ben-Ami echoes, is that Israel made huge concessions at Camp David and Taba; Palestinians refused to make any concessions, because of what Dr. Ben-Ami repeatedly calls Arafat's unyielding positions; and that Arafat missed a huge opportunity. Now, it is correct to say that if you frame things in terms of what Israel was legally entitled to under international law, then Israel made precisely and exactly zero concessions. All the concessions were made by the Palestinians."

"Since the mid-1970s, there's been an international consensus for resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict. Most of your listeners will be familiar with it. It's called a two-state settlement, and a two-state settlement is pretty straightforward, uncomplicated. Israel has to fully withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza and Jerusalem, in accordance with the fundamental principle of international law, cited three times by Mr. Ben-Ami in the book, his book, that it's inadmissible to acquire territory by war. The West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem, having been acquired by war, it's inadmissible for Israel to keep them. They have to be returned. On the Palestinian side and also the side of the neighboring Arab states, they have to recognize Israel's right to live in peace and security with its neighbors. That was the quid pro quo: recognition of Israel, Palestinian right to self-determination in the West Bank and Gaza with its capital in Jerusalem. That's the international consensus. It's not complicated. It's also not controversial."

"Frankly, part of me says…"you know what, we deserve the problem on our hands because some things Bin Laden says are true". One of the things he said on that last tape was that "until we live in security, you’re not going to live in security", and there is a certain amount of rightness in that."

"Articulating the key Holocaust dogmas, much of the literature on Hitler's Final solution is worthless as scholarship. Indeed, the field of Holocaust studies is replete with nonsense, if not sheer fraud. (p. 55)"

""If everyone who claims to be a survivor actually is one," my mother used to exclaim, "who did Hitler kill then?" (p. 81)"

"I think very highly of Professor Finkelstein. I regard him as a very able, very erudite and original scholar who has made an important contribution to the study of Zionism, to the study of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and, in particular, to the study of American attitudes towards Israel and towards the Middle East."

"[A] simplistic lumper who refuses to make the most elementary analytical distinctions, believing that the concept of new antisemitism hasn't anything to do with fighting bigotry – and everything to do with stifling criticism of Israel; a polemicist with an ugly and sectarian mode of argument and a prose style that is a parody of a once-flourishing antisemitic literature; a lover of the ad hominem attack which leaves the substance of the question unaddressed, preferring to parade before the readers his collection of ... "antisemitism mongers" who should "crawl back into their sewers"; a tendentious joker trading in the indirect expressions of hostility or obscenity; a conspiracy theorist who reduces the history of Holocaust memory to the machinations of the Zionist propaganda machine, and contemporary forms of antisemitism to a public relations exercise; a crude reductionist who prefers a caricatural simplification of the historical process to a careful reconstruction of the dynamics of either collective memory or protean hatreds; a man who normalises antisemitism by telling his audiences that most Jews believe in their group's superiority, talk too much about the Holocaust, are over-represented in the media and use that over-representation for Jewish ends, are tapped into the networks of power and privilege, and who should stop complaining about antisemitism."

"It takes an enormous amount of academic courage to speak the truth when no one else is out there to support him. And so, I think that given this acuity of vision and analytical power, demonstrating that the Swiss banks did not owe the money, that even though survivors were beneficiaries of the funds that were distributed, they came, when all is said and done, from places that were not obligated to pay that money. That takes a great amount of courage in and of itself. So I would say that his place in the whole history of writing history is assured, and that those who in the end are proven right triumph, and he will be among those who will have triumphed, albeit, it so seems, at great cost."

"When I read Finkelstein's book, The Holocaust Industry, at the time of its appearance, I was in the middle of my own investigations of these matters, and I came to the conclusion that he was on the right track. I refer now to the part of the book that deals with the claims against the Swiss banks, and the other claims pertaining to forced labor. I would now say in retrospect that he was actually conservative, moderate and that his conclusions are trustworthy. He is a well-trained political scientist, has the ability to do the research, did it carefully, and has come up with the right results. I am by no means the only one who, in the coming months or years, will totally agree with Finkelstein's breakthrough."

"Finkelstein's work is, from beginning to end, a tendentious series of inventions. …[T]he examples from his article that are deemed to be the strongest are thoroughly misleading and without merit. Finkelstein’s writing is the sort of transparent political polemic that—had others not cynically propped him up as an expert and a champion of truth—would not even merit a response. This is a man who has made a career of attacking Israel’s legitimacy... His documented inventions about my book, it is worth noting that Finkelstein has never before written anything on the Holocaust or German history and cannot read German ... which means that he cannot read many of the sources on which he is passing his 'expert' opinion ... [A] man who has arrived overnight to a scholarly field made up of massive scholarly literature, not to mention all the documents, who, to boot, cannot read most of the sources because they are in German."

"Finkelstein sees the Jews as either villains or victims - and that, I fear, takes him closer to the people who created the Holocaust than to those who suffered in it."

"[I]t is striking to hear someone who appears to have nothing but contempt for his own people. He issues the same call sent out by David Irving in the high court this year - that Jews should not simply condemn anti-semitism, but examine their own role in provoking it. Like Irving, Finkelstein sees Jews as the authors of their own suffering. He claims that Jews have made up stories of persecution and that there are too many survivors to be true - another Irving favourite."

"I wasn’t wrong. I am just far more correct now than I was then."

"When I was in the south in the 60s, the white people didn't really curse you out, they just tried to kill you. And this abuse is nothing compared to that...On the other hand, I have not seen this level of hysteria before. I haven't. Ever since I got involved 12 years ago, it has been increasing. And it hasn't leveled off. Even some of the attack dogs are being attacked. Did you see them going after Dershowitz? It's very unusual for him, to get some of his medicine back. He was bitten and he was kind of shocked."

"It there had been a few people like Alan Dershowitz during the 1930s and 1940s, the history of European jewry might have been different."

"Alan Dershowitz is one of the world’s most famous lawyers. He is also probably one of the best. If you're a billionaire accused of serially raping minors, he's the guy who can get you a non-prosecution agreement and 13 months of "work release" in your own office. Dershowitz is uncommonly talented as an advocate, which is why famous scumbags so often turn to him for help. If I was accused of a hideous crime, and I was told I could have Alan Dershowitz as my lawyer, I would thank my lucky stars."

"Over this storied career, Dershowitz’s public persona has remained more or less unchanged: loud, provocative, brilliant and principled, if also relentlessly self-promoting. And, until recently, his positions have been tolerated, if not always embraced, by the legal academy and universally acknowledged for their moral seriousness."

"Professor Alan M. Dershowitz is Brooklyn native who has been called "the nation’s most peripatetic civil liberties lawye"’ and one of its "most distinguished defenders of individual rights," "the best-known criminal lawyer in the world," "the top lawyer of last resort," "America’s most public Jewish defender" and "Israel’s single most visible defender – the Jewish state’s lead attorney in the court of public opinion." He is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School."

"Dershowitz does not engage the debate in this country about Israel on the factual, legal, moral, and humanitarian merits because he knows that his client is "guilty" of violating international law in its occupation of the Palestinian territories"

"As much as people dismiss him (Dershowitz) as a clown and charlatan and roll their eyes ­ the fact of the matter is that he very effectively makes use of his Harvard pedigree ­ it is a distinguished university and he has an eminent chair of that university and he makes use of those credentials to lend credibility to his work"

"Dershowitz is not only a remarkable liar and slanderer, but also an extreme opponent of elementary civil rights."

"Elaine Kendall of the Los Angeles Times calls Dershowitz "the attorney of last resort for the desperate and despised, counselor for lost causes and forlorn hopes.""