Jewish International Opposition Statement Against Attack on Iran

Efforts to beat the drums of war for an attack on Iran’s nuclear reactor facilities are promoted in both the USA and Israel scenes. The recent New York Times opinion piece of July 18th, written by the Israeli historian Benny Morris, serves to consolidate those political forces. The Jewish opposition here expresses our outrage in order to forestall this horrendous proposal.

That clamour for war with Iran has met not only popular opposition but also runs counter to the quiet diplomacy that has engaged Iran in ongoing relations with the UN nuclear agency, as well as economic trade talks with the USA itself. Israel is also committed to a cease-fire that has held now for a month’s time, to the relief of both the populations of Israel and Gaza. In light of the developing political atmosphere of reason and negotiations, the militarist mindset has pumped up its rationale for war attempting to create the preconditions for a further war. Morris seeks to fabricate such prior conditions arguing,

“They are likely to use any bomb they build, both because of ideology and because of fear of Israeli nuclear pre-emption. Thus an Israeli nuclear strike to prevent the Iranians from taking the final steps toward getting the bomb is probable. The alternative is letting Tehran have its bomb. In either case, a Middle Eastern nuclear holocaust would be in the cards.”

This promotion of inevitability plays on Jewish and Israeli memory of the Nazi Holocaust in order to garner any and every source of support for an Israel military strike against Iran, provoking a reaction and leading to a further war by drawing in the USA. This is particularly deplorable in view of the fact that 16 US intelligence agencies concluded that Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program and has not had one for five years.

We extol the heroic courage of Israel's nuclear whistle-blower Mordechai Vanunu, joining our voices to his in condemnation of Israel's illegal stockpile of nuclear warheads and support the call for a nuclear-free Middle East.

The mindset calling for a war of mutual annihilation as a solution to security is astoundingly self-contradictory. Only the fabrication of a Nazi-like threat seeks to provide any credibility to such a call to war, much like the rationale for occupation that perceives a Palestinian plot to drive Jews into the sea. The reference to Iranian ideology (Islam) as the source of confrontation does not stand up to scrutiny, since the political challenge to Israel by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is not a call for extermination, despite any mistranslation.

We seek security for all concerned by affirming the right of all to security. While we lend no credibility to the prospect of an inevitable conflict, we nonetheless object to the hysteria promoted by the Iran-bashers who are now desperate in their repeated false starts to create another unnecessary war. The attempt to oblige Iran to comply with Security Council resolutions loses its legal, diplomatic and political force as the United States and Israel consistently ignore UN diplomacy and World Court decisions, relevant to the question of Palestine. We call upon all opposed to a military confrontation with Iran to write their governmental representatives demanding that the State of Israel subject its nuclear facilities to international inspection and sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT) as has Iran, rather than issue threats of war.

Further endorsements may be added by sending in a message to saalaha@fokus.name

Initiators:

Stanley Heller www.TheStruggle.org
mail@TheStruggle.org

Connecticut, USA

Prof. Dr. Fanny-Michaela Reisin

Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in Middle East - EJJP

www.juedische-stimme.de

mail@juedische-stimme.de

Germany

Abraham Weizfeld

saalaha@fokus.name 514.284.66.42

Interim Administrative Secretary, Alliance of Concerned Jewish Canadians

Loze mir alle leiben mit shytvis un shulim

Montréal

Organizational Co-signers :

Alliance of Concerned Jewish Canadians

jewish.alliance@yahoo.ca

Colorado Jews for a Just Peace

Granny Peace Brigade Philadelphia

Germantown Friends Meeting, Peace & Social Concerns

Independent Jewish Voices Montreal

Jewish Voice for a Just Peace, Switzerland

Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods

New Profile

a feminist, pluralist Israeli movement of males and females who wish to transform Israel from a militaristic society to a civil-ized one. www.newprofile.org

Women in Black

San Francisco Bay Area in Oakland, California

Women in Black (Vienna)

Co-signers :

Paula Abrams-Hourani

Women in Black (Vienna) and

Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in the Middle East (EJJP-Austria)

Miriam Adams

New Mexico

Prof. Ammiel Alcalay

CUNY Graduate Center & Queens College

Henry Ascher, MD, PhD, Assoc. Professor
Gothenburg, Sweden

Tsela Barr

Madison Chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace

Abigail B. Bakan, Ph.D., Queen’s University

Canada

Judith Bernstein

Jewish-Palestinian Dialogue Group Munich

Murray & Marcia Bernstein

Brooklyn, NY

Rudolf Bkouche

vice-président, l'Union Juive Française pour la Paix

Mark Robert Brill

As a Jewish Canadian (and inhabitant of the same planet as any and all who may read this), I

Wholeheartedly endorse the statement in opposition to the Benny Morris article which appeared in the New York Times urging an attack on Iran.

Neither as a Jew, nor a human being living in this age of myriad pressing concerns which threaten the existence of our species, can I condone the insanity of the current policy of the present United States & Israeli administrations which at least states as its belief that the Iranian nuclear program is a threat to world security. (Though I must credit the authors of those policies to be intelligent enough to know full well the dishonesty of such a stated belief so therefore must further condemn them for such cynical manipulation).

In fact, the by far greater threat to world security is and has been for some time now the actions of those above-named states.

Shelley Berlowitz

Jewish Voice for a Just Peace

Switzerland

Judith Butler

Berkeley, California

Paola Canarutto, physician

Chiacchiera con i tuoi amici in tempo reale!

//it.yahoo.com/mail_it/foot/*//it.messen...

Italy

Lorenzo A. Canizares

Harrisburg, PA

Union Organizer

Smadar Carmon
Toronto, Canada

Prof. Noam Chomsky

James Cohen

Dept. of Political Science

Université de Paris VIII (France)

Viviane Cohen

Woman in Black, Paris France

secretaire nationale of the UJFP.
I endorse your statement against war on Iran . Definitively.

Stephen Conroy, B. Com.

Montreal, Canada

Mark Cramer

Professor Université Paris-Jussieu and Sciences-Po (Paris)

Mike Cushman

Secretary LSE University and Colleges Union Branch (personal capacity)

Uri Davis (Dr)

MAIAP: Movement Against Israeli Apartheid in Palestine

Richard Lee Deaton, Ph.D., LL.B.

Ottawa, Canada

James Deutsch, M.D., Ph.D.

Judith Deutsch, M.S.W.

Jean M. Entine

Interim Chair Jewish Voice for Peace

USA

Dror Feiler

Composer, musician, artist

Chairman, European Jews for a Just Peace (www.ejjp.org)

Stockholm, Sweden

Pnina Feiler

Reg. nurse, Israel

Deborah Fink

Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods

Joel Frangquist

San Francisco, CA

Member of Jewish Voice for Peace, Bay Area chapter

Racheli Gai

Tucson Women in Black

Miriam Garfinkle M.D.

Sheila Goldmacher,

Member, Bay Area Women in Black Study Group

Sherna Berger Gluck

Professor Emerita, California State University Long Beach USA

Sue Goldstein
Toronto

Women in Solidarity with Palestine

Julius Gordon

Tucson, AZ

Please add my name to the list of violent dissenters with Benny Morris, who proposes the start of a nuclear war in the Middle East. Based on his NY times article it appears that Prof. Morris, who at one time was considered a valuable scholar in Middle East history, has suffered a dissociative disorder. How else to explain the patent lies (no intelligence service in the world..) that a rational historian would never allow to be printed under his name.

Tony Greenstein

Robert B. Gross

Suffern N.Y.

Batja P. Guggenheim- Ami

St.Gallen Switzerland

&

Chanan H. Guggenheim-Ami

St. Gallen Switzerland

Members of the Israel- Palestinian Dialogue Group ‘Olivenzweig’ St. Gall CH

Evelyn Haas [ oldleft@hotmail.com ]

Abe Hayeem

Architects and Planners for Justice in Palestine

Dr. Annette Herskovits

Writer, California, USA

Fred Hirsch

Executive Board Member Plumbers and Fitters Local 393, Delegate to the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council, Delegate to the Santa Clara and San Benito Counties Building and Construction Trades Council

I endorse the statement wholeheartedly.

Benny Morris thinks the unthinkable. His article justifying a nuclear strike against Iran speaks the unspeakable. Such an action could and probably would open humanity's door to the abyss - a monstrous step toward the end of human viability on Earth.

Shame on the New York Times for admitting such barbarity into the public discussion as normal discourse.

Israel's unchecked development of nuclear weapons, with the help of apartheid South Africa, was an affront our legacy as Jews - a sharp stick in the eye to the population of the planet. Weapons of mass destruction indeed!

Any nuclear threat today is despicable.

Louis Hirsch

Chicago, Illinois

Dr. Tikva Honig-Parnass

Jerusalem

Tamzin Jans

Brussels, Belgium (in Libya)

Jake Javanshir

I endorse your stand of no attack on Iran. I am an Iranian Jew, living in Canada. If anyone should be stoped of aggression, it's Israel not Iran.

Dan Judelson

Secretary , European Jews for a Just Peace

Gilda Katz

MSW, RSW, Toronto

Maxine Kaufman-Lacusta

citizen of Canada and Israel

Mira Khazzam

Montreal, Canada

Alisa Klein

Israeli and U.S. Citizen

Jason Kunin

Toronto

Rebekah Levin
Oak Park, IL

Joseph Levine
Dept. of Philosophy
Univ. of Mass
Amherst, MA

Abby Lippman, PhD, Professor

Montreal, Quebec

Antony Loewenstein

Sydney, Australia, journalist/author

Leslie Lomas

Colorado Jews for a Just Peace

Moshé Machover

London, UK

Dr Sabetai Matsas MD

Athens, Greece

Hilda Meers

Writer

member of Scottish Jews for a Just Peace,

Aberdeen Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament,

Grampian Senior Citizens Forum

Peter Melvyn

Vienna, Austria

Jewish Voice for a Just Peace in Neareast

Brigitte Meyer

Jewish-Palestinian Dialogue Group St.Gallen, Switzerland

I fully support the content and spirit of this statement. Real security can only come from peace.

Dorinda Moreno
Fuerza Mundial Collaborative

Dorothy Naor Ph.D.

Israel Naor

Israel

My spouse and I both endorse the statement and fervently hope that reason rather than emotions and war profiteering will hold sway.

Diana Neslen

United Kingdom

Joan Nestle

Alex Nissen
Senior Educator / Coordinator
Israeli/Australian
Women in Black Melbourne

Prof. Judith Norman

Jewish Peace News

Prof. Bertell Ollman

Dept. of Politics, NYU

New York, New York, USA.

Karin Pally

Women in Black-Los Angeles

Jean Pauline

Oakland, California

Daniel Pines

Karen Platt

member of Jewish Voice for Peace, Albany, CA

Laurie Polster

Jewish Voice for Peace/Bay Area

Oakland, CA

Yakov M Rabkin

Professor of History, University of Montreal
Israel’s elites disdain – to their own peril - the Mishna that praises as a hero someone who knows how to turn an enemy into a friend.

Naomi Rankin

I fully support the content and spirit of this statement. As a Jewish Canadian with cousins in Israel, I am interested in real security for Israel, and that can come only from peace.

Bruce Robbins

Columbia University

Stewart M. Robinson

retired Prof of Mathematics

Professor Jonathan Rosenhead

Secretary, British Committee for the Universities of Palestine (BRICUP)

Prof Andrew N. Rubin

Georgetown University

Washington, DC

Molly Rush

PUSH PA. United for SinglePayer HealthCare

Health Care for All PA

www.healthcare4allPA.org

Margot F Salom (BA Soc Work, M Phil)

Palestinian & Jewish Unity for Justice & Peace

Stop this madness - What has happened to Jewish ethics?

Shay Salomon

Tucson, Arizona

Marlena Santoyo

Philadelphia, PA, USA &

member of Jewish Voice for Peace

Yom Shamash

Jews for a Just Peace

Vancouver, Canada

Cindy Shamban

Berkeley, CA

affiliation: Jewish Voice for Peace

Avi Shlaim, FBA

Professor of International Relations

St Antony's College

Oxford

Rich Siegel

Musician, Advisory Board Deir Yassin Remembered

Teaneck, NJ USA
//www.deiryassin.org

Andy Silver

Cary, NC

July 27 letter to the Raleigh News & Observer. It was not published.

America is no place for satire. The New Yorker Obama cartoon went over like a John Kerry joke. Now some are responding seriously to the column by Benny Morris, “Soon, strike on Iran” (N&O, July 20), which presented a case for another pre-emptive war with the cogency with which Jonathan Swift proposed that Irish poverty be relieved by devouring babies.

Morris’s proposal is as insane and as devoid of humanity as Swift’s “modest proposal.” It should convince any sane person of the insanity of attacking Iran.

I doubt, however, the sanity of all discussion of Iran’s nuclear threat. The existing nuclear threat in the Middle East comes from Israel. Israel’s arsenal is controlled by the same Israeli government that dropped a million cluster bombs in southern Lebanon only for the purpose of killing and maiming farm families that wished to return to their land. Israel’s bombs provide the motive for surrounding nations to seek nuclear weapons. The only way to prevent nuclear proliferation in the Middle East is to create a nuclear arms free zone. In return for Israel’s dismantling its nuclear arsenal and agreeing to strict inspections by the IAEA, other countries in the region should make similar commitments.

Jonatan Stanczak

The Freedom Theatre, Jenin refugee Camp

Roger Tucker
//one-state.net

Richard Wark, PhD.

Durham, North Carolina

Dr. Samuel Wiener

Jewish Voice for a Just Peace

Switzerland

Judith Weisman,
Toronto, Canada

Suzanne Weiss

Not In Our Name (NION) Jewish Voices Opposing Zionism

Toronto

Evan Weissman
Denver, CO USA

Playwright and Nonviolence Teacher

Célie Weizfeld Castelijn

Montréal Kébèk

Roger van Zwanenberg (Dr)
Chair & Commissioning Editor
Pluto Press

Further endorsements may be added by sending in a message to saalaha@fokus.name

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Originally published: //www.thestruggle.org/jews_iran_attack_8_08.h...

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