When President Chaim Weizmann died in 1952, there was a vacuum of international relations that Israel was eager to fill. The Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion hurdled over reams of governmental red-tape to offered the position to “the greatest jew alive” — Albert Einstein.
Forgotten in the enthusiasm was the fact that Einstein, though sympathetic to Israel, had never been an ardent Zionist; he believed in a bi-nationalism that meant “friendly and fruitful coexistence with the Arabs.” He does not even know Hebrew, official language of the new state.1
The historical persecution of the Jewish people primed Einstein for an ideological receptivity to Cultural Zionism—a sect of Zionism that “emphasized the establishment of cultural and educational centers among Jews.2” Cultural Zionists advocated complete equality for Arabs and Jews and, in 1938, Dr. Einstein expressed concern for the existential implication of a Jewish state.
“Apart from practical considerations, my awareness of the essential nature of Judaism resists the idea of a Jewish State, with borders, an army and a measure of temporal power, no matter how modest. I am afraid of the inner damage Judaism will sustain — especially from the development of a narrow nationalism within our ranks, against which we have already had to fight strongly, even without a Jewish State.”3
Einstein’s fear crystallised in 1948 when a newly “recognised” Israel gave birth to the ultranationalist conservative party, Tnuat Haherut. Einstein and a handful of other Jewish intellectuals penned an open letter in The New York Times condemning Herut for the Deir Yassin Massacre, identifying the party as “closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties.”4
14 years after warning that a Jewish ethnostate would bring “inner damage” to the Jewish people—Einstein was faced with a prime opportunity to confront the narrow nationalism he’d predicted. He refused the offer—stating he had “neither the natural ability nor the experience to deal with human beings”. Presidency would’ve required him to “say to the Israeli people things they would not like to hear.”
Most of the Jewish dissidents advocating a binational state considered themselves Zionists or friends of Zionism. But theirs was a different Zionism. Just as Christianity comes in thirty-nine different flavors, each with its own strains and schisms, so, albeit on a smaller scale, there have been--and still are-many Zionisms: labor Zionism, Revisionist Zionism, political Zionism, socialist Zionism, cultural Zionism, territorial Zionism, and many more. — Fred Jerome, Einstein on Israel and Zionism
These fence-sitting varieties of Zionism are endeavours of cosmetic surgery, rearranging the facial features of a colonial project to make the theft appear more palatable. When the violent ultranationalism Dr. Einstein warned about wove itself into the very foundations of Israeli politics—he saw no moral urgency to fight it. He didn’t flounce his lack of experience in the manner right-wing men of action have been known to do to rise to the occasion to leverage his own social capital as “the greatest jew alive”. He did not adopt a position of considerable influence and say to the Jewish people the things they would not like to hear to course-correct from the far-right violence. He declined. And 73 years, a Nakba and countless massacres later—the colonial genocide against the Palestinians is only now being “recognised”.
“As far as I’m concerned, “liberal” is the most meaningless word in the dictionary. History has shown me that as long as some white middle class people can live high on the hog, take vacations in Europe, send their children to private schools, and reap the benefits of their white skin privileges, then they are “liberals.” But when times get hard and money gets tight, they pull of that liberal mask and you’re talking to Adolf Hitler. They feel sorry for the so called under privileged just as long as they can maintain their own privileges”
― Assata Shakur
The liberal. The moderate. The centrist.
Many of the Black Enraged—from Martin Luther King Jr. to Assata Shakur—have expressed their disillusionment with the fence-sitting class.
After Ezra Klein praised Charlie Kirk for “practising politics the right way” in The New York Times, Ta-Nehisi Coates penned a response in Vanity Fair to push back on the post-humous revisionism of Kirk’s legacy. The two decided to talk it out on a podcast. One of Klein’s first questions was, “why are we losing right now?”.
Coates answers, “because there are always moments when we lose.”
My response is far more scathing. It relocates Klein and liberals like him away from any category of “we”. The New York Times piece he penned helped legitimise the right’s hagiographies of Kirk, diminishing the regressive impact of his debate-me-bro stochastic terrorism. I needn’t understand Klein’s justifications to know that his apologia is unbecoming of someone I’d consider on my team.
Through the interview, Klein wrestles with strategies for political victory. His suggestions carry the faint whiffs of panic and dysregulation as he proposes running pro-life democrats to win Southern states.
Coates asks Klein to define his place in this current, political moment. Klein responds, “I don’t know what my role is anymore”. He doesn’t know because the ideological core of the fence-sitting class is principally unmoored and Klein is a card-carrying member. He believes the democrats lost the presidential election due to strategy mismanagement and not because of the irreconcilable hypocrisy of demonising their opponent while full-throatily funding a genocide. Where Coates fights for the existential health of America, Klein’s concept of winning is exclusive to electoral success. The Republican drift towards authoritarianism is a matter of envy; the moral regression at the heart of this moment is an aside, he’s more concerned with figuring out which tactics his own sports team needs to adopt to win the championship next season.
Klein is incapable of examining Kirk’s political success without infusing his analysis with admiration. The billionaire-backed theatre of politics has convinced him that victory is a set by socio-political acrobatics which require moral fluidity. It is unfathomable for him to consider that “winning” is meaningless without being morally resolute. The health of our civilisation depends on championing a robust opposition to wealth inequality, environmental exploitation, racism, misogyny, queerphobia, ableism and an unwavering advocacy for the dignity of the vulnerable. Any political strategy doesn’t look to synthesise these truths within the existing, social landscape are a profound waste of time. Running concession democrats has only veered our society right-ward. On a purely electoral level—it is crucial to run and support principled, progressive candidates who can speak to people’s core worries, put together compelling campaigns and actually deliver policies that’ll make people’s lives better. Those types of candidates are popping up all over the country. If Klein and the fence-sitting class want to know what their role is (and if they believe their utility is as strategists rather than truth-tellers): they should be running interference for progressive candidates that are faced smear campaigns and, as Coates rightfully pointed out, choosing the option of silence when grace might embolden the right.
The mainstream presentation of the fence-sitting class as a diametric opposition to conservatism is a fictional struggle fitting snugly inside the Overton window. The fence-sitting class embraces moral chameleonism to the point where it impedes their personal comfort. They throw their weight behind safe political actions like boycotting streaming platforms to support a millionaire talk-show host so they can maintain the delusion that their freedom of speech and freedom of the press isn’t being eroded in real time. Such protests costs them nothing—in fact, less than nothing. They get to save money and feel the warmth of a pyrrhic victory.
For decades, conservatives have misrepresented the fence-sitting class as their primary opposition—lumping them in with “the left” and making no bones about their disdain for both. In response, the fence-sitting class has sung endless kumbayas, reached across the aisle, created “third-way” politics, and sought common ground with a political faction that hates and doesn’t respect them.
The harsher truth is that the fence-sitting class benefits from the viscosity of their own moral position. Culturally zionist bi-nationalism would’ve been nice for Einstein and other Jewish dissidents but they also materially benefit from the realisation of a Jewish ethnostate. Whether they condemn the ethnostate or lament about the “inner damage” to the Jewish people, they and every modern fence-sitting supporter of zionism ultimately benefits from the end-goal of the occupation via the option of Aliyah.
The liberal pledges themselves to understand the conservative, recognise their humanity and treat them with respect. The grace given is fundamentally asymmetrical. The conservative makes no effort to conceal their disdain or their reluctance to reason with the liberal. They believe liberals are all closet conservatives pretending to be “woke” out of guilt and if they can’t get liberals to rip off their masks and reveal their “true face”, they’ll settle for the fence-sitter’s submission. I’m hard pressed to disagree with them.
The Fable of Hermione
Emma Watson’s conversation with Jay Shetty is a fascinating marbling of disparities, she measures her words in a way that doesn’t feel like the triangulation of a deeply held truth but rather the excavation for a version of the truth that will appeal most broadly. It is a Princess Diana re-enactment for a world that believes, in its conspiratorial core, that Princess Diana was murdered. Watson’s soft outpourings of empathy feel chronologically displaced, especially on the back-drop of political unrests and live-streamed genocides. We are not living with the same delusions of the nineties. We know too much now. Still, her solemnity traffics a comforting nostalgia.
Shetty asks about J.K Rowling’s statements; that she’d never forgive Watson for her views on trans people or how Watson and her co-stars ruin the Harry Potter movies for her. Watson’s response is a heartfelt olive branch—a stately extension of grace that holds her memories with Rowling and her disagreement with Rowling’s transantagonism as incompatible truths that may never reconcile.
Days later, J.K Rowling reposts a video mocking Watson, tweets a ham-fisted metaphor about being a crocodile and finally addresses the olive branch directly by spitting on it, snapping it in two and jamming them into Watson’s eyes.
The basic moral of this fable is—when someone shows you who they are, believe them.
For the fence-sitting class—who over-intellectualise the pageantry of being civil at the expense of practicing principled kindness—there might be more to learn.
In the face of political antagonism, you have a choice. It is a choice we will all have to make over and over again. It is not necessarily between right and wrong, that binary is far too simplistic. J.K Rowling believes she is right, which is why she’s devoted her every waking, mould-respiring breath to chastise a vulnerable demographic that makes up 1% of the population.
The choice we all have is between protection and endangerment. Who you dedicate your words, your time, your money and your efforts to—will protect or endanger someone. Watson chose to protect herself and Rowling by answering Shetty’s question from a place of personal compassion but her compassion would’ve been better spent advocating for the trans people who are experiencing violent prejudice.
Watson shared that she was reluctant to say anything “that continues to weaponise a toxic debate”. From a purely political standpoint—the grace she showed Rowling was always going to be transformed into toxicity. Rowling has been itching to say something, and she was quick to spin Watson’s words ammunition for her anti-trans agenda. Rowling took Watson’s diplomacy as suck up attempt—she turned an expression of empathy into an act of submission.
From Watson extending Rowling grace to Klein’s admiration of Kirk—there is a point where grace becomes enabling. My recognition that the fence-sitting class aren’t on my team doesn’t necessarily make them as my opponents. They’re just too much of a liability to be trusted as a teammate. The most obvious thing to me about Klein’s essay and his subsequent podcast with Coates is how uncritical of himself he is. For someone who thinks so mechanically about strategy—at no point does he ever consider that his essay was a tactical misfire. Despite admitting that he “doesn’t know what his role is”, there is never a point where he self-reflects and reasonably entertains the possibility that he made a mistake. What a dangerous, blissful kind of to ignorance. To be so unaware of how your actions will be weaponised shows a lack of survival instincts and the fence-sitting class perch in a position where the flak won’t reach them.
Much of the toxicity of the “trans debate” originates from talking past, over, and about trans people in grotesque and infantilising ways. Every time I encounter the cruelty of transantagonism in the wild—I get a glimpsed understanding of how the Salem Witch Trials happened. A whole demographic of people have been made a spectacle and Rowling’s relentless chastisement of anyone who doesn’t fit into the dainty, lily-white mould of western womanhood is largely to blame. Watson believed she could gracefully opt out. But the truth is: there is no opting out. The polarising issues of our time are approaching a boiling point (and by that, I mean the repercussions have begun to noticeably affect the fence-sitting class). The wish-wash of the fence will soon be too uncomfortable to balance on. It is very much side-picking time. Who will you protect and who will you endanger?
Very interesting read, thanks for writing
every word is ❤️🔥