[HedgeYourBets]

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Israel can be proud of the way it stood up to terrorism. Israel should be proud of the way it has fought the wars that were thrust upon it for so many years. The last thing Israel wanted to do was fight the wars. Not in 1947, in 1948, not in 1956, not in 1967, not in 1973 and not in any era since. All Israel wants to do is live in peace and prosperity and openness and become a center of science, of intellectualism, of art and culture.

You know you hear excuses all the time that democracy is only for secure nations. "It's only for rich nations. It's only for old nations. Don't expect democracies too quickly in Iraq, don't expect it in other parts of the world. Don't expect it in China. It's a luxury. The United States can afford it, Western Europe can afford it." Israel puts the lie to that.

Israel has been a democracy since the day it was born. Israel never gave up democracy even when faced with genocidal attempts to destroy it. Even when faced with a war and the potential for major, major destruction, it never gave up on democracy. There is no question Israel will remain a democracy.

And as a democracy, Israel can take criticism. Israel is a country with a thick skin. It has had to develop that thick skin over a number of years. It will remain a democracy, believe it. That's a given. Just go online and read the Israeli press. If you want to see criticism in Israel just read Ma'ariv or Yediot Ahranot or Ha'aretz. They tell the joke of the Israelis who were stranded on a deserted island. They were rescued after five years and they had 15 political parties and several newspapers. And American Jews shouldn't be timid to criticize policies of a particular Israeli government. You hear Michael Lerner and others say that to criticize Israel you are called an anti-Semite. That's just nonsense.

I have challenged Michael Lerner, I have challenged others both in the Bay Area and other places too. Show me a single instance where a major Jewish leader or Israeli leader has ever said that criticizing a particular policy of Israeli government is anti-Semitic. That's just something made up by Israel's enemies. It is not something that can actually be argued today.

It is anti-Semitism to single out Israel -- to single out the Jewish nation and blow its faults out of proportion and beyond any kind of recognition, and it is anti-Semitism to continually compare Israel to Nazism.

I was accused of carrying my own anti-Semitisic agenda the first time in my adult life when I spoke at Fanueil Hall and received an award from a Jewish organization for my work in human rights. As I walked out there was a group from the hard Left chanting "Dershowitz and Hilter, it's all the same, the only difference is the name!" and "Dershowitz and Goebbels, all the same, the only difference is the name!" They were chanting that Jews who support Israel are worse than Nazis. Norman Finkelstein has said he doesn't understand why Israel isn't flattered by the comparison with Nazis.

You'll notice these people never compare Israel to others -- to dictatorships, to China, never to Pinochet, never to Cuba, never even to Mussolini and never to solve anything. And that is anti-Semitism. To compare a democratic state that is trying so hard to conform to the rule of law and has never killed innocent civilians deliberately or willfully to the Nazi regimes that killed Jews can only be motivated by hatred and bigotry. So criticism is there. Criticism should be comparable, contextual, constructive. Israel thrives on criticism and the Jewish community thrives on criticism. All I want when I come to Berkeley is to confront those people, those professors, those Israel haters.

Again, I say I'm pro-Palestinian. The only difference between me and other pro-Palestinians is they are anti-Israel. I could debate them because my goal is simply to bring more nuances in the discussion of the Israeli/Arab Palestinian conflict to the college campus. Enough of the shouting, enough of the polemics, enough of the extremism, enough of the ignorant comparisons to Nazism or to apartheid. Enough of the thoroughly non-intellectual sloganeering. Let's have a real intellectual discussion, let's have a real conversation. Let's have a real case.

But you can't buy that case unless there's elimination of the extremist rhetoric -- this sense that Israel is demonized, de-legitimized in the world. In fact, the extreme criticism makes it hard to get the nuances of criticism of both sides. And what happens is each side gets polemical views and that doesn't make progress toward peace.

So I ask those in the progressive movement, who support feminism and civil liberties, -- the kind of political theories I've supported all my life-- to come join an effort to support Israel and support Palestine. To support a democratic Palestinian state to be sure. Take the position you want on unilateralism, or on the fence; they are issues about which reasonable people can disagree. Israelis disagree.

The fence case is now in the Israeli Supreme Court as well as the International Court of Justice. The Israeli Supreme Court will resolve it fairly. The International Court of Justice won't. Why? Because the International Court of Justice is just like the Mississippi Supreme Court in the 1930's.

There was a Mississippi Supreme Court that could do justice only for cases of a White against a White. It was an all White court. It could in a paternalistic way solve a case of a Black against another Black, but it couldn't do justice in a case involving a Black and White. It would always find in favor of a White in such a case.

The same goes for the United Nations General Assembly and the International Court of Justice, which is a United Nations court. It can do justice in some disputes, but when Israel is involved it is incapable of doing justice. Like the Mississippi Supreme Court, it used its credibility that existed in some cases to pretend it was doing justice, but no perspicacious students of the International Court of Justice will be fooled. But many people are not perspicacious. They'll see judges with robes declaring the use of a fence to prevent terrorism not only a violation of international law, but a grievous one!

Among cases now pending before the International Court, there are no cases pending involving genocide or slavery, or oppression of women. There are no cases of oppression of people because of their religion. There are no cases involving events in Algeria or the Sudan or Rwanda. But Israel builds a moveable fence, a fence that three times already has been moved by order of the Israeli Supreme Court and by the Israeli government in response to changes on the ground, and that seems to be the greatest violation of international law.

There is a clear effort on the part of those who want to demonize and de-legitimize Israel to win a struggle for the hearts and souls and minds of the next generation of American leaders. The generation educated at Berkeley, at Stanford, at the University of San Francisco, today's students at UC Santa Cruz. Students from all over the state of California and all over the United States. Fifteen to 20 years from now these will be the congress people, the senators. These will be the judges and business leaders. The President of the United States and international leaders as well. The goal is to make these people so knee-jerk anti-Israel that they will resemble typical French or most Western European leaders of today. That's the goal of the divestiture campaign. The leaders of the divestiture movement knew it couldn't work. Noam Chomsky knew it. He said he never believed in divestiture, yet he supported it. Why? Because it would cause students to be misled by the context of the petition, to believe Israel deserved to be singled out as a great human rights violator of the world.

So it is a struggle for the hearts and minds of the students. "College is a dangerous place," Chomsky said. Your children and grandchildren and the children and grandchildren of our friends, they come from high schools, many from a Jewish education, and they are directed into classes that present a totally one-sided perspective. And when somebody tries to speak up for Israel they are demonized the way I have been demonized.

My book has been attacked viciously. I've been accused of plagiarism when I have all my original hand written copies. Norman Finkelstein said I didn't write it. People are prepared to make all kinds of false allegations not only against Israel, but against any Israel supporters also. Martin Gilbert, Stuart Eisenstadt, Debra Lipstadt, Elie Wiesel -- everybody who can speak in favor of the Jewish community -- is subjected to a well-organized, well-orchestrated and well-financed attack.

But they cannot stop us. They know they are not going to stop us. They know they aren't going to succeed in discrediting me, but they are sending a message to young assistant professors that "if you write a book that is pro-Israel or you write an article that is pro-Israel, we will savage you, we will accuse you of plagiarism. We will savage you, we will call you a fraud. And Dershowitz may be able to survive those charges, but you won't; when your tenure comes up those charges will be there, they will be in the air."

As Churchill said, "A lie can make its way half way around the world before the truth can get its pants on."

That's the goal, that's the purpose. And let there be no mistake about it. This is a battle for the hearts and minds for all of our future generation. That's why you all have to become Op Ed writers, you all have to become the people who call the TV and radio stations. You all have to write letters to the editor. You all have to support your local federation in the best defense of Israel.