Self-Determination: Jews Need Not Apply

Over at the NY Times Opinionator blog, Professor Joseph Levine’s dense, 2,052-word pronunciamento tries to explain why it not anti-Semitic to question Israel’s right to exist.

Levine’s kind enough to “grant” that the Jews are a people, maintains that self-determination ain’t all it’s cracked up to be (Palestinians take note), then concludes that “the very idea of a Jewish state is undemocratic.”

Hillel Neuer debunked the philosophy professor with a key snippet just 32 words long:

Levine takes it as a given that the Palestinian Arabs have a natural claim to the same right of self-determination that he is so quick to deny to Israel and Jewish people.

Although Levine is Jewish, his view happens to be at odds with the US State Department and European Union definitions of anti-Semitism.