PEW (from another Substack post): That is an excellent video. Thanks for sharing. You will be disappointed in my new essay if you are expecting something so sweeping and comprehensive. My essay has a much narrower focus (mostly on the infamous McMahon-Hussein Correspondence). Anyway, I just published it on my personal Substack - The Turn.
Feel free to offer your insights and critiques over there (eventually this work will be combined to form a book, so now is the time to get the sucky bits out). Here you go Kevin - https://jamespew.substack.com/p/israel-a-promised-land
REPLY: I'm somewhat (but not "too") surprised that you had not already viewed Rubenstein's suggested video. That demonstrates my tendency to "monism", in that I tend to lump all anti-woke people that I read [i.e. you, James, Frances Widdowson, Jim McMurtry, Hymie Rubenstein, Peter Best, Brian Giesbrecht and even Bruce Pardy; who is mostly obsessed with the pandemic, truckers and "emergency measures" vs. "rights"] under 1 umbrella, to wit: THE ANTI-WOKE!!!
PEW: Berlin felt the reliance on enlightenment rationally led thinkers of the day to a sort of MONISM. In a math problem there is only one correct solution. This is an example of a monistic framework. Obviously, this mode of problem solving or knowledge production was central to the technological advancement of humankind, however, it is Berlin’s contention that monism has no place in the social sciences and humanities.
COMMENT: Thus my "monism" as mentioned in the REPLY above and your explanation of monism as a math phenomenon. As to "obviously", you could say "arguably", for it is not so "obvious" that only one answer to any problem is obvious. Take for humble and common examples the 1. Main course for a meal and 2. Dessert. Hardly only 1 choice for one's daily bread/necessary-calories/superfluous calories.
FIRST and PRIMARY criticism:- You run clauses together that should be broken into independent sentences using commas which ought to be periods. e.g. The comma afer "humankind" above should be a period. Then, in contrast, you "hang" CLAUSES almost "in mid-air" as if they were complete sentences, even though it is obvious that they modify either a previous sentence or a previous clause. For example:-
PEW: "Conclusions which poisoned the historiography of the period." [Last clause of the first paragraph below footnote 6]
But, obviously, the above mentioned clause clearly refers to the conclusions mentioned in your previous sentence. Again,
PEW: "Although it was not a straight line to get there." [another clause pretending to be a sentence, which clearly refers to the previous sentence just below footnote 7., where Karsh was misspelled as "Karash"].
And again, the lengthy clause, cited below, could be related to either the previous lengthy sentence or the following shorter sentence, at the section of your essay immediately prior to the subtitle "Middle East Historiography The Stories We Tell; The Things We Believe", quote
PEW: "Even if the answers turn out to be complex, untidy, objectively pluralistic and morally unsatisfying, which in most realms of reality, is exactly the case."
NEXT: When you quote from The Arab Awakening just after Footnote 8, first sentence and last word, you write "FRACTIONS". The word is probably/arguably "factions" rather than "fractions". Objectively, yet differently and pluralistically, the word could be located or described as "above footnote 9, in the first sentence of the quoted passage of footnote 9." Thus, whether the word is located below footnote 8 or above footnote 9, the 2 ways of describing the location of the word do refer to the same single word. So is that a "monistic" or "pluralistic" phenomenon, or just 2 different "subjective" points of view [i.e. viewing from above or below the word.] of the identical word as an identically located OBJECT.
PEW: "Did the British renege on a pledge they made to the Arabs?" [Just before the subtitle THE CHATAM HOUSE VERSION]
REPLY: One would arguably say "Yes they reneged!", just from watching the Movie "Lawrence of Arabia". [But later you called Lawrence an "irresponsible adventurer" from Kourdie's point of view and "infamous" when referred to as being "mentored" by David G. Hogarth whom you describe as an "honored scholar"].
THEN:
PEW: "However, the pledges made by McMahon in his exchanges with Sharif Hussein were not 'unilateral'. [ Did you mean "categorical"???] They were contingent... "
COMMENT: Arguably McMahon and Hussein speak for BILATERAL "folks", to wit, 1. The English and 2. The Arabs, even though it is incredible that Hussein could ever speak for all Muslims, especially Indian or Indonesian Muslims. "Categorical" opposes "contingent" rather than "unilateral" opposing "contingent". Unilateral would be opposed to bi-lateral, tri-lateral, quadri-lateral etc. etc.
THEN:
This, below, is a "dreadful" run-together sentence, in distinct contrast to hanging CLAUSES which should be parts of other sentences, as above noted. The sentence is located in the essay just above a quote of Friedman which was not footnoted.
PEW: "A balanced reading of both sides, taken with a general understanding of the context of the times, the severity of the situation and its intense need for haste (due to the imminence of war), might lead an objective thinker to see that fairness did not elude the Arabs, it could not have, considering their poor military performance alone."
COMMENT: There, arguably, should be a period after the phrase "... elude the Arabs, ..." and a reworking of the rest of the "dreadful" sentence. e.g. Their poor military performance failed to justify providing Arabs with territory they had not conquered (or "earned").
Speaking again of MONISMS, James, think of your exchange with Frances Widdowson, with whom I have "monistically lumped you" as fellow "anti-wokers". You said, quote
PEW: "The history of Jewish persecution makes Jews exceptional. They need special protections which are more consequential and existential in nature, and linked to their survival. Freedom of speech and academic freedom do not, and should not, take priority over protecting Jews." [Facebook post to Widdowson's Facebook]
And again, quote:
JAMES PEW: (Replying to Kevin Byrne) because antisemitism is not about hatred of the Semite, it’s about jealousy of the excellent (which inspires hate of them). Antisemitism is hatred of a smarter, more excellent group who achieves with less, what others can’t achieve with more. Jews are hated for their brilliance and excellence - they make the rest of us slouchers look bad. [Same Facebook exchange].
SO QUESTION: Are you thinking of Jewish people as a "MONISM"? The reason I ask is because we had a pair of Catholic Arab Palestinians (father and son) in our Knights of Columbus group where the father talked about Israelis "wiping out" an entire Arab village --- the old "mass murder" or "genocide" trope. The old man wasn't anti-Semitic. But he was anti-Israeli. And I'd vaguely heard the same thing before from some other source. I also "reasoned" that such things were perfectly possible, given that "turn about is fair play". For example, after some Canadian paratroopers were murdered by the SS after being captured at the beginning of D-Day, there were groups of Canadian soldiers that let every German know that they were not "taking prisoners". So "Consider yourselves warned, you German pigs." was the general idea.
There were, of course, Jews who had their friends or relatives killed by Arabs. So why wouldn't they also do "tit for tat" sorts of killings? I mean, anyone who's read Leon Uris' fiction knows that there were more than 1 group of Jewish fighters in Palestine, to wit, 1. the Palmach (? spelling; Branch of the Hagenah) and 2. the Irgun, who were the guys who blew up the King David Hotel --- led by Menachem Begin. Does a terrorist make the rest of us "slouchers (sic; slouches) look bad". After all he won a Nobel Prize for making peace with Egypt after his "terrorist" days. But Albert Einstein and friends didn't think that highly of him, quote
Thus a case of Albert Einstein and Hannah Arendt, among others, trying "to cancel" a fellow Jew, from Israel, in America. Jews don't look very "monistic" to me.
Jewish thinkers (meaning most Jewish people) are so independent in their thinking that, despite being the majority in one of the smallest Democracies of the world, they have the largest number of political parties of any Democracy. They have 149 political parties in Israel. Most Western Democrats don't have 149 cogent "thoughts" in their goofy heads.
Well, a pretty long-winded piece on the historiographic circumstantiality of British military meddling in Middle Eastern affairs which, to be honest I found at times both a little tedious and repetitive. Obviously in a period before oil became vital whilst trade with India was still vital, the British concern was almost exclusively to protect the safe passage of ships through the Suez Canal. They were weasel experts in using whatever promises and pledges to whomsoever to advance that one goal, and then wriggling out of them again afterwards as necessary, and I think this piece far from defending the honorability and integrity of British diplomacy in the region rather exposes the lack of it. McMahon's hands washing letter to the Times just prior to the outbreak of WW II exemplifies this. The authors bias (the disorganised rabble of camel owning Arabic tribes only being "worthy" of their pan Arabic nation if they prove themselves in battle against the Germans and the Turks, is uncontestingly swallowed as a raison d'être for the unacceptability of the Arab bias on the story), shows through the piece pretty transparently I feel. Neither is much time spent on speculating why it might have been that the Balfour Declaration specifically worded its pledge as: “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” rather than the very different " . . . .establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine." But a rather obvious analysis might have been to avoid conflicting with the possible interpretations of the pledges given to the Arabic population in return for their help in the war effort.
None of this of course would in any case justify the Zionist movement in doing what it has done and continues to do, but I get that the author's mission mainly is to exonerate the British from accusations of two faced politics being to blame for the mess the region is in today. But I do not think the mission has succeeded.
PEW (from another Substack post): That is an excellent video. Thanks for sharing. You will be disappointed in my new essay if you are expecting something so sweeping and comprehensive. My essay has a much narrower focus (mostly on the infamous McMahon-Hussein Correspondence). Anyway, I just published it on my personal Substack - The Turn.
Feel free to offer your insights and critiques over there (eventually this work will be combined to form a book, so now is the time to get the sucky bits out). Here you go Kevin - https://jamespew.substack.com/p/israel-a-promised-land
REPLY: I'm somewhat (but not "too") surprised that you had not already viewed Rubenstein's suggested video. That demonstrates my tendency to "monism", in that I tend to lump all anti-woke people that I read [i.e. you, James, Frances Widdowson, Jim McMurtry, Hymie Rubenstein, Peter Best, Brian Giesbrecht and even Bruce Pardy; who is mostly obsessed with the pandemic, truckers and "emergency measures" vs. "rights"] under 1 umbrella, to wit: THE ANTI-WOKE!!!
PEW: Berlin felt the reliance on enlightenment rationally led thinkers of the day to a sort of MONISM. In a math problem there is only one correct solution. This is an example of a monistic framework. Obviously, this mode of problem solving or knowledge production was central to the technological advancement of humankind, however, it is Berlin’s contention that monism has no place in the social sciences and humanities.
COMMENT: Thus my "monism" as mentioned in the REPLY above and your explanation of monism as a math phenomenon. As to "obviously", you could say "arguably", for it is not so "obvious" that only one answer to any problem is obvious. Take for humble and common examples the 1. Main course for a meal and 2. Dessert. Hardly only 1 choice for one's daily bread/necessary-calories/superfluous calories.
FIRST and PRIMARY criticism:- You run clauses together that should be broken into independent sentences using commas which ought to be periods. e.g. The comma afer "humankind" above should be a period. Then, in contrast, you "hang" CLAUSES almost "in mid-air" as if they were complete sentences, even though it is obvious that they modify either a previous sentence or a previous clause. For example:-
PEW: "Conclusions which poisoned the historiography of the period." [Last clause of the first paragraph below footnote 6]
But, obviously, the above mentioned clause clearly refers to the conclusions mentioned in your previous sentence. Again,
PEW: "Although it was not a straight line to get there." [another clause pretending to be a sentence, which clearly refers to the previous sentence just below footnote 7., where Karsh was misspelled as "Karash"].
And again, the lengthy clause, cited below, could be related to either the previous lengthy sentence or the following shorter sentence, at the section of your essay immediately prior to the subtitle "Middle East Historiography The Stories We Tell; The Things We Believe", quote
PEW: "Even if the answers turn out to be complex, untidy, objectively pluralistic and morally unsatisfying, which in most realms of reality, is exactly the case."
NEXT: When you quote from The Arab Awakening just after Footnote 8, first sentence and last word, you write "FRACTIONS". The word is probably/arguably "factions" rather than "fractions". Objectively, yet differently and pluralistically, the word could be located or described as "above footnote 9, in the first sentence of the quoted passage of footnote 9." Thus, whether the word is located below footnote 8 or above footnote 9, the 2 ways of describing the location of the word do refer to the same single word. So is that a "monistic" or "pluralistic" phenomenon, or just 2 different "subjective" points of view [i.e. viewing from above or below the word.] of the identical word as an identically located OBJECT.
PEW: "Did the British renege on a pledge they made to the Arabs?" [Just before the subtitle THE CHATAM HOUSE VERSION]
REPLY: One would arguably say "Yes they reneged!", just from watching the Movie "Lawrence of Arabia". [But later you called Lawrence an "irresponsible adventurer" from Kourdie's point of view and "infamous" when referred to as being "mentored" by David G. Hogarth whom you describe as an "honored scholar"].
THEN:
PEW: "However, the pledges made by McMahon in his exchanges with Sharif Hussein were not 'unilateral'. [ Did you mean "categorical"???] They were contingent... "
COMMENT: Arguably McMahon and Hussein speak for BILATERAL "folks", to wit, 1. The English and 2. The Arabs, even though it is incredible that Hussein could ever speak for all Muslims, especially Indian or Indonesian Muslims. "Categorical" opposes "contingent" rather than "unilateral" opposing "contingent". Unilateral would be opposed to bi-lateral, tri-lateral, quadri-lateral etc. etc.
THEN:
This, below, is a "dreadful" run-together sentence, in distinct contrast to hanging CLAUSES which should be parts of other sentences, as above noted. The sentence is located in the essay just above a quote of Friedman which was not footnoted.
PEW: "A balanced reading of both sides, taken with a general understanding of the context of the times, the severity of the situation and its intense need for haste (due to the imminence of war), might lead an objective thinker to see that fairness did not elude the Arabs, it could not have, considering their poor military performance alone."
COMMENT: There, arguably, should be a period after the phrase "... elude the Arabs, ..." and a reworking of the rest of the "dreadful" sentence. e.g. Their poor military performance failed to justify providing Arabs with territory they had not conquered (or "earned").
Speaking again of MONISMS, James, think of your exchange with Frances Widdowson, with whom I have "monistically lumped you" as fellow "anti-wokers". You said, quote
PEW: "The history of Jewish persecution makes Jews exceptional. They need special protections which are more consequential and existential in nature, and linked to their survival. Freedom of speech and academic freedom do not, and should not, take priority over protecting Jews." [Facebook post to Widdowson's Facebook]
And again, quote:
JAMES PEW: (Replying to Kevin Byrne) because antisemitism is not about hatred of the Semite, it’s about jealousy of the excellent (which inspires hate of them). Antisemitism is hatred of a smarter, more excellent group who achieves with less, what others can’t achieve with more. Jews are hated for their brilliance and excellence - they make the rest of us slouchers look bad. [Same Facebook exchange].
SO QUESTION: Are you thinking of Jewish people as a "MONISM"? The reason I ask is because we had a pair of Catholic Arab Palestinians (father and son) in our Knights of Columbus group where the father talked about Israelis "wiping out" an entire Arab village --- the old "mass murder" or "genocide" trope. The old man wasn't anti-Semitic. But he was anti-Israeli. And I'd vaguely heard the same thing before from some other source. I also "reasoned" that such things were perfectly possible, given that "turn about is fair play". For example, after some Canadian paratroopers were murdered by the SS after being captured at the beginning of D-Day, there were groups of Canadian soldiers that let every German know that they were not "taking prisoners". So "Consider yourselves warned, you German pigs." was the general idea.
There were, of course, Jews who had their friends or relatives killed by Arabs. So why wouldn't they also do "tit for tat" sorts of killings? I mean, anyone who's read Leon Uris' fiction knows that there were more than 1 group of Jewish fighters in Palestine, to wit, 1. the Palmach (? spelling; Branch of the Hagenah) and 2. the Irgun, who were the guys who blew up the King David Hotel --- led by Menachem Begin. Does a terrorist make the rest of us "slouchers (sic; slouches) look bad". After all he won a Nobel Prize for making peace with Egypt after his "terrorist" days. But Albert Einstein and friends didn't think that highly of him, quote
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=2411566922359434&set=ecnf.100005184491488
If the picture is of bad quality, the text is reproduced by Marxists, at:
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/einstein/1948/12/02.htm
Thus a case of Albert Einstein and Hannah Arendt, among others, trying "to cancel" a fellow Jew, from Israel, in America. Jews don't look very "monistic" to me.
Jewish thinkers (meaning most Jewish people) are so independent in their thinking that, despite being the majority in one of the smallest Democracies of the world, they have the largest number of political parties of any Democracy. They have 149 political parties in Israel. Most Western Democrats don't have 149 cogent "thoughts" in their goofy heads.
https://homework.study.com/explanation/how-many-political-parties-are-in-israel.html
Bye for now,
Kevin
This is a well-organized and insightful essay. The history is carefully documented and is well worth several readings.
Well, a pretty long-winded piece on the historiographic circumstantiality of British military meddling in Middle Eastern affairs which, to be honest I found at times both a little tedious and repetitive. Obviously in a period before oil became vital whilst trade with India was still vital, the British concern was almost exclusively to protect the safe passage of ships through the Suez Canal. They were weasel experts in using whatever promises and pledges to whomsoever to advance that one goal, and then wriggling out of them again afterwards as necessary, and I think this piece far from defending the honorability and integrity of British diplomacy in the region rather exposes the lack of it. McMahon's hands washing letter to the Times just prior to the outbreak of WW II exemplifies this. The authors bias (the disorganised rabble of camel owning Arabic tribes only being "worthy" of their pan Arabic nation if they prove themselves in battle against the Germans and the Turks, is uncontestingly swallowed as a raison d'être for the unacceptability of the Arab bias on the story), shows through the piece pretty transparently I feel. Neither is much time spent on speculating why it might have been that the Balfour Declaration specifically worded its pledge as: “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” rather than the very different " . . . .establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine." But a rather obvious analysis might have been to avoid conflicting with the possible interpretations of the pledges given to the Arabic population in return for their help in the war effort.
None of this of course would in any case justify the Zionist movement in doing what it has done and continues to do, but I get that the author's mission mainly is to exonerate the British from accusations of two faced politics being to blame for the mess the region is in today. But I do not think the mission has succeeded.