On Dershowitz, Finkelstein and Scholarship
I felt I just had to write something about this continuing farce, which makes a mockery of Academe’s supposed dedication to the pursuit of truth and high standards of historical scholarship. I have read both The Case for Israel by the celebrated fraud Alan Dershowitz (who was on OJ’s defence team) and Norman Finkelstein’s Beyond Chutzpah.
One book is a well-written, scrpulously researched, utterly devastating and precise work of historical scholarship. The other is a fraud, devoid of any meaningful content and lacking in even basic standards of historical sourcing and footnoting.
Of course, Finkelstein’s demolition of Dershowitz should have ruined the latters career. No scholar should hope to hold his place (and at Harvard, no less) when his work has been shown to be such a disgrace. Dershowitz copies entire sections from Joan Peters From Time Immemorial (itself a fraud, as Finkelstein has demonstrated in the past) with impunity. Dershowitz is not a scholar, he is a lackey for the Israel lobby in the United states. His book was not an attempt to write history, rather, it was a dishonest lunge to blacken the historical record and blame the victims for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Now Finkelstein, who (used) to teach at De Paul University, has been denied tenure for the forthcoming academic year. This is an utter disgrace, and it was not motivated by, as the letter which fired him states ‘concerns touching upon his scholarship’. No, this a lie. Finkelstein has been part of a witch-hunt, organised by Dershowitz (who is still smarting from the destruction of his reputation) and others, to close down the debate about American Jewry’s role in the continuing humiliation of the Palestinian people by the Israeli state.
It is that simple. Finkelstein is a brave man, and I fully support him during this time. I hope another University gives him the full professorship he so richly deserves. Dont let the bastards grind you down, Norman.
-posted by Adam
