A tip of the spudik to Gen. JC Christian for his post today about the JIBS. It's painful to see Orthodox Jews being criticized by outsiders, but I can't object to the general's point: The overwhelming majority of nominees in the Israel Advocacy category express opinions that (a) make the rest of us look bad and (b) aren't in line with the thinking of the majority of Jews or the majority of Israelis.
As I've said before, I don't understand how Israel's interests are served by blogs (and commenters) that insult Arabs. When well-meaning people visit those blogs they often see horrible and hateful comments directed at the whole of the Muslim world. As a result, many make the mistake of presuming that anyone who supports Israel is also horrible and hateful. (I've seen it happen. )
Are Israel's interests really served by blogs that makes Israel's supporters look like monsters? They aren't monsters (obviously) but you wouldn't know it from reading some of their posts.
Moreover, many of these blogs have terrible reputations among the centrist and left-leaning blogs. Does that help Israel? The people who need to be convinced of the rightness of Israel's position aren't reading righty blogs. Those readers are already sold on the subject. The people who need to know that the Israeli argument is, at bottom, a moral argument are reading the centrist and left leaning blogs and among many of those blogs names like LGF or Cox and Forkum are mud.
Next time you find yourself wondering why the media sometimes paints right-wing Israelis as genocidal maniacs ask yourself if your favorite "pro-Israel" blog is part of the solution --or part of the problem.
