To Be or Not to Be: Between Palestine and Israel

Introduced and Compiled by Muzaffar Karim and Mubashir Karim

Locating the issue within the Intelligentsia

[dropcap]“H[/dropcap]e who thinks great thoughts often makes great errors” appears as an epigraph to an episode dedicated to the German philosopher Martin Heidegger in the 1999 BBC documentary Human, All Too Human. The quote is attributed to Heidegger, although no such quote can be found anywhere in his whole oeuvre. But one can understand why the quote gets attributed to him, given his Nazi collaboration. Great errors by great writers and thinkers are no surprise to any student of literature and philosophy. We have encountered misogyny in Plato and Aristotle, racist and Orientalist attitudes in Kant and Hegel, colonial tendencies in Rudyard Kipling and Charles Dickens, Nazi sympathies in Heidegger and Paul de Man. Great Thought/Great Errors/Great People – the literary-philosophical-moral triptych dovetails with many questions, one of them being: are we talking about the person or his/her thought and work? Heidegger – the person – joined the Nazi Party in 1933, but his philosophy is rich and bears an indelible mark upon the Western philosophical tradition. The question being: Is Heidegger’s Nazi inclination his personal error, while his thought travels clean off Nazism in his personal life? Is his Nazism an inherent tendency within his own philosophy or his way of reading Frederich Nietzsche? Then what about Nietzsche and his thought? Can we neatly separate the person and the thought, or are the two dancing a minuet? If the person is bad, is the work/thought bad as well? If we condemn the person, should we condemn the work/thought also? Is Kipling a bad person, while his writings are erudite? Does Kipling’s colonial attitude also stream into his works? Should we go with the humanist author-centered reading or side with Theory and its proclamations of ‘the death of the author’?

The Nazi era in Europe was a moral litmus test for all the intellectuals and writers working in and around that period. Their attitude toward the Nazi agenda was a testimony to their hearts being in the right place, and most of the writers and thinkers unanimously denounced the brutality of the Nazis and garnered sympathy for the persecuted minorities in their writings and activism. However, post-1947, Palestine became such a litmus test and most of the writers and philosophers failed in unanimously denouncing Zionism and supporting Palestine. Did they fail in their personal moral capacity or in their thought/work? Is their thought/work separate from their personal views? What should we do with, say, Jorge Luis Borges’s beautiful stories when in his personal life he had a strong Zionist tendency? What should we do with Emmanuel Levinas’ profound ethical thought regarding ‘Face’ while failing to acknowledge Palestinians as having a ‘Face’? There are as many answers as there are questions.

The issue of Palestine is as old as some of the generations of our parents and grandparents. Since our childhoods, we have been hearing things about the conflict of Palestine and the power dynamics involving Israel and the United States of America. Most of the writers in the list that follows were working during and after the Holocaust and their sympathies for a certain persecuted minority, it can be argued, were not misplaced as a response to a certain historical situation (although there were always exceptions). One can make up this case that most of them would not know the genocidal state that Israel would turn out to be (although Israel’s genocidal intention was clear from the Nakba itself), but following Naksa and post-Shabra and Shatila massacres, everything became clear. The historical situation around the 1980s and 1990s was different; the writers and philosophers of that time were responding to that historical situation. However, the events of October 7, 2023, have brought a renewed urgency and attention to the Palestinian question for the current generation and that is our historical situation. Those of us who, earlier, ignored the issue, snubbed the question or had completely forgotten about it now have to, consciously or unconsciously, tackle and confront it. Ignoring the question now is not an option. Even the current social media, inebriated on laughter, triviality, thus reeking of complicit silence, bears (if only in a limited scope) witness to plundering, killing and desecrations of the Palestinians in real-time. While many of us feel powerless to directly intervene in the issue, we still can sustain an ethical responsibility for the same. Especially as educators and teachers, we could, at least, remain conscious of the political and moral stances of the philosophers, writers, and thinkers we keep alluding to, or keep invoking in our classrooms and daily conversations. The list comes out of this sense of awareness and understanding:

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S. No.

Name

Vocation/Nationality

In Favour of

Reference

1.

Adrienne Rich

Writer/American

Palestine

‘Why Support the U.S. Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel?’ and The School among the Ruins: Poems (2004)

2.

Alain Badiou

Philosopher/French

Palestine

‘Uses of the word Jew’ in Alain Badiou’s Polemics (2012)

3.

Albert Camus

Writer/French

Israel

Letter to Pierre Moinot in Albert Camus and the Critique of Violence by David Ohana (2016)

4.

Alice Walker

Writer/American

Palestine

Overcoming Speechlessness (2011)

5.

Annie Ernaux

Writer/French

Palestine

Vocal support for Palestine since many decades, signed many letters condemning Israel - Letter against Apartheid: In Support of the Palestinian Support for Decolonization (2021)

6.

Arundhati Roy

Writer/Indian

Palestine

‘Come September’ speech at Lensic Performing Arts Center (2002)

7.

Ayn Rand

Writer/Russian-American

Israel

‘Israel and the Middle East’ on Donahue Show (1979)

8.

Bertrand Russell

Philosopher/English

Palestine

‘Last Message’ in Yours Faithfully Bertrand Russell (1970)

9.

Edward Said

Writer/Palestinian-American

Palestine

The Question of Palestine (1979)

10.

Emmanuel Levinas

Philosopher/French

Israel

‘Politics After’ and ‘Assimilation and New Culture’ in Beyond the Verse (1994)

11.

Eugene Ionesco

Playwright/Romanian French

Israel

Interview with Jason Weiss in Writing at Risk: Interviews (1987)

12.

Felix Guattari

Philosopher/French

Palestine

Worked as a pro-Palestinian activist with Elias Sanbar

13.

François Mauriac

Writer/French

Ambiguous

Elie Wiesel’s And the Sea is Never Full: Memoirs, Articles written in Le Figaro post-1967

14.

Friedrich Jameson

Theorist/American

Palestine

‘Capitalism, not Zionism, is the Problem’ (1980)

15.

George Orwell

Writer/English

Palestine

Inference drawn from his essays particular ‘Antisemitism in Britian’, ‘Notes on Nationalism’ and few letters in George Orwell: Essays (1984)

16.

Gilles Deleuze

Philosopher/French

Palestine

‘Stones’

‘Spoilers of Peace’

‘The Indians of Palestine’

‘The Grandeur of Yasser Arafat’ in

Two Regimes of Madness: texts and Interviews 1975-1995

17.

Giorgio Agamben

Philosopher/Italian

Palestine

Inference drawn from his concepts like ‘Bare Life’ and ‘State of Exception’

18.

Hannah Arendt

Philosopher/German

Ambiguous

Eichmann in Jerusalem (1963)

19.

Harold Pinter

Playwright/English

Palestine

Signed a letter criticizing media hypocrisy regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (2006)

20.

Haruki Murakami

Writer/Japanese

Palestine

‘Always on the side of the Egg’ speech (2009)

21.

Ian McEwan

Writer/English

Ambiguous

Jerusalem Speech (2011)

22.

Jacques Derrida

Philosopher/Algerian-French

Ambiguous

An Event Perhaps by peter Salmon (2020)

23.

James Baldwin

Writer/American

Palestine

‘Open Letter to the Born Again’ in ‘The Nation’ (1979)

24.

Jean Baudrillard

Philosopher/French

Palestine

Inference drawn from his various works

25.

Jean Genette

Writer/French

Palestine

‘Four Hours in Shatila’ and Prisoner of Love (1986)

26.

Jean Paul Sartre

Philosopher/French

Israel

‘Signed a statement against UNESCO’s move to Ostracize Israel in 1974’

27.

John Berger

Writer/English

Palestine

‘Undefeated Despair’ in Hold Everything Dear (2007)

28.

Jordan Peterson

Writer/Canadian

Israel

Israel’s Right to Exist: Interview with Benjamin Netanyahu in 2023

29.

Jorge Louis Borges

Writer/Argentinian

Israel

Letter sent to David Ben-Gurion on October 16, 1966 in Borges, Judaism and Israel as reported in ‘The Times of Israel’ (2019)

30.

Judith Butler

Philosopher/American

Palestine

Parting Ways: Jewishness and the Critique of Zionism (2012)

31.

Jurgen Habermas

Philosopher/German

Israel

‘Principles of Solidarity: A Statement’ (2023)

32.

Levi Strauss

Theorist/French

Palestine

Memoirs by Raymond Aron (1983)

33.

Maurice Blanchot

Philosopher/French

Israel

Maurice Blanchot: Political Writings (2010)

34.

Maxime Rodinson

Historian/French

Palestine

‘Why Palestine’ (1984)

35.

Michel Foucault

Philosopher/French

Israel

As stated by Edward Said and Gilles Deleuze

36.

Noam Chomsky

Writer/American

Palestine

On Palestine (2015)

37.

Ocean Vuong

Writer/Vietnamese American

Palestine

Signed Call for Boycott of Israeli Publishers ‘Complicit’ in Dispossession of Palestinian People (2024)

38.

Pankaj Mishra

Writer/Indian

Palestine

The World After Gaza (2025)

39.

Paul Ricoeur

Philosopher/French

Palestine

‘Perplexites sur Israel’ - a response to Andre Neher

40.

Roald Dahl

Writer/English

Palestine

Going Solo and the review of Tony Clifton's God Cried

41.

Sally Rooney

Writer/Irish

Palestine

Joined Palestinian-led BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement in 2021

42.

Salman Rushdie

Writer/Indian-British

Ambiguous

‘On Palestinian Identity: A conversation with Edward Said’ (1986) and “Palestinian state formed today would be ‘Taliban-like’’ (2025)

43.

Simone de Beauvoir

Philosopher/French

Israel

Jerusalem Prize Speech (1975)

44.

Slavoj Zizek

Philosopher/Slovenian

Israel

‘The Real Dividing Line in Israel-Palestine’ (2023)

45.

Susan Sontag

Writer/American

Ambiguous

Jerusalem Prize Speech (2001)

46.

Thomas Mann

Writer/German

Ambiguous

‘An Enduring People’ (1944)

47.

Toni Morrison

Writer/American

Palestine

Signed  ‘A Letter from 18 Writers’ (2006)

48.

Valeria Luiselli

Writer/Mexican American

Palestine

Signed WAWOG (2023)

49.

William Dalrymple

Historian/Scottish

Palestine

‘Disappearing Christians’ (2003)

50.

Zadie Smith

Writer/English

Ambiguous

‘Shibboleth’ and Letter signing Ceasefire (2025)

In Favour of Palestine: Those writers and thinkers who outrightly support the Palestinian Cause

In Favour of Israel: Those writers and thinkers who support the existence of the state of Israel

Ambiguous: Those writers and thinkers whose commitment has wavered over the course of time. Most of them support Israel’s existence while at the same time criticize its violent policies against Palestine, showcasing a humanitarian outlook.

About the Contributor

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Muzaffar Karim was born in Kashmir and completed his MA from the University of Kashmir. He went on to pursue his Ph.D. from JNU and is currently employed as an Assistant Professor at the University of Kashmir, South Campus. Muzaffar Karim also writes poetry and short stories that have appeared in various newspapers and journals. He is a regular blogger at http://muzaffar-askesis.blogspot.in

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