Merav Michaeli has Tony Judt's last interview on Israel (recorded just after after the Flotilla raid disaster):
The characterization that comes to mind is "autistic." Israel behaved in a way that suggests it is no longer fully able to estimate, assess or understand the way other people think about it. Even if you supported the blockade (I don't) this would be an almost exemplary case of shooting oneself in a painful part of the anatomy.
Firstly because it alienates Turkey, who Israel needs in the longer run. Secondly because it was undertaken in international waters and largely at the expense of civilian victims. Thirdly because it was an overreaction. Fourthly because it had the predictable effect of weakening the case for a blockade rather than strengthening it.
In short, this is the action of a country which is fast losing touch with reality.
On Israeli fears of a two-state solution:
Israel should be much, much more afraid of the Israel it's creating for itself: a semi-democratic, demagogic, far-right warrior state dominated by racist Russians and crazed rabbis. In this perspective, an internationally policed and guaranteed federal state of Israel, with the same rights and resources for Jews and Arabs, looks a lot less frightening to me.
And on Jewish Americans' changing views of the Jewish state:
The world has changed since 1939. But Israel is a fact and there is no point debating whether it should exist. However, like many, many Jews outside of Israel, I feel a declining sense of identification with the place: its behavior, its culture, its politics, its insularity, its prejudices have nothing to do with being Jewish for me and I know that is especially true of younger Jews, excepting ultra-religious ones. So even if things went wrong for Jews today, I don't think most of us would want to go and live in Israel …
Another perspective, the long one, would be to say that Israel is behaving very much like the annoying little Judean state that the Romans finally dismantled in frustration. This classical analogy may be more relevant than we think. I suspect that in decades to come America (the new Rome) will abandon Israel as annoying, expensive, and a liability.
Jeffrey Goldberg doesn't like Judt's thoughts so much. The reflexive bile is staggering:
What comes through, more than anything else, is Tony Judt's contempt for Jews, his blatant dishonesty, and his support for the radical Arab vision of a Judenrein-Middle East.
Yes: Tony Judt was a lying anti-Semite. And a Nazi who wanted a Judenrein Middle East. Feel better after writing that?
The Dish 