Overcoming Zionism : Talk by author and activist, Professor Joel Kovel in Victoria Hotel at 8PM

galway | rights, freedoms and repression | event notice Friday April 20, 2007 14:15 by TD - Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign

Victoria Hotel, Victoria Place (south-west corner of Eyre Square) at 8PM (FREE ADMISSION).

Joel Kovel, Alger Hiss Professor of Social Studies at Bard College in New York and American Jew, argues that Israel is an incorrigible human rights offender because, by discriminating against Arabs, it is guilty of 'state-sponsored racism'.

Like apartheid South Africa, the best hope for peace in Israel is to return to the idea of a one-state solution, where Jews and Palestinians can co-exist in a secular democracy. Kovel is a well-known writer on the middle east conflict the most recent: Overcoming Zionism: Towards a Single Democratic State in Israel/Palestine.

In it, he draws on his detailed knowledge to show that Zionism and democracy are essentially imcompatible. He offers a thoughtful account of the emotional and psychological aspects of Zionism that helps us understand the relationship between ideology, culture and political processes. Ultimately, Kovel argues, a two-state solution is essentially hopeless as it concedes too much to the regressive forces of nationalism, wherein lie the roots of continued conflict.

Kovel became involved in political activism during the Vietnam War. He has been an active member of antinuclear and peace campaigns, Central American and Caribbean solidarity movements, the movements for democratic media and environmental campaigns. As part of his campaigning work, he lived briefly in Nicaragua in 1986 and joined the Pastors for Peace as they broke the US blockade on Cuba in their 1994 Friendshipment.

In 1990, Kovel moved into party politics by joining the Green Party of the US. Since joining, he has been the Green Party candidate for US Senator from New York. He also ran for the Green Party's Presidential nomination in 2000 but was beaten by Ralph Nader.

QUESTIONS AND DISCUSSION AFTERWARDS