In Quest of Questions
Making itself
intelligible is suicide for philosophy.
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
There is much madness abroad in the world
now. Not all of it stems from Heidegger
or Kant, but they do give the pretence of philosophical depth to the
post-modernist ideology. Unlike Judaism
which demand intelligence, intellectual acumen, scientific knowledge of the
real world, and constant questioning of sac red texts, one another, and
oneself. Not submission. Not faith.
But questioning and study, debate and self-discipline. Otherwise, as Heidegger the Nazi points out,
philosophy is impossible couched in the discourses of neologistic
post-modernism and the obscurantism of Edward Said’s anti-Orientalism.
Because there can be no “conversations” when
there are no shared “narratives,” it seems pointless to construct rational
arguments in which to debate the strategies of asymmetrical warfare. The statements by Hamasniks are, on the face
of it, completely absurd, as wildly far from the realities on the ground as can
be. The reports in the Western media and
the speeches made by academics in various forums established to isolate Israel
and Judaism from universities, discussions, and civilized discourse are
something else: and yet again there can be no careful analysis, interpretation
of facts or compromises made when the other side premises its texts on outrageously
inaccurate news or outright lies, and is firmly unwilling to hear the other
presentation, although it keeps calling for a free and open debate. That is why I set out the paradigm of text/counter-text,
antitext, untext and non-text.
John
Milton’s whole argument in the Areopagetica
falls away in such situations where the opposition denies you your right to
exist and keeps bellowing out for your annihilation. At very best, a concession for the sake of
argument permits the other side to trounce on your weakness. Giving the opposition a fair hearing is
impossible, when the audience is primed to shout down your statements—if at all
they allow you into the auditorium to take part in the discussion or
conversation, which usually means all invited speakers are on the same page,
the Hamas version of reality.
A Theatre of Cruelty in Gaza
[Antonin] Artaud
understood that the theatre is a means for structuring mythogenes which lend
meaning to the lives both of performer and spectator, just as the paintings of
van Gogh mythogenically linked the artist and his audience over time and space,
and revealed some important insight, to both.[i]
Whereas as it is usual to take discussions of
art, popular culture and terrorism as separate categories and to treat them as
divorced from the dynamic of historical processes—and thus, by the way, to
romanticize artists and folk, while demonizing terrorists as pure simple fanatics. However, it may be better to see all of us as
doing more than passively listening to or observing from out of the darkness of
our private selves the performance of horrible deeds, such as massacres,
suicide bombings, and endless “resistance” to order and civilized governance.
There is a unity for those who gather in what Artaud once called “the theatre
of cruelty”, and we have also seen as le Grand Guignol and the festivals of
Laughter or Tears, Blood and Mangled Corpses, and Justice or psychological
relief for the distorted, dysfunctional and incomplete bonding between the
child and the closest care-giver (who in those particular instances, abuses,
betrays and rejects him or her). It is
no wonder, then, that much of the video-news of Gaza plays out either with
film-grabs from Hollywood horror films (zombis, vampires and other monsters) or
images taken from Syria, Iraq, or even sites in Israel of terrorist
attacks. Those shots beamed out from
Gaza itself are carefully staged, cleansed of all indications of Hamas
activity, and covered by reportial voice-overs interpreting the scenes
according to the official party line.
The Melodrama of Masochism
Meanwhile Arab
masochism has been elevated to a new art form.
It is their refusal to grow up and assume responsibility for their
plight. Hamas articulates the
masochist’s motto—“victory through defeat.”
Hamas has lost and remains addicted to its melodrama. Just watch Al Jazeera [to see how] the Arab
world drowns in the blood and guts of such masochism while cleverly denying its
own sadism. Hamas and the Islamic State
are the carriers of rage which exceeds murder itself.[ii]
Yet again, le t me say, the analysis and interpretation of terrorism and
manipulated “resistance” can only be properly understood as part of a long
history of ideological and religious prejudice against Jews and Christians,
wherein individuals and whole communities are brain-washed repeatedly, kept in a
state of stress and excitability by threats of punishment and, above all, by psychological
dysfunctions in the basic family structure of infant care and early domestic control.
But since the collapse of classical Marxist states and ideology, the leftist
mentality in the West has operated by post-modernist concepts of denial—no master
narrative, no right and wrong in the notion of truth since all people have
their own valid positionalities, knowledge is a construct of powerful persons
and parties, and victimology: whoever suffers more casualties and deaths must
be politically correct.
The Fantasies, Myths and Hallucinations of Hamas:A Double-Refraction and a Carnival Mirror in the Madhouse
“Woe
to the makers of the pit (of fire)” Surah 85:4
Palestine, the
heart of this entire world, is still shrouded in smoke… The degraded [Israeli]
savages, the Tartars and Nazis of our times, have no future unless the
[Palestinian] nation is destroyed, leaving no survivors except for traitors,
fools and those who are submissive… The disasters befalling us in this blessed
land help to clarify the Surah of the Constellations [chapter in the Quran]…
The scene [in the Surah] involved the ancient Christian believers… The Quran
provides no details about the story, [which] is the summary of a tale about a
group of evil men who dug and plowed ditches in the ground, lit raging fires in
them and gave the believers [Muslims] a choice between being burned alive and
renouncing their faith… In Palestin e, they [Israelis] have dug ditch after
ditch for us… There is a struggle [going on] between those who carry in their
hearts the right [to Palestine], the truth and the cause, and [Israelis]
despised creatures devoid of human feelings, who mock man’s right to life and
liberty. They are armed by the US and
imperialism, who helped them produce and market weapons, and to obtain nuclear
warheads, with full impunity.
Al-Hayar A-Jadida, 26 July 2014[iii]
The distorting mirrors and lenses of Hamas
propaganda have been partly shaped by clever awareness of how Western
intellectuals respond to code words, conventionalized imagery honed in regions
where colonialism and imperialism have interfered with the normal political and
economic development of indigenous peoples; and partly been generated by very
sick minds that are without self-consciousness and filled with boundless rage
seeking outlets for destruction of the self through destruction of the
seemingly happy, contented and successful others—infidels, dhimmis, Americans
and Israelis. Ever since Jean-Jacque-Rousseau,
Pierre Loti, Paul Gauguin, and Victor Segelen for instance, Western
intellectuals have primed themselves on the notion of the Noble Savage, the
romantic Arab, and the erotic and exotic other, with all their irrationality,
mythic thinking, and spiritual closeness to Mother Nature (in her various, usually
violent, forms).
[i] C. Giroa Shoham, “Antonin Artaud: Noah’s Ark Outside Time” Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture
8:3 (2001) 204.
[ii] Nancy Hartvelt Kobrin, “Trains: What Do They Have In Common with
Tunnels?” The Times of Israel (18
August 2014) online at
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/trains-what-do-they-have-in-common-with-tunnels
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