Why Paul Krugman Avoids Thinking About Israel

The New York Times columnist is paid for his opinions, but he says, “like many liberal American Jews … I basically avoid thinking about where Israel is going.” And where it’s going, writes Krugman, is “national suicide.”

Krugman’s comments deserve to be read in context, so we’ll paste his New York Times blog post below in its entirety. It was inspired by Peter Beinart’s book “The Crisis of Zionism.”

Paul Krugman of The New York Times via Glenn Greenwald:

Something I’ve been meaning to do — and still don’t have the time to do properly — is say something about Peter Beinart’s brave book The Crisis of Zionism.

The truth is that like many liberal American Jews — and most American Jews are still liberal — I basically avoid thinking about where Israel is going. It seems obvious from here that the narrow-minded policies of the current government are basically a gradual, long-run form of national suicide — and that’s bad for Jews everywhere, not to mention the world. But I have other battles to fight, and to say anything to that effect is to bring yourself under intense attack from organized groups that try to make any criticism of Israeli policies tantamount to anti-Semitism.

But it’s only right to say something on behalf of Beinart, who has predictably run into that buzzsaw. As I said, a brave man, and he deserves better.

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