I’ve been watching Norman Finkelstein videos in part because the whole discussion with the White Women’s Tears and the eye color videos reminded me of my introduction to him.
Some of the incidental details I’m not too sure of (what is the function of the guy trying to interrupt Dr. Finkelstein?) but the core of the video is really pretty clear.
This takes place after his talk at the University of Waterloo. Girl in a yellow hoodie is the first person in line for the Q&A. The video starts before she asks the question.
NF: “…when you’re sitting in the audience, and somebody goes on for an hour and a half, saying things you find utterly loathsome and repulsive, and also you think factually incorrect.” (Applause from the audience.) “I think people should have more than sixty seconds. As I said, I’ll leave it to the patience of the audience. If you feel it’s going on too long, you know how to express your disapproval; otherwise, they should be allowed to go on. Go ahead.” Points to girl in a yellow hoodie.
GYH: “Hi. During your speech, you made a lot of references to Jewish people, as well as certain people in your audience—not Jewish people in general, but certain people, especially in your audience—to Nazis. Now—” (She starts to choke up.) “—that is extremely offensive—” (Outright crying.) “—when certain people are German, and they’re also extremely offensive to people who have actually suffered under Nazi rule.”
NF: “I don’t respect that anymore. I really don’t. I don’t like and I don’t respect the crocodile tears—”
(Uproar. Some people are clapping, some are yelling, some are booing. Yellow hoodie is still crying.)
NF: “—the crocodile tears—allow me to finish! Allow me to finish! Allow me to finish! Sir! Sir! Allow me to finish! I don’t like to play, before an audience, the Holocaust card. But since now I feel compelled to, my late father was in Auschwitz. My late mother—please shut up!” (Huge applause.) “My late father was in Auschwitz. My late mother was in Majdanek concentration camp. Every single member of my family on my father’s side and my mother’s side—”
(Yellow Hoodie girl clutches her head and sobs. Some guy in the back of the line yells “The Jews can not take arms against—” but NF shouts him down.)
NF: “My late father was in Auschwitz concentration camp, my late mother was in Majdanek concentration camp! Every single member of my family on both sides was exterminated. Both of my parents were in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising! And it is precisely and exactly because of the lessons my parents taught me and my two siblings, that I will not be silenced when Israel commits its crimes against the Palestinians! And I consider nothing more despicable than to use their suffering and their martyrdom to try to justify the torture, the brutalization, the demolition of homes, that Israel daily commits against the Palestinians! So I refuse, any longer, to be intimidated or browbeaten by the tears! If you had any heart in you, you would be crying for the Palestinians! Not for what you [inaudible]!”
(Huge applause and cheering. Girl in yellow hoodie is still crying, clutching her head, etc. Someone approaches Finkelstein, hands him a water bottle, and sends him to sit down. Finkelstein speaks directly to the cameraperson, with a smile.)
NF: “I’ve never been in a crowd like this. They’re nuts.”
(Cut to Finkelstein in the back seat of a car, talking to the cameraperson.)
NF: “I think it’s pretty audacious when people try to play the Holocaust card with me. I think that’s pretty nervy…What percent of the audience was opposed to me, about a quarter, or a fifth? A quarter.”
Person driving the car (same as water bottle person): “I think about a quarter. The girl in the dark t-shirt who was yelling about the anti-semitism throughout the thing, she began to yell ‘well, they’re probably turning over in their graves now!’”
NF: “Sorry, my parents were alive throughout most of my struggle and they totally supported me. That one won’t work. It’s not like I did an about-face in 1995 when my parents passed away. I’ve been doing this since 1982. They heard every word. I never heard an objection.”
I brought him up in a class about Middle Eastern politics and actually had a few classmates claim he was a Holocaust denier. It disgusts me how many privileged people would rather shoot the messenger instead of facing facts.
(via milkeemountainmama)
