I think Gary Rosenblatt was much too kind to Peter Beinart regarding his new book (“Pushing Morality, A Victim Of Myopia,” March 23).
I have not read the new book and I have no intention of doing so because it seems to be only a variant of Beinart’s execrable New York Times op-ed of March 18 and his earlier essay published in the New York Review of Books in 2010.
Rosenblatt’s kindness lies in taking some of Beinart’s inaccurate characterizations of the State of Israel’s democracy as though they were sensible, accurate and arguable. Rosenblatt ends up with the right conclusion about Beinart’s article that he “weakens his moral case by ignoring Israel’s security concerns. And he sees the Washington-Jerusalem relationship through a one-sided political lens.”
That conclusion warrants a more severe judgment about Beinart’s sense of morality and the lack of intellectual integrity and judgment in advocating a boycott of products made by Jews living in West Bank settlements. Rosenblatt’s judgment should have been that Beinart has stepped out of the circle of commentators whose views should be taken seriously.
Manhattan
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