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Norman Finkelstein

15 quotes

“Articulating the key Holocaust dogmas, much of the literature on Hitler's Final solution is worthless as scholarship. Indeed, the field of Holocaust studies is replete with nonsense, if not sheer fraud. (p. 55)”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If everyone who claims to be a survivor actually is one," my mother used to exclaim, "who did Hitler kill then?" (p. 81)”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Frankly, part of me says…"you know what, we deserve the problem on our hands because some things Bin Laden says are true". One of the things he said on that last tape was that "until we live in security, you’re not going to live in security", and there is a certain amount of rightness in that.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2001 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: How to Lose Friends and Alienate People: A Conversation with Professor Norman Finkelstein,” CounterPunch (December 13, 2001) by Don Atapattu
“That said, sometimes I feel that Israel has come out of the boils of the hell, a satanic state.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2009 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Norman Finkelstein: Israel is committing a holocaust in Gaza", Today's Zaman (19 January 2009).
“To my thinking the honorable thing now is to show solidarity with Hezbollah as the US and Israel target it for liquidation. Indeed, looking back my chief regret is that I wasn’t even more forceful in publicly defending Hezbollah against terrorist intimidation and attack.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Speaking as a devout atheist, thank God in his Almighty wisdom that he made us mortal.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2010 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: http://movies.nytimes.com/2010/02/11/movies/11radical.html
“David Irving was a very good historian – I don't care what Richard Evans (the historian who was a key player in the Lipstadt libel trial) says. He produced works that are substantive ... If you don't like it, don't read it. In the case of Irving, he knew a thing or two – or three.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I don't see the reason to get excited about Holocaust deniers. First of all I don't know what a Holocaust denier even is. People say if you deny the centrality of the six million Jews being killed and you try to bring in other groups of people you become a Holocaust denier. Other people say if you deny the centrality of the gas chambers you become a Holocaust denier.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: During an online meeting of the Labour against the Witch-Hunt group, as cited in "Norman Finkelstein praises Holocaust denier David Irving at pro-Corbyn group meeting", The Jewish Chronicle (July 31, 2020).
“Since the mid-1970s, there's been an international consensus for resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict. Most of your listeners will be familiar with it. It's called a two-state settlement, and a two-state settlement is pretty straightforward, uncomplicated. Israel has to fully withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza and Jerusalem, in accordance with the fundamental principle of international law, cited three times by Mr. Ben-Ami in the book, his book, that it's inadmissible to acquire territory by war. The West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem, having been acquired by war, it's inadmissible for Israel to keep them. They have to be returned. On the Palestinian side and also the side of the neighboring Arab states, they have to recognize Israel's right to live in peace and security with its neighbors. That was the quid pro quo: recognition of Israel, Palestinian right to self-determination in the West Bank and Gaza with its capital in Jerusalem. That's the international consensus. It's not complicated. It's also not controversial.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What were the offers being made on each side of the Camp David and in the Taba talks? And the standard interpretation, which comes — which is — you can call it the Dennis Ross interpretation, which, I think, unfortunately Dr. Ben-Ami echoes, is that Israel made huge concessions at Camp David and Taba; Palestinians refused to make any concessions, because of what Dr. Ben-Ami repeatedly calls Arafat's unyielding positions; and that Arafat missed a huge opportunity. Now, it is correct to say that if you frame things in terms of what Israel was legally entitled to under international law, then Israel made precisely and exactly zero concessions. All the concessions were made by the Palestinians.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2006 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Norman Finkelstein & Former Israeli Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben-Ami Debate: Complete Transcript", Democracy Now (c. February 2006).
“There are a large number of claims circulating about rampant anti-Semitism on college campuses. When you go actually go through the records, talk to the schools, speak to the deans and so forth, all of these claims turn out to be fraudulent. There’s just no record of this so-called rampant anti-Semitism on college campuses. The most striking example is Columbia University where [...] pro-Israel outsiders were disrupting the classrooms of these professors [falsely accued of anti-Semitism], secretly video-taping their lectures and being turned, as the Columbia Report put it, into informers for the pro-Israel lobby. The real story was the harassment of professors who were critical of Israeli policy.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My parents -- we lived in Brooklyn, NY, we owned a house -- my parents were difficult people, they didn't get along with anyone. Actually, they didn't even get along with each other. So, on the one side were the Golds and on the other side were the Kasslers and they did not get along with the Golds and they did not get along with the Kasslers, so they built a fence. And it was within their right to build a fence. But, as everybody knows, when you build at fence, at any rate in New York, you first have to hire a surveyor. That's a fact, I'm not joking. You have to hire a surveyor and you have to make sure that fence is right down the line on your property because if that fence is literally one quarter of an inch on the Golds' side or on the Kasslers' side, they have the right to tear it down. Under law, that's it. Now, let's take Israel's wall. What happens if my parents decide to build a fence that's not only on the Kasslers' side but goes right around their swimming pool? Well, some people will begin to wonder "are Mary and Harry Finkelstein trying to protect their property? Or are they trying to steal the Kasslers' swimming pool?”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2006 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Source: Talk at Santa Cruz, CA (October 23, 2006).
“Since completing this memoir in 1995 I've returned to Palestine every year. In fact, apart from traveling abroad to lecture, Palestine is the only place I've been since I first journeyed there 15 years ago. I sometimes fantasize vacationing in Greece or Italy but never do. If I have time and cost isn't prohibitive, I always return to Palestine. I do so mostly from a sense of duty - do I have a right to be elsewhere? - relieved by the authentic affection I've developed for friends. I cannot say I enjoy going back. From the moment I arrive, even before arriving, I count the minutes left before I depart. The eminent Hebrew University sociologist Baruch Kimmerling has described Gaza as "the largest concentration camp ever to exist." The West Bank ranks only a mite less awful. Once the Israeli wall currently under construction is finished, the West Bank will replace Gaza with top honors. Bordered on both sides by four meter deep trenches, fortified with guard towers at regular intervals, and topped with barbed wire, this massive barricade will stretch across fully 347 kilometers - twice the size of the Berlin Wall.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Whenever Israel faces a public relations debacle such as the Intifada or international pressure to resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict, American Jewish organizations orchestrate this extravaganza called the 'new anti-Semitism.' The purpose is several-fold. First, it is to discredit any charges by claiming the person is an anti-Semite. It's to turn Jews into the victims, so that the victims are not the Palestinians any longer. As people like Abraham Foxman of the ADL put it, the Jews are being threatened by a new holocaust. It's a role reversal – the Jews are now the victims, not the Palestinians. So it serves the function of discrediting the people leveling the charge. It's no longer Israel that needs to leave the Occupied Territories; it's the Arabs who need to free themselves of the anti-Semitism.”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“For the past 20 years the people of Gaza, half of whom are children, have been immured in a concentration camp. Today they breached the camp's walls. If we honor John Brown's armed resistance to slavery; if we honor the Jews who revolted in the Warsaw Ghetto — then moral consistency commands that we honor the heroic resistance in Gaza. I, for one, will never begrudge — on the contrary, it warms every fiber of my soul — the scenes of Gaza’s smiling children as their arrogant Jewish supremacist oppressors have, finally, been humbled. The stars above in heaven are looking kindly down. Glory, glory, hallelujah. The souls of Gaza go marching on!”
Norman Finkelstein (born 1953) first seen 2023 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Finkelstein's Substack entry (October 7, 2023), as cited in Barbara Kay "The useful idiots trotted out to bash Israel", National Post (December 17, 2023).