Gideon Levy

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Gideon Levy (Hebrew: גדעון לוי‎; born 1953) is an Israeli journalist for the Haaretz newspaper, where he is also an editorial board member. He is a prominent left-wing commentator,^[1] and publishes on the weekly column "Twilight Zone" of Haaretz, where he covers since 1988 what he describes as Palestinian hardships and suffering in the West Bank, which he attributes to the actions of Israel and to Jewish Settlers. He is a regular participant and a representative of the left-wing in a television panel on the TV show, "Moetzet Ha'Hahamim" (Trans. 'The Committee of the Wise').

Levy was awarded the 1996 Emil Grunzweig Human Rights Award and the 2007 Anna Lindh Foundation Euro-Med Journalist Prize for Cultural Dialogue.^[2] Levy also served as spokesman for Shimon Peres from 1978 until 1982.^[3]

Contents 1 Biography 2 Political views 3 Criticism 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Biography

Levy was born in 1953 in Tel Aviv, the eldest of two sons to immigrants from Germany. The family settled in Shtand street in Tel-Aviv and Levy went to the nearby "Public School Alef" (Hebrew: עירוני א'‎). In an article, Levy recounted that a shell that hit Tel-Aviv during the Six-Day war hit a porch in the adjacent street, Reich.^[4]

Levy describes his adolescence as one in which he was "a full member of the nationalistic religious orgy." Citing a collective feeling of an "existentialistic danger," levy explains that everyone "felt that another holocaust is around the corner."^[1]

From 1978 to 1982 he served, together with Yossi Beilin, as an aide to Shimon Peres. Since 1982 he has worked for the Israeli daily Haaretz and from 1986 has written extensively in its pages on 'the occupation of Gaza and the West Bank and Palestinian life under that occupation'.^[5] In 1996 he was awarded the Emil Grunzweig Human Rights Award by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel. In 2007, he was awarded the Euro-Med Journalist Prize for Cultural Dialogue of the Anna Lindh Foundation for his "exceptional writings on the challanges [sic] of the region".^[6]. The French newspaper Le Monde has described him as a 'thorn in Israel's flank'.^[5]

[edit] Political views

Levy has spoken of his 'modest mission to prevent a situation in which many Israelis will be able to say, "We didn't know".'^[1] A recurrent theme in his articles is what he describes as Israeli society's 'moral blindness' to the effects of its acts of war and occupation in Gaza and the West Bank. He has criticized Israel's government for refusing to stop the construction of settlements on private Palestinian land, describing the policy as 'the most criminal enterprise in [Israel's] history'.^[7]

During the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict, he shared the minority view among Israeli commentators which dismissed the idea that it was a 'just war', of the kind in which civilian casualties were both inevitable and acceptable.

While working in Gaza in early 2007 with a French film crew that was making a documentary about him, Levy declared on camera that the Gazans' plight made him ashamed to be an Israeli.^[8]

Levy supports unilateral cession of occupied Palestinian territories without asking for concessions, saying that "Israel is not being asked 'to give' anything to the Palestinians; it is only being asked to return - to return their stolen land and restore their trampled self-respect, along with their fundamental human rights and humanity." He further says that "There are not, and cannot be, any preconditions for restoring justice."^[9]

Levy wrote that the Gaza War was a complete failure for Israel, writing that none of the objectives of the war were achieved. Levy wrote that "The conclusion is that Israel is a violent and dangerous country, devoid of all restraints and blatantly ignoring the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council, while not giving a hoot about international law."^[10]

Levy is against an Israeli attack on Iran, writing that such an attack would end in disaster. Levy wrote that it is important "for Israel to finally wean itself of the ideology that force is a solution to everything, and that it is the policeman (aka thug) of the Middle East."^[11]

[edit] Criticism

Levy has been criticized by several commentators,^{[12] [13][14]} including Amnon Dankner, for "anti-Israeli" and "pro-Palestinian" base of perspective;^[15] Der Spiegel cited him as "[Israel's] most radical commentator", crediting him as the main reason given by Haaretz readers for subscription cancellations.^[16] Levy himself is on record as quipping that somewhere in Haaretz's newsroom there exists a thick file of notifications by regular readers canceling their subscriptions after reading his articles.^[8]

Levy's main publisher, Haaretz, saw a wave of angry letters and subscription cancellations following the mainstream publication of a letter to Haaretz by Israeli novelist Irit Linur,^[17] in which she announced the cancellation of her own subscription and argued that the newspaper had become compromised by a radical anti-Zionist,^[13]-[a] pro-Palestinian agenda, and she cited Levy's work and ideology as an example.^[13]-[b] Another public figure canceling his subscription to the paper was the military and security correspondent for Israeli Channel 2, Roni Daniel, who cited Levy's use of a television review section to criticize his correspondence.^[18] Haaretz's publisher, Amos Schocken, expressed puzzlement at Linur's public letter, describing his newspaper as "exceedingly Zionist" and suggesting Levy's reports should be "read mainly as a description to the effect of the Israeli occupation in the territories".^[13]

Several journalists,^[19][14] including Ben Dror Yemini, and PMW's media analyst, Itamar Marcus, have accused Levy of promoting Palestinian violence and of being, along with fellow Haaretz correspondents Amira Hass and Danny Rubinstein, glorified by the Palestinian media and having his views used as "proof of the justness of their way against Israel".^[20][21] A senior lecturer at the Hebrew University, Dr. Alexander Jacobson, charged that Levy makes no attempt at keeping a universal perspective on morality in the Arab-Israeli conflict but rather portrays a distinct and "particular attitude towards the State of Israel".^[22]

Following the Palestinian elections of 2006, Gideon Ezra, the former deputy Minister of Internal Security in Israel, suggested that the General Security Services should monitor Levy and supervise his reports as he is treading on the borderline of someone having anti-Israeli interests.^[23]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Interview with Levy on PBS (2003)
• Articles on Iran: 'Days of darkness' by Gideon Levy
• Selection of articles by Levy
• Article about Levy in the French daily Le Monde September 2006
• Gideon Levy's Official Lecturer Page
• Author: Gideon Levy (voltairenet.org)
• Twilight Zone 'We saw death a thousand times'
• Gideon Levy, ‘One swift kick’, Haaretz 6/6/2008
• Gideon Levy, 'The neighborhood bully strikes again ', Haaretz 12/28/2008
• An open letter to Gideon Levy By A.B. Yehoshua, Haaretz 16/01/2009
• [3]An open response to A.B. Yehoshua, By Gideon Levy