Zoom invite to F Scale Reading Group Nov 18 8 am PST and some other notes and links

Dialectic of Enlightenment

I thought this interview in the New Yorker with an Israeli West Bank settler was fascinating because of the interviewee’s claims about the physical boundaries of Zion and of her claims for Judaism’s primacy, an interpretation of monotheism that Freud’s reading of the Old Testament tries to undo.

As most of you know by now, I’m not a fan of Judith Butler, but people who don’t know me or my orientation very well keep referring me to her article on Gaza shortly after October 7. It is takes a long time to make a point that I agree with: we need more context for these events. I’m not going to go into the article in the reading group, but I do want to get more technical about a psychoanalytic reading of mouring, coming out of Freud’s Mourning and Melancholia.

Norman Finkelstein is a better guide to the politics of the Middle East. Here on TrueAnon one of our foremost experts on Gaza agonizes over and reasons out loud about how to think about the conflict in the Middle East.

Hope to see you on Nov 18. Paid subscribers only!