Finkelstein’s doctoral thesis debunked a very influential forgery called “From Time Immemorial,” which fabricated data to show there were hardly any Palestinians in Palestine during the nineteenth century. Whatever your stance on the issue is, fabrications like that can be dangerously misleading, and Finkelstein exposed how the data was twisted, footnote after footnote. He wrote excellent rebuttals of some of Benny Morris’ more reactionary claims, showing how they were undermined by Morris’ own historical research. He has taken brave stances against many forms of injustice, and paid a high price.

(I want to note in parenthesis that while he does frequently mention that both his parents were Holocaust survivors, and does accept the validity of conventional histories of this event, there are some extremely irresponsible passages in his book on the “Holocaust Industry” which undermine survivors’ testimonies. But that deserves a separate discussion).

Recently Finkelstein has taken what many see as a disappointing stance regarding the right of return: citing his own experience after he was prevented from teaching in his academic institution, he advises Palestinians to “move on” and make more realistic demands:

“People get offended when I make the analogy – I’m going to make it tonight – I wish people would understand the point I’m making. I knew I had a right to return to DePaul. I knew I had that right, and I knew if I went to court for ten years, I would win. But then I have to make a judgment: Do I want to draw this out for ten years, or am I going to go for a settlement that’s going to give me less than my right to return, but it will give me something? And then I made my choice. I think it’s basically the same for the Palestinians. Do they have a legal right? Yes. But is it worth fighting this out through eternity, or do you cut your losses and move on?”

Feminism is the radical idea that women are people too. The right of return is the radical idea that if you’re born in a place, you get to live there – even if you’re an Arab! – and that you and your children are therefore not immigrants, but natives. Why would someone like Finkelstein be confusing people like that? Expecting people to give up their connection to their places of origin is no more “pragmatic” than telling women to settle for an inferior status in society.

Regardless of his personal quirks, what I think is going on here is something I’ve noticed among many Jews in the pro-Palestine movement, including myself. Even if we declare ourselves to be progressive, we still carry a lot of fear. There are ‘traditional’ Jewish fears of being a persecuted minority. There is the unavoidable nightmare of a new Holocaust, which we constantly project onto Arabs and Muslims. There are periods in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict where we or our relatives experienced physical threat, such as the suicide bombings of the second Intifada. And of course there are the never-ending manipulated fears that Israeli leaders drum up to gain more votes, or more support for their latest expansionist policy.

What I’ve noticed is that a way a lot of us deal with these fears is by giving Palestinians advice: if only they play nice, sound less angry, tone down their demands, and generally be reasonable, we and people we know will be calm enough to accept them. Now, clearly our Palestinian allies can sometimes be wrong, and we do get to disagree with them if we are to be a real part of this movement. But I think the ubiquity of this tendency to advise goes beyond that. Finkelstein should have known better than to tell Palestinians to compromise on this very personal right: I think the real reason was his fear.

The right of return, if implemented fully, will involve a huge upheaval. It is understandable that people would be afraid to take such a step. As allies, it is our responsibility to work through these fears and not allow them to prevent Palestinians from living in their own home. Anyone born in Jerusalem has the right to live there, whatever religion or ethnicity they belong to – this much should be obvious. Anyone whose family has lived in Yaffa/Jaffa for centuries belongs there, not in exile. Israel should be welcoming back its Palestinian inhabitants, instead of constantly devising tricks to keep them out.

None of this has to come at the expense of the true legitimate rights of Israelis like me. As Edward Said explained, in a very inspiring essay:

“What we never concentrated on enough was the fact that to counteract Zionist exclusivism, we would have to provide a solution to the conflict that, in Mandela’s […] phrase, would assert our common humanity as Jews and Arabs. Most of us still cannot accept the idea that Israeli Jews are here to stay, that they will not go away, any more than Palestinians will go away. This is understandably very hard for Palestinians to accept, since they are still in the process of losing their land and being persecuted on a daily basis. But, with our irresponsible and unreflective suggestion in what we have said that they will be forced to leave (like the Crusades), we did not focus enough on ending the military occupation as a moral imperative or on providing a form for their security and self-determinism that did not abrogate ours. This, and not the preposterous hope that a volatile American president would give us a state, ought to have been the basis of a mass campaign everywhere. Two people in one land. Or, equality for all. Or, one person one vote. Or, a common humanity asserted in a binational state.”

This may not happen anytime soon. But if you are interested in being a good ally to Palestinians right now, it helps to think about this, because your fears can get in the way of providing good support, or of simply getting close to people. In the end, this isn’t only about politics – it’s about friendship: I think of the right of return as having my best Palestinian friends as neighbors in Israel too, for them to be around me whenever I miss them.