{"id":5174,"date":"2022-06-28T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-06-28T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2025-03-03T16:20:49","modified_gmt":"2025-03-03T14:20:49","slug":"israels-linguistic-acrobatics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/2022\/06\/israels-linguistic-acrobatics\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel’s linguistic acrobatics [Book Review]"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

No amount of Israeltalk can whitewash Israeli crimes<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I am careful about recommending books. Everyone\u2019s time is precious. My commending Alex McDonald's H<\/em>ow I Learned to Speak Israel: An American\u2019s Guide to a Foreign Policy Language<\/em><\/a>, and its sequel, When They Speak Israel: A Guide to Clarity In Conversations About Israel<\/em><\/a> to your attention in a single review, then, means I found them to be beyond impressive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McDonald writes, \u201cLanguage has consequences.\u201d Then, as Mr. McDonald skillfully dissects the discourse on Israel and Palestine, that statement begins to seem wildly understated. McDonald\u2019s analysis explains in detail how Israel and the West have used language, discourse, and narrative framing to camouflage a never-ending stream of the dispossession of Palestinians, including institutionalized discrimination, human rights abuses, military occupation, and so much more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Reviews<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, learning is a journey, and this is the story of one person's journey, a story that will surely enlighten scores more as they pursue the best way to speak truth to power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

English:<\/strong> Medium<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Arabic:<\/strong> Wattan News<\/a> and Alhadath<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alex McDonald's website:<\/strong> speakisrael.info<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am careful about recommending books. Everyone\u2019s time is precious. My commending Alex McDonald’s\u00a0How I Learned to Speak Israel: An American\u2019s Guide to a Foreign Policy Language,<\/em> and its sequel,\u00a0When They Speak Israel: A Guide to Clarity In Conversations About Israel<\/em> to your attention in a single review, then, means I found them to be beyond impressive. McDonald writes, \u201cLanguage has consequences.\u201d Then, as Mr. McDonald skillfully dissects the discourse on Israel and Palestine, that statement begins to seem wildly understated. McDonald\u2019s analysis explains in detail how Israel and the West have used language, discourse, and narrative framing to camouflage a never-ending stream of the dispossession of Palestinians, including institutionalized discrimination, human rights abuses, military occupation, and so much more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6822,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[948,942],"tags":[1201,1200,319,1198,114,1199,1275],"ppma_author":[936],"class_list":["post-5174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","category-sams-writings","tag-alex-mcdonald","tag-george-orwell","tag-hasbara","tag-how-i-learned-to-speak-israel-an-americans-guide-to-a-foreign-policy-language-book","tag-language-linguistics","tag-when-they-speak-israel-a-guide-to-clarity-in-conversations-about-israel-book","tag-zionism-zionists"],"authors":[{"term_id":936,"user_id":4,"is_guest":0,"slug":"sambahour","display_name":"Sam Bahour","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/bca109c333bf6d8ae807746dd512adde46265d37c923f6cd0fc4aab437f8e9aa?s=96&d=mm&r=g","author_category":"1","first_name":"Sam","last_name":"Bahour","user_url":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour","job_title":"","description":"

Sam Bahour<\/strong> is a Palestinian-American business consultant, writer, and commentator based in Al-Bireh\/Ramallah, Palestine. He is the principal of Applied Information Management (AIM)<\/a>, a consultancy specializing in business development and startup advisory services.<\/p>\r\n

Bahour played a foundational role in establishing two of Palestine\u2019s publicly traded companies: the Palestine Telecommunications Company (PALTEL) and the Arab Palestinian Shopping Centers (APSC). He co-founded Americans for a Vibrant Palestinian Economy (A4VPE), of which he is now an emeritus member, and served as an independent director on the board of Arab Islamic Bank P.L.C. from 2004 to 2025. He currently serves on the board of Just Vision<\/a> and The Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute (MAS)<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n

He frequently gives talks to delegations visiting Palestine on the subjects of Palestine\u2019s political economy, Palestinian Politics 101, and a general orientation to the state of affairs under Israeli military occupation.<\/p>\r\n

A prolific writer on Palestinian affairs, Bahour has been published in major international outlets including The New York Times, The Guardian, Haaretz, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, Al Jazeera America, Le Monde diplomatique, Al-Monitor, +972 Magazine, The Hill, and Arab News. He has appeared as a commentator on NPR, CNN, BBC, and other broadcast media.<\/p>\r\n

Bahour is the co-editor of Homeland: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians<\/a><\/em> (Olive Branch Press, 1993) and was profiled in the bestselling anthology Kingdom of Olives and Ash<\/a><\/em>, edited by Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman, in a chapter authored by Chabon titled \u201cThe Tallest Man in Ramallah<\/a>.\u201d He holds an Associate\u2019s and Bachelor\u2019s degree in Computer Technology from Youngstown State University, and a Kellogg-Recanati International Executive MBA \u2014 a joint program of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and the Recanati Business School at Tel Aviv University.<\/p>\r\n

He tweets at @SamBahour<\/a>, blogs at www.epalestine.ps<\/a>, and may be reached at sbahour[AT]gmail[DOT]com.<\/p>"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5174"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7292,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5174\/revisions\/7292"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5174"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epalestine.ps\/sambahour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=5174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}