‘NYT’ can’t keep its story straight on anti-Semitism in Germany

Three weeks ago the New York Times stunned its readers with a frontpage story proclaiming, “Europe’s Anti-Semitism Comes out of the Shadows.

From the immigrant enclaves of the Parisian suburbs to the drizzly bureaucratic city of Brussels to the industrial heartland of Germany, Europe’s old demon returned this summer.

The story contained numerous references to German anti-Semitism. “Gas the Jews!” yelled marchers at a pro-Palestinian protest in Germany, the story said. And a long section on “Anxiety in Germany” included this lesson from an attempted firebombing of a synagogue in Wupperthal:

“For Jews in Germany, especially for us, this has very, very deep meaning,” said Artour Gourari, a local businessman and synagogue member. “Synagogues are burning again in Germany in the night.”

OK, now fasten your neckbolts tight. Because today the New York Times has a story, on an inside page, about Jews leaving Israel for… Germany: “In Exodus From Israel to Germany, a Young Nation’s Fissures Show.” Germany sure seems like a different place than the last article:

Israelis have for years been drawn to Berlin’s cosmopolitan flair, vibrant arts scene and advanced public transportation. There are already several places in the city where one can have authentic hummus, and there is a bimonthly Hebrew-language magazine…

Asaf Moses, 32, said there were “no Israelis around” when he moved to Berlin a decade ago, but now he could hardly walk a mile from home “without picking up some Hebrew from the sidewalk.” There are at least three Israeli restaurants in Prenzlauer Berg, a central neighborhood near a synagogue and Jewish cemetery. What began as a casual monthly book exchange over coffee has grown into a Hebrew lending library with 2,000 volumes.

“Our community is growing every day,” said Diana Reizman, 32, who moved to Berlin as a student and now owns Elfenbein, a kosher cafe and caterer.

We have a simple question for the Times. Which story is correct?

These stories can’t be reconciled. You can’t have an old demon coming out of the shadows and Jews wanting to move to the country. Jews fled Nazi Germany from the time of Hitler’s ascent in the early 1930s. When synagogues burned in the night, in 1938, there was huge desperation among the Jews still in the country. It seems clear that the Times is falling prey to hasbara hysteria– not unlike Todd Gitlin saying that “Jew-hating pogroms and murders rage through Europe.”

P.S. Today’s Times piece treated the exodus of young Israelis to Berlin as part of an “adolescent” nation’s growing pains. They want a better quality of life than they can get in Tel Aviv. The Times reporter trivialized the movement by highlighting the fact that they can buy a pudding in Germany for a lot less than the same pudding in Israel. She all but ignored the fundamental  issue, that Israel is becoming a deadend politically because of the occupation and international efforts to isolate the place. Even former Clinton ambassador Marc Ginsberg says this about the young Israelis leaving, at Huffpo:

With its international standing rapidly eroding, and calls for more punishing economic boycotts against Israel’s incendiary occupation, younger Israelis — the future foundation of the state — are increasingly calling it quits. In 2013 alone, more than double the Israelis quit Israel than in 2012.

What about their participation in “incendiary” occupation? Might that be a reason they want out?

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>> The Times reporter trivialized the movement by highlighting the fact that they can buy a pudding in Germany for a lot less than the same pudding in Israel.

The “Jewish State”, the “Jewish homeland”, the nation-state of the Jewish people, the only place in the world where Jews can truly feel safe and at home.

vs.

Cheaper pudding.

No contest.

I have the impression that anti-Semitism in Germany — and especially in Berlin — is limited to marginal groups of Muslim extremists and neo-Nazis. German experiences during and immediately after World War Two were enough to totally discredit Nazism for the great bulk of the German population. And this is particularly true of Berlin, which never voted for the Nazis, was not particularly enthusiastic about Nazi rule even when the Nazis were in power, and has a long history of harboring leftist German youth (who could escape conscription during the Cold War by living in Berlin — when I happen to have lived in Berlin myself for a couple of years.)

Maybe you can have both: [1] a resurgence of antsemitism in Germany (perhaps only in some places) and also a flow of emigrants from Israel into Germany (perhaps only into some different places).

NYT should get its (Oh! so careless) act together and report on facts which will reconcile these two stories (or show as this essay suggests) that the Israeli immigrants into Germany are moving in, apparently happily, even in the face of actual growing antisemitism.

The meaning of that would be: life in Germany today, even with increasing antisemitism, is better than life in Israel today.

Could be it’s just the price of pudding of course. Maybe they’d think of ASKING the new immigrants why they moved. Ask a lot of them, get a range of answers, I’d suppose.

Maybe North/Weiss could find someone to do the job for NYT (which would probably be reluctant to do real informative reporting on such a topic anyhow).

Any sociologist or pollster in the house?

I disagree that the two can’t be reconciled (European anti-Semitism and Israelis moving to Germany), logically at least. It could be logically true that in some places in Europe/Germany there is simmering anti-Semitism causing Jews to move or want to move, while at the same time some areas are as described in this latter article about Berlin. Or it could be the case that there is some anti-Semitism but not enough to discourage those who really want to move there.

That said, I have absolutely no doubt that these stories are completely overblown. From my reading and time spent in Europe and interaction with many Europeans (I have a Swiss boyfriend and many, many European friends) I do not believe this to be a real problem. I think that it is used to detract from the suffering of Palestinians, or to implicitly excuse it (see, we really need Israel, otherwise we are in danger). In short, I think this post is logically flawed but at heart it’s correct. And definitely agree that it is “interesting” that they did not mention ways in which international isolation is affecting the country

oh this is so interesting to me. and i was just commenting to shmuel about another article i read on this topic, translated from german as i recall, and israeli ministers freaking out at the allegations!!! now i will really have to find the article. i could swear i sent it to you phil. hot topic.