The Israeli Zionist ministry of propaganda has successfully blurred the distinction between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. With clever adeptness and manipulation they have succeeded in spreading a form of domestic terror to Europe and the United States. This form of terrorism as defined by the Thesaurus is “the calculated use of violence or threat of violence to civilians in order to attain goals that are religious or political or ideological in nature; this is done through intimidation, coercion or instilling fear.” Use of the Holocaust as propaganda invites fear and hysteria.
Netanyahu drew thunderous applause that followed the words loudly proclaimed as if he owned them: “Never Again.” I felt sick as he spoke of the deadly rise of anti-Semitism, a hatred of Jews bound together with the destruction of Israel. “Never Again,” a powerful and highly charged statement, was used here to create a lie in the suppression of the crimes of Israeli Zionism, covered up and justified as a means to “defend itself.” What? To defend itself from a repeat of Hitler’s program to rid Europe of all Jews? Is that the vision of a Jewish State only, a place of safety for all Jews to be protected from a hostile world, with walls, and born from the blood of apartheid and ethnic cleansing? Is this not insanity to pursue an agenda with complete disregard to human values except for Jews?
Now as Europe and the United States struggle to wake up, to question the blind support of Zionist Israel, those who speak out and say “No,” continue to be vilified. Israel’s shouts of anti-Semite are attempts to drown dissent. Can one really believe there still exists the possibility of another incarnation of the Nazi Holocaust? Is this not designed for empathy and support from those who still fantasize the lost dream of Israel as a beacon of light? It is not difficult to observe the strong emotional responses, particularly in Jews and Germans, upon hearing reference to the ashes of the Holocaust as a justification for Israel to “defend itself. ” “Never again” would refer to a justification to commit atrocities against Palestinians for the past 70 years. It must stop.
As the memory of the Holocaust is ignited, cries of “anti-semite” grow and create fear. Useful for the purpose of taking the focus off internal brutal assaults, land stealing, apartheid and ethnic cleansing, it is a distortion in my view and obscures the genesis of a new rise of anti-Semitism in the last decade. True anti-Semites hate Jews. Rising up against Israel is about standing against an ideological, nationalistic and racist government.
I feel particularly as Jews we have a responsibility to remain vigilant and to speak out against victimization. The pursuit of a just society is a fundamental concept of Judaism, which teaches involvement and concern with the plight of our fellow human beings. Every life is sacred and we are obligated to do what we can to help others. The Torah states, “neither shalt thou stand idly by the blood of thy neighbor.“ (Lev. 19:16) There is nothing anti-Semitic about speaking out against the suffering perpetrated on the lives of Palestinians.
The distinction between Zionism and Judaism remains in constant need of clarification and discussion. Fanatics closed to discussion believe in their moral superiority and create political terror so as to silence and deny. The charge of “delegitimizing Israel “ requires one to question what the Israeli government is hiding and whether Israel has not delegitimized itself through decades of illegal human rights abuses. I believe these abuses have contributed profoundly to the rise of true anti-Semitism in the world today.
Powerful, true, hugely important, and refreshing to read.
“Now as Europe and the United States struggle to wake up, to question the blind support of Zionist Israel, those who speak out and say “No,” continue to be vilified. Israel’s shouts of anti-Semite are attempts to drown dissent.”
Precisely. I, for one, am sick of it. I won’t be silenced, either.
I read a fascinating and wide- ranging article this morning about B’Tselem that includes this bit:
“When I asked El-Ad whether he thought a moral society in Israel could remain Jewish, it was the closest I ever saw him to expressing anger. “I think the narrowing of Jewish identity to demographics – that’s profoundly un-Jewish,” he snapped. “When you build a wall in this city to expunge, reject, thousands of people on a demographic basis, that’s un-Jewish.”
“What is Jewish?” I asked.
“Treating people with dignity,” he answered. “I think that’s enough.””
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/12/the-battle-to-be-israels-conscience
Thank you, Lillian. Very much.
I continue to respect and admire Ms. Rosengarten.
Murderous violence has always been and will always be a possibility, and not just against Jewish people but also against women, homosexuals and others.
The just and moral solution to persecution has never been and should never be the creation of a supremacist state for each group of persecuted people, but the universal and consistent application of justice, accountability and equality.
When 9/11 made Americans ready to become overly fearful, we readily acquiesced in the destruction of what little remained of our “civil rights” — protection from unreasonable searches and seizures is about gone now, Thanks you PATRIOT ACT and NSA.
Similarly, the holocaust made Jews everywhere ready to be overly fearful. I say “overly” because Israel vilifies Hamas for (alleged) holocaust-like thoughts just as if Hamas were powerful enough to carry them out — and them attacks Hamas just as if there were a real danger.
Jews (and not only in Israel) forgot all decent tenets of Jewish religion or Jewish life and replaced them all with a SPARTAN ethos of war, war, war, destruction of anyone who might be labelled an enemy, etc. (The USA is not far different. How did Iraq “threaten” the USA or even American “interests” to justify the recent Iraq war? and how does threatening USA interests justify aggressive war anyhow? no-one asks any more!)
Thank you Lillian.
Murderous violence has always been and will always be a possibility, and not just against Jewish people but also against women, homosexuals and others.
“Others”? Like the indigenous peoples of the Americas, Australia, the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, Africa. Each of whom were the object of centuries of genocide, unlike any of those groups you mention.
Also unlike those three groups you mention, they do not have a powerful “Lobby” working on their behalf.
I think of anti-Semitism as prejudice against at least some things characteristically Jewish, so it can be manifest long before the stage of stark hatred is reached. I think of anti-Zionism as rejection of claims to exclusive Jewish rights in Palestine. Anti-Zionism can be completely rational, so not be a form of prejudice, so not be anti-Semitic.
Negative sentiments, even hatred, directed against some people who are in fact Jewish need not be anti-Semitic if they are rational sentiments, ie respond to wrongs done by those persons. Just as the same feelings, even hatreds, directed against non-Jewish people need not spring from anti-Gentile prejudice if those persons have really done wrong.
It is quite possible for an anti-Semite to be a Zionist – he may think that what is wrong with the Jewish condition arises from Jews’ having often been strangers in our midst and that Zionism has a chance of putting these things right. It is also quite possible for someone who has a strong admiration for the contribution made by Jewish people in our midst to regret Zionism because it reduces that contribution.