Recently while surfing the web, I happened onto an article at a number of alternative-press websites by a widely-published internet author.
I couldn't believe what I was reading: the essay was a long diatribe aimed, it seemed, at an amorphous Jewish conspiracy that according to the author is at the heart of what ails America and its policies.
Maybe I misunderstood, I thought -- since the actual word “Jews” was not used -- so I googled the author’s name and read another essay by him. This one pulled no punches; it was a defense of Holocaust denial and a scabrous attack on "the Jews" as the evil villains of contemporary society.
I have nothing against the right of anyone to print anything; it's the glory of free speech, and I find reprehensible Austria's throwing David Irving into prison for expressing similar Holocaust-denial thoughts in his writings. (If rightwingers can be jailed for expressing their opinions, at some point it surely will happen to leftwingers. Free speech should always be defended for one and all, the exception being actual incitements to violence -- "shouting fire in a crowded theater," that sort of thing.)
But I wondered whether the website editors had carefully perused what this author was writing in his article, or whether they simply read the first paragraph or two and decided to publish or link to it because he had established a reputation questioning the Bush Administration's Iraq war policies and its 9/11 scenario.
The other possibility, which I didn't really want to consider, was that the editors had read his article carefully and agreed with this kind of racist garbage. Anti-Semitism is universal and, though more prevalent on the Right, also exists on the Left. (Note: I'm not talking about anti-Zionism, i.e., articles opposed to Israeli policy and even to the existence of Israel, about which reasonable minds can agree or disagree. No, I'm referring to out-and-out raging rants about "the Jews," as a people.)
ANTI-SEMITISM FROM THE LEFT
Anti-Semitism on the Left is generally not spoken about, but it's real and appears to be growing. For those so inclined, it’s easy to slip from denunications of Israeli policy -- many of us on the Left are quite vocal in opposing Israeli policies and actions -- to out-and-out anti-Semitism.
It's often difficult to locate that fine line. Jew-haters often can hide their true feelings and arguments inside broadsides against Israeli policy, but those opposed vehemently to certain Israeli policies (and I count myself as one of that breed) are definitely not anti-Jewish in this context. So how to tell the difference?
Certainly, AIPAC (the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee) has no problem: Anybody writing anything in opposition to Israeli policies is all too-often smeared with the "anti-Semitic" or "Jew-hater" brush; if they happen to be Jewish, AIPAC types often throw the phrase "self-hating Jew" into the denunication.
In my experience, in order to judge articles about Israelis and Jews somewhat accurately, you sort of have to follow a pundit's writings over time, and discern where the arguments are coming from and where they are going.
REACTIONS TO ISRAELI POLICIES
Most liberals and leftists, including those who have grave disagreements with Israeli policy and U.S. policy toward Israel, abhor generalized statements about any subgroup of people, be they Jews, Arabs, Muslims, African-Americans, gays, women, et al.
But because U.S.-supported Israeli policies are at the heart of much of the conflict in the Middle East, and thus are connected in some degree to Islamist terrorism around the world, anti-Jewish feelings get stirred up more than usual in these current times.
The anti-Semitism-on-the-Left issue cries out for more in-depth examination as to motive and intent. Perhaps in time, I will be able to delve deeper into this topic. Suffice it to say that elements of anti-Semitism are alive and well not only in the usual hate and neo-Nazi sites on the internet but also can be found where most of us live in alternative, progressive and even mainstream circles.
I realize that I come at this topic from an insider's extra-sensitivity, having been raised Jewish and with many members of my parents' families having perished in the Holocaust. Perhaps I’m over-reacting. I would love to believe that, but I don’t really think so. I’d love to hear others’ opinions on this development, which might help expand the thesis.
Bernard Weiner, Ph.D. in government & international relations, has taught at universities in California and Washington, worked for two decades as a writer-editor at the San Francisco Chronicle, and currently serves as co-editor of The Crisis Papers (www.crisispapers.org).
This issue of 'antisemitism' had become a lovely candy for the US pundits on all sides. As mostly the pundits (including the one author of this paper) are profoundly ignorant and also for some strange reason consider themselves as special just either because they are Jewish or because 'my relatives perished', they are unstoppable in their diatribes full of old clishees like ' dormant virus' thing or 'new Jews" etc.
It is all as boring as it is stupid. There are
the simple things though:
1. The website reference listed above belongs to the right- wing demagogues and all their conclusions about 'antisemitism of the left' are to be sent to the toilet.
2. The reference to all those Jugoslavians under Tito who according to the author were bound to kill each other is a racist slander. Most likely the author just heared what he wanted to hear. There are numerous, overwhelming evidences of the excellent coexistence between the nations there and not only because of Tito. The author is ignorant as I said. This time he is even mean.
3. Jews are exactly the same as everyone else. The actual Holocaust did happen to the victims of it. It by no means entitles the people who live now to any special treatment except the acknowledgement that it happened and who did it; thus for instance criticising Israel is perfectly OK: we criticise any government if we consider it a government. Thus Israeli government recently and before behaved as a non-democratic institution and no Jewishness in the world can make it otherwise.
4. There is no 'Jewish conspiracy' but there is a Zionist influence and that movement explicitly defines that 'all Jews' belong to them. If you want to properly treat the Jews as well as anyone else you should distinguish those things and say loud and clear that no one in the world can claim the ownership over the nation and no one in the world can tell a Jew, an Arab, an Indian or a Kentukkian that he /she is obligated by birth to belong to a certain movement. To make claims on the individual by birth is racism.
5. The best to treat the Jews as well as anybody else is to acknowledge the simple thing: that they are no different from anyone else. As such as individuals they can be good and bad, as groups they can have 'conspiracies of interest' and as governments they can be bad governments and good governments. You will find nothing in the actions, say of the government of Israel which was not done before by England, France, USA, Russia, India, Pakistan, Egypt,Germany, etc.
The best thing is to show the facts and make opinions about them. Opinions, whether correct or not are not anti--isms as soon as you treat all the same. As an example we have to acknowledge that there is such thing as AIPAC and it is an Israeli lobby. But it is not the ' Jewish lobby', no matter how they call themselves. An average Jewish person does not benefit from AIPAC activity. So, there is no antisemitism in the exposing of the AIPAC as soon as this exposure is on the same grounds as, say Saudi Lobby influence or powerful Food Business influence ( only do not tell me that US Food works for the US national interests, please). Everyone who deliberately invokes a hammer of antisemitism to brand a label on the 'left' or ' right' for that matter does a bad service of demagoguery to everyone including the Jews. David Irving suffered correctly not because of his antisemitism but because his idiocy was proclaimed and supported as a real science by his peers. As such he decided that he was really a 'historian' of sorts and as such he thought too much about himself. That prompted him to go to Austria where there are laws against his kind of 'views'. He could stay in England with no problem. Idiocy and malice are not really antisemitic- they are anti-human. Truly, the Irving's activity harmed not only Jews, right?
There are no New Jews, Old Jews, etc. There are Jewish people: bad, good, politicians, crooks, murderers, geniuses, fornicators, Zionists, demagogues, rich, poor, stupid, ignorant, mean, nice, perfect, men, women, children. JUST AS EVERYBODY ELSE! TREAT THEM THE SAME OR LEAVE THEM ALONE, PLEASE, ALL OF YOU! FIND ANOTHER CANDY TO SUCK ON!
by
Mark Sashine (46 articles, 19 quicklinks, 234 diaries, 3338 comments)
on Wednesday, March 22, 2006 at 7:26:44 AM
Why won't you take a look in the mirror before throwing in
To Ardee
I never said 'Zionist conspiracy'. I said,' Zionist movement'.You can go yourself and find out that there is such thing and Israel has it as its official ideology and according to that ideology every Jew by blood 'belongs' to them eventually, no matter where and no matter who that person is as a personality. Such ideology no matter what its goal is racist because it assumes unequivocally a bondage by blood. But it has nothing to do with Jews; it has everything to do with some people who happens to be Jewish ( and some of them are not) who promote and pursue their own political agenda using all the means at their disposal. As for conspiracies, people do conspire through pursuing their interests all the time and Zionists are not an exception. Far from it.They would be stupid not to be.
By conspiracy I do not mean the covert meetings etc. I mean a natural way of promoting an agenda of a group of people who for whatever reason feel that together they can achieve their goals. Happens all the time. Can be of good and bad consequences but it always involves hypocricy, demagoguery and manipulation. By actually acknowledging a simple truth that among the Jewish people there could be and certainly are the people who will pursue their own special interests through political and power manipulation we acknowledge the equality of the Jewish people to anyone else. On the contrary, by proclaiming them somehow an artificial exception to the rule we become antisemitic. In fact, as soon as we put a label of 'exceptionality' whether good or bad on the nation or a religious group, we preach thus intolerance and malice. The group can pursue its goals and those goals can be unbelievably mean but they are not exceptional: other people have done that before and will do that after. Jewish people are not an exception in the mozaic of the humans; they posess all the good features and all the vices of all other people: no more and no less.
As such they are subject of the same scrutiny as everyone else. No exceptions.
And one more thing: We usually accuse other people of what we ourselves are capable of. So, before you insult someone you better take a good look in the mirror.
by
Mark Sashine (46 articles, 19 quicklinks, 234 diaries, 3338 comments)
on Thursday, March 23, 2006 at 8:00:54 AM
