ISRAEL, ANTISEMITISM AND THE LEFT

[Behind the Aegis]

In November 2005 an all-party inquiry into antisemitism was set up at Westminster. John Mann, labour MP for Bassetlaw, said that antisemitism is no longer “solely a problem of the far right.” He added pointedly, “The liberal and progressive left is not immune.” An article in the November issue of Progress went further, claiming that “parts of the left peddle a particular version” of antisemitism.

Here is an example of what leads some people to make this allegation. In Davos, Switzerland, January 2003, at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, a group of anti-globalization protestors engaging in street theatre were captured on camera. Two masked figures in monkey costumes represented Donald Rumsfeld and Ariel Sharon. Pinned to ‘Rumsfeld’s’ chest was a yellow six-pointed badge that looked like the yellow Star of David that Jews had to wear under the Nazis, except that it was inscribed sheriff rather than Jude. On ‘Rumsfeld’s’ shoulders was a yoke supporting a massive golden calf. Standing to one side and slightly behind him, arm upraised as if goading him on, ‘Sharon’ brandished a club.

For some, this is the face of the ‘new’ antisemitism: hostility to Israel and Zionism. Others claim that partisans of the Jewish state call their opponents antisemitic in order to silence them. And some of them do. But this does not mean their accusations are always false. If we sincerely want to know the truth of the matter, we need to stop engaging in polemics and to start thinking clearly about what antisemitism is – and what it isn’t.

Let’s start with Mann’s remark that the left is “not immune” to antisemitism. Some find this hard to swallow. After all, antisemitism is racism against Jews, racism is a form of oppression, and fighting oppression is precisely what the left is all about. So, how could there be such a thing as left-wing antisemitism? The very idea seems absurd. Yet human beings are not beyond being absurd. Voltaire, the ‘man of reason’ who represents the Enlightenment, was not exactly rational about Jews. In his Philosophical Dictionary (1764) he writes: “It is with regret that I discuss the Jews: this nation is, in many respects, the most detestable ever to have sullied the earth.” This outburst is in his article on ‘Tolerance’: absurd but true.

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[salvorhardin]

1. ISRAEL, ANTISEMITISM AND THE LEFT

Another great article. I hadn't realized Mossad had hired me a research assistant. I'll have to see about getting you on the Illuminati dental plan. :evilgrin:

Thanks again.

[Behind the Aegis]

2. LOL!

I am all about a good dental plan!!!

Glad you liked the articles...I thought they were interesting.

[question everything]

3. And then there is the Walt-Mearsheimer paper

This is from the WSJ, but google will provide many sites, including one by Dershowitz and many links here http://jpundit.typepad.com/jci/2006/03/walt_mearsheime.html

Sadly, too many DUers hold similar opinions

The Wall Street Journal

Israel Lobby
By RUTH R. WISSE
March 22, 2006; Page A16

(snip)

Now Professors Stephen Walt of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago would have us believe that the Boston cabbie was a dupe of the "unmatched power of the Israel Lobby." Their essay in the latest London Review of Books -- based on a longer working paper on the Kennedy Center Web site -- contends that the U.S. government and most of its citizens are fatally in thrall to a "coalition of individuals and organizations who actively work to steer U.S. foreign policy in a pro-Israel direction." Though not all members of said "coalition" are Jews, and though not all Jews are members, the major schemers are such key organizations as the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, joined by neoconservatives, think tanks, and a large network of accomplices including (they will learn to their surprise) The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.

The thesis of Messrs. Walt and Mearsheimer is remarkably broad and singleminded: A loose association of special-interest groups has persuaded the country to sacrifice its interests to a foreign power, thereby jeopardizing "not only U.S. security but that of much of the rest of the world." Israel, it is claimed, hurts every facet of American life: U.S. emergency aid to Israel during the War of 1973 triggered a damaging OPEC oil embargo. Israel is a liability in the war on terror: It goaded the U.S. into the war in Iraq, betrays America through espionage, and destroys American democracy by quashing all criticism. Recently the Israel Lobby -- a term the authors render with a sinister capital "L" -- has begun to intimidate the universities by trying to create a field of Israel Studies and monitoring anti-Israel bias.

Were it not for the Lobby, the U.S. would have nothing to fear in the world, not even a nuclear threat from Iran: "If Washington could live with a nuclear Soviet Union, a nuclear China or even a nuclear North Korea, it can live with a nuclear Iran. And that is why the Lobby must keep up constant pressure on politicians to confront Tehran." Not Iran but the Lobby is the true threat to America's security by trying to compel the U.S. to oppose Iran against its interests. Most dangerously, Jews control the man at the top: In the spring of 2002 " Sharon and the Lobby took on the president of the United States and triumphed." Given the creative scope of these charges, one is surprised to find no hint of Israel's role in the spread of avian flu.

Organized as a prosecutorial indictment rather than an inquiry, the essay does not tell us why the "Israel Lobby" should have formed in the first place. The 21 countries of the Arab League with ties to 1.2 billion Muslims world-wide are nowhere present as active political agents. There is no mention of the Arab rejection of the United Nations's partition of Palestine in 1948; no 58-year Arab League boycott of Israel and companies trading with Israel; no Arab attacks of 1948, 1967 and 1973; no Arab-Soviet resolution at the U.N. defining Zionism as racism; no monetary and strategic support for Arab terrorism against Jews and Israel; and no Hamas dedication to destroying the Jewish state. The authors do not ask why Arab aggression and Muslim "rage against Israel" should have morphed into a war against the U.S. and the West. Israel's existence elicits Arab and Muslim hostility, hence in their view Israel is to blame for Arab and Muslim carnage.

(snip)

Yet it would be a mistake to treat this article on the "Israel Lobby" as an attack on Israel alone, or on its Jewish defenders, or on the organizations and individuals it singles out for condemnation. Its true target is the American public, which now supports Israel with higher levels of confidence than ever before. When the authors imply that the bipartisan support of Israel in Congress is a result of Jewish influence, they function as classic conspiracy theorists who attribute decisions to nefarious alliances rather than to the choices of a democratic electorate. Their contempt for fellow citizens dictates their claims of a gullible and stupid America. Their insistence that American support for Israel is bought and paid for by the Lobby heaps scorn on American judgment and values. No wonder David Duke, white supremacist and former leader of the Ku Klux Klan, claimed that this article "validated every major point I have been making since even before the war started." But he and Walt-Mearsheimer have it backwards: Americans don't support Israel because of the strength of any lobby; Israel earns American support the hard way, for the very reasons the Boston cabbie cited several decades ago.

Ms. Wisse is the Martin Peretz Professor of Yiddish Literature and professor of comparative literature at Harvard.

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http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114299039902704761.html (subscription)