On course for Holocaust II…..?
More than a quarter of a century on from Harkabi’s warning, the impression conveyed by mainstream Western media reporting and comment while the IDF was (and still is) delivering death and destruction to the Gaza Strip was not that a transformation of anti-Israelism/anti-Zionism into historical anti-Semitism might be underway, but that the anti-Israel protests and demonstrations across the world, in Europe especially, were manifestations of naked anti-Semitism. In other words, what used to be called the “sleeping giant of anti-Semitism” is awake again.
The most dramatic headline that came to my notice was over an article in The Guardian by Jon Henley on 7 August. It read: Antisemitism on rise across Europe “in worst times since the Nazis”. And underneath that there was a secondary headline, Experts say attacks go beyond Israel-Palestine conflict as hate crimes strike fear into Jewish communities.
One of the “experts” Henley quoted was Dieter Graumann, president of Germany’s Central Council of Jews. He said: “These are the worst times since the Nazi era. On the streets you here things like ‘Jews should be gassed, Jews should be burned’. We haven’t had that in Germany for decades. Anyone saying those slogans isn’t criticising Israeli policies, it’s just pure hatred against Jews; nothing else. And it’s not just a German phenomenon. It’s an outbreak of hatred against Jews so intense that it’s very clear.”
Some demonstrators and protestors were using Israel’s latest war on the Gaza Strip as a cover for expressing their inherent anti-Semitism, but most were not. Most were criticising and condemning Israel’s actions, not expressing hatred of Jews just because they are Jews.
I agree with Christopher Dickey who made this comment. “Can you criticise Israel’s military actions and a lot of its policies without being anti-Semitic? Yes. Can you do it without having some people accuse you of anti-Semitism? No, you can’t.”
In passing I want to add that in my opinion the global reaction against Israel was driven not only by visual evidence of the death and destruction the IDF delivered to the Gaza Strip but also the absurd statements of justification made by all who speak for Israel right or wrong from Netanyahu down. (“Hamas is engaging in child sacrifice” etcetera, etcetera). Their statements were in my view an insult to the intelligence of all sane people who could see for themselves what was happening as Israel unleashed its fire power. Avi Shlaim put it this way. “The terms in which Netanyahu and his right-wing colleagues frame the conflict with Hamas is a mixture of half-truths, outright lies, deliberate deception and mind-boggling double-standards.”
The key to understanding is, I submit, in the following paragraph.
Yes, it’s true that the giant of real anti-Semitism has been present throughout history, sometimes sleeping, sometimes awake and on the rampage. But after the Nazi holocaust, and because of it, the giant not only went back to sleep, IT ALMOST CERTAINLY WOULD HAVE DIED IN ITS SLEEP IF THERE HAD BEEN NO ZIONISM.
That last statement is, of course, speculation on my part but I believe it is fully supported by the completeness of the assimilation of the Jewish citizens of the Western nations as the second half of the 20th century unfolded. Also to be noted is that in the last decade or so about one million Israeli Jews said goodbye to the Zionist state to start new lives in the Western nations; and in the months before the European protests and demonstrations against Israel’s latest war on the Gaza Strip, more of those who took their leave of Israel resettled themselves in Germany rather than America.
Page 2 of 6 | Previous page | Next page