Conflating anti-Semitism, criticism of Israel helps no one

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 25/05/2016 (3752 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s the ghoul that refuses to disappear: anti-Semitism, the hatred of Jewish people merely and exclusively because of who they are. It’s dark, multifaceted and complex in origin, and impossible to properly define and dissect in a single column but, as I say, it simply will not die.

Its earlier form was religious, its more modern was racial, and now it has become political. In Europe in particular, Jew-hatred has been enabled by the debate around Israel and Palestine and here is where the discussion becomes acutely difficult but absolutely essential: isolating and condemning the anti-Semite but acknowledging and allowing the concerned critic of Israeli policy.

In Britain, the Labour Party is experiencing internal paroxysms as it investigates and sometimes expels members, some of them relatively senior, for comments about Jews that go far beyond anti-Zionism.

In Canada, the post-Mulcair NDP could well have its own challenges, with the left sometimes losing its sense of decorum over the Middle East.

So how do we know, how should we respond and how do we react to the irrational?

The first reality we need to embrace is that the last people who should be held responsible for anti-Semitism are the Palestinians. In spite of the contrived narrative around the repugnant Mufti of Jerusalem in the 1930s and ’40s and his support for Hitler, the vast majority of Palestinians had absolutely nothing to do with the European genocide of the Jews. The anti-Semitic toxins that flowed into the bloodstream of the European body politic were, to the shame of the church, a gruesome mingling of perverted Christianity, forest tribalism and political instability.

For Palestinians, the Jews were not victims, not persecuted people begging simply to be left alone but strong, determined, bellicose young pioneers who wanted Palestine for themselves. A Palestinian hating Israelis is nothing at all like a moronic fascist hating Jews, and to confuse the two is unfair to Palestinians and dilutes the sheer horror of authentic anti-Semitism.

However, while we should absolutely understand Palestinian agony, it’s a little more challenging to blithely forgive some of the hysterical statements made by Europeans and North Americans.

Whatever may have been done in the name of Zionism, the reality is Israel was not some colonial or academic project but an act of desperation from a people who had worked to be accepted in Germany, Poland, Russia, and pretty much everywhere else. It’s simply too facile to condemn Israel without at least some empathy with the Jewish experience.

But then, of course, we have the downright Jew-haters using Palestine as an excuse to perpetuate their racism. They should be exposed by everyone, whatever their views on the Middle East, but in dismissing the racists, it’s important not to demonize those who have no hostility to Jews but do believe Israel acts unjustly and the Palestinians have both a historic and contemporary grievance.

Nor can it be denied that for decades the label of anti-Semite was thrown at those who criticized Israel. It was a shortsighted and unethical ploy, and was so overused that today, tragically, the accusation is sometimes ignored even when entirely appropriate.

It’s a dilemma. Pakistanis who have no knowledge of Israel or the Arab world screaming at Jews out of a misguided sense of Islamic solidarity while saying nothing when Pakistan enforces its vile blasphemy laws. American Christian Zionists applauding every Israeli action out of an obsession with the end times but dismissing the cries of fellow Christians who are Palestinian. White leftists comparing Israelis to Nazis but admiring Iran even though it murders young gay men. And so on.

Paradox, blood-thick confusion, hypocrisy, inconsistency and exploitation. The Arab rulers continue to oppress, the world powers continue to fight wars vicariously, and Israel does pretty much what it wants to do. Yet, the Palestinians continue to suffer and ordinary Israelis continue to wonder why they can’t just put down their guns and party. I wish I had a solution, but I don’t, and I fear that those who want to divide, hate and hurt are winning the battle.

Michael Coren’s new book is Epiphany: A Christian’s Change of Heart & Mind Over Same-Sex Marriage.

mcoren@sympatico.ca