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December 12, 2004

When anti-Israel = anti-Semite

I am happy to add That Liberal Media to my blogroll. I was particularly interested in this post where Brian Crouch thoroughly fisks an article by Rick Steves for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Can we fight terrorism constructively? Which basically ignores the basis of terrorism and indulges in the usual blame America and Israel mendacity.

What happens in the post's comments is interesting. A poster by the handle of "Tom Murphy" pretty much lets it all hang out. He lays the blame for 9/11 squarely at the feet of American support of Israel. He claims that when the rights of "non-Jews in Israel" are so violated, what can we expect? For "Tom" Israel, not the Arabs, are the transgressors. Israel is the villain and the Arabs are the victims. He ignores and twists history to suit his dogma.

Is Israel perfect? A utopia? No. But to be Churchillian, it is a damn sight better than the countries around it dedicated to its annihiliation.

There comes a time when such Israel-hating rhetoric as "Tom" spews needs to be called for what it is. A figleaf for anti-Semitism.

As Natan Sharansky so movingly wrote in November 2003

Obviously, the state of Israel cannot be the cause of a phenomenon that predates it by over 2,000 years. But might it be properly regarded as the cause of contemporary anti-Semitism? What is certain is that, everywhere one looks, the Jewish state does appear to be at the center of the anti-Semitic storm--and nowhere more so, of course, than in the Middle East.
The rise in viciously anti-Semitic content disseminated through state-run Arab media is quite staggering, and has been thoroughly documented. Arab propagandists, journalists, and scholars now regularly employ the methods and the vocabulary used to demonize European Jews for centuries--calling Jews Christ-killers, charging them with poisoning non-Jews, fabricating blood libels, and the like. In a region where the Christian faith has few adherents, a lurid and time-worn Christian anti-Semitism boasts an enormous following.
.........
The centrality of Israel to the revival of a more generalized anti-Semitism is also evident in the international arena. Almost a year after the current round of Palestinian violence began, and after hundreds of Israelis had already been killed in buses, discos and pizzerias, a so-called World Conference against Racism was held under the auspices of the United Nations in Durban, South Africa. It turned into an anti-Semitic circus, with the Jewish state being accused of everything from racism and apartheid to crimes against humanity and genocide. In this theater of the absurd, the Jews themselves were turned into perpetrators of anti-Semitism, as Israel was denounced for its "Zionist practices against Semitism"--the Semitism, that is to say, of the Palestinian Arabs.

Naturally, then, in searching for the "root cause" of anti-Semitism, the Jewish state would appear to be the prime suspect. But Israel, it should be clear, is not guilty. The Jewish state is no more the cause of anti-Semitism today than the absence of a Jewish state was its cause a century ago.
To see why, we must first appreciate that the always specious line between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism has now become completely blurred: Israel has effectively become the world's Jew. From Middle Eastern mosques, the bloodcurdling cry is not "Death to the Israelis," but "Death to the Jews." In more civilized circles, a columnist for the London Observer proudly announces that he does not read published letters in support of Israel that are signed by Jews. (That the complaints commission for the British press found nothing amiss in this statement only goes to show how far things have changed since Orwell wrote of Britain in 1945 that "it is not at present possible, indeed, that anti-Semitism should become respectable.") When discussion at fashionable European dinner parties turns to the Middle East, the air, we have been reliably informed, turns blue with old-fashioned anti-Semitism.

I don't expect to change the minds of the "Tom Murphy" ilk. However, I will bear witness, whenever wherever I can, that such Jew-hatred and support of Judenrein motives as operate in the Middle East and elsewheres will not go unchallenged.

Posted by Darleen at December 12, 2004 06:48 PM

Comments

Darllen, you have skipped past the main point. The point was that Bush and others lie about why we were attacked. You ignore what the 1998 Fatwa (I just put this page together for you)says an the rest of the evidence.

You ignore the points I rais and insist on slandering people instead of dealing with the facts. Did you notice that Tenet and others chop off the key sentence of the 1998 Fatwa? (removing the part that mentions the motive) Did you see that or not?

Posted by: Tom Murphy at December 13, 2004 10:07 AM

- Tom you're whole premise is totally off the mark and sounds more like the parroting of one of your Socialist college profs if you even attended one....Read and learn...

- Bin Laden is one of 22 brother Saudi Princes, who tried mightily to garner the favor of His father for years, finally attempting in vain to instigate an all out war on several of the neighboring countries because he felt they failed to live up to the teachings of his Wahabi sect. His family eventually tired of his delusional, aggressive acts and disowned him, banishing him to exile in the Sudan. He was thrown out of there for various petty crimes and landed in Afghanistan...

- He is a bitter, hedonistic extremist, most closely comparable to Hitler during the "Mien Kompf" years. He adores Fascism, and has openly embraced the ideals of the third Reich, including ethnic cleansing and religious intolerance. Like Hitler, he set out to "prove" all of his critics wrong, and show the world what a great leader and purveyor of ideas he is. That is his whole modus operandi....

- To do that he needed to use the old Fascist ideas of Identifying an enemy, demonizing that enemy, and then painting a "crusade" in the colors and clothing of "the underdog abused class" against the "thieving murdering overlords". He naturally reverts back to his most ardent beliefs and the things he was taught in his extreme fundamentalist schooling...

- His first "enemy" was the Russians in Afghanistan. When they quit and went home he was lost for a cause for a time. When the Berlin wall came down in '89 he turned his attention to America and took part in the planning and operations of the first WTC bombing...

- His Fatwa's are rejected by the vast majority of the Islamic sects, and regarded as "religious prevarications" by most Muslim leaders. His "war" has nothing to do with America perse'. He wants America to turn its back on Arabia to weaken the strong financial status of the countries he hates, most of all the Saudi Royal family itself, and bring them down. That is his main goal....

- You simply have to be stupid or uneducated to repeat the lies and rants, Jihadist driven, concerning the Israeli/Palestine situation. Time after time since the very beginning in 1948 the Israeli's have tried to reach settlements with the Palestinian leadership. Every time they have initially agreed and then attacked. In the three day war they combined with Russia and Egypt against Israel and got their asses kicked and lost half their territory. Then they whined that they were taken advantage of. They had a chance to get 95% of what they wanted but they choose war instead. Arafat was the worst lying thug of the bunch....

- They always lie and war because their agenda is not to live in peace with their neighbors. They don't give a damn about any Mosques in Televiv or Jerusalem. They want to destroy all Jews and Israel. Just as on a larger scale, the megalomaniac Bin Laden dreams of an all Muslin world. Just another despot like so many before him, and not nearly as good at annihilating people as Stalin, Hitler, or even Hussein...

- You asshat Marxists never give up trying to shove your Utopian dreams down peoples throats. It never works but like lemmings you can't seem to stop yourselves. Of course the dirty little secret in this latest assault on Liberty by you and your Socialist/Communist friends, is the unholy alignment you find yourselves in with the Islamic Jihadists. You can't accept the hideous notion that you're in bed with Fascism, a form of competing totalitarianism the left has always despised, so you do everything you can to deny it even exists, and demonize everything "American"/"Israeli". Thats also why the lefturds paint Bush and the "neocons" as Fascist. Just to rally the ire and hate of the party faithful. "The big lie". Its all been done before. Old, old ideas that everyone sees though these days. Good luck. You and yours won't be happy puppies. History has shown that over and over. Men want freedom, not "sheltering", opportunity, not "entitlements"....

Posted by: Hunter at December 13, 2004 01:13 PM

"Time after time since the very beginning in 1948 the Israeli's have tried to reach settlements with the Palestinian leadership."

where the hell are you getting yor "facts" from? It really is messed up for you to lie like that. What is your deal? are you really this ignorant or do you figure anything goes as long as it serves the Jewish State? start dealing with the facts

Posted by: Tom Murphy at December 13, 2004 05:09 PM