In the recesses of too many minds throughout the int’l community dwells the notion that Jews are inherently to blame for whatever befalls them.
Fate inserts assorted unexpected subplots into our lives. Some months ago, a reader from Germany responded to a column of mine in so insightful a manner that I thought it merits acknowledgment. From there sprang forth a friendship by e-mail that still thrives. This non-Jewish German friend quickly explained that his unwavering support for Israel is by no means the bon ton of his Bavarian milieu and that his outspokenness on its behalf hardly enhances his popularity.
A relative of his, a philosophy professor who currently teaches in China, won’t hear of visiting Israel due to its “flagrant human rights violations.”
But aren’t Beijing’s abuses, pressed my Internet interlocutor, far more off-putting?
China, retorted the professor, “clearly imposes capital punishment according to the law. Hence any reasonable person must arrive at the conclusion that China is a Rechtsstaat” – a state of justice. Not so Israel, judges the professor. “What law anywhere permits bombardment of Hamas training camps? Israel therefore is a Räuberland” – robbers’ land. The professor stresses that he wouldn’t even dignify Israel with the title of “state.”
It didn’t end there. My friend wondered whether double standards, demonization and delegitimization of Israel don’t attest to anti-Semitism (as per Natan Sharansky’s three-D test). The professor stood his ground: “If you want to know why anti-Semitism is resurfacing, ask all those people who had lost money and whose living standards were lowered. You will then hear names like Goldman-Sachs and Lehman Brothers and you will know why.”
The Jewish collective is clearly held liable for the conduct of individuals. It matters nothing that publicly traded companies like Lehman’s and Goldman’s haven’t been necessarily or exclusively Jewish-run for years. Non-Jewish names like Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch or Morgan Stanley obviously trigger no hostility.
My friend recently attended a family birthday party where one of the guests, a retired German judge, opined that “you can’t make peace with a Jew.”
Plain and simple with no reservations or elucidations. His flat-out ruling went unchallenged by any of the celebrants. It was axiomatic.
Those among us who still strive to pretend that Jew-revulsion isn’t a formative factor out there may dismiss these as irrelevant anecdotes. But they aren’t. They are crucial facts of life which many Israelis and Jews prefer to repress.
It’s more comforting to make believe that we don’t face bottomless blind hate which we cannot moderate. It’s distressing to recognize that underlying animus (even when camouflaged and rationalized) poisons minds and tilts the scales forcefully against Israel in the kangaroo court of world opinion.
It’s disagreeable to realize that de rigueur Israel-bashing has unleashed latent predilections which, despite their transitory apparent abeyance, festered beneath the floorboards of human decency. They aren’t really suppressed even in a country like Germany, where minimal introspection and circumspection (not just on the official level) may be expected.
Admitting that the cards are stacked against us, that there’s little we can do to make ourselves better liked, goes against the ancient Jewish instinct to ingratiate ourselves. We want the world to appreciate the real us – virtuous, liberal and altruistic to a fault.
It’s reassuring to assume, even if misguidedly, that everything hinges on our improving our behavior. That imparts a semblance of control. The reverse awareness, even though eminently accurate, is agonizing. It implies lack of control.
It tells us that even our best conduct can’t change the way we’re perceived. We cannot face-lift our image. We can explain ourselves till we’re hoarse and employ the most ostensibly effective and sophisticated PR, but it won’t make an iota of a difference. We’ll end up convincing ourselves, preaching to the choir and not getting so much as a polite hearing abroad.
THAT’S WHAT happened in the Gaza-bound flotilla’s case. We couldn’t emerge smelling sweet no matter how things were handled. Our hankering after good press is essentially what emboldened the Mavi Marmara terrorists to resort to homicidal violence against our commandos. We willingly fell for the illusory façade of “aid ships” ferrying pacifist, “Kumbaya”-crooning philanthropists.
We fell for their mendacious mantras because we desired to show restraint and to regard the Mavi Marmara’s Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood passengers in the same amiable light that their propaganda radiated throughout Europe and in America’s “progressive” enclaves. We wanted to be just as loved in those same quarters. We declined to delve into why terror mongers are endeared and why we, who seek to defend ourselves, are so vilified.
Refusing to look unpleasant truth squarely in the face, we sent naval units to a violent encounter armed with paint-ball guns. The shipboard Hamas-boosters promised nothing but passive noncompliance and we chose not to remember that even when Arabs blow up fast food eateries and lob rockets into a sleepy outlying town, they manipulatively resort to “human rights” and “resistance” terminology.
If anything, we were guilty only of wishful thinking. It’s therefore especially galling that Israel’s most ardent promoters of such wishful thinking and self-deception are our loudest Monday-morning quarterbacks, the ones who most vehemently let us know (in retrospect, of course) which moves the government should have made. Their hindsight, as always, is remarkably flawless.
But self-flagellation is fundamentally futile. There is no way Israel could have won or could win the world’s sympathy. In the recesses of too many minds within the supposedly enlightened international community dwells the notion that Jews are inherently to blame for whatever befalls them. It’s nothing new. It’s unrelated to any policy practiced by any Israeli government. It predates Israel.
It can be monstrous.
In 1858 Bologna the Papal Police burst into the Mortara home and abducted the Jewish family’s six-year-old son, Edgardo. The pretext was that sometime during his infancy, Edgardo’s nanny surreptitiously baptized him. The Vatican remained impervious to the widespread outcry and the distraught family’s entreaties. Pope Pius IX “adopted” the child and kept him cloistered in a monastery. Edgardo was never returned. In time he was ordained a priest and dispatched to proselytize Jews.
Yet Pius IX managed to blame the Jews for the outrage. He maintained the parents could have Edgardo back instantly, if only they would convert. When they refused, Pius cleansed his hands: Obstinate Jews inflict pain on themselves. All the Mortaras had to do was give in.
The identical message resonates today. Obstinate Israel inflicts pain. All it needs to do is voluntarily capitulate. Otherwise, it will be pilloried.
My late father used to say: “We will be condemned whatever we do, but to be condemned for nothing is stupid. We ought to at least earn the inevitable censure, deserve it just a bit.”
The sooner we come to grips with this reality – unlovely as it is – the better for our national psyche. We have to do what’s good for us and not view ourselves through lenses tinted by the prevalent likes of the above-mentioned professor and judge.
www.sarahhonig.com
Good news and bad news.
Good news is tha they found oil beneath the gas,
Bad news. Israel signed leases with the consortium that allows them a free hand in other markets. They intend to sell the gas to non Israeli buyers.
Too much corruption here.
The Gas field off the coast of gaza can pay for every gazan to be relocated elsewhere in style BP would be overjoyed
Yamit… Of course I agree completely with what you say, especially about instilling fear rather than pointlessly trying to instill love…
And this:
kind of says it all.
ron I think this might ans. you best.
PASCAL WAS ASKED TO PROVE THE EXISTENCE OF G-d BY KING LOUIS 14TH. HE REPLIED: “THE JEWS YOUR MAJESTY THE JEWS”
calvary is correct but not exactly as he states. Too complicated to explain briefly.
ron it’s not about the Gentiles it’s all about the Jews
Faith and trust in G-d are no small matter. The Jewish People must prove their trust in G-d by difficult, frightening, and sometimes ostensibly.
The commandment, do not be afraid, is a difficult one to obey, and a major commandment. But the person whom G-d has sent on His mission must stand firm in his trust in Him.
Dangerous acts, acts that demand of Israel courage, acts which by their very nature show disdain for the non-Jew, anger him and threaten to bring a confrontation between him and Israel, and all must be performed with complete faith and trust that if Israel do what is decreed upon them, then G-d, too, will fulfill what he promised His treasured nation. Precisely this proves one’s true faith and trust, for it is impossible that one who fears mortal man really believes in G-d. Real trust in G-d requires the Jew both to trust in Him and cast off all fear of mortal man and reliance on human aid. […]
Whoever accepts this principle of bitachon (trust in G-d) unreservedly, truly believes that G-d is the One Supreme Power, G-d of heaven and earth. Whoever hesitates, whoever fears the non-Jew, shows that he questions G-d’s ability to help His people. It is doubtful, whether he completely believes in G-d as an Omnipotent Supreme Power.
I don’t know what answer I expected to hear but I must admit I am very pleasantly surprised.
Uncle, there were some bad claims laid upon the Jews for no good reason. Hate evolved and like a lie when not nipped in the bud continues to fester and becomes destructive running unchallenged gathering momentum and spreading like wildfire, picking up fools like fly paper to carry their banner to be passed on from one generation to another.
Uncle there seems to be some validity to what Calvary suggest.
Israel has to face reality of Jew-hatred, and it does run very deep, exploding to the surface in times of economic distress and the absence of any non-Jewish voice with moral authority (Pope, President, UN, ha ha ha). I do not know if energy independence, when Israel’s natural gas starts flowing, will change anything, but it can’t hurt.
Being the Chosen People is a blessing and a curse, the blessing being that in the end we’ll prevail, and the curse being that the journey will be tortuous. God put us on Earth to become the light unto humanity, which means being despised. That’s our role. We have always been humanity’s scapegoats, and it’s not to change anytime soon. In fact, it’s getting worse. If it becomes too much to bear, there’s an opt-out clause. We can always become Muslims. I’d rather be despised. In the war between the Jews and the world, the world will lose as long as we side with God. He gave us Jerusalem, and we have no right to trade it in exchange for Pharaoh Obama’s blessing. We were taught as children that as long as the Jews hold Jerusalem, all will end well, but if the pragmatists ever carry the day, Israel is doomed. It may seem like superstitious nonsense to many people including most Jews, until you realize that it’s impossible for Israel to exist today. There’s no way. It was long gone and dead, and when it was reborn it was hopelessly outgunned and outnumbered. Israel can’t now be alive, except that the God of Israel guaranteed it. Our faith is being tested by our God. That’s the only challenge that matters because it’s the decisive one. If we ace that test, we’re home free. I’ll see you tomorrow.
Yamit, it’s interesting to me that you use the Bible to lay out a secular understanding of anti-Semitism. After all, those three elements can apply to any particular group within a larger dominant culture.
So, I’d go further into the spiritual realm and say that anti-Semitism is a unique form of evil driven by a desire to thwart God’s plans and purposes for Israel – ultimately a fool’s errand if ever there was.
Of course, that begs the question: What is God’s primary plan for Israel? But, I KNOW we all have different answers for that!
Ron if you really want to get a handle on antisemitism take your KJ bible go to the Book of Esther and read the story.
This might help you: Mordechai saves the life and the throne of Ahasuerus. He discovers a plot against the king, and since the story is told in romantic-poetic and not in political-historical terms, we are not told whether this is an imperialist, fascist, or Trotskyist-Maoist plot. Or perhaps it was a plot instigated by Haman himself? And now we come to the central theme which is the first presentation of anti-Semitic theory and practice. Thousands of anti-Semitic books have been written since them in every country and every language, which are all nothing but a repetition and amplification of the same basic theme stated by Haman: “There is a certain people scattered and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom; their laws are different from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king’s laws, so that is not to the king’s advantage to tolerate them.” (Esther 3:8)
No clearer, more succinct definition of anti-Semitism has been formulated since. All the three elements are there: Desire for domination, particularism, disloyalty. But Haman was not only the first anti-Semite theoretician, he was also a man of action who submitted to his king, and to all the kings and rulers throughout the ages, the model plan for the FINAL SOLUTION — this time not in Berlin and not at the Kremlin, but at Shushan: “To destroy, to slay, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, and plunder their goods” ( Esther 3:13).
There are those that for years have been rightfully denouncing the use of the term “anti-Semitism” on the grounds that there are ultra-Semites who are among the worst enemies of the Jews. and the ultra-Aryans who are the friends of the semitic Arabs who provided they help them get rid of the Jews. The alternative term is HAMANISM, after the father of the anti-Jewish doctrine and of the final solution. Legend has it that Waisata, the last of Haman’s ten sons, managed to tear himself away from the scaffold and escape. It was created to account for the fact that despite the hanging of the original Haman and his sons his descendants keep cropping up again time after time, in every country and in every age.
Laura, trust me I must be either the dumbest SOB on earth and or just plain stupid.
I am completely overwhelmed with this Jew hatred, none of it makes any sense. I had said numerous times I can’t find any justification for an ounce of hatred.
It reminds me as a little kid people would say be careful of the boggy man. We became afraid of this character and we passed it along to others, baseless as it was the boggy mans for us was real. That’s how shit starts.
Yamit, you have mirrored my own youth. I had many fights and lost some, but developed respect in my community, schools and athletic teams. It was the same for my military service, business life and my senior days. One can not make someone love you, but you can make them respect you in many ways.
But this current hysterical wave of Jew-hatred comes at a time when muslims are waging global jihad against all non-muslims. Yet the bloodthirsty actions of muslims worldwide have not engendered nearly as much hatred against them. In fact the worse the muslims get, the more Jews are villified.
And who do the gentiles blame for the muslims inflicting pain upon them? I know, that is also the fault of the Jews, certainly not themselves or the jihadist barbarians.
ron my friend ( smiling) what ever gives you confidence that when it comes to hating Jews reasonable conclusions will win out? It has nothing to do with smarts. Some of the smartest people around today as well as the past were virulent anti-semites like Tolstoy and Rousseau. Very smart Jews are Jew haters as well.
I don’t care if Jews are hated it is when it crosses the line from thoughts to actions and threatens the Jews physically is where my lines are drawn .
s.
I realize that however, by calling them out on their speech hopefully it will encourage them to reason why they feel the way they do about Jews and I am sure if they are smart enough they will come to the conclusion there is no justification for this hatred.
ron you may control public utterances or speech but you can’t control everyone’s thoughts.
There is anti semitism in places with no Jews and no history of Jews like Japan and China.
Easier to eradicate world poverty and cancer, HIV than Jew Hatred.
I never sought to be accepted by gentiles and even some Jews. I enjoyed my childhood fights and enjoyed kicking the crap out of them. Even when I lost a few fights I won in all cases because I got respect and they never came near me again. That’s when I began to acquire my good Christian friends. They stopped seeing me as a Jew and as one who could and would if provoked beat any of them to a pulp.
I will admit that on occasion it was ME who did the provoking. This story is micro to the macro I always advise readers here and elsewhere.
If you want respect from the world? Apply my youthful examples on a larger scale, even and especially a national scale.
Fear begets respect but fear must be earned by actions. Fear needs to be instilled in the hearts and minds of those who wish you harm.
Uncle (Yamit) just as I commented earlier. A situation where this judge (they should take his robe away) should have been called out on this comment and to explain what he means by that.
When situations like this go unchecked, the continue to breed more and more.
“SPEAK UP, STOMP OUT ANTI-SEMITISM”
Thanks for posting this. I love Sarah and I think she is the best writer of anything in Israel.