Recent expressions of antisemitism

Not too long ago, I came across yet another claim that antisemitism is pretty much over with. That would make it the only prejudice to ever disappear as a result of getting bad. Perhaps, then the answer to all sorts of other prejudices would be to have an Inquisition? Or an outbreak of pogroms? Or, a Holocaust? Well, no.

Slavery and lynchings didn't lead to the end of racism and the Holocaust didn't lead to the end of antisemitism. It is not relegated to the fringes where it's safely contained. While overt expressions were hushed, the same ideas that underlie it are still prevalent in society. And that means it's still around.

The CST in Britain just released a report on antisemitic incidents in Britain from 2007. It's a .pdf, so I'll also link to the post at Harry's Place which picks out a few statistics. The numbers were slightly down from 2006, which Mark Gardner of the CST attributes to a decline in hate mail while the number of violent assaults were actually up. That the numbers were down was attributed to a lack of a "Lebanon War-type trigger" in the Middle East, but that's likely to mean bad things for 2008 starting with the attention on Gaza. And future trigger events, whether they relate to the Middle East or expand to domestic politics in Western countries, are inevitable. Jews, of course, have been blamed for more than just wars in the past - and that might be starting.

While hate crime statistics are rarely very solid, recall that a 2006 study found Jews in Britain far more likely than Muslims to be victims. And while American statistics on hate crimes are harder to interpret, they suggest the same thing, with Jews victims of over 65% of religiously motivated hate crimes while Muslims were victims of almost 12%. In part because Jews are not recognized as a distinct ethnic group in statistics and many Islamophobic attacks may have been listed as racially-motivated, in part because there's likely to be different willingness to report crimes among the two demographic groups - mostly because there's no need or use in trying to say who's got it worse - I'd caution against arguing that one group faces worse oppression. But two groups can face oppression at the same time. Duh! Yet time and again, I've been told that Jews aren't oppressed or that Muslims have it worse and so we shouldn't worry about antisemitism.

So here are some more links I've collected over just the past few days:

The Guardian jumped to conclusions about who killed a member of Hezbollah. Irrational anti-Zionism/anti-Israelism/antisemitism? Whichever, I'm not particularly happy about it. Yaacov Lozowick has a dissection of the headline well worth reading.

It's not so hushed anymore in Poland (even though there aren't many Jews there):

WARSAW - This was not a pogrom, but it was close. Sunday's incident in Krakow at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus was rife with overtones of hatred. "The Jews are attacking us! We need to defend ourselves," shouted Prof. Bogoslav Wolniewicz, to stormy applause.

Ben Cohen writes about the links being formed joining part of the left to the far-right, discussing specifically events in Italy. The same is happening in the US, with Mearsheimer and Walt providing a high profile (and cover, as everyone is too intimidated to denounce their work in strong terms).

Unsurprisingly, the Iranians make the list.

A minor tv celebrity "sent her former Israeli-born employer, Ami James, an autographed photo some months ago bearing a swastika and the invective 'burn in hell Jewbag.'"

Although it was a discussion about immigration, not antisemitism, Lou Dobbs dissed the ADL. (Of course, if you're of the opinion that the Final Solution provided an ironic final solution to antisemitism, that wouldn't bother you, but then you might be the sort of person who thinks Jews abuse the memory of the Holocaust for political gain.)

And a blatantly antisemitic hoax about AIPAC trying to bribe Kucinich -taken as proof of Jewish power- is circulating the internet, including DailyKos and Portland Indymedia. According to the DailyKos posting, "Kucinich now faces several well-financed primary challengers for his seat in Congress," and this is implied to be the quick work of an organization with power quite beyond that of any other I've ever heard of.

Of course, I'm probably blissfully unaware of a few more cemetary desecrations and other incidents. And, of course while the guy recently arrested in Brooklyn might have been a fringe figure, that doesn't mean he couldn't have killed people. So, yeah, the ADL is relevant. And people are right to worry about the effects of Mearsheimer and Walt's thesis of Jewish power.

Updates: Vancouver public library to showcase blatant antisemite (who often simply substitutes the word Khazar for "Jew" like some people use Canadian for "black"). And, yes, the antisemitism of groups like Hamas (an interesting video), does count as antisemitism in the world. Another sampling, of a different character can be found here. And, you know, I missed the significance of part of the Dennis Kucinich rumor: supposedly, Pelosi was with AIPAC as they tried to get Kucinich to drop his efforts to impeach Cheney. Because, of course, Jews are running both branches of government in an orchestrated fashion.

Arun Gandhi has been sacrificed?

After his initial insult -placing a "Jewish identity" overly tied to the Holocaust at the center of a global culture of violence- and his failure to really apologize, I predicted:

Now, surely there will be arguments from the "anti-Zionists" complaining that the "Zionists" have stifled Arun Gandhi.

No surprise at all that this has happened, or that it uses more of the standard tropes of antisemitism to defend antisemitism. Not such a surprise, either that it isn't just those "anti-Zionists" who keep Nazi flags in their closets. John Mearsheimer, for instance. He's received a lot of polite criticism, savaging his arguments at the most basic levels while denying that he is an antisemite, as he campaigns against "The Israel lobby," which he claims has a "stranglehold" on Congress. Readers of this blog will know that I read that as a complaint about Jewish power that's inherently antisemitic regardless of how politely it is said. Mearsheimer says that there were many important points Gandhi raised that aren't being dealt with by Gandhi's critics. For instance, as paraphrased in an article in Outlook India (to me via Judeosphere):

it is widely recognized that many Israelis and American Jews use the memory of the Holocaust for political purposes and that Israel adopts violent strategies in the Arab world.

No, John. Among ordinary people, it is widely recognized that the Holocaust was an incredible tragedy that, a mere 60 years later, is still worth remembering. It is only people like Mearsheimer who respond to people's genuine fears by accusing them of being duplicitous. Whether such charges derive from the classic stereotype of scheming Jews is hard to say, but it certainly echoes them quite closely.

And wouldn't you be afraid if there were people like John Mearsheimer on the New York Times bestseller list arguing that you are somehow silencing them? (The implication of that argument, as we've seen historically, is eliminationist; though Mearsheimer, Gandhi, et al. haven't thought through the implications.) That an argument so clearly wrong could sell itself so well certainly makes me scared.

On the other hand, while it is disappoiniting, it's not very surprising that some of this has come from Arun Gandhi himself (again, via Judeosphere).

There is no escaping the fact that the language I used and the generalisations I made in an article that I wrote hurriedly and did not revise were the main cause of the controversy. In addition, of course there are a strong group of radical, right-wing Jewish people who don’t entertain any criticism of Israel at all.

Here, we have the insinuation that anyone who complains too loudly about antisemitism is a "radical, right-wing" member of the Israel lobby, playing up their reaction for political gain. Well, I'm not - I'm just offended by antisemitism.

I think the Jewish lobby is strongest in the US and therefore the reaction was stronger here than it would have been anywhere else.

(Oh, whoops. Not the Israel lobby as I had said, but the Jewish lobby.) This is a perfect example of what I termed double bind antisemitism. The fact that Jews act against antisemitism is taken as proof of Jewish power to push an even more antisemitic world-view. Gandhi rightly stepped down from his position - then argues that he has "sacrificed himself" to the Zionist Lions - neatly inverting the power relationship to suggest that it is Jews oppressing the rest of the world.

I was told that the university was under tremendous pressure. There was a possibility that some funding would be cut off. I thought that the institution is greater than the individual and so I was willing to sacrifice myself so that the university and the institute did not suffer.

Sure! I certainly wouldn't give money to an institute for nonviolence that was led by someone so willing to demonize Jews. Even if I weren't so offended by antisemitism, that sort of language goes against all the principles of nonviolence.

Here's what I didn't predict, though. Arun Gandhi, John Mearsheimer, et al, are using these arguments despite acknowledging that the original source of the problem was that Arun Gandhi's statement was genuinely antisemitic. Without denying that the Arun Gandhi's post was antisemitic, they claim that this is an example of a Jewish lobby stifling criticism of Israel - Gandhi portraying himself as valiantly "sacrificing." That's quite a trick, when even acknowledged antisemitism is defended by blaming the Jews.

This trick of antisemitism, to always turn it around to blame the victims, is part of the reason I think antisemitism tends to grow so quickly when it takes root.