There's been increased focus here on Jewish claims that anti-semitism is on the return in Europe, but judging from today's debate on NRK Standpunkt we're nowhere near a serious response to it. It was unsettling to watch the gap between what the guests wanted to focus on. On one hand you had Norwegian Jews telling real life stories about anti-semitism, which was after all the topic of the debate: A father told how Muslim pupils had picked on and threatened to kill his kids for being Jewish. Another Jew showed newspaper cartoons with clear anti-semitic undertones, (in one Arafat had been crucified with a Star of David on his head). There were claims of increasing violence against Jews elsewhere in Europe, stories of Jews who considered "escaping" from Europe, etc. Most of it very specific: Here is a case of anti-semitism, and here, and here.

And all the other side wanted to talk about was Israel and its evil ways, its responsibility for its own demonization, and even for European anti-semitism. These people weren't dragged in from the fringe, they are among the most influential Israel critics in Norway. Kåre Willoch was there, the prominent anti-Israeli and former P.M. He refused to acknowledge any rational connection between criticism of Israel and anti-semitism, and left it at that. When the Jewish father identified Muslim kids as the ones who had threatened to kill his children, Willoch warned against a demonization of Muslims. It's the "you too" style of debating - those who warn that demonization of Israel encourages anti-semitism are themselves the demonizers, are themselves the ones blurring the line between criticism of Israel and anti-semitism. He made that last point repeatedly: The Israeli inability to tolerate criticism is itself a cause of anti-semitism. And anti-semitism is a European disease anyway, so why are we dragging the Muslims into this?

The most surreal moment was reserved Lars Sigurd Sunnanå, NRK's former Middle East correspondent. When accused of underreporting Israeli suffering in the conflict, he feigned regret for a moment, and admitted that yes, he had underreported suffering. Palestinian suffering. Unfortunately the military activities of the Israeli had prevented him from doing enough to cover the Palestinian side of the story. He explained that contrary to accusations he had reported a lot of Israeli suffering. The proof could be found in NRK's archives, which he encouraged critics to explore. That's funny. Odd Sverre Hove did just that - wade through hours of NRK recordings from the early months of the second intifada. Wrote a book about it. His conclusion is worth repeating:

1. In 29 news reports, NRK failed to mention that the Israeli shooting was a return of fire directed against terrorists who had first shot at the Israeli soldiers from inside groups of children and teenagers, and claimed instead that Israeli was shooting at children and teenagers who were merely protesting and throwing rocks. 2. NRK kept silent about the systematic planning of the intifada, with summer camps for children, bussing of children to about a 100 selected Intifada-places, transport of stone baskets and molotov cocktails, etc, and instead presented the intifada as a spontaneous, unorganized grassroot rebellion by the people. 3. In practice, NRK adjusted itself completely to Arafat's media strategy, and became a pure microphone service for the face Arafat wished to show to people in Norway. 4. NRK lied about, defended and excused the terrible lynching in Ramallah, 12.10.00. 5. NRK defended and excused the terrorist bomb against school children in a bus from Kfar Darom 20.11.00. 6. NRK systematically mixed reports and opinions, and presented judgments that were not supported by nuanced "pro and contra" information. 7. NRK did not separate self defense from terrorism in its judgments.

Sunnanå was NRK's correspondent in the area at the time. This, as one guest pointed out, is the man who once used the phrase "the Jewish war machine is crushing the Oslo process" on air. The Jewish war machine. Ah yes, this is a debate about European anti-semitism, and that is close to the real thing. It got closer: Sunnanå speculated that Israelis have exaggerated the prevalence of anti-semitism in Europe to get sympathy, and to shift attention from their own war crimes against the Palestinians. Like the way they exaggerated the Holocaust to blackmail guilt-ridden post-war Europe? Yes, I've heard that theory.

What all these people agreed on, in as few words as possible, before returning to what they really wanted to talk about, was that anti-semitism is very bad. (And like so many bad things it's caused by Israel.) But where do you go from there? If it is bad, and is a problem, how do you go about to solve it? Nobody would even begin to speculate, and if they had we can be sure that the answer would have involved .. Israel.

It's not a very complex issue this, but it's still too complex for Norwegian TV. What we lack is an attempt to understand the area where anti-Israelism and anti-semitism overlaps. In the eyes of the anti-Israelis, criticism of Israel is legitimate, and it isn't anti-semitism. In a sense they're right. Honest criticism, which they clearly believe they're providing, is legitimate, and these aren't modern Hitlers, these aren't Jew haters. And yet Jews all over Europe do experience anti-semitism, and whenever they do there's a connection to Israel somehow. So there's a discrepancy here that needs to be worked out. I've written before about the difference between anti-Israelism and anti-semitism, and I don't think anti-semitism has become mainstream in Europe again, at least not among the natives. I think that anti-Israelism has, and that it has elements or traces of anti-semitism in it.

And that's what I see in Willoch and Sunnanå, anti-Israelism with traces of anti-semitism. We can't hope to understand the problem until we realize that there is an area where anti-Israelism and anti-semitism overlaps, where the irrationality of anti-Israelism hook up with the conspiracy thinking of anti-semitism and create little baby myths: The Zionist influence in Washington, the revival of dead evil ideologies in Israel, the almost supernatural wickedness of Sharon. Once we understand that, it's not so difficult to see the connection with purer anti-semitism. Some people just take one more step in the same direction. We saw it in the NRK debate, a young Palestinian girl who seemed to think that the Norwegian press had recently escaped from Israeli control. She used that word, control. Now that's nutty. And yet - she was only a little nutty, a few steps away from Sunnanå's respectable nuttiness. That's the connection, and it's hidden in the last place anyone will want to look.

Excellent article! I could not agree more.
However, another point worth mentioning is the lack of aggressive acts against Muslims in Norway committed by Norwegian Jews. Jewish Norwegians are able to understand that their Muslim neighbours are not to blame for Mideast Muslim terrorist acts, but Muslim Norwegians do not seem able to see Norwegian Jews as private individuals with no responsibility for Israeli politics.

The demand, repeatedly stated in last night's program, that Norwegian Jews must declare in public their diagreement with Israeli politics in order to escape persecution, is abhorrent.

Bjørn writes:

"I don't think anti-semitism has become mainstream in Europe again, at least not among the natives. I think that anti-Israelism has, and that it has elements or traces of anti-semitism in it."

Indifference, complacency & intellectual obtuseness are not, I would submit, mere "elements or traces."

The toxic virulence of current, mutated, transmogrified European anti-semitism is characterized by INDIFFERENCE to 3rd Reichian agit-prop emanating from the Euros' object of sweet compassion, the Arab world; by the COMPLACENCY with which Euros -- including Norwegians pridefully wearing their "Euro" identity -- now project onto their victims -- the Jews as symbolized by the popularly elected Ariel Sharon -- their own clotted, gory genocidal past; and the INTELLECTUAL OBTUSENESS you describe so eloquently.

Wish it weren't so -- but "traces or elements" it ain't by a looooong shot.

Another fine article. Thank you, Bjørn.

Og: But indifference is indifference, and complacency is complacency, they're not defining qualities of anti-semitism. Pure anti-semitism is conspiratorial bigotry against Jews, and it's traces of that - but only traces - I see in European anti-Israelism. Takes a lot more than just being irrational or shallow.

The Russian treatment of Chechens is much more brutal in every respect than Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. The number of Chechens killed is about 25 to 100 times the number of Palestinians dead depending on which numbers you accept. If Europeans weren't pathologically anti-semitic there would at least be an equal focus on Russia and Russians as human rights abusers. But Russians aren't attacked on the streets for their treatment of Chechens by Europeans. Putin isn't compared to Hitler. The UN doesn't hold emergency meetings on the plight of the Chechens. The EU only offers mild condemnation of Russia. Why the disparity of treatment? The answer is obvious if you are an objective thinker.

Bjorn, the fact is there is a much higher percentage of Europeans who are anti-semitic than either you or Europe are willing to admit.

Is comparing Arafat to Jesus anti-semitic or anti-Christian?

The first step in anti-semitism is to say that understandable grievances against Jews (people don't like merchants in general, people don't like Bolsheviks in general, many Palestinians have suffered, etc.) justify all sorts of behavior. Europe doesn't ask Arabs to have perspective (killing is immoral, Palestinians prospered under Israeli rule, almost all Palestinians live under PA autonomy, checkpoints wouldn't exist without violence, Jews do not control the world, etc.), and soon native Europeans will allow themselves to oppose Jews without perspective, as they now do to Israel.
Hitler gained respectability by people saying that Germany had legitimate grievances, and ignoring the fact that most of his complaints were obviously illegitimate. Then people got used to him and his ideas, and a civilized country became barbaric.

We're really past the point where discussing or reasoning with these people will be of any use. I see most of us who are worried with the growth of Euro anti-Semitism trying to make those responsible for it admit that, if not consciously anti-Semitic, they're guilty of demonization, double-standards and so on. This strategy might have worked, say, a decade ago, when the whole thing was still a rather fringe phenomenon and the accusation of anti-Semitism still carried weight and people were still afraid of being "named and shamed". Ever since then, things have changed a lot, and the trouble, mainly after 911, is not as much that people will be more or less openly anti-Semitic, (ever less) under the guise of anti-Zionism, but that, really, most of the Europeans, in my view, couldn't care less. The burden of proof is always on those who complain of anti-Semitism and, right now, in the continent, there's nothing like "beyond a reasonable doubt". Whatever doubt (or counter accusation) is presented, that's enough to acquit anyone and everyone from the charge of being a Jew-hater. This means that new tactics have to be developed. The burden of proof has to be transfered to the other side. Even if it may sound unfair, there's a need to begin characterizing the whole of Europe as an anti-Semitic continent. Blanket accusations must be used instead of pinpoint ones. The Euro elites, its intelligentsia and press have to be put on the defensive. Now is the time to underline at each and every occasion the link between Israel and the Holocaust, between Arab anti-Semitic rejectionism and Euro complacency and, finally, between all this and the current anti-Semitism. If at least part of the continent's population is still uninfected by the virus, it needs then some kind of shock therapy to wake up from its dangerous coma. I don't know how this can be done, but it surely passes through some sustained campaign in the US. We'll see things are beginning to work when, as happened with Jacques Chirac, the Euro politicians are forced out of their closets and will have to declare publicly, always in a defensive tone, "we're not anti-Semites". But the time for TV debates, op-eds and so on is surely over.

maor: "Hitler gained respectability by people saying that Germany had legitimate grievances, and ignoring the fact that most of his complaints were obviously illegitimate. Then people got used to him and his ideas, and a civilized country became barbaric."

Germany was already anti-semitic before Hitler. So was much of Europe. Hitler didn't cause European anti-semitism, he largely cured it by associating it with Nazism, which everyone hated. The situation is not analogous.

Nelson: "We're really past the point where discussing or reasoning with these people will be of any use."

Let's keep some perspective here - Europe is not a doomed continent, caught in some bizarre totalitarian dream world. There's still grounds for a discussion. Yes, the anti-Israelis must be put on the defensive, but with facts and reason, not flame rhetorics. People who believe in reason will eventually fall victim to reason, and Europe believes in reason. The moment people start hating Israel in the name of a Glorious Leader or a God, then the time for discussions are past, but as long as Europeans are convinced that politics is about doing what is right and rational, there's hope. The definition of right and rational is completely wacky, but let's face it, it's neither the first nor the worst irrationality any of us have grown out of. Was the American civil rights movement hopeless?

As long as Europe believes in doing what's right and rational there is a place for civilized debate. The problem isn't the overwhelming persuasive power of anti-Israelism, but the media feedback loops that artificially preserve it. It won't survive out in the wild, on a true battlefield of ideas, where no single group of similar minded people can monopolize the debate. That is what must be created. There's no magic to it, and it may not be easy, but we're not facing the smartest idea since the wheel here. Anti-Israelism is really, really dumb. That just needs to be pointed out. In a polite, rational way - and yes, in TV debates, op-ed's and everywhere else in the public sphere.

I appreciate Bjørn's effort to disassemble anti-Israeli from antisemitic polemics, and I even appreciate the fact that *someone* at NRK took the issue seriously enough to address it. It should be blindingly obvious that you can be critical to Israel's policies (as 100% of Israelis are, for one reason or another) without wishing to harm Jews.

But it is becoming increasingly apparent that no amount of factual reasoning will persuade the European "elite" that antisemitism warrants any concern. Their antisemitism is dyed in the wool and their sense of superiority so ingrained that I think it's futile to persuade them of anything anymore. They agree that antisemitism is a bad thing, but only to the extent that it is vulgar and distasteful. Their sensibilities are much like Himmler's, who ordered millions of people murdered but was queasy if he saw blood himself. The fact that Sunnanå, Tveit and Willoch are so transparently hypocritical and vile is overshadowed only by the public's unwillingness to confront them. There shouldn't even be any question that their rhetoric has antisemitic undertones - the real problem is that nobody is willing to see it as such.

The antisemitism so prevalent in Germany, Poland, and the rest of Europe in the 1930's is very similar to what it is today - Jews were neighbors, colleagues, even acquaintances and friends, but their difference wasn't entirely acceptable. It took the rabid wickedness of a few, the blind obedience of a few more, and the profound indifference of the many to murder over six million people in cold blood.

The fact that Willoch, Sunnanå and Tveit are even taken seriously simply proves Israel's point: there is no reason for Jews to trust anyone - anyone at all - to protect them if it becomes the least bit convenient. And this is why Sharon, after all, may be right. It might have been more just for Israel to establish itself in the Rhine Valley, displacing millions of Germans, but this didn't happen.

In a diary entry written during the second half of 44, the Hungarian novelist Sandor Marai said something like this (I quote from memory): "The Russians are already on the opposite site of the Danube, the Americans and British bomb us day and night, and, in the meanwhile, the Hungarian middleclass is unable to talk about anything except the Jews".
The problem, I'd say, with debates, op-eds, protest marches etc. is that they perpetuate in the European mind the centrality of the "Jewish problem". For some reason, people from Portugal to Russia and from Malta to Norway, not excluding Ireland or Greece, have persuaded themselves that the Jews, or Israel, or Zionism, whatever, are absolutely central, important, unavoidable to their own fate. Thus, they have endorsed the monomania of the Arab/Muslim world that thinks along the same lines, that is, that either the Iran-Iraq war or the Algerian civil War, or the genocide in the Suddan, or the now forgotten Yemeni civil war, or anything else that happens in their world can be in some way related to the existence of Israel. Actually, Israel is a small country that has a quantitatively small problem with a small population of neighbours. Compared to what happens in Central Africa, say, or Central Asia, there would be no rational reason to turn the spots on that region where there's not even oil to talk about. In terms of the numbers of victims involved, that is a problem that pales in comparison, for instance, even with Kosovo or the guerrilla plus narcotraffic battles in Colombia. But keeping it on the frontpages and headlines is a means to endorse the Arab/Muslim view that it is the decisive question, a view that has obviously more to do with symbolism than reality. But the Europeans, or many of them, ended up buying in this symbolism whole and atributing to the conflict ilogically cosmic dimensions. Thus, even if one wins a rational discussion about Israel, one is still losing, just by discussing it in this wider context, the symbollic one. And I don't see how one can make people wake up from the dream in which Israel or the Jews pervade all dimensions of most discussions. In other words, maybe if there were a way to put the Israeli/Arab question in perspective, that would help. But what scares me is the following: 911 was exactly such an event, something that could have helped show that the Israeli/Arab question is nothing but a chapter of a much bigger problem, that of extremist Islam or of the failure of Arab societies or whatever. But instead of doing this, of taking a fresh look at the whole thing, I think many, maybe most, Europeans have managed to classify 911 as a chapter of the Israeli/Arab question and, ultimately, as an organic part of the so called "Jewish Problem". The point is, there is need for a change of paradigm in Europe, otherwise anything that happens, any discussion, any point scored will only strenghten this tacit paradigm. I confess that I do not have the slightest idea of how to do it.

I've often wondered why the "Jewish question" or "Israel question" just goes on and on. Today's world court circus over the fence is a typical example. As Nelson pointed out, the numbers of hurt and injured have nothing to do with the sick desire to punish the Jews for something . . . anything.

Imagine a "Milwaukee question" that went on for decades, centuries. Why not? The approximate land area is the same, the questions are the same. The viciousness of Milwaukeans is approximately the same as the viciousness of Israelis.

Let's all get together and harp on all the failings of the Milwaukeans. And if they complain, well it's all in their mind and they should shut up already.

Nelson Ascher wrote a very interesting piece. I agree - the paradigm must change.

One way to do this is to redefine what people think of as a "Jewish question" as what it really is - "THE EUROPEAN QUESTION."

Europeans have a long, horrifying history of enforcing conformity with torture, murder, oppression, intimidation, and every other means. When the moderator in yesterday's discussion asked why Jews have attracted European hatred and bigotry, he put the blame on the Jews, not on the Europeans where it belongs. We have to reject the very premise of this question and put it back on Europe: what is it about *Europeans* that gives rise to inquisitions, crusades, holocausts, colonialism, multiple regional and world wars, etc., etc.

We have to make it clear that people like Willoch and Sunnanå are part of the European problem by their assumption that they can judge Israel.

Five or six years ago I interviewed, for my paper, one of my (how can I express it in a less ridiculous term?) idols: the German poet and essayist Hans Magnus Enzensberger. That was way before 911, but when the Yugoslav Civil War was still were much in the air (and on the ground). Having followed his work since the days when he was a commited Marxist to those when he became, in my view, the most perceptive critic of the "Second (communist) World" (he even predicted, two or three years before it happened, Ceausescu's downfall and execution almost exactly in the way it took place), I put him many questions, which he answered openly and straightforwardly. But there was one he basically refused to discuss, the one related to Yugoslavia. All he said was that there was something deeply wrong with all sides involved in that war.
This very idea of "something deeply wrong" appeals to me when it comes to the European "Jewish Question". It surely goes beyond common political passions and, though I hate using psycoanalytic terminology, there's something very neurotic and disturbing about it. The feeling I've had during my last three years in Europe was that not a few people felt actually relieved, because, after half a century during which there was, in their eyes, a taboo against saying what they really thought about the Jews, finally they could legitimately come out in the open and speak out to their heart's content. Thus, I don't see what's going on right now as something new, but as a continuation of what went on before and, for some reason or another, had to be buried or silenced for a while. If this is so, that means that the Holocaust and the creation of Israel didn't put a full stop to Europe's oldest obsession, that affluence, social democracy, NGOs, the cult of human rights etc. etc. etc. didn't made more than some short lived ripples on the surface. Trying to turn the (still) living reality of the Holocaust into a museological piece was just a kind of exorcism, not indeed a solution, as were all the other rituals, holidays, school and university courses on the subject and so on. In short, it is still an open question to know why the hell are so many Europeans still obsessed with the Jews, why they can't simply drop the whole matter, forget about them. For some reason, though Europe now preaches against national identities and praises multiculturalism, it is as if at some level many of its citizens still defined themselves in opposition to the Jews. Weird.

On 2004-02-25 14:03, Bjørn wrote:

"Og: But indifference is indifference, and complacency is complacency, they're not defining qualities of anti-semitism. Pure anti-semitism is conspiratorial bigotry against Jews, and it's traces of that - but only traces - I see in European anti-Israelism. Takes a lot more than just being irrational or shallow."

Bjørn –

Think : E. coli O157:H7

=========

With masterful brevity and clarity you lay bare the most dangerous misconception about 21st century European anti-Semitism:

“Indifference is indifference, and complacency is complacency” gives perfect cover for the pernicious, mutated, post-Hitler (post-Vichy, post- Jedwabne, etc.) strain of anti-Semitism that passes for supposedly well-intentioned “anti-Israelism,” and that has infected Europe’s masses through the vector of media misdirection, distortion, incitement and outright falsehood.

It is a category error, I would submit, to posit a dichotomy between “indifference and complacency” on the one hand, and tin-foil hat “conspiratorial bigotry” on the other.

You assume, it seems, that these two categories both inhabit distinct but relatively narrow ethical spectra, and hence are comparable categories reasonably contrasted and dichotomized.

A. “Conspiratorial bigotry” conjures an image of hands “dirtied” through affirmative (conspiratorial) furtherance of some injustic for reasons of vile prejudice.

B. “Indifference and complacency,” by contrast, might sully one’s honor or even constitute a grave sin of omission, but as far as society is concerned, indifference/complacency does not automatically derail you from the ethically straight and narrow track – slightly splattered you may find yourself, but gloved hands still nice & clean.

Reality throws this false dichotomy for a loop. “Indifference/complacency” does not occupy a narrow band of toxicity. There are thousands upon thousands of variants of indifference/complacency.

Yes, it takes more than being "irrational and shallow" for indifference/complacency to descend to 3rd Reich levels. And plenty more there is.

Let’s first note, though, that the traces, “only traces” of “pure anti-Semitism” that one sees in Europe nowadays in the form of conspiratorial bigotry are in fact fairly vulnerable to 'anti-bodies' of reason and rationality, hence relatively easy to vaccinate against. This archaic anti-Semitic "conspiratorial bigotry" still has its uses in generally well-educated Europe today, but not as the toxin it all dressed up as, but rather, as a decoy, throwing everyone off the scent of the anti-Semitic "emperor's new clothes," providing wonderful cover for the insidious, mutated, post-classical anti-Semitic spores.

Let’s next note that of the tens of thousands of bacterial strains of Escherichia coli, as with the countless variants of "shallow or irrational" “indifference/complacency,” most are pretty harmless, and some are beneficial.

E. coli O157:H7 is an exception, a stand out killer.

Likewise, DEPRAVED INDIFFERENCE stands out from the pack on the “indifference is indifference, and complacency is complacency” front.

You were right a couple of months ago about "emic" and "etic,” concepts that shed light on the archaic, self-serving, alibi definition of "anti-Semitism" prevalent in Europe (and that you repeat again in your post) but too academic and esoteric for general consumption or easy digestion

There’s nothing esoteric or academic, however, about DEPRAVED INDIFFERENCE. It is a recognized element of criminal homicide under the laws of probably every civilized nation, and certainly those such as UK, US & CND that follow English common law.

And DEPRAVED INDIFFERENCE is what?

It's one thing passively to be informed that last Ramadan Egyptian state-sponsored TV produced and broadcast a 30 to 40 part series based on the Tsarist fiction and Nazi canonical work known as the so-called "Protocols."

It is entirely different -- and an exhibition of UTTERLY DEPRAVED indifference -- when BBC broadcast (& posted) a puff piece on this Hitlerite production, "explaining" to the unwashed masses that such sordid holiday fare is in "fact" "innocuous" and in any case quite "understandable," as BBC informed us last fall.

No sir, that's not mere "shallow or irrational" "indifference."

That is EXACTLY the kind of "indifference" that CHARACTERIZES the continent of Europe in the Year 2004

That's aiding, abetting and encouraging genocide through agit-prop disseminated worldwide by an agency of the British government -- an altogether different form of "indifference" that rises to the level of a crime against humanity.

It was criminally, DEPRAVEDLY indifferent for French National TV to produce, broadcast and disseminate worldwide the apparent hoax re: Mohammed al-Dura, without reasonable fact-checking finding or any subsequent, world-wide retraction or clarification about the mounting evidence that the young boy was shot (if in fact he was shot) by Arab gunmen in a set piece of Hamas street theater that may possibly have got out of hand. (Who said movie making was risk free? Vic Morrow, RIP.)

The archives of Merde in France contain reams of examples of criminally depraved and indifferent incitement of Euro anti-Semitism. Biased-BBC has more. As do many other web resources.

Come to think of it -- so does your website, Bjørn.

So let's mince words no more.

This may be your initial acquaintance with the phrase "depraved indifference"; and quite likely the first you've heard it used to explain the EXACT nature of the mutation of Hitlerite anti-Semitism into the nearly or equally GROTESQUE anti-Semitism entrancing mainstream Y2004 Europe.

I’m sorry this insight reaches you from such a humble source… though others are trying to get the same message across to you from different angles.

Should we try some reverse psychology instead? :)

In sum: it is a fundamental misunderstanding to consider "conspiratorial bigotry against Jews" to be the only, or the main, or even a significant form of, as you put it, "pure anti-Semitism."

Criminally depraved indifference and complacency is the kinder, gentler and increasingly vicious "pure anti-semitism" practiced now, in the first decade of the 21st century. The high minded, hundna-process loving, pure-as-driven- Norwegian-snow Europeans continue to aid, abet, incite & fund -- and who knows, do they also lead and direct -- the implementation of their now sub-contracted final solution, in the Arab War of Attrition against the Jewish People.

Maybe you'll find your way out of the definitional maze you seem locked into, Bjørn.

Or maybe you’d go nuts if you to were acknowledge fully what clearly you already strongly sense and probably acutely intuit.

Thank you for considering these points.

-Og

In answer to Nelson's question of why Europe is obsessed with the Jews; Europe has crowned the Jews as the chosen people.

I believe anti-semitism amongst modern Europeans is rooted in envy, anger and fear at Jews disproportionate influence in the intellectual arena. Europeans are perfectly aware that the Jews, unlike the Muslims, have no intention or capability to try and dominate them physically. But in the intellectual arena Europeans feel they are not in control and that greatly disturbs them.

In further answer to Nelson's question:

If you were a true blue Euro, would you not also consider Jews for Oil an eminently fair & reasonable exchange?

Nothing personal, this hudna-protracted pro-judenrein policy; and better late than never, Die "Endlösung der Judenfrage." (Okay, maybe it IS a little personal, but that's beside the point.)

Business is business.

But you knew that. :)

Og

If it were so rational. By the end of WW2 the Germans were actually paying to keep exterminating the Jews. The French opposed the invasion of Iraq even knowing that cuting a deal with the US and backing it at the right time would have been the right opportunistic thing to do. The Palestinians refused their own country a number of times and accept to live in misery just for the privilege of killing some Jews. I know that through some complicate reasoning we may find here and there a couple of rational connections, but I think that here, ultimately, passion trumps calculus.

Nelson:

It's not your or my rationality. But let's keep our cultural biases at bay. :)

"If it were so rational. By the end of WW2 the Germans were actually paying to keep exterminating the Jews."

Rational -- End game was to eliminate witnesses who could testify in war crimes trials that well-educated Germans knew legalistic Anglo-Saxons would surely institute. Wise move. How many SS lives were saved thereby, or sentenced reduced for lack of evidence?

"The French opposed the invasion of Iraq even knowing that cuting a deal with the US and backing it at the right time would have been the right opportunistic thing to do."

Possibly a reasonable roll of the dice. How close did Robin Cook come to pulling off a Labor coup against Blair? We don't know, so the odds of the Frankenreich gamble are hard to second guess. Winning over Colin Powell (or was it really James Baker, behind the scenes?) to agree to the quagmire of UN debates: utter brilliance. Nor is the downside to the gamble so obvious. More cards yet to be played...

"The Palestinians refused their own country a number of times and accept to live in misery just for the privilege of killing some Jews. I know that through some complicate reasoning we may find here and there a couple of rational connections, but I think that here, ultimately, passion trumps calculus."

I agree that the Israel-Pal stand-off is a passion play. Are you so sure that Jewish passion for a zionist entity will trump brutal Arab calculus?

Like Ho, Giap & Cie., the rulers of Araby and Islamdom seem prepared to spill Mekongs and Niles and Amazons of their own people's blood in order to prevail. Whereas not only does much of Israeli wish to avoid loss of life of their own their countrymen, but they're apparently rather queasy about exterminating an enemy dying with anticipation to exterminate them.

You're very well traveled and no doubt know the scene over there far better than I. But from what I can glean, if rationality = cost/benefit analysis, then the "reason" that you and I are perhaps culturally attuned to is not a decisive factor for the Palestinians (themselves mainly terrorized fodder) or their overlords.

On the other hand, if rationality = demoralizing the Jews through ceaseless & escalating terror, isolating the Zionists from the rest of the world, triggering emigration away from the Entity, and driving the remaining hardcore into the sea, then regardless whether Tehran and/or Mecca are turned to glass in this long drawn out process, the Pals and their overlords, though ice water flows through their veins, may turn out to be the coolest & most rational of all.

It's a roll of the dice, of course. But then what's not?

Just a contrarian point of view.

Og.
OK.
Still:
the extermination of the Hungarian Jewry began in earnest only by mid-44, when the Germans had more to do, and anyway those wouldn't have been Jews to testify about what happened, for instance, in Poland. I'm not that sure, anyway, the Germans were that worried with being sued because of the Jews after the war, and they were right: the Holocaust didn't weigh much either at Nuremberg or at most post WW2 trials, nor would have it weighed much more if some hundred thousands extra Jews had survived. In merely economic terms much of the Holocaust was irrational: in the case of Hungary, for instance, it prepared to join the German war effort by killing or reducing to slave labourers half of its doctors. Not very clever, is it?
The instrumentalization of Israel at the hands of the Arab elites is pretty obvious, but it still doesn't explain the passion with which the majority of the people adopts it.
Finally, about the UK: yes, the French tried hard to destabilize the Blair government. Fine. But Blair's, anyway, the most Euro Brit PM available. Any other (Gordon Brown, probably)would keep more distance from the continent, and in the mid-term the French do need the UK's military capabilities and its pension funds.(Actually the UK's more important for Europe than for the US.) And, after Rumsfeld told that the US would go to Iraq even qithout the UK, the possible French game of stopping the war effort by breaking its weakest (British) link was for all effects over, wasn't it? Whatever was the French game, it was a risky one and though it is not finished yet there's much to point to the fact that they have been losing on many fronts, and that's maybe because they allowed themselves to be overtaken by their anti-American chauvinistic passions and put cold calculus on the back-burner.
PS: I'm not so sure most Palestinians are simply "terrorized fodder". Maybe the theory of "willing executioners" works as well here as it did elsewhere? In the end, suicide bombing is somewhat beyond what most of us would consider rational calculus. Well, as Bakunin once said, the passion for destruction is also a creative passion.
(Oh, and my hint is that the decision to go to the UN was due to an anti-Rumsfeld Blair-Powell alliance. Blair may have said something like this: it's Afghanistan first and Iraq next with me and through the UN or vice-versa without me; Powell, on the other hand, was probably energized by whatever deal he managed to impose on Musharraff, still his major or only victory, if that is so, in this war.)

I think that anti-semitism is not based on anything Jews do, but the fact that they are by self definition a Free People. They have their own language, culture and history. They even had their own kingdom. And Kings. They did not believe that the pope was infalible, or that the Vatican was even legitimate, and by extension the ruling elites of Europe. The vast majority of Jews were not rich, or members of the intelligencia. They were poor and lived in ghettos. But no matter how oppressed, preferred to be Jews. Even though Jews could be extremely loyal, good citizens, on a certain level they were not under control. They did not accept the superiority of the European culture and it's elites, and that is unforgivable. Islam, which is actually much closer to Christianity that it is to Judaism, also demands that it's superiority be accepted. But there go the Jews, preferring their own way. It is the Jews that are an indigenous people, look up the definition, and the Arabs bear all the hallmarks of a secondary invading culture. Islamized Crusader/Turks. The Palis do not hate the Jews because they "invaded", but because they refuse to be dhimmis.They refuse the acknowlege the superiority of Islam, and the benificent rule of Ayatollahs and Imams. And Popes. And elites. That's why the Euros are so obsessed with having the Palis destroy the Jews. It will validate the supremacy of the Europeans. In a lot of ways, the Jews don't really act any differently from other independent tribal people.They are Free, with their own independant leadership, and that is intolerable. Small wonder then that the construction of anti-Americanism is so similar to anti-semitism. (revisionist history, evasion of the real issues, outright lies, vilification, a reversal of victim/aggressor etc.) The ruling elites can't control the US either. It's an affront to the elite's supremacy. I believe that this is why anti-semitism is almost an obsession, so out of proportion to any reality. It's not about Jews, (or even Americans) it's about superiority and control.

Maor: “Hitler gained respectability by people saying that Germany had legitimate grievances, and ignoring the fact that most of his complaints were obviously illegitimate”

The problem is that Hitler rose to power on the back of real legitimate grievances (Not in relation to the Jewish question to be sure!), concerning the economically crippling treaty terms from the first world war, the mistreatment of ethnic germans in lost territories, legitimate problems which he then succeeded in blaming (illegitimately) the jews for.

In much the same manner in which the legitimate grievances of the Palestinian people (discrimination, excessive force, illegal settlements, a barrier that denies equal access to employment etc..) are used by some PA leaders to ferment hatred in order to launch morally repugnant attacks against generally innocent Israel citizens. The moral ammunition of the Palestinian agitators needs to be removed, if there is going to be any hope of a settlement between the too warring parties.

Nelson: If you wholistically condemn all Europeans based on the anti-Semitism of their elites than you are just as guilty of racist hatred as those who hate all jews as a result of occasional Israeli military excesses. I think you are very right though when you say that this current conflict may merely be yet another chapter in the sordid tale of failed Islamic states. For any state based on theocratic irrationality is a humanitarian basket case waiting to happen. I think it may be difficult for an us and them mentality to the jewish to change in Europe, especially when (at least in Germany) children are still forced to confront the jewish question, and their cultural heritage of oppressing jews by compulsory lessons, visits to concentration camps etc…

I wouldn’t be surprised if such a continuous teaching of such subject matter would result in a desensitizing effect rather than as a lesson to the mistakes of the past.

David.
I'm obviously not blaming each and every European and, as I'm neither judge nor prosecutor, I'm not talking along strict judicial, legalistic lines. But imagine that if every time we talked about German anti-semitism or the Holocaust, we were forced to say something like "the German (actually their leadership, and obviously not all the people, sure not Hans and Fritz and Caspar, not to mention those below the age of consent and those who opposed the dictatorship and those who were forced to fight against their will and those who weren't all that informed or anyway didn't know Jews or didn't ever vote for or belonged to the National Socialist Party and we have to include also those, like gays and others who were also outside the system and so on etc.) people had something to do with the Holocaust. There's, I think, a hardcore of mainly leftist European anti-Semites, then there is the active or passive backing of very large parts of the intelligentsia, universities and press included, there's the cynical opportunism of the ruling elites and then there's the mass os the population, affected in different degrees or not at all by the virus. Nevertheless, the growth of the so called "democratic deficit" in Europe means that whatever the elites and those who influence public opinion say/think carries an excessive weight. In short, Europe has a "Jewish problem". It doesn't immediately translate in individual or even collective responsibility, but could quite well be seen as a problem and moral burden that much of the continent has so far avoided seriously dealing with.

Og K: "It is a category error, I would submit, to posit a dichotomy between “indifference and complacency” on the one hand, and tin-foil hat “conspiratorial bigotry” on the other."

Not a dichotomy - but the first does not include the other. The anti-semitic indifference you speak of, the one that allows people to sit by and watch as their Jewish neighbours are sent off in trucks, is different from the indifference of Europe to Israeli suffering. We don't need anti-semitism to explain that, but we do need it to explain the origin of some particular myths about Israel, and of course we need it to explain the hatred of some Muslims for Jews. Your anti-semitic indifference can also be observed in Europe - I remember a story about a small group of Muslim youths heckling a Jewish artist in France, and an audience of thousands around them saying nothing. That's your kind of indifference. "Yes it's bad about all the Israelis getting killed by terrorists and all, but don't they realize it's their own fault for terrorizing the Palestinians?" is the more common one.

"This archaic anti-Semitic "conspiratorial bigotry" still has its uses in generally well-educated Europe today, but not as the toxin it all dressed up as, but rather, as a decoy, throwing everyone off the scent of the anti-Semitic "emperor's new clothes," providing wonderful cover for the insidious, mutated, post-classical anti-Semitic spores."

Yes - regret over Holocaust is today used to cover anti-Israelism, a token display that proves nothing and convinces many. (Phrase it a different way: "Because I'm against the Holocaust my criticism of Israel is completely rational and has no traces of anti-semitism in it", and the logic falls apart.) There's still room for anti-semitism to sneak in, but only in hiding. Europe is still pretty well vaccinated against open anti-semitism, and that's something.

"It is entirely different -- and an exhibition of UTTERLY DEPRAVED indifference -- when BBC broadcast (& posted) a puff piece on this Hitlerite production, "explaining" to the unwashed masses that such sordid holiday fare is in "fact" "innocuous" and in any case quite "understandable," as BBC informed us last fall. [..] That is EXACTLY the kind of "indifference" that CHARACTERIZES the continent of Europe in the Year 2004"

I'm not sure it is, if by characterizes you mean it's shared by a large number of anti-Israelis. This is rather one of those border cases that make people stop and think "but wait, you mean Arabs aren't just motivated by legitimate grievances, but by something Hitler believed in? Maybe it's not so understandable after all." Arab anti-semitism is not usually attempted understood in Europe, it is _ignored_. It is ignored because introducing obvious provable anti-semitism into this debate makes it more difficult to preserve a black-white picture of the conflict, so one or the other has to go. A good strategy then, for a discussion about anti-Israelism in Europe, may be to point out the obvious, pure anti-semitism in Arab countries, note that this also exists in Muslim communities in Europe, and then move on to the similarities between the rhetorics of these anti-semites and Europe's anti-Israelis. That's a point that, if it can't be ignored like it is now, may actually force a lot of people to abandon their myths about Israel. Because Europeans don't generally hate Jews. If they did, Arab anti-semitism wouldn't bother them.

"It was criminally, DEPRAVEDLY indifferent for French National TV to produce, broadcast and disseminate worldwide the apparent hoax re: Mohammed al-Dura, without reasonable fact-checking finding ..."

No that was different, that was mere anti-Israelism. Israel was the bad guy, a boy got shot - well _of course_ the Israelis did it, and isn't it a great symbol of the whole tragic conflict, the boy caught in a firefight and killed by an Israeli bullet? There's no more anti-semitism in the decision to run and instantaneously believe in this story than there is in any other anti-Israeli myth, which is to say some, but not a lot. This case _is_ characteristic of European anti-Israelism.

"In sum: it is a fundamental misunderstanding to consider "conspiratorial bigotry against Jews" to be the only, or the main, or even a significant form of, as you put it, "pure anti-Semitism.""

I agree, but it's still the essence of anti-semitism. Not everyone has to be a pure anti-semite for the anti-semites to succeed, but the definition is still useful.

"Criminally depraved indifference and complacency is the kinder, gentler and increasingly vicious "pure anti-semitism" practiced now"

What I'm missing here is an attempt to show how exactly this indifference and complacency _is_ a form of anti-semitism. What does it mean for an idea to be anti-semitic? Clearly if it's related to anti-semitic myths there's a connection, and that connection is what I've been looking for in several entries in this blog, but we must be careful about how we show that connection: Stupidity that harms Jews isn't necessarily anti-semitism, for there are many kinds of stupidity that harm other people, but it can be. Attempts to explain away Arab hatred of Jews aren't necessarily anti-semitism, for there can be many motives for apologizing for evil, but it can be. Which is it and why? And how common is it? We know there is pure Arab anti-semitism, also in Europe, and it's connected with Israel. We know there's an irrational attribution of evil motives to Israelis among native Europeans. That's not very hard to establish. The overlap and exchange of ideas between the two is however more difficult to point at. You seem to think that all anti-Israelism is at some level also anti-semitism, ie. that it all overlaps. That solves one problem, but creates others, like why exactly that is so. I don't think you've showed that.

"Or maybe you’d go nuts if you to were acknowledge fully what clearly you already strongly sense and probably acutely intuit."

Nah. Bring it on!

Bjorn.
The point is that for your dichotomy between two clearly different phenomena, i.e., anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism, to work there should be other similar phenomena, like, say, anti-Ugandianism, anti-Paraguayanism, anti-Sri Lankism etc. But there's nothing like that. The only country against which there's such an animus directed in Europe is Israel (well, there's anti-Americanism, but that's another story) and it is not merely incidental that that's the country of the Jews. Chechnya, Cambodia, the Congo, Rwanda, Guatemala etc. don't really have the power to move many people in Europe. Israel does. Why? Israel's an obsession and it cannot be disconnected from the older obsession with the Jews. You could say it is all a result of Arab/Muslim propaganda, but would this have worked so well had it not fallen on fertile ground?

nelson: "well, there's anti-Americanism, but that's another story"

No it isn't. Anti-Americanism and anti-Israelism are connected, they're the same kind of emotion, what Orwell called negative nationalism: http://www.resort.com/~prime8/Orwell/nationalism.html

There's nothing new about attributing very good or bad characteristics to some entity, or of seeing as Orwell puts it world politics as a game of competitive prestige. There are many reasons why Israel would be the victim of that that don't involve anti-semitism. It's culturally Western, which means it's okay not to like it. It's engaged in war, and we don't like war. And then there's something more, and that's where anti-semitism enters into it, but we don't strictly need anti-semitism to explain why people obsess about some particular country.

Nelson has expanded on my comment about Chechnya. This line of thinking is purposefully avoided by virtually everyone. The reason is that with the exception of Iceland, every nation is guilty of occupying some ethnic groups homeland. And most of those occupations were achieved through military conquest at some time in history. Norway is occupying Lappland. Britain is occupying parts of Ireland. Russia is occupying countless ethnic homelands. The USA is occupying Native American land. I could go on and on but you get the picture.

Yet only Israel receives nearly universal condemnation for occupying someone elses land. The Palestinians are the only occupied nation that is represented at the UN. The Basques have a much greater claim for an independent nation than the Palestinians yet where is their representative at the UN?

Bjorn, if a Lapp terrorist group decided they wanted an independent nation and started killing civilians in Oslo, Stockholm and Helsinki would the Scandinavians give them independence or ruthlessly crush the movement? Answer: The Scandinavians would brutally put down the insurgency probably with far more ruthlessness than the Israelis. Reason: Europe and the world for the most part won't care what you do. Your not Jewish or American.

Reid.
Maybe Iceland is not such an exception after all. If I'm not wrong, its first inhabitants were Celtic (possibly Irish) monks who were later displaced by the Norsemen.
Bjorn.
I don't disagree that anti-Americanism and anti-Israelism and, yes, anti-Semitism are interconnected and, in a way, resemble each other. But, though there's much symbollism involved in anti-Americanism, whatever one's position, hating America is about the real thing. I mean, America is much more real than symbollic, it's the richest, most powerfull, influential and so on country on earth. One can admire it or hate it, but one cannot ignore it. But Israel, well, in terms of size, weight, strategic importance etc. is, as that French ambassador would have it, nothing but a sh..ty little country. Let's say that anti-Americanism is 80% realism and 20% symbollism, while anti-Israelism is 80% symbollism and 20% realism (if that much). There's no mystery why people are positively or negatively passionate about America. But why Israel? Why not Brazil, India, China, Russia, South Africa, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan etc.? Sorry, but there's more to it than meets the eye.

Bjørn,

As is usually the case, I respect your insightful analysis of this overall, and indeed when I saw this event on NRK I expected you would comment. But, in this case I am compelled to give it my best shot(as I have a few times before) to try and get you to fire up your intellectual searchlight and see this a bit deeper. I'm picking a single point in order to do so, but it impacts much of the rest of your position if you find it is a valid critique.

In response to Og's assertion that you were understating or perhaps playing apologist a bit too willingly (if I understood it right) for the idea that anti-Semitism was having an impact on the "mainstream" in Europe, you said: "But indifference is indifference, and complacency is complacency, they're not defining qualities of anti-semitism."

True enough Bjørn, but when that complacency/ indifference is against something that we can all universally agree is unambiguously bad (as was done with enthusiastic lip service again and again in the debate as you pointed out), then is not complacency tantamount to COMPLICITY? Who is to say that resurgent anti-Semitism as a tool of social control would resemble EXACTLY what it did seventy years ago. After all, are we not infinitely more "sophisticated" now; and our basest human nature in need of much more "nuanced" titillation to be inspired. Even for the purveyors of what indeed may be barely clothed naked hatreds (this presently includes the US as an object of emotive caricature as well) it is easy in the present discourse to rationalize a faux reason under clouds of deconstructive wordsmithing.

As I watched NRK that night, I noted once more that much of the “debate” in Europe, revolves around ensuring that we can all continue to FEEL good about our position. We are reassured that (since we are innately superior and open-minded and tolerant etc.), our position is not a bad one even though we, by doing so, continuously sanction something quite bad indeed.

You did not mention Bjørn, that the polling question which took place at the bottom of the screen during the “debate” was (and please correct my translation if I am misrepresenting it) essentially, "Do you think that any rising anti-Semitism in Europe is the result of Israeli Policy? Yes or no."

Now I must tell you, when I saw the postmodern, almost Goebbelsesque framing of that question (which also essetially amounts to push-polling), I could wearily label the entire forum as more of the same from our sacred projectors of high cultural opinion I described above. This is the nature of the public discourse in Norway (and most of Europe) and amounts to more of a speech than a discourse. Yet, I was nevertheless horrified when the results of the poll at the end showed that around two thirds of Norwegians who tuned in and phoned said that indeed, yes… any of this (certainly bad we can agree) rising anti-Semitism in Europe was really a result of nefarious policies on the part of the Jews (I caricature it by design here Bjørn… because I think that was the point of the question and the sadly predictable automoton like result).

THINK ABOUT THAT! That has real world implications Bjørn. It has a true essence and it is far indeed from the image it is given consistently in the public forum. This is why I say that this chasm opening up in Western Civilisation is unsustainable. It is as though there were a cognitive dissonance in the collective consciousness (a loaded metaphysical concept I know, but not without practical grounding.... ask Goebbels!) so profound that, it must ultimately either expunge itself in a catharsis, or implode.

You cannot simply argue reasonably Bjørn, that while it is true that there is something profoundly wrong in Platos Cave that yet, we shouldn't make too much of it. We SHOULD make of it... WHAT IT IS! Are you truly asking yourself what it really is?... at the level it matters?... at the level that moves history?

Kevin

PS And I have to add that if I heard him say "Israeli War Machine" one more frikkin time with that arrogant, NeoMarxist, elitist, stony expression on his face.... I was going to throw my TV out the window!... thereby nullifying the utility value of my just paid for annual NRK "TV License". It was a close call.

I have read the other responses after I wrote mine, and I see the "indifference versus complacency" issue has been treated... but I think the point I am making in my post is related but quite distinct.

Excellent thread by the way.

Sylvia of Denver had an excellent point above about Jews and Americans being Free Peoples. Something to think about. Jews and Americans will never ever become dhimmis, and maybe the elitists know this.

Bjørn,

Here's where your lose me:

"The anti-Semitic indifference you speak of, the one that allows people to sit by and watch as their Jewish neighbors are sent off in trucks, is different from the indifference of Europe to Israeli suffering."

It's not indifference to "suffering" that troubles and perplexes me.

Indifference and complacency are normal enough with regard to the suffering of distant people. Who really cares about famine in Ethiopia, genocide in Rwanda, annihilation of Tibetan culture, etc.? For the most part, not many and not deeply.

But the apparent European attitude (including "root-cause" excuse-making) toward the vilest, purest, most classical expression of anti-Semitism that is now received wisdom in the Middle East and an important component of their public education and discourse -- is indifference neither innocent nor misguided but better characterized as depraved. The studied silence or minimizing of the Euro-export of "classical" Hitlerist rhetoric to Islamdom is an example par excellence of complacency turned complicit.

I'm not sure you'd find Europeans quite so blase or indifferent or complacent or unopinionated about the criminal ideology used to justify other distant tragedies such as genocide by famine in Ethiopia, genocide by machete in Rwanda, and cultural genocide in Tibet, even if they might not care to focus on the unpleasantness of the suffering itself.

The obvious objection to this comparison is that the Israelis have not yet been driven into the sea; they aren't all hacked up by the hundreds of thousands as were the Rwandans.

No, they're simply the remnants of those who were shot, gassed, starved and exterminated to the point of extinction in Germany, Mittel-Europa and the Baltics; murdered in vast numbers elsewhere in Europe; and expelled, driven out and ethnically cleansed to a point of near crystalline Islamic purity throughout Dar-al-Islam (except one thin strip of disputed territory), such that half of world "Jewry" is now quarantined in tiny Israel.

Proceeding to the next objection: the Israelis have Apaches and F-16s, whilst the Pals have no choice but to don suicide jackets.

And on and on we go: there seems no end to fine reasons for Euros to remain innocently indifferent and misguidedly complacent toward the straight, two hundred proof Adolph Hitlerisms constantly on tap amongst their Arab allies -- and oil suppliers.

Bjørn, anti-Semitism as an express, overt ideoplogy has been so thoroughly discredited in Europe that its ability to survive -- or thrive --has required that it adapt to the current environment by adopting systems of camouflage and concealment. Therefore, if you define the offense -- as you have -- as one requiring proof by smoking gun or corpus delicti, you'll never see it. That standard is outmoded. Time to consider a forensic upgrade. :)

Og

Sylvia of Denver : very interesting ideas. Thank you.

Nelson: I think you're right about the Hungarian-Jewish deportation and extermination operation. More like a death cult than either a serious business plan, objective war strategy, or cooly logical witness elimination program. I was going to suggest an analogy to the Aztecs, until I came across this -- "The Enigma of Aztec Sacrifice" (only cached version available):

http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:44lUF9kZJPUJ:www.rose-hulman.edu/~delacova/aztecs/sacrifice.htm+%22The+Enigma+of+Aztec+Sacrifice%22+%22Natural+History%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Og: Interesting piece about the Aztec's. Here's a contradictory point of view though, (same site): http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:VfbfjJUhH7YJ:www.rose-hulman.edu/~delacova/aztecs/montellano.htm&ie=UTF-8

The majority of Europeans may not indeed actively champion the jewish cause in the face of minority anti-Semitism opinion. However a lack of objection in no way constitutes hidden support. Ie; I don’t care if a person overeats or smokes, thus endangering their health, but this doesn’t mean that I wholeheartedly support such a damaging life style.

Indeed if anything the majority of Europeans and institutions appear to be very much against any who displays anything that could be remotely (mis?)construed as anti-Semitism. Although anti-Israeli media and opinions seem to be commonly held there. Opposing Israeli policies as being unjust however, hardly makes one an anti-Semitic.

A good example is the case of the German politician who was labeled an anti-Semite for merely criticizing Ariel Sharon.

http://www.factsofisrael.com/blog/archives/000145-print.html

Check the following links to see evidence of European vigilance against anti-Semitism.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3507945.stm

http://www2.dw-world.de/bscms_english/current_affairs/1.31218.1.html

www.antiwar.com/hacohen/h092903.html

http://www.germany-info.org/relaunch/politics/new/pol_osce_12_2002.html

Nelson: Well it is extremely important that anti-Semitism (all forms of discrimination) be combated both in Europe and world wide. While I personally do not believe that the current anti-Israel atmosphere and marginal anti-Semitism present in Europe will develop into the full-blown mass hatred of the 1930’s, that doesn’t mean that prudent steps shouldn’t be taken to contain any obvious occurrences of anti-Semitism.

"Let's say that anti-Americanism is 80% realism and 20% symbollism, while anti-Israelism is 80% symbollism and 20% realism (if that much). There's no mystery why people are positively or negatively passionate about America. But why Israel? "

Nelson: Because to many people Israel is an extension of the US. They can critique the powerful US of A through Israel, and through the support the US gives Israel and its apparently inhumane policies. Thus anti-Israeli views are no different (with the exception of anti-semites) anit-american views.

Hard to tell. There's a case to be made that those 20% of symbolic anti-Americanism are rather a consequence of the 80% of symbolic anti-Israelism and not the opposite. The Arabs at least say (lying, of course) that their main problem with the US is that it backs (does it really?) Israel unconditionally. They don't usually declare that they hate Israel only because they consider it America's colonial outpost in the ME.(They hated her, after all, when she was a strategic ally of the French, didn't they?)
Now, I don't think that it is altogether fair to equate, in Europe, anti-Semitism with all other forms of racism. Europe does not have a historic "black problem" or an Eskimo one. Even the so-called Islamophobia is nothing but a smokescreen to downplay Europe's longest standing, most deeply rooted and most murderous prejudice. Anti-Semitism in Europe and in the Arab world is a case apart.

Sylvia: "It is the Jews that are an indigenous people, look up the definition, and the Arabs bear all the hallmarks of a secondary invading culture."

Depends on your definition of indigenous. Abraham was an invader, if you believe that story. The exodus was an invasion. The return of the Babylonian exiles was perhaps not an invasion, but the Judeans who had remained didn't like it, nor did the surrounding peoples. And what they brought back was practically a new religion, so call it at least a cultural invasion. Then there was the Maccabean revolt, which involved the conquest of non-Jewish areas, and the colonization and imposition of Judaism in some of them (such as Galilee).

Of course, there are no indigenous people anywhere, especially not in the Middle East. The ones we call indigenous today are peoples that invaded the area before they began to record their own history. In my eyes, any people that has lived in the same area for a couple of generations is indigenous. At least when people start using other standards bloodshed usually follows, so it's a wise standard if not a perfectly historical one.

Bjorn - Thank you for your response to my comment. I agree that there really are no indigenous peoples anywhere, and that the definitions can be quite fuzzy. Unfortunately one of the canards of European anti-semitism is that some how the Jews just popped up in 1948, were maganaimously granted a peanut sized piece of land and unfortuately pushed out the "natives", whom they are now horribly oppressing or something. Here's one definition of indigeous that I copied off of the web - and it's referring to Asian groups of all things.

www.adb.org/documents/Policies/indigenous_Peoples:

From the perspective of developing a working definition of indigenous peoples for use in Bank operations, several aspects must be considered. A starting point would be to define indigenous peoples on the basis of characteristics they display. Two significant characteristics would be (i) descent from population groups present in a given area, most often before modern states or territories were created and before modern borders were defined, and (ii) maintenance of cultural and social identities, and social, economic, cultural, and political institutions separate from mainstream or dominant societies and cultures. In some cases, over recent centuries, tribal groups or cultural minorities have migrated into areas to which they are not indigenous, but have established a presence and continue to maintain a definite and separate social and cultural identity and related social institutions. In such cases, the second identifying characteristic would carry greater weight.

Additional characteristics often ascribed to indigenous peoples include (i) self-identification and identification by others as being part of a distinct indigenous cultural group, and the display of desire to preserve that cultural identity, (ii) a linguistic identity different from that of the dominant society, (iii) social, cultural, economic, and political traditions and institutions distinct from the dominant culture, (iv) economic systems oriented more toward traditional systems of production than mainstream systems, and (v) unique ties and attachments to traditional habitats and ancestral territories and natural resources in these habitats and territories.

Obviously the Israelis have adapted modern farming techniques, and diverge from an exact match, but it's pretty darn close.Most of the Jews in Israel were actually expelled from the surrounding Arab countries and by no means are acclimated to western culture.

It is interesting to note that the term "Palestinian" is derived from the Hebrew word "philashtim" sometimes pronounced in English as Philistine. It is derived from a term that means foreigner in Hebrew, and was probably originally a reference to Aegeans/Greeks. Not too many peple call themselves foreigners in someone else's language.

Hebrew is about 5000 years old, as compared to Arabic which is much more recent, having appeared about 1400 years ago or so. Interestingly, Arabic uses a new script, in a region where certain languages and their scripts (and variants) have been consistently in use for thousands of years. There is no such thing as Arab antiquities - ancient cultures are Assyrian, Chaldean, Babylonian,Judean, etc. Some of these ethnic minorities are still in the area. I could go on. The point that I was trying make (albeit a bit poorly) is that one of the basis for European anti-Israelism is that Jewish land claims in the area are contrived (or to be granted by the UN or something) and that the Arabs - many of whom were brought into the area by the British as workmen are somehow more "native". Many ethnic groups were destroyed or absorbed by the Islamic and Turkish conquests of the region, so there is some basis for semitic descent of some Arab groups (many are mostly Turkic, Greek etc.)However, they have no unique linguistics or heritage at this point. The term Arab is itself a generic, and that is quite revealing. I have also noticed that the European press never uses the term Judea, It's always "Palestine", "Ancient Palestine", "Biblical Palestine", when in fact there was no such place. The region was renamed "Philistia" by the Romans sometime in the third century, I believe. No one was called a Palestinian until 1967 - prior to that they referred to thenselves as Jordanians, Egyptians,etc. The identity of the Palestinians is a modern political definition. There are no historical Arab claims to the region - except by conquest. Funny how that is selectivly applied. My wordy point here (sorry about that)is that there is a systematic attempt to selectivly discredit Jewish claims in the region and to somewhow portray the Arabs as being "indigenous" when they certainly don't even come as close to any definition I have read as the Jews do. And all this while the BBC or something is talking about "Israeli Occupation" while the Arabs are rioting on top of the 2000-3000 year old base of the old Hebrew Temple. I about put my foot through the TV when a BBC commentator a few years back referred to the Israeli occupation of Bethlehem. Goodness, what's next I thought, Celts spotted in Dublin oppressing native Saxons? Germans incensed by Polish occupation of Warsaw? It's gotten to the point where the European anti-Israeli/Semitic canards are bordering on the ludicrous, and that's what got me thinking about what could really be behind this. That's why I think that anti-Israelism and anti-semitism are really different sides of the same coin. They've got to be because their purpose is exactly the same - discredit, then destroy the Jews (only the coat of paint is a slightly different color). But why bother?

Sorry about the long post. I always find your blog interesting and informative, a pleasure to read. Thank you.

Sylvia,

There has been Islamic peoples living in Israel since the failure of the Crusades to free the "holy lands" from their heathen grasp :-)

And even before then with the fall of Byzantium at the hands of the Islamic state, and again later when the Turks came to dominate the middle east and the Islamic world (1453).

To claim that arabs/turks/muslimes were only introduced to Israel by the British (it became a British protectorate after the Brits bested the Turks in WW1, although still with a majority arab population) as workmen is rather absurd.

Indeed Arab ethnic groups have called Israel home since its conquest by them in 638AD.

Meaning that such people have had a connection to this land over a larger time period then white Americans do in north American.

Sorry, but Sylvia didn't "claim that arabs/turks/muslimes were only introduced to Israel by the British"; what she actually wrote was the following: "Arabs - many of whom were brought into the area by the British as workmen". There's a huge difference between both propositions. And Sylvia's limited one is true: the Jewish immigration was the cause of a parallel Arab immigration, because of newly available jobs, from neighbouring lands. That's why, curiously, the official UN definition of a native Palestinian Arab is any Arab who or whose family was living in the region by 1947. On the other hand, the Arabs, from the Mufti, to Hamas, PLO etc. don't admit as a native Jew anyone who or whose family arrived there after 1914, even if he/she or his/her family came from exactly the same lands (Egypt or Syria, for instance) from which a large part of the "native" Arab population came. Many Muslim still have claims for Spain and they surely lived there for longer than white Europeans lived in the Americas. The goal of the whole propaganda campaign about the region is to prove that the Jews are intruders in a place that was ethnically pure and Arab. What the Arab/Muslims actually think is that that land is a "waqf", that is, Allah's patrimony that, once incorporated to Dar al Islam, will belong to it for ever. But they cannot present this argument to the secularized West and, thus, they use the colonialist argument, forgetting that, first, those Jews who came from Europe were not colonizers but, much more likely, immigrants (they didn't came with an army or representing a colonialist country), exactly as the Arab/Muslims who live nowadays in Europe, while those Jews who came from Islamic lands (they had been expelled) belonged in the region as much, or more, than the Arab conquerors. Jews had a continuous presence in North Africa for over 2.500 years, while the Arabs didn't arrive there before the Muslim conquests. But all this is secondary. The point is: the Jews don't want to expell the Arabs from the Middle East: they want a country of their own there, because if they didn't have it they would be either massacred, expelled or reduced to "dhimmitude". The Arabs, on the other hand, see as an offense against their honour, their god, whatever, the independent presence of Jews in the region. Jews don't want Damascus or Cairo, but the Arabs want Haifa and Tel Aviv. The Jews are minimalists while the Arabs are maximalists. According to most international rules, whoever was born in a place or has legally immigrated (in a liberal view, even those who have ilegally immigrated) belong in it. All Israelis qualify and the very wish to expell them is a crime against humanity. On the other hand, there's no country on earth that would give over control over its immigration to foreigners: the US wouldn't allow its territory to be flooded with Latin Americans, the Europeans do not allow their continent to be flooded with people from the third world and neither do the Arab countries have anything resembling an open door (or rather no door) policy. Yet the Arabs want to impose such a thing in order to destroy Israel and the Euro elites seem happy to comply with this plan. Were we to be real progressists, then we'd admit that the whole earth belongs to everybody, and we could quite well begin allowing ten millions of Arabs into Austria or Switzerland, why not?

Bjorn,
Hitler used existing antisemitism to make Europe more antisemitic (pre-war). The muslims may accomplish the same thing. Europeans may get angry that Jews refuse to "acknowledge" their (Isarel's) faults, thus "justifying" muslim rage.
David,
The idea that the security fence prevents equal employment opportunities for Palestinians is bizarre. Besides the fact that demanding and recieving autonomy would seem to reduce the right to enter Israel in a time of war, workers can legally pass the fence. You know, the evil checkpoints!
PS Israelis who tried to work in the PA have been murdered on several occasions. This seems more serious, no?

I am an American Jew and have served in the army twice. I am nearly 75. The Arab nations fought any nubmer of times to eliminate Israel. They have not succeeded. It is the way fo the world that if you lose land during war, you do not get anything back till there is a peace accord. There is none. Now go forth and talk about the Syrian occupation of Lebanon.

Go and be against this or that Israeli policy--heck, many Israelis are. But don't piss on me and tell me it is raining...I am not sure why there is so ingrained a hostility troward Jews in so many places, but Muslims living outside Muslim majority countries ought to learn that they owe allegiance to the state and not to their religion aboive their state. If they choose to place religioin aboive state, then move to a country that you will be more comfortable in. If you choose not to, then act like a fucking human being.

Hello,

Islam is an anti life religion and its aim is to impose stupid, ignorant, anti life Arab culture on every creature of this world. If we all Christians of the world stand united (no matter what kind of Christians we are Catholics, Protestant, Marionettes, Orthodox etc.) then no one can beat us because we Christians belong to the creative races while most muslins belong to the non creative races, some times I do go further and say that Christians can unite with Jews, Hindu, and Buddhists because we Christians we do not have any problems with these religions but Islam does have problems with these religions too. Let me give you some examples

Chechnya Muslims vs. Russia Christians
Bosnia Muslims vs. Serbs & Croats Christians
Kosovo Muslims vs. Serbs Christians
Turkish Cyprus Muslims vs. Greece Cyprus Christians
Palestine Muslims vs. Jews Hebrew
Pakistan Muslims vs. India Hindu
South Thailand Muslims vs. Thailand Buddhist
North Sudan Muslim vs. South Sudan Christian
North Nigeria Muslim vs. South Nigeria Christian
Lebanon Muslims vs. Lebanon Christian
AL Qiada Muslim vs. Against all non Muslims

THE COMMON FACTOR IN WARS IS MUSLIMES.

These are wars that are being waged by Muslims against any one who is not Muslim, because Muslims want to impose there Arab culture on others, Muslims want there male children to meet and marry Christian females so that in he future they will impose there religion on the future children of the couple, but they forbid to let there females to marry to Christians and they threaten them with dead if they do so. Muslims forbid Christians to build a Church in Saudi Arabia, we say Italy is washed with the blood of our Saints, for us Roman Catholics Italy is Holy as Saudi Arabia is holy for the Muslims, but Muslims in Italy did build the biggest mosque in Europe but we Christians we don’t stand a chance of building a church in Saudi Arabia !!!!!!!!!!!!!.

TIME IS APPROCHING FAST WHEN WE CHRISTIANS, JEWS, HINDUS, BUDDIST MUST UNITE AND START TREATING MUSLIMES (THE NON CREATIVE PEOPLE, THE ANTI LIFE PEOPLE AND THE IMPOSSING PEOPLE) AS THEY TREAT US.

http://www.sullivan-county.com/id2/index3.htm

CHRISTUS VINCES
CHRISTUS RENIA
CHRISTUS IMPERA

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