In a recent New York Times opinion article, its author states: “Israel is a state like any other, long-established and internationally recognized.” If only it were so!
Granted, Israel, like all states, deserves its share of well-placed criticism, but also needs legitimacy and approval generally. But, something else is happening that steps over the line of propriety and enters the swamp of anti-Semitism or Jew-hatred. Israel’s efforts to “normalize” itself have been fraught with the necessities of self-defense from the outset.
What nation other than the world’s only Jewish country has been singled out for repeated military and political attacks by its Arab and Muslim neighbors since its birth in 1948? What nation other than Israel today — even ones accused of genocide (like Sudan, in Darfur) or who are openly threatening genocide against another nation (namely, Iran and its proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah, against Israel) — is subjected to so much verbal abuse by totally fabricating charges against it, accusing it of being Nazi and/or apartheid, but ultimately an illegitimate state? Such epithets are inaccurate and morally offensive. Israel is not gathering Palestinians and exterminating them in Nazi-style death camps; nor, as once in South Africa, is there a strict legal exclusion of Palestinians from civilian life, unless they engage in terrorist acts. Further, we are not reassured when Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan says “it’s not possible for a Muslim to commit genocide.” In my view, it is clear that many Arab and Muslim states reject a Jewish homeland in their midst.
My focus and slant on Israel is not so much a defense of its specific policies and practices. Instead, it is a response to the types of attacks on the Jewish state, the ones which seek refuge in or are driven by Jew-hatred. Accordingly, the anti-Semitic eruptions we see in many parts of the world today are attempts to displace criticisms of Israel and place them in that repugnant context. Throughout history, anti-Semitism usually has been triggered by an event, situation, person or an action. In this case, globalized anti-Semitic attacks center on the Jewish state by trying to isolate, degrade and ultimately delegitimize its right to exist. To deflect these sorts of attacks before the world community becomes desensitized to them and sets the stage for a far worse calamity, the linkage between anti-Semitism and criticisms of Israel must be clarified.
The derogatory, centuries-old stereotype of the “outcast” Jew; the “other”; the rootless, cunning, greedy member of a race bent on power and world domination, appears to be driving the tendency to delegitimize Israel. (In fact, the term “anti-Semitism” was coined in the 1880s in the context of a racist or anti-Jewish nationalism). That is, the stereotype is morphing into the unjustified demonization of Israel as the outcast among nations whose mere existence is supposedly designed to victimize and control the world’s Arab and Muslim populations. Recent examples of the blending of some critiques of Israel and traditional anti-Semitism include Syria’s representative to the U.N.’s Human Rights Council evoking the ancient blood libel against Jews (the viciously false accusation that the blood of non-Jews is used in Jewish rituals); or Cuba’s former President Fidel Castro stating that the Nazi swastika has replaced Israel’s banner; or the hate-driven outburst of the disgraced reporter, Helen Thomas, demanding that Jews get out of Israel and return to their post-Holocaust homes in Germany and Poland (Note: Israel has always been the Jewish homeland, and Jewish presence there has persisted since biblical times). Further, shouts of “kill the Jews” can clearly be heard in protests against Israel and its defenders, from onboard the recent “humanitarian” flotilla that tried to run Israel’s self-defensive blockade of Hamas-controlled Gaza, to street actions against pro-Israeli diplomats, speakers, musicians and academics.
Physical assaults against Jews and Jewish institutions in many parts of the world, especially in Europe, because they are assumed by the perpetrators to be “Zionists” or believers in Israel as the Jewish homeland, are of increasing frequency and concern. In fact, the distinction between Israel as a state and Jewish communities around the world seems to be collapsing so much that Jewish people anywhere are becoming targets, as the rife institution of security measures attests.
The emerging political climate concerning anti-Semitism and Israel has become of sufficient concern that Yale University, a premiere educational institution, is sponsoring its inaugural scholars’ conference titled “Global Anti-Semitism: A Crisis in Modernity” (to which this writer has been invited to present his paper).
In the aftermath of the Holocaust, the decimation of Europe’s Jewish communities, Israel is commonly understood by many Jews as a redoubtable sanctuary from past religious and political Jew-hatred (from exclusion and pogroms to Hitler’s death factories). As the memory of the Holocaust recedes, and with it the guilt and shame, the plume of anti-Semitism is again surfacing with its key focus on Israel. It is our task to use all educational, moral and legal resources to meet this challenge and so prevent another genocidal calamity.
Rosenbaum is a professor of philosophy at Cleveland State University and editor of the third edition of “Is the Holocaust Unique? Perspectives on Comparative Genocide.”
http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2010/07/global_anti-semitism_is_on_the.html
