1. desember 2003

Is Anti-Zionism a form of Anti-Semitism? Criticism of the state of Israel has reached intense levels in Europe over the last years, especially during the mounting violence after what is called the second intifada. The European left has pretty consistently sided with Israel's Islamic opponents for several decades, and miss few opportunities for criticising Israel for all its real and perceived errors and crimes. At the same time, the total absense of criticism of the most repelling Islamic regimes in the Middle East is so notable that it makes the strongest argument that criticism of Israel in many cases is just thinly veiled anti-Semitism. The Guardian's columnist Julie Burchill, who is leaving for another newspaper, delivers a scathing farewell message, clearly accusing the leftist newspaper of anti-Semitism under the guise of rightous humanistic criiticism of Israel's actions. . But if there is one issue that has made me feel less loyal to my newspaper over the past year, it has been what I, as a non-Jew, perceive to be a quite striking bias against the state of Israel. Which, for all its faults, is the only country in that barren region that you or I, or any feminist, atheist, homosexual or trade unionist, could bear to live under. I find this hard to accept because, crucially, I don't swallow the modern liberal line that anti-Zionism is entirely different from anti-semitism; the first good, the other bad. Emanuele Ottolenghi makes a similar argument in the same newspaper, but more carefully worded and with more detail. He meets the serious counter-argument that it must be possible to criticise Israel's actions without being accused of anti-Semitism. That is of course true. Still, he delivers a convincing argument that quite a bit of the criticism hurled at Israel would not be delivered at another nation doing the same things. And moreover, why do critics of Israel insist on using images from the long history of vicious anti-Semtism in its propaganda? If Israel's critics are truly opposed to anti-semitism, they should not repeat traditional anti-semitic themes under the anti-Israel banner. When such themes - the Jewish conspiracy to rule the world, linking Jews with money and media, the hooked-nose stingy Jew, the blood libel, disparaging use of Jewish symbols, or traditional Christian anti-Jewish imagery - are used to describe Israel's actions, concern should be voiced. Labour MP Tam Dalyell decried the influence of "a Jewish cabal" on British foreign policy-making; an Italian cartoonist last year depicted the Israeli siege of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem as an attempt to kill Jesus "again". Is it necessary to evoke the Jewish conspiracy or depict Israelis as Christ-killers to denounce Israeli policies? The fact that accusations of anti-semitism are dismissed as paranoia, even when anti-semitic imagery is at work, is a subterfuge. Israel deserves to be judged by the same standards adopted for others, not by the standards of utopia. Singling out Israel for an impossibly high standard not applied to any other country begs the question: why such different treatment? That is definately the core question. On the surface, almost all of the criticisms hurled at Israel has at least some possible merit. The question is why Israel, of all the world's nations, is singled out for massive international criticism, typically for human rights violations (real and perceived) that are routine in most of Israel's enemy states. Emanuele Ottolenghi argues that many Europeans can love the suffering Jews who are victims, but that they loathe the Jews who have created a strong and powerful national state. Israel is not permitted to be a sometimes selfish, sometimes overly aggressive state like all other countries in the world. Everybody claims a stake in the Jews, and have their own ideas of how the dispersed nation who suffered the Holocaust should really have acted. Those who denounce Zionism sometimes explain Israel's policies as a product of its Jewish essence. In their view, not only should Israel act differently, it should cease being a Jewish state. Anti-Zionists are prepared to treat Jews equally and fight anti-semitic prejudice only if Jews give up their distinctiveness as a nation: Jews as a nation deserve no sympathy and no rights, Jews as individuals are worthy of both. Supporters of this view love Jews, but not when Jews assert their national rights. Jews condemning Israel and rejecting Zionism earn their praise. Denouncing Israel becomes a passport to full integration. Noam Chomsky and his imitators are the new heroes, their Jewish pride and identity expressed solely through their shame for Israel's existence. Zionist Jews earn no respect, sympathy or protection. It is their expression of Jewish identity through identification with Israel that is under attack. I agree with the above. However, there is one fact overlooked by many who criticise the radical left for its attacks on Israel. The left similarly attacks its own culture, the whole western civilisation, and of course America in particular. Israel is a western, liberal democracy, and it frequently demonstrates its political and military superiority to its 3rd world neighbours who have been unable and unwilling to adapt democracy and market economics. The radical left has been furious at the success of western civilisation after it rejected Marxist theories to the junk heap of history. Maybe the radical leftist hatred of Israel is just another aspect of their hatred of our own civilisation. These ideas, both the implicit anti-Simitism described earlier and the self-loathing of the radical left, unfortunately has a following far beyond the radical left in Europe. This is sadly apparent when a respected conservative, Norway's Kåre Willoch, can protest against Israel on the Kristallnacht anniversary, drawing only a minumum of outrage. I fear that is because the sinister undercurrents behind Europe's rabid attacks on Israel has not been sufficiently exposed. In Europe, the anti-Semites are winning the propaganda war. 10:04:56 PM    comment []  trackback []

The Norwegian King has cancer His Majesty King Harald V of Norway (picture) has cancer on the bladder. He is scheduled for an operation on December 8, and the prognosis is good as the cancer was discovered early. Last Tuseday the king was admitted to hospital with hematuria, blood in the urine.He was released after a number of tests, and it is obviously one of these tests that came back with this result  His son, Crown Prince Haakon Magnus will be acting regent during the king's illness and convalescence. 6:53:24 PM    comment []  trackback []

Steel tariffs to be repealed There are now very consistent rumours coming out that the Bush administration will repeal the tariffs on imported steel, thus averting a major trade war with the EU. The official story is that the tariffs have now served their course as they have protected US steel industry long enough to allow it to restructure. I believe some of the things the Bush administration says, but that isn't one of them. 5:31:42 PM    comment []  trackback []

The Swedish collision A bit of local news, for once. This, at a supermarket in Bergen, is the result of a Swede wanting to teach a young Norwegian girl how to drive, by standing outside the car giving instructions. As the speed increased, she suddenly panicked and confused the brake and the accelerator, with the result you see above. Nobody was injured. (From a Norwegian article in Bergens Tidende) 12:54:34 PM    comment []  trackback []

Yes, Minister If I have to name one candidate for the best TV comedy series of all times, it has to be the BBC's Yes, Minister and the sequel Yes, Prime Minister, aired between 1980 and 1988 in Britain and probably shown at some time in the furthest reaches of this planet. It is based on the life of a newly appointed British Cabinet Minister, James Hacker MP (Paul Eddington; seated) and his daily struggle with the civil servants, immortalised through the characters Sir Humphrey Appleby (Nigel Hawthorne, left) and Bernard Woolley (Derek Fowlds, center). The number of conflicts arising from the politicians trying to accomplish some of their goals and promises and the civil servants doing everything to stop precisely that from happening is very illuminating to how government really works, or doesn't. It is actually true that Margaret Thatcher, Britain's Prime Minister at the time, was a great fan of the show, and were convinced its creators had inside information from the workings of Whitehall. "Its closely observed portrayal of what goes on in the corridors of power has given me hours of pure joy". When you watch it, you will laugh, and also realise that as a voter, the last laugh may well be on you. 1:51:27 AM    comment []  trackback []

© Copyright 2004 Jan Haugland. Last update: 01.01.2004; 02:46:10.