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Institute of the World Jewish Congress
Policy Dispatch March 2003 The "New Antisemitism" A volatile mix of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish hostility At Issue The past two years have witnessed a recrudescence of antisemitism in Western Europe the likes of which have not been seen since the end of World War II. Synagogues, schools and other Jewish buildings have been torched and Jews have been subjected to physical and verbal abuse. While most of these acts have been the work of Muslims, it is the European elites who have created an ambience in which antisemitism is no longer considered unacceptable in "polite company". Jews and the Jewish State have been subjected to an intense campaign of public vilification and have even been called "the new Nazis." Arab outrages, on the other hand, are passed over in silence or "contextualized." Opposition to the American-led attack on Iraq has served to further stoke antisemitic sentiment among Muslims and the Left, as biased media outlets provide platforms for anti-Zionist and anti-Jewish rhetoric. The specter of antisemitism The morality of Western Europe is again being tested. And again the test focuses on the treatment of Jewish communities that were reborn after near annihilation in the Shoah. The facts speak for themselves. In the past few days alone a young American Jew was assaulted in Berlin (on March 24) and two French Jews were accosted on the streets of Paris by anti-war protesters from the Action Committee for Peace and Justice in the Middle East (on March 23). While Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe condemned the attack, groups involved in organizing the anti-war demonstration have remained silent. These most recent attacks are just the latest and most blatant incidents of the antisemitic trend that has engulfed Europe¹s Muslim and Left communities. In the recent past, the first weeks of April 2002 bore witness to the worst outbreak of antisemitism in Western Europe since the Second World War. Synagogues, schools (and school buses), kindergartens, burial grounds and other Jewish institutions have been targeted across the length and breadth of France and similar violence has spread to other parts of Western Europe. The charred remains of Jewish sanctuaries, vandalized Jewish cemeteries and other Jewish sites in the very places from which Jewish men, women and children were rounded up and sent to their deaths little more than half a century ago is cause for reflection. These events cannot but force Jews to wonder whether the specter of antisemitism, this time in the guise of anti-Zionism, is again haunting Europe. Future historians may yet call this "new antisemitism" (the term coined to describe what has been happening in Europe in the last 2 and a half years, since the Palestinians abandoned diplomacy for violence) a watershed in the long gloomy history of Jew-hatred on the European continent. Today, more than five decades after French police rounded up Jews on the streets of Paris for deportation to the East, no Jew with a kippah on his head feels secure walking the streets of any city or town in Europe. He knows that he is a target. Jews congregating in any easily recognizable Jewish institution are uneasy, and with good reasonŠ Even customers at the kosher butcher shop are aware that buying kosher means placing oneself at risk. Blurring the distinctions Antisemitism garbed in the robe of condemnation of Israel and Zionism is nothing new. For many years now, those who wished to express their antipathy toward Jews (a sentiment which was not generally acceptable) vented their frustration against Israel. Today, however, the distinction has become more blurred than ever. Not only has hostility toward Israel reached new depths, but today one also finds a distinct tendency toward acceptance of antisemitism in so-called "polite society". Writing in the London Sunday Times, and making reference to a senior French diplomat's remark that Israel is "a shitty little country", Andrew Sullivan described this phenomenon: "That 'shitty little' country [Israel] has become among many European elites, the object of hate which polite company can pillory when there is hesitation in using the word 'Jews'". Not since the 1930s has such blithe hatred of Jews gained this much respectability." This situation is mirrored in the great universities of Europe, which have become hotbeds of antisemitism. According to Prof. Joel Kotek of the University of Brussels "One's position regarding the Arab-Israeli conflict has become a test of loyalty. Should he express solidarity with Israel, he becomes a supporter of a Nazi regime." Now, this has been compounded by the anti-Iraq war movement¹s antisemitic tendencies. As Martha Mucznik, Executive Director of the European Union of Jewish Students, notes, ³The Jewish communities will suffer from the war, by the way it will be portrayed in the media.² Indeed, Jewish community leaders in Belgium fear that the Jews will once again become the target of anti-American rage. Jews on the campuses, which have been the focus of much anti-Israel activity in the past 2 years are especially vulnerable to attack, both rhetorical and physical. There, Muslim anti-Israel furor joins with the anti-globalization and anti-American forces in a potent and dangerous fusion. ³The Jewish communities will suffer from the war, by the way it will be portrayed in the media² The failure of the Europeans to mount any effective opposition to the torrent of anti-Jewish invective, which flooded the UN World Conference Against Racism in Durban in September 2001, demonstrates that antisemitism is no longer beyond the pale. Ostensibly, it was Israel that was censured for its treatment of the Palestinians (which would have been odious enough), but observers both Jewish and non-Jewish could not fail to note the vituperative tone directed at Jews. US Congressman Tom Lantos described his own shock "at this blatant display of antisemitism. For me, having experienced the horrors of the Holocaust first hand, this was the most sickening and unabashed display of hate for Jews I had seen since the Nazi period." Similar slogans have been a hallmark of the anti-war movement, even in the United States. The anti-war movement has been so co-opted by anti-Israel and antisemitic forces that even Michael Lerner, a left-wing Jewish activist, was prevented from participating in an anti-war demonstration in California because he is Jewish. That Europeans, given their disgraceful history, would stand by and observe this spectacle speaks volumes about the atmosphere in present-day Europe. Significantly, the actions of those who hijacked the conference and turned it into a hate fest against Jews - and these include such ³champions of human rights² and tolerance as Iran, Iraq, Libya, and Syria were passed over in silence. That trend continues. Almost nobody in Europe dared to criticize the failure of Arab leaders to issue a forthright rejection of suicide bombings at any of their meetings on the Middle East conflict over the past months. The social and intellectual elites have not themselves engaged in acts of violence against Jews, but they have turned a blind eye toward the actions of Muslim militants in their midst. Today, some 20 million Muslims live in Europe (and that number is rising). There is considerable evidence that despite the widespread antipathy toward this burgeoning Muslim presence, there is a sense of satisfaction in seeing the Muslims turn against the Jews. Yet, despite the depressing situation in France there are a few bright spots on the horizon. Antisemitic incidents have begun to decline following the elections in France and the inauguration of the new government. In February, French Education Minister Luc Ferry initiated a program aimed at stamping out antisemitism in the schools, after a teacher was prevented by his students from teaching about the Holocaust and an 11-year-old boy had to change schools because of intimidation by Arab students. Concerned over sustained antisemitic violence and vandalism, Ferry said, ³We cannot let things go on like thisŠAntisemitism is being viewed as commonplaceŠ But we must not accept it.² The drop in antisemitic incidents in France is also being attributed to the determination of Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy who has taken concrete steps to protect Jewish institutions. Nevertheless, the situation in France and across Europe warrants concern. Muslim Rage ³Islamists and Western media [are] using anti-Zionism as a fig-leaf for prejudices rooted in Š Nazi demonology² Most of the attacks on Jews and Jewish institutions are the work of disaffected members of the burgeoning Muslim communities who are venting their rage at Jews and Israel in the way they know best - through violence and intimidation. However, the onus of blame for the present outrages cannot be placed on the shoulders of Muslims alone. On the contrary, in recent months the political and intellectual elites of much of Western Europe have been guilty of creating an ambience of anti-Jewish antipathy in which it suddenly became legitimate to hate Jews, and even chic to attribute all social ills (including, for example, the murderous attacks on the United States on September 11th) to Jews and Israel. Even in Germany, in which, for historical reasons, there has generally been a degree of sensitivity for Jewish concerns, observers report a wave of grass roots antipathy toward Israel and Jews. Western Europe is cynically appeasing and rewarding those who utilize terror both on its home front and abroad. That, of course, is nothing new, and it is not for no reason that Arab terrorists have always found the West Europeans most compliant when advancing their demands, especially at gunpoint. But today that trend reaches new depths of cynicism. More than two years ago, when the Camp David talks collapsed due to the Palestinians' intransigence, the West Europeans blamed Chairman Arafat for his failure to accept the generous terms offered by then Prime Minister Barak. As soon as Chairman Arafat unleashed his terrorists against Israeli civilians, it was Israel that was suddenly to blame for the break down of the peace process. And as the crisis escalated, the Jewish State found itself a pariah in Europe. It was not long before synagogues were again being put to the torch. A fig leaf for Nazi demonology As Melanie Phillips reported in The Spectator of London, the key motif in the ³new antisemitism² is ³Holocaust inversion, with the Israelis being demonized as Nazis and the Palestinians regarded as the new Jews. Israel and the Jews are being systematically delegitimised and dehumanized a necessary prelude to their destruction with both Islamists and Western media using anti-Zionism as a fig leaf for prejudices rooted in both medieval Christian and Nazi demonology. This has produced an Orwellian situation in which hatred for the Jews now marches behind the Left¹s banner of anti-racism and human rights, giving rise not merely to distortions, fabrications and slander about Israel in the media but also to mainstream articles discussing the malign power of the Jews over American and world policy.² The Portuguese Nobel prize-winning author Jose Saramago's suggestion that Israel was guilty of recreating Auschwitz in Ramallah is symptomatic of the current mood. Indeed, comparing the actions of Israel to those of Nazi Germany has become almost de rigueur in Europe. Demonstrators marching through the streets of European capitals today routinely carry placards that label Prime Minister Sharon "the new Hitler", and call the Israeli response to the terror inflicted on its citizens "genocide". Clearly, this unremitting and hypocritical condemnation of Israel has given the green light to those who wish to take the jihad to the streets of Antwerp, Paris, Berlin and Marseille. In almost deafening silence did Europe pass over the deaths of nearly 30 Jews, including aged Holocaust survivors, sitting at a Passover Seder in Netanya. Only Israel's attempts to defend itself have been worthy of unambiguous opprobrium. European leaders claim that the current violence is a reflection of dismay at Israel's actions. They implore both Arab and Jew not to play out the Middle East crisis in Europe. The message, of course, is quite clear. The problem is not the burning of synagogues, but merely, that the synagogues have been set ablaze in Marseille and Paris, and not in Israel itself. Former French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine explained: "One is not shocked when young French Jews instinctively sympathize with Israel regardless of its policies, so one should not be shocked when young French citizens [of North African background] feel compassion for the Palestinians." What Vedrine failed to point out is that however disenchanted Jews may be with Palestinians, they do not burn down mosques or attack Muslims on the street. The new litmus test Much of the intellectual elite of Europe has cast Israel as an international pariah whose very existence as a legitimate state has been called into question. And that trend can be seen across the political spectrum. According to Mario Pirani, an Italian journalist who writes for the left-leaning La Repubblica: "The public opinion among part of the left-wing is very pro-Palestinian and very confused. They think they are not antisemitic, but in reality they slide toward positions of real antisemitism, and that is very dangerous. They don't understand that Israel's very survival is at stake now." Alas, many of them do understand that Israel is imperiled, but given the way they perceive Jews and the Jewish State, that does not seem to trouble them greatly. While some may have sympathy for the "poor" and "defenseless" Jews who perished in the Holocaust, these same people display a distinct feeling of unease when Jews defend themselves. For them, Jewish powerlessness seems natural - and they cannot come to grips with the actions of Jews who refuse to stand by while they are blown to bits by suicide bombers. Classic antisemitism is undoubtedly behind this contempt for Jews who "don't know their place". That West Europeans were recently forced to confront the skeletons in their closet has also contributed to this phenomenon. Casting Israelis as the new Nazis seems to assuage the conscience of those who know only too well about the sins of their forefathers. There seems little that Jews can do to turn this tide. It is up to European society to cure itself of this terrible malaise. Some years ago, the British historian Paul Johnson, a Christian, noted that a country's attitude toward its Jews is a vital litmus test. "No intellectual society can flourish where a Jew feels even slightly uneasy." Indeed, history has shown that where Jews are attacked, others are soon imperiled as well. The current global war against terrorism is a case in point. When the Israeli Embassy and the Jewish community building in Buenos Aires, Argentina were bombed in 1992 and 1994 respectively, it should have served as a wake up call to governments that international terrorism is getting stronger and poses a real danger. But for over a decade nothing was done to bring the perpetrators of these heinous crimes to justice. Indeed, while international terror aimed its sights on Jews and Israel exclusively, it was ignored. But it was ignored at great cost. While the world slept, the terror masters solidified their organizations, grew and plotted more misery. It took the deaths of 3,000 people in the United States to rouse the world from its slumber and force it to act. Today the Jews of Western Europe feel very uneasy. But it is Europe that must draw the appropriate conclusions. March 2003 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The World Jewish Congress is an international federation of Jewish communities and organizations representing 80 nations on six continents, and it serves as the multinational representative of world Jewry. Founded in 1935 to fight the poison of hatred and intolerance of Naziism, the WJC has been combatting the persecution of Jews around the world for more than six decades, and today it is leading the fight for material and moral restitution to the Jewish people of the greatest theft and most heinous crime in recorded history. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * W O R L D J E W I S H C O N G R E S S Douglas M. Bloomfield, Washington Representative 301/460-3285 € F: 301/460-4187 € wjc@his.com http://www.wjc.org.il/ |
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