Europe’s Estrangement from Israel

Pajamas Media ^ | January 17 | Frank Furedi

[AJKauf]

I am standing in a queue waiting to buy a train ticket from London to Canterbury. A well-dressed lady standing behind me informs her friend that she “can’t wait till Israel disappears off the face of the earth.” What struck me was not her intense hostility to Israel but the mild-mannered, matter-of-fact tone with which she announced her wish for the annihilation of a nation. It seems that it is okay to condemn and demonize Israel. All of a sudden Israel has become an all-purpose target for a variety of disparate and confused causes.

When I ask a group of Pakistani waiters sitting around a table in their restaurant why they “hate” Israel, they casually tell me that it is because Jews are their “religion’s enemy.” Those who are highly educated have their own pet prejudice. One of my young colleagues who teaches media studies in a London-based university was taken aback during a seminar discussion when some of her students insisted that since all the banks are owned by Jews, Israel was responsible for the current global financial crisis.

Increasingly expressions of aversion towards Israel have assumed the status of a taken-for-granted sentiment in many sections of polite European society....

[quadrant]

It doesn't matter. Europe is an advanced industrial society with a national health insurance programs. Thus, sins such as antisemitism can be overlooked.

[GiovannaNicoletta]

"And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it" (Zech 12:3).

[Owl558]

“I’m still unsure exactly how and when liberalism became vaguely synoymous with anti-Semitism...”

There’s nothing vaguely synomous about it. The grandparents and great grandparents of these racists were spewing this same garbage in the 20’s and 30’s. The history is there, my friend.

[MadAnthony1776]

When I ask a group of Pakistani waiters sitting around a table in their restaurant why they “hate” Israel, they casually tell me that it is because Jews are their “religion’s enemy.”

And where will they go next? After Christians because all religions except Islam are their religion’s enemy. Shiite and Suni can’t even get along. This world would be a lot more peaceful without Islam than without Jews.

[chuck_the_tv_out]

as always, the real facts are the most obscured. At 200 years young, America is easily the most youthful country with fresh ideas and opportunity for all. euro countries have had few “regime changes” since kings killed whoever they liked for sport. And little has changed. They still dominate their subjects, but now they do it with a mind control system called liberalism, where the subjects feel that they are in control

[penowa]

"Most either participated or turned a blind eye to the treatment of the Jews in all countries of Europe."

And it appears the only change in attitude in Europe in this regard is that the new Europeans (Muslims) re-inforce it by their numbers.