ANDREW SULLIVAN: Anti-semitism sneaks into the anti-war camp

An article by a first-year student criticising what he regards as the anti-semitism tolerated at the United Nations appeared in last week’s Yale Daily News, the paper for the elite American university. If the article was typical fare the response to it was not. The author had touched a nerve and a torrent of anger was unleashed.

“I recently attended a forum focusing on the Israeli/Palestinian issue,” wrote one respondent. “Both sides made valid points but there was a heated exchange when the pro-Israel side initiated the ‘anti-semite’ slur. I am sick and tired of Jewish people always smearing those that merely disagree with their views as ‘evil’.

“I never thought I’d say this but a lot of what the so-called ‘white supremacists’ are saying (is) proving more accurate than I feel comfortable admitting.”

Then there was the recent Not In Our Name rally in Central Park, demonstrating against a potential war against Iraq. Around the edges of the rally copies of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the classic forged document of 19th-century anti-semitism, were being sold. According to the New York Sun, this peddling of anti-semitic tripe was not entirely accidental.

One protester said: “There are interest groups that want Israel to dominate Palestine. If Bush goes with them and is too critical, he might lose their support . . . the international financiers have their hooks in everything.” Ah, those international financiers. Remember them? America’s anti-war movement, still puny and struggling, is showing signs of being hijacked by one of the oldest and darkest prejudices there is. Perhaps it was inevitable. The conflict against Islamo-fascism obviously circles back to the question of Israel. Fanatical anti-semitism, as bad or even worse than Hitler’s, is now a cultural norm across much of the Middle East. It’s the acrid glue that unites Saddam, Arafat, Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, Iran and the Saudis.

And if you campaign against a war against that axis, you’re bound to attract people who share these prejudices. That’s not to say the large majority of anti-war campaigners are anti-semitic. But this strain of anti-semitism is worrying and dangerous.

Earlier this year there were calls for America’s universities to withdraw any investments in Israel. A petition at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard attracted hundreds of signatures, prompting Larry Summers, the president of Harvard, to say that “serious and thoughtful people are advocating and taking actions that are anti-semitic in their effect if not their intent”. He said views that were once the preserve of poorly educated right-wing populists were now supported in “progressive intellectual communities”.

Summers’s argument was simple: why has Israel alone been singled out as worthy of divestment? Critics cite its continued occupation of the West Bank. There’s no question that Israel’s policies there are ripe for criticism and that to equate such criticism with anti-semitism is absurd. Similarly, it’s perfectly possible to argue against Israel’s domestic policies without any hint of anti-semitism. But to argue that Israel is more deserving of sanction than any other regime right now is surely bizarre.

Israel is a multiracial democracy. Arab citizens of Israel proper can vote and freely enter society; there is freedom of religion and a free press. An openly gay man just won election to the Knesset. Compared with China, a ruthless dictatorship brutally occupying Tibet, Israel is a model of democratic governance. And unlike China’s occupation of Tibet, Israel’s annexation was a defensive action against an Arab military attack.

Compare Israel to any other Middle Eastern country — Syria’s satrapy in Lebanon, Mubarak’s police state, Iraq’s barbaric autocracy or Iran’s theocracy — and it’s a beacon of light. To single it out for attack is so self-evidently bizarre that it prompts an obvious question: what are these anti-Israel fanatics really obsessed about?

The answer, I think, lies in the nature of part of today’s left. It is fuelled above all by resentment of the success western countries, and their citizens, have achieved through freedom and hard work. Just look at Israel’s amazing achievements in comparison with its neighbours: a vibrant civil society, economic growth, technological skills, an agricultural miracle.

It is no surprise that the resentful left despises it. So, for obvious reasons, do Israel’s neighbours. The Arab states could have made peace decades ago and enriched themselves through trade and interaction. Instead, rather than emulate the Jewish state, they spent decades trying to destroy it. When they didn’t succeed, Arab dictators resorted to the easy distractions of envy, hatred and obsession.

Al-Qaeda is the most dangerous manifestation of this response; Hezbollah comes a close second. But milder versions are everywhere. And what do people who want to avoid examining their own failures do? They look for scapegoats. Jews are the perennial scapegoat.

This attitude isn’t restricted to the Middle East. In the West the left has seized on Israel as another emblem of what they hate. They’re happy to see Saddam re-elected with 100% of a terrified vote, happy to see him develop nerve gas and nuclear weapons to use against his own population and others. But over Israel’s occasional crimes in self-defence? They march in the streets.

Ask the average leftist what he is for, and you will not get a particularly eloquent response. Ask what he is against and the floodgates open. Similarly, ask the average anti-war activist what she thinks we should do about Iraq and the stammering begins. Do we leave Saddam alone? Send Jimmy Carter to sign the kind of deal he made with North Korea eight years ago?

Will pressurising Israel remove the nerve gas and potential nukes Saddam has? Will ceding the West Bank to people who cheered on September 11 help defang Al-Qaeda? They don’t say and don’t know. But they do know what they are against: American power, Israeli human rights abuses, British neo-imperialism, the “racist” war on Afghanistan and so on. Get them started on their hatreds, and the words pour out. No wonder they are selling the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in Central Park.

Such negativism matters. When a movement is based on resentment, when your political style is as bitter as it is angry and your rhetoric focuses not on those murdering party-goers in Bali or workers in Manhattan but on the democratic powers trying to protect them, your fate is cast. A politics of resentment is a poisonous creature that slowly embitters itself. You should not be surprised if the most poisonous form of resentment that the world has ever known springs up, unbidden, in your midst.

Go to Joe Sobran's websites.

He blames Jews for communist atrocities. He refuses to hold Christians accountable, because of a double standard. (Actually this is very common among Ukranain anti-semites, who are happy to by communist spin blaming Jews. It is sad that a Ukranian American would follow in the mindless bigotry)
Sobran spreads lies about the Jewish religion and Jewish law in some of his articles.
Sobran speaks at Holocaust denial/revision conferences.

If he is not an anti-semite, then no one without blood on their hands is.

It's very easy to make accusations such as yours, which is why I ignore them unless they're backed by citations and references. By the way, did I detect a note of anti-Ukrainian bigotry in the above? Just a matter of appearances, I'm sure.

Yes, Sobran has noted the strong participation of Jews in the original Communist movement and the takeover of the Russian Empire. He's also noted that the original design of Israel was very socialist (more so than today), and that this design was largely laid down by Eastern European Jews. He's written about the interfaith acrimony, in which Jews have blamed Christians and Christianity for their many persecutions but have seldom acknowledged the efforts and sacrifices of Christians, for example during World War II, for Jewish benefit. I find all of this to be fact. They might be coincidental, but the correlations he has noted are real correlations.

Yes, Sobran is involved in Holocaust revisionist history, as are a number of other historians and scholars. You seem to find this objectionable. Let's imagine for a moment that we weren't talking about the Holocaust, but rather about the Stalinist purges of the Thirties. Would you challenge investigations into those events, designed to probe whether the common beliefs about them were exaggerated, as unacceptable? The only difference would be that the victims of the Holocaust, by definition, were Jewish. Inasmuch as the Holocaust has been elevated to a position of overriding grand-historical significance, such that all other atrocities, however large, disappear in its shadow, I'd say it's rather important that we have the best information possible about it, wouldn't you? But as regards this one event, it is considered impermissibly anti-Semitic to question the prevailing beliefs -- it is considered perfectly acceptable to use the force of law to prevent research into them, in most of Europe! By my lights, that is unacceptable -- and Sobran and others like him who insist on poring over the records in search of verification of the figures and events are to be applauded.

The one accusation you made that might have force is that Sobran "spreads lies about the Jewish religion and Jewish law." All right, produce the articles, produce the citations, and produce the references. Otherwise, what are we to think of your defamatory comments?

Oh, and before you get started on me personally, my wife is Jewish. So was my first wife. And so are my two daughters.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com

It would be helpful if Bamford, a leftist, could get his dates straight. He believes that Israel attacked the Liberty to hide evidence of a war crime against Egyptian soldiers. The problem is that the attack occured 2 days AFTER the Liberty was attacked and that there is no forensic evidence backing up the claims of a few Egyptian sodiers.

I've noticed Bamford's politics in radio interviews of him. I think you're right that he's a leftist, but I don't think that vitiates the quality of his history. He does appear to have gotten most of his facts on the Liberty from sources who were in a position to know.

On his explanation for the Israelis' reason for attacking the Liberty, I think he presents that as his own explanation, and that that can be separated from the facts of his narrative. I think he can be wrong about the first without being wrong about the second (on the facts, what he says is consistent with what other authors say.) I will have to check what you say about the chronology, but, as I said above, my inclination is to believe that what the Israelis wanted to keep hidden was their military plans about future actions in the war, not war crimes in Egypt -- as Bamford claims.

It would be nice if Bamford were to look at why the CIA ordered the Liberty into a war zone in contravention to Naval orders.

It would have been the NSA that did that, not the CIA, but Bamford says that it was, unusually, the Joint Chiefs of Staff that ordered the ship in in the first place. I assume he is correct about that. My recollection is that Bamford does say that the Pentagon tried to order the ship back out of the war zone, but that there was a snafu in transmitting the orders. I suppose it's possible that people are lying about that, that the mistransmissions were deliberate, and that people in the Pentagon were trying to keep the Liberty in place. I find it hard to see how the CIA could have been involved.

In any case, whatever was going on, the Liberty may have been in a war zone, but it was in international waters. It was indeed collecting signals intelligence, but to do so in international waters -- war zone or not -- was perfectly legal, under international law. Israel had no right to attack her, even if somebody was disobeying presidential or other internal U.S. orders. The sailors, who were obeying all the orders they knew about, did not deserve to die.

It's very easy to make accusations such as yours, which is why I ignore them unless they're backed by citations and references. By the way, did I detect a note of anti-Ukrainian bigotry in the above? Just a matter of appearances, I'm sure.

My father is a Galicianer. My ancestors on my father's side have lived in Poland Ukraine and Russia for 1300 years. They were there before the Varangians came and conquered the local Slavs to form the Rus. They founded Kiev, origionally Sambata-Kuiev. I am hardly anti-Ukranian.
Of course ancestry isn't everything. 'm suprised you didn't note that Joe Sobran carries a Jewish name. Joseph is Biblical and Sobran, Savrin, Sevrin etc is a Jewish name common to Ruthenia.

Yes, Sobran has noted the strong participation of Jews in the original Communist movement and the takeover of the Russian Empire.
Conveniently, he fails to mention the anti-Jewish policies of the USSR.

He's also noted that the original design of Israel was very socialist (more so than today), and that this design was largely laid down by Eastern European Jews.
The communists and socialist utopians wished to create an atheist, biracial home for ethenic Jews. However, this group was never the majority.
Ironically, there "solution" is amazingly similar to Sobrans.

He's written about the interfaith acrimony, in which Jews have blamed Christians and Christianity for their many persecutions but have seldom acknowledged the efforts and sacrifices of Christians, for example during World War II, for Jewish benefit.
Jews have been a persecuted minority in Europe for 2000 years. Christianity was used as the basis for the repression for 1500 years.
The left (Jewish and simply of Jewish descent) minimize this for political reasons. Certain ultra-nationalists do as well. Most Jews recognize the sacrifices of many Christians for their Jewish bretherin against the pagan Nazis. Sobran's bete-noir, the neo-con Jews are the most likely to write about this noble acts.

The only difference would be that the victims of the Holocaust, by definition, were Jewish.
Not true. 3 million victims of the Holocaust included Gypsies (the Roma were targeted like Jews), cripples, political prisoners, and others.

Inasmuch as the Holocaust has been elevated to a position of overriding grand-historical significance, such that all other atrocities, however large, disappear in its shadow, I'd say it's rather important that we have the best information possible about it, wouldn't you?
Yes. But Sobran hangs defends not those doing real research but deniers.

But as regards this one event, it is considered impermissibly anti-Semitic to question the prevailing beliefs -- it is considered perfectly acceptable to use the force of law to prevent research into them, in most of Europe!
It is quite unfortunate. However, please do note that people have also been prosecuted for talking about radical Islam. The enemy is political correctness, not the "victims" used by the social Marxists.

By my lights, that is unacceptable -- and Sobran and others like him who insist on poring over the records in search of verification of the figures and events are to be applauded.
Then you have fallen for their politcal juditsu. These people understand that the Holocaust made anti-semetism unacceptable. Thus they seek to minimize or erase it. They then use the overreaction of the PC left to claim victimhood status themselves.

Sobran, who is extremely averse to military action, holds that the establishment of the State of Israel was morally wrong. Inasmuch as Israel was established by force of arms, after the failure of the United Nations partition decree of 1947, one cannot dismiss his contentions out of hand. I disagree with him, but this is a political point and has nothing to do with his opinion of Jews, the Jewish culture, or the Judaic religion.
There is no equivalence. 6 Arab armies invaded Israel in 1948, and these were armed by the British.
Opposing the circumstances surrounding the creation of the modern state of Israel is one thing, opposing the existance of a Jewish state is quite another.

The one accusation you made that might have force is that Sobran "spreads lies about the Jewish religion and Jewish law." All right, produce the articles, produce the citations, and produce the references. Otherwise, what are we to think of your defamatory comments?

Take a look at The Church and Jewish Ideology
http://www.sobran.com/jewid.shtml

There is this fun quote:

They have repeatedly migrated to Christian countries and have been repeatedly expelled, for reasons that have usually had little to do with theology — though the obscene blasphemies against Christ and his mother in the Talmud, unique in religious literature, besides reflecting oddly on Jewish demands for Christian tolerance and for the cleansing of offensive passages in the Gospels, have done nothing to endear the Jews to Christians.

This libelous claim is taken specifically from anti-Semetic tracts. The authors of these purposely conflate Yeshu ben Pandera, a Jew from egypt who lived 100 years before Jesus and was stoned to death for heresy before the Romans came, with Jesus (Yehoshua ben Yosef).

I note from your profile that you're very young. One of the characteristic weaknesses of the young is intemperateness: the desire to divide the world neatly into heroes and villains. In the realm of political and cultural opinion, this usually cannot be done. The attempt to do it is almost always highly unjust. Perhaps with the passage of time, you might learn, as most of us do, that it is possible to disagree, even to disagree on fundamentals, without being evil -- and it's preferable to do so without being disagreeable.

You should look at my other postings. I am quite forgiving of most political positions. Heck, I debated and voted for Pat Buchanan despite his use of rhetoric which borders on classic anti-semetic themes. However, Sobran goes well beyond this. And I am not the only person to say so. Bill Buckley has.

Your response is clever but specious. As it happens, the "Yeshu ben Pandeira" figure is conflated by Talmudic scholars themselves with Jesus of Nazareth, as part of an argument for their position that Christ -- "the historical Jesus" -- never actually existed.

The rest of your remarks are either off-the-subject or clever evasions, and I will not trouble myself with them.

What interests me most about this contretemps is the unwillingness, as with racism-shouters and sexism-shouters, ever to define what constitutes anti-Semitism. It's a regular pattern among those who hurl epithets instead of arguing facts and logic.

Is an anti-Semite someone who opposes the existence of Israel as a formally Jewish state, in which Jews have a legal privilege (the "right of return") denied to non-Jews, apart from any opinions he might hold about Jews or Judaism?
Is an anti-Semite someone who finds that he personally dislikes most Jews, or all, but has nothing against the Judaic faith or culture?
Is an anti-Semite someone who holds that most Jews do not adhere to the tenets of their professed faith, but would have nothing against them if they did?
Is an anti-Semite someone who holds that the Judaic faith and culture are themselves evil, and that, by aligning oneself with them, one is formally embracing evil?

I hold that only #4 above is an adequate definition of anti-Semitism. Political opinions, unless they involve the identification of a particular group for genocidal treatment, cannot be racist, sexist or ethnicist (into which broad category all notions of anti-Semitism fall). Personal dislikes cannot be regarded as racist, sexist, or ethnicist either; the disliker has to promote some program of action or oppression to qualify for those. And one such as Joseph Sobran, who points out that others are failing to adhere to their own professed creed -- a creed he admires and endorses as the foundation stone upon which Christianity was laid! -- is merely noting hypocrisy, an important practice at all times.

Anti-Semitism is the identification of Judaic faith or culture as an evil with evil effects. I can think of very few persons in public life who fit this description; Louis Farrakhan and his henchmen are all that come to mind.

If the anti-Semitism shouters would just reflect on the predictable long-term effects of their rhetoric for a moment, they would realize that they're doing Jews and Judaism the worst possible disservice. Look at what racism-shouting and sexism-shouting have done in the United States. The reaction against those communities of interest is now in full swing, such that, in most circles, to be identified with those groups comes near to a condemnation. We temperate ones have grown tired of dealing with them, and more than mildly irritated at having to introduce half of our opinions with "I'm not a racist / sexist / anti-Semite."

In part, the current American ambivalence toward the support of Israel -- a support it desperately needs if it's to stay afloat among so many vicious and dedicated enemies -- arises from the previous relentless drumbeat of "anti-Semite!" which was routinely shouted at anyone who questioned whether American foreign policies aimed at supporting Israel were in fact in the interests of the United States. Those conservative opinioneers who've cut loose from Israel, and who emphasize that American foreign policy should be oriented toward American interests, are among the disaffected group. Sobran and Buchanan are prominent among them.

By the way, Bill Buckley never said that Sobran was an anti-Semite. He chided Sobran for presenting his anti-war opinions in a fashion that some might interpret as anti-Semitic -- pure deference to the anti-Semitism-shouters who were so numerous during the days before the 1991 Gulf War.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com

Your response is clever but specious. As it happens, the "Yeshu ben Pandeira" figure is conflated by Talmudic scholars themselves with Jesus of Nazareth, as part of an argument for their position that Christ -- "the historical Jesus" -- never actually existed.

Citation please. I have read translations and commentaries and have not seen things to this effect. This is not to say that Jesus of Nazareth was liked, he was a heretic and false Messiah, only that these are two different people. As far as I know, all refrences to Jesus were expunged, at least in European editions, due to Christian censorship.

The rest of your remarks are either off-the-subject or clever evasions, and I will not trouble myself with them.
They are specifically on subject and undermine your case. You want to lecture me, not debate anything.

What interests me most about this contretemps is the unwillingness, as with racism-shouters and sexism-shouters, ever to define what constitutes anti-Semitism. It's a regular pattern among those who hurl epithets instead of arguing facts and logic.
We are having a debate. I'm not sure why you see this as an embarassing episode.
At any rate, I have noted why I consider Sobran an anti-Semite. I am looking at his repeated behavior in totality, not one or two incidents. You are debating the color of the leafs, instead of looking at the etnire forest.

Is an anti-Semite someone who opposes the existence of Israel as a formally Jewish state, in which Jews have a legal privilege (the "right of return") denied to non-Jews, apart from any opinions he might hold about Jews or Judaism?
No. This is a general anti-nationalist stance.
However, Sobran only holds this position towards Israel. He supports other natioanlisms and even discriminatory laws.

Is an anti-Semite someone who finds that he personally dislikes most Jews, or all, but has nothing against the Judaic faith or culture?
This is a tenuous counter-factual. Sobran has condemned his straw-man versions of Jewish culture.
I suppose it is possible to dislike most Jews without hating all or their culture. It is difficult, though. One cannot hate all Jews, without this being a reflection of their opinion on belief or culture.

Is an anti-Semite someone who holds that most Jews do not adhere to the tenets of their professed faith, but would have nothing against them if they did?
Hardly.

Is an anti-Semite someone who holds that the Judaic faith and culture are themselves evil, and that, by aligning oneself with them, one is formally embracing evil?
YES.
The Webster's definition of anti-semitism is "hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group"

As for your definition, it is neither the standard one, nor is it coherent. Personal dislikes always influence behavior and ideas.

Anti-Semitism is the identification of Judaic faith or culture as an evil with evil effects. I can think of very few persons in public life who fit this description; Louis Farrakhan and his henchmen are all that come to mind.

Check out David Duke.
Michael Hoffman Jr(http://www.hoffman-info.com/) is not a very public figure, but Sobran does associate with him. (http://www.hoffman-info.com/irving.html)

Those conservative opinioneers who've cut loose from Israel, and who emphasize that American foreign policy should be oriented toward American interests, are among the disaffected group. Sobran and Buchanan are prominent among them.

You just refuse to get it. Sobran's anti-Zionism is not the reason why he is called an anti-Semite. It is a symptom of it. Sobrans repeated attacks on Jews, his double standard against Jews and Israel, and his lies about Jews and Judaism all show anti-Semetism.
You have bought into Sobran's claim that anti-semetism is a PC "thought-crime" with no purpose other than to silence critics. (http://www.sobran.com/fearofjews.shtml) I can find no more Orwellian reversal than Sobran's doublespeak here.

Anyone who calls you anti-Semitic, or any other defamatory name, in the course of such a discussion is then quite clearly attempting to stop discussion. Not necessarily. This does happen sometimes, but more often the motivation is different: to make the speaker discuss the issues <>fairly.

This is what has been an eternal tool of an educated anti-Semite. He advances his position in three stages: (i) construct an artificial criterion, such that when judged by any people/faith would fail, (ii) show that the Jews/Zionists/Israel fail when judged by this criterion, and (iii) declare: "See, I am not in general agaisnt the Jews: these people, as I just proved are simply wrong."

So, you too claim to be a victim of an "honest" discussion. But was it honest? To be such it must be based on fair, universally applicable criteria. When it is such, you are completely safe from being accused of being anti-Semitic.

What else could he intend, by diverging from facts and principles to attack your motives and you as a person?

When you are attacked as a person, seemingly instead of the principles, you are asked, "What is that in you that made you choose unfair principles?"

Go back to all such discussions, and you will be surptised how well all of them will fit into what I just described.

Do so if you are still seeking the truth and want your soul to be pure...

If not, continue on, but don't blame "the other side" of unfairness.

I'm still concerned about Pearl Harbor. Seems to me a lot of people are still concerned about the Holocaust, which happened much more than 35 years ago.

Are you so thoroughly confused? Of course you should be concerned with Perl Harbor. Of course you should be concerned with the Holocause (in't it telling that you removed yourself from that list?).

This is because those were big events and, as such, they teach us complex and lasting lessons. They are manifestations of evil in human nature, so they also serve us as reminders of that evil and help us focus on good in us.

In contrast, the case of USS Liberty, as tragic as it was and as it continues to pain me, was the case of friendly fire. We had almost 10% of such casualties in Viet Nam, in Desert Stornm, and just a few months ago slaughtered (accidentally) a bunch of Canadians in Afghanistan. This is the category of events to which Liberty incident belongs.

Now, why is it that all those cases of friendly fire are crossed out as resolved, except for this one? You've got it: this time friendly fire was committed by the Jooooos. And it was not an accident at all: remember, they also killed another Jew, Joshua -- I mean, Jesus?

Bingo, you uncovered the truth.

You know, Aristeides, your last post explains it me completely: I can see that the incident may haunt you and make you feel that it has been unresolved. That is honest and fine.

But you cannot fail to notice whom else this discussion draws. As I asked you, why do you not speak up against others who --- in contrast to you, as you say --- merely use the Liberty as pretext.

It is much like joining a demonstration against a tax hike in your county only to discover that most other people are there to express hate for the commissioner because he is black. An honest person then says to his fellow travellers: "Wait a minute: it was stated that we are protesting the tax hike, you are hijacking the demosntration." An honest man, thus, insists on honesty and attempts to redirect it to the stated objective. If he is unable to do that, he must disassociate himself from it. That's what an honorable man does: disassociate himself from scum.

And, if you remain a racist picket, then do not be offended if someone take YOU for a racist. If you are not a pig, what are you doing in the pigsty?

Substitute here "tax" with "Liverty" and "black" with "Jew." When was the last time you disassiciated yourself from pigs?

In particular, I asked you in the last post where is your outrage at RMVH's smear?

Well, I buy your explanation and original motivation for invstigating Liberty. But I also see you keeping company with pigs. When pigs become really dirty --- such as RMVH, who never fails to pick something rotten from the floor --- you are not appalled; you continue to be in harmony with them.

Forgive me then if next time we meet I confuse you with one of those pigs.

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