There was a time when the Left was reflexively pro-Israel. I know, it seems that could never have been the case, but I assure you, in the Fifties and early Sixties, it was. Back then, to oppose Israel in anything was labeled anti-Semitic by the Left. This state of affairs came to an end with the burgeoning of the military and intelligence relationships between Washington and Tel Aviv.
With the Gulf War of 1991, we reached the antipodes of the previous state: anyone who opposed Israel in anything was labeled anti-Semitic by the Right. A number of major conservative commentators, Pat Buchanan, Charley Reese, and Joseph Sobran prominent among them, found themselves ejected from magazines where they'd been ensconced for many years because they'd concluded that Israel's interests clashed with America's interests in that conflict.
Why can't we discuss certain matters with a proper regard for the intermediate possibilities? It is possible that a man might oppose an initiative that would favor Israel without being anti-Semitic, or for that matter, without being anti-Israel. There's no guarantee that the interests of Israel and America will always run in harmony -- that's why they're two separate nations, after all -- in which case, would you really want to be called anti-Semitic for preferring to promote America's interests?
Religion, ancestry, and public policy make a volatile mix. That's one reason why, when discussing public policy, it's best to avoid the other matters and to focus as narrowly as possible on objectively verifiable facts and general moral and Constitutional principles. 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. What else could he intend, by diverging from facts and principles to attack your motives and you as a person?
This applies with equal force to any other issue where religion, ethnicity, race, hair color, shoe size, or any other non-player in political decisionmaking is introduced.
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com
I understand your point, but it almost seems you ignored the article above. Sullivan isn't just casting labels, he's citing specific examples of undeniable anti-Semitism. The "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" is hardly a rational treatise about foreign policy difference.
What Sullivan is saying, and I agree, is that real and true anti-Semitism of the proto-Nazi type is really and truly manifesting itself in the anti-war movement. It comes there by means of a thriving anti-Jewish press in the Arab world.
Cate blanche dismissal of an argument for containing the term "anti-Semitic" is just as much an attempt to stop debate as the misuse of the term you condemn.
If he is not an anti-semite, then no one without blood on their hands is.
Pat Buchanan is not an anti-Semite. I certainly would not have debated for and voted for him if he were. However, he has and continues to brush the line with his comments on secret cabals and claims of dual-loyalty. Frankly i think that this hurts his arguements on foreign policy.
Charlie Reese is a hater of Israel. Virtually all such people are anti-Semites. However, I give people the benefit of the doubt and have yet to see him say anything overtly anti-semetic.
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.
Of course it is, as Sullivan himself acknowledged:
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.
Sullivan's point is that there are plenty of reasonable grounds on which to criticise Israel. But when you go beyond legitimate criticism into the Protocols of Zion or selective boycotts, anti-Semitism is a reasonable point to raise.