Antisemitism increases around the world
Bookworm on Mar 13 2008 at 8:55 pm | Filed under: Anti-Semitism
It’s not a surprise — I figured it out myself — but it sure is depressing to see it confirmed:
Anti-Semitism, including government-promoted hatred toward Jews and prejudice couched as criticism of Israel, has risen globally over the last decade, the State Department said on Thursday.
“Today, more than 60 years after the Holocaust, anti-Semitism is not just a fact of history, it is a current event,” it said in a report to Congress.
U.S. embassies have noted an increase in attacks on Jewish people, property, institutions, and religious facilities in the last decade, the report said.
The report, titled “Contemporary Global Anti-Semitism,” did not give comprehensive statistics, and said that in any case such statistics were skewed against Western democratic countries more likely to report the incidents. But it said other governments and institutions had documented similar trends.
[snip]
While traditional anti-Jewish prejudice, a centuries-old phenomenon, persists, new forms have evolved, the report said.
“The distinguishing feature of the new anti-Semitism is criticism of Zionism or Israeli policy that — whether intentionally or unintentionally — has the effect of promoting prejudice against all Jews by demonizing Israel and Israelis and attributing Israel’s perceived faults to its Jewish character,” it said.
This was common throughout the Middle East and in Muslim communities in Europe, but was even encouraged by some activity at the United Nations, the report said.
Various U.N. agencies are asked each year to investigate what are often “sensationalized reports of alleged atrocities and other violations of human rights by Israel,” the document said.
Such unremitting criticism of Israel “intentionally or not encourages anti-Semitism.” This hostility can translate into physical violence, as in the surge in anti-Semitic incidents worldwide during the 2006 war between Israel and the Shi’ite Muslim group Hezbollah, the report said.
The report, released by the State Department’s Office of the Special Envoy for Monitoring and Combating Anti-Semitism, follows up on a 2005 document. It was dedicated to the memory of U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos of California, the only Holocaust survivor to have served in Congress. The Hungarian-born Lantos died last month of cancer at age 80.
The State Department document also listed examples of some governments and leaders it said “fan the flames of anti-Semitic hatred within their own societies and even beyond their borders.”
It cited Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has questioned whether the murder of millions of Jews by the Nazis took place, and Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chavez, who the State Department said had “publicly demonized” Israel.
Syria’s government “routinely demonizes Jews through public statements and official propaganda,” while in Belarus, “state enterprises freely produce and distribute anti-Semitic material.”
State-sponsored media were vehicles for anti-Semitic discourse in Saudi Arabia and Egypt. There were also blatantly anti-Semitic private media venues such as the conservative Catholic radio station Radio Maryja in Poland, the report said.
Traditional anti-Semitism remained a problem in Central and Eastern European countries such as Russia and Ukraine. Anti-Semitic violence was a significant concern in France, Germany and the United Kingdom, and the report noted increases in anti-Semitic incidents in Argentina, Australia, Canada, and South Africa.
Sigh….
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I wish I understood the blind hatred that lies behind anti-Semitism. I grew up in a racist family, and I understand how nothing but time has the chance to overturn such deeply held - and unfounded - beliefs.
A respected Muslim preacher - respected among his jihadist hard-liners at least - claims that the Holocaust killed 50 or 60 Jews, and that Germany has been paying reparations for years for those mere 50 or 60 killed. And that the REAL Holocaust is what Jews are doing to Palestinians. One wonders if this is merely evil pandering, or does the idiot actually BELIEVE what he is saying? If he does believe it, you can be sure that there will be no way to change his mind. Such a denial of reality cannot be altered.
The Palestinians attack the Jews with broad, blunt instruments, creating nearly random acts of murder and destruction. The Jewish State responds with great restraint, and with cautious acts of force that are tightly calibrated and targeted.
The Palestinians put forth the most outrageous and monstrous propaganda both externally and internally. Its lies and vicious hatreds would peel paint from walls; it scalds the soul of any rational empathetic person. The Jewish state engages in no such propaganda.
If all the Arabs stopped attacking Jews and the Jewish state of Israel, peace would immediately break out. Israel has no interest in a continued murderous struggle, but all the Arabs do.
And through all this, who gets blamed? Over and over and over again: Israel and the Jews.
You need only consider the scenario of where Mexicans are firing missiles over the border into Texas towns. After a few such incidents, war would break out, and if we could not root out the missile launchers, you can bet that within a short time, the border would be a very large DMZ, a no-man’s land - where no Mexican civilians would be allowed to remain. We’d never tolerate anything else. Yet it is demanded of Israel that they continue to allow rockets to fall upon their people and take no meaningful action.
How dare people demand of Israel actions that they wouldn’t demand of their own government and their own people? I can’t imagine any rational response to that. Yet it is the way of this world to make that demands. Some how, some way, Israel and her Jews continue to agree to this.
A state that WILL NOT protect its people suffers loss of legitimacy in the long run.
To me this is so sad. The Jewish people have suffered throughout the ages. Now spread world-wide, they are often still hated. But just as understanding and acceptance of blacks or Hispanics must begin in the individual heart, so must the acceptance of Jews.
The situation is complicated by the fact that Jews are a race and Judaism a religion. This creates cohesion within a nation but confusion in the diaspora. And now many Jews insist that we hate Muslims to support them.
That seems to be the current problem. Nations and individuals (backed by religious doctrine) seem forced to choose between loving one brother or the other. That isn’t right. I’m not talking about supporting terrorists, who can be of any nationality or ethnicity.
Frankly, Bookworm, every anti-Islamic article posted makes it that much harder to side with the Jews. No one should be forced to side with one ethnicity over another. One country over another, maybe. Peace-loving people over terrorists, sure. But not one of the tribes of Israel over another. Not the good people of the Old Testament over the Bad ones.
I refuse to hate Jewish people. But I also refuse to hate those who live in Muslim countries. I will not choose one brother over the other. As a Christian, I believe Jesus sought to unite Jew and Gentile.
Helen, are you saying that, when we point out that Muslims demand Jewish genocide, it makes the Jews look worse? I respect you too much to believe that of you.
I was born a mere 15 years after the end of the Nazis. I grew up with Holocaust survivors and refugees. The one thing I know for an absolute fact is that it is suicidal to listen to people announce that they are bound and determined to kill you and either (a) to ignore them or (b) to pretend that they can’t possibly mean what they say.
On my local radio station, they have been running advertisements promoting a speech by a man whose name I can’t remember. I made no effort, frankly, to remember it, because there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in Hell that I could break away to go to that speech. Nevertheless, the ad quotes him making one striking point: In many circles today, it is considered worse to judge evil than to do evil.
I’m not in those circles. To the extent the voices for the Muslim community — and that they are the voices argues complicity and agreement from the rank and file — are absolutely savage in their rhetoric toward Jews, and to the extent that the actors in the Muslim community routinely put that rhetoric into effect, I can and will judge them — and I find them wanting.
No, I am not saying that.
I am saying that Jews ought to be able to make a least one Muslim friend. I’m talking about one on one. When that happens, suddenly we are able to see with different eyes. Likewise, when white Americans make one African American friend, they can see, too.
Jews must keep the Holocaust ever before the eyes of the world, because the message is “never again.” This is the same reason blacks must keep slavery in the forefront.
I am saying every “Beware of Obama cause he might be Muslim” article is fuel for the continuation of division. If you want to be understood, begin by understanding.
Helen,
Judaism is a religion. Jews are not a race. Jews are mostly white, but come in all colors (including black). Jews do not insist that we hate Muslims. But many Jews, like many Christians, say that it is necessary (and moral) to judge the anti-Jewish teachings and actions of many Muslims, and to denounce them for the evil that they are. To NOT do so is immoral. There is so much that your “can’t we all just get along” philosophy doesn’t allow you to see - or that you won’t see.
Thanks for the clarification, Helen. As you know, I couldn’t care less about Obama’s minute intersection with Islam when he was an elementary school child. I have problems with his policies and outlook, but none of them are tied to his Muslim moment. I agree with you that it’s a grave problem to latch onto that as the single factor to discredit him. To me, it’s not discrediting at all. Those who distrust him — as you know I do — can find many more substantive issues to pick on.
As for befriending a Muslim, that’s easier said than done. I certainly have friendly day to day interactions with the Muslims who, for reasons unknown to me, are showing up in ever greater numbers as check-out clerks at my two local Safeways. They are pleasant to me, and I am pleasant to them. To me, that is the perfect essence of a pluralistic society.
Sadly, though, news stories indicate that it’s not always such a good idea to get friendly with Muslims, especially Muslim girls. Every report about Muslim girls being killed by their families for socializing with non-Muslims in any way, no matter how minor, are going to render them untouchable. Likewise, the small but increasing number of non-Muslim men being killed by families offended by the men’s contact with the Muslim daughters is also going to create a very large space between Muslims and non-Muslims, no matter how good the intentions might be on either side.
…and another thing. Look how you’ve turned this around. BW’s post was about anti-Semitism and here you are chastising Jews for not befriending Muslims one on one.
Antisemitism is like a sleeping volcano. It’s not just post Shoah (60 years) - it’s pre-Exodus and post-Exodus. Sadly, the volcano is always there and we never know when it will erupt, we just know that it will.
The existence of the UN has served to flame the fires of hatred while blaming it on the State of Israel. Anyone that has read any history book on the subject knows that Jews didn’t need Statehood to be victims.
It’s not the rage and anger that threatens the Jewish people, it’s the silence of those that watch it, hear it, see it.
This message is for Judyrose:
Good point/s. Like many people, some insist on making their point rather than addressing the issue that was raised. Always easier to have a discussion when all parties are coming to the table with the same information and certainly the same realities.
JudyRose - Your last observation is astute.
Helen - I am sure you have seen news articles or heard radio programmes in which B. Obama’s alleged Islamic ties are discussed in dark and sinister tones. And then there are those that insist on emphasizing his middle name. If those are the types of things to which you are referring, then I completely agree with you - they are unnecessary and wrong.
But we SHOULD be free to discuss the problems that face us and there is no doubt about it that radical Islam (and their silent and not-so-silent supporters) are a threat to peace, security, and prosperity. Discussing the reality of the enormous problems that seem to flow endlessly from the Islamic world is NOT the same thing as being anti-Islamic. It’s simply looking at reality and discussing our observations.
Anyway Helen - my question for you then is this: When you see articles or posts written anywhere about Islam, regardless of whether they are the distasteful type that you and I both despise or the type that merely examine the legitimate concerns that many people have regarding the Muslim world, why do you say that those articles or posts make it that much harder to side with the Jews? Why did you say “the Jews” specifically?
The reason I ask is that whenever I come across either one of those types of articles or posts, the Jews alone never pop into my brain. I tend to think more about the people who support radical Islam versus everyone else. Because really, everyone else has been affected - Europeans, Americans, South Americans, Africans, Asians, Hindus, Christians, animists, other Muslims, and yes, Jews. I don’t think of this conflict as something that started because of something between the Jews and the Muslims - history and the facts on the ground simply do not support that.
Deana
Bookworm -
The point that the ad made:
In many circles today, it is considered worse to judge evil than to do evil.
That really is so clear, concise and true. I feel like I’ve been coming to that conclusion myself for a long time but for whatever reason, was grappling with it. I wouldn’t have been able to put my feelings into words but that is it precisely.
It’s scary. I mean - there is no end to the evil that can occur if large portions of a population refuse to judge evil.
Deana
Yes, as to all your points Judy Rose, SADIE and Deana. Helen is, I know, a person who genuinely desires to do good, to turn the other cheek, to live by Anne Frank’s belief that there is good in all of us. It’s that last point, though, that I think is terribly, terribly wrong, especially when its practitioners ignore reality to stick to that faith. I’m absolutely certain that Anne Frank no longer believed it herself when she entered Auschwitz or when she died, alone, starved, and riddled with typhus in Bergen-Belsen.
There is evil among us, and what distinguishes men of true good will from others is that they call it by name, not that they set up a straw man concept of “everyone is good,” except for those who bad mouth others.
Mind you, if you’re going to set yourself up as judge, it’s important to be able to tell the difference between stuff you don’t like, or with which you disagree, and stuff that is genuinely evil. Wishing horrible death upon others because of their race, religion, nationality or sex is evil. I’m okay with calling it like I see at to those practitioners of Islam who do have those wishes. I don’t wish the same on them, but I do believe we need to be constantly vigilant and appropriate defensive. And when push comes to shove, we need to save ourselves, and hang the cost to them.
Hello Bookworm,
Sadly, I’ve been tracking this for some time now, and this is yet another confirmation. A co-worker at my office made a very good point back in 2006 about the rising antisemitism during Israel’s war with Lebanon.
She was confounded why Europe behaved so anti-Israel when out of the entire Middle East, Israel is the sole beacon of freedom and the only country with shared Western values. More bewildering to her was how Europe tended to consistently side with the Muslims and the Palestinians even though their culture and ideology and ideals are barbaric to Western sensibilities. So, why do they have vitriolic reactions against a country they have more in common with than the Muslim nations?
I haven’t come up with an adequate answer to her question. Whatever secular reason I come up with– differing political ideology, historical divisions over who owns what, etc. — just falls apart upon closer inspection.
The question that brings me up short is simply this: If the State of Israel conceded all points to the Palestinians and their Muslim neighbors, would Israel’s Muslim neighbors cease to kill Jews? The answer is no. It is written in their Koran to kill Jews whenever they can. And on top of that, the Koran advocates mendacity and duplicity to achieve their ends of a Muslim Caliphate across the world. The Muslims in the Middle East, at root, don’t care much about the Palestinians, but they care deeply about the destruction of Israel.
Europeans know this is true, and all their secular arguments against Israel and Jews in favor of the Muslims are inexplicable in any rational sense.
I see this antisemitism across the world in a straightforward spiritual light. Rational secular arguments don’t provide any answers reasons. But spiritual speaking, the answer is simple.
Like it or not, the Hebrews are the chosen people of God. And for that reason alone, the world will actively hate them… and hunt them. This is the only reason that makes sense to me.
Frankly, Bookworm, every anti-Islamic article posted makes it that much harder to side with the Jews.
Since when does pointing out anti-Semitism make it much harder to side with the Jews?
Ort is it that pointing out anti-Semitism is inherently anti-Islamic? Perhaps it is because so many Muslim preachers refer to Jews as “apes and pigs?” Oh, but that’s part of their “tradition.” Just like wanting to build mosques in Rome and anywhere else in the western world, but forbidding the construction of Christian churches in the entire territory of Saudi Arabia.
http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Area=sr&ID=SR01002#II
Where are all the Muslims denouncing such anti-Semitism? Mighty silent, they are.
Yes, as to all your points Judy Rose, SADIE and Deana. Helen is, I know, a person who genuinely desires to do good, to turn the other cheek, to live by Anne Frank’s belief that there is good in all of us.
Whether there is good in us all or not, usually it only comes out once the skin is flayed, Book. For some, they can perhaps gouge it out and keep it safe, that inherent and intrinsic goodness within, but for most, special tools and methods may be needed.
So, why do they have vitriolic reactions against a country they have more in common with than the Muslim nations?
Because Europe and their leaders are more in agreement with the Arabic autocrat system of ethics and law than they are to a place like the United States or Israel.
This is only one of the reasons why that is so.
Link
Deana, The only reason I singled out the Jews is because Bookworm began the post by talking about antisemitism. I thought that was on topic, not that Jews were the only people to which this applies. I think posing one group of people against another group of people for the purpose of putting one group on top (and the other, obviously, on the bottom), regardless of who those groups are, is wrong. I personally think of Jews in the mainstream, but then I am not Jewish and have never been discriminated against due to either race or religion. I am of the privileged majority.
If one considers Judaism as a religion, I think much of the time one can substitute Christian for Jewish in anything I said. Sometimes antisemitism is not far from anti-Zionism. But hate is hate, no matter what.
Bookworm, Indeed, there is evil among us. But what I believe plain and simple is that there is both good and evil in everyone, but not in the same amounts. There is good is the worst human being, and badness in the best. Pure goodness is found only in God. I have stated before that I have no problem locking up the worse criminal offenders and throwing away the key. We must protect society, especially the young, old and ahndicapped, from violent people.
Barack Obama is not a violent person. And he is not my first choice for President for a number of reasons, none of which is his personal faith.
There is good is the worst human being, and badness in the best.
and thus the goal of fake liberal justice is to mix the two so that the good can give their goodness to the bad and the bad can give their badness to the good. Eventually equality is achieved.
When a person judges another as evil, then this prevents anyone from giving evil sacrifices from the part of the good. This prevents equality in that it prevents evil from gorging on things that might change it, which is not an optimum consequence for the goal of equality.
I am saying that Jews ought to be able to make a least one Muslim friend. I’m talking about one on one. When that happens, suddenly we are able to see with different eyes. Likewise, when white Americans make one African American friend, they can see, too.
Unfortunately for those people making friends, violence and war is not predicated upon how well you understand or do not understand each other.
Helen says:
And now many Jews insist that we hate Muslims to support them.
Which Jews? Please document. ( I prefer to say “Jewish people.” ) Where is the hatred coming from? The hate is MUCH stronger coming from the Muslim side than it is from the Jewish side, both in numbers and in intensity. We are not talking about Mayberry, but about Paris and Lahore: the world.
Read the MEMRI link I supplied in a previous posting. You tell me where the hate is coming from. Compare the number of Arabs in the Knesset, compared to Jewish people in governments in the Middle East outside Israel. Read the MEMRI link I supplied. Read the MEMRI link I supplied. Read the MEMRI link I supplied.
Your making the above statement shows an appalling lack of knowledge of what it is like outside the US. I repeat: the hate is MUCH stronger coming from the Muslim side than it is from the Jewish side, both in numbers and in intensity. In summation, as a fellow Gentile and fellow American, I am appalled at your ignorance, well-intentioned though you may consider it to be.
For the life of me, I fail to understand why you equate making people aware of anti-Semitism with hating Muslims. Also note this was not a report by the B’nai B’rith, but the US State Department, for Pete’s sake!
I personally think of Jews in the mainstream, but then I am not Jewish and have never been discriminated against due to either race or religion.
You need to get out of the parochial perspective of your nice little town in the South. The posting was about anti-Semitism in the WORLD. How many people of the Jewish faith in the world? Definitely NOT mainstream, a very small part of the world. And to bring up Obama: the posting was about the WORLD, not about the US. Get out of your parochial mindset. This posting was NOT all about the US. Many Americans make the assumption that the US is the world, and the world is the US. Not so. Te lo juro.
Since you are writing from a US-centric perspective, I might add that widespread anti-Semitism ( another term for hating the Jews) is not that far from historical memory in the US. My sweet little Okie Grandmother, who loved me to death, and I loved her back, was also anti-Semitic. I doubt that her attitude towards people of the Jewish faith was that different from most people of her time and place- and I don’t mean just Oklahoma.
Helen says in post 2:
“And now many Jews insist that we hate Muslims to support them.”
This kind of a statement is always difficult to respond to. What is Helen’s intent in using the word “many”? You can find people, in any identity group of any sort, with whatever opinions you seek. Is Helen intending to paint Jews, in general, with this brush?
Obama’s pastor is a black man who in these recent sermons levied monstrous and racist charges against all whites; and he had “many supporters” at those vicious sermons. (Just listen to their cheers and assents.) If many blacks insist on such horrifying racism against whites, would that be any reason to paint all blacks with THAT brush?
But I am interested in trying to respond in any case.
I am aware that there are Jews that treat Palestinians with prejudice, as second class citizens and as undesirables. It is interesting to me that those Palestinians living in Israel do not fear for their very lives every second of their existence. Put a Jewish community in the middle of any Palestinian controlled territory and I wonder, just what their level of frozen fear would be? Change ‘territory’ to ‘terrortory’ and you’d have a better word explaining their circumstance. Or Lebanon. Or Syria. Or Saudi Arabia. Or Egypt. Or Iran. etc, etc, etc.
HADITH Sahih Muslim [41:6985]
The last hour would not come unless the Muslims will fight against the Jews and the Muslims would kill them until the Jews would hide themselves behind a stone or a tree and a stone or a tree would say: Muslim, or the servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me; come and kill him; but the tree Gharqad would not say, for it is the tree of the Jews.
Please find a similar pronouncement by Jehovah indicating that Jews will not be allowed to reach the Promised Land, nor Salvation, until such a time as they had cleansed the very earth of all Muslims.
I challenge all multiculturalists to identify characteristics of any culture that are to be criticized, and to do so. It is so easy to criticize the Nazis; they are nearly extinct, and they are Western, and they are white. It takes much more courage and wisdom to criticize what you see today, and the Palestinians and most Arabs are to be criticized for this endless campaign of genocide.
There is no such campaign of genocide by Jews against Palestinians nor against any Arabs or any sort or state.
Israel and her Jews are not at all above criticism. (Nor is America.) However, to hold Israel to a higher standard is racist. To refuse to criticize the Palestinians for their murderous genocidal attempts; and then to criticize Israel for sins of a much lesser nature… there is a word for that. There are several adjectives for that as well. None of them are complimentary.