Emboldening the anti-Semites

Emboldening the anti-Semites

By Gil Troy
Canadian Jewish News

A paradox confounded the 180 activists and intellectuals gathered in Jerusalem in mid-February for the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s Global Forum Against Anti-Semitism. As historian Robert Wistrich noted, anti-Semitism has never been so illegitimate – broadly denounced by international bodies – while also being so ubiquitous and menacing.

Not since the Holocaust have so many Jews felt so much fear for their survival. Iran combines its nuclear ambitions with genocidal threats against the Jewish state. Palestinian terrorists delight in murdering Jews at seders, bar mitzvahs and synagogues. Ancient libels about Jewish influence-peddling resurrected in the Arab press and jihadist sermons become mainstreamed, more subtly, in the western media and among some academics.

Tragically, an intellectual dust-up about whether vehement anti-Zionism feeds anti-Semitism has sidetracked the important fight against Islamist anti-Semitism.

An American Jewish Committee (AJC) pamphlet written by Prof. Alvin Rosenfeld has been denounced for “target[ting] liberal Jews.” While accusing Rosenfeld of distorting their words, many critics have distorted his argument. They claim he called all critics of Israel “anti-Semites” when his essay explores which criticisms cross a red line – and why. The AJC – and by extension the American Jewish community – has been accused of being monolithic and “silencing” critics, when the condemnations of Israel and Rosenfeld’s essay illustrate the community’s diversity. The critics’ disproportionate fury at the AJC, despite its silence in the face of Islamist hatred, is the latest chapter in a modern La Trahison Des Clercs, (Treason of the Intellectuals) that MP Irwin Cotler denounced in a rousing speech to end the forum.

Just before Cotler’s address, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni reaffirmed her country’s commitment to self-critical democratic debate even while fighting anti-Semitism. Israel’s own, vicious, internal critics prove Israel’s democratic vigour. Just days after Livni’s speech, an Israeli Arab MK came to Montreal for “Israel Apartheid Week.” His speech, “Debunking the Myth of Israeli Democracy,” failed to acknowledge that his status as a Knesset member free to libel his country debunked his debunking.

To illustrate the virulence of today’s anti-Semitism, Livni read from a document that sounds medieval or Nazi but was written in 1988: “With their money, they took control of the world media, news agencies, the press, publishing houses, broadcasting stations, and others… They were behind the French Revolution, the Communist revolution… They were behind World War I… They were behind World War II… There is no war going on anywhere, without having their finger in it.” The “they” referred to by Article 22 of the Hamas Charter is, of course, “the Jews.” In Article 7, in calling for Jihad, the charter quotes “The prophet” saying “Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them).” Given Hamas’ track record of killing Jews and killing rival Palestinians, encouraging these deadly delusions is criminally negligent.

Intellectuals who fail to oppose Islamist bigotry – and often perpetuate it by legitimizing it, even if unintentionally – are indeed part of the problem. Their attacks are also counterproductive. Anyone who seeks calm in the region has to recognize that slandering Israel only makes peace even more elusive. Before you can have stability, let alone compromise, you need trust. It’s hard to trust when you are being charged with the most heinous of crimes and your enemies demand your destruction.

This problem became apparent when Sheikh Abdallah Nimr Darwish, the head of the Islamic Movement in Israel, addressed the forum. The crowd, representing a range of political opinions, was quiet, respectful, recognizing the sheikh’s courage in condemning anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial. But his refusal to acknowledge the virulence of anti-Semitism that is coursing through the Palestinian Authority and the Muslim world, and his failure to note the existence of initiatives such as the week in February devoted to perpetuating the apartheid slur, made the crowd restive.

Trust is a fragile flower. Without confronting the true difficulties, and without specifically denouncing the rhetoric of apartheid, genocide and delegitimation, it will be impossible for any peace buds to blossom, especially in the Middle East’s rocky soil.

We must take responsibility for the impact of our words. Too many intellectuals, by slandering the Jewish state disproportionately and obsessively, not only embolden the lethal anti-Semites, they help trample that trust rather than cultivating it. They should be criticized – and challenged to change.