"He explained this accident by saying that he had been intellectually lazy and had failed to take sufficient care to substantiate his sources."

This is a much more interesting admission than whether or not he can be labeled bona-fide antisemite. A person who so openly and easily admits to laxity and intellectual laziness; how can anyone trust anything anywhere or whatever he has to say? Why would any movement want such a person to speak in its name or represent its cause? And what worth is a cause that such are its representatives?

This comes down to a question I have asked a few people recently: How many antisemitic ideas does someone need to believe or express before they can be described as an antisemite?

A friend of mine has an ant phobia. If he is in a park he will always inspect the grass before putting down his picnic blanket. His rule of thumb goes like this: if he sees one ant, it may be lost. if he sees two, well the second one may have just followed the first. But if he sees three...then there is a nest nearby and it is time to move.

I think three antisemitic expressions makes someone an antisemite.

Why is it that any post that goes up on Engage - Noga knows better?  And always so quickly!

On this occasion I think Noga is wrong.  Anybody can make a mistake.  Anybody can fail to check a source.  But the point here is not that he's made a mistake and that making a mistake makes you worthless.

The point is that the form of the mistake is connected to the politics.

I was once in an exchange with a left-wing "anti-Zionist" who reference 'Jews in the back room laughing at how easily the goyim are tricked.' After several more posts on the website, he realized what he had said and offered, "I was tired." And, yet, still for some time I was willing to continue to give people the benefit of the doubt.  

More recently, I don't think it's worth it to be so generous. No matter how we might complicate the charge of antisemitism, the simple narrative -that the statement is blatant and ugly antisemitism- is far more important.

So if we are to name people like John Wight as "antisemites" what does it change?

How would it change what we do?  What is at stake in this discussion?

We define an antisemite as a person who pushes antisemitic ways of thinking - not as a person who hates Jews?   So we think intent is immaterial?

And what about people who push Islamophobic ways of thinking?  Do we also name them as "Islamophobes"?

Can a person who is an antisemite or an Islamophobe change, or is it a designation about something that is central to their being?

Are we judging what people say and do or are we making a more essentialist claim about what people "are"?

Short answer, No. But a couple of points:

1) This material needs to be sent to the labour movement in Edinburgh, to the Morning Star, to the Scottish Left Review, which apparently publishes Wight.

2) This sort of thing keeps happening.  Sue Blackwell linked to such sites, then Neumann got into a lengthy discussion with 'Jewish Tribal Review', then someone from the AAUP wanted to send out material from the Barnes Review to invitees to its boycott-fest, and now Wight wants us to look at Holocaust revisionist sites. But still, still, my jaw still drops, every time this happens.

Now, to invoke the principle of charity, I realise it's quite easy to find something online, to cut and paste the url.  But anyone can tell, with a seconds perusal, what sort of sites these are.  Neumman, Blackwell, the AAUP staffer, and Wight didn't take that second.  Why not?  Only in one case can this be a genuine mistake - the AAUP staffer.  

All three of the others are involved in - what they think of as - a concerted campaign of solidarity with Palestine.  All three know that there are anti-semites, in their words, 'at the fringes' of such a campaign. Yet all three can't get over the lowest of thresholds in combatting or even recognising anti-semitism.

All three loudly proclaim their anti-racist credentials.  

Give us a break.

Every now and then, serious people suggest to me that Engage is focussing on a relatively minor problem on the Left, or that it is over-sensitive.  I think, in the case of some of the material that occasionally crops up in the comments - like the criticism of Michael White -  they are occasionally right.  

But, then, this stuff keeps on happening.

"Are we judging what people say and do or are we making a more essentialist claim about what people "are" "

I'm a point where I'm just uninterested in any discussion about what such people are. It's beside the point, isn't it?

David

Antisemitic intent is not immaterial, but nor is it as important as antisemitic impact. I think, having read your working paper, that you would agree with me on this. For what it is worth, very few people today are knowingly antisemitic, and even fewer admit to it. Even BNP members claim that they don't hate anybody, they just love the white race. Yet there appears to be more antisemitism now than in the (recent) past, so either antisemites know that they hate Jews but won't admit to it, or they don't know that they hate Jews, or, most likely, they hold and transmit ideas about Jews that are capable of generating such hatred, but don't understand how, or why, their ideas are so dangerous.

Ten, certainly fifteen years ago, most SWP members, whatever they thought of Israel and Zionism, would not quote a Holocaust Denier. Nowadays that understanding of antisemitism has gone, because of a way of thinking that is too similar to far right ideas about Jews for the person in question, in this case John Wight, to differentiate between his own ideas and those of CODOH.

Now of course, somebody can come to understand that their prejudices are wrong and move to a new way of thinking. I don't think essentialist descriptions of what people "are" are relevant, and I'm sorry if I gave that impression. John Wight is an antisemite because of how he thinks about Jews, and how he publicly transmits those thoughts. If he changes how he thinks about Jews, he will stop being an antisemite.

Given the ever rising chorus of hateful statements against Jews notwithstanding the charge that such statements are Antisemitic, I really wonder if the ascription of that label serves any useful purpose.

Assuming that it does, if we label these people Antisemites, what then? Does that mean we do not pay them any attention? Does it mean that we can remove them from polite company? Have we done our job by finding the correct label? Or, is labeling an excuse to stop thinking - a conclusion that ends all thinking?

In any event, such people have found an effective answer to the charge of Antisemitism. They assert that Antisemitism is charged to advance a political agenda. So, such people do not shut up because they think what they say is the truth. And, the average person, hearing that there is an answer to the charge of Antisemitism, then listens to what is being said.

People on my side of the Atlantic have a saying: the remedy for speech is more speech. That, over all, appears to work best. So, I would say that it is pretty unimportant to label someone like Wight, when he says something bigoted, an Antisemite. It is more important to persuade the public, by reasoned argument, that what the likes of Mr. Wight and Co. say is grotesquely wrongheaded.

When someone is a 'we are all hizbollah' sleepwalker and is stupid enough to publicly reference a right wing Holocaust denial website on Engage, is it any wonder that he should also spout hate loaded phrases like 'multi headed hydra' and 'international Jewry'?

We could be generous and say he lay down with a dog and got fleas, but I don't even know where this dog ends and the fleas begin. I do know, however, that the Scottish branch of this particular kennel has a bigger infestation problem than its English equivalent. Funny really, that the oppressed should become the oppressor...hmm, now where have I heard that one before??  

David Hirsh “Can a person who is an antisemite or an Islamophobe change, or is it a designation about something that is central to their being?

Are we judging what people say and do or are we making a more essentialist claim about what people "are"?”

These are important questions, David.

It seems to me that the opposing existentialist/essentialist view of reality is too narrow.

If one can’t say that Wilhelm Marr, a self declared antisemite, and one of the first antisemitic politicians in Europe, or Adolph Hitler were antisemitic then the term has no meaning.

Of course, no one quality can define a person and human beings can change, but for someone who spent most of their lives promoting antisemitism and died for it one can say they are essentially antisemitic. Death essentializes.

The question, then, is can one say of a living person that they are essentially antisemitic. I would argue that you can if they devote themselves to hating Jews as individuals or as a collectivity.

Yes, these people can change, yet while they are engaged in such activities then they are essentially antisemitic. Afterwards they can say that at one time in their life they were antisemitic.

Here is the problem, David, as I see it. One can argue from the point of view of the total person against defining someone essentially as this or that. Hence until they are dead it’s difficult to categorize them.

However, people do not live their lives as “total persons.” We live our lives engaged in different projects. I can only see myself according to the project I am engaged in at the moment. At the moment I am engaged in a campaign in opposition to those who are anti-Zionists. I am also engaged in other projects. Yet, I have no problem being categorized as an anti-anti-Zionist.

I think much of the confusion about definitions also arises from an inability to clearly define antisemitism. It’s easy enough to define it when someone calls himself or herself an anti-Semite; today though people take umbrage at being called antisemitic even while they are engaged in antisemitic projects. Even a David Duke doesn’t want to be called an antisemite.

This is the case with John Wight. Yet as the case of Mr. Wight clearly shows his own words an actions classify him as an antisemite. Until he stops acting in ways that are antisemitic I have no problem with referring to him as a Jew hater.

It’s not rocket science.

You also ask:

“So if we are to name people like John Wight as "antisemites" what does it change?”

If you call David Duke and antisemite, what does it change? Everything, it explains his behavior, it also alerts people to the modalities of thinking about different ethnic groups, especially Jews. It also allows one to form strategies to counter his antisemitic projects.

John Wight unlike say the current mayor of London doesn’t just indulge in antisemitic actions for self serving reasons, but like Wilhelm Marr, his antisemitic actions are essential to the performance of his other activity.

I suspect that he sees the Jews as standing in the way of the creation of an “ideal world.”

In any case, my point is that the essentialist/existentialist dichotomy can be overstated. These terms don’t always function as either/or qualifiers, but often they interact in surprising ways.

“So if we are to name people like John Wight as "antisemites" what does it change?”

"... Everything, it explains his behavior, it also alerts people to the modalities of thinking about different ethnic groups, especially Jews. It also allows one to form strategies to counter his antisemitic projects."

Now that's one of the things I'm worried about.  I don't believe that if we call John Wight an antisemite then this explains his behaviour.  

We then get "...he behaves like an antisemite because he is an antisemite..."

But this is not an explanation.  What if his antisemitic ways of thinking come first?  What if thinking like an antisemite makes you into an antisemite, rather than being an antisemite makes you think like an antisemite?

The kinds of explanations that we have been working on still apply - even if Wight is an antisemite.  We cannot explain antisemitism in terms of antisemitism - that is no explanation.

so we still need to explain why and how antiracists become antisemites - and our explanation cannot simply be - "because they're antisemites".

It doesn't work theoretically.  It doesn't work empirically.  And it doesn't work politically.

David,

You write: "so we still need to explain why and how antiracists become antisemites - and our explanation cannot simply be - 'because they're antisemites'."


People who are against something are usually filled with hate. This is not to be confused with a person who is for something. So, I distinguish people who are for a pluralistic society where all are judged, as Dr. King once said, by the content of their character and not the color of their skin from a people who assert, I am against racism. The latter sort of person could very well be - but, of course, is not necessarily - a hate monger and likely is. So, I see a natural attraction to Antisemitism among certain types of antiracists.

"Can a person who is an antisemite or an Islamophobe change, or is it a designation about something that is central to their being?"

It's no different than being any other kind of bigot. Show me any flavor of bigot and I'll show you someone who lives in a bubble that needs to be popped. Meet enough of them, work with enough of them, really get to know enough of them and the misconceptions will be challenged. Works for kids who leave biggoted homes for College or the Marines (no really! ask my Dad) or whatever. But to do it, you have to leave that confort zone (and in many cases leave "home").

The problem with the intellectualizing of the anti-Israel boycott crowd is that they think of themselves so highly that they have no need to rub shoulders with anyone outide their clique (read: beneath them). "Too smart to study = too dumb to learn."

I wrote a longish comment offering some reasons not to call people antisemites. Then I remembered how careful we were to make the distinction on the UCU Activist List between antisemites on the one hand and antisemitic arguments on the other.

Our distinction was frequently rejected or ignored - "We know what you mean" was the kind of response. Livingstone doesn't distinguish, nor do all the other people who say that Jews use antisemitism as a smokescreen to divert criticism away from Israel. Antisemitic arguments and antisemites become merged into 'antisemitism' for them.

To anti-antisemites it's a big deal, but maybe to everybody else it's just semantic.

Shriber: (antisemitism) “explains behavior, it also alerts people to the modalities of thinking about different ethnic groups, especially Jews. It also allows one to form strategies to counter his antisemitic projects."

How do you get from my complex view of antisemitism to the following simplistic reduction?

David Hirsh: “We then get "...he behaves like an antisemite because he is an antisemite..."

In your original question, David, you had asked:

“So if we are to name people like John Wight as "antisemites" what does it change?”

My answer had little to do with definitional causality “he behaves like an antisemite because he is an antisemite...” and more to do with strategies of dealing with antisemitic activity.

Ina any case, antisemitism does explain behavior, an antisemite is someone who engages in such behavior and hence it’s not useless to call someone “an antisemite.”

“ I don't believe that if we call John Wight an antisemite then this explains his behaviour.”

But it does explain his attitude towards Jews as well as the quality of his thinking about Jews. It may even explain ex post facto his behavior towards Jews. It explains the kinds of views about them he expresses in his writings (his use of terms like “international Jewry, for example), his behavior towards Jews (the call for boycotts of Israel, his support for Hezbollah, etc.).

It doesn’t cause that behavior, though.

Furthermore you also said:

“But this is not an explanation. What if his antisemitic ways of thinking come first? What if thinking like an antisemite makes you into an antisemite, rather than being an antisemite makes you think like an antisemite?”

Why does it matter which came first? There is dialectic at work here. No, antisemitism is not a natural phenomenon we acquire at birth. But like a language it is acquired along with our regular language. Most people disregard it the way they disregard stories about wizards and witches and other non-rational phenomena, yet most of us know them nonetheless and a few people actually believe in them and see the world in its terms.

In any case, I am not concerned with how Mr. Wight was infected with the antisemitic virus. The fact is that he has it. As physicians are fond of saying ‘a complex of symptoms are consistent with a certain kind of disease even though we do not know its cause, yet.’

I am not using medical terminology to explain social phenomena. I am merely borrowing an explanatory method that is used in medicine.

I would further suggest that antisemitism is predictive of behavior in another way: the kind of company they keep. John Wight’s support of Hezbollah is such an example. There is also the world of books they read and write, the journals they publish, etc. The point here is that antisemitism isn’t just a series of disconnected acts which can only be subjectively described, but an objective discipline. It is in a way a sub-culture which at certain moments, Nazi Germany, Stalinist Soviet Russia, Iran, etc. it can even take over the mainstream culture.

Finally, I don’t see how the essentialist/existentialist definition would work in the context of antisemitic views becoming endemic to a whole culture.

Shriber, why are there always so many long gaps in your long comments - which our moderators have to spend time editing out?

You say: "In any case, I am not concerned with how Mr. Wight was infected with the antisemitic virus."

Well I am particularly concerned to explain, and to understand, how it is that a socialist and an antiracist ends up as an antisemite.

If we don't understand that then we can't prevent it from happening again.  We can't fight it.  We have to understand.  Denouncing is not enough.

'I think, in the case of some of the material that occasionally crops up in the comments - like the criticism of Michael White -  they are occasionally right.'

Like many Jews in this country it was the vehement opposition to the war crimes bill that made us realise we were truly strangers in a strange and dangerous land ("dangerous" did I say? For once I am being diplomatic). From that moment on, I determined that I owed Britain nothing but the barest minimum in terms of loyalty.

Oversensitive to the fact that many people thought it was just fine and dandy for murderers who had stripped Jewish women and children naked and machine-gunned them into pits to live large in Britain? On the contrary, I do not believe the Jews of Britain have been nearly sensitive enough about such matters. Do you really imagine that one James Patrick Bulger was worth more than 1.5 million Jewish children? Is Jewish life really that cheap?

While White's comments are pretty typical, they are nevertheless still despicable.

Sorry about the gaps, David. I’ll try to space my paragraphs more evenly.

“Well I am particularly concerned to explain, and to understand, how it is that a socialist and an antiracist ends up as an antisemite.” David

There is a long tradition of that particular phenomenon, David. Socialist used to be antisemites in the 19th century. As far as I know it wasn’t till the Dreyfus affair that progressive socialists in France finally turned away from that form of hatred.

Still, apropos this topic I am reminded of Trotsky’s question about how in Communist Russia there were still people who used the word Jew as an insult even within the party bureaucracy.

I read that many Communists in France vote for Le Pen. Isn’t there in some places a red-black alliance?

There is a lot of material out there on the topic.


“If we don't understand that then we can't prevent it from happening again.  We can't fight it.  We have to understand.  Denouncing is not enough.”

I agree there, David. Referring to someone as an antisemite is not the end but the beginning of the oppositional work we have to do.

Shriber writes: "Referring to someone as an antisemite is not the end but the beginning of the oppositional work we have to do."

Exactly. That was basically my point, before. Labels are interesting but they are not an end. In this case, they are hardly even a beginning. In fact, they tend to stand in the way of addressing the issue at hand.

Mira is starting to sound like an anti-Semantite.

A few observations:

- Being an anti-Semite and thinking like an anti-Semite must be the same thing, for how can BEING something like ant-Semitic consist of anything other than in how one thinks? But ACTING (which includes speaking) like an anti-Semite is a separate thing.

- It cannot be immaterial whether a person thinks like an anti-Semite. There are many reasons why it matters. Just one is that a person who thinks like an anti-Semite may for a long time never act like one (because he's sophisticated enough to hide it), and therefore be considered okay by the let's-only-look-at-what-people-do-and-not-what-they-are test, but wait until he starts bringing up his children, whom he is likely to infect with his own bigotry whether he wants to or not (that being the nature of things, or rather people), thus contributing to the propagation of racism down the generations.

- It could be that, through a combination of ignorance, susceptibility to influence, etc., a person who doesn't habitually think like an anti-Semite nevertheless sometimes acts like one.

- It could also be that a person who habitually thinks like an anti-Semite also acts (speaks) like one without intending to (i.e., slips); therefore intent alone is not a sufficient criterion by which to judge all cases.

- If we say of someone "He is an anti-Semite", that usually means "he harbours negative prejudices about Jews and/or he simply dislikes Jews (possibly without quite knowing why)". This statement DOES mean something, and what it means is not unimportant.

- We are not forced to choose between considering how a person appears to think, or how they appear to intend to act. We can consider both of these things, in addition, of course, to how they DO act.

Once again the trolls have hijacked the discussion into meaninglessness. (Josua is frankly ebarrassing - there are perfectly legitimate legal reasons to oppose that Act; antiracists are attracted to antisemitism! Nonsense upon nonsense on stilts)

There is a problem on the left. John Wight is systematic of that problem We know the nature of the problem. These are important and serious issues. We need to think through them, carefully and with consideration. We need to understand it and think of ways to combat it whilst educating others. That is what is needed. This is what Engage is about!

I agree with Saul. Can we stick to the very important subject which is John Wight's antisemitism

In another thread - pleasingly empty of the usual suspencts, a letter from Tariq Ali includes,

"In France, we know, it is virtually impossible to criticise Israel. In Germany, too, for special reasons. It would be sad if Italy went the same way."
He continues,

"How many times do we have to stress that criticism of Israel’s colonial policies is not anti-semitic. To accept this is to become willing victims of the blackmail the Israeli establishment uses to silence its critics"

1. We know, as the comments by Wight show - this is not always the case. Maybe he could comment of John Wrights comments and links.
2 Tariq makes the statement immediately following the articulation of a myth of Jewish power!

3.The case against Israel by the left is not inherently antisemitic, but allows itself to tainted by the aura of antisemitism (Tariq accepts Israel's right to exist as an independent state) The left, and people of the calibre of Tariq Ali and Perry Anderson should know that. They need to get the house in order. The question is why they are no.

This is the type of problem we are dealing with (and. no Tariq Ali is NOT an antisemite - end of story on that bit!)

According to Modernity John Wight posts comments on Socialist Unity under the name John W.
javascript:window.open('comment.php?id=1612','','resizable=yes, location=no, width=700, height=400, menubar=no, status=no, scrollbars=yes');void(0);

If this is correct, then John W's comment today on a piece on Atzmon and Tony Greenstein is relevant as John W says

http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=1667#comment-40425

"Whilst I take your point, I don’t think it makes a blind bit of difference to David Hirsh and the Engage constituency how the arguments against Israel are presented. They are determined to equate anything pro-Palestinian with antisemitism. They are Zionists after all. This is what Zionists do."

What ENgage does on this post is equate John Wight's antisemitism with antisemitism and not "anything pro-Palestinian with antisemitism"

You couldn't make it up !

'They are Zionists after all. This is what Zionists do'.

Essentializing. Which is what racists do.

Richard,
He says it all really. He shows his complete inability to distinguish between antisemitism and pro-Palestinain. He actually believes that what he reads in a far-right site that talks about "International Jewry" is pro-Palestinian! THIS is the problem we are dealing with!

Richard,

I tend to keep an eye on Socialist Unity blog, and there are few REAL open antisemites there, some strange views for sure, a lot of ignorance, but John Wight's posts stands out for the venom and consistency of hatred

He posts under John W or as John Wight, if you scan the posts you'll see that the syntax of his posts are similar and I would reasonably suggest they are the same individual.

looking through the article the dead give-away is the comment about "international Jewry"

you rarely ever hear that even on the "anti-Zionist" Left, but it is common currency on the Far Right and most antifascists know about CODOH, in my opinion, it is an inexcusable mistake by John Wight, if it was a mistake

the page footer gives it away: "Committee for Open Debate on the Holocaust, Bradley R. Smith, Director - Post Office Box 439016, San Ysidro, CA 92143 11"

also see the below links for more of John Wights' posts

Muslim Council Of Britain To Commemorate Holocaust Day http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=1408
Commemorate Holocaust Victims http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=1505

Socialist Unity has a "pruning" policy so after a few days the really dodgy comments may get deleted, as if they were never there.

It does make you wonder where somebody gets the phrase "international jewry" from.

Here's a little syllogism:
- Tariq Ali is neither ignorant nor stupid nor ill-informed. (This is a premise that I think anyone who knows even a little bit about Ali would have to grant.)
- Therefore, he knows that it's not only entirely possible to criticise Israel in France but that this happens all the time.
- He states that it's impossible to criticise Israel in France.
- Therefore, he makes statements that he knows are untrue.
- Therefore, he argues in bad faith.

I wouldn't trust him as far as I can throw him.

When John W writes with regard to ENgage "They are determined to equate anything pro-Palestinian with antisemitism. They are Zionists after all. This is what Zionists do."

I wonder how he feels when ENgage posts what i guess could be described as "pro-Palestinian" pieces (though i would describe them as in defense of Palestinian rights) ?

http://www.engageonline.org.uk/blog/article.php?id=1589

And there's many more on ENgage. Perhaps he thinks that Engage is being dishonest and is only doing this for tactical reasons ? I've heard this kind of argument before - damned of you do , damned if you don't. You can't win , in the same way that you can't win agasinst conspiracy theorists because it's just "zionists" being clever.

"There is a problem on the left. John Wight is systematic of that problem We know the nature of the problem. These are important and serious issues. We need to think through them, carefully and with consideration. We need to understand it and think of ways to combat it whilst educating others."

One theory for you: That particular branch of the left seems to have sealed itself off from honest criticism, not just from the “Right” but also from their own peers within the Left and Progressivism. In their minds, they are smart (true), "aware" (questionable, see my "Too smart" nag) and above it all (in their dreams). It's a recipe for the very types of bigoted behavior that we see emerge in such sealed environments be they movements or offices. That they are Left-wing, doesn’t make them immune from the same problems other self-selected, self-insulated, self-reinforcing groups stumble into. And unfortunately these problems are rarely self-correcting without popping their proverbial bubble.

How to deal with or combat it? Honestly, I don’t think you can, beyond containment. Sorry for the pessimism. You can’t get a court order to get them to face reality (unlike an sealed office that discriminates). Their hubris makes self-examination difficult beyond a result that’s often more self-gratifying than self-correcting. They’ve also made this issue part of their identity, which is why they make unhinged comments about Engage (see Richard’s recent quote), so even sober “peer review” doesn’t work. As such, those who point out their errors (like pointing to hate sites) requires huge amounts of face saving at minimum with a little demonization of those who outted the “oversight,” or half-hearted self examination that won’t really be heeded (and that’s if you’re lucky). After all, we’re not of consequence, or just on “the other side.”

The best I think we can do is hold them up as a cautionary tale to those who begin to feel that good intentions and high headedness means that you can do no wrong and need not critically review yourself (or accept criticism from others). That and distance ourselves from that kind of behavior and attitude. The left is filled with sober reasonable people who have well tuned BS detectors who see through this supidity, so progressivism is not doomed by Wight et al. If that weren’t the case, the UCU would have its discriminating boycott, Engage wouldn’t exist, and we wouldn’t be having this discussion – because we’d all think we knew better!

Saul,

in answer to your question, somewhere like this?

http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=1488

Gilad Atzmon Meeting Cancelled

My two pesos worth

http://tinyurl.com/2p49nc

I would encourage everyone to click on the first link above--the one for "Press Officer"--to see the petulant, childish drivel that passes for "Press" at the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

Indeed: "If this demand is not complied with forthwith, we will ensure that a picket is present at every event organised by the Film Festival, that the contact details of your office are released nationally to ensure your phone lines and email is deluged with calls and emails, and that the reputation of the Festival is discredited all over the world."

Very mature.

Oh, and an "anti-Zionist" "Solidarity" activist exhibiting rank antisemitism? I'm shocked, shocked!

If i may...

http://drinksoakedtrotsforwar.com/2008/02/05/peace/

http://www.gentheoryrubbish.com/archives/001403.html

And you people should stop linking to genocide deniers at Spiked Online. They are as much vermin as the filth you have highlighted in this post.

For the next 7 days you can Listen Again to this week's Moral Maze on BBC Radio 4 website.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/religion/moralmaze.shtml

It's about the new lexicon from Whitehall to guide civil servants in the ways they refer to terrorism carried out in the name of Islam. The parts which might be of interest to people who got involved in this discussion here are those dealing with the tension between calling things by their right names and at the same time wanting to avoid alienating people you might be trying to convince. I haven't listened to it yet so I can't tell you where to listen.

(For connoisseurs, it's Clifford Longley, Melanie Phillips, Claire Fox and Ian Hargreaves)

"In France, we know, it is virtually impossible to criticise Israel. In Germany, too, for special reasons."

This is just straight out ludicrous. Why would anyone say that, when it is SO OBVIOUSLY false? Why?

M..........why, indeed?
Mind you that nonsense came from someone who thought antisemitism ia a colonial exput into an otherwise harmonious Middle East - So, he is rude and paronising to Arabs and Muslims as well as Jews.

"Are we judging what people say and do or are we making a more essentialist claim about what people "are" "

Certain ideas are antisemitic.

When one uses such an idea, for whatever purpose, that person is an antisemite.

An analogy:

When one uses a bicycle, for whatever purpose, that person is a cyclist.

Now, if one only occasionally cycles, but keeps his bicylce in his garage, and plans on keeping it as long as he lives, while using it occasionally for a particular purpose (e.g. biking to the pool for a monthly swim) is that person a cyclist? A bicycle owner? Whats the difference?

The same goes for these people who seem to both own and use antisemitic arguments for their own particular purposes and willingly refuse to give them up.

John Wights defence is:

"30. In the course of the exchange that followed on their site, amongst others, I indvertently posted the url of a far right site devoted to Holocaust Denial. I didn’t even open the link to the site, as I was looking for the site: Campaign For An Honest Discussion Of Zionism (CODOZ) and instead ended up on (CODOH). This was an honest mistake, which Engage, and certain contributors on here, have sought to capitalise on. I offered an immediate and unreserved apology for this mistake, which I fully admit was a case of intellectual laziness on my part
...
Comment by John W — 7 February, 2008 @ 5:52 pm"

http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=1687

which is strange, because if you use google and type in:

Campaign For An Honest Discussion Of Zionism (CODOZ)

nothing relating to that appears out of the billions of pages, even permutations such as "CODOZ zionism" produce nothing

it is not a very convincing excuse

This is a bit like a kangaroo court.  Sure, he makes a mistake in his use of a link, but overall it seems to be selective editing aimed at getting him to 'fit the cap'.

How is a 'multi-headed hydra' anti-semitic? he clearly identifies what he thinks are the heads behind Israel.  Being against israel politically and zionism is not the same as anti-semitism.

In Scotland this guy writes a lot of stuff and he does use this colourful language with characters borrowed from greece and rome.  He is known for it, he is also known as a PSC activist, which is why we are discussing this in the first place.

I would suggest that the multi-headed hydra allegation is taking it too far, if we see anti-semitism in that remark we will see it eveywhere.

This guy apologised for the link, states he doesnt agree with that position and criticises Altzmon and others in the debate that followed on that link to Socialist Unity, the rest is stretching it and verging on mcarthyism.

"the rest is stretching it and verging on mcarthyism."

That's a real insult to the victims of Macarthyism.

If it quacks like a duck......

Actually "homhub", what John Wright says is also is "Arrayed against this monster are the forces of human progress". - and we all note the fate of those who stand against the objective laws of history (maybe check out some older Morning Star's. He then adopts the language of “international Jewry". He then claims that the real victims of the Holocaust are the Palestinians. He then makes the claim that Engage and others who raise antisemitism to "muddy the waters" so as to hide what he sees as a series of crimes committed by ther Israelis. So, this lovable "Boris Johnston of the left" as you put it, marks Israel down for destruction, adopts the language of nazism and calls Jews liars willing to fabricate their own pwrsecution for the interests of "their" state.
He claims that one can't say a thing about Israel without being called an antisemite and takes the position that you can't say a thing about being a antisemitism without being a Zionist and an apoloigist for Israel and its (inherently) illegitemate existence -and you call it "stretching a point" and "McCarthyism". Apologists? - "Zionists" could learn a thing or two from you, "homhub". More imprtantly, Wright and you are dragging down the level of the Pro-Palestinian campaign that, let's be honest, is not only becomming not just counter-productive, but, frankly, a positive embarassment.

Why homhub, if Wight is so opposed to Atzmon, did the Scottish PSC, of which Wight is the Press Officer for, ask Atzmon to write some music for a production of the widely viewed as antisemitic play, Perdition, that it staged last year?

homhub,

surely the point is when you're discussing a sensitive topic, that you take a degree of care?

and any cursory glance at CODOH would indicate that it is a Holocaust denying web site

John Wight's excuse that he was looking up CODOZ is not tenable, not because it doesn't sound plausible, but the evidence isn't there

type in CODOZ into google and view the results? nothing remotely like his intended "source" appears

of course, if you can provide CODOZ's URL I'd welcome it :)

Spellcheck changed Wright to White. It should be John White or John W.

Modernity,
I too was looking for the CODOZ site. I can't seem to find it.

Wight!! darn it!!!!!

Saul,

clearly, John Wight's explanation is fictitious, and demonstratively so, even his defenders can test out his excuses by using google

I thought Mike Rosen's responses to John Wight were funny, if a bit too subtle

I think John Wight's CODOZ excuse is delightful, although something tells me that the so-calleded "Campaign For An Honest Discussion Of Zionism (CODOZ)" probably isn't much of a campaign, isn't very honest, isn't much of a discussion, and isn't really about Zionism...

SU blog is a must read for those interested in the study of contemporary antisemitism, and the comments on this thread display such a profound ignorance of the topic

"How Indymedia UK Lost Its Way and became a safe haven for Anti-Semitism" http://www.socialistunity.com/?p=1690

I wonder, half seriously, if Engage should start an outreach and training programme to educate parts of the Left as to what actually constitutes antisemitism, rather than leave them to their own devices, which as the above thread indicates is not a good idea

I am writing from well-set city of Edinburgh.  Having some time ago deicide... whoops... decided that I'd rather stick my head in a bucket of horse urine than associate with my local chapter of Stop the War - no, not that one! - Coalition on the grounds that I am not a complete and utter mentalist, I admit I hadn't really heard of John Wight.

I have now.  Thank you Engage.

By the way, John, if you're still here, did you have a PSC banner tied to the railings outside St John's Church just before Xmas?  Someone made a complaint to the police and it was taken down.

Deary deary me.

Having read the comments at SocialistUnity.com it becomes clear that the likes of John Wight actually believe that Zionism and its concrete expression, Israel,  are evil in every way, the most evil thing they know (perhaps second to the US). Believing that, it's not possible for them to conceive that anyone could support Israel—neither any of its acts nor its existence—without resorting to explanations of coercion, manipulation or complicity. The continuing existence of Israel, to them, is only explicable in those terms. If the Americans continue to aid Israel either the Zionist conspiracy must be working on them or they must be part of the conspiracy. The same goes for the Jews themselves. At least some of these people replicate antisemitism not because they are primarily antisemitic but because they relate to the image of Israel that they have themselves constructed in the same, visceral way that the Jew-fixated relate to their imagined Jews.

I think N Friedman's comment is correct:
"People who are against something are usually filled with hate. This is not to be confused with a person who is for something. So, I distinguish people who are for a pluralistic society ...from people who assert, I am against racism. The latter sort of person could very well be - but, of course, is not necessarily - a hate monger."

Exactly.  "Anti-racists" aren't a special case.  They fall into antisemitism and conspiracy theories for the same reasons as other people; namely, the bigot's prejudice boosts his own ego.

The anti-Zionist gets to consider himself a clever fellow because he's seen through the conspiracy, despite the way Zionists control the media.

He's a bit of a hero, too, taking on the all-powerful Israel lobby, and he’s a maverick as well – one of the few people in France/Germany/the U.S. willing to criticize Israel.

Moreover, since the Zionists are so evil, he becomes virtuous simply by hating them.  Any notion of fair play toward them becomes absurd and he feels licensed to act in ways that would otherwise be considered reprehensible – promoting a racist boycott for example.

In the most extreme case, a conspiracy theory becomes a license for genocide, as Cohn famously put it.

There's no arguing against a conspiracy theory; it's a closed circle.  Contrary evidence is dismissed as propaganda manufactured by the conspirators: rather than counting as evidence against the conspiracy theory, it's proof of the conspiracy’s power.  If you point out to an anti-Zionist that he's spouting antisemitic rubbish.  He'll tell you that you've demonstrated how Zionists always try to stifle debate; in his closed system, you’ve proved his point.

In any case, like other forms of bigotry, anti-Zionism isn't motivated by intellect; it's emotionally based, a form of egotism.  The cure lies in convincing the bigot to become humble.  Good luck!

The only real remedy against anti-Zionism or any other form of bigotry is to isolate it.  I think ridicule works well and so does taking apart the bigot's claims and showing them up as the rubbish they are.

This is seemingly insoluble because antisemitism as a type of racism is a mental health disorder that finds its expression through a form of political discourse, but cannot be addressed through political discourse. It is expressed as politics, objectively resembles a belief system and is fundamentally a projective identification disorder.

Open expression of antisemitism is in my experience more prevalent now than at any time I can remember and it always comes in the same form: Jews lumped together with Israel have a negative influence in the world. This fantasy is hydra-headed and eventually consumes all of the conspiracy madness of truthism, holocaust denial etc.

German Jews in the 30s couldn't believe that the sophisticated culture in which they lived could produce something as debased and primitive as nazism. We need to lose our sense of shock that intelligent and educated people are driven by a subconscious ugliness that subverts their thinking.

I wonder if Wight knows 'scales falls from their eyes' is Christian imagery? 'International Jewry' is enslaved to Zionism, even as the Church Fathers and their successors said Jews were enslaved to Judaism. 'Hydra-headed monster' is indeed a Classical allusion. Which is why so many antisemites used it, from the 19th century on, of 'Asiatic' 'International Jewry', enemies of western, European culture and civilization, before (or, with the result that?) the Zionist monstrosity of Israel came into existence. Wight reveals himself to be fairly uncultured and ignorant if he does not know this (surprise, surprise). More likely he has simply absorbed this language and imagery from the 'air'. Which begs the question, What kind of 'air' has he been breathing?

As for the Conversion's of the Jews, or International Jewry, (for that is what it means for Scales to Fall from their Eyes), saving the world, that is the language of an apocalytpist, a far left mirror image of extreme right wing millennarian Christians. But they say extreme right and left meet, usualy in matter of 'International Jewry', and, apparently, in the person of Mr. John Wight.

Á propos of Palestinians sacrificed on altars. Jewish sacrifice in their (ruined, no longer extant) temple was the peculiar bete noir of the Church Fathers. Note how, for Wight, the West is worshipping Israel, by sacrificing on her behalf. A sacrifice, moreover, that is human. Now, that is a very old, very culturally Christian libel.

You can see how Palestine and Palestinians have become, for Wight, the new Christ, the new spotless, pure (to all intents and purposes) Victim (never mind all the opportunities the historical Palestinians actually had for independent, sovereign statehood, never mind the existential dispossession of the Jews), sacrificed for (but, come on, really BY) Israel.

The irony is that all this Christian imagery derives from a religious discourse in which the nation sacrificed on the altar of western, European identity was the Jews, whom Rome, the origin of Christendom (and, in a sense, Islam), had dispossessed righteously to punish them for having crucified/rejected Jesus Christ. In his City of God, while Augustine questions the shedding of the blood of millions, the conquest and dispossession of the Jews is Rome's wholly righteous, if not justifying, act, her taking de facto vengeance, on God's behalf, for Jews' sins against him, their crucifying/rejecting the original Christ.

More often than not, an antisemite is someone who absorbs all this imagery, without knowing its provenance, but with an uncanny knack of perpetuating the direction in which it has been historically tending.

And, funnily enough, it tends to point towards the largest, most obvious, most visible and, more often than not, most imperilled group of Jews in question.

Zkharya will you explain more fully the origin and the meaning of the phrase "scales fall from their eyes"?

Sure, David. It originates from Acts 9, 18, when Paul is cured by Ananias of the blindness he incurred following the revelation of Jesus to him, on the road to Damascus, in Acts 9, 3-9.

Acts 9, 19 reads, in Greek: καi εuθέως Eπέπεσαν αuτοu aπo τoν oφθαλμwν wς λεπίδες.

And immediately there fell away from his eyes something like scales.

The precise meaning of this text, especially 'somelike scales', has been debated endless by scholars. But it is the origin of the metaphor.

Once again, Zkharya, I am in love.

"This is seemingly insoluble because antisemitism as a type of racism is a mental health disorder that finds its expression through a form of political discourse, but cannot be addressed through political discourse. It is expressed as politics, objectively resembles a belief system and is fundamentally a projective identification disorder."

With all due respect, this notion of antisemitism as a psychological desease is most unhelpful. After all, this is the way that Jaqueline Rose pathologises the situation in Israel and Palestine - a sort of blending between domestic viloence and national character.

Antisemitism is a political phenomenon which, ultimately, depends on real relations social and political between Jews and non-Jews; in this case the Jewish state and its opponents. Antisemitism is a distortion and mystification of such relations. It ontologises that relation as well as the parties involved. Jews are, and have always been ,as responsable for the world as any other group, incuding, of course, the phenomenon of antisemitism. Jews has a material role in its production - Jews really are cracking skulls in Palestine; Jews really were owners of banks and department stores in Germany in the early part of the 20th century (although not so much by the late 1920's). So, the argument that if Israel stopped its oppression in the OT that antisemitism would decrease, is undoubtedly the case. But, that is a very different thing from saying, what others who should know better have, that Jews are "responsible" for antisemitism. The only way antisemitism would stop would be for Jews to stop acting in the world, period; since all acts involving Jews would be caught up in the mythology and fantasy of antisemitism.
It is these real "conflicts" that feed the myths of antisemitism. The power of antisemitism is the truth of the real relations that it distorts. The real problem is to see Jewish/non-Jewish relations in the same terms as all other conflicts - as contemporary political issues - and to challenge its antisemitic interpetation wherever and whenever it appears; that is, to "de-Judify" them, so to speak. (Hence the damage down to the fight against antisemitism by Jews like IJV, JfPP, etc. who insist in splattering it with some "religious" or "cultural" veneer and venom)
(It is, in effect, no different from explaining "Third WOrld" conflcits, i.e. Kenya, Rwanda, as if it really is a tribal conflict, rather than a political conflict that is being mystified in an apolitical, asociological reduction to anthopology and ontology).

Saul, my point addresses the concept of distortion and mystification in your analysis. A position some of whose roots are economic/political is transformed into a fantasy that is driven by projection of primitive feelings and therefore no longer susceptible to dialectic. This is why the anti-Israel+anti jew position (syndrome) presents opinions that are completely out of proportion to the actual issues in the world. How does Jewish ownership of "some businesses in Germany" turn into Auschwitz? How does the political machinations of Israel in attempting to secure its borders (however they are to be drawn) turn into a fantasy of world domination and comparisons between the occupation of palestinian land and the holocaust? And support for indiscriminate murder of civilians?

Whether a person is a racist is a matter between them and their shrink. But the level of hate being directed against Jews now demands a robust defence that must start by categorising the hate propaganda as unacceptable in our society; because it is a dangerous madness.

Zkharya,

What you are describing is a form of supersessionism that replaces Jews with Palestinian Arabs. The terminology used by some is neo-Marcionism (as in a modern version of the Marcion heresy). Sometimes it is called Palestinian replacement theology. Sometimes it is called Palestinianism.

Whatever name is employs, the objection to Israel is not based on Israel's actions. It is based on the assertion that God transferred his blessings from Jews to certain others, in this case Palestinian Arabs. And, of course, the rejection of Jews in God's eyes has its roots in how one interprets the role of Jews in the Gospels.

This "theology" has been strongly pushed by Christian clergy in the Middle East but, as I understand the matter, has now begun to gain a substantial following in Europe and Great Britain.

This phenomena is a bellwether for understanding Christian attitudes about Jews. It is very discouraging, to say the least.

Fortunately, it is not the only Christian theological current that addresses the role of Israel. A prominent competing version is Restorationism. That version is very prominent in the US - and is growing. In that version, God's covenant with Jews remains and, just as America is the new Israel, Israel is the old Israel upon which God's blessing is shone.

JR,

With respect to your comment that views Antisemitism as a type of racism, I think that the issue with Antisemitism is that Jews are assigned a role in historical phenomena. As a result, Jews are either condemned to that role (e.g. as eternal wanderers) or fail to follow their assigned role (e.g. as noted in Fiamma Nirenstein's famous essay "How I became an 'unconscious fascist'").  Even Restorationism is based on Jews playing an assigned role - returning to Israel where the ultimate demise of the world, which they tie to Israel's circumstances, leads to the demise of Jews -. Where racism and Antisemitism differ, I think, is that the role assigned to Jews changes from time to time and place to place. Which is to say, people tend to hate blacks for being different - although there are examples of blacks being assigned a societal role - while hatred of Jews tends to be a shifting phenomena.

Zkharya,

On a different note, and iven you seem to know some of this stuff, can you point to me the origins of the phrase poisoned wells?

Hi Mikey,

I am afraid I do not know so much about medieval stuff, but presumably it originates in Europe during the Black Death. And that is not just because I do not wish encourage Alec's amour.

Hi N. Friedman, what you say is somewhat different from what I was talking about, but it is interesting, and I will have to think about a reply. In the meantime, you might find this article on neo-Marcionism in Palestinian Christianity interesting:

http://sicsa.huji.ac.il/nerelprinter.pdf

Otherwise, check out what was appearing on MPACUK's pages in 2004:
http://web.archive.org/web/20041018152049/http://www.mpacuk.org/mpac/data/c907ef4f/c907ef4f.jsp (from Harry's Place)

Underlying the prejudice constructed around historic-mythic roles is a more basic mechanism. The racism that depicts the black man as a Caliban is related to the degradation of slavery but conveniently provides a receptacle for unacceptable base instincts. The role assigned to Jews as killers of the messiah, child killers or in other words killers of the hope of the world seems to me like a very early ego projection: the Jew is invulnerable and expropriates all power to himself: the ego hated and feared by the fractured self.

In the wake of the Iraq war, many people in the UK ask themselves why they were unable to prevent the acquiescence of  a supposedly progressive government that they probably voted for in an act that was seemingly unjustifiable and horrific. The fantasy of zionist involvement removes guilt and provides a receptacle for the anger of impotence.

"A position some of whose roots are economic/political is transformed into a fantasy that is driven by projection of primitive feelings and therefore no longer susceptible to dialectic"

JR. Thanks for this. I do not disagree that this nonsense is unacceptable - but the fact is that it is becoming acceptable. I disagree however that it is "madness" political or otherwise. It is, as you know, perfectly possible - and necessary - to understand irrational phenomena rationally. It is possible that something as so fantastic or phantasmorigical is "susceptible to dialectic". Indeed, it is antisemites who, through their antisemitism, seek to breach all "dialectic" between Jews and non-Jews.It is, moreover, a common misunderstanding that appears in discussions of the Holocaust - that its sheer horror puts it beyond understanding or dialectic.
I think also that the idea that antisemitism is the product of "primitive feelings" is far too Hobbesian.  There is nothing latent, no reserve of concealed energy that comes into play in what appears to be a "breakdown of society".


Again NF gets it wrong. If anything has been static it is the ontological concept of the Jew. Where he may be partially correct (but I am sure he did not realise it) is the way that the layers of historical images of the Jew are overlaid one with the other culminating in the merging of blood libel and global government.  He also presumes that difference precedes evaluation; as in "Which is to say, people tend to hate blacks for being different".  The idea that Jews are "assigned" roles - by whom? - points to a lack of their own agency, which, again, in the Manicheanism of antisemitism is precisely what the Jew-haters say.

Thanks Zkhraya, I was just wondering if you had an exact quote like you did for scales over eyes. No worries that you have not.

"Etymology The phrase "poisoning the well" comes from the Middle Ages, where bubonic plague was spreading across Europe. A rumour arose that Jews were poisoning the wells of Christians in order to have them die of the plague."


http://www.skepticwiki.org/index.php/Poisoning_the_Well

Thanks Jose, that is my understanding too, from elsewhere, but I do not rely on Wikipedia and my own source is also a bit suspect. But thank you for your efforts.

Saul, yes I think I have just had too many depressing encounters with prejudice and I am sure that persuasive argument is important.

JR.
The problem with "projection" is twofold; why the Jew? (the answer on this can only be circular) and, secondly, the real Jews, flesh and blood Jews become nothing other than the screen on which others project their "primitive being". Again, it presumes the very thing that needs to be addressed.
On a different note, I have always thought that the claims of antisemites are like those who believe in "intelligent design"- the world/Israel-Palestine is so complex there MUST be a hidden hand or concealed force controlling it (i.e. the war in Iraq and Labour and the Israel Lobby). But, again, why the Jews? and why the Jews now? No amount of projection theory or veneer of civilisation theory can answer it I am afraid.

Saul,

You have a tendency to misread and, at the same time, read too much and, at times, too little, into what I write. You also have a tendency to speak in theoretical terms when some examination of the historical record ought precede such analysis.

I go where I think the historic record goes. I do that whether or not it offends your sensibilities or even my own. But, in this case, what I said and what you have me saying are basically unrelated.

I never denied that there are asserted ontological conception of Jews that have been fairly static. That is something you have made up. My point was different.

And, my comment does not have anything to do with Manicheanism. And, I never said that Jews either have or do not have agency. Etc., etc. These things had nothing to do with my point.

I was - if I understand the comment to which your post is directed - making a comparison between two similar but, I think, different phenomena, racism and Antisemitism.

As for the substance of your comment, I certainly agree that there have been conceptions of Jews that remain static. However, I note that notwithstanding such conceptions, Antisemitism does not always arise. A relative of mine with close connections to the (non-US) Georgia notes that notwithstanding that land being devoutly Christian, Antisemitism never much flourished there.  And, yet, such people certainly were exposed to the same conceptions. So, these conceptions are not an adequate explanation. In fact, as I have noted, the accusation of essentialist language is, in my view, a bogus one.

The fact is, I think, that Antisemitism has revolved around different issues at different times. But, it is common - although not always the case - that Jews are said by their enemies to either behave according to some role or to deviate from a role which enemies of Jews would find acceptable for Jews. Hence, the issue today among people on the left does not appear to deny Jews the right to live in peace outside of Israel or, no matter where they live, to oppose Israel's existence or actions. The objection is to Jews who would assert a right to live in a sovereign state and to defend that state. It is that role which is deemed illegitimate.

Lastly, I would appreciate if, before you throw bile at me, you actually address the points I make, not make believe points.

“With all due respect, this notion of antisemitism as a psychological desease is most unhelpful. After all, this is the way that Jaqueline Rose pathologises the situation in Israel and Palestine - a sort of blending between domestic viloence and national character.” Saul

Just because Jacqueline Rose is as bad a psychologist as she is an historian doesn’t mean that anti-Semitism isn’t a psycho-pathology.

Some very excellent studies of anti-Semitism as a psychological disorder have been published over the last century, Saul.

“Jews really were owners of banks and department stores in Germany in the early part of the 20th century (although not so much by the late 1920's).”

I don’t know what point you are trying to make, Saul. Jews owned banks and department stores but how does that explain anti-Semitism?

Your other example is equally mistfiying,

“Jews really are cracking skulls in Palestine”

Arab anti-Semitism pre-existed the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. I don’t therefore know how in itself the conflict and killings on both sides explains it.

Anti-Semitism is a political phenomenon, you are right about that. But, it is also a psychological, sociological phenomenon which has its origins in religious conflict and differences. You can’t explain it by reducing it to a magical formula such as “the political.”

Anti-Semitism on display

"‘Jews’ Parade on the Streets of Vilna"  By Michael Casper

http://www.forward.com/articles/12634/

Are Jews cracking heads in Lithuania?

“Anti-Semitism is the swollen envy of pygmy minds.” ~Mark Twain

Avi,
Thanks for the comments. The point is that whenever jews get involved in conflicts, those conflicts become distorted and mystified in the language of antisemitism. That does not on any way deny a pre-occupation Arab antisemitism (far from it!). At the moment, Israel is occupying and settling someone' else's territory, it has made, and is making life intolerable for thousands of Palestinians. It is this conflict that is being fantasised into the language and imagery of antisemitism. It is a fact, for example, that the US gives or loans x million dollars every year to Israel. It is a fact that the US has never condoned Israel at the UN. It is a lie and a distortion to believe that the reason for this is down to some sort of Israel Lobby that controls and manipulates the US (the UN, etc. etc.). In may ways this antizionist antisemitism is like "intellegent design". It is all so complex, there has to be, just has to be, a hidden hand behind - the Jews, It is, of course, rubbish.
And, yes, there have been many good and interesting psycological studies. They need to be intergrated into history and politics. Rose gives it a determinist role while chucking in a rather silly reading of Jewish messianism.


NF, So, Jews are hailed and interpolated into roles by others which they do or do not fulfil. So, now it is Althersarian structuralism - whatever next! Where are the Jews in all of this? Again, your "thought" fits in exactly with the type of "analysis" Arendt rightly dismisses in the Preface to "Origins".
And of course antisemitism has never flourished where there has been devout Christianity. The fact you think that is insightful shows precisely your inability to even begin to understand the phenomenon under discussion.

Saul  “The point is that whenever jews get involved in conflicts, those conflicts become distorted and mystified in the language of antisemitism. That does not on any way deny a pre-occupation Arab antisemitism (far from it!). At the moment, Israel is occupying and settling someone' else's territory, it has made, and is making life intolerable for thousands of Palestinians. It is this conflict that is being fantasised into the language and imagery of antisemitism.”

But Saul you yourself said that the “language of antisemitism” predates the occupation.
If that is so, how can you be sure that “it is this conflict that is being fantasized into the language and imagery of antisemitism?”

Where does the antisemitic imagery of this conflict begin and end and how do you differentiate it from pre occupation antisemitism? Then there is important question of non Palestinians and Arabs and especially Europeans also using antisemitic imagery to characterize a conflict that is not their own!

In fact, Europeans by the very fact that they are taking sides against the Jewish State are already engaging in the same antisemitism of Arab Israel conflict.  This is especially true for Europeans who believe that Israel has no right to exist.

Do Europeans indulge in anti Russian or anti Arab language and imagery because of Chechnya or Darfur? These conflicts are even more deadly than the Arab Israeli conflict.

“It is a lie and a distortion to believe that the reason for this is down to some sort of Israel Lobby that controls and manipulates the US (the UN, etc. etc”

I agree with this comment, Saul, however when you say that these distortions are based on a “fact” then I take issue with you.

““It is a fact, for example, that the US gives or loans x million dollars every year to Israel. It is a fact that the US has never condoned Israel at the UN.”

Europe does not give “millions” to Israel nor do they routinely “condone” Israeli policy, either in neither the UN, nor anywhere else. They, in fact, condemn it routinely. Yet in Europe too there are those who believe in the “Jewish Lobby” canard. In fact believe it more strongly than does the American public.

Again while there is some correlation between Jewish action and anti-Semitism it is not as strong as you make it out to be. There is certainly no one to one correspondence.

Imagine if Jews had hijacked planes and bombed the WTC. Imagine further if Jewish terrorists cut off the heads of Muslims. Don’t you think that the amount of anti-Semitism would be at WW2 levels in Nazi Germany? Is there this kind of reaction to the Islamicists  attacks? Isn’t it rather the reverse? There are millions in Europe and in the Arab world who blame the Jews for these attacks and not the Islamicists.

Where is the logic in that, Saul?  

You seem to working with a materialist, dialectical or not, view of history.  Unfortunately dialectical materialism (or neo-realism) can’t account for the fact of anti-Semitism.
 

In addition to wells, Jews have also been accused of poisoning bananas.

see: http://tinyurl.com/93aw8

The issue I think is that you can never understand rationally antisemitism.
Yes you can understand some things, which gives the scholar the feeling that he has the key.
For example, you can understand the fear of Jews "poisoning the wells" and in doing so spreading the Black Plague by explaining it through the anti-Jewish propaganda of the Church, plus the fear of diseases that were not understood in an age where there was no microscope, plus the fact that the Jews were seen as alien by the majority culture.
But you can never understand completely antisemitism, because it is irrationalism.
For example, if you explain to an antisemite the study of this same scholar about the prejudice regarding the role of Jews during the Black Plague, and how the prejudice had no basis at all, he will still believe that the Jews control the media and plan world domination. There is no mental "click", in which sane people add two plus two and understand that if in the medieval ages people hated and killed Jews by stupid and ignorant reasons, he might be doing the same now. No. He will hold fast to his beliefs in a Jewish conspiracy and discard the relation you have just presented as irrelevant.
Therefore, antisemitism is a mental disease. And that is the further you can go in understanding it. It has an irrational nucleus and cannot be understood by rational means except by saying that antisemites are sick people.

I have explained my point. You think that antisemitism, as an irrational phenomenon that cannot be understood rationally. I will state my point clear and concise. Antisemitism is a distortion of Jewish/non-Jewish relations.  With nazism, antisemitism lost all touch with reality (see Arendt). Antisemitism has not achieved that yet, but it is moving in that direction (see Wlat and Mearsheimer as evidence of what is to come) At the moment, its distortions are still "grounded" in a real conflict - just!
If phenomena are part of this world, they can be understood as part of this world. Antisemitism is part of the world, and no matter how irrational is amenable to rational understanding. If that is not understood, myth will really have won the day.

And regarding anti-zionism, my view is the same that for antisemitism: except for the Palestinians, the people directly affected, the rest of the anti-Zionists are simply sick.

Reflect: these people live their lives collecting (and inventing) small piesces of evidence (Zionist "quotes", statistics, declamations) to destroy a specific state in which they don't live, most don't even know, and for the sake of people they don't even care! (whomever thinks that Tony Greenstein, for example, is anti-Zionist because he cares for the Palestinians has never read him). They are obsessed about a specific country. They inevitably fall into demonization of Israel because the only way to achieve their objectives is by trying to prove that Israel is somehow worse qualitatively that the rest of the states in the world. Demonization is inevitably a sympthom of a disease. Just like antisemitism is a disease.

Lets put forward an analogy. There is this guy called Tal and his girlfriend Miriam has just left him for Avi. Tal cannot accept this and gets obsessed with Avi. He tries to win Miriam back by digging and fabricating incriminating evidence against Avi. All his life, Tal is consumed by hatred of Avi. He thinks that his children would have been much well-off if Miriam had stayed with him instead of running with Avi, so he transmits his obsession to his children.

That I can understand. Someday his grandchildren will think that passing this hatred for Avi to his own children is sick, but, I can totally understand Tal. He is a Palestinian.

Now imagine that this other guy, lets call him Nimrod, hears Tal's story in a pub and gets as obsessed as Tal by what Miriam and Avi did. He is also consumed by hatred for Avi and also fabricates his own incriminatory "evidences". All that he wants is for Avi to die. Would you understand this hatred? Of course not. Nimrod is a sad character without a life, and needs to impersonate Tal to feel that he is important. Nimrod is obsessed by someone else's sad lovestory.

That guy is the average anti-Zionist. The guy that posts against Israel in every forum and talks about evil Zionists. The guy who digs quotes from Jabotinsky when he was 17 years old to prove that Zionism is racism. I can understand Tal, but this other guy I can't understand. He is sick. Anti-Zionism is also a sickness.
Best,
Fabian

"For example, if you explain to an antisemite the study of this same scholar about the prejudice regarding the role of Jews during the Black Plague, and how the prejudice had no basis at all, he will still believe that the Jews control the media and plan world domination."

This has been brought up more than a few times here in the past.  I think the best quote was, "You can't reason someone out of what he he didn't reason himself into in the first place."  

I think there is also the issue that antisemitism is the proverbial "oldest hatred."  The saying is a little hyperbole of course but it rings true to a point since antisemtism has been around for 2000 years and as such the Jews have accrued so many bigotted and conspiratorial memes that anything that's ever been said about anyone has been said against the Jews sometime or another and overtime, they have evolved into highly specialized universals:

They are the chosen people (as if everyone else's creed says "We suck and God hates our guts").

They are simulatneously the quintisential subhuman and onipotent cabal even though many other groups have been held up as examples of each (but who's at the top of the rolodex when you need an image of either one?).

The blood libel and related imagery concept easily applies to canibals that acutally existed and still do, both real and metaphorical (but who makes the best matzah?)

Who is the only appartheid state (except for all the others)?  The only occupier (except for all the others)?  The only state that has a religious test for citizenship?  The only state created out of religious or ethnic partitioning?  

Poisoning natural resources from wells to bananas?  (Ohmigod... Salt is like SO 150BCE, and the Romans didn't really do that anyway, but the *Jews* on the other hand.)

and so on...

It's become such a rut that the Jews have practically become designated testbed of bigotry.  They've been called everything, blamed for everything, that it's easy to slide into it.  And conversely easy to be very sensitive to any criticism of Jews, and in turn Israel, that those of us with itchy triger fingers when it comes to racism in general tend to hold back even when it's Israel and only Israel that's critizied, or critized as the scapegoat for all the rest of the world sins, or demonized to such orgasmic levels the critic who is "definitely NOT an antisemite" needs a cigarette afterwards.

Perhaps another example. Hamas is an example of antisemitism that has left and grounding in reality. As is well known their charter points to the idea that the Jews are the motor of history from, at least, the French Revolution onward. True the roots for its expression can be found in the conflict with jews, but its "analysis" is sheer ideology that does not depend on any fact for its espousal. And, of course, it is the more basic case that antisemitism works the other way. It takes an issue like Israel and Paelstine and makes it one of Jews v whoever.

"If phenomena are part of this world, they can be understood as part of this world. Antisemitism is part of the world, and no matter how irrational is amenable to rational understanding. If that is not understood, myth will really have won the day. "

Saul, that is a very nice silogism, and you can try to live as if it were true, but it is not true.

Nobody understands how people form their thoughts, or, to get more metaphysic, what makes me, me. How am I in this body, during these lifetime, while you are there, in your own body and Napoleon was there but he isn't anymore. All this is a phenomena happening in this world, but I don't think anyone will ever have an answer.

The last part, about the myth having won the day is a non-sequitur. There is no myth, there is a sickness. Why the Jews? why not the Jews?
As Norman Cohn shows, in his book "Europe's inner Demons", early Christians were accused by Romans of carrying out demoniacal and incestuous Shabbats. Afterwards the Christians used those same images and applied them to the Jews. Maybe the Christians could have been the victims of a 2000 year hatred, if Constantine had not converted. Who knows?

Best,
Fabian

The website for which Wight was looking appears to be this one:

http://www.codz.org/

Mednel,
Thanks.........another conpsiracy theory site. This time from people who should know better. I mean, look at Mearsheimer and Walt - that never got to see the light of day did it? Who published it? oh yes. that small independent publshers, Penguin. Carter's book, now was that published? Oh yes,,,,, it was. So, apparently the complaint is that some (Jewish Zionists) complain about it, and think it may well be antisemitic. What is the problem with that? Lots of people complain about books. What is so special about when Jews complain. Finklestein? Does any know what really happened? No. it is anecdotal and assumptive. Did Tutu speak? Yes he did.
As I said pure above a case of believing in "intelligent design". These guys assume that everything that happens in regard to Israel must be the result of a hidden hand, of a power behind the throne! Oh, really! Fantast, pure fantasy!

Saul,

You write: "And of course antisemitism has never flourished where there has been devout Christianity."

I really wonder if you actually read what I wrote before you post. I said nothing of the sort.

I have had enough of you, Saul. Learn to read.

"A relative of mine with close connections to the (non-US) Georgia notes that notwithstanding that land being devoutly Christian, Antisemitism never much flourished there. And, yet, such people certainly were exposed to the same conceptions. So, these conceptions are not an adequate explanation. In fact, as I have noted, the accusation of essentialist language is, in my view, a bogus one".

Whilst I appreciate clarity is not your strongest point - one minute you cite culturalism, then you don't, one minute you cite history, then you don't. One minute you a clash of civlisation kinda guy, the next you're an ALthuesserian - So, let's be clear?

So, underneath all this obscurantist nonsense of "exposure to concepts" (whatever that can mean!) and bogus essentialism (is this a reference to your earliest posts?)what is it that you are actually saying? Does antisemitism flourish Christian countries. I say no. I have no idea what it is you are saying. Apparently when asked, you claim never to say what you have said.

Saul,

If you do not know what I am saying, then it is wise not to make wild assertions, as you have done. That, frankly, is very annoying.

As to what I said, I noted that one country - Georgia - has no real history of Antisemitism.  One country is not all of Christiandom. OK?

Regarding essentialist language, many on this website take the view that essentialist language is necessarily offensive. My view is (a) that describing doctrines of a religion is not essentialist and (b) that not all essentialist statements are improper (e.g. All men are mortal); rather, what is important is the truth quotient of the statement.

"Christendom" - why am I not surprised you still think in terms of Christendom.........

Saul,

Come now. I was addressing your misstatement of my point. It was you who brought the entirety into play, not I.