Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
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Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
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Nationalism is chametz, during Passover and always!Freedom only for some is never enough. This Passover, at a time when violence against Palestinians by the Israeli state, military and settlers continues to escalate, we gather to demand and dream liberation for everyone.For anti-Zionist Jews, this holiday can be a challenging time. For some, it can feel impossible to separate our holiday traditions from Zionist propaganda advocating ethnic cleansing and land theft. Many of us feel reluctant to even celebrate the holiday as Zionist terror escalates in Palestine. And many of us may be facing yet another holiday where our beliefs and politics are not welcome.This year, bring your whole anti-Zionist self to our virtual seder! Our beloved community is coming together to set the Pesach table for you. Our seder will feature joy and rage and hope from our Havurah, BIJOCSM and student networks, our campaigns, our rabbis, and from JVP members from near and far—all gathered for collective liberation for us all.
Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
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The cynicism is almost beyond belief. Even the language they use shows that they know that this has nothing to do with reality.Here we reproduce two draft e-mails which have been suggested by the European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) coordination team of the European Coordination of Committees and Associations for Palestine (ECCP). ECCP is a network of 43 European organisations, NGOs, trade unions and solidarity groups from 18 European countries, dedicated to the struggle of the Palestinian people for freedom, justice and equality.We find that this attempt to link different struggles – to show that Palestinian rights are indivisible from the rights of women and LGBTQI+ people – is an important development in building an international movement to support the Palestinians. We therefore urge you to support the ECI initiative and to send these mails to any relevant organisations with which you are in contact.In particular, the mails ask for support for the ongoing ECI to #StopSettlements and stop EU complicity with the oppression of Palestinians. An ECI is more than just a “normal” petition. If the initiative receives one million validated signatures, the EU Commission is legally obliged to respond to the demand for a ban on illegal trading with the occupied territories.
As Europeans fighting for gender equality, and against sexism and the patriarchal system in our countries, we bear a responsibility to support our sisters’ fights abroad. Including in Palestine where Palestinian women resists the Israeli apartheid regime and demand the fulfilment of Palestinian rights. Our Palestinian sisters are not only confronted with gender violence, femicide but also Israeli settler colonialism which constitutes a gender violence in itself. Israeli occupation and colonisation add another layer of oppression and contribute to gender-based violence within Palestinian communities.
The Palestinian struggle is deeply committed to addressing gender violence, feminicide, queerphobia and settler colonialism, which are co-constitutive of each other. The State of Israel and its supporters use Pinkwashing as a strategy to cynically exploit LGBTQIA+ rights in order to project a progressive image of Israel while concealing its occupation and apartheid policies oppressing Palestinians.Awareness that queer and trans-liberation cannot be separated from Palestinian liberation is growing. As Europeans fighting against sexism, patriarchy, queerphobia and all systems of oppression in our countries, we must support Palestinian people in their struggle for their rights and against the Israeli settler colonial system.
Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon! Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424. Read all about it here! |
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Recent years have witnessed an increased awareness of a seemingly new brand of conspiratorial antisemitism propagated mainly by sections of the left. The phenomenon, which has become known as ‘new antisemitism’, or anti-Zionism, is defined by the fact that the central object of disparagement and prejudice are not Jews as such, but Israel as the Jewish state (Chesler, 2003, Iganski and Kosmin, 2003, Foxman, 2004, Taguieff, 2004). Rather than viewing Israel as a country whose policies and actions, like that of any other, can (and indeed should be) criticised on merit, sections of the political left have come to view it as the source of uniquely harmful influence in the world. Israel’s actions, and even its very existence, are believed to be an expression of the uniquely iniquitous nationalist ideology (Zionism), which is considered to be comparable to Nazism: it is racist, imperialist, expansionist and tyrannical. Transgressions of the Israeli state – from human rights violations to military actions that are deemed, by critics, to be disproportionate – are seen as inherently more sinister than those committed by any other state in history, with the exception of Nazi Germany. Furthermore, Israel’s policies are seen as sufficiently egregious to undermine its basic legitimacy: exponents of ‘new antisemitism’ often go as far as to call for the dismantlement of Israel. This makes Israel the only member of the United Nations whose very existence is routinely brought into question and Jews the only people whose right to self-determination, it is argued, should be retrospectively revoked. Crucially, as David Cesarani (2004: 72) notes, the definitive crossing of the boundary between criticism of Israel and antisemitism occurs at the point where the former becomes articulated in language typically associated with antisemitism, that is, when it ‘intentionally or unintentionally uses or echoes long-established anti-Jewish discourse, characterising Jews inside Israel or in the Jewish diaspora as singularly wealthy, powerful, conspiratorial, treacherous and malign.’ In other words, when it is embellished with the motifs of a Jewish conspiracy.
Accounts of ‘the Lobby’ are so blatantly conspiratorial that their exponents on occasions candidly admit that what they are alleging is essentially a Jewish plot, one that resembles the classic antisemitic conspiracy theory. Writing in the magazine Tikkun, Paul Buhle (2003) writes, for example, that when one looks at the power of the pro-Israel lobby ‘it is almost as if the anti-Semitic Protocols of Zion, successfully fought for a century, have suddenly returned with an industrial sized grain of truth’. The British historian Tony Judt has also admitted that claims about the sinister power of the ‘Israel lobby’ sound ‘an awful lot like, you know, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the conspiratorial theory of the Zionist Occupational Government and so on’ but that, while ‘unfortunate’, this cannot be helped as this is ‘just how it is’ (cited in Hirsh, 2007: 86). Such comparisons are rhetorically significant, because writers use the notoriety of the Protocols to accentuate the sinister influence of ‘the Lobby’, while at the same time forestalling any accusations of antisemitism by implying that, despite the resemblances, their claims are distinguishable from those of the right. As Tony Judt put it, ‘you can’t help it if idiots [on the right], once every 24 hours, with their stopped political clock are on the same time as you’ (ibid.). Thus, a distinction is drawn between disreputable (and false) conspiracy theories of the right and the accounts of real conspiracies uncovered by the left.
The ‘slippage from criticism of American foreign policy to wild eyed conspiracy theory’ (Fine, 2006) apparent in the discussions of ‘the Lobby’ should not occur so easily, however. Left-wing thought is marked by long tradition of opposition to racism and a standing commitment to equality and social justice, which means that its contemporary exponents should be resistant to ideas traditionally peddled by their ideological opponents. And yet, as we have seen, among critics of ‘the Lobby’, this sensitivity is often lacking. This is at least in part because their ideological position is sustained by another key feature of the conspiracy theory, namely its essential irrefutability. As noted in Chapter 2, conspiratorial explanatory logic comprises a number of interpretative devices that makes the conspiracy theory immune to conventional cannons of proof and testing (e.g. by transforming disconfirming evidence into proof of the conspiracy). These devices protect the conspiracy theorist not just from challenges related to evidence or proof, but also from those made on moral grounds. Moral criticism, just like disconfirming evidence, can be attributed to the conspiracy and thus rendered invalid. This is an essential feature of the writing on ‘the Lobby’. The very reason why the idea of a Jewish plot should be resisted – namely antisemitism – is perceived as a distraction, a label deliberately manufactured, manipulated and used by ‘the Lobby’ for silencing opponents, de-legitimising criticism of Israel and controlling public opinion. Thus, antisemitism ceases to be a danger to be avoided by all those discussing the sensitive issue of Jewish influence in politics, and is perceived, instead, exclusively as a weapon of Zionist self-legitimisation. This stance towards antisemitism goes hand in hand with the so-called Holocaust industry argument, popularised by Norman Finkelstein (2000). According to Finkelstein and his followers, the Holocaust has been exploited and instrumentalised by powerful Jews to justify Israel’s aggression against the Palestinians and build a taboo around antisemitism (see Laqueur, 2006, Cesarani, 2004). The effect of this stance on antisemitism and the Holocaust, but also its underlying psychological function, is to undermine any sympathy for Jews that would normally foster resistance to antisemitic motifs. In other words, by persuading their audience, and, importantly, also themselves, that the moral standpoint from which their arguments can be criticised is consciously imposed by ‘the Lobby’ – and therefore an essential part of its sinister method – writers can pre-empt, destabilise and render unfounded any criticism of their ideological position. This places ‘the Lobby’ theory of America’s foreign policy beyond moral reproach, removes the taboo surrounding antisemitism, reinforces the believers’ conviction in the absolute truth of their views and inoculates them from any awareness of where the boundaries lie between acceptable and unacceptable opinion. The belief that everything, including the definition of what is acceptable, is manipulated by the sinister lobby not only shields the anti-Zionist worldview from the effects of disconfirming evidence, but also makes it vulnerable to the malign influence of motifs and stereotypes rooted in the conspiracy tradition.This is brilliant analysis, describing how the Left uses the additional conspiracy theory that Jews are defining antisemitism to discredit critics as a way to make modern antisemitism palatable - and immune to criticism itself!
Expose Israeli Apartheid:Targeted Sanctions [against Israel]Apartheid Free Zones in your community "as spaces free of racism, sexism, discrimination"Corporate Complicity (pressure on companies with branches in Israel)Racial and Indigenous Justice: Support Indigenous-led and Black-led struggles for racial justice...Environmental and climate justiceWomen’s struggles: "justice in Palestine is a feminist issue"Ethical City Councils: "Promote an intersectional motion in your local council..."Faith Communities & Tourism: "respect the Palestinian call for ethical tourism/pilgrimage."Cultural Boycott of IsraelAcademic Boycott of IsraelStudent Activism: Organize intersectional campaigns...Sports Boycott: Join the global campaign to boycott Puma...LGBTQI+ Rights: "Unmask and counter Israel’s agenda of pinkwashing..."Donate to BDS: BDS needs support from people of conscience everywhere...
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PROTOCOLS: EXPOSING MODERN ANTISEMITISM
If you want real peace, don't insist on a divided Jerusalem, @USAmbIsrael
The Apartheid charge, the Abraham Accords and the "right side of history"
With Palestinians, there is no need to exaggerate: they really support murdering random Jews
Great news for Yom HaShoah! There are no antisemites!