Evelyn Gordon: Jews Feel Safer in Europe’s Conservative East Than Its Liberal West
Everyone except anti-Semites understands that Israeli actions don’t justify attacks on Jewish citizens of other countries, but rampant anti-Israel sentiment often makes anti-Semites believe that society will tolerate such attacks as long as they can be portrayed as “anti-Israel.” And this belief is hardly unfounded. To take just one example, consider the notorious case of a German synagogue firebombed in 2014. Both the trial court and the appeals court ruled that this wasn’t an anti-Semitic crime, but merely an overly zealous form of political opposition to Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza. Consequently, the perpetrators received mere suspended sentences.Liberal Jews are still turning a blind eye to anti-Semitism on the left
In short, hostility toward Israel in the surrounding society encourages anti-Semitic acts among people who already hold anti-Semitic beliefs. And since hostility toward Israel emanates primarily from the left these days, it’s no surprise that such hostility is higher in liberal Western Europe than conservative Eastern Europe. Thus, both of the main contributors to anti-Semitism in Europe today—Islamic anti-Semitism and left-wing hostility toward Israel—are more prevalent in the liberal West than in the allegedly “fascist, anti-Semitic” countries of Eastern Europe.
None of the above implies that right-wing anti-Semitism isn’t a real problem; it obviously is. Nor does it imply that Eastern Europe’s right-wing governments have a clean bill of health on anti-Semitism; they have been responsible for some undeniably problematic acts and statements. It certainly doesn’t guarantee that nationalist parties won’t turn against the Jews tomorrow, as a prominent European rabbi warned last week. The British Labour Party’s swift transformation into an anti-Semitic cesspool shows just how quickly Jew-friendly attitudes can disappear. And it doesn’t mean America’s situation is necessarily analogous; the U.S. is too different from Europe for easy parallels to be drawn.
Yet to pretend, as many American Jews do, that right-wing anti-Semitism is the only kind we need to worry about flies in the face of reality, at least as it has played out in Europe. The European reality similarly belies the claim that rightist governments are, by definition, bad for the Jews. And given that reality, Netanyahu’s close relations with conservative European governments could actually help combat anti-Semitism in those countries by bolstering their positive attitudes toward Israel.
The world is a great deal more complex than the simple “left-wing good, right-wing bad” equation so prevalent among American Jews today. And recognizing that complexity might help liberal Jews be more understanding of their conservative brethren, both at home and in Israel.
Consider Peter Beinart, the one-time New Republic editor. “No, BDS Is Not Anti-Semitic, And Neither Is Ilhan Omar” was the headline for a piece he wrote in the Jewish Daily Forward recently.Firecracker thrown at Israeli reporter in Berlin
BDS, of course, is short for boycott, divest, sanction—a movement that singles out the Jewish state for such punishment. This, despite the horrors that are routine around the world, from China to Venezuela.
Beinart writes that the “BDS movement doesn’t officially oppose the existence of a Jewish state, but some of its most prominent advocates do.” So leaders of the movement want to destroy Israel, but the movement isn’t tainted by them? Where else would this be an acceptable line of argument? If white nationalists marched for gay rights, which liberal would disregard their outsize hate and focus on the one point of agreement? It’s laughable.
As for Ilhan Omar, she’s the newly elected Minnesota congresswoman who in January will take Ellison’s seat in the House of Representatives. In 2012, she tweeted: “Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel.”
The notion that Jews have the world under a spell is as classic an anti-Semitic trope as one can find, yet somehow Omar finds a Jewish defender in a Jewish publication.
Then there’s Linda Sarsour. Last week the Women’s March leader called out “folks who masquerade as progressives but always choose their allegiance to Israel over their commitment to democracy.” This was another old Jew-hating trope: namely, that Jews secretly harbor dual loyalty to Israel. And this is just the latest in a long litany of anti-Semitic comments she’s made.
What’s even more odious is that the Sarsours of the country are called on to help heal the hatred they sow. Last year, Sarsour sat on a panel at the New School about fighting anti-Semitism. And just last week Al Sharpton, who has a history of saying heinous things about Jews in the 1990s, was on MSNBC to discuss — you guessed it — fighting anti-Semitism.
It’s like a bad joke. The guy who has referred to Jews as “interlopers” and “diamond merchants” is now the one claiming to fight Jew-hatred. Has he ever apologized? Jews forgive public figures like Ellison, Omar, Sarsour and Sharpton. But they would never encourage other targeted groups to do the same.
Fighting the normalization of anti-Semitism has to begin with Jews themselves speaking out. Now would be a good time to start.
A reporter for the Israeli public broadcaster KAN was attacked in Berlin on Sunday evening while filming a report on the street.
Antonia Yamin, the Europe correspondent for KAN, was speaking to the camera in Hebrew in the Neukölln neighborhood of Berlin when a rowdy group of four teenagers passed by. At first they attempted to disrupt her broadcast, shouting and blocking the camera. Yamin paused and asked the group to move along. The video then shows her running after one of the men who threw a firecracker at her and her cameraman. The firecracker is then seen burning on the sidewalk.
“The truth is I had a very nice day at work today,” Yamin tweeted on Sunday evening with a video of the incident. “But between one interview and another I had to stop to report about the Brexit deal. As you can see on the video you can’t report in Hebrew in Neukölln, Berlin without being disturbed and without people throwing firecrackers at you.”
The Neukölln neighborhood is known for having a high concentration of immigrants.
Yamin told The Jerusalem Post on Monday that she didn’t report the incident to the police.
“I had an interview afterwards and I am filming the whole week,” she wrote via a direct message. “I also don’t think that it will bring me anywhere to sit for a few hours at the police station.”
Yamin said she won’t let the incident change anything about how she will report in the future.
“Fifteen minutes after the incident I was already filming my next story,” she said, “about an Israeli drag queen who performs together with a Syrian belly dancer (a wonderful story about friendship).”
האמת שבסך הכל עבר עלי יום נחמד בעבודה. היו לי כמה מרואיינים מדהימים שאני כבר ממש משתוקקת שתראו בסדרת כתבות שתעלה בקרוב. בין מרואיין אחד לשני הייתי צריכה לעצור לרגע כדי לדווח על הסכם הברקזיט המתגבש. אבל מתברר שבשכונת נויקלן בברלין אי אפשר לדווח בעברית מבלי שיפריעו ויזרקו עליך נפץ pic.twitter.com/1TKJqora5b
— Antonia Yamin (@antonia_yamin) November 25, 2018