Anti-semitism thread: onwards from 2023

the original one was looonng

It might be good to leave behind the thread title "Is this anti-semitism?" Asking/answering that question only occupies a small sliver of the discussion there. The broader topic deserves a thread that's less ambiguous.

yep. the de facto core thread on the subject having that title isn't great. it's funny with the guardian thread tho

I find the topic of antisemitism difficult to express my full opinions about, because it always feels like they will be used against Jews. I don't want to police the way other people experience things, but there is something very frustrating to watch about people who are relatively safe and privileged in life get overly worked up about what actually may be a large threat in their life. E.g. I think the issues of campus antisemitism and left antisemitism are simultaneously real and exaggerated. The idea that Jews are somehow no longer safe on college campuses is ridiculous, and yet there are also very real aggressions happening against Jews on college campuses of the type that would probably be made an issue of if they happened to any other minority group.

I think discomfort is often confused for lack of safety, but there are also real threats to safety, and I know that these reactions come from generational trauma, and that violence can rear its head any time. There have been real synagogue shootings in recent memory. Someone really did paint a Jewish star on a Jewish bakery in my town a few days ago, and then a Jewish star was painted on a home a couple of days after, along with a pentagram and what looked like "9/11" although I'm not sure. Maybe just a mentally unstable individual. Maybe that person is harmless or maybe they are violent.

I am always hesitant to minimize antisemitism, because it is real, and because it has been taken to worse heights in living memory, and because it can become exacerbated. And at the same time I don't feel comfortable with devoting too much attention to antisemitism that doesn't disrupt most of our lives while people are being killed in airstrikes.

The discourse around Palestine is also very challenging to navigate. The place where it bleeds into antisemitism is slippery, hard to pinpoint, just like with use of the "Z-word." "Free" is hard to argue with, "From the River to the Sea" is open to different interpretations, and I think different people mean different things by it, but it has definitely historically been used at times to mean "expel the Jews from all of Palestine," and I'm sure some people at rallies mean that today. Maybe some would argue that even this meaning isn't "antisemitic" because the Jews in Israel/Palestine are all just "colonizers." I feel like antisemitism in the Muslim world is a third rail that is difficult to talk about, but it is a significant phenomenon (and I will fully admit that racism in Israel and islamophobia in Israel are serious problems). It wasn't that long ago that Protocols of the Elders of Zion was made into a tv miniseries in Egypt. The book used to be a bestseller in many Muslim countries. I don't know if that's still the case. I don't really know what to do with this information exactly - it's not as though I assume most Muslims are antisemitic or anything like that, I just think the dynamic of prejudices is a bit more complex and multilayered than it is made out to be. Certain European antisemities also seem to be almost glad to have Israel as a vessel for their antisemitism.

At the same time, I can even kind of understand why Palestinians in the territories might hate Jews, if the primary face of Jews for them is settlers and the IDF.

Jews are a very small minority in the world. We are a minority that have kind of "punched above our weight" in success and privilege, and some of us get to be white in America, and we are also a minority with a long history of persecution and relatively short modern history of persecution being at much lower levels, but still have collective memory of that long history of persecution. I don't think that contemporary discourse on race and class has really figured out how Jews fit in to the whole thing.

*overly worked up about what may not actually be a large threat in their life.

great post man alive.

I think this has been discussed already on the threads at some point but one of the things that is most challenging for me is that the conflating of Israel and Jews happens across the political spectrum and with all sorts of valences, not only among those who use it as an antisemitic brush to tar Jews. I know A LOT of Jews who cry antisemitism at any Israel criticism because they really believe it for themselves - support for Israel is foundational to *their* Jewish identities, and they struggle to imagine any sort of meaningful Jewish identity that doesn't share that pillar (or if they can conceive of it, they denigrate it). Just today I got a group text from a friend about how "antisemitic messages" were being chalked around town. He sent a picture of one: it said "Free Palestine." In this climate it is just maddening to establish any solid ground to have these discussions from, about an uptick of actual bigotry against Jews - is there one, how big is it, how concerned should I be about it.

My wife's cousins just visited over the weekend. They're pretty conventionally liberal but take Judaism seriously, or at least one of them does. I brought up the "river to the sea" chant and made the devil's advocate argument that not everyone saying it is anti-Semitic, and they bristled, likening its defense to the bad faith defense of phrases like "all lives matter." It's not inherently offensive, or even literally offensive, but when you see an "all lives matter" sticker or sign you know what it means and generally who embraces it.

Of course, Jews have been primed to detect (and ignore) anti-Semitism to varying degrees for decades, because it's always around, unprompted, sometimes more virulent than other times but never totally absent, and definitely amplified (or minimized) by the context. For example, the Yiddish cultural center in the Bronx that was tagged with "Free Palestine:"

The Sholem-Aleichem Cultural Center in the Bronx was vandalized with "Free Palestine" graffiti. A Yiddish language cultural center, it's not a Zionist-related institution by a longshot. pic.twitter.com/jTI4ZWMD4E

— portnoy (@eddyportnoy) November 2, 2023

"Free Palestine" is not itself offensive, but tagging it on a Yiddish cultural center is an example of how it can be perceived that way. Or how, reportedly, the Philly Palestine Coalition circulated a list of 15,000 restaurants to boycott because they are "owned by Zionists." Which is to say, purportedly owned by or associated with Jews.

The conflation of Judaism with Israel is always a challenge. The relationship demands nuance, and nuance is the antithesis of angry protest. As I probably posted before, ignorance of Judaism is pretty widespread in the best of circumstances, imo, and can easily be exploited or otherwise be taken advantage of in the race to raise voices.

I heard a good interview with two local Reform rabbis yesterday, about how to support a grieving congregation when everyone is hurting but no two people may be hurting the same way, or for the same reason. But both rabbis noted that something in the air feels different this time, a release of generational trauma that's affecting everyone from kids to grandparents. I think a lot of that came from the simultaneous revelation of the specific horrors of Oct. 7 with the ramping up of anti-Israel protest, even before Israel's retaliation. It was like Jews had no time to mourn or process before they were immediately, inevitably put on the defensive again. It's emotionally exhausting, and while that's not the same thing as feeling physically threatened, Jews, like a lot of minorities, understand it doesn't take much to tip things in that direction. 

Similarly:
https://x.com/ElliotKaufman6/status/1721893935247966487?s=20

(across from an Orthodox synagogue)

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F-VlZ9saAAA0zOe?format=jpg&name=900x900

Are you saying that’s antisemitic? It’s not totally coherent but I’m not sure about antisemitic.

aiui, brooklyn has a very large jewish population and that's been the case for a long time. it also is experiencing gentrification. if anything, the 'settlers' in brooklyn would be hipster goyim. so maybe the point of that slogan was striving to raise issues of intersectionality. hard to say.

re: Brooklyn, they could be talking about Europeans buying the land that would become Brooklyn from the Canarsie Indians, but being that half of NYC's Jewish population lives in Brooklyn, that may be the anti-Semitic angle?

I talked to my brother the other day, he's active at his Brooklyn synagogue, which is apparently very lefty/activist. He's part of an anti-Zionist group there and they had been planning out a big potluck. Unfortunately, the scheduled date was Oct 8 and they stirred up a lot of controversy for going ahead with it right after the Hamas attack. According to him, the synagogue has both pro- and anti-Zionists groups, and even some pro-Hamas people! Sounds like it is a very hectic and stressful time for him and everyone there. I don't have much of a point with this other than the kinds of situations he described are way outside of my own personal experience living in suburban Texas.

xp
I guess this is my "as a Canadian" day on ilx. Settler has a very clear and unmistakable meaning in the context of Canadian leftism (= everyone who isn't Indigenous, while remembering the history of the slave trade) and wouldn't normally be antisemitic. But I agree that as a statement with no author or context it's pretty stupid, and it's unhelpful as a comment on an ongoing genocide. Plus as stated, posting near a synagogue absolutely opens the door to it being perceived as antisemitic.

even some pro-Hamas people

...

I was a bit shocked and incredulous about this, but I guess he meant people who are pro-armed struggle, don't know if that really makes it any better

The sticker is in Philly, not Brooklyn. ILXors understood the reference to large numbers of Jewish immigrants living in Brooklyn.

It's associating this with a "problem."

Real brain-dead, lizard brain stuff.

xp

good post man alive. especially identify with this part

I am always hesitant to minimize antisemitism, because it is real, and because it has been taken to worse heights in living memory, and because it can become exacerbated. And at the same time I don't feel comfortable with devoting too much attention to antisemitism that doesn't disrupt most of our lives while people are being killed in airstrikes.

never want to minimize anti-semitism, but i do want jewish people (at least the privileged people in my community) to get some perspective.

I asked my brother if any of these I/P slogans or demonstrations are happening at my nephew's junior high school. My brother says he is a lot more worried about my nephew growing up African-American with a potential Trump presidency.

I don't think any of these manifestations of Jewish hatred should be accepted. And yet it's also possible to keep them in perspective.

I totally get that. But imagine the response to any other marginalized group's discomfort being "get some perspective."

xp ah sorry I didn’t click through to the tweet. It being in Philly makes it unambiguous

Yesterday my wife and 6 yr old were walking by the catholic school which was letting out on the corner near our house when a bigger kid, but still elementary aged kid, came up to them, held up a cell phone with a picture of Hitler on it and said "what do you think about him?" or something.

My wife just pushed on by but contacted the school and they quickly saw the kid on security cameras and talked to him and his parents. Surprised it got that kind of response.

Can't even imagine what the kid was going on about or thinking. It's easy to just think "dumb, confused, asshole kid, no big deal" but also probably good to stop that kind of thing at the root.

I totally get that. But imagine the response to any other marginalized group's discomfort being "get some perspective."

― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, November 7, 2023 10:56 AM bookmarkflaglink

Oh totally. I should have said that was my brother's perspective. Not that I have any claim to impose any chosen perspective on others.

Xp

A 6 year old? That's grim.

You have to wonder what led a kid to that point.

Kids can be so dumb and not really understand half the things they do or the impact/repercussions of their actions when it comes to stuff like this. In fourth or fifth grade, I gave my yearbook to a boy to sign. He passed it around to the others and they all drew swastikas and stuff implying that my dad was a naxi in it and all ove it because my dad is from Germany. I was upset. I think my mom had a meeting with the teacher. In the end though, I think those kids knew that was something bad but not really how bad. Maybe I'm being naive and they did. Kids can be idiots though and I think it's absolutely good to squash that. Sorry that happened though.

aiui, brooklyn has a very large jewish population and that's been the case for a long time. it also is experiencing gentrification. if anything, the 'settlers' in brooklyn would be hipster goyim. so maybe the point of that slogan was striving to raise issues of intersectionality. hard to say.

I'm imagining a kid who doesn't understand anything. Just knows something's supposed to be shocking or taboo and likes to fuck around. Just a kind of bullying. I don't imagine he's thinking "oh this kid is definitely half jewish" or even thinking much of anything? I don't know. I think my wife just told my daughter it was something he shouldn't be doing and she didn't ask more. I've had a lot of thoughts about how to talk about what's going on or if to talk about what's going on in general and haven't really. My wife told her a little bit, just explained there's some terrible stuff going on and it's making people very upset.

I can't imagine having to have or even think about having those conversations with a child. I am also inclined to think that the kid in question knows the guy is bad and gets a reaction from people so a kind of shock value thing but it's still terrible.

I feel like there was always one kid in school (in the 80's) who was obsessed with Nazis/Hitler/WWII. In high school, one of them was in my german class, and he called me a fag on a daily basis. He was actually Persian and I had to inform him that Hitler would have had him killed. I finally ratted him out to the teacher because his notebook was covered in swastikas.

I started reading the Gary Gulman memoir (he's a really funny comedian). A lot of it is about growing up poor, and Jewish, in Boston. Here's an excerpt of his discovery, in 2nd grade, so around age 6 or 7, of anti-Semitism, by way of his soon to be ex-best friend, Wally Mitler:

“But it was his Holocaust miniseries recap back when I was in Rand’s class that caused me the most pain. It had a permanent effect on our friendship and my self-image.

He had told me about the miniseries the day after it started airing in April 1978. We were playing catch on the side of my house. Wally was not good at baseball, but, like every other boy, he had a glove and played Little League. Playing Little League was basically compulsory in 1970s Massachusetts. He threw wrong and seldom caught the ball. He claimed he needed a new glove. No, he needed new hands.

I had been sent out of the family room and its door was shut when Holocaust premiered on NBC the night before. It was the talk of the town, especially among the town’s Jews. Our "Roots.”

I am not sure if I had even heard the word “Holocaust” before the series began to air, and I definitely knew none of the particulars. I had a fear of Hitler identical to my fear of the devil, but I’m not sure of its origin. If it was discussed around me, it was done quietly; my mother forbade the discussion of anything solemn or emotionally challenging in her presence. Wally, now an expert after having seen the program, filled me in on what happened to Jews during the Holocaust, sharing with me the unspeakable specifics. He said that Jews were burned alive in ovens and starved in camps. My people were also gassed with poison. I was horrified, hoping he would stop talking about it. But much like with his devil voice, I think he enjoyed unnerving me.

When his précis ended, I asked the unanswerable question. Why? Why did they do that to the Jews? What could we have done to deserve this? I was asking out of genuine curiosity, the same way when I was five, I had asked him what G-d looked like. But I also asked him because I knew that whatever he said would let me know what he thought about Jews. I understood, as early as kindergarten, that my people were the object of pervasive hatred.

“Why?” I asked.

Without any hesitation Wally gave me his analysis.

“The Jews were rich snobs … walking around with their noses in the air.”

He said this with certainty, like it was an indisputable fact and, what’s more disturbing, a valid explanation for Hitler’s atrocities.

There is no way Wally generated this explanation on his own. This was an idea an adult in his life must have expressed. Until that moment I’d never thought about how close Mitler is to Hitler. They’re one letter apart.
I’d bet that after watching the show he’d had the same question I just asked him. Instead of giving a historically accurate attempt at an answer, someone in his orbit must have said to him, “Well, kid, these kikes got too big for their britches and Uncle Adie had to put them in their place. Also, the numbers are exaggerated.”

Wally’s next move, and this was particularly sadistic, had been to let his favorite Hēb in on the exigency of the final solution.

No matter the provenance of his despicable “snobs” theory, once again my gut told me how I should respond and hammered me for resisting.

It was my fault. I had appeased Mitler. I should have fought him when he gave my dad the finger that time when we honked at him. And now, he’d gone too far.

I had let my dad down. Phil Gulman would fight you just for saying the word “Jew” in a less than reverent tone; surely, he would have torn the throat out of some Nazi spawn announcing that the Jews were to blame for the Holocaust.

“They were snobs.”

A good reason to dislike someone? Maybe. A defensible reason to torture and murder them? J-sus Chr-st.
I had to keep this to myself. If I shared this with anyone, they’d ask why I didn’t violently attack him. I did have an answer for that: I’m a coward. As evidenced by the fact that I couldn’t even defend the honor of my people. I said nothing and instantly hated myself. And I stayed friends with him. Like a schmuck.”

Ok so maybe some kids know a lot more by way of asshole parents but I still think that doesn't necessarily they grasp the impact of the words/actions.

Schmuck is SUCH a good word.

There are some people for whom no other word will do.

Also, having lived on the edge of Brookline for years, I wonder where in Boston he grew up and will check him out.

It looks like Peabody, I think?

I totally get that. But imagine the response to any other marginalized group's discomfort being "get some perspective."

― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, November 7, 2023 1:56 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

look, i'm a jewish person, and i understand being nervous about the potential increase of anti-semitism in society. but i got a concerned message from my friend about a pro-palestinian march in brooklyn worried about me because he heard that they were "hunting jews." that just plain is not happening.

A relative of mine goes to the private girls’ school in London where some kid painted a swastika and “kill Jews” on the wall recently. On the one hand, you know it’s just some idiot kid, maybe’s not even a serious risk, maybe just a kid confusing righteous rebellion tor something stupider. On the other hand… who knows?

xpost Yeah, I wouldn't lose any sleep over that, either. That's like that day of global jihad, or whatever bullshit was foretold a few weeks ago. Though again, it's a fine line between "hunting Jews" and "targeted for being Jewish." Let's just say I wouldn't show up to that march waving an Israeli flag, or even holding a sign with a star of David on it. Unless it was, you know, depicted being tossed in the trash, that seems to be OK. (joke, sort of)

jewish voice for peace has the star of david in its logo.

i also wouldn't wave an israeli flag at a free palestine rally, idk why that would be so controversial.

Xposts ah ok - think that's north shore maybe near Salem

xpost Yeah, it would be pretty obnoxious. I think my point was that the protest itself should not strike fear into the hearts of Jews, let alone fear of being "hunted." But that it wouldn't take much provocation to invite negative attention.

Hey, good timing, Isaac:

https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/where-does-antisemitism-come-from

Lemme know if anyone needs it copy and pasted.

You heard about Paul Kessler then? That happened in what is considered a normal suburban enclave in LA.

I don't think anyone should be assaulted for counter protesting.

i also wouldn't wave an israeli flag at a free palestine rally, idk why that would be so controversial.

― is he disgruntled adrian? (voodoo chili), Tuesday, November 7, 2023 11:46 AM (one minute ago)

Just read this story of an 65 year old counter-prostestor waving an Israeli flag at a Free Palestine demonstration in suburban LA who was involved in a physical altercation and has died as result of a fall (witness details are mixed whether he was struck, or tripped and fell to the ground on his own). The other person (a 50 year old man) involved in the altercation is cooperating with authorities but there is a burst of social media claming this incident was anti-semitic/terrorist (source: my pro-Israel friends IG shared stories).

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-11-06/man-dies-after-fight-at-protest-westlake-village-israel-hamas-war

his discovery, in 2nd grade, so around age 6 or 7, of anti-Semitism, by way of his soon to be ex-best friend, Wally Mitler

Woah, Wally Mitler?

But imagine the response to any other marginalized group's discomfort being "get some perspective."

xp to steve shasta, to be clear, i don't think the guy had it coming, obviously that's a terrible thing to happen. of course it's now going to be used as evidence that none of the hundreds of other worldwide protests were peaceful at all.

gyac, I really appreciate that.

Re: taking pain seriously, I agree that it's rarely as much as is warranted or needed, and regardless, it's not like sympathy can be quantified. But here's another story involving one of my kids that I can offer (I've probably told it before). A few years back some knucklehead scribbled racist and anti-Semitic stuff on a bathroom stall at the high school. There was the expected outrage, protests, eventually an assembly, but none of it ever addressed the specifically anti-Semitic aspect of the incident. My daughter came home that afternoon and basically asked, "what about us?" She's a strong kid, and the school responses have improved some since then, but I know she still carries that hurt with her. It's probably curdled into cynicism, which helps no one.

Re "settlers" -- there were a lot of arguments going around right after October 7 that the people who were killed were not civilians because they were "settlers." (This is not true by any international law standards btw, as they were living within the 1948 borders, not to mention that I would guess few of them were first generation in Israel). In that context, putting up a sign about "settlers" being "the problem" across from a synagogue seems like pretty clear intent to me.

of course it's now going to be used as evidence that none of the hundreds of other worldwide protests were peaceful at all.

― is he disgruntled adrian? (voodoo chili), Tuesday, November 7, 2023 12:05 PM bookmarkflaglink

I think there is a difficulty in engaging with this kind of claim if there appears to be a willful blind spot or what looks like an oblivious/disingenuous denial that some symbols of hatred are mixed with legitimate political protest. Kind of a mixed-motive situation.

Notice I didn't restrict this to pro Israel or pro Palestine.

Has this happened with other peaceful protests?

That’s not remotely the point of that post. That post is specifically calling out people who don’t know better about some of the terms and tropes they’re sharing and warning them that anger is no excuse for antisemitism. I’m…not really sure why you brought Muslims up, at all, since the topic of said post is broader than Nazi infiltration? It’s about people being aware of what they are saying and listening to Jewish people about the language they’re using because there are a lot of bad actors looking for recruits.

Antisemitism in the Muslim world is very old

is this true? my understanding is that european-style (i.e. conspiratorial, metaphysical) antisemitism is a relatively recent import to the region. I could be misinformed. I don't think dhimmi status for jews or christians is the same thing at all.

unless we're including babylonians, romans etc as antisemites which you could make an argument for but that's a much broader definition than I usually see from historians

yeah, I don’t think of Muslim anti-Semitism as being old, either. Of course, being raised Muslim I might be blind to an ugly history.

There is a lot of reference to conflict with Jews in the Qur’an, but my understanding is that that has to do with the social circumstances the Bedouins were in and actual military hostilities between them and neighboring Jewish tribes (of course in this era, uneasy relations between tribes were the norm.) I remember a Muslim scholar once observing that Muslim conflicts with people of the book tilted toward Christians for the next millennium (Crusades, etc.)

I have definitely heard Muslim acquaintances and family members express anti Semitic sentiments when venting their spleen about actions taken by the Israeli government. This has mostly taken the form of eliding Israel with Jewish people writ large. Historically, it made me try to avoid the discussions at all, but I now regret that. As a non-Jew, it was my responsibility to challenge the anti-Semitism as it arose and disambiguate the non bigoted critique of the country from participation in the sludge that is anti-Semitism.

I have definitely heard Muslim acquaintances and family members express anti Semitic sentiments when venting their spleen about actions taken by the Israeli government. This has mostly taken the form of eliding Israel with Jewish people writ large. Historically, it made me try to avoid the discussions at all, but I now regret that. As a non-Jew, it was my responsibility to challenge the anti-Semitism as it arose and disambiguate the non bigoted critique of the country from participation in the sludge that is anti-Semitism.

ugh my internet sucks so bad; sorry about the double post

my perception is that antiSemitism in the Muslim world is fairly young and springs from bad feeling about the conflict. As is the anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment I have sometimes heard from American Jews who must have thought because I was college educated and not foaming at the mouth that I couldn’t possibly be Muslim.

I regret being a nice, polite liberal and staying quiet in the latter circumstances, too.

the new testament has some awful stuff in it too - ofc it was written before christianity and judaism were as distinct so what might have been seen as intra-jewish debates take on much darker meanings later on

I'm sure there is something analogous going on with how modern islamic antisemites use quran or hadiths but I don't know enough about it xps

there is for sure a lot of that and it is gross

That's good.

A follow up question.

I was wondering when you said

It seems to me that if supporters of a cease fire would also clearly state that they disagree with Hamas' mission to eliminate the existence of Israel that would go a long way.

Respectfully, I seriously doubt this. Also, Emmanuel Macron is calling for a ceasefire now; it’s not exactly a marginal position (except in the US). Bernie finally said it too.

― horseshoe, Friday, November 10, 2023 6:22 PM bookmarkflaglink

Do you believe it doesn't matter if people are unclear about whether Israel has a right to exist?

It would certainly matter to me. Even if just knowing who I'm dealing with.

I do think it’s hard to overstate the degree to which the Holocaust is just not central to the non Western world’s understanding of the 20th century; that was European business from their perspective, and I think much of the post-colonial world is pretty focused on their own grievances with Europe. I know that people in Muslim countries have taken up European antiSemitic texts like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in the twentieth and twenty first centuries, which is depressing af. And I have definitely encountered the conspiracist idea of a Jewish cabal controlling everything among Muslims.

I've heard plenty of antisemitic stuff from muslims I worked with and went to school wikt - mostly starting with support for Palestine, "the jews" first used to mean israeli settlers but quickly broadening into the kind of conspiracy shit that took over a lot of the UK left and anti-war movements from the mid 00s onwards

a lot of them changed their minds after being challenged, learning more about history, actually meeting Jewish people, etc. ofc a few were just intractable bigots including an iranian counsellor I had as a teen who noticed my german name and tried to bond with me over hitler

Do you believe it doesn't matter if people are unclear about whether Israel has a right to exist?

It would certainly matter to me. Even if just knowing who I'm dealing with.

― felicity, Sunday, November 12, 2023 12:37 PM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think that framing of the question—that of Israel’s right to exist—doesn’t particularly resonate with me. It feels like abstract rights discourse is an odd fit for the material, violent underpinnings of all nation states. Does the United States have a right to exist? Does Pakistan? Probably not and both nations have done and continue to do a lot of harm, but they’re here, and I don’t anticipate them disappearing or being dismantled. I don’t want them to. It would complicate my own life as a US citizen, for sure, but my life isn’t worth more than the lives of the slaughtered indigenous people or enslaved Africans whom this country assaulted.

if my presence in this thread is upsetting to you or anyone else more directly affected by antiSemitism, I’m happy to bow out.

there is also a perception among people who have experienced colonialism that their suffering and atrocities they've survived are never taken as seriously as jewish suffering which is deeply unfortunate all round and is made much worse by a media that loves pitting Jews and their struggles against those other minorities in a zero sum way xps

The other day, a social media friend posted a video of someone (probably in his 30's or 40's) defending the ongoing bombings by going through all the peace deals and land negotiations officially rejected by Palestinians. (FWIW, at this point, I would say the overwhelming majority of my friends and acquaintances on social media who are Jewish are horrified by Israel's disproportionate response to Hamas, but there are five, maybe six who have maintained an uncompromising, hardline stance and this is one of them.) The information is not wrong - those were indeed failed agreements - but what's extremely unsettling to me is when his argument spends so much time in the mid-20th century, going back to the 1940's. In other words, these are events involving individuals who are likely no longer around. It's inherent to any lasting peace that you have to look forward, to understand from a practical perspective that the real hope for peace lies with newer generations who are physically removed from past conflicts and disagreements. I was already demoralized that the past month has already ensured generations of new hatred, of surviving children who will grow up angry and unforgiving for the atrocities they've now lived through whether it's the Oct. 7th massacre or the incessant bombings leveling Gaza, but a bleak future begins to look devoid of any hope if unforgiving blame can stretch back that far, at least for too many people.

It's not upsetting.

It's just from my background I can tell you that there is miles of difference from saying Israel should be held to every standard of international law and saying it shouldn't exist. I truly don't know if this is something non-Jewish people can understand.

Becuase of my background on my mother's side as well I don't know if I can be sorted into the colonizer or colonizer class. She was occupied, forcibly moved, among a population that saw many unjustified killings by the Japanese and also the Russian and Chinese communists.

Also I don't consider myself white which seems to come up a lot in the rhetoric. Thankfully few people have tried to argue this with me.

xp

To more directly answer your question (I didn’t mean to obfuscate; I just get distracted), I do not personally advocate that Israel cease to exist. I’ve always taken that as inflammatory rhetoric that Hamas and other shit-starters engage in to get a reaction. Israel has kicked ass every time conflict has become more-than-rhetorical. Again, applying a standard of legitimacy to Israel that I wouldn’t to the United States seems nakedly anti-Semitic. But I am uncomfortable with sentimental attachment to a nation; a lot of Kashmiris I know are attached to Pakistan because they view it as a “Muslim homeland” alternative to India, and…I mean, I do not want that. I both understand why European 19th century style nationalism appeared progressive and good when it arose and cast a jaundiced eye on its outcomes.

maybe I still haven’t answered your question, Felicity. I guess, I don’t think a lot about whether other advocates of Palestinian liberation want Israel to “end” because it seems like wanting to live in a world of make-believe, to erase the past 100ish years) Most activists I know who organize for a free Palestine don’t want that, for what it’s worth. If I heard someone say it, I would have follow up questions for sure. When I have heard it from a American leftists/Muslims, it has seemed like posturing.

I mean, also, it seems like what is in danger of ceasing to exist is Palestinians.

As of today, that is certainly the greater danger.

To more directly answer your question (I didn’t mean to obfuscate; I just get distracted), I do not personally advocate that Israel cease to exist.

I really appreciate this. It means everything.

I didn't think you were obfuscating either. I think these are very emotional issues and it's hard to focus and think straight when you are fearful of being accused of this or that.

And I absolutely sympathize and emphathize with the existential threat to Palestinian people. I think we have a lot in common that way.

Yes both of you otm

what does saying Israel shouldn't exist mean to you? does it imply something genocidal? or that Jews shouldn't have anywhere where they can be safe?

I'm not sure what my responsibility is here or if I should even be engaging considering my ancestors are a small part of the reason Israel became a lifeline to millions of people. I have considered that I should never talk about the subject at all. at the same time I can't ignore or punish the people of Gaza because of my inherited guilt that they have nothing to do with. I need to learn to sit with the uncertainty and contradictions and avoid my usual kneejerk reactions. I want to jump in and fix things with easy answers which is not helpful to anyone.

Well, I think there's what it could theoretically imply and what it practically implies. Theoretically, it could imply some kind of binational democratic state with equal rights for all. That sounds fine to me, but I don't live in Israel nor do I intend to, so easy for me to say. I don't think it actually has much support as an idea on either side. That, of course, doesn't mean that can never change, we just aren't very close to it now. There are also all kinds of demographic prognostications in play about who would *really* control the state if that were to happen. And of course there are fears of retribution and retaliation and civil war (in fact I think there could also be intra-Jewish and intra-Palestinian civil war).

I think it's important not to imagine that if you create a power vacuum, it will necessarily be filled with the thing you hope for. We see this play out over and over again, where we naively assume an overthrown repressive state will be replaced with democracy, and instead it is replaced by whoever is best organized, often another repressive group.

Not that this is really immediately on the table anyway. But Hamas's political goal has been to simply resist until Israel is gone, and Israel's goal under Likkud has been to erase the possibility of a Palestinian state. I do hold Israel particularly responsible for failure to do more on the settlement issue before Likkud took power. I want to scan and post a great essay from 1967 or 68 by Yeshayahu Leibowitz called "The Territories." He basically predicted that the occupation of the West Bank would be a disaster for Israel and that the fantasy of creating a "secure border" was illusory as long as Israel antagonized whoever was immediately on the other side of that border. I can't really speak to whether or where Palestinian leadership went wrong or what they were or weren't truly willing to give up under Oslo vs what they said. Negotiations are a poker game, intent is very hard to discern. But I do know that Israel has made it harder to negotiate by settling the territories, and I hold Israel responsible for that.

I think a lot of us here find ourselves in the difficult position of wanting something for Israel/Palestine that a lot of people there don't want, and that the current Israeli government is trying to destroy (and that Hamas also tried to destroy, fwiw, as their entire raison d'etre is non-capitulation to the Israeli state on anything, but I still hold Israel more responsible). I am constantly struggling with this dilemma, and as much as I would like to just wash my hands of it, I don't feel like I can, because I am too personally connected to it.

I really appreciate the reasonable and thoughtful discussion happening here. I especially appreciate the input of horseshoe, for lots of reasons but specifically for a vantage that incorporates or at least has referenced the partition of India, which may (or may not) be a model going forward. (I only say that like that because I'm not particularly well versed in its history or specific repercussions.) Conveniently, India and Pakistan have existed as they are for about as long as Israel has (a product of similar colonial meddling). Has that partition been considered a success? I'd love to know why, or why not, or how.

I would certainly not look to India and Pakistan and the partition as a model for anything!

Assuming Israel and Palestine are one day split into two, there would seem to be parallels. No?

I can only speak for myself but I think it’s a disaster. It’s fairly positional. I suppose if you’re an upper-caste Hindu nationalist, it’s working out okay for you right now, but I imagine even those people are occasionally kept up at night with anxieties about the potential for nuclear war. More specifically, Partition itself unleashed waves of brutal sectarian violence that no one has forgotten, that continue to echo in today’s sectarian violence in the subcontinent. There are plenty of Muslims (and Sikhs, and Christians, etc) in the putative Hindu sanctuary of India, and that’s been working out less and less well for them. Tolerance was enshrined in the Indian constitution in 1948, but Modi has actually removed that language and the majority of Indians seem to agree that tolerance has failed. Pakistan has repeatedly oppressed its religious minorities and also its Muslim populations (Bangladesh) and is just a terrible kleptocracy that is corrupt and terrible.

Again, my family is Kashmiri Muslims, so I have a Point of View on the whole thing. Kashmir…is going to be unrecognizable soon I think; properties considered valuable are going to be settled by Indian Hindus and Muslims will be priced out or killed. Partition was bad, and at this point I am not sure how to staunch the bleeding.

lol Tom D. much pithier and otm

Thanks for that. To be clear, I didn't mean a model as in something to be emulated, something that works, just as an example of how things might turn out. Which doesn't bode well.

Given that India and Pakistan spent nearly 20 years fighting over a glacier, it’s definitely not a model to follow. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siachen_conflict

https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/suspect-arrested-in-death-of-jewish-man-after-socal-pro-israel-and-pro-palestinian-rallies/3270208/

A man has been arrested in the death of a 69-year-old Jewish man who suffered fatal injuries at dueling pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian rallies in Thousand Oaks.

Loay Alnaji, 50, of Moorpark, was arrested Thursday at his home on suspicion of involuntary manslaughter in the death of Paul Kessler. Alnaji's bail will be set at $1 million, according to the Ventura County Sheriff's Department.

Details about what led to the arrest were not immediately available. In a news release announcing the arrest, the sheriff's department did not provide details about the altercation between Kessler and Alnaji at the Nov. 5 rally in the community northwest of Los Angeles.

It was not immediately clear whether Alanji has an attorney who can speak on his behalf. The Ventura County District Attorney's Office said a charging decision is expected by later Thursday and a case status update will be issued at that time.

Analji was identified as an employee with the Ventura County Community College District, where he was employed as a computer science professor. The district said in a statement released Thursday that Analji was placed on administrative leave.

Huh, go figure:

"Antisemitism was rising online. Then Elon Musk’s X supercharged it."

https://wapo.st/47GpBEA

was arrested Thursday at his home on suspicion of involuntary manslaughter

Seems right. You give a guy a shove, he trips, hits his head and dies, that's the charge. And yet when this happened my feed was evenly split betweeen "elderly Jew murdered by crazed Arab / woke prof" and "the Zionist lunged at the peaceful protester who had no choice but to meekly defend himself with his megaphone." And I'm sure those same people will now be evenly split between "FREE ALNAJI" and "the short prison sentence he's likely to get is a slap on the wrist that emboldens the pro-Hamas tendency on campus."

"Antisemitism was rising online. Then Elon Musk’s X supercharged it."

I'm just gonna come out and say it, and you guys are probably gonna think I'm naive, but I am pretty surprised that Musk just went straight to classic "Jews in the shadows are behind everything" antisemitism. And I still don't know whether to think something has gone organically wrong with his brain or whether from the very beginning when he talked about "free speech" he meant "the freedom to reveal the shadowy Jews behind everything is in danger from the shadowy Jews who control the means of information transmission." I can't rule that out!

The ADL is now cool with him cause he’s pro-Israel

Well I'm not the ADL

And I think Musk is about as pro-Israel as John fucking Hagee

Cool, cool

🚨ADVISORY! 🚨
Masked neo-Nazis have been spotted at the Library Mall marching toward the Capitol Building. They look like they might be Blood Tribe but unconfirmed. More info to follow as it becomes available.
Please stay safe! pic.twitter.com/bpILMsVgFd

— MadCityRWWatch (@WiRWWatch) November 18, 2023

It’s so weird for an extremely powerful billionaire to complain that Jews control things. Like he has more power than all but a handful of people in the entire world. Unless Jewish space lasers blew up his latest launch.

But he lacks the freedom to say whatever racist or anti-semitic shit he imagines, that's the rub.

must be economic insecurity

But the thing is despite being perhaps the most powerful and autonomous man in history, he doesn’t have 100% power to just control reality. So it must be the Jews.

Lots of people disagree and/or dislike like him, and objectively this can't be the case if people were acting with free will, but as we know individual agency doesn't exist it is a question of who is pulling the strings. He is now in a powerful position and is pulling the strings and yet.....thre are still people not playing ball.

This can only mean there are more strings that people somehow further up than him are pulling

dilettante and anvil fully otm about how this psychology works

I wish I could find it now but a couple of years ago I read a long article about Tolyatti, and if I recall correctly it had something about the city mafia boss and then an FSB head meeting, and one of them asking "yes but who is pulling the strings really", and that at the top there was still the perception someone further up was really controlling things (which may just have been a function of the fact their control wasn't omnipotent)

The point being I guess that leaders and powerful people aren't immune to conspiratorialism, may even be more prone to it, as controllers themselves and perceiving the world through a controller/controlled lens

only the Jews could be so devious as to get him shadowbanned on his own website

Also, I think some of this stuff is anti-semitism, but some isn't anti-semitism - but these aren't completely distinct, and some of the stuff that isn't anti-semitism today could become so tomorrow

For a lot of people with this mindset, its not necessarily Jewish people that are pulling these other strings, its the CIA, its capitalists, its Americans - and there's nothing inherently anti-semitic about that. But there's overlap and underlying thinking is the same

So its not just individuals that have no agency, the same is true for movements such as color revolutions or Maidan. Its also why Ukraine isn't real, and neither is Ecuador, Albania, or New Zealand.