It’s not all about religion though. Most Kurds are Muslim, but this has not stopped their Turkish and Syrian Muslim neighbors from slaughtering them whenever they get the chance. Likewise, the Muslim neighbors of the Palestinians in Jordan have kept them locked up in refugee camps for decades as a political bargaining chip; Lebanon did the same until kicking them out.
This is going to be repeating some points from a Pit thread, but I am hoping to get discussion on the subject less specific case and more broad -
The ADL now defines any statement of “anti-Zionism” as antisemitic. You Babale have supported that position. I definitely do not. But some “anti-Zionism” gets into the range. I think. Honestly not so interested in your take here Babale but more for those who don’t agree that anti-Zionism is enough.
The Columbia University coalition of student groups loosely affiliated into what they call the Columbia Union Apartheid Divest (CUAD) is good example here. They indeed have statements as officially of official group policy positions as possible that are pretty vile, including lauding Hamas leadership and the attack on October 7, and vilification of Zionists. Individuals of the group saying Zionists should die. With a fair amount of “Oh not ‘Jews!’ … just those who support Israel!”
So vile. Yes.
And without doubt members include no small number who are Jew haters lumping antisemitic tropes and conspiracies as “not antisemitic … just against Zionism and those who support it, which happens to be all Jews that won’t endorse our beliefs.”
And some who really are vile in their beliefs, not caring that they are literally threatening a fair number of students for political beliefs and are reasonably understood as threatening Jews in general. But not Jew haters themselves.
And some who just want to be part of an edgy group and feel revolutionary and will join whatever is the extreme cause of the moment.
Is it correct to label the organization as antisemitic?
I think so. But open to argument.
All members of the group as antisemites? I don’t think so.
All who support the group as antisemites? No. Even if they are supporting a group that supports vile things.
Many individuals of the group? Yes. Easy to say when you have past history of dressing up in traditional antisemitic caricature costume, or of making other Jewish conspiracy theory trope statements. But I do not think those three Ds are enough. Enough to side eye maybe, but not enough.
So, they’ve defined anti-Zionist Jews as antisemites.
Is Ben Carson racist against black people? Or do you think that’s impossible too?
This is slicing things pretty thin. I applaud the intellectual exercise but question the practical utility.
To put it in evolutionary terms, if you hear a rustle in the tall grass, is it better to assume it’s prey or predator?
More to the point, let’s assume some proportion of a group chanting From the River to the Sea is largely doing performative virtue signaling. If a breakaway group becomes more aggressive, are you confident that the performative group will intervene to prevent violence, or are they more likely to do nothing?
Jews definitely can be antisemitic … “self hating” … but more precisely as saying things that are antisemitic, in intent or effect.
Do you think that all members of the KKK are racist? Or is that an unfair generalization?
Can you support the KKK without being a member and without being racist?
Yahya Sinwar was a fucking terrorist, and if someone thinks he was cool, that essentially tells you all you need to know about them. So let us forget about him.
Pivoting on the subject of terrorists, people like Menahem Begin were also terrorists, and he has fucking streets named after him in Israel, which perhaps makes it undiplomatic to criticize him and his ilk but that does not make it anti-semitic.
Yep, exactly. Not to mention, didn’t we have a big societal shift in understanding where we became open to the idea that sometimes unintended actions may have a racist effect, even if we have no racist intent? Why is that getting dropped as soon as the topic is Jewish people?
You may need to re-count.
Sorry, but there really is no comparison between Hamas and the Irgun.
The worst thing the Irgun did was the King David Hotel bombing, which at the end of the day did target a British command center, not civilians. Sinwar’s men went into Kibbutznik homes and a music festival and butchered civilians by hand.
No, Satmar Hasidim are not self hating Jews. They are Jews who oppose the existence of the state of Israel on religious grounds.
“They hold that Jews are commanded by God to remain in exile until the arrival of the divine Messiah, and that creating a sovereign state through human political action defies divine will.”
Moderating:
On that post, @Wesley_Clark & @DPRK and anyone else, drop the state religion bit from this thread. It is barely connected anyway to the topic. This thread doesn’t need more drift.
Wow, what about people like David Raziel killing and maiming hundreds of civilians? But I was, emphatically, not trying to make any sort of comparison, just pointing out that all these people are legitimate and necessary targets of criticism without being anti-Semitic, or anti-Palestinian or whatever the case may be.
No, but they certainly hold antisemitic positions towards secular Jews and even observant Jews who don’t follow the same exact sect as they do.
I have little confidence that any general public would intervene at any point when any mob becomes aggressive, which informs not at all on what the beliefs of those bystanders are.
The slicing thin is to me the point of the exercise: yes easy to assume that every rustle in the grass is a predator, a wolf. But nevermind the boy who calls wolf story, sometimes a rustle is just a rustle and maybe reserve the burning the field down for threats more confidently assessed?
But it’s not a question of rustles in the grass. These people are taking actions that cause real harm. Their rhetoric and celebration of violent terrorists like Sinwar directly leads to actions like this one.
Federal Hate Crime and First-Degree Murder Charges Filed Against Alleged Killer of Israeli Embassy Staff Members
And this
And this.
You are telling me that we should carefully examine these people to determine if we think that they are truly anti-semitic or if they’re just swept up in the fervor of virtue signaling and trying to one up their friends with how edgy and extreme and countercultural they are.
But whatever their internal intentions, the net result is indistinguishable. So why should I even care?
All the more reason to be cautious of large numbers of people gathering and chanting anti-social slogans. Be it “From the River to the Sea” or “Jews will not Replace Us”. It seems a short walk from the one to the other at this point.
Moderating:
Watch the blind links, either describe the story or at least let the preview box display.
They should have just said “Zionists will not replace us”!
Sorry, they’re just links to news sites - I was about to describe each one in this reply but I see you broke the links out already so that’s fine.