There have been 800 arrests in Israel of anti war protesters. There have been anti Israel attack demonstrations all over the world. So the Nazis may be goofy but they have a legitimate complaint. Many peaceful demonstrations have been held.
And before you know it, six million Jews are dead!
Hmm. Too soon?
Down with Israel! Down with Palestine! Stop the human race’s illegal occupation of the West Bank! I am only half kidding!
Is it OK for me to be pro-French but anti-France? I don’t think Frenchmen should be rounded up and put into concentration camps, mind you, I just don’t think they should be allowed to have their own country to live in.
Excerpt:
Anti-Semite worthy of a good beating by the tough-as-nails Rune were he alive today…
Ironic, really, because Gandhi was shot to death for being too inclusive for the tastes of Hindu hardliners (and for allowing the Muslims to “steal” Pakistan, the formation of which he strongly opposed anyway; he reflected on his post-independence marginalization with the words, “everybody is eager to garland my picture, but nobody wants to listen to my advice.”
His anti-Zionism beliefs were based on his disgust over Partition- he thought Hindus and Muslims and everyone else should learn to live together, instead of segregating themselves.
Y’know, Red, just because Gandhi didn’t want to exterminate all the Jews doesn’t mean that there aren’t people who really do want to exterminate all the Jews.
Can we agree that anyone who advocates killing all the Jews is an anti-Semite? Or is that too hasty?
Well, if the person advocates killing everybody, anti-Semite is a bit restrictive.
Gandhi also said that European Jews should have walked willingly into the gas chambers. Fuck Gandhi.
Alessan, Please provide a cite for this .
Missed edit window …
Is the link same as in post 26 ?? I haven’t read the link yet .
It’s not stated as bluntly as Alessan claims, but the gist of it is Gandhi said the Jews should’ve stayed in Germany and tolerated the suffering, rather than strike out on their own, because the Jews that survive will have won some kind of moral victory, or something.
I guess that’s fine when a population is so vast that a mere six million deaths can be absorbed without the destruction of the culture, and when being oppressed by people who won’t resort to systemic and energetic elimination.
Bad analogy for at least two reasons. *Jewish *and *Israeli *are separate concepts (whereas France and French are obviously much more tied together), so anti-Israeli =/= anti-Jew. Also, one could be in favor of recognizing a Jewish state within the pre-1967 borders but opposed to Jewish settlement in the West Bank. Both of these are positions to take in opposition to some aspect of Israeli policy, but do not necessarily constitute anti-semitism.
In fact, I think a much stronger case can be made that America’s strong pro-Israeli stance is racist. I think Americans think of Israelis as quasi-Europeans (since for most Americans, the Holocaust (an obviously European event) is the main justification for Israel, and since most Americans know American Jews). All this talk about “we support Israel because they are like us 'cuz they have a a democracy and stuff” is a smokescreen. We like them because they are not Arabs. I don’t see Americans crying in their beer over the fragile state of Lebanon’s quasi-democracy, or over the fate of Iran’s democracy at our hands. This position is *at least *as plausible as the canard that anti-Zionism is anti-Semitic.
You may have something, but even if true, it’s not likely to change as long as “Terrorist = Arab” to the Americans, and it’s not a wholly unreasonable attitude in light of the last thirty years. I guess if North Koreans begin hijacking planes and kept at it intermittently over the next few decades, the formula would change.
http://www.sepiamutiny.com/sepia/archives/004247.html
Is a cite that contains Ghandi’s quotes on the subject. He was not in sympathy with the Nazis, but rather with the Jews, saying that they should have followed his own methods. He was not in favor of Zionism. Ghandi was mistaken in thinking that his methods would have worked with the Nazis in my opinion and that of others.
It did work in Ghandi’s case. That did not obligate Jews or anyone else to give it a try. The only reason it worked was because Ghandi’s opponents were far more British than they were Nazi. The world has stood by many times while there has been genocide and done nothing. If Nazi Germany had controlled India, Ghandi would not have been successful in his independence bid. Ghandi’s efforts and methods are laudable because he correctly identified his own opponents strengths as human beings.
As for “fuck Ghandi” for his naivete? Sorry, I don’t buy it. Six million Jews did pretty much what Ghandi would have asked them to do had he known about the Holocaust during the war. Like good citizens, most marched right into the showers and worked themselves to death at command. As painful as this is to think about, I cannot condemn them for not fighting back more often. I cannot condemn those who worked the crematoriums themselves to avoid being killed as long as possible. I cannot condemn those who rose up in the Ghetto in hopeless defiance, and being born afterwards, I cannot mourn distant cousins I never knew, or who weren’t and will never be born. Ghandi did what he set out to do, free the people of the Indian sub-continent from British rule and show people all over the world how to act in that situation, achieving freedom with so much less bloodshed. He did this despite many, many obstacles, including holding Hindu and Muslim hatreds in check. He did it consistently offering the same advice. Advice which would not have been effective for European Jews had he given it before the war, which we know because it is largely what they did.
I agree that this is a bad analogy. Jews and Israel are not co-extensive. I’ll seek protection here in North America if someone decides my Jewish ancestors require my death. I won’t fight over holy dirt. I’ll protect my friends, family and neighbors with laws and good will with nearby countries. As many Jews in American have made this decision as Jews in Israel. And as of today, Israel has decided that Arab-Israeli citizens may not form political parties on the basis of race. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090112/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_arabs_1
From here:
Gandhi was a great man, and non-violence was exactly the right strategy for his place and time, but like most idealists he tended to think that his ideology could be replicated elsewhere, without taking different cultures and different circumstances into consideration. In other words, he had a very effective hammer, so everything started to look like a nail.
It’s interesting how India and Israel, two countries founded within a year of each other, in some ways mirrored each other - in the sense that they were exact opposites. The Indians, a huge, ancient people with a history of violence, found redemption through pacifism; while the Jews, a small, ancient people with a history of non-violence, found redemption through warfare. It’s a funny world.
*The Indians, a huge, ancient people with a **history of violence ***
Alessan, will you explain the history of violence part ? I am curious .
There was no India identity prior to 20th century . It was a lot of small kingdoms held together by desire to be free from british rule in 19th and early 20th century.
The small kingdoms did battle violently once in a while, but it does not mean India was a violent nation. I think all nations/kingdoms fought violent battlles in ancient times.
Or do you mean faith based violence ??
Perhaps I took my search for symmetry a bit too far.
Still, the inhabitants of India, while no more violent than most nations, were also no less violent - they fought among themselves for millenia, as well as against the Moghuls, the Afghans, the British and others. It was by rejecting this violence that they managed to secure their freedom.