And to make things easier for MCso as to avoid having to painfully slog through some obscure blogger’s ravings in search of paydirt - cite us any political officeholder or syndicated pundit in the U.S., any remotedly influential figure or any member of the SDMB who has ever said that criticism of Israel is to be equated with anti-Semitism.
Yes, but there is also a fair amount of institualizonlized racism within the Isareli government and soceity as a whole, examples are (these pre-date the intifada)being a studies of Israeli textbooks and how they stereotyped Arabs as lazy, lying theiving, aggressive or a poll of Israeli Jewish opinion(from 1971)which found that 84% would be bothered if a friend or relative married an Arab , 74% would object if their children befriended an Arab, 90% wished that there were fewer Arabs in Israel and 90% agreed with the propostion that “Arabs only understand force”. Alsoyou have offical discrimination like the unrecognized Arab villages and the fact that Arabs are not allowed to be members of quasi-governmental organisations like the Jewish Agency (which owns the majority of the land in Israel). Racism undeniably exists in large doses on both sides.
Your argument is a strawman, I did not say “Syndicate coulmnists in the US say…” (for a start I’m not even from the US) I also believe I cited two examples Masada2000 (which I refuse to link to)and Ariel Sharon:
http://www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1430_A_1041583,00.html
binationalism is a philosphy whoch predates the foundation of Israel and was one of the three main strands of Zionism. basically binationalists believe that Jews and Arbs should share the land in a single stae as equals.
The final point was in direct response to something that DSeid posted, it certainly seems to me that he was asscoaiting the description of the Palestinains as “oppressed” with antisemtism.
I was giving you a wide field from which to choose examples to back your claim that criticism of Israel is widely equated with anti-Semitism. The fact that you do not provide a single example from these mainstream (well, in the case of the SDMB, not entirely mainstream :D) groups speaks volumes about the legitimacy of your claim. Feel free also to quote non-U.S. elected leaders, syndicated pundits etc.
It has already been pointed out that Masada2000 is an obscure fringe group. As for your article re Ariel Sharon, the line you quote “Sharon believes…” is a reporter’s interpretation of what he/she thinks Sharon means. The actual quotes from Sharon tell a different story: "“What we are facing in Europe is an anti-Semitism that has always existed and it really is not a new phenomenon,” Sharon said. “This anti-Semitism exists and what pushes it is a 'collective anti-Semitism’ that incorporates Israel into this equation.”
What DSeid actually said was this:
How you jump from that to the idea that he is equating all descriptions of Palestinians as oppressed with anti-Semitism is beyond me. As you yourself recognize, there are anti-Semites who make use of anti-Israel invective to advance their hatred in a socially acceptable manner.
I think that if you had a better understanding of what a strawman argument is, you wouldn’t be so quick to use it.
A few comments.
First off MC, please do not misunderstand me. I have not said that characterizing the Palestinians as “oppressed” is antisemitic - I have said that some antisemites use defending those who they claim are oppressed as coverage for stating things that in any other context would be clearly understood as racist or antisemitic. And they get a pass on it more often than not. And maybe they should, but I still get concerned.
You see, I agree that the charge should be made very sparingly. Again, even if I suspect it I will rarly make the charge. You are right, an unreasonable charge against Israel can be made for a benign reason and a reasonable one for evil intent. It merely raises the flags to be suspicious. Sharon has abused the charge on several occassions, IMHO.
Finally, without doubt Israel has its share of idiots, hateful and otherwise, powerless and powerful alike. Finding a few of them does not prove much. (Would it be fair to judge America by the likes of those who have joined our boards in recent days?) Jewish is not a race, and Zionism is not racism. There are Arab Jews, Black Jews, Indian Jews, even Chinese Jews. But it is not a perfect country. Some Israelis do have racist views about Arabs. But they are fairly marginalized (at least in public) just like the stormtrooper types are marginalized in American life today. Arab citizens do not always have equal access to educational and other resources. To use an ill-chosen term, “pork” will go to those with powerful connections and that usually is not the Arabs in Israel. Minority Jews are also relatively unlikely to get as big of a share of the pie of the tax dollars in public works as those better connected. And the ultra-religious/secular collision is merely on hold until some resolution to the ongoing conflict with the Palestinians is secured. Many of these sorts of problems Israel shares with most other countries that have some diversity to deal with. Many are the same sort of failings that occur in the US to this day. They are not excusable but they are not villiany. When Israel is (not just criticised but) villified for being no worse than many/most other nations and better than many that are getting a pass, say like most of the Arab nations, then one has to say “Hmmmm.”
One final thing I forgot to mention in my first post, I agree with edwino thataccusing Israel of trying to systematically kill the Palestinians is a pretty good indicator of antisemitism. It may not suprise you to know that this is a view spearheaded by Nazi revisionist Michael Hoffman.
MC
The correct distinction to make would be:
What are the rights of an Arab in Israel? What is the standard of life of an Arab in Israel?
versus
What are the rights of a Jew in the Arab World? What is the standard of life of a Jew in the Arab World?
Note that I am not talking about the occupied territories. I am talking about Israel proper. The de facto state of war in the occupied territories explains some of the oppression going on there; I will not try to justify the rest of it because I agree it is a miserable situation.
I think you will find that Israel does pretty well in the above comparison. In fact, I think you will find Israel does pretty well in comparison with many European countries. There is racism in Israel; there are definite injustices and the Arabs do, in a large part, form an underclass. There is a lot of hate and the only way I can partially justify it is by saying much of it must be reactive to the situation. But Israeli Arabs are enfranchised, they are part of government, they have freedoms of speech, movement, press, and religion. That is far better off than the tiny fraction of Jews still remaining in Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and elsewhere.
Jackmanii, I did not say that the view that the view all criticsm of Israel is antisemtism is a mainstream one, howver it is one that has been expressed many times, mainly by the most extreme fringes of the Israeli relgious right (though the view is not unheard of among pro-Netanyahu Likudniks). The fact that neither Dseid or edwino have heard this before says to me that they have never associated themselves with this element.
DSeid- Israel is picked out partly due to antismetism, I certainly believe that this is the case in places like Russia and Greece where antisemitic views are still pretty acceptable and certainly Ariel Sharon is no Kim Jong-il, but your also have to look at the ideology for other reasons. For example (and just for example as this is not menat tobe a far-reaching comparison) apartheid South Africa’s black population received simlair or in some ways better treatment from the appartheid regime than some other governments treated some other groups (or their population in general), however they were criticized in a way that no other state was, due to their underlying ideology. Simlairly Israel is singled out for what is seen (rightly or wrongly) as it’s underlying colonialist (or for some people for what is seen as it’s racist) ideology, which make it extremely unpopular in places which were formerly subjected to colonialist regimes like sub-Saharan Africa (certainly not helped by Israel’s former alliance with the appartheid regime) (which was partly responsible for the Durban conference simply becoming an anti-Israel conference).