# No, the Left is not anti-Semitic (Good grief!) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 3, 2015, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847 "2015-08-03T03:16:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 17
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/321 "2015-08-08T16:08:42Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Well, darn, there I was, all ready to spout some bullshit about how long ago it all was, but your pre-emptive strike cut me off! Got me that time, **Al**! Curses, foiled again! > > But maybe next time, wait till I actually do it? That would be nice. Luc, nice reference to “pre-emptive strike” but we’re talking 1948 not 1967. You’ll notice after both WWI and WWII vastly, vastly more dramatic changes in the maps than what happened in 1948. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/322 "2015-08-08T16:22:23Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > French isn’t an ethnicity. In fact, any distinction based on ethnicity is strictly forbidden here. Even mentioning ethnicity in a database, for instance, is forbidden. > > “French” is a nationality, a citizenship. Same with “German”. “German state” and “French state” means something very different from “Jewish state”. I believe you’re disingeneous, here, because I don’t think you’re unaware of the difference. > > Besides, you’re saying that “Jewish” in that sense, isn’t a religion. So, can you tell me on what basis it is defined? For instance, regarding the right to immigrate to Israel, how do you think it’s determined whether you’re Jewish? > > Let me help you : > > You might think you’re ethnically Jewish, but if you happen to be Christian or Muslim, though luck! No Jewish state for you. I don’t know where your cite is from but it’s not an accurate depiction of who Israel classifies as a Jew for the purposes of immigrating to Israel, getting Israeli citizenship and having “Nationality: Jew” stamped on their national ID cards. > [@](#): > > “The rights of a Jew under this Law and the rights of an oleh under the Nationality Law, 5712-1952\*\*\*, as well as the rights of an oleh under any other enactment, **are also vested in a child and a grandchild of a Jew, the spouse of a Jew, the spouse of a child of a Jew and the spouse of a grandchild of a Jew, except for a person who has been a Jew and has voluntarily changed his/her religion.** ”[3] This was from the Jewish ancestry Amendment of 1970 to the Law of Return. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law\_of\_Return](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Return) I think the bolded part at the end may clear up the confusion as to why Israel takes in huge numbers of Russian Christians who are of Jewish ancestry. The Israelis only seem to say “fuck off, you’re not a Jew” if you were raised a Jew but “voluntarily changed” your religion. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/323 "2015-08-08T16:23:13Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > According to Israeli law anyone who has at least one Jewish grandparent is Jew. The idea behind the law was to make sure to protect anyone who would have been killed by Hitler as a Jew. I have always heard that Jewishness is strictly matrilineal. If that has changed, it is a good thing. But yes, 75 years ago I’d be off to the camps. > [@](#): > > Didn’t you say you’re an atheist? Atheist with an open mind, Roman Catholic by birth and inclination (I loves me my ceremonies and some Fundamentalist Christians inspire in me a need to burn a heretic now and then 😉 ), Evangelical Lutheran in official practice because they are some of the hippies in American organized Christianity and remind me where Vatican Two was guiding the RCC before it got hijacked by the old farts. It’s complicated and depends on the day of the week. :o ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/324 "2015-08-08T16:40:41Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > The legal distinction between the two groups is all it takes. It makes the latter Real Israelis and the former The Others, inviting discrimination. Yes, it’s a slippery slope argument, but those are not always invalid. Some slopes are easier to slip down than others, and by creating that distinction Israel has sprayed the slope with grease. > > Humans have always been tribal, but that does not make it a permanently sustainable position. Keep your grandmother’s recipes alive, but the world is changing and tribalism, us vs them, has no place in it. To quote another Jewish philosopher who really is a darling of the American Left, “Your old road is rapidly aging. Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend your hand, for the times they are a-changin’.” It’s hardly that slippery. Israel doesn’t even pretend to give equal funding to the Jewish and Arab schools, until about 10 years when the Israeli Supreme Court stepped in, 70% of the land was off-limits to non-Jews, has rampant employment discrimination and to the best of my knowledge is the only western country in the World that still has de facto anti-miscegenation laws. It’s pretty sad when a Muslim boy and a Jewish girl in Tehran who want to get married can, but a Muslim boy and a Jewish girl in Tel Aviv can’t. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/325 "2015-08-08T16:44:24Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > I have always heard that Jewishness is strictly matrilineal. If that has changed, it is a good thing. You’re confusing Jewish tradition with Israeli law. This is not meant as an insult to Israel, but they’ve always been more concerned with the Nuremberg racial codes than the halakhic laws in regards to “who is a Jew” because part of their reason for existence(in their mind) was to make sure anyone Hitler would have killed could have had a place to flee too. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/326 "2015-08-08T17:00:22Z")
Makes sense. Thanks for the update. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/327 "2015-08-08T17:14:08Z")
As I have said before, my mom didn’t know her father was Jewish until about ten years after he died! He had told me long before after I told an offensive joke that I didn’t understand (I was five). Atheism runs in my family and my grandfather was another who used the figleaf of non-practicing Lutheranism to get along, but he was in the “rag trade” and had a German last name that could go either way, but is usually Jewish. Not statements, but clues if you are looking for clues. Shortly after she found out she was watching a show about the Holocaust with new eyes and told my father that maybe we shouldn’t talk about her Jewishness in case that happened again. His response was, “Don’t worry. They’d have known about it before you did.” Fatalism also runs in the family. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/328 "2015-08-08T17:16:20Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > It’s hardly that slippery. Israel doesn’t even pretend to give equal funding to the Jewish and Arab schools, until about 10 years when the Israeli Supreme Court stepped in, 70% of the land was off-limits to non-Jews, has rampant employment discrimination and to the best of my knowledge is the only western country in the World that still has de facto anti-miscegenation laws. > > It’s pretty sad when a Muslim boy and a Jewish girl in Tehran who want to get married can, but a Muslim boy and a Jewish girl in Tel Aviv can’t. Technically speaking, they can get married abroad and the Israelis government has to accept their marriage. That’s because there’s no secular marriage system of any kind, which I’ll be the first to agree is a majorly fucked-up situation. It’s why my wife and I got hitched in New York, despite the fact that we’re both Jewish. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/329 "2015-08-08T17:19:54Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > It’s pretty sad when a Muslim boy and a Jewish girl in Tehran who want to get married can, but a Muslim boy and a Jewish girl in Tel Aviv can’t. Muslims and Christians can’t legally get married in Israel too, though. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/330 "2015-08-08T17:32:36Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > French isn’t an ethnicity. In fact, any distinction based on ethnicity is strictly forbidden here. Even mentioning ethnicity in a database, for instance, is forbidden. [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=18554157&postcount=169](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=18554157&postcount=169) Please tell me what Kobal2 means by “real French” then. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/331 "2015-08-08T17:33:55Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > The legal distinction between the two groups is all it takes. Again, cite an Israeli law that negatively discriminates against Israeli Arabs. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/332 "2015-08-08T17:47:29Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Technically speaking, they can get married abroad and the Israelis government has to accept their marriage. That’s because there’s no secular marriage system of any kind, which I’ll be the first to agree is a majorly fucked-up situation. It’s why my wife and I got hitched in New York, despite the fact that we’re both Jewish. > [@](#): > > **Captain Amazing** > Muslims and Christians can’t legally get married in Israel too, though. You’re both correct but it’s not because Israel has no civil marriage and only recognizes marriage recognized by the different religious groups(I think, and correct me if I’m wrong, they don’t recognize marriages performed by Reform or Conservative Rabbis). If that were the case Muslim boys and Jewish girls wouldn’t have a problem getting married in Tel Aviv. Islam allows interfaith marriage, though with some sexist restrictions. Muslim men are allowed to marry women who aren’t Muslim so long as they are members of other Abrahamic religions that preceded Islam. Muslim women, not so much.That’s why my father and mother were able to get married in Tehran and why his family, who were hardly progressives didn’t disown him for marrying her. That’s why Yasser Arafat and King Hussein were able to marry Christian women without anyone batting an eye(though I should in all fairness admit that Muslim tradition or no, such a marriage to a Jewish woman would obviously not have been possible). In fact, under Ottoman rule, that happened, there were instances of interfaith marriages performed that were recognized by the government. In Israel by contrast, interfaith marriages do not seem to be legal unless performed outside of Israel, usually Cyprus, despite Islam allowing interfaith marriages. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/333 "2015-08-08T17:48:58Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Again, cite an Israeli law that negatively discriminates against Israeli Arabs. I’ve been agreeing with you for the most part about ethnicity vs nationality vs religion for Jews and Israelis, but I do think that separate is inherently unequal. If all Arab Israelis are fine with their different status, then that’s great, but if some are not, than I think I sympathize with them. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/334 "2015-08-08T18:17:15Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I’ve been agreeing with you for the most part about ethnicity vs nationality vs religion for Jews and Israelis, but I do think that separate is inherently unequal. If all Arab Israelis are fine with their different status, then that’s great, but if some are not, than I think I sympathize with them. As I said, “negatively discriminates”. If an Arab Israeli wants to volunteer for the military service instead of getting drafted like a Jewish Israeli, he (or she) can do that and the IDF will joyfully take him in. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/335 "2015-08-08T18:21:07Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > As I said, “negatively discriminates”. If an Arab Israeli wants to volunteer for the military service instead of getting drafted like a Jewish Israeli, he (or she) can do that and the IDF will joyfully take him in. I don’t think that addresses my point, which is that any different treatment, positive or negative or neutral, is inherently unequal, and therefore bad, in my opinion. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/336 "2015-08-08T18:26:52Z")
But the point is, it isn’t a part of the legal structure, and that is definitive. Look at America, as soon as we passed laws forbidding racial discrimination, it totally disappeared! ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/337 "2015-08-08T18:42:14Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > I don’t see how an American can complain about right of conquest, seeingf as your whole country was founded that way. > > (And don’t start spouting some bullshit about how that was all a long time ago. So was 1948). I’m not going to defend what my people did to the Indian nations. There are Yanks who would insist that it was “good” because it was good for them, but that’s amoral. The USA did eventually incorporate the Indians as citizens of the USA as well as nationals of their own nations, by Constitutional Amendment. And we treat Chicanos as citizens, at least in theory. Legally the status of “non-white” Americans has been settled (for now) with the USA no longer demanding “Caucasian” racial identity to be a citizen (absent a white supremacist resurgence). Blacks are still fighting for respect, but\* legally\* they are citizens. Now, Israel’s situation is very different. I think the big problem is a certain vagueness about what actually happened to Judea and Samaria. Have they _been_ conquered? Are they _being_ conquered? Are they being settled in anticipation of future conquest? Is this question settled by past wars or unsettled in anticipation of future wars? Is there a two-state solution, or is the objective still a single Zionist state? If Israel wants Judea and Samaria, fine. You did conquer it. Let’s try and write that treaty, and repatriate the Palestinians, with generous compensation. If Israel wants to leave the Palestinians there in a two-state solution, fine. Let’s try and work out that treaty. But the reality seems to be that there is no treaty the Israelis will really keep, on the premise they can always go and conquer more. That does sound very like my Yankee forebears. In my opinion, those guys were dirtbags; and some of them, some of the time, certainly talked like genocidists. Understandably, a lot of us here the USA look at Zionism today and see dirtbags and potential genocidists, because we see a version of our ancestors in you. Elements of the right wing–the parts that think that the Injuns were bestial savages to be taken advantage of, and that we “brought civilization to the wilderness”–don’t care. They adore our ancestors. Those of us who call a spade a spade and are ashamed of what was done to the Osage, the Cherokee, and the rest, are indeed the “cultural left.” And so we get told that the Left are “antisemitic.” When really, we’re just hostile to rapacious expansionism, rule by terror, and the denial of human rights. Seriously, though, I think you probably should do what Poland did after WWII. Dictate a treaty to the PA as the victor who can dictate terms, and repatriate as many Palestinians as you can out of the country. Get the USA to pay them for their lost property if you can’t do it yourselves. But failing that, there will be endless anger and uprising. Is that what you really want? (Probably. There’s a game theory argument here I’ve been thinking about wherein some Zionists feel safer with a hostile Palestinian population in striking distance. But that will be another thread.) ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/338 "2015-08-08T18:46:25Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > French isn’t an ethnicity. In fact, any distinction based on ethnicity is strictly forbidden here. Even mentioning ethnicity in a database, for instance, is forbidden. > > “French” is a nationality, a citizenship. Same with “German”. “German state” and “French state” means something very different from “Jewish state”. I believe you’re disingeneous, here, because I don’t think you’re unaware of the difference. Thank you! It’s so weird to me that someone would claim that French and German are “ethnicities.” I admit I let it slide at first instead of immediately correcting Terr. But, that’s…not how France has ever _worked._ Like…does Terr even know anything about those countries? ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/339 "2015-08-08T18:57:26Z")
> [@marshmallow](#): > > … you see liberals who will one moment viciously attack fundamentalist Christianity but then rush to defend fundamentalist Muslims when they’re doing worse things… What? ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2015, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/340 "2015-08-08T18:58:31Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > In Israel by contrast, interfaith marriages do not seem to be legal unless performed outside of Israel, usually Cyprus, despite Islam allowing interfaith marriages. It’s that way in Lebanon, too (or was relatively recently, anyway). There’s no civil marriage system, so mixed couples go to Cyprus. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847.md?page=16) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847.md?page=18)