ADL identifies 4.2 million anti-Semitic tweets from 3 million accounts last year

I do question the choice of Israel though. I get the emotional reasons why, but… oof. Early on, there WZO did scout out alternatives. Too bad nothing stuck.

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Fuck homelands. What a terrible concept. Some Palestinian family gets displaced so some Israeli folks can build a settlement? Even the fact they’re called settlements… that ain’t no frontier!

I don’t think Israel should have a right to exist and Palestine doesn’t. Israel seems to be driven by racism, xenophobia. It’s disgraceful.

And don’t give me some line about me being antisemitic. I’m Jewish.

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Well, on some sense they do, depending on the meaning of “they”. The creation of the Israeli state was the Allied “solution” to the question of what to do with displaced Jews; whether or not it was the best or all possible solutions, the establishment and the Holocaust are so tightly linked that it is hard not to interpret some of the more extreme criticism (such as call for the State not to have existed, or assertions that “Zionism=racism”) as operationally equivalent to a desire that the Jews of the period should have simply have been discarded, and therefore are fundamentally anti-Semitic.

Now, as a diasporic Jew I likewise fail to see the operational benefits of a “homeland”, I hate that the current Israeli government has forced people like me as a non-Israeli into even having opinions about the country, the crazed obsession of the religious right with my people scares the pants off me, and I think that the Israeli government can be criticized without that criticism being anti-Semitic, and in fact should be because Netanyahu is dangerous idiot.

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Netanyahu is no more an idiot than trump. They’re both masters at wagging the dog, both adept at pushing their extremely right wing agendas. Both are thieves. trump is a blowhard asshole, but that seems to be in line with his masterly distraction of the world’s attention from all the terrible things being done in the background.

They’re both dangerous, both hideous, but unfortunately neither is an idiot. I really wish they were.

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The usual explanation for homophobia/heterosexism is that it’s a subset of the enforcement of patriarchy. Not everything is about class.

OTOH, you can find plenty of work by queer and feminist writers exploring the relationship between patriarchy and capitalism. I haven’t read enough of it to say much about it, though.

Explaining the rise and fall of social conservatism is tricky, but I suspect that there’s a fair bit of economic influence there; stock market vs hemline correlations etc. The correlation between social liberalism and wealth is far from absolute; excessive inequality can cancel it (e.g. Saudi Arabia).

I’m less interested in the individual psychology and more in the structural and historical forces that create and maintain systems of injustice.

I think that there has been too much focus on individual psychological factors (prejudice) and not enough on global structural factors (power). I associate this one-sided approach with liberalism, and I see it as entirely ineffective. Diversity training will not solve our problems.

Yup, you have to start at the roots.

For African American history, that means roughly Sungbo’s Eredo and the Revolt of the Zanj, then through the Mali empire, Transatlantic slavery, the Haitian Revolution, the Jamaican Uprising, the US Civil War, the Betrayal of Reconstruction, the return of the Klan, the destruction of Black Wall Street…and then you get to the more modern stuff, and the number of hyperlinks here is already getting ridiculous. See the BLM thread for the rest.

For antisemitism…

The diaspora is fundamental, so you have to start at least as far back as the Jewish Revolt and Masada. Then through the medieval expulsions, Isabella’s Inquisition, Tsarist pogroms, Dreyfuss, the Protocols and White Russian propaganda and then to the rise of fascism.

Fascist antisemitism of the interwar period was fairly closely linked to economics, though. The horror of WWI and the suffering of the Depression shocked both left and right into a radical critique of the war and the capital behind it. But while the radical left responded with opposition to capitalism, the fascist right deflected the blame into antisemitism.

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Do you apply this idea to all nation states which include such an idea or is this a double standard?

“Discarded” gets to the heart of the matter and this goes back far beyond the Holocaust. There’s enough history of this going back very far and even now (social media posts about “Hitler didn’t finish the job” and so on) that it isn’t a matter of interpretation.

You may also recall @jlw posting this one a while back

How do we “interpret” the desire for Judenfrei environments in 2018 differently than in 1948?

That can’t be pinned on the current government as these controversies go back to the first organized efforts to return to our homeland in the 19th century.

I’ve never disagreed but let’s be clear about the difference between actual criticism (as per my previous comments) and emotional response, rage or baseless hate. Really how often does any of this “criticism” address any actual government polices or actions outside of land use? Also I might be strange but I kind of expect critics to have a minimum understanding of the topics they address.

As an example of quality criticism take a look at Operation Opera

This fits well with the basic Clausewitz concept of war being an extension of politics and the article goes into the Begin Doctrine, it’s plusses and minuses and how this specific operation though an operational success may be also understood as having counterproductive results. Also interesting that it sets the legal precedent for pre-emotive strikes in current military law.

Compare this as criticism with what is in the ADL report, the Op-Ed in the press that poses as reporting or even what’s in this very thread.

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Our diaspora goes far beyond Europe. As does anti-semitism

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Further back to at least Manetho. And don’t forget bans on intermarriage, forced conversations, yellow patches & special hats, the Council of Toledo, bans on citizenship, the Fez pogrom, the 1391 Spanish pogrom, Pope Gregory IX fallout, blood libel, black death persecutions, Jewish segregation into ghettos, Martin Luther, Pope Paul IV, Pope Clement VIII’s expulsions, King Louis XIII’s expulsions, Khmelnytsky Uprisings…

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How does pre-Revolt Jewish history influence antisemitism?

There’s nearly limitless detail to dig into, to be sure. However, there do seem to be commonalities between some aspects of the Jewish experience and those of other religious/ethnic minorities. Empires use and abuse minorities in predictable patterns.

Like say, Palestinians.

Oh, the awful ironies.

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Don’t read more than what I said, barring a few nitpicks from my own experience I agree with you on all points, while also pointing out that it’s really far more complicated than you present, but I digress…

As for the study, a quick search isn’t turning it up, but there’s various avenues for further investigation cited in this article.

Because Jews have been persecuted since the time of Christ.
Hitler didn’t invent that, he just used it to his own advantage.

I certainly think this is certainly part of the issue. But Im still meditating on it.

The Revolt began in 66 CE or thereabouts. It was “the time of Christ”, pretty much.

AFAIAA, pre-Revolt Roman treatment of Jews was not notably better or worse than their treatment of any of the other people they conquered.

The diaspora was initially a result of the Roman suppression of the revolt, not the consequence of some irrational Roman antisemitic bias. Jerusalem was smashed because it rebelled against Rome, not because it was Jewish.

Given that I’ve been talking about classical and medieval history, I thought my understanding of that point was obvious.

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Nope… Nobody should have a homeland that displaces others. Nobody gets a birthright.

I was actually thinking of Armenians when I wrote that.

But yeah, there is wider application of these patterns. Kurds, Tamils, Tutsi; empire and ethnicity is rarely a happy mix.

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This just floated past in my feed:

History doesnt begin with Rome. Nor was Rome particularly interested in killing us off entirely or eliminating our faith. Nor the Assyrian Greeks, nor the Babylonians (1) nor the Persians. I’ll also go as far as nor Saladin.

And yet, each of those empires subjugated, exiled, mocked or otherwise reduced our self determination, etc.

  1. C.F. Psalm 137 regarding forced exile and mocking of our religion which followed the destruction of the first Temple. The last time I mentioned Ps 137 here a regular member accused me specifically of being a baby killer. Blood libel never gets old!

On if I’m a bastard for not not groveling or if Hertzl was right? Personally I dont see a difference between the two.

Perhaps you are forgetting the exiles and diasporas which pre-dated Rome?

So again, selective application/double standard or are you willing to extend that to most of Europe, all of North Africa, most of North and South America and wide swaths of the Asian continent?

Also how far back do you set that threshold? In the specific case of Israel does the archeological evidence that we’ve been there over 2,500 years not “count”? Or perhaps because another group displaced us after that their newer claim is better? How exactly does it work pray tell?

OTOH if you have a double standard, why not just come out and say so clearly? Plenty of others here are willing to own their double standards, you can too!

To be fair, its not like self-determination was in fashion in those days. The purported elimination of the Canaanites didnt really consider their self-determination much. Me personally Im not sure Joshua really did commit genocide, and that might not have been literally trumpets which brought down Jericho’s walls. But lets not blame the ancients for anti-semitism when really they were just doing what everyone did.

As for Rome, well thats a great subject. Yeah, my reading of Josephus suggests the problem wasnt Rome’s intolerance but Israel not knowing when they were beat. In some respect there is a lesson here for the Gazans. Not that “Flavius” Josephus is an entirely reliable source. That story about taking lots in the cave with the other fanatics suggests he was a totally slippery character (I would have done the same if I had the smarts). But the main point is that there wasn’t one Jewish revolt but three. In the case of revolt number 3, the Roman’s appeared to lose two complete legions. Impressive!!!

But you can hardly be surprised that they decided to totally fuck up the guys who wouldnt lie down. What amazes me is that they didnt take it personally - and they left the sizable Jewish populations in Italy and Greek Asia Minor alone. Otherwise well I guess we wouldnt be having this conversation!

Anyhoo, I was just saying that you are right on the bastard thing. Nobody likes pushy Israelis. When Jews stand up and demand their rights accompanied by the potential use of arms, they experience serious and unreasonable push back.

I meditate on it because I suspect there is something else there in the back of my mind about this. Consider the case where you have say, heavily armed African Americans who start to demand their rights and do it without apology. This development is not going to be welcomed and is not going to be considered attractive. We as humans are tribal. It is always threatening when what is perceived as another tribe is heavily armed and not conciliatory. Its naturally threatening. The other thing, is that demanding ones rights is not really consistent with negotiating, where sometimes both sides have valid points. Let me continue thinking about this. What’s in my head is not coherent.

Finally, with regard to “deserving” a homeland - I dont agree. “Homelands” are not “deserved”. Same as inheritances are not “deserved” - its an orthogonal concept. However you/we have one now and I do not agree with violently moving people. Its done - regardless of right or wrong - and I see no moral way to undo it, were that even to be desirable. Blessings upon Israel, may he/she live in peace with her neighbors.

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True, for many in the west there can never be enough Jewish blood spilled. But honestly I think its not just about pushy Israelis. See also the recent kerfuffle about the Women’s March and Farrakhan. Theres plenty who dont like it in western society when we stand up for ourselves. As before, its a problem when we dont “know our place”.

Have you read much about Marcus Garvey? His story is really compelling to me, that here is this contemporary of Hertzl saying the same kind of things and making effort to prepare for repatriation by developing a professional class and so on and so on.

In light of recent news I sometimes finding myself wondering if Marcus Garvey was right after all. But then I soon return to the idealism I was raised on that somehow in the US, there really is a something for everyone. All of us who dont know our place can have our fair share.

Oseh shalom bimromav
Hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu
V’al kol Yisrael
V’imru, v’imru amen.