From the archives: Churchill’s “Good and Bad Jews” and the BBC…

Here is some simplified historical context for the article.

In The Great War (or the First World War, as it became known subsequently), Russia was on the side of the ‘Allies’, fighting the Central Powers (Germany, Austro-Hungary, the Ottomans and Bulgaria).

In October 1917, the Bolsheviks led a Revolution overthrowing the old Tsarist regime.

They had promised peace, and in March 1918 Russia signed the Brest-Litovsk accord with Germany.

The Allied powers were already concerned that Germany could gain control of Russia, or at least of Russian ports, full of war equipment shipped by the allies. They planned and executed a military intervention with hundreds of thousands of troops.

Some, most notable of all Winston Churchill, were vociferously against the Bolshevik idea of world revolution and communism, and this seemed a good opportunity to stop it at birth..

The British sent one of the largest contingents, totalling over 59,000.

Once the Great War ended in November 1918, the first reason for deploying troops to Russia had no validity. By the time of this article in 1920 Britain was withdrawing troops (a process completed a few months later).

Churchill was outspoken against this as he wished to overthrow the Bolsheviks. But as Britain had decided to withdraw, he wished to boost the status and support for the White (anti ‘Red’) Army, led by General Deniken, who the article calls ‘the Protector of the Jews’.

In reality, Denikin’s White Army was a major perpetrator of violent anti-Jewish atrocities and pogroms.

The Whites were finally fully defeated later in 1920.

This forgotten, and disgraceful, imperialist intervention failed in its objectives, but it changed the course of history in many ways.

piffle
“Are there many Jews who think like you?” wondered Balfour. “I believe I speak the minds of millions of Jews,” replied Weizmann. “It is curious,” Balfour remarked, “the Jews I meet are quite different.” “Mr Balfour,” said Weizmann, “you meet the wrong kind of Jews.”
Firstly, things being what they were in 1906, Weizmann hadn’t the foggiest idea what ‘millions of Jews’ were thinking. That didn’t stop him from claiming they were ardent Zionists
Secondly, by ‘wrong kind of Jews’ he meant Jews who were not interested in Zionism – and that was the majority of Jews in Manchester – by implication the lumenproletariat whom he openly despised, the illiterati, tradesmen, malodorous and uncouth: in Jabotinsky’s infamous ‘typology’, Yids rather than Hebrews. He was a Hebrew, of course. Multitudinous Yids whose minds Weizmann could read (like the British Chief Rabbi who also claims to be able to ‘know the minds of’ pro-Palestinian protestors better than they know themselves’) were beyond the Pale [no apology] to be avoided at all costs – and Weizmann qua first President of Israel found to his horror that post-Independence Israel was positively swarming with Yids.
As for Churchill, jaw-droppingly prolific Man of Letters [aided and abetted by numerous go-fers rootling through the Library at Chartwell] had an opinion on, well, everything… except perhaps Gallipoli and the Zion Muleteers, the Bengal famine – Churchill’s Secret War: The British Empire and the Ravaging of India during World War II. New York: Basic Books. 10 August 2010. ISBN 978-0465002016. Churchill did not greet the Arab delegation who had travelled to london in august 1921 for clarification of the balfour declaration… and did not bid them farewell when they left in september 1922. They did not go empty handed, Churchill published the first White Paper on Palestine in June 1922. No consultation. Appallingly bad manners. And consequentially bad diplomacy – the repercussions still haunt Palestine today.

Many thanks to Mark Etkind for a tiimely reminder of this infamous Churchill text.

The absurdity of the question of “Israel’s right to exist”, repeated ad nauseam by news anchors and trotted out by the insufferabe Nick Robinson, has been brilliantly summarised by Jonathan Cook (see JVL 12/10/2026 “No State has a ‘Right to Exist’ “.

A telling example not usually mentioned is that of Germany’s prewar Weimar Republic. The constitution of the Weimar Republic was never abolished by the Nazi régime. Formally it continued to exist until after the German defeat in 1945. So did the “only state of the German people” have the right to exist in 1940?
Not only are such questions meaningless historically, but they have no plausible interpretation in international law either then or now.

Nick Robinson might have known this had he spent enough time studying for his mediocre PPE degree (see article in Cherwell). Instead he spent his time as a student at Oxford rising through the ranks of the Young Conservatives eventually to become National Vice-Chairman (1985-1987). So my advice to Polanski or anyone else interviewed by him would be to be ready to hit back hard at his ignorance. That is the only possible method of turning the tables on an interviewer who asks questions containing false premises and whose asinine method of arguing is to keep repeating the question… According to Robinson’s avowed beliefs he should be expecting it:

“To argue with somebody is to accept the likelihood of offence” – he pontificates – “a ‘safe space’ which provides cotton wool from the real world of debate is inimical to free speech”.

Polanski did not start off very well in this interview because he was much too polite. When Robinson asked “Mr Polanski, why are you avoiding the question?” Polanski should have replied. “The question you asked is ill-informed and meaningless and here is the reason…. “.

[cut to our limit of 300 words – admin]

This article and the comments are very much appreciated. A couple of comments stand out for me in an interesting way – “like the British Chief Rabbi who also claims to be able to ‘know the minds of’ pro-Palestinian protestors better than they know themselves”- such a need for projection! I have come across this extraordinary arrogance and well it would appear such people have a visceral need that any push back could only come from monsters. Another comment I find particularly relevant is the reference to to “go-fers rootling though the library” which is basically what AI does so well – the cherry pickings often being delivered in exactly the right register to seamlessly drop in.