Abusing the concept of antisemitism
JVL Introduction
We reported few days ago on Ben & Jerry’s decision not to allow its ice cream to be sold in the occupied Palestinian territories here.
In the an op-ed in Haaretz, Prof Joshua Shanes looks at some Israeli and Jewish American responses to this decision, responses he describes as “outsized, unhinged and dishonest outrage”.
Not only are Ben & Jerry told they are “morally wrong”, committing a “discriminatory act” or running a “dangerous campaign”, accusations that can be assessed on their merits.
More extraordinary is the utter failure to be able to distinguish between Israel and the occupied territories, the immediate accusations of antisemitism, and even worse, analogies with Nazism.
Thus an image of a tub of Ben & Jerry’s icecream with the word Judenrein stamped on it in the image above…
Antisemitism has been redefined not as hatred of or discrimination against Jews as Jews, but anything that might weaken Jewish hegemony in Israel.
The effect of this is to associate Jews irrevocably with Israel’s illegal actions. It can only endanger Jews worldwide.
This article was originally published by Ha'aretz on Wed 21 Jul 2021. Read the original here.
Ben & Jerry's Aren't Nazis and Their Settlement Boycott Isn't Antisemitic
‘A dangerous, Nazi-like act of economic terrorism that dehumanizes the Jewish people’: Why Ben & Jerry’s tokenistic decision to pull out of West Bank settlements has triggered such outsized, unhinged and dishonest outrage
Loading article text…
Vexatious claims of anti semitism are hate crimes and should be prosecuted
As someone with a partly Quaker background I can perhaps speak without the accusation that I may have the right or wrong slant on this – As with so much I read here I am glad to have such issues raised – May quiet minds and gentle caring hearts be heard.
Groundless allegations of antisemitism are a hate crime and should be prosecuted. We live in an age of lies where people construct their own reality to fit their own prejudices. Only the ice-cold reality of facts will wake them up. I’m afraid the older I get, the less pity I have for people who cultivated their own evil.
A point made in the JVL intro needs to be stressed more often. Redefining antisemitism as anything that might weaken Jewish hegemony in Israel associates Jews irrevocably with Israel’s illegal actions and “can only endanger Jews worldwide.”
The article itself makes a lucid case against the madness of condemning Ben & Jerry’s as Nazis, Palestinian terrorists and/or antisemites. It’s interesting that the author also criticises BDS supporters for celebrating the ice-cream maker’s action as if it were directed at the entire state of Israel, not just the OPT – joining mainstream and rightwing Zionists in “erasing the Green Line, insisting that there is no difference between Tel Aviv and Kfar Tapuach.”
I can see that from the viewpoint of a liberal Israeli, it seems like a good argument to say – don’t make idiots of yourselves attacking B&J, they’re only acting against the illegal settlements, our Jewish state is not threatened.
But the author cannot avoid demonstrating how little difference there is, in fact, between illegal occupation and ’48 Israel. In fact Joshua Shanes put it rather neatly: “The main difference is that in the West Bank, individual Jews can often just steal Palestinian land – or inflict violence on Palestinian bodies – without consequence. In Israel, only the state can do that.”
Trust B & J will stand firm. Israel’s ridiculous over reaction a sure sign of insecurity and guilt.
I think that the enraged critics of Ben & Jerry’s know perfectly well – deep down – that they are spouting nonsense. These are people who have so completely gaslighted themselves that the vaguest hint that they might be wrong threatens them at an existential level.
There is a madness at work here. A madness which can, rather sadly, be seen also in the deranged accusation that JVL is full of outright communists. Any conversation with this sot of madness is frankly just not worth the effort.
Naomi’s “irrevocable (association of all Jews with the apartheid Israeli state – RC)” is too pessimistic and too fatalistic. We can, do, and must REVOKE that association at all times and in all ways – as she does, vigorously and effectively in her video of last year. Ben and Jerry ice-cream goes to the top of my shopping list, as soon as the store opens, and I’ll make the point. (Unilever as a (giant) whole needs (sorry!) more leverage to send a clear signal via selection of its products.
Let’s all have THAT ice-cream breakfast – and that goes especially for those of us called Ben (speak up Jerries everywhere, too! and EAT UP with us!)