The unholy alliance: Hindutva and Zionism
JVL Introduction
Amrit Wilson draws troublesome parallels between the Hindu nationalist movement Hindutva and Zionism.
The links she identifies are of two kinds: ideological and historical parallels on the one hand, and increasingly close political and military collaboration on the other.
The attempt to demonise all criticism of the Modi regime by progressives in the diaspora as Hinduphobic has echoes of Israel’s use of antisemitism in similar fashion.
So too is the creation of an imaginary past in which Muslim contributions to India’s history are eliminated, with the Hindutva claims that all true Indians are Aryans who lived in India from time immemorial.
But what weighs most today is the consolidation of ethno-nationalist sympathies with material cooperation in which India today is Israel’s largest purchaser of weapons, accounting for nearly 50 percent of Israel’s arms sales.
This article was originally published by The Cradle on Wed 29 Jun 2022. Read the original here.
The unholy alliance: Hindutva and Zionism
The Hindu-nationalist ideology promoted by PM Narendra Modi shares a remarkable similarity to Zionism, the Jewish-nationalist movement that oppresses Palestinians
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I’m pleased that Amrit mentions Modi’s Gujerati nakba. But the ‘Aryan’ nonsense needs serious analysis and opposition, in another, long-standing and deep-seated respect: whatever the ‘Dravidians’ and their descendants are, they are not ‘Aryan’. The attempted imposition of Hindi as the main – sometimes the only – official language has met with vigorous resistance in the South – not only, but to the best of my knowledge, especially, in Tamilnadu. The widespread complexion-racism, easily visible in the ‘lonely hearts ‘columns of English language newspapers impacts heavily on southern Indians, and if some of them give in to this form of racism, it only emphasises the pernicious character of ‘Aryan’ dominance.
Needless to say, Starmer leaped eagerly to support Modi’s flouting of international law and agreements in persecuting Kashmiris and their rights in destroying article 370 of the Indian constitution. Why? The most plausible explanation is rabid Zionism and its Döppelganger – Islamophobia. Oborne’s book, THE FATE OF ABRAHAM, well reviewed on this website provides a most useful guide to this other foul political and quasi-racist phenomenon.
There is plenty to criticise in Modi’s rule without adding fanciful descriptors at every opportunity. The reader doesn’t need the writer’s superlative adjectives, adverbs and verbs such as notorious, so-called, massive, fascist, claimed etc, if the narrative has merit based on facts, but on close inspection it’s more fiction. My favourite is the R & R for Israeli soldiers.