We need to decolonise our understanding of antisemitism
JVL Introduction
“If the IHRA illustrations are now considered so central to defining antisemitism,” points out Robert A.H. Cohen, “then by implication they must also define what it is to be Jewish.”
It’s a frightening thought.
It means, for example, despite all evidence to the contrary, denying the possibility that Zionism has developed in racist ways; denying the possibility that Israel is not a fully democratic state despite internal discrimination against Palestinian citizens on ethnic grounds; denying the reality of occupation.
And Cohen puts his finger on the button when he writes: “Beyond IHRA being, “what the Jewish community wants”, I’m yet to hear an argument made for it which explains exactly why it’s so good (and better than anything else) despite the fury it’s created and the shoddy formulation of the actual definition.”
We’re all been waiting for that good argument for many years now…
This article was originally published by Writing From the Edge / Rescuing the Hebrew Covenant One Blogpost At A Time on Sat 6 Mar 2021. Read the original here.
We need to decolonise our understanding of anti-Semitism
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The main problem as I see it is that to assert that all Jews support
the Israeli state when it shoots unarmed Palestinian teenage
demonstrators at the Gaza fence is to create prejudice against all Jews.
Thus the conflation of Judaism and Zionism is anti-Semitic speech.
One democratic state? If there is a bullet to be bitten (by Palestinians as well as Israelis) this is it. As Jeff Halper points out, apartheid in South Africa would never have ended without international support for the ANC. Onestatecampaign.org
Robert A. H. Cohen provides us with another thought provoking piece. I agree with the the general thrust of his article. We need to campaign against the anti Palestinian IHRA definition on anti semitism. Defending Jewish supremacism over the Palestinians in the name of fighting antisemitism is totally unacceptable. Settler colonialism has nothing to do with Jewish self determination. There is nothing honourable about seeking to liberate one oppressed group at the expense of another. It’s time to get behind the one state solution.
Ever since Starmers attacks on non Zionist Jewsand their suspension from LP I have pointed out that if criticising Israel is anti-Semitic then this means that the definition of Semitism is whatever Israel does. We have catalogue of the illegal and racist acts of The Israeli govt in the UN resolutions over decades criticising their persistent violating of international law mimicking the crimes of the Nazis and more recently even open intention of the extending the Lebensraum expansion
With this definition of What Constitutes Semitism, confirmed by the changes in the constitution of July 2018 and the open claim by cabinet ministers that Jews have superior genetic makeup, the racism of Zionism as opposed to Anti- Zionism is clearly stated for all to see.
In which case, not only is Anti- semitism a legitimate view to hold; but is obligatory on all democratic and freedom loving law abiding supporters of the UN Declaration of Human Rights and and similar idealist codes.