JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

12/08/08 01:04 PM

Anti-Semitism is on the rise for the same reasons that it was on the rise in Nazi-Germany.  Jews remain isolated and they form few alliances.  This makes them vulnerable.  They do not provide specific answers to specific charges.  The holocaust revisionists provide a good example.  They rely on official media and state propaganda, not realizing the power of word of mouth.  Many have ignored major criminals like Henry Kissinger and George Soros, who have caused untold suffering in the world.  Above all, Zionist fanaticism is host to an enumerable number of crimes and it has come to characterize Jews as ruthless and arrogant fanatics.  Zionism is to Judaism as Mormonism is to Christianity.

12/08/08 01:27 PM

By blaming Jews for anti-semitism, Mr. Hanks has revealed himself as a sufferer of that disease.

12/08/08 01:30 PM

Yes John, blame the victim.

12/08/08 03:41 PM

There is no common-sense reason for 100,000 Jews to be living in Germany, the nation which led to the near-destruction of European Jewry from 1933 to 1945.  It was no more than wishful thinking that Jews could go back to Germany and create a viable Jewish community amongst a people who hate and despise them so much
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The Jews should have learned their lessons after 1945.  The German people of today are just as anti-semitic as they ever were and ever will be.  Yes, Jews have been returning to Germany, and despite some anti-semitic actions, they have begun to forge a semblance of Jewish life there.  However, when the going gets a little bit rough, the ugly demon of anti-semitism raises its head and shows us that the Germans may have changed their skins but they have not changed their hearts.  Once again we are seeing the German population venting their hatred and blaming the Jews for all their troubles. 

It is my belief that the only thing the Germans care about is what the Holocaust did to the character of the German people, and how it made them look in the eyes of the world:  The historical German hatred of the Jews culminated in the industrialization of mass murder, and, like a virulent disease, it dehumanized a large segment of the German populace to a pack of wolves, swarming across Europe and nearly eliminating the Jewish presence on the European continent.  The Germans fear to be shown in the same light today But the signs of potential anti-semitism are all there.  Germans are more than just uncomfortable with the resurgence of Jewish life in Germany.  .  Jews in religious garb are attacked in the streets.  Synagogues are defaced.  Holocaust memorials are damaged.  A recent article in JTA stated that the German government is proud that there were no synagogue burnings in the past year.  Is that something to be proud of?  For now, instead of burning the synagogues, they just deface them with anti-semitic symbols.  These scenes take us back to the 1930s.  As long as the economy is bad, German bigots will whip up fury and they will ignite the fires of anti-semitism throughout the German people.  As long as the world economy continues to struggle, Germany will be at the spearhead o anti-semitism.  And it behooves the Jews to do whatever they can to protect themselves and their communal property.  Jews in the 1930s failed to recognize the sickness in the German character.  They did not think the Germans were capable of harming them to any great degree.  I hope that the German Jews of today, will have the common sense to wake up, smell the evil, and be prepared to leave before they get swept up.

12/08/08 06:24 PM

As an academic, I have been privy to increasing signs of anti-Semitism (usually of a relatively “genteel” rather than eliminationist variety), as well as troublingly unbalanced comments about Israeli policies and, sometimes, the existence of Israel as a Jewish state. My head is not in the sand, and I think the post-WWII taboo on expressions of anti-Jewish sentiment in polite society has largely run its course.

But if we are contemplating likely victims of economic and perhaps political turmoil on the European continent, I think the likely victims are far more likely to be Muslims than Jews (except, perhaps, with respect to violent outbreaks among Muslims themselves). While Jews and Muslims will have our differences around matters of Middle East politics, I hope Jews will be in the forefront of European movements resisting any racial or ethnic manifestations of prejudice, discrimination, dehumanization, and victimization, and find common cause with sensible leaders of the Muslim communities of Europe.

12/10/08 10:09 AM

I agree with Weisbard that anti-Arab and Islamophobia is far more widespread than anti-semitism. If the last decade has proved anything, then it is that the more paranoid a religious group becomes, the more dangerous it becomes. Perhaps both Jews and Muslims should try to stand back from their immediate defensive rhetoric for a change and examine the reasons why there is growing resentment.