Jeffrey Goldberg blasts Human Rights Watch's Ken Roth
A few days ago, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, Kenneth Roth, tweeted the following statement: “Germans rally against anti-Semitism that flared in Europe in response to Israel’s conduct in Gaza war. Merkel joins.” Roth provided a link to a New York Times article about the rally, which took place in Berlin.
Roth’s framing of this issue is very odd and obtuse. Anti-Semitism in Europe did not flare “in response to Israel’s conduct in Gaza,” or anywhere else. Anti-Semitic violence and invective are not responses to events in the Middle East, just as anti-Semitism does not erupt “in response” to the policies of banks owned by Jews, or in response to editorial positions taken by The New York Times. This is for the simple reason that Jews do not cause anti-Semitism.
It is a universal and immutable rule that the targets of prejudice are not the cause of prejudice.
Just as Jews (or Jewish organizations, or the Jewish state) do not cause anti-Semitism to flare, or intensify, or even to exist, neither do black people cause racism, nor gay people homophobia, nor Muslims Islamophobia. Like all prejudices, anti-Semitism is not a rational response to observable events; it is a manifestation of irrational hatred. Its proponents justify their anti-Semitism by pointing to the (putatively offensive or repulsive) behavior of their targets, but this does not mean that major figures in the world of human-rights advocacy should accept these pathetic excuses as legitimate.
A question: If a mosque in Europe or in the U.S. were to be attacked (God forbid) by Islamophobic arsonists, would Ken Roth describe such an attack as a manifestation of “anti-Muslim hatred that flared in response to the conduct of Muslim groups in the Middle East?”
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I don’t know what motivated Ken Roth to blame the Jewish state for the violent acts of anti-Semites. I do hope that he reconsiders his position on the root cause of anti-Jewish prejudice.Read the whole thing. Goldberg is spot-on.
Labels: Angela Merkel, anti-Semitism, Germany, Human Rights Watch, Jeffrey Goldberg, Kenneth Roth
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:28 AM
2 Comments:
Hmm... Goldberg? One of the Obama/Clinton/Khmer Rouge Kerry Posse's go-to mouthpieces? It would be easier to stomach such a Democrat Party flattering post, if the whole story of these Democrats were posted. Look at the horrible tweet from Jeffrey Goldberg, with no apology, no note from the Jewish world. Gotta be brave to counter the Democrats, because this is how it is, if you do.
ATLANTIC REPORTER COMPARES PALIN TO BURQA-WEARING TALIBAN SUPPORTER
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2014/09/19/atlantic-reporter-compares-palin-to-taliban
yeah Goldberg is an outrage, he has no credibility. Plus this blabber about the trumped up blather that is Islamophobia. People critical of the Jihad or sharia law are labeled Islamophobes, and often enough by anti-Semitic Leftists and anti-Semitic Islamists.
Goldberg doesn't go far enough, blaming anti-Semitism on Israel/Jews is anti-Semitic. The Nazis blamed the Jews for their anti-Semitism, so do Muslim extremists. Goldberg doesn't notice nor can he be bothered to mention this. So Roth is anti-Semitic himself, as is anybody who blames the Jews for anti-Semitism.
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