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Friday, February 13, 2009

'Good' and 'bad' anti-Semites

Pajamas Media translates a German article by Malte Lehming that originally appeared in the Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel in which Lehming decries the double standard between condemning Muslim and Christian anti-Semitism. No, he's not trying to defend Catholic Bishop Richard Williamson. He's wondering why the harsh standards now being visited on Williamson are not being visited on Muslims.
Muslims are in fact not taken entirely seriously in the West. The anti-Semitism of Muslims is regarded as a kind of folklore, for which on account of cultural backwardness mitigating circumstances should apply. It is an ideological import from Europe grafted onto the teachings of Mohammed, something artificial and not organic. As a consequence, even in Germany anti-Semitic slogans of the most grotesque sort could be shouted at anti-Israeli demonstrations during the Gaza war — slogans like “Jews out!” and “All Jews must die!” If native Germans had shouted the same slogans, the DA’s office would have started an investigation long ago.

But anyone who employs such double standards is either ignorant or a racist. There is extensive research on anti-Semitism in the Arab and Muslim world. One knows, for instance, the shameful story of the Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, who was received by Hitler in 1941 and supervised the Muslim-SS divisions from Berlin. And various speeches by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad come to mind. (For instance, his speech of February 11, 2006: “[A]s far as several aggressive European governments are concerned…, it is permissible to harm the honor of the divine prophets, but it is a crime to ask questions about the myth of the Holocaust. … On the basis of this myth, the pillaging Zionist regime has managed, for 60 years, to extort all Western governments. … They are lying when they claim they have freedom. They are hostages in the hands of the Zionists.”)
But the key passage is this one towards the end of the article:
All of this is well-known and documented. But what member of the Middle East quartet is bothered nowadays by the dissertation that Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president and co-founder of Fatah, completed in Moscow in 1982 ? Its title: “The Secret Ties between the Nazis and the Zionist Movement Leadership.” The claim that the Holocaust is simply used by Israel as a pretext remains one of the most important themes of contemporary Islamic anti-Semitism. This is why even dealing with the Holocaust is regarded as betrayal of the Palestinian cause. What German tourist has not received a grateful pat on the back in Cairo, Amman, or Damascus on account of the Nazis’ genocidal “Jewish policy”?
Why no one outside of Israel (and almost no one in Israel) cares that 'moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen is as much of a Holocaust denier as Richard Williamson is one of the great mysteries of 21st century diplomacy. Yes, the same man who is a 'good' terrorist is also a 'good' anti-Semite. Why doesn't the world care? Is it expediency - someone has to remain standing to fight against the Jewish state? Is it that Williamson was foolish enough enough to say in the open what socially acceptable Muslims like Abu Mazen keep within their own circles? I don't have an answer. But perhaps we should ask the chattering classes why they don't take Muslim words more seriously.

3 Comments:

At 4:31 PM, Blogger Unknown said...

Very valid points... though really nothing new here, it's just the continuation of a familiar pattern.

 
At 4:44 PM, Blogger NormanF said...

Carl - if you've read Andrew Bostom's riveting history of Islamic anti-Semitism, please take the time if you haven't. It shows that anti-Semitism flows organically and naturally out of Islamic theology. What Western anti-Semitism actually did was to reinforce a hatred of Jews in the Muslim World that was already long present.

The difference between Western and Islamic anti-Semitism is the former is now viewed as an aberration though little more than a century ago it was perfectly acceptable to be an anti-Semite. The Holocaust changed that in the West. Islam on the other hand has never confronted and repudiated its anti-Semitic history of bigotry, contempt and genocide.

If you're in doubt about where I stand Carl - don't. There is no real distinction to be made between various types of anti-Semites and in any case the what they all have in mind for the Jews bear them identical consequences. What is important is that the Jews deal with Jew-hatred from a position of reality rather than continue to engage in denial to the effect that it really doesn't exist.

There are still those in the world who want to see the Jews dead and that's the bottom line.

 
At 4:55 PM, Blogger sheik yer'mami said...

You have no idea how Islamic attitudes are infecting young Euro-dhimmies, who probably never met a Jew, but now have to go to school or uni with Turks, Lebanese, Moroccans and what not.

These people are obsessed with Jew-hatred and they are equally obsessed to spread it around. It is tragic that Anti-Semitism is inflicted on young Eurabians in this way.

A complete and utter disaster.

 

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