On Philo-Philosemitism, by Jacques Berlinerblau

Jacques Berlinerblau, of Georgetown University, has written an important essay entitled On Philo-Semitism. Here is an extract: Jews have sensed, often correctly, that Christian philo-Semites aspire to convert them. Economic philo-Semites, they suspect, are solely and selfishly interested in material advantages. Liberal or secular anti-Semites seek to eliminate Judaism on the backstroke by eliminating religion in general. Atoning philo-Semites simply want to assuage their own guilt, and Jews do not feel that it is their responsibility to provide a shoulder to cry on. Kitschy philo-Semitism risks associating Judaism with lowbrow art of the most banal variety. Mindful of these problems, many Jews reject philo-semitism altogether. But where does that leave Jews? It leaves them perennially suspicious. It leaves them incapable of understanding one fairly obvious reading of the Book of Ruth. It leaves them incapable of making sense of the Talmudic adage that “all the righteous of the gentiles have a portion in the world to come.” In short, it leaves Jews radically alone in this world. It shows them to be as ill-disposed toward the other as anti-Semitic propaganda insists that they are. Are there any kinds of philo-Semitism that can pass muster? I would suggest two legitimate forms. The first construes philo-Semitism as anti-anti-Semitism, nothing more, nothing less. It consists of no hyperbolic fondness for Jews, but rather only a conviction that Judeophobia is morally wrong and must be combated. It may acknowledge Jews as different, but it understands that they are neither better nor worse for that difference. The second is intellectual philo-Semitism. This is the project that studies Jewish texts and interpretations of those texts. It looks at what Jewish thinkers made of these works across the span of civilization. And since the old adage about two Jews, three opinions is empirically verifiable, intellectual philo-Semitism comes to understand in the clearest possible terms what Jewish difference is and why it is so central to the survival, vitality, and uniqueness of Judaism. Such an approach invariably recognizes that Jews are not one thing. Indeed, their extreme heterogeneity makes the irrationality of liking or hating all of them easy to discern. In closing, let me note that although a considerable amount has been written about philo-Semitism, I have yet to see a researcher suggest what the deeper relevance of the discussion might be. In my view, the burgeoning debate points to a congeries of questions that scratch at some of the most sensitive wounds in the Jewish psyche. Those who probe this issue are often asking about the existential place of Jews in the world. They ponder whether gentiles are truly ready to accept Jews qua Jews. They ask if non-Jews can ever be trusted. And they wonder if the chosen people are really the inveterate pariahs that the history and historiography of anti-Semitism suggest they have always been. Jacques Berlinerblau holds separate doctorates in ancient Near Eastern Languages and Literatures and in Sociology. He is currently the director of the Program for Jewish Civilization and Visiting Professor of Jewish Civilization at Georgetown University. Published in January 2007 by the PROGRAM FOR JEWISH CIVILIZATION, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University

The 'Israel Lobby' Myth, by George P. Shultz

Israel is a free, democratic, open, and relentlessly self-analytical place. To hear harsh criticism of Israel's policies and leaders, listen to the Israelis. So questioning Israel for its actions is legitimate, but lies are something else. Throughout human history, they have been used not only to vilify but to establish a basis for cruel and inhuman acts. The catalog of lies about Jews is long and astonishingly crude, matched only by the suffering that has followed their promulgation.

Defaming the Jews by disputing their rightful place among the peoples of the world has been a long-running, well-documented, and disgraceful series of episodes across history. Again and again a time has come when legitimate criticism slips across an invisible line into what might be called the "badlands," a place where those who should be regarded as worthy adversaries in debate are turned into scapegoats, targets, all-purpose objects of blame.

In America, we protect all speech, even the most hurtful lies. We allow a virtual free-for-all by which laws are adopted, enforced, and interpreted. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent yearly to influence this process; thousands of groups vie for influence. Among these are Jewish groups that have come under renewed criticism for being part of an all-powerful "Israel lobby," most notably in a book published this week by Profs. Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer.

Jewish groups are influential. They also largely agree that the United States should support Israel. But the notion that they have anything like a uniform agenda and that U.S. policy in Israel and the Middle East is the result of this influence is simply wrong.

One choice. Some critics seem overly impressed with the way of thinking that says to itself, "Since there is a huge Arab Islamic world out there with all the oil, and it is opposed to this tiny little Israel with no natural resources, then realistically the United States has to be on the Arab side and against Israel on every issue, and since this isn't the case, there must be some underhanded Jewish plot at work." This is a conspiracy theory, pure and simple.

Another tried and true method for damaging the well-being and security of the Jewish people and the State of Israel is a dangerously false analogy. Witness former President Jimmy Carter's book Palestine—Peace Not Apartheid. Here the association on the one hand is between Israel's existentially threatened position and the measures it has taken to protect its population from terrorist attacks, driven by an ideology bent on the complete eradication of the State of Israel, and, on the other, the racist oppression of South Africa's black population by the white Boer regime.

The tendency of mind that lies behind such repulsive analogies remains and is reinforced by the former president's views, spread across his book, which come down on the anti-Israel side of every case. These false analogies stir up and lend legitimacy to more widely based movements that take the same dangerous direction.

Anyone who thinks that Jewish groups constitute a homogeneous "lobby" ought to spend some time dealing with them. For example, my decision to open a dialogue with Yasser Arafat after he met certain conditions evoked a wide spectrum of responses from the government of Israel, its political parties, and American Jewish groups who weighed in on one side or the other. Other examples in which the United States rejected Israel's view of an issue, or the view of the American Jewish community, include the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia and President Reagan's decision to go to the cemetery at Bitburg, Germany.

The United States supports Israel not because of favoritism based on political pressure or influence but because the American people, and their leaders, say that supporting Israel is politically sound and morally just.

We are a great nation. Mostly, we make good decisions. We are not babes in the woods. We act in our own interests. And when we mistakenly conclude from time to time—as we will—that an action or policy is in America's interest, we must take responsibility for the mistake.

So, on every level, those who blame Israel and its Jewish supporters for U.S. policies they do not support are wrong. They are wrong because, to begin with, support for Israel is in our best interests. They are also wrong because Israel and its supporters have the right to try to influence U.S. policy. And they are wrong because the U.S. government is responsible for the policies it adopts, not any other state or any of the myriad lobbies and groups that battle daily—sometimes with lies—to win America's support.
In U.S. News, Sept. 9, 2007
George Shultz was secretary of state from 1982 to 1989. This is excerpted from his introduction to The Deadliest Lies: The Israel Lobby and the Myth of Jewish Control by Abraham Foxman (Palgrave Macmillan).
http://www.usnews.com/articles/opinion/2007/09/07/the-israel-lobby-myth.html

Cartoonist Ben Heine portrays Avigdor Lieberman as Zionist Hitler and Zionist Pig and Ahmadinejad as Iranian President

Israeli politician Avigdor Lieberman is Zionist pig

Israeli politician Avigdor Lieberman is Zionist Hitler

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is Iranian President (neither Pig nor Hitler)

http://benjaminheine.blogspot.com/2007/09/ahmadinejad-taken-out-of-context-in.html
http://benjaminheine.blogspot.com/2007/09/law-of-return.html
http://judeosphere.blogspot.com/2007/08/media-without-conscience.html
http://modernityblog.wordpress.com/2007/08/02/is-it-art/http://www.engageonline.org.uk/blog/article.php?id=1319

Daniel Deronda, a novel by George Eliot (1876)

One of the finest books about Jewish experience was written by an Englishwoman. George Eliot studied Judaism for years before writing this novel, her last, and her hero's gradual discovery of his Jewish origins seems to reproduce her own evolving appreciation of what Jews were about. Daniel Deronda's mother despised being Jewish, and when he was born she arranged for him to be raised as the ward of a wealthy English gentleman. But Deronda is pleased as his self-discovery unfolds, and he dreams of helping Jews find their own land "such as the English have"--in effect becoming a Zionist more than two decades before Theodor Herzl founded the Zionist movement. The novel has its painful side. Deronda's Jewish path thwarts his potential romance with the lovely Gwendolen Harleth, and well-meaning Christians who want to envelop Deronda in their embrace must learn from him the art of "separateness with communication."

5 best, The Chosen, Essential works about Judaism, by Ruth R. Wisse, WSJ Opinion, 22/9/2007
George Eliot (1819-1880), English novelist
http://www.opinionjournal.com/weekend/fivebest/?id=110010640

A French sickness: anti-Sarkozy-ism has its best before it, by Claude Moniquet

On the bright side, despite a constant barrage of media criticism and attacks, President Sarkozy’s approval rates remain surprisingly high. Is this evidence that public opinion is sharply at odds with that of mainstream media, not to mention with websites like the one referred to by Claude Moniquet, whose appeal is obviously limited to the most extreme fringes?

“Few French politicians –in any case few heads of the executive branch with the notable exception of Pierre Mendès-France during the 1950’s –have aroused so much dislike as Nicolas Sarkozy. This is at times so massive and so extreme that you don’t know for sure if you should not just laugh about it. But that would mean forgetting that the nauseating stench of anti-Sarkozy-ism has a ‘1930’s’ side to it, which makes one shudder, because, decidedly, everything is permitted to be used against this man. And it would be to ignore the fact that in the months to come this attempt of organized destruction is going to mount in strength.

We are not making an allusion here to the democratic Opposition –the “Liberals”, the Socialists, the extreme Left –which, instead of managing to recover and to rebuild a coherent program is hiding behind systematic criticism of everything that the President does, wishes, thinks and says. It is legitimate that the Opposition is opposed, even if it can, simply, regret not having done so in a more intelligent manner. We don’t attack; here, the media, even when they make us believe that the vacation spent in an honest beach resort visited by ‘upper middle class’ Americans (according to the sociological terminology used on the other side of the Atlantic) was the ‘vacation of a billionaire.’
...
No, what we see today is the shapeless jumble bringing together extreme Left, extreme Right, stale Third-World-ers, old fashioned pacifists, anti-Semites of all stripes and eternal opponents of ‘American domination.’
…
An internet site that was born before the elections and that we hoped was dead and gone offers a stunning synthesis of this unique new thought, unique in the sense that it mixes the extreme Left and the extreme Right in a new and fascinating alliance of ‘Reds-Browns’: ‘Anyone but Sarkozy.’ (in French: Tout Sauf Sarko)

From the very home page the tone is clear. While a sound tape of the Song of the Partisans (the hymn of the French Resistance against the Nazi’s) plays, a line appears: ‘Whom does he represent? The axis of evil!.’ Then comes a picture: Nicolas Sarkozy on a background of American and Israeli flags. On the same site, Minister of Foreign Affairs Bernard Kouchner is called the ‘Voice of his Zionist masters,’ Dominique Strauss Kahn is ‘the Man of Israel,’ Christine Lagarde (Economy minister) is the ‘Woman of the United States’ and Hervé Morin (Defence minister) is the ‘Man of the Americans.’

They are, of course, clearly supported by ‘the big bosses always eager for financial gain and morally degenerate’ who have been able to install in power ‘a vile beast.’There are the usual ravings about globalization, the invisible hand of the Group of Bilderberg who would make policy based on the ‘oil companies’ or the ravings of the Voltaire Network of the revisionist Thierry Meyssan who denies the 09/11 attacks. In a word, here is Nicolas Sarkozy enthroned as the ‘USraelian Governor’ (please admire the subtle word game) of an occupied France.

If we have stopped on this site, other than the abjectness of anti-Semitic propaganda that we thought was gone by in France, it is because we think that this propaganda of hate which incites people to civil war will not just continue. It runs a great risk of expanding immeasurably in the months to come.

If Nicolas Sarkozy arouses hatred, it is not only due to his ‘pro-Americanism’ or his partly and perfectly accepted Jewish origins (it is not without interest from this point of view to underline that Mr. Mendès-France, who, we have recalled, was in his time the victim of the most base calumnies, was Jewish…). It is also and above all because he wants to shake up the customs of an old country, to question the holy of holies, the ‘established privileges’ and liberate the energy of a nation which has spent the last few years contemplating its navel and lamenting. In a word: to put France on a battle footing in order to confront the challenges of the century.

There are too many interests which are otherwise often opposed to one another but are now converging to oppose this in-depth mutation which is indispensable even if painful. They can only lead to an escalation of this type of propaganda.

The question is to know up to what point a democracy should tolerate this type of message of hate.”
Claude Moniquet is President of ESISC (European Strategic Intelligence & Security Center)
Read the whole piece here:
http://www.esisc.org/documents/pdf/en/edito-nicolas-sarkozy-eng-305.pdf

INTERMISSION - WE WILL BE BACK IN OCTOBER

"Never Give In, Never, Never, Never"
Winton Churchill (1941)

INTERMISSION
WE WILL BE BACK IN OCTOBER

in the meantime: "Never Give In, Never, Never, Never"

Israel 1969, a poem by Jorge Luis Borges

I feared that in Israel there might be lurking,

sweetly and insidiously,

the nostalgia gathered like some sad treasure

during the centuries of dispersion

in cities of the unbeliever, in ghettoes,

in the sunset of the steppes, in dreams,

the nostalgia of those who longed for you,

Jerusalem, beside the waters of Babylon.

What else were you, Israel, but that wistfulness,

that will to save

amid the shifting shapes of time

your old magical book, your ceremonies,

your loneliness with God?

Not so. The most ancient of nations

is also the youngest.

You have not tempted men with gardens or gold,

and the emptiness of gold

but with the hard work, beleaguered land.

Without words Israel has told them:

Forget who you are

Forget who you have been

Forget the man you were in those countries

which gave you their mornings

and evenings and to which

you must not look back in yearning.

You will forget your father's tongue

and learn the tongue of Paradise.

You shall be an Israeli, a soldier,

You shall build a country on wasteland,

making it rise out of deserts.

Your brother, whose face you've never seen,

will work by your side.

One thing only we promise you:

your place in the battle.

In In Praise of Darkness

Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), Argentinian writer

Translated by Norman Thomas di Giovanni

"Borges was anti-totalitarian, philosemitic and a Zionist." (Raphaël Lellouche)