German Leftists Declare Solidarity with Israel, by Elif Kayi

From: Z word blog: Elif Kayi, Z Word’s European press reviewer, reports on Gregor Gysi’s declaration of solidarity with Israel. There is a common perception that the European left is uniformly hostile to Israel. In that respect, Germany appears to have bucked the trend. Last week, Gregor Gysi, who jointly heads the party Linkspartei with Oskar Lafontaine, delivered a speech about Israel that was, by the prevailing standards of the European left, quite startling. Speaking at a conference organized by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, Gysi warmly congratulated Israel on its 60th anniversary and called on his party to “show solidarity” with the Jewish state. Critically, Gysi defined such solidarity as an integral part of Germany’s “raison d’etat.” In so doing, Gysi harshly criticized the historic position of the PDS - the direct descendant of the communist party which ran the totalitarian East German state and now one of the constituent elements of Linkspartei - for its faithful reflection of Moscow’s line of implacable hostility towards Israel. “The leadership of the DDR (German Democratic Republic) did not only lack understanding of Israel’s security interests,” said Gysi. “It also did not understand the specific responsibility towards Jews that emerged from the eternal warning of the Shoah.” Gysi also counselled against classic left-wing anti-Zionism. “The concept of imperialism does not apply to Israel,” he said. Israeli democracy, he added, “is a really great achievement, that deserves admiration.” In an op-ed published in the daily Tageszeitung, journalist Stefan Reinecke described the importance of Gysi’’s speech: “Maybe more important than the criticism of the traditional leftist opposition to Israel is the commitment to the raison d’etat itself. This is a concept Linkspartei…have always avoided. Gysi interprets this concept not as authoritarian, but as rational - and the course is clear. If the party recognizes Israel as part of the German raison d’etat, it shows that it has finally accepted the western value system.” An editorial published in the daily Tagesspiegel also underscored the significance of the speech: “The speech…brings to an end a chapter in the party’s history: its often unclear position on the terror of extremist Palestinians. Not so long ago, during a visit in Teheran, Oskar Lafontaine tried to curry favour with the rulers of Iran, who are hostile to Israel. Hopefully, Gysi has set standards within his party that Lafontaine cannot pretend to ignore.” The head of the German Young Socialists (JuSo), Franziska Drohsel, also warned against antisemitism from the left and denounced the identification of some leftist groups with the Islamists: “The goals of the Islamist organizations are not compatible with the leftist concept of emancipation…Antisemitism is evil and has to be fought against, no matter who expresses and defends it”.

Inauguration of a memorial to the Jewish victims of the 1506 massacre in Lisbon

"Among these were two Dominican friars, who went through the city of Lisbon with crucifixes on their shoulders, inciting the people...they attacked the weak and defenseless group of ill-baptized New Christians with spears and unsheathed swords. They killed four thousand of them, robbed them..they maimed them, dashed children against walls and disembered them, defiled women and girls and then killed them. They threw many pregnant women out of windows onto spearpoints awaiting them below..."

Consolation for the Tribulations of Israel, by Samuel Usque, 1553, Ferrara (translated from the Portuguese by Martin A. Cohen, Jewish Publication Society of America, 5737-1977 (Ladina))

The Massacre, from EJP:

"Historians estimate that between 2,000 and 4,000 "New Christians" - Jews who were forced by the state to convert in 1496 - were thrown into pyres set up across the city centre before authorities regained control of the Portuguese capital.

The violence erupted on April 19, 1506 after a man believed to be a "New Christian" suggested that a light emanating from a crucifix at a chapel was likely caused by natural causes instead of divine intervention as thought by many Christians.

He was dragged from the church by a group of women who beat him to death, according to several historical accounts.
A priest then made a fiery sermon against "New Christians" while two other priests, crucifix in hand, marched through the cobblestoned streets of Lisbon inciting people to kill them.

In the ensuing violence even Catholics who were thought to look like "New Chistians" were killed or saw their homes destroyed.

King Manuel, who was outside of the Portuguese capital when the massacre began, ordered the ringleaders rounded up and hung while those convicted of murder or pillage received various corporal punishments.
When the king forced the Jews to become Christians, many of them decided to leave the country, including a number of highly educated people, such as the astronomer and mathematician Abraão Zacuto, who went to Turkey, and Baruch Espinosa's (Spinoza) parents, who went to Holland.

The massacre highlights the growing unease in Portugal at the time with "New Christians." Spain had launched its Inquisition in 1492 which aimed to expel or forcibly convert to Christianity all Jews and other non-believers, prompting thousands to cross the border into Portugal where they sought shelter.

But nearly five decades later Portugal launched its own Inquisition which led hundreds of Jews to be tortured or burned at the stake in the 16th and early 17th century after being accused by church tribunals of being heretics.

The forced conversion of Jews together with the Inquisition drastically reduced the number of Jews in Portugal, leading the memory of the "Lisbon massacre" as it has come to be known to fade.
"Since Jewish culture practically disappeared from the country, there was no one to evoke the memory of the massacre," author Richard Zimmler, who has written novels set against the purge of Jews in Portugal, said in an interview published in daily newspaper Público last Sunday. Some historians estimate that 20 percent of Portugal’s population, or 200,000 people at that time, before the start of the Inquisition were Jewish.

Many were successful traders and scientists whose international visibility made the term "Portuguese" be synonymous with "Jew" at the time.

Today there are just some 3,000 Jews in Portugal, a nation of just over 10 million people. Most are concentrated in Lisbon and the majority came to the country after Portugal’s Inquisition was officially abolished in 1821."

Read more on Friends of Marranos

Pontiff's Greeting to the Jewish Community

Via Bennauro
WASHINGTON, D.C., APRIL 17, 2008 (Zenit.org)
Here is the greeting and message Benedict XVI gave today to the Jewish community.

My dear friends, I extend special greetings of peace to the Jewish community in the United States and throughout the world as you prepare to celebrate the annual feast of Pesah. My visit to this country has coincided with this feast, allowing me to meet with you personally and to assure you of my prayers as you recall the signs and wonders God performed in liberating his chosen people. Motivated by our common spiritual heritage, I am pleased to entrust to you this message as a testimony to our hope centered on the Almighty and his mercy.

To the Jewish community on the Feast of Pesah

My visit to the United States offers me the occasion to extend a warm and heartfelt greeting to my Jewish brothers and sisters in this country and throughout the world. A greeting that is all the more spiritually intense because the great feast of Pesah is approaching. "This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as an ordinance for ever" (Exodus 12: 14). While the Christian celebration of Easter differs in many ways from your celebration of Pesah, we understand and experience it in continuation with the biblical narrative of the mighty works which the Lord accomplished for his people.

At this time of your most solemn celebration, I feel particularly close, precisely because of what Nostra Aetate calls Christians to remember always: that the Church "received the revelation of the Old Testament through the people with whom God in His inexpressible mercy concluded the Ancient Covenant. Nor can she forget that she draws sustenance from the root of that well-cultivated olive tree onto which have been grafted the wild shoots, the Gentiles" (Nostra Aetate, 4). In addressing myself to you I wish to re-affirm the Second Vatican Council's teaching on Catholic-Jewish relations and reiterate the Church's commitment to the dialogue that in the past forty years has fundamentally changed our relationship for the better.

Because of that growth in trust and friendship, Christians and Jews can rejoice together in the deep spiritual ethos of the Passover, a memorial (zikkarôn) of freedom and redemption. Each year, when we listen to the Passover story we return to that blessed night of liberation. This holy time of the year should be a call to both our communities to pursue justice, mercy, solidarity with the stranger in the land, with the widow and orphan, as Moses commanded: "But you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this" (Deuteronomy 24: 18).

At the Passover Sèder you recall the holy patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and the holy women of Israel, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachael and Leah, the beginning of the long line of sons and daughters of the Covenant. With the passing of time the Covenant assumes an ever more universal value, as the promise made to Abraham takes form: "I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing... All the communities of the earth shall find blessing in you" (Genesis 12: 2-3). Indeed, according to the prophet Isaiah, the hope of redemption extends to the whole of humanity: "Many peoples will come and say: 'Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths'" (Isaiah 2: 3). Within this eschatological horizon is offered a real prospect of universal brotherhood on the path of justice and peace, preparing the way of the Lord (cf. Isaiah 62: 10).

Christians and Jews share this hope; we are in fact, as the prophets say, "prisoners of hope" (Zachariah 9: 12). This bond permits us Christians to celebrate alongside you, though in our own way, the Passover of Christ's death and resurrection, which we see as inseparable from your own, for Jesus himself said: "salvation is from the Jews" (John 4: 22). Our Easter and your Pesah, while distinct and different, unite us in our common hope centered on God and his mercy. They urge us to cooperate with each other and with all men and women of goodwill to make this a better world for all as we await the fulfillment of God's promises.

With respect and friendship, I therefore ask the Jewish community to accept my Pesah greeting in a spirit of openness to the real possibilities of cooperation which we see before us as we contemplate the urgent needs of our world, and as we look with compassion upon the sufferings of millions of our brothers and sisters everywhere. Naturally, our shared hope for peace in the world embraces the Middle East and the Holy Land in particular. May the memory of God's mercies, which Jews and Christians celebrate at this festive time, inspire all those responsible for the future of that region-where the events surrounding God's revelation actually took place-to new efforts, and especially to new attitudes and a new purification of hearts!

In my heart I repeat with you the psalm of the paschal Hallel (Psalm 118: 1-4), invoking abundant divine blessings upon you: "O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his steadfast love endures forever. Let Israel say, 'His steadfast love endures forever.' . . . Let those who fear the Lord say, 'His steadfast love endures forever'."
From the Vatican, 14 April 2008© Copyright 2008 -- Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Islam and the Evolution of Europe’s Far Right, by R. John Matthies

Islam and the Evolution of Europe's Far Right, by R. John Matthies, Pajamas Media (Read full article here)

"Mounting fears of Islamic encroachment are restructuring the European Far Right, bringing about the rise of fire-breathing libertarians and pro-Israel populists."

"One might prefer to dismiss Wilders ["Geert Wilders, the Netherlands' puckish libertarian"] and Kjærsgaard [Pia Kjærsgaard of the Danish People's Party (DF)] as hotheads, or merely out of touch. But a report just now released by the World Economic Forum (in partnership with Georgetown University) on the subject of West-Islamic world dialogue, suggests that the Far Right's anti-Islam turn is far more representative of Europe's fears than one has wished to believe. According to the results of surveys gathered by the Gallup Institute, 60% of Europeans surveyed see the growing interaction between the Muslim world and the West as a menace to freedom. What's more, the study claims that the citizens of Wilders' Netherlands and Kjærsgaard's Denmark are most fearful, with 67% of Dutch and 80% of Danes surveyed in agreement with this statement. What's more, like Kjærsgaard, fully half of Danes consider Islam incompatible with democracy. (Sadly, Gallup failed to collect opinions in France, Germany, or Great Britain.)

In the end, the phenomenon of right-wing populism (or left-wing reaction) is as good a marker as any to insist upon the new ground being broken among these figures and parties of the "Far Right." And it is clear that perceptions of Islam as an intolerant faith are driving the agenda - for Left and for Right, and across the political spectrum. For this reason, one can no longer easily dismiss the hodgepodge of characters, all platforms considered, who "bang on about Islam." And if Britain’s Nick Griffin is correct in his estimation that Islam is soon to dominate political discussion, we can expect to hear noises like his own from the continent’s mainstream political elite. It is unlikely that Old Guard formations like the British National Party will ever enjoy the support of the Swiss and Danish Far Right - both for reasons of their history and the promise of fresh libertarian faces like Wilders'. But in the meantime, Britain’s flagging passion for "diversity" presents sure opportunity for the party - as it does for anyone interested in the popular vote."

Islam and the West: Annual Report on the State of Dialogue, January 2008

"European populations surveyed are much more likely to believe that greater interaction between the Muslim and Western worlds is a threat rather than a benefit. This appears to reflect widespread anti-immigration sentiment within the European Union.
Clear majorities in all European countries surveyed see greater interaction between the West and Muslim worlds as a threat. This is true of 79% of the population in Denmark, 67% in Italy, 67% in the Netherlands, 68% in Spain, 65% in Sweden and 59% in Belgium. This corresponds to a growing fear among Europeans of a perceived 'Islamic threat' to their cultural identities, driven in part by rising immigration from predominantly Muslim regions.
A recent poll found that only 21% of Europeans supported Turkey’s bid for EU membership. Nicolas Sarkozy’s successful presidential campaign in France included strong opposition to Turkish EU membership. A 2006 poll found that the main reason Germans opposed Turkey’s membership was 'fear of a growing influence of Islam in Europe'.
Although some might expect the United States, Israel and the Middle East to be more likely than Europe to feel threatened by the 'other,' the opposite is the case. In the United States (70%), Canada (72%) and Israel (56%) majorities say that greater interaction is a benefit." (p.p. 24-25)

Portugal: "For 500 years, we were Christians outside the house and Jews inside"

From TJP Lopez marks Pessah alone, as his ancestors did for centuries by Shelly Paz

“While the Spanish still do not like to be called Marranos, the Portuguese feel differently. "In Portugal, Marrano means not just a pig's leg but is also an adjective used to describe a determined person who fights for what he believes in and doesn't give up," Prof. Filipe Ferrão, 51, a neurophysiologist from the University of Porto, the second largest city in Portugal, told the Post.

"I was raised in Porto with all these customs I didn't understand. For example, we were constantly told not to count stars while pointing to the skies. We were told that if we did so our fingers would be calloused. Years later, I learned that Jews know Shabbat is over only when they count three stars in the skies. Our parents were afraid that if we did so, we would be suspected as hidden Jews," Ferrão recalled.

"Our dining table was rectangle and whenever I placed bread on it horizontally, my mother used to come over and tell me to move it. She never said why, but it became second nature to me. When I grew up, I understood it was in her attempt to prevent me creating a cross."

It took Ferrão 20 years to complete the process of returning to Judaism. He and 15 other Marranos were converted by a Jerusalem rabbinic court in January 2007. (…)

"One needs to live in a Jewish community with an authorized rabbi for a year before starting the legal process with the rabbinate in Jerusalem, and for me it was impossible since there was no rabbi and no solid community in Porto when I started the process," he said. "But now I feel like I paved the way for others. And I've stayed in Porto to help them."

Ferrão converted with his wife and their younger child, who is 19. Their older child is 26 and married, and was not interested in going through the process.

Participants in the convention [fifth convention for Spanish and Portuguese Marranos of the Shavei Israel organization] described many strange customs that were passed down to them. Several spoke of having a special dining room table with a hidden drawer, in which a bowl with a piece of pork in it was kept in case a neighbor stopped by.

Others noted that their ancestors had chosen acceptable Christian names that constituted a secret code to signal insiders they were descendants of Jews "Before the Inquisition, the Jews were 30 percent of the population of Portugal. If you browse a Portuguese phone book today, you'll be amazed how many 'secret' Jewish family names are in it," Ferrão said.

To decrease assimilation, many Marranos married within the extended family and into families they knew shared their history.

Most of the descendants still have no idea of their origins, and many who do know nonetheless have no interest in returning to Judaism, participants said. Others are simply interested in exploring their roots or in searching for spiritual reconnection with the Jewish people and the State of Israel. Annually, a couple of hundred Marranos pursue conversion and about half of them are interested in immigration to Israel. (…)

Paulo Vitorino, 40, a father of six and a businessman from Lisbon, insisted to the Post that "I am a Portuguese Jew, not a converted Jew. For 500 years, we were Christians outside the house and Jews inside."

He said he had found out about his Judaism at the age of 24, after his mother died. "My father told us we are Jews and that we can choose between the synagogue and the church. I chose the synagogue."

But Vitorino protested that in Portugal "we are Jews without the backing of the State of Israel or the local Jewish community. They don't accept us. And this, to me, is the new Inquisition.""

Portugal, the Jews and Israel - a difficult relationship
The Marquis of Pombal and the 3 yellow hats
Campaign to rehabilitate Captain Barros Basto, the 'Portuguese Dreyfus'
Aristides de Sousa Mendes, the Portuguese Consul who saved thousands of Jewish refugees during the Holocaust

Italy: Fiamma Nirenstein will be in the next Parliament

Berlusconi win means seat for pro-Israel J'lem-based journalist, by Ruthie Blum, TJP

"The results of Monday's Italian election - placing media magnate Silvio Berlusconi back in power for a third run as prime minister, this time after two years of Romano Prodi rule - have one unexpected outcome: Jewish journalist, author and global terrorism expert Fiamma Nirenstein will be in the next Parliament.

Nirenstein, the long-time Israel correspondent for the liberal daily La Stampa, and more recently for the Berlusconi-owned, right-wing Il Giornale, is famous in Italy for her unapologetic support of Israel and the United States, and for her vocal opposition to Islamic fundamentalism. Indeed, her most recent book, Israele Siamo Noi (Israel Is Us), was a huge best-seller. She also backed the war in Iraq, from where the previous Prodi-led government withdrew Italian troops as soon as it took office.

In Israel, Nirenstein is best known for her association with the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, where she is a fellow, and for being one of the few European journalists whose reportage on the Middle East portrays Israel and the IDF in a positive light. She has spent nearly two decades dividing her time between Rome and Jerusalem, where she lives with her Israeli husband, news photographer Ofer Eshed.

That Nirenstein was asked to join Berlusconi's joint list with Gianfranco Fini, and was placed in the No. 4 slot to guarantee her seat, is a statement on the part of the People of Freedom Party, whose victory indicates a swing back to the pro-Western platform that the previous Berlusconi government espoused, before it was replaced by Prodi."

This pro-American, pro-Israel worldview is connected to a strong identification, on the part of at least one major sector of the Italian people, with the same values of freedom and democracy,"
Nirenstein said in a phone interview from her Rome apartment, where she watched the election results on TV with her family.

Nirenstein pointed to the massive wave of illegal immigration into Europe as one possible explanation for the public's having reinstated Berlusconi.

"It is a desire to restore the sense of identity which Italians feel has been affected by the influx of other cultures, most notably Muslim," said Nirenstein.

Nirenstein's celebrity in Italy - both for her writings and for her now-defunct television show on global politics - made her the target, during the period leading up to the election, of a smear campaign from the ranks of the extreme Left. An anti-Semitic cartoon that appeared in the Communist paper Il Manifesto, which depicts "Fiamma Frankenstein" wearing a star of David on one lapel and the symbol of the fascist regime in Italy on the other, was circulated widely on the Internet. After being condemned by the Anti-Defamation League and other groups, the Italian press association suspended the membership of the cartoonist for three months.

"It was a frightening example of how anti-Semitism has not only reemerged, but has crept into the mainstream of European discourse," asserted Nirenstein."

Methods of genocide denial, by Oliver Kamm

Read the full article here "Genocide denial is an ugly subject. I wrote a post about a recent variant a few months ago, relating to Ed Herman, one-time collaborator of Noam Chomsky. Herman has devoted himself in recent years to rubbishing the notion that 8,000 Bosniaks were massacred at Srebrenica. In an article last October entitled "Genocide Inflation is the Real Human Rights Threat: Yugoslavia and Rwanda", published in the far-left Z Magazine, he went one better, and insisted: "To an amazing degree, the Western media and NGOs swallowed the propaganda line and lies on Rwanda that turned things upside down." (...) The proponents of genocide denial are not a weighty force, and some of them are very trivial indeed. But there are reasons for refuting them. First, while I don't wish to sound melodramatic, once you let go by default the arguments of Herman and others, you have in effect granted the legitimacy in debate of the equivalent methods of reasoning of Holocaust denial. Holocaust denial, pace Chomsky's frivolous and absurd remarks, necessarily has malevolent implications. Secondly, it's surprising how some of the propositions of genocide deniers can insinuate themselves into respectable forums without their being recognised as such. I noted an example last year when the novelist Kurt Vonnegut died. In his best known work, Slaughterhouse-Five, Vonnegut directly relies on the discredited claims of my reader David Irving concerning the death toll at Dresden. Portraying the Allies as war criminals while downplaying the crimes of the Nazis is one the techniques of Holocaust deniers such as Irving. Thirdly, there is matter of honour. It is plainly not logically impossible that fewer than 8,000 men and boys were murdered by Bosnian Serbs at Srebrenica; but the means by which Herman and his followers advance that conclusion are a violation of the methods of critical inquiry. That's what is wrong with genocide denial - not that it's an offence to our feelings, but that it's an offence against historical truth. Fourthly, while the proponents of genocide denial are on the fringes of Western intellectual life, this is not necessarily true elsewhere. Holocaust denial has gained ground in the Muslim world. In particular, it's espoused by the puppet-president of a state that seeks a nuclear capability and anticipates the extinction of the Jewish state."