Gilad Atzmon:
Monday, March
21, 2011 at 2:29PM Gilad Atzmon
A
German think-tank affiliated with the Social
Democratic Party issued a new report last
week that revealed high levels of
criticism of Israel in Germany, Poland and
Hungary.
Dr. Beate Küpper, a
researcher from the University of Bielefeld
who co-authored the study along with her
colleagues Andreas Zick and Andreas
Hoevermann, told The Jerusalem Post that the study showed a strong
presence of anger that is linked with
Israel and is hidden behind criticism of
Israel, and is not neutral.
Küpper termed the outbreak
of Jew-hatred in Germany
remarkable because, according to
her, there were widespread
Holocaust remembrance and education events in
Germany.
It is possible that Küpper
and others in the widely respected University
have completely failed to notice a most
obvious link here -- It is more than likely
that the mushrooming of Holocaust museums
actually contributed to the resentment
towards the Jewish state. Those who are
inclined to interpret the Holocaust as a
universal and a moral message against
racism and oppression would obviously also
identify the Jewish State as a primary enemy
of humanity and humanism. I guess that
Germans and others expect Jews to be at the
forefront of the battle against racism. As it
happens, the Jewish State sticks out as the
total opposite; it is a leading abuser of
human rights. It is a terrorist racist state
that locks thousands behind walls and barbed
wires.
The study, entitled
Intolerance, Prejudice, Discrimination:
A European Report questioned
roughly 1,000 people in each of the selected
EU countries. Asked to respond to the
statement that Israel is conducting a
war of extermination against the Palestinians,
47.7 percent of the studys participants
in Germany expressed agreement the
highest number in Western Europe.
Given Polands
lukewarm foreign policy toward Israel, the
finding that 63.3% of the Poles questioned
agree that Israel is seeking to obliterate
Palestinians may be deeply alarming to some
Zionist and Israeli Hasbara campaigners. It
seems as if the Hasbara project has been a
disaster -- Israel has managed the buy more
than a few politicians around the world
-- but the masses still see the Jewish
state for what it is.
It seems as if the
Holocaust indoctrination that is rallied and
utilised by every Jewish and Zionist
institution around the world has
backfired, and on every possible front: more
and more people around regard the Israelis as
the Nazis of our time.
I must admit that I am
uncomfortable with that comparison -- I
actually believe that Israel is a unique case, at
least from certain perspectives. Israelis,
for instance, are fully aware of their
government and armys brutal
measures against Palestinian civilian
population -- and yet, the vast majority
of them support it all, and even affirm it
democratically.
The researchers in
Bielefeld were shocked to find out that the
statement, considering Israels
policy, I can understand why people do not
like Jews met with general affirmation
across Europe (35%-55%).
I would like to try
to help the unimaginative scholars': I
would argue that Israel presenting
itself as the Jewish State
may have something to do with it -- Zionism
has successfully managed to redefine Jewish
identity. While in the past, Jews where
largely associated with a world religion,
namely, Judaism, they are now associated with
the Jewish State and Global Zionist politics.
Considering the Jewish States
atrocities then, it is only natural that
Jewish political activity should reflect
so badly on the image of world Jewry.
The research also asked
Europeans whether Jews try to take
advantage of having been victims during the
Nazi era (as if we actually need a poll
to know the answer to that one). Almost half
the Germans responded in the affirmative.
Poles who are subject to a constant flood of
hostile Shoa tourism, totally approved the
statement (72.2% affirmed). Furthermore,
not only do Jews take advantage of their
victimhood, there is also an extensive body
of academic work that suggests that the
Holocaust is the new Jewish religion :
victimhood seems to be the current collective
Jewish bond.
It seems as if Dr
Küppers lameness knows no bounds --
for instance she insists on making a link
between the growing resentment towards
Israeli barbarism -- and the
expanding intolerance towards marginalized
minority groups: Poland and Hungary,
she says, are also plagued by
extraordinary levels of sexism and
homophobia.
Someone should remind
Küpper that gays are yet to lock their
alleged foes in
Bantustans, to surround them with walls and
barbed wire, to impose a blockade on
them with a gay Navy or drop bombs on them
from aero planes decorated with gay symbols.
Gays and homosexuals do not
use white phosphorus against people seeking
refuge in UN shelters, and they do not
raid peace activists flotillas in the
middle of the sea.
In short, the resentment
towards gays which Küpper detected in Poland
and Hungary has nothing whatsoever to do with
the clear antagonism towards Jewish politics
--describing anti Israeli feeling and anti
gay sentiment as originating from
the same source, and explaining them as
being rooted in a similar animus is
both illogical and groundless.
It is embarrassing how lame
academia has become.
I guess that the University
of Bielefeld may have to raise its academic
standards, and the sooner the better. I would
like to suggest that it search for
the right minds -- those who can teach and
discuss the true intellectual heritage of
German thought.
Heidegger, Nietzsche, Hegel,
and Schopenhauer could be a good start.