When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, he had plausible arguments that Kuwait had always been part of Iraq. But the world didn’t care much for his arguments, for obvious reasons. When the modern state of Israel was formed, it was with the acquiescence rather than the enthusiasm of much of the rest of the world, which rightly imagined that Arabs wouldn’t like it much, but wrongly imagined they would get used to it and wouldn’t be able to do much about it. Sixty years later, in a world thirsty for oil and desperate for stability, if the cause for modern Israel were to be argued again, knowing what we know now, it would fail. The fear of another Holocaust, like the fear of another 9/11, has not come to pass. The Jews do not NEED a homeland anymore than any other people needs a homeland. The Jews in America, Britain, France, etc., are generally as safe as the Jews in Israel, and frequently safer.
Is it wrong, then, to think that a Jew can be a Jew (particularly a secular or semi-secular, assimilated Jew) in these countries as well as in Israel? I would think that inviting Israeli Jews to return to Europe might well be interpreted as “anti-Semitic” by persons with vested-interests in modern Israel, but is it really anti_Semitic? Is modern Israel really different from anywhere else? If so, how and why? Keep in mind that arguments based on uniqueness are particularly vulnerable to arguments based on analogy.

If I don’t like countries dominated by right-wing or overtly religious governments, then isn’t it hypocritical of me to make an exception for modern Israel as currently constituted? How different is Israel from, say, Poland? — another corrupt country dominated by a dysfunctional right-wing government too closely allied with the USA and too much dominated by un-elected religious leaders? If I can say that Poland is a mess, and that letting it into the EU was a premature gesture and therefore a mistake, why can’t I say similar things of Israel? That it, too, is a mess, that it is disruptive and overly dependent on the USA, that its bellicosity is destabilising and unhelpful to its patrons and the western world generally, and that in respect of the Palestinian people and the Occupied Territories it has behaved and continues to behave deplorably, in fact has behaved and continues to behave in ways that essentially demand and certainly invite the terrorist activities it complains of? Why should the Palestinians be peaceful and patient when they very understandably see themselves as victims?
Thank you, Mr Lerman, for putting these points better than I have been able to put them myself.

Neturei Karta and other ultra religious sects that hate Israel are irrational on many issues. Why should they be different on the issue of Israel?

If you consider that other religious groups like the Jehovah Witnesses who don’t recognize any State or government are also probably anti-Zionists than you would have to consider them as another group that is not anti Semitic.

But do these religious groups live in the real world?

The real question should be are people engaged with the real world also anti Semitic if they are anti Zionist. The answer is yes.

Mikey’s positions are well argued but his insistence that quoting a group’s doctrines proves his case is in error.

I could quote the Soviet constitution about equal rights all day long, but that doesn’t mean that there was such a thing in the Soviet Union.

Of course, his use of evidence is a lot better than Ben White’s questionable appeal to emotions to make his case.

He has no facts, not figures, just some emotive notions about “evil Zionists.”

Until he answers any of the many questions (I’d settle for his answering three questions) posed to him by posters there is no need to take anything he says seriously.

Yes, Ben, it would be interesing to discuss the Satmar take on the Holocaust. I have been in debate with them and others on this issue, since my bar Mirtzvah, but I suspect we should do so on a different thread.

It seems absolutely clear to me that you have a belief that Zionists created a great crime in 1948 and that you do not recognise any fault in the Palestinian Arab leadership at that time. But it is also clear to me that you have no justification for that belief apart from propaganda that has been fed to you that you lap up. You stated that you would “happily sit down and type out a list of books” to try and justify your position but when subsequently challenged to provide some quotes that backed it up you ran away from the challenge.

Despite numerous requests you have also failed to explain why you believe that Israel is the only country in the world not worthy of existence. Your position is morally bankrupt.

I apologise, you are correct. I may have been overly sarcastic but it was because I was getting a bit annoyed. Quite early on in this thread, I said I was “Hopefully concluding on this matter.” It is absolutely clear that Satmar are anti-Zionist. I ideally wanted to stop there but Shriber came back. Ultimately I requested of him to “Please, give it up.” He did not but continued and gave a source to try and justify his position. I went to the trouble of reading his source. His own source states that “Satmar Hasidim oppose all forms of Zionism.” I am happy to drop the matter now.

Regarding Satmar’s blaming Zionism for the Holocaust, this is indeed very concerning but fits in with their general thesis. To explain why they do, it is necessary to have some background:

The 16th century Talmudic scholar, the Maharal of Prague, warned that “the prohibition against returning from the Diaspora is as strict as any apostasy.” The reason for this is that Jewish exile is a punishment for Jewish sins. God scattered the people of Israel amongst the nations and they must await the coming of the Messiah for their redemption.According to the great eleventh century Jewish scholar and commentator, Rashi “he who leads one to sin is worse than one who kills since killing puts an end to ones existence in this world, but sinning puts an end to it also in the next world.”

The Satmar Rebbe, Grand Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum,believed “sin is the cause for all suffering.” Zionism was a great sin and would lead to a terrible disaster. In his book Vayoel Moshe (And Moses Agreed), which Teitelbaum composed in the late 1950s: “six million of Israel were killed… for this is the bitter punishment as the Talmud makes it clear when it says ‘I am permitting your flesh [to be devoured] like the flesh of the deer and the gazelle’.” He drew the inevitable conclusion: the Holocaust itself was a direct result of Zionism and divine punishment for the Zionists’ sin: “For their hands are stained with blood, and they are the reason for the terrible disaster of the killing of the killing of six million Jews.” He believed Hitler to be a messenger of divine wrath sent to chasten the Jews because of the bitter apostasy of Zionism against the belief in the eventual Messianic redemption.

[NB. I have used a number of sources for this, but it is explained very well and in some detail in Dina Porat’s article, “Amalek’s accomplices” that I have referred to earlier on in this thread. Her essay has also been republished in her recent highly acclaimed book, Israeli Society, the Holocaust and its Survivors (London: Valentine Mitchell, 2008)pp. 358-387]

I am not saying that I agree with any of this, but it explains the theological reason as to why the Satmarer blame the Holocaust on the Zionists.

Regarding Neturei Karta, they are in a world of their own. To the best of my knowledge, other ultra-Orthodox sects want nothing to do with them. According to a report published onynetnews.com in the week of the Tehran conference:

The Satmar Hassidism Court published an unprecedented statement calling on the public to disassociate themselves from the seven Neturei Karta members who visited Iran to attend the Holocaust denial conference this week.

The Satmar movement printed an official placard, with bold black lettering, publicly denouncing “fanaticism, and those committing insane acts to walk hand in hand with the Arabs.”

The court further ordered that the offenders be shunned and their actions be condemned. It slams the offenders for “joining in desecrating the name of the heavens.

The declaration expresses astonishment at how a few people “dared attend a special conference of the nations of the world that despise Israel (may the names of the evil rot), deny the Holocaust, and deny and belittle the immensity of the evil and murder of those killed for sanctifying the lord; they desecrated the name of the heavens.”

Residents of the Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim said that the Orthodox leaders could not stand the fact that those individuals who visited Iran identify themselves as Satmar Jews, and thus stain the name of Orthodoxy.

Its all but indistinguishable (bar literary floursihes, such as meetings in Prague cemetery) from the antisemitic compendium that is the Protocols.

This is antisemitism in the 21st century. It is re-packaged and newly branded as anti-Zionism, but our great grandmothers would have known it exactly for what it is.

There are some people who have far better reasons than others for hating Zionists. I’d certainly include Palestinians & Neturei Karta in that category. I don’t hate these people for their hatred, because its largely understandable: unlike their fellow travellers who claim to know better, but who have allowed their failed ideological rhetoric to lead them down antisemitic one way alleys, and who now reflexively dismiss and deny all mainstream majority Jewish perspectives on identity & antisemitism.

New Statesman’s editor Peter Wilby didn’t know why a gold star of david piercing a union jack was antisemitic. He wouldn’t apologise to mainstream Jewish community groups, and only did so when Jewish anti-Zionists occupied his office. - And we are expected to respect the opinion of Wilby et al as to what is and is not antisemitic. What a sad joke.

Ben:

Sorry, simply saying “I do not subscribe to the Ilan Pappe version of events” is not particularly revealing about your view on a fairly fundamental point here. So I’ll ask again:

“are you saying that it is simply not true that for a Palestinian, Zionism has meant the loss of a village, land, expulsion, enforced exile, and collective dispossession?”

If so, it’s amazing that all these years later, a ‘Z-Word’ blog still boils down to the same point: “It never happened”. (Which doesn’t even have the honesty of the position that says, ‘Yes, it happened, and it was jolly well worth it’.)