It is hard to believe that, in light of his past expressions of acute hatred and distaste towards Jews:

“Je suis antisémite et je n’ai plus peur de l’avouer, je vais faire dorénavant des croix gammées sur tous les murs… je veux que chaque juif vive dans la peur, sauf s’il est propalestinien. Qu’ils meurent !”

“I am anti-Semitic and I am no longer afraid to own to it… I want to paint swastikas on all the walls… I want all Jews to live in fear, unless they are pro-Palestinian. Let them die,”

Or:

“Moi, honnêtement, entre une musulmane en tchador et une juive rasée, mon choix est fait !”

“Honestly, between a Muslim woman in a chador and a shaved Jewess, my choice is made!”

It’s important to note in these comments that Sine is not expressing intense hostlity towards JUDAISM. Unlike the Danish cartoons, which mocked the historical religious figure of Mohammad, meaning that the satire was aimed indeed at the religion, Sine clearly trains his arrows on Jews qua Jews, with stereotypes that instantly appeal to the vulgar imagination: the rich Jewish heiress, the shaved Jewess, and the young Sarkozy, already showing all the pushy ambition of a Jew… Had he mocked a rabbi, or some Biblcal figure, or the Torah, or the Talmud, sacred to Jews, that would have supported the opinion expressed by Colin F Saint-Denis. As it is, Sine chose to speak in classical antisemitic code which suggests that his anumus is motivated by much lesser ideals than the longing for perfect laicite.

The first point is that Sinés commens were not antisemitic but an attack on the opportunism of Sarkozy’s son Jean who, it was rumoured at the time, was readying to convert to Judaism in order to marry a rich heiress. Far from being antisemitic, Siné is an old-fashioned anarchist who detests ALL religions, including Islam. (Siné did not, unfortunately, protest when Charlie Hebdo editor Philippe Val decided to publish the Danish cartoons).

The second is that you imply, naively or dishonestly, that Lenin and his co-thinkers claim that antisemitism “IS” a scurrilous tactic “DESIGNED” to divert attention from the oppression of the Palestinians by the State of Israel, when if course what they are saying is that (usually false) ACCUSATIONS of antisemitism are being deliberately USED to this end.

Nobody is denying that antisemitism exists, though it is generally to be found elsewhere than in the Palestine solidarity movement. Worse, making false and obviously unfounded accusations of antisemitism is clearly the best method of weakening any opposition to real antisemitism when it rears its head.

By the way, the petition in support of Siné now has 12 000 signatures.

i’m too lazy to go back and look, but there was something like that just last week.

as if anyone who regularly reads lenin’s blog really takes him seriously when he pretends to be an anti-racist.