I want to draw your attention to Eamonn McDonagh’s dissection of Rodolfo Walsh, the Argentinian revolutionary who made anti-Zionism a central element of his credo, on the main Z Word site.
Eamonn observes:
…Walsh’s view of Jews certainly represents a step forward from the traditional antisemitism of his youth. Not all Jews are to be despised; only those who seek to exercise national rights and refuse to see the light of international revolution. Without straining ourselves unduly, we can here perceive a parallel with current “anti-Zionist but not antisemitic” discourse which is prepared to accommodate those Jews who reject Zionism but which spares nothing in its attacks on those who don’t.
For those who want to understand the provenance of anti-Zionist discourse in our own time, this essay is essential, not least for its focus on a leading thinker in a region of the world which is too often neglected in favor of the more obvious candidates - the UK and South Africa come to mind - in the analysis of contemporary anti-Zionism and antisemitism.
The article is simply excellent! I will make sure it gets lots of readers.
I just want to know if Eamonn by chance did not write it also in Spanish?
BTW, Now I know where some nutty anti-Zionist from Indymedia Argentina came up with the idea of Jewish bankers duping Jewish poors!
A reverence to Eamonn.
thanks. I’d be happy to do a spanish version if I could find someone to publish it
“As he sets it out here, Walsh’s view of Jews certainly represents a step forward from the traditional antisemitism of his youth. Not all Jews are to be despised; only those who seek to exercise national rights and refuse to see the light of international revolution. Without straining ourselves unduly, we can here perceive a parallel with current “anti-Zionist but not antisemitic” discourse which is prepared to accommodate those Jews who reject Zionism but which spares nothing in its attacks on those who don’t.”
I am not sure it does.
All forms of antisemitism save that of the National Socialists always had their bad Jews, their worse, Jews and their redeemable Jews.
Christian antisemitism allowed that Jews could be redeemed if the gave up their “false faith.”
Voltaire similarly castigated religious Jews but thought that Jews who gave their “superstitions” could be assimilated into society.
Even in Tsarist Russia Jews who embraced the Russian Orthodox faith were given equal rights.
Leftist antisemites (pre-1948) said they only hated Capitalist Jews and right wing antisemites only “communist Jews.”
And so it goes.
Anti-Zionist hatred of Zionist Jews while embracing non Zionist Jews is strictly temporary. If their goals of the destruction of Israel were to be achieved they will find another class of Jews to hate.
In this sense Walsh’ anti-Zionism is a continuation of his antisemitism of his youth.
I think that your account of Walsh’s journey is fair and balanced. Your argumentation is logical and ingenious as usual in the sense that, as a son of Irish immigrants to a land taken from an indigenous population, he wasn’t in a position to illegitimate the Zionists.
But IMO, the main problem with his approach is the paternalistic view of Arabs as passive victims of Zionists uncontested initiative prior to 1948 (or 1965 i.e. until Arafat). He doesn’t even cites the Mufti’s activities or the Great Uprising of 1935-39.
Now, both Zionist and anti-zionist share a common view of national movements as uniform ideologies. The truth is most of the people, most of the time, aren’t militants.
European Jewish masses didn’t flock to Palestine, but to America, W. Europe, Argentina, etc. The main political force in Polish Jewry until 1939 was the Bund (anti-zionist) which advocated for national-cultural rights for each group guaranteed by parliamentary constitutions in eventually socialist, multi-ethnic States as such of E. European. A very much civilized (yet hard to achieve) than uniform-ethnic States, always prompted to permanent civil war (cf. Jugoslavia, Caucasus, etc.).
In the same sense, the Muslim Brotherhood terrorist activities weren’t shared by the bulk of Palestine peasantry (not to speak of Palestine Christians). It was the Zionist policy of undiscriminated retaliation on innocent people, awful colonization of seized lands and funding of Hamas net of social aid (Shamir in the ’80s) who pushed the Palestinian majority unto its arms. Hamas is the enemy the Zionist Right loves to get.
I forgot: I’m sure there’ll be no problem to publish a Spanish translation of your essay in such places as Arte Política or La Cooperativa de Blogs. Just tell me if you need help to edit some Spanish translation nuances. My best.
I strongly disagree Roberto.
First, about immigration from the Pale settlements in Russia.
Most Jews didn’t immigrate. They stayed put and were killed. The Bundist had some success with the Jewish masses but were never accepted either by the local governments of Russia, Poland, etc. and certainly not by the Communists.
Lenin and Trotsky especially hated the Bund. Stalin tolerated it when it was in his interest to do so but the turned against it with a vengeance.
As for Hamas you State:
“In the same sense, the Muslim Brotherhood terrorist activities weren’t shared by the bulk of Palestine peasantry (not to speak of Palestine Christians). It was the Zionist policy of undiscriminated retaliation on innocent people, awful colonization of seized lands and funding of Hamas net of social aid (Shamir in the ’80s) who pushed the Palestinian majority unto its arms. Hamas is the enemy the Zionist Right loves to get.”
This isn’t historically accurate.
Leaving aside your questionable history of the conflict, the Palestinian Arabs became Islamicized at the same rate other Muslim Arabs and non Arabs became radicalized.
In fact in Algeria the process was even more pronounced and a ferocious civil war ensued in the 1980’s which killed tens of thousands of people.
To blame Islamic radicalization on this or that policy doesn’t make since it’s an ideology which has been around since the 20’s and began to take off when other ideologies, Fascism, Marxism, (Bathism, etc.) began to lose its hold on the educated classes in the Arab world.
It was only a matter of time before this ideology took hold among Palestinian Arabs.
If anything it’s the corrupt policies of Arafat and his movement which pushed people into the Islamic camp.
@jdyer:
1) Most peoples didn’t immigrate. Jewish rates where one of the highest and immigration to Palestine wasn’t one of the first choices, by far. Zionism was not a significant political force between Jewish masses until the rise of the Nazis. Even when Poland turned to an antisemitic regime they gather around the Bund to fight for their rights as Polish citizens. It’s what regular people do in America (most Jewish voted Obama) or elsewhere. Zionism was an unrealistic choice for the majority but a bunch of idealistic youngsters. The relative success of the Borochovists tnuot was such in the measure they showed prone to fight the fascism side by side with the Bund. It was so in the Warsaw ghetto as well as in Argentina in the ’60s (when I was a Borochovist myself). The real deal for the majority is where you live.
2) Your rebuttal of my historical account doesn’t show any evidence. Contra factual casuistic isn’t one. The fact is that rightist Israeli administrations funded Hamas to fight PLO popularity within the Palestine people. Today they say that Abu Mazen is their partner and Hamas is the terrorist. Poor Israeli governments; always deceived with no responsibility at all!
You know what: most people in the world doesn’t believe this hypocritical cry anymore.