How Anti-Semitic Rhetoric Became Mainstream
Using anti-Semitic rhetoric, society historically accused Jews of being rich oppressors as well as leeches. Jews were rulers as well as disloyal agitators. Jews, they opined, are members of an inferior race; now, they are members of a privileged one.
Contemporary Jew-haters have similarly evolved in their use of anti-Semitic rhetoric. They have transformed what were once the sentiments of the radical fringe into the accepted stance of our current woke moralists.
“Doublespeak” – the deliberate use of language to conceal or distort the truth, a concept made popular in George Orwell’s 1984 – is the main tool in the arsenal of today’s anti-Semites. Spouting the correct language, they have seamlessly transformed their expressions of unbridled, raw hatred into commendable academic jargon. Unfortunately, it is also pure anti-Semitic rhetoric.
“What is really important in the world of doublespeak is the ability to lie, whether knowingly or unconsciously, and to get away with it; and the ability to use lies and choose and shape facts selectively, blocking out those that don’t fit an agenda or program,” explains writer Edward S. Herman in his book Beyond Hypocrisy.
Phase I: “Zionism is Racism”
Post World War II, the anti-Semitic rhetoric shifted away from overtly anti-Jewish to a new concept, “anti-Zionist.” The murder of six million Jews in the Holocaust was a fresh memory. This made attacking Jews on the international stage less politically attractive.
While this didn’t stop powerful countries from closing their doors to Jewish refugees from Europe, it did change the discourse. Now, Jews were attacked by the declaration that “Zionism is racism.”
Where and how did this ruse begin? Not surprisingly, with the Soviets, world-class masters of doublespeak.
The USSR’s Campaign Against Israel
The 1917 revolutionary forces in the former USSR officially abolished the Czarists’ discriminatory policies against Jews. Yet, the reality of life for Jews under the Bolsheviks was one of state-enforced antisemitism and demonization.
Jews lived with quotas as well as outright rejection from universities. Many professions simply shut them out. When they did find employment, they faced glass ceilings, never able to progress to the highest levels.
Yet, surprisingly, when the state of Israel was created in 1948, “All international communist parties supported partition and the creation of a Jewish State,” documents Philip Mendes in Jews and the Left: The Rise and Fall of a Political Alliance.
This included as well the U.S. Communist Party which called Israel “an organic part of the world struggle for peace and democracy. The French communists viewed the Israelis in solidary with “resistance” fighters throughout the world.
Why Soviet Support Changed
Immediately after Israel’s 1948 victory in the War of Independence, “Zionism was … celebrated by the left as an organic movement of national return and a model for national liberation and decolonization movements throughout the world,” writes Alex Rychin in “Red Terror: How the Soviet Union Shaped the Modern Anti-Zionist Discourse.”
“Israel’s victory in its War of Independence and refusal to succumb to far mightier foes was positively awe-inspiring to adherents of political movements predicated on toppling structures of power,” explains Rychin.
Ironically, it was the communists who understood Zionism for what it actually is. Namely, the return of the Jewish people to their indigenous homeland (“Zion” being one of Israel’s biblical names). Historically, the Jewish people are the only people in existence who have had a continuous presence and a claim to the land in what is now the state of Israel.
However, communist support for the nascent state of Israel waned quickly, not due to ideology but to politics. By the time the modern state of Israel was created, the Cold War between Russia and the United States had already begun. The two superpowers pitted against each other, each vying for world dominance, including in the Middle East.
Israel's Support for Democracy
By the early 1950s, when it became apparent that Israel was espousing Western democratic values and supporting America, the Soviets realized they needed to significantly downgrade Israel, if not entirely ostracize it in the eyes of the world. That's where the anti-Semitic rhetoric came into play.
As a first step, the Soviets began spewing and exporting rabid anti-Semitic rhetoric. Specifically, they embarked on an intense and concentrated campaign against the “Zionists.” Part of this campaign was the infamous 1953 “Doctors Plot.” There, the Soviet government levied false charges against prominent Jewish doctors. They accused them of planning to murder leading government and communist party officials.
“The propaganda was highly compelling and steeped in long-established [anti-Semitic] themes of Jewish bloodthirstiness, greed, corruption, manipulation and cunning. It would contend that the very existence of a Jewish homeland was not only a plot of imperialism, but a mortal danger to the peace of the world,” writes Rychin.
While Russia was busy introducing the term “anti-Zionist” into the global lexicon, most Americans were focused on the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement. Yet Soviet-supporting professors at top American universities were paying close attention. In truth, anti-Semitism had never been in short supply at these universities. Most of them had Jewish quotas of their own.
The UN Ruse
At the UN, the Soviets began employing an audacious strategy using anti-Semitic rhetoric against Israel learned. Although the Nazis were their arch enemies, the Soviets learned from none other than Adolf Hitler. In his 1925 book Mein Kampf, Hitler praises the efficacy of using the psychological technique known as the “Big Lie”-- essentially promoting a lie so big that no one would believe that anyone "could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously."
Rychin documents the fabrication of the “Big Lie” against Israel by the Soviets:
When a sub-commission of the United Nations was tasked with drafting a convention on the “elimination of all forms of racial discrimination,” the proceedings naturally focused on apartheid, neo-Nazism and antisemitism. But the Soviets viewed the reference to antisemitism as a direct rebuke to their anti-Jewish measures, and served up an amendment that “was almost a joke,” even to the Soviet delegation itself.
The amendment inserted Zionism into the listed forms of racism. According to sources close to the deliberations, the Soviets understood “full well that the idea that Zionism is racism is an indefensible position,” yet they floated it anyway, in part to turn the US-led initiative into farce, and in part perhaps, to see how far a “big lie,” could go.
Ultimately, the Convention was adopted with neither antisemitism nor Zionism referred to … But the seed had been planted.
On 10 November 1975, the General Assembly of the United Nations passed resolution 3379 on the “elimination of all forms of racial discrimination,” which determined that “Zionism is a form of racism and discrimination.”
The accusation stuck, and pro-Israel advocates are still fighting this absurd allegation.
Phase II: “Zionism is a settler-colonial white supremacist ideology”
Today, anti-Semites still use the “Zionism is racism” canard against Israel. But now, the anti-Semitic rhetoric comes with a litany of other “sins” – namely that Israel is a “settler-colonial white supremacist” state. In this context, its “racist” nature is simply a given.
What caused the switch in language? How does it benefit those who desire to bring down the only Jewish state in the world?
“Coalition of the Oppressed”
Most Americans viewed the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States as a watershed moment. Finally, the country thought, the era of post-racism had arrived. The fight for racial equality began with the freeing of the slaves. It was codified into law through the 1968 Civil Rights. Yet, it saw its ultimate expression in Obama’s election.
Most Americans thought that the era of post-racialism in America had finally arrived. Yet, Obama’s reaction to a number of pivotal moments in his presidency – the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin in Florida, the 2014 police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri (an event that sparked the Black Lives Movement) and the 1915 death of Freddie Gray while in police custody in Baltimore – proved otherwise.
With racial tensions flaring, the Obama years constituted the perfect atmosphere for the divisive concept of critical race theory to break through the walls of academia and find its expression in the streets of America.
By the end of Obama’s second term as president, a Rasmussen poll found that 60 percent of American voters thought race relations in the United States had worsened since President Obama’s election. A similar New York Times/CBS poll taken at the same time found that nearly 70 percent of Americans thought race relations in America were bad. This represented a level unseen since the 1992 Rodney King riots.
Critical race theory’s charge that America is a “systemically racist” country was powerful. Yet, those in Obama’s camp who were forward thinking knew that this grievance alone would not be enough to sustain their power base over time. Obama also recognized the limitations of this charge.
Identity Politics and Anti-Semitic Rhetoric
It was thus during his second term that Obama embraced the concept of identity politics. He began to push the idea of a “coalition of the oppressed.” The coalition included blacks, women (feminists), Hispanics, Muslims, indigenous and other “brown” people as well as those identifying as gay, lesbian, trans and a myriad of other emerging sexual identities – essentially all those granted victim status due to their oppression by the “Establishment.”
Jews were noticeably and pointedly not included.
In the 1960s, the “Establishment” was loosely defined as the structures of societal authority. By the early 21st century, those reviving the concept had a much more specific definition of their oppressors. Namely, “white supremacist colonial powers.” Those powers specifically included Jews, Zionists and Israelis, all of whom were now identified as white, European interlopers on land indigenous to “Palestinians” (a term previously used in common English to identify anyone living in British Mandate Palestine, Jews and Arabs alike).
Despite Sharia law’s treatment of gays, women and minorities, the coalition welcomed Islamist organizations. It did the same for radical Palestinian organizations, rebranding their violent tactics and support for terror conveniently as “resistance.”
Many of these organizations, such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), had already enjoyed victim status on college campuses. This was due to the successful mainstreaming of the “Zionism is racism” mantra, classic anti-Semitic rhetoric.
"Points of Unity"
When Nerdeen Kiswani, co-founder and former chair of New York City SJP (NYC SJP), began the radical Palestinian group Within Our Lifetime (WOL), it was with this broader “coalition of the oppressed” in mind. On a page titled “Points of Unity, “ WOL’s website reads,
“We are anti-Zionists. Zionism is a settler-colonial white supremacist ideology built on the genocide and dispossession of the Palestinian people.”
On the same page, WOL pledges its allegiance to
“all oppressed nationality people in the United States and around the world to engage in all forms of struggle in pursuit of freedom.”
One of WOL’s goals is to “Globalize the Intifada,” a strategy they employ to tie all “liberation” of “colonized and oppressed people” to persecution by the Jews – in WOL’s words, to “break free from the genocidal grip of U.S. imperialism and Zionism.”
Neveen Ayesh: A Case Study
Ayesh is a millennial Palestinian-American activist working as the government relations coordinator for the Missouri branch of American Muslims for Palestine, an extremist anti-Israel organization with links to terror groups and terror financiers. The Anti-Defamation League has accused AMP of “provid[ing] a platform for anti-Semitism.”
She was active on Twitter between 2011-2017 when she was between 18- to 24-years old. There, she openly and unabashedly expressed her vitriolic hatred of Jews and spewed anti-Semitic rhetoric. A sample of her rage from that period includes the following tweets:
“#crimesworthyoftherope being a Jew" ( August 4, 2011)
“I want to set Israel on fire with my own hands & watch it burn to ashes along with every Israeli in it. Call it what you want to call it idc" (February 17, 2014)
“I should join al-Qassam [Hamas’ terrorist wing]. Be the first female to join their group lololol #IdLoveToThough." (August 2, 2014)
Ayesh is now a political ally of Congresswoman Cori Bush (D-MO) and co-hosted a fundraiser for her. She also has political aspirations of her own and has toned down her anti-Semitic rhetoric.
Re-branding Anti-Semitic Rhetoric
Canary Mission recently called out Bush for her relationship with Ayesh (whose antisemitism was widely known). In an attempt at damage control, Ayesh responded with a long tweet thread, essentially excusing her antisemitism by re-branding it in the “language of the oppressed.”
After acknowledging that she had said “horrible things” about Jews and assuring us that she is really “not that person,” she blamed her hatred on the “chaos” she claims is part of the Palestinian experience.
“Chaos,” she says, “that no one seemed to - and still does not - care about because we’re brown. Muslims and Christian’s alike but we’re brown and Palestinian Arab.”
Ayesh says that after moving to the United States and going to college, she “learned how to assign academic terminology to what I had witnessed, experienced, & continue to experience at home & abroad. I became able to speak from an analytical and informative aspect rather than an emotional one of rage …”
Namely, what Ayesh learned was how to use anti-Semitic rhetoric effectively. Now, she labels Israel a “settler-colonialist white supremacy” entity. From this perspective, it then becomes legitimate to advocate for Israel’s total destruction.
Agendas Over Facts
Increasingly, agendas are more important to our populace than facts. This makes language a powerful tool in the arsenal of anti-Semites. It is particularly dangerous when used by radical groups like the New York-based Within Our Lifetime (WOL). These groups have successfully used venomous rhetoric to inspire physical attacks on Jews.
Last year, WOL activists sent Jews in New York to hospitals through their violent attacks. The group’s aggressive campaigns have been linked to the dramatic increase of attacks on Jews in the wider New York population.
Through equally anti-Semitic and venomous rhetoric, campus groups like Students for Justice in Palestine have successfully created atmospheres at U.S. universities where Jews are not only pushed out of student leadership positions but where Jewish students at large no longer feel safe on campus.
Like their Soviet predecessors, today’s anti-Semites rely on the “Big Lie” to sell their wares. Unfortunately, they are being sold to increasingly uneducated and gullible consumers.
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Today was Yom HaShoah, the day that Jews remember the Holocaust. The Holocaust was the industrialized genocide of the European Jewry by Nazi Germany and its collaborators from 1941-1945.
This is a really simple opening statement, but bear with me--I think it gets a lot more... 'yeah, buts' than most people may realize. And I think a good way of illuminating that is to break down the difference between how gentiles and Jews commemorate and remember it.
In my experience, gentiles seem to view the Holocaust as the ultimate example of mankind's barbarity to mankind. Like, the distillation of evil, the most obvious example of dehumanization and bigotry brought to its horrifying and extreme conclusion. They emphasize Nazi Germany's responsibility, elevate the instances of non-Jewish Frenchmen and Poles and Germans who made efforts to save Jewish lives, and generally view Nazi oppression as a catastrophe of whom Jews were one of many victims. And they emphasize the Allied Powers' role in ending it by liberating the camps and invading Germany. Hence why International Holocaust Remembrance Day falls on January 27th, the day Auschwitz was liberated.
But Jews have a different perspective.
We view the Holocaust as the most extreme manifestation of--but far from the conclusion to--mankind's barbarity to Jews. Not to his fellow man, per se, not to some universalized insert minority here slot, but to Jews, particularly and deliberately. The Nazis could never have accomplished their genocide were it not for the two millennia of anti-Jewish hatreds and dehumanization embedded deep in the institutions and political structures of European society. They didn't have to persuade Europe that the Jews were incurably evil, the Europeans already believed that. The Nazis had 99% of their work done before they'd even come to power, work that was done by the the Russian Empire, the Romans, Martin Luther, Christian Passion Plays, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the centuries of blood libels, the Fourth Lateran Council, the New Testament, the Spanish Empire, and on and on and on and on. It's as if some people think Hitler just woke up one day, out of the blue, with a total hatred of Jews and managed to use propaganda to convince the previously 100% tolerant Germans to hate Jews, too. Antisemitism did not begin or end with the Holocaust.
The sole responsibility of Nazi Germany in the Holocaust is also just... not true. Vichy France rounded up 13,152 Jews in the Vel' d'Hiv roundup, with not a single German participant, and sent them off to be murdered in Auschwitz. Vichy passed antisemitic legislation without any outside coercion--French Jews were hiding as much from the French police as they were from the Gestapo. France, of course, was the home of the Dreyfus Affair--antisemitism was and is a deep part of French society. And it isn't just France. Ukrainian nationalists participated in the Lviv pogroms, killing maybe around 8,000 Jews, Poles perpetrated the Jedwabne pogrom, and that doesn't even bring in that countries like the US, Switzerland and Ireland and Britain blocked Jewish emigrants, and I could just keep going on, but I think you get the point. Quite simply, six million Jews interspersed throughout Europe don't get murdered if it isn't without the collaboration of--or at minimum, silent assent and indifference--of all of their neighbors. The Nazis were the primary perpetrators of the Holocaust, of course, but almost all of Europe collaborated on some level, too. And this is a history that gets wiped away in favor of the comforting narrative of the Allied Powers bursting into Auschwitz, killing Nazis, and being horrified by what they've found, and then the poor people in the surrounding towns having NO IDEA about what had been going on. I think this narrative is why gentiles have International Holocaust Remembrance Day when Auschwitz was liberated--when they 'came to the rescue'--and why we have Yom HaShoah on the day in the Jewish calendar that the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began--when we died on our own terms in spite of our murderers.
Think of the tiny, unwritten, centuries old minhagim of small Jewish shetls and towns like Trochenbrod, which were entirely annihilated. The end of the burgeoning Yiddish cinema. Yiddish going from 13 million speakers to 600,000 today. See how many entries in this list of shetls end with "town/city survived, but all/most Jews exterminated." Imagine for a moment, the potential rabbis and scholars and actors and scientists and artists who could have lived, had they survived or been born of Jews did. Three and a half million Polish Jews, to around 15,000 to 20,000 Polish Jews today. Imagine if Thessaloniki were still a majority Jewish city. How many Jews worldwide would be alive today had the Holocaust never happened? I've heard estimations of 32 million, compared to the real life 16 million. To kill such a massive number of people from an already tiny minority group--that has real consequences. The cultural loss for the Jewish people is staggering and beyond human comprehension.
And yet, the Nazis deliberate targeting of us is, in many ways, being pushed aside. Magnus Hirschfeld was gay, yes, and advanced the Institute of Sexology way ahead of its time and yeah, the Nazis were homophobic. But they were homophobic for antisemitic reasons. They viewed his work as Jewish perversions BECAUSE Dr. Hirschfeld was Jewish. In fact, they viewed homosexuality as a creation of the Jews. But so many progressive queer people, especially those who run in antizionist circles, seem to be trying to co-opt the Holocaust as being their trauma, downplaying Hirschfeld's Jewishness and holding the Institute up as proof that queer people were the 'real' victims of the Holocaust, entirely shutting out the millions of Jews, Sinti, Roma, and Slavs who were murdered. You can also see this in anti-mask conservatives comparing masking mandates during the pandemic to anti-Jewish legislation in the Holocaust, or the comparisons of the ongoing war against Hamas as being a 'modern day Holocaust.'
This phenomenon, Holocaust universalization, gets so much pushback from Jews for a reason--it downplays the anti-Jewish character of the Holocaust. It's softcore Holocaust denial. And it's so ridiculous we even have to say that, as the whole point of the Holocaust was to be anti-Jewish, to be the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question." It's 'All Lives Mattering' the Holocaust. Holocaust universalization, and Holocaust inversion--the phenomenon of talking about Jews, Zionists, or Israelis as perpetrating a 'new Holocaust'--minimizes and trivializes the astounding damage and traumas and death and destruction wrought by the Holocaust. It's a polemical lie, so incendiary and so insulting--imagine telling a sexual assault survivor that they're morally no better than their rapist--that the only thing it can be is antisemitic. It is beyond reprehensible to talk like that, but it's so mainstream and acceptable to do it. Activists who say these things need to examine their own rhetoric, because it's dangerous, antisemitic, and adjacent to Holocaust denial. Not a place I think anyone should want to be.
The Holocaust is not a lesson Jews should have learned, an educational seminar, a 'card' Jews play, a choose your own adventure novel, a philosophical meditation on the nature of mankind's evils, or an empty slate upon which to project modern politics, warfare, or your ideology onto.
The Holocaust is, quite simply, the industrialized genocide of the European Jewry by Nazi Germany and its collaborators from 1941-1945. And today was Yom HaShoah, the day we remember that.
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