{"id":256796,"date":"2024-03-11T12:00:06","date_gmt":"2024-03-11T12:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=256796"},"modified":"2024-03-08T07:22:00","modified_gmt":"2024-03-08T07:22:00","slug":"how-the-fight-against-antisemitism-became-a-shield-for-israels-genocide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2024\/03\/how-the-fight-against-antisemitism-became-a-shield-for-israels-genocide\/","title":{"rendered":"How the \u2018Fight against Antisemitism\u2019 Became a Shield for Israel\u2019s Genocide"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Western capitals no longer treat Israel like a state, a political actor capable of slaughtering children, but rather as a sacred cause. So any opposition has to be a blasphemy<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

7 Mar 2024 <\/em>– If you read the establishment media, you might conclude that a serious battle is being waged by Israel and its most ardent supporters to tackle an apparent new wave of antisemitism in the West.<\/p>\n

In article after article, we are told how Israel and western Jewish leadership bodies are demanding our concern, and outrage, at a rise in anti-Jewish hate<\/a>\u00a0incidents. Organisations such as the Community Security Trust\u00a0in the UK and the Anti-Defamation League in the US produce lengthy reports<\/a> on the relentless increase in antisemitism, especially since 7 October, and warn that action is urgently required.<\/p>\n

Undoubtedly, there is a real threat of antisemitism and, as ever, it comes largely from the far right. Israel\u2019s actions \u2013 and its false claim to be representing all Jews \u2013 only help to stoke it.<\/p>\n

This moral panic is transparently self-serving. It directs our attention away from the pressing, all-too-concrete evidence that Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza \u2013 one that has slaughtered and maimed many tens of thousands of innocents.<\/p>\n

It redirects our attention instead towards tenuous claims of a deepening antisemitism crisis, one whose tangible effects appear limited and for which the evidence is all too clearly exaggerated.<\/p>\n

After all, a rise in \u201cJew hatred\u201d is all but inevitable if you redefine antisemitism, as western officials have recently done via the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance\u2019s new definition<\/a>, to include antipathy towards Israel \u2013 and at the moment when Israel appears, even to the World Court, to be carrying out a genocide<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The logic of Israel and its supporters runs something like this:<\/p>\n

Many more people than usual are expressing hatred of Israel, the self-declared state of the Jewish people. There is no reason to hate Israel unless you hate what it represents, which is Jews. Therefore, antisemitism is on the rise.<\/p>\n

This argument makes sense to most Israelis, to its partisans, and to the overwhelming majority of western politicians and career-minded establishment journalists. That is: the very same people who interpret calls for equality in historic Palestine<\/a> \u2013 \u201cfrom the river to the sea\u201d \u2013 as a demand for a genocide against Jews.<\/p>\n

The singer Charlotte Church, for example, found herself accused of antisemitism by the entire establishment media after a \u201cpro-Palestinian chant\u201d to raise money for Gaza\u2019s children being starved by an Israeli aid blockade. The offending song<\/a> had included the lyric \u201cFrom the river to the sea\u201d, calling for the liberation of Palestinians from decades of Israeli oppression.<\/p>\n

At the weekend, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt once again suggested<\/a> marches calling for a ceasefire were antisemitic because they supposedly \u201cintimidated\u201d Jews. In fact, Jews are prominent at those marches. He was referring to Zionists who excuse the slaughter in Gaza.<\/p>\n

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A BBC News correspondent tried to stop me from calling Israel's onslaught on Gaza a genocide because it might "offend" people.<\/p>\n

Since when did we worry about "offending" g\u00e9nocidaires? I will never accept such attempts at censorship. pic.twitter.com\/RLkIRU4Zmz<\/a><\/p>\n

— Chris Williamson (@DerbyChrisW) March 1, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n