brennan
Argumentative Brit
My intention here is to discuss what makes a useful definition of anti-semitism and illustrate why many accusations of anti-semitism are unjustified, particularly in view of the barrage of smears against Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters within the Labour party.
A lot of the fuss in the UK Labour party over anti-semitism has been over the IHRA definition:
“Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”1
Honestly this seems like a fairly reasonable stab at the matter, if a bit verbose. Something more streamlined could easily be suggested but it gets to the nub of the matter – which is actual negative opinions/feelings about Jews (as a people). Wikipedia suggests a variety of similar statements offered by various sources over the years2 and many of them could apply to an y form of racism with little rewording.
An interesting element of this discussion is that while Labour is commonly said to not be using the definition, the actual definition as stated above has in fact been embraced and is repeated verbatim in Labour party documents (see the code of conduct3).
So why the fuss?
The answer is in the detail of course: Labour has not embraced all of the suggested examples of anti-semitism that accompany the IHRA definition and there is a fairly simple reason for this – they are mostly (7 out of 11) dedicated towards identifying criticisms of Israel as being (potentially) anti-semitic:
Numerous Jewish groups that are politically opposed to Israeli policies in the occupied areas and towards Palestinians in general point out the flaws in these examples, as does the man who wrote them6 and cautions users not to interpret them too rigidly. The problem is that the examples give legitimacy to the inaccurate notion that criticism of Israel is anti-semitic:
“The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which is increasingly being adopted or considered by western governments, is worded in such a way as to be easily adopted or considered by western governments to intentionally equate legitimate criticisms of Israel and advocacy for Palestinian rights with antisemitism, as a means to suppress the former.”4
“the United Kingdom's University and College Union (UCU), a trade union of English university professors, considered a motion to disassociate itself from the EUMC definition ... based on a belief that it 'confuses criticism of Israeli government policy and actions with genuine anti-Semitism'”5
“some of the recent allegations (such as charging pro-Israel Jewish students admission to a university event while allowing others to attend for free) might well raise a claim under Title VI, many others seek to silence anti-Israel discourse and speakers.”6
Two significant notes: the third quotation is part of a joint statement attributed partly to one of the drafters of the IHRA definition, Kenneth Stern and the IHRA definition was never endorsed by the organisation who commissioned it.
Stern goes on to point out an additional caveat:
“The “working definition” is a useful tool to identify statements that merit attention on campus, but deciding whether a given remark is antisemitic can require careful attention to rhetoric, context, and even intent. As the AAUP has suggested, even objectionable statements can have content worthy of debate. Most individual remarks, moreover, do not rise to the level of creating hostile environments.”
In other words, application of the examples requires, in his view, some nuance and a statement that contravenes them is not necessarily anti-semitic. In practice those who are keen to identify anti-semitism make zero attempt to apply any nuance at all, cynically breaking the principles laid down in the IHRA working definition itself.
A similar problem exists in the case of accusation of anti-semitism based upon criticism of individuals. In one prominent case7 a Labour party member raising a fairly common criticism of the Blairite/’Brownite right-wing of the party (that they are too friendly with the right-wing press in the UK) has been banned from the party, simply for making precisely the same (relatively benign) accusation about a Labour MP who happens to be Jewish. It makes no sense that a valid criticism of one person is considered automatically racist when directed at another person of a particular race.
The essential problem in defining anti-semitism in the current era is clear: real anti-Jewish racism is being conflated (sometimes deliberately) with criticism of an individual state that many people believe commits war crimes and atrocities, is an aggressive occupying force, and is considered by many to be inherently racist when judged by its own founding ethos and definition as ‘the Jewish State’. Legitimate criticism of Israel must be allowed by any objectively functional definition of anti-semitism and the same should be true of legitimate criticisms of individual Jewish people (or relatively small groups of Jewish people). If anti-semitism cannot be distinguished from legitimate criticism then the method being used to determine what is and is not anti-semitic is faulty.
I would suggest that there are some simple tests of what sort of accusations of anti-semitism are valid:
1) If it is a criticism of Israel that could be made of any other country in the same circumstances then the intent should not be inferred as anti-semitic.
Example: If someone criticises Iran for calling itself ‘the Islamic Republic’ then they are entitled to criticise Israel for calling itself ‘the Jewish State’. Both nomenclatures imply a discriminatory nature with one protected character given an implied primacy over others.
Example 2: If someone believes that US border guards are not entitled to shoot unarmed Mexicans for crossing the border, then they are perfectly entitled to criticise the IDF for shooting Palestinians for the crime of being near the Israeli border.
Example 3: Criticism of the Israeli occupation of Palestine is readily legitimised by criticism of any other occupation8, e.g. occupation of Northern Cyprus by Turkey.
Note that all of the above criticisms are routinely held by supporters of Israeli policy to be ‘holding Israel to a standard not expected by other countries’ – an obvious untruth and demonstration of the cynicism of many accusations of anti-semitism.
2) If it is a criticism of a Jewish person (or collective of similar Jewish persons) that can validly be made of other, non-Jewish groups or persons, then the intent should not be inferred as anti-semitic.
Example: The Koch brothers and other prominent lobbying groups are frequently criticised for having too much political influence in the United States because of their wealth/connections and/or the amount they spend on political lobbying. It would be perfectly legitimate to make such an accusation against a Jewish person, such as George Soros, or pro-Israeli organisation, such as AIPAC, providing the accuser is not being inconsistent.
Example 2: If I think Tony Blair was too cosy with the Telegraph then I am entitled to hold the same opinion of Ruth Smeeth without being accused of anti-semitism.
3) If application of the accusation routinely identifies Jews and Jewish organisations as being anti-semitic then it is clearly worthless. This should be obvious and it applies to most attempts to categorise an anti-Israel stance as anti-semitic. There are Jewish individuals and organisations (some of them inside Israel) that describe Israeli policies as racist for example:
“we have a law that confirms the Arab population as second-class citizens. It follows that this is a very clear form of apartheid. I don’t think the Jewish people lived for 20 centuries, mostly through persecution and enduring endless cruelties, in order to become the oppressors, inflicting cruelty on others. This new law does exactly that. Therefore, I am ashamed of being an Israeli today.”
There are also comparisons with Nazis and Nazi Germany, made by Israeli Jews:
“we see not just a growing Israeli fascism but racism akin to Nazism in its early stages.”10
Criticisms like these should draw serious introspection from supporters of heavily criticised Israeli actions and policies, not accusations of anti-semitism. In a notable recent incident Jeremy Corbyn was accused of being at an anti-semitic event because the speaker made nazi comparisons – the gentleman in question was actually an elderly Jewish survivor of Auschwitz, making the accusation totally absurd in every respect.11
These examples demonstrate the hollowness of more of the IHRA examples. The numbers of people who see worrying parallels between the Israel/Palestine conflict and the traumatic history of the Jews that led to the foundation of Israel is growing and should not be ignored or covered up by false and unjustifiable claims or racism.
Let’s be clear: anti-semitism is definitely present in the Western democracies, no one should ever try to claim that it isn’t. But it is nowhere near as prevalent as commonly claimed. In particular it is not a prevalent problem on the left – and the accusation that this is the case is most commonly made by those who simultaneously make soothing noises about how legitimate criticism of Israel is allowed, but who appear in practice to never make much effort to actually make this distinction, being only too happy to throw around the anti-semitism charge willy-nilly, even if they are accusing actual Jews of Jew-hating (see again, the Hajo Meyer case11.)
Polls regularly demonstrate that what are somewhat loosely described as ‘anti-semitic attitudes’ are more commonplace in the political right than the left12, although for some reason some of the organisations that publish this research make much more effort to publicise concern about alleged anti-semitism on the left than real anti-semitism on the right. Somewhat more discerning studies13 have shown that when anti-Israel opinion is distinguished from anti-semitic attitudes then a clear division emerges: the far left is mainly anti-Israel and less anti-semitic, while the far right is pro-Israel but significantly more anti-semitic.
Seen in the light of all this the complaints about anti-semitism in the left are revealed for what they are: smoke and mirrors. Almost every complaint of anti-semitism fades away under close scrutiny with individuals accused of antisemitism actually found guilty merely of ‘bringing the party into disrepute’ for bringing up contentious subjects14; the targeting of Jewish individuals who criticise Israel is also evident in the smear campaign15, which many people on the left see as merely the continuation of a two year campaign across the British media to trash Jeremy Corbyn16, 17.
In truth, neither Corbyn, nor the left in general have an anti-semitism problem and the Jewish community in the UK is being whipped up into a panic that disguises the real problem, which is very minor in the UK as a whole13. Poor identification of real anti-semitism is the principle culprit in this – and not just in the UK, but globally, with large amounts of legitimate criticism being incorrectly identified as anti-semitism, to the extent that there is some truly jaw-dropping hyperbole18.
Real anti-semitism was responsible for one of the worst crimes in history. Let’s not do a disservice to the living and the dead by pretending that the UK is Nazi Germany.
http://normanfinkelstein.com/2018/0...e-you-havent-a-clue-what-youre-talking-about/
1. https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/working-definition-antisemitism
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism#Definition
3. https://cst.org.uk/public/data/file/5/0/NEC code of conduct Antisemitism.pdf
4. https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/blog/global-jewish-statement-on-defining-antisemitism/
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Definition_of_Antisemitism#cite_note-Marcus21-12
6. https://www.aaup.org/news/cary-nels...-open-letter-campus-antisemitism#.W4hPKuhKiUm
7. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...eport-ruth-smeeth-jeremy-corbyn-a8325261.html
8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_occupations
9. https://www.theguardian.com/comment...st-new-law-ashamed-apartheid-daniel-barenboim
10. https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.pr...m-and-a-racism-akin-to-early-nazism-1.5746488
11. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hajo_Meyer
12. https://antisemitism.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Antisemitism-Barometer-2017.pdf
13. http://www.jpr.org.uk/documents/JPR.2017.Antisemitism_in_contemporary_Great_Britain.pdf
14. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...mitism-hitler-claims-complaints-a8234621.html
15. https://www.brightonandhovenews.org/2018/02/18/labour-expels-controversial-brighton-member/
16. http://www.lse.ac.uk/media-and-comm...rch-projects/representations-of-jeremy-corbyn
17. https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petiti...ount-for-it-s-smear-campaign-on-jeremy-corbyn
18. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...apers-chronicle-ihra-definition-a8464311.html
A lot of the fuss in the UK Labour party over anti-semitism has been over the IHRA definition:
“Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”1
Honestly this seems like a fairly reasonable stab at the matter, if a bit verbose. Something more streamlined could easily be suggested but it gets to the nub of the matter – which is actual negative opinions/feelings about Jews (as a people). Wikipedia suggests a variety of similar statements offered by various sources over the years2 and many of them could apply to an y form of racism with little rewording.
An interesting element of this discussion is that while Labour is commonly said to not be using the definition, the actual definition as stated above has in fact been embraced and is repeated verbatim in Labour party documents (see the code of conduct3).
So why the fuss?
The answer is in the detail of course: Labour has not embraced all of the suggested examples of anti-semitism that accompany the IHRA definition and there is a fairly simple reason for this – they are mostly (7 out of 11) dedicated towards identifying criticisms of Israel as being (potentially) anti-semitic:
Spoiler :
Numerous Jewish groups that are politically opposed to Israeli policies in the occupied areas and towards Palestinians in general point out the flaws in these examples, as does the man who wrote them6 and cautions users not to interpret them too rigidly. The problem is that the examples give legitimacy to the inaccurate notion that criticism of Israel is anti-semitic:
“The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which is increasingly being adopted or considered by western governments, is worded in such a way as to be easily adopted or considered by western governments to intentionally equate legitimate criticisms of Israel and advocacy for Palestinian rights with antisemitism, as a means to suppress the former.”4
“the United Kingdom's University and College Union (UCU), a trade union of English university professors, considered a motion to disassociate itself from the EUMC definition ... based on a belief that it 'confuses criticism of Israeli government policy and actions with genuine anti-Semitism'”5
“some of the recent allegations (such as charging pro-Israel Jewish students admission to a university event while allowing others to attend for free) might well raise a claim under Title VI, many others seek to silence anti-Israel discourse and speakers.”6
Two significant notes: the third quotation is part of a joint statement attributed partly to one of the drafters of the IHRA definition, Kenneth Stern and the IHRA definition was never endorsed by the organisation who commissioned it.
Stern goes on to point out an additional caveat:
“The “working definition” is a useful tool to identify statements that merit attention on campus, but deciding whether a given remark is antisemitic can require careful attention to rhetoric, context, and even intent. As the AAUP has suggested, even objectionable statements can have content worthy of debate. Most individual remarks, moreover, do not rise to the level of creating hostile environments.”
In other words, application of the examples requires, in his view, some nuance and a statement that contravenes them is not necessarily anti-semitic. In practice those who are keen to identify anti-semitism make zero attempt to apply any nuance at all, cynically breaking the principles laid down in the IHRA working definition itself.
A similar problem exists in the case of accusation of anti-semitism based upon criticism of individuals. In one prominent case7 a Labour party member raising a fairly common criticism of the Blairite/’Brownite right-wing of the party (that they are too friendly with the right-wing press in the UK) has been banned from the party, simply for making precisely the same (relatively benign) accusation about a Labour MP who happens to be Jewish. It makes no sense that a valid criticism of one person is considered automatically racist when directed at another person of a particular race.
The essential problem in defining anti-semitism in the current era is clear: real anti-Jewish racism is being conflated (sometimes deliberately) with criticism of an individual state that many people believe commits war crimes and atrocities, is an aggressive occupying force, and is considered by many to be inherently racist when judged by its own founding ethos and definition as ‘the Jewish State’. Legitimate criticism of Israel must be allowed by any objectively functional definition of anti-semitism and the same should be true of legitimate criticisms of individual Jewish people (or relatively small groups of Jewish people). If anti-semitism cannot be distinguished from legitimate criticism then the method being used to determine what is and is not anti-semitic is faulty.
I would suggest that there are some simple tests of what sort of accusations of anti-semitism are valid:
1) If it is a criticism of Israel that could be made of any other country in the same circumstances then the intent should not be inferred as anti-semitic.
Example: If someone criticises Iran for calling itself ‘the Islamic Republic’ then they are entitled to criticise Israel for calling itself ‘the Jewish State’. Both nomenclatures imply a discriminatory nature with one protected character given an implied primacy over others.
Example 2: If someone believes that US border guards are not entitled to shoot unarmed Mexicans for crossing the border, then they are perfectly entitled to criticise the IDF for shooting Palestinians for the crime of being near the Israeli border.
Example 3: Criticism of the Israeli occupation of Palestine is readily legitimised by criticism of any other occupation8, e.g. occupation of Northern Cyprus by Turkey.
Note that all of the above criticisms are routinely held by supporters of Israeli policy to be ‘holding Israel to a standard not expected by other countries’ – an obvious untruth and demonstration of the cynicism of many accusations of anti-semitism.
2) If it is a criticism of a Jewish person (or collective of similar Jewish persons) that can validly be made of other, non-Jewish groups or persons, then the intent should not be inferred as anti-semitic.
Example: The Koch brothers and other prominent lobbying groups are frequently criticised for having too much political influence in the United States because of their wealth/connections and/or the amount they spend on political lobbying. It would be perfectly legitimate to make such an accusation against a Jewish person, such as George Soros, or pro-Israeli organisation, such as AIPAC, providing the accuser is not being inconsistent.
Example 2: If I think Tony Blair was too cosy with the Telegraph then I am entitled to hold the same opinion of Ruth Smeeth without being accused of anti-semitism.
3) If application of the accusation routinely identifies Jews and Jewish organisations as being anti-semitic then it is clearly worthless. This should be obvious and it applies to most attempts to categorise an anti-Israel stance as anti-semitic. There are Jewish individuals and organisations (some of them inside Israel) that describe Israeli policies as racist for example:
“we have a law that confirms the Arab population as second-class citizens. It follows that this is a very clear form of apartheid. I don’t think the Jewish people lived for 20 centuries, mostly through persecution and enduring endless cruelties, in order to become the oppressors, inflicting cruelty on others. This new law does exactly that. Therefore, I am ashamed of being an Israeli today.”
There are also comparisons with Nazis and Nazi Germany, made by Israeli Jews:
“we see not just a growing Israeli fascism but racism akin to Nazism in its early stages.”10
Criticisms like these should draw serious introspection from supporters of heavily criticised Israeli actions and policies, not accusations of anti-semitism. In a notable recent incident Jeremy Corbyn was accused of being at an anti-semitic event because the speaker made nazi comparisons – the gentleman in question was actually an elderly Jewish survivor of Auschwitz, making the accusation totally absurd in every respect.11
These examples demonstrate the hollowness of more of the IHRA examples. The numbers of people who see worrying parallels between the Israel/Palestine conflict and the traumatic history of the Jews that led to the foundation of Israel is growing and should not be ignored or covered up by false and unjustifiable claims or racism.
Let’s be clear: anti-semitism is definitely present in the Western democracies, no one should ever try to claim that it isn’t. But it is nowhere near as prevalent as commonly claimed. In particular it is not a prevalent problem on the left – and the accusation that this is the case is most commonly made by those who simultaneously make soothing noises about how legitimate criticism of Israel is allowed, but who appear in practice to never make much effort to actually make this distinction, being only too happy to throw around the anti-semitism charge willy-nilly, even if they are accusing actual Jews of Jew-hating (see again, the Hajo Meyer case11.)
Polls regularly demonstrate that what are somewhat loosely described as ‘anti-semitic attitudes’ are more commonplace in the political right than the left12, although for some reason some of the organisations that publish this research make much more effort to publicise concern about alleged anti-semitism on the left than real anti-semitism on the right. Somewhat more discerning studies13 have shown that when anti-Israel opinion is distinguished from anti-semitic attitudes then a clear division emerges: the far left is mainly anti-Israel and less anti-semitic, while the far right is pro-Israel but significantly more anti-semitic.
Seen in the light of all this the complaints about anti-semitism in the left are revealed for what they are: smoke and mirrors. Almost every complaint of anti-semitism fades away under close scrutiny with individuals accused of antisemitism actually found guilty merely of ‘bringing the party into disrepute’ for bringing up contentious subjects14; the targeting of Jewish individuals who criticise Israel is also evident in the smear campaign15, which many people on the left see as merely the continuation of a two year campaign across the British media to trash Jeremy Corbyn16, 17.
In truth, neither Corbyn, nor the left in general have an anti-semitism problem and the Jewish community in the UK is being whipped up into a panic that disguises the real problem, which is very minor in the UK as a whole13. Poor identification of real anti-semitism is the principle culprit in this – and not just in the UK, but globally, with large amounts of legitimate criticism being incorrectly identified as anti-semitism, to the extent that there is some truly jaw-dropping hyperbole18.
Real anti-semitism was responsible for one of the worst crimes in history. Let’s not do a disservice to the living and the dead by pretending that the UK is Nazi Germany.
http://normanfinkelstein.com/2018/0...e-you-havent-a-clue-what-youre-talking-about/
1. https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/working-definition-antisemitism
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisemitism#Definition
3. https://cst.org.uk/public/data/file/5/0/NEC code of conduct Antisemitism.pdf
4. https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/blog/global-jewish-statement-on-defining-antisemitism/
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_Definition_of_Antisemitism#cite_note-Marcus21-12
6. https://www.aaup.org/news/cary-nels...-open-letter-campus-antisemitism#.W4hPKuhKiUm
7. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...eport-ruth-smeeth-jeremy-corbyn-a8325261.html
8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_occupations
9. https://www.theguardian.com/comment...st-new-law-ashamed-apartheid-daniel-barenboim
10. https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.pr...m-and-a-racism-akin-to-early-nazism-1.5746488
11. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hajo_Meyer
12. https://antisemitism.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Antisemitism-Barometer-2017.pdf
13. http://www.jpr.org.uk/documents/JPR.2017.Antisemitism_in_contemporary_Great_Britain.pdf
14. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...mitism-hitler-claims-complaints-a8234621.html
15. https://www.brightonandhovenews.org/2018/02/18/labour-expels-controversial-brighton-member/
16. http://www.lse.ac.uk/media-and-comm...rch-projects/representations-of-jeremy-corbyn
17. https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petiti...ount-for-it-s-smear-campaign-on-jeremy-corbyn
18. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...apers-chronicle-ihra-definition-a8464311.html
