Skip to content or view screen version

Journalist accuses the Left of anti-semitism

Melanie Phillips, Daily Mail Columnist | 17.03.2004 19:10

This is the right-wing Melanie Phillips, columnist for the Daily Mail, speaking about a new anti-semitism that is emerging....apparently

"Let us all agree on one thing at least. The more Jews warn that anti-Semitism has come roaring out of the closet, the more people don't like the Jews. Which is a bit of a problem if you believe, as I do, that the oldest hatred has indeed alarmingly resurfaced but is hiding under the respectable skirts of hostility to Israel.
This week, the European Union finally admitted there was a problem with rising Jew-hatred. While there was no comparison with the Holocaust, said European Commission President Romano Prodi, some criticism of Israel was 'inspired by what amounts to anti-Semitic sentiments and prejudice'. Yesterday, the Community Security Trust, a Jewish charity, reported the second largest rise in 20 years in attacks on synagogues, cemeteries and Jewish people in Britain.

Yet there were immediate moans in the press of 'grossly exaggerated' warnings about rising anti-Semitism. In an Economist debate at London's Institute of Contemporary Arts last week, those issuing such warnings were accused of being the 'new McCarthyites', waving the shroud of the Holocaust to stifle legitimate criticism of Israel.

So when a woman said to me one evening, 'I hate the Jews', I should have dismissed my shock as a 'grossly exaggerated' response. When I was listed in a newspaper as one of the Jews exercising sinister control over public debate in Britain, I should have said I brought this on myself by writing anything at all.

When I heard claims by a radio reporter that the Jews might have 'poisoned the water wells of Egypt' in 1947, I should not have wondered why one of the stock libels of medieval Jew-hatred was being broadcast as if it were true, since my concern was obviously shroud-waving.

And when in the ICA debate Tory MP Robert Jackson accused British Jews of dual loyalty, saying their Britishness was conditional on their explicit repudiation of the policies of Sharon, it was obvious the reason he was singling out the Jews as second-class citizens in this startling way was because they are McCarthyites.

Let's all agree on something else. Some Jews grossly over-react to perceived anti-Semitic bias. Their campaign of insults is as bad as the kind of insults which wing their way with monotonous regularity to me.

Nevertheless, as Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks told the EU conference, an unholy alliance between the Left, the far-Right and the Islamic street means millions are being told that alone among nations, Israel has no right to exist and that all the troubles of the world are the work of the Jews.

At the heart of this bitter disagreement is the conflation of the issue of Israel with the issue of Jew-hatred. The latter claim maddens people who feel they can't criticise Israel without risking being accused of anti-Jewish prejudice. The two, they say, are not connected. In theory, that's true. In practice, one issue often morphs into the other, both implicitly in the way Israel is described and explicitly in overt Jew-hatred.

Criticism of Israel is certainly legitimate, as is criticism of any country. I am myself critical of its policies. But a line has been crossed into something else - the demonisation and dehumanisation of Israel based on systematic lies, libels and distortions. As a result, a lot of decent people have been unwittingly caught up in a narrative of hatred.

Former Sunday Times editor Sir Harold Evans tried to show where that line should be drawn. It was not anti-Semitic, he said, to report Israeli ill-treatment of Palestinians or Sharon's past, or to deplore the long occupation of the territories. It was anti-Semitic to present Israel as diabolical, to invent malignant outrages, to condemn actions by Israel while not condemning worse elsewhere, and to vilify Jews so as to incite violence.

In all four categories, that line has been crossed. Diabolical? Israel is routinely described falsely as an apartheid or, worse, Nazi state. While its society is far from perfect, Arab Israelis not only have the vote but serve in the Knesset, supreme court and army. To label it 'Nazi' is to delegitimise it.

Malevolent outrages? Look at the so-called 'massacre' of Jenin, which has become an accepted fact even though there was no massacre: 23 Israeli soldiers and 52 mostly armed Palestinians died in that incident. There are some appalling and inexcusable incidents in Israel. But that doesn't explain why Israeli self-defence is systematically and falsely represented as malevolent aggression.

Double standards? British academics try to impose boycotts on Israeli universities. Yet they organised no boycotts against Kuwait, which expelled 350,000 Palestinians in 1991; or Jordan, which murdered tens of thousands of Palestinians; or Syria, which has occupied Lebanon. And increasingly, people are saying Israel should not exist at all, thus singling it out alone for destruction.

Inciting violence? People such as Lib Dem MP Jenny Tonge have come close to excusing the mass murder of Israelis in a manner they would never apply to the mass murder of other peoples.

Coverage of Israel is obsessive and disproportionate, and marked by a hysteria and malice not applied to any other conflict. And it cannot be divorced from the overt Jew-hatred that has now surfaced in Britain and Europe, particularly the give-away calumny of world Jewish power. The claim that Jews conspire to dominate the world is one of the oldest tropes of classic Jew-hatred. Astonishingly, claims made by the European Left are not far removed. It repeats claims that the 'powerful Jewish lobby' is now running American foreign policy. When Labour MP Tam Dalyell observed that a 'cabal' of Jewish power was behind Blair, he was thought a loveable eccentric. In the House of Lords, a meeting heard that Jews control the British media. One peer told a Jewish colleague: 'We've finished off Saddam. Your lot are next.'

The outcome is that an astonishing axis has developed between Islamic Jew-haters and the Left, marching behind the banners of 'human rights' on demonstrations in Europe producing chants of 'Hamas, Hamas, all Jews to the gas'.

Why? The main reason is ignorance of both the Middle East's history and its present. Next, the Left's hatred of Sharon is so great, along with its prejudice that America/the West is the oppressor and therefore the Islamic/Third World the victim, that it can't see what is happening.

Then there's the Left's deconstruction of the very concepts of objectivity and truth, so that it has become a conduit instead for propaganda and lies; and finally, its own history of Jew-hatred from Marx onwards. The final twist is that there are some Jews on the Left who subscribe to all the above too.

Former Archbishop Desmond Tutu said people were scared to say the Jewish lobby in America was powerful. So what? he asked. 'The apartheid government was very powerful but today it no longer exists. Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Pinochet, Milosevic and Idi Amin were all powerful, but in the end they bit the dust.'

So Jews not only have vast power, according to Tutu, but are on a par with those tyrants. Yet it was Tutu who could publish this calumny about the Jewish people, and thus incite yet more to hate them. But of course, any Jews who call this by its proper name are the new McCarthyites."

· Melanie Phillips is a Daily Mail columnist

Melanie Phillips, Daily Mail Columnist

Comments

Hide the following 11 comments

she is right

17.03.2004 21:10

she is 100 percent right. Big up Melanie!!

david


why is this being posted?

17.03.2004 21:54

This is the Indymedia website; why are your reposting mainstream newspaper stuff? If I wanted to read the Daily Mail, I'd buy that newspaper. All it does is make your own protestations look part of a enbittered agenda.

Anyway, if attempts to criticise what the STATE of Israel do, as opposed to jewishness, were not so regularly met with cries of anti-semitism, then the issues raised in this article would not arise near as much. In other words, the problem is being partly fed by those to try to abuse the sensitivities surrounding anti-semitism by applying this label to those who criticise right wing Israeli politics.

It is this approach more than anything which is leading to the unfortunte blurring of the distinction between disagreement with Israeli political policy and anti-semitism. If you are really concerned about this, then you should be tackling this issue.

This is not to say that I agree with anti-semitism or seek to justify it's existance; I vehemently oppose it, but I also oppose the right wing policies of the Israeli government. I do seek however, to point out that there is more than one body politic to blame in this situation, and both deserve criticism.

FtP


The daily mail actually make a point for once???

18.03.2004 09:37

As much as i despise the daily mail and its conservatism, she has a point, sections of the MAB/SWP alliance do contain anti-semetic elements. And our toleration for them has spread a kind of mild xenophobia, why for example are certain sections of the left constantly focusing on israel? Its become a fixation for some, that utterly distracts from the realities of the global class struggle, by diverting it along nationalist lines.

(I mean fuck it, the left barricaded marks and spencer for their behaviour, what the fuck?, why would any serious leftist be shopping in marks and spencer anyway??)

If you allow people to shout slogans like victory to the intifada which is basically a rallying cry of the palestinian bourgeoisie (yes they most definitely DO exist you 'anti-west' type morons) or simply kowtow to the bourgeoisie of arab nations then yes, you are tolerating anti-semitism

Its hardly suprising, if you provide a platform for ractionary fascists then what do you expect.

No war but the class war, victory to the PROLETARIAN REVOLUTION

nobody68


Conflict of Loyalty

18.03.2004 10:24

"And when in the ICA debate Tory MP Robert Jackson accused British Jews of dual loyalty, saying their Britishness was conditional on their explicit repudiation of the policies of Sharon, it was obvious the reason he was singling out the Jews as second-class citizens in this startling way was because they are McCarthyites."

Does that make sense? There is an obvious potential conflict of loyalty in British Jews who support Israel. There are British Jews who do not. And there are some who were so torn that they abandoned their religion.

Although Religion is the most potent detonator for civil conflict, are they wise to abandon their religion? Is it that the Rabbis are neglecting the individual's personal relationship with God and not showing how everyone connects into the web of Life and depends on it?

Everyone seems to have missed that we are already living in Heaven - and really messing it up.

Darkerloud


Daily Mail columnist not telling the truth shock!

18.03.2004 11:46

Just for any of our non-UK readers who might believe any of that rubbish:

- The Daily Mail is the most frothingly right-wing daily paper in the UK, regularly whipping up racist frenzies against asylum seekers, so much so that the Fascist British National Party now have a slogan 'Vote BNP, Read the Daily Mail'.

(And worth remembering when the Mail levels accusations of anti-semitism at others that in the 1930s it initially backed Hitler!)

- I have been on plenty of anti-war protests and never heard anti-Jewish slogans. Pro-Palestinian yes, often, anti-Israel yes, sometimes. Anti-Jewish, no, never. No-one on the UK left would stand for anti-semitism any more than any other racism.

- And for the record, the allegation that Marx hated Jews is a bit odd.. Marx was Jewish.

kurious


hey mr nobody..

18.03.2004 12:29

You ask 'why for example are certain sections of the left constantly focusing on israel?'

Because it happens to be the key to understanding why there is so much war in the world.

You say'If you allow people to shout slogans like victory to the intifada which is basically a rallying cry of the palestinian bourgeoisie (yes they most definitely DO exist you 'anti-west' type morons) or simply kowtow to the bourgeoisie of arab nations then yes, you are tolerating anti-semitism '.

Of course there is a small Palestinian bourgeoise but it is not the driving force behind the al-aqsa intifada which includes everyone of all classes resisting a brutal occupation. Bourgeois aspirations for national statehood are secondary in the intifada to basic and rightfull self-protection against the Israeli genocidal killing machine. Go see for yourself!

Even so those-westerners- who 'kowtow to the bourgeoisie of arab nations' are no more anti-semites than those who kowtow to the bourgeoisie of any other nation. You seem to equate 'arab'and 'bourgeoisie' with 'anti semite'which is a strange logic that can only be described as racist and kowtows to the racism of the the Israeli bourgeoisie.

Finally you say

'Its hardly suprising, if you provide a platform for ractionary[sic] fascists then what do you expect.'

Its easy to try and cover up your own racist logic with this kind of abuse but it does not work.

Who is giving a platform to reactionary fascists? You are.



.


being anti-zionist is not the sama as being anti-jewish

18.03.2004 13:05

USA is the biggest doner of money to isreal, isn't that telling. the support for isreal is purely imperialistic by nature.to keep an eye on all of those Arab nations which happen to have a lot of lovely oil.

somebody should tell nobody68 (embarressment for class war supporters or what) being anti zionist is totally different to being against jew. Also why is the tooser siding with the right wing shit bags of the daily mail in having a go at the left and the anti war movement.

is nobody68 really asupporter of class war or being ironic/stupid?


red letter


My original point

18.03.2004 14:11

The reason the left is in support of the Palestinians is because they view Israel as an illegal occupier, which it is.

It also views it as a US-backed racist regime, which it is.

In 1919, Lenin said “The socialist revolution will not be only or chiefly a struggle of the revolutionary proletarians in each country against its bourgeoisie – no, it will be a struggle of all colonies and countries oppressed by imperialism, of all dependent countries, against international imperialism.”

Matt
mail e-mail: mattkidd12@aol.com


MF

18.03.2004 18:37

Melanie Phillips is one of the most disgraceful journalists in Britain today. She's a fuckin joke, and deserves to be treated accordingly. Put a big fat spliff in her racist mouth and tell her to suck on that.

Krop


anti-semitic left? hardly!

18.03.2004 21:20

a few things that ms phillips (a notoriously reactionary zionist who was only too happy to meet and greet the war criminal sharon on his visit to london last summer) seems to have missed:

1) is this anti-semitic left, the same one that opposed nazism in the 30's and 40's, and has always drawn attention to the plight of jews who have suffered from persecution?

2) has she forgotten that her paper, the daily mail, is traditionally the most anti-semitic daily in britain?

3) israel is the focus because of the absurd level of backing it receives from america, which includes allowing it to constantly flout international law (that's a lot more breached un resolutions than iraq); because it goes around claiming to be a democracy yet practices policies of apartheid, torture and ethnic cleansing; because its whole existence is on land stolen on their behalf by the british army; because it has nuclear weapons; and because it is now the scene of a genuine popular uprising - the intifada gives hope to all oppressed peoples.


i am a left wing jew myself and am sick and tired of the anti-semitism card being wheeled out as a defence for the indefensible. thankfully, people in the west are finally seeing through the lies of israel.

swp andy


Don't look now, but moslems are involved in every war on the planet

19.03.2004 00:09

"Because it happens to be the key to understanding why there is so much war in the world. "

Let me get this straight...THE JEWS are the only people to EVER offer peace to the palestinians (Arabs generally just kill them, put them in camps, or expell them)...so, that is the key to war in this world?? So, if there weren't any JEWS , and israel didn't exist...there would be universal peace. There's a common denominator that you are purposely ignoring...every country that borders a mslem nation, or which has a sizeable moslem minority...is at WAR!
If Israel disappeared today, then tomorrow, Moslems wouldn't be blowing up Aussies in Bali. Pakistan would all of a sudden join India in a group hug. We'd all be sitting around together singing Kumbaya...

Distraction and deflection