Angered Swiss Zionists demand explanations

Di | 05.01.2005 14:42 | Anti-racism

JEWS in Switzerland are reportedly "outraged" at a passage in the government's new extremist report that refers to Jewish extremism in the country.

A delegation of the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities is calling for an explanation when it meets Justice Minister Christoph Blocher on January 18.

"There is no Jewish extremism here. There are armed security people here and there at Jewish institutions.

But it is completely legal and is carried out at places where unfortunately the state is not in a position to look after our security," commented Alfred Donath, president of the Federation.

"But these people are not militant Jews. The accusation of extremism is totally false," he added.

In the latest amended version of the report on extremism, there is a passage which reads that "anti-Semitic action could lead to Jewish extremism prepared for violence."

Cannot understand
In an interview with the "NZZ am Sonntag" newspaper, Donath says he cannot understand why the passage is still in the corrected version of the report.

"We would like to know that too! Is it dilettantism or bad will? A delegation of Swiss Jews will visit the minister responsible, Justice Minister Christoph Blocher, on January 18 for clarification on this issue," commented Donath.

He told the newspaper that the federation would be asking for the entire passage referring to Jewish extremism to be taken out of the report.

Asked whether there were not Swiss Jews who took radical positions, Donath explained that the spectrum of opinions about the Middle East situation was "naturally large", both among Swiss Jews and the rest of the Swiss population.

"But to construe from that we have an extremism prepared for violence is completely unfounded," he said.

Comments

Hide the following 4 comments

Yes

05.01.2005 15:38

I am an anti-Zionist and to be honest this sort of thing is not uncommon. For example, in Sydney whenever Jewish-school children are being transported there is often a lead car and a tail car. Unmarked and armed to the teeth.

St Ives Synagogue reportedly has a cache of automatic weapons “1 minute away”.

I often wondered why Sydney’s large Lebanese population never ever ever made even the slightest gesture of hostility towards local Zionists. I put it down to their good nature and good sense. This may only be half the story.

Can you blame the Jews for being armed? Their government has practiced apartheid so they are about as popular as an Afrikaner in a township.

Alas, Zionism poisons everything.

Yes

Isn't it a bit more complicated

05.01.2005 17:31

First off the article talks about Jews, but the poster has headlined it 'Zionists'. Not all Jews are Zionists and the issue does not seem to be directly about Zionism at all. Although it has not been made clear from the article it seems fair to assume that the people armed are security guards employed to protect Jewish communities from the threat (real or not) of terrorist attack (e.g. in Argentina about five years ago).
A large number of Jewish communities around the world employ such tactics and if fire-arms
are being carried legally then according to Swiss law this seems acceptable rather than
being extremist.

If there are large stockpiles of weaponry then this is a different story. If any group has weapons to be used for the purposes of aggression, whether on the grounds of an ethnic-based ideology or not, the weapons should be removed. As far as I can tell there is no such evidence.
Hopping up and down and yelling 'Zionist extremists!' at the top of your voice.

Also 'Can you blame the Jews for being armed? Their government has practiced (sic) apartheid so they are about as popular as an Afrikaner in a township.' What? Swiss Jews do not as far as I know vote in Israeli elections. Nor do Swiss Jews live in Palestinian refugee camps. This is frankly a colossally stupid sentence and reveals a desire to label all Jews as Arab-hating Sharon voters.

Of course, should a load of Swiss Jews start pumping non-Jews full of lead on the grounds of Biblical ideology I will eat my words...

Think a bit...

Peace and love,
x

anti-Zionist, anti-racist

Yes, yes

05.01.2005 18:24

that does sound really likely.

gullible

Remidial reading lessons

06.01.2005 09:02

"Also 'Can you blame the Jews for being armed? Their government has practiced (sic) apartheid so they are about as popular as an Afrikaner in a township.' What? Swiss Jews do not as far as I know vote in Israeli elections. Nor do Swiss Jews live in Palestinian refugee camps. This is frankly a colossally stupid sentence and reveals a desire to label all Jews as Arab-hating Sharon voters."

Except that I was talking about the orthodox community in Sydney, the majority of whom are Zionists, not Swess Jews. So you obviously did not read my post which is, frankly, colossally stupid and reveals a desire to label all critics of Zionism as Jew-haters.