Webster defines it as "the organized persecution of an ethnic group, especially Jews."
The Jews have been vulnerable, and have made easy targets as scapegoats, and have endured so many attacks and massacres in the last 3000 years that many people, I among them, think it important that they have a Jewish-controlled place to go to be safe when they are again under threat. There is always a demand for scapegoats. The largest pogrom was, of course, the Holocaust, which killed an estimated third of all the world's Jews. I think the Jews have done their part in supplying the world's scapegoat market. Time for a safe haven.
Reading about historical pograms, I came on this interesting paragraph about the origins of the ghetto. Of course ghettoization makes for easy targeting.
<<<At first, Jews in the diaspora segregated voluntarily. This was partly for
self-protection, but it was perhaps more the result of the requirements of the
Jewish religion: to be close to a synagogue and other religious institutions. The
concept of segregating Jews involuntarily behind walls was developed in ancient
times, but it was not actually implemented as a policy until 1462 in Frankfurt,
Germany. The idea caught on in the rest of Europe and became the norm in the
16th century...
However, the isolation of Jews in ghettos had the effect of eliminating
assimilation with the host communities, and preserved and enhanced the survival
of the Jewish culture. Those governments unwilling even to tolerate Jews who
were segregated in ghettos expelled them.At one time or another, all Jews were
expelled from England (1290), France (1306 and 1394),Austria (1420), and Spain
(1492). There were local expulsions throughout Europe including thosein Germany.
Some expulsion policies were reversed when governments realized that the
Jewsserved a useful purpose.
It was not until the Enlightenment that Jews had the opportunity to participate
inmodern society free from persecution...>>>
killeenroos.com
Here is a quote from an interesting Zionist website:
<<<Palestinians chose to begin a continuous stream of
attacks against Jewish residents and immigrants to
Palestine starting with 11 unprovoked attacks on
unarmed Jewish villages between 1888 and 1914, and
continuing with the 1920-21 waves of attacks that
prompted the Jews to form the Hagannah, to the 1929
Palestine wide anti-Jewish pogroms, to the Arab
campaign of 1936 in which 92 Jewish villages were
attacked just between April and August, to the Arab
attacks against Jewish targets killing a total of 79 Jews
in the 12 days following passage of the UN partition
resolution on November 30, 1947.>>>
salam-shalom.net |
