Jewish belief in universal antisemitism is itself a consiracy theory! Why is it never permissible to criticize Israel or Jewry without being attacked as an antisemite?
A DEBATE BETWEEN A JEWISH PROFESSOR AND THE AUTHOR OF THE TRIBAL REVIEW
The origin of the following email exchange is this article by Jewish philosophy professor Michael Neumann:
What is Antisemitism? by Michael Neumann,
Counterpunch, June 2, 2002
( counterpunch.org )
Very good, and very honest, article. But I have a question for you? Do you consider our web site, Jewish Tribal Review, "antisemitic?" ( jewishtribalreview.org )
Here's my response to someone who posted your article at an online discussion forum:
Good post, Pilgrim. But here's the deal: Neuman admits to the nonsense of "antisemitism" applied to critics of Israel. But the issue is much deeper than that. What he doesn't discuss is that there is a monolithic wall set up by Jews against criticizing Jews about anything. Jews fear if it becomes open season to criticize their racist state, the dam breaks and ANYTHING about Jewish identity and history can be under critical attack. Neuman plays with the stereotypes about "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," as if once you go beyond criticizing the state of Israel and start investigating the power and ideology that CREATED the Jewish state, then you're in the real "antisemite" realm.
What Neuman doesn't discuss is the implications of the enormous fear Jews have about openly discussing this kind of thing. The accusation of "antisemitism" is crucial to Jewish power and identity, and when a Jewish guy like Neuman comes along and starts talking relatively honestly, it is AN ENORMOUS THREAT to the Jewish power structure, because, in Jewish eyes, those accused of "real" "antisemitism" will appropriate Neuman's honest comments as merely an EXAMPLE of what's going on with the term. On the other hand, Neuman is right about the fact that Jewish efforts to brand critics of Israel "antisemites" totally devalues the smear for other realms. If Jews try to pin the smear on someone for telling the truth about Israel, more and more people are going to recognize that this accusation, in other realms too, is paper thin. And has zero substance. It's increasingly a political tool, and that only. It's a good article, but Neuman is way off base here when he says:
"If antisemitism is going to be a term of condemnation, then, it must apply beyond explicitly racist acts or thoughts or feelings. But it cannot apply beyond clearly unjustified and serious hostility to Jews. The Nazis made up historical fantasies to justify their attacks; so do modern antisemites who trust in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. So do the closet racists who complain about Jewish dominance of the economy. This is antisemitism in a narrow, negative sense of the word. It is action or propaganda designed to hurt Jews, not because of anything they could avoid doing, but because they are what they are."
Here Neuman links the Nazis with those who "complain about Jewish dominance of the economy" which is, in his words, an expression of "closet racists." In other words, to complain about Jewish tribalism beyond the state of Israel (and Jewish tribalism CREATED the state of Israel) in the realms of economic, media, publishing, and other cultural realms is an act of "racism," despite the fact that Neuman here admits that a current of racism informs Jewish identity itself. In other words, he attacks those who complain about Jewish "dominance" (which he infers is illusory) even as he admits that an important part of Jewish identity is racism. If then, it can be illustrated that there is indeed a Jewish "dominance" in realms of popular culture (say, as Jaeger evidenced at this forum about Hollywood) [This is added to the email exchange: Jaeger's link to the Film Industry Reform Movement data about Jewish dominance is here], then it is intrinsic in this "dominance" that there is an attendant Jewish racism. This Jewish racism is everywhere. And the dangers to the likes of Jews who tremble when Neuman speaks so honestly in such an article is that this racism, and attendant power, is, thanks to Jewish commentators like Neuman, another inch closer to public examination.
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From: mneumann@trentu.ca
Date: Mon, 25 Nov 2002 06:44:42 -0500
Re: Counterpunch article
[Citation of the email query by Jewish Tribal Review:] Very good, and very honest, article. But I have a question for you? Do you consider our web site, Jewish Tribal Review, "antisemitic?" ( jewishtribalreview.org )
Um, yes, I do, but I don't get bent out of shape about it. I know you're site and it's brilliantly done. Maybe I should say that I'm not quite sure whether you guys are antisemtic in the 'bad' sense or not: I'll bet, whatever you may say, you're not quite sure yourselves. As I recall, and I could be wrong about this, it would be theoretically possible to put up a site like yours and be antisemitic only in some unobjectionable way. The analysis below of what I'm doing in the article is, at a quick read, quite correct! We must agree to disagree. People like Shamir make a pretty convincing case for Jewish dominance along much the same lines that you do. But I feel that, despite *some* evidence, nothing close to proof is there: it's a conspiracy theory, and I don't go for those, including leftist ones. And from the left I am used to the sort of 'making connections' reasoning that looks so overwhelming but don't hold up to close scrutiny. I guess I try to keep an open mind, but it remains open. My main problem with sites like yours is that, in my view, they actually weaken (tend to discredit) the case for collective Jewish responsibility (or something like it) for Israeli crimes. Michael Neumann
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Thank you, Mr. Neumann, for responding. I thought you might, because your articles are not "kneejerking" in their reflection of questions pertaining to Israel. They are very good, and I respect you for them. I'd like to reply to your comments.
YOU WRITE: "Um, yes, I do, but I don't get bent out of shape about it. I know you're site and it's brilliantly done. Maybe I should say that I'm not quite sure whether you guys are antisemtic in the 'bad' sense or not: I'll bet, whatever you may say, you're not quite sure yourselves."
My REPLY: No, we're quite "sure" about ourselves. Our web site is factual, exhaustively researched, ethical, moral, and just. Period. Which of these self-anointed attributes would you object to? Of course, by Jewish popular political convention (which I wondered whether you transcended), it is "antisemitic," as is just about anything that is critical of Jewish tradition, identity, history, power, etc. We have an entire chapter about "the accusation of antisemitism," and the accusation is deconstructed, I think, quite adequately. It seems that the future will entail a political struggle over the meanings of this word, as is already beginning to happen (your own observations about the way the word is used as a defensive shield for Israel is a case in point. Again, I respect your courage and honesty).
YOU STATE: "As I recall, and I could be wrong about this, it would be theoretically possible to put up a site like yours and be antisemitic only in some unobjectionable way."
MY REPLY: Well, I don't understand what you're saying in this sentence. "Theoretically possible?" Do you mean it's theoretically possible if the Jewish community disbands its blanket condemnation of anyone who criticizes the traditions and actions of Jewry as a collective group, a group that is (despite all "political correctness" that seeks to reductively qualify it into an ambiguous, and fractious, entity), as you know, very, concretely distinct in its common denominators).
YOUR STATEMENT: "The analysis below of what I'm doing in the article is, at a quick read, quite correct! We must agree to disagree. People like Shamir make a pretty convincing case for Jewish dominance along much the same lines that you do."
MY REPLY: Yes. He's very good. His recent article on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is quite insightful.
YOUR STATEMENT: "But I feel that, despite *some* evidence, nothing close to proof is there: it's a conspiracy theory, and I don't go for those, including leftist ones."
I REPLY: Well, have you ever reflected upon the fact that, within the Jewish community, the conviction of an omnipresent "antisemitism" is itself such a "conspiracy" theory? I ran across some interesting scholarship, for example, about surveys of Jewry in San Francisco, in the 1980s. A large percentage (I think around a third) of the people interviewed believed that antisemitism was so prevalent (even in San Francisco!) that a Jew could never be elected Congressperson. The researcher pointed out that Jews were, at the time, prevalent in the upper eschelons in the elected San Francisco government, and were the majority of those elected for various congressional positions in the local area. My point is that the very notion of "antisemitism," as understood by the Jewish community at-large, is very much a "conspiracy" therory. Jewish convention holds that antisemitism is a kind of "virus," a "disease," irrational and sinister, that exists in some form under every rock, in every corner, in just about every place in the world. It is, in its own way, a totalitarian concept and it is very much part of the bedrock of Jewish identity. It, by self-definition, negates the "dialogue" you mention above.
Per the premises of Israel Shamir. Of course I think he's usually correct, and there is plenty of evidence for his arguments. It's not a question, at all, of Jews coming together to decide, in a room, how to rule the world. Hardly. That's silly. But it is very much about particular common denominators that adjust Jewry towards common goals, whether Orthodox, atheists, or whatever. Those exceptions to this, as you know, are condemned by mainstream Jewry as "self-haters" (a decreed form of "antisemitism" itself) and I trust you have had this accusation tossed, from time to time, in your direction.
And per "conspiracy." The Jewish Tribal Review doesn't champion the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. But Israel Shamir's recent article about it is a very good read, and he makes some excellent points.
YOUR STATEMENT: "And from the left I am used to the sort of 'making connections'reasoning that looks so overwhelming but don't hold up to close scrutiny. I guess I try to keep an open mind, but it remains open."
MY REPLY: It is interesting to me that those many Jews (and a few non-Jews) who condemn the Jewish Tribal Review allude to it as, in essence, "right-wing Nazi Ku Klux Klan" material, despite the fact there is nothing whatsoever that champions -- in the least -- that realm of ideology. On the contrary. The kneejerk response is to caricaturize it, to simplify its entirety into a pathologized stereotype, a stereotype that protects the Jewish community from much-needed introspection.
Per "making connections." I make those too. But the emphasis at the Jewish Tribal Review is not to declare a Jewish "conspiracy," but to amass tons and tons of facts and data useful in evaluating the Jewish community (a very powerful Western elite) per their demonstrable influence (towards distinct ethnocentric aims) in the social and political world.
YOUR STATEMENT: "My main problem with sites like yours is that, in my view, they actually weaken (tend to discredit) the case for collective Jewish responsibility (or something like it) for Israeli crimes."
MY REPLY: For a man who has written some quite illuminatng things about the Israel issue, you trail off here into darkness. How can an exhaustive investigation into the origins of Jewish identity (which inform the modern state of Israel) "weaken" the case for collective Jewish responsibility which, in origin, and largely still enduring, is a sophisticated "tribe?" On the contrary. It seems that you, who go so far in the realm of Zionism, completely bail out when troubling evidence oozes beyond that framework of your critical interest. Communal "responsibility" is very much what the Jewish Tribal Review argues for, and Jews (as a collective group) have (except for the rare individual) no interest in examining the problematics of their past towards understanding today. And, of course, towards honestly understanding "antisemitism." The reason I contacted you is because, as I say, your writings about Israel are very good. Judging by the few texts of yours I've read about Israel, you are (at least per this subject) a reasonable and moral man. It is of interest to me to find out your boundaries regarding these attributes. What is the barrier that bars (overwhelmingly) most people of Jewish heritage to come to terms, fairly, with the essences of traditional Jewish identity, Jewish (not merely "Zionist" power and influence), the injustices of Jewish history (and Jewry's resistance to accept responsibility for them), and so forth? This has been a mystery to me, although I think I am beginning to understand it. And this is why the Jewish Tribal Review exists. Its purpose is to put all the facts upon the table so that the reasoned, ethical, and open individual can have access to information necessary to examine the course of modern (Jewish/Zionist-influenced) history. Please, Mr. Neumann. You are an "open" man. Where, in our censorial Judeo-centric world is the place where this information may be accessed, in any collected form, but the likes of our web site? (I make the important point here too, that I realize that it is only the political Right that is open to this realm of investigation -- and the Jewish Tribal Review is sometimes pathologized for the sorts of "white separatist" groups that link to us. The Left (at least the gutsier realm) makes that fine distinction between "Zionist" and "Jewish" before criticizing Jews. Jewish organizations decry everywhere a merger between the "Right" and the Palestinian cause, as if a merger of demons. I note to you that the Left's silence and self-censorship on the Jewish issue will, in long term, be harmful to Jewish interests. Ironically, paradoxically, it is the Right that is suddenly in the vanguard of "free speech," at least regarding this particular issue. There is even a tradition of martyrs being born (where so-called "Holocaust deniers" are fined and imprisoned in Western democracies). My point to you is that the Left, per the issue of "Jews," is, like most other aspects of popular culture, self-censorial).
The irony, of course, is that part of the Jewish Tribal Review's concept is to get Jewry engaged in self-reflection about all this. Thus far, in that regard, it has failed. It seems to me that, without this self-reflection, the Jewish community sets itself on a very rigid course that can only, in the future, be an enormous problem for everyone. I point out to you that the avalanche of facts and citations at the Jewish Tribal Review are not fantasy. We document what we put up there. It is up to "open" minds to digest their ultimate meanings. In the struggle of political ideologies, it seems that the political Right is appropriating documentable truths for their own cause, while the Left and -- more importantly -- Jewry are in total denial. Thank you for your kindness, and time, in replying to my query. |
