Since Israel Asper controls and censors much of the Canadian media, his political and theological views are of great interests to the Christian majority in Canada. We begin by first examining the beliefs of on of Asper's greatest heroes, Vladimir Jabotinsky.
Israel Asper is the well-known media mogul in Canada. Vladimir Jabotinsky was an early Jewish -- and Zionist -- fascist. From WHEN VICTIMS RULE: "Labor Zionism had been completely dominant in Israeli political society until 1977, when the rightist Zionist strands of Menachem Begin was voted to power. Begin's coalition party was the Likud; his own roots were in one of the right-wing organizations called Herut, which in turn was historically linked to the "radical right" version of Zionism known as Revisionism, founded by Vladimir Zabotinsky. Although overshadowed by Labor Zionism, Revisionists were not tiny. By 1931 the Revisionists claimed 21% of the delegates at the World Zionist Congress. [BELL, Terror, p. 24] "Vladmir Zabotinksy," noted David Biale, charged that Jews in the Diaspora "despised manhood, the principle of male power as understood by all free people in history, physical courage and physical force ..., [and] prowess of the body ... [which was] an object of ridicule." [BIALE, p. 137] "Because the Yid [Jew] is ugly, sickly, and lacks decorum," once said Jabotinsky, "we shall endow the ideal image of the Hebrew with masculine beauty." [RUBENSTEIN, A., p. 4] Elsewhere, Jabotinsky asserted that "Every race possessing a definite uniqueness seeks to become a nation, that is, to create for itself an economic, political, and intellectual environment in which every detail will derive from its specific thought and consequence that will also relate to its specific taste. A specific race can establish such an environment only in its own country, where it is master. For this reason every race seeks to become a state." [AVISHAI, B., p.125] "In the 1930s," says Haim Breseeth, "the Revisionists, a typical European rightist force, were greatly influenced by Mussolini, adapting some of the trappings of fascism: motorcades of blackshirts, a party publication was renamed Diary of a Fascist; and some training camps were held in fascist Italy. Immediately after the coming to power of the Nazis, fascism became a central icon in Palestine, dividing left and right, or more accurately, Labor Zionism, led by Ben-Gurion, from the Revisionist camp, led by Jabotinsky." [BRESEETH, p. 194-195] "Breaking away [from the other Zionist groups] in the 1920s," says Peter Grose, "Jabotinsky's Revisionist Zionism organized its own fighting force in Palestine. The Irgun Zvai Leumi came to remind unsympathetic outsiders of Mussolini fascists; Ben-Gurion called the Revisionist leader 'Vladimir Hitler.'" [GROSE, p. 161] "Revisionists," notes Edwin Black, "... were heavily fascists and profoundly influenced by Mussolini ... True to fascist ideology, the fist and shout were the preferred methods of achieving Revisionist goals." [BLACK, E., p. 143] Labor and Revisionist Zionism came close to civil war when the latter group brought a shipload of weapons into Israel. The ship was sunk by rival Zionists' artillery fire and 16 members of the IRGUN were killed. And, "ever since the mysterious murder of the Zionist 'foreign minister' Chaim Arlosoroff in 1933," says Jay Gonen, "allegedly by right-wing Revisionists, there had been fears of Jewish fascism." [GONEN, p. 58] "Jabotinsky's most cherished creation was Betar," noted Livneh Eliezer, "[This] youth movement ... was ... a semi-militaristic entity that stressed hierarchy, discipline, obedience to superiors, rituals, and ceremonies. Military values [were] ... a virtue," as was "romantic heroism." [ELIEZER, p. 26] Another small group (founded in 1931) linked to Revisionist theory was Brit Habironim (the Covenant of Thugs) which "was a mythological rediscovery of the glorious tales of the [Israeli] nation, a romantic glorification of the old days of blood, soil, heroism, and conquest." [ELIEZER, p. 25] Among the "Covenant of Thugs" was Uri Zvi Greenberg, a popular poet well-respected in today's Israel. Greenberg saw socialism as a "most dangerous enemy, and became more and more convinced that a dictator was needed to lead the masses." [LAQUEUR, p. 362] Some in the Revisionist camp in the 1930s, notes Jewish scholar Walter Laqueur, "expressed the view that but for Hitler's anti-Semitism German National Socialism would have been acceptable [to Jews] and that, anyway, Hitler had saved Germany [LAQUEUR, W., p. 33] ... Within the [Revisionist] movement there were ... sections, some of them influential [where] ... fascist ideas had made considerable headway and, but for the rise of Hitler and Nazism, would no doubt have become even more prominent." [LAQUEUR, p. 382] Among Revisionist plans for Palestine (and a larger Transjordan area) was the expelling of Arabs to Iraq. [SELZER, p. 218, 219] Revisionist policy foresaw Jewish lands stretching from the Nile River into what is today Jordan. (In 1983, Eryk Spekter, CEO of Fame Fabrics in the U.S. and a former chairman of Herut USA, began awarding a $100,000 "Defender of Jerusalem" prize from his Jabotinsky Foundation at presentation dinners to people "who had stood up for Jewish rights." Over the years, winner's of the Jabotinsky Foundation's award included Menachem Begin, New York Times editor A. M. Rosenthal, American Republican cabinet members Jeanne Kirkpatrick and George Schultz, Hawaiian Senator Daniel Inouye, and former French cabinet minister, Simone Weil among others). [NY TIMES, 12-16-98, B13] Simha Flapan notes that "The Yishuv and the Jewish masses in the Diaspora rejected most of his concepts, but [Jabotinsky] left an indelible mark on the Zionist attitude towards the Arab question. He implanted in Jewish psychology the image of the Arab as the mortal enemy, the idea of the inevitability of the conflict and of the impossibility of a solution except by sheer force. He propagated the 'either-or' notion by which all and every means was justified including terror and ruthless retaliation in the struggle for survival." [FLAPAN, S., 1979, p. 117] ] |
