Because the Jewish people are a people, have been one for thousands of years, have spent much of that time being driven out of one place after another. When somebody who all for national self-determination in every other case suddenly starts decrying and/or demonizing Jewish particularism and nationalism (which is what Zionism is), it is part and parcel of holding the Jews to a standard that never applied to anyone else. The Israelis are constantly being judged for not living up to a standard of behavior which in their circumstances would be suicidal.
I don't agree. That argument assumes we're expected to support People A's self determination regardless of its affect on Peoples B, C and D.
I don't think anybody minds if the Jews all live in one place. Go ahead. All else being equal, why should anyone care? In the case of Israel, people object to it primarily because there were plenty of non-Jews that were negatively affected by its creation in 1948, there are negatively affected by its current actions today, and they are attempting to claim Jerusalem, among the most multi-national places on the planet, as part of a Jewish homeland. So opposition to Israel is based on the harm it causes to other ethnicities who are from the land in question, and also the historical significance of the location. It has nothing to do (at least in my case) with any view of Jews or Judaeism.
Mormons live together in Utah, inside the USA, as equals with their non-Mormon neighbors in Utah, inside the USA. It works fine. People worldwide are not (in general) anti-Mormon. If the Utah Mormons try to forcibly secede from the USA, and happen to displace loads of non-Mormon Utah residents in the process, do you think worldwide objection to that seccession is a sign of "anti-Mormonism", or of opposition to the secessionist activity? I think the latter.
It has nothing to do with whether the seceders are Mormons, Jews, intellectuals, homosexuals, lepers, movie stars, members of mensa, or farmers. It is opposed by objective observers because the people who are not members of the secessionist group are disadvantaged. The characteristics of the secesssionist group itself is unimportant. If Israel weren't the Jewish homeland, and was instead the Greek Othodox Church Levant homeland, you're going to have the same response if the new homeland displaced a good chunk of the previous residents.
Now normally this objection fades away, as it will in Tibet, as the displaced group has no backers that want to keep up the fight for generations. The Israelis foolishly decided to displace a group that isn't going to fade away because there are a billion of them.
So I don't buy the argument. Objection to Israel is no more anti-Jewish than the idea of objection to Utah seceding from the US is anti-Mormon.
Do you think Utah should forcibly secede from the US (if it could)? If not, are you anti-Mormon? |
