<<< We do not persecute Jews and never have>>>
This remark betrays ignorance of the history of both informal and institutionalized anti-semitism in American history. In the late 19th century it was not uncommon for exclusive resorts to post signs announcing "No Jews or Dogs Allowed." As late as the 1960's the top colleges operated with Jewish quotas, as did a broad range of other elite institutions. My cousin, who was not Jewish, looked Jewish to some in his Maryland neighborhood (and was not a church-goer), and was consequently called "Jewboy," and stoned from time to time. In my own neighborhood in North Carolina, there was one Jewish child, Joey, whom I have talked about here before. "Joey the Jew," he was called, a taunt used so frequently and viciously when he appeared outside, that he seldom emerged from his house to play with the other children, in spite of my mother's attempted intervention. (She told the incredulous Christian children that Christ was a Jew. If it helped significantly, I don't recall that.) Until well into the 19th century, Jews were prohibited from holding public office at various levels (for example, as local postmasters) in many states. (I am aware of this in the case of postmasters in particular because of a historical event I'll tell you about another time.)
<<<There is a limit to the blame we should be willing to accept.>>>
I believe, but can't believe, that you are saying that the denial of general asylum to the condemned Jews of Europe (because the documented antisemite Breckenridge Long controlled immigration policy) has no moral implications. You are saying that the return of that boatload of refugee Jews to the Nazis for extermination was a small thing, an incident it would be perhaps salutary to drop into the memory-hole.
(The antisemite Father Coughlin had a nationwide radio following. The KKK, which was explicitly antisemitic, not merely isolationist, had a membership in the millions.)
You really think, do you, that the Jewishness of those pleading, terrified passengers had nothing to do with the willingness to see them die?
My German grandmother lived in America from the time she was three. In the house in Brooklyn next to the house in which she raised her children, lived, and had lived alongside Grandma's family for forty years, the Reich family. The Reichs were fine people, teachers and musicians, better educated than were my grandparents or any of their children, and responsible, with their neighborly ministrations (the details are too numerous to recount), for my grandparents ability to remain, in old age, in the family home for a decade or more beyond what would have been possible without such kind neighbors. I am too ashamed of her words to reveal them here; but I will tell you that when I was 20 or so, my grandmother made a casual antisemitic remark about a member of the Reich family so shocking to me that my feeling for her never recovered.
You have been away from America for a long time. You are not exposed to, for example, talk radio. It might surprise you how much antisemitic rhetoric, often veiled, but rather slightly, is to be heard there, and how pro forma any effort to rebut it is. Pacifica radio in particular seems to be hospitable to various shades of antisemitic rhetoric. I have heard such casually-accepted antisemitic vileness on that station it makes me physically ill to think of it.
There is no longer official persecution of Jews in America. There is still an abundance of antisemitism. An SI friend of mine (a born-again Christian) told me of her intention not to go to a particular physician because he was Jewish. (I made a point about qualifications; she changed her mind; she is glad she did.)
The letter of Ike, which btw dates from the aftermath of the Six Day War, contains no sophisticated analysis or advocacy concerning Israel's immediate geopolitical situation. It contains, I think, a bitter cynicism about those who criticize Jews for behavior rather universal in circumstances less exigent than theirs have been. Your extremely sanguine view of the military intentions and capabilities of Israel's declared enemies is puzzling. The Iraqis appear to be developing instruments of mass destruction and refuse to permit inspection of their facilities. The Iranians, too. The Saudis, in addition to supporting the military enemies of Israel, continue to allocate millions of dollars annually to a network of religious foundations throughout the middle east whose specific ideology promotes hatred of the Jews.
Your phrase admonishing the Israelis to "set their bitter litanies behind them" is a startling one to me. "Litanies," "Bitter litanies," is the impatient characterization you choose for their so recently lived, recounted, history? Should their memories not be bitter? Should they not be held close? Would that not dishonor the dead? Should the Jews not have learned lessons from the world's uninterest in their centuries of agony? These words coming from you are all the more startling when they appear in the same text with the line "We do not persecute Jews and never have," (shall we argue over the word "persecute"?) and with your notably blithe exculpating rationalization ( a rationalization I've never seen before; congratulations on a nice contribution to a movement seeking fresh ones!) of our turning away the terrified Jews, dooming them to Auschwitz and Buchenwald and Ravensbruck (complete with the strange denial that being Jews is what sealed their doom, not only at the hot hands of the Nazis, but at our cool ones.)
You think that what you have shared with us is the hope or practical suggestion that Israel might take certain steps that would conduce to peace in the area. I would not feel upset by what I have just read ( I feel that way because you are its writer, of course) if that is truly what you had communicated here.
Steven, I believe if you lived in America right now, you would see things differently. Certainly if you had Jewish friends who feel fear you would.
I've been rough on you, I know. I'm feeling bad about this exchange. I'll let you have the last word. And you must know that's a hard thing for me to do. |
