My friend and colleague, Tammi Rossman-Benjamin of the AMCHA Initiative, has written a piece for Algemeiner likening the attempt to boycott Israeli academics with the expulsion of Jewish professors from German universities in the 1930s.
http://www.algemeiner.com/2014/04/28/bds-movement-echoes-germany-in-the-1930s/
Her points are valid. The whole spectrum of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic activity has put European Jews in a similar position to the early years of Hitler's reign in Germany. And anti-Semitism is on the march in America as well. The difference is that many of the proponents of this anti-Semitism insist they are not anti-Jewish, just anti-Zionist. Unfortunately, the old canards about Jews as people often creep into the discourse.
The campaign about Israel is, indeed, about anti-Semitism. Contrary to the claims of the Palestinians and their supporters, this is not so much about who owned what land in 1948 as it is about the fact that the Arab world will never support a Jewish state in their midst. They have learned Jew hatred since they were born. It is an intractable issue. People like John Kerry and Barack Obama do not understand this.
If this is not about religion, ask yourself why there is no call to boycott Russia over what it has done in Ukraine. Why is there no call to boycott any of the Muslim nations that routinely abuse human rights on a daily basis? Christian churches are burning in Egypt, and there are no demonstrations on college campuses. Christians are being massacred in Syria, and there are no demonstrations. Gays are being hanged in Iran. Where are the demonstrations? The Baha'i in Iran are persecuted. Where are the protesters?
Tammi is correct. This is all about Jew hatred pure and simple.
Oh please. A plaintive and widely ignored call to break off ties with the intact professors of a sovereign nation, is equivalent to an entrenched government aided by legally unrestrained paramilitary adjuncts of the party in power physically ejecting professors who are citizens of the nation where this takes place from their profession and livelihood? This lady has a thin skin and a vivid imagination, or a the martyrdom complex peculiar to people who are comfortable and intend to remain comfortable, but want to delude themselves that they are somehow oppressed.
ReplyDeleteWhat was Gary saying a while back about crybabies who whine "nobody is more oppressed than I am"???