Why Euros hate Israel? Rage of the Repressed Anti-Semite...

Re: Re: Re: Re: Is the Catholic Church Anti-Semitic?

Bill--

Lots of good and salient questions. I'll take a stab--but I hope you accept that I'm still grappling with many and am still, therefore, developing "my" answers!

Yes--I do stereotype people! I accept that we all do (I believe you resist the notion--for well-intentioned reasons, but I doubt I accept them), that generalizations and stereotypes are often (although not always) rooted in fact, and I'm therefore grappling with their sources and implications--hence this thread.

Repressed? Europeans have good reasons to repress this hatred! The Holocaust, for one; a long history of anti-Semitism for another (the term in the subject line of an Amazon.com books search yeilds over 1100 titles); my surprise that "old" lessons could go unlearned by peoples with much more historical awareness than Americans; and finally, this subject appears to haunt the politics and prospects of the EC's future ("European Community"="European Union"--it's true these terms have evolved, but American parlance IS loose, admittedly, and I am an American), because of the many (tens?) of millions of Muslim immigrants to these nations in recent decades; PM Tony Blair's interior ministry has recently warned of potential catostrophic events from this, ie, riots, and the immigration problem have marked recent election controversies throughout most of western Europe.

But do I stereotype "Euros" for the same things you say? There are exceptions to even revealing or growing generalizations (Jews may be shorter than most caucasion peoples on average, but IS there any Jew in the NBA? Or the other pro-leagues? And what of it if there is [or are]?), but what does this prove other than that there are exceptions? Even you, Bill, may be exceptional! So I'm not sure that most Euro's agree with you--but many? Of course. That's not the change or the problem I'm alluding to.

Apparently Nobel laureate Simon Wiesenthal has opined recently that "Europe is more anti-Semitic now than it was in the 1930s...." IS this true? How? To what extent and in what way? That's why I raised the point with this thread--to explore it, not simply close my mind to alternatives views or explanations for what on the surface is quite disturbing. What's undwer the "surface" in Europe may be more or less so.

That's certainly a worrysome possibility. But I'm guessing that most peoples in Iraq are more or less exhausted and depleted by Saddam's oppression.

HOW will a liberated Iraq inspire Iranian revolt? Success tends to inspire imitation, but first the US must be successful!
According to a poll, most Iranian young (most of the nation is under 30) want the US to succeed and want the theocrats thown out, while the official policy of the regime, representing the theocrats, does not.

Could be.

re the "EC"--I have before me an official 1999 publication of the "EC"="European Commision." "Palestininan nationalism?" I'm not sure what you mean....There was no official Palestine, just Jordan (and Egypt and Lebanon), before the creation of Israel. I'm not sure it's fair to call it "nationalism" either; most "Palestinians" were Jordanians (and most of Jordan is made up of Palestinians I believe)--so where is the Jordanian nationalism one ought to expect? Muslim's don't "do" nationalism well--especially since much of it was imposed by once occupying powers.

I do believe that what passes for Palestinian nationalism has been promoted to curry the gratifying perception that these people are being victimized by Israelis, and to curry Euro favor as an oppressed people needing liberation from "Israeli occupation." It sure serves as positive propaganda among Westerners!

I'm not sure that "Paletsinian nationalism" (to whatever extent it describes an authentic western counterpart in the Middle East) is homegrown; it could be imported.

Exactly the problem! It's quite true that they are a people who needed a Mandela and got an "Arab" instead--in all to many negative steroptypes. Popular soveriengty is a foreign concept in practically all of this part of the world--save for Israel.

Who indeed? Muslim non-comformists tend to get assassinated--c.f., a certain Egyptian president named Anwar Sadat. Or read the chapter in Milton Viorst's "In The Shadow of The Prophet," entitled "The Murder of Farag Foda," assasinated in 1992 for questioning Islamic dogma by Islamists. It's quite depressing....

And exactly why would the Catholic church be negotiating with PA head Arafat for (or about) Palestinian sovereignty? Yes--I do believe that only the "Zionists" are the proper authority to negotiate with. Under international law, they are the sovereigns.
You write "If the only people that negotiaters can morally talk to are Zionists, haven't you doomed your negotiations to failure before they ever begin?" I think the PA has had options and opportunities (with the US and others) repeatedly--tell me, who do you think has wasted them?

The EC funds most of the monies the Palestinian authority receives--the Us only small sums--yet the EC won't eveninvestigate the manifest malappropraition of funds the Israeli's have found! There are also a variety of treaties and organizations regulating EC relations with Arab countries--these "fix" things so as to exclude or compromise Israel and promote acceptance of Muslims as benign and good. In other words, realism about quite different peoples is sabottaged (sp?).

I believe what Sharon's current govenment accepts could be called a "reservation" policy; I don't see any immediate hope for improvement in these bi-lateral relations until basic changes get underway. (I'm not endorsing Israeli policy--I just don't see any reasons for them to become more compromising than they have already tried to be. I think this is realistic and regretable.)

--Orson

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is the Catholic Church Anti-Semitic?

You need to demonstrate that your peculiar political psychoanalysis is more helpful than simply taking your opponents arguments at face value and responding to them on their merits.

There may be credible arguments against going to war with Iraq. If that's the case, then those arguments need to be considered instead of denounced.

Even if we both agree that we will try to dodge opponents' arguments by reducing them to expressions of some underlying "historical forces" of our choosing, we still need to justify our choice of intellectual framework.

Why should we accept your chosen analytical framework (in terms of the parties' position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict) rather than some other framework, from traditional Marxist economic class analysis on one hand, to "clash of civilizations" or big-power "realpolitik" models on the other.

It's perfectly possible to discuss contemporary European politics and the stresses and strains on NATO and on trans-Atlantic relations without reading it all as responses to one particular ethnic/religious group whose direct relevance to any of these issues is remote. It's possible to argue for and against war in Iraq without treating Israel as more than a tangential issue. (The Kurds are more directly involved.)

It's even possible to disagree with Israeli politicians like Ariel Sharon without thereby becoming an "anti-Semite". Many Israelis disagree with him, so I don't see why Europeans can't. Nobody has immunity from criticism.

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is the Catholic Church Anti-Semitic?

I don't know that I'd call my arguments "political psychoanalysis," whether "peculiar" or not. Cultural history and analysis has arguably progressed since Spengler, mostly because of increasing consensus about the definition of the humane society and what the liberal society requires. I take this as my starting point. Do you? Or are you taking issue with something here?

True. (In fact I believe in some credible arguments against a US led war in Iraq.) But what are the credible arguments for anti-Semitism?

In like fashion, one can be critical of Zionism (jist as one may be criticl of Judaims or Jews) and Zionists--but what are the credible liberal arguments against the existence of Israel?
WE could debate them as an historical exercise, proposing alternate historical outcomes. But the liberal position growing out of the 19th century is to accept people and deal with their political aspirations in terms of nationalism. This is enshrined in the Charter of the UN.

The post-colonial problem, however, is how to fit horseshoes on camels; how do western "states" fit into cultures that don't "do" nationalism--much less those lacking most any political mechanisms for generating popular sovereignty, accerpting clah of opinion, and social and political means of peacefully compromising. If these cultural toosl had already existed, there might already be peace in the Middle East instead of recurrent crisis!

The post-fall of communism era we are in seeks to address the requirements of civil society for successful state-hood--and this is where we are in the Middle East and why most crises there repeat. What are these requirements? How can they be developed and sustained? To many observers, they are yet to exist for the palestinians. Yet without them, there can be no peace with Israel.

Agreed.

You don't have to accept my framework--iyou are free to choose another, of course. It's simply the lite essence of the most famous philospher of science (and so-called when he died in the mid-90s), Karl Popper's, that when all rival tentative explanations are eliminated, one ought the accept what remains. My position is that this is what I've done; propose my conclusions not as The Truth, but a tentative one. I remain willing, even if unable, to debate it further.
[SNIP!]

Of course. They do have genuine dissent, debate, opposition in Israel--unlike all the countries that surround it. Where is the "opposition" in Arafat's one-party elections?

"Nobody is immune for criticism" is one of Popper's tenets, and I agree. It is possible to be anti-Zionist without being anti-semitic.

But what does this mean? That one "disagrees with Israelis policy" is one thing (and I do); that one "believes Israel has no right" to exist is quite another! MANY EC polices promote such a position, according to historian Bat Ye'or; they were, in fact, promulgated by Arabist organizations over many decades with the intent of excluding and eliminating Israel. Therefore I am willing to treat Euro politics that furthers these ends with all due suspicion.

--Orson