On Zionism and Anti-Semitism

I have been in the United States for a couple of years only and may stay for a
few more months, so I can't speak for the left in this country.

My experience with being critical of the Israeli state - which I equated in many
an arguments, essays or reports, to apartheid, or worse, even - is shaped by the
responses from the white (Jewish) community in South Africa, where I am from.

Whereas we accused whites of being racist (in most cases) and did not exclude
white Catholics, Protestants or Jews - and we found that they all (whites in
general) benefitted from apartheid, served and in its army etc, we could not
criticise Jews (our critcism had nothing to do with them being Jewish and
EVERYTHING with the fact taht they were AS RACIST and oppresive as most whites -
there were notable exceptions, but these were NOT ONLY JEWS). There were whites
(who happened to be Jews) who voted for the National Party.

Two incidents that may illustrate the point:

1. The last great discussion I had about the the Israeli state - the behaviour
of the Israeli government and (at the time illustrated) the bombing of the homes
of Palestinian activists (during the Intifada) turned into a mess. Tony Leon,
the leader of the minority-white-led, post-apartheid South African Democratic
Party (a neo-liberal grouping with direct institutional links with the
Conservative Party in Britain), screamed at me across a dinner table:

"You fucking intellectuals hide your anti-semitism behind anti-Zionism" - that
was the end of that discussion. I was a well known political writer opposed to
racism in all its incarnations, an activist from the broad black community...
that one pronouncement condemned me as a racist.

2. Among a group of serious leftists and anti-apartheid activists, I had to
close friends, "A" & "B"... Both were internationalists, and could see the
similarities between the jackboot tactics of the South African government during
the states of emergency in the eighties and the way the Israeli government was
acting. Once, B put a Palestinian sticker on her bedroom door," A " had a
visitor who was a white activist (good anti-apartheid activist, a marxist and
probably a member of the communist party)... the latter complained about the
Palestinian sticker on B's door, muttered something about anti-semitism and left
the dinner party in a huff.

This may be an explanation as to why the left is silent... Any criticism of the
Jewish state can so easily be seen as a criticism of Jews.

for what it's worth...

ismail


Ismail Lagardien
World Bank Institute
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