0
THE Western response to an alarming upsurge in antisemitic incidents in several countries invariably falters when it comes to ascertaining its causes. Vague references to liberal values and a focus on better policing usually top the agenda, but Israel and its genocidal agenda rarely make the cut.
Even the most vicious Israeli actions in the occupied territories and beyond cannot justify murderous attacks on Jews in Golders Green or the desecration of synagogues. But that’s not the point. The question must be why the offenders look upon their victims as fair game. Might it have anything to do with Israel’s self-image as an exclusively Jewish state that represents all Jews, including the majority based in foreign lands?
Apart from dual citizens who eagerly participate in the IDF’s atrocities, Jews living outside Israel obviously ought not to be held responsible for Israel’s war crimes, regardless of their political views. Many of them blindly approve of Israeli actions, but a growing number, horrified by the genocide and associated outrages in Lebanon and Iran, have no wish to be linked with the increasingly unpromising land.
Western protests against the genocide in Gaza and beyond almost always include a Jewish contingent, often including Holocaust survivors or their descendants. Parallels between the Nazi extermination campaign against European Jews and the Israeli attitude towards Palestinians have been acknowledged even by a handful of former military and intel chiefs. The genocide scholar Omer Bartov notes that when, as a young Israeli academic, he wrote to Yitzhak Rabin, the defence minister during the first Intifada, denouncing the latter’s directive to break the bones of Palestinians flinging stones at their oppressors, Rabin’s response was: How dare you compare the IDF with the Wehrmacht!
Opposing genocide reduces the likelihood of a backlash.
Whether Rabin saw the light a few years later when, as prime minister, he endorsed the Oslo accords, knowing that the proposed two-state solution was a pathetic deal for the Palestinians, is dubious. Those who hail him as a martyr to the lost cause of peaceful coexistence ought to look deeper into his proclivities. There can be little doubt, though, that much worse lay ahead, with the likes of Ariel Sharon and Benjamin Netanyahu waiting in the wings. Sharon’s role in the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacres in Lebanon provoked mass outrage and official inquiries in Israel, yet he returned as prime minister, and pulled out of Gaza to secure the West Bank.
Sharon is long gone, but today 60 per cent of Gaza is occupied by the IDF, and the army has indicated that it is prepared to resume its full-fledged aggression. At least 800 Palestinians have been killed since last year’s ‘ceasefire’, including toddlers and students. In transporting its Gaza playbook to southern Lebanon, the IDF has again focused on educational and health facilities, apart from wanton attacks on civilians.
Perhaps Israel’s status as a racist rogue state does not figure in the calculations of its Western backers because their beloved American godfather falls in the same category. Almost all US presidents go out of their way to please Israel. Donald Trump has gone up a level, and his Gaza Riviera plan potentially excludes all Palestinians from that part of their homeland. One can only wonder how the settler/ military perpetrators of the West Bank pogroms don’t recognise their inspiration from Nazi activities in mid-century Europe.
Yesterday, British PM Keir Starmer was holding an antisemitism summit, where he was expected to dish out the usual gibberish instead of pointing out that Israel’s violations of human rights and international law inspire a misdirected backlash. He has already suggested that some marches against the genocide in Palestine could be banned, because the cumulative impact was more than British Jews could bear. The even more idiotic opposition leader has suggested that all pro-Palestinian marches should be banned. These clowns purport to be champions of free speech.
There’s a similar story unfolding in Australia, where horrific killings of Jews in December prompted an inquiry into antisemitism that is constrained from investigating the perpetrators’ motivations. The focus is on outlawing pro-Palestinian slogans and marches, lest Zionist feelings be injured.
The safety of Jews anywhere in the world obviously ought to be guaranteed as much as it should be for everyone else, regardless of race, religion or ethnicity. At the same time, it might be worth acknowledging that taking a clear stand against genocide — as Spain and Ireland have attempted — instead of aiding it – as Starmer and Australia’s Anthony Albanese, among other leaders, have been inclined to do — reduces the likelihood of an ill-advised backlash. Antisemitism, however abhorrent, will prosper as long as the genocide endures.
Published in Dawn, May 6th, 2026
