Is it antisemitic to hate Israel?

Corbyn risks his party being torn apart if he can’t sort out this anti-semitism business (pic from the Independent)

What does anti-semitic mean?  The top three online dictionaries (of a Google search) say:

anti-Semitism discrimination against or prejudice or hostility toward Jews (www.dictionary.com)

anti-Semitism Hostility to or prejudice against Jews (oxforddictionaries.com)

anti-Semitism the strong dislike or cruel and unfair treatment of Jewish people (dictionary.cambridge.org)

Well, that seems simple enough, right?  Unfortunately, it isn’t that simple.  Some people want the term antisemitic to cover a lot more than anti-Jewishism.  And it’s tearing the Labour party into strips when Britain badly needs a working Opposition to the Conservative government.

So what is the problem?  Some people want the Labour party to adopt an “official” international definition of anti-semitism.  The definition they have chosen to push is that of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).  Their definition is:

Anti-Semitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred towards Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-Semitism are directed towards Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, towards Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.

Even this definition isn’t too bad.  But the main problem is the examples that go with the definition.  These include “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, eg by claiming that the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour,” and “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.”  Basically, criticism of the state of Israel should be viewed as anti-Semitism, as should any equivalence of their racist policies and those of Nazi Germany.

Why should criticising Israel be labelled anti-Semitic?  Generally it is accepted that anti-Semitism is wrong.  So now criticising Israel is wrong too?  That country can do no wrong?  And why is it wrong to point out that Israel’s foreign and domestic policies are racist?  I mean, those policies are racist, inasmuch as they are hostile to Palestinians.  And how exactly does pointing out this racism deny the Jewish people their right to self-determination?  Israel is denying Palestinians their right to self-determination… but to point that out is anti-Semitic?  My head’s starting to hurt.

The organisation that first drafted this definition, the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia, recognized it was contentious – it drafted but never adopted the definition.  And the UK government, which has adopted the “working definition” and the examples, was warned by the Commons home affairs select committee in October 2016 that in the interests of free speech it ought to adopt an explicit rider that it is not antisemitic to criticise the government of Israel, or to hold the Israeli government to the same standards as other liberal democracies, without additional evidence to suggest antisemitic intent (the government sadly ignored this advice).

Unfortunately for the Labour Party and its leader, some party members and supporters of the leader have come out with some awful stuff on this subject.  Peter Willsman, for instance, has said some stuff that is just plain wrong and he needs to resign.  But the party should not adopt the IHRA definition.  And if supporters of Israel don’t like that country’s policies being criticised, maybe they should call for those policies to be changed.  To be made less racist.  Less likely to be compared to those of that old Nazi Adolf Hitler.

Foreign Policy doesn’t fuel domestic terrorism? Get real!

A lot of “centre-ground” (and right-from centre)  commentators and “moderate” Labour MPs are pissed off that Stop The War Coalition think that French foreign policy regarding Syria might have provoked the shootings and bombings in Paris in November – and that Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has not distanced himself from the anti-war group.

It was blogged in the Spectator site:

Labour MPs appear to be just as annoyed by Jeremy Corbyn’s links to the Stop The War coalition as they are about his comments on shoot to kill. In the questions following David Cameron’s Commons statement on the Paris attacks, several MPs used the opportunity to make coded attacks on Stop The War for a blog it published, titled ‘Paris reaps whirlwind of western support for extremist violence in Middle East’. It has been since been removed (cached version here) and Corbyn said he was glad it was deleted — but he has yet to condemn the fact it was published in the first place.

And the Daily Mail reported that

One Labour MP said the suggestion that the French people were to blame for the attack was ‘akin at the time of the Second World War to blaming the Jews for their deaths under the Nazis’.

Frontbencher Hilary Benn refused to rule out resigning if Mr Corbyn attended the event [a Stop The War Coalition Christmas fundraiser] as Labour MPs lined up to condemn their leader’s opposition to armed police shooting to kill terrorists.

This is so disingenuous, and not the first time politicians and political commentators have come out with this nonsense that somehow Western military action abroad doesn’t provoke terror acts at home.  Tony Blair, UK prime minister in 2005, denied at the time that the 7/7 bombings were in any way provoked by British military action in Iraq – and he’s still denying it.  But, after the bombings, a video was acquired by an Arab TV station in which Mohammad Sidique Khan, one of the suicide bombers, said the attack was in response to British military foreign policy in the region.

At the time the BBC reported:

On the tape the bomber said: “Our words are dead until we give them life with our blood.

“I and thousands like me have forsaken everything for what we believe.”

He said the public was responsible for the atrocities perpetuated against his “people” across the world because it supported democratically elected governments who carried them out.

“Until we feel security, you will be our targets,” he said.

“Until you stop the bombing, gassing, imprisonment and torture of my people we will not stop this fight.

“We are at war and I am a soldier. Now you too will taste the reality of this situation.”

Muslim Council of Britain spokesman Inayat Bunglawala told BBC News:

“Mr Khan has allowed his hatred to distort his moral compass.

“However, this tape does serve to confirm that the war in Iraq and our policies in the Middle East have indeed led to a radicalisation amongst a section of Muslim youth.”

The same is happening now.  While it would be ridiculous to claim that the people slain in Paris somehow “deserved it”, it must be acknowledged that the terrorists – all French or Belgian citizens who had connections with ISIL – did see the French military action in Iraq and Syria as a provocation.

Corbyn can see the connection, and now his political rivals – in Labour and in other parties – want to use his honesty as another lever to undermine him.

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