"Criticism of Israel isn't Necessarily Anti-Semitism"
I suppose the British Left and the American mainstream will never understand each other when it comes to anti-Semitism. What it boils down to is this: we think their rhetoric sounds anti-Semitic; they think it doesn't.
Americans, reading the Guardian, Independent, or New Statesman, tend to find the hostility towards Israel and Jews fairly shocking, if not always actually anti-Semitic. The British lefties think such shock is misplaced. They maintain that Americans are too dumb to see the difference between true anti-Semitism and legitimate criticism of Israel and its policies. "Criticism of Israel isn't necessarily the same thing as anti-Semitism" runs the constant refrain, repeated in op-ed after op-ed and time and again in casual conversation in pubs and cafes. "We don't hate the Jews," they seem to be saying. "Just their state and everything it does. Is that so wrong?"
Well, of course criticism of Israel's policies isn't the same thing as anti-Semitism; I don't know of anyone who has ever maintained that it is. But there's something about the sheer intensity of this hostility and determined ill will that gives pause. I suppose their ideology (broadly speaking, '68-era Marxism) requires that international conflict be understood in terms of a "sophisticated" analysis of the "underlying structure," a dichotomy of Oppressor vs. Oppressed in which the only decent thing is to side with The Oppressed and excoriate The Oppressor. Even without the retrograde ideological claptrap, support for Palestinian nationalism is as worthy as support for any other cause of national liberation. I suppose it's possible to claim (though not very convincingly) that Israel is entirely and uniquely in the wrong in the matter. I have no intention of arguing for or against any of these positions or attitudes, or challenging the substance of the Leftist critique of Israel. I merely point out that the terms and tone often adopted by the British Left when they write about Israel and Jews can be jarring, unpleasant, and rather perplexing to everyone else. Maybe it's all just honest well-intentioned "criticism," maybe it's not exactly anti-Semitic, but the over-the-top hostility is undeniable. And a bit creepy, to be perfectly honest.
Even a dumb American like me can understand their argument. Yet I admit, I'm at a loss to understand the depth of the hostility. I'm not the only one. Recently, Ron Rosenbaum wrote a piece in the New York Observer proposing a not entirely convincing psychological explanation for contemporary Europe's distaste for the Jews and lack of support for the Jewish state: they are "in denial" over their collective guilt for having murdered so many of them in the last century and must therefore "blame the victim." Whether or not you're inclined turn to the platitudes of pop psychology for an explanation, there does appear to be something unwholesome and irrational behind the deeply-felt antipathy. The pretense of a rational critique arising from a sober assessment of geopolitical realities does not seem to square with the extreme bitterness and vehemence of the denunciations. Even if you take the Brit-lefties at their word, allowing them to exempt themselves in advance from any hint of suspicion of anti-Semitic sentiment, and accepting that they may indeed hate Israel for purely creditable reasons, the puzzle remains.
(The last time I tried to puzzle it out, I received quite a lot of email from affronted British leftists, most of whom took care to explain carefully that criticism of Israel isn't necessarily anti-Semitism, etc. If I ever had any confusion on that point, rest assured I'm well aware: your position is that criticism of Israel isn't necessarily anti-Semitism. Whatever. There's still something odd about the tone of the New Statesman's "criticism" of Jews and Israel, even if it's not "necessarily" anti-Semitic. I know you guys don't think there's anything at all odd about it-- that's the point I'm trying to make here.)
In a way, the British Leftists have the same difficulty: they find America's lack of hostility towards Israel and the Jews to be utterly unfathomable, and can't account for it without recourse to conspiracy theories about Jewish control of the media or secret Jewish enclaves in the government. Those who point out that such rhetoric echoes the rhetoric of classic anti-Semitism and thus sounds a bit, well, anti-Semitic, are themselves alleged to be part of the Jewish conspiracy to silence legitimate criticism, which is not necessarily the same as anti-Semitism, etc.
The weird thing is, writers for publications like the New Statesman don't seem to have any clue that positing Jewish conspiracies isn't the most convincing way of establishing your bona fides where anti-Semitism is concerned. It sounds, at minimum, a bit "off" to us; it sounds just fine to them. "Come, come, my dear fellow! I say! I was merely stating the simple fact that the Jew lurks in the highest echelons of power and has a stranglehold on the American media, crushing dissent with merciless claws. What's all the fuss about?"
A case in point is New Statesman writer Andrew Stephen. In this piece (cited by Gary Farber as one reason he could never live in Britain) Stephen attempts to answer a fairly silly question: "why doesn't the US take immediate action against Israel?" Real answer: we rarely launch military attacks upon our allies, even if doing so would please the Swedes and Fleet Street. New Statesman Answer: the US has no choice, because Jews control the government through the all-powerful "Jewish lobby" and "Jewish money." (Stephen even manages to turn Clinton's pardon of "Jewish fugitive" Marc Rich into a sinister Jewish conspiracy-- I don't approve of the pardon, but casting it as part of a Jewish plot is spectacularly twisted.)
And why do Americans think this kind of "criticism" sounds anti-Semitic? Real answer: because it kind of does. New Statesman Answer: criticism of Israel is not allowed, Stephen writes, curiously echoing Rosenbaum, because Americans feel a collective guilt for failing to save the Jews in WWII. "Jews and Israelis can therefore do no wrong here in whatever they choose to do in order to right the monstrous wrongs of history." Then, in a truly bizarre turn, Stephen offers this example of America's determination to excuse Jewish wrong-doing at all costs:
When the Wall Street Journal man Daniel Pearl was kidnapped in Pakistan, the US media collectively agreed not to mention that he was an Israeli citizen whose bar mitzvah was held at the wailing wall in Jerusalem; I read that in the Israeli press, but not a word of it (as far as I know) ever appeared here.
As a general matter, Stephen doesn't think the American media do a satisfactory job of informing the public about Jews in high places. And he expresses astonishment at all the fuss over this "mild observation" from another New Statesman column a few months back:
Though Jews comprise no more than 2 per cent of the US population... Hanukkah is now seen as an event that the US president must officially recognize and celebrate. His spokesman, Ari Fleischer, is Jewish and a couple of weeks ago put his spin on how the White House expected Yasser Arafat to behave... The deputy defence secretary is also Jewish and vociferously argues for war on Iraq. But I have never seen these facts mentioned in the media here.