 | By Jonathan Hoffman
December 20, 2009 | Share |
http://www.thejc.com/blogpost/miles-vile-bile
The first one came from Oliver Miles - formerly our man in Tripoli - disingenously suggesting that the soi-disants (not him of course, oh no!) might question the impartiality of the two Jewish historians on the Iraq Inquiry.
Now comes the flanking move from Sir Alistair Hunter, formerly our Consul in New York and not an obvious Arabist, writing this letter to the Times:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/letters/article6962060.ece
"Anti-Israel is different from anti-Semitic" says Hunter, in response to George Walden's observation that the arrest warrant for Livni was part of the 'climate of creeping antisemitism' in the UK.
Really? Then (as John Mann MP said in Jerusalem earlier this week) why has Daniel Machover not issued an arrest warrant for Claire Short, who was a member of the Cabinet that decided to invade Iraq? Treating Israelis differently from other nationalities is of course antisemitic, see EUMC Definition.
"There is, happily, little anti-Semitism in Britain compared with the 1930s" says Sir Alistair. The fact is that there were more antisemitic incidents in the first six months of 2009 than in any year since CST began to collect the data in 1984. But by Sir Alistair's metric - the years preceding the Holocaust - everything is dandy (so those uppity Jews should stop complaining....) Would he tell blacks in the US not to voice concern about racist incidents because things are better than they were in the 1950s, I wonder?
Finally we get to the nub of Sir Alistair's argument: "It has been necessary to make such distinction [between anti-Israel and antisemitic] at least since 1919, when the first Zionists arriving in Palestine to look for a homeland angered, by their arrogance, the Jews who had lived in Jerusalem for centuries under the Ottomans, guarding the holy sites."
Aha ... that is what upsets our friend. Instead of being well-behaved and guarding holy sites at the bequest of their Arab masters, those uppity ("arrogant") Jews had the temerity to buy land, emboldened perhaps by the Balfour Declaration.
Jews should know their place shouldn't they, Sir Alistair and Mr Miles. Next thing we know, they will be wanting to be Ambassadors!
moshetzarfati2
20 December, 2009 - 14:59
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By conflating anti-Israel policies and anti-Semitism, you are belittling the struggle against the latter. Also, as for your closing jibe, it's a bit daft since the next ambassador to Israel is...Jewish.