Anti-Semitism, July 2016

[vschanoes]

Well, yesterday was a day, wasn't it?

First Trump tweeted his impressively anti-Semitic anti-Hillary ad: a star of David calling her "corrupt" on a background of dollars. Here it is. After criticism, he pasted a circle over the star...poorly. CNN's newest employee has called objections to this ad "political correctness run amok."As an aside, I

Comments

[nick_kaufmann]

It's disgusting. As I said elsewhere, this is why I, as a Jewish person, feel the need to speak out whenever I hear people like Trump maligning the Mexicans and the Muslims as a people. It's because I know we're on that list, too. We may not be first on the list anymore, but we're on it, we're ALWAYS on it, and if we let bigotry against other groups slide, by the time they come after us it'll be too late.

[vschanoes]

In full agreement with you. Always remember who your enemies are, and who considers you the enemy. I always wonder that about Jews who cozy up to the American right--do they really think those people won't turn on them eventually?

[nick_kaufmann]

They think the right's unequivocal support for Israel protects them from anti-Semitism. They're mistaken.

[deborahjross]

I don't think we can roll back time and re-invent Israel differently. Israel's Declaration of Independence is amazingly inclusive and egalitarian, a flash of idealism in a sea of fractured cultures and roiling animosities. Add to that the waves of trauma culminating in Ha Shoah but reaching back millennia. The challenge then becomes how to preserve a safe haven for Jews, one not dependent upon the whims of a hostile, anti-Semitic world, and at the same time put into action our core values of respect and compassion for every human being?

[vschanoes]

I agree. All nation-states are founded on blood and injustice, and since I don't see the US dissolving and handing control of its land back to the people it was taken from, I don't see why Israel should be expected to. But that doesn't mean that Israel as it operates today vis-à-vis the Palestinians is the right, the best, the moral way of doing things. Or even the most effective, in my opinion, at keeping Jews, Israeli or not, safe (let alone Palestinians, of course).