That fact has been pointed out many times across all media but there are those that choose to ignore and label any criticism of the Israeli government's actions in Gaza or the ultra zionist settlers west bank atrocities antisemitic.
Mistakenly released prisoner Brahim Kaddour-Cherif has been arrested for being unlawfully at large on Blackstock Road in Islington, north London He was detained at 11:30 GMT after a member of the public called the police to report a sighting of a man they believed to be the 24-year-old Algerian Kaddour-Cherif had been released in error from HMP Wandsworth on Wednesday, 29 October He had been convicted in November of indecent exposure relating to an incident in March that year, police said Kaddour-Cherif is the second mistakenly released prisoner to return to custody in as many days - William "Billy" Smith handed himself into HMP Wandsworth on Thursday
So very true, but some just won't have it. This came up recently. "Are we really going to do that dumb dance of saying, ‘Criticising Zionism is not the same thing as hating Jews’? Stop it. I’m tired." Brendan O'Neill, Spiked Online. Unfortunately there has been systemic discrimination against Jews across Israel itself - supporters of Maccabi Tel Aviv being a noticeable spearhead - towards Mizrahi Jews "Sons of Arab ****es". Estimates suggest that over 50% of Israel's Jewish population is of at least partial Mizrahi descent, making them the largest Jewish ethnic group. Mizrahi oppression refers to discrimination and marginalization faced by Jewish people originating from the Middle East and North Africa, both before and after their immigration to Israel. While there were occasional antisemitic incidents before the 20th century, tensions surrounding Zionism and conflicts in Mandatory Palestine led to growing antisemitism in the Arab world. The violence and brutality of the Nakba - Israel's displacement of Palestinians - created a backlash that endangered Mizrahi Jews throughout the region, forcing many Arab Jews to flee to Israel where they faced a different form of oppression. In Israel, this oppression materialised as systemic discrimination by the dominant Ashkenazi (European Jewish) establishment, which viewed Mizrahi culture as inferior and imposed its own norms through policies in housing, education, and employment. This led to socioeconomic inequalities and the erosion of Mizrahi identity, disparities that persist in Israeli society today¹ with Mizrahi communities continuing to face lower average incomes, educational gaps, media presence and a stark underrepresentation in positions of power. Forms of oppression: Cultural: The Ashkenazi-led state sought to create a European-centric society, leading to the dismissal of Mizrahi culture, language, and traditions. Arab Jews were never part of the original Zionist vision, which was fundamentally a European nationalist project emerging in Central and Eastern Europe in the late 19th century as a response to European antisemitism and the rise of ethnic nationalism. Social and economic: Arriving Mizrahi immigrants were often directed to live in overcrowded and impoverished areas, experience segregated educations, their cultural background was seen as a hindrance to success in a society that favoured European norms. Political: The ruling establishment exploited and marginalized Mizrahi communities, leading to a lack of representation in political and economic systems. "De-Arabization": Many Mizrahi Jews felt pressured to abandon aspects of their identity, particularly their connection to Arab culture, to be accepted into Israeli society. This pressure was codified in the 2018 Nation-State Basic Law, which stripped Arabic of its official language status, reducing it to merely having 'special status' - a symbolic and practical erasure of Mizrahi linguistic and cultural heritage. If the Zionist state discriminates among Jews - creating a hierarchy of “kinds of Jews,” what Mizrahi scholars call the paradox of Jewish racism; then Zionism cannot be equated with the protection of Jews from antisemitism. Criticizing Zionism is not antisemitic, and defending Zionism is not the same as defending Jews as a people. Mizrahi Jewish critics are some of the sharpest critics of Zionism - because they lived its hierarchy. That’s how we actually fight anti-Semitism: by naming it clearly, by defending free speech, and by holding everyone accountable - Israel very much included. Both Zionism and European antisemitism emerged from the same historical context of 19th-century European nationalism and racial thinking. It is deeply bad faith to project European frameworks of antisemitism onto Arab and Palestinian resistance to Israeli occupation and expansionism; conflating the opposition to specific state violence with the racial hatred that characterized European antisemitism, erases the material reality of dispossession and systemic oppression. “If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that?” David Ben-Gurion (Founding father of Israel and first Israeli Prime Minister) Le Paraddoxe Juif . pp121. Ben-Gurion could discuss, quite openly, that “we have come and we have stolen their (Palestinians) country,” while describing the later unforeseen Arab Jewish immigrants as being “two thousand years behind us,” implying they needed to be remade as modern Israeli citizens, modeled on European Ashkenazi norms. Tom Segev, 1949: The First Israelis 1. Gender, ethnic, and national earnings gaps in Israel: The role of rising inequality (Haberfeld & Cohen)
"Svengali (/svɛŋˈɡɑːli/) is a character in the novel Trilby which was first published in 1894 by George du Maurier. The name "Svengali" has become synonymous with a manipulative authority figure who dominates another person, especially one with a villainous intent. The character is a stereotypical antisemitic portrayal of an Ashkenazic (Eastern European) Jew, complete with "bold, black, beady Jew's eyes" and a "hoarse, rasping, nasal, throaty rook's caw, his big yellow teeth baring themselves in a mongrel canine snarl". George Orwell wrote that Svengali, who—while cleverer than the Englishmen—is evil, effeminate, and physically repugnant, was "a sinister caricature of the traditional type" and an example of "the prevailing form of antisemitism. In the novel, Svengali transforms Trilby into a great singer by using hypnosis. Unable to perform without Svengali's help, Trilby becomes entranced." Wikipedia.
That is a stretch. lol. These days any portrayal of any Jewish character as anything = anti semitism. lol. "portrays as a sinister and manipulative figure" Its a dual hit of hypnotism and brainwashing is something people all over the place accuse the right of all the time. Seems fair game to me to strip away anything to do with him being a Jew and see without tinted glasses that its using his hypnotist background allied with the brainwashing aspect and nothing at all to do with him being Jewish. Reminds me of when that Australian cartoonist / characaturist did that image in a newspaper of Serena Williams as a cry baby and was immediately criticised for racism when characatures are "grotesques" at worst and exaggerated features at best, pretty much like spitting image or Gerald Scarfe. People are looking for things that just aren't there these days. No idea why because there's plenty of actual bad **** to attack without trying to skew things like this. Where does this link to Svengali come in?
Tees Valley mayor Lord (Ben) Houchen promised renewal. Instead, Britain’s biggest regeneration project has turned into a taxpayer-funded scandal - enriching a few local businessmen while leaving public bodies on the brink. Private eye podcast https://fb.watch/DeR-HZaYuJ/
I saw the cartoon last night, Polanski has been depicted as Svengali. So I thought it was appropriate to quote the wiki stub on Svengali for context. The historical baggage of the grotesque, hypnotic, effeminate, and physically repugnant hypnotist Svengali overrides any claim of "fair game". The cartoon is pertinent as it led on from with my previous post critiquing the "antisemitism = anti-Zionism" trope, by looking at forms of discrimination in Israel itself against the wrong "type of jew". Elsewhere there are other more treacherous types, American liberal Jews "who hate Israel and their religion"* or in Zack's case a Jewish UK political leader who actively supports Palestinian statehood. We could have a thought experiment; what if there was also a version of this Svengali cartoon depicting a right-wing Jewish politician with a Israeli flag/Star of David on his lapel? Given the historical context I've laid out - that the Svengali character was explicitly created as an antisemitic caricature of Jewish manipulation - how can we possibly strip away the fact that a Jew who once happened to be a hypnotist is being depicted with the precise imagery of the infamous antisemitic trope (but with an added Palestinian flag)? I'm curious what specific criteria you'd use to determine when a visual trope against a minority figure stops being satire and starts being hate speech. *Donald Trump: America First podcast - March 18, 2024
