By Michael Kuttner…
This one word encompasses several meanings applicable to the situation being faced today by Israel and Jews worldwide.
Synonyms include treacherous, duplicitous, deceitful, false, untrue, dishonest and two faced.
Take your pick because any one of them more than adequately describes politicians, social influencers and the media and their orchestrated orgy of hate and disinformation.
There has not been such a fetid frenzy since the heady days of the pre Shoah era. Today’s eruption of vile bile is eerily reminiscent of the blood curdling libels of the Middle Ages when temporal rulers and ecclesiastical authorities combined to accuse the Jews of deicide and child murders.
It has always been a puzzle for good people to understand how the most outrageous accusations against Jews could gain such traction among supposedly educated and cultured sectors of society.
The answer in fact is very simple.
A relentless and constant torrent of poisonous lies and accusations is the most effective means to influence the masses. When the targets are Jews the noxious seeds of hate germinate spontaneously.
I remember my mother and other German refugees recounting their experiences during the years leading up to the Shoah. They remembered how school friends with whom they had socialized for years suddenly wanted to have nothing to do with them. In 1933 Jewish children found that those they had imagined were life long friends had cut off all contact. From one day to the next they were ostracized, vilified and abused. Called “dirty Jews” German schoolchildren faced a bewildering reality.
The trauma these children suffered was shared by their parents. Many considered themselves loyal Germans and well integrated into German society. They had little understanding as to how years of delegitimization caused this catastrophic situation.
Today we should know better but have the lessons of the recent past been truly learnt?
Last week in Melbourne students from Mount Scopus College visited a museum. They were confronted there by older pupils from a non Jewish school who verbally abused them with the same “dirty Jew” slurs among other unmentionable phrases.
What precipitated this onslaught from students who in most cases had most probably never had a Jewish friend and do not have the slightest idea what Judaism is all about?
The answer of course is very simple.
Thanks to a relentless campaign against Israel in the media these students have absorbed a negative and toxic understanding about Jews. As has been proven, it does not take very much for this incitement to morph into hate about Jews. Social media and peer pressure contribute equally in brainwashing receptive minds.
Several troubling questions must be asked.
What did these non Jewish abusers learn at their school about Jews and Israel?
Did the teachers accompanying those pupils make any real effort to stop and condemn this outbreak of intolerance?
How many of these abusive pupils picked up their shameful attitudes from their parents or home environment?
Apart from horrified shock what steps are being taken to hold those responsible accountable?
Politicians, groups and the media who disseminate the most outrageous lies about Israel cannot hide from the inevitable fallout of their rhetoric and reporting.
Jewish students must be provided with sufficient knowledge and an ability to counter and cope with the tsunami of disinformation now flooding social outlets.
Those adults who still live in denial and believe the situation is all overblown and exaggerated need to take a long hard look at the past and wake up to the realization that inaction leads to disaster.
The warping of young minds is already well under way.
In a recent survey in the United Kingdom 21% of young Britons say that Israel does not have the right to exist.
This comes hard on the heels of a US survey which revealed that half of young Americans support Hamas.
How many of them were part of the 20% of Jews who voted for the Democratic anti-Israel candidate for the forthcoming New York mayoral elections?
A recent American podcast illustrates the extent to which ignorance and the drip feed of lies can produce the most outrageous outbursts about Jews. The eight young participants claimed that “Jewish people caused the Holocaust and therefore they should themselves be eliminated.” This assertion was followed by accusations of Jewish conspiracies as the reason for problems in the USA.
The moderator did nothing to shut them down or challenge them in any way. If this example of the up and coming generation of Americans is anything to go by then the future for Jews in that country is indeed bleak.
One has only to witness the chaos at US universities and the uncontrolled torrents of anti Israel/Zionist bile to realize that a lava flow of Jew hate is waiting to erupt. The spectacle of Jewish Democratic politicians embracing and tolerating these manifestations is indicative of a deep malaise in the American Jewish community.
Jewish celebrities who suddenly discover their hitherto latent ethnicity and condemn Israel from the supposed safety of Hollywood and London are embraced by a media salivating at the prospect of disaffected “stars.” This week Miriam Margolyes compared Israel and Israelis to Nazis and the journalists were euphoric.
Politicians distort historical facts with gay abandon and many communal spokespersons let them get away with it.
Australian PM Albanese stated that his country was proud to support the establishment of Israel in 1948 and two States. Presumably he was referring to the 1947 UN partition plan. Glaringly omitted of course was the fact that the Arab representatives (Palestinian fake nationality not yet having been invented) rejected the very notion of a two state solution. Albanese and his supporters deliberately erase this inconvenient truth and gloss over the 80 years of terrorism against the Jewish State.
The perfidious British in direct contradiction to the Mandate provisions and San Remo agreement handed territory intended for Jewish settlement to their Hashemite friends. Starmer, Macron, Albanese and others want to hand over the remaining strategic heartland of Israel to a terror supporting entity.
Shamefully, some communal groups endorse this lethal plan. They equivocate by saying the time is not right thus in effect giving a wink and a nod to its implementation.
What they do not comprehend is that the same jihadists who are waiting in the wings to murder and annihilate Jewish sovereignty are also rapidly entrenching themselves in democratic countries.
The recent horrific massacres of Syrian Druze by local jihadists highlight the fate that Israeli Jews would face if “Palestine” was ever established in Judea and Samaria. Israel was the only country which came to the aid of the beleaguered Druze minority and even then it was condemned for doing so. The international community, showing that it has learnt nothing from its shameful silence during the Shoah, remained conspicuous by its indifference.
University mobs and the usual “useful idiots” were nowhere to be seen or heard. Most media outlets contributed to a mass amnesia and instead concentrated their venom against the only nation which tried to defend the Syrian Druze from complete annihilation.
These daily doses of lies, slander, delegitimization and hate are producing a harvest of poisonous fruit.
Dismissing and minimizing these looming threats is a failure.
The only strategy is to stand up, speak up, demolish untruths and strengthen Jewish knowledge and identity.
As we commemorate Tisha B’Av and all the calamitous events which have occurred over the millennia we should resolve to never again be at the mercy of those who prefer to appease Jew haters.
Michael Kuttner is a Jewish New Zealander who for many years was actively involved with various communal organisations connected to Judaism and Israel. He now lives in Israel.
[This article was originally published on J-Wire and is reproduced here with permission from Michael Kuttner.]
