The Tradition of Jew-Hate - by Nils A. Haug for the Gatestone Institute - 18.09.24
Michael Julien- Sep 18, 2024
- 5 min read
If the demonstrators really cared about Palestinians, as the Muslim Arab journalist Bassam Tawil points out, "they would be speaking out against the repressive measures and human rights violations perpetrated by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.... instead of improving the living conditions of their people, Hamas and PIJ leaders are imposing new taxes and leading comfortable lives in Qatar, Lebanon and other countries. Instead of bringing democracy and freedom of speech to their people, the terror groups are arresting and intimidating journalists, human rights activists and political opponents."
"Racial hatred and hysteria seemed to have taken complete hold of otherwise decent people," said an eyewitness. "I saw fashionably dressed women clapping their hands and screaming with glee, while respectable middle-class mothers held up their babies to see the 'fun.'" — Eyewitness to the November 9, 1938 Kristallnacht.
Jihadist media efforts, and especially massive donations to universities from Qatar and other oil-rich Islamic countries, have been so successful that many academics and students in Western tertiary educational institutions have been captivated by the narrow ideology of Jew-hate.
"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism." — Zuheir Mohsen, PLO official, Trouw, March 1977.
In the jihadist view, Islam is the one true faith and therefore Christians, Jews, Hindus, and all other "disbelievers" are following a false religion and therefore can be righteously killed as apostates.
"The Crusaders conquered Eretz Israel, reaching Jerusalem in 1099. Once there, they gathered all the Jews of Jerusalem into the central synagogue and set it afire. Other Jews, who had climbed to the roof of Al-Aksa mosque on the Temple Mount, were caught and beheaded." — 'The First Crusade,' chabad.org.
Anti-Semitism should not be minimized nor disparaged. It is not a temporary development. It is an ongoing, unyielding, malignant ideology manifesting itself over millennia. Whenever it finds no opposition, it grows explosively.
In a tumultuous geo-political environment where fresh political and military, challenges arise almost unexpectedly, mounting threats to Jews everywhere deserve urgent attention. This view is based not only on daily situations in the West, but on a long and distressing history.
Concerningly, a 2023 report indicated that in New York State, "44% of all recorded hate crime incidents and 88% of religious-based hate crimes targeted Jewish victims, the largest share of all such crimes." The report reveals an increase of 89% in these crimes over the last five years. In addition, the academic year of 2024 highlights increased campus unrest, ostensibly over whether Palestinians should be given a state as a reward for terrorism.
If the demonstrators really cared about Palestinians, as the Muslim Arab journalist Bassam Tawil points out: "they would be speaking out against the repressive measures and human rights violations perpetrated by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.... instead of improving the living conditions of their people, Hamas and PIJ leaders are imposing new taxes and leading comfortable lives in Qatar, Lebanon and other countries. Instead of bringing democracy and freedom of speech to their people, the terror groups are arresting and intimidating journalists, human rights activists and political opponents."
"Buildings at Cornell University [were] vandalized," read the report; "Michigan University student government [was] calling for severing of ties with Israel; and [there were] protests leading to more arrests at Columbia University,"
Across the Atlantic, in the UK, the hostility towards Jews has displayed by mass demonstrations, violence, and "hate-marches" in favour of Islamist terrorist organizations and their claims to a fictitious, borderless and lawless "Palestine." This situation shows no sign of letting up but, to the contrary, will probably escalate, with little chance of a compromise. The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, recently made reference to this development: "antisemitism plagues our world... from the Middle East to Europe and Africa, reports of attacks and hate speech have multiplied."
Rising hostility towards Jewish minorities has started to feel like a prelude to the Nazi-inspired event, Kristallnacht ('the night of broken glass'), on November 9, 1938, when thousands of Jewish homes, businesses, stores and synagogues, were looted and destroyed throughout Germany, Austria, and areas of Poland. More than 30,000 Jewish men were sent off to centration camps. Most were executed.
"Racial hatred and hysteria seemed to have taken complete hold of otherwise decent people. said an eyewitness. "I saw fashionably dressed women clapping their hands and screaming with glee, while respectable middle-class mothers held up their babies to see the 'fun.'"
While such extreme social manifestations of Jew-hate are not yet widespread in the West, similar events show a growing animosity. In the past, such feelings in the West were subtle and largely hidden. Now, to quote Steven Spielberg, "it is no longer lurking but standing proud like 1930's Germany."
Kristallnacht occurred at the time of Adolf Hitler's rising popularity when Jew-haters – both Nazi party supporters and average citizens alike - joined forces to vent their anger, probably about the collapsed economy, on the persons and property of Jews living peacefully in their midst. While the apparent catalyst was assassination of a German diplomat, Ernst von Rath, by a 17-year-old Jewish youth in Paris, France, another of the underlying reasons was likely mass Nazi propaganda blaming Jews for Germany's defeat during World War I, as well as the dire economic situation.
Despite the fact that, prior to the Nazi Party taking power, most Jewish citizens were seemingly well integrated into German society, crowds were nonetheless stirred by anti-Semitism emanating from the Reich Minister of Propaganda from 1933-1945, Joseph Goebbels.
One can understand why Chaim Weizmann (later, Israel's first president) wrote at the time, "The world seemed to be divided into two parts—those places where the Jews could not live and those where they could not enter." In other words, they were hated on all sides and had nowhere to go.
In an ironic imitation of Nazi-era demands that Jews leave their homes in Germany and go to "Palestine," calls are now made for them to get out of "Palestine," now the State of Israel. Jews again face violent radicals seeking to expel them from their homes. For centuries past, through pogroms in Europe, as well as persecution in the Muslim world, where Jews were ousted from cities, towns and villages where they had resided peacefully since biblical times.
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Nils A. Haug is an author and columnist. A Lawyer by profession, he is member of the International Bar Association, the National Association of Scholars, a faculty member at Intercollegiate Studies Institute, the Academy of Philosophy and Letters. Retired from law, his particular field of interest is political theory interconnected with current events.
He holds a Ph.D. in Apologetical Theology. Dr. Haug is author of 'Politics, Law, and Disorder in the Garden of Eden – the Quest for Identity'; and 'Enemies of the Innocent – Life, Truth, and Meaning in a Dark Age.' His work has been published by First Things Journal, The American Mind, Quadrant, Gatestone Institute, Jewish News Syndicate and many others.
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