{"id":142285,"date":"2014-11-28T20:02:09","date_gmt":"2014-11-28T20:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=142285"},"modified":"2014-11-28T20:02:09","modified_gmt":"2014-11-28T20:02:09","slug":"nazification-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/war-terrorism\/nazification-israel\/","title":{"rendered":"Nazification of Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Norman Pollack
\nRINF Alternative News<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Note: not, the Nazification of Judaism, my religion, that of my parents, ancestors, from the shtetlach of Russia, a religion I revere for its secular associations with struggle for the underdog, devotion to working people and the poor, emancipation of thought about\/specific participation in the achievement of, racial equality; for its cultural associations with beauty in all its affirming-of-life qualities, whether in literature, philosophy, painting, especially for me, music; its religious associations with moral principles imparted by Torah, love of the stranger, implicit sharing of bounty, authenticity of mindset concerning devotion and faith. Also, not the Nazification of Zionism, for while I believe Zionism has proven to be a colonialist-imperialist ideology, that was not always the case, and in its earlier stages perhaps still in the Yishuv the manifestation of labor radicalism rooted in the kibbutz. But rather, the Nazification of Israel, which has, I believe, corrupted, shamed, distorted, betrayed Judaism in all its historical reaching heavenward in the praising of God and its secular and cultural aspirations to freedom and democracy, in contrast to Israel\u2019s own militarization of religion through arrogance, hubris, superiority complex, leading to contemptuous disregard of all that stands in its way\u2013even the kibbutz integrated into the security system which feeds on population displacement and unimpeded fury directed to the Enemy, within as well as without.<\/p>\n

Why the term \u201cNazification,\u201d in the first place? The product of a self-hating Jew? Absolutistic defenders of Israel, who cannot, out of misguided loyalty, bring themselves even to denounce the recent atrocities in Gaza, may think so, regrettably including a preponderance of world Jewry especially in America today. As for Israelis themselves, opposition to ethnic cleansing, disproportionate application of force, second-class citizenship of Arab citizens, is near-nonexistent to dead on arrival. The Behemoth of the Middle East is taking on appropriate monolithic mental\/ideological features of its own, so that internal critics, too, are seen as self-hating Jews. I have chosen the term \u201cNazification\u201d deliberately because of what is currently going on, as stated in the New York Times heading for Isabel Kershner\u2019s article, \u201cIsrael Cabinet Approves Nationality Bill,\u201d (Nov. 24), the euphemism for the kind of Aryan laws seen in Germany at the advent of Hitler. This is troubling to say the least, a confirmation of what I have been suggesting all-along: The extreme pain and brutality of the Holocaust had become the seminal historical-psychological experience searing the Jewish mind as though a post-Apocalyptic barrenness had left Jews vulnerable to the psychodynamics of introjection\u2013taking into oneself the mental framework and world view of the oppressor\u2013under obviously dire conditions, and passed on as self-commending to future generations.<\/p>\n

To this day, the cycle has not been broken, and indeed, it is replenished through \u201cboots on the ground\u201d savagery toward those pronounced weaker and inferior, the Palestinians. For it is they who have been rendered, a collective surrogate, as the Jews under Naziism, fulfilling the pathology of identification with the original captors. Liberation of this kind comes at the expense of the contrived scapegoat, and hence, not liberating at all but driving the mindset still deeper into the darkness of the horrific primal context of extermination. The cry of \u201cNever Again\u201d made sense, a sign of bravery, moral courage, consciousness of life from the profound depths of despair, but when the founding of Israel should have been the moment of supreme affirmation, the wound cankered rather than healed, the cry itself prostituted into a vehicle of unrestrained power and self-righteousness in the service of popular subjugation of those now made less fortunate.
\n***<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s turn first to Kershner\u2019s article; she begins: \u201cThe Israeli cabinet on Sunday [Nov. 23] approved contentious draft legislation that emphasizes Israel\u2019s Jewish character above its democratic nature in a move that critics said could undermine the fragile relationship with the country\u2019s Arab minority at a time of heightened tensions.\u201d The assumption of Israel\u2019s \u201cdemocratic nature\u201d we\u2019ll leave moot\u2013at least the reporter recognizes the Nationality Bill is separate from it. But the proposed legislation has been long in the making, opponents (thus far a decided minority\u2013mine) \u201cfear[ing] that any legislation that gives pre-eminence to Israel\u2019s Jewishness could lead to an internal rift as well as damage Israel\u2019s relations with Jews in other countries and with the country\u2019s international allies.\u201d In Cabinet, \u201cthe bill, a proposal for a basic law titled \u2018Israel, the Nation-State of the Jewish people,\u2019 passed 14 to 6,\u201d with opposition from two centrist coalition partners. The Knesset still has to vote.
\nNetanyahu defended the legislation, claiming that he would amend it before the final vote to include the principle of \u201c\u2019equal individual rights for every citizen,\u2019\u201d vague and to me suspect, because of the present situation, his track record, and the emphasis on \u201cindividual\u201d rather than collective and communal rights. One critic, Ahmad Tibi, Arab member of the Knesset, sees \u201cJewish Democracy\u201d as a contradiction in terms, \u201c\u2019confirm[ing] that the Jewish and democratic state is fiction.\u2019\u201d Kershner reports that preliminary drafts were \u201cpromoted as private initiatives by right-wing lawmakers,\u201d which, among other things, had stripped Arabic of its status as an official language.<\/p>\n

Yes, where this is heading is sending nervous ripples through the state, blatant discrimination feared not only tension-provoking but poor public relations that, according to Avinoam Bar-Yosef, of the Jewish People Policy Institute, \u201c\u2019may stain Israel in the eyes of the free world and distance diaspora Jews who are counted as supporters of the Zionist project.\u2019\u201d Netanyahu appears to remain firm, calling for new legislation that would revoke welfare benefits (and things unspecified) of those who throw stones and, presumably, their families. Lines already drawn with respect to Arab Israelis are further hardening. I give Netanyahu the last word in her dispatch: \u201c\u2019There are many who are challenging Israel\u2019s character as the national state of the Jewish people. The Palestinians refuse to recognize this, and there is also opposition from within.\u2019\u201d Opposition, Arab Israelis but also miscreant Jews, now admittedly few, as the hatred of the many becomes self-devouring, placing the soul of Israel in jeopardy.
\nThe Nationality Bill is still under the radar, but Peter Beaumont, of the Guardian, in his article, \u201cIsraeli Cabinet approves legislation defining nation-state of Jewish people,\u201d (Nov. 23), fleshes out some details and implications of the measure, stating that cabinet approval comes \u201cdespite warnings that the move risks undermining the country\u2019s democratic character,\u201d particularly the definition of \u201creserved \u2018national rights\u2019 for Jews only\u201d and not for Israel\u2019s minorities. For as Beaumont writes, \u201cThe bill, which is intended to become part of Israel\u2019s basic laws, would recognize Israel\u2019s Jewish character, institutionalize Jewish law as an inspiration for legislation and delist Arabic as a second official language.\u201d This last, of course, is intended to hurt, as though undermining the history-culture-identity of the Adversary, allowing then for impersonal treatment of the nameless\u2013part of the salient trait of Israeli policy, deniability whenever convenient. Yet there is also the rough stuff: \u201cIn the West Bank, a Palestinian home was torched on Sunday [Nov. 23]. \u2018The settlers came here and they hit the door, but I refused to open,\u2019 said Huda Hamaiel, who owns the house. She said they then broke a terrace window and hurled a petrol bomb inside. \u2018Death to Arabs\u2019 and another slogan calling for revenge were also painted on the walls of Hamaiel\u2019s home[.]\u201d Whether the legal-constitutional or the storm-trooper mode of ensuring purity is worse, neither comports with pretensions of democracy.<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

I use the term \u201cAryan\u201d here not to call names, but in its generic sense of stating a hypothetical ethnic type, PURITY, whether pertaining to race, religion, nationality, whatever suits the historical-ideological purpose of the totalitarian society. Israel? In the Nationality legislation, ethnocentrism is inscribed in its very being, Jews as a New Pseudo-Gemeinschaft, drawing inward, known to itself by whom is excluded, expanding outward in a combative spirit as a means of demanding respect and flexing military muscle, from Jew to Israeli marking the journey to supermensch, disdainful of international obligation and world esteem. Curiously, conversion comes into play, Israel\u2019s rabbinate setting conditions which ensure that purity-of-type, while busily tilting the society further to the Right in areas having little to do with religion. Perhaps my New York Times Comment to Shmuly Yanklowitz\u2019s op. ed., \u201cJudaism Must Embrace the Convert,\u201d (Nov. 24), himself an Orthodox rabbi who recognized the closed-nature of Israeli society, helps to extend my argument on Nazification (a term he would find abhorrent as applied to Israel):<\/p>\n

Rabbi Yanklowitz\u2019s article is deeply moving, sensible in its own right, but also, although perhaps not intended, of great significance about the current state of world Jewry with respect to values of Torah and Jewish moral-ethical principles as they apply to the Palestinians. Welcoming the stranger does not have to apply only to the convert\u2014it applies fundamentally to all human beings\u2013welcome, as in social justice and respect accorded to others.<\/p>\n

Judaism presently is afflicted with ethnocentrism, the we-they dichotomy, that prevents reaching out, the acknowledgment of what is HUMAN in others.
\nYes, develop a more enlightened, kinder attitude toward conversion, but also, contemplate the recent destruction to Gaza, the baseness of the Occupation, the strangling of internal dissent in Israel.
\nJudaism is at a cross-roads, its spiritual essence of compassion, its centuries-old experience of discrimination and suffering, all evaporating before our eyes in the cruelty of oppression exhibited by modern-day Israel with the complicity and acquiescence of the world Jewish community. Conversion is a test of inclusiveness, of raising moral principles to the defining level of the faith; but so too is the Palestinian Question a test\u2014are we, as Jews, going to replicate the behavior of those who condemned, beat, and murdered us, or are we going to live up to our finest professions of faith, yes, Rabbi, the passage on the stranger. No one is a stranger in God\u2019s sight.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Norman Pollack\u00a0has written on Populism. His interests are social theory and the structural analysis of capitalism and fascism. He can be reached at\u00a0pollackn@msu.edu<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Norman Pollack RINF Alternative News Note: not, the Nazification of Judaism, my religion, that of my parents, ancestors, from the shtetlach of Russia, a religion I revere for its secular associations with struggle for the underdog, devotion to working people and the poor, emancipation of thought about\/specific participation in the achievement of, racial equality; for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,16],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-142285","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-war-terrorism"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}