European Jewish Association slanders left and urges dialogue with far-right
By
Jean Shaoul
24 November 2018
This year’s European Jewish Association special conference underscored the deeply reactionary character of the global efforts by Zionist groups and their allies to redefine opposition to Israel’s repression of the Palestinians as anti-Semitism. It is the spearhead of a broader campaign to equate socialism with “Jew hatred” and to apologise for and make an alliance with far-right forces.
Central place at the two-day event in Brussels, November 6-7, was given to a session slandering UK Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters as an “existential threat” to Jews, accompanied by a call to reach out to Europe’s far-right parties as potential allies of Israel in the struggle against Islam.
Rabbi Menachem Margolin, the founder and chair of the EJA, said that while efforts should be made to outlaw explicitly anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi parties, once a far-Right or populist party joined a coalition government in Europe efforts should be made to open communications and engage with them. Another participant, Riccardo Pacifici, former President of the Jewish Community in Rome, justified this, saying, “What’s happening in Europe is a new history. It’s impossible to classify European parties as Left or Right. Everything has changed.”
Such statements are in line with the alliance Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu’s government is seeking to build with xenophobic and far-right populist parties throughout Europe that defend Israel based on anti-Muslim prejudice and shared support for imperialist intervention in the Middle East.
A front for the Israeli government
The two-day event was targeted at European and UK Parliament legislators, with many of the…