Former Jewish Voice for Peace director Rebecca Vilkomerson tweeted:
Think about the phrase “visionary heart-opening anti-Zionist book.”
Try to imagine the phrase “visionary heart-opening anti-“anything else.
Anti-communist? Anti-white supremacist? Anti-terrorist? Anti-gay? Anti-Chinese? Anti-global warming? Anti-abortion? Anti-Muslim?
There are lots of people and groups against a lot of things, and hate is an appropriate response to many outrages. But how many people who hate anything try to elevate that hate into art and poetry?
I can only think of two examples.
Nazi Germany turned Jew-hatred into poetry. Here is a poem “If All People Were Jews:”
If all people were Jews,What would become of the world?No corn would grow,No plow would move through the fields,No forester would tend the woods,No miner would start his shift.Jews don’t even likeTo sail the seas.The steamboat would never have been invented,Nor would the train.No dirigible would riseShining into the sky.We wouldn’t have gunpowder,Nor electric lights.For the Jew can barter,But he cannot invent.… What can the Jew give,He who has nothing,Yet presumes toCall himself “elect”?Only the devil knows,For the devil loves pride and arrogance.Thank God there are stillPeople other than Jews on earth!
And now the “anti-Zionist” community, with books and songs and chants dedicated to hate..
Like the KKK, the modern haters used to pretend that their movement was not negative but positive. They pretended to be “pro-Palestinian.” But that façade has faded as it became increasingly clear that these groups were doing nothing to help Palestinians and as their philosophy developed around the theme of hating Israel and everything it stands for. They only support Palestinian initiatives that align with that goal. (How many “pro-Palestinians” make solidarity visits to Lebanese or Jordanian UNRWA camps? It’s very rare.)
Here is an entire book of “personal stories, history, poetry and art” that is based on a negative: “confronting Zionism.” These people define themselves by what they hate. And now like their antisemitic forebears they are trying to use their hate as a springboard build an entire artistic community.
This idea of elevating antisemitism as anti-Israel art has been building for years. Belgium’s poet laureate Charles Ducal and poet Alice Walker both wrote poems that compared Jews to Nazis under the guise of “anti-Zionism.” So did the acclaimed play “Seven Jewish Children.”
The modern haters are all strengthened by finding comrades who share their hate, and since they look at themselves as being cultured, they are now in the forefront of integrating hate into art.
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