HOWARD EPSTEIN: ANTI-SEMITISM AND REALISM
On BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour earlier this week, Labour party leader, Jeremy Corbyn was interviewed by ever-rising star broadcaster, Emma Barnett. It is Corbyn’s party that has refused to expel Hitler-obsessing Ken Livingstone. Corbyn himself has for years associated with Hamas and Hezbollah, and supported the IRA over the UK. Barnett is a Jewess. Corbyn and his former lover, the risible Diane Abbot, frequently give car-crash interviews. Here is another:-
Emma Barnett received abuse over her BBC Radio 4 Woman’s Hour interview with Jeremy Corbyn (pic – BBC)
| Emma Barnett | Jeremy Corbyn |
| How much will [your child-care proposal] cost?
You presumably have the figures?
So how much will it cost?
You don’t know it.
You’re logging into your iPad here. You’re announcing a major policy. and you don’t know how much it will cost?
You’re holding your manifesto, you’re flicking through it, you’ve got an iPad there, you’ve had a phone call while you’re in here, and yet you don’t know how much it’s going to cost.
This is a policy you’re launching this morning.
But you don’t know the cost?
This is a very expensive policy. Mr Corbyn. I’m going to help you out with the figures. Would you like to hear how much it’s going to cost?
Would you like to know how much your policy is going to cost, Mr Corbyn?
Well, it’s actually from Angela Rayner, your shadow education secretary. £2.7billion, and then £4.8billion. With half a billion to reverse the cuts to the Sure Start scheme. Does that sound about right? |
Er, it will cost, er. It will obviously cost a lot, we accept that.
Yes, I do.
I’ll give you the figure in a moment.
Er…
Can I give you the exact figure in a moment?
Can we come back go that in a moment?
I think what is important for voters to understand is that if we don’t invest in our children they do less well in primary school, less well in secondary school less will in the future.
I want to give you an accurate figure.
What we think is, it’s important to invest for the whole community and collect the money back through taxation on the principle of universalism.
What is your estimate of it?
It does sound correct… |
In May, 1997, the BBC’s presenter of Newsnight, Jeremy Paxman, interviewed the Conservative politician (later party leader) Michael Howard. This edited clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uwlsd8RAoqI shows Paxman asking Howard the same question (“Did you threaten to overrule him?”) twelve times before abandoning hope of an answer. (It is not relevant but Howard is Jewish, whilst Paxman is not.)
Paxman received praise for his persistence. Emma Barnett (who was no more offensive than Paxman (ie not at all)) has received a great deal of blatantly anti-Semitic/anti-Zionist abuse and trolling from supporters of Corbyn for hers, despite it being plain that he just did not know his own party’s policy published that day.
The Jewish vote for Labour used to be automatic and monolithic. In the election on June 8 next, 77% of British Jews are expected to vote Conservative.
One looks forward to American Jews waking up and smelling the coffee.
In America, it is the leftist anti-Zionists who single out Jews and supporters of Israel for opprobrium and violence. The BDS (boycott, divest, sanctions) movement, which wages economic war on the state of Israel – and is a front for the PLO, which founded it – is directly responsible for increasing anti-Semitic incidents on college campuses. Nevertheless, BDS support comes from the Left and there are connections to the increasingly vocal and influential wing of the Democratic party that is deeply critical of Israel and willing at times to engage in speech that singles out Jews as part of an alleged cabal of Zionists seeking to manipulate American foreign policy against the best interests of the United States. (Let us call it The Protocols of the Elders of Zion Lite.)
In November 2016, progressive groups and United States senators, including Bernie Sanders, supported Representative Keith Ellison for chair of the Democratic National Committee (“DNC”). The ultra-liberal/Leftist Israeli newspaper, Ha’aretz (which gives much space to Gidon “Watch me publicly slit my unworthy Israeli throat, and yours too” Levy), in December 2016, commented on Ellison realistically thus:-
Keith Ellison Has a Real Israel problem.
Many pro-Israel groups had been skeptical of his candidacy to lead the Democratic National Committee from the start due to concerns over his past affiliation with the Nation of Islam and his criticism of Israel’s use of force in Gaza in response to Hamas rocket attacks.
But the revelation of a 2010 audio clip of Ellison charging that American foreign policy in the Middle East is governed primarily by Israeli interests has significantly complicated Ellison’s efforts to lead the DNC. The Anti-Defamation League, which had initially taken a wait-and-see approach to Ellison, responded to the clip by calling his words “deeply disturbing and disqualifying.” Making the case that Ellison is within the reasonable boundaries of being pro-Israel is far harder now than it was before.
On February 25, 2017, Ellison was defeated on the second ballot for leadership of the DNC. Minutes later, newly elected Chairman, Tom Perez, motioned for Ellison to be elected his Deputy Chair, which was approved unanimously by the DNC’s members. [my emphasis] Worrying or outrageous?
How about the comments made by Democratic Senator Robert Menendez during the February 2017 confirmation hearing of David Friedman, Trump’s (ultimately successful) nominee for ambassador to Israel? In questioning Friedman, Menendez — who in the past had been a stalwart friend of Israel and a foe of Iran — raised the specter of dual loyalty for American Jews. That should have alarmed the ADL and others who should worry about the way anti-Semitic stereotypes are gaining ground in American public life; but the ADL has been silent about the outrageous question the senator posed. (The ADL is 103 years old. Most people surviving to that age have lost their teeth. It seems that the ADL has retained at least that human characteristic, which must give great comfort to Noam Chomsky who accused it of “having lost entirely its focus on civil rights issues in order to become solely an advocate for Israeli policy”. The ADL now seems to live in a post-Chomsky age.)
Menendez increasingly speaks in language that manifests the growing influence of the anti-Israel Left. Yet American Jews’ support for the Democratic party is monolithic, unquestioning and infinitely forgiving.
The coffee they should wake up and smell has an aroma that is distinctly Cuban, Mexican and generally Latino. All candidates in future major elections in the USA will have to take that constituency into account. Do not expect it to be other than pro-Palestinian and antipathetic to Israel for their natural empathies have no connection to Israel or Jews. The writing is on the wall for a minority that used to punch above its weight, the Jews – now around 1.73% – given that the Latin minority is pushing out beyond 17.3% of the population.
Being American, Jewish, left-wing, liberal and Democratic used not to require a large quantities of white-wash slapped over hog-wash. Those days are over. With sure signs of rising anti-Semitism in the USA, one looks forward to its Jews re-assessing their traditional loyalties, as have their British cousins.
