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Let all those who hate Zion be put to shame and turned back. Let them be as the grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows up. (Psalms 129:5,6) If, as I have already noted in previous articles, this summer has not been easy for the United States, it has been even more difficult for Western Europe, where the record-breaking heat wave has left thousands dead, besides resulting in enormous damage to agricultural produce. Reading the newly written book by Joseph and Arie Carmi, The War of Western Europe Against Israel (Devora Publishing, Jerusalem, New York, 2003, ISBN 1-930143-77-X, $14.95) one wonders whether judgments pronounced by God on those who turn against His people or ignore their plight are not already going into effect. The pride and arrogance of Europe's continuous hypocritical, self-serving and duplicitous behaviour towards Israel is bound to bring a firm answer of divine wrath upon those nations, as we have already seen, and will witness much more of in the coming days as these self-serving and cowardly attitudes continue. In their foreword, the Carmis write: This book takes a close look at the disturbing upswing in anti-Semitic violence in Europe by investigating European attitudes towards the State of Israel since its inception; by paying close attention to statements made by leading politicians ad opinion-makers, and by following trends in European media. Drawing from a wealth of sources, the authors paint a frightening picture of the general duplicity of many of the European positions held in both the political and media echelons. As they quote from an article by Ovadia Sofer, "The Challenge from Europe's Left," which was published on June 11, 2002 in The Jerusalem Post: A look at Palestinian propaganda in Europe and the rest of the world leads to the clear conclusion that the 'new anti-Zionism', which is just like anti-Semitism, resides within leftist and far-left circles, and not necessarily with the extreme Right, as is commonly thought. The latter apparently choose to conceal their hatred of Jews for the time being, for tactical electoral reasons. Post columnist Evelyn Gordon put it like this in her article "Hooligans take their cue": "But all of these justifications, though true, fail to explain the one salient fact [that] while anti-Semitic violence is up sharply in Europe, there has been no similar upsurge in the United States. "Like Europe, the US has a large Muslim community that cares deeply about the Middle East. It also has a very visible Jewish community that would provide an easy target for anti-Semitic attacks. Yet according to the Anti-Defamation League, the US has experienced no increase at all in anti-Semitic incidents over the last nineteen months." (Tuesday, May 14, 2002) This all makes me think of the words of Isi Leibler, vice president of the World Jewish Congress, and formerly from Belgium, when he recently spoke in Brussels: "Your government, and particularly your foreign minister, Louis Michel, have employed such outrageous double standards against Israel that they warrant being described as anti-Semitic. "Would you tolerate a neighboring territory orchestrating, funding, and blessing as 'holy martyrs' suicide murderers targeting your civilian population? Would you tolerate a situation in which Belgian women and children were terrified at being blown to pieces in your cafes and shopping centers? Would you tolerate street side celebrations by your neighbors sometimes just a few kilometers away, frequently displayed on your TV screens, rejoicing at the carnage that they had inflicted on your people? "I reminded the Belgian foreign minister that his country had supported a United Nations resolution condemning Israel for defending itself and even indirectly endorsing Palestinian terrorism as a legitimate vehicle against so-called Israeli occupation. "It is a mark of shame," I said "for your country - most of whose Jews were exterminated by the Nazis - to now stand at the forefront of actions designed to undermine the only democratic state in the Middle East; the state which also provided a haven to survivors of the Holocaust. "Your calls for a boycott and other acts of hostility against the Jewish state, make me feel that despite my roots in Belgium, I would be dishonoring the memory of my Belgian grandparents by identifying in any way with a government whose leaders have such short memories that they can behave so appallingly to the heirs of the Holocaust." Leibler then adds these words: Nevertheless, it would be a grave mistake to view this abomination in isolation. The Belgians are simply less sophisticated than most Europeans and their Israel-bashing or anti-Semitism is perhaps cruder and more brutal than their colleagues. But we should be under no illusion. Belgium's excesses carry the support of most Europeans whose zeal in attacking Israel is motivated by the same prejudice and double standards even when presented in a more sophisticated manner and accompanied by cliches about Israel's right to exist. Just as Belgium may be one of the most outspoken examples of what is happening in many other West European Nations, former Norwegian diplomat Terje Roed Larsen is certainly one of the most visible and crude examples of the duplicity of many European politicians of our day. About Larsen who is now U.N.'s special representative to the Middle East, Professor Shlomo Avineri writes: All that Larsen has to say about why Oslo failed is that both sides 'deviated' from the Oslo principles; to wit, 'Israel expanded the occupation, and built new settlements, while Palestinian groups resorted to terror.' Such sanitized language is not only falsification of the historical record but also assumes a moral equivalence between new settlements and suicide bombings. This stinks. I have no other, more diplomatic, words for it. This is also the language of Arab propaganda, and Larsen appears to give it further currency. Statements like these coming from an official UN representative, only explain why the UN has until now failed to achieve anything meaningful in the Middle East, and will continue to fail if people like Larsen continue to be its spokesmen in the region. "The Moral Blindness of Terje Roed-Larsen" in The Jerusalem Post, August 24, 2002 This trend, therefore, is present in many other European nations, like Norway, Sweden, Holland, England, and others, some of which are mentioned in this book. How terrible it is, that on the soil of Europe where less than a century ago, so many of the Jewish people were brutally packed into trains to be massacred in the Nazi concentration camps, that there so many seem to have learned nothing, and continue their Jew bashing, or again look the other way as they did then, when Nazi-like enemies surround the Jewish nation - or what is left of them in Israel - ready to complete what Hitler left undone. What utter and double shame on Europe! Woe unto Europe when her day of reckoning will come. Jan Willem van der Hoeven, Director |
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