As a Jew, I’m simply ashamed….

This is a guest post by Geary

Dear Sir,

As-a-Jew…

Ken Livingstone’s was a brilliant and honest piece. As a Jew in my 50s, I have been disgusted at the way in which the spectre of anti-Semitism have been used as a shield against any criticism of Israel’s repugnant and racist policies towards the Palestinians over 60 years.  Livingston eloquently reminds us there are still some universal values and that the lessons of the Holocaust apply equally to Israel. I feel proud to be a Londoner having a mayor like Livingstone.” (Letter, Guardian, March 2005)

DANIEL DAY-LEWIS’S account of Gaza children trapped in a gigantic ghetto, imposed by descendants of those who experienced the same (Magazine, March 20, 2005) was soul wringing. As a Jew I feel ashamed of the criminal behavior of the Israeli government which claims to represent Jews worldwide. The so-called “disengagement”, if it ever happens, will leave a scorched Gaza while the obscene apartheid wall turns the West Bank into a series of concentration camps, and illegal Israeli settlements expand exponentially.” (Letter, Sunday Times, April 2005)

As a Jew, and above all as a second-rate academic with personality problems and a hyperbole-fixation, I wish to express my outrage and disgust at whatever it is that the Guardian and the BBC is accusing Israel of this week.

How dare the Jewish state make my life such a misery? As the intellectual runt of a talented family I suffer bouts of deep insecurity, and only by joining in the demonisation of Israel whenever I can, can I hope to allay the witch-hunting suspicions of my left-wing colleagues – who will then love me or, at least, despise me a bit less.

The personal accounts of unparalleled deprivations caused by the criminal-Nazi-apartheid-genocidal Israeli regime are truly soul-wringing – all testified by unimpeachable political scientists the likes of Daniel Day-Lewis and Lauren Booth, not to mention that gentle soul, George Galloway. It is a true miracle and a tribute to the indomitable spirit of the Palestinian leadership, from the sainted Yasser Arafat to the even more sainted martyr Sheikh Yassin, that there are any Palestinians left at all. And how mean-spirited of some to ask for supporting evidence!  Who needs empirically-based facts and objective reporting when we have, at our disposal, the cool, dispassionate analysis by the sages at the BBC and The Guardian.

Why can’t my fellow Jews see Hamas and Hezbollah for what they really are?   They are clearly modern-day John Browns and Anne Franks.  Mostly, though, they are merely charity organisations whose schools teach the brotherhood of man and (only most reluctantly, I’m sure) basic weapons-training, bomb-making, and anti-Semitic incitement.

Israel must stop provoking its Arab neighbours by being such a modern functioning state and become just like every other Middle Eastern country. It must hold out the hand of peace to Iran. It must accede to all its enemies’ demands before tea-time. Only a cynical Islamophobe could believe that Hamas and Hezbollah would really carry out their frequent promises to eliminate the Jews.

Only then can we Jews go back to being inconspicuous, just like in the good old days. Being despised for our weakness was such a small price to pay.

And only then can I stop being a self-hating As-a-Jew. Perhaps.

Yours faithlessly,

Seth Berchelstein-White

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