On remarks by Isaac Herzog: Racial purity is reprehensible in any language

Long before Donald Trump became President of the United States, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had stopped pretending to be concerned about whether the largely liberal Jewish-American community would continue to support its warmongering policies. Having obtained the unwavering support of hard-line Republicans – especially right-wing fundamentalist Christians – Netanyahu calculated that he no longer needed to speak for political progressives, even if they were Jewish.

began to explain why he is ready to strike out American liberal Jews: He believes that in a generation or two, they will no longer exist

Netanyahu's office denied it Accuracy of a report that suggested this last year, but the editor Makor Rishon – an Israeli newspaper owned by American casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, a political boss of Netanyahu and Trump – noted that Netanyahu had "repeated this evaluation several times in private talks, and that Israel's ambbadador to the United States, Ron Dermer, was heard making similar projections."

Twisted Logic

It should not be surprising that the factions of the Israeli government to the right of Netanyahu's ruli The Likud party also agrees with its fatal badessment of the largest Jewish community in the world. A few hours after the 2016 US presidential election, Israeli Minister and party leader Shas, Aryeh Deri, hailed Trump's victory as a sure sign of the decline of liberal Jews

Netanyahu and Deri, partners of the coalition, agree on the reason for their imminent condemnation. Orthodox American Jews are as likely to have a romantic relationship with a pagan as with a Jew. According to this twisted logic, inter-religious relations are nothing more than a "disease". In July, Deri took on Twitter lambaste the reformist movement for "arguing that mixed marriages are not a disease and that we should not see marriages between a Jew and a pagan as a failure" [sic] ] ". It is unfortunate that Herzog regards Jewish and pagan families as a scourge for which he hopes to find a solution. Unfortunately, it is a consensual stance that unites the far right of Israel to its radical center

While the right and the far right of Israel see the so-called influence Liberal liberalism as a blessing, Israeli centrists like former Labor leader Isaac Herzog see it with a little concern. Regardless of his own religious inclinations, Herzog depended on some of those very liberal American Jews for financial support in Israeli internal elections, so he must be careful not to offend their sensibilities, let alone encourage their extinction. .

American liberal Jews, Herzog 's five – and – a half year stay as Israeli opposition leader qualifies him for the presidency of the Jewish Agency, the parastatal that he recently elected to lead. The organization is often called the government of the world Jewish community and its presidency as "prime minister of the Jewish people".

In fact, Herzog's parliamentary record reveals that, on key issues, the differences between him and Netanyahu are barely perceptible. But his rivalry for the role of the Jewish Agency was not really fierce. A month before the vote, his main rival, Netanyahu's minister, Yuval Steinitz, openly lambasted EU allies, declaring that the European Union could "make a thousand hell"

Talking points anti-miscegenation

The same day he was appointed to the coveted position of the Jewish Agency, Herzog revealed that his opinions on inter-marriage are not very different from Netanyahu, Deri, or even, besides, Bentzi Gopstein. The latter leads Lehava, an anti-miscegenation gang that patrols Israeli cities and mentally and physically harbades Métis couples.

In an interview on Israeli television, Herzog adopted anti-miscegenation discussion points. In identifying the issues that he intends to address as incoming president of the Jewish Agency, Herzog enumerated Jewish-non-Jewish marriages as his first order of the day. "I encountered something that I called a real plague: I saw the children of my friends married or badociated with non-Jewish partners," said Herzog, adding, "He must There is a campaign, a solution … Discover how to solve this great challenge. "

VIDEO now with English subtitles: The day he is appointed president of the Jewish Agency, Isaac Herzog -" Leader of the "Israeli" Opposition for the Last Five Years – Slams Love Relationships Between Jews and Non-Jews in the United States as "a Real Plague" for Which He Expects to Find "A Solution" pic.twitter.com/ NQMMOdUtSi

– David Sheen (@davidsheen) June 25, 2018

The reports on Herzog's comments by Middle East Eye and others sparked some enthusiasm in the days that followed. Some outside observers have been shocked that an ostensibly liberal leader incites against married couples and uses what amounts to an eliminationist language to describe them.

Israeli Jews seem to be doing everything they can to make sure I disavow my Jewish identity. If they succeed in their attempt to define Judaism, they will succeed in making Jewish something they will be ashamed of. https://t.co/MrKjKvB2ML

– (((Barry Solow))) (@BarrySolow) June 25, 2018

After a few days, Herzog finally responded to the fury, insisting on Jewish Jewish Daily Influential Jewish Daily information website that he had done no harm. In an interview with editor-in-chief Jane Eisner, Herzog argues that his Hebrew was misinterpreted: "The discourse on interfaith relations is different in Israel," he says slang: "I did not mean it in negative terms."

It is absolutely amazing that to dismiss the criticism of his comments, Herzog invented an easily reprehensible lie: that he did not mean the word "plague" as an insult, but he did not no Hebrew translator in the world – human or machine – who will say that the word magefa means something other than a scourge.The word has no non-negative context, no meaning other that an infectious disease

Contemptuous comments

Herzog could have taken responsibility for his derogatory comments and said sorry to mixed families.He would have owned his mistake and issued a public apology, embracing interreligious couples as esteemed members of their societies whose life decisions – and life partners – must be accepted and respected in any country claiming to be a democracy.

But instead of retracting his racist remarks and trying to expiate them, Herzog blatantly lied in an attempt to whitewash them.

If there remained any doubt about his intent, Herzog clarified it just after the interview. when he traveled to pay homage to some of the most racist rabbis in the history of Israel. On the grave of former Sephardic Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, Herzog received the blessing of his son, Yitzhak Yosef, the current chief rabbi. According to the Israeli media, Herzog thanked Yosef for the blessing he received, including inviting him to "defend the Jewish people against miscegenation".

It is regrettable that Herzog considers Jewish and pagan families as a scourge for which he hopes to find a solution. Unfortunately, it is a consensual position that unites the Israeli far right to its radical center.

But if Herzog's comments were horrible, the attempt to conceal them is even more false.

Unreliable Media

Eisner provided a platform for Herzog to explain his comments, and did not even bother to ask a Hebrew speaker if his alibi was plausible. Eisner has just published the obvious falsehood of Herzog, then began to tax him for not being a carbon copy of Netanyahu and for descending from the founding families of Zionism, the Israeli equivalent of kingship.

As I wrote last week at Middle East Eye The venerated grandfather of Herzog, for which he was appointed, was the chief rabbi who established the Lehava of yesteryear, the anti-half-breed position of Palestine in the 1930s.

In his editorial, Eisner totally ignores the war But if the opposition leader of a Christian-majority or Muslim majority state was filmed by calling the Jews "a real plague" that demanded "a solution", we can safely badume that the first instinct of any honorable Jewish newspaper would question these comments, not to bring water to them.

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Israel's racial purists: United in fear of Jews who love non-Jews [19659008] In contrast, the Israeli media were a little more honest in this whole affair. The far right Channel 7 has released a play titled "Herzog, The Right Man at the Right Place", which bore the subtitle: "His gaze mistress esteem in the diaspora as a horrible plague that threatens us annihilate him to head the Jewish Agency. "

Even as Israel gallops towards Gomorrah, spiraling toward the unthinkable at a speeding pace, liberal Zionists will knot themselves to avoid d & # 39; To admit Israeli prejudices and fanaticism. We can not count on them to accurately account for Israeli society, and we can not trust them to tell the truth about its rampant racism.

As for Herzog himself, he turned out to be a big zero. And I really want to say that it's a negative term.

– David Sheen is a Canadian-born independent journalist and filmmaker, now reporting from Israel-Palestine. His work focuses mainly on racial tensions and religious extremism. In 2017, Sheen was named human rights defender for her report by Front Line Defenders, based in Ireland. His website is www.davidsheen.com and he tweets @Davidsheen

The opinions expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial line of Middle East Eye.

Photo: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pbades a large Israeli flag as he enters the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem on June 10, 2018 (AFP)