Concerned about OWS?

Anti-Semitism, a Growth Industry in Bad Times

By Alan Caruba

In bad times, anti-Semitism seems to crawl out of the sewers like a repugnant odor. It is not subject to a rational response. It is pure emotion and a very nasty one at that. Lately we got a whiff of it at some of the Occupy protests.

On November 3rd, the Anti-Defamation League released a nationwide study that found that “anti-Semitic attitudes have risen slightly in America, demonstrating once again that ‘anti-Semitic beliefs continue to hold a vice-grip’ on a small but not insubstantial segment of America.”

“The ADL survey found that 15 percent of Americans—nearly 35 million adults—hold deeply anti-Semitic views, an increase of 3 percent from a similar poll conducted in 2009, and matching the levels of anti-Semitic propensities recorded in the U.S. in 2005 and 2007.” Even so, what passes for anti-Semitism today is not remotely comparable to earlier, pre-World War Two generations.

One of the lesser reported aspects of the Occupy Wall Street movement has been a strong element of anti-Semitism. Little wonder that it has been endorsed by the American Nazi Party and other extreme groups, both Left and Right.

As Abraham H. Foxman, the ADL National Director, noted, “The fact that anti-Semitic attitudes have increased significantly over the past two years is troubling and raises questions about the impact of broader trends in America—financial insecurity, social uncertainty, the decline in civility and the growth of polarization—on attitudes toward Jews.”

For example, 19 percent of those polled answered “probably true” to the statement that “Jews have too much control/influence on Wall Street”, an increase from 14 percent in 2009. This indicates that Jewish stereotypes remain strong; particularly claims that Jews control Wall Street and the media.

This reflects events and attitudes in Europe as well. In an article published in the UK newspaper, The Guardian, on November 6, Emine Bozkurt, a Dutch MEP who heads the anti-racism lobby at the European Parliament, was quoted saying that “We are at a crossroads in European history. In five year’s time we will either see an increase in the forces of hatred and division in society, including ultra-nationalism, xenophobia, Islamaphobia and anti-Semitism, or we will be able to fight this horrific tendency.”

Thomas Klau of the European Council on Foreign Relations, referring to the study, said, “As anti-Semitism was a unifying factor for far-right parties in the 1910s, 20s and 30s, Islamaphobia has become the unifying factor in the early decades of the 21st century.”

The difference worth noting is that the Jews of Europe never had any intention of taking over those nations while Muslims have made it clear they want to impose Sharia law.

Kristallnach 1938

November 9-10 is the anniversary of Kristallnach in 1938 (the Night of Broken Glass) in which Jews and their synagogues suffered violent attacks throughout Germany, the recently annexed Sudetanland, in Hanover, and the free city of Danzig. It was the beginning of what would evolve into the Holocaust, the deliberate extermination of Europe’s Jews.

Some Jews, in response to Europe’s entrenched anti-Semitism, joined the Zionist movement, beginning in the 1890s to create a Jewish homeland in Israel, moving there before the cataclysm of the Holocaust. At the time it was a protectorate of the British. Post-World War Two Holocaust survivors moved there and, in 1948 Israel declared its sovereignty. Thereafter, many Jews fled Middle Eastern nations for the sanctuary Israel provided and were later joined by Russian Jews fleeing the Soviet Union.

These days, the Holocaust-deniers in Iran openly boast of their intent to destroy Israel (and America) with the nuclear weapons they are developing.

The ADL report’s findings are unpleasant, but hardly surprising. Anti-Semitism in America is a phenomenon of the fringes of political movements of the Far Right (neo-Nazis) and Far Left (Communists).

In these times, however, Israel has no greater support than among American conservatives and evangelicals; Jews have no better friends.

The American historian and scholar, Thomas Cahill, said, "The Jew gave us the Outside and the Inside—our outlook and our inner life. We can hardly get up in the morning or cross the street without being Jewish. We dream Jewish dreams and hope Jewish hopes. Most of our best words, in fact—new, adventure, surprise, unique, individual, person, vocation, time, history, future, freedom, progress, spirit, faith, hope, justice—are the gifts of the Jews.”

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Time to Rid the Streets of the "Occupy" Movement

By Alan Caruba

Is there any doubt left in the minds of observers of the Occupy Wall Street movement tends toward violence and is in need of control? The mayors of the cities—some seventy at last count—that are being occupied need to crack down on it.

Not all agree, of course. Among the list of the Occupy movement are the following organizations and individuals that have expressed support or sympathy:

Communist Party, USA
American Nazi Party
Revolutionary Communist Party
Industrial Workers of the World
International Bolshevik Tendency
International Socialist Organization
Marxist Student Union
Freedom Road Socialist Organization
Party for Socialism and Liberation
President Barack Obama
Vice President Joe Biden
Former House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi
The Revolutionary Guards of Iran
Communist Party of China
Louis Farrakhan, National of Islam
Black Panthers

There are others but they all have commonalities, not the least of which is a belief in Communism, they are representative of the American Far Left, and have an affinity for class and racial warfare.

There is nothing to recommend its supporters and considerable reason to take action against the movement that claims to be leaderless, but which has already been granted a tax-exempt status as it continues to collect a large bankroll.

As Lincoln pointed out, ‘The Constitution is not a suicide pact” and this nation fought a Civil War to ensure that the Union would remain intact. Thus, appeals to freedom of speech have their limits when it comes to efforts to undermine and destroy the nation. The free speech argument has been the initial fall-back position of some mayors, but it is rapidly wearing thin.

No doubt, Mayor Bloomberg of New York has been hoping that the dropping temperature as we advance toward winter will have the salutary affect of causing the occupiers of Zuccotti Park to leave. In a cash-strapped city, the millions in overtime and other costs do not justify his forbearance, but the Mayor is a liberal so his inaction is understandable. Mayors of other cities under siege have responded timidly for the most part.

As a student of history, I recall the hippie movement of the 1960s, the famed Haight-Ashbury refuge in San Francisco, and other places where a disaffected and unhappy youth gathered to “tune out” and listen to speeches about the Vietnam War and other grievances. In general, they did not engage in violence because their focus was on drugs and “free love.”

The Occupy movement is a different animal. The object of its anger is Wall Street, banks, capitalism, and the current  economic distress. One group, OurTime.org, “a non-profit organization standing up for Americans under 30”, noted that the October jobs report “reveals that young Americans hold a 15.4% unemployment rate, which marks the eighth straight month that the 18-24 demographic…”

Their anger would be better directed against a federal government that is responsible for the 2008 collapse of the housing market and major banking, investment and insurance companies, many of which were bailed out by Congress using the funds of taxpayers, the real 99%.

The youth have cause to be unhappy, but they would be better informed if they understood how poorly they have been served by a debased national educational system and indebtedness brought about by universities that thrive off the student-loan system underwritten by the federal government. Their ignorance of this and so much more is both understandable and deplorable.

You don't solve unemployment by embracing tyranny.

Further back in history, one recalls the mobs that brought down the Weimar Republic in Germany and opened the doors to the Nazi movement. Earlier, mobs led by Bolsheviks deposed the Russian czar and imposed some seventy years of Communist control there. It is not surprising, therefore, that so many communist organizations and nations support the Occupy movement or that Wall Street is its target.

In time we shall learn who the organizers of this “spontaneous” movement truly have been, but for now public safety must be asserted to rid Zuccotti Park of this gang of “useful idiots” and wherever else they show up.

There no longer is any excuse to tolerate them and plenty of communist groups who will welcome them or, if the message of “change” put forth by Barack Obama is more closely examined, they can join the Democratic Party and continue its long history of destroying the nation’s economy.

© Alan Caruba, 2011