Hatred of Jews and of Judaism is as old as the hills: one may even call it the equivalent of a law of nature. The hatred is subterranean. It surfaces and explodes under various external forces. Of course there are philo-Semites, but anti-Semitism is the norm.
I will not go into the theological reasons for this anti-Semitism. Instead, I limit myself to the explosion of anti-Semitism that coincides with the Arafat War against the Jewish state, a war that erupted after Ariel Sharon went up to the Temple Mount in September 2000 and preached peaceful coexistence between Jews and Arabs.
To be sure, Arafat had planned the war long before Sharon’s stroll on the Temple Mount. Nevertheless, even though Arafat used Sharon’s visit to the Mount as a pretext for initiating the war, that visit was a precipitating cause. But I was talking about the explosion of anti-Semitism.
It is my contention that the explosion of anti-Semitism that has swept the democratic world during the past three years would not have occurred were it not for the failure of Israeli prime ministers to eliminate the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its terrorist network. No one is more culpable in this regard than Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, whose landmark victory over Ehud Barak in the February 2001 election was a mandate to destroy the PA and thereby abrogate Oslo.
By his readiness to create a Palestinian state on Jewish land, and by calling this land “occupied territory” while perpetuating the myth of the “Palestinian people”—actually a welter of Arab gangs—Sharon actually confirms the accusation that Jews have stolen their land. Coming from him it is hundred times more convincing than from any Arab.
This most crucial fact aside, Arafat and his minions could have been eliminated in one swift and sweeping attack using overwhelming force, which could have been done before and certainly after 9/11. Instead, Mr. Sharon pursued a policy of self-restraint against the terrorists. This had predictable consequences. First, it revealed that such was Sharon’s commitment to a Palestinian state that he would refrain from eliminating the PA as “negotiating partner.” His appointment of Shimon Peres as Foreign Minister was all Arafat needed to sleep peacefully.
Second, failure to destroy the PA enabled Arafat’s minions to accumulate more and more weapons, as well as deadlier weapons. This could not but prolong the war.
Third, this prolongation of the war enabled Arabs and Muslim throughout the democratic world to inflame anti-Semitism; and this could the more readily be accomplished by TV clips of Israeli retaliation against terrorist attacks. Operation Defensive Shield should never have been necessary. Jenin should never have been the focus of CNN and BBC. Targeted killings should never have been a cause for denunciation. There should have been no Arab bomb factories, no incitement of Arabs via the Palestinian media, no brainwashing of Arab children to emulate suicide bombers. And there should have been no “security fence” to arouse Jew-haters. All this could have been avoided were it not for the gross incompetence of Israeli prime ministers, above all, Ariel Sharon.
This incompetence—to put it mildly—has been a primary cause of the explosion of anti-Semitism.
When Israel defeated its Arab enemies in the Six-Day War, the Jewish state was admired throughout the world. What they admired was not the justice of Israel cause so much as Israel’s display of power. The world respects strength, not weakness. The world certainly has no respect for Jewish prime ministers willing to sacrifice their people’s heartland for “peace.” It certainly has no respect for Jewish prime ministers who negotiate with and reward terrorists. It must certainly despise Jewish prime ministers who release and arm Arab terrorists to provide for their country’s security. It must surely despise a Jewish prime minister that exchanges 435 terrorists for a single Israeli and the corpses of three Israeli soldiers. Is it any wonder that Jew-hatred has exploded around the world?
Organizations which are now activated to combat anti-Semitism are shadow boxing. As long as the Israeli Defense Forces target various terrorists, as long as Arab women and children blow themselves up to kill Jews, anti-Semitism will persist. Because Arabs are willing to die for their cause, they will win the support of thoughtless men and women, of whom there is no shortage. As long as Israeli prime ministers behave like cravens and cretins, Jews everywhere will become targets of the anti-Semites. As long as the Jews of Israel do not rise up and put an end to this humiliating and degrading state of affairs, Jews everywhere will suffer the taunts and torments of Jew-hatred.
