The Guardian Newspaper embraces Antisemitic Conspiracies

When I read the article about leaked South African documents referring to an Israeli conspiracy to dry up the Nile my first reaction was not skepticism or laughter but outrage.  Put aside the logistics for such an undertaking. (The River Nile is the longest river in the world at 4,300 miles and is shared by eleven countries).

I even understood the “secret” report that emanated from South Africa.  Before the end of the Apartheid regime the population of South Africa was officially twenty-two million people with Whites representing 27% of the total. Post apartheid that total population doubled to forty-four million with the white group being reduced to just 13.6% of the total.  Apparently no government had ever seen the need for an effective population census. Preventing civil war or a Zimbabwean style economic and social collapse has meant accommodating prejudice and superstition, in spite of South Africa’s recent history.  Despite both Arab (Muslim) and Western nations leading the top ten countries with economic influence in Apartheid era South Africa and though Israel had very minor economic interests in South Africa during the apartheid era (well below the top ten export nations) I would even expect an antisemitic narrative to be a predictable outcome.  It is easier to damn a minor irritant for its imagined crimes than it is to confront a major export partner.  What surprises me is that Israel’s Mossad would trust South Africa’s intelligence service sufficiently to interact with it.

This latest story is reminiscent of Egyptian and other Arab conspiracies that were laughable, for instance the migrating bird that was “really” an Israeli spy, at least according to the quality Arab press.  And who can forget the sharks that were also accused of working for the Mossad?  We expect crackpot journalism to be the hallmark of the fascist press. A story about drying up the River Nile with genetically modified Israeli weeds (read “Jewish” if you really want to dive into the sordid world of conspiracy journalism) sounds like the South African Intelligence Service creating its own version of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (which was largely the work of the Russian Secret Police).

I expect the British newspaper, The Guardian, to be antisemitic. There exists a longstanding tradition in British society that is hostile towards any display of difference, as a result of which the urge to conform is enormous.  One result is to foster a characteristic curiosity and disdain for difference that may explain Britain’s fascination with eccentricity.  At the same time, the repressive urge to conform has meant that successive generations of immigrant communities eventually did assimilate into British society.  Not by subsuming their peculiar group characteristics but by culturally “vanishing” (assimilation, not integration).

The Jewish community has mostly survived through the infusion of successive waves of Jewish immigration and not, by natural population growth.

That intolerance of difference has been legislatively marginalized but it has also created ghettos that are virtually untouchable by law enforcement and are therefore immune to any of the normal pressures that society would apply to conform.  Instead of nurturing a multicultural society, anti-racist legislation hot-housed mutually antagonistic communities, disabling any pressures that might have facilitated reconciliation.

A simple example is the anti-racist legislation that was too hurriedly passed in reaction to the Muslim terror attacks on the London transportation system that murdered 52 civilians and injured over 700 more people on the 7^th of July 2005). 

Nationwide, teachers were exposed to potential accusations of racism, without provocation. The immediate effect was to silence any legitimate criticism because of the threat posed by that latent, ever present threat.  A teacher could be accused of racism and faced suspension from work for a period of up to 12 months while the allegations were investigated.  Even if all charges were subsequently found to be false the result would be that your career was ended.  In Education, the legislation helped to create a perception that there is no smoke without fire.   The Salem Witch Trials of over three centuries ago spring to mind – how ironic that legislation meant to protect everyone from being persecuted was exploited by Muslims to terrorize the rest of us.  In one Muslim dominated school the Imam who taught the Koran to Muslim students told of one child who threw their Koran across the room and was immediately turned into a Monkey. This evokes a Muslim antisemitic myth. The science teacher who confronted this imam (remarkably, all the students believed him) and challenged the story very quickly understood that to question this story was to invite allegations of racism.

This is more than simply an unintended consequence of badly crafted legislation.  Instead of protecting us all it has created an atmosphere of fear and censorship which is exploited by and insulates minority bigots who correctly understand the virtue that inheres to a group placed in a position of privilege. Being a protected minority they can virtually do no wrong.  I would be surprised if, because of this legislation, recent, massive, sex abuse scandals involving Muslim pedophile groups were not encouraged by the reluctance of authorities to investigate Muslim wrong-doing.

The political Left has never had to come to terms with the original sin of its creation. Its antisemitism and its genocidal history arose out of its over-exuberant ideological intolerance of competing worldviews and its dogmatic, literalist assertion of Right against all others. Again, this perhaps explains bad legislation as deliberate, ideologically crafted social Darwinism.

The British Left has always been comfortable within its polite antisemitic skin.  Jews who practiced obsequious self-flagellation did so because of an ethnic (religious) affiliation few ever attempted to familiarize themselves with.  They were held up as exemplars of what a ‘good’ Jew looks and behaves like.  Being honorary members of the British anti-Zionist Left made them almost accepted.  That societal pressure to conform to a barely concealed undercurrent of antisemitism exposes its prejudice when the mainstream Jewish community and their Christian supporters are less than silent.

The Guardian Newspaper is similar to the New York Times in enunciating a philosophy around human conflict that is unique in its focus on Israeli “original sin”.  The philosophy is summed up with the explanation that the Paper will not address Palestinian racism in any of its writing about the conflict. By its acceptance of an exclusive anti-Zionist, anti-nationalist agenda the racism of Israel’s opponents is dismissed by making the claim that when “the Palestinians” have their own state the Paper will change its attitude towards antisemitism.

This buys into an immoral intellectual argument that if you uncritically support a bigot and a murderer they will cease with both practices once you satisfy all of their demands.

It places the victim in the insane position of being entirely to blame for everything.

The Guardian, through its uncritical support for an anti-Israel conspiracy has bought into the vein of similar writings reminiscent of medieval blood libels, rumors of well poisonings and the spreading of the Black Death. 

So I return to the story of Judeo-Zionists (the Mossad) attempting to dry up the worlds longest river – the Nile. That a specific allegation can be used to prepare the ground for an Arab attack on Israel (which following on from the inevitable annihilation of the state’s Zionist inhabitants through the use of non-conventional weapons) would be justified by reference to a potential attack on the Nile.

In this case, the Left truly has become the Nazi Left.

Israel is at war with the Guardian Newspaper. It is apparent that Israel is oblivious to this fact. That story about Israel’s mythical technological endeavors demonizes all Israel and her supporters.

This is not just a Freedom of Speech issue. This story is not “just” another hoax. We know that once a story is published through a reputable newspaper website, it becomes universally available for dissemination.  It cannot be removed from the internet even if it is withdrawn, with apology, from the Guardian website. 

When the facade of a semblance of diversity exists it can be difficult to respond to any threat that materializes with uniform action because inevitably, complexity requires a nuanced approach. The Guardian Newspaper has presented itself as hegemonic in its opposition to Israeli statehood, as hateful in its approach towards Jewish self-determination in Israel and as wholly uninterested in any truth applicable to a Jewish State.

War with a hegemonic adversary is straight forward. The enemy is identified, unambiguous and promoting an agenda that is without mercy.  Israel is at war with the fascist and antisemitic Guardian Newspaper and it is time it took the written war as seriously as it takes the hot war against Hamas and similar Nazi ideologies such as Islamic State (Daesh), Hezbollah and the Islamic State of Iran.

The People of the Book seem to be reluctant to internalize the lessons of our recent history. Sticks and Stones can break our bones, but with words begins the slaughter.