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21st century antisemitism (served norwegian style)

August 10, 2006 at · Filed under politics, religion

gaarder

there is a big debate in norway over an opinion column written by jostein gaarder on August 5th.

a translation of the original article (also appears at the bottom of the post).

i think criticizing israel and its actions is legitimate. and i don't like it when jews throw the antisemitism blame quickly at anyone who dares criticize israel, but sometimes it is just too obvious. like in this case.

gaarder of course denies being an antisemite, but i would argue he is not only an antisemite but also one that calls for moving beyond rhetoric and on to actions against jews/israelis. 

below is my interpretation/translation to some of this text.

on jews:

"We laugh at this people's fancies and weep over its misdeeds. To act as God's chosen people is not only stupid and arrogant, but a crime against humanity"

jews are people who believe they are god's chosen people (the title of his column). unlike the enlightened christians of which only the smallest of fractions are all waiting for the apocalypse as described in the book of revelations. or the victimized muslims never looking to kill any non-believer according to the concept of jihad.

on tolerance:

"There are limits to our patience, and there are limits to our tolerance… We call child murderers 'child murderers' and will never accept that such have a divine or historic mandate excusing their outrages."

so israelis are child killers in the name of their god… hmmmmm. and there is a limit to the tolerance the world should show in the face of such fanatic religious child killers. makes sense.

on the future:

"But fear not! The time of trouble shall soon be over. The state of Israel has seen its Soweto.

We are now at the watershed. There is no turning back. The state of Israel has raped the recognition of the world and shall have no peace until it lays down its arms."

behold gaardner's prophecy. israel haters, do not fear. israel shall soon be destroyed.

on the state of israel:

"The state of Israel does not exist. It is now without defense, without skin. May the world therefore have mercy on the civilian population"

a call for action. i appreciate his call for mercy for the civilian population of israel. some collateral damage probably can not be avoided, but probably a small price to pay for the destruction of israel.

on the moral fiber of israel: 

"We do not believe that Israel mourns forty killed Lebanese children more than it for over three thousand years has lamented forty years in the desert. We note that many Israelis celebrate such triumphs like they once cheered the scourges of the Lord as "fitting punishment" for the people of Egypt. (In that tale, the Lord, God of Israel, appears as an insatiable sadist.) We query whether most Israelis think that one Israeli life is worth more than forty Palestinian or Lebanese lives.

For we have seen pictures of little Israeli girls writing hateful greetings on the bombs to be dropped on the civilian population of Lebanon and Palestine. Little Israeli girls are not cute when they strut with glee at death and torment across the fronts."

this paragraph is so good. i just had to copy whole of it. great prose. israelis claim they mourn dead lebanese children. bahh. come on. you know the jews. they are sadistic people, known as such from the beginning of time.

and these small israeli girls writing on bombs (actually artillery shells) fired on civilian population on purpose. these girls are not cute. maybe we should put a caveat in the "show the civilian population mercy" concept, and just kill these girls too.

on the founding of israel:

"We do not recognize a state founded on antihumanistic principles and on the ruins of an archaic national and war religion"

judaism is a religion of war. in great contrast to the peaceful history of christianity and islam. and the peaceful and humanistic history that his behind the creation of the european states.

on zionism:

"Two thousand years have passed since the Jewish rabbi disarmed and humanized the old rhetoric of war. Even in his time, the first Zionist terrorists were operating."

zionists=terrorists. this equation has been true for over 2,000 years

on the jewish people hearing problems:

"For two thousand years, we have rehearsed the syllabus of humanism, but Israel does not listen." 

"we" have been humanists for the past 2,000 years (maybe some small exceptions during the middle ages, the crusades, the colonialism, a few small wars here and there, a couple of big wars, holocaust. but other than that it is really a clean slate of pure humanism).

it's just these damn jews that don't get it.

on final solutions:

"…there are those who want, with God's assistance, a final solution to the Palestinian problem"

zionists=terrorists nazis 

on how to handle the surviving jews: 

"We do not recognize the state of Israel. Not today, not as of this writing, not in the hour of grief and wrath. If the entire Israeli nation should fall to its own devices and parts of the population have to flee the occupied areas into another diaspora, then we say: May the surroundings stay calm and show them mercy"

"…Give the Israeli refugees shelter, give them milk and honey!"

unfortunately "we" may have to deal with some israeli refugees that were not killed during the destruction of israel. last time "we" promised them bread and jam when "we" put them on the trains. say what you want about the jews, but they have good memory. they will not fall for this trick again. this time "we" should promise them "milk and honey"..

when "we" put them in these shelters "we" need to make sure there is room for as many jews as possible, lock the doors and release the gas.

the full text:

God's chosen people
Jostein Gaarder, Aftenposten 05.08.06
From the Norwegian by Sirocco

There is no turning back. It is time to learn a new lesson: We do no longer recognize the state of Israel. We could not recognize the South African apartheid regime, nor did we recognize the Afghan Taliban regime. Then there were many who did not recognize Saddam Hussein's Iraq or the Serbs' ethnic cleansing. We must now get used to the idea: The state of Israel in its current form is history.

We do not believe in the notion of God's chosen people. We laugh at this people's fancies and weep over its misdeeds. To act as God's chosen people is not only stupid and arrogant, but a crime against humanity. We call it racism.

Limits to tolerance

There are limits to our patience, and there are limits to our tolerance. We do not believe in divine promises as justification for occupation and apartheid. We have left the Middle Ages behind. We laugh uneasily at those who still believe that the God of flora, fauna, and galaxies has selected one people in particular as his favorite and given it funny stone tablets, burning bushes, and a license to kill.

We call child murderers 'child murderers' and will never accept that such have a divine or historic mandate excusing their outrages. We say but this: Shame on all apartheid, shame on ethnic cleansing, shame on every terrorist strike against civilians, be it carried out by Hamas, Hizballah, or the state of Israel!

Unscrupulous art of war

We acknowledge and pay heed to Europe's deep responsibility for the plight of the Jews, for the disgraceful harassment, the pogroms, and the Holocaust. It was historically and morally necessary for Jews to get their own home. However, the state of Israel, with its unscrupulous art of war and its disgusting weapons, has massacred its own legitimacy. It has systematically flaunted International Law, international conventions, and countless UN resolutions, and it can no longer expect protection from same. It has carpet bombed the recognition of the world. But fear not! The time of trouble shall soon be over. The state of Israel has seen its Soweto.

We are now at the watershed. There is no turning back. The state of Israel has raped the recognition of the world and shall have no peace until it lays down its arms.

Without defense, without skin

May spirit and word sweep away the apartheid walls of Israel. The state of Israel does not exist. It is now without defense, without skin. May the world therefore have mercy on the civilian population. For it is not civilian individuals at whom our doomsaying is directed.

We wish the people of Israel well, nothing but well, but we reserve the right not to eat Jaffa oranges as long as they taste foul and are poisonous. It was endurable to live some years without the blue grapes of apartheid.

They celebrate their triumphs

We do not believe that Israel mourns forty killed Lebanese children more than it for over three thousand years has lamented forty years in the desert. We note that many Israelis celebrate such triumphs like they once cheered the scourges of the Lord as "fitting punishment" for the people of Egypt. (In that tale, the Lord, God of Israel, appears as an insatiable sadist.) We query whether most Israelis think that one Israeli life is worth more than forty Palestinian or Lebanese lives.

For we have seen pictures of little Israeli girls writing hateful greetings on the bombs to be dropped on the civilian population of Lebanon and Palestine. Little Israeli girls are not cute when they strut with glee at death and torment across the fronts.

The retribution of blood vengeance

We do not recognize the rhetoric of the state of Israel. We do not recognize the spiral of retribution of the blood vengeance with "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." We do not recognize the principle of one or a thousand Arab eyes for one Israeli eye. We do not recognize collective punishment or population-wide diets as political weapons. Two thousand years have passed since a Jewish rabbi criticized the ancient doctrine of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."

He said: "Do to others as you would have them do to you." We do not recognize a state founded on antihumanistic principles and on the ruins of an archaic national and war religion. Or as Albert Schweitzer expressed it: "Humanitarianism consists in never sacrificing a human being to a purpose."

Compassion and forgiveness

We do not recognize the old Kingdom of David as a model for the 21st century map of the Middle East. The Jewish rabbi claimed two thousand years ago that the Kingdom of God is not a martial restoration of the Kingdom of David, but that the Kingdom of God is within us and among us. The Kingdom of God is compassion and forgiveness.

Two thousand years have passed since the Jewish rabbi disarmed and humanized the old rhetoric of war. Even in his time, the first Zionist terrorists were operating.

Israel does not listen

For two thousand years, we have rehearsed the syllabus of humanism, but Israel does not listen. It was not the Pharisee that helped the man who lay by the wayside, having fallen prey to robbers. It was a Samaritan; today we would say, a Palestinian. For we are human first of all — then Christian, Muslim, or Jewish. Or as the Jewish rabbi said: "And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others?" We do not accept the abduction of soldiers. But nor do we accept the deportation of whole populations or the abduction of legally elected parliamentarians and government ministers.

We recognize the state of Israel of 1948, but not the one of 1967. It is the state of Israel that fails to recognize, respect, or defer to the internationally lawful Israeli state of 1948. Israel wants more; more water and more villages. To obtain this, there are those who want, with God's assistance, a final solution to the Palestinian problem. The Palestinians have so many other countries, certain Israeli politicians have argued; we have only one.

The USA or the world?

Or as the highest protector of the state of Israel puts it: "May God continue to bless America." A little child took note of that. She turned to her mother, saying: "Why does the President always end his speeches with 'God bless America'? Why not, 'God bless the world'?"

Then there was a Norwegian poet who let out this childlike sigh of the heart: "Why doth Humanity so slowly progress?" It was he that wrote so beautifully of the Jew and the Jewess. But he rejected the notion of God's chosen people. He personally liked to call himself a Muhammedan.

Calm and mercy

We do not recognize the state of Israel. Not today, not as of this writing, not in the hour of grief and wrath. If the entire Israeli nation should fall to its own devices and parts of the population have to flee the occupied areas into another diaspora, then we say: May the surroundings stay calm and show them mercy. It is forever a crime without mitigation to lay hand on refugees and stateless people.

Peace and free passage for the evacuating civilian population no longer protected by a state. Fire not at the fugitives! Take not aim at them! They are vulnerable now like snails without shells, vulnerable like slow caravans of Palestinian and Lebanese refugees, defenseless like women and children and the old in Qana, Gaza, Sabra, and Chatilla. Give the Israeli refugees shelter, give them milk and honey!

Let not one Israeli child be deprived of life. Far too many children and civilians have already been murdered.

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Marius said,

August 10, 2006 @

The translation of this text are totaly wrong. You cant understand the meaning og the text if you dont read it in Norwegian. Gaarder is not a rasist. He only wanted to express that he is against the war, and that Israel cant do what ever they want, on account for the WW2. If Gaarder cant mix Jews and Israel in his text, then should not mix their country and religion.

avneron said,

August 10, 2006 @

you are welcomed to offer a different translation. the blogger who translated the text is far from being sympathetic to israel.

itai said,

August 10, 2006 @

I just want to mention that there was a whole Norwegian volunteers SS division. I don’t know how Norway treated its SS “veterans” after the war. Did they go to prison? Maybe Marius can answer.
Btw Marius, why do you think Israel acts on account of WW2?
When the UK and U.S. fight in Iraq it’s on account of WW2? NATO in serbia? Vietnam? France in Algire? All those were “nicer” wars? Less civilian casualties? Maybe if you’ll keep comparing Israel to the Nazis you’ll be able to clean your consciousness?

Sirocco said,

August 11, 2006 @

Marius asserts that my translation is “totally wrong,” but does not substantiate this claim.

The translation was done fairly quickly and posted before the major brouhaha began. In hindsight I can see a room for improvement here and there, but mostly on details; e.g. the Norwegian ‘griller’ could be rendered ‘obsessions’ rather than ‘fancies’ (the latter being suggested by a standard dictionary). The expression ‘jamret over’ is more accurately be rendered ‘wailed over’ than the term I used, ‘lamented’. That said the translation certainly isn’t “totally wrong.”

Ha-emet said,

August 16, 2006 @

Jostein Gaarder is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the seriosly and dangerously increasing anti-semitism on the left in norway.

As a Norwegian Jew i am considering to seek political asylum if this is not dealt with soon, at least now we have Israel to flee to when the Norwegian police come to “deport” us again like they did in the 1940’s!

By comparison at least Mel Gibson was absolutelly wasted when he came with his anti semitic remaks , I doubt Herr. Gaarder was when he wrote his “protocol of the elders of Zion” !

Blargon 7 said,

August 23, 2006 @

Itai:
Many nazi sympateurs were brutally mobbed after the war, this goes especially to those who worked for them publicly as social servants, women who had boyfriends among the german occupiers, and the eventual children of those relationships.
However, there were also those who escaped the public notice, such silent cowards who supported the germans. (And then acted like they’d been the original “boys in the woods” after the war.) It was difficult during the war, as households and families could become split between sympathizers and oppositionists. I personally know of a story from my local community where a family who was on good relations with the germans became subject of extreme “revenge” and alienation after the war.
As the official story goes, after someone came and told him to come with them, the father, a professional marksman, walked into the woods shot himself twice in the head with a handgun, dropped the gun, walked 30 meters and died. An obvious suicide.
At his funeral one of the freedom-fighter groups that had operated in the region came to show their respect. Why? Because the man had been an informant who used his relations with the occupying forces to get said information. And why was he killed? Because stupid people remain ignorant of these facts.

Ha-emet:
Curb your hysteria. Anti-semitism is as widespread in Norway as our muslim immigrants’ plans to take over our government. The only case of anti-semitism, (if it can be called that,) I can recall lately is the one where a jew was beaten up by a muslim. (Who, apparently, was in turn angry for the actions of Israel, and decided to take it out on someone who has nothing to do with the country, go figure.) And historically, on account of Norway being OCCUPIED by NAZI forces, many inhabitants were understandably angry, and so twarthed some of the deportations by sneaking the jews, and other people who were deported, away. (Police forces were also included in this, but had to be very careful since they were being closely watched by their superiors.)
If by growing anti-semitism you mean that people don’t like Israeli policies, then yes, anti-semitism is growing. If you mean by growing anti-semitism, actual growing anti-semitism, then no, there isn’t. I’m sorry I had to be the one to tell you this, but people just don’t care.

On the article:

“We laugh at this people’s fancies and weep over its misdeeds…”
Actually I do this. I laugh at people who believe in sillyness. Don’t you? Take for example when the giraffe thought the zebra was hidden in the hole in the ground in that movie that I found moderately entertaining. What a silly giraffe, surely the zebra could not hide in such a tiny hole! Oh, what a thrill to see him believe that the zebra could fit in a hole that is obviously too small for a zebra!
Seriously, if you think jews are hurt because you find their beliefs stupid or funny or unbelieveable, think again. They don’t care.

“so israelis are child killers in the name of their god…”
No. The statement is that there is no divine or HISTORICAL excuse/mandate for the killing of innocent children (or civilians, for that matter).
But thank you for illustrating how we can pull the worst anti-semitic meaning of a written phrase. Also, if you read the sentence it says:
“We call child murderers ‘child murderers’ and will never accept that such have a divine or historic mandate excusing their outrages.” (Notice it says ‘we call child murderers child murderers’, not ‘we call jews child murderers’.)
And if you disagree that there is not a historic or divine mandate for child murder, then I guess there’s bigger problems in this world than anti-semitism.

“behold gaardner’s prophecy…”
Uh, you ARE aware that the opinion piece was shaped after the words of the prophet Amos?

“a call for action. i appreciate his call for mercy for the civilian population of israel. some collateral damage probably can not be avoided, but probably a small price to pay for the destruction of israel.”
Are you trying to make this sound like I think it sounds? Like this:
“a call for action. I appreciate Israels call for mercy for the civilian population of Lebanon. Some collateral damage probably can not be avoided, but probably a small price to pay for the destruction of hezbollah.”
Because if you are, it’s pretty funny. If it’s not though… Well, it’s still kinda funny.

“zionists=terrorists. this equation has been true for over 2,000 years”
Yup. Exactly what gaarder meant. This is a fact like muslim = terrorist is a fact.

“this paragraph is so good…”
Let me spell this paragraph out for you:
“We do not believe that Israel mourns forty killed Lebanese children more than it for over three thousand years has lamented forty years in the desert.”
Ok, so 40 years in the desert was tough, right? According to my jewish sources, those 40 years were a necessary trial. A necessary evil to be overcome. So I would think the meaning here is that in gaarders point of view, Israel, or it’s government, would see the death of 40 children to be a necessary evil to be overcome.
The rest is pretty much reference to old texts for which I have no interest.

“judaism is a religion of war. in great contrast…”
Yes if there’s one thing we don’t want, it’s to learn from history. Come on, you can do better than this. How many wars has Norway started after 1906? And, yes, I know that we live in a more stable corner of the world, but that is beside the point. (Since it is the claim of gaarder that Israel carries its own blame in the conflicts we’re seeing.)
You see, the “you peed your pants 15 years ago, so you should still wear dipers” argument is flawed, and nothing else.

“”we” have been humanists for the past 2,000 years (maybe some…”
It is no mistake that the history of europe fraught with conflict. Which could be why gaarders statement read: “For 2000 years we have REHEARSED the syllabus of humanism…”
You know. Rehearsal. The refinement of our knowledge on a subject.

“zionists=nazis ”
“whites=racist/anti-semite/neo-nazi/corporate business owner/rich” yada yada yada.

“unfortunately “we” may have…”
The rest of this is becoming ridiculous, although since you apparently was not aware that the opinion piece was modeled after the words of Amos, some shepherd prophet of some place I don’t care about, I guess you couldn’t be expected to notice the similarities.

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February 24, 2007 @

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