Mickey Z
Cool Observer
Tuesday, July 06, 2004
This is what I get for reading Parade Magazine:
Dear Mr. Mickey Z.,
I read your article “Elie Wiesel: Madman or Commissar?” in Press Action at http://www.pressaction.com/news/weblog/full_article/mickeyz07062004/.
You write: “Why not welcome the Armenians, you wonder? Chalk it up to two conspicuous factors: the need to monopolize the Holocaust(tm) image and the geopolitical reality that Turkey (the nation responsible for the Armenian genocide) is a rare and much-needed Muslim ally for Israel.”
Contrary to what you believe, the geopolitical reality at the time you have in mind (i.e. in 1982) was that, while Turkey recognized and had diplomatic relations with Israel, Turkey had no alliance with Israel. Such alliance, you will note, did not occur until the 1990’s, in fact, not until after the Oslo process began. I accordingly doubt that a non-existent and not even anticipated alliance weighed heavily on anyone’s perspective.
So far as the Armenian genocide is concerned, I think you misunderstand the issue profoundly. The issue is not an effort to monopolize a word and it is certainly not to deny the horror of the Armenian genocide. What concerns Jews is the effort by some to downplay what occurred to the Jews during and after World War II.
To note, not only were Jews, like the Armenians, massacred in extraordinarily large numbers - about six million Jews died and hundreds of thousands, according to the Encyclopedia Britannia, of Armenians died -; not only were the Jews herded, marched and concentrated - as were the Armenians -; not only were Jews the subject of ghastly experiments; not only were their possessions robbed; and not only was the hair and skin of Jews used for commercial purposes. More than that, the German effort was, entirely unlike what occurred to the Armenians - horrible as the Armenian genocide was - to eradicate all Jews wherever they might be located and to eradicate anyone else having more than a certain percentage of Jewish ancestry and to eradicate all vestiges of Jewish culture and life that may have existed. You will note, in particular, that during the Second World War, the above noted activities were even given precedent to the German aim to conquer land.
And unlike what happened to the Armenians, the “civilized” world did not merely sit idly by; instead, the world made it largely impossible for Jews to escape their fate, which is to say, the Jews who escaped the grips of the Nazis were, by and large, denied refuge which added millions of souls to the death toll. And, after the war, those Jews who survived at first sought to return to their homes in Europe but were met with massacres, the most famous having occurred in Poland and, moreover, Jews were herded together, this time in Displaced Person camps with no prospect - since no country would take them in - of re-settlement.
So that you clearly understand the point, I quote Howard Jacobson:
“When Jews demur from the word Holocaust each time there is an instance of man’s inhumanity to man, it is not because they think their suffering is keener, or somehow more pristine, than anyone else’s. It is simply that one thing is not another thing. When next there is an attempt first to slander and then to wipe out a whole people, to burn away every trace of them and their beliefs from the face of the earth, to make it as though they never were and to ensure they never will be again, Jews will accept that Holocaust is the word. //This is not a species of scholasticism, verbal fastidiousness for its own sake. If we do not properly describe what a thing is like and not like, we do not know what it is. It is in the nature of hatred not to know what a thing is like and not to care. Which is why we say that hatred is blind. Indeed, one of the signs that hatred is being brewed, in an individual or a community, is the deliberate wedding of like to unlike. Brutes yoke unlikes together in haste, enjoying that surge in emotional violence that blurring all distinctions brings.”
Howard Jacobson, “Think what you like about Israel, but to equate Zionism with Nazism is simply incendiary,” The Independent, April 20, 2002.
The first error you made is a simple factual error. It suggests you do not know your facts. It is the sort of mistake that calls the rest of your facts into question.
The second error, however, amounts to an attempt, perhaps unconsciously, to wed likes and unlikes - as if the Israelis have some obligation to equate all examples of genocidal activity with what happened to the Jews during and after World War II. I do not accuse you of hatred because I know little about you or your views. I merely caution that such is the practical implication of what you have written.
N. Friedman
Posted by N Friedman on from 07/08 at 11:34 AMThanks for the long comment. Let me reply to your two concluding points:
You say:
“The first error you made is a simple factual error. It suggests you do not know your facts. It is the sort of mistake that calls the rest of your facts into question.”Israel was courting Turkey as an ally at the time...but even if this were factual error, the conclusion you draw from such an error is rather melodramatic.
You also say:
“The second error, however, amounts to an attempt, perhaps unconsciously, to wed likes and unlikes - as if the Israelis have some obligation to equate all examples of genocidal activity with what happened to the Jews during and after World War II. I do not accuse you of hatred because I know little about you or your views. I merely caution that such is the practical implication of what you have written.”The standard retort being trotted out: Be careful with your critique of anything related to Israel or being labeled an anti-Semite. “I’m just looking out for you because your ignorance might get you in trouble.”
While I appreciate you taking time to offer your feedback, the points you make above are all too familiar.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from 07/08 at 01:03 PMDear Mr. Mickey Z.,
With respect to your first comment, do you really believe what you are saying? On your view, Israel, during a conference on a matter of central importance in - in fact, the central focus of - contemporary Jewish history, namely, the Holocaust, employed politics in order that maybe someday somehow Israel might enter into an alliance with Turkey. You really believe that? And you really believe that even though, in 1982, such an alliance could have, on any rational scenario, been only marginally important to Israel? And you really believe that even though Israel did not downplay other massacres where, in fact, Israel had, in 1982, much more to gain by downplaying such other massacres?
Your response suggests you still have not thought through the issue at all. And yes, when I read articles which repeat incorrect propaganda, I question the remainder of the scholarship. So do most other people.
On the second issue, obviously, since I quote someone else and merely filled in the blanks, the opinion I stated is nothing new. You have not made an argument but merely an observation.
In fact, the substance of my point, namely, that combining likes with unlikes brews hatred, is true. You do not even bother to dispute my point. Instead, you changed the subject, calling my point all too familiar.
I made rather clear that I had no idea regarding your intention. And I did not claim that your criticism of Israel was antisemitic. What crossed my mind is that you reached opinions which suggest the absence of serious research or thought and which wed likes to unlikes. I stand by that opinion. I await some evidence suggesting I am remotely wrong about anything I wrote.
Your attempt, lastly, to deflect my comment as a warning about antisemitism suggests you did not comprehend what I wrote. I reiterate: dragging likes and unlikes together brews hatred. That, frankly, is problem enough. My comment was not to warn that you might be stepping into antisemitic territory. I expressed only the thought stated. Nothing more, nothing less. And antisemitism had nothing to do with my comment.
N. Friedman
Posted by N. Friedman on from 07/08 at 06:17 PM
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