8. Conclusion
In the period proceeding September 11 2001 and the consequence - War
on Terror - two pillars of Antisemitism had already discovered a common
language: Arab/Islamic fundamentalist and Left-wing Antisemitism utilized
the common ground of anti-Israel and anti-imperialism to vent their hatred
against the West, Israel and – inevitably - the Jews.
The radical right, traditional bastion of racial discontent, having
found that Islamic fundamentalists and the left adopted its rhetoric of
antisemitism, now stands alongside them in their vilification of Israel
and attacks on Jews the world over.
“ Chanting anti-imperialist slogans that often had a distinctly
radical leftist ring, Germany's otherwise xenophobic National Democratic
Party (NPD) and other ultra-right-wing groups used the demonstrations
to make political capital out of the war, having discovered their sympathy
for Palestinians, Iraqis and even for al-Qa‘ida.
"… an indication of the now socially acceptable hatred
of Jews, often masked as anti-Zionism, was the appearance at anti-war
demonstrations of slogans such as “Jewish pigs” and “Sieg
Heil” which in the past would have been sufficient to ban neo-Nazi
marches or to outlaw the NPD.”
http://www.tau.ac.il/Anti-Semitism/asw2002-3/general.htm
By December 2003 the three pillars of Antisemitism had thus become welded
together: left-wing demonstrators were painting swastikas in the name
of Palestine.
Encouraged by the success of the anti-war demonstrations organized by
the left, extreme right-wing activists also organized their own “peace
marches.” The impending war on Iraq also inspired some of these
“peace activists” to create peculiar associations, such as
that between the situation in Iraq and “what happened 60 years ago
in Germany.”
The 200 extreme rightists and neo-Nazis who met on 22 February 2003 in
Hamburg demonstrated under the banner:
“Amis [Americans] out – Peace in.”
However, their slogans were far from peaceful and showed their real
priorities:
“Bombs on Israel!”;
“German soldiers in defense of Iraq!”;
“Revolt of the vassals!”;
“For international solidarity! Down with Zion-fascism!”;
“For a world of free peoples – solidarity with Palestine!”;
“Emancipation of the Zentralrat” (the Jewish community leadership
in Germany).
Source: http://www.tau.ac.il/Anti-Semitism/asw2002-3/general.htm
The oldest hatred has thus been reborn in a new and more dangerous "incarnation"
and - as Professor Murray Gordon, of Villanova University, Pennsylvania,
observes :
“History has demonstrated that once the germ of a
new form of anti-Semitism takes hold in Europe, it becomes extremely
difficult to eradicate.”
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