Stars and Spites

Melanie Phillips:

The Independent (subscription required: don’t bother) chose today to illustrate a self-serving and repellent Robert Fisk interview with Stephen Walt (as in the infamous Mearsheimer/Walt paper on ‘The [Jewish] Lobby’ in America) with a picture of the American flag in which the stars of the union are replaced by Stars of David, under the headline: 'The United states of Israel?'

The image makes the claim that America is run by the Jews. As such, it is merely a variant on the ‘Jewish conspiracy’ theory that has long been a defining feature of anti-Jewish prejudice. In these degraded times this particular trope, which once would have caused any publication which printed it to be treated as racist or a Nazi-style pariah, has become a commonplace of mainstream media discourse because now it is Israel which is treated as a Nazi-style pariah; and so vicious libels against the Jews are regarded as fair comment. (The illustration calls to mind the notorious New Statesman ‘Kosher Conspiracy’ cover which portrayed a Star of David piercing the UK flag, and also a previous illustration in the Independent which was almost identical.) David T at Harry’s Place neatly juxtaposes the Independent illustration with near-identical ones on neo-Nazi and other racist websites. Thus our anti-racist, multicultural media.

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The idea that America’s Jews have had more influence over the policy of the United States than the Arab oil lobby has had is, of course, ludicrous. And as anyone who has addressed an audience of American Jews on the east or west coast rapidly discovers, to support Bush or the war in Iraq is often to provoke a hostile reaction, since American Jews overwhelmingly vote Democrat (supporting the party that is most lukewarm towards Israel), have views on Bush which are unprintable and did not generally support the war in Iraq. Yes, American Jews do form a lobby. But the idea that they have unparalleled power over the US administration and form a malign conspiracy that spans Jerusalem and Washington merely exists in the imagination of those for whom the Jews pose some kind of problem.

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But a simple question for all those Independent readers and others who really, genuinely believe that the Jews wield a sinister global influence of cosmically staggering proportions: if their influence is so vast, how come they remain, uniquely in the world, mired in a fifty-year struggle for survival against people who are determined to exterminate them, who have murdered large numbers of them and who show no sign of ever stopping doing so, due in large measure to the implacable indifference, ambivalence or hatred displayed towards them by the world over which they are reported to wield the said cosmic influence? Just what kind of a two-bit cosmically powerful lobby is this?

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There is more. She nails the question. If they are so powerful why would they want Israel to being with. Why not France or Italy or Saudia Arabia? As far as real estate goes, there are better places to control.