The fantastic Howard Jacobson has written a breathtakingly brilliant essay in today’s Independent. With a potent combination of passion and clarity, he shows the recent increase in ‘criticism’ of Israel for what it nearly always is: antisemitism. He takes those who liken Gaza to the Warsaw Ghetto and shows once and for all why “there is not the remotest similarity, either in intention or in deed – even in the most grossly mis-reported deed – between Gaza and Warsaw”.
Of those who make such comparisons, he writes: “Given the number of besieged and battered cities there have been in however many thousands of years of pitiless warfare there is only one explanation for this invocation of Warsaw before any of those – it is to wound Jews in their recent and most anguished history and to punish them with their own grief. Its aim is a sort of retrospective retribution, cancelling out all debts of guilt and sorrow. It is as though, by a reversal of the usual laws of cause and effect, Jewish actions of today prove that Jews had it coming to them yesterday.”
Then he takes to pieces Caryl Churchill’s hideous Seven Jewish Children play, in which “lie follows lie, omission follows omission”. He concludes of Churchill’s play: “Once you repeat in another form the medieval blood-libel of Jews rejoicing in the murder of little children, you have crossed over. This is the old stuff. Jew-hating pure and simple.”
Let’s be clear: the Royal Court Theatre has been made fully aware of the dishonesty and racism in the play it is showing. That they keep showing it tells its own story.
Please read Howard’s brilliant essay in full. As regular readers know, I’ve always been a big fan (that’s me below with him last summer). Having read this essay I might have to see if I can find an even bigger pedestal to put him on.
[...] Oy Va Goy! wrote an interesting post today on New pedestal for Howard Jacobsob please…Here’s a quick excerpt … here is not the remotest similarity, either in intention or in deed – even in the most grossly mis-reported deed – between Gaza and Warsaw”….He takes those who liken Gaza to the Warsaw Ghetto and shows once and for all why “t… [...]
Anyone with a media presence must now ensure that Caryl Churchill is represented as theatre’s equivalent of David Irving for the rest of her wretched life.
Yes. And the world must be reminded that the Royal Court put on this play.
Thanks for posting that article and link Chas – great stuff; it’s facinating to read some of the comments at the end of Howard’s piece – they totally prove the point in the article! I found after reading the first few comments I was filled with a sense of nausea and sickness though.
I read the article this morning and was highly impressed, but I had that usual sinking feeling as I approached the comments – with justification. I have to agree with David’s comment above that the talkbacks just proved Jacobson’s point.
The trouble is that there is simply no way to get through to those anti-Semites that they indeed hold anti-Semitic opinions. They are so smug in their self-righteousness and if you point out their prejudice, their reactions is either “well, you would say that” or “some of my best friends are Jews”, or “Israel’s war crimes” bla bla bla.
It is so hugely frustrating and makes me despair for British and European Jews.
Annie – you’re dead right. That’s why I made my post. We can only make any difference by being slightly unfair and throwing vegetables. That way people will start being as fearful of us as they are of the other lot. Caryl Churchill won’t like the future treatment she’s gonna get one little bit.
Hello Chas. Well done for speaking out against all these Jew-hating nutters who are a disgrace to the ‘left’ to ‘liberalism’ and the UK in general. Jacobson’s piece was excellent but it depresses me that it is only Jews or non- Jews with Jewish surnames writing these pieces in the media. I feel that those of us with entirely un-semitic surnames need to do more to oppose the hateful swill flung about by the likes of Churchill, Galloway et al and that there must be more of us out there who are appalled by all this disgraceful shit. We lack organisation. I wonder meanwhile if you have lost any friends due to your outspoken pro- Israeli views.
Thanks Daniel.
Have I lost friends due to my outspoken pro-Israeli views? Well, Hassan Nasrallah never sends me birthday cards any more.
Well he’s a c*nt, so no great loss there.
the one issue I do take with Jacobson’s op-ed is placing the average Gazan on the same level as the average Polish Jew who was rounded up and placed in the Warsaw Ghetto. Gazans voted in some plurality for a party that promised to wage constant war against Israel and got what they voted for, foolishly believing that Israel would never retaliate in ernest for Hamas’s stealthy ethnic cleansing program that the firing of rockets at Sderot and other southern Israeli settlements for fear of the usual global condemnation for “disproportionality” that worked for Hezbollah. But they were wrong. Enough world leaders saw the way Hezbollah rearmed after they forced Israel to back off in 2006. The Jews of Poland (many relatives of mine, few of whom survived) posed no threat whatsover to their non-Jewish neighbours. Before Hitler’s advent, the Jews were merely the convenient scapegoats for a corrupt and greedy aristocracy that mercilessly exploited the Catholic peasants and Jews alike.
Before you continue waxing lyrical about Mr Jacobsen, please note that he ALSO, a few weeks back, stated in the Jewish Chronicle – to the amazement of Jews – ‘Jesus was a Jewish prophet’.
I’m sure you know enough about Judaism to realise this is incorrect. Jesus does not feature in Judaism, and he was not a ‘prophet’ for any Jews, anywhere. Judaism was a complete faith for thousands of years before Jesus was even a glint in Joseph’s eye.
On a more serious note, though, Mr Jacobsen, by making that silly remark, undid all the hard work that many Jews – me included – have done in online forums, trying to represent accurate Jewish beliefs, and counter the lies told by the Christian evangelists who pose as ‘messianic jews’.
So while I agree with you that Mr Jacobsen has indeed voiced what a lot of people are thinking, you might just want to pause before heaping any more praise on his head….