Racism, Anti-Semitism, and Middle East Conflict

As the conflict in the Middle East continues to escalate, heated debates are raging throughout the blogosphere regarding the morality and justification of Israeli military actions in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. While some debates maintain a reasoned, unemotional tone, the sensitivity of the subject often leads to accusations, exaggerations, and rhetorical excesses.

While most of the extreme rhetoric in the (somewhat mainstream) blogosphere is found in the often uncensored reader comments sections, a number of accusations and ongoing arguments occur between bloggers on the left and right. One of the most common accusations in such debates are claims by supporters of Israel that those who oppose Israel's actions are "anti-Semitic". While anti-Semitism unfortunately continues to thrive throughout much of the Arab world, and increasingly in Europe and Russia, accusations of anti-Semitism are often unfounded and serve only as cheap rhetorical tricks and irrational ad hominem attacks.

I recently came across a representative example of such questionable use of the anti-Semitic accusation at Little Green Footballs (LGF), a popular conservative, pro-Israel blog. The blog entry included a quote excerpted from the rival leftist Daily Kos blog, which said the following (Daily Kos entry here):

As we watch this war unfold in front of our eyes thousands of miles away, the only price we pay is at the pump.
But those of us who pay taxes, we pay another price.
And Israeli weapons aren’t cheap.
When an Israeli missile blows up a few homes, burns some kids alive...those are our missiles.
Our bombs.
We continue to support terrorism.
Do you want to know what our bombs just did in a little town called Marwaheen?

The poster at LGF wrote the following as an introduction to the excerpt from the Daily Kos: "Another disgusting anti-Israel post in another Daily Kos diary, as the antisemites crawl out of the woodwork at the web’s premier “progressive” site." The American Thinker blog also featured a link to the LGF entry, with the following introduction: "Little Green Footballs has been documenting the frequent anti-semitic screeds on Daily Kos for sometime, screeds like this." Furthermore, the vast majority of the 89 user comments at LGF expressed agreement with the poster's characterization of the quote as "anti-Semitic".

From these responses, it is fair to deduce that many Israel supporters consider statements such as those at Daily Kos to be anti-Semitic, however there is nothing in the statement expressing dislike of Jews in general. While the post controversially labels Israel's actions as "terrorist", there is no indication that this labeling arises from any prejudice against Jews or even Israelis -- it is simply a condemnation of a military action. While someone expressing that opinion could very well be anti-Semitic if they considered Israeli actions to be "terrorism" solely because of a prejudice against Jews, there is nothing in the statement itself that can be fairly characterized as anti-Semitic.

If those statements by Kos are to be taken as anti-Semitic, then any condemnation of Palestinian violence must be considered racist or anti-Arab. This brings me to another controversial issue, which is the use of many LGF posters and commenters of terms like "raghead", among other derogatory terms that seem to reveal deep-seated prejudice and hatred against Arabs and/or Muslims. While the majority of Israel supporters do not use such terms, it is probably fair to estimate that there are an equal number people using such racist or prejudiced terms in the pro-Israel community as there are anti-Semites among those who oppose Israel.

As someone whose views regarding Israel vary greatly from case to case, I find this tendency to be inappropriate and counter-productive. Widespread misuse of the term could also take away from the impact of serious denunciations of actual anti-Semitism at a time when enlightened people should seriously oppose the increasing prevalence of this ignorant and destructive prejudice. Sadly, it is likely that baseless accusations of anti-Semitism will become more, rather than less prevalent in the near future, as the situation in the Middle East worsens and debates become more heated. This makes it all the more important for thoughtful people be as vigilant in pointing out misuse of the term as they are in denouncing real anti-Semitism, lest real anti-Semites become more likely to point to widespread misuse of the term as cover for their hateful views.