Eliminationism

In the mid-1990s, political scientist Daniel Jonah Goldhagen caused a heated controversy with the publication of a book arguing that the Holocaust was possible because ordinary Germans served as "willing executioners [...] who believed that exterminating Jews was right and necessary." Last month, Goldhagen came out with a new book, that is likely to once again generate much controversy.

The book's main title, Worse Than War, is already provocative: what could be worse than war? The subtitle hints at the answer: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity.
Some of the controversial aspects of this book - as well as the still-lingering controversies about Goldhagen's previous work - are addressed in a recent interview with Goldhagen published by the German news magazine Spiegel.

One issue that will certainly invite much criticism is Goldhagen's view that "political Islam" poses a very serious danger. As Goldhagen explains in the interview:

'Political Islam' is the appropriate term to describe political movements that are grounded in an understanding of Islam and seek to assert control - often totalitarian control - over their societies and other societies which they think should be Islamic. These movements often use violence and often with a genocidal or eliminationist attempt."

Goldhagen's views on this subject are also highlighted in a New York Times review of his book. Noting that Goldhagen argues "that 'political Islam' - jihadism - constitutes 'the most coherent and deadly mass­murderous ideology since Nazism,'" reviewer James Traub accuses Goldhagen of turning "political Islam into an eliminationist bogy." Traub also argues that "even al Qaeda, with its ideology of mass murder, has not been able to marshal the resources of a state to attain its ultimate goals."

However, from an article published in the spring 2007 issue of the progressive journal Democracy (free registration required), it is clear that Goldhagen's primary concern in this context is not al Qaeda. Indeed, he explicitly argued in his concluding paragraph:

Abandoning the Middle East to the Political Islamists and having Israel capitulate (and ultimately surrender its existence) is the only thing that will satisfy them - the only thing that will stop Political Islamists […] from feeling 'humiliated' (and then only partly, given the growing number of Muslims in Europe). Needless to say, this would be extremely self-injurious, not to mention immoral.

Instead, we should recognize the broad-based danger not merely of terrorism, but of Political Islam. And we must realize that it can only be defeated by active diplomatic, economic and military containment and, when practical, rollback by the United States and its allies in Europe and in the Middle East.

We should stop fixating on al Qaeda and terrorism, narrowly construed, as the overwhelming problem and recognize that the biggest danger is the Political Islamic colossus and aspiring hegemon: the soon-to-go-nuclear Iran."

This view will of course be vociferously rejected by many as just another variation of the "clash of civilizations" theme. While there is obviously room for a legitimate debate about Goldhagen's arguments, it is clear that this debate will inevitably reflect the wide-spread Western ignorance - and even denial - of anti-Semitic, anti-American and anti-Western sentiments in the Arab and Muslim world.

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Kristallnacht reflections

When President Obama welcomed the newly re-elected German chancellor, Angela Merkel, in Washington last week, he commented on the imminent 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989. But as Merkel emphasized in an address to both houses of the US Congress, November 9 is also the anniversary of the so-called Kristallnacht in 1938, the "night of the broken glass," when Nazis brutalized Jews and attacked their homes and property in an orgy of unrestrained violence that "later turned into the break with civilization that was the Shoah."

In the same speech, Merkel also declared that a "nuclear bomb in the hands of an Iranian president who denies the Holocaust, threatens Israel and denies Israel the right to exist is not acceptable." A few weeks earlier, Israel's Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had focused on this specific issue in his address to the UN General Assembly, where he sought to highlight the danger posed by a fanatic Iranian regime that is pursuing its nuclear ambitions at all costs while denying the Holocaust and Israel's right to exist.

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Amalek and Der Spiegel

No doubt, when it comes to demonizing Israel, the race is on - though it's not entirely clear if the finish line is set at the bottom of journalism or the height of hypocrisy. In any case, here is a strong contender: under the title "Potential for Apocalypse," the German news magazine Der Spiegel asked on Monday: "Is War between Iran and Israel Inevitable?" The lead-in for the long essay of some 4400 words provides a sensationalist summary to whet the appetite of readers:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may seem very different, but they are united in their apocalyptic religious visions. Their respective beliefs may be propelling them on a collision course with potentially horrific consequences."

I rubbed my eyes in disbelief, and read it again, and again - but that's what it says: Bibi Netanyahu, the secular prime minister of a secular democracy, has "apocalyptic religious visions" that somehow "unite" him with the Holocaust-denying, fanatically religious Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who recently "won" re-election by "divine assessment," because the "supreme leader" of the Iranian mullahcracy said so.

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Obsessed with 'The Lobby'

Opponents of the "Israel Lobby" in the US like to claim they only have America's best interest in mind, but a just-published article by John Mearsheimer of "Israel Lobby" fame illustrates how hollow this claim is.

The forthcoming issue of the London Review of Books (LRB) includes an article by John Mearsheimer. Mearsheimer's piece, entitled "The Lobby Falters," will definitely be regarded as very good news by most devoted LRB readers. In so far as Mearsheimer comments on the Freeman affair, it's about yesterday's news - in case you missed the story, it was discussed in JPost blogs by Alan Dershowitz; Martin Kramer; and in several posts at Rosner's Domain.

But while much has already been written about the Freeman affair, it's still worthwhile to read Mearsheimer's take, because some of the claims and arguments he makes illustrate that for those truly dedicated to the valiant fight against the "Israel Lobby" and its supposedly extraordinary powers, reality and realism don't count for much - and apparently, this is even true for a professor of political science who is a well-known proponent of the realist school of international politics.

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Iran's Islamic revolution at 30

"Crowds chanted 'Death to America! Death to Israel!' at the ceremony at Khomeini's mausoleum in southern Teheran ... attended by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, government ministers and military commanders." It's scary, scarily pathetic, that this is apparently considered a dignified way to begin the ten-day celebration marking the 30th anniversary of Iran's "Islamic revolution" this weekend.

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The boycott tradition

Some 300 British academics, writers and intellectuals have declared their resolve "to stop Israel from winning its war." In order to achieve this lofty goal, the ivory tower powers have called for a campaign against Israel "starting with a programme of boycott, divestment and sanctions". While they say that this is what they envision for starters, they are not very specific about what is to come afterwards, though the end goal is crystal-clear: "Israel must lose."

Of course, it would be positively offensive and entirely outrageous, unjustified and hypocritical if anybody should be reminded of another call for a boycott, made a few decades ago in the early 1930s. Without a doubt it would be much more polite and infinitely more "politically correct" to overlook the fact that back then, the boycott was also just for starters. And, come to think of it, there is another curious concurrence: back then, the boycott campaigners gave out the call "Deutsche wehrt Euch!" That is: Germans, defend yourselves, defend yourselves against the evil machinations of the Jews. This time around, the boycott campaigners call on their British compatriots, on the British government, and indeed on the wider civilized world to defend the Palestinians against the evil militarism of the Jewish state.

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Rallying against Israel

There is good reason why news reports describe the demonstrations that took place in many European cities on Saturday against the fighting in Gaza not as demonstrations for peace, but as "anti-Israel rallies".  To be sure, some of the protesters may well have been motivated mainly by the images of death, destruction and despair coming out of Gaza and the desire to see this suffering end.

But many of the demonstrators were clearly motivated by something else altogether - that's why you could hear chants like "Hey! Ho! Israel Has Gotta Go", and why you could find at a protest in London "more Nazi imagery on display ... than you'd expect to see at a fascist rally" - go to "Harry's place" to see for yourself.

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Iran's apologists

The new president of the UN General Assembly, Miguel D'Escoto Brockmann, recently suggested that "we all have to agree that no one dies because of words." He made this remark in response to a journalist's question about the rhetoric favored by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad when he speaks about Israel. That D'Escoto is not in the least disturbed by the way Ahmadinejad rants against Israel is also clear from the warm embrace he had for the Iranian President after the latter had offered the UN General Assembly his bits of wisdom adapted from the notorious anti-Semitic forgery "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion".

It was a truly pathetic spectacle to see the representatives of UN members assembled to listen attentively and politely to a speech that regurgitated the classic anti-Semitic themes of Jews dominating and controlling finance and governments and fomenting conflict around the world. But Ahmadinejad knows how little it takes nowadays to deflect accusations of anti-Semitism: all you need to do is to substitute "Zionists" for "Jews" and then you are free to say what anti-Semites everywhere love to hear:

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The 'anti-lobby' nominee

When an award-winning journalist writes an article about Barack Obama's speech to AIPAC, it is quite shocking to find some themes resembling anti-Semitism and gross distortions of facts.

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The question of Iran's intentions

The question what Iran is really up to has been passionately debated for quite some time and there is still much resistance against the conclusion that Iran's nuclear program has clear military purposes. Most people who debate this question have of course no access to classified information, and even most pundits who write about the subject ultimately form their opinions based on "common sense" - and what passes as "common sense" inevitably depends heavily on political views. There is also the very fundamental question of how well Western commentators really understand the Middle East, because even knowledgeable analysts may be tempted to look for developments that fit their broader world view. Arguably, there are two main tendencies to look at the world: one is to look for differences in foreign lands, the other is to look for similarities.

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