Tuesday, February 24, 2015

The Daily Kos "Jew Rule"

Michael L.

{Originally published at the Elder of Ziyon.}

lord of the rings sauron zion lotr tolkien jewAs a progressive-left political blog, Daily Kos is infested with anti-Zionists and encourages what one participant has dubbed the Jew Rule.  In The Jew Rule on Daily Kos, "dhonig" reminds us that for many participants when Jews are murdered by Jihadis in Europe, ultimately it is Israel's fault for allegedly being mean to the perfectly innocent, bunny-like "indigenous" population.

Of course when some horrendous maniac in North Carolina shoots up three young Muslims no one would suggest that ultimately it's the fault of the Islamic State or Saudi Arabia.  No one would ever try to justify, or explain, the murders by pointing to the excesses of Islam.  On the contrary, everyone would understand that the murderer is solely responsible for his behavior and no one would endeavor to shift blame to other members of the victim's ethnicity, nation, or people.

Daily Kos, like much of the Left, has special rules for Jews.  The Jew Rule, of course, is not a formal rule.  It is merely the way things are on the foremost progressive-left blog in the United States.

What Honig calls the Jew Rule is actually nothing more then the influence of garden variety anti-Semitic anti-Zionism.

He writes:
Daily Kos has become a haven for anti-Semites. There, I said it. Sure, the anti-Semitism is usually couched in "but Israel" terms, but it's there. Allow me, please to give a recent example of the Jew Rule here, the one that says, "every other form of bigotry and hatred is rejected here, but feel free to blame the Jews, as long as you use the word 'Israel' when you do it."

I'm going to compare two recent incidents, and diaries about each. The first is the murder of three young Muslim students in North Carolina. The second is the murders the other day in Denmark. I'll assume, for the sake of this diary, that readers are familiar with both.
Under a piece entitled Jews are NOT at war with Islam. But jihadi terrorists have declared war on Jews, Honig finds a number of examples of how Daily Kos members use Israel as a justification for the murder of European Jews.

Here are a few examples:
Of course they did nothing to deserve being (56+ / 8-)

killed.  But the role the current Israeli leadership plays in endangering Jews around the world cannot be ignored.  Otherwise you're discussing the issue in a vacuum.

by Paleo on Sun Feb 15, 2015 at 11:08:46 AM EST
So, Paleo is not arguing that they deserve it, but that it is perfectly understandable why any Arab or Muslim would want to kill Jews, because the Israeli government has them, rightfully, filled with impotent rage.  Your average "Kossack" believes, therefore, that Arabs have every right to kill Jews.

Sure, the victims don't deserve it, but Israel...

Or, say, this for an example:
The actions of the Israeli state create a clear and present danger to Jews across the world.  That's not debatable.  To discuss the issue of murderous anti-Semitism among jihadi extremists without acknowledging their best recruiting tool is simply dishonest.

by Dallasdoc on Sun Feb 15, 2015 at 11:29:06 AM EST
Dallasdoc thinks that Israel manufactures hatred for the Jewish people and, thus, danger for the Jewish people and that this conclusion is "not debatable."  The crazed Jihadis may do the killing, but behind the Jihadis lurks the evil Jewish state which causes radical Islamists to go into a murderous rage at random Jews.

They just cannot help themselves.

Sure, the victims don't deserve it, but Israel...
Whether the Jewish people of the world like it or not, they are tied to the actions and existence of Israel as a Zionist state. I can understand you do not want to discuss it but unless you want to turn this into a book review of Leon Uris's Exodus book, expect others to disagree with you.

by Sinan on Sun Feb 15, 2015 at 01:30:39 PM EST
Sinan is a bit more strident concerning the Jew Rule.  We are tied to Israel and, therefore, responsible in some measure for its behavior.  Thus it is perfectly natural for Muslims to seek to kill random Jews anywhere in the world.

Sure, the victims don't deserve it, but Israel...

Or, how about this one?
To not address the obscene Israeli policy, euphemistically called "mowing the Palestinian lawn", which involves the starvation, imposition of drought and killing of innocent Palestinians as having some relationship to the re-emergence of anti-Jewish violence may be interpreted as purposely deceptive.

When the noble term "Never Again" is meant not as a declaration that humanity will no longer abide by genocide, no matter who the victims, but is instead used as a justification for Israeli preemptive violence against their neighbors, that declaration loses all moral authority.

If we're attempting to analyze the circumstances that contribute to such violence, we must not be myopic and view events in a vacuum. 
by elesares on Sun Feb 15, 2015 at 11:36:05 AM EST
This person obviously sees the world through the eyes of Hamas.  She honestly believes that the Jewish people of the Middle East are so utterly immoral that the government of Israel would intentionally starve Arab children and impose drought upon them... as if Jews command the weather.

This is the contemporary blood-libel and anyone who thinks that Israel is this evil is unquestionably an anti-Jewish racist.

When Obama told Jewish Israeli college students that they needed to see the world through "Palestinian" eyes, is this what he had in mind?  Self-loathing?  That we should hate ourselves through the eyes of those who hate us?  Perhaps what is really needed is for the great Arab majority to try to see the world through Jewish eyes, for a change.

In any case, sure, the victims don't deserve it, but Israel...

Again, no one would suggest that the murder of the three young Muslims in Chapel Hill was in any way due to anything other than whatever hallucinations, racist or otherwise, that Craig Hicks may have endured when he opened fire.  However, whenever a Jew is killed by a Muslim the act is justified by pointing the trembling finger of blame at the Jews of the Middle East.

The western Left is, in fact - as we see by the behavior of Barack Obama - endeavoring to drive a wedge between the Jews of the diaspora and the Jews of Israel.  If Israel represents, as I believe it does, the salvation of the Jewish people, then progressives in places like Daily Kos are trying tell Jewish people that we are immoral for embracing that country and, thereby, defending ourselves and our people.

They prefer their Jews weak, guilt-ridden, and compliant.  Israel, however, stands as a constant reminder that traditional Jewish subservience can no longer be expected.   Individual Jews may exhibit the galut mentality, but the Jews as a people are redeemed by Zionism; that is, by autonomy grounded in collective self-defense.

Here is another example of how Daily Kos progressives seek to divide the Jewish people from the State of Israel in order to undermine our well-being, solidarity, and security.

In a piece entitled Will Netanyahu Ask US Jews to Become Traitors, someone writing under the nom de blog, tsackton, suggests that if American Jews agree with Benjamin Netanyahu, in his dispute concerning Iran with Barack Obama, then we are traitors to the United States.  He writes:
Our President is trying to negotiate a deal to prevent another war in the Middle East, and most of the country supports him on this.  For Netanyahu to imply that you cannot be an American Jew and still support these negotiations with Iran is a call for Jews to abandon America.
Of course, Netanyahu has implied no such thing.

The purpose of this "diary," ultimately, is to give notice to American Jews that if we disagree with Barack Obama then we are traitors to our country.  The purpose is to keep American Jewry in-line in the most egregious manner possible short of violence.
Israel has become a violent, anti-democratic (no equal rights for palestinians)  and vastly corrupt and racist country.

If Americans are forced to choose, the outcome will not be pretty. 
In other words, this individual despises Israel and is threatening American Jews.

This is what the progressive-left has evolved into.

The Jew Rule reigns and Honig should be commended.

12 comments:

  1. This is why I was left a bit baffled by the SJP complaints at UCLA about David Horowitz's poster effort that showed SJP's Hamas friends torturing and killing people and proudly celebrating it. You're missing the mark if you try to shame people when it's they who openly cheer for the things you're highlighting as shameful. They're mad because it's libelous or inaccurate. They're mad because you found out it's not. You can point out all day how much DKos is chock full of Jew hating Nazis. They agree. They are. Glad we cut through the haze on that. I usually just ask people like that why they still worship Hitler if there was no Holocaust. Wouldn't that make him kind of a pansy?

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    1. I barely glanced at the UCLA / Horowitz thing.

      I passed it by for the same reason that I did not go in for the Je Suis Juif thing.

      Although, as it happens, Laurie and I adopted a crazed little mutt out of the pound maybe one week before the Hebdo / Kosher killings and, coincidentally enough, named him Charlie.

      {Life is weird.}

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  2. Again though I'd like some of them to answer with a straight face why anyone need take them seriously AS Jews since they lean so heavily on that label. If they were just run of the mill people they'd be run of the mill crackpots. But somehow we blindly accept their definition of the moral high ground they because they claim they're Jews.

    How so? They're not observant, they don't obey the misvoth, they don't have the least interest in Jewish education and have no Jewish knowledge, they don't marry Jews, they don't have Jewish children, they follow none of the ethics of Judaism and barely any of the major holidays, they don't go to shul. And they're not Israelis who live, vote, work or serve there.

    So why should any of us worry all that much about what the Jon Stewarts of the world say, do or think? It's just another chattering voice in a hurricane of stupid and hate. I genuinely do not consider what George Galloway or PressTV or the Guardian or al Ahram or Hamas or Stormfront or David Duke has to say about 'The Jews' and so I don't consider what J-Spit, Peter Beinart, The Daily Show, Jodi Rudoren or any of that ilk have to say either.

    Open Hillel? Who effing cares what they are? Seriously, who cares? Just another group who wrap themselves in a Hamas flag. I'm not worried that we don't 'understand' one another.

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  3. Not a surprise, coming from the clown who said "the Nazis were a blip."

    It would be one thing if he'd admit his bigotry and bias, but his laughable charade of pretending to be some sort of voice of reason or moderation there was always insulting.

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  4. Wow, that POS really said that! And since that douchebag is basically staff (rescue ranger, infinite mojo) shows how the leadership of that rag really feels. All of this needs to be remembered especially if Markos himself wants to run for office. It needs to be let known far and wide just what disgusting bigotry he allows on his site. (Just as Ron Paul was taken to task for the bigoted crap in his newsletter he said he didn't personally write)

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  5. I have to say, guys, I love dkos as much as anyone, but I've been giving this more thought than it deserves, and I honestly do not think that this is an example of hostile speech.

    What he meant was that before the Nazis were a blip "on the radar," Mussolini's men blah, blah, blah.

    He was just referring to the period of time before the Nazi's distinguished themselves from all the other German political street gangs operating in Berlin after World War I.

    Those were rough days, for sure. The vets couldn't defeat their enemies so they turned on themselves in the streets of Germany.

    Of course, we had that kind of thing here, as well.

    Y'know, in San Francisco after that war, American Legion roughnecks would march into gatherings of socialist or communists and start breaking skulls.

    That Timothy Lange, however, is entirely biased against Israel, in terms of the Long War, is without question.

    He obviously favors Arabs above Jews.

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  6. You're giving him more credit than he deserves. This was at a time when he was declared by Markos to be the official site moderator, and one of his jobs was regularly patrolling A-I diaries.

    Follow the parent comments upthread, and you'll note that this comment of his was made in the context of his arguing that calling Gaza a "concentration camp" is not an antisemitic 'Jews are now Nazis!' slur.

    For someone, part of whose shtick was policing language, he seemed to drop in to criticize and attack supporters of Israel in this very manner 9 times out of 10, every once in a while making an obviously forced 'balancing' action by wagging his typing finger at a blatant antisemite. Not that there were any shortage of those, of course, but you could almost hear that his heart was never in it even 1/10th as much as when he was gleefully scolding Jews.

    The somewhat more semi-sly Jew haters (like those who call Gaza a "concentration camp," but who refrained from literally calling Jews Nazis - hey, they could be referring to Mussolini!... as if that's any better or much different) always got a pass from him.

    I think you give him far too much credit. He knows exactly what he was doing.

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  7. And back to the original comment you link to upthread, all I can say is thank G-d Israel doesn't act according to the 'morals' of people like him.

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  8. He is a rather pompous know it all who wears well-worn ideological blinders while pretending to be Solomon. Immune to any criticism as well.

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  9. Few of them deserve attention because it is a waste of time to try and reason with the unreasonable.

    After all, they censor dissenting views using the tactics of authoritarians, not democrats. Because they know their ideology is weak and out of touch. Events increasingly show this.

    It is time for people to understand that disproportionate negative criticism of Israel is not only undeserved by virtually any objective measure, but that it promotes and legitimizes, rightly or wrongly, the antisemitism of others.

    They are no one to lecture about bigotry.

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  10. Right you are, school, but is the American Left turning Israel into a partisan issue?

    I imagine that they would argue that I am one of the people helping to do so.

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  11. To the extent that Obama is pulling their strings, it's rather hard to sustain an argument that he is not unilaterally damaging the relationship with Israel and thereby giving license to carry on in ways that promote antisemitism.

    With the explosion in Jew hatred, including on campuses here, the overkill and spiteful treatment of Israel can be seen as incitement, and it may get worse. Read the CBC was entertaining a walkout.

    There are plenty of Democrats that have little faith in Obama's prowess with Iran, however. Netanyahu is the one with the more bipartisan position. By the time it is over, Obama may have more support among the anti-Israel, pro-BDS types, but less from reasonable people that see the behavior against the one ally that shares our values.

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