Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News Editorials & Other Articles General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

Behind the Aegis

(54,808 posts)
Tue Aug 27, 2024, 07:27 PM Aug 27

(Jewish Group) Meet the new antisemitism, same as the old antisemitism

(This is the JEWISH GROUP! RESPECT!)

Did you know that Michel Hazanavicius, the French director whose film The Artist won the Academy Award for best film in 2011, was Jewish? Not only did I not know this, but in a sense Hazanavicius did not know it either. In a recent essay in Le Monde, he writes that, though he is Jewish, he never thought much about it. But, of late, he wonders why he has “the impression to be more and more obliged to be Jewish? To react as a Jew, to think as a Jew, in short, to be Jewish above else?”

Hazanavicius is not alone. Since last October, I too have found that being Jewish borders on being a full-time occupation. It is an odd turn of events. While I had always considered Jewishness to be part of my identity, I never considered that it defined my identity any more than being from Jersey, being a Mets fan, or being nearly 70 does (I know: I don’t look it).

Yet something has changed since Oct. 7, 2023, so that being Jewish has become our default being. The events on and since that day have been seismic and tragic for the peoples of Israel and Gaza. But the aftershocks have reverberated far and wide. For Jews here and elsewhere, one of the most disturbing aftershocks has been the great spasm of antisemitism, one which, it bears repeating, began before the catastrophic consequences of Israel’s military invasion of Gaza became nightly news.

The latest in a long line of surveys has just been issued by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights. Though released last month, it was conducted before the October massacre by Hamas (it contains more recent responses, as well). Among the survey’s many depressing trends, we learn that 80% of respondents feel that antisemitism has increased in their country over the past five years, 56% experienced offline antisemitism from people they know, 37% have been harassed by antisemites once over the past year, and many of these same individuals have been victims of multiple expressions of antisemitism. In textbook bureaucratese, the agency’s director notes that this explosion of hatred “severely limits Jewish people’s ability to live in safety and with dignity” and concludes with the inevitable plea for tolerance.

more...

5 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
(Jewish Group) Meet the new antisemitism, same as the old antisemitism (Original Post) Behind the Aegis Aug 27 OP
The antisemites will never let you forget you are a Jew. Beastly Boy Aug 27 #1
I've come to the conclusion willamette Aug 28 #2
That is not how it works today. Behind the Aegis Aug 28 #3
As far as I know, willamette Aug 28 #4
ENOUGH! Behind the Aegis Aug 28 #5

Beastly Boy

(11,015 posts)
1. The antisemites will never let you forget you are a Jew.
Tue Aug 27, 2024, 07:50 PM
Aug 27

They will hunt you down and remind you, even if you would rather forget you are one.

They need to hate, and the millenia old consensus is that Jews are easy prey. Unless Jews fight back. Then the antisemites get shocked of their colonialism and oppression and their staunch refusal to just die.

willamette

(182 posts)
2. I've come to the conclusion
Wed Aug 28, 2024, 01:06 PM
Aug 28

that if one's ancestors were from Judea, then they are of Judean descent --- no matter what religion, or no religion, they practice. It is a definition using a homeland, civilization, and ethical mores. Many peoples, with many religions and lack thereof, have ancestral roots in Judea.

Behind the Aegis

(54,808 posts)
3. That is not how it works today.
Wed Aug 28, 2024, 04:01 PM
Aug 28

Seriously, a Jew is someone who practices the religion and/or has recent ancestry, not what you are peddling. If we go by your "logic" then most of the entire population are "African-Americans".

Judaism shares some of the characteristics of a nation,[70][71][72][73][74][75] an ethnicity,[13] a religion, and a culture,[76][77][78] making the definition of who is a Jew vary slightly depending on whether a religious or national approach to identity is used.[79][better source needed] Generally, in modern secular usage, Jews include three groups: people who were born to a Jewish family regardless of whether or not they follow the religion, those who have some Jewish ancestral background or lineage (sometimes including those who do not have strictly matrilineal descent), and people without any Jewish ancestral background or lineage who have formally converted to Judaism and therefore are followers of the religion.[80]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews

So, stop with this nonsense in this group, especially in topics where anti-Semitism is being discussed.

And as a host here, another post like this will get you blocked from this group!

willamette

(182 posts)
4. As far as I know,
Wed Aug 28, 2024, 09:14 PM
Aug 28

the entire human population originated in Africa. The Great Rift Valley in Ethiopia, specifically. How do you come up with "most?"

https://aboutholocaust.org/en/facts/how-did-the-germans-know-who-was-jewish

Germany’s racial laws identified a “Jew” as anyone with three or more Jewish grandparents, regardless of their religious identity or practice. Conversions to Christianity were pronounced illegitimate going back two generations, formalizing and instituting Nazi racial theories.


My point is that when it comes to life, death, pogroms, or the everyday insults and exclusions of antisemitism, those of us externally assigned as Jews have little say in the matter. When the rabbi holds a discussion group on "Who is a Jew?", and Israel decides who can immigrate --- it makes little difference when they come to kill us, or to break all the shop windows and destroy the businesses. Or prevent us from going to our classes on the university campus. The use of "Palestinian" for Arabs around Israel leaves out my Jewish grandfather from Palestine, and the Israeli Arab citizens. When it comes to antisemitism, anti-Zionism, anti-Israel-ism it is all the same in practice. Someone else decides that they are privileged to take away my rights, bodily autonomy, and life. When I try to point out that I have an ancestral base in Judea, just as the Arab Palestinians have, I may be told to sit down and shut up, even in a Jewish forum.

Behind the Aegis

(54,808 posts)
5. ENOUGH!
Wed Aug 28, 2024, 11:14 PM
Aug 28

This distraction from the topic is over-the-top. This is NOT about everyone else, and that is the jist of your posts. This is the JEWISH group, not the JUDEA Group and if you cannot understand this, then head out on your own or I will do it for you! What you are doing is trying to "redefine" anti-Semitism in a roundabout way and it will not be tolerated.

This is your last warning.

Latest Discussions»Alliance Forums»Jewish Group»(Jewish Group) Meet the n...