    A letter to one-state e-group

    By Israel Shamir

    Totalitarianism is the greatest danger of our society. It is a new sort
    of totalitarianism, quite different from the one mankind tried but it is
    probably even more virulent sort. It imposes one powerful social group -
    namely, jews - above criticism, and turns the rest into Children of
    Lesser God. This is the main reason of sorrow in Palestine and of much
    of it elsewhere.

    You have made a step in this direction, when you decided to censor
    ('moderate') posts of my friend Paul Eisen and in the same time to
    continue discussing his important work The Jewish Power (see on my site
    www.israelshamir.net ). This is a major breach - not only of precious
    freedom of speech, - but of elementary ethics. You may not discuss a
    text while shutting the author's mouth. You took away from Paul Eisen
    the most natural right to defend his views.

    In the same time, you allowed Ms Maccoby (inter alia) to attack his
    article and to attack Christian people of Europe. Her jewish apologetics
    are so primitive that they would be discarded even in an Israeli high
    school. She writes:

    "Paul Eisen entirely fails to mention that Jews were forbidden in
    mediaeval Christian Europe to own or work on the land ., but were forced
    to become money-lenders."

    I would cry in anguish for bitter fate of a Rothschild whom the cruel
    Christians forced to become a banker when all he wanted was to pick
    cotton. But then a heretic thought came to my mind: much water flew down
    the Thames since this prohibition was lifted, but the jews did not flock
    to create a jewish yeomanry. True, many jews own land, especially in
    Palestine, but the work is done by Gentile hands, Palestinian or, since
    recently, Thais. Tsar Nicolas I of Russia tried his damnedest to settle
    jews on land, but miserably failed, as Solzhenitsyn describes in his 200
    Years Together. Jews did not and do not want to till the land; and to
    best of my knowledge Ms Maccoby and other members of the group are not
    an exclusion to the rule.

    Outlandish claim of Ms Maccoby is a blood libel against people of Europe
    who accepted jews and gave them a unique privilege to practice their
    xenophobic faith. This privilege is so great that even today in the
    Jewish state it is considered a sign of extreme benevolence. Indeed, my
    Russian Orthodox friends are often being told that for non-jews there is
    no place in Israel. Israeli ministers express this opinion quite
    frequently.

    In Europe every religious heresy was punished by death - but the Jewish
    faith was permitted.

    Ms Maccoby does not understand or intentionally mis-presents reality of
    medieval Europe. The continent had a caste system with some limited
    mobility. The nobles had some title to the land and had to fight for
    their sovereign in return.

    Peasants tilled the soil and had to provide for their noble masters.
    Jews did not want to serve in the army and did not want to till the
    land; the only thing they wanted to do with the land was to treat it as
    real estate. The state rightly forbade them to do so, for the land is
    not a real estate but means of life. The jews (now you probably
    understand why I use low case, as 'jews' were a social strata, much like
    'nobles' and 'peasants') were moneymen of Europe. If they did not want
    to act as moneymen they could become nobles; and such cases were
    described by Abram Leon and many Spanish and Polish historians. They
    could become peasants, as they did in Sicily. They could not become
    'noble jews' or 'noble peasants' when the caste system did not allow for
    it. In other words, jews were extremely well treated in the Christian
    Europe - and in Muslim Levant; better than coreligionists of the rulers.
    It does not fit into the narrative of eternal Jewish (capital case for
    its religious meaning) suffering - but not much does.

    Paul Eisen noted that Chmielnicki, the leader of a Ukrainian popular
    uprising, offered poor jews to join the uprising against their
    exploitative co-religionists, but the jews declined.

    This relevant observation caused Ms Maccoby to make this acerbic remark:

    "Paul seems to castigate the poor Jews who, when given the wonderful
    opportunity to massacre their fellow-Jews, refused - however rich and
    exploitative these fellow-Jews were, isn't their refusal
    understandable?"

    Isn't it a typical fascist nationalist view (and I use this term just
    for definition purposes without any value judgement): poor and rich
    (however rich and exploitative, in her words) of one nation are
    'fellows' and brothers? This is so different from the concept of class
    struggle promoted by the jewish revolutionaries of 1918-1921 in the
    bloodbaths of Russia, Bavaria and Hungary. Poor Russians, Germans and
    Hungarians did not understand what Ms Maccoby understands and preaches,
    namely, that their own rich folk were their brothers and fellows, while
    the jewish revolutionaries were not. Those who did understand were
    branded 'fascists', racists, Nazis, 'black hundreds' and were shot by Ms
    Maccoby's uncles.

    The remark of Ms Maccoby speaks volumes for us helping to understand
    futility of separating (self-identified) jews into 'left' and 'right'. G
    K Chesterton wrote in 1920s on extremely friendly personal relations
    between jewish millionaires and jewish labour organisers. Now we see it
    in the US, where 'exit [jewish] Neo-Conservatives, enter [jewish]
    Neo-Liberals', in apt expression of Mark Green and Wendy Campbell, but
    the bottom line remains the same one. In this very group, left-wing jews
    have no problem to forward slander produced by extreme right ADL and its
    satellites. Moreover, left-jewish Searchlight is a subsidiary of
    right-jewish ADL. True Left is non-jewish left. It may contain people of
    jewish origin and background, but not those who identify themselves with
    'the Jews'. But we shall discuss it elsewhere.

    Ms Tilley also attacked the text of Eisen. She wrote:

    'Taking on the challenge that it is wrong to falsely conflate "the
    Jews," Eisen observes that Jews themselves tend to see "the Jews" as a
    unit and that therefore it is not wrong to address directly the question
    of "the Jews." Yet in his own discussion, "Jews" becomes a unit which
    acts.

    "Jews have told the world" and "we have treated Jews", etc. As a result,
    as his argument proceeds, he increasingly uses "the Jews" to convey a
    monolithic singular mode of thought which becomes fused in a rigid way
    with Israel's state-Zionism. Hence opposing Israel means opposing
    "Jews." This is precisely the kind of conflation that translates into
    anti-Jewish racism.'

    Opposing Israel indeed means opposing the Jews (capital letter like in a
    name of a state). You can find a few jews totally on our side, but they
    hardly consider themselves 'Jews'; you will find more of those who would
    play along and agree with you for a fair price of limiting your
    criticism until it will become toothless; but yes, opposing Israel means
    exactly that, whether you like it or not. If 'opposing the Jews' means
    for Ms Tilley 'anti-Jewish racism', then probably opposing the US means
    'anti-American racism' and opposing, say, Iran means 'anti-Iranian
    racism', for there is no reason to think that the Jews are less coherent
    group that the Americans or the Iranians. Until this pro-Palestinian
    movement will learn to oppose the Jews fearlessly, it has no chance to
    succeed.

    Ms Tilley continues:

    "By the end of the article, he has therefore worked around to the idea
    that "Jews" in Israel, linked to "Jews" outside Israel, have insatiable
    ambitions for power. "Who's next?" he finishes. All his earlier
    arguments are swamped by this culmination, which is identical to logics
    promoted by the Nazi and neo-Nazi movement and Protocols of the Elders
    of Zion.

    Instead of dropping into hysterical fit, Ms Tilley could read what
    jewish writers think, 'who is next?' Dershowitz thinks it has to be
    Iran. Perle thinks it has to be Saudi Arabia. But extremely popular
    jewish American writer Irwin N. Graulich, whose most recent article has
    been posted on over 100 websites worldwide, as well as in numerous
    publications, writes in his "Let Israel Do Iran"
    (http://michnews.com/artman/publish/article_4191.s html): "we should do
    Iran, and afterwards - France". Somehow Graulich and his numerous
    readers are not worried by proximity to the Protocols.

    And finally, Aref Nammari the moderator of the new MODSS, writes:

    Dear Paul,

    I am very sorry to have to do this. As a moderator of the list I am
    going to remove your post from the archives until we discuss it. Our
    position as far religious and ethnic intolerance are very clear and your
    post in my view crosses the boundaries.

    War is an extreme form of intolerance, and we are in the midst of it.
    You have your choice to be intolerant to the Jews or to the Arabs,
    Iranians, French, eventually Russians, Chinese and ordinary Americans.
    If we are intolerant to the Jews, jews are liable to lose their
    privileged position in the society; but if their intolerance will
    prevail, Arabs and Iranians will die. Aref, in this unequal situation
    you have made your choice.

    Probably you know the Arab fable of trees that were afraid of the axe.
    The sheik comforted them saying: as long as one of you would not help
    the axe (by providing its handle) it will be harmless. By stopping Paul
    from carrying on the necessary critique you provide the axe with the
    handle.

    I call you to stop censorship, to allow Paul to defend himself freely,
    or alternatively to change the name of your group into Jews Above
    Criticism dot com.

    Israel Shamir

    Jaffa