Antisemitism Report 2009 - World Jewish Congress

Perhaps Mr Brumby is not aware that the world changed after George W Bush left office. Talking to Iranian
political figures, particularly figures like Khatami who battled against hardliners during his eight years as
President from 1997 to 2005, is now okay. A quick scan through back copies of The Economist, one of the most
reliable reporters on Iran over many years, gives one a sense of just how brave Khatami was in taking on the
mullahs who blocked his every move. It should also be remembered that Khatami was instrumental in back
channel discussions with Israel and in a celebrated remark, reported by the BBC on 14 June 1999, Khatami
spoke of Jews being safe in Iran.
The Jewish lobby in Australia has every right to campaign for its issues. But it is guilty of curtailing freedom of
speech on this and many other occasions -- behaving in exactly the same way that the apartheid era regimes of
South Africa did when it came to demonising and blackening the name of persons with views that challenged
their own narrow view of the world.
Why does the organised Jewish lobby in Australia have such a disproportionate influence on politicians like
John Brumby? The cause for which it fights -- Israel -- is a controversial one, given that nation’s serial abuse of
the human rights of its Palestinian neighbours. Yet no other ethnic or nationalist based movement in Australia
comes near the Jewish establishment when it comes to being able to seduce political leaders. It is time to
question whether this is a healthy state of affairs in a democracy like ours. (Crikey 19/3/09)
The groups in this part of the political spectrum share with the far-right a vigorous
opposition to the "establishment" and what they perceive to be those with power. Anti-
Americanism and contempt for liberal democracies is marked by conspiracy theories and by
simplistic divisions of political forces into friends and enemies.
Although there are some differences in the approach to Israel taken by these groups, the
general attitude is that Israel is clearly in the camp of their enemies and is therefore a fair
target for abuse, delegitimation and defamation.
Some far-left groups have made common cause with extreme anti-Israel Islamist groups,
which promote social and economic agendas which would logically be repugnant to social
progressives. Even more common is the drawing of precise analogies between Israel and
Nazi Germany. Many of the small far-left groups publish newspapers or magazines, which
generally follow limited political agendas and include extreme, maximalist anti-Israel
material. For example:
* World Socialist Web Site (31/12/08) carried a report of an anti-Israel rally in Melbourne,
with a summary of comments by protesters, including ―Imad, a real estate agent, explained
why he was attending the protest. ―We all came to express our feeling for the Palestinian
people in Gaza,‖ he said. ―No human on earth should just sit and watch the TV now… The
people in Gaza have not been allowed to move in or out for more than two years. They have
been blocked in like the Berlin Wall or like what Hitler did to the Jewish people in the
concentration camps. Israel now calls this self-defence! What kind of self-defence is this, to
massacre innocent people? The role of the media has been miserable. The media is lying
about this claim of self-defence – self-defence against people who cannot even find enough
bread to eat! Just like they lied about Iraq when they said that there were weapons of mass
destruction there.‖
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