Brian Mast, a U.S. Army veteran who previously volunteered with the Israeli military, is reportedly on the shortlist to replace Dan Driscoll as Secretary of th…
To my understanding (and anyone reading this feel free to correct me if I’m wrong), the idea of Jews as a race that is genetically ontologically evil is a specifically Western brainworm that arose from eugenics and racial “science.” This is very different from the view of Judaism as a religious category which is how things tend to be in other parts of the world and even in earlier Europe (e.g. Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” is pretty blatantly antisemitic, but Shylock is spared on the condition that he convert to Christianity, which is very different from the Nazi policy of “you had one Jewish grandparent so there is no alternative but your death”). You can see how that would change the reading of “curse upon the Jews.” It’s not something I’d say myself, because as a white American, I’m not a victim of Israel and there’d be reasonable grounds to suspect me of using it in the skull-measuring sense. Very different context from a Palestinian or Iranian saying it.
Ronnie Kasrils and Norman Finkelstein both have provided excellent context to such slogans and the rationale as to why it is expressed.
Personally, I either omit the line in question or substitute it with “Death to the Axis of Satan” when I chant it.
I have seen the Sarkha displayed at protests in Johannesburg and have not really heard any outrage/concerns about it, except from Rhodeaboos pearl-clutching over “left-wing South Africans being so openly hostile to piSSrael”
To my understanding (and anyone reading this feel free to correct me if I’m wrong), the idea of Jews as a race that is genetically ontologically evil is a specifically Western brainworm that arose from eugenics and racial “science.” This is very different from the view of Judaism as a religious category which is how things tend to be in other parts of the world and even in earlier Europe (e.g. Shakespeare’s “The Merchant of Venice” is pretty blatantly antisemitic, but Shylock is spared on the condition that he convert to Christianity, which is very different from the Nazi policy of “you had one Jewish grandparent so there is no alternative but your death”). You can see how that would change the reading of “curse upon the Jews.” It’s not something I’d say myself, because as a white American, I’m not a victim of Israel and there’d be reasonable grounds to suspect me of using it in the skull-measuring sense. Very different context from a Palestinian or Iranian saying it.
Ronnie Kasrils and Norman Finkelstein both have provided excellent context to such slogans and the rationale as to why it is expressed.
Personally, I either omit the line in question or substitute it with “Death to the Axis of Satan” when I chant it.
I have seen the Sarkha displayed at protests in Johannesburg and have not really heard any outrage/concerns about it, except from Rhodeaboos pearl-clutching over “left-wing South Africans being so openly hostile to piSSrael”