Israel/Palestine
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Vienna protesters call for 'death to Jews'
Activists protesting against Operation Pillar of Defense call for "Freedom for Palestine," the destruction of Israel.
Anti-Israel demonstrators gathered on Friday in the heart of Vienna, protesting Israel’s Operation Pillar of Defense and chanting slogans calling for the murder of Jews and bashing the Jewish state.
Israel’s eight-day military operation to stop Hamas rocket fire from entering the country prompted two fiercely anti-Israel protests in the Austrian capital.
Protests held worldwide against Gaza violenceW. Bank: Palestinians protest, clash with IDF troopsSamuel Laster, an Israeli journalist who lives in Vienna, told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday that he heard a contingent of 15 to 20 Austrian Islamists chanting in Arabic, “Death to the Jews.”
http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=293435
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Alamuti Lotus
(3,093 posts)headline: "Vienna protestors call for 'death to Jews'"
substance: "Some guy told some guy that he heard a micro sub-group of people say that"
holdencaufield
(2,927 posts)... it's always a micro-group. When a small group of people call for the death of a particular group and everyone else keeps silent that is the beginning of a movement. You don't have to look very hard for hundreds of examples (especially in "enlightened" Europe) of a small group calling for the death of Jews which turns into a reality.
Even after the Holocaust, everyone claimed -- "It wasn't ME who wanted to kill all the Jews ... it was those other guys. I just didn't speak up"
Tacet qui consentire videtur: he who is silent is understood to consent.
Alamuti Lotus
(3,093 posts)At least 400 total (I have seen reports elsewhere that suggest that can at least be doubled, but I will stick to information provided in the OP to illustrate my initial point for you). Around 15-20 fit the headline according to the second-hand information provided within. That's roughly 5% if taking the highest of the latter and lowest estimate of the former figures. By most statistics methods, 5% barely covers the standard margin for error; but according to the journalist (once again, if that's what you can fucking call him), that's the only thing that mattered enough to put in the headline.
That's a mighty disingenuous smear tactic for writing, and if somebody was talking about Jews that way, you'd call bullshit too. But they weren't, so it's different. This kind of journalism (if that's what..yeah, said that already) is insulting to the reader and should be received as offensive, not informative and something to be unleashed on others, but again, it's different because...eff it.
All of that said, Godwin's Law invoked, you lose.
holdencaufield
(2,927 posts)... you don't condemn what they say ... only seek to prove that there weren't "too many" saying it out loud.
It only takes one speaker -- and a lot of followers -- to create a movement.
Alamuti Lotus
(3,093 posts)pull the string, I say what you want to hear... etc. Maybe I'm a juke-box, put a quarter in my butt and push A-12? Umm...yeah.
I didn't comment on that aspect because that part didn't really interest me. For a variety of reasons I actually don't much care for protests as a form of political expression; they're too easily ignored or misinterpreted. And as you said, "it only takes one speaker...to create a movement"--or lack thereof, as is more often the case.
What did interest me more was the really shoddy effort on the part of the writer who assembled that extremely and obviously biased and misleading piece, and presented it as so-called journalism. Such efforts by established organizations can create a movement too.
I read fragments of nonsense fairly regularly, but I don't feel the need to inflict them upon others. The OP did feel that need with the nonsense being presently discussed; for that reason, the decision was made that it was open and asking for comment.
holdencaufield
(2,927 posts)... might be "fragments of nonsense" to you. But, it has a very personal impact on me and several million of my coreligionists.
Those sensibilities in Europe might be buried under a veneer of civility for now. But, they are never very far from the surface.
This is a great concern to me also. It seems to always start in Europe.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)By the same token, the existence of such sensibilities in Europe must not be used to score points in the I/P dispute, since Palestinians didn't invent them...the Church is largely responsible for keeping those hateful feelings alive for the last 2000 years.
holdencaufield
(2,927 posts)... (an odd euphemism for Jew hatred) that are precisely the reason why Zionism came into existence and why Israel MUST exist. It's clear that for Jews to survive there has to be at least one place on Earth where their survival isn't dependent on the beneficence of the host nation.
There have always been, and probably always will be, people who want to kill Jews because they are Jews (no other reason is needed). Sad, but true.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)I used that word because YOU used it.
After all this time, you should know me well enough that I would never minimalize the toxicity of antisemitism(it is lethal, as are all other forms of bigotry).
Alamuti Lotus
(3,093 posts)but I suspect that strategic misinterpretation is more of a tactical approach and not some mere accident, reference the offense you just took to your own phraseology. People just won't put themselves on the defensive, so some nasty insinuation needs to be cleverly shoe-horned into the conversation to do so; well, I don't pay much attention to such attempts.
Do you agree with the suggestion in the article that the state agencies should better suppress such gatherings as this? The suggestion is that these people pose some imminent national security threat--akin to the Nazis and communist spies, which is really such an interesting suggestion in its own right (the kind of thing that says more about the accuser than the accused).
If that supposed imminent threat is indeed the case, do you believe that the government should have lists drawn up of the participants, and people that fit a similar profile?
holdencaufield
(2,927 posts)... a few people on a street corner, yelling about the Jews.
... people walking silently by, nodding their heads in agreement or thinking "at least they're not coming after me"
... a few more people, yelling about the Jews
... racial purity laws
... boxcars and camps.
The solution to calls for "death to (fill in the blank)" is for decent people (if they exist) to point the cold hard light of scorn and ridicule on ANYONE who calls for the death of any group.
The way to make sure the hate succeeds is to go out of your way to trivialise it and point out just how FEW people are screaming for death.
When my parents fought for civil rights in the '60s -- they weren't out there yelling about how few Klansmen there were -- they were standing up to them.
oberliner
(58,724 posts)A reporter reports to a newspaper that he hears "Death to Jews" from some people at an anti-Israel protest. That seems like exactly the sort of thing that ought to condemned. Those who try to bring antisemitism into the peace movement ought to be called out and unwelcome.
Ken Burch
(50,254 posts)Israel is not "the Jews", nor are Jewish people as a group responsible for its crimes.
