COMMENTARY: By Saige England
Good on the Jewish Council of Australia (JCA) for its submission to the Royal Commission.
The New Zealand Jewish Council is so very different to the Jewish Council in Australia. The latter has far larger numbers and more clout, over there at least.
The NZ Jewish Council has clout and applies it. It is heavily involved in New Zealand media, some members are journalists, and it has long been running a hasbara propaganda campaign.
- READ MORE: Conflation of Jewish identity with Israel driving antisemitism, Jewish Council says in submission to royal commission
- Which Australian journalists and politicians have gone on trips to Israel and Palestine?
- Other Israeli propaganda reports
‘The JCA submission says two important drivers of antisemitism are the “growth of far-right, neo-Nazi and conspiracist movements, which represent a significant and often overlooked threat to Jewish communities, and the aggressive actions of the state of Israel and conflation of Jewish identity with Israel”.’
— The Guardian
Freebies to Israel if you play the toxic game — dehumanise Palestinians, deem them all terrorists, and declare Israel the promised land for one people, not the other.
The New Zealand Jewish Council spreads lies. I know this for a fact. One of its key members who is lauded in New Zealand film and television defamed John Minto, a humanitarian, called him antisemitic, I challenged that and asked him to provide evidence.
Of course there was none. This man who is Jewish and influential in entertainment and journalism defamed Damien O’Connor and said he was antisemitic. Again I challenged him and asked for evidence. There was none.
Zionism inflates antisemitism
I have news for Zionists and their allies in the media who are doing this. Conflating anti-Zionism and antisemitism inflates antisemitism. They know it.
It is not fair, is not sensible, rational or compassionate. It is baiting and inciting.
The NZ Jewish Council applies one law for Jews and one for Muslims, different standards completely. One can be the victim, the other is never the victim, in its view.
I previously supported the NZ Jewish Council when I witnessed media bias in a programme featuring a former Waffen SS officer who praised Hitler and claimed he did not know about what happened to the Jews. It was impossible not to know about the systemic murder of masses of Jews, then and now.
When the evidence points to the contrary, the journalist should call it, everytime. Evidence.
This Gaza genocide. More than 75,000 killed — children, little children, babies, women, aid workers, journalists. A target on their backs for being Palestinian.
I have been appalled at the NZ Jewish Council’s double standards, its staunch sense of entitlement, its clear political view that the only good Jews are Zionists, its supremacism.
Stalwart Zionists
The NZ Jewish Council is run by and supported by stalwart Zionists. It does not represent humanitarian Jews because it is Zionist, because it fails to call out a genocide which has murdered tens of thousands of infants, aid workers, and more journalists than World War One and Two combined and the total number of recent wars.
Genocide is not a conflict, it is not a war. The massacres have been carried out since the Nakba. It was always the plan.
Jews have fought against Zionism, literally. The Bund. Jews against Zionism.
Not all Jews are Zionists and the NZ Jewish Council fails to recognise it and support those who support all people equally.
I know about antisemitism. When I worked in a shop I was asked if I was Jewish, when I asked why the question was asked, I was told by the customer that they would never buy from a Jew. My grandfather’s people hid their Jewishness due to anti-semitism.
My aunt was yelled at in the street: ‘You black Jews are all the same’. I know the difference between antisemitism and pro-colonisation Zionism, one supports equality and the other robs other people of their rights.
I stand firmly with the most oppressed people in the world, Palestinians, and for the dismantling of the state of supremacism, apartheid and genocide, a state which always had a policy of steal the land, assimilate those who won’t resist, and exile and exterminate the rest.
And this is why I say it is antisemitic to support the Zionist state. When we free Palestinians we free ourselves from the chains of one kind of victimhood. The victimhood that leads people to become persecutors and create more victims. Zionism.
Saige England is an award-winning journalist and author of The Seasonwife, a novel exploring the brutal impacts of colonisation. She is also a contributor to Asia Pacific Report.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.