Comment by YZF

1 year ago

I don't know if you missed my point below but can Jews in Iran live in a democracy? Do they enjoy human rights and freedoms similar to what Jews enjoy in Israel?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Jews#Legal_discriminat...

"For example, if a Jew were to kill a Muslim, the family of the victim would have the right to ask that the death penalty be imposed, but if a Muslim kills a Jew, the penalty would be left to the discretion of the judges with the wishes of the victim's family carrying no legal weight" - I mean only fair, right?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Jews

"There were two waves of confiscation of homes, farmlands and factories of Jews in Iran. In the first wave, the authorities seized the properties of a small group of Jews who were accused of helping Zionism financially. In the second wave, authorities confiscated the properties of Jews who had to leave the country after the Revolution. They left everything in fear for their lives and the Islamic Republic confiscated their properties using their absence as an excuse"

So no, it's is not reasonable to ask Jews in Israel to live under similar conditions that Jews are subjected to in Iran (and really it's much worse than you're painting it). I stand by my original statement.

I think your last statement really tells it all. "makes it dangerous to be Jewish" tells us that the problem really is antisemitism. Israels' critics are the ones "conflating" things and the treatment of Israel by its haters is primarily coming from a place of hating Jews (and sorry, I'm going to put "uninformed" in the same bucket, because if you hate Jews because you're uninformed you're still an antisemite). As a Jewish person living out of Israel I see this in play. Israel is saying that much of the criticism against it is antisemitism and I think that's not way off the reality. It's also true that there's plenty of criticism that's not antisemitic but the bulk of it is. Saying Israel is somehow responsible for this is just victim blaming. If we were more aggressive about antisemitism not being ok/acceptable then we'd just be left with the valid criticism (of which there's plenty) and Israel wouldn't be able to hide behind the antisemitism defense. It's not that hard to tell whether criticism is valid or not, just s/Israel/Non-Jewish country/g and see if it still rings reasonable. That's the test Israel tries to get its critics to apply. Then it's either accused of whataboutism or colonialism or something else by people who don't want to apply this test.

EDIT: another by the way is that Iran is not an Arab country.

> I think your last statement really tells it all. "makes it dangerous to be Jewish" tells us that the problem really is antisemitism. Israels' critics are the ones "conflating" things

The cynical conflation of Judaism/Jewish ethnicity with Israeli Zionism is absolutely driven by the Zionist regime and their hasbara appendages like ADL. Do you know what the "ADL definition of antisemitism" is and why that is significant? It explicitly equates "criticism of Israel/Zionism" with antisemitism. They have literally legalized this conflation in many respects.

It is totally disingenuous to imply that antisemites are the ones driving this confusion. They certainly benefit from it, but so does the Zionist regime, both at the expense of Jewish people of all backgrounds.

  • You can read HN threads about this issue and see the kernel of truth on both sides of the argument of whether antisemitism is "weaponized" by supporters of Israel, but you do your side of the argument no favors throwing around phrases like "their hasbara appendages like ADL". I'm well aware of the criticisms leveled against the ADL, and they may well be valid, but you're obliged to introduce them more seriously and carefully if you don't want to come across sounding like you believe any Jewish advocacy group is definitionally politically Zionist and thus ineligible to charge antisemitism.