Published: 14 December 2017
Last updated: 4 March 2024
This wasn't supposed to happen at a conference on anti-Semitism (Haaretz)
Many would argue that anti-Semitism is no worse than any other hatred. But it’s not every day that a top official at the World Jewish Congress tries to make that case – let alone suggest that Jews are apathetic to the suffering of other minorities.
So when Menachem Rosensaft, the general counsel of the WJC, an organisation dedicated to fighting anti-Semitism, delivered remarks in this vein at a Tel Aviv conference on anti-Semitism on Monday, the audience was – needless to say – caught off guard.
“Anti-Semitism is sometimes referred to as the most pernicious hatred,” he told delegates. “I respectfully reject that characterisation and any suggestion that anti-Semitism is somehow worse than other forms of bigotry.
He continued: “I’m sorry, but the white supremacist ideology that holds African-Americans and Hispanics to be inferior to Caucasians is every bit as reprehensible as anti-Semitism. So are other kinds of discrimination and oppression on the basis of religion, race and nationality.
“The hatred that resulted in the genocide of Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica and of the Tutsi in Rwanda are no less evil than the hatred of Jews that resulted in pogroms and the Shoah,” he added.
AND SEE
Say no to the tyranny of the majority (Ynet)
SAMI MICHAEL All over the world, we Jews are obsessed with interpreting democracy as a shield and wall for minorities, crying out whenever we suffer as a religious minority; in Israel, however, we seem to have forsaken a decent interpretation of democracy.
Photo: Menachem Rosensaft (BBC)
