“Hitler Would be Proud”

Eugene Volokh wants to know if the cartoon below is anti-Semitic, or merely anti-Israel as the editors of the Sacramento News & Review say it was intended to be.

My take? As Rabbi Adlerstein wrote here previously, the Journal of Conflict Resolution recently published a study demonstrating that “anti-Israel sentiment consistently predicts the probability that an individual is anti-Semitic, with the likelihood of measured anti-Semitism increasing with the extent of anti-Israel sentiment observed.” Nowhere is the false nature of the distinction more clear.

Given that the Star of David is recognized across the United States as a Jewish symbol, independent of the flag of Israel, the cartoon is indefensible — or as Rabbi Reuven Taff said in his letter to the News and Review, it is “worthy of the notorious Nazi paper Der Sturmer.”

What’s your opinion?

Uncle Sam in a Star pillory

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6 Responses

  1. Ahron says:

    The creator of this cartoon, John Kloss, claimed (after the furor began) that his masterwork was simply about “the violence”. Of course the cartoon itself belies this poor attempt at deception. But his belated dissimulation reveals that those who publish anti-Israel/Antisemitic material are still uneasy about being publicly perceived as anti-Jewish.

    The fact that being “anti-violence” is increasingly seen as synonomous with being anti-Israel is a telling indicator of the “success” of Israeli and Jewish PR efforts… It’s also a telling indicator of the profound moral corruption of the modern Left.

  2. Bob Miller says:

    Another editorial cartoonist, the widely syndicated Oliphant, has been putting out garbage like this for years.

  3. Ori Pomerantz says:

    What’s your opinion?

    Nothing I can express in polite language. Instead, I’d like to see if I can locate Kloss’s inspiration. Is it this one http://www.bytwerk.com/gpa/images/lb/lb43-27.jpg ?

    BTW, I got that image from http://www.bytwerk.com/gpa/lustige.htm .

  4. Lumpy Rutherford says:

    To me, the cartoon suggests that once again, the Jews are crucifying a good guy. The lock says that the Jews have total control over the U.S.

  5. NerBochur says:

    To be fair, being that the Star of David today is primarily a symbol representing Israel; the cartoonist can legitimately claim that the Star of David, here, refers to Israel. In fact, the symbol originally dates back to and ancient Egyptian and Middle Eastern cultures, so should we then say that this is a negative portrayal of those cultures. The answer is no, because this is obviously not what the artist meant. So too in this situation, it is obvious that the cartoonist was referring to Israel, and not the Jewish population. We can’t convince anybody that something is anti-Semitism just by saying it is. The bottom line is that nobody will become an anti-Semite because the cartoon could be stretched as referring to Jews as opposed to Israel. Not that I at all sympathize with the view portrayed in cartoon, but my concern is that Jews are gaining a reputation for silencing fair criticism of Israel by labeling everything as anti-Semitism. The negative result of that is that legitimate claims of anti-Semitism become ignored. In other words, if everything is anti-Semitism than nothing is anti-Semitism. Furthermore, the impression is given that Israel defects criticism of their “atrocities” by crying Anti-Semitism, a claim we know is far from the truth. Instead of whining, we should engage in dialogue using convincing arguments and facts to defend the reputation of Israel. This would be a far more effective method than interpreting everything as anti- Semitism, a behavior which unfortunately is far too common today. Jews should refrain from behaving in a way in which they look like whiners, and should only cry anti-Semitism when legitimately so.

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