Contagious insanity

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It is well known that viruses are contagious, and now it seems that a new variant is rampant among certain sections of the body politic.

Michael Kuttner

Irrational insanity has always infected those for whom hating Jews and Israel is second nature.

Following Israel’s just concluded elections, the ripple effect of knee-jerk hypocrisy has reached epidemic levels. Once mainly but by no means exclusively confined to international groups it has now also resurfaced in our own domestic left-wing “elites.” Add in the roll call of Diaspora Jewish leadership and you have a perfect recipe for the diagnosis of “trembling Jews” syndrome.

The common theme which unites all of them is the apparent (to them) calamitous repercussions following the expected formation of the most right-wing and religious coalition in Israel’s history.

Despite President Herzog telling doomsday prophets to accept the democratic will of the Israeli electorate, this has largely fallen on deaf ears. It seems axiomatic that only leftist voters can be democratic, while right-wing voters are racist to the core and threaten democratic values.

As I mentioned in my previous op-ed, this has been a long-standing contention by our own leftist politicians going back long before the re-establishment of sovereignty.

What really takes first prize for chutzpah and unhinged reactions however must go to the Biden Administration closely followed by the UK media including the Jewish Chronicle. In its lead editorial, the JC stated, “Britain’s bond with Israel will outlast the far right.” What a patronizing chutzpah that has been echoed by various “lords” of the trembling Jewish establishment. No wonder the anti-Israel mob in the UK and further afield in the EU feel emboldened to criticize the Israeli voters’ choice.

It has taken the White House a week to congratulate Netanyahu, and during this inexplicable delay, there were non-subtle hints from various sources that the USA expects the new Israeli Government to “respect an open democratic society.” Just think about this for a moment. For seventy-five years Israel has been a model democratic country in a neighbourhood renowned for not respecting democracy and human rights. During this time we have had left-wing, centrist and right-wing coalitions, none of them posing any sort of remote threat to the values espoused by the Biden White House or genetic Jewish American voters.

The hypocritical insanity, however gets even weirder and more evident the closer one looks at inconvenient truths pushed under the State Dept carpet.

If respect for “an open democratic society” is indeed a vital US requirement why have heavy-handed hints already been dropped that one of the incoming coalition’s prospective cabinet ministers may be boycotted? In their hasty eagerness to display virtuous political correctness and no doubt to reassure the left-wing progressives of the Democratic Party, these inane utterances merely highlight a far more hypocritical stance.

If indeed democracy and respect for human rights are a requirement, how come the Biden Administration continues to cozy up to one of the biggest abusers of these values? Why has the US embraced Abbas and the PA? The last elections took place there so many years ago, and Abbas continues to rule by decree. Critics of the corrupt regime continue to be targeted, and incarcerated murderers of Israelis continue to receive stipends while those deemed martyrs receive pensions from the PA. The President for life and the media churn out daily hate diatribes while school textbooks continue to extol the illegitimacy of Israel and Jews.

My question is very simple.

Why is the US still embracing Abbas and reassuring him that the mirage of a two-state solution is still a viable option? Why is the State Dept not boycotting this serial denier of democracy and human rights?

Is the answer perhaps something to do with blatant double standards whereby threats to democracy and hints of boycotts only apply to Israel? The same questions can also be posed to all those others who have convulsed post-election day.

Jewish establishment spokespersons overseas have also been notable in their varying reactions to the results of the elections. The further left on the political and religious progressive spectrum, the more strident and doom-laden their pronouncements.

My question to these so-called guardians of political correctness is this.

Where were you when the previous coalition governed with the help of an Arab Party which has warned that Jews praying on the Temple Mount will ignite a war? Where were your voices of outrage when terrorists murdered Israelis and Arab MKs in the Knesset called them martyrs?

Israel’s possible incoming police minister, who is viewed as an irredeemable racist, has stated that he does not hate Arabs. He only hates terrorists, but as 99% of terrorists are Arabs that apparently labels him as beyond the pale. Likewise, his proposal to deport terrorists and their families if they are found to have aided them after due process of law resonated with large swathes of the Israeli electorate. Why should the Israeli taxpayer support terrorists in jail while they gain university degrees? Apparently, this is all too much for the delicate and trembling liberals ensconced in their make-believe bubbles of exile.

Recently the PA boasted that “over 100 babies were conceived using the liberated sperm of jailed terrorists.” If this is not a case of immaculate deception then it is yet another reason why these murderers of Israelis should be expelled from the country lock stock and barrel never to either be a drain on our prison system or ever again pose a physical threat to our citizens.

An increasing number of Israeli voters want a much firmer policy and this is something the declining excusers of Arab terror have yet to internalize.

I suspect that the politicians in Washington and elsewhere are terrified that the contagious insanity might infect their own constituencies. If this occurs, then it will merely confirm that voters have had enough of current failed and hypocritical policies.

Nothing epitomizes the out-of-reality syndrome which has enveloped masses on the left more than today’s fiasco in Israel surrounding the commemoration of the anniversary of Kristallnacht on 9 November. The far-left Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, named after a German revolutionary “extremist” socialist, which today receives funding from Germany, decided to hold an evening dedicated to the theme of comparing the Shoah with the Nakba, the “tragedy” of Israel’s rebirth. Hosted by the Goethe Institute (another irony), this obscene comparison equating the two historical events on Kristallnacht was initially called out by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Los Angeles, closely followed by a storm of derision and condemnation from Israeli officials. Realizing their foot-in-mouth own goal, the Goethe Institute called off the 9 November event and, unbelievably rescheduled it for 13 November. The organizers obviously still don’t get that the theme of the evening is so insulting and toxic for most sane Israelis.

That’s the tragedy of today’s leftist breast beating guilt-laden critics who are convulsing over the fact that Israelis are fed up with this sort of woke nonsense.

Apart from the Wiesenthal Centre, where are all those progressive religious voices and defenders of the oppressed? They are conspicuously mute as usual. Blaming Arab leaders for their own self-inflicted tragedies and condemning the ongoing daily outpouring of delegitimisation is not part of their agenda. It is obviously far easier to give unsolicited advice to Israel’s incoming PM as to who he should choose to be part of his coalition. If they think that it will earn them brownie points from the US Administration, they are, as usual mistaken. All it will do is confirm to most Israelis that far too many living in their countries of exile are detached from reality regarding real threats facing Israelis.

Political insanity is certainly contagious and is running rampant.

Michael Kuttner is a Jewish New Zealander who for many years was actively involved with various communal organisations connected to Judaism and Israel. He now lives in Israel and is J-Wire’s correspondent in the region.