Henryk Broder and “Leftist Anti-Semitism”

Godwin’s Law stipulates that in any argument one party will eventually accuse the opposing side of being Nazis.  Well, Spiegel columnist Henryk Broder has taken Godwin’s Law to a new level: he accuses anyone of who criticizes a preemptive military attack on Iran by Israel of being "Holocaust Deniers":

"Dann gibt es die zweite Holocaust Leugnung. Das sind Leute die
behaupten, dass Ahmadinedschad´s Politik für Israel keine Gefahr
darstellt. Das heißt die einen wenigen leugnen den Holocaust der
passiert ist und die nächsten bestreiten, dass es im Nahen Osten
demnächst einen Holocaust geben könnte. Nach meinem dafür halten sind
die zweiten viel gefährlicher. Das sind die Antisemiten des 21
Jahrhunderts" (Now we have the second Holocaust denial. That is the position of people who believe that Ahmadinedschad’s policies are not a danger to Israel. While the first deny that the Holocaust occurred, the new ones deny that a Holocaust could soon take place in the Middle East. In my opinion the second variety is much more dangerous. These are the anti-Semites of the 21st century.)

The new anti-Semites are, according to Broder, no longer the jack-booted skinheads shouting "Sieg Heil" (yes, they exist, but they have been marginalized). The new ones are the well-groomed leftist intellectuals who dare to voice criticism of Israel.  Broder elaborates on this in a longer piece in Die Welt:

Der moderne Antisemit findet den ordinären Antisemitismus schrecklich,
bekennt sich aber ganz unbefangen zum Antizionismus, dankbar für die
Möglichkeit, seine Ressentiments in einer politisch korrekten Form
auszuleben. Denn auch der Antizionismus ist ein Ressentiment, wie der
klassische Antisemitismus es war. Der Antizionist hat die gleiche
Einstellung zu Israel wie der Antisemit zum Juden. Er stört sich nicht
daran, was Israel macht oder unterlässt, sondern daran, dass es Israel
gibt. Und deswegen beteiligt er sich so leidenschaftlich an Debatten
über eine Lösung der Palästinafrage, die für Israel eine Endlösung
bedeuten könnte,
(The modern anti-Semite is horrified by ordinary anti-Semitism, but is openly anti-Zionist: he is grateful for the opportunity of expressing his Ressentiment in a politically correct form. FOr anti-Zionism is also a kind of Ressentiment, just as the classical anti-Semitism was. The anti-Zionist has the same attitude towards Israel as the anti-Semite to the Jew. He is not really concerned about what Israel does or doesn’t do; he is much more concerned that Israel even exists. And he therefore gets passionately involved in the debate about a solution for the Palestine question, which would mean the annihilation of Israel.)

We have seen similar efforts to stifle criticism of Israel in the United States: Jimmy Carter was called an anti-Semite (and much worse) when he dared to criticize the treatment of Palestinians in his book Palestine: Peace not Apartheid and Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt managed to enrage the Israel lobby by just pointing out the existence of such a lobby.  But I suspect Henryk Broder is far more effective in Germany, since he combines his condemnation of "leftist anti-Semitism" with criticism of "multi-culturalism" and attacks against the Muslim population in Germany. Open expressions of hate against Islam and Muslims is a respectable form of racism of the right wing in both Germany and the United States.

Ironically, as New York TImes columnist Nicholas Kristof pointed out in his recent piece The Two Israels, it is the Israelis themselves that are most critical of their government’s policies:

All told, the most persuasive indictments of Israeli actions come
from Israelis themselves. This scrupulous honesty and fairness toward
Israel’s historic enemies is a triumph of humanity.

In short,
there are many Israels. When American presidential candidates compete
this year to be “pro-Israeli,” let’s hope that they clarify that the
one they support is not the oppressor that lets settlers steal land and
club women but the one that is a paragon of justice, decency, fairness
— and peace.

But to acknowledge the existence of Two Israels would require a degree of honesty that Henryk Broder does not possess.  It is far easier – and far more lucrative in Broder’s case – to smear all of your opponents as anti-Semites.