by Dr. Alex Joffe
A simple explanation for these patterns is that BDS interest correlates with post-Christian contexts in which Jews are relatively absent, or with “white” class anxiety emanating from academia.
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BDS France, image via Wikipedia
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BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 1,249, August 8, 2019
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: An
original analysis of the global distribution of BDS Internet searches
revealed disproportionate interest in countries such as New Zealand,
Ireland, and Sweden, as well as in coastal US states with large academic
institutions. In the former regions there are few Jews and little
contact with Israel, while in the latter, there are many Jews but
proportionately fewer Christian supporters of Israel. A simple
explanation for these patterns is that BDS interest correlates with
post-Christian contexts in which Jews are relatively absent, or with
“white” class anxiety emanating from academia. In the US, growing
negativity about Israel in liberal Western communities is likely a
class-based transfer of anxiety regarding ”white privilege” onto Israel
and Jews.
Hillel Frisch’s highly original analysis
of the popularity of BDS raises important questions about the character
of this global ”movement.” In brief, by examining the geography of
Google queries on BDS and Israel’s legitimacy, Frisch concludes that
interest in BDS may be slowing, but it is also distributed uniquely.
Underlying this distribution are important factors that deserve highlighting.
Frisch found, for example, that Google searches
regarding BDS in New Zealand, Ireland, and Sweden exceed those in the US
and Britain. That is to say, individuals in post-Christian countries
with almost no Jews and few relationships with Israel exhibit a
disproportionate interest in negative information regarding both.
One explanation for this is that it is precisely
the relative absence of Jews and contact with Israel that drives
interest. There is a curious symmetry there with the obsessions of
Islamic countries like Saudi Arabia and Indonesia, which are entirely
Jew-free. In both, Israel and Jews are given a disproportionate place in
media and scholarship and are ascribed an outsized role in world
affairs, albeit with different interpretations.
The relative Jewish (and general religious) void
in places like New Zealand and Sweden is filled by historical
refractions of Christian antisemitism, contemporary left-wing politics,
and the effects of Muslim migration. The left-wing affinity toward
Palestinians is a traditional secular religious article of faith, given
new impetus by immigrant populations.
But there is another driver in the West, a broader
leftward movement of ”white progressive” populations and politicians.
Even in the absence of either Jews or Muslims, affluent, liberal
communities are being influenced by the progressive left and are moving
toward more strident and negative attitudes toward Israel. Hostility is
becoming a normative position based on decontextualized notions of ”war
crimes,” ”human rights” or Israel’s ”right-wing government,” founded on post-colonialist ”anti-imperialist” intellectual stances. In turn, these notions, specifically aimed at Israel, Jews, and the US, are being woven into the fabric of liberal middle class respectability.
The simplest explanation for this phenomenon is
that affluent ”white” populations anxious about their own status in the
racialized context of American and now global politics seek to defray
their ”privilege” by scapegoating Israel and Jews and pandering to
further left (and ethnic minority) opinions. Dislike for Israel and Jews
is a litmus test and symbol of enlightened status. Since support for
Israel (at least in the US) is strongly correlated with traditional
religious viewpoints, anti-Israel bias serves to distinguish social
classes even more broadly.
This interpretation also helps explain Frisch’s
finding that expressions of American interest in BDS on Google are
disproportionately centered in coastal states, especially those with
numerous academic institutions. Emanating directly from academia, these
attitudes are becoming naturalized throughout affluent, “white,” and
Democratic constituencies. To this, as Frisch notes, must be added
states that have growing Muslim populations, such as Minnesota and
Michigan, which have now elected overt BDS supporters to Congress.
Ironically, growing explicit support for boycotting Israel by neo-Nazi groups puts the respectable progressive left in a de facto
alliance with the far right, broadening what had been a convergence
between the disreputable left and right, such as between Nation of Islam
leader Louis Farrakhan and neo-Nazi leader David Duke. These realities
point to both the perennial utility of antisemitism for extremist
movements and the collapse of such categories as left and right.
Conversely, Frisch found that countries such as
Nigeria, Kenya, and the Philippines show Google searches that are
disproportionately philo-Semitic. The preponderance of evangelical
Christianity in these countries is part of the obvious explanation for
this phenomenon, as are their negative historical and contemporary
experiences with Islam. As more African and Christianizing countries in
Asia, especially China, become more connected to the Internet and the
global information environment, we may expect similar results.
But BDS is not simply a free-floating social
preference among particular demographics. Institutionally it is a key
instrument of the red-green alliance between left-wing “social
democratic,” which is to say communist, organizations and Muslim
Brotherhood-controlled groups. Human agents drive and shape its
narratives, which are pulling broader constituencies leftward and toward
Israel antipathy.
New research by the Community Security Trust (CST)
in Britain has also shown that the information environment in which
politicians and populations alike operate has been driven by social media “engine rooms”
that churn out endless streams of hostile postings about Israel. Labour
members from Islamist, socialist, and pro-BDS backgrounds are all part
of this Corbynite cadre, targeting Labour critics inside and outside the
party as well as Jews and Israel. This is Soviet-style information
warfare cranked up to an entirely new level.
Institutionally, these efforts mesh with the
effective takeover of Labour under Jeremy Corbyn by the Israel-obsessed.
Another report submitted as part of the Equality and Human Rights
Commission investigation into Labour antisemitism demonstrates that the
leadership of the Labour Party after the election of Corbyn set about systematically taking over party structures and radicalizing members against Israel and its supporters, especially Jews.
The obsession of a minority permitted the
disinhibition of a broader group of bigots, and, indeed, encouraged it.
They then indulged in all manner of crude antisemitism. The same
process, of an Israel-hating “social democratic” fringe seeking to take
over the broader party and in the process dragging it and politics as a
whole leftward, is underway with the Democrats.
But another curious feature of this process is
that with the election of Boris Johnson as leader of the Tory Party and
his elevation to Prime Minister, Labour wrath has now descended on those ethnic minorities
who had the temerity to join Johnson’s Cabinet. The same process has
occurred in American politics, as supporters of Trump are accused of
being “racists” and “white supremacists,“
and even within the American Jewish community, as Jews accuse other
Jews of supporting Trumpist and Israeli “white supremacy.” Revolutions
invariably create conflicts between the radicals and the extremely
radical. Politics as a whole is the casualty but minorities who fail to
conform are, with Jews, among the first victims.
Like antisemitism, BDS is both an environment and
an instrument; it exists as a free-floating cultural norm both of the
far left and far right, and as a tool utilized against Israel and Jews.
The presence or absence of Jews is secondary and the complex realities
of Israel are irrelevant. But the creep of BDS and resulting
antisemitism into the normative liberal political behavior of Western
countries where Jews have been an active, welcome presence in post-war
history is an ominous development.
Source: https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/social-geography-bds-antisemitism/
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