On the Re-Issue of The New Antisemitism: an Interview with Dr. Phyllis Chesler

by Jerry Gordon (December 2014)

The New Anti-Semitism
by Phyllis Chesler
Gefen Publishing House (November 20, 2014)
408 pages

“Anti-Israelism is Antisemitism.” It effectively turned the Jewish nation into the world Jew, an object of scorn as the dhimmi usurper in the Muslim Middle East.

upcoming debate at the European Parliament following symbolic votes by several EU members.

World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination and Xenophobia held in Durban, South Africa in August and September 2001 with subsequent review conferences over the past decade. It found fertile ground in the International Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel with allies in liberal churches, academia and the media seeking to economically punish the Jewish state.

Nidra Poller drew attention to the “lethal narrative” of the Al Dura affair, captured in the 55 second news video by France2 on September 30, 2000 at the start of the Second Intifada. That news video spawned a new blood libel, the alleged killing of 12 year Mohammed Al Dura in Gaza. It took 13 years for an Israeli government commission sparked by an intrepid group of journalists and activists to demonstrate that the killing had never occurred. Nevertheless, the myth persisted becoming embroiled in court cases for libel in France.

Dr. Phyllis Chesler
Credit: Bosch Fawstin

personal experience confronting Islamic Antisemitism in Kabul the early 1960’s, she recognized the confluence of these developments. that prompted her to write a prescient work in 2003, The New Antisemitism: The Current Crisis and What We Must Do About It (TNA). The re-issue of an expanded version, The New Antisemitism by the Gefen Publishing House in Israel is a testament to her prescience. While her thesis had been rejected in 2003 by the American Jewish leadership as no cause for alarm, the march of events have proven her correct. Polls in Europe reflect adverse views of both Israel and Jews. Manfred Gerstenfeld using these poll results in 2013 estimated that 40% of the 400 million population in the EU harbor such opinions. There have been attacks on synagogues and businesses, massed protest marches and riots by Muslim and allied radical groups with cries of “Jews to the Gas” reminiscent of the 1930’s in Nazi Germany. There were murders of Jewish citizens and Israelis in France, Belgium, and Bulgaria perpetrated by home grown Islamikazes inspired by terrorist groups Al Qaeda, Hezbollah and ISIS.

synagogue-Mosque ‘twinning ‘programs, seeking to mollify the primal Islamic doctrinal hatred of Jews. Outgoing Anti-Defamation League executive director, Abe Foxman, launched misguided attacks against the supposed threat of the evangelical Christian community endeavoring to “Christianize America.” Evangelicals are among Israel’s best defenders. Ironically, Dr. Chesler’s views have found a wider accepting audience in conservative media.

Watch this excerpt of Dr. Chesler on Fox News’ Huckebee Program discussing, “Israel under Attack”:

Watch the latest video at video.foxnews.com

Against this background, we reached out to Dr. Chesler to interview her on the occasion of the re-issue of The New Antisemitism.

Jerry Gordon: Dr. Chesler thank you for consenting to this interview

Dr. Phyllis Chesler: Thank you for inviting me.

Gordon: Gefen Publishing in Israel is releasing an updating of your 2003 book, The New Antisemitism. What prompted Gefen to republish this updated version?

Chesler: As monumentally distressing events have gathered force and as all that I predicted has come to pass, it seems possible that there might be a greater receptivity to this message now, than there was back in 2003. Also, the founder of Gefen Publishing asked me to interview him and we really hit it off. He is a hero, one of the Jewish American sailors who crewed the illegal ships which took on the vicious British blockade to bring in nearly 40% of Holocaust survivors at least to Cyprus, if not to Tel Aviv or Haifa. We exchanged books. Back in Israel, he said that my book was causing something of a stir at Gefen. And, I wanted a publisher based in Israel.

Gordon: What is the ‘new Antisemitism’ and how does it differ from the traditional form?

Chesler: Today, the “new” Antisemitism is the result of a Perfect Storm, an alliance between a suicidal and “politically correct” Western intelligentsia and radical, fundamentalism Islam. Anti-Zionism is also what the “new” Anti-Semitism is about. The Jewish state, which was meant to protect Jews from anti-Semitic persecution is now the excuse given for attacking Jews in Europe and in North and South America. The almost permanent Intifada against the Jewish state launched by Arab states, the United Nations, human rights groups, professors and students now can claim that they are not anti-Semitic, they are merely anti-Zionist. Thus, the single, small, democratic, and only Jewish state on earth has become the world’s Jew, the scapegoat for the crimes committed by others.

Gordon: What were the reactions to the book by your former colleagues in the feminist movement?

Chesler: My movements included academics and artists of all sorts as well as leftists, and feminists. The book itself was not reviewed by the mainstream media. Their disapproval and capacity to punish politically incorrect speech resulted in an absolute refusal to engage. I lost my formerly very trendy reputation and was almost comically seen as a traitor, a neo-conservative, and (gasp!) a Zionist because I held the “good” people accountable for their racism or for their Judeophobia. Many believed that, by definition, I now “hated” Muslims. But I work with Muslim and ex-Muslim feminists, dissidents, and apostates and they honor me for my work on Islamic gender and religious apartheid and for my studies on honor based violence, including honor killing. Over the years, a number of feminists have either grudgingly or lovingly thanked me for my keen-sightedness and ability to remain engaged in history as opposed to merely resting on my laurels of long ago.

Gordon: In retrospect how did the American Jewish community react to your book in 2003 and has that changed over the past decade?

Chesler: They are afraid. They do not want to offend highly aggressive Muslims and their many Jewish and non-Jewish supporters. They want to get by with as little trouble as possible. Jews, like everyone else, want to lead safe and happy lives. They wish to be popular, trendy. They do not necessarily want to bear the burden of the pariah status that has been visited upon Israel so unfairly, so outrageously.

Gordon: There is an estimate developed by Manfred Gerstenfeld that 40% of Europeans surveyed harbor anti-Israel views. Is that prompting Jews in the EU to consider leaving for Israel or America?

Chesler: Yes, the Jews are again on the move. And Israel is the largest and best defended ghetto the Jews have ever had. And President Obama is dancing with the Iranian devil as the Iranians procure a nuclear bomb with the clear intention of launching it against Israel.

Gordon: How dangerous is the current wave of violence by Arab Muslims in Israel to the future of the Jewish nation?

Chesler: These so-called lone wolf attacks are not so lone. They are directly related to a lifetime of indoctrination in Arabic by both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. What is dangerous is the normalization of bloody barbarism in the general neighborhood that led, most recently, to two Arabs invading a Jerusalem synagogue with axes and meat cleavers to butcher the Jews (‘itbak al-Yahud“); and then there are the cars that ride over people and into crowds. And these weapons of destruction are blessed by the Palestinian Authority in Arabic.

Gordon: The success of the Islamic State calling itself a Caliphate ruled by Sharia has attracted thousands of young Muslim men and women globally to its cause. Has Western tolerance of the intolerance of Islam abetted the New Antisemitism?

Chesler: It is not so much tolerance which has caused this. Rather, multi-cultural relativism has allowed barbaric practices and customs to be considered not only equal but as somehow sacred. Also, the Western (and Muslim) indoctrination of people into thinking that Muslims, especially, are being persecuted – when they are not, when they are only being treated as equal, not as superior. Also, the indoctrination of young people in mosques, in families, on the internet, by the media, into believing that ISIS will give meaning and significance to otherwise ordinary lives; that it will allow the “powerless” and sociopathic to become powerful and significant – all play roles in abetting the most fiendish barbarism. Anti-Semitism is at the heart of this evil, this virus. Bin Laden described the 9/11 attacks as having been launched against the “Crusader-Zionist” conspiracy.

Gordon: Dr. Chesler thank you for this timely and important interview.

Chesler: The pleasure is all mine.

_____________________________________

Also see Jerry Gordon’s collection of interviews, The West Speaks.

To comment on this interview, please click here.

To help New English Review continue to publish timely and interesting interviews like this one, please click her e.

If you have enjoyed this article and want to read more by Jerry Gordon, please click here.

Jerry Gordon is a also regular contributor to our community blog. To read his entries, please click here.