Karim Emile Bitar sur Twitter : "Aung San Suu Kyi and Viktor Orban agree ‘continuously growing Muslim populations’ is great challenge. She’s a #Nobel Peace Prize! As #Orwell said : “Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent...” via Le_Dornien_ via @SabrinaBennoui ▻https://t.co/goNpTZ4v8p" / Twitter
▻https://twitter.com/karimbitar/status/1137277238792118273
Le sud-est européen sur la voie de l’« orbanisation »
▻https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/international/250519/le-sud-est-europeen-sur-la-voie-de-l-orbanisation
En pleines élections européennes, les droites des pays des Balkans sont écartelées entre des courants modérés europhiles et une lame de fond ultraconservatrice. Courtisés à la fois par Viktor Orbán et par Angela Merkel, les États membres de l’UE sont devenus des pions essentiels pour la grande famille de la droite européenne, le PPE.
#EUROPE #Serbie,_Viktor_Orban,_Slovénie,_croatie,_Macédoine_du_Nord,_élections_européennes_2019,_Bulgarie
Hongrie : siphonnée par Orbán, l’extrême droite du Jobbik vit son crépuscule
▻https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/international/240519/hongrie-siphonnee-par-orban-l-extreme-droite-du-jobbik-vit-son-crepuscule
Il y a dix ans, l’Europe découvrait les images des miliciens du Jobbik paradant au cœur de Budapest. Puis le parti d’extrême droite s’est fait couper l’herbe sous le pied par la trajectoire autoritaire de Viktor Orbán. Il s’avère aujourd’hui incapable d’enrayer la toute-puissance du premier ministre hongrois.
#EUROPE #Magyar_Gárda,_Gábor_Vona,_Roms,_extrême_droite,_Jobbik,_élections_européennes,_Fidesz,_Viktor_Orban,_Hongrie
Siphonnée par Orbán, l’extrême droite hongroise du Jobbik vit son crépuscule
▻https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/international/240519/siphonnee-par-orban-l-extreme-droite-hongroise-du-jobbik-vit-son-crepuscul
Il y a dix ans, l’Europe découvrait les images des miliciens du Jobbik paradant au cœur de Budapest. Puis le parti d’extrême droite s’est fait couper l’herbe sous le pied par la trajectoire autoritaire de Viktor Orbán. Il s’avère aujourd’hui incapable d’enrayer la toute-puissance du premier ministre hongrois.
#EUROPE #Fidesz,_Viktor_Orban,_extrême_droite,_élections_européennes,_Jobbik,_Gábor_Vona,_Roms,_Hongrie,_Magyar_Gárda
L’Opéra de Hongrie annule « Billy Elliot » pour éviter de transformer les petits garçons en « homosexuels » - Les Inrocks
La descente aux enfer en Hongrie
▻https://www.lesinrocks.com/2018/06/25/actualite/monde/lopera-de-hongrie-annule-billy-elliot-pour-eviter-de-transformer-les-pet
En Hongrie, une campagne homophobe fait supprimer des représentations du spectacle Billy Elliot à l’opéra.
L’opéra national de Hongrie a annoncé jeudi dernier l’annulation de quinze représentations de la comédie musicale Billy Elliot à Budapest après une campagne médiatique homophobe.
La comédie musicale « Billy Elliot » victime d’une campagne homophobe en Hongrie. L’Opéra national hongrois a supprimé 15 représentations de la comédie musicale.
▻https://t.co/3hptE5Z061 pic.twitter.com/NF9vqMNydD
— France Musique (@francemusique) 22 juin 2018
La production a en effet été accusée de faire de la "propagande gay" par le site web d’actualités Magyar Idok qui soutient ouvertement Viktor Orbán, le très conservateur Premier ministre hongrois. Le journal est considéré comme un organe officieux de son gouvernement nationaliste et a pour habitude de stigmatiser les personnalités publiques qui s’opposent au gouvernement.
Gabrielle Cluzel (Boulevard Voltaire) : CNews et LCI installent la « fachosphère » sur leurs plateaux - Acrimed | Action Critique Médias
▻https://www.acrimed.org/Gabrielle-Cluzel-Boulevard-Voltaire-CNews-et-LCI?var_mode=calcul
Qui, dans l’espace médiatique, pourrait être à la fois spécialiste du Conseil constitutionnel, des nationalistes corses, de la justice japonaise, des radars vandalisés, du « Grand débat », de l’écriture inclusive, de l’ISF, de la réforme des lycées, de Viktor Orbán, des élections municipales parisiennes, des gilets jaunes, du harcèlement en ligne, de la mortalité routière, de Benalla, des débats européens, du hijab de Décathlon, de la France rurale, de Juppé, de l’antisémitisme, des fonctionnaires et de la politique italienne ? Réponse : à peu près tous les éditorialistes [1]. Et ça tombe plutôt bien, puisque c’est en tant que telle que Gabrielle Cluzel, rédactrice en chef de « Boulevard Voltaire », est très régulièrement invitée sur CNews et LCI depuis le 1er février. Trois émissions en particulier, « L’heure de Bachelot » (LCI), « Les Voix de l’info » et « Punchline » (CNews) contribuent ainsi à la légitimation et à la promotion médiatique d’un nouveau visage de l’éditocratie, tout droit issu des milieux d’extrême-droite sur internet – de la « fachosphère ».
Le jour où je suis allé me faire arracher les dents chez Viktor Orbán
▻https://la-bas.org/5517
C’est fou tout ce qu’on fait pour les pauvres ! Il y avait les vols low cost, les magasins hard discount et les obsèques à bas prix. Il y a maintenant la santé pour les faibles revenus. Si, comme la majorité des Français, tu n’as pas les moyens de t’offrir un sourire de vedette américaine chez ton dentiste, pas de souci, le marché européen libre et non faussé t’offre l’opportunité d’aller te faire refaire le bridge ou poser un implant dentaire ailleurs. Les sans-dents aussi peuvent profiter de la mondialisation heureuse ! Notre reporter Mathieu Colloghan est allé vérifier ce miracle européen en allant se faire arracher toutes les dents en Hongrie.Continuer la (...)
Lebanon looks to hardline eastern Europe approach for Syrian refugees
Lebanon said on Wednesday it wanted to follow the example of eastern EU states that have largely rejected refugees as a way of resolving its own refugee crisis.
Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil sympathized with the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia’s refusal to accept refugee distribution quotas proposed by the EU after the 2015-16 migrant crisis, when more than a million people streamed into Europe, mostly from Syria.
Populist eastern EU leaders including Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Poland’s powerbroker Jaroslaw Kaczynski and Czech President Milos Zeman, among others, blasted German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s “open door” policy on accepting migrants during that period.
These countries “were acting in their national interest and decided that the redistribution of refugees among European countries is not in their national interest, although they faced EU sanctions for that,” Bassil told reporters in Prague.
“I would like this attitude to be an inspiration for Lebanon, because every state must make national interests its top priority and at this moment Lebanon’s key national interest is the return of Syrian refugees to their homeland,” he added.
Lebanon says it is hosting 1.5 million Syrians — around a quarter of its own population. Less than one million of them are registered with UN refugee agency the UNHCR.
Most of the Syrian refugees in Lebanon live in insecurity and depend on international aid.
The International Monetary Fund has said their presence has led to increased unemployment and a rise in poverty due to greater competition for jobs.
The influx has also put strain on Lebanese water and electrical infrastructure.
Lebanese government officials and politicians have ramped up calls for Syrians to return home, but the United Nations has consistently warned that conditions in the war-ravaged country are not suitable for such returns.
“I would like Prague or Beirut to host a meeting, an initiative of countries seeking to plan and ensure the return of Syrian refugees to their country,” said Bassil.
“This would be immensely useful for both Lebanon and Syria and in general it would be the best solution to the human, humanitarian and political crisis we have right now and which could get worse in the future,” he said.
Lebanon denies forcing Syrian refugees back home
At least sixteen deportees say they were pressured into signing forms saying they voluntarily agreed to return home.
Nicolas Sarkozy et Éric Zemmour à Budapest aux côtés de Viktor Orbán
▻https://courrierdeuropecentrale.fr/sarkozy-et-zemmour-a-budapest-aux-cotes-orban
Anti-semitism vigilantes are feeding the far-right
▻https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2019-02-16/anti-semitism-vigilantes-are-feeding-the-far-right
This degrading of political language to the point of absurdity isn’t accidental. While those claiming to worry about anti-semitism are busy defaming every leftwing argument made against the current neoliberal order, real anti-semitism – the rightwing kind that actually targets and sometimes kills Jews – mostly gets a free pass.
Real Jew-haters and Nazi sympathisers get the space to tell us how much they love Israel. Some of them, such as Hungary’s leader, Viktor Orban, can even rely on a warm handshake from Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
If the left try to point out what is going on, or suggest that the charge of anti-semitism is being “weaponised” to silence us, we are accused of promoting a conspiracy theory and one that – yes – has echoes of “anti-semitic tropes”.
The message of the anti-semitism witch-hunters to the left is simple: Shut up or be smeared over and over again.
#extrême-droite #sioniste #Israel #antisémitisme #intimidation
The Knesset candidate who says Zionism encourages anti-Semitism and calls Netanyahu ’arch-murderer’ - Israel Election 2019 - Haaretz.com
▻https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/.premium.MAGAZINE-knesset-candidate-netanyahu-is-an-arch-murderer-zionism-e
Few Israelis have heard of Dr. Ofer Cassif, the Jewish representative on the far-leftist Hadash party’s Knesset slate. On April 9, that will change
By Ravit Hecht Feb 16, 2019
Ofer Cassif is fire and brimstone. Not even the flu he’s suffering from today can contain his bursting energy. His words are blazing, and he bounds through his modest apartment, searching frenetically for books by Karl Marx and Primo Levi in order to find quotations to back up his ideas. Only occasional sips from a cup of maté bring his impassioned delivery to a momentary halt. The South American drink is meant to help fight his illness, he explains.
Cassif is third on the slate of Knesset candidates in Hadash (the Hebrew acronym for the Democratic Front for Peace and Equality), the successor to Israel’s Communist Party. He holds the party’s “Jewish slot,” replacing MK Dov Khenin. Cassif is likely to draw fire from opponents and be a conspicuous figure in the next Knesset, following the April 9 election.
Indeed, the assault on him began as soon as he was selected by the party’s convention. The media pursued him; a columnist in the mass-circulation Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, Ben-Dror Yemini, called for him to be disqualified from running for the Knesset. It would be naive to say that this was unexpected. Cassif, who was one of the first Israeli soldiers to refuse to serve in the territories, in 1987, gained fame thanks to a number of provocative statements. The best known is his branding of Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked as “neo-Nazi scum.” On another occasion, he characterized Jews who visit the Temple Mount as “cancer with metastases that have to be eradicated.”
On his alternate Facebook page, launched after repeated blockages of his original account by a blitz of posts from right-wing activists, he asserted that Culture Minister Miri Regev is “repulsive gutter contamination,” that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is an “arch-murderer” and that the new Israel Defense Forces chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi, is a “war criminal.”
Do you regret making those remarks?
Cassif: “‘Regret’ is a word of emotion. Those statements were made against a background of particular events: the fence in Gaza, horrible legislation, and the wild antics of Im Tirtzu [an ultranationalist organization] on campus. That’s what I had to say at the time. I didn’t count on being in the Knesset. That wasn’t part of my plan. But it’s clear to me that as a public personality, I would not have made those comments.”
Is Netanyahu an arch-murderer?
“Yes. I wrote it in the specific context of a particular day in the Gaza Strip. A massacre of innocent people was perpetrated there, and no one’s going to persuade me that those people were endangering anyone. It’s a concentration camp. Not a ‘concentration camp’ in the sense of Bergen-Belsen; I am absolutely not comparing the Holocaust to what’s happening.”
You term what Israel is doing to the Palestinians “genocide.”
“I call it ‘creeping genocide.’ Genocide is not only a matter of taking people to gas chambers. When Yeshayahu Leibowitz used the term ‘Judeo-Nazis,’ people asked him, ‘How can you say that? Are we about to build gas chambers?’ To that, he had two things to say. First, if the whole difference between us and the Nazis boils down to the fact that we’re not building gas chambers, we’re already in trouble. And second, maybe we won’t use gas chambers, but the mentality that exists today in Israel – and he said this 40 years ago – would allow it. I’m afraid that today, after four years of such an extreme government, it possesses even greater legitimacy.
“But you know what, put aside ‘genocide’ – ethnic cleansing is taking place there. And that ethnic cleansing is also being carried out by means of killing, although mainly by way of humiliation and of making life intolerable. The trampling of human dignity. It reminds me of Primo Levi’s ‘If This Is a Man.’”
You say you’re not comparing, but you repeatedly come back to Holocaust references. On Facebook, you also uploaded the scene from “Schindler’s List” in which the SS commander Amon Goeth picks off Jews with his rifle from the balcony of his quarters in the camp. You compared that to what was taking place along the border fence in the Gaza Strip.
“Today, I would find different comparisons. In the past I wrote an article titled, ‘On Holocaust and on Other Crimes.’ It’s online [in Hebrew]. I wrote there that anyone who compares Israel to the Holocaust is cheapening the Holocaust. My comparison between here and what happened in the early 1930s [in Germany] is a very different matter.”
Clarity vs. crudity
Given Cassif’s style, not everyone in Hadash was happy with his election, particularly when it comes to the Jewish members of the predominantly Arab party. Dov Khenin, for example, declined to be interviewed and say what he thinks of his parliamentary successor. According to a veteran party figure, “From the conversations I had, it turns out that almost none of the Jewish delegates – who make up about 100 of the party’s 940 delegates – supported his candidacy.
“He is perceived, and rightly so,” the party veteran continues, “as someone who closes doors to Hadash activity within Israeli society. Each of the other Jewish candidates presented a record of action and of struggles they spearheaded. What does he do? Curses right-wing politicians on Facebook. Why did the party leadership throw the full force of its weight behind him? In a continuation of the [trend exemplified by] its becoming part of the Joint List, Ofer’s election reflects insularity and an ongoing retreat from the historical goal of implementing change in Israeli society.”
At the same time, as his selection by a 60 percent majority shows, many in the party believe that it’s time to change course. “Israeli society is moving rightward, and what’s perceived as Dov’s [Khenin] more gentle style didn’t generate any great breakthrough on the Jewish street,” a senior source in Hadash notes.
“It’s not a question of the tension between extremism and moderation, but of how to signpost an alternative that will develop over time. Clarity, which is sometimes called crudity, never interfered with cooperation between Arabs and Jews. On the contrary. Ofer says things that we all agreed with but didn’t so much say, and of course that’s going to rile the right wing. And a good thing, too.”
Hadash chairman MK Ayman Odeh also says he’s pleased with the choice, though sources in the party claim that Odeh is apprehensive about Cassif’s style and that he actually supported a different candidate. “Dov went for the widest possible alliances in order to wield influence,” says Odeh. “Ofer will go for very sharp positions at the expense of the breadth of the alliance. But his sharp statements could have a large impact.”
Khenin was deeply esteemed by everyone. When he ran for mayor of Tel Aviv in 2008, some 35 percent of the electorate voted for him, because he was able to touch people who weren’t only from his political milieu.
Odeh: “No one has a higher regard for Dov than I do. But just to remind you, we are not a regular opposition, we are beyond the pale. And there are all kinds of styles. Influence can be wielded through comments that are vexatious the first time but which people get used to the second time. When an Arab speaks about the Nakba and about the massacre in Kafr Kassem [an Israeli Arab village, in 1956], it will be taken in a particular way, but when uttered by a Jew it takes on special importance.”
He will be the cause of many attacks on the party.
“Ahlan wa sahlan – welcome.”
Cassif will be the first to tell you that, with all due respect for the approach pursued by Khenin and by his predecessor in the Jewish slot, Tamar Gozansky, he will be something completely different. “I totally admire what Tamar and Dov did – nothing less than that,” he says, while adding, “But my agenda will be different. The three immediate dangers to Israeli society are the occupation, racism and the diminishment of the democratic space to the point of liquidation. That’s the agenda that has to be the hub of the struggle, as long as Israel rules over millions of people who have no rights, enters [people’s houses] in the middle of the night, arrests minors on a daily basis and shoots people in the back.
"Israel commits murder on a daily basis. When you murder one Palestinian, you’re called Elor Azaria [the IDF soldier convicted and jailed for killing an incapacitated Palestinian assailant]; when you murder and oppress thousands of Palestinians, you’re called the State of Israel.”
So you plan to be the provocateur in the next Knesset?
“It’s not my intention to be a provocateur, to stand there and scream and revile people. Even on Facebook I was compelled to stop that. But I definitely intend to challenge the dialogue in terms of the content, and mainly with a type of sarcasm.”
’Bags of blood’
Cassif, 54, who holds a doctorate in political philosophy from the London School of Economics, teaches political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Sapir Academic College in Sderot and at the Academic College of Tel Aviv-Yaffo. He lives in Rehovot, is married and is the father of a 19-year-old son. He’s been active in Hadash for three decades and has held a number of posts in the party.
As a lecturer, he stands out for his boldness and fierce rhetoric, which draws students of all stripes. He even hangs out with some of his Haredi students, one of whom wrote a post on the eve of the Hadash primary urging the delegates to choose him. After his election, a student from a settlement in the territories wrote to him, “You are a determined and industrious person, and for that I hold you in high regard. Hoping we will meet on the field of action and growth for the success of Israel as a Jewish, democratic state (I felt obliged to add a small touch of irony in conclusion).”
Cassif grew up in a home that supported Mapai, forerunner of Labor, in Rishon Letzion. He was an only child; his father was an accountant, his mother held a variety of jobs. He was a news hound from an early age, and at 12 ran for the student council in school. He veered sharply to the left in his teens, becoming a keen follower of Marx and socialism.
Following military service in the IDF’s Nahal brigade and a period in the airborne Nahal, Cassif entered the Hebrew University. There his political career moved one step forward, and there he also forsook the Zionist left permanently. His first position was as a parliamentary aide to the secretary general of the Communist Party, Meir Wilner.
“At first I was closer to Mapam [the United Workers Party, which was Zionist], and then I refused to serve in the territories. I was the first refusenik in the first intifada to be jailed. I didn’t get support from Mapam, I got support from the people of Hadash, and I drew close to them. I was later jailed three more times for refusing to serve in the territories.”
His rivals in the student organizations at the Hebrew University remember him as the epitome of the extreme left.
“Even in the Arab-Jewish student association, Cassif was considered off-the-wall,” says Motti Ohana, who was chairman of Likud’s student association and active in the Student Union at the end of the 1980s and early 1990s. “One time I got into a brawl with him. It was during the first intifada, when he brought two bags of blood, emptied them out in the university’s corridors and declared, ‘There is no difference between Jewish and Arab blood,’ likening Israeli soldiers to terrorists. The custom on campus was that we would quarrel, left-right, Arabs-Jews, and after that we would sit together, have a coffee and talk. But not Cassif.”
According to Ohana, today a member of the Likud central committee, the right-wing activists knew that, “You could count on Ofer to fall into every trap. There was one event at the Hebrew University that was a kind of political Hyde Park. The right wanted to boot the left out of there, so we hung up the flag. It was obvious that Ofer would react, and in fact he tore the flag, and in the wake of the ruckus that developed, political activity was stopped for good.”
Replacing the anthem
Cassif voices clearly and cogently positions that challenge the public discourse in Israel, and does so with ardor and charisma. Four candidates vied for Hadash’s Jewish slot, and they all delivered speeches at the convention. The three candidates who lost to him – Efraim Davidi, Yaela Raanan and the head of the party’s Tel Aviv branch, Noa Levy – described their activity and their guiding principles. When they spoke, there was the regular buzz of an audience that’s waiting for lunch. But when Cassif took the stage, the effect was magnetic.
“Peace will not be established without a correction of the crimes of the Nakba and [recognition of] the right of return,” he shouted, and the crowd cheered him. As one senior party figure put it, “Efraim talked about workers’ rights, Yaela about the Negev, Noa about activity in Tel Aviv – and Ofer was Ofer.”
What do you mean by “right of return”?
Cassif: “The first thing is the actual recognition of the Nakba and of the wrong done by Israel. Compare it to the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in South Africa, if you like, or with the commissions in Chile after Pinochet. Israel must recognize the wrong it committed. Now, recognition of the wrong also includes recognition of the right of return. The question is how it’s implemented. It has to be done by agreement. I can’t say that tomorrow Tel Aviv University has to be dismantled and that Sheikh Munis [the Arab village on whose ruins the university stands] has to be rebuilt there. The possibility can be examined of giving compensation in place of return, for example.”
But what is the just solution, in your opinion?
“For the Palestinian refugees to return to their homeland.”
That means there will be Jews who will have to leave their home.
“In some places, unequivocally, yes. People will have to be told: ‘You must evacuate your places.’ The classic example is Ikrit and Biram [Christian-Arab villages in Galilee whose residents were promised – untruly – by the Israeli authorities in 1948 that they would be able to return, and whose lands were turned over to Jewish communities]. But there are places where there is certainly greater difficulty. You don’t right one wrong with another.”
What about the public space in Israel? What should it look like?
“The public space has to change, to belong to all the state’s residents. I dispute the conception of ‘Jewish publicness.’”
How should that be realized?
“For example, by changing the national symbols, changing the national anthem. [Former Hadash MK] Mohammed Barakeh once suggested ‘I Believe’ [‘Sahki, Sahki’] by [Shaul] Tchernichovsky – a poem that is not exactly an expression of Palestinian nationalism. He chose it because of the line, ‘For in mankind I’ll believe.’ What does it mean to believe in mankind? It’s not a Jew, or a Palestinian, or a Frenchman, or I don’t know what.”
What’s the difference between you and the [Arab] Balad party? Both parties overall want two states – a state “of all its citizens” and a Palestinian state.
“In the big picture, yes. But Balad puts identity first on the agenda. We are not nationalists. We do not espouse nationalism as a supreme value. For us, self-determination is a means. We are engaged in class politics. By the way, Balad [the National Democratic Assembly] and Ta’al [MK Ahmad Tibi’s Arab Movement for Renewal] took the idea of a state of all its citizens from us, from Hadash. We’ve been talking about it for ages.”
If you were a Palestinian, what would you do today?
“In Israel, what my Palestinian friends are doing, and I with them – [wage] a parliamentary and extra-parliamentary struggle.”
And what about the Palestinians in the territories?
“We have always been against harming innocent civilians. Always. In all our demonstrations, one of our leading slogans was: ‘In Gaza and in Sderot, children want to live.’ With all my criticism of the settlers, to enter a house and slaughter children, as in the case of the Fogel family [who were murdered in their beds in the settlement of Itamar in 2011], is intolerable. You have to be a human being and reject that.”
And attacks on soldiers?
“An attack on soldiers is not terrorism. Even Netanyahu, in his book about terrorism, explicitly categorizes attacks on soldiers or on the security forces as guerrilla warfare. It’s perfectly legitimate, according to every moral criterion – and, by the way, in international law. At the same time, I am not saying it’s something wonderful, joyful or desirable. The party’s Haifa office is on Ben-Gurion Street, and suddenly, after years, I noticed a memorial plaque there for a fighter in Lehi [pre-state underground militia, also known as the Stern Gang] who assassinated a British officer. Wherever there has been a struggle for liberation from oppression, there are national heroes, who in 90 percent of the cases carried out some operations that were unlawful. Nelson Mandela is today considered a hero, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, but according to the conventional definition, he was a terrorist. Most of the victims of the ANC [African National Congress] were civilians.”
In other words, today’s Hamas commanders who are carrying out attacks on soldiers will be heroes of the future Palestinian state?
“Of course.”
Anti-Zionist identity
Cassif terms himself an explicit anti-Zionist. “There are three reasons for that,” he says. “To begin with, Zionism is a colonialist movement, and as a socialist, I am against colonialism. Second, as far as I am concerned, Zionism is racist in ideology and in practice. I am not referring to the definition of race theory – even though there are also some who impute that to the Zionist movement – but to what I call Jewish supremacy. No socialist can accept that. My supreme value is equality, and I can’t abide any supremacy – Jewish or Arab. The third thing is that Zionism, like other ethno-nationalistic movements, splits the working class and all weakened groups. Instead of uniting them in a struggle for social justice, for equality, for democracy, it divides the exploited classes and the enfeebled groups, and by that means strengthens the rule of capital.”
He continues, “Zionism also sustains anti-Semitism. I don’t say it does so deliberately – even though I have no doubt that there are some who do it deliberately, like Netanyahu, who is connected to people like the prime minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, and the leader of the far right in Austria, Hans Christian Strache.”
Did Mapai-style Zionism also encourage anti-Semitism?
“The phenomenon was very striking in Mapai. Think about it for a minute, not only historically, but logically. If the goal of political and practical Zionism is really the establishment of a Jewish state containing a Jewish majority, and for Diaspora Jewry to settle there, nothing serves them better than anti-Semitism.”
What in their actions encouraged anti-Semitism?
“The very appeal to Jews throughout the world – the very fact of treating them as belonging to the same nation, when they were living among other nations. The whole old ‘dual loyalty’ story – Zionism actually encouraged that. Therefore, I maintain that anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism are not the same thing, but are precisely opposites. That doesn’t mean, of course, that there are no anti-Zionists who are also anti-Semites. Most of the BDS people are of course anti-Zionists, but they are in no way anti-Semites. But there are anti-Semites there, too.”
Do you support BDS?
“It’s too complex a subject for a yes or no answer; there are aspects I don’t support.”
Do you think that the Jews deserve a national home in the Land of Israel?
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘national home.’ It’s very amorphous. We in Hadash say explicitly that Israel has a right to exist as a sovereign state. Our struggle is not against the state’s existence, but over its character.”
But that state is the product of the actions of the Zionist movement, which you say has been colonialist and criminal from day one.
“That’s true, but the circumstances have changed. That’s the reason that the majority of the members of the Communist Party accepted the [1947] partition agreement at the time. They recognized that the circumstances had changed. I think that one of the traits that sets communist thought apart, and makes it more apt, is the understanding and the attempt to strike the proper balance between what should be, and reality. So it’s true that Zionism started as colonialism, but what do you do with the people who were already born here? What do you tell them? Because your grandparents committed a crime, you have to leave? The question is how you transform the situation that’s been created into one that’s just, democratic and equal.”
So, a person who survived a death camp and came here is a criminal?
“The individual person, of course not. I’m in favor of taking in refugees in distress, no matter who or what they are. I am against Zionism’s cynical use of Jews in distress, including the refugees from the Holocaust. I have a problem with the fact that the natives whose homeland this is cannot return, while people for whom it’s not their homeland, can, because they supposedly have some sort of blood tie and an ‘imaginary friend’ promised them the land.”
I understand that you are in favor of the annulment of the Law of Return?
“Yes. Definitely.”
But you are in favor of the Palestinian right of return.
“There’s no comparison. There’s no symmetry here at all. Jerry Seinfeld was by chance born to a Jewish family. What’s his connection to this place? Why should he have preference over a refugee from Sabra or Chatila, or Edward Said, who did well in the United States? They are the true refugees. This is their homeland. Not Seinfeld’s.”
Are you critical of the Arabs, too?
“Certainly. One criticism is of their cooperation with imperialism – take the case of today’s Saudi Arabia, Qatar and so on. Another, from the past, relates to the reactionary forces that did not accept that the Jews have a right to live here.”
Hadash refrained from criticizing the Assad regime even as it was massacring civilians in Syria. The party even torpedoed a condemnation of Assad after the chemical attack. Do you identify with that approach?
“Hadash was critical of the Assad regime – father and son – for years, so we can’t be accused in any way of supporting Assad or Hezbollah. We are not Ba’ath, we are not Islamists. We are communists. But as I said earlier, the struggle, unfortunately, is generally not between the ideal and what exists in practice, but many times between two evils. And then you have to ask yourself which is the lesser evil. The Syrian constellation is extremely complicated. On the one hand, there is the United States, which is intervening, and despite all the pretense of being against ISIS, supported ISIS and made it possible for ISIS to sprout.
"I remind you that ISIS started from the occupation of Iraq. And ideologically and practically, ISIS is definitely a thousand times worse than the Assad regime, which is at base also a secular regime. Our position was and is against the countries that pose the greatest danger to regional peace, which above all are Qatar and Saudi Arabia, and the United States, which supports them. That doesn’t mean that we support Assad.”
Wrong language
Cassif’s economic views are almost as far from the consensus as his political ideas. He lives modestly in an apartment that’s furnished like a young couple’s first home. You won’t find an espresso maker or unnecessary products of convenience in his place. To his credit, it can be said that he extracts the maximum from Elite instant coffee.
What is your utopian vision – to nationalize Israel’s conglomerates, such as Cellcom, the telecommunications company, or Osem, the food manufacturer and distributor?
“The bottom line is yes. How exactly will it be done? That’s an excellent question, which I can’t answer. Perhaps by transferring ownership to the state or to the workers, with democratic tools. And there are other alternatives. But certainly, I would like it if a large part of the resources were not in private hands, as was the case before the big privatizations. It’s true that it won’t be socialism, because, again, there can be no such thing as Zionist socialism, but there won’t be privatization like we have today. What is the result of capitalism in Israel? The collapse of the health system, the absence of a social-welfare system, a high cost of living and of housing, the elderly and the disabled in a terrible situation.”
Does any private sector have the right to exist?
“Look, the question is what you mean by ‘private sector.’ If we’re talking about huge concerns that the owners of capital control completely through their wealth, then no.”
What growth was there in the communist countries? How can anyone support communism, in light of the grim experience wherever it was tried?
“It’s true, we know that in the absolute majority of societies where an attempt was made to implement socialism, there was no growth or prosperity, and we need to ask ourselves why, and how to avoid that. When I talk about communism, I’m not talking about Stalin and all the crimes that were committed in the name of the communist idea. Communism is not North Korea and it is not Pol Pot in Cambodia. Heaven forbid.”
And what about Venezuela?
“Venezuela is not communism. In fact, they didn’t go far enough in the direction of socialism.”
Chavez was not enough of a socialist?
“Chavez, but in particular Maduro. The Communist Party is critical of the regime. They support it because the main enemy is truly American imperialism and its handmaidens. Let’s look at what the U.S. did over the years. At how many times it invaded and employed bullying, fascist forces. Not only in Latin America, its backyard, but everywhere.”
Venezuela is falling apart, people there don’t have anything to eat, there’s no medicine, everyone who can flees – and it’s the fault of the United States?
“You can’t deny that the regime has made mistakes. It’s not ideal. But basically, it is the result of American imperialism and its lackeys. After all, the masses voted for Chavez and for Maduro not because things were good for them. But because American corporations stole the country’s resources and filled their own pockets. I wouldn’t make Chavez into an icon, but he did some excellent things.”
Then how do you generate individual wealth within the method you’re proposing? I understand that I am now talking to you capitalistically, but the reality is that people see the accumulation of assets as an expression of progress in life.
“Your question is indeed framed in capitalist language, which simply departs from what I believe in. Because you are actually asking me how the distribution of resources is supposed to occur within the capitalist framework. And I say no, I am not talking about resource distribution within a capitalist framework.”
Gantz vs. Netanyahu
Cassif was chosen as the polls showed Meretz and Labor, the representatives of the Zionist left, barely scraping through into the next Knesset and in fact facing a serious possibility of electoral extinction. The critique of both parties from the radical left is sometimes more acerbic than from the right.
Would you like to see the Labor Party disappear?
“No. I think that what’s happening at the moment with Labor and with Meretz is extremely dangerous. I speak about them as collectives, because they contain individuals with whom I see no possibility of engaging in a dialogue. But I think that they absolutely must be in the Knesset.”
Is a left-winger who defines himself as a Zionist your partner in any way?
“Yes. We need partners. We can’t be picky. Certainly we will cooperate with liberals and Zionists on such issues as combating violence against women or the battle to rescue the health system. Maybe even in putting an end to the occupation.”
I’ll put a scenario to you: Benny Gantz does really well in the election and somehow overcomes Netanyahu. Do you support the person who led Operation Protective Edge in Gaza when he was chief of staff?
“Heaven forbid. But we don’t reject people, we reject policy. I remind you that it was [then-defense minister] Yitzhak Rabin who led the most violent tendency in the first intifada, with his ‘Break their bones.’ But when he came to the Oslo Accords, it was Hadash and the Arab parties that gave him, from outside the coalition, an insurmountable bloc. I can’t speak for the party, but if there is ever a government whose policy is one that we agree with – eliminating the occupation, combating racism, abolishing the nation-state law – I believe we will give our support in one way or another.”
And if Gantz doesn’t declare his intention to eliminate the occupation, he isn’t preferable to Netanyahu in any case?
“If so, why should we recommend him [to the president to form the next government]? After the clips he posted boasting about how many people he killed and how he hurled Gaza back into the Stone Age, I’m far from certain that he’s better.”
traduction d’un extrait [ d’actualité ]
Le candidat à la Knesset dit que le sionisme encourage l’antisémitisme et qualifie Netanyahu de « meurtrier »
Peu d’Israéliens ont entendu parler de M. Ofer Cassif, représentant juif de la liste de la Knesset du parti d’extrême gauche Hadash. Le 9 avril, cela changera.
Par Ravit Hecht 16 février 2019 – Haaretz
(…) Identité antisioniste
Cassif se dit un antisioniste explicite. « Il y a trois raisons à cela », dit-il. « Pour commencer, le sionisme est un mouvement colonialiste et, en tant que socialiste, je suis contre le colonialisme. Deuxièmement, en ce qui me concerne, le sionisme est raciste d’idéologie et de pratique. Je ne fais pas référence à la définition de la théorie de la race - même si certains l’imputent également au mouvement sioniste - mais à ce que j’appelle la suprématie juive. Aucun socialiste ne peut accepter cela. Ma valeur suprême est l’égalité et je ne peux supporter aucune suprématie - juive ou arabe. La troisième chose est que le sionisme, comme d’autres mouvements ethno-nationalistes, divise la classe ouvrière et tous les groupes sont affaiblis. Au lieu de les unir dans une lutte pour la justice sociale, l’égalité, la démocratie, il divise les classes exploitées et affaiblit les groupes, renforçant ainsi le pouvoir du capital. "
Il poursuit : « Le sionisme soutient également l’antisémitisme. Je ne dis pas qu’il le fait délibérément - même si je ne doute pas qu’il y en a qui le font délibérément, comme Netanyahu, qui est connecté à des gens comme le Premier ministre de la Hongrie, Viktor Orban, et le chef de l’extrême droite. en Autriche, Hans Christian Strache. ”
Le sionisme type-Mapaï a-t-il également encouragé l’antisémitisme ?
« Le phénomène était très frappant au Mapai. Pensez-y une minute, non seulement historiquement, mais logiquement. Si l’objectif du sionisme politique et pratique est en réalité de créer un État juif contenant une majorité juive et de permettre à la communauté juive de la diaspora de s’y installer, rien ne leur sert mieux que l’antisémitisme. "
Qu’est-ce qui, dans leurs actions, a encouragé l’antisémitisme ?
« L’appel même aux Juifs du monde entier - le fait même de les traiter comme appartenant à la même nation, alors qu’ils vivaient parmi d’autres nations. Toute la vieille histoire de « double loyauté » - le sionisme a en fait encouragé cela. Par conséquent, j’affirme que l’antisémitisme et l’antisionisme ne sont pas la même chose, mais sont précisément des contraires. Bien entendu, cela ne signifie pas qu’il n’y ait pas d’antisionistes qui soient aussi antisémites. La plupart des membres du BDS sont bien sûr antisionistes, mais ils ne sont en aucun cas antisémites. Mais il y a aussi des antisémites.
Ilhan Omar has sparked panic in AIPAC
Rep. Ilhan Omar has apologized for her inexcusably insensitive tweet. But the core issue behind her comment - whether the U.S. should continue to reflexively embrace the views of the Israeli government - won’t go away
David Rothkopf
Feb 13, 2019 2:37 PM
▻https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-ilhan-omar-has-sparked-panic-in-aipac-1.6935041
U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota has apologized for her offensive tweet that suggested Israeli influence in the U.S. Congress was “all about the Benjamins.” But that does not mean that the core issue underlying the controversy surrounding the tweet, Representative Ilhan and new voices critical of Israel in U.S. politics, is likely to fade away.
I’m not going to defend Omar.Her own apology was unequivocal and the tweet itself was, at best, inexcusably insensitive. But it is vitally important we distinguish between criticism of Israel and anti-Semitism. And, as importantly, we also must recognize the massive response against Rep. Omar for what it is - a spasm of fear about our changing times.
>> Aaron David Miller: No, Israel and America Aren’t Breaking Up. Don’t Believe the Hype
The entire infrastructure that has been built over the years to advance the interests of Israel in the U.S. is quaking in its boots - not because of the badly developed arguments of a rookie Congresswoman - but because of the coming generational change in U.S. views of Israel and because support for the Israeli government has been damaged among Democrats by the choice of the Netanyahu administration to so closely tie itself to Donald Trump and the Republican right wing in America.
Supporters of US President Donald Trump cheer during a rally in El Paso, Texas on February 11, 2019
Supporters of US President Donald Trump cheer during a rally in El Paso, Texas on February 11, 2019.AFP
Rep. Omar damaged her own credibility by embracing an old anti-Semitic trope. There is no place for that in American politics. But even as she should be condemned, her views of Israel need to be heard. There is no reason all American views on a foreign government should be in lockstep.
Quite the contrary, Americans who seek to protect and advance our interests should no more reflexively embrace the views of the Israeli government than they do those of a pro-Brexit UK government or an anti-refugee Italian government.
Israel’s defenders would like the relationship to be deemed so important that it must not be criticized. This echoes the position, say, of the Saudis in the wake of the Khashoggi murder. And it is just as indefensible.
A growing number of Americans realize that. Further, a growing number of American Jews feel the positions of the Netanyahu government are contrary to both U.S. interests and the values of Judaism, and thus the rationale for a Jewish state. In other words, they see Netanyahu’s actions as undermining the reasons Israel might have a special claim on their support.
Indeed, no one, in fact, has done more to damage the standing of Israel than a Netanyahu government that has actively waged war on the Palestinian people, denied them their rights, responded disproportionately to threats and refused to acknowledge its own wrong-doing.
Anti-Semites, with their stale and discredited attacks, can never do the kind of damage to the U.S.-Israel relationship that rampant Israeli wrong-doing can (especially when the Israeli government weakens the arguments against anti-Semites by embracing them, as in the case of Victor Orban in Hungary, or hugging those like Donald Trump who promote anti-Semites and anti-Semitic ideas about “globalists” or George Soros.)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban share a light moment during the reception ceremony in front of the Parliament building in Budapest, Hungary, July 18, 2017.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orban in front of the Parliament building in Budapest, Hungary, July 18, 2017Balazs Mohai/AP
None of this is to diminish the real and ever-present threat of anti-Semitism. Which is why, of course, it is essential that we are careful to distinguish between it and legitimate criticism of the government of Israel.
In fact, if we in the U.S. stand for what is best about America and hope for the best for Israel, then we must welcome those who would criticize Israel’s government not as our enemies but as the true defenders of the idea of Israel, and of America’s deep investment in the promise of that country.
With that in mind, we must be careful that we do not allow the justifiable aspects of the critique against Rep. Omar to lead to a reflexive position where we silence active criticism of the Israeli government, or the worst actions of the State of Israel.
Judging from comments in the media about her that pre-dated these statements, and comments about Rep. Rashida Tlaib, and comments about the “left” becoming anti-Israel, in my view we are in the midst of a pre-emptive push to combat the coming rethinking of the U.S.- Israel relationship.
Feb. 5, 2019, photo, Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., left, joined at right by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., listens to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union speech, at the Capitol in Washington
Feb. 5, 2019, photo, Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., left, joined at right by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., listens to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union speech, at the Capitol in Washington.J. Scott Applewhite,AP
It will seize upon the fact that some elements who offer the critique of Israel are in fact anti-Semitic or tap into anti-Semitic rhetoric and traditions, in order to tar with the same brush those who legitimately disapprove of the behavior of the Israeli government.
That would be a mistake. Because it would not only silence a debate we need to and deserve to have, but it would undermine the ability of the U.S. to be a force for positive change in Israeli policies - change that is necessary to the future of Israel and to U.S. interests in that region.
We must combat anti-Semitism. But we should also combat those who have no tolerance for democratic processes, or who would seek a political purity test for politicians based on narrowly-defined, traditionalist, outdated guidelines.
The future of the U.S.- Israel relationship - and the future of Israel, the Palestinian people and peace in the region - depends on our willingness to look past biases of all sorts to the facts on the ground, to the justice that is required and to our interests going forward.
David Rothkopf is a foreign policy expert and author, host of the Deep State Radio podcast and CEO of The Rothkopf Group, LLC a media and advisory firm. His next book, on the national security threat posed by the Trump administration, is due out later this year. Twitter: @djrothkopf
Des milliers d’étudiants étrangers privés d’études en France
Outre une perte d’attractivité des universités françaises, l’augmentation des frais d’inscription pour les étudiants extra-européens risque d’entraîner un effacement du champ de recherches et de formation dédié à la Méditerranée, estiment François Castaing et Pascale Froment, professeurs à l’université Paris-VIII.
L’annonce du gouvernement d’augmenter les frais d’inscription des étudiants étrangers [hors Union européenne] a été affichée en moins de quarante-huit heures sur tout le réseau Campus France. Une diligence rare, souvent constatée lorsqu’il s’agit de sélectionner et d’exclure, socialement et géographiquement…
Différentes voix se sont exprimées à ce sujet, hélas difficilement audibles dans un contexte politique et médiatique fort troublé. Il n’en reste pas moins que la question soulevée par la décision d’un barrage financier à la liberté d’étudier dans les universités françaises ne peut être éludée ; il en va d’un choix de société à long terme.
L’université Paris-VIII Vincennes-Saint-Denis, située en Seine-Saint-Denis (93), accueille actuellement près de 30 % d’étudiants étrangers, soit deux fois plus que la moyenne des universités françaises (14 %). Cette attractivité de Paris-VIII n’est pas sans rapport avec les choix assumés d’être une « université-monde », même si d’autres logiques interviennent qui ont aussi à voir avec son « territoire » d’insertion dans l’un des départements français les plus pauvres et stigmatisés. Cette attractivité est clairement menacée par la hausse des frais d’inscription compte tenu du profil de nos étudiants, avec à la clé un effacement probable du champ de recherche et de formation dédié à la Méditerranée.A
Depuis vingt-cinq ans, l’actuel master « Méditerranée, Maghreb, Europe » peut s’enorgueillir d’avoir défendu – contre vents et marées – un espace d’enseignement et de recherche axé sur la Méditerranée, occidentale au départ puis élargie à l’ensemble du bassin. Une Méditerranée appréhendée non pas dans l’opposition de deux rives mais bien comme un espace de circulations, d’échanges, de transformations, un espace pluriel, complexe, commun, pour ne pas dire partagé.
Métissage intellectuel et social
Contre tout enfermement dans des catégories et assignations culturalistes, le pari d’une approche transdisciplinaire a largement contribué à un décloisonnement de la pensée, indispensable pour l’intelligibilité de cet espace, et à la rencontre d’étudiants issus d’horizons géographiques, linguistiques, disciplinaires multiples.
Venus de France, d’Espagne, d’Italie, de Grèce, mais aussi de Turquie et de Mauritanie en passant par le Liban et Israël et, bien sûr, des pays du Maghreb, les étudiants de ce master ont été formés scientifiquement sur la base d’un métissage intellectuel et social ouvrant à une compréhension partagée de la richesse et de la complexité de l’espace méditerranéen.A
Par leurs diplômes, puis leurs projets, ils se sont pour beaucoup insérés professionnellement ici mais aussi ailleurs… Ce faisant, ils sont devenus de subtils passeurs de ces rencontres et de ces proximités culturelles. La connaissance fine des nombreux enjeux que cristallise la Méditerranée dans ses géométries variables ne peut se concevoir sans la participation des étudiants des rives sud et est.
Nous connaissons bien ces étudiants qui sont les nôtres, leur situation universitaire, certes, mais aussi leurs conditions de vie, leurs « galères », tant en amont de leur arrivée (la course d’obstacles et les exigences croissantes pour espérer obtenir un visa) qu’au quotidien de leur vie d’étudiant, sur les plans économiques (travailler pour financer les études), social (des conditions d’hébergement difficiles), de la santé ou encore familial.
Pour l’écrasante majorité, ils ne pourront passer le cap des frais d’inscription. Ce sont assurément des milliers de jeunes interdits d’études. Et c’est aussi, pour la France, se priver de la construction de savoirs croisés, co-construits, indispensables sur cet espace et à partir de cet espace.
Bien au-delà de notre master et de l’université Paris-VIII, il y a là le risque imminent d’une désertification progressive du champ des études méditerranéennes et d’une méconnaissance pour la société française de cet espace, des tensions et des contradictions mais aussi des richesses et des potentiels qui le traversent, avec tous les dangers que cela représente. Une menace régulièrement rappelée par nombre d’universitaires, comme en témoignait déjà Misère de l’historiographie du « Maghreb » post-colonial (1962-2012), de l’historien Pierre Vermeren (Publications de la Sorbonne, 2012).Lire aussi Comment la France a délaissé les études sur le Maghreb
Ce cynique « Bienvenue en France » [du nom de la stratégie d’attractivité pour les étudiants internationaux, présentée par Edouard Philippe en novembre 2018] – sic – combine alors tristement une vision à courte vue, très libérale en son essence, dans la lignée de l’immigration choisie de 2006, et un message pour le moins inquiétant de fermeture à l’égard d’une partie de cette Méditerranée à laquelle nous appartenons. Visions qui se rapprochent dangereusement de celles des Viktor Orban ou Matteo Salvini par une volonté, si peu masquée, de tarir le flux d’étudiants en provenance de cette région, très largement francophone, à l’instar des autres flux migratoires transitant par la Méditerranée.
Ce sera, nous l’espérons, tout à l’honneur des universités françaises, et de Paris-VIII, que d’affirmer une résistance à cet « air du temps » délétère – qui s’installe dans la durée – en défendant une politique d’ouverture aux étudiants de Méditerranée et d’Afrique et, au-delà, gage d’une connaissance désoccidentalisée, mieux partagée des « fluidités » méditerranéennes et, plus largement, d’une reconnaissance de l’altérité.
▻https://mondafrique.com/des-milliers-detudiants-etrangers-prives-detudes
#frais_d'inscription #université #France
►https://www.univ-lyon2.fr/universite/presse-medias/cp-l-universite-lumiere-lyon-2-s-engage-a-exonerer-les-etudiant-es-etrang
(Je crois que Clermont-Freand a pris la même décision.)
Le Gouvernement a annoncé à l’automne dernier l’augmentation des droits d’inscription des étudiant.es extracommunautaires de 170€ à 2 770 € en licence et, respectivement, de 243€ et 380€ à 3 770 € en master et en doctorat.
La Commission recherche, le Comité technique, le Conseil académique et le Conseil d’administration de l’Université Lumière Lyon 2 se sont clairement prononcés en décembre dernier contre l’augmentation des droits d’inscription pour les étudiant.es étranger.es extra-communautaires.
Cette mesure, inscrite dans une stratégie intitulée paradoxalement « Bienvenue en France », remet en cause le principe d’une université française ouverte à tou.tes ainsi que la stratégie internationale de la France en matière d’accueil des étudiant.es étranger.es, de développement de la Francophonie et d’attractivité de la recherche française.
Si l’amélioration de l’accueil des étudiant.es étranger.es est évidemment une nécessité, l’augmentation des droits d’inscription ne paraît ni pertinente, ni juste car elle concerne des étudiant.es parmi les plus fragiles et bat en brèche le principe d’égalité de traitement entre usager.es du service public de l’enseignement supérieur et de la recherche.
Le triplement annoncé des bourses et des exonérations ne permettra pas de couvrir tous les besoins. De nombreux/ses étudiant.es devront renoncer à leurs projets de formation en France en raison du niveau des frais d’inscription. Cette éviction concernera en premier lieu les régions du monde les plus pauvres et, plus généralement, les étudiant.es les moins fortuné.es.
Afin de permettre au plus grand nombre de poursuivre leurs études en France, l’Université Lumière Lyon 2 exonérera à la rentrée universitaire 2019/2020 l’ensemble des étudiant.es étranger.es de ces frais complémentaires et leur appliquera uniquement les droits en vigueur pour l’ensemble des étudiant.es français.es.
@gonzo : je confirme pour Clermont :
▻https://seenthis.net/messages/739892#message753347
Yad Vashem teaches the Holocaust like totalitarian countries teach history
Yad Vashem is now paying the price of the many years in which it nurtured a one-dimensional, simplistic message that there’s only one way to explain the Holocaust
Daniel Blatman SendSend me email alerts
Dec 18, 2018
▻https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/.premium-what-happened-to-yad-vashem-1.6759139
The Warsaw Ghetto Museum, which the Polish government decided to establish eight months ago, is now at the center of a debate.
This debate has political elements, but it’s mainly a clash between two views of what should be stressed when researching and remembering the Holocaust, and above all of what educational messages should be sent – what Israelis like to call “the lessons of the Holocaust.”
Haaretz’s Ofer Aderet, in his article about the Warsaw museum, mainly discussed the political perspective, giving considerable space to the criticisms by Prof. Hava Dreifuss, a Yad Vashem historian. Dreifuss assailed the Warsaw museum and those who decided, despite all the problems, to take on a project whose importance is hard to overstate. This criticism deserves a response.
First, the political context. There’s no more appropriate response to Dreifuss’ criticism than the old saying that people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
>> Budapest Holocaust museum: Orban’s grand gesture or a whitewashing of Hungarian history?
Dreifuss works for an institution that in recent years has functioned as a hard-working laundromat, striving to bleach out the sins of every anti-Semitic, fascist, racist or simply murderously thuggish leader or politician like Hungary’s Viktor Orban, the Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte and Italy’s Matteo Salvini.
My heart breaks when I see my colleagues, honest and faithful researchers of the Holocaust, giving tours of this historic museum, apparently under compulsion, to the evildoers the Israeli government sends to Yad Vashem to receive absolution in the name of Holocaust victims in exchange for adding a pro-Israel vote at international institutions. For some reason, Dreifuss has no criticism about this.
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But for the Polish government (every Polish government, both the current one headed by the nationalist Law and Justice party and the previous one headed by a liberal centrist coalition), which is spending tens of millions of zlotys every year to preserve historical Jewish sites, Jewish graveyards and countless memorials, she has scathing criticism.
Fear and demoralization
A week and a half ago, Matti Friedman published an opinion piece in The New York Times about what’s happening at Yad Vashem, and it made for difficult reading. When you read his conclusions, your hair stands on end. He doesn’t quote a single Yad Vashem employee by name, because no one wanted to be identified. After all, they have to earn a living.
Friedman described a mood of frustration, fear and demoralization among the employees because the current extremist, nationalist government has turned Yad Vashem into a political tool reminiscent of history museums in totalitarian countries.
But the most astonishing thing Friedman reported is that the institution’s chairman, Avner Shalev – who turned the museum into an international remembrance empire, and who for years has viciously fought every attempt to present a different conceptual or research approach than that of Yad Vashem – is reluctant to retire, despite having reached the age of 80.
>> How a Nazi sympathizer helped found one of Sweden’s most powerful parties
The reason for his reluctance is that many people at the institute fear that when he leaves, his place will be taken by someone nominated by the relevant minister, Education Minister Naftali Bennett, who will turn Yad Vashem into a remembrance institute in the spirit of Bennett’s Habayit Hayehudi party. It would be interesting to know what Dreifuss thinks about that.
Yad Vashem is now paying the price of the many years in which it nurtured a one-dimensional, simplistic message that there’s only one way to explain the Holocaust. Today, the institution is apparently willing to place its reputation for Holocaust research, which it has built over many years, at the service of a government that has recruited it to accuse anyone who criticizes Israel of anti-Semitism. So it’s no wonder that its researchers have become partisan explainers of the Holocaust.
It’s one thing when, at dubious conferences with political leaders whose governments include former neo-Nazis, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tries to pass resolutions calling criticism of Israel the new anti-Semitism. It’s another when a research and remembrance institute doesn’t stand courageously against all such attempts.
Thus Yad Vashem would do better not to look for evidence that other governments are attempting to distort history and dictate nationalist content – not to mention engaging in Holocaust denial, as Dreifuss charges.
The Polish angle
Does any of the above justify the current Polish government’s position on the Holocaust? Obviously not. The Polish government has a problematic agenda in explaining the past, which we aren’t obligated to accept and in fact should even criticize.
But Poland’s government hasn’t interfered with the work of the museum’s employees, who have now started working, and certainly not with the development of the museum’s narrative. Had Dreifuss and her colleagues gotten involved in this effort, as they were invited to do, they would have been welcomed. Had Yad Vashem offered its help and support instead of giving the project the cold shoulder, nobody would have been happier than we at the museum.
>> Opening Italy’s ‘closet of shame’
And now we come to the historical issue. To take part in the effort to establish the Warsaw Ghetto Museum, one has to agree that the Holocaust can be presented and explained from perspectives other than an ethnocentric Jewish, Zionist and nationalist one.
One has to accept that the Holocaust can be studied in a way that sees Jewish history during this period as an integral part of Poland’s history under the Nazi occupation. One has to agree that the horrific Jewish tragedy that occurred during World War II can and should be understood in part by simultaneously examining – while noting both the differences and the common elements – what befell Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war and others who were murdered alongside Jews in the vast genocidal expanse that occupied Poland became.
To set up a museum with a humanist, universal and inclusive message about the Holocaust, one has to accept an approach that sees the Warsaw Ghetto – a horrific terror zone that caused the deaths and physical and spiritual collapse of hundreds of thousands of Jews – as one element of a much bigger terror zone in which hundreds of thousands of other people suffered and fought for their existence: the Poles who lived on the other side of the wall.
The obvious differences between the fates of these two peoples don’t absolve the research historian, or a museum depicting the history of this period, from presenting this complex message and demanding that visitors to the museum grapple with its lessons.
Therefore, the new Warsaw Ghetto Museum won’t be Yad Vashem. It will be a Holocaust museum in the heart of the Polish capital that remembers the fate of the 450,000 Jews, Warsaw residents and refugees brought to the ghetto.
After all, the vast majority of them were Jewish citizens of Poland. That’s how they lived, that’s how they suffered, and that’s how they should be remembered after being murdered by the Nazis.
Prof. Daniel Blatman is a historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the chief historian for the Warsaw Ghetto Museum.
Israel’s president to CNN: Fighting anti-Semitism alongside neo-fascists is ’absolutely impossible’
Reuven Rivlin’s remarks come after PM Netanyahu praised Austria, Hungary for combating the issue
Noa Landau SendSend me email alerts
Nov 29, 2018
▻https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-rivlin-fighting-anti-semitism-alongside-neo-fascists-is-absolutely
President Reuven Rivlin responded on Thursday to a poll published by CNN earlier in the week that revealed the depth of anti-Semitism in Europe.
Rivlin told CNN that anti-Semitism is “an evil that can be found anywhere – left and right, nationalist and religious” and argued that combatting the phenomenon by forming coalitions with neo-fascist movements is impossible.
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Rivlin’s comments come after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the right-wing leaders of Austria and Hungary for fighting anti-Semitism, a problem which Netanyahu said is fueled today by the “extreme left and radical Islamic pockets.”
"I saw [Prime Minister] Viktor Orban in Hungary," Netanyahu told CNN on Tuesday in response to the poll. “He’s opened up a center against anti-Semitism. I saw [Chancellor] Sebastian Kurz in Austria, he just held a conference against anti-Semitism, and that’s encouraging.”
In the interview Thursday, Rivlin told CNN that neo-fascism is “absolutely incompatible” with Israel’s principles and values. “You cannot say ‘we admire Israel and want relations with your country, but we are neo-fascists,’" Rivlin said.
“I meet leaders from all around the world – presidents and prime ministers – and they tell me that sometimes they need to work with movements like these to build coalitions and that although they are neo-fascists they are great admirers of Israel. I tell them that this is absolutely impossible,” Rivlin said.
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According to the president, rejecting neo-fascists movements is a way of fighting anti-Semitism. “The fact that the President of Israel says to neo-fascist movements ‘you are persona non grata in the State of Israel’ is a statement that fights anti-Semitism in a concrete way. It is a statement that makes clear that memory is important and that we will not compromise on for the political expediency of the state of Israel,” Rivlin said.
CNN’s poll, conducted in seven European countries, found that a quarter of Europeans believe Jews have too much influence in business and finance. Additionally, more than one-third of respondents said they have no substantial knowledge of the Holocaust. One-third of respondents also said that Jews use the Holocaust to advance their own positions or goals
According to Rivlin, the problem can be fought by “strengthening memory” and sticking “to the historical facts, not politicians’ talking points.” Rivlin added that Israel must collaborate with other nations “to fight against xenophobia and discrimination, of which anti-Semitism is a variant.”
Reinforcement of the southern borders because of nonexistent migratory pressure
Since Gergely Gulyás, Viktor Orbán’s new chief-of-staff, has taken over, the so-called “government info” press conferences introduced by his predecessor János Lázár are held only every second Thursday. On the last such occasion, on October 25, Gulyás announced that, according to “the information of the Hungarian and European intelligence services, approximately 70,000 refugees are heading toward Hungary along the old Balkan route, and therefore the Hungarian government has offered assistance” to Croatia and has decided to reinforce the Croatian-Hungarian border.
Prior to that day, I found only one short news item in Magyar Idők which reported that rumors were circulating among refugees stuck in Bosnia-Hercegovina that Zagreb would allow them to cross into Croatia, and from there they could proceed to Western Europe. About 100 refugees spent the night at the Bosnian-Croatian border in the hope of entry, but the Croatian ministry of interior denied the story. The paper gave official figures on the refugee situation in Bosnia. Since the beginning of the year 20,000 migrants have arrived in the country, but 13,000 were turned away. At the moment only 4,000-5,000 refugees can be found in Bosnia, some of whom are clustered in Bihać, close to the Croatian-Bosnian border. Those who manage to get into Croatia unnoticed usually go to Slovenia and from there to Trieste, Italy.
I looked high and low on the internet to find the 70,000 refugees heading toward Hungary but was unsuccessful. In fact, according to the UN Refugee Agency, only 26,548 refugees arrived in Greece in 2018. So, I suspect that Gergely Gulyás’s story of 70,000 migrants was another instance of purposeful disinformation intended to mislead Hungarians fearful of migrants. Strengthening the Croatian-Hungarian border can serve only one purpose: to keep the fear of migrants alive among the population. I’m almost certain that the overwhelming majority of Hungarians don’t have any idea where Bihać is and that they would be surprised to hear that it is 6.5 hours away by car from #Röszke.
The story of those migrants who managed to get through from Bihać to Italy, France, or Germany is vividly told by Davide Lemmi in his article “From Bosnia to Trieste, migrants’ journey across the new Balkan route” in Lifegate. The journey’s most difficult leg is the migrants’ stay in Croatia, where they are cautioned to remain in wooded areas near the Slovene border, which is far from the Hungarian-Croatian border Hungary is now reinforcing because of the alleged new migrant onslaught threatening the country.
Of course, this new “danger” requires more money for border defense. On the very same day that Gulyás announced the new danger coming from Croatia, the government approved another 24 billion forints “for the handling of the extraordinary migratory pressure” that had presented itself. Although since the fence was erected in September 2015 Hungary hasn’t had any “migratory pressure” to speak of, just in 2017 the Hungarian government spent 155.1 billion forints on border defense. Given the opacity in which the Orbán government operates, we don’t really know where these large sums of money have been and will be going.
Every time the government announces some new real or fake news, the regime’s faithful “national security experts” also show up. Georg Spöttle, a man of dubious past and dubious expertise, is always ready to claim that Hungary is in danger. Since there was a small clash between the refugees and the Croatian police 500 km away near Bihać, Spöttle predicted that “the scene will soon be repeated” along the Hungarian border. Therefore, more policemen and soldiers should be stationed there. In addition, the “weak spots” of the border fence should be reinforced with stronger fencing. It is possible that the source of Gergely Gulyás’s 70,000 migrants who are heading toward Hungary is Georg Spöttle, who told Hír TV that “at this very moment the number of migrants who are stuck in one of the Balkan countries is 60-70,000.” Where this figure comes from no one knows.
The story of the clash in which some women and children were injured was widely covered in the government media. It is typical of the low level of government journalism that one of the journalists from Magyar Hírlap mixed up the name of the alleged Iranian instigator with the name of a Bosnian town, Velika Kladuša, where a fair number of refugees can be found, something that would be really ridiculous if it weren’t so sad. Figyelő, Mária Schmidt’s daily paper, tried to make “an organized operation” out of the clash between Croatian police and about 150 refugees. Who is behind it? According to the head of the Croatian border police, the culprits are the “Serbian and Bosnian migration centers.” The article calls attention to guide books prepared for the migrants by the Soros organizations in 2015. By making a reference to the Soros organizations’ activities three years ago, the article strongly suggests that these people are still working to help the refugees stranded in Bosnia get across the border to Croatia.
While I was gathering material pertinent to this post, I couldn’t help comparing the story about the alleged 70,000 migrants heading toward Hungary to the frenzy Donald Trump has whipped up about the Honduran caravan. The caravan is still 1,500 miles from the United States border, and the refugees have an arduous journey ahead of them on foot. Yet the caravan is being described by the president as an imminent “assault on our country.” He keeps talking about criminals, gangsters, Middle Eastern terrorists in the crowd without any proof. He has hinted that the entire spectacle was funded by the Democrats, and he vows to send troops to the border while his supporters cheer. A Republican congressman insinuated that George Soros is financing the exodus. The story gets bigger and bigger with every passing moment in order to create fear and hatred–and, of course, to garner votes ahead of the mid-term elections. As we have seen in the last two days, verbal incitement can easily be translated into action, especially if it is the president who is inflaming passions. Right-wing populists like Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán are playing with fire when they unleash hatred and mislead their followers, creating an alternate reality.
▻http://hungarianspectrum.org/2018/10/27/reinforcement-of-the-southern-borders-because-of-nonexistent-migr
#militarisation_des_frontières #hongrie #frontières #asile #migrations #réfugiés #Croatie
Operation Sophia : new training module in Italy
A Training “Package 2” module in favour of Libyan Coastguard and Navy started in #La_Maddalena (Italy) on October the 8.
In the wide framework of Libyan Coastguard and Navy training carried out by SOPHIA operation, a new module, composed by “#Deck_Officer_Course” and “#Maintainer_Course” and in favour of 69 trainees, was launched in the Italian Navy Training Centre in LA MADDALENA (Italy) last 8th of October.
The end of the course is scheduled for next 30th of November 2018.
The course, hosted by the Italian Navy, will last 8 weeks, and it will provide knowledge and training in relation to the general activity on board an off shore patrol vessel and lessons focused on Human Rights, Basic First Aid, Gender Policy and Basic English language.
Additionally, with the positive conclusion of these two courses, the threshold of 305 Libyan Coastguard and Navy personnel trained by EUNAVFOR Med will be reached.
Moreover, further training modules are planned in Croatia and other EU member states in favour of a huge number of trainees.
From October 2016, SOPHIA is fully involved in the training of the Libyan Coastguard and Navy; the aim of the training is to improve security of the Libyan territorial waters and the Libyan Coastguard and Navy ability to perform the duties in their territorial waters, with a strong focus on respect of human rights, including minors and women’s rights, and the correct handling of migrants in occasion of search and rescue activities to save lives at sea.
https://i.imgur.com/sU18faG.png 
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https://www.operationsophia.eu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/DSC_0335-996x664.jpg 
https://www.operationsophia.eu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/DSC_0341-996x664.jpg –---
Ajouté à la métaiste sur les formations des gardes-côtes lybiens sur le territoire européen :
►https://seenthis.net/messages/938454
EU rift widens on migrants, Sophia Op extended for 3 months
The EU’s Political and Security Committee has approved a three-month extension for Operation Sophia, the bloc’s mission against human trafficking in the Mediterranean Sea whose mandate was set to expire on December 31. But there are still many issues regarding border protection and migration that the 28 EU countries disagree on.
The decision to extend Operation Sophia came on the second day of the EU summit held in Brussels on December 13 and 14. Though migration was not even the central topic of the summit (Brexit was), it ended up being the cause of friction once again with many losing their patience altogether.
At the end of the summit, European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker criticized what he viewed as the hypocrisy of those calling for more secure borders but who are blocking Frontex reform at the same time.
He also accused some European leaders of spreading false news, such as Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban.
Divisions in the EU
Even Belgium, which on the Global Compact issue has lost part of the government, called for those blocking the reform of the Dublin Rules on asylum to be removed from the Schengen zone. It also asked Brussels for an investigation into misinformation spread on social media on the UN agreement.
Despite six months of negotiations, the 28-member bloc is still divided on Operation Sophia. The EU mission in the Mediterranean was due to expire at the end of this month, but has received a three-month extension in a last-minute attempt to achieve an agreement at the beginning of the year to review the rules of engagement and the distribution of migrants taken to Italian ports.
Faced with EU conclusions that are even vaguer than usual, in which there are no expiration dates for the Dublin reform nor for the Frontex one, Juncker said that he was losing his patience.
He said that though ’’everyone says they want better protection of external borders’’, a proposal on the table for a 10,000-strong EU border guard agency had been refused by those claiming to be the most interested in border control - among them are Hungary and Italy, who oppose the measure for reasons of national sovereignty.
Juncker rails against governments supporting fake news
Some heads of state and governments were also spreading fake news on issues ranging from migrants to Brexit, Juncker said, such as ’’when Orban says I am responsible’’ for Brexit or that migrants were.
The countdown for Visegrad countries - meaning the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia - who do not want to accept migrants could come soon, said Belgian prime minister Charles Michel. There is ’’ever more agreement’’ among EU states to remove those blocking Dublin reform from the Schengen zone, he said. Michel asked the European Commission to open an investigation into ’’manipulated information’’ on the Global Compact circulated online with a deliberate desire to destabilize EU democracies.
▻http://www.infomigrants.net/en/post/13971/eu-rift-widens-on-migrants-sophia-op-extended-for-3-months?ref=tw
La fin de la plongée croate pour les #garde-côtes_libyens
Pour trois gardes-côtes libyens et trois autres marins libyens, ce 29 mars sonne comme la fin des cours de #plongée.
Durant cinq semaines, ils ont suivi un module de formation au Centre de formation de la marine croate à Split (Croatie), géré par l’opération Sophia d’EUNAVFOR MED. La cérémonie de clôture a eu lieu au centre d’instruction de la marine croate à Split, en présence de son chef, le commandant adjoint de l’opération Sophia EUNAVFOR MED et de son chef du secteur de l’instruction de l’OHQ, ainsi que d’une délégation libyenne d’officiers supérieurs.
Le cours, organisé par la marine croate, portait sur les procédures et techniques de plongée afin de pouvoir effectuer des opérations de maintenance sous-marine des navires. Le cours comprenait également quelques leçons sur les droits de l’homme, les premiers soins et la politique en matière d’égalité des sexes (un rituel côté européen).
Avec ce cours, l’opération Sophia indique avoir atteint un niveau de 355 membres du personnel des garde-côtes et de la marine libyens formés.
▻http://www.bruxelles2.eu/2019/03/29/la-fin-de-la-plongee-croate
Le visage hideux de la bourgeoisie en temps de crise (Acte II)
▻https://www.agoravox.fr/tribune-libre/article/le-visage-hideux-de-la-bourgeoisie-208437
Ecoutez<p><b>Donald Trump,Viktor Orban, Matteo Salvini, Heinz-Christian Strache... ne sont que les visages hideux de la bourgeoisie en temps de crise. Tant</b> …
The Suffocation of Democracy | Christopher R. Browning
▻https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2018/10/25/suffocation-of-democracy
The most original revelation of the current wave of authoritarians is that the construction of overtly antidemocratic dictatorships aspiring to totalitarianism is unnecessary for holding power. Perhaps the most apt designation of this new authoritarianism is the insidious term “illiberal democracy.” Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey, Putin in Russia, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, and Viktor Orbán in Hungary Source: The New York Review of Books
Les libéraux et l’épouvantail rouge-brun
▻https://lemediapresse.fr/idees/les-liberaux-et-lepouvantail-rouge-brun
Le rouge-brun est devenu l’épouvantail confortable des libéraux pour défendre leur projet économique et politique. Pourtant, il relève largement du fantasme.
La « véritable frontière qui traverse l’Europe est celle qui sépare les progressistes des nationalistes » explique depuis cet été Macron, qui veut se poser en rempart contre la montée de l’illibéralisme (régimes autoritaires qui reprennent des éléments de la démocratie représentative) aujourd’hui symbolisées sur le Vieux Continent par Viktor Orban (Hongrie), Mateusz Morawiecki (Pologne), voire Mattéo Salvini (Italie). Mais dans la tête du président français, il s’agit aussi de désigner comme dangereuse toute critique de gauche ou de droite contre le système libéral actuel...
Le progrès, mais de quoi ?
« Quand on me présente quelque chose comme un progrès, je me demande avant tout s’il nous rend plus humains ou moins humains . »
George Orwell
Finalement derrière l’adage populaire selon lequel « on n’arrête pas le progrès » se cache l’idée plus perverse selon laquelle on n’arrête pas le capitalisme...
Immigration : l’UE veut intensifier sa coopération avec l’Egypte et l’Afrique du Nord
Les dirigeants européens sont convenus d’engager des négociations avec l’Egypte et d’autres pays d’Afrique du Nord pour lutter contre les départs clandestins de migrants vers l’Europe, a annoncé jeudi le chancelier autrichien Sebastian Kurz au second jour d’un sommet de l’UE à Salzbourg.
« L’Egypte est prête à approfondir son dialogue avec nous », s’est félicité M. Kurz, saluant « une nouvelle étape importante » dans la lutte contre l’immigration en Europe.
Depuis le pic de la crise migratoire en 2015, l’UE a déjà conclu avec la Turquie et la Libye des accords qui ont contribué à une forte baisse des arrivées sur le continent via la Méditerranée.
Mais les Européens veulent étendre ces partenariats à tous les pays d’Afrique du Nord à la faveur notamment d’un sommet avec la Ligue arabe (basée au Caire) que le Conseil européen (représentant les Etats membres) espère organiser en février.
Pays fondateur de la Ligue arabe, l’Egypte joue un rôle modèle dans la lutte contre les embarquements clandestins à destination de l’Europe, a souligné M. Kurz, dont le pays assume jusqu’à la fin de l’année la présidence tournante de l’UE.
« L’Egypte est le seul pays (d’Afrique du Nord) qui a réussi depuis 2016 à empêcher tout départ de migrants » par voie de mer, a souligné le chancelier autrichien, saluant l’"efficacité" du Caire.
Le ministère égyptien des Affaires étrangères a confirmé la proposition d’un sommet UE-Ligue arabe en Egypte, en ajoutant toutefois que l’immigration ne saurait figurer seule au menu.
« Le sommet proposé aborde toutes les questions de coopération arabo-européenne et ne se limite pas au sujet de l’immigration comme cela se dit », a insisté le ministère égyptien.
Malgré la chute des arrivées en Europe à des niveaux inférieurs à ceux d’avant 2015, la question migratoire reste une des priorités des Vingt-Huit, qui en ont fait l’un des deux principaux sujets à l’ordre du jour du sommet informel de Salzbourg, avec le Brexit.
« Nous avons une crise politique, pas une crise migratoire. Les chiffres (d’arrivées) sont même inférieurs à ceux qu’ils étaient en 2007. Mais il faut répondre aux préoccupations des citoyens européens, on ne peut pas les ignorer et attendre la prochaine crise », a reconnu le Premier ministre libéral luxembourgeois Xavier Bettel, à quelques mois de l’échéance électorale européenne (mai 2019).
Pour autant, quand on évoque les sujets migratoires, « on parle de gens », a-t-il relevé, appelant les pays européens à faire preuve de « davantage de solidarité » au sein de l’UE.
M. Kurz, un tenant d’une ligne dure dans ce dossier, a toutefois souligné que « la question migratoire ne se résoudra pas par la répartition (des migrants au sein des pays de l’UE), mais par la défense des frontières extérieures », telle que la souhaite la Commission européenne avec un renfort des moyens de l’Agence européenne des gardes-frontières et des gardes-côtes (Frontex).
Répondant aux critiques de Vienne, qui avait accusé jeudi les capitales du sud de l’Europe d’aborder avec réticence le renforcement de la mission Frontex, une source diplomatique espagnole a assuré jeudi que son pays ne voyait « pas d’inconvénient » à une telle mesure. « Mais nous le considérons comme un mécanisme flexible et complémentaire », a ajouté cette source.
Craignant une atteinte à la souveraineté hongroise, le Premier ministre Viktor Orban a indiqué jeudi avoir proposé à la présidence européenne de garantir « le droit des pays à défendre » eux-mêmes leurs frontières.
Une source proche de la présidence française a jugé que la question de la souveraineté était un « faux débat », car « personne n’a jamais dit qu’un garde-frontière étranger imposerait sa décision dans le pays où il est posté ».
▻https://www.voaafrique.com/a/migrants-l-ue-veut-intensifier-sa-cooperation-avec-l-egypte-et-l-afrique-du-nord-/4579509.html
#asile #migrations #réfugiés #externalisation #frontières #Egypte #UE #EU #politique_migratoire
Egypt
Introduction
Egypt is a destination country along the central Mediterranean refugee route with people arriving from both the Middle East and east Africa. A growing population of concern is stranded in the most overcrowded and poorest neighbourhoods of its largest cities such as Cairo and Alexandria as a result of an upward trend of new arrivals and tightened control measures aimed at curbing irregular outflows towards Europe.
Of the more than 247 000 refugees registered by the UNHCR, around 133 000 are from Syria with the remainder from East Africa or Iraq.
What are the needs?
Egypt continues to see a steady increase of refugees and migrants. Almost 31 000 were registered in 2018, more than 30 percent of them Syrians.
Newly-arrived refugees and asylum seekers mix with an urban refugee population as well as with stranded migrants, and are heavily reliant on humanitarian assistance. Refugees reside in overcrowded and impoverished urban centres, where local communities already struggle with difficult living conditions, high unemployment rates and poor access to critical services such as healthcare and education. According to the UN, 85 percent of registered Syrian refugees in Egypt are unable to meet their basic needs.
This coincides with Egypt’s worst economic recession in decades, which has seen dramatic price hikes in food and utilities. In addition, refugees from African countries have no or limited access to formal education and suffer linguistic barriers and discrimination, further contributing to their marginalisation.
How are we helping?
European Union assistance targets Syrian refugees and the most vulnerable among other refugees groups and their hosting communities. The EU funds humanitarian projects that focus on three main priorities: protection, healthcare, and education in emergency (EiE).
Given the upward trend for new arrivals and, amongst them, the sharp increase of unaccompanied and separated children, strengthening core protection activities for the most vulnerable remains the paramount objective.
While refugees in Egypt are legally entitled to access public health services, several structural causes (e.g. poor quality of services), calling for developmental investments, limit their capacity to benefit from them.
The EU’s humanitarian aid efforts aim to facilitate access to emergency health services, particularly maternal and reproductive health, for those refugees without financial means to afford health fees, as well as for victims of discrimination and marginalisation. The most vulnerable groups or individuals in the hosting communities may also benefit from these interventions.
In the area of education, the EU’s humanitarian aid funding intends to provide access to formal schooling and reduce related barriers for the most vulnerable refugee children. Barriers to education may be academic, financial, institutional or social and emotional, as well as any other obstacles children face as refugees. The support for educational activities focuses on primary and secondary school levels.
The EU also provides multipurpose cash assistance to address the basic expenditures of those most in need among the registered refugees through cash transfers. The value of the transfer is normally based on a minimum expenditure basket (MEB, or what a household needs on a regular or seasonal basis and its average cost over time), while taking into account the contribution made by households, and available resources.
▻https://ec.europa.eu/echo/where/middle-east/egypt_en
#Egypte
Avec ce commentaire de Marie Martin via la liste Migreurop :
Pour celles et ceux pour qui ce serait pas clair, l’Union européenne considère désormais l’Egypte comme un pays de « destination » pour les personnes réfugiées, alors que les années précédentes les documents officiels parlaient de pays de « transit et de destination ». L’appel du HCR fait ainsi étrangement écho à une réalité qui ressemblerait presque à une #prophétie_auto-réalisatrice.
–-> Appel du #HCR :
Le HCR appelle à un « soutien crucial » en faveur de l’Egypte, débordée par le nombre de réfugiés
Près de 250 000 réfugiés et demandeurs d’asile sont présents dans le pays, principalement des Syriens, des Soudanais et des Ethiopiens.
Le nombre de réfugiés arrivant en Egypte est en hausse, a signalé l’ONU, jeudi 28 février, appelant à un « soutien crucial » face aux « ressources insuffisantes » du pays, partenaire clé dans le contrôle des migrations en Méditerranée. « Les conflits en cours au Yémen et en Afrique subsaharienne ont forcé davantage de personnes à fuir en Egypte », a indiqué dans un communiqué le Haut Commissariat des Nations unies pour les réfugiés (HCR).
Le nombre de réfugiés et de demandeurs d’asile enregistrés dans le pays au cours des deux dernières années a augmenté de 24 %, selon cette organisation internationale spécialisée. Au total, près de 250 000 réfugiés et demandeurs d’asile sont enregistrés par le HCR en Egypte, principalement des Syriens, des Soudanais et des Ethiopiens, selon des chiffres publiés en février par l’agence de l’ONU.
« Des conditions humanitaires épouvantables »
La capacité d’accueil de l’Egypte « est sous forte pression en raison de cette hausse d’arrivées et de ressources insuffisantes », a averti le HCR. « Huit réfugiés sur dix en Egypte vivent dans des conditions humanitaires épouvantables, estime dans ce communiqué le Haut Commissaire des Nations unies pour les réfugiés, Filippo Grandi. Ils ne peuvent même pas satisfaire leurs besoins les plus élémentaires. Mettre du pain sur la table est un défi quotidien. Or nous ne sommes pas en mesure de leur fournir le strict nécessaire ni de maintenir nos principaux programmes de protection des réfugiés dans ce pays. » Le HCR appelle ainsi à un « soutien crucial ».
Du 24 au 26 février, l’Egypte a accueilli un sommet entre la Ligue arabe et l’Union européenne, dont la lutte contre l’immigration illégale était l’un des thèmes principaux au menu des discussions, sans aboutir à des annonces concrètes. Dans ses relations avec les chancelleries européennes, Le Caire se présente régulièrement comme un champion de la lutte contre l’immigration illégale et un modèle pour l’intégration des réfugiés sur son sol.
▻https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2019/03/01/le-hcr-appelle-a-un-soutien-crucial-en-faveur-de-l-egypte-debordee-par-le-no
#UNHCR
Changement de régime à Budapest ? Diana JOHNSTONE - 20 Septembre 2018 - LGS
La Hongrie désobéissante : De l’Union Soviétique à l’Union Européenne
▻https://www.legrandsoir.info/changement-de-regime-a-budapest.html
CNN a récemment découvert un paradoxe. Comment était-il possible, se demandait la chaîne, qu’en 1989, Viktor Orban, alors leader de l’opposition libérale acclamé par l’Occident, appelait les troupes soviétiques à quitter la Hongrie, et maintenant qu’il est Premier ministre, il se rapproche de Vladimir Poutine ?
Pour la même raison, imbécile.
Orban voulait que son pays soit indépendant à l’époque, et il veut qu’il le soit maintenant.
En 1989, la Hongrie était un satellite de l’Union soviétique. Peu importe ce que les Hongrois voulaient, ils devaient suivre les directives de Moscou et adhérer à l’idéologie communiste soviétique.Aujourd’hui, la Hongrie doit suivre les directives de Bruxelles et adhérer à l’idéologie de l’UE, c’est-à-dire à "nos valeurs communes".
Mais quelles sont exactement ces "valeurs communes" ?
Il n’y a pas si longtemps, "l’Occident", c’est-à-dire les États-Unis et l’Europe, revendiquaient une dévotion aux "valeurs chrétiennes". Ces valeurs étaient évoquées dans la condamnation occidentale de l’Union soviétique. Ce n’est plus le cas. Aujourd’hui, en effet, l’une des raisons pour lesquelles Viktor Orban est considéré comme une menace pour nos valeurs européennes est sa référence à une conception hongroise du "caractère chrétien de l’Europe, le rôle des nations et des cultures" . La renaissance du christianisme en Hongrie, comme en Russie, est considérée en Occident comme profondément suspecte.
Il est entendu que le christianisme n’est plus une "valeur occidentale". Qu’est-ce qui a pris sa place ? Cela devrait être évident : aujourd’hui, "nos valeurs communes" signifient essentiellement démocratie et élections libres.
Devinez à nouveau. Orban a récemment été réélu par un raz de marée. Guy Verhofstadt, chef de file des libéraux de l’UE, a qualifié ce mandat de "mandat électoral pour faire reculer la démocratie en Hongrie".
Puisque les élections peuvent "faire reculer la démocratie", elles ne peuvent être l’essence même de "nos valeurs communes". Il peut arriver que les gens votent mal ; c’est ce qu’on appelle le "populisme" et c’est une mauvaise chose.
Les valeurs communes réelles et fonctionnelles de l’Union européenne sont énoncées dans ses traités : les quatre libertés. Non, pas la liberté d’expression, car de nombreux États membres ont des lois contre le "discours de haine", qui peut couvrir de nombreux domaines puisque son sens est sujet à une interprétation large. Non, les quatre libertés obligatoires de l’UE sont la libre circulation des biens, des services, des personnes et des capitaux dans l’Union. Ouvrir les frontières. Open Borders . C’est l’essence même de l’Union européenne, le dogme du marché libre.
Le problème avec la doctrine des Open Borders , c’est qu’elle ne sait pas où s’arrêter. Ou qu’elle ne s’arrête nulle part. Quand Angela Merkel a annoncé que des centaines de milliers de réfugiés étaient les bienvenus en Allemagne, l’annonce a été interprétée comme une invitation ouverte par des immigrants de toutes sortes, qui ont commencé à affluer en Europe. Cette décision unilatérale allemande s’appliquait automatiquement à l’ensemble de l’UE, avec son absence de frontières intérieures. Avec l’influence de l’Allemagne, Open Borders est devenu la "valeur commune européenne" essentielle et l’accueil des immigrés l’essence même des droits de l’homme.
Des considérations idéologiques et pratiques très contrastées contribuent à l’idéalisation des frontières ouvertes. Pour n’en nommer que quelques-unes :
• Les libéraux économiques soutiennent qu’en raison du vieillissement de la population, l’Europe a besoin de jeunes travailleurs immigrés pour payer les pensions des travailleurs retraités.
• De nombreux militants juifs se sentent menacés par les majorités nationales et se sentent plus en sécurité dans une société composée de minorités ethniques.
• Plus discrètement, certains patrons favorisent l’immigration massive parce que la concurrence croissante sur le marché du travail fait baisser les salaires.
• De nombreuses personnes ayant des tendances artistiques considèrent que la diversité ethnique est plus créative et plus amusante.
• Certaines sectes anarchistes ou trotskystes pensent que les immigrés déracinés sont "les agents" de la révolution que le prolétariat occidental n’a pas su devenir.
• De nombreux Européens acceptent l’idée que les États-nations sont la cause de la guerre et en concluent que tout moyen de les détruire est le bienvenu.
• Les investisseurs financiers internationaux veulent naturellement lever tous les obstacles à leurs investissements et promouvoir ainsi Open Borders comme étant l’avenir.
• Il y a même quelques puissants intrigants qui voient dans la "diversité" la base du "diviser pour régner", en fragmentant la solidarité sur les bases ethniques.
• Il y a des gens bienveillants qui veulent aider toute l’humanité en détresse.
Cette combinaison de motivations contrastées, voire opposées, ne constitue pas une majorité dans tous les pays. Notamment en Hongrie.
Il convient de noter que la Hongrie est un petit pays d’Europe centrale de moins de dix millions d’habitants, qui n’a jamais eu d’empire colonial et n’a donc aucune relation historique avec les peuples d’Afrique et d’Asie comme en ont la Grande-Bretagne, la France, les Pays-Bas ou la Belgique. Étant l’un des perdants de la Première Guerre mondiale, la Hongrie a perdu une grande partie de son territoire au profit de ses voisins, notamment la Roumanie. La langue hongroise, rare et difficile, serait sérieusement menacée par une immigration massive. On peut probablement dire sans risque de se tromper que la majorité de la population hongroise a tendance à être attachée à son identité nationale et pense qu’elle serait menacée par une immigration massive en provenance de cultures radicalement différentes. Ce n’est peut-être pas gentil de leur part, et comme tout le monde, ils peuvent changer. Mais pour l’instant, c’est ainsi qu’ils votent.
En particulier, ils ont récemment voté massivement pour réélire Victor Orban, approuvant évidemment son refus de l’immigration incontrôlée. C’est ce qui a provoqué la surveillance étroite d’Orban et la recherche de signes de la mise en place d’une dictature. En conséquence, l’UE prend des mesures pour priver la Hongrie de ses droits politiques. Le 14 septembre, Victor Orban a clairement exposé sa position dans un discours prononcé devant le Parlement européen à Strasbourg :
"Soyons francs. Ils veulent condamner la Hongrie et les Hongrois qui ont décidé que notre pays ne sera pas un pays d’immigration. Avec tout le respect que je vous dois, mais aussi fermement que possible, je rejette les menaces des forces pro-immigration, leur chantage à la Hongrie et aux Hongrois, toutes basées sur le mensonge. Je vous informe respectueusement que, quelle que soit votre décision, la Hongrie mettra fin à l’immigration illégale et défendra ses frontières contre vous si nécessaire."
Cela a été accueilli avec indignation.
L’ancien Premier ministre belge Guy Verhofstadt, actuellement président du groupe Alliance des démocrates et des libéraux pour l’Europe au Parlement européen et ardent fédéraliste européen, a répondu furieusement que « nous ne pouvons laisser des gouvernements populistes d’extrême droite entraîner des États européens démocratiques dans l’orbite de Vladimir Poutine ! »
Dans un tweet à ses collègues du PE, Verhofstadt a averti : « Nous sommes dans une bataille existentielle pour la survie du projet européen. ... Pour le bien de l’Europe, nous devons l’arrêter ! »
CNN a publié avec approbation un article d’opinion de Verhofstadt décrivant la Hongrie comme une "menace pour l’ordre international".
« Dans les semaines et les mois à venir, la communauté internationale – et les États-Unis en particulier – devront tenir compte de notre avertissement et agir : le gouvernement hongrois est une menace pour l’ordre international fondé sur des règles, » a-t-il écrit.
« Les gouvernements européens et les Etats-Unis ont l’obligation morale d’intervenir », a poursuivi M. Verhofstadt. « Nous ne pouvons laisser des gouvernements populistes d’extrême droite entraîner les États européens démocratiques sur l’orbite de Vladimir Poutine et saper les normes internationales de l’après-guerre. »
Viennent ensuite les sanctions : « Les coûts politiques et financiers doivent être affectés à la lutte contre les gouvernements qui suivent une voie autoritaire et au soutien aux organisations de la société civile... ».
Verhofstadt a conclu : « Ce n’est pas dans l’intérêt des peuples d’Amérique ou d’Europe. Nous devons l’arrêter … maintenant. »
L’appel de Verhofstadt à l’Amérique pour « arrêter » le Premier ministre hongrois ressemble étrangement aux appels lancés à Brejnev par des communistes purs et durs pour envoyer les chars en Tchécoslovaquie réformiste en 1968.
Cependant, cet appel à l’intervention ne s’adressait pas au président Trump, qui est aussi impopulaire qu’Orban parmi les atlantistes, mais plutôt à l’état permanent que le fanatique belge suppose être toujours au pouvoir à Washington.
Au début de son article sur CNN, Verhofstadt a rendu hommage à "feu John McCain, le grand John McCain, celui qui a un jour décrit Orban comme "un fasciste en cheville avec Poutine...". Celui qui a parcouru le monde en tant que chef de la branche républicaine du National Endowment for Democracy (NED), encourageant et finançant des groupes dissidents à se rebeller contre leurs gouvernements respectifs, en préparation de l’intervention américaine. Sénateur McCain, où êtes-vous maintenant qu’il faudrait changer de régime à Budapest ?
La réputation de dictateur d’Orban en Occident est incontestablement liée à son conflit intense avec le financier d’origine hongroise George Soros, dont la fondation Open Society finance toutes sortes d’initiatives visant à promouvoir son rêve d’une société sans frontières, notamment en Europe orientale. Les activités de Soros pourraient être considérées comme une politique étrangère étasunienne privatisée, innocemment "non gouvernementale". L’une des initiatives de Soros est l’Université privée d’Europe centrale (UEC) basée à Budapest, dont le recteur est Michael Ignatieff, partisan de l’Open Society. La Hongrie a récemment imposé une taxe de 25% sur l’argent dépensé par les organisations non gouvernementales pour des programmes qui " visent directement ou indirectement à promouvoir l’immigration " , ce qui affecte l’UEC. Cela fait partie d’un paquet de mesures anti-immigration récemment adopté, connu sous le nom de projet de loi "Stop Soros".
Les mesures hongroises contre l’ingérence de Soros sont bien sûr dénoncées en Occident comme une grave violation des droits de l’homme, tandis qu’aux Etats-Unis, les procureurs recherchent frénétiquement la moindre trace d’ingérence russe ou d’agents russes.
Dans un autre coup porté à l’ordre international fondé sur des règles, le cabinet du Premier ministre hongrois a récemment annoncé que le gouvernement cesserait de financer des cours universitaires en études de genre au motif qu’ils "ne peuvent être justifiés scientifiquement" et attirent trop peu d’étudiants pour être valables. Bien que financée par le secteur privé et donc capable de poursuivre son propre programme d’études sur le genre, l’UEC s’en est "étonnée" et a qualifié la mesure de "sans aucune justification ou antécédent".
Comme l’Union soviétique, l’Union européenne n’est pas seulement un cadre institutionnel antidémocratique promouvant un système économique spécifique ; elle est aussi le véhicule d’une idéologie et d’un projet planétaire. Tous deux sont basés sur un dogme quant à ce qui est bon pour le monde : le communisme pour le premier, "l’ouverture" pour le second. Les deux exigent des citoyens des vertus qu’ils ne partagent peut-être pas : une égalité forcée, une générosité forcée. Tout cela peut sembler bien, mais de tels idéaux deviennent des méthodes de manipulation. L’imposition d’idéaux finit par se heurter à une résistance obstinée.
Il y a différentes raisons d’être contre l’immigration tout comme d’être pour. L’idée de la démocratie était de trier et de choisir entre les idéaux et les intérêts pratiques par une discussion libre et, en fin de compte, à main levée : un vote éclairé. Le Centre autoritaire libéral représenté par Verhofstadt cherche à imposer ses valeurs, ses aspirations, voire sa version des faits aux citoyens qui sont dénoncés comme "populistes" s’ils sont en désaccord. Sous le communisme, les dissidents étaient appelés "ennemis du peuple". Pour les mondialistes libéraux, ce sont des "populistes", c’est-à-dire le peuple. Si l’on dit constamment aux gens que le choix se situe entre une gauche qui prône l’immigration massive et une droite qui la rejette, le virage vers la droite est inéluctable.
Diana Johnstone
#Hongrie #UE #union_européenne #union_soviétique #indépendance #viktor_orban #guy_verhofstadt #indépendance #migration #christianisme #john_mccain #NED #soros #open_society #UEC #idéologie #populisme #ennemis_du_peuple
Pour information, tous les hongrois.e.s avec qui j’ai travaillé ont rapidement abordé le sujet du traité de Versailles.
Cette remarque, pour illustrer leur conception de leurs frontières.
Bruxelles : Les fanatiques de l’union européenne ne lisent pas les discours de monsieur Guy Verhofstadt.
Le premier festival européen de la démocratie au Parc Léopold à Bruxelles RTBF avec Belga - 22 Septembre 2018
▻https://www.rtbf.be/info/regions/detail_le-premier-festival-europeen-de-la-democratie-au-parc-leopold-a-bruxelle
. . . . . .
Le citoyen y sera invité à s’exprimer et à échanger des opinions avec des responsables politiques européens ainsi que des représentants des institutions européennes et d’organisations de la société civile. Divers groupes politiques européens y seront aussi représentés.
Le festival, à l’initiative d’individus engagés, comprendra plusieurs scènes, des stands des institutions européennes, des outils interactifs ou encore des expositions sur l’Europe citoyenne et des formats de discussion variés, comme le Pechakucha, qui mêle une présentation orale à la projection de 20 diapositives se succédant toutes les 20 secondes.
Jubel abordera des questions telles que l’origine de l’euroscepticisme, l’avenir des dialogues citoyens et cherchera des pistes pour transformer les institutions européennes en meilleurs organismes d’écoute.
« Malgré plusieurs initiatives entreprises par les institutions européennes pour renouer le contact avec ses citoyens, Jubel est convaincu qu’une approche plus haute en couleur, originale et bottom-up est nécessaire pour créer un lien plus fort entre les citoyens européens et leurs élites », soulignent les organisateurs dans un communiqué
. . . . . .
The festival wants to contribute, by means of a bottom-up approach, to the idea of citizen consultations launched by French president #Macron and endorsed by his fellow heads of state and government, as well as the consolidated initiative of the European Commission, with the help of a structured output about the future of the European democratic project and the current functioning of the European Union.
Populisme et UE, 1989-2018
▻http://www.dedefensa.org/article/populisme-et-ue-1989-2018
Populisme et UE, 1989-2018
Il lui était impossible de se cacher : Viktor Orban se trouvait avec Vladimir Poutine lors de la conférence de presse où le président russe fut conduit par une question à donner sa première réaction publique à la destruction d’un avion de surveillance électronique Il-20 en Syrie. Le premier ministre hongrois avait passé plusieurs heures de discussion avec le président russe. Peu de dirigeants européens de petits pays de l’UE osent se livrer à cet exercice. (Il y en a d’ailleurs fort peu qui y sont conviés.) Orban n’en a donc été que plus détesté, et dénoncé avec d’autant plus de vindicte, d’anathème furieux par l’ayatollah, le Savonarole du Parlement Européenet président du Groupe Alliance des démocrates et des libéraux pour l’ Europe, l’ex-“plus jeune premier ministre belge” et (...)
The State of Israel vs. the Jewish people -
Israel has aligned itself with one nationalist, even anti-Semitic, regime after another. Where does that leave world Jewry?
By Eva Illouz Sep 13, 2018
▻https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium.MAGAZINE-the-state-of-israel-vs-the-jewish-people-1.6470108
An earthquake is quietly rocking the Jewish world.
In the 18th century, Jews began playing a decisive role in the promotion of universalism, because universalism promised them redemption from their political subjection. Through universalism, Jews could, in principle, be free and equal to those who had dominated them. This is why, in the centuries that followed, Jews participated in disproportionate numbers in communist and socialist causes. This is also why Jews were model citizens of countries, such as France or the United States, with universalist constitutions.
The history of Jews as promoters of Enlightenment and universalist values, however, is drawing to a close. We are the stunned witnesses of new alliances between Israel, Orthodox factions of Judaism throughout the world, and the new global populism in which ethnocentrism and even racism hold an undeniable place.
When Prime Minister Netanyahu chose to align himself politically with Donald Trump before and after the U.S. presidential election of 2016, some people could still give him the benefit of doubt. Admittedly, Trump was surrounded by people like Steve Bannon, the former head of Breitbart News, who reeked of racism and anti-Semitism, but no one was sure of the direction the new presidency would take. Even if Trump refused to condemn the anti-Semitic elements of his electoral base or the Ku Klux Klan, which had enthusiastically backed him, and even if it took him a long time to dissociate himself from David Duke – we were not yet certain of the presence of anti-Semitism in Trump’s discourse and strategies (especially since his daughter Ivanka was a convert to Judaism).
But the events in Charlottesville in August 2017 no longer allowed for doubt. The neo-Nazi demonstrators committed violent acts against peaceful counter-protesters, killing one woman by plowing through a crowd with a car (an act reminiscent in its technique of terrorist attacks in Europe). Trump reacted to the events by condemning both the neo-Nazis and white supremacists and their opponents. The world was shocked by his conflation of the two groups, but Jerusalem did not object. Once again, the indulgent (or cynical) observer could have interpreted this silence as the reluctant obeisance of a vassal toward his overlord (of all the countries in the world, Israel receives the most military aid from the United States). One was entitled to think that Israel had no choice but to collaborate, despite the American leader’s outward signs of anti-Semitism.
This interpretation, however, is no longer tenable. Before and since Charlottesville, Netanyahu has courted other leaders who are either unbothered by anti-Semitism or straightforwardly sympathetic to it, and upon whom Israel is not economically dependent. His concessions go as far as participating in a partial form of Holocaust denial.
Take the case of Hungary. Under the government of Viktor Orban, the country shows troubling signs of legitimizing anti-Semitism. In 2015, for example, the Hungarian government announced its intention to erect a statue to commemorate Balint Homan, a Holocaust-era minister who played a decisive role in the murder or deportation of nearly 600,000 Hungarian Jews. Far from being an isolated incident, just a few months later, in 2016, another statue was erected in tribute to Gyorgy Donáth, one of the architects of anti-Jewish legislation during World War II. It was thus unsurprising to hear Orban employing anti-Semitic tropes during his reelection campaign in 2017, especially against Georges Soros, the Jewish, Hungarian-American billionaire-philanthropist who supports liberal causes, including that of open borders and immigration. Reanimating the anti-Semitic cliché about the power of Jews, Orban accused Soros of harboring intentions to undermine Hungary.
Whom did Netanyahu choose to support? Not the anxious Hungarian Jewish community that protested bitterly against the anti-Semitic rhetoric of Orban’s government; nor did he choose to support the liberal Jew Soros, who defends humanitarian causes. Instead, the prime minister created new fault lines, preferring political allies to members of the tribe. He backed Orban, the same person who resurrects the memory of dark anti-Semites. When the Israeli ambassador in Budapest protested the erection of the infamous statue, he was publicly contradicted by none other than Netanyahu.
To my knowledge, the Israeli government has never officially protested Orban’s anti-Semitic inclinations and affinities. In fact, when the Israeli ambassador in Budapest did try to do so, he was quieted down by Jerusalem. Not long before the Hungarian election, Netanyahu went to the trouble of visiting Hungary, thus giving a “kosher certificate” to Orban and exonerating him of the opprobrium attached to anti-Semitism and to an endorsement of figures active in the Shoah. When Netanyahu visited Budapest, he was given a glacial reception by the Federation of the Jewish Communities, while Orban gave him a warm welcome. To further reinforce their touching friendship, Netanyahu invited Orban to pay a reciprocal visit to Israel this past July, receiving him in a way usually reserved for the most devoted national allies.
The relationship with Poland is just as puzzling. As a reminder, Poland is governed by the nationalist Law and Justice party, which has an uncompromising policy against refugees and appears to want to eliminate the independence of the courts by means of a series of reforms that would allow the government to control the judiciary branch. In 2016 the Law and Justice-led government eliminated the official body whose mission was to deal with problems of racial discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance, arguing that the organization had become “useless.”
Encouraged by this and other governmental declarations and policies, signs of nationalism multiplied within Polish society. In February 2018, president Andrzej Duda declared that he would sign a law making it illegal to accuse the Polish nation of having collaborated with the Nazis. Accusing Poland of collusion in the Holocaust and other Nazi atrocities would be from now prosecutable. Israel initially protested the proposed legislation, but then in June, Benjamin Netanyahu and the Polish prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, signed an agreement exonerating Poland of any and all crimes against the Jews during the time of the German occupation. Israel also acceded to Poland’s move to outlaw the expression “Polish concentration camp.” Moreover, Netanyahu even signed a statement stipulating that anti-Semitism is identical to anti-Polonism, and that only a handful of sad Polish individuals were responsible for persecuting Jews – not the nation as a whole.
Like the American, Hungarian and Polish alt-right, Israel wants to restore national pride unstained by “self-hating” critics. Like the Poles, for two decades now, Israel has been waging a war over the official narrative of the nation, trying to expunge school textbooks of inconvenient facts (such as the fact that Arabs were actively chased out of Israel in 1948). In order to quash criticism, Israel’s Culture Ministry now predicates funding to creative institutions on loyalty to the state. As in Hungary, the Israeli government persecutes NGOs like Breaking the Silence, a group whose only sin has been to give soldiers a forum for reporting their army experiences and to oppose Israeli settlers’ violence against Palestinians or the expropriation of land, in violation of international law. Purging critics from public life (as expressed in barring the entry into the country of BDS supporters, denying funding to theater companies or films critical of Israel, etc.) is an expression of direct state power.
When it comes to refugees, Israel, like Hungary and Poland, refuses to comply with international law. For almost a decade now, Israel has not respected international conventions on the rights of refugees even though it is a signatory of said conventions: The state has detained refugees in camps, and imprisoned and deported them. Like Poland, Israel is trying to do away with the independence of its judiciary. Israel feels comfortable with the anti-democratic extreme right of European states in the same way that one feels comfortable with a family member who belches and gossips, losing any sense of self-control or table manners.
More generally, these countries today share a deep common political core: fear of foreigners at the borders (it must be specified, however, that Israelis’ fears are less imaginary than those of Hungarians or Polish); references to the nation’s pride untainted by a dubious past, casting critics as traitors to the nation; and outlawing human rights organizations and contesting global norms based on moral principles. The Netanyahu-Trump-Putin triumvirate has a definite shared vision and strategy: to create a political bloc that would undermine the current liberal international order and its key players.
In a recent article about Trump for Project Syndicate, legal scholar Mark S. Weiner suggested that Trump’s political vision and practice follow (albeit, unknowingly) the precepts of Carl Schmitt, the German legal scholar who joined the Nazi Party in 1933.
“In place of normativity and universalism, Schmitt offers a theory of political identity based on a principle that Trump doubtless appreciates deeply from his pre-political career: land,” wrote Weiner. “For Schmitt, a political community forms when a group of people recognizes that they share some distinctive cultural trait that they believe is worth defending with their lives. This cultural basis of sovereignty is ultimately rooted in the distinctive geography… that a people inhabit. At stake here are opposing positions about the relation between national identity and law. According to Schmitt, the community’s nomos [the Greek word for “law”] or sense of itself that grows from its geography, is the philosophical precondition for its law. For liberals, by contrast, the nation is defined first and foremost by its legal commitments.”
Netanyahu and his ilk subscribe to this Schmittian vision of the political, making legal commitments subordinate to geography and race. Land and race are the covert and overt motives of Netanyahu’s politics. He and his coalition have, for example, waged a politics of slow annexation in the West Bank, either in the hope of expelling or subjugating the 2.5 million Palestinians living there, or of controlling them.
They have also radicalized the country’s Jewishness with the highly controversial nation-state law. Playing footsie with anti-Semitic leaders may seem to contradict the nation-state law, but it is motivated by the same statist and Schmittian logic whereby the state no longer views itself as committed to representing all of its citizens, but rather aims to expand territory; increase its power by designating enemies; define who belongs and who doesn’t; narrow the definition of citizenship; harden the boundaries of the body collective; and undermine the international liberal order. The line connecting Orban to the nationality law is the sheer and raw expansion of state power.
Courting Orban or Morawiecki means having allies in the European Council and Commission, which would help Israel block unwanted votes, weaken Palestinian international strategies and create a political bloc that could impose a new international order. Netanyahu and his buddies have a strategy and are trying to reshape the international order to meet their own domestic goals. They are counting on the ultimate victory of reactionary forces to have a free hand to do what they please inside the state.
But what is most startling is the fact that in order to promote his illiberal policies, Netanyahu is willing to snub and dismiss the greatest part of the Jewish people, its most accepted rabbis and intellectuals, and the vast number of Jews who have supported, through money or political action, the State of Israel. This suggests a clear and undeniable shift from a politics based on the people to a politics based on the land.
For the majority of Jews outside Israel, human rights and the struggle against anti-Semitism are core values. Netanyahu’s enthusiastic support for authoritarian, anti-Semitic leaders is an expression of a profound shift in the state’s identity as a representative of the Jewish people to a state that aims to advance its own expansion through seizure of land, violation of international law, exclusion and discrimination. This is not fascism per se, but certainly one of its most distinctive features.
This state of affairs is worrisome but it is also likely to have two interesting and even positive developments. The first is that in the same way that Israel has freed itself from its “Jewish complex” – abandoning its role as leader and center of the Jewish people as a whole – many or most Jews will now likely free themselves from their Israel complex, finally understanding that Israel’s values and their own are deeply at odds. World Jewish Congress head Ron Lauder’s August 13, 2018, op-ed in The New York Times, which was close to disowning Israel, is a powerful testimony to this. Lauder was very clear: Israel’s loss of moral status means it won’t be able to demand the unconditional loyalty of world Jewry. What was in the past experienced by many Jews as an inner conflict is now slowly being resolved: Many or most members of Jewish communities will give preference to their commitment to the constitutions of their countries – that is to universalist human rights.
Israel has already stopped being the center of gravity of the Jewish world, and as such, it will be able to count only on the support of a handful of billionaires and the ultra-Orthodox. This means that for the foreseeable future, Israel’s leverage in American politics will be considerably weakened.
Trumpism is a passing phase in American politics. Latinos and left-wing Democrats will become increasingly involved in the country’s politics, and as they do, these politicians will find it increasingly difficult to justify continued American support of Israeli policies that are abhorrent to liberal democracies. Unlike in the past, however, Jews will no longer pressure them to look the other way.
The second interesting development concerns Europe. The European Union no longer knows what its mission was. But the Netanyahus, Trumps, Orbans and Morawieckis will help Europe reinvent its vocation: The social-democrat bloc of the EU will be entrusted with the mission of opposing state-sanctioned anti-Semitism and all forms of racism, and above all defending Europe’s liberal values that we, Jews and non-Jews, Zionists and anti-Zionists, have all fought so hard for. Israel, alas, is no longer among those fighting that fight.
A shorter version of this article has originally appeared in Le Monde.
Eva Illouz : « Orban, Trump et Nétanyahou semblent affectionner barrières et murs »
▻https://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2018/08/08/eva-illouz-israel-contre-les-juifs_5340351_3232.html?xtor=RSS-3208
Dans une tribune au « Monde », l’universitaire franco-israélienne estime que l’alliance du gouvernement israélien avec les régimes « illibéraux » d’Europe de l’Est crée une brèche au sein du peuple juif, pour qui la lutte contre l’antisémitisme et la mémoire de la Shoah ne sont pas négociables.
LE MONDE | 08.08.2018 à 06h39 • Mis à jour le 08.08.2018 à 19h18 | Par Eva Illouz (directrice d’études à l’Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales)
Tribune. Un tremblement de terre est tranquillement en train de secouer le monde juif. Lorsque le premier ministre israélien, Benyamin Nétanyahou, choisit de soutenir Donald Trump avant et après l’élection présidentielle américaine de 2016, certains pouvaient encore donner à ce dernier le bénéfice du doute. Certes, Trump s’était entouré de gens comme Steve Bannon dont émanaient des relents antisémites, certes, il refusait aussi de condamner sa base électorale sympathisante du Ku Klux Klan, mais personne n’était encore sûr de la direction que prendrait sa nouvelle présidence.
Les événements de Charlottesville, en août 2017, n’ont plus permis le doute. Les manifestants néonazis commirent des actes de violence contre des contre-manifestants pacifiques (tuant une personne en fonçant dans la foule avec une voiture), mais Trump condamna de la même façon opposants modérés et manifestants néonazis.
Le monde entier fut choqué de cette mise en équivalence, mais Jérusalem ne protesta pas. L’observateur indulgent (ou cynique) aurait pu interpréter ce silence comme l’acquiescement forcé du vassal vis-à-vis de son suzerain : de tous les pays du monde, Israël est celui qui reçoit la plus grande aide militaire des Etats-Unis.
Cette interprétation n’est désormais plus possible. Il est devenu clair que Nétanyahou a de fortes sympathies pour d’autres dirigeants qui, comme Trump, front preuve d’une grande indulgence vis-à-vis de l’antisémitisme et dont il ne dépend ni militairement ni économiquement.
Une statue à Budapest
Prenons l’exemple de la Hongrie. En 2015, le gouvernement y annonça son intention de dresser une statue à la mémoire de Balint Homan, ministre qui joua un rôle décisif dans la déportation de 600 000 juifs hongrois. Quelques mois plus tard, en 2016, il fut question d’ériger à Budapest une statue à la mémoire d’un des architectes de la législation antijuive durant la seconde guerre mondiale, György Donáth....
Netanyahu expands his struggle against EU during Baltics visit -
Netanyahu said he intended to counterbalance the EU’s ’unfriendly approach to Israel’ through direct contact with European leaders
Noa Landau
Aug 24, 2018 4:18 AM
▻https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-netanyahu-expands-his-struggle-against-eu-during-baltics-visit-1.6
In the heart of Vilnius, Lithuania – his ancestors’ homeland, as he often points out – Benjamin Netanyahu formally thanked the country’s prime minister for helping him wage his all-out diplomatic war on the European Union in recent years.
Netanyahu lauded Saulius Skvernelis on Thursday for his “strong stand” in support of Israel in EU forums. He said it was refreshing to see Skvernelis stand for “clarity, truth and courage.”
“I want to thank you, Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Linas, for the strong position you have taken in the forums of the EU on behalf of truth, on behalf of Israel, on behalf of decency. Israel is often mistreated by the EU in Brussels. There are many distortions that are leveled at us and it’s refreshing to see that you take a stand of clarity, of truth and of courage. And we discussed how that can be expanded,” he said.
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Netanyahu said he intended to counterbalance the EU’s “unfriendly approach to Israel” through direct contact with European leaders, as he began a three-day trip to Lithuania, where he is set to meet leaders of the Baltic nations.
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Lithuania helped Netanyahu visit the EU headquarters in December by getting him a breakfast invitation with European foreign ministers before their monthly session. The move was seen at the time as running contrary to protocol and raised considerable anger in the office of the union’s head of foreign affairs, Federica Mogherini.
Netanyahu has systematically cozied up to the most nationalistic countries of central and east Europe, with the aim of sabotaging the required consensus among the union’s 28 members to pursue a uniform foreign policy. Now he further revealed his strategy to use sub-regional blocs of states, like the Visegrad Forum and its star from Hungary, Viktor Orban, to sway EU positions on the Palestinians and Iran, or at least prevent a consensus, a tactic that would hinder the possibility of advancing new moves affecting Israel.
“I am interested in balancing the not always friendly attitude of the European Union towards Israel so that we receive fairer and more straight-forward treatment. I am doing this through contacts with blocs of countries within the European Union, Eastern European countries, [and] now with the Baltic countries, as well, of course, as with other countries,” Netanyahu said before boarding his plane.
Netanyahu is also due to meet Lituhania’s President Dalia Grybauskaite, Latvian Prime Minister Maris Kucinskis and Estonian Prime Minister Juri Ratas. Also, Netanyahu is scheduled to attend a commemoration ceremony at the memorial site of the Jews’ massacre in Ponar, meet the leaders of the Jewish community in the Vilnius’ Choral Synagogue, the only in the city to survive the Holocaust, and visit the gravesite of the Vilna Gaon, where he will no doubt tell his hosts yet again the history of his family, descendants from the sage of Vilna.
“You know, my family’s from here,” Netanyahu told his Lithuanian counterpart a moment before their meeting. “I know, I know,” the host said.
Israel’s relations with Lithuania and Latvia have been growing warmer in the last few years. Estonia is seen as cooler in its position and leaning toward a neutral stand on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – especially during its term as the EU’s president. Unlike West Europe’s larger states, the Baltic states suffer from negative migration to other EU countries, which leads to a brain drain, and Israel is seeking to strengthen its relations with Estonia on the basis of this issue. Also, the complex history of the Baltic states and Russia has led to the rise of ultra-nationalistic views, and, since the Russian invasion of Crimea, deep concern over defense and military power.
Netanyahu emphasized that, too, in his meetings, telling Lithuanian leaders that like Israel, Lithuania has great national pride, while stressing that this quality stood “alongside democratic values and individual rights.”
Observers in the corridors of Brussels told Haaretz that Netanyahu’s acts indeed have a “chilling effect” on the ability to publish joint statements in the name of the 28 member states. These dynamics are not new but became more prevalent and assertive in the past two or three years. “It’s more difficult for the EU to speak with one clear voice on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” one observer said.
Netanyahu’s cultivation of relations with the eastern European and Baltic states at the expense of the large liberal countries, like France and Germany, comes at a price that some would call ideological and others would call strategic. He is doing all he can to undermine Germany and France in a bid to prevent EU support for the two-state solution, which he himself usually supports in statements made to international audiences.