January 31
2005
Pigs on a poster are the least of our worries (Independent)
» Posted on January 31, 2005 07:20 AM » Category: Anti-semitism

‘The trouble with you Jews’, I was once told, ‘is that you are far too sensitive’. My correspondent (who went on to inform me that the fact of my presence in the pages of a national newspaper was, of itself, evidence that Jews run the media) was upbraiding me after a piece in which I pointed out that, whilst criticism of Israel is certainly not evidence of anti-Semitism, there are times when the two are indeed one and the same thing.

There is now little doubt that the oldest hatred is on the march once more. On the streets, where anti-Semitic incidents are rising to new levels, Jews are physically attacked for the mere fact of being Jews. It is easy – and proper – for liberals to condemn such behaviour. But there is a far more insidious, and far more dangerous, form of anti-Semitism which is now taking hold across large parts of the culture, which uses implicit attacks on ‘the Jews’ to make political capital. When there is evidence of such behaviour it needs to be highlighted, condemned and punished. The consequence of not doing that was commemorated last Thursday, on Holocaust Memorial Day.

But it is critical that the accusation of anti-Semitism is used only in the clearest cut cases. Bandying it around when the evidence is weak is dangerously counter-productive. As the boy who cried wolf discovered, when it really matters, no one will listen.

That is why the latest contretemps over a supposedly anti-Semitic Labour Party poster is so dispiriting. The poster consists of the heads of two Conservative politicians, grafted on to the bodies of two pigs with wings, with the phrase ‘The day the Tory sums add up’. That’s when pigs will fly; get it?

It’s a pretty silly poster. But apparently it’s not just silly; it’s also anti-Semitic. The reason? The two politicians are Michael Howard and Oliver Letwin, who are both Jewish.

The story arose when a Tory candidate said that the poster is “tasteless” because there is nothing more distasteful for a Jew than being associated with a pig. I won’t name the accuser since his publicity stunt was contemptible and should not be rewarded. He appears to have thought that if he made an accusation of anti-Semitism it would somehow endear him to his Jewish would-be constituents.

Let’s leave aside his fatuous statement about pigs and Jews and concentrate on the matter in hand. Being beaten up by anti-Semites is, after all, ever so slightly more distasteful.

The phrase ‘when pigs fly’ is in common parlance. Suggesting the Leader of the Opposition and Shadow Chancellor’s sums don’t add up is fair comment - and has nothing whatsoever to do with their being Jewish.

There are, however, real examples which do merit concern. Another Labour poster, which has Michael Howard mocked up as a Fagin or Shylock-style money grabber is genuinely worrying, since it seems to have no intent other than to promote the association between Michael Howard and Jewish caricatures.

And take a recent piece by the Energy Minister, Mike O’Brien in Muslim News: “Ask yourself what will Michael Howard do for British Muslims? Will his foreign policy aim to help Palestine? Will he promote legislation to protect you from religious hatred and discrimination? Will he give you the choice of sending your children to a faith school? Will he stand up for the right of Muslim women to wear the hijab? Will he really fight for Turkey, a Muslim country, to join the EU?”

Fair comment, you might think. But all bar one of those items are Tory party policy. So the only construction that can be put on Mike O'Brien's words is that Mr Howard will not do what his party has pledged to do, such as aiming "to help Palestine" or "really fight for Turkey, a Muslim country, to join the EU". And why might Mr Howard – the Jew – not do that?

Mr O’Brien also chose to attack another MP, this time a LibDem, in the same piece. The man he alighted upon just happened to be Evan Harris. Not Charles Kennedy. Not any other LibDem. Just Mr Harris - the only Jewish LibDem MP, who is not even a front bencher.

His remarks – genuinely playing the anti-Semitic card to a Muslim audience – are as foul in their own way as anything emanating from the BNP.

Or there’s Khalid Mahmood, the Labour MP for Birmingham Perry Barr, who condemned the Muslim Council of Britain's boycott of the Auschwitz liberation commemoration: “I’m proud to be a Muslim. But if people are boycotting this, then I think it’s a mistake. People who were exterminated in the Holocaust were not just Jews. There were Romany Gypsies as well.”

It wasn’t ‘just Jews’ who died. It was decent people, worth commemorating, too.

Probably the most widespread current anti-Semitic trope is the use of the phrase ‘neo-con’. Few of its users have the slightest idea what it means and employ it instead as a politically acceptable euphemism for ‘imperialist Jews’.
Given time, and the ever greater use of genuinely anti-Semitic political tactics, the need for such euphemisms will disappear. Attacks on ‘the Jews’ will not need to be couched.

Stemming that tide is vital – and it is not helped when baseless accusations muddy the water.

Stephen Pollard’s essay on ‘anti-Semitism and the EU’ will be published shortly in The New European Extremism (Institute for Jewish Policy Research)


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Comments

Fair comment.

Note that the Shylock/Fagin mock up wias done by the ('Hurrah for the Blackshirts') Daily Mail.....

Stated by: Mark on January 31, 2005 12:54 PM

But the Mail dropped support for Mosley the moment Jewish department store owners threatened to pull their ads.

It is quite wrong to use "neocon" as a synonym for Jew, since American Jews are only 25 times as likely as gentiles to be prominent neoconservatives. It is also incorrect to use "anti-semitic" as a synonym for "anti-Jewish".

Pretty thin, kvetching stuff, this. Is Pollard tired after his Blunkett swimgloat? Has he been sacked by or quit the Times? The Indy has a much smaller circulation. Does it pay better?

Stated by: Gorblimey on January 31, 2005 1:24 PM

Yes more blatant Jew-baiting from 2k5mrjm02@sneakemail.com ("Gorblimey" today). It is truly sad that Jewish children live in a land where they must breathe the same air as this odious individual.

What do you reckon he does? Unemployed? Librarian? Office clerk?
Plumber?

And more on this topic from William Rees Mogg

Fagin, Shylock and Blair

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1052-1463793,00.html

And from Melanie Phillips:

Labour spin and the oldest hatred

http://www.melaniephillips.com/articles/archives/001025.html

Stated by: Jessica on January 31, 2005 1:43 PM

Flying pigs? It’s not because Muslims would have been insulted by being depicted like that, that it is the same for the Jews. But for the case the pictures might have been intended to be insulting (in fact anti-Semitic), this only proves something about the habitat of those who invented it.

For Jews the result was probably only good laughing.

Flanders

Stated by: Johan Van Beek on January 31, 2005 2:20 PM

My question though is what is the "jewish labor' position i.e. do fold like Gerald Kaufaman thinnk there is no issue or just that all's fair in love and politics?

Stated by: Giles on January 31, 2005 3:36 PM

Jessica re: 'Gorblimey' "What do you reckon he does? Unemployed? Librarian? Office clerk?Plumber?"

Well going on form it looks like he's part of the New Labour copywriting team. New Labour, putting the National back into Socialist.

Stated by: dmick on January 31, 2005 3:48 PM

Jessica, dmick: You're both wrong. I'm a rentier.

Mazel tov!

Stated by: Gorblimey on January 31, 2005 6:39 PM

Neocon being imperialist Jews? Condelezza Rice is Jewish?

Stated by: Moi on January 31, 2005 10:27 PM

Rees-Mogg makes the most coherent argument for there being a much more sinister plot behind this. It makes sense - drag up a storm that seems petty, so the party doesn't get damaged. Yet at the same time remind the (worryingly large) proportion of the population who said they wouldn't vote for a Jew as PM that Howard is Jewish...

Possibly far-fetched, but a coherent idea.

Stated by: Ken on January 31, 2005 11:59 PM

Condelezza Rice is a neocon?

Stated by: Matthew on February 1, 2005 10:13 AM

Muslim voters out-number Jewish voters 6 to 1. Or am I too cynical?

Stated by: Guido Fawkes on February 1, 2005 1:51 PM

As hard as I try to believe this poster is not anti-semitic I'm afraid I just don't buy it. It is inconceivable that such a poster would have been put out about two Muslim politicians; Campbell and Milburn would have been too terrified that old Osama or one of his mates would have sent the boys round.

Most non-Jewish people know absolutely nothing about Judaism or Jews. I suspect that the people who did this poster and who approved it never realised that Letwin was Jewish. But the inescapable fact is, notwithstanding that pigs are fine halachically (ie, in Jewish law) except for eating, that most people, once the connection is pointed out, perceive the association with pigs as being a sly and unpleasant reference to Letwin and Howard being Jewish. It just shows that clever ad men can be incredibly stupid. As are the politicians who brief them who seem incapable of understanding that the public are absolutely sick to death of this sort of negative advertising.

Stated by: The only Jew in the village on February 1, 2005 11:20 PM

Personally I don't think the pigs poster was intended to refer to Letwin and Howard'sfaith. I might have run such a poster (had I not thought it was a poor poster in political terms) against Labour's policies regardless of the religion or ethnic background of any cabinet member. I'm not in a position to say whether the poster would be offensive to any individual Jews or Muslims or to their faiths. However, I disagree with The only Jew in the village. There is absolutely no way that those responsible for approving these adverts - even to the extent of sending them out to party members - would have been unaware that Letwin is Jewish.

Stated by: Mike Wood on February 2, 2005 12:25 AM

I can only add that as an American Jew, I feel grateful that I don't have vote for any UK political party. I cannot find a single party that I would feel comfortable voting for.

Is there someone here who can explain why anti-Semitism is so much stronger in supposedly enlightened Europe than in the USA?

Stated by: Susan on February 7, 2005 6:50 PM

Anti-semitism is not particularly stronger in Europe than in the US - if you look at the statistics on anti-Jewish opinion, Europe and the US score about the same. There has been a rise in vandalism and attacks over the last couple of years which is alarming in percentage form, but from a very low base.

For a thoughtful discussion of the issue, see this Prospect article from 2002:

http://www.axt.org.uk/essays/Lerman.htm

Stated by: Athenian on February 8, 2005 5:26 PM

I'm neither Jewish nor ever likely to vote for Mr Howard and his party, but I nevertheless I found that the 'nudge-nudge, wink-wink' reference to Howard's Jewish roots in New Labour's piggy and Fagin posters left me with a nasty taste in my mouth. I just do not believe that there was nobody in New Labour's propaganda team or the advertising agency responsible for the posters who did not question the use of such imagery in connection with someone who is well known to be a Jew. The use of such imagery cannot be an accident, as we are not dealing with politically naive or stupid people. This coming general election is going to be very personalised (mainly because there is so little difference between the policies of the Tories and New Labour) and will be extremely unpleasant. These posters and Mike O'Brien's statements mentioned above make a shameful kick-off to it.

Stated by: Arthur Trusscott on February 14, 2005 1:34 PM

I cannot find a single party that I would feel comfortable voting for.

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