Month: May 2025

The More Things Change

For some decades after the Second World War, anti-Semitism was pushed to the margins of political discourse, at least in the United States and Europe. The example of the Nazis in showing the logical consequences of formerly widely accepted ideas of master races and inferior races seemed to discredit racist ideas altogether. The only public anti-Semites have been ignorant skinheads and Holocaust-denying cranks.

Lately, this has been changing. Anti-Semitism is making a comeback. Most disturbingly, this resurgence of anti-Jewish hatred is not found among the ignorant and the bigoted but in what might be called the educated elite. Jews are increasingly harassed on and off college campuses. Protests, allegedly against actions of the Israeli government, become anti-Jewish hatefests. Anti-Jewish comments worthy of Julius Streicher are increasingly being accepted. The trope that the Jews are in control of the government is no longer found only in the Israel hating extreme left or the Neo-Nazi extreme right. It is becoming conventional wisdom.

Oddly, the massacre of the Israelis on October 7, 2023, has only stoked hatred of Jews. Public opinion worldwide seems to be more sympathetic to the savages who murdered 1200 people than to the victims of the slaughter. When they do not advance conspiracy theories that the Jews somehow faked the attack, the anti-Semites excuse the attack by asserting that we must see it in the context of previous Israeli atrocities against the Palestinians. Of course, the Israeli response, to eliminate the ability of Hamas to repeat the attack, is not seen in any context. The Israeli response to Hamas terror is inexcusable and genocidal.

The new anti-Semites insist they are not anti-Semitic at all but anti-Zionists. They are not bigots who hate Jews but are protesting against the genocidal oppression of the Israeli government. This is unconvincing. For one thing, they have increasingly been attacking Jewish individuals. These are not representatives of the Israeli government but ordinary Jews, often students on campuses. The pro-Palestinian left has been increasingly making use of the hoariest anti-Semitic tropes of Jewish control of finance and governments. For another thing, the social justice warriors have displayed little concern for or even knowledge of the many oppressed people in the world, except the Palestinians.

Where are the demonstrations against China’s genocide of the Uyghurs? Have there been any protests against Turkey’s oppression of the Kurds? What about Iran’s oppression of religious minorities? Coptic Christians are disappearing in Egypt. No one is concerned. Baha’is are oppressed throughout the Middle East, except in Israel. Christians are mistreated in every Middle Eastern country, except Israel. Whites are having their property confiscated without compensation in South Africa. No one seems to care.

If it is a matter of land being occupied, where is the outrage against China’s lengthy occupation of Tibet? What about Turkey’s occupation of Northern Cyprus? Is anyone protesting Morocco’s occupation of the Western Sahara? Why not? Why is Israel singled out as an outlaw state when there are so many examples of worse behavior in the world? I have listed only a few notable examples of bad behavior. There are many more. None gets the attention that the Palestinian situation gets. Why? Is Israel uniquely bad?

Israel is not an ideal state. No state inhabited by human beings can be perfect. But Israel is, in many ways, an admirable state. Israel is a democratic country in a region where autocracy is the norm. Israel is the only country in the Middle East where women are equal to men. The Arab citizens of Israel have the same freedoms as the Jewish population, and greater freedom than anywhere else in the Middle East.  Israel is the only state in the region where anyone may worship as they please. It is the only place in the region where being homosexual does not lead to a death sentence.

Israel is a small country, but it punches well above its weight economically. Unlike its neighbors, Israel has an advanced and wealthy economy based on industry and technology. Israel leads the world in scientific research and technological development.

Israel ought to be generally admired. Yet Israel is despised. Why is this? Why is Israel, alone among the nations, held to a standard no nation could attain and then condemned for not achieving the impossible standard? Israel is uniquely condemned. Israel is not uniquely evil. Is there some other way that Israel is unique?

Yes, Israel is unique because it is the only Jewish nation. Doesn’t it stand to reason that there must be some relation between these two uniquenesses? It is almost a mathematical proposition. If A=B and B=C, then A=C. Israel is uniquely condemned. Israel is uniquely a Jewish state. Israel is condemned for being the Jewish state. The people protesting Israel on our college campuses do not care about the alleged atrocities committed by Israel. They show no interest in protesting against worse atrocities elsewhere. They do not care about the welfare of the Palestinians. What they care about is hating Jews.  They are the moral and intellectual descendants of the Nazi Brownshirts who harrassed the Jews of Germany.

The people protesting Israel like to call Republicans Nazis and Trump Hitler. If they really want to see who the Nazis are, they should look in a mirror.

Cinco de Mayo

Charge of the Mexican Cavalry at the Battle of... Charge of the Mexican Cavalry at the Battle of Puebla (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

Today is Cinco de Mayo or the Fifth of May. Contrary to what is commonly believed, (including by myself), Cinco de Mayo is actually more of an American, or at least a Mexican-American, holiday than a Mexican one. Cinco de Mayo is only celebrated regionally in Mexico, primarily in the states of Puebla and Vera Cruz. Schools are closed on this day, but it is not an official national holiday in Mexico.

Cinco de Mayo celebrates the Mexican victory over the French at the Battle of  Puebla on May 5, 1862. In 1861, the Mexican government was bankrupt and President Benito Juarez suspended payments on Mexico’s foreign debt. In response, Britain, France, and Spain sent naval forces to occupy the city of Vera Cruz and demand payment on the debts Mexico owed them. Juarez managed to come to an arraignment with Britain and Spain, but the French, ruled by Emperor Napoleon III had other ideas.

Louis Napoleon III was the nephew of Napoleon I Bonaparte. He had somehow managed to get himself elected president of the Second Republic of  France in 1848. Still, he decided that president was not a grand enough title for a Bonaparte, and in 1851 he seized dictatorial power in France and named himself Emperor. Despite being the nephew of Napoleon I, Napoleon III was not a particularly aggressive Emperor and was mostly content to have France at peace with other European powers. With the crisis in Mexico, however, Napoleon III saw an opportunity for France to gain an empire in Latin America. The United States was involved in the Civil War and was in no position to try to enforce the Monroe Doctrine. In fact, an additional benefit to the French occupation of Mexico would be to give France a base with which to send aid to the Confederate States, keeping the nation divided and unable to resist the French conquest.

 

The French army invaded Mexico with 8000 men under the command of General Charles de Lorencez late in 1861. This army marched from Vera Cruz in April  1862 and defeated Mexican forces led by Ignacio Zaragoza Seguin on April 28. Seguin retreated to the city of Puebla where the Mexicans had two forts. Seguin had only 4500 badly armed and trained men to defend the city. It seemed likely that the French would crush the Mexicans and march on to Mexico City without any further resistance.

 

On May 5, Lorencez attacked the forts with 6500 men. Against all odds, the Mexicans successfully defended the forts against three assaults. By the third assault, the French artillery had run out of ammunition, so the infantry had to attack without artillery support. They were driven back and the French had to fall back. Then, Seguin attacked with his cavalry while the Mexican infantry outflanked the French on both sides of their positions. The French were routed with 462 men killed, while the Mexicans only suffered 83 dead. This unlikely victory has been an inspiration for Mexican patriots ever since.

 

The victory was a short-lived one. Napoleon III sent reinforcements to Mexico and the French were able to conquer the country. Napoleon III placed the Austrian Hapsburg Maximilian as the first Emperor of the Mexican Empire. He was also the last Emperor since as soon as the United States was finished with the Civil War, the US government made it clear to Napoleon III that it would not tolerate a French colony on the southern border. Since Napoleon III did not want to fight a war against battle-hardened Civil War veterans, he removed the French troops. Maximilian, even though he sincerely tried to govern Mexico well, was quickly overthrown and executed.

 

Although Benito Juarez declared that the anniversary of the Battle of Puebla would be a national holiday, Cinco de Mayo was first celebrated by Mexicans in the American Southwest, the territories the US gained in the Mexican War. The former Mexicans began to celebrate Cinco de Mayo both as a way to express their Mexican identity and to show their support for the North in the Civil War. It may seem odd that these unwilling Americans would care about a war half a continent away, but the Mexicans were against slavery, and Hispanics insisted that California enter the United States as a free state. Cinco de Mayo gained popularity in the 1960s with the rise of Latino activism and still more in the 1980s when beer companies realized that the celebratory nature of the holiday would be a good marketing tool to sell more beer.

 

So happy Cinco de Mayo, or should I say Feliz Cinco de Mayo!

 

 

 

 

Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started