Jewish self-defense

Jews today should not be choosy about those offering assistance against the new fascism.

By AMIEL UNGAR
Max Levitas, 96, who participated in the 1936 ‘Battle of Cable Street’, poses 75 years later in front of a mural depicting the clash. (photo credit: REUTERS)
Max Levitas, 96, who participated in the 1936 ‘Battle of Cable Street’, poses 75 years later in front of a mural depicting the clash.
(photo credit: REUTERS)
IN THE Rosh Hashana spirit, I prefer to give a pass to the internal debate over the right approach to achieving peace while ensuring Israel’s survival.
The one area where we were unquestioningly defeated out - side Israel during the recent war in Gaza was on the street.
Those seeking to Boycott, Diversify and Sanction Israel out of existence were everywhere, seeking to intimidate Israel supporters of every stripe.
While the Gaza fighting did trigger a spike in such actions, the portents were already profuse. Stores selling Israeli products were harassed. Attendees of performances featuring Israeli artists were cursed on their way in by demonstrators who then sought to disrupt the performance itself. Israeli spokespersons were prevented from speaking on campuses and pro-Israeli students found “eviction notices” pushed under their doors. With each success the anti- Israel crowd became further emboldened.
One of the high points of their self-confidence came on July 25 when a band of anti-Israel demonstrators decided to raid the predominantly Jewish New York Diamond Center. They were silenced and expelled when the store owners closed their stores and came out en masse to stage a counter demonstration. There were few similar bright spots during the summer.
What happened in New York reminded me of what I had read about the October 1936 “Battle of Cable Street” in London, when Jews, helped by communists and others, physically opposed marches by the British Union of Fascists through their East End neighborhoods.
This fighting response to Oswald Mosley’s “Blackshirts” marked a repudiation of the British Board of Jewish Deputies’ defensive approach, which insisted that the Jews respond to their tormentors as “citizens rather than as Jews.”
While it is, of course, preferable that efforts at harassment and intimidation be viewed as an attack upon society as a whole, the Jews have to take the lead as Jews, if society proves tardy or indifferent. As a result of Cable Street, the British government banned Mosley-style uniformed marches and Jewish militancy served as a catalyst for the Public Order Act of 1936.
To repel the Fascists, the London Jews were willing to accept the aid of British communists at the time of the 1930s Moscow show trials. If the Euro pean establishment parties are willing to countenance the intimidation of their Jewish citizens, Jews today should not be choosy about those offering assistance against the new Fascism.
It is also time to insist on reciprocity.
If pro-Israeli speakers cannot speak on campuses, then pro-Palestinian speakers are not welcome either; if British MP George Galloway advocates Israel-free zones, we should endeavor to establish zones free of Galloway.
This is not a prescription for suicidal tactics or martyrdom. Jews cannot retake Muslim-dominated Malmö in Sweden or make areas that are considered no-go zones by the police safe areas for Jewish and pro-Israel activity, but we can fight back in places like the Paris suburb of Sarcelles.
Where governments actively foment anti-Semitism and instruct the law enforcement bodies to act in this spirit, evacuation is the only answer. Evacuation, however, should not be the default response.
While as a committed Zionist, I would like to see as many Jews as possible here in Israel, I do not want the Galloways as my recruiting sergeants or the Dieudonnes of France as my aliya agents. Economy Minister Naftali Bennett warned that for every Jew motivated by anti-Semitism to make aliya, others would elect to live at best as crypto-Jews or at worst opt out altogether.
Israel will, of course, be there to act as a welcoming haven. But it has a prior obligation to make good on the warning delivered to EU ambassadors by Kadima MK Yisrael Hasson at the Knesset Diaspora Affairs Committee, “If European countries fail to protect their Jews, the State of Israel will. Jewish blood is not cheap,” he declared.
 Contributor Amiel Ungar is also a columnist for the Hebrew weekly Besheva