Israelis Vs. Jews

In a bar near campus, American College Republicans were bonding with a group of Israelis visiting the school, telling stories revolving around a shared love of firearms and the military. The Israelis had all done military service; none of the College Republicans had. Casually but neatly dressed, the Israeli men spoke knowledgeably about international politics and military strategy when they weren’t cracking racist jokes. The Israeli girls dressed stylishly to show off their fit physiques but kept an appropriate appearance and gloried in politically incorrect speech and humor, speaking with open contempt of nonwhites (which, it was implied, didn’t include themselves). If they hadn’t been Israelis, the College Republicans would have left the table in horror and denounced them; they instead stayed, drank, and laughed. 

At a nearby table, scowling at the throng, were the leaders of the school’s progressive groups, including the LGBTers, the Socialists, the Democrats, the feminists, and a few others. With the exception of the blacks and “Chicanos,” all were at least part Jewish, gay, or both. The Jewish students were either timeously small or monstrously obese, with pockmarked skin, smelly clothes littered with buttons and curse words, and a deliberately slovenly appearance that I half sensed was a protest against “fascist beauty standards.” It couldn’t have been a greater contrast to the cocky, confident, and soldierly Israelis holding court with what passed for the American Right on campus. Even in physical features, the two groups of Jews looked nothing alike.

Going further (and yes dear readers, I am baiting you here) the Israelis were the most aristocratic in their dress and behavior of any of the people in the room, including the Republicans. They acted like they owned the place and could take anyone who said otherwise.

In Mein Kampf (see guys, I haven’t gone soft), there is a famous passage that gets recited in all of your history of World War II classes and is prominently featured in any documentary or movie about the “Rise of Evil.” Hitler describes seeing a Jew with “black curls” and a “long caftan” walking through the city and is caught off caught by what to him is a strange sight. He asks himself, “Is this a Jew?” More ominously, he wonders just afterward, “Is this a German?”

When confronting these swaggering militarists who acted like they were Draka, I couldn’t help but wonder, “Are these Israelis?” and then, just afterward, “Are they really Jews?”

The mainstream media has largely responded to the unexpected victory of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud party with barely disguised disgust. The dominant Narrative is that by electing Netanyahu, the Israelis have decided that they are “rejecting peace.” And leading the charge are many American Jews, notably the cultural Hofjude Jon Stewart, who accused Likud of “ginning up racist fears of minority turnout” like they were evil White Republicans. In the medium term, we can expect increased support for the divestment movement among mainline Protestant churches and on college campuses. There will also be increased public pressure on the Jewish state, especially given the now openly hostile relationship between Barack Obama and the newly empowered Israeli Prime Minister.

The Alternative Right is perhaps overly impressed with the use of “cuckold” as an insult, but no other word so accurately describes the behavior of the Republican Party and mainstream conservatives in response. Speaker John Boehner was willing to insult the President of the United States in order to fête Benjamin Netanyahu, but he did it on the very day he utterly betrayed his own constituents by surrendering on Obama’s unilateral amnesty for “undocumented migrants” (or what the Israelis call “illegal infiltrators.”)

The cutesy references to the Israeli leader as “Bibi,” the weird fetish about passing around pictures of Netanyahu’s youth as a soldier, and the open declarations on Twitter that the Israeli Prime Minister should be President of the United States make it difficult to avoid the conclusion that many American conservatives have effectively outsourced their sense of identity to a foreign people half a world away. The desire for someone, anyone, to take strong action against “the Muslims” is also part of the explanation, and needless to say, the issue of possible Israeli support for ISIS as a check on Shiite Iran doesn’t come up.

Of course, the fact that many American evangelicals quite literally worship Jews as a people doesn’t help. The publication of the new book “When a Jew Rules the World,” by the Christian news organization WorldNetDaily speaks for itself.

But if American politics has taught us anything, it’s that whatever the Republicans support is destined to lose. And while the overwhelming majority of Democratic politicians still support it, Israel is slowly becoming a partisan cause. President Obama and Vice President Joseph Biden both boycotted Netanyahu’s speech, Nancy Pelosi insulted the Prime Minister after it, and black Democrats accused the Israeli leader of racism because he had “disrespected” The First Black President. Democratic support for Israel has dipped below 50 percent. Though American Jews hate White American evangelicals, it’s the nonwhite immigrants that American Jewish organizations champion who are leading the charge against Israel.

Fewer people are listening to the last argument pro-Israeli American Jewish organizations have left, which is simply the hypocritical claim that Jews are somehow different and entitled. Unless they have a religious belief for believing it, no can take this seriously as claims of “anti-Semitism” from the political Right appear increasingly fantastic. If the classic Zionist position is “diversity for thee, but not for me,” it looks like the Left is shifting towards a more consistent egalitarian position.

This includes many American Jews, as polls show decreasing identification with the Zionist project among the younger generation of the Chosen. Though it’s harder to find objective data proving this, it seems that more self-defined “anti-racists” are now openly anti-Zionist, with Jews like Tim Wise and the Israel-obsessed Max Blumenthal serving as prominent examples.

Today, the slogan “Open Borders for Israel” is a way to point out the naked nationalist double standard and the stark existence of Jewish privilege. A decade from now, “Open Borders for Israel” may be policy. Will this somehow improve our own situation?

It won’t happen overnight, as Israel still enjoys far more favorable press coverage (for obvious reasons) than any other nation would in similar circumstances. But for how long?

If Israel dies, it most likely will not be with a bang (or a Samson option) but a whimper. The beleaguered Israeli Left is already looking to the Arabs for electoral support and changing demographics will make it harder for Zionists to maintain a majority willing to defend the essentially Jewish character of the state. Further complicating the situation is Israel’s own native Parasitic Class in the form of the self-interested ultra-Orthodox Jews, who possess a soaring birthrate, are almost entirely reliant on welfare, and are fiercely resistant to military conscription. Whatever the estimates of the Jewish population of Israel, deduct the ultra-Orthodox, who aren’t actually doing much to keep the Zionist project going.

This leaves the burden of defending the state on the more secular Israeli population, who may start wondering why they should conduct armed patrols among hostile Arabs when they can leave for America and enjoy the Kali Yuga in style. There’s also the moral burden of being the “bad guys” of global opinion.

It’s not uncommon to meet young Jewish-Americans whose parents took them away from Israel as children so they could avoid conscription. One acquaintance who possess dual citizenship but who moved to America as a child laughs at the letters from the Israeli government demanding he report back for the draft. “Well, I’ll never be able to make Aliyah,” he joked. He doesn’t seem to care, and few other American Jews of the younger generation see Israel as anything other than place where you can get a free vacation and get laid on Birthright. And with intermarriage now at 71 percent among non-Orthodox American Jews, that is likely to continue. (What, after all, is the difference between a SWPL and a secular American Jew, a Stephen Colbert or a Jon Stewart?)

One of the major contributing factors to the Death of the West is that the responsibility of preserving a people and a state involves hard work. If you already enjoy a reasonable expectation of personal safety, it’s easier to go along with the flow.

As Jews in the United States and other locations don’t face the possibility of pogroms any time soon, many American Jews look at Israelis the same way European-Americans view White advocates. Life is short; why make things harder for yourself? Like the Afrikaners, who voted to destroy themselves rather than become “far right,” the Israelis may eventually break as Zionism becomes increasingly unrespectable.

Naturally, there is an alternative. If I were in Netanyahu’s position, I would use the current position of strength to cut a deal with the Palestinians offering extremely generous terms, including the partition of Jerusalem, while holding the line on denying the “right of return.” A two-state solution that would protect a permanent Jewish majority in Israel proper could make the Zionist project sustainable in the long term, even if it means temporarily confronting the Israeli Right. Israel would become a “normal” country focused on the welfare state and economic growth. Netanyahu would also be widely praised internationally for confronting his own religious extremists and hard Right, so it wouldn’t be much of a personal sacrifice for him.

But who are we talking about here? Just days before the election, Netanyahu told voters that if he was elected, it meant there would “never” be a Palestinian state, even though he has supposedly reversed position since the election. It appears his real strategy is to give the international community just enough to keep them from imposing sanctions, while quietly seizing Palestinian land a few settlements at a time. An expansionist policy also helps him domestically by defusing concerns about the skyrocketing cost of living.

However, in the long term, it makes the Israeli position all but untenable, ensures permanent war, and essentially takes for granted continuous support from Europe and the United States, which seems all but guaranteed to fade over the coming decades. The Israeli leadership is banking on its ability to continuously juggle domestic and foreign policy crises indefinitely while grabbing as much as they can. They have done a skillful job over the last few years and their influence within the West gives them an advantage, but they only have to fail once for the entire enterprise to fall apart.

What will happen to Israel in the end? I turn to my well-thumbed copy of Pat Buchanan’s Death of the West to quote Richard Nixon’s verdict.

“The long run?” Nixon responded. He extended his right first, thumb up, in the manner of a Roman emperor passing sentence on a gladiator, and slowly turned his thumb over and down. (122)

Some European nationalists have decided that they can garner an improved reputation in the media by openly supporting Israel. It doesn’t seem to have worked, and, as we are talking about Israel, it is never going to. But we can expect some kind of Realpolitik from Israel, as it was the Jewish state that was one of apartheid South Africa’s strongest backers.

The real question is what will happen with American Jews, who are starting to regard their Israeli cousins like careerist Southerners who move to Washington DC think about their gun toting relatives back in Dixie. As the current Israeli leadership seems determined to believe they can get away with whatever they want indefinitely, the uncomfortable reality for diaspora Jews is that Israel may actually become harmful to Jewish interests. The “escape” argument doesn’t seem very appealing in the Middle East of all places. And while European Jews are flirting with leaving the Continent, more appealing exile locations, notably Canada and the United States, still beckon the Tribe.

Power is more effectively exercised through indirect forms. When trying to persuade someone, you always want them to think that they have made up their own mind rather than simply screaming at them. The illusion of choice is far harder to combat than the mailed fist of raw power—one of the reasons that electoral democracy is, in its own way, far more tyrannical than any autocracy. Democracy, to quote Harold Covington, is a system designed to prevent change.

There will never be a hate campaign of the kind conducted against South Africa, certainly not by diaspora Jews. Nor would the world tolerate the kind of genocide against Jews that we see against Boer farmers. But many Jews, especially safe, prosperous, and powerful ones like many of those in the American media and cultural establishment, may find that the end of Israel as a militaristic Jewish state would actually strengthen their own influence. Jewish power is actually lessened when the world confronts aggressive, swaggering Israelis marching across the world stage and flaunting their influence by bringing the most powerful nation on Earth to heel. When it is more subtle and unseen, it is actually stronger.

A one-state non-sectarian Israel/Palestine would quickly devolve into just another Third World Arab country. Even if it were still called “Israel,” we can expect most Jews would flee to the West, especially the United States. Instead of images of the powerful IDF merrily bombing its way across the Gaza Strip, the media would show images of Jews tearfully leaving the Middle East, victims and wanderers once again. However, as the strength of the Tribe is in its powerfully ethnocentric religious tradition and not in a military or a state, they would find a welcome refuge in the diaspora communities as well as sympathy (furthered by guilt) from the host population. Our situation would be worse, not better. To use Winston Churchill’s phrase, in the conflict between Zionism and Bolshevism, the latter will have won, eternally.

Israel’s nationalism is somewhat dishonest because it is so dependent on Western aid and military protection. And even though the Israeli impact on our foreign policy is not the monolithic cause for America’s pointless interventions in the Middle East, it’s clearly a contributing factor. Obviously, we shouldn’t choose between “Palestine” or “Israel”—we choose Europa. But if forced to choose between the tactics of Israel’s ethnocentric garrison state and the left wing Culture of Critique we encounter at home, the former is less objectionable and harmful.

Where do European Identitarians fit into all this? Israel is worth exploring for two reasons.

First, Europeans who dream of an ethnostate that transcends “petty nationalism” should look closely at the Israeli experience. Here we have a state that wielded together widely disparate traditions, worked to obtain aid through existing states where they had a presence, and had to wage both guerilla and conventional warfare to defend their territory. While some have pointed to the Irish independence struggle or the War for Southern Independence as models for how the White ethnostate will be achieved, the truth is that if it is a “White” ethnostate rather than a revitalized existing state, the process will look more like the Zionist project than anything else.

Secondly, more importantly, and certainly more controversially, we have nothing to gain from the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state (have at it, comments section). I’ll go further—the end of Israel as a Jewish state is likely to increase the power of left wing Jews globally, not decrease it.

Furthering the Jewish victimization Narrative, increasing progressive influence and media power at home, and racking up another victory for the forces of universal egalitarianism isn’t worth whatever schadenfreude people might feel at Israel’s comeuppance. It’s doubtful that American foreign policy would be radically changed, as we can expect American forces would still be needed in the Middle East because of the oil fields and the close ties the American government has with Saudi Arabia. And while we shouldn’t act like Republican shills for Israel, “solidarity” with the Palestinian cause doesn’t do anything to advance the cause of European liberation. Nor can I stomach the possibility of making common cause with the churches that profiteer by importing nonwhite immigrants or the Third World campus organizers leading the anti-Israel charge.

(Besides, would you want to live in, or even visit “liberated” Palestine? Probably no more than most of those “anti-apartheid activists” wanted to stick around their precious new Rainbow Nation.)

We have to confront the possibility that a real split is developing between “Israelis” and “Jews,” something that could have momentous consequences for our own geopolitical situation. We should treat this development the same way we should treat secession movements or the international balance of power—opportunistically and for our own ends. I support the Russian efforts to destabilize the American led balance of power not because I want to live under the rule of some Duginist Imperium, but because it creates new opportunities. Similarly, I believe that the Left’s coming abandonment of Zionism and the increasing challenges to the Jewish state will create more opportunities for Europeans to stake our own claim to a homeland.

Ultimately, this isn’t about them. It’s about us. Our policy towards Israel should be opportunistic indifference. And awareness of and education about the forces targeting us shouldn’t blind us to the reality that our fate as a people is ultimately in our own hands and the future will bring opportunities we don’t expect.

As Richard Spencer concluded his speech on “Facing the Future as a Minority,”

In Altneuland, Herzl wrote, referring to his “utopian” plan for Jewish state in Palestine: “If you wish it, it is no fairy tale. … If you don’t wish it, it is a fairly tale and will remain one.”

Or, to quote another historical figure: “I have a dream.”