Infamy, infamy – the Jewish News has got it in for me!

What kind of state is it whose Ministers Urge Other Countries not to fund their human rights groups? a Zionist state

Louise Ellman's War Against Palestinian Children

Sometimes I feel like my favourite comedian, Frankie Howerd, whose catchphrase in the immortal Up Pompei was ‘infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it in for me.’ [although, as a reader has pointed out Kenneth Williams was the originator of the line, judged as the funniest one liner ever]  Almost every week I seem to provide copy for the Jewish News. I’m not quite sure what I’ve done to deserve it. It’s getting to the stage where, if I catch a cold, the headline in the Jewish News will be something like:

‘Tony Greenstein who was expelled from (insert your favourite organisation) claimed he caught a cold this week. However we have good reason to believe he was just trying to avoid getting expelled from the local chess club.’

The Jewish News Political Editor and according to his own description a 'so-called journalist'

Jack Mendel, the 'so-called journalist' took pride in reporting me to Twitter for having dared to disagree with him and boasted that I had been removed -  however he kept silent when I overturned the ban!

First it was their ‘so-called journalist’ (his description not mine) Jack Mendel @mendelpol. Jack had called Israel the victim of Hamas aggression on Twitter when we all know that the Israeli state has been playing the innocent victim for the past 70 years. When I explained that when Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939 it too had claimed victim status Mendelpol saw red (or blue).

This headline is like saying the Pope is a Catholic - perhaps I should have said that the anti-Semitism witchhunt was about genuine antisemitism?

Unable to muster a reply he cried ‘hate  speech, anti-Semitism’ etc. and  complained to Twitter, who promptly banned me. We then had the spectacle of a ‘journalist’ boasting he had managed to censor an opponent. However he who laughs last laughs longest. As a result of a sustained campaign with help from Canary, Mondoweiss and Electronic Intifada Twitter agreed to reverse their decision. @Mendelpol has been very quiet ever since!

Spot the difference between the Jewish Chronicle headline above and the Jewish News one below

Like its sister paper, the Jewish Chronicle, the Jewish News was pleased that my account had been taken down by Medium over a post correctly linking North West Friends of Israel to Tommy Robinson supporters - Free Speech and Zionism being a contradiction in terms

I'm worried that if I blow my nose in public there may be a Jewish News reporter lurking in the bushes

The JN’s latest headline concerns my decision to stand for Secretary of Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Entitled Expelled Labour activist Tony Greenstein standing to be Secretary of PSC (because it is essential that the JN’s readers are reminded that the Fake Anti-Semitism Campaign Managed to Catch At Least One Jew) readers are also told that ‘

According to this headline I've been suspended from UNISON, according to a later article I've been 'booted out' - the problem with Internet Newspapers is that they have no standards

‘Jewish anti-Zionist, who has also been booted out of Unison trade union too, launches a bid to become the secretary of Palestine Solidarity Campaign.’

Of course I sympathise with the author of the article, one Joe Millis. It must be terribly difficult remembering an article which your paper carried all of two months previously Notorious anti-Zionist Tony Greenstein is suspended from Unison union for three years Still, if one week is a long time in politics, as Harold Wilson observed, then two months must be an eternity for ‘journalists’ like Millis.

One of many shock horror headlines from the Jewish News - anyone expelled from the Labour Party is an untouchable according to the Zionists

Any cub journalist knows that it’s a cardinal rule of journalism not to mix fact and opinion. That’is how you tell the quality press from the tabloids. Except that all the quality papers, bar the Torygraph, are tabloids these days! The phrase ‘notorious anti-Zionist’ might just suggest a certain bias unless the word ‘anti-Zionist’ is a synonym for notoriety.

Another pathetic Jewish News headline - Momentum is criticised because I hold one of its banners - Momentum isn't the Nazi Party - it can't control its grassroots - this non-story quotes the JLM saying Momentum should 'abide by the party's decisions' - I wasn't aware the Party had decided I was banned from holding a Momentum banner!!

And then there is the other difficulty Millis faced and it is indeed perplexing. How to include all the organisations I have been excluded from.  I was expelled from the SWP’s previous incarnation, the International Socialists in 1973 and if they really want to go back far enough then I was expelled from the King David High School in Liverpool in 1972. It has been a career of expulsions. The only institution that I can think of that didn’t expel me was Brighton Polytechnic.  But although they didn’t expel me (I was Student Union Vice-President for 2 years) they did blacklist me because I’d organised one too many occupations.

Quite when I made the transition from a 'controversial' Jewish anti-Zionist to a 'notorious' one is not known

We only found this out when we occupied Assistant Director, Robin Plummer’s office in the Art College. When we opened his filing cabinets (his secretary had helpfully left the keys in the desks) we found a memo from Director, Geoffrey Hall asking that any attempt by me to enrol on a course to be referred to him! Oh and I haven’t been expelled, not yet anyway, from the National Autistic Society!

That was why I became the only Jewish student at the Roman Catholic Teacher Training College of St Mary’s College in Strawberry Hill, Twickenham. The person who interviewed me, Father Michael Prior, was both a supporter of liberation theology and the Palestinians (he founded Living Stones). I guess these days Michael would also be considered an anti-Semite.

I was, as I’ve already written, suspended last October for 3 years from UNISON for protesting the refusal of London Regional Organiser, Cllr. Steve Terry, to defend a member who had been sacked for saying that the Zionists collaborated with the Nazis, which is a matter of record. Sacking someone for exercising the right to freedom of expression under Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights was outrageous enough, failing to defend their member was even worse and I pulled no punches in describing Terry’s scabby behaviour for what it was.

But strangely enough in Unison until your appeal is heard you are still a full member. For over 2 months I have heard nothing which means I am still a full member of Unison. So naturally I penned a letter to the Jewish News explaining their errors. However since the Zionist rag doesn’t have a letters page I suspect that it will be disappear into the ether. However you can read it here.

QUESTION: In what state are Human Rights groups Seen As The Enemy? ANSWER: Emily Thornberry’s Beacon of Freedom – ISRAEL

Emily Thornberry and other apologists for Israel pretend that Israel is a beacon of light and freedom in the Middle East. Thornberry wittered in a visit to Israel about how ‘I love the liberal democracy that is Israel. And it’s in contrast to many other countries around it.’  In a grovelling address at Labour Friends of Israel annual dinner’ in November 2017, Thornberry declared that

‘even today... modern Israel stands out as a beacon of freedom, equality and democracy, particularly in respect of women and LGBT communities.’

And she sent on to declare that BDS was ‘bigotry against the Israeli nation.’ The irony of that remark, which betrays Thornberry’s fawning ignorance, is that there is no Israeli nation. That is why Israel is an apartheid state. Israel is not a state of its own inhabitants but a state of its Jewish citizens. There is, in Zionist mythology, a Jewish nation, of which Israeli Jews are a part, but unlike all other states Israeli citizenship is not coterminous with nationality. Israel is different from most other countries – it has no common nationality for all of its citizens.

Another way in which Israel differs from all democratic states is that Israeli ministers, including the Prime Minister, on their trips abroad lobby other governments not to support Israeli human rights organisations, in particular B’tselem and Breaking the Silence. Thus in a visit in October Netanyahu gave Angela Merkel a letter which

lamented the federal funding given by Germany to dozens of organizations, including political foundations and aid groups operating in Palestinian territories.

Amongst the organisations that the Israeli government was targeting was

the leftist Israeli political magazine +972, whose authors “regularly accuse Israel of apartheid”; the Evangelical relief organization Bread for the World that supports initiatives such as the Coalition of Women for Peace, which supported boycott campaigns against Israel; and the international film festival Berlinale, which allegedly regularly welcomed supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement as guests.

Not content with this list of organisations, the letter went on to single out a particular target viz. the Jewish Museum in Berlin which had the audacity to show a special exhibit on Jerusalem that reflected "largely the Muslim-Palestinian view". It is also claimed that the state-funded Berlin Jewish Museum ‘regularly organizes events and discussions with prominent BDS supporters.’ Israel is used to organisations in the Jewish diaspora faithfully following the line laid down by Israel.  So you can understand the anger felt by Netanyahu that some countries take freedom of speech seriously.

Israeli Government Foreign Minister Hotoveli went to Switzerland to Lobby Against an Israeli Human Rights Group Breaking the Silence

Netanyahu is not the only one. In June 2015 the Jerusalem Post reported that

‘Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely declared war on the left-wing Breaking the Silence NGO on Tuesday, calling for an “urgent meeting” in the ministry to come up with steps to counter the group’s actions in Switzerland.’

Hotoveli, who is a religious nutcase, was particularly worked up by an exhibition by the soldiers’ group Breaking the Silence which reveals the atrocities and war crimes committed by the army. ‘She said she had also directed Israel’s embassy in Switzerland to immediately consider ways of working against the exhibition.’

This is the ‘democratic’ state that Labour’s Shadow Foreign Secretary believes is a ‘beacon’ in the Middle East. Apart from demonising human rights groups, Israel is a state that uniquely has made torture legal, which uses imprisonment without trial, not just in the Occupied Territories but in Israel itself against Palestinian Israelis, has an all pervasive censorship and of course does little things like confining Palestinians to 3.5% of Israeli land because 93% of land is ‘national’ i.e. Jewish national land.

Naturally Thornberry in her speech to LFI trotted out such things as womens’ equality and LGBT since pinkwashing is an Israeli speciality.

What Thornberry didn’t say was that Israel’s love of gays is strictly for foreign consumption. Within Israel it is a different story. Most Israelis are hostile to gays, especially the Orthodox. In Jerusalem, in 2016 16 year old Shira Banki was stabbed to death and 5 others injured by an Orthodox Jewish assailant who went wild with a knife.  Police had allowed him access to the demonstration despite his having only recently been released from prison for similar stabbins at a previous Gay Pride demonstration.

Israel also refuses to accept the idea of gay marriage because it would cut across the hostility felt across the Zionist spectrum to miscegenation, sex across racial borders. Gay marriage would not fit in with the existing separation of the population. Likewise surrogacy rights for  gay couples have been rejected by the Knesset.

Strangely enough, neither the Jewish News or the JLM commented on Netanyahu's embrace of Brazil's new fascist President - clearly it's a match made in heaven

Of course when Netanyahu recently visited Brazil for a 5 day visit, Israel’s pinkwashing went out the window altogether. As the Jerusalem Post reported

‘Netanyahu steered clear, as he did throughout his five-day visit to Brazil last week, of any reservations regarding the president’s controversial positions – opponents accuse him of an authoritarian streak – or disparaging comments Bolsonaro has made in the past about gays, women and minorities.’

In fact this report in itself is a bit, how should we say, underwhelming. Bolsonaro hasn’t merely made ‘disparaging comments’ he stated explicitly that if he saw 2 men kissing in the street he would hit them, which is a green light for anti-gay violence.  None of this disturbed Netanyahu who was certainly not going to allow gay rights to get in the way of a warm relationship with the new fascist kid on the bloc.  Among Bolsinaro’s more repulsive comments were his statement that

It is difficult to think of a single repressive regime that  Israel doesn't embrace - because Netanyahu is only following in the footsteps of Israeli Labour governments

"I would prefer my son to die in an accident than show up with a mustachioed man,"

Israel is nonetheless a beacon of light in Emily Thornberry’s eyes. Thornberry is a woman who is being tipped as a replacement when Jeremy Corbyn stand down or is pushed.

Tony Greenstein

Israeli artists urge Germany to reject funding cuts to groups critical of Israel

Israel accused HRW director of supporting BDS

Written by Polina Garaev

Israel accused Human Rights Watch's local director of supporting the campaign to boycott the country

THOMAS COEX (AFP/File)

Israel reportedly made the demand of Germany in October

BERLIN -- Israeli artists are urging German authorities to reject Jerusalem’s demand to cut funding to institutions critical of Israel, including Berlin’s Jewish Museum and the city’s world-famous film festival.

According to German media, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself conveyed the request to Chancellor Angela Merkel during her visit in October.

The demand was passed on in the form of an unsigned seven-page letter from the Israeli government, which was first published in December in the German left-leaning daily Taz. The letter lamented the federal funding given by Germany to dozens of organizations, including political foundations and aid groups operating in Palestinian territories.

Among the organizations mentioned in the letter are the Israeli political magazine +972, whose authors “regularly accuse Israel of apartheid”; the Evangelical relief organization Bread for the World that supports initiatives such as the Coalition of Women for Peace, which supported boycott campaigns against Israel; and the international film festival Berlinale, which allegedly regularly welcomed supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement as guests.

The letter also criticized the Jewish Museum in Berlin, now showing a special exhibit on Jerusalem that reflects "largely the Muslim-Palestinian view". It is also claimed that the state-funded museum, which is not affiliated with the local Jewish community, regularly organizes events and discussions with prominent BDS supporters.

Jerusalem exhibition in Berlin's Jewish Museum

i24NEWS, Polina Garaev

“The German support of non-governmental organizations that intervene in Israel's internal affairs or promote anti-Israel activities, is unique,” read the Israeli letter. “We would like to see the Federal Government tie its further financial support to the complete stop of such activities.”

The German daily FAZ later reported that the letter was handed by Netanyahu directly to Merkel during the intergovernmental consultations that took place in Jerusalem in October. The newspaper also noted that the German Foreign Ministry demanded a high-level meeting in Berlin, to clarify the letter, but that was canceled by the Israeli side.

The request stirred significant controversy, also among Israeli artists. On Sunday, 63 of them – including film director Udi Aloni, whose work has been featured in the Berlinale on multiple occasions – published an open letter in the Taz, proclaiming their support for Berlin’s Jewish museum and calling the Israeli demand “shocking.”

“We reject these attempts to curtail the freedom of cultural expression, which are part of a larger campaign by populist and ultra-rightwing governments worldwide to limit the scope of critical thought – and, where possible silence it altogether,” read their letter.

“We therefore call on the German government, its parliament, its media, and the broad public to resist this specious demand, and, more broadly to beware of the attempts by the Israeli government and its anti-liberal allies to export this damaging culture of fear and censorship to other democratic domains.”

In a previous statement, the museum rejected the accusations of the Israeli government.

“We believe that an open discussion involving sometimes controversial views is essential to enable our visitors to form their own, differentiated judgment,” stated a spokeswoman for the museum.

She also stressed that all speakers participating in its events represent their own private opinions.

Polina Garaev is i24NEWS's correspondent in Germany.

The Jewish Labour Movements Cruella

Dame Louise Ellman MP’s War Against Palestinian Children

How despicable can one get? Louise Ellman MP, together with Tory and even a DUP MP, is seeking to cut the funding for the education of Palestinian children

You have to hand it to Louise Ellman the Zionist MP for Tel Aviv South (& occasionally Liverpool Riverside). She really doesn’t like Palestinian children. 

When Sarah Champion introduced a debate on January 16th 2016 condemning Israel’s horrific treatment of Palestinian children – torture, beatings, night-time arrests etc. there was Louise Ellman on her feet justifying everything the Israeli army was doing – all in the name of ‘security’ of course – See for example Two-thirds of Palestinian Minors Testify to Abuse in Israeli Detention

Louise Ellman has gone out of her way to defend this - any party that considered itself progressive let alone socialist would have removed her long ago

For the past 70 years Israel has specialised in using ‘security’ as the excuse for ethnic cleansing, demolition of homes and villages, torture, arbitrary detention without trial etc. Ellman is well versed in the black arts of using ‘security’ to explain human rights abuses. See  Louise Ellman - Supporter of Israeli Child Abuse - Night Time Arrests, Beatings and Incarceration of Palestinian Children and Palestinian Children are Caged like Animals with the support of Labour's Despicable MPs Louise Ellman and Joan Ryan

Now this despicable woman has gone one step further.  She’s trying to cut off funding for Palestinian schools on the grounds that their curriculum teaches them to ‘hate’ those who fire tear gas at them as they are going to school, who invade their houses night and day, beat up their parents, confiscate their land and keep them in poverty.  Ellman operates on the theory that if it wasn’t for the ‘inciters’ of the Palestinian Authority (Netanyahu’s collaborators) then Palestinians in the West Bank would come to love their occupiers.  Even the Nazis didn’t pretend that those whose countries they occupied would come to love them.

In fact the exact opposite is true.  It is Israeli schools which teach their children to hate Arabs through their portrayal of Arabs as terrorists and ‘baddies’. There are no good role models of Palestinians in the Israeli curriculum. See for example Biased new study skirts around racism in Israeli school books by Professor Nurit Peled-Elhanan of Tel Aviv University.

Thus it was that in a debate last week on a motion International Development Assistance (Palestinian National Authority Schools) moved by Louise Ellman and 11 other MPs she began:

 I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to prohibit international development assistance to schools operated by the Palestinian National Authority that do not promote values endorsed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization;

This is incidentally the same UNESCO that Israel has left because it refuses to accept that Jerusalem belongs to the Zionists only. It isn’t as if the West Bank isn’t poverty stricken enough as it is, with the withdrawal of all aid to UNWRA by Trump.  Louise Ellman of the Jewish Labour Movement is trying to do her little bit to make it even more poverty stricken whilst helping the occupation too.

In fairness Ellman wasn’t alone.  Her accomplices in this vile attack on Palestinian children were

Joan Ryan, joan.ryan.mp@parliament.uk, joan@joanryan.org.uk, @joanryanenfield,

Ian Austin, austini@parliament.uk, @ianaustinmp, 

Theresa Villiers, theresa@theresavilliers.co.uk,

Stephen Crabb, stephen.crabb.mp@parliament.uk, @scrabbmp,

Jim Shannon, jim.shannon.mp@parliament.uk, @jimshannonmp, Rachel Reeves, rachel.reeves.mp@parliament.uk, @rachelreevesmp,  John Howell, howelljm@parliament.uk,

John Spellar, john.spellar.mp@parliament.uk, john.spellar@btconnect.com;  @spellar,

Andrew Percy, andrew.percy.mp@parliament.uk,

Guto Bebb guto.bebb.mp@parliament.uk, @gutobebb  

and Bob Blackman, bob.blackman.mp@parliament.uk.

Guto Bebb, a nasty right-wing Tory MP didn't like being challenged over why he wants to cut the funding for Palestinian education

You may wish to contact them to let them know your feelings. Do be polite to these creatures.

The Mediterranean The Largest Graveyard in Modern History

Europe’s Refugees – the victims of neo-liberalism

This article speaks for itself. There is a deliberate policy now in the European Union of allowing refugees to die rather than admit them.  The policy has spread from Netanyahu’s best friend Viktor Orban of Hungary to Italy and Malta.

At the same time we have seen far Right parties enter government in Italy and Austria and gain ground in virtually every European country, as well as controlling governments in Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and  the Czech Republic.

The wave of refugees that has broken on the shores of Europe is a direct consequence of western intervention in Africa and the Middle East.  The invasion of Iraq created shock waves in the Middle East.  Coupled with the war in Syria, which became a proxy war for Russia, Saudi Arabia and Qatar amongst others. European Union countries had been at least partly responsible for the destabilisation of Libya which was the direct cause of the refugee stream.

Peter Koenig’s article is self-explanatory although some of the political analysis leaves a lot to be desired. For example Italy’s 5 Star Movement is NOT a leftist movement.

Tony Greenstein

Mediterranean Sea – The Largest Graveyard in Modern History By Peter Koenig

July 07, 2018 "Information Clearing House" 

In June 2018 alone, more than 500 refugees drowned in the Mediterranean Sea. Their boats were refused access to land in either Malta, or Italy. They were force-driven back by gun-boats to the North African shores they came from, mostly Libya, but many boats capsized and countless refugees didn’t make it.

These are de facto murders, high crimes against humanity, committed by the very European Union. The same “leaders” (criminals, rather), whose forebears are known to have raped, exploited, tortured, ravaged peoples and their lands of Asia, Africa, Latin America over the past 1000 years of abject colonization. Europeans have it in their genes – to be inhuman. This can possibly be extended to the ‘superior’ greedy white race in general. At least to those who make it to political or corporate high office in the formidable EU or exceptional US, or to those who appoint themselves into the European Commission. We should call them “The Heartless Bunch”.

This is the so-called West, now led by the United States of America – basically the British empire transplanted across the Atlantic, where they felt safer between two shining seas, than as a rickety island in the Atlantic, just in front of the enormous, contiguous land mass called Eurasia. The Old Continent, alias Europe, was given by the new trans-Atlantic empire, the new masters of the universe, a subservient role. And that was in the making for at least the last 100 years, when the new empire started weakening Europe, with two World Wars.

Are You Tired Of The Lies And Non-Stop Propaganda?

Today’s European (EU) leaders are puppets put in place by the Atlantist elites, to make sure that the rather educated Europeans do not go on the barricades, that they are debilitated regularly by free market corporatism creating unemployment, taking their hard worked-for social safety nets away, saturating them with fake news – and gradually oppressing them with growing police states, with a massive militarization – and finally using the articulately planned flood of refugees from the very US-EU-NATO destroyed countries – destroyed economically and by wars – as a further destabilizing weapon. Greece should serve as a vivid example of what’s really going on and is planned, starting with “inferior” southern EU states, those bordering on the strategic and economically important sea way – the Mediterranean Sea.

Refugees forced on a death march into the Sahara

You think I’m crazy? – Start thinking again and connect the dots.

The refugee death toll in the Med-Sea in 2017 was about 3,200, 40% down from 2016, and more than 600 up to end of April 2018, and another more than 500 in June. This figure is bound to increase drastically, given the European closed-border policy – and more. The EU is contracting among others, the Libyan Coast Guard with gun boats to chase refugee vessels back to the Libyan shores, many sink – and saving those thrown into the sea is ‘forbidden’ – they are simply left to die. That’s the rule. Malta, a little island-appendix to Brussels, but important as a refugee transit, has issued strict bans on private fisher boats and NGOs trying to rescue refugees.

As a consequence, the by now well-known “Lifeline” boat with 330 refugees – miserably poor, sick, desperate people – struggling for sheer survival, many with small kids, who wanted nothing more than their children to have a better life – was rejected by Malta, turned back into the sea, under guidance of NATO and EU hired military-type private contractor gun-boats. Malta has a Partnership for Peace (PfP) Agreement with NATO, i.e. obeys NATO orders. NATO, a killer organization, has, of course, not a shred of humanity in its structure, nor in the blood of the people at its helm – anywhere in the world.

Imagine – in this context, an EU summit took place at the end of June 2018 to “arrange” and agree on how to handle the refugee crisis in the future, in other words, how to keep them out of Europe. None of the countries, other than Germany, were even considering accepting some of these poor souls out of sheer humanitarian reasons, to give them shelter, food and medication. The discussion even considered where to build a wall – yes fences were discussed to keep them out – Europe a xenophobic free-port for the rich, acting in questions of migration as a carbon copy of Trump. They deserve each other, Trump and Brussels, trade wars not withstanding – let them shred each other to pieces.

Well, this almost happened during, before and after the now-called “mini-summit”, with Madame Merkel almost losing her Chancellor’s job, as she, against all odds, represented the most humanitarian view of all the 28 neolibs. This did not go down well with her partner party, the ultra-conservative Bavarian CSU. Calls for her resignation abounded. The German Interior Minister, Horst Seehofer, was about to resign over Merkel’s alleged refugee ‘generosity’ – in which case the highly fragile right-left coalition would have collapsed – and who knows how Germany may have continued to govern. Perhaps new elections would have had to be called, and then only god knows what might have happened. The empire could not allow this uncertainty to prevail, because Washington needs Germany as the chief-slave driver to lead Europe into total disarray and serfdom. It worked. Germany is alive and saved – and ticking.

Instead, the European refugee / migrant policy is in shambles. The EU are literally out to kill refugees, as a means of dissuasion? – Mass-murder as a means of discouraging the desperate to seek shelter in those very countries that were instrumental in destroying their livelihoods, their families, their towns, their infrastructure, their education and health facilities – their youth? Generations of young Middle Eastern and African people are gone, destroyed.

Did these high-ranking EU officials in Brussels mention their own huge responsibility for the refugee floods with one single word? – No, of course not. Not with one breath. Has the conscience in one single head of these fake, neolibs-neonazis, as it were, self-serving EU heads of state been awakened by this very fact of guilt for what they are to confront? – Has it caused sleepless nights? I doubt it. They are far from this level of human compassion, they are monsters.

Then, there was and is Italy, with her strange new coalition, a coalition of convenience. The leftish 5-Star Movement in alliance with the right-wing Lega Norte, selling their human conscience to be able to reign, giving away their responsibility for migration to the xenophobic, narcissistic, and yes, close to fascist Lega Norte – which is adamant not to receive migrants. They would boycott any result that would force Italy to take in refugees, or even build border transit camps. In the end, they reached a toothless agreement; a non-agreement, rather; an accord that obliged none of the parties to do anything. Everything is voluntary. Period. And Macron said that this was the best refugee summit the EU ever had. So much for dismal brainlessness.

All was voluntary. The only agreement they could book for themselves, is to build refugee camps in North African countries for the shipped-back survivors. Fortunately, every North African country, from Egypt to Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco said no. Having seen what happened in such literal slave camps in Libya, they had at least the compassion for these desperate human beings to prevent this from reoccurring. Compassion, a term, a feeling or sensation, the Europeans are devoid of.

However, no Israeli- Trump- Brussels-type wall or barbed-wire fence will keep the desperate in their economically, or by war, or western terrorism destroyed countries. The west, and only the west, is responsible for the endless destructive chaos, torture and lawlessness in these nations that the west wants to dominate, for myriad reasons – to steal their energy, minerals; for their strategic location, and finally on the way to total full spectrum world hegemony. This, the west will not achieve. That’s for sure. Evil will not prevail in the long run. Darkness will eventually cede to light. That’s the way nature works. But on its way to collapse, Evil will maim and kill millions of lives. Countless children will have no future, no parents, no education, no health services, no drinking water. They will be made to slaves as a means for their survival, to be raped and exploited or eventually killed. The European crime is of infinite dimension and nobody sees it, let alone stops it.

Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a water resources and environmental specialist. He worked for over 30 years with the World Bank and the World Health Organization around the world in the fields of environment and water. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for Global Research; ICH; RT; Sputnik; PressTV; The 21^st Century; TeleSUR; The Vineyard of The Saker Blog; and other internet sites. He is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe. He is also a co-author of The World Order and Revolution! – Essays from the Resistance.

Alternative for Germany – Love Israel Hate Jews

The Symbiosis Between Zionism and neo-Nazism

The Times of Israel article below probably sums up the situation in Germany where Alternative for Germany, a neo-Nazi party, has become the third largest party in the Bundestag with nearly 100 seats and 13% of the vote.  ‘Loathed by Jews, Germany’s Far-Right Loves the Jewish State’.  

Perhaps one correction to the headline is in order.  There is nothing ‘Jewish’ about Israel except that being Jewish means you are part of the herrenvolk, the master race, that group of society which has, because of its ethnic-religious characteristics privileges.  In that sense and only in that sense Israel is a Jewish state.

When anti-Semites like Gilad Atzmon say that Israel is the ‘Jews only’ state and that Israel is a continuation of ‘Jewishness’ over the ages they could not be more wrong.  Jewish identity has changed many times over the centuries.  It is no more fixed than Islamic or Christian identity has been.

Zionism, like many fake nationalism, because Zionism is not Jewish nationalism although it is nationalist, a crucial difference, writes the present back into all of history.  So for Zionism Israel is a continuation of 2,000+ years of Jewish history.  Likewise for anti-Semites, what Israel does today is just a continuation of being Jewish over the centuries.

However that great Israeli anti-Zionist, the late Professor Israel Shahak, who was a survivor of the Warsaw Ghetto and Belsen concentration camp, in his book ‘Jewish Religion, Jewish History’ and also a great scholar of  Jewish history wrote that

there has been a great deal of nonsense written in the attempt to provide a social or mystical interpretation of Jewry or Judaism as a whole.  This cannot be done, for the social structure of the Jewish people and the ideological structure of Judaism have changed profoundly through the ages. [Shahak, Jewish Religion Jewish History, p.50]

It is one of life’s ironies that, almost without exception, neo-Nazi and fascist/far-Right parties are in awe of the Israeli state.  Israel is the model of what their type of ethno-nationalist state would be like.  Even as I write this Israel is trying to expel some 35,000+ Black African refugees.  This is a bipartisan issue.  Both the Israeli Labour Party and Netanyahu are in favour of the removal of what are termed ‘infiltrators’ i.e. non-Jews.

Israel constantly seeks to ensure that it is as Jewish as possible.  Unfortunately it has a 20% Palestinian/Arab minority but it is dedicated to ensuring that this minority doesn’t increase.  This is the type of state that Richard Spencer, the neo-Nazi founder of the alt-Right in the United Sates admires.  That is why he is a self-confessed White Zionist.  This is no mere rhetoric.  All of these parties are anti-Muslim.  Muslims are seen as the threat to White hegemony.  Jews have been taken inside the racial tribe.  MJews are, for the time being anyway, accepted as part of White society however, diaspora Jews are not so stupid as the far-Right believes.  In the event these parties were to come to power then Jews would be the archetypal cosmopolitan, liberal elements who they would attack as we saw in Charlottesville where Trump’s baying mob quickly turned to anti-Semitic slogans.

What this demonstrates above all is that the interests of the Israeli settler state and diaspora Jewry are fundamentally opposed.  Israel is a threat to the future of the diaspora.  That is why Israel spends so much money convincing the diaspora otherwise but despite this there are growing fractures between the Israeli state and Jews outside of it.

Historically Zionism wanted to wind up what it called the ‘accursed Galut’ (Galut = exile).  This has not proved possible but Israel spends millions of dollars each year trying to encourage Jewish immigration to Israel even whilst, at the same time it devises ways of excluding Palestinians and indeed Black African Jews.  How this cannot be racist is something best left to Talmudic rhetoricians.

Ironically Zionism first grew as a reaction to anti-Semitism in the late 19th century but it was a unique reaction amongst Jews because it accepted the framework that the anti-Semites had set.  The Zionists accepted that Jews did not belong, even worse they accepted that the anti-Semites were right – the Jews were an anti-social element.  Indeed sometimes Zionists spoke of Jews in ways identical to that of the worst anti-Semites.  For example Israel’s first Justice Minister, Pinhas Rosenbluth described Palestine as ‘an institute for the fumigation of Jewish vermin’.  [Joachim Doron, p.169, Classic Zionism and modern anti-Semitism: parallels and influences’ (1883-1914), Studies in Zionism 8, Autumn 1983]

Today we see the harvest that Zionism has created.  The world’s only Apartheid state, the most racist state in the world, a state admired by neo-Nazis the world over, indeed a model for what is now termed White Zionism.  And some Zionists still resent the comparison between Zionism and Nazism!!

German neo-Nazi lawmaker charged with hate speech is big Israel fan

Ali Abunimah Electronic Intifada 2 January 2018

Lawmaker Beatrix von Storch, accused by Cologne police of inciting hatred against Muslims, sees Israel as a model for Germany. (Nicolaus Fest)

A neo-Nazi member of Germany’s parliament who has been charged by police with inciting hatred against Muslims is a big fan of Israel.

Beatrix von Storch was suspended from Twitter and Facebook after she slammed police in the city of Cologne for this tweet – one of several put out in various languages – wishing the city’s residents happy new year in Arabic:

In response, von Storch accused the Cologne police of trying to “appease the barbaric, gang-raping hordes of Muslim men.”

This was an apparent reference to a spate of alleged sexual assaults that were blamed on men from Muslim-majority countries in the city on New Year’s Eve two years ago, and that then fueled exaggerated or outright fabricated claims against immigrants in other parts of Germany.

Police have filed a criminal complaint against von Storch for hate speech.

Her posts were removed under a new online hate speech law that civil liberties advocates have warned deputizes social media companies to carry out censorship on behalf of the government.

Neo-Nazis embrace Israel

Von Storch is the deputy leader of Alternative for Germany – known by its German initials AfD – the neo-Nazi party that won almost 100 seats in Germany’s general election last September, prompting alarm from the country’s Jewish community.

Like their neo-Nazi counterparts who just joined the government of neighboring Austria, AfD has been cozying up to Israel – a philosemitic stance that aims to rebrand the anti-Semitic far-right as defenders of Jews against a supposed Muslim threat.

Their embrace has been reciprocated by politicians in Israel’s ruling Likud party.

A granddaughter of Hitler’s last finance minister, von Storch told The Jerusalem Report last September that “For historical and cultural reasons, we will always look for good relations and close cooperation with Israel.”

She has been very explicit not only about her party’s support for Israel, but also that hatred of Muslims is one of the values she shares with its Zionist ideology.

“Both anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism are strongest in the Islamic community, as well as the Left,” she explained. “They reject the fact that the Judeo-Christian foundations of European civilization are instrumental to its success. We recognize the threat they pose to both Israel and Germany’s Jewish community and their safety is a high priority for us.”

Von Storch concluded that “Israel could be a role model for Germany” as a country that “makes efforts to preserve its unique culture and traditions.”

This echoes closely the line of American neo-Nazi demagogue Richard Spencer who speaks of Zionism as a key model for the kind of Aryan homeland he seeks to create under the guise of preserving “European” culture.

Not surprisingly, von Storch’s Jerusalem Report interview was promoted approvingly by Breitbart, a major platform for racism and white supremacy.

Israel as racist model

Von Storch’s identification with Israel is a symptom of the long-standing alliance between the right, and even anti-Semites, on the one hand, and Zionism and Israel, on the other.

This alliance has recently found new life in a common hatred of Muslims.

Israeli leaders have habitually exploited violent attacks in Europe to further stoke Islamophobia and justify their own violence against Palestinians.

Yet while many mainstream commentators in Germany can be expected to express horror at von Storch’s anti-Muslim incitement, few dare speak out in criticism of Israel – including its prominent role in fomenting xenophobia and hatred of Muslims as part of its effort to push Europe further into its far-right camp.

Indeed, Germany’s establishment appears to be less tolerant than ever of advocacy for full, equal civil, political and human rights for Palestinians. In December, the city council in Munich passed a measure smearing the BDS – boycott, divestment and sanctions – movement.

The Palestinian BDS National Committee had written to city councillors to explain that the definition of anti-Semitism cited in the resolution is one drawn up by Israel lobbyists to deliberately conflate criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.

Yet there do appear to be cracks. Foreign minister Sigmar Gabriel is under intense attack from Israel for stating a simple truth. Israel’s public security minister Gilad Erdan, who is also in charge of combatting the BDS movement, accused Gabriel of engaging in speech that “demonizes and delegitimizes the Jewish state.”

Gabriel reportedly told a group of Muslim representatives in December that when he visited the occupied West Bank city of Hebron a few years ago, what he witnessed reminded him of apartheid.

Loathed by Jews, Germany’s far-right AfD loves the Jewish state

Candidates for nationalist Alternative for Germany, derided as anti-Semitic, overwhelmingly profess to hold pro-Israel positions, poll shows

The TIMES OF ISRAEL

By Raphael Ahren 24 September 2017, 11:58 pm 18

Members of the nationalist German AfD, 'Alternative for Germany', celebrate during the election party in Berlin, Germany, September 24, 2017, after the polling stations for the German parliament elections had been closed. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner)

Jews hate the Alternative for Germany, but the Alternative for Germany loves Jews — or at least the Jewish state, according to a new poll.

The Jewish community largely condemned Sunday’s election victory of the far-right party, known in Germany as AfD, which garnered some 13 percent of the vote in Sunday’s national poll, making it the country’s third largest faction in parliament.

Yet the party derided for anti-Semitic, xenophobic views redolent of the Nazis is also staunchly supportive of Israel, one of a number of right-wing populist parties in Europe that have tried to make common cause with Israel’s tough stance toward terror and self-styled position as a forward bulwark against Islamic extremism.

Most German Jews repudiate the AfD as anti-Semitic, pointing to its anti-immigration and anti-Muslim platform and arguing that whoever targets Muslims and other minorities will sooner or later seek to harm the Jews’ religious freedoms.

“It is abhorrent that the AfD party, a disgraceful reactionary movement which recalls the worst of Germany’s past and should be outlawed, now has the ability within the German parliament to promote its vile platform,” said World Jewish Congress president Ron Lauder.

“This result is a nightmare come true,” declared Charlotte Knobloch, chairwoman of Munich’s Jewish community and former president of Central Council of Jews in Germany.

“With the AfD, exclusion, inwardness, aggression, contempt for humanity, conspiracy theories, volkisch nationalism, neo-Nazism, violating the constitution, Holocaust denial, anti-Semitism, racism, anti-religiousness, hostility toward the media and Europe, revisionism and historical relativism move into the Bundestag and its national and international bodies,” she said.

Past statements from senior AfD officials suggested a desire to change Germany’s admission of guilt for the Holocaust and admiration for Wehrmacht soldiers during World War II. Despite intense efforts, party officials were never quite able to get rid of the impression that it had become a platform for anti-Semites, racists and other xenophobes.

But, like many far-right parties in Europe and elsewhere, the AfD presents itself as staunchly supportive of Israel.

According to a wide-ranging poll commissioned by a group promoting German-Israeli relations, most AfD politicians profess to care deeply about Israel’s security, support Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state, reject unilaterally recognizing a Palestinian state, and generally support a stronger relationship between Jerusalem and Berlin.

Nearly 90% of the 35 AfD members who were surveyed totally or somewhat support Chancellor Angela Merkel’s dictum that “Israel’s security is Germany’s raison d’etre.” Two said they oppose the statement and two had no opinion.

A quarter of those polled had been to Israel.

A supporter of the nationalist AfD party holds a placard, reading, ‘Protect the constitution from Merkel,’ as German Chancellor Angela Merkel speaks at an election campaign rally of her Christian CDU party in Bitterfeld, Germany, on August 29, 2017. (AFP Photo/Odd Andersen)

Over half of the AfD respondents said they “totally” agree with the statement that support for the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement to be anti-Semitic; no other major party had such a strong opposition to BDS.

Seventy-seven percent those polled agreed with the statement that anti-Zionism is a form of anti-Semitism; 23% disagreed.

“Criticizing the State of Israel and on Zionist behavior is not anti-Semitism,” one polled AfD politician said when asked to comment on his response.

Some 88% said Israel’s 70th birthday next year was a reason for Germans to celebrate, while fewer than 4% disagreed with that statement. (For comparison, at the Social Democrats of Martin Schulz — which came in second in the national elections, ahead of the AfD — 11% felt that Israel’s anniversary was no reason to celebrate.)

“German-Israeli relations are special, not only because of history, but also because Israel is the only really functioning democracy in the region,” one polled AfD member said. “Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East and both politically and from a Christian perspective, a brotherly country,” opined another.

A large majority of polled AfD candidates (86%) also support German arms exports to Israel.

“As long as the Germany provides Islamic regimes such as Turkey or Saudi Arabia with arms, there is no reason why Israel, as a pro-Western, democratic state should be excluded from arms deals,” said Beatrix von Storch, the party’s deputy spokesperson.

A vandalized Alternative for Germany party campaign poster is seen in Berlin on September 21, 2017. (AFP Photo/John Macdougall)

Israel’s Foreign Ministry and the Prime Minister’s Office on Sunday evening remained mum on AfD’s strong showing in the German elections, though the PMO tweeted congratulations to Merkel, calling her a “true friend of Israel.”

Congratulations to Angela #Merkel , a true friend of Israel, on her re-election as Chancellor of Germany.

— PM of Israel (@IsraeliPM) September 24, 2017

Jerusalem has a complicated relationship with populist European far-right parties, which thrive on anti-Muslim sentiment, but enthusiastically embrace the Jewish state.

MK Nachman Shai, an opposition lawmaker who chairs the Israel-Germany Parliamentary Friendship Group, said Germany’s democratic elections must be respected, but at the same time called them “a great warning sign” for Israel and the Jewish people.

“The rise of the extreme right in Germany is indicative of dangerous moods that are growing stronger,” he said. “Xenophobia, racism and extremism have conquered a significant portion of the German public and prove that the democratic stratum is fragile and vulnerable.”

Two thirds of AfD candidates do not believe that settlements are the main obstacle to peace

Three quarters of polled AfD politicians do not want Germany to recognize the State of Palestine before a peace deal with Israel is signed, while 11% tend to favor a unilateral recognition. (To compare, 77% of Greens and 28% of Social Democrats tend to support unilateral recognition.)

Every single AfD candidate polled said Germany should use its financial aid to the Palestinians to pressure them into ceasing its incitement to and glorification of terrorism.

Two-thirds of AfD candidates do not believe that West Bank settlements are the main obstacle to Israeli-Palestinian peace; 19% do think so. Also, two-thirds said they “totally” disagree with the European Union’s decision to label Israeli products made in the settlements — no one expressed support for the idea (21% tended to disagree with the policy and 12% had no opinion)

Sixty-nine percent “absolutely” agreed with the statement that a comprehensive peace treaty needs to include the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. Only 3% “absolutely” disagreed.

Beatrix Von Storch of Alternative for Germany. (CC BY-SA, Wikimedia)

“The recognition of Israel’s right to exist the precondition to every peaceful solution of the Arab-Israeli conflict. This emphatically includes the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state,” von Storch said. “Like any other nation, Israel has the natural right to protect its citizens, secure its borders and safeguards its cultural identity.”

When it comes to Holocaust education, however, the AfD scorecard doesn’t look so great. While 100% of respondents from the center-left, the center-right parties, and the Greens, said they “totally” agreed that it was important to teach the young generation about the Shoah, at the AfD, 38% “tend to” agree and 6% “tend to” disagree.

The rise of Germany's far-right: Its impact on Europe and Israel

By GOL KALEV

Jerusalem Post, September 25, 2017 13:42

AfD deputy chair Beatrix von Storch tells 'The Jerusalem Report' that Israel could be a role model for Germany.

Member of the European Parliament Beatrix von Storch speaks at a press conference of the Germany's far-right Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) party in Berlin. (photo credit: HANNIBAL HANSCHKE/REUTERS)

The September 24 German election can be seen as part of the series of European elections serving as litmus tests for European sentiment on core issues: the future of the European Union, immigration, the rise of Islam and the character of Europe. 

Much of the attention throughout the German campaign centered on the rise of the far-right party Alternative for Deutschland (AfD). Established just five years ago as a Euroskeptic party, it has since evolved to garner messages that are similar to other European far-right parties: anti-immigration, anti-Islam, anti-EU and German nationalism.

While AfD has so far been successful in having its representatives elected to 13 of 16 state parliaments, it is now set to enter the Bundestag, Germany’s federal parliament – the first time since the aftermath of World War II that a far-right party is represented in the parliament. Furthermore, it was the surprise of the election by becoming the third largest party, winning over 13 percent of the seats, according to preliminary results.

“We reject the move toward a centralized federal United States of Europe. We favor the return to a community based on sovereign nations of shared economic interests,” Beatrix von Storch, AfD’s deputy chairwoman and one of the public faces of the party, tells The Jerusalem Report.

When asked if she sees a possibility of the European Union disintegrating, von Storch is clear: “If the present path of centralization and harmonization continues, the result will be disintegration.”

Such a move away from “federal Europe” inevitably comes with greater emphasis on German nationalism; there are those in Germany who feel their nationalism has been exaggeratedly suppressed in the aftermath of World War II.

AfD prominently highlighted German nationalism in its campaign such as banners at its rallies stating, “Our land, our homeland” and advertising with the caption, “Get your country back.”

Although some are uneasy with such slogans, which evoke memories of similar catchphrases in Germany’s past, von Storch does not see a problem with elevating German nationalism. “We stand for patriotism that promotes peace and good-neighborliness,” she says.

Dr. Marcel Lewandowsky, a political scientist at Helmut Schmidt University who researches populist parties and election campaigning in Germany, explains, “The mainstream in Germany has been very sensitive when it comes to German nationalism. Every nationalist party that has popped up over the years was stigmatized and interpreted in the context of German history. But in the last 10 years, the Christian Democrats [the center-right party], under the leadership of Chancellor Angela Merkel, has shifted to the political center. That created a gap in Germany’s party system.”

The void on Germany’s Right is not the only contributor to the rise of AfD. Prof. Catherine de Vries of the University of Essex focuses on the rise of Euroscepticism and the success of extremist parties in Europe. She views the rise of AfD in the context of a broader European anti-establishment wave.

“There is a crisis of representation on a national level throughout Europe,” she says. “It is not just about the EU. Voters are crying foul against the elite, against their governments, against their ministers.”

Capitalizing on the combination of the political void and the anti-establishment attitudes, von Storch believes her party delivers an appealing answer.

“Many things drive our voters. Central to all of them are the policies of Merkel’s government such as the expansion of the EU, failure of the euro, and Merkel’s failed immigration policy,” she says.

Some, however, are questioning who exactly are those voters attracted to AfD and what are their backgrounds.

“There is a moderate faction within AfD, but there is also a strong nationalist faction, especially in parts of eastern Germany. Indeed, AfD also attracts real neo-Nazis, but they are not the majority in the party,” says Lewandowsky.

It is the presence of such elements within the party that has drawn accusations that it is antisemitic.

Lewandowsky addresses the validity of these accusations. “There is some secondary antisemitism. You find amongst AfD sympathizers those who hold the view that Germany should get rid of the past, get rid of the culture of guilt. That by itself implies a relativization of the Holocaust.”

Von Storch, a member of a European royal family, is the granddaughter of Adolf Hitler’s last finance minister, Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk. When asked what role Germany’s past should play in its current politics, she puts it this way, “We have learned from our history that we must defend the principles of democracy, freedom and the rule of law.”

Von Storch does not feel her party’s rise should be of concern to others in Europe.

“Our neighbors are not afraid of AfD. They fear the repercussions of Merkel’s open-door refugee policy and resent its contribution toward an EU refugee redistribution scheme.”

The success of AfD raises questions not merely about the role of the EU, but also about the crux of the European narrative.

For most people, it is clear what it means to be German or French ‒ having a distinct language, culture and heritage. But it remains unclear what exactly it means to be European. What is the pan-European narrative?

There are those who would suggest that the European narrative is the lack of narrative ‒ a reactionary correction to previous European wars that were caused as a result of narratives, nationalism, religion and ideologies.

But such regression of narrative arguably allows for the emergence of a competing narrative in Europe: The strong and distinct narrative of Islam, which includes faith, customs, dress, behavior patterns and language.

That not only generates a debate about the role of Islam in Europe, but also generates a fear.

“Replacement is the core of the fear of AfD voters,” asserts Lewandowsky. “You add replacement to terrorism and you get AfD message that Islam produces terrorism, Islam does not match our culture and Islam is spreading in Europe."

This fear of replacement was featured prominently in AfD advertisements. One shows a pregnant white woman and reads, “New Germans? We’ll make them ourselves.”

But the reality remains that, with declining birthrates, Germans and other western Europeans do not make many babies ‒ the European Muslims do. Not only is there an incoming narrative to replace the previous European narrative, the logic goes, but there is also a demographic path for such replacement to materialize.

That fear of replacement is further augmented by the fear of terrorism, and that too has been a central feature in AfD’s campaign. An ad showing blood-traced tire tracks listed recent terrorist attacks that have occurred in Europe. It states, “The tracks left by the world chancellor through Europe” ‒ a reference to Merkel.

The rejection of Islam in Germany is not unique to AfD. Even Merkel herself has repeatedly objected to the notion of having separate Islamic and other new cultures in Europe. In 2010, she stated that the multicultural approach has utterly failed and that immigrants need to do more to integrate.

In 2015, she said multiculturalism leads to parallel societies and, therefore, remains a life lie.” Other European leaders echoed the same message, essentially demanding that Muslims and other immigrants fully assimilate into the prevailing European culture.

AfD takes the demand for assimilation to higher levels. One of its campaign ads shows a photo of two women in bathing suits and reads, “Burkas? We prefer bikinis.” Another, showing a pig, reads, “Islam? It does not fit in our cuisine.”

But, closing the door on the possibility of any form of autonomous Muslim life in Europe creates a problem. What do you do with those Muslims who do not wish to wear a bikini and who do not wish to eat pigs because it is against their faith.

“Islam, as a political ideology, and shari’a law are not compatible with the principles of a free society. Muslims must separate their religion from its political implementation such as calling for shari’a law,” von Storch states clearly.

Lewandowsky says AfD links its anti-Islam views with its anti-EU platform, going further than just blaming Merkel for the rise of Islam.

“AfD members view the EU as a traitor to Europe’s Christian heritage because they let in the Muslims. The view is that the Islamization of Europe was caused by the EU,” he says.

The discussion about the character of Europe emanating from the German election and rise of its far-right could trigger debates on more strategic issues. Some in Europe are frustrated with the rise of the populist vote in recent elections and have developed a counterreaction accusing that “the people do not know what is good for them.” Could this signal the early stages of a debate on the actual merit of European liberal democracies?

“That is a super-important question that is not easy to get into empirically,” says de Vries. “In the 1960s, if you were a member of a labor union, you would automatically vote for a particular party. Parties could send their messages through unions and through churches. That has changed. Voters are now critical consumers.”

Could such critical consumers in other parts of Europe be affected by the German election? For example, in South Tyrol, a German-speaking region that has been controlled by Italy since World War I.

Some Tyrollean residents claim that, unlike Catalonia to their west, they are less at liberty to pursue national aspirations because of the taboo of German nationalism. Furthermore, a strong EU allows them to feel European, deferring the questions of their sentiments toward Italy and their Tyrollean national identity.

But, if the German election legitimatizes German nationalism and further elevates calls for weakening of the European connection, could this change?

De Vries claims AfD getting into parliament could be a game-changer, giving it a bigger platform and budget to carry its message through Europe.

“As long as populist parties are in parliament and do not end up in government, they can be successful. As long as they can stay on the sidelines and scream, they will be raising expectations for governments and will make governing more difficult.”

Would such screaming further energize the populist movement in Europe? De Vries is looking beyond the German vote.

“Some looked at the French election and victory of [mainstream candidate Emmanuel] Macron, and said the populist wave is over. That is naïve. The voters for populist parties have real concerns ‒ about immigration, about terrorism. Those sentiments are not going away and they are not being picked up by the mainstream parties either.”

One of the more interesting sentiments held by far-right parties is their attitude toward Israel.

Von Storch draws a line from Germany’s past to her party’s current support for Israel. “For historical and cultural reasons, we will always look for good relations and close cooperation with Israel.”

As a member of the European Parliament, von Storch was one of the founding members, in 2016, of “Friends of Judea and Samaria in the European Parliament,” which is composed mostly of members from far-right parties.

That was shortly after the EU issued a first of its kind decree mandating the labeling of products made by Jewish-owned businesses in Judea and Samaria – perhaps in doing so, attempting to draw a contrast between friends on the far-right and adversaries in the European establishment.

Some question the purity of support of AfD and the far-right for Israel, arguing it might be a way to excuse antisemitic elements in its midst. Lewandowsky says it is hard to tell.

“It is too soon to figure out the source of their Israel support,” he says. “There are no studies done about it. It is new. It is possible that it is driven both by AfD’s anti-Muslim stand and as a way to refute charges of antisemitism. But there is no doubt that there is also genuine support for Israel in AfD, especially amongst the moderates.”

Interestingly, observers also claim it is too soon to determine the source of the anti-Israel escalation that has occurred in Europe over the past 20 years. Some argue it is a function of developments in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; others claim it is a result of catering to Europe’s growing Muslim population; and still others attribute the escalation to European discomfort with the astonishing success of the Jewish state.

While Israel was not an issue in the German election, it does seem that on the Right and Left, among the European establishment and anti-establishment, the Europe-Israel relationship is evolving and is affected by the domestic European issues debated throughout the elections.

Support for Israel, says von Storch, is an ideological one, connecting it to other key messages of her party.

“Both antisemitism and anti-Zionism are strongest in the Islamic community, as well as the Left. They reject the fact that the Judeo-Christian foundations of European civilization are instrumental to its success. We recognize the threat they pose to both Israel and Germany’s Jewish community and their safety is a high priority for us.”

Keeping in mind that Israel’s foundation is rooted in solid ideology ‒ Zionism ‒ a comparison can be made. Von Storch takes note of that in the context of Germany’s relation with its Muslim community.

“Israel could be a role model for Germany,” she says. “Israel is a democracy that has a free and pluralistic society. Israel also makes efforts to preserve its unique culture and traditions. The same should be possible for Germany and any other nation.”