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The Golem Of Antwerp
Dry Bones
DEMOCRATIC
IRAQ COULD GO
ISLAMIST-
AND THEN
CONDEMN
DEMOCRACY
-go
he choices before the 50,000 Jews of
Belgium are not existential as they were at
the beginning of the Holocaust more than
60 ago, but they are tough enough in their own
terms.
The core problem is that the Muslim population
of the country has been growing explosively — they
now number more than 360,000 of Belgium's 10
million — and increasing numbers of them are
being drawn to a form of Islamic fundamentalism
that embodies hatred toward Jews. The most vocal
force opposing this part of the Muslim community
is the right wing; these political parties are cam-
paigning on anti-immigrant themes that blend a
modern rejection of Islamic terrorism with
a Nazi belief in white racial superiority.
The dilemma for the Jews, who have
been a vital force within Belgium since the
end of the 15th century, is whether to make com-
mon cause with extreme nationalist parties such as
Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest) that counts Nazi
collaborators among its founders.
According to a recent New York Times report, the
party is gaining Jewish supporters, particularly in
Antwerp, the scene of many anti-Semitic incidents.
A 16-year-old Jewish student nearly died after being
stabbed outside his school last June; less than a week
later, a 43-year-old Jewish man was beaten uncon-
scious. In October, an Orthodox Jew was shot to
death outside his Antwerp home.
Muslims have been named as the attackers in all of
the incidents, as they were in a 1980 grenade attack
that killed a teenager on his way to summer camp
and a 1981 truck bombing that killed three Jews and
injured more than 100 others outside a synagogue in
the heart of Belgium's diamond district.
Anti-Semitic violence has been rising throughout
Europe even before the start of the second
Palestinian uprising against Israel in 2000. Most of
it is linked to the flood of Muslim workers from
North Africa and the Middle East, but some, partic-
ularly vandalism against synagogues and cemeteries,
seems to be the work of resurgent Nazism. More
than 10,000 neo-Nazis marched this week in
Dresden as a counter-demonstration to services
remembering the firebombing of that city by British
and American planes at the end of World War II.
It is always tempting to proclaim that
the enemy of my enemy is my friend;
Belgian Jews turning to the anti-immi-
grant militancy of Vlaams Belang is an
example. But it is a dreadful mistake.
The ultra-nationalists are very similar to the arch-
segregationists who fought against equality for
blacks in America. Many of the new Muslims in
Europe are poor and poorly educated, forced to
hold menial jobs, housed in separate neighborhoods
and deprived of real opportunity to hope for
improvement, just as blacks were for so many
shameful years in America. Muslim fundamentalism
adds an extra layer of complexity in any push for
greater social justice, but it should not be used as
excuse for Jews' cozying up to the people who deny
the Holocaust and preach racial superiority.
It is worth noting that the head of the Muslim
Executive Council stood with Antwerp's chief rabbi
Adrift In History
serious scholarship could rise to an influential
Then I saw the story about a survey of col-
position at a major state university.
lege students indicating that one in three felt
But I shout into the hurricane.
that the press should have its rights restricted
Laura Berman wrote a column recently
by the government.
about speaking to college journalism stu-
How could so many presumably educated
dents who weren't especially interested in
young people have such a flawed under-
reading newspapers. I find the same phe-
standing of one of the bedrocks of our
nomenon in my college classes.
Constitutional freedoms.
What could have possessed these students
Given the way history and political science
GEO RGE
to entertain thoughts about entering a career
are taught in the public schools, it really
CAN TOR
path that so obviously is alien to them? Even
shouldn't be surprising. In too many instances,
Re aliiy
more than an ability to write, a curiosity
they are smushed together in a course called
Ch eck
about the world around them is a prerequisite
social studies that neglects to inform students
for aspiring journalists. Without that, better
about the basic political theories on which our
you should stay home and write poetry in your diary.
government is built.
I used to think that Jewish kids had a better ground-
Now we have media figures and politicians
ing in history because so many of our holidays are
demanding that University of Colorado activist
based on historical events. Purim. Pesach. Chanukah.
Ward Churchill be fired because of his odious writ-
Now I'm not so sure. They seem as adrift as anyone
ings about 9-11.
else, unable to speak with any precision about events
Churchill is an academic flame-thrower who stat-
that happened before they were born. Or happening
ed that the people who died at the World Trade
right now, if they aren't events that are covered on
Center in New York had it coming because they fed
Entertainment Tonight.
America's global exploitation. "Little Eichmanns" he
They definitely know who just got eliminated on
called them.
American Idol"or The Apprentice. Beyond that? "Why
A real sweetheart, this guy. But if free speech
do I have to know this? Will it be on the test?"
counts for anything, it is to protect the rights of peo-
But there I go again. Get back, Andy. Did ya' ever
ple like Churchill to spout nasty stupidity without
notice, though, how tough it is to unwrap a jar of
fear of government retribution. The larger question is
instant coffee these days?
how someone so deficient in intellectual honesty and
T
YOU STILL EXPECT
LOGIC IN THE MID
?
EDIT ORIAL
T
he older I get, the more I have to fight to
keep from turning into Andy Rooney.
Not that there's anything wrong with
being a curmudgeon. There's just so much that
annoys me.
For example, I read two recent newspaper columns
about how Jack Johnson is the "forgotten" heavy-
weight champion. Both of them coincided with a
PBS documentary on him, and the implication there
was that the cultural amnesia is deliberate.
Far from being forgotten, Johnson, the first black
man to hold the heavyweight tide, was the subject
of Howard Sackler's Pulitzer Prize-winning play,
"The Great White Hope. "It was a career - defining
role for James Earl Jones, hardly an obscure actor.
When Mohammed Ali, who was then being charged
with draft evasion, saw a performance, he said:
"That's me up there."
But all that was 35 years ago. How can anyone be
expected to know about things from so far back? Or
to look them up? Better to just go with the press
handout from PBS.
George Cantor's e-mail address is
gcantor@thejewishnews. corn.
to denounce the violence against Jews last year. Jews
need to similarly protest against the harassment and
violence inflicted on Muslims.
Most of all, Jews need to work with responsible
Belgian Muslims to break through the isolation
rather than reinforce it through a collaboration that
sets loose the golem of nationalism and intolerance
in a country with proud history of protecting indi-
vidual rights. CI
aN
❑
2/17
2005
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