[Wall Street Journal] Manfred Gerstenfeld - 63 years after the liberation of Auschwitz on Jan. 27, 1945, one of the most perfidious forms of contemporary anti-Semitism is Holocaust inversion - the portrayal of Israelis and Jews as modern-day Nazis. The charge is that Israel supposedly behaves toward the Palestinians as Germany did to the Jews in World War II. Portraying Jews as Nazis, Israeli prime ministers as Hitler, and the Star of David as equal to the swastika is almost routine in the Arab world. In the Netherlands you can buy T-shirts and greeting cards showing Anne Frank wearing a kaffiyeh. In other words, the Palestinians are the new Jews, which makes the Israelis the new Nazis. Holocaust Memorial Day should not only be a day of commemoration. Its meaning is undone when at the same time new versions of the old anti-Semitic demonizations are gaining ground. The writer is chairman of the board of fellows of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.
2008-01-28 01:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive