In
an Op-Ed piece about Mel Gibson's
vicious drunken rant against Jews, Michael Medved writes:
At a time of surging Jew-hatred around the world, Gibson's remarks to arresting officers represent a far less serious threat than the very public anti-Semitic, anti-Israel comments by numerous celebrities, academics, United Nations officials and politicians.
Medved needs to be more careful in his use of labels, though.
- Very strictly speaking, "Jew-hatred" is prejudice expressed toward people who are (a) ethnically, (b) culturally, or (c) religiously affiliated with the Jewish faith.
- Anti-semitism, although generally used to describe discrimination against Jewish people, is a broader term, including members of "the Afro-Asiatic language group that includes Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, and Aramaic." The term comes from the biblical patriarch Shem, son of Noah, and is applied to all the nations traditionally believed to have descended from Shem's line after the Flood.
- Anti-Israel sentiment is expressed against the modern nation of Israel, not to be confused with the biblical Kingdom of Israel. Modern-day citizens of Israel are "Israelis" not "Israelites," and Israel at its heart functions more like a secular democracy than the theocratic kingdom its namesake was. A not-insignificant percentage of Israel's population today is not Jewish in any of the senses discussed.
Medved uses these labels as though they were synonymous. Although they are semantically related, there's more than a little difference between them!
Conceding that, for most intents and purposes, the distinction between the first two in common usage is pretty much academic, it's still disingenuous to suggest that any and all opposition to the modern state of Israel, its politics, and its practices, is tantamount to bigotry. Even at the height of the "freedom fries" silliness, no one seriously suggested that conservative criticism of the French government equaled dangerous racism against people of French ancestry. And although many Europeans find much to criticize in American policy, traveling abroad last summer I found that whatever they felt about my government, they were warm and welcoming toward me as
an American man. See the distinction?
It's the difference between weighing someone by who they are - their speech, their conduct, their individual quirks - or judging them by their color, religion, or even nationality. It's the difference between political dissent and irrational slander. It's the difference between having an opinion and being a bigot.
And that's a big difference.
It's entirely possible and even legitimate for unbigoted people to have sharp words to say about modern Israel and its policies.
Mel Gibson, on the other hand, spewed extremely vile racial slanders against Jewish people in a moment of drink-induced "candor."
That's shameful.
