Israel and its supporters have been waging a global campaign to restrict criticism of the country, pressuring governments to amend their laws to ban and punish a wide range of demonstrations. This campaign is now arriving in Brazil, thanks to congresswoman Tabata Amaral (PSB-SP), some accomplices in the Chamber and the pro-Israel lobby Stand With Us, by André Lajst.
This occurs for the same reason behind every censorship campaign: Israel is losing the global debate about its various wars, its expansionist project, the atrocities in Gaza (which several courts and some of the world’s leading Jewish intellectuals and academics have committed) and the racial supremacism inherent to Zionism, clearly demonstrated this week with the approval, by the Knesset, of a death penalty law that applies exclusively to Arabs and Palestinians.
Opinion polls record a collapse in support for Israel around the world —. Rather than reversing this trend through public debate or adjusting the conduct behind this rejection, Israel and its defenders prefer to control the discussion, redefining any criticism of the country as illegal, intolerant and hate speech.
It is difficult to overstate the severity of the censorship envisaged in this bill. It becomes clear when observing repression in several countries. The biggest example is the US, where President Trump — whose campaign was largely financed by pro-Israel billionaires — spent the last year forcing major US universities to adopt this same pro-Israel censorship system.
As a result, some of the most important professors at top US universities are being forced to modify their CVs or look elsewhere. This includes genocide studies professor Marianne Hirsch, a Jewish woman. For decades, she included in her curriculum a famous and respected book by Hannah Arendt, one of the main philosophers of the 20th century, also Jewish, whose harsh criticisms of Israel and Zionism would violate the censorship rules imposed by Trump on Columbia University. These are the rules that Amaral wants to impose on Brazil.
Under the guise of combating hate, this project aims to radically expand the legal definition of anti-Semitism to include common criticisms made of the State of Israel and some Jewish individuals. And this is done by codifying into law the definition of anti-Semitism proposed by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) — an organization with a highly manipulative name.
This cynical exploitation of Holocaust memory and the spurious accusations of anti-Semitism against critics of Israel are highly dangerous. In addition to trivializing both things, this strategy has a high potential to cause de facto anti-Semitism when populations realize that their freedom of expression is being coerced in the name — and interests — of Israel.
It’s hard not to be shocked after reading what is being proposed by the IHRA. One of the prohibited opinions would be to say that “the existence of the State of Israel is a racist enterprise.” This view was held by countless Jewish leaders in the 20th century and by many Jews today. The mere idea that a certain opinion about a foreign country should be prohibited by law is completely absurd.
Even more remarkable is that Israel — and only Israel — enjoys these protections. Under IHRA rules, Brazilians remain free to say that any other country in the world is a racist enterprise. You could say that about China, Russia, South Korea, Indonesia, Mexico or Canada. Brazilians can even say that Brazil itself is a racist project. But not Israel.
The same goes for comparisons between the Israeli government and the Nazis, a view increasingly common after the world witnessed Israel’s crimes in Gaza. The law proposed by Amaral prohibits this comparison, but only when it comes to Israel. President Lula’s speech last year, comparing Israeli actions in Gaza to the Holocaust, would also be considered criminal under this law.
Despite the name, which has a strong emotional appeal, this law has nothing to do with anti-Semitism — it is just a pretext. The law serves to suppress debate about Israel’s behavior at a time when that debate is more important than ever.
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