“Freedom is always, exclusively, the freedom of those who think differently from us” (Rosa Luxemburg). The Brazilian left, which lives preaching judicial repression of the “wrong” word, has no moral right to contest its call for the elimination of the State of Israel. I have, because I am among those who agree with the German communist revolutionary.
Yes: José Maria’s speech was anti-Semitic, no matter how much he uses the vulgar trick of dressing it in the clothes of “anti-Zionism”. The accusations he uses against (“racist”, “colonialist” State, which practices “genocide”) are not his true motivations for calling for its extinction. His problem is that Israel is a Jewish state.
Israel, “racist” state? False. But what if it was? Why was the extinction of the USA, which maintained racial discrimination laws until 1967, never demanded?
“Colonialist” state? High school simplification. What if it was? It was never suggested to wipe the USA off the map, again, together with Canada, Australia, Brazil and several, etc., nations of settlers implanted on the ruins of indigenous peoples.
Does Israel practice “genocide”? Valid debate. However, no one had the idea of removing Turkey, Germany, Cambodia or Rwanda from the planet, which carried out the biggest genocides in contemporary history.
Zé Maria’s accusations, which are those of the anti-Semitic left in general, single out Israel, describing it as the synthesis of an unparalleled perversity: the rotten fruit of an original sin. “Sin,” for them, is their Jewish nature.
The Jewish State is not Netanyahu, but a national contract that guarantees political and civil rights for its 10.1 million citizens. With what moral authority does a non-Israeli call for the cancellation of others’ contracts?
An Israeli citizen, Jew or Arab, would exercise his right by proposing to his fellow citizens a plebiscite designed to replace Israel with the unlikely “secular and democratic Palestine” invoked by José Maria. I doubt the success of the initiative – but the roll is with them. On the other hand, when a foreigner (even a Jew!) calls for the suppression of the Jewish State, he is beating the drum for a war of national annihilation.
Zé Maria did not shout against the occupation of Palestinian territories to demand the division of the Holy Land into two states. He did not argue that if Israel rejects partition, there would be only one democratic solution left: granting full citizenship to all Palestinians in the occupied territories. Instead, he chose to unfurl the Hamas flag on Avenida Paulista: “from the river to the sea”. Even so, you must retain the freedom to express abominable ideas.
“Progressive” Brazil has invented several legal subterfuges to repress political opinion, criminalizing speeches that can be interpreted as racist, homophobic or misogynistic. Criminalization obviously fails to teach society good manners – and sometimes triggers a short circuit, leading to the conviction of an anti-Semitic “progressive” accused of racism.
The court decision is an error protected by law. Freedom for Zé Maria! May anti-Semitism come out of the woodwork, show its right and left faces, so that we can combat it in the light of day.
LINK PRESENT: Did you like this text? Subscribers can access seven free accesses from any link per day. Just click the blue F below.
