I have remarked before that hatred against Jews now appears to become socially acceptable whenever Israel enters the picture. This has produced yet another Catch-22 for Jews, in that the issue of Israel has provoked a firestorm of anti-Jewish hatred, but if one draws attention to this anti-Jewish hatred in the context of Israel one is told such views are in fact perfectly acceptable. Thus the ‘world Jewish conspiracy’ is a lunatic pathological prejudice when used by neo-Nazis claiming that the Jews dangerously subvert the world, but entirely fair comment when university professors claim that Jews dangerously subvert American foreign policy.
In Sweden, prejudice against Israel appears to be running at a dangerously high level. It has just pulled out of European military exercises because of Israel’s involvement, as this article reports. There has also been another particularly disturbing development, as this article reveals:
It is a crime in Sweden to express derogatory statements about ethnic, racial, national, religious and sexual minorities or to incite hatred and violence against them. Simultaneously the limits of what one can express in Sweden against Jews are being expanded gradually. All Jewish institutions in Sweden are being continuously guarded because of threats directed to Jewish individuals as well as to Jewish institutions, and the Jewish communities spend 25% of their budget on security.
The hate website Radio Islam continues to spew forth its coarse Anti-Semitism, spread lists of Jews (real or imagined) and conspiracy theories on its site without the security police or the prosecuting authorities doing anything about it. When the radical right-wing party the Sweden Democrats on the other hand, had one of the Muhammed cartoons on its web-site, it was closed down after a quick and direct intervention by an official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
At the beginning of this year, the Chancellor of Justice, Goran Lambertz, discontinued his preliminary investigation against the great mosque in Stockholm. Cassette tapes had been sold in the bookshop of the mosque with a violently Anti-Semitic contents. After a couple of broadcasts on the 26 and 27th November last year, the Stockholm mosque was reported to the police.
In his decision to discontinue the preliminary investigation Lambertz wrote that 'the lecture at hand contains statements that are strongly degrading to Jews, among other things, they are throughout called brothers of apes and pigs.' Furthermore a curse is expressed over the Jews and 'Jihad is called for, to kill the Jews, whereby suicide bombers - celebrated as martyrs - are the most effective weapon'.
The Chancellor raises the question whether the statements 'should be judged differently, and be considered allowed, because they are used by one side in a continuing profound conflict, where battle cries and invectives are part of everyday occurrences in the rhetoric that surround the conflict.' Lambertz thought that the 'recently mentioned statements in spite of their contents are not to be considered 'incitement against an ethnic group according to Swedish law'. His conclusions were that the preliminary investigation should be discontinued because this case of incitement against Jews could be said to originate from the Middle East conflict. That is, in spite of the calls for 'killing the Jews', these statements are not a crime in the legal sense in Sweden, because of the current conflict in the Middle East, according to the Chancellor of Justice. The logical conclusion is clear. If one mentions Palestine in hate speeches and calls for mass murder against Jews, one risks nothing in Sweden.
In May last year the Minister for Justice, Thomas Bodstrom, stated in Parliament that the police and the prosecuting authorities should give top priority to hate crimes as e.g. incitement against Jews. The reinterpretation of the law by the Chancellor of Justice gives the absolute opposite message. If this interpretation will turn into practice the threshold for the expression of hatred and incitement against Jews will be nearly eradicated. The most frightening thing about this decision is the resounding silence that it has generated.
Meanwhile, as Jewish victimisation is airbrushed out of the picture, the largest Swedish Muslim body, the Swedish Muslim Association, is piling on the pressure. Here is its list of demands which includes:
...Corrections of the Swedish family law to adapt it to Islam. It is this law that is the most important to Swedish Muslims: marriage, divorce, child protection, and raising underage children
the right to take a vacation on some of the two major religious holidays, and to be allowed a few hours time off in the middle of the day on Friday to participate in the Friday prayers
Counties and provinces ought to elevate all the so called basement- and apartment mosques around the country to equal status with Churches
The construction of mosques ought to be financed by interest free loans as an alternative to voluntary contributions from abroad.
Elevating native language and religion [Islam] to the level of normal subject in the curriculum, where Muslim children have the possibility of being educated in homogenous groups using their own native language and their own religion in the County schools. Imams and native language teachers should have status as ordinary teachers in Second Native Language and religion.
Every county ought to have one night a week that should be a womans evening, and respectively a mans evening, in the gym and the swimming hall. The entire hall [facility] should be open only for women or men, whereas other evenings would be for both genders... We demand that county politicians should deliberate this matter immediately
We demand special legislation in this matter that is the right to two days paid vacation in connection to the celebration of these holidays and that these two days cover the need to celebrate the holidays for Sunni and Shia Muslims and it proves that our religion and culture are accepted by the community.
And finally -- without, of course, any irony:
The biggest problem that Muslims face is the opinions of the majority. The community is responsible [or guilty] for trying to assimilate the immigrants of the nation. Both in daily speech and learned discussion the community uses such concepts and expressions in regards to Muslims that are untrue, distorted, and laden with negative undertones. Borders are made between ‘us’ and ‘them’.
Don’t you just love multiculturalism?
