Behind the Humanitarian Mask: the Nordic Countries, Israel, and the Jews 18
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BEHIND THE HUMANITARIAN MASK Books by the Same Author Revaluing Italy, with Lorenzo Necci (Italian), 1992 Environment and Confusion: An Introduction to a Messy Subject, 1993 Israel’s New Future: Interviews, 1994 The State as a Business: Do-It-Yourself Political Forecasting (Italian), 1994 Judaism, Environmentalism, and the Environment, 1998 The Environment in the Jewish Tradition: A Sustainable World (Hebrew), 2002 Europe’s Crumbling Myths: The Post-Holocaust Origins of Today’s Anti-Semitism, 2003 American Jewry’s Challenge: Conversations Confronting the 21st Century, 2004 Israel and Europe: An Expanding Abyss? 2005 European-Israeli Relations: Between Confusion and Change? 2006 Books Edited The New Clothes of European Anti-Semitism, with Shmuel Trigano (French), 2004 Academics against Israel and the Jews, 2007 Israel at the Polls 2006, with Shmuel Sandler and Jonathan Rynhold, 2008 Monograph The Autumn 2005 Riots in France: Their Possible Impact on Israel and the Jews, 2006 BEHIND THE HUMANITARIAN MASK THE NORDIC COUNTRIES, ISRAEL, AND THE JEWS Edited by Manfred Gerstenfeld Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Institute for Global Jewish Affairs Center for Holocaust Studies Copyright © 2008 by Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA) and Manfred Gerstenfeld All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system—except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews—without written permission from the JCPA, 13 Tel Hai Street, Jerusalem, 92107, Israel. Tel: +972 2 561 9281, Fax: + 972 2 561 9112. E-mail: [email protected], www.jcpa.org ISBN: 978-965-218-066-7 Set in New Times New Roman at Marek Lasman, Jerusalem Printed at Ahva—Coop. Printing Press Ltd Cover design by Rami & Jacky Dedicated to Simon Wiesenthal: a witness for the victims, a voice for the survivors, a conscience for the world. He combined humanity with being human, and became an inspiration to all who accepted that hatred and anti-Semitism must be fought. Table of Contents Acknowledgments 9 Introduction 11 Gert Weisskirchen: Foreword 15 Manfred Gerstenfeld: Behind the Humanitarian Mask: The Nordic Countries, Israel, and the Jews 18 ESSAYS AND INTERVIEWS ON INDIVIDUAL COUNTRIES Manfred Gerstenfeld: Anti-Israelism and Anti-Semitism in Sweden: An Interview with Zvi Mazel 81 Mikael Tossavainen: Arab and Muslim Anti-Semitism in Sweden 89 Gerald Steinberg: The Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency’s Support for NGO Campaigns against Israel 101 Efraim Zuroff: Sweden’s Refusal to Prosecute Nazi War Criminals, 1986-2007 106 Manfred Gerstenfeld: Norway: Extreme Expressions of Anti-Israeli and Anti-Semitic Attitudes 130 Erez Uriely: Jew-Hatred in Contemporary Norwegian Caricatures 142 Odd Sverre Hove: The Cut-and-Omit TV News: Norway 159 Manfred Gerstenfeld: Norway: The Courage of a Small Jewish Community; Holocaust Restitution and Anti-Semitism: An Interview with Bjarte Bruland 165 Arthur Arnheim: Anti-Semitism after the Holocaust: Also in Denmark 171 Vilhjálmur Őrn Vilhjálmsson and Bent Blüdnikow: Rescue, Expulsion, and Collaboration: Denmark’s Difficulties with Its World War II Past 179 Gerald Steinberg: Finnish State Funds Support Palestinian NGO Campaigns against Israel 204 Manfred Gerstenfeld: Finland’s Tarnished Holocaust Record: An Interview with Serah Beizer 209 Vilhjálmur Őrn Vilhjálmsson: Iceland, the Jews, and Anti-Semitism, 1625-2004 219 Contributors and Interviewees 241 Index 245 Acknowledgments My thanks are due to the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies for publishing this book. I would also like to thank the authors of the essays and the interviewees for sharing their knowledge with me. I am very grateful to Prof. Gert Weisskirchen for honoring me with his informative Foreword. I appreciate the constant support I have received for the Post-Holocaust and Anti-Semitism program from Dore Gold and Chaya Herskovic, president and director-general of the Jerusalem Center, respectively. Many thanks also to Edna Weinstock-Gabay, who was responsible for the production of this book. I am particularly appreciative of Hili Hansen for her assistance with the research for my two essays. I am also obliged to Mikael Tossavainen for his many insightful remarks. My colleague at the Jerusalem Center, Justus Weiner, has been very helpful in many ways. I would like to thank Serah Beizer, Margalit Israeli, Yael Beck, Berit Reisel, and Tamas Berzi for their detailed comments. I also thank all the many others who have helped me in this endeavor with their knowledge. I am indebted to Fredelle Ben-Avi for her patience in typing the many drafts of this volume. Last but not least I am thankful to David Hornik for his copyediting, proofreading, and preparation of the index. Manfred Gerstenfeld Manfred Gerstenfeld Introduction In recent years the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs has published several articles about the Nordic countries, Jews, and Israel in both the Jewish Political Studies Review and Post-Holocaust and Anti-Semitism. Gradually a picture has emerged of these countries that differs greatly from the often superficial friendliness the visiting tourist experiences, or the impressions one gains abroad from the few usually positive articles in international media. Little is known about the multiple negative events in the Nordic countries regarding Israel and the Jews. The Jerusalem Center’s collaboration with the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies has made it possible to group and update in this volume several earlier articles and interviews and to complement them with additional essays. This volume aims to provide a more strategic picture of the Nordic countries’ attitudes toward Israel and the Jews than is available elsewhere in English. Our research clarifies that in recent years part of the societal elites, particularly in Sweden and Norway, have been responsible for many pioneering efforts to demonize Israel. Prominent among the perpetrators are leading socialist and other leftist politicians, journalists, clergy, and employees of NGOs. This demonization is based on the classic motifs of anti-Semitism, which often also accompany its new mutation of anti-Israelism. Darker Attitudes Behind the Nordic countries’ righteous appearance and oft-proclaimed concern for human rights often lurk darker attitudes. This volume’s main purpose is to lift their humanitarian mask as far as Israel and Jews are concerned. This disguise hides many ugly characteristics, including the financing of demonizers of Israel, a false morality, invented moral superiority, and “humanitarian racism.” Such humanitarian racists think—usually without expressing it explicitly, sometimes not even being conscious of it—that only white people can be fully responsible for their actions while nonwhites cannot (or can but only to a limited extent). A journalist for the Norwegian conservative daily Aftenposten reacted to the prepublication of this author’s essay on Norway in this volume, stating that its tone was “extraordinarily shrill.” This was a bizarre remark in view of the tone 11 12 Introduction of the daily that employs him. Assuming that he was writing in good faith, it illustrates a major problem: being in denial about matters that occur in one’s own environment. In recent years Aftenposten has published a variety of extreme anti-Semitic cartoons, articles, and letters to the editor. Before World War II it also published anti-Semitic articles. No overview of twenty-first-century West European anti- Semitism can be complete without reference to this paper. The facts presented in this volume about this Norwegian “quality daily” demonstrate how hypocrisy and anti-Semitism converge. When discussing the more general convergence of these two tendencies during the preparation of this volume, one example seemed to impress my conversation partners in particular. In Norway, Jewish ritual slaughter has been forbidden since well before World War II, under Nazi influence. On the other hand, except for Norway, Japan, and Iceland no countries allow whaling. The Norwegian quota for the 2008 season is the highest, with over one thousand whales to be killed.1 These mammals are harpooned and die in an exceptionally cruel way. Meeting Israel’s Challenges? Arrogance and double standards toward Israel often go together. Would Norway and Sweden have remained democracies if they had had to cope with the kinds of challenges Israel has faced in the past decades? There are several indications that they would not have. In May 2008, Håkan Syrén, commander of the Swedish Armed Forces, warned that if security conditions were to deteriorate the country would not have the protection it needed.2 In the same month it became known that at the Oskarshamn nuclear plant safeguards were lacking “to ensure that security checks are performed on everybody entering the plant.”3 The facility’s operating company OKG reacted by saying it hoped to remedy the situation by October 2008. In Norway General Robert Mood, inspector-general of the army, “has described the army’s current capability as only being able to defend perhaps one neighborhood in Oslo, much less the entire country.”4 In June, the Norwegian vice- admiral Jan Reksten, commander of the country’s troops in Afghanistan said that the Norwegian base at Meymaneh is less secure than “similar bases” belonging to other NATO forces. Colonel Ivar Haisel, the base’s future commander said that if the Taliban attacked as they had in May the Norwegians would no longer have weapons superiority.5 The opening essay of this volume offers more substantiation of the point: seemingly these countries would not fare well if they had to face Israel’s challenges. Manfred Gerstenfeld 13 The Future It is likely that, because of future global developments, clearer perspectives will emerge on the double standards of many members of Nordic elites toward Israel and Jews. In rapidly changing times it is important to document situations at a given moment.