Is James Petras anti-Semitic?

I recently published an article on James Petras' innovative work in relation to our understanding of the Israel Lobby and its power in the United States government. (1) In his work Petras makes no bones about the fact that he regards the Israel Lobby as a primarily jewish lobby and that the cornerstone of the Israel Lobby's power is related to the creation and the power of a new predominately jewish elite political class made up of financiers and entrepreneurs.

Now as any seasoned commentator on Israel and/or the jews knows: writing anything mildly critical of Israel or a jew is quickly labelled as 'anti-Semitic'. Let alone someone who has written so trenchant a critique of the entanglement of the powerful jewish political class in the United States with the Israel Lobby. Naturally Petras has been called a veritable barrage of pejorative names by the slavish (and often slobbering) jewish and pro-Israel blogger community (2)

Now in order to ascertain the truth or falsity of this: we need to understand what anti-Semitism actually is. The reason for this is simple: the argument is that Petras is an anti-Zionist and thus he is anti-Semitic so unless we know what anti-Semitism actually is then we cannot judge the label that is being pejoratively attached to Petras.

Anti-Semitism broadly defined is simply the opposition to jews on the basis that they are a biological group. Now there are two other forms of what we may term anti-jewishness. That is anti-Judaism, which broadly defined is opposition to Judaism as a religion and anti-Zionism, which similarly defined is the opposition to the state of Israel and Zionism as a political and intellectual ideology more broadly.

This then gives the lie to the popular misconception that anti-Zionism is synonymous with anti-Semitism precisely because there are three kinds of opposition to jews which can be held individually or in varying combinations. None of these broad categories are mutually exclusive to each other either as there have been anti-Semites who were all for Zionism and critics of Judaism who thoroughly supported Israel and Zionism while roundly condemning anti-Semitism.

Now with the common jewish and Israeli claim that anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism (the missing unstated word there is 'necessarily' incidentally) we should note that this cannot be so unless one exclusively takes Zionist logic to be the only intellectually valid position.

What do I mean by that?

Well very simply: Zionism postulates that Israel is the homeland for all jews and thus all jews are citizens of Israel (whether they have actively claimed this citizenship or not). Now this means that Zionists actively associate Israel as being representative of all jews as it is the homeland for all jews in their view. This means that opposition to Zionism and/or criticism of Israel is ipso facto 'anti-Semitic' to a Zionist precisely because by criticising Zionism and/or Israel then one is held to be criticising all jews. Thus, to a Zionist: anti-Zionism is always a manifestation of anti-Semitism, because to a Zionist Israel is the jews and the jews are Israel.

As an aside we should note that in Judaism (for example in the Mishnah and Gemara): the term 'Israel' is actually the designation of the jewish people writ large and is - like Israeli definitions of Jewishness - defined biologically not - as commonly implied by liberal jewish rabbis - confessionally

Now if we take Zionism's logic as read then indeed anti-Zionism would per force be anti-Semitism, but yet Zionism's logic is ignored by scholars of anti-Semitism as well as by most historians of the jews (including many jewish ones). The reason for this is really quite simple: Zionism's logic assumes that every jew is a Zionist (even if they don't know it yet) and wants to be associated with and eventually live in Israel.

This is however quite wrong as there are numerous jewish individuals and groups like the Neturei Karta who are stridently opposed to both Zionism and to Israel. In this particular case on the grounds that they believe (quite rightly in terms of traditional jewish religious thinking) that these invalidate the promise of the jewish messiah and that this will not occur until such time as Israel ceases to exist.

Also, to associate jews with Israel and Israel with the jews is clearly very dangerous, because it means that while everything positive that jews do also rebounds to Israel's credit (and vice versa) it also necessitates that everything negative that jews do also rebounds to Israel's loss (and vice versa). It creates a potentially dangerous spiral for jews in the Diaspora especially when Israel acts the way it does.

Now Zionists naturally want to have all the good bits of that logic (i.e., the positive things and the credit), but then promptly deny the bad bits of that logic (i.e., the negative things and the blame) labelling them as 'libellous', 'slander', 'irrational', 'paranoid', 'conspiracy theories' as well as 'anti-Semitism' and so on.

Now who in that logic is being 'irrational' and 'paranoid'?

Clearly it is the Zionists as it is they who want to associate all that they can that they perceive to be good or to their credit from the jews to Israel and vice versa, but will not countenance any blame being similarly apportioned.

This is the fundamental weakness of the Zionist intellectual position and why incidentally few scholars of anti-Semitism or historians of the jews have agreed with it, because anyone in their right mind can see the intellectually dangerous necessary consequences of claiming that Israel is the jews and the jews are Israel.

We should add that this is why scholars of anti-Semitism have been careful to split out forms of opposition to jews broadly speaking into the three types mentioned earlier: anti-Judaism, anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. This allows us to define what the view being espoused is so that we can understand the particular logic behind it rather than simply lumping opposition to the jews in a single category and claiming it is all 'irrational' (as Zionists and Israeli writers often do I might add), which ironically undermines the whole jewish critique of anti-Semitism I might add.

This means that anti-Zionism does not necessarily equate anti-Semitism precisely because they do not operate against the same object (i.e., anti-Zionism is opposed to Zionism and/or the state of Israel while anti-Semitism opposes the jews defined biologically writ large regardless of Zionism or the existence of Israel) and nor are they a consequence of each other (i.e., anti-Zionism can held while not being anti-Semitic, while anti-Semitic beliefs can be held while being pro-Zionist).

Now in Petras' case it is fairly clearly, he is not anti-Semitic, but rather anti-Zionist because he doesn't subscribe to the belief that the jews are a biological entity (3) and he doesn't associate all jews as being part of the jewish lobby or the jewish political elite. (4) The former is the necessary part of being an anti-Semite as it states one direct logic in how regards the jews, while the latter is simply a necessary clarification to Petras' belief in the existence of the jewish lobby given that he is not an anti-Semite.

In essence Petras thinks that there are many progressive jews, but that these progressive jews have had their voices shut out of the debate on the Middle East, while hawkish neo-conservative jews who have hijacked American foreign policy for the interests of another state: Israel. There is nothing anti-Semitic about that view precisely because it is a statement of opposition to Zionism and Israel as opposed to a statement attacking all jews as a biological group as such and such.

Indeed, when one takes the time to remember - as most of the typically reactionary Colonel Blimp types that form the vanguard of pro-Israeli blogging fail to do - that Petras is an avowed Marxist and accordingly denies any validity to the concept of biological origin as a determining factor in human affairs or as a useful taxonomic category. Petras use of the adjective 'jew' is for him simply a way of expressing a reference to particular group of people who self-describe in that way.

In other words, Petras is using the adjective 'jew' as a descriptive label and as nothing more than that.

So accordingly, we can see that James Petras cannot be an anti-Semite.

Oh, and did I mention Petras' wife Robin Eastman-Abaya is (probably) jewish?

References

(1) See my article: https://karlradl14.substack.com/p/james-petras-the-israel-lobby-and

(2) For example: http://fresnozionism.org/2011/11/dr-james-petras-yet-another-antisemitic-professor/; http://www.thejudeosphere.com/?p=1069; http://cifwatch.com/tag/james-petras/ ; http://www.scribd.com/doc/78332767/THE-SORDID-ANTISEMITIC-LEGACY-OF-JAMES-PETRAS-PETRAS-THE-ANTISEMITE-GOOGLE-SEARCH-ALL-PETRASEXPOSUREUSA-PETRASWATCH

(3) James Petras, 2007, 'Rulers and Ruled in the US Empire: Bankers, Zionists, Militants', 1st Edition, Clarity Press: Atlanta, pp. 99-110; 249

(4) Ibid., p. 109; James Petras, 2006, 'The Power of Israel in the United States', 1st Edition, Clarity Press: Atlanta, pp. 25; 56