Nations United

By Jamie Glazov
January 18, 2007
FrontPageMagazine.com
Original Source: http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=26498

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Alex Grobman, an historian with an MA and Ph.D. in contemporary Jewish history from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He is president of the Institute for Contemporary Jewish Life, a think tank dealing with historical and contemporary issues affecting the Jewish community. He is a former director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angles, and the author of a number of books including Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened, and Why Do They Say It? (with Dr.Michael Shermer). He is the author of the new book Nations United: How the United Nations Undermines Israel and the West.
FP: Alex Grobman, welcome to Frontpage Interview.
Grobman: Thank you very much.
 
FP: What inspired you to write this book?
 
Grobman: In November 1975, the UN General Assembly (GA) passed Resolution 3379 stating that Zionism equals Racism.  This was probably the most damaging assault against the Jewish state because it undermined the basic ideological and spiritual foundations of the country. 
 
Although the resolution was rescinded on December 16, 1991, this malicious accusation is still used against Israel in international fora and on university campuses. 
 
I wanted to understand why the resolution succeed in passing, who was responsible for initiating and pushing it through the GA, and how the nations of the world responded to such a clear fabrication. 
 
I also wanted to provide a reasoned response to this Big Lie. 
 
This was a dangerous precedent for Israel and the West.  Once the UN succeeded in lying about the character of one nation, what would stop the Member States from doing so against other countries when it fit their needs?  
 
FP: What is the big lie? What are the major flaws behind the thesis that Zionism equals racism? In whose interest is it to perpetuate this lie? Why does such a large portion of the international community go along with it?
 
Grobman: The big lie is that Israel is a racist country. Zionism is not a racial or a discriminatory movement any more than any other national liberation movement was in Europe during the 19th century or Africa and Asia in the 20th century. 
 
Jews and Arabs are not separate races, even though Nazis claimed that the Jews were. Zionism is defined in religious terms—not ethnic ones. The mother determines the religion of the child regardless of the race or religion of the father—even if he was a non-Jew and was not converted according to Jewish law. An individual who converts to Judaism is considered a Jew, and a Jew who converts from Judaism is regarded as a non-Jew. 
 
There are no separate seats or buses for Jews and Arabs in Israel. Arabs attend Israeli universities.
 
There are no civil marriages in Israel, but this has to be seen within a historical perspective. Members of most religious denominations adhere to religious law in marriage ceremonies “a matter of conscience.” As Israeli historian Jacob Talmon pointed out, the secular parties reluctantly agreed to adhere to the religious laws on civic status because of “the anguished, post-Auschwitz fear that as a result of the destruction of the cohesion of Jewish life in Central and Eastern Europe, the atomized, rapidly assimilated Jewish communities, in which mixed marriages threaten to disrupt all that is left of the fabric of Jewish life, are left with the synagogue as the sole focus of group identity.” 
               
The Jews of Israel are so concerned and anxious about the survival and unity of the Jewish people that they decided not to assist people to have mixed marriages. Mixed marriages are permitted in Israel, but the government does not provide facilities to have them officially sanctified. Once they are formalized, then they are legally recognized. 
 
Practically every member of the UN practices some form of discrimination against those not in the minority—whether according to race, language, culture, religion, sex or origin. Citizenship in Arab countries, for example, is determined by native parentage. Immigrants from one Arab state find it practically impossible to become naturalized citizens, particularly in Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Kuwait. Arab countries allowing foreign Arabs to be naturalized reject Arabs from Israel. 
 
Jordanian law prohibits Jews from living in Jordan. In 1954, Jordan passed a law conferring citizenship to all former residents of Palestine—except Jewish ones. Civil Law No. 6 that governed the West Bank under Jordanian occupation, stated: “Any man will be a Jordan subject if he is not Jewish.” 
 
Phyllis Chesler, a psychotherapist, observed that Jews in Israel are “black, brown, olive, yellow and white. Thus, Israel has not constructed an apartheid state based on racial differences or concepts of racial purity and impurity. Their policies are a direct result of security concerns and have everything to do with reality of terrorism and nothing to do with race.” 
 
Israel’s Proclamation of Independence declares that the state “will promote the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; will be based on the precepts of liberty, justice and peace taught by the Hebrew Prophets; will uphold the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of race, creed or sex; will guarantee full freedom of conscience, worship, education and culture; … and will dedicate itself to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.” In South Africa, blacks living under apartheid were not citizens of the country and were not permitted to vote. 
 
The country’s resolve to remain a Jewish state “does not make it any more racist than countries like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia or Mauritania, which constitutionally call themselves Islamic States,” the London Observer noted a day before the UN passed the Z=R resolution. 
 
Former chief justice of Israel’s Supreme Court, Aharon Barak, explained that Zionism was not based on discrimination against non-Jews, but on their integration into the Jewish national home. Zionism was the response to European antisemitism. As a democratic state, Israel opposes discrimination and insists on equality. Treating individuals differently does not always mean discrimination. Nor does treating individuals in an identical manner automatically indicate equality. 
 
Equality is not absolute and may be infringed upon in the context  of a law that maintains public safety, and does not go beyond what is required for the survival of Israel.
 
The Arabs and the Russians pushed the Zionism Equals Racism (Z=R) resolution through the UN General Assembly as part of a worldwide campaign to delegitimize the State of Israel. This was after her enemies failed to expel her from the UN. The resolution was the first attempt to attract worldwide attention to Zionism as “a form of racism and racial discrimination,” so that it would be viewed as global problem.
 
Many nations continue to accuse Israel of racism because it allows them to deflect attention away from the problems in their own countries and in the area. They do not want their citizens thinking about human rights, social justice, corruption, terrorism and the religious fanaticism that plagues the region. Freedom of speech, of choice, thought, worship and the ability to take control of ones life is an anathema to these repressive regimes. 
 
Hating Israel and the West allows them to have someone to blame for their poverty, backwardness and inability to compete in the 21st century.  Israel and the West are convenient scapegoats to justify the reasons for their failures as individuals and as nations.
 
FP: Can you give us an insight into the psychology of the Palestinian death cult? And why do you think the Palestinians are venerated by the international community, when it is the Israelis that are the true victims of their terror and hate?
 
Grobman: The Arabs are true masters of deceit. They have duped many countries and individuals in the West to believe that they are the underdog, are casualties of Israeli aggression, and have been dispossessed of their land. They have transformed themselves into victims. Thus anything they do, including blowing up women and children, is justified. 
 
Homicide bombings are viewed by many in the West as acts of desperation by people who have lost hope in the future. Homicide bombings are designed to terrorize and demoralize the Israeli civilian population. They have also become an effective tool in manipulating the international press into keeping the eyes of the world focused on the Arab cause and their plight. 
 
Notice the leaders only encourage other people’s children to blow themselves up. Their own children are not used as cannon fodder. If homicide bombings were so rewarding and critical to the Arab cause, then why don’t the political and religious leaders and their families engage in this “holy act?” Only cowards and people with no soul can brainwash innocent and impressionable children into committing such heinous crimes. 
 
Many in the West have been duped into accepting their distorted version of the history. How many people will take the time to learn the truth? 
 
Members of the media generally do not have the time to verify what the Arabs say. For example, the Arabs love to quote UN General Assembly resolutions out of context claiming Israel is required to give up land captured in the 1967 war. 
 
They fail to mention that implementation of the resolution requires that not all the territory be ceded to the Arabs and that before a compromise can be reached as to how much will be given to then, there has to be peace between the two parties. The Arabs do this knowing that very few people have read the resolutions or remember the details. 
 
We also know that some in the media are intimidated by the Arabs not to investigate too deeply into some stories that put them in a bad light. Others sympathize with the downtrodden Arabs and either become their media advocates or fail to tell the entire truth.  
 
FP: Tell us about the U.N.’s war on Israel and the West.
 
Grobman: The attacks are a direct assault against what Israel and the West stand for: an open and free democracy where there is individual freedom and where people are free to worship. 
 
Their real objective is to destroy the American way of life. That is why this is not a Jewish issue alone. Airline hijackings, suicide bombings of cafés, supermarkets and other attacks against civilians started in Israel. Now they are being used elsewhere in the world to terrorize people.
 
Palestinians and Islamists like to portray themselves as victims, but when talking to their fellow citizens in Arabic, their political and spiritual leaders preach a supremacist ideology promoting the conquest of Israel and the West.  The Jews are the first group to be attacked, but the ultimate goal is domination of the Western world and the destruction of its values. 
 
What is particularly disturbing is that member states spew this hatred under the aegis of the UN, at the expense of the West that funds a significant portion of the UN budget. In other words, the West is helping undermine its own well-being by supporting the UN.  
 
FP: Why do you think anti-Semitism is so rampant in the U.N.?
 
Grobman: Because as one scholar noted, the international community has not yet learned that anti-Semitism is a tool of those who want to destroy democracy. The more anti-Semitism is used to incite hatred against the Jews and Israel, the greater the possibility of war becoming the only means to release that loathing and rage. 
 
FP: So why does the West continue to support the U.N.? Why engage in this self-destructive behaviour? 
 
Grobman: There is an element of inertia.  For others, there are more pressing issues that need attention. You have to pick your fights they say. Look at the controversy surrounding former UN Ambassador John Bolton, who was a forceful champion for democracy and human rights. For a number of American politicians, he was too strident. 
 
Even those who recognize the UN's failures, believe it is a forum to discuss and hopefully resolve or at least address a number of the critical problems confronting the world community. What they ask, would take its place? 
 
FP: Alex Grobman, thank you for joining Frontpage Interview.
 
Grobman: Thank you very much Jamie for the opportunity to discuss my book with your 
readers.