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scious people about itself and about many of its neighboring nations. Any comparison of Judaic history (including myths) to that of other Western and even Far Eastern nations highlights the relatively well-documented historicity of Jewry's collective saga compared to the decidedly beclouded origins and development of any of the other peoples and nations that have existed since ancient times.
The denunciation of Jewry's behavior in certain cultural and political domains when these same standards or patterns are typical of most nations and individuals in the world is one of the common denominators of all classic manifestations of anti-Semitism. Yehezkel Kaufmann identified four salient characteristics for recognizing anti-Semitic statements:
l. Fabrication -- Accusing Jews of crimes/sins they never committed (the "Blood Libel" [currently being propagated by the Saudis] being one of the most infamous examples).
2. Generalization -- Holding all Jews responsible for the acts of an individual.
3. Judaization -- Asserting that only Jews commit crimes/sins that are regularly committed by non-Jews.
4. Discriminatory harshness -- Acts not considered to be crimes when performed by non-Jews are considered to be crimes when performed by Jews.
A major example of the first criterion in Post-Zionist works is their assertion that famous Hebrew writers and historians were commissioned agents of the Zionist Organization. That assertion is pure fabrication.
Post Zionists meet the criterion of Judaization in their negation of the meaning that Jews in general and Zionists in particular attribute to Jewish history as a rationale and/or explanation for their contemporary behavior Third, the Post-Zionists' ideology is anti-Semitic in that their negativism is directed toward Jewry as a collectivity and is embodied in their view that Jews differ from other nations in terms of what they may think and do. For the Post-Zionists, the efforts made by Jews, including those of the Zionist enterprise, to transmit a sense of historical continuity and responsibility to the youth of Palestine/Israel and elsewhere for the fate of the Jewish People as an ethnic-national group constitutes an invasion by a collective ideology into the life of the individual. It matters not that teaching the public, young and old, about their historical heritage so as to transmit its messages to future generations is accepted as the unassailable right and duty of each and every nation or group. Would the Post-Zionists condemn the entire world for what is universally agreed to be a positive, necessary and highly valued practice that lies at the heart of civilization itself? There can be no clearer indication of the Post-Zionists' anti-Semitic orientation than its defamation of Zionism by accusing it of this universal act as if it were a crime.
Post-Zionist authors have led themselves into the swamp of anti-Semitism common among some academic groups in Western universities.
It is transparent that the Post-Zionists wish to disseminate a myth of their own, the myth of anti-Zionism woven out of the strands of deconstructionist nihilism and academic anti-Semitism. The negation of Judaic and Zionist history, culture, aspirations and vision preached by the Post Zionists would effectively deprive Israel of its soul and leave it an aimless haphazard mass of immigrants -- what Post Zionists falsely claim it is. The more inroads Post-Zionist thinking has made in Israel or elsewhere, the more impoverished Judaic culture has become.
Societies without faith in their identity founded on their collective past, without aspirations for a collective future as a historical culture, have little prospect for social survival.
Shlomo Sharan is professor emeritus of psychology at Tel Aviv University.
(Editor's note: In recent issues of Outpost, we have noted the absurdity of looking to "separation," whether through buffer zones, fences, walls, or any other type of physical obstacle, as a "solution" to terror attacks.)
The announcement by Prime Minister Sharon that a "buffer zone" would be created separating Israelis from Palestinians ignores the fact that we have already seen this movie: indeed the film predates 1967. At that time, there was "separation": however, the shootings and artillery attacks from the then-Jordanian "West Bank" on Israel's Mediterranean coastline showed how ineffective it was. All the elements that caused the old separation to fail are present today in more pronounced form.
At that time, the terror organizations were small, while today Israel confronts tens of thousands of armed terrorists with advanced communication networks. In those days, there was still some distance between the green line and the coastal cities. Today, the Israeli population, which has grown dramatically, has reached the old green line.
In the framework of my position in the reserves, I was asked many years ago to work with others to prepare a position paper on creating a "secure buffer zone" to prevent terrorist attacks on the coastal areas. The answer was obvious to the army officers in the Six-Day
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Outpost - 8 - April 2002