In the category of "lame but disturbingly effective ways to malign Israel and Jews in general," the state-owned Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation recently aired a documentary about the pro-Israel activists in Norway, concluding - or rather precluding that it's not unlike a conspiracy of fundamentalist, end-of-day Christians run by devious, shadowy Jews at the Israeli embassy in Oslo.
I am one of the "pro-Israel" (though I rather think that peace should be of some passing interest to Palestinians as well) Norwegians, and I am not Christian nor particularly fundamentalist, and the Israeli embassy in Oslo won't respond to my e-mails even when I ask questions.
Remember Newsradio? That much admired but too little viewed TV show with Phil Hartman? Remember when he bumped into Jerry Seinfeld and interviewed him, only to edit the responses so as to distort not only what Seinfeld meant but what he actually said?
That's what NRK did in producing this report. Partial quotes, wierd camera angles, you name it, they did it. And they're not even embarrassed. They think the pro-Israel camp should be happy they got to be on TV at all.
A lot of people are calling foul, and NRK doesn't seem to care. What I want to point out, though, are two things:
First, that "editing" at NRK doesn't mean "for brevity" or "for clarity," but "for meaning." Any news organization that would even consider using (and then defending!) such tactics once DOES IT ALL THE TIME.
Second, and this is a bit more complicated, so bear with me: The accusations of antisemitism are going to bounce off NRK like water off a duck's ass, because to them, maligning Jews isn't antisemitism. Maligning Jews in this crowd is simply telling the truth. It works like this: Israel is wrong. Anyone who defends Israel is therefore morally deficient. We must look for some explanation why they are morally deficient, and some explanations seem vaguely familiar and make sense besides.
To these clowns, antisemitism is when you're frothing at the mouth, rabid antisemitic like Julius Streicher. Anything short of that is at worst impolite. They can tolerate someone who is Jewish, as long as they hate Israel and know their place.
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