I actually find the behaviour of Marty Peretz to be far more disturbing than the wolf calls of Antisemitism. Conservative Jewish commentators have had a long history denying legitimacy to their opponents that is much more fundamental than accusations of Antisemitism.
Leon Wieseltier is right to be worried about making moral, political, and economic arguments a religion as opposed to its followers, he seems blind to how far many in the Jewish community have committed to this path.
While this certainly has found many manifestations in the "War on Terror" its origin in American culture goes back much further, at least to Irving Kristol.
Irving Kristol did not merely choose sides in a debate that pitted different factions of the western Christian tradition against each other, he eventually made it an object of faith that political discourse must chose a winner. That the Christian socialist tradition was in fact so inferior as to be an illegitimate influence on public discourse.
Irving Kristol made a political dynasty of separating good Christians from bad. The centrality of this separation is common amongst conservative Jews.
While columnist such as Dennis Prager engage in full throated denunciations of main stream protestant denominations, main stream Jewish columnist have come nearly as close.
Marty Peretz recently spoke of the inferiority of Haitian Voodoo culture. David Brooks was even more explicit. Voodoo is clearly within the Western Christian tradition. While Voodoo does preserve elements of African religions it is heavily influenced by and almost always practiced in conjunction with Catholicism.
Most notably the arguments that Brooks and Peretz use against Voodoo is that it deviates from their particular view of capitalism an argument that could just as easily be made against many main stream Christian movements.
While Peretz may be far more vocal in his denial of the legitimacy of the Muslim faith, the nature of the arguments are merely one of degree not kind.
When Peretz and Brooks say there is good Christianity and bad Christianity they are inviting Judaism to be similarly evaluated.
If Voodoo is holding Hatti back and is bad because it discourages capitalist behavior. Then is Zionism bad because it rejects equality based on practice of religion.
Peretz and Krauthammer do not make modest claims regarding terrorism and rule of law but broad claims. They repeatedly state forthrightly that they place either no value what so ever upon the due process of those of accused terrorist or so little value that whatever value it has would have no effect in policy.
While they often like to say that this is merely denying rights to terrorist, it is in fact granting the government huge unchallengeable powers to imprison and kill unquestioned.
This type of thinking deviates substantially from western thinking at least since the War of the Roses.
If there is something about their Jewishness which causes them to deviate from the rule of law, then why can't that be condemned
If Kristol, Brooks, and Peretz are willing to delegitimize elements of the Western tradition, than why not strike off elements of Judaism, or Judaism as whole.
What could Peretz have to say if some Haitian wrote Israel has been cursed with Judaism which by encouraging the government to grant different rights to Jewish and Muslim citizens has contributed to an environment which risks millions of innocent lives?
But far more realistically, what would prevent another Pope from deciding that Judaism, like Islam is incompatible with European culture.
If as many conservative Jewish commentators seem to agree there is a superior religious culture that should drive out inferior ones; and if, as the current Pope has repeatedly stated Catholicism is superior to all other paths, than what defense is there against intellectual anti-Antisemitism.
The Shoa did not happen in one generation. Europeans had been murdering Jews in spirit long before Hitler industrialized the physical destruction. When Brooks or Peretz try to kill Voodoo, they are engaging in the first acts of their own Shoa.
"Krauthammer"
- Something Much Darker | The New Republic (view on Google Sidewiki)
