Antisemitism and Islamophobia: a double standard

Dec 10, 2021 by

by Melanie Phillips:

Claims of moral equivalency are bogus. Bigotry is based on falsehoods, not fact.

One of the most obvious characteristics of antisemitism is the double standards it perpetrates, through which Jews are singled out for harmful assumptions and treatment directed against no other people in the world.

Yet the practice of double standards is perpetrated against antisemitism itself, as has been demonstrated recently in disturbing developments in both America and Britain.

[…]  A similar double standard over antisemitism has been on recent display in Britain. At the end of last month, a group of ultra-orthodox Jewish teenagers on a bus tour of central London dismounted in order to dance on the sidewalk in celebration of Chanukah.

They were promptly spat upon and abused by a group of men — some of whom at least were Muslim — who also performed Nazi salutes and hit the bus with their shoes (an Arab insult) as it drove the boys away to safety.

This horrible scene was recorded by someone on the bus. The BBC, however, included in its report of this attack the claim that “racial smears” were heard from inside the vehicle. This was later amended to one “anti-Muslim” smear that the BBC said was clearly audible.

But no one else who has watched that video has heard any such smear. Against a lot of background noise, the only words that have been detected appear to be Hebrew words tikra lemishehu, ze dachuf, which mean: “Call someone, it’s urgent”.

So astoundingly, the BBC seemed to be falsely tarnishing these young Jewish victims in order to spread moral opprobrium and thus lessen the stain of antisemitism.

With the BBC doubling down on its claim, a former Labour MP, Lord Austin — who has a record of decency towards the Jews — has written in outrage that he “can’t imagine an incident involving any other group being reported in this way”.

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