Same Old O.J. M.O.

Melanie Phillips has noticed that Official Jewry (being largely lefty, and therefore given to perambulating with their noggins lodged firmly up the fundament) is pretty much the same on both sides of the pond (H/T MK):

On a recent speaking tour in Montreal and Toronto, I was struck by the beleaguered state of many Canadian Jews.

They were battling the usual mad barrage against Israel from the media, politicians on the left and rabid anti-Israel and Judeophobic lies and libels on campus.

Home from home, in other words.

But perhaps the most troubling aspect was that they appeared not to possess the verbal ammunition with which to respond.

It seemed to me that, as I wrote here last month, the problem was that to a greater or lesser extent they themselves had been sucked into the narrative of lies.

Because so many were centrist or liberally-minded folk, they accepted a premise they quite mistakenly thought represented the ‘centre ground’.

That premise was that the settlements were the big problem. That inevitably paints Israel as the bad guy in the region. So these Israel defenders are forced onto the defensive. And once there, the argument is all but lost.

But as I put to them, Israel has actually done nothing to be defensive about. It is instead Israel’s attackers who are murderous aggressors who refuse to accept Israel as a Jewish state, even though settlements have been evacuated and territory offered up as a compromise.

So I suggested they should rethink their entire approach. Change the narrative. Get off the back foot and put Israel’s attackers onto theirs.

Refuse to argue on the Israel-bashers’ chosen ground. Disdain them socially. Take their words and their reputations apart. Treat them as pariahs for their bigotry. And so on.

The response was startling. For these Canadian Jews were amazed. No-one, it seemed, had ever suggested any of this to them before.

Suddenly they saw a way out of the box. Suddenly they saw how they could reclaim for Israel not just the language but the great cause itself of truth, law and justice...

I think Melanie is being overly optimistic. Once you're stuck in the internationalist/multiculturalist/"social justice"/"human rights"/"bridge building" box (really, a big house of mirrors) it's almost impossible to break free. To do so requires an epiphany that changes one's entire world view, and how likely is that for folks who believe the lefty way and the way of virtue are synonymous?