Judaism and Jewish history: the weight of three millennia
Foreword by Gore Vidal
Shahak is the latest, if not the last of the great prophets "At the end of the fifties, the great gossip and amateur historian who was John F. Kennedy said Harry Truman in 1948, just when he appeared presidential candidate, had been virtually abandoned by all. It was then that a Zionist American election went to see him on the train and handed him a briefcase with two million dollars in cash. That's why the United States immediately recognized the State of Israel. Unlike his father, old Joe, and my grandfather, Senator Gore, neither I nor Jack were anti-Semitic and commented on that episode as one of many funny stories that circulated on behalf of Truman and corruption and peaceful in the sunshine policy americana.Purtroppo, quell'affrettato recognition of the State of Israel has produced forty-five anni di confusione e di massacri oltre alla distruzione di quello che i compagni di strada sionisti credevano sarebbe diventato uno stato pluralistico, patria dei musulmani, dei cristiani e degli ebrei nati in Palestina e degli immigrati europei e americani, compreso chi era convinto che il grande agente immobiliare celeste avesse dato loro, per l'eternità, il possesso delle terre della Giudea e della Samaria. Poiché molti di quegli immigrati, quando erano in Europa, erano stati sinceri socialisti, noi confidavamo che non avrebbero mai permesso che il nuovo stato diventasse una teocrazia e che avrebbero saputo vivere, fianco a fianco, da eguali, con i nativi palestinesi.Disgraziatamente, le cose non andarono così. Non intendo passare ancora una volta review the wars and tensions that have afflicted and afflicted that unhappy region. I just remember that the hasty invention of Israel has poisoned the political and intellectual life of the United States, this unlikely patron of Israel. I say unlikely because, in U.S. history, no minority has ever so much money extorted from American taxpayers to invest in the "homeland." It 'was as if we the taxpayers have been forced to finance the Pope for the reconquest of the Papal States simply because one third of the inhabitants of the United States are religious cattolica.Se had attempted such a thing, there would be a violent reaction and Congress would have suffered much the opposite. In the case of Jews, a minority that represents less than two percent of the population has bought or intimidated seventy senators, two-thirds needed to nullify a presidential veto, however unlikely, and has benefited from the solid support of some media.In sense, I admire the way the Jewish lobby has managed to make, since then, billions and billions of dollars go to Israel "bulwark against Communism." In fact, the presence of the USSR and the weight of communism were in those regions, while significant and that the only thing that we Americans are able to do was to attract the hostility of the Arab world that was first a friend . Even more sensational is the misinformation about everything that happens in the Middle East and if the first victim of those blatant lies is the American taxpayer, on the contrary, so are the Jews of the United States are constantly blackmailed by terrorists as Begin and Shamir profession. Worse still, save a few honorable exceptions, Jewish-American intellectuals abandoned liberalism for concluding demented alliances with the Christian religious right political, anti-Semitic, and the military-industrial complex of the Pentagon. In 1985, one of those intellectuals openly stated that when the Jews arrived in the United States had found "more congenial to the public and political liberals, but now is interest Judaism ally with Protestant fundamentalists because, after all, 've probably some reason why we Jews must remain faithful, dogmatically and with hypocrisy, the ideas that we shared yesterday?. "At this point, the American left has been divided and those of us who criticize our former allies to the Jews that their foolish opportunism are now branded with the ritual epithet of "anti-Semitic" or "haters of themselves." Fortunately, the voice of reason is alive and strong and Israel is just the same. From Jerusalem, Israel Shahak, with its continuous and systematic analysis, exposes the disastrous Israeli policy and the Talmud, in other words the effect that the whole tradition Rabbinical the small state of Israel, the rabbis of the extreme right now want to turn into a theocracy ebrei.Shahak reserved only see with the eye of satire all the religions that claim to rationalize the irrational and, as a scholar, brings out contradictions in the texts. It 's a pleasure to read, with his leadership, the great hater of the kind that was Dr. Maimonides! Needless to say, the Israeli authorities deplore Shahak's work but can do nothing against a retired professor of chemistry, was born in Warsaw in 1933 who spent some years of his childhood in Nazi concentration camp at Belsen. In 1945 he went to Israel Shahak, he served in the Israeli army e non è diventato marxista negli anni in cui essere marxisti era di gran moda. Shahak era, ed è, un umanista che detesta l'imperialismo sia che si manifesti come il Dio di Abramo che come la politica di George Bush e, con lo stesso vigore, la stessa ironia e competenza, si oppone al nocciolo totalitario del giudaismo.Israel Shahak è un Thomas Paine più colto che continua a ragionare e, di anno in anno, ci rivela le propsepttive che abbiamo e ci dà gli strumenti per chiarirci la lunga storia che sta alle nostre spalle.Coloro che si preoccupano per lui saranno forse più saggi o, - devo proprio dirlo? - migliori, ma Shahak è il più recente, se non l’ultimo, dei grandi profeti.
