These graphic anti-Jewish accusations lend visual force to the further demonization of Israel, a process that has been going on for many years now and has become reenergized since Hamas’ assault on Oct. 7. The atrocities that took place on that day should have provoked a sharp sense of horror and outrage. In some, it did. In others, something weirdly akin to elation occurred, and it continues to this day with robust shouts of “Israelis are Nazis,” “Hitler was right,” and “gas the Jews.” Add the formulaic denunciations of Israel as a “racist,” “apartheid,” “settler colonial,” and “genocidal” state unworthy of a future, and we confront questions similar to those provoked by the “swastika epidemic” of 1959-60.
What brought on this wave of open hatred? How long is it likely to last? How much damage will it cause? And what can be done to restrain it and forestall a repeat?
It is too soon to answer all these questions, but the first one may be clarified by what we know about who triggered the events of 1959-60. After the worst of that seemingly spontaneous torrent of raw Jew-hatred subsided, it was discovered that some of the neo-Nazis responsible for the spread of the swastikas and anti-Jewish slogans had been recruited by the KGB, which had launched an ambitious disinformation campaign against West Germany carried out by Soviet secret agents in East Germany. The Russian aim was to expose the newly denazified German state as still incorrigibly infected by Nazi ideology and thereby weaken its alliance with Western nations. For a short time, the operation succeeded, as questions were raised about the true character of West Germany: Was the successor to Hitler’s Germany in fact a liberal democratic state worth supporting or not?
Plus ça change: American multimillionaire couple funds Marxist group coordinating anti-Israel protests.