READER LAURENCE JARVIK, who also puts out The Idler, shares his impressions of last night’s Nightline:

To my eye, it was overtly anti-Semitic. Strangely Koppel only narrated the final portion, a weak interview with Elie Wiesel where he accused him of falsely equating criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism, which Wiesel denied–translation: it is OK to trash Israel.

Report from Paris apparently justified attacks on Jews as result of Arab rage, talked about conflicts between Jews and Arabs, not making clear that every case is one of Jewish victimization and Arab attacks.

Reporter John Donvan repeated anti-Semitic canards and permitted Hitchens to rail against the Israeli lobby apparently qualified because he is Jewish and his wife is Jewish — hardly making him an expert on Anti-Semitism (Hitchens was reportedly raised non-Jewish and ‘discovered’ his Jewishness later in life, so may have some psychological conflicts that Donvan declined to mention). He grilled Foxman and got him to say it was OK to call Sharon a ‘murderer.’

To my eye Donvan looked guilty, wanted permission from Foxman to bash Jews as Jews. Perhaps you should find a transcript, it seemed like the lowest point of the series in history. Maybe Disney was right to want to cancel the show.

Cheers,
Larry

PS I only watched it because you mentioned it in Instapundit. Curious about other blogosphere reactions…

So am I. I didn’t see it; we get up at the crack of dawn around here, so watching Nightline is more than a sacrifice than I cared to make. Reader John Kluge adds:

Of course, criticizing Isreal alone does not make you an anti-semite anymore than critcizing Jesse Jackson or Cynthia McKinney makes you a racist. However, isn’t it interesting that the very people on the left who have been charging everyone who disagrees with them on racial issues racists for years, now whine that they are being tagged for being anti-semitic for criticizing
Isreal? I don’t think that its true that they are being called anti-semitic merely for criticizing Isreal. You are dead on the mark when you write “Sure, you can criticize Israel without being antisemitic. But when you criticize Israel for things you ignore in others, it raises certain doubts” However even if they are right and they are being unfairly accused of anti-semitism, who are they to complain after spending the last 40 years calling anyone who disagreed with them on racial issues racist?

It is hard to imagine Nightline running a show whose main theme is that people who criticize black political leaders, even all black political leaders, aren’t racist, isn’t it?

Actually, it gets easier to imagine all the time. I think that the growth of antisemitism in Europe prefigures a broader resurgence of racism and general nastiness, which is one reason I’ve been calling attention to it. (I don’t think it will spread to the U.S., with the exception of those limited segments of society who look to Europe for their lead in all things). It’s too bad Nightline is contributing to the problem by making excuses. Of course, maybe this characterization is unfair. I didn’t see the show, and though I find Laurence Jarvik’s impressions generally reliable, I might have disagreed with him in this instance. I’ll be interested in seeing what other people say.