Conspiricy Theories – דיויד סטברו

The Far-right Activist Who Sparked an Imaginary Pogrom in Stockholm

The question of whether the attack on Israelis in Amsterdam last month was an isolated incident or the beginning of a trend is critical to Israel's relationship with the rest of the world and the future of Europe's Jews. And according to several Israeli media outlets, two days after the incident in Amsterdam, a similar incident occurred in another European capital.

Published in Haaretz: https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2024-12-12/ty-article-opinion/.premium/the-far-right-activist-who-sparked-an-imaginary-pogrom-in-stockholm/00000193-b770-dd53-a3f3-f77b2ee60000

The online news site Mako reported that Jews were attacked "in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, during a ceremony commemorating the Kristallnacht pogrom." It said anti-Israel demonstrators yelled derogatory names at the ceremony's participants, snatched their Israeli flags, tore them up and threw them into the river.

The report was accompanied by a video titled "the difficult footage from Sweden." It shows police officers chasing a woman and arresting her. Channel 14 News added analysis and superlatives. "Antisemitism is having a feast day," it reported. "Pro-Palestinians brutally attacked Jews who gathered to mark the anniversary of Kristallnacht in Stockholm." The same news item, with some variations, appeared in other media outlets and was widely circulated on social media.

Meanwhile, in the real world, what happened in Stockholm is indeed troubling, but for different reasons. First, no ceremony commemorating Kristallnacht took place there. Second, no Jews were attacked. Third, this false information was disseminated by people who counted on the media to spread the lie, thereby providing them with free political propaganda. And they were right. The Swedish media refused to buy the goods, but the Israeli media sure did (I might add, for the benefit of Mako's investigative reporters, that Stockholm doesn't have a river).

What actually happened in Stockholm that night was revealed by Swedish investigative reporter Jonathan Leman in Expo magazine (which defines itself as fighting "racist ideas, myths and conspiracy theories"). On the evening of November 9, a pro-Palestinian march took place in central Stockholm. Such demonstrations have been happening in Sweden for more than a year now. The marchers chant slogans that some people (myself included) see as antisemitic, and they are filled with hatred for Israel. But usually, they are completely nonviolent.

This demonstration was the same, aside from one difference – the protest march was joined by a guest riding a bike, who was widely filmed by videographers broadcasting from the scene. One of them is known to work with media outlets identified with the Sweden Democrats, a populist right-wing party that has a neo-Nazi past.

The demonstrators immediately realized that the bike rider wasn't one of theirs. She was an older woman who spoke with the videographers and attracted attention because she had an Israeli flag attached to her bike (as well as the Finnish flag and Iran's flag from before the Islamic Revolution). She also had a loudspeaker through which she played Hebrew songs like "Am Yisrael Chai" and a megaphone via which she proclaimed that "Hamas murdered all the homosexuals in Gaza" and "Hamas planned to annihilate all the Jews."

At first glance, she appeared to be a courageous warrior who supports Israel. And that is indeed how she was depicted in reports from the videographers who were there. But this isn't true. As Expo discovered, the woman is actually a far-right activist. On social media, she spreads a mixture of antisemitism, Holocaust denial and conspiracy theories about the coronavirus, an Islamic takeover of Europe and the destructive power of Sweden's Jews, who "want to destroy the Nordic peoples" and constitute "a metastasizing cancer."

So why was she demonstrating against the Palestinians and seemingly supporting Israel? Anyone who tries to impose order on this eccentric activist's political theories will discover that her support for Israel stems from her hatred of Jews and Muslims in Europe. Despite her ideological hatred of Zionism, she wants the Nordic states to be free of Muslims and Jews, so she supports their expulsion. This isn't love of Zion, but radical racism and antisemitism.

The bike rider's appearance at the demonstration had the potential to cause an outbreak of rioting. But that didn't happen. Granted, there was some anger, but the organizers worked to calm it. At the end of the demonstration, one demonstrator grabbed the woman's Israeli flag, threw it off a bridge and was arrested on the spot. The headline the right-wing media gave this incident was "On the day we remember Kristallnacht, a Palestinian activist stole an Israeli flag and threw it into the water." What happened next is fascinating. People posting on numerous X, Instagram and Facebook accounts in several countries began adding details, limited only by their imaginations.

A ceremony that never took place was invented, groups of Jews who were attacked were created ex nihilo, one flag became many flags, and on some accounts, it was no longer flags that thrown into the freezing water of the Baltic Sea, but Jews. Anger boiled over, and there were thousands of shares and comments in groups with hundreds of thousands of members. When all this reached the Israeli media, the makeover was complete – the inventions became news. Even their rejection of the original videographer's false information didn't change anything.

Two conclusions can be drawn from the incident in Stockholm. First, the support Israel's government has found in Europe's far right is a broken reed. Beneath the hatred of Arabs and the nationalist fervor that the government likes so much lies a thick layer of antisemitism that cannot be mistaken. Second, the battle that honest politicians on all sides must join is the battle against the agents of chaos who create a world in which instead of truth and lies, there are only narratives.

The worship of likes and internet traffic, media outlets that dispense with checking facts and operators of trolls and bots aren't a threat to the opposition or the governing coalition. Rather, they are threat to the very existence of a free society.

The question of whether last month's attack on Israelis in Amsterdam was an isolated incident or the beginning of a trend remains critical. Yet anyone who reports on imaginary pogroms is not only undermining the media's credibility, but also creating a situation in which nobody will believe in or deal with the real ones.

For Europe's Jews, Antisemitism Is Felt in Everyday Interactions

More than physical violence, antisemitism against European Jews now reveals itself through incidents such as school bullying and ostracism at the workplace. Israeli expat communities on the continent could become a bridge between Israeli and European societies.

Published in Haaretz: https://www.haaretz.com/opinion/2024-11-19/ty-article-opinion/.premium/for-europes-jews-antisemitism-is-felt-in-everyday-interactions/00000193-447d-dd32-a9df-7e7d4c000000

STOCKHOLM – The rioting that followed the soccer match between Maccabi Tel Aviv and the Dutch team Ajax in Amsterdam at the beginning of the month engendered mixed reactions in Israel. Initially, there was shock over its blatant antisemitic character and lamentations over "the Islamization of Europe." That was followed by claims that the violence was prompted by the conduct of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans and that comparisons to Kristallnacht trivialized the Holocaust.

Such arguments merit discussion, but, to delve more deeply, it's worth considering the European perspective in addition to the Israeli one. First of all, when Maccabi Tel Aviv fans faced physical violence, they were facing a very extreme expression of anti-Israelism and antisemitism. However, for Jews who live in Europe, it's just one manifestation of antisemitism, albeit perhaps the most frightening one, but certainly not the most common.

Other manifestations are less photogenic, but they impose a heavy burden on the lives of European Jews: pestering at school, aggressive campaigns on social media, cultural and academic boycotts, hurtful comments, and tension and ostracism in the workplace. Physical violence is rather rare.

Secondly, antisemitism is much more than an individual case of racism. In European public discourse, there is a nascent recognition that it's a kind of conspiracy theory. Those falling into its net and spreading it might be people who have never met a Jew, and perceive themselves as liberals who "have nothing against the Jewish people." They don't even need to use the word "Jewish." The conflict in the Middle East and the so-called gray area between what is antisemitic and what is anti-Israel has made it possible to use code words such as "globalists", references to George Soros – and, of course, Zionists.

It's not a new phenomenon, but it involves a world of new concepts. Instead of old-style antisemitism in which the Jews were considered Christ's killers, or more modern antisemitism accusing the Jews of controlling the world through the banking system, revolutionary movements and secret societies, there are contemporary allegations that prove confusing even to those who don't hold clearly racist views. The most popular ones claim Jews spread COVID-19 to profit from vaccines, are behind the war in Ukraine, and are breaking up nation-states. In addition, the well-known conspiracies about Jewish control of the media and the financial markets are still going around.

The Israeli left has also sometimes fallen into the trap. Since it rightly opposes continued Israeli control of the West Bank and the war crimes in Gaza, it finds European partners for its worldview. Sometimes they're serious and honest partners, however, other times, they're actors spreading allegations of genocide who support Islamist terrorist groups and propaganda advocating Israel's destruction.

Just as the Israeli far-right finds neo-Nazi partners as a result of their campaign against Muslims, some on the left find antisemitic partners because they oppose the occupation – even if its opposition is to Israel's 1949 armistice borders rather than to those post-1967.

Third, real-life antisemites, unlike those portrayed in the media, aren't two-dimensional figures. The coverage of what happened in Amsterdam focused on scenes of masked men of Middle Eastern origin looking for blood. In the real world, antisemitism has been hiding behind more familiar faces with other characteristics, other backgrounds and motives: young Europeans who read Trotskyite literature, high school students using antisemitism as a means of abusing classmates, and university lecturers attempting to attract attention to themselves.

Not all immigrants are antisemitic. Not all antisemites are immigrants, and the antisemitic incidents in Europe aren't necessarily spontaneous outbursts of hate or protest. They're also a product of campaigns financed by actors such as Qatar, Turkey and Russia. Just as most rapists don't look like monsters and don't lurk behind bushes in dark parks, the antisemitic monster sometimes lives within ordinary and seemingly unthreatening figures.

When soccer fans come to Europe and witness demonstrators spreading hate against Israel under the banner of the Palestinian flag, they experience it as a physical threat. When European Jews witness the same demonstration, more than violence, they fear that the hostile crowd includes their children's kindergarten teacher, their bank clerk or their nurse at the local clinic.

And one last point. We're used to identifying the victims of antisemitism in Europe with members of local Jewish communities. In Amsterdam, the victims were Israeli tourists who experienced it for the moment and then returned home. But among those two distinct groups, there's another. In recent years, groups of Israeli expats in Europe have established communities engaged in education, culture and social initiatives; the Hebrew language and secular Israeli identity are flourishing there.

These communities experience and deal with antisemitism differently, constituting both an opportunity and a risk in that regard. On the one hand, they're liable to constitute an attractive target for violent attacks and antisemites. On the other hand, their members might build a bridge for dialogue between Israeli and European societies that could help to deal with the sickness of antisemitism that the continent has been suffering from for centuries.

Why Don't You Recognize October 7th – A letter to a Burmese friend (and a genocide researcher)

This is a tectonic and world-changing event, carried out by thousands of people supported by hundreds of thousands of people, as well as by movements, states and regimes. Not condemning it is supporting it. And the results are inevitable. Because of the horror that these people have inflicted on the world, an even darker night is to come before we will see the light.

Published in "Davar": https://en.davar1.co.il/462536/

A is my friend. He is a Burmese expatriate from Myanmar living in Europe. He is an academic, an educated and friendly person, and a veteran human rights activist. As a journalist who writes, among other things, about countries where acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing and human rights violations take place, I consult with various experts. A is one of them. This is the letter I sent him last week.

Hello, A. I am writing in response to your letter regarding the “colonial character and genocidal policy of Israel.” As you can imagine, I am quite busy these days, and as someone who is far away from his family in Israel, I am distracted. I am responding to you despite all this, mainly because your words opened with a reference to Auschwitz, a place where many of my family members were murdered about 80 years ago.

According to you, Israel is using the Holocaust as a “blank check” to justify the imprisonment, bombing and starvation of 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, almost half of whom are children. "In these circumstances, 'never again' is a hollow phrase," you write. “It becomes a call for uncontrolled violence, battle cries and a campaign of revenge and extermination." In the past and under different circumstances, I must admit that I might have agreed with you.

A, you must remember that we got to know each other after several occasions when you very generously shared with me your expertise, knowledge and experience regarding Myanmar. When I first contacted you, I wrote that as a journalist working in a free country, I felt obliged to tell the story of the victims of atrocities there – amongst others, the Rohingya people other minorities who have been suffering from genocidal policies for years since the military coup in 2021.

Since I am not an expert myself, I reached out to you, just as I reached out to many other experts, witnesses and human rights activists who could shed light on other places I wrote about, such as China, Ethiopia, Syria, Iran, Mexico, Belarus and Iraq.

This is an important point. As you know, there are complicated conflicts in many of these places about which there are different opinions. Still, my feeling was that we shared a real commitment to expose and fight certain types of acts which cannot be excused under any circumstances, regardless of the different narratives that explain the conflict. I mean the kind of actions that cannot be permitted even if there is no agreement on the history of the conflict or even on the identity of those responsible for it.

These actions include those that took place in Rakhine province in Myanmar, which I wrote about with your kind help. The barbaric murder, torture and rape of innocents that happened in your country is inexcusable. Political, ethnic, religious or demographic claims simply cannot justify throwing babies into fire, torturing children to death in front of their parents, and the mass rape of women before their execution. I thought we agreed on that.

This week, I received a long email from you, Dr. A. Extremely long. Long enough to clarify your words or even to add something along the lines of: "despite all this, of course I condemn [Hamas’ actions],” or even "despite the absolute truth of the Palestinian claims and genocidal policy of Israel, I do not justify killing civilians."

But there was none of that. Somehow, your post references 100 years of conflict prior to October 7 (including explanations using maps, cartoons, pictures, and quotes). And there is a reference to the days after October 7.

But the day itself, when over a thousand people, most of them civilians, were brutally murdered and over 200 people, again most of them civilians, were kidnapped, was completely absent. And it's strange given the fact that, as I recall, we share an interest in cases of throwing babies into fire, torturing children to death in front of their parents, and the mass rape of women before their execution. Yes, to make the point clear to a person from your background, for one historical moment, Israel's Gaza envelope region became Myanmar's Rakhine.

A, since I received your message, I have been trying to understand why you do not recognize October 7th. I understand your opinion about the essence of Zionism and the essence of Israel. I don't agree with it, but I understand your point. Still, there's that little matter of “under all circumstances.” Perhaps there is a certain type of fascist, fundamentalist, racist, and violent organization that, against your usual leftist positions, you actually do support.

But if so, what are the criteria? Is it because they are jihadists? Is it a matter of religion? Or that according to the accepted code of the post-colonialist discourse, the "natives" have certain Jew-killing privileges because of the many years of oppression they have endured? Oppression, which, as you know, I have never denied.

And maybe you are one of those who do not believe the photos, the direct testimonies of survivors, the explicit confessions of the attackers and the unwatchable and undeniable videos. Do all these not meet your strict standards? Strange, because we never applied such strict standards when I wrote about Myanmar.

Do you think it's all a conspiracy of Western governments spreading fake news? Is it all the settlers’ lies, supported by American imperialists? Are you really not affected by the testimonies of Israeli women, children and elders, many of whom, by the way, are peace activists who built their homes in socialist communes that are not in any way located in the West Bank or in any way disputed. Unless the very existence of Israel is disputed, a position I assume you hold since you treat Israel as a settler and colonialist entity.

And maybe I didn't understand what you meant. In this case, perhaps in the future, we can discuss the true nature of Israel. As you know from our previous correspondence, I never supported Netanyahu, I have always believed in compromise with the Palestinians and I am absolutely against any kind of war crime, including against civilians in Gaza. You also know that I am a social democrat and a person who is aware of the climate crisis and the hardships of the "global south.” But wait, here I am, once again falling into this trap. If I were not all of these things, if I were a Netanyahu supporter or a settler in the West Bank, would my massacre and that of my family members be justified?

Again, there's that "under all circumstances" nuisance. Even if the Jews were like the French in Algiers, and they are not, deliberate murder of innocents is always evil and mass murder is absolute evil. Among us Jews, even complete secularists like me sometimes recite from the ancient texts: “I have set before you today the heavens and the earth, life and death; I have set before you the blessing and the curse. Choose life, for your lives and for your descendants,” as it is written in the book that you call the Old Testament. Do you understand A? You chose life – without “buts” and without “maybes.” This is why I always opposed my own people murdering other innocent people. And you know what, I'm angry at myself for not resisting enough.

***

And so for the record, I want to mention that I believe that Jews, not just Palestinians, also have rights in the place where I was born. They have personal, social and national rights and they also have responsibilities that are well described in the Declaration of Independence of their country, our country, which was founded 75 years ago. You don't acknowledge that, which is probably the real reason you didn't mention October 7th in your message. If "Palestine will be free from the river to the sea," as they are now shouting in the streets near my house in Europe, the events of October 7th are probably not an accident in your eyes. They are the first step in the plan.

"Free from the river to the sea” means without the people who are living there now. This is not the two-state solution, nor a partition plan, nor a federation. I think with your education, you know exactly what it means. But in case it's not clear enough, I'll say it explicitly: Hamas is the genocidal wing of the Palestinian national movement, and it turns out that it has quite a few supporters. My friends say that such views stem from antisemitism, but I don't know what is hidden in a person's heart. How much darkness, how much hatred.

I also don't know what is hidden in your heart. But I know that October 7th was not another attack, another battle, another chapter in the bloody history of the Middle East. It cannot be solved with sentences like "I cannot be expected to condemn every action taken by the weak and oppressed.” This is a tectonic and world-changing event, carried out by thousands of people supported by hundreds of thousands of people, as well as by movements, states and regimes. Not condemning it is supporting it. And the results are inevitable. Because of the horror that these people have inflicted on the world, an even darker night is to come before we will see the light.

***

And so, as a wise man wrote during the World War II, you and I now stand on two sides. "My opinion is clear about your motives,” he wrote, “and you would do well to speculate on my motives.” And he added: "I have one more thing left to say to you, and let it be the last. I want to tell you how in the past we were so similar and today we are enemies. How could I have stood by your side, and and why everything between us is over now.”

And that's the thing. In Xinjiang and Syria, in Tigray and Iran, in Myanmar and Israel, acts like those committed by Hamas are not only the absolute lowest of what the human race is capable of. They also redefine the lines. If they do not fill a person's heart with unconditional anger and disgust, they place him outside the legitimate discussion of civilized people. If you can only find room in your heart for the pain of one side, that's your problem. But with your permission, I think I'll find myself a different expert on Myanmar.

Before I finish, I will ask just one last thing. Do me a favor – next time, please refrain from referring to Auschwitz. Not because I have a monopoly on the memory of the Holocaust or the memory of the victims. But because when it comes to the 1940s, those people on whose behalf you are currently campaigning, they tend to be something different than you imagine. When you remove the appearances of European leftist movements, those people tend to be supporters of the side that built Auschwitz, not of those led there to their deaths.