Israel – עמוד 2 – דיויד סטברו

Guo Esther Yan Was Abducted. Her Tale Does Not Bode Well for China’s Kaifeng Jews

The kidnapping last month of Guo Yan, a descendant of the ancient Jewish community in Kaifeng, is a disturbing new chapter in the annals of a tiny community that existed under the radar for a thousand years – until now

Published in "Haaretz": https://www.haaretz.com/magazine/2023-05-24/ty-article-magazine/.premium/guo-esther-yan-was-abducted-her-tale-does-not-bode-well-for-chinas-kaifeng-jews/00000188-4ea7-df79-a19d-febfe4240000

In mid-April, Noam Urbach received a worrying letter by email. “I am Guo Yan, a descendant of the Jews of Kaifeng,” the letter began. “Seven days ago, on April 7, 2023, in the evening, I was abducted by a number of men as I was walking in the street, and was forced into a car in which there were two men wearing civilian clothes who did not present identification documents. They claimed they were government employees. After driving several hours far from the city, I was taken to a hotel room under guard. Not having my mobile phone with me when I was kidnapped, I asked to use a phone in order to inform my family, so that my sudden disappearance would not make then anxious, but they wouldn’t let me.

“After five days, I was driven back to Kaifeng and taken to an empty room, where I was interrogated by four men. One of them was wearing a police uniform and claimed he was a police officer. They recorded the entire conversation. At no stage did they state the reason for abducting me or claim that I had violated any law or regulation. I was released after the interrogation.”

Urbach, a China scholar and commentator on Chinese affairs who has spent many years studying the history of China’s Jews, was only one of the people who saw the letter – which was sent to a group of Jewish activists who are connected with the U.S.-based Sino-Judaic Institute, which maintains ties with the descendants of the historic Jewish community in Kaifeng. The city, which is in Henan Province in central China and has a population of about 5 million, was in the past the country’s capital. It’s also known as the only place where an active Jewish community existed in imperial China.

Why was Guo disappeared for five days? Why did a large number of government agents wander about the vicinity of the building where she lives while she was gone? The abductors didn’t explain, but Guo, who also uses the Hebrew name Esther, has a theory. On the days she was absent, the Polish ambassador to China visited Kaifeng. Guo is certain that the two events are connected: that the authorities removed her from the city as a preventive measure, so that she would not be there should the ambassador request to meet her or other descendants of the Jews of Kaifeng. “I was held as a captive not because of something I did,” she wrote, “but because someone wanted to meet with me.”

That might sound paranoid to those unfamiliar with the background. In the past few years, the Chinese government has taken a hard line against ethnic and religious minorities across the country. From the Buddhists in Tibet to the Muslim minorities in Xinjiang and the Christians in the east of the country, the authorities object to every manifestation of religion that is not authorized by the government. This persecution has also affected the tiny Jewish community of Kaifeng. Urbach terms this a policy of “total totalitarianism,” which reaches down to the lowest resolution: persecution of every expression of religious life, however small and local.

Guo, who is in her early 40s, can be said to represent that small, local level. She is a significant figure among the descendants of Kaifeng’s Jews – indeed, Urbach has written about her activity in his academic work and she has spoken to Western journalists in the past. “She stood out especially because of her unique stance,” Urbach says. “Instead of focusing on hopes of immigrating to Israel or the United States, she advocated the reconstruction of the unique Jewishness that existed in Kaifeng.”

Guo’s home is adjacent to the site where the historic synagogue in Kaifeng once stood. The ancient structure was demolished in the 19th century, but the family preserved objects associated with the Jewish community. Today, Guo maintains a private, unofficial museum at the site that is devoted to the city’s Jewish heritage. These days, the authorities prohibit the public display of anything identified with Jewishness, and as such they are opposed to the use of the venue as a historical or religious site.

Although Guo is fearful for her fate, she is no longer reluctant to go public. After all, the authorities know who she is, and international exposure might make it more difficult for them to persecute her. In an interview with Haaretz earlier this month, she agreed to talk about the abduction. She requested that we communicate by email, as her mobile phone is under surveillance by the powers that be, she says. She responded to questions in English with answers in Chinese, which have been translated here.

“I was born in 1980,” she wrote, by way of background. “My mother is a descendant of the Kaifeng Jews; her father was born to a Jewish father.” She attached a photograph from 1906 of her great-great grandfather standing next to a stone tablet from the year 1679. In the past the stone stood next to her house, near the synagogue site, but it is now apparently in the possession of the municipal museum of Kaifeng and is not on display. “In the year of my birth there was a reform that allowed foreigners to enter China,” she adds. “The appearance of foreigners from all over the world in Kaifeng, among them Jews, led me to infer from what my parents, my neighbors and visitors said, that I am Jewish.”

Guo is devoting her life to documenting Jewish history and culture in Kaifeng. “If there are visitors who want to learn about the culture or history of Kaifeng’s Jews, they are invited to contact me.” She says she is not connected to any organization or religion, does not cooperate with organizations and activists in China or elsewhere, nor, she adds, is there any element of extremism in her work, as the authorities are liable to allege. “I am only telling about history,” she says. “The interpretation – extreme or not extreme – is in the eyes of the beholder.”

The recent incident was unusual, she says, but it wasn’t the first time she was harassed. “I am frequently harassed,” she notes. “In some cases they removed and wrecked informative signs outside my home that advertised my research activity and ways to contact me. In one case, when I held a reception in my apartment, cameras and inspectors showed up below the building. When my mother came to visit me, I was detained and asked what she wanted.” She adds that people who identified themselves as government officials have knocked on her door many times and said they wanted to talk to her. They also informed her that her telephone was being monitored.

Do you expect help of any sort from Israel or from the world Jewish community?

“No, I don’t expect help, because the descendants of the Kaifeng Jews are not recognized as Israelis (or Jews) by the government of Israel or the government of China. I have only a Chinese ID card. What I went through is the result of the Chinese government’s conception that Jewish history and culture are not an appropriate subject for the Jewish descendants to tell foreign visitors about.”

Have you considered leaving China?

“I want to learn about the development of Jewish culture in Kaifeng. Leaving Kaifeng would mean giving up that work. I can’t just give up the work because of danger. They might hope that I will give up and leave, but I do not want to leave, at least not at this stage.”

Indeed, the city’s Jewish community is a riveting and extraordinary slice of history. “It’s actually the only Jewish community that is documented in China,” Urbach says. “There are modern communities, like the Baghdadi Jews in Shanghai, the Russian Jews in Harbin, and afterward also Yekkes [German-speaking Jews] and other Holocaust refugees, but that is a completely different subject. There is no connection between the descendants of the Kaifeng Jews and communities of foreign Jews who live in China. In fact, the foreign communities are forbidden to take part in Jewish activities with Chinese citizens – including the descendants of the Kaifeng Jews – because Judaism is not officially recognized in China and is effectively legitimate only for foreigners.”

Students of the subject think that the community’s first members were Persian-speaking merchants who apparently arrived via the Silk Route between the 10th and 12th centuries C.E. According to the earliest stone tablet that has been found, from 1489, a synagogue – the only one known ever to have existed in China – was inaugurated in the year 1163, so it’s likely that this was when the merchants coalesced into a community. Once established there, Urbach notes, they also underwent a process of Sinicization.

“They created a kind of syncretism of Jewish elements – such as the use of Hebrew, at least in writing – with the Chinese language. For example, there are stone tablets on which a Chinese text has been engraved that vaguely tells the biblical story, from Noah and Abraham to Moshe and even Ezra, but it’s mixed with Chinese mythological figures and the discourse bears distinctly Confucian features. There were also rituals that were unique to the Kaifeng Jews. The synagogue was managed in large measure like a Confucian temple and included ancestor worship.”

The community’s existence became known to the Western world only hundreds of years later. “The community was discovered by chance in 1605 by the Jesuit Matteo Ricci, who is known as the first missionary in China,” Urbach relates. “The Jesuits visited Kaifeng several times, documented what they knew about the community and sent the information to Europe. It’s a fascinating history, and it has moved a great many people, Jews and Christians alike, from that time to the present. For no few Jewish Sinologists, China is ostensibly a foreign and remote area of study, yet suddenly a Jewish connection is revealed.”

The encounter with the Kaifeng community was meaningful for Urbach, too. “In 1999, I was in Kaifeng as a student for half a year,” he says. “I didn’t find a functioning Jewish community when I was there, but I discovered the immense importance of the story of the local Jewish community for the city, as well as the tension and sensitivity around the question of its existence. I’ve been back to visit a few times, the last was in 2018.”

Urbach is currently writing his doctoral dissertation on the subject of Christian influences on the Kaifeng Jewish community. He spent two years as a researcher and a teacher of Hebrew and Talmud at what was the first center of its kind in China for the study of Judaism at Shandong University in eastern China. For more than a decade Urbach taught Chinese at universities in Israel and helped Yad Vashem in Jerusalem in translation of texts, films and other Holocaust related material into Chinese for Yad Vashem – The World Holocaust Remembrance Center. Parallel to his academic research, he also collected material for a documentary film about the Jewish community in Kaifeng. However, fearing for the consequences for the descendants of the Kaifeng Jews who took part in the filming, he decided to shelve the project for the time being.

Urbach says that research estimates that the community reached its peak size at the beginning of the 17th century, toward the end of the Ming Dynasty, totaling a few thousand individuals. The members of the community didn’t speak Hebrew, but there are testimonies to the effect that at least the elders of the community could read the Torah in Hebrew. According to Urbach, not much is known about the community’s observance of the Jewish festivals. “It’s thought that they practiced circumcision, but the custom wasn’t preserved beyond the beginning of the nineteenth century,” he says. “They also observed Shabbat in some way and held prayers.”

During prayer service, the male congregants customarily wore a tallit-like headdress. One of the Jesuit priests who visited the community related that a blue kippa set them apart from their Muslim-Chinese neighbors, who wore white head coverings, and so the Jews were known as “blue-capped Muslims.” In the past the community was also known as the “sinew-plucking sect” – an apparent reference to the ban on eating the “gid hanasheh” (the sciatic nerve) of animals, thereby differentiating their laws of kashrut from the dietary laws of their Muslim neighbors.

If we leap ahead in time, in the 19th century, there was no longer a real community in Kaifeng.

“True, according to documentation by the British, who arrived in 1850, they found the synagogue with the books and some inscriptions intact, but the community was sparse, and lacking in vitality. The British envoys succeeded in buying some of the objects in the synagogue, including Torah scrolls and also a genealogical book that documented all the deceased of the community over a certain period in the 17th century. It’s the only document anywhere that combines Hebrew and Chinese, and it attests to a religious existence that combined the two languages.”

At the beginning of the 20th century, Urbach relates, an Anglican bishop who lived in the city tried to bring together the community’s members, but to no avail. Despite this, there was always an awareness that there were descendants of Jews living in the city. “By the 20th century,” he says, “they already knew that they were part of a well-known community called ‘Yuotai’ – Jews.”

After the 1949 revolution, there was a process of registering China’s official minorities. Were the Jews recognized by the authorities as an ethnic minority?

“There is documentation to the effect that the local government in Kaifeng sent representatives of the descendants of the Jews to Beijing in order to be recognized as an official minority, apparently out of the understanding that there was a world Jewish community and a Jewish state, and because there are descendants of such a community here, too, it should be given recognition. The delegation met with the prime minister, but it was decided not to recognize them as a minority. At the same time, it’s recorded by government officials that their rights should be preserved and they should not be subjects of discrimination. It was simply a small group and didn’t really exist as a [functioning] community.”

After the death of Mao Zedong, when China began opening up to the world, a number of processes took place concurrently. “There was enthusiasm at the discovery of the community’s descendants, but it was a romantic enthusiasm, both on the part of Jews in the West and on the part of Christians as well,” Urbach relates. “There was curiosity that led to visits by individuals and groups that came to Kaifeng in order to discover the Chinese Jews. City authorities responded to that interest from outside. That led to a program to revive a physical presence of Jewish history in Kaifeng.

“Following the opening of the Israeli embassy in Beijing, in 1992, the feeling in the local government was that the preservation of Kaifeng’s Jewish heritage had been given the go-ahead. A plan to rebuild the synagogue at the original site and in its historic form was quickly approved, this time as a museum of the history of the local Jews and rather than a functioning house of worship. In addition, a society for the research of Chinese Jewry was established in Kaifeng, and local authorities recognized the descendants of the Jewish community as Jews on a semi-official basis. These developments also stirred hopes among both local descendants and enthusiasts from abroad for the community’s revival. At the same time, some of the descendants also harbored the hope that immigration to Israel would be possible.

But in the mid-1990s, all these plans came to an abrupt halt. The research society was shut down, as was the office that was in charge of establishing the museum, and the registration of any local residents as Jews was erased. Urbach says: “Apparently the central government realized that something was happening in Kaifeng that was liable to give rise to a sentiment of religious revival. They decided that it must be nipped in the bud.”

The government homed in on the person who was perceived as the leader of the Jews’ descendants, a professor from Beijing who headed the society for the study of Jewish history and culture in Kaifeng and who had also visited Israel. “Having become a representative figure of the community, he was forced to leave Kaifeng, was pensioned off early from the National Academy of Social Sciences and was silenced. He was placed under house arrest, and to a certain degree remains under house arrest to this day,” Urbach says. “I visited him in his home and found a cowed, defeated man.”

According to Urbach, at the time there was no active Jewish community in Kaifeng, but there were potentially hundreds or even thousands of descendants who might identify themselves as Jews given the right conditions. Most of them were not actively engaged with questions of their Jewish identity, but there were always a few dozen activists who did deal with the subject. They were in contact with the foreign visitors, requested support from the authorities and from abroad, and some said they wanted to immigrate to Israel.

At the end of the 1990s there was in fact a small aliya (after official conversion), and during the 2000s there was something of another Jewish awakening, which the authorities chose to ignore. “People organized to mark Shabbat and Jewish festivals at a community level,” Urbach says, “and two unofficial study centers were opened in rented apartments with foreign teachers and foreign financing.”

Who was behind all that?

“The Sino-Judaic Institute in the United States and the Jerusalem-based Shavei Israel organization, which succeeded Amishav [an organization that maintained ties with groups connected with the Jewish people that were not under the purview of the Jewish Agency, such as the Bnei Menashe in India and the descendants of the anusim, who were forced to abandon Judaism]. There was also support from Christian groups.”

What is Israel’s position in this?

“The approach in Israel, at least in the diplomatic context, was to see it as an historic symbol of friendship between the nations. China too had an interest in promoting this message: an ancient Jewish community, a thousand years old, that had never suffered antisemitism. It’s a slogan that both sides, and especially the Chinese, liked, and still do.”

Urbach also offers an illustration of the complex relations between Israel and the descendants of the Kaifeng community, who are not considered Jews by the Chief Rabbinate. “Israel’s first ambassador to Beijing, Zev Sufott, decided that his initial official visit as ambassador outside the capital would be to Kaifeng. He sought to carry out a historic gesture by the government of Israel toward China, and it was actually his Chinese hosts who introduced him to the community’s descendants. I interviewed him for my research, and he told me that it was plain to him that the descendants of the Jews whom he met ‘are Jews like I am Chinese.’”

The final stage in the story of the Kaifeng community began with the rise to power of the current president of China, Xi Jinping, a hardliner when it comes to ethnic and religious minorities. “In the middle of the past decade, there was a clear change for the worse in the attitude toward the descendants of the Kaifeng Jews,” Urbach notes. “The change is related to the Chinese policy that opposes any manifestation of religion that goes outside the official organizations which are supervised by the Communist Party. However, in my opinion there is also a specific apprehension about importing a Jewish-Muslim conflict into China, given that in the old part of Kaifeng there is also a significant Muslim-Chinese population.”

According to Urbach, “It actually started with an optimistic report in The New York Times, possibly too optimistic, about a Passover seder held in Kaifeng in 2015. The report drew attention in Beijing and angered the authorities. Afterward the two Jewish study centers were shut down. One of the families of the descendants arrived in New York and requested political asylum on the grounds of religious persecution. The request was apparently granted.

“After that event, the authorities began cracking down, and prohibited any public manifestation of Jewish historic existence in Kaifeng. A stone monument that had been installed outside the historic synagogue a few years earlier by the authorities themselves was suddenly removed. The municipal museum, which had an entire wing devoted to the city’s Jewish history, was shut down in order to construct a new building. When the new museum opened, in 2018, there was no longer a trace of the Jewish wing and no mention whatsoever of the Jewish past. They simply erased the Jewish history that was unique to the city. Instead of taking pride in the historic stone tablets, they are hiding them.”

In the same year, according to Anson Laytner, the president of the Sino-Judaic Institute, Jewish communal gatherings were barred and an SJI teacher was expelled from Kaifeng. The national authorities, he tells Haaretz, “are attempting to obliterate all traces of Jewish life in Kaifeng, present and past, not as a result of antisemitism, but as an extension or consequence of the government’s campaign against non-unauthorized religions. Judaism,” he explains, “despite a 1,000-year history in China, is not an authorized religion, nor are Jews a recognized ethnic minority.”

Laytner adds, “If Israel were to express its concern in a non-confrontational, friendly way, China might be inclined to find an internal resolution to its ‘Jewish problem’ by talking with the Kaifeng Jewish descendants.”

In the meantime, Urbach discerns extreme caution also among Chinese academics, who are afraid to address the subject of Chinese Jews. A case in point, he says, is a study by a Chinese anthropologist who investigated the story of the two dozen or so Jewish descendants from Kaifeng who underwent conversion to Judaism and immigrated to Israel. Her study included an analysis of their complex identity. But in complete contrast to academic custom, her article, which was published in English in a scientific journal last September, appeared under a pseudonym.

“After looking into the subject, we know almost for certain who wrote the article,” Urbach says. “She is a Chinese research student who learned Hebrew in Beijing and did the research within the framework of M.A. studies at a prestigious university in England. But she has since returned to China, and it was apparently made clear to her that publishing the article in her own name was liable to be harmful to her.”

There was hope that in this period, with China reopening after Covid, the government would show renewed acceptance of Kaifeng Jews or at least ignore the community’s barely noticeable activity, as it had in the past. “But events such as the abduction [of Guo] and the publication of an article under a false name are a clear indication that things are moving in the opposite direction,” Urbach says.

Guo, for her part, says she will continue with her work, but that she is genuinely concerned for her safety. “What will happen the next time a foreign visitor wants to talk with me about the Jewish community?” she wrote in last month’s letter. “Suddenly, I will be abducted again. And if I resist strongly, maybe the abductors will decide simply to solve the problem once and for all. It might be, say, that a drunk truck driver will run me over the next time I’m out in the street. Therefore, while I am still able to speak out, I am writing this and trying to send it to you.”

The letter ends by cautioning the letter’s readers not to call her, because, she says, her cell phone is under government surveillance. “Your reply will only bring you unnecessary troubles,” she notes, and sums up: “I am sending you [this information] not to ask for help or a response from anyone, but simply to complete my work: to document and tell the history.”

Israeli Elections, October 2022

Published in Swedish daily newspaper Svenska Dagbladet (please note: this is an unoficial and unedited English translation)…

Israel is sometimes called the "only democracy in the Middle East", and in many ways it is. But Israeli democracy is very different from the Swedish one, even though theoretically both have similar parliamentary systems and the same kind of general elections. The differences are more about dynamics than technicalities. One important difference is that governments in Israel very rarely last an entire term, which is why Israelis will be going to the polls again on November 1^st in what may seem like a déjà vu. This is the fifth election campaign in the last four years and the 11^th since 2001. In the same period Sweden had only six.

Even though recent years have been unusually unstable in Swedish politics, with weak minority governments and changing political alliances, this is nothing compared to the instability of Israeli politics. This instability combined with unique historical and cultural differences, make the coming up elections very difficult to understand for those who are not locals. Here are a few things to keep in mind if you're following the political drama in the land of milk and honey.

There's probably only one global household name in current Israeli politics – the name of Benjamin Netanyahu. Since Netanyahu first became Prime Minister in 1996, he has held the job for 15 years, even more than David Ben-Gurion who's considered to be Israel's founding father. Netanyahu is head of the "Likud" party and currently leads the opposition even though he's standing trial for bribe and fraud charges. But Netanyahu is more than just a candidate. He's the key issue of these elections. He's not a man leading an agenda. He is the agenda itself. In these elections, many Israelis won't be voting because they want to promote their ideology or influence concrete issues, they'll be voting because they love or hate Netanyahu.

This leads to a misconception of Israeli politics. Since all recent elections ended in a tie between rival blocks, some assume this is a tie in the European style, meaning between left and right. But nothing could be further from the truth. In a European sense the Israeli left makes up 10 to 15 percent of the electorate on a good day. That is if left means socialist or social-democratic ideology combined with progressive values like secularism, civil rights, feminism, LGBT rights and multiculturalism. In Israel the blocks have nothing to do with all that. It's not socialists against capitalists or conservatives against liberals. It's all about Netanyahu. One block supports him, the other wants to get rid of him.

On Netanyahu's side, things are pretty clear – together with Netanyahu's "Likud" party, there's a coalition of Jewish ultra-orthodox parties, nationalist parties and representatives of West-Bank settlers. The other side, however, has no common values, ideas or interests with the exception of one – the idea of replacing Netanyahu. Led by centrist current Prime Minister Yair Lapid, it's a bizarre coalition based on middle class secular Jews supported by left-wing liberals, a variety of Israeli Palestinians (some Islamist, others secular, some nationalists, others old-school communist) and right-wing conservatives who for some reason or another are in conflict with Netanyahu. This is the main reason why the last Israeli government stayed in power for only a year and even during this short period it had to have two heads of government in rotation. If in Swedish politics, the old left-right spectrum became more complicated in recent years and developed into the so-called GAL-TAN spectrum, in Israel the opposite happened, things became simpler – the whole spectrum is reduced to one man.

But where exactly is Netanyahu on a left-right scale? That should be a simple question to answer since Netanyahu is and always has been a self-proclaimed right-wing leader. He's been called an Israeli Trump, an Israeli Orbán and even an Israeli Erdoğan (although they should be called American, Hungarian and Turkish Netanyahus since he assumed office before them). But context is king, and in an Israeli one, Netanyahu may be hated by the left, but that doesn't mean he's as right as it gets. In a social-economic perspective, Netanyahu used to be a Thatcherist, pushing for privatisations, tax cuts and restraining government spending, but it's been years since he spent his political capital on those kinds of issues. Today he leaves the economy in the hands of others. Though he's certainly a hawk and a sceptic when it comes to relations with the Palestinians, he's always been careful with the use of military power and he never went all the way towards Israel's hard core right which supports the annexation of the West Bank and putting an end to the so-called two state solution. In recent years Netanyahu has been mostly concerned with staying in power and avoiding prison. Unlike his potential successors, he's secular, he was raised in the US and has a western education and world view and he's an intellectual. In Israel this means that in many ways he's actually a centrist.

Just for the sake of perspective, the rising star of these elections is the 46-year-old leader of the "Jewish Strength" party, Itamar Ben Gvir, a man who first came to public attention when he threatened the life of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin a few weeks before he was assassinated in 1995. Ben Gvir also supported Baruch Goldstein an American Jew who massacred 29 Muslims in Hebron in 1994. The party Ben Gvir is currently part of has the support of 10 percent of the electorate in the latest polls. When it comes to ideology, Netanyahu is a middle of the road pragmatist compared to Ben Gvir and other Israeli nationalist and religious fanatics. The stark opposition he faces is more about his alleged corruption, opportunism and his relentless populist crusade against Israel's judicial system and law enforcement officials.

One of the reasons that Netanyahu's party is supported by over 25% of the voters according to polls is that in Israel many people don't vote according to their opinions. Rather, they vote according to their identity. It's not about what you think, it's about who you are. Arabs vote for Arab parties, religious people vote for religious parties, traditional Jews with an Eastern background vote for the Likud and secular Jews from a western background vote for one of the liberal centrist parties, usually led by ex-Army generals or former media celebrities. These include the Labour Party led by former TV and radio anchor, Merav Michaeli, and the National Unity Party led by Benny Gantz, former army Chief of Staff. To put it in a Swedish context – no one in Israel needs a "Val Kompas", many parties don't even have a party platform. a strong sectorial identity is much mor useful. The comparison may not be entirely fair, but in this aspect, Israeli parties are not very different from "Nyans".

Finally, Swedes may be surprised to know that the Palestinian issue is no longer an important part of the Israeli discourse. Back in the 80s and 90s, the lines of Israeli politics were drawn according to policies towards the Palestinians. The left promoted the two-state solution, the right argued against a Palestinian state. These days, the two-state solution is probably discussed more in Sweden's Foreign Ministry at Gustav Adolfs Torg, than it is in Jerusalem. It seems like both Israelis and Palestinians have lost faith in concepts like negotiations, compromise and peace agreements and a reality of a never ending low-intensity conflict is accepted on both sides. As a result, Israelis will not be voting to stop or to continue the occupation of the West Bank, they'll also not be voting about the threat from Iran, social issues or the economy. Instead, it's a mix of identity politics combined with anger about an eclectic collection of issues which happened to appear in yesterday's papers or social media feeds. When it comes to art and culture, entrepreneurship and industry, history and science, Israel is a beautiful country full of promise and potential. Its political establishment, on the other hand, has lost its way and is deeply divided. The only democracy in the Middle East is stuck in an endless spiral of election campaigns. The result of this fifth round is still unknown, but it may very well simply be nothing more than round number six.

Cynicism prevails for vote-hungry officials

פרשת הכתבה על הסחר באיברים בעיתון השוודי אפטונבלדט

Published in The Local – Sweden's news in English, August 2009 http://www.thelocal.se/21740/20090828/

The latest quarrel between Israel and Sweden is a particularly ugly one. Although some of the points made by both sides are valid, they are contaminated by cynicism and false innocence on the Swedish side and by inadequate and inappropriate reactions on the Israeli side. This may be the time, almost two weeks after the publication of the original article in Aftonbladet, for both sides to take a fresh look at the situation and to reconsider a new course of action.

It would be wise to begin with what started the tension in the first place – the article itself. I don't know Donald Boström, the journalist who wrote it and I'm not a regular reader of Aftonbladet, but I read the article titled "Our sons plundered for their organs" more than once and it must be said that before being inciting or inflammatory it's simply bad journalism, if it can be called journalism at all. Don't take my word for it. Read it yourself: in Swedish (http://www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/article5652583.ab) or in one of the web-based translations (http://www.tlaxcala.es/pp.asp?reference=8390&lg=en). There's no proof of anything, no real investigation and no news value whatsoever. It's a bizarre combination of speculation, unconfirmed testimonies and half truths from old, washed up stories. Anything goes as long as it can summon up the words Israel, war-crimes and stolen organs along with a picture of an autopsied body. Expressions like "serious accusations" and "questions remain" used throughout the article, remind one of those low budget conspiracy theories.

Here's just a taste of the article's negligence – first of all, the main story, which is one of many unrelated stories, is 17 years old which makes it well-nigh impossible to confirm. Second, Boström makes no attempt to contact the Israeli Ministry of Defence, the Israeli Forensic Pathology centre or the Israeli medical profession. In fact the only Israeli he claims to have interviewed (a soldier) is unnamed, we don't get his rank or his position and we don't get any context to the interview. The same applies to the UN staff Boström claims to have talked to. Maybe this is designed to create an atmosphere of secrecy and mystery but journalism isn't about atmosphere: it's about facts. And facts are not a high priority for Boström who makes too many sloppy mistakes.

Why, for example, would soldiers, who as Boström claims, are sent out to steal organs, deliberately shoot the people they're stealing organs from in the chest or the stomach, when it's common knowledge that organs cannot be harvested from bodies with serious chest wounds. Even the family members whose evidence is the only "source" to the story are now distancing themselves from Boström's report and are claiming that they never said that organs were stolen. It's as if an Israeli reporter would visit Sweden and 17 years later publish an article about witnessing a group of blond, drunken Vikings (just like Boström uses stereotypes of IDF soldiers) kidnapping and murdering a Norwegian woman. He can't prove it, he spoke to no one about it, and they're no "sources" other than relatives and an anonymous cop. But, obviously, there are serious accusations and many questions remain.

Israelis are right in claiming this is the stuff blood libels against Jews were always made from. But that, I think, is not the point here. It's more important that this is the stuff a certain kind of modern journalism is made from. Just like the English Sun and the German Bild, Aftonbladet needs human-sacrifice and the Jews, though far from being the only victims, are indeed ideal ones. They were in the medieval shtetl and they still are in 21^st century journalism. The differentiation between Jews and Israel in this case, like in many others, is wishful thinking on the part of many. In reality, there is no differentiation. Like it or not, Israel and the Jewish people are intertwined, each paying the price when the other is attacked, each rising and falling with the others' successes and failures. Aftonbladet knows this of course and takes advantage of it. They can make racist attacks disguised as legitimate political journalism. Their's isn't traditional anti-Semitism based on religion (the Jews killed Jesus). It isn't even modern anti-Semitism (the Jews are rich and control the world). This is Post Modern anti-Semitism. It's all about rating and it's business orientated. It sells news papers. No body cares about the truth because it's subjective anyway, nobody has time for research and you can definitely count on it that no one will take responsibility. The writer gets his 15 minutes of fame; the paper makes millions. And damn the consequences.

But it's not just about money; it's also about politics too. The never ending and, quite frankly, tedious text Swedish officials use about freedom of speech is not relevant in this case. First of all, despite the claims of various official spokespeople, it is not absolute and untouchable, even in Sweden: witness the Danish Muhammad cartoons, and various regulations, self censorship and safeguards that protect Swedes from offensive commercials and sensitive publications. Sweden is very firm when it defends the rights of large minorities or powerful establishments (like Aftonbladet) but much less decisive when it comes to weaker groups or even the general public. This is why authorities in Malmö preferred to defend the right of an angry mob to boycott a tennis match between Israel and Sweden than to defend the right of the general public to watch the match.

Is Sweden's Foreign Minister, Carl Bildt, really so naïve that he thinks that freedom of speech in Sweden applies equally to everyone and works equally for every one? I don't think so. When he says that free press and free speech are the best defense against "breaches of judgment, bad taste and transgressions of core societal values", he knows very well that these freedoms can very easily be used to wage attacks on minorities by an aggressive majority. Israel isn't a minority in Sweden but an attack against it is very popular in many circles. This is where Bildt's claims have a cynical twist. Defending freedom of speech in this case earns him the support of many. Especially valuable is the support of many on the other side of the Swedish political spectrum. What politician would object to that?

To be fair, Bild't and Sweden's political establishment didn't have to limit freedom of speech; they weren't requested to close down Aftonbladet or to censor it. Instead of flying empty slogans which hide political interest, all they needed to do was to say they don't believe the allegations and they see them as provocative and irresponsible. That's not taking sides, it's just being fair-minded. Instead of that, Bildt chose to distant himself from Sweden's ambassador to Israel who did exactly that. He did the math: no one gains political points in Sweden from pleasing Israel. Quite the opposite.

But the cynicism is not limited to the Swedish side. Israel too is responsible for the deterioration of the situation. Every state has the right to defend itself against slander and lies, even if they're published in a paper thousands of miles away. But there must be some kind of discretion in choosing methods of defence and counter attack. I would like to know, for example, who chose to use the holocaust card as the first reaction. Surely, of all the arsenal of Israeli arguments, another one could have been used against a Swedish tabloid, Auschwitz could have been saved for say, states that say they want to annihilate Israel and are in the process of building the weapons to do it. If, according to Israel's Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, the Afonbladet article is like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Bildt's refusal do condemn it is equivalent to Sweden's WW2 neutrality, then what is left for going after terrorist attacks against Jewish and Israeli targets and against genocidal, fascist regimes?

Perhaps it's time for Israeli spokespeople to learn the power of understatement. A simple and straight-forward statement denying the allegations and denouncing those who spread them, accompanied with a nuanced "you should be ashamed of yourselves" would have done the job. If Israel wants to take it a step further, why not show the world the power of civil debate and education? Why not organize a seminar for journalists on the connection between irresponsible journalism and hate crimes? Why not get Jewish organizations around the world to promote educational projects about anti-Semitism in the world today and invite Swedish teachers and students to join? The point is not that the memory of the holocaust cannot be used in current public debate: it can and it should. It should be used by Israelis searching for their identity and moral values, it should be used around the world to fight racism and discrimination and it should be used moderately and responsibly. It's true any official using Hitler and Goebbels for a diplomatic dispute is bound to get in the papers. The problem is that those papers are exactly the same kind as the one that started the current controversy. When Lieberman speaks, he's not a speaker on a soapbox and he's not in an academic seminar. His remarks are documented, they're binding and they have consequences. Does anyone take this into account before statements are released?

In general, much of Israel's reaction was confused and embarrassing. First, we heard Israeli officials claiming that Carl Bildt is not welcome in Israel if he doesn't apologize. He obviously didn't apologize and now we are told that no one actually really intended to cancel his September visit. If Bildt's visit to Israel is important, how could anyone consider cancelling it because of an independent newspaper article? If it isn't, why waste tax payer's money on it in the first place? The sad truth is that no Israeli politician ever lost points attacking "those anti-Semitic Scandinavians" and no public figure in Israel has anything to lose from a good old display of patriotism. And so, while Israeli bloggers are suddenly all experts on Sweden's foreign policy in the forties and Swedish bloggers know all about Israeli organ transplant procedures, we come to a full circle. Everybody's happy. Lieberman gets lots of headlines that are not related to the criminal charges pending against him; Carl Bildt becomes a champion of freedom of speech and broadens his electorate; Aftonbladet sells more papers and the Swedish and Israeli public can start a new round of boycotts and demonstrations. Everybody's happy.

Well, everybody but me. It's not easy being an Israeli in Stockholm these days. Even those who don't believe what they read in Aftonbladet blame Israel for being paranoid and hysterical. Everything you see on the news is annoying and there's always the fear that something may happen, that someone may do something. It's not like it hasn't happened before. Obviously I'm not suggesting that Swedish or Israeli policy will be made according to my convenience, but here's a thought: if policy makers could only learn to lower the flames instead of fanning the fire, any fire, and thus spread more light than heat onto our public discourse, then life wouldn't only be better for Israelis living in Sweden. I think it would probably be better for everyone else too.

ותרגום לעברית:

ראשית, גילוי נאות – אני ישראלי ואני חי בשוודיה. בימים האחרונים, מטבע הדברים, זה לא שילוב מנצח. זה לא שפרשת הכתבה בעיתון אפטונבלדט היא בראש סדר היום כאן בסטוקהולם. גם לא פרצו כאן מהומות ופוגרומים אבל בכל זאת, כפי שיעידו ישראלים רבים שחיים בחו"ל בשנים האחרונות, פרשיות בעלות גוון אנטישמי ומתיחויות דיפלומטיות בין ישראל למדינות אירופה יוצרות טעם רע של ייאוש ותסכול. יאמרו רבים, ואולי בצדק, שהבאנו את זה על עצמנו בכך שחזרנו לכאן, ליבשת בעלת העבר הטראגי וההיסטוריה הטעונה. ובכל זאת, קשה להשתחרר מהתחושה שהמהומה האחרונה היא תוצר של שילוב לא הכרחי של היתממות צינית מהצד השוודי אבל גם של איזו התלהמות ותגרנות מהצד הישראלי. ועכשיו, כשכל טוקבקיסט ישראלי הוא מומחה למדיניות החוץ השוודית בשנות הארבעים וכל בלוגר שוודי כבר מכיר את יהודה היס וחושף אי-סדרים באבו-כביר, אולי הגיע השעה לעצור לרגע, לעשות חושבים ולשנות כיוון.

כדאי להתחיל במה שהתחיל את כל הפרשה – בכתבה עצמה. סביר להניח שמעט מאוד ישראלים קראו אותה. וטוב שכך. מדובר בעבודה עיתונאית רשלנית וחסרת כל ערך חדשותי. אין שם תחקיר ואין הוכחות. מה שיש שם זה שילוב ביזארי של ניחושים, ספקולציות, עדויות לא מבוססות וחצאי אמיתות מסיפורים ממוחזרים. הכל בנוי כך שאפשר יהיה לכלול את המילים דם, יהודים ופשעי מלחמה באותה מסגרת עם תמונה של גופה מצולקת תחת הכותרת: "בזזו את האיברים של הילדים שלנו". ההוכחות היחידות שכתב העיתון, דונלנד בוסטרום, מביא הן עדויות של בני משפחה פלסטיניים והוא מרבה להשתמש בביטויים כמו "סימני שאלה רבים עולים". אפילו כתיאורית קונספירציה זוהי כתבה עלובה. קודם כל, הכל סובב סביב תקרית שאירעה לכאורה לפני 17 שנה. מה שהופך את האימות לכמעט בלתי אפשרי. שנית, בוסטרום מתאר (בצבעוניות רבה) חיילים אכזריים היורים בצעירים פלסטיניים, בין השאר בבטן, כדי לבזוז את איבריהם. הוא לא לוקח בחשבון עובדות כמו העובדה שיריות בבטן ובחזה הורסות את האיברים שלכאורה נבזזים.

בוסטרום לא פונה ללשכת שר הביטחון, לא אוסף עדויות מהחיילים, לא בודק באבו-כביר ולא מראיין אף איש ציבור ישראלי. התגובה היחידה שמובאת מדובר ישראלי היא של "דובר צבאי" שאינו מצוין בשמו, בדרגתו או בתפקידו. הוא מצוטט ללא הקשר וללא שום תיעוד. אי אפשר שלא להתרשם שהעניין פשוט מומצא. אפילו עורך העיתון, יאן הלין, כותב במאמר מערכת תוקפני בזכות חופש הביטוי שהעיתון לא מאשר את הטענות לכאורה של הפלסטינים ולא קובע מהי האמת. ועכשיו, מסתבר מפרסום בג'רוסלם פוסט, שהמשפחות הפלסטיניות עצמן מתנערות מהכתב ומהמצאותיו. הדבר דומה לכך שעיתונאי ישראלי יחזור משוודיה, יספר שהוא היה עד לחטיפתה ורציחתה של אישה נורבגית ע"י קבוצת וויקינגים שיכורים. הוא לא יכול להוכיח את זה, הוא לא בדק את זה עם אף אחד, הוא לא שאל אף אחד חוץ מקרובי משפחה ושוטר מקומי אנונימי, ובכל זאת העיתון היומי הנפוץ במדינה יפרסם את זה. סימני שאלה רבים עולים מהמקרה אחרי הכל.

אלו הם החומרים של עלילת דם ימיביניימית אבל יותר מכך, אלו החומרים של סוג נפוץ של עיתונאות מודרנית, עיתונאות, שלמרבה הצער, הופכת נפוצה יותר ויותר בכל מדינה מערבית ודמוקרטית. האפטונבלדט הוא העיתון הנפוץ ביותר בשוודיה וממש כמו הבילד הגרמני או הסאן האנגלי הוא מכונת רייטינג משומנת הזקוקה לקרבן אדם. והיהודים הם קרבן קלאסי. הם היו כאלה בשטייטל והם כאלה גם היום בכרך התקשורתי של המאה העשרים ואחת. לא יעזרו כל ההכחשות של השמאל האירופי, אין הבדלה אמיתית בין יהודים לישראלים מחוץ למוחותיהם של פסיאודו אינטלקטואלים ואקדמאים בגרוש. כותבי ועורכי האפטונבלדטים של העולם הזה יודעים את זה היטב. כתבות כאלו נוצרו למען הפרובוקציה והן מביאות איתן גל של שנאה, גזענות ולפעמים גם אלימות. אך זוהי איננה אנטישמיות קדומה המבוססת על חומרים דתיים, זוהי אנטישמיות מודרנית, אולי אפילו פוסט-מודרנית, אנטישמיות עסקית המבוססת על רווח. אף אחד לא מעוניין בחשיפת האמת, לאף אחד אין זמן לתחקיר אמיתי ובוודאי שאף אחד לא אחראי לתוצאות. זה ביזנס אחרי הכל. הכתב מקבל את דקות התהילה שלו והעיתון עושה מיליונים. אבל יש כאן הרבה יותר מאינטרס כלכלי. יש גם עניין פוליטי.

זעקות השבר הנישאות מראש כל גבעה מטעם דוברים שוודיים בדבר קדושתו האינסופית והמוחלטת של חופש הביטוי הן שקריות וצבועות. האם הדוברים השוודים באמת חושבים שישראל לא תגלה שחופש הביטוי הוגבל גם הוגבל כשפרשת הקריקטורות הדניות של הנביא מוחמד שטפה את סקנדינביה והעולם? אז, נסגר אתר אינטרנט של הימין הקיצוני שפרסם את הקריקטורות בעקבות אינפורמציה שסופקה ע"י המשטרה החשאית השוודית. שרת החוץ, שאמנם הכחישה שהסגירה הייתה תוצאה של לחץ ממשלתי, לא היססה לגנות את המפרסמים. השוודים נוטים לא להגביל את חופש הביטוי כשהפגיעה היא במיעוטים שאין להם כוח פוליטי גדול במיוחד אבל יש לא מעט צנזורה עצמית בכל הנוגע בפגיעה בציבורים בעלי כוח אלקטוראלי גדול. האם שר החוץ השוודי, קרל בילדט, באמת תמים עד כדי כך שהוא חושב שהמדיניות השוודית היא ניטראלית ושפתחון פה ניתן לכולם ובאופן שווה. אני בטוח שלא. זוהי לא תמימות. זוהי היתממות והיא צינית ומכוערת. השוודים במקרה זה, כמו במקרים אחרים, אינם מסוגלים לעמוד בפני התוקף ולהגן על המותקף אם לתוקף יש כוח אלקטוראלי גדול או תמיכה ציבורית רחבה. זאת הסיבה שכשציבור גדול בעיר מאלמו איים בהפגנות והחרמות נגד נבחרת ישראל בטניס כשזו שיחקה שם נגד שוודיה לפני כמה חודשים, השלטונות העדיפו לסגור את המשחק לקהל במקום להגן על זכותם של אוהדי הספורט, הספורטאים והציבור הרחב שרצה להשתתף באירוע ספורטיבי, חוקי ולגיטימי.

הממשלה השוודית לא צריכה הייתה לסגור את העיתון או לצנזר אותו. כל מה שנדרש היה הצהרה מפי פקיד בכיר בסגנון הזה: "אנחנו חושבים שהדברים שהתפרסמו באפטונבלדט הם שקריים וחסרי אחריות. למרות שאנחנו שומרים על זכותו של העיתון לפרסם קשקושים חסרי בסיס, אנחנו לא חייבים להסכים אליהם ואנחנו מגנים אותם". זה הכל. לא יותר. רוצה הפקיד הבכיר להגדיל ראש? שיבטל את המנוי שלו. לא רוצה? גם בסדר. במקום זה קיבלנו התנערות של שר החוץ מהשגרירה שלו בישראל שאמרה את הדבר הנכון והביעה זעזוע מהכתבה. קיבלנו גם הרצאות צבועות על חופש הביטוי כאשר ברור שמה שעומד מאחוריהן היא ההגנה על זכותו של הממסד העיתונאי לעשות כסף ושל הממסד הפוליטי להרוויח קולות. לשוודיה אין אינטרסים רבים מדי בישראל ואלו שיש לה לא ייפגעו בלאו הכי. לעומת זאת לקואליציה של בילדט, הנחשבת בשוודיה לפרו-ישראלית באופן יחסי, יש אינטרס פוליטי להרוויח כמה קולות מאלו שמחפשים גינויים אוטומטיים של ישראל בכל הזדמנות. כל הדיבורים הפילוסופיים על חירות וחופש הם דיבורים באוויר.

אבל הציניות היא לא נחלתו של הצד השוודי בלבד. גם למדינת ישראל יש אחריות בהידרדרות הפרשה לכדי המשבר הדיפלומטי הנוכחי. לכל מדינה יש את הזכות ואפילו את החובה להגן על עצמה מפני השמצות ושקרים, אפילו אם הם מופצים ע"י עיתונים הנקראים במרחק אלפי קילומטרים ממנה. אבל האופן שבו נערכות המגננה ומתקפת הנגד נתון לשיקול דעת. והפעם דומה שהוחלט לוותר על שיקול דעת. מעניין אותי לדעת, למשל, מי החליט שמכל הקלפים בחפיסת הקלפים של הטיעונים הישראליים, דווקא זה של השואה צריך להישלף ראשון. האם אין אף אחד במשרד החוץ שחשב שכדאי לשמור את הקלף של אושוויץ וטרבלינקה לאיומים אסטרטגיים יותר. אולי, נאמר, למדינות שמאיימות להשמיד את ישראל ומכינות במרתפיהן נשק שיכול לעשות את זה. אם, אליבא דה אביגדור ליברמן, כל כתבה בצהובון משולה לפרוטוקולים של זקני ציון והתגובה השוודית הנוכחית משולה לתגובה השוודית לנאצים, מה נאמר על פיגועים נגד מטרות ישראליות בחו"ל, על מדינות, משטרים ותנועות פוליטיות שחוטפות ורוצחות יהודים או, אתם יודעים מה, מה נאמר על מעשי הג'נוסייד שמתרחשים עדיין בעולם.

אולי כדאי להסביר למשרד החוץ הישראלי שיש כוח גם לאנדרסטייטמנט. וזאת לא חייבת להיות הבלגה, פגיעה בכבוד הלאומי או השלמה עם רוע הגזרה. מה היה רע, לצורך הדוגמא, אם ישראל הייתה מסתפקת בהודעה רשמית המכחישה את הדברים בתוקף ומתבוננת מלמעלה במעט התנשאות, כמו אומרת: "תתביישו לכם". מה היה רע להשלים את התגובה הישראלית בהזמנה לסמינר משותף לעיתונאים שוודיים וישראלים בנושא הקשר בין עיתונאות לא אחראית לשנאת זרים וגזענות, בתוספת לאירועים חינוכיים של ארגונים יהודיים מרחבי העולם בנושא אנטישמיות אז והיום. למה היה צריך לגרור את השואה גם לכאן? מה בדיוק ניסו להשיג המפגינים מול שגרירות שוודיה כשהם הציגו לעיני העולם מצות מרוחות בדם בצורת מגן דוד? זוהי וולגריזציה שנועדה להכניס את המפגינים לעיתון. לא יותר.

הבעיה היא שהעיתונות שמחפשת את התמונות האלו היא בדיוק העיתונות שמוכנה לפרסם כתבות כמו זאת שהם מפגינים נגדה.

בעוונותיי, עסקתי פעם בהדרכה של בני נוער במסעות לפולין ואני האחרון שיטען שאסור לדבר על השואה בקונטקסט עדכני. להיפך, מותר וגם צריך. צריך את זכר השואה כדי להילחם בגזענות, באנטישמיות ובשנאה. צריך את זכר אושוויץ וטרבלינקה כדי להתמודד עם הזהות שלנו כיהודים ועם דרכה של מדינת ישראל. צריך את הדוגמאות ההיסטוריות של גבלס, היטלר ואייכמן כדי להתמודד עם שאלות פילוסופיות על טבע האדם והמערכות הפוליטיות והמדיניות שהוא יוצר. אבל לא בכל הקשר מותר להשתמש בשואה ולא לכל אחד מותר לעשות את זה בכל הזדמנות. כשליברמן מתבטא זוהי לא הפגנה בכיכר ולא פעולה בתנועת נוער, זוהי התבטאות דיפלומטית של מדינת ישראל. היא מתועדת, היא מחייבת ויש לה השלכות. יש מישהו שלוקח את זה בחשבון?

כל ההתנהלות הזאת היא מביכה למדי. תחילה היו דיבורים מטעם גורמים רשמיים שונים על ביטול ביקורו של שר החוץ השוודי אם הוא לא יגנה את הכתבה. הוא לא גינה. והיום אנחנו קוראים שהוא עדיין מוזמן ושאף אחד בעצם לא רצה לבטל את הביקור. וכך למרות הטרמינולוגיה המצ'ואיסטית, ישראל שוב מצמצה ראשונה. אם הביקור הוא חשוב לאינטרסים של שתי המדינות, איך ייתכן שכתבה בעיתון תגרום לביטולו או, כפי שהוצע, להסבתו ממטרתו המקורית למעין ביקור נזיפה. ואם הוא לא חשוב, למה בכלל מראש צריך לבזבז עליו את כספי משלם המיסים. האמת הקשה היא שגם בצד הישראלי יש אינטרס פוליטי. אף אחד מעולם לא הפסיד נקודות בציבור הישראלי ממופעים מרהיבים של פטריוטיזם. לפוליטיקאי הישראלי יש רק מה להרוויח מכך שהציבור הישראלי יתפוס אותו כאחד "שהראה לסקנדינבים האנטישמים האלו מאיפה משתין הדג". וכך, נסגר המעגל. כולם מרוצים. העיתון הרוויח את המנה היומית שלו, שר החוץ השוודי הפך לגיבור היום כשהוא מגן על חופש העיתונות ומרחיב את האלקטורט שלו וישראלים רבים הצליחו שוב להוציא את העצבים שלהם בקריאות להחרמות (שכמובן לא יתקיימו ויישכחו כעבור שבוע) בניצוחם של פוליטיקאים שהרוויחו עוד כמה אינצ'ים של כותרות שאינן קשורות לחקירות ולכתבי אישום. כולם מרוצים.

כולם חוץ ממני. לא נעים להיות יהודי או ישראלי בסטוקהולם בימים אלו. גם מי שלא מאמין למה שנכתב באפטונבלדט מאשים את ישראל בהיסטריה ובפרנויה. כל דבר שנאמר בחדשות הוא מעליב ופוגע וכמו תמיד, יש את החשש ששוב יקרה משהו, במקרה הטוב הפגנה, במקרה הגרוע יותר תקרית אלימה. אינני מציע, חלילה, שמדיניות החוץ של ישראל תקבע לפי הצרכים שלי ושל יהודים או ישראלים אחרים היושבים בחו"ל אבל הנה רעיון מעניין: אולי ביום שקובעי המדיניות יהיו כאלו שמרוויחים מהנמכת הלהבות ולא מהוספת שמן למדורה, כל מדורה, לא רק מצבם של הישראלים בסטוקהולם ישתפר. אולי גם ישתפר מצבם של אלו היושבים בציון.