Paul Luckraft reports on Melanie Phillips’ Yom Hashoah lecture.

This year’s Simon Wiesenthal Memorial Lecture was given by journalist and author Melanie Phillips at St John’s Wood Synagogue on 12 April. The theme, as indicated by the title - ‘Time to Leave? Jews in Britain and Europe’ - was an exploration of anti-Semitism, its main causes and current trends.

The talk was powerfully presented and passionately received by a large audience – present among which was our Resources Editor, Paul Luckraft, who brings us this report.

Storm Clouds Over Europe

Renowned social commentator Melanie Phillips, of Jewish heritage, started her lecture by painting a picture of the current climate for Jews in Britain and Europe. The recent realisation that the Labour Party is riddled with anti-Semitism from the top downwards and the latest atrocities in France mean that these are alarming times for Jews. Fear is on the rise again. In 2017 there was the highest number of anti-Semitic incidents in the UK since 1985 when records began. Surges like this usually occur in response to Israeli military action - but not this time.

Equally alarming, she noted, are the increasing numbers of synagogues being attacked and Jews being taunted in the streets in countries such as the Netherlands, Sweden and Germany. This is against the backdrop of the rise of nationalistic parties in Europe and surveys showing that in many countries there is a significant percentage of the population who don’t wish to see Jews in their country - certainly not on their street!

These are alarming times for Jews in Britain and Europe.

Phillips’ sobering conclusion was that it is possible to see clear signs of history repeating itself - a gathering storm similar to that within the Weimar Republic of the 1930s. But this time there are significant differences. In Nazi Germany, anti-Semitism was state policy. This is not the case in modern European countries, but the parties in power seem to be ineffectual in combatting the evident rise in this, the oldest of all hatreds.

Islamic Jew-Hatred

The reasons behind this rise, Phillips argued, also seem more complicated and interconnected than in the 1930s. Some come from the political left, some from the political right and some from the arrival and growth of Islam.

The fruit of the latter, she posited, is growing increasingly apparent in many areas of Western society. For instance, the large number of jihadis now in the UK (25,000), of which 3,000 are under constant investigation or monitoring. Or the level of sexual violence targeting white girls - as highlighted by the Rotherham case, merely one of several such cases in the UK as well as in other countries such as Germany and Sweden. But, she rightly noted, these incidents cannot be adequately reported or tackled nowadays without facing accusations of racism or Islamophobia.

The UK and Europe generally refuse to accept these sorts of incidents (as well as other, directly anti-Semitic ones) as being based on religion. The threats are not acknowledged as being basically Islamic. The charge of being Islamophobic makes it difficult to draw attention to any kind of Islamic hatred – including Jew-hatred.

Not all Muslims, of course, adopt these views, nor would consider doing so. Some also feel under threat from Islamist groups, and do not want to see anti-Semitism increase either. This needs to be constantly stressed, yet these Muslims also feel restricted in speaking out and objecting. Nevertheless, Islam more broadly holds that modernity as found in the West must be destroyed if Islam is to flourish here, and that Jews are a fundamental part of this problem.

The charge of being Islamophobic makes it difficult to draw attention to any kind of Islamic hatred – including Jew-hatred.

Intriguingly, present within European politics and culture is a different, but no less toxic, anti-Western sentiment – the inevitable result of the continent dismantling its own traditional cultures and values. This undermining from the inside out is a threat against which the West, at present, cannot defend itself.

The West’s Cultural Suicide

Phillips argued compellingly that we cannot fully understand anti-Semitism in the UK and Europe unless we realise that the West has ripped up its own cultural foundations. Moreover, the West is now seen as the main oppressor in the world (a view held most strongly by those on the political left). These two facts have changed everything in recent times.

The key driver behind the ascent of these beliefs about Western civilisation was, in Phillips’ view, the Holocaust, which smashed Europe’s belief in itself as a continent of enlightenment and high culture. It wasn’t just the Jews who died in the concentration camps - but the West’s own self-confidence in its values and civility.

As a result, she suggested, the West took an axe to its own roots and began to radically alter the way it operated - especially in areas such as education and the family. Transnationalism became viewed as the best way forward, as nationalistic views were considered too parochial and likely to cause more harm. International groups, such as the UN and EU, were to take precedence over national governments.

This new globalist way forward also meant incorporating a different morality and a sense of multiculturalism as an idealistic norm. Politically, the extreme left became mainstream, as a new version of Marxism was called upon to help reshape our society and culture.

Anti-Zionism: The New Anti-Semitism

Another key event Phillips brought to the attention of the audience was the Six Day War (1967), which fomented a new kind of anti-Semitism centred upon the state of Israel. No longer the victims, Jews were recast as the aggressors. Israel was now to be delegitimised and demonised - not through rational arguments but with a torrent of dehumanising abuse and irrational malice.

Phillips was quick to stress that though this anti-Israel fervour could be called anti-Zionism, in reality it is just anti-Semitism in another form. Any distinction is bogus: the new anti-Zionism cannot be split from its anti-Semitic roots.

Phillips was quick to stress that though this anti-Israel fervour could be called anti-Zionism, in reality it is just anti-Semitism in another form.

Israel is now seen as menacing and powerful, but this, she maintained, is a paranoid delusion. In reality, Israel has only become powerful in order to defend itself. Initially the Jewish nation was accepted by the West, which was crippled with guilt and self-doubt after the Holocaust. Now though, Israel can no longer claim victimhood. They are the aggressors, while the Palestinian Arabs have become the new victim group which demands our support. And this changes everything.

Activists protest in support of the Gaza 'March of Return', New York. See Photo Credits.According to Phillips, victims, by definition, cannot be victimisers. Nor are they held responsible for their own shortcomings. They have a ready-made excuse for their actions – “we’re the victims here!” They are placed beyond criticism and are effectively handed a ‘get-out-of-jail-free card’ to react however they like to those who are perceived to be victimising them.

Meanwhile, Jews can no longer be regarded as victims. When they emerged from the Holocaust, they were the supreme victims, but since then they have gained power and wealth throughout the world. And this is now resented. Obviously they are intent on taking over the world (and so the old anti-Semitic conspiracies are revived)!

One incredible feature of this diatribe highlighted by Phillips is the appearance of the claim that Jews burnt Arabs in the concentration camps! Here is not just Holocaust denial, but Holocaust reversal.

Victim culture is now at the heart of left-wing politics, and victim culture is essentially anti-Jew. So, Phillips concluded, the Labour Party is caught up in anti-Semitism which is intrinsic to its politics - and will remain so even with a change of leader.¹

Europe’s Lost Soul

Why is anti-Semitism so much on the rise in the West? Because, Phillips argues, the West is in cultural disarray. It is starting to disintegrate, bringing this trouble upon itself.

According to Melanie Phillips, Europe lost its soul after the Holocaust and is now floundering. Immigration policies are creating turmoil, as migration is viewed as inherently a good thing (to say otherwise would be racist). As a result, Islamic ‘no-go zones’ have started appearing in many countries. Traditional cultures have become fragmented and weak. Real threats abound, but governments are helpless, hamstrung by their own policies and beliefs.

Europe lost its soul after the Holocaust and is now floundering.

In such times of transformation and confusion, she noted, prejudices easily arise and old ones will always re-surface. One reason why there is so much Jew-hatred is simply because there is now much more hatred in general.

Europe may be becoming increasingly Islamic, but it will not go down without a fight. Either way the Jews will be caught in the middle and are likely to suffer accordingly. They will continue to be accused of many things, including of fuelling claims of anti-Semitism in tactical pursuit of their own malicious aims.

Is it Time to Leave?

So, is it time for the Jews to leave Western Europe? According to Phillips, it could be said this question is an overreaction based on paranoia, rather than a fair one. Yet the final choice of whether to leave or stay is always a personal one. For individual Jews, the key question may well be, ‘where do I feel safer?’

Although Israel is surrounded by enemies with thousands of missiles pointing in its direction, it is increasingly being said by Jews that they feel safer there than in a continent which seems to be in danger of repeating the grave errors of its past.

A sobering thought indeed.

A video of the Simon Wiesenthal Memorial lecture is now available online. We welcome Melanie Phillips’ insightful social commentary, more of which can be found on her blog, www.melaniephillips.com.

You may also be interested to watch this week’s fiery Parliamentary debate on the rise of anti-Semitism – click here for the full debate.

Notes

1 Moreover, the left asserts that to be anti-Semitic you must be fascist and hence on the right. On that basis it is impossible for those on the left to be anti-Semitic: they exonerate themselves.

Tom Lennie reviews ‘No Go Zones’ by Raheem Kassam (2017, Regnery Publishing).

There has been much heated debate in recent years regarding the extent and effects of Islamic extremism across Europe, with Donald Trump being vilified for daring to suggest that Sweden was experiencing major problems with its steady influx of Muslim immigrants.

The idea that there are actual ‘no-go zones’ in various European cities – Muslim-dominated districts where Sharia law can prevail and from which the police stay well clear - has caused even more contention, many liberal commentators insisting that such ‘zones’ are purely a figment of the ‘far right’s’ imagination.

Both the title and sub-title of this book – ‘How Sharia Law is Coming to a Neighbourhood Near You’ - are deliberately (and perhaps unnecessarily?) provocative. The author, a former senior advisor to Nigel Farage and editor of the Breibart website, is himself an ex-Muslim, being brought up in the Ismaili sect of Shia Islam.

In this his first book, Kassam (now a self-confessed atheist) takes on the role of investigative journalist, as he makes a personal tour of the most potent Islamic community-strongholds across the Western world – or at least across Europe and North America.

Kassam makes a personal tour of the most potent Islamic community-strongholds in the Western world.

Selective Survey

I was surprised that the Kolenkit area in Amsterdam isn’t given a mention, nor one of the Muslim-majority districts of Rotterdam. Instead, Kassam restricts his European survey to four other countries - France (various Parisian suburbs, such as Aulnay-sois-Bois, and the southern town of Beziers), Sweden (particularly Malmo, but also Stockholm), Belgium (the north Brussels district of Molenbeek, home to one of the surviving terrorists who took part in the 2015 Paris attacks which killed 130 people and injured hundreds more), and the United Kingdom. Here attention is focused on the Yorkshire town of Dewsbury and on various parts of London.

Crossing the Atlantic, the areas the author is concerned with in the USA are Hamtramck, Michigan (“essentially an Islamic colony in the Midwest”), and the Californian city of San Bernardino – quite different communities to those investigated by Erick Stakelbeck in his 2011 book, ‘The Terrorist Next Door’.

Conversations On the Ground

Kassam discusses the varying degrees to which these districts truly are ‘no go zones’ – clearly not wholly so, since he himself entered each of them relatively freely, although he was careful in his movements. He converses with local residents of differing ethnic backgrounds, as well as local policemen (whose anonymous testimonies often contradict official police reports) and other intelligent parties. 

Through these, and his own insights, Kassam provides evidence that in each of these districts ‘infidels’ are made to feel distinctly unwelcome, a subculture of resentment is fostered against the very nation that hosts them (and very often houses, clothes and feeds them), every effort is made to ensure that Islamic law governs, and extremism is growing at an alarming rate.

Kassam converses with local residents of differing ethnic backgrounds, as well as local policemen.

A Compelling Read

While the intent is clearly to shock and disturb, Kassam does provide a degree of balance.

He is first to admit that the areas discussed in the book are not aflame (for the most part) with radical Islam. You won’t get flogged if you enter them, and you’re unlikely to encounter screeching Islamist imams on their street corners. As is stated in the foreword, often the people who inhabit such districts are victims of their own community leaders, whose very desire is to create no-go zones and to drive a wedge between migrant communities and native populations.

It’s a fast-moving, compelling read, which also discusses the degree to which socio-economic factors play a role in extremism, as well as the part played by Western media and governments, who constantly downplay the reality of the tensions within such ‘problem’ communities. All in all, a fascinating book.

‘No Go Zones: How Sharia Law Is Coming To A Neighbourhood Near You’ (256pp, hardcover) is available widely, including on Amazon. RRP £20.99. Also available as an audio-book and as an e-book. 

A call to radical discipleship.

In part two of a series examining the relevance of the message and ministry of the non-writing prophets for today, Wilfred Wong looks at the lessons which can be learned from the life of Elisha.

The ministry of Elisha was complementary to that of Elijah. Elijah's name means ‘God is Yahweh’ while the name Elisha means ‘God is Salvation’. Elisha was an evangelist whereas Elijah, like Moses, had to restore and vindicate the dignity of the law which was, at the time, neglected and despised. Elisha led back to God those who had been aroused from their complacency by the ministry of Elijah.

The role of both Elijah and Elisha are crucial for today's church to encompass, in presenting to the world the message of who God is (Elijah) and that God saves (Elisha).

They both prophesied to Israel at a time of widespread religious confusion and disobedience to God. This was fuelled by relativism and syncretism, a mix of false teaching and divine revelation, similar to the times that we now live in. At that time in Israel, remnants of God's teachings existed side by side with the idols Baal and Asherah of the Canaanite religion. The king of Israel and the people were confused as to who the true God was.

Similarly, today, this nation has been flooded with more religions and occultic belief systems than at any other time in its history. Under the guise of 'tolerance’ and 'progressiveness’, even church leaders have professed their own subjective and unsubstantiated opinions about God rather than what he has revealed in Scripture.

Today in the West, many people have adopted a consumerist attitude towards religion, including Christians. Some Christians like to pick and choose those aspects of God's character which they are happy to accept. God's love is emphasised and his anger ignored. Many convince themselves that surely God will not mind if they continue to be disobedient. God has been neatly packaged for our convenience and placed in our back pockets. These mistakes are nothing new; they were committed as long ago as the time of Elisha. For all our ’modernity’ and 'progressiveness’, we appear to have come full circle and are no more spiritually enlightened than the people of old.

Elijah and Elisha both prophesied to Israel at a time of widespread religious confusion and disobedience to God.

This spiritual depravity is also reflected in the senseless violence that is on the rise in British society, where even little children are brutally murdered for sexual gratification and about eight million unborn children have been killed since the introduction of the 1967 Abortion Act.¹ The latter is perhaps comparable to the human sacrifices conducted in the Canaanite religion.

God’s Righteous Anger

God's anger is clearly demonstrated after Elisha is mocked (2 Kings 2:23-25). This passage is often cited as a major moral problem in the Old Testament. However, the mocking of Elisha, as God's representative, was tantamount to mocking God himself and such blasphemy was punished according to the Deuteronomic doctrine of retributive justice (Deut 7:10, 18:19).

Furthermore, Elisha himself could not have brought about the punishment of the youths. There is no need for Christians to try and make excuses for God's anger in these verses, for though God is love, he is also a God of righteous anger and he has no need to justify his acts to those whom he has created. This anger is demonstrated at many points in Scripture, for instance in the punishment of Ananias and Sapphira for lying to God (Acts 5:1-11).

Although God is merciful and forgiving, he wants us both to love and fear him - the reason for the latter being that fear of God will help to keep us from sinning (Ex 20:18-20, Luke 12:45). Many people, including Christians, lack an awareness of sin and its consequences because much of the Church has shied away from teaching about God's righteous anger. Sin is an unpopular subject nowadays. Perhaps it may only be a matter of time before God's anger results in a terrible chastisement upon this nation and on the whole world, for its blatant disregard for his laws.

For Those Who Will Obey

Though Elisha is to proclaim that God saves, this salvation is only for those who humble themselves and are obedient to God. As is demonstrated above, those who dare to mock God are made to account for their actions (see also Gal 6:7). There are numerous miracles performed by Elisha, which demonstrate God’s saving power for those who are obedient to him: in 2 Kings 4:1-7, Elisha saves a widow in debt from having her two boys taken away as slaves. 2 Kings 4:38-41 describes God’s power to make safe that which is harmful, when Elisha makes a deadly stew edible.

Although God is merciful and forgiving, he wants us both to love and fear him – for the fear of God will help to keep us from sinning.

God also shows his care and provision for those who follow him. In 2 Kings 4:42-44 Elisha feeds a multitude of people with only a small number of loaves demonstrating, yet again, the Lord's care for the needs of his people. In the healing of Naaman, in 2 Kings 5:1-27, Elisha demonstrates God's mercy on those who are willing to humble themselves before him, seek God’s will and faithfully obey him (here we have a story of the conversion and healing of a non-Israelite leper).

We also see God’s severe punishment upon those who are unfaithful in their service to him. Naaman, in gratitude for his healing, offers Elisha a gift, which he refuses (vs 15, 16). However, Elisha’s servant, Gehazi, deceives Naaman into giving him the gifts and he and his descendants are struck down with leprosy.

Storing Up Treasures in Heaven

Gehazi was supposed to be serving God through his service to God’s chosen prophet, Elisha, yet he failed miserably when tempted by riches. This is a lesson for all of us who are engaged in Christian service. It is very common today to hear reports of Christians whose ministries are corrupted by sex, pride or money or any combination of these factors. All of us who serve God need regularly to examine our motives and attitudes and ask ourselves whether we are storing up treasures in heaven or on earth (Matt 6:19-21).

Will we follow the way of Elisha or Gehazi? Until the day we leave this world, we can never be too sure. This is a humbling thought and we need always to seek God’s help in remaining faithful. Although life may sometimes be very difficult, it is only temporary and God will reward believers according to how faithfully and obediently they have served him (Rom 14:12, Rev 22:12, 1 Cor 2:9).

It is quite awesome to realise that the nature of God's eternal reward awaiting us in Heaven will be determined by whatever we do during our temporary stay on earth. If all Christians truly internalised this truth, we would fling aside all those distractions which side-track us from effective Christian service, and focus single-mindedly on serving and pleasing God.

Uncompromising Discipleship

Such is the manner in which Elisha served God. He not only was obedient and faithful, but was willing to give up his livelihood, humble himself and be a servant to Elijah in order to be prepared for his prophetic ministry (1 Kings 19:19-21).

All of us who serve God need regularly to examine our motives and attitudes and ask ourselves whether we are storing up treasures in heaven or on earth.

By the standards which Jesus set, Elisha was a true disciple. When called to serve God, he left everything and did not look back (Luke 9:57-62) and he was not afraid to sacrifice and suffer and even to risk his life, as his ministry was likely to incur the wrath of the authorities (Luke 14:20-27).

True discipleship is always radical, yet we often water down the quality of our service to God, justifying this in the interests of our convenience and comfort. Elisha in his ministry was not only proclaiming God’s salvation but also encouraging the people to obey God. Some parallels can be seen with the Great Commission which Jesus gave to his disciples as recorded in Matthew 28:18-20. They were instructed not only to ‘make disciples’ but stress was also placed on ‘teaching them (i.e. the nations) to obey everything I have commanded you.’

What prophetic role is the Church in this country performing to teach the nation to obey God's commands? Unfortunately, some Christians seem more concerned with their image and not upsetting others than with uncompromisingly proclaiming God’s laws. The wavering stance within parts of the Church on the sinfulness of homosexual practices is just one example of this continuing process of compromise.

Sadly, many parts of the Church are failing to teach God’s commands by word or example. In the West, rather than influencing society, society is influencing the Church. Even sincere and devout Christians often fall into the trap of professing beliefs which are based more on the cultural influences of the day than on God's teachings as found in the Bible.

It is quite awesome to realise that the nature of God's eternal reward awaiting us in Heaven will be determined by what we do during our temporary stay on earth.

More Than We Can Imagine

We are all called to radical discipleship. It is not an easy road and we need God’s assistance and guidance along every step of the way. Like Elisha, we should have lives of deep prayer and seek God's will, in prayer, with an attitude of humility and obedience and through the study of God's word.

When we are humble and obedient instruments of God, he is able to achieve great things through us, perhaps more than we can imagine, as he did through his servant Elisha.

First published in Prophecy Today, Vol 13(5), 1997. Part of a series - click here for back issues.

Notes

1 2015 statistics.