The numbers are not important, let the historians and researchers argue over whether it was five or six million Jews or whether it was half-a-million or two million Roma who ‘went up the chimney’[1] (I don’t have a number for the Serbs, but perhaps a million died at the hands of the Croatian Ustase, the local Nazis in the then Yugoslavia, as well as at the hands of German Nazi occupiers).

What is important about the ‘Final Solution’ is that it was a state-sponsored project to not only entirely eradicate ‘non-Aryans’ but to erase all traces of their existence; their history, their cultures and languages, what today we call genocide. An apt lesson for the creation of the state of Israel, that for its creation, also required the total removal of all things non-Jewish.

The parallels with the Nazi state are so obvious yet not alluded to at all in the current tragedy of the Palestinian people, but Eretz (Greater) Israel flows from the same source, the imperial urge to expand and subdue, to exterminate all that is non ‘Jewish’ in the land that is Palestine.

And it doesn’t require much digging around in the history books to find that the Zionist founders of Israel drew much of their ‘inspiration’ from Nazi ideology in the 1930s.

“Zionism convicts itself. On June 21, 1933, the German Zionist Federation sent a secret memorandum to the Nazis:

"Zionism has no illusions about the difficulty of the Jewish condition, which consists above all in an abnormal occupational pattern and in the fault of an intellectual and moral posture not rooted in one's own tradition. Zionism recognized decades ago that as a result of the assimilationist trend, symptoms of deterioration were bound to appear, which it seeks to overcome by carrying out its challenge to transform Jewish life completely.

"It is our opinion that an answer to the Jewish question truly satisfying to the national state can be brought about only with the collaboration of the Jewish movement that aims at a social, cultural and moral renewal of Jewry--indeed, that such a national renewal must first create the decisive social and spiritual premises for all solutions.

"Zionism believes that a rebirth of national life, such as is occurring in German life through adhesion to Christian and national values, must also take place in the Jewish national group. For the Jew, too, origin, religion, community of fate and group consciousness must be of decisive significance in the shaping of his life. This means that the egotistic individualism which arose in the liberal era must be overcome by public spiritedness and by willingness to accept responsibility."

Thus from the getgo we see the idea of ‘racial purity’ embedded in the Zionist project. Avraham Stern of the infamous Stern Gang and his followers announced that

"The NMO, which is well-acquainted with the goodwill of the German Reich government and its authorities towards Zionist activity inside Germany and towards Zionist emigration plans, is of the opinion that:

1. Common interests could exist between the establishment of a new order in Europe in conformity with the German concept, and the true national aspirations of the Jewish people as they are embodied by the NMO.

2. Cooperation between the new Germany and a renewed folkish-national Hebraium would be possible and,

3. The establishment of the historic Jewish state on a national and totalitarian basis, bound by a treaty with the German Reich, would be in the interest of a maintained and strengthened future German position of power in the Near East.

Proceeding from these considerations, the NMO in Palestine, under the condition the above-mentioned national aspirations of the Israeli freedom movement are recognized on the side of the German Reich, offers to actively take part in the war on Germany's side."

Brenner concludes this section by saying,

“They hanged people all over Europe after WW II for notes to the Nazis like these. But these treasons against the Jews were virtually unknown in the run up to the creation of the Zionist state in May 1948.” — ‘51 Documents: Zionist Collaboration with the Nazis’ by LENNI BRENNER, Counterpunch 22 December, 2002

That such collaboration took place should not come as a surprise given the history of Zionism and the concept of 'racial purity' that Zionism and Nazism held in common (this not to say that Zionism and Nazism were the only exponents of the doctrine of ‘racial purity’).

In any case, is there such a thing as the Jewish race? After all, both Jews and Arabs from the Middle East and North Africa are all Semites. My mother used to quote a Jewish joke, 'A Jew is just an Arab on horseback'. The same cannot be said for most of the European Jews who constitute the majority in Occupied Palestine.

The twists and turns of Zionism are a wonder to behold. Am I Jewish by ‘race’, religion or culture, for Zionism conflates the three to the point where it is impossible to disentangle them.

Defenders of Israel argue that Stern and co. do not represent the views of the majority of Jews who settled in Palestine a view which may or may not be true but frankly it’s neither here nor there as those who led the occupation were adherents to Stern's view of Palestine as “the Jewish Nation Lawful Owner of the Land of Israel, and the Palestinian Arabs, its Unlawful Occupiers”, as a letter I received today, put it.

Thus the important point here is that from the day Israel was founded in 1948 its driving force has been the creation of a ‘racially pure’ state for the ‘Chosen People’ and as such, the removal by one means or another of the original inhabitants inevitably led to the slaughter we have witnessed in the Gaza Strip.

One can only come to the conclusion that the destruction of the physical infrastructure of the Gaza Strip, let alone the thousands of dead and injured, is intended to make the place uninhabitable leaving only the West Bank as the putative Palestinian state.

So Israel too, has its ‘Final Solution’ for the Palestinians of which the assault on Gaza was the coda, following sixty years of ‘softening up’, leaving only a ‘mopping up’ operation for the West Bank, of which around 66% is already in the hands of Israel’s frontline Fascist shock troops, the settlers, armed to the teeth and mostly immigrants from the US.

Two-state solution? How about a no-state Final Solution? The obscene destruction of Gaza, witnessed by the entire world (in spite of the BBC and other corporate/state media’s attempt to blank it out), was as brazen as anything undertaken by the Nazis, perhaps more so given that it was done in the name of all Jews, everywhere. Never again? Gimme a break!

But how did such a situation come to pass?

The dominant view in the West is that Israel, because of the history of the persecution of the Jews is entitled to ‘defend’ itself by whatever means it has at its disposal. The Jews (or Israel or the Zionists, take your pick) therefore, constitute a ‘special case’, whereas the Palestinians do not.

But how can there be one law for Israel and none for the Palestinians, best illustrated by the current furore surrounding the BBC’s refusal to air the aid appeal, for buried in the refusal is the idea that the Palestinians are less than human thus not entitled to humanitarian assistance.

And why are they less than human? Because they resist and thus must be bombed into submission. For proof we need only look at the language used by media outlets like the BBC which regularly describes Palestinians who resist as “terrorists” or “militants” and by implication all the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip are therefore not deserving of aid for they too are “terrorists” or “militants”. What other conclusion can be arrived at when the BBC decides that showing an appeal video would compromise their ‘impartiality’?

Is the Israeli ‘Defence’ Force ever described as an army of occupation or its actions as terroristic when it showers phosphorus or ‘flechette’ bombs on schools, hospitals and homes?

It appears then that the Palestinians got what they deserved for not submitting, for not surrendering and by implication, there are no innocent Palestinians.

Chris Hedges in a piece for Truth Dig, talking about US media coverage of the destruction of Gaza but it could equally well apply to the BBC, wrote,

“We retreated, as usual, into the moral void of American journalism, the void of balance and objectivity. The ridiculous notion of being unbiased, outside of the flow of human existence, impervious to grief or pain or anger or injustice, allows reporters to coolly give truth and lies equal space and airtime. Balance and objectivity are the antidote to facing unpleasant truths, a way of avoidance, a way to placate the powerful. We record the fury of a Palestinian who has lost his child in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza but make sure to mention Israel’s “security needs,” include statements by Israeli officials who insist there was firing from the home or the mosque or the school and of course note Israel’s right to defend itself. We do this throughout the Middle East.” — ‘With Gaza, Journalists Fail Again’.

This is the ‘balanced’ and ‘impartial’ journalism that the BBC speaks of when it tries to justify why it refuses to show the video.[2]

Note

1. The term 'up the chimney' was used by people who lived near Nazi death camps, in some instances as a threat to frighten children who misbehaved and is often cited as proof that ordinary Germans knew exactly what was going on in the concentration camps.

2. See Sarah Gillepsie: ‘The BBC and the transformation of suffering into propaganda’

Postscript:

A report in the Israeli daily Ha’aretz (26 January, 2009) illustrates the corrosive nature of the Zionist ideology masquerading it seems to me as being a message directly from God. Titled ‘IDF rabbinate publication during Gaza war: We will show no mercy on the cruel’, it contains the following quotes circulated to IDF troops involved in the destruction of Gaza, the first by Rabbi Aviner,

“Is it possible to compare today's Palestinians to the Philistines of the past? And if so, is it possible to apply lessons today from the military tactics of Samson and David? … A comparison is possible because the Philistines of the past were not natives and had invaded from a foreign land ... They invaded the Land of Israel, a land that did not belong to them and claimed political ownership over our country ... Today the problem is the same. The Palestinians claim they deserve a state here, when in reality there was never a Palestinian or Arab state within the borders of our country. Moreover, most of them are new and came here close to the time of the War of Independence.” [my emph. Ed.]

Another is an excerpt from a publication entitled "Daily Torah studies for the soldier and the commander in Operation Cast Lead," issued by the IDF rabbinate.

“[There is] a biblical ban on surrendering a single millimeter of it [the Land of Israel] to gentiles, though all sorts of impure distortions and foolishness of autonomy, enclaves and other national weaknesses. We will not abandon it to the hands of another nation, not a finger, not a nail of it.”

In another, circulated amongst IDF troops but not an ‘official’ publication of the IDF’ rabbinate,

“In addition to the official publications, extreme right-wing groups managed to bring pamphlets with racist messages into IDF bases. One such flyer is attributed to “the pupils of Rabbi Yitzhak Ginsburg” - the former rabbi at Joseph's Tomb and author of the article “Baruch the Man,” which praises Baruch Goldstein, who massacred unarmed Palestinians in Hebron. It calls on “soldiers of Israel to spare your lives and the lives of your friends and not to show concern for a population that surrounds us and harms us. We call on you ... to function according to the law ‘kill the one who comes to kill you.’ As for the population, it is not innocent ... We call on you to ignore any strange doctrines and orders that confuse the logical way of fighting the enemy.” [my emph. Ed.]