M&G Censorship

The recent sloppy piece of Chris McGreal propaganda masquerading as journalism in the Mail & Guardian singled out South African Jewry apart from all other white South Africans as being particularly complicit in the crimes of apartheid.

You would think that such serious accusations warrant a fair right of reply. If you single out a particular group for extraordinary criticism then you should be brave enough to allow them the space to defend themselves.

But the M&G play by their own rules.

Last week the following severely edited David Saks article appeared in the M&G. (David Saks is the Associate Director of the SA Jewish Board of Deputies.)

Your editorial of March 3 falsely comments that the S A Jewish Board of Deputies equates criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. The SAJBD is careful to distinguish between attacks on Israel and racist abuse of Jews per se. Of course, it regards unreasonable prejudice against Israel as being as much a form of bigotry as it does prejudice against Jews.

Obviously the M&G decided to censor the full David Saks article - not wanting to give the SA Jewish Board a fair chance to defend themselves. The full David Saks article - not printed by the M&G - is shown below.

Dear Editor Your editorial of 3 March included the gratuitous and wholly untrue comment that the S A Jewish Board of Deputies automatically equates criticism of Israel with antisemitism. The SAJBD is in fact careful to distinguish between attacks on Israel, however unjust, and racist abuse of Jews per se. It goes without saying, of course, that it regards unreasonable prejudice against Israel as being as much a form of bigotry as it does prejudice against Jews. As for Chris McGreal's extended attempt to equate the State of Israel with apartheid South Africa, a deeply unpleasant aspect of this is the inordinate extent to which he dwells on the response of the South African Jewish community to apartheid, as if this is somehow relevant to his main argument. The result of this disproportionate focus on the behaviour of a small ethnic minority who never constituted more than 3% of the white population, has the effect of making Jews uniquely guilty of benefiting from apartheid. Every other white ethnic and faith group of the time seems to have gotten off scot-free. Predictably, McGreal hauls out the Percy Yutar example to illustrate this collective Jewish complicity. Somehow, the Jewish origins of Yutar, the only Jewish lawyer of any note who supported the apartheid government, have been raised time and again. By contrast, one never finds mention of the Jewishness of such great anti-apartheid lawyers as Isie Maisels (a former President of both the S A Jewish Board of Deputies and Zionist Federation, by the way), Sydney Kentridge, Arthur Chaskalson and many others. This kind of gross selectivity pretty much tells its own story. McGreal's attempt to equate Israel and apartheid also fundamentally misses the mark. Apartheid was an all-encompassing system of social engineering that, on the basis of arbitrary racial differentiations, imposed controls on every conceivable facet of daily life. From the workplace to the bedroom, in the classroom, legislature, judiciary and other areas to numerous to mention, South Africans were divided from one other, with the system blatantly favouring the white minority. It is true that a degree of discrimination exists in Israel (it exists in South Africa too, of course, being generally referred to as "affirmative action"), but to compare this to what constituted the reviled apartheid policy not only grossly exaggerates it but by implication also diminishes what apartheid was. Had McGreal subjected other Middle Eastern countries - Saudi Arabia and Iran are obvious examples - to the same kind of nitpicking scrutiny that he has applied to Israel, he will have uncovered examples of religion-based discrimination far more overt than that which exists in Israel. However, these countries are never even mildly called to book for this, let alone accused of practising apartheid. The reality is that the "Israel equals apartheid" equation has been concocted by those bent on Israel's complete eradication and who are hoping to achieve this by turning it into a pariah state just as apartheid South Africa was. David Saks (Associate Director S A Jewish Board of Deputies)

But what do you expect from a newspaper that runs articles celebrating the death of Israelis - like this opinion piece in 2002...

Finally, let us now be honest. Who on the left did not feel a sense of Schadenfreude at the sight of the World Trade Centre towers crashing to the ground? It is the same instinct that now leads us to quietly celebrate the news of an Israeli casualty. In the end, oppression and its appeasement can bring out the "terrorist" in all of us.

Comments

[Gary]

The Mail & Guardian is a very spiteful Stalinist rag!
For may years they had a vicious and obsessive vendetta against Mangosutho Buthelezi and the Inkatha Freedom Party , doing all they could to demonize them

Now they have a vicious and obsessive vendetta against Israel and her people...only publsihing what conforms to their Stalinust prejudices.
Some things never change...