#bar kokhba

[apenitentialprayer]

I was reading about 20 Questions and

The false Messiah???

And then I checked the actual page and

People really do have the strangest afterlives sometimes, huh?

[storiearcheostorie]

ARCHEOSCOPERTE / Straordinario ritrovamento in Israele: da una grotta riemergono quattro spade romane (con fodero) e la punta di un giavellotto [FOTO, VIDEO]

#ARCHEOLOGIA #SCOPERTE / Straordinario ritrovamento in #Israele: da una grotta riemergono quattro spade romane (con fodero) e la punta di un giavellotto [FOTO, VIDEO] Tutti i dettagli su Storie & Archeostorie

Le spade dopo il ritrovamento (foto: ©Israel Antiquities Authority) Quattro spade romane e la punta di un giavellotto (pilum), tutti risalenti a circa 1900 anni fa, sono stati rinvenuti in perfetto stato di conservazione in Israele a Seliq, all’interno di una grotta nella riserva naturale di En Gedi (o Ein Gedi), un’oasi sulla sponda occidentale del mar Morto. Il ritrovamento, annunciato a…

[priapocalypse]

This is a really exciting discovery! Firstly, this cache of Roman swords dates to around the time of the Bar Kokhba Revolt, the last Judean revolt against Roman rule. It was a major uprising led by Bar Kokhba, who many believed was the messiah and had come to win the Judean independence. The result was, unfortunately, a near-total Roman victory that cost the lives of perhaps 400,000 Judeans, with another 200,000 captured and either expelled or sold into slavery. Judea was drastically depopulated, and Jews were banned from entering Jerusalem, save for Tisha B'Av. It also solidified the firm separation of Christianity from Judaism.

What's interesting (at least to me) about these swords are that, if they are indeed from the Bar Kokhba Revolt, they pre-date our current examples of their use by the generalized Roman Army. Three of them are spathas, a type of sword that is longer than the traditional gladius, and which replaced it in the 3rd Century CE onwards. Prior to that, the spatha was mainly used by Celtic and Germanic warriors/mercenaries. The fourth sword is a shorter ring-pommeled sword, which was very rare to see anywhere outside western Europe at the time. It was most common in Romanized Germania. So it might not be a stretch to say this particular cache was procured (most likely stolen or acquired during a raid) from German Auxiliaries - though I'm no expert on this, and if I'm wrong, please correct me.

I love Roman finds that express the true width and span of the Roman Empire.

[edenfenixblogs]

I saw so many posts this morning claiming that Jesus was not Jewish and felt Iike I was losing my mind. If he’s not Jewish, then what is the WHOLE THING doing being called the “New Testament” of OUR Bible????

Anyway, sorry bros. Jesus was Jewish. There is no version of the idea, “I hate all Jews—past and present—and wish they never existed before and were all dead now” that doesn’t include Jesus.

And this makes me no sad—not just because of the baffling desire to kill and erase Jews is still so strong after all this time—but because we see by your current actions exactly what you’d do to our memories if we were all gone. You’d erase us. Claim our culture as your own. Our suffering as your own. You’d paint us at the villains in our own demise. As long as we live, you’ll all have to live with the fact that your antagonism and continued attempts to erase us from the earth and from history make you the villains in that narrative, actually.

It would be so easy. You could all just stop. Any time you want. You could stop hating Jews. I’d love it so much if you stopped. And by “you” I don’t mean Palestinians. I mean every single culture that welcomed us only to abuse, expel, and murder us. Every single person who promised us friendship only to betray us by their hatred. People are so desperate to erase us, because we are visible reminders that their own histories and presents are filled with a horrible violence that their continued attempts to demonize and erase us are a continuation of that brutal cycle.

But guess what? You can all still just…stop. Any time.

Anyway, Jews are indigenous to the Levant and the Land of Israel.

But so are Palestinians. Palestinians have been present in the region since the region became known as Syria Palestina in about 135 CE after the (near total, but not complete) expulsion of Jews from the region after the loss of the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135.

Because current rhetoric is so violently trying to erase any discussion of Jewish indigeneity to the region, I am duty bound to point out to say something that I hate talking about. I hate talking about it, because it reinforces an idea that I fundamentally do not agree with. I know that people who already hate Jews will use my discussion of this topic to try to claim that I am erasing Palestinian indigeneity to the Levant. I am emphatically not doing this. I am right here right now stating that I do believe Palestinians to be indigenous to the Levant.

But so are Jews. And the extremely uncomfortable truth that I hate saying out loud is that neither Palestine nor Palestinians would not exist if it weren’t for Jews—specifically for the murder and ethnic cleansing of Jews. The area of Syria Palestina was named in an explicit attempt to erase Israel and Judeah and Jewish history in the region. This specific expulsion of Jews and the formation of Syria Palestina is the event that sent Jews into our current diaspora in the first place. The creation and existence of Syria Palestina CREATED diasporic Jews.

This is why it is especially painful when people claim that Jews are not indigenous, but Palestinians are. It’s not because Palestinians are not indigenous. It’s because if they are, why aren’t we? The answer of course is that we are indigenous.

By every metric—Jews are indigenous.

In the historical terms as outlined in the above sources. Our language and culture and history took shape there. We sing of our history there in prayers every day. We sing of it in so many prayers —and have for thousands of years—that I cannot even begin to name all of the prayers that mention Israel or Jerusalem. But feel free to look into the lyrics and words of any of our prayers and you’ll find those places in many—maybe even most— of them.

And no, we aren’t singing of the desire to violently rip the land away from whoever is already living there. We are singing of the history documented in our biblical texts. We are singing of the desire to go home. We are singing of the last place we ever had self determination as a people. That doesn’t necessarily mean we want anyone else to leave. We just want the option to be where we came from and to be safe there.

I don’t believe indigeneity necessitates that only the first people in a location can be indigenous. Palestinians have a culture that is unique to the area of Palestine. It has become their cultural and ancestral homeland over the course of 2000 years. They exist because Syria Palestina was created. Civilizations have risen and fallen and they’re still there. And they have a right to be. They have a right to every freedom that modern Israelis have. I will never deny that.

That’s why I hate bringing up the history of Jewish indigeneity. There is no way to discuss how Palestine came to be without describing a serious of violent acts against Jews. It makes it seem like there is no escape from an antagonistic relationship between Palestinians and Jews. I do not believe this has to be the case. The past is unchangeable. Our extremely distant ancestors had an antagonistic relationship with each other. But we don’t have to perpetuate that. The only thing that remains true for all of us is that we share a history there.

I know there are studies of DNA that confirm our indigeneity. But I’m in the back of a car right now. I will reblog with sources once I have more access and can verify any sources I find or that are sent to me responsibly enough to link.

So what’s the point of all this?

Just to say that you’re not helping Palestinians by trying to erase Jewish indigeneity. All you’re doing is hurting Jews. But for some of you acting in bad faith, that’s always been the point.

As I have said. As I have always said. As I will always say: our fate is intertwined. Peace for Palestinians cannot ever be achieved without Peace for Jews. The only solution that will ever have a chance at working is one that honors the history we all share and protects us all equally. A peace that guarantees freedom and equality for everyone.

There are so many organizations led by Palestinians, Israelis, and people of other Arab nations devoted to achieving that freedom, peace, and equality. There are organizations devoted to political activism, education, interfaith and intercultural dialogue, sending direct and immediate aid and so, so much more.

Instead of shouting at Jews on the internet for existing and having the audacity to refuse to watch themselves being erased from history, find the way you are best suited to help, pick an organization geared toward peace with a verifiably responsible track record, find your team, and get to work.

ok that's it. tomorrow i'm gonna publish my longer piece on why the modern day Arab Palestinians are NOT the same as the Ancient Greek Philistines (who all died out around 604 BCE when the Babylonians sieged Jerusalem).

but the tl;dr version is this:

we know that the Philistines are Ancient Greeks based on DNA-testing that's been done on their skeletons, and based on their pottery and artifacts, which are Ancient Mycenaean Greek. (the Torah is consistent with this -- it records them as being from Crete, which at that time was under Mycenaean Greek control)

also, being Greeks, the Philistines were not indigenous to the Levant. they were interlopers. the native Israelites fought with the Philistines over and over. the story of David and Goliath is likely a cultural memory of this conflict.

in Hebrew, the Philistines are called Peleshet, and they are likely the same as the Peleset tribe -- one of the tribes of "Sea Peoples" who tried (and failed) to conquer Egypt at the end of the Bronze Age.

and like, duh. obviously the Arab Palestinians and the Greek Philistines are not the same people.

but there are some really bad actors (both in the conspiracy sense, and in the literal "drama" sense) on Tiktok who are trying to erase Jewish history by spreading conspiracy theories that somehow Philistines and Palestinians are "the same". (omg the people who believe this shit are so dumb!!)

they're doing it so they can claim that "Jesus was a Palestinian".

ugh, it gives me a headache even to write something as stupid as that.

no, ya dumb-dumbs. Jesus was a Judaean Jew. he was from Bethlehem. in Judaea.

you know, Judaea. the place where the Jews are from.

deep sigh.

and like, clearly these people have not read a Bible ... ever ... because being associated with the Philistines was NOT a good thing!! they were literally the worst!

the Philistines were Ancient Mycenaean Greeks from Crete.

and the Palestinians are modern day Arabs.

and there is zero connection between them.

the only "connection" is that after the Romans tried to murder all the Jews in the Levant, following the Jewish Bar Kochba revolt in 135 AD, the Romans renamed Judaea, and gave it the name "Syria-Palaestina". they did this to try to wipe the cultural memory of Jews "off the map". they literally went through the Torah, found the name of one of the Judaeans' historical enemies (the Philistines), and renamed the region using that name.

so by claiming that "Jesus was a Palestinian", not only are you calling him a Philistine (ew), you're also giving him the name that the ROMANS WHO CRUCIFIED HIM renamed Judaea after trying to murder LOTS OF OTHER JEWS.

G-d these people are so dumb!!!

[girlactionfigure]

A rare coin from the Bar Kokhba Revolt, engraved with the name “Eleazar the Priest” in ancient Hebrew and “Year One of the Redemption of Israel” was discovered in the Judean Desert.

Going to show that Israel is the eternal homeland of the Jews and no amount of historical revisionism will change that.

📸 @antiquities_il

[secular-jew]

Remarkable Discovery at the Tower of David: A 2,000-year-old bronze coin featuring King Antiochus IV Epiphanes, known for his role in the Maccabean 3-year long Bar Kokhba Revolt (the Jews vs the Romans in 133-136 AD), has been unearthed within Jerusalem's historic citadel.

Found by chief conservator Orna Cohen during routine maintenance, this coin showcases Antiochus with a crown and a goddess with a scarf on its reverse. This surprising find at a site thought to have been fully excavated reveals a tangible piece of the tumultuous Hasmonean era, linking the Jews, once again, directly to biblical history, and proving their indigenous connection to Judea.

[raihanmutual]

I haveeee a presentation in my Roman history class on the Jewish revolt against Rome and my FAVOURITE history YouTuber who’s a professor is doing a zoom seminar on the topic next week and I got in and it aligns with my schedule THREE CHEERS FOR ME!!!

[infiniteglitterfall]

That gif of everyone at a party giving the viewer a variety of "what the fuck" stinkfaces is the correct response.

But I'd also like to add me pounding on the desk yelling, "JEWS ALREADY HAD THE PAX ROMANA! IT RESULTED IN THE DEATHS OF 1,680,000 JEWS! THAT'S WHAT THIS POST IS ABOUT!"

“why are jews so mad about stuff that happened hundreds of years ago” it’s because the timeline of antisemitism on wikipedia looks like this:

some centuries have their own separate articles. here’s the decade leading up to the creation of the term “anti-semitism” from the nineteenth century article:

so like. i think anyone with a brain can understand why jews are pissed off. and if your knee jerk reaction to learning about the history of antisemitism is to ask “what did the jews do?” nothing. the convenient lie is that jews have been persecuted throughout the centuries because of some inherent malignancy or evil disposition. the truth is more simple: people hate jews. and the truth is also more complex: people would rather believe jews are worth hating than confront the shame they themselves feel upon learning about the long history of antisemitic violence around the world. and the longer that shame exists, the more corrosive it becomes.

and what do human beings do when they feel ashamed? they project that feeling onto others. they may even blame the source of that shame, even if that source wasn’t the cause. rinse and repeat. it’s a very, very old cycle. just like how antisemitism is a very, very old cycle. not sure what the exact point of this post is, but i would love to stop seeing goyim dismiss jewish anger and trauma and grief for five minutes.

[ancientoriginses]

Enclavada en el desierto de Judea se encuentra un tesoro histórico: la Cueva de las Letras. ¿Su última oferta? Una prenda infantil única de la época de la revuelta de Bar Kokhba. ¿Por qué este vestido "anudado" tiene a los historiadores entusiasmados?

[storiearcheostorie]

Impressive Hiding Complex from the period of the Bar Kokhba Revolt revealed near the Sea of Galilee [VIDEO]

Impressive Hiding Complex from the period of the Bar Kokhba Revolt revealed near the Sea of Galilee [VIDEO]

Archaeological excavations at Huqoq near the Sea of Galilee, in which students, local residents and soldiers participated over the past few months, provide a glance at dramatic episodes in the history of the Jewish people: the preparation of shelters in preparation for the Revolt of the Jews against the Romans, led by Bar Kokhba in 132–136 CE. 1.Huqoq site, aerial view. Photograph Emil Aladjem,…

[fdelopera]

YUP. After the Bar Kokhba Revolt in Judea in 135 CE, Roman Emperor Hadrian tried to remove the Jewish history from Judaea (he failed, motherfucker). Fucking Roman Colonizer. He and his Wall can go fuck off.

He renamed Judaea, and gave it the Greek name, Syria-Palaestina, which he took from one of the Jewish peoples' historical enemies, the Greek Philistines, who were Mycenaean people from Crete.

Hadrian got this term "Palaestina" from the Greek historian Herodotus. In Herodotus' Histories, completed in Athens around 430 BCE, Herodotus referred to the Greek Philistine settlement along the coast of Judea, calling it Palaistine. However, Herodotus wasn't referring to all of Judea. He was only referring to the former settlement of Greek Philistine invaders.

Of course, the Philistine invaders had all been wiped off the map around 600 BCE (around 170 BEFORE Herodotus finished his Histories), when Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II besieged Jerusalem and destroyed the Philistines settlement, murdering the Philistines. In 586 BCE, king Nebuchadnezzar II sacked Jerusalem, destroyed the First Temple, and dragged many of the Jews into captivity in Babylon, which was the beginning of the Babylonian exile.

Also, we shouldn't put too much stock in what Herodotus wrote about Judea. He didn't know much about the Levant, and what he did know, he interpreted through a Greek lens. Herodotus was also the historian who opined that the Egyptian Pyramids were built by enslaved people, and we now know that this is false. Archeology has shown that the Pyramids were constructed by skilled Egyptian craftsmen and laborers. They certainly weren't built by slaves.

So the fact that Herodotus refers to the strip of land on the coast of Judea as "Palaistine" doesn't mean much. "Palaistine" was not a name in common use, and it was not the name that the Jews used -- the Jews referred to their land as יהודה (Yehudah), anglicized as Judea. Herodotus referred to this strip of land by its Greek name because he was Greek, and he recognized that the Philistines had also been Greek.

Now, "Philistines" of course is an anglicized spelling. The Hebrew word for Philistines in the Torah is "Plishtim." And this word relates to the Hebrew word for Invaders, "Polshim."

This accords with the archeological evidence, that the Philistines were the same as the Peleset tribe of "Sea Peoples" that the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses III defeated at the Battle of the Delta around 1175 BCE, during the end of the Bronze Age.

And yes, the Israelite/Jewish people were already in Israel at that time. We go all the way back to the Bronze Age. The earliest mention of Israel is around 1203 BCE in the Merneptah Stele, and the earliest mention of Jerusalem was around 2000 BCE.

So, when you refer to "Palaestina," just know that what you are actually saying is Plishtim, the Greek invaders of the Kingdom of Judah, which is a word closely related to Polshim, or Invaders. And "Palaestina" is a name from Roman colonizers, intended to erase the Jewish history of Judea. (Which again, didn't work -- we're still here, motherfuckers!)

Learn history, kids! And understand that words mean things! Because (let's say it all together now), Jew-hatred makes you stupid!

*dies from frustration*

*gets up on a stage*

*takes a deep breath*

*screams*

PALESTINE WAS NEVER A COUNTRY!

[still-searching-for-something]

I'm a Zionist.

I'm tired of pro-Palestine anti-Zionists trying to turn 'Zionist' into a bad word, an antisemitic slur. And they demand that we Jews reject Zionism and that we only embrace alternative responses to antisemitism that they approve of.

You know what happened to the Jewish proponents of other solutions? The assimilationists, Bundists, territorialists, and Jewish communist revolutionaries were murdered. And now, the left wing antisemites hate the Zionists too. Why? What did the Zionists do that was so offensive to the anti-Zionists? I'll tell you what they did.

Zionists created the first independent Jewish state since the Bar Kokhba revolt. Zionists tried to bring as many Jews to safety as possible while the rest of the world closed their doors to them. And when they couldn't do so legally, they risked their lives to bring Jews home covertly during the Aliyah Bet. Zionists restored an indigenous people's sovereignty over their own land after a millennia of colonization, deforestation, and dispersion. Zionists restored an ancestral and historic language after millennia of forced disuse. Zionists took in and saved the lives of the Mizrahim when they were violently expelled by their home countries. Zionists created a prosperous, liberal democratic nation state in a part of the world very hostile to every word of that. And Zionists successfully defeated one, two, three, four, and are currently fighting off a fifth genocidal war of annihilation against all of their accomplishments and people.

What did the anti-Zionists do? They opposed every one of those things.

So, when you anti-Zionists hurl that label at my feet, 'Zionist', as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won't work, because I will pick up that label and wear it as a badge of honor.

[dchan87]

A year ago today, Hamas butchered 1,200 Israelis, triggering a war in Gaza and another one across Western institutions, campuses, and social media. At American Dreaming, we’ve extensively covered the discourse post-10/7, from the depraved joy the “decolonize” left felt at news of Jews being slaughtered, to the obscene double standards imposed on Israel, to the explosion of full-blown leftist anti-Semitism. We’ve published articles about the young progressives who hate Biden and love bin Laden, the disturbing redefinition of “genocide”, and the absolutely unhinged Western pro-Palistinian activist movement. And after a year of discourse, one thing has been made crystal clear: the political left has an anti-Semitism problem. Everywhere I looked, over these past 12 months, far-left protestors not only tolerated but actively propagated centuries-old anti-Semitism, including celebrating the October 7th massacre and even praising Hitler. It was equal parts disgusting and confusing. How could a movement that, in theory, is supposed to oppose bigotry and racism have so openly embraced it? How did we end up with left-wingers attacking synagogues, creating lists of Zionists, canceling events with “Zionist” participants, defacing Anne Frank memorials, and protesting Israel outside of Auschwitz? How could only half of young adults, by far the most left-leaning age group, disagree with the statement “The Holocaust is a myth”? How did we get to a place where good progressives openly display swastikas, tell Jews to go back to Europe, express the desire to gas them, and perform Hitler salutes? The rhetoric was much the same as it had been for centuries: that Jews are violent, bloodthirsty, imposters — not even Semitic, but a bunch of Europeans playing pretend. Demonstrators held signs with a Star of David in a trash can next to the words “Keep the world clean.” Classic anti-Semitic tropes like the blood libel resurfaced. All of this happened within far-left movements, who now sound eerily like the far right. It’s no wonder that far rightists blend right in at pro-Palestine protests. But why? Integral to the left’s worldview, elaborate theory aside, is solidarity with the underprivileged, be it the poor, ethnic minorities, LGBT people, etc. Logically, the left should be sympathetic to the Jewish people, given their long history of persecution. At a glance, there should be no reason for the hard left to behave functionally the same as neo-Nazis. And yet they do. 

Sadly, anti-Semitism, as one of humanity's oldest hatreds, has never been confined to any one ideology. To understand the history of left-wing anti-Semitism, we must first look back to before the concept of the political “left” even existed.

An Extremely Brief History of Anti-Semitism

In 132 CE, during the apex of Roman imperial power, the Bar Kokhba revolt broke out in the troublesome Roman-controlled province of Judea. Emperor Hadrian solved it with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. In an outright genocidal war, he utterly crushed Jewish resistance, slaughtering large numbers of Jewish civilians and devastating many towns and villages. The destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE tends to be more remembered by Jews themselves as the beginning of the diaspora, but the events of 135 were when the Jews truly lost their homeland. Although a small population remained, most fled throughout the Middle East or Europe. 

Hadrian’s actions were not anti-Semitic per se — Rome was just as brutal to any rebellious subject — but it set the Jews up as a people without a land, a people with nowhere to go whose religion and customs made them visibly other. With the rise of Christianity, the relative religious tolerance typical to polytheistic societies faded away, and the Jews faced constant oppression, at best living as second-class citizens. Of course, Christians have a long history of treating their fellow devotees with murderous contempt if they happen to be the wrong kind of Christian. The massacres of the First Crusade that included Christians as well as Muslims and Jews, the expulsion of Protestants from France, the bloody Anglo-Irish conflict, the Anglican church's persecution of Puritans, and so on. Now imagine what it would mean to openly belong to another faith, one deemed heretical by the Church, the supreme arbiter of morality.

Jews were widely barred from “honest” work — leaving niches in fields considered less savory, like money lending, clerking, pawnbroking, and lawyering. Making the most of the niche they had been forced into by these discriminatory laws — although far from all Jews did such work — led in turn to the stereotype of Jews as greedy, bloodsucking parasites who hated and exploited honest Christians, which, of course, led to even more persecution. Jewish populations were expelled from countries multiple times, or faced savage butchery. There were the brutal Rhineland Massacres of the First Crusade in 1096 CE that saw 800 Jews killed, and expulsion from England in 1290, from France in 1306, and from Spain in 1492. It was a vicious cycle of violent intolerance. 

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

In the late 1700s, the birth of European liberalism changed everything. The French Revolution and Napoleon both offered a greater level of religious tolerance toward Jews, making new inroads toward coexistence. After Napoleon’s downfall, despite a rightward reaction, Europe slowly began to liberalize, incorporate Enlightenment values, and move toward democracy. By and large, Jewish people naturally drifted leftward — the monarchist right wing of the 1800s was no friend to them. When socialism made strides decades later, Jews were an influential part of the movement, such as the Bund, a socialist Jewish party in Russia. 

At the same time, many Jews were understandably fed up with the still-rampant anti-Semitism in Europe, and started to dream of returning to their ancestral homeland, and so began the seeds of modern Israel. 

So far, Jews seemed like natural allies to the left, as an oppressed, marginalized underdog if ever there was one. But anti-Semitism is a powerful, deeply rooted force. Vladimir Lenin forcibly dissolved the Bund in 1921, and all those who did not join the Communist Party were forced to flee abroad or face persecution. It only got worse under Stalin, who systematically eradicated Jewish influence wherever he could find it. His Doctors Plot, in which Stalin invented false charges of treason and espionage toward nine doctors, seven of them Jewish, resembled nothing so much as a classic anti-Semitic purge. Indeed, between 1939 and 1941, the Soviet secret police deported tens of thousands of Jews to Siberia and Kazakhstan. Despite Marxism’s pretensions to antiracism, Soviet anti-Semitism, from Party leadership down to the common comrade, was pervasive, and often intertwined “anti-Zionism” with negative stereotypes about Jews.

It was not until after the Holocaust had been exposed to the world that anti-Semitism finally began to become unfashionable, as humanity took a cold, hard look at the logical conclusion to such hatred. But anti-Semitism did not disappear from either end of the political spectrum.

In the 1960s, James Baldwin explained the pronounced anti-Semitism among the black community in the US, which he tied to attitudes of anti-whiteness and an oppressor/oppressed mindset. In the 1970s, influenced by Soviet propaganda, which relentlessly demonized Zionism and Jews, the Australian Union of Students, dominated by young Trostkyites and Maoists, began following suit on Australian university campuses. When Jewish groups protested, they were physically assaulted.

The ferocious “anti-Zionism” of the Western “New Left” was widely seen as a cover for Jew hatred. In Germany, far-left groups in the 1960s and 70s celebrated the deaths of Israeli civilians in terrorist attacks, engaged in anti-Semitic violence, and schemed to bomb a synagogue. In the famous 1976 Entebbe Raid — in which pro-Palestine terrorists hijacked an Air France plane at gunpoint, then released the non-Jewish and non-Israeli passengers to hold the Israelis and Jews hostage — two of the hijackers were German leftists.

Today’s left ought to be unburdened by such bigotries, at least in theory. Unlike their forebears from previous eras, they did not grow up in a social environment where racism was normal and casual prejudice ubiquitous. The average modern far-leftist is highly educated, affluent, and conscious of systemic biases. They ought to know better. So why don’t they?

Like any complex phenomenon, it has no single explanation. Unlike the far right, which has anti-Semitism encoded into its ideological genetics, leftism is not inherently anti-Semitic. But in true horseshoe fashion, they nevertheless end up in the same place.

The Horseshoe of Anti-Semitism

First, the political far left shares an uncomfortable number of basic assumptions about reality with the far right. Both believe that:

A class of moneyed elites control the government, and democracy is a sham maintained by these vaguely defined, malicious elites.

Proper far-left or far-right beliefs (depending) would naturally take root in society if not for an aggressive campaign of materialist propaganda pushed by these shady elites to distract the masses from realizing their true destiny.

Their cause is one that is so vital and so obviously true that any approach to further it is legitimate, whether that means lying, propagandizing, or committing violence.

The liberal West is evil, degenerate, cruel, and exploitative, and must be crushed at all cost to realize this vision.

This antisocial, conspiratorial worldview is inherent to the far left, to a greater or lesser degree. Name a popular myth about how the West is evil, and a leftist will believe it — whether it’s that the US invaded Iraq to steal oil, or that all Western economies are built purely on the exploitation of developing countries, or that our media and government is controlled by sinister three-letter organizations. Such a mindset is incredibly vulnerable to conspiracy theory — and all conspiracy theories ultimately come back to anti-Semitism. 

If you believe the government is controlled by moneyed elites and that the evil force of Zionism has its claws deep in the US government, then the leftist is already 90 percent of the way to being in full agreement with the Nazi. This is how we get university lecturers saying, “Zionists are straight Babylon swine [...] Zionism is beyond a mental illness; it’s a genocidal disease.” It’s how we get progressive screenwriters complaining that “the entertainment industry is ran [sic] by Zionists.” It’s how you get left-wing musicians like Eric Clapton saying, “Israel's running the show, running the world.”

Israel-Palestine is a Uniquely Sore Issue

Second, Israel-Palestine is singularly inflammatory. It takes every problematic tendency the far left already has — shallow performativity, radicalism, narcissism, subordinating truth to ideology, and viciousness toward perceived opponents — and dials it up to eleven. Palestine offers the leftist a classic oppressor-oppressed binary, one that fits the Marxist image of the world perfectly: a cruel, settler-colonialist nation, brutally oppressing a native population, neatly including a white-vs-brown layer of oppression. It also offers a religious layer, where Israel is painted as both a theocracy and a fascistic ethnostate no different from Nazi Germany.

Of course, there are many facts that one must ignore to believe these things. One must ignore that Israel began with legal land purchases, and that among both Israelis and Palestinians you can find people passing for white as well as people who would not. One must ignore that anti-Semitism is on the rise, and that 48 percent of Israel is of Mizrahi (meaning Middle Eastern) origin. One must ignore that Israel is a democracy with Arabs in its parliament, and that the Palestinians harbor many deeply regressive, misogynist, and homophobic values out of touch with modern progressivism.

The Left is Just Too Successful, But Still Needs a Revolution

Third, modern leftism is no longer the struggling worker’s movement it began as. In the early 1900s, the left struggled with real, material problems, such as genuinely unfair wages and labor power imbalances in which employers held all the cards. Protesting for better pay, fewer hours, and more benefits and vacation were real, concrete improvements to fight for. But with these and other battles won — with an eight-hour workday and five-day workweek, with vacation and sick days taken for granted, with LGBT acceptance and racial equality both legally enshrined and culturally mainstream, the modern left had to pivot. Their crusades became less about tangible change in the face of injustice, and more about an opportunity to display righteousness by advancing an incredibly shallow worldview divided between the morally pure and the wicked, with no in-betweens. The ethos of no bad tactics, only bad targets thereby became bad tactics and bad targets.

Jews Just Aren’t Oppressed Enough

Finally, the far left is captured by a narrative in which the underprivileged are the center of attention. There is a foundational leftist belief that the world right now is not only terrible, but actively getting worse due to capitalist exploitation. In this understanding of the world, everything is defined by class struggle between the wealthy, parasitic capitalists, and their victims, the workers, whose labor is exploited for pennies, deliberately keeping the lower classes down. 

When taken to its logical end, we are left with a movement that resents success. So where do Jews fit into this? Well, from this grievance-focused, eternally victimized perspective, the Jewish people are just a bit too white, a bit too financially successful, and a bit too well-integrated to be seen as truly oppressed. Rather they are seen as oppressors. Just as Asians are now “helping white supremacy” because they’re more financially successful than other groups on average, Jews are just not persecuted enough. The far left resents success, and the Jews have shown extraordinary perseverance in their achievements. Indeed, the archetypal Jewish businessman, lawyer, or doctor fits perfectly into the petit-bourgeoisie stereotype the far left so intensely loathes.

What’s left is a movement deeply committed to performative role-playing while eschewing achievable goals, pragmatism, and principles. It’s a dreadful state of affairs. There ought to be room for a left-of-center movement to express a sane pro-Palestinian worldview, but it’s been hijacked by radicals who are as ignorant as they are venomous. Any healthy, open society requires a variety of perspectives represented, but they need to be rooted in reality — not collective guilt, group resentment, and unhinged conspiracism punctuated with Hitler salutes.

In the span of one year, the anti-Zionist far left has done serious and lasting damage to themselves. If they are to avoid becoming simply an inverted variant of neo-Nazism, utterly fringe and dismissed, they must reckon with and expel their radicals, not celebrate them. Is protesting Israel worth trafficking in old anti-Semitic tropes? Is it worth lowering yourself to the level of a fascist? Is it worth an entire political movement with over two hundred years of history? Because if things continue as they are, the left will be left behind, with all sane and decent people having shied away in disgust. Perhaps that’s one faint silver lining of this past year, that the radical left have lunged toward their far-right counterparts on the great trash heap of history. It’s where they belong.

[girlactionfigure]

NOVEMBER 4, 2024

WHAT HAPPENED?

A Palestinian-owned café in Oakland, California kicked out a Jewish customer for wearing a blue hat with a Star of David on it, claiming that the symbol was “violent.”

This is a clear violation of Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act. Note that this applies even if the Jewish customer went to the café expecting that something like this would happen (in other words, “he tricked us into discriminating against him!” is not a legitimate defense).

 It’s also worth noting this café has menu items titled “Sweet Sinwar” and “iced in tea fada” and its menu is decorated with the Hamas inverted red triangle. The café also openly expresses support for the October 7 massacre.

JVP TO THE RESCUE

What do you do when under fire for antisemitism? You tokenize (Not So) “Jewish” Voice for “Peace,” which openly supports terrorism against Jews and has even glorified Nazis in the past. For more, see my posts “Stop Sharing JVP” and “Time To Talk About JVP…Again.”

For those of us familiar with Jewish history and the history of antisemitism, this is par for the course. In the 1920s, the Soviet Jewish “Yevsektsiya” made it its mission to destroy “traditional Jewish life, the Zionist movement, and Hebrew culture.” The fact that the Yevsektsiya was “Jewish” was central to its purpose. After all, the Soviet regime couldn’t be accused of antisemitism when those shutting down all Jewish cultural and spiritual life were Jews themselves.

WE HAVE SEEN THIS BEFORE

Historically there have been, arguably, two kinds of antisemitism: (1) Nazi antisemitism, in which Jews are physically exterminated, and (2) Hanukkah antisemitism, in which the antisemite does not necessarily intend to take our lives, but rather, seeks to strip Jews of all the elements which make us...well, Jews.

Under the Soviet regime, for example, Jews suffered from “Hanukkah antisemitism.” The Soviets heavily suppressed Jewish cultural and spiritual life, stripping many Jewish families of thousands of years’ worth of history. Speaking or studying Hebrew was punishable by law. So was participating in Jewish religious traditions. At the same time, Jews were unable to assimilate into Soviet society due to their ethnic background. Jews were often imprisoned under false pretenses, accused of vague “Zionist crimes.” People with Jewish last names were subject to highly restrictive university quotas or banned from performing certain jobs.

Maybe you’ve noticed a pattern over the past year. First, it was only “Zionism,” not Judaism, that was a problem, despite the fact that the Jewish connection to -- and desire for sovereignty in -- the Land of Israel is inextricable from 3000 years of Jewish tradition. Then, they started denying our extensively recorded history and origins in Israel. At anti-Zionist Jewish events, now praying in Hebrew is considered “too triggering,” so it’s best to pray in colonial languages, like Arabic or English. Now, the Magen David is a “racist, genocidal symbol,” to quote Palestinian activist Mohammed El-Kurd.

Do you not see what’s happening? This is no longer about the State of Israel, the Israeli government, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or this current war. This is a thinly-veiled effort to methodically legitimize the discrimination of Jews -- and anything Jewish.

THE STAR OF DAVID

The Star of David, also known as the Magen David or the Seal of Solomon, is mentioned in Jewish texts as early as the first century. In fact, it’s found in coins from the period of the Bar Kokhba Revolt against the Romans (132-135 CE). It was also used as a decorative motif in the Khirbet Shura synagogue in the Galilee in the third century. Though initially merely used as an ornament, the Magen David was ascribed deeper spiritual meanings since the 11th century. It has since been associated with Kabbalah, or Jewish mysticism.  

In the 17th century, the Jewish community of Prague was ascribed the Magen David as its official symbol. Shortly thereafter, the Jewish community in Vienna also adopted it as a marker. By the 19th century, the Star of David was the distinctive Jewish emblem.

More than anything, perhaps, the Star of David is a symbol of Jewish resilience and survival. For centuries, Jews in Europe and the Islamic world had been forced to wear distinguishing clothes marking them as Jews. After the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939, Jews in Poland and in other Axis-occupied territories were forced to wear a Star of David, most often seen in the form of a yellow badge with the word “Jude” (Jew) or a similar variation. Therefore, for many Jews, the act of wearing Star of David jewelry or clothing is a reclamation of our ancient symbol that was once weaponized to oppress us.

A DOUBLE STANDARD

Hundreds of millions of people have been slaughtered under the banner of Christianity and Islam each. The Crusades alone took about 1.7 million lives. The Spanish Inquisition? Up to 300,000 lives. In the “New World,” some 56 million Indigenous people were killed in the name of Christianity. These are just a few examples. It’s estimated Islam’s conquests alone left some 270 million people dead. 

During the First Jewish Revolt, the Romans crucified some 500 Jews a day. Yet I would never dream of denying someone service at a coffee shop because they’re wearing a crucifix. 

When Jihadists carry out terrorist attacks, they shout “Allahu Akbar” — the same phrase used by the 1.8 billion Muslims around the world in their daily prayers. Muslims recite the Shahada prayer daily, the same prayer that is inscribed in the ISIS, Hamas, and Al Qaeda flags. And yet, I would never dream of denying someone service at a coffee shop because they’re a Muslim who says “Allahu Akbar” or recites the Shahada prayer.

Under Islamist regimes, such as the Islamic Republic in Iran, women are beat to death for not wearing hijab or wearing hijab “improperly.” But I think you would agree that denying a woman in hijab service at a coffee shop on account of the Islamic Republic’s crimes is plain bigotry.

You may be triggered by crosses, hijabs, or the Star of David, and your triggers may be rooted in valid trauma. But your triggers are no one’s responsibility to deal with but your own, and they are no excuse to lash out in bigotry.

Even if Israel’s actions were equivalent to those of Nazi Germany, equating the Star of David with the Nazi hakenkreuz (commonly misidentified as the “swastika”) is an inherently problematic analogy.

Unlike the Star of David and the Jewish people, the swastika has zero spiritual or cultural significance in German culture beyond Nazism.Within the German context, the Nazi hakenkreuz means one thing and one thing only.

On the other hand, the Sanskrit swastika and other similar symbols, such as the whirling log, have long, rich traditions in their respective cultures. While some Native American tribes have decided to retire the whirling log, others continue to use it. The Sanskrit swastika is commonplace in countries such as India and Nepal. 

Sure, if someone with zero cultural connection to the swastika or the whirling log decides to “reclaim” the symbol, I’d probably do a double take and consider it an antisemitic dogwhistle. But when I went to India, I saw the swastika everywhere, and because I am capable of critical thinking, I was easily able to recognize that the symbol has an entirely different connotation in this particular cultural context, despite my personal and family trauma.

A NOTE ON HOLOCAUST INVERSION

Holocaust inversion is a rhetorical tool used to portray Jews as morally equivalent — or worse — than Nazis. It’s often employed in discussions about Israel-Palestine and is frequently used by anti-Zionists.

 To understand why Holocaust inversion is unquestionably antisemitic, we must first understand what Holocaust denial actually is. Holocaust denial is not just an outright denial that the events of the Holocaust happened, but more often than not, it’s a denial of well-established facts about the Holocaust. For example, someone who says the Holocaust didn’t happen at all is as much a Holocaust denier as someone who claims the Holocaust did happen, but only one million Jews were killed.  

Therefore, Holocaust inversion is always Holocaust denial, because: 

(1) it relies on the minimization of established facts about the Holocaust. However harrowing the humanitarian crisis in Gaza — and it is — it’s just in no way equivalent in scale, scope, and methods to the atrocities committed during the Holocaust. This is a historical fact, and denying it is denying the Holocaust.

(2) characterizing Jews — Zionist or not — as Nazis is a denial of the well-established fact about the Holocaust that the predominant force in Nazi ideology was genocidal Jew-hatred. Jews cannot be the inheritors of Nazism simply because the Nazis wanted all Jews exterminated. A denial of this basic fact is Holocaust denial.

For a full bibliography of my sources, please head over to my Instagram and  Patreon. 

rootsmetals

I sincerely don’t understand how there’s still Jews out there who still make excuses for these people, who don’t see what’s happening. Learn your history. Have some self-respect.

[whencyclopedia]

The Bar-Kochba Revolt

The Bar Kochba Revolt (132–136 CE) was the third and final war between the Jewish people and the Roman Empire. It followed a long period of tension and violence, marked by the first Jewish uprising of 66-70 CE, which ended with the destruction of the Second Temple, and the Kitos War (115-117 CE). In many ways, the Bar Kochba Revolt differed markedly from its predecessors. For the first time, the Jews presented a united front against Roman forces and fought underneath a single charismatic leader, the eponymous Simon Bar Kochba (also given as Shimon Bar-Cochba, Bar Kokhba, Ben-Cozba, Cosiba or Coziba). It was marked as well by strong religious passions, with many apparently believing that Bar Kochba was the promised messiah who would lead the Jewish people to final victory against their enemies.

In its initial stages, the revolt was surprisingly successful and may have resulted in the destruction of an entire Roman legion. It is possible that the rebels regained control of the city of Jerusalem, and they must have held large portions of ancient Judea. The Romans, however, regrouped and adopted a scorched-earth strategy that ultimately extirpated the rebels and laid waste to the country. The war shattered Judean society and led to far-reaching demographic and political changes, with the majority of the Jewish population of the province killed, enslaved, or exiled, and their national hopes definitively crushed. The Jewish people would not regain their political independence until the Zionist era and the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 CE.

The Problem of Sources

Unlike the revolt of 66 CE, the historical sources on the Bar Kochba Revolt are scanty at best. The war had no chronicler such as Josephus Flavius, at least none whose work has survived. The primary non-Jewish sources are an epitome of Cassius Dio's Roman History and a handful of lines by the ecclesiastical historian Eusebius, the bishop of Caesarea. The war is also briefly mentioned by the Church father Jerome. While by no means comprehensive, these sources do provide several important details.

The Jewish sources are not per se historical and, while also scanty, are found throughout the rabbinical literature of the period and after, in particular, in the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds. While they are often clearly legendary and unreliable in nature, they do paint a general picture of the Jewish experience of the war and its aftermath.

In addition, several important archaeological finds have shed light on certain aspects of the revolt. Coins minted while Judea was temporarily freed from Roman rule indicate the existence of an independent Jewish state for a brief period. In the 1960s CE, a cave in the Judean desert was found that likely once housed refugees from the revolt. Called the “Cave of Letters,” it contained a cache of documents that included several letters from Bar Kochba himself, which shed unprecedented light on his personality and style of rule.

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