(BLOG) Using Auschwitz Against Israel

"A rhetorical ploy that I have found disturbing and disgusting whenever I have come across it are attempts to use Nazi analogies against Israel. It has always seemed such an offensive metaphor to use against the Jewish state that I struggle to see how anyone can even begin to deploy it: indeed, if it comes to seem reasonable, then that in itself is surely evidence that you should re-assess seriously your reasoning and perspectives.

A recent essay by Yoram Hazony Israel Through European Eyes has proved to be greatly enlightening in explaining how the spectre of Auschwitz can be used against the Jewish state: indeed, how a certain conception of what Auschwitz represents fundamentally undermines the legitimacy of the Jewish state.

Not that the essay has changed my mind about how repulsive use of Nazi analogies against the Jewish state is. Hazony, a citizen of Israel, seems to have written the essay to try and understand what seems so self-evidently offensive."