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Holger Jensen's Anti-Semitism

TruthNews Commentary, September 7, 2001

In a recent editorial for Denver's Rocky Mountain Times, columnist Holger Jensen accuses the Bush administration of not doing enough to stop the violence in the Middle East. Jensen goes on to accuse President Bush of not being even handed in the conflict, and calls for international intervention to protect the Palestinians from the Israelis.

While Jensen's charges may strike one as being simply anti-Israel and uninformed, Jensen reveals his true biases in the first sentence of his column: "French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine accuses the Bush administration of washing its hands of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, just as the biblical Roman governor Pontius Pilate washed his hands of responsibility for the crucifixion of Christ." This may seem like only a colorful metaphor at first, but for those who are familiar with the crucifixion of Jesus, Jensen's comparison reveals the anti-Semitic bias behind his column.

For those who are unfamiliar with the crucifixion of Christ, here's the background. Some of the religious leaders of the Jews went to the Roman governor Pilate and demanded the execution of Jesus. Pilate found Jesus innocent of any crime against Rome, but wanting to please the Jews, he ordered that Jesus be put to death. He tried to assuage his conscience, and put the blame solely on the Jews, by bringing out a basin of water and washing his hands in front of everyone, declaring, "I am innocent of the blood of this just person."

So when Jensen likens the current situation to that of Pilate and Christ, who are the protagonists in this analogy? First, as Jensen states, the Bush administration is likened to Pilate. Second, as Jensen's sympathies obviously lie with the Palestinians, presumably he is likening them to Christ, an odious comparison in itself. Finally, Israel is, for obvious reasons, the Jews. Thus, Jensen reveals the evil motives of his black heart as he invokes the "Christ-killer" accusations that have been made against the Jews by false Christians for many centuries, as well as the blood-libels of the Dark Ages.

Besides being deeply anti-Semitic and offensive to both Jews and Christians, the Pilate accusation is completely inaccurate. Jensen, in effect, is accusing Bush, "by washing his hands," of doing nothing. But did Pilate do nothing? No, Pilate ordered the execution of Jesus. No one could be executed in Roman-controlled Jerusalem except by Rome. Pilate ordered the execution, and Roman soldiers carried it out.

In fact, this is the lie of the "Christ-killer" accusation. There were at least three groups of people who were complicit in the crucifixion of Jesus. The Jewish religious leaders (not all the Jews, many of whom were followers of Jesus) demanded the execution, the Roman governor ordered the execution, and the Roman soldiers, who in all likelihood were not from Italy but from Syria or a neighboring Asian province, carried it out. Thus, since Jesus died for the sins of the world, the whole world was also complicit in his crucifixion, Jew and gentile, Roman and territorial citizen alike. By the way, for the anti-Semites out there masquerading as Christians, we'll remind them that Jesus is a Jew. If you hate Jews, then you hate Jesus, and are therefore not a Christian.

Given all this, for the Pilate analogy to be accurate, Bush would have to be actively involved in killing the Palestinians because Israel demanded it. This is not the case. The reason the Bush administration has not interceded in the conflict is because Israel is a sovereign nation capable of handling its own problems. No one is calling for international intervention in Sudan, where the Muslims have killed 2 million Christians. No one is calling for international intervention in Zimbabwe, where at least nine white farmers and dozens of opposition supporters have been killed since June opposing dictator Robert Mugabe's seizure of white-owned farms. No one is calling for international intervention in Afghanistan, which has put 24 Christians on trial for their lives for the crime of preaching Christianity. So why is Jensen calling for America to be the international cop in Israel?

Jensen's call for Bush to be more even-handed in dealing with the conflict strains the bounds of credulity. According to Jensen, "President Bush tends to be more critical of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat than Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, sometimes alarming his diplomats by ignoring their carefully nuanced positions designed to protect American interests in the Arab world." This would be like a columnist in 1940 saying "President Roosevelt tends to be more critical of German leader Adolph Hitler than British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, sometimes alarming his diplomats by ignoring their carefully nuanced positions designed to protect American interests in the Nazi world." Today, this sounds ludicrous, but in 1940, there were probably ill-informed and evil-intentioned people who talked this way.

Returning to the present situation, what's wrong with putting blame where blame is due? Who in the Middle East is sending suicide bombers to blow up innocent women and children? Who in the Middle East is calling on snipers to kill at least one a Jew a day? In a crime, are cops and robbers equally to blame? Should a fireman show restraint in dealing with a fire? Even Bill Clinton put the blame on Arafat for the collapse of the Camp David summit. We don't want a leader to be even handed in dealing with good versus evil. We want him to oppose the evil and help the good, and that's exactly what Bush is doing.

If you want to complain to Rocky Mountain Times about the Jensen's racist, anti-Semitic column, you can write to the editor at this address:

A Charge to Keep
by George W. Bush
In this autobiography, George W. Bush writes of growing up as the son of George and Barbara Bush, as well as of his record as governor of Texas.