Neo-nazis in Israel

[Mr. Premise]

In the "almost too much irony" department from Xymphora http://xymphora.blogspot.com/2006/05/neo-nazis-in-israel.html today:

Saturday, May 13, 2006
Neo-nazis in Israel
From Haaretz http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/714887.html:

"A week after the desecration of the Great Synagogue in Petah Tikva, nothing remains of the horror the worshipers encountered there last Thursday when they arrived for morning prayers. The walls, which had been sprayed with swastikas and blasphemy, have been newly painted, the floor polished and the curtain covering the holy ark replaced.

However, the danger is far from over. For the past two years the ultra-Orthodox community there, which includes some 5,000 families and 300 synagogues, has been subjected to incessant attacks by street gangs from the former Soviet Union (FSU). The gangs have been beating ultra-Orthodox men, hurling curses at them and desecrating synagogues.

'These youths feel out of place in the Russian community they belong to, but they are not accepted in Israeli society either,' says Bella Alexandrov, the director of the multi-disciplinary youth center in Petah Tikva. She distinguishes between two kinds of immigrants - punks and skinheads."

France should send some officials to Israel to encourage the beleaguered Jewish minority in Israel to emigrate to a country that is much safer for Jews, like France.

 

[Mr. Premise]

And, from the Comments to that post by Xymphora, is a caution:

There has been numerous references to Russian neo-nazis in the press this past week. Wouldn't have anything to do with Russia being on the shit list at the moment..would it? More research is in order, as Haaretz has a way of changing stories for western consumption.
I think we're witnessing another smear campaign.
Attacks on nationalities always start with nazification and demonisation.

 

[Keit]

And, from the Comments to that post by Xymphora, is a caution:

There has been numerous references to Russian neo-nazis in the press this past week. Wouldn't have anything to do with Russia being on the shit list at the moment..would it? More research is in order, as Haaretz has a way of changing stories for western consumption.
I think we're witnessing another smear campaign.
Attacks on nationalities always start with nazification and demonisation.

Exactly. They are "nothing more" then a couple of drunk, aggressive and bored Russian kids. There is no "neo-nazis" organization behind them, and they don't have any specific plan. And when there is no doubt that such acts of vandalism are disturbing and out of law, there is no such thing as "neo-nazis" movement.
This is a fabricated threat because Russia considered today an "Israel enemy" because of her support to Iran.
We already had such "campaigns" here.

 

[Mr. Premise]

I was hoping you would respond, Keit.

I wouldn't be surprised if Russians start to get demonized again in the U.S. Which would be typical reverse manipulation, since it would in the U.S. probably take the form of media attacks on the Russian mafia, which is now, perhaps, actually more of a support for the Israeli and U.S. state than the Russian.

But I still like the irony of Xymphora's comments. If such incidents did happen in France we would never hear the end of it!

And, from the Comments to that post by Xymphora, is a caution:

There has been numerous references to Russian neo-nazis in the press this past week. Wouldn't have anything to do with Russia being on the shit list at the moment..would it? More research is in order, as Haaretz has a way of changing stories for western consumption.
I think we're witnessing another smear campaign.
Attacks on nationalities always start with nazification and demonisation.

Exactly. They are "nothing more" then a couple of drunk, aggressive and bored Russian kids. There is no "neo-nazis" organization behind them, and they don't have any specific plan. And when there is no doubt that such acts of vandalism are disturbing and out of law, there is no such thing as "neo-nazis" movement.
This is a fabricated threat because Russia considered today an "Israel enemy" because of her support to Iran.
We already had such "campaigns" here.

 

[Hildegarda]

I wouldn't be surprised if Russians start to get demonized again in the U.S.

they already are; in every Wall Street Journal and Financial Times issue there is something negative about Russia. Recent comments by Cheney poored oil on fire, too.

Exactly. They are "nothing more" then a couple of drunk, aggressive and bored Russian kids. There is no "neo-nazis" organization behind them, and they don't have any specific plan. And when there is no doubt that such acts of vandalism are disturbing and out of law, there is no such thing as "neo-nazis" movement.

I have been spending some time on Russian forums lately. Skinheads and their attacks are a recurring topic. People describe attacks that don;t even make it into the news. There does appear to be a certain magnitude and system to the problem. It is obviously MUCH MORE than 'a couple of drunk agressive and bored" kids.

However, whether it is a full-blown "neo-nazi" movement is hard to tell. The fact that there MAY be some organiation behind them is evident from the info on a purported publication of school notebooks with pictures of skinheads and their 'dictionary' (circulation 200,000; aimed for wide retail distribution). That was in 2005. A similar info showed up earlier in 2000. Either a rumor, or someone tried to sell the rest of the notebooks. A Jewish organization blew the whistle on this one, too, so go figure. http://xeno.sova-center.ru/45A29F2/5269800?print=on

 

[Keit]

In Israel or Russia? Russia indeed have such problem.

 

[Borderfox]

The nazis considered russians to be a"untermenchen" (subhuman) race that needed to destroyed to make way for a greater german reich that would expand far into the east.Isnt it weird that russian youths wave swastikas in Moscow and St petersburg and yearn for a return to a system that wanted the russian people slaughtered.It strikes me as odd in the extreme!! is the collective memory that short? or are these youths merely a minority of morons with too much time on their hands.? As for a neo-nazi movement in Israel, pull the other one

 

[Guest]

Isnt it weird that russian youths wave swastikas in Moscow and St petersburg and yearn for a return to a system that wanted the russian people slaughtered.

I dated a Russian girl a few years ago that told me (and kept telling me) that the Russians were the descendants of the Ruse, who were of Nordic stock, and that this view is popular in Russia, a kind of new ethnic identity thing, where Nordic mythology is considered the cultural inspiration.

In fact some Russians view the Germans as the "lower", "southern" stock and hence not as pure in the sense of the tall, blond blue-eyed Aryan ideal. These Russians consider that Hitler basically had it reversed. I guess whatever puts downtrodden people's at the top of the food chain, works best. Germans were also devastated by WWI and the Nazis raised them to a "high place" in the scheme of things pretty quickly. Go figure.

 

[Hildegarda]

In Israel or Russia? Russia indeed have such problem.

Yes, I was talking about Russia. I thought that the happenings in Russia and in Israel are bound to be closely connected, considering that the skinheads from the original article were repatriates from Russia.

I looked around a bit more, and here is what I found. First of all, there does appear to be a certain magnitude and system to the purported 'neo-nazist' incidents in Israel. Graffitti, incidents in schools and army units, comments on the street, to name a few. Neo-nazist materials can be freely bought in the Arbat bookstores (an Israeli chain specialising in Russian-language recourses). There are have been in existence Israel-based neo-nazist websites. Communication with other neo-nazist sites and organizations abroad have also been noted. I inferred all of this from a couple of Israeli newspaper articles and their discussion on Russian-language Israeli-based forums.

The bigger picture is that in Israel, there is a large, poorely assimilated, and generally disinfrenchised community of Russian and Ukrainian repatriates. Those people speak poor Hebrew and are not famliar with the tenets of Judaism. Many of them are technically barely Jewish, having only, say, one Jewish grandparent. Many used that one drop of Jewish blood in their veins simply as an excuse to emigrate from Russia, no matter where; thus they lack the due ideological allegiance to Israel as a nation. Moreover, some of those repatriates are actually practicing Orthodox Christians. Many also TOOK Orthodox Christianity AFTER they emigrated to Israel; a veritable proliferation of orthodox christian churches have been noted. I imagine that for these people chirstianity is a way to accertain their identity in new surroundings. It is also one that would clash with the mainstream culture, where judaism is an important part of national identity. This is further combined with an imprint of a general pervasive culture of an 'everyday anti-semitism', that unfortunately is still present in Russia.

So what we have is a crowd of a first-generation repatriates / immigrants who basically, due to common problems that all immigratns face, and also through theirs lifestyle choices, set themselves apart from the mainstrean society. In such situation almost all immigrant groups develop a kind of an internal network of support and ideology, like Italian Mafia. Neo-nazism unfortunately would be a fitting choice for this group.

Most people on the forums I read acknowledged that, while the disturbing incidents DO occur regularly and are NOT given a proper attention by the authorities, there is really no such thing as a pervasive and massive problem of neo-nazism that would have put people's lives in danger.

But, on the wake of these discussions, certain groups have demanded to toughen the repatriation laws, in order to limit the influx of immigrates from Russia and vicinity.

And this is perhaps where the wind is really coming from.

 

[Hildegarda]

I dated a Russian girl a few years ago that told me (and kept telling me) that the Russians were the descendants of the Ruse, who were of Nordic stock, and that this view is popular in Russia, a kind of new ethnic identity thing, where Nordic mythology is considered the cultural inspiration.

The story was that a bunch of slavic tribes supposedly asked the Ross (who were regularly coming through and looting everything in a true Viking fashion), to kindly stay and be their Kings. Which they did, and everyone lived happily ever after. Sounds pretty cheesy if you ask me; and as I understand it is still not exactly clear to the historians whether this was a process of 'friendly merging' or a 'hostile takeover'.

Regardless, this partly Nordic descent is as much of a source of a certain inferiorty complex in some poeple as it is a cultural inspiration, if any. Were slavs really that spineless that they couldn't govern themselves properly, and had to rely on the outside authority for that?

More traditionally, it is the Slavic part of this dual origin of Russians that was emphasized. But the duality itself, from Slavs and Nordics, was used too, as a basis for a mentality of certain 'chosenness' of Russia, as a bridge between East and West, something unique, from where wonderful things will come. Well, what can I say ...

But, some Russian neo-nazist groups DO indeed base their philosophy on an idea that Russian are the original Aryans. A lot of it comes from a certain Book of Veles, which purportedly contains some ancient wisdom (and is considered a total fake). But in the end it is really all about rpojecting whatever you hate in yourself or in the objective reality on those who are in any way different from you. An old story.