After neo-Nazis marched in Charlottesville, North Carolina, and then President Donald Trump responded by saying there were \u201cgood people on both sides,\u201d people who abhor white supremacism stood up, took notice, and condemned the marchers. Anti-racists would be wise to do the same about the far-right march that took place last week in Jerusalem.<\/p>\n
The situation in Jerusalem began with clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces over restrictions placed on the Damascus Gate entrance to the Old City. Then, in response to TikTok videos showing two Palestinian youths slapping an ultra-Orthodox Jewish man, the far-right Jewish group Lahava called for a \u201cdemonstration of national dignity.\u201d Leaked WhatsApp messages<\/a> revealed calls to lynch Palestinians.<\/p>\n As the Jewish-Israeli extremists marauded through the streets on Thursday, April 22, Israeli forces fired rubber-coated steel bullets at Palestinian counterprotesters. The remarks of a young orthodox Jewish girl went viral<\/a> on social media. \u201cI don\u2019t want to burn your villages, I just want you to leave and we\u2019ll take them\u201d she said. On her shirt was a sticker reading \u201cRabbi Kahane is right.\u201d Kahane\u2019s group was placed on the US terror list in 2004.<\/p>\n 105 Palestinians were injured<\/a>, twenty-two requiring hospitalization. <\/em>Twenty Israeli police officers were also injured. The next morning, Israel\u2019s Internal Security Minister Amir Ohana released a statement<\/a> condemning \u201cattacks by Arabs.\u201d He said nothing of the violence committed by Jews.<\/p>\n US State Department spokesperson Ned Price condemned<\/a> the \u201crhetoric of extremist protestors.\u201d However, the US embassy in Jerusalem\u2019s statement that they were \u201cdeeply concerned\u201d declined to weigh in on the issue of Jewish extremism.<\/p>\n Avi Mayer of the American Jewish Committee tweeted<\/a>: \u201cThe individuals perpetrating it are as foreign to me and my Judaism as are skinheads, white supremacists, and other racists around the world.\u201d But those who chanted \u201cdeath to Arabs\u201d in Jerusalem are a normalized, accepted part of Israel\u2019s government.<\/p>\n Members of Lehava, the group that organized the extremist march in Jerusalem, are followers of Kahanism, a Jewish supremacist ideology based on the views of Rabbi Meir Kahane<\/a>. Inspired by Kahane, in 1994, Israeli settler Baruch Goldstein massacred<\/a> 29 Palestinians in the West Bank Ibrahimi mosque. As recently as 2014, three members of Lehava were charged<\/a> with setting fire to an integrated bilingual Palestinian-Jewish school.<\/p>\n In 1988, the Kach party was banned<\/a> from running for the Israeli Knesset. In 2004, the US State Department labeled<\/a> Kach a terrorist organization. However, the Kahanist movement has recently made its way back into Israel\u2019s government where it is being met with open arms.<\/p>\n During Israel\u2019s recent election, Netanyahu, willing to do anything to hold onto his prime ministership, encouraged voters from his own Likud party to cast their ballots for the anti-Arab Religious Zionism slate, which included the Kahanist-inspired Otzma Yehudit party, so that they could make it over the election threshold. Religious Zionism won six<\/a> seats, bringing Kahanism back into Israel\u2019s Knesset for the first time since the 1980s.<\/p>\n As Netanyahu is proving unable to form a coalition, attention is now turning towards Naftali Bennett, the next most likely candidate to become Israel\u2019s prime minister.<\/p>\n In 2016, Bennett called<\/a> Israelis to be willing to \u201cgive our lives\u201d to annex the West Bank\u201d, evoking the Kahanist view that terrorist acts against Palestinians are a patriotic act of martyrdom. Bennett\u2019s negotiations, as he hopes to form a government, have included meetings<\/a> with Religious Zionism.<\/p>\n Such statements as Bennett\u2019s call for violence have surely led to increased levels of unrest in the Holy Land. After last week\u2019s extremist march in Jerusalem, clashes continued between Palestinian protestors and Israeli forces. In addition, rockets<\/a> were launched from Gaza and the Israeli military responded with bombings, Finally, on Sunday, April 25, in order to deescalate the situation, Israel\u2019s police commissioner ordered<\/a> the barricades at Damascus Gate be removed.<\/p>\n Though the situation in Jerusalem has now calmed, the floodgates of Jewish extremism have already been flung wide open.<\/p>\n The neo-Nazi march in Charlottesville and Trump\u2019s response rightfully alarmed the world. Though Trump has been ousted from office, we all know that the violent racist movement that blossomed during his presidency did not begin with him and is far from gone. We would be wise in the aftermath of last week\u2019s \u201cdeath to Arabs\u201d march in Jerusalem to also speak out against Kahanism in Israel.<\/p>\n