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Israel’s Perfectly Natural Ties To Anti-Semitic Right-Wing Governments
How this is but one example of the spread of authoritarian nationalism, the modern version of monarchism
“Reading, Writing, ‘Rithmetic, and don’t let the Holocaust happen again!” Yes, that description of modern American education is hyperbolic, but the point is clear: all of us — including nearly all the so-called deniers — know the Holocaust happened, and we don’t want to see it again.
So why would the Israeli government align itself with far-right governments that tolerate or even encourage anti-Semitism? Benjamin Netanyahu is no longer prime minister, but during his long tenure he strengthened relations with the Visegrad States — Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary — whose societies have grown increasingly nationalistic and xenophobic, two traits that always seem to go hand-in-hand.
It turns out that unlike magnets, political like attracts like, of which the rapprochement between China and Russia is only the latest example. Perhaps the best-known (and most ill-fated) of authoritarian relationships was that between Hitler and Stalin, and we all know how that ended. More recently, we all watched red-faced as Trump fawned over every authoritarian leader he met, while at the same time insulting…
