Opinion Interview with Yossi Klein Halevi | Fighting Words

What is the most effective counterargument to the claim that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza? A group of prominent center-right intellectuals—among them journalist and author Yossi Klein Halevi, Rabbi Irving “Yitz” Greenberg and Rabbi Micha Odenheimer of Israeli nonprofit Tevel b’Tzedek—raised eyebrows recently by penning an open letter that not only marshals arguments against the designation “genocide” but ups the ante by asserting that the use of the term constitutes a “blood libel” against Jews. The letter has circulated online, collecting signatures and calling on supporters “to stop the spread of this pathological falsity before it leads to catastrophic assaults on the Jewish people worldwide.” Klein Halevi spoke with Moment about the power of words and the pitfalls of political rhetoric. –Amy E. Schwartz

Are there words in politics that bring all argument screeching to a halt?

Yes. And genocide is the crown jewel of such words. It no longer means quite what it used to mean, but it still carries enough historic resonance to be a Mark of Cain on the Jewish people. The success of the anti-Zionist movement is primarily linguistic. It has succeeded in attaching a demonic term to every stage of Zionist and Israeli development. So, the founding of Zionism in the late 19th century was an act of white settler colonialism; the creation of Israel was ethnic cleansing; the emergence of Israeli society was apartheid. And all of this culminates with the Gaza war, which is genocide. All these words are showstoppers.

That all of them together are being directed against Israel is an existential threat in the world of ideas.

I don’t think there’s another people in the world who would respond to this kind of systematic assault by engaging in learned discourses on “Is antisemitism a form of anti-Zionism?” or “What is the definition of genocide?” We’ve got the lynch mob howling outside the door, and we’re sitting and having these philosophical conversations. I grew up in a survivor family, and at some point Jewish cleverness becomes counterproductive. So that’s how this petition was born.

What gave you the idea of invoking the blood libel, another discussion-ending term?

We’ve gotten a fair bit of pushback on that language. And that surprised me, because I thought that if you already agree Israel hasn’t committed genocide, then is calling the accusation a blood libel really controversial? Jews have been killed around the world in the name of Gaza genocide. It is literally a libel against the State of Israel that has resulted in blood being spilled. To my mind, that is a classic definition of blood libel. We’ve talked about just calling it a libel, if that would open the way to additional signatories. I would be fine with that, but I don’t think it would.

I read it as “Well, you’ve got a big word, we’ve got a bigger word.” Is that how you approached it?

Subconsciously, I probably did. But also, if you are being attacked from every side, you don’t quibble over definitions. It’s like the debates over the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism. You take the hammer that you’ve been given, and you swing it.

Is it working?

I think it’s working for the people who are signing the petition. It’s giving us a strong language of empowerment. And I think that that’s useful, too, in the current atmosphere. It’s put some anti-Zionist Jews on the defensive. And if that’s all it does, then, you know, dayenu.

What makes something a blood libel?

The original term comes from the accusation that Jews use blood for their matzah. That is a literal blood libel. It’s true that Jews have sometimes expanded the definition to cover anything that offends us. But I’m using it in a very specific way, because I do believe that the accusation of genocide is leading to the shedding of Jewish blood. When you define the Jewish state as Nazi-like, you are accusing the overwhelming majority of the Jewish people of being pro-Nazi. That’s a way of, in the Hebrew idiom, “permitting their blood”—that is, it makes them a legitimate target of murder. You see that language if you follow anti-Zionist social media, especially in Europe and England—that the Jewish community is complicit in genocide and guilty until proven otherwise. Terrorists in Bondi Beach and in Washington, DC, invoked “genocide.” It’s the rallying cry for forces around the world that seek to harm Jews.

Isn’t blood libel an even more loaded term than genocide? Is there any danger that it could also become debased?

I don’t think so. I hope it’s as evocative as the term genocide, that it has that same weight. But I fear it doesn’t. Genocide is the ultimate accusation, and anti-Zionists have succeeded in transforming the language of the mainstream to the point where genocide is now a legitimate way of describing the war in Gaza. They’ve won the linguistic war. We’re playing catch-up now. So whatever language I have in my arsenal, I’m going to use.