Anti-Semitism is a designation coined in mid-19th century Germany to offer a more politically correct term for Jew-hatred. Jew-hatred sounded bad, ugly, and uncouth. Anti-Semitism sounded more scientific, civil, and ´gentile´. Few spoke out against this "euphemization". So the term gained acceptance, and entered the vocabulary of western civilization. In doing so, it turned a primitive social psychosis into a politically correct social value. European, and especially German, society was then able to integrate this legitimized psychosis in to a political doctrine of hatred, repression, and ultimately genocide.

Happily for western society, especially post-World War II, this euphemization has been recognized for what it is. Most of the West´s mainstream social, political, and intellectual leadership has distanced itself from anti-Semitism; recognizing that, no matter what faux-veneer of pseudo-acceptability is used, Jew-hatred is still just that: a senseless hatred, symptomatic of a sick mind and a sick society, leading ultimately to injustice, repression, and genocide.

Not so in the Arab world. Mainstream media and school books have for decades promoted the crudest and ugliest of the images, slogans, and canards of Nazi and Medieval Christian Jew-hatred; lending valence and acceptability to the basest of anti-Jewish lies, forgeries, and accusations. Witness, inter alia, the recent series of newspaper articles in Saudi Arabia, describing Jewish blood libel as scientific fact. And even more heinous, the textbooks used in elementary schools in Syria, Egypt and the Palestinian Authority, which demonize Jews, Zionists, and Israelis. The children of much of the Arab world are educated into an ideology of hatred that de- legitimizes a whole nation, an entire people. That de-legitimization makes it noble to work toward the destruction of Israel and the butchering of its Jewish inhabitants. Dulce et decorum est... to slaughter the Jews.

Oddly, this Arab version of Jew-hatred has begun to insidiously infect western society with the help of new euphemisms: Anti-Israel, anti-Zionist.

Clearly, one can be anti-Israel without being anti-Jewish. Anti- Zionism does not equal anti-Semitism. But it is precisely this truism that is exploited by the purveyors of the new Jew-hatred. They seek to create a faux-veneer for the old psychosis. Anti-Jewish hate speech seeks shelter under the mantle of free speech -- against Zionism. Palpable and unabashed hate crimes perpetrated against Jews and Jewish institutions are defended as expressions of reasonable political critique -- against Israel. We are witness to a rerun of the phenomenon of 19th century Germany: find the right euphemism, and the hatred becomes acceptable, even in the most civil of societies.

Even odder, a growing number of academics and liberal leaders, erstwhile paragons of the pursuit for truth, working unfettered in the bastions of free speech, have adopted this newly revised edition of Jew-hatred as a cornerstone in their prejudiced fight for justice. These putative defenders of our social and political systems, which for centuries have been defined as having malice toward none and equal opportunity of access for all, have incorporated the new euphemisms of Jew-hatred into their publications, speeches, and classrooms... much to the bewilderment of many, and to the glee of a hate-driven few.

And perhaps most odd of all, they have done so of their own free will, enthusiastically exploiting their faculty status and academic freedom to proffer anti-Israel propaganda as scholarship and anti- Zionist polemic as education. Their criminal misuse of their positions of trust among colleagues, students, and society at large, has contributed directly to the creation on many campuses of an atmosphere of hate and distrust toward Israel, Israelis, Jews, and anyone identifying with any of the above.

The recent deeply misguided AUT boycott of Israeli universities is, tragically, a very good example of this heinous trend. The clearest indication that this sudden surge of venomous anti-Israel diatribe is nothing more than Jew-hatred cloaked in the faux-mantle of protecting human rights can be found in the fact that this movement is very far behind the trajectory of current events. Arafat is dead. Abbas´ election offers at least some tenuous hope for peace. Israel is pulling out of Gaza and parts of the West Bank, so now is the time to support the belligerents and encourage their interaction. Attacks on Israel and Israeli institutions of higher learning make no sense at this crucial cusp of Middle East history -- except as an expression of unmitigated and irrational anti-Israel venom.

Moreover, the justifications for the boycott are baseless, as many commentators have pointed out; and the boycott supporters take no notice of the horrific violations of human rights in the universities and political institutions of the Palestinian Authority.

But this last point may actually be a good sign, or at least a useful indicator. When must the justification for action be based upon a palpable double standard that cannot stand up to honest scrutiny? Only in the case where there are no logical rejoinders to the opponent´s critique. Only when there is nothing left in the boycott supporters´ intellectual arsenal except the primitive, childish, sophomoric rhetoric of the extremist hate-monger whose baseless bigotry has been exposed.

I urge you to re-consider that your support for neo-Nazi Jew-hatred. The boycott does your institutions no credit. Your willingness to accommodate Moslem pressures compromises rational and time-tested campus procedures. And your stand against Israel is a stand against rational thought and against peace. Your complicity in aggression supports terrorism and encourages further violence.

All that it takes for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing. (© 2001-2005 Koret Communications Ltd. 05/15/05)