Anybody that gives even a just criticism of the Jew is instantly labeled antisemite. The Jew cries louder than anybody else if anybody criticizes him. You can tell the truth about any minority in America, but make a true observation about the Jew, and if it doesn't pat him on the back, then he uses his grip on the news media to label you anti-Semite.

Formerly an anti-Semite was somebody who hated Jews because they were Jews and had a Jewish soul. But nowadays an anti-Semite is somebody who is hated by Jews.

When people criticize Zionists, they mean Jews, You are talking anti-Semitism!

It's a trick, we always use it. When from Europe somebody is criticizing Israel then we bring up the Holocaust. When in this country [US] people are criticizing Israel then they are "anti-semitic" and the organization is strong and has a lot of money and the ties between Israel and american jewish establishment are very strong and they are strong in this country. As you know, they have power which it's okay, they are talented people and they have power, money and media and other things. And their attitude is "Israel is my country, right or wrong", the identification, and they are not ready to hear criticism and it's very easy to blame people who criticize certain acts of the Israeli government as anti-semitics and to bring up the Holocaust and the suffering of the jewish people. And that is to justify everything we do to the Palestinians.

The word anti-Semitism is another word which should be eliminated from the English language. "Anti-Semitism" serves only one purpose today. It is used as a smear word. When so-called or self-styled Jews feel that anyone opposes any of their objectives they discredit their victims by applying the word anti-Semite or anti-Semitic through all the channels they have at their command and under their control. I can speak with great authority on that subject. Because so-called or self-styled Jews were unable to disprove my public statements in 1946 with regard to the situation in Palestine, they spent millions of dollars to smear me as an anti-Semite hoping thereby to discredit me in the eyes of the public who were very much interested in what I had to say. Until 1946 I was a little saint to all so-called or self-styled Jews. When I disagreed with them publicly on the Zionist intentions in Palestine I became suddenly Anti-Semite No. 1.

One key fact about contemporary antisemitism is that it must not be mentioned. Antiracists are educated to assume that talk about antisemitism is an indicator of a Zionist attempt to silence the oppressed Palestinians; it is mis­recognized as the mobilisation of Jewish victim­power, the playing of the Holocaust card. The left is not hostile to Jews when they are powerless and stateless; but it finds it hard to shake the idea that Jews are untrustworthy and are connected to money. The image today is that the Jews have managed to strike a bargain with the American and capitalist devil; instead of playing their role as the symbol of the oppressed, they are conceived of as having saved themselves at the expense of everybody else.

The anti‐Semite has chosen hate because hate is a faith; at the outset he has chosen to devaluate words and reasons. How entirely at ease he feels as a result. How futile and frivolous discussions about the rights of the Jew appear to him. He has placed himself on other ground from the beginning. If out of courtesy he consents for a moment to defend his point of view, he lends himself but does not give himself. He tries simply to project his intuitive certainty onto the plane of discourse. I mentioned awhile back some remarks by anti‐Semites, all of them absurd: "I hate Jews because they make servants insubordinate, because a Jewish furrier robbed me, etc." Never believe that anti‐ Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti‐Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past. It is not that they are afraid of being convinced. They fear only to appear ridiculous or to prejudice by their embarrassment their hope of winning over some third person to their side.

"I say the word " Anti-Semite" is vulgar and pedantic : that I think will be universally admitted. It is also nonsensical. The antagonism to the Jews has nothing to do with any supposed "Semitic" race which probably does not exist any more than do many other modern hypothetical abstractions, and which, anyhow, does not come into the matter. The Anti-Semite is not a man who hates the modern Arabs or the ancient Carthaginians. He is a man who hates Jews."

The effect of equating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism is to silence the criticism of the Israeli government by Palestinians and their advocates. Characterizing all such criticism as an inherent form of bigotry is used to justify the exclusion of such critics from mainstream society, to suspend them from their schools, or to fire them from their jobs. But it is not anti-Semitic to want equal rights for all in Jerusalem, in Tel Aviv, in Gaza, in Ramallah. That is, after all, what generations of Americans have sought in their own home.

Now to speak to the charge of antisemitism. To say that Louis Farrakhan is an antisemitic is an improper and unjust characterization of me. To say that I have been critical of Jews and critical of the state of Israel is true. But I have been critical of blacks, critical of our leaders, critical of Arabs, critical of whites, and yet my own people don't call me anti-black and Arabs don't call me antisemitic and they are also semitic people. The term is wrong. And is wrongfully applied. My criticism of Jews should be taken in that light. And criticism, sir, with all due respect, is not necessarily born out of dislike of the person, but dislike of the condition that maybe these persons are involved with...

As for the Jews, their explanation of anti-Semitism is more characteristic yet. In addition to the usual cliche, "with hatred and savagery" - naturally with no motive, they do not care to discuss motives - according to them, anti-Semitism is a madness, an intellectual degeneration, an affliction of the spirit.

The common Jewish practice is to name our experience differently from those with whom we might share it. Jews say anti-semitism, not racism against Jews; Jews say Zionism, not nationalism for Jews. We cling to the term Holocaust as ours only, anxious about whether other genocides deserve the name. All this separate naming makes it harder to identify and analyze commonality and difference.

For example, in the Labour code it is no longer likely to be antisemitic "to accuse Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations". The code simply says this is "wrong", as if imprecise or uncivil language is the problem, rather than the prevalence of antisemitic attitudes. Yet this charge, that Jews cannot be trusted or must always be suspected of having a hidden agenda, is central to the old-fashioned, rightwing antisemitism that the Labour party claims to oppose.
Similarly, the IHRA definition says it is antisemitic to compare Israel to Nazi Germany, but Labour's code says this is only the case if there is "evidence of antisemitic intent": a caveat it attaches to all "contentious views" relating to Israel.

The anti‐Semite understands nothing about modern society. He would be incapable of conceiving of a constructive plan; his action cannot reach the level of the methodical; it remains on the ground of passion. To a long‐term enterprise he prefers an explosion of rage analogous to the running amuck of the Malays. His intellectual activity is confined to interpretation; he seeks in historical events the signs of the presence of an evil power. Out of this spring those childish and elaborate fabrications which give him his resemblance to the extreme paranoiacs. In addition, anti‐Semitism channels evolutionary drives toward the destruction of certain men, not of institutions. An anti‐Semitic mob will consider it has done enough when it has massacred some Jews and burned a few synagogues. It represents, therefore, a safety valve for the owning classes, who encourage it and thus substitute for a dangerous hate against their regime a beneficent hate against particular people. Above all this naive dualism is eminently reassuring to he anti‐Semite himself. If all he has to do is to remove Evil, that means that the Good is already given. He has no need to seek it in anguish, to invent it, to scrutinize it patiently when he has found it, to prove it in action, to verify it by its consequences, or, finally, to shoulder he responsibilities of the moral choice be has made. It is not by chance that the great outbursts of anti‐Semitic rage conceal a basic optimism. The anti‐Semite as cast his lot for Evil so as not to have to cast his lot for Good. The more one is absorbed in fighting Evil, the less one is tempted to place the Good in question. One does not need to talk about it, yet it is always understood in the discourse of the anti‐Semite and it remains understood in his thought. When he has fulfilled his mission as holy destroyer, the Lost Paradise will reconstitute itself. For the moment so many tasks confront the anti‐Semite that he does not have time to think about it. He is in the breach, fighting, and each of his outbursts of rage is a pretext to avoid the anguished search for the Good.