Problem is he’s 100% correct here. His take is more that they have not succeeded in eliminating anti-Semitism and persecution, not that Jews are inherently bad.
Kissinger was a jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, not an anti-semite.
Hate him all you want, he’s done plenty of shit to deserve it, but this “context” is straight up disinformation.
Quite frankly, the ADL commemorating him makes my blood boil. To be clear, they do some absolutely vital work combatting and monitoring hatred in the US, and I have been angered by the straight-up conspiracy theories about them. They are undoubtedly a scapegoat of a diverse swath of political movements. But between this (and Greenblatt’s recent defense of Musk), I cannot endorse them.
It seems like it’s easier to pick some prominent (often Jewish) person or organization to scapegoat than to actually confront the depths of American foreign policy, police brutality, etc. There’s no point to policing people’s anger towards Kissinger. He deserves much worse. But I cannot be fully comfortable with where it leads.
ADL has always been captured by right wing interests. I find the Southern Poverty Law Center to be much more reliable when it comes to what you think the ADL should be doing.
The “right” of this country hates the ADL as well. They’ve pretty consistently fought the American right and extremism in this country, from the red scare to the civil rights movement to LGBT rights to Trumpism, internet radicalization and the alt-right in the present.
What I would describe as the root of their hypocrisy is cowardice. That’s what I see when they give powerful people like Musk and Kissinger a free pass. It’s a short walk from cooperation and dialogue to outright complicity. To say it’s been ‘captured’ almost absolves it of responsibility; these are clearly choices made by the leadership, not puppeteered by outside influence.
There’s no point to policing people’s anger towards Kissinger.
I explicitly endorsed their anger. My issue is with the disinformation.
What’s one of the worst things he did, in your opinion? Also I don’t think exact quotes can be misinformation.
“… exact quotes can be misinformation.”
sub_ubi, on interpreting historical figure quotes without the full context.
If I quote you out of context, I can make you appear to hold any position I’d like.
That’s a classic disinformation tactic. Happens in every political campaign.
They said disinformation, not misinformation. Disinformation and misinformation are both information that’s incorrect. The difference between dis-and-misinformation is intent; disinformation is spread with the express purpose of misleading.
A direct quote can be taken out of context or manipulated to convey a false message.
“Exact quotes can be misinformation” I’m glad we agree. In all seriousness, it’s not exactly hard to intentionally or even accidentally mischaracterize a direct quote by taking it out of context.
As for the worst things, I think the Bangladesh genocide is not mentioned enough. Though if you type into google “Henry Kissinger [insert any country here]” you’ll definitely find something horrific.
Here’s the thing, Jews can be antisemitic too, it’s internalized antisemitism. Even if he was still just saying “it’s the Jews’ fault for not having good PR” that’s not a good thing to say either. The onus shouldn’t be on Jewish people to convince others not to be bigoted and genocidal towards them. Not being bigoted and genocidal towards any group of people should be a given.
I’m confused, does he think anti-Semitism is just a natural thing for everyone that’s born not Jewish?
No, he hated Jews but believed he couldn’t be antisemitic because he was Jewish, which is pretty dumb.
Oh so he’s saying without being born Jewish, he would be considered anti-Semitic?
“Do you find this helpful?” More like, do you find this hateful amirite. Kissinger was a criminal, but the “context” itself is ringing some anti-semitic bells.
Like that it not the context I would have added. Just do a web search of “Henry Kissinger controversy” and you’ll find plenty to actually get upset over.
Nah, ignoring Kissinger’s repeated defenses of antisemitic words and behaviors over his career just because he happened to have a Jewish mother is way more of a disservice to the Jewish diaspora imo.
Like, let’s put this quote in context,
The quote on X appears in a section of the book describing Kissinger’s attitude toward his Judaism and how his faith was viewed by Nixon. According to Kissinger, Nixon felt Jewish people “put the interests of Israel above everything else” and “that their control of the media made them dangerous allies.”
Isaacson wrote that following Israel’s violation of a 1973 ceasefire with Egypt, "Kissinger grumbled at one WSAG meeting, ‘If it were not for the accident of my birth, I would be anti-Semitic.’
"In other moments of exasperation, he would note that “any people who have been persecuted for two thousand years must be doing something wrong.'”
So, yeah, this is Kissinger saying, “Man, Israel’s such a pain in my ass right now, I totally get why people hate Jews.” That’s just a straight up defense of antisemitism and was a shitty thing to say/think.
And it’s not like this was a just a joke that landed badly, Kissinger did not give a shit about Jewish suffering.
Among his statements, one from March 1973 caused a stir when it was published in 2010. Taped in conversation with Richard Nixon soon after a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, Kissinger disdained the notion of pressuring the USSR about persecuted Soviet Jews, saying: “The emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy, and if they put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern. Maybe a humanitarian concern.”
In 2011, hitherto secret U.S. State Department documents from late 1972 were likewise published, revealing that Kissinger was irked by the concern expressed by American Jews about the fate of Soviet Jewry, calling the former “self-serving…bastards
The man was a rat bastard fascist whose experience surviving the Holocaust just convinced him he wanted to be on the other side of the gas chamber doors.
Yeah Kissinger was reprehensible, no doubt. I wasn’t saying the context was untrue. Just not what I would have chosen to highlight.
Even in their own mythos, wouldn’t it be more like 5,000?
Shit didnt start with jesus.
Even for an organization that furthers the interests of the Israeli right over the welfare of Jewish people, they don’t seem to understand Kissinger’s legacy.
On October 6, 1973, it did. Egypt and Syria attacked occupied Sinai and the Golan Heights, respectively. Their initial success stunned Israeli officials. Defense Minister Moshe Dayan was convinced Israel might be conquered. Moreover, Israel was running out of war matériel and desperately needed to be resupplied by the U.S.
Kissinger made sure America dragged its feet, both because he wanted Israel to understand who was ultimately in charge and because he did not want to anger the oil-rich Arab states. His strategy, as another top diplomat put it, was to “let Israel come out ahead, but bleed.”
You can read this in Kissinger’s own words in the records of internal deliberations now available on the State Department website. On October 9, Kissinger told his fellow high-level officials, “My assessment is a costly victory [for Israel] without a disaster is the best.”
– On Top of Everything Else, Henry Kissinger Prevented Peace in the Middle East by Jon Schwarz
