The film carefully and concisely packs into 81 minutes the birth, metamorphosis and metastasization of Jew-hatred.
Published: December 19th, 2012
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For those tired of hearing that Jews are in danger and that Israel-hatred is only the latest form of Jew-hatred, this movie, Unmasked Judeophobia: the Threat to Civilization is
for you. That’s right, those really are the people who need to see
this movie, but they need to see it only if they are willing to cleanse
their minds of the countless layers of sediment that the New York Times, Haaretz,
television network news, and Hollywood party chatter has built up over
their eyes and stuffed into their ears. Because for those crumbling
pillars of western civilization, truth is false, big is little, careful
is belligerent and right (and the right) is always wrong.
But everyone else should see it too. There are three reasons why.
First, the film carefully and concisely packs into 81 minutes the birth,
metamorphosis and metastasization of Jew-hatred. It shows how the
early anti-Semitism of the Catholic Church was fueled forward by the
angry sense of betrayal of Martin Luther and the other Protestants,
which was then transmogrified into racial hatred by the Nazis, which in
turn was embraced and transformed into the hatred of the Jewish
nation-state, or anti-Zionism, by the Arab Nazi-acolyte al-Husseini,
which is now being fed back to the far left, the far right and much of
Europe, as the loop is replayed and reinforced.
This
film carefully and clearly reveals that process, through the use of
expert testimony and documentation, explained by the leading thinkers in
the field. And in it you will learn why Greenfield believes Judeophobia
is a more accurate and more powerful term than is anti-Semitism, which,
like the former universal guilt over the Holocaust, has lost its
teflon-like ability to protect Jews from further harm.
The
second reason why this film needs to be seen is that its very existence
proves its thesis true. The location of most of the screenings in
England could not be advertised because of serious security concerns.
If a movie about Jew-hatred cannot be seen in 21st Century England
without fear of physical assaults and mayhem, Houston, we have a
problem.
And finally, the completely obtuse responses by the major movie critics of the English language – in the New York Times , in Variety, and The Hollywood Reporter make
clear that the refusal to understand Jew-hatred is almost as powerful
an affliction as is Jew-hatred itself. It is hard to find another
explanation for the fact that what appear to be otherwise intelligent
people can watch a movie and then criticize it for proving what it sets
out to prove. Indeed, the mainstream critics simply refuse to
acknowledge there is a problem, and instead prefer to blame the victim –
for acknowledging they are victims! Read on.
“Unmasked
Judeophobia: the Threat to Civilization,” is Gloria Z. Greenfield’s
second documentary. The first, released in 2008, was “The Case for
Israel,” which showcased Israel as democracy’s outpost in the Middle
East. Earlier in her career, Greenfield was deeply involved in the field
of radical feminism. But when, over time, the radical feminists made
it clear to Greenfield that support of Israel would not be accepted
within the fold, Greenfeld left the fold.
As
she watched audiences respond to her first film, it dawned on
Greenfield that whether or not Israel is a shining democracy in a sea of
tyrannies, for most people the only issue that mattered was the
conflict between the Arabs and the Israelis, and that for such people
the conflict was about territorial policies. The widely held belief –
conscious or not – was that it is in the control of the Israelis to end
the conflict – all they have to do is give up some (more, of course) of
the land, and the problem would go away. And everyone wants the problem
to go away.
That
way of thinking about the conflict has several advantages: it means
there really can be a solution; it allows cursory observers to read and
listen to the mainstream media with a nod and a flip of the page; and it
allows what should be ancient history to remain buried.
But,
Greenfield believes, it isn’t true. And there still are people out
there who want to know the truth who will, if you can make the solid
case, comprehend the situation and begin to make a move towards
addressing the problem.
Greenfield
realized that she needed to produce a documentary that would educate
“the good and decent people, provide them with the context for the
hatred that was being expressed towards the nation-state of the Jewish
people, and that would also give some context to the global resurgence
of lethal Jew-hatred – this hatred towards the Jewish people and towards
Israel as the collective Jew.”
Greenfield
means for this film to be a modern “tekiyah gedolah” – the mighty
shofar blast that warned the ancient Israelites of danger. Because, she
says, once again, the Israelites are in real danger.
In
this documentary, Greenfield set for herself a mighty task. She
divided the eighty minute film into several different “chapters,” so
that it can be stopped at various points in order to facilitate
discussion, or simply to help viewers organize and understand the
different permutations of Judeophobia. It is a disease that has
traveled and adapted through time and space, shrinking in the wake of
the Holocaust, adapting and transforming to the needs of whoever wished
to vilify the Jews at whatever moment they most needed a convenient
scapegoat. Greenfield shows how Jew-hatred builds upon the evil lies of
the past to create a new and detested monster that can be hated anew in
the present.
How
does she do this? Greenfield weaves together testimony from the most
knowledgeable analysts of the day, people like Robert Wistrich, Ruth
Wisse, Manfred Gerstenfeld, Natan Sharansky, Elie Wiesel and so many
others who examine Jew hatred through the lens of human history. This
enable us to understand the moments of transformation and distribution,
guided by those who have spent lifetimes and filled volumes meticulously
reviewing the evidence. But Greenfield is able to keep the narrative
flowing with skillful editing and an ever-ready ability to snip out
extraneous information under which the enterprise would otherwise
collapse.
We
also hear from contemporary commentators who share the view from their
perspectives, people like Bret Stephens and Prof. Alan Dershowitz and
Amb. John Bolton. These are people with ringside seats – at the Wall Street Journal, Harvard Law School and the United Nations – to today’s attacks on Jews and on the Jewish State.
People
who saw the film during its recent screenings throughout England were
all wildly enthusiastic about its strengths. Clyde Hyman, is a Scotsman
who has lived for many years in Golders Green, a Jewish suburb north of
London. Hyman was unabashed when he told The Jewish Press that
the film, “scared the [deleted expletive] out of me.” Hyman is an
activist who generally denounces fellow pro-Israel Brits whom he
describes as “practitioners of dynamic apathy,” but, he said, this film
“really put all the pieces together in a wonderful way, like a jigsaw
puzzle pulls together what look like unrelated bits.”
Simon Barrett is a British television journalist and Christian Zionist. Barrettinterviewed Greenfield
last week on his show, “The Middle East Report,” a weekly current
affairs show on Revelation Television. Barrett is a skilful interviewer
and on his show he allowed Greenfield to talk frankly about her hopes
and plans for “Unmasked Judeophobia,” interspersed with extended clips
from the movie.
When Barrett spoke to The Jewish Press,
he expressed dismay that the people who hosted screenings of the movie
in Manchester and in Liverpool would not publicly disclose the
locations. As he put it, “the haters have already won if people are too
afraid to publicize this film.” While Barrett acknowledged that it is
very different for him to sit in a television studio and not have to
live with the possible negative consequences of public attacks, “they’ve
got to overcome that spirit of fear, or we really will all watch as the
world goes mad.”
Even
the film’s score is worthy of note. Sharon Farber created a subtle
musical accompaniment that never overpowers the visual, but rather
weaves in and out, ominously rising where the drama increases and then
fluttering to a whisper when more sensory stimulus would be a
distraction.
One
of the few criticisms this reviewer heard from knowledgeable pro-Israel
activists such as Helene Fragman Abramson, of Princeton, New Jersey, is
that the documentary lays out the problem, but then viewers are left
without a game plan. Abramson saw the documentary last year in New York
City, at an event hosted by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East
Reporting in America. Senior leadership at CAMERA are co-producers of
the film.
As if in answer to Abramson’s complaint, just last week Greenfield’s production company, Doc Emet Productions, released With Clarity and Courage – An Activist’s Guide as a companion to the film. The publication is available here.
It was written by Anna Kolodner, former executive director of the David
Project Center for Jewish Leadership, and contains detailed information
on how to combat Judeophobia. So in addition to delivering an
absolutely first rate, must-see documentary, Doc Emet Productions has
now provided a follow-through game plan, or at least the tools for
activists to use to create their own.
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