Nazis!!!

This isn't going to be pretty, so if you want to focus only on the news, feel free to skip this.

I don't usually follow what's happening in the Blogosphere, as I spend a lot of time reading the regular media, but in the past few days the Blogosphere has been in an uproar with accusations and counter-accusations going strong. Apparently it started with Little Green Footballs accusing several right wing groups of being racist and of hitching up their agenda to the anti-Jihadi movement.

I debated whether to jump into the fray. My blog focuses on translating news, not on inter-blog debates, but most important - I'm afraid of the reactions. On the other hand, maybe this is a good reason to speak up.

I do not want to get into the debate about any specific group being "racist". What bothers me more is the idea that bloggers can't speak, or express an opinion, because they stepped on somebody else's feet. Because they expressed a valid fear.

I am afraid of the Islamization of Europe. But I am also, and even more, afraid of the rise of the extreme right. In fact, one of my main fears is that people will get so fed up by the political correctness being shoved down their throats that they'll go from liberalism to the other extreme. As a Jew, I have no illusions - the Muslims might be kicked out first, but the Jews will suffer horribly when that happens.

I had blogged in the past about the anti-mosque protests in Cologne, and what struck me most was an interview with one "ordinary German" : "I'm just afraid of fundamentalist Muslims gaining more and more ground," says one female shop assistant. But it's hardly possible to voice this fear because of the risk of immediately being labeled right-wing, she says.

Indeed. Of course, the Left is using every tactic it can and labeling people Nazi's and racists is one of the simplest. But this does not mean that there is no such thing as neo-Nazis, no such thing as racists and no such thing as extreme right.

Going back to the Cologne protests: neo-Nazi groups are hijacking the protests. All it takes is a couple of skinheads to show up, wave banners and the entire demonstration changes its tone from one of serious concern about Islamizatoin to a racist one.

Can anybody guess which picture was featured on the news and which on the Pro-Cologne site?



Now, why am I writing all this? Because what gets me really upset is hypocrisy. Little Green Footballs named Vlaams Belang and the Sweden Democrats as racist groups. Brussels Journal, in return, accused LGF of being "more PC than thou". But didn't Vlaams Belang/Brussels Journal do exactly the same thing, just less than two months ago?

On September 11th three groups from the UK, Denmark and Germany, organized a demonstration in Brussels against Islamization under the umbrella organization Stop the Islamization of Europe. The demonstration was banned by the mayor of Brussels, and Dr. Ulfkotte, the German organizer, went to court.

Ulfkotte got support from Vlaams Belang, and Brussels Journal followed the story very closely. That is.. until Ulfkotte decided he's had enough. Then he became the enemy. He was accused of planning it all in advance to discredit Vlaams Belang and the demonstration.

Brussels Journal discovered that Ulfkotte had written a book about the French riots where he had brought up the claim that the Mossad was responsible for them. In other words, Brussels Journal accused a fellow anti-Jihadi, an until-recently valued member of the group, of being a paranoid anti-Semitic. (Btw, this piece of info was freely available to Vlaaams Belang in the days when the demonstration was planned and when the court was petitioned. A simple internet search brings it up.)

The claim now floating about Little Green Footballs giving ammunition to CAIR and their ilk are ridiculous. But they're ridiculous most for the underlying premise which is that a right wing blogger can't agree with Muslims. This claim is ridiculous because there are quite a few anti-Muslim groups who agree with Muslims, in their anti-Semitic views. Hitler salutes, kill the jews.. does that sound at all familiar? There are quite a few radical Islamists and right-wingers who would be at home with those sentiments.

Stop the Islamization Denmark (SIOD) had organized a protest in Copenhagen this past Sunday. On their way to the protest the organizers were brutally attacked, apparently not by Muslims but by left-wing radical anarchists. (see here, here and here)

The claim is that this wasn't mentioned in the Danish media, but both the demonstration and the attack were mentioned on the Jyllands Posten, Politiken and DR sites. The identity of the attackers might not have been mentioned, and in that sense the media were remiss.

A right wing extremist group was attacked by left wing extremists in a city which in the past few months had seen hundreds of left wing extremists riot. Hundreds of leftists and anarchists have been battling the police, using tactics that wouldn't have embarrassed any Intifada rioter. And now anti-Jihadi blogs want to know why this specific incident wasn't made into a more serious item. Clashes between right wing and left wing extremists are not that rare and are usually very violent.

Talking about the "media being remiss" - while the blogging community reported every car torched by Muslims (two more torched last night in Amsterdam, Dutch) they simply ignore and ignored the mass riots in Copenhagen. Of course, blogs dealing with Islam might not be expected to focus on left-wing anarchist riots. The media, of course, does focus on them. Danish media is full of stories about the left-wing anarchists.

I fear Islamization because it is a threat to liberal democracy, just like the radical left and the radical right. Between the different possibilities, it is much more likely that a right-wing extremist group would get to power in Europe than it is that an Islamist group would do the same. The swastika is much more frightening than the crescent because it is much more realistic.

Update: Nazis!!! (an explanation)