Maram Stern is worried but optimistic. CEO of the World Jewish Congress, he is concerned about the movement of the extreme right in the world. He just doesn’t think it will be able to advance like the fascist and Nazi marches did in the first half of the 20th century.
“Times are worrying, as they present new threats,” Stern tells Sheet. “There is misinformation, fake news travels faster, the extreme right that is becoming international, the socio-economic consequences of the Covid pandemic and the energy crisis caused by the Russian aggression against Ukraine, among others. This is fertile territory for the flowering of ideologies. extreme.”
Now, however, humanity has the expertise to deal with it, according to Stern, in São Paulo to participate in the 53rd National Convention of Conib (Israeli Confederation of Brazil), this weekend.
“We know this better than before and we must act. We have an international legal order and multilateral organizations that are more solid than a century ago to face threats to democracy. by the root.”
For the Jew, who was born in West Germany during the Cold War, the Jewish community has a historic responsibility to oppose far-right nationalism. And anti-Semitism, he says, is the first sign that there is something rotten in democracy. Stern argues that Jew-hatred is not just a form of racism. Both deny equality between individuals and must be fought firmly.
“However, there are important distinguishing features. Anti-Semitism began before Christianity. In the Middle Ages, Jews were discriminated against because of their religion. During the Shoah [Holocausto], Jews were discriminated against and massacred by the Nazis because of their race. Today, Jews are collectively demonized because they are the scapegoat for all evil.”
Hence, the anti-Semite is not merely a type of racist, in the Jewish leader’s view. He preaches “a distinctive ideology and conspiratorial worldview that changes according to the haters who espouse it.”
Stern rejects a circulating idea that accuses Israel of subjecting Palestinians to an oppression that Jews have also suffered in the past. “It’s not acceptable. It’s a form of Holocaust revisionism and a form of instrumentalization for political ends.”
This year’s edition of Documenta in Kassel, the biggest art exhibition on the planet, based in Germany, annoyed him. There was a work in it by the Taring Padi collective, from Indonesia, called “People’s Justice”. It contained a huge mural in a public square that portrays political resistance through hundreds of figures in a cartoon-like aesthetic.
One of them had a soldier with the word Mossad, the name of the Israeli spy service, stamped on his cap, a red scarf around his neck and a Star of David.
It turns out that this character joins others associated with repressive forces, such as KGB agents. All with helmets and weapons in hand. The Israeli icon has a pig snout on its face.
Eating pork is prohibited by the Jewish religion. Worse, one of the anti-Semitic symbols is the Judensau, the Jewish sow, which was replicated in several medieval churches – in the form, for example, of sculptures and illustrations of Jews suckling a pig and eating its excrement.
Another image in the Indonesian work: an executive with a cigar in his mouth, with the air of a ruthless capitalist. He has a peyot, the side curls typical of Orthodox Jews. The work has sparked “heated debates about how far freedom of art and expression goes,” says Stern. “Quoting German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, ‘a line is crossed when criticism of Israel turns into a questioning of its right to exist.’ Adding that artistic freedom is not and cannot be absolute.”
Maram declined to answer questions about the support of a significant part of the Jewish community for Jair Bolsonaro (PL) nor about the likely incorporation of ultranationalist acronyms into the coalition that made the party of former Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu the most voted in the parliamentary election of Tuesday (1st).
The president of Conib, Claudio Lottenberg, talks about the Brazilian issue. “I have said in all my demonstrations that the Jewish community is a cut of the larger community, which means saying that we have right-wing Jews, left-wing Jews, liberal Jews, conservative Jews.”
In 2017, then a pre-candidate for the presidency, Bolsonaro spoke at Hebraica, a traditional Jewish club in Rio. Several samples of Bolsonar’s oratory came from that meeting. There, he narrated in a racist way, for example, the visit to a quilombo where “the lightest Afro-descendant there weighed seven arrobas”.
“Possibly on this occasion he was received by people from the Jewish community who were sympathetic to him, but that in no way means that the Jewish community supports him.”
Lottenberg says he recognizes “important aspects in terms of identity with the state of Israel that the president has and that I think is positive.” But that “does not extend to any unconditional and widespread support on behalf of the community for him,” adds the ophthalmologist, who also chairs the Deliberative Council of Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein. He refers to gestures such as promising to migrate the Brazilian embassy, now in Tel Aviv, to Jerusalem – which never happened.
He recalls that evangelicals, a crucial electoral base for Bolsonarism, have a strong connection with Israel. “Perhaps most of the symbols that are present within the current political scenario are born precisely from this relationship.” It is good to remember, he says, that evangelicals “are tens of millions in Brazil, while we Jews are approximately 120 thousand”. Therefore, he sees the issue with the Israeli state as “a coincidence of agenda, and I can only see this as a positive thing”.
The Conib convention starts this Saturday (5th) and runs until Monday (7th). Among the guests are presenters Tiago Leifert and Benjamin Back, journalists Patrícia Campos Mello, from SheetJulia Dualibi, Madeleine Lacsko and Albert Einstein President Sidney Klajner.
With a wealth of experience honed over 4+ years in journalism, I bring a seasoned voice to the world of news. Currently, I work as a freelance writer and editor, always seeking new opportunities to tell compelling stories in the field of world news.
