Our Very Own Vichyites

Vichyites are rightly regarded with contempt. But what motivated these creatures? Did they share the Nazi ideology of Nordic racial supremacy and kampf [= unending struggle]? Some did share it. Others had other motives. Some wanted the Nazis to help them by getting rid of their domestic enemies for them. Some "right-wing" Vichyites agitated in this way of thinking. On the other hand, the Commies in France --like the USSR and the "Third International"-- opposed making war on or resisting the Nazi conquerors ["occupiers" in today's lingo] on the grounds that resistance and opposition served British imperialism or imperialism as such [tout court]. War against the Nazis was "an imperialist war." That was the Communist position after the Nazi-Soviet Pact of August 1939. But their position changed, of course, after the Nazi German army invaded the Soviet Union in 1941. In the Commie perspective from 9-1939 to 6-1941, accepting the Nazi conquests was being on the side of peace. Indeed, the German and Soviet foreign ministers declared a joint "struggle for peace" in the Fall of 1939 while the fires of war were still burning in Poland and the persecutions of Jews had begun.

After the Nazi German conquest of France in 1940, Communists of both the Stalinist and Trotskyist varieties joined the Vichy regime set up as part of France's surrender to Germany. Therefore, some Stalinists and Trotskyists became official Vichyites. Other Trotskyists who remained in the underground in France and Belgium during the war argued against armed resistance to the Nazis. Instead they wanted to see the hobnailed-boot-wearing Wehrmacht as fellow members of the working class. Instead of armed resistance, they put out an underground paper meant for the occupying forces called Arbeiter und Soldat [Worker and Soldier].

Before the war, "socialists" and "social democrats" and "right-wingers" and "nationalists" too were on the side of peace. They opposed resistance to Hitler's aggressive aims and advocated peace with Hitler by satisfying his territorial demands [Territory-for-Peace]. After the conquest and occupation of France in the summer of 1940 members of all these groups joined Vichy. Think of Pierre Laval, Jacques Doriot, Marcel Déat, Xavier Vallat, Drieu la Rochelle, Brasillach, etc. I think it proper to use the term Vichyite for those who --before WW2 began in September 1939-- were eager for peace with Nazi Germany, to the point of agreeing to Hitler's various pre-war territorial demands. Think of the Saar, the Sudetenland [a mountainous, ethnic-German-inhabited area of Czechoslovakia, vital for that country's defense], Danzig, Memel, and Alsace-Lorraine.

In the Nazi-fascist period, the Arab nationalists and many European Muslims joined the Nazis and sided with them openly. Hitler saw Islamic jihad as an admirable concept and institution [see here]. It resembled his own kampf notion. Arabs and Bosnian and Soviet Muslims joined the Wehrmacht and SS in special Arab and/or Muslim units and in units with non-Muslims. The Nazis were served by an Arab Legion, by a Bosnian Muslim SS division [the Handschar, pronounced khanjar], and by the Kossovo Albanian Muslim Skanderbeg SS unit.

Nowadays, all sorts of peacemongers and "human rights" and "humanitarian" exponents oppose Israel fighting against Nazi-like Arab terrorists and jihadists, such as Hizbullah & Hamas for example. Indeed they provide vital political support and human shield services for the Arab mass murderers and "resistance" movements, misusing the word "resistance" as if these mass murders had an affinity to the French Resistance against the Nazis. This group of supporters also includes artists, poets, novelists, and other intellectual brutalitarians -- including Noam chomsky, the late Edward Said, n finkelstein, José Saramago, Tom Paulin [Oxford prof of Eng lit], K Stockhausen, Hollywood's late Mustafa Akkad, etc. Karl Stockhausen, a German composer, considered the attack on the Twin Towers "a work of art." This just goes to show how reliable many or most of our artistic crowd are in their political and moral judgements. Perhaps providentially Mustafa Akkad was killed by his own heroes in a terrorist attack on a hotel in the ancient Ammonite town of Rabbath-Ammon, now Arab-inhabited under the name Amman, Jordan, in November 2005.

Is this phenomenon new? In fact, artists, poets, novelists, film directors [i.e., Leni Riefenstahl] supported the Nazis in those fateful days. One Vichyite novelist was Jean Giono of France, who described adolf hitler as "a poet in action." Jean Giraudoux was a respected "anti-war" playwright. His play Tiger at the Gates [in French, La Guerre de Troie n'aura pas lieu] was meant to promote peace with Nazi Germany. Tiger at the Gates was a favorite of the "anti-war" movement in the US back in the 1960s. A prominent theme evoked by pre-WW2 Vichyites of both "right" and "left" was to blame any future war on the Jews. The socialist Zoretti declared a few months after the pro-Nazi Munich Pact that: "We are not going to make war for 100,000 Polish Jews." As if the hapless Polish Jews were bringing about the Nazi German invasion of Poland [see here for references for these quotes and other info in this article].

Unfortunately Israel too now has its own Vichyites. We have the Peace Now Movement, which follows an identically named American organization that called for peace with Nazi Germany in the midst of World War 2 and the Holocaust. Then we have the morally defective Avraham Burg who --disappointed that his demands for increased retirement benefits were rejected by a court-- turned against Israel; maybe the European Union pays better. The morally corrupt, egocentric and slightly mad Shulamit Aloni is another Vichyite. It is interesting that all three want olmert to continue as prime minister --despite his immorality, criminal corruption and incompetence at managing the state-- because they believe that he is likely to surrender territory to the Arabs [see link].

Another Israeli Vichyite and peacemonger is Daniel Barenboim, a talented musician who is not notorious enough for his insensitivity toward his terminally ill wife. Then we have the pro-Arab Nazi novelist, A B Yehoshua, who called on President Bush to withdraw the US ambassador from Israel until what the Nazi sympathizers call "illegal outposts" are taken down. Yehoshua follows in the ignoble footsteps of Jean Giono. In other words, Yehoshua wants to drive Jews out of their homes. Just as Vichyites like Zoretti and Céline blamed Jews for the coming war, Yehoshua blames "Jewish settlers" in Judea & Samaria just for living where they are. But the champion in this race of human filth is david landau, editor of the pro-Arab Nazi HaArets daily, but born, raised and educated in Britain [surprise!!]. Landau goes down in crudeness and verbal filth to the level of Céline, the Judeophobic French novelist, a Vichyite of course. Landau asked US secretary of state, condoleezza rice [riso amaro] to have the US "rape" Israel in order to get Israel to surrender to Arab demands. He went on to say that it was his "wet dream" to see this "rape" take place. Here landau --like the French "right-wing" Vichyites-- wants the United States and/or the Arabs --it doesn't matter so much which-- to overrule Israel's democratic decision-making processes and suppress his domestic enemies. A B Yehoshua's position is much the same.

The Biblical book of Qohelet [Ecclesiastes] tells us that "there is nothing new under the sun." Indeed, today's Vichyites in Israel and elsewhere come out of a base and ignoble tradition.
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Coming: Peace follies, lies of the "peace process," propaganda, Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron and elsewhere in the Land of Israel, etc.