An opinion column in the Jerusalem Post appeared this week from a Swedish grad student, Anders Persson of Lund University. Persson argued that Israeli fears of BDS (boycott, sanctions, and divestment) are currently misplaced, largely due the prevailing indifference of the Swedish public to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Persson notes that the pro-Palestinian radical activist groups are very small, and no one in Sweden really cares where their tomatoes and oranges come from anyway. Nonetheless, he cautions, should Israel be drawn into a conflict with Iran or its proxy Hezbollah, and the economy nose dive, well, things could be different. And by different, we are talking about not good.The sad news is that Mr. Persson has not been reading this blog, or—to give him some credit—not reading it enough. If he were keeping up with SIJ, he would know that anti-Semitism in Sweden is rising, and the government is decidedly not dealing with this issue. On the contrary, the government-sponsored media heats things up by pushing a pro-Palestinian issue. And that is the real problem Mr. Persson. It’s not about Sven and Anna deciding which fruit to put in the shopping cart. It’s about politicians like Ilmar Reepalu and Carl Bildt, who openly either blame the Jews for anti-Semitism or back the extremists who side with the Hamas terror state while helping Iran fend off sanctions.
When the power elites back anti-Semites and terror states, the problem is now. When you write that if the world economy tanks, the Jewish state will take the blame, that’s the result of existing anti-Semitism, and again, time to fix the problem is now.
By Chanah Shapira
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