L'antisémitisme de Julian Assange revisité

Ben Cohen is a New York City-based journalist and author who writes a weekly column on Jewish and international affairs for JNS:

"[…] Assange himself has spoken about Jews several times, with plain and heartfelt hostility. The first occasion was in 2011, when he phoned Ian Hislop, the editor of the British satirical magazine Private Eye, to complain about a piece that highlighted Assange’s friendship with a notorious character named Israel Shamir. (A Russian Jew who converted to Orthodox Christianity, Shamir has been writing unhinged missives denouncing Judaism and Zionism for the last 20 years, mostly for far-right websites.) By running the item, Assange said, Hislop had joined an international conspiracy against WikiLeaks led by journalists, all of whom, Assange emphasized, “are Jewish.” When Hislop challenged this invocation of a classic anti-Semitic trope, Assange suddenly replied, “Forget about the Jewish thing.”

But Hislop didn’t forget, and Assange promptly accused him—as is the fashion among those charged with making anti-Semitic statements—of engaging in a smear campaign. Those who gave Assange the benefit of the doubt on that occasion were, however, stumped in 2013, when WikiLeaks employee James Ball resigned from the organization precisely because of Assange’s relationship with Shamir, whom he described as “an anti-Semitic writer … and a man with ties and friends in the Russian security services.” Then, in 2016, four years into his residency at the Ecuadorean embassy, Assange picked up on the social-media meme of placing parentheses symbolizing an echo chamber on either side of the names of Jewish writers.

“Tribalist symbol for establishment climbers? Most of our critics have 3 (((brackets around their names))) & have black-rim glasses. Bizarre,” Assange said on Twitter, in a routine example of anti-Semitic dog-whistling. Shortly afterwards, and getting a taste of his own medicine, a private message sent by Assange in which he insulted the Jewish journalist Raphael Sutter was leaked online. “He’s always been a rat,” Assange said of Sutter. “But he’s Jewish and engaged with the ((()))) issue.”

It would seem, then, that what most agitates Assange about Jews is their clannishness and tribalism, their habit of sticking together politically, their notorious practice of smearing critics as “anti-Semites” and their penetration of the establishment. It’s probably not coincidental that these supposed traits are exactly what Shamir detests about Jews, too, as will be demonstrated by a quick perusal of his ravings."

Lire l'article complet @ JNS

Brice Couturier, journaliste, producteur de radio et essayiste, (FB) écrit à propos de Julian Assange:

"Ce qu’il s’est passé ensuite avec Julian Assange est complexe, mais il en ressort une ligne directrice: le militant antiaméricain s’attaque aux secrets des pays démocratiques, et rarement à ceux de pays totalitaires. Il a travaillé pour Russia Today, la télévision pro-Poutine financée par le Kremlin."