In brief, my point was that stipulating a degree of truth to the author's claims of anti-Semitism among the left, it should not be surprising for several reasons.

• The Holocaust was the end result of the same sort of general perspective as the left wing typically holds. The causes and issues of the left might change, but they are ungrounded in traditional morality and ethics, are generally willing to shortcut around or through traditional strictures and restraints to achieve their ideals, which are generally aimed at objectives beyond human experience. This actually serves to justify their cutting loose from approved, proven or tested methods and codes, because they are trying to get somewhere those ways have never led.

In the early 20th century, the Progressive mentality embraced many positions and beliefs that were, in hindsight, rather monstrous and inhuman when taken to their logical extreme. The Nazis were not a reversion or reaction in support of tradition or established mores, they were every bit as iconoclastic and unconstrained as the anarchists, socialists and utopians who predated them. The traditionalists and conservatives opposed the Nazis on the same grounds and for the same reasons they opposed others who used Progress as their goal and justification.

It should not be surprising therefore, that people as ethically and morally rootless and relativistic keep falling into the same mistakes, since they deliberately part from tradition, which is the experience of generations, in an effort to transcend the known limitations of traditional methods. Ultimately, however personally moral a liberal might be, at the heart, he has no authority or firm guideposts on which to base that morality.

• The various arguments and behaviors the author describes being used against the Jews or Israel or Zionism are entirely typical of liberalism in general. The author seems at times to be under the impression that because they use such dishonest and facile arguments and unprincipled tactics, they harbor anti-semitic sentiments. In fact, conservatives are all to familiar with all of the described methods of attack, and they only appear unique to the author, because the author is unused to be being their target. Furthermore, the author commits the same errors or sins attributed to these liberal anti-Semites in a number of points.

• The author makes the particularly striking claim attributing the perceived anti-Semitism among liberals to the influence of the Soviet Union, among the western left, citing the persecution of Jews under Stalin in the last years of his reign. In the first place, that Soviet influence has always been a point of heated contention. If the USSR reached so deeply into the community of Western liberalism, it would certainly justify Joe McCarthy's complaint. McCarthy was not calling for an anti-communist pogrom, he was contending that the communist associations and affiliations of numerous individuals with government positions within the national security apparatus made them security risks. If the USSR has the reach and influence the author claims was used to poison the left against the Jews, McCarthy was absolutely right.

Secondly regardless of the influence of the Soviets in the west, the Jewish purges after the war were not necessarily indicative of anti-Semitism within the USSR and Soviet government, nor proof that the USSR was the source of the alleged anti-Semitism in the West. As in the points above, Stalin's treatment of the Jews at the end of his life was almost identical to his treatment of various other groups and factions he took it into his head to liquidate and purge. His change of position on Jews is typical of a man who routinely consigned former friends to concentration camps and death. Furthermore, his opposition to anti-Semitism at the beginning of his reign may be attributed to his need for the loyalties of the significant Jewish Communist membership, when the USSR was a pariah state. Once his power was secure, and he had extended his control over half of Europe, and the rest of his potential domestic rivals were purged or neutered, that same Jewish bloc represented one of the last groups left in the USSR with motivations and loyalties that could be turned against him, so their purging was simply a matter of time. It was very unlikely to be solely motivated by their positive reaction to the notion of Israel or Golda Meier's visit.

• Throughout the article, the author repeatedly demonstrates a complete blindness to how other situations might be more important or more significant than Jewish issues, that people might have other priorities than those of the Zionist community, or that anything other than total acquiescence to the Zionist position and acknowledgement of their moral supremacy might not be as bad as being actual Nazis.

• The tactics of liberals in an immediate sense, beyond their long-term goals to save the human race or planet or remake either in their approved image, are either about getting support or self-congratulation. In that vein, the Jews offer them nothing. In the US, at least, Jews block vote for Democrats almost as heavily as do blacks, so there is no need to pander to them, and they don't have the numbers to matter anyway. Regarding the feel-good stuff, the Jews don't fit the liberal narrative, so they don't make good victims to champion, and certainly not as good as their enemies. When such enemies were prototypical white males, in one of the most prosperous, advanced and powerful nations, it was a different thing, but being surrounded by poor, semi-literate savages of stereotypicaly darker coloration, who are traditional enemies of Western civilization really negates your value as a target of liberal advocacy. Liberals' interest in the crimes against the Jews is in the mechanism itself, due to the outrage and horror it evoked, so they might use it as a basis for comparison to demonize and vilify other targets, particularly since Hitler's rise was so politically innocuous, and thus containing elements which permit many superficial comparisons. The Jews might be confused seeing all the attention and outrage, and assume that sympathy for their position would naturally go hand in hand, but they are really only interested in scoring points in politics or in self-serving discussions.

Finally, the success of Israel, and their subsequent violation of the key elements of the liberal narrative make them uncomfortable, however natural the flow of events has been. Liberals score political and conversational points by championing the disenfranchised, marginalized or victimized, and by identifying with them. They, as mentioned above, promote utopian and idealized solutions, promising outcomes never before achieved (and then congratulate themselves for their boldness and daring, instead of worrying about wagering the fates of nations and people on unproven strategies). The empowerment of victims is one such liberal prescription, but the in one of the most striking cases where it was actually tried, the Zionist solution to the sufferings of the Jews, the success of the outcome did not support, but contradicted the liberal promises. Meanwhile, to anyone who has observed the cycle of abuse in individuals should recognize that the liberal demands to empower victims would only see power concentrated in the hand of those prone to make more victims. Child abuse does not produce children with compassion and a tendency toward kindness and tolerance, and the near extermination of a people through state-mandated violence does not produce a nation inclined to make allowances for their enemies' points of view, or compromise on perceived threats.

Long story short, it's not anti-semitism. Liberals, whether modern Western politicos and wonks and academics or Josef Stalin, have only been interested in what the Jews could do for them, and once the Jewish situation altered so that they no longer fit the role liberals had in mind for them, and especially once their enemies fit it even better, the Jews were treated just as Stalin or the left treats anyone else standing in their way. Every instance given by the author of the article of anti-Semitism is merely a case of criticizing Israel. Setting aside the issue of whether or not the two are one and the same (they aren't), the examples given by the author of anti-Semitic/anti-Zionist arguments, statements or behaviors of the left are entirely typical of standard leftwing, liberal tactics. Especially tactics against anyone facing off against an underdog with the characteristics commonly embraced by liberals. Likewise with Stalin. When the Jews were a useful member of his coalition, he defended them, and when he was in a secure position, he turned on them as he turned on his mentor, on his fellow Old Bolsheviks, on his military leadership and against any other domestic group which could conceivable serve as a power base for anyone other than Stalin himself. The author may be right about anti-Semitism, but all the examples given in the article fit into a pattern of typical liberal behavior, and their changing degree of sympathy and support for Israel fits within the usual criteria for clients of liberal advocacy or targets of liberal criticism.

Liberals from Stalin don't hate the Jews any more than they hate anyone else who has their act together and adheres to traditional mores or values or loyalties or methods of success and survival. The problems perceived by the author are not about their feelings toward Jews as such, but are hardwired into the DNA of the leftwing. The author's prescription for an honest discussion/debate on Israeli issues and treatment of Palestinians are completely against the liberal approach to any and all other issues.