[Marxism] The Madoff Victims: Schadenfreude, Not Anti-Semitism

[Dbachmozart@xxxxxxx]

by Daniel McGowan / December 22nd, 2008 
 
As the news of Bernard Madoffâs colossal fraud focused on Americaâs most  
â
importantâ Jewish tycoons and moguls, it was only a matter of hours before 
the  
story was spun around their victimhood with the usual cudgels of â
anti-Semitismâ  and the Holocaust. In Israel, columnist Bradley Burston spun 
the story 
best by  declaring, âThe anti-Semiteâs new Santa is Bernard Madoff. â The 
Aryan 
Nation at  its most delusional couldnât have come up with anything to rival 
this.â 
As the list of Madoffâs âvictimsâ grows, their common characteristic is 
not  
philanthropy, but rather political Zionism. Virtually all have worked to 
build a  Jewish state with little regard, and often downright hatred, for the 
non-Jewish  population living there. 
The money from this type of mogul or âganzer macherâ has been used to  
dehumanize and depopulate non-Jews in Palestine for over 120 years. But in 
spite  
of creating a strong Israeli economy based on guns, diamonds, and security  
services and in spite of walling Arabs in Bantustans in the West Bank and in 
the  
KZ lager known as Gaza, they have failed. Non-Jews outnumber Jews within the  
borders controlled by Israel, which makes a mockery out of calling it a 
Jewish  state. 
Schadenfreude is defined to be largely unanticipated delight in the suffering 
 of another which is recognized as well deserved. Political Zionism deserves  
scorn and derision; it is racist and antithetical to what Americans profess 
to  hold self-evident: that all men and women are created equal and that we 
should  share equal rights of citizenship. When rich Zionists lose a piece of 
their  portfolios, especially to the guile of one of their own, it is a 
delight. 
The press was first to report Madoffâs pilfering of the Robert Lappin  â
Charitableâ Foundation, an organization whose âmission is helping to keep 
our  
children Jewish, thus reversing the trend of assimilation and intermarriage.â 
If 
 the reader has trouble seeing the blatant racism here, substitute âWhiteâ 
for  âJewishâ and imagine it was the stated goal of the David Duke 
Charitable  
Foundation. 
While Mr. Burston found Madoffâs bilking of âfellow Jews, even Holocaust  
survivorsâ particularly outrageous, there are those who find divine justice 
in  
seeing one fraud defraud another. Elie Wiesel and his Foundation for Humanity  
would certainly qualify. Here is a man who has made millions peddling his  
narrative on the deaths of Jews in World War II; his novel, Night, is  
mandatory 
reading for most high school students; questioning it in any way  invites 
charges of âanti-Semitismâ and âHolocaust Denial.â He has been feted by 
 
Presidents and holds dozens of honorary degrees. If there were a CEO of the  
Holocaust Industry (a term coined by Norman Finkelstein), surely it would be 
The  
Great Weasel. 
Wieselâs Foundation claims to combat indifference, intolerance and injustice  
through programs to promote acceptance, understanding, and equality. Yet he  
remains persistently indifferent to over 60 years of suffering of the  
Palestinian people and treats them with silence or as the âuntermenschenâ 
his  
people once were under the Nazis. Wiesel boasts of having worked for the  
terrorists of the Jewish Irgun, not as a fighter but as a journalist, and he  
steadfastly refuses to apologize for the massacre by his employer at Deir  
Yassin. As a 
devout Zionist there is no way he can endorse one state in  Israel/Palestine 
with equal rights of citizenship for all. 
Other victims of Madoffâs deception, like the Shapiro Family Foundation and  
the Chais Family Foundation, are undoubtedly genuinely philanthropic and  
well-meaning. But insofar as their gifts support Jews-only education, medicine, 
 
and social programs in Israel, they deserve the derision that would be accorded 
 to Aryan philanthropists or others who support a racist state, one whose 
very  laws favor one chosen group over all the rest. 
Madoffâs clients were not just generous Jews; they were Jews who directly or  
indirectly support the racism inherent in political Zionism. They support the 
 assimilation of Ethiopian Jews (a noble enterprise), but reject the 
assimilation  of Israeli Arabs and the Palestinians caged in West Bank and 
Gaza. They 
support  âbirthrightâ trips for young American Jews in hopes they will 
settle 
in Israel,  but not the âBirthright Unpluggedâ educational trips of Hannah 
Mermelstein or  the work of Jeff Halperâs Israeli Committee Against Home 
Demolitions. 
Madoffâs wealthy victims build ever more Holocaust memorials with the message 
 âNever Forgetâ but ignore the current siege and starvation of Gaza to 
which 
they  contribute financially and by their silence. Like The Great Weasel, 
they simply  dismiss the analogy as âunworthy.â Where is the Spielberg 
movie of 
the Gaza  ghetto that isolates three times as many people as the Warsaw Ghetto 
and in  worse conditions? Where is the support for _Righteous Jews_ 
(http://www.righteousjews.org/)  like former Princeton  University law 
professor 
Richard Falk, who calls what Israel is doing to the 1.5  million Palestinians 
in 
Gaza âa crime against humanity?â Falk has condemned the  collective 
punishment 
of the Palestinians in Gaza as âa flagrant and massive  violation of 
international humanitarian law as laid down in Article 33 of the  Fourth Geneva 
Convention.â 
Cast in terms of their impact on the struggle for Palestinian human rights,  
it is difficult not to plead guilty to schadenfreude caused by the greed of  
Bernard Madoff. In fact, my only regret is that Edgar Bronfman and Alan  
Dershowitz were not among his preferred clients. 
Daniel McGowan is Professor Emeritus at Hobart and William Smith  Colleges. 
He can be reached at: _mcgowan@xxxxxxxx (mailto:mcgowan@xxxxxxx) . _Read other 
articles  by Daniel_ (http://www.dissidentvoice.org/author/DanielMcGowan/) . 
<_http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/12/the-madoff-victims-they-richly-deserve
d-it/_ 
(http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/12/the-madoff-victims-they-richly-deserved-it/)
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