I carry no candle for the German-nationalist Third Lager in Austria, with its rabid capitalism and anticlericalism. But Jörg Haider was never in government nationally, whereas Avigdor Lieberman is now Israel's Foreign Minister. So, can we expect Israel to receive anything even remotely approaching the vilification and the pariah status heaped on Austria after the FPÖ entered government in 2000?
If not, why not?
After all, Haider was a member of the native population fighting, as he saw it, against immigrants. Whereas Lieberman is an immigrant fighting against the native population, Arab and Haredi (for a start) alike.
But then, secular Ashkenazi immigrant hostility to Arabs and to Orthodox Jews alike has been the defining characteristic of the Zionist project from the start. Does it now stand exposed by, and in the person of, someone picturesquely naïve enough to take it at face value? I almost hope so.
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