Antisemitic Calumny: “Jews have too much power in the financial world”

ADL Global 100 Survey: A majority of people in 48 of 102 countries and territories surveyed say it is probably true that Jews have too much power in the business world^[1][1] https://global100.adl.org/did-you-know

ADL-Global-100-Survey-Responses-to-Jews-have-to-much-power-in-the-financial-world-1 Download

Selected Surveys:

• CNN European Poll 2018: 28% believe Jews have “too much influence” in business and finance, while 20% felt Jews had the same excessive influence in media and politics^[2][2] https://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2018/11/europe/antisemitism-poll-2018-intl/
• Survey 2020: “1 in 5 Europeans say secret Jewish cabal runs the world”^[3][3] https://www.timesofisrael.com/1-in-5-europeans-say-secret-jewish-cabal-runs-the-world-survey-finds/
• Survey 2014: 59% of Koreans believe Jews have too much power in the business world^[4][4] https://global100.adl.org/country/south-korea/2014
• Survey 2019: 72% of Ukrainians, 71 percent% of Hungarians, 56% of Poles, and 50% of Russians agreed Jews have too much power in the business world^[5][5] https://www.adl.org/news/press-releases/adl-global-survey-of-18-countries-finds-hardcore-anti-semitic-attitudes-remain
• France Survey 2014:  74% of respondents who self-identified as observant Muslims agreed with the statement that Jews have too much influence on French economics compared to 25% in the general population. The assertion that Jews control the media received an approval rating of 23% in the general population group and 70% among practicing Muslims^[6][6] https://www.timesofisrael.com/french-muslims-see-jews-controlling-nations-economy-media/
• IPSOS (Feb. 2021): 63% of French says advocating for Israel’s destruction is antisemitic and 61% many antisemites “are trying to make their ideas respectable by attacking Israel rather than the Jews.” 33% agreed that antisemitism should be a “priority issue” for the government and law enforcement, while another 55% saw it as an “important subject, but not a priority.”
• European Poll 2009: “Roughly 30% of Europeans in seven countries surveyed in 2009 specifically accused Jews to a greater or lesser extent for the considerable misery and injury caused by, and further threatened by, the global economic and financial crisis at that time.”^[7][7] Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. The Devil That Never Dies (pp. 268). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition.

• Hungary (July 2021): “Around one-third of Hungarians hold either moderately antisemitic views or strong ones” 23% of Hungarians can be described as strongly antisemitic and 16% are moderately antisemitic, according to the poll that was carried out in November and December of 2019 by Medián Opinion and Market Research Ltd. on behalf of the Federation of Hungarian Jewish Communities, or Mazsihisz. 

• 23% of respondents stated that “The number of Jews in certain occupations should be limited” 

• 29% of respondents mostly or completely agreed that intellectuals of Jewish descent keep the media and culture under their control.

• 36% agreed that “[t]here is a secret Jewish network determining political and economic processes”

• 32% agreed that “[t]here is an excessive influence of the Jews in Hungary today”

• 15% stated that “[i]t would be best if the Jews left the country” 

• 19% agreed that “[t]he suffering of the Jews was God’s punishment.”

• Pope Francis (Sept. 2021): “I think of the threat of antisemitism still lurking in Europe and elsewhere. This is a fuse that must not be allowed to burn….” Pope Francis warned on Sunday of “the threat of antisemitism” in Europe and beyond in an address to Christian and Jewish leaders during a brief visit to Hungary, where he also met anti-migration premier Viktor Orban. …“I think of the threat of antisemitism still lurking in Europe and elsewhere. This is a fuse that must not be allowed to burn….”
   

Comment on Calumny: “Too Much Jewish Power”

Goldhagen explains:^[8][8] Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. The Devil That Never Dies (pp. 267). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition. “Being asked a question about Jews’ excessive business power actually makes sense to those being asked. This in itself is astonishing. To them we should ask: What does the aspect of people’s identity—among the many other aspects of their identity – that happens to be Jewish have to do with them being businessmen or businesswomen? On the face of it: nothing. … So the very identification of people’s defining identity when they are in business as Jews –instead of as just being Italian or French … or, for that matter, just businessmen and -women operating in a market economy—is in itself marking Jews as fundamentally different….” 

“Again, the statement begs the question of why international bankers and currency traders who happen to be Jews would be defined as Jews, why such Jews’ having such power (whatever that means) let alone too much power would be bad—for what evil are the supposed Jews supposedly using such power? …”^[9][9] Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. The Devil That Never Dies (pp. 267). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition “What could this mean? … Power is always potentially dangerous. Otherwise, no one would talk about power or certainly about Jews having too much of it. Because if it were not dangerous or at least problematic in some substantial if ill-defined way, then it would make no sense to say that Jews possess too much of it. … [Furthermore] the number of each of the European countries’ Jews is between tiny and minuscule.  …  The largest percentage that Jews compose of any of the European Union’s large countries is in France. How big? Less than 1 percent. The number is seven-tenths of 1 percent. Yet twenty-two million French are preoccupied enough with alleged Jewish power in business that they are concerned this tiny minority has too much power….”^[10][10] Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. The Devil That Never Dies (pp. 262-264). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition “… Such a large number of Europeans projecting such culpability upon Jews is a clear instance of how a general antisemitic belief or orientation leads people to be ready to accept new accusations and specific accusations of Jews’ supposed malfeasance as being true … [and] predisposes people to expand and intensify their antisemitism in all kinds of circumstances, ones that have something to do with Jews and ones that do not.”^[11][11] Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. The Devil That Never Dies (pp. 269). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition

The Guardian: 60% of Europeans believe Israel poses a greater threat to world peace than Iran and North Korea.”^[12][12] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/nov/03/eu.israel

 (A poll in 2003 also showed that 59% of Europeans held that Israel is the number one threat to world peace including 74% of the Dutch and 65% of Germans)^[13][13] https://www.dw.com/en/eu-poll-names-israel-greatest-threat-to-world-peace/a-1022127

French Survey 2018: 53% agreed that “Zionism is an international organization that seeks to influence the world and societies to the Jews’ benefit”^[14][14] https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-french-poll-majority-say-zionism-is-a-jewish-conspiracy/

“At the same time, 54% of respondents agreed that anti-Zionism is a form of anti-Semitism and 59% agreed that Zionism is a “movement of liberation and emancipation for the Jewish people.”^[15][15] https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-french-poll-majority-say-zionism-is-a-jewish-conspiracy/

Poll: 44% of UK Muslims back antisemitic conspiracy theories^[16][16] https://www.timesofisrael.com/44-of-uk-muslims-back-anti-semitic-conspiracy-theories-poll-finds/

The Savanta-ComRes poll finds that 34% of British Muslims believe Jews have too much control over the global banking system. The ICM Unlimited poll reports that 18% of British adults share this view. Thirty-three percent of British Muslims also believe that Jews have a disproportionate influence in politics. That view fell to 15% of Britons at large, according to ICM Unlimited.

Times of Israel, 21^st Century Blood Libel (June 2021): The pandemic has “unleashed a unique worldwide wave of antisemitism”: “This new type of antisemitism … includes conspiracy theories alongside medieval blood libels” “that accuses Jews and Israel of either causing the virus or standing to benefit from it.”

A report published Tuesday by a Tel Aviv research group found that the coronavirus pandemic has become a vehicle for an intense and exceptional wave of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionist propaganda that accuses Jews and Israel of either causing the virus or standing to benefit from it.

“This new type of antisemitism, which partly reiterates classic antisemitic themes, includes conspiracy theories alongside medieval blood libels, now renewed in a 21st century format….”  The researchers also pointed to anti-Semitic sentiments by those who see the virus as divine punishment of Jews and to Holocaust imagery used by those protesting lockdown restrictions.

Oxford University Survey 2020: One in five English people believe to some degree that Jews created COVID-19 to collapse the economy for financial gain^[17][17] https://main.knesset.gov.il/EN/News/PressReleases/Pages/press6720q.aspx

Argentina Survey (Aug. 2021): 40% believes “Jewish businessmen” are benefiting from the COVID-19 pandemic:  The study was published at the end of June by the Laboratory of Studies on Democracy and Authoritarianism at the University of San Martín. Award-winning columnist and broadcaster Jorge Lanata asserted on his radio show: “We also think that we are not antisemitic. In many ways, this is an antisemitic country.” He went on to argue that “myths about the Jews are part of our popular culture — we do not say so openly because it looks bad.”

Australian State of Queensland Survey (Aug. 2021): A full 60% of community members had experienced antisemitism.

Continue Reading:Attitudes Towards Jews as Friends, Neighbors and Fellow Citizens

Click Here