There's a really good chance that the translation that has Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez making very anti-Semitic comments in a Christmas Eve speech is wrong. I received an e-mail from
The rest of the e-mail (I though it necessary to include the entire e-mail, sorry for the length) is below the fold...
I am not absolutely certain the charge is wrong, but I think it probably is, and should be further investigated before being propagated. Already, however, some other Jewish organizations have leaped on this JTA article to attack President Chavez.
I think the charge itself may, if incorrect, bring about great and unnecessary hostility between North American Jews and Chavez and his supporters throughout the Americas.
I wrote privately to urge JTA to explore the issues further through good journalism; my urgings were utterly rejected. So I am more publicly sharing this concern and my own effort at serious investigation (in what I see as the best version of Jewish journalism).
This past Friday (December 30), JTA sent out the following bulletin:
Chavez makes anti-Semitic slur
Venezuela's president said in his Christmas speech that "the descendants of those who crucified Christ" own the riches of the world.
"The world offers riches to all. However, minorities such as the descendants of those who crucified Christ" have become "the owners of the riches of the world," Chavez said Dec. 24 on a visit to a rehabilitation center in the Venezuelan countryside.
When I first read the bulletin, I was both surprised and angry.
Surprised because never has anyone, through all the years of attacks by the US government against Chavez, suggested he was anti-Semitic.
Angry because if he actually said and meant what he is quoted as having said and meant, this is disgusting.
I was angry enough to write the listserves of United for Peace and Justice that I was very concerned, thought maybe there was a way to understand the talk that did not bring the Jews into it at all, but that this needed to be clarified. I quoted the teaching that "Anti-Semitism is the socialism of fools," and added that I had never thought Chavez was in any way a fool.
Now -- suppose you knew that the quote actually read as follows --
The world has enough for all, but for, it turns out that some minorities, descendants of the same ones who crucified Christ, descendants of the same ones who threw Bolivar out of here and also crucified him in their own way at Santa Marta there in Colombia.
What is Bolivar doing there?
That is the point. But at the moment I read the JTA bulletin, I did not know that Bolivar was in fact there. Read on, and you'll see why this matters.
So I sent the JTA bulletin (accurately cited and sourced) to people whom I thought might have some contacts in Venezuela. I got back a comment from an American in Venezuela expressing great surprise, since, she said, no in-country press has quoted President Chavez' Christmas speech to any anti-Semitic effect. She said he usually teaches his views to the public by repeating a theme over and over again, but this has not appeared at all that she knows of.
At that point I did not have a source for the text of the speech in full, since the JTA bulletin did not give one; but I was able to find it here.
The remarks about those who crucified Jesus are on page 18. They are as follows:
Presidente Chávez: Primero, primero hay que reconocer, todos tenemos que reconocer, yo el primero, el gran esfuerzo de ustedes, de los pioneros, de Fabiola, de Juan el Alcalde, de la Dirección de Atención al Ciudadano, al Soberano de la Alcaldía Mayor de Caracas, fíjense ustedes lo importante que es la consolidación política de la Revolución y el avance de la Revolución. Ya lo decía Fabiola, ya lo decía Leida: Un buen día se llevaron de aquí a los ancianos ¿por qué?, le pregunté yo, porque no había dinero, decían, en la Gobernación de Miranda ni en la Gobernación de Caracas seguramente. No había dinero ¿y dónde estaba el dinero? El dinero en Venezuela se concentró... así como en el mundo, porque esto es un fenómeno mundial ¿saben? Acabo de leer esta madrugada el último informe de la Organización de Naciones Unidas sobre la situación del mundo y es alarmante por eso es que digo que hoy más que nunca antes jamás en 2005 años nos hace falta Jesús el Cristo, porque el mundo, el mundo, se está acabando el mundo cada día, cada día, la riqueza del mundo, porque Dios, la naturaleza es sabia, el mundo tiene agua suficiente para que todos tuviéramos agua, el mundo tiene riquezas suficientes, tierras suficientes para producir alimentos para toda la población mundial, el mundo tiene suficientes piedras y minerales para las construcciones, para que no hubiera nadie sin vivienda. El mundo tiene para todos, pues, pero resulta que unas minorías, los descendientes de los mismos que crucificaron a Cristo, los descendientes de los mismos que echaron a Bolívar de aquí y también lo crucificaron a su manera en Santa Marta, allá en Colombia. Una minoría se adueñó de las riquezas del mundo, una minoría se adueñó del oro del planeta, de la plata, de los minerales, de las aguas, de las tierras buenas, del petróleo, de las riquezas, pues, y han concentrado las riquezas en pocas manos: menos del diez por ciento de la población del mundo es dueña de más de la mitad de la riqueza de todo el mundo y a la... más de la mitad de los pobladores del planeta son pobres y cada día hay más pobres en el mundo entero. Nosotros aquí estamos decididos, decididos a cambiar la historia y cada día nos acompaña y nos acompañará mayor cantidad de jefes de Estado, de presidentes y de líderes; vean ustedes cómo el pueblo boliviano... Bolivia, que es el país más pobre de Suramérica y uno de los más pobres del mundo, esa República fundada por Bolívar y por Sucre, esa que lleva el nombre de nuestro Bolívar, esa Bolivia, muy rica es Bolivia: minerales, oro, plata, estaño, petróleo y gas, y tierra muy fértil, y grandes montañas. Sin embargo, es uno de los pueblos más pobres de este planeta, Bolivia, pero los pobres están resucitando y acaban de elegir a un indio, por primera vez en la historia, Presidente de Bolivia.
Please note the following section:
El mundo tiene para todos, pues, pero resulta que unas minorías, los descendientes de los mismos que crucificaron a Cristo, los descendientes de los mismos que echaron a Bolívar de aquí y también lo crucificaron a su manera en Santa Marta, allá en Colombia.
In English --
The world has enough for all, but for, it turns out that some minorities, descendants of the same ones who crucified Christ, descendants of the same ones who threw Bolivar out of here and also crucified him in their own way at Santa Marta there in Colombia.
Please note the parallel between those who crucified Jesus and those who fought against Bolivar.
I know of no one who accuses the Jews of fighting against Bolivar.
And certainly I -- and most Jews -- teach that it was the Roman Empire, and Roman soldiers, who crucified Jesus.
So knowing the presence of the Bolivar piece of the passage, which did not appear in the JTA bulletin, poses at minimum an important doubt to the interpretation of the speech embodied in the JTA headline -- that it was an anti-Semitic slur.
At that point I wrote JTA to raise my concerns.
Meanwhile, my contacts in Venezuela then translated the longer passage, as follows:
On Christmas Eve, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez visited the "Nucleo de Desarrollo Endgeno Manantial de los Sueños," a drug rehab center in the state of Miranda, about an hour and a half from Caracas. Residents and outpatients there get detox if they need it, medical and psychological attention, and vocational training. After talking with the director, staff and participants of the program and celebrating its accomplishments, Chavez started talking about the availability of resources for such efforts. Not long ago, he said, neither the state government of Miranda nor the government in Caracas had any money.
"Where was the money?" Chavez asked. He continued, "Venezuela's money is concentrated, as the world's money is concentrated, because this is a worldwide phenomenon..."
Early this morning I just read the latest report from the U.N. on the world situation and it is alarming. Because of it I say that today more than ever before in 2005 years we need Jesus Christ, because the world is ending every day. Because God, nature, is wise, the world has enough water that all could have water. The world has wealth enough, land enough to produce food for everyone, the world has enough rocks and minerals for construction that no one should be without housing. The world has enough for all, but for, it turns out that some minorities, descendants of the same ones who crucified Christ, descendants of the same ones who threw Bolivar out of here and also crucified him in their own way at Santa Marta there in Colombia. A minority takes over the wealth of the world, a minority takes over the gold of the planet, the silver, the minerals, the waters, the good land, the oil, the wealth and has concentrated the wealth in a few hands. Less than 10 percent of the world's population owns more than half the world's wealth. More than half the population of the planet is poor and every day there are more poor people.
We are determined to change history and every day more heads of state, presidents and leaders join us, and every day more will join us. You see how the Bolivian people... Bolivia, the poorest country in South America and one of the poorest in the world, this republic founded by Bolivar and Sucre, this republic that carries the name of our Bolivar, this Bolivia is very rich: minerals, gold, silver, tin, oil and gas, very fertile land and tall mountains. Without a doubt it has one of the poorest populations of the planet, Bolivia, but the poor have revived and have just elected an Indian president for the first time in history.
This is what I wrote JTA:
To me this sounds more likely to have been an attack on what in English we might call the "heirs," not the "descendants," of those who killed Jesus and fought against Bolivar -- that is, the heirs of the Roman Empire and the Spanish Empire.
For Chavez, as he has said again and again, that means the American Empire.
Whether one agrees with his hostility to the present US government or not, it is not anti-Semitism.
Now even IF that is the correct understanding of the speech, the phrasing is both careless and dangerous. It is hardly surprising, given the history of the Jewish people, that a reporter reading the speech without knowing much about Chavez would take it as anti-Semitic. And it certainly behooves us to find out -- I would say, neither assuming it is nor assuming it is not.
I asked for and received comments from my contacts in Venezuela - from people who know Venezuela and the Chavezian rhetoric well, who are independent-minded - open to disagreement with Chavez but not members of the intense opposition to Chavez that attempted to overthrow his elected government.
They said -- even before I had tried out my hunch or hypothesis about the "crucifiers" as the empires, not the Jews -- that after studying the speech they had come to much the same thought.
I still do not view this as a settled question. If the speech was intended as anti-Semitic, we must not only denounce it but try to reeducate Chavez. If it was not so intended, then we need to correct whatever misimpression of it that North American Jews might have given or taken, and he needs to understand what dangerous language he is flirting with.
But surely until we on further examination become convinced that the "anti-Semitic" interpretation of the speech is correct, we need not go running to recruit a new and powerful person into the bands of anti-Semites. There are already more than enough without our recruiting for them!
I suggest that until more is learned, serious Jews and responsible citizens of all communities should take this assumption as not yet substantiated, and hold in abeyance either believing it or not believing it.
How do we learn more?
In the meantime, I urge that JTA say publicly that serious doubts have been raised concerning the interpretation of the speech as anti-Semitic, and that JTA asks readers to suspend judgment on this question.
Since both Western folk wisdom and Jewish teaching remind us that false accusations run far more swiftly than the truth to correct them, I urge JTA to issue such a statement right away.
Shalom,
Arthur
Rabbi Arthur Waskow
The Shalom Center
The managing editor of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency utterly rejected this line of thought. He utterly rejected the possibility that anyone at all had ever or would ever talk about "Christ-killers" without meaning the Jews. He refused to examine the matter further by any investigations in Venezuela, and shrugged off the Bolivar reference as irrelevant (though Bolivar is in fact the central hero of Chavez' life and politics).
Already the Simon Wiesenthal Center has accepted the JTA's premise without thinking further. Other Jewish organizations will probably do the same.
This is incredibly dangerous. If my hypothesis is correct, this behavior by leading organizations in the North American Jewish community can turn Chavez and his supporters into enemies for no reason. If my hunch is incorrect, we can find out by checking the facts in Venezuela.
Only two interests are served by jumping off this cliff: those of the Bush Administration, which is intensely hostile to Chavez, and those of Jewish organizations that gain politically or financially from such alarms.
I repeat: I am by no means claiming that for sure Chavez' comments had nothing to do with the Jews. But I am claiming that decent Jewish ethics, prudent Jewish self-protection, and honest journalism all require further investigation.