Criticizing Israel's Gaza action not anti-Semitism

By Jan 2, Israel's military adventurism in the Gaza Strip had claimed the lives of more than 22,000 people, the majority being women and children, inviting a wave of criticism and condemnation from around the world. But some Israeli and Western media outlets have chosen to target Chinese netizens, accusing them of "anti-Semitism" for criticizing Israel's military policy. Such criticism, if not an attempt to confuse right and wrong and to call a stag a horse, is an attempt to deny history or misrepresent it.

The term "anti-Semitism" refers to prejudice, discrimination and hatred against Jews, their religion and culture. Since the time of the Diaspora, Jews scattered across the world have faced anti-Semitism. They have been discriminated against, expelled from different lands and even massacred because of their ethnicity and religion. They have been forced to wear special markings, move into ghettos and pay extra protection fees to governments. The Holocaust, perpetrated by Hitler in the 1930s and 1940s, is the worst genocide in history and a tragic irony of modern Western civilization.

In contrast, a thriving Jewish community once flourished in Kaifeng, capital of China during the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127). The Jews, known locally as the "blue-capped Huihui", eventually integrated into Chinese society, making it the only anthropological case of Jewish assimilation in a non-Jewish society.