Germany is one of the worst countries to live for people with a conscience. Right now, grand children of Nazis, such as anti-Semitismus czar Felix Klein (who likes to be referred to as Doctor) are telling Jews opposing Apratheid in Israel that they are anti-Semitic, while simultaneously considering the proposed ethnic cleansing of Gaza by Trump as being “worth looking into”. “Doctor” Klein makes a lot of noise about the need to resist right wing extremism in Europe whilst simultaneously deyning that the Israeli government has been very proactive in cultivating relationships with the same parties.
This absolute perversion is the hallmark of kakistocracy. The fact that the German government is becoming increasingly nervous about the protests against genocide and can only respond by cracking down harder, for which the term anti-Semitism has to be increasingly inflated, again shows the combination of defilement and cowardice corrupting the Establishment. Having embraced the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism is also convincing proof that German political culture has actually rejected to take its own history seriously. The definition is based on conflating a state with an ethno-national group, as if the two are interchangeable, and this is exactly how the Third Reich was able to portray all Jews as enemies of the German State because they are not Aryans. Thus, when the IHRA states that “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour” is anti-Semitic, this would mean that every collective calling itself “a people” – including Aryans – can justify their racist endeavours as part of exercising the right to self-determination. Then any attempt to stop a genocide – for example in Rwanda – would be akin to the evil of anti-Semitism.
At the surface, tracing the conflations of religion to ethno-nation and of state to ethno-nation (ethnocracy) thus reveal “ethno-nation” as a key factor of kakistocracy; every ethnocracy is at its core a kakistocracy. Hence, a critical historical analysis should look into the genesis of conception of ethno-nationhood as part of the Establishment. Many books have been written about the birth of nationalism and it is a rich field of historical analysis. There is no need to regurgitate all the arguments and debates here, but there seems to be a widespread consensus that nationhood has been transformed from a mostly kinship and clan-based tribal formation, closely associated with the etymology of nation, meaning “birth”, into a much more abstract “imagined community” that was territorially anchored and controlled as part of an estate. This may seem like a justification for linking nationhood to ethnicity, as the latter also has a strong base in kinship relations and tribal forms. However, that would require the obfuscation of one major element: the incest taboo. As Claude Lévi-Strauss has argued, the incest taboo was a major factor in governing inter-tribal relationships, including celebrations, hospitality, trade and warfare. No tribe would survive without multi-ethnic sociality. Thus: the links between family, tribe and nationhood are not simply all bridged by ethnicity; notions of tribal kinship are not exclusively defined by family-bloodlines (see Marilyn Strathern and Donna Haraway). It is at this point, that we can no longer -understand nationhood without gender, sexuality and – in certainly also in the European context – patriarchy.
In most patriarchal systems, the concept of ethno-nationalism suggests that identities always follow the paternal bloodlines. In this context, women are being referred to as objects of trade or raids, their ethnic lineage automatically changes once they have been adopted into the oikos of the tribe. Often it is suggested that Judaism is an exception to this, where the obligation to pass on the adherence to the 613 laws of the Thora passes via the maternal bloodline. With the secularization of Judaism amongst larger sections of the Jewish populations in Europe, the religious obligations became marginalized and being Jewish simply meant having a Jewish mother.
However, and I am speculating here, one thing that may have amplified the scapegoating of European Jews, which has been traced back to at least the 12th Century, is the fact their conception of ethnicity follows the maternal bloodlines, rather than the paternal ones. In a patriarchal system, where men control women, this may engender (literally) an anxiety over loyalty conflicts. Jews could infiltrate tribal collective but be secretly loyal to another. This may also explain, why in the IHRA definition, one symptom of anti-Semitism is defined as: Accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations. If this is true, then one of the major factors in the institutionalization of anti-Semitism is patriarchy itself, rather than Christianity, which is the most often cited root cause (in the Gospel of St Matthew, the Jewish leadership are particularly negatively portrayed in the persecution and crucifixion of Jesus Christ).
I hope to have now planted a seed, that one should always remember to include gender, sexuality and patriarchy into every analysis of nationhood and nationalism. It is much more convincing to understand anti-Semitism as a fear of an enemy within than as a mere religious-ideological conviction. The first is much more visceral, embodied and libidinal. The latter is primarily intellectual and abstracted. Of course, such endeavours may help to legitimate and justify the anxieties over enemies-within, but they are probably more secondary, as helpful justifications of possible cognitive dissonance (as most of us probably know many Jews that are very good people).
Disaffected Sociology 
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