New Article: Yoram Hazony and Jair Bolsonaro: A Bashert Made in Alt-Right Heaven
David Shasha
Yoram Hazony and Jair Bolsonaro: A Bashert Made in Alt-Right Heaven
I was quite intrigued to receive the following announcement from our longtime friend Yoram Hazony in his e-mail newsletter:
https://jerusalemletters.com/the-virtue-of-nationalism-in-brazil/
Here is the announcement:
The Virtue of Nationalism in Brazil
I know this period of quarantines and closures has been
difficult for many of you. Here in Jerusalem, Yael and I have had most of our
kids home for the last nine weeks. Despite the difficulties, there has been a
lot of growth and bonding as well as we all learned to live together and get to
know each other better. Israel is doing better for now, with only one new case
of the virus reported today. Our youngest kids are returning to school this
week, and we’re praying for the best.
I wanted to share with you a video that I found quite moving. As you probably
know, my book The Virtue of Nationalism is being translated
into a dozen languages foreign languages. Before the virus hit and slowed some
of these editions down, the book had already appeared in Italian, Hungarian,
and Portuguese.
In each country in which the book is published, it stirs up a renewed debate over
the question of nationalism versus the post-nationalist “liberal international
order.” No two nations are the same (which is, of course, the whole point), and
so it is fascinating to see the way in which The Virtue of Nationalism,
appearing in translation, is understood by friends working hard to draw
attention to its message in another nation with its own unique culture and
concerns.
Below is a video from the book launch in Brazil (in Portuguese with English
subtitles). It features Evandro Pontes, a prominent law professor who
translated The Virtue of Nationalism into Portuguese, which
was published last year. On December 11, 2019, Pontes spoke about the meaning
of the book for Brazilians—and for him personally—at an event about the book
sponsored by Brazil's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Alexandre de Gusmão Foundation
(FUNAG). He is introduced by Roberto Goidanich, President of the Alexandre de
Gusmão Foundation.
Thank you to everyone in Brazil who made the Portuguese translation, as well as
this meaningful event, possible!
The Hazony book event was of course sponsored by the Far Right Brazilian government:
Jair Bolsonaro is one of the most notorious Trumpist Fascists in the international Alt-Right alliance:
He has praised Pinochet, expressed support for torturers and called for political opponents to be shot, earning him the label of “the most misogynistic, hateful elected official in the democratic world”.
But he built a successful campaign on fear over rising violent crime, anger over repeated corruption scandals and an efficient social media operation.
“To his supporters Bolsonaro represents law and order and that’s a very compelling message in a country with 60,000 homicides a year and the biggest corruption scandal ever detected anywhere,” Brian Winter, the editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly, told the Guardian earlier this year.
He is not fond of the minorities:
Bolsonaro is widely loathed by political opponents for his inflammatory attacks on women, black people, gay people, foreigners and indigenous communities, for which he was fined and even faced charges of inciting hate speech.
His attitude towards women is pure Trump:
In 2015 he was ordered to pay compensation to a fellow member of congress for saying that she wasn’t “worth raping”.
I have spent a good deal of time discussing Hazony’s reactionary Zionist extremism:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!searchin/Davidshasha/hazony/davidshasha/yjAI5OTMF_U/8IbN9KpXBQAJ
Here is my article on The Virtue of Nationalism:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!searchin/Davidshasha/hazony/davidshasha/zKBuLzktVLA/usKOVtVTCwAJ
Hazony is naturally a very enthusiastic Trumpist:
https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/01/opinions/trump-nationalism-history-opinion-hazony/index.html
So, it comes as no surprise that he is all in with the odious Bolsonaro:
That’s right, Hazony’s buddy believes that the Holocaust can be “forgiven”!
Just give the Nazis a mulligan on that one.
Indeed, it makes perfect sense given his racism and xenophobia:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/03/01/bolsonaros-plan-legalize-crimes-against-indigenous-peoples
Like Trump, Brazil’s strongman does not care about human rights, but does care a lot about corporate greed, as he promotes the previously-illegal raping of the Brazilian rainforest:
Many Indigenous lands in the Amazon are suffering drastically from gold mining and its associated deforestation, according to Instituto Socioambiental (ISA), a non-profit organization. The Yanomami Indigenous people, for example, have reported that encroachment by thousands of wildcat miners in their territory has been associated with increased mercury poisoning, which has devasting consequences for health that can lead to lifelong disability and in extreme cases death.. Instituto FioCruz, a public research center of the Health Ministry, analyzed hair samples from women and children in two Yanomami communities and found that the majority had mercury concentrations above the limit established by the World Health Organization (WHO).
The new bill comes at a time when FUNAI, the federal agency tasked with defending Indigenous rights, is severely weakened and in many areas of the Amazon incapable of carrying out its mandate. In addition, despite suffering two massive mining disasters in the last five years, in Mariana and Brumadinho, which claimed the lives of hundreds of people, supervision of mining operations in Brazil remains quite deficient. In Pará, a state almost three times the size of Spain with extensive mining operations, there were only four mining inspectors in October 2019, according to media reports. In this context, opening up Indigenous territories for mining is recipe for abuse.
This corporatist racism makes Bolsonaro the perfect Hazony ally.
Once again, it is important to note how the Jewish radicals have moved further and further into the world of the Alt-Right Fascists; the very people whose nativism has caused so much suffering to us over the course of our history.
David Shasha