Following the backlash against fellow Harry Potter actress Emma Watson for allowing a group to post an anti-Israel meme on her Instagram account, Miriam Margolyes has spoken out. And by spoken out, I mean utterly disgraced herself.
It all went down in this interview with Middle East Eye.
Note how Margolyes paints all Israelis with the same brush when she snarls “And you can only expect the Israelis to respond in the way they did.” How so? Isn’t she aware of the truism “two Jews three opinions”? Israeli society is very polarized on all kinds of issues, including the expression of solidarity with palestinian Arabs. Has she not read Ha’aretz laterly? By painting us as monolithic, Margolyes is betraying her bigotry against us.
The same goes for her statement “Indeed, any criticism of Israel is regarded as being antisemitic.” This is actually a favorite retort of haters when confronted with actual antisemitism. No, we do not regard any criticism of Israel as antisemitic, and to suggest so is offensive. Take the responses to the Emma Watson fiasco for instance. Danny Danon did call Watson antisemitic, and he got roundly criticized for it by his fellow Israelis and Jews – including by yours truly.
But perhaps the biggest doozy of them all is when Margolyes blurts out that she does not think Israel should have ever been brought into existence. This is not about the so-called 1967 occupation, this is about Israel’s very existence.
So she can “as a Jew” us all she likes. Her comments betray the fact she thinks very lowly of Jews in Israel and denies us the right to self-determination.
She did get one thing right, though.
