Is Malaysia pushing for a “second Holocaust against the Jewish people”?
American academic Bruce Gilley certainly thinks so.
The professor of political science from Portland State University made a statement to that effect In a talk titled “Will Malaysia Become an Active Middle Power” at Universiti Malaya on April 23. Other than purporting that Malaysia has genocidal intent against the Jews, the professor also supposedly downplayed Malaysia’s ties with the US.
“‘A country whose political leaders advocate a second Holocaust against the Jewish people will never be a serious player in world affairs, and will certainly never be a friend or partner of the US,’ from my keynote address yesterday in KL on Malaysian foreign policy,” he wrote in a post on X yesterday.
“This has been a long-standing vice of Malaysian politicians going back to (former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s) advice to learn from the Germans on how to kill Jews.
“Most explicitly, in October, agriculture (and food security) minister Mohamad Sabu promised a rally that ‘Israel will soon disappear’,” he added.
There are a few things that I would like to say as a Malaysian to the professor’s comment.
The first is that if Gilley’s remarks are representative of the American viewpoint towards Malaysia, we can forget about thinking of America as our friend or partner. The way that Gilley was talking to us in his keynote address, is how a master talks to their servants, not how a friend talks to a friend.
I am not saying that we are a servant to the Americans – just because America might look at us like we are their servants, it doesn’t make us a servant – America is not god, for its views to automatically become an aspect of reality – all I am saying is that we can’t control what the Americans believe, but we are not beholden to their beliefs.
If anything Gilley’s statement should tell us, it is that we should tread carefully with the Americans. They can use such words as “friend” or “partner” all they want, but from their tone and gestures, it should be clear to us that they are not our friend or partner. We might be too small to make an enemy or opponent of the Americans, but we shouldn’t be so foolish as to put our trust or count on them.
A country that talks like America cannot care about anything but itself. Whether it is a country or an individual, the only appropriate way to deal with a self-absorbed entity is in a transactional manner. There is no point trying to build a relationship with the Americans, because to the Americans, there is only one side in any relationship, and that is its own side. In dealing with such a self-absorbed nation, the cash-on-delivery method is probably the best. Money should exchange hands at the point that the goods are delivered, and the relationship should be terminated at the point that money and goods change hands. Past exchanges should have no bearing on present or future transactions. Every transaction should be completed and terminated in and of itself.
Being a superior power, when America talks to us using terms like “partner” and “friend”, we will have to talk to it back using the same terms, but whenever we call America our “partner” or “friend”, we should not forget to cross our fingers as we say it, and remember to pray or meditate as soon as it becomes convenient, to cleanse our conscience for the sin of lying.
The second thing that I want to say about Gilley's comment, is that it is more accurate to say that it is the Muslims all over the world, including Malaysia, that are pushing for a second holocaust against the Jewish people.
Malaysians who are not Muslim are certainly not pushing for a holocaust against Jewish people and even Americans who are Muslims might be entertaining a genocidal intent against the Jewish people in their hearts.
Some people like Muda acting president Amira Aisya Abd Aziz are claiming that Malaysia “has never advocated for a second Holocaust,” and that we are just advocating for an independent Palestinian state, but who is she kidding?
You have to be blind, deaf and stupid to live in Malaysia and not realise that Muslims in Malaysia do have a very negative view of the Jews, and would most likely be immensely pleased if a great calamity were to befall Israel.
And let us not forget, that it is not just the Muslims that have a monopoly of genocidal intent in the conflict raging in the Middle East.
Israel has struck down 34,000 Palestinians and wounded 77,000 since Oct 7 last year, many of whom are women and children. Anyone who doesn’t think that Israel has genocidal intent against the Palestinians must also be equally blind, deaf and stupid.
If Malaysia is to claim innocence at all on the subject of wishing the Jews harm, we can only do so in terms of action. In intention and speech, however, we can’t fully claim innocence, because there are indeed a large number of Malaysians, who are almost entirely composed of the Muslim segment of the population, who in intent and speech, desire harm upon the Jewish nation.
Action wise, however, I think I can quite confidently say that no Malaysian will ever harm a Jew personally. We are nice people. We will boycott Starbucks and Mcdonald's, but in no part of the world will you find a Malaysian going berserk on the street trying to physically harm any Jew they can find.
As for higher education minister Zambry Abd Kadir ordering all programs and activities scheduled to be attended by a Gilley to be cancelled immediately, I heartily support his recommendation, and would like to propose that we use this incident to reflect on our penchant to invite all sort of second rate white people to the country, simply because they are white.
As a rule of thumb, I think we should only consider white people who are valued by their own people as being of value to us. If even their own people can't care to listen to what someone like Bruce Gilley is saying, why should we care? Let us not stop importing any more second-rate white people to our country and force our own people to listen to them simply because we erroneously believe that they must be of value just because they are white.
Even after we have ascertained that a white person is valued by their own people, we also have to determine whether that white person is of value to us, before we import them to the country, and ask our people to learn from them.
We all know that a fool is a fool regardless of his or her skin colour is. It is about time that we start applying this knowledge on a practical level, especially when it concerns a white person.
We really have to stop supporting this view that having a white person on board our company, team, university or concert, adds value to our company, team, concert or institution. This sort of view might be understandable in the year 1964, but in the year 2024, it is just embarrassing.
It is about time that we learn from the antics of the lead singer of the rock band 1975 last year and Professor Bruce Gilley this week, and stop welcoming every rejected white person in the world to our shores, when they likely have little or no talent, and just aim to get ahead in life at our expense.
Nehru Sathiamoorthy is the author of “While Waiting for the World to end”. He was a columnist at FMT and a frequent contributor to the South China Morning Post, The Star, Malaysia-Today, MalaysiaNow, MalaysiaKini and Focus Malaysia.
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