Nidra Poller

NIDRA POLLER INTERVIEWED BY WOLFF BACHNER: WORDS OF HOPE FOR ISRAEL AND THE JEWISH PEOPLE…….

 

Nidra Poller has been one of the stoic voices in the Jewish diaspora, observing, writing and warning Western society of the many dangers and pitfalls befalling it during a time of increased Islamzation, as well as being a clarion voice for renewed support for the beleaguered Jewish state of Israel, and and a champion of the return to traditional common sense based politics.

NOTE: This recent interview was conducted by Political Columnist and Editor, Wolff Bachner, and a portion of it re-posted here with the author’s consent.

NIDRA POLLER

nidra poller interview- words of hope for israel and the jewish people 4.10.2013

Today, we continue our examination of this most important subject by speaking with a renowned Jewish author and journalist, Nidra Poller. Born in America to an observant Jewish family, Ms. Poller left the confines of the United States for France, and since 1972, she has lived and worked in Paris. Thus, she is in the unique position to not only discuss the future of Israel, but she can give voice to the unfortunate rebirth of open Jew hate that is now plaguing the nations of Europe.

Jew hate is not a new story. It has pursued the children of Israel since they first became a “chosen people” and were given their purpose. Not to be superior to others, but to be a light unto the world and a shining example to humankind. To do good works for the betterment of all and to uphold the laws that permit humanity to peacefully co-exist in a civilized society.

Sadly, despite the noble intentions of the Jewish people, this was not to be. For 1800 years, Jews have been called Christ killers and faced unrelenting persecution. For 1400 years, Jews have been crushed by the surging armies of Islam and made into dhimmis and ‘Court Jews’, serving the whims of an unpredictable master. Bereft of their beloved Israel by Roman and Muslim invaders, they wandered the planet as exiles, never welcome and barely tolerated in the nations of the world; living in ghettos and denied all rights and privileges. Long before Hitler killed the six million, Jews were demonized and annihilated with impunity.

For all of those many centuries of persecution, death, and exile, the Jewish people never abandoned the hope that some day they would return to Israel and rebuild their nation. They prayed constantly, century after century, “next year in Jerusalem” and waited and suffered and never gave up. Somehow, they even managed to defy their many masters and maintain a continuous presence in Israel for 3300 years, clustered in impoverished villages, keeping their traditions, refusing to abandon their god and convert to the faith of their conquerors.

But this is not is story of defeat. It is a story of perseverance in the face of terrible odds and triumph over unbelievable adversity. It is about taking a desert and making it into a garden. The transformation of an ancient nation into a vital, vibrant modern society, populated by a people who remember their history and yearn for peace with every particle of their being. In a better world, the Israelites would be the heroes.

Yet, some things never change. Jew hate still permeates the human psyche and a supremacist religion refuses to relinquish its claim on the land it took by force so many centuries ago. So much hate, unrelenting, never ending, and still, the Jewish people say: “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem. May they prosper who love you. May peace be within your walls, And prosperity within your palaces.” A prayer for all of humanity.

Perhaps, if we listen with an open mind to what Nidra Poller has to say, we may begin to cast aside all the propaganda and utter nonsense that is now masquerading as reality and learn something of the truth. As Nidra wrote so simply and so eloquently, “Jews are an asset to civilization and a Jewish state is a precious asset to the world. Persecuting Jews, periodically trying to annihilate Jews is a recurrent bout of a terrible life-threatening illness of human societies…Turning Jews into pariahs, turning the Jewish state into an evil entity is a terrible perversion that cannot be cured. But it can be controlled. This is the task of Judaism. Not to feed into the destructive madness, not to drink the poison, but to stand up proudly and push back the tide.”

[Introduction written by Wolff Bachner for The Inquisitr.]

Now, let us begin our interview with Nidra Poller:

Wolff Bachner: Nidra, welcome to The Inquisitr. As an American Jew who has lived in Paris since 1972, you have witnessed first hand the rebirth of Jew hate and the incredible hostility to the state of Israel that is common today in Europe and Great Britain.

Nidra Poller: Yes, Wolff, and it happened suddenly between the 28th and 30th September 2000, with the outbreak of the misnamed “Intifada,” attributed to the visit of Ariel Sharon to the Temple Mount (identified in France as “l’esplanade des mosquées” [Mosque Square]) and the fabricated report of the alleged killing of Mohamed al Dura. In the space of two days, the situation of Jews in France was radically transformed. You could hear the sound of a tear in the fabric of French society!

Of course this rupture, this outbreak of irrational hatred and violence, did not come out of a clear blue sky. Hostility to Jews is an ongoing phenomenon, an undercurrent that flows insidiously throughout history. But acute outbursts such as we saw in the year 2000 are still shocking and, somehow, unexpected.

At the time, while earning my living as a translator as I had been doing for some 30 years, I was thinking about the next novel I would write. I set aside that project. It was not a time for fiction. Events playing out before my eyes were of the scope and depth that makes great novels. I opened a writer’s notebook and started to chronicle what was happening. I wrote in French because I was speaking to my adopted country, and because I had been writing in French rather than English for close to twenty years.

Today’s blogs are a pale version of the writer’s notebook, a distinguished literary tradition, an art in itself and one of my favorite literary forms because I have always used fiction the better to write about reality. And, as a novelist, I work with time as a precious metal. I love to capture reality with precision in its fleeting moments. My Cahier d’une honnête citoyenne tells the story of what was happening as it happened in France, Europe, the United States, and the world in the crucial period that began in September 2000. This literary exercise, shaped by my abiding interest in history and politics, led gradually to my current activity as a latecomer journalist. While I was composing and subsequently publishing in French, my colleagues were asking me to translate their texts into English because their voices could not be heard in France. After a few years I decided it was foolish of me to continue writing in French when English, my mother tongue, reached the international audience we were all grasping for. I will be publishing an English version of the chronicle—Notes from a Simple Citizen– in January or February.

There was the shock in September 2000, but we had advance warning in 1991 during the First Gulf War. Then, too, I set aside fiction and opened a writer’s notebook where I chronicled the “arabesque” discourse built around Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait… to liberate Palestine. I realized then that anti-Semitism could come back in a new form with new arguments and the same sting. French intellectuals, some of Muslim origin others not, spun a tale that, while remaining theoretical and abstract, would later justify atrocities against Jews.

“Betrayed by Europe: an Expatriate’s Lament” Commentary 2003

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