Q&A: Kahane
Kahane
Question
I keep running into an interesting phenomenon here (I’m in the U.S.): every so often Kahane comes up, and of course people immediately dismiss him as “extreme.” I point out to them that today almost everyone says the same things he used to raise: transfer, that the problem is that they do not recognize our existence, that they carried out terror attacks even before the State was established. People obviously don’t accept that.
Are there, in the Rabbi’s view, problematic aspects in Kahane’s doctrine (which I don’t really know, aside from a few of his debates on YouTube)? Is there real substance to the strong opposition toward him?
Answer
I am not familiar with his views in detail. But my impression is that there was racism in his approach, and certainly among his students.
Discussion on Answer
I haven’t changed my mind. I’m using the term in its accepted conventional sense. Theoretically, the moral problem here is not racism but other things. Around here, that’s what we call racism.
In the past you wrote regarding racism: “There is considerable doubt whether this has any clearly defined content at all,” and also, “It is doubtful whether there is anything that can successfully be called racism; in my opinion, not really.” Interesting to see that you changed your mind.