| As someone who lives in New Zealand, I can tell you that NZ does a good job of veiling its antisemitism and anti-Zionism. A US Episcopalian priest who is also a university lecturer and psychologist in NZ said that he was surprised to find so much closet racism in NZ, more than anywhere else in the world. He said that NZ was disingenuous about its race relations. Some races seem completely unprotected by racism legislation, for instance, running the British down and calling British people names is pervasive in Kiwi culture. For a while, a TV journalist used to call British people “pongo scum” almost every night on state-run TV. Jews are not often referenced directly, because the community is so small, but New Zealand, led strongly from the government and media, is demonstrably pro-Palestinian and anti-Israeli. Some leaders have even expressed their tiredness of hearing about the Holocaust. And this latest incident demonstrates NZ’s attitude of denial of Jewish issues, by suppressing information about this incident in the NZ media. For a country that is obsessed with discussing race and division, while denying the seriousness of cultural divisions, it is telling that this incident has been swept under the carpet. As to the 2004 incident, it was blown out of all sense of proportion, and has a questionable dimension to it if one considers that some of those involved apparently held legitimate Australian passports. Furthermore, nobody sought out French graves when French agents carried out a terrorist attack on Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior while docked in a NZ port! NZ passport anyone? |
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