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Here’s what’s fascinating about this video. It’s being run by RT, Russia’s state-run propaganda channel. Early in it Galloway points out the Red Army’s role as the savior of European Jewry. It’s a point that’s been for years central to Russia’s propaganda. 1/10
This point is an offshoot of a broader one—that the Red Army saved Europe in WW2 & therefore Europe & all of the free world owe it.This point is of personal import to Putin, & we’ve seen it deployed in various ways, as I wrote here: wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/russ… 2/10
This crude, propagandistic simplification of history is a very specific, very Kremlin propaganda point. Galloway wouldn’t have come up with it on his own, and there’s no reason for him to have mentioned it in this context unless he was specifically asked to or is pandering. 3/10
Russia’s positioning of itself as the savior of the Jews in the past & therefore their biggest friend & defender in the present is exceptionally cynical, given 1) what we know about its support for today’s European far-right tango-noir.com/introduction/ 4/10
and 2) what we know about decades of state-sponsored Soviet AS (including within the Red Army, where 500k Jews fought valiantly but were often bypassed for recognition). 5/10
I wrote about Soviet AS, especially its massive anti-Zionist campaign in wake of the Six Day War, here fathomjournal.org/soviet-anti-zi… and here tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-an… Russia never took responsibility for any of it. 6/10
Note that the period when Putin came of age and built his KGB career coincided almost exactly with that campaign. KGB played the leading role in it, and East Germany, where he was stationed, was an important part of it too. 7/10
Point is that people who are in power in Russia today, including FSB, the current iteration of KGB, understand antisemitism very well & know exactly how to manipulate it for their purposes. They have decades of institutional experience at their fingertips. 8/10
They have, for example, weaponized antisemitism in their infowar with Ukraine, as @SamuelSokol has described in his new book, to the point where it’s become virtually impossible to discuss some very real issues with AS that do exist in that country. isgap.org/isgap-books/pu… 9/10
So a question that comes up for me re this video is what exactly the connection between Galloway and Russia’s propaganda apparatus is. And the fact that RT is promoting it raises the question of what exactly Russia’s game is with respect to current AS crisis in the West. 10/10
