Review of Thieves In The Night by Arthur Koestler, or, The Jewish Question

In our time the prospect of a ‘Jewish Question’ seems beyond the pall, confined to history as something quaint and monstrous, but I find that strange considering it is only in our time that a Jewish state exists, it is only in our time that Jewish culture exerts the strength it does and Jewish people, though perhaps fewer in number as a proportion of our species as a whole, is almost stronger than it has ever been.

So I see it fit to ask the Jewish Question: Are the Jews the way they are because of their experiences, or are their experiences simply a result of who they are. The Jew is cunning, thrifty, creative, analytic, cynical, callous, and just a little evil, but I saw an adorable squirrel eating the head of a baby bird so it can be assumed evil is part of this world and everything in it.

It’s perhaps not a popular mode to talk of this or that race in these terms but, looking around with the disinterested eye of a child or tourist, the stereotypes most commonly associated with the races seem to hold true. Each ethnic group has it’s own foibles and novelties and I think we should appreciate the good as much as we reject the bad, but accept one comes with the other.

I’m a love the honey despite the grit kind of guy so on those grounds all I can do is love the Jews, as I’ve probably said in past, but few books have ever submerged me in Jewry as this book did.

Like all self-interested people the Jews are liars, not to say they speak untruths, not anymore than anyone else, but their ability to avoid speaking truth when it is contrary to interest is an art the Jews excel at, and so although you can learn much of the good of Jewry from Jews themselves, you will struggle to glean their errs. Sadly the haters of the Jews are so enflamed (probably out of some sense of inferiority, God’s chosen people and all) that it can likewise be difficult to get a clear picture of the failings of these folk from their enemies. Enter Koestler, who points out the absurdity of arid desert and neglected swamp remaining as so rather than be made livable by people desperate for a home, but who is not shy at confronting the prejudices of those who seek to inhabit these places, whose tactics are made as clear as day, and whose excesses are relayed in the same manner as those of the arabs and the brits.

We get the impression Koestler has some skin in the game, he is an intellectual and so the chances are many of his friends are jews and either his trust or his accountant are too, but Koestler is a hard-nosed aesthete and never averts his gaze to truth, and the snivelling servile Jew is stated in as few words as the amber mud-coated zionist. It wasn’t zionist youths who funded the napoleonic or first world war, nor who functioned in European courts to permit ursury where Christ had been pretty clear in the matter. In fact as far as I can see those Zionists are guilty of one and only one crime (though it’s a biggy): adopting any and all measures necessary to assure their continued existence in the land of Israel. With the Brits on one hand the Arabs on the other they’ve had the cool mechanistic breaking of natives as one lesson and the empassioned bombing of public places as another, taken the two together and outdone both teachers. Is it a crime to win, despite insurmountable odds?

Now I’m showing my hand, but I always rout for the underdog. But who has the title. Israel is a small country surrounded by enemies. Palestine is an even smaller country all but surrounded by an enemy. Who is the underdog? Depends who you ask.

Much of history is this way, and if we seek clarity we generally find it, but after our efforts the status quo has changed and that issue, though clear in our minds or on our page, no longer relates to the world it hoped to clarify. We can either take vague impressions of the world as it is, or depict in some detail the world as it was. I’m not a Jew so I can’t tell you which they do, but I don’t think Koestler was either, he just knew something interesting when he saw it, and as tragic as the case of Palestine is, I can’t say it distinguishes itself from any other Arab country. So Israel, Israel until the end, which should be coming any time now.