Barcelona is not a Spanish city, but the capital of Catalunya. Having hated Franco`s denial of their nationhood, there is a present-day residual xenophobia bordering on racism that even democracy has not managed to "eliminate". The anti-Semitism is also greater than in any other part of Spain, conflated in its modern expression with a demonstrable dislike of anything Israeli.
The Catalunyans hold this anti-Israelism and more marked tendency toward anti-Semitism in common with many of the smaller and semi-independent nations of Europe. You only have to look to Scotland and Wales to see far, far greater "liberal" criticisms of Israel. Go into the European hinterland of the rump nations of the former Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires - now mostly subsumed into the new liberal empire of the EU - and it is the same story.
It would seem that they cannot forgive Israel for having fought and won her freedom and fought subsequently to maintain it. And Israel is full of Jews... |
|
