[Updated]
I did not think that yesterday's post would be validated that fast: the synagogue of Caracas was attacked last night by a group of pro Chavez thugs. They knew perfectly well what they were doing, they knew how to find the Torah and left taking with them the surveillance videos. The antisemitism of Chavez is now having serious consequences. Preliminary information is found here and here. One more reason, if needed, to vote NO on February 15 and ensure that Chavez is gone by January 2013 at the latest. His language of hate is only going to have more and more negative consequences for the people of this country.
But yesterday also gave us one more reason to vote NO. The students of some of the major universities of Venezuela held a referendum of their own to express their opinion on the eternal reelection idea of Chavez. The result was astonishingly strong against Chavez. In fact chavismo tried to dismiss it before the vote instead of encouraging its supporters to participate (Is Robert Serra not a UCAB student?). But of course without any credibility because they did not try even to hold such a vote at the chavista campus, UBV. Heck, even students of the UNEFA are now marching in support of the NO.
Every day we are watching over the growing chasm between retrograde, if not even barbarian attitudes and civilization embodied in the thinking students. It does not matter if Chavez wins on February 15: the civilized and thinking country is against him and he will not be able to build the country with the mediocre sycophantic folks he tries to "educate" in his campuses. Well, I suppose they will know how to chant "Uh, ah" and attack synagogues while we remain mentally in the XIX century
Update:
Of course this has become today event distracting us from the SI/NO campaign. The government was prompt in taking its distances from the Synagogue attack. Unfortunately for the government even if it can prove that there is no direct links between its Red Shirted storm troopers and the attack, Chavez and his acolytes have been saying too many things against Israel (when not the Jews themselves) not to take blame from this attack. It also does not help the credibility of the government that the "condemnation" was emitted during a political act where the Venezuelan diplomatic expelled from Israel was received as heroes. As if they ever held a stone in some Intifada....
At least elsewhere the condemnation was certainly less ambiguous, showing clearly that any antisemitism in Venezuela is to be found almost exclusively in the chavista ranks. The Catholic Church, the dissident Student movement, the political opposition did not waste time. For many the finger is pointed to the hate speech coming from the government itself, something that this blogger has been writing for years now, and which is today quite open from scholars to some of the best legal minds of the opposition.
The CAIV (confederation of Israelite Associations of Venezuela) issued its protest in due form.
It includes the following paragraph:
La comunidad judía de Venezuela, con arraigo de larga data en el país, hace pública su indignación y más enérgica protesta ante esta agresión producto del clima antijudío que se ha desatado en Venezuela como consecuencia del discurso incitador al odio del Gobierno Nacional. La continua difusión de textos claramente antijudíos en medios oficiales de comunicación, tanto escritos como audiovisuales y digitales, exacerban estos sentimientos.
The Jewish community of Venezuela, with a long tradition in the country, makes public its indignation and its most energetic protest in front of this aggression product of an anti Jewish climate that has been unleashed in Venezuela as a consequence of the hate inducing speech of the National Government. The continuous diffusion of clearly antijewish texts in official media, written as well as audiovisual and digital, exacerbate these feelings.
There you have it, it cannot be said any clearer. Now it is up to the government to prove the CAIV wrong. I am not holding my breath
-The end-