Jon Juaristi
Jon Juaristi Linacero, (born in Bilbao in 1951) is a poet, essayist and Spanish translator in Castilian and Basque[1]. He has moved from involvement with ETA in the 1960s through the Spanish Communist Party and the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE) to become associated with Zionism and European Neoconservative networks as demonstrated by his attendance at the Neocon International conference in Prague in 2007.[2]
Early political activism
At the age of 16, spurred by the reading of Federico Krutwig´s "Vasconia", he entered in an incipient ETA. He tried to link Carlist armed cells with ETA after the expulsion by the Franco regime of Carlos Hugo de Borbón Parma (a pretender to the Spanish throne)[3].
In 1980, he affiliated himself with the Communist Party of Spain during its process of unification with Euskadiko Ezkerra(EE), which would give rise to a new social-democratic group that actively rejected the violence. He left it in 1986, disappointed when EE disagreed with the socialists after the autonomic elections of 1986. In 1987 Juaristi joined the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) .Later, he declared in his memoirs that he did so spurred by the attack of the "Mendeku" group against the "Casa del Pueblo" (PSOE local chapter) in Portugalete. Several PSOE militants were burned to death in the attack.[4].
Current political activity
His critical voice against ethnicism and the invention and manipulation of myths, in particular on the part of Basque nationalism, has gained media visibility through numerous articles, essays, and speeches. Juaristi's stance against terrorism, and his support to the ETA victims, was further made visible by the formation of the Foro Ermua (Forum of Ermua, now a conservative anti-terrorism organization but with roots in basque left) in 1997. In the last decade he has been defined, in different interviews from mass media, as a “Spanish nationalist .” At the end of 1999, after the ETA announcement of which it gave by finalized the truce, and noticed of the seriousness of the threats against hers, he decided to leave his position in the University and to leave the Basque Country definitively.[5]
Describing his conversion to Judaism, Juaristi said:
"El judaísmo para mí no es exactamente una religión, sino más bien una visión ética del mundo."
"Judaism is for me not exactly a religion, but rather an ethical view of the world"[6].
Juaristi dedicates a number of his articles to the criticism of antisemitism (and anti-Zionism,which he considers to be inherently antisemitic). He has also written in defence of Israel's right to be its own state.
Affliliations
Democracy and Security International Conference, Attendee [7]
Notes
- ↑ Esther Esteban, El Mundo Jon Juaristi, Accessed 01-March-2009
- ↑ Democracy and Security Conference, List of Participants, Accessed 25-February-2009
- ↑ Esther Esteban, El Mundo Jon Juaristi, Accessed 01-March-2009
- ↑ Esther Esteban, El Mundo Jon Juaristi, Accessed 01-March-2009
- ↑ S. B. Alicante, LaVerdad, Un «nacionalista español» con imperativos éticos, Accessed 01-March-2009
- ↑ Esther Esteban, El Mundo Jon Juaristi, Accessed 01-March-2009
- ↑ Democracy and Security Conference, List of Participants, Accessed 25-February-2009
