Published 11 April 2024 at 07.03
Foreign. Jonathan Conricus, former press spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces IDF, speaks out about Jewish power and Swedes in an interview with Dagens Nyheter.
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Jonathan Conricus , who grew up in Malmö, appeared extensively in both Swedish and international media during the first three months of the war in Gaza.
As a spokesman for the IDF, he shared the Israeli view of the war. Among other things, he “confirmed” the false Israeli propaganda story that Hamas had beheaded babies on October 7. This propaganda did much to silence criticism of Israel's warfare at the start of the war.
Now Jonathan Conricus has a new job – at the “Foundation for Defense of Democracies”. It is one of the neoconservative Jewish lobby groups in the US that is dedicated to trying to persuade the US government and Congress to start a war against Israel's enemies.
In DN's interview, the 45-year-old talks about how different it is being a Jew in the USA compared to how it is in Sweden.
He says that he has just been invited on a trip by Aipac – “you know, the Jewish lobby” – which he considers to be “smeared in the Swedish media”.
SVT received harsh criticism in 2017 after the US correspondent Erika Bjerström described an “extremely strong Jewish lobby” in the US. The Swedish Committee against Antisemitism, SKMA, stated that the term “the Jewish lobby” fueled antisemitism and SVT had to delete the text.
However, Jonathan Conricus has no problem describing the Jewish lobby in the US as specifically Jewish. Nor does he deny that the lobby is powerful. On the contrary.
– There is no Jewish lobby in Sweden. Swedes are not used to Jews having power, standing straight back, looking people in the eye and saying: I decide here. Swedes don't know such Jews, he tells DN and continues:
– But they are here. Especially in New York. Swedes do not understand that there are Jews who organize, take initiative, dare, have power and use power.
Furthermore, he says that he wishes more people could attend the Aipac policy conference and witness for themselves “how American politicians stand up in front of 18,000 people and explain how important American-Israeli relations are”.
According to Jonathan Conricus, what is happening in Gaza and Egypt is just “a side show”. “The real show” is about getting the US to war against Israel's main enemy – Iran. Instead of fighting with the “little kids” – i.e. Iran's proxy groups – it's time to “take care of daddy”, as he puts it.