Understanding our complex relationship with the Jews.

I must as they say declare an interest - I have been pro-Jewish as long as I can remember. I volunteered for the Six Day War in 1967 and spent time on a Kibbutz, and down in Eilat working in a beach bar. So the current series on BBC 2 The Story of the Jews is a programme I'm really enjoying. Written and introduced by the brilliant communicator Simon Schama, its infused with historical references. The Christian world in particular has not had a positive relationship with Jewish people. They have been blamed for the murder of the messiah - Jesus. This opprobrium has its apotheosis in the nightmare rule of Hitler and the Nazi regime. Being scapegoated and vilified was not a new phenomena for the Jews, but this was on an altogether lager industrial scale.
I had a long analysis with a German Jewish psychoanalyst who had escaped from the Nazi tyranny just in time. The psychoanalytic explanation for this tyranny is that we as humans need to - project those parts of ourselves that we hate into other people and things. These projections then get codified into a political movement and reified. This toxic political evolution was told in detail in a not to be missed programme on Channel 4 last night in Hitler's Rise: The Colour Films.