Ray Cook - As I See It

Israel, Zionism and the Media

Tag: Israel (Page 5 of 34)

I make a point about Jewish refugees from Arab lands

17/07/2012 / / 5 Comments

For months now a particular pro-Palestinian website has directly linked to an image on my website.

The image was of a UK and an Israeli flag and used to illustrate an article, on this other website, about the decision of the UK government to tighten up the universal jurisdiction rules which were being abused to issue arrests for Israeli lawmakers and military visiting the UK.

I just deleted the image so that a blank space would replace the flag image.

Then, after so many months, still linking to my site, I decided to strike a blow for the hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees from Arab lands who were expelled over a decade for no other reason than they were Jews in a spiteful ‘revenge’  for the creation of the State of Israel.

Of course, where would these refugees go? Many to Israel. Thus the Arab countries were hoist by their own petard, as it were and now it was my time to do a little hoisting of my own.

So I recreated the image I had deleted but this time it carried a message: “Between 1947 and 1958 900,000 Jews were expelled from Arab countries because they were Jews”; beneath is the Israeli flag.

So far, it’s still there.

I wonder how long it will remain.

I guess you might call it self-hacking on their part.

But then, those uprooted Palestinians are the only refugees in history whose numbers have increased over time and who are granted that status in perpetuity and uniquely.

Meanwhile the 900,000 Jews have settled and got on with their lives building a future for their families having left behind their property, memories and dead relatives who lived in their former host countries for centuries.

Nothing speaks more eloquently of the need for a Jewish homeland than those who would deprive us of one.

Israel, Palestine, valuing life, valuing death

06/06/2012 / / 3 Comments

A couple of weeks ago I had the privilege of hearing Rabbi Israel Meir Lau speak at the official opening of the new King David High School in Manchester.

I had heard him on three previous occasions, the first in Birkenau in 1998. You can see a snippet of that speech in the video I posted of the March of the Living here. Rabbi Lau, now Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv, mesmerised his audience at King David with a vivid account of his experiences after liberation from Buchenwald concentration camp. He was 8 years old and was at a young persons convalescent camp near Paris.

I won’t rehearse the story here. I suggest you do what I did and that is to buy his memoir ‘Out of the Depths’.

Almost every page contains a heart-rending story, an amazing life-saving incident, a tearful memory. You gasp, you cry with every line and the unfolding of his amazing story.

I was struck at the beginning of the book where Rabbi Lau describes one of the many occasions where his life was saved by what appeared to be a providential hand.

The story I have in mind is heart-breaking and unbearable. Rabbi Lau describes how, as a 7 year old, he was to be placed on a transport with his mother whilst his older brother Naphtali was separated with the men of working age.

Rabbinit Lau knew that she and the women and children were destined for death, whereas those who could work had a chance, at least, for life.

With a mother’s desire to see her child live she literally threw ‘Lulek’ at his brother in order to save him, knowing full well that it was unlikely she would see either of them again. She took the agonising decision to separate herself from her little boy and face almost certain death alone so that he might live.

Her instinct was to do anything she could to save her son.

How different, I thought, when reading this, from those mothers in Gaza and Jenin and across the Palestinian territories who do the exact opposite. Instead of saving their sons and daughters they encourage them to strap suicide belts to their bodies and detonate them in Israel. Then they celebrate their son or daughter as a martyr and rejoice at the deaths their child has caused.

Not all Palestinian mothers think this way, of course, but many, many do.

At the heart of the conflict with its many nuances and complexities lies this awful truth.

The Jewish experience means that we embrace life and mourn loss and regret the killing of innocents – their are always those who do not fit that generalisation, but it is largely and overwhelmingly the case; the Palestinian experience has taught them to embrace death and martydom and exult in its consequences – another generalisation but very often true.

Am Yisrael Chai

 

 

 

Julian Barnes and the truth of history

05/06/2012 / / 0 Comments

I have just finished reading Julian Barnes ‘The History of the World in 10½ Chapters‘.

I am currently doing my thing of finding an author I like and then gorging myself on the complete oeuvre.

The book is amusing and thought-provoking and, ultimately, eschatological.

And the end of the ½ chapter, which is titled ‘Parenthesis’, I was struck by a tidbit, a wee morsel of prose which struck a chord about the two parallel narratives with regard to Israel and the Palestinians which I’ll come to shortly.

This dual narrative is familiar to those involved in hasbara and defending Israel and I came face to face with the ‘other side’ on Twitter recently. A guy called Zbigniew was rather annoyed that I was tweeting the good news of the failure of the BDS brigade to stop the performance of Habima, the Israeli national theatre, at the Globe theatre in London where they performed The Merchant of Venice on two consecutive nights.

I have written previously about the shameful attempt by a group of luvvies who should know better to have Habima banned and the disgusting singling out of Israel just because Habima has played in settlements in Judea and Samaria/West Bank. It is, therefore seen as somehow complicit in the counter-narrative of colonialism, land-stealing and general oppression.

Zbigniew told me that Israel was to be ‘loathed’ and when challenged about which other contries he loathed he placed Israel in a group with Syria, Libya and Zimbabwe.

What I will, for the sake of shorthand, call the pro-Pal narrative always sees the conflict as one of good (Pals) against evil (Israel, or more precisely – Jews). Any wrongdoing by an Israeli or group of Israelis confirms them in their demonisation and hatred of Israel.

This is how Z tweeted:

“I think every right minded person should be concerned about Israel and what is happening…”

“does the expulsion and mistreatment of Palestinians not concern you? chants of Death to arabs?”

“Attacks on Arabs by (illegal) settlers, racism towards the african communities? Israel should be loathed!”

Of course, if you want to cherry-pick specific incidents, ignore history, and even fail to ask yourself questions like “why did these (mainly Muslim) Africans come to Israel in the first place rather than Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt etc.” then you will continue to see Israel and the conflict in this myopic and polarised way.

Such views never consider the actions of the other protagonists because you have already decided their cause is just and so whatever Israel does, even the patently good things, always have a malign intent or are dismissed as propaganda or irrelevant, or impossible without US dollars.

So here is the quote from Barnes which I believe so succinctly tells us about why hasbara is not working; historical truth is going the same way as moral relativism:

We all know that objective truth is not attainable, that when some event occurs we shall have a multiplicity of subjective truths which we assess and then fabulate into history, into some God-eyed version of what really happened. This God-eyed version is a fake – a charming, impossible fake… But while we know this, we must still believe that objective truth is obtainable; or we must believe that it is 99 per cent obtainable; or if we can’t believe this we must believe that 43 per cent objective truth is better than 41 per cent. We must do so, because if we don’t we’re lost, we fall into beguiling relativity, we value one liar’s version as much as another liar’s, we throw up our hands at the puzzle of it all, we admit that the victor has the right not just to the spoils but also to the truth.

Too many people – luvvies in the UK, Israelis in Israel, left-wingers and the whole motley crew of dillusionals – are throwing up their hands and then prostrating themselves before the god of fashionable and deluded ‘truth’ that tells them it’s all Israel’s fault and if Israel changed its policies all would be right with the world.

Yet all they do is to give succour to the loathers and haters who have their single cyclopean historical eye put out but then claim, nevertheless, that they can see more clearly.

Where are the human rights protestors at the Crucible?

25/04/2012 / / 1 Comment

I predict that within 5 years the World Snooker Championship will move to China.

Why? Money.

There are already several snooker tournaments in China and this year there were four Chinese qualifying for the World Championship at the Crucible in Sheffield. This is a record.

So where are the Human Rights demonstrators? Did anyone see anyone with placards outside the Crucible? Did anyone deliberately interrupt a match by standing up and decrying China’s abysmal Human Rights record?

Are players who go off frequently to play in China for several thousand pounds vilified on their return?

Do hundreds of people try to fly to Lhasa airport in Tibet to show solidarity with the Tibetan people whose culture is being destroyed?

Will the Chinese athletes require special protection at this year’s Olympics in London?

You know the answer to all these questions is ‘no’.

I might remind you that the 2008 Olympics actually took place in China and the entire world turned up.

I will also remind you that the USA and others boycotted the 1980 Olympics because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan! You couldn’t make it up, really. In 1984 the Soviets reciprocated and the Warsaw Pact countries didn’t show up for Los Angeles.

Here are some facts about China:

Press freedom? Nah

Can you move freely around China? That’s a ‘no’.

Can you access any website you wish in China? Nope.

How about religious freedom? Ask the Catholics, the Falun Gong and the Buddhists. So, uh, uh.

How about political freedom? You are kidding me!

So you can have as many children as you like, at least? Ah, sorry, just one per family. Get pregnant with number two and it’s the abortion clinic for Mum, and they are not too particular about how many weeks of your pregnancy have passed.

But the judicial system is up to modern standards? Well, not quite – no less than 68 crimes are punishable by death. Torture is also rife.

I could go on. But it is self-evident that China is not alone. Some of its neighbours are pretty awful, including Russia. And then there are the old favourites: Sudan, Zimbabwe, Saudi Arabia, Syria, yada yada.

Now let’s look at Israel. Yep, you knew I would get there in the end.

Press freedom? Absolutely.

Can you move freely around Israel (I said Israel, not the ‘Territories’) Yes. Once you enter Israel you can go anywhere without hindrance.

Can you access any website? You sure can.

Religious freedom? Guaranteed by law. Try building a church in Egypt or a synagogue in Saudi Arabia.

Political freedom – pretty much. You can even create a party whose purpose is to destroy the state which gives it the political freedom to try to do so and to advocate replacing it with another state which doesn’t.

Can you have as many children as you like? – sure, and it’s compulsory if you are religious.

Death penalty? In theory, but only one person has ever been executed – Adolf Eichmann in 1962 and that was probably a mistake.

Ok, so Israel is not perfect. I agree. But is this country of 7 million people such an egregious state that a group of actors and theatre people decide that the Israeli theatre group, Habima, should be banned from contributing to the World Shakespeare Festival at the Globe in London? Why? Because they perform in ‘settlements’. Wow – crime of the century.

Now if these worthy luvvies were consistent they would wish to ban other companies which may well be sponsored by governments or be involved with some unsavoury people and institutions. Of course. They surely would.

Did they check all the other theatre groups? What about the ones from South Africa, Serbia, Belarus, Afghanistan, the United States (yes, don’t forget Guantanamo and special rendition etc.), Iraq!

Plenty there for the luvvy boycotters to get their intolerant, hypocritical, salonfaehig teeth into.

Now let us turn to Brazil. That caught you by surprise, I bet.

A beacon of western democracy in South America? Sure. No-one would want to boycott Brazil or its produce? Would they?

Well, yes, they would. That is, if they were consistent with their targets of demonisation.

Heard of the rainforest? I’m sure you have seen Sir David Attenborough and others cavorting through, under and up it for years, decades, in fact.

Did you know it’s being destroyed? Yes? Did you know that such behaviour, much of it illegal in Brazil, directly affects your climate and the world’s most important ecosystem? Don’t care? Rather declare ‘We are all Hamas’ and sit outside a cosmetics shop in Covent Garden? Your choice, but your children’s future and your grandchildren’s is at stake.

Not a ‘Human Rights’ issue, you say? Wrong!

Have you heard of indigenous people? Do you care that their way of life, their environment and, too often, they themselves are being destroyed? If not, why not? Do you only care about ‘indigenous’ people in a few thousand square kilometres of the Middle East?

Take a look at this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17827072

Yeah, I know it’s the BBC but it’s not all bad – as long as it’s kept away from the Middle East desk it can be quite reliable, sometimes.

The Awa are experiencing genocide and extinction. They are not the only rainforest dwellers thus endangered and not the only species, either.

So the Awa live a long way from civilisation (so-called) and do not have the UN and the US pumping in billions of dollars, or UN agencies to protect them in perpetuity. They are ‘primitive’. They do not contribute anything to the modern world – no arms dealing (though they may swap the occasional blowpipe), no insider trading, no suicide bombers, no desire to spread perverted ideologies across he world.

So who cares? Apart from Sting (and kol haKavod to him – I am not scoffing).

Hardly anyone speaks up for them, challenges the Brazilians, protests outside embassies, boycotts coffee shops for using Brazilian beans (or beauty parlours for providing ‘Brazilians’). Nothing. Nada.

Environmentalists may get a bit hot under the anorak on occasion but these people and this environment have few people willing to protect it. Effectively, that is.

So I think you get my drift.

If you want to criticise one country for a particular reason and this is your ’cause’ of choice and you want to ignore far more important issues, then that is your right. Just be a little more subtle about WHY.

Yom HaAtazmaut sameach. Happy Birthday Israel. Shame you don’t have any rainforests.

 

Left-wing luvvies gang up on Israeli artists

31/03/2012 / / 4 Comments

H/T Barry Shaw

I don’t read the Guardian. I used to when it was a decent newspaper.

However…

when I was alerted to this letter

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/29/dismay-globe-invitation-israeli-theatre?newsfeed=true

(no,  I am not going to give them the benefit of a link even from my modest website – on principal)

I was outraged at the list of people, who claim to be artists, that are objecting to the appearance of Israeli theatre group Habima at the Globe.

The reason is that this company has performed at and co-operated with ‘halls of culture’ in Israeli ‘settlements’.

Here are these morally outraged Thespian signatories so YOU know who to boycott in the future:

David Aukin producer
Poppy Burton-Morgan artistic director, Metta Theatre
Leo Butler playwright
Niall Buggy actor
David Calder actor
Jonathan Chadwick director
Caryl Churchill playwright
Michael Darlow writer, director
John Graham Davies actor, writer
Trevor Griffiths playwright
Annie Firbank actor
Paul Freeman actor
Matyelok Gibbs actor
Tony Graham director
Janet Henfrey actor
James Ivens artistic director, Flood Theatre
Andrew Jarvis actor, director, teacher
Neville Jason actor
Ursula Jones actor
Professor Adah Kay academic, playwright
Mike Leigh film-maker, dramatist
Sonja Linden playwright, iceandfire theatre
Roger Lloyd Pack actor
Cherie Lunghi actor
Miriam Margolyes actor
Kika Markham actor
Jonathan Miller director, author and broadcaster
Frances Rifkin director
Mark Rylance actor
Alexei Sayle comedian, writer
Farhana Sheikh writer
Emma Thompson actor, screenwriter
Andy de la Tour actor, director
Harriet Walter actor
Hilary Westlake director
Richard Wilson actor, director
Susan Wooldridge actor, writer

I’m sure, like me, you have admired many of these names for years.

I would hazard a guess that very few of them know the history of the conflict and have accepted the narrative of ‘Occupation’ and ‘colonialism’.

How many of them have ever protested about anything else?

How many of them know that although settlements are illegal under certain interpretations of international law there is no ‘Occupation’ in any legal sense and there has never been any legal ruling that Israel is an occupier.  And before you knee-jerk, just check. Here’s a useful link for the sceptics

Maybe American actors should be boycotted and made pariahs because of Guantanamo or Iraq?

It’s only ever Israel and the ‘Occupation’ which gets these people frothing at the mouth and hearts bleeding.

But, you see, this is the Left’s favourite cause. The Lord forfend that they should be tainted by association with Israeli actors who have committed the terrible crime of setting foot in a ‘settlement’.

“The villainy you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.”

As individuals they are entitled not to go to see Habima.

As indivduals we are entitled to never watch any film, play or documentary any of these people appear in.

Keep the list handy.

 

BBC, Gaza and continued illegitimate reporting

11/03/2012 / / 7 Comments

The blatant misreporting and misrepresentation of Israel’s self-defensive action against rocket fire from Gaza continues to be a national disgrace.

There’s something very rotten in the State of the BBC’s Middle East desk on its news website.

Only today did the continuing murderous barrage of southern Israel which puts a million lives at risk, not to mention property and treasure, actually make it to the website’s home page. Although even that small mention now seems to have disappeared.

And what was the headline to direct us to this sudden escalation in rocket fire from Gaza which has seen over 200 missiles launched since Friday? Was it “Miltitants in Gaza launch rocket barrage against southern Israel’?

Not bloody likely. This is the BBC, remember and they seem only interested, for the sake of balance, of course, to highlight Israel’s response in defence of its citizens.

‘Israel launches fresh airstrikes on Gaza’

This was the disgusting headline.

“Israeli (sic) says almost 100 rockets fired from Gaza have struck Israel since the exchange of fire began.”

Subtle, no? Israel ‘says’ – after all, you take what Israel ‘says’ with a strong dose of scepticism, no? And ‘since the exchange of fire’. Thus, in a sentence, neutralising and sanitising the assault on Israel and characterising it as morally equivalent that Israel’s fire, in response to the rockets, is somehow a justification for the rocket fire from the Gaza side. So, once again,  cause and response are turned on their head.

In fact, the report lies and implies that Israel is responsible for the escalation:

“The latest flare-up began on Friday when an Israeli air strike on a car in Gaza City killed militant commander Zohair al-Qaisi, secretary general of the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC), and two of his associates.”

What it does not mention is that al-Qaisi was plotting a terrorist attack. When the British or Americans take out terrorist leaders in Afghanistan that is justified but because the BBC is ‘neutral’ about the Israel-Palestine conflict and terrorists are ‘activists’ or ‘militants’, taking them out is an ‘escalation’ not a defensive act.

The Arab League, which has proved useless in preventing the horrors in Homs in Syria, characterised the 15 deaths of terrorists and rocket firers as a ‘massacre’. I wonder what the minimum number of Palestinians is to be called a ‘massacre’ ? 5? 10? In Syria it appears to be several hundred. Are innocent Syrian lives worth so much less than Palestinian militants in the debased arithmetic of the Arab world?

And just to show how even-handed the BBC is, what picture do they show us? The school in Beersheva hit by a rocket? No, they show us the results of an airstrike on Rafah where one person was killed.

UN spokesman Richard Miron called the situation in Gaza “very fragile and unsustainable”.

“We deplore the fact that civilians are once again paying the price,” he said.

I wonder whose civilians he means? Could it be the 1 million Israelis who are indiscriminately targeted by rockets and mortars? Or those in Gaza who are unfortunate enough to pay the price for the actions of groups who care nothing for the safety of their own fellow citizens? Maybe he means both? But I doubt it.

And whilst Israel closes its schools (and it’s lucky it did, as one rocket hit a school in Beersheva as I mentioned above) to protect its children, in Gaza, no doubt as has always been the case, schoolyards and hospitals, mosques and residential areas are used as bases for rocket launchers with the callous, deliberate and cynical hope that Israel will strike and injure or kill ‘martyrs’ and bring opprobrium on itself.

It is instructive to muse what would be the situation if Israel were Syria and Netanyahu Assad. What response would there be to hundreds of rockets aimed at civilians? Israel’s restraint is in gross contrast to Assad’s brutal massacre of his own people. Indeed, as the rockets rained down, Israel was discussing how to continue to deliver humanitarian aid through its crossings.

Assad, lays a real siege to his own people cutting off electricity and starving the populace whilst Israel feeds its enemies and provides them with the wherewithal to live.

Yet, no doubt, sooner or later, the UN will be stirring itself to condemn Israel for defending itself

 

 

Aya’s story

05/02/2012 / / 3 Comments

How often do we hear or read about how terrible Israel is preventing Palestinians in dire need of medical treatment getting through checkpoints and borders quickly enough?

How many reports have you read which characterise the massive humanitarian efforts of the Israeli medical community as somehow being part of the ‘occupation’?

I have written before about the extraordinary Rambam Medical Centre in Haifa.

I have no problem reproducing in full this story I received today which is just one example of hundreds, thousands, which are simply overlooked by the likes of the Guardian because it is a positive story which undermines all the negativity and false spin some of the media puts on anything positive which comes out of Israel.

So here is the report from the Rambam by David Ratner, Director:

Haifa, 5 February 2012

Just a Heartbeat Away…

Aya and Prof. Avraham Lorber : Photo by Pioter Filter-RHCC

When Aya Almasal, 12, left her Gaza home approximately one month ago and headed for Rambam, she didn’t know that this trip would save her life. For several years Aya had suffered from sudden bouts of unconsciousness, and her doctors couldn’t find the cause. About a month ago, Aya set out for Rambam to treat this problem, which had accompanied her since birth. Upon leaving Gaza, she felt ill and the situation steadily deteriorated. As the girl neared Rambam, in Haifa, her heart stopped working and she was, in effect, dead. After repeated attempts at resuscitation, the girl’s heart began to pump and she arrived at Rambam, artificially respirated and in serious danger. At the hospital, Aya was diagnosed as suffering from Long QT Syndrome, a disorder of the heart’s electrical system that causes irregular and rapid heart rate, and had prevented blood from reaching her brain. This had caused Aya to lose consciousness suddenly, and could have killed her.

Shortly after the diagnosis, Aya was hospitalized in Rambam’s Department of Pediatric Intensive Care, where she remained for a week. Doctors there stabilized her condition, and Dr Munder Bolus, director of the Unit of Electrophysiology implanted her with a defibrillator pacemaker. Accompanying drug treatment, the pacemaker supplies an electrical shock which ‘jump starts’ the heart during irregularities. After almost a month of hospitalization, Aya felt better, was discharged last Thursday, 2.2.12, and returned to her home in Gaza, standing on her own two feet.

According to Aya’s treating physician, Prof Avraham Lorber, who is head of Rambam’s Department of Pediatric Cardiology and Adult Congenital Heart Defects, Long QT Sydrome is a widespread heart defect that can be controlled with appropriate treatment. “Aya will need a pacemaker all her life,” said Prof Lorber. “She will be monitored to be sure the pacemaker and battery are working correctly.”

Fortunately, Aya had arrived at Rambam in time to receive life-saving treatment. But the girl did not have to die in order to live. Aya’s congenital defect should have been detected earlier. “Every year we treat a number of children with these types of problems,” says Prof Lorber. “Some patients are diagnosed when they seek treatment for their irregular heart rates, and others in regular check-ups. This early detection of life-threatening problems illustrates the far-ranging implications of preventive medicine.”

Rambam’s Department of Pediatric Cardiology and Congenital Heart Defects treats a wide range of disorders, like Aya’s. A large number of patients, some 650 children and youth, arrive from neighboring countries and are treated on a humanitarian basis. A number of Palestinian patients are currently at the department, among them a three-week old infant scheduled for heart surgery, and a 40-day old baby who needs a stent procedure. “Other Palestinian patients are now receiving treatment here or will soon be transferred to Rambam,” states Prof Lorber. Our experience in general medicine, and in cardiology, specifically, allows us to help most of these patients.”

I doubt we will see Guardian reporter Harriet Sherwood and all the others mentioning this any time soon. Unless they can find a way of making it an anti-Israel story.

Mr Cameron, you are needed in Tahrir Square again

21/01/2012 / / 0 Comments

According to the BBC, Islamists in Egypt have won the election.

All the warnings about Islamists and the Arab Spring which were so poo-poohed by over-optimistic Western leaders seem to be coming true.

Tunisia, the first country to experience a revolution, also returned an Islamist government which saw fit to invite Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh to Tunis as a baying mob shouted ‘Kill the Jews’. Nice.

It is almost a year since I sat watching the upheaval in Egypt in my hotel bedroom TV in Eilat, Israel. I was impressed but cynical. I hoped the true secular democrats would win. I feared they would not. I also noticed the many banners which accused Mubarak of being a Zionist and others which said unpleasant things about Israel and Jews.

Israel was criticised for not embracing the changes across the region. Any suggestion by its politicians or supporters that this was an opportunity to unleash forces that had been held under control by dictators, was dismissed as Israel being a country that claimed to be a democracy but would deny such freedoms for its neighbours.

Soon after President Hosni Mubarak’s ouster, Prime Minister David Cameron flew to Egypt to join in the crowds in Tahrir Square declaring how happy he was to see the Egyptian people free at last.

The BBC reported at that time the following:

He said Egypt had a “great opportunity” to push for democracy.

“This is a great opportunity for us to go and talk to those currently running Egypt to make sure this really is a genuine transition from military rule to civilian rule, and see what friendly countries like Britain and others in Europe can do to help.”

How naive was that. It’s typical of a government that is purblind to the real intentions of the Palestinian Authority to engage in the politics of wishful thinking.

If Cameron was so ignorant about the almost certain outcome of a democratic election in Egypt installing the Muslim Brotherhood as the party of government (and joined by a hefty number of Salafist extremists, apparently), then his and his government’s belief that the PA is moderate, just because they would like it be true, is pretty much indicative of the politics of hope and delusion that is now endemic in Europe.

But it is more toxic than delusion.

If you see events in the Middle East through a haze of hope instead of clear-eyed reality you can assert that the impasse in the Israel-Palestine peace negotiations are due to Israeli incalcitrance and the settlements, and not Palestinian rejectionism and Jew-hatred.

You also get involved in the hypocrisy of a UK government, as part of NATO, helping rebel Libyans to unseat a government that it and its predecessors have been cosying up to in order to protect their commercial interests.

It leads to the Gibson Inquiry into claims, as reported by the Daily Mail and othersthat:

MI6 was involved in the illegal transfer of two Libyans into the hands of Colonel Gaddafi.

Democrats are only worth supporting, it seems, when they have a chance of success. Otherwise, tyrants will do just fine.
So Mr Cameron should return to Egypt and Tahrir Square to view the new Egypt, the Egypt of reality where pipelines to Israel are blown up by out of control Hamas supporters in the Sinai, where the Israeli embassy can be attacked with almost lethal consequences, where international peace agreements are likely to be dishonoured.
I happen to be old enough to remember the last great victory of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt: the assassination of President Sadat who was bold enough to make peace with Israel and perhaps because he did so.
As a result the Brotherhood was suppressed and its activities deemed illegal.
Now it has won. It was the long game for the Brotherhood just is it is for the PA.
So, off you go, Mr Prime Minister, go and see the new Egypt and tell us now about that opportunity for democracy you saw last year.
It’s the same democracy that elects Hamas in Gaza or Ghannouchi in Tunisia.
It’s a strange democracy indeed where the people vote to be enthralled by religious fanatics in place of hardline military dictatorships.
Maybe they need a lesson in democracy from Mr Hague and Mr Cameron; or why not send Cleggy; after all, he is now an expert on the Middle East.
No doubt Mr Cameron will express his hope that the Brotherhood will be democratic and ‘moderate’. Then Hague will announce that it is in Britain’s vital interest to do business with the new regime in Cairo.
Yes, moderate; maybe only 50,000 Christians will have to flee the country this year instead of the 100,000 that left last year.
If there are 50,000 left, that is.

Muslim Israeli soldiers and proud of it

17/01/2012 / / 0 Comments

H/T Elder of Ziyon

Hey, guess what, the Israeli army contains proud Israelis who are Muslim.

Who would have thought it.

That Apartheid system must be really bad for Muslim Bedouin to join up and be proud to serve.

Update:

I made a mistake in confusing Arab with Bedouin. As has been pointed out to me there are very few Arab Muslims in the IDF and those in this video are Bedouin.

Apparently, many Arabs want to serve but their leadeship prevents them.

Alistair Burt, Israel and the hypocrisy of hope

16/01/2012 / / 1 Comment

About 20 years ago I was travelling back to Manchester from London on a crowded train.

As the train was about to leave the station, a man sat down opposite me carrying a dark briefcase and proceeded to take out his mobile phone.

That man I instantly recognised as Alastair Burt who was the MP for the constituency neighbouring mine.

These were the heady days of the John Major government in the interregnum between Thatcher and Blair.

When Mr Burt began speaking to ‘John’ on his mobile phone I wondered whether this was the PM at the other end with instructions for his Under Secretary of State at the Department of Social Security.

Being a Labour party voter at the time, I’d remained decidedly unimpressed by Mr Burt. He lost his seat in 1997 and returned to a safe Tory seat in 2001, but he all but disappeared during the Blair and Brown years, so I gave him little thought.

But politicians have stamina. With the return of Tories to power, albeit as part of a coalition, Mr Burt was back in business and soon found himself as Under Secretary of State At the Foreign and Commonwealth office with a Middle East portfolio.

So, when I heard that Mr Burt was in Israel and had made a speech at Bar Ilan University, I was intrigued to hear what he had to say and prepared to not be impressed.

A link to this speech (edited and audio only) can be found here.

After what appeared to be a nervous start Mr Burt both surprised me and didn’t.

He surprised me after a slow beginning because he was quite convincing on his and his government’s commitment to, and support for Israel. He surprised me due to the often charming and sincere way he delivered the medicine.

He’s no great orator but he is a competent speaker.

It was the medicine which did not surprise me; the toeing of the party line about how illegal settlements detract from Israel’s image abroad and how the occupation weighs heavily on the Palestinians; how the stringent restrictions against Gaza are counter-productive to Israel’s interests; how building in ‘occupied East Jerusalem’ is illegal.

He told his student audience how those that were always against Israel will remain so, but many who used to support Israel now remain silent. Mr Burt is a ‘former’ member of Conservative Friends of Israel. Hmm.

Although there was nothing exceptional or new in this, and Mr Burt went on to praise Israeli high-tech, medicine and Nobel laureates, a couple of things struck me whilst I listened.

Firstly, as ever, it always has to be Israel that has to make ‘painful compromises’ and see the ‘Arab Spring’ as a reason for greater urgency in negotiations and not an excuse to avoid them.

Her Majesty’s government never acknowledges that the PA is still dedicated to Israel’s destruction, refuses to recognise its right to exist and daily demonises Israel and Jews in its policies, institutions, schools and media.

Neither does Mr Burt and his party appear to wonder for one moment whether a Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza would pose a threat to Israel given that there is no guarantee that it would not become a proxy for Iran with a Hamas government.

With Egypt apparently willing to tear up its treaties with Israel, with the Road Map ditched by the Palestinians and Jordanians also making noises about the existing peace agreement with Israel, any deal with the Palestinians can be dishonoured in a heartbeat. But Mr Burt does not live in Tel Aviv, a short missile distance from prospective Hamas launch sites.

HMG appears to be labouring under the same delusion as the Left and appeasers in Israel itself, namely that Israel must do everything in its power to create a political reality that presents a clear and present existential threat, whilst the Palestinians need do nothing except make demands which make that thereat more lethal.

So I wondered why, if HMG so loves Israel and claims to be its strong ally and friend, it wants it to speed along its own self-destruction.

This is what is known as politics, diplomacy or realpolitik. We can’t really blame politicians for issuing platitudes posing as policy; is that not what politicians always do? Problem is, they believe their own rhetoric and spend much time and diplomatic effort pursuing illusion and refusing to see the truth. The truth cannot be confronted because it means that they would have to confess the futility of peace talks where one of the parties has never wanted a peace which will destroy its own raison d’être – namely the destruction of Israel.

It also struck me and at least one member of the audience, why it is that Britain has arrogated to itself the right to travel the world criticising the policies of other countries. I don’t see Indians or Brazilians or the Japanese coming to the UK and putting its policies under a microscope. Israelis neither. Maybe they should every time an Afghan is abused or a missile goes astray in Helmand and wipes out a village. Maybe some junior minister from the Knesset with a north west Europe portfolio should go to the LSE and berate the Met for poor policing of the riots or using disproportionate force in kettling demonstrators or for taking money from journalists. At least he won’t be arrested as a war criminal now the moment he steps off the El Al plane at Heathrow.

And this so often comes pretty close to patronising. It goes something like this: we are your friend and trading partner (nudge, nudge) and we believe that that relationship would be even stronger, and your country will be a better place, if you were as good as us at human rights, civil liberties and, oh yes, democracy. Yeah, we know you are surrounded by millions of people who want to destroy you, but peace is never that easy. Once you have dismantled the settlements and withdrawn behind the 1967 lines the Palestinians will be so happy about their freedom that peace will reign and all will be well with the world. What’s that you say? You did that in Gaza and look what happened. Ah.

So it is a bit rich when Mr Cameron swans off to Saudi Arabia, a country with an appalling civil and human rights record, where thieves have their hands amputated and people have their head hacked off for offences which would be minor in most Western countries, where women’s rights are non-existent, freedom of religion is curtailed and democracy absent.

Yes, that Saudi Arabia, birth place of Osama bin Laden, center of Salafism and cradle of Wahhabism, the source of funding for UK schools which teach antisemitic tropes and encourage hatred of Jews.

Yes, the same Saudi Arabia which has lots of oil and spends shed loads of money on British arms and tries to hush up any investigation into illegal sweeteners for defence contracts.

Yes, Saudi Arabia whose king gets a full-blown state visit with all the trimmings.

The same Saudi Arabia where no Under Secretary of State visits to tell them that cutting off people’s heads and oppressing women, funding Islamist schools and sending troops into Bahrain to suppress the same Arab Spring which shot Mr Cameron to Tahrir Square to proclaim victory for democracy, is wrong and gives them a bad image.

But that’s what politics is about, isn’t it? It’s about hypocrisy, fudges, and defence contracts. It’s about not upsetting your constituents so you get re-elected. It’s about looking after your country’s self-interests and telling your friends ‘do as I preach’.

Politics is a dirty business, especially when you have to do that business with regimes you don’t like, as William Hague has said when challenged.

Look, “nobody’s poyfect!”.

So don’t ask me to put too much faith in an Under Secretary’s ability to be of any relevance whatsoever. Mr Burt is a nice man but he isn’t going to change anything. Don’t expect him to appear at a Damascus university criticising the Assad regime any time soon.

Oh yes, friends may criticise, but is it not also incumbent upon these friends to criticise even more the actions of those who would destroy your friend and are not that shy to publicise that fact? Instead, we get Obama-esque audacious hope with a good helping of cant thrown in for good measure.

« Older posts Newer posts »

© 2024 Ray Cook – As I See It

Theme by Anders Norén — Up ↑