You are currently browsing the monthly archive for December 2009.
This is a cross-post by Professor Richard Landes of Augean Stables
SELF-CRITICISM AND CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT
Self-criticism stands at the heart of any experiment in civil society.
Only when we can acknowledge errors and commit to avoiding making them again, can we have a learning curve. Only when scholars can express their criticism of academic colleagues, and those criticized are able to acknowledge error, can scientific and social thinking develop. Only when religious believers can entertain the possibility that they may not have a monopoly on truth (no matter how convinced they might be of their “Truth”), can various religions live in peace and express their beliefs without fear of violence. Only when political elites are willing to accept negative feedback from people who do not have their power, only when the press can oppose those who control public decision-making, can a government reasonably claim to be “of the people, by the people, and for the people.”
But self-criticism is difficult, especially if it takes place in public. Public admission of fault can provoke a powerful sense of humiliation, and involves an obligation to cease the erroneous behavior and attitudes. Most people actively dislike admitting error, fault, or failure, and will go to great lengths to avoid public concessions. We all develop elaborate means to protect ourselves from such public shame and obligation, by rationalizing or finger-pointing at some other party whom we try to coerce to take responsibility for the problem, either by manipulating public opinion or using force. The extreme expressions of such efforts to avoid responsibility involve scape-goating and demonizing, in which the sacrifice of the assigned “guilty party” is necessary to cover our own refusal to admit any fault.
And yet, self-criticism can become a valuable acquired taste. All positive-sum outcomes depend on some degree of willingness, if only implicitly, to admit fault, to share the blame, and to make concessions to the other side. Without self-criticism and its accompanying learning curve, there is little progress. Hence progressives rightly emphasize self-criticism.
MASOCHISTIC OMNIPOTENCE SYNDROME (MOS) AND THE PATHOLOGIES OF SELF-CRITICISM
In some cases, however, self-critical progressives can take this strategy so far that they fall into the trap of taking most or all of the responsibility for something when it is not primarily of their doing. To some extent, this unusual generosity reflects the notion that it takes a “big man” to admit fault, and that if we progressives are stronger, we should make the first, second and even third moves of concession and apology, in order to encourage those with whom we find ourselves in dispute.” Combining inflated rhetoric with a therapeutic notion that the disadvantaged should not be held to the same exacting standards (moral equivalence) leads one to fall into self-critical pathologies.
In the most extreme cases, we encounter Masochistic Omnipotence Syndrome (MOS): “it is all our fault; and if we can only be better, we can fix anything/everything.” This hyper-critical attitude can be seen with particular clarity in the response of some progressives and radicals to both the 9-11 attack in 2001 in the US, and the 7-7 attack in 2005 in London. For many, “What did we do to make them hate us?” trumped “What are they telling themselves that makes them hate us so?” In a sense, the very preference for the former question underlines our desire to be in control. Maybe we can fix what it is that we do to them, so they’ll not hate us so. Maybe even, they’ll like us.
At some level, this hyper-self criticism operates as a kind of prophetic rhetoric: by inflating the sins, by self-flagellating, one hopes to whip the offending Western party into changing their behavior, a kind of public shaming designed to provoke so much outrage and guilt as to change the situation. When the head of Amnesty International compared Gitmo to the Gulag, the comparison was of course grotesque in its moral equation of Gitmo with one of the most repressive and murderous regimes on the historical record, but Irene Zubaida Khan justified the comparison on rhetorical grounds:
- “What we wanted to do was to send a strong message that … this sort of network of detention centers that has been created as part of this war on terrorism is actually undermining human rights in a dramatic way which can only evoke some of the worst features of human rights scandals of the past,” she said. “I don’t think people have got off the hook yet.”
While one can debate the value of such rhetorical moves designed to create a sense of drama, one must at least become aware of the significant distortions in perception it can lead to. The tendency to hyper-self-criticize leads to a kind of moral self-absorption in which one loses any sense of the other side of any conflict as moral agent. Any attempt to put matters in perspective by comparing gets dismissed: “I refuse to judge myself (us) by their standards.” This kind of thinking undergirds both PCP1 and PCP2, indeed one can gauge the passage from the more moderate to the more extreme thinking precisely in terms of the degree to which self-criticism becomes, like Freud’s tyrannical super-ego, vindictive and destructive.
But the real tragedy here comes with the unconscious racism involved in such a moral argument. The proponents of such thinking fail to grant the “other side” any moral agency. “Their behavior is entirely reactive, a response to our bad deeds. If only we would stop, they would stop.” This approach, which gives us, among other things, the current policy of appeasement in the West, also operates on assumptions that the “other” — in this case, the global Jihadis and the Muslim cultures from which they draw their recruits — are not autonomous moral agents. In other words, they, like animals, can’t help themselves. Hence, we make no moral demands on them, indeed, we lower ourselves to their moral level with our equivalences.
THE DISTORTIONS OF NOT FACTORING FOR SELF-CRITICISM
However one feels about this hyper-self-critical discourse, one should at least acknowledge the role of a therapeutic inflation that makes for extremely bad history. When one looks at all the forms of imprisonment that cultures have designed for people they identify as enemies, Gitmo is not the Gulag, not even in the same league, not on the same planet. Similarly, the only traits that Israel and the Nazis share, every other sovereign culture in the recorded history of mankind also shares… indeed, when viewed in the context of history, Israel is unquestionably the least Nazi-like state in the long history of cultural conflicts resolved by violence. As a result, the last thing that a sober analyst — as opposed to an enthused activist — wants to do, is read the situation in the light of this rhetoric of therapeutic inflation.
Observers trying to resolve matters to everyone’s advantage, should, when examining evidence from the Middle East, always consider the source. They should never forget how much, normally, people dislike self-criticism and how much they will do everything to avoid it. All zero-sum outcomes depend to some degree on the ability of one side to impose its blame on the other (they deserve to lose). In tribal warrior cultures, there is no need for such arguments since the basic understanding of all the tribes is “my tribe is right or wrong,” and “plunder or be plundered.” But even the most educated, evolved, and enlightened people can fall into the game. No one likes criticism, a fortiori, public criticism.
This purely human reluctance to self-criticize highlights an element of Jewish culture that most outsiders do not really understand, and that leads to a marked misreading of the Middle East conflict. In the comparative history of self-criticism, Jewish culture is probably the most self-critical. Jews are commanded to rebuke each other and to listen to that rebuke. Jews invented prophetic rhetoric. The Ethics of the Fathers (compiled ca. 200 CE) invoke as one of the traits of a great Torah scholar, “lover of rebukes” (6:6).
The ability to both give and take criticism — admittedly one of the most difficult acts of dialogue in the human repertory — constitutes one of the keys to Jewish survival through millennia of oppression, to Jewish self-deprecating humor, and to the dramatic success of Jews once modern civil societies adopt fair rules: equality before the law. One might even argue that Jews, unlike any other culture, so thrive on their ability to self-criticize that some Jews actually can become addicted to self-criticism.
And so, not surprisingly, among nations, the Jewish nation — Israel — has produced among the most self-critical sovereign cultures on record, certainly when one takes into account the behavior and attitude of its neighbors. Under conditions that lead other sovereign entitites to shut down dissent and move to “martial” law, Israel has maintained an extraordinarily vibrant discourse of self-criticism. Post Zionist historiography is impossible to understand without this framework.
Nothing contrasts more with Israel’s culture of self-criticism than its belligerent neighbors, especially the Palestinians. Here we find one of the most aggressive zero-sum political cultures on record. They accept no responsibility for the war they wage, and justify all their behavior — including how they treat their own people — as a response to the Zionists. They demonize the Zionists with conspiracy theories and blood libels drawn from the most delirious of European anti-Semitic fears to inspire their victimized people to take arms against this malevolent enemy. Who could self-criticize when being assaulted by such merciless and powerful forces? Self-criticism under such conditions is unthinkable, and dissent is treachery. The exceptional number of Palestinians killed by Palestinians suggests a culture in which intimidating dissenters and eliminating traitors is the norm.
Our understanding of the Middle East conflict suffers from a peculiar twisting of the dynamics of self-criticism. As a result, many people do not understand the nature of the rhetoric they hear and, assuming it all comes from the same “place” — no one likes to self-criticize — mis-interpret the information they get. In the case of the information coming from Israel and the Palestinian or Arab media, for example, much “even-handedness” has insisted that the Arab media is every bit as reliable as the Israeli, and vice-versa, that Israeli media can be as dishonest and propagandistic. From one perspective it would seem obvious and straightforward to distinguish between the unusually self-critical Israeli press willing to air its disagreements publicly and the exceptional reluctance of the Palestinian press to express serious criticism of their own side, to allow any dirty laundry to go public. And yet, a wide range of highly intelligent and well-informed people tell us the exact opposite.
Even-handedness demands that we give both sides a hearing. If the Palestinians start shouting about tunnels under al Aqsa and rioting, and the Israelis deny that there are any tunnels, the media presents this in terms of what each side claims. No mention of the ridiculous nature of the accusations — that would be to judge! — nor of the violent contempt with which Muslim building projects in Solomon’s Stables violated every norm of civilized behavior and destroyed precious sites of knowledge.
As a result, for uninformed observers, the Middle East conflict may seem bewildering. If one presents the “refugee problem” in terms of “both sides,” and you get your typical self-critical Israeli to speak, you get Israelis taking 50% of the responsibility, while the Palestinian spokespeople will put 98% of the responsibility on the Israelis, largely using and citing the self-critical Israelis to make their points. The uninformed comes out thinking, “Okay, so Israel’s about 75% responsible/guilty.”
In order to understand this problem, one must understand a critical cultural issue: civil societies thrive on self-criticism, and authoritarian ones thrive on scape-goating and demonizing. To take the “narratives” from both sides as equally legitimate (or worse, to primarily trust the demonizing narrative from the authoritarian side because they are “losing” the battle with civil society), is to make critical category errors. In the battle between a totalitarian society and a democracy, “even-handed” approaches will always favor the totalitarian state. Rather than appreciate the value and difficulty of self-criticism, reward it, and encourage it on the other side, it punishes the self-critical and rewards the demonizers.
Instead, one needs to factor in the role of demonizing and refusal to self-criticize not only in producing the narratives we hear about the problem, but also in the creation and exacerbation of the problem itself. In the history of nations and ethnic disputes, normal response of a culture faced with the behavior of Arab elites and their genocidal discourse and war plans in 1948, would have been massive return massacres by the victorious enemy against whom they had declared so merciless a war. Thus, if one places the Palestinian refugee problem on the vast the panorama of such ethnic disputes — even ones contemporary to it (like India and Pakistan, 1948) and ones contemporary to us (Balkans, Rwanda, Sudan) — the blame for its insolubility seems to reside primarily, overwhelmingly, with the Arab elites.
By not holding them responsible, by approving their lethal narratives, by affirming their boundless sense of entitlement, by justifying their rage and violence, the West has nurtured a monster… Global Jihad. Only by understanding the dangers of their hyper-self-criticism will Westerners at once learn to respect themselves, and show respect for Arab and Muslim culture by demanding minimal levels of self-criticism from them. Only then will the destructive combination of demopaths and their dupes be broken.
_____________
To explore this subject of Masochistic Omnipotence Syndrome further Professor Landes has a highly recommended post here.
Ha’aretz is reporting that the Guardian has been forced to admit yet another foul-up when it comes to their biased anti-Israel coverage of Israel.
According to the Guardian’s “corrections and clarifications” page al Grauniad admits
We should not have put the headline “Israel admits harvesting Palestinian organs” on a story about an admission, by the former head of the Abu Kabir forensic institute near Tel Aviv, that during the 1990s specialists at the institute harvested organs from the bodies of Israeli soldiers, Israeli citizens, Palestinians and foreign workers without getting permission from the families of the deceased (21 December, page 15). That headline did not match the article, which made clear that the organs were not taken only from Palestinians. This was a serious editing error and the headline has been changed online to reflect the text of the story written by the reporter.
Serious editing error. You don’t say.
As ModernityBlog pointed out in his excellent post on the subject earlier this week which we cross-posted here (and for which he can probaly take partial credit for the Guardian’s emabarassing admission of wrongdoing),
“the Guardian can write considered and thoughtful articles on the Alder Hey scandal, but when a similar situation arises in Israel it is used as a political stick to beat Israelis with, and any notion of thoughtful journalism is thrown out of the window.’
The fact of the matter is that the Guardian’s subsequent retraction buried in an obscure place in its website or in the back pages of its newspaper is too little, too late as the damage has already been done. The vile antisemitic commentary on the Antony Lerman thread this week only served to confirm this and I’ll wager that we’ll continue to see in the comment threads allegations of havesting of Palestinian organs along with the long list of blood libels such as the so-called “Jenin massacre” that are regularly trumpeted on “Comment is Free”.
And can we expect any change in the Guardian’s editorial policy? Not one that I can foresee and I tend to agree with CAMERA’s assessment on the subject who in their response to the Guardian’s retraction stated:
It’s unfortunately safe to expect that, with respect to the Arab-Israeli conflict, the newspaper we’ll continue to see won’t be the Guardian that corrected a distorted headline, but the Guardian that so frequently distorts the conflict, and the Guardian whose culture allows an editor to unblinkingly announce that “In Israel they murder each other a great deal” only because “they don’t like their political style and what they’ve got to say.”
So what play does Lyn Gardner, The Guardian’s theatre critic, include among her ‘things to celebrate’ in 2009?
Seven Jewish Children of course!
Remember Michael Billington’s comment about that obscenity? How can we forget? I nominate it as “Crassest Comment of 2009 from a Guardian Journalist”.
But Churchill also shows us how Jewish children are bred to believe in the “otherness” of Palestinians …
What are your nominations for “Crassest Comment of 2009 from a Guardian Journalist?”
One may be excused for thinking that if ever there’s a wrong side on which to be on whatever issue, Seumas Milne will be found there. This is, of course, the man who only days after the 9/11 attacks was chastising grieving Americans. This is the man who supports the ‘resistance’ in Iraq and sneers at the opponents of Ahmedinijad. This is a man who harbours romantic nostalgia for communism – don’t you just love those old school Reds who never actually had to live under a repressive regime themselves, but seem to delight in wishing it upon others? This is a man who supports the infamous ‘Stop the War Coalition’ led by our old friend George (cash for Hamas) Galloway and makes speeches at rallies calling for Britain to pull out of Afghanistan because he believes that there was no terrorist threat to his country before British troops went there.
Given this track record, it comes as no surprise that Milne’s CiF article of December 17th demonstrated his usual toxic medley of selective vision and fact-tweaking.
“The rockets that were supposed to be the justification for Gaza’s devastation have been virtually silent all year, as they were for much of the six months before the assault, policed by Hamas.” Interesting use of the word ‘virtual’ there Seumas; I doubt that the residents of Sderot and its environs think that well over 200 rockets and mortars since the end of Operation Cast Lead are ‘virtual’, even if it is an improvement on what they previously had to put up with.
So, pull up a comfy chair, make yourself a hot drink and come wade with me through the selection of comments which Milne’s thread generated. Even the faithful CiF Watch team was unable to work fast enough to record them all, so you can tell how bad it was. On second thoughts, you may need something a little stronger than tea…Let’s ease into it gently with some advocates of boycotts and sanctions.
17 Dec 2009, 8:38AM
Until Israeli politicians, soldiers and their legal poodles face sanctions, they will continue to act in defiance of human decency and international law.
Until more of the Israeli public learn compassion and humanity, it will tolerate the crimes committed in its name.
Time for action.
17 Dec 2009, 9:10AM
Well said, Seumas.
Until we can send the leaders off to the Hague, a boycott of the Israeli economy is the answer. It is a slow trudge but gradually they will feel it.
17 Dec 2009, 12:32PM
I believe several countries have reacted in the same way as the UK to the threats from Israel. It is hard to understand that in this situation it is the state, acting against international law that sets the agenda. I think that those who call for an embargo on Israel are right.
I apologise if this is double- or tripleposting.
17 Dec 2009, 2:03PM
An indefinite boycott of Israel in all possible and practical ways.
(Tourism, Cultural events, film fetivals and the like. just don’t go near them)
until Israel puts something on the table that the Palestinians of both factions can take seriously.
Collective punishment of Israeli artists, fim -makers, restaurant owners etxc etc Yes. Sorry. As their government often tells them and the world at large : Well life’s like that. The World is often unfair.
Now let’s progress to examples of believers in the famous ‘Giyus conspiracy’.
17 Dec 2009, 1:08PM
nusadua
On every tread where Israel is mentioned you get the same loony left posters who bleat,whinge and whine and repeat and throw the same worn out bromidic platitudes, the same blaaah,blaaaaah,blaaaaa.How sad,how pathetic,how bloody boring.
Only matched by the official Israeli Cheerleader Squad, who will misrepresent any action no matter how brutal, tell any tale no matter how tall, and are always looking the other way when the IDF are shooting, in order to make their team look good. They never succeed. You can’t turn shit into gold.
Oh, and there’s also half arsed, so called “fans” who simply mouth idiot platitudes (can’t find the bromide) because their own prejudice makes any real appreciation of what’s going on impossible.
Blah blah blah. Sorry to have kept you awake. Try some heroin for the boredom, although many find it more boring than death, you shouldn’t let that stop you.
17 Dec 2009, 11:35AM
Best ignore nusadua. He’s a recent arrival and very active on the Israel-Palestine threads.
Most likely a giyus troll.
Then there are those who already ‘know’ that war crimes have been committed and by whom. Note the ever increasing appearance of posters suggesting a UK/US/Israel axis.
17 Dec 2009, 8:40AM
Let’s all look forward to the day when Tzipi, Tony and George are restricted to life in either the USA or Israel: the civilised world should not be a welcoming place for war criminals.
17 Dec 2009, 9:26AM
Good article, Seamus. When one appreciates that, as others here have said, the leaders of the US, UK and Israel are birds of a feather singing from the same page, this mutual support network of sorts becomes inevitable. The real axis of evil looks after its own, naturally. Miliband, Livni, Brown, Obama … enemies of humanity, the lot of them.
17 Dec 2009, 1:45PM
nusadua
people who initiated this dumb arrest warrant against Livni owe her an apology.
Using white phospherous as a weapon is a war crime. Dropping it indiscriminately
on a civilian population is evil.
And an excellent article.
17 Dec 2009, 4:36PM
I would be very happy to see Livni, Blair, Bush, Mugabe, Hu etc in the dock. They are all criminals. It would be difficult to do the same with Hamas however as Israel assassinates their leaders with impunity along with any innocent women and children in the area.
To follow; the age-old ‘chosen people’ trope, and some Nazi analogy.
17 Dec 2009, 4:31PM
@ hebrewhammer
of how i see the error of my thinking now, not realising that you have the god given right to do whatever you want, as you are of a race that is chosen specifically by an all powerfull god, excuse my misunderstanding for even dare state a contrary postion from yours.
i am now converted into championing your crusade to bring religous and humanitarian enlightment and tolerance to the world, may the israeli state rise above the shackles of this petty international UN interfering legislation that dares to critise, limit and question your rightful place as the moral and spiritual superiors that you are!
17 Dec 2009, 3:57PM
Excellent article – Well said! How contemptible the israelis continue to be – but not more contemptible than our own politicians, who, had they have lived in the 30′s, would probably have made excuses for the nazis.
Everybody’s favourite ‘moderate’ then informed us what ‘Good Jews’ should not be doing.
17 Dec 2009, 9:06AM
Contributor
Great piece, Seumas. How depressing to see the UK Foreign Office Minister Ivan Lewis apologising to the Israelis and saying that the UK government is “determined to take whatever action is necessary so that Israeli leaders can visit us at any time.”
Of course, this is the same Ivan Lewis MP who so disgracefully took part in a pro-Israel rally in Manchester at the height of the Israeli bombardment and invasion of Gaza earlier this year saying that he stood ‘shoulder to shoulder with Israel’.
Next; some ‘Israelis are colonialists and generally nasty people’ comments.
17 Dec 2009, 11:20AM
Why is the racist, apartheid, terrorist state of Israel in Palestine allowed the right of Self-defence, but the democratically elected Hamas Government and its freedom fighters are condemned and isolated? Israel commits war crimes every day and should not be exempt from the law and justice. If Hamas committed those offences against the Israelis, not only would Nato have intervened but there would have been mandatory sanctions against them.
These double standards continue and I’m sure it has nothing to do with the fact that the majority of White Israelis are European and American.
17 Dec 2009, 9:22AM
Israel, like most of us, is her own worst enemy. Spoilt, arrogant, self-justifying, with a massive chip on each shoulder while constantly bickering and jostling and fighting herself and neighbours as she re-arranges deck chairs on the Titanic.
Still not feeling too queasy? Good, because the majority of comments on this thread came from subscribers to the conspiracy theory of Jewish/Israeli control of no less than Her Majesty’s Government, as recently promoted by the Channel 4 ‘Dispatches’ programme.
17 Dec 2009, 8:54AM
Correct, lovemymod.
Israel’s leaders act like spoilt children because we spoil them, giving into every mischievous whim and every act of petty spite. Some one will always be there- paid or unpaid- to find an excuse. That’s why we have a Minister for Israel (sorry, the Middle East).
And like the famous spoilt child, Violet Elizabeth, in the William books, Israel “screams and screams and makes herself sick” when she doesn’t get her own way.
You’d have to have a heart of stone (as Oscar Wilde said) not to find some of the outrage hilarious.
17 Dec 2009, 12:26PM
I would never dare to even suggest that a small part of the reason why an evil rogue state like israel enjoys impunity in the west is due to the (implicit and explicit) jewish lobby &, in the US & the UK, the influence of jewish politicians
[recreated from DPerone99 17 Dec 12.33pm]
17 Dec 2009, 12:38PM
the small but powerful Jewish circle pulling the strings of an unwitting gentile nation
again: that’s your interpretation of my words, reality is much more complex and nuanced than the evil caricature that you draw, in an attempt to discredit that (complex) truth
17 Dec 2009, 1:01PM
What I cannot understand is why it is taking so long for the British government to obey a direct order from Jerusalem. I think that hesitating over obeying a direct order is just as bad as not obeying it at all.
17 Dec 2009, 1:10PM
whilst israel continues to infest western countries with its agents with which to mold malleable government officials into the’ israel-first ‘ way of thinking, the one-state solution is as distant as ever……….time to call a spade a spade……………….
17 Dec 2009, 1:54PM
A good article Seamus.
But me think this is all a storm in a teacup but with sinister motives. It is just another calculated ploy to make Labour more unpopular.
The reaction of some government ministers was predictable given their deep rooted association with the Zionists and the state that is Israel. Given the shift in public opinion since its slaughter in Gaza, Israel figured that telling British leaders to change its laws enshrined in the 1949 Geneva Conventions on behalf of alleged war criminals will not go down well with the public.
It is also a shot across the bows of the potential government in waiting, of which half of its shadow cabinet and 80% of its MPs are already sitting in Israeli pockets. Israelis have not been happy with some anti-Israeli decisions of late such as not participating in the vote against Goldstone report and the re-labelling of West Bank products. It is a win win for them.
17 Dec 2009, 4:55PM
Nusadua -
I was glancing through the posts on this thread and couldn’t help noticing that a very large number of them had your name attached. That many posts must be worth reading I thought, so I began. I read every single one and can honestly say I am impressed, even taking into account the many previous articles on Israel/Palestine, which consistently exhibit reams of ridiculous assertions from the Israeli supporters, it is a fact that you have won the main prize for writing absolute bollocks. Congratulations.
Now to the case in point. I notice that the post made by bebiking at 12.13pm, in which he/she pointed out that both government ministers involved in the decision to lift the warrent , David Miliband and Ivan Lewis were Jewish, has been deleted.
On a thread that is about the relationship between the British government and Israel, and the influence of the Israeli/Jewish lobby on that relationship, I would have thought that the fact (it is public knowledge) that the Home Secretary and another senior government minister are Jewish was eminently relevant. It should at least call into question the impartiality of the Ministers involved. Even in the House of Commons an MP has to declare any interests in the subject under discussion.
Or has it got to the stage in the UK where the Israeli/Jewish lobby has grown so powerful that that even the Guardian can’t print the public fact that a person is Jewish? I have no interest per se in anyone’s religion or race, but I am concerned about possible vested interests possibly perverting International Law in my name.
We live in a free democracy and I would have expected to be able to discuss issues such as this one without having relevant and reasonable comments of a factual nature censored.
17 Dec 2009, 5:14PM
Once upon a time the sun never set in the British Empire.
Not any more obviously for over a century, but still how does it feel to be British today and watch Israel, essentially a second world country issuing orders at the behest of Uncle Sam, it’s prime benefactor, to a once proud nation.
If I was British I would be horrified
The European Union is letting Israel away with murder, literally but Britain seems to be caught in a very compromised crouched position.
As the Latins like to ask; Has Britain become Israel’s play thing?
17 Dec 2009, 6:23PM
PaulMetcalf
yes, that is how we work. Do you insinuate any country that backs Israel it is under UNDUE lobby pressure.
This is being discussed in the US and there are lots of people there who think that the answer is yes:
The Lobby Within
http://www.counterpunch.org/baroud12172009.html
Are you British? It makes a difference you see, because you keep calling for British allies and British politicians to be arrested.
I haven’t been calling for British politicians to be arrested until now. Maybe Miliband and Brown who are trying to change the law to protect people acused of war crimes and possible crimes against humanity should be arrested. Yes, I’m calling for the arresting of Livni. What’s the problem?
Your answer was bad. I said that some people aduce facts which leads them to say of Israel what you say of Hamas. You are not able to refute them.
17 Dec 2009, 6:28PM
My comment was deleted. When it comes to Israel nobody can voice opinions like this.
Israel owns Britain.
@giants – you will be zapped for your last comment
At times like this I almost feel like getting a T-shirt printed: ‘Israel Lobby – Staff’. Joking aside, an example of another recent Channel 4 programme’s effect was also in evidence. The ‘Unreported World’ documentary from November 27th 2009 reported ‘on the growing influence of ultra-orthodox Jews in Israel’ and obviously, the message was received loud and clear.
17 Dec 2009, 3:27PM
@ nusadua, you do realise that most people i know, from all political spectrums, view isreal as a murderous, despotic, bullying, genocidal state.
you wrote
“The Israeli army has a strong moral code of ethics that is unmatched by any other army in the world,it doesn’t need lessons in morality,least of all from CiF posters.”
really? how laughable! how out of touch with the reality of the situation over there are you? i see a state that is run by fundamamental religious extremism, and a state thats had a nuclear arsenal for some decades, now thats scarry.
i applauded the judge for taking the decision to issue the arrest of tivni, truely cheered my day when i read that some aspects of our legal systym still works as it should do and doing what it morally should do.
i do hope the moderate isreali people take over and some humiltiy is shown by the extreme israeli factions
Well I hope you’re still with me after all that because we also have some examples of pro-Israel comments which got the moderator’s chop.
17 Dec 2009, 1:46PM
“But the barbaric siege of the Gaza strip continues unabated, backed by the US, Britain and the European Union, leaving 70% of Gazans living on less than a dollar a day, without clean water or the means to rebuild the 21,000 homes, 280 schools and 16 hospitals partially or completely destroyed last December and January.”
The usual rubbish.
There was a recent article about starvation in Nepal, and I did a little digging to see how Nepal’s needs and aid compare with the Palestinians (remember – the only group in the world which has its own special UN welfare agency) which is worth repeating here to put the situation in Gaza in perspective:
UNRWA’s General Assembly-approved cash budget for 2008 is US$ 541.8 million. Registered refugees 4,671,811 , registered refugees in camps 1,373,732 (UNRWA Annual report 2008)
Nepal’s population is 28,581,687 – 2008 Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators
Wiki:
According to Nepal’s Ministry of Finance, total foreign aid committed in fiscal year (FY) 2003 was US$555 million, with 63.3 percent in grants and 36.7 percent in loans.
So 28M Nepalese get about 2/3 the grants that 4.7M Palestinians get, and the rest is loans. (Ever hear of the Palestinians having to repay a loan???)
Per capita, the Palestinians get 7x the assistance given to the Nepalese, and if you use the number in refugees “camps” (sic – townships) its something like 20x.
According to Ed Douglas, “The WFP need $7m a month to restore its food programme in Nepal.”
So the palestinians are doing quite a lot better than many others.
But the squeaky Palestinian wheel gets the grease – have there been 10 articles this week about Nepal, or Sudan, or Sri Lanka, or Congo, where conditions are far worse than the “barbaric siege of the Gaza strip”? This “barbaric seig” of a terrorsit run area where Israel allows tons of food every day to pass into the Strip, provides H1N1 flu vaccine, and treats Gazans in its own hospitals if Hamas terrorists allows them to leave?
There’s never been a barbaric siege like this in history, perpetrated by the victims of 8000 rockets fired at its citizens (“only” 242 this year – a mere pinprick that I’m sure would pass unnoticed if they had landed in Britain – not!!)..
What a load of fictional hate-mongering this article is.
17 Dec 2009, 1:51PM
A characteristically unbalanced and context-free article.
I wonder when the Guardian will start being published with the byeline “Die Juden sind unsere ungluck.”??
17 Dec 2009, 2:16PM
@usini, as you are probably aware, that was the byeline of Der Sturmer, a viciously antisemitic newspaper in Nazi Germany. I thought that the implication of my comment was pretty clear and relates to the lack of balance and overt bias of too many Guardian opinion pieces and CIF comments.
When a journalist with a record like that of Milne writes a blatantly one-sided article such as this, it is quite easy to anticipate a vivid demonstration of that shameless symbiosis which exists between below the line commentators and above the line writers at CiF. And very unpleasant viewing it is too.
This is a guest post by Jonathan Hoffman
Jonathan Romain had an appalling piece in CiF last Wednesday about the Supreme Court’s JFS judgment.
If a rabbi writes about the JFS judgment (which was about the right of the school to give preference to halachically authentic Jewish children – that is, children whose mother is halachically Jewish or who have converted in an Orthodox way, recognised by the Chief Rabbi) you’d maybe like to know whether he was an Orthodox or non-Orthodox rabbi. Well, Jonathan Romain never tells you that he is non-Orthodox, either in his article or in his bio on the CiF site. And if that author says he is a member of an organisation that is ‘concerned about how faith schools operate’, you’d maybe want to know a bit more. For example if that organisation wanted to abolish faith schools completely, you’d maybe like to know that. The Accord Coalition, of which Jonathan Romain is the Chairman, is rather coy about saying this: we read on its home page that it “takes no position on the desirability or undesirability of state-funded faith schools.” But go to its declaration of aims and you find this as the first “aim”:
Operate admissions policies that take no account of pupils’ – or their parents’ – religion or beliefs.
No equivocation there then.
For Romain, the JFS judgment was the first salvo in a battle that he hopes will end with the death of faith schools. No wonder we get such hyperbole from him:
It is no exaggeration to say that the supreme court has just saved the Jewish community from itself. Or, rather, from the more right-wing exclusivist tendencies that unfortunately seem to exert much greater sway than they deserve to.
And no wonder accuracy takes a back seat:
….and just as most people regard Anglicans, Catholics, Baptists, Methodists and others as all Christian, so most Jews regard each other as fellow Jews.
That’s really not correct. A Jew who attends a Liberal synagogue has about as much in common with a Chassid from Stamford Hill as he does with Her Majesty The Queen – possibly less.
And then Romain believes that the Judgment has implications for other religions:
This applies to other religious schools – whether Christian, Muslim or Hindu – which are controlled by one strand of the faith and can deny access to children of other groups within it.
It really doesn’t. Those faiths are not regarded as a ‘race’ under the UK’s Race Relations legislation. Judaism is – and that was the problem.
As I argued after reading the Appeal Court judgment, it turned on ‘false equivalence’: the Judges said that what is sauce for the Race Relations Act goose, must be sauce for the school admissions gander: they said that Jews are correctly treated as a racial group for the purposes of the Race Relations Act but that means that a school admissions policy that relies on the Orthodox definition of Judaism (matrilineal descent or Orthodox conversion) is illegal. But the definition of a Jew for the purposes of the Race Relations Act is much wider than the biblical one which the Chief Rabbi and JFS have. It is invalid to equate the two.
Romain descends into arrant nonsense:
Whether one is religious or not, many will agree that state-funded faith schools should serve not just themselves but also the community around them. JFS was adopting an approach that breached that sense of inclusivity and fair play…. [The Judgment] will also serve as a wake-up call to all state-funded faith schools to honour their responsibilities to wider society.
Utter drivel. JFS was not failing to “serve … the community around it” or ”to honour its obligations to wider society.”
It simply fell foul of Sir Stephen Sedley’s zeal (and that of his two Appeal Court colleagues) to use his judicial office as an instrument of social engineering.
This is a guest post by Mitnaged
After the Guardian’s Political Editor, Michael White, made ill-judged and scurrilous allegations about the IDF on the BBC Radio London’s Breakfast programme on 14th December, I felt constrained to make a formal complaint to the BBC. Those who missed what White said can find it verbatim by clicking here.
A copy of the BBC’s reply to me follows, prefixed by “>” and embedded in it, in italics, is my subsequent reply to them:
>—–Original Message—–
>From: complaintresponse@bbc.co.uk [mailto:complaintresponse@bbc.co.uk]
>Sent: 19 December 2009 10:58
>To: [intentionally omitted]
>Subject: [intentionally omitted]
>
>Thanks for your email about the interview on BBC London 94.9′s
>’Breakfast’ programme on December 14 with the Guardian newspaper’s
>assistant editor Michael White.
>
>Mr White was invited to give his views on the news story of the attack
>on Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
>
>Having investigated your complaint, BBC London would like to apologise
>for any offence you might have felt on hearing Mr White’s comments.
>However, we would point out that Mr White is not a BBC journalist, and
>he was clearly introduced to listeners as a commentator from the
>Guardian newspaper.
I am glad that you apologised. It matters little whether or not
Mr White was one of your journalists (given the paper for which he writes his comments were hardly surprising – but most offensive was the fact that he was allowed to make those remarks unchallenged by the BBC hosts of the programme.
>He was putting forward his own views with his own choice of words, and,
>as with other commentators, the listener is free to make up their own
>mind on the validity of his arguments. The BBC’s advice to its own
>journalists would be to use plain and simple language, rather than make
>value judgements, but we cannot apply the same guidance to interviewees.
See my point above. The BBC has a responsibility to those who pay it to make sure that lies are not promulgated unchallenged. That the hosts remained silent implied that they agreed with those lies. (Additional note, not in the original: I have since been reminded that actually, the interviewer did not remain silent. She made a noise expressing agreement, as if what White said was as obvious as the fact that the sun always rises, and then they went on).
>Mr White’s comments about Israel were a brief aside, along with other
>remarks about Northern Ireland, during the interview about Signor
>Berlusconi. In these circumstances, the presenter had to judge whether
>to divert the interview into a discussion about what Israel calls
>’targeted killing’ or his comments about Northern Ireland rather than
>concentrate on the matter in hand.
I disagree. Brief asides can nevertheless be offensive and inciteful. The presenter could either have challenged White or carefully steered him away from digging himself a hole by a statement that his remarks were beyond the remit of the programme.
>
>Given this background and the incidental nature of Mr White’s comments,
>we believe the presenters were right to concentrate on the substance of
>the interview.
I am not surprised, given the BBC’s record in the past. I however want to remain on record as taking issue with your reasoning.
I intend to take this up to the highest level. Not only did the presenters not concentrate on “the substance of the programme” as the BBC called it, but their presenter actually agreed with what White said, or at least failed to correct it. More predictable, however, was the standard BBC excuse and divesting themselves of all responsibility by reminding me that White was not one of theirs. That makes little difference – indeed I would argue that there is precious little clear blue water between the BBC’s attitude towards Israel and that of Michael White – but the BBC put out the programme, therefore the BBC was responsible for the content of it and for any offence caused.
In the spirit of continuing the anti-Israel barrage in commemoration of the upcoming one-year anniversary of Operation Cast Lead (well actually, on second thoughts, the Guardian doesn’t need a special reason to bash Israel), “Comment is Free” just published a new article by Theobald Jew, Neve Gordon, whitewashing Palestinian terrorism.
It is well known that the Guardian moderators censor views that do not comport with its own world view. Only yesterday we had Tom Wonacott’s comment deleted from the Lerman thread which happened to be perhaps the only on-topic comment on the thread, and Tom’s comment was one of a number of pro-Israel comments that were inexplicably deleted.
Here’s a stark example of the Guardian World View in action on the Gordon thread with the deletion of this comment.
JeremyinOz
23 Dec 2009, 12:29PM
More Guardian apologia for terrorists.
The Palestinians are victims, but as much victims of their own flawed mythologising and manipulative supporters as the state of Israel. Until they realise that Syria and Iran support them through naked self-interest, the sooner they may come to see that their only future lies with reaching an accommodation with the state of Israel.
Given that the Guardian regularly gives a platform to terror apologists and has even gone as far as to host articles by terrorists themselves including Khaled Mish’al, JeremyinOz’s comment is completely fair and should not have warranted deletion. And with respect to Neve Gordon himself, during the Second Intifada while Israelis were enduring wave after wave of suicide bombings orchestrated in the main by Arafat’s al-Aksa Martyrs’ Brigades, Gordon barricaded himself up with Yasser Arafat in Arafat’s Ramallah compound.
Its at times like this that I am reminded of the words of a certain daughter of a certain editor-in-chief of the Guardian who responded to a commenter’s complaint that “[t]he Guardian censors are removing all trace of posts that are [sic] do not agree with their political positions.”
Let me just state categorically, we do not do this. The Guardian has hundreds of staff, and believe it or not, there is no official position to disagree with. You only have to read any article to see lots of varied opinions.
Yes that comment has about as much credibility as Matt Seaton’s comments to the JC last year when he said
“We have a zero-tolerance policy on antisemitic postings or any other form of hate speech…We do not tolerate any hate speech, and our moderators will delete comments which are antisemitic or Islamophobic or otherwise racist , as soon as they are reported to us or when we see them ourselves. That happens in minutes rather than hours or days.”
Congratulations are in order for Alan Rusbridger and his team for winning two highly coveted Dishonest Reporter Awards for 2009, more than any other media outlet. The awards are given in a number of categories for the most skewed and biased coverage of the Mideast conflict and this is the ninth time Honest Reporting is running this.
The Guardian was the winner in the category of “Biggest Train Wreck of Palestinian Sources”. The Guardian was honored with this prize for this:
Shortly after Haaretz’s bungled soldier’s testimonies, The Guardian published a package of news, video, commentary and a staff editorial about Israeli war crimes in Gaza it claimed to have uncovered. The so-called expose suffered from three primary problems, which HonestReporting elaborated on.
Furthermore, the Jerusalem Post discovered that The Guardian crossed the line into outright activism with a letter to bloggers and web site owners appealing for them to plug the package in order to
. . . add weight to calls this week for a full inquiry into the events surrounding Operation Cast Lead, which was aimed at Hamas, but which left over 1400 Palestinians dead – around 300 known to be children.
The Guardian, well more precisely, associate editor Michael White, was also the winner in the category of “Most Senseless Talking Head” for this:
Michael White, an associate editor at The Guardian, was a guest on BBC Radio London’s Breakfast Show discussing an attack on Italian PM Sylvio Berlusconi when he made the following statement:
In Israel they murder each other a great deal. The Israeli Defense Forces murder people because they don’t like their political style and what they’ve got to say and it only means that people more extreme come in and take their place.
A sharp interviewer with a little chutzpah could’ve stopped White in his tracks and followed up on his silly accusation. But it didn’t occur to the Breakfast Show hosts to do that because White’s language is now mainstream in the UK media. But even more troubling is the ease of White’s lie coupled with his responsibilities as associate editor.
And how does The Guardian relate to this? Good question. The paper hasn’t yet responded to HonestReporting’s concerns or the hundreds of emails we were cc’d on.
Last year the Guardian was the winner of only one award, the “Most Questionable Terror Links” award.
To see who the other recipients of Dishonest Reporter Awards for 2009 click here.
This is a cross-post from Israellycool (for more on Richard Silverstein at Israellycool click here – check out the names that Aussie Dave has for this Theobald Jew – nincompoop is my favorite)
Anti-Israel loonblogger Richard Silverstein organized “a series of media and public events on the Iranian nuclear crisis,” which was designed to “explore ways of resolving the Iranian nuclear crisis through negotiation, rather than force.” Amongst the ideas expressed at this conference was that there “is no evidence so far that Iran is actively following a path that would lead to building a nuclear weapon.”
http://tiny.cc/eoXzq
Silverstein, Jimmy Carter called and demanded back his delusions.
Silverstein promises that video will be posted shortly. For now, we will have to do with pictures from the conference, including this one of our silver friend.
Forget Iran’s impending nuclear weapon. Silverstein’s sweater should be banned as a weapon of mass destruction.
Not that we weren’t already aware of his dress sense.
Mere Rhetoric is running a poll on what the next media-legitimized anti-Israel canard is going to be.
To cast your vote click here.
The Guardian’s favorite Theobald Jew, Antony Lerman, was at it again fuelling the flames of Jew-hatred in the comment thread with an article entitled Israel’s doctors must allay doctor’s fears bearing the byline “[a]llegations of Israeli doctors colluding in the torture of Palestinians must be investigated”. There being no substance to Lerman’s article, the commenters seized upon this to focus on the news that during the 1990s Israel used organs from deceased Israelis, Palestinians and foreign workers without their consent.
The first volley of comments in the thread set the tone for the entire thread:
orwellwasright
22 Dec 2009, 12:10PM
This on top of the admission by the Israeli government that they were indeed harvesting the organs of Palestinians – after accusing anyone who saw any credibility to the allegations revealed in the Swedish press of being “anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists”.
Talk about a complete, institutionalised rejection of morality…
ellymiranda
22 Dec 2009, 12:11PM
Yes, now when Israel officially admitted that their physicians have stolen organs from both Israelis and Palestinians, it is time to put it all on the table.
Of course, this kind of perversion of the truth is a well known tactic employed by the hate-Israel crowd. Predictably, orwellwasright and ellymiranda manipulated the false headline that “Israel Admitted to Harvesting Palestinian Organs” using this as proof that the Aftonbladet blood libel (that Israeli soldiers harvest the organs of Palestinians for trafficking) is true, despite the fact that such charges are completely unsubstantiated and Donald Bostrom, the Aftonbladet “reporter”, has since distanced himself from the story.
As Yaacov Lozowick observes
Antisemitic allegations almost always start from some grain of fact. What makes them antisemitic (or even merely slander) isn’t the original grain of truth but the edifice built on it. In the Rostom blood libel earlier this year the slander was that IDF forces were regularly killing Palestinians so as to harvest their organs. The grain of truth uncovered here (which actually isn’t news at all, it has been known in Israel for years, which is one reason Hiss no longer heads the Abu Kabir institute) has nothing to do with those allegations, and doesn’t substantiate them in any way.
But to point out that what orwellwasright and ellymiranda were doing was propagating antisemitic blood libels was met with this:
orwellwasright
22 Dec 2009, 12:21PM
I wonder how long it’ll be until the usual suspects come here and start making excuses for this? They do it for the slaughter of children, so why not for the complicity of the medical establishment in torture or the harvesting of organs?
orwellwasright
22 Dec 2009, 12:25PM
ThePrompter: “What I’d like to know is, as far as Israelis are concerned, what isn’t antisemitic?”
Praising the IDF for shooting children, perhaps?
bill4me
22 Dec 2009, 12:30PM
Or praising Hamas for raining rockets down on civilian populations?
KrustytheKlown
22 Dec 2009, 2:48PM
Rubbish! The whole point about the article to which you refer was that it claimed that Palestinians were being killed in order to obtain their organs without a shred of evidence being offered to support the claim.
Did the article make this claim?
From what I’ve read (admittedly I haven’t read a translation of hte original article) the newspaper did not make this claim, but rather reported the remarks of individual Palestinians who did make this claim. Not at all the same thing.
It is, btw, really quite chilling to see how so many of our zionist posters are playing down Israel’s admission that it stole organs from members of an occupied people. If that kind of carry-on really isn’t so bad after all, why then did the Israeli govt throw out the usual pathetic ‘anti-semite’ accusation at Aftonbladet, and demand an official condmemnation from the Swedish governemnt?
maskdmaverick
22 Dec 2009, 3:58PM
This story just shows how Israel has been willing to label any criticism as anti-semitic. Great to see them fall flat on their face.
orwellwasright
22 Dec 2009, 4:55PM
deWinter: who on earth is talking about Israeli hospitals and the standard of care?? The topic is specific allegations of doctors assisting in torture.
It would be a good idea of those on CIF who go around making sweeping statements bothered to read both the article and the subsequent comments properly before spouting out irrelevant posts.
MeandYou
22 Dec 2009, 5:31PM
According to the Huffington Post Israel do more than torture:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/21/israel-admits-harvesting_n_399623.html
“(AP) JERUSALEM – Israel has admitted that in the 1990s, its forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies, including Palestinians, without permission of their families.”
The only thing that seems illegal in this War Machine state is any criticism of it.
And then we have Jay’Reilly who described Jews who challenge this kind of discourse as the “absolute dregs of the Jewish diaspora”. Do you think he will get banned for making such a blatantly antisemitic comment? (Its a rhetorical question – this is CiF, the incubator for this kind of discourse.)
JayReilly
22 Dec 2009, 12:50PM
“This on top of the admission by the Israeli government that they were indeed harvesting the organs of Palestinians – after accusing anyone who saw any credibility to the allegations revealed in the Swedish press of being “anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists”. “
Its amazing how a country that goes in for such regular depravity is seemingly untouchable on the world stage. We are desperately rewriting our laws to protect their war criminals, the global talks on racism were walked out on by most of the West because Israel’s fine name had been sullied, they threatened Sweden for not backing their grotesque cover up, the UK was silent over their assaults in Lebanon, and to cap it all off the absolute dregs of the Jewish diaspora relentlessly scream about anti-semitism when these things are raised.
And for a further insight into the depraved mind of JayReilly we have this.
JayReilly
22 Dec 2009, 2:14PM
“And by jove, he’s irrationally angry: “
Irrational? How so? A country that operates apparently on a different moral and legal basis to the rest of the world with the overt support of my government, my objection to its practices are “irrational”. Please explain.
“The ‘regular depravity’ which, because of the complex ethical, moral, legal, problems involved, has engulfed 200 hospitals here. In regularly depraved UK?”
The UK is about as depraved as any developed demoracy, yes. Maybe if we were illegally occupying Wales and taking organs from the Welsh who we regularly pounded to dust with illegal munitions, maybe then I’d find it even worse than depraved and actually become “irrationally angry” about it. Funny thing context, isnt it, its almost like it actually matters.
“Now on to Livni and a magistrate’s warrant which can be issued without evidence by politically motivated activists but has not and will not be issued to Messrs Blair, Clinton, Putin, Mugabe, Assad.”
Aside from the crass wotaboutery at the end, are you saying magistrate’s are “political activists”? The warrant must be issued by a court, not the activists.
“Were anti-semitic literature was sold in the foyers?”
I was under the impression one of the principle complaints was the description of Israel as a “racist state”, something that appears factually irrefutable.
“In there with a chance: Israel ‘threatened’ Sweden? Did they? What was the threat? And what is the cover up?”
Forgive me, Israel voiced its displeasure and politely requested the Swedish government take steps against the paper. Apologies for the error.
“An unsubstantiated accusation” – which it has now been found was pretty close to the truth.
“Try and refute or explain, it’s screaming and our Jay describes someone like me as part of ‘the absolute dregs of the Jewish diaspora’.”
I said in very plain English that those who respond to all criticism with cries of “anti-semitism” are the “dregs of the diaspora”, yes. Whats the problem, and what have you got to do with it? I didnt realise you were one of the “anti-semitic!!!!!!” crowd.
Anyway lets see what other characters are attracted to a thread like this.
Well in time honored CiF fashion, we have the Jewish conspiracy theorists:
doask
22 Dec 2009, 12:56PM
curiously israeli organ harvesting has not yet reached bbc broadcast news .. in fact nor has the continued collective punishment of gazans nor the threat by admiral mullin to iran of military action in 2010.
is the bbc reporting anything other than weather these days?
Rgk78
22 Dec 2009, 1:02PM
curiously israeli organ harvesting has not yet reached bbc broadcast news .. in fact nor has the continued collective punishment of gazans nor the threat by admiral mullin to iran of military action in 2010.
is the bbc reporting anything other than weather these days?
why has govt been silent of the israeli abuses?
My view point is that the pro-Israel Murdoch media report items in a way that is 95% bias towards Israel.
The UK government policy is about 90% pro-Israel.
The BBC is about 75% pro-Israel and this is low enough to be accused of anti-semetism.
And then there’s those that make Nazi analogies:
Rgk78
22 Dec 2009, 12:42PM
I don’t know if doctors in Israel take the Hippocratic Oath but you have to question your morals if you have any part in this. A doctor should not ever participate in anything like this.
Being complicit with the government echoes regimes that I dare not mention at the risk of being shouted down.
ThePrompter
22 Dec 2009, 1:08PM
There were people in Germany who’s indiscriminate support for the Nazi regime to a large extent allowed that regime to commit the atrocities that it did.
The un-discriminating appologists for the Israeli state are in danger of making the same mistake.
I am not saying that Israeli behavior is comparable to the behavior of Nazi Germany, but to contend that Israel doesn’t have questions to answer is just ridiculous
FrankFinlay
22 Dec 2009, 1:23PM
So are Israeli doctor’s complicit in torture or not?
The world needs an answer. My God, I hope they aren’t. If they are then the moral compass of the world has truly been inverted. Which would mean that Israel could no longer claim a special moral position because of the terrible history of the Jewish people. History does not excuse evil.
phindrup
22 Dec 2009, 3:22PM
What I’d like to know is, as far as Israelis are concerned, what isn’t antisemitic?
Odd isn?t it? Though some Jews are also Semites, many, especially the European Jews are not, and never have been.
Palestinians however, are definitely Semites, there is absolutely no doubt about this.
Isn?t it time that the charge of against anybody questioning the behaviour of Israel was described correctly? Whatever a person supporting the Palestinian cause might be, they are not anti-Semitic.
Why is Israel ?singled out? for criticism?
The fact that in 1947 Jews owned less than seven percent of the land in Palestine.
Today, Israel occupies 87 percent of Palestine. It controls the airspace, the land and sea borders and all food, water, fuel, electricity, medical supplies and access to medical aid, building materials, spare parts, etc.?Gaza is an immense concentration camp — 1.5 million people squeezed into 140 square miles hemmed in on all sides by 25-foot-high walls separated by a vast expanse of bulldozed earth. The 2005 “pull-out” left Gaza still controlled by Israel from air and sea, its entries and exits prisonlike mazes electronically controlled and under constant surveillance. Bombing it, assaulting it with tanks and Uzis, is like shooting animals in a pen.?
“Israel may have the right to put others on trial, but certainly no one has the right to put the Jewish people and the State of Israel on trial.” Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, 25 March, 2001
29numbers
22 Dec 2009, 4:09PM
They consider them a lesser specie but still use their organs. Hypocrites.
And then we have a commenter that uses the “chosen people” trope.
need4enlightenment
22 Dec 2009, 4:22PM
Man, I heard about the harvesting of organs…. sick bastards. By the way I am NOT calling ALL Israelis sick bastards, only those that cut numerous organs from a dying persons body, sow them back up and dump them in the street… Oh or dump phosphate on people from a great height…. oh, or blockade ports knowing full well the people will starve… yeh, if you do none of that you are a nice person, perhaps even gods-chosen…
And then there are those that think they’re history experts because they’ve read some Pappe or Shlaim:
ThePrompter
22 Dec 2009, 5:21PM
SantaMonika -
“Oh, the endless attempts here to rewrite history by the biased and ignorant” etc.
1947-49
There were indeed 7 Arab armies, however they were outnumbered by the Zionist forces. They never invaded the land that the Zionists had been given, all of the battles took place on the land that was to be the Palestinian state, and they only attacked the Zionists after the Zionists had committed a number of massacres including Deir Yassin where 100 Palestinian men, women, and children were killed, on Palestinian land. By the end of the war Israel had control of all of Palestine except The West Bank and Gaza, 750,000 Palestinians had become refugees, and over 500 Palestinian towns and villages had been obliterated. It was, and still is, the Israeli Zionists who are the aggressors.It’s all pretty well documented you know……
ONeill70 4.33pm -
You are making the same mistake as SantaMonika, I do happen to know quite a lot about Nazi Germany and the Israeli/Palestine conflict, based on a lot more than CiF or Israeli propaganda sites.
However I suggest we drop this subject because it’s getting seriously off-topic.
ThePrompter
22 Dec 2009, 3:48PM
TawdryDog -
“This forum is not appreciative when others point out the absence of criticism of ‘freedom fighters’ and their masters in Tehran”
My comment was clearly aimed at the Israeli state and it’s un-critical supporters, but even if it wasn’t clear enough for you, you should have realised what I meant because the Palestinian ‘freedom fighters’ don’t have a state, Israel nicked it 61 years ago.
And the historical distortions continue with this:
MmeEAB
22 Dec 2009, 3:43PM
Why is anybody surprised at anything horrible which is done by israelis to the original inhabitants of the land these northern european refugees occupy?
And to top if off, perhaps one of the only comments which was on-topic – in that it addressed the subject of torture raised by Antony Lerman – gets deleted. Read this comment – I can only surmise that Tom Wonacott expressed a view that did not fit in with the Guardian World Veiw. Bad boy Tom! You should know better by now.
TomWonacott
22 Dec 2009, 1:43PM
“……..Even though Israel’s supreme court in 1999 finally ruled that methods of torture used at that time by the security forces were illegal, a loophole was left for interrogators who tortured in “ticking bomb” situations, which ultimately allowed old forms of torture to creep back in by the mid-2000s, as a 2007 report by PCATI showed. So there is good reason to be seriously concerned about the use of torture today……..”
The ticking time bomb scenario is one of the most controversial “loopholes” used to condone the practice of torture. In a November 3, 2005 New York Times editorial, ?The Prison Puzzle?, the New York Times stated:
“We’re not naïve enough to believe that if the C.I.A. nabs a Qaeda operative who knows where a ticking bombs hidden, that terrorist will emerge unbruised from his interrogation…”
Thus, even the New York Times believes that under certain circumstances, torture is warranted. What leader would give in to principal when faced with the loss of a significant amount of innocent lives? For me personally, its not so much the use of torture, but when to apply the ticking time bomb scenario – and what criteria makes torture the preferred technique to gather important, life saving information.
I read the account of one suspect (Bajat Yamen) who was clearly tortured in 2004. This was done toward the end of the second intifada when more than 1100 Israelis lost their lives from suicide bombings and other attacks that targeted Israeli civilians for murder. In 2004-2005, nearly 100 Israelis lost their lives from suicide bombings alone.
Identifying Palestinian suicide bombers is difficult at best because they blend in with the population (and many look a lot like the Israeli Arabs that reside in Israel). While the use of torture is illegal, no one can blame Israel for torturing high value targets to protect their citizens during a war (at least in my opinion) -especially from those who target civilians for murder which is (just as) illegal under the Geneva Convention. Protecting Israel citizens is the number one priority of the Israel government.
Oh well. Another day in the parallel universe of the Guardian.
This is a cross post from ModernityBlog
Yes, that is a sensationalist title and although the Guardian did not use it, it might have, had Brits been Israelis.
In another example of dodgy journalism coming out of the Guardian, they originally chose to run a by-line of “Israel admits harvesting Palestinian organs.”.
It was subsequently changed, but the Guardian’s original headline was rather revealing of the prejudices found at that newspaper. In the article you will notice that the pathologists took organs from nearly everyone.
But that alone would not make a sufficiently dramatic headline, nor does it point out that the Israelis themselves brought up this issue and investigated it in a TV programme. The evidence is a bit obvious as the sources are written in Hebrew, and I am sure that even Guardian journalists realise which nation has that as its language?
The problem is, that the Guardian did not make any effort to give this story any context because that would require a degree of objectivity and journalistic competence from the Guardian, which it does not have around the subject of Israel or Israelis, so instead the article is used to slate Israelis.
It could have simply said, that there were insensitive and clumsy pathologists extracting organs from dead bodies that crossed their paths, including Israelis, IDF soldiers, etc.
However, that would not have been enough to make it into an issue for a national paper, so it was dressed up to have a quick swipe at Israelis along the way.
This is territory where we have been before.
Older readers will remember that British doctors did this very same thing, but with children.
Even though the activities at Alder Hey children’s hospital in Liverpool caused outrage, I doubt the Guardian would have run an article entitled “British harvest organs of young children”.
That is the type of headline more suitable for tabloids or other rags.
In fact, the Guardian has a section dealing with the Alder Hey issue, but contrast their carefully considered language there, as opposed to the startling by-line that sought to indict Israelis and only Israelis for this practice.
Rather than merely criticise pathologists involved the Guardian attempted to widen the accusation against all Israelis.
That is the problem, the Guardian can write considered and thoughtful articles on the Alder Hey scandal, but when a similar situation arises in Israel it is used as a political stick to beat Israelis with, and any notion of thoughtful journalism is thrown out of the window.
I do wish the Guardian would ditch these prejudices and go back to quality journalism.
Anyone interested in the history of Alder Hey children’s hospital and the organs removed from children, without permission, should read the Royal Liverpool Children’s Inquiry Report summary of key findings and the main recommendations, with the fuller findings here.
Update 1: Organ removal and the illegal storage of the body parts are still an issue in Britain, as the Torygraph reports:
“More than 200 hospitals have been instructed to account for all the organs and human tissue being held in mortuaries and pathology labs, because of concerns that body parts are being stored illegally, without the consent of bereaved relatives.
The HTA has ordered the probe after finding five cases in which bodies which had been examined for post-mortem were released for burial or cremation without their brains.”
Update 2: A section at the Scotsman newspaper shows how important this issue is as an on-going problem and the natural distress that it causes parents and families.
Update 3: The BBC news site has a piece from 1999 concerning Bristol hospital:
“The Bristol Childrens’ Heart Action Group, a parents’ campaign group, says the hospital removed and retained the hearts of at least 170 hearts from children who died in operations over a 12-year period.”
Also, Organ removal: the legal background from 1999 too.
Update 4: I came across a version of this story on msnbc, but it seems that the feed could have come directly from AP. It is possible that the Guardian “tidied” it up before publishing. Astute readers will notice the wording here, compared with the AP story:
“Israel has admitted pathologists harvested organs from dead Palestinians, and others, without the consent of their families – a practice it said ended in the 1990s – it emerged at the weekend.”
The Guardian could have written “a practice that ended in the 1990s”, but rather they chose “…a practice it said ended in the 1990s…”. Insinuating that it is not a fact, just that it was “said”. Same old tricks.
Update 5: If you want to see how the racists come out and use this topic you need to look no further than this Anthony Lerman article.
Update 6: Yaacov Lozowick has more:
“Antisemitic allegations almost always start from some grain of fact. What makes them antisemitic (or even merely slander) isn’t the original grain of truth but the edifice built on it. In the Rostom blood libel earlier this year the slander was that IDF forces were regularly killing Palestinians so as to harvest their organs. The grain of truth uncovered here (which actually isn’t news at all, it has been known in Israel for years, which is one reason Hiss no longer heads the Abu Kabir institute) has nothing to do with those allegations, and doesn’t substantiate them in any way.
Actually, what we’ve got here is a fine litmus test to discover antisemites. Anyone who spins the true story in the direction Rostom took it are essentially setting themselves up. They need to be asked why they took that particular grain of truth in that particular direction.”
The comments threads on CiF often remind me of those tins of mixed chocolates one gets given at holiday times in which there are some good ones, but the vast majority are very unappetising. The Guardian editorial on the subject of the arrest warrant issued by a British court against former Israeli Foreign Minister Tsipi Livni naturally prompted a veritable selection box of offensive commentary below the line.
Yet again, the influence of last month’s Channel 4 ‘Dispatches’ programme was illustrated in the form of conspiracy theorist-style references to the mythical ‘Israel lobby’.
TheGreatGigInTheSky
17 Dec 2009, 12:18AM
I was absolutely appalled by Miliband’s and Hague’s statements over this affair.
The COURTS decide if issuing a warrant for arrest is appropriate or not.
This country is rapidly becoming like a banana republic.
I don’t see how an arrest warrant could NOT be issued in the case of Livni.
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out why Miliband and Hague said what they said though does it?
RoHa2
17 Dec 2009, 5:01AM
Of course, we all know that the British-Israel lobby has no real power, don’t we
17 Dec 2009, 1:06PM
I wonder if their apologizing has any thing to do with the clout that Friends of Israel (Labour & Conservative) has over the parties? I’m not suggesting anything but after watching Peter Oborne Dispatches a few weeks ago it does make you wander just how much influence they have
JakeJay
17 Dec 2009, 5:23PM
Exiledlondoner (or whoever) : To what do you attribute Israel’s extraordinary influence over UK?
JakeJay
17 Dec 2009, 6:14PM
Sorcey: I’ll tell you how ties will be damaged if EU and UK withdraw their support for Israel. — Israel will withdraw their financial support of political parties. What other power (apart from a USA supported military/nuclear force) does Israel have? Without the underpinning of Israel’s financial support and expertise, USA would not survive. It is not difficult to see who is the most powerful/influential nation on earth. USA is in Israel’s pocket. Why is everyone afraid of Israel? Is it because they might go off half cocked (in our opinion) and unilaterally launch a nuclear pre-emptive strike against Iran? Enlighten me somebody. Israel will do whatever they want to do, without giving any notice or consulting anybody.
————————-
My comment of 3;01 pm on Dec.17th was removed. I wish I knew why. Has anyone seen the Guardian’s standards – in writing? I think we should all know precisely what/how we should NOT be writing so that we don’t waste our time and Guardian’s. I don’t get rabidly insulting – but I try to make clear what my views are. I don’t expect everyone to agree with me – even the Guardian! – But censorship is a very heavy hand in a supposed democracy, unless the comment is blatantly rude and profane. And that’s not my style. My ideas may be cockeyed in some people’s eyes, but that goes for all of us.
Then we saw an example of a concept which seems to be becoming increasingly popular on CiF threads – the bracketing together of political leaders from Israel, the US and the UK as ‘war criminals’.
FalseConsciousness
17 Dec 2009, 12:26AM
War criminals backing other war criminals. I doubt anyone is surprised.
Whenever I read a comment like that, I am reminded of the Parisians of 1789 knitting socks by the guillotine. In addition, there were those who are not ashamed to advocate the annihilation of the one and only Jewish state in the world.
torvald
17 Dec 2009, 2:25PM
well 20 years from now there will not be an Israel as we know it
they will become a niority tribe in their own country
Matzpen
17 Dec 2009, 3:27PM
Machover has rendered a good service to the Palestinian struggle here; in the words of the song – no saviour from on high delivers, no faith have ye in prince or peer.
The UK will not deliver Palestine from Zionism, nor the EU.
Candidly
17 Dec 2009, 6:33AM
I would love to see the responses of some of the Israel bashers here if Israel issues an arrest warrant against, shall we say, George Galloway, David Miliband, or Danial Machover, or Allan Rusbridger.
Of the above, only David Miliband, because of his position as Foreign Secretary, could ever have made a decision that might have resulted in a war crime being committed. Which is not to say that he ever has made such a decision.
Be that as it may, it occured to me that this single small act by a court against Israeli’s former Foreign Minister may have done more to humble the Israeli government than all the hundreds of rockets fired into Israeli by Hamas. If only Hamas and similar groups could realise that this sort of non-violent action is they only way forward for them. Isreali is constantly telling the world that it is the only democracy in the region and that it abides by the rule of law. This has been shown by many, including Jimmy Carter in his excellent book “Palestine: Peace not Apartheid,” to be sham.
I, personally, doubt that Israel can ever be made to change it’s approach towards the Palestinians by military means – except in the most catclysmic extreme scenario that would result in thousands losing their lives.
But Israel’s self-proclaimed and much publicised commitment to democracy, human rights and the rule of law are its achilles’ heel because that commitment cannot stand up to detailed scrutiny. Let us see more actions of this sort involving open and public challenges to Israel’s appalling human right record.
We were also treated to an excellent example of the ‘Good Jew/Bad Jew’ school of thought; ah yes – that nice Mr. Goldstone…
17 Dec 2009, 2:25PM
The establishment are getting desperate.
It was suggested on the “Today” programme that Tzipi Livni shouldn’t have been arrested “because Israel is a democracy”.
Since when did “being a democracy” exempt a Government from it’s obligation not to commit War Crimes ?
Our own democracy is deeply flawed when the leaderships of all three major political parties are so cravenly Zionist
David Miliband’s apology to Avigdor Lieberman is disgraceful and made my skin crawl.
What is equally revolting is the attempt to rubbish that distinguished Jewish Jurist Judge Goldstone.
Bizarrely, even a defence of Eichmann appeared, and remained, on this thread.
stevehill
17 Dec 2009, 7:05AM
hophmi1
It’s obscene to compare Israel’s arrest of Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi who helped plan the final solution, with using universal jurisdiction as a political tool to harass Israeli leaders. Lest people forget, the Goldstone Report found that Hamas had committed war crimes too.
You’re quite right. Israel’s legal remedy was to make a request to Argentina to arrest him, then start extradition proceedings.
Kidnapping him in broad daylight in a foreign country was a wholly illegal act.
And of course a UK court should issue a warrant for the arrest of any named Hamas terrorist who shows his face in Britain. As indeed it would.
But the Brazil nut left at the bottom of the CiF tin of chocolates has to be this comment:
17 Dec 2009, 4:30PM
First of all, Law should be prevail and should not be influenced by politicians.
If this person has nothing to fear and committed nothing, she should have challenged the court and presented her case which I doubt it . ..
I am thrilled to read this article, it is very strong and to the point, if Brown and FS needs some moral guidance , they should read and respond to the article …
UK historically created so called Isreal and this claiming to be country it is worse that South African Appartheid – that one used to ruling based on race and this one based on relegion – all fact are there … i am not bringing it from the blue !??
You can just get academic comparer and see what difference would get out between the two ? you would be surprised .
Am not against Jews in general, but against some of them who creates country only to commit what has been committed against them !!!
Palestinians are born on that land and so their ancestors for thousands of years , my knowledge that jews are nationals of so many countries including Palestine.
Why take other people lands and be a war monger ? didnt we have enough already . ?!
I think Brown should apologise for Britain giving away Palestine whilst had no right to do that ? is it less of case than the slave apology , children shipping apology and the latest apology ? Palestine give away present difinetely deserve one .
UK law should be preserved against any change other ways goodbye human right and morals.
Well, Firsttimeguardian, I think you’ve found your perfect milieu at CiF. Just one thing though; Israel is real, rather than so called, but you don’t have to join the two words together.
Now, where have all the strawberry creams gone?
Hawkeye
Omar2
WellofSense
Medusa
The Alchemist
Louise
Tosca
Maimon
Telling the Truth
Israelinurse
Adam Levick
Margie in Tel Aviv
Guest/Cross Post
Hadar Sela
Red Rag to a Bull
December 25, 2009 in Uncategorized | Tags: Antisemitism, Comment is Free, Guardian, Petra Marquardt-Bigman | by Israelinurse | 15 comments
Petra Marquardt-Bigman’s excellent article on CiF recently was like the proverbial red rag waved in the face of the assorted bullish anti-Israeli commentators below the line. Almost immediately, there were cries of ‘propaganda!’ from a variety of posters. So quick were they off the starting block that one does have to wonder if they actually bothered to read Petra’s well-constructed piece, or does the very fact that a CiF article fails to meet their expectations of a daily ‘fix’ of Israel-hatred produce this knee-jerk reaction?
As is usual on the rare occasions when a balanced view of the Middle East’s problems is presented on CiF, the hardliners were in their default state of apoplexy at the very idea of any kind of compromise on the part of the Palestinians which may have the result of upsetting the world view of their valiant key-board bashing supporters. (Incidentally, Matzpen: any relation to the Machovers by any chance?)
Now I don’t know about you, but I’m becoming increasingly curious as to just what causes the CiF moderators to be so touchy about pro-Israeli comments. Take this one, for example – is it offensive? Is it irrelevant to the topic of discussion? If it is either, I’m afraid I just can’t see it.
Go figure….
Share this:
Like this: