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An exquisite convergence of anti-Americanism and anti-Zionism appeared in ‘Comment is Free’ today, written by Mark Weisbrot, perhaps the most prolific among CiF’s core of extreme left commentators.
Weisbrot’s sophistication and erudition, when expounding upon the U.S war against sadistic Taliban terrorists, was on display in his previous CiF entry, where he thriftily and pithily summed up the US campaign as “soldiers pissing on corpses [and] drones slaughtering civilians”.
He characterized the U.S. war against terrorism more broadly as arguably indicative of “a crusade against the Muslim world” – agitprop which seems to slip off Weisbrot’s tongue with the ease of someone schooled in the Noam Chomsky school of tyranny apologetics.
And, as I noted previously, Weisbrot quite explicitly accused the U.S. of committing a “Holocaust” in Iraq, accusing critics of such a characterization as guilty of “Holocaust Denial”.
Naturally, as part of his broader anti-American ideological package, Weisbrot is necessarily as hostile to Israel as he is sympathetic to Arab despots.
Weisbrot – whose output of anti-Zionist and (mostly) anti-American vitriol, at Znet and CiF, is quite impressive – today published “Why American ‘democracy’ promotion rings hollow“, Jan. 31.
While the broader narrative, mocking American democracy promotion in the Arab world is itself a work of political sophistry worthy of scrutiny, the following passage about Israel is a much repeated, if banal, narrative within Guardian-Left circles, and represents yet another casual assault on the Jewish state’s legitimacy.
Write’s Weisbrot:
Nowhere is [the hypocritical U.S. claim to promote democracy] more obvious than in the Middle East, where the US government’s policy of collaboration with Israel’s denial of Palestinian national rights has put it at odds with populations throughout the region. As a result, Washington fears democracy in many countries because it will inevitably lead to more governments taking the side of the Palestinians,
The notion that the Arab world, which continues to be defined by increasing intolerance towards religious and ethnic minorities, extreme antisemitism, and the denial of basic human rights – in stark contrast with Israel’s unique and enduring democratic prowess - possesses any moral credibility in denouncing the U.S. is a political inversion of the first order.
Arabs of Palestinian origin, whose rights are systematically denied throughout the (non-Jewish) Middle East, have become the propaganda tool of choice for far left ideologues such as Weisbrot – activists who similarly fail to mention the absence of such democratic values in Palestinian ruled territory.
The reason why Western liberals fear the upheavals in the Arab world is the increasingly clear slouch towards Islamist political movements which are, by definition, decidedly reactionary and illiberal, and at odds with true democratic values.
The romaticization of the Arab Spring, the edifice of a “democratic” revolution, is becoming increasingly difficult for those who claim intellectual integrity to maintain.
The Muslim Brotherhood and Salafists in Egypt, the Enhada Party in Tunisia, or major parties vying for power in Libya, can largely be defined (or may likely, one day, be defined) by a greater adherence to (in spirit or letter) Sharia law, and an atavistic, ideological antisemitism which bears little if any connection to the plight of the Palestinians.
As a report on antisemitism in the Arab world in the context of the ‘Arab Spring”, written by scholars at the Kantor Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry at Tel Aviv University, noted:
[While] the popular uprisings in the Arab world do not represent a general change in attitude towards Israel, Zionism and the Jews it seems the anti-Semitic discourse and incitement have become more extreme and violent,”
Charges of an international Jewish conspiracy have been a central motif in the anti-Semitic propaganda that has accompanied the Arab Spring uprisings. This motif has been emphasized in each of the countries especially by way of pointing a blaming finger towards Israel, Zionism and Jews conspiring against Arabs and Muslims
Of course, the continuing Arab antipathy towards Jews is not at all surprising to those who study the politics of the region, and the habitual denial of this endemic Judeophobic dynamic by Guardian reporters and commentators is documented continually on the pages of this blog.
But the mere ubiquity of voices like Weisbrot, at ‘Comment is Free’, who are willfully blind to the most malign anti-Jewish racism, makes it no less deserving of critical scrutiny, nor, especially, any less morally repugnant.
Related articles
- Reinforcing Prejudices: Mark Weisbrot’s subtle meditation at CiF on why America is so vile (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian publishes letter by supporter of Gilad Atzmon, refuses to publish rebuttal (cifwatch.com)
- The Perils of Self-Deception on the Root Cause of Antisemitism (cifwatch.com)
- Arun Kundnani, & a Guardian dog-whistle about the injurious effects of a wealthy American Zionist (cifwatch.com)
- The ‘Humanitarian Racism’ of Harriet Sherwood and the Guardian Left (cifwatch.com)
This blog’s “What the Guardian wont’ report” posts typically highlight news which we feel is vital to accurately understanding the Israeli-Palestinian (and Israeli-Islamist) Conflict, but which doesn’t comport to the Guardian’s political narrative and so is ignored by their reporters covering the region.
As such, it is impossible to engage in a rational debate about the root cause of the conflict without acknowledging the degree to which antisemitism and the glorification of violence against Jews permeates Palestinian society and, moreover, how such culturally normative racism represents one of the greatest impediments to peace.
At the end of the day, if Israelis aren’t reasonably sure that a future Palestinian state will accept the existence of a Jewish state, and will inculcate their children with the values of peace, tolerance and pluralism, most will continue to be skeptical of further territorial concessions which could strengthen the most malevolent Palestinian political movements.
The significance of the following story simply cannot be dismissed or rationalized by anyone sincerely passionate about promoting peace in the region.
As you recall, on March 11, 2011, five members of the Fogel family were killed in their home in the town of Itamar by Palestinian terrorists from the Awad family. Hakim Awad led the attack, killing the parents Ehud and Ruth and three of their children, aged 11 years, 4 years, and 2 months.
Per Palestinian Media Watch (PMW):
Official Palestinian Authority TV broadcast greetings to the murderers of the Fogel family from the relatives of the killers and from the PA TV host.
The weekly PA TV program For You dedicated to Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons let the mother and aunt of one of the murderers praise the terrorists as “heroes.” After the mother of the murderer Hakim Awad explained how she is prevented from visiting her son for security reasons, the PA TV host said: “Go ahead, sister, we can convey your voice.”
On the phone, Hakim Awad’s mother “blesses” her “dear son,” and despite the fact that participants in this TV program normally do not mention the terror attacks for which their relatives are serving time, the mother mentions that her son is the one who “carried out the operation in Itamar and sentenced to 5 life sentences,” referring to her son’s brutal killings in the town Itamar.
Hakim Awad’s aunt also participated in the program and referred to the terrorists involved in the killings as “heroes,” calling Hakim Awad “the hero, the legend.” This prompted the PA TV host to add: “We, for our part, also convey our greetings to them.” [emphasis added]
As PMW noted, it was Hakim Awad who killed Ehud and Ruth Fogel and their young children by stabbing them repeatedly with a knife.
Ruth Fogel, 35, Udi Fogel, 36, and their children Elad, 4, three-month-old Hadas, and Yoav, 11
I suggest that you consider sharing the following video of the Palestinian program described above not as “hasbara”, but merely to reach those who are still open minded, so they might ponder the injurious impact of such morally toxic messages within Palestinian society on the peace process.
The program, about which neither Harriet Sherwood nor Phoebe Greenwood will ever report, was broadcast on official state-run Palestinian TV on January 19, and repeated again on January 21.
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In September 2010 I wrote here about the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and it’s too ready inclination of sympathy towards Hamas, to the extent that it gave sanctuary to three wanted Hamas fugitives, Ahmad Attoun, Khaled Abu-Arafa and Muhammad Totah.
The three had been ordered to leave East Jerusalem having had their residency permits revoked when they refused to renounce their ties with Hamas. As I noted in my previous article, the Hamas members were openly supported by Uri Avneri and others on the extreme left in Israel, who visited them at the ICRC’s headquarters in the Sheikh Jarrah building in East Jerusalem.
The Red Cross, despite their statement that the Israeli police could have arrested them whenever they wanted, aided and abetted them to break Israeli law by making them comfortable there.
According to the Jerusalem Post (Hamas MPs hiding in E. Jerusalem Red Cross arrested, Jan. 23) all of the fugitives were provided with a room inside the building where they could sleep and keep their belongings, a bathroom, and electricity for their protest tent together with a water cooler. Readers will agree that these are hardly the actions of unwilling hosts towards wanted men. We are told that the men met with overseas dignitaries, and even held a press conference there. Family members came daily to bring food and clothing. All this is in contrast to the ICRC’s passivity and its lack of effort to gain access to Gilad Shalit while he was being held by Hamas.
It seemed then that the ICRC’s house guests, like the fish in the proverb, would soon begin to smell but it transpired not. Ahmad Attoun was arrested several months ago, having been lured onto the street by Israeli police.
The police seemed unsure what to do about Abu-Arafa and Totah, but undercover police finally went into the building and arrested the two, who put up no resistance.
It seems that the ICRC’s actions are the only things that smell, because, in spite of its protestations that it is involved only in humanitarian issues, it did not force these Hamas supporters to leave their premises.
Its “we are involved only in humanitarian efforts” excuse also rings rather hollow in the light of recent revelations that it has provided first aid training to the Taliban, the impact of which it tried to minimise by staying that it had also provided training to Afghani civilians “to ensure that everyone is treated humanely” and …”as fairly as possible.”
People might wonder, and rightly, whether that first aid to non-combatants included how to relieve the pain and prevent further harm to people who have had a limb chopped off or acid thrown in their faces.
Now I would not put it past the Taliban to have the cheek to demand/request these favours from the politically and morally paralysed – oops, I mean “neutral” – ICRC, but the moral equivalence which accompanied the meeting of that demand/request beggars belief, as do the ICRC’s excuses for providing it.
Related articles
- Question to Harriet Sherwood: How are Gazans living in sovereign Palestinian state still “refugees”? (cifwatch.com)
- On fish and House Guests (cifwatch.com)
SOAS: International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network event in 2010
Almost a decade ago, on April 6th 2002 – a mere ten days after the Park Hotel terror attack which killed 30 Israelis and injured 140 others, prompting Operation Defensive Shield – a group of 125 British academics had a letter published in the Guardian calling publicly, for the first time, for an academic boycott of Israel.
Throughout the subsequent ten years – and in particular since Operation Cast Lead – the growth of anti-Israel incitement and antisemitism at British universities has become a serious cause of concern for anti-racist organisations, politicians and prominent figureswithin British society, as well as some academics.
The news, therefore, that the Israel Society at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) has been recently revived at the initiative of two Israeli students might seem like a glimmer of hope in the dark world of anti-Israeli activism in British academic institutions, especially as SOAS has been particularly egregious on these counts.
In 2009 SOAS invited the prominent Muslim Brotherhood representative in the UK Kamal Helbawy and Ibrahim el Moussaoui – the former head of the foreign department of Hizballah’s ‘Al Manar’ TV – to teach a course on political Islam. In 2010, Hamas activist Azzam Tamimi was invited to speak to students at SOAS alongside his fellow Guardian contributor Ben White. Tamimi told students:
“Today Hamas is considered a terrorist organisation because that’s what the Americans and Israelis and cowardly politicians of Europe want, but what is so terrorist about it?
“You shouldn’t be afraid of being labelled extreme, radical or terrorist. If fighting for your home land is terrorism, I take pride in being a terrorist. The Koran tells me if I die for my homeland, I’m a martyr and I long to be a martyr.”
“Why are the Jews superhuman and better than anyone else that God would give them a homeland? Is God a racist? A god who would prefer people because of their race is not a god I want to associate with. Claiming they are being given the land of God is a racist idea.
“If the world felt so guilty about the Holocaust, the Jews should have been compensated, not brought to my country at the expense of my people.
“Israel does not belong to my homeland and must come to an end. This can happen peacefully if they acknowledge what they did — or we will continue to struggle until Israel is no more.”
“I want to encourage you not to be intimidated by the pro-Israel lobby. The Zionists tell a pack of lies.”
(Tamimi, as is well known, was born in 1955 and his family moved from Hebron to Kuwait when he was 7 years old – a full 5 years before Jordan lost the Six Day War.)
Unfortunately, any hopes of the rejuvenated SOAS Israel Society swimming against the tide of anti-Israel hatred and propaganda already appear to be overly-optimistic. The society’s opening event on January 30th is to be a panel discussion purporting to “re-examine BDS through a more nuanced lens”.
Nuance, however, is hardly the territory inhabited by anti-Zionist panel member Ilan Pappe; controversial for his jaundiced use of history to advance a political agenda, his blithe dismissals of anti-Semitism and his recent spirited defence of Raed Salah. Neither are we to expect much in the way of nuance from Dr John Chalcraft – an old hand in the business of promoting an academic boycott against Israel.
Further along the spectrum, we find Dr Lee Jones – an expert on Southeast Asia (where Israel obviously is not) and Hannah Weisfeld of the debatably ‘pro-Israel, pro-peace’ British J-Street look-alike, Yachad. Also taking part as a discussant will be SOAS Doctoral candidate Sharri Plonsky (Plonski) whose brief experience of Israel must be seen in light of her three year role as Development Coordinator for ‘HaMoked‘: an organization of which the Israeli State Prosecutor said “the organization’s self-presentation as ‘a human rights organization’ has no basis in reality and is designed to mislead.”
Panel member and co-chair of the SOAS Israel Society is occasional Guardian writer and +972 magazine co-founder and editor Dimi (Dmitry) Reider who is currently working on a Master’s degree at SOAS and who was perhaps (we are not told) one of the ‘two Israeli students’ instrumental in the society’s rebirth. Reider is known for his support of the so-called ‘one-state solution’ under which Israel as a Jewish and democratic state would cease to exist and his opinions on BDS appear here.
Interestingly, in a recent article in the Tablet, +972 magazine’s editor in chief Noam Sheizaf admitted that only 20% of its readership is Israeli, indicating “the growing unpopularity of its progressive politics” although that fact does not appear to perturb him as he believes “[i]t’s good to internationalize the conversation”.
“Rejected by the Arabs, ignored by the Jews: This is the reality with which the magazine’s 15 or so writers have to contend, writing, as they do, in English for a largely American audience. The magazine’s name is no coincidence: It is a tribute to Israel’s international calling code and an acknowledgement that, increasingly, any serious conversation about Israel’s policies is to be had outside of Israel’s borders.”
It therefore does not seem unreasonable to ponder the possibility that the SOAS Israel Society has in fact been rejuvenated as a British front for the +972 magazine agenda to which Reider subscribes: an agenda which has so little respect for Israeli democracy that it promotes the use of “dramatic pressure from abroad”, of which – of course – BDS is an integral arm.
Certainly no ‘Israel Society’ which invites Ilan Pappe to spread his anti-Zionist views or has an advocate of the dissolution of the Jewish state such as Dimi Reider as its chair is going to help stem the rising tide of anti-Israel incitement and anti-Semitism on UK campuses. But there is an additional irony to this story.
It turns out that Dimi Reider’s studies at SOAS are supported by a Chevening Scholarship donated by the British Embassy in Tel Aviv and the British Council. So whilst some British MPs and academics work tirelessly to combat anti-Israel incitement on campus, their own Foreign and Commonwealth Office has in this case – be it by accident, design or neglect – made their job somewhat harder.
Related articles
- How to most effectively advocate for Israel on campus (cifwatch.com)
- CiF Watch exclusive interview with Smadar Bakovic, who fought anti-Zionist bias in UK Academia & won! (cifwatch.com)
- Jenny Tonge rants about the Holocaust and idolises Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh. (cifwatch.com)
- Why is anti-Israel extremist Gary Spedding affiliated with Holocaust Memorial Day Trust? (cifwatch.com)
Ali Abunimah, who was published at ‘Comment is Free’ and The Huffington Post through 2009, is a Palestinian American journalist who’s argued that Zionism is inherently incompatible with human rights, is an opponent of the existence of a Jewish state within any borders, has characterized Israel as a “supremacist” state, and has approvingly cited those who compare Israeli behavior to Nazi Germany.
Abunimah is also co-founder of the site, Electronic Intifada.
More recently, Abunimah, from the safety of his Chicago home, Tweeted the following.
The essay at Electronic Intifada he linked to explicitly calls for another Intifada – necessarily evoking the 2nd Intifada, which, from 2000 through 2004, claimed over 1,000 innocent Israeli lives.
Ali Abunimah believes Israel is based on a Jewish “supremacist” ideology, has no right to exist and whose end should be facilitated by a coordinated campaign of violence against its civilians – men, women and children who, per such moral calculus, are fair game.
Its getting harder and harder to understand how such anti-Israel activists can be characterized as “progressive” in even the broadest sense of the word.
Related articles
Earlier today, the IDF targeted a Palestinian terrorist squad that was planting an explosive device near the security fence in the northern Gaza Strip. Hits were confirmed, causing an explosion originating from the bomb the terrorists attempted to plant.
The Guardian chose to cover the terrorist incident by posting a video titled “Two Palestinians killed on Gaza-Israel border” and a photo in their continuing series of “24 hours in pictures (The best images from around the world)“.
Here’s the video:
Here’s the photo:
The caption:
Beit Hanoun, Gaza: Palestinians look through a hospital window at the body of a man killed in an Israeli attack.
Here’s a photo you won’t see at the Guardian – a disguised explosive found near a Gaza security fence on January 4th.
The goal, of course, as with all such explosive devices planted by Gaza terrorists at the border fence, is to kill and maim as many Israelis as possible.
Hamas’s military website, Al-Qassam, has already pronounced the two terrorists as “martyrs”.
Related articles
- #PropagandaWaves: The Guardian’s Roy Greenslade or the ‘Free Gaza’ Movement? (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian Warning: 24 hrs in photos gallery contains ‘highly distressing’ images [& HIGHLY misleading] (cifwatch.com)
- Harriet Sherwood legitimizes Gazans’ complaints that they can’t enter Israel to sue the Jewish state (cifwatch.com)
- Hamas, Harriet Sherwood and the Guardian Left’s continuing antisemitic sins of omission (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian interactive map rewrites Israeli-Arab history (cifwatch.com)
- What the Guardian won’t report: Freed Palestinian terrorist implores Gaza children to follow her example (cifwatch.com)
Simon Tisdall
His moral instincts are so refined, so sophisticated, and so unburdened by conventional thinking that he was able to see past the universal enmity towards Sudan’s tragically misunderstood leader, Omar al-Bashir, charged with genocide for acting with intent to destroy non-Arab ethnic groups in the Darfur region.
Al-Bashir’s unimaginably bloody campaign resulted in up to 400,000 dead and resulted in 2.5 million refugees.
Here’s the money quote from Simon Tisdall’s Dec. 27, 2010 apologia for Omar al-Bahsir.
“ostracised by western governments, [and] makes an easy target. America always needs bogeymen and Bashir fits the bill: big, bothersome, bad-tempered, black, Arab and Muslim.”
That final sentence should be placed in a museum of intellectual thought as a perfect representation of the Guardian Left’s capacity to synthesize anti-Americanism, post-colonialism and a perverse understanding of anti-racism in order to defend the morally indefensible.
Such background should help partially contextualize Tisdall’s latest “analysis” of the foreign policy implications of the American elections, “You’ve been Romney-ed! Obama must beware of GOP foreign policy vortex“, Jan. 15.
Tisdall’s broad argument is that Obama should keep to his principles and not be pushed unwillingly into a regional war with Iran, as both the result of a political pressure (to be more hawkish and, thus, win re-election) from Mitt Romney’s increasingly confrontational and belligerent foreign policy positions regarding Iran – pressure partially caused by “Israel’s obsession ”with eliminating the Iranian threat.”
Tisdall blames Romney for his ”uncompromising hostility to the Tehran regime” – such as his support for an “increase [of] US military presence around Iran, stepped up covert warfare, support for Iranian opposition groups, and beefed up military co-operation with Israel” – which, he argues, would play right into Netanyahu’s hands.
Tisdall:
All this must be highly encouraging to Netanyahu, who does not get on with Obama, is obsessed with eliminating the Iranian threat, and fears Obama would use a second term to pursue a more forceful regional peacemaking agenda, on Palestine as well as on Iran. For Iranian leaders, pondering war or peace, it must all seem highly provocative.
In this passage Tisdall demonstrates his moral divide: a militaristic Israel which fears the specter of a “peacemaking agenda”, and is irrationally obsessed with the Iranian threat, versus an Iran (“pondering war and peace”) which understandably views such American and Israeli belligerence as “provocative”.
Tisdall’s empathy for the legitimate concerns of the Mullahs in Tehran, and condemnation of Israeli measures meant to thwart the Iranian threat, represents pretty much conventional wisdom at the Guardian.
Such moral reasoning has included:
- Brian Whitaker sowing doubt over the “question” of whether Iran is seeking nuclear weapons (Why do the US media believe the worse about Iran?, Nov. 9).
- A Guardian editorial warning Israel against saber-rattling against Iran, and arguing that the Jewish state should just learn to live with a nuclear armed Iran (Iran, bolting the stable door, Nov. 9).
- Mehdi Hasan’s tear jerking tale of a beleaguered Iran threatened on all sides, which understandably may desires a nuclear weapon to defend themselves from U.S. and Israeli aggression (If you lived in Iran, wouldn’t you want the nuclear bomb, Nov. 17).
- Seumas Milne’s polemical attempt to obfuscate Iranian nuclear ambitions, which included an urgent plea for readers to prevent a “covert US-Israeli campaign against Tehran” from exploding into a global war (War on Iran has already begun. Act before it threatens all of us. Dec. 7).
- Simon Jenkins’ argument that the Israel lobby is pushing an unwilling Obama into militaristic policies towards Iran, (“Why is Britain ramping up sanctions against Iran?, Jan. 3).
- Saeed Kamali Dehghan’s warning against covert actions by the West and Israel to prevent Iran from acquiring nukes, which will “ruin any chance of dialogue with Tehran” (The covert war on Iran is illegal and dangerous, Jan. 11).
Of course, strangely missing from any of these essays and editorials warning about the dangers of provocative acts by Israel and the US is any mention that Iran’s military is not only already engaged in routine belligerence acts, but routinely foments terrorism around the globe, and engages in proxy wars as a component of their foreign policy aims of exporting their Islamist revolution.
Iran is widely recognized as the world’s leading state sponsor of international terrorism. Both directly and indirectly, Iran funds, trains and arms groups that share the regime’s stated goal of destroying Israel and the West, as well as overthrowing moderate Muslim regimes. Groups who have received the Islamic Republic’s largess include Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas.
Iran also provides support to Islamist insurgent groups in Iraq and Afghanistan, which have inflicted casualties on American, British, Australian and other multinational forces.
In fact, Iran is attempting to expand its terror network beyond the Middle East, using Hezbollah and splinter groups of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard to recruit and train sleeper cells in foreign countries.
The manner in which Tisdall and his Guardian colleagues almost uniformly contextualize the regional tension in a manner which frames Israel and the West as the warmongering aggressors and Iran as the victim of such (imperialist) aggression represents another instructive example of Guardian Left ideology.
The anti-imperialism which inspires such moral inversions, and informs their journalistic activism, is one of the more salient factors in properly understanding the institution’s near universal lack of moral sympathy for the Jewish state and the very real dangers the country faces.
The Guardian’s anti-Zionism doesn’t occur in an ideological vacuum and, as such, their coverage of the Iranian nuclear issue should necessarily be seen as part of their broader perverse understanding of what stances their “liberal” political package demands.
Related articles
- Guardian warns of dangerous saber-rattling by anti-Iranian Sunni-Zionist Alliance (cifwatch.com)
- The Iranian Guardians: CiF readers come out in force to demonize Israel, & defend Islamist regime (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian’s Simon Jenkins suggests Obama’s sanctions against Iran caused by Israel lobby (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian’s Simon Tisdall, genocidal Arab dictator whisperer, takes aim at Israel’s Prime Minister (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian and rest of British media get it wrong about Iranian threat. (cifwatch.com)
- Flagman: Arab ‘Spring’, the Guardian & the glorification of a nation’s anti-Zionist obsession (cifwatch.com)
- More Pro-Iranian “Hasbara” at ‘Comment is Free’ (cifwatch.com)
- Berchmans’ off-topic Israel hatred of the day: On the IDF and dead Palestinian children (cifwatch.com)
- Israel, Likudniks & their enablers: The Guardian’s Ian Williams takes a brave stand against Zionism! (cifwatch.com)
- The Guardian’s continuing obsession with Israel, by the numbers (cifwatch.com)
A guest post by Marc
Amongst the names of Palestinian prisoners freed by Israel in the second wave of releases in exchange for Gilad Shalit was a man named Tastos Zaki Husni Sultan.
(Full list available here and in English here though only the Hebrew actually states the crimes they were indicted for).
I remember well the day we arrested him in his home town Nablus. Though it wasn’t what he eventually was convicted of, we were told at the time by the Shin Bet that the main reason he was important to the terrorist networks was that he was the link between Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and Hezbollah.
We were also told that he would be armed and ready to fight when we came for him. He was convicted for (forgive the direct translations from the Hebrew):
“Firing at people, throwing Molotov cocktails, membership in an unknown terrorist organization, providing shelter to terrorists.”
The mission resulted in the arrest of both Tastos and another terrorist named Jamal Sa’adon.
Both were among the top 5 most wanted terrorists in the city and we had rehearsed the operation that would ultimately result in their capture many times. It was in 2004 (when I was approaching the end of my service) that that we grabbed them. We had already aborted the operation in various stages of carrying it out many times due to last-minute intelligence telling us that he was no longer in the hideout we were targeting.
The operation was considered so sensitive that military vehicles had been forbidden from driving past the apartment block that his family lived in for fear that it would spook him from returning there and ruin our chances of picking him up.
We were guarding the settlement of Migdalim when we were told to get our body armour on and pile into the vehicles. I didn’t think that the op was going to go ahead after it had already been aborted so many times, but the drivers gunned their engines and we were off. I waited for the mission to be aborted right up until the point that the vehicles stopped outside the building and we launched out into the hostile territory outside.
Once the residents of the block had been brought out of the building the search team went in, and no one was under any doubt that this man would come quietly. I spotted a hand emerge from the building to close a window when everyone was supposed to be outside. The squad commander directed the search team to an apartment they had already searched.
After the 2nd unsuccessful search they took no chances, and threw in a grenade.
Once the noise of the explosion died down the search team could hear muffled cries of surrender coming from somewhere deep within. A hand emerged from a kitchen cabinet that was only waist-high. The terrorists had pulled a small brick out of the back of this cabinet and squeezed into a tiny hollow that they had carved out behind it.
We had only expected to find Tastos, so Sa’adon was an extra surprise, who had previously spent 17 years in an Israeli prison.
After serving that term, he murdered the son of the mayor of Nablus by mistake while trying to kill the mayor – who he evidently considered to be too moderate. The list of his crimes was endless and he was not one of those released in the deal for Shalit.
Tastos had been a wanted man in the Casbah of Nablus for years prior to finally being captured. He had been responsible for terror attacks that had undoubtedly resulted in deaths of innocent civilians, and provided a level of technical sophistication to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade that allowed them to perpetrate attacks and gain information that otherwise wouldn’t have been available to them.
But when the army came for him, when he was looking death in the face, he knew better than the fellow terrorists he inspired and so chose prison instead – despite the fact that he was armed when he surrendered.
Tastos is just one out of a thousand people who have now been thrown back into the mix for Gilad Shalit.
There is no right or wrong answer to the question of whether it was worth it or not.
The whole country breathed a collective sigh of relief when Gilad came home and now we all just have to wait and see what damage terrorists like Tastos may do.
Related articles
- Lost in anti-Zionist translation? Guardian’s McGreal repeats mistranslated answers of Shalit in Arab interview (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian Letters Editor abets distortion of Gilad Shalit’s comments about Palestinian prisoners (cifwatch.com)
- Why is anti-Israel extremist Gary Spedding affiliated with Holocaust Memorial Day Trust? (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian publishes letters arguing Shalit’s release (in exchange for 1027 terrorists) is unfair to Hamas (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian’s Middle East Editor, Ian Black, equates Gilad Shalit with Palestinian terrorists (cifwatch.com)
- Arnold & Frimet Roth, whose daughter Malka was murdered by terrorists in 2001, responds to Shalit news (cifwatch.com)
I’d truly like to understand the moral logic which guides those who believe that a man who associated with the most violent, hateful, misogynistic and reactionary movements in the world can be considered a voice for human rights.
Moazzem Begg, former member of Al-Qaida and the Taliban, who attended terrorist training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan to “assist in waging jihad against enemies of Islam” has published his 18th essay at CiF, “We demand the truth about British involvement in torture“, Jan 12.
Begg, a British Pakistani Muslim, was detained by the Pakistani military in 2002 due to evidence linking him with al-Qaeda, was shortly turned over to the U.S., and spent two years in Guantanamo Bay before being released after pressure from British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw – albeit over the strong objections of The Pentagon.
Bryan Whitman, U.S. Defense Dep’t spokesman, said after Begg’s release that there was no question he has strong, long-term ties to terrorism—as a sympathizer, as a recruiter, as a financier and as a combatant.”
Whitman added, quoting an eight-page confession that Begg made while incarcerated, that Begg admitted:
I was armed and prepared to fight alongside the Taliban and al-Qaeda against the U.S. and others, and eventually retreated to Tora Bora to flee from U.S. forces when our front lines collapsed…. [I] knowingly provided comfort and assistance to al-Qaeda members by housing their families, helped distribute al-Qaeda propaganda, and received members from terrorist camps knowing that certain trainees could become al-Qaeda operatives and commit acts of terrorism against the United States
After his release, Begg became an advocate for the rights of terror suspects, and, as Director for Cageprisoners, continues to speak around the country, lecturing on imprisonment without trial, torture, and anti-terror legislation, and has been promoted by Amnesty International.
True to form, Begg, in his latest CiF post, lashes out against allegations of extrajudicial detention, and torture, of terror suspects, by the UK.
Yet, it would take truly exceptional mental tricks not to question the moral authority of a polemicist with proven ties to the Taliban, a group whose brutality and savagery, to both combatants and civilians, is exceptional even by the standards of Islamist terror groups.
Does it at all strike Guardian editors as odd to continually commission essays on the subject of “human rights” by a Jihadist associated with a group which engaged in simply horrendous repression of women and girls, issued edicts which forbade women from being educated, and publicly beat women for running afoul of the regime’s morality police?
It would be impossible to do justice to the degree and quantity of Taliban atrocities, but, in addition to conducting nothing short of an extermination against the Hazara minority in the 90s, Afghanistan under the Taliban had, by any measure, one of the worst human rights records in the world. They systematically repressed all sectors of the population, denied even the most basic individual rights, and literally enslaved the female population. As Christopher Hitchens noted, “the Taliban does not violate human rights, but entirely lacks the concept of their existence.”
Astonishingly, Begg, the “human rights advocate”, wrote, in his autobiography that the Taliban had made “some modest progress—in social justice and upholding pure, old Islamic values forgotten in many Islamic countries.”
In fact, Begg’s support for terror hasn’t waned in recent years.
In an article in the Irish Times, when asked if the actions of the Taliban, and the resulting deaths British soldiers and foreign aid workers, were justified, he answered:
“If you are asking me what are my feelings towards people fighting occupation, the answer is I completely support them. I believe in the inalienable right to defend yourself against foreign occupation.”
In fact, in a recent essay published by Begg, titled ‘Jihad and Terrorism: A War of the Words’, he glorifies violent Jihad, writing:
“The Quran also describes both jihad and qitaal as a transaction for which the ultimate prize is achieved by paying the ultimate price: Indeed Allah has purchased from the believers their lives and their wealth in return for Paradise. They fight in the Way of Allah, they kill and are killed.”
And:
“O you who believe! Shall I guide you to a commerce that will save you from a grievous torment? That you believe in Allah and His Messenger and you perform jihad in the way of Allah with your wealth and your lives.”
In the very next paragraph, he writes that Jihad is the duty of every Muslim and condemns those who refuse to do this, as a ‘major sin’.
“According to the consensus of the Islamic schools of thought (mathaahib), jihad (with wealth and in person, in the military sense) becomes an individual obligation, like prayer and fasting, on Muslim men and women when their land is occupied by foreign enemies or when an invasion is imminent.
Moazzem Begg: former member, recruiter, propagandist and combatant for reactionary, murderous terrorist groups, believer that violent Jihad is required of every Muslim, and supporter of attacks against his nation’s own citizens.
And, “human rights” commentator at ‘Comment is Free’.
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- Meet Moazzam Begg: Al-Qaeda and Taliban supporter, and latest Guardian contributor (cifwatch.com)
- CiF contributor characterizes Israel’s relationship with India as an alliance based on Islamophobia (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian Warning: 24 hrs in photos gallery contains ‘highly distressing’ images [& HIGHLY misleading] (cifwatch.com)
The Guardian’s continuing campaign to persuade the world of the benign nature of the Iranian regime and its nuclear programme (also, here and here) was augmented on January 11th with another article by ex-pat Iranian Saeed Kamali Dehghan which, in finger-wagging fashion, informs us that “[t]his covert war on Iran is illegal and dangerous“.
With all the integrity and accuracy of a tabloid gossip columnist, Dehghan lays the responsibility for a whole string of events – which he takes care to detail meticulously – firmly at the door of Israel, the United States or the United Kingdom.
Or, perhaps all three: he doesn’t seem quite able to decide and of course he has no real proof for any of his speculations beyond the usual knee-jerk official Iranian reactions.
But for the Guardian and Dehghan, it is enough that Israel “has refused to deny involvement” to make it the natural prime suspect of choice.
Apparently having fully embraced the traditional Guardian anti-Western stance, Dehghan appears not to have considered the possibility that the Gulf nations in proximity to Iran have just as much – if not more – of an interest in preventing its acquisition of nuclear weapons. Conveniently, he also neglects to mention that the various incidents were apparently carried out by Iranian nationals – a fact which opens up even more possibilities.
Dehghan choses to lump attacks on various nuclear scientists together with the two explosions at military bases last year, despite the fact that there is no proof of connection and the explosions took place at sites later shown to have nothing to do with Iran’s nuclear program. In fact, what little information there is may even suggest that at least some of the past year’s incidents may have more to do with internal factors than cunning covert warfare.
But the cherry on the cream comes in the form of Dehghan’s appeal to international law in defence of a totalitarian regime which (as he well knows) violates human rights laws in its domestic arena on a daily basis, and arms its Syrian dictator ally (currently engaged in the murder of innocent civilians), as well as terrorist groups in Gaza and Lebanon.
“But no matter who is responsible for the extrajudicial killings and apparent sabotage, one thing should be considered above all: these are illegal actions under international law.
Whether it’s an individual simply murdering people or a foreign state inflicting injuries upon the nationals of another state and violating the territorial sovereignty of the Islamic republic, international laws and human rights conventions prohibit such activities.
Supporters of covert war against Iran see it as an alternative to aerial bombing raids or full-scale war. They believe it’s a better approach (even though it is illegal) since there are fewer civilian casualties and public confrontation with supporters of Iran, such as Russia and China, can be avoided.”
Until reaching the final paragraph, it is difficult to ascertain from this article what Dehghan would prefer: the upholding of his (unsourced) version of international law or the mass-killing of civilians on both sides. But then we read this:
“But illegal action will only ruin any chance of dialogue with Tehran. It will encourage Iran to be less prudent and become more radical about its nuclear activities and – most importantly – will encourage Iran to react in a similar fashion with its own covert operations. The covert war against Iran, if not stopped, could escalate out of control.”
So in fact, Dehghan is conveying a not so veiled threat – but the question is, on behalf of whom?
Has he merely spent too much time in the company of Seumas Milne – a supporter of the Stop the War Coalition, which frequently collaborates with the Khomenist Islamic Human Rights Commission and has embraced the approach of the ‘Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran‘ (CASMII)?
Of note, CASMII was founded by Abbas Edalat, a professor connected to the inner circle of the Iranian regime whose primary mission appears to be the defense of the Iranian regime’s nuclear ambitions. As such, it was interesting to see Dehghan’s ‘Comment is Free’ piece featured prominently on CASMII’s website.
Or is Dehghan – an Iranian national who openly champions LGBT rights, and has family still at the mercy of a regime which executes gays - subject to other pressures?
One sincerely hopes that the former is the case, but nevertheless, his analysis indicates that there is no room for the proverbial cigarette paper between the approach of the Guardian and that of the repressive theocratic dictatorship in Tehran.
That fact should be of profound concern to any Left-wing liberal still reading Comment is Free.
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Perhaps to fill their quota of CiF essays not viscerally hostile to the U.S., and Israel’s very existence, the Guardian published “A covert campaign is the only way stop Iran’s nuclear ambitions“, by Andrew Cummings – an adviser on the Middle East and US affairs in the UK cabinet office national security staff.
Cummings argues that a negotiated settlement needs a comprehensive strategy, including covert action, increasingly robust sanctions, along with a credible threat of military action.
The author also pointed out the following politically inconvenient fact:
“Through the Revolutionary Guards, “Iran has been responsible for increasing the efficacy of insurgent improvised bombs in both Iraq and Afghanistan. It has helped to prop up Bashar al-Assad’s murderous regime in Syria and has a track record of attempting to assassinate or imprison its enemies – both at home and abroad.”
True to form, the merry band of Iran defenders whose Guardian-style politics can be pretty much summed up as “the enemy of the US and Israel are by definition deserving of sympathy”, immediately pounced on Cummings’ heterodox pro-Western views, often leveling clear ad hominem attacks on the author which have curiously not been deleted.
(I’ve read the first 202 comments posted thus far, and would gauge those militantly opposed to Cummings’ views in the 90-95% range, many of which are openly hostile to any suggestion that the West should challenge Iran’s aspirations for regional hegemony.)
Cummings is a Mossad agent who should be imprisoned or exiled (12 Recommends, not deleted)
Another accusation that Cummings is a Mossad Agent (10 Recommends)
U.S. and Israel are terrorists and war criminals (41 recommends)
The U.S. and Israel are a blight on the human race (22 recommends)
Iran should be seen as a check against the bullying and hegemony of the U.S and its allies. (23 Recommends)
Cummings is closer to an al-Qaeda terrorist than a civilized human being (25 Recommends)
Israel is an aggressive, jingoistic country which constantly murders innocent civilians (6 Recommends)
Cites conspiracy theory, including the suggestion that Israel lobby is behind assassinations
Perhaps Israeli leaders should be assassinated (8 Recommends)
And, finally, for some comic relief, here’s Berchmans, on the secret war mongering agenda of the “buffoons” at (multiple?) anti-CiF sites!
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- On CiF contributor Jonathan Guyer’s “chilling relations” with truth, context, and proportion (cifwatch.com)
- CiF piece by Brian Whitaker on “why media believes worst about Iran” draws on conspiracy blog (cifwatch.com)
- The Guardian welcomes back Ben White, tireless campaigner for the end of the Jewish State (cifwatch.com)
- Tin-Pot Pravda: Guardian editorial scolds Israel for taking Iranian nuclear threat seriously (cifwatch.com)
- How Guardian writers file stories about life in Gaza without mentioning Hamas, without really trying (cifwatch.com)
- CiF contributor characterizes Israel’s relationship with India as an alliance based on Islamophobia (cifwatch.com)
- Guardian readers claim leading Zionists during WWII rooted for Hitler. Comments not deleted by CiF Moderators (cifwatch.com)
Brian Whitaker has had many assignments during his nearly twenty-five year career at the Guardian, including a long stint as the paper’s Middle East editor.
So, the Guardian veteran’s image and moniker caught my eye in the comment section below CiF’s latest edition of Divine Dispatches by David Shariatmadari.
Whitaker was responding to Shariatmadari’s final bullet point about “speculation as to whether Mormons would have undue influence over the White House” (in the event of a Mitt Romney Presidency).
Here’s Whitaker’s reply:
Whitaker linked to an essay he wrote in 2005, while Middle East editor, titled “Fundamental Union“, which began thusly:
Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi is a controversial Islamic scholar who approves of wife-beating and believes in traditional family values. The Mormon church, having abandoned polygamy more than a century ago, believes in traditional families too.
With that much in common, they have joined forces to “defend the family” and fight progressive social policies at the United Nations.
Intrigued by a comparison between the Muslim Brotherhood spiritual leader and the Utah based Church of Latter Day Saints, to which Romney is a member, I read on.
“The Doha conference”, Whitaker informs us, “provides a striking example of growing cooperation between the Christian right (especially in the United States) and conservative Muslims.” [emphasis mine]
Further intrigued by a Guardian editor evoking the specter of a burgeoning Evangelical-Islamism Alliance – which, after all, represents something approaching apostasy at an institution which continually claims that the Christian right (and America more broadly) is immutably Islamophobic – I read further.
The debate about family values, opined Whitaker, does not “follow the usual dividing lines of international politics. The battle is between liberal secularists and conservatives…who think religion has a role in government.”
On this issue, Whitaker’s flourish concludes, “the United States now sits in the religious camp alongside the Islamic regimes: not so much a clash of civilisations, more an alliance of fundamentalisms.” [emphasis mine]
While there is, to be sure, much to criticize about the Christian right in the U.S. – such as their views on gay rights and other social issues – it takes a truly breathtaking leap to posit anything approaching a moral overlap with Islamism, particularly the brand of Islamist thought championed by Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi.
Al-Qaradawi’s Islamism (which, along with the even more extreme Salafists, garnered a strong majority of the vote in Egypt’s recent elections) doesn’t merely condemn gays, but calls for their execution.
Al-Qaradawi’s Islamism approves of female genital mutilation, and believes that women who are the victims of rape arguably should be punished for their apparent sin of tempting their innocent male attacker!
Al-Qaradawi Qaradawi also supports acts of terrorism innocent American and Israeli civilians – and issued a fatwa in 2003 specifically authorizing the use of women in suicide attacks.
Finally – and strangely absent, even in passing, anywhere in Whitaker’s nearly 2,000 word essay – there’s the issue of Al-Qaradawi’s extreme, explicit and unapologetic antisemitism.
Such Jew-hatred, which Whitaker ever so curiously omitted, includes the MB spiritual leader’s citation of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in “religious deliberations”, and his incitement of violence specifically against Jews.
More recently, Al-Qaradawi’s (Mormon-style?) Islamism explicitly endorsed Hitler’s genocide against the Jews, and was quoted in a Wikileaks cable literally calling on Allah to kill every last Jew on earth.
Whatever legitimate criticisms their may be regarding Mormon religious doctrine, even a cursory view of the Church (and its leadership) would disabuse those sincerely interested in such an inquiry of any suggestion that the faith is compromised by even a hint of such extremism.
Whitaker’s bizarre, tall tale of twin, morally overlapping, fundamentalisms represents a classic Guardian polemicism: preconceived, politically convenient, and ideologically driven conclusions in desperate search of anything even resembling supporting evidence.
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- Guardian provides free PR to Interpal, a “charity” widely known as terrorist front group (cifwatch.com)
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Is ‘Federation of Student Islamic Societies’ (FOSIS) Training the Violent Extremists of Tomorrow?
February 3, 2012 in Comments which are off-topic, ad hominem, racist, vulgar or include threats of violence will be deleted | Tags: anti-Zionism, Antisemitism, Cross Post, Federation Of Student Islamic Societies, Huffington Post, Sharia, Terrorism, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab | by Guest/Cross Post | 11 comments
This is cross posted by Hasan Afzal at Huffington Post
University Islamic Societies have been described as ‘conveyor belts‘ for extremism and terrorism. There may be some truth in this. After all, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, better known to you and I as the underwear bomber, who tried to make a martyr of himself by attempting to detonate a bomb in an airplane en route to the US was the president of UCL Islamic Society. Amazingly, Malcolm Grant, the vice-chancellor of the University, tried to later claim that campus extremism is ‘made up‘.
The ‘conveyor belt’ theory follows the line that young Muslims enrol into university as liberal-minded, impressionable students only to be indoctrinated by extremist Islam and turned into insular, backward-thinking, extremely conservative Muslims. In turn, the mindset of these students can then be used by terrorist recruiters to mould them into potential bombers. The rationale is convincing as this is precisely what is thought to have happened to Abdulmutallab.
All too often we see the end product of the conveyor belt. We see the Abdulmutallabs and extremists of this world when it’s too late. Ever seen what goes on in the middle? Have you ever wanted to know how well intentioned young Muslims turn into their community’s worst nightmare? I can give you a sneak peak.
The Federation of Student Islamic Societies (FOSIS), the umbrella organisation that represents most Islamic Societies, likes to make-believe that it has no part to play in turning young Muslims into extremists.
If that is the case, why is FOSIS hosting an event with a vicious hate preacher to an audience described as “exclusively for the leaders of London Islamic Societies”?
A concerned Muslim student provided us with a link (in case it is shut, have a look at this screenshot) inviting that person to a religious gathering. The concerned student had reason to be worried for Haitham al-Haddad would be speaking at that event.
Haitham al-Haddad is an extremist. Let’s have a look at what this man believes in:
The Arab-Israeli conflict is one of our generation’s biggest challenges. To solve the conflict, it will take time, nuance and a lot of patience. But, that’s not how al-Haddad it. Like other extremists, he takes the far-right view that the conflict is one against Muslims and Jews (ignoring the fact that Israel’s population is one-fifth Arab).
In a video on YouTube, al-Haddad’s advice to Muslims is to “be ready to pay the price for this victory from our blood”. You read that correctly. Whilst NGOs and governments across the world try to bring both sides together in peace, Mr al-Haddad has told Muslims to be ready to die. Indeed, al-Haddad’s opinion on the Gaza conflict is to tell Muslims, “to prepare themselves for jihad, all over the world.”
Furthermore, Haitham al-Haddad runs such a Sharia court. Sharia law brings untold, and often unheard, misery to moderate Muslims in the United Kingdom (just have a look at the brilliant work of One Law for All). There are many stories of women being denied justice because they are forced by their families or communities to go through the unfair and unjust sharia court system in the UK.
Al-Haddad’s tribunal has issued a number of judgements (otherwise known as fatwas). In a question asked to him on why sharia law considers two women the equivalent of one man, he answers with the following, “The text (Surah Al-Baqara 2:282) which requires two female witnesses in place of one male witness, gives a clear reason for it i.e. “if one of them forgets, the other reminds her.” Is this derogatory to the status of the women or is it a revealed secret about the nature of the women?”. The misogyny and extremism is laid bare.
In another judgement, al-Haddad was asked if stoning and hand lopping should be discontinued as a barbaric practice. al-Haddad’s answer was, “As a Muslim we should know that our religion is perfect without any imperfection as Allah says, ‘this day, I have perfected your religion for you, and have chosen for you Islam as your religion’. Therefore, belittling them or calling them as out-of-date constitutes disbelief as Allah says.”
A final example of the sick mind of Haitham al-Haddad comes in a fatwa asked of him what to do if a woman refuses to sleep with her husband due to a history of childhood sexual abuse. His answer is that should that woman refuse to sleep with her husband, “angels will curse” her.
So, the Federation of Student Islamic Societies London is inviting someone whose views would render him a sociopath in a decent-thinking person’s judgement. This is what young Muslims in Islamic Societies across the country are taught, they are taught to hate the very society that has brought them up. Just don’t be surprised when the next Abdulmutallab decides come off the conveyor belt and into the news headlines.
I challenge Nabil Ahmed, the president of FOSIS, and FOSIS London to explain why they are inviting such a nightmarish individual to their ‘religious gathering’?
What good can this man do to the minds of young Muslims?
Follow Hasan Afzal on Twitter: www.twitter.com/hasanafzal
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