Prominent British Jews targeted

Jerusalem Post ^ | 2-15-04 | RAJEEV SYAL

[SJackson]

Prominent Jews in Britain are being targeted in a wave of anti-Semitic harassment by far-right and Islamic fundamentalist organizations.

The home of Lord Triesman, the former general secretary of the Labor Party, has been attacked by Combat 18, the neo-Nazi group. Uri Geller, the Israeli television personality, and Barbara Roche, the former Labor minister, have been the victims of graffiti and hate mail.

The incidents have emerged as police prepare to release figures this week showing that Britain saw a significant rise in anti-Semitic incidents in 2003.

Mike Whine, the security spokesman for the Board of Deputies of British Jews, said that the problem of prejudice directed towards Jews on the European mainland was spreading to Britain. "Tensions in the Middle East and the rise of far-Right activity have come together to produce a depressing increase in anti-Semitic activity," he said.

Whine, who works closely with the police to monitor anti-Semitic attacks on synagogues and Jewish graves, said that extremist Islamic groups are behind many anti-Semitic incidents. "There is reliable evidence from the police to prove that an increasing number of incidents are committed by sympathizers of the Palestinians and Islamists. "The promotion of anti-Semitism by the Arab media and by Islamist organizations worldwide is having a significant effect on the attitudes of Muslim communities around the world towards the Jews." Combat 18, the banned neo-Nazi terror group, has orchestrated a 14-month campaign of terror against Lord Triesman of Tottenham. His windows have been broken and his walls daubed with swastikas in 12 separate attacks.

The problem became so bad that he was advised by Special Branch to erect a three-meter fence around his home in Dartmouth Park, north London. The fence was dismantled in December, however, because it fell foul of the planning rules of the Labor-run Camden borough council. Lord Triesman, 61, said that he was disturbed by the attacks, which he blamed on anti-Semitic sentiment.

"When a group like Combat 18 spray swastikas and slogans on your walls and brick your windows, it's evident what it's all about," he said. "My family was at home through a number of attacks and it was pretty grisly. It has been a really bad time, horrendous, and no one should have to go through that." He criticized Camden council for forcing him to take down the protective fence. "The fence has come down now. I am not happy about it at all. It was there because Special Branch advised it."

Lord Triesman was brought up in the north London Jewish community. Although he is not a practicing Jew, police fear that his race was the reason for being targeted by Combat 18.

Geller, 57, the Israeli-born exponent of mind over matter, was shocked to discover the word "Jew" painted on a fence at his home in Sonning, Berkshire, last Thursday. He said that his family had been subjected to a three-year campaign of intimidation including hate mail, silent telephone calls and stalkers, but this was the first time that graffiti had been painted on his property. "It is a real shock to be confronted with the word 'Jew' being used as an insult. It is a sickening feeling," he said.

In November, Roche's office in Crouch End, north London, was daubed with swastikas for the third time in a year. The Labor MP for Hornsey and Wood Green said: "The use of Nazi symbols is abhorrent." Earlier this year, the far-Right British National Party tried to march in her constituency but was stopped after residents objected. In 2002, there were 350 recorded anti-Semitic incidents in Britain, according to the Board of Deputies – a rise of 13 percent on the previous year. This year's rise, to be announced this week by the Board of Deputies, will show a small but significant increase in incidents that include name-calling, physical assaults and hate mail.

Gerry Gable, the publisher of Searchlight, the anti-fascist magazine, said that far-Right organizations such as Combat 18 were orchestrating campaigns on the Internet against prominent Jews by circulating their names and addresses. "They believe they are participating in a race war," he said.

An ICM poll last month in Britain found that one in five Britons would oppose a Jewish prime minister, while one in seven believed that the Holocaust was exaggerated.

Abu Hamza, the hook-handed former cleric of Finsbury Park mosque, north London, was reported to the police for preaching alleged anti-Semitic comments about the Holocaust. He is one of several extremist Islamic clerics who have been accused of encouraging anti-Semitic views among young Muslims. (The Daily Telegraph)

[GeronL]

It is amazing that socialists become "far-right" when they hate jews.

[SouthernFreebird]

Wow, and 'The Passion' hasn't even played there yet.../sarcasm

[SJackson]

If you'd like to be on or off this middle east/political ping list, please FR mail me.

Jewish graves desecrated by Russian Nazis

ST PETERSBURG, FEBRUARY 16: Dozens of Jewish graves have been desecrated in St Petersburg in the city’s second xenophobic attack in a week, a Jewish community leader said on Monday, accusing authorities of negligence.

The Administrative Director of St Petersburg’s Jewish Association, Yefim Babushkin, said up to 40 graves had been daubed with Nazi swastikas on Saturday night. Police said an investigation had been launched into the attack on a city cemetery, but officials refused to speculate on who might be responsible. St Petersburg has a bad record of xenophobic attacks.

Last week, a nine-year-old girl from ex-Soviet Tajikistan in Central Asia was beaten to death in a city courtyard by a group of teenagers, blamed by the media on skinheads. In September, police arrested four skinheads suspected of killing a six-year-old girl from Tajikistan. A year earlier, about 30 skinheads beat to death a trader from ex-Soviet Azerbaijan. Attacks against Jews are not unusual in Russia where anti-Semitism was rampant in Tsarist times.

[risk]

Haven't Russian Jews suffered enough?

[MegaSilver]

No kidding. From their web site:

Q: Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq?
A: Because they had weapons of mass destruction honey.

Q: But the inspectors didn't find any weapons of mass destruction.
A: That's because the Iraqis were hiding them.

Q: And that's why we invaded Iraq?
A: Yep. Invasions always work better than inspections.

Q: But after we invaded them, we STILL didn't find any weapons of mass
destruction, did we?
A: That's because the weapons are so well hidden. Don't worry, we'll find
something, probably right before the 2004 US Presidential election.

Q: Why did Iraq want all those weapons of mass destruction?
A: To use them in a war, silly.

Q: I'm confused. If they had all those weapons that they planned to use in a war, then why didn't they use any of those weapons when we went to war with them?
A: Well, obviously they didn't want anyone to know they had those weapons, so they chose to die by the thousands rather than defend themselves.

Q: That doesn't make sense Daddy. Why would they choose to die if they had all those big weapons to fight us back with?
A: It's a different culture. It's not supposed to make sense.

Q: I don't know about you, but I don't think they had any of those weapons our government said they did.
A: Well, you know, it doesn't matter whether or not they had those weapons. We had another good reason to invade them anyway.

Q: And what was that?
A: Even if Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein was a cruel dictator, which is another good reason to invade another country.

Q: Why? What does a cruel dictator do that makes it OK to invade his
country?
A: Well, for one thing, he tortured his own people.

Q: Kind of like what they do in China?
A: Don't go comparing China to Iraq. China is a good economic competitor, where millions of people work for slave wages in sweatshops to make U.S. corporations richer.

Q: So if a country lets its people be exploited for American corporate gain, it's a good country, even if that country tortures people?
A: Right.

Q: Why were people in Iraq being tortured?
A: For political crimes, mostly, like criticizing the government. People who
criticized the government in Iraq were sent to prison and tortured.

Q: Isn't that exactly what happens in China?
A: I told you, China is different.

Q: What's the difference between China and Iraq?
A: Well, for one thing, Iraq was ruled by the Ba'ath party, while China is
Communist.

Q: Didn't you once tell me Communists were bad?
A: No, just Cuban Communists are bad.

Q: How are the Cuban Communists bad?
A: Well, for one thing, people who criticize the government in Cuba are sent to prison and tortured.

Q: Like in Iraq?
A: Exactly.

Q: And like in China, too?
A: I told you, China's a good economic competitor. Cuba, on the other hand, is not.

Q: How come Cuba isn't a good economic competitor?
A: Well, you see, back in the early 1960s, the US government passed some laws that made it illegal for Americans to trade or do any business with Cuba until they stopped being Communists and started being capitalists like us.

Q: But if we got rid of those laws, opened up trade with Cuba, and started doing business with them, wouldn't that help the Cubans become capitalists?
A: Don't be a smart-girl.

Q: I didn't think I was being one.
A: Well, anyway, they also don't have freedom of religion in Cuba.

Q: Kind of like China and the Falun Gong movement?
A: I told you, stop saying bad things about China. Anyway, Saddam Hussein came to power through a military coup, so he's not really a legitimate leader anyway.

Q: What's a military coup?
A: That's when a military general takes over the government of a country by force, instead of holding free elections like we do in the United States.

Q: Didn't the ruler of Pakistan come to power by a military coup?
A: You mean General Pervez Musharraf? Uh, yeah, he did, but Pakistan is our friend.

Q: Why is Pakistan our friend if their leader is illegitimate?
A: I never said Pervez Musharraf was illegitimate.

Q: Didn't you just say a military general who comes to power by forcibly
overthrowing the legitimate government of a nation is an illegitimate
leader?
A: Only Saddam Hussein. Pervez Musharraf is our friend, because he helped us invade Afghanistan.

Q: Why did we invade Afghanistan?
A: Because of what they did to us on September 11th.

Q: What did Afghanistan do to us on September 11th?
A: Well, on September 11th, nineteen men, 15 of them Saudi Arabians, hijacked four airplanes and flew three of them into buildings, killing over
3,000 Americans.

Q: So how did Afghanistan get involved in all that?
A: Afghanistan was where those bad men trained, under the oppressive rule of the Taliban.

Q: Aren't the Taliban those bad radical Islamics who chopped off people's
heads and hands?
A: Yes, that's exactly who they were. Not only did they chop off people's
heads and hands, but they oppressed women, too.

Q: Didn't the Bush administration give the Taliban 43 million dollars back
in May of 2001?
A: Yes, but that money was a reward because they did such a good job
fighting drugs.

Q: Fighting drugs?
A: Yes, the Taliban were very helpful in stopping people from growing opium poppies.

Q: How did they do such a good job?
A: Simple. If people were caught growing opium poppies, the Taliban would have their hands and heads cut off.

Q: So, when the Taliban cut off people's heads and hands for growing
flowers, that was OK, but not if they cut people's heads and hands off for
other reasons?
A: Yes. It's OK with us if radical Islamic fundamentalists cut off people's
hands for growing flowers, but it's cruel if they cut off people's hands for
stealing bread.

Q: Don't they also cut off people's hands and heads in Saudi Arabia?
A: That's different. Afghanistan was ruled by a tyrannical patriarchy that
oppressed women and forced them to wear burqas whenever they were in public, with death by stoning as the penalty for women who did not comply.

Q: Don't Saudi women have to wear burqas in public, too?
A: No, Saudi women merely wear a traditional Islamic body covering.

Q: What's the difference?
A: The traditional Islamic covering worn by Saudi women is a modest yet
fashionable garment that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and fingers. The burqa, on the other hand, is an evil tool of patriarchal oppression that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and
fingers.

Q: It sounds like the same thing with a different name.
A: Now, don't go comparing Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are our friends.

Q: But I thought you said 15 of the 19 hijackers on September 11th were from Saudi Arabia.
A: Yes, but they trained in Afghanistan.

Q: Who trained them?
A: A very bad man named Osama bin Laden.

Q: Was he from Afghanistan?
A: Uh, no, he was from Saudi Arabia too. But he was a bad man, a very bad man.

Q: I seem to recall he was our friend once.
A: Only when we helped him and the mujahadeen repel the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan back in the 1980s.

Q: Who are the Soviets? Was that the Evil Communist Empire Ronald Reagan talked about?
A: There are no more Soviets. The Soviet Union broke up in 1990 or
thereabouts, and now they have elections and capitalism like us. We call
them Russians now.

Q: So the Soviets ? I mean, the Russians ? are now our friends?
A: Well, not really. You see, they were our friends for many years after
they stopped being Soviets, but then they decided not to support our
invasion of Iraq, so we're mad at them now. We're also mad at the French and the Germans because they didn't help us invade Iraq either.

Q: So the French and Germans are evil, too?
A: Not exactly evil, but just bad enough that we had to rename French fries and French toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast.

Q: Do we always rename foods whenever another country doesn't do what we want them to do?
A: No, we just do that to our friends. Our enemies, we invade.

Q: But wasn't Iraq one of our friends back in the 1980s?
A: Well, yeah. For a while.

Q: Was Saddam Hussein ruler of Iraq back then?
A: Yes, but at the time he was fighting against Iran, which made him our
friend, temporarily.

Q: Why did that make him our friend?
A: Because at that time, Iran was our enemy.

Q: Isn't that when he gassed the Kurds?
A: Yeah, but since he was fighting against Iran at the time, we looked the other way, to show him we were his friend.

Q: So anyone who fights against one of our enemies automatically becomes our friend?
A: Most of the time, yes.

Q: And anyone who fights against one of our friends is automatically an
enemy?
A: Sometimes that's true, too. However, if American corporations can profit by selling weapons to both sides at the same time, all the better.

Q: Why?
A: Because war is good for the economy, which means war is good for America. Also, since God is on America's side, anyone who opposes war is a godless un-American Communist. Do you understand now why we attacked Iraq?

Q: I think so. We attacked them because God wanted us to, right?
A: Yes.

Q: But how did we know God wanted us to attack Iraq?
A: Well, you see, God personally speaks to George W. Bush and tells him what to do.

Q: So basically, what you're saying is that we attacked Iraq because George
W. Bush hears voices in his head?
A. Yes! You finally understand how the world works. Now close your eyes,
make yourself comfortable, and go to sleep. Good night.

Good night, Daddy.

[MegaSilver]

And more:

Shallow media commentators may be greatly exercised at present by the idea of us replacing the Tories as the main opposition to New Labour in an ever-increasing part of the country, but no one should be inclined to think that this means we are becoming a new Conservative party. Oh no! The key word is ‘replace’, not ‘become’, and anyone who doubts this should make a point of re-reading some of the articles in ID in recent months, such as the pieces on future urban design and the potential of local distributive currencies. There is more genuine, practical radicalism here than in dozen copies of the New Statesman or Red Pepper. This party is certainly not here with the aim of saving globalist capitalism from the consequences of its own greed and folly. There is at our very centre a mature but radical impulse not just to save the best of the past, but also to build something even better for the future. We want to clean the gutters and make the streets safe, but we also aim for the stars, both figuratively and literally.

[Peter Libra]

I read somewhere that the so-called Combat18 is so much infiltrated by the agents of the British Government, it hardly exists as such. I am going to research this. Mark my words. Scotland Yard absolutely notorious in the deep past for agents provocateurs . It was widely used many years ago. Go very careful on some of this information. About the Islamic lot, this I believe.

The British Government will do almost any dirty trick to smear the hard right.

[GeronL]

The Conservative Party leader in the UK now supports gay marriage.

can victory be far behind?

*yawn*

[Alouette]

Captain Hook alert

[Peter Libra]

Some research done. Google(UK) gets it, also Google (Canada). The name of the special police are officially The Hate Crimes Unit. Canada had a disgrace when a provocator called Grant Bristow, infiltrated the so-called Heritage Front. I believe he encouraged criminal offences.

The original tactics of Scotland Yard were culled from anarchists in England who fled from Russia. Poor English fools were sent to prison for long sentences for buying into rhetoric plotting violence- it worked well. An exception is, of course, the IRA. Only positive identification and proof should taken into account, on any so-called white supremicists. I believe my last statement to be a fair one- hopefully.