Posted on 02/12/2006 5:04:10 AM PST by Hannah Senesh
Now that Israel is under threat of extermination by Iran and Hamas, with Nazi-style libels against the Jews pouring out of the Arab and Muslim world and with Jews everywhere under siege from physical and intellectual attack, what is the response of the most progressive religious and intellectual minds in Britain and America to this phenomenon of global fascism and threat of a second Holocaust directed against the Jewish state? Why, to cut Israel’s economic throat. Last year’s aborted Israel boycott by Britain’s Association of University Teachers was, as predicted here at the time, merely a practice run for what has become the progressive recreational sport du jour – singling out the one country on the planet that is targeted for extermination, first by demonising it with a campaign of lies and then severing its intellectual and economic lifelines to the so-called civilised world.
Israel boycotts now seem to be as popular as a CND badge on a 1950s beatnik. The Church of England, which has done so much to foster hatred of Israel, has now successfully resurrected its narrowly averted boycott support attempt of last year (you can’t keep a good prejudice down) and at the General Synod overwhelmingly backed the call by the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem to divest from ‘companies profiting from the illegal occupation ... until they change their policies.’
(Excerpt) Read more at melaniephillips.com ...
This entire scenario in the Bible is being played out with the Muslims more than willing and ready to shed their blood to exterminate Israel. Two thousand years and most of the conditions have been or are being met in this run to war and destruction for the final days.
And she is a "chore" to read.
Hardly the stuff of the "freep". One needs three men and a small dog just to get started plowing thru her tons of prose.
Whew!
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Yet, where were the Israeli leaders when the "International Community" started campaign of vilification and eradication of Serbs from Krajina and Kosovo? And what about the morbid show trial in Hague?
First they came for the communists First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out-- because I was not a communist; Then they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out-- because I was not a socialist; Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out-- because I was not a trade unionist; Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out-- because I was not a Jew; Then they came for me-- and there was no one left to speak out for me.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
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Largely forgotten amid Sharon's hatred for "terrorism" was his outspoken criticism of Nato's war against Serbia in 1999, when he was Israeli foreign minister. Eleven years earlier he had sympathised with the political objective of Slobodan Milosevic: to prevent the establishment of an Albanian state in Kosovo. This, he said, would lead to "Greater Albania" and provide a haven for - readers must here hold their breath - "Islamic terror". In a Belgrade newspaper interview, Sharon said that "we stand together with you against the Islamic terror". Once Nato's bombing of Serbia was under way, however, Sharon's real reason for supporting the Serbs became apparent. "It's wrong for Israel to provide legitimacy to this forceful sort of intervention which the Nato countries are deploying... in an attempt to impose a solution on regional disputes," he said. "The moment Israel expresses support for the sort of model of action we're seeing in Kosovo, it's likely to be the next victim. Imagine that one day Arabs in Galilee demand that the region in which they live be recognised as an autonomous area, connected to the Palestinian Authority..."
NATO's bombing, Sharon said, was "brutal interventionism". The Israeli journalist Uri Avnery, who seized on this extraordinary piece of duplicity, said that "Islamic terror" in Kosovo could only exist in "Sharon's racist imagination". Avnery was far bolder in translating what lay behind Sharon's antipathy towards Nato action than Sharon himself. "If the Americans and the Europeans interfere today in the matter of Kosovo, what is to prevent them from doing the same tomorrow in the matter of Palestine?
"Sharon has made it crystal-clear to the world that there is a similarity and perhaps even identity between Milosevic's attitude towards Kosovo and the attitude of Netanyahu and Sharon towards the Palestinians." Besides, for a man whose own "brutal interventionism" in Lebanon in 1982 led to a Middle East bloodbath of unprecedented proportions, Sharon's remarks were, to say the least, hypocritical.
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The way that Netanyahu’s government handled the NATO war on Serbia, so as to avoid alienating the Russians, has been even more irritating to the United States. In this effort, Foreign Minister Sharon has been serving as the pointman for his government. While the Prime Minister has offered luke warm support for the NATO offensive, Sharon has been outspoken and highly critical. His comments have been so breathtakingly undiplomatic they deserve to be quoted: “It’s wrong for Israel to provide legitimacy to this forceful sort of intervention which the NATO countries are deploying, led by the United States, in an attempt to impose a solution on regional disputes. The moment Israel expresses support for the sort of model of action we’re seeing in Kosovo, it’s likely to be the next victim…. Imagine that one day Arabs in the Galilee demand that the region in which they live be recognized as an autonomous area, connected to the Palestinian Authority….Brutal interventionism must not be legitimized as a way to try to impose a solution in regional conflicts.” (This, of course, a shocking observation from the man who engineered the brutal Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982!) Sharon continued, “Far from easing the conflict, the American bombardments have caused suffering and sent tens of thousands of refugees fleeing.”
Sharon also made comments warning that should Kosovo win independence it might become part of “a greater Albania that will turn into a center of Islamic terrorism in Europe…. If a big block of Muslim countries develops in this area, this could be the center of Islamic terrorism and the seed for this already exists there. This might lead to instability.” It was reported in the Russian press that Sharon’s comments were well received by that government.
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The official Israeli position.
Newspaper reports alleged that in a public statement, Foreign Minister Sharon warned that the presence of Moslem refugees in the heart of Europe could create problems in the future. This caused some confusion as to Israel's policy on the Kosovo crisis, where NATO planes were engaged in massive bombing of Serbia and masses of Albanian refugees were flowing from Kosovo to neighboring Macedonia and Albania. In the following clarification, Foreign Minister Sharon said that Israel was rendering aid to the war casualties. Indeed, in mid-April, the IDF installed a field hospital in a refugee camp in Macedonia, and Israel later accepted 104 refugees from Kosovo.
Text:
Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon, today (Friday), 2.4.99, clarified his position that the terrible human tragedy taking place in Yugoslavia, and particularly in Kosovo, must be drawn to an immediate close.
Foreign Minister Sharon added that he takes a harsh view of all acts of murder, injury or deportation directed against innocent civilians. "As steadfast friends of the United States, we expect that the United States and the NATO forces will do everything possible in order to end the suffering of the innocent, and to bring about the resumption of negotiations between the parties," he said.
The Foreign Minister added that, as in the past, Israel is rendering assistance to the casualties. "This is our moral responsibility as Jews, and the consistent policy of the State of Israel."
Thank you. I did not see it, it did not get much coverage in the Western media, did it?
But still the "luke warm support for the NATO offensive" HAS BEEN OFFERED. If Israel condemned it from the start, maybe the event would go different way - as many American Jews were very supportive of NATO attack.
Some. I'll link a couple quote searches below.
In the context of Israel not supporting the US, it got a bit, mostly in anti-Israel quarters. In the context of wait a minute, Israel is opposed, what are we doing here, not much other than limited Jewish publications and think tanks. As would be expected, I admit. I'll link a couple articles if you're interested.
NATO'S BOMBING OF SERBIA, By Elyakim Ha'etzni
Search:"we stand together with you against the Islamic terror"
The Jews of Israel have moved (or their parents have moved) into a part of the world where they are hated and reviled, and the local population lusts for their spiritual and physical extermination.
Many of them would like to rely for their safety and simple physical survival on "decency", or "international law", or a "right to exist" which could be granted by some nonexistent authority.
In fact, they must, if they are to survive, rely mainly on the willingness of the Jewish people to employ brutality against their many enemies, essentially forever.
I'm not sure this is such a good bet.
Most American Jews, like most Americans, would likely respond that Kosovo is a little European car if asked in a survey. Among the few with whom it registered, issues weren't known. Virtually no one at the time correctly identified it as an Islamic threat, and no one would have cared in any case. Of what opposition there was on the right, I'd speculate much of it was anti-Clinton, not anti-bombing. As to anyone paying attention to Israel, no one does. Particularly Netanyahu/Sharon positions of the "radical right". If you recall, Clinton made quite an effort to see that Netanyahu lost in 1999.
The unfortunate fact is that no one cared much.
"The Jews of Israel have moved (or their parents have moved) into a part of the world where they are hated and reviled, and the local population lusts for their spiritual and physical extermination."
Leaving aside the fact that around half of Israel's Jewish population came from the Middle East (having been ethnically cleansed by the Arab nations) and a large number have lived there for many generations, you seem to forget that the remainder came from a continent whose peoples had not just lusted for "their spiritual and physical extermination," but had actually nearly achieved it.
"In fact, they must, if they are to survive, rely mainly on the willingness of the Jewish people to employ brutality against their many enemies, essentially forever"
This article is not about the Arabs, but Israel's many enemies in the West who are collaborating with those who wish to destroy her.
I don't forget that at all.
I just sometimes think that Fort Lauderdale would have been a better bet.
Am I really reading you right? You're criticizing Israel for NOT condemning the United States when the US is at war?
Personally, I don't believe criticism of Israel- from a "patriotic" American- can get more funny then that.
Who speaks for the Poles in America? I would like you to name a couple of people so that if they say something, I will know they speak for [many]American Poles. And for you.
If several prominent Jews supported the war because of misguided humanitarian concerns, or because of loyalty to the Democrat President, they did so as individuals.
American Jews, like most Americans, were not really certain why we were involved, and many were sympathetic to the Serbs.
Some were "sympathetic to the Serbs", but many if not the majority were convinced that another Holocaust is going on in the middle of Europe - by the evil Serbs on the innocent Muslims. Ignorance should not be an excuse, if they were not certain they should have learned more.
But it is not too late - the trial at Hague is still open and the pogroms of Serbs and Gypsies in Kosovo are not finished yet. (Serbian Krajina is already destroyed)
"I don't forget that at all."
If you didn't forget then it was disingenuous of you to not mention that half of Israel's Jews came from the Middle East and many more (or at least their families) have lived there for centuries.
"I just sometimes think that Fort Lauderdale would have been a better bet."
And I knew exactly what you were getting at and I find your comment extremely offensive:
1) We Jews are entitled to live in our ancestral homeland. Jews live there because they want to live there. Would you desert your homeland simply in order to be safe?
2) We Jews have a right to a nation like everyone else. You prefer the company of Americans. Many Jews prefer the company of Jews. Israel runs by a Jewish clock. It is a Jewish nation. It is our home.
3) We Jews learned from the Holocaust that we need to defend ourselves because no one else will do it for us. Ariel Sharon put it rather more graphically a short while ago when he suggested that the Holocaust taught us never again to trust a gentile nation (that is not something I agree with). You imagine Europe was safe? The souls of six million Jews would beg to differ.
4) America as a matter of deliberate policy kept out Jews during the 1930s and severely restricted Jewish immigration even at war's end. It's rather late in the day to suggest that the U.S. would have been a better place for the Jews of the world to live.
"Ignorance should not be an excuse, if they were not certain they should have learned more."
After many centuries of the most virulent anti-Semitism that is something which should be inscribed on the heart of every living Pole.
Yet, you could have shown the solidarity with Serbs (and Kosovo Gypsies) in their time of need. (Serbs were one the few European nations who resisted Hitler against the overwhelming odds as Poles and Greeks did).
Such gesture would be remembered long by the Balkan Christians and appreciated by the Christians in the Middle East.
"If several prominent Jews supported the war because of misguided humanitarian concerns, or because of loyalty to the Democrat President, they did so as individuals."
Whatever the situation, they manage to find a way to blame "the Jews." It's their culture.
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