Richard Cohen: A lesson from Helen Thomas

The Washington Post ^ | June 8, 2010 | Richard Cohen

[2ndDivisionVet]

Ah, another teachable moment!

This one comes to us from Helen Thomas, the longtime White House reporter and columnist who announced her retirement on Monday. Thomas, of Lebanese ancestry and almost 90, has never been shy about her anti-Israel views, for which, as far as I'm concerned, she is wrong and to which she is entitled. Then the other day, she performed a notable public service by revealing how very little she knew. Asked at a White House event if she had any comments about Israel, Thomas said, "Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine. . . . Go home. Poland. Germany. And America and everywhere else."

Well, I don't know about "everywhere else," but after World War II, many Jews did attempt to "go home" to Poland. This resulted in the murder of about 1,500 of them -- killed not by Nazis but by Poles, either out of sheer ethnic hatred or fear they would lose their (stolen) homes.

The mini-Holocaust that followed the Holocaust itself is not well-known anymore, but it played an outsize role in the establishment of the state of Israel. It was the plight of Jews consigned to Displaced Persons camps in Europe that both moved and outraged President Harry Truman, who supported Jewish immigration to Palestine and, when the time came, the new state itself. Something had to be done for the Jews of Europe. They were still being murdered.

In the Polish city of Kielce, on July 4, 1946 -- more than a year after the end of the war -- rumors of a Jewish ritual murder triggered a pogrom in which 42 Jewish Holocaust survivors were killed. The Kielce murders were not, by any means, the sole example of why Jews could not "go home."(continued)

[Frank_2001]

In addition, I don’t like his slap at the USA as being at the time in the “grip of feverish anti-Communism”- We were “feverish” because we were SERIOUSLY INFECTED WITH COMMUNISTS!!!

[Zionist Conspirator]

Pigs are flying!

[MEG33]

AMEN

[Borges]

Truman was a fairly patriotic Democrat wasn’t he?

[lentulusgracchus]

The problem is that her father was from a Lebanon still under the strong influence of the Ottoman Empire .....

So were the Moslems I've read about and seen documentary reports about, who moved to Iowa 100 years ago -- no Salafists there. So what up? What's with Helen Thomas's newfound (she wouldn't have said stuff like this 30, 40 years ago) objurgations against Israeli Jews? There is some sort of DC Zeitgeist that accounts for this outburst, not her long-ago roots. You don't hear George Mitchell saying stuff like this.

[muawiyah]

You are wrong about what Helen was saying 30 or 40 years ago. This business of complaining about the Jews in Israel is not particularly new. I've heard ME folks ~ Moslems, Orthodox, Maronite, Arabic speaking, Farsi speaking, Turkish speaking, and so on kvetching about what was going on in Israel for a very, very long time.

It's what they do!

Lord Rotschild bought the Golan Heights in 1891. That's 120 years ago!

[Grzegorz 246]

“Well, I don’t know about “everywhere else,” but after World War II, many Jews did attempt to “go home” to Poland. This resulted in the murder of about 1,500 of them — killed not by Nazis but by Poles, either out of sheer ethnic hatred or fear they would lose their (stolen) homes.”

Except the Kielce “pogrom”, which was carried out by security formations of the communist government (a fact, not theory) to cover up totally falsified elections, there weren’t any ethnic cleansing of Jews in post-war Poland and the idea that Poles made money on Holocaust, which he is clearly promoting, is disgusting and about as accurate as 9/11 conspiracy theories. This fool doesn’t mind to insult the whole nation just to attract more attention to his crappy piece of text.

[dfwgator]

And it was Gomulka and his Soviet Commie stooges that in 1968, forced most of the remaining Jews out of Poland.

[Grzegorz 246]

“he nailed it.”

What ? He is using anti-Semitism as the offensive weapon, not a defensive one in the same way the left is using “racism”, “homophobia”, “global warming deny” and other nonsense against whoever they want. It's the same methodology, forget for a while that this is about Jews, imagine that this is... let's say about Mongols, you would clearly notice that then.

[Deb]

The reality of people on the Left, like Cohen, is they get mad at their own and even sometimes take them to task, but then all is forgiven. They'll start talking about Helen's "body of work" and "the incredible advances she made for women".

When they judge an "infraction" on the Right, its never forgiven. Its compounded and added to the list of grievances they trot out whenever they need to condemn conservatives or Republicans.

"Sure, Bill Clinton completely defiled the Oval Office and lied to the American people, caused his cabinet to lie and then lied to a federal court judge, but we forgive him. The economy's great and everyone lies about sex. But Valerie Plame says George Bush, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove and Donald Rumsfeld outted her...THEY MUST GO!!!!!"

[muawiyah]

Valerie Plame is now a joke ~ Helen Thomas, though, is going to be remembered for having suggested sending the Jews home to Germany!

That sort of thing simply cannot be forgotten.

[Grzegorz 246]

“And it was Gomulka and his Soviet Commie stooges that in 1968, forced most of the remaining Jews out of Poland.”

This is actually very interesting. A deportation of thousands of people based on their ethnicity in the middle of Europe in the 2nd half of the 20th century... something totally shocking, yet hardly anyone outside of Poland heard about It. But you hear again and again about Jedwabne where “the Poles” supposedly burnt 1600 Jews (in a 150m^2 barn, unusual achievement, isn't it?) and now “mini-Holocaust” bullshi*ts... Why ? Maybe because unlike in case of those two, here one can't use It to push any financial or political agenda ? It can't be blamed again on “the Poles” as fortunately the events were documented well enough, so there's no doubt that a gigantic majority of Poles in worst cases didn't care about the deportation.

[Deb]

Maybe not forgotten, but Helen will be forgiven. There are lots of media flaks who are "really sad" and "can sympathize" with Helen, after all, "would you want things your 89 year old grandmother said, repeated in the press?"

On the other hand, there's a movie coming out in a few weeks ("Fair Game") about the Valerie Plame "scandal" in an attempt to keep it alive and help her lawsuits against the Bush administration.

But I just picked a typical Democrat-created, non-story in the "Plame Affair" to illustrate how people like Cohen treat his own versus the "other side".