Firstly, do you apologize for calling me a liar? I’ve yet to hear it although I quoted you to your face when you accused me of telling lies.
I have some sympathy for the Indians (as I like to call them) but they often gave as good as they got. Do you visit America? The Northeast is littered with burial grounds due to Indian massacres and many of the ancient homes around places like Deerfield and Salem have prototypical “panic rooms” where women and children would hide during raids. And don’t believe every story you read of disease-infected blankets. I have tremendous sympathy for the troopers sent out West to fight the Indians - many untrained immigrants led by battle-hardened Civil War generals who were bewildered by their unruly soldiers and who often had no appetite to shove Indians around - although they were ordered to do so from Washington.
I believe there was plenty of British anti-semitism behind Jewish immigration to the Holy Land, despite (or because of) the excesses of the Irgun and Stern gang. I consider myself a proud Zionist and will always support the only democracy in that crazy region. I assume from your comments that you “dislike” Israel?
No, Leo Frank was murdered here in the good ole US of A. He has been memorialized in books, plays and films. It was a shameful act but I do not blame the American people for that terrible crime. I blame the murderer and the times he lived in for what happened. But at least I acknowledge the crime. You are completely silent on the subject of English cruelty toward Jews during the Middle Ages and into Shakespeare’s time.
P.S.: You guys should have taken in Texas when they asked (if they, in fact, did ask). You would then know how to protect yourself against marauding looters in the high streets of beautiful England.
1—I dont apologise because I didnt actually call you a liar. I accused you of exaggeration and flawed extrapolation, thats different from saying you lied.
2—Oh, I know the Indians were never the passive people modern myth portrays. I was simply asking your remarks on MD, given 150 years or so of hindsight.
And I also know the blankets myth is just that: remember British America 1607-1775 is also blamed for that too.
3—No, there was not. There was great sympathy amongst Britons in 1945 to the Jews (how couldnt there be), the policy was one of Britain trying to keep Arabs happy whilst under immense pressure from the US, Jewish groups and the world. In a colony we’d only had since 1917.
The policy may have been wrong, but the notion by some now that it was deliberately antisemitic is nonsense.
And remember just who gave the world the Balfour Declaration....was it you, the French, the Germans?.....nope.
4—’I assume from your comments that you “dislike” Israel?’
How can you assume that?. I have said nothing on Israel bar that I dont agree with all their policies, just as almost all people dont agree with the policies of their own nation and allies.
Good god woman, are you actually saying that if I dont support Israel 100% all the time, I therefore dont like Israel?.
Lunacy.
And actually making my earlier ‘blind patriot’ point for me.
5—I am not been silent. I am happy to discuss the history of the Jews in England (at this juncture, I will point out there is no history of anti-semitism in Scotland, Wales and Ireland, south or north). Be it 1290, Cromwell and the Jewish return, Judaism in British politics.....
My reference to Frank was a point to counter the self-satisfied attitude I do see here and in America that anti-semitism is an affliction of Europeans. Just to remind that Americans can be vile and bigoted to Jews as well.
I will defend my English friends by pointing out that the history of antisemitism in England is much, much less than the appalling anti-semitism that Europe inflicted on the Jewish people.
Remember, many of Britain’s most established companies, beloved entertainers, revered politicians etc have been Jewish. So little is antisemitism an issue in this country that to this day most are unaware of the Jewish origins of a celebrity or company, and more importantly, no one cares.
Just as Leo Frank should never be allowed to suggest Americans are anti-semitic, some instances of history should never cloud the clear fact that the English and British people have never been remotely an anti-semitic people and in fact have rejected the minority who were/are.
And the fact that a minority of Britons, on the left, are vocal in their dislike of Israel shouldnt cloud that fact either.
p.s I am Scottish, not English. The name’s a clue, sweetie.