The real lobby and its acolytes

Joshua

Nazis dining with Nazis.

Truthtriumphs

This is 1930s Germany, no less.
Added to that, there is no real Jewish leadership in this country to counter the lies and distortions, especially in the universities, where the Arab/Muslim lobby is so assiduous and effective in spreading the lies about Israel, ably aided and abetted by the fascists on the hard, and not so hard Left.
It is already 5to12, so when will the Jewish leadership wake up?

Disturbed

Uh.....know WHAT exactly?.......do you really think that OTHER Lobby doesn't do "awareness" and to a MUCH higher level?!...How about a nice piece about AIPAC's very own Steven Rosen....your naivety is reaching new levels Mel...

Neil Turner

Great expose Melanie. Well done.

I often think why it is that the media distorts the truth about Israel

I wonder how much else is going on without our knowledge, and behind the scenes. For example, the close relationship between Chris Gunnis of UNWRA and the BBC's Jeremy Bowen, which was "outed" a couple of weeks ago

It's encouraging though, that the Dan Hannan case (1M hits on Youtube) shows how the mainstream media is now being circumvented by those with a mind to know the truth

Keep up the great work Melanie

Suffolkbor

Was Jeremy Bowen there ?
Surely he should have been allocated one of the best tables and his own personal server to attend his every need .

It,s a shame "Tibbles" Galloway and his buddy girl Ridley could not have attended as bona fide guests but I expect that they are still too "Stoned " at the moment .

EDDIE

What is it about Israel that she so ignores the Media? Is it simply arrogance? Or is it that their government thinks that the cause is so just that the Almighty will assure them victory. There is no doubt that you can easily play with people’s minds. You can make them believe anything and even do anything provided you know how it is done. Israel is paying a very high price for this lack of effort. She needs a television entity to compete with El Jezeera and a whole range of other media initiatives. However good, Melanie Phillips is just not enough.

J. Isaacs

Are there others on the guest list whose names should be published?

Lynne T

Here's a sample of Nashashibi's handiwork. http://www.doublestandards.org/nashashibi1.html

Note how he attempts to hold out that Israel's construction of the security barrier had nought to do with reducing suicide-terror attacks, ignoring altogether that construction commenced well after Arafat baffled the rest of the world, Saudi Arabian included, by walking away from the Clinton brokered deal offered by Ehud Barak.

Jim Carr

It's sickening to behold the slavish sycophancy of the British media to this pressure group.
Well it's time to set up an Israel Media Watch.
Fight fire with fire.

Lynne T

Jill:

There are a number of media watch organizations -- CAMERA, Honest Reporting are two. The thing about pressure groups is that using them is seen as OK for just about everyone except Jews and Israel.

Gordon Neil

Thank you for this. Any chance of a little investigative work on who actually funds and controls, as opposed to fronts, this obviously extensive and well connected media pressure outfit. This looks professionally put together and very well sourced. Who owns it, who finances it , how is it able to gain access to senior editorial and management levels across the MSM ? The AMW are obviously engaged in a wide range of influencing strategies and activities and appear to have extensive access to 'middle east information sources' . I wonder why our fearless MSM have not bothered to let we the paying public know about the AMW or how much they 'admire' and 'benefit' from their input ? And just how and too what effect it shapes or determines what they in turn choose to tell us ?

Carl

The irony is exquisite. You would have to have a heart of stone not to laugh at this article.

Nicole S

'What is it about Israel that she so ignores the Media?' Eddie is right. Israel seems not to have noticed how goodwill towards it, especially on the left, ran out years ago. It badly need to step up its PR game to counter Hamas propaganda, not to mention Arab oil and funds.

just Louise

So now we know, indeed.
How is it that the BBC gets away with this partisan pandering when its Charter obligates it to be neutral?
Seriously, the time is long overdue for some shrill whistle-blowing.
Mass civil disobedience, anybody? Refusal to pay the licence fee and all that?
I would suggest chaining ourselves to some Westminster railings Emmeline Pankhurst-style to draw attention to the cause but we don't want to end up like Starbucks windows, do we.
Whatever happened to MP Michael Fabricant's efforts to have BBC bias condemned by Parliament - anybody know?

Gautam

Is Israel losing the propaganda war? Does seem so. How important is it for Israel to win this war? Not very.

Jacqueline

I find the fact that the media is so pro Arab and anti Israel totaly incomprehensible. What is it they so love about that gang of killers, liars and fakers leading so called Palestine? The problem is where will it lead the world to.

Teresa

Here's some other facts for you to ponder over "Mel";

- The fact that Israel is enforcing collective punishment on Gaza and has maintained a complete siege of the territory for 2 years
- The fact that the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel was on the condition that Rocket attacks into Israel stopped AND Israel lifted the blockade. Israel never honoured it's commitment end of the bargain. Not only that but it was Israel that carried out a raid into Gaza in November long before Hamas resumed rocket attacks. Even the US network CNN broadcast this fact.
- The fact that Israeli Arabs can not live in Settlements despite being Citizens of Israel, apparently.
- The fact that Israel is the only country in the Middle East to actually possess weapons of mass destruction

Linda Smith

Teresa: just as well "Israel is the only country in the Middle East to actually possess weapons of mass destruction" because it knows, as you do not, that it faces an existential threat from Islamists, including your friends Hamas, Iran's proxy.

Terry

I'm surprised and disappointed about Peter Oborne - I thought from some of his books he was sensible.

YA

Welcome to the wonderful world of UK's 24/7 news, where

..democratically elected freedom fighters are united with impoverished people,

..victims of disproportionate acitons are helped by the international community,

..legitimate right to resist immoral, illegal and brutal occupation by all means is supported by justice-loving states,

..defamation of people's believes is forbidden,

..apartheid regimes are boycotted, their war crimes and illegal use of weapons are condemned,

..stop-the-war movements demand changing dangerous foreign policy, that might bring insecurity to the streets of our cities,

..sensitivites, traditions, culture and religious authorities are respected,

..community cohesion is kept intact and radicalization is prevented by addressing all issues in communities,

..heavy-handed actions by police against protesters are investigated,

..greedy, corrupt, media-controlling foreign lobby is confronted,

..racial discrimination of ethnic minorities is monitored,

..and human rights of innocent people are fully respected..

It's English stupid.
No translation needed.

steve bronfman

teresa, that's a very stupid comment almost all Muslim regimes maintain large quantities of chemical and biological weapons ( used by Iraq on Iran) and the missiles to deploy them. Many regimes including Syria, iran, Iraq and libya have nuclear programs. Your statement is pure ignorance or stupidity.

Derek BLADES

Teresa March 27
Thank you for bringing a breath of fresh air into the fetid swamp of vicious anti-Palestine hatred generated by "Mel's" blog. Your lucid presentation of some of the facts behind Israel's latest war on her neighbours will generate a huge outpouring of semi-literate (at best) vituperation and school-yard insults. Don't let that put you off making further contributions and, especially, don't answer them directly. Leave them to stand condemned by their own ignorance and paranoia.

gary

Teresa

It's so nice to know that some people still have unquestioning faith in the tales the news decides you should believe. There's really no need to wonder whether there's more to it than that. Do you also unquestioningly believe the weather report and the astrology predictions? They're in the same news.

solemnman

The time has come for Israel to doff it's halo and get down to the nasty bussiness of exposing the ugly truth about its enemies.As Churchill said "they are either at your feet or at your throat" .It's time they were made to visit Israel's extremities.Israel need not resort to lying.THE TRUTH COULD NOT BE BLACKER! ! !

Mr Melrose

Anyone else sick of anyone and everyone being labled a Nazi?

Surely it would be far more simple to just put NN (Non Nazi)after a persons name, and it would save a lot of time.

I have been keeping a careful record of people being lablesd as Nazi on here and so far it is 1,623,452 Nazis to 32 Non Nazis.

PS Are there grades of Nazis? eg The bloke who gives you a parking ticket for being 2 minuits over - obviously a Nazi - but probably not as bad as someone who indulges in mass genocidal murder.

PPS What is a Nazi? - would it be useful to have a definition.

Linda Smith

Derek Blades posted: "...a huge outpouring of semi-literate (at best) vituperation and school-yard insults.... don't answer them directly"

Derek Blades does not answer me directly, because he cannot do so without exposing his irrational bigotry. Consequently I am still waiting for a response to my comment to him many threads back:

"Derek Blades: 5 Feb. 10:08 You wrote: I start from a different point - believing that almost all people are good at heart and that if we treat them fairly we will receive the same treatment in return."

I was born 4 years after the Holocaust ended.
Please explain the Holocaust in the context of your statement above."

Of course, Hamas is not interested in being treated "fairly", nor does it treat non-Islamists "fairly" Hamas, Iran's proxy, is an Islamo fascist organisation, sworn to killing Jews. (no word yet on the fate of the Christians) Hamas's raison d'etre is not to create a Palestinian State, hence no reference to Palestine in it's name, but to create a worldwide Ummah.

Derek Blades does not think he will be the last to be eaten by the crocodile. Derek Blades is so irrational, he refuses to acknowledge the existence of the crocodile. In the manner of a Holocaust Denier, Derek Blades is obliged to deny the existence of Islamo fascism in order to pursue his personal agenda of Israel/Jew Bashing..

Derek Blades is certainly irrational in his assertion that I am semi-literate.

Linda Smith

Doubtless, if Derek Blades deigns to respond to my previous comment, it will be only to apologise for insulting me by asserting that I am semi-literate.

He will not respond to any of my points made re the topic of Melanie Phillips's blog because, as I have said, he cannot without exposing his irrational bigotry.

phil

Hope they all enjoyed Jenny,s version of "galloway" sung to the tune of amarillo and understood the comedian derek blade,s joke, now that he is back from his cruise , mr melrose ,was doing a fine job on the door counting nazis and a fine evening of lying and fawning was enjoyed by all .sadly the truth died in the lobby .

Indigo121

To Mr Melrose:

While the labeling of 'Nazi' indeed might be a little liberal here, I would say that a Nazi is anyone who deliberately betrays their journalistic integrity for an agenda of bashing and demonising Israel no matter what.

Singling out Israel, giving out-of-context half-facts, sensationalist headlines, describing testimony as "evidence", and in general feeding a newspaper public (at least 2 of these come to mind in Britain) a constant brainwash because they want and expect it, despite the wrongness of it all.

Embracing brazen lies against Israel for rating is racist and inciting to violence, and is Nazi.

phil

jenny,s song for anyone that hasnt seen it

When the day is dawning
On a Middle Eastern morning
Oh, how I long to be there
Saluting Saddam’s ‘indefatigability‘, yeah

I’m with Yvonne Ridley
And a few others like that.
They think my leotard looks pretty
And Gaza’s where we’re headed at.

Chorus :
Is this this the way to Hamastillo?
I’m full hot air, like a dildo
Dreaming dreams of Hamastillo
Where sweet jihadists wait for me.

Show me the way to Hamastillo
We can’t fit all this in the tunnerillo
Get the crocodile tears ready to go
And tell the jihadists to wait for me.

Qassam, fire, fire - bang, bang.
Qassam, fire, fire - bang, bang.
Qassam, fire, fire - bang, bang.
And mainstream media look away.

Verse:
There’s a terrorist tunnelling,
Just look at the arms they‘re smuggling.
Oh how they love the shariah,
And the grovelling Western media.

Just beyond the highway,
There’s a terrorist campaign,
Just read Article 7 of the charter
And all will become plain.

Chorus :
Is this this the way to Hamastillo?
Was that a stone I saw someone just throw?
How much further do we have to go
To where the jihadists wait for me?

Show me the way to Hamastillo
Where the hell did Yvonne go?
Don’t leave me on my own, no.
And tell the jihadists to wait for me.

Qassam, fire, fire - bang, bang.
Qassam, fire, fire - bang, bang.
Qassam, fire, fire - bang, bang.
And mainstream media look away.

(repeat the line about Hamas’ Qassam rockets 6,000 times)

Si, N

Yes, 'so now we know'.

'[W]e know' for instance that there was absolutely no bias towards Palestinians in the recent Israeli massacre in Gaza. How do ‘we know’? ‘[W]e know’ because in 99.9% of all mainstream reporting zero attention was paid to the ongoing occupation of Palestinian land and the continuing ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from lands on which they have lived for centuries. Without such crucial context the oft cited ‘Hamas rockets’ fired at former Palestinians territories such as Sderot are made to appear like the product of an innate Arab animosity towards Jews. But ‘we know’ that’s not so – as latter-day Zionist Benny Morris said:

‘(t)he fear of territorial displacement and dispossession was to be the chief motor of Arab antagonism to Zionism'.

Morris was of course entirely correct and was echoing David Ben Gurion’s candid acknowledgement:

’If I were an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel… We have taken their country. Sure, God promised it to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We come from Israel, it is true, but 2,000 years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country’.

It’s heartening to read such stuff from honest Zionists – it throws into sharp relief the utter guff that Melanie Phillips spews out.

And as for ‘Arab antagonism’, again, Ben Gurion got it right:

‘the fighting is only one aspect of the conflict, which is in its essence a political one. And politically we are the aggressors and they (Palestinians) defend themselves.’

So ‘we know’ what one of the founding fathers of Israel thought. But from what in recent times did Palestinians need to defend themselves? Apart that is from the 60+ year Israeli project of ethnically cleansing Palestinians from the land on which they have lived for generations and Israel’s ongoing violent occupation of Palestinian lands – remember, Ehud Olmert acknowledged the need to:

‘withdraw from almost all the territories, if not all the territories. We will leave a percentage of these territories in our hands, but will have to give the Palestinians a similar percentage, because without that there will be no peace."

Thus, the democratically elected government imprisoned in Gaza (those not illegally imprisoned in Israeli jails) are duty bound to defend themselves and their people against the crushing siege imposed by the Israelis in collusion with Egypt.

And let’s not forget the ‘rockets’ Israel fired into Gaza during the period of the much trumpeted 6,000 ‘Hamas rockets’; Israel fired 14,000+ military grade high explosive into Gaza. ‘[W]e know’ for sure that 99.9% of mainstream reporting completely failed to note that aggression. I’d say that a media with a supposed ‘Arab bias’ is failing roundly when such facts are wholly overlooked. In fact the outright failure of the media to report the Palestinian narrative (the truth) effectively renders reporting partial in favour of Israel.

Get real

Leslie

I doubt that people who rail on about posters'"anti-Palestine hatred" give a fig about Palestinians.
Would they do anything to help the lives of Palestinians if there was no Israel for them to hate?

Si, N

Leslie, on what do you base your assumption that people don't 'give a fig about Palestinians'?

Israel is there, though it will never be in peace until it deigns to 'give a fig about Palestinians'.

I suggest, if you 'give a fig' about Israel, you start taking people at their word. There is on the table an Arab Peace Initiative - Hamas are agreeable to the Peace Initiative - it's worth noting, Hamas carefully observed the 2008 ceasefire - even in the face of Israel's ever tightening strangulation of Gaza Hamas' word was good - the tabled Peace Initiative guarantees Israel's security within the Pre '67 borders. Israel's increased activities in the occupied territories tells us all we need to know about how little of 'a fig' it gives about ANY Peace Initiative. Eretz Israel is the only ‘fig’ that matters. Israel may even eventually have the whole ‘fig’; but it will never have peace.

From your perspective, can you not see how utterly tragic that would be for Israelis? Have you ever really put any proper thought into the matter?

Si, N

'phil' points again to silly jill's ditty: '(repeat the line about Hamas’ Qassam rockets 6,000 times)'.

Can we have a descant going: 'disregard the 14,000 missiles Israel fired into Gaza in the same period'.

Also, next time the ridiculous 'phil' appears on this blog wringing his hands and bleating about being a seeker of dialogue and peace, please direct him back to his outlandish and immature taunts.

Ref: March 28th, 2009 12:03pm

gus3

"You know you're near the target when you start taking flak."

Judging by the comments, Ms Phillips must be very near the target, indeed.

Valerie

Si N, You may want to run those statements from Israeli leaders by CAMERA and see if there even real-There have been many so called "quotes" by Israeli's that have been planted by the opposition.

Yisrael Medad, Shiloh, Israel

Typo: transmitting in first paragraph

Derek BLADES

Being realistic, Hamas poses no real threat to the existence of Israel. The real "existential" threat to Israel is created by Israel itself. Illegal settlements, destruction of Arab homes in East Jerusalem, imprisonment without fair trial of hundreds of Palestinian men, assassination of democratically elected Arab politicians and the bloody wars against the civilian populations of Lebanon and Gaza are turning Israel into a pariah state on a par with apartheid South Africa. Many thinking people – perhaps a majority - in the Western world are questioning whether Israel is worth saving. That is the real danger that Israel faces. It is not too late to turn things around by a return to the Oslo peace process but time is running out for Israel and her true supporters (among whom I count myself). There are none so blind as will not see and, unfortunately, Ms Phillips’ website show that there are many of them still round.

EDDIE

It is instructive to note that there are people who read Melanie’s blog who are virulently anti Israel, I don’t suppose it will do them much good because their minds are closed to reasoned arguments. I Would not bother to look at the thousands of anti Israel blogs on the web. Most of them are absolutely vile and advocate genocide. The only thing these people are good at is hate and murder. No Israeli government would dream of promoting such foul ideas about any group of people..

Linda Smith

Si,N Hamas refuses to recognise Israel as a Sovereign State. It has offered a TEMPORARY truce (in order to regroup and re-arm. Hamas's Charter is totally based on religious Islamist ideology, it's stated main objective is murder of the Jews. Go and read it.

All the rest is sophistry

Get real yourself

Linda Smith

Si'N if you want to quote Benny Morris, here is a useful extract on Benny Morris from Wikipedia:

"Morris calls the Israel-Palestinian conflict a facet of a global clash of civilizations between Islamic fundamentalism and the Western World, saying that "There is a deep problem in Islam. It's a world whose values are different. A world in which human life doesn't have the same value as it does in the West, in which freedom, democracy, openness and creativity are alien.[2] He also says "Revenge plays a central part in the Arab tribal culture. Therefore, the people we are fighting and the society that sends them have no moral inhibitions."[2]

When a Haaretz interviewer called the 1948 Palestinian exodus "ethnic cleansing," Morris responded that "[t]here are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing. I know that this term is completely negative in the discourse of the 21st century, but when the choice is between ethnic cleansing and genocide—the annihilation of your people—I prefer ethnic cleansing."[2]

Morris has also written in the Irish Times in February 21, 2008, that "There was no Zionist 'plan' or blanket policy of evicting the Arab population, or of 'ethnic cleansing'" and that "the demonisation of Israel is largely based on lies -- much as the demonisation of the Jews during the past 2,000 years has been based on lies. And there is a connection between the two."[28] Morris has criticized Ben-Gurion for not carrying out such a plan, saying "In the end, he faltered... If he had carried out a full expulsion - rather than a partial one - he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations."[2]

Hope you find that useful Zi'N. Straight from the mouth of an Israeli who doesn't want to be murdered by your Islamist friends, Hamas.

Lizzy

Any journalist worth his or her salt should view with scepticism any information laid out for them on a platter. An old-fashioned idea, I know. The trouble is, now, mainstream media outlets do not encourage investigation. Apart from the knee-jerk leftist agenda, it takes too long and costs too much money while you wait for results, they reckon. Easier to get most of the information ready-packaged to feed the 24/7 news monster.

Lizzy

Any journalist worth his or her salt should know to view with scepticism any information laid out for them on a platter. An old-fashioned idea, I know. These days, the set left wing narrative makes it easier to report news, while mainstream media also considers real investigation too costly and time-consuming. So much easier to feed the 24/7 news monster with pre-packaged information.

Merlyn

well done Melanie, yet again. I once read on little green footballs that AP was 50% financed by Arab money, with 50% Arab reporters thereby having a strong influence just by close proximity.
By the way, sorry to change the subject, but does anyone know how Lord Ahmed managed to get out of jail after having served so little of his prison sentence?

Joseph McNulty

We live in an age of moral inversion in so many respects. Who would have thought that on two generation after World War II, antisemitism, suitably disguised (although not inpenatrably) would be with us again and respectable. Israel stands alone, and I fear that Obama will show us that even the United States can no longer be counted upon. Truman and Nixon are well and truly dead.

israel

Ah yes, LGF, worldnetdaily, and fauxnews. Home of the tinfoil hat wearing birthers, sons and daughters of joe mccarthy and deranged stalker irish "news" hosts. Just the people to use as an example of reliable rational news reporting about all the things most of the posters rant about on this site.

Linda Smith

Derek Blades you posted "Many thinking people - perhaps a majority - in the Western world are questioning whether Israel is woth saviing"

Can you cite the survey on which you based your opinion?

Thought not.

Pray tell us, just how is this majority of thinking people in the Western world, who populate your imagination, going to "save" Israel? In the same way as they saved 6 million Jews from the Holocaust perchance?

Seems the sun went to your head on your little seaside jaunt.

yochanan ben avrohom

between 2005 and 2009 there was no Israeli in gaza, not one inch was occupied. yet the arabs shot 6,000 + missles into Israel from gaza, frankly the british and world media did not give a flying fig about it.
dead jews have never mattered to the anti semitic left.

YA

google UK news - contaminated.

Radical bishop quits early for new mission

(that is about guy who noticed no go areas)

what else proof is needed?

Carrington Malin

"Well now Arab Media Watch lifts a curtain to show us the real lobby at work" - what utter rubbish! Arab Media Watch has hardly been operating undercover and with regards to its annual fund-raiser, it published a full report on last year's fund-raising event on its website if you had taken the trouble to look. As a non-profit lobby group Arab Media Watch is abundantly clear on its purpose of helping to ensure objective British coverage of Arab issues and so journalists are forewarned that the group acts on behalf of certain interests. It's very much to AMW's credit that it does state its interests clearly and publishes so much information on its activities (there are many lobbyists who do not). Surely, any journalist worth their salt knows in what context to accept the group's information, recommendations or assistance? If you're looking for Arab conspiracies to uncover, I think you'll have to start digging a little deeper.

Pip

So, yesterdays news was that Obama (and Ellison) are planning for more Muslims in his administration.

What are your thoughts on this Melanie. I know what mine are, fear and anxiety that O is turning out to be everything I thought he would be (and more)...eeek!

30 years from now, I suppose we won't even have a platform to air our concerns and opinions, and I'll be, from head to foot, in a burka!

Truthtriumphs

Carrington Malin.
So, accoprding to you, AMW is utterly transparent, pure and honest.
Would that be in line with the recent revelations about Muslim/Islamic charities raising money for "humanitarian causes" and enjoying tax relief, thanks to our gullible Charity Commission.
The most recent case reported is the Bangladeshi from Stockport, whose charity was found to be supporting, inter alia, terrorist insurgents helping to blow up our troops?
Get real!.

Miranda Rose Smith

There's an old saying. Be careful what you ask for. You might get it. These journalists who co-operate with the AMW in reversing victim and victimiser to present Israel as the regional aggressor and the Palestinians as their victims may ultimately, G-d forbid, get what they want: Israel wiped off the map. However, then the Islamofascists will be free to concentrate on Europe and these journalists will all get what's coming to them and woe unto those who call evil good and good evil.

benjamin

I recognise the massive influence of Jewish thought and culture on Western civilisation. I prefer Jewish culture, thought to Moslem culture & thought. However, in a conflict like this there are inevitably 2 sides - 2 narratives - 2 truths - 2 sets of perceptions that are mutually antagonistic. Melanie Phillips and supporters don't recognise any Palestinian narrative, there is no attempt to see their side of the story (Ben Gurion was more lucid than Ms Phillips & Co). That's why these discussions are so sterile and non-productive.
For me, it seems reasonable that a group of people should set up an organisation to promote the Palestinian point of view - why is this so terrible? Its called lobbying - it's part of the Western political process. Or are you against all organisations that promote a particular cause (e.g. Greenpeace; pro-Tibet lobbies etc.) Should they all be banned?
Israelis also promote myths about its foundation "A land without people for a people without land" - all peoples do this, its human.
What Ms Phillips and supporters never does is propose POLITICAL solutions to the problem. Why not? Because they know that any solution, barring expulsion of Arabs from Palestine, will involve renouncing the dream of Eretz Israel, and they are not ready for that yet.

phil

Si, N so long as I can keep you busy whingeing about me ,I am stopping your flow of garbage and lies -,you are so blinded by hate that you cannot even read properly -it was Jenny,s wonderful song not Jills,and you need to read what Benny Morris really said too.You and your kind are one of the main destroyers of the path to peace ,at least I try .you so far NEVER HAVE .

Merlyn

In the Sunday Times today- and nowhere else-
ISRAEL used unmanned drones to attack secret Iranian convoys in Sudan that were trying to smuggle rockets into Gaza. The missiles have the range to strike Tel Aviv and Israel’s nuclear reactor at Dimona, defence sources said.

The unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) attacked two convoys, killing at least 50 smugglers and their Iranian escorts. All the lorries carrying the long-range rockets were destroyed. Had the rockets been delivered to Hamas, the militant Islamic group that controls Gaza, they would have dramatically raised the stakes in the conflict, enabling Palestinians to wreak terror on Tel Aviv.
Also 23/10/08, in Israeli news but nowhere else, Iranians planned to detonate a radioactive "dirty bomb" off Israel's coast on Yom Kippur. This was to be the long-anticipated Iranian attack on Israel. Not the expected rocket attacks (which could be intercepted by the Israelis) but an even more deadly and unexpected attack by sea.. Unfortunately for the Islamic plotters, Somali pirates hijacked their ship......and died from exposure to the contents.
These are the sorts of things that are not being aired on the mass media as they should be.

Merlyn

Benjamin, we have the whole world promoting the Palestinian point of view loudly, but there is nowhere in the media outside of Israel that it gets its point of view across, and there endless lies printed as headlines demonising the Jews that do not get corrected in the public's mind. Antisemitism is higher than at any time since before the last world war.
People when they have economic downturns turn to war, the next one could be nuclear. We in the West are being systematically Islamised as part of a Jihad [you really do need to check out www.thereligionofpeace.com....This is why Melanie's blog is VITAL...

Augustus

It is going to be nigh impossible for Obama, or anyone else to broker a peace agreement for the Arab/Israeli conflict, and certainly more difficult than it was in say 2000. Leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad won't compromise on Israel becoming a majority Arab state. Iran wants to influence whatever talks between Israel and neighbouring countries are put in motion, and the more moderate leaders are afraid of igniting a civil war if they try to cajole Hamas into moderation. And as for Israel, already a small country, even if it were to compromise as to its size, it cannot be expected to compromise on its very being, no matter how 'invaluable' the work of AMW or any other media voices may be.

Carrington Malin

Truthtriumphs -- It's your choice of words not mine. I am not in a position to vouch for everything that AMW says or does. My point was that AMW is open about what cause it supports. Therefore those dealing with AMW know in advance to expect a pro-Arab opinion and I'm sure most BBC or Reuters journalists are equipped to deal appropriately with the information they receive.

stanley Jerusalem

benjamin
March 29th, 2009 12:19pm
"For me, it seems reasonable that a group of people should set up an organisation to promote the Palestinian point of view"
I see, you take the vanquished survivors of a war, give them an identity label and a cloak of apparent respectability irrespective of their true identities and the nature of their reason for conflict and then you burden the rest of Mankind by appealing to their consciences despite our vanquished survivors having been the aggressors in the first place. Then you expect us to say that we must do all in our power to give these people succour and understanding.To start with, let's vilify their victors and claim an identity for them to which they had never previously aspired and to which they had no right nor claim. By now you are so swept up in your crusade for truth and justice nothing will stop your head-on rush for self-justification on their behalf. By now the aggressor har become the poor victim and the victorious victim the cruel aggressor. So your inverted world progresses while planes are hijacked, athletes murdered, diplomats assassinated and communal centres vaguely associated with the object of your bile are blown up by 'brave' suicide bombers.'
You are now so brainwashed by your own propaganda that you wouldn't recognise the truth if it punched you on the nose.So, in your own words:-
"it seems reasonable that a group of people should set up an organisation to promote the Palestinian point of view - why is this so terrible?"

Linda Smith

Benjamin posted "What Ms Phillips and supporters never does is propose POLITICAL solutions to the problem."

If the Arabs want peace with Israel, its up to the Arabs to demonstrate it. Until such time, Israel has a right to protect itself from those who threaten its existence and the safety of its citizens. After World War II Germany was occupied for years.

Resolution 242, so beloved of critics of Israel, requires recognition of Israel before Israel vacates territories. Netanyahu has said he wants to build up the West Bank economically and give them internal autonomy. Ultimately, the Jewish settlements can be dismantled and Jews vacate the West Bank. Hamas, who the Gazans elected to represent them, say it will never recognise Israel. It's up to the "Palestinians" to decide if they want Hamas to represent them or if they want peace with Israel. The ball's in the "Palestinians" court.

Forget Right of Return for Arabs to Israel, it ain't going to happen, because that would mean the Jews were outnumbered. The "refugee" problem is solvable by recognizing that circa 800,000 Jewish refugees were created by the Arabs since 1948 via murder, persecution and asset stripping. The Jewish refugees have been resettled. It's up to the Arabs to resettle the Arab refugees. Fair swap.

Si, N

Valerie, let’s not be coy, if you can disprove any of those quotes please do - I’m all for getting the facts right. Thing is, such comments are commonplace – instances abound where Zionists have made clear their intentions and owned to the consequences for Arabs/Palestinians - it's just not mentioned much; certainly not in the mainstream media – odd that isn’t it for a supposedly ‘Arab biased’ press?

Here’s another bald declaration:

‘[w]e are the generation of colonizers, and without the steel helmet and the gun barrel we cannot plant a tree and build a home’. [Moshe Dayan, quoted in Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi, "Original Sins: Reflections on the History of Zionism and Israel"].

And, speaking more recently about the future of Arab-Israelis, here’s Tzipi Livni:

‘I will be able to approach the Palestinian residents of Israel, those whom we call Israeli Arabs, and tell them, “your national solution lies elsewhere”’.

And Avigdor Lieberman to Arab Deputies in a Knesset debate:

‘[y]ou are only temporarily here. One day we will take care of you’.

You see, entirely frank – an ‘Arab biased’ media would seize upon and really run with such material - but no such bias exists – the media almost always frames the conflict in terms favorable to Israel. Only when Israel so seriously and blatantly oversteps the mark, as it clearly did in the recent massacre in Gaza, only then does the media sit up and pay attention.

Linda Smith, your kind of intransigence is dangerous. Not only do you talk plain rubbish; you cite Benny Morris talking plain rubbish too. Morris you reckon called ‘the Israel-Palestinian conflict a facet of a global clash of civilizations between Islamic fundamentalism and the Western World’. How lame a theory is that? It holds water only if we pull-off one of those amazing feats of intellectual dishonesty (here you're at an advantage) and totally overlook Israel’s inability to make peace with the secular PLO. Still, overlooking such things is a bizarre habit of the ‘Arab biased’ media; really.

About the rest of the bilge you write - it seems like Morris you favour ethnic cleansing over genocide or something, either way; yuk!

Henry Sidgwick

yochanan ben avrohom

Lauding Israel for its "withdrawal" from Gaza is brazen, or possibly it simply reflects ignorance of the policy of the Israeli government, which is understandable since the government does not usually broadcast its intentions in its propaganda (what government does?).

I am sure you know of a senior advisor to both Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert by the name of Dov Weisglass, who is sometimes less discreet than is ideal:

"The significance of the disengagement plan is the freezing of the peace process. And when you freeze that process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, and you prevent a discussion on the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package called the Palestinian state, with all it entails, has been removed indefinitely from our agenda. All with the US presidential blessing..."

You will remember that the Palestinians had the effrontery to vote Hamas into government. The West froze all aid. Israel imposed a blockade. Here is Mr. Weisglass again:

"It's like an appointment with a dietician. The Palestinians will get a lot thinner, but won't die." (I still wonder how he knows Palestinians won't die.)

You see what he's doing there - a little joke about imposing collective punishment on the people because they voted for Hamas. (Democracy has to be very carefully managed, or you might not get the result you want. The US ought to know this by now, after so many decades of practice at managing other peoples' elections.)

You mention some numbers for Qassam rockets. I have some from an earlier period, but I think you will find the answer is the same pretty much whatever period you choose.

Between September 2005 and June 2006, Hamas launched about 1000 rockets. In the same period, the IDF and IAF launched 7000-9000 missiles, shells etc.

In the six months to June 2006, eighty Palestinians were killed. In the five years to June 2006, eight Israelis were killed.

Check it out for any period you wish. Of course, not all the Palestinian casualties are reported in the Israeli press or in the West. You will have to go to B'tselem, the Red Crescent, the UN and other such radical Islamist outfits.

I am beginning to suspect that the accusation of anti-Semitism has become the last refuge of those without a decent argument.

Yochanan

Some say anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism, and some say and feel, that it is. Let us be clear: denying the legitimacy of the Jewish State, and thereby threatening the welfare or survival of half the world's Jewish population, must be regarded as a particularly serious form of anti-Semitism. The problem is that the many 'anti-Semites' these days are Semites themselves, so the term needs to be more precise in its reference to the Jewish people: "Judeophobia"?

Maven

Palestinians broke the Gaza ceasefire 24th June 2008. Why all this medias lie about Israel breaking it in November. From the BBC 24th June 2008 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7470530.stm

"Rockets Violated Gaza ceasefire"

Israel chose not to respond but that does NOT mean it wasn't a ceasefire breach. How this has escaped everyon'es attention is beyond me.

Adam B.

Derek Blades, I thought you'd left this blog in a strop. Guess you can't help yourself.

Linda, our friend derek has worked for the Communist dictatorship of China, which imprisons and tortures political prosoners (when they're not mowing down unarmed students in Tianenmen Square). Why on earth would anyone, with an ounce of morality, listen to what he has to say about democratic Israel?

Mary P

You’re confident in al-Beebzera and al-Reuters can “deal appropriately with the information they receive” are you, Carrington Malin?

The reason why I’m not confident in either of those organisations deal appropriately with the information they receive is because the first is so ashamed of its own findings into its own news teams’ bias against Israel it refuses to publish The Balen Report and the second has had to admit to publishing inaccurate captions to photographs supplied by news sources sympathetic to jihadists when the Israelis have been engaging them.

Both those organisations have a track record of piling in against Israel knowing that the real damage a story can exert is when it breaks, not later on when the facts come out in full.

josé

i love specially this one
The ‘myth that Palestinian rockets are a grave threat to Israeli civilians’ heh

boxermk

It seems to me Melanie was responding to the utter twisted logic of people who hear nothing but Anti-Israel hatred and Arab Propaganda from most of the Western media, but are still convinced that there is a massive Zionist conspiracy pulling the strings behind the scenes. These peace-lovers can barely get the word "AIPAC" out of their mouths without spittle dripping out in rage, as if aging New York Jews who all voted for Obama is the only reason Israel still exists. Anybody who supports Israel is a Zionist (i.e: worse than a Nazi), or has been fooled by the vast, powerful "Israel-lobby."

The truth, like most everything about this particular situation, is completely inverted in the mainstream culture. It's wonderful being told that there "is two sides to every issue" by people who are convinced that Israel is a genocidal apartheid regime and have heard nothing but the Arab narrative.

Menachem Chazan

Both the Palestinians and the Israelis are the victims of tha agenda of the Fundamentalist Despots, of the the Middle East, who are imtent on perpetuating their regimes by eradicating Democracy from the Middle East. This is a war of Despots vs Democracy.

Truthtriumphs

Carrington Malin.
So its open about what cause it supports, is it?
How do you know?
How do you know whether ALL the monies it receives are spent on Arab propaganda only?
And even if it is, are you not aware of the propaganda based on outright lies and staged events designed and contrived to delegitimise Israel in the court of public opinion?
Good examples are:- the Mohammed al Dura case, in which a young Palestinian boy was apparently killed by Israeli sniper fire---- subsequently PROVED to have been staged and which fuelled the Intifada of 2000 in which some 1000 innocents lost their lives,
the Gaza "beach massacre", the Jenin "massacre", the Quana "massacre" in the 2006 Lebanon war, and so on and on.
Do not judge those with a different mindset by the values we hold dear in our western, liberal (in the true sense of the word) value system.

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

I am not sure that you read your quotes from Benny Morris as carefully as perhaps you should.

He said that Israel carried out an ethnic cleansing, and he justified it as preferable to the genocide of his own people. (The fact of ethnic cleansing is undeniable. The justification he provides his highly tendentious: the intelligence received by Ben Gurion about Palestinian mood and intentions, about the readiness of Hagana and of the terrorist groups, and about the military readiness and political intentions of the Arab nations all confirmed that the risk of an Israeli defeat were slight to non-existent.)

He bemoans the fact that Ben Gurion did not complete the ethnic cleansing, but left roughly 100000 Palestinians in their villages.

His comments to the Irish press are disingenuous. There may have been no single plan, but there was a succession of plans, drawn up and implemented by the smae group of politicians, military men, and "Orientalists".

His comments about the Arab Psyche are the usual embarassing colonialist racism that should be familiar to anyone from the UK.

Benny Morris is a skilful, if selective, historian, and a political thug. In his historical works he has tended to rely implicitly on Israeli archives and to ignore other sources.

Kurtlane

benjamin, "A land without people for a people without land" was a slogan invented by Christians and never embraced by Jews (and btw, there weren't any Israelis then). When Chaim Weizmann repeated in in his speech in 1914, he did it to mock those who might've thought this way. I know, I've read his speech.

In the same speech, he talked about the Jewish settlers "who have drenched the soil with their sweat and blood [and who] will defend our possessions, should anything happen in Palestine." What blood is he talking about? Jewish blood, same as now. And who is spilling it? Local Arabs, same as now.

No, there aren't two truths here, just like there weren't two truths in Nazi-Jewish "conflict." There is one truth and one lie.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: "His comments about the Arab Psyche are the usual embarassing colonialist racism that should be familiar to anyone from the UK."

What do you know about the Arab Psyche that Benny Morris does not? Do you think that Arabs have the same psyche as an Englishman?

As Truthtriumphs aptly put it "Do not judge those with a different mindset by the values we hold dear in our western, liberal (in the true sense of the word) value system."

Truthtriumphs

benjamin.
It is most gracious of you to "recognise the massive influence of Jewish thought and culture on western civilisation", but that is completely besides the point.
Your post betrays a lazy mindset based on recycled mantras instead of on knowledge and critical analysis of that knowledge.
The reason that such a post is dangerous, is that it misleads reasonable people with little knowledge of the history of the Middle East and the situation that obtains there now, into believing that the truth lies somewhere at a point equidistant between the two diverse opinions.
You say that there are inevitably 2 sides, 2 narratives and 2 truths, but in fact there can only be one truth.
You say that Israel promotes myths about its foundation, but its re-establishment was based on the fact that the Jews were the ONLY people in history to have had dominion and independent statehood in the Holy Land in the countries of Israel and Judah, for a period of 1,700 years.
That was before Islam was even thought of.
Indeed,in 1922, when all 51 members of the League of Nations ratified the Mandate for Palestine document, which allocated the WHOLE area west of the Jordan for the future Jewish state, it was in recognition of the historic ties of the Jewish people to the land, and called for its "close settlement" by Jews as of right.
It should also be emphasised that there has been a continuous Jewish presence in the land since the Roman expulsion, albeit a small one.
In the old city of Jerusalem, this was only interupted between 1948 and 1967, when the Jordanians expelled them and destroyed all 58 synagogues there.
The myths are all on the Palestinian side. We know that, because some Arab leaders admitted that the construction of a Palestinian identity was a necessary ploy to remove the Jews from their rightful homeland.
Have you never heard Arabs claiming that there is no difference between a Palestinian, Jordanian, Lebanese etc. and that they are all part of the Arab Umma?
The "moderate" Mahmoud Abbas only recently said that he refused to countenance the concept of a Jewish state in the region.
As to a political solution, why was no Palestinian state created between 1948 and 1967, in the "occupied territories" when they were controlled by Jordan and Egypt, or indeed ever?
You put the blame entirely on Israel, yet in 2000 in Camp David under Clinton's peace plan, Arafat was offered everything he asked for, but in the last moment he refused to make peace, instead demanding that Israel allow all the Palestinian "refugees" the right of return to Israel, in addition to the creation of a new Palestinian state.
Clinton, Denis Ross and the whole American team all blamed Arafat for his intransigence.
In fact, have you ever pondered why, after the six day war in 1967 when Moshe Dayan immediately offered every inch of the conquered territory back in return for peace, the message came back from Khartoum,
NO negotiation
NO recognition
NO peace. ??

The more honest brokers among the Palestinians have always maintained that peace in the region is contingent on the demise of the Jewish state.
i.e. the total surrender of one party to the dispute--- the Jewish one.

David Guy

There is so much that is suspicious in the wording that I wonder about the authenticity. Perhaps it was written by someone for whom English is a 2nd language,

The anonymous responses were so bland, so lacking in the style, verve, vocabulary we would expect from professional wordmeisters.

‘Thank you…We did enjoy it.’ - Financial Times / Reuters. Not, we enjoyed it?

‘I enjoyed the programme and the company of your nice guests.’ - BBC. NICE My 3rd grade English teacher would have rapped me over the knuckles for that one!

It was refreshing. – BBC A 'refreshing' fundraiser?

Thank you so much for your generous invitation…– BBC. Unless the 'fund raisers' paid the journos to come, why was this generous? Attending these events was part of their job, wasn't it?

Linda Smith

Si,N: You quote Benny Morris when it suits your agenda but reject quotes from him as "rubbish" when they don't. You're the one who is intellectually dishonest.

Of course Benny Morris prefers ethnic cleansing over genocide. Far better to deport people who threaten to kill him than to allow himself to be murdered.

The secular PLO did not want to make peace with Israel. What did Arafat do with all the EU money that's never been recovered? Where is it?

Freedom Now

If AIPAC could muster a wide field of journalists like this, then there would be enormous Israeli-bias in the media.

However, it is the Arab Media Watch that is able to do this. Thanks to the anti-Israeli bias in the media.

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

When you distort what is said and ignore the substantive points that are made, is it wilful on your part, a strategy for avoiding debate, or is it something else?

Truthtriumphs

Pete Hoskins.
What happened to my post of yesterday evening at about 11pm?
It took me a considerable amount of time to research it.
Could you please try to find it?
Thanks.

Truthtriumphs

SIN.
I know something about Benny Morris' writings---- he categorically denied that there was any plan in place to expel the Arabs in 1948, so please desist from writing complete untruths in order to further your own immutable agenda.

Henry Sidgwick

Yochanan

Again we ignore the behaviour of the Israeli state and revert to anti-Semitism. Has anti-Zionism among Arabs been transformed by impotent rage into rabid anti-Semitism? In many instances, undoubtedly. Is this expressed in blood-curling threats? Yes. Are they in a position to carry out these threats? No. What is the best way to defuse such unreasoning hatred? Create the space for moderation on both sides by serious negotiation. Lumping all Israel's enemies in with the most extreme of them is simply a pretext to prevent negotiating while completing the annexation.

Linda Smith

Can AMW explain the inconsistency between 'The "factual errors" it has tried to correct on its website AMW such as

The myth that Hamas is out to destroy Israel

and the fact reported by Spectator Poster Truthtriumphs on another thread:

"A prominent MAB member articulated on the BBC, (btw MAB is the British outpost of the Muslim Brotherhood), on the subject of a Palestinian state---- "we do not need another Islamic state, we just don't want a Jewish state in our midst."

Pete Hoskin

Truthtriumphs: I'll take a look now.

Pete Hoskin

Truthtriumphs: comment found and approved now. Apologies it didn't make it up in the first place.

Linda Smith

William Hazlitt:

You have ignored my substantive point to you on the Arab Psyche in your comment disparaging Benny Morris. You have not responded to my question: "What do you know about the Arab Psyche that Benny Morris does not? Do you think that Arabs have the same psyche as an Englishman?"

I do not avoid debate. You just don't like it when you are challened. The "something else" you refer to is called intellectual rigour.

Margaret

blah...blah...blah.... As usual venemous Melanie is given a platform at the Spectator to vent some of her poison. Why is it that the Zionist lobby is the only one that has the right to act and to interact with the media??? By the way I am sure that as usual my comment will not be published because it does not dance to the same tune Melanie dances to!!!!

Original Tony

Simply amazing...not a word from Si,N ; Blades, Carl, Laird or Hazlett on the earlier blog about Iranians wanting democracy, but put Israel back into the equation (vis-a-vis "accurate reporting") and all the cockroaches come out of their dark crevices!

Pure Jew haters!

Robin

Well, Margaret, it seems to me that (a) the venom comes from you "Zionist lobby"; "poison" and (b) you were wrong about your post.

It's a measure of the breadth of comments here that yours was posted.

Many of us here are neither Zionist nor Jew. We just appreciate Melanie's incisiveness. Those who are, like me, evangelical & Bible-believing Christians will have other powerful reasons for supporting Israel.

Many of the aetheists who post here also come because they love truth - which I feel this place is all about.

Truthtriumphs

Dear Pete Hoskin,
Thanks for locating the lost comment from last night, but it STILL hasn't appeared.
Would be most grateful if you could rectify this.
Thank you.

Si, N

Truthtriumphs, 'I know something about Benny Morris' writings' - I bet you do. So why don't you:

A. stop misrepresenting it;

B. try supplementing your reading with works that don't necessarily validate your warped beliefs - try Ilan Pappe, 'The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine' - there's a fine book about the detailed plans to 'transfer' 'Arabs' - lots of detail about the 'Consultancy' and Plan Dalet.

Anyway, for the record - and by way of demonstrating that you can't even present the truth in the writings you claim to know 'something about', here is some material from Morris about the 'transfer' of Palestinians - remember, 'transfer' = ethnic cleansing:

'[t]he compulsory transfer of the Arabs from the valleys of the proposed Jewish state could give us something which we never had, even when we stood on our own during the days of the first and second Temples', (Morris, Righteous Victims, p. 142 citing David Ben-Gurion diary entry, July 12, 1937);

'I support compulsory transfer. I don't see anything immoral in it', (Morris, Righteous Victims, p. 144 citing Ben-Gurion);

'[w]e will not be able to win the war if we do not, during the war, populate upper and lower, eastern and western Galilee, the Negev and Jerusalem area, even if only in an artificial way, in a military way. . . I believe that war will also bring in its wake a great change in the distribution of Arab population', (Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem p. 181, citing Ben-Gurion);

'[t]ransfer could be the crowning achievements, the final stage in the development of [our] policy, ' (Morris, Righteous Victims, p. 254, citing Moshe Sharett);

'[w]e must continually raise the demand that our land be returned to our possession .... If there are other inhabitants there, they must be transferred to some other place. We must take over the land. We have a great and NOBLER ideal than preserving several hundred thousands of [Palestinian] Arabs fellahin [peasants]', (Morris, Righteous Victims, p. 141, citing Menachem Ussishkin [28 April, 1930 address to journalists])

I could go on for pages (literally, such is the extent of evidence that the mooted Israeli state planned and executed a massive ethnic cleansing, an ethnic cleansing that is ongoing), but I think that which I have presented here will be adequate for any sensible person to deduce that an ethnic cleansing was planned and executed, that Benny Morris reported it, and that you Truthtriumphs just told a lie.

Truthtriumphs

SIN.
Well, well, quoting Ilan Pappe, now that IS interesting.
Look at Pappe's website---it carries the logo of the Palestinian flag---- hardly an impartial voice.
Sorry to disappoint you, but Pappe himself admitted that the truth can be compromised in pursuit of the ideology.
And, BTW, his latest book was completely slated for its numerous, let's call them, inaccuracies.
Benny Morris, on the other hand, is a highly respected historian, and, for the record, hasn't always been kind about Israel.

Your permanent rage on this blog indicates to me that you know, and you know that we know, that you don't have a leg to stand on.
You have comprehensively lost the argument.

Truthtriumphs

SIN.
I strongly object to your outrageous assertion that I have told a lie, and wonder why such a post was allowed past the moderator.
I was present at a lecture given by Benny Morris in London following the publication of his revised account of the 1948 events, and he categorically denied any such plan for ethnic cleansing.
As you seem to be so exercised by this subject, why don't you treat us to an account of the real ethnic cleansing by the Arabs of 800,000 indigenous Jews in Arab lands, where they had lived for more than 1000 years, brutally expelled in 1948, stripped of all their possessions.
Unlike the Arab countries who refused to absorb the Palestinian Arab refugees (except Jordan),the fledgling state of Israel absorbed and resettled the Jewish refugees from Arab lands.
Of course, the enforced refugee status imposed on the Palestinians by their own kith and kin is a marvellous tool with which to permanently try to delegitimise Israel.
No other people on the planet have managed to do it.

Pete Hoskin

Truthtriumphs: is it not the comment timed at 10:55pm last night, and which is showing above? That's the one I approved earlier, and it was appearing on the site when I made my last comment.

Si, N

Truthtriumphs, let me get this straight - you accuse me of 'writing complete untruths' (lying) without any attempt to prove that I was proffering untruths (beyond your assertion that you 'know something about' Benny Morris) - then when I demonstrate the falsity of your post you spit out your dummy.

Get over it

Truthtriumphs

Pete Hoskin.
Yes, it is, and it has only just appeared at my end.
Thank you for your time and trouble.

Linda Smith

Si'N: What do you think about the ancient villages that are being destroyed to make way for the new runway at Heathrow Airport. The inhabitants are very angry. Shall we give the inhabitants a right to return? Governments are always compulsorily purchasing property against the inhabitants' wishes to build roads etc. They just don't call it "ethnic cleansing, but it amounts to the same thing.

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

On your "substantive" point: why would I think Arabs are like Englishmen (except in that they are human beings like the rest of us)? And, No, I do not know more than Benny Morris about Arabs, I know as little as he does. Evidence of intellectual rigour would be some attempt to address the substantive points.

Labhras

Linda Smith--you cherry picked Morris,a article in the Irish Times.

Here is the part you missed.

"It is true that Plan D gave the regional commanders carte blanche to occupy and garrison or expel and destroy the Arab villages along and behind the front lines and the anticipated Arab armies' invasion routes. And it is also true that mid-way in the 1948 war the Israeli leaders decided to bar the return of the "refugees". BM

Clearly the Regional Commanders did what was "expected" of them.Wink wink.

I expect you want us to believe that Your leaders at the time, Begged the 700,000 Arabs to Stay.

We hear that myth quite often.It is about as believable as Benny Morris,s change of heart.I believe he had a few meeting with some wigs in TA who questioned his loyalty to the "Cause".

Wm. Hazlitt

Original Tony

You call me a Jew-hater.

I know you tend to scurry off when challenged, but before you go, could you tell me why you call me a Jew-hater? It is not just some annoying tick you have. It is a shameful habit. You should try to rid yourself of it.

Truthtriumphs

SIN.
How have you demonstrated the "falsity of my posts"?
You have done nothing of the kind, and instead suggest I read Ilan Pappe "The ethnic cleansing of Palestine".
In similar vein, pehaps I should read David Irving's account, sorry, denial of the Holocaust?
I repeat, Pappe has said that the truth is not that important in the pursuit of an ideal.

Can you follow a reasoned argument?
Evidently not, as you always resort to ad hominem insults.
BTW, my "warped beliefs", as you charmingly put it, accord with the majority view on these blogs.

Linda Smith

Labhras: I did not cherry pick. I copied the info from Wikipedia.

Why do you say "Your leaders"? I am English.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: Yes, Arabs are human beings like the rest of us. But the point was about the Arab Psyche. The Arab Psyche cannot be the same as that of an Englishman because one's psyche is shaped by one's personal experience of living in the world. Clearly the experiences of a Middle Eastern Arab are not the same as that of an Englishman. More importantly an Englishman has been educated in the British system, and has imbibed British culture, law, history, based on Judao/Christian principles, and not Islam. An Englishman's psyche is the product of the Christian Church, Magna Carta, the Glorious Revolution, the Enlightenment, etc etc. A Middle Eastern Arab's psyche is not.

Unless you, Wm Hazlitt, were born and raised in the Middle East, I am certain that Benny Morris knows more about the Arab psyche than you do as he has lived with Arabs all his life.

Si, N

Please note, in her post of March 30th, 2009 6:44pm, Linda Smith plainly admits the truth of what I and a few others have been saying about Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

‘Governments are always compulsorily purchasing property against the inhabitants' wishes to build roads etc’, we are told – as though:

A. Israeli’s ill-treatment of Palestinians these past 60 years is comparable to aggressive town-planning in 21st century Britain;
B. Israel at some undisclosed point in history bought the whole of Palestine;
C. Governments are to be trusted.

Ditto you and your quickie wikipedia approach to research.

Chancer

Si, N

Truthtriumphs, why are you talking about 'the Holocaust'?

Linda Smith

Labhras: what have you got to say about the 800,000 Jewish refugees persecuted and forced to flee Arab countries stripped of their assets?

Gav T

It's interesting to see the Israel-haters falling back on Ilan Pappe for their anti-Israel rants. That always happens when they run out of arguments & also reveals where they get their vitriol from. It's especially amusing to see the quotes from Ben Gurion taken out of Pappes book. Those interested might like to read Efraim Karsh's amazing destruction of both Morris and Pappe, he demonstrates brilliantly how excerpts from Ben Gurions diary were selectively edited to show him as making claims that he never made. Karsh actually quotes the full diary entries, so people can see for themselves how Pappe & Morris deliberately distorted the writings of Ben Gurion to paint a picture of Ben Gurion that doesn't exist. Link here, follow the Karsh link on that page for more of his articles. http://www.meforum.org/466/benny-morris-and-the-reign-of-error A fascinating read for those who like to chase truth.

David

Henry Sidgwick

You claim that the IDF and IAF launched 7,000-9,000 missiles, shells etc into Gaza between Sep 2005 and June 2006 (i.e. a period of 9 months). I find that statistic extraordinary. Could you refer us to where you got that information from.
Here's my problem: Israeli weapons are advanced and very powerful. As a result, It is difficult to see how 7,000-9,000 missiles and shells in a crowded Gaza could have done anything else than utterly decimated the most part of Gaza. It would certainly have killed many hundreds, if not thousands of people.
Yet, I'm not aware of any reports of such devastation over that time period from any news agency or even from Hamas itself.
I tried a fair amount of internet research to find data that supports your claim and simply can't find it. Perhaps you could provide a link/URL to a reputable, independent source which supports your claim? Thanks in advance!

David

Si, N
"Hamas carefully observed the 2008 ceasefire - even in the face of Israel's ever tightening strangulation of Gaza".

Here is a link to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Israel-Hamas_ceasefire) which states that between 10 and 30 rockets were fired monthly from Gaza into Israel (July - Nov 2008). I know that some regard that as being a terrific achievement (after all, 300 rockets were fired into Israel during the month before the ceasefire started). However, based on Wikpedia's account, that still means that some 100 rockets were fired into Israel over a five month period; To my way of thinking that's not a cease-fire and I invite you to name any countries that you think would regard having "only" 100 rockets fired at them as part and parcel of a cease-fire.

Here is a further link to a map of Israel (http://www.science.co.il/Israel-map-Carta.asp). It shows that Gaza shares a border with Egypt (a border over which many tons of weapons are brought into Gaza. Well, it wasn't the Israelis who gave them the weapons, was it? :-)). Given this very porous border, it's simply not possible for Israel to strangle Gaza without Egypt's consent and collaboration. Can you explain to me how it is possible that tons of weapons are constantly brought across the border with Egypt but no food, fuel or medical supplies?

Si, N

Gav T., I clearly indicated that the 'quotes from Ben Gurion' are taken from Morris - do keep up.

'[B]rilliantly', or otherwise, please 'demonstrate' how this:

'I support compulsory transfer. I don't see anything immoral in it', (Morris, Righteous Victims, p. 144 citing Ben-Gurion);

has been 'selectively edited to show (Ben Gurion)…making claims that he never made'.

Si, N

David, I see you're another advocate of the quickie wiki approach to research/fact checking - do you expect to be taken seriously?

About the Hamas rockets that you so readliy acknowledge - what are your views on Isaeli fire into Gaza - you clearly missed it - so here is the reliable Henry Sidgwick on the matter:

'[b]etween September 2005 and June 2006, Hamas launched about 1000 rockets. In the same period, the IDF and IAF launched 7000-9000 missiles, shells etc.
In the six months to June 2006, eighty Palestinians were killed. In the five years to June 2006, eight Israelis were killed.

Check it out for any period you wish. Of course, not all the Palestinian casualties are reported in the Israeli press or in the West. You will have to go to B'tselem, the Red Crescent, the UN and other such radical Islamist outfits'.

Derek BLADES

Linda Smith March 31st, 2009 12:16am asks Labhras: "what have you got to say about the 800,000 Jewish refugees persecuted and forced to flee Arab countries stripped of their assets?"
After 1948 many Jewish people living in different parts of the Middle East did indeed uproot to Israel. Her assertion that they numbered 800 000 is on a par with estimates of the number of Palestinian rockets fired into Israel – a wild guess. That they were "stripped of their assets" is another urban myth. Certainly they left their houses behind and restrictions on capital movements, which were applied in virtually all countries in the 1940s, would have made it difficult for many of them to transfer their financial assets to Israel. But to assert that Jews were in some way singled as targets to be “stripped” of their assets is just nonsense.

Si, N

David, ,[c]an you explain to me how it is possible that tons of weapons are constantly brought across the border with Egypt but no food, fuel or medical supplies?'

Food, fuel and medical supplies were being smuggled into Gaza - it was necessary to smuggle such life-sustaining basics into Gaza because in collusion with Egypt (as I acknowledged - so no need for your helpful pointer to a map), Israel has imposed a murderous siege on the 1.5 million inhabitants of Gaza.

Do you approve of starving and bombing the captive population of Gaza or something?

Linda Smith

Si;N: Your rants about Israel vis-a-vis "ethnic cleansing" are bizarre and bigotted.
Arab countries have been practising persecution and "ethnic cleansing" of Jews since time immemorial. What say you? Nothing.

"The Jews' sojourn in Arab lands was marked by alternating periods of prosperity - in which they contributed to advances in medicine, commerce and culture - and of plight - in which they were subject to punishing taxes and relegated to the lower levels of the social strata." (http://info.jpost.com/C003/Supplements/Refugees/12-13.html)

In March 2008, "for the first time ever, ... a Jewish refugee from an Arab country" appeared before the United Nations Human Rights Council. Regina Bublil-Waldman, a Jewish Libyan refugee and founder of JIMENA, "appeared before the UN Human Rights Council wearing her grandmother's Libyan wedding dress."[27] Justice for Jews from Arab Countries presented a report to the UN Human Rights Council about oppression Jews faced in Arab countries that forced them to find amnesty elsewhere.

At a July 2008 joint session of the United Kingdom’s House of Commons and House of Lords convened by Labour MP John Mann and Lord Anderson of Swansea, in co-operation with Justice for Jews from Arab Countries (JJAC) and the Board of Deputies of British Jews, Canadian MP Irwin Cotler said Arab countries and the League of Arab States must acknowledge their role in launching an aggressive war against Israel in 1948 and the perpetration of human rights violations against their respective Jewish nationals. Cotler cited evidence from a report titled Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries: The Case for Rights And Redress which documented for the first time a pattern of state-sanctioned repression and persecution in Arab countries – including Nuremberg-like laws – that targeted Jewish populations.[28]" Wikipedia

Linda Smith

Derek Blades posted "Her assertion that they numbered 800,000 is .....a wild guess."

You are wrong as usual Mr Blades.

The statistics of the mass displacement of 856,000 Jews from Arab countries between 1948 and 2005 are displayed on a chart on page 30 of the report titled "Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries: The Case for Rights and Redress cited at the Joint session of the Houses of Commons and Lords I mentioned in my previous post.

I quote from page 3 of the report which is available on-line:

"Since 1948, over 850,000 Jews have left their birthplaces and their homes in some 10 Arab Countries. Today, fewer than 7,000 Jews remain in these same countries.

The fact that Jews displaced from Arab countries were indeed bone fide refugees, under international law, is beyond question.

On two separate occasions the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) ruled that Jews fleeing from Arab countries were indeed 'bona fide' refugees who "fall under the mandate of my (UNHCR) office".

Si, N

Linda Smith, it's funny how you happily cite UNHCR when it suits you.

Adam B.

Derek Blades conveniently misses out the pogroms against Jews in Islamic nations, the rampant anti-semitism as well as the dhimmi status forced upon Jews and other minorities. This status restricted their rights in every facet of life - what employment one was allowed to take, where one was allowed to live, where one could go - in modern times, this is called apartheid.

Consider this: several decades ago, a quarter of Baghdad was Jewish - one QUARTER! Now, not one single Jew lives in the whole of Iraq. If things were so wonderful for the Jews Derek, and if there was no pressure placed upon them, why is there not one single individual left?

Funny how those who scream about Israel are not only silent about the ethnic cleansing of Jews form Arab nations, they actively deny it, or defend it.

Hypocrites!

Henry Sidgwick

David

I have mislaid the original reference, but I have some supplementary figures. Human Rights Watch (13/06/06) quotes the IDF as saying that it launched 5000+ shells in that period. I have no supplementary figures for the IAF. The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights 2nd Session Document A/HRC/2/5 of September 2006 quotes a figure for the period AFTER 25th June (i.e. during Operation Summer Rain) of 200 shells/day fired by the IDF and another 200/day by the IAF. I know this is not what I quoted before, for which I apologise (and I will keep looking), but it does give an idea of the order of magnitude.

On reflection, I would take issue not with the rate of shell fire, which I don't think is in serious question, but with the fact that I quoted rather glibly Israeli deaths north of Gaza from Qassam missiles. First, it does not take into account the injuries and psychological distress caused by the missiles. Secondly, it clearly (by definition) gives the wrong impression of the overall cost to Israelis in lives lost and lives ruined. More comprehensive figures on casualties of the conflict from all causes for both Israelis and Palestinians can be found in UN publications and in publications by B'tselem (a trawl through whose archives makes for a sobering read). Of course, the statistics still show Palestinian casualties far exceed Israeli.

My point is that too often the loud complaints on this blog about Hamas missiles and Israeli losses appear to devalue the equally tragic losses sustained by the Palestinians. On the premiss that all life is sacred, this needs to be addressed. On the premiss that peace requires each side to understand the other, it needs to be addressed urgently.

Again, I apologise for mislaying my reference. I tend to chuck stuff out when finished instead of filing it.

Linda Smith

Si,N: If the UNHCR is obliged to recognise the Jews fleeing from Arab countries as refugees, then they must be - with knobs on.

David

Si, N
Bless you! Here’s my original question to you: “Can you explain to me how it is possible that tons of weapons are constantly brought across the border with Egypt but no food, fuel or medical supplies?” I asked this because you had previously noted “....even in the face of Israel's ever tightening strangulation of Gaza....”.
Here are your two responses:
[1] “Food, fuel and medical supplies were being smuggled into Gaza” (BTW, thanks for explaining that these goods are “life-sustaining basics”!). OK, well if that’s the case, could you explain what proportion of these “life-sustaining basics” came via Egypt and Israel respectively and how those proportions lead you to your earlier conclusion that Israel was responsible for strangling Gaza?
[2] You then ask: “Do you approve of starving and bombing the captive population of Gaza or something?” ... SI, How on earth did you manage to work your busy way from my enquiry to you (about logistics) through to your rhetorical question to me (about genocide)? Oh well....Just for the record, I am completely against the killing of any person, whatever their religion, sex, age etc etc. (Si, even if my difference of opinion with you was, as you’d like to make out, indicative of me being a genocidal fruitcake, did you really expect me to own up to the fact on this, or any other, post? Not a great debating ploy, Si!).
I also asked Henry Sidgwick a question about the number of missiles and shells fired by the IDF into Gaza (BTW...Henry, thanks for your response, which I appreciated. Great research and agree with your conclusions....I’ll look out for your postings in future!).Si, I based my question to Henry on some data in Wikipedia....Here are your responses to that question:
[1] Wikipedia is rubbish and anyone who refers to it shouldn’t expect to be taken seriously.
[2] I should refer to Henry Sidgwick for the right data (Actually, I had done so and received a thoughtful, researched and well-argued response, in the posting after yours :-)).
[3] You then refer to deaths OUTSIDE the cease-fire period which wasn’t being discussed at the time by Henry or I.
[4] Finally, you point me toward a number of sources that set out the numerical inequality of deaths in Gaza and Israel. Thanks for the great pointer Si! Actually, there isn’t a statistical source in the world which disputes the NUMERICAL inequality between respective deaths....It’s the context of those deaths that are debated.
Si... Your “arguments” are too illogical and shrill to respond to any further. I won’t be looking out for your postings any longer. There’s simply no point to it. Bye!

Gav T

Si, N It's very simple. Benny Morris decided all by himself that the word 'transfer' was a codeword dreamt up by the Zionists to describe their (alleged) plans of ethnic cleansing. To support his claims of ethnic cleansing he dug up as many quotes with the word 'transfer' in it as he could find. But what he never proved, or even came up with a scrap of evidence of, was that 'transfer' even was a codeword or that it had any relation to plans of ethnic cleansing. Another BIG problem for Morris, and Pappe, is that transfer is also a dictionary word which is commonly used. It means move from one place to another, it also has little relation or similarity with words like evict or eject. Your Ben Gurion 'quotes' there don't say anything, they're out of context. It was Morris who claims that 'compulsory transfer' means eject all the Arabs from the land. Ben Gurion isn't saying that is he, you and your ilk just want to think he is. The only way one could know what Ben Gurion said is to know exactly what 'compulsory transfer' he was talking about and what exactly he meant by the term.

To sum up. Ben Gurion says he supports compulsory transfer. Well hey, so do most employers how many people in work have been transferred to another branch or office by the bosses? Your 'proof' of Ben Gurions evil plans is just laughable.

Wm. Hazlitt

Gav T.

I took your hint and leafed through a copy of Ilan Pappe's book (it appears to be surprisingly popular - all the book shops stock it). I also read Efraim Karsh.

Here are some more out-of-context quotes.

The first is from Ben Gurion:

"There are 40% non-Jews in the areas allocated to the Jewish state. This composition is not a solid basis for a Jewish state...Only a state with at least 80% Jews is a viable and stable state."

He also told the Executive of the Jewish Agency that the Palestinians within the Jewish state could become a fifth column. "They can either be mass arrested or expelled; it is better to expel them."

And here is Yossef Weitz in 1940. He was the head of the settlement department of the Jewish National Fund and had been closely involved in the project of collecting files on every Palestinian village:

"Transfer does not serve only one aim - to reduce the Arab population - it serves also to free up land now cultivated by Arabs. The only solution is to transfer the Arabs from here to neighbouring countries. Not a single village or a single tribe must be let off."

Here is Ben Gurion again after military action against Palestinian quarters in Jerusalem:

"In many Arab neighbourhoods in the west you do not see even one Arab. I do not suppose it will change. And what happened in Jerusalem and Haifa can happen in large parts of the country. If we persist it is quite possible that in the next six or eight months there will be considerable changes in the country. There will certainly be considerable changes in the demographic composition."

Ezra Danin, head of Hagana's Arab section, quotes Ben Gurion as telling him that there was no need to distinguish between innocent and guilty: "Every attack has to end with occupation, destruction and expulsion."

Or here is Yigal Allon:

"If we accuse a family, we need to harm them without mercy, women and children included. During the operation there is no need to distinguish between guilty and not guilty."

Here is the modus operandi from the Yehoshua plan:

"These operations can be carried out as follows: either by destroying villages(by setting fire to them, blowing them up, and by planting mines in the rubble), especially in those population centres difficult to control permanently; or by...encircling the villages, conducting a search, and in the case of resistance wiping out the armed forces and expelling the population beyond the borders of the state."

These were military orders, applied only to villages where the armed forces encountered or expected resistance. But in practice did this not come to mean most of the villages in Palestine?

I am no historian. I don't read Hebrew. Is it your contention that all these quotes when taken in context mean something other than what they seem to mean explicitly and unambiguously when selectively quoted? What is their true meaning?

(I am afraid I got rather lost when it came to your dictionary definitions and corporate usage - in what way could Ben Gurion have meant the same as an employer reallocating their staff?)

As for Efraim Karsh, he is a passionate partisan of Zionism. Many of his pieces appear as fair, balanced and rational as Melanie Phillips. This passion takes precedence over the proper practice of history, which is a shame since he could do Zionism (and the rest of us) a great favour by writing a definitive, wholly honest history - he clearly has the detailed knowledge to do so.

Some reviewers have criticised Pappe (with some reason I have to say having leafed through his book) for similarly allowing his history to become a tract or diatribe, but he is the epitome of cool rationality beside Karsh.

Linda Smith

Gav T. The Peel Commission Report 1937, available on line recommended Partition as Jews and Arabs could not live together harmoniously. It also recommended population transfer citing the successful transfer of Greek and Cypriot populations in 1922 following the Greco-Turkish War.

One might say that a population transfer has taken place - 850,000 Jews expelled from Arab countries since 1948 against 750,000 Arabs from Israel. Fair swap.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: I suggest you read the Peel Commission Report 1937 available on line to learn about both sides of the dispute in context, not just the Arabs as victims as you portray them.

Gav T

Yes indeed Linda Smith. But the word 'transfer' has become synonymous with 'ethnic cleansing' to the mob who quote Pappe & Morris. You only need look at the post above yours to see what I mean. The claim by Pappe in particular is that the Zionists had a premeditated plan to evict all the Arabs from the land, and that 'transfer' was the Zionists codeword for that plan which they used in public. No evidence has ever been produced to suggest or prove a plan of ethnic cleansing. Instead Pappe & Morris simply filled their books with as many statements as they could find which had the word 'transfer' in it. They used circular logic. They didn't begin their narratives with proof or evidence, they simply made an accusation based on their own opinion & then used their own manufactured evidence to support their argument. If 'transfer' doesn't mean ethnic cleansing then their arguments have no merit, their books are just useless words with no meaning.
You might like to research the above quoted statements by WM Hazlitt and see for yourself the context in which they were said. Ben Gurion for example planned to increase the Jewish percentage with immigration, a perfectly reasonable objective. It's only Hazlitt & co who immediately think he wanted to get his 80% by booting out the Arabs. Yossef Weitz had no authority beyond his position, his personal views are irrelevant to the issue because he had no remit to carry out any evictions. The much quoted Dalet Plan is free to download. Says in black & white that it's a defensive plan, nowhere does it say it's a plan for evicting every Arab from the land. It's all about context, and the Israel bashers are blind to that.

Linda Smith

Gav T: Of course the Israel bashers claiming that Israel is racist and apartheid overlook the fact that the Arabs want a Judenrein Palestinian State. Even Jordan, presently enjoying harmonious relations with Israel, denies citizenship to Jews.

The claim that the settlements on the West Bank are illegal under International Law is disputed, one of the reasons being that the West Bank was never a State. Anyway, many of the settlements are built on land that was previously Jewish. The Arabs want the right of return to Israel but deny the right of return to Jews who lost there homes on the "West Bank" in Hebron and as a result of the Arabs declaring and waging war in 1948.

Linda Smith

On the subject of "transfer", I wonder what the British government would do should a large number of people to whom they have granted citizenship rise up against the indigenous Brits in the name of Islam?

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

I suppose if you dispute that the settlements on the West Bank are illegal, then it must be disputed, by definition. However, in the legal sense, there is no dispute. The International Court of Justice, which is the court that determines what the law is in such cases, made a ruling which is clear and unambiguous. In law, the West Bank is Occupied Palestinian Territory, and the Israeli settlements are illegal.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt re the disputed territories, the following are extracts from a response to an article in the Independent. http://www.globalpolitician.com/22896-israel

"Whether the settlements are legal or illegal is a matter of law for a court with Jurisdiction to decide. No such court exists. The ICJ is not seized of the matter now will it be. What the UN resolutions say can in no way determine what is or is not lawful. Its resolutions have no force of law. Nor does an advisory opinion of the ILC...."

"Finally it is still valid international law that land acquired in a defensive war may be kept by the victim of aggression. ...."

"Because self-defense is an "inherent right" under the U.N. Charter, many international law scholars maintain that territory taken in a defensive war can be kept — this further serves the goal of deterring aggression."

"Still, the norm against acquisition of territory through force is so strong that many claim it even applies to land taken in a defensive war.

They may claim what they want but look at reality. Borders are often changed as a result of war. A most recent example is the recent Balkan Wars which created many new countries or countries to be with changed borders.

To the credit of Mark Regev, the Israel Foreign Ministry spokesman, he said yesterday: "We do not accept that the West Bank is occupied in the classic sense." He added that it was not sovereign Jordanian territory before 1967 and it had not enjoyed legal status since the British mandate, which had the remit, underpinned by the League of Nations, of establishing a Jewish national home.

He is in effect saying the Palestine Mandate set aside all of Palestine including Judea and Samaria for "close settlement of the Jewish people" and the Geneva Convention can in way way interfere with such rights.

It is for these reasons that Israel considers the land "disputed land" rather than "occupied lands...."

"Thus final borders will be determined by negotiations and not law or, failing agreement, by possession."

Gav T

Linda T. It's a bit more logical than that Linda, bizarre but logical. All the Israel bashers here have Pappes book as their middle east bible. One can confirm that by drawing the trogs out from their caves... as can be seen above. Pappes basic thesis is that the Jews took the land of Israel by planned conquest and callously evicted all the Arabs from their land. That places the refugee problem entirely at the feet of the Jews, they did it on purpose. No fault can be attached to the Palestinians, it was the Jews who drove them from their homes.
If that story was true then it becomes the basis for which to judge the conflict by. That was the birth of Israel, nothing Israel can subsequently do will garner support or approval from the Pappe followers because the Jews (Zionists) have no right to be there in the first place. Until the evil Jews return the land they 'stole' then they will always be the bad guys in the eyes of the Pappe, Chaim & Morris believers. Of course those authors wild claims are fallacies, and proven demonstrably so by numerous historians who came after the 'new historians', but for the Israel haters to accept that would mean renouncing their bible. You're not dealing with towering intellects here, reason and rational thought has no place in their lives. But that's what you're up against.

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

Thank you for your reply. The ICJ is the court to judge of this matter, and on this matter it is unanimous. You will find very few scholars of international law to support the contention you quote. Mark Regev is a spokesman for the Israeli Government, not a legal expert. I push the point that these are Occupied Territories because they provide the only practical means to a lasting peace - a compromise by both sides. Thank you again for taking the time to set out your reasons.

Linda Smith

Gav T: of course by the reasoning of the Israel haters, the Europeans had no right to take over the Americas, Australia and New Zealand from the original inhabitants.

Singling out Jews for critism is antisemitic or, more aptly, Judeophobic.

Wm. Hazlitt

Gav T (O towering intellect!)

I am intrigued by your views on transfer. It has been a part of the Zionist debate since Herzl and after him, for example, Zangwill, who in 1905 said, "We must be prepared either to drive out the tribes in possession...or to grapple with the problem of a large alien population"; and in 1920 advocated putting pressure on the Palestinians to resettle in neighbouring lands; they couldn't be allowed to block Zionist "reconstruction"; they were "not entitled to democracy"; they should "fold their tents and silently steal away."

Immigration was indeed to be the main way to produce a Jewish majority (self-evidently, as there were only a few thousand Jews in Palestine before the immigration began). Nevertheless, most mainstream Zionist groups at least considered transfer as a part of the solution to their demographic problem.

It has been mentioned that the Peel Partition Plan advocated population transfer, and in so doing made the subject fit for public debate. There are two things to be said about this. First, it is disconcerting to find supporters of Israel shoring up the case for transfer (something they insist never happened) by drafting in an imperial power: a policy is made no more defensible simply because imperialists are willing to countenance it. Secondly, as a matter of history, it is worth mentioning that transfer appeared in the Peel report in large part because of vigourous lobbying by Chaim Weizmann, who told the Colonial Secretary that "the whole success of the scheme (exchange of land and population) depended upon whether the British government genuinely did or did not wish to carry out this recommendation. The transfer could only be carried out by the British government and not the Jews. I explained the reason why we considered the proposal of such importance."

After accepting Peel's proposals, the Jewish Agency set up a "Committee for the Transfer of Population" to gather information on the Palestinian Arabs with a view to "resettlement" either voluntary or compulsory. The committee was also to consider transfer to neighbouring countries. They concluded that the Jewish state was not viable with a large Arab population, which would be a security risk and would occupy land needed for Jewish immigrants. However, they agreed that the Palestinians were unlikely to leave voluntarily and the Arab states would not accept them, so diplomatic pressure and military force would be required, which in current circumstatnces could only be provided by Britain, who seemed unwilling. In other words, they were left with a perceived problem and as yet no solution.

You focus on Ben Gurion, so I will quote him again. (By the way, any quote is necessarily out of context.)

In 1937: "Now the transfer will have to be carried out on a different scale altogether. In many parts of the country new Jewish settlement will not be possible unless there is a transfer of Arab peasantry...The transfer of the population is what makes possible a comprehensive (Jewish) settlement plan."

He simplified the message for his son: "The Arabs will have to go."

There is no shortage of other statements to the same effect. I will end with one from Yossef Weitz, who played an important part in the military planning and operations of 1947-48: "Only after this transfer will the country be able to absorb the millions of our own brethren."

Wm. Hazlitt

Gav T

I also find it curious that you believe Plan D to be defensive simply because its authors say it is.

In 1946, the commander of British forces was asked what would happen if he withdrew. His answer: "Hagana would take over all Palestine tomorrow." He was asked, But could Hagana hold Palestine? His answer: Certainly. They could hold it against the entire Arab world."

Ben Gurion wrote to Sharett in 1948, "If we get the weapons we have already bought...we will take over Palestine as a whole. I am in no doubt. We can face all the Arab forces."

Yigael Yadin said in retrospect, "If it had not been for the British, we could have quelled the Arab riot (Palestinian resistance to the Partition) in one month."

Troop numbers convey the same message. The Israelis had 30k troops and 20k auxiliaries. By mid-1948, they had 80k troops. The Palestinians had around 7k troops. (Remember the Palestinian political elite and its military capability had been destroyed in the suppression of the 1937 uprising.) There were around 3k Arab volunteers. And when the Arab states sent in troops they sent about 50k. Of these, the best were the Arab Legion. But they were instructed only to defend the parts of Palestine Abdullah had agreed with Golda Meir would go to Jordan. Glubb Pasha, their British general, characterised their effort as a "phony war".

After the war, Ben Gurion, when it was put to him that this was a war of the few against the many, said, "This is not true". Later he said,"Though this sounds strange, we had then an army that was bigger than theirs."

The Israelis and outside observers never doubted that Israel would win. There were crises and casualties, and heroic fighting by Israeli soldiers, but there was never any doubt among the ruling elite that the war was theirs to win.

By the time Plan D was finalised, Hagana was pursuing a policy of "aggressive defence", which differs only semantically from offensive operations. But Yigael Yadin wanted to make it explicit and more aggressive: "This (retaliation) is not what we are doing, this is an offensive and we need to initiate peremptive strikes, no need for a village to attack us."

What did the Hagana think the Palestinians were up to? Ben Gurion: "I believe the majority of the Palestinians accept the partition as a fait accompli and do not believe it is possible to overcome or reject it...The decisive majority of them do not want to fight us."

Hagana operations were offensive, not defensive.

What was the objective? Israel Galili: "The borders of our state will be defined by the limits of our force. The political borders will be those of the territories we shall be able to liberate from the enemy. The borders will be the fruit of our conquests." Yigael Yadin: "The borders of partition cannot be for us the final borders. The partition plan is a compromise unjust to the Jews. We are entitled to decide our borders according to our defence needs."

What was to be done with the newly conquered land? Ben Gurion instructed his commanders that even if the Arab Legion were to become more aggressive (for example, if Israel explored the possibility of reneging on its territorial agreement),this should not be allowed to distract them from the principal task - "the cleansing of Palestine remained the prime objective."

And what did this cleansing require? Yitzak Rabin in his memoirs: "Yigal Allon asked: what is to be done with the population (of Lydd and Ramla)? Ben Gurion waved his hand in a gesture that said, Drive them out."

In 1948, Ben Gurion said, "We will not be able to win the war if we do not during the war populate upper and lower eastern and western Galilee, the Negev and Jerusalem." This would be made possible by a "great change in the distribution of the Arab population."

So much for the words.

Now look at the Israeli military campaign operation by operation. You will find that Israel conquered a territory identical to the territory presented to the UN commission as the minimum requirement. You will find that the Palestinian population in this territory was largely expelled.

It is clear that Plan D was instrumental in effecting Israel's grand strategy: conquer the territory; evict the inhabitants; encourage immigration (about which there are also interesting stories to be told).

It is surely time for Israel to be honest about its past, just as it is long since time for it to negotiate in good faith. This is not Judeophobia. It is good advice.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: I would be interesterd to know your views on the circa 850,000 Jewish refugees fleeing Arab States since 1948, having been persecuted and stripped of their assets.

Gav T

Wm. Hazlitt I'm not sure what you're trying to achieve there. Anyone can take random quotes and spin a fanciful story from them. Without the proper context of the quotes they're meaningless. Since Pappe likes to talk about Ben Gurion and his diary we can look at your notes about him as an example of correct context. The Arab peasantry he referred to there were Arabs squatting on land the Jews had bought from Arab & Turkish landowners. Prior to partition the Jews bought & paid for all of the land they settled on, no Arab lost their land. When the Jews bought land they gave any squatters or tenants an eviction notice, they couldn't use the land otherwise could they. Most of your talk about 'transfer' above relates to that, which is a far cry from talk about driving all the
Arabs from their land. The Jews always respected the concepts & rights of land owners. Every time the Jews bought land there would be meetings & notes made about evicting any squatters so they could use the land themselves. Lots and lots of juicy quotes for Pappe to spin his yarns from, but totally out of context eh?
The Dalet plan was handed out to commanders defending the new Jewish borders. It was operational instructions, so if it said 'this is a defensive plan' then it would obviously be a defensive plan wouldn't it. It would have to be countermanded by another order for it to be anything else. Pappe never produced any counter order.

It is surely time for people like yourself to be honest about your misplaced faith in the likes of Pappe & Morris. When there are conflicting histories the only rational and reasoned approach is to read the different versions and attempt to find a middle ground. The Pappe followers blindly swallow every word he wrote and reject everything else. Hardly the sign of intellectual honesty huh?

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: (5 April 12:52) Mark Regev does not have to be a legal expert to act as spokesman for the Israeli Government. As of course you are well aware the views he reports vis-a-vis the disputed territories are the views of legal experts, not his own. If you care to do an internet search you will find many expert legal opinions published on line endorsing that of the Israeli government, including that of Eugene V. Rostow, US Undersecretary of State 1966-69) helped produce Resolution 242.

There is a view that considers "the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to be "foreign" territory to which Israel has no claim. Yet the Jews have the same right to settle there as they have to settle in Haifa. The West Bank and the Gaza Strip were never parts of Jordan, and Jordan's attempt to annex the West Bank was not generally recognized and has now been abandoned. The two parcels of land are parts of the Mandate that have not yet been allocated to Jordan, to Israel, or to any other state, and are a legitimate subject for discussion." (Eugene Rostow).
(http://www.tzemachdovid.org/Facts/islegal1.shtml)

Evidently you are in favour of the ICJ as its view on the disputed territories concurs with your own. But "International justice" is a political swamp. The ICJ is a UN organisation, and all its "judgements" are highly politicised. So,it is a matter of contention whether the ICJ is "the court to judge of this matter" as you would have it.

The UN itself is regarded by many as not fit for purpose and in need of reformation. Certainly the UN Human Rights Council is a laughing stock with the worst offenders sitting on Council, ie the lunatics running the asylum,

As long as there is a possibility of Islamist Hamas taking over the disputed territories, Israel will not withdraw from the West Bank. So it is irrelevant whether the settlements are legal.

My own view is that in 2009, talk of a Palestinian State on the West Bank and Gaza is smoke and mirrors as neither the Arab States nor the US and its allies are going to countenance the setting up of a Talebenized Islamic State under Hamas which will abet the Talebanization of Lebanon under Hezbollah.

Wm. Hazlitt

Gav T

...and this is all your towering intellect could come up with? After your comments dripping sarcasm and condescension I had expected so much more.

What percentage of Palestine was privately owned by Jews in 1947? It was something under 10%, I believe. All the remarks by Zionists from Herzl to Ben Gurion and Weitz were about the eviction of the peasants from this less than 10% of Palestine? So, for example, Zangwill in 1905 or 1920 had the foresight to see that Jews would own less than 10% of the land and would have to persuade the peasants on that less than 10% to move? Ben Gurion in 1937 or even more so in 1948 had nothing better to do with himself than look into the legal minutiae of land transactions?

If Plan D is called "defensive" then it is defensive; but if Yigael Yadin says it is offensive, and Galili agrees, and Yallon agrees..., then it is..."defensive"? Even when they lead attacks outside the borders stipulated by the UN, it is "defensive"?

In history, we have to determine which story is the more likely: in this instance, that Ben Gurion busied himself with the minutiae of land transactions while wholly defensive actions somehow left Israel with 78% of Palestine west of the Jordan and without most of its indigenous population; or that the Yishuv planned and mounted a highly effective campaign to get what they considered the minimum they needed for a viable state?

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

People who disagree with UN resolutions or with the ICJ's judgements may well feel aggrieved and unwilling to accept their authority. For example, the Palestinians felt that the UN's grossly unfair partition of Palestine should not be allowed to determine what happened to their homeland (the land they lived in).

Those who accept the authority of the UN and the judgements of the ICJ in some cases when it suits them (e.g. in 1947) are required by intellectual and moral honesty as well as by law to accept them even when they do not suit.

I concur with the ICJ, as you say, because it is an integral part of a fragile attempt to impose law on international relations, which has to be a Good Thing. (You will have guessed that I think the UN's decision in 1947 was unjust, but I think now everyone has to accept it. You will have guessed that I think Israel's borders after 1948 were determined by conquest, but no-one now talks about return of territory, only about redress or compensation.)

On your other question, I have said before that the eviction of Jews from Muslim states was criminal, and tragic for its victims.

I confess to almost complete ignorance of the details of the history.

But I will share some quotes that certainly startled me.

The Chief Rabbi of Iraq: "The Jews - and the Muslims - in Iraq took it for granted that Judaism is a religion and Iraqi Jews are Iraqis. The Palestine problem was remote...By mid-1949 the big propaganda guns were already going off in the United States. American dollars were going to save the Iraqi Jews - whether the Iraqi Jews needed saving or not. There were daily "pogroms" - in the New York Times and under datelines which few noticed were from Tel Aviv. Why didn't someone come to see US instead of negotiating with Israel to take in Iraqi Jews? Why didn't someone point out that the solid responsible leadership of Iraqi Jews believed this to be their country - in good times and bad - and we were convinced the trouble would pass.

"Zionist agents began to appear in Iraq - among the young - playing on a general uneasiness and indicating that American Jews were putting up large amounts of money to take them to Israel, where everything would be in apple-pie order. The emigration of the young began to tear at the loyalties of families...

"Then instaed of the quiet emigration of individuals there began to appear public demands to legalize the emigration of Jews en masse...in the United States the "pogroms" were already underway and the Iraqi government was being accused of holding the Jews against their will...campaigning among Jews increased...The government was whip-sawed...accused of pogroms and violent action against Jews...But if the government attempted to suppress Zionist agitation attempting to stampede the Iraqi Jews, it was again accused of discrimination."

Then there were the bombs targeted at the Jewish community, which it later emerged were planted by Zionist agents.

The Iraqi government was not alone responsible for the tragedy of the exile of the Iraqi Jews.

"Ingathering" was of over-riding importance to the new state of Israel. There was a pattern to its behaviour. I refer you to "In the Shadow of the Holocaust" by Yosef Grodzinsky.

Gav T

Wm. Hazlitt. I suggest you take pause for thought. I'm merely exposing your writing to others to show them where you and the other anti-Israel mob who post here get your words from. You just argue Pappes words from a book, none of your own thinking there. Efraim Karsh wrote a whole book rebutting all the arguments you post here, no need for me to do it. As for Jewish land ownership, try looking at a population map of the place sometime. There's land, and there's useful land. The Hegev desert alone comprised over 40% of the land that the Jews owned your 10% of, and the Jews didn't own any of the Negev desert. The Jews owned a very large perecentage of the land that was inhabited. Of course Ben Gurion involved himself in minutiae. That's what leaders do. In history there has never been a war that didn't have refugees fleeing their homes in panic from the fighting. There's been literally thousands of wars big & small, and you'd have us believe that in this war all the Palestinian Arabs were just sitting quietly in their homes until driven out by the Jews. The only war in the history of man where that happened. Try again.

Wm. Hazlitt

Gav T

I am not anti-Israeli. I have not relied on Ilan Pappe. You seem to rely on Efraim Karsh (in other words your strictures on me apply at least equally to you, and therefore get you nowhere.) It is certainly not a good idea to rely on Karsh - he is as open about his bias as Ilan Pappe, and venomous in his polemics. His strategy is to find minor points he can dispute while ignoring the points of substance or simply denying them. I have seen estimates of Jewish land ownership of less than 6% of Mandate Palestine (you can perhaps give me the true number). Something like 85% of the Jewish population was concentrated in three cities. If 6% represents all the useful land, why was the Yishuv so keen to aquire all the rest? You still insist that all the Zionists from Herzl onwards who considered evicting the Palestinian population were truly only concerned with moving the peasants off this 6% of Palestine owned by Jews. You also insist that Ben Gurion in time of war busied himself with the minutiae of land transactions involving 6% of Palestine. Refugees certainly do flee, epecially when terrorized, and return when hostilities end. You resort to the stratgem of pretending I said something absurd that I didn't say: I even enumerated the Palestinian and Arab soldiers and compared them with the larger number of Hagana and other Israeli soldiers they were fighting against. This is again a truly sorry attempt at a rebuttal.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: you posted re the eviction of Jews from Muslim states: "I confess to almost complete ignorance of the details of the history. You then quoted the Chief Rabbi of Iraq without giving a date for the quote. What the Chief Rabbi is reported is saying must be interpreted in light of the regime under which his remarks were made. If his remarks were made in Iraq, he would have to be very careful not to antagonise the regime for fear of reprisals.

For factual information of the Jews in Arab lands I recommend the following site from which I quote on Iraq here:

"Iraq

The Iraqi regime in those days was not much more benevolent than the present one of Saddam Hussein. Jews were publicly hanged in the streets of Baghdad on the charge of "Zionist" activities.

By Shavuot 1941, 180 Jews were murdered and 700 injured, in a pogrom in Baghdad. Damages to Jewish property ran into millions of dollars.

Upon the establishment of the State of Israel this situation was further aggravated: Jewish emigration was forbidden, and hundreds of Jews were jailed. Those convicted of "Zionism" were sentenced to internal exile or fines of up to $40,000 each. Tens of thousands slipped out of the country.

But in 1950, the government legalized emigration and pressured the Jews to leave. Emigrants were permitted to take with them only $140 per adult; all of their enormous remaining assets and property were confiscated.
Israel came to their rescue in Operation Ezra and Nehemia.

This prosperous community, which once numbered 190,000, has only 100 Jews today."

Linda Smith

Apologies. I omitted the link for the info on Jews in Arab Lands in my previous comment:

http://info.jpost.com/C003/Supplements/Refugees/12

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: always best to get facts right:

"Who owned the land?

Before the termination of the British Mandate in 1948, 8.6% was owned by Jews and 3.3% by Arabs within the Green Line.
Another 16.9% was owned by those Arabs termed refugees. Plus 71.2% was State-owned land, mostly barren state owned land."

http://info.jpost.com/C003/Supplements/Refugees/10-11.html

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: Your admission re the eviction of Jews from Muslim states "I confess to almost complete ignorance of the details of the history" confirms your one sided pursuit of the Arab/Israeli conflict in favour of the Arabs. As you admit you are ignorant of the Arab attitude to, and treatment of, Jews, then any prescription for a "just" resolution to the conflict you make must be treated with the contempt it deserves as it is made in ignorance.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: Your statement "I am not anti-Israeli" is negated by the failure of your comments to take account of the purpose of a Jewish State of Israel - a Jewish National Homeland as set down in the Balfour Declaration and the terms of the British Mandate..

You wrote "I think the UN's decision in 1947 was unjust...." If you are of the opinion that the UN's decision in 1947 was unjust, then you must think that any other UN decisions, including those made by the ICJ, may also be unjust. If you can pick and choose which UN decisions are just, so can the Israelis re the UN ICJ's view of the "occupied" territories.

"...but I think now everyone has to accept it." The only reason "everyone has to accept it." is because the Israelis have won every war launched against it by the Arabs. "Would you be advocating "now everyone has to accept it", if the Arabs had succeded in the aim to destroy Israel and "throw the Jews into the sea"?

As for "intellectual and moral dishonesty": According to your reasoning, Arabs and others who berate Israel for not abiding by various UN Resolutions, including 242, are intellectually and morally dishonest because they refused to abide by the Partition Plan under under the original, and therefore governing, UN Resolution 181 of 29 November 1947.

Re "return of territory" and "right of return" for Arabs to Israel. The Arabs declared war on Israel at the outset.
"There must be a price paid for starting and losing wars... Aggressors should be made to absorb refugees created by their aggression."

(Prof Alan Dershowitz of Harvard University)

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

Thank you for your your comments. In your posting at 11.50am you make some excellent points. I would not want to be thought to be defending the Iraqi regime. Any regime has a duty to protect its citizens and their rights, and Iraq clearly failed in its duty. I think you skate over the Zionists contribution to the tragedy too lightly, especially when they apparently stooped to terrorism. I think the story of the "ingathering" deserves a scholarly history.

Your posting of 11.59am says "Best to get your facts right." I agree, and I accept that I am as prone to get mine wrong as anyone else. However, I would recommend "Access Denied" by Hussein Abu Hussein for some of the historical detail of patterns of land ownership and property rights in Palestine.

Your posting of 12.30pm reverts to pointless abuse. My ignorance of the details of the history has not prevented me deploring the events that ended the long history of the flourishing Jewish community in Iraq and elsewhere. Past events do not preclude present negotiation, compromise and agreement.

Your posting of 12.30pm has a bit of everything. I am not anti-Israeli. I think Israelis have the same rights as everyone else. Your comments about the Balfour letter and the Mandate are not to the point: they in no way support your contention that what I said is somehow negated. (I think we have discussed the history before and disagreed.)

I said I thought the 1947 partition unjust, not that I thought the decision of the international community should be ignored (even although the "international community" after the War meant the US). I agree that the Palestinians cannot pick and choose any more than Israel (although given that the US is Israel's sponsor this is clearly against natural justice). Your comment about the Arabs throwing Israel into the sea is good rhetoric but no-one in a position of authority believed it remotely likely, and in any event the US, before Truman over-rode his officials and went for partition, was floating the idea of "looking after" Palestine until a peaceful agreement could be reached - I doubt the US would have allowed the Yishuv to founder.

Finally, the refugees were decidedly not created by Arab aggression (but that is another subject we have discussed before and disagreed on). The right of return is enshrined in another of those pesky UN resolutions that give us both such trouble. And I am sorry but Alan Dershowitz is not a credible witness.

Can I just repeat that I appreciate you taking the time to set out some of the counter-arguments to what I assert. I have visited this site to learn.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt:

As you say you have visited this site to learn, I will take the opportunity of informing you of the following point which it appears you have overlooked: Israel is a Jewish democratic State which means that it is Jewish by dint of numerical superiority. The purpose of the Jewish numerical superiority is to ensure that anyone with a link to Judaism, howevery tenuous, may find refuge there from persecution. It is a fact of history that Jews have been persecuted, expelled and murdered for no reason other than "Jewishness" and that they had no land of their own in which to take refuge. Jewishness to the antisemite is not a matter of belief but ancestry. Therefore, Israel will never accede to any demand that will threaten Jewish numerical superiority.

You dismiss Professor Alan Dershowitz' opinions on Arab "right to return" without giving your reasons. I assume you seek to denigrate him because his arguments are strong:

'The millions of other refugees who were forced to leave their homes in the decades following World War II - the Sudeten-Germans, the Greeks and Turks, Pakistanis and Indians, and the 700,000 Jewish refugees from Arab countries - have all been integrated and normalized. Only the Palestinian refugees have been kept in camps by their Arab hosts. The reason was and is entirely political: to maintain resentment and to hold open the empty promise of a triumphant return that would achieve demographically what the Arab nations have been unable to achieve militarily - destruction of the Jewish state.

Israel sees the right not as an individual, humanitarian claim, but rather as a collective, political assertion designed to turn Israel into another Arab state. In 1949, Egypt's foreign minister candidly acknowledged: "It is well known and understood that the Arabs, in demanding the return of the refugees to Palestine, mean their return as masters of their homeland, and not as slaves. More explicitly: they intend to annihilate the state of Israel." .......

..........Imagine if the Palestinians had won and many Israelis had been forced to leave, while others left of their own volition or as the result of fear. Now imagine those Jews seeking a right of return, either in the immediate aftermath of the war or 60 years later. It is inconceivable that a Palestinian state would grant Jewish refugees a right of return. Certainly that would be true if the number of Israeli refugees and their descendants threatened to outnumber the Palestinian population. How can a right of return go only one way? Has Yemen offered its Jewish refugee population any right of return or compensation? Has Egypt? Has Iran? Has Iraq? Has Syria? Of course not.......

........For peace to be achieved, pragmatism must be balanced with principle. The right of return should be implemented so as to protect Israel against demographic annihilation without denigrating the Palestinian narrative. '
http://www.alandershowitz.com/publications/docs/return_csm.htm

"Last but certainly not least, implementation of the "right of return" demand for Palestinian Arabs would force the relocation of millions of people, most of them refugees or the descendants of refugees themselves, who have been resettled in the course of sixty years on land that is claimed by the Palestinian Arabs. The "return" of four million alleged "refugees," actually the descendants, mainly third and fourth generation, of people who once were or claimed to be refugees, who have been trained from birth to hate Israel, would result in a massive internal insurgency against the state, followed by the occupation of Israel by hostile Arab armies and the probable extermination of its Jewish population. Indeed, there is considerable evidence that this is precisely what most "right of return" advocates have in mind. "
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/01/the_arab_right_of_return_to_is.html

Wm Hazlitt: Moslems cannot accept a Jewish State on religious ideological grounds. Antisemitism (against Jews and Judaism regardless of Israel and Zionism) is alive and thriving in the Arab Moslem world. Israel will never accede to any demand that will threaten Jewish numerical superiority. That way lies death. When Jews say "never again!" they mean it.

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith,

Most of what you say here I have picked up from your previous contributions. I can accept it as an expression of strongly held beliefs which I do not share. Some of it I can't accept as accurate history (I have more studying to do, but I would suggest so do you). Some of it I can't accept as an accurate judgement on Israel's enemies and their capabilities and intentions. But what strikes me most is that your vision of a solution is the complete capitulation of the Palestinians (those whose ancestors have "alledgedly" lived in the "disputed" territories for generations and those who are "alleged" refugees or their descendants now living in the "disputed" territories and in neighbouring countries). You insist that Israel's minimum requirement is complete victory over the Palestinians (which requires their continued brutalisation, as an honest reading of the Israeli press and Israeli human rights organisations would lead you to acknowledge). This is certain to produce more unnecessary suffering. You frequently refer to crimes and tragedies elsewhere in the world. But here is one that can be put right. The longer it is left, the less likely it is to end well.

As to Alan Dershowitz, I will bore you with a brief history of our acquaintance. I first came across him in a film where he is portrayed as an inspiring teacher and lawyer. I read some of his books. With great forebearance, I have continued to read his books. Their tone is unpleasant (or so it appears to me). I then came across his contributions on television which confirmed that the man is indeed unpleasant. Of course, that does not affect the truth or otherwise of his assertions. But I then happened upon an article by a philosophy professor on the internet attempting to adjudicate a quarrel between Professor Dershowitz and a Norman Finkelstein. Professor Dershowitz is clearly guilty of some blatant sins against academic standards. So I went to the books at issue. You may well find Finkelstein's style as unpleasant as I find Dershowitz's. You may find his politics unacceptable. But after you have read his book you will not take Alan Dershowitz seriously again.

Best wishes, and thank you again.

Linda Smith

I am posting this as my previous post appears to have got lost.

Wm Hazlitt: "Some of it I can't accept as an accurate judgement on Israel's enemies and their capabilities and intentions."

Israel's enemies have made their intentions very clear since 1947, to destroy Israel as a Jewish State and murder the Jews. Your acceptance of Israel's judgements on the risks they would face were they to allow millions of Arabs into their country is irrelevant. As you are not an Israeli Jew, it is not your life that is at stake.. It seems to me that you value the alleged property rights of Arabs above the lives of Israeli Jews.

"You frequently refer to crimes and tragedies elsewhere in the world. But here is one that can be put right."

Why can the other population transfers not be put right? If Israel is required to implement "right to return" under UN Resolution 124, then so must all other States in the world be required to state a commitment to implement Right of Return for Jews to Arab Lands, Hindus and Muslims in Arab/Pakistan, Sudetenland Germans; vietnamese refugees, etc.

"This is certain to produce more unnecessary suffering"
The Arabs and Jews could not live amicably together under the Mandate, so why do you think they could do so were Israel to admit millions of Arabs and the Jews become a minority in Israel? The "Palestinian" Arabs cannot live peacably with each other - see the fighting being Islamist Hamas and Fatah. How would the Israeli Jews fare in an Islamist Israel?

"The longer it is left, the less likely it is to end well."

Who for - the Arabs or the Jews???

Wm. Hazlitt

Linda Smith

I fully intend to let you have the last word, but again I feel I should clarify what I have said first.

I am very clear that it is for Israelis to make their own decisions. Your comments to that effect are somewhat gratuitous.

That I value "alleged" property rights over lives is another of your lapses into rhetoric that maybe sounds good to you but contributes nothing to the exchange of ideas.

As Golda Meir demonstrated in her discussions with Abdullah over the West Bank in 1947-8, Israel can find interlocutors when it wishes. However, there has been an unfortunate pattern in its diplomacy to refuse to acknowledge the existence of moderates while also refusing on principle to negotiate with extremists, thus leaving it free to follow its preference for military force over compromise. (I refer you to Moaz: The Defence of the Holy Land for a detailed exposition.)

The cry that "the "Arabs" mean to kill us all!" has no doubt been an expression of genuine fear among large numbers of Israelis. But it has been used by the governing elite as a pretext for maximalist diplomacy, military conquest, and occupation.

I mentioned other conflicts to suggest that this one is unique in being relatively straightforward. I am probably wrong. The people of Kashmir have consistently made their wishes clear. They were only thwarted in 1947 by their then corrupt ruler. India could in theory simply stop its cruel oppression. Darfur is part of a struggle for secession. The USSR has shown that the break-up of a state can be managed, although the US under Lincoln has shown that it can be messed up horribly. The "solution" in Tibet is certainly straightforward - it will be similar to the solution in the US to the inconvenient existence of natives: turn them into a tourist attraction. China claims an historic right to Tibet. China is too powerful to be crossed, and too important to the finances of the US. Tibet will be subject to continuing genocide. I have read of immigrants to Israel from Europe and from elsewhere in the Middle East who have pined for their former homes. The regimes in the Middle East that are sustained in power by the US are I think sufficiently vile to deter any of the immigrants from seriously considering return.

I am sure I have said before that after sixty years of expropriation, return is problematic. There will have to be negotiation and any solution is bound to require compensation in lieu of return of land and property.

The straightforward solution I mentioned a moment ago is for Israel to get out of the Occupied Territories and allow a Palestinian state to prosper (i.e. not insist on creating a prison as in Gaza currently). Economic cooperation between the two states would benefit both, and there is nothing like mutual advantage for keeping the peace.

Your comments about Hamas and Fatah are graceless given Israel's role as agent provocateur in this conflict as in so many others, in this instance seconded by the US with the intention of ousting the elected Hamas government.

"The longer it is left, the less likely it is to end well" "Who for?" For both Israelis and Palestinians, although, if current trends continue, overwhelmingly for Palestinian civilians, men, women, and children.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: The Palestinian Arabs wanted all of Israel as well as the territories allocated to them under the Partition Plan. The Arabs launched three wars and lost. Israel is entitled to demand reparations from the Arab States who declared war in 1948. Jerusalem was not allocated to the Arabs by the UN, but they claim it nonetheless.

Had the Arabs not instigated three wars against Israel there would have been no disputed territories.

Had the Arabs not made war on Israel in 1948, there would not have been a Palestinian Arab refugee problem. The Arab refugees are an Arab responsibility.

Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), present head of the Palestinian Authority wrote in March 1976:

"The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny, but instead they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and to leave their homeland, imposed upon them a political and ideological blockade and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live in Eastern Europe."

Arab politician, Khaled al-Azm, a former Syrian Prime Minister, stated in his memoirs published in 1973 that

"Since 1948, it is we who have demanded the return of the refugees, while it is we who made them leave. We brought disaster upon a million Arab refugees by inviting them and bringing pressure on them to leave. We have accustomed them to begging...we have participated in lowering their morale and social level...Then we exploited them in executing crimes of murder, arson and throwing stones upon men, women and children...all this in the service of political purposes..."

There are 850,000 Jewish refugees from Arab and Muslim countries since 1948 as a result of persecution

"Hebrew Professor Baron Tiqva described what it was like to be forced out of her home in Basra, Iraq, in 1948. Tiqva told the story of her family and how they suffered under Nuremberg-style Iraqi laws forbidding Jews to hold bank accounts, serve in government, walk on the sidewalk, attend public schools or own land. In one of the most striking moments of the story, Tiqva described her childhood memory of the day her family finally was forced out of Iraq.

Allowed only one suitcase, young Tiqva wore layers upon layers of clothing as her family set out for the airplane destined to Cyprus. Once they arrived at the gate, however, police forced Tiqva and her entire family, including her grandmother, to strip down naked. Looking for the last remnants of wealth in the form of gold or jewels, the Iraqi Police stole even the wedding bands from Tiqva's mother, father and grandmother. There they were, a once prominent family with wealth stretching throughout the most fertile regions of the biblical lands - now naked with nothing but each other."

The 850,000 Jewish refugees since 1947; the 15 million ethnic Germans expelled from Poland and Czechoslovakia after World War II, 2 million ethnic Greek and Turks in 1922; 200,000 Greeks expelled from Cyprus in 1974; the millions of Hindus and Muslims displaced in 1947; the millions of Russians who fled Russia in 1917; the millions of Cubans; Vietnamese and Laotians who fled after the Communist takeovers. have all been denied repatriation, the return of the vast amounts of property they were forced to leave behind, or even compensation for their lost property.

There is no reason for Arabs to have more "rights" than any other refugees from wars and/or revolutions. To require Israel alone amongst all the States in the world to compensate the Arabs is blatant antisemitism.

Linda Smith

Wm Hazlitt: you graciously said you would allow me the last word. Here it is:

You paint a fairytale scenario of two States living peaceably side by side.. But, as long as Israel's enemies condemn "Zionism" and refuse to recognise the Jewish State of Israel there can never be peace.

You peddle in distortions. At the top of this thread Melanie Phillips said "the British media at the top of puts across an overwhelmingly Arab narrative about Israel and the Middle East, transmitting lies and distortions as facts and reversing victim and victimiser to present Israel as the regional aggressor and the Palestinans as their targets.." So do you.

It appears that the other commenters have now left this thread, so I too will depart and leave you to your fantasies.

Adieu.

Yail Bloor

So let's be clear here. Israel is the 'oppressor' when it comes to Palestinians. There really is no other way to look at it. Beginning in the early 20th century a bunch of us Jews fled oppression in Europe (and elsewhere) to, amongst other options, Palestine with the intention of creating a Jewish state. Problem of course came when it was realized that there were already people there who were not Jewish. Herzl's "A land without a people for a people without a land" appears inherent;y ludicrous. Come 1948 Israel formally came into existence. At the expense of many Palestinians who fled the fighting between Arab states and Israeli forces. Come to '67 and Israel annexed the rest of Palestine. Now who came into whose house and took whose land? Nurrrrrrrr.... At any rate that is all in the past, it can't really be fixed now.

What I wish is that Israel would give up its national identity as a 'Jewish' state and become a state for all its citizens. Then we could approach things from the one state solution - which I might add would be in line with the oringinal vision of Zionism. Socialist Utopia here we come!