And so it begins again

just Louise

Ah, yes. There is at least one example among those comments (so far) of what you've called the "pond life of the British intelligentsia", Melanie - a pro-Boycott academic who is on record as having stooped so low as to refuse to submit a book review in his academic field to a specialist academic journal in Israel.
Clearly, it's Open Season on the Jews in some quarters. And as another comment on there shows, there's at least one "high profile" person of Jewish parentage hastening to heap obloquy on the beleaguered little Jewish State.
But the comments should remind us, too, that there are plenty of decent people out there, who deplore the bigotry and naked antisemitism others voice, and realise that Israel is more sinned against than sinning.

David Gray

I wouldn't worry Melanie...Osbournes programs are usually mistake laden garbage ...full of breathless inuendo and falsehoods. It will probably take you less than 10 minutes to write a full list of the lies and the bias he comes up with.Osbourne is a prat.

Fran

Channel 4 appear to have an outbreak of sloppy moderation syndrome. Are they aware of the The European Union Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia's Working Definition of Anti-semitism which says that anti-semitism ‘… charges Jews with conspiring to harm humanity, and it is often used to blame Jews for “why things go wrong.” ’

It continues

• ‘Contemporary examples of antisemitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere could, taking into account the overall context, include, accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations.’ and

• ‘Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective – such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions.’

Moderators of the comment thread attached to the summary of ‘Inside the Israel Lobby’ have passed numerous examples of these forms of anti-semitic discourse for publication, for instance,

‘Let's see the hand of global Zionism at work.’

‘We want our country back. The agents of a foreign power embedded at all levels of our government and politics need flushing out.’ and

‘we are being attacked from within by 5th columns in our parliament for this murderous regime.’

I hope that Peter Oborne's documentary isn't going to feed such rabid hatred of Israel.

Yehuda

I certainly hope that there does, in fact, exist a powerful, influential lobby in Britain, supporting Israel's right to exist, supporting its struggle against the genocidal ambitions of its Arab / Islamist enemies and their fanatical collaborators in the Western world, both on the left and right of politics; and supporting its legal territorial rights as they were determined in 1922.

People of all faiths and political leanings, who have any sense of decency, justice and equity, should support such a lobby.. and they do.

Judging, however, by Britain's recent track record, there are not enough of them.

Jason from AZ

From this side of the pond, it appears that bashing Jews/Israel is a favorite British past time.

To British Jews: "I feel your pain."

J A Evans

If it is such a powerful lobby I wish the results were more evident ! From what I hear Osbourne refused to meet and talk with anyone from BICOM and certainly with no other grass roots activists . Perhaps he does not know of them.

David Lindsay

Peter Oborne, excoriating scourge of the Political Class and true conservative opponent of its wars, will use tomorrow evening's Dispatches to break one of Britain's great political taboos, namely that against mentioning the existence of our very own Israel Lobby. It will be interesting to see how far Channel Four will let him go.

Just in case, the Israel Lobby accounts for the overwhelming majority of newspapers sold in this country, terrifies the life out of the broadcast media with its screaming about anti-Semitism if anything other than its own view is ever presented, provided from the criminal sale of seats in the legislature much of the money necessary to create New Labour (can you imagine that someone like James Purnell, who used to chair Labour Friends of Israel, would ever have become a Cabinet Minister under normal circumstances?), dominates Cameron's Tories, and remains much stronger in the Lib Dems than is often assumed.

Most significantly of all, it embodies, just as it does in America, a secular Ashkenazi nationalist position which is not held by most Israelis, fewer and fewer of whom fall into all three of those categories.

How far are we paying for it? Oborne may be able to tell us. I very much hope that he is and does. But we know that the American taxpayer is ultimately footing the bill for the maintenance on his soil of, in such forms as AIPAC and the ADL, the largest spy network maintained by any country on the soil of any other, to which Presidential candidates are even expected to go and pay court.

Will Obama bother to turn up in 2012? What would happen if he didn't? The Christian Zionists (by no means all of the white Evangelicals, quite a number of whom voted for him anyway) would never vote for him, no matter what, so he wouldn't be losing anything there. And the Jews, many of whom in any case do not agree with the Mossad position, mostly live in safely blue states.

At their respective heights, the British Empire and the Soviet Union ran large and powerful spy networks in the United States. But they were real powers. And, courtly as Britons and Russians can both be, they certainly did not have the sheer effrontery to charge the Americans for the privilege of hosting those networks. Oh, the shame, the shame!

Fabio P.Barbieri

A question. Would Channel ultra-right-on super-politically-correct Four have given Peter Oborne the time of day, let alone an hour's worth of broadcasting prime time, had it been on any subject other than Israel-bashing?

Baron Pipin II

David Lindsay @ 11.23

… and then you woke up, right?

Aaron

David Lindsay is a cringe-worthy mentalist.

Steven Michealson

This is the sort of garbage that makes it clear why to Jewish people the State of Israel is so necessary and important - to protect us against the vile hatred that's thrown at us by people like this.

Roger K

Well here is what I posted to Channel 4. It sure seems that the whole British pond has gone rancid and fetid. Let's hope one day something will come out of the decomposition which actually is new life with promise.

Perhaps a future programme could be "The true hidden existence of the Protocols of Zion." After all half the Islamic World believe it.

Great. Let's also have a look at whenever an Israeli committed an act of terrorism in Britain or even shot at British service personell other than approximately fifty years ago when British troops were over in Israel trying to renege on United Nations and Balfour Agreements.
Let's also look at who gets British handouts and uses them for international terror campaigns.
I am glad that I wont see the the half wit's programme and that I live on the other side of the world now, but I am watching the nasty unbalanced mess that Britain is turning into.

daniel maris

Well I've never trusted Oborne and basically stopped reading the Spectator while he edited it.

of course there's nothing wrong with a programme about the pro-Israel lobby. We should in fact have more programmes on how various lobbies - Saudi, Pakistani, whatever, affect British policy.

C. Gee

David Lindsay:

Manipulation of power.
Ownership of media.
Tentacles of influence.
International spy rings.

If Obourne manages to expose these, the Jewish Lobby will not be pleased. They will have to get the Elders to think up a whole new set of protocols. But meanwhile, keep a firm grip on your wallet. You think you're paying tax, but where is the money really going?

Wilhelm

A pro Israell lobby in England , huh ? You dont get jewish people in the street with anti English banners, death to democracy, spitting at British soldiers unlike the er um the islamic lobby.

Well thats the multyculty channel 4, isnt it .

Yehuda

David Lindsay: if you truly believe even a word of your post, then clearly you are suffering from autocardiophagy.
Well done!

Wilhelm

The piffle scribbled by David Linsday is worthy of a Hans Christian Anderson fairytale.

Keep on taking the medication.

Merlyn

It is time the media felt some legal 'repercussions' for its antisemitism.

Lizzy

Channel 4 = The Guardian on TV. Reading some of those comments on the Channel 4 website I wanted to shout like John McEnroe: YOU CANNOT BE SERIOUS MAN!! But they are.

phil

Is there something wrong in their being an Israel lobby ?---There is of course a point to having lobbies and that obviously is to put forward one,s cause in a good light .I do believe that Britain has lobbies all over the world and why not ?,what we will have to see here is what Oborne has to say ,how much is true and whether in fact it is an attack on both Israel and Jews in general .Jumping to conclusions will be seen as hysterical so I suggest you keep your powder dry until at least tomorrow .

Cruster

Oborne is quite a good writer - I hope he comes up with a factual documentary and that is it. Is he an anti-semite too with a hidden agenda? I hope not.
I was reading the other day how our Hebrew community helped us win the Napoleonic War with some crucial finance. I suppose we should be more PC these days and not be discriminatory to defeat. Choose defeat and be proud! Victory can be bigoted, and the Europeans don't like it.

Philip Horowitz

The Guardian is also running this programme as a story: Pro-Israel lobby group bankrolling Tories, film claims. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/nov/16/pro-israel-lobby-conservatives-channel4-dispatches. They have not allowed comments so far.

jose garcia

no mention of the billions, i mean billions of arab money used to brainwash our kids and young people in the schools/universities against the israelis, and pro the islamic terrorists,

or the billions the arabs spend arming terrotist activity around the globe, you know those bombs and rockets are not free you know?.

disgracefull

Ellen

Of course we will wait to judge the programme itself but there is plenty of stuff we already know that can be discussed now - not least what's going on on Channel 4's website, and the track record of Peter Oborne, whose own views on Israel are well documented in his writing.

And has Channel 4 come under a lot of criticism for its reporting bias in the Middle East and on the defence against the global jihad in general? Why, yes.

How odd, then, that it should commission a programme like this!

Let us remind ourselves a little of Mr Oborne’s track record as a ‘journalist’ and probe just how deep his ‘principles’ are.

The most corrupt and venal politician in living memory must be Jonathan Aitken. Not only did he lose a libel case that he brought, he had to be imprisoned for perjury.

The most famous act of this dreadful man in government? Selling the people of this country out by organising the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia, a country filled with Wahhabists hostile to the west. Mr Aitken was happy to be provided with prostitutes at a place the Press dubbed “Inglenoookie” in Britain as he went about cultivating all this.

And what does Peter call-me-Mr-Moral-Compass Oborne think of this deal? Why, he has been the journalist banging the drum loudest that it should not be investigated by the Serious Fraud Office. The American authorities are beside themselves over such treachery and cannot understand why the whole thing is not in the Number One court at the Old Bailey.

It seems that for Mr Oborne all that needs to be done to sanctify such a sell-out is to ignore the recipient of these arms and excuse that by saying it provides some British people with jobs (it also provided an elite group of British business people with a lot of cash, but like the Wahhabism, it seems best in Mr Oborne’s book if you just ignore that).

Mr Oborne’s myopia does not end there. He went out of his way recently to praise Conservative peer Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, calling her “among the best four or five figures in David Cameron's senior team” and that she “should earn her a top place in any Cameron cabinet.”

Mr Oborne continues: “It's just a pity that Warsi, who fought (but lost) Dewsbury at the 2005 general election, is in the House of Lords… It would be better for her, and for British democracy, if she could be persuaded to renounce her peerage and fight the next election to become an MP.”

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1222601/PETER-OBORNE-Is-David-Cameron-making-catastrophic-mistake-Iain-Duncan-Smith.html

But hold on. She’s already tried to become an MP. Why did she fail, Mr Oborne?

Could it possibly have been because, as the Daily Telegraph reports
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1557596/Cohesion-Tory-criticised.html

“The Conservatives’ new ‘cohesion’ spokesman was criticised yesterday after being accused of issuing different election leaflets aimed at different sections of the community. The row involves Sayeeda Warsi, the new shadow minister for community cohesion, who stood as a Tory candidate in Dewsbury, West Yorks, in the 2005 general election.

“During the campaign she produced two very different leaflets. One was festooned with images of the Union flag and focused on issues such as Europe and immigration, apparently in a bid to appeal to white voters. The other leaflet - which appears to be aimed at Muslims - showed Ms Warsi wearing a head scarf, condemned the ‘illegal war’ in Iraq and criticised Labour for ‘openly allowing homosexuality to be promoted in our schools’.

“Critics say her approach was designed to send different messages to different ethnic communities in the constituency… The Conservative Party last night rejected suggestions that Ms Warsi had adopted different campaign messages for different sections of the community. ‘The leaflets were distributed in every ward, so there is no question that they were tailored to different races,’ a spokesman said. ‘She accepts her comments about the promotion of homosexuality undermining family life were not well phrased but has made it clear she is not anti-homosexual.’”

Conservative Home here dissects Ms Warsi’s views:

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/platform/2007/07/statement-by-th.html

Have a read of them and see if you agree with Mr Oborne that Warsi is “among the best four or five figures in David Cameron's senior team”.

Mr Oborne fancies himself an expert at sniffing out politicians’ hypocrisies - so has he missed all this?

Hmm. By the way, who should have been on the judging panel but for The Spectator awards last week? Fraser Nelson tells us on this site that one of the judges was none other that Peter Oborne. And who should have won an award but Baroness Warsi. Fancy!

Did the ‘Israel Lobby’ control that media decision?

Will Mr Oborne admit his hypocrisy and make a documentary about the Islamic lobby’s grip over the Conservative Party to the extent that the website of the Conservative Muslim Forum (address at the Conservative Party’s headquarters in Millbank, London, so it’s part of the Conservative Party) has, according to The Brussels Journal, published “text” that “has been lifted from IslamOnline, founded and co-owned by hate preacher, and terrorism promoter, Yusuf al-Qaradawi.”

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/4171

Mr al-Qaradawi has been banned from America since 1999 and Britain since 2008. In July 2003 he visited Sweden for a conference at the Stockholm Mosque set up by the Muslim Association of Sweden. At the conference al-Qaradawi expressed his support for suicide attacks against Israeli civilians, calling such attacks a “necessary jihad”.

Why has it taken this for the Conservative Party to begin an investigation? The Brussels Journal despairs that when an investigation was begun into the Conservative Muslim Forum: “Remarkably, it wasn’t [because of] its radical opinions, its apparent support of Hamas, or even its linking to the website of Ta-Ha publishers, which, as I mentioned last year, is an online bookstore that sells books on sharia, along with the odd conspiracy theory.”

The Conservative Muslim Forum also calls for the continuation of sharia finance, despite this form of finance’s proven track record in assisting Islamic terror activity. Is Mr Oborne going to make a programme about all this?

just Louise

Philip Horwitz, I had a look at the Guardian report and made my very first CiF comment ever. I was brief, to the point, polite, and reasonable - but obviously pro-Israel.
Within minites - literally less than five - my comment had been removed!
Unbelievable!!!

Bill M

Have they removed the comments? I can't find them on the link.

phil

Wilhelm ,take three deep breaths ,I have to agree with you both at 6.21 and 8.04.lyndsay has lost it .now if you wrote sensibly like you have here we could be friends -do not regress ,you are doing well :)

Bill M

Strange. Now they are back.

Wilhelm

Well Phill my hero apart from Enoch Powell is
Geert Wilders who is very pro Israel and
holidays there often.

So I have to follow the big chief in sticking up
for Israel against the leftopathics who have ITS which is '' Israel Tourettes Syndrome.''

Harvey

A previous Dispatches investigation highlighted the correlation between Islamic scholars preaching Jihad and homophobic and rascist sentiment within mainstream Mosques and 7/7 .Of the two programmes, I know which one I would rather be the subject of.

Charlie

So are we to believe that it was the British Jewish Lobby that did the deal with Libya's Qaddafi to spring the Pan Am terrorist in exchange for oil?

Ann Farmer

We have a Director of Public Prosecutions who has in effect legalized 'assisted suicide' in this country, against repeated rejections by Parliament, and yet we are expected to believe that it just 'happened' - in contrast to anything to do with Israel, when it is attributed to some sort of powerful lobby.

Stephen Rothbart

David Lyndsay was surely being ironic. I mean no one who can actually spell can come up with this nonsensical rubbish as a serious point, can they? I mean it's legitimate to hate Israel and hate Jews. More than half the world does, but to try to cloak such hatred in a way that tries to present points seriously, with logic and 'facts,' well he was just being ironic, I am sure because hatred of a people or a religion is just not justifiable on any grounds for someone who is normal. Look at Hitler and Stalin. Were they normal?

I mean, he has only to listen to Kate Adler on the BBC to know that Israel not only has no control over the BBC's anti-Israeli bias, but it actually reports only the incidents that support its views rather than the facts or for that matter the news. Where is this all powerful Jewish/Israeli lobby when you need one?

Channel 4 is even worse, if that were possible. Our own dear Melanie is not allowed to comment about Israel in her Daily Mail columns in case it frightens Middle England, and while any raving mad Islamic cleric is welcomed into Britain by such worthies as Ken Livingstone and Jack Straw, a pro-Israeli Dutch MP, elected by a fellow member state of the EU, has to creep in by the back door. At the second time of asking! Of course if you are a university teacher from Israel, even one who hates her government's policies, you get banned from speaking too at many universities. Better to be an Islamist, and spew out your hatred for everything that isn't you. That gets you a good hearing. So the dastardly Jews have not penetrated the education system yet. For God's sake, where is that damned Lobby? Too busy sucking childrens' blood and harvesting organs of Palestinians I suppose. Typical.

All this is clearly lost on Mr. Lyndsay. But no, it couldn't be.

He was just being ironic.

phil

Wilhelm please read what I have just written on the lesser pond life thread ,you might begin to understand what I am about ,neither left nor right ,just a guy who was brought up to care about others and that is a gift sadly lacking in too many who post here -I make no distinction between Christians Jews or Muslims ,just those who behave decently or otherwise and I make that call for myself .You like to be a joker but it is plain that you care ,I just would prefer you didn't need the bnp to help you .

Wilhelm

Phill

'' if you wrote sensibly like you have here we could be friends''

Aw, shucks, Phil, now you have embarrassed
me.

phil

Wilhelm.don*t worry it will make you a better person :))