Own goal

Mr. D

This really is a terribly fantastic piece. Usually, it is the smug Guardianistas smirking with their 'I must be right' pomposity. But on this occasion, I would not blame Melanie, since they really go to shoe it is an upside down world indeed.

Can't wait to read the book!

Nick

It's satire, Mel. I thought you approved of that sort of thing?

Personally I found it hilarious. There seems to be no need to read the book now.

Liz

The fact that the Grauniad has devoted an entire page to "reviewing" your book, proves how threatened they feel by you. Keep up the good work Melanie.

Peter A

I challenge anyone to read this piece to the end.

Harold

"He pretends insensibility to censure and criticism, though it was observed by all who knew him that every pamphlet disturbed his peace,and that his extreme irritability laid him open to perpetual vexation; but he wished to despise his criticks, and therefore hoped that he did despise them." Johnson on Pope.

Jetlagged

Does the guy actually get paid for writing such juvenile piffle?

ron

Havn't read the book but I think I getthe article:
The Jews are bad
The Israelis are bad
The zionists are bad
without them all the problems in the world would dissapear.
Not very original but will always get a Pavlovic nod of approvement from Guardian readers and other idealists.

Philip

Voltaire has a pithy response:

"I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: 'O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it."

Wilhelm

John Crace is a typical liberal Guardian smart arse, he thinks he's a comedian. He's not living in Israel which is on a 24 / 7 war footing surround by 1 Billion nutty muslims hell bent on Israels destruction.

Why does the left and the lame stream media have I.T.S which is Israel Tourette Syndrome ?

Murdoch MacMaster

I think he's got you bang to rights Mel.

Si, N

Peter A. - I passed your challenge. Very funny piece it is too...go on, swallow your prejudice and read to the end - what are you afraid of?

As the man says,in MP's world 'Black is white'.

What a hoot!

Nicholas Hallam

I think he forgets the rule that satire should be funny.

There may be a funny article to be written about Melanie's views - I can imagine Craig Brown making a decent fist of it - but this really is puerile.

In fact the level of humour shows that he has made no attempt to engage with Melanie's ideas, which I should have thought was the first step towards developing a decent parody.

RR

juvenilia - and was it supposed to be witty, ironic or what?

Fran

Well what would one expect from someone who ends his review of Yann Martel's Beatrice and Virgil

'Digested read, digested: The Holocaust can get stuffed.'

Keep up the great work Melanie.

Zeilig

If you seek to understand an accusation, look at
the accuser, not the accused.

ab

The Crace article is as humorous and elegant as a stupid juvenile prank born out of jealousy. The man is a bully who knows his audience. For anyone else, reading it is embarrassing. If that’s the best Crace can do and if he has no shame to publish it, one gets a pretty good measure of the man: a zero. And if a “reputable” paper publishes it, it shows you how far it has sank.

W. Smith

"It's satire, Mel. I thought you approved of that sort of thing?"

Oh, yes, truly a Swift de nos jours. It reads like the juvenalia found in a student newspaper and I imagine that I wasted only fractionally less time in reading it than he did in writing it: it's too slap-dash and exaggerated to be funny --- more a satire for a certain type of sixth-former (I'm thinking of those curious souls who will at the drop of a hat recite Monty Python sketches verbatim and ad nauseam).

...Do you really find it "hilarious" or are you being satirical too?

AussieMark

I don’t think I have ever read such a piece of trash (Guardian Article) in my life (though the articles in the radical Green Left Weekly are just as bad). My head is spinning, and I’m left is a rather perplexed state of mind. Am I going crazy, or did that article not make on ounce of sense? I think I will just go and bang my head against the wall now...

Baron Pippin II

piffle, the Guardian stuff, not worth commenting on

Mladen Andrijasevic

Melanie Phillips ends her book with:
“In repudiating Jewish teachings and its moral codes, the West has turned upon the modern world itself. In turning upon the State of Israel, the West is undermining its defenses against the enemies of modernity and the Western civilization that produced it. The great question is whether it actually wants to defend reason and modernity anymore, or weather Western civilization has now reached a point where it has stopped trying to survive.“

Apparently, many have not only stopped trying to survive. They are, like John Crace, already brain-dead.

Edward McLaughlin

Si, N

Well, I persevered with it, and I found it to be very revealing of the extent to which the blinkered left have come to realise the corner they have liberated themselves into.

Crace is fraught in the realisation of his moral bankruptcy.

Robert Page

Brilliant piece; oh, and another opportunity for Mel to post a link to her Amazon page.

Surely too good to miss.

Zachary

Is he serious? Not being from the UK, Perhaps I don't get the British sense of humor. To my US ears, Crace's humor is sophomoric. If serious, Crace makes ignorance look good.

JamesC

nick, Melanie does use satire from time to time. However this is done after she has introduce facts which she then uses to create a logical argument. She backs up her satire. John Crace makes no arguments here but only unsubstantiated statements. In short a bigot.

Olaf Rye

Good Lord, that was perhaps the worst and most pointless review I have ever read. The satire was idiotic and seemed to be directed more at a caricature of Daily Mail readers than Melanie's book. I am sure that a sophisticated and well reasoned criticism of her book is possible, which makes this sort of dross all the more peculiar.

Ann Magsalik

I am currently reading this book quite carefully - it makes depressing reading. I tried a little PG Wodehouse to cheer myself up but it only reminded me of a mythical world that perhaps never was and in any event is long gone. Curiously I found Psalm 1 more encouraging.

Shaun Harbord

Crace's piece is spot on - that's why so many of MP's supporters vilify it. The Own Goal is Phillips alerting people to it.

Augustus

Crass, puerile and stupid journalism, laced with a hidden and malicious agenda.

John Edwards

I thought John Crace's last sentence was particularly appropriate

Worried

I haven't read M's book nor the full review, but M is spot on in her overall point that the threat to our so far taken for granted freedoms is real. A single example: I know from direct communication that non Muslim Turks are very worried about the drift away from secularism in their country - something you do not hear about over the attacks on Israel.

zsa

Funny thing, before I came to your blog I googled your name and Mr. Crace's article popped up, so I clicked on it and read it. After reading it I thought wow, he just proved everything that she wrote. Jokes on him.

Jonathan Karmi

Melanie, you're too kind. This guy is way beyond "beyond pathetic". He's so far beyond, that the English language runs out of words to describe it.

david elder

Mel, get him posted to Israel. Or to over here in Australia. Both will know how to deal with him!

Rob-NY

The Guardian must be slipping. I am surprised they didn't hire Helen Thomas to review the book.

Mark Allinson

Ah, yes, Melanie, as you say, way beyond pathetic.

But below the pathetic under-graduate attempt at satire via hyper-hyperbole in this review, I detect a real sense of hysteria, almost to the degree of panic.

The inflated and detached ego of a person who needs to see himself as infallibly right and morally superior is a highly unstable thing, subject to many fears and doubts which, in order to protect that ego’s view of itself as perfect and correct, must be repressed, and so kept from awareness.

So any one who suggests to such a person that they might be wrong in their moral evaluations, and in effect be seeing the world upside down, will be treated as a profound threat to their sense of psychological security. This is why name-calling and rage is often the first response from these people, who perceive any opposition as a direct ontological threat, to be met with the strong emotions of fear and anxiety. This is why conservative speakers are regularly prevented from speaking at universities, where they are shouted down by Left-wing students. And this is one of the reasons why anxiety and panic-attacks are increasing in our society.

The childish emotion I detect behind this review is merely another expression of this fear reaction at the suggestion that the reviewer’s vision of reality might be challenged. The immature over-reaction in this review is indeed very revealing. A plague of egomania drives the Left wing of politics today.

Anth

You can judge a man by the enemies he makes. As we Aussies say, when you toss a rock into a chicken run, it's the chook that squawks that got hit, and John Crace sure is squawking ! It's a pity his writing is so garbled and devoid of wit : it's not funny enough to be satire, nor clever or original enough to be effective critique. I guess it's just plain vitriol : sickness for a sick audience. The last time I saw such a gratuitous and tasteless hatchet job was a face of Bob Dylan superimposed onto a hideously bloated Henry VIII (Charles Laughton) body in the early 80's. No comment at all - just a vile attempt to execrate the singer for daring to believe openly in Christ.
But as Dylan says :
"If the arrow is straight
And the point is slick,
It can piece through dust, no matter how thick".
Write on, Melanie !

Mrs.Josephine Hyde-Hartley

The thing to do, I think, might be to step back and try to think of a bigger perspective because otherwise what may really be a simple clash of paradigms, so to speak, will continue to cause ridicule and frustration all round which are no good to anybody. Perhaps we're beyond searching for "The great question" such as this one quoted (above) from the end of Melanie's book. Such a conurbation of unmentionable awfulness ie one's reasonable view of the seemingly intractable and permanently entrenched dualistic type positions being adopted by people who really should know different -might be better understood by the rest of us via a good motto, as some of the other commentators have noticed. I'm reminded of somebody famous who once said;

" Honi soit qui mal y pense" which roughly translated means "Shame unto him who speaks evil of it".

Miv Tucker

What really, really hurts is that people like Crace actually get paid money for writing that kind of drivel; and that an entire editorial staff also get paid for commissioning and publishing said drivel.

mark

Olaf Rye "I am sure that a sophisticated and well reasoned criticism of her book is possible, which makes this sort of dross all the more peculiar."
Spot on.
Trouble is I have not yet seen one. Neither I have I seen a positive comment that isn't laced with sycophancy, vitriol against the left and the same crudeness displayed by Crace.

Harold's quotation of Johnson is marvelous, just who do we believe it applies to?

Steve Lee, London

Melanie cannot see she holds the same sort of hands over eyes, fingers in the ears, blind prejudice against the BNP and the people who vote for them. Just like the Israelis, the English are trying to avoid being wiped out from their historic homeland.

David B. in Sydney

Can't imagine anyone of any political persuasion finding this article funny. As satire it fails. As criticism it misses.

wearenotblind

I have not read the book and I doubt that Crace did either. The "review" sounds like the reviews from the orthodox leftist press that greeted Mark Steyn's book America Alone. Not bad company to be in. I particularly liked the smug attitude of the review that anyone who would defend Israel is obviously unworthy of even being taken seriously. Israel being the one country on earth that is indefensible regardless of the situation seems to be a truth for some people no more open to debate than a triangle having 180 degrees. And this review by Mr. Crace will once and for all destroy the idea that British humor is oh so much more sophisticated than that which is churned out in America. Or maybe it is just over our itsy bitsy brains. My only question of the Guardian would be "did anybody even bother to read this before you published it?"

Diana Sydney

You cannot attribute reason to a bigot as is the case with Cace's article. Anyway, he must be fuming at the success and popularity of your book.
Keep them coming Melanie.

Simon Wolfendale, Israel.

He's got you bang on there. Brilliant piece. They could well be just a couple of pages ripped out of your masterpiece.
We should be told.

David SI

Mel,
I followed the link in your article and was genuinely interested in finding out what The Guardian would make of your book which I've read.

What a let down! Totally amazed at how puerile the review was .... No new facts offered, viewpoint argued or counterpoints made; Just a gush of schoolyard level sarcasm.... that's it! Complete let down ... Absolutely nothing in it apart from juvenile mockery!

Mel, why are you paying any attention to that level of review and reviewer?

Terry in Oz

To adapt a famous phrase from Fawlty Towers...."You'll have to forgive him, he's from the Guardian!"

But then the Guardian is to serious journalism what Fawlty Towers is to the hotel industry!!

Ros

While writing this drivel, Crace must have cracked himself up with his 'wit', 'incisiveness' and 'humour.' Sad really. And he gets paid for it?

Yehuda Rosenzweig

I wasn't planning on reading your book, but this review has persuaded me to. John Crace resorts to personal attacks, insinuating the mental instability of the author. The book was clearly too good for him to be able to confront the arguments in any coherent way. Smug, arrogant, unfunny, sheltered moron who has never emerged from his cosy little cocoon inhabited by friends and colleagues who share exactly the same bigoted sentiments as he does. We can all trade personal insults can't we, Johnny boy?

Geoff Miller

Some people here say they thought this was "satire" and that it was hilarious.

Well I love satire and hilarity but this piece was neither.

If I had written something like this in 5th form my mates would have laughed At me not With me.

Purile. I hope he wasn't paid.

But it does serve to show the intellectual maturity of the writer, his fans and the average Grauniad reader.

gary ashton

it's the guardian. typical really, dumbed down news and dumbed down journalists, dumbed down book reveiws and dumbed down reveiwers.
all for dumbed down people.

Robert Mitchum

Normally I read all your 'links' but to the Guardian?
No! I refuse to dignify that pathetically juvenile trash with even a minute of my time. I know what it will consist of anyway. I last read something in it some months ago. It was in the 'Comment Is Free' section and was so full of bile as to be unreadable, written by one of its brat columnists. Sorry Melanie but I do have standards.

Jon_Boy

Why even worry about it? It just proves that the political orthodoxy of that paper is all purvasive.

If the paper can't even undertake a simple book review without resorting to knee jerk political positions and standard practice tactical smears then there is obviously a scary and insiduous culture at the Guardian that is reminsicent of theocratic states like North Korea and Iran.

It makes you wonder if their TV guide sometimes possibly leaves out programs they politically disagree with?

Lizzy

Well played, Melanie. I'm reading your book at the moment. Crace's review is so bad it's genuinely embarrassing, even more so because his tone says he thinks this stuff is pretty damn good. More than pathetic alright.

Jonathan Hoffman

What a moronic piece by Crace. How typical of The Guardian. Take it as a compliment Melanie.

Joshua

Simon Wolfendale writes:

"He's got you bang on there. Brilliant piece. They could well be just a couple of pages ripped out of your masterpiece."

I've just looked up Mr. Wolfendale on Facebook. He also likes "George Galloway" and "International laws and UN resolutions broken by Israel". No surprise then that he has gone orgasmic over Crace's awful piece. Birds of a feather, quite obviously.

gareth

I finished reading the report and wanted to comment, but I had already forgotten what he wrote - bah!! I remember something about there being no oil on Eilat beaches.....ha ha - so funny.
you'd never guess the Guardian is losing 100,000 quid a day, and looking to get rid of it's journalists.
Perhaps they could hire Piers Morgan like those desperados at CNN.
Mel - note how he first dismissed you as being "clinically insane" as per Saul Alinsky rules. Destroy the Messenger, Kill the Debate!!!
Well - you are in good company in the asylum with Newton, Einstein et al, and all those who could hold opposing views in their mind at the same time.

uncle tobias

Why weren't The Guardian, Harold and chums laughing at The Flotilla Choir (Harold, see below, was very upset by that video, almost as much as Channel 4 News was)?

Could it be that it's because that satire was based on truth?

"We are peaceful travellers
With guns and our own knives"

Painful, isn't it, Harold? They snatched guns and brought their own knives.

They were even able to use footage from the incident.

So where's the reality to John Crace's satire?

Oh, look.

There is none.

He couldn't deal with the reality of Mel's book and so spent a whole page putting words into her mouth – just like they do in the allegedly serious comment pages on that rag. So much for variety of writing style!

Could this monotonous stream of cerebrally-challenged prose be why The Guardian lost £38 million last year?

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/180373/Guardian-Media-Group-report-huge-losses

I don't know. I'm too busy laughing.

And when I think I might be about to bust a rib laughing at that, I've got to hold my diaphragm in as I remind myself that's even before the axe falls on all of the hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayer-funded advertising that New Labour handed The Guardian.

I'll give that one to Rusbridger - he had a laugh at our expense on that one.

Mind you, if the public wouldn't dream of paying for such drivel, I suppose we coudn't expect better of The Guardian than to fall back on the old socialist principe of forcing us all to pay for it through our taxes.

But that's going to change now. So must try harder, Mr Crace. £38 million harder to be precise.

Now get back to work. That rag won't lose money by itself. You'll have to fill it with third-rate tat before it will do that.

Dan T

Makes it sound much better than the Amazon reviews. Will have to get a copy when its in paperback.

Dr Michael Salt

Fantastic piece, I agree. Nothing exemplifies the venal stupidity and bigotry of the Guardian better. I blush when I recall that I used to read that disgusting hate-rag. The good news is that of all my Guardianista friends, not a single one reads it any more.

Claire

Not that Crace's piece is especially clever or funny, but haven't any of you asked yourself why you have reacted so much to it? Struck a nerve, perhaps?

And just because it criticises Melanie's somewhat biased opinions about Israel, doesn't mean ALL GUARDIAN READERS ACTUALLY HATE ISRAEL.

Don't use one journalist's averagely written piece as proof of the stupidity of a whole paper's readership. I wouldn't assume you lot were as misguided as Melanie. Or at least I certainly hope not....

Timac

I read it yesterday.

I don't always agree with your views, melanie, but I was incensed enough to complain to the Guardian about it. It was a nasty piece of writing.

Groovy Times

I think what Crace would like us to believe is that he is the intellectual and moral nemesis of Melanie Phillips, a tour-de-force in critical thinking who wouldn't stoop so low as to actually engage with any of Melanie's arguments.

What it actually proves to us is that Crace suffers from delusions of grandeur, his moral and intellectual superiority are mere constructs of his own mind. His review is only amusing when he has proven to his readership that he is capable of demolishing Melanie's arguments through reason, rather than sanctimonious, self-serving sloganeering. In other words Crace needs to put his money where his mouth is, otherwise we are left with the impression that his vacuous opinions are built on arrogance rather than substance.

Campbell Gray

People - catch a grip! It wasn't a review, it wasn't a 'reasoned arguement'. He has been just as rude about some fairly major lefties.

dougal

It's not a review.

Gerry C

I'm reminded of the reaction of the old rabbi to his college-educated son after the young man enthused to his father about Einstein's paper on The Special Theory of Relativity: "And from this he makes a living?!"

Morris

Not so amazing stuff from Crace and his ilk No wonder the Guardian has such a pathetically poor readership.

Margaret Muller-Johansson

Melanie you are a hero.

Merseymike

Anything but an own goal, Melanie - its screamingly funny. If only you had one iota of self awareness you would realise just how you appear to people who recognise your paranoid anger for the nonsense it is

josoap

Merseypike - explain.

Carl

More stalking by the Cif watch creeps:

"I've just looked up Mr. Wolfendale on Facebook. He also likes "George Galloway" and "International laws and UN resolutions broken by Israel". No surprise then that he has gone orgasmic over Crace's awful piece. Birds of a feather, quite obviously."

And yes moderator, I know that you won't have the balls to publish this, but that is a matter for your conscience, not mine.

Harold

uncle tobias
June 16th, 2010 1:42pm

""We are peaceful travellers
With guns and our own knives"

Painful, isn't it, Harold? They snatched guns and brought their own knives."

Here we have that rare thing, propaganda changing before our very eyes. - They were armed with guns...they threw their guns overboard before they could use them... they disarmed our soldiers, yes, that's what they did...they turned our soldiers' own weapons on them, the terrorists...okay, they disarmed our soldiers and emptied their magazines onto the deck..and, yes, threw the weapons overboard or hid them to produce later as evidence...but you can't prove any of this, because we've confiscated/destroyed your evidence, and our evidence we edit and we doctor...

And they had knives! on a ship! knives!

Apparently a BIC razor was also produced in evidence.

So, what was the joke - the Jerusalem Post's deputy editor and her chums, or the official Israeli version of events, or both?

Frank Sutton

Well, what do you expect?
The Guardian is the paper that also employs the witless Steve Bell

Michael

It was funny. Showed the contempt your laughable tome deserves to be held in.

Carry on.

Adam B.

Is Crace meant to be a professional writer? This is juvenile and hollow garbage. It also has a whiff of antisemitism.

H Montfort

I read the 1st sentence of Mr Crace’s review. I paused. Suddenly it came to me, might Mr Crace have been inebriated? I decided to put this idea to test. I had 5 strong cocktails, and then rested for half an hour. I read the rest of it. I gagged. To Whom It May Concern; if you imbibe before writing, please be sick somewhere else.

Adam B.

Harold, the claim about the bic razor was made by Mankell, a longstanding Communist (apologist for every Communist dictatorship) who has a history of Israel bashing. Pardon me if I take his "word" with a pinch of salt. Funny he didn't see the antisemitic chanting which one can see on Youtube, nor did he see the interviews of the passengers declaring their intention to become shaheeds ("martyrs"), nor did he know three of the six ships were from the IHH, a jihadist terror supporting group, linked to the attempted bombing of Los Angeles airport. He didn't see or hear the comments telling the Jewish sailors to "Go back to Auschwitz", nor the comments celebrating 9/11. Two Israeli soldiers were shot, and others were stabbed. This was not done with a bic razor. This is verifiable information, because the soldiers were in hospital with these wounds. The aid was so desperately needed in Gaza that Hamas has turned it away.

Don't you just love those "peace" (jihad) activists?

Joshua

"More stalking by the Cif watch creeps"

No, this was research. Stalking is when I gain access to your medical records and discover that you really are barmy.

Frank P

The antidote: Mark Steyn, standing on his head in order to get the true perspective of the Upside Down World then describing it in pristine prose:

http://www.steynonline.com/content/view/3401/59/

Truthtriumphs

Carl.
"More stalking by the CiFwatch creeps".
You're obviously rattled--- can't take a bit of dissent from the GWV (Guardian World View)--- is that it?
Why do the Guardianistas get so cross with anyone who departs from their hallowed script?
Oh, I forgot, they, and only they have the right to decide the parameters of debate.
And in the department of showing them up for who they really are, no one, but no one does it better than Mark Steyn.
Mark, if you're following this, carry on taking the Guardian and their "journalists" to the cleaners--- simultaneously revealing and hugely entertaining!

Mark

Hello Melanie,
I read your book "Londonistan" and admired it very much. I also read last weekend this article/satire/humour attempt by John Crace in the Guardian. I am astounded that the editors let it through. What were they thinking of? Looking forward to the new book by the way!

roger

I recommend Pieter Toypom's review of Melanie's new book on Amazon.co.uk. His other reviews are also excellent providing very useful suggestions for further reading.

Bryan White

Umm, Mel. It's a joke. It's a series called Digested Read, which satirises a new book. It's nothing personal.

Shaun Harbord

Crace has obviously hit the target. hence the indignation of MP and her claque. Good for Crace.

Peter

Having so far read about a third of Melanie's book, I consider it to be an incredibly well-researched and reasoned piece of work. We need more of this to expose what passes as conventional wisdom these days. The Guardian article is the very antithesis of this - just the sort of rubbish one would expect from the Guardian. As Melanie says: "Own goal".

General Zod

From the title, I thought this must be an article about Israel's miscalculation in killing nine people in stopping the flotilla.

(only kidding, I actually thought it would be an article torturing logic to argue that Western commentators' criticism of Israel constitues an own goal)

Adam B.

Harbord, on the contrary. The fact that people like Crace are reduced to writing such hollow snyde silly pieces, with substanceless but hateful comments by people like you, show that Melanie is indeed hitting the nerves of those who have been behind the moral inversion in which we live.

Lucashyde

Am reading the book now. What a breath of fresh air. Thanks Melanie.

Colin Harrison

I've read some this author's parodies before and never been impressed. They always seem unnecessarily childish, conceited and glib.

However, the fact that you misappropriate such satirical writing as being "reasoned argument" is perhaps unsurprising...

David Booth

When John Crace stoops too snide comments about Melanie Phillips instead of discussing the points she has raised , he is doing what is known in football parlance as tackling the man and not the ball, and is a sign of a crap player, or in Crace's case a crap writer.

Ronnie

Thank you all for this insight into life in the bunker.

George Marklow

Melanie,

I've just finished reading your new book and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was good to read something interesting after my maths degree exams this summer.

Keep up the good work!

P.S. Thanks for your recommendations on Israel books. The Case for Israel was a good read.

George Marklow

uncle tobias

What's that, Harold?

You don't like the video tape that shows the soldiers coming under attack?

Well, that's just tough.

As evidence changing before your very eyes for propaganda purposes. That would be Al Reuters cropping photos to remove knives used by the 'peace activists'.

http://www.speroforum.com/a/34500/Reuters-admits-to-doctored-photos-of-Gaza-Flotilla

I've got the photos and the video, Harold.

What do you have?

Manuel

Hilarious! Love it.. I saw it the other day and immediately circulated it to all my friends, I'm glad you're doing the same! It was spot on

Australians for Non-Bigoted Thinking

Would it be asking too much if John Crace ACTUALLY READ YOUR BOOK BEFORE REVIEWING IT !, or must he just cherry pick out of context some phrases, to support his self-confirmation bias that you represent only what he wants you to be.

P.S.

Your book and other excellent tomes that you have penned should be compulsory reading in schools and universities. It would be heartening if students could hear a well argued, eloquently written, and factual alternative, to the Left Group Thinking, West Hating, and Antisemitic Misinformation, that is suppose to constitute an education.

Keep up the good work Melanie.

My Heroine

Harold

uncle tobias
June 17th, 2010 3:12pm

I have yet to find anyone who disputes that, as the soldiers attacked the Turkish ship, they met resistance from people wielding knives and bars. Just to be clear, the ship was flying the Turkish flag. Its crew had every right to resist attack. So your footage is neither here nor there. There is dispute about just about everything else - like what happened before and after the soldiers descended from the helicopters. And Israel's version changes in the telling. As I said, the Israeli propaganda machine in overdrive to portray and illegal attack as self-defence is as absurd in its way as the terribly comical video about people pretending to get bullets through the head.

Nick

Here's an interesting snippet, courtesy of Ben Goldacre - "Adam Curtis has found this documentary: on a 1947 jewish ship trying to break the British blockade of Palestine http://dlvr.it/1mjCK

Definitely worth a read.

Gerry C

Just found this apposite remark on another forum: "Everybody is in favour of free speech. Hardly a day passes without its being extolled. But some peopleâ™s idea of it is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage." - Winston Churchill Of course Winnie was just another Yank-lover who didn't understand that only Guardianistas know the truth...

Archie

Well, Miss Phillips, if that's satire Guardian-style, give me Monty Python any day!

Adam B.

Harold, Israel had every legal right to intercept the ship and board it. In addition, I note you simply avoid answering the points about the IHH, the antisemitic chanting, the desire of the passengers to becomer shaheeds, and the injuries of the Israeli soldiers. At one point the activists formed a circle around the Israeli on the ground and repeatedly beat him mercilessly. Was that "resisting"? Rodney King anyone?

Trumpeldor

Harold
June 17th, 2010 4:36pm
uncle tobias
June 17th, 2010 3:12pm

I have yet to find anyone who disputes that, as the soldiers attacked the Turkish ship, they met resistance from people wielding knives and bars. Just to be clear, the ship was flying the Turkish flag. Its crew had every right to resist attack. So your footage is neither here nor there. There is dispute about just about everything else - like what happened before and after the soldiers descended from the helicopters. And Israel's version changes in the telling. As I said, the Israeli propaganda machine in overdrive to portray and illegal attack as self-defence is as absurd in its way as the terribly comical video about people pretending to get bullets through the head.

Your lack of knowledge in maritime laws is appalling...
Just browse using google and look for SAN REMO MARITIME TREATY !
Flying the Turkish flag did not make the ship immune from legitimate Israeli control in the international waters !

Hoob

You go girl!

postergirl

Melanie, thank you for your excellent new book with its valuable insights. You have gone a long way in helping me understand what's ailing our society. I am very encouraged by your work. Keep it up - in the end, truth triumphs.

Augustus

A comment from the link to the book:

"In the chapter 'The Revival of Christian-
Jew Hatred' the author (rightly, in my opinion) directs her wrath specifically against the Anglican church and more generally against liberal protestantism for their recent habit of making excuses for radical Islam even as they excoriate Israel." And there are a lot of things to make excuses for: Suicide attacks, no-go areas, incest, genital mutilation, honour killings, explosive increase in numbers, sectarian violence, rejection of democratic values, stoning of people for adultery not criticised, laws against adoption, marriage
to children, persecution of homosexuals, enslavement of people, beheadings, destruction of religious houses, honouring
of leaders who committed genocide, and more.

Dixon

"Gerry C
June 16th, 2010 6:17pm
I'm reminded of the reaction of the old rabbi to his college-educated son after the young man enthused to his father about Einstein's paper on The Special Theory of Relativity: "And from this he makes a living?!""

To which was replied: "No, from this he makes atom bombs".

Gerry, your viewpoint I can agree with but not how you put it.Comparing an obvious dimwit to Einstein. What are you thinking of?

Meanwhile, Claire says :
"And just because it criticises Melanie's somewhat biased opinions about Israel, doesn't mean ALL GUARDIAN READERS ACTUALLY HATE ISRAEL. "

Is she a send-up or seriously unaware of how the first part of that statement contradicts the second part? Doh! Of course, so many people use irony on these comments boards that one can never tell. But hey, she makes the same blunder twice:
"
Don't use one journalist's averagely written piece as proof of the stupidity of a whole paper's readership. I wouldn't assume you lot were as misguided as Melanie. Or at least I certainly hope not...."

Hilarious!

Harold

Trumpeldor
June 17th, 2010 6:50pm

Show me where the treaty says (with surprising foresight) that a blockade is legal if Israel says it is regardless of international law, and where it says that Israel can invade the sovereign territory of others whenever it feels the urge to make a statement about terrorism by shooting people in the head.

Adam B.

Harold, anything to avoid engaging with the points put to you.

Come on, you need to do better.

Gerry C

@ Dixon 11.18 pm Apologies if I didn't make it clearer. I certainly was not comparing Einstein to whatever-his-name-is. Einstein is one of my heroes: anyone who can come up with the statement that "God does not play dice with the universe" is worthy of admiration quite apart from his astonishing work in physics. No: my notion was centred on bemusement: whatever-his-name-is can write what appears to me (poor uneducated non-Guardian-reading soul that I am)to be incomprehensible tosh and make money from it! No wonder The Grauniad is in the red!! (The story about the rabbi, BTW, appears in Leo Rosten's book The Joys Of Yiddish: an erudite and entertaining guide to that language, and a well of wisdom for a gentile such as myself.)

phil

Harold
June 17th, 2010 11:30pm
Harold your nose is now within touching distance of the floor !! As for crace -lets just face the facts -it is a demonstration of writing that is fit for an old edition of Der Sturmer .nothing less.

John Thomas

I have a fantasy and a formerly-secret, ultimate desire: to have an article in the Guardian rubbishing me, saying I'm dreadful. It would be the supreme accolade, greater than any Nobel prize or anything; for then, surely, with no possibility of doubt whatever, would I truly know that I had been doing something right, that truth, somehow, was mine ...

Dynamo

Posters who deny Israel's right to frustrate possible arms deliveries to a belligerent by boarding ships and inspecting cargoes in international waters are substituting intuition for knowledge. A possible reason for this is that they are too lazy to consult reference material.

Thomas

"Adam B.
June 18th, 2010 12:40am
Harold, anything to avoid engaging with the points put to you.

Come on, you need to do better."

I have only just noticed this gem.

On an earlier thread I quoted questions Uri Avnery said any proper inquiry into Israel's piracy would have to answer.

This Adam B. "engaged" with the questions thus (I paraphrase only slightly): Ooh, such a lot of questions! Someone must like the sound of his own voice.

Adam B.

Thomas

Harold has refused to acknowledge that there was antisemitic chanting on the flotilla, that three of the ships were chartered by a jihadist group, the IHH, which is linked to the attempted bombing of Los Angeles airport, that the passengers said they wished to become shaheeds ("martyrs", thus promising violence before even embarking), and told Jewish sailors to "go back to Auschwitz" whilst celebrating the 9/11 terror attacks.

Maybe this is OK with you and Harold. It is not to any decent human being.

Your post was ridiculously long, with dozens of "questions". Do you really expect someone to spend literally hours answering them all?

Thomas

Ooh! Too many questions to read any. Too many questions to answer any. (They might have proved awkward.)

Topics for casuistry practice:

- which is worse? supporting the "wrong" cause and shouting bad things? or violating another country's sovereignty and shooting its citizens in the head? Hmm.

- which looks more like terrorism? sailing a ship in international waters, armed with iron bars, knives, and a BIC razor, carrying a cargo of humanitarian aid past its sell-buy date? or firing on a ship in international waters, boarding it, killing and injuring its passengers and crew, and stealing their belongings? Hmm.

- which is more like humbug? taking humanitarian aid (past its sell-by date) to an imprisoned population? or imposing a "blockade" which seeks to prevent arms smuggling by placing an embargo on medicine, crayons, cummin (or is cummin now allowed?), most other foodstuffs, most other goods of any sort..., and claiming that the "blockade" has produced teeming markets and prsoperity so what is all the fuss about? and the Egyptians are just as bad and no-one complains about them why is it always Israel gets picked on when it kills and starves terrorists its a worldwide conspiracy a pogrom? Hmm.

Augustus

Thomas, it's you who are past your sell-by date. On Thursday the Israeli Security Cabinet decided to lighten the blockade
and allow all goods which pose no security threat into Gaza.

Amidst all the criticism of Israel by Turkey against Palestinian terrorism, it shot 130 PKK terrorists on Friday, and actually used Israeli weapons to do so, even though Erdogan had announced a freeze on all Israeli defence contracts. The hypocrisy is truly amazing.

Thomas

"Augustus
June 20th, 2010 5:48pm
Thomas, it's you who are past your sell-by date. On Thursday the Israeli Security Cabinet decided to lighten the blockade
and allow all goods which pose no security threat into Gaza."

Doh!

- And these goods ("which pose no security threat!) were subject to embargo because...? They had what to do with arms smuggling...? The Israeli Security Cabinet (if that is what they like to call themselves) has admitted what has previously been denied by the Israeli government and their faithful echoes here.

The story may change however many times, but, if Israel says it, it must be true, if Israel does it, it must be right.

And still you manage to be self-righteous.

Adam B.

Sorry Thomas, was there a question somewhere in your latest rant?

I find it hard to engage with someone who you can actually hear shouting through typed words. Calm down, then we can talk.

One point: the Israeli soldiers suffered gunshot wounds, stab wounds, and were battered. This was not achieve with a bic razor - so don't be so silly.

Thomas

Adam B.
June 20th, 2010 11:07pm

Rich.

Harold

Adam B.
June 20th, 2010 11:07pm

Look at that - he's managed to evade "engaging" again. Respect.

It also turns out that the soldiers were hurt violating the sovereign territory of another country, which somehow makes their actions right. Remarkable.

Adam B.

Harold, there was no "violation", becuase the partial blockade is legal, as is its enforcement.

As for Turkey's bombing raids in northern Iraq against Kurdish civilians...

Adam B.

A final "humpf!" from Thomas!

Harold

It is so easy to rule by fiat: Israel says, "It is legal" and, lo, it is legal. It allows Israel to disragard the "international community", the institutions of international law, or international law itself, which Israel purports to subscribe to.

No wonder Thomas got fed up waiting for honest answers.

Harold

And so easy to avoid "engaging" with questions you don't want to consider: "was there a question somewhere in your latest rant? " Rule by fiat - "no question can be detected here, so no answer is required." Easy. No need to do anything so vulgar as try to win the argument by reason.

Dr Paul Fidlon

"Wrap with Love" is a volunteer group set up by the NSW Arts and Crafts Society to knit woollen wraps for, among other countries, Gaza (Palestine). It doesn't seem to bother "Wrap with Love" that they are supporting Hamas, a terrorist organisation proscribed in Australia.

Adam B.

Harold.

If I ask you 80 questions, as Harold did, will you answer them?

The partial blockade is not illegal, no one but extreme lefties and jihadists say it is. Which category are you in?

Grow up.

Harold

If the questions exceed a certain number, or are excessively awkward, we are not to expect an answer to any one of them.

If anyone disagrees with Israel's fiat on what is legal, then they must be lefties or jihadis, like the ICJ.

It is an honour to witness such virtuosity in the arts of casuistry and avoidance.

Adam B.

Harold, I'll just pick the ones I want to answer then.

I'm sure you'd be content with that.

Harold

Ooh! answers! ...

Ben Maharey

You know, its funny that all you people got so upset about it. Regardless of whether its well so well written, it shouldn't make you all so upset.

It is satire. The digested read series are worth reading, they only take 2 minutes - and they are not 'reviews' in any sense.

Stop being so pompous people!