Grave of academe

Ann

Shocking indeed. Describing Israel as a 'European colonial outpost' that 'subjugates the indigenous population' is one of the worst indictments I have ever seen of the abysmal 'intellectual' stature of today's so-called acaedmic institutions.

patricia

Or we could of course focus on Israel’s deliberate entrapment of UK students with Palestinian origins in Gaza - a 'closure policy' that violates fundamental principles of international law which prohibits collective punishment.

Or the World Bank report criticising Israel for breaking up the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT) into “cantons” and curtailing Palestinian freedom of movement through impeding access to “work, school, shopping, healthcare facilities and agricultural land.”

Or the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights' agreement with Jimmy Carter, Archbishop Desmond Tutu in comparing Israel to apartheid South Africa.

Or the US State Departmen's 2001 report that found Israel guilty of ensuring that Palestinian citizens of Israel are continually subjected to discrimination in education, housing, and employment.

It takes two, Melanie.

roGER

"antisemitism is little more than a 'tactic' used by "Zionists" in bad faith to silence debate."

Absolutely 100% correct.

Sam Dempster

This came up when I tried to read the article on Harry's place
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jose garcia

yeah..... poor palestinians

all those billions in aid and all they can do with it is blow out jews.

And what about the entrapment of jews behind a wall because of all the suicide bombers in the markets and cafes?

Patricia you are a sad bigot you dont care about palestnians you only care about destroying israel.

palestinians dont care about themselves either, they just blind with jihad.

this is a genocide who has been going on since 1947.

and guess what ? you been losing for 60 years.

LilyS

jose garcia: are you the same person as 'phil' (from countless other threads)? You have extremely similar writing/formatting styles...

I kinda think you might be phil's less 'middle-ground' persona. For when he wants to say something a bit more forceful. Am I right?

Ann

Either way, he makes a lot more sense than ignorant bigots like Patricia and Roger.

phil

lily s you will never make a detective -just stick to writing nonsense -I have no clue to jose,e identity and I WILL CONTINUE TO WRITE "MIDDLE GROUND" SO LONG AS LUNATICS LIKE PATRICIA ARE ABOUT-sad to see she is back from her honeymoon with sorething-both last seen carrying whips as souvenirs for placing under chins-smile Jose there are nutters about

Gary

Melanie,
If I were Jewish living in the UK I would pack up and leave. What is the Jewish establishment doing to combat this insanity?

david s

"antisemitism is little more than a 'tactic' used by "Zionists" in bad faith to silence debate."

if someone calls me a greedy jew then i am guilty of silencing his debate on the greediness of Jews by calling him an antisemite.
In other words Jews not only have no right to self defence against physical attack of terrorists but have also no reight to defence aagainst verbal attacks

Barry

Patricia,

"a 'closure policy' that violates fundamental principles"
So why does Egypt not open its border with Gaza?

"Or the World Bank report criticising Israel ...."
Why not read up on UN criticism of Israel in the 70s when it started building decent housing for Palestinians in Gaza, constructing proper roads, piped water and installed electricity, built health clinics and a hospital (until Oslo and Arafat's re-appearance the Palestinians had the best health statistics in the Arab world), apart from educational infrastructure, you know, those universities that exist in the West Bank etc?
The beginning of the "Oslo Peace" process saw the creation of industrial parks on the Israel/Gaza border to enable the locals to have work and not have to travel several hours to their place of work, only to have Hamas and Islamic Jihad, shoot and bomb them into closure.

As for "the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights' " John Dugard, well what can one say except use the word hypocrite, because as professor of Law in Johannesburg at the height of Apartheid he should know better
(as should Tutu who was a minister for the Anglican Church in Johannesburg in the 60s and 70s) than anyone in that there are no laws in Israel that are like those enacted in South Africa.
As for Carter and Tutu, well they have the typical Christian attitude to Jews as displayed by the Anglican clerics Riad et al and their Sabeel group..
Carter has a very personal problem reconciling the fact that Jesus was a Jew
and died a Jew.

"Palestinian citizens of Israel are continually subjected to discrimination in education, housing, and employment."

Now that is the biggest load of whatever stinks.
Firstly the Arabs living in Israel have autonomy of their religion, education and local government i.e. they alone administer their mosques, clerics, schools, towns and villages.
Maybe you should have a long chat with Irene Lancaster about "discrimination in education" for the Arabs. Especially Haifa University.
So how do we explain the Arabs who are in the diplomatic corps, the Supreme Court Judge, and others, the professors at the Universities, the Heads of departments in the hospitals and the gamut of hi-tec professionals, lawyers and accountants working alongside the Jews in Israel?

Melanie's words are spot on because they bring out comments like yours which expose the thuggish disregard for fact, context and honesty be it from the media and education you face or your own mindset.

Harvey

That Ann...

You gotta laugh.

Or possibly not.

phil

Barry well written but sadly you waste your time with the woman,she sinks to depths never before recorded -you are just responding to a woman who lies on any subject to do with Jews or Israel and spews out hate at any opportunity -if I were you I would just ignore her ,there are a lot more worthy people who post here and would be interested in your research

Andy Gill

@roGER
"antisemitism is little more than a 'tactic' used by "Zionists" in bad faith to silence debate."

And that is a claim used by closet anti-semites. Funny they never say the same thing said about Islamophobia isn't it?

Cara

"What is the Jewish establishment doing to combat this insanity?"

You're right, Gary. Melanie has touched upon this in her columns for the Jewish Chronicle and in her web-only writings.

I'm not Jewish myself, but it is important for Jews themselves - and the rest of society if decency is to be defended - that they do defend themselves from this spite. Melanie seems to think there is a softly, softly approach for fear of stirring up more antipathy towards Jews, but it's not working, is it?

People such as myself mainly become aware of issues around Jewish and Israel, through mainstream comentators such as Melanie, but there need to be more people like her or I don't see things improving.

It's not enough to simply sit back and hope things will look after themselves - the attacks Jews face must be articulated to the broader public if we're to see and understand what's going on.

Ann

Andy, not so sure about 'closet'.

Cara, I agree. Melanie is doing the work of a dozen people in this area. There is also exposure of BBC antisemitism on Biased BBC. The more this problem is out in the open, the more pressure on the BBC, the more pressure on the police and their masters to act, the better the prognosis.

Si, N

Barry, it’s clear from your writing that when you speak of ‘context and honesty’ you of course exempt yourself from having to apply the same standards. You failed to mention two important overarching facts: the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and the ongoing occupation of Palestinian land. By the way, ongoing means that the occupation is still happening and the theft of land continues apace. Your failure to attend to such crucial contextualisation leaves you looking a bit silly really.

Also, your attempt to correct another poster is somewhat problematic.

You ask, ‘why does Egypt not open its border with Gaza’ – well had you been paying attention you’d understand that, despite the theatrics, Israel has effectively retained control of the Rafah crossing.

(why not brush up, others on this thread rely on your ‘research’, and we wouldn’t want them to appear any sillier than they do presently: to begin with try http://www.btselem.org/english/gaza_strip/rafah_crossing.asp)

It’s similar to that other masterstroke of deception, the Gaza disengagement ploy; smoke and mirrors to distract from the ever tightening screw – you will recall Dov Weisglass saying, ‘the idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger’, well guess what – he meant it. Now that’s what I call honesty. Such candidness helps us to recognise the weasel words of apologists like you.

Your account of an imagined Golden Era of Israeli benevolence is very amusing – are you in comedy?

About your appraisal of John Dugard – caution is advised – using the word ‘Apartheid’ when discussing this conflict is a no no – like Carter, you may find yourself ostracised.

You point out that ‘Arabs living in Israel have autonomy’ over their institutions - though if you imagine that life in Israel for any Arab is run-of-the-mill then your delusion runs deep. Understand this, there’s a sinister reason for that ‘autonomy’; it’s entirely based on ‘discrimination’ – you see, Israel is a Jewish State – run by Jews for Jews. You ask, ‘how do we explain the Arabs’ that attain a professional standing in Israel; well they’re the exception to the rule of course. And as Patricia rightly pointed out, Arabs in Israel are routinely subjected to discriminatory practices. If I were you I’d stick with nitpicking about ill grammar and typos. Alternatively, you could join the baseline chorus bleating on about antisemitism. Whatever, just stay clear of the documentary record, it damns your arguments.

Cara, the ‘establishment’ you refer to bears a great deal of responsibility for the continuing ‘insanity’ – it really needs to have a dialogue with itself – it sure as hell won’t talk to anybody else – bloody minded intransigence, despite the wishes of Sderot’s citizens, and direct, Carter brokered appeals from Hamas. Sadly, your understanding of this conflict is informed by ‘commentators such as Melanie Phillip’s’ - I urge you to read more widely on the subject – try looking at the reports of the manifold human rights and health organisations, their’s is an honest and exhaustive coverage of the realities of the occupation: torture, murder, mass murder, home demolitions, arbitrary detention of men, women and children, denial of water, collective punishment, rocket fire into Israel, illegal expansionism, etc… You see, that sure is a terrible litany – and apart from the rockets fired at Israel, the mainstream consensus on this site refuses to acknowledge that such awful crimes are commonplace. In fact, those crimes are necessary to sustain the ongoing occupation.

And if we are being honest, here’s the rub – the occupation – Whistleblower knows that. He says:

‘bad jews are also “Zionists” because even if they criticize the Israeli occupation of the West Bank they nonetheless accept the existence of the state on pre-1967 borders’.

That ‘even’ says it all really – the occupation is the central issue, but supporters of Israel can barely acknowledge that fact, let alone ‘criticize’ it. Now that presents a considerable barrier to debate – those that recognise the brutality of the occupation have difficulty contending with arguments that pre-suppose Israeli irreproachability.

Finally Melanie, I’m agog at your complaint about the ‘shocking taster’ provided by the reader’s comments to the guest post. Do you follow the responses to your own commentary? Are you aware of the murderous hatred you inspire? I’ve read people on this site calling for the carpet bombing of Gaza and the West Bank for God’s sake. There’s a regular poster here who denies there is such a thing as a Palestinian, or Palestine for that matter. Which is fair enough, we can’t force X to accept the chosen nomenclature of Y, that’s X’s business – of course, X’s stance is racist. And when that stance is adopted in order to facilitate or excuse an ethnic cleansing, I’d say that is a ‘shocking taster’ - of what I dread to think - maybe the holocaust as promised by the genteel Mr. Vilnai?

Resume bleating

Ann

"the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and the ongoing occupation of Palestinian land" - two overarching lies trotted out by Jew-haters. And the reference to 'holocaust', which Vilnai never said, is another such antisemitic lie. As Goebbels said: "Keep repeating the big lie, and eventually people (or he may have said, ignorant sheep-like airheads) will believe it". He was talking about this kind of lie.

phil

just a little reminder for patricia and roger -and only for the sake of clarity,hence my disdain for you both

You declare that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely anti-Zionist.
And I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountaintops, let it echo
through the valleys of God s green earth: when people criticize Zionism,
they mean Jews.

Lecture by Martin Luther King, Harvard University, 1968

Ann

Most of the so-called 'anti-Zionists' don't even know what Zionism means; they used it merely as a term of abuse. Of course, by doing so they actually reveal that they are Jew-haters, given the meaning of the word ...

Si, N

Actually prime bleater it's you that appears to have no true conception of what Zionism means and what it entailed - that much is evident from your inability to comprehend that Palestinians (Arabs) were ethnically cleansed from land on which they lived in order to clear the way for the Zionist project. The Zionists themselves said that an ethnic cleansing would be necessary to realise the project - and guess what? They meant it - once again, the lack of truth in what you say is easily exposed - we simply need to recall what the founders of Zionism actually said. (Don't ask for evidence, I'm not going to supply it again - simply remove your head from the sand)

On the subject of definitions - whilst the Zionist concept is not particularly difficult to grasp, you are clearly struggling. Why don't you first try to gain an understanding of words such as honesty, decency and compassion. Maybe then you will see why the resultant 'facts on the ground' problematise the notion of a benign Zionism.

In the mean time, won't somebody with a little influence on this site reign her in - really, she's an embarrassment to you all.

roGER

Phil, that Martin Luther King quote is fraudulent. He never said it, he never wrote it.

It appears some Zionist twit felt the need to invent it about 10 years ago.

Ann

Anyone ranting about 'ethnic cleansing' is in no position to talk about embarrassment. There was no ethnic cleansing. Oh, hang on, I forgot - those Arab professors at Haifa university, those Arab senior surgeons at many Israeli hospitals - they are really Jewish Mossad agents pretending to be Arabs.
Will someone reign in this clown, he is an embarrassment to your side.
Roger is no better. Whether or not MLK said it, it's true: Zionism, for the benefit of the slow of thinking here, is the belief that the Jews are entitled to their own independent country in their homeland, just like every other nation. Those who object to this idea are Jew haters by definition. Work it out with a little diagram.

Si,N

'Oh, hang on, I forgot - those Arab professors at Haifa university, those Arab senior surgeons at many Israeli hospitals - they are really Jewish Mossad agents pretending to be Arabs'.

What? You think that because some 'Arabs' are alive today that an ethnic cleansing never happened - Christ you're ignorant, and craven to boot. I'd say, based on your overt Arab hatred, you would prefer it if there were no Arabs. In praise of an honest Zionist, I'll give Benny Morris his dues - not only has he been instrumental in rescuing the historic record of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine - he also has the courage of his convictions and is unafraid to say that he wished the Zionists had done a more thorough job. Whereas you and your ilk are merely spineless apologists - you hide behind the fevered imaginings of your own personal victim-hood and blithely wash your hands of the blood of the real victims - the Palestinians and Israelis that suffer under the ongoing occupation.

You’re a disgrace.

Ann

I am proud to be called a 'disgrace' by ignorant antisemites. I must be doing something right. You've made my evening.

phil

to si-- n I have never before defended anns way with words but this (below) from you is beyond the pale -IT IS IN FACT YOU WHO IS THE EMBARRASSMENT ON THIS SITE .THE TRUTH SEEMS BEYOND YOU -and the way to peace is marred by you and your like-you patricia, roger sorething et al only escalate the hate that drives the terrible problems that we all face -go to the chemist .they will give you something to help you -same advice for you roger

quote ;
In the mean time, won't somebody with a little influence on this site reign her in - really, she's an embarrassment to you all.

Ann

Your honest words are appreciated, Phil.

Daniel

Ethnic cleansing? Interesting interpretation of the facts. Actually, in 1947, the Jewish state huddled on 18% of the original British Mandate land. The Jews accepted it gratefully. Then, in 1948, the Arab refugees were encouraged to leave Israel by Arab leaders promising to purge the land of Jews. Most of the Arabs left in fear of being killed by their own Arab brothers as traitors. So please explain how, over the course of time, does attempted (albeit unsuccessful) ethnic cleansing of Jews become ACTUAL ethnic cleansing of Arabs?