Dishonest arguments by Palestine solidarity activists are legion. Arguments like this one:

“When a massive earthquake rocked China and cyclones ravaged Myanmar, the world responded. Governments and civilians alike rallied to help. Yet world governments have witnessed a manmade humanitarian catastrophe unfold before our eyes in Gaza. Karen Koning AbuZayd, Commissioner-General of the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, has asserted that ‘Gaza is on the threshold of becoming the first territory to be intentionally reduced to a state of abject destitution, with the knowledge, acquiescence and — some would say — encouragement of the international community.’”

The author of these lines is Huwaida Arraf, writing on the Electronic Intifada website. Arraf is one of the crop of activists who tried - and failed - to provoke the Israeli Navy into a confrontation when they sailed two boats into Gaza last weekend.

Consider the argument above. Firstly, there is the reference to “Myanmar,” the name which the country’s brutal military rulers chose to replace its proper title of “Burma.” This was done without a referendum and is opposed by the leaders of Burma’s democracy movement, like Aung San Suu Kyi. One anticipates that Arraf would howl with disapproval at hearing the West Bank referred to as “Judea and Samaria,” yet she has no qualms about adopting the chosen nomenclature of the Burmese junta.

Then consider her portrayal of the Burma cyclone and the Chinese earthquake as natural disasters pure and simple. Again, not true. The cause may have been the weather, but much of the suffering - in Burma, the vast bulk of it - was the consequence of deliberate government policies. Aid workers and politicians all condemned the Burmese regime’s “inhuman behavior” (as Gordon Brown put it) in not permitting aid to reach the victims. The BBC reported on how local residents of the Irrawaddy Delta risked the retribution of the regime in trying to provide whatever assistance they could. Some countries condemned the Burmese Generals, others were silent, no state took serious measures to challenge them.

And Burma is not the only example of what the UNWRA Commissioner-General, admiringly quoted by Arraf, calls a territory “intentionally reduced to a state of abject destitution.” One could say the same about Zimbabwe, where a ban imposed by Robert Mugabe’s regime on aid agencies has placed a staggering five million people on the road to starvation. Or about Darfur, where a genocide enabled and supported by the Sudanese regime continues to rage - and where few left-wing activists have dared to tread, knowing that the Sudanese armed forces and the janjaweed are not as indulgent as the Israeli Navy.

Of course, for people like Arraf, it’s only Palestine that matters, and only Israel that is responsible. Just as the suffering of other nations is absent from Arraf’s narrative, so are the crimes of the movement which is hosting her and her colleagues - Hamas.

If the Palestine advocates think that the best way to show solidarity is by aligning with a violent, misogynistic, antisemitic and homophobic group, there is, sadly, little we can do about that. But those of us who honestly care about human rights are duty bound to resist these sordid attempts to play down the oppression of others in order to play up the suffering of the Palestinians.