Ben Cohen writes: What follows is an in-depth article by Jonathan Hoffman unraveling the tissue of lies that is “Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner’s Guide,” by the anti-Zionist propagandist Ben White. Z Word readers should note that Jonathan has been banned from attending a launch for White’s screed hosted by sham British “charity” War on Want.
In November 2008, Z Word published an important article by Anthony Julius. Entitled “False Confessions: How Anti-Zionists Incriminate Zionism”, it points out that doctored quotations are rife in the Israel bashing world: “We are now in the fifth stage. Incriminatory quotations are a staple of anti-Zionism. These quotations are partly the old ones, mostly updated by substituting “Zionist” for “Jew,” and partly new ones. They are a mix of fabricated quotations (including fictitious endorsements from prominent figures such as Nelson Mandela), and genuine quotations that are given undue weight. These quotations serve as substitutes for reasoned argument.” It seems that Julius had had a preview (premonition, more accurately) of this book.
The claim that Israel is an ‘apartheid state’ has a long history. In December 2004, for example, there was a Conference at SOAS (London University) on this subject. It is an especially attractive comparison for the unreconstructed Left. Since the collapse of Communism twenty years ago, it has been bereft of causes. “If pressure from anti-racists such as us brought down South African apartheid” goes their argument “then we can do the same in the case of Israel.”
That’s where Ben White is coming from, with some anti-colonialism mixed in for good unreconstructed socialist measure. And maybe something else - this is the fellow who said “I do not consider myself an anti-Semite, yet I can also understand why some are” and who tried to contextualise comments of Ahmadinejad denote a disbelief in the Holocaust.
Of course the whole book is a Big Lie. Far from being a racist state, Israel was born from centuries of racism committed AGAINST Jews. Had Israel existed ten years sooner than 1948, hundreds of thousands of lives of those murdered in the Nazi death camps might have been saved.
Israel’s 20 percent non-Jewish minority has always had equal voting and other political rights. Arab Israelis were elected to the first Knesset in 1949 and have won as many as
12 Knesset seats in a single election. Some hold important positions in the government, court system, Ministries and the IDF. There has been an Arab Vice Consul (in San Francisco) and an Arab Minister. Contrast that with the position of blacks in South Africa under apartheid.
As in all countries there remain valid concerns about the treatment on minorities but Israeli Arabs and Palestinians have acknowledged the protection afforded them under the law, for example:
“Israel has proved that for fifty years its real power is in its democracy, guarding the rights of its citizens, applying laws [equally] to the rich and poor, the big and small.”
- Dr. Talal Al-Shareef, Palestinian newspaper Al-Quds, May 27, 1999
Israel rescued tens of thousands of Ethiopian Jews and welcomed them. Israel also rescued boat people from Vietnam and has been saving the lives of thousands of Sudanese refugees, including Darfuris, who escaped from Sudan through Egypt. What other Middle Eastern country has given refuge to Darfur refugees? Certainly not Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, or Saudi Arabia. Israel is the lone oasis of safety for those who are persecuted in the Middle East. 77 percent of Israeli Arabs say they prefer living in Israel to any other country in the world (Ha’aretz, 23 June 2008).
The rights of Arab citizens of Israel have been vigorously upheld in the Israeli Courts. A clear demonstration was in January 2003, with the decision of the Israeli High Court in favour of two Israeli Arab politicians, Ahmed Tibi and Azmi Bishara, who challenged the ruling of Israel’s Central Election Committee (CEC) disqualifying them from running in the Israeli general election. Such an episode could never have happened in an “apartheid state”. And Israel has a Communist Party whereas the Nationalists in South Africa banned it. Arabs in Israeli society get all the opportunities of Israelis. Take healthcare - the standard of healthcare available to all in Israel is far higher than in the neighbouring Arab States, and Arab life expectancy is considerably higher.
White’s book comes from the same genus as Walt and Mearsheimer’s “The Israel Lobby”. Like that book, everything is meticulously referenced but that enables the reader to see the circularity in the sources. Many are from known Israel bashers: Pappe, Uri Davis, Charles D Smith, Tom Segev, Tanya Reinhart, Jeff Halper, Hussein and McKay, and Maxime Rodinson. Colin Chapman features three times: He is the author of “Whose Promised Land” which revives the ancient Christian canard of ‘supercessionism’ - the belief that because the Jews denied the divinity of Christ, God transferred His favours to the Christians while the Jews were cast out as the party of the Devil. This doctrine lay behind centuries of Christian anti-Jewish hatred until the Holocaust drove it underground.
If the conclusions are a Big Lie, it follows that the arguments used to draw it must be, too. And so it proves. The rot starts early. The Foreword to the book was written by John Dugard, the South African lawyer who made the apartheid analogy, as a result of which Israel refused to allow him to conduct a UN-mandated fact-finding mission on its Gaza offensive in 2006.
The rot continues in the endorsements. Desmond Tutu - whom Alan Dershowitz called a ‘racist and a bigot’ - says “This book deals rationally and cogently with a topic that almost always generates heat…” Stephen Sizer says “If you really care about peace in the Middle East, read this book.” Sizer has given interviews to, endorsed or forwarded material from American white supremacists and Holocaust deniers. He has also applauded Ahmadinejad for having ‘looked forward to the day when Zionism ceased to exist’.
In the rest of this article I go through the book, cataloguing the omissions, inconsistencies and incorrect facts.
Part One takes only one paragraph to get to ‘ethnic cleansing’ (a phrase repeated on average every 12 pages in the book). It then quotes Jabotinsky out of context: “Zionist colonisation, even the most restricted, must either be terminated or carried out in defiance of the will of the native population”. Jabotinsky (writing in 1923) also said “I understand as well as anybody that we have got to find a modus vivendi with the Arabs; they will always live in the country, and all around the country, and we cannot afford a perpetuation of strife”. But White does not quote that passage (of course). As we will see, ‘doctored’ quotes (that is, partial quotes or quotes taken out of context or isolated from important supporting quotes) permeate this book.
White admits that Israeli Arabs have full voting rights - how can he not? But of course he sees an ulterior motive: had it been otherwise, he says, “outside support would surely have been jeopardised.”
But then White claims that the Israeli government planned the genocide of the Israeli Arabs. Why was it not worried about “outside support” now? It simply does not add up. (The claim of the intention of genocide is sourced from Moshe Machover, the Israeli Communist who now lives in the UK).
The tone of Chapter Two - on the history of Zionism - is set by the doctored quote with which it opens. As anyone who reads Guardian: Comment Is Free knows, a whole new industry of manufacturing false quotes has been set up by the Israel bashers. White has chosen probably the most common one to open Chapter Two. David Ben-Gurion never said “We must expel Arabs and take their places!” He said the opposite: “We do not wish and do not need to expel Arabs and take their places.”
The second quote at the head of Chapter Two is from Benny Morris: “Ben Gurion was right … Without the uprooting of the Palestinians, a Jewish State would not have arisen here”. First, that was not what Ben Gurion believed. Second, the quote refers to ‘transfer policy’, a policy which was never advocated by more than a tiny minority of Israelis - for example the followers of the fanatic Rabbi Kahane. As Ami Iseroff has written, beginning with “Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1948″ (published in 1987) Morris has written several books and articles about the creation of the refugee problem in 1948 and related issues. In them, he carefully documented expulsions of Palestinians and massacres. He claimed that these were part of an unwritten policy. Yet later Morris notes the action of the Mayor of Haifa, Shabtai Levy, who on 22 April 1948 begged the Arabs to stay. In other words, Morris has been inconsistent. As Iseroff says “If “transfer” had been in the air, someone would remember it. Veterans of 1948 with whom I have spoken remember no such atmosphere of transfer. Transfer was always part of the ideology of revisionist Zionists and some Labour party activists. However, it was not part of the official ideology of the Labour-aligned political movements that supported the Haganah and the Palmach”.
Another false quote from the “Israel Bashers’ Greatest Hits” is ‘A Land Without A People, For A People Without A Land’ (pages 16 and 22). But even White resists the temptation to attribute it to an early Zionist (it was “coined and propagated by nineteenth-century Christian writers”). For a more thorough scholarly analysis, see Diana Muir, Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2008.
Back to ‘transfer policy’. Instead of explaining that this was only the view of the fanatic Kahanists, White suggests it was the general policy of the Zionists. On page 17 we get “… it is important to realise just how central the ideas of ‘transfer’ was to Zionist thinking and strategising. The need to ethnically cleanse Palestine of its native Arabs was understood at all levels of the Zionist leadership, starting with Ben-Gurion himself.” On page 19 there follows an alleged Ben Gurion quote at the 20th Zionist Congress, sourced from Benny Morris: “the growing Jewish power in the country will increase our possibilities to carry out a large transfer”. There are two problems with this alleged quote. The first is that it is from Ben Gurion’s private diary - it never appeared in the public domain. The second - entirely omitted by White, for obvious reasons - is that the 20th Zionist Congress was convened in Zurich a month after the July 1937 publication of the Peel Report and was convened specifically to consider that Report. And what do we find in the Report? A recommendation for a transfer of land and population: “[s]ooner or later there should be a transfer of land and, as far as possible, an exchange of population”.
To recap: Britain, the mandatory power in Palestine, had commissioned a Report, the recommendations of which were approved by the government in principle. That Report recommended that “[s]ooner or later there should be a transfer of land and, as far as possible, an exchange of population”. One month later the Zionist Congress meets, specifically to consider the Peel Report. Is it so surprising then that it should discuss the Report’s recommendation of ‘a transfer of land and … an exchange of population?” (In October 1938 the Woodhead Commission effectively killed off the Peel proposals which were rejected by the Arabs and which split Jewish opinion).
On page 22, White is at pains to tell us how superior the Israeli military forces were to carry out the “forced ‘transfer’ they knew was necessary for the old propaganda slogan of ‘a land without a people’ to become a darkly self-fulfilling prophecy”. Avi Shlaim is his source for his assertion that Jewish forces significantly outnumbered Arab forces throughout the 1948 War of Independence. What a shame White ignored this passage from the same source:
“It is true that the Yishuv numbered merely 650,000 souls, compared with 1.2 million Palestine Arabs and nearly 40 million Arabs in the surrounding states. It is true that the senior military advisers told the political leadership on 12 May 1948 that the Haganah had only a ‘fifty-fifty’ chance of withstanding the imminent Arab attack. It is true that the sense of weakness and vulnerability in the Jewish population was as acute as it was pervasive and that some segments of this population were gripped by a feeling of gloom and doom. And it is true that during three critical weeks, from the invasion of Palestine by the regular armies of the Arab states on 15 May until the start of the first truce on 11 June, this community had to struggle for its very survival.”
Pages 22-29 deal with the so-called ‘Naqba’. White opens with a quote from Henry Siegman (New York Review of Books, February 2004): “the dismantling of Palestinian society, the destruction of Palestinian towns and villages, and the expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians … was a deliberate and planned operation intended to ‘cleanse’ (the term used in the declassified documents those parts of Palestine assigned to the Jews as a necessary pre-condition for the emergence of a Jewish state).”
Again, White omits to tell us crucial information about the quote. In Siegman’s article, the quote is said to come from a Benny Morris interview in Ha’aretz (January 9, 2004). But here is what Morris said in response to Siegman’s NYRB article:
“In his article, Siegman repeatedly “cited” things I had said-with a consistency of distortion that is truly mind-boggling. Just to give one key example: I most emphatically never stated anywhere that “the dismantling of Palestinian society…and the expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians [were] a deliberate and planned operation intended to ‘cleanse’…those parts of Palestine assigned to the Jews.” Quite the opposite. Had Siegman bothered to read my books, he would have discovered that mainstream (Haganah-JewishAgency) Zionist policy, until the end of March 1948-meaning during the first four months of the war-was to protect the Arab minority in the Jewish areas and to try to maintain peaceful coexistence. Intentions changed only in April, when the Yishuv was with its back to the wall, losing the battle for the roads and facing potentially politicidal and genocidal pan-Arab invasion. And even then, no systematic policy of expulsion was ever adopted or implemented (hence Israel’s one-million-strong Arab minority today). The Arabs have only themselves to blame for the (unexpected) results of the war that they launched with the aim of “ethnically cleansing” Palestine of the Jews.”
White’s account of the so-called Naqba is par for the course from an anti-Zionist. Of course there were isolated but regrettable atrocities committed by the Jewish forces, as atrocities occur in most wars: Deir Yassin (though that was irregulars), and some of what happened at Lydda and Ramle (following Arab attacks on Jewish traffic on roads near the strategically important cities throughout 1947). But there was no ‘ethnic cleansing’ and Plan Dalet was not a masterplan to achieve this non-aim, as White contends. As Benny Morris has written, “There was no Zionist “plan” or blanket policy of evicting the Arab population, or of “ethnic cleansing”. Plan Dalet (Plan D), of March 10th, 1948 (it is open and available for all to read in the IDF Archive and in various publications), was the master plan of the Haganah - the Jewish military force that became the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) - to counter the expected pan-Arab assault on the emergent Jewish state. That’s what it explicitly states and that’s what it was. ”
- Irish Times, 21 February 2008
Deir Yassin was followed a few days later by the conveniently forgotten massacre of 70 academics, doctors and nurses travelling to Mt. Scopus carried out by Arabs in revenge. The remains of their convoy line the road to Jerusalem to this day as a memorial.
Part Two of this catalogue of falsehoods purports to describe the methods by which Israeli ‘apartheid’ has been maintained. The fact-twisting starts in the third paragraph: “Israel is not a State for all of its citizens … but rather a State for some of its citizens: Jews”. Such an assertion writes off the Declaration of Independence:
“[Israel] will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.”
and writes off all the ‘checks and balances’ in a thriving democracy which are there to protect minorities - as in all thriving democracies. To support his argument White (p42) reprints a quote from Shamir (”the Jewish state cannot exist without a special ideological content. We cannot exist for long like any other state whose main interest is to insure the welfare of its citizens”) without revealing (a) that it was said when Shamir was in opposition and (b) that the quote was nothing to do with suppressing minority rights and everything to do with criticising his successor, Rabin, for failing in his inaugural speech to refer to Israel’s Biblical status as the promised land.
The next ‘fraud on the reader’ (to quote from Anthony Julius, op cit) is a 1972 quote from Yeshayahu Ben-Porat (p44): “One certain truth is that there is no Zionist settlement and there is no Jewish State without confiscating lands and fencing them off.” First, this was not said about Arab citizens of Israel, it was said about the West Bank and Gaza; second it was not an ‘ex-cathedra’ pronouncement by a politician but merely a call by a journalist to the government to recognise the implications of the occupied territories.
On page 45, White suggests that the Absentee Property Law (1950) allows land of absentee Arabs to be seized ‘if the owner was absent for even just one day’. This is pure sophistry. The text of the Law makes it clear that it applied only to long-term absentees. Moreover absentees that had left Israel were compensated financially. And decisions under the Law are subject to judicial review (as is the case with all administrative decision-making). For example, in an opinion of 1 February 2005, Attorney-General Menachem Mazuz held that the Ministerial Committee and the Israeli Cabinet had exceeded their powers under the Law.
Now White moves the focus to Gaza and the West Bank. Nowhere in this section does he mention that Israel pulled out of Gaza in 2005 (indeed in places (eg page 60) it is as if this had not happened) and nowhere does he mention the Khartoum Conference (August 29 to September 1, 1967) where eight heads of Arab countries responded to Israel’s offer to give back the lands with Three No’s: ‘No Peace, No Recognition of Israel, No Negotiations’. Instead we get ‘land theft’ assertions: “the main characteristic of Israel’s rule in the OPT since 1967 has been land theft.” While there may be some cases of land acquired without compensation (see the recent Spiegel Report) the situation is far more nuanced than White suggests. First a final peace settlement will see the restitution of most of the land under Israel control in the West Bank. The exceptions will be compensated by ‘land swaps’ which has already been agreed with the Palestinian negotiators. Second Israel’s right to control the use of public land (in the so-called Area C, amounting to 72 percent) was accepted by the Palestinians at Oslo.
White repeats the untruth that the settlements are illegal (p62). The United States for example has not considered them illegal since the time of Professor Eugene Rostow, US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, 1966-9. Article 49(6) of the 4th Geneva Convention does not prohibit the voluntary movement of Israelis who wish to live in Jerusalem or the West Bank, since this does not constitute a deportation or transfer within the meaning of that provision, which mentions the word ‘forcible’ (”…individual or mass forcible transfers….”)
Much the same applies to White’s assertion that the separation fence is illegal. It is not. The ICJ declared it so - but the ICJ has no legal standing. It is the judicial body of the United Nations. Its opinions are advisory only. On occasion White lapses into pure invective eg p73: “The logic of the wall is to grab as much land as possible, with as few Palestinians as possible”. Wrong - the logic of the fence is to save the lives of Israelis - all Israelis - from suicide bombers and in pursuit of that aim it has been highly successful. Many countries have similar fences to protect their citizens.
The book ends with some FAQs, mostly a rehash of earlier material. However we do get White’s view (or rather, Charles D Smith’s view) of the Camp David negotiations in 2000: “Israel never offered the Palestinians 95 percent of the West Bank as reports indicated at the time. The ‘generous offer’ was just another incarnation of previous Israeli plans to annex huge swathes of the OPT, retaining major settlement blocs ‘that effectively cut the West Bank into three sections with full Israeli control from Jerusalem to the Jordan River’ “.
Dennis Ross was at Camp David in the US negotiating team. If you go to Dennis Ross’s book “The Missing Peace” you will learn that the Palestinians turned down an offer of 91 percent of the West Bank in contiguous territory plus an additional 1 percent in land swaps (there was to be a continued Israeli security presence along 15 percent of the border with Jordan). Contiguous - not cut “into three sections”.
In April 2000 Nelson Mandela came to London and spoke to the Board of Deputies of British Jews. He spoke of the need for Israel to leave the lands taken in 1967 but not unless there was first recognition of the Jewish State by the Arab States: “I added a second position, that Israel cannot be expected to withdraw from the Arab territories which she legitimately conquered when the Arab States wanted to whip her out of the map of the world.” No mention of ‘apartheid’ in Israel - from a man who spent 27 years as a prisoner of the loathsome apartheid regime in South Africa.
There can be no better answer to Ben White than that.
This artless, crude piece of Israel-bashing will no doubt be welcomed in all the usual circles but anyone with a modicum of independent critical faculty will soon see it for the tired piece of intellectually bankrupt propaganda that it is. What a waste of a Cambridge English degree.
Stephen Sizer said , “If you really care about peace in the Middle East, read this book.”
This reviewer says “don’t bother”.
When may we expect Mr. White to acknowledge the valiant efforts of Egyptian border forces for protecting refuge-seeking Darfurians and Eritrean Christians from entering the dastardly apartheid State of Israel by shotting groups of them to death?
/sarcasm
How can White, War on Want, et al exclude you from a public meeting, Jonathan? The Orwellian element in this move is that the meeting is held to condemn the allegedly exclusionary practices of Israel! This needs to be publicized further in order to shame War on Want.
Wonderful piece by the way. The bit about the Mandela misquote is simply astounding.
Great review Jonathan exposing Ben White for the fraud that he is.
Palestine likes killing her children, please see Google’s YouTube 5 minute link, just below, particularly at the link’s end here >
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWIFhKYiMqU
The UN’s Convention On The Rights Of The Child, paragraph 38 item 3 is against soldiers under the age of fifteen.
Some would say that Israel is at the sharp end of the Jihad and beyond this some would say that Ben White has spotted a niche market, namely Guardian Readers, for his book - any excuse for a quick buck in the recession, eh?
Well done, Jonathan. I wonder whether they are barring you because, given their base nature, they cannot guarantee your safety and yet wouldn’t want to be sued?
Ben White is typical of the genre which perpetrates lies and probably believes them, too. I gather that he is the son of a Christian minister (and I wonder how he gets on with Daddy?) and much of what he writes should be viewed from within that perspective.
And I wonder how the following from Arutz Shiva would sit with Ben White’s idee fixe?
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/132257
And if it happened in Safed, then where else did it?
And I wonder whether White sees himself as the reincarnation of Goebbels? After all he seems to be enamoured of the Big Lie and to find it easy to memorise anti-Jewish buzz words in the hope that if he repeats them often enough people will believe him.
Does anyone know why he chooses to live in Brazil?
What is War on Want, an alleged “charity” doing promoting this book full of falsehoods. I shall be referring this to the Charity Commissioners.
further, WoW receives funding from the EU, Comic Relief & the National Lottery. All these bodies should be made aware of WoW’s activities which are way & beyond the remit of a charity.
The fact that Mandela, vigorously opposed to Israel as he is, has never used the word ‘apartheid’ relative to Israel must irk these odious people. Ben White especially.
Also.
I simply cannot understand why Ben White does not go an live in Gaza and show the Muslims there where the ‘light’ is. Then he will either learn to fly blindfolded with his hands tied behind his back or be dashed to the ground.
Thank you for publishign such a detailed rebuttal of this latest anti-Zionist drivel. One small - but far from insignificant - quibble: you write that “far from being a racist state, Israel was born from centuries of racism committed AGAINST Jews.” President Obama was (rightly) criticised for saying something similar in his Cairo address to the Arab world. Without going into religious arguments we can - and must - stress that Israel was born from a 1,900-year longing of the Jewish People to return to the Homeland from which they had been forcibly expelled. Dig into the ground of Eretz Yisrael and you will find artefacts from various peoples who have lived there, from Caananites to Crusaders, Romans to Ottomans. But more than any of them - and reaching farther back than most of them - you will find Jewish relics. The one thing you won’t find is anything ‘Palestinian’.
So 650 000 Jews, men women children drove out 600 000 Arabs unaided while fighting a war of existence! Congratulations is all I can say to them
No wonder Ben White is afraid of doughty Jews like Mr Hoffman
Stefan,
“The one thing you won’t find is anything ‘Palestinian’.”
You’re right. And it’s very much taboo to mention this nowadays, but a historical Palestinian Arab identity never existed. It’s an entirely modern, i.e. 20th century, transposed onto the Jordanian Arabs of historical Palestine.
It’s worth mentioning one piece of evidence that attests to this that I found pretty interesting: It comes from Theodor Adorno’s analyses of antisemitism.
To explain contemporary antisemitism, Adorno traces its roots to the Enlightenment. He quotes at length from many of the key Enlightenment figures like Kant, Rousseau, etc., many of whom harbored strong antisemitic views in spite of their otherwise enlightened philosophies. What’s remarkable is that when speaking (ill) of Jews many of these 17th and 18th century thinkers referred to them as … “Palestinians!” And this use of the term Palestinian to refer to Jews happens over and over again in Enlightenment texts, as well as in the personal diaries, etc. of the philosophers.
Great review I will only add some more facts:
1)one of the Supreme court judges in Israel is an Arab, his name is Salim Jubran, he was appointed in 2004.
2)Before Jubran was appointed to the Israeli Supreme Court (the Highest court in Israel) there was another Arab judge which was there in a temporary appointment, his name is Abad El-Rahman Zuabi.
As far as I know the USA and many supreme courts in the west which have existed for longer than Israel’s supreme court had less minorities on their bench than Israel in its short history.
3)Arab Knesset( Israeli Parliament) Member Hamad Tibi, was vice chairmen of the Knesset in 2006-2007 and was the chairmen of the Israeli Knesset when the Chairmen was abroad. it should also be noted that he graduated as a medical doctor from Hebrew University. also it should be noted that he often incites hate and violence against Israel and is still allowed to be a Knesset member.
4)Arab Knesset member Mohammad Baraca, also incites against Israel but is still allowed to be a member and to speak freely against the Knesset and country he is supposed to represent, it should also be noted that he has a masters degree in math from the Tel-Aviv University. he was the vice chairmen of the Knesset in the 16th Knesset.
5)The mainly Arab soccer team (has mostly Arab player along side few Jewish players) from the Arab city of Shanin, won the 2004 Israeli cup for soccer.
6)in the year 1990, Druze Arab Sheikh Amin Tariff, received the Israeli Award (the most regarded Israeli award the country gives to the highest achievements.)
7) His brother Salah Tariff was a captain in the IDF, a Knesset member and a minister in the Israeli government.
Those are just a few examples that show that Israel is a free and open society in which its minorities have great freedoms and reach the highest level of achievement and even exceeds such countries as the USA and UK (I don’t think the UK has a Muslim or Pakistani Judge on the Supreme court) with sharp contrast to the situation that exists in a true apartheid state, in which minorities would not get to such high level of government and involvement in the country, in the apartheid South Africa blacks were denied education, could not be doctors or learn math like Tibi and Baraca could in Israel, in South Africa Blacks would not receive an award from the country for their achievements, and would not get equal rights and the opportunities to reach such levels of involvement and contributions.
But in Israel Arabs and other minorities can study where ever they want, they get jobs at the most respectable places (Supreme court, Government, Knesset, police and so on.)
In fact the situations of the Arabs living in Israel is far better than of the Arabs living in Egypt, Syria or Jordan, the funny thing is that in Jordan the Arab Palestinians are heavily discriminated against, and are not allowed into public office in sharp contrast with Arabs who live in Israel and that it although that Palestinians make 70% of the population of Jordan!)
For further information you are advised to read this book by an Iraqi Arab who visited Israel:
http://www.ejpress.org/article/in_depth/18430
It’s a little dubious, in an article relying on exposing misquotes, to do the same thing yourself Jonathan.
Here’s the full wording of of Article 49:
(1)Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.
(2)Nevertheless, the Occupying Power may undertake total or partial evacuation of a given area if the security of the population or imperative military reasons do demand. Such evacuations may not involve the displacement of protected persons outside the bounds of the occupied territory except when for material reasons it is impossible to avoid such displacement. Persons thus evacuated shall be transferred back to their homes as soon as hostilities in the area in question have ceased.
(3)The Occupying Power undertaking such transfers or evacuations shall ensure, to the greatest practicable extent, that proper accommodation is provided to receive the protected persons, that the removals are effected in satisfactory conditions of hygiene, health, safety and nutrition, and that members of the same family are not separated.
(4)The Protecting Power shall be informed of any transfers and evacuations as soon as they have taken place.
(5)The Occupying Power shall not detain protected persons in an area particularly exposed to the dangers of war unless the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand.
(6)The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.
Here’s the source - given the context of Jonathan’s review, I thought it would be wise to include it for those of us who do not know it by heart:
http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/92.htm
Just to spell it out: Jonathan mixes up Article 49(1) with Article 49(6). Article 49(1) would cover the forcible transfer of West Bank or Gaza Strip population into Israel. Article 49(6) would cover settlement activity and all the government subsidies and contracts to build housing units in the West Bank or East Jerusalem.
With respect to Article 49(1), one ought at least to consider the situation of thousands of Palestinians, some from the West Bank who languish in administrative detention. They are not there voluntarily. Without due process I don’t think detention there can be defended any more than 28 day detention without charge can be here in the UK.
And with respect to Article 49(6), I think the attitude of a current President of the US is a better indicator of that state’s opinion than that of the distinguished under-Secretary of 40 years ago. Besides, the US is important, but it is not the determinant of international law.
I don’t think Israel is an apartheid state. The analogy is profoundly flawed in factual terms and in political ones. (I DO think Israel applies a system of apartheid in the West Bank. See http://www.hsrc.ac.za/Media_Release-378.phtml for detailed information on this.) Nor do I think Jonathan should have been excluded from the meeting at Toynbee Hall. But I have seen him being highly disruptive myself, demanding a right of reply (by which he has meant a place on the platform, rather than commenting, speaking or raising questions from the floor in the general Q&A). But - and I am sure this will not surprise readers here - I and others in JfJfP are still waiting for our “right to reply” invitations from the ZF to speak at events they organise. Such as Israel & Judaica expos where settlement properties are on sale. No wonder Jonathan needs to quote selectively from Article 49. It doesn’t say what he wants it to say.
To Dan Judelson,
I read your little response. It is even possible that what you write (re: the Articles) are right. What totally disqualifies and discredits the validity of your comment is the reliance (in the 2nd part) on such crystal-clearly partisan, ergo irrelevant parties like those referred to in the linked webpage. all those who have a tiny fragment of information on the matter are readily able to identify the organisations that took part in the work as a joke. And dear Sir, this is exactly the “smoking-gun”-typerevelation that unmask you and blows off your cover, the veneer of “moderation” and “scholarly diligence” on your part.
You are demonstrably failed, and failed big.
P.S.: Sorry for my sometimesincorrect English grammar, I am a non-native English speaker.
Dan - Article 49 (1) says ‘forcible’. That word is said at the outset of 49 so applies to the whole of it. And while President Obama has said settlement building should stop, he has not changed the earler US position - that the settlements are not illegal. Like the ZF, War On Want has the right to exclude who they want, which was why I did not try to go into the meeting on Thursday. However I do object to John Hilary’s quote in the Jerusalem Post: “known for causing serious disturbances at public events on this issue”. In 56 years I have heckled at three meetings, all of which were Israel hatefests. That does not constitute “known for causing serious disturbances at public events”.
Call me a cynic, but I am hardly surprised by Dan Judelson’s comments, that is bearing in mind that Dan’s organization is actually pushing Ben White’s book.
http://jfjfp.com/?p=3349
Conflict of interests?
:)
Article 49(1) would cover the forcible transfer of West Bank or Gaza Strip population into Israel. Article 49(6) would cover settlement activity and all the government subsidies and contracts to build housing units in the West Bank or East Jerusalem.
According to whom? Link?
Better still, maybe Mr. Judelson, can explain why Article 49(1&6) of the 4th Geneva Convention, published in August 1949, specifically covers a situation that neither arose due to a high contracting party’s systematic policy of forcible transfer - neither of West Bank and Gaza Arab populations into Israel, nor Israeli populations into the West Bank and Gaza - and how it specifically covers a situation that came into being only after June 1967?
In any event, his allegation that Jonathan Hoffman was misquoting, or omitting relevant portions from Article 49 appears to be entirely informed by his as of yet unsubstantiated, and likely unsubstantiatible opinion, about how Article 49 ought to be read.
Jonathan Hoffman is certainly not falsifying Article 49 (either 1 or 6) by writing that: “voluntary movement of Israelis who wish to live in Jerusalem or the West Bank… does not constitute a deportation or transfer within the meaning of that provision”.
Rather, Mr. Judelson is the one assuming that his expanded reading of Article 49 somehow negates the intention of the Convention to regulate forcible and compulsory transfers undertaken by a high contracting party in occupied territory, as opposed to how he would have it, namely, having the Convention also regulate non-coerced and non-compulsory free movements of people. Perhaps he does so in order to get it to say what it doesn’t say.
And as for the Territories themselves, there is no International Law that states that Jews, or Israeli Jews are not permitted to freely choose to live in the West Bank or Gaza on land to which they either hold unextinguished title, or on land in which title isn’t held by anyone else.
I’m sure it’s entirely lost on Mr. Judelson that the only times a High Contracting Party implemented a systematic policy of forcible or compulsory transfer into or out of either Israel or the Territories occurred when Israel evacuated the Jewish population from Sinai following ratification of the Peace treaty with Egypt and then when Israel evacuated the Jewish civilian and military population from Gaza and the Jewish civilian population from several settlements in the West Bank in 2005.
Because if it wasn’t lost on Mr. Judelson and he wasn’t prone to politicizing International Law for his own purposes, you’d be forgiven for expecting that for the sake of nothing save consistency, he would be condemning those transfers as violations of Article 49 of the 4th Geneva Convention.
JFJFP - How low can they get , promoting Ben White’s book.
Well pretty damn low - JFJFP had a speaker at an MPAC fundraiser.http://jfjfp.com/?p=830
Call you a cynic Modernity? Wouldn’t dream of it. I don’t know you, after all. But JfJfP signatories have a range of views, from Zionist to anti-Zionist to non-Zionist, as we are always keen to point out. What unites us is opposition to the occupation. That’s why I tackled Jonathan’s interpretation of Article 49.
Sure, there’s difference of opinion but not a conflict of interest. I’m not praising the book here: regarding the analogy of Israel with apartheid I made it pretty clear in my comment above that it is not a comparison I would draw or think should be drawn by others - except with respect to the West Bank. My source for that is not Ben White’s book, but a report from the Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa.
Jonathan, I don’t agree that 49(1) is a preamble or overview of the whole article. 49(1) deals with population movements in one direction; 49(6) with population movements in the other.
Of course, Dan Judelson, I am sure that “JfJfP signatories have a range of views, from Zionist to anti-Zionist to non-Zionist, as we are always keen to point out. “ is true.
Ahh, but you are something more than a simple signatory, aren’t you?
I understood that you were one of the JfJfP leaders?
Which would paint a different picture now that your organisation is aiding Ben White in the sale of his shoddy book.
So despite your disagreement with White on some minor points, your organisation is essentially backing his book.
That is your right, but I do wish you would have the candour to admit it.
“My source for that is not Ben White’s book, but a report from the Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa.”
Dan you cite the Human Sciences Research Council of South Africa as though it were a dictionary or some sort of infallible authority. Why should we accept this appeal to authority without any additional reasoning or evidence? Furthermore, does the Council’s view on the matter represent any a consensus among ALL social scientists which rules out the very possibility of contesting its findings?
Come on Dan, you shouldn’t insult our intelligence - “It’s true cause such and such Council said so!” Please.
Modernity, I have been a member of the executive of JfJfP for some years and am currently chair. I have spoken on behalf of JfJfP on many occasions, at public meetings and in the media, (including with Jonathan Hoffman on more than one occasion) so I assumed it was known. There was no intention not to be candid and apologies if you thought otherwise.
In my first comment here I wrote “I don’t think Israel is an apartheid state.” I later wrote that it was not an analogy “I would draw or think should be drawn…” I haven’t read Ben White’s book, but I really do not see how that can be called disagreeing on “some minor points”. Given your emphasis on my position as a leader of JfJfP, doesn’t that also rather underline my point about people in JfJfP holding differing opinions?
Ganselmi, I cited the SA HSRC to make it clear that it was that report and not Ben White’s book that is the basis of my opinion about the situation in the West Bank. I think the report makes a credible assessment, clearly, but I do not see how I have given it the hallowed, unchallengeable status you seem to think I have.
Lbnaz, I have not seen a legal interpretation of Article 49 that lets the settlements off the international law hook, perhaps you can cite one that does defend them? In the meantime, for a link that supported my argument I suggest: http://www.icrc.org/web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/5FLDPJ There are many others.
Dan, your argument about Article 49 (that clause 1 deals with population movements in one direction and 6 in the other) is clearly baloney. (1) clearly says “… forcible transfers…are prohibited” - regardless of direction. (6) implies force - there is a presumption of action by “the Occupying Power”
(1)Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.
(6)The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.
Hi Dan
I was speaking to a couple of people including a JFJFP activist a while ago. The JFJFP activist agreed with the comment - “JFJFP - good against the occupation but shit on antisemitism”.
So why did you send a speaker to an MPAC fundraising event? WHy did you help an antisemitic organisation to raise funds ? WHy do you co-operate with antisemites ?
Why when Richard Kuper sahred a platform with Jenny Tonge did he not speak out when she made an antisemitic comment about zionist control of finance and the Lib Dems? Richard was speaking on behalf of JFJFP but didn’t say a word.
And you wonder why you don’t get a platform. You couldn’t make it up.
Dan Judelson, you wrote:
“Given your emphasis on my position as a leader of JfJfP, doesn’t that also rather underline my point about people in JfJfP holding differing opinions?”
Not really, but I am surprised at the banality of your response, self-evidently ALL organizations contain differing opinions, be they the Tory Party, the American Democrats, etc
But what is surprising is that you can’t speak to the issue of JfJfP pushing Ben White’s book?
Who decided to post it on the JfJfP web sites? Did anyone decide?
If so, was there a discussion? Or does the JfJfP default to a position of “Well, it attacks Israel so we’ll publicize it”? How exactly does it work?
I assume that you are informed on these issues?
Dan, your argument about Article 49 (that clause 1 deals with population movements in one direction and 6 in the other) is clearly baloney.
Of course it’s baloney. Oh and the ICRC link he provides, while calling settlements “illegal” certainly doesn’t state that Israeli citizens were forcibly transferred into the territories, nor claim that one clause of Article 49 deals with population movements in one direction and a second clause deals with population movements in another direction. Ergo, contrary to Judelson’s claim, the ICRC link does not support his argument at all.
Hey Dan, don’t give up your day job: interpreting international law doesn’t seem to be a strength of yours.
Let me make a seemingly irrelevant comment here. I have read myself several times readers’ letters in the hyper-hostile (and in the case of the Guardian: anti-Semitic press) mainstream print media, some by Mr. Judelson hostile, utterly manipulative, distorted narrative-peddling (like the joke that the Palestinians can only get the “22 per cent” of “remaining Palestine” even if they were to accept a territory on the 67 borders and such and such. Clearly, this lie-mongering does nothing to help his other claims on other fronts like the interpretation of intl. law and others. The sheer hostility and hysteria on their parts (Jews for Justice) just invalidate all their claims in my view.
I recommend that readers try out the following site:
http://www.letstalkisrael.com/.
Entitled “Let’s Talk Israel”, this is a multi-media advocacy project put together by the South African Jewish Board of Deputies aimed at showing the true face of Israel and debunking various malicious accusations made against it.
As a mater of interest I posted a comment on Jonathan Hoffman’s blog in response to his comments to Ben White. I posted it at 9.12am (GMT). However when I checked at 2pm (GMT) they were gone.
Can you please tell me where they have gone?
Here it is again minus the hyperlinks in case this forced the comment to automatically go to spam
July 13th 9.12am
Dear Jonathan,
Ben White’s book focuses on Israel’s occupation not what occurs in Israel proper (although discrimination is inevitable when state’s have one dominant community).
Israelis, Nobel Peace prize winners and top UN officials have made comparisons of Israel’s occupation with Apartheid South Africa and even dare I say it with Nazis. Yes, such analogies should be cautiously used given the seriousness and offensiveness of the allegation. However, there are times to acknowledge when the practices of our governments do reflect racist policies as shown by Apartheid South Africa and Nazi Germany.
As an Australian I am fully aware that my own country mimicked Apartheid policies. South Africa mimicked racist policies that had already been occurring in Queensland. The United States too lives in the shadow of an apartheid system.
Creating a Jewish state and conquering another people in 1948/1967 will inevitably lead to discrimination and racist policies. These are hard truths.
Despite the the many advances in civil society within Israel such principles are inevitably underminded when a state is based on racial lines and when an indigenous people resist occupation.
1. Persons who have made comparisons between Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza with Apartheid South Africa
Desmond Tutu, Apartheid in the Holy Land, 30 April 2002
- see bbc news and counterpunch
Uri Avnery, A Freedom Ride, 20 Jan 2007 - see gush shalom
Uri Davis - see wiki and his personal homepage
Yossi Verter, “PM loses vote on Palestinian State,” Haaretz, May 14, 2002
Meron Benvenisti “Bantustan plan for an apartheid Israel,” Guardian, April 26, 2004
Akiva Eldar, “Analysis: Creating a Bantustan in Gaza,” Haaretz, April 16, 2004
Jimmy Carter: Israel’s ‘apartheid’ policies worse than South Africa’s, 11 December 2006 - see haaretz
UNGA President calls Israeli policies ‘apartheid’
Top UN official: Israel’s policies are like apartheid of bygone era
United Nations General Assembly President Miguel D’Escoto Brockmann - see from occupied palestine
2. Persons who have compared Israeli occupation with Nazi Germany
Sir Gerald Kaufman - see British parliamentary papers and youtube
Read Gideon Levy’s work - see from occupied palestine
Look at Amira Hass’s video - see youtube
Amira Hass been compared to Nazis and Hitler - see commondreams
Settlers calling IDF soldiers Nazis - see ynet news
Peace is possible for Palestinian, Palestinian-Israelis and Jewish-Israelis. What is required is the cessation of violence from all sides, political and civil freedoms in the Palestinian territories, economic security and reframing the historical record to acknowledge the wrongs of both communities and their common aim to live in peace and security.
Stewart, you write:
“Creating a Jewish state and conquering another people in 1948/1967 will inevitably lead to discrimination and racist policies.”
Your argument is based on thoroughly unsound assumptions.
First of all, why should/would the creation of a Jewish national state inevitably lead to discrimination? States are based on ethno-national narratives, which aren’t necessarily shared by ALL of their citizens. Yet the dominance of one particular narrative or identity doesn’t necessarily preclude the possibility of diverse communities getting along on fair and equal terms. By your definition, almost every country in existence today is practicing some form or other of “apartheid.” And that’s absurd, wouldn’t you say?
Second, how did Israel “conquer” another people in 1947 and then again in 1967? Only by disregarding the Jewish people’s millennia-spanning ties to the land could you possibly characterize Israel’s founding as an illegitimate act of “conquering.” I’m not denying that some degree of expropriation was involved in the initial founding of the state of Israel — but, again, name one modern nation state that wasn’t founded on the basis of some degree of expropriation!
Ganselmi,
I respect the religious, cultural and ethnic connection of the Jewish community to Eretz Israel and Palestine. Just as I respect the Palestinian Arab connection to the land. My concern is how do we balance the mutual desire for the land. Herzl tried to acquire the land through diplomatic efforts and through land purchase. However, the Palestinian Jewish community could never buy enough land to make a viable state. Political intervention was sought through the League of Nations and the UN to create a Jewish state. The problem for me is that this denied the democratic rights of the etant population who was 87% non Jewish in 1917 (the time of Balfour) and 67% non Jewish in 1947.
Popular historical accounts describe the UN General Assembly Partition resolution of 1947 but fail to mention the rejection of this by the UN Security Council and the decision from the Jewish Agency to take the land by force with or without UN consent or consent of the 67% non Jewish population.
This is my sadness. That a people who espouse some of the highest order of humanity (eg Micah 6:8) sacrificed those who too sought a place they could call home.
The act of taking land by force i.e conquering, subduing another occurs time and again through history. Israel was taken by force in ancient times, and it was retaken by force in modern times.
Please take the time to read my blog looking at the question of occupation and colonisation. Ther is much we can learn from historical parallels in European settler states and with states like Sierra Leone created by freed African Americans who within a generation subdued the local population by force and ruled them for 100 years.
Stewart,
You didn’t answer any of my questions, but only continued to use loaded and biased language to accuse Israel. So I will repeat:
(1) why should the predominance of a national identity or ethno-national narrative necessarily lead to apartheid qua legalized racial segregation?
(2) when in the history of nation states has the drawing up of new borders and the founding of new states NOT involved some kind of trauma? i.e. why should the founding of a Jewish homeland be held to a different standard?
Your added argument about the percentage of Jews vs. non-Jews in 1917 and then 1947, not to mention the notion of an indigenous vs. foreign population, don’t hold either. You elevate Jordanian Arabs to the position of conquered, “original” natives, thereby conveniently forgetting the fact that no single group has a longer-running, continuous claim to the land than the Jews.
Stewart Mills,
Fascinating but your account leaves out the civil war in Palestine in the post WW2 period, the actions of the neighbouring states and their Arab armies.
Might I suggest a less ahistorical approach next time?
Hi Dan
I’d be interested in what you have to say about the comment i previously left as below. Perhaps you missed it , or perhaps you can’t justify JFJFP grovelling to antisemites.
I was speaking to a couple of people including a JFJFP activist a while ago. The JFJFP activist agreed with the comment - “JFJFP - good against the occupation but shit on antisemitism”.
So why did you send a speaker to an MPAC fundraising event? WHy did you help an antisemitic organisation to raise funds ? WHy do you co-operate with antisemites ?
Why when Richard Kuper shared a platform with Jenny Tonge did he not speak out when she made an antisemitic comment about zionist control of finance and the Lib Dems? Richard was speaking on behalf of JFJFP but didn’t say a word.
And you wonder why you don’t get a platform. You couldn’t make it up.
Lbnaz, I’m glad you acknowledge the ICRC definition of the settlements as illegal. Do you agree with it? Or is it “baloney?” If you think it is “baloney” then I have to ask you the same question you asked me: “According to whom? Link?”
Now I do happily acknowledge that the link I posted supports the definition of the settlements as illegal, rather than the ‘direction of travel’ points I made, but then again, the language of 49(1) is not that complicated. Israel is the occupying power, the population of the OPTs are the protected persons. For 49(6), the settlers are the civilian population and the OPTs are the territory it occupies. Jonathan thinks it’s ok because the settlers are not forcibly transferred, but I’ve yet to see a expert opinion that agrees with that assertion - and at them moment, that’s all it is. I know why Jonathan Hoffman and the ZF make that assertion and in so doing defend the sale of properties there to UK citizens, but that doesn’t make the occupation any less illegal.
Shachtman, I spoke at the MPACUK fundraiser ( http://jfjfp.com/?p=830 ) for two reasons: to help raise money for their joint Gaza relief appeal and because it was an opportunity to address a very different audience to one that comes to standard political meetings. And there is no way that the people I spoke to in conversation during the evening could be described as antisemitic.
Now, I’m used to people saying trite stuff about someone Jewish opposing Israel’s actions. I’ve also come across the slightly less trite “we’ll we’re all descended from Abraham so it’s wrong to hate” line. Neither of those lines got trotted out that evening. What people there did say was how good it was to hear what I had said, to hear another perspective on the situation.
But what I found most interesting of all hearing a variation on the descendants of Abraham line: that as we all come from the same root, our choice of what faith to follow is a human choice and that our common humanity and what ought to be respect for one another has to come before examining the world and events through our chosen faith. I thought that was pretty interesting coming from individual members of what is generally considered to be a profoundly radical Muslim group.
I don’t think MPACUK as an organisation is antisemitic. I do think their forum in particular has had problems with contributions that are clearly antisemitic but they have also banned people for making them. Equally importantly, many of the comments have condemned antisemitic remarks. (http://forum.mpacuk.org/showthread.php?t=40517&highlight=jewish ) I also think it is welcome that the forum specifically bans contributors from having avatars that could be construed in any way as support for violence.
I’m not starry eyed about this, I don’t think the problem is over. But the last time I spoke to someone from MPACUK, at a record setting attempt for the most people running 100m relay in 12 hours at Mile End stadium, when I brought up the problem of antisemitic comments, the response was straightforward: tell us (MPACUK) about them and we’ll remove them.
Clearly the proof of the pudding in such a situation will be in the eating. But none of this sounds to me like an organisation committed to a programme of antisemitism. I’d prefer it if it didn’t happen in the first place, but where there is willingness to address it, I think we ought to engage.
Sorry for the delay in responding, I have had a full plate in the past few days.
Gábor Fränkl, I’m sorry but I do not know what to make of most of your comments. Do you think Jonathan or any of the other contributors - including yourself are less partisan than I am? Are their opinions any less valid as a result? Without a specific reference it is difficult to answer your claim about letters I have written, but perhaps you could explain why you regard the 78%-22% issue as a joke?
Dan Judelson,
Lest you forget the other questions raise above,
Hi Modernity
Missed your question initially. Like lots of websites and blogs, jfjfp.com has a number of people posting to it, including me. We don’t normally discuss each entry before posting. Given the controversy surrounding the book, we did - yesyterday - talk about this particular one and thought the post ought to be updated to include that - such as Jonathan Hoffman’s review, here and Ben White’s response on his blog.
Dan Judelson,
Fair enough, I’ll read your update.
I do hope that it covers the five fake quotes in White’s book?
Dan Judelson,
Hmm, just read it, seems like a bit of arse covering by JfjfP?
As I get the feeling that I am talking to a professional politician and getting a straight and lucid answer (without a disclaimer) is probably not on the cards, I’ll leave it at that.
Oh, and Jfjfp forgot to include Jonathan Hoffman’s reply to White’s rejoiner, a bit elementary?
You might get them to update, again :)
“As I get the feeling that I am talking to a professional politician and getting a straight and lucid answer (without a disclaimer) is probably not on the cards.”
That’s it!
Hi Dan
You say
“Clearly the proof of the pudding in such a situation will be in the eating. But none of this sounds to me like an organisation committed to a programme of antisemitism. I’d prefer it if it didn’t happen in the first place, but where there is willingness to address it, I think we ought to engage.”
If the proof is in the pudding - what about their leader fundraising for and defending David Irving - or their links to holocaust denial pieces , or their accusations about a zionist cabal behind the 2012 Olympics ?
Dan - as long as you play the role of the “performing Bear” or the “useful idiot” and defend antisemitic organisations or individulas 9i note you haven’t replied about my point re Jenny Tonge) then your group will continue to be ignored by 99.99 % the Jewish community.
Sorry , links to Holocaust denial pieces should be links to far right neo nazi websites.
Hi Shachtman
Can you give me the URLs for the links to the far right neo-Nazi sites and the 2012 cabal story please?
Shachtman, sorry no need, I found the 2012 links. It’s astonishingly bad and appalling that it was ever posted, let alone not removed when asked. (I’m assuming someone complained?) As I said, the proof of the pudding - the remarks made to me about antisemitic stuff being removed - will be in the eating and I’ll let you know what they say.
Dan Judelson,
JfJfP’s site is still not updated, fully?
On the site there is:
The missing one is the last one,”More Damn Lies About Israeli “Apartheid”” http://blog.z-word.com/2009/07/more-damn-lies-about-israeli-apartheid/
That is Jonathan Hoffman’s answer to White’s rejoiner, the final one.
Obviously, such an oversight on JfJfP web site was merely a human error, I mean, it is not like JfJfP would want to leave anything out or paint a false picture, eh?
Ganselmi and modernity,
Thank you for your replies. I respectfully will decline to participate in further dialogue due to personal priorities.
I wish you well.
For what it is worth I draw great inspiration from Micah 6:8 and Deuteronomy 24:17. My prayer if for us as fellow human beings to see how we can be peace today.
My blog details a historical, psychological and sociological alternative to understanding the conflict.
God’s blessing and peace to you.
Deuteronomy 24
[Remember the alien]
17 You shall not deprive a resident alien or an orphan of justice; you shall not take a widow’s garment in pledge. 18Remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this.
Micah 6:8
what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
Stewart Mills,
Please can I suggest that quoting scripture is a poor substitute for your inability to read history with a careful eye.
Also, it is rather condescending when those at the receiving end of your lecturing do not share your Christian views.
Modernity, mate, you’re too polite. Stewart needs to have a nice lie down.
Wow, what an amazing forum!
So often forums that involve discussions about Israel and Gaza degenerate in to rabid hatred…but here you guys are a real credit to those who dare to fight against the lies and blood libels that are thrown around as fact against Israel.
So guys, I take my hate off to all of you, including those who are defending Mr White and his “ahem” book for keeping the discussion civil.
If only the commentary in the MSM around Israel and its right to self defense was as intelligent and insightful.
Regards
Mailman
Alrighty Stewart - best of luck with your personal priorities! Though I have to say it’s a little bit cheap and a little bit degrading to use Deuteronomy and Micah as a substitute for reasoning and evidence in order to score political points. I say this as someone raised on the Qur’an, another text too often abused for political purposes.
Thanks for your reply Dan. Apologies that i didn’t reply earlier. Rgds , S.
Hi Dan
From the All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Antisemitism
(i know J4J4P) aren’t keen on it bit i hope you trust them. I did see the original links but MPac took them down and i remember they claimed that they were mistakes
http://thepcaa.org/Report.pdf
“The activities of the Muslim Public Affairs Committee, MPACUK, have given cause for concern. Although its rhetoric is often extremist, MPACUK identifies itself as part of the mainstream British Muslim community, describing itself as “the UK’s leading Muslim civil liberties group, empowering Muslims to focus on non-violent Jihad and political activism”. Originally set up as a web-based media monitoring group, MPACUK’s declared first mission was to fight the perceived anti-Muslim bias in the media and to redress the balance. However, MPACUK has been criticised for publishing material on its website promoting the idea of a worldwide Zionist conspiracy, including the reproduction of articles originally published on neo-Nazi and Holocaust Denial websites, and is currently banned from university campuses under the NUS’s ‘No Platform’ policy. MPACUK are known to have removed an offensive posting from their website on one occasion, after complaints were made, but thereafter continued to publish similar material.”
Here’s another “mistake”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2006/nov/19/secondworldwar.religion
Ben White is an old school antisemite.