Zionists making presence felt at BBC?

No sooner had I read an Electronic Intifada article about how Zionist have taken top posts at the BBC than I read that a programme questioning the story of the exile of Jews from Palestine has been pulled from BBC 4.

The details of the programme are still up on the Radio Times website.  Here's the blurb:

The exile of the Jewish people has played a central role in Christian and Jewish theology for nearly 2,000 years, even being mentioned in Israel's national anthem and its declaration of independence. But what if the exile never actually happened?

This documentary by Ilan Ziv looks at new evidence that suggests the majority of the Jewish people may not have been exiled following the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Travelling from Galilee to Jerusalem and the catacombs of Rome, the film invites us to review and rethink our ideas around the exile, raising important ethical questions about its impact on present-day Middle Eastern issues along the way.

Here's what The Commentator has to say:

BBC documentary set to air last night has been mysteriously pulled from the broadcaster's line-up and has so far failed to appear on its online iPlayer service.

The programme, entitled, "Jerusalem: An Archaeological Mystery Story" was set to air on BBC Four last night at 9pm but was sharply pulled from the line-up in lieu of a programme called, "The Man Who Discovered Egypt" - a repeat of documentary about the British Egyptologist, Flinders Petrie.

The Jerusalem programme was noted by the Guardian's Martin Skegg as, "likely [to] ruffle some feathers" as it deals with the sensitive subject of Jewish exile from Jerusalem in 70AD.

The documentary is closely linked to Ziv's feature film, "Exile" which holds a similar description.

The BBC told The Commentator over its audience participation telephone service that the film was initially brought in to "supplement" the BBC Four series on archaeology and history but that the station's planning department decided at the last minute that the documentary would not "fit editorially".

The BBC insisted that it "plans to show the programme in the future".

The Beeb's explanation doesn't fully explain why it was pulled from the schedule given that it was considered an editorial fit when the schedule was drawn up and for a long while after.  But it certainly doesn't explain why it's been withheld from iPlayer.

And the Beeb "insisted that it "plans to show the programme in the future"".  Well we shall see or maybe we won't.

Zionist theology?

There's a theological discussion going on at Harry's Place. It's been initiated by a post by HP's resident Christian zionist, Joseph W where he jumps through hoops to show how a Palestinian expressing sympathy with Jews over Auschwitz is actually antisemitic.  The post is fairly typical of Joseph W except he usually lists lots of past misdemeanors by his subject whilst linking back to, er, Harry's Place posts.  This time the subject doesn't appear to have past form so he lets the following words speak for themselves:

He writes:

“We are called to love our enemies. No matter what we think or feel, no matter how much anger we have in us, we are called to love our enemies. And for me, my biggest challenge has been to understand exactly who my enemy is, in order for me to love them. As a Palestinian, as a Christian, the most transformative experience for me has been going to places like Auschwitz and Birkenau and understanding who my enemy is. To understand the Holocaust, to understand the suffering, the pain, and the fear that exists within the Jewish community. The only thing that you can do after that experience is to love them more, to have real compassion for them and real understanding of where they came from and where they are now—and what is needed for us, as Christians, to follow the healer of all healers.”

“Them” are clearly the Jews.

Awad seems very proud of himself, for choosing to understand his enemy the Jews, and now trying to love them. His understanding of his trip to Auschwitz, seems to relate mainly to his own personal, spiritual journey and his overall mission.

But surely someone who as an adult considers the Jews to be his enemy, is by definition an anti-Semite.

There follows a load of HP type expertise in the comments including this crass generalisation by Zachary Esterson:

If he wants to understand his enemy he needs to understand himself, and his own experience of exile and dispossession, which Palestinian Christians said was Jews' just fate for near 2000 years.

To which Stephen Marks replied:

' exile and dispossession, which Palestinian Christians said was Jews' just fate for near 2000 years'.

Well now, wherever would they have got that idea from? Well, from the Jews actually. When God makes his covenant with the Children of Israel, they are promised the land of Canaan in return for accepting the Torah and keeping its commandments. But the small print says that if they don't keep the commandments, they will lose the land.

The Prophets warn them that they will bring God's wrath down on them if they persist in their disobedience by whoring after strange gods, grinding the faces of the poor, oppressing the widows and the fatherless, seething a calf in its mothers milk, lying with beasts of the field, breaking the sabbath, mixing different fibres and various other of the 613, but they don't listen and they suffer the consequences, to live in exile till the Messiah comes etc etc.

Now personally I find this a bit implausible but the fact is its all in the Tanach/'Old Testament' and that's where the idea comes from.

As for Justin Martyr if you're going to dig up what Christians and Jews were saying about each other in the 2nd century CE, what about the Toldot Yeshu, the bit of the Talmud with the lowdown on Jesus. Apparently his mother was a whore who conceived him by fucking a Roman centurion during her period, and he will spend all eternity being boiled alive in a tubful of shit..

All of which has buggerall to do with the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. Actually when you consider what's been done to them by Zionist Jews in the name of all Jews and, at least till recently, with the support of most Jews, it is greatly to the credit of the Palestinians that they don't all hate Jews. If you don't like it tell Israel to stop calling itself the 'Jewish state' and to take the Maged David off its planes and tanks the next time it bombs the shit out of Gaza.

The comment has survived for a few hours so far without deletion or counter-comment. Let's see how it goes...

Another post on HP takes the Sunday Times to task over publishing an anti-Netanyahu cartoon on Holocaust Memorial Day, of all days.  Here's HP's Sarah Annes Brown:

Given that there have been no widely reported significant moves relating to the peace process, or its absence, in recent days it seems slightly odd that Gerald Scarfe chose this issue, of all others, as the focus of today’s cartoon.

More or less odd than Sarah focusing on a cartoon about Netanyahu? She doesn't say.

Christ without the checkpoint?

Here's an article from the Irish Times showing that Israel's capacity for projection knows no bounds:

The Israeli embassy in Dublin has apologised and taken down a post on its Facebook page that said that if Mary and Jesus were alive today they would “probably end up being lynched in Bethlehem by hostile Palestinians”.

The post, which was made on the Israel in Ireland Facebook page at about lunchtime yesterday, showed a picture of Mary and Jesus, accompanied by the comment: “A thought for Christmas . . . If Jesus and mother Mary were alive today, they would, as Jews without security, probably end up being lynched in Bethlehem by hostile Palestinians. Just a thought . . .”

By 3pm it had 20 “Likes”, though several comments expressed distaste for the post.

Among them was one saying: “Have you no regard for honesty whatsoever? If Jesus Mary were alive today, they would be protesting against the Israeli occupation of Palestine, along with all the Palestinian Christians currently living in Bethlehem.”

I don't do Facebook myself but it's good to see that supporters of the Palestinian cause are monitoring the shenanigans of Israeli embassies, no doubt, worldwide

War on Islam?

According to Ben White and now Richard Bartholomew the UK's army and Ministry of Defence are being advised by a chap with a record of scathing condemnation of Islam and "islamisation" of the west.

Here's Ben in Electronic Intifada:

It has been revealed that a British Ministry of Defense advisor — who helped write the “religious engagement strategy” for troops occupying the Afghan province of Kandahar — believes Islam might “be the rod of God’s anger,” raising disturbing questions for the military and the UK government.

Patrick Sookhdeo, who teaches at the UK’s Defense Academy and has served in the role of “cultural advisor” to troops in Afghanistan and southern Iraq, is also a regular speaker at events held by churches and Christian organizations internationally.

Speaking in a Washington DC church in 2007, Sookhdeo wondered if “[there is a] danger facing the West, particularly with Islam, might Islam be the rod of God’s anger?” (“Understanding Radicalization and Islamicization,” Capitol Hill Baptist Church)

Jumping to more on this "rod of anger stuff", Ben White asked Sookhdeo what it all meant:

He said that the idea of Islam as the “rod of God’s anger” was “developed by the leadership of the Syrian Orthodox Church about 75 years after the death of [the prophet] Muhammad. Faced with the fact that most of the lands that had constituted Christian territory had been lost in the Arab invasions, the church leadership posed the question why this had occurred. Instead of laying the blame on the Muslims and the Arab invasions, they concluded that it was their own fault because they had sinned and gone away from their faith in God by neglecting to be truly Christian in terms of love and compassion, to be humble and not to be motivated by money and power.”

Sookhdeo said that he had used the “rod of God’s anger” concept to ask if Christian churches today are now being punished for their “lack of faithfulness to God.” He added: “Could it be that Islam, which is now seen to be the dominant religion that may well replace Christianity in the future, can be seen as God’s instrument? This is not a negative comment of Islam, but a negative comment on the Church with her intrinsic weaknesses and failures.”

To which Richard Bartholomew responds:

This is somewhat disingenuous: the notion of Islam as the “rod of God’s anger” clearly fits into a long tradition in which disasters are explained as being expressions of God’s chastisement; being placed into a category of calamities is hardly a positive comment. Further, the expression itself is derived from Isaiah 10, where it is applied to Assyria; the Biblical author suggests that being the “rod of God’s anger” has its downside:

“Woe to the Assyrian, the rod of my anger, in whose hand is the club of my wrath!”… When the Lord has finished all his work against Mount Zion and Jerusalem, he will say, “I will punish the king of Assyria for the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes… Does the ax raise itself above the person who swings it, or the saw boast against the one who uses it?… Therefore, the Lord, the Lord Almighty, will send a wasting disease upon his sturdy warriors;… The Light of Israel will become a fire… The splendor of his forests and fertile fields it will completely destroy…”

Further discussion of how Christians used the “rod of God’s anger” concept in the context of early Islam can be found in a couple essays in the book Redefining Christian Identity: Cultural Interaction in the Middle East Since the Rise of Islam, edited by J.J. van Ginkel, H.L. Murre-van den Berg, and T.M. van Lint (Leuven: Peeters, 2005).

Vulgarized versions of the general concept can also been seen in contemporary American conservative evangelicalism: post-9/11, Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell notoriously suggested that God had allowed the attack to occur (which is quite not the same thing as causing it) because of liberalism in American society; a current American bestseller called The Harbinger claims that American failure to return to religion following the attack means that further disasters will occur. Last year, an anti-gay evangelist named Bradlee Dean suggested that God would “raise up” Muslims to execute gay people because of the USA’s unwillingness to implement less severe anti-gay measures.

All very unpleasant stuff. According to Richard, this Sookhdeo chap has quite a good academic pedigree and his work has won serious praise but the appropriateness of his advisory role to the UK military is surely questionable.