Finkelstein denied tenure at DePaul University

Bad news from across the pond. I got a comment to the effect that DePaul University has denied tenure to Norman Finkelstein. I checked his site. At the time of writing, nothing. I googled I can't remember what but I got to Wikipedia and the news was there with a link to the Chronicle of Higher Education report on the matter. This is it in full:

DePaul Rejects Tenure Bid by Finkelstein and Says Dershowitz Pressure Played No Role

Norman G. Finkelstein, the controversial political scientist who has been engaged in a highly public battle for tenure at DePaul University, learned today that he had lost that fight. In a written statement released to The Chronicle, the university confirmed that Mr. Finkelstein had been denied tenure.

Mr. Finkelstein’s department and a college-level personnel committee both voted in favor of tenure, but the dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences wrote a memorandum against it, and the University Board on Promotion and Tenure voted against granting tenure. The final decision rested with the university’s president, the Rev. Dennis Holtschneider, who said in the statement that he had found “no compelling reasons to overturn” the tenure board’s recommendation.

“I played by the rules, and it plainly wasn’t enough to overcome the political opposition to my speaking out on the Israel-Palestine conflict,” Mr. Finkelstein said in an interview. “This decision is not going to deter me from making statements that, so far as I can tell from the judgment of experts in the field, are sound and factually based.”

Mr. Finkelstein’s case has excited widespread interest, in part because of the involvement of Alan M. Dershowitz, a professor of law at Harvard University. The two scholars have sparred repeatedly in public. Last fall, Mr. Dershowitz sent members of DePaul’s law and political-science faculties what he described as “a dossier of Norman Finkelstein’s most egregious academic sins, and especially his outright lies, misquotations, and distortions.”

Informed of the news this evening, Mr. Dershowitz said, “It was the right decision, proving that DePaul University is indeed a first-rate university, not as Finkelstein characterized it, ‘a third-rate university.’ Based on objective standards of scholarship, this should not have even been a close case.”

In the DePaul statement, Father Holtschneider decried the outside interest the case had generated. “This attention was unwelcome and inappropriate and had no impact on either the process or the outcome of this case.” —Jennifer Howard

Posted on Friday June 8, 2007 | Permalink |

The site accepts comments and yet despite being published yesterday only three have appeared. They all support Finkelstein.

Now we shouldn't assume that the tenure has been denied because of his stance on such issues as holocaust "compensation," zionism generally and, of course, Professor Alan Dershowitz in particular but it does seem rather odd that Dershowitz has a prestigious seat at Harvard and Finkelstein can't get tenure at DePaul. It's like zionists have some special influence in US academia but they can't have, can they?

Jewish National Fund's* most prominent patron denounces boycott

Yes our very own Tony Blair is reported by the Jewish Chronicle (pay for subscription only) denouncing proposals to boycott Israel or even to consider boycotting Israel as being contrary to the cause of peace. Indeed he made a reference to the "peace process" and apparently he did so with a straight face. See here:

Blair: ‘Drop the boycott – it’s no good for peace’
08/06/2007
By Bernard Josephs and Leon Symons
You have entered a subscription free zone. This story is from www.thejc.com – the website of The Jewish Chronicle Newspaper:

TONY BLAIR has led the worldwide condemnation of the British academics’ union supporting moves towards a boycott of Israeli universities.

In the Commons on Wednesday, Mr Blair called on the University and College Union to drop the resolution, passed at its annual meeting last week.

“I hope very much that the decision is overturned because it does absolutely no good for the peace process or indeed for relations in that part of the world,” Mr Blair told MPs. “The only solution ultimately is to relaunch the framework for a negotiated peace with a two-state solution at the heart of it.”

He also discussed the issue in a telephone call with Israel premier Ehud Olmert on Wednesday. According to a statement from Mr Olmert’s office, the boycott proposal did not reflect British public opinion, nor that of British universities.

Another sign of government displeasure was Higher Education Minister Bill Rammell’s acceptance of an invitation from Israeli Ambassador Zvi Heifetz to visit to Israel on Sunday to meet senior officials and university heads. A Parliamentary motion tabled by Labour Friends of Israel chair Jane Kennedy regretting the passing of the UCU resolution gathered 37 signatures within an hour of its presentation.

As Nobel Prize winners, research bodies, British and American Jewish leaders and Israeli politicians and academics added their voices to the protests, the executive of the embattled union was due to meet today to discuss its next move.

A spokesman insisted on Wednesday: “There is no boycott. The decision made was that there will be discussions at all our branches around the country.”

UCU has received a large number of letters and emails, “some very rude, others keen to engage in debate. But there have been no resignations.” However, King’s College London computational linguistics professor Shalom Lappin has told the JC that he has resigned from UCU because of the boycott motion and has urged colleagues to do likewise.

The UCU spokesman denied that the union had deliberately snubbed Gregg Rickman, the US special envoy for monitoring and combating anti-Semitism, who spent three days in Britain this week.

Dr Rickman claimed that the union had pulled out of a meeting with him. UCU maintained that it was “a clash of diaries. The request was made at the last minute and people were very busy after the congress.”

The New York based Anti-Defamation League took out display advertisements in The New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, the Financial Times and today’s JC pointing out that, at a time when journalists were being arrested in Iran, activists tortured in Zimbabwe and 400,000 people murdered in Darfur, “British unions have singled out Israel for boycott. That’s antisemitism.”

Organisations such as UCU and the National Union of Journalists (which voted at its conference to boycott Israeli goods) “should be embarrassed”, the ADL declared.

UK national newspaper leader writers were briefed by London Israel Embassy officials, who were understood to be pleased that most editorials were highly critical of the boycott.

A number of anti-boycott petitions were launched on the web. One,w by an organisation calling itself the Peace in the Middle East Society, attracted more than 13,000 supporters by Wednesday.

Underlining the seriousness of the threat, Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks told the JC that the UCU vote was “part of a deeply disturbing trend which will do nothing to advance peace in the Middle East and do a great deal to harm the integrity of academic life in Britain”. The Chief Rabbi will be writing on the issue in next Friday’s JC.

Following criticism of a slow response from British Jewish leaders, a long-term campaign was launched by the Britain-Israel Communications and Research Centre (Bicom) and the Jewish Leadership Council.

Bicom chief Lorna Fitzsimons said the aim was to mobilise senior MPs and “celebrity” academics to press the case against the boycott motion.

A website, stoptheboycott.org, due to go live today will provide information and advice to people wanting to join the campaign. A fundraising effort was also under way. “We are in this to win and campaigns like this do not come cheap,” Ms Fitzsimons pointed out.

“The aim is to persuade [UCU general secretary] Sally Hunt to do as she promised in her election manifesto and hold a ballot of all UCU members on the boycott motion.”

Also key to the fightback were the academics behind Engage, the website which combated earlier moves to boycott Israeli universities. David Hirsh, the University of London sociology lecturer who edits the site, warned that the anti-Israel movement was at “critical mass” on the left and in the trades-union movement.

To subscribe to The Jewish Chronicle Newspaper plus full access to website and archives click here

See more Boycott stories

UK leaders quiet... as Americans fight back

‘Academic Freedom cannot be undermined'

‘The UCU decision is shameful and goes against intellectual pursuit'

So what is the Board of Deputies doing to fight Israel’s corner?

What they want you to boycott...

Out of all those links I couldn't find any to support any kind of boycott or any campaign against Israel by Jews. This paper calls itself the Jewish Chronicle. It used to call itself "the organ of British Jewry." Clearly it is the in house paper of the zionist movement. I think I read that it was bought out in 1913 by a consortium of zionist businessmen. Whether it changed hands since then I don't know but it clearly cannot accommodate the range of opinions held by Jews (unless, of course, I missed something in which case I'll be happy to correct). It is also indicative of the panic that zionists are now in that they refuse to run arguments in favour of campaigning against Israel in spite of the fact nearly all zionists say nowadays that they support the two state solution that Israel could have accepted at any time in the last 40 years and certainly since the PLO leadership accepted the two states idea.

*Jewish National Fund website

Demonstration for Palestine in London today

Enough! Coalition - National Demonstration for Palestine 9th June National Demonstration: March and Rally in Trafalgar Square - 40 Years of Occupation is Enough! 09 June 2007 National Demonstration to Protest 40 Years of Israeli Occupation Assemble at 1:30pm in Lincoln's Inn Fields The ENOUGH! coalition is organising a major national demonstration and Rally in Trafalgar Square to take place in London on the afternoon of 9 June 2007 - the international day of action to mark the 40th anniversary under the slogan: "The World Says No to Israeli Occupation". Speakers include: From Palestine: - Mustafa Barghouti - Palestinian Minister of Information - Anglican Bishop Riah Abu El Assal And: Prof Manuel Hassassian (Palestinian Delegation to the UK) Lord Andrew Phillips Bruce Kent Richard Burden MP Jeremy Corbyn MP Emily Thornberry MP George Galloway MP Caroline Lucas MEP Dr Daud Abdullah (MCB) Ismael Patel (Friends of Al Aqsa) Dr Azzam Tamimi Mairead Corrigan Maguire (Nobel Peace Laureate) Keith Sonnet (UNISON) Netan'l Silverman (Combatants for Peace) ################# Full details to appear here - but please put the date in your diary now. This is the primary international event of the year in support of the Palestinian people, and it is up to us to ensure that the UK action sends a strong message both to the Israeli government and to No 10 Downing Street. For more information about the Enough! Coalition please visit the website: www.enoughoccupation.org

When Charlie Pottins visited Doctor Demon

I'm having a bit of a to-do with a zionist commentor called Malachi. I cross verbal swords with him with some trepidation (is that the word?) because he is actually a barrister called Adrian Cohen. I must point out here that he doesn't use the name Malachi as cover for his real identity. He is quite open about who he is and what he does for a living, or at least what he is qualified at. He uses the name Malachi in the same way that I use the name Levi9909 or that Michael Rosen uses Isakofsky. He's not like, say Alf Green (did I mention him?) or Baruch Spinoza (how about him?).

Anyway, he pops up here and there accusing anti-zionists and other campaigners against Israel of "demonisation" and sometimes making more specific allegations. I have sought clarification when he's done this but none came so I asked again just recently:

I remember asking you what you meant by "demonisation" and you wouldn't say. And then there was your charge that I had made "intemperate and deeply personal comments about Hirsh and Grant and others who don't share your extreme anti-Zionist views." When asked for examples you disappeared again.

You need to stand back and look at yourself and start debating like an honest grown up. This isn't the Engage site where you can make things up as you go along and rely on a bunch of zionists to feed frenzy when someone asks for an explanation or makes an honest point.

So go on, have an honest go now.

And this is how Malachi responded:

My point is that you use the term zionist to dehumanise people such as myself. Its a simple point. We are all multifaceted individuals with complex identities, the truth of which you try and erase. Your comments about anti-yiddishism are particularly inaccurate.

Your use of the term 'zionist' has no connection with the reality of how most Jews define themselves. I mix with lots of Jews with lots of different views and we don't go around saying 'hello I am a zionist and I understand you are a non zionist or a post zionist'. We don't debate the finer points of Borochov's inverted pyramid and we don't much discuss classical Zionism versus polycentrism. Your world view is a bizarrre pastiche of some throw back to the 1920s.

I work with members of the community drawn from atheist, theological liberal through to haredi and politically from left to right. Zionism as an ideology doesn't come up much, except for when people denigrate it because we know that these are in truth attacks on our identity - we all care about Israel's well being because we have friends and family there and because it plays a huge part in our traditions, for some of us our faith and for all of us our identity. Israel is also hopelessly interwinded with the history of the Shoah. It has been a salvation for Jews from persecution. Where would you rather be a Jew today:- Iraq, Ethiopia or Israel? Most of us see it as a refuge as well.

All your crawling over the minutae of zionist misdeamenours, real or imagined, misses the big picture and shows a quaint but dated obsession with ideology that reminds me of my friends in my student days who were in the RCPBML.

Wellbeing for Israel includes a hope that there is a settlement with the Palestinians and the overwhelming consensus is a recognition that this must be on the basis of two states.

Take this as a lesson on dehumanisation of Israel as well and apply to Israelis mutatis mutandis.

Malachi

Now I didn't read the whole thing, I simply scanned for "demonisation" which I didn't see and for anything about Hirsh and Grant. Nothing. Unless you count the "anti-Yiddishism" bit. Zionism as an ideology and in practice in Israel has been dismissive of Yiddish. I have used zionist antisemitism as a counterpoint for "zionism is good for Jews" positions but since I think that how zionists have treated the Palestinians is of far more importance than how bad I think it has been for Jews I don't make much of an issue out of it. Anyway, I swore at him in my reply so I won't repeat it here. I only use bad language in the comments. Just to say that I had asked him to explain "demonisation" and that he had invented a whole scenario conflating zionists with Jews (whilst accusing me of that) and ignoring the question about Dr Hirsh and Ms Grant altogether. I also pointed out (and this is where the headline comes from) that my reference to Yiddish annoying the zionists came from a run in when Charlie Pottins had used a Yiddish word in a comment to the Engage site and got told off for doing so by none other than Doctor David Hirsh, the great anti-antisemitism campaigner. I know I've posted it before, and reposted it quite recently, but it seems that Malachi, in spite of being an avid follower of this site, has missed it every time. Here's the exchange starting with Charlie's comment:

Obviously Sue Blackwell can do no right by you. After all, she moved a resolution in the AUT to boycott two Istaeli institutions on account of specific issues, and in your book this places her "behind the campaign to blacklist Israeli scientists, academics, teachers, students, musicians and artists".
Presumably you had some arguments against the proposal to boycott Haifa and Bar Ilan, but why trouble with details when you can so much more easily scare the kinder with tales about a completely different and imaginary boycott.

And here is Doctor Hirsh's anti-Yiddish response:

Charlie Pottins, please relate to the argument in the post. Of course Sue is in favour of a full academic and cultural boycott of Israel. Don't play games. Relate to the discussion Charlie.

And please write in English Charlie, not in Yiddish. This is not a forum for you to perform your anti-Zionist Jewish identity. It is a serious discussion about antisemitism in the British Labour Movement.

So you see, I do believe that Doctor Hirsh was trying to impress his zionist and Israeli cohorts with his anti-Yiddishism. And I believe that much of, for example, Gilad Atzmon's anti-Jewish attitudes stem from his zionist upbringing. The negation of the diaspora may not be a consistent zionist principle but it has been very widespread in the movement, it lives on as a cultural instinct in Israel and some diaspora zionist circles but at the same time, the negation of the diaspora cannot be too overt given that fact that the zionist movement wants the Jewish communities of the diaspora to be hasbara parrots and donors to zionist coffers. So, maybe zionists are ambivalent or inconsistent in their approach to Yiddish. Up against the crimes of zionists against Palestinians, it's really no big deal. It certainly doesn't amount to dehumanisation or demonisation to comment on it one way or another.

Now that should put this business to bed but there's another thing. Whilst checking back to see when this Malachi chap had first accused me of demonisation I noticed that it was in the comments under the post about David Hirsh being so insulting to Charlie Pottins over the use of one Yiddish word on the Engage site. The post I linked above. So Malachi knew exactly where I got the anti-Yiddishism thing from and no matter how clumsily or lazily I express myself, and I know I do, there was no excuse to elevate this from a little dig at one Engagenik to the demonisation or dehumanisation of a whole movement or community, particularly as he never thought of it at the time of the post he was commenting under.

And he said "it's a simple point." It wasn't simple enough for him first time round. He must be on some learning curve.

The (in)complete Michelin guide

I nearly didn't follow up on this. I got a useful response from Dizzy to an earlier post on Shimon Tzabar. It's as much of the (not the) Michelin guide as can be found on line,as far as I know anyway. The site is Oznik.com and it's a useful resource against zionism and the occupation:

Michelin Guides Sue Israeli Satirist over Spoof Michelin Guides have recently filed suite against Israeli expat satirist Shimon Tzabar, publisher of a pamphlet titled MUCH BETTER THAN THE OFFICIAL Michelin Guide to Israeli Prisons, Jails, Concentration Camps, and Torture Chambres. Below is an excerpt from the guide, followed by Tzabar's defense submitted to the British Hight Court. Shimon Tzabar 19 Jul. 2004

Update: 19 Oct. 2004 The court case was yesterday (18/10/04), in the High Court of Justice in London. After I admitted that I printed 500 copies and all were already distributed and that I have no intention to print and distribute more copies, Michelin decided to end their litigation with no demand for paying costs, fines, etc. That is the end of that saga. shimon tzabar Excerpt: The Guide (pp. 6-11): Before we start our guided tour of Israel's prisons, concentration camps and torture chambers, it would make sense to ask why we are doing this. Why should anyone go on such a tour? The answer is simple: to see history in the making. Usually, it is through newspapers that history unfolds before our eyes. In the case of Israel however, we cannot trust newspapers. They mix everything up and make us confused. We cannot distinguish any more between anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism, and anti-Israeli government policy. The only way to know the truth is to go there in person and see with our own eyes and watch history, true history, in the making. Going to Israel is quite simple. Anyone can do it; with or without a travel agent. The problem, once you are there, is how to see the prisons. There are two ways to see prisons, one is from the outside and the other is from the inside. For the sake of watching history in the making, there is not much one can see from watching from the outside but, after all, it is better than nothing. Since this guide serves everyone, we thought we would help people to reach the prisons and concentration camps and to see them from the outside as well as from the inside. We therefore, where possible, provide telephone and fax numbers of the prisons and police stations concerned. It will be obvious that to see the prisons from the inside, one has to be arrested. For Palestinians or any other Arab, this is not a problem. But for people who are not Arabs and may speak Arabic but don't have the proper accent, it is not so easy to get inside a jail. So, we have to give some guidance as how to be arrested. Of course, it is easy to commit a crime and be arrested, but we can't recommend such an ungraceful solution, especially since being arrested as a criminal may land you in the wrong jail. So, you have to do something political. You can demonstrate against the mistreating of Palestinians or try to stop bulldozers demolishing their homes or even try to save children from being shot. But this carries with it another danger. Instead of being arrested you may be shot yourself, or buried alive by the bulldozer. This is not a hypothetical suggestion because it has already happened to a few English and American people. We must admit that there is no 100% safe way to be arrested. Watching history in the making, especially in Israel, carries some risk with it, but we will try to help make that risk as small as possible. The safest way to be arrested, although this also carries a risk with it, is to look like a Palestinian Arab. This can easily be achieved by putting on some Arab garb, such as, for example, an Arab head dress or a kafiyeh, as it is commonly known. Once you look like a Palestinian you have a good chance of being arrested. Your chance is actually so good, that you don't have to do anything in particular. You can be arrested for anything, even for smiling (in the wrong place or at the wrong person!) Once you have been arrested, don't talk or answer questions. Don't open your mouth even if you do understand what is being said. We would especially stress that whatever happens, never protest because if you do it in any other language apart from Arabic (in the correct accent), you might be released at once or worse still, you could be expelled from the country. There is also another and much more important reason not to open your mouth. This is especially important if you want to observe what Israelis are capable of and are actually inflicting on the Palestinians. If you don't talk, they will assume that you know and have something to hide, so they will employ physical and psychological means to make you talk. They will start by beating you up. There are different methods of beating. One of them for example is known as the 'bending method'. After they have handcuffed your hands with plastic wire behind your back, and seated you on a small chair without a back support, two people will hit you: one, sitting in front of you, will push your chest with his left hand and, at the same time,will slap your chin with the palm of his right hand, while the other person, just standing behind you, will hold your head with his left hand, and box your left arm with his right fist. We go into these details so that you will know what to expect. Other methods of first stage torture include the 'tripping game'. While your eyes are covered and you can't see, you will be given the command to go forward. The moment you move, a soldier will trip you with his boot. These are mere examples but there are a lot more surprises once you are in the hands of the Shabak, the Israeli army police. You may rightly ask how we know all this. Is it from personal experience? The answer is no. We copied this information from a booklet by the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel which was published in Jerusalem, in April 2003. You can order this booklet yourself, by writing to: Public Committee Against Torture in Israel / PO Box 4634 / Jerusalem 91046 / ISRAEL. (see also: related links) Here is one concrete example of a torture case, as published on December 12th 2003 by the Organisation Mondiale Contre la Torture (Case ISR101203.CC): “According to the information received, at around 2 pm on April 24th 2003, a 16-year-old Mejad Abdalatif Fatah Sabach was arrested by Israel Defence Forces (IDF) soldiers near Kfar Geva/Jenin (see Map 1, pp. 12/13). He was in a taxi on the way to school. The soldiers handcuffed him, stripped him of his clothes down to his underpants and hit him all over his body, including the head. They reportedly subsequently tightened his handcuffs so much that the marks were still visible, two and a half months later, when he submitted his complaint. “While they were transporting him blindfolded to the prison facility at Araba, the soldiers beat him again. When they arrived, they threw him into the camp with his hands and feet tightly handcuffed. [Editors Note: It turns out that Araba is not a prison as such, but in fact a small Palestinian village south-west of Jenin which is occupied by a whole brigade of Israeli soldiers, called Hativat Menashe]. He was left that way until 10 pm, without receiving any food or drink. He was then transferred to the Salem detention facility (see Map 9, pp. 28/29). On arrival, four soldiers, using the butts of their rifles and sticks, beat him on the head, face, in the stomach and on the legs until he bled. This lasted until 2 am. “Mejad was subsequently taken to the Kishon detention center (see Map 2, pp. 14/15), where he was questioned for three hours while seated on a small chair, with his hands and feet handcuffed and his body bent backwards. After this, he was put in solitary confinement for a week. During this time he was interrogated twice, once for 6 hours and once for 3 hours. “He was then taken to Megido Prison (see Map 9, pp. 28/29). After having been held there for 15 days in a tent with 20 other prisoners, he was sent back to the Kishon Detention center for another week in solitary confinement. On the 7th day of detention there, he was taken for interrogation which lasted from 10 am to 5 pm. “During this interrogation, Mejad was placed in a painful position, his back stretched backwards, with his interrogator kicking him in the legs. The following day, he was again interrogated for three hours, seated in the same position. The many kicks that he received made it difficult for for him to stand. After this interrogation, he was taken back to his cell, where he remained until June 20th 2003, when he was taken to the Hasharon Prison. There could be some confusion here because there are 2 prisons called Hasharon. One is situated on Road 553, near Tel-Mond, (see Map 4, pp. 18/19) which belongs to the Prison Service, and the other belongs to the Police and is near Petach-Tikwa (see Map 5, pp. 20/21), where he is still being held”. On top of physical torture one can also expect psychological torture. Since psychological torture involves vocals, and is executed in Hebrew or in Arabic, those who don't know these languages will not understand a word and, therefore, have nothing to fear. Bon voyage. Letter submitted to the British High Court, Chancery Division, in London, in response to a suite by famed international publishing house Michelin, against the MUCH BETTER THAN THE OFFICIAL Michelin Guide to Israeli Prisons, Jails, Concentration Camps, and Torture Chambres: Michelin claim against me is invalid, for the following reasons: 1. The “book” that Michelin is referring to, is not a book in a commercial sense. The “book” that the claimants are referring to, is not a book in a commercial sense. It doesn't have an ISBN number or a publisher. It has not been sent to the British Library as the law requires of any book published in this country and has not been sent to any bookshop to be sold to customers. It is a political pamphlet given free or in exchange for a small donation that some people send us voluntarily or at our request, to cover the cost of printing and postage. A notification of the existence of this pamphlet and a request for a donation was only sent to a few people who are on my e-mail address list. Since it is not a book in the commercial sense, it could not have caused any loss or financial damage as Michelin claims. As for other, real or imagined damages, like damage to reputation for example, I will refer later on. This pamphlet is a political publication. It attacks the government of Israel for its treatment of the Palestinians; for their imprisonment and torture, for the demolition of their houses and for the killing of hundreds of innocent people, including children. To make it impressive, it is written in a literary style of a satire that I’ve learned from Jonathan Swift. 2. The cover of the pamphlet is a visual satire, to fit the style of the text. I assume that what the claimants are objecting to, is not the pamphlet itself but the cover of that pamphlet. That cover, which was printed separately and added to the pamphlet later on, is in the same spirit of satire as the text is. I chose the subject of the satire on the front page to be that of the famous Michelin guide. However, I made it clear that it is not a real Michelin guide. I made this clear by printing, on the cover, in bold letters, the title which is: “MUCH BETTER THAN THE OFFICIAL Michelin guide” if it is better, it cannot be a Michelin guide. This must be clear to everyone. In addition, I printed on the spine: “THE TOURIST GUIDE THAT NEVER WAS. These additions are clear evidence that it is not a genuine Michelin guide but a spoof. The idea came to me from the Campbell Soup silk-screen print, by the artist Andy Warhol. He took a commercial logo and made an art object out of it. Since I am also an artist I thought that I can create something in the same spirit. 3. The accusation that I have caused damages to Michelin is not true I have already explained in paragraph 1), why my publication could not have caused financial damage to the claimant. As for damage to reputation, I must say that the way I used the name of Michelin in the cover of the spoof, could only add to their reputation, not to damage it. I used their name to make the international public aware that Israel is trying to eliminate the Palestinians. I tried to prevent a holocaust. I am sure that Michelin, as a company that employs many people, supports humanitarian causes but as a commercial company they cannot express it. 4. Michelin has given me a tacit permission to distribute it In spite of all that, I still wanted to make sure that Michelin did not object to the spoof. Being a French company, I was sure that they would know what satire is and would have enough sense of humor to tolerate a spoof based on one of their products, especially for such an humanitarian cause. To make sure that they did not object, I made one copy of this cover, enveloped a pamphlet with it and sent it to Michelin with a note of my address stacked among the pages. Since I did not receive any response from them for over three weeks, objecting to what I had done, I was sure that they did not mind. So, I enveloped all the pamphlets with this cover and started to distribute them among my friends. Allow me to end my defense by quoting a short poem written by the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda: You will ask: where are the lilacs And the metaphysics petalled with poppies And the rain repeatedly spattering its words, filling them with holes and birds?… You will ask why his poetry does not speak of dreams and leaves, and the great volcanoes of his birthplace? Come and see the blood in the streets. Come and see the blood in the streets. Come and see the blood in the streets! [oznik.comment: We have been able to obtain a copy of the Much Better than the official Michelin Guide and wish to inform our readers that in addition to detailed maps and brief descriptions of Israeli prisons, jails, concentration camps, and torture chambers, this pamphlet also contains a translation of a memoir published in Israel, but nowhere else. Checkpoint Syndrome by Liran Ron Furer, is a personal account of an Israeli soldier's experience as an occupier, and his being haunted by this memory. A note found among the pages of the book says: "We asked for permission to translate Checkpoint Syndrome from Hebrew into English but it was denied. Since we think the book is of great importance, we have decided to translate and publish it without permission. The Editors."] Shimon Tzabar is a satirist, poet, and artist. A new edition of his book, The White Flag Principle: How to Lose a War (and Why) (buy from an independent book shop, buy from Amazon) was published by Four Walls Eight Windows in Feb. 2003. Tzabar is editor of Israel Imperial News.

Israel "uniquely evil"

Thanks to commentor, Hulkagaard for the link to this ridiculous Education Guardian article on how Anthony "blood libel" Julius and Professor Alan (From time immemorial II) Dershowitz are going to be working together on a project to sue academics who support or try to implement any boycott of Israel. Here's the whole article by Donald McLeod:

The prominent lawyer Anthony Julius has said he will represent individuals or institutions affected by the proposed academic boycott of Israeli universities.

The intervention, by the man who acted for Princess Diana in her divorce and is representing Heather Mills McCartney, is likely to alarm members of the University and College Union, who passed a pro-boycott motion at their annual conference last month.

Dr Julius, who also successfully defended the historian Deborah Lipstadt against a libel suit brought by the Holocaust denier David Irving, is collaborating on a forthcoming statement on the issue with American legal star Prof Alan Dershowitz.

Prof Dershowitz has threatened sanctions to "devastate and bankrupt" those acting against Israeli universities.

Dr Julius used less colourful language, but he told EducationGuardian.co.uk yesterday: "It is truly appalling that this kind of thing should be happening."

He says Israel is being treated as "uniquely evil" - in contrast to the attitude towards India's position in Kashmir or China's in Tibet - in a way that is reminiscent of the anti-semitism of the medieval Christian church.

The lecturers' union has not yet called a boycott, unlike its predecessor Association of University Teachers in 2005, but that decision was reversed at a special conference.

The motion, passed at this year's conference in Bournemouth by 158 to 99, notes the call for a boycott by Palestinian trade unions and says the full text of the Palestinian boycott call should be sent to all branches "for information and discussion".

As a boycott has not yet been imposed the possibility of legal action has not yet arisen, said Dr Julius, but he said he would he delighted to act for academics who found themselves in contractual difficulties because of the boycott or, say, an Israeli PhD student had their supervisor withdrawn.

"Boycotts are gesture politics anyway but a resolution that comes close but is afraid to strike is a gesture wrapped up in a gesture - it's nothing more than a bad smell," he said.

I said ludicrous. Look how Alan Dershowitz is described. "Legal star." What's a legal star? He's acted for some wealthy people and he holds some chair or other at Harvard. Do they really know nothing of his other works, like his plagiarism, his ad hominem attacks on Norman Finkelstein, his attempts to get a book banned and then his denial that he had tried to get the same book banned? Do these things contribute to legal stardom? The handling of Anthony Julius is no better. He acted for Princess Di! Wow! He defeated the moronic holocaust denier, David Irving, in a case where Irving, famous for denying the holocaust, decided to deny that he denied the holocaust. And what about his work on the "blood libel," published to intimidate people out of reporting, still less protesting, Israel persistent killing of Palestinian children? Was that not worth a mention? Apparently not. Instead we get this:

Israel is being treated as "uniquely evil" - in contrast to the attitude towards India's position in Kashmir or China's in Tibet - in a way that is reminiscent of the anti-semitism of the medieval Christian church.

Now what's he saying? Is he saying that Jews really did kill Christian children in those times but so did the Chinese and Indians? He probably doesn't mean to say that. He is saying that Israel occupies territory and abuses the basic human rights of the occupied so why target Israel? His comparison to medieval times is an appallingly clumsy one then. But there are two major differences between Israel on the one side and China and India on the other. Israel's existence, not just its occupation, is predicated on persistent human rights abuses. This doesn't apply to India and China. Also, who are India and China's defenders in the newpapers in, say, the UK. Who are India and China's Jonathan Freedland and Linda Grant at the Guardian? Who is India and China's Eric Silver at the Independent? Who is their Melanie Phillips at the Mail?

No, if Israel is being singled out for disapproval it's because Israel has been singled out by itself and by its propagandists and sympathisers in the media.

But there's another thing that makes this particular Education Guardian article ludicrous. See this bit again:

As a boycott has not yet been imposed the possibility of legal action has not yet arisen, said Dr Julius, but he said he would he delighted to act for academics who found themselves in contractual difficulties because of the boycott or, say, an Israeli PhD student had their supervisor withdrawn.

"Boycotts are gesture politics anyway but a resolution that comes close but is afraid to strike is a gesture wrapped up in a gesture - it's nothing more than a bad smell," he said.

So what on earth was the article doing there in the first place? Dershowitz and Julius are threatening academics over proposals that haven't been adopted and may not be. Who allows them to get their intimidation in up front like this?

Comment is free cuts out the middle man

Did anyone notice how the Guardian cut out the middleman yesterday and instead of running a Comment is free article by an Engagenik to celebrate the conquest of the occupied territories they ran with Israel's Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert. Of course it did nothing for accuracy. In fact, as far as I can tell it made no difference. See this summing up of the war of June 1967:

Six days, 40 years ago. Looking back to the weeks preceding the war, it may be difficult for you to imagine just how desperate life seemed for Israelis, ringed by peoples whose armies pointed their weapons towards us, whose leaders daily promised the imminent destruction of our state and whose newspapers carried crude cartoons of Jews being kicked off the face of the earth. As we consecrated mass graves in expectation of the worst, we were once again people facing annihilation. We had no alternative but to defend ourselves, no strategic allies to ensure our survival. We stood alone.

Of course it wasn't quite like that but perhaps I'm being inconsistent falling back on Olmert's zionist predecessors top explode the myth he seeks to perpetuate.

These quotes are held together on the Cactus 48 site by way of a Q and A session:

Did the Egyptians actually start the 1967 war, as Israel originally

claimed?

"The former Commander of the Air Force, General Ezer Weitzman, regarded as a hawk, stated that there was 'no threat of destruction' but that the attack on Egypt, Jordan and Syria was nevertheless justified so that Israel could 'exist according the scale, spirit, and quality she now embodies.'...Menahem Begin had the following remarks to make: 'In June 1967, we again had a choice. The Egyptian Army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.' "Noam Chomsky, "The Fateful Triangle."

Was the 1967 war defenisve? - continued

"I do not think Nasser wanted war. The two divisions he sent to The Sinai would not have been sufficient to launch an offensive war. He knew it and we knew it." Yitzhak Rabin, Israel's Chief of Staff in 1967, in Le Monde, 2/28/68

Moshe Dayan posthumously speaks out on the Golan Heights

"Moshe Dayan, the celebrated commander who, as Defense Ministerin 1967, gave the order to conquer the Golan...[said] many of the firefights with the Syrians were deliberately provoked by Israel, and the kibbutz residents who pressed the Government to take the Golan Heights did so less for security than for the farmland...[Dayan stated] 'They didn't even try to hide their greed for the land...We would send a tractor to plow some area where it wasn't possible to do anything, in the demilitarized area, and knew in advance that the Syrians would start to shoot. If they didn't shoot, we would tell the tractor to advance further, until in the end the Syrians would get annoyed and shoot.

And then we would use artillery and later the air force also, and that's how it was...The Syrians, on the fourth day of the war, were not a threat to us.'" The New York Times, May 11, 1997

And I thought these people were Olmert's mentors.

Co comment? Schmo comment

Bit of yiddish there to annoy those Jewish nationalists known as zionists. Look up schmo if you want here.

To cut down on clutter and general stupidness I use moderating in the comments. There is a facility down in the bottom right hand corner called co-comment. It allows people to participate in and follow threads without returning to the site. When you comment the comment goes straight to co-comment even if I delete it. It's a boon for avid debaters, serial pains in the neck and to me.

So comment!

The late Shimon Tzabar obituary

A regular commentor called Montag has reminded me of the passing of Shimon Tzabar. He was already the late Shimon Tzabar back in March this year so its my post on his obituary that's late. I wasn't blogging much when the man died and by the time I was there was too much to catch up on so I didn't even try. Daphna Baram's obituary in the Independent is a fascinating biography of a man who was in on the founding of the State of Israel as an armed zionist only to become disillusioned with the project later on in life. 3 months after the June 1967 war he and 11 others published the following statement in Ha'aretz:

Foreign rule leads to resistance. Resistance leads to oppression. Oppression leads to terror and counter-terror. . . keeping the territories will turn us into a nation of murderers and murder victims.

I only heard of this chap a few years ago when he had a run-in with Michelin, the tyre and restaurant awards company, because he published a booklet satirising their good restaurant guide with a replica detailing Israel's "prisons, concentration camps and torture chambers" together with details on "how to get there." Michelin's case was ludicrous and must have been politically motivated. The BBC report of it at the time is here. The outcome was that no further copies of the booklet were produced and so the multi-national giant, Michelin, won a great case against an elderly man in poor health who was no threat to them commercially, though apparently a terrible threat politically. I've hunted around a bit but I could only find the cover on the net and that's everywhere. Surely someone has it and thinks a run in with Michelin is worth the trouble. So go on, if you have it on line or in hard copy, let me know.

Thanks

Boycott news: Dershowitz is on the case

The most notorious liar in the zionist movement has threatened to ""devastate and bankrupt" anyone who supports the boycott of Israel, according the UK's Financial Times:

A top American lawyer has threatened to wage a legal war against British academics who seek to cut links with Israeli universities.

Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor renowned for his staunch defence of Israel and high-profile legal victories, including his role in the O.J. Simpson trial, vowed to "devastate and bankrupt" lecturers who supported such boycotts.

This week's annual conference of Britain's biggest lecturers' union, the University and College Union, backed a motion damning the "complicity of Israeli academia in the occupation [of Palestinian land]".

It also obliged the union's executive to encourage members to "consider the moral implications of existing and proposed links with Israeli academic institutions".

Prof Dershowitz said he had started work on legal moves to fight any boycott.

He told the Times Higher Educational Supplement that these would include using a US law - banning discrimination on the basis of nationality - against UK universities with research ties to US colleges. US academics might also be urged to accept honorary posts at Israeli colleges in order to become boycott targets.

"I will obtain legislation dealing with this issue, imposing sanctions that will devastate and bankrupt those who seek to impose bankruptcy on Israeli academics," he told the journal.

Sue Blackwell, a UCU activist and member of the British Committee for Universities of Palestine, said: "This is the typical response of the Israeli lobby which will do anything to avoid debating the real issue - the 40-year occupation of Palestine." Jewish groups have attacked the UCU vote, which was opposed by Sally Hunt, its general secretary.

Of course we can't be sure if this suing lark is actually Dershowitz's own idea after all, he's nothing if not unoriginal.

NUJ policy blog?

See this National Union of Journalists policy blog I just stumbled on. It seems to carry a bit of boycott news so I'd say it's worth a look at.

Boycott Britain and boycott boycotts update

Here's more on the anti-saxonist boycott Britain campaign. It's an article by Conal Urquhart in today's Guardian.

Israeli groups are planning to launch a counter-boycott of Britain in response to a series of boycotts proposed by British unions and associations.

The counter-measures include an email campaign to convince North Americans to boycott British goods and services and a threat by union workers to refuse to unload British exports to Israel.

Israelis have reacted angrily to proposals by the University and College Union and Unison, the largest public sector workers' union, to boycott Israel in protest at its treatment of Palestinians. The proposals follow a similar resolution passed by the National Union of Journalists earlier this year.

Before yesterday's weekly meeting of the Israeli cabinet in Jerusalem, ministers said they were concerned at the prospect of a boycott. Israel's trade minister, Eli Yishai, said he would hold talks on how Israeli industry would respond. The minister for social affairs, Isaac Herzog, said the boycott proposals were part of "a long trail of anti-semitism in Europe, which includes one-sided articles and anti-semitic harassment, topped by torching of the synagogue in Switzerland. This is a great challenge for the Israeli government to deal with."

While Israeli officialdom examines ways of countering the boycott against them their unofficial on line embassy known as Engage has gone into overdrive in its comments section on the same subject.

Reading the Engage comments gives a wonderful insight into the sheer disarray that the zionist movement is in. Some contain threats of the power of American government being brought to bear on known boycotters:

it's time to pass on a list of boycott supporters and activists to the US authorities. This will in due process turn this group into persona non grata in the US, prohibit any academic exchange and will make any financial/grants emanating from the US illegal.

As the following link demonstrates, counter action can be swift, effective and painful.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3407111,00.html

Goodness, to the American authorities. But the Americans have got 50 states, the British have only got one! There's a saying "if you've got it, flaunt it" but do zionists really have the power this guy is flaunting on the Engage site? Dr Hirsh, the leader of the Engageniks clearly thought this was a comment worth approving. That's not to say he approved of it, just that he thought it a worthy contribution to a discussion on helping Israel out of its current difficulty.

Of all the comments, I found Linda Grant's and the responses to them to be the most fascinating. Linda Grant sees the way the wind is blowing on this one:

If you want to have this debate, you really should familiarise yourself with your enemy's arguments. I do not think they are stupid, or incoherent.

I have had these conversations many many times with the pro-boycotters. They believe that as apartheid South Africa was replaced with a single democratic state which despite its difficulties today is better than its predecessor, so in Israel the same will happen. All objections as to how this will happen, the difference between the two situations, the complicated nature of the Middle East, the role of religion ,the Jewish right to self-determination, are brushed aside. South Africa is the model. Faith in the future is the creed.

Palestine has become a Cause, as was Spain in the 30s, South Africa, Vietnam, Nicaragua, Chile, etc. There is an anti-imperialist world view which sees the oppressed in a struggle against America and its chief ally Israel. The Palestinians are regarded as the shock troops of that struggle, the suffering uber victim of American/Zionist aggression. Which side are you on, they ask themselves? Well, it is a simple choice, they see themselves as on the side of the oppressed, of course. Israel is simply on the wrong side, and only by its dismantling as a Jewish state can the beginnings of real equality in the whole region can emerge.

Needless to say I do not agree with this view, but that is the debate you are entering, on the left.

There it is, Palestine is the new black, zionists the new blackshirts. She'll try to argue that it is the closedmindedness of the pro-boycotters that is the problem with trying to defend Israel from the boycott proposals. For her the campaign should be against boycotts generally and not for Israel as Israel will lose the debate, as it has already. It is clear though that she is concerned that the non(so far)committed will be swayed by the "Israel is an apartheid state" argument:

If you repeat over and over again the question why Israel, then over and over again you will get the answer because it is an apartheid state, until Israel=apartheid becomes an association in the minds of the public.

There's a hint there of how some of these Engageniks want to play it. They want to ask "why Israel?" Those of us who are familiar with Engage-type arguments will know that the question "why Israel?" isn't a question, it's an allegation of antisemitism and a false one. And they've done that one to death now anyway. They know the answer to the question and Linda Grant has spelt it out for them. Israel is an apartheid state. Governments are doing nothing and unlike other serial abusers of human rights, Israel is rarely condemned in the media. This leaves boycotts by ordinary people and their own grass roots organisations to fill the gap. The only way to argue against a boycott of Israel is to boycott boycotts generally. Linda Grant's right about that one.

Harvard war criminals

I was emailed this link some weeks ago. It's a site devoted to exposing the relationship between Harvard and various war criminals and human rights abusers. I was sent it on the occasion of Dan Halutz completing course there.

Cambridge, MA (24 May) -- Notorious war criminal Dan Halutz [dossier] completed his course in Harvard Business School's two-month Advanced Management Program (AMP) yesterday.

Halutz, former head of the Israeli military, orchestrated the indiscriminate bombing of Lebanon last summer, killing up to 1,200 civilians. Major human rights organizations condemned his policies as amounting to war crimes. It is not clear if Halutz managed to wow faculty and students at HBS with his tips on cluster bombing and how-to pep talks on strafing ambulances.

The Harvard-based Alliance for Justice in the Middle East (AJME) launched a public safety campaign last week to alert the community to Halutz's presence. AJME circulated mock WANTED posters for Halutz on campus and printed his likeness on helium balloons to help boost awareness.

As Halutz is a "flight risk," AJME has put up WANTED notices to warn travelers at Boston's Logan international airport and notified authorities there to keep their eyes peeled for the suspect.


AJME's efforts this past week were covered by international media and its website, http://harvardwarcriminals.blogspot.com, received over 12,000 unique visits in the first ten days.

The Halutz campaign is part of a broader effort by AJME to end Harvard's pattern of hiring and training known war criminals and human rights abusers, regardless of nationality. AJME's research over the past 1.5 years has revealed at least six individuals who had public records of personal or command responsibility for specific war crimes and human rights abuses before coming to Harvard. AJME welcomes any information about other Harvard-affiliated abusers who meet the same criteria.

Thanks to Montag for this.

Official Jews?

I had a comment recently from a Harry's Place regular suggesting that I'm not a real Jew, largely because I refuse to lie for the racist war criminals of the State of Israel. Independent Jewish Voices, including the rabbis among them, had all of that nonsense thrown at them, I remember. It was particularly amusing coming from David Aaronovitch, who seems to be making a good living out of one Jewish cause, but I don't think he actually claims to be Jewish himself. Anyway, this comment. Here it is from a guy using the screenname Zkharya:

'Jews sans Frontieres' is, of course, a complete affectation.

Mark Elf is a fully integrated, and assimilated non- Jewish Jew (he only raises his 'Jewishness' to distinguish himself from the majority of his fellow Jewish Jews) in a western liberal democracy i.e. the kind of situation most Jews, European or middle eastern, who became Palestinian or Israeli, did not find themselves in.

Fortunately his views and opinions are irrelevant to the situation and choices that most Jewish Jews confront as they remain part of Jewish continuity and history.

Of course Mark Elf may well play the part of making life more and more difficult for most Jewish Jews, as so many culturally Christian, non-Jewish Jewish converts to culturally Christian (or Islamic) anti-Judaism or anti-Zionism have before him.

But, in the end, he, like they, will be forgotten by Jewish history.

Yeah like that deadbeat Jesus. Here's my reply:

Zkharya - you're part of that rare breed, an almost honest zionist. you make your distaste for liberal values plain as well as your aversion to assimilation. in so doing you admit to something most zionists won't admit to, that zionism is a bulwark not against antisemitism but against the free choice of assimilation. personally i'm neutral on that one.

since you're being personal I think you were the chap who disrupted an mpac meeting one friday evening. you even described paying the fare to get the train from north london. i'm just wondering what's so authentically jewish about being a fare paying, train riding, sabbath breaking hooligan on a friday night? that's assuming it was you of course. I went there to listen to quite a rivetting speaker on jewish issues, stephen marks. I read a bit of that hart chap's book and engaged in a bit of discussion and debate. maybe i'm assimilated but my behaviour was positively talmudic compared to yours. assuming it was you of course.

I've put that there partly because the guy didn't come back to answer a question about his identity (since he's so interested in mine) but mostly because I stumbled on a Comment is free piece by Tony Greenstein where he touches on the question of who can speak for Jews.

Now I'm not clear on whether there is both a Jewish Society and a (World Zionist Congress affiliated) Union of Jewish Students at SOAS or whether the former is a local affiliate of the latter but here's Tony on the two:

According to the chair of the Jewish Society, Emma Clyne, posters for a meeting the society put on were repeatedly torn down. Ms Clyne told a meeting of Independent Jewish Voices on May 15 that she had to put new ones up every day.

The UJS not raised its customary hue and cry about this. A clue as to the reason for its silence might lie in a short article in the Jewish Chronicle of April 27 ("Students in censorship row over IJV debate").

When the Jewish Society at Soas proposed holding a meeting with speakers from IJV, including Brian Klug, Sir Geoffrey Bindman and Professors Donald Sassoon and Jacqueline Rose, the UJS sought to prevent the meeting on the grounds that it was "propaganda for a particular viewpoint". When this ploy failed, Simmons sought to "balance" the speakers' panel - something the UJS has never attempted with pro-Zionist speakers.

Ms Clyne has come under considerable pressure ever since taking up the chair of the Jewish Society at SOAS. When the UJS tried to offload a weighty stack of pro-Israeli propaganda for freshers, she suggested that it might be more suitable for an Israeli society rather than a Jewish society.

A stray comment on my blog, a Union of Jewish Students trying to turn a generalist Jewish society into a specific Israel society and a hysterical and panic stricken campaign against boycotting Israel (see today's Observer leader) are all adding up to a zionist movement that is bidding to become the authentic representative of the Jewish people. Given zionism's ignoble history of collaboration with antisemitism, Jews who want that to happen simply don't know their history.

Jewish Chronicle on the boycott and 1967

The boycott Israel motion passed by the University and Colleges Union makes the front page of the Jewish Chronicle this week. Not being a subscriber this was all I could grab from the website:

Colleges back a boycott
01/06/2007
By Bernard Josephs, Bournemouth

Israel accused of ethnic cleansing, ‘barbaric colonisation’ and apartheid Despite pleas from their own leadership, and a concerted campaign by pro-Israel supporters and academics, members of the newly merged Universities and Colleges Union voted this week to move towards a boycott of Israeli academic institutions. The vote, by 158 to 99, with 17 ....

There are also two almost full pages (4 and 5) on boycott issues.

Ironically, it's the 1967 war that gets the most coverage in this week's JC what with this month being the fortieth anniversary. Ironical because if Israel had confined itself to its pre-1967 boundaries there might not be this boycott movement emerging just now. It's still not an anti-zionist boycott though of course many of the activists who have promoted the boycott are anti-zionists.

Out of the 1967 war coverage the most interesting I think is Jeremy Bowen's piece. He strikes an interesting balance between the perceptions of ordinary people at the time such as overconfident Egyptians and worried Jews and Israelis on the one hand and on the other, the in know, justly confident Israeli leaders together with Arab leaders whose "blood-curdling threats" belied their own anxiety and weakness.

Boycott Google! Er no, google boycott

Woops sorry. Don't boycott google (just yet). Google "boycott." Do it now before it goes cold. This is what I got just now, assuming the html from the selection source translates ok into whatever blogger uses:

News results for boycott - View today's top stories
	UK's largest labor union to debate boycott of Israel - Taipei Times - 11 hours ago Altitude ban brings boycott threat - CNN International - 2 hours ago AIADMK to boycott TN cooperative polls - Hindu - 15 hours ago

The word "boycott" sends the boycott of Israel to the top of the google news. As it happens that news story from Taipei is second in the news section when you google "Israel" at the time I'm writing this:

News results for Israel - View today's top stories
	Israel sees problem skyrocket - Baltimore Sun - 4 hours ago UK's largest labor union to debate boycott of Israel - Taipei Times - 11 hours ago Illegal Palestinian workers hide out in Israel, staying longer as ... - San Diego Union Tribune - 16 hours ago

The big boycott news today is that Unison, apparently the UK's biggest trade union is debating a boycott motion next month.

Another apology here but I am sorry that I have to use this expression yet again. The zionists are in a blind panic about what is happening to them. They used to have an influence in the labour movement in the UK that was completely at odds with their intrinsically right wing racist ideology. That now is damaged beyond repair as the cause of Palestine becomes the cause of labour just as the anti-apartheid cause was until it won its victory in the 1990s.

Evidence of this panic is found on the Engage site where there is a call for a "crisis meeting." See this:

The anti-Israel “anti-apartheid” movement is on the verge of attaining a critical mass and becoming a reality on the British left, in the trade union movement and in public discourse in the UK.

Other evidence includes the panic measure of trying to have anti-zionism outlawed in the EU and decrying the mere reporting of facts of Israel killing children as "blood libel."

But the zionists are in a bind. The more they try to spread their word the more the word of their opponents is heard. And now their campaign against the campaign against them has sent the main weapon of solidarity to the top of the hit parade in cyber space.

I remember some wag saying words to the effect that if the Oslo process reaches the conclusion that the generous Ehud Barak had in mind then all the Palestinians would get would be "freedom on (or of) the internet." Actually, under Barak's proposals they wouldn't have even got that. But one day they may get freedom via (together with other things of course) the internet and today looks like a good day for demonstrating that.

Israel kills still more children

Another job for Anthony Hasbara Julius. World War IV Report carries a Chinese news agency report on Israel killing two more children in Gaza.

Israeli soldiers stationed in northern Gaza Strip shot dead on Friday afternoon two Palestinian children, paramedics and eyewitnesses said.

The witnesses said that Israeli soldiers opened fire at two Palestinian children, 10 and 8 years old, who were playing on the beach near the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahia.

I blame the parents myself.

Boycott Britain!

A Jews sans frontieres exclusive?

I've just received the following email:

Dear Friend of Israel,

You have received this email because you are someone who cares about the one and only Jewish State. This is not your typical urban-legend “chain email”. This is about a real political issue— the growing British boycott of Israel.

The chief union of British university professors has just voted to boycott Israel and to urge its members to terminate their relations with Israeli faculty and researchers. Worse, Britain’s largest and most influential union of government employees is expected to enact its own boycott later in June. Beyond symbolism, this could have significant long-term consequences for the Israeli economy, and will certainly embolden other European unions to implement their own boycotts and divestment campaigns. Developments in Britain thus threaten to set off a chain reaction that would marginalize Israel and suffocate its export-oriented economy.

The British government has officially opposed these actions; however, it is not blameless in the matter. In the name of “Mideast even-handedness”, it has blocked and hindered exports of essential arms and spare parts to Israel since around 2001. It also raised a scandal upon discovering that a U.S. military cargo plane, transporting ammunition to Israel during last year’s war with Hezbollah, had used a British airfield to refuel. (It seems that nothing has changed from 60 years ago, when some British units and volunteers fought side-by-side with the Arabs to destroy Israel during its War of Independence).

These are not the actions of a friendly state. It is clear that both the British government and Britain's public-sector elites are opposed to Israel’s right to self-defense, and therefore, its right to exist.

However, a boycott can be a two-way street. While the State of Israel, with its tiny population and economy, cannot respond in kind, we in North America can.

So until Britain changes its attitude and policies 180-degrees, please do not travel to Britain, do not partake of British products or brands (e.g. HSBC Bank, Reebok, Umbro, Burberry, French Connection, Virgin Megastores, Cadbury, Amstrad, Invensys), do not spend money on British movies or music, do not fly on any British airline (e.g. British Airways, Virgin Atlantic), and, if this applies to you, consider limiting your business with British nationals, divesting your British assets, and/or voting against tenure for British faculty in your department.

Also, please write the British Embassy and Consulates in protest, ask your Congressman for a statement on the issue, and pass along this email to as many friends of Israel (and websites and blogs) as you can.

Whatever you do, please do not sit by idly. Let them know that their hateful, pro-terrorist actions have consequences, and will not be ignored on this side of the Atlantic. Together, we can make a difference.

Thank you,

A Fellow Friend of Israel

It's on us. A boycott of the beloved homeland. Don't they understand that we are the world's one and only British state?

More boycott, well actually, anti-boycott news

Charlie Pottins is an angry young man (especially for his age!). He's cross because he thinks there might be a veracity issue with champion in the struggle against the rampant antisemitism that pervades UK society and college campuses in particular (bit of a mouthful), Dr David Hirsh. Here's an email from Charlie to the Just Peace UK list:

The Universities and Colleges Union has voted to circulate the Palestininian call for a boycott of Israeli universities within the union; to ask members to consider the moral implications of working with Israeli institutions, to invite a delegation from Palestinian unions, and to strengthen links with Palestinian higher education.

Nowhere in the resolution that I saw before the UCU conference was there any call for boycotting individual Israelis, and the mover of the resolution is quoted in the press as saying it is not aimed against any individuals.

Out of curiosity I turned to the Engage website and found these doughty defenders of "academic freedom" claiming: "UCU Congress has today voted for a roadshow touring colleges and universities drumming up support for an exclusion of Israelis - and only
Israelis - from our campuses, our conferences and our journals. The union is mandated to finance this tour and to stack the debate in favour of a pro-boycott outcome".

This is signed by David Hirsh, founder of Engage, and lecturer at Goldsmiths College in London. According to his logic, some of the people who have campaigned for a boycott would be excluding themselves from campuses, as they happen to be Israelis!

I ask whether a person who so deliberately misinterprets the facts and distorts what people are saying is really fit to be teaching in an institution of higher education, let alone to be a member of the academics union?

No wonder Hirsh was so angry when I suggested some time ago that he was trying to frighten the kinder. (his response was to complain that I had used a Yiddish expression!) He treats his own audience and supporters with contempt, and insults their intelligence, but I guess they must deserve it.

Incidentally, to the credit of some academics in Israel, I see they were asking whether Israel can object to a boycott while it boycotts Palestinian students - they cited the case of 10 students from Gaza who were not permitted to cross to the West Bank to attend a course in Occupational Therapy, something that is not provided in the Gaza area. Only a little instance, which might be frustrating for the students but will not attract publicity from our media or be sufficiently important for our defenders of "academic freedom" to become outraged about.

Just as the Israeli authorities can decide who travels to, and within, occupied Palestine, so they feel confident to decide what goes on here, at least for Jews. One reaction to the UCU conference was from an Israeli minister saying he would call for a freeze on donations to British universities by Jewish businessmen. I trust we will all know our duty when the Israeli minister gives instructions?

UCU members can expect a witch-hunt and hysteria, orchestrated not just from Israel but from the much worse lobbyists in the United States. I'm sure they can take it. But do they need a witch-hunting fanatic in their midst?. It's bad enough having the 'leadership' of Sally Hunt.

I can't be bothered to leaf through Engage to find the actual post that Charlie is complaining of so I'll get a link from him later but have a browse round the Engage site. If you're anti-zionist your heart will swell. If I was a zionist I'd swear the movement had been infiltrated by agents provocateurs trying to undermine the anti-boycott movement.

Meanwhile, Dr Hirsh is known to be an avid monitor of this site and the Just Peace UK list so I wonder if or how he'll respond to Charlie's post.

Entebbe, did Israel set it up to set it up?

This is one for conspiracy theorists. I usually steer clear of such tales even when they ring true but according to the BBC there was a suggestion in British diplomatic circles that Israel may have had a hand in the PFLP hijacking of, among others, several Israeli citizens that ended with the Israeli commando raid on Entebbe.

newly released documents contain a claim that the 1976 rescue of hostages, kidnapped on an Air France flight and held in Entebbe in Uganda, was not all it seemed.

A UK government file on the crisis, released from the National Archives, contains a claim that Israel itself was behind the hijacking.

An unnamed contact told a British diplomat in Paris that the Israeli Secret Service, the Shin Bet, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) collaborated to seize the plane.

The flight was seized shortly after it took off from Athens and was flown to Entebbe, where 98 people were held hostage, many of them Israeli citizens.......

In the document, written on 30 June 1976 when the crisis was still unresolved, DH Colvin of the Paris Embassy writes of his source: "According to his information, the hijack was the work of the PFLP, with help from the Israeli Secret Service, the Shin Beit.

"The operation was designed to torpedo the PLO's standing in France and to prevent what they see as a growing rapprochement between the PLO and the Americans."

There are a few little points in this saga that might be of interest or use to Trivial Pursuit enthusiasts. As the article says, there was one Israeli killed. What it doesn't say is that he was, Jonathan Netanyahu, the brother of Benjamin Netanyahu, former Israeli PM. Also the Israelis built Entebbe airport so they knew their way around it better than the hijackers. And finally, the article makes no mention of a passenger of dual British-Israeli nationality, Dora Bloch, who seems to have been murdered and mutilated by the Idi Amin regime as a result of the hijack and raid.

Oh yes, the Hat-tip: thanks Justin.