#ScarJo to Oxfam: Drop dead. Norway to Leviev: Drop dead - again

A big day for BDS: Scarlett Johansson has chosen Sodastream over Oxfam. Oxfam comes out looking very unprincipled, having issued waffling statements and endured media scrutiny of why a human rights organization was dithering over what should have been a no-brainer decision. EI reported disarray within the org. Reuters reported on Palestinian worker complaints of racism at Sodastream's West Bank plant, illegally located in the industrial zone of the Israeli megasettlement, Ma'ale Adumim, and a Palestinian worker told the Electronic Intifada last May the company "treats us like slaves." See also this report on worker treatment at Sodastream's plant by the Israeli NGO Who Profits. The media storm around ScarJo gave wide exposure to BDS; entertainment magazines are covering it. Here is a still from inside a New York taxi an activist took today:

The ScarJo imbroglio may look unrelated to another BDS decision today; the Norwegian Government pension fund divested for a second time from the settlement mogul Lev Leviev's Africa-Israel company. (Leviev had his own embarrassing encounter with Oxfam, over a donation he claimed he gave them, a fact they expeditiously denied) The first time round was part of a wide campaign that probably helped push Leviev to stop construction in the Palestinian village of Bi'lin. This led the Norwegian fund to conclude the company had a clean bill of health - or maybe they did not pay much attention at all - until activists spotted signs for Danya Cebus, Africa-Israel's construction arm, building new units in Gilo settlement in occupied East Jerusalem. Activists pressured the Norwegian gov't to re-divest from Africa-Israel.  This divestment decision received coverage in Ha'aretz, the Wall Street Journal, & JPost.

So how are these related? Well as this graphic from the Institute for Middle East Undertanding (IMEU) shows, there used to be seven Palestinian villages where Israel has built Ma'ale Adumim. The industrial zone attached to it antiseptically keeps Palestinian workers out of the settlement & away from its Jewish colonists. Scarjo and her supporters argued Sodastream was doing Palestinians a favor by employing them in their factory on land that used to be theirs. In 2004, World War 4 Report wrote about a similar sinister scheme that was being cooked up for the Palestinian farmers who live in villages separated from their farmlands by Israel's security wall & touted by current Kerry aide & Israel lobby vet David Makokvsky. One of these villages, Jayyous, has the Jewish settlement of Zufim built by another of Leviev's companies, Leader Management and Development, built on its lands, and is currently expanding behind the wall. Jayyous is in the same district with the walled-in Palestinian city Qalqilya:.

The Industrial Agenda

What Israel and Makovsky have in mind for the people of Qalqilya district first became clear during a November 2003 visit to Washington by Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz. On Nov. 14, the Israeli daily Yedioth Aharonot ran an article titled "Mofaz's Initiative: Jobs for Palestinians," reporting that Mofaz presented the US government with an "initiative to build industrial parks that will create jobs for 120 thousand Palestinians." Yediot's Washington correspondent, Orly Azulai, noted that Secretary of State Colin Powell had asked Mofaz to "minimize the suffering caused on Palestinians as a result of the construction of the Separation Fence."

"To implement the initiative, of course, there is a need for an end for terrorism and financial resources," Mofaz said after a meeting with Dick Cheney and Condolezza Rice. "As part of the plan, industrial parks will be built in the Palestinian side and on the seam line. The Palestinians will be able to go to these places without going through IDF checkpoints; private security companies will monitor these passages." 

Possibly this will be the fate of Jayyous. The independent farmers of Jayyous who have tilled the land for at least nine generations will be a dependent Israeli-controlled industrial workforce on what used to be their land, without even entering Israel. This is already happening to the south of Jayyous, where residents of Arab Ramadin, who lived off of sheep herding, have been enclosed inside the fence with the illegal Jewish settlement of Alfe Menashe, and, thus cut off from their grazing lands, have been compelled to abandon their traditional way of life and take jobs in the settlement's industrial zone. In a Dec. 18, 2003 press release, the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign of the Palestinian Environmental NGOs Network (PENGON) concluded: "The completion of the Wall and its ghettoization of Arab Ramadin are turning a community of shepherds into exploited workers for Israeli settlement industrial zones, as they are unable to sustain their lives."

Guardian asks should @Oxfam say #NoScarJo?

This is good of the Guardian to pitch in with the campaign to get Oxfam to ditch one of Israel's ambassadors for the occupation, Scarlett Johansson.

Here's the headline:

#NoScarJo: should Oxfam sever ties with Scarlett Johansson?

The article raises many issues around this case and credits our comrades at the Electronic Intifada for coming up with most of the analysis and info.

But it also raises a serious general point about running with people who might raise money and awareness of a cause but, well there's a but:

While there is no doubt that celebrity endorsement yields financial dividends for NGOs and can raise the profile of a cause, it can also infuriate staff and create tensions with communities in which the organisation works. So what should Oxfam do? Take our poll and tell us your experiences or thoughts on celebrities and NGOs in the comment threads below.

So check out the poll which still has 6 days to run and check out the comments too.  The zionists are having a bit of a field day in the comments but the poll so far is that 87% say #NoScarJo! 

Uppity Rodent Part II

Being sympathetic to Flying Rodent on Ben Gidley's Bob from Brockley blog I attempted a comment not that long ago.  I signed it off with my usual Levi9909 but as far as the tech goes it was anonymous.  Well it got deleted within minutes of appearing.  I'm just posting it here so I can draw this Flying Rodent's attention to it on Twitter:

 

Anonymous said...

Flying Rodent - I think you may have been a bit too specific about the spelling of "as a Jew". Norm railed against these types all the time as do a whole ragbag of racists around here, HP and Engage, but Norm only employed the "zz" spelling and the "pet" prefix once. Sadly Bob here too likes to be precise, especially when it helps him duck and dodge his way around a critical comment about his condemnation of Israel's opponents. When he relaxes the precision he can "verbal up" like the old bill on the case of an Irishman/woman back in the day but you were precise so he repaid in kind.

You also missed Bob's presumptiousness about the lack of Jewishness of Israel's Jewish detractors. Apparently Israel's Jewish supporters do (or have) a lot more Jewish stuff than Israel's Jewish detractors. And what stuff might that be? Well you'll just have to ask Bob if you can stand the inevitable twists and turns. I think he means that supporting Israel is more Jewish than opposing Israel but it would be uncharacteristically honest for Bob to admit he meant that.

And don't miss either Bob's assertion that ""AsaJews"...claim their position is *the* authentically Jewish one." The definite article is vital here. These people are usurpers. They are not saying that they are as Jewish as the next Jew. No, they are saying they are more Jewish than Hirsh, Geras, Garrard, and Uncle Bob Brockley and all. Except of course, they aren't and Bob has already claimed that mantle for his brand of authenticity. They are actually a mixed bag altogether. You were right that some, not all, use their Jewish identity to bat away the bogus allegation of anti-Jewish racism. Some want to reclaim the Jewish identity from racist war criminals and their supporters. Some want to show solidarity with non-Jews falsely accused of racism for supporting the Palestinian cause and some want Palestinians to see Jews through a lens other than the barrel of a supremacist's gun. And there are still others, too numerous and varied to categorise. But for Bob, there is only one and it's a bad one.

Anyway, you've already been subjected to the old one two. One being the false allegation of antisemitism, two being the accusation of trolling. But then there's three and four, three being Bob's pretence at accuracy and four you being banned for one and two unless you stay away for a while which I think you might do without being told.

Levi9909

Actually the fact that the comment has now been deleted suggests that my points three and four, indeed, one, two, three and four were all quite accurate.

UPDATE: He's now reinstated my comment and replied to a tweet I sent but what a dodgy character.

@jewssf I did not delete that comment. It's probably in the moderation queue. But if you harass me I will delete stuff
— Bob From Brockley (@bobfrombrockley) January 27, 2014

But to be honest I'd rather get a reply from Ben Gidley about his alter-ego's plan to write about "the long-harassment of one Ronnie Fraser in UCU, a trade union." The "trade union" is actually his own trade union, you know, the one that some of his comrades left and at least one joined simply to attack it.

Uppity Rodent?

I've just revisited the blog of "racism expert" Ben Gidley, aka Bob from Brockley where Flying Rodent is on cracking form exposing and denouncing the racism implicit and certainly the bullying inherent in such terminology as "as-a-Jew" etc.

The Rodent copies and pastes the bits he is commenting on so he reads BfB so you don't have to:

flyingrodent said...

...there is the way that the Western anti-Israel left, both its "as a Jew" strain and its gentile majority...

I've tried and failed to see any difference between this whole "As a Jew" thing and either "Uncle Tom" or "House Negro".

All seem to imply shameful subservience at best, and certainly some kind of fucked-up ethnoreligious treason. The entire "As a Jew" idea appears to dictate precisely what Jewish people should and shouldn't think or behave, implying that people who think otherwise to you are somehow traitorous or otherwise disgusting. The historical echoes here are crystal clear.

Quite why this usage has caught on uncritically among certain foreign policy enthusiasts is mystifying to me, since it appears to be a rehabilitation of a particularly nasty ethnic slur that had thankfully fallen from common usage.

(By the way, I've seen this defended by folk saying things like "Oh, but these awful fucking AsaJews actually exist and blah blah blah", apparently in the belief that this renders the insult harmless fun. I'll anticipate this by pointing out that it doesn't).

25 January, 2014 16:04

Again you don't need to see the whole of Gidley's response though I should point out it's actually more slippery than Flying Rodent seems to notice:

flyingrodent said...

First, I am not 100% sure that the terms "Uncle Tom" and "House Negro" are necessarily racist

Neither am I, but it should be entirely obvious that they're fucking horrible slurs to be chucking at people, for reasons that are surely too obvious to require demonstration.

The terms "self-hating Jew" and the appalling "kapo" carry something of the same meaning as those terms, and I guess I find them very offensive but not necessarily racist.

These terms all mean the same thing, and it's not a coincidence that the people most fond of using them tend also to be horrendous human beings who have exceptionally nasty opinions on all manner of issues.

Rather, the term is used of those who make a big deal of their Jewishness in prefacing their anti-Zionism.

This isn't right. It seems to me that some Jewish people who think the Israelis generally look like a bunch of hard-right belligerent mentalists determined to thwart a Palestinian state at all costs believe that, if they preface their acknowledgement of this obvious and undeniable reality by noting their shared religious background, they might immunise themselves against utterly fraudulent accusations of racism.

As demonstrated here however, they're wrong about that, because of some bizarre coalescing consensus among gung-ho bombs-away Israel fans that Jews generally should all be Decent war enthusiasts like you are, and that those who disagree are basically immoral.

I suggest that this newfound habit of labelling these people as Uncle Toms for disagreeing with your Likud Are Boiling-With-Hate Mental But Hey-Ho, Shit Kind Of Happens And That mentality is unjust, unfair and suspiciously convenient.

There's also an issue of positioning themselves as the Good Jews, the Exceptional Jews, as Arendt put it

I'm surprised you raise Arendt in this context. She had some very, very harsh words for the Commie Israel enthusiasts of the fifties and sixties, so God knows what she'd make of the extreme rightists that run the place these days.

I half-share those issues with "certain foreign policy enthusiasts" (nice euphemism).

There's no need for the "nice euphemism". I'm all over the internet under this name basically telling everyone how much I dislike your* politics, which I constantly describe as hopelessly insane sectarian horseshit mingled with wowserist magical thinking, allied with a very alarming form of extreme militarism and wearing a very unconvincing cloak of humanitarianism.

This has squarely nothing to do with anyone's ethnoreligious background and everything to do with the fact that I think you're a bunch of lunatics who push highly toxic politics in the service of an extremely belligerent ideology that has had significant and hideous real-world effects.

None of which is nice to say to strangers, but you know, I didn't call you fascist apologists for psychotic violence or any of the terms that you tend to dole out to your political enemies, even though most of your political enemies are entirely imaginary and your own attitude to creative violence is significantly more enthusiastic than mine.

*You collectively as bullshitting war-fans, not you individually.

26 January, 2014 03:16

 Now Rodent deserves some bonus points for the Hannah Arendt stuff.  Gidley is very fond of describing her as one of his intellectual heroes and I never know why.  Certainly she has been accused of intellectual dishonesty and pretentiousness which certainly gives her Venn diagram an overlap with Bob's but she has also exposed zionist collaboration with the nazis and been accused of self-hatred for her trouble.  But she did self-describe as a zionist though I'm not sure she ever defined it and she did hold that it was only right and proper to try Eichmann in Jerusalem in spite of his crimes being against humanity not just Jews and certainly not just zionists with whom he collaborated.

But I digress.

At this point Sarah Annes Brown of Harry's Place pops up with a largely irrelevant comment. Is Tom Hickey Jewish?  But the Rodent addresses the first part of her comment all the same:

flyingrodent said...

You refer to people who think "the Israelis generally look like a bunch of hard-right belligerent mentalists determined to thwart a Palestinian state at all costs" as though this was a reasonable summary of the situation.

Not only is this "a reasonable summary of the situation", it is the situation. Many will say "Well, it's more complicated than that" but at the brass tacks of practicality, taking all of the partisan blah out of it, it is not more complicated than that.

this seems to me the mirror image of those who assert that the Palestinians are all antisemitic brutes who ought to go and live in Jordan.

And how many divisions have they? None, is the answer - twats of that type have nothing but internet waffle backing them up, numerous as they are.

For real, the current situation is that the Israelis are going to intentionally steal as much shit as they can in a deliberate policy of fucking over the Palestinians with the quiet yet total support of the world's only superpower, and folk who don't like it are going to make some sad faces and whinge, but nothing more.

This is the whole issue in a nutshell, and all the woe-is-us nonsense that fills the web to bursting point is just that - woe-is-us nonsense, existing for no other purpose than to muddy a perfectly straightforward and easily-comprehensible scenario.

Given that's my opinion on the matter, you can imagine why I'm not keen on slurs like the one we're discussing here. People should be able to describe bald facts without having to fend off insults that wouldn't look out of place in a Tarantino movie about slaves.

(Although if I'm being honest, I actually think this one is tame by comparison with Professor Norm's old habit of referring to "Pet Azzajews", which he used to chuck at Jewish people who addressed simple undeniable facts of this type. The fact that nobody smelt a rat there tells me that a lot of people who make a very big noise about rat-smelling wouldn't smell a rat if a rat was sitting on thier upper lip slapping on rat-scented aftershave).

26 January, 2014 12:54

Actually when I started this, that last comment wasn't there and I'm not sure I agree with or follow all of it but that Blackadderesque last bit was worth a copy.

Anyway, Flying Rodent tweets here and blogs here.

UPDATE (14:55) : The thread continues with a false allegation of antisemitism against Flying Rodent by one nutty Contentious Centrist who claims the rat allusion is a metaphor for Jew.  And now FR has responded by calling her (for it is she) a conman not woman.  Now let's look forward to accusations of sexism instead of the usual antisemitism....

In honour of Sharon - My Way - time to face the final version

My Way has had several versions performed.  Of course it was sung by its author, Paul Anka.  Frank Sinatra made it famous.  Elvis gave it a whirl at Vegas.  And I remember Sid Vicious getting a hat tip from the New Musical Express for treating the song with the contempt it deserved for being such self-indulgent tosh.  The homophobia of that last example seemed to slip below the NME's radar back then.

Anyway, years ago, back in the day when Ariel Sharon slipped into a coma and the end seemed near, Deborah Maccoby, of Jews for Justice for Palestinians notoriety, wrote this version of My Way:

MY WAY: ARIEL SHARON

And now, the end is near, and so I face the final curtain
My friend, I'll say it clear, I'll state my case, of which I'm certain
I wrecked the hope for peace - I did it all in such a sly way,
And more, much more than this, I did it my way.

Regrets -  I wish I'd killed old Arafat back in the '80s;
I wish that Israel filled right from the Nile to the Euphrates -
But I built settlements and an apartheid settler highway,
And more, much more than this, I did it my way.

Yes the were times, I'm sure you knew,
When I bit off more than I could chew.
And yet, from Gaza, I'd no doubt
That I would get the settlers out!
I built a Wall- and best of all, I did it my way!

I knew I would go far in my career as a mass killer.
I started with Qibya, went on to Sabra and Shatila.
But I've made them believe I'm in the middle of the highway!
Likud I left for good - I did it my way!

For what is a man, what has he got?
If not himself, then he has not
To dare to murder and to lie
And not to care how many die;
The record stands, I took their lands
And did it my way!

 Hmm, I wonder if the cantor might sing it at the funeral.

Whatever happens, those of us who expected a whitewash got precisely what we expected and Deborah's lyric should be a corrective to that which is why it was appropriate for some bright spark to splice her lyric to a cartoon by Latuff showing the trail of blood in the wake of Sharon's every move being cleansed by the whitewash of the mainstream media.  See earlier post.

Caption Competition

See if you can put a face to this hostage to fortune of a caption:

“Removing privilege is not the same as discrimination.”

To which should have been added, retaining privilege is the same as discrimination.

If you know who said it you'll know why they didn't add the bit I added but give it a go.  Or even give it a google.

Sharon before and after the Whitewash

Gaza "disengagement": Sharon's punishment for the Palestinians

Back when Israel was first deciding to remove its daily presence from the ground in Gaza, whilst controlling everything else, I had an article published in Ireland's Sunday Business Post about the cruel charade.  I posted it here too.

Coincidentally, at the time, Yasser Arafat was dying, possibly poisoned on orders, presumably, from Ariel Sharon.

Anyway, here's the piece again:

Sharon’s punishment for the Palestinians
As obituaries are being written for the ailing Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, what kind of Palestine does Ariel Sharon promise to the Palestinians?

The Gaza Strip comprises 360 square kilometres of land with a population of about 1.4 million Palestinians and 7,500 Jewish settlers. It is mostly desert and much of the arable land is reserved, at present, for Jewish use only. 75% of its Arab population live below the poverty line and 13% suffer from malnutrition. It has no natural freshwater resources and no control over its telecommunications. It was occupied, together with the West Bank, by Israel during the six days war of June 1967 and has been occupied ever since. It is no stranger to Palestinian resistance or Israeli war crimes. During the ethnic cleansing campaign (1947-1949) that brought Israel into existence with its Jewish majority, Gaza [with an influx of Palestinian refugees] became the most densely populated place on earth; a distinction it still holds. Israel emerged from that war controlling 78% of what was Palestine.

Gaza and Ariel Sharon have been well acquainted since the 1950s when Ariel Sharon led "reprisal" raids against Palestinian villages that brought shame even to Israeli leaders. Foreign Minister Moshe Sharrett referred to one of Sharon’s atrocities as a "stain [that] would stick to us and not be washed away for many years". Clearly he underestimated the strength of Zionist propaganda in the mass media.

During one of Ariel Sharon’s visits to the White House, President George W. Bush described him as a "man of peace". Leaving aside the fact that Bush often can’t tell one world leader from another, it is possible that he was responding to Ariel Sharon’s stated willingness to make "painful concessions" on the "roadmap" to peace with the Palestinians. To those familiar with Sharon’s history, the description "man of peace" wasn’t one that sprang to mind. Apart from the bloody and disproportionate "reprisals" mentioned above, he was the architect of the Lebanon war that began in 1982 with the slaughter of perhaps 20,000 Palestinian and Lebanese civilians in a matter of weeks. The Israeli Supreme Court declared Sharon "unfit for office" because of his culpability in some particularly gruesome atrocities by Israel’s Lebanese allies in the refugee camps of Shatila and Sabra. Whenever there have been peaceful overtures by Arab states or the Palestine Liberation Organisation, Sharon’s response has always been, at best, dismissive and usually downright hostile. He has had more Palestinians killed, for example, since the PLO accepted Israel’s right to exist on 78% of Palestine than when their demand was for a "democratic secular state" or the "destruction of Israel" as the Zionists prefer to call it. In 1981, the Rabat plan, whereby the Arab states agreed to normalise relations with Israel in return for Israel withdrawing to its pre-1967 boundaries, was described by Sharon as "a declaration of war". And the recent Saudi peace plan, much the same as Rabat, is now gathering dust.

In addition to the war crimes Sharon has always had a reputation for being dishonest with his political masters. His first patron, David Ben Gurion, recorded in his diary (29/1/1960) that "if he could wean himself from the habit of lying he could be an exemplary military leader." Later, in 1982 he lied to Menachem Begin about his aims in the Lebanon war. He lied to the Kahane Commission (Supreme Court), he lost a libel action against the Israeli liberal daily Ha’aretz and now he tells of painful concessions for peace.

So what does the proposed Gaza withdrawal consist of? We have seen what Gaza itself consists of. It has almost nothing and what it does have has been commandeered by illegal colonial settlers or is provided by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). The settlers will, if the plan goes ahead, be withdrawn. Settlers have been known to kill civilians so this could bring some comfort to the Gazan population. However, if the withdrawal goes ahead, might Israel press for UNRWA to be withdrawn? UNRWA provides housing, healthcare, education, but above all, jobs. This isn’t mere speculation. Some weeks ago, Sharon accused an UNRWA ambulance team of loading a Qassam (home made) missile on to an ambulance. He was too hasty in his accusation. Israeli intelligence didn’t have time to doctor their photographic "evidence" and the accusation was exposed as another lie when the "missile" turned out to be a stretcher. But looking at American websites and other media, many commentators have happily run with the Qassam story. This does not simply expose Palestinian ambulances to Israeli attacks. Israel has attacked medical facilities without "pretext" before. It is to undermine the authority and credibility of the Agency in order to hinder all of its work. Taken with the mass campaign of political assassinations, Sharon is creating a Gaza with no viable economy or polity.

Sharon has said that his withdrawal plan is a part of Bush’s much vaunted "road map" to peace and Palestinian statehood. This is curious since his most trusted adviser, Dov Weisglass, is on record as saying that "the significance of the disengagement plan is the freezing of the peace process, and when you freeze that process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, and you prevent a discussion on the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package called the Palestinian state with all that it entails, has been removed indefinitely from our agenda". So the idea of following the road map is yet another lie by Sharon, though Weisglass has since been forced to withdraw his prepared statement.

But how painful is this particular concession? In a way, it represents a step back by Sharon. True, the Jewish population of Gaza is hardly a significant factor as a proportion of Israel’s population as a whole and Sharon has always said that "Zionism is not about what Israel can do for Jews but what Jews can do for Israel." But his party, the Likud, still sings the anthem Shtei Gadot with its expansionist lyric "one side of the Jordan is ours and so is the other". So relinquishing land, any land, is always painful. The outcry from the far-right isn’t just choreography, though that is part of it. But the Israel-free Gaza will be so enfeebled and dependent many Palestinians will have to leave as they have done for decades now. The ethnic cleansing that Israel has failed to fully achieve by war, they have tried to make up for by economic stealth and this will surely continue in an "independent" Gaza. If large sections of the population leave, it is likely that only the most militant would remain. If this happens it wouldn’t take much for Sharon or a successor to manufacture a pretext for reoccupation.

Some commentators are perplexed over the support that Sharon is now garnering from the Zionist "left" for his plan. This is because they fail to see that Zionism doesn’t really have a left. Traditionally, the Likud wanted Jewish rule over Palestine and the Palestinians if needs be. Ethnic cleansing was never an essential part of their policy. They were happy to go the "way of (apartheid) South Africa". This never suited the left. The call for "transfer" (the expulsion of all of the Arabs from all of Palestine) was always a Labourite demand. The strict segregation engendered by the barrier is also a Labourite idea. The fact is that Sharon has a Labour Zionist background and he has made no significant departures from that throughout his career.


So with massive military strength, a reduction in Palestinian attacks, a Palestinian leadership either dead or brought to its knees, the uncritical support of an American President (and Congress and Presidential hopeful) and no viable alternative government of Israel, why is Sharon withdrawing from Gaza? When the disengagement plan was first discussed, Sharon’s extreme right critics argued that he was rewarding the Palestinians. His words in an interview with Yedioth Ahronoth (Israel’s most popular daily newspaper) are informative. Of unilateral disengagement from Gaza he said that "this should be seen as a punishment and not a reward for the Palestinians".

For once, he might just be telling the truth.

Just see how many in the mainstream media mention that when Sharon finally dies.

Picture This! Hi Viz Wall at St James's Church Piccadilly

I tweeted this tweet yesterday night, well about 6 hours ago:

Bethlehem Unwrapped. The Wall at St James's Church Piccadilly as seen at night from Swallow St. W1 @bethlehemfest pic.twitter.com/sadCGBi1YW
— Jews Sans Frontieres (@jewssf) January 1, 2014

I'm pleased with the picture which I took from Swallow Street, just across Piccadilly from St James's Church.  The point is the visibility of the thing.  Everyone who walks along Piccadilly towards Piccadilly Circus sees it and everyone I saw passing, stopped to take a closer look and that was when the place was closed.

I reckon more people have seen that wall in London that have seen the real thing on TV in the whole of the UK.

If you want an even closer look than I got then consider what are left of the events lined up by the Bethlehem Unwrapped partnership.  Apparently zionists have been picketing and leafleting at each event but they are summoning the faithful for a particularly menacing presence on 4th Jan.  It wouldn't surprise me if the Israeli embassy's decision to pull out of the panel discussion might be linked to their sheer embarrassment at the antics to be expected of the zionists.  On the other hand it could just be that there simply is no case for The State of Israel.  Yeah, that's probably it.

Israeli Embassy places barrier between itself and Bethlehem Unwrapped

This has really caught me on the back foot.  There's been quite a remarkable series of events taking place in London from the opening of a replica apartheid wall at St James's Church in Piccadilly, London on 23rd December just gone and continuing up to, I suppose, the last day of Christmas.  Well, the last actual event is on 5th January 2014 and I'm guessing the wall comes down the next day.

See this youtube video about the whole thing:






 And here's how the Bethlehem Unwrapped website announces the panel discussion:

PANEL – Jan 4^th 8pm: ‘Both sides of the Barrier – Separation or Security?’ – speakers include Jeff Halper, founder of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD),  Leila Sansour, Bethlehem resident, filmaker and founder of Open Bethlehem, Yiftah Curiel, public affairs spokesman at Embassy of Israel, London and Alan Johnson, Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre. Chaired by David Loyn, BBC foreign correspondent.

Now, as you can guess, zionists weren't happy with the whole thing and many made their displeasure known on Richard Millett's blog.  Here's the man himself:

I understand that there are due to be a couple of last minute voices putting Israel’s case at the panel debate with Halper “Both sides of the Barrier: Separation or Security?” on January 4th but it is a drop in the ocean when compared to what is taking place over the entirety of the festival.

"Last minute voices"?  Now I'm not sure of Dan Judelson's status with Bethlehem Unwrapped but here is his response to Millett's post:

Richard, good to see you at the launch last night. A couple of important corrections to your piece. Far from being a last minute addition, the Israeli Embassy were one of the first people, in the person of the ambassador, to be invited to join the panel. In fact, although neither could make it, Ambassador Taub was invited before I wrote to Ambassador Hassassian. You may recall I emailed you at the beginning of December to ask for Chas Newkey-Burden’s contact details as I was very keen for him to speak.

In terms of corrections, the other point to make is that it is Lucy Winkett rather than Julie. The rain did not make for good acoustics last night I guess.

People are welcome to write whatever they like on the wall, ask whatever questions they like at the panel discussion and Q&A after the film screening. We’ve made that clear in all our invitations and discussions with, among others the Board of Deputies (though this is not to suggest they were content). I hope people will take part and listen to one another, rather than retreat into fixed positions that brook no challenge as so many of the respondents here appear to have done.

He made a couple more comments in the same thread which is well worth a look at but with 247 comments so far I won't reproduce it all here. Well, whatever it was that led to the invitation to the Israeli Embassy and whenever it was sent and accepted, the Israeli embassy has now decided to withdraw. They made their new position known by way of a tweet with a twitpic of a letter:

Why @IsraelinUK has decided to withdraw our participation from the Bethlehem Unwrapped event at St James’s Church pic.twitter.com/TFCwnOLcvm
— Yiftah Curiel (@yiftahc) December 30, 2013

The letter is hardly legible in the twitpic and googling some of the words I could only find one website with the letter in a copyable format and that's the Jews Down Under website which I'd never heard of before.

Here's their intro:

The Israeli Embassy had been invited to attend a ‘debate’ on Saturday night by the organisers of ‘Bethlehem Unwrapped’ 

They were only invited after much pressure by the Board of Deputies and The Jewish Leadership Council.. Please find letter from Embassy explaining their decision to not attend, says it all really…

So the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the UK's Jewish Leadership Council got on the case to pressure Bethlehem Unwrapped to invite the Israeli embassy in London to attend a discussion?  Is that right?  Well that doesn't quite tally with what Dan Judelson said above.  Also it seems strange that the BoD, which often seems to double as an Israeli embassy in London would press an organisation into inviting the Israeli embassy only to have the Israeli embassy eventually decline but here's the Israeli embassy's letter.  See what you can make of it:

I’m writing to inform you that our embassy’s representative will not be able to participate in Saturday’s panel on the security barrier. As you know, our intention has always been to conduct an open dialogue with Church institutions, and it is rare that we turn down an invitation to participate in a church event, especially when it concerns Israel.

However, we have closely followed the unfolding of the ‘Bethlehem Unwrapped’ event this past week, and have been brought to the inescapable conclusion that this is not an event which is intended to deepen understanding, or promote reconciliation but rather is a transparent attempt to incite against Israel and Israelis.

A prominent quote on the homepage of the event states
“The most unhelpful thing you can do is be pro one side; it just adds to the  conflict”
This week’s event has proven to be exactly that, a one-sided affair that unfortunately does nothing to bring the sides together.  One of your event speakers, Jeff Halper, spoke in front of the replica will stating  it had nothing to do with security, while much of the writing on the wall, contrary to our previous understanding, is clearly political and divisive in nature

Where we feel that there is an openness to genuine discussion, we are committed to participating and engaging in genuine debate. However, to participate in an event of this nature would in our view be a disservice to the hundreds of Israelis. Jews and Christians alike, murdered in acts of suicide terrorism, which the barrier was established to prevent.

We believe that today, as Christians are being persecuted on an unprecedented scale across the Middle East, churches burned and whole communities forced to flee, to focus on a temporary defensive barrier built to prevent terror, is to do an injustice not only to Israel but to Christian communities across our region.

For these reasons, we will not be able to participate in Saturday's panel.  We will be glad to co-operate with the Church in the future on activities that truly promote understanding and foster peace building.

So all that Board of Deputies pressure came to nothing.  The main thing I don't understand is why the Israeli embassy withdrawal from the event is low key.  Israel advocates are usually quite a noisy bunch.

Aha, that reminds me. I did hear rumours that zionists are planning a picket of St James's Church in 4th Jan.  Someone told me that emails were coming out from these people, Sussex Friends of Israel summoning the faithful.  Maybe Israel's embassy staff would be embarrassed by some of the people who turn up at these things.

Anyway, happy new year to anyone reading this....

Tony Greenstein: An Apology or Mr Elf Regrets...

Tony Greenstein had a birthday bash last night. He was four bar mitzvahs and then some. Rounding up to the nearest ten that makes 60. My spies tell me that the do was well attended but unfortunately one of the invitees couldn't make it and that was me. Still, I've cleared my diary and I should make it for three score and ten.

Many happy returns Tony.


Regards

Mark Elf



PS: Here are the lyrics to a birthday song written by Deborah Maccoby and arranged and performed at the party by Deborah Fink:

THE BALLAD OF TONY GREENSTEIN

 

1ST VERSE

 

Tony Greenstein is a leftie

And one of Marx's lads;

He's fought the fascists all his life,

Those counter-revolutionary cads.

 

CHORUS

 

Those counter-revolutionary cads,

Those counter-revolutionary cads,

He's fought the fascists all his life,

Those counter-revolutionary cads.

 

2ND VERSE

 

His father was a rabbi

Who wanted him to be

A pillar of the Liverpool

Jewish community.

 

CHORUS

 

Jewish community,

Jewish community,

A pillar of the Liverpool

Jewish community.

 

3RD VERSE

 

But little Tony said:

"This plan I will resist;,

I'm an atheist, a Marxist

And an anti-Zionist."

 

CHORUS

 

An anti-Zionist,

An anti-Zionist.

He's an atheist, a Marxist

And an anti-Zionist.

 

4TH VERSE

 

With the fervour of his father

Towards the Jewish law,

Young Tony went to demonstrate

Against the Springboks' tour.

 

CHORUS

 

Against the Springboks' tour,

Against the Springboks' tour,

Young Tony went to demonstrate

Against the Springboks' tour.

5TH VERSE

But it wasn't only fascists

And fans of apartheid;

The British left found Tony

A thorn within their side.

CHORUS

A thorn within their side,

A thorn within their side;

The British left found Tony

A thorn within their side.

6TH VERSE

 

The exiled Palestinians

The left did not discern,

So Tony helped to edit

The magazine "Return".

 

CHORUS

 

The magazine "Return",

The magazine "Return",

So Tony helped to edit

The magazine "Return".

7TH VERSE

When the left regarded Israel

As a socialist country,

Young Tony with a few comrades

Co-founded PSC.

 

CHORUS

 

Co-founded PSC,

Co-founded PSC.

Young Tony and a few comrades

Co-founded PSC.

 

8TH VERSE

 

When PSC supported

The process called Oslo,

Then Tony and a few comrades

Said it was time to go.

 

CHORUS

 

Yes, it was time to go,

Yes, it was time to go,

Then Tony and a few comrades

Said it was time to go.

 

9TH VERSE

 

But later he rejoined it,

When he had been proved right;

Against the anti-Semites

He set himself to fight.

 

CHORUS

 

He set himself to fight,

He set himself to fight,

Against the anti-Semites

He set himself to fight.

 

10TH VERSE

 

Against those anti-Semites

He spoke out clear and strong;

They crawled back in the woodwork

Where all of them belong.

 

CHORUS

 

Where all of them belong,

Where all of them belong,

They crawled back in the woodwork

Where all of them belong.

 

11TH VERSE

 

For JfJfP

He didn't care a fig;

He called for total BDS

And signed up to J-BIG

 

CHORUS

 

And signed up to J-BIG,

And signed up to J-BIG;

He called for total BDS

And signed up to J-BIG

 

12TH VERSE

 

So - three cheers for Tony Greenstein!

He's sixty on this day;

May he win all his battles,

The first among the fray!

 

CHORUS

 

The first among the fray,

The first among the fray,

May he win all his battles,

The first among the fray! 

 

-----------------

The song is to the tune of Harry Pollitt by The Limeliters.

Peace of Ass?

I found this Avital Raz song on Youtube rather disturbing:




We, she and I, had a little natter about it on Twitter. Avital Raz's website is here.

I should have pointed out without prompting that the proceeds from the song are going to StopTheWall.Org as Avital Raz herself says:

Glad to see this song is shared.
A lot of the press contacted either ignored it on the grounds of it not being politically correct or Not being black & white. I think its important to support art on the subject to help make sense out of what's going on. Just wanted to add that all the earnings from the download of this song are going to Stopthewall.org an anti apartheid Palestinian organization. And I'd like to make a point that I'm an Israeli (living in the UK now) trying to raise money to stop the wall. Download here: https://avita lraz.ban dcamp.com...
Thanks for sharing.

Thank you, Avital, for sharing...

The Pixies herald "better days" in Gaza

I dunno, maybe they're drawn to the raw sewage I keep hearing about in the news from Gaza these days but The Pixies cancelled an Israel gig in 2010 saying "We can only hope for better days, in which we will finally present the long awaited visit of the Pixies in Israel".  That was Ha'aretz in 2010.

This is Ha'aretz now:

Bloomfield Stadium will be hosting a new international music festival next June that will feature the first appearances in Israel of the Pixies and of Soundgarden, two 1990s bands which are very popular among Israelis.

The festival, produced by Shuki Weiss, has yet to be named.

Bringing the two bands to Israel is a dream come true, Weiss said. He promised that further details about the festival will be released early next month, but did elaborate that the festival, which will take place on June 17 and 18, will include nightly joint performances by local and international bands.

So what's improved?  What's made The Pixies change their minds?  Don't they understand that normalising dealings with the racist war criminals of The State of Israel puts "better days" on the back burner?

Sleepless in Gaza?

Who can sleep in Gaza?!

Art exhibition by the Palestinian artist Laila Kassab

!من يستطيع النوم في غزة؟ 

The Exhibition will be at:

 The INCA Italian Advice Centre

124 Canonbury Road, London N1 2UT, nearest tube, Highbury & Islington 

This weekend, Saturday 14th; Sunday 15th December, both from 10am - 10pm

Admission Free

Exhibition facebook: www.facebook.com/events/257382647752813/ 

The artist Laila Kassab created harmony, beauty, imagery and symbolism to express the harsh reality in besieged Gaza. The vivid colours of her paintings are in stark contrast to the brutal blockade imposed by Israel. But her choice of colours are also symbolic. For Kassab blue expresses loss, deep secrets, hidden feelings, weirdness and dislocation. 

The latest works Islington Friends of Yibna managed to get smuggled out of Gaza are characterised by visual metamorphosis and a flow of merging and evolving forms and structures often mixed with symbolist motifs.

Despite being locked in the tiny Gaza Strip and subjected to the savage Israeli bombardment, Laila's artwork conveys love, music, hope and motherhood, but the longing for being free of fear is an underlying thread. The tunnels which brought life saving food are intertwine with womanhood. Though Jerusalem is forbidden by the Israeli occupation it is often referred to both explicitly and implicitly. Hidden keys and keyholes symbolise the yearning to return to the homes from which Palestinians had been ethnically cleansed. 


Here are 4 photos of Laila Kassab paintings, smuggled out of Gaza for this exhibition by Islington Friends of Yibna. 

Zionists use Crystal Meth to Bust the Boycott

It's true, Zionists in the UK are trying to use the Co-Op Bank's former CEO's alleged drug abuse to get the bank to call off its boycott of goods from Jewish only settlements in Palestine.  Admittedly Marcus Dysch of the Jewish Chronicle isn't the most reliable of journos but here he is anyway:

The Co-operative movement has confirmed there are no plans to alter its policy of boycotting companies which source produce from Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

Israel supporters have appealed to the organisation to revisit the issue following the resignation of Co-op chairman Len Wardle, who quit the business after revelations about the conduct of its former banking chair, Reverend Paul Flowers.

The Board of Deputies and Jewish Leadership Council this week requested a meeting with the Co-op’s new leaders to discuss the issue.

Rev Flowers, who was believed to be a key supporter of the boycott campaign, is being investigated by police over claims he bought, sold and used Class A drugs, including crystal meth and crack cocaine.

In May last year the Co-op implemented a full ban on engagement with any Israeli suppliers known to work with the settlements.

A campaign led by the We Believe group has also seen Israel supporters write to the movement’s new chair, Ursula Lidbetter, asking her to reconsider the boycott.

They seem to be suggesting that there is a link between using crack cocaine and crystal meth and supporting a boycott of the State of Israel.  Maybe they'll end up making the boycott look cool.  That's what the "just say no" campaign did for drugs.  Or maybe they're on drugs themselves.

See the Light This Saturday!

Here's an event this Saturday 30 November 2013

Jewish Socialist Group Event

Saturday 30^th Nov, 7.15pm, Harry Rice Hall, 72-74 Hargrave Park, N19 5JN

Light up your life and celebrate Chanukah with the JSG and friends. Magical time guaranteed as our special guest is socialist conjuror Ian Saville who will take the lid off the mysteries of high finance when he performs his “Free Money Magic Show” that was a roaring success at Edinburgh this year. Chanukah gelt with a difference!

Please bring some vegetarian food to share(and some drink if you can)

All welcome – entrance by donation.

Not sure if smoked salmon counts as vegetarian food. Probably safest to assume it doesn't.

I got a whole load of other info in the JSG mailout.  See these:
 

Saturday 30^th November: Left Unity Founding Conference 10am-5pm. Details: http://leftunity.org/category/foundingconference/

Saturday 30^th November: International Anti War Conference, 10am-5pm. Organised by STWC. Details: http://www.stopwar.org.uk/events/international-antiwar-conference#.UpMQvYW6-cM

Sunday 1^st December: “The Radical Jewish East End”. Last guided walk of the year led by JSG member David Rosenberg. From 11am-1pm. Fee: £8/5. Book online: www.eastendwalks.com

Tuesday 24^th December: Traditional Jewish Xmas Eve at Hampstead Comedy Club compered by JSG member Ivor Dembina with Sol Bernstein, Lewis Schaffer and Mark Maier. Early show 7.30pm/late show 9.30pm. Details and booking: http://www.hampsteadcomedy.co.uk/?page_id=6

Saturday 18^th January, 12 noon – 2pm Protest Vigil: Cast lead Five years On: We will not forget. Opposite the Israeli Embassy, Kensington High Street, W8 5NP. Called by Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Palestinian Forum in Britain, British Muslim Initiative, Jews for Justice for Palestinians.

 This is the Jewish Socialist Group website but it could do with a bit of an update.

BBC aims weapon of mass destraction at the Prawer Plan

I was amazed yesterday when I heard a BBC Radio 4 announcer announce an interview with Amal Elsana Alh’jooj.  I'm not sure how long the recording will be on the net but you can hear it certainly for a while here. 

Obviously the big news for many of us regarding the Negev, the Bedouin and the State of Israel is the Prawer Plan so my amazement was based on the fact that the beeb was going to give its listeners a Bedouin perspective on the plan to ethnically cleanse between 40 k and 70 k Bedouin Arabs from their land in the Negev.

Here is Adalah.Org on the plan:

On 24 June 2013, the Israeli Knesset approved the discriminatory Prawer-Begin Bill, with 43 votes for and 40 votes against, for the mass expulsion of the Arab Bedouin community in the Naqab (Negev) desert in the south of Israel. If fully implemented, the Prawer-Begin Plan will result in the destruction of 35 "unrecognized"Arab Bedouin villages, the forced displacement of up to 70,000 Arab Bedouin citizens of Israel, and the dispossession of their historical lands in the Naqab. Despite the Arab Bedouin community's complete rejection of the plan and strong disapproval from the international community and human rights groups, the Prawer Plan is happening now.

The Prawer-Begin Bill is an unacceptable proposition that entrenches the state’s historic injustice against its Bedouin citizens. Adalah and our NGO partners have been challenging the Prawer Plan before courts, government authorities and the international community, but we need your help to stop what would be the largest single act of forced displacement of Arab citizens of Israel since the 1950s!

Now this is big news for most of us but alas, not for the BBC.  Amal Elsana Alh'jooj spoke about inequality, exclusion, segregation, expulsion but all on a personal level with regard to her own dealings with her own community or the informal, rather than formal, segregation between Jews and Arabs.

Oh I'm sure her work is valuable and important but the BBC here seems to have deliberately distracted attention from a core issue regarding the State of Israel and its native non-Jewish population.  They are under a permanent threat of ethnic cleansing and of course the reason Arabs are a minority within Israel's pre-1967 borders is because of a recent, current and, as we see, on-going ethnic cleansing campaign.  And of course one of the reasons they get away with it is because of the help and encouragement they get from mainstream media organisations like the BBC.

Anyway, give the BBC Radio 4 Woman's Hour programme a listen and see what I mean.

Jewish woman pays $140 a day for Israel's Theocracy

Here's a bizarre story that highlights something I hadn't known about "the only democracy in the Middle East".  Here's Ha'aretz:

An Israeli rabbinical court has handed down a precedent-setting ruling that requires a mother to circumcise her son, against her will, or pay a fine of NIS 500 ($140) for every day he remains uncircumcised.

“The baby was born with a medical problem, so we couldn’t circumcise him on the eighth day as is customary,” said Elinor, the boy’s mother. “As time went on, I started reading about what actually happens in circumcision, and I realized that I couldn’t do that to my son. He’s perfect just as he is.”

The mother said that the baby’s father had a part in the decision, but when the couple began to discuss their divorce in the rabbinical court, he unexpectedly decided to insist that their son be circumcised.

Israel's rabbinical courts are part of the country's justice system and have legal jurisdiction over matters of religion, including marriage and divorce, when it comes to the country's Jewish citizens. [My emphasis]

Good for Jews? I don't think so but I wonder if Israel grants the same powers to the clergy of other religions.

Check this out on Ha'aretz's paywall.

When Norman Geras met David Ward MP

I know I keep referring back to that Flying Rodent post, A Requiem for a Blog but some of the comments have been so worth a read they are worth posting in their own right.

Here's a chap called Phil drawing attention to Norman Geras condemning David Ward MP over that business about Auschwitz and Israel.

Phil said...

For anyone still checking back here, here's a "deliberate calumny against the Jews" (in Norm's words) from 2013:

"Having visited Auschwitz twice - once with my family and once with local schools - I am saddened that the Jews, who suffered unbelievable levels of persecution during the Holocaust, could within a few years of liberation from the death camps be inflicting atrocities on Palestinians in the new State of Israel and continue to do so on a daily basis in the West Bank and Gaza."

And here's Norm from 2002:

"It is a tragedy of its own kind that from the people which had suffered so much in Nazi Europe, and during a long history of persecution before that, should have emerged what is today an oppressor state. To guard against misunderstanding: I am not talking of the separate tragedy of the Palestinians which is a consequence of this fact ... I am referring specifically to the Jewish dimension: that out of this people, with all its own historical experience of injustice, should have come so grave an injustice towards another people."

Funny old world.

11:35 PM

 What a difference 11 years made....

A Doctor Writes on Alliance for Workers Liberty on "Antisemitism"

I've just revisited this racist article by the Alliance for Workers Liberty's leader, Sean Matgamna as re-presented on the Shiraz Socialist blog of Jim Denham.  In my post before last I highlighted a gem of a comment from a Harry's Place regular accusing Denham of using marxism to justify racism in the same way as some use the same pseudo-intellectual kit to support Atzmon.  Well revisiting the SS post I followed through to another leftist turned zionist, Andrew Coates and found another comment which lays the above the line post to waste.  This one is from Dr Paul, (Paul Flewers not to be confused with Crystal Methodist, Paul Flowers)

The AWL is quite inconsistent in respect of Islamism. It did indeed warn against the dangers of Islamism in Tunisia and Egypt, yet cheered on the opposition to Gadaffi in Libya, despite the fact that there were quite a few Islamists prominent in the opposition, and al Qaeda elements to boot, and they are now in the government, including a certain Mr Belhadj, not so long ago a leader of the jihadist Libyan Islamist Fighting Group. Why the silence? Similarly, in the Yugoslav collapse, the AWL said nothing about the presence of jihadists in Bosnia-Hercegovina and Kosovo. As for Afghanistan, it’s often stated that the AWL (or whatever it called itself then) supported the jihadists against the Soviet Union, but as I don’t have proof to hand, I’ll wait for others to clarify this.
As for anti-Semitism, I have been personally accused of that by an AWL member; not, as might be expected, by an inexperienced young cadre over-enthusiastically projecting the party line in an exaggerated, ill-learnt manner, but by the ganzer-macher himself, Sean Matgamna. Why? Because I feel that the best solution to the Israel/Palestine crisis is a single state in which all the inhabitants have full and equal rights, that one can be ethnically and/or religiously a Jew, a Christian or Muslim or Arab, or whatever. This, he mumbled to me in his inimitable manner, was ‘an anti-Semitic position’.
This — a call for racial and religious equality and genuine democracy — might be considered a little unlikely to occur in the near future (but then so is socialism, and the AWL doesn’t stop promoting it on those grounds), but only by the most abstruse logic — or the most tortuous form of ‘dialectics’ — could it be considered as based upon racial discrimination, particularly as it is predicated upon the demand for national/ethnical equality between Arabs and Jews. Moreover, this casual throwing around of accusations of anti-Semitism — that is, hatred of Jews — in response to a political position such as this makes it less easy to combat real anti-Semitism whenever it raises its head, as it trivialises a very serious question.
As for the AWL’s presence in the labour movement, it has broadly speaking been the most positive aspect of its activities over the years. It was its trade-union work which attracted me to the group 35 years back; other aspects, in particular its attitude towards the Labour Party, put me off it. It is in respect of other issues, less directly connected to the working class, where the less positive aspects of its politics are evident.

This comment was followed with another little gem attacking Coates's assertion that the AWL has "real roots in the Labour movement":

“with real roots in the labour movement”
On what fucking planet? This noxious cult doesn’t even exist outside of London and Yorkshire, so its real roots are by definition somewhat truncated. The AWL ex-member interviewed in the WW had been a member for 3 years, not a couple of months, and the story he tells together with the evidence of the email exchanges will be familiar to anyone who has encountered this sect – bullying, suppression of any real dissent and an appeal to sect loyalist groupthink, and crude scatological insults. And talk about a few words being taken out of context is pretty rich from a group which has been doing precisely that in order to smear people as anti-semites for years (with AWLers of the Denham stripe, even words taken out of context are not necessary, since he is capable of divining what people are “secretly” or “objectively” thinking, often the very opposite of what they actually say).,

 Yup, that's certainly the Jim Denham I know.  I'll have to dig some old stuff if only for its entertainment value.

But, in fairness, less look at Andrew Coates's less than ingenuous response to Dr Paul:

Well, for what it’s worth, I did not agree with them at all on the Yugoslav collapse, and while I agree with the ‘two-state’ solution to Palestine I would not go into detail about the Israel-Palestinian dispute because it is like walking into a burning pit.
If you tot up every political dispute, all you get (as with us all on the left) plenty of disagreements/agreements on a host of issues.
More fundamentally personally I do not come from, to say the least, their strand of Canon-Trotskyism.
Sean Matgamna is, as they say, “controversial”, but then there’s plenty of people in that category.
But on this one I was impressed by Solidarity’s coverage of the Arab Spring and a serious approach to Islamism.

Marko Attila Hoare has a more detailed recollection of where Andrew Coates stood on the "Yugoslav collapse" and my recollection of Andrew Coates playing fast and loose with allegations of antisemitism hardly distances him from the "burning pit" of discussions of Palestine.

Anyway, it's mostly gossip but Dr Paul's comment was the kind of gem that leaves you wondering what the AWL actually exists for.