When is not a genocide a genocide?

Garbled question, I know. But the Anti-Defamation League in America has argued for some years now that the genocide of the Armenians by Turkey didn't count as such, presumably because Turkey is more important to Israel than Armenia or Armenians are. Now it seems they have performed a U-turn but it took a while and some sacking and some resignation and an effective boycott of the ADL by an American town with a large Armenian population. From Ha'aretz:

Over the past two weeks, the ADL has faced a tremendous amount of pressure over the issue. Two weeks ago the town of Watertown, a suburb of Boston with a large Armenian community, decided to cut its ties with the ADL sponsored "No Place for Hate" program, after they discovered that the ADL was not planning to support a bill that would force the American government to accept that the massacre was in fact a genocidal act.

The ADL itself was split over the issue; it fired New England regional director Andrew Tarsy for telling The Boston Globe he agreed the killings were genocide and that he "strongly disagrees with the ADL's national position." Foxman had explained that he did not support the bill in fear that it would hurt both the U.S. and Israel's relations with Turkey while putting the Jewish community in Turkey in danger.

In a statement Tuesday, Foxman said he consulted with historians and his
friend and Holocaust survivor Elie Weisel after the controversy began, and became convinced genocide had occurred.

I'm wondering how long the ADL will keep Foxman as its face and voice and I'm not alone.

Netanyahu's blind vision

Here's Gideon Levy in Ha'aretz and he's none to happy with Bibi, who is apparently the most popular leader in Israel today. It follows Netanyahu's victory against Moshe Feiglin in the Likud's leadership contest and is a kind of compare and contrast between the "moderate" Netanyahu and the extreme, indeed "loony" Feiglin.

The bitter truth is that Netanyahu is essentially no different than Feiglin.....

Netanyahu, like Feiglin, supports a continuation of the occupation and both are adherents of the one-state solution - a "Jewish," occupying and racist state in which two types of people live: Jews, superior, and Arabs, inferior. Neither have any real intention of changing the current state of affairs. Feiglin speaks about a Jewish state, racial purity, and Netanyahu indeed does not dare to utter such things, but the non-solution he proposes - like anyone who opposes a complete end of the occupation - will continue to bolster the status quo, which means a Jewish state, ostensibly, with a huge Arab population living a dog's life......

Feiglin responds to Netanyahu's haughty statement, "if they give, they will receive," by saying, "they won't give and they won't receive; the enemy must be vanquished." But what's the difference? After all, even when the Palestinians gave, surrendering most of the Land of Israel, they did not get a thing. Even when terrorism subsided, their miserable lives and the conditions of the large prison in which they live did not improve a bit. And what exactly will Netanyahu "give" them? What bone will he toss them if they behave "nicely"? A quarter of Hebron? Half of Nablus? And how much longer will it be possible to talk about terror, of course only Palestinian terror, another one of Netanyahu's favorite topics, as Israel is killing four times as many of their men, women and children - while Palestinian terror nearly has disappeared from our streets?

Indeed, there is one difference: Unlike Feiglin, Netanyahu speaks at length about sand slipping through the hourglass on the Iranian threat. Oh, how he loves to talk about the Iranian threat. It is a winning card. And what could be bad about searching for the coin under the lantern instead of where it is really located, to become Mr. Iran in Israel and the world and completely disregard the truly dangerous hourglass - the Palestinian problem? The fact that nothing sustains terrorism and Iran like the occupation is something that our very own expert on global terror and Iran is blind to.

The opinion polls show that Netanyahu is the most popular leader in Israel today. This says something about Israel and its mood: It does not want peace. It's unlikely Netanyahu's star-struck supporters have ever even asked themselves where this man, whom they seek to crown and anoint, wants to lead Israel. They only know that they are supporting a moderate statesman - as opposed to the extremist Feiglin. Thus, Netanyahu has made fools of them yet again. And whom does he have to thank? Feiglin.

So that may be the next Israeli PM. Did you see where he is on peace with the Palestinians? Did you see where he is on Iran? So many "left" zionists here in the UK jumped on the Kadima bandwagon as it passed itself off as a compromise between left and right zionism. It was a shift of the mainstream to the right. Zionist "lefts" told themselves and others that Sharon had reformed and Israel was moving left. Israel was moving right. And it still is.

Israel withholds holocaust survivor funds

That's according the Ha'aretz article here:

The report finds that the state's treatment of the survivors has been marked by mismanagement, red tape and a shortage of adequate personnel in the treasury, State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss said.

Lindenstrauss called on the state to treat the survivors humanely and equalize their rights. The process of locating and restoring property lost during the Holocaust to its rightful owners was delayed due to both bureaucracy and a lack of cooperation among the various groups holding the properties in Israel, the report says.

In 2006, the treasury's budget department was late in transferring NIS 21.6 million to a foundation for survivors' welfare, eventually transferring the funds only at the end of the fiscal year.

The Foundation for the Benefit of Holocaust Survivors, a central organization aiding needy survivors, could use only about a third of the budget due to the treasury's delay in transferring the funds, while some NIS 14 million remained unused. Thus the organization's activity in providing aid and other essentials to needy or sick survivors was seriously curtailed.

And to think that Israel got reparations from Germany over the holocaust.

Apparently in the wake of the above news, Professor Alan Dershowitz has contacted DePaul Uni and asked that they grant Finkelstein that tenure after all.

Israel out of the news

Nothing happened in Israel today. Israel did nothing of note. Well that's the verdict from google anyway. Time was when I would get up at 5.30 am, google "Israel" and three news items would appear at the top of the page. Not now. I got three maps of Israel.




As always, there's an issue here. What is a news blog for example? I remember Little Green Footballs campaigning to count as a news blog on google's list but go look at it, if it's still there. It was no more news than mine. I don't think LGF was ever on the list but one that was and was subsequently dropped was URUKnet. I was told that it was an Iraqi Ba'ath site. I think I remember they ran something from my blog or maybe it was just a link. News? Hardly. I also remember Atzmon boasting that he could get his antisemitic tosh on there as well as other sites that ought to know better. But is he or anything he says news? The SWP covering for him is baffling but it's gone on for three years now since Lenin's Tomb exposed his antisemitism so again, the man's hardly news. But I'm rambling. I think it is conflict aversion that has caused google to drop the news as a given at the first point of enquiry. It still has a secific news button. Oh, and I just discovered, it runs the maps now because it's touting its map's button.

Ok, so we've seen the news when there's no specific enquiry. Now let's try "Israel". Now I get it. Israel is still in the news and what news? America is upping its aid from more than anyone else gets to much more than anyone else gets. But according to Mearsheimer and Walt its because of the lobby. According to zionists that's antisemitic. According to Chomsky and Massad it's because America wants Israel to be its regional strongman because of its inherent stability and depedency as a colonial settler state. According to zionists, well the "non"-zionists at Engage, that's anti-American. So why give Israel all this money. It's because America is nice and Israel is nice. Apparently that's how international relations works. It's all about degrees of niceness.

Oh why oh why did I want to know what was news about Israel today?

Did you hear the one about the...

....comedian who was smeared on Facebook for the offence of putting down some Israeli hacklers by referring to the occupation? It's a sure sign that zionists are losing their monopoly on the mainstream media that this article has appeared at all, let alone in the UK's Mirror which used to belong to one Robert Maxwell. When Robert Maxwell died he was given full military honours by the State of Israel. Anyway, here's the article:

It is not an offence to offend somebody

Sue Carroll 15/08/2007

Heard the one about the comedian who brought the house down - and found himself libelled on Facebook?

This is the fate that befell my friend Dave Johns and it's no joking matter.

As well as working the comedy circuit, Dave has appeared on the West End stage in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest and is a regular on Never Mind The Buzzcocks.

AdvertisementFor 20 years he's been in the business of entertaining hip, young audiences with surreal whimsy. He's used to hecklers, habitual mobile phone-users talking through acts and awkward customers.

All comedians are, it's an occupational hazard.

So, one recent Saturday night at Manchester Comedy Club, after seeing a group of 10 noisy Israeli students behaving obnoxiously he decided to nip it in the bud.

"Are you the Israeli students?" he asked at the start of his act. "Because there's 10 Palestinians at the box office saying you lot are occupying their seats."

Well, it made me laugh.

Luckily we've not reached the stage - yet - when the "joke police" can step in to ban comedians from making a few members of the audience feel uncomfortable and offended.

Isn't that what good comedy is about?

Imagine that great Jewish comedian Jackie Mason not being able to to mock his own faith. It would be like taking a plumber's wrench away and asking him to fix the boiler.

As Stephen Fry so succinctly put it when talking about censorship in comedy: "You're offended? So effing what."

Anyway, the audience loved it. The mob from Israel did not.

They walked out after calling Dave a "p****" and telling anyone who'd listen that, despite two UN mandates stating the very opposite, Israel did not occupy Palestinian territory. It hadn't occurred to them that if they'd been Palestinians, Dave would have turned the joke on its head.

But they didn't want reason, they wanted trouble. Suffice to say, it took all of 24 hours for this bunch to condemn Dave as a racist with a posting on Facebook calling his act "disgusting and unforgivable", his jokes anti-Semitic, mocking up a picture of him as Hitler and urging people "to destroy this pathetic excuse of a comedian's career".

That the posting, which included a totally fictitious account of a mass walkout and someone in the audience shouting "dirty Jews", might be a complete fabrication clearly didn't occur to the cowboys at Facebook.

After all, why let the truth get in the way of revenue? Let's not forget this is the same organisation which ran BNP propaganda alongside bank adverts.

Dave, as it turns out, has been completely vindicated. Manchester Comedy Club recorded the entire show. You won't, of course, Palesfind the scurrilous posting on Facebook now.

After being told this was the sort of libel newspapers pay lawyers vast sums of money to avoid, it was hastily removed.

But what remains is an ominous reminder of how easy it is to play the race card in the public domain and get away with it.

A tape recording exonerated Dave, but what if it had been his word against theirs? That's what worries him.

"A comic should be allowed to make satirical jokes about political situations," says Dave. "If people don't like them, that's their right. But to see racist intent where there is none is wrong. It's an emotive accusation. To use it glibly does a disservice to people who suffer genuine discrimination."

He's right. Real anti-Semites spray graffiti over Jewish graves, daub synagogues with swastikas, deny the holocaust, and preach the extermination of Jews in radical mosques.

Here's a funny thing. You don't find too many of them in the Comedy Club.

It looks like the game's up for the false allegation of antisemitism. I should say "it's all over bar the shouting." But losing a hasbara by libel battle on the internet and then having it reported in a UK tabloid, that's what I call, on the ropes. They'll holler their false allegations for a good time to come but fewer and fewer people will believe them and now and again they'll be exposed.

Many thanks to Ken Waldron for posting to this to the comment section. Where we need these reports most is in the tabloid, at least the mainstream, media. But a tabloid is the least likely place for them to appear.

Why boycott Israel?

Here's a sharp article in the San Francisco Chronicle going into the various reasons why Israel should be on the receiving end of a boycott. It also notes the "for us or against us" apoplexy on the part of "unions" and academics in the USA that might, as I said in an earlier post, actually be working in favour of the boycott movement by generating publicity for it and causing searching questions to be asked. Questions like, "why boycott Israel."

When does a citizen-led boycott of a state become morally justified?

That question is raised by an expanding academic, cultural and economic boycott of Israel. The movement joins churches, unions, professional societies and other groups based in the United States, Canada, Europe and South Africa. It has elicited dramatic reactions from Israel's supporters. U.S. labor leaders have condemned British unions, representing millions of workers, for supporting the Israel boycott. American academics have been frantically gathering signatures against the boycott, and have mounted a prominent advertising campaign in American newspapers - unwittingly elevating the controversy further in the public eye.

But is it unwittingly? Are these zionists stupid? They've made remarkable achievements over the decades. Would they really make such a basic error as to publicise a boycott of Israel that draws attention to Israel's lack of legitimacy, its outrageous conduct and the way that western governments and media have covered for these racist war criminals over the dacades? I don't think the zionists are stupid. I think they're bullying, or least trying to. I think they are relying on antisemitic notions of "Jewish power" to try to have would-be boycotters abandon the boycott. I don't think they realise the extent to which the tide has turned against Israel on both sides of the atlantic.

Anyway, having dealt with various reasons for a boycott of Israel the article turns to why it is necessary for ordinary folk to try to uphold the rights of the Palestinians.

Politicians worldwide, and American ones especially, have failed us. Our leaders, from the executive branch to Congress, have dithered, or cheered Israel on, as it devoured the land base for a Palestinian state. Their collective irresponsibility dooms both Palestinians and Israelis to a future of strife and insecurity, and undermines our global stature. If politicians cannot lead the way, then citizens must. That is why boycotting Israel has become both necessary and justified.

Hear Hear!

And here are the scores.......

I'm sure I've run this headline before. The International Center for Media and the Public Agenda (ICMPA) has published a study of media coverage of what Israel calls the second Lebanon war.

What did the world press say about the Hezbollah-Israel war?

Hezbollah won.
Israel was the victim.
Deaths were mere stats.
Qana was the turning point.

I'm just letting you know because I'm sure it makes for interesting reading. I just can't quite get my head around what's being said. But please go see.

Thanks!

Engage on the offensive

Engage is getting a bit freaky now. Dr David Hirsh seems to be leading the group to a position where they don't just try to defeat boycott resolutions against Israel as they arise. It now seems that Hirsh wants various groups to declare themselves anti-boycott. In fact Engage seems to be degenerating into some kind of Campus Watch UK. See this:

The Editorial Board of the British Sociological Association journal, Work, employment and society, published by SAGE, supported the campaign for a 'boycott of academic and scientific institutions in Israel'.

This, it said, in a 2004 editorial, is to protest at

"that government's appalling war of occupation and vengeance in the form of collective punishment of the Palestinian people. While the legal implications of the BSA’s charitable status has prohibited the adoption of this as part of our publishing policy nevertheless, the current editor has continued to support the resolution."

Work Employment Society 2004; 18; 661

This journal has an editorial position that Israeli actions in the West Bank can be characterized as an "apalling war of occupation and vengeance...". "Vengeance" for what, one may ask? Perhaps this BSA journal is doing nothing more than echoing the old rhetoric about the Jewish God being a vengeful God, in contrast to the the Christian God, who is the God of love?

This journal also had an editorial position that this "apalling war of occupation and vengeance" constitutes "collective punishment of the Palestinian people". The use of the term "collective punishment" here clearly implies the criminality of the vengeful state.

The editorial of Work, Employment and Society does not mention any other human rights abuses anywhere else in the world. Only the ones committed by the "vengeful" Jews.

Does anybody believe that a person who works at an institution in the "vengeful" state would be fairly treated by this journal?

Can anybody explain why sociologists in Israel whose research interests are in the field of 'Work, employment and society today' should be punished for the "vengefulness" of the state in which they work?

Are sociologists in Britain going to allow a British Sociological Association journal to continue supporting a campaign to boycott colleagues from the "vengeful" state - and only from the "vengeful" state?

The whole editorial is online here.

Ok, now leaving aside the none too subtle hint of antisemitism see this comment from a Brian Goldfarb, no friend of the boycott movement and a regular commentor to Engage:

I have just retired as a Trustee (Executive Committee Member) of the British Sociological Association - my term of office ended at the April 2007 AGM, and I had been a member of the EC for 8 years (that is, since 1999). I am aware that the _then_ editor had such a policy, he wished to but was prohibited from publishing it in the Journal, let alone acting on it as far as selecting papers for the Journal was concerned.

The editorial team has since been replaced - as they are every three or four years, as a matter of BSA policy. What is printed reads as though it was (please note the past tense) meant as a personal statement, not a statement as to the editorial direction of Work, Employment & Society. Note that the quote states quite clearly "the legal implications of the BSA's charitable status has prohibited the adoption of this as part of our publishing policy..."

In 2004, this was brought up at an Executive Committee meeting at which I was an attendee - I missed only one in those 8 years. The then chair of the EC made it abundantly clear (as did the Executive Officer - the full-time, paid person who runs the BSA on a day-to-day basis - who had taken legal advice)that the BSA's charitable status made it impossible for it to have such a policy or for its WHOLLY-OWNED journals (that is, these journals are owned, lock, stock and barrel by the BSA, they are run by BSA Publications, a wholly owned subsidiary of the charity) to run any such editorials.

Please check immediately with BSA (David, you have the contact numbers and email addresses, as do I) and alter the piece as necessary.

The person (or team) that wrote that sentence in 2004 is no longer in charge of the journal, and, indeed, any editor writing such an editorial as a statement of editorial policy could find themselves removed from office as being in violation of the BSA's charitable status.

I fear that the current status of the Journal editorial team was not checked out before this article was published.

So where are we with this? A guy at this sociological association has expressed a personal view in the editorial of its publication and said that the board of the publication cannot express or support such a view. Hirsh has suggested that this personal view is official policy, yes? I think that's it. But he's been rumbled by someone who often comments at Engage. Usually when something like this happens, Hirsh deletes the original post and the comments and carries on as if nothing's happened but now he is digging in. Look:

Brian, could you please give us the reference in WES or elsewhere where the policy of the editorial board to support the boycott campaign but not actually to boycott, is rescinded?

Eh? But surely, oh never mind, here's Brian Goldfarb again:

David, where is the evidence that the current Board of WES is in favour of a boycott? Equally, that they are trying to do something about it in the pages of WES, specifically against the remit of the Executive Committee (let alone the Charity Commissioners and Charity Law)?

You are referring to a statement that specifically acknowledges that the journal cannot operate a boycott, even if the editorial team is in favour of one.

Either the current editorial team is in favour of a boycott and there is evidence that they are operating one (have Israeli sociologists submitted articles, only to have them rejected?), or there isn't. If the former. why not refer the evidence to the BSA Exec, via the office of the BSA (all BSA members have the address, both email and surface)?

Stop trying to make me prove a negative, especially when I don't subscribe to the Journal.

In other words, what's to rescind? Back comes Hirsh:

The evidence that the Board of WES is in favour of a boycott is that they said so in 2004 in an editorial and they haven't - to my knowledge - said anywhere else that they have reversed their position. Personnel comes and goes - has there been a statement changing the position of the board?

The statement from 2004 says that the only reason they are not operating a boycott is that they understand it to contravene the law which regulates charities. This, from a scholarly journal, is in my view not good enough. They seem to say they would be excluding Israelis from the journal if only they were allowed.

Given that the editorial board supports the Roses' "call" (at least did in 2004 and has not to my knowledge rescinded that support), and given that the Roses call for a silent boycott, and the Roses say that the boycott is already in force, it is reasonable then to ask for assurances that the editorial board is not doing what it says it believes in.

One guy, one outgoing guy has expressed a personal view and now it's the Board's policy set in 2004. So again, back comes Brian Goldfarb:

Again, stop trying make me prove a negative.

As Jimmy says, there is no evidence that the CURRENT WES editorial board, a different group of people, have supported the call of the previous editor for a boycott either.

This is turning into a witch hunt, which is rich coming from people who are, rightly, quick to condemn "loyalty oaths" from Israeli academics for the edification of the pro-boycotters.

It is also coming close to a scenario in which it is demanded that a newly elected government repudiate a policy statement apparently supported by a previously elected government - but one that was never turned into a bill, let alone an Act of Parliament. They wouldn't waste their breath.

David, last time I looked, you were a member of the BSA. Why don't you write to the executive officer and ask her what the BSA's policy is, and what the BSA's view of this is. I have. But I will have to wait until Monday at the earliest for an answer. Meanwhile, this is spreading and, to repeat myself, beginning to look suspiciously like a witch hunt.

No-one has any evidence that the present editor(s) of WES support a boycott. Perhaps they don't believe it's necessary, just as no-one here would actually expect Israeli academics to sign the Rose's loyalty pledges.

Maybe this will run and run, I don't know but why did this 2004 editorial get attacked now? Why does Dr Hirsh want associations that have no policy on an Israel boycott to declare against such a boycott? The post is, at the time of writing, the second post down on the forum/blog page. The one above is also about pressuring a professional association, the American Sociological Association, into declaring itself anti-boycott. That article goes into a long list of American labour organisations that have passed anti-boycott resolutions in spite of American unions' reputation for focusing on bread and butter issues only. Contrast that with the UCU leader's view that her members are only interested in pay and conditions. Are American trade unionists really as concerned with protecting Israel as they are with pay and conditions and therefore more concerned with what is a foreign affairs issue than their UK counterparts.?

But I digress. My own view is that shenanigans like these, in the UK anyway, can only benefit the Palestine solidarity movement. If professional or workers' associations declare themselves to be anti-boycott this raises the spectre of the boycott in a way that a mere voting down of boycott or pro-boycott proposals would not. I think so anyway. Dr Hirsh might think that this will have people thinking that the union movement or certain professional or academic bodies are riddled with antisemitism and that activists are exposing and fighting it. I think that many people will wonder why there are any proposals to boycott Israel and, as there are, there must be something boycott-worthy about Israel. They then might start looking into ways to deal with the last of the colonial settler states, and one of those ways might just be a boycott.

Israel's integrated apartheid road system

This article demonstrates how, for Israel, appearances are everything, substance nothing. Apparently Israel is building roads that can be used by Jews and by Arabs but in separate lanes.

Israel is constructing a road through the West Bank, east of Jerusalem, that will allow both Israelis and Palestinians to travel along it - separately.

There are two pairs of lanes, one for each group of people, separated by a tall wall of concrete patterned to look like Jerusalem stones, a beautification effort indicating that the road is meant to be permanent. The Israeli side has many exits; the Palestinian side has few.

The point of the road, according to those who planned it under former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, is to permit Israel to build more settlements around East Jerusalem, cutting the city off from the West Bank, but allowing Palestinians to travel unimpeded north and south through Israeli-held land.

"The Americans demanded from Sharon contiguity for a Palestinian state," said Shaul Arieli, a reserve colonel in the army who participated in the 2000 Camp David negotiations and specializes in maps. "This road was Sharon's answer - to build a road for Palestinians between Ramallah and Bethlehem, but not to Jerusalem. This was how to connect the West Bank while keeping Jerusalem united and not giving Palestinians any blanket permission to enter East Jerusalem."

I got this from the Mercury News but apparently it also appears in the New York Times.

Israel's one state solution: ethnic cleansing both sides of the "Green Line"

Israel often blurs the so-called "Green Line," the pre-1967 border. The ethnic cleansing of Arabs, without which, Israel would not have a Jewish majority, continues to this day on both sides of the line.

Here's a report on the Negev, within the Green Line:

Thousands of residents participated on Wednesday in a conference which comes in solidarity with the "unrecognized" Arab villages in the Negev, and the ongoing Israeli threats to evacuate these villages and displace the 90,000 Arab residents in the Negev living in 45 unrecognized villages.

The participants in the conference stated that Israel is housing thousands of Israeli settlers in the Negev and establishing towns for them, while it rejects recognizing the Arab villages in the Negev and continues to displace their residents.

The participants also called on the Arab countries to act in support of the residents of the Negev and counter the racist Israeli policies against them.

On Wednesday, the Regional Council of the Unrecognized Villages conducted a press conference to expose the Israeli policies against the Arab residents in the Negev, and the continuous demolition of Arab houses there. Several Arab members of the Knesset, and dozens of Arab leaders, in addition to hundreds of residents, participated in the conference.

The participant carried banners written in Arabic, Hebrew and English, reading: "Yes to recognizing our villages" and "Israel wants us out of our land, and wants settlers to replace us."

Arab member of the Knesset, Talab Al Sane’, said that the Negev is 12,000 square kilometers, which it as twice as big as the West Bank, but after the 1967 war Israel displaced 90% of the Arabs there and replaced them with settlements and settlers.

Al Sane’ also said that now there are only 90,000 Arab residents in the Negev, and that those residents are facing displacement by Israel "just because they are Arabs."

He added that the Israeli government is financing the annexation of Arab lands in the Negev, has already annexed graveyards in Be’er Shiva, and has transformed an old mosque into a museum.

And from the officially occupied West Bank:

After Israel demolished structures in at least five Palestinian villages in the Jordan Valley in the last week, Hadash Chairman Mohammed Barakeh called on Thursday for an end to what he termed the "ethnic cleansing" in the area.

Pools, tents and tin structures built without permits and belonging to Palestinian residents, were destroyed in the villages of Bakia, Jeftlik, Beit Dajan and Bardella, which are scattered along the Jordan Valley.

Barakeh said that the demolitions prevent the residents from providing for themselves through working the land and raising livestock. The information was received by the Hadash chairman from the residents - who also turned to Amnesty International - and was verified by Haaretz.

I suppose its only appropriate for Israel to behave that way in this, the sixtieth year of zionist occupation.

Haifa Uni harrasses anti-racist pickets

This is a report from the Alternative Information Center:

On Wednesday, 7 August, a few dozen Jewish and Arab students at Haifa University, held a quiet protest on campus, in response to racist remarks made by the Haifa University Students Union (HUSU) spokesperson, Saar Ziv, when interviewed by a local newspaper. In the protest, organized by the local student club of the Democratic Front for Peace and Equality (Hadash), the protesting students held hands to form a human chain across campus. Their mouths were covered in duct tape and they held signs that read, in Hebrew and Arabic: “Let the Students Union Know—It is Better to SHUT UP than SPEAK RACISM.”

The University officials, who are generally hostile towards any student political activity, and especially the activities of Arab students, has charged seven of the protesting students, both Jewish and Arab, with “Provoking a commotion” and “Wild behavior.” The Haifa Seven, who are to be put in front of a disciplinary committee are: Rami Hod, Reem Hazzan, Arik Zolfin, Osama Amer, Uri Weltmann, Remon Maalouf and Elad Bardes.

“During our peaceful protest, we shut our mouth with duct tape to show our objection to the racist talk, the kind of which came out of the mouth of the HUSU spokesperson,” said Reem Hazan, one of the Haifa Seven. “Now it seems the university officials are keen to shut our mouths by force, for enacting our right to freedom of speech and expression. Had the university been sincere in claiming to uphold pluralism and critical thinking, it would have given us its support, rather than threatening to expel us.”

The protest came about after an interview with the HUSU spokesperson to a local newspaper, in which he made racist remarks towards the Arab students in general, and towards the Arab Students Committee (ASC) in particular. Around 25 percent of the students of Haifa University are Arabs, and they annually elect the ASC as their independent representative body. The HUSU spokesperson claimed that the “Arab Students Committee is against co-existence,” and wished the university would disallow its activities. He further said that he hopes that Arab students “will realize who constitutes the majority around here.” After the protest took place, the HUSU spokesperson was interviewed for the leading news portal NRG.co.il, where he publicly apologized for his remarks.

“What's most absurd is that the university chose to charge with disciplinary actions those Jewish and Arab students who participated together in a nonviolent and peaceful protest,” said Rami Hod, one of the Haifa Seven. “But rightwing activists from the HUSU held several demonstrations, none of which were according to university regulations, all of which almost resulted in violence.” Hod recalled that when the DFPE student club called for an on-campus Jewish-Arab demonstration on June, to protest the ongoing occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip and in support of the establishment of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel, the HUSU activists held a counter-protest, unauthorized by the university. Nevertheless, the university officials took no disciplinary steps towards them. In his opinion, this is a conscious and deliberate policy of Prof. Aaron Ben-Ze'ev, President of the University of Haifa, and Prof, Yosi Ben-Artzi, the Rector of the university, designed to put down all anti-racist and anti-occupation activities.

During the coming months, the disciplinary committee will convene several times to hear witnesses, discuss evidence, and decide whether to convict and punish the Haifa Seven.

You can protest the harassment of the students by contacting Haifa University officials. You may want also to send a copy of your letter of protest to jabha.stud@gmail.com

President of the University of Haifa
Prof. Aaron Ben-Ze’ev
Tel: 972-4-8240101
Fax: 972-4-8240281
E-mail: abenzeev@univ.haifa.ac.il

Rector of the University of Haifa
Prof. Yossi Ben-Artzi
Tel: 972-4-8240405
Fax: 972-4-8342101
Email: yossib@univ.haifa.ac.il

Dean of Students of the University of Haifa
Prof. Ariel Bendor
Tel: 972-4-8240334/5
Fax: 972-4-8340319
Email: abendor@univ.haifa.ac.il

Chairman of the Board of Govenors
Prof. Manfred Lahnstein

Tel: 972-4-8240093
Fax: 972-4-8342104

Chairman of the Executive Committee
Moshe Gavish

Tel.: 04-8249560, 8240585
Fax: 04-8342104

Call for moratorium on Israel's defence force

It turns out that Tony Greenstein's letter to the independent yesterday was the latest in a string of them. Thanks to Evan Jones of the late Alert and Alarmed blog for pointing this out to me in the comments to the Tony Greenstein post:

Israel's 'history' a hoary chestnut

Sir: S W Massil (letter, 26 July) reproduces the hoary chestnut of the 1947 UN partition.

The reason why the Palestinians and the Arab states did not accept the partition is because it gave 55 per cent of Mandate territory to the Jewish state, when the Jewish population was less than 30 per cent, and Jewish ownership of land about 6 per cent. The partition was a con job of the Western powers.

But no, this generosity was not good enough. The Zionist jihadis did not accept the partition then and their children do not accept it now.

A Jewish state without Jerusalem? No thank you. The plight of the Palestinians cannot be blamed on the Arab states' behaviour in the late 1940s.

Can we have a moratorium on printing letters from the party faithful who continue to defend the indefensible, Israel as pariah state?

EVAN JONES

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA

Evan went on to point out that the papers don't publish letters from flat earthers so why do they publish tosh they know to be tosh in favour of Israel? Anyway, they didn't publish that bit but then the Indie has been known to publish said tosh in its own editorial column.

Oh, and here's a link to the letter that Evan Jones was complaining about.

Independent naqba denial

I didn't see the letter in the Independent that prompted Tony Greenstein's response here:

Sir: Jim Roland (letter, 4 August) really cannot be allowed to get away with the same old discredited Israeli propaganda.

It was nearly 50 years ago, in 1959, that Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi debunked the myth that the Palestinian refugees were the product of exhortations by Arab leaders to leave in order that they could invade. Independently, in 1961, Erskine Childers, in The Spectator of 12 May, published an article after having examined the transcripts of Arab radio stations, monitored by the BBC and CIA, which showed that far from ordering the refugees to leave, they instructed them to stay! This particular myth was created in the early 1950s by Israeli leaders as a means of deflecting the demand that Israel accept the right of return of the refugees.

The explanation for the expulsion of the Palestinian refugees is quite simple. Even in the area that the United Nations allocated to a Jewish state, a majority of the population were Arabs. If a Jewish state were to be created then it was inevitable that the Arabs had to be expelled. As Joseph Weitz, the key official responsible for Jewish colonisation wrote in his diary in 1940: "Between ourselves it must be clear that there is no room for both peoples together in this country ... And there is no other way than to transfer the Arabs from her to the neighbouring countries, to transfer all of them; not one village, not one tribe should be left..."

TONY GREENSTEIN

BRIGHTON

The letter Tony was responding to is here.

The United State of Israel?

Thanks to Montag for sending me this suggestion from Rosa Schmidt Azadi in OpEdNews that America adopt Israel as it's 51st state:

A Modest Proposal: U.S. Statehood for Israel?

By Rosa Schmidt Azadi

I’m only half kidding.

Just think of the possibilities. Making Israel the 51st U.S. state could be a win-win-win solution for our country, for Israel, and for Middle East peace. The way I see it, Israel’s security would get a boost at a lower cost to the U.S. taxpayer, and the biggest cause of conflict in the Middle East would be resolved, reducing the threat of terrorism.

Stay with me on this for a minute.

Improving security in Israel.

We’re supplying Israel with billions of dollars in weaponry and we look like their only friend at the United Nations. Right? This is supposedly to defend them from attack by their sworn enemies, who are legion. Many Americans have a deep emotional commitment to the people in Israel and so we are bending over backward to protect them from threats both real and perceived.

But if Israel were the 51st state of the USA, things would be different. I doubt anyone would seriously attack the world’s only superpower. Every state is defended by the U.S. armed forces, which we’re already funding out of our tax dollars, and the United States has plenty of missiles and spy satellites. Plenty enough to watch over the newest state as well as all 50 others.

Israel is too far from the U.S. to feel protected, you say? Well, if Japan was betting on Hawaii being too far from the “contiguous United States” when they attacked Pearl Harbor, they had another think coming.

Imagine this, too. Once Israel became a state they would officially benefit from the services of the CIA and wouldn’t need their own spy agency (Mossad) anymore. That would be a relief to Americans who were so disappointed to hear that Israeli agents had spied on the U.S. and deceptively lobbied Congress. Also, what a relief it would be to hear no more rumors about how Mossad was secretly behind an unrealistic number of dastardly deeds in an unrealistic number of locations all over the world. (These rumors are not helping the struggle against anti-semitism.)

Saving U.S. taxpayers money.

If Israel were a state, we wouldn’t need to give them billions of our hard-earned dollars in military aid every year any more than we had to send the governor of Alaska billions of dollars to defend his state from the nearby USSR during the Cold War.

As a bonus to the U.S. bottom line, individuals and businesses in Israel would pay into the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) like everyone else who receives the protection of the U.S. Defense and State Departments. And they'd also benefit from the services of all the other federal agencies.

Promoting peace in the Middle East (and reducing terrorism).

Statehood is not just about Israel’s security and U.S. taxpayers’ comfort, though. Think how Israeli statehood might benefit the peace process and Middle East peace in general. This would help reduce terrorism.

First, Israel’s borders and land disputes would have to be settled before statehood could be granted, and naturally the U.S. would be interested in getting the best possible bargain. Other countries would also weigh in with their opinions and help mediate. This might be the perfect chance to offer compensation or repatriation to dispossessed Palestinian refugees. With an ultimate prize so big, the price would be worth it, and Israel wouldn’t have to worry about paying the cost all alone.

Second, we probably wouldn’t hear many complaints from the Palestinians and Arab Israelis about discrimination or “apartheid” after Israel joins the United States. Why? Because Israel’s state legislature would have to abide by the U.S. Constitution in its guarantee of religious freedom, separation of church and state, and equal civil/legal rights to all residents. We could also expect to see a sharp drop in terrorist recruitment as conditions improve.

Third, and equally important, transforming Israel from a major military power into one of 51 states in the USA would go a long way toward stabilizing the region. Neighboring countries would understand that, just as the Texas State National Guard cannot on their own authority attack Tijuana and the New York State National Guard cannot attack Montreal, the Israel State National Guard (which would replace the Israeli Defense Force) couldn't launch preemptive strikes into towns in the West Bank, Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, or Iran. And that would mean we U.S. taxpayers wouldn’t have to “balance” the billions in military aid we send to Israel with yet more billions in military aid to Israel’s neighbors. Nor would we have to worry about being drawn into conflagrations that we don’t want and that Congress wouldn’t approve if they knew about them in advance (e.g., bombing Iran).

Fourth, when it became part of the USA, Israel would be automatically signed on to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty and other international agreements that they’ve so far avoided. Israel would finally have to answer whether or not they have nukes and/or chemical weapons and, if so, put them under Pentagon command. What a public relations coup this would be for the United States internationally! In one fell swoop we’d eliminate all further talk of the “Israeli lobby” or the tail wagging the dog.

As a bonus, we wouldn’t need unpopular military bases in Saudi Arabia or Iraq because we’d have bases in Israel. We could dock our aircraft carriers there instead of in the Arab-Persian Gulf, a move that would reduce tensions in the region. Maybe we could even use this as an excuse to get out of Iraq, saving more money (and lives) and further improving our image.

In sum, if Israel became the 51st state, Israelis would be safer, Palestinians would breathe easier, the biggest source of tension in the region would have been settled, Americans would look like heroes, and the U.S. taxpayer would save megabillions. Which we need for repairing bridges and dams, it seems.

Statehood for Israel: an impossible dream?

There’s only one problem with this dream solution: it might be hard to sell. I think two groups would be especially hard to convince.

The first group would be the people who are emotionally attached to the notion of Israel as a solely “Jewish state.” Statehood advocates will need to convince them that it’s in their best interest to adopt the American system of separation of church and state. (If Israel changed in this way, it would also be easier for Americans to criticize “Islamic nationalism” without being called hypocrites.)

The other group that would need to be won over are those in the region who have always seen Israel as a U.S. satellite helping police the countries of the Middle East and North Africa so that U.S. corporations can exploit their resources. These people would say that making Israel part of the United States would be like putting a leash on the police dog that’s been scaring people . . . and then bringing in a squad of police commandos.

But we can prove they’re wrong, can’t we?

This reminds of when a leading Israeli politician, maybe even the PM of the day, suggested that Israel go on to the US dollar to stabilise the currency. By way of a protest, or maybe a joke, a referee tried to flip a dollar bill at the start of a football match. I think he got the sack.

Israel's right refuseniks

Apparently refusing to obey orders to evict settlers from certain settlements or taken over houses is a growing phenomenon in Israel. Soldiers are phoning their parents or rabbis and asking what to do when told to evict settlers. Ha'aretz's editorial today showed signs of panic over the problem. Here's the whole thing:

Dozens of Israel Defense Forces soldiers in the Duchifat Battalion - part of the Kfir Brigade, which, as a rule, is stationed in the West Bank - informed their commanders, after consulting with their rabbis, that they would refuse to participate in the evacuation of Jewish families who took over buildings in the Hebron marketplace.

The soldiers were not slated to evacuate the settlers-intruders with their own hands, but were going to be replacing Border Police officers who were being removed from their posts for the evacuation. Some of the soldiers explicitly announced their intentions to refuse orders, while others reported being stricken by various aches and pains that led to their being granted sick leave. Twelve of them were sent, under orders from the commanding general officer, for a disciplinary hearing. However, that is not enough; tomorrow there will be another evacuation, and more refusal.

This is the big test for Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi. Over the last few days, Barak and Ashkenazi repeatedly condemned evasion of duty, but refusal is no less dangerous. Political refusal - and cloaking it in religious terms does not disguise its political nature - is a malignant growth in the IDF's body. Military authorities must fight it without compromise. Refusal from the right is no more acceptable or worthy of understanding than refusal from the left. If there is the chance of a political compromise that will lead to peace with the Palestinians, it entails the evacuation of settlements. An army that conveys weakness toward those who refuse its orders will not be able to be a reliable and skilled tool of those who dispatch it.

The refuseniks' organization is a declaration of revolt, and must be dealt with to the full extent of the law. The army must cancel its arrangements with yeshivas whose rabbis reject the commanders' authority. If it is true that extremist groups, some of them from abroad, are offering financial compensation to the refuseniks, they are abetting the soldiers in committing an offense. Those bribing the refuseniks should be brought before the police and the prosecution.

The founders of the state understood that the IDF must have a unified chain of command that includes only military commanders subordinate to the chief of staff, who in turn follows the orders of the supreme headquarters of the IDF: the government. Private armies will lead to the disintegration of the IDF, and will ultimately fight each other, as in pre-revolution China or in Iraq after the American invasion.

Two years ago, ahead of the evacuation of the settlements in Gaza and the northern West Bank, the government and General Staff took a forgiving approach toward the refuseniks, people staying in settlements illegally and violent anti-disengagement protesters. Just recently, MKs on the religious right once more asked that youths who harmed soldiers and police officers at the time of the pullout be pardoned and allowed to join the IDF. But this is not the place for compassion.

Israel is facing several difficult military fronts - Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas - over which it has limited control. It must not accept the existence of an internal front as well, within the sole armed force under its authority. This front, the refusal front, must be dismantled without delay. If Ashkenazi, Barak and the government, led by Ehud Olmert, are too weak to do so, then they must not remain in their posts a single day longer.

So call for the Likud or call for the army? Who else is there to call for to rule Israel?

Scofflaw? What's a scofflaw?

Why Israel is of course! Here's an interview in Dissident Voice with Gabriel Ash which had me reaching for the dictionary. Gabriel Ash is an articulate advocate for a boycott of Israeli goods:

Israel is a small country with large military expenses. In order to maintain relatively first-world living standards, Israel’s economy depends on exports, foreign investment and non-commercial support. Clearly, a full EU trade boycott of Israel will cause severe damage to the Israeli economy. The EU is Israel’s largest trading partner, and Israel exports to the EU are over $10 billion a year. Let us, however, not deceive ourselves. There is no chance for such a trade embargo to happen in the foreseeable future.

Nevertheless, grassroots boycotts can have a cumulative impact. Increased public awareness to Israel’s criminal politics can translate into lower sales for brands associated with Israel, lower investment in Israel, and pressure on EU governments to stop some of their more directly damaging involvement in the region, including buying Israeli weapon systems, selling weapons to Israel, subsidizing the Israeli occupation and helping Israel fight Palestinian resistance.

The most important role of grassroots boycott initiatives is educational and moral. They expose Israel for the kind of country it really is: a racist, brutal colonial outpost. And they undermine the mainstream media whitewashing job. Grassroots boycotts can thus repeat the dynamics that made Western support for Apartheid South Africa untenable.

Ok, so much for boycott, but what about "scofflaw"?

Boycotts do not change the legal situation. Israel is in breach of every UN resolution that mentions it and then some. It is in breach of the UN charter, the Fourth Geneva Convention, The Fourth Hague Convention, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, The International Court for Justice, etc. etc. Furthermore, all these breaches are not merely technical, but massive and substantial.

With regards to international law, Israel is a major scofflaw.

International law, however, cannot simply be called upon for redress, because there is no world government with enforcement powers. International law represents the stage of the enlightened opinion of humanity with regards to how states should behave. But only the application of pressure by other states can force states to obey the law, should their own residents be unable or unwilling to demand such obedience.

Ok, it's kind of obvious what it means from the context and the etymology squares with the meaning as in, one who scoffs at the law. I actually thought that the tri-lingual Ash had made it up.

The interview is referenced and quoted in Iran Daily as follows:

A leading Jewish political writer called for Israel’s political abolition.

Gabriel Ash--the US-based anti-Zionist activist who grew up in Israel--made the remark when asked whether the Hezbollah victory marks Israel’s annihilation, in an interview with Iran Daily’s Amir Tajik.

“If by that one means physical annihilation, I must say that this goal is wrongheaded both morally and strategically,“ he said.

Expanding on the strategic point, he said Israel, even with the most cowardly soldiers and most craven generals, is still a regional military mastodon.

“To overcome the Israeli military in a large war would require an army as dedicated as Hezbollah, but a hundred times larger and better equipped. None such army is at hand,“ he said.

Ash, however, said he will support ’annihilation’, only if it were to mean political abolition, namely the end of Israel as a racist, colonial state.
“We should speak clearly and precisely, not about annihilation, but about de-Zionification, de-colonization, revolution,“ he said.

He pointed out that nothing strengthens the hold of Zionist ideology among Israeli Jews better than anti-Zionists using language that can be interpreted--and will be so interpreted by Israeli and Western media and politicians--as calling for the physical annihilation of Jews.

“If the goal is to help Israel unravel, this rhetorical overkill is counter-productive,“ he said.

“Simply put, it is a gift to Israel’s Zionist rulers.“

Ash further said that if Hezbollah and other sources of resistance can create a new context in which Israel cannot respond to pressure by military escalation, the conditions for the end of Zionism would materialize.

What a mouth that guy's got. Mastodon? Oh it's an elephant of some sort. I'll remember that now.

UPDATE - Gabriel Ash has commented here to the effect that he never used the word "annihilate" in the way the interview claims he did. I thought his English was too exquisite for that. Apologies for that, I should have emailed the man himself.

Iranian Jews wiping Jews off the map of Iran

Apparently, the people raising the money to pay Iranian Jews to go live in Israel are Iranian Jews living in Los Angeles. According to a commentor called Rysk, this means that Israel and the zionist movement have nothing to do with what they are doing and that therefore this is not an example of Israel or the zionist movement undermining the standing, security or existence of yet another Jewish community. Here's the comment:

Mark -now you're the one being dishonest. You explicitly state
''its by Jonathon Cook and it sets out how Israel seems to be intent on destroying yes another...''
So, the opening and entire premise of your post based upon Jonathon Cook's article is wrong as its know that the offer was made by the Los Angeles Persian Jewish community.
There is a substantial gap between the actions of a particularly exciteable community such as the L.A Persian Jewish community and the actions/official policy of the State of Israel/ quasi government bodies such as the Jewish Agency.
Trying then to rectify both yours and Cook's mistake by bluring the lines between the two just does not wash.I would have noted this in the original post but the blogger edit function is down at the moment and I like to correct significant errors as soon as they come to my attention.

I would have just noted this in the original post but the edit facility in blogger.com is down at the minute and I like to correct significant errors as soon as they come to my attention. But was this significant? Here we have a whole new post to say that Israel is not stumping up the money to wipe the Jews off of the map of Iran. Iranian Jews based in Los Angeles are stumping up the money to have the Jews of Iran up and go to Israel. Now when we consider that the settlements are often funded privately by American Jews, or Jews based in America (and maybe elsewhere) and that the biblical village of Emmaus was razed by Israel but covered over with trees paid for by Canadian Jews it's not significant at all. Some zionists are part of the organised movement some are freelance. Ideology's like that, that's all.

UPDATE - Aha! I got my editorial rights back so I can do this update and not another post. It turns out that the contributor who accused me of dishonesty over the earlier post was himself being a tad economical with the truth. Here's a later comment under the same post.

note this, Rysk: " More than $1 million has been invested in the fund, and it is operated by means of one of the major aliyah organizations in Israel."

Text of report by web version of Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv on 8 July

[Report by Eli Bradenstein: "Israel to Iranian Jews: Immigration At Any Price"]

Israel is trying to find new ways of encouraging immigration from Iran in the wake of a lack of desire on the part of thousands of Iranian Jews to leave. In order to do this, an expatriate group of Iranian Jewish donors, which is behind a special fund to encourage aliyah from the land of the ayatollahs, is now offering approximately $60,000 to every Jewish family that makes comes to Israel, which will be in addition to the regular absorption basket.

Only a few months ago, the fund decided to grant an incentive of $5,000 to every new immigrant, but this did not persuade Iranian Jews, many of whom are comfortably off, to leave.

The fund has now decided to double the sum for every new immigrant, and to offer $10,000 in the hope that it will persuade Iranian Jews to come to Israel.

If the Jews do decide to come to Israel as whole families, they will also receive thousands more dollars: $2,000 for a head of family and $1,500 for a mother and each of her children. More than $1 million has been invested in the fund, and it is operated by means of one of the major aliyah organizations in Israel. Unconnected with the grants, the new immigrants also receive the regular absorption basket like other immigrants, as well as mortgages on easy terms.

The news of the grant has been published on an Israeli Internet site in Persian, which has been launched in order to convey vital information on the process of aliyah. It has also been reported on Israel Radio's Persian-language service, and is being passed on by means of various organizations and relatives to Jews in Iran.

Some 20,000 Jews live in Iran, mostly in Tehran. It is the largest remaining Jewish community in the Arab states. According to reports, many of them are comfortably off and free to practise their religion and provide religious education for their children. Given that, most are not interested in leaving Iran. However, Iran's Jews visit Israel a lot to see their relatives, and Israelis of Iranian origin pay family and business visits there. Iranian Jews who live in the United States also make frequent visits to family in Iran.

"In contrast to the previously laughable sum, we are now talking about a sizeable sum, and if a whole family decides to make aliyah, they will receive tens of thousands of dollars - a serious sum that could really persuade Jews to leave there and come to Israel, and assist in their absorption here," Ma'ariv was told by sources that are dealing with Iranian immigrants.

Source: NRG Ma'ariv website, Tel Aviv, in Hebrew 8 Jul 07

So these Jewish "communities" aren't quite as independent of the State of Israel or the established zionist movement as some zionists would have us believe. In a comment to this post prior, of course to this update, Charlie Pottins wonders how much this LA based Jewish community would do for their compatriots to get into the US.

Holocaust survivors protest against Israel

The BBC website carries a report about holocaust survivors in Israel demanding support from the state.

Representatives of Israel's 250,000 Holocaust survivors are to demand more state support in a protest outside Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's house.

A government offer of a monthly stipend of $20 (£10) was rejected as too little by survivor groups, and they vowed to go ahead with the Jerusalem action.

Many elderly survivors say they struggle to pay for medical treatment and, in some cases, food.

Mr Olmert called for a "fair and balanced" solution as his cabinet met.

He pointed out that his government was the first to take up the issue of providing for Holocaust survivors' families with special aid.

Since there's no case for the State of Israel the holocaust has been one of Israel's main propaganda weapons and yet Olmert, the current Prime Minister of the State of Israel can claim that his government is the first government (presumably of Israel) to consider special aid for the survivors of that crime against humanity. And what happened to all those holocaust assets amassed by the "Claims Conference"?

Wiping Jews off the map of Iran part II

Charlie Pottins has just posted this al Ahram article to the Just Peace UK list. It's by Jonathan Cook and it sets out how Israel seems to be intent on destroying yet another middle eastern Jewish community. As far as I know they have only tried bribery so far but bearing in mind the violence deployed by Israel that undermined, ultimately destroyed, the Jewish communities of Egypt and Iraq, the failed bribery may give way to violence directly by Israel or by bribed elements of the Iranian regime.

But if financial enticements fail to move Iranian Jews, there is every reason to fear that Israel may resort to other, more dubious ways of encouraging them to emigrate. That is certainly a path Israel has chosen before with other communities of Arab Jews, whom it has regarded either as a pool of potential spies and agents provocateurs to be used when needed, or as "human dust", in the words of Israel's first prime minister, David Ben Gurion, to be recruited to Israel's "demographic battle" against the Palestinians.

In "Operation Susannah" of 1954, for example, Israel recklessly recruited a group of Egyptian Jews to stage a series of explosions in Egypt in a bid to discourage Britain from withdrawing from the Suez Canal zone. When the plot came to light, it naturally cast suspicion of disloyalty over Egypt's wider Jewish community. Following Israel's invasion and occupation of Sinai two years later, the government of President Gamal Abdel-Nasser expelled some 25,000 Egyptian Jews and, after others were imprisoned on suspicion of spying, the rest soon left.

Even more notoriously, Israel went to greater lengths to ensure the exit of the Arab world's largest Jewish population, in Iraq. In 1950 a series of bombs targeting Jews in Baghdad forced a rapid exodus of some 130,000 to Israel, convinced that Arab extremists were behind the attacks. Only later did it emerge that the bombs had been planted by members of the Zionist underground, supported by the Israeli government.

Now, Iran's Jews may find themselves treated in much the same manner -- simply as human fodder. Stories are growing of Israel exploiting the free movement between Iran and Israel enjoyed by Iranian Jews and their Israeli relatives to carry out spying operations on Iran's nuclear programme. Such reports have come from reliable sources such as the American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, citing US government officials.

The fallout from such actions is not difficult to predict. Besieged by the US and the international community, Tehran is cracking down on dissent and minority groups, fearful that its own grip on power is shaky and that the well-publicised subversion being carried out by US and Israeli agents is likely only to be stepped up. So far most officials in Tehran have been careful to avoid suggesting that Iran's Jews have dual loyalties, as has the local Jewish community itself, both of them aware of Israel's interests in provoking such a confrontation. But as the strains increase, and Israel's need to prove Tehran's genocidal intent grows ever stronger, that policy may end up being forfeited, and with it the future of Iran's Jews.

More important than the welfare of Iranian Jewish families, it seems, is the value of Iranian Jews as a propaganda tool in Israel's battle to persuade the world that coexistence with the Muslim world is impossible. For those who want to engineer a clash of civilisations, the 3,000- year-old Jewish legacy in Iran is not something to be treasured, but is merely an obstacle to war.

There's a little loyalty test here for zionists. They make great play of the fact that they support Israel because lots of Jews might be in danger there. That's when they're not saying how safe Israel is when compared to the diaspora. I wonder how loyal these hasbara parrots will be to the Jews of Iran if it does turn out that Israel has wilfully undermined their safety and security in their Iranian homeland in order that they may become cannon fodder in Israel's race war against the natives of Palestine or a tool in the no less racist propaganda war against the wider Muslim world.

Of course, Israel couldn't pull off these stunts if it wasn't for the reactionary witlessness and cruelty of some of the Arab and Muslim rulers.

8 Jews left in Baghdad but for how long?

Someone just posted this Yahoo report to the comments section in an earlier post. Apparently there are 8 Jews still in Baghdad and they are being cared for by an Anglican priest:

Baghdad was once one of the great cradles of Jewish culture and wisdom, but now, according to the Christian priest who has been looking after them, there are only eight Jews left in the Iraqi capital, and their situation is "more than desperate." The Rev. Canon Andrew White, the Anglican chaplain to Iraq, says that the small group is in considerable danger. However, the community has been unable to agree to emigrate as a whole. Some of its members, without identifying themselves as Jews, have attempted to leave individually, but have been turned down. White says that only one of the Jews, a woman, still regularly goes to a Baghdad synagogue, though he will give no details.

How many can there be?

The Jewish population in Iraq began to disappear after 1948, when the founding of Israel resulted in anti-Jewish reprisals throughout the Arab world. Says Felice Gaer, one of the International Religious Freedom panel's commissioners and head of the American Jewish Committee's Jacob Blaustein Institute for Human Rights: "I didn't know about this community until I heard about it from Canon White. I certainly intend to learn more about the situation. It's hard to believe that those who want to provide charitable assistance couldn't reach people anywhere in the world, no less in a country where he U.S. has 160,000 troops."

Both Gaer and White point out that the plight of the remaining Jews is not very different from the hardships faced in Iraq by other religious minorities such as Christians, Mandeans (a gnostic group to whom John the Baptist is a central figure) and Yazidis (whose faith draws from Zoroastrianism, Islam, Judaism and Christianity and other sources). However, the priest says that the Jews have not been able to get any material aid from the Iraqi government, and have been advised by officials "to say that they are Christians or to become Christians, because it's a lot safer."

Actually the departure of Jews from Iraq is a lot murkier than the reference to Arab reprisals would suggest. And the involvement of the American Jewish Committee may not be altogether welcome.