Free Speech on Israel rebuts claims of Holocaust Denial

 A brief statement from Free Speech on Israel:

• Miko Peled did not endorse Holocaust Denial
• Entrapment and character assassination tarnish political life

Allegations that have been made that Free Speech on Israel, a Jewish-led organisation, is complicit in holocaust denial are a signal episode in the manufacture of fake news. 

They are distortions based on highly selective quotations, ripped out of context, from a strong and principled speech by celebrated Israeli Army veteran and author Miko Peled at our fringe meeting at the Labour Party Conference in Brighton. These allegations, too readily re-broadcast by an insufficiently critical press, misrepresent the meaning and intention of his talk. His words, read in the flow of his speech, offer no support at all to holocaust denial. These tactics of attempted entrapment and character assassination tarnish the integrity of political life in Britain.

Free Speech on Israel always challenges Holocaust denial whenever it rears its head, just as we are resolute in our opposition to antisemitism. Like Miko we are equally determined to fight false accusations of antisemitism and their use to silence criticism of Israeli crimes or to suppress support for Palestinian rights.

So there we have it. A fairly standard Zionist smear.  It's sad that the busting of it had to be released before the Labour Conference was even over but since Jeremy Corbyn did so well in the general election the opportunists in the Labour Party, who thought he was an electoral liability, have gone to ground leaving the smearing to Blairites and Zionists.

It's my guess that after the conference has ended, we'll be hearing more in the mainstream media about antisemitism than we'll be hearing about socialist Labour Party policies. There's no case for Israel and no case for austerity and antisemitism smears are their only tactic.

Kultur Kampf?

This is a straight lift from the Free Speech on Israel website:

FSOI rejects antisemitism smears against artists boycotting Pop-Kultur 

As so often occurs, allegations of antisemitism are being leveled at artists who have taken a principled decision not to participate in a cultural event which receives sponsorship from the Israeli state.

The 6th artist to withdraw from Berlin’s Pop-Kultur festival on August 23-25, Annie Goh, issued a statement via Facebook on August 20 explaining the reasons for her cancellation, criticising misinformation put out by Pop-Kultur’s organisers regarding the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and describing as ‘despicable’ smears against four Arab artists who withdrew from the festival.

Goh is the second UK Pop-Kultur participant to pull out following a call from Artists for Palestine UK, supported by Brian Eno and Roger Waters, to respect the Palestinian boycott call. Israeli citizens have also lent support to the boycott call.

Free Speech on Israel rejects the attacks on the Arab artists whose statements to the festival, cited in the APUK letter, make clear the humane and principled reasons for their protest.
By accepting sponsorship from the Israeli Embassy, Pop-Kultur festival enables Israel to use culture to sanitise and normalise an apartheid regime.

The cultural boycott is an anti-racist protest against that racist endeavour. In this case, the Israeli funding was kept secret until just before the festival, perhaps anticipating and hoping (as it turned out mistakenly) that they could avoid performers withdrawing from the festival in protest.

By falsely accusing them of antisemitic motives, festival organisers try to cover up their own complicity with the racist agenda of the ongoing “Brand Israel” campaign.

As a Jewish-led campaign, Free Speech on Israel asserts: Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel is not antisemitic.

The Truth about Jeremy Newmark: "you couldn't make it up"

Oh but he could and he did.  Not only is Jeremy Newmark utterly dishonest he is also stupid so a couple of times recently he popped into my timeline and probably wished he hadn't. A little bit of history first.  I heard a rumour that Momentum were going to host Jeremy Newmark at a meeting at the Labour Conference.  Most followers of Zionist antics in the UK will know Jeremy Newmark as the most notorious liar in the Zionist movement here.  They will also know that liars for the racist war criminals of the State of Israel (Zionists) are ten a penny in all the mainstream media and political establishment including the so-called opposition. So free speech isn't denied to the likes of Jeremy Nemark.  He has no shortage of outlets for his abject dishonesty.  So some of us are dismayed that Momentum are giving Newmark the time of day.

I tweeted as follows when I heard the rumour:

Rumours that @PeoplesMomentum plans to host the most notorious liar in the UK #Zionist movement: @Jeremy_Newmark. Are the rumours true?

— Jews Sans Frontieres (@jewssf) August 25, 2016

Well then Tony Greenstein and Jeremy Newmark responded to Tony.   See this:

@TonyGreenstein so much for “free speech”… you couldn’t make it up!

— Jeremy Newmark (@Jeremy_Newmark) August 26, 2016

Now just a little detour because I like exposing Newmark for what he is. I responded thus:

.@Jeremy_Newmark you couldn't make it up? You're too modest, you're always making things up. It's official. #FUCU! @TonyGreenstein

— Jews Sans Frontieres (@jewssf) August 26, 2016

My comment here was based on the finding of the Tribunal in the case of Fraser v University and College Union. The FUCU case was a rehearsal for the orchestrated smear campaign we have witnessed against the Labour left ever since Jeremy Corbyn became leader of the party. This is what the Tribunal judges had to say about Jeremy Newmark on the matter of free speech:

The opinions of witnesses were not, of course, our concern and in most instances they were in any event unremarkable and certainly not unreasonable. One exception was a remark of Mr Newmark in the context of the academic boycott controversy in 2007 that the union was “no longer a fit arena for free speech”, a comment which we found not only extraordinarily arrogant but also disturbing.

So much for Newmark's commitment to free speech. Regarding who could make what up. Here is what the Tribunal had to say about Newmark making stuff up:

We regret to say that we have rejected as untrue the evidence of Ms Ashworth and Mr Newmark concerning the incident at the 2008 Congress. Evidence given to us about booing, jeering and harassing of Jewish speakers at Congress debates was also false, as truthful witnesses on the Claimant’s side accepted. One painfully ill-judged example of playing to the gallery was Mr Newmark’s preposterous claim, in answer to the suggestion in cross-examination that he had attempted to push his way into the 2008 meeting, that a ‘pushy Jew’ stereotype was being applied to him.

So there we have a bog standard Zionist.  He believes that free speech on Israel should not be allowed in a trade union whose members might (or might not) support the Palestinian cause.  He lies when he can't convince anyone who matters that criticising or condemning Israel is of itself antisemitic, because of course it isn't. And he lied of course to make out there had been an antisemitic incident when there wasn't one.

He tries to ridicule honest anti-racists who don't want to offend real victims of racism by hosting a low life like him.  You really couldn't make it up.

By the way, Momentum still haven't responded to my tweet asking them to confirm or deny the rumour that they are to host the shameless Newmark.