Leon Rosselson and Robb Johnson

Leon Rosselson & Robb Johnson, a concert of mainly new songs in the
Storrow Room of Cecil Sharp House, 2 Regent's Park Road, London NW1, (nearest tube Camden Town), FRIDAY 12th OCTOBER 8pm. £7/£5 unwaged.
Come and hear THE GHOST OF GEORGES BRASSENS, THE THIRD INTIFADA,
SATURDAY NIGHT IN ALBION, THE BIGGER THE CAR, THE SMALLER THE BRAIN
and many more.

Chris Bertram - an apology

Oh damn and blast! I was sure this Crooked Timber bloke, Chris Bertram supported the war on Iraq and that he "broadly supports Israel" but according to him:

I didn't support the war on Iraq.

I'm not sure whether I "broadly support Israel" by your lights. According to the "decent left" I don't.

I was against the academic boycott and supported a ballot, but (largely) disagree with David Hirsh's ascription of base motives to pro-boycotters.

Well he's been very nice about it. Being accused of supporting the war on Iraq when you didn't is well out of order. I'm not sure where we are with "broadly supports Israel" but anyway, I am sorry.

Why make a post out of it? Why not just correct the last one? Well this Chris Bertram is quite a prominent chap. A colleague of mine used to be lectured by him in philosophy at Bristol University. He's a contributor at the Crooked Timber blog. I don't read it myself but I think it has a big following. Imagine if a supporter of his blog saw my post. Not good.

But now there's the problem of people googling say, Chris Bertram, and hitting the page with the offending piece so I'm going to have to update it anyway. Curses!

Israel deliberately targets children

I read this in Ha'aretz on Sunday. Gideon Levy on Israel's propensity to kill children. Apparently Israel's still building up its "proof" that they didn't kill Mohammed al Dura.

The concern Israel demonstrates for the fate of one Palestinian boy touches the heart: Again, note what a fuss is being made about the case of the killing of Mohammed al-Dura. Our heart is impervious to the fate of other children who have been killed. Just little Mohammed continues to haunt us. But the question of who killed al-Dura is not important. And maybe he is even alive, as some eccentrics claim. Perhaps he committed suicide, as the strange investigations are liable to suggest.

All of these are tasteless questions designed to divert attention from the truly important issues: According to data collected by human rights group B'Tselem, Israel is responsible for killing more than 850 Palestinian children and teenagers since al-Dura was killed, including 92 in the past year alone. Last October, we killed 31 children in Gaza. This is what should have raised a storm and not the measurements by the former head of the Israel Defense Forces' Southern Command, Yom Tov Samiyeh, aimed at proving that his soldiers did not kill al-Dura, or the "investigations" by the physicist Nahum Shahaf. In an eccentric obsession, Shahaf has devoted the past years to this affair

I often do what I just did. I take a piece of the article, copy and paste it and then intend to sign off with a little outro. But then I read on and find a better chunk. How's this?

A thousand Nahum Shahafs will not succeed in blurring the unequivocal fact that a scandalous killing of children is taking place in the territories.

It's not a bad one, is it? The problem is that it doesn't stand alone without knowing who this Nahum Shahaf is.

I want something that simply makes it clear that Israel targets children. Let's try another piece:

Even if the director of the Government Press Office, Danny Seaman, is right in determining that the film made by the reliable and experienced French journalist Charles Enderlin was "staged," and even if he succeeds in clearing Israel from responsibility for this killing, what will we say about the other children who have been killed? That their killing was also "staged?" That the IDF did not kill them through carelessness and contempt for their lives; by being trigger-happy and even acting with premeditation?

It's getting worse. I need a soundbite.

How about a look at Engage. I thought I saw something about Israel targeting children. Obviously it wasn't an exposé, not a deliberate one anyway. Let's have a look. Ok, they have a headline, 'The Israeli army snipers deliberately target children' - Yvonne Ridley. It's not an article. It's a film clip of a speech by Yvonne Ridley. But they do put a link to a pamphlet by Anthony Julius titled "Blood Libel." Are they accusing Yvonne Ridley of blood libel? They don't actually say so. But the headline doesn't help with my soundbite. It does lead me to suspect that Engage are trying to "persuade" people not to mention Israel's child killing army. So let's look at the comments. Sometimes they let dissenters through.

The first comment is ludicrously sexist and claims that the Mohammed al Dura killing "was all faked." I don't think Hirsh would have approved that comment but it came from a close associate of Alf Green. Long story. The next is a well informed and sourced comment from that Fred again. He seems to be the resident dissident at Engage these days, though I don't look at the site half as much as you might think. Anyway he has a little catalogue of Israel's child murders which smokes out that David Miller guy. He tries the old "one bad apple" routine but Engage have bungled badly here.

They have this tactic where they say, "they say Israel kills children deliberately!" as if there's something wrong saying that. But listening to Yvonne Ridley, by the way I'm not a fan, the evidence of Israel's child killing is pretty damning. What was I saying? Oh yes, they've bungled so they're going to have to delete the post and pretend it never happened or they'll have to get one of their prize winning celebrities to bail them out. Step forward Linda Grant. Now, what does this house believe. This house believes that "Israeli army snipers deliberately target children." And what does Linda Grant say?

Suicide bombers deliberately target children, cf the Sbarro restaurant bombing in Jerusalem

Wow. No wonder she won a Leopold Bloom award and before that a Jaffa. As it happens when I first saw the comments, that was the last one. I couldn't believe either Linda Grant or Engage would stoop so low as to seek to justify the killing of children. Linda Grant is no longer an editor (or whatever it was) at Engage so she might not be in the loop as to tactics. I just explained the method. Israel gets accused of some dastardly thing and you pretend to be shocked as you repeat the accusation and that shocked response is your denial. Whataboutery is an admission, nay more, a justification, an excuse.

I don't know if he realised that Linda Grant had perhaps been a little too spontaneous but David Miller was back pretty sharply to help her out here with what must be her favourite words "Linda is right of course." But then this awkward chap, Chris Bertram, who, I think, supported the war on Iraq and broadly supports Israel, said:

I'm dumbfounded that Linda Grant can respond with a complacent "they do it too".

Actually even I was a little taken aback. Bertram followed up with a chunk of Gideon Levy's article above. Things get weird after that. Paul Miller comes back to explain what Linda Grant must have meant, apparently without consulting her. Another Engage regular accuses Bertram of "bullshit." But Linda Grant hasn't come back so far to back up what she said. Still with a champion like Paul Miller, why should she.

Still, I can't complain. I got my soundbite.

Israel deliberately targets children

And it's all thanks to Linda Grant at (though not of) Engage.

UPDATE: Chris Bertram has been in touch to say

I didn't support the war on Iraq.

I'm not sure whether I "broadly support Israel" by your lights. According to the "decent left" I don't.

I was against the academic boycott and supported a ballot, but (largely) disagree with David Hirsh's ascription of base motives to pro-boycotters.

I posted an apology above this post.

Whilst clicking around for this update I had another look at the Engage comments and Linda Grant has been back to explain her one-liner, here:

Heavens, I had no idea this debate was going on. My words were in no way intended to imply, 'they do it too, so it's okay.' The killing of children in conflict whether targeted or 'colaterel damage' or 'caught in the crossfire' is insupportable. Having spent a harrowing day in the presence of the father of a 13-year-old who was murdered by a bus bomber in Haifa, which I wrote about in the Guardian, I merely wished to remind Yvonne Ridley that the targeted murder of children is not confined to one side in the conflict, though it is absolutely true to say that there have been far more deaths of children on the Palestinian side than on the Israel side. It is the deaths, and the cold-blooded, callous lack of empathy of the killers which is, for me, the central issue, not the political motivation or excuses.

And here:

And lest the final remark be too laconic for some: it is not acceptable to say, well, we have to kill kids to fight terror, or we have to kill kids to defy the occupation. If some see that as moral equivalence, fine. I just don't like dead kids, whatever their nationality, religion etc. Yvonne Ridley, on the other hand, will excuse and explain away the bodies of dead Israeli children. And that is my objection.

No it's not her objection. Her objection is to the fact that publicising Israel's killing of children is bad news for Israel. How can I assume this. Well look at this Comment is free piece about the work of a war photo-journalist:

A child mutilated by modern warfare; without the caption, who knows his nationality? He might be a Palestinian kid, injured by the fall-out of an Israeli hit on a militant's house. He could be an Israeli boy who was eating pizza at a cafe in west Jerusalem moments before a suicide bomber detonated himself. Or he could be in an another part of the world altogether

Many Palestinian children have been killed by a single bullet and yet Linda Grant chooses to mention a Palestinian kid "injured" and an Israeli boy who was killed, ok, maybe injured, but the latter, for her, was targeted. She went to some trouble to suggest that Palestinian children are not actually targets whilst demonstrating that Palestinians do indeed target children. But if children get hurt or killed by Israel it's "fall-out." And what did she say again?

I just don't like dead kids, whatever their nationality, religion etc. Yvonne Ridley, on the other hand, will excuse and explain away the bodies of dead Israeli children. And that is my objection.

Again I say, no it isn't

More on Israel's overt nazis

The Independent ran an interesting article on Israel's overt nazis, mostly from Russia. I notice it's written by Eric Silver. Eric Silver used to write for the Guardian and distinguished himself there with a grotesque response to the suggestion that Israel had "raped" Lebanon. Silver said that if Lebanon was raped, "she was hardly a virgin in the first place." I think he now lives in Israel under the racist Law of Return. Anyway, where was I. Ah yes. The article is all hand-wringing stuff about how this could happen in the Jewish Shangri-la but this passage leapt out at me:

"Israel has problems with non-Jews? Israel has one greater problem – the absence of a desire to cooperate with us in solving the vital issues of Jews and non-Jews living together in the Holy Land."

Perhaps Jews and non-Jews living together wasn't the point of zionism. I'm only guessing.

OneVoice but not for peace

Oh please! Only a cynic would say such a thing. So who was the cynic? Well the organiser actually. Here's the Mercury News:

"Ours is not a message of peace and love and coexistence," said Daniel Lubetzky, the 39-year-old Jewish businessman who's behind the OneVoice concerts.

"It's a message of let's not let this get worse," he said. "We are fed up. We don't love each other. You leave us alone and we leave you alone and let's just have a state and get that done before it gets ugly."

In other words, let's beautify what's already ugly and has been since its inception.

DAM at OneVoice

I got this info last night but I had to check it before posting on it. DAM (da Arab MCs) are performing at the OneVoice gig. I don't like commenting on what Palestinians do or don't do. I often get things wrong, I always get told off for it and, being Jewish, I have got genuine issues with commenting on what Palestinians should or shouldn't do to liberate themselves from, er, Jews. But I do have a problem with them being so cutting edge an outfit and yet they are happy to involve themselves with a gig that has the establishment written all over it.

Concurrent with the event in Jericho, Israeli moderates will gather in Tel Aviv to demonstrate their support for a two-state solution and an immediate return to negotiations. This unprecedented “People’s Summit” will mark the first time that massive numbers of Israelis and Palestinians gather simultaneously to propel their elected leaders to sit down and negotiate a two-state solution, guaranteeing independent states for Israelis and Palestinians.

The music and entertainment portion of the Jericho program is being overseen by Dr. Fathi Darwish, a seasoned executive who has worked with the Palestinian government and within NGOs & civil society organizations for 30 years.

Security at the event will be provided by the Palestinian Presidential Forces and leading private security firms.

It's like these "rock" bands in the UK performing for the Queen's jubilee. It just ain't rock'n'roll.

Looking on the bright side, it is an opportunity to rerun these helpfully subtitled videos from YouTube.

This is Born Here



This Meen Erhabe? (Who are the terrorists?)



Maybe they'll go to Jericho armed with a shofar each, who knows?

Boycott threat over?

Here's an article that gets the celebrants of the zionists' "victory" at the UCU back to the reality of what the boycott was all about in the first place. It's from Ynet, Yediot Ahranot online It's written by Uri Ram, a sociology professor at Ben Gurion University:

In the midst of the anxiety over academic boycott threat against Israel, I published an opinion piece that criticized the manner in which Israel's public relations spin diverted attention from the essence (that is, the occupation) to issues of secondary importance (that is, the boycott.)

Spokespersons for Israeli academia were screaming out that "the boycott is immoral" or that "the boycott is illegal" – as if the occupation is moral and legal. At the time, I wrote that the question of whether the boycott is the appropriate response (I was of two minds on this question) is a secondary issue, and more importantly, the boycott turned attention to the main issue, the occupation, while condemning it and its supporters.

And so, now that the British lecturers' union has decided to call off the boycott for internal legal and procedural reasons, which have nothing to do with the matter at hand, I wish to reemphasize the unfounded nature of the Israeli spin. It's not the calling off of the boycott threat that is important here. Rather, it's the continuation of the occupation that matters.

Regardless of whether there is a boycott or not, there is no room here for the joy expressed by the education minister and top education officials. What are they so happy with? The fact that universities in the territories are unable to function?

Or maybe it is the fact that, on the other hand, we are seeing an Israeli academic institute being increasingly established in the central occupation town of Ariel (while facing weak protest alongside support for its infrastructure and continued existence)? Are they pleased over the fact that universities in Israel can continue to teach, with no interruption, democratic and enlightened traditions as if a few kilometers away a regime of oppression and expulsion has not been in place for 40 years now?

It seems to me they are pleased about that. But the boycott idea is still alive and well. Engage may trumpet that the boycott "has been defeated ideologically, politically, morally and legally" but the question as to why boycott was raised in the first place will continue to be asked and to level the tiresome and false allegation of antisemitism isn't going to cut it. And the reference to the UK's equalities legislation to defend such a hideously racist monstrosity as Israel will continue to rankle until a way is found for people whose profession should be truth to tell the truth and act on the truth that they tell.

OneVoice, one million voices?

But what difference does it make if they all say the same thing? Last week the JC carried an article about OneVoice event.

Rabbi Tony Bayfield, the head of the Reform movement, had invited Mr Livingstone to organise an event in support of the group.

But in a letter, the Mayor wrote: “Unfortunately, it would not be permissible for me as Mayor of London to host such a meeting at City Hall.

“However, I would reiterate that I remain committed to supporting those who work for peace in the Middle East and who would advocate a viable, two-state solution.”

Rabbi Bayfield said: “I suspect that it is a way of saying he’d rather not do this. At least he has again, unequivocally and unreservedly, committed himself to the two-state solution and there must be some value in that.”

Supporters of OneVoice are due to hold a day of action in several cities across the world, including London, on October 18.

Now I read the article last week but I didn't have a clue what it was about. I did smell a rat when I saw that Tony Bayfield was involved. He is a zionist who is more than happy to conflate Jews with zionists and he has even said, in a Guardian article, that the state of Israel is to Jews what the gospel is to Christians. Actually this is what he said

My point is this: religions are not all the same. The textbooks which make them look the same by describing each at equal length, under neat chapter headings, grossly distort. Consider this thought: perhaps the Jewish attachment to land is as important to Jewish self-understanding as the need to share and spread the "good news" is central to Christianity.

At first glance it looks like he is saying that Israel is to Jews as the gospel is to Christians, as in "look, you have your book, we have our colonial settlement, ethnic cleansing and racist laws." But his mention of the Christian propensity to "share and spread the "good news" may have meant "you Christians have done ethnic cleansing so why shouldn't Jews." Read the rest of the article. It's a bit Howard Jacobson in that it tries to turn the whole of Jewish history into a history of zionism. It's a load of nonsense.

Ok, that was a bit of a digression but I wanted to point out that this guy will say pretty much anything that pops into his head to defend the zionist project, all the while being a supporter of two state, of course. Anyway, Ken Livingstone has responded to last week's JC article in this week's JC:

Your report on whether City Hall should host an event for OneVoice (Ken refuses to host OneVoice, September 28) does not reflect my views. Correspondence with Rabbi Bayfield on matters of concern to Jewish Londoners is cordial and constructive and I do not conduct my relations with him or other community leaders through the pages of newspapers.

A peaceful resolution of the situation in the Middle East would undoubtedly be of great benefit to good community relations in London.

To that end, I strongly support a peaceful solution to the situation in the Middle East, which requires that Israel withdraw from the territories it occupied in 1967 and the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside an Israeli state within secure borders.

The powers of the Greater London Authority in the field of international relations are limited by law. However, it is right and proper that we should support steps internationally which are of benefit to the people of London.

Is there anything between the lines here? I say that because I can't see how the original article didn't reflect Livingstone's views. Maybe I missed something or maybe Ken thinks that this OneVoice represents something incompatible with his own take on what a two state solution should be like.

Ok so let's take a look at OneVoice. This is their opening blurb:


See anything suspicious? Well did you? Ok, try this quote:

On October 18, 2007, OneVoice will hold the largest simultaneous mobilization of Israelis & Palestinians in the history of the region. Via live, internationally-broadcast public summits in Israel, Palestine, and in communities worldwide, One Million Voices to End the Conflict will give ordinary citizens a platform to voice their commitment to end violence, occupation and terror on both sides.

Ok then, if you missed the word "moderate" in the first blurb you might not have noticed the "commitment to end violence, occupation and terror on both sides." So this is a group of moderates who see "violence, occupation and terror on both sides." Not only that, these moderates get the blessing of an absolute monarch right there on the home page of their website. Yup, His Majesty King Abdullah II ibn al Hussein is a moderate among these moderates. No wonder Tony Bayfield is so enamoured of them and no wonder Ken wants to distance himself. Where does the funding come from for a group that has a video ad from a King? Never mind. Let's see what the Palestinian Campaign for an Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel has to say about this event booked for 18th October 2007.

On October 18th, One Million Voices, an organization led by Israelis and international figures with the support of some Palestinians, is organizing a public event in Jericho and Tel Aviv, simultaneously. The event will include performances by renowned artists Brian Adams and Ilham Madfa'i. As stated on the organization's English webpage, the objective of the event is to “mark the first time that massive numbers of Israelis and Palestinians gather simultaneously to unite against violent extremism.”

According to the widely accepted boycott criteria advocated by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), the event falls under the category of normalization projects and violates the call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), endorsed by over 170 Palestinian civil society organizations, trade unions, political parties, and grassroots movements, for the following reasons:

1. Participants are required to join the One Voice Movement and sign a mandate -- ostensibly based on a "two-state solution," but without any commitment to international parameters -- which assumes equal responsibility of "both sides" for the "conflict," and suspiciously fails to call for Israel's full compliance with its obligations under international law through ending its illegal military occupation, its denial of Palestinian refugee rights (particularly the right of return), and its system of racial discrimination against its own Palestinian citizens.

2. The event is sponsored by Israeli institutions (mostly from the private sector) and endorsed by mainstream Israeli political figures from parties including the Likud, Labour and Shas. These Israeli "partners" are unquestionably complicit in maintaining Israel 's occupation and other forms of oppression.

Not happy then. I must say, I looked for OneVoice's "mandate" and I couldn't find it on the site. I can't find it. Can anyone else out there? Thanks if you can.

UPDATE: Thanks to Ernie in the comments for directing me to this.

MWTV?

Actually it should just be MTV, as Mearsheimer was without Walt in this interview. I just got it from Engage, who in turn got it from Judeosphere. It's interesting because whilst the interviewer tries to undermine Mearsheimer, Mearsheimer comes out quite well. See for yourself:



See the way the zionists smear the man and he even says that Israel is a democracy like Britain, France and a few other places. The zionists are right about one thing about the Israel Lobby book, it has some factual inaccuracies. Israel is a state for the world's Jews. Democracies are states for all of their people.

Actually I only went to Engage to see a ludicrous article which someone drew my attention to. I think it's a write-up of a speech made by a David Miller from Leeds Universities and Colleges Union. It comes close to supporting or at least excusing the occupation whilst, as is the fashion in zionist circles, claiming to want a two state solution. The article is clearly at odds with David Hirsh's stated position on the occupation and there's more than a hint of "there's no such thing as a Palestinian" to it so Hirsh has relaxed the moderation policy and allowed a couple of incisive criticisms through. See this from Fred:

"Even the settlements that are outlawed under the fourth Geneva convention must be seen in the context of their disputed ownership (particularly the West Bank) post 1967 that would permit them as a legitimate form of defence."

I'm not sure exactly what Miller is trying to say; if it's that there are settlements that arent outlawed under the Fourth Geneva convention, certainly he is incorrect; all settlements are equally illegal under international law and convention. As for disputed ownership -- if he is referring to the fact that a small % of Gush Etzion and Hebron were Jewish-owned before '67, it is still illegal to populate and expand these areas while they remain under a state of belligerent occupation. As for the "legitimate form of defence" -- most, like Martin van Creveld, argue the settlements have weakened and not strenghtened Israel's defenses. The land appropriation and settlement expansion helped fuel two intifadas.

There are forms of legitimate self-defense Israel can take in the territories -- settling civilians there, and building permanant structures there, are not legitimate.

David Miller responded to that one:

My wording was rather clumsy and I forgot to change 1967 back to 1948. What I meant to indicate was that (most of) the West Bank was expected to fall under Israeli jurisdiction following the 1948 war but was annexed and occupied by Jordan instead. Hence, in international law, the territory can be viewed as being Israeli under the terms of the final partition plans. Ownership of the post '67 settlements is therefore disputed. But please don't get me wrong; I want them removed or handed over to the new Palestinian State when it comes into being.

But Fred's not having that:

"What I meant to indicate was that (most of) the West Bank was expected to fall under Israeli jurisdiction following the 1948 war but was annexed and occupied by Jordan instead."

I'm still not understanding you, David. Most of the West Bank was expected to fall under Israeli jurisdiction, by who? Here is the UN partition map of 1947:

http://www.jafi.org.il/education/100/maps/part.html

You can see that more of the West Bank was expected to fall under Arab jurisdiction than eventually did. Israel controlled more territory by the end of the war than the UN had allotted to it in the partition plan.

"Hence, in international law, the territory can be viewed as being Israeli under the terms of the final partition plans."

Can you quote a source?

"Ownership of the post '67 settlements is therefore disputed."

According to who? I recommend you consult the respected Israeli human rights group B'tselem on the legality of settlements:

http://www.btselem.org/English/Settlements/
"Especially conspicuous is Israel’s manipulative use of the law to create a semblance of legality for the settlement enterprise. So long as Jordanian law assisted Israel in advancing its goals, it seized the argument that international law requires that an occupying state apply the law in effect in the territory prior to occupation, thus construing international law in a cynical and tendentious way. When Jordanian law was unfavorable for Israel, Israel did not hesitate to revoke it though military legislation and develop new rules to meet its ends. In doing so, Israel tramples on international agreements to which it is party – agreements which are intended to reduce human rights violations and protect people under occupation.

"Because the very establishment of the settlements is illegal, and in light of the human rights violations resulting from the existence of the settlements, B’Tselem demands that Israel evacuate the settlements. "

http://www.btselem.org/English/Publications/Summaries/200205_Land_Grab.asp

"The establishment of settlements on the West Bank violates international humanitarian law, which establishes the principles applying during war and occupation. Moreover, the settlements lead to the infringement of international human rights law.

"International humanitarian law prohibits the occupying power to transfer citizens from its own territory to the occupied territory (Fourth Geneva Convention, article 49). The Hague Regulations prohibit the occupying power to undertake permanent changes in the occupied area, unless these are due to military needs in the narrow sense of the term, or unless they are undertaken for the benefit of the local population.

"The establishment of the settlements leads to the violation of the rights of the Palestinians as enshrined in international human rights law. Among other violations, the settlements infringe the right to self-determination, equality, property, an adequate standard of living, and freedom of movement."

And back comes David Miller again:

OK OK Fred; point conceded; I should have been more precise and indicated that it was the British and not the UN plan that allocated the West Bank to a future National Home. But we're surely quibbling here. The point is that both plans were firmly rejected by the Arabs and Jordan seized the West Bank in 1948. In the absence of a peace agreement, successive Israeli Governments have felt compelled to interpret the legal framework to suit their own ends with regard to the post '67 settlements; and I think that the legal position is sufficiently ambiguous to give them some justification for doing so. Personally speaking, I would like to see the settlements removed. Since we both seem to agree about that, can we move on now please?

OK OK, I got my facts wrong in such a way as to justify the occupation but, as nearly all zionists who do exactly the same thing as I just did, I say I want the occupation to end so please stop embarrassing me with your silly factual accuracy. What a disgrace!

UPDATE: It was nice of Engage to allow a comment that contradicted one of their people but it couldn't last. A regular commentor here, johng,

pointed out that no evidence was put foward whatsoever for the claim that if the Palestinians had only been reasonable Israel would not have been established (apparently we would all be very surprised to hear this, historical naifs that we are), that in order to make this incredible claim he had puffed up the importance of the bi-nationalist current within Zionism, and finally suggested that referring to the nakba as 'hysterical depopulation' (a phrase which I think should be remembered) represented an assault on serious historiography, both Zionist and anti-Zionist.

It wasn't put up but I'm glad that someone else has called him on an article in which almost every single claim false.

Ah well, Engage reverts to type. They should have a recent comments section on the blog's home page so when zionists see a name they hate they can come along and question the person's motive, accuse them of antisemitism, islamo-fascism, dishonesty, cowardice, being silly, erm.....er.... that sort of thing. Anti-zionists don't do much trolling I notice. We tend to attack people on their arguments and we believe that truth is on our side.

Minnesota Uni messes with Tutu

In the UK a tutu is a fairly average degree result but you can't get one in some American universities. I wonder if that makes them above average or below.

Desmond Tutu has been barred from speaking at the University of St Thomas, Minnesota because he has said things that were "hurtful" to some Jewish leaders, ie, he has criticised Israel in terms used by a mainstream, if slightly leftish Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz. Yup, Desmond Tutu, non-violent campaigner against apartheid has likened, not Israel but the occupation to apartheid. And the truth hurts "some Jewish leaders." Here's Inside Higher Ed:

"Doug Hennes, vice president for university and government relations at St. Thomas, said that when administrators were informed of the invitation, they did some research about Tutu, and found that some of his comments had been controversial. Then, the university consulted with some Jewish leaders, and concluded that Tutu had made remarks that had been “hurtful” to Jewish leaders.

“We had heard some criticism of him in the past that he had said things some people judged to be anti-Semitic. We talked to the Jewish Community Relations Council. We know a number of other people in the Jewish community, and they said that some of the things he said had been hurtful and there was a feeling — and this isn’t among all Jews — that he had said things that were hurtful to them,” Hennes said.

“We never made a judgment that he is anti-Semitic. We have not made that judgment. We have only been told by members of the Jewish community that his words have been hurtful,” Hennes said. He stressed that the university sought out the views of Jewish leaders, and that the revocation of the invitation was a university decision, and not one that was sought by anyone outside St. Thomas.

Of course not. It's that non-existent lobby again.

Airbrushed out of history?

This is bizarre. Socialist Workers Party activist Alex Callinicos recently wrote an article fretting that to go for a boycott vote was a mistake. He subsequently wrote a "clarification." But the clarification has disappeared from the Socialist Worker website. Now I have a google cache copy here:

Unite against this gagging order on a trade union

Very unusually, this is the second column of mine running on the same subject – the controversy caused by the UCU lecturers' union decision to discuss a boycott of Israeli academic institutions.

My suggestion that the left in UCU should not propose a boycott at next year's union congress caused some anger among Palestinian solidarity activists. I regret this, but believe our disagreement was essentially over tactics, not principle.

I support boycotting Israel, but believed that we needed to head off the danger of a big defeat for the left if UCU general secretary Sally Hunt went ahead with a membership ballot on the issue. But now Hunt has gone even further than I expected.

On Friday of last week the union's strategy and finance committee declared a ballot would be "unlawful" and cancelled the planned series of meetings around the country to implement the congress decision to hold a debate on the boycott.

This decision was based on legal advice that "it would be beyond the union's powers and unlawful, directly or indirectly to call for or to implement a boycott by the union and its members of any kind of Israeli universities and other academic institutions".

The lawyers also say, "to ensure that the union acts lawfully meetings should not be held to ascertain the level of support for such a boycott".

This amounts to the most astonishing and self-imposed gagging order on a trade union. We've grown too used to the scope of trade union action becoming heavily restricted thanks to the Tory legislation that New Labour has kept in force.

But now we're being told that we can't even debate a boycott. As a UCU member, the first thing I want to know is who provided this legal advice.

I was astonished to learn that over the summer UCU head office had consulted the solicitor Anthony Julius, Princess Diana's divorce lawyer.

He has equated anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism, denounced the UCU decision to discuss a boycott as "truly appalling", and offered to act for academics or students affected by any boycott.

What on earth is Sally Hunt doing using UCU members' subscriptions on consulting someone so clearly associated with one side of the argument?

[apparently this was wrong - see below]

The strategy and finance committee's decision follows the most massive international campaign by supporters of the state of Israel against the UCU decision. The Harvard lawyer Alan Dershowitz threatened legal action to "devastate and bankrupt" anyone acting against Israeli universities.

Witch-hunted

Dershowitz is an arch-hypocrite. He claims to be a civil liberties lawyer but has defended the use of torture and the destruction of Palestinian villages in the fight against terrorism.

He has witch-hunted US academic critics of Israel, helping to block the award of tenure to the anti-Zionist historian Norman Finkelstein. That's how much he cares for freedom of speech.

But the UCU's leadership's caving in under pressure goes way beyond the debate over Israel and the boycott. This is a fundamental attack on the right of trade unions even to discuss, let alone to engage in, international solidarity.

As Amjad Barham of the Palestinian academics' union points out in a letter to Sally Hunt, "during the struggle against the odious apartheid regime in South Africa, British academics were at the forefront of the academic and other boycotts of the racist state. We do not see why considering ways of fighting Israeli oppression of Palestinians should be subject to different considerations."

It's bitterly ironic that this decision should have come the week there were widespread calls in the Western media for tougher international sanctions on Burma. Why is it OK to boycott Burma but we can't even discuss boycotting Israel?

This issue now transcends the question of the boycott. Whatever our views on that subject, lecturers – and all trade unionists – should unite to condemn and to demand the reversal of last week's decision.

We won't stand for being gagged on the say-so of anonymous lawyers. The debates on the boycott should be reinstated. And the next UCU congress should have high on its agenda how to deepen our solidarity with the Palestinian people.

---

© Copyright Socialist Worker (unless otherwise stated). You may republish if you include an active link to the original and leave this notice in place.

Not easy leaving a link to the original when the original doesn't have a link to the original. But what's all this about? I just posted a post about how Ha'aretz has broken a taboo and used the A-word, apartheid, to describe the situation in occupied Palestine. I had a quick look at Engage to see if they had misrepresented the article and smeared the editor as a blood libeller or some such, as they do when someone approaches a truthful description of the "non"-zionists' favourite state and I stumbled on the most ludicrous case of hypocrisy I can think of right now: Engage berating the Socialist Worker for removing a page from their site as if the page had never happened. That's where I got the google cache from. They used the "airbrushed etc" schtick to hurt the feelings of these trots. Trots hate being likened to Stalinists you see(chortle, snigger). But the post is by the same David Hirsh who removes his own posts willy nilly whenever they make him, whenever he realises they make him look silly. Remember the non-zionist lecturing his daughter that "we're not Likudniks you know?" Remember him telling "Diasporist" that Richard Littlejohn is more anti-racist than the trade union movement and then saying that he didn't mean or even say what he definitely did say. And then he removed the whole thing, comments and all when his web got too tangled. And whatever happened to the likely lad, Alf Green? And Engage cocks a snook (is that the expression?) at the SWP. What a bunch, honestly! Honestly? Hark at me!

UPDATE: The SWP has run an apology and correction over the above article. Apparently the UCU leadership didn't take advice from Anthony Julius.

Israel "becoming" an apartheid state

Ha'aretz has editorialised that Israel has so "normalised" the occupation that the state that has segregated Jews from Arabs since it's inception is "becoming" an apartheid state.

The occupied territories and the Palestinians living there are slowly becoming virtual realities, distant from the eye and the heart. Palestinian workers have disappeared from our streets. Israelis no longer enter Palestinian towns for shopping. There is a new generation on each side that does not know the other. Even the settlers no longer meet Palestinians because of the different road systems that distinguish between the two populations; one is free and mobile, the other stuck at the roadblocks.

While the politicians argue over dividing the land between two peoples, the public is apathetic. The people feel that the division has already taken place. The disengagement from the Gaza Strip, the evacuation of Gush Katif, the construction of a separation barrier - the problem is solved to our satisfaction. The settlers are conducting a settlement policy of their own, taking over new areas, expanding settlements, anything to prevent a permanent solution. They are also satisfied with the status quo that relies on the Shin Bet security service and the Israel Defense Forces.

The de facto separation is today more similar to political apartheid than an occupation regime because of its constancy. One side - determined by national, not geographic association - includes people who have the right to choose and the freedom to move, and a growing economy. On the other side are people closed behind the walls surrounding their community, who have no right to vote, lack freedom of movement, and have no chance to plan their future. The economic gap is only getting wider and the Palestinians are wistfully watching as Israel imports laborers from China and Romania. Fear of terrorist attacks has transformed the Palestinian laborer into an undesirable.

There have recently been reports of a further "upgrading" of the occupation. Sixteen crossing points between the West Bank and Israel are now being controlled by civilians instead of soldiers. On the face of it, this is an act of normalization, similar to the situation at international border crossings. But in this case a country exists only on one side. In the absence of an agreed border, there is only a security border that Israel has unilaterally established. The frustrated and frightened soldiers checking every Palestinian have now been replaced by contractors hired by the Defense Ministry.

Their job is to check people holding permits; in other words, people the civil administration, under the Shin Bet's guidance, has allowed to enter Israel. The checks are being carried out by sophisticated means, almost without human contact, in reinforced, blast-proof structures. The new method has removed a burden from IDF soldiers but has created a distancing. The contact between the soldiers and the Palestinians at the crossings, precisely because it is so traumatic, has driven the Israelis and Palestinians to seek a political solution. The stories the soldiers brought home fueled public debate. Now the soldiers are stationed only at roadblocks in the West Bank, and there is less friction. So the discourse is also minimized.

Can this situation continue indefinitely? The more Israelis see less of the occupation, the easier it becomes to ignore. In September, 33 Palestinians and one soldier were killed in operations against terror and Qassam rockets. Only in the next intifada, or after missiles are fired at Israel from the West Bank, will we once again be reminded of the occupation.

But don't worry there is still some sanity in the Jewish media. Here's Forward, the used to be yiddischer leftist paper:

Sure, there are similarities between the lives of Palestinians under Israeli occupation and those of black South Africans under apartheid. Indeed, in certain respects, the conditions Palestinians face are arguably even worse. But while the Palestinians’ circumstances may resemble those once faced by blacks in South Africa, the apartheid analogy ignores crucial context for why this is the case.

Unlike South African blacks, Palestinians bear no small share of the responsibility for their plight. If not for repeated Arab threats and efforts to destroy the Jewish state, there would have been no occupation in the first place. And if not for wave after wave of terrorism, there would quite possibly be an independent Palestinian state today instead of a West Bank security barrier. And, it goes without saying, constant rocket barrages from post-disengagement Gaza do little to encourage Israel to end its occupation of the West Bank.

So, there we have it. The zionist movement never wanted the whole of Palestine but the Arabs goaded them into taking it all and more. And black South Africans never resisted apartheid by force of arms and were rewarded with the legal equality they have today. Except I ought to remind those on whom irony is lost, that the ANC did wage an armed struggle against apartheid and Nelson Mandela spent as long as he did in prison because he refused to renounce the armed struggle. And what did Lenni Brenner say? Forward is backward. He wasn't wrong.

CAABU ahead of its time

Now this is peculiar. I have been sent a link to the CAABU website showing a letter from CAABU, that's the Council for the Advancement of Arab-British Understanding, to the Jewish Chronicle, complaining of Geoffrey Alderman's call for the annihilation of the Gaza population. The curious thing is that the letter "was" published on 5th October 2007 which hasn't been yet, today being 3rd October 2007. Here it is:

"We would like to express our outrage at Geoffrey Alderman's article (Turn off Gaza's water and fuel, Sept 28). It is a disgrace, essentially a call for collective punishment by depriving an entire civilian population of water. If he was an Iranian and talking about Israelis, his president would be truly proud of him. This is tantamount to incitement to commit a war crime.

Water is essential to life, needed by every one of the 1.5 million men, women and children in Gaza. Gaza's water resources have been massively depleted and polluted to the point of crisis, not least by actions by the Israeli military, damming water streams that should flow into the strip and drilling wells on the east of Gaza which deplete the western-flowing water aquifer from which Gazans are entitled to benefit in part. The point is that there is a clear dependency on water coming via Israel.

The firing of Kassams at innocent Israeli civilians is an atrocity but it does not justify by any measure of civilized values a call effectively to destroy Gaza. Nothing does. Such incitement should not find space in any respectable newspaper."

Chris Doyle
Director of the Council for Arab-British Understanding

Perhaps they didn't see Melanie Phillips's demand for the same thing. And they definitely can't have read Emanuel Ottolenghi pouring scorn on the very idea of Israel being capable of an ethnic cleansing campaign when it has been so successful at that very thing in the past:

There was tremendous excitement in Europe in 2002 over the declaration by 99 Israeli academics that their government was planning an imminent “fully fledged ethnic cleansing” of the Palestinian people (a charge that was not withdrawn when the atrocity failed to occur)

Alright then I'm sorry. I'm sorry that Israel has not completed its ethnic cleansing campaign just yet. But don't worry Emanuel, you have colleagues at the JC who support such a dastardly thing. So it may well happen. I wonder what he'd say then.

But of course the burning question for the night is how did CAABU get to be published in the JC two days before the JC itself is published?

False allegations, bogus history and erm.... a way with words

I don't know about that last one, some of their arguments sound downright clunky. Whose? Zionists of course. This is Ben White in the Palestine Chronicle with an article titled, It's about Palestine

The clinking champagne glasses on Engage’s website said it all. The movement established to oppose the proposed boycott of Israeli academic institutions was celebrating a victory, as the British University and College Union (UCU) announced that to even discuss the boycott risked “infringing discrimination legislation”. The boycott of Israel, it seemed, had suffered a blow. Engage and their fellow-travellers popped open the bubbly at the end of what must have seemed like a rather good week. Days earlier, the UK’s Socialist Worker had published an article in which the boycott was called into question for tactical reasons. Smugly, it was noted that “even” the “Israel-demonising” Socialist Worker’s Party now doubted the boycott.

Undoubtedly the UCU decision is a setback for the Palestine solidarity movement – but then that is hardly new, or unexpected. Apartheid South Africa, a model for civil society resistance to structural state injustice, took decades to be toppled without the profound ideological, financial and geopolitical commitments that Israel enjoys in the West. So we should not be disheartened, but neither should we settle for a soothing eschatological certainty that we shall somehow inevitably overcome.

The academic boycott is just one part of the broader Boycott Divestment Sanctions movement aimed at bringing about justice in Palestine, stepping into a vacuum left by both those who are perfectly content with the status quo, or those who prefer civilised ‘dialogue’ and ‘conversation’ between coloniser and colonised. In other professional spheres, action is being taken by the likes of architects and doctors to give just two examples. More shareholders will be pressuring companies to divest, following the example of a number of churches. Consumers can boycott Israeli-made produce as activists continue to raise awareness about this still under-employed method of solidarity and resistance.

We are campaigning for Palestine for different reasons. We are revolutionary socialists, Orthodox Jews and middle-class Methodists. We are Islamists and evangelical Christians, and many of us don’t subscribe to any particular ‘ism’ but simply know an injustice when we see one. We begin the struggle from different perspectives and with often widely divergent motives. But Palestine is what unites us. And ultimately it is not, and should not, be about any agenda, personal or partisan – other than Palestine.

It’s about the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians ethnically cleansed from their homes in 1948 while the world stood and watched approvingly. We’re doing this so that they and their descendents might not be condemned to permanent exile at the hands of the last settler-colonial state. It’s about the millions more Palestinians who live their daily lives under the shadows of military watch towers, concrete walls and red-roofed colonies built on stolen land. We’re doing this for every Palestinian – and Israeli – who is denied peace and justice because one group of people are subordinating and dominating another.

The anti-boycott movement build their campaign with distortions and smears, ignorance and straw men arguments. The charge of anti-Semitism is the corner store, mythologized history form the pillars, and rhetorical flourish the cornices. But this fragile edifice can only crumble when confronted with both the reality of the Zionist colonisation of Palestine and the justifying illogic that because it’s Israel, these crimes should remain unopposed. That’s why we continue the struggle with a sure hope but without complacency, encouraged by how far we have already come, yet remembering this is only the beginning of the end.

I don't know, I disagree with Ben here. This wasn't a setback. The leader of the union was against the boycott and she said that most of the members are only concerned, not with principles but with pay and conditions. The zionists would have won the vote it seems. So why didn't they want it discussed? Let's face it, the supporters of the racist war criminals of the State of Israel are hardly committed to equal opportunities policies. Any debate was going to place Israel under the spotlight. That's what they couldn't stand. Ben's right that we have to keep up the campaign against Israel but this was no victory for zionists. They have admitted that they cannot win arguments even if they can win votes.

Ben White is a freelance journalist specialising in Palestine/Israel. His website is at www.benwhite.org.uk and he can be contacted directly at ben@benwhite.org.uk

Crisis in Burma - it's good for Jews!

News just in the from the World War IV Report. Killing unarmed demonstrators in Burma is good for Jews. See this:

The Burmese junta currently shooting unarmed protestors received a cynical plea for restraint from the Israel government on Sept. 29. According to the Israeli paper Ha'aretz, the Israeli foreign ministry announced "Israel is concerned by the situation in Myanmar, and urges the government to demonstrate restraint and refrain from harming demonstrators." The article ended by pointing out that "Israel denies selling weapons to Burma or Myanmar." (Ha'aretz, Sept. 29)

Not true, according a March 1, 2000 report in the authoritative British publication Jane's Intelligence Review by William Ashton. The article, titled "Myanmar and Israel develop military," details how Israeli companies and the Israeli government have been supplying and developing weapons for the Burmese regime, and sharing intelligence:

In August 1997 it was revealed that the Israeli defence manufacturing company Elbit had won a contract to upgrade Myanmar's (then) three squadrons of Chinese-built F-7 fighters and FT-7 trainers. The F-7 is a derivative of the Mikoyan MiG-21 'Fishbed' jet fighter. The FT-7 is the export version of the GAIC JJ-7, itself a copy of the MiG-21 'Mongol-B' trainer. Since they began to be delivered by China in 1991, the Myanmar Air Force has progressively acquired about 54 (or four squadrons) of these aircraft, the latest arriving at Hmawbi air base only last year. In related sales, the air force has also acquired about 350 PL-2A air-to-air missiles (AAM) from China and at least one shipment of the more sophisticated PL-5 AAMs.

Since their delivery to Myanmar, these new aircraft have caused the air force considerable problems. Several aircraft (and pilots) have already been lost through accidents, raising questions about the reliability of the Chinese technology. There have also been reliable reports that the F-7s were delivered without the computer software to permit the AAMs to be fired in flight. Also, the air force has complained that the F-7s are difficult to maintain, in part reflecting major differences between the structure and underlying philosophy of the Myanmar and Chinese logistics systems. Spare parts have been in very short supply. In addition, the air force seems to have experienced difficulties in using the F-7 (designed primarily for air defence) in a ground attack role. These, and other problems, seem to have prompted the air force to turn to Israel for assistance.

Of course if there are sanctions against Burma, as it's not "illegal" to discuss boycotts of states other than Israel, this will be even better for Jews because Israel has always been chief among sanction busters. Ask a South African. No ask a Rhodesian. Oh dear, you can't ask a Rhodesian, Rhodesia no longer exists.

Who are like the nazis?

I really should pay more attention. I don't have my copy of the Jewish Chronicle now but I think Geoffrey Alderman and Melanie Phillips may actually appear on the same page, I'm not sure. Anyway, for the post before last I borrowed a headline from Melanie Phillips for the headline. She had accused Independent Jewish Voices (I think it was them) of being Jews for genocide as if to say they wanted Jews annihilated, though she disclaimed that interpretation in the article itself. This in turn begs the question, why run the headline? Anyway, I have only just seen that Geoffrey Alderman too thinks that Gazans should be deprived of water. What I noticed about Alderman's article is that he sees fit to liken Qassem rockets, a homemade missile, to the industrially manufactured V1 and V2 bombs pioneered and used by the Germans in World War II. But that isn't the only dubious comparison he invokes. See this:

But just suppose, for a moment, that a radio broadcast from a neutral country had revealed that Nazi-occupied Western Europe was receiving electricity from British power stations. That water from British reservoirs was being transferred to European cities. And that precious fuel, bought from British refineries, was being sold, through third parties, to the Nazi regime. Let us further suppose that, when confronted with these shocking revelations, Churchill’s government had explained that it was permitting the transfer of electricity, water and fuel as “humanitarian gestures”. After all, why should innocent civilians suffer — and be collectively punished — because of the iniquities of Hitler and his allies?

Now I should have thought that if we are going to invoke analogies between the middle east now and World War II then surely Israel is more like nazi Germany. Israel is the aggressor, Israel has the master race belief in itself, Israel is so racist that like Germany before it, it alienates potential friends by assuming that all Arabs are the same. This is what happened last year in Lebanon with many Christian communities, formerly phalangist, turned to Hizbullah for defence or at least moral support.

I think it's always important to study the nazi era, how they got into power, what they did once in power and how they conducted their war effort and how that war effort was informed by its racism. It was its racism that did for it in the end. It's all very well this or that Israeli commander telling his troops to do to a refugee camp (or maybe it was Gaza) what the nazis did to the Warsaw ghetto. But he might want to tell his troops that Germany lost the war and many of its commanders were executed or spent lengthy spells in prison when Germany lost.

But that's not the point I want to make. When people compare Israel to the nazis there are howls of hysterical protest. Some even call it holocaust denial though why liken Israel to the nazis if you are denying the holocaust? I remember Howard Jacobson saying that if you compare Jews to the nazis you are saying that the Jews should be annihilated. I'm not sure of the logic because I've never heard anyone saying that the Germans should be annihilated. Perhaps it was a freudian slip on Jacobson's part. These people that compare the Palestinians to the nazis do seem to want them annihilated. And there are two such possibly on the same page of the main UK Jewish community newspaper.

Anarchists against the Wall in London tonight

Just in from Jews for Justice for Palestinians

Meeting with ADAR GRAYEVSKY and SARIT from ANARCHISTS AGAINST THE
WALL

Anarchists Against the Wall are a group of Israelis who have shown
steadfast and courageous opposition to Israel's illegal "security"
barrier. This stance has earned them physical injury and legal
attack. They have been foremost amongst those instrumental in the
recent legal victory over the wall in Bil'in.

Come and hear from two of those directly involved in the regular
Friday protests in the village against the stealing of land; about the
Barrier and about the reaction of Israelis to the campaign and
the recent Supreme Court judgement.

In their own words: A 3 year battle has been waging over several
hundred acres of West bank lands. This struggle has come
to symbolize the popular resistance to Israel's "separation barrier".

Aligned on one side were a city of 30,000 settlers, several of the
largest construction companies in Israel, the state itself and the
IDF. On the other side was a village called Bilin population
1700. Bilin is supported by a loose collection of activist from
around the world and from Israel. A significant part of that
support comes from the Israeli group called Anarchists Against the
Wall (www.awalls.org).

By ceaseless demonstrations, direct actions and endless creativity the village and its supporters have forced the Israeli court to yield back part of the lands of the village in a stunning decision on Sept 4th. The struggle is not over but one thing is already clear; the joint popular movement of Palestinians internationals and Israelis is capable of sustaining intensive campaigns for years and has more power than even it knew.

Venue: Indian YMCA 41 Fitzroy Square London W1T6AQ ( nearest
tubes Warren Street and Great Portland Street )

Organised by Jews for Justice for Palestinians

Melanie Phillips, a Jew for genocide?

Some time ago Melanie Phillips of the Mail on Sunday and Jewish Chronicle, described mild mannered Jewish critics of Israel as "Jews for genocide." Her zionist colleague at the Jewish Chronicle, Guardian columnist and occasional leader writer, Jonathan Freedland, baulked at that description. But now here's Melanie in this week's Jewish Chronicle joining the Israeli Jewish zionists who have lost their moral compass completely and are now discussing, indeed planning, depriving the Gaza civilian population of all of the means of life itself.

Is the Jewish people capable of defending itself properly? This may seem an absurd question to ask when Israel has created a formidably armed society in an explicit renunciation of the powerlessness of the Jewish diaspora.

But with Israel under internal and external pressure over its decision to designate Gaza a “hostile entity” and the prospect that it may cut off its fuel and electricity, we might ponder the absurdity of it not doing so.

Has something changed here? Israel has always been based on a cultivated and encouraged genocidal impulse of settlers towards the natives. All are agreed that Israel isn't colonial in the expoitative sense. Elimination of the natives was always the aim of the mainstream zionist movement. But what happened to the circumspection called for by Herzl and practised so adeptly by a combination of labour zionist hypocrisy and western government and media connivance? Decades the zionists have spent covering their crimes and blaming the victims as the aggressors. Now Melanie Phillips - yes a wacko but - a mainstream journo can openly join the settler population in occupied Palestine in calling for the application of a water diet on top of the food diet forced on the Gaza population. The Jewish Chronicle is happy to publish this outrage but their readership is almost entirely Jewish (and its circulation is in decline). I must check the Mail on Sunday tomorrow to see if Melanie Phillips sees fit to share this sordid genocidal racism with her goyishe readers.

I should say that I did my usual here and only read part of the article. I just returned to it and I see that Melanie Phillips is promoting the same racial mythology that Howard Jacobson was promoting a couple of weeks ago. It's the idea that all Jews come from an Israel that was purged of its entire population by the Romans and that in the intervening 2,000 years Jews have done nothing but "yearn" for return and suffer a real physical exile. The difference is that while the "left wing" Jacobson thinks we should "feel" for the Palestinians' exile (don't panic, not in a doing anything about it sort of a way), Phillips pretends that they haven't been exiled at all or if they have they deserved it for being enemies of the Jews.

So where now? An open call in a Jewish community newspaper for the intensification of a genocidal campaign that was first mooted in the 1890s and initiated in 1947 and continuing "even as we speak." The call has already been made in the mainstream Israeli press and there have been Israeli cabinet ministers openly calling for what would be called nazi policies were they repeated in a European cabinet. How long before this enters the mainstream discourse of the west. And how long before some of the fascist parties of Europe start to say that all they want is what Israel already has?

I'm not sure but I think a line has been crossed here. I think that sort of thing shouldn't even be published but I wonder if there will be any counter argument in the JC next week. A truly unedifying spectacle, the Jewish community openly discussing whether or not one and a half million people should be deprived of the means of life itself.

Zionists use the law to silence the boycott Israel movement

Zionists at the University and Colleges Union are celebrating a "victory" over the movement for a boycott of Israel. See this from the Engage website:

The campaign for an academic boycott of Israel has ended today in an absolute and final political, legal and moral defeat.

The University and College Union’s (UCU) own lawyers advised it that a policy to exclude academics who work in Israel from the global academic community – and to exclude nobody else on the planet - would have been a violation of equal opportunities legislation in Britain.

Given this legal advice, the leadership of the UCU had no choice but decisively to end the union’s flirtation with a boycott of Israeli academia. To persist in a ‘discussion’ of an illegal and discriminatory policy would have opened the union up to potentially fatal lawsuits on the grounds of unfair discrimination. Union members could have been held personally liable if they had ignored clear legal advice. The Opinion was given to UCU by a widely respected barrister.

I'm not sure how using equal opportunities legislation or policies to defend the most thorough-going racist state on the planet amounts to a "moral" defeat for those who support an academic boycott, but then frankly, I couldn't bear to read the whole article.

But international solidarity has always been part of the credo of the trade union movement so work still needs to be done for the Palestinian cause in the unions. Of course zionists will try to have international solidarity itself outlawed but the focus now will have to be simply on drawing attention to Israel's crimes. This of itself won't stop Israel's crimes but ultimately it might stop or hinder our own government from supporting, indeed participating in, these crimes.

I actually first got to hear about this discussion (or not) business via Justin in the comments to the post below this one. I also got to hear about this Socialist Worker article in the same thread.

The effort by supporters of Israel to prevent any debate on the role of the state’s academic institutions is itself an attack on the human rights of British lecturers and should be dismissed with contempt.

Nevertheless, while the decision to discuss a boycott was a victory for the left, it is also a potential trap. The first elections to the new union’s leadership earlier this year produced a split result.

Sally Hunt, with the support of the right and centre-left in the old Association of University Teachers, won the position of general secretary. But the left won a majority on the executive.

Hunt came out very strongly against the decision to discuss a boycott. She has also expressed sympathy with calls from the Zionist camp to hold a membership ballot on the issue.

The signs are that Hunt wants to rush through the debate that the congress decided on and probably to weight it in favour of opponents of a boycott. She will then in all likelihood attempt to move quickly to mount a ballot with the aim, not simply of throwing out the boycott, but also of isolating the left within UCU.

The left faces two problems here. The first is that the boycott is an issue that divides critics of Israel. Even as sterling an anti-Zionist and anti-imperialist as Noam Chomsky opposes it.

The second is that any ballot would be dominated by a well-funded Zionist campaign that would enjoy the overwhelming support of the mass media. Under such pressure, the boycott would almost certainly be heavily defeated. Such an outcome would set back the cause of solidarity with Palestine in British universities for many years.

The left should refuse to walk into Hunt’s trap. We should make it clear now that we do not intend to propose an actual boycott of any Israeli academic institutions at the next union congress.

We should do so in order to achieve the maximum unity over the question of Palestine.

Many opponents of the boycott have been fulsome in their support for the Palestinians. We should put them on the spot and demand to know, if a boycott were off the agenda, what they intend to do help the Palestinians.

Yup, that's the question now. But will the zionists at the UCU get the question outlawed as well?

What is Abbas for?

This article is all over the net now. It's Gideon Levy in Ha'aretz denouncing Mahmoud Abbas as a "puppet leader." Here's the whole thing:

Mahmoud Abbas has to stay home. As things stand right now, he must not go to Washington. Even his meetings with Ehud Olmert are gradually turning into a disgrace and have become a humiliation for his people. Nothing good will come of them. It has become impossible to bear the spectacle of the Palestinian leader's jolly visits in Jerusalem, bussing the cheek of the wife of the very prime minister who is meanwhile threatening to blockade a million and a half of his people, condemning them to darkness and hunger.

If Abu Mazen were a genuine national leader instead of a petty retailer, he would refuse to participate in the summit and any other meetings until the blockade of Gaza is lifted. If he were a man of truly historic stature he would add that no conference can be held without Ismail Haniyeh, another crucial Palestinian representative. And if Israel really wanted peace, not only an "agreement of principles" with a puppet-leader that will lead nowhere, it should respect Abbas' demand. Israel should aspire for Abu Mazen to be considered a leader in the eyes of his people, not only a marionette whose strings are pulled by Israel and the United States, or affected by other short-term power plays.

Right now power rests with the powerless Abu Mazen. Since Washington - and perhaps Jerusalem as well - badly want the photo-op otherwise known as a "peace summit" to show off an "achievement," Abu Mazen could and should threaten to boycott the meeting to try and force some achievement on behalf of his people. Palestinians live in Gaza, too - an area controlled by Hamas, which Abu Mazen so loathes: He cannot continue to ignore the inhumane conditions in which Gazans live, caged in by Israel.

But the impression Abu Mazen makes is that he's no more than a political survivor. He's participating in the American-Israeli masked ball not because of naivete or weakness - for him, Gaza is just as "hostile territory" as Israel is. Therefore, he shares a shameful common interest with Israel, which will do neither side any good. Judging by his behavior Abu Mazen not only doesn't object to what Israel is doing in Gaza, he may even agree with the twisted doctrine arguing that cruel pressure will subdue Hamas and return the people to Fatah's embrace. In so doing, Abu Mazen proves that he's no "downy chick," as Ariel Sharon once put it, but a cynical rooster who cares little for the welfare of his people.

A genuine peace conference should involve all the hawks. Peace is forged between bitter enemies. The question of whether Saudi Arabia will take part in the summit or not is futile unless it includes real Palestinian representation. At most Abu Mazen represents only half of his people and could achieve, at best, half an agreement that wouldn't survive anyhow, given Hamas' strong opposition. It is in the interests of all the parties involved, including Abu Mazen, to drag Hamas to the negotiation table. A peace conference without Hamas and without Syria is a joke. But the short-sighted coalition of the royal triumvirate, Jerusalem-Washington-Ramallah, is trying to promote a false vision of "peace talks" without the decisive partners, while the world is busy applauding this illusion.

Obviously, it is hard to expect from Abu Mazen that he will rise above his narrow interests and call for an invitation to be issued to Hamas, the party that was democratically elected to lead the Palestinian government. But the least one could expect from the person with the lofty title of "President of the Palestinian Authority" is to strive for the greater good of all his people, especially in light of the extent of their distress. But instead of acting to bring about a cessation of hostilities and opening Gaza to the world, the triumvirate is busy formulating yet another position paper that won't be worth the paper it's written on and that will soon find itself in the garbage bin of history, along with its predecessors. It will only serve to impose increasingly cruel hardships on the people of Gaza. Abu Mazen must not participate in this farce.

But he will, won't he?