03 November 2010

Israel wins Cambridge Uni debate

We shall go slowly with this one, savoring it. First the lede:

Despite hostile audience, Israeli team marks unexpected victory in debate titled 'Israel is rogue state,' hosted by prestigious British university.
Good. Now to some details:
It's not every day that Israel marks a victory away from home, especially not on hostile grounds such as University of Cambridge in England. But on Thursday, Israel secured an unexpected triumph in the institution's prestigious debate club, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Monday.
So who was representing the feuding sides?
The Israeli embassy in London decided to send representatives Ran Gidor, the embassy's political advisor and a Cambridge graduate, and Shiraz Maher, a former radical Islamist that has become an enthusiastic Israel supporter.
The opposing side was represented by journalist and publicist Lauren Booth, the sister-in-law of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. ... and Mark McDonald, who heads the Labor party's Friends of Palestine & Middle East Association.
Uhu... the beauty and the lawyer. Between us, bringing Lauren Booth to the debate was a recipe for disaster on Palestinian side, since she still hasn't come down from the spiritual high she is experiencing. So her ability to sound coherent is in doubt. And then it went further downhill:
The event took a sharp turn when a few students from the pro-Palestinian camp raised pro-Israeli arguments during the discussion.
The result of the debate caused an uproar in various quarters, with some of the participants claiming that the pro-Israeli side injected a "sayan" (a pro-Israeli helper) to the other debating team. The most typical response is that of the eternally anti-Israeli AssaJew Philip Weiss:

Cambridge debate on Israel is undermined by wily neocon (is that redundant?)

Mr Weiss is obviously agitated, as a result it's hard to grok what exactly he is considering redundant. Anyhow, the long hand of Mossad is clearly in this debate, if you believe this, fairly odious character.

To conclude: I actually agree with one statement made by an anti-Israeli commentator that "these debates are of minuscule importance" and we shouldn't assign too much importance to them. However, it's still a pleasure and not to be denied.

And something smelly for a conclusion. An especially irked commentator of Mr Weiss' opus says about the "neocon infiltration":
Best advertisement yet for academic boycotts of Israel. This will have repercussions within that world, silent but deadly ones.
I am shocked... does the man really intend to commit a silent flatus during the next debate? Cambridge authorities must be warned immediately!

Hat tip: שירה.

5 comments:

yuval said...

"Latner also swore at me in private before taking up his speech. He said: 'I'm going to nail you to the fucking wall.'"
notice that "he said it" in privet, so no one would know... what is going over these people?

SnoopyTheGoon said...

I guess Latner confessed to saying this.

shira said...

<span>I did explain it to Yuval and he promised me he would get my authorization before posting a comment next time... we're flat mates, I was away this week... </span>
<span>I didn't know Latner was a debater. AlondonNet only mentioned Booth and that other guy, now it just seems strange.</span>

SnoopyTheGoon said...

Why can't Yuval comment without an express permission? OK, never mind, I shouldn't ask, I guess.

Yes, its' a strange story in general, but AssaJew Weiss takes the cake as usual.

shira said...

<span><span><span>he's more of a Z- Word follower(that's in general) but, he didn't bother to check the links on the post before sending a comment so he self- subdued himself to my approval(he's a perfectionist). I'm just going to play this for a little while before getting something better out of it, like getting him to do the dishes. <span> </span></span>
<p><span> </span>
<span>


</span></p></span></span>