The Good and Bad of the British Left

For those who have never heard of it, The Commentator is a website that acts rather like an online newspaper. It is liberal (in a good sense - one of Nick Cohen's liberals, not one of his "progressives"), and supportive of the right of Israel to exist in peace and security. It's well worth your while adding www.thecommentator.com to your list of links.

The first story is by John Mann, Labour MP, all-round good guy and one of the few MPs who came out of the expenses scandal looking better than he did going in. He is also an unrepentant anti-racist: that is, he includes antisemitism in his list of things to oppose and fight. The item is about his opposition to the antisemitism shown in some parts of the 'occupy' movement. The comments attached to this article also make interesting reading: notice how "Thom" slowly but surely reveals his true colours under pressure from real anti-racists and anti-antisemites. This shows the benefits of keeping on at suspect commenters, at least on sites that are on the side of liberalism and genuine free speech to begin with.

The second item is from hfconservatives (also via The Commentator) - which I assume stands for Hammersmith & Fulham Conservatives. For non-Londoners, let alone non-UK residents, Hammersmith & Fulham is a London Borough in the west of the city, one of whose MPs is at present a Labour man, name of Andrew Slaughter. Read and weep.

Post By: Brian goldfarb

Silwan - Photojournalism Behind the Scenes

...or how photojournalists make the news they are supposed to report on.





If the video doesn't work, watch it here.

Sheikh Raed Saleh loses deportation case.

Sheikh Raed Saleh, who entered the UK despite an order barring him by the Home Secretary, Theresa May, has lost his tribunal case against deportation. He entered Britain, therefore , illegally, and it took the police three days to arrest him, despite his publicly available itinerary. The Community Security Trust helped to assemble the case against him, which included the outstanding charges against him Israel (where he lives), his fundraising for Hamas, an antisemitic poem he had written and an inflammatory speech he had made in which he appeared to repeat the blood libel. At first he denied all of this, then, following the painstakingly assembled CST evidence, admitted it all, but argued that the CST had (deliberately?) distorted the evidence. When this defence failed, Ilan Pappe appeared as a witness but, for some strange reason, failed to convince the Tribunal members of his interpretation of all the above. You can read all about it here: http://adamholland.blogspot.com/.

Incidentally, if you follow this link http://jfjfp.com/?p=26301 it will take you to the website of Jews for Justice for Palestine. I know, but into each life , a little rain must fall, and this is ours! However, this page is their take on Raed Saleh case. Take careful note of how they blame the judges for following the politicians instead of the law. Funny that, what would they have said if he'd won his case? I leave all of you to consider that puzzle for yourselves.

Post By: Brian goldfarb

British "luminaries" and Press TV

I know that this is very old news, but while the lovely (I am being ironic, honestly) Gilad Atzmon is in the news, I thought I'd share the following with you from my collection of historic documents. If you follow the link, you'll find that it's from that good guy David Aaronovitch, writing in The Times, before it went behind its pay wall, depriving those of us disinclined to pay up of its insights. What most intrigued me was the list of British luminaries of the Left (and we all know what Nick Cohen thinks of people like this), at least in their own eyes, prepared to accept Ahmanedinejad's gold and appear on Press TV:

"Despite this history of malicious stupidity Mr Hart has been praised by Lauren Booth and Clare Short, has been joined on his Press TV show by luminaries such as John Pilger, Jenny Tonge, Ghada Karmi, Norman Finkelstein, Ilan Pappe, Abd al-Bari Atwan, Alastair Crooke and Steven Rose, and appears up and down the country at respectable venues, complaining about his treatment at the hands of "Zionism"."

From the following, where David A. notes that he would have been joined on a public platform by Gilad Atzmon, at which points he declined, and shared his unhappiness with the rest of us. I'm especially intrigued by the notion that Steven Rose, the paragon (am I being ironic again?) of the scientific method, except where it involves Israel, is quite prepared to appear on Press TV, as paid for by Iran.You will all have your own views of just how democratic and free Iran and Press TV are:

http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/columnists/52885/anti-zionists-having-a-laugh

Post by: Brian Goldfarb

The Palestinian cause

I was reading an excellent article by Rob Marchant in The New Statesman about the growing antisemitism on the left, when the words "it hurts the Palestinian cause" popped out at me quite unexpectedly. Then it hit me. Almost every decent article or blog post about antisemitism absolutely has to remind readers that antisemitism is bad for - you guessed it - palestinians!

Funny thing is, nobody tells us what exactly this Palestinian cause is. A quick google search reveals that there are a lot of Palestinian causes. Depends on who you ask, but you shouldn't loose your time asking just anybody.

We all know what Hamas would say. They also speak for the PA, in terms of goal, although they can't agree on the means. Their version of Palestinian cause is ultimately what Israel has to deal with, since they are their people's leaders. In their struggle to liberate themselves from even the slightest scent of racism, too many western intellectuals find themselves right (or rather left...) on the opposite side, playing into the hands of racist dictatorial thugs whose goals are fundamentally different from those of their idealistic supporters.

I wonder when was the last time a journalist stopped typing to think - really think - what the Palestinian cause means. Is it too much to ask a journalist to add a few explanatory words about his/her personal views on "the Palestinian cause"?

More antisem...sorry, anti-Zionism from The Guardian

If you don't get to see www.engageonline.wordpress.com (who has time to read everything they should or is even of interest to them, if only they knew about it), this might be a useful link.

The following is by Eve Garrard and is a guest post by her. It follows up on an article by one Deborah Orr, a Guardian columnist of whom The Guardian say that she "is one of Britain's leading social and political commentators." But then they would, wouldn't they. Eve's article is a response to a column by Orr on the Shalit prisoner swap and picks up on an ill-judged use of the word "chosen" (as in "chosen people"). For those who don't know of Eve Garrard, she is a recently retired philosophy lecturer (University of Keele, UK), and can be found on occasions at normblog, by invitation.

You might find the Alan Johnston article also very interesting, as linked to by Eve, which also picks up on this, but also on the other theme in the article (spun - word used advisedly - off from the theme of one Israeli life being worth 1000+ Palestinian) which then uses the nasty "chosen" theme. This Alan Johnston is the academic, and not the pro-Palestinian journalist. Note also that Eve links to criticisms of the supposed main purpose of the post: the "arithmetic" of the swap.

http://engageonline.wordpress.com/2011/10/24/on-being-chosen-eve-garrard/#comments

Post by: Brian Goldfarb

The Shalit deal and Ban Ki-moon's epiphany

This is what UN's Ban Ki-moon had to say about Shalit's homecoming:

"With this release, it will have a far-reaching positive impact to the stalled Middle East peace process," Ban told Reuters at the end of a three-day trip to Switzerland.

Er...the stalled peace process is (not) taking place between Israel and the PA in the West Bank, not the Hamas in Gaza, Mr. UN's President. How exactly is playing into Hamas hands going to have a positive impact on anything? We know all about impact when it comes from the Hamas ruled Gaza, and I assure you that on the ground it ain't what it seems to be.



There's more:

"I am very encouraged by the prisoner exchange today after many many years of negotiation," Ban said. "The United Nations has been calling for (an end to) the unacceptable detention of Gilad Schalit and also the release of all Palestinians whose human rights have been abused all the time."

I was awake half of last night trying to figure out what was about the prisoner exchange that could make the world's organization leader to feel very encouraged. Was it the joy of seeing so many criminals finally getting their basic human right of killing Israelis back?

Maybe he just realized that what the world he's leading really needs are more terrorists bent on destroying the one tiny stubborn country that just won't go away quietly.

Gilad Shalit: understanding the swap

A lot has been, and more will be, said about freeing Gilad Shalit in exchange for one thousand palestinian prisoners.

Yes, freeing criminals is not such a smart thing to do. Still, they won't make much difference to us, there are plenty of would-be martyrs out there anyway. The pros and the cons are well known, I'm not willing to go into that quicksand.

There is however one argument that has thus far eluded both sides. Israel is about to get back a young man who never did anything wrong, a simple citizen of this country. The palestinians, on the other hand, are going to be flooded with almost one thousand criminals, and good luck building a stable society with that (Hamas could use some stability in light of recent and ongoing events in the region, and even though it won a few points with the Shalit deal, this is not quite what ordinary people need for their daily lives to run smoothly).

One simple citizen for us, one thousand criminals for them. We win.

Because it's Sukkot...

Because it's Sukkot, and you'll all be there in the Sukkah, with your laptops, running off solar energy, so no-one's really working to power them, I thought I'd bring you some good news, for a change. The following three articles are all via Harry's Place, a good, left wing (but not that sort of left wing) blog.

The first reports that an Australian teaching union has defeated a BDS motion at its Annual Conference. So, unlike the UCU here in the UK, there are some English-speaking teachers and academics who know sense when they see it: and it's not an anti-Israel motion. The second is about the Histradut mounting a campaign against contract labour, in true, good and old-fashioned free trade union fashion. Not that many British trade unionists, or at least those at the top of such unions, want to know that, let alone follow their Israeli comrades example. They're too busy passing boycott motions. Against Israel.

The third link is to our good friend Nick Cohen and an article of his in the Jewish Chronicle. He takes up this same theme of the Histradut, but this time, he's attacking the British Trades Union Congress for not backing their Israeli colleagues in their efforts to serve all the workers in their sphere: Jewish, Arab, foreign guest workers, and for their efforts to link up with and support their Palestinian trade unionist comrades.

Read and enjoy.

http://www.jwire.com.au/news/union-defeats-pro-bds-motion/19628

http://www.globes.co.il/serveen/globes/docview.asp?did=1000689906

http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/columnists/56132/a-foul-smell-britains-unions

Post By: Brian Goldfarb

Sheik Raed Saleh and his connection with the truth...or not.

So, Snoopy, off on his vacation (he's allowed time off?), suggested that I, among others, might help to keep the show on the road. Well, that's a mighty tall order, especially when you've just come back from a short break yourself (to visit the offspring in another country).

Still, in my wanderings around the blogosphere, I came across the following from the Community Security Trust blog. It concerns one Sheikh Raed Salah who, you may or may not recall, entered Britain against the express instructions of the UK Home Secretary, Teresa May. Now, neither the Government of which she is a part nor her in particular are exactly favourites of mine, but still...they did good here. This was because of the Sheik's record (and it is on the record - he still has charges against him outstanding in Israel, where he lives) of antisemitic statements and writings.

It took them three days, but, finally and despite a well-advertised itinerary, the police caught up with him and issued a deportation order against him. He's appealed this, for reasons that need not detain us here. In the article below, the CST acknowledges that it provided the UK government with evidence of the Sheik's antisemitism and other undesirable activities.

It appears that Saleh's defence team have alleged that the CST have, in various ways, distorted the (un)good Sheik's writings and other sayings, by having him say or write things he (they claim) didn't write or say. So the CST people show in this article how the charges against them are nonsense, through a description of their meticulous research to substantiate their claims. Sheikh Raed Saleh lives in Northern Israel and is Hamas's representative in Israel. Now that's a dubious occupation if ever I heard of one.

Read the detail below:

http://blog.thecst.org.uk/?p=3072

Posted by: Brian Goldfarb

Parking your carriage Romanian style

Ever felt nostalgic about those good ol' days when horses drawn carriages weren't polluting the air with greenhouse gas emissions and dirt roads in the countryside led to nowhere in particular?

Well, those days will never return, as progress made its way into the heart of the back of beyond - small Romanian villages scattered between hundreds years old forests and brand new gas stations.

Watch and weep (with laughter).

If the video doesn't work, watch here.





OK, I know it's an ad, but it's still funny.

Mason Crumpacker's reading list

I don't know who's more amazing in this story - 8 years old Mason asking Christopher Hitchens for a reading list, or her mother for raising such a wonderful child.

Worth reading in full.

Vacation notice

Due to richly deserved vacation, services from this blog member will be interrupted for a month or so. But no worries, Pisa with (hopefully) contributions from Brian will keep the blog going. So there, I am on vacation:

Nikolai Valuev as female yeti

Nikolai Valuev aka The Russian Giant aka The Beast from the East aka Sugar aka Goliath, a retired professional boxer and former two-time WBA heavyweight champion, has decided to dedicate some of his time to science. Well, science of a kind: on an expedition to the Azasskaya cave the role assigned to Valuev was to impersonate a female yeti in the hope that yeti males will be attracted by this live bait. The reasoning behind the idea was that Valuev, while certainly one of the largest humans in existence - 2.18 m (7 ft 2 in), is still not up to male yeti standard, thought to be in the region of 2.7 m. Here is Valuev in action (on the left, of course):

Unfortunately, according to the report, male yetis were not all that excited by the bait (I wonder why) and the meeting of minds didn't take place.

However, aside of making contact with a live yeti, the expedition was a total success, with multiple finds of yeti traces of all kinds. In addition, ESP experts of several kinds who were part of the expedition, reported on feeling yetis' presence in the area.

Well, I personally feel that the yeti's case is almost sewed and shut. Next time, though, I would suggest to perfume Nikolai with different substances every time he is being sent out for contact. Who knows...

Leaflet Atzmon, the Who that wandered too far

Gilad Atzmon’s book ‘The Wandering Who?’ may not match the sales of Mein Kampf, but it is without doubt a poisonous anti-Semitic tome. Atzmon’s politics also represent a threat to Palestine solidarity as they turn the focus away from Israeli settler-colonialism and its US backers onto Jews as individuals

The above words have been written by one of Atzmon's fellow travelers, a founder member of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Tony Greenstein.

Oops.

Greenstein wants the J-Big (Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods) to leaflet Atzmon's book launch this evening. Which proves that even asajews have standards. Who knew?

Being branded by Greenstein as "anti-semitic" is weird enough. I guess Greenstein's world consists of bad Israeli/pro-Israel jews, good anti-Israel jews, and Atzmon.

The catch, as shown by the above quote, is that Atzmon's ideas are against the sacred socialist anti-imperialist pro-palestinian ideology that demands to destroy Israel and if possible the US first, then deal with brain-washing individuals into an obedient flock. Atzmon is a dissenter, he must be punished. The call to leaflet the book launch is not a call against anti-semitism, but the punishment for a traitor.