As I see it: Those nice Israel-bashers’ Achilles’ heel

Why can't Israeli's styled friends understand tand that the things they say about Israel are not in fact the sentiments of friends but of enemies? Whenever someone says “As a friend/candid friend/staunch ally of Israel...,” you know that what’s coming is a vicious kick to the head. Delivered, of course, purely in a spirit of friendship. The Canadian foreign minister Stéphane Dion, describing himself as a “steadfast ally and friend to Israel,” criticized both the Palestinians’ unilateral pursuit of statehood and the Israelis’ settlement construction. “Canada is concerned by the continued violence in Israel and the West Bank,” he said. “Canada calls for all efforts to be made to reduce violence and incitement and to help build the conditions for a return to the negotiating table.” Dion seemed to be suggesting that Israeli terrorism victims were somehow asking for it and that Palestinian murder attacks were to be equated with Israeli self-defense.

Doubtless he thought he was being studiously even-handed and therefore fair, wise and just. But in the battle between victim and aggressor, legality and illegality, truth and falsehood, even-handedness inescapably entails blaming the victim and tacitly endorsing illegality and lies.
A few days later the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon did something similar. While condemning the current wave of Palestinian stabbings and other attacks upon Israelis, he claimed the perpetrators were driven by “alienation and despair.” “It is human nature to react to occupation, which often serves as a potent incubator of hate and extremism,” he said. When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed outrage at such an apparent justification for Palestinian violence, Ban appeared genuinely affronted. His words, he said, had been twisted. Palestinian attacks and incitement were reprehensible and he condemned them. Yet having stated, “Nothing excuses terrorism,” he then repeated the excuse for Palestinian terrorism. “No one can deny that the everyday reality of occupation provokes anger and despair, which are major drivers of violence and extremism and undermine any hope of a negotiated two-state solution.”

Well actually, no one who pays the slightest regard to reality could maintain such a thing. Whatever the provocation, it is not “human nature” to set out to murder as many innocents as possible, including women and children. Ban’s apparently real bewilderment that anyone could possibly think he supports terrorism arises from two things. The first is his fundamentally false view of the Arab war against Israel. The “occupation” does not cause Palestinian violence. It is unending Palestinian violence that prolongs the “occupation.” The Palestinians aren’t driven by despair at the absence of their state. How can this be so, when they have turned down repeated offers of such a state since the 1930s? Isn’t it more logical to assume that the relentless incitement – to which Ban himself alluded – which tells them falsely that Israel plans to destroy al-Aksa and that their highest calling is to kill Jews and conquer the whole of Israel has rather more to do with it? Moreover, this is not an occupation in the normally accepted understanding of the word. Israel has not occupied another people’s land, because the disputed territories never belonged to another people.

Nor is Israel there out of an aggressive colonial impulse. The Jews are entitled to hold and settle the territories under international law several times over, both as a legally permitted defense against continuous belligerence and from their never-abrogated entitlement to do so – as the only people for whom this was ever their national homeland – under the terms of the Palestine Mandate.

These false premises about Israel’s “occupation,” however, are widespread.

This helps explain the distressing fact that most of the almost daily Palestinian terrorist attacks on Israelis aren’t noted at all in the Western media. Few realize that Israelis going about their everyday lives are routinely being murdered or wounded by stabbing, shooting, rock-throwing or cars driven into bus queues. This onslaught is not being reported because, to the Western media, it is the understandable response to occupation. The settlers have chosen to put themselves in harm’s way, goes the thinking, and other Israelis have also brought this upon themselves merely by being Israelis. So to the West, these Jewish victims of terrorism just don’t exist. At the same time, the Western media never reports the near-daily Palestinian incitement of the mass murder of Israeli Jews. That doesn’t fit the narrative of Palestinian victims of Israel. For identical reasons, the media also ignores the victimization of Palestinians by other Palestinians. According to Palestinian Media Watch, last year the Palestinian Independent Commission for Human Rights received 292 complaints of torture, maltreatment and physical assault in the West Bank and 928 in the Gaza Strip.

The West remains almost totally ignorant of the tyrannical abuse Palestinians inflict upon one another. But why is its Palestinian narrative thus hermetically sealed against the truth? Here’s the second reason for Ban’s bewilderment. Progressives subscribe to universalizing agendas. These by definition deny any hierarchy of cultures or moral values. So Palestinian society cannot be held to be innately hostile to human rights, and Palestinian terrorism is equated (at best) with Israeli defense against such attacks. Thus on Holocaust Remembrance Day, of all things, Ban equated anti-Semitism with anti-Muslim bigotry. But the two are not remotely comparable. Of course there are some who are irrationally bigoted against Muslims.  But most anti-Islamic feeling is a rational response to Islamic violence and aggression. By contrast, anti-Jewish hatred is true bigotry as it is based entirely on lies, myths, and paranoid and deranged beliefs about Jews who have never posed an aggressive threat to anyone.

Ban and others committed to universalism think this equation is fair. In fact, it diminishes Jew-hatred and sanitizes Islamic aggression. Which is why progressives who think they are pure because their hearts so conspicuously bleed for the oppressed are not pure at all. They are morally corrupt. They aren’t driven by compassion for any kind of victim. What drives them instead is hatred of supposed victimizers in the “powerful” West. Their purported even-handedness thus camouflages a moral degeneracy. For while denouncing Israel, they support Palestinians who throw gays from the top of tall buildings, who abuse women and children, who jail, torture and kill dissidents. They support the racist ethnic cleansing of Jews from a future state of Palestine. They help incite false grievances that kill. They have the blood of innocents on their own hands. But they think of themselves as fair, decent, progressive. This is where they are vulnerable. For like Ban, they also tend to be remarkably thinskinned. That’s because their image of themselves really is all that matters to them. They don’t care about the world’s victims. They care about being seen to care. They think of themselves as nice people. We have to show them that they are not. Self-regard is everything to them. It is therefore their Achilles’ heel.

We should puncture it.

Melanie Phillips is a columnist for The Times (UK).


http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/As-I-see-it-Those-nice-Israel-bashers-Achilles-heel-443934


I Have to say I have never been a fan of Melanie Phillips and not likely to either and whilst I certainly do not agree with all her points, like for example where she went off on the Canadian for condemning the settlements. He is right to do so, even if they are not the root cause of the violence and terrorism by the Palestinians. Even if the Palestinians want to ethnically cleanse these settlements from a Recognized Palestinian nation. You know, actual Apartheid this time, deny no Jews at all. Still they have not helped and again even if known they are not the cause for violence, as such attacks occurred even before the creation of Israel, showing the terrorism is based on incitement by the Palestinians, incited off lies. For example claiming there is a threat to the  Al Aqsa Mosque, the very same bullshit used to incite murder back in 1929 oddly enough is nothing more than the biggest load of bull. So not only is the terrorism from incitement through the invention of lies spread through social media, the media, word of mouth, but the other two reasons are daily indoctrination bashing Israel as having no right to exist and a hate of Jews. Being taught from the earliest ages and why antisemitism stands at 93% in the Palestinian territories. That shows the continued and systematic plan of both Hamas and the PLO to never genuinely entertain any real peace treaties with Israel. If they did, they would make it a part of all education to to back the right of Israel to exist, but they do not, because they know how well to falsely play the victim card. As no matter how many excuses the regressive give, there is no reason that Abbas  could not have accepted the last proposal which gave 95% of the West Bank, including part of Jerusalem. Its why Arafat instigated the Second Intifada whilst the Oslo accords were being negotiated. People who lay claim to the right to statehood for the Palestinian people and claiming to want peace do not then throw away the very chances for this to happen, by then actually do then the opposite. by then fundamentally denying the Palestinian people a nation of their own, which has never happened ever in history. This is why the Palestinian leadership has to change, as neither Hamas or Fatah will accept the right of Israel to exist and by their stance to continue the conflict, the Palestinians are the ones that lose out again, due to their own incompetent leaders

So she is wrong on a few things, but very much right on others

Dion's criticism is one shared by a lot in the US liberal community, which was once the very backbone of support for Israel.  Whether or not the Canadian minister realizes it, the fact is that Israel has changed.

One might make jokes about how your daughter can't stay a virgin forever, but something similar is happening with Israel.  Once the paragon of innocent victimhood, she has now moved into circles of aggression and, yes, a little bit of deceit.  

It's telling that Netanyahu has come down the mountain and into the sandbox to play in American politics, particularly since he flirts not with the left--Israel's traditional support in the US--but with the right.  The fact that he has chosen to align with the side that is in disintegration right now merely shows that he is inept at playing American politics.  It's the fact that he has given up on Israel's hallowed purity that is significant.

The article goes on to engage in the war rhetoric of the Palestinian-Israeli feud, but it never really addresses this point save to use it as a segue.  I think it poses the crucial question for the survival of Israel: what is it going to do without the western left?  Particularly when the left is ascendant and the right is so severely in decline.  It leaves me saying, Hmmm...bad choice.

Original Quill wrote:Dion's criticism is one shared by a lot in the US liberal community, which was once the very backbone of support for Israel.  Whether or not the Canadian minister realizes it, the fact is that Israel has changed.

One might make jokes about how your daughter can't stay a virgin forever, but something similar is happening with Israel.  Once the paragon of innocent victimhood, she has now moved into circles of aggression and, yes, a little bit of deceit.  

It's telling that Netanyahu has come down the mountain and into the sandbox to play in American politics, particularly since he flirts not with the left--Israel's traditional support in the US--but with the right.  The fact that he has chosen to align with the side that is in disintegration right now merely shows that he is inept at playing American politics.  It's the fact that he has given up on Israel's hallowed purity that is significant.

The article goes on to engage in the war rhetoric of the Palestinian-Israeli feud, but it never really addresses this point save to use it as a segue.  I think it poses the crucial question for the survival of Israel: what is it going to do without the western left?  Particularly when the left is ascendant and the right is so severely in decline.  It leaves me saying, Hmmm...bad choice.

You see Quil you make a culmination of historical errors or more to the point not understanding that Israel was once far more suspicious and look to control strategic areas, to deny where it once had enemies at every single border country. This is now changed with Jordan and Egypt, but the Palestinians, refuse to accept the olive branch of peace. Do not forget the occupying forces which again are mainly centered in area C are there under agreement with the PLO through the Oslo accords. Again you have two leaderships here in Fatah and hamas that care more about their own imagine than they do in peace and the creation of a Palestinian state. This is very easy to surmise when you look at every turn to see Israel is erased from maps within the West bank and Gaza. That is just the tip of the iceberg, where fundamentally the Palestinians in the majority do not accept the right of Israel to exists, of which the Palestinians have no right to decide and even less so when they caused this conflict in the first place. Now Israel has to have guarantees of peace and disarmament from the Palestinians. Where they have so much evidence to show how many times they have been attacked unprovoked and the second Intifada was kicked off by Arafat during the Oslo accords and why? So IDF would have to reoccupy strategic areas they had , whilst under daily attack. So to make it look like the Israeli's would not relinquish control. Is armed forces goes beyond any other in the world by actually sacrificing the element of surprise to warn civilians around a target, through a number of means, also knowing this will allow military personnel to withdraw from the targeted area, making its sole aim the destruction of the offensive capabilities of Hamas. Sadly Hamas intentionally start these conflicts to ensure enough Palestinians have been ordered to protect weaponry, thus abusing the human rights of the Palestinians, who then render themselves by remaining legally participants.

It should not even come into the equation to even suggest the survival of Israel, as that shows again two things
That you do believe the Arabs want to erase Israel and that you fail to understand a people that has been persecuted world over for over 2500 years. So its no good outside nations like France who are considering granting full statehood. Which would then render any of both nations coming to an agreement on statehood moot. By fproviding Statehood yet with no ironclad guarantees and disarmament from fatah for peace, Israel would just then incorporate the whole of area C, being left no choice strategically. As if that happened the Palestinians would not have to come to any accommodation with Israel and would allow a people who have year after year been aggressors, the Palestinians. To be rewarded their state  by failing utterly to bring about a peaceful resolution between the two nations. As there is no fixed border lines and the land is not actually owned by either side legally. israel would just incorporate are C as part of Israel and there is nothing the UN or the Palestinians would be able to do about it, if they denied and failed to guarantee peace for Israel.

And it would be perfectly legal for Israel to do so based on resolution 242, which was carefully drafted to guarantee Israel's rights to remain there until such time as there is a "Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgement of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force."

So still much to resolve here, but what is evident is how many of the left continually turn a blind eye to Palestinian hated and how at every turn they have no intention of there being peace until Israel ceases to exists. Yet I condemn wrongs like the settlements


Go figure

Didge wrote:You see Quil you make a culmination of historical errors or more to the point not understanding that Israel was once far more suspicious and look to control strategic areas, to deny where it once had enemies at every single border country.

What historical errors, and what does “culmination of historical errors” mean?  I made a very pointed statement that Israel has lost whatever ‘high ground’ it enjoys by delving into mundane politics.  I don’t think that is historical, as I understand the word.

Didge wrote:This is now changed with Jordan and Egypt, but the Palestinians, refuse to accept the olive branch of peace. Do not forget the occupying forces which again are mainly centered in area C are there under agreement with the PLO through the Oslo accords. Again you have two leaderships here in Fatah and hamas that care more about their own imagine than they do in peace and the creation of a Palestinian state. This is very easy to surmise when you look at every turn to see Israel is erased from maps within the West bank and Gaza. That is just the tip of the iceberg, where fundamentally the Palestinians in the majority do not accept the right of Israel to exists, of which the Palestinians have no right to decide and even less so when they caused this conflict in the first place. Now Israel has to have guarantees of peace and disarmament from the Palestinians. Where they have so much evidence to show how many times they have been attacked unprovoked and the second Intifada was kicked off by Arafat during the Oslo accords and why? So IDF would have to reoccupy strategic areas they had , whilst under daily attack. So to make it look like the Israeli's would not relinquish control. Is armed forces goes beyond any other in the world by actually sacrificing the element of surprise to warn civilians around a target, through a number of means, also knowing this will allow military personnel to withdraw from the targeted area, making its sole aim the destruction of the offensive capabilities of Hamas. Sadly Hamas intentionally start these conflicts to ensure enough Palestinians have been ordered to protect weaponry, thus abusing the human rights of the Palestinians, who then render themselves by remaining legally participants.

That is all to do with the Israeli-Palestinian dispute.  I concede that the article dwells on that subject, but I was only speaking to Canadian foreign minister Stéphane Dion’s point that “Canada calls for all efforts to be made to reduce violence and incitement and to help build the conditions for a return to the negotiating table.”   The article characterizes this rather bland statement as “a vicious kick to the head.”

If that very moderate position is to be criticized as unfriendly, it says more about the critic than Minister Dion.  If there was any expectation more than that both sides behave, it shows how deviated the presumptions were. Apparently, the author expects that the world will simply accept how special and virginal Israel is, and overlook the atrocities that it is committing.

Israel expecting more is much like the pigs in Animal Farm, who declared that All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others... (1945).  The anomaly is unmasked, I suggest, by Netanyahu’s abandoning traditional neutrality in American politics.  In short, if you are going to play in the mud, then you should expect to get muddy.  And when Netanyahu candidly revealed that he was never going to support a two-state solution, what conclusion was left but that it was just a massive land-grab that the west was being asked to support?

Israel’s once exalted status is lost in the present day.  The curious thing is that Israel was always supported by the American left, and Netanyahu’s courtship of the quixotic, wacky, present-day Republicans is a slap in the face of not only the left, but common sense.  I think Minister Dion is merely expressing the sentiment of most of the west, America included, in the aftermath of Netanyahu’s massive miscalculation.

1) You blatantly missed out why Israel occupies controls area C legally.
You negate it did far worse in the past, which again is ignoring history. You are again soley looking at Israel and not both Palestine and Israel, another historical error here. Israel never had a high ground when the nation was created. It was certainly a first though for the Middle east being mainly secular and democratic. Which shows those on the left that fail to show balance and biased against israel automatically concede their liberal values, if of course they do not take task to the Palestinian authorities, which of course you never do.

Your next point on the author is very subjective, I happen to know they are old school conservative, but she was in that instance over sensitive herself, when there is no need to be.

Considering the South and central american nations in the pockets of the Gulf states, you again fail to grasp what is being manipulated here, the UN. Its controlled clearly as proven many times by the Gulf States, which they fail miserable to pass resolutions against their human rights records and why Israel is given countless, not meriting how by far it has far better human rights than all of the Middle east states

So it never had an exhausted status to start with. It was a minnow nation, which was able to rise to the challenge of enemies invading them from all sides, where they are on the very brink of collapsing. Where they snatched victory from the jaws of defeat and why you should never underestimate Israel

Didge wrote:1) You blatantly missed out why Israel occupies controls area C legally.
You negate it did far worse in the past, which again is ignoring history. You are again soley looking at Israel and not both Palestine and Israel, another historical error here. Israel never had a high ground when the nation was created. It was certainly a first though for the Middle east being mainly secular and democratic. Which shows those on the left that fail to show balance and biased against israel automatically concede their liberal values, if of course they do not take task to the Palestinian authorities, which of course you never do.

Your next point on the author is very subjective, I happen to know they are old school conservative, but she was in that instance over sensitive herself, when there is no need to be.

Considering the South and central american nations in the pockets of the Gulf states, you again fail to grasp what is being manipulated here, the UN. Its controlled clearly as proven many times by the Gulf States, which they fail miserable to pass resolutions against their human rights records and why Israel is given countless, not meriting how by far it has far better human rights than all of the Middle east states

So it never had an exhausted status to start with. It was a minnow nation, which was able to rise to the challenge of enemies invading them from all sides, where they are on the very brink of collapsing. Where they snatched victory from the jaws of defeat and why you should never underestimate Israel

History doesn't deny what Israel is doing now...

CNN wrote:The prospect of a Palestinian state is nil so long as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stays in office, Netanyahu said in a Monday interview.

Asked by an interviewer with the Israeli news site, NRG, if it was true that a Palestinian nation would never be formed while he's prime minister, Netanyahu replied, "Indeed."

http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/16/middleeast/israel-netanyahu-palestinian-state/

The only reference I make to history is to concede that Israel started out with a noble purpose, which has a lot to do with a guilty conscious in Europe.  America, which is not Europe, has long supported Israel, even when it was a bit irrational.  But the turn of events lately have shown that the mist of concern is evaporating.

Gotta go, for a bit. But a good talk, Didge. Appreciate it.

No worries Quill but you are avoiding most points I have made
You then go off the CNN, know for a bias against Israel as your evidence

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNN_bias_against_Israel

See you later