The UK's condescending press release to Israel

From the British Foreign Office:

Minister for the Middle East, Alistair Burt MP said:

The conviction and sentencing of Ahed Tamimi is emblematic of how the unresolved conflict is blighting the lives of a new generation, who should be growing up together in peace, but continue to be divided.

The treatment of Palestinian children in Israeli military detention remains a human rights priority for the UK. We will continue to call upon Israel to improve its practices in line with international law and obligations.

We have offered to help the Israeli authorities through expert-to-expert talks with UK officials. The offer still stands and we hope Israel will take us up on it. While we recognise that Israel has made some improvements, it needs to do much more to safeguard vulnerable people in its care.

What an unbelievably condescending  statement. The UK, the paradigm of colonialism for centuries, is telling Israel that it can dispatch "experts" on human rights because how Israel treats prisoners under 18 is clearly a "human rights priority" for England.


I am reminded of what Menachem Begin said in 1981 to the US for its desire to "punish" Israel:
 " Are we a vassal state of yours? Are we a banana republic? Are we youths of fourteen who, if they don't behave properly, are slapped across the fingers?"

As I wrote in January after a similar statement from Ward:

The UK has more children under 18 in prison than Israel has in custody - 912, as of November, compared to about 300 in Israeli detention.

The UK's youth prisons are hotbeds of gang violence and makeshift weapons, and children are deprived of basic social services. One child dies in a UK prison every month!
The government is doing little to fix the problems.

Imagine the outcry if, say, France or Germany would publicly reproach the UK over its treatment of child prisoners. Imagine if Netanyahu issued a statement of concern over whether Great Britain is really doing everything it can to reduce the 11% of incarcerated youths who have attempted suicide.
No one blinks when Western nations chide Israel for its actions, but they would never say a word about any other Western nation's actions.

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-uks-condescending-press-release-to.html

Didge wrote:The UK, the paradigm of colonialism for centuries, is telling Israel that it can dispatch "experts" on human rights ...

I certainly agree on the colonialism comparison.

Original Quill wrote:

Didge wrote:The UK, the paradigm of colonialism for centuries, is telling Israel that it can dispatch "experts" on human rights ...

I certainly agree on the colonialism comparison.

How so?

Can you name this European Jewish nation that colonized the Middle East?

Or is in fact the reality that Jews are decolonizers, being that Arabs colonized the entire Middle east and North Africa through Arabization?

I prefer the term: Lebensraum. Israel thinks nothing of taking land from others and not returning it.

Israel is acting very much like Germany just prior to WWII.

Original Quill wrote:I prefer the term: Lebensraum.  Israel thinks nothing of taking land from others and not returning it.

Israel is acting very much like Germany just prior to WWII.

In the spirit of the Stockholm Declaration that states: “With humanity still scarred by …antisemitism and xenophobia the international community shares a solemn responsibility to fight those evils” the committee on Antisemitism and Holocaust Denial called the IHRA Plenary in Budapest 2015 to adopt the following working definition of antisemitism.

On 26 May 2016, the Plenary in Bucharest decided to:

Adopt the following non-legally binding working definition of antisemitism:

“Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”

To guide IHRA in its work, the following examples may serve as illustrations:

Manifestations might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity. However, criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic. Antisemitism frequently charges Jews with conspiring to harm humanity, and it is often used to blame Jews for “why things go wrong.” It is expressed in speech, writing, visual forms and action, and employs sinister stereotypes and negative character traits.

Contemporary examples of antisemitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere could, taking into account the overall context, include, but are not limited to:

• Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion.

• Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions.

• Accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews.

• Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust

• Accusing the Jews as a people, or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.

• Accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations.

• Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.

• Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.

• Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g., claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterize Israel or Israelis.

• Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.

• Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.

Antisemitic acts are criminal when they are so defined by law (for example, denial of the Holocaust or distribution of antisemitic materials in some countries).

Criminal acts are antisemitic when the targets of attacks, whether they are people or property – such as buildings, schools, places of worship and cemeteries – are selected because they are, or are perceived to be, Jewish or linked to Jews.

Antisemitic discrimination is the denial to Jews of opportunities or services available to others and is illegal in many countries.


https://www.state.gov/s/rga/resources/267538.htm