Israel lobby v Corbyn

[Granny Danger]

9 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

2 hours ago, welshbairn said:

Do any Sudeten Germans want to leave their comfortable housesrefugee camps and BMW's and return to the Czech republic? 

That was my point. If after 70 years they have been able to move on and almost nobody takes that seriously any more, why do some people on the left like George Galloway still see the status of Israel inside of its 1948 borders as being open to question?

That's twice you've mention Galloway; that is pure deflection.

Israel has had an official policy of a two state solution for a long time but everyone knows it's a crock of shit.  If there were a genuine commitment to the stated policy then Israel would not come under the criticism that it does except from genuine anti-Semites.

Instead we have a country that flaunts international law and conventions yet has been, and still is, propped up by successive US governments pressured by Christian fanatics and a very influential Zionist lobby.

 

 

[Peppino Impastato]

3 hours ago, LongTimeLurker said:

Think the concern that some people have revolves around why certain left-wingers (George Galloway is the poster child for this) choose to make Israel their cause celebre when there are so many other possible causes to champion around the world. Why for example is the return of Palestinians exiled in the 1940s more important than that of the Sudeten Germans and if the latter can be forgotten about in the name of pragmatism and expediency and because people have simply got on with their lives in the interim, why can't that approach also not apply in the Middle East?

Lol, it's cause it's the biggest injustice on the face of the planet and Israelis are today's Nazis.

[welshbairn]

28 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

2 hours ago, welshbairn said:

Do any Sudeten Germans want to leave their comfortable housesrefugee camps and BMW's and return to the Czech republic? 

That was my point. If after 70 years they have been able to move on and almost nobody takes that seriously any more, why do some people on the left like George Galloway still see the status of Israel inside of its 1948 borders as being open to question?

Because the continuing confiscation of Palestinian land and property is still happening as we speak, and if we acknowledge the original ethnic cleansing and confiscation of property as being legitimate, the current stuff gets a pass.

[pandarilla]

The BBC still covering this fucking trash on their flagship programme. It quietly points out that the supposed anti semite in question was actually an Auschwitz survivor, and yet the whole tone of the report screams 'scandal'.

What an absolute embarrassment.

[D Angelo Barksdale]

'If the Sudetenland Germans have moved on why can't the Palestinians' is a hot take I did not expect to see.

[Benjamin_Nevis]

The BBC still covering this fucking trash on their flagship programme. It quietly points out that the supposed anti semite in question was actually an Auschwitz survivor, and yet the whole tone of the report screams 'scandal'.

What an absolute embarrassment.

Is anyone who thinks Israel are being a bit dickish towards Palestinians now an anti-semite?

Don't get me wrong, I despise Labour and am far from a Corbyn fan, but this seems absolutely fucking bonkers.

I assume the same programme had plenty to say about three prominent Tories meeting basically a fascist?

[welshbairn]

I had a lot of sympathy for the Israeli state till the wholly unnecessary invasion of Lebanon in 1982. Before then they'd reacted to attack by enemies, or imminent attack. A failed assassination attempt had been made on the Israeli Ambassador in London about a year before by a splinter group, and some nutter had tried to attack Israel from a hang glider flying over the Lebanese border, but those were the justifications for war, and while Israel was under no serious threat from anyone, launched an attack on Lebanon, with the sole purpose of putting a Christian party in power. 20.000 people died, not sure if that includes the massacres at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps where the Israelis guarded the perimeters and let the right wing Phalangists in to murder everyone they found, whatever age. Apparently Ariel Sharon kicked it off when he was Defense Minister but didn't ask permission from the rest of the government. Is he fucking dead yet?

Edited August 1, 2018 by welshbairn

[NotThePars]

That was my point. If after 70 years they have been able to move on and almost nobody takes that seriously any more, why do some people on the left like George Galloway still see the status of Israel inside of its 1948 borders as being open to question?

I must’ve missed the blockade, persecution, land grabs, forcible resettlement and bombing of Sudeten Germans that continues to this day.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

Is anyone who thinks Israel are being a bit dickish towards Palestinians now an anti-semite?

Don't get me wrong, I despise Labour and am far from a Corbyn fan, but this seems absolutely fucking bonkers.

I assume the same programme had plenty to say about three prominent Tories meeting basically a fascist?

What I don't understand is why Labour deemed it necessary to f**k about with what was recognised as the international definition of antisemitism. That was always asking for trouble.

[welshbairn]

7 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

16 minutes ago, jupe1407 said:

Is anyone who thinks Israel are being a bit dickish towards Palestinians now an anti-semite?

Don't get me wrong, I despise Labour and am far from a Corbyn fan, but this seems absolutely fucking bonkers.

I assume the same programme had plenty to say about three prominent Tories meeting basically a fascist?

What I don't understand is why Labour deemed it necessary to f**k about with what was recognised as the international definition of antisemitism. That was always asking for trouble.

The EU don't accept it, neither do I,  nor the guy who wrote it. If you say it's anti semitic to criticise how the Israelis established their State then it's anti semitic to criticise what's happening now. 

Edited August 1, 2018 by welshbairn

[Peppino Impastato]

24 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

I had a lot of sympathy for the Israeli state till the wholly unnecessary invasion of Lebanon in 1982. Before then they'd reacted to attack by enemies, or imminent attack. A failed assassination attempt had been made on the Israeli Ambassador in London about a year before by a splinter group, and some nutter had tried to attack Israel from a hang glider flying over the Lebanese border, but those were the justifications for war, and while Israel was under no serious threat from anyone, launched an attack on Lebanon, with the sole purpose of putting a Christian party in power. 20.000 people died, not sure if that includes the massacres at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps where the Israelis guarded the perimeters and let the right wing Phalangists in to murder everyone they found, whatever age. Apparently Ariel Sharon kicked it off when he was Defense Minister but didn't ask permission from the rest of the government. Is he fucking dead yet?

Great post.  Yes he is.

[pandarilla]

The EU don't accept it, neither do I,  nor the guy who wrote it. If you say it's anti semitic to criticise how the Israelis established their State then it's anti semitic to criticise what's happening now. 

Absolutely this.

I generally paid minimal attention to this issue until a few weeks ago. Since then it's got me really fucking annoyed.

The spin game played by those opposed to Corbyn is becoming less effective every week. They're relying on people not fully paying attention to the detail.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

The EU don't accept it, neither do I,  nor the guy who wrote it. If you say it's anti semitic to criticise how the Israelis established their State then it's anti semitic to criticise what's happening now. 

It's the equating of the Israeli state with Nazi Germany that's antisemitic not the criticism of of the policies of that state.

 

You can be a critic of Israeli policies and be an anti-zionist without being antisemitic.

 

As the international definition itself says:

 

"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."

 

After previous issues with antisemitism you'd think Labour would tread a little more warily.

 

[pandarilla]

It's the equating of the Israeli state with Nazi Germany that's antisemitic not the criticism of of the policies of that state. 
You can be a critic of Israeli policies and be an anti-zionist without being antisemitic.
 
As the international definition itself says:
 
"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."
 
After previous issues with antisemitism you'd think Labour would tread a little more warily.
 

But the labour party have adopted that bit of the definition.

Do you think an Auschwitz survivor is being anti Semitic when they compared the policies of the Israeli government with the Nazis?

[welshbairn]

Just now, DeeTillEhDeh said:

It's the equating of the Israeli state with Nazi Germany that's antisemitic not the criticism of of the policies of that state.

You can be a critic of Israeli policies and be an anti-zionist without being antisemitic.

After previous issues with antisemitism you'd think Labour would tread a little more warily.

The main example that is dubious in the thing is this:

"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."

The man who wrote it didn't intend it to be part of a list that everyone would have to sign up to to clear themselves of being anti semitic, it was meant to be a statistical polling tool. The man who Corbyn sat with in 2010 saying that the suffering being imposed on Palestinians brought shame on Israel was a Jew who had survived Auschwitz.

[Peppino Impastato]

14 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

It's the equating of the Israeli state with Nazi Germany that's antisemitic not the criticism of of the policies of that state.

 

You can be a critic of Israeli policies and be an anti-zionist without being antisemitic.

 

As the international definition itself says:

 

"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."

 

After previous issues with antisemitism you'd think Labour would tread a little more warily.

 

If the Israeli state acts like Nazi Germany it's unreasonable not to make the comparison.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

If the Israeli state acts like Nazi Germany it's unreasonable not to make the comparison.

The use of Nazi Germany trivialises the Holocaust - it's why I personally don't like such comparisons. It's like when people accuse others of being Nazis when clearly they aren't.

 

It's just a bloody awful comparison.

 

Some of the rhetoric on both sides of the debate needs toned down. Accusations and counter-accusations don't deal with the very real problem of anti-Semitism, which is vile, inexcusable and exists on the left as well as the right.

 

That goes for everyone - from Margaret Hodge and her "fucking anti-Semites and racists" comments to more inflammatory Israel=Jew comments from certain elements of the left.

[LongTimeLurker]

When Communism collapsed in the Czech Republic property was restored to its 1948 owners but the Benes decrees were kept intact and that meant that Sudeten Germans didn't get their property back. Nobody in the international community batted an eyelid at that. That means there isn't some universally applied principle at stake where the 1948 wave of Palestinian refugees are concerned, but some people on the left (George Galloway is the poster child for this) act as if there is. When that is viewed from a Jewish perspective there is a strong suspicion that what fuels that sort of apparent double standard is anti-Semitism, so this isn't an issue that is going to go away any time soon.  

Edited August 2, 2018 by LongTimeLurker

[Granny Danger]

4 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

The use of Nazi Germany trivialises the Holocaust - it's why I personally don't like such comparisons. It's like when people accuse others of being Nazis when clearly they aren't.

 

It's just a bloody awful comparison.

 

Some of the rhetoric on both sides of the debate needs toned down. Accusations and counter-accusations don't deal with the very real problem of anti-Semitism, which is vile, inexcusable and exists on the left as well as the right.

 

That goes for everyone - from Margaret Hodge and her "fucking anti-Semites and racists" comments to more inflammatory Israel=Jew comments from certain elements of the left.

I think comparisons with Apartheid are more accurate, would be less emotive and would actually be more effective.

However the real point here is the organised attempt to try to oppose all criticism of Israel.  That is at the heart of the current furore.

Personally I think the other xenophobic attacks, being stoked by the anti-EU rhetoric, is a far more real and worrying issue than anti-Semitism at this moment in the U.K. but is no getting anywhere near the same publicity.

 

[Detournement]

5 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

The use of Nazi Germany trivialises the Holocaust - it's why I personally don't like such comparisons. It's like when people accuse others of being Nazis when clearly they aren't.

 

It's just a bloody awful comparison.

 

I agree that it would be more helpful to avoid Nazi comparisons but if people can call Trump, Bannon, Le Pen etc Nazid then surely the Palestinians have the right to compare their occupiers to Nazis.

Just calling Israel imperialistic, apartheid, violent and racist is enough imo.