Faulty Connection

Those of you - the vast majority - who would rather gouge your eyes out than read Murdoch's Australian will have remained blissfully unaware that Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, while on his latest Israeli rambamming with Albert and the lads (see my previous post), scored a one-on-one with Benjamin Netanyahu in his office:

"Benjamin Netanyahu is cast as the ultimate 'heavy' of the Middle East. But after a long discussion in this small office, a discussion sandwiched between the Indian foreign minister and a delegation of powerful US congressmen in the afternoon, Netanyahu extends our time together for a few minutes because there's one thing he likes to show visitors. He leads me over to his window. 'You see this', he points to a small collection of stones taken from an archaeological dig. The stones are dated from nearly 3000 years ago. This is the signet ring of a Jewish official of that time. And the official's name was Netanyahu'. The Israeli leader never misses an opportunity to emphasise the long, deep connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel." (Making his case on Iran's menace, 14/1/12)

Of course this huckster never misses an opportunity to hawk his version of 'the true cross' or 'the true shroud' by way of harping on the long, deep connection of your Danbys and your Dadons to the land of Israel. He probably does it in his sleep.

To what must have been squirming embarrassment for those present possessing critical faculties more advanced than that of a retarded chimp, 'Bibi' shamelessly invoked his 'sacred' relic before the UN General Assembly last September:

"In my office in Jerusalem, there's an ancient seal. It's a signet ring of a Jewish official from the time of the Bible. The seal was found right next door to the Wailing Wall, and it dates back 2,700 years, to the time of King Hezekiah. Now there's a name of the Jewish official inscribed on the ring in Hebrew. His name was Netanyahu. That's my last name. My first, Benjamin, dates back a thousand years to Benjamon - Binyamin - the son of Jacob who was also known as Israel. Jacob and his 12 sons roamed these same hills of Judea and Samaria 4,000 years ago, and there's been a continuous Jewish presence in the land ever since."

To broadcast the fact that this faker's father was actually Benzion Mileikowsky* of Warsaw, that his grandfather, Nathan Mileikowsky, also of Warsaw, was a Zionist fanatic who used the name Netanyahu as his nom de plume, and that, in the Zionist fashion, Benzion jettisoned his Polish name on entering Mandate Palestine and replaced it with the Hebrew 'Netanyahu' is to assail Benjamin Netankowsky's mummery with inconvenient truths, no doubt anathema to the pious and gullible Sheridan, even assuming he'd heard them before. The truth is that Sheridan's as credulous as any gormless medieval pilgrim being shown a piece of 'the true cross' or a scrap of 'the true shroud'.

The most interesting aspect of Benjamin Netankowsky's performance, however, is not his 2,700 year-old signet ring, but that which it's supposed to signify - Sheridan's long, deep connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel.

Of course, this stock-in-trade of Zionist mumbo jumbo has about as much relationship with reality as Netankowsky with the ancient 'Netanyahu', or the rest of us with Adam and Eve. No matter, it's been around as long as political Zionism itself and even managed to find its way into the preamble of Britain's Mandate for Palestine, thus illustrating the fact that, for Zionists and many of their gentile supporters and dupes, incantatory versions of 'the true cross' are the real thing.

Our indispensible guide to the drafting of the Mandate is, of course, its pre-eminent historian, JMN Jeffries. Keeping in mind that it was drafted, as Jeffries puts it, "in the quiet between the Government and the Zionists, mostly by the Zionists, and then was issued under cover of the League of Nations, as though it were the result of the collected debates of the world's lawgivers," the 'historical connection' incantation first appeared in a June 1919 draft as "... recognized the historical connection of the Jews to Palestine and the claim which this gives them to find a national home in that country," suspected by Jeffries as coming from the pen of Lord Balfour. Typically, the Zionists, who, given the proverbial inch always reach for the mile, wanted the even stronger "historical title" substituted. What they got, in late 1919, was a reference to the recognition of "the historical connection with Palestine and the claim which this gives [the Jewish people] to reconstitute Palestine as their National Home (Erez Israel)." This had vanished by June 1920, with Jeffries suggesting, however, that it was more than made up for by the insertion in the draft-Treaty (with Turkey) of the Balfour Declaration, but was restored in August 1920. Following US State Department intervention, it vanished again in October, only to reappear the following month as: "Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country." In December 1920, the final draft Mandate for Palestine appeared with the foregoing clause in its preamble and was published in The Times in February 1921. In August of that year it was tabled - but not debated - in parliament, and came into being by a resolution of the Council of the League of Nations in September 1923.

"The sincerity of the business," writes Jeffries, "and the extent of the belief of the Government in this 'historic connection' plea, can be gauged from the fashion in which the phrase appeared in one draft as the basis of everything, and in the next was removed as superfluous." (Palestine: The Reality, 1939, p 531)

As its appearance in Sheridan's interview with Netankowsky indicates, the long, deep connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel mantra remains, for Zionist deadenders such as the Israeli prime minister and his fawning Australian acolyte, the very bedrock of Zionist dogma, despite the devastating assaults on its fundamental premise by such scholars as Shlomo Sand, Keith W. Whitelam and others.

Surely, no belief in medieval religious relics could have been as strong.

[* See my 24/9/11 post Benzion, My Father.]