Mike Carlton on the Likud Lobby

"In today's piece for Crikey on the end of the seven-week Gaza conflict, which he describes as 'Israel's Vietnam', Carlton also had some words for his critics, writing: 'None of this is even vaguely understood by the powerful and sophisticated Likud lobby in Australia. The faintest criticism of Israel is always met with concerted howls of 'anti-Semitism!' It is a facile label flung about by the comfortable kaffeeklatsch of Sydney and Melbourne, well-upholstered burghers who have never actually experienced a flicker of anti-Semitism in their gilded lives, let alone the Gestapo knock at midnight or even a rocket landing down the street. In doing so, they demean the memory of those who truly knew what it meant: the dead of Auschwitz'." (Mike Carlton pens first column for Crikey since quitting Fairfax, Mumbrella, 28/8/14)