Whatever Happened to Free Speech?

Now here's a loaded opening sentence:

"Jewish groups are demanding an apology from the ABC over an interview with a disgraced British vicar accused of anti-Semitism and spreading anti-Israel conspiracy theories." (ABC under fire for interview with accused anti-Semite, Michael Koziol, Sydney Morning Herald, 4/4/18)

To unpack: Jewish groups or Zionist shop fronts?* Disgraced? - says who? Accused means guilty? Has Israel never been known to conspire?

"Radio National marked the start of Passover... by speaking to Stephen Sizer, a retired Anglican vicar and critic of Christian Zionism... "

And how did Israel mark it? By massacring Palestinians.

And as for Sizer being a "critic of Christian Zionism," which End Times theology mandates that, prior to the fabled Battle of Armageddon, Jews either convert to Christianity or die,** wouldn't that, like, be a plus? But no, what really matters to our knee-jerk Zionist complainants, is not Jews as Jews, but apartheid Israel.

Sizer's 'crime'? In 2015, "he shared an article from the website Wikispooks titled '9-11 Israel did it'...", saying, "'the article raises so many questions'." At which, lo and behold, "the Church of England subsequently barred him from writing or speaking about the Middle East."

Perhaps if Radio National had interviewed one of our very own Anglican Friends of Israel instead, said "Jewish groups... demanding an apology from the ABC," would have been happier. After all, AFI's aims include such Zio-friendly items as (1) "To resist the call for a boycott of Israel"; ( 4) "To recall the Church to G-d's Covenant with the Jewish people and to call the Church to affirm the centrality of Israel to the Jewish faith"; and (5) To call Anglicans to repentance for the wrongs - of both word and deed - inflicted by Christians on the Jewish people and their State." (anglicanfriendsofisrael.com)

FYI: Stephen Sizer's 2014 book on Christian Zionism is Christian Zionism: Road-map to Armageddon.

[*Those "demanding an apology" are revealed later in the piece: Peter Wertheim, chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), who railed against what he called a "soft" interview, and Dvir Abramovich, chairman of the Anti-Defamation Commission (ADC), who declared that the ABC had "'crossed the line big time' in giving Dr Sizer a platform 'to spew his anti-Israel venom'".]

[**"Chuck warned us that Jews who refuse to acknowledge Jesus as their messiah by the time of the Battle of Armageddon will face divine punishment in the form of a double-strength Holocaust. 'Check it out! Zechariah 13:8 - "in the whole land, says the Lord, two thirds shall be cut off and perish, and one third shall be left alive". A third of the world's Jews, six million out of eighteen million, died in the Holocaust. We're talking two-thirds at Armageddon - do the math!'" (Allies for Armageddon: The Rise of Christian Zionism, Victoria Clark, 2007, p 16)]

Labor Voters & a Palestinian State

In the lead-up to the next Australian Labor Party national conference in July, the usual suspects, in this instance the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) are getting nervous. Solution: wheel out Murdoch hack Simon Benson to unveil ECAJ's YouGovGalaxy poll which, according to Benson, reveals that:

"Federal Labor is at risk of alienating its support base over the party's pursuit of Palestinian statehood ahead of its national conference, with a majority of its own voters rejecting the move without the Palestinian Authority striking a peace deal with Israel." (ALP voters reject Palestine push, The Australian, 13/3/18)

Sample question:

In your opinion, when should Australia recognise a Palestinian state?

Now check out the framing, particularly of the third:

Immediately, with or without a Palestinian peace agreement with Israel (ALP voters: 14)

[How about:... with or without an Israeli withdrawal from the Palestinian territories illegally occupied for the past 60 years?]

After a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (ALP voters 27)

[... premised on Israel's wanting one of course]

When all Palestinian groups renounce violence (ALP voters 12)

[But not Israel of course]

Never (ALP voters 12)

Don't know (ALP voters 36)

[Actually, it's the enormous number of 'dunnos' that make this last category the most interesting. Does it mean that 36% of ALP voters are deaf, dumb and blind? Or live in sheltered workshops? Or under rocks? I mean, this is 2018.]

Re-definitial Dizziness

I'm getting dizzy.

In the beginning was anti-Semitism.

Then along came the Zionist wordsmiths, who gave as 'the new anti-Semitism.'

(Somewhere along the line the hyphen got lost.)

Now, apparently, it's either 'rightwing antisemitism,' or "leftwing antisemitism usually presented as 'anti-Zionist or anti-Israel'." (Antisemitic incidents in Australia up nearly 10% over year, study* says, Helen Davidson, theguardian.com, 28/11/17)

I wonder what "leftwing anti-Semitism [not] usually presented as 'anti-Zionist or anti-Israel'" looks like.

And what tomorrow's debasing of the coin will bring.

[*By the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ).]

Et Tu, ECAJ & AIPAC?

Over at News Corpse, Greg Sheridan's fairly beside himself at the First Coming of King Bibi. Even Fairfax has plonked its useless bum on the proverbial fence for the occasion, with a pro (Anthony Bergin) and a con (Stuart Rees) on its opinion pages. But this week's (17/2) Australian Jewish News is strangely silent on the subject, no front cover pic of the Zionist Messiah, no editorial encomiums, nothing really.

Could this AJN report on page 3 possibly have anything to do with it?:

"Australian Jewish leaders have expressed concern over Israel's controversial new legislation on settlements, describing the law which would retroactively legalise an estimated 4000 West Bank settler homes built on privately own Palestinian land as 'troubling' and 'counterproductive'. In a joint statement, Executive Council of Australian Jewry [ECAJ] president Anton Block and executive director Peter Wertheim said the Regulation Law passed by the Knesset last week, which prevents the government demolishing the homes and forces the landowners to accept compensation, is 'very troubling'. 'It seeks to legalise retroactively outposts that were built on land in the West Bank that had been privately owned by Palestinians. At the time they were built these outposts were illegal under Israeli law,' Block and Wertheim noted. Stating that the law was enacted 'despite the opposition of the Attorney-General of Israel', they said, 'Both he and the Defence Minister, as well as many legal experts, are predicting that the law will be successfully challenged in the Supreme Court of Israel. We can only hope that occurs, reaffirming that Israel is the only country in the Middle East that is a democracy governed by the rule of law'." (Leaders unsettled by settlement legislation)

OMFG, they're criticising Israeli colonisation here, folks! ECAJ is criticising core Zionist business, namely the theft and settlement of any and every bit of Palestinian land they can possibly lay their hands on!

So WTF is going on here? These boZos have spent their entire lives cheering on, and otherwise aiding and abetting, Israel's colonisation of occupied (River-to-Sea) Palestine, but this latest land grab is a bridge too far? C'mon, guyZ, talk about swallowing the proverbial camel but straining at the proverbial gnat.

But lest one think that the Zcales have at last fallen entirely from their eyes, Block and Wertheim are really only worried that "this episode will... have  the 'unfortunate effect of feeding the false narrative that settlements are the primary reason for the absence of peace and will provide the Palestinians with a further excuse to keep avoiding a return to direct negotiations with Israel'."

(As Yishai Fleisher, the International spokesman of the Jewish community of Hebron, said in the New York Times recently: "Israel never seems to have a good answer to accusations against the settlement enterprise. Whenever the claim that Israel stole Palestinian lands is heard, Israel's answers inevitably are: 'We invented the cellphone,' 'We have gay rights,' 'We fly to help Haiti after an earthquake.' Obvious obfuscation. And when pushed to explain why the much-promised two-state solution is perenially stuck, the response is always to blame Arab obstructionism." (A settler's view of Israel's future, 14/2/17))

But there's more:

"Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC) national chairman Mark Leibler and executive director Colin Rubenstein said AIJAC believes the bill is a 'counterproductive and unwise piece of legislation aimed at pandering to fringe constituencies at the expense of Israel's integrity and image abroad'."

Whaaat?! Did they say "fringe"? As in 'lunatic fringe'? OMFG, they're calling Israeli colonisers, pioneers, FFS, who are merely doing what Zionist colonisers, formerly known as kibbutzniks, have been doing ever since Balfour gave them Britain's blessing in 1917, lunatics! Can you believe it?

Nonetheless, they too insist that "the Palestinian refusal to negotiate, not settlements" is "the biggest barrier to peace."

(Reread Fleisher.)

Seriously - well, not really - you've got to feel sorry for the current King of the Colonies once he gets to Sydney. Should Block, Wertheim, Leibler and Rubes draw too close to Caesar, will he fix them with his eye, and ask, Et tu, ECAJ & AIJAC?

Whited Sepulchres

Not one, not two, but three Zionist lobbyists in three days in the mainstream press. Top that!

And all pointing the finger at, and pontificating on, the likes of Pauline Hanson, Sonia Kruger and 'Islamism', while of course ignoring the evils of the apartheid state, the defence of which is their real shtick.

Never has Matthew 23:27 seemed more appropriate: "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.

1) The Executive Council of Australian Jewry's Peter Wertheim:

"Hanson has often denied that her views and her party's policies have anything to do with racism and bigotry, but it is difficult to see how else one can characterise her numerous public pronouncements attributing negative behaviour and traits to groups of people on account of their ethnic or religious background..." (Perils of Pauline far from unique, The Australian, 18/7/16)

You mean like the numerous public pronouncements attributing negative behaviour and traits to Palestinian Arabs regularly heard in Israel?

2) The Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council's Colin Rubenstein:

"This ideology is best described as Islamism, a violent, totalitarian ideology which argues all political and social problems can be resolved by returning to an imagined version of the Islamic caliphate which existed in the time of the prophet. This ideology is a political belief system - like communism or fascism - and not at all the same as the religion, Islam." (Let's speak clearly on Islamism, Sydney Morning Herald, 20/7/16)

You mean like political Zionism, a violent, totalitarian ideology which argues all political and social problems can be resolved for Jews by returning to an imagined version of the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah which existed in the Iron Age?

3) The Australia/ Israel & Jewish Affairs Council's Mark Leibler:

"As a person of the Jewish faith, racism and its consequences are etched into my soul. Racism robs a people of their choices and opportunities, their homes, their livelihoods and their sense of confidence and security." (Lurches to the right reveal racism is the problem, not the solution, The Australian, 20/7/16)*

You mean like Zionist apartheid robs the Palestinian people of their choices and opportunities, their homes, their livelihoods, and indeed their very lives?

Drover Dan & His Good Mate, Mike, Ride Again

Now that Labor's shadow minister for Israel, Michael Danby, has been re-elected in his seat of Melbourne Ports, and his brother-in-Zion, Mike Kelly, has won back his old seat of Eden Monaro, can we expect the pair to once again resume their practice of rounding up and "corralling" their Labor colleagues in support of Israel, much as they did in 2009 in the wake of Israel's Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Ghetto?

(To see what I mean, please re-read my 1/3/09 post Nipping at their Heels.)

If so, one hapless colleague they'll probably be keeping an eye on and/or singling out for special attention is the new Labor member for the south-western Sydney seat of Macarthur, Dr Michael Freelander, profiled in the Australian Jewish News as "a senior pediatrician at Campbelltown and Camden hospitals with more than three decades of medical practice in the region," and described as "a proud Zionist." (Jewish candidates setting their sights on Canberra, 1/7/16)

The extent of the good doctor's "Zionism", of course, remains to be determined, but it's clear he's hardly in the Danby mould, because, as the AJN just had to point out, "he landed himself in hot water earlier in this campaign when he compared the Manus Island detention centre for refugees to a concentration camp. He apologised for offending the Jewish community and said that he was aware that he chose the wrong words." (ibid)

Judging by his apology, Freelander's chances of standing up to a Danby/Kelly damage control exercise following the next, inevitable Israeli outrage aren't looking too good. Still, we live in hope.

Re the election result, I find myself, at least this time around, in full agreement with ECAJ supremo, Peter Wertheim:

"Describing the election of so many Jews as 'a historic first', executive director of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry Peter Wertheim said, 'Nothing could better illustrate how fortunate we are to live in a society where every office or position, no matter how high, is within the reach of any citizen, regardless of his or her ethnic or religious background." (History made with record number of Jews in Parliament, AJN, 8/7/16)

What a pity though he can't say the same about Israel.

'Neither I nor anyone in my organisation...'

23/3/16:

"The University of Sydney is refusing to answer questions relating to its short-lived decision to ban a Palestinian American activist, amid claims administrators singled him out for his support of boycotts against Israel. The university first approved, then banned, then approved again less than 24 hours later an address on Monday by Ali Abunimah, a US-born Princeton and University of Chicago-educated author and journalist.

"On Thursday last week the university informed organisers they must cancel the event, then on Friday it said the problem had been Abunimah's lack of a visa and since he now had one the event could go ahead. Jake Lynch, director of the University's Centre for Peace & Conflict Studies and a supporter of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, said the explanation 'lacks credibility'.

"The HES (Higher Education Supplement) has obtained the email correspondence regarding Abunimah's visit. The organisers sought to book a lecture hall more than a month in advance and, after filling out an application, were told by university venues acting assistant Samantha Dos Santos that 'everything should be fine.' Ms Dos Santos said that if for any reason the event was not approved, 'a reason will be given.'

"On Thursday after 4pm, Ms Dos Santos wrote to the organisers to say the event 'wasn't approved by the university and you'll have to cancel it,' without stating a reason. Soon after 2pm on Friday, though, after a storm of online protest including a petition signed by more than 750 people, university venues manager Caroline Martin-Edwards wrote to organisers to say the issue was visa-related but since Abunimah now had one, the event could proceed given the university was 'deeply committed to free speech and open debate.' In fact, Abunimah, though he had difficulties getting a visa, had received it about 36 hours before Ms Dos Santos issued the email cancelling the event, and online media such as New Matilda reported on Wednesday that the visa had been granted.

"Sceptics of the university's explanation have pointed out that the abortive move to cancel the event came after considerable reporting of the visa controversy, and a couple of days after Robert Goot, president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), issued a media statement describing Abunimah as 'a leader and founder of the loathsome BDS campaign.'

"Among questions Sydney University would not answer was whether University of Michigan art history professor Patricia Simons, who also delivered a public lecture on Monday - in her case on Italian Renaissance painter Jacopo Tintoretto's Susanna & the Elders - also had been screened for whether she had a visa, and how this was done. Associate Professor Lynch said: 'The university should clarify whether it is operating a general policy of checking for itself whether intended visitors to the university have visas to enter Australia or whether Mr Abunimah was singled out. If it is the latter, the university should explain why'." (Sydney fails to clear air over activist ban, Ean Higgins, The Australian, 23/3/16)

24/3/16:

"I refer to your article 'Sydney fails to clear air over activist ban' (23/3). It implies that Sydney University's short-lived decision to cancel a speaking event by anti-Israel campaigner Ali Abinimeh was as a result of my comments criticising him. Neither I nor anyone in my organisation has had any contact with anyone at Sydney University at any time in connection with Abunimah. My statement was about Abunimah's repugnant views, and makes no mention of his visa application." (Letter to editor, Robert Goot, Executive Council of Australian Jewry, 24/3/16)

Here Comes the Rain!

M'Lord Turnbull's elevation of Craig Laundy, the member for Reid, to the post of Assistant Minister for Multicultural Affairs has triggered alarm bells in Lobbyland.

Is there no rest for these eternally vigilant warriors for Zionism?

No sooner have they staved off one existential threat from the NSW Labor grassroots, than M'Lord Turnball throws them this Liberal curveball. At any rate, loins have been girded and talking points sharpened. Operation Inundation has begun.

Here are those talking points, both text and subtext:

Peter Wertheim (Executive Council of Australian Jewry - ECAJ):

"The ECAJ will be seeking a meeting with the Assistant Minister for Multicultural Affairs at the earliest opportunity. Many of our community's most pressing concerns fall within his portfolio - the recrudescence of antisemitism, communal security costs and threats to religious freedoms... We believe that the Asst Min well understands that the responsibility of government is to promote social cohesion, not discord." (Eager to meet a new member of the ministry, jwire.com.au, 17/2/16)

Translation:

It's all about us, ourselves and we. And us, ourselves and we is all about Israel. You see, Mr Laundy, airing doubts about Israel is merely how it begins. Then, before you know it, the social fabric, which rests entirely on love of Israel, is rent and life in Australia will become solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short in the Hobbesian manner. Now you wouldn't want to be responsible for that, would you, Mr Laundy?

Colin Rubenstein (Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council - AIJAC):

"While we have certainly had our concerns about Craig Laundy in the past, especially in terms of his poorly-informed, one-sided comments on Israel and the Middle East we look forward to constructively engaging with him in his new role... We hope his knowledge of Israel and the broader Middle East... will grow, and anticipate he will both better understand and endorse his Government's commendable policies towards Israel and the peace process..."

Translation:

We've got a 5-star re-education camp study tour in the vibrant Land of Our Dreams lined up for you, Mr Laundy. All the right people have been there and done that, and all have returned with the right ideas and singing like canaries. Take Ms Plibersek for instance. She too started out frothing at the mouth. That we could ignore from a mere MP, but once she began to rise through the ranks we had no option but to, as we like to put it - constructively engage - with her. Constructive engagement, you see, is our specialty. We've had almost a hundred years of experience at it. No 'immovable object' has ever been able to withstand our irresistable force. Oh, yes, Mr Laundy, initially she kicked and she screamed, but a few constructive engagement sessions soon wore her down and she eventually took the cure tour. Now look at her! Almost Labor leader! Do you see my point, Mr Laundy? Think about it...

Michael Danby MP:

"Malcolm Turnbull might charm Jewish audiences in Wentworth by joking about being a member of Mishpocha,' but I think the community has a right to be disappointed with his choice for the Multicultural Affairs portfolio... His APAN-inspired 2014 speech on 'International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People,' during which he claimed 'the lobby' was restricting free speech on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; and that Israel's creation was the source of all today's unrest in the Middle East, was as ugly a sentiment as it was factually and historically incorrect. But more than that, inflammatory comments like that are the antithesis of Multiculturalism, and can only serve to create division between communities..."

Translation:

Listen up, Laundy. First, do you know who I am? Right! I'm sooo disappointed in you. Not to mention Mishpocha Malcolm. Second, how very, very dare you! Third - and let's get this straight once and for all - because you obviously weren't paying attention in Sunday school - my mob wrote the script on the Middle East, OK? G-d gave it to us, not them, not just 60 or 70 years ago, but thousands of years ago. So don't think you can just swan around in this joint, shooting off your mouth, without hearing from me, OK?

Pray for the soul of Craig Laundy.

Deconstructing Q&A's 'Anti-Semitism' Segment 1

As usual, what panelists say on Q&A often sorts the wheat from the chaff, particularly when the subject under discussion is Palestine/Israel. Monday's program only reconfirmed my contention. Herewith, a deconstruction in 3 parts:

Erin Gordon: After the Sydney siege, we were all heartened to see the #illridewithyou campaign...

Oh really?

However, I would like to ask the panel 'Who would ride with us, the Australian Jews, if we were to travel in particular areas of Sydney...

Such as?

... in our religious clothing.

Heard the one about the ultra-orthodox rabbi walking down Haldon St, Lakemba?

No?

Neither have I. 

Anti-Semitic attacks have risen 35% in the past year and physical incidents 200%.

You are now entering the realm of 'lies, damn lies and statistics'. Gordon doesn't say so, but her figures are taken from the Executive Council of Australian Jewry's Report on Antisemitism in Australia 2014, which uses the EU Monitoring Centre on Racism's bogus 'working definition' of anti-Semitism, illegitimately incorporating anti-Israel criteria.

IOW, an Israel lobby report based on an Israel-friendly definition of anti-Semitism. 

ECAJ's report is primarily concerned with alleged anti-Semitic comments ("increasingly open anti-Semitism associated with polemical attacks against Israel as part of the fallout of the Israel-Gaza war") arising out of perfectly valid commentary/analysis by journalists and politicians such as Peter Goers, John Lyons, Glen Le Lievre, Bob Carr and Malcolm Fraser. These comments are described as having increased by 35%, ie from 231 (2013) to 312 (2014).

As for "physical incidents" increasing by 200%, this is based on the same report's allegation that "physical attacks" have risen from 5 (2013) to 15 (2014). In the same part of the report, "abuse" is noted to have declined by 35% from 115 (2013) to 75 (2014), but as that doesn't buttress Gordon's argument, it's been conveniently left out.

(On the so-called new anti-Semitism, see my posts: The Tel Aviv Declaration on Combating Criticism of Israel (17/5/13); Criminalising Criticism of Israel (24/7/11); The Analogies That Got Away (25/4/09); Sheridan in Love 4 (17/5/09); Backman & the New Anti-Semitism (30/1/09).)

Why is there this precedent [sic] and yet we have received no widespread support from the general public?

Maybe because the public knows that the new anti-Semitism is really Islamophobia.

Is it not alarming to the public that the hashtag #Hitlerwasright trended worldwide last year?

Absolutely! But with apartheid Israel parading itself as the Jewish State what can you expect from the hoi polloi? 

Tony Jones: Miriam Margolyes?

Miriam Margolyes (taking the above question at face value): People don't like Jews.

In retrospect I'm sure Miriam meant 'some' people. After all, such an assertion flies in the face of her testimony in last week's Good Weekend (Miss Margolyes Mysteries, Jane Cadzow, 21/2/15): "Everywhere I go in Australia... people come up to me in the street and say, 'I love you!'"

"It's not comfortable to say that and it's not comfortable to hear it. After the holocaust, it was not fashionable or possible to be anti-Semitic because of the horrors that Jews experienced during the holocaust. But because of the actions of the State of Israel and the appalling treatment of the Israelis towards the Palestinians, and the settlements that have been built in contravention of United Nations rulings and the support that has been given by American Jews and Australian Jews to what is going on in Israel, anti-Semitism has again reared its horrific, ugly head and anti-Semitism is as unacceptable as anti-Muslim feeling.

Tony Jones: I am just going to go back to our questioner. Do you accept that response? I mean their appears to be blame levelled at the state of Israel for the rise in anti-Semitism.

Appears to be...?

Erin Gordon: I mean, Israel and Judaism, they are interlinked, but they are separate things.

So who routinely conflates the two, Ms Gordon?

Not every Jew supports everything that Israel does, like, but why should we still face some anti-Semitism that's going on in Australia, not in Israel? Why is that an acceptable level whereas the #illridewithyou campaign, just because of the incidents of a group of people in another country?

Miriam Margolyes: I think you are right to be furious about it and I would be, as a Jew and as a non-Zionist Jew. I am shocked that there are anti-Semitic outbursts but it hasn't got to the level that it did in France where people were killed. Remember that. And we have to just keep fighting it and demand that we be given the respect that all citizens should enjoy and a sense of safety that all citizens should enjoy, but you asked me why, and I think that is the reason. I think it is because of Israel.

Tony Jones: Can I just ask you a logical follow-up question? Is the rise in Islamophobia related to what happens in Arab countries?

Miriam Margolyes: I have no doubt that it is because of these murderous bastards and the terrible things they are doing. Of course people are going to react in the way that they do, but just the same an ordinary person would be horrified if they saw what goes on in Gaza and Palestine. It is unacceptable, and when you know that something is morally unacceptable you have to do something about it. Not to the level of murder. That is not acceptable.

To be continued...

Exposing ECAJ's BDS 'Expose'

Here we go:

"An information booklet about the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel has been sent to politicians, journalists and key decision-makers by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ)." (ECAJ exposes BDS, The Australian Jewish News, 9/5/14)

And what is it that this expose will be telling its readers?

Basically, that "BDS leaders are not seeking a peaceful two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian issue," but rather "the right of return of seven million ancestors of Palestinians displaced during the Arab-initiated war of 1948," which "would demographically change the Jewish State into a Jewish minority state."

Now if we were to translate this particular specimen of Zionist spin into language more in keeping with the historical record, this is what we'd get:

In addition to an end to the illegal, brutal and ongoing (1967-?) Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, BDS seeks the international law-backed right of return of Palestinian refugees (from whatever generation) ethnically cleansed from 78% their homeland by Zionist terror gangs both before and after the intervention of Arab forces in May 1948, which thankfully prevented the ethnic cleansing of the remaining 22% of Palestine, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, at the time.

OK, having sorted that out, let's get the substance of ECAJ's brief straight: a minority community of European settlers invades Palestine under the protection of British bayonets, achieving critical mass by 1948 sufficient to oust its native Arab majority. Having thus won de facto majority status, these colons view the return of those ousted as a threat to their 1948 ethno-religious gerrymander, fearing a reversion to their pre-1948 minority status.

Sorry guys, if majority rule by the natives was good enough for South Africa in 1994, it's good enough for Palestine now, and your insufferable hysteria over the 'destruction' of the Jewish state should carry about as much weight among people of conscience as did the hysteria over the 'destruction' of White South Africa displayed by its defenders at the time.

Now I can understand, but not support, Israeli Jews wishing to maintain their ethno-religious gerrymander, which is to say their monopoly on power. The prospect of sharing a place with those you've been brutalising for decades must feel pretty damn uncomfortable.

But what's really at stake here for ECAJ and its constituents? Just what is it that Australian (or American or British or...) Zionists so value about a Jewish state in Palestine that they have to campaign against BDS, which is to say fundamental Palestinian rights, so vigorously?  Considering the time, energy, and treasure spent by them on defending Israeli apartheid, you'd imagine that something pretty damn important was at stake, right?

Well, mystery solved, because in the same issue of the AJN we find an online opinion poll of its readers which asks the question: 'What's the best thing about Israel?'

37% answered 'The Jewishness'; 31% 'The food'; and 14% 'The weather'. That is, 82% of respondents summed up their interest in Israel as Jewishness, food and weather.

So, to clarify: for Australian (or American or British or...) Zionists, the anti-Palestinian, ethno-religious gerrymander of 1948, which underpins Israel's Jewish majority, must remain forever unchanged so that they can visit what amounts effectively to a Jewish theme park, with just the right proportions of Jewishness, food, and weather, whenever they so desire.

Next to that, the fundamental right of the Palestinian people to return to their country, enshrined in Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is apparently a thing of little consequence.

But to return to the subject of BDS:

"The booklet... explores the links between BDS activities in Australia and anti-Semitism, including Holocaust denial and calls for violence against Jews."

Links? What links? There are none.

Two points here:

1) According to the booklet, "the anti-Semitism [is] implicit in seeking to deny the Jewish people their right for national self-determination."

The Jewish people?

Make no mistake, ECAJ isn't talking here merely of Israeli Jews. It's talking about all Jews (whether Australians or Americans or British or...), people for whom Israel, as indicated, represents little more than Jewishness, food and weather. And these are the people ECAJ imagines, in line with Zionist ideology, have a right of national self-determination in Palestine which trumps that of its indigenous Arab population. Seriously.

2) The linking of BDS and anti-Semitism here surely lets the cat out of the bag with regard to the current debate over the removal of Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act. For weeks now, we've been bombarded in the ms media with the message by Zionist representatives that 18C is necessary as a protection against Holocaust denial, long ago defined as the very acme of anti-Semitism. If the same people are allowed to get away today with defining BDS as anti-Semitism, and 18C remains on the books, don't be surprised if it's used to harass and silence supporters of BDS.

Why I Can't Get Too Excited Over Section 18C

This post was prompted by the report in yesterday's Sydney Morning Herald - Jewish community opposes changes to 18C racial vilification laws. Inevitably, the headlined term 'Jewish community' reduces in the text to "the largest Jewish peak body in Australia," specifically, the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ).

As far as the ECAJ (or those who take it seriously, whether Jew or Gentile) is concerned, the 4 nasties cited in Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act, namely 'offending, insulting, humiliating and intimidating', represent more than just racist abuse requiring exposure and condemnation but are the first flickering signs of a potential pogrom or worse. As ECAJ's submission on the subject of 18C is reported to have put it: "Acts of violence begin with words."

Now if the ECAJ were merely just a "Jewish peak body," as Fairfax journalist Sarah Whyte terms it, I might be inclined to take its opposition to Senator Brandis' proposed removal of Section 18C from the Act seriously.

The problem I have, however, is that the ECAJ is also a Zionist organisation, that is a supporter of a Jewish state in Palestine with all that that entails for the dire fate of Palestine's indigenous non-Jewish population. In the words of the Council's constitution, one of its three objects is "To support and strengthen the connection of Australian Jewry with the State of Israel." (3.1(c))

Would that all the Palestinian people had to put up with were the 4 nasties of Section 18C. Or your common and garden bigots. Or the likes of Andrew Bolt.

But no, they've been under 24/7 assault by Israel's 4 nasties - colonization, dispossession, expulsion and occupation - since 1917. Any wonder why I can't get too excited over "Jewish community" objections to the removal of 18C?

Jake Lynch Update 5

An unusual article this, for The Australian:

"A Jewish association has branded the racial discrimination case against University of Sydney's Jake Lynch counter-productive, saying it has only raised the profile of his support for the Boycott, Divestment [&] Sanctions campaign against Israel. Since the Israeli legal activist group Shurat HaDin launched the lawsuit in the Federal Court, Professor Lynch's stand has become a cause celebre in sections of the academic community, claiming the right to freedom of speech and academic expression is under attack... Two new groups have been established to support him and the global BDS movement, including one among university staff. One of the organisers of the Sydney Staff for BDS group, lecturer Nick Riemer, said he and other staff decided to create it 'because of what's happened to Jake'. The groups have helped raise about $20,000 towards Professor Lynch's legal defence, he has been invited to address BDS public meetings around the country, and one recent BDS event in Sydney in his support drew about 200 people. One of the pro-Lynch speakers at the Sydney fundraiser, Jewish Israeli academic Marcelo Svirsky who is a lecturer at the University of Wollongong, says he will walk from Sydney to Canberra later this year to raise awareness of the BDS campaign. Dr Svirsky said he would stop in towns along the way to deliver public addresses and then lodge a submission in parliament calling on the government to back BDS. Executive Council of Australian Jewry executive director Peter Wertheim said Shurat HaDin's legal action against Professor Lynch was 'the wrong way to oppose BDS. Regardless of the outcome, the Shurat HaDin court case would give a very marginal BDS campaign in Australia undeserved exposure and a shot in the arm,' Mr Wertheim said. 'Our organisation's strategy has been to expose the aims and methods of the BDS campaign in the marketplace of ideas'..."

Regarding that last sentence, the aims of the BDS movement, for those still wondering, are quite simple: to pressure Israel to end its occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip; grant full equality to the Palestinian minority in Israel itself; and allow Palestinian refugees, expelled from their homeland in 1948 and again in 1967, to return to their homes and lands in Palestine/Israel. BDS is therefore about implementing basic human rights. How one can oppose these is frankly beyond me.

As for "exposing" BDS in the "marketplace of ideas," this has so far manifested itself in mobilising Australian politicians, both state and federal, to smear supporters of BDS as anti-Semites and Nazis, ongoing attacks of like nature in the Murdoch press, the establishment of links with the police (see my 28/10/11 post Israel 101 for Cops), and most significantly, the actual or threatened blocking of funding to academics such as Jake Lynch who support BDS (see my 29/1/13 post The Punishing of Jake Lynch). So much for the "marketplace of ideas."

To continue with the above report:

"Dr Svirsky, a political scientist who grew up in Argentina but moved to Israel after being conscripted during the Falklands War, said 'there is increasing support for Lynch because of this particular court case. For me the BDS is about not just ending the Israeli occupation, but also the rules of apartheid in Israel', he said." (Discrimination case 'raising profile of BDS', Ean Higgins, The Australian, 26/4/14)

All credit to Dr Svirsky.

Clarification Sought

Notice how Netanyahu describes criticism of Israel as vilification:

"In a world where Israel is vilified, castigated, where a beleaguered democracy is defending its very life against radical Islamist forces, we don't always get credit..." Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, quoted in Netanyahu plans historic visit, John Lyons/ Jared Owens, The Australian, 20/3/14)

Notice how local Zionist lobbyist, Peter Wertheim, describes criticism of a "group" as vilification:

"The Jewish community has been at the forefront of opposition to changes to the [Racial Discrimination] Act. Peter Wertheim, head of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, points out laws against vilification operate in Britain, Canada... 'The protections provided by section 18C are similar to those that exist under defamation laws, but the protections extend to groups and not merely individuals'." (The recovery of liberty, Christian Kerr, The Australian, 20/3/14)

When is someone - anyone - in the corporate media going to ask the ubiquitous Mr Wertheim what he means by "group," and specifically, whether the term encompasses Israel/Israelis/Zionists?

The Go-To Man

"A political fight is brewing between Attorney-General George Brandis and the Institute of Public Affairs. Senator Brandis has angered the IPA and other powerful Liberal Party allies, who believe the A-G is using tricky language to dilute his promise to repeal a controversial section of the race discrimination laws... 'After a spirited campaign from some community groups, it seems the A-G has been having second thoughts,' [IPA executive director John] Roskam said. Senator Brandis is now wedged between the Liberal Party's natural allies on the right and a powerful coalition of ethnic groups... Leaders from Australia's Jewish, Muslim, Chinese, Greek, Armenian, Lebanese, Vietnamese and indigenous populations have united against abolishing or weakening the race hate laws." (Think tank says Brandis is backtracking on hate laws, Jonathan Swan, Sydney Morning Herald, 12/3/14)

Some community groups? Hm... funny how the list of such groups invariably begins with 'Jewish'. Maybe Swan will go on to quote one of the leaders of one of the other deeply concerned groups. Armenian perhaps? Or maybe Greek? After all, as we all know, an Armenian or a Greek can't put his head out the door here in Australia without being subjected to a hailstorm of racial abuse, right? Why, only the other day I...

Or maybe not:

"Executive Council of Australian Jewry executive director Peter Wertheim said he could not recall 'any other issue on which there has been such unity of purpose and strength of feeling across such a diverse group of communities'."

Now where have I seen Wertheim's name before on this matter? Oh, yes, in another (dare I say more informative?) report by Jonathan Swan - see my 17/11/13 post The Jewish Paradox.

Notwithstanding "such unity of purpose and strength of feeling" among Armenians and Greeks, it's funny how Mr Wertheim always seems to pop up as the go-to man on the subject. Why is it so?

With My Own Eyes

At last, the case of Sydney University's Professor Jake Lynch has made it into the Sydney Morning Herald in the form of an article by Richard Ackland on Attorney-General George Brandis' plan to strip the Racial Discrimination Act of its prohibition on 'offending and insulting' ethnic/racial minorities (section 18C) in the interests of professional offenders such as Murdoch mouthpiece Andrew Bolt. Needless to say, Brandis will be spinning it as a blow for free speech.

Ackland makes the perfectly valid point that:

"What is now a distressing hypocrisy surrounding the campaign to reform or do away with section 18C of the act is that its advocates are generally the same people cheering on the use of the act as the basis of proceedings in the Federal Court against University of Sydney academic Jake Lynch. He is being sued under different provisions of the act by Shurat HaDin - the Israel Law centre. The application was filed last October and it alleges that Lynch, from the Centre for Peace & Conflict Studies, refused to support an application by Israeli academic Dan Avnon for a Zelman Cowan fellowship at the University of Sydney. It is claimed that in an act of racial discrimination, he deprived Avnon of his professional rights. Lynch is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel over its treatment of Palestinians. The Shurat HaDin statement of claim goes further and says that by calling for a boycott of Israel, Lynch adds to a campaign that disadvantages owners of Israeli-related businesses and deprives Israelis of cultural opportunities such as seeing Santana and Pink Floyd. Avnon, of the Hebrew University does not seem to have suffered a setback as a result of Lynch's lack of support. He lists on his resume, among his forthcoming appointments, that he will be the Sir Zelman Cowan visiting scholar at the University of Sydney this year. So, on the one hand the act is evil for affecting the free speech in the narrow provisions that deal with offending and insulting ethnic and racial minorities, but is heroic when its broad provisions are engaged as a basis of proceedings against lefty academics in the BDS movement. The whole thing could land Brandis in a bit of a pickle." (Free speech is a double-edged sword, 17/1/14)

Ackland lists a number of organisations - Aboriginal, Greek, Chinese etc - who have been lobbying Senator Brandis not to ditch 18C. Included in the list is the professionally offended Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ).

Its involvement in this issue, of course, raises the perennial question of whether Jews, as a purely faith community, should be so involved.

On the other hand, if Jews are seen as an ethnic/racial community, in line with the Zionist 'Jewish people' dogma, which ECAJ subscribes to, one wonders whether Ackland understands that ECAJ, as an organisation that wishes to retain 18C but is part and parcel of the Zionist/Murdoch attack on BDS and its proponents such as Professor Lynch, is also in something of a pickle, its unconvincing attempt to distance itself from Shurat HaDin's litigation by describing it as "inappropriate and counter-productive" notwithstanding.

As Shurat HaDin's Australian operative, Andrew (Akiva) Hamilton, has said:

"There is more than one way to confront BDS and our efforts complement those of the ECAJ." (Shurat HaDin, ECAJ disagree on skinning the BDS cat, j-wire.com.au, 3/11/13)

Took the words right out of my mouth, Akiva! As Irgun leader Menachem Begin might have said in the late 40s: 'There is more than one way to deal with the British and the Arabs, and our efforts complement those of the Haganah nicely, wink, wink, nudge, nudge, know what I mean?'

Still, all credit to Ackland for raising the case of Jake Lynch. I hope he reports on the coming court case in February.

The Jewish Paradox

"Jewish leaders are preparing to fight the [Federal] government's plans to weaken race hate laws, saying they could encourage persecution and racially-motivated violence." (Jewish concern at plan to change hate laws, Jonathan Swan, Sydney Morning Herald, 15/11/13)

Hm... persecution and racially-motivated violence.

Presumably, these guys are concerned about anti-Semitism, right? Jews coming under attack because they're Jews.

But read on and you find it's not that simple:

"Mr Wertheim [the executive director of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ)]* has warned that the 'wholesale repeal' of sections of the [Racial Discrimination] act would not only prevent vilified groups from defending their reputations legally, but would also encourage more sinister forms of hate speech. 'It would... open the door to importation into Australia of the hatreds and violence of overseas conflicts'..." (ibid)

So that's it: what they're really worried about is the spillover effect of overseas conflicts, specifically, the spillover effect of the Middle East conflict on the community they purport to lead.

The trouble is, and the average reader is unlikely to pick this up from such a report, Wertheim and other Jewish leaders also act as lobbyists/apologists for Israel. In that capacity, they emerge as partisans in the very conflict they fear could affect the well-being of Jews here in Australia.

As political Zionists, of course, they routinely conflate anti-Semitism with anti-Zionism, which is to say anti-Israelism. For them, criticism of Israel, its ideology and practice, is either anti-Semitism pure and simple, or verging on anti-Semitism, or crossing the line into anti-Semitism, the circumlocutions for smearing a critic of Israel as an anti-Semite being many and varied.

Unfortunately, this is where the matter becomes problematic for the community they supposedly represent - as veteran British journalist and author Alan Hart so lucidly points out: 

"In my book Zionism: The Real Enemy of the Jews, the answer to the question of what Zionism would do in the event of mission failure was given to me by Golda Meir in one of my interviews with her for the BBC's flagship Panorama programme. She said that in the event of a doomsday situation, Israel 'would be prepared to take the region and the whole world down with it.'

"The Jewish paradox comes down to this. Israel was created by Zionism to guarantee the well-being and existence of the Jews, but that well-being and perhaps even existence is most seriously threatened by Zionism's policies and actions.

"How can that possibly be true?  

"What we are witnessing today is a rising, global tide of anti-Israelism. It is NOT a manifestation of anti-Semitism, meaning that it's not being driven by prejudice against or loathing and even hatred of Jews just because they are Jews. Anti-Israelism is being provoked by Israel's arrogance of power, its sickening self-righteousness and its contempt for international law in general and the rights of Palestinians in particular.

"The danger for Jews everywhere is that anti-Israelism could be transformed into rampant and rabid anti-Semitism. The most explicit warning that this could happen was given by Yehoshafat Harkabi, Israel's longest serving Director of Military Intelligence. In his book Israel's Fateful Hour, published in English in 1988, he wrote this (my emphasis added):

'Israel is the criterion according to which all Jews will tend to be judged. Israel as a Jewish state is an example of the Jewish character, which finds free and concentrated expression within it. Anti-Semitism has deep and historical roots. Nevertheless, any flaw in Israeli conduct, which initially is cited as anti-Israelism, is likely to be transformed into empirical proof of the validity of anti-Semitism. It would be a tragic irony if the Jewish state, which was intended to solve the problem of anti-Semitism, was to become a factor in the rise of anti-Semitism. Israelis must be aware that the price of their misconduct is paid not only by them but also Jews throughout the world'." (The Jewish paradox arising from the curse of Zionism, Alan Hart, sabbah.biz, 11/5/13)

(The Attorney-General, Senator George Brandis, who is behind the push to remove those sections of the RDA that make it an offence to offend another person on grounds of race or ethnicity, has the interests of the right-wing commentariat, particularly Andrew Bolt, very much at heart. At the same time, however,  Brandis has been rambammed (2009 & 2010) and has form in raising the concerns of the Israel lobby in the Senate. (See my 29/5/09 post Her Brilliant Career.) The question arises: can he please both interest groups with his new legislation? Watch this space...)

[*For a critique of the role of ECAJ and other Zionist lobby groups from within the Jewish community, see my 20/6/13 post Join the Dots...]

Danby to Keep Young Bill on Straight & Narrow

"Bill Shorten embodies the traditional core values of the Labor Party, and his solid support for Israel reflects that. Mr Shorten knows, as we do, that bipartisan support for Israel is an integral part of the fabric of our country's foreign policy."(AIJAC national chairman Mark Leibler, The Australian Jewish News, 18/10/13)

While firefighters in NSW are battling desperately to contain and extinguish blazes across the state, a battle of far greater import, unheralded by the media, has been fought by a small band of heroes against a fire that came close to consuming the very core principle - nay, the very heart and soul - of the federal Labor Party: its unshakeable, unswerving, uncritical, river deep and mountain high love for Israel.

Make no mistake about it, in igniting the (dead) wood of the parliamentary Labor party last November, Labor's pyromaniacal foreign minister, Bob Carr, triggered a conflagration that almost destroyed the PM herself!

Still, PMs come and PMs go.

Far, far worse, Carr's incendiary act came close to changing forever the very way we vote - vis-a-vis Israel - in the UN General Assembly.

The good news is that now, with Carr's unlamented departure from Labor's parliamentary ranks, the last burning embers of critical thinking on the subject of Israel have finally been extinguished, and the smoke is beginning to clear to reveal the lineaments of a new party firmly under the control of those for whom Israel is, was, and always shall be, the proverbial light on Labor's hill.

I can now reveal that this epic struggle for the Israeli soul of the Australian Labor Party was won largely by the heroic efforts of one man, Michael Danby MP. After all, as this humble and self-effacing man hinted in a recent tweet, it was his Solomonic wisdom that has guided Bill Shorten ever since the latter fell under his spell while barely out of short pants:

"Known Bill since he was 20. Always thought he'd be PM. Hope my (parliamentary secretary) role contributes to his office projecting serious and adult policies." (17/10/13)

Serious and adult policies? Wink, wink, nudge, nudge...

Still, it should not be forgotten that however great has been Danby's role in seeing off Carr and overseeing Bill Shorten's rise and rise to the wuthering heights of Labor leadership, others too have been risking their all in dousing those last flickering embers of critical thinking (on the subject of Israel):

"ECAJ representatives have met with Tanya Plibersek on several occasions, most recently in Sydney last week. The meeting discussed the differences of opinion we had had with the former government but was friendly and constructive', [said ECAJ president Danny Lamm]." (ECAJ on Plibersek: forgive and forget, The Australian Jewish News, 18/10/13)

And just to make sure that Danby's magic on Shorten doesn't wear off, ECAJ "will be working with him to try to reverse some of the poorly considered statements about Israel that were made in the name of the previous government." (ibid)

And just to make sure that ECAJ's magic on Shorten doesn't wear off, AIJAC's Colin Rubinstein "said he was looking forward to working with Shorten and his shadow cabinet." (ibid)

And just to make sure AIJAC's magic on Shorten doesn't wear off...

The Day Julia Gillard Faced the Music

"Explaining why her foreign minister was 'so hostile to Israel' and blaming the Jewish community for the weakness of her cabinet and caucus on Israel - this was what Bob Carr had reduced Julia Gillard to in her final months as prime minister." (Gillard driven over by Carr on Israel, Chris Kenny, The Australian, 12/10/13)

The bastard! Sounds like emotional abuse to me.

OK... For "Jewish community" read 'Israel lobby'.

"Leaked documents reveal the acute embarrassment Senator Carr created for Ms Gillard over the question of Australia's support for Israel... Ms Gillard's briefing notes for a Jewish community [sic] event in Sydney in April included talking points with suggested answers to the question: 'Bob Carr is so hostile to Israel - what are you going to do about it?'"

Can you imagine any other foreign lobby so cocksure of itself as to ask an Australian PM such a question?

"The then prime minister's speaking notes also included a plea for the Jewish community [sic] to lobby Labor MPs to bolster support for her position in cabinet and caucus. 'There were not many voices in caucus,' she complained. 'This community has work to do'."

Can you imagine the leader of any other country calling on a foreign lobby to put pressure on her own parliamentary colleagues in order to achieve its aims?

"The split over the Middle East came to a head last December [sic: November] when Ms Gillard told cabinet of her intention to vote no to a UN resolution giving the Palestinian territories [sic: Authority] observer status at the UN. This triggered a backlash within government, led by Senator Carr, that forced Ms Gillard to back down and instruct Australia's UN ambassador to abstain from the vote. It is the only clear instance of Ms Gillard being thwarted by her own cabinet and caucus... Australia received diplomatic complaints from the US and Israel..."

Ouch!

"... for failing to vote against the resolution, which passed comfortably regardless. And domestically, Jewish community leaders conveyed their disappointed [sic] to the government."

I'm - we're - so sorry, so very, very sorry. Even Bob... No, really!... Please believe me - er, us... What's that?... I owe you one?... I see... Yes, I've got a pencil... April 23?... Chifley Tower?... Right... OK, OK, don't worry, I'll be there, promise...

"So on April 23, when Ms Gillard went to a high-powered lunch at Chifley Tower, hosted by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, she was in a difficult position. At the event she would become the first Australian politician to sign the London Declaration on [Combating] Antisemitism."*

Penance!

But that wasn't all:

"But she also might might have to apologise for her foreign minister, who had led the charge on the UN vote and also had made strident comments about Israeli settlements on the West Bank being illegal. 'I know Bob is genuinely committed to Israel's security and survival,' her speaking notes suggested. 'He feels exceptionally strongly on the settlements'."

What kind of political system do we have where a PM has to - or feels she has to - grovel like this to a foreign lobby? Or even blame the lobby for her not being able to deliver the goods in the manner to which it's become expected:

"The notes also directly addressed the way Ms Gillard was rolled by her party on the UN resolution; and they suggested putting the onus back on the Jewish community [sic]. 'There were not as many voices in cabinet supporting a 'no' vote on that resolution,' they prompted. 'There were not many voices in caucus. There were a lot of members who should have been heard from - and who were not. So I believe this exposed a weakness in the community's [sic] reach compared with previous years'."

Where was this woman's, this nation's, dignity?

And the near future?

"Once Labor's new leadership team is resolved on Sunday, it can expect to be lobbied fervently by the Jewish community [sic] to strengthen its support."

Back to the grovel...

(For my complete coverage of this issue see my posts: Australia's Foreign Policy Shame (28/11/12); While You Weren't Looking (1/12/12); Julia the Downhearted (6/12/12); The Prisoner of Zion (4/12/12); The Prime Minister Who Put Her Job on the Line for Israel (18/1/13).)

[*On the London Declaration see my posts: The Latest Prime Ministerial Kowtow (28/4/13); Behind the Anti-Semitism Industry (30/4/13); The Tel Aviv Declaration on Combating Criticism of Israel (17/5/13).]

PS: Make of this what you will: "Your story 'Gillard driven over by Carr on Israel' (12-13/10), refers to a lunch attended by Julia Gillard on April 23 organised by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry. It alleges that Ms Gillard's 'speaking notes' included 'a plea for the Jewish community to lobby Labor MPs to bolster her support in cabinet and caucus'. As one of the organisers of the lunch who sat alongside the prime minister, I can say without qualification that Ms Gillard, who spoke without notes, made no statements of the kind referred to in the article at the lunch, openly or in private conversations with the guests. If any such statements were included by Ms Gillard's staff in her briefing or speaking notes, as the article seems to claim, she did not use them. Nor did Ms Gillard or any of her parliamentary colleagues or staff make any such statements to the ECAJ at any other time." Dr Danny Lam, ECAJ president, Sydney, NSW (Letter to The Australian, 14/10/13)

PPS: Make of this 14/10 twitter exchange what you will:

Jack Sumner: Letter in Oz fr Pres. Exec Council Aust. Jewry indicates @chriskenny piece 'Gillard driven over by Carr on Israel' is a misrepresentation.
Chris Kenny: No, your tweet is a misrepresentation. Letter says nothing of sort and is not at odds with story at all. Facts. Try them.
Jack Sumner: Your piece based on leaked speaking notes which Gillard did not have at lunch or use in her address. Facts. Try them.
Chris Kenny: Politicians don't take their briefing notes to lunch. Strangely enough they are for briefing. You could try Cuba...
Jack Sumner: "If any such statements were included --- in her briefing --- she did not use them." Don't recall any mention of that in ur piece.
Jack Sumner: As I said a misrepresentation.
Chris Kenny: Don't know or care what she said... the story was about the briefing notes... Bad luck.

Anatomy of a Beat-Up

*Sigh* - yet another Christian Kerr EXCLUSIVE in the Australian:

The headline: ANU faces rage over conference

Really? It must be a pretty outrageous conference then:

"Australian National University officials have gone to ground in the face of Jewish community outrage for hosting Middle East hardliners at a Human Rights in Palestine conference this week."

Right.

So a conference on Palestinian rights is ipso facto "outrageous," and anyone speaking at it is ipso facto a "hardliner." (Definitions courtesy of the "Jewish community," aka the Executive Council of Australian Jewry's Peter Wertheim, and the Australian Union of Jewish Students' Dean Sherr.)

Now if the conference were about human rights in Burma or Tibet, say, it would no doubt be seen as being to the university's credit, but the very fact that the ANU is hosting a conference on Palestinian human rights apparently constitutes a damning indictment of the institution:

"The ANU was included in the international top 30 institutions in the QS World University Rankings released yesterday, but the conference has led to questions being asked about the university's credibility."

And who is asking the questions?

Now for those "hardliners" and their 'crimes'. (Beware, you are about to enter a Zionist twilight zone of false allegations, smear tactics and innuendo.):

There's Richard Falk, professor of international law at Princeton University and the UN's special rapporteur for human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, "who was publicly rebuked by UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon in 2011 for 'preposterous' remarks questioning whether the September 11 terror attacks were orchestrated by the US government."

Falk, of course, has made no such claim. His crime  - apart from standing up for Palestinian rights - seems to consist of being sufficiently open-minded to have once raised the idea of an independent investigation into the 9/11 attacks.

(Incidentally, if it's "preposterous" you want, look no further than Ban - Is anyone home? - Ki-moon: "United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon met with students at the UN headquarters in Jerusalem on Friday afternoon, and admitted that his organisation was biased against Israel. Responding to a student who said Israelis felt their country was discriminated against in the international organisation, Ban confirmed that there was a biased attitude towards the Israeli people and Israeli government, stressing that it was 'an unfortunate situation'." (UN chief admits bias against Israel, Omri Efraim, ynetnews.com, 16/8/13))

There's Palestinian activist Hanan Ashrawi of Sydney Peace Prize (2003) fame, "who was among a few PLO members who in 1996 voted not to remove clauses in the PLO charter calling for Israel's destruction." (That, BTW, is a Zionist distortion of the reference, in Article 15 of the now defunct 1968 Palestinian National Charter, to the need to "eliminate Zionism in Palestine." Eliminating Zionism means no more and no less than dismantling Israel's system of apartheid legislation, which condemns Israeli Palestinians to second class citizenship and Palestinian refugees to eternal exile.)

The simple fact of the matter here is that not one Israeli government has ever lifted a finger to amend any of Israel's discriminatory and exclusionary (that is, anti-Palestinian) laws and practices.

Finally, there's Israeli activist Jeff Halper, who allegedly "claimed in 2011 that Israel has developed 'spectral dust' it could spray over wide areas of land, every grain of which was a sensor programmed with a person's DNA to track, locate and kill that individual."

I'm sorry, I've given up on this one. Trying to track it down to any credible source is about as fruitful as the search for Saddam Hussein's mythical people-shredder.

Having marshaled the suspects and their alleged crimes, judge and jury in the form of Zionist apologist Wertheim and footie fanatic* Sherr (aka 'the Jewish community') are duly wheeled in to deliver the guilty verdict:

Wertheim: "A conference that features fringe conspiracy theorists and ideologues and omits recognised scholars in the field has no academic credibility. It is appalling that one of our top universities, the ANU, seems no longer to understand the difference between genuine scholarship and political advocacy."

Sherr: "It is highly concerning to see someone with such a history of anti-Semitic slurs invited on to [sic] Australian university campuses. We repeatedly come up against extreme anti-Israel groups on campus that blur the line between attacking Israel and attacking Jews. Our fear is Falk will only inflame this."

"Sigh" - only in Murdoch's Australian...

[*Check out his tweets.]

Bishop Takes Axe to Human Rights Activism

On 11 July 2011 the Israeli Knesset approved a Law for Prevention of Damage to State of Israel through Boycott.

According to Wikipedia "[t]he law states that individuals or organizations who publicize a call for an economic, cultural or academic boycott against a person or entity merely because of its affiliation to the State of Israel and/or to an Israeli institute and/or to a specific region under Israeli control, may be sued civilly, in tort, by a party claiming that it might be damaged by such a boycott. The law also allows Israeli authorities to deny benefits from individuals or organizations - such as tax exemptions or participation in government contracts - if they have publicized a call to boycott and/or if they have obligated to participate in a boycott."

Unfortunately, this particular attack on human rights activism has finally found its way to these shores, and a variant of same is now being promoted by opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman, Julie Bishop, who has just declared that "[t]he Coalition will institute a policy across government that ensures no grants of taxpayers' funds are provided to individuals or organisations which actively support the BDS campaign." (Libs to cut funding for anti-Israel activists, Ean Higgins, The Australian, 25/5/13)

And who should she be in her sights but Associate Professor Jake Lynch of Sydney University's Centre for Peace & Conflict Studies (CPACS):

"It is inappropriate for Associate Professor Lynch to use his role as director of the taxpayer-funded CPACS... in support of the anti-Semitic BDS campaign." (ibid)

Not that Bishop is operating entirely under her own steam in this matter, of course. The usual suspects are never far away:

"Australia-Israel & Jewish Affairs Council executive director Colin Rubenstein supported the Coalition's initiative. 'It is obviously inappropriate for publicly funded bodies to engage in BDS against Israel... it is the role of government to make this clear,' he said." (ibid)

The Coalition's initiative - don't you just love that?

I suspect that the passage of anti-BDS legislation in federal parliament would be for Israel lobbyists such as Rubenstein what the issuing of the Balfour Declaration was for Chaim Weizmann back in 1917. Orgasmic.

Still, certain prior ejaculations and emissions on the subject of BDS by Israel lobbyists are sure to create a measure of cognitive dissonance here.

Take Rubenstein, for example. Back in 2011 he signed a document called Statement of Jewish Organizations on BDS, one of whose central tenets was that BDS is "antithetical to freedom of speech." (stopbds.com)  He now has the unenviable task of justifying Bishop's move to muzzle BDS supporters. 

Then there's Peter Wertheim, Executive Director of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), who only days before (May 20 to be precise), at a UNSW panel discussion, suggested that, when all is said and done, BDS is really a bit of a paper tiger:

"My take on BDS, particularly in Australia, and I've said this a number of times, is that it has been a free gift for the cause of Zionism. That doesn't mean I support it. I think it's an insidious campaign. I do think it's inherently racist, but in terms of its success and whether it's something to be really afraid of or anything like that... no. We need to be alert to it, keep monitoring it, watching it, but we don't need to fear it." (Q&A: On-campus anti-Semitism & BDS)

Draconian legislation to combat something so harmless? But that's not all. According to Wertheim, not only is BDS a paper tiger, but it's actually done wonders for Max Brenner's bank balance:

"Since the boycott campaign against Max Brenner Australia began in 2011, their business has really boomed." (Quoted in BDS targets uni over campus shop, Christian Kerr, The Australian, 18/4/13)

Well, what do you know? Maybe for Zion's sake and Max's profit margin, our friends in the lobby should be promoting BDS? Maybe Wertheim should have a word in Bishop's ear before the print dries on the paper and the damage is done?

There's another angle here worth considering. I'm wondering to what extent Bishop and Gillard are now caught up in an outbidding process on this issue that they can't quite contol? A short time line will show you what I mean:

September 2012: Opposition moves anti-Greens motion in Senate condemning BDS. Government & Greens vote against it. Motion is defeated. Bishop crows, "This reveals the extent to which Federal Labor is captive to the radical agenda of the Greens."

April 2013: Gillard beats Opposition to punch by signing London Declaration on Combating Antisemitism. (See my 28/4/13 post The Latest Prime Ministerial Kowtow.) 

May 16 2013: Opposition ups ante by staging mass Opposition signing of declaration. (See my 17/5/13 post The Tel Aviv Declaration on Combating Criticism of Israel.)

May 25 2013: Bishop declares above-mentioned anti-BDS legislation if Coalition wins coming election. Ball now in Gillard's court.

So what's next? Gillard responds with an even more draconian Israeli-style 'Law for the Prevention of Damage to State of Israel through Boycott'? 

Seriously, it's time to take Israel out of Australian politics. 

[*jewishnews.net.au/jntv/2013/05/23/qa-on-campus-anti-semitism-and-bds/3170]