I just couldn't resist this one...
Anyone familiar with the gaggle of Israel apologists who regularly ply their trade in the letters pages of the corporate press will recall Daniel Lewis of Rushcutters Bay.
Now although Daniel's latest letter - in the Sydney Morning Herald of June 4 - has absolutely nothing to do with Israel, please bear with me and read it anyway:
"I agree with Kim Woo's observation on a lack of manners which resulted in a sandwich being thrown at the PM. But then Kim blames 'the media, especially the shock jocks' for fomenting hatred of the government. Clearly Kim forgets a shoe being hurled at John Howard on national television. I also doubt that your average school student is listening to Alan Jones. I wonder if instead it's that left-wing education policymakers have made it impossible for teachers to discipline students. From drunken teenagers disrespecting police to sandwich-throwing children, the results were predictable. As long as a student can go to a public school with coloured hair, facial piercings and flashy running shoes it is clear who is in charge. It also explains why independent and private schools are so attractive to parents who want their children to grow up well behaved."
Yep, thank God for private schools: no red teachers/policymakers, short-back-and-sides, no nasty piercings, sensible shoes, bums on seats, noses in books...
"A group of about 100 high school students travelling from New York to Atlanta were thrown off an AirTran flight, along with their chaperones, after the pilot and crew lost patience with some kids who wouldn't sit down and put away their cellphones. Seniors from the Yeshiva of Flatbush* in Brooklyn were on the flight about 6 am Monday at LaGuardia Airport. AirTran's parent company, Southwest Airlines, said in a statement that flight attendants asked passengers several times to take their seats and put their mobile devices away. The airline said that when some didn't comply, the captain repeated the request. When that didn't work either, the whole group of students was ordered to disembark for safety reasons, the airline said. The flight was delayed for about 45 minutes while the students filed out of the Boeing 737, which seats about 137 people, leaving the plane mostly empty. Rabbi Seth Linfield, executive director at Yeshiva of Flatbush, said administrators Tuesday were still looking into the disagreement, but he said in a statement that 'preliminarily, it does not appear that the action taken by the flight crew was justified'... Southwest spokesman Brad Hawkins wouldn't get into details as to why the entire group was kicked out, but said, 'I have no indication that the flight attendants overreacted'. He said the AirTran cabin crew made 'repeated requests' for an unknown number of the students to behave. 'The point at which the captain comes on the PA system and says, 'You all need to sit down' is unusual. The students were on a 3-day trip that was to include a rafting excursion and a visit to to a Six Flags theme park. The students were then put on other flights, but it took 12 hours for some to reach their destination... Some of the students posted pictures and video of their journey on social media sites. At least one sent a barrage of Twitter messages to media organizations, complaining that the way they were being treated was a 'scandal'.**" (A group of about 100 high school kids kicked off flight, David Caruso, AP, 5/6/13)
[*"Since 1927, the Yeshivah of Flatbush has stood at the forefront of American Jewish education and has set the standard of excellence emulated by other academic institutions. It has imbued its students with a thirst for knowledge, a commitment to Zionism..." (From the Yeshivah of Flatbush Mission Statement, flatbush.org); **A future Abe Foxman for sure!]
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Overstating the Sunni-Shi'a Divide
In sounding the death knell of pan-Arabism/secularism in the Middle East, the Lowy Institute's "resident fellow" Rodger Shanahan has it down just a little too pat:
"It appears that the days of the Arab secularists are gone. There is no longer a contest of ideas in the Arab world, only a contest whom God does and doesn't favour. Today the dominant narrative is one of religion, which in turn is largely a reprisal [sic] of the centuries-old contest between the two main branches of Islam. Religion marks a rather more prosaic battle for political influence between Shia Iran and Sunni states led by Saudi Arabia." (Pan-Arabism loses ground in religious divide, The Australian, 4/5/13)
If, as he contends, "[s]ectarianism is now a more defining characteristic than ethnicity or tribal affiliation, and each of them is more powerful than nationality," then how does he explain the results of the following polls?:
"Despite the Sunni-Shi'a divide - especially in Arab states where Shi'a populations are majorities or pluralities such as Iraq, Lebanon and Bahrain - which is often matched by a division in attitude about Iran in these countries along sectarian lines, Sunni Arab populations elsewhere tend to base their views of Iran on issues that go far beyond this divide, and on some of which they are inclined to favor Iran. In polls I have conducted in six Arab countries - Egypt, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, and Lebanon - Iran consistently placed third on the list of choices provided by respondents when asked to identify the 'two most threatening states', indicating that many Arabs do see it as a threat. But what is more important in this case is that Arabs see Israel and the United States as presenting far greater threats. For example, in 2009, 88% of those polled identified Israel, 76% identified the United States, and only 12% identified Iran as one of the two greatest threats. There was some change a year after the start of the Arab uprisings in the November 2011 poll, although Iran remained far behind Israel and the United States: 71% identified Israel, 59% identified the United States, and 18% identified Iran as one of the two greatest threats." (Arab Perspectives on Iran's Role in a Changing Middle East, Shibley Telhami, Wilson Centre/USIP, February 2013)
Likewise, Shanahan's misrepresentation of Hamas and his use of Palestine's national poet, the late Mahmoud Darwish, to support his simplistic thesis, is far from scholarly. Here's his concluding paragraph:
"Nowadays, the Muslim Brotherhood that inspired Hamas's Islamist persuasion, and Iran that nurtured its religious character have fatally riven an already divided Palestine. The despair of the original Palestinian nationalists at what religion has done to Arab inclusivity was summed up by the famous Palestinian poet and activist Mahmoud Darwish near the end of his life when he famously noted of Hamas's triumph in Gaza that 'We have woken from a coma to see a mono-coloured flag (of Hamas) do away with the four-colour flag (of Palestine)'."
Hm... doesn't that first sentence rather contradict Shanahan's Sunni vs Shi'a thesis?
Now to Hamas:
First, as its full name - the Islamic Resistance Movement - suggests, Hamas is focused solely on resistance to, and liberation from, Israeli settler-colonial aggression in Palestine. National liberation, not pan-Islamism, is its raison d'etre. As such it has little in common, Zionist propaganda notwithstanding, with outfits such as Al-Qaeda.
Second, since the Oslo 'peace press', Hamas embodies more of the traditional Palestinian national program than its secular Palestinian rival, Fatah.
In short, Hamas is as much a nationalist organization as it is an Islamic one.
As for Mahmoud Darwish, he was not condemning Hamas alone, or suggesting it had dropped Palestine for Islam, the impression Shanahan gives, but reacting specifically to the democratically elected Hamas government's preemptive coup against the forces of the notorious CIA-backed Palestinian Fatah stooge Muhammad Dahlan in July 2007.*
That his words were directed at both camps is apparent in his following (ironic) words: "We have triumphed. Gaza won its independence from the West Bank. One people now have two states, two prisons who don't greet each other. We are victims dressed in executioner's clothing."**
[*See my 6/3/08 post Mainsewer Media Clueless in Gaza;**See Failing Darwish's legacy, Sumia Ibrahim, The Electronic Intifada, 19/8/08.]
"It appears that the days of the Arab secularists are gone. There is no longer a contest of ideas in the Arab world, only a contest whom God does and doesn't favour. Today the dominant narrative is one of religion, which in turn is largely a reprisal [sic] of the centuries-old contest between the two main branches of Islam. Religion marks a rather more prosaic battle for political influence between Shia Iran and Sunni states led by Saudi Arabia." (Pan-Arabism loses ground in religious divide, The Australian, 4/5/13)
If, as he contends, "[s]ectarianism is now a more defining characteristic than ethnicity or tribal affiliation, and each of them is more powerful than nationality," then how does he explain the results of the following polls?:
"Despite the Sunni-Shi'a divide - especially in Arab states where Shi'a populations are majorities or pluralities such as Iraq, Lebanon and Bahrain - which is often matched by a division in attitude about Iran in these countries along sectarian lines, Sunni Arab populations elsewhere tend to base their views of Iran on issues that go far beyond this divide, and on some of which they are inclined to favor Iran. In polls I have conducted in six Arab countries - Egypt, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, and Lebanon - Iran consistently placed third on the list of choices provided by respondents when asked to identify the 'two most threatening states', indicating that many Arabs do see it as a threat. But what is more important in this case is that Arabs see Israel and the United States as presenting far greater threats. For example, in 2009, 88% of those polled identified Israel, 76% identified the United States, and only 12% identified Iran as one of the two greatest threats. There was some change a year after the start of the Arab uprisings in the November 2011 poll, although Iran remained far behind Israel and the United States: 71% identified Israel, 59% identified the United States, and 18% identified Iran as one of the two greatest threats." (Arab Perspectives on Iran's Role in a Changing Middle East, Shibley Telhami, Wilson Centre/USIP, February 2013)
Likewise, Shanahan's misrepresentation of Hamas and his use of Palestine's national poet, the late Mahmoud Darwish, to support his simplistic thesis, is far from scholarly. Here's his concluding paragraph:
"Nowadays, the Muslim Brotherhood that inspired Hamas's Islamist persuasion, and Iran that nurtured its religious character have fatally riven an already divided Palestine. The despair of the original Palestinian nationalists at what religion has done to Arab inclusivity was summed up by the famous Palestinian poet and activist Mahmoud Darwish near the end of his life when he famously noted of Hamas's triumph in Gaza that 'We have woken from a coma to see a mono-coloured flag (of Hamas) do away with the four-colour flag (of Palestine)'."
Hm... doesn't that first sentence rather contradict Shanahan's Sunni vs Shi'a thesis?
Now to Hamas:
First, as its full name - the Islamic Resistance Movement - suggests, Hamas is focused solely on resistance to, and liberation from, Israeli settler-colonial aggression in Palestine. National liberation, not pan-Islamism, is its raison d'etre. As such it has little in common, Zionist propaganda notwithstanding, with outfits such as Al-Qaeda.
Second, since the Oslo 'peace press', Hamas embodies more of the traditional Palestinian national program than its secular Palestinian rival, Fatah.
In short, Hamas is as much a nationalist organization as it is an Islamic one.
As for Mahmoud Darwish, he was not condemning Hamas alone, or suggesting it had dropped Palestine for Islam, the impression Shanahan gives, but reacting specifically to the democratically elected Hamas government's preemptive coup against the forces of the notorious CIA-backed Palestinian Fatah stooge Muhammad Dahlan in July 2007.*
That his words were directed at both camps is apparent in his following (ironic) words: "We have triumphed. Gaza won its independence from the West Bank. One people now have two states, two prisons who don't greet each other. We are victims dressed in executioner's clothing."**
[*See my 6/3/08 post Mainsewer Media Clueless in Gaza;**See Failing Darwish's legacy, Sumia Ibrahim, The Electronic Intifada, 19/8/08.]
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Sheridan Discovers Beleaguered Syrian Christians
The Australian's foreign editor, Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan writes:
"Bob Carr's suggestion that Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad be allowed to stay in office if it facilitates an end to the bloody fighting there is a sharp and sensible departure from the US and European consensus... Carr believes it is no longer realistic to demand Assad's removal from office as a precondition to a peace conference. This analysis reflects the sober realisation that, with Russian, Iranian and Hezbollah support, the Assad regime has been making progress on the battlefield and there is little imminent prospect of its overthrow. Carr also expresses 'serious reservations' about Western nations arming the Syrian opposition. He says the al-Qa'ida-affiliated al-Nusra group has grown stronger within the Syrian opposition and 'there seems very little doubt they will get a share of the arms' available. He also expresses concerns about the treatment of Christians and other minorities in the region. The Foreign Minister is right to make this point and it is a sad commentary about political correctness in much of the West that almost no one raises a voice in defence of the increasingly beleaguered Christians of the Middle East." (Carr's Syria stand makes sense, The Australian, 3/6/13)
Let's hear that last bit again: "[I]t is a sad commentary about political correctness in much of the West that almost no one raises a voice in defence of the increasingly beleaguered Christians of the Middle East."
Now why is that?
My guess is if, like Sheridan and his great and powerful mates in the US, you spend much of your time cheerleading for Jewish supremacism in Palestine, and ignoring the cries of its indigenous Christians, embodied in the Kairos Palestine Document,* for an end to Israeli occupation, you're probably not that well-placed to take up the cause of Christian minorities at the hands of a Muslim supremacist group such as the Islamic State of Iraq & the Levant.**
If Sheridan had had any real interest in the plight of Syrian Christians, he might have taken the trouble to talk to Syria's Mother Agnes-Mariam de la Croix, here in October last year to talk on that very subject.
After all, the Australian's Rowan Callick did. He even wrote a profile of her for the paper, Christians 'emptied from Middle East' (6/10/12).
Did Sheridan bother reading it? If he had, he might have discovered that Mother Agnes-Mariam's late father was "a Palestinian who fled Nazareth in 1948 when the state of Israel was established."
And if he'd talked to her, he might've found that she'd been born in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon.
Ah, but that'd be to invite an attack of cognitive dissonance, wouldn't it?
[*For the KPD, see my 25/12/09 post A Not So Merry Palestinian Christmas; **See Iraqi al Qaeda wing merges with Syrian counterpart, Sami Aboudi, reuters.com, 9/4/13)]
"Bob Carr's suggestion that Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad be allowed to stay in office if it facilitates an end to the bloody fighting there is a sharp and sensible departure from the US and European consensus... Carr believes it is no longer realistic to demand Assad's removal from office as a precondition to a peace conference. This analysis reflects the sober realisation that, with Russian, Iranian and Hezbollah support, the Assad regime has been making progress on the battlefield and there is little imminent prospect of its overthrow. Carr also expresses 'serious reservations' about Western nations arming the Syrian opposition. He says the al-Qa'ida-affiliated al-Nusra group has grown stronger within the Syrian opposition and 'there seems very little doubt they will get a share of the arms' available. He also expresses concerns about the treatment of Christians and other minorities in the region. The Foreign Minister is right to make this point and it is a sad commentary about political correctness in much of the West that almost no one raises a voice in defence of the increasingly beleaguered Christians of the Middle East." (Carr's Syria stand makes sense, The Australian, 3/6/13)
Let's hear that last bit again: "[I]t is a sad commentary about political correctness in much of the West that almost no one raises a voice in defence of the increasingly beleaguered Christians of the Middle East."
Now why is that?
My guess is if, like Sheridan and his great and powerful mates in the US, you spend much of your time cheerleading for Jewish supremacism in Palestine, and ignoring the cries of its indigenous Christians, embodied in the Kairos Palestine Document,* for an end to Israeli occupation, you're probably not that well-placed to take up the cause of Christian minorities at the hands of a Muslim supremacist group such as the Islamic State of Iraq & the Levant.**
If Sheridan had had any real interest in the plight of Syrian Christians, he might have taken the trouble to talk to Syria's Mother Agnes-Mariam de la Croix, here in October last year to talk on that very subject.
After all, the Australian's Rowan Callick did. He even wrote a profile of her for the paper, Christians 'emptied from Middle East' (6/10/12).
Did Sheridan bother reading it? If he had, he might have discovered that Mother Agnes-Mariam's late father was "a Palestinian who fled Nazareth in 1948 when the state of Israel was established."
And if he'd talked to her, he might've found that she'd been born in a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon.
Ah, but that'd be to invite an attack of cognitive dissonance, wouldn't it?
[*For the KPD, see my 25/12/09 post A Not So Merry Palestinian Christmas; **See Iraqi al Qaeda wing merges with Syrian counterpart, Sami Aboudi, reuters.com, 9/4/13)]
Monday, June 3, 2013
We Want Gough!
Last night I watched the second of the 2-part ABC documentary, Whitlam: The Power & the Passion, on the prime ministerial career of Labor's Gough Whitlam (1972-1975).
What an inspiration the man was! Back then, the Australian Labor Party was truly the embodiment of Chifley's 'light on the hill'.
The following assessment of Whitlam, by one of his colleagues, sums up the man and the era beautifully:
"Yesterday's Canberra Times [1/1/76] carries an interesting letter which begins by saying that Gough Whitlam's early sponsors 'saw him merely as a shallow lawyer who would charm sufficient middle-class voters to put the Labor Party in office'. Instead, the letter continues, they unleashed a genuine radical who released imprisoned conscientious objectors, spent more money on education, introduced free legal aid, showed a concern for the aboriginal people and for human rights.
"Gough was indeed a radical; he probably had a deeper commitment to Socialism than Evatt, Forde, Scullin, Hughes, Charlton, Tudor, Fisher or Watson. The only Federal Leaders who had Whitlam's commitment to social change were Calwell, Chifley and Curtin. Socialism, Gough once explained, was about the quality of life. Wages and conditions, he said, were no longer the chief determinants of real living standards. What really mattered, he argued, was 'the social capital a country can offer its people in the form of health, housing and education'.
"Soon after his election as Leader he made a declaration of faith in Socialism which went beyond anything even Curtin, Chifley or Calwell would have said after they became Leaders. He declared: 'There never was an age when Socialism was so nearly inevitable, there never was a country where it was so necessary... Public ownership and public control of the economy are more than ever central to the Labor programme for Government'." (The Cameron Diaries, Clyde Cameron, 1990, pp 3-4)
But how is the party of the great Gough Whitlam faring these days? Is Chifley's 'light on the hill' still burning?
For answer, one need look no further than the opening paragraph of a short report in the May 24 issue of The Australian Jewish News. This one-sentence 'snapshot' speaks volumes about the current state of the party, managing to capture - as only a 'picture' can - both the essence and extent of its political vision, and, tellingly, the size of its membership base:
"Members of the Young Labor Women's Network showed their love of chocolate and their support for Israel and the Jewish community earlier this month by holding a meeting at Max Brenner in Parramatta." (Chocolate beats BDS for Labor's young women)
What an inspiration the man was! Back then, the Australian Labor Party was truly the embodiment of Chifley's 'light on the hill'.
The following assessment of Whitlam, by one of his colleagues, sums up the man and the era beautifully:
"Yesterday's Canberra Times [1/1/76] carries an interesting letter which begins by saying that Gough Whitlam's early sponsors 'saw him merely as a shallow lawyer who would charm sufficient middle-class voters to put the Labor Party in office'. Instead, the letter continues, they unleashed a genuine radical who released imprisoned conscientious objectors, spent more money on education, introduced free legal aid, showed a concern for the aboriginal people and for human rights.
"Gough was indeed a radical; he probably had a deeper commitment to Socialism than Evatt, Forde, Scullin, Hughes, Charlton, Tudor, Fisher or Watson. The only Federal Leaders who had Whitlam's commitment to social change were Calwell, Chifley and Curtin. Socialism, Gough once explained, was about the quality of life. Wages and conditions, he said, were no longer the chief determinants of real living standards. What really mattered, he argued, was 'the social capital a country can offer its people in the form of health, housing and education'.
"Soon after his election as Leader he made a declaration of faith in Socialism which went beyond anything even Curtin, Chifley or Calwell would have said after they became Leaders. He declared: 'There never was an age when Socialism was so nearly inevitable, there never was a country where it was so necessary... Public ownership and public control of the economy are more than ever central to the Labor programme for Government'." (The Cameron Diaries, Clyde Cameron, 1990, pp 3-4)
But how is the party of the great Gough Whitlam faring these days? Is Chifley's 'light on the hill' still burning?
For answer, one need look no further than the opening paragraph of a short report in the May 24 issue of The Australian Jewish News. This one-sentence 'snapshot' speaks volumes about the current state of the party, managing to capture - as only a 'picture' can - both the essence and extent of its political vision, and, tellingly, the size of its membership base:
"Members of the Young Labor Women's Network showed their love of chocolate and their support for Israel and the Jewish community earlier this month by holding a meeting at Max Brenner in Parramatta." (Chocolate beats BDS for Labor's young women)
Sunday, June 2, 2013
Going Mad in Herds
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one." Charles Mackay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions & the Madness of Crowds
"Premier Barry O'Farrell and Opposition Leader John Robertson have cast party politics to the side, when they signed the London Declaration on Combating Antisemitism*... In Canberra, all 105 federal Coalition parliamentarians have now signed the declaration, with both sides of politics in Victoria also set to commit to the global initiative in the coming days." (Leaders unite against hate, The Australian Jewish News, 24/5/13)
In stunning contrast to this extraordinary display of groupthink, two NSW Greens politicians, David Shoebridge and John Kaye, have publicly declared their refusal to sign the declaration on the grounds that it "wrongly conflates valid criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism." (This is not how you fight anti-Semitism, newmatilda.com, 28/5/13)
Australia has over 800 state and federal politicians. Are Shoebridge and Kaye the only two Australian politicians with sufficient intellectual courage and moral fibre to speak out against this Zionist sleight of hand?
[*See my 17/5/13 post The Tel Aviv Declaration on Combating Criticism of Israel.]
"Premier Barry O'Farrell and Opposition Leader John Robertson have cast party politics to the side, when they signed the London Declaration on Combating Antisemitism*... In Canberra, all 105 federal Coalition parliamentarians have now signed the declaration, with both sides of politics in Victoria also set to commit to the global initiative in the coming days." (Leaders unite against hate, The Australian Jewish News, 24/5/13)
In stunning contrast to this extraordinary display of groupthink, two NSW Greens politicians, David Shoebridge and John Kaye, have publicly declared their refusal to sign the declaration on the grounds that it "wrongly conflates valid criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism." (This is not how you fight anti-Semitism, newmatilda.com, 28/5/13)
Australia has over 800 state and federal politicians. Are Shoebridge and Kaye the only two Australian politicians with sufficient intellectual courage and moral fibre to speak out against this Zionist sleight of hand?
[*See my 17/5/13 post The Tel Aviv Declaration on Combating Criticism of Israel.]
Saturday, June 1, 2013
Alleged Journalists
"Labor has squibbed a Coalition challenge to toughen its opposition to the BDS campaign against Israel, possibly fearing retaliation from the academic community and Muslim voters." (ALP avoids hard line on BDS, The Australian, 30/5/13)
So begins Ean Higgins' latest 'report' in the Australian's ongoing crusade against the BDS movement in Australia.
Nothing out of the ordinary here, really.
That is until you come to a reference to Israel's "alleged oppression of Palestinians."
Talk about being reality averse! On a par, if you will, with 'alleged global warming'.
Higgins, of course, is one of the 'BDS SUX!' tag team over at News Ltd, the other being one, Christian Kerr.
Now as it happens, while Higgins was busy wielding the 'a' qualifier on Thursday, Kerr, presiding over the paper's political gossip column, Strewth!, was accusing the ABC of "bias" because it had used the "ideological qualifier" 'hardline' to describe Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, one of the panelists appearing on this Monday night's Q and A.
Fair dinkum, there's really no end to the hypocrisy of these two alleged journalists.
So begins Ean Higgins' latest 'report' in the Australian's ongoing crusade against the BDS movement in Australia.
Nothing out of the ordinary here, really.
That is until you come to a reference to Israel's "alleged oppression of Palestinians."
Talk about being reality averse! On a par, if you will, with 'alleged global warming'.
Higgins, of course, is one of the 'BDS SUX!' tag team over at News Ltd, the other being one, Christian Kerr.
Now as it happens, while Higgins was busy wielding the 'a' qualifier on Thursday, Kerr, presiding over the paper's political gossip column, Strewth!, was accusing the ABC of "bias" because it had used the "ideological qualifier" 'hardline' to describe Liberal senator Cory Bernardi, one of the panelists appearing on this Monday night's Q and A.
Fair dinkum, there's really no end to the hypocrisy of these two alleged journalists.
Friday, May 31, 2013
The things that you're liable to read into the Bible...
... ain't necessarily so.
All things considered, the settler-colonial movement known as Zionism really has had a dream run.
While there are many reasons for this, one of them is purely ideological. No other mob of usurping European colonials has ever been able to exploit the Bible to such great advantage as the Zionists. Having said that, it was only the prior colonisation of the European mind by the biblical narrative that enabled them to get away with it.
I was yet again reminded of this when I read the following letter, by Vic Alhadeff, chief executive of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies, in the Sydney Morning Herald of May 29:
"Associate Professor Mohamad Abdalla indulges in a groundless swipe against Israel in his response to Paul Sheehan's column on the Koran. Arguing that many groups use biblical texts to justify violence against others, he claims that 'Zionists use them regularly against Palestinians'. No they don't. What reputable Israeli leaders do is rely on the Bible to justify their 4000-year connection to the land. They disavow violence and they don't use biblical texts to justify violence against Palestinians. That's a critical difference."
A "groundless swipe," eh? I don't think so. Alhadeff is being disingenuous here.
Historically, although primarily secular nationalists, Zionist leaders have unashamedly used the Hebrew Bible to dress up their naked colonial land grab in Palestine, and none more so than Israel's founding father, David Ben-Gurion:
"The Bible has been utilised by modern secular Zionism as 'history' rather than theology or a source of belief... [T]he secular Zionist claim to Palestine is based on the biblical paradigm and the notion that God had given the land to the Jews... In 1937 David Ben-Gurion (1886-1973), a Russian Jew, later to become the first prime minister and chief architect of the State of Israel, told the British Royal Commission visiting Mandatory Palestine that the 'Bible is our Mandate'. Ben Gurion, who is revered in Israel as the 'Father of the Nation', was a non-believer and deeply secular Zionist. From its earliest days in the late 19th century secular Jewish Zionism embraced the Protestant Zionist biblicist doctrine of exclusive land ownership. This fundamental doctrine was premised on the notion that the Hebrew Bible provides for the Jews' sacrosanct 'title deed' to colonise Palestine, and gives moral legitimacy to the establishment of the State of Israel and its current policies towards the indigenous Palestinians. The nationalised and racialised European doctrine, which viewed the Jews in racial terms, was not only central to Zionist policies in the late 19th century but was ever pervasive within mainstream Christian theology and biblical scholarship. The link between Zionist myth-making, Zionist settler-colonialism, territorial expansion into the occupied West Bank and the use of the Hebrew Bible is reflected in the claim of Ben-Gurion that the Bible was the Chosen People's sacrosanct title deed to Palestine, 'with a genealogy of 3,500 years'. A leading advocate of the historicisation of the Bible, Ben-Gurion wrote: 'The message of the Chosen People makes sense in secular, nationalist and historical terms... The Jews can be considered a self-chosen people... Though I reject theology, the single most important book in my life is the Bible'." (The Bible & Zionism: Invented Traditions, Archaeology & Post-Colonialism in Israel-Palestine, Nur Masalha, 2007, pp 16-17)
Much as Alhadeff might pretend that by referencing the Hebrew Bible "reputable Israeli leaders" are merely illustrating an alleged "connection to the land" of Palestine, as opposed to asserting a divinely- (or historically-) sanctioned prior ownership of it, no serious student of Zionist colonialism in Palestine is fooled.
All things considered, the settler-colonial movement known as Zionism really has had a dream run.
While there are many reasons for this, one of them is purely ideological. No other mob of usurping European colonials has ever been able to exploit the Bible to such great advantage as the Zionists. Having said that, it was only the prior colonisation of the European mind by the biblical narrative that enabled them to get away with it.
I was yet again reminded of this when I read the following letter, by Vic Alhadeff, chief executive of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies, in the Sydney Morning Herald of May 29:
"Associate Professor Mohamad Abdalla indulges in a groundless swipe against Israel in his response to Paul Sheehan's column on the Koran. Arguing that many groups use biblical texts to justify violence against others, he claims that 'Zionists use them regularly against Palestinians'. No they don't. What reputable Israeli leaders do is rely on the Bible to justify their 4000-year connection to the land. They disavow violence and they don't use biblical texts to justify violence against Palestinians. That's a critical difference."
A "groundless swipe," eh? I don't think so. Alhadeff is being disingenuous here.
Historically, although primarily secular nationalists, Zionist leaders have unashamedly used the Hebrew Bible to dress up their naked colonial land grab in Palestine, and none more so than Israel's founding father, David Ben-Gurion:
"The Bible has been utilised by modern secular Zionism as 'history' rather than theology or a source of belief... [T]he secular Zionist claim to Palestine is based on the biblical paradigm and the notion that God had given the land to the Jews... In 1937 David Ben-Gurion (1886-1973), a Russian Jew, later to become the first prime minister and chief architect of the State of Israel, told the British Royal Commission visiting Mandatory Palestine that the 'Bible is our Mandate'. Ben Gurion, who is revered in Israel as the 'Father of the Nation', was a non-believer and deeply secular Zionist. From its earliest days in the late 19th century secular Jewish Zionism embraced the Protestant Zionist biblicist doctrine of exclusive land ownership. This fundamental doctrine was premised on the notion that the Hebrew Bible provides for the Jews' sacrosanct 'title deed' to colonise Palestine, and gives moral legitimacy to the establishment of the State of Israel and its current policies towards the indigenous Palestinians. The nationalised and racialised European doctrine, which viewed the Jews in racial terms, was not only central to Zionist policies in the late 19th century but was ever pervasive within mainstream Christian theology and biblical scholarship. The link between Zionist myth-making, Zionist settler-colonialism, territorial expansion into the occupied West Bank and the use of the Hebrew Bible is reflected in the claim of Ben-Gurion that the Bible was the Chosen People's sacrosanct title deed to Palestine, 'with a genealogy of 3,500 years'. A leading advocate of the historicisation of the Bible, Ben-Gurion wrote: 'The message of the Chosen People makes sense in secular, nationalist and historical terms... The Jews can be considered a self-chosen people... Though I reject theology, the single most important book in my life is the Bible'." (The Bible & Zionism: Invented Traditions, Archaeology & Post-Colonialism in Israel-Palestine, Nur Masalha, 2007, pp 16-17)
Much as Alhadeff might pretend that by referencing the Hebrew Bible "reputable Israeli leaders" are merely illustrating an alleged "connection to the land" of Palestine, as opposed to asserting a divinely- (or historically-) sanctioned prior ownership of it, no serious student of Zionist colonialism in Palestine is fooled.
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