The Push for a Judeo-Christian Curriculum

Beware the J-C word:

"The inclusion of an additional cross-curriculum priority that ensures the continued recognition of the 'Western/Judeo-Christian influences on our society may help to address these concerns'." Christian Schools Australia submission to the national curriculum review, quoted in Christian schools eye 'rebalance', Justine Ferrari, The Australian, 10/3/14)

Here's why:

"First used by early 20th century biblical scholars to describe the scope of Old and New Testament studies... The concept [of Judeo-Christian heritage/values] all but disappeared until the 1980s when it was revived by Ronald Reagan... After a 1990s hiatus, the Judeo-Christian tradition was more recently given the kiss of life by the US religious right as anti-Islamist sloganeering. Borrowed willy-nilly from these US sources, where it is code for Christians against Islam, the phrase has now become a constant theme in Australian neoconservative rhetoric..." (Australia's 'Judeo-Christian heritage' doesn't exist, Tony Taylor, theguardian.com, 13/1/14)

Abbott's Anglosphere

Tony - ah - Abbott here. Everywhere you look - ah - our precious Anglosphere is - ah - not only under threat, from without, by - ah - baddies, but worse, from within, by - ah - goodies. I mean - ah - what was New Zealand thinking here?

"The federal government led secret diplomatic efforts to frustrate a New Zealand-led push for nuclear disarmament, according to documents released under FOI laws... because 'we rely on US nuclear forces to deter nuclear attack on Australia'. In October last year, following the election of the Coalition government, Australia refused a NZ request to endorse a 125-nation joint statement at the UN highlighting the humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons. Australia objected to a sentence declaring that it is in the interest of humanity that nuclear weapons are never used again, 'under any circumstances'." (Government pushed against NZ on nukes, Philip Dorling, Sydney Morning Herald, 10/3/14)

Just as well we put the kibosh on that one! The - ah - bottom line here, to quote that great American Suppository of all Wisdom, Sarah Palin, is - ah - this:

"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a nuke is a good guy with a nuke." (How to stop a bad guy with a nuke, AFP/SMH, 10/3/14)

Then there's Britain! As - ah - my own dear Suppository of all Wisdom, Monsignor Sheridan JP, has written only this weekend past:

"A few years ago I wrote a book about the US/Australia alliance and everywhere I went in research for that book I was surprised to find Britain as a third partner. Most people in both Australia and Britain don't realise how close the operational, political, intelligence, military, diplomatic and economic partnership really is. At AUKMIN [Australia United Kingdom Ministerial meeting] next Tuesday the two governments will sign a joint statement on enhanced diplomatic network co-operation." (Old ties that secure our future, Greg Sheridan, The Australian, 8/3/14)

Sadly, however, even - ah - the British these days are deviating from one of their - ah - core historical responsibilities, screwing the Palestinians. Maybe they're getting a little - ah - tired of this after almost 100 years? Whatever - ah - Foreign Minister Palin - sorry, Bishop - is resolved to - ah - show wee willie Hague the way here:

"Bishop, who admires Hague, who has indeed become a globally important foreign minister, disagrees with her British counterpart in his insistence that all Israeli settlements beyond the 1967 borders are illegal under international law. Hague got Bishop's predecessor, Bob Carr, to sign up to that language the last time an AUKMIN was held in Sydney. This was a departure for Australian policy and Bishop has reverted to the far more sensible formulation that these settlements... are part of negotiations now under way." (ibid)

We'll - ah - show them.

Then There Were Two

There will soon be two openly Islamophobic parties operating in Australia. The first, of course, is Fred Nile's Christian Democrats - see my post Witches Brew 5 (7/10/11).

Here's the second:

"An anti-Islam party based on the hardline views of Dutch politician Geert Wilders plans to field candidates at the next federal election... Australian Liberty Alliance was registered as a not-for-profit business last month by Debbie Robinson, the president of the Q Society, an anti-Islam think tank that was responsible for bringing Mr Wilders to Australia last year." (Anti-Islam party to contest next election, Chip Le Grand, The Australian, 5/3/14)

An anti-Islam think tank?! Just imagine the conniptions in the ms media if someone were to set up an anti-Judaism or anti-Christianity 'think tank'?

The Q Society, BTW, has just held a Stop Islamization of Nations (SION) 'congress' in Melbourne:

I couldn't help but notice that its panelists included such luminaries as Pamela Geller (awarded the 'Queen Esther Award for Jewish Heroism' by the Creative Zionist Coalition in 2013); Robert Spencer (director of Jihad Watch, "a program of the David Horowitz Freedom Center"); Dr Mordechai Kedar (ex-IDF Military Intelligence); and Michael Burd (described as "a passionate Zionist advocate and a critic of the Jewish community representatives' views on multiculturalism and asylum seekers") (See sionaustralia.com for the complete list.)

Maybe the congress should have been called Zap Islamization of Nations (ZION)?

John Lyons Slams Sheridan, AIJAC

What follows is a response, in full, by The Australian's Middle East correspondent, John Lyons, to the bizarre attack launched against him (and the ABC) in last weekend's edition by its foreign editor, Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, over Four Corner's expose of Israel's abuse of Palestinian children, Stone Cold Justice.

To be honest, I had feared a grovel. Happily, though, I was disappointed. Lyon's piece is an absolute must-read for several reasons:

a) It's full of home-truths about the Israel lobby and Sheridan, its main mouthpiece in the corporate media;
b) It's a superb example of the gulf - yawning in this case - that must inevitably develop between a home-based, doctrinaire foreign editor, for whom support for Israel is an article of faith, and a relatively open-minded Middle East correspondent, exposed on a daily basis to the reality of life in a worse-than-apartheid state;
c) Incredibly, it's all happening in the pages of Rupert Murdoch's Australian flagship.

Savour:

"So a priest at a church Greg Sheridan attended in Melbourne said something possibly anti-Semitic, and somehow ABC1's Four Corners and I are responsible? It's not even certain the priest watched the Four Corners program on Israel's treatment of Palestinian children. But it sounds as if he didn't need anyone to stoke his anti-Semitism - Sheridan said he spoke as someone 'with 2000 years of Christian anti-Semitism behind him'. Sadly, this is the level to which discussion about Israel has sunk.

"Last Saturday, Sheridan said a program I reported for Four Corners was 'a crude piece of anti-Israel propaganda that revived some of the oldest anti-Semitic tropes'. Why can journalists put the Australian Army or federal police or US Army through the ringer, but if we investigate the most powerful army in the Middle East it's anti-Semitism?

"As a correspondent in Jerusalem my job is to report through Australian eyes. What the Israeli army does to Palestinian children systematically - such as taking a 12-year-old from his home at 2am and denying access to a lawyer or parent - would be illegal in Australia. Four Corners showed how Israel enforces two legal systems in the West Bank, one for Jews and one for Palestinians.

"For 'exhaustive rebuttals', Sheridan recommended the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council run by Colin Rubenstein, also based in Melbourne. AIJAC is not an elected body representing the Jewish community but a privately funded lobby group for a rebuttal of journalism. Bob Carr recently revealed that when he was foreign minister, AIJAC 'directed a furious effort at trying to block even routine criticism of settlements, as if this were more vital than advocating a two-state solution or opposing boycotts of Israel'. After reading Carr's comments, prominent Israeli Alon Liel wrote: 'Who are you 'Israeli lovers' of the Australia-Israel Council? Who authorised you to put pressure on the Australian government 'on my behalf'? Especially regarding a matter that affects my family's future? Why are you trying to ruin my country, pretending you are 'pro-Israeli'? Liel, a former Israeli Foreign Ministry chief, wrote: 'What would you do, dear Jew, if the risk of such isolation was hovering over the head of Australia, France or Canada, countries whose passports you hold?'

"He echoed Breaking the Silence, 950 current and former Israeli soldiers, who reported on Palestinian children, including one soldier saying a colleague put children against a wall and made them sing Israel's national anthem - if they didn't sing in time, he'd hit them. Another said his commander beat a child 'to a pulp' and put a gun in his mouth, saying, 'Don't annoy me'. When Melbourne Jewish leader Danny Lamm alleged 'crude propaganda', 15 former officers condemned 'Lamm's armchair Zionism, pontificating from afar while true Israelis put their lives on the line'.

"Sheridan repeated AIJAC's claim about settlements not growing - year after year AIJAC says this while construction booms, even outside existing settlements. US President Barack Obama this week referred to 'aggressive settlement construction'. Israeli statistics show settler housing more than doubled last year, and in the first half of 2011 grew 660%. Outposts are also surging - these are illegal under Israeli law, yet Israel tolerates them. Having visited the West Bank hundreds of times, I am astonished that Melbourne-based people such as Sheridan and Rubenstein portray themselves as experts yet ignore reality.

"Last week, Amnesy International said Israeli forces had displayed a 'callous disregard' by killing dozens of Palestinian civilians, including children, over 3 years with 'near total impunity'. Last year, Unicef said ill-treatment of Palestinian children appeared to be 'widespread, systematic and institutionalised', and 'children have been threatened with death, physical violence, solitary confinement and sexual assault'. In 2012, a delegation of British lawyers led by former attorney-general Patricia Scotland, found Israel had breached 6 articles of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Geneva Conventions.

"There are also now big issues for Australia relating to the Geneva Conventions, under which Israel's settlements are widely considered illegal. Yet Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has cast doubt on whether Australia accepts the Geneva Conventions in that regard. Her new policy may have serious implications for Australian soldiers overseas - the conventions govern not only how civilians under occupation should be treated but captured soldiers. It was after two world wars with their collective death toll of about 80 million that postwar leaders signed up to the Fourth Geneva Convention. The danger of Bishop cherry-picking the Geneva Conventions could expose Australian soldiers who currently have protection.

"Sheridan ignores the fact Israeli spokesman Yigal Palmor told Four Corners soldiers were not appropriately trained to detain children. AIJAC critises me for interviewing 'extremist' settler Daniella Weiss - if she is an extremist then so are key members of Israel's cabinet who share her views. Weiss planned settlements with Ariel Sharon to forestall a Palestinian state.

"Leaders of Australia's Jewish community visiting Israel often approach me for a coffee. One opposed the occupation, saying it was against Jewish teachings to rule over others. Another, from Sydney, wanted the occupation to end. When I asked why he never said that publicly, he replied: 'Are you serious? And have the Melbourne guys declare a fatwa against me? This denial - or fear - does not help Israel.

"The film The Gatekeepers, which interviewed 6 former chiefs of intelligence service Shin Bet, warned about Israel's future. Avraham Shalom said of the Israeli army: 'We have become cruel'. But one Melbourne Jewish leader told me the Shin Bet chiefs were 'all left-wing'.

"An insight into the attacks on journalists covering Israel comes from Clyde Haberman, an Orthodox-raised American Jew who has just retired after 37 years with The New York Times. For decades, he says, the paper has had correspondents who, no matter how different or good, were branded anti-Semitic or self-hating Jews. He says correspondents in Israel could expect 'to have your integrity hurled back in your face every single day'. But he thought of a solution: 'If I didn't want to be accused of hating Israel, I should start every story with: 'Fifty years after 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust, Israel yesterday' did one thing or the other'.

"Obama told Israel their occupation was unfair. It is possible that Obama, Unicef, Amnesty International, 950 soldiers, Shin Bet chiefs and others are wrong and that Sheridan and Rubenstein are right. But I don't think so." (Distant 'experts' choose to ignore Israeli realities, 8/3/14)

Stay tuned...

The Native Police

Zionist propagandists today (it wasn't always the case) just hate being described as settler-colonialists.

They prefer to paint themselves as an indigenous 'people' or 'nation', who, having been evicted from their Palestinian homeland by the Romans nigh on 2000 years ago, just sat around moping until, under the banner of political Zionism, they were able to 'return'.

OK, it's a great yarn, but sadly, that's all it is.

As much as Zionists like to pretend that theirs is a movement for national self-determination, rather than its opposite, just another, albeit highly creative, white European colonizing movement, there are simply too many tell-tale signs for the settler-colonial reality to be glossed over.

Like this, for example:

"Known popularly as the Magav, the Israeli Border Police evolved in part from an army division created in the wake of the state's foundation for the explicit purpose of capturing and deporting Palestinian refugees who had slipped into their former villages to reunite with family and spouses. Named the Minorities Unit, the division was comprised mostly of deeply impoverished young men recruited from Druze villages in the north and Bedouin Arab enclaves in the south. Their recruitment of non-Palestinian Arab subgroups served David Ben Gurion's divide-and-conquer strategy, which he dubbed, 'fragmentation'. As one Israeli official said, the Minorities Unit formed 'the sharp blade of a knife to stab in the back of Arab unity'." (Goliath: Life & Loathing in Greater Israel, Max Blumenthal, 2013, p 255)

And here's the same phenomenon closer to home:

"The frontier violence inflicted upon Aboriginal people in Queensland was a refinement of practices in southern colonies and a tradition of violence migrated north with landseekers. Colonialism is inherently violent. Moreover, the concept of using Indigenous troops to further colonisation and suppress resistance was not new. Like the British, other conquerors had found that Native forces enjoyed a number of advantages as imperial soldiers and frontier guards. Indigenous people were familiar with local terrain, customs and languages, and they had an ability to survive off the land without the catastrophic medical problems that affected invading armies and expeditions... By the time the British colonised Australia, several practices were standard. The Native Police, like other armed colonial formations based on the use of Indigenous recruits, took advantage of the fact that Native people had no loyalties to other Indigenous groups. Indeed, in some cases they were sworn enemies, and fought as much in their own self-interest as for other reasons. It has been argued that the search for a Native power base is an essential step in many colonial annexations. The concept of divide and rule, implicit in the recruitment of Indigenous troopers, shows how the British had learned to adapt traditional Indigenous enmity to their advantage." (The Secret War: A True History of Queensland's Native Police, Jonathan Richards, 2008, p 10)

Same old, same old.

Games Bibi Plays

You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see through this one:

"The Israeli navy said that it seized a ship in the Red Sea on Wednesday carrying dozens of advanced Iranian-supplied rockets made in Syria and intended for Palestinian guerillas in the besieged Gaza Strip. The disclosure came as Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu was in the US to press his case for tougher international action against Iran over its disputed nuclear program." (Seized rocket shipment was from Iran, Israel says, Dan Williams, Sydney Morning Herald/Reuters, 7/3/14)

I see... "Iranian-supplied rockets made in Syria."

And I thought the Syrians were only up to barrel bombs. Silly me. But wait, what's this:

"Israeli military footage showed a rocket on the floor of a ship hold, with cement bags labelled 'Made in Iran' in English next to it."

LOL

Ding-dong, Avnon Calling

Dan Avnon, "a Hebrew University political scientist whose initial bid for a fellowship application was rejected as part of a boycott against Israel has arrived in Australia expressing outrage at the action taken by Sydney academic Jake Lynch." (Boycotted Israeli embraced by other fellows, Ean Higgins, The Australian, 5/3/14)

But what's this? Contrary to what I'd expected, it seems the Avnon Lad's not over here to promote a range of Israeli propaganda lipsticks and cosmetics for Australian consumption. Or to swan around Sydney University going 'Nyah nyah nya nya nya, Jake Lynch'.

No, in Ean (with an 'e') Higgins' "exclusive interview," he describes himself as someone "devoted to overcoming certain undemocratic practices in Israel."

"Undemocratic practices"?

What? Israel? The Middle East's ONLY DEMOCRACY? The very model of a modern "liberal, pluralist democracy" as our dear leader is wont to refer to it.

Nooo... surely it cannot be!

But, hey, what would I know? Thanks to the Avnon Lad calling around my eyes are now open!

Hm... "undemocratic practices"?

Might these be such things as:

1) Occupying and colonizing someone else's land?
2) Booting out the indigenous population and denying it the right of return?
3) Relegating the remnant indigenes to second class status?

You'd imagine so. But wait, isn't that what BDS is all about?

This is all sooo confusing!