What with Senator Cory (Ban the Burqa) Bernardi inviting a certain seriously coiffed Dutch Islamophobe to come down and see him some time, and the emergence of the seriously confused sadsacks of the Australian Protectionist Party, who can find nothing better to do with their time than 'protect' a certain Israeli enterprise from BDS protesters, Peggy Seeger's Song of Choice* has never seemed more relevant:
Early every year the seeds are growing.
Unseen, unheard they lie beneath the ground.
Would you know before their leaves are showing
That with weeds all your garden will abound?
If you close your eyes, stop your ears,
Shut your mouth, then how can you know?
For seeds you cannot hear may not be there.
Seeds you cannot see may never grow.
In January you've still got the choice.
You can cut the weeds before they start to bud.
If you leave them to grow high, they'll silence your voice
And in December you may pay with your blood.
So close your eyes, stop your ears,
Shut your mouth and take it slow.
Let others take the lead and you bring up the rear
And later you can say you didn't know.
Every day another vulture takes flight.
There's another danger born every morning.
In the darkness of your blindness the beast will learn to bite.
How can you fight if you can't recognise a warning?
Today you may earn a living wage.
Tomorrow you may be on the dole.
Though there's millions going hungry you needn't disengage
For it's them, not you, that's fallen in the hole.
It's alright for you if you run with the pack.
It's alright if you agree with all they do.
If fascism is slowly climbing back,
It's not here yet so what's it got to do with you?
The weeds are all around us and they're growing.
It'll soon be too late for the knife.
If you leave them on the wind that around the world is blowing,
You may pay for your silence with your life.
So close your eyes, stop your ears,
Shut your mouth and never dare.
And if it happens here, they'll never come for you
Because they'll know you really didn't care.
[* My favourite version is the incomparable Dick Gaughan's.]
Monday, September 12, 2011
Your ABC?
I've often wondered, among other things, at the complete absence of good critical docos on the Palestine problem on ABC television.
Could the presence of the ABC's Managing Director, Mark Scott, and its Head of News & Current Affairs, Kate Torney, at the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies Luncheon Club be part of the explanation? (Opinion-makers at lunch, At the Board, Volume 2-2011)
Could the presence of the ABC's Managing Director, Mark Scott, and its Head of News & Current Affairs, Kate Torney, at the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies Luncheon Club be part of the explanation? (Opinion-makers at lunch, At the Board, Volume 2-2011)
Friday, September 9, 2011
The Pits
Mike Kelly, Labor MP for Eden Monaro, boasts of the 'new' boy on Labor's factional block:
"[T]he former military man spoke of Labor's 'felafel [sic] faction': a group of pro-Israel Government MPs. 'We've banded together, whenever issues arise we put our views to the executive'. An example of that, he said, was convincing Prime Minister Julia Gillard to withdraw Australia's representatives from the 'Durban III' anti-racism convention in New York later this month. 'The Durban circus will roll without us, it is important we send an early message', he said." (Government won't support PA at UN, The Australian Jewish News, 9/9/11)
Gillard needed convincing? Give me a break! With the honourable exception of Doug Cameron or (fill in space), I can't think of anyone in federal Labor who isn't a card-carrying member of this so-called falafel faction.
But there's really nothing new about the falafels, as the following 2009 puff piece from The Australian Jewish News on Labor's Zionist godfather, Michael Danby MP, reminds us. Danby is described as "act-[ing] as a watchdog with the new Rudd Government... corral[ing] his parliamentary colleagues and forc[ing] them to think long, hard and seriously about matters that often conjure knee-jerk reactions. 'During a recent political controversy, we had 11 federal MPs get together on an Israeli issue. Mike Kelly convened them and I organised with Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ)... to sit down with us and we strategised together'."* (A decade of Danby, AJN, 27/2/09)
I wonder if, rather than the AJN's euphemistic corraling, Danby's canine style wouldn't be more aptly described as 'bailing up'. In which case, maybe a more appropriate moniker for the 'faction' would be the 'pitbull faction', or, more accurately, just the pits.
But alas, the slobber doesn't end there.
Once dubbed the 'clanking colonel' by Bob Carr for his bizarre intervention from Iraq in the awarding of the Sydney Peace Prize to Palestinian activist and academic Hanan Ashrawi in 2003, an award Kelly described in a letter to Carr as "legitimating terrorism and giving 'comfort to the enemy',"** Kelly is actually married to a cousin of former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert.
No surprises then to learn that he "also spoke strongly against the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) movement, calling it 'anti-Semitic, vile & disgusting'." (Government won't support PA...)
And the by now ritual thirties flashback so characteristic of the pits? Kelly doesn't disappoint:
"Last month in Parliament, Kelly delivered a powerful speech on BDS posing the question: 'What are we going to see next? Will these people be daubing windows and breaking windows again?' He also called upon Greens leader Senator Bob Brown to 'exercise some control or intervention' over the NSW branch of his party, which openly supports the BDS movement." (ibid)
[* See my 1/3/09 post Nipping at Their Heels; **Army critic of peace proposal angers Carr, Nick O'Malley, SMH, 3/11/03)
"[T]he former military man spoke of Labor's 'felafel [sic] faction': a group of pro-Israel Government MPs. 'We've banded together, whenever issues arise we put our views to the executive'. An example of that, he said, was convincing Prime Minister Julia Gillard to withdraw Australia's representatives from the 'Durban III' anti-racism convention in New York later this month. 'The Durban circus will roll without us, it is important we send an early message', he said." (Government won't support PA at UN, The Australian Jewish News, 9/9/11)
Gillard needed convincing? Give me a break! With the honourable exception of Doug Cameron or (fill in space), I can't think of anyone in federal Labor who isn't a card-carrying member of this so-called falafel faction.
But there's really nothing new about the falafels, as the following 2009 puff piece from The Australian Jewish News on Labor's Zionist godfather, Michael Danby MP, reminds us. Danby is described as "act-[ing] as a watchdog with the new Rudd Government... corral[ing] his parliamentary colleagues and forc[ing] them to think long, hard and seriously about matters that often conjure knee-jerk reactions. 'During a recent political controversy, we had 11 federal MPs get together on an Israeli issue. Mike Kelly convened them and I organised with Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ)... to sit down with us and we strategised together'."* (A decade of Danby, AJN, 27/2/09)
I wonder if, rather than the AJN's euphemistic corraling, Danby's canine style wouldn't be more aptly described as 'bailing up'. In which case, maybe a more appropriate moniker for the 'faction' would be the 'pitbull faction', or, more accurately, just the pits.
But alas, the slobber doesn't end there.
Once dubbed the 'clanking colonel' by Bob Carr for his bizarre intervention from Iraq in the awarding of the Sydney Peace Prize to Palestinian activist and academic Hanan Ashrawi in 2003, an award Kelly described in a letter to Carr as "legitimating terrorism and giving 'comfort to the enemy',"** Kelly is actually married to a cousin of former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert.
No surprises then to learn that he "also spoke strongly against the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) movement, calling it 'anti-Semitic, vile & disgusting'." (Government won't support PA...)
And the by now ritual thirties flashback so characteristic of the pits? Kelly doesn't disappoint:
"Last month in Parliament, Kelly delivered a powerful speech on BDS posing the question: 'What are we going to see next? Will these people be daubing windows and breaking windows again?' He also called upon Greens leader Senator Bob Brown to 'exercise some control or intervention' over the NSW branch of his party, which openly supports the BDS movement." (ibid)
[* See my 1/3/09 post Nipping at Their Heels; **Army critic of peace proposal angers Carr, Nick O'Malley, SMH, 3/11/03)
Which Side Are You On?
NSW Greens MLC mining spokesman and anti-coal seam gas crusader, Jeremy Buckingham, has joined the Parliamentary Friends of the CSG Industry, saying he's concerned about the 'tone' of anti-CSG protests:
"The NSW Greens MP Jeremy Buckingham has spoken out against the targeting of Max Brenner chocolate stores as part of an anti-Israel boycott, deepening the split within the Greens over the issue. Mr Buckingham argued that the campaign was 'counter-productive to the cause of peace and human rights in the Middle East'. He has also joined the Parliamentary Friends of Israel, as well as the equivalent Palestinian friendship group... 'There are a variety of ways to express concern about the abuse of Palestinian human rights and to push for a just peace between Israelis and Palestinians... I am concerned that the tone and public perception of the Max Brenner protests* may be counter-productive to the cause of peace and human rights in the Middle East'." (Anti-Israel boycott opens fresh split in Greens, Sean Nicholls, Josephine Tovey, Sydney Morning Herald, 9/9/11)
[* Code for 'I've been reading The Australian'.]
"The NSW Greens MP Jeremy Buckingham has spoken out against the targeting of Max Brenner chocolate stores as part of an anti-Israel boycott, deepening the split within the Greens over the issue. Mr Buckingham argued that the campaign was 'counter-productive to the cause of peace and human rights in the Middle East'. He has also joined the Parliamentary Friends of Israel, as well as the equivalent Palestinian friendship group... 'There are a variety of ways to express concern about the abuse of Palestinian human rights and to push for a just peace between Israelis and Palestinians... I am concerned that the tone and public perception of the Max Brenner protests* may be counter-productive to the cause of peace and human rights in the Middle East'." (Anti-Israel boycott opens fresh split in Greens, Sean Nicholls, Josephine Tovey, Sydney Morning Herald, 9/9/11)
[* Code for 'I've been reading The Australian'.]
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
The Palfour Declaration
Here's the Palestinian 'President' Mahmoud Abbas' version of 'the vision thing' in the lead-up to the Palestinian Authority's bid to seek UN membership for a Palestinian state later this month:
"We don't want to isolate Israel but to live with it in peace and security. We don't want to delegitimize Israel. We want to legitimize ourselves. We have good coordination [with Israel] to prevent terror and keep the situation calm and quiet. We will continue to do our job. Security will prevail as long as I'm in office." (Abbas affirms Palestinian bid for UN membership, Ethan Bronner, nytimes.com, 5/9/11)
Yet as inspiring as Abbas' vision thingy is, I think the Palestinians could do better. Heaps better. So, in the spirit of 'what's good for the goose is good for the gander', and drawing on precedent, here's the text I think the Palestinians should be taking to the UN:
'The United Nations view with favour the establishment in Israel of a national home for the Palestinian people, and will use its best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing Jewish communities in Israel, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.'
Way to go!
"We don't want to isolate Israel but to live with it in peace and security. We don't want to delegitimize Israel. We want to legitimize ourselves. We have good coordination [with Israel] to prevent terror and keep the situation calm and quiet. We will continue to do our job. Security will prevail as long as I'm in office." (Abbas affirms Palestinian bid for UN membership, Ethan Bronner, nytimes.com, 5/9/11)
Yet as inspiring as Abbas' vision thingy is, I think the Palestinians could do better. Heaps better. So, in the spirit of 'what's good for the goose is good for the gander', and drawing on precedent, here's the text I think the Palestinians should be taking to the UN:
'The United Nations view with favour the establishment in Israel of a national home for the Palestinian people, and will use its best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing Jewish communities in Israel, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.'
Way to go!
The Silence of the Intellectual 2
Further to my previous post on Robert Manne's Quarterly Essay critique of The Australian, here's an interesting exchange between another Israel indulgent, Phillip Adams, and Manne:
Adams: Explain to me why The Greens are in the [Australian's] crosshairs. What's going on there?
Manne:Well, I think the paper was extremely opposed to Gillard's decision to work with The Greens... I think that they see The Greens as economically mad. I think that they have a hostility to what they see as the inner-city late set which they think to be the voting power of The Greens. I think they oppose what they think is the radicalism of the climate change attitude of The Greens, and there's also a pocket of Greens in NSW that are very hostile to Israel, and that again is one of the things that they really exaggerate...
Adams: I think it causes Bob Brown some problems.
Manne: And causes Bob Brown some problems. To put it simply, both sides of politics, Liberal and Labor, are so pro-Israel that the fact that there is a faction of The Greens in NSW that are hostile to Israeli policy is not that important...
Adams: Well, it might even be healthy.
Manne: Might even be healthy, but it's certainly not important in the way that the paper made a huge amount, during the NSW state election, of that issue. ('Bad News': Quarterly Essay, Late Night Live, 5/9/11)
What Manne (and Adams) show no interest in exploring is just why this unimportant spot of BDS ferment among the NSW Greens should put The Australian into such a towering rage. And that is because he doesn't seem prepared to admit that toeing and promoting the Israeli line is absolutely central to The Australian, let alone canvass the implications of same.
Adams: Explain to me why The Greens are in the [Australian's] crosshairs. What's going on there?
Manne:Well, I think the paper was extremely opposed to Gillard's decision to work with The Greens... I think that they see The Greens as economically mad. I think that they have a hostility to what they see as the inner-city late set which they think to be the voting power of The Greens. I think they oppose what they think is the radicalism of the climate change attitude of The Greens, and there's also a pocket of Greens in NSW that are very hostile to Israel, and that again is one of the things that they really exaggerate...
Adams: I think it causes Bob Brown some problems.
Manne: And causes Bob Brown some problems. To put it simply, both sides of politics, Liberal and Labor, are so pro-Israel that the fact that there is a faction of The Greens in NSW that are hostile to Israeli policy is not that important...
Adams: Well, it might even be healthy.
Manne: Might even be healthy, but it's certainly not important in the way that the paper made a huge amount, during the NSW state election, of that issue. ('Bad News': Quarterly Essay, Late Night Live, 5/9/11)
What Manne (and Adams) show no interest in exploring is just why this unimportant spot of BDS ferment among the NSW Greens should put The Australian into such a towering rage. And that is because he doesn't seem prepared to admit that toeing and promoting the Israeli line is absolutely central to The Australian, let alone canvass the implications of same.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
The Silence of the Intellectual 1
As predicted, Robert Manne's critique of The Australian in the latest edition of The Quarterly Essay, Bad News: Murdoch's Australian & the Shaping of the Nation, shies away from one of the salient features of the paper - its zealous, no-holds-barred defence of Israel and related promotion of Islamophobia.
Not that Manne is not aware of it, as this solitary reference (on page 3) indicates: "The Australian is ruthless in pursuit of those who oppose its worldview - market fundamentalism, minimal action on climate change, the federal Intervention in indigenous affairs, uncritical support for the American alliance and for Israel, opposition to what it calls political correctness and moral relativism." (Interestingly, this was missing from the "edited extract" published in Friday's Fairfax press that sparked my first post on the subject of Robert Manne and his 'Don't mention Israel' blindspot.)
The question of why, in a 119-page essay, Manne chose not to go there (even in his chapter on The Greens, who have been more pilloried by The Australian over their support for BDS than anything else) was raised in my earlier post*, so I'll leave it there. It suffices to note that it is precisely the choice of prominent liberal intellectuals (particularly those who identify as Jews) such as Manne not to go there, not to speak out against Zionism and its crimes, that prolongs the agony quaintly known as the Middle East conflict. [* Who Speaks for Palestine, 2/9/11]
Not that Manne is not aware of it, as this solitary reference (on page 3) indicates: "The Australian is ruthless in pursuit of those who oppose its worldview - market fundamentalism, minimal action on climate change, the federal Intervention in indigenous affairs, uncritical support for the American alliance and for Israel, opposition to what it calls political correctness and moral relativism." (Interestingly, this was missing from the "edited extract" published in Friday's Fairfax press that sparked my first post on the subject of Robert Manne and his 'Don't mention Israel' blindspot.)
The question of why, in a 119-page essay, Manne chose not to go there (even in his chapter on The Greens, who have been more pilloried by The Australian over their support for BDS than anything else) was raised in my earlier post*, so I'll leave it there. It suffices to note that it is precisely the choice of prominent liberal intellectuals (particularly those who identify as Jews) such as Manne not to go there, not to speak out against Zionism and its crimes, that prolongs the agony quaintly known as the Middle East conflict. [* Who Speaks for Palestine, 2/9/11]
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