The Age: Enough Already!

What is going on at The Age?

This month, it's been one Zionist propaganda piece after another on the opinion page:

15/8/11: Why Australia should back creation of a Palestinian state, Harold Zwier & Larry Stillman (Don't be misled by the title - I'll be returning to this one later in the post.)

18/8/11: Tent city is a beacon of social justice & optimism, Robin Margo (See my 22/8/11 post 114 Years of Zionist Bombast.)

22/8/11: 'Virtual' Palestinian state could lead to actual disaster, Colin Rubenstein

While the 2nd and 3rd are obvious examples of the ZPP genre, the 1st sneakily adopts a pro-Palestinian (state) veneer: "Next month, the Palestinian delegation to the United States is expected to ask the General Assembly to recognise a Palestinian state. We believe Australia should support such a move."

Zwier and Stillman, however, described grandly in their bio as "on the executive of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society," quickly reveal themselves as Zionistas, albeit of the 'soft' variety, by perpetrating the following false equivalence: "Israel is more entrenched than ever in its territorial expansion through settlements in the West Bank, and Palestinians are more strident than ever in asserting their right to return to their original homes in Israel."

Get the picture? Z&S attempt to con the reader with a supposed balance of extremists: on the one hand, Jewish settlers taking Palestinian land in the West Bank; on the other, Palestinian refugees stubbornly determined to return home to - shock! horror! - Israel.

Anyone with even the haziest understanding of the conflict, however, will see through Z&S's subterfuge, knowing that while Israel floods the West Bank (and East Jerusalem) with settlers in defiance of international law, namely the Geneva Convention's ban on the occupier transferring "its own civilian population into the territory it occupies," Palestinian refugees have the full weight of international law on their side in the form of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and UNGA resolution 194. In short, there can be no equivalence whatever between those involved in a criminal enterprise and its victims.

Z&S's sleight of hand brazenly continues with:

"Palestinians will also be aware that recognition of Palestine will be a significant move towards dealing with the Palestinian refugee issue within their state and with compensation, rather than solely through the 'right of return'. It diminishes the credibility of a Palestinian government to insist that Palestinians should be able to live in the state next door in preference to their own state."

Run that past us again: A Palestinian government that doesn't ditch the fundamental right of all refugees, including Palestinian refugees, to return to their homes and lands loses credibility!

And, as if the above weren't Zionist chutzpah enough, were you to read Z&S's piece in its entirety, you'd see that nowhere does this pair of prestidigitators even suggest pulling Jewish settlers out of the West Bank to make way for the refugees they wouldn't want in what they - despite being Australian citizens - outrageously believe, as Zionists, is their state.

Breathtaking, isn't it?

PS 24/8/11: Letter in today's Age: "We've had views on Palestinian statehood from the Jewish left and now the Jewish right. Is it asking too much for The Age to publish a Palestinian perspective, or doesn't it count?" Shane McCartin, North Fitzroy