The first two episodes of The Promise (SBS1 on Sunday nights) have confirmed my hopes (Looks Promising! 25/11) for Peter Kosminsky's dramatised interweaving of the final years of British mandate rule over Palestine with the current situation in Israeli-occupied Palestine. The quality, sweep, intellectual courage and historical fidelity of this television drama makes it compulsory viewing for anyone interested in understanding why things are as they are in Palestine/Israel today.
In large part, episode 2 focused on the 1946 Zionist terrorist bombing of the British Mandate government's civil and military headquarters in Jerusalem's King David Hotel and the motivation of its Irgun perpetrators - which brings me to the real subject of this post.
Who could have predicted that, 63 years after the event, this particular outrage would become the subject of one of the most tasteless jokes ever made by any Australian politician, and one that, in fact, should figure prominently in any future assessment of the joker's character and fitness to retain office. But I'll come to that later. For some idea of the scale of the Irgun's operation, and hence its potential and actual human cost, against which the gravity of 'The Joke' might be measured, it is necessary to first revisit the massacre in some detail. The following account of the bombing comes from one who was there, a young British officer named Philip Brutton:
"In Tel Aviv [Menachem] Begin's Irgun gang began their operation early on Monday 22 July, while Jerusalem and the author slept. At 05.30 they stole a Jewish taxi and a Jewish truck. They then drove to Jerusalem where at 11.00 they stole a pick-up lorry and loaded it with 7 milk cans, a significant number in Jewish tradition. Then, dressed as Arabs, armed with Sten and Tommy guns, they drove to the King David Hotel at 11.45. They descended the slope to the unguarded entrance, rounded up the stuff and unloaded the explosives packed into the milk cans... (p 44)
"[T]he first - diversionary, as it turned out - bomb exploded [at about 12.20]. The city siren sounded, then the all-clear at 12.31... Then at 12.37 there was a very loud explosion indeed... More than 90 people had just been killed, including 17 Jews, in the Hotel and one terrorist found by the police. The terrorists had, as noted, arrived at the basement of the King David Hotel at 11.45, placing the 7 milk cans containing the explosives along the corridor underneath the government Secretariat offices...
"Two orders had been ignored by the Irgun, the first being that the operation was to take place out of office hours to avoid, hopefully, any loss of life; also a warning must be telephoned in good time. It was, even so, a dangerous, uncertain, unprincipled and ungrateful act against the one country which had gone out of its way, however unfairly to the Arabs and disastrously for its administrators, to help the Zionist cause. It was, too, organized at the highest level of the Yishuv. The planting of the bombs, and consequent planned destruction of government offices, was an extension of the rebellion, undeclared and never admitted, against the Mandatory power. British intelligence, however, was well aware of the existence of X Command and the identity of its chairman, Ben-Gurion. The King David Hotel operation did not have the destruction of documents as a prime objective: they were not filed exclusively there and those removed from the Jewish Agency had been copied. It was a pointless counter-reaction of provocation which backfired. It was also cold-blooded premeditated murder by the Irgun gang. [British PM] Ernest Bevin and the British government were conversant with the Zionist strategy to obtain their state, both from public pronouncements and from decryptanalysis:
1. Calculated use of violence and, when the occasion demanded, denunciation of the violence initiated by X Command or its affiliates.
2. Condemnation of government response, provoked by violence, as being - to use Weizmann's words - a declaration of war against world Jewry.
3. The Arab position to be ignored.
4. American support to be rallied in both political and financial dimensions.
"The government's knowledge of facts, nevertheless, could not provide a solution. If a solution was acceptable to the Jews, it would not be to the Arabs, therefore not to the Mandatory power. Thus, the strategy and tactics of obtaining the end by the means outlined above continued: terrorism - condemnation of terrorism - government reaction - condemnation of this reaction - more terrorism. Neither the ambition to obtain the goal, nor the blood lust which went with it could be either controlled or assuaged.
"No one knew this better than Israel Levi who was in charge of the party which placed the bombs. He connected the timing devices, and also a booby trap, duly announced, to discourage defusing. He and his gang were disturbed by Captain A.D. Mackintosh, Royal Signals, whom they failed to overcome. They then shot him in the stomach. He stumbled towards the staircase and was found by a porter to whom he gave the facts. The porter informed the manager, Hamburger, who told security.
"Thus the Hotel security, alerted through the heroic efforts of the Royal Signals officer, knew at 12.10 that 'an officer had been attacked. Armed Arabs were in the basement'. A security officer then peered through a grill. He was fired at. Irgun withdrew at 12.15. The Hotel alarm bell alerted Jerusalem Police Headquarters. Hotel security fired on the Irgun lorry. It was abandoned. The occupants fled on foot. Two were hit.
"Minutes later, between 12.20 and 12.25, the smaller bomb we heard in the Old City, intended to divert attention and block access to the Hotel, was exploded. At 12.37 the 7 milk cans blew up. The whole south-west corner of the Hotel collapsed; 6 floors and 28 rooms were reduced to rubble. Robert Newton was in his office when the ceiling fell and the wall behind him disappeared. Below was open space; beyond had been the lift shaft, the typists' room and an adjacent office in which a colleague had worked. Everything and everybody had disappeared. The girls in the typing room were buried under the rubble, dead.
"Superintendent K.P. Haddingham had just arrived from Police Headquarters. He was injured and placed on a stretcher. He then saw, with horror, on the wall of the YMCA opposite, the bodies of two middle-aged men, flung by the blast, like plaster, against the stone, their blood streaming in rivulets, their crucified remains splayed and contorted 16 feet above ground, resembling some sick mural, stuccoed and silhouetted in high relief. They were his friends, Postmaster General G. D. Kennedy and Assistant Secretary E.W. Keys, who had been standing at the Secretariat entrance.
"About 15 minutes earlier the first so-called diversionary bomb had been detonated outside a car showroom, owned by a Christian Arab, a few yards from the Hotel. It failed to set off the ancillary devices which would have fired the whole street. The second diversionary bomb failed to explode and was dismantled by the police... It was some diversion. It had been placed north of the Hotel in a nearby street, outside a shop named Deen's Indian Taylor. It contained TNT and inflammable wadding. Four petrol cans were on top.
"Meanwhile, we made our way back to the New City through the deserted, winding ways of the Old and soon passed through a police cordon where the car containing the second so-called diversionary bomb was being searched and the bomb dismantled. We collected the jeep and went to the Hotel. The bar was a shambles of broken glass and blood. The barman told us no one had been killed there, so Rosemary Walsh was safe. Arthur Butler was cut about the knees. Had we been there we would not have been killed, but flying glass can damage more than knees.
"Rosemary's father was buried under the masonry and presumed dead. He was not among those missing who miraculously survived, one of whom was dug out 24 hours later. He shook hands with the High Commissioner and was taken to hospital where he died of shock.
"After lunch we returned to examine the damage, having no idea of the numbers buried, dead, and alive underneath. There was no noise as soldiers and police began the prolonged job of digging into the rubble. The police, in the meantime, had found the two terrorists hit by the Hotel security: one was dead, the other wounded. He was arrested, later tried and hanged. They were the soldati. The capi escaped.
"The warning ordered by X Command, with whom the ultimate responsibility for the outrage rested, was, in practice, ignored. The first warning was given two minutes before the main explosion, and repeated twice afterwards, by which time it was an epilogue...
"In sum: the terrorists fled from the Hotel at 12.15, after being there for half-an-hour, during which time they placed and primed the bombs. The diversionary explosion occurred between 12.20 and 12.25. The first of 3 warning calls was received at 12.35. The main explosion occurred at 12.37: 91 dead, including 41 Arabs, 28 British, 17 Jews and 5 others. Our rendezvous with Rosemary Walsh saved her life. She would otherwise have been in her father's office. Weizmann's cordite had come full circle." (A Captain's Mandate: Palestine 1946-1948, 1996, pp 46-49)
Got the picture? Now for the loose lips. Here, according to he Australian Jewish News of December 17, 2011, is how foreign minister Kevin Rudd began his "keynote address" to an Australia Israel Leadership Forum (AILF) audience in Jerusalem's King David Hotel on December 13, 2010:
"It is an honour to be among Israeli and Australian friends tonight here in Jerusalem, at the King David Hotel. Shimon Peres, Israel's President, who we met earlier today, said some years ago that when you come to the King David, you come not just as a guest, but you come also to a place which has seen almost the complete cast of players across the history of the modern State of Israel, often in this room in which we gather here tonight. From the 1930s, this hotel became the British field headquarters for what was then British Palestine, until Menachem Begin undertook some interior redesign."
That crack, in the context of Rudd's obscenely uncritical embrace of Israel, goes to the heart of the man's character, and, as I've suggested, raises the issue of whether he's fit to represent this country as foreign, or any other, minister.
Equally, it goes to the heart of our corporate media culture, which never really gave it the attention it deserved. None of the ms media's court reporters who accompanied Rudd, or any of its Middle East correspondents (Koutsoukis/Fairfax; Ben Knight/ABC; John Lyons/ News Ltd) queried it, as the Q&A following Rudd's press conference next day with PA foreign minister Riad Malki makes clear.
Rudd barracker and foreign editor of Murdoch's Australian, Greg (Jerusalem Prize) Sheridan, managed to simultaneously soft-soap Rudd and whitewash Israeli terrorism when he wrote that there are "times when he seemed to strain just that bit too much to connect with the audience. Rudd was referring to the incident in which Israeli independence activists [!] blew up the hotel. I accept that they were not the equivalent of modern terrorists. [!] But people died in that incident. I don't think such a joke was in good taste, although many in the audience appreciated it." (That's no way to treat a precious friend, Mr Rudd, 16/12/10)
That many in the audience appreciated [the joke] speaks volumes for the moral void inhabited by Rudd's camp followers.
At home, the Sydney Morning Herald editorialist came closest to cottoning on to its significance when he/she called it "a distasteful joke," and asked, "Has Rudd really got it as a diplomat?" (Mid-East peace: a time to speak, 21/12/10).
Further along (May 5, 2011), journalist Brian Toohey, writing at inside.org.au, commented relevantly: "Nor does... Kevin Rudd display a deep concern for human rights. Although Rudd professes to abhor terrorism, this belief wasn't apparent while he was seeking to impress an audience during a speech at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem in March [sic] this year. Representing Australia, Rudd said that Menachem Begin 'undertook some interior redesign' at that same hotel. This sick attempt at humour was a reference to how Begin's terrorist group killed 91 people when it blew up the British-occupied hotel in 1946."
But that was it really. No doubt 'The Joke', which should have resulted in lead stories all over, is destined for Orwell's memory hole.
Finally, to round this one off, what about the Zionist response to 'The Joke'? In fact, there was none. The Australian Jewish News wisely kept mum. But, true to form, there's always one in this category who wants his tuppence worth. Someone called David Singer, who blogs at - wait for it - jordanispalestine.blogspot.com, just couldn't contain himself at the Herald's reference to Rudd's "distasteful joke" and its questioning of his diplomatic competence:
"(i) The King David Hotel was the headquarters of the British army - a legitimate target for an attack. (ii) Warnings were given to clear the hotel but were ignored by the British. (iii) The attack was not a 'terrorist bombing' since the civilian population was not deliberately targeted. I would suggest the Herald not worry about Rudd... the Herald needs to worry about its journalists who write such nonsense as this skewed and inaccurate editorial. Maybe in the spirit of openness and transparency being lately espoused by the Herald in its ongoing exclusive releases from WikiLeaks - the Herald might tell us (i) who wrote the editorial (ii) the qualifications of the person writing the editorial (iii) who checked the editorial for its accuracy before publication. At this festive time of goodwill and cheer the Herald has clearly displayed that this editorial is lacking in both." (Hark the Herald devil sings, analyst-network.com, 7/1/11)
Presumably, the Herald editorialist should have endorsed 'The Joke' with a hearty 'Ho, ho, ho, Kevin! What a blast! May you and yours have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
[For the background to Rudd's 'joke' see my posts The Kevin Rudd Road Show 1 (18/12/10) and TKRRS 2 (20/12/10).]
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Sunday, December 4, 2011
A Surreal Experience
Judging by the account at jwire.com.au, Yachad-Unity-Israel, Australia & Education (29/10/11), the National Australia Bank Yachad Scholarship Fund Luncheon in Melbourne on November 25 was a surreal experience.
There was Mark Leibler, Deputy Chair of Yachad, who talked about his, the NAB's, and his community's "passion for redressing the disadvantageous circumstances faced by Indigenous Australians."
(In that case maybe he could put the hard word on the Chair of NAB, Michael Chaney, who doubles as Chair of Woodside, to drop its plan for a gas hub at James Price Point on the Kimberley coast which is the location of a song cycle sacred to the Goolarabooloo and other people of the Dampier Peninsula. (See Sacredsong-cycle site disturbed by gas hub plans, Paddy Manning, The Age, 5/12/11)
Needless to say, nothing was said of Israel's passion for creating and maintaining the disadvantageous circumstances faced by indigenous Palestinians.
There was PM Julia Gillard, who gushed:
"We do gather as friends today - friends of the great republic of Israel whose peace and security is so dear to Australian hearts and to mine. We are two countries separated by distance but united by values. Liberal democracies that seek freedom and peace. A just and secure Israel as a homeland for the Jewish people is an indispensible part of a just and secure world. In the Common Era there has never been a century when the Jewish people have known safety. May this century be the first. May this be the time when people of good will, Israelis and Palestinians alike sit together and find a lasting peace. A century when understanding overcomes hate."
Which, if you took her seriously, could only mean that Australia too is an apartheid state. Still, how can you think straight when you've got an election to fund in 2013, if not sooner, and the usual suspects are scrutinising your every word and then some? So on she went:
"On my visit to Israel I was struck repeatedly by the depth of commitment amongst Israel's people to solving problems, for innovation and ingenuity in the face of adversity. It is a quality that we can all benefit from. Strength in partnerships through education and social action is a vital part of any society."
The rest of us tend to be struck repeatedly by the hole Israel has been digging for itself ever since its creation in 1948, but no matter, for an Australian PM trailing in the polls, and for whom nothing matters more than hanging on to power, the show, as they say, must go on.
There was Dr Ron Weiser, Honorary Life President of the Zionist Council of NSW, who chimed in with: "Despite the certain sacrifices and risks that any negotiated peace would entail, Israel still relentlessly pursues that peace and mutual recognition."
Which makes for high comedy when paired with this little item from this week's Australian Jewish News on Netanyah's relentless pursuit of peace: "In light of regional unrest, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told the Knesset on Wednesday last week that Israel must now move slowly and cautiously in peace moves with the Palestinians, and those who urged otherwise had their heads 'buried in the sand'... We can't know who will end up with any piece of territory we give up. Reality is changing all the time, and if you don't see it, your head is buried in the sand', Netanyahu said." (Netanyau warns against rushing into peace deal, Herb Keinin, The Jerusalem Post/AJN, 2/12/11)
Finally, there was Dr Jakelin Troy, "2011 NAB Australian Friends of Tel Aviv University Yachad," and "an indigenous academic" who researches "indigenous social and cultural well-being at the Australian Institute of Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Studies based in Canberra."
This was surely the most surreal touch of all - an indigenous Australian set to sit at the feet of the mob who, in 1948, ethnically cleansed Palestine of most of its indigenous inhabitants, and who, since 1967, have occupied the rest.
There was Mark Leibler, Deputy Chair of Yachad, who talked about his, the NAB's, and his community's "passion for redressing the disadvantageous circumstances faced by Indigenous Australians."
(In that case maybe he could put the hard word on the Chair of NAB, Michael Chaney, who doubles as Chair of Woodside, to drop its plan for a gas hub at James Price Point on the Kimberley coast which is the location of a song cycle sacred to the Goolarabooloo and other people of the Dampier Peninsula. (See Sacredsong-cycle site disturbed by gas hub plans, Paddy Manning, The Age, 5/12/11)
Needless to say, nothing was said of Israel's passion for creating and maintaining the disadvantageous circumstances faced by indigenous Palestinians.
There was PM Julia Gillard, who gushed:
"We do gather as friends today - friends of the great republic of Israel whose peace and security is so dear to Australian hearts and to mine. We are two countries separated by distance but united by values. Liberal democracies that seek freedom and peace. A just and secure Israel as a homeland for the Jewish people is an indispensible part of a just and secure world. In the Common Era there has never been a century when the Jewish people have known safety. May this century be the first. May this be the time when people of good will, Israelis and Palestinians alike sit together and find a lasting peace. A century when understanding overcomes hate."
Which, if you took her seriously, could only mean that Australia too is an apartheid state. Still, how can you think straight when you've got an election to fund in 2013, if not sooner, and the usual suspects are scrutinising your every word and then some? So on she went:
"On my visit to Israel I was struck repeatedly by the depth of commitment amongst Israel's people to solving problems, for innovation and ingenuity in the face of adversity. It is a quality that we can all benefit from. Strength in partnerships through education and social action is a vital part of any society."
The rest of us tend to be struck repeatedly by the hole Israel has been digging for itself ever since its creation in 1948, but no matter, for an Australian PM trailing in the polls, and for whom nothing matters more than hanging on to power, the show, as they say, must go on.
There was Dr Ron Weiser, Honorary Life President of the Zionist Council of NSW, who chimed in with: "Despite the certain sacrifices and risks that any negotiated peace would entail, Israel still relentlessly pursues that peace and mutual recognition."
Which makes for high comedy when paired with this little item from this week's Australian Jewish News on Netanyah's relentless pursuit of peace: "In light of regional unrest, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told the Knesset on Wednesday last week that Israel must now move slowly and cautiously in peace moves with the Palestinians, and those who urged otherwise had their heads 'buried in the sand'... We can't know who will end up with any piece of territory we give up. Reality is changing all the time, and if you don't see it, your head is buried in the sand', Netanyahu said." (Netanyau warns against rushing into peace deal, Herb Keinin, The Jerusalem Post/AJN, 2/12/11)
Finally, there was Dr Jakelin Troy, "2011 NAB Australian Friends of Tel Aviv University Yachad," and "an indigenous academic" who researches "indigenous social and cultural well-being at the Australian Institute of Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Studies based in Canberra."
This was surely the most surreal touch of all - an indigenous Australian set to sit at the feet of the mob who, in 1948, ethnically cleansed Palestine of most of its indigenous inhabitants, and who, since 1967, have occupied the rest.
On Aztec Sacrifices
Former Age sports journalist turned "senior writer" and local rah-rah man for Israel's 'Peace Team', Martin Flanagan, is not at all happy with the British (or Australian) media, citing Murdoch's blessedly defunct News of the World's disgraceful treatment of the parents of abducted British child, Madelaine McCann.
The occasion for his piece was a line from a (UK) Daily Telegraph article on Britain's Leveson inquiry on the media, which he praised as the single best line of 2011: "'Is there a journalist's byline on that article?' thundered Lord Justice Leveson, who is starting to wear the aghast look of a missionary observing his first Aztec sacrifice."
Concluded Flanagan:
"Nowadays, nobody thinks Aztec sacrifices were just something that happened between the Aztec priests and the victims whose hearts they cut out. Our idea of Aztec sacrifices extends to the crowds who stood and stared, who drank it up as a spectacle, who either believed they couldn't stop it or didn't care and are thus remembered as being part of the barbaric practice." (The sad truth about the morality of our media, The Age, 3/12/11)
Funny, but with Palestinian hearts being ripped, torn, stilled and broken on a daily basis by Israel's current crop of state-of-the-art 'obsidian knives', all Flanagan can find to say is, "Personally, I don't want to get involved in the politics of the Middle East." (Without politics, Peace Team is peaceful, The Age, 24/9/11).
The occasion for his piece was a line from a (UK) Daily Telegraph article on Britain's Leveson inquiry on the media, which he praised as the single best line of 2011: "'Is there a journalist's byline on that article?' thundered Lord Justice Leveson, who is starting to wear the aghast look of a missionary observing his first Aztec sacrifice."
Concluded Flanagan:
"Nowadays, nobody thinks Aztec sacrifices were just something that happened between the Aztec priests and the victims whose hearts they cut out. Our idea of Aztec sacrifices extends to the crowds who stood and stared, who drank it up as a spectacle, who either believed they couldn't stop it or didn't care and are thus remembered as being part of the barbaric practice." (The sad truth about the morality of our media, The Age, 3/12/11)
Funny, but with Palestinian hearts being ripped, torn, stilled and broken on a daily basis by Israel's current crop of state-of-the-art 'obsidian knives', all Flanagan can find to say is, "Personally, I don't want to get involved in the politics of the Middle East." (Without politics, Peace Team is peaceful, The Age, 24/9/11).
Ted Baillieu's Mr Unforgettable
Meet Michael Kapel, the man who "runs" Victoria's (rrrabidly anti-BDS) Baillieu government:
"Now chief of staff to Premier Baillieu, Kapel has more than the Premier's ear. There are those who wonder whether this intense 48-year-old economic conservative and social moderate actually runs this government, or comes close to it. Others suggest that the Premier has simply found a perfect ally in Kapel, someone who shares his values and understands his quirks and leadership style. As one colleague put it: 'Michael just gets him'. Kapel prefers being the backroom player - he declined an interview for this story - but he has been embroiled in unusual controversy in the state government's first year, disliked by some, admired by others. No one denies that he is now one of the most influential people in Victoria. Officially, it is Kapel's job to manage the Premier's private office, hire and fire, oversee policy, devise strategy, offer Baillieu advice and watch the Premier's back. In reality, some Liberal MPs argue - none on the record - that the government is too centralised, with all roads leading to Kapel. They blame him for the fact it took months for the government to appoint ministerial staff - he was on the selection committee and vetted every appointment." (The man behind the man in charge, Farrah Tomazin & David Rood, The Age, 27/11/11)
But there's more. Much more:
"Few people in the Liberal Party say they really know Kapel; fewer claim to understand him. He's the son of French Holocaust survivors who grew up in a left-leaning home, which imbued in him a fierce sense of social justice and racial tolerance. A neo-conservative on foreign policy who in the 1990s edited the Australia/Israel Review*, he campaigned against the emergence of the far right in national politics. He's a man who is loyal to those he trusts, and receives loyalty in return. He's a staffer so close to the Premier that last year Baillieu serenaded the guests at Kapel's wedding with a version of Nat King Cole's Unforgettable... His work as editor of the Review in the 1990s was a defining period. The magazine - which covers Israeli and Jewish affairs - broke major stories: the inner workings of the American anti-semitic LaRouche organisation; suspected Nazi war criminals living in Australia; exposes about Holocaust denier David Irving; and the rise of Pauline Hanson's One Nation party." (ibid)
[*The magazine of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC).]
For those interested in joining dots, please read my posts Criminalising BDS (9/8/11), and We Need to Talk About Ted (10/8/11). Just click on the Ted Baillieu label below.
"Now chief of staff to Premier Baillieu, Kapel has more than the Premier's ear. There are those who wonder whether this intense 48-year-old economic conservative and social moderate actually runs this government, or comes close to it. Others suggest that the Premier has simply found a perfect ally in Kapel, someone who shares his values and understands his quirks and leadership style. As one colleague put it: 'Michael just gets him'. Kapel prefers being the backroom player - he declined an interview for this story - but he has been embroiled in unusual controversy in the state government's first year, disliked by some, admired by others. No one denies that he is now one of the most influential people in Victoria. Officially, it is Kapel's job to manage the Premier's private office, hire and fire, oversee policy, devise strategy, offer Baillieu advice and watch the Premier's back. In reality, some Liberal MPs argue - none on the record - that the government is too centralised, with all roads leading to Kapel. They blame him for the fact it took months for the government to appoint ministerial staff - he was on the selection committee and vetted every appointment." (The man behind the man in charge, Farrah Tomazin & David Rood, The Age, 27/11/11)
But there's more. Much more:
"Few people in the Liberal Party say they really know Kapel; fewer claim to understand him. He's the son of French Holocaust survivors who grew up in a left-leaning home, which imbued in him a fierce sense of social justice and racial tolerance. A neo-conservative on foreign policy who in the 1990s edited the Australia/Israel Review*, he campaigned against the emergence of the far right in national politics. He's a man who is loyal to those he trusts, and receives loyalty in return. He's a staffer so close to the Premier that last year Baillieu serenaded the guests at Kapel's wedding with a version of Nat King Cole's Unforgettable... His work as editor of the Review in the 1990s was a defining period. The magazine - which covers Israeli and Jewish affairs - broke major stories: the inner workings of the American anti-semitic LaRouche organisation; suspected Nazi war criminals living in Australia; exposes about Holocaust denier David Irving; and the rise of Pauline Hanson's One Nation party." (ibid)
[*The magazine of the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC).]
For those interested in joining dots, please read my posts Criminalising BDS (9/8/11), and We Need to Talk About Ted (10/8/11). Just click on the Ted Baillieu label below.
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Syrian Barbarism
Typical Syrian barbarism:
"One military defector stated that he had decided to defect after witnessing the shooting of a 2-year-old girl in Al Ladhiqiyah on 13 August by an officer who affirmed that he did not want her to grow into a demonstrator', the report says." (Syrian death toll includes 250 kids, The Wall Street Journal/The Australian, 30/10/11)
There's just no way that could happen in civilised Israel, right?
Wrong:
"Dead babies, mothers weeping on their children's graves, a gun aimed at a child and bombed-out mosques - these are a few examples of the images Israel Defense Forces soldiers design these days to print on shirts they order to mark the end of training, or of field duty. The slogans accompanying the drawings are not exactly anemic either: A T-shirt for infantry snipers bears the inscription, 'Better use Durex', next to a picture of a dead Palestinian baby, with his weeping mother and a teddy bear beside him. A sharpshooter's T-shirt from the Givati Brigade's Shaked battalion shows a pregnant Palestinian woman with a bull's-eye superimposed on her belly, with the slogan, in English, '1 shot, 2 kills'." (Dead Palestinian babies & bombed mosques - IDF fashion 2009, Uri Blau, Haaretz, 20/3/09)
Ah, but that's now. Back in the good old days - 1953 - when Israel's 'soul' was intact, knocking off women and children was unheard of, right?
Wrong:
"Sharon's life-long war against the Arabs in general and the Palestinians in particular started immediately after that first successful operation against the Bedouin. His next major proposal to command headquarters was a limited raid against the al-Burg refugee camp, which was supposedly used by infiltrators as a base. When he described the details of the operation to his soldiers, one of them - according to Uri Benziman - observed that the obvious objective of the raid was to kill as many civilians as possible. The soldier complained that this was an improper objective, but Sharon ignored the remark. The result was that 15 Palestinians were killed, most of them women and children. Interrogated by superiors after the raid, he argued that the high casualty rate was necessitated by the need to defend the lives of his soldiers. He explained to his own soldiers that all the women of the camps were whores that served the murderers." (Politicide: Ariel Sharon's War Against the Palestinians, Baruch Kimmerling, 2003, pp 48-49)
"One military defector stated that he had decided to defect after witnessing the shooting of a 2-year-old girl in Al Ladhiqiyah on 13 August by an officer who affirmed that he did not want her to grow into a demonstrator', the report says." (Syrian death toll includes 250 kids, The Wall Street Journal/The Australian, 30/10/11)
There's just no way that could happen in civilised Israel, right?
Wrong:
"Dead babies, mothers weeping on their children's graves, a gun aimed at a child and bombed-out mosques - these are a few examples of the images Israel Defense Forces soldiers design these days to print on shirts they order to mark the end of training, or of field duty. The slogans accompanying the drawings are not exactly anemic either: A T-shirt for infantry snipers bears the inscription, 'Better use Durex', next to a picture of a dead Palestinian baby, with his weeping mother and a teddy bear beside him. A sharpshooter's T-shirt from the Givati Brigade's Shaked battalion shows a pregnant Palestinian woman with a bull's-eye superimposed on her belly, with the slogan, in English, '1 shot, 2 kills'." (Dead Palestinian babies & bombed mosques - IDF fashion 2009, Uri Blau, Haaretz, 20/3/09)
Ah, but that's now. Back in the good old days - 1953 - when Israel's 'soul' was intact, knocking off women and children was unheard of, right?
Wrong:
"Sharon's life-long war against the Arabs in general and the Palestinians in particular started immediately after that first successful operation against the Bedouin. His next major proposal to command headquarters was a limited raid against the al-Burg refugee camp, which was supposedly used by infiltrators as a base. When he described the details of the operation to his soldiers, one of them - according to Uri Benziman - observed that the obvious objective of the raid was to kill as many civilians as possible. The soldier complained that this was an improper objective, but Sharon ignored the remark. The result was that 15 Palestinians were killed, most of them women and children. Interrogated by superiors after the raid, he argued that the high casualty rate was necessitated by the need to defend the lives of his soldiers. He explained to his own soldiers that all the women of the camps were whores that served the murderers." (Politicide: Ariel Sharon's War Against the Palestinians, Baruch Kimmerling, 2003, pp 48-49)
Friday, December 2, 2011
Classic Zionist Effrontery
Sometimes historical events leave us flabbergasted. The shadowy manoeuvrings which led to the issuance of the Balfour Declaration of 1917 are one such case. They leave us not just asking why, but screaming it. To my knowledge no one has ever registered their outrage over the matter quite like British journalist and historian J.M.N. Jeffries:
"Meanwhile, far from desert warfare and from the perils of the scaffold, another cause was making its progress. Bella gerant alii... Zionism wedded itself civilly first to this country and then to that. In the United States it was organizing itself with marked success, which meant a great deal, since of all the Jews in the world at least 3 million were in the United States. These were concentrated too in the large cities where their influence had greatest play. On the 2nd of October [1916] most of the chief Jewish organizations issued a joint manifesto... This manifesto demanded for the Jews full rights wherever they lived in the world, as well of course as the abrogation of all extant laws or regulations prejudicial to them. 'It being understood', explained the manifesto, 'that the phrase 'full rights' is deemed to include (1) Civil, religious and political rights; (2) The securing and protection of Jewish rights in Palestine'.
"The second item needed all the 'deeming' and the 'understanding' which its authors could give it, but they did not delay to argue their case. In or out of the United States they proclaimed it vociferously, and that on the whole was enough. But in England well co-ordinated action was taken by them.
"Matters had reached such a state [as an official Zionist Organization report was to explain later] that in October 1916 the Zionist Organization felt justified in putting forward a formal statement of its views as to the future government of Palestine in the event of its coming under the control of England or France.
"This was a big advance, co-related of course with the development in the United States. So far the Zionist Organization's views, even though incorporated in Foreign Office memoranda, had been laid unofficially before the British Government. Now these views were to be presented as a formal statement, officially, as though the Zionist Organization possessed an internationally established status which might be affected by the advance of England and of France into the Syrian territories. Whence this status was gained remains undiscoverable. But the document which presupposed it was adroitly accepted by the British Government and thereby the said status, though it did not exist, was recognized.
"The document was rather a long one, divisible roughly under 6 heads. One clause demanded that a Jewish Chartered Company should be established of which the purpose would be the resettlement of Palestine by Jewish settlers. This Chartered Company project was not a new one: the Sultan Abdul Hamid had been asked to consider something similar. It had British precedents of the most attractive character, and without doubt the Chartered Company was expected to dissolve in short course into a Government, more easily even than such Companies had dissolved into Governments in India and in South Africa.
"Meanwhile, it was to have power 'to exercise the right of pre-emption of Crown and other lands and to acquire for its own use all or any concessions which may at any time be granted by the suzerain Government or Governments'.
"Reading this, one is led to ask, 'Why have a suzerain Government at all?' The Jewish Chartered Company of Palestine was to have at its disposal any land anywhere at any time in that country. Any concessions which anyone else might obtain or might have obtained were to be taken away from him and were to be bestowed on the Chartered Company. Nothing was left for the 'suzerain' to do but the clerical work of surrendering everything and of expropriating everybody. (In fact, though it may not seem credible, the general scheme of this clause actually was enforced within about 5 years, in favour of the notorious Rutenberg concessions.)
"Another clause ran: 'Inasmuch as the Jewish population in Palestine forms a community with a distinct nationality and religion, it shall be officially recognized by the suzerain Government or Governments as a seperate national unit or nationality'.
"Upon which clause it might well be observed that inasmuch as the Jewish population in Palestine then did not form a distinct nationality but was divided amongst all the nationalities of eastern Europe and some of western Europe and some of Asia; that inasmuch as at least three-quarters of that population had no sympathy with political Zionism and continued to repudiate it after it had come to Palestine; inasmuch as the identification of the Jews as a religious body or the adherents of a creed was then and still is rejected by the political Zionists; therefore there does not appear to be cause for official recognition here of anything but of three separate units of fallacy.
"The most significant clause of all, though, was that in which the Arabs came in for mention. Astonishingly, they did come in for mention in a Zionist document of that date. But in what manner? 'The present population, being too small, too poor, and too little trained to make rapid progress, requires the introduction of a new and progressive element in the population, desirous of devoting all its energies and capital to the work of colonization on modern lines'.
"The Arabs, the 'present population' of the above paragraph, at the time numbered some 675,000, and Palestine is of merely county dimensions. These however were not facts to detain the Zionist Organization. It dismissed the Arabs without further consideration, after what seemed without doubt the conclusive remark that their population was 'small and poor'. To be small and poor is the supreme crime in a category of thought which, curiously, is itself small and poor.
"Therefore these Arabs, exiguous in their hundreds of thousands, required 'the introduction of a new and progressive element'. Sentences of such surpassing effrontery as this one are rare, and it would be hard to find anything matching in insolence the whole clause. What right had the Zionist Organization to talk of what the Arabs needed? None whatsoever.
"Still, whether the clause or the whole programme of which it was a part were insolent or not, the programme of the Chartered Company was accepted as a foundation-stone by the British Government. 'The Government', says the Zionist Report, 'seems to have regarded the Zionist claims embodied in the programme as forming a basis for discussion'. Negotiations thenceforth went on steadily. Talks with individual statesmen 'gave place to discussions of a more formal character. Zionism won recognition as one of the complex problems connected with the Middle East on the one hand and the question of small nationalities on the other'. (Zionist Official Report)
"There it is. A better example could not be supplied of the sophistries by which the hapless Arabs were to be supplanted. Zionism, political Zionism, not alone was confirmed in the status it had acquired out of the skies, but now was advanced a stage beyond. Political Zionism became one of the 'complex problems connected with the Middle East'. All in a flash it was enrolled amidst the problems which by and by the Allies must face.
"The role thus assumed by political Zionism was one unwarranted by any law, any deed, any political conditions which were then in existence, or previously had been for over a thousand years. Zionism as a political entity had owned no situation outside the brains of its own recent devisers. Political Zionism was not something engrained in the soil of the Near East, nor had it any place amidst the problems which the Ottoman Empire handed on so profusely to its successors.
"The Ottoman Empire had been approached and had refused to introduce this amidst its many complicated factors. It would not have a Jewish enclave. No statesman in the world had toiled for years over Zionism, no statesman in the world had inherited dossiers in hundreds filled with the negotiations of his predecessors-in-office concerning it. It simply was not a problem at all. There was a Jewish problem in Eastern Europe; there was none in Palestine. It was intended now to introduce the problem where it had never existed, but that was to create a problem - something vastly different. In fact, to say that political Zionism was a complex problem connected with the Middle East was a thumping lie. Its true situation in the realm of politics was that of a theory just beginning to be exploited in London and Paris and New York.
"The complexity attributed to it was wholly unreal. What was called complexity only meant the difficulty of finding a formula opaque enough to disguise the immediate or future annexation of Palestine.
"But sophistry did not confine itself to slipping political Zionism in this way in among the problems of the Middle East. With the same stroke Zionism also won 'recognition as a problem connected with the question of small nationalities'. Indeed it did. The operative word... is 'connected'. By more adroitness that which had been nothing, but had been transmogrified into a problem, was now again transmogrified from a problem into a small nation, by coupling it to various lesser lands.
"The scheme for this can be visualized. In 1916 the small nations were already forming up to put their pleas to the (it was hoped) conquering Allies. Together they made a political caravan, a train if you like. When the moment came they would all set off together, the train would depart for the terminus where the victorious Peace was being prepared. The political Zionists were ready for this. Rapidly and unostentatiously a van labelled 'Zionist Problem' would be connected to the last carriage. The train would puff away. Somewhere en route the label would disappear, and a van inscribed 'Jewish National Home' would draw eventually alongside the arrival platform, behind Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, Latvia and all the others. The whole scheme is very simple. But the chance of watching the manoeuvre is not often given." (Palestine: The Reality, 1939, pp 127-130)
"Meanwhile, far from desert warfare and from the perils of the scaffold, another cause was making its progress. Bella gerant alii... Zionism wedded itself civilly first to this country and then to that. In the United States it was organizing itself with marked success, which meant a great deal, since of all the Jews in the world at least 3 million were in the United States. These were concentrated too in the large cities where their influence had greatest play. On the 2nd of October [1916] most of the chief Jewish organizations issued a joint manifesto... This manifesto demanded for the Jews full rights wherever they lived in the world, as well of course as the abrogation of all extant laws or regulations prejudicial to them. 'It being understood', explained the manifesto, 'that the phrase 'full rights' is deemed to include (1) Civil, religious and political rights; (2) The securing and protection of Jewish rights in Palestine'.
"The second item needed all the 'deeming' and the 'understanding' which its authors could give it, but they did not delay to argue their case. In or out of the United States they proclaimed it vociferously, and that on the whole was enough. But in England well co-ordinated action was taken by them.
"Matters had reached such a state [as an official Zionist Organization report was to explain later] that in October 1916 the Zionist Organization felt justified in putting forward a formal statement of its views as to the future government of Palestine in the event of its coming under the control of England or France.
"This was a big advance, co-related of course with the development in the United States. So far the Zionist Organization's views, even though incorporated in Foreign Office memoranda, had been laid unofficially before the British Government. Now these views were to be presented as a formal statement, officially, as though the Zionist Organization possessed an internationally established status which might be affected by the advance of England and of France into the Syrian territories. Whence this status was gained remains undiscoverable. But the document which presupposed it was adroitly accepted by the British Government and thereby the said status, though it did not exist, was recognized.
"The document was rather a long one, divisible roughly under 6 heads. One clause demanded that a Jewish Chartered Company should be established of which the purpose would be the resettlement of Palestine by Jewish settlers. This Chartered Company project was not a new one: the Sultan Abdul Hamid had been asked to consider something similar. It had British precedents of the most attractive character, and without doubt the Chartered Company was expected to dissolve in short course into a Government, more easily even than such Companies had dissolved into Governments in India and in South Africa.
"Meanwhile, it was to have power 'to exercise the right of pre-emption of Crown and other lands and to acquire for its own use all or any concessions which may at any time be granted by the suzerain Government or Governments'.
"Reading this, one is led to ask, 'Why have a suzerain Government at all?' The Jewish Chartered Company of Palestine was to have at its disposal any land anywhere at any time in that country. Any concessions which anyone else might obtain or might have obtained were to be taken away from him and were to be bestowed on the Chartered Company. Nothing was left for the 'suzerain' to do but the clerical work of surrendering everything and of expropriating everybody. (In fact, though it may not seem credible, the general scheme of this clause actually was enforced within about 5 years, in favour of the notorious Rutenberg concessions.)
"Another clause ran: 'Inasmuch as the Jewish population in Palestine forms a community with a distinct nationality and religion, it shall be officially recognized by the suzerain Government or Governments as a seperate national unit or nationality'.
"Upon which clause it might well be observed that inasmuch as the Jewish population in Palestine then did not form a distinct nationality but was divided amongst all the nationalities of eastern Europe and some of western Europe and some of Asia; that inasmuch as at least three-quarters of that population had no sympathy with political Zionism and continued to repudiate it after it had come to Palestine; inasmuch as the identification of the Jews as a religious body or the adherents of a creed was then and still is rejected by the political Zionists; therefore there does not appear to be cause for official recognition here of anything but of three separate units of fallacy.
"The most significant clause of all, though, was that in which the Arabs came in for mention. Astonishingly, they did come in for mention in a Zionist document of that date. But in what manner? 'The present population, being too small, too poor, and too little trained to make rapid progress, requires the introduction of a new and progressive element in the population, desirous of devoting all its energies and capital to the work of colonization on modern lines'.
"The Arabs, the 'present population' of the above paragraph, at the time numbered some 675,000, and Palestine is of merely county dimensions. These however were not facts to detain the Zionist Organization. It dismissed the Arabs without further consideration, after what seemed without doubt the conclusive remark that their population was 'small and poor'. To be small and poor is the supreme crime in a category of thought which, curiously, is itself small and poor.
"Therefore these Arabs, exiguous in their hundreds of thousands, required 'the introduction of a new and progressive element'. Sentences of such surpassing effrontery as this one are rare, and it would be hard to find anything matching in insolence the whole clause. What right had the Zionist Organization to talk of what the Arabs needed? None whatsoever.
"Still, whether the clause or the whole programme of which it was a part were insolent or not, the programme of the Chartered Company was accepted as a foundation-stone by the British Government. 'The Government', says the Zionist Report, 'seems to have regarded the Zionist claims embodied in the programme as forming a basis for discussion'. Negotiations thenceforth went on steadily. Talks with individual statesmen 'gave place to discussions of a more formal character. Zionism won recognition as one of the complex problems connected with the Middle East on the one hand and the question of small nationalities on the other'. (Zionist Official Report)
"There it is. A better example could not be supplied of the sophistries by which the hapless Arabs were to be supplanted. Zionism, political Zionism, not alone was confirmed in the status it had acquired out of the skies, but now was advanced a stage beyond. Political Zionism became one of the 'complex problems connected with the Middle East'. All in a flash it was enrolled amidst the problems which by and by the Allies must face.
"The role thus assumed by political Zionism was one unwarranted by any law, any deed, any political conditions which were then in existence, or previously had been for over a thousand years. Zionism as a political entity had owned no situation outside the brains of its own recent devisers. Political Zionism was not something engrained in the soil of the Near East, nor had it any place amidst the problems which the Ottoman Empire handed on so profusely to its successors.
"The Ottoman Empire had been approached and had refused to introduce this amidst its many complicated factors. It would not have a Jewish enclave. No statesman in the world had toiled for years over Zionism, no statesman in the world had inherited dossiers in hundreds filled with the negotiations of his predecessors-in-office concerning it. It simply was not a problem at all. There was a Jewish problem in Eastern Europe; there was none in Palestine. It was intended now to introduce the problem where it had never existed, but that was to create a problem - something vastly different. In fact, to say that political Zionism was a complex problem connected with the Middle East was a thumping lie. Its true situation in the realm of politics was that of a theory just beginning to be exploited in London and Paris and New York.
"The complexity attributed to it was wholly unreal. What was called complexity only meant the difficulty of finding a formula opaque enough to disguise the immediate or future annexation of Palestine.
"But sophistry did not confine itself to slipping political Zionism in this way in among the problems of the Middle East. With the same stroke Zionism also won 'recognition as a problem connected with the question of small nationalities'. Indeed it did. The operative word... is 'connected'. By more adroitness that which had been nothing, but had been transmogrified into a problem, was now again transmogrified from a problem into a small nation, by coupling it to various lesser lands.
"The scheme for this can be visualized. In 1916 the small nations were already forming up to put their pleas to the (it was hoped) conquering Allies. Together they made a political caravan, a train if you like. When the moment came they would all set off together, the train would depart for the terminus where the victorious Peace was being prepared. The political Zionists were ready for this. Rapidly and unostentatiously a van labelled 'Zionist Problem' would be connected to the last carriage. The train would puff away. Somewhere en route the label would disappear, and a van inscribed 'Jewish National Home' would draw eventually alongside the arrival platform, behind Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, Latvia and all the others. The whole scheme is very simple. But the chance of watching the manoeuvre is not often given." (Palestine: The Reality, 1939, pp 127-130)
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Granny Watch
The following letter from dear old Mary Werther of "Armadale, Vic" in yesterday's Australian is polished and, on the surface, persuasive, just the kind you'd expect from a resident matron of that up-market, leafy Melbourne suburb. And it's sure to have worked a treat on readers who either haven't read the article referred to or are blissfully ignorant, by choice or no, of one simple inconvenient fact... but I'll come to that later. First to Mary's letter:
"Lavinia Moore's letter (29/11) and the article by John Lyons in The Weekend Australian Magazine (Stone cold justice, 26-27/11) both raise the difficult issue of how to treat Palestinian teenage combatants who attack Israeli civilians with rocks thrown at cars, aiming to cause severe injury and murder, such as the recent deaths of an Israeli father and his infant son.
"These children are effectively used as frontline soldiers and brainwashed to extreme hatred and violence by their parents to further their political agenda.
"Should they simply be allowed to kill Israeli civilians without any recourse in the courts?
"In practice, while no one likes arresting under-age youths, least of all the Israelis, they are usually held only briefly as a disincentive to others to emulate their actions.
"Unsubstantied allegations of any mistreatment are usually trumped-up propaganda for Western ears. They may indeed be frightened by their capture and courtroom trial, but is that worse than the pain they inflict?
"In Lyons's article, the mothers are so sympathetically portrayed, weeping in the court-room. Perhaps it is they, and the fathers, who should be held accountable for inciting their teenage sons to conduct murderous attacks."
Mmm... how smooth and plausible is that? Why, it almost comes with a cup of tea and a bagel on a silver platter!
It's as though Mary's writing about teenage toughs come from distant Kensington to rock the good folk of Armadale. You just wouldn't know from her account that, unlike my imagined gang from Kensington, these young Palestinian stonethrowers were born into, and educated by, a decades-long, brutal Israeli occupation which sets the scene for acts of resistance, however futile, by its victims. A comparable scenario might be one where the good folk of Armadale invade, occupy, colonise, patrol and shoot up the residents - or should that be denizens, Mary? - of Kensington and get all shirty when the Kensingtonians start reaching for the rocks. Ah, but pigs will fly before you'll get an acknowledment from Mary of an Israeli occupation engendering a Palestinian resistance. Certainly not when she's just put her hand up for the vice-presidency of the newly-formed Australian Voices for Israel, a fact that the old dear apparently forgot to append to her letter. (See Two new groups get behind Israel, jwire.com.au, 2/9/11).
Now I know she's a busy girl, but what, I wonder, would Mary have made of the opinion piece by Times' journalist Ben MacIntyre, Moral issues give rise to revolution, published in the exact same edition of The Australian that carried her letter? MacIntyre broaches the concept of resistance to oppression in the context of the so-called Arab Spring, beginning:
"You are a Syrian soldier watching, with mounting uncertainty, as the revolution builds. Do you slip away in the night to join the Free Syria Army? Do you follow your commanding officer if he defects to the rebels, or stay put? Do you wait and watch, or take the plunge?"
Now if MacIntyre had been writing instead about the Israeli occupation of Palestine, he could well have begun thus: 'You are a Palestinian teenager watching, with mounting anger, as the occupation takes its toll on your family, your community, your people. Do you pick up a stone and throw it at the Israeli settlers who relentlessly colonise your land or the marauding troops who aid and abett them? Or do you repress your feelings and tuck your tail between your legs. Do you wait and watch, or take the plunge?'
You just know Mary's response to that one, don't you?
MacIntyre goes on to remind his English readers: "In Britain, we are particularly susceptible to the myth that Britons never, never, never shall be slaves. We hear tales of collaboration in Nazi-occupied Europe and believe that the British would have held out, resisted, fought back if the Germans had invaded. But resisting a well-organised despotism, ruthlessly enforced, is astonishingly difficult, demanding a level of courage that few know they possess until tested. 'What would you do?' This remains the central conundrum of every war, revolution or resistance movement."
What would you do? I can just imagine Mary's response: 'About what?'
MacIntyre quotes Anthony Eden's words "when asked whether Britain would have behaved differently from France under Nazi dictatorship: 'It would be impertinent for any country that has not suffered occupation to pass judgment on one that did'."
Or, one might add, for an individual from an up-market, leafy Melbourne suburb to pass judgment on any Palestinians.
Now I indicated earlier that Mary's letter would have gone down well with those who hadn't read Australian Middle East correspondent John Lyons' revealing piece, Stone cold justice. Anyone who had, however, would have noticed just how wondefully artful the old dear's letter is:
While Lyons refers matter-of-factly to children, Mary has them pegged as "combatants" and "frontline soldiers," bent on bloody murder. And while it's clear from Lyon's expose that the targets of the stone throwers are largely marauding Israeli troops, Mary's exclusive focus is "Israeli civilians."
While Lyons writes of near 100% conviction rates, sentences ranging from 2 weeks to 10 months, confessions (in Hebrew!), handcuffing, blindfolding, manhandling, placing boots on necks, sleep deprivation, electric shocks, threats of rape, molestation by dogs, beatings, and solitary confinement, Mary reassures us that "while no one likes arresting under-age youths, least of all the Israelis, they are usually held only briefly as a disincentive to others to emulate their actions," and is adamant that "[u]nsubstantiated allegations of any mistreatment are usually trumped-up propaganda for Western ears."
Least of all the Israelis?!!!
Forget the kids from Kensington - it's the little old ladies from well-to-do, leafy suburbs you've got to watch out for.
"Lavinia Moore's letter (29/11) and the article by John Lyons in The Weekend Australian Magazine (Stone cold justice, 26-27/11) both raise the difficult issue of how to treat Palestinian teenage combatants who attack Israeli civilians with rocks thrown at cars, aiming to cause severe injury and murder, such as the recent deaths of an Israeli father and his infant son.
"These children are effectively used as frontline soldiers and brainwashed to extreme hatred and violence by their parents to further their political agenda.
"Should they simply be allowed to kill Israeli civilians without any recourse in the courts?
"In practice, while no one likes arresting under-age youths, least of all the Israelis, they are usually held only briefly as a disincentive to others to emulate their actions.
"Unsubstantied allegations of any mistreatment are usually trumped-up propaganda for Western ears. They may indeed be frightened by their capture and courtroom trial, but is that worse than the pain they inflict?
"In Lyons's article, the mothers are so sympathetically portrayed, weeping in the court-room. Perhaps it is they, and the fathers, who should be held accountable for inciting their teenage sons to conduct murderous attacks."
Mmm... how smooth and plausible is that? Why, it almost comes with a cup of tea and a bagel on a silver platter!
It's as though Mary's writing about teenage toughs come from distant Kensington to rock the good folk of Armadale. You just wouldn't know from her account that, unlike my imagined gang from Kensington, these young Palestinian stonethrowers were born into, and educated by, a decades-long, brutal Israeli occupation which sets the scene for acts of resistance, however futile, by its victims. A comparable scenario might be one where the good folk of Armadale invade, occupy, colonise, patrol and shoot up the residents - or should that be denizens, Mary? - of Kensington and get all shirty when the Kensingtonians start reaching for the rocks. Ah, but pigs will fly before you'll get an acknowledment from Mary of an Israeli occupation engendering a Palestinian resistance. Certainly not when she's just put her hand up for the vice-presidency of the newly-formed Australian Voices for Israel, a fact that the old dear apparently forgot to append to her letter. (See Two new groups get behind Israel, jwire.com.au, 2/9/11).
Now I know she's a busy girl, but what, I wonder, would Mary have made of the opinion piece by Times' journalist Ben MacIntyre, Moral issues give rise to revolution, published in the exact same edition of The Australian that carried her letter? MacIntyre broaches the concept of resistance to oppression in the context of the so-called Arab Spring, beginning:
"You are a Syrian soldier watching, with mounting uncertainty, as the revolution builds. Do you slip away in the night to join the Free Syria Army? Do you follow your commanding officer if he defects to the rebels, or stay put? Do you wait and watch, or take the plunge?"
Now if MacIntyre had been writing instead about the Israeli occupation of Palestine, he could well have begun thus: 'You are a Palestinian teenager watching, with mounting anger, as the occupation takes its toll on your family, your community, your people. Do you pick up a stone and throw it at the Israeli settlers who relentlessly colonise your land or the marauding troops who aid and abett them? Or do you repress your feelings and tuck your tail between your legs. Do you wait and watch, or take the plunge?'
You just know Mary's response to that one, don't you?
MacIntyre goes on to remind his English readers: "In Britain, we are particularly susceptible to the myth that Britons never, never, never shall be slaves. We hear tales of collaboration in Nazi-occupied Europe and believe that the British would have held out, resisted, fought back if the Germans had invaded. But resisting a well-organised despotism, ruthlessly enforced, is astonishingly difficult, demanding a level of courage that few know they possess until tested. 'What would you do?' This remains the central conundrum of every war, revolution or resistance movement."
What would you do? I can just imagine Mary's response: 'About what?'
MacIntyre quotes Anthony Eden's words "when asked whether Britain would have behaved differently from France under Nazi dictatorship: 'It would be impertinent for any country that has not suffered occupation to pass judgment on one that did'."
Or, one might add, for an individual from an up-market, leafy Melbourne suburb to pass judgment on any Palestinians.
Now I indicated earlier that Mary's letter would have gone down well with those who hadn't read Australian Middle East correspondent John Lyons' revealing piece, Stone cold justice. Anyone who had, however, would have noticed just how wondefully artful the old dear's letter is:
While Lyons refers matter-of-factly to children, Mary has them pegged as "combatants" and "frontline soldiers," bent on bloody murder. And while it's clear from Lyon's expose that the targets of the stone throwers are largely marauding Israeli troops, Mary's exclusive focus is "Israeli civilians."
While Lyons writes of near 100% conviction rates, sentences ranging from 2 weeks to 10 months, confessions (in Hebrew!), handcuffing, blindfolding, manhandling, placing boots on necks, sleep deprivation, electric shocks, threats of rape, molestation by dogs, beatings, and solitary confinement, Mary reassures us that "while no one likes arresting under-age youths, least of all the Israelis, they are usually held only briefly as a disincentive to others to emulate their actions," and is adamant that "[u]nsubstantiated allegations of any mistreatment are usually trumped-up propaganda for Western ears."
Least of all the Israelis?!!!
Forget the kids from Kensington - it's the little old ladies from well-to-do, leafy suburbs you've got to watch out for.
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