Sign In
0 Items (
Search
Comments (85)
Forlorn creatures of habit, our household watches ABC TV flagship 7pm News (Victoria) nightly. As I remarked across the dinner table at 6.59pm on Tuesday, “Stand by for Hamas footage of suffering children in Gaza, with no ABC mention that Hamas uses them as human shields.”
Sure enough, we got loads of this, climaxed by a Hamas-approved or provided clip of a girl about 8, said to be from a refugee camp in northern Gaza. Her face is disfigured by oozing wounds and blood runs from her eye socket and nose. There are bleeding holes on her neck and shoulders, and her once-white T-shirt is filthy from the blast and grit. Her hair is tangled and filthy. In shock, she speaks hysterically to camera of a missile hitting her family and showering bricks on them. “Where is my Dad and where is my Mum?” she begs in Arabic, ABC correspondent Allyson Horn acting out the translation.
The preceding item was about Aboriginal teen Cleveland Dodd’s death in a Perth prison, with newsreader Tamara Oudyn first saying, “A warning. This story contains content that some viewers might find distressing.” There was no such warning before the Hamas-approved interview of the shockingly injured Gaza girl. Incidentally the interview-filming took precedence there over anyone giving her immediate first aid.
The visuals to further illustrate the ABC narrative about Gaza becoming an Israel-caused “graveyard for children” include
♦ Two young Gazan men on a motorbike rush an injured or dead boy aged about six to an ambulance
♦ Four men weep over and kiss the shroud containing a dead child, along with weeping mother and siblings
♦ The Palestinian Prime Minister breaks down and weeps as he describes a mother of three children buried in rubble calling out to them, “Let me see you!”
Sure, for form’s sake the ABC included some Jerusalem clips of Jews’ distress about the 240 hostages in Gaza and mild scenes of Jews writing cards to them and discussing use of the inclusive Hebrew language. There were also some anodyne words from Prime Minister Netanyahu.
But how about this segment at 20mins16sec. Allyson Horn’s voice-over goes, “As Israel flies its flag to the north, Israel’s propaganda machine is in full swing, showing Hamas rocket launchers inside a children’s scout hall.” This segment lasts eight seconds from go to whoa, indeed it flashes past so fast that I needed many replays to catch the detail.
Why does the ABC TV news item single out only Israeli material as emanating from a “propaganda machine in full swing”? Is the ABC suggesting Israeli spin doctors have faked up the rocket launchers from postage tubes for 2024 calendars and installed them at a pretend scout hall in Tel Aviv? By omission, is the ABC also suggesting that all its Hamas-approved footage from inside Gaza is the real deal, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
The ABC has used the term “propaganda” in the opinion program Media Watch, and once or twice quoted Gaza-war protagonists using it, but this is the first time the ABC itself has abandoned its statutory impartiality to brand undoubtedly authentic Israeli footage in a news item as originating from “Israel’s propaganda machine”.
ABC clips of Gaza children dead and dying from Israeli air strikes are real enough. But the ABC tax-funded propaganda machine didn’t bother to mention that
♦ The war is because Hamas raided Israel on October 7 to literally butcher 1400 helpless men women and children, including a baby roasted in a household oven. Its charred, unrecognisable corpse had the oven filament mixed with the remains.[1]
♦ Hamas has built 500km of tunnels in Gaza but not one bomb shelter for the 2 million population it governs
♦ Hamas instals its lairs and vast stockpiles of fuel, food, water and other essentials under schools and hospitals
♦ Israel’s IDF issues warnings to civilians to vacate its intended targets but Hamas prevents the civilians from leaving both the targets and the whole northern Gaza war zone. You can learn chapter and verse of Israeli’s warning phones calls here.
♦ When Gazan civilians, including children, are killed and injured as a result of Hamas policy, Hamas parades the victims – such as the eight-year-old bloodied girl last night – to the global media to win sympathy and vilify Israel.
♦ No discussion of Israeli’s own civilian death and destruction – let alone emotive film clips – from thousands of Hamas rockets fired indiscriminately into Israeli towns and cities.
♦ Hamas policy is successful to the extent that Israel is pressured towards a ceasefire.
I hope ABC viewers measure each night’s TV dose of Gazan child victims against the above context.
The flagship news’ labelling Israeli footage as “propaganda” was bad enough. But just as bad – for other reasons – was the ABC’s opening five minutes of anti-Israel indoctrination of 10 to13-year-old schoolchildren last week. It was on Episode 30 of Behind the News (BTN) for classrooms. The kids’ program-makers, desperate not to offend Muslims, ran the same context-free line about Gazan child victims of Israeli air strikes. From BTN’s website, we learn that
BTN is a high-energy, fun way for Upper Primary and Secondary students to learn about current issues and events in their world… It unpacks and explains news and current affairs to young people in a dynamic and creative way. A range of opinions are presented so students gain a greater awareness of differing points of view. Through watching BTN Classroom, students increase their understanding of complex political, economic, environmental and social issues.
Yeah right.
In its segment supposedly on “international aid”, BTN uses adroit editing and stripping away of all crucial context to paint Israel as a sadistic bombarder of Palestinian civilians. In the whole episode BTN provides just seven words of context for the war’s destruction as follows: “After the recent terrorist attack on Israel…”
What attack? By whom? How bad was it? BTN doesn’t tell the impressionable schoolkids.
…the Israeli government shut the border completely, and has been launching rockets [sic] into Gaza in response.
The words “into Gaza” imply the strikes are indiscriminate, as distinct from hitting Hamas lairs below buildings after warning civilians to get clear. And in the whole episode there is not one mention of Gaza’s terrorist government, namely Hamas. Instead BTN deluges schoolkids with vision of Israel’s aerial destruction of city buildings and the suffering of Gaza’s women and kids. The episode ends with a final Hamas talking point – the need for a ceasefire to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza. Any ceasefire of course benefits Hamas alone by undercutting the Israeli military response.
BTN’s helpful test for schoolkids to ensure they get the pro-Hamas messaging reads
1/ What essential supplies are running out in Gaza? [Correct answer: None. Hamas has large stocks available, stored under schools, hospitals etc].
2/ How is the war and lack of essential supplies affecting children like Haya, Rama and Remas?
The children are suffering because Hamas organised a massacre of 1400 Jewish citizens on October 7, and because Hamas uses kids like Haya, Rama and Remas as human shields].
3/ What are the three steps that have to be followed when providing humanitarian assistance?
4/ What help is the Australian Government providing?
5/ People have been calling for a ________________to let aid into Gaza.
What people? What about “people” calling for the righteous destruction of Hamas and its murderous infrastructure? Isn’t the best answer for the missing word not “ceasefire” but “Hamas surrender”?.
The episode (apart from its single vague reference to “terrorists”) would get Hamas’ seal of approval.The ABC’s narrative is generated by the usual sly combination in documentary-making of voice-over, vision and editing. Readers prepared to log in to ABC iView can view the item here. For others, I’ve created this transcript, plus my take on the vision that accompanies it.
Transcript, International Aid, Episode 30
“Hey, how’s it going? I’m Amelia Mosely and you’re watching BTN. Thanks for hanging out with us again. Let’s see what’s coming up on today’s show. [Bushfires, solar powered car, a staffer does a comical Halloween trick or treat]. All that soon, but first…
Trucks bringing aid have finally been allowed into Gaza as the war with Israel continues on. They’re carrying really important supplies that people there are relying on.
Joe [BTN’s Joseph Baronio] took a closer look at humanitarian aid and how it works.
(Shot of devastation to Gaza buildings, like a scene from Dresden 1945. Camera circles in on the destruction.)
Baronio: Here in Gaza , supplies of everyday essentials like food, water, medical aid and fuel have been rapidly running out.
No, Hamas is hoarding and stealing the supplies.
People are sheltering from daily air strikes in schools, hospitals and emergency shelters
Built above Hamas military posts.
(Women in hijabs with small children come into an official office apparently seeking aid. A dark bearded man (father or aid worker) cradles a white-skinned child about 3, while another child aged 5 sits sadly behind.)
Girl about 10 (translated): The war broke out. Our house was destroyed, and we fled to the UNRWA school.
Nicely phrased from Hamas’s point of view
(She wears a pink T- shirt with text “Home” and cartoon mouse ears. Shot of residential flats, kids 8-12 kicking footballs, then shots of bombed streets and cars and a bomb crater. Shot of crowded family flat with baby. Crowds mill in the street below, in an aerial perspective scene of a bombed multi-storey building. A family carrying an infant emerge out of a ground floor rubble into daylight. In a courtyard of residential building there are kids swarming and playing – with tent housing on fringes. Then a shot of orderly rows of tent housing.)
Another girl, about 12, in translation: We are terrified, we didn’t know what to do.
She has a white hair ribbon with bow and white T-shirt.
Baronio shows map of Gaza: Since 2007 most of Gazas essential supplies have come through this border which Israel controls, but after the recent terrorist attack on Israel, the Israeli govt shut the border completely, and has been launching rockets [sic] into Gaza in response.
(Shot of horrific damage from Israeli air strike in a built up Gaza area, with a crowd of 200 milling around the fringe of the rubble. A youth in baseball cap turned back to front sits forlornly on a collapsed concrete floor, with curtains and clothes strewn in background. Men walk gingerly across a rubble-filled street.)
Baronio: Weeks on, aid groups say many of the 2 milllion people who live in Gaza desperately need humanitarian assistance, and lots of countries around the world have pledged to help out.
(Women and boys on a crowded street carry water flagons. Several shots of mothers and kids scrabblinig for water.)
But actually making that happen isn’t easy, and there are some steps that have to be followed.
(More shots of blasted buildings and rubble. Discussion of aid process. Shots of men and families traversing rubble. One man lugs a toy tricycle covered in bomb dust. An older sister pulls her younger sister through a tent camp.)
Baronio includes UNRWA among the good guys like Red Cross and Red Crescent helping out.
Beth Delaney, Dept of Foreign Affairs: They are often the ones on the ground with the ability to provide the kinds of support that is needed in response to a crisis.
(More shots of bombed buildings.Official rescuers dig for survivors and provide food from trucks. Shots of pathetic mothers getting supplies for their children. Reference to Australia’s $25 million aid to Gaza.)
Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles: We are particularly concerned for those who are suffering in Gaza so we committed to providing assistance to them through international agencies such as UN and Red Cross.
Baronio: After lots of international pressure Israel recently allowed some supplies to enter Gaza through its border with Egypt. But many say it is nowhere near enough to help everyone.
Many also say Hamas should distribute its own stockpiles to civilians.
Thomas White, director of UNWRA Gaza: The aid that is coming in right now is not of the scale that we need to serve the population.
Ali Zaki, World Food Program: We had to reduce the ration of food we were providing per person to make sure it is stretching out to as many people as possible.
Baronio: UN agencies have been calling for a ceasefire but while the fighting continues world leaders say the most important thing is to keep supplies as safe as possible.
(Shot of smoking rubble. A cute boy aged about nine, in strangely neat light and dark blue T-shirt and shorts, stands on rubble. Shot of family sheltering with about five kids in a wrecked house. One teenager holds his head, apparently in despair.)
Ted Chaiban, UNICEF: Humanitarian supplies for children and their families need to be available on a sustained basis for the population.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres: To ease epic suffering, and make the delivery of aid easier and safer, I reiterate my appeal for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire.
Guterres suggested no pre-conditions, such as Hamas releasing the civilian hostages. Either in this speech or an earlier one, he created outrage in Israel by claiming the Hamas massacre of 1400 on October 7 “did not happen in a vacuum.”
(Shot of families getting bedding supplies, upbeat kids riding through on bikes, upbeat colours, ten kids aged 6-12 play hula hoop spinning against a background of homeless citizens. Final shot of two girls and a boy poring over school books alongside a bright wall mural.)
BTN Episode 30 was screened shortly after UNRWA reported that Hamas had stolen its fuel and medical aid, after forcing UN people out of the scene. Mysteriously UNRWA then deleted its accusation and an UNRWA official – possibly under duress from Hamas – falsely denied any Hamas looting had occurred.[2] The stolen 24,000 litres of fuel was enough to run water desalinators for four days for those civilian water supplies the ABC says are desperately needed.
While BTN quotes UNWRA Gaza director Thomas White appealing for more aid, White’s predecessor Matthias Schmale was pushed out of Gaza by Hamas in 2020 as persona non grata for acknowledging that Israeli air strikes at that time were precisely targeting the terrorists.
UNWRA’s education materials and teachers by the hundred have encouraged three generations of Gazans to kill Jews and destroy Israel. Just two examples:
♦ UNRWA has endorsed violence, demonized Israel, and encouraged martyrdom. In December 2022, an UNRWA-created Arabic reading comprehension exercise for 9th graders at Al-Maghazi Middle School for Boys B (Gaza) “celebrated a Palestinian firebombing attack on a Jewish bus as a “barbecue party.”
In a Grade 5 UNRWA textbook teaching Arabic reading comprehension to girls, an entire chapter is dedicated to praising the martyr Dalal al-Mughrabi, who led a team of terrorists in the massacre of 38 Israelis, including 13 children, in 1978. She is glamorized and draped in the Palestinian flag.
Meanwhile I’ll stick in a complaint to the ABC Ombudswoman Fiona Cameron about last night’s 7pm mudslinging misinformation concerning the “Israeli propaganda machine”, to see what happens. To date I haven’t found the supposedly more unbiased complaints regime there (“a position created to build on the credibility and trust Australian audiences have in the ABC”) to be any different from the old in-house complaints cabal.
Tony Thomas’s new book from Connor Court is Anthem of the Unwoke – Yep! The other lot’s gone bonkers. $34.95 from Connor Court here
[1] Ben Shapiro mentions this in his podcast Episode 1843 of last week.
[2] UNRWA referred bizarrely to its own tweets, after deletion, as “reports on social media.” Oct 17:
URGENT CLARIFICATION FROM @UNRWA With regards to reports on social media of looting of an UNRWA warehouse. UNRWA would like to confirm that no looting has taken place in any of its warehouses in the Gaza Strip.
“I hope ABC viewers measure each night’s TV dose of Gazan child victims against the above context”.
.
In our dreams.
The problem of bias in all media is dangerous but it seems to be the way of the world. ABC bias in one direction is countered by bias in other media. You have to access a broad spectrum to gain a modicum of valid information.
There are two sides to this conflict and it is just a pity that there is no media outlet which is prepared to provide that balance.
As a note of comfort perhaps, most Australians do not bother with the ABC or SBS which offer some information about the Palestinian side, and the rest are pretty much so pro-Israel that the levels of bias are a bit cringe-making at times.
The Israeli media/propaganda machine is well honed and fabulously funded so the Palestinians are a long way behind. But, as some Israelis and more Jews join the fight for justice, that may well change. The mainstream media is fickle and sensationalist so there may well be limits even for Israel.
I take heart from the fact that the heavily biased media and massive amounts of funding, did not brainwash Australians into voting Yes in the recent Referendum. I suspect the same will apply to the tragedy which is this conflict. An unknown factor will be of course how many Australians hate Muslims so much they must support Israel by default and that includes any level of violence which may be reached. Time will tell.
Or how many Australians both Muslim or otherwise inherently Anti-Semitic hate Jews and Israeli’s alike enough to support barbaric terrorists.
If you honestly think the cohort who voted No on the voice are the pro-Palestinian crowd in spite of all the alignment they have with the Left and their Acolytes, you are truly more deluded than I ever imagined.
“Or how many Australians both Muslim or otherwise inherently Anti-Semitic hate Jews and Israeli’s alike enough to support barbaric terrorists.”
They hide behind word salads and sophistry, but their pride in their hatred is always transparent. Plenty of examples even here.
You do make huge leaps although perhaps I was not clear enough.
I was not saying Referendum No voters are likely or automatically to be pro Palestinian or even pro facts and balance.
I was saying it is unwise to assume what the general public thinks and, as the Referendum demonstrated, massive amounts of funding and propaganda do not necessarily bring success.
In essence, no amount of bias and propaganda promoting Israel’s side of this terrible story is going to brainwash the general public into believing it. There is information out there and people will access it. The more biased media outlets become the more they will be ignored.
My view of this issue in Australia is most people do not care, just as they did not care about Ukraine. Some care a great deal and they will find out for themselves. Highly biased media outlets will find their subscriptions plummet. I think after Covid people are sick of being treated like idiots and fed information which is patently propanda and so one-sided it is a disgrace.
If the pro-forma Israel position has any legs it will stand on its own. The more the hatefest against Palestinians and Muslims goes on, the more people will become suspicious and stop listening.
There may not be a conscious linkage but analyses of the demographics of voters show great commonality between Remainers in the UK and supporters of The Voice in Australia. When you look at how the mainstream media align, again commonality of Remain and The Voice and now, also with support of Hamas and Palestinians against Israel. By these consistencies you can also put the Woke Left in the same camp as Remain, the Voice and pro-Palestine against Israel. The causes of this alignment are open to question but the alignment is there, not perfect, not 100% but real enough. I’m still waiting for any one of those calling for a ceasefire to demand the release of the hostages.
One place to search for causation is in education. the Left/Woke/Remain/The Voice/Pro Palestine against Israel capm are younger, recently educuted in a system now dominated by cultural Marxism.
Oh I forgot, you can add to that camp BLM supporters and Climate Catastrophists. Demographically the same people every time.
PS. rosross, you may conclude from my typos that I am uneducated but I have a good degree from Cambridge and a number of post-graduate qualifications. My brain works even if my fingers don’t.
Believe me Peter, the last person in the world you need to justify your considerable intellect to is the quack Homeopath.
Ros, you talk about media bias. It exists and it depends now on what most journalists were taught at school or university. In the bad old days journalists came from practical experience of life as cadets who reported it as it was. Not as what it might be.
Japan has been criticised by China and the media for releasing tritium from the damaged reactors at Fukushima. Tritium is a natural radioisotope produced by cosmic radiation striking the earth, its produced by nuclear reactors and China has more of them than Japan. The effect of tritium radiation on our health has been studied for since the first nuclear bombs went off. Lack of real technical knowledge in the media and its propensity to dramatise issues are problems.
Which age group is most affected by leukemia ?
Privatise the elitist ABC and SBS sheltered workshop. They’ve been going their own Leftist way on taxpayer funding for far too long. Their political bias is execrable. Their lack of accountability infuriating. Time to defund the ABC and SBS and spend our money on benefitting all Australians.
Why didn’t the Coalition go after the ABC/SBS/NITV when they were in power? Just complaining about them does nothing! In the USA, they have the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) TV and National Public Radio (NPR) which are not-for-profit organisations funded by various means.
Very interesting to read that. There is a growing movement to defund the BBC in the UK for similar reasons. At least Australians are not locked up for refusing to pay the mandatory BBC licence fee. It could be much worse. I try to explain to my family and friends in UK that the ABC in Australia is just as biassed to the left and equally unaccountable. I used to argue that at least we don’t get interminable asinine ads on the ABC but now we do – all self-promotion but ads nonetheless. People in UK hoped GB News would be a counterbalance, but that too is full of wholly unnecessary self advertising to the point of being painful to listen to and unwatchable. I can understand commercial advertising because it brings in the money but self promotion to the audience that has already tuned in not in response to the ads makes no sense to me at all.
The common causative factor is state funding. I am not keen on ads in commercial channels either but they are necessary. Perhaps we should tighten up on the conditions of state funding to penalise partiality instead of commercialising the ABC and BBC (and SBS).
Check out the PBS and NPR in the USA, via the internet. They provide intelligent journalism and programs, but without commercials. Part of the funding is from voluntary subscriptions, various public funding as well as corporate donations. For example, a program might be sponsored by Shell Oil, but there is only an acknowledgement of that sponsorship in text, and a small picture of the Shell logo accompanying it. That could be done here.
Truth telling; Release the images of the beheaded babies, clean up your act progressive media darlings!
This from Snopes resonated with me:
Infants Died. Does It Matter if They Were Beheaded or Not?
.
When Kfar Aza, just 3 kilometers from the Gaza Strip, was attacked on Oct. 7, 2023, men, women and children were brutally killed by Hamas fighters. The massacre was documented in photos and videos by reputable news outlets, including the Wall Street Journal and BBC.
Yes and where’s the progressive lefts build back better gone, out the back in Hamas’s slaughter house?
@lbloveday,
All war crimes should be investigated but that would also have Israel in the dock even more so.
I tend to think that this topic ought not to be dealt with by BTN. It’s too complicated and there is too little consensus over recent events , let alone the 125 year history of overt Zionism dating back to the Basle conference in 1897 and the gradual takeover of Palestine by Jewish settlers added to longterm Jewish inhabitants punctuated by various Arab attempts to dislodge the Jewish state. Both Israel and Hamas could care less about the non-combatant victims of this conflict but there is no right or wrong here. We have the interest of Israel and most of the Jewish diaspora in claiming the land of Gaza and the West Bank and we have the interest of the Muslims in reclaiming Jerusalem and maybe the rest of Palestine. It is a question of force.
If the USA were independent it might get the both sides to the table but half of Biden’s cabinet including the Secretary of State are Jewish. In addition all of Biden’s legitimate grandchildren have Jewish mothers (Hunter also has an illegitimate daughter) so the president’s posterity is hitched firmly to the Jewish star.
>” … punctuated by various Arab attempts to dislodge the Jewish state ,,,<" [from the Isaac comment]
Actually, we call those "attempts" active, deliberate war – each and every failed time. Repeatedly since 1947 …
You know that, of course.
@ianl,
Since Palestinian attempts, with the help of Arab allies, was to fight an occupier, how does that differ from the French Resistance, with the help of allies, fighting an occupier?
Why the double standards? Israel was imposed on Palestine and not the other way around. If Israel had remained in the UN mandate and allowed a fully independent State for Palestine, or had annexed all of Palestine and given citizenship to everyone, equality beyond religion, would this violence have erupted?
That is the question. You cannot separate the existence of the Palestinian Resistance from the Israeli occupation. That would be illogical. Resistance militia are created by unjust oppression. And an occupier has full responsibility for the welfare of the people it controls and accountability for all violence because it has all the power. Again, simple logic.
@ianl ‘you know that of course’
Yes, but I was thinking of all the other minor incidents as well. I didn’t mean to minimize the wars which have been fought to reclaim lands allocated away from the Palestinians by the UN, or lost in previous wars. The Arabs do keep losing but in their eyes they have a righteous cause. Of course the Israelis feel the same way.
@David Isaac,
If Hamas does not care about Palestinians why are they so popular? There is solid evidence they were elected in the first place because they were effective in helping the people and improving their lives and they were not corrupt like the PLO. There is evidence from aid agencies working in Gaza that they remain highly effective in helping to lessen the misery and suffering of those imprisoned there.
Given the suffering of the Palestinians in Gaza, and it must rank as some of the worst in human history, is it plausible to claim that Hamas does not care about them even while the group retains massive support from all Palestinians? That does not work. It would be clear to the Palestinians in the Gaza prison if Hamas did not care about them. Why would they choose to die in their cause as so many have done and continue to do?
As to Biden’s Jewish connections does it really matter since most Jews do not live in Israel, never did and never will and American Jews in particular are standing up for justice for Palestine at this time in huge numbers? Times have changed. Israel gives Judaism and its followers a bad name and making American Jews realise they are Americans first and Jews second.
That will weaken the Israeli/Zionist/Jewish stranglehold on American politics. A power which actually is relatively recent in American history.
@rosross ‘Hamas…so popular’
I don’t know enough about it to say why Hamas are popular but I was trying to say that neither Hamas nor the IDF seem to care much about the other side’s innocent casualties.
@David Isaac,
I meant that the Palestinians appear to support Hamas. Popular in that sense.
As to not caring about civilians Israel has far more choice on that count than the Palestinian Resistance/Hamas. Like all Resistance militia they are a part of the civilian population and that means civilians are involved. And since Gaza is a prison from which there is no escape, the Palestinian Resistance will be fighting surrounded by civilians.
Israel is attacking a prison, the most densely populated place on the planet and yes there will be civilians who are collateral damage as a result. However, none of that explains or excuses the fact Israel has targeted hospitals, ambulances, schools, churches, UN facilities and that it told Palestinians to flee to the Rafah border and then bombed them.
To attack the Palestinian Resistance in Gaza it is impossible for Israel to not incur some civilian deaths and injuries but there is also no doubt Israel could have acted to reduce them and it has chosen not to do so.
By any reckoning, 1400 dead Israelis, many of them killed by their own soldiers according to survivors, is surely compensated for by 10,000 and more dead Palestinians, most of them women and children.
And military experts have said a major problem for Israel is that its soldiers are poorly trained and have little experience beyond maintaining occupation and controlling an unarmed civilian population. This is why they are attempting to reduce Gaza to rubble. Can that work? Who can say? The Russians proved in Stalingrad that the human spirit is not easily extinguished.
The conservative evangelical Christian political lobby is a relatively recent development in America, and they have a belief that the creation of the state of Israel was part of “end-times” Biblical prophesy being fulfilled, to be followed by the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem, and THEN Jesus will return! To this end they support Israel as a fundamental tenant of their faith, and therefore view the Palestinians as analogues of the Biblical Philistines, fit only to be put to the sword!
@cbattle1,
Exactly and they have a lot of power in Washington. The Crazy Christians fund Israel in whatever it does. The Israelis don’t care where the money comes from and who believes in the Armageddon theory anyway? But that power and influence does fuel the need for and possibility of constant war in Palestine and Israel.
Excuse me for saying so but the Jews were living in the region, including much of what is now Israel, long before, centuries before Islam had even been invented.
@gardner.peter.d,
Yes Jews have been around in the Middle East and Palestine for a long time. Their religion began in what is now Iraq and a few tribes then moved into Palestine.
But religions don’t get rights to land. One presumes if they did the Jews would have a right to some of Iraq and it would be Christians who had a right to some of Palestine. But none do.
Also worth remembering that Istanbul was a Christian city for more than a thousand years. Now it is a Turkish/Muslim city and Christians could not claim rights to it.
More pathetic moral relativism.
Jews or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group who originate from the ancient Hebrews (i.e. Israelites), and whose traditional religion is Judaism. They are simultaneously a Religion, an ethnographic group and a culture – hence the reason why many Jewish people share common hereditary traits and morphological features. They did not arise out of nowhere, they are the traditional peoples of the region now referred to as Palestine.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c2/12_Tribes_of_Israel_Map.svg/375px-12_Tribes_of_Israel_Map.svg.png
I suggest that it is important to read Arthur Koestler’s “The Thirteen Tribe”, which puts the case that the Ashkenazi Jews of central and eastern Europe, who started the Zionist political agenda in the late 19th century and now constitute the “ruling class” of today’s Israel, are actually not Jews at all, but descendants of the Kazars, a people of the eastern steppes that had converted to Judaism a long time ago. Recently, an Israeli academic, Shlomo Sand, wrote a book titled “The Invention of the Jewish People”, which examines the Kazar origin of the Ashkenazi Jews in considerable depth. Sand goes further, by suggesting that today’s Muslim Palestinians are actually the original Jews! The way he puts it is that there was no forced Jewish Diaspora, and so when the Eastern Roman Empire transformed into the Byzantine Christian Empire, the Jews were living under Byzantine persecution in Palestine, as the so-called “killers of Christ”, and were forbidden to pray on the Temple Mount, which had a Christian Church on top of it. When the armies of Islam came and drove the Byzantines out of Palestine, the Jews saw them as liberators, and Mohammed as the Messiah! Conversion to Islam was a no-brainer, and had the added benefit of not having to pay the non-believer’s tax! I encourage people to explore this interesting possibility, which puts a whole different perspective on the Middle Eastern story.
Religions don’t get rights to land today but in those times they did. My religion, my territory where I and my brethren of my faith and culture live. You think Islam did not conquer territory and throw out the people such as those Jews and Christians they did not either kill or enslave or take jizya from? By what right did it do so? What do you mean by rights? Rights granted by what authority recognised by which people and adjudicated by what court acting under what authority and accepted by whom? Why do you think exile was commonly used to remove people from a territory on religious among other grounds? Have you read the Lexus and the Olive Tree?
However, religion being fundamental to culture and culture being fundamental to a nation, one could argue that religions do get land via the nation state, although all of that is now under challenge to day from many quarters.
And to reverse your argument neither does Islam have land rights, not in Israel, not in Palestine. Islamists don’t accept your Western reasoning. They were given Gaza and the West bank as nascent Palestinian states. But they did not want to build a fair, well governed and prosperous state. No they wanted only oine thing: to destroy Israel and extirpate the Jews by creating their people as victims to attract aid to use to build an armoury with which to attack Israel and kill Jews. In this war today, Hamas even steals the fuel sent into Gaza as aid to maintain itself and its fighting capability while hiding underground below its human shield of women and children.
Today’s REJECTED by The Australian:
.
Au contraire, there are plenty of groups who can, and do, support Hamas, including a good number in Australia.
*****
Quote: Where were those who want to prosecute “hate speech”?
.
Watching out for someone to say “Women don’t have penises”?
I fail to understand why the policy of genocide, the founation principle of Hamas and its ilk, is not condemned in the harshest possible manner rather than given support by our media that exhibits nothing but hatred of Jews and the desire to see Israel and its people destroyed.
Every death in Gaza down to Hamas.
Once the terrorists are gone one outcome can bring peace, and that involves expanding Israel to include Gaza and West Bank with Israeli citizenship to all with all the benefits that entails.
Giving full and equal citizenship to the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank would be a great solution, and with the “right of return”, the addition of the Palestinian Diaspora will mean that the Palestinian Arabs will constitute the majority of the democracy! At present, full and equal citizenship is not enjoyed by the Israeli Arabs, and never will be.
People need to think this through! Eliminating Hamas will not result in the liberation of the Gazans and tears of joy and profound thanks given to the Israelis……….. Why? Because every family that survives will have lost sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, and a number of those still living, as they sort through the rubble of their former homes, may well be physically and psychologically crippled. Most likely scenario is a new legacy of pain and a new generation dedication to revenge of the blind-rage sort. And so the cycle of violence continues…
They were given Gaza and the West Bank as nascent Palestinian states and look what they did with it.
They were not given Gaza or any independence. The PA is a nominal stooge of Israel in what is called the West Bank which is just Occupied Palestine, everything beyond the UN Mandate, and Gaza has been a prison since 2007 where Israel has total military control over the fences which surround it. Well it did, except for October 7.
The Palestinians have never been offered a fully independent State with the same right to defend itself as Israel. They have been offered bantustans which would have remained under Israeli military control.
Somewhere within a billion words the beheaded baby images will surface to lead this literary fest.
I saw some weeks ago but did not bookmark them and can’t find them today. Maybe they were these:
.
Jerusalem, Oct 12 (EFE).- Israeli authorities on Thursday published explicit photos in response to questions regarding claims that Hamas killed children and babies. The US Secretary of State accused the Islamist group of using the population of Gaza as “human shields.”
.
On Thursday, the White House walked back President Biden’s claim to have seen photos of beheaded children, saying he was referring to reports from Israel and that the president had not seen the pictures himself.
.
HOURS LATER, THE ISRAELI GOVERNMENT SHOWED PHOTOS AND VIDEOS TO US SECRETARY OF STATE ANTONY BLINKEN AND POSTED OTHERS ON SOCIAL MEDIA. BLINKEN SAID, “PICTURES ARE WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS. THESE PICTURES MAY BE WORTH A MILLION.”
So your position is that if any group commits an atrocity, whether simply claimed, or proven, they void all human rights and claims on justice? Is that it?
Do you apply that to Israel and the atrocities it has committed over 75 years to maintain occupation or do you only apply it to people crushed under colonial military rule fighting for freedom and justice?
You won’t get anything like this reporting from the ABC:
*****
When one of Israel’s most elite combat medics thinks of all the horrors he witnessed on October 7, it’s not the death that gets him.
.
It’s the signs of life; the glimmers of hope and resilience. Two babies, found alive in a cupboard where their parents hid them before being slaughtered.
.
A woman’s first gasps of fresh air after 10 hours huddled in a bomb shelter with six children. And the old man, standing in front of his burning home in a street full of corpses, who told the young men and women in uniform “Yihiyeh tov” – everything will be all right.
.
Those words crushed Major G, a battle-hardened operative with Unit 669 who gave The Australian a harrowing first-hand account of October 7.
.
His story is stomach-turning in parts, but it bluntly answers the question of why Israel has mounted a powerful ground incursion against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
.
“WE’RE NOT ACTING AGAINST AN ARMY,” MAJOR G SAID. “THIS IS EVIL, UNEQUAL TO ANYTHING I CAN THINK ABOUT.”
*****
https://todayspaper.theaustralian.com.au/infinity/article_popover_share.aspx?guid=73ccf76a-c05c-42e0-9e9f-a93e3c083593
There are some really interesting indicators of the fatuity of our zombie civilisation in this catastrophe. There is the ‘so much care’ for the victims in Gaza, as compared with the so little care that was offered the tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers massacred at the behest of Washington and Canberra. There is the ‘so much care’ for the cause of Palestine, which has completely displaced all that ‘so much care’ for the cause of Ukraine, now recognised as a lost cause by all but the most ignorant. There is of course the ‘so much care’ for the Gazan children, and so little care for Israeli children.
Perhaps most fascinating is that the Russia-hating ABC of a year ago has now sided completely with Russia against Israel, one of our allies. In fact, RT’s propagandising of the conflict is possibly more moderate than that described above, even though Israel is actually an ‘enemy’ of Russia.
Soon it will be Christmas, and nobody will care less about any of this because of a mystical being who breaks into houses via the chimney and deposits Chinese-made junk all over the place, and then we will be back to climate change to fill in the gaps between worthy cause emergencies.
By the way, do people still watch tv? If so, why?
“A truth that’s told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent.”
from William Blake, “Auguries of Innocence”
There have been a super-sufficiency of reader commentary on articles about this conflict with very little sign of people changing their opinions. The one incontrovertible fact is that no matter what the causes of the hostility, HAMAS does not, never has, and never will obey the rules of war. Hamas’s series of blatant war crimes that started this latest episode, and continue while they hold hostages and shelter behind their effectively self-imprisoned citizenry, cannot be excused by anything Israel or its Jewish citizens might have done, or might do in self-defence. They are utterly indefensible as are the people who try to excuse them. Shame on them.
From Melanie Phillips:
‘As any dispassionate person who has followed Israel’s wars knows very well, the IDF try everything they can to get enemy civilians out of harm’s way — by leafleting, “knock on the roof” warning shots, phone calls and other means of communication.
No other army in the world has ever done this. When coalition forces bombed Afghanistan or when US forces flattened Mosul, no-one even bothered to mention the civilians who must have been killed there. Yet Israel’s wars repeatedly engulf it in international outrage with accusations that it kills enemy civilians wantonly or deliberately. This is not just a malevolent lie; it could not be a more grotesque inversion of the truth.
The lie is nevertheless perpetrated day in, day out by western media. While the Israelis say they have killed “thousands of Hamas terrorists” in this current war, western media outlets publish Hamas claims that 10,000 “civilians” have been killed — with no attempt whatever to acknowledge that any of these were Hamas operatives and referring only to women and children among the dead.’
.
That same grotesque inversion of truth and its Jew-hating variants are perpetrated ad nauseum here in the comments.
‘Truth is the first casualty of war.’ However Melanie Phillips is very far from being disinterested in this conflict.
So what? Who is?
And that changes the facts?
Thanks for your post pgang – take away all the “,Who’s to blame ” positions from those who should know better here, and note that if the tip of the Arab spear obliterates Israel as rosross seems to desire, the middle east will be “Judenfrei” and another terrorist state will have been entrenched. And yes. Tactics in war matter and both the Germans and Russians went on rapefests in WWII among other atrocities, yet some will blame the US for everything. Surprised they didn’t vote Yes in the recent referendum, so terrible were the colonialists to the indigenous , apparently.
I am not antisemitic .
I understand how horrific was the attack on Israel by Hamas .
However the body count is telling .
No matter how a child dies a dead child is a dead child .
The Israeli pilots are seen as brave heroes turning Gaza city into ruins and destroying Hamas .
But 70% of the humans that those bombs are killing are women and children .
We need to reflect the fact that those fanatical Hamas fighters were once innocent children too but three generations of repression and disinheritance of their birthright drove those young men into the radical Islamic mullahs .
What Israel is doing now is ensuring the next generation of Islamic radicals that will be prepared to fight Israel to the death .
What Israel is doing seems not just a war against the Hamas but against the Palestinians as a whole .
Where will those Palestinians that lived in all the buildings destroyed by Israel live once Hamas has been destroyed?
Unless the blockade of water medicine and food and fuel is lifted soon a huge genocide will occur that Israel will never recover from .
As an Australian I am ashamed that we did not vote for a cease fire at the United Nations .
The hate speech against Palestinians on this forum I have found sickening .
Jews through out history have been terrible victims of the dehumanising propaganda before murderous pogroms .
The Nazis in WW2 took it to a new level .
Never Again I can understand but there were other lessons from the past that are being ignored in what is occurring now .
How over whelming military power corrupts is one such lesson .
It is also telling that 1400 Hamas fighters died in the attack on Israel and most of them were prepared to die in that attack .
So approximately 1 Israeli was murdered by each Hamas fighter that died .
Israeli pilots have only a very small chance of dying each bombing mission they make .
Each bomb they drop kills more people than each fanatical Hamas fighter killed in there attack on Israel .
Each group of young men have been brain washed to do what they are doing .
‘But 70% of the humans that those bombs are killing are women and children.’ Says who? This is yet another unsubstantiated claim as is the death toll figures in general which is information provided by the Hamas Health Ministry. It seems that no matter how many times it is pointed out that when a terrorist organisation uses its own people as a defensive shield, horrific carnage will likely ensue. This should be taken up with Hamas and their tactical and strategic choices to sacrifice civilian blood to protect themselves. If you are the Humanitarian that you are seemingly purporting to be’ Why aren’t you asking for the immediate release of all Israeli civilian hostages? Why aren’t you asking that Hamas surrender without delay? Why is there not condemnation of Hamas leadership who are housed far from the conflict in Qatar while their people suffer? Why no condemnation of the stated genocidal ambitions of the Free Palestinian movement to wipe Israel off the face of the map? Why no condemnation of the Iranian Ayatollahs who have orchestrated the October 7 barbarism from afar? The only rational explanation for that omission is that you don’t want Israel to prevail in this conflict and you harbour the same goals as, or at least sympathize with, Hamas and the Pro- Palestinian movement.
As Ramesh Thakur so succinctly put it in the Spectator;
The civilian toll in Gaza is greatly magnified because, as they say, while Israelis use missiles to protect their people, Hamas uses its people to protect its missiles and shield its fighters. Hostilities could not resume after a ceasefire absent fresh Hamas attacks. Those calling for a ceasefire must be forced to confront the logic of their call. It necessarily means accepting the 7 October attacks as a fait accompli, rewarding the brutal Hamas tactics of killing, kidnapping and sacrificing Israeli and Palestinian civilians, denying Israel the right to self-defence in practice while paying lip service to it in rhetoric, and encouraging repeats of the cycle not just by Hamas, but also by other terrorist groups mimicking the successful Hamas tactics and strategy. All who celebrated 10/7 and call for Israeli restraint and a ceasefire should be required to watch the raw footage that Israel has prepared of what happened on that evil and sorrowful day and be asked immediately afterwards: Do you really want Israel to stop before the job is done and Hamas is finished off?
@John Daniels,
There are others who agree with you and full marks to Quadrant for allowing dissent because many media outlets do not.
There are increasing numbers of Jews and even a few Israelis who see it as you do and who understand that Never again meant all humans, not just Jews.
Israel has the fourth biggest military in the world, backed up by the first, and it is up against a Resistance militia with home-made rockets and second-hand guns. However, what the Palestinians do have is right, justice and determination on their side and as we saw in Vietnam, those things can defeat any enemy.
Even if all 16 million Palestinians in the world could be exterminated the Resistance would not end. Justice is an idea which can never be defeated. Israel should know that.
To ignore the reality of more than 75 years of Zionist/Israeli terrorism against the Palestinians is not simply immature it is foolish. The Palestinian Resistance would not exist if Israel did not occupy and continue to colonise all of Palestine, denying 6 million Palestinians human and civil rights, justice and freedom.
Israel is surprised at the savagery of some of the Palestinians who broke out of Gaza. How can they be when those young men have experienced mental and physical torment and torture from Israel since they were toddlers. What kid grows up to be normal in a prison where every day involves trauma and fear and you are regularly bombed as Israel tests its weapons? Some might but most do not.
Israelis consider the Palestinians to be subhuman and treat them as such. How is that going to win hearts and minds? It is a tragedy that people died singing and dancing outside the walls of the Gaza prison but it is an even greater tragedy that such a prison even existed.
‘Even if all 16 million Palestinians in the world could be exterminated the Resistance would not end. Justice is an idea which can never be defeated. Israel should know that.’
In other words Antisemitism is an idea that can never be defeated.
70% of those killed are women and children? Well, of course. That is a good outcome for Hamas, WHere are the men? Hiding underground.
Sounds antisemitic to me . Does one have to repeat the tired ” if the Palestinians laid down their arms there would be peace, if Israel did same, no Israel”. Can’t say I’m a huge fan of secular Jews, but Palestinians are the tip of the Arab/Muslim spear, will only destroy , not build and are the stated enemy of the West.
Australia has “skin” in this game, in that Australian forces (Light Horse, etc) played a role in taking Palestine from the Turks, and the British and French then went ahead with the secret Sykes-Picot plan to carve up the middle east. Under that plan, the British were to occupy Palestine, which would give them the opportunity to implement the Balfour Declaration, entailing the creation of a homeland for Jews in Palestine in return for Jewish help in influencing the Americans to join the Allies (Entente Powers) in WW1. Because of the collapse of the Russian Empire, Germany was transferring its armies in the east to the western front, which would mean that the Central Powers (Germany, Austro-Hungary, Turkey) could not be defeated, and may well have proved victorious over the Allies. Hence the British collaboration with the Zionists, on the assumption that Jews in America had enough influence on government and public opinion there to affect US foreign policy. So, Australia has a direct share in the creation of the present situation in the middle east, by its military role in wresting Palestine from Ottoman rule. We were an active party in creating this problem, so what is our role in solving it?
Precisely none.
Thank you for the excellent historical summary though.
Actually it was British intelligence of Germany’s intentions that persuaded the US to join the Allies and enter WW1.
But no responsibility of the Turks who invaded Palestine in 1517 and held it for the last 400 of the 500 years since?
Furthermore, your history lesson has as many holes through it as Swiss cheese. The Balfour declaration was not enacted to create the state of Israel but quite the opposite throughout the duration of WW2. It was not until after the end of WW2, did the British along with its international partners and a fledgling United Nations reinstate the principles of the Balfour declaration that a Jewish homeland be established.
In May 1939, the British published a White Paper that marked the end of its commitment to the Jews under the Balfour Declaration. It provided for the establishment of a Palestinian (Arab) state within ten years and the appointment of Palestinian ministers to begin taking over the government as soon as “peace and order” were restored to Palestine; 75,000 Jews would be allowed into Palestine over the next five years, after which all immigration would be subject to Arab consent; all further land sales would be severely restricted. The 1939 White Paper met a mixed Arab reception and was rejected by the AHC. The Jewish Agency rejected it emphatically, branding it as a total repudiation of Balfour and Mandate obligations. In September 1939, at the outset of World War II, Ben-Gurion, then chairman of the Jewish Agency, declared: “We shall fight the war against Hitler as if there were no White Paper, and we shall fight the White Paper as if there were no war.
The entry of Italy into the war in May 1940, which brought the war closer to the Middle East, convinced Churchill and his military advisers that the immigration provisions of the White Paper needed to be enforced so as not to antagonize the Arabs. Thus, the British strictly enforced the immigration limits at a time when European Jewry sought desperately to reach the shores of Palestine. Despite rising British-Jewish tensions, thousands of Jewish volunteers served in the British army, and on September 14, 1944, the Jewish Brigade was established.
In May 1946, the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry unanimously declared its opposition to the White Paper of 1939 and proposed, among other recommendations, that the immigration to Palestine of 100,000 European Jews be authorized at once. The British Mandate Authority rejected the proposal, stating that such immigration was impossible while armed organizations in Palestine– both Arab and Jewish–were fighting the authority and disrupting public order.
By 1947 Palestine was a major trouble spot in the British Empire, requiring some 100,000 troops and a huge maintenance budget. On February 18, 1947, Bevin informed the House of Commons of the government’s decision to present the Palestine problem to the United Nations (UN). On May 15, 1947, a special session of the UN General Assembly established the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP), consisting of eleven members. The UNSCOP reported on August 31 that a majority of its members supported a geographically complex system of partition into separate Arab and Jewish states, a special international status for Jerusalem, and an economic union linking the three members. Backed by both the United States and the Soviet Union, the plan was adopted after two months of intense deliberations as the UN General Assembly Resolution of November 29, 1947.
You also conveniently have overlooked that the deployment and stationing of Allied troops, including 3 Australian Brigades in Palestine to protect it from Axis forces invasion was responsible for protecting all Arab states in the middle East from German occupation during the second world war. So arguably they already owe us a debt of gratitude!
Stop it with your facts.. Palestinians are First Nations Peoples and that’s that. And Zionists, don’t forget about them. They are causing all the problems (in the world), even though anyone who has spent a bit of time in Israel knows that Zionism is an irrelevance.
I used to be sceptical about the supposed ubiquity of anti-Semitism in the world. That was, until October 7, 2023. The days since then have turned around my view on the matter. I’m now astonished at how easy it is to induce anti-Semitism in a person who would otherwise not know a Jew from a pillar of salt.
The narrative tends to go something along the lines of, ‘The Holocaust was bad but this time it’s the Jews’ own fault for getting themselves slaughtered because (Palestine, Zionism, insert convenient trope). I therefore deny them the right to self defence.’ Victims must know their place I guess.
Dear Citizen Kane: I have not “conveniently” overlooked anything, I just have a different perspective and different priorities than you have. Regarding Australian troops stationed in Palestine in WW2, the Palestinian Arabs would not perceive them as being there to “protect” them, rather they would hope that the Axis powers could come and liberate them! In fact the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem went to see Hitler seeking help! The Australians, with the British, invaded Vichy French-held Syria and Lebanon from Palestine, taking control. Likewise, the Egyptians didn’t see the British as occupying their country for their benefit. It all depends on perspective, and everybody has their own view point.
Thanks for clarifying your perspective that you would rather be on the side of Hamas and Nazi Germany. But I think that has been obvious to most here reading your posts to date.
On 10 June 1940, during the Second World War, the Kingdom of Italy entered WW2. Within a month, the Italians attacked Palestine from the air, bombing Tel Aviv and Haifa, inflicting multiple casualties.
In 1942, there was a period of great concern for the Yishuv, when the German forces of General Erwin Rommel advanced east across North Africa towards the Suez Canal, raising a fear that they would conquer Palestine. This period was referred to as the “200 days of dread”. This event was the direct cause for the founding, with British support, of the Palmach – a highly trained regular unit belonging to Haganah (a paramilitary group composed mostly of reserves). While the bulk of the Arab world supported Allied efforts during WW2, a number of leaders and public figures saw an Axis victory as the likely outcome and a way of securing Palestine back from the Zionists – somethings never change do they cbattle1?
As someone who had a direct relative stationed with AIF forces in Palestine during WW2, indeed willing to give his life on their behalf, I can report that were well received and highly regarded by the local Arab population.
The fact that you seek to appropriate what you think was the unanimous view of Palestinian Arabs from WW2 with the comment -‘the Palestinian Arabs would not perceive them as being there to “protect” them, rather they would hope that the Axis powers could come and liberate them!’ demonstrates the Anti- semetic undercurrent that pervades everything you say.
Leaving aside your omission of the millenia before WW1, the US joined the Allies in WW1 for several reason, nothing whatsoever to do with using the Jews in American in a Zionist plot.
President Wilson remained resolutely opposed to US involvement until 1917 but the torpedoing of the Lusitania two years earlier on 7 May 1915 had helped shift American public opinion. At the end of that day Charles Ives was waiting on the platform of the Hanover Square train station in Manhattan when the crowd suddenly broke into one of his beloved gospel hymns, which he incorporated in his Orchestral Set No. 2 – III From Hanover Square north, at the end of a tragic day, the voices of the people again arose.
Three things persuaded Wilson to commit US forces to the war. First, Germany announced her resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare in January 1917. Second, Wilson was determined that America should decide the peace. Taking part would be an advance payment. Third, in February 1917 Germany offered Mexico an alliance if she attacked America. Wilson found out only after he was told that British Intelligence had intercepted the telegram making the offer from Germany’s foreign minister Zimmerman. America’s declaration of war in April 1917 gave Germany about a year until American troops would arrive in strength.
The point I was making is that the British BELIEVED that Jews had the ability to influence American policy; I’m not aware that they in fact had any effect. Certainly there was a quid pro quo expected from the Balfour Declaration; perhaps it was a deal with the Zionists for more monetary support for the war effort, via Jewish financiers; certainly the Rothchilds would be on board with the Zionist project in Palestine. Certainly, Arthur Balfour didn’t wake up one morning and think, “Hey, I’m going to pledge the British government to the creation of a homeland for Jews in Palestine!” There would have been lobbying to that effect by the Zionist organisation, and they would have been offering something.
@cbattle1,
There is no doubt the Zionists, a political movement, who were largely atheists exploited Judaism and Jews for their colonial venture. They had been working on the project from the 1890’s and had a lot of money and influence to wield in the UK and US and elsewhere to get support for their plan to set up a State in Palestine.
The Germans gifted them victimhood in WWII and they played it to the hilt. Also worth remembering that, in the times, many in Europe and the UK considered Arabs to be inferior and that is why the Zionists never gave much thought to what they would do or continue to do to maintain their State in Palestine.
But the world has changed, as it does, and what could be tolerated in 1947 cannot be tolerated today. If they had taken the South American colony option the world might be a very different place. But they did not so the task is to clean up the mess created in 1947.
So if the holocaust was a gift, may I ask to whom you are feeling generous right now? It seems to be Iran, Hamas and their supporters. If you are organising a whip round to donate a similar gift to them, do let me know. I assume you will be with them to receive the gift.
@cbattle1,
Well said. We also have skin in this game because like Israel we claim to be a Western democracy and it behoves us to demand that Israel abide by the bar it has set itself and act like a Western democracy and not a theocratic Middle Eastern tyranny.
Israel could never have done what it did and become what it has without the support, compliance, if not encouragement of other nations including our own.
Israelis have been betrayed by those who call themselves friends. Helping people be the worst that they can be and not the best is the act of an enemy, not of a friend.
There is an unholy international alliance between the woke Left and Islamo-Fascism. The common enemy? Free thinking democratic people. They both use the tactic of eliminating their opponents, not engaging with them. One cannot reason with them. They differ only in degree. The Woke cancel, the Islamo-Fascists kill. How long before they both kill?
This is not just about Israel. It is existential for the West as a whole. Time to wake up.
Umm, can I infer that Australia is in a Holy international alliance?
No cbattle1, whoever you are, hiding behind that false identity. But is is free democratic one – just about although people with your views are trying to destroy it.
Please, Honourable Editor, can you please lower the boom on this ridiculously pointless argument?
This may well be a ridiculously pointless argument, but at least it keeps us off the streets!
@Doubting Thomas,
I have not heard facts called ridiculous before. Indeed, one could argue all debate is ridiculous until we consider the echo chamber alternative. You want it to stop because there are differences of opinion when such dissent preserves and protects all of us.
I’ve given up on you, ros. You are completely blind and deaf to rational argument with your fanatical anti-semitism driving your disgraceful, utterly despicable, defence of HAMAS’s terrorism, insisting, in effect, that Israelis are just getting their just deserts.
Your callous statement above that “The Germans gifted them victimhood in WWII and they played it to the hilt.” is just about the most outrageously ignorant piece unmitigated anti-semitism ever seen in polite discussion. It totally destroys whatever shred of credibility you’ve managed to hold onto until now.
It is possible to criticise Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians without excusing HAMAS’s brutal war crimes, and every single aspect of their current behaviour in their war against Israel has been a blatant war crime.
1. Attacking and brutally killing unarmed Israeli and visiting tourist civilian families. War crimes, each and every instance.
2. Taking and holding hostages for ransom. War crimes in each and every instance.
3. Using their own women and children as shields to fight behind. War crimes in each and every instance.
4. Deliberate refusal to allow their civilian population to accept Israel’s warnings to leave areas the Israelis intend to attack. War crimes in each and every instance.
5. Hiding HAMAS command and control headquarters in tunnels beneath hospitals and schools. Hiding ammunition and weaponry in and/or under schools and hospitals. War crimes in each and every instance.
6. Using ambulances as military transport. War crimes in each and every instance.
You haven’t got a feather fly with, ros, let alone a leg on stand on.
Israel doesn’t just issue a warning and carry on. It telephones to ensure the message has been received and then as the time of raid draws near it telephones again. And Again.
Israel cut off the phones and internet in Gaza.
@Doubting Thomas,
I am trying to make sense of things which do not make sense. I cannot get my head around an occupier being a victim and a colonised people with no freedom and no army being the dangerous aggressor.
I agree with you that one can criticise Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians without excusing crimes committed by the Palestinian Resistance/Hamas.
I also agree with you that war crimes should be investigated and those responsible held accountable. But that applies to Israelis as well as Palestinians and Israel has a much longer record of such crimes. Do you support them being held accountable?
And would you agree that if the fighters in Gaza were using their own women and children as shields, remembering there is nowhere to run, then so were the fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto who also had nowhere to run?
There is nowhere to run in Gaza and when some obeyed the Israelis and fled to the Rafah Crossing they were bombed. Surely a war crime. But we are in agreement that Israelis and Palestinians must both be held accountable for war crimes. That is progress.
But is it possible to understand why those crimes were committed without taking into account more than 75 years of deadly violence toward the Palestinians from the Zionists/Israelis?
I don’t think it is.
You make many charges against the Palestinian Resistance, some of which are proven and others which are not but let us take your position that all of these atrocities happened.
Does that then give Israel licence to commit its own atrocities and war crimes?
I don’t think it does, and neither do many Jews and some Israelis, but that seems to be the argument in response to October 7. It does not make sense to call Israelis victims and Palestinians the aggressors. It is as simple and as complex as that.
Henry Ergas had this to say (inter much alia):
.
The contrast could not be starker. Israel systematically warns civilians in areas that are likely to be under attack, despite the risk that poses to its troops.
.
Hamas slaughters children in their sleep.
.
To say that is not to suggest Israel is incapable of making mistakes: states, in this world of ours, are not saints. But unlike Hamas’s murderers, the perpetrators of any breaches will face a powerful, vigorously independent judiciary that enforces the law of armed conflict as part of domestic law. Even more importantly, they will face a body of citizens that remains as intensely committed as it has ever been to Israel’s abiding values, including the rule of law.
.
That, in the end, is the fundamental difference between barbarism and civilisation: between those who know no law and those who live by the biblical command to “follow justice and justice alone”. And that is why this Remembrance Day, as we honour those who died so that justice may live, the dead Jews of October 7 are, and must remain, our dead too.
At this point the greatest barbarism comes from Israel and has done for more than 75 years.
How can justice be occupation or colonisation?
How can justice be a genocidal foundation for Israel?
If Israel believed in justice it would have either created one State shared equally by the native Palestinians and their colonisers long ago or it would have ensured the Palestinians had freedom in their own State.
None of that happened and that is why October 7 happened.
All of the dead, 1400 Israelis and 10,000 plus Palestinians are our dead because we have not held Israel to account since 1947.
‘How can justice be occupation or colonisation?’
Looks you stand accused of a crime against humanity then!
Cue the moral relativism and ‘contextualization’ the obfuscation and the rank hypocrisy – back over to you Roslyn.
Australia is not a coloniser nor an occupier denying human and civil rights, justice and freedom to the native peoples of this land.
We are talking about now. There is no other nation calling itself a Western democracy which does NOW to the native people of the land it colonised, what Israel does and has done to the Palestinians for 75 years. By all means, cite one if you can.
Funny how most Aboriginals see it differently. What is their catch cry again; always was – always will be. And ‘Never ceded”. But I guess you are better placed to speak on their behalf. Thanks for delivering the moral relativism, and rank hypocrisy once again right on cue!
lbloveday: The “powerful, vigorously independent judiciary” that you mention, would that be the one that Netanyahu is determined to set up? And, regarding “Israel’s abiding values, including the rule of law”, those would be the values behind the building of settlements on Palestinian land in the occupied “West Bank”, in breach of international law?
I’m done!