Netanyahu’s speech to a frenzied mob of crazed American Zionists was quite appalling to behold. Juan Cole dissects with a steely brilliance Netanyahu’s wildly unhistorical claims. This should be compulsory reading for all people interested in politics anywhere:
Netanyahu mixed together Romantic-nationalist cliches with a series of historically false assertions. But even more important was everything he left out of the history, and his citation of his warped and inaccurate history instead of considering laws, rights or common human decency toward others not of his ethnic group.
So here are the reasons that Netanyahu is profoundly wrong, and East Jerusalem does not belong to him.
http://www.juancole.com/2010/03/top-ten-reasons-east-jerusalem-does-not.html#comments
What modern Israel most closely resembles is apartheid South Africa. Those who deny that Israel is a racist state should read this – just one of hundreds of thousands of such personal stories:
Larry do you get paid per comment? Or are you doing this because you are a sad fat old virgin with no friends?
Anyway, the Larrys have unconditional loyalty to Israel.
Labour, Liberal and Conservative friends of Israel are a bunch of Larrys, their loyalty lies with Israel and not to this country, its people or even their parties.
Loyalty to Israel goes above party politics.
Israel right or wrong
Netanyahu may appear rather brutish, but he’s a seasoned tactician, I doubt very much that he actually believes the romanticised, nationalistic, bullshit he spouts when he deems it useful.
The Israeli historian Shlomo Sands has written an excellent new book called the “Invention of the Jewish People” which is required reading. Sand’s book which was a bestseller in Israel, cuts right to the heart of mythologies surrounding Israel/Palestine and the “creation” of the Jewish people as an ethnically exclusive entity.
Essentially a people, or “volk” seem to invent the history they need to justify their version of history and their special roots and rights to land, especially when the land is disputed territory, and let’s face it, what land isn’t disputed, as usually more than one “volk” lay claim to it.
I would argue that nationlism came before the nation, and the “volk” is an an invention too.
Zionism was an intellectual conceit, a strand of European, romantic nationalism. The absurd idea that every “volk”, in order to express themselves fully as an exclusive “volk” simply had to have their own country, or “holy land.”
In this respect Jewish people are part of a “proud” European tradition, of expansionism and conquest. I mean, if it’s ok for the Americans and the Spanish to conquer most of the Americas, why shouldn’t the Jews be allowed to take as much of the Middle East as they can get their hands on? Arguably they have more “right” to it, than the Europeans do to the Americas.
Hey, Larry the agent provocateur,
I thought I’d mentioned before that if you want to engage in a debate you need an argument, not a expletive.
Great interview with Norman Finkelstein which touches on NetenYahoo’s attempt to justify Israel’s illegal settlements in Arab East Jerusalem. Finkelstein has to be among the most brilliant, honorable and courageous Jews in America today.
http://desertpeace.wordpress.com/2010/03/24/norman-finkelstein-on-the-aipac-farce/
Ingo – keep posting mate
Larry from St. Louis. You are still embryonic. Grow a little.
Alfred, I don’t know precisely, how the Zionist influence will pan out on the world stage–what I do believe is that, the western powers are so morally and politically weak, that Zionist influence may have a destabilising effect, which will precipitate a war with Iran , against better judgement.
“America is a plutocracy where a handful of people at Goldman Sachs, for example, have vastly more power than, say, 30 million more or less bankrupt Californians . . .”
Exactly that. America is a hotch-potch of so many conflicting ideas that, those with a common goal and are united will dominate–the Zionists.
I am responsible for the Alfred response.
If you people think that the Joooooooooo Zionist are secretly taking over America, you’re even more stupid than I thought.
Granted – they do have a better PR campaign than, say, Syria. But the same can be said of the Bosnian Muslims, as the Serbs were entirely incompetent at pleading their case internationally.
You people are primitive thinkers, as additionally evidenced by the fact that you think that Goldman Sachs has more power than California.
Larry,
Good attempt at an argument. However, no one said Zionists are “secretly taking over America,” or even that all Zionists are Jews. Vice President Biden is outspokenly Zionist as is Hilary Clinton and President Obama, and non of them are Jews.
As for the power of Goldman Sachs, how many billion dollars have they received so far from the American taxpayer, versus the average Californian? And here’s a incredible graphic presentation of Goldman Sachs in Government:
http://www.goldmansachs666.com/2009/10/map-of-goldman-sachs-employees-past-and.html
Click on the boxes and see the boxes within boxes.
John,
I agree that a Zionist-driven attack on Iran is likely. However, I don’t see this as an instance of Zionist influence, so much as the likely action of a Zionist US Government backed by Zionist owned governments in the UK, France, etc. In other words, the US Government is not weak and hence subject to Zionist influence, it is by its own declaration, a Zionist government that will do whatever the Zionists deem desirable. The only means to deflect such government is by, in effect, revolution: a revolution against a fundamentally anti-democratic ruling elite.
So if there is weakness, it is a weakness of the people. Whenever government has the means to exert greater control over the masses, it will obviously do so. How exactly the advanced technology revolution will play out politically is hard to see.
The people hold some cards, e.g., the blogsphere. But how much longer will that last? Governments have already committed massive funding to agent provocateurs and agents of disruption on the Web. And if necessary, they can shut the whole thing down.
On the government side, there are, in the UK, how many million spy cams now, plus New Labor’s various Stasi-like organizations, and the mass media, which though they may be losing eyeballs, still largly control the public mind.
@Ingo: not sure why you might feel your words are lost here. You have a good heart, so please keep posting.
@Alfred. I believe we have around 6m CCTV cameras in the country now. If only we had a touch of our American friends’ libertarianism!
Alfred,
I think we are pretty-well in agreement and any difference is hair-splitting so far:
“So if there is weakness, it is a weakness of the people”.
This is my meaning–the same applies in the UK, where the British population has recently become atomised by a massive and uncontrolled immigration of divers people.
Whatever loose cohesion the British had before, there always seemed to be a point, where they might act in unison against a bad law, or Governmental action–now I feel, the influx of so many aliens, has placed an unfair and overwhelming burden on the British people.
Weakening of the people, allows the ruling elites–through the facility of a partisan Parliament, to become even stronger.
Moreover, we have too many politicians, who, like the Congressmen on Capitol Hill, sign up to be “Friends of Israel”, which skews, at source, any independence of foreign policy.
BTW Alfred, your piece on Goldman Sachs is most revealing–thanks.
I had to cringe when I saw point four of Juan Cole’s list.
4. Jerusalem was founded in honor of the ancient god Shalem. It does not mean City of Peace but rather ‘built-up place of Shalem.”
Embarrassing pedantry. Must dash, I’m just about to nip off into the built-up place of London.
I expect he wanted a round 10 points and then moved this idiocy to no. 4 from no. 10 as an afterthought.
Thanks for all your supportive posts here. I’m a little depressed I think, something that comes with being unemployable (over 55)
There is only so much gardening you can do and I am getting fed up with arguing around in circles.
The world is facing unprecedented dangers, far more than we ever faced in a cold war.
I feel as if the spat between Netanyahu and the US is somewhat artificial, without really meaning it. UN resolutions dealing with Gaza and the land stealing in the Westbank East Jerusalem and Gholan is not going to be solved by blocked or abstained resolutions.
I fear that the two state solution is increasingly unlikely and hey presto what do I find this morning?
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LDE62M16A.htm
Some old geezer agrees with me. I think that we now should lobby each and everyone for an arms embargo against Israel, as much as the arms trade is unregulated and uncontrollable.
Anybody who arms Israel at the same time as they are arguing for a peacefull solution to all of these stalled initiatives, is a hypocritical lying bastard.
Thanks again for all your support, I hope that I have answered your question Jon.
Oh yes, Larry, on yer bike you little weasel, got get ……
I have to say that I just dont believe in the Innernashnul Zyniss Conspirusseh. I’m sure that there ARE power groups, both overt and clandestine, with substantial pro-zionist influence, but there are plenty of other centres of greed-power out there with their own agendas and ravenous appetites that are unallied with the cause of Israel’s ruthless elites.
As for an answer – well, it seems to me that the single state solution would lead to a Rwanda-style bloodbath at some point. A formally recognised independent Palestine would offer a chance for Palestinians to build anew.
Why is it that those like Larry and mike cobley who dis critics of Zionism use weird spelling like “Innernashnul Zyniss Conspirusseh”? Are you standing in for Larry, Mike, since Larrry was told to piss off?
Anyhow, who raised the issue of an international Zionist conspiracy? No one here, I think. What has been discussed is whether the Government of the US can be said to be acting merely in response to Zionist pressure when it is an avowedly Zionist administration (with a White House Chief of Staff the son of an Irgun terrorist, a citizen of Israel, an IDF veteran and, presumably, a Mossad agent) and thus can be assumed to be fully in sync. with the Zionist government of Israel. On that view, the blather about Obama as an anti-Semite, etc., merely provides cover from those who might expect the Government of the United States to serve American interests first, last and always.
Talking of the form of an Israel/Palestine settlement seems off topic too, since the discussion was initially about Netenyahu’s statement about illegal construction in Arab East Jerusalem. But as the advocate of an Independent Palestine, which speck of land in the Palestinian Archepelago, does Mikey thinks the Palestinians should have as their homeland?
http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/2009/03/30/270-palestines-island-paradise-now-with-a-word-from-its-creator/
More evidence, if any were needed, of the unity of the Zionist governments of the United States and of Israel:
Nearly 300 members of Congress have signed on to a declaration reaffirming their commitment to “the unbreakable bond that exists between [U.S.] and the State of Israel”, in a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
….As the Vice-President said during his recent visit to Israel: “Progress occurs in the Middle East when everyone knows there is simply no space between the U.S. and Israel when it comes to security, none. No space.”
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1159159.html
Alfred – I dont deny the clear and pernicious influence of the Israeli elite and their worshippers at various levels of power in the West. I try not to attribute to Zionism and its enablers the same kind of global-reach-awe that BushCo attached to Al-Qaida. I suppose that, arguably, Zionism/pro-Israeli-elites have much great power and global reach than Al-Qaida has ever had but we need to ensure that criticism clearly derives from cold, hard fact rather than anything tainted by irrationalism. I have no doubt that Larry from Unowhere will guffaw mightily at this, but hey, he is as they say an empty vessel.
Ingo – You’re not alone in having trouble getting work. I’ve not talked to anyone, of any age, who’s not had problems in the last few years. A few of the people i know have jobs again now – but half of them are in job centres, advising people on what benefits are available.
Ingo wrote “Anybody who arms Israel at the same time as they are arguing for a peacefull solution to all of these stalled initiatives, is a hypocritical lying bastard.”
Too right. If Obama’s serious he should put forward a ban on arms sales and financial aid to Israel till it ends the siege of Gaza, starts talks with both Fatah and Hamas and ends all settlements outside the pre-1967 war borders.
Of course it might never get through congress due to AIPAC having bought half of congress – and he might have to reduce it to reducing aid to Israel – but it’d show he meant a word he said.
Mike,
To compare Zionism with Al Qaeda is absurd. Al Qaeda consists of, what was it Robin Cook said just before so conveniently dropping dead on a remote Scottish hillside, oh yes, “The database.”
Even if you include the corpse of Bin Laden, whose family so generously bankrolled one of George W. Bush failed business ventures, plus the handful of extras with AK 47s that appear with Bin Laden in that ancient U-Tube vid, Al Qaeda amounts to essentially nothing in relation to the power of the United States.
What I argued was that the United States Government is not subject to Zionist influence, it is simply Zionist by its own declaration. That is why there is no danger whatsoever of Israel dragging the US into a war with Iran. If the US goes to war with Iran, whether as the result of an Israeli false flag attack on the US navy in the Persian gulf , a pre-emptive Israeli strike on Iran followed by Iranian retaliation against American forces in Iraq, or any other mechanism, you can be sure that the whole thing will have been carefully coordinated with the US Commander in Chief, Barack, Wall St. Obama.
Whether Obama is ideologically a Zionist or simply a Manchurian candidate is immaterial. He was bought and paid for largely with Zionist money and he is surrounded and controlled by Zionists in his own administration.
Ingo, Duncan,
The job market is crap because the bulk of UK/US manufacturing plus many intellectual tasks such as software development, all kinds of R&D, back office work for international accounting firms, etc. has been outsourced to Asia where they have a ten to one or better wage advantage.
What is, on the face of it, puzzling is that outsourcing of jobs has not resulted in a collapse in the Sterling/US$ exchange versus the Asian currencies. Had that happened, the UK/US workforce would have maintained competitiveness with that in Asia. So the question is why has this not happened.
Several processes have prevented job market equilibration via currency devaluation. One is an explosion in private, mainly mortgage, debt (for example, see Steve Keen at “DebtWatch”: http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs/2010/01/22/google-lower-bandwidth-version/) , which fueled a property boom, which masked the loss of jobs in the tradable goods and services sectors by creating generally low-skilled jobs in retail and construction.
This effect cannot go on forever. At some point a limit in the capacity to increase borrowing is reached, then a depression. This transition has already occurred in the US and is, presumably, occurring now in the UK.
In addition, the loss of jobs in the tradable goods and services sector has been masked by abnormal profits in the financial sector: profits resulting largely from the business of creating unsustainable private debt. These unsustainable profits fueled the markets for expensive wine, fancy houses, kitchens, cars, etc. Now the banks are broke there is a double bust, which however, is partially masked by government stimulus spending, i.e., more borrowing but in this case by the public, not the private, sector. This too will prove unsustainable. Either governments will run out of borrowing capacity and will have to stop spending, or they will print, in which case, hyperinflation.
Add to these factors the Chinese reluctance to recycle trade surpluses and the disruptive effect of compelling millions of workers to switch from writing software to stocking shelves in some big box store selling cheap Chinese crap, or working on some futile government make-work project and you have the conditions for the second great depression.
From this I draw two morals. First, no one should feel bad about being unemployable. It’s the times, not the individual. (We need more sidewalk cafes where those of us who are old geezers can play dominos and drink decent coffee.) Second, don’t underestimate the value of gardening, although a row of cabbages in the front border makes more sense than geraniums.
Alfred – yes, I pretty much agree with most of what you say in yr 2.36 post. What I meant was that some critics confer on Zionism a similar global-scariness factor to that which Bushco conferred on Al-Qaida. That said, the cultural and economic reach of zionist power centres is far more profound than anything AQ can do.
Hmm, bit of a broad-brush appoach, there, Neil. Going by your definition, just who is qualified to claim moral equality with Israel? I’d love to hear of some examples.
Anyone wishing to understand the Jewish psyche must acquire a copy of The Talmud. It’s exemplary precept regarding the “Other” should, with the necessary alterations, be emulated by the UK’s BNP, Unfortunately a plethora of Frankfurt School influenced “snivel – rights” laws disallow such a Semitically time – honoured option for a Goyim political party with the temerity to defend the legitimate interests of White Brits (tautologically speaking).
Here’s a copy of the Talmud if anyone wants a read:
http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/talmud.htm
I’ll past a translation of the Quran too, just encase anyone wants knowledge of Islam:
http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/engagement/resources/texts/muslim/quran/
The link contains verse by verse of three different translations.
My problem is not with the Jews, or their books. My problem is with the Zionists, and they have no book, no religion and no God as all the ones who past here have admitted atheism.
So the Talmud is irrelevant to the discussion. Those guys who shoot Palestinian babies in the heads to steal their kidneys, don’t believe in God, why would their actions be determined by a book they don’t believe in?
They shoot Palestinian babies in the heads to steal kidneys because they are racist. And they believe they belong to a race that has a greater right to life than the ones they kill.
They kill Palestinian babies for the same reason I kill sheep to eat, or mice as pest control.
Not because of religion or the Talmud.
The Talmud forbids them from even being in that land until the Prophet arrives. If they disobey and disbelieve in the Talmud on that issue, why do you think they will abide by it on any other.
Let me get this straight, Zionists are not Jews and Jews are not Zionists.
For an eminently sensible take on this discussion I think nobody who contributed at the outset takes a lot of beating.
I would generalize his critique of Xymphora to the left generally.They seem to take Netanyahu,a former furniture salesman groomed by the CFR at his word.He becomes the kind of hate-figure on which the left psyche feeds for its nourishment.
The Middle East conflict is a little more nuanced.
To his credit nobody senses the underlying cynicism behind the Zionist PR.Israel was designed by Sabbatean elites less as a homeland for persecuted Jewry more a laboratory experiment.The said Sabbateans with their Round Table Group allies saw the state in terms of its potential as an attack-dog pawn in the geo-strategic plan to dominate not just the Middle East but more latterly Central Asia as well.
Anyone visiting the state of Israel gets an immediate sense of its inherent artificiality and fragility.The buildings are ramshackle and aside from the Temple Mount and the Supreme Court are plainly meant not to stand the test of time.
“The Zionists try to make the world believe that Jewish national consciousness desires satisfaction in the creation of a state in Palestine.The Jews again slyly dupe the dumb goyim.
“It doesn’t even enter their heads to build a Jewish state for the purposes of living there.All they want is a central organization for their international world swindle endowed with its sovereign rights and removed from the intervention of other states.A haven for convicted scoundrels and a university for budding crooks.”
Seems Hitler,for it is he cited above,knew the game-plan from the get-go.
Typically the left still ain’t got it!
The the klepto-masonic state soon became a major base for Meyer Lansky to operate with impunity.Later Sharon and his Bronfman crime gang allies perpetrated the massive West Bank land-scam.
The left focusses most of its energies decrying the Israeli state’s atrocious victimization and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.This dimension of the state’s behaviour is in fact merely an extension of its brutalization of its own citizens.
The apartheid nature of the regime foregrounds its inescapable parallels with Nazism.The left critique needs extending to the Israeli state’s depredations against its own people.
Tainted vaccination programmes,brutal medical experiments including the infamous irradiation tests conducted against N.African sephardi immigrants were the state’s means to create its own underclass.The allocation of huge numbers of children to its vast special education programme and the “Holocaust” brain-washing supervised by its secret service all suggest that Israel is not and was never meant to be merely a homeland sanctuary from centuries of persecution in Europe.
Brenner is not the only writer to cover the collusion between Zionists and Nazis that took place in the run-up to WW2.Edwin Black’s The Transfer Agreement found evidence that the pact saw many secular German Jews settle in Palestine perticularly around Haifa.It was these migrants who laid the basis of the government,military,educational, psychological,medical and social work infrastructure of the new state.
The state is actually firmly in the hands of about 200 families who employ a vast network of state functionaries in Orwellian-sounding goverment departments like The Ministry of Absorption,Religious Affairs,and Social Work.
This is the state referred to in mainstream official propaganda as “the only democracy in the Middle East”.A cursory glance at state practice in Israel suggests the definition of “democracy” implicit in this categorization must be pretty broad.Quasi or ersatz democracy might be more accurate designations.
Lest we forget-the left’s focus on the apartheid nature of the Israeli regime is aimed chiefly against its segregation and immiseration of the Palestinian population in the territories.In fact from the start Israel has discriminated against its own sephardi minorities.
Israel is an elite experiment in how far a population can be controlled and brutalized by the state’s officially-enforced siege-menatlity.How far can its population be pushed in the direction of their own spiritual and moral degradation?
Whereas 96% Israelis are said to have backed the Gaza cull of Palestinian civilians in 2009 the 25% figure for Israelis finding means to avoid conscription to the IDF in the territories may be a more hopeful sign that the an intractable morality still exists among a sizeable minority.
We shouldn’t feel obliged to buy into the rather ahistorical notion that Hitler’s brand of anti-semitism was inherently just bad and mad.
It’s an absurdly ahistorical proposition that ultimately will make it all the more difficult to prevent anti-semitism rearing its ugly head with similarly fateful consequences again some time soon.
One Jewish writer who saw the dangers of what she called “the scapegoat theory” was Hannah Arendt.In The Origins of Totalitarianism she noted that the idea that the Jews are always the scapegoat implies the scapegoat might have been anyone else as well.
The other form of taken-for-granted common sense assumption about anti-semitism Arendt targetted was the doctrine of “eternal anti-semitism” which she felt was but another fallacy that could count many Jews among its adherents.
Arendt was characteristically fearless and scathing in her denuciation of cheap formulae such as these to explain complex and disturbing aspects of human experience.Anti-semitism did not target Jews arbitrarily but occurred within the general framework of the emergence of the nation state.
She insisted its source was to be found in certain aspects of Jewish history and specifically Jewish functions when they operated as state bankers during previous centuries.
According to Arendt’s reading “which group of people would turn anti-semitic in a given country at a given historical moment depended exclusively on general circumstances which made them ready for a violent antagonism against their government.Their role as state bakers led to their being perceived as the group most closely allied to the state the populace now wanted overthrown.
Arendt discerned in the anti-semitic mind of the host population the recurrence of images of Jews “as an international trade organization,a worldwide family concern with identical interests everywhere,a secret force behind the throne which degrades all visible governments into mere facade,or into marionettes whose strings are manipulated behind the scenes.
“Because of their close relationship to state sources of power,the Jews were invariably identified with power,and because of their aloofness from society and concentration on the closed circle of the family,they were invariably suspected of working for the destruction of all state structures.”
Such perceptions were undoubtedly alive throughout the Weimar years.One need only recall that the role played by international Jewry in securing US intervention in WW1 to help Britain.The latter in return promised them a homeland in Palestine.All this fed the German perception that they had been stabbed in the back when they had been winning the war in 1916.
The moral decay during the Weimar years,the sight of 12 year old prostitutes outside Jewish-owned hotels in Berlin all added to the seething resentment that had been building since the international synarchy’s role at Versailles and the subsequent reparations policy and trashing of Germany’s currency and economy during the Depression years.
Hitler discarded the central banking system that had so ravaged Germany’s post-war economy and succeeded in rebuilding Germany and signing international trade deals based on bartering.Britain was especially peeved when he managed to negotiate a big oil deal with Mexico just prior to WW2.
The anti-semitism that in Arendt’s view became the core of Nazism was less a form of madness and badness than a natural human reaction to the perceived role of international Jewry in bringing Germany down in WW1 and during the post-war period,as well as its role in spreading Bolshevism from Russia.
tungsten
On the Transfer Agreement and Nazi-Zionist collusion in the 1930s this IHR piece is a condensed account.
http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v13n4p29_Weber.html
onedemocraticstate has a fascinating article called:
Zionism and Nazism:Is There A Difference That Makes A Difference? It’s by Roger Tucker-great read especially if you noted how the killing fields of Gaza in 2009 so resembled the Warsaw Ghetto in 1944.