The true face of the organisation calling itself “Labour Friends of Israel” has been revealed today, in truly disgusting victim-blaming tweets reacting to the massacre of over fifty Palestinians – including yet more children – by the Israeli Defence Force in Gaza.
No Israelis were injured and no “border communities” attacked. This amplification of the worst extreme right wing zionist propaganda by the Likud government shows beyond doubt that “Labour Friends of Israel” is nothing whatsoever to do with the professed values of the Labour Party, but rather a well-funded entryist front solely intended to promote the interests of a violent, expansionist and aggressive foreign state.
I am not a Labour Party member and I do not know what institutional ties the “Labour Friends of Israel” has to the Labour Party, but whatever they are they should be cut off immediately.
The “Labour Friends of Israel” featured very prominently on our TV screens after the recent English local elections, beating the drum for their widespread accusations of anti-semitism within the Labour Party. They have been driving that agenda for many months. One would like to think that the mainstream media would, after today, cease to accept them as a genuine and well-motivated group and understand them for the hate-filled fanatics they truly are. Of course that will not happen, and they will be back on television shortly accusing yet more lifelong anti-racism campaigners who have the temerity to criticise Israel.
At an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council Tuesday, United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley denied the violence in Gaza Monday had anything to do with the U.S. opening up its new embassy in Jerusalem.
“Rather, the violence comes from those who reject the existence of the state of Israel in any location,” Haley said. “The location of the embassy has no bearing on the specific boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem, or the resolution of contested borders. … It does not undermine the prospects for peace in any way.”
Haley placed the blame for the violence, in which at least 60 people were killed according to Gaza’s health ministry, squarely on Hamas terrorists, backed by Iran.
A vocal supporter of Israel, Haley walked out of the Security Council meeting in protest before the Palestinian representative addressed the chamber.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/nikki-haley-denies-gaza-violence-related-us-embassy/story?id=55178732.
I’m sure that these self-acclaimed & self-appointed representatives of British Jews would have also walked out, judging by this obscene statement;
https://twitter.com/BoardofDeputies/status/996386432376885248
Read and learn you Blairite LFoIs.
Rebuilding health services in Gaza won’t be possible while Israel maintains blockade, says report
BMJ 2014; 349 https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.g6644 (Published 04 November 2014)
Response:The Maiming Fields of Gaza
‘Since 30 March 2018, Palestinians civilians living as refugees and exiles in Gaza ever since they were driven out from Palestine have been gathering in mass, unarmed demonstration about their right of return to the homeland they lost in 1948. Confronted by the Israeli army, including 100 snipers, the toll of dead and wounded Palestinian civilians is mounting at a shocking rate as we write.
There is a background to this. Firstly, there is the ongoing impact of the 12 year long Israeli blockade of Gaza on the care and health of her people, and the degrading of its health services. The violence and destruction inflicted by Israeli military action in Operation Protective Edge in 2014 and Operation Cast Lead in 2008-9 marked a distinct turning point in the pauperization of Gaza, against a backdrop of an ever tightening blockade since 2006.That assault in 2014 killed over 2,200 civilians, a quarter of whom were children, wounded 11.000, destroyed 15 hospitals, 45 clinics and 80,000 homes.
/..
https://www.bmj.com/content/349/bmj.g6644/rr
/..
https://www.bmj.com/content/349/bmj.g6644/rr
Article
Related content
Article metrics
Rapid responses
Response
The Maiming Fields of Gaza
Wisdom from a Brit in Palestine. Essential reading https://www.jonathan-cook.net/2018-05-16/gaza-protests-israel-massacre/
Laura Loomer, CRIPES:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikWyNJobKuc&ab_channel=talkRADIO
Good to see King Hussein stepping up to the plate…again.
https://www.albawaba.com/news/jordan-king-orders-jhco-deliver-aid-gaza-1132544
He need not be the only one:
https://www.map.org.uk/
Appreciated in advance.
Jones
May 15, 2018 at 20:41
“today Nikki Haley defended Israels mass murder in the UN Security Council and then walked out of the meeting as Palestine’s envoy began to speak — Clearly the US couldn’t care less what happens to the Palestinians and have given the green light to Israel to do exactly what they please, appalling, clearly the US has no interest in peace,”
……………………………………………………………….
Quite true Jones.
The most provocative action the US could take was to move their embassy to Jerusalem; and they did it.
So, the “two-state solution” is now effectively dead.
What will our Labour Friends of Israel do now who’s banner is “Working for a Two-State Solution”?
Will the UK and others follow suit and move their embassies to Jerusalem?
Members of the IDF sniper team seem relaxed at killing men women and children from a safe distance.
Will they ever be held to account? Only following orders sir.
Canadian physician Tarek Loubani shot in leg near Gaza border
By Levon Sevunts | [email protected]
Tuesday 15 May, 2018
http://www.rcinet.ca/en/2018/05/15/canadian-physician-tarek-loubani-shot-in-leg-near-gaza-border/
In a blog posted on Monday, Dr. Tarek Loubani, who works at the London Health Sciences Centre, said he was shot as he was standing with a group of paramedics about 25 metres away from the protest area, wearing “hospital green top and bottom so I could both be identified as medical staff and a physician.”
“We were standing well away from the main protest area,” Loubani wrote. “The snipers in the three sniper outposts all had clear views of us.”
There was no active shooting from the Israeli snipers immediately before or after and there were no protesters in the immediate vicinity, Loubani said.
…
A total of 19 Palestinian medical professionals were shot Monday, he said.
If the IDF want to create a 300 metre buffer zone then create it on their side of the border. If the fence or wall gets breached warning shots can be fired and then and only then can there be any justification for killing.
Its high time the Labour party said enough of the claims of anti semitism and just got on with normal business.
Pandering to this Labour friends of Israel is just weakness and its about time Labour got tough and gave them the boot.
The BBC has marked the passing of the President of a micro nation, on the border of everyone’s favourite apartheid state and Lebanon. Here is the link : https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/world-middle-east-44142794
The article notes the micronation is built on what was once an Arab village but the inhabitants ‘fled’ in 1948. Not much context, reads as if those silly Arabs left their houses of their own accord and never came back!.
You should have heard Tanya Bryer (her SA celebrity dentist father was a Zionist supporter) and a Jonny Gould, giving it large on the Sky News paper review this morning, on the Torygraph ‘story’ about the Palestinian victims being members of Hamas. Shock horror. . Dramatic emphasis given esp by Ms Bryer. I wonder if the 8 mth old baby was a Hamas member. The Israelis pronounce the word ‘Hamas’ as if they are spitting.
The choice of ‘stories’ reviewed is made by the Sky News producers of course.
Bryer talked about ‘crossfire’. I was screaming. ‘There was no crossfire you silly *****. The Palestinians do not have guns or rifles.’
In the Torygraph who don’t like Hamas.
Hamas are using their own people as expendable tools. Don’t fall for their games
By
Colonel Richard Kemp (I guessed it would be him)
plus these
Hamas plans further protests as it rejects medical supplies from Israel Telegraph.co.uk 14 hours ago Raf Sanchez
Bloody protests on the Gaza border will only buy time for Hamas in the sidelined Palestinian cause Telegraph.co.uk 2 days ago Raf Sanchez
Gaza braces for protests and funerals a day after at least 58 Palestinians killed by Israeli troops Telegraph 2 days ago by Raf Sanchez, Jerusalem and Roland Oliphant, Senior Foreign Correspondent
Felicity Arbuthnot. Always good.
Draft Dodger in Chief Dodges “Historic” Opening of US Embassy, Jerusalem
May 16th, 2018
It was NBC’s Cal Parry who summed up the obscenity of Donald Trump’s ignorant and igniting decision to move the US Embassy to West Jerusalem, then to celebrate the inauguration on Monday, 14th May: “Well dressed American and Israeli officials on one side of the screen: desperation, death and fires on the other.”
In 1948, 700,000 Palestinians began their flight from the city and the region trying to escape the massacres by Jewish militias on that date, seventy years ago. Commemorated ever since as the day of “Nakba” — disaster, catastrophe, cataclysm — following them to this day as land is stolen, families expelled and “settlements” encroach, and Palestinian history is bulldozed.
‘ “When the massacre started the (paramilitaries) took a kid and strapped him on an army jeep and drove him around different neighbourhoods of Jerusalem, saying ‘the same will happen to you if you don’t leave,’ ” Abu Kaya said, retelling his grandfather’s story to Middle East Eye.’
… not a single country currently has its embassy in Jerusalem because such a move is widely considered to violate international law.
/..
https://dissidentvoice.org/2018/05/draft-dodger-in-chief-dodges-historic-opening-of-us-embassy-jerusalem/
‘Tweets from two Foreign Office ministers tell you all you need to know about the government’s views on Israeli massacres’:
https://www.thecanary.co/trending/2018/05/16/tweets-from-two-foreign-office-ministers-tell-you-all-you-need-to-know-about-the-governments-views-on-israeli-massacres/?__s=seteeshtqok6ahengz28
‘Alistair Burt
✔@AlistairBurtUK
14 May
Extremely saddened by loss of life in Gaza today. Concerned peaceful protests are being exploited by extremist elements. Urge restraint in use of live fire. Violence is destructive to peace efforts. UK remains committed to a two-state solution with Jerusalem as a shared capital.’
He and others used weasel-worded putting the blame on ‘extremist forces’ and not mentioning I*rael’s murdering snipers.
Criticising Labour Friends of Israel will elicit howls of “Anti-Semitism!”
Al Jazeera published an investigation into Israeli meddling in British politics.
https://www.aljazeera.com/investigations/thelobby/
Unfortunately, the British government were completely relaxed about this outrageous behaviour.
@ Steve Hayes May 17, 2018 at 14:42
Yet they (and the Yanks) get apoplectic over merely ‘alleged’ Russian interference. In the case of the I*raeli Embssy, it is proven.
Utter unmitigated hypocrisy.
Imagine if Assad or Maduro (Venezuela) were using snipers against peaceful demonstrators!! But I*rael, aw, shucks, the Palestinians are dying in ‘clashes’. They are right, in a way: I*raeli snipers bullets or bombs ‘clash’ with the heads and bodies of unarmed protesters.
Thanks Steve, considering that video is coming up for 18 months old, why hasn’t it been used to debunk the whole anti Semitism farce against Jeremy Corbyn and people who support him?
Sometimes when I speak to people about US and UK politics, and highlight the influence of AIPAC (in the US particularly), they just look at me as if I am some nutcase.
Here we have absolute proof of the lengths to which the Israeli state will go to, in order to push their agenda and corrupt people.
Aaronovitch gives equivalence to the Israelis and the Palestinians.
May 17 2018, 12:01am, The Times
Making war is easier than making peace
The tragedy of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is that it suits extremists on both sides to continue the slaughter
From beside a wrecked tank on the surprisingly green hill you could look down and see the line of the border, with its fence and watchtower. We’d driven the coast road south from Beirut with Bassam, our Palestinian guide, through PLO and militia checkpoints and were now looking at Israel, the land taken from his parents by invaders. Five days later, we were by the same fence, under the same watchtower, gazing back up to those hills, wondering if we could see the tank and listening to Shaul, our Israeli guide, talking about the defence of his new country.
That was 1978: 30 years into the state of Israel and now, unbelievably, …paywal
lhttps://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/comment/making-war-is-easier-than-making-peace-78pjdmg7f
Not aware the Palestinians were engaged in ‘slaughter’. They were protesting. He concludes by saying that the Palestinian Right of Return is dead in the water.
Read his slime at the dentists!|
“……it suits extremists on both sides…..”
Aaronovitch better be careful. He’s drifting close to a criticism of Israel here.
What the fcuk is this obsession with Israel? why are so many people jumping to their defence? have they been stalwart allies if so in what arena?.
The Labour Party must initiate an urgent enquiry into the actions, tactics and associations of LFI. The timing and coordination of their recent campaign against antisemitism in the Labour Party was characterised by an absence of real and substantiated evidence. Their ‘evidence’ often consisted of anecdotal claims that in no way could prove that the Party or it’s members were in any way involved in the behaviour complained of. As a lawyer and member of the Labour Party I felt that this whole situation was being manipulated by people (and their backers) who had a vested interest in the success of a weak mud-slinging campaign against the most antisemitic political party in the U.K.
Gove to Washington with AIPAC in 2017
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=11858
Mrs Gove (aka Sarah Vine) to Hampstead Garden Synagogue for a fundraiser for the Emunah children’s home at Afula, northern Israel.
https://www.thejc.com/community/community-news/sarah-vine-my-life-with-gove-1.55121
https://www.emunah.org/our-projects/childrens-homes/sarah-herzog-childrens-home/
….. 0 Search Results Found For: “palestinian children”
From Dissident Voice’s Poetry on Sunday
With God On Whose Side
by Robert Filos / May 20th, 2018
damn the politicians
damn the red
damn the blue
when fifty-five have to die
to just make a move
can I say it
is it right
can I say it
damn the white
damn the politicians
damn the red white and blue
no one should have to die
for your office just to move
*****
In a many dark hour
I’ve been thinkin’ about this
That Jesus Christ
Was betrayed by a kiss
But I can’t think for you
You’ll have to decide
Whether Judas Iscariot
Had God on his side.
— “With God On Our Side”, Bob Dylan, The Times they are A-changing, 1964
https://dissidentvoice.org/2018/05/with-god-on-whose-side/
The fight to leave the ‘open air prison’ of Gaza
Stuart Ramsay witnesses scenes of desperation as families try to leave Gaza – with only a pitifully small number making it.
20 May 2018
Palestinians crowd to get on a bus going to Egypt after the border was opened in a rare move Video
Report: Desperate Palestinians try to leave Gaza
Uniformed officials scream at a desperate group of men and women trying to force their way into an indoor football stadium in the Gaza town of Rafah on the border with Egypt.
The men and women are desperate because they have effectively won the lottery – a chance to leave Gaza for Egypt – and they do not want to miss the bus. And it is literally a bus.
Tens of thousands of people are waiting for their names to be called for travel. But their numbers will be pitifully small. A few hundred people are waiting today but most of them won’t cross.
The crossing to Egypt was closed for 329 days last year. It is open now for Ramadan, a gesture by the Egyptian government after the violence here in recent weeks, but it is only for a few.
/..
https://news.sky.com/story/the-fight-to-leave-the-open-air-prison-of-gaza-11379847
:
Has anyone else read and probably vomited over Corbyn’s good pal Paul Mason’s equally stomach-churning brutish War-mongering article in the New Statesman, from back in April?:
https://www.newstatesman.com/world/2018/04/futile-air-strikes-syria-won-t-defeat-assad-and-putin
If Corbyn ever does become PM I have every confidence, with advisors like Mason, that he will continue the dismal War-Crimiinal heritage of Blair, Brown, Cameron and May.
May be Craig would like to write one of his articles on Mason’s “comiing out” as a supporter of war-crimes. I’ll just finish by comnenting, with Mason in mind, that NAZI propagandists WERE hung at Nuremberg.
.
.
God is great.
– a “great” what?