I'm aware that this is boring, but my readership has been down recently, so I may as well just write about politics. In the UK, LibDem MP David Ward has come under scrutiny following comments he made on his website. To quote directly, he said "having visited Auschwitz twice - once with my family and once with local
schools - I am saddened that the Jews, who suffered unbelievable levels
of persecution during the Holocaust, could within a few years of
liberation from the death camps be inflicting atrocities on Palestinians
in the new State of Israel and continue to do so on a daily basis in
the West Bank and Gaza." [source]
There are two caveats, the use of these words on Holocaust Memorial Day are undoubtedly controversial, as is his misguided, but potentially innocent, use of the phrase 'the Jews' instead of 'the Israelis.' Of course, all kinds of self-aggrandising idiots have crawled out of the woodwork to express their disgust and call it racist, including the band-wagon jumping Labour MP Ian Austin who called David Ward "a disgrace" and "racist."
What I am most afraid of here is that any reasonable argument put forward against Israel is labelled anti-Semitic. Any mention of the Holocaust in relation to Israel is automatically labelled as racist, and allows the offended parties to deflect from their often inhumane behaviour. Israel is shaming its own nation through the acts it takes, but at the same time seems to be beyond criticism because of the lingering threat of being branded an anti-Semite. This makes people shirk back in fear legitimate criticisms of the country, and that in itself is wrong.
David Ward has refused to apologise, the first time in living memory that a Lib Dem has stood up for their views and stuck to their principles. We mustn't forget the holocaust, nor the lessons from it, conversely we mustn't use it as a shield to prevent us from seeing what continues to go on in Israel itself. Just because Jews suffered so heavily both historically and during the Holocaust, it shouldn't mean that Israel is allowed to do as it pleases.
More recently, the arch prick Rupert Murdoch has apologised for a cartoon published in his Sundays times magazine which was held as anti -semetic. This is the same Rupert Murdoch who refused to apologise for hacking into celebrities voicemails to get a good story. This is of course not the first time there has been controversy over a cartoon, let's not forget the ridiculous and pointless deaths after the Danish cartoons depicting Muhammad, so old Scrotum head was probably wise in nullifying the offence through an apology. Anyway, here's a bit of the picture.
Although this also had the misfortune to be published on holocaust memorial day (luckily that isn't celebrated in Iran), and the illustrator himself has apologised here over the timing of the publication. I believe it's not anti-Semitic, and it does hint at the terrible things Israel is doing. The cartoon shows the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, building a wall using what appears to be the blood of
Palestinians. It carries the strap line: "Will cementing peace continue?" To quote again, the source of this snippet of the cartoon (the full thing is now impossible to find online) says:
"How to draw an Anti-Israel cartoon for a UK paper. It’s very simple really.
1. Draw an Israeli Prime Minister with exaggerated Semitic facial features, especially the nose and lips, covered in Muslim blood.
2. Stick a wall in there somewhere."
There is also a third point which is irrelevant to this discussion so has been ignored, so let's look at these two points.
First of all those aren't "exaggerated Semitic facial features", that's how the cartoonist draws. In fact, if taken purely at the face, it could easily be Vladimir Putin. In fact, let's have a look at another of his pictures
The bizarre, elf-like creature on the left is Putin, while the creature drawn on the right is Syria's genocider-in-chief Assad. It isn't an anti-Semitic picture of Netanyahu.
The second point, that of "stick a wall in there somewhere" is also held as evidence of it being racist. I don't see how. The wall is pretty much unarguable there.Follow this link for the following pictures
and only the most insecure apologist for the Israeli regime would say that acknowledging this wall is racist.
For Israel, the Holocaust is, obviously, monumentally important, but playing the victim card will only get you so far, and can't be used to distract from things which happen today. When you prop up the Apartheid regime in South Africa, when you do your best to dehumanise and starve the country of Palestine, by brutal military attacks, the arrest and imprisonment of hundreds of Palestinian children every year, when you force innocent people to strip for no reason in the name of safety, and ignore recommendations by the U.N., You can't take offence to even the slightest mention of a wall which obviously exists. The holocaust might have been the worst thing to have ever happened to humanity as a whole, but we should take lessons from it and try to learn from it, not use it as a mask for our own reprehensible behaviour.
Please note, I am well aware of the thousands of Israelis who flee the country to avoid military service, and the many thousands who work there as human rights watchers. Nor am I so naive as to say that Palestine and the rest of the Arab world are blameless here, but that is beside my point. Don't try to deflect your own awful behaviour through something which has happened to you, and don't spring to say that everything is racist just because you can't argue a point coherently.
Published today, but needs an extensive spell and logic check.
There are two caveats, the use of these words on Holocaust Memorial Day are undoubtedly controversial, as is his misguided, but potentially innocent, use of the phrase 'the Jews' instead of 'the Israelis.' Of course, all kinds of self-aggrandising idiots have crawled out of the woodwork to express their disgust and call it racist, including the band-wagon jumping Labour MP Ian Austin who called David Ward "a disgrace" and "racist."
What I am most afraid of here is that any reasonable argument put forward against Israel is labelled anti-Semitic. Any mention of the Holocaust in relation to Israel is automatically labelled as racist, and allows the offended parties to deflect from their often inhumane behaviour. Israel is shaming its own nation through the acts it takes, but at the same time seems to be beyond criticism because of the lingering threat of being branded an anti-Semite. This makes people shirk back in fear legitimate criticisms of the country, and that in itself is wrong.
David Ward has refused to apologise, the first time in living memory that a Lib Dem has stood up for their views and stuck to their principles. We mustn't forget the holocaust, nor the lessons from it, conversely we mustn't use it as a shield to prevent us from seeing what continues to go on in Israel itself. Just because Jews suffered so heavily both historically and during the Holocaust, it shouldn't mean that Israel is allowed to do as it pleases.
More recently, the arch prick Rupert Murdoch has apologised for a cartoon published in his Sundays times magazine which was held as anti -semetic. This is the same Rupert Murdoch who refused to apologise for hacking into celebrities voicemails to get a good story. This is of course not the first time there has been controversy over a cartoon, let's not forget the ridiculous and pointless deaths after the Danish cartoons depicting Muhammad, so old Scrotum head was probably wise in nullifying the offence through an apology. Anyway, here's a bit of the picture.
 |
| [source] |
"How to draw an Anti-Israel cartoon for a UK paper. It’s very simple really.
1. Draw an Israeli Prime Minister with exaggerated Semitic facial features, especially the nose and lips, covered in Muslim blood.
2. Stick a wall in there somewhere."
There is also a third point which is irrelevant to this discussion so has been ignored, so let's look at these two points.
First of all those aren't "exaggerated Semitic facial features", that's how the cartoonist draws. In fact, if taken purely at the face, it could easily be Vladimir Putin. In fact, let's have a look at another of his pictures
 |
| Add caption [source] |
The second point, that of "stick a wall in there somewhere" is also held as evidence of it being racist. I don't see how. The wall is pretty much unarguable there.Follow this link for the following pictures
and only the most insecure apologist for the Israeli regime would say that acknowledging this wall is racist.
 |
| Not a picture, but graphs are the pictures of words. |
Please note, I am well aware of the thousands of Israelis who flee the country to avoid military service, and the many thousands who work there as human rights watchers. Nor am I so naive as to say that Palestine and the rest of the Arab world are blameless here, but that is beside my point. Don't try to deflect your own awful behaviour through something which has happened to you, and don't spring to say that everything is racist just because you can't argue a point coherently.
Published today, but needs an extensive spell and logic check.
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