Hamas And A Hook Nose Dummy by Les May

AS soon as the first rocket was fired into Israel by Hamas it handed Netanyahu his ‘get out of jail card’. ‘Honest Joe’ could say ‘Israel has a right to defend itself’, talk grandly about a ‘negotiated settlement’ and then when the carnage stops declare the US is back in the Middle East showing how different he is from Trump. Though not different enough to think twice about continuing the ten year long agreement signed in 2016 which sends Israel $3.3 billion in military aid and $500 million for missile defence systems each year.

Meanwhile his Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, can mouth his platitudes, preceded by the obligatory ‘Israel has a right to defend itself’, while Israel calmly announces to the world it is going to bomb two schools and justifies its bombing campaign against civilian targets by claiming the buildings stand above a tunnel system used by Hamas. A claim that no-one can verify and if untrue would mean the bombing is a war crime.

And then some genius in the UK decided what a good idea it would be to hand out yet another ‘get out of jail card’. This time it was to our home grown apologists who respond to every denunciation of Israel’s attacks on Palestinians and the theft of their land, by claiming it is just another example of anti-semitism. Quite why anyone would think that a huge dummy seemingly depicting Israel as a hook nosed Jew, with sinister features and horns, had any place at a demonstration supporting the Palestinians, is beyond me. It comes as no surprise to read an attempt being made to link Jeremy Corbyn with this, though the only placards visible carry the imprint of Socialist Worker. With people like this as ‘friends’ the Palestinians will never have a shortage of enemies.

You can find the image of the ‘demo’ at:

https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/05/16/the-lefts-shameful-silence-on-anti-semitism/

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Rats And Lawyers. by Les May

QUESTION: What’s the difference between a rat dead in the road and a lawyer dead in the road? Answer: There are skid marks in front of the rat. Not a very nice joke, but a reminder that not every member of the legal profession always has the best interests of humanity at heart.

It appears that the largest supplier of textbooks to UK schools, the publisher Pearson, is halting further distribution of two books about the Israel/Palestine conflict published in 2020. The books concerned are not the original versions which were published in 2016 and 2017 and previously available to schools and others. The original text had been amended after a complaint from a group called UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI). The amendments were extensive amounting to more than 650 changes or more than three per page.

A description of the process by which these two books were altered is given in a statement issued by the British Board of Jewish Deputies last September. It reads a follows:

After initial constructive conversations with Pearson, the Board of Deputies worked together with UKLFI [UK Lawyers for Israel] to produce thorough comments on both textbooks, which Pearson have received and acted upon. After detailed and lengthy process over a number of months, the books have now been published for students to use in the 2020-1 academic year. Board of Deputies of British Jews President Marie van der Zyl said: "We applaud Pearson for their openness to constructive feedback and willingness to revise these textbooks. We are pleased with the final material which gives a balanced and accurate portrayal of the Middle East conflict. I would like to pay specific tribute and thanks to UKLFI for their hard work on this project and their collaborative effort with us to get these textbooks to where they needed to be.”

The decision of the publishers to pause further distribution of the altered version came in response to an eight-page report by Middle East specialists Professors John Chalcraft and James Dickins, which found hundreds of changes to the textbooks overwhelmingly favouring an Israeli narrative and removing or replacing passages that support Palestinian narratives.

Below is an extract which forms the last two paragraphs of that report.

The revisions have changed the presentation of the facts in ways which bolster pro-Israeli narratives, and make pro-Palestinian narratives less credible. Explanations of the events recorded have also been treated in a selective manner, with potentially pro- Palestinian interpretations removed, and pro-Israeli interpretations augmented. The revisions exhibit troubling double-standards at a very basic level: potentially unjust Israeli actions are dealt with in the language of perception and controversy, while potentially unjust Palestinian actions are dealt with in the language of fact and objective certainty. The revisions also offer distorted definitions of key terms, such as Jewish ‘settlers’, and mislead students about matters on which there is a wide consensus, such as international law. The revisions direct students towards activities and interpretations that favour and explore a pro-Israeli narrative.

In sum, we have found the process to have been biased and the outcome misleading. The outcome is two textbooks that distort the historical record, failing to offer students a balanced view of the conflict. These books, we conclude, are not fit for purpose. School children should not be supplied with propaganda under the guise of education.

What we have here is an organisation of lawyers advocating for a foreign country. We also have the Board of Deputies, which does not represent all the Jewish people in the UK, trying to determine what is taught in our schools. This is just as reprehensible as the actions of those Muslims who are trying to do the same at Batley Grammar School. It also gives further credibility to those who believe that the motivation of those attacking Jeremy Corbyn were motivated not by concerns about anti-semitism, but by a desire to remove someone who was an advocate for the Palestinians.

You can find the full text of the report from which two short extracts are given above at:

http://www.bricup.org.uk/documents/GCSE_textbooks.pdf

There is a more detailed discussion at:

https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/article/textbooks-altered-line-by-line-at-uk-lawyers-for-israels-behest/

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The Ha’Penny & The Gingerbread by Les May

INFAMY, Infamy, they’ve all got it in for me! is a line by Julius Caesar (Kenneth Williams) from the 1964 comedy film Carry on Cleo. But it sums up the response of recent Israeli governments and their apologists whenever they are confronted with questions about their behaviour in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT).

Apartheid is recognized as a crime against humanity in the 1973 International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid (“Apartheid Convention”) and the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC) which also sets out the crime against humanity of persecution.

Because the state of Palestine is a party to both the Rome Statute and the Apartheid Convention the International Criminal Court (ICC) ruled in February 2021, that it has jurisdiction over serious international crimes committed in the entirety of the OPT, including East Jerusalem, which would include the crimes against humanity of apartheid or persecution committed in that territory. In March 2021, the ICC announced the opening of a formal investigation into the situation in Palestine.

On 27 April the organisation Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a 213 page report which claims that the overarching Israeli government policy to maintain the domination by Jewish Israelis over Palestinians authorities amounts to the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution.

Predictably the response of the apologists for the Israeli government has been to both reject the report and to try to muddy the water by claiming that organisations which try to bring pressure on Israel to change its policies are intent on denying its right to exist.

Legal measures such as those we may see from the ICC are necessarily directed against individuals within a state, not against the state itself, so it is difficult to see how this is a credible argument if say the Israeli Prime Minister were tried in his absence. If found guilty it would be for other states to decide what sanctions should be place on the individual concerned. It would also be a massive embarrassment for the state of Israel.

Such a case could only meaningfully be brought so long as Israel remains as the Occupying Power in Palestine and continues its annexation of East Jerusalem, which is itself prohibited by international law. If Israel does not want to be seen as a country whose rulers could face the ignominy of being declared guilty of crimes against humanity it has the option of simply ending its occupation and allowing a functioning state of Palestine to come into being.

But Israel wants both the Ha’Penny and the Gingerbread; it wants to continue its occupation and be given a Persilschein.

The HRW report is called A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution. It is available on WWW.

****************************************************************

Nothing To Gain, Everything To Lose by Les May

A JEWISH lady by the name of Jenny Manson had an interesting message left on her answerphone which went as follows, "You fucking Nazi bitch… You should burn in the gas oven. You dirty fucking bitch… Stinking, stinking swine… You deserve … to burn in acid." Even more interesting is that the police tracked down the caller and found him to be a middle-aged Jewish man. He was formally cautioned for the offence of malicious communications in May 2019.

Manson it seems is ‘the wrong sort of Jew’. Her crime is that as a co-chair of Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL) she draws attention to the fact that there is a diversity of opinion amongst British Jews both about the level of anti-semitism in the Labour party and about the behaviour of the government of Israel towards Palestinians.

In November she was interviewed by Kirsty Wark about the decision to readmit Jeremy Corbyn to the Labour Party. According the Jewish Chronicle there were ‘complaints logged with the BBC by Jewish campaigners angry at Newsnight’s decision to invite Ms Manson onto the show only a few weeks after the appearance of another leading figure in JVL Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi.’

Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi was suspended from the Labour party a few days ago. Her crime? There were complaints that she had made some members ‘uncomfortable’ perhaps because she had said, ‘The idea that Jewish people require for their comfort that whole swathes of subjects should not be debated by the membership of this party is insulting to Jewish people.’

The Labour party bars everyone suspended or investigated from sharing any details of their cases. But we do know that Wimborne-Idrissi is not the only Jewish member of the party to have been suspended or investigated on accusations of anti-semitism. The figure now seems to be more than twenty, and includes a significant proportion of the members of the JVL committee. Commenting on the psychological impact on Labour party members who have received Notices of Investigation. She has said: ‘It is Kafkaesque, You are not told who is accusing you. And you are not allowed to discuss it with anyone. So you receive this devastating letter – and are immediately isolated.’

We can gain some insight into what is going on from a comment made about her; ‘She can marry whomever she pleases and hold whatever ideological stance she finds attractive. Naomi Wimborne was free to marry a Muslim, and become Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi... But, given her life choices, is Naomi really in a position to talk publicly as if she is representative of British Jewish identity?’

Some people might find the comment implicitly offensive or suggest it verges on ‘racism’. But the real import of it, as with the complaints to the BBC about interviewing two members of Jewish Voice for Labour on Newsnight, is that it is an attempt to silence people who will not accept that the views presented in Jewish Chronicle and by the Jewish Labour Movement (JLM), are representative of those of all British Jews.

In addition to Jewish Voices for Labour there are a number of other organisations, Independent Jewish Voices, Jewish Socialists’ Group, Jews for Justice for Palestinians, Manchester Jewish Action for Palestine, Free Speech on Israel, which are equally representative of the views of British Jews. The JLM organisation differs from these other Jewish organisations because it has what Jewish Voices for Labour has called a ‘profoundly Zionist orientation’ and seems to be unwilling to be in any way critical of the treatment of Palestinians by the state of Israel.

So anxious is JLM to control the narrative around accusations and definition of anti-semitism, and by inference around Labour’s attitude to the treatment of Palestinians by the state of Israel, that in April 2018 it asked for, and received, a guarantee that JLM would remain Labour's only Jewish affiliate, after suggestions that Jewish Voices for Labour might be allowed to affiliate.

The Jewish Chronicle has described JLM as a 'gathering-place for moderates concerned about the direction the party is taking under Mr Corbyn' and JLM has changed its rules to facilitate this by allowing non-Jews to have affiliate membership so providing a base for attacking him. But the fact that so many Jewish members of the Labour party have been accused of anti-semitism suggests to me that what we are seeing is Labour being the battleground chosen by the Zionist oriented JLM to drown out the voices of protest from other non-Zionist oriented Jews. Corbyn was a reluctant accessory to this; Starmer, Nandy, Long-Bailey and Rayner have jumped in with both feet and embraced it by signing up to the ‘Ten Pledges’ I have written about previously.

Is it not absurd that a definition of anti-semitism is being adopted by the Labour party which can be used against Jewish members on the basis of complaints made by other Jewish members and organisations, some of which like CAA, (Campaign Against Antisemitism) are utterly pernicious and adopt dubious tactics to discredit their opponents? Labour has nothing to gain and everything to lose by allowing this battle to be fought on its territory. Blackmailers always come back for more.

****************************************

Zionism & the State of Israel

  by Martin Gilbert

Israeli citizen humiliating refugees in Tel Aviv

I WAS brought up in a fairly pious Jewish family.  It might be assumed that all Jews are Zionists. Not so.
 

The idea of a State of Israel, known as Zionism arose around the 

1880’s-1890’s. Pre 1914 Palestine had Jewish settlements inspired 

by a range of political ideas. 

There were socialists, communists and anarchists.  The right wing 

Jewish Chronicle tagged those activists as not being proper Jews.  

A stance that paper holds to-day.  Below, some historical detail is offered.

Post 1918, following the end of the Ottoman empire Palestine 

became part of the middle east “carve-up” by French, British and 

other powers. 

Oil interests also grabbed a slice.  We now have two contestants. 

One, totally bent on Israel’s destruction because the Palestinian 

people are controlled by opportunists and fundamentalists.  

They do not represent the constituents they claim. Israel too has its 

share of fundamentalists and opportunists holding power.  

But they have a 21^st century sophistication, quite lacking in the 

Palestinians. 

Both peoples want to get on with life, having a peace that is not imposed by militarism.

After 1945 in Europe, there were many people displaced by the war. Jews were a significant number. 

The Zionist propaganda at that time claimed “a land without people for a people without land”. 

It ignored the Palestinians.  

Following various events they were confined to an increasingly small area.  

It has been known as Gaza or the Jordan Valley.  It’s ground water and other water resources have been much reduced by the best irrigation engineers in the world: the Israelis.  Another reason why the so called “two state solution” is impossible.

Over the decades much international opinion has condemned Israeli colonialism in their treatment of the Palestinians.  Ever increasing settlements by Israel continue to complicate the situation and make it worse.  But too often such international opinion has been toothless.  Any criticism of Israel has been attacked by the right as anti semitic.

Recently, Donald Trump said that Israel should take over the Jordan valley.  He is supported by the Christian right. 

They believe that Jews should have the same geopolitical borders 

they had in Biblical times. 

But some Jews in America, the U.K. and Israel have said Trump considerably adds to the problems.  Consistently, the magazine 

Jewish Socialist have given detailed reports, supporting that opinion.

Under South Africa’s apartheid system Black Africans had to have passes to work in white areas.  Also, they were forced to live in specific areas called Bantustans.

The so called “two state solution” is no answer.  At best the 

Palestinian state would only be like a Bantustan: still controlled by 

fundamentalists. 

A distant idea is that all Palestinians should be integrated into Israel and areas that have have been stolen from them.

Recent statements by the Chief Rabbi add to the confusion and miss information.  He gives the impression that “the Jewish

community” is of one, monolithic structure, just one opinion.      

It’s rather like an Arch Bishop claiming to speak for all Christians. Lessons can be drawn from the struggle against apartheid.  

Truth and reconciliation groups have made much progress.  South

Africa still has serious problems but there is no perfect answer.

martin gilbert, November 2019

**********************

Pastor NIEMOLLER for OUR TIME

“First they came for the Communists
 And I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists

And I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews

And I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then the Jews came for the Palestinians

And I didn’t speak out, afraid of being labelled “Anti-Semite””.

 

Christopher Draper, 2019

**************************

Sauce For The Goose?

by Les May

TRACY Ann Oberman, the actress, has written to the BBC to complain about the appearance of Ash Sarkar, an editor of Novara Media, in the documentary ‘Rise of the Nazis’. The reason Sarkar is included is to illuminate the context and perspective of Ernst Thälmann who led the German Communist party from 1925 to 1933, and died in a concentration camp in 1944. Oberman’s objection was that Sarkar had defended two people who had sprayed ‘Free Gaza and Palestine’ on one of the remaining walls of the Warsaw Ghetto.

Once again we have a complaint about what someone has said, in this case about a third party’s actions; in other words guilt by association.

Would it be legitimate to claim that by objecting Oberman is guilty by association with the policies of Israel, because it is the Israeli state that the graffiti was directed against?

I am not a particular fan of Sarkar, but I don’t think she should be prevented from speaking in BBC programmes just because I don’t always like what she says.

**************** 

Are Tameside Labour shackled to the Shekel? Trade Unionists demand to know!

Fadi Abu Salah - Killed Gaza Border Wall - May 2018

IS it any wonder that the public feel disconnected and disillusioned with mainstream politics, when their elected Members of Parliament, choose to ignore questions that they put to them.  According to research done by 'djs research' in June 2015, some 75% of people don't even know who their local MP is, the survey found, and only 6% of Labour supporters, voted for the party because of their local candidate. 

In June trades unionists in Tameside, wrote two letters to a local newspaper, about a visit that two local Labour MPs - Jonathan Reynolds and Andrew Gwynne - made to Israel in May 2018, as part of a delegation of 'Labour Friends of Israel (LFI). This visit coincided with the mass shootings of innocent unarmed civilians at the Gaza border wall by the occupying forces of the Israeli Defence Force (IDF). These shooting continue on a regular basis.

They asked through the paper who had paid for this visit? Whether Mr Reynolds (Stalybridge & Hyde), had consulted members of the Stalybridge CLP about his intention to visit Israel and whether they had endorsed the trip and the comments he'd made on Facebook? To date, neither Mr Reynolds or the Stalybridge CLP have responded to their questions.  Members of the Tameside Trades Union Council, have  met with a wall of deafening silence.

Mr Gwynne issued a statement that a holocaust survivor had begged him to visit the holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, Yad Veshem. He did not mention that his expenses were paid by LFI, an organisation of which, he is a former Chairman. The same applies to Mr Reynolds, who also got a free trip to Israel, his fourth visit to the region since 2004. Mr Reynolds is also a former vice-chair of LFI and is currently an LFI officer in Parliament.

According to the Electoral Commission, the cash value of these visits between 27 May - 31 May 2018, was £1,600 for each MP. The donors name was LFI and the purpose of the visit was a "fact finding visit." 

Why both MPs should be so coy about answering these questions and declined to do so, is something they find bewildering, given that Mr Gwynne has a weekly column in the same paper and Mr Reynolds is not denied access. But it does go to show the general disdain with which, the political class treat ordinary members of the public, including trades unionists, who are evidently not worthy of a response.

As to the 'facts', Mr Reynolds has stated that many of the Palestinians who died at the Gaza wall in May, were somehow culpable, because of "their willingness to effectively walk into live gunfire in their desperation..." He fails to mention in his Facebook statement that many of the dead were children, or protesters shot in the back, by sniper fire. One murder victim, was a double-amputee in a wheel chair and other victims, included medics and journalists.

Jolly Jaunt - Reynolds and Gwynne on free trip to Israel

In his Facebook statement Mr Reynolds' added - "Israel is the only real democracy in the Middle East, and the only country where minorities have full equality before the law..." Just what planet does Mr Reynolds live on?

Israel is a country where the Prime Minister can describe Arabs as 'beasts', where Palestinians are prevented from marrying Palestinians outside of Israel and where Israeli Arabs are prevented from living in hundreds of Jewish communities, because the law (Access to Communities Act) allows existing residents to bar Arabs from renting properties there. Two million Gazans, live in the biggest open air prison camp in the world, which is policed by the Israeli's. The Israeli Knesset recently passed the 'Jewish Nation State Law', making Israel officially a racist and apartheid state because only Jews have the right to self determination. Whereas, under the famous 'Law of Return', promulgated in July 1950, every Jew has the right to come to the country, this does not apply to the  Palestinians who fled the country in 1948, to escape the war and Israeli terrorist groups. Just what sort of democracy is this Mr Reynolds?

Israel's existence is predicated on the forced dispossession and expulsion of Palestinians which was, and remains, the means by which the country established and maintains its Jewish majority domination. Discrimination is the essential guarantor of that majority, the preservation of which, is an existential imperative for which reason there can be no right of return for the millions of Palestinian refugees. Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories has now reached its 51st year despite being a flagrant violation of international law and an obstacle to peace. The Israeli's continue to expand illegal Jewish settlements on the West Bank and pursue a policy of ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.

Razan al-Najjar -Palestinian nurse- killed Gaza Wall 2018

On 23 December 2016, UN Security Council resolution 2334, condemned Israel's settlements on the West Bank  and demanded that Israel - "immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and seeks a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."

In January 2017, the Israeli Embassy official Shai Masot, was caught on camera plotting to "take-down" UK MPs who were pro-Palestinian. Masot had links with, and was sending funds to various groups, including the 'Fabian Society', the 'Jewish Labour Movement' and 'Labour Friends of Israel'. This undercover sting operation by the TV network al Jazeera,  showed the extent to which a foreign power (Israel), meddles in the political affairs of this nation and the influence it seeks to exert over some of its politicians.

Both Andrew Gwynne and Jonathan Reynolds, say they are in favour of a 'two-state solution' to the Israeli/Palestine conflict. But when the following motion was moved in the House on 14 October 2014:- 

"That this House believes that the Government should recognise the State of Palestine alongside the State of Israel, as a contribution to securing a two state solution", only one Tameside MP, David Heyes (Lab) Ashton-under-Lyne, voted for the motion. So serious were Gwynne and Reynolds about securing a two state solution that they couldn't even be bothered to vote for the motion. Yet, two months before the vote, on August 14, Gwynne who represents Denton and Reddish, wrote in a local newspaper:

"We need to show that we are actually serious about a two-state solution, and we need a proper discussion in Westminster about illegal Israeli settlements as well as Hamas' rocket attacks from schools." 

There have been calls for Labour Party members to end their association with LFI. At the very least, Mr Gwynne and Mr Reynolds (who are sponsored by Unite the Union) should make clear on their elections leaflets their support for LFI and also make clear, how they lobby on behalf of LFI.

***********

Lies, Damn Lies and Irony

by Les May

IT seems that nowadays we are all thought to be too stupid to understand a definition and have to be provided with an example.  Not wishing to buck the trend I give you an example.

It appeared on the Facebook page of the Jewish Studies professor Jerry Haber.  After he examined the proper context of what Corbyn had said by going back to the text of the speech by Manuel Hassassian, the Palestinian Authority representative to the UK, which Corbyn was referencing and which led to the ludicrous outburst from Jonathan Sacks.

— Did you hear that Jeremy Corbyn, in a speech in 2013, said that British Jews weren’t really British even if they were born there?

— Really?  He said that?

— Well, he intimated that British Jews couldn’t grasp English irony and didn’t understand history.”

— Really?  He was referring to Jews?

— Well, he didn’t SAY Jews, but he said that about UK Zionists, which is a leftwing code term for British Jews.

— Hang on, he made a reference to UK Zionists as a group?

— Well, not exactly.  Actually, he was referring to some pro-Israel members of the audience who came up and started arguing with the Palestinian ambassador who had presented the history of Palestine and used irony when he said, 'You know I’m reaching the conclusion that the Jews are the children of God, the only children of God and the Promised Land is being paid by God!  I have started to believe this because nobody is stopping Israel building its messianic dream of Eretz Israel to the point I believe that maybe God is on their side. Maybe God is partial on this issue.' which apparently some of the Zionists thought he meant without irony (We do not have a transcript of what they said).  And Corbyn referred to ‘the Zionists in the audience’.

— So, you mean to say he did not refer to British Zionists as a whole, but he was saying that the Palestinian ambassador, who is Armenian Palestinian, had a greater grasp of English irony, than these Brits who had lived in England all their lives?

— Yes, that’s about it.

— So, in effect, he accused pro-Israeli members of the audience, whom he referred to as ‘Zionists’, which they are, and who argued with the Palestinian ambassador, with being humourless and misunderstanding history, compared with the Palestinian ambassador.

— Yep.

— Well, that makes the man clearly an anti-Semite, doesn’t it?

And what does HIS interpretation make Jonathan Sacks?

Read the full story at:

  https://freespeechonisrael.org.uk/sacks-vs-corbyn/

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/writingfromtheedge/2018/07/the-jewish-war-against-corbyn-risks-bringing-real-antisemitism-to-britain/

 *******

HUMOUR, IRONY & JONATHAN SACKS

by Brian Bamford

Anti-Zionist Jewish demonstration

IN the NEW STATESMAN last week the former chief rabbi Jonathan Sacks said: ‘Jeremy Corbyn is “an anti-Semite” who has “given support to racists, terrorists and dealers of hate”.’

In 2013, in a speech to a meeting convened by the Palestinian Return Centre in 2013, Corbyn spoke about the importance of history and of how necessary it was for people to understand the origins of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.

He then praised a speech he had recently heard by Manuel Hassassian Palestinian ambassador at a meeting in parliament, in which the Palestinian ambassador to the UK gave an 'incredibly powerful' account of the history of Palestine.

During the speech Corbyn had said of a group of British 'Zionists' that: 'They clearly have two problems. One is they don’t want to study history and, secondly, having lived in this country for a very long time, probably all their lives, they don’t understand English irony either.'

This so insensed Jonathan Sacks that he claimed it was as divisive, as Enoch Powell’s speech in that 'it undermines the existence of an entire group of British citizens by depicting them as essentially alien'.

Irony is described in the Oxford Dictionary definition as 'the expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect.'

When Ludwig Wittgenstein the Jewish philosopher considered the similar claim that humour was lacking in Nazi Germany he wrote in his notebook reflections 'Culture and Value' that:
''Humour is not a mood, but a way of looking at the world.  So, if it's right to say that humour was eradicated in Nazi Germany, that does not mean that people were not in good spirits or anything of that sort, but something much deeper & more important.'  [88e 'Culture & Value']

Probably Jonathan Sachs would find this comparison offensive, but Wittgenstein considered:
'What is it like when people do not have a sense of humour?  They do not react properly to each other.  It is as though there were a custom among certain people to throw someone a ball, which he is supposed to catch & throw back; but certain people might not throw it back, but put it in their pocket instead.'  [95e 'Culture & Value']

In the context of the current dispute in the media, I suppose Wittgenstein would say that some people are not playing the ball. 

*******

Whose Afraid of Jonathan Sacks?

by Les May

CARVED into the wall at Broadcasting House are the words of George Orwell, ‘If liberty means anything at all it means the right to tell people what they so not want to hear’, which makes the juxtaposition of articles in the most recent copy of the Radio Times all the more interesting.

The ‘Pick of the week’ on Radio 4 is ‘Morality in the 21^st Century’ presented by ex-Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks.  We are told that his aim is to ‘provoke thought and discussion never to proselytise or preach’ and that ‘Morality is what lifts us above the pursuit of self interest and self esteem’.  And in case you are wondering, yes that’s the same Jonathan Sacks who are few days ago was denouncing Jeremy Corbyn as an antisemite and a racist because he did not like what Corbyn had said.  Or more correctly he did not like his interpretation of what Corbyn had said.  This in turn became his justification for his absurd comparison of Corbyn words with Enoch Powell’s speech.

The other article is by the BBC’s world affairs editor John Simpson.  In it he comments ‘People have allowed themselves to be persuaded that there’s something wrong with being given open and unbiased information from BBC journalists’.  I think that Simpson is over egging the pudding a bit here because all media outlets select what is ‘news’, who they are going to quote or interview, and how much space or air time they are to be given, so reports are never going to be quite so unbiased as he suggests.  But that does not mean it is not worth making the effort.  He goes on to say ‘Well, I’m sorry, but I don’t think any subject is too important to keep our minds closed to it’.  I agree and the fact that someone might be ‘offended’ by some subjects cuts no ice with me.  You are never going to change anyone’s mind unless you can talk to them.

Simon Kelner, who writes ‘think pieces’ for the ‘i’ newspaper, i.e. he’s a columnist not a journalist in the mould of Simpson, wrote last week that Sack’s used his Instagram account to tell the world that he was ‘a religious leader, philosopher, award-winning author and a respected moral voice’.   Clearly Sack’s is not a man over endowed with modesty or self doubt.  Kelner says that he is ‘definably, a Zionist’, which suggests to me that he, Kelner, has not actually spent much time trying to figure out what a Zionist is.  Seeking enlightenment I found that the explanation on Wikipedia runs to some 11,000 words which is 28 A4 pages.   Here is the link, I’ll let you figure it out for yourself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zionism

In a remarkable bit of inventiveness Kelner writes, ‘Not all Jews are Zionists, but (mostly) all Zionists are Jews, and I, as a liberal-minded British Jew (rather than a Zionist) am offended by Mr Corbyn’s pronouncements’. The flaw in this bit of twisted logic is that one chooses to be a Zionist, you are born a Jew.   To my mind that means that you can criticise a Jew for being a Zionist, but not for being a Jew.   (I would add that I feel uncomfortable using Kelner’s form of wording because in my own speech I prefer to say someone is ‘a Jewish person’ rather than ‘a Jew’, and ‘Jewish people’ rather than ‘the Jews’).

As for Kelner’s complaint that he is ‘offended’ by what Corbyn said, all I can say is ‘So what’?   Since when did Kelner, or indeed anyone else, have a right never to be offended?  No one seems to be too concerned about not offending me in matters just as close to my heart as Sack’s and Kelner’s hobby horse.

(Andrea Dworkin was once quoted in the The Observer as saying ‘All men are Nazis’.  After it was published there was no rush to defend men or censure Dworkin, so I am unlikely to feel I have to avoid making comparisons between some of Israel’s policies towards the Palestinians and the behaviour of the Nazis.)

One of the curious things about the claims that Corbyn is presiding over a Labour party riddled with antisemitism is that I have not yet met anyone who has actually witnessed it.  And it’s not just my Labour friends who say this.  A friend who never misses an opportunity to denigrate Labour has made exactly the same point on more than one occasion.   Nor is antisemitic crime running riot in this country. About 15,000 prosecutions for ‘hate crime’ are launched annually.  Annual prosecutions for anti-semitism have yet to top two dozen. In spite of Margaret Hodge’s silly musings no one is being threatened by a new Holocaust.

So I think we can reasonably ask who is behind the repeated complaints against Corbyn.  On the photographic evidence published in the newspapers there seem to be two culprits, the Jewish Chronicle and the Campaign Against Antisemitism.   We also know from the films on the Al Jazeera TV channel which were shown in 2017 that the state of Israel has been interfering in UK politics and has tried to destabilise the Labour party.

Why? That’s easy. Corbyn is unashamedly on the side of the Palestinians.  It is to discredit any charges he makes against the state of Israel by claiming that he is an anti-Semite.  It's to turn Jewish people into victims, and by implication, Israel into a nation of victims.   It's no longer Israel that needs to leave the Occupied Territories; it's Corbyn and the rest of us who need to free ourselves of antisemitism.

I’m sure Corbyn has plenty of advisers and does not need my advice, but I’m going to give it all the same.  Fight these people on the basis of freedom of speech. Put them on the defensive for a change.  Remind people what Orwell said.   Remind them that the first thing the Nazis did was to suppress dissent, so remind people about how many British lives were lost in defence of that liberty. 

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The None Exclusivity of Death

by Les May

IT would appear that my reaction to Margaret Hodge’s preposterous comments about possibly facing a Labour party inquiry about her conduct bearing comparison with being a Jew in Nazi Germany in the 1930s, is shared by others.

http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.com/2018/08/margaret-hodge-is-humbug.html

Labour MP Ben Sellers caught the right note of ridicule when he tweeted;

‘The other day I had to queue for five minutes for a poor-quality mince pie and a Bovril at a local non-league ground.  It was a bit like being rounded up by Pinochet’s forces and getting a bullet through the temple in Chile’s national stadium in 1973.’

In response Anna Turley MP tweeted:

‘The Holocaust didn’t happen in a vacuum.  It happened because ordinary people turned a blind eye to racism and anti-Semitism.’

Sounds good doesn’t it? But wait a minute it’s we ‘ordinary people’ who cannot see this supposed antisemitism in the Labour party.  We are constantly being told it’s there, but we struggle to see any examples of it in the Labour supporters we know.

Anti-semitism is expressed as hatred of Jews.  That hatred manifests itself through discrimination, verbal and physical attacks on Jews, and attacks on their individual or collective property.  These are the province of the adherents to extreme right wing parties, not members of the Labour party.   They are not the sort of thing that come to light years later by someone trawling the web looking for something to make a fuss about in an attempt to discredit Corbyn.  They are what we and the Jewish Chronicle should be worried about.  For Anna Turley to even hint that we are ‘turning a blind eye’ is arrogant in the extreme.

As for the ‘ordinary people’ in Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1945 is Anna Turley sure, and I mean REALLY sure, that if she had been one of them she would have opposed the Nazis?  This is not a question for Anna Turley alone, it is one that we should all ask ourselves.  It’s one thing to live in the UK in 2018 where the cost of expressing opposition to Nazi ideology is small to non-existent and doing it in Germany in 1933 to 1945 where it would get you a visit from the Gestapo and much worse.

Nor am I willing to privilege the killing of Margaret Hodge’s antecedents over the murder of millions of Russians and Poles, or the death of even one Allied serviceman who fought to liberate Europe from the Nazis.  All these deaths have their origin in Nazi ideology.  Let us not forget this.

Recently Jeremy Corbyn tweeted:

“The nation state law sponsored by @Netanyahu's government discriminates against Israel's Palestinian minority. I stand with the tens of thousands of Arab and Jewish citizens of Israel demonstrating for equal rights at the weekend in Tel Aviv.”

Long may he continue to be able to do so and still remain a member of the Labour party.

Anna Turley’s Wiki CV makes interesting reading. Do you think she qualifies as an ‘ordinary person’?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Turley