Israel Bombs Syria

So what is going on?

Are the Israelis intervening on one side of the conflict? Although Syria does back Hamas and Hezbollah the regime surely poses less threat to Israel than a potential Islamist run Syria.

Perhaps they just want to destroy Syria's chemical weapons in order that the rebels don't get control of them or so the regime doesn't try to give any of the weapons to one of it's terrorist clients.

American & Chinese Diplomats Discuss Arab-Israeli Conflict

Britain & Israel.

Israeli president Shimon Peres claims that the English are antisemitic and 'always work against Israel'. The ironic thing is that Shimon Peres was quite deeply involved in the Suez crisis where the UK went quite far in working on Israel's side. Britain and the Jewish people should be friends anyway, united as we are by the undying hostility of Mel Gibson.

Headline Of The Day

Convoy raid condemned as Aussies found safe

Look Australians can be a little bit annoying but surely not harming Aussies isn't cause for condemnation.

Zionist Non Plot

Hamas normally blame everything from political setbacks to natural disasters on Zionist conspiracies, yet when faced with an actual conspiracy that almost certainly involves Israel you'd think they would feel vindicated by an actual Zionist conspiracy, but no that turns out to be the one thing that isn't Israel's fault!

STFU STUC*

Nick M says most of what needs to be said about the Scottish Trades Union Congress's request for people attending the Celtic versus Hapoel Tel Aviv football match to "show solidarity" with the Palestinians. It is a disgraceful attempt to insert politics and sectarianism into sport. The STUC's secretary general, Dave Moxham, explains their demand with this:

“This December marks the one year anniversary of the Israeli invasion of Gaza in which 1,400 men, women and children were killed in an act described by the United Nations as ‘indicating serious violations of international human rights’ and ‘amounting to war crimes, and possibly crimes against humanity’.

Oddly enough Celtic played Dynamo Moscow in August, which marked the one year anniversary of the Russia invasion of Georgia, yet I don't seem to be able to find the STUC's calls for solidarity from back then. I also don't seem to be able to find the STUC calling for similar displays when teams from Turkey or the former Yugoslavia have played in Scotland, despite the conflicts that have beset them.

Odd that.


* Headline shamelessly stolen from a comment by 'Kevin B' in the same post that I linked to at the beginning of the article.

Cultural Continuity.

It this day and age isn't it good to see that some communities are keeping old traditions thriving.

Blair- Still Got The Old Magic.

It's nice to see that Tony Blair is having as much success in his role as Middle East peace envoy as he had as Prime Minister. In fairness the Israeli Palestinian situation has always been volatile even before his Tonyness came along saying "look guys, how come you don't have the Christmas spirit over here?".

The Independent reports that:

Three Israelis killed as Hamas launches revenge attacks

Which isn't really true seeing as it was Hamas's rocket attacks that precipitated the current situation. Perhaps Hamas were taking preemptive revenge.

I'm not sure whether Israel's actions are correct or appropriate. Allowing rocket attacks to continue is clearly not an option but the Prime Minister is corrupt and demonstrably incompetent so who knows whether this is the best response or whether it is being done with one eye on the upcoming Israeli elections? It would be nice if there were a means of targeting those who fire the rockets without endangering civilians but without effective intelligence gathering that is difficult to do.

However the way the UK media have been reporting the situation is misleading in that it present every Israeli action as occurring in a vacuum with no context given for why they are doing it whereas Hamas's behaviour is presented as being a reaction to what Israel does rather than the conscious choices of sentient individuals.

As with Hezbollah's unprovoked attack on Israel two years ago, territory that Israel had completely withdrawn from is being used as a platform to attack and murder Israelis. This clearly undermines the case for Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and East Jerusalem so you would have imagined that opponents of Israel's presence in the West Bank would have been the loudest in denouncing Hamas and Hezbollah but instead there is a long pause followed by a barrage of propaganda and conspiracy theories to excuse them.

"Extremely Seriously".

Tony Blair had to be rushed on to his plane at an Israeli airport after one of his British bodyguards accidentally fired his gun causing a security scare.
.....

Accidental firings are taken extremely seriously in Israel and its Airports Authority has launched an inquiry.

Is there anywhere that accidental firings aren't taken too seriously? It's not as if you let of a couple of rounds at Stanstead they let you laugh it off.

Quote Of The Day, Or Possibly Year.

Over at another blog I've been disagreeing with the author and many of his commentators over the role that Israel has played in the Russian Georgian conflict. In short I think the idea that the West is opposed to Russia because of Israel is nonsense. Thankfully though one alert commentator was able to out me for what I am:

The Russians have had no behavior over the last couple of years. From the way you spell behaviour, you are probably an Israeli yourself doing hasbara.

Yep that's right I'm a secret Israeli* because I er use British spellings!!!

*It isn't everyday that I feel the need to declare myself to be Judenfrei but I suppose I should add that I'm not Israeli, not Jewish, never been to Israel and don't even have a single Jewish friend that I know of, although I haven't run everyone's spelling yet to check.

Alan Hart Guest Blog: Another Zionist Myth Busted.

One of the staples of misinformed 'Israel can do no wrong' commentators is a myth that has been used to smear one of the great peacemakers of the region, Yasser Arafat. This is the oft repeated claim that Yasser Arafat was unattractive or even ugly. By ugly I mean physically unappealing.

In fact Yasser Arafat's striking looks were a source of tremendous pride to the Palestinians and conversely envy by the Israelis. In 1974 when I was working ITN General Rabin told me: "Alan, you're a legendary journalist and an inspiration to writers everywhere. Because you've explained that you couldn't possibly be anti semitic because you had a jewish taxi driver take you to the Airport I'm going to let you in on a secret, Arafat handsome face is making our propaganda work ten times harder so we have decided to spread rumours that he is in fact uglier than a Rottweiler's arse".

This was perplexing how could anyone be convinced that Yasser's tender smile and twinkling eyes that could make a grown journalists knees tremble were repellant? How could Zionists convince people that the face that launched a 1000 mortars was something to be ashamed of? The answer was that the Zionist lobby in the USA could easily suppress the TRUTH, so only a few honest journalists like me could give it to you straight.

Some years later when I told Yasser Arafat why he was no longer appearing on the front cover of Vogue he took it with great courage, "Alan, lick me" he said "Run your tongue over my nose, into my ears, taste the salt of my tears". After several minutes I asked him if I could stop now, he smiled and nodded. He did not have to say anything, the sweet aftertaste was devoid of any bitterness, his point was made.

His Struggle

Whilst lesser men denounce Alan Hart as an anti semite or belittle the persecution this latter day Solzhenitsyn has suffered, but with no greater tool at his disposal than a threat to bankrupt people by embroiling them in costly legal issues Alan bravely fights on against those who want their pound of flesh. So to show my solidarity I've asked Alan to write a couple of guest blogs for this site.

Hart Attack.

Former BBC man Alan Hart's suggestion that the kidnapping and possible murder of Alan Johnston was a false flag operation by the Israelis has met with deserved derision. So much so that he has posted a series of ripostes which are so self pitying and paranoid that I though he was going to start lambasting deceitful charlatans and debauchery, he writes that:

The trouble is that defenders of Israel right or wrong simply don't want to know the truth of history, (they want Zionism's propaganda version of it to stand unchallenged)....

...
That being so I am going to make representations to appropriate authorities about the need for a Blogging Protocol. It would require all who make blog comments to identify themselves properly and completely so that they could be called and held to account for defamation, and quite possibly inciting hatred

Presumably evidence free insinuations that Israel is going round murdering hostile journalists inspires only love and understanding.

What Media Bias?

Canadian blogger Damian Penny notes two recent events:

BBC News, April 14: "The UK's National Union of Journalists (NUJ) has strongly condemned the abduction of BBC reporter Alan Johnston in Gaza more than a month ago."

The Guardian, April 13: "The National Union of Journalists has voted at its annual meeting for a boycott of Israeli goods as part of a protest against last year's war in Lebanon."

Last year the mainstream media was loftily insisting that their coverage of Israel's war with Hezbollah was entirely impartial, but as soon as the dust settles they vote en masse to condemn one side. The aggressor in that war, Hezbollah, has suffered no such boycott. If Israel chooses to boycott NUJ members when they attempt to (mis)report from their country then that would be a fair response. In a way it is a good thing that the journalistic profession spew their bile so openly that it can't be ignored.

Incidentally can anyone confirm whether the NUJ once issued a statement of solidarity with Colonel Gadaffi after the United States bombed Libya in response to Libya's support of terrorism?