Max Brenner support in Sydney
Federal Labor MP Michael Danby hosted household names on a bitterly cold evening at Max Brenner’s chocolate shop on SYdney’s Broadway…sending a message to those who support boycotts against Israel and have use the Brenner company as a target for their protests.
Gerard Henderson, Eric Roozendahl, Jana Wendt, Paul Howes, Warren Mundine, Austen Tayshus and Michael Danby Pic: Henry Benjamin
At one table, Danby was joined in conversation by former NSW treasurer Eric Roozendahl, journalists Gerard Henderson and Jana Wendt, ex-Labor Party president Warren Mundine, Australian Workers Union secretary Paul Howes and comedian Austen Tayshus aka Sandy Gutman.
But they were not alone in the busy restaurant. Many members of the Sydney community were at adjoining tables showing their support for the anti-BDS gathering including the executive director of The Executive Council of Australian Jewry Peter Wertheim, former president Robert Goot and Yair Miller, president of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies.
Recently, a Max Brenner store in Melbourne was the scene of a protest supporting a boycott against Israel. Three policemen were injured and 19 protesters arrested.
Mundine told media that the boycott was not anti-Israel but “anti-Jewish”.
Paul Howes said: “The violence outside the Melbourne outlet earlier this month shocked me. The violence I witnessed in our media after the anti-Israel BDS mob targeted a Jewish-owned business was far too reminiscent of Hitler-era mobs targeting Jewish businesses in Berlin. We have to nip this in the bud. There is simply no excuse for the Extremist Far Left seemingly mimicking the behaviour of the Nazi thugs. A Jewish-owned shop was surrounded by Far Left protestors, some of them linked arms, demanding people not patronise the shop because it supplies sweets to the Israeli Army. Australians of all political hues have to show they won’t stand by and allow this to be an established part of social discourse in this country.”
“ Violence of any sort during protests is abhorrent. Violence based on religious and ethnic hatred must be firmly opposed in our multicultural society,” Paul Howes added.
Michael Danby said: “ It is a tribute to the real spirit of Australia that these identities , so well known in public life, Paul Howes, Warren Mundine, Sandy Gutman, Jana Wendt, Gerard Henderson and Eric Roozendahl, turned out to identify with the Australian Jewish Community to repudiate the boycotters. The boycott against Revlon because the chairman is a member of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre and the call to boycott Westfield are contained in the official glossy boycott brochure. Lets call a spade a spade. These people advocate a boycott of Jewish commerce”
He added: “Boycott activists and Greens political party Senator Lee Rhiannon claimed in Sydney on Friday night that she wanted to extend the Boycott. She also falsely claimed the Boycott was peaceful. We know better that in Sydney and in Melbourne the Socialist Alternative and Hamas supporters are violent and aggressive.
Anyone who wants to see what these people really stand for need to only look at the slogan chanted by them when they protest Max Brenner or other Israeli and Jewish shops. There slogan From the River to the Sea is an Hamas slogan. These people are violent extremists and bigots. Our latest manifestation at Max Brenner is a sign that mainstream Australia does not support these extreme views.”
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To Alex Milne
Remember Tony Abbott who was castigated for speaking at a rally at Parliament House when an offensive poster was put up behind him which he didn’t even see?
If you knowingly associate with Jew haters carrying posters and calling out “Free Palestine” and “Free Palestine from the River to the Sea” you cannot escape criticism for not tearing down their banners and telling them to get the hell out of there. If you lie down with dogs you get fleas.
You have also been duped on the right of return.
The Universal Declaration says:
“Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.”
“Palestine” was not a country. It was not independent nor did it possess the attributes of sovereignty. It was part of the former territory of the Ottoman Empire captured in the First World War and placed under Mandate to Great Britain.
Had the Arabs accepted the partition plans proposed in 1937 or 1947 – or even accepted Israel’s declaration of independence in 1948 – the situation might have have been different. But they didn’t and went to war to try and get it all.
The right of return is a furphy that has only inflicted untold suffering on the poor refugees who have been kept in refugee camps for decades believing that one day they would return to Haifa and Jaffa.
People like you repeating this nonsense only help to perpetuate the status quo.
Jews came from the Nazi concentration camps and were resettled in Palestine to start their lives anew. The Arab countries could have done the same for the Palestinian Arab refugees instead of letting them rot in camps until today with no human dignity or hope – only increasing hatred for the Jews.
Think again about the rubbish you are posting. It only keeps getting worse.
Alex Milne and all other purveyors of “fairness”in human affairs, get this:
It is absolutely fair for Jews to build and control a state of their own !!!
In that particular State, called Israel,fundamental state principles of security must prevail,just as with any other state.
Considering the millenia old reality of anti Semitism and contemporary extremely tangible threats to Israel’s security by its Arab neighbours, of whom the so called palestinians are, by far,the greatest element of danger, the necessary composition of the Sate of Israel must rely mainly on those who can ensure Israel’s security. Israel’s Jewish population is the most reliable dmographic element to provide the said security.A larger Arab population in Israel provided by those who reckon that they have the “right” to occupy major Israeli teritory will GUARANTEE a drastic change in the security of the Jewish population of Israel.
Alex Milne talks about “equality” as if the arabs calling themselves palestinians would be some kind of angels deprived of their rights. Either Alex Milne has been dweeling under some rock for the past two thousand years or he reckons that Jews are as stupid as he obviously reckons they are “domineering” and “opressive”,not that such thoughts would make him a traditional subliminal,at least, anti Semite.
Just you wait for the retort ” I am not an anti Semite, far from it,just want a fair deal for everyone etc. etc.”
As we Jews believe in the comming of Messiah, once He will arrive all of Alex Milne’s and his mates’ demands for “fairness” will be granted.
Meanwhile fairness must be applied to the treatement of Hamas and the rest of their “opressed” and homeless artisans of terror.
To David Singer
The BDS campaign calls for equal rights between Palestinians and Jews. The fact that this campaign was instituted by Hamas does not mean that support for the BDS is the same as support for the Hamas charter.
The discrimination over the right of return is one of the most glaring inequalities in Israel/Palestine. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights allows any person the right to return to his or her country of origin. This right is denied to Palestinians. In contrast, the Israeli Law of Return extends the right of return to “a child and a grandchild of a Jew, the spouse of a Jew, the spouse of a child of a Jew and the spouse of a grandchild of a Jew”.
Is this fair?
To Alex Milne
So you agree the Palestinians claim is false and yet you still support their BDS program.
Have you any views on the following clauses in the Charter:
Article 5: The Palestinians are those Arab nationals who, until 1947, normally resided in Palestine regardless of whether they were evicted from it or have stayed there. Anyone born, after that date, of a Palestinian father – whether inside Palestine or outside it – is also a Palestinian.
Article 6: The Jews who had normally resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion will be considered Palestinians.
Are you still comfortable supporting a BDS campaign instituted by people whose objective is to wipe out Israel and reinstate 1947 Palestine with no equal rights between Arabs and Jews?
I appreciate being given the space in this forum. I only became involved in this site when I looked for information re the Max Bremmer rally on the ‘net and came across a lot of inaccurate and insulting claims that we are a bunch of Jew-hating bigots. I assure you that nothing could be further from the truth!
I understand that you and others on this site have a very different view to us regarding the Palestinian-Jewish conflict. Perhaps we are wrong, in our support for Palestinians. But we do not hate Jews.
to Alex Milne
– at the academic level you have failed both in logic and data.
– at the factual political data you failed to consider comprehensive and true,well known facts.
In both cases you extrapolate and abuse reality in a manner I and all those contributing here on behalf of Israel have been exposed to for decades.You do not add anything original and/or rational to the tested and failed palestinian ideology.
These are the only valid “academic” considerations.
You are being decently and politely allowed to exhibit your views not because you’d inspire, in spite of what you may think.
I am not being abruptly dismissive because I have already dismissed your position from your words: ” In my opinion “.
To David Singer:
All the Abrahamic faiths have religious ties to Isreal/Palestine, so the Charter’s claim that Jews do not is clearly false. The rest of the Charter sounds quite reasonable to me.
To Otto Waldmann:
You accuse others of employing a pseudo academic approach?!
To Alex Milne
Forget the mammals, cheese lovers and mice.
Focus on the Palestinian Arabs – who devised the world wide BDS campaign of Jewish goods and services emanating from Israel and the West Bank that you apparently support.
This is what their Charter says:
“Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong. ”
Is this Jew-hatred or not?
Support the BDS if you will. But don’t pretend to be under any illusion about what you are doing and who you are getting into bed with.
To Alex Milne
1st. – You attribute my argument a false syllogism which in itself contains a non sequitur. All my propositions or premisses are concordant with the respective conclusions. By posing false premisses in your “demonstration” of elementary logic and falsely attributing them to ME, you perform PRECISELY the same dismissably highly prejudiced rhetorical comedy act so transparent in your ideological attack on matters Jewish and Israeli. Let’s make one point clear:
THERE IS NO CONTRADICTION BETWEEN ANTI ISRAEL AND ANTI SEMITIC STANCES !!!
Those who reckon that they may escape the CORRECT syllogisms I have presented, and are persuaded into the false areguments in your attempt at compromising a verifyable reality of palestinian extended Israel hate propaganda, suffer from severe debilitating credulity, a condition you and your mates are exploiting cynically and,might I say, doomed to ridicule and, therefore, failure.
Placing as arguments logical demonstration juxtaposed to what YOU would falsely, therefore tendentiously, pretend would be my stances and respective logic is not only dishonest within the generosity of this debate forum, is not only highly abusive of you,but so easily proven disingenious, to the point of saying that you have mutilated your ideological foot by shooting it with rational blanks in such a manner that this is, arguably, the only instance when a blank is actually..loaded.
2nd- This is an exercise in eliciting relevant facts and not one engaged in constructing a “logical” edifice of the ideology of the anti Israel camp, one that has been indulging in a variety of tactics. One of the tactics employed of late has been the pseudo academic approach. A tangible reality of terror,prejudice and persecution definitory of the ENTIRE palestinian society is glossed over by a virtual academic “aula” ( lecture theatre ) type of “elevated”, “elegant” touches of the pretence of some kind of metamorphosis of a palestinian party dancing, in perpetual fact, to the tune of the only music they can produce,the sound of Kassam.
“Polished” clowns,such as Khatib, a revamped Ashrawi, regiments of tendentious and farcical fellow travellers, such as yourself and some other comrades engaged in this forum ( one “hasbaracentral” with acute convulsions of unhappiness excreted upon us )reckon that by ,digressing into home-made contortions of dialectics, could “demonstrate” that Zionism is such a universal malefactor that humanity should expurgate !
And since analogy is your ellected type of “addressing” the issues…directly, my alluding to nazi inherrited anti Semitism in all your approaches, whether you’d be aware of it or not, based on my very solid historical knowledge of the phenomenon, you will have to carry the burden of my “incongruities”.
To Otto Waldman
Judging from the erudite tone of your posts, I am guessing that you are well-versed in the art of philosophy. On this assumption, let’s test the validity of your argument by condensing it into a syllogism.
Simplified for ease of calculation, your argument is as follows:
All BDS supporters are Palestine supporters
Some Palestine supporters are Jew-haters
Therefore all BDS supporters are Jew-haters
You can see that this follows the proper syllogistic form. There are two premises and one conclusion; there are exactly three terms (“BDS supporter”, “Palestine supporter” and “Jew-Hater”), each of which is employed twice in the argument; and finally the middle term (Palestine supporter) appears in both premises. In addition, the syllogism obeys the rules of quantity and quality (apologies to those who have not studied logic!)
So far, so good, but this argument is guilty of the fallacy of composition, i.e., what is true of a part is falsely asserted to be true of the whole. From the (undoubtedly true) preposition that some Palestine supporters are Jew-haters, you erroneously conclude that this is true of all people who support Palestinian liberation. This fallacy can be seen more clearly in the following syllogism:
All mammals are cheese-lovers
Some cheese-lovers are mice
Therefore all mammals are mice
This argument is false, as the fact that a mammal loves cheese does not prove that that mammal is a mouse. Following exactly the same logic, it is possible for a person to be a Palestinian supporter without being a Jew-hater.
Otto, if you can find any flaws in my argument, please let me know. If you could leave out the obscure insults and incongruous Nazi references, that would be greatly appreciated.
“then the shape of the said “one state” will be based on the principles known as belonging to your palestinian mates”
Please provide reasons to think this.
“because I can show you sickening proofs of palestinian literature and actual facts which exhault such hatred of Jews, and they mean ALL Jews,”
I can show you sickening proofs of male literature and actual facts which exhault such hatred of women, and they mean all women!
Does that justify stigmatising men as woman haters and claiming that it is impossible to live side by side since such hate exists? I don’t think so!
To Cassie
Please enumerate what you consider to be the “racist policies of Israel”.
One of the strong features of Trotskyte rhetoric is its inability to develop rational extentions. They are a sedentary lot, dwelling stubbornly on the same ideas, phrase, oblivious to the points they reckon they are addressing and, therefore, evolving as craftsmen/women of absurdities. At least if they would read Lenin and Marx a bit more attentively. Those two blokes were really good at arguing outside the stringencies of mental cannons.
Cassie, if you support a one state formula in the Israel-palestinian conflict, and, also, advise us that the Zionist entity is not quite on the map of your intellectual wonderings, then the shape of the said “one state” will be based on the principles known as belonging to your palestinian mates, predominantely.
Since the “monor” issue advanced here is “racism” or demographic intollerance,tell us, dear Cassie, where, when, how are the same palestinians the glorious purveyors of demographic tollerance, because I can show you sickening proofs of palestinian literature and actual facts which exhault such hatred of Jews, and they mean ALL Jews, that will make the nazi monsters look like angels.
The mere fact that you entered this forum to attack “the Jew” denotes a disposition which my Shoah surving parents did and passed on to me identified as anti Semitic. To them and to me, there is no diferrence between an Australian Cassie of 2011 and a Hungarian Katalin of 1944 !
If you’d understand Hungarian, Romanian or Yidish I’d let you know what I really think ! Lucky you.
I confess this whole debate puzzles me!
When alex and james try to explain they don’t support an arab only state arising you continually ask them if they do. Intellectual dishonesty perhaps?
They clearly support a one state solution. As do I.
Let me clearly address a few issues that have arose-
“Labelling whole nations as evil is a racist, rather than marxist position.”
Nobody here claimed a whole nation was evil. What is being stated is the racist policies of Israel are wrong and should be opposed. Just as they should be opposed in any country.
Before you start on with “why don’t you protest against libyan and syrian governments then!” I will pre-empt you by stating that I have. I have also protested against the egyptian government in the middle of a a flash flood. Do you need the pictures?
I am sure you will somehow justify to yourself accusing me of “jew-hate” but I really don’t see it as a sensical assertion.
Alex Milne
If only you knew that my comments are a generous simplification of very basic rules of logic,something absent in your vacuous thrust of verbal gymnastics !!
Not only I do agree with Mendes,but this is not what you seem to be engaged in, a race of bravado , a vain desire to prommote one’s pathological need to be noticed, regrdless of one’s cacophonies rattling the market place of decency.
To Philip Mendes:
Perhaps it would be more accurate for me to state that the Israeli government is being oppressive to the Palestinian people. Checkpoints, the refusal to allow people to return to the place of their birth, and the wall are all examples of oppression of the Palestinian people.
To Otto Waldman:
You need to proof-read your posts. You make the same point as Phillip, but you obfuscate the tenor of your animus with a surfeit of polysyllabic confabulations.
Alex: the very fact that you describe the Jews per se as an “oppressor” people shows how divorced your thinking is from basic marxist let alone broader socialist analysis. The Left does not divide nations into oppressed or oppressor or good and bad. Rather, it analyses class and socio-economic divisions within nations. Labelling whole nations as evil is a racist, rather than marxist position.
At the most casual scrutiny, Alex Milne’s ( in fact all of his ilk’s) arguments rely quite unatractively on such pedestrian fallacies, complimented with redundant and factually irrelevant non sequitur so called historical events, that one would be tempted to abandon any degree of attention/respect to these lamentable rickety soap box political circus acts.
To engage in clear base rate fallacies , to make more than a probability judgement based on conditional probability without taking into account the effect of prior realities, in effect to arrive at the afforistic conjunction falacy that ” opressed become opressors ” and automatically hoist it upon Israel and its Jews, constitutes the regurgitation of the oldest anti Semitic canards and a crass mutilation of confirmed realities. Simply put, what on Earth have Fiji, Malaysia, with the specifics of Israel and its constant encounters with a palestinian entity determined to destroy the Jewish State ???!! Oblivious to anti Semitic visceral palestinian activism, these distorted political analysts cum activists have acquired a mode of constructing “rationals” completely devoid of truth and dominated by ideology while pretending that they are dealing with tangible realities ! The farcical concoction of an Israel unworthy of respect and legitimacy dominates their tormented lives.
Just wait and see how enthusiastic Mr. Milnes will deny he’d be an anti Semite or even anti Israel !
Rhetorical question stands: How would he know, when all he… knows and enjoys is basking in the exploits of delusion ??!!
To Alex Milne
You miss the point.
Among those supporting the BDS are Hamas supporters screaming their slogan and possessing these “abhorrent” (your term) views.
Don’t you feel uncomfortable being seen at a demonstration with such people? If their cries are not a call for ethnic cleansing – knowing what you now know about the Hamas Charter – what is their significance?
BDS is a Jew-hating program aimed at boycotting goods, services and intellectual property produced or provided only by Jews and no one else. Such a campaign will naturally attract Jew haters – such as Hamas supporters – precisely for that reason.
What do you think of the “moderate” PA President Mahmoud Abbas who said on 28 July 2010:
“I’m willing to agree to a third party that would supervise the [possible future Israeli-Palestinian] agreement, such as NATO forces, but I would not agree to having Jews among the NATO forces, or that there will live among us even a single Israeli on Palestinian land.”
Why should any Palestinian State be predicated on no Jews being allowed to live there or serve in an international supervisory force? Is this the type of Palestinian State you want to see emerge as a result of the BDS campaign?
Is the ethnic cleansing of 500000 Jews from the West Bank and East Jerusalem a proposition that you would approve?
To David Singer
My apologies – I did, of course, mean article 11.
The Max Brenner protests have been organised as part of the BDS campaign, which emphatically does not call for an Israel/Palestine in which Israelis are not allowed to live. On this basis, I maintain that the slogan “from the river to the sea”, as it was uttered at the protests, was not a call for ethnic cleansing.
To Philip Mendes
Of course, Jews are an historically oppressed people, but the oppressed can easily become the oppressor. Witness the situation in Fiji, where legislated discrimination has driven out a large number of Fijian-born ethnic Indians (“Fijiindians”). A similar, though not as harsh, discrimination exists in Malaysia, where the ninety per cent of government contracts go to Malays, who comprise less than half the overall population. In both countries, legislated discrimination was introduced to counter historical oppression, and is now used to oppress the majority of the respective populations.
To Alex Milne
I referred you to article 11 – not article 7 – of the Hamas Charter – but both are equally despicable.
Do you now retract your following statement:
“I believe that the slogan “from the river to the sea” is a call to allow Palestinians to live where they like in Palestine/Israel, but not to the exclusion of Jews or others who have a legitimate claim to Israeli citizenship.”
A simple “yes” or “no” will suffice.
Janie/James et al: you must seriously be the last Trotskyists on earth who don’t understand that Jews are a historically oppressed people, and that Israel was created as an act of affirmative action to provide a haven for Jewish refugees from both Europe and the Arab countries. Have a read, for example, of the various writings of the Trotskyist Workers Liberty group in the UK. They get it, you really need to.
To David Singer
Article seven of the Hamas charter is indeed abhorrent. What could be worse than a people using their religion to justify ethnic cleansing?
To Janie Raine
I have not read Barghouti’s book but there are many examples of racist statements by Arab leaders concerning the exclusion of Jews from a Palestinian state.
I repeat the racist quote of Mahmoud Abbas on July 28, 2010:
“I’m willing to agree to a third party that would supervise the [possible future Israeli-Palestinian] agreement, such as NATO forces, but I would not agree to having Jews among the NATO forces, or that there will live among us even a single Israeli on Palestinian land.”
Just read the PLO Charter and the Hamas Charter to learn about institutional and constitutional Jew-hatred among the Palestinian Arabs. Their refusal to recognize Israel as the Jewish state in the face of such an endorsement by international law indicates their underlying Jew hatred and racism that has never changed over the last 130 years.
The BDS campaign is but another cheap shot at vilifying and delegitimizing Jews. It is Jew-hatred of Jews and the goods and services they produce – plain and simple. It is racism – pure and unadulterated – that has duped people like you.
To James Crafti
Not very impressed with your answers.
Answer 1:
Can you imagine what would happen to any civil society group in any of the Islamic Conference countries that called for a boycott of that country? By the way the boycott against Israel was not called for by any civil society group in Israel.
Answer 2:
South Africa was racist because it practiced apartheid between its white and black populations as a matter of Government policy. It had nothing to do with the numbers of blacks or whites – except it was particularly heinous because the minority oppressed the majority.
Are you saying Israel does the same? Go visit any shopping center, university, the knesset or any picture theatre and judge for yourself. Let me know where you see “Jews only” or “Arabs only” signs
Answer 3:
If you don’t support a Palestinian State where no Jews are allowed to live how can you support the creation of any such a state in the West Bank where many Palestinian Authority spokesmen have made it clear the 500000 Jews living there will have to go.
Abbas for example was most specific on July 28, 2010, when, he said: “I’m willing to agree to a third party that would supervise the [possible future Israeli-Palestinian] agreement, such as NATO forces, but I would not agree to having Jews among the NATO forces, or that there will live among us even a single Israeli on Palestinian land.”
The civil society in the West Bank pursuing the BDS remain loyal to Abbas – no Palestinian spring seeming to have emerged calling on Abbas to revoke his racist statement.
Getting into bed with them is not a wise thing for you to do.
Answer 4:
Don’t the Arabs have Arab only settlements? Is that ok?
Anyone from around the world can apply for Israeli citizenship.
Can you please detail the 20 Israeli laws that discriminate against ethnic minorities.
96% of the Arabs in the West Bank and 100% of the Arabs in Gaza are under the administrative rule and control of the Palestinian Authority. and Hamas respectively. That they have not had a vote for years is the fault of their rulers – not Israel.
You seem to have a factual disconnect with reality.
It is with deep sadness that one observes some of the younger generation,such as Crafti and Raine, wasted in the Dantesque “ogni speranza”.
Once again Philip Mendes shows what an appalling bad academic he is… he makes motherhood statements and unsubstantiated ascertains and fails to provide the evidence to back up these statements (we are still waiting on the exact quote, with the page number from Barghouti’s book where he supposed states he want’s an “exclusive Arab state”, but don’t hold your breath, Phillip will not be able to provide it because there is no such quote (yes, Philip, I too read the book but unlike you I don’t go around lyilng about what Barghouti actually said in his book).
As for James Crafti being an “uncle Tom”, I am sure he is laughing his head off at that pathetic accusation because I certainly am. Zionists like Mendes love to turn reality on its head and play the victimhood card, but the real victims of oppression in this particular scenario are the Palestinians who are being ethnically cleansed, occupied and murdered by the Israeli state.
Mendes and others here who are defending Israel and attacking James Crafti are no different from the white apologists who defended South African apartheid. White South African’s who took a stand against the Apartheid regime were also called lots of unsavoury names by the apologist for the regime. But that did not stop those white South Africans who stood in solidarity with Black South Africans from continuing to stand up for human rights and against racism and oppression and in time they were proven to be right. The same will happen here, in time history will show it was anti-Zionist Jews, who had the courage and guts to say “not in my name”, who were in the right, not Zionist apologists for racism and apartheid like Philip Mendes.
Finally, Max Brenner is a target for BDS because the Strauss Company which owns it, is complicit in Israel occupation and apartheid polices, through its active support for the Golani and Givati brigades of the Israeli Occupation Forces. Both the Golani and Givati brigades were heavily involved in Operation Cast Lead where Israel killed over 1300 Palestinians, the majority of whom were civilian, including 350 children.
That is hillarious Phil. Your Jewish victim mentality is so twisted that you make it sound like the Palestinians are occupiers, not the ones under occupation. You still didn’t answer my question where does Omar Barghouti talk about an exclusivists Arab state?
As for David’s questions:
“Would you support any BDS campaigns against any of the 56 states that comprise the Organization of the Islamic conference? If so do why don’t you start a BDS against those states.”
Possibly if there was actually a call for them by civil society groups in those countries like there are calls by the Palestinian occupation living under the rule of the Israeli state.
“How can you describe Israel as racist when at least 20% of its population is non- Jewish?”
Easy. South Africa was racist with 90% of its population being African.
“Do you support a Palestinian State where no Jews will be allowed to live?”
No I don’t and neither does the BDS movement. Hence my question to Phil which he still keeps avoiding.
“Do you not support the Moslem “ghettos ” in Europe in places like France,Holland and England because in your opinion such an idea is racist both to Moslems and and non-Moslem people?”
There are always going to be areas which have a concentration of one culture or another. This is qualitatively different to having Jewish only settlements or having a country which allows Jews from around the world to claim citizenship when other people can’t.
As for Israeli “Democracy,” what sort of democracy has over 20 laws that discriminate against ethnic minorities. Also surely a “democracy” is one where all people who are subject to the rule of the state have a vote? The Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza are subject to the whims of the Israeli millitary and their “law” yet have no vote.
Actually quite a lot of locals believed and followed Hitler as a result of his Mein Kampf. By 1929 Hitler ammased a small fortune from the sales of his few editions of his book. The analogy we can draw here is precisely the fact that we are witnessing several modestly educated Jews and non Jews attracted by the visceral anti Semitic ideology of the palestinian camp. It is precisely, just as with Hitler, the KNOWN anti Semitic sentiments ingrained in a number of western subcultures that allow for the easier permeation of palestinian fundamental ideology to be syncronised with these soft targets.
The adherence of those with Jewish ancestry to this composite canards has a lot to do with an existing abandonment by these targets of Jewish values, an inner desire to attain any kind of notoriety and, at the same time, satisfy the need to combat anthing in an almost clinically related conflict between personal failures and “objective” socio-political irritants. It is,indeed, the subjective “livre du poche”, pocket size personal fight ( each one’s individual “kampf” ) to attract attention and thus arrive at incredibly questionable achievements. They are profusive in “debating” their ideas and ignore any laws of logic, reason, while basking in somehow clean syntaxes.It is the vision of the words, slogans in fact, reflexively put out that gives their mental excretions the needed daily fix. I am confident that David and Phillip are perfectly right, but also just as confident that their targets are just as determined NOT to learn anything from the retorts to their inexorable ineptitudes.
To Alex Milne
You really are naive to believe the Hamas slogan “From the River to the Sea” is “a call to allow Palestinians to live where they like in Palestine/Israel, but not to the exclusion of Jews or others who have a legitimate claim to Israeli citizenship”.
Have you ever read the Hamas Charter?
Article 11 states:
“The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that the land of Palestine has been an Islamic Waqf throughout the generations and until the Day of Resurrection, no one can renounce it or part of it, or abandon it or part of it. No Arab country nor the aggregate of all Arab countries, and no Arab King or President nor all of them in the aggregate, have that right, nor has that right any organization or the aggregate of all organizations, be they Palestinian or Arab, because Palestine is an Islamic Waqf throughout all generations and to the Day of Resurrection. Who can presume to speak for all Islamic Generations to the Day of Resurrection? This is the status [of the land] in Islamic Shari’a,”
Hardly sounds like the welcome mat is being extended to the Jews.
Hitler made his intentions very clear in “Mein Kampf” but nobody believed him. History is in danger of repeating itself when people like you become duped into believing the rubbish you are spouting. I only hope it is caused by ignorance.
James: you still don’t get it. When those people clapped you for saying you were Jewish at the boycott rally, it was because you are the classic “Uncle Tom” providing a Jewish defence for anti-Jewish racism.
It is the same as the far Right Institute of Public Affairs who set up the Bennelong Society to provide a small group of Indigenous Australians who would oppose land rights, and the East Timorese groups who defended the Indonesian annexation of East Timor.
And the old Soviet Jewish anti-Zionist committees who denied that there was any anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union.
You are being suckered James. They love you because you reinforce their prejudices.
To David Singer
Damn, I really did not mean to continue this debate.
To answer your questions: I believe that the slogan “from the river to the sea” is a call to allow Palestinians to live where they like in Palestine/Israel, but not to the exclusion of Jews or others who have a legitimate claim to Israeli citizenship.
I was not present at the first protest outside Max Brenner, so I can only rely on second hand information from friends who were there. They all tell me that the violence was instigated by the police – a not-unusual phenomenon, in my experience!
Finally, comparisons to Hitler’s regime are a slight exaggeration, don’t you think? This was hardly a Kristallnacht, and I’ve yet to hear anyone suggest that we should boycott Acland St cake shops, because they are Jewish-owned.
Why is it that any support for the Palestinian cause is met with Nazi references?
To James Crafti
You state:
” I don’t support any state set up for the benifit of one ethnicity to the exclusion of another”
Would you support any BDS campaigns against any of the 56 states that comprise the Organization of the Islamic conference? If so do why don’t you start a BDS against those states.
You further state:
” I DON’T support a Jewish “ghetto” in the middle east because in my opinion such an idea is racist both to Jewish and non-Jewish people”
How can you describe Israel as racist when at least 20% of its population is non- Jewish?
Do you support a Palestinian State where no Jews will be allowed to live?
Do you not support the Moslem “ghettos ” in Europe in places like France,Holland and England because in your opinion such an idea is racist both to Moslems and and non-Moslem people?
By the way you are still to reply to the following post:
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“What do you mean by “regime change in Israel”?
Israel is a democracy that holds regular free and transparent elections when the electors make their choice. Regime change is up for grabs every time an election is held – same as in Australia if I am not mistaken.
Why have any boycott in such circumstances – unless you mean something very different ? Please explain.
How can you compare Israel in the same breath as the position that existed in South Africa and Germany where regime change was the objective?
If you want to pursue authentic regime change why not a BDS boycott against Libya or Syria where long time autocratic leaders are killing their own citizens day in and day out?”
David. If I wanted to see the disappearance of Vatican City as a seperate entity from Italy would that make me anti-catholic or simply someone who believes in seperating religious/ethnic beliefs from state entities? I don’t support any state set up for the benifit of one ethnicity to the exclusion of another. Which is why my last comment to Phil involved me asking where does Barghouti say he “wants an “exclusivist Arab state.”” I support democracy and for Jews to be an important part of the richness of democracy. I DON’T support a Jewish “ghetto” in the middle east because in my opinion such an idea is racist both to Jewish and non-Jewish people. The largest Jewish population is in the United States not Israel/Palestine so obviously the majority of Jews including us in Australia do quite well outside of a Jewish state.
Ok Phil. Show me where in Barghouti states that he wants an “exclusivist Arab state.” One would hope an “academic” like yourself should actually be able to quote or at least be able to provide a page reference to your source. However I fear that in your desire to protect Israel at all cost you are “soooo disingenuous”
To James Crafti
So you do want to see the disappearance of the only Jewish State on earth. Isn’t that Jew-hatred?
Alex Milne
Did you read the above article and Michael Danby’s statement:
“Anyone who wants to see what these people really stand for need to only look at the slogan chanted by them when they protest Max Brenner or other Israeli and Jewish shops. There slogan From the River to the Sea is an Hamas slogan. These people are violent extremists and bigots.”
Or perhaps Paul Howes:
“The violence outside the Melbourne outlet earlier this month shocked me. The violence I witnessed in our media after the anti-Israel BDS mob targeted a Jewish-owned business was far too reminiscent of Hitler-era mobs targeting Jewish businesses in Berlin. We have to nip this in the bud. There is simply no excuse for the Extremist Far Left seemingly mimicking the behaviour of the Nazi thugs.
You better think again about your support of BDS
James: you are soooo disingenuous. Read what the leaders of the BDS movement such as Omar Barghouti (in his new book BDS) are saying. They are very honest, they want to end the existence of Israel and replace it with an exclusivist Arab state. That is not equality, it is rather ethnic cleansing at best and genocide at worst. You are just repeating over and over again the mistakes that Jewish communists made in the 1950s and earlier in defending Soviet anti-Semitism, and the earlier anti-Jewish pogroms in Palestine. The earlier Jewish radicals at least had good intentions, actually identified as Jews, and were genuinely conned by the Soviets. You and the likes of Loewenstein and Brull have no excuse. You know full well what you are doing, and enjoy lapping up being the “good Jews” who are popular with the far Left.
PM
One of the reasons these discussions continue is that some of us think it necessary to regurgitate proven fallacies about palestinians being persecuted,the same palestinians being nothing but champions of human rights and, to top it all, the regurgitation of bankrupt ,would you believe, “leninist” canards.
What has been deemed redundant by the real politik is being aired with the serenity of redundant failed barricade holders of principles which, in practical terms, have NO PLACE AT ALL at the coal face of political negotiations where it really matters.
What the palestinian Jew hating populace is duped into is,however, the sustained vacuos debate about an instransigent Israel “evidently” a purveyor of unspeakable crimes, the kind identical to all recognised inhumane exploits of the past century. The incriminations must be of the ilk still current in the communal memory !!
Can we expect a realistic,rational discussion with the kinds of the two above objectors to Zionism ???!!! Most definitely NOT !! What we shall constantly encounter shall be the same redundant phraseology devoid of truth and reason,aimed only at creating and maintaining distorted dialectics with the single function of, actually, giving “reason” and succor to the abovementioned real politik palestinian side in undermining the necessary reason by virtue of… popular pressures. So, how useful are these two……??!!
Oh have people heard the story about how white South African’s were wiped out when Apartheid ended? No… well that may be because it didn’t happen.
They got rid of this white state, let black people live there (no longer confined to the bantustans) with equal rights and what a surprise… there were still white people there! Mendes seems to have some strange ideas if he thinks that fighting for equality rather then a Jewish state is a form of ethnic clensing.
To David Singer
I had not intended to keep up this debate but, since I’ve been asked a question, I’ll respond.
No, I do not think the BDS is “unadulterated Jew-hatred”. The movement is motivated by, dare I say it, a love of Palestinians and a desire to help them achieve the same rights in Israel as those enjoyed by the Jewish population. I have never heard anyone at the rallies suggest that Jews should “driven out from Israel”, and I certainly would not support the movement if this was an objective.
I can’t deny that businesses in Israel will suffer if the BDS is successful. The same could be said about the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. Both, I believe, are justifiable for similar reasons.
To philip mendes
Well said Philip. Couldn’t agree more.
BDS = Jew hatred of 6.25 million Jews on a scale not seen since the Nazis.
Those duped by its insidious racist campaign need to take a long hard look at themselves.
Alex and James: you are deluding yourself. Stormtroopers don’t switch from being Nazis to Marxists/Trotskyists just because they claim to be. BDS involves a racially-based ethnic stereotyping of all Israeli Jews as inherently evil. You need to reflect on the fact that much of the post-1967 anti-Zionist fundamentalism that groups such as Socialist Alternative and their allies espouse is based on a right-wing nationalist, rather than class/structuralist perspective. There is nothing remotely left-wing about the BDS agenda which urges absolute injustice for Israeli Jews (the violent destruction of their state and the ethnic cleansing of most of their population) in favour of absolute justice for Palestinian Arabs (the transformation of the existing state of Israel into an Arab State of Greater Palestine).
Philip Mendes
To James Crafti
What do you mean by “regime change in Israel”?
Israel is a democracy that holds regular free and transparent elections when the electors make their choice. Regime change is up for grabs every time an election is held – same as in Australia if I am not mistaken.
Why have any boycott in such circumstances – unless you mean something very different ? Please explain.
How can you compare Israel in the same breath as the position that existed in South Africa and Germany where regime change was the objective?
If you want to pursue authentic regime change why not a BDS boycott against Libya or Syria where long time autocratic leaders are killing their own citizens day in and day out?
There were also millions of white people in South Africa when BDS was used there. It doesn’t mean the people involved were anti-white. There are also groups like “Boycott from Within” who are calling on the international community to take these sorts of measures in order to create regime change in Israel.
By your same logic the Jews in the US who argued for a boycott of German goods in 1933 were also racist because the boycott affected innocent germans who didn’t support Hittler’s regime.
To Alex Milne
I did not use the word “antisemitism” so why try to attribute it to me?
I used the word “Jew-hatred”.
Is the BDS directed at boycotting the goods and services provided by 6.25 million Jews or not? Do many of those joining BDS demonstrations also want to see those 6.25 million Jews driven out from Israel ?
There have been similar previous boycotts against Jews in Germany and Jews in Israel by Arab countries.
Collective punishment of Jews in Israel – men,women and children irrespective of whether they are Zionists or not and irrespective of whether they support or don’t support their Government’s policies such as members of the New Israel Fund and B’Tselem – is the intended result.
In my language this is unadulterated Jew- hatred.
Do you agree or not?
Bragging about his anti Jewish exploits, James Crafti does not just take pride in confronting the vast majority of the Jewish community but, at once,he is exercsing his right of abandoning the same. At this stage it does not matter at all what Mr. Crafti thinks of himself ,but that he managed quite successfully to convince the respective Jewish community that he has joined the OTHERS. Not at all a strange new identity, the world if full of non Jews.
To Alex Milne
Your “demand”for rational debate is a substitute for excreting incongruities of the venomous type aimed at people who should ignore you !
To David Singer
Your accusations of antisemitism are a poor substitute for rational debate.
To James Crafti
You also talk a load of garbage.
6.2 million Jews living in Israel are the intended collective victims of the BDS campaign – no matter what their political motives might be. If that is not Jew-hatred then tell me what is.
That Jews in other parts of the world seek to join in the denigration and vilification of their fellow Jews is a matter of profound regret.
That is obviously a matter for your conscience which you have to live with.
Where is the proof that we are anti-Jewish? I spoke at the rally which marched to Max Brenner in Melbourne last night and I spoke saying I am proudly Jewish and these rallies are not against Jewish people. There was loud applause to my comment. Also I recently attended a hearing which amended bail conditions for 11 of those arrested on July 1. I heard the police giving evidence tell the court that these rallies are anti-Israel but that there is no sign that these rallies are anti-Jewish in any way.
To Alex Milne
You are talking a load of garbage.
The BDS is designed to bring economic hardship on 6.25 million Jews (and ironically 1.2 million Arabs who have been caught up in the campaign).
I doubt that any of the Arabs are Zionists. I also doubt that all 6.25 million Jews are Zionists. Those born in Israel had no choice. Many of those who came to Israel did so for other than Zionist reasons.
The BDS seeks to impose collective punishment on all these Jews. Many of its proponents openly espouse “Free Palestine – From the River to the Sea” at BDS protests – calling for the elimination of the one Jewish State, the removal of its Jewish population and its replacement with a 57th Islamic State.
The BDS is an insidious form of Jew-hatred of a most extreme and disgusting nature.
Alex Milns is courting insults, although according to the strictness of the topic he is at once irrelevant and provocative.
Here is the ..relevant retort to the provocation:
Being Jewish is not a simple genetic right. One must behave consistently with essential Jewish tennets. Fighting the Jewish people cannot make one the same as the people one fights !
Yair Miller and Peter Wrtheim reported as drinking chocolate at Brenner’s should make a magnificient cover of a special Shabbos edition of the AJN !!
Headline suggested ” TOP 50 MOST INFLUENTIAL AUSSIES CHOCCERS WITH FIGHTING SPIRIT AGAINST THE BDS !!!
These protests are anti Zionist, not anti Semitic.They support the right of Palestinians to return to their homeland. They support freedom of movement for Palestinians. The socialist groups supporting these protests have a long and proud history of opposing racism in all its forms.
A sizable proportion of the people attending these protests are Jewish. To accuse us of “anti-semitism” is inaccurate and insulting.
Well, actually Shirlee, judging by Michael’s letters in the AJN, he would do a better job than the practitioners of “sha shtillism” who dominate the NSWJBD. Their focus on outreach which is not returned, their dignified diplomacy which is treated seriously to their faces only and their infatuation with clever words instead of the truth, all result in the enemies of Jews and of Western civilisation becoming bolder. By failing to act, demonstrate and openly calling on authorities to curb jihadis, they are undermining our local community, Israel and those mohammedans who want to be liberated from the savagery of Islam, which takes hold of any mohammedan community not checked by civilising forces
It seems Jew hatred will never disappear. That it should emerge in Australia is disgusting. Congratulations to all those who have shown they are personally prepared to take a stand to nip it in the bud.
Hi Shirlee,
Perhaps Ted Lapkin then… I read Today’s AJN.
Michael Burd … what’s your problem ?
Do you think you’d do a better job? Apply for it then, if and when the position as CEO, becomes vacant.
Sandy Gutman [ aka Austenteyshus] is a true Gem he should be running the NSWJBD he is not afraid of the BDS ratbags.