Ray Cook - As I See It

Israel, Zionism and the Media

Year: 2009 (Page 2 of 13)

Responses to Channel 4 Dispatches: Inside the Israel Lobby

18/11/2009 / / 0 Comments

There have been a number of outstanding and some amusing rejoinders to the Channel 4’s “Dispatches: Inside the Israel Lobby” which illustrate, as I said yesterday, what a pile of doo-doo the programme was.

Some of these commentators point out how dangerous it is to trot out the usual tropes of shadowy rich Jews manipulating  government and the media, and how close this sort of defamation is to 1930’s Nazi propaganda. Of course it is nothing like as virulent but it is, nevertheless, malign and panders to the worst type of conspiracy theorist, anti-Semite and anti-Zionist tendencies in British society whilst ignoring far more sinister and dangerous elements. In this respect, the treatment here of the Israel Lobby is the same as much treatment in the media of Israel itself: a crass, disproportionate, obsessive demonization, twisted half-truths and downright lies.

Here are some links to the responses to which I refer:

David Berkley

David Cesarani

Tom Gross

Denis McShane

Melanie Phillips

Robin Shepherd

Channel 4 Dispatches – the Israel Lobby

17/11/2009 / / 0 Comments

Channel 4’s Dispatches programme (Monday 16th November) about the British ‘Israel Lobby’ was very poor journalism which began with an agenda, tried as hard as it could to prove its own premise, failed to do so but reached the conclusion it set out to demonstrate: The Israel lobby works (behind the scenes) to subvert the British political class and media with money and bullying tactics and is effectively working for a foreign power.

This was a sordid piece of polemic which came  pretty close to the usual canards whilst stating, just in case any accusation might come its way, that ‘there is no conspiracy’ – well that’s a relief – but there is one, of course, a conspiracy to defame Israel and (a section of) the Jews of Britain and those who try, against overwhelming media bias, to put Israel’s case to the British public.

The huge gap between reality and delusion was aptly demonstrated by Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger, who could find no connection between media reporting on Israel and anti-Semitic attacks.

The accusation, which was advertised before the programme went out, that the ‘Lobby’ is working in the interests of a foreign power and against the interests of Britain, defames thousands of loyal British citizens. The programme failed to recognise the unique, deep and abiding connection between most Jews and Israel and characterised this as treasonous.

I support Israel’s right to exist and resist terrorist attacks, donate to charities that operate within Israel, write letters and emails to newspapers and the BBC, have a Zionist blog, therefore I am a traitor; a veritable latter-day Lord Haw-Haw. But much more importantly, BiCom the ZF, Conservative and Labour Friends of Israel and all other groups that are pro-Israel are treacherously working against the interests of Britain, no doubt manipulated by the deep subterranean machinations of the Elders of Zion themselves.

Promoting Israeli-Palestinian Trade Unionism

16/11/2009 / / 0 Comments

Following my previous post, I’d urge readers to look at the TUFI web site and read about how Israeli and Palestinian Trades Union co-operate and contribute enormously to improving conditions in the Palestinian Authority amd creating a paradigm for future co-operation and mutual respect.

Please take time, especially, to read about what TUFI says about boycotts.

Meanwhile ASLEF  (train drivers’ union) supports the Left Wing Hands Off Venezuela Campaign and Hugo Chavez, friend of Iran, Libya and other nasty dictatorships. This is the base from which boycott calls against Israel arise; not from the realities but from pure ideological prejudice. This leads to obscenities such as British Trades Unions supporting obnoxious regimes directly or indirectly.

Palestinians don’t support Israel boycott

13/11/2009 / / 2 Comments

Yeah, kinda goes against your preconceptions and prejudices, doesn’t it.

Recently, TUFI ([British]Trade Union Friends of Israel) went on their own fact-finding mission to both Israel and the Palestinian Authority West Bank to meet Israeli and Palestinian Trades Unionists.

Each day one of their number wrote a short blog article about their experiences.

You can find their blog here.

Here are some of the interesting and revealing things they had to say. Yes, I know they are ‘Friends of Israel’ but the TUFI mission statement states:

TUFI was established to promote Israeli-Palestinian trade union co-operation and strengthen the links between the Israeli, Palestinian and British trade union movements.

On the every first day, Terry McCorran, clearly on a first visit to Israel says at the beginning of his blog entry:

The first thing to say is that Israel was not what I expected, at all….. I was expecting a large Israeli military presence – like there used to be in my home town of Belfast – but throughout the day we only saw a handful of soldiers walking around Jerusalem.

It is often the case that those who only know a place by media reporting and British media reporting at that, form preconceptions that are not matched on the ground. In a recent BBC programme about the Frankincense which tracked the ancient trade route from Yemen to Gaza, when report Kate Humble arrived at the Jordanian-Israeli border to enter Israel she was expecting a different reception. She told us that the Israeli Army has reputation for being formidable and she was clearly apprehensive. She was then amazed that the only person at the border post was a diminutive female border guard and instead of being delayed an interrogated by those nasty Israeli soldiers, she and her camera team entered Israel in a matter of minutes. Humble, like McCorran have be conditioned to think of Israel in the way it is represented by the media and anti-Israel propaganda.

McCorran continues:

It is hard to describe how intertwined the significant religious sites are in the Old City  – Churches, Mosques and Synagogues next to each other, overlapping and sometimes even on top of one another.  The proximity is astounding.

I expected to see friction and stand-offs, but people were just getting on with their lives with complete religious tolerance and freedom.

Well, yes, again, life is always different from propaganda. McCorran, no doubt, had seen and read about the problems on the Temple Mount because Muslim clerics and the Palestinian leadership have been trying to manufacture stories about Jewish plans to both undermine the Al Aqsa mosque and to storm the Temple Mount and claim it for Judaism. As a result there were tensions and incidents but it seems Israeli Arabs and Palestinians didn’t buy in to their own propaganda and despite ongoing attempts to stir things up, so far, the Third Intifada has not happened. As McCorran witnessed first-hand, people just go about their daily lives.

The thing that struck me the most was the mix of people in the different quarters – Arabs, Israelis, Jews, Muslims, Christians and secular people all walking and working freely side by side.  Our Jewish guide seemed to be friends with every Palestinian in the Arab quarter and everyone was working together.

But aren’t Jews and Muslims supposed to hate each other?!  This is the same Jerusalem from which every Jew was expelled by the Jordanians in 1948 and every synagogue destroyed. Those Israeli Jews are amazing: they actually allow their non-Jewish citizens to work and practice their religion in freedom and respect – like any other decent, enlightened, democratic nation.

I got the impression that if left to their own devises – if the extremists on both sides backed off – the people of Jerusalem, Israel and Palestine would have peace.

Amen to that, brother.

And so to the Knesset:

It just so happened that when we walked in an Arab Member of the Knesset was making a speech against some of the government’s policies in the West Bank.

What! Freedom of Speech! Freedom to criticise the government! Freedom to vote and organise politically! I can hardly contain myself. But Israel is worse than Iran, isn’t it? Ok, some Arab MK’s have been making very anti-Israel statements and, yes, the reaction of some Israeli MK’s (heard of Avigdor Lieberman, for example?) have been pretty extreme and, yes, Israeli Arabs do face some discrimination, but there are a whole raft of NGO’s, political groups, individuals and also the Supreme Court who are working in the interest of Arabs within Israel and the Territories. At least mechanisms exist in Israel to stand up for minorities and to try to right wrongs.  Name me one Arab country where the same could be said. Go on. Still thinking are you? You’ll be thinking a very long time.

Later in the day we had a very positive meeting with a representative working for Tony Blair at the UN Quartet office in Jerusalem.

He said that although there were still many problems for people in the West Bank, there had been significant achievements in the last twelve months.  He said that for the first time the Palestinian Authority was performing on the security side, which in turn has lead to improvements with security and access.

He emphasised that there was no comparison to how it was just two years ago, with checkpoints being opened up and dismantled and the economy growing dramatically in the West Bank.

Again this was another positive that has not been reported by the media.  And this is my concluding point – the main eye opener of the day for me is that there seems to be little or no resemblance between what I have seen today and how Israel is sometimes portrayed in the media back home.

I don’t think any comment is necessary, just read that last sentence again.

And so it goes on. Day Two, Gerry Maloney:

One of the most surprising things about Israel is the lack of ill-well and bad sentiment between Jewish Israelis and the Israeli-Arabs.

We have visited both Jewish orthodox areas and Arab areas and found both communities mixing freely.

Each community seemed to be perfectly at ease with the other.  This was the exact opposite of what I expected to see – it was certainly the opposite of what the media in the United Kingdom report….

… The media propagate Israel as being a “military state” but the reality is that there has been no military presence in evidence at all.

Now here’s the rub:

Listening to people from both communities on the subject of the proposed international trade union boycott, it is evident that all parties oppose this action.  In a meeting with the Jerusalem Municipality workers, one view from the Palestinian contingent was that a boycott would be more detrimental to the Arab workforce than any other.

The reason for this was that in the event of economic sanctions, it would cause a detrimental impact on the employment levels of their community.

Are you listening Israel boycotters everywhere? THE PALESTINIANS DO NOT WANT YOU TO BOYCOTT ISRAELI GOODS. The Palestinians that really count, that is, not their leaders or the fanatics among them but every day decent Palestinians trying to earn a living. The boycotters would harm the very people they are supposed to be trying to support. But they don’t really care about that because the boycott is not about Palestinians and their rights, it is about demonizing and delegitimizing Israel. Boycotters hate Israel so much they are willing to make the Palestinians pay for it.

Finally, having spent a few days in Israel, I certainly intend to return for a holiday. …. the climate is a warm and inviting as any Mediterranean resort and, most importantly, completely safe.

Completely safe!! Yes, you heard and read right. Completely safe!!! I can vouch for the fact that in Israel you feel much safer walking at night than you do in London or Manchester. I am not saying Israel is crime-free, on the contrary there is a growing problem with crime. But attacks against the person are far less frequent than in Europe. Let’s hope it stays that way. Oh, you may scoff and ask how safe it is for a Palestinian who lives near an Israeli settlement in the West Bank. How about one who lives in Gaza City under a fundamentalist Islamic regime> I know where I’d rather be.

As the delegation moved to Nablus, Mike Dixon reported on the positives but also found negativity with a Trade Unionist referring to Israel as her enemy. But even here in the heart of Palestine the boycott was not wanted. They were more concerned with the traditional trade union concerns of pay and conditions.

You can be cynical and say TUFI were pre-disposed to finding the positives in Israel and that may well be true, but they report what they saw and they spoke to both sides.

Boycotts are cynical, political, anti-Israel mechanisms which harm Palestinians and ignore the facts. Let’s hope that that lesson is learned around the world and here in the UK. Somehow, I doubt it. TUFI is a minority in the Trades Union movement and boycotts or attempts to boycott will continue to be used against one country – Israel.

Goldstone Report – an opportunity for Israel?

06/11/2009 / / 1 Comment

Yesterday the UN General Assembly approved the Human Rights Council sponsored Goldstone Report recommendations.

The Report found that Israel and Hamas may both have committed war crimes and crimes against humanity during Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.

Israel refused to cooperate with the fact-finding mission because it believed that those doing the fact finding had already made up their minds that Israel (and not Hamas) had committed war crimes. The report, therefore, was biased from the start.

The report itself focused almost entirely on perceived Israeli infringements whilst barely mentioning Hamas at all. The weight of the report was firmly against Israel with accusations of disproportionality, deliberately targeting civilians and even attacked the Israel Supreme Court and its justice system, acknowledged to be one of the very best and most impartial in the world. In other words, Israel was accused of the very things it prides itself as not being.

The HRC decision to recommend to the General Assembly was made by a rag-bag of dictatorships and human rights offenders including Libya and Egypt. The HRC and, indeed, the UN General Assembly have proved to be obsessed with condemnations of Israel whilst overlooking gross injustices and crimes elsewhere in the world which dwarf even the worst accusations against Israel.

Any country which has such accusations against it must surely respond to the recommendations which would be to set up an independent body to investigate the findings of the report.

Israel (that is the IDF) had already begun and completed a number of investigations even during the conflict and these investigations are ongoing. Israel considers itself to be as capable as any Western democracy in investigating alleged crimes that it or its citizens are accused of making.

But the problem Israel has in agreeing am independent internal investigation is that it gives legitimacy to a UN and an HRC that comprise members whose sole obsession is to paint Israel as the fount of most of the evil in the world whilst ignoring the crimes of other UN members including Security Council members Russia (Chechnya, South Ossetia) and China (Tibet).

But there is some confusion about what any investigation should investigate. Goldstone did not seem to be concerned with named soldiers as much as the state itself in the areas of: proportionality including inter alia the extent of destruction to civilian infrastructure, illegal weapons use and  rules of engagement including white flag infringements.

In other words it is state policy that is in the dock although, in theory of course, individuals in government and senior officers could be held accountable within Israel or abroad.

Israel has already stated that it will allow no IDF officer to be prosecuted abroad. If Israel does not hold internationally credible investigations it seems we will shortly be in a position where Israeli politicians and soldiers will be unable to travel to Europe, for example, for fear of arrest. There have already been attempts by pro-Palestinians in Britain to have Israeli politicians arrested.

So what is the ‘opportunity’ in my title. Well it is this: both Israel AND Hamas have been asked to carry out credible investigations. Despite the absurdity of a terrorist organisation investigating its own terrorism, here’s the opportunity: if Israel complies, however hard that bitter pill is to swallow, and if the conclusions of such an investigation are accepted, then there will be no need for the International Criminal Court to issue warrants or whatever it is they do. But as Hamas surely won’t investigate themselves then they will be subject to such actions and their gross violations laid bare, even in absentia, perhaps.

Is this too much to hope for? Well, the first question is: is there any way that Israel could ever satisfy the international community that their own investigations are fair when that same community is so clearly bent on the destruction of Israel and the glorification of its enemies? Probably not.

Then there is the issue of interpretation of international law. Proportionality, which lies at the heart of the accusations against Israel, depends on who is doing the proportioning. If you are a Human Rights NGO or you are predisposed to be anti-Israel for whatever motivation, then your interpretation of what is proportional will be different to that of Israel itself which is fighting an existential war against forces which are fanatically committed to its destruction and who use all and every means to further their genocidal war against Israel and the Jews. I speak of Hamas, Hizbullah AND Fatah (the latter who are seen as moderates but whose intentions ultimately are the same – destroy Israel, destroy Jewish culture and blot out and annihilate Jewish history in the Holy Land).

Israel’s definition of proportionality will depend on its interpretation of the level  of threat posed by Hamas and the methods Hamas used to wage war from within a civilian population and to exploit that population and all its instruments mercilessly and cynically.

So it is likely that any putative independent Israeli investigation’s conclusions will not be accepted by an Israel-hostile world. But as I have argued before, it is still worth doing for Israel’s sake because the Goldstone Report despite its many flaws does ask serious questions about the conduct of asymmetric warfare (although it does not properly give weight to the challenge of such warfare) and an independent investigation is necessary for Israel’s moral health and will also bring to the fore some of the most important questions we face: how do you fight an enemy which hides behind the sick, women, children and the elderly; how do you fight an enemy prepared to sacrifice itself and its own civilians; how do you fight an enemy that has a cult of death; how do you fight religious fanatics; how do protect the innocent under such circumstances; what value do you put on your own life and the life of your fellow soldiers and civilians when compared to the lives of the enemy and its civilians with whom you have no quarrel.

The laws of warfare and human rights have developed apace since World War II. They were framed for a very different world order. That doesn’t make those laws any less valid, but it does mean that interpretation of them has to be nuanced  and contextual. If the UN and the HRC are not even-handed when it comes to investigating nations then the HRC and the UN should be held in contempt. Sadly, as flawed as the UN is, a world without it and the opportunities it provides for dialogue among nations and even enemies, would be a lot worse.

UN Human Rights Council Petition

28/10/2009 / / 1 Comment

Honest Reporting has started a petition to urge the UN Security Council to reject the UNHRC resolution which recommended the findings of the Goldstone Report.

The video cam be seen here http://www.honestreporting.com/a/UNHypocrisy.asp

It reveals what we all should know: the UNHRC is no longer a Human Rights advocate but a political tool in the hands of Israel’s enemies.

Please sign this petition.

Although we all know that the United States will veto the resolution anyway, it is important for the UN to understand that their constituency are not prepared to stand by whilst the UN and its instruments are used to wage political warfare against a single state whilst ignoring the gross crimes of other countries, especially those who obscenely are members of the UN Human Rights Council.

Nick Griffin – a supporter Israel can do without

23/10/2009 / / 1 Comment

The appearance of the British National Party’s leader, Nick Griffin, on the BBC”s prime political debating programme, Question Time, last night has for weeks been the subject of extraordinary media focus, heated debate and political demonstration.

The BBC devoted almost the entire programme to questions about the BNP, statements by Nick Griffin and the party’s policies.

Chairman David Dimbleby pressed Griffin on his history of Holocaust denial and Griffin lamely stated that he had changed his mind about it although he couldn’t express his views because of European Law which might lead to his arrest if he were to enter certain European countries. However, he did say that he had changed his mind on the ‘numbers’ after reading about a German radio intercept of 1945! The inadequacy and ludicrousness of this response was not lost on fellow panel members. Clearly Griffin is prepared to have his mind changed (somewhat) by German radio intercepts but not by the testimony and meticulous records of those same Germans, let alone thousands of survivors and other witnesses.

But the BNP is now no longer anti-Semitic, of course, its main scapegoat now is Islam and Muslims. At one time he was heard to say that ‘they’ can stay if ‘they’ accept this is a British and Christian country. How very generous of him. Where does he propose to send millions of British citizens were they not to accept his terms of tenure?

At one extraordinary moment he made a bid to show his pro-Semitic credentials by saying that he and his party supported Israel in Operation Cast Lead against Hamas. Well thanks for that, Mr Griffin’ with friends like you etc,

But isn’t this so typical of neo-Fascists. They delude themselves that by supporting Israel (Jews), who they hate, against Muslims, who they hate even more (only for now whilst it is politically advantageous to scapegoat Muslims), they are demonstrating some sort of moral purity and acceptability by trumping anti-Semitism with Islamaphobia.

The BBC’s reason for inviting Griffin was that since the BNP now had two MEP’s (including Griffin himself) and a million votes in the European elections, its charter had to be impartial and a BNP member had as much right to an invite as the Green Party or UKIP. But it then chose to atone for a sin it said it had not committed by focusing almost exclusively on Griffin and the BNP, something which has not been the case with other minority parties. So the BNP would be justified in complaining to the BBC about unfair treatment, would it not? Either Griffin is a panel member like all others or he is not. If he is not, then maybe he shouldn’t have been invited in the first place.

Whether the BBC’s biased attack on the BNP has any effect on that party’s standing remains to be seen. I hope there are a million people out there who watched Griffin and who now regret ever voting for him.

The Liberal Democrats might also be given pause to consider that their policy of Proportional Representation in the UK parliament would inevitably lead to candidates such as Griffin gaining a foothold in UK democracy as they have done with a PR system in Europe.

Griffin’s performance was appalling. He showed himself to be an oleaginous, sniggering, cowardly, intellectual midget who had no place on a panel of this calibre.

Israel’s Moral Dilemma

21/10/2009 / / 0 Comments

The 500+ page Goldstone Report, produced for the UN Human Rights Council by Judge Richard Goldstone and a distinguished group of Human Rights advocates, came to some damning conclusions about Israel’s conduct of its assault on Hamas in the Gaza Strip between December 2008 and January 2009. The report also criticised Hamas.

The report found that Israel and Hamas were probably both guilt of war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity. The report was endorsed by UNHRC and will be sent to the UN Security Council for recommendation to be considered by the International Criminal Court.

Israel refused to co-operate with the Report on the grounds that some of the fact-finding members who were to produce the report had already decided in advance that Israel had committed war crimes and were, therefore biased. Israel and its supporters also saw the move to condemn it as yet another attempt by the UNHRC to delegitmise the State of Israel and pillory it internationally. The UNHRC’s activities have been disproportionately focused on Israel in the past and Israel sees the UNHRC as an instrument of its enemies and detractors.

Indeed, supporters of Israel like myself, have focused on the injustices and bias of the reporting of Operation Cast Lead, the manipulation of the world media and world opinion by Hamas and the Palestinian Authority and the virtual free pass that Hamas and its seven year rocket attack on Southern Israel have received. The Goldstone report was seen by me and those of like opinion as yet another tool with which to bash Israel and whitewash the murderous and genocidal Hamas terrorists. This was a new opportunity to further advance Israel’s pariah status in the world.

By focussing on the one-sided nature of the report and the extraordinary moral equivalence which persists in the corridors of the UN and elsewhere between Hamas’s attempts to destroy Israel and Israel’s attempts to defend itself, we have to be careful about dismissing the findings of the Report out of hand.

Although it may be unfair that Israel is once again singled out and it may be galling that most of the nations voting in the UNHRC to recommend the Report have themselves human rights records which are far worse than even the most partisan interpretation of the report, nevertheless, Israel must investigate every allegation and every criticism of its conduct because that is the only moral and, indeed, politically expedient route to take. Israel’s Deputy Prime Minister, Dan Meridor has told Ha’aretz “[he] thinks Israel should establish its own independent committee to investigate Israel Defense Forces activity in the Gaza Strip during last winter’s Operation Cast Lead.”

If Israel can rebut the accusations then it should find the means to do so via a truly independent internal investigation. Just how it does that and what would be considered fair and independent by the outside world is hard to say, but, it is important for Israel itself to make the investigation and to act on any findings. Not because that’s what the UN requires but because Israel must preserve its own moral compass, it must prove primarily to itself that either it is guiltless or if it is not, then how to remedy and rectify its transgressions.

Of course, the Report calls on Hamas to do the same, to investigate its own conduct. This is ludicrous; terrorists do not have a conscience or moral scruples. For Hamas ALL is justified in their Jihad against Israel and, indeed, against the Jews. They have no regard or respect for International Law except to use it to beat Israel with. Their objection to the report was that it confused aggressor with victim – on that score they were dead right, except the aggressor was Hamas and the victim Israel.

The question Israel has to address now is whether there own aggressive act of self-defence, to destroy or disable Hamas before it could pose an existential threat to Israel, was conducted not just according to International Law but Israeli Law and customary law; was their strategy morally and ethically sound, could they have achieved the same goal with less destruction and fewer casualties.

For those whose default position is ‘Israel: evil, rabid, colonial, apartheid, illegitimate, expansionist, American proxy state. Palestine: freedom fighters, oppressed, impoverished victims of injustice and dispossession’, no accounting by Israel will ever be enough; they just want Israel destroyed and look no further than that goal, the consequences of which would be far worse than the status quo.

For those of us with a more temperate view and who have Israel’s and, indeed, the Palestinians’ long-term well-being at heart, Israel must bite the bitter bullet and formulate its own investigation into Operation Cast Lead which avoids accusations of whitewash from all but its bitterest enemies.

Colonel Richard Kemp and the truth about Operation Cast Lead

19/10/2009 / / 1 Comment

If you want an expert, unbiased, dispassionate assessment of the Israel Defense Force during Operation Cast Lead then I refer you to Colonel Richard Kemp who knows more about asymmetric warfare then the whole of the UN Human Rights Council combined:

But the HRC is not interested in truth, only politics and deligitimisation.

Col. Kemp tells it as it is. Thank you,

Goldstone the patsy

19/10/2009 / / 2 Comments

Now that the United Nations Human Rights Council has voted to send the Goldstone report to the UN General Assembly, the head of the fact-finding team that produced the report, Richard Goldstone, is back-pedalling.

Goldstone has been exposed in all his naivety. Just like a ghetto Jew policeman, collaborating with his people’s murderers, Goldstone accepted the role of heading the fact-finding mission. And no sooner than the report is presented to the UNHRC, the resolution recommending it to the UN General Asembly becomes doctored to exclude any mention of Hamas and  to include extraneous materials attacking Israel which were not part of the original brief.

And Goldstone, like a naive Jew collaborator never saw it coming.  The revered jurist, the impartial investigator who produced a report so one-sided as to be obscene. Now he is widely reported as being “saddened” by the resolution as jta.org reports, Goldstone went on to say “”There is not a single phrase condemning Hamas as we have done in the report”

Well that’s naive and disingenuous, isn’t it? Even in the report the condemnation of Hamas was a mere after-thought thrown in, probably at Goldstone’s embarrassed insistence, as a fig-leaf to cover a deeply nasty biased and dangerous report.

So Goldstone finds himself surprised at being the patsy of the anti-Israel league.

You see the resolution of the UNHRC does not mention Hamas AT ALL! Surprise, surprise. The murdering, lying terrorist abomination that calls itself Hamas and who committed every war crime and broke every rule of war, the Geneva convention, customary law and human decency get off scot free whilst Israel is now called a war criminal and its pariah status no doubt enhanced. Meanwhile other countries for whom no investigation and no resolution will ever see the light of day (Russia in Chechnya and South Ossetia, China in Tibet, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe and probably Pakistan) laugh on the sidelines or actively participate in condemning Israel.

This moral inversion, this moral blindness towards Israel and Israel alone is the real crime.

And the UNHRC resolution did not stop at the Goldstone Report. Here’s the extraneous stuff

Reaffirming the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and the inadmissibility of the acquisition of land by the use of force, as enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations

So what’s that got to do with the Gaza conflict?

Affirming the applicability of international human rights law and the international humanitarian law, namely the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem,

That’s OK until ‘to the Occupied Palestinian Territory..’ bit. This has nothing to do with Gaza but a lot to do with final status negotiations. Clearly those sponsoring the resolution have already decided that East Jerusalem is occupied Palestinian Territory even though there is and never has been a Palestinian state. Indeed, the resolution’s title is:

HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN PALESTINE AND OTHER OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES.

Do they mean Iraq? Probably the Golan Heights and Gaza which the UN is determined to call ‘occupied’ even though Israel abandoned it and withdrew all its troops several years ago. It was that very withdrawal which led to Gaza being taken over by Hamas and other terrorist groups who used the Gaza Strip to launch thousands of rockets against Israeli towns and cities and whose actions precipitated the conflict.

Only the naive and the blind could say that the text of the resolution includes Hamas by implication.

Goldstone, meanwhile has defended his Report in the Jerusalem Post and this defence is analysed brilliantly by Alan Baker here.

So like the ghetto policeman, Goldstone, a man of impeccable credentials, has sold his soul. But not because of self-serving, but because he has failed to spot the trap. He has failed to see how many lies and distortions Israel’s enemies are prepared to use against it. He has failed to expose the lies of Hamas, the lies of the Palestinian Authority and the moral inversion of the bleeding-heart human rights lobby for whom the narrative is simple: Israel is the aggressor and Palestinians the victim. End of.

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