Ray Cook - As I See It

Israel, Zionism and the Media

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Israel Report Day 8: Home Thoughts From Abroad

12/08/2014 / / 0 Comments

Today, Israel and Gaza enjoyed the first day of the new three-day truce. As the stuttering talks and posturing in Cairo continues everyone is hoping for a more long-term cessation of hostilities.

George Galloway’s (yimach sh’mo) declaring Bradford an Israeli-free zone has caught the British-Israelis attention here. A suitable response by Israelis in the UK and British Jewish supporters posting images on Facebook and Twitter of their raising the Israeli flag in central Bradford caused some pride and amusement.

The positive response to this from many Bradfordians demonstrates, perhaps, more frustration with Galloway’s track record of supporting dictators and Islamists rather than concentrating on his duties as an MP.

I have a suspicion that many of those giving thumbs up to the Israeli flag do so for Islamphobic reasons rather than philosemitic. However, the Yorkshire Post op-ed slammed Galloway and said that everyone is welcome to Bradford. Galloway is not good for tourism. Other reports say that there has been a huge demand by Israelis and Jews for Bradford Tourist Board information.

Sitting here in Israel, we definitely feel safer, less stressed and more relaxed than in the UK where we are fed a rising tide of latent antisemitism and unbelievable pro-Islamist chic masquerading as support for Gaza. Coupled with this a virulently one-sided press reporting of the Gaza conflict is making life increasingly uneasy for British Jews.

In the UK Jews can no longer feel comfortable walking around with overtly Jewish dress, walking to and from synagogue, wearing – Magen David (Star of David), expressing support for Israel.

Board of Deputies vice-President, Laura Marks, with whom I had the honour of sharing a platform at Manchester Limmud in February, is also here in Israel and in a recent article also describes how much more relaxed she feels here than in the UK, and this from someone who is peerless in her involvement in interfaith work and promoting Jewish values in the UK.

Other prominent Jews also express this sense of unease, including Jewish Chronicle editor, Stephen Pollard.

Jews in the UK and Europe have coped for decades with casual antisemitism and anti-Zionism. Although unpleasant, it rarely affects whole communities.

Unfortunately, it has to be said that the current fears come for a steep rise in an apparent tolerance of Islamist and even mainstream Muslim antisemitism, which is almost always indistinguishable from anti-Zionism.

Jews feel outnumbered. They feel accused and victimised for the policies of a foreign government in a way that Muslims rarely are and Christians never.

They feel that when the Isis, Hamas and Hizbollah flags can be flown and displayed with impunity on the streets of Britain, when ‘political’ demonstrations against Israel’s actions against Hamas in Gaza are peppered with banners comparing Israel to Nazis and overt antisemitism, when these same rallies are supported by mainstream politicians from all parties, then, maybe, their time in the UK and Europe is approaching its end.

Jews are great students of history. They need to be. Down the centuries they have been a settled minority in many civilisations, all of which have, eventually, murdered, expelled, forcibly converted, economically attacked or curtailed their human and civil rights.

We have been labouring under an illusion, it seems. That illusion is that we have been accepted, our contribution honoured, our rights guaranteed, and if we wish to support Israel, that support will not be seen as disloyalty but a natural affinity, and part of our religious and cultural identity.

For some time that identity has been attacked: all over Europe the fundamental tenets of our faith and cultural foundations such as Shechita (animal slaughter) and Brit Milah (circumcision) are subject to legal challenge; areas where we find common cause with Muslims.

But the greatest attack of all is reserved for Israel and Zionism.

It seems that the world forgets why Israel was so necessary in the first place. Antisemitism in Europe is driving thousands of Jews out of the countries of their birth to make ‘aliyah’  to Israel, the very place that is the excuse for and focus of those attacks.

It is a splendid irony that the safe haven of Europe is regarded as less safe than a country surrounded by enemies, or unstable regimes, most of whose citizens would consider Jew-murder a religious imperative.

So whilst in Israel I can enjoy an alternative perspective. I can see the UK and Europe with Israeli eyes and it is not an edifying experience.

Soon I shall be returning to the maelstrom that is Europe. There is a war there for hearts and minds and the Jews are at the epicentre as they were 80 years ago.

Israel Report Day 7: Wandering Jews

11/08/2014 / / 0 Comments

Sunday, a working day in Israel, was spent on a shopping trip into Netanya where we bought absolutely nothing.

Forgetting previous warnings of my wife’s cousins, I ordered lunch which would have served 6 people.

Netanya, surprisingly, perhaps, for what I call Bournemouth-in-Israel, is very cosmopolitan. Languages heard yesterday: Hebrew, English,French, Russian, Arabic and Amharic.

Walking around the Kenyon HaSharon mall once again gives the lie to accusations of Apartheid. I actually saw Arab women go into the same restroom as their Jewish compatriots, and in the restaurant there were no sign for Jews only or Arabs only seating; we all sat together. I know this will be something of a shock to European and American demo placard holders. Awful, isn’t it.

Arab women were very noticeable. They were all immaculately dressed in headscarves and flowing dresses, often beautifully decorated with colourful needlework. Some young Arab girls wore leggings and a hijab.

My wife wandered into a shop specifically catering to Oriental female fashion, whether it be Arab or oriental Jewish. Her Western dress stood out. No-one gave her a second look.

We had a bit of a logistical problem for Monday night: the relatives with whom we are staying are expecting their son and three of his children to arrive that day, and their other son arrived with his two today (Sunday). So no room at the inn, as it were, for us. We did not want to deprive anyone of a bed.

So we went into a couple of hotels to see if they could provide a room for one night. I’m not sure what they thought when they saw a middle-aged couple asking for a room for one night – didn’t really cross my mind, but the first hotel had one on the sixth floor which we were shown by a young Russian-Israeli who told us she came from that part of Russia near Alaska. Nice little room with balcony and panoramic views but it was $240.

The second hotel point-blank refused the middle-aged couple on an apparent tryst.
However, back home, we resolved the logistical problem after much discussion and a few phone-calls. We are staying.

Hopes of another 72 hour ceasefire increased throughout the day and came into effect at midnight. So far, as I write, this Monday morning, it is holding.

Footnote: my special Halifax credit card was rejected yet again! So I am giving up. It could even be it was charged without the restaurant realising it.

I received three more calls from the Sheraton (see day 2 blog) and my money has now been reimbursed although it hasn’t yet appeared on my account.

I shall be having words with the Halifax when I get back to Blighty.

The day ended with my wife and I looking at the ‘Super Moon’. It was very white and very bright. Our cousin’s daughter unimpressed: ‘Looks the same to me’.

Israel Report Days 5 and 6: On the Move

09/08/2014 / / 2 Comments

The last two days have been spent with more of our extensive family in Israel.

On Friday, we travelled to Elad, which is close to Petach Tikva.

There was a bit of a family get together with my wife’s cousin’s family. Their daughter, who is charedi, has a very small apartment with four children. It is quite high up and there were views across to Tel Aviv in the distance.

The kids don’t speak English. I was immediately roped in to a game which is a cross between Monopoly and Snakes and Ladders. The purpose of the game was to collect all you need for Shabbat. When landing on certain squares you have to pick a card which teaches you how to do mitzvot (good deeds) and sometimes has an instruction, like skip one round.

As it would have taken me several minutes to translate, I needed an interpreter. After a while, with about five words of Hebrew and some gesturing, I was communicating adequately with a six-year-old.

Over the very pleasant lunch we played more games which we could all join in. My wife’s cousin asked us all to be a biblical character we drew from my hat. We then had to ask others if they were David HaMelech or Avraham etc. Correct guesses forged teams. Not to sure how the winner was chosen but much fun was had. The second game was a form of charades where several words associated with Judaism, written in Hebrew script, were placed in my hat again! Luck I brought my hat.

When I was asked to explain what was on the paper slips I first had to decipher the Hebrew script which was a bit of a handicap. I scored 6!

At an early stage of our visit we were formally shown where the safe room was. My wife was reading to her 4-year-old cousin twice removed from a book about rabbits burrowing into ground. She turned to my wife and said ‘They are going into the shelters’.

In the afternoon we arrived in Netanya to stay with my wife’s aunt and uncle.
Today, I went to the synagogue where there was a barmitzvah. One of the congregants was a soldier returned from Gaza. He was called up to ‘bentsch gomel’ which is a blessing you make when surviving a life-threatening experience.

At the kiddush after the service, I thought I recognised my optician from Manchester. Maybe, with a different prescription, I would have been sure. We had to leave before I could get any closer.

Hamas are threatening to fire at Tel Aviv tomorrow. We spent some time as armchair politicians discussing how to solve the Gaza conflict. Having decided genocide and ethnic-cleansing are not acceptable options, we were left without an answer.

However, I was left wondering whether Hamas supporters had the same scruples.

Shavua Tov – a good week to all.

Israel Report Day 4: One Wedding and almost Three RTA’s

08/08/2014 / / 1 Comment

Yesterday, Thursday, was a day where normality was overshadowed by my expectation that rocket fire would recommence the following morning.

As I write, Friday morning, that fear has been realised with reports of rocket fire in the area in the immediate vicinity of Gaza. The Iron Dome is back to its work.

Yesterday, we returned to central Tel Aviv and visited Bialik Street. Here there are some fine old buildings and the atmosphere reminded me of Jerusalem.

Beit Bialik was the house of Israel’s national poet Haim Nachman Bialik. It is now a museum dedicated to his life and work. It is a very beautiful house both externally and internally. You can read about it here: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bialik_House

We also visited Beit Ha’Ir the former City Hall. So we learned a lot more about the first Mayor of Tel Aviv, Meir Dizengoff. There is little else of interest in the building. It has an imposing facade.

Outside, in the beautiful square, we saw a recently married couple and their friends posing for wedding photos. Life and love goes on. My wife wished them mazal tov.

We made our way to the beach. Not exactly heaving. It was like Brighton before the First World War.

We had dinner at the Sheraton with my son and watched the sun setting on the last day of the ceasefire.

I was rather annoyed that the credit card I had specifically got to avoid currency charges was not, apparently, accepted and I had to use a second card. The waiter was apologetic. I continued to be British and told them it was not their fault.

The taxi driver who took us home was determined to have an accident; driving in excess of the speed limit he almost rear-ended one car, just avoided a side impact with another car that pulled across him to park and had to brake hard to avoid another which pulled over leaving a few centimetre clearance.

Back home, I received a call from the manager of the restaurant. He apologised profusely for the earlier credit card incident and revealed that the first card had actually worked but did not produce a slip. In all, they had debited my cards four times! He said it would be reveresed on Sunday. We could have free coffee and cake next time we were passing by.

Sleep was hard in expectation of what the morning would bring.

Israel Report Day 3

07/08/2014 / / 2 Comments

Our third day in Israel and the second day of the three day ceasefire period. We decided to go into central Tel Aviv with our son to do a bit of tourism and take the opportunity for some shopping.

I thought I’d have little of any interest to write about, but in Israel, unless you spend your time hermetically sealed in a safe room, there is always a story.

Today was no exception.

I had never been to Beit Ha’Atzma’ut – Independence Hall, where Israel’s Declaration of Independence took place in 1948. So we decided to take a taxi to Rehov Rothschild and make our way there.

Outside, on the central pedestrian area, which divides this wide boulevard, stands a statue of Meir Dizengoff, the first mayor of Tel Aviv. I wondered why his statue stands here and not on Tel Aviv’s most famous street, which is named after him. I was about to find out.

Meanwhile, about that central pedestrian area. Well, it’s not just for pedestrians. You share with cyclists who pedal like car drivers drive in Israel. The best policy is to just ignore them, stick to the marked pedestrian areas, and let them cycle round you. This can be unnerving as they all seem to be participants in the Tour de France who have taken a wrong turn and are desperate to rejoin the peleton.

The central area is clearly demarcated with symbols of bicycles and people. It makes little difference to either group who, with typical Israeli anarchy, choose whichever lane best suits their immediate inclination.

Another typical Israeli touch of humour uses, for the pedestrian ‘lane’, the silhouetted symbol of a clearly orthodox Jewish man, complete with shtreiml and peyot, holding a child’s hand. That reminder of the religious element in the country appears somewhat forlorn, as female cyclists, in skimpy shorts and revealing tops, run over those same symbols in a demonstration of the secular-religious divide.

Back at Beit Ha’Atzma’ut, we enter. I see a group of four elderly people seated on the right. On the left, the desk, with a young lady behind it, and to her right, slouched in a low chair, a young man in a kippah appears to be reading from a religious text.

The young lady takes our money and explains that a ‘seniors’ group is currently in the Hall, and the next guided tour is not for some time. She will first take us into another room and play us a short film. The room which can accommodate about 100 people is completely empty. We sit near the front on hard plastic chairs. Being British, we don’t sit on the front row.

The young lady explains that this building was the house of Dizengoff, first mayor of the city, which he built on the plot of land that was allocated to him in the lottery which established the new town of Tel Aviv in 1909. Hence, his statue outside. On the death of his wife, he converted it to an art gallery in her memory.

In 1948 the building was chosen, and prepared hastily for the Declaration.

The twelve minute film begins. It tells the history of the house, the city and its role in Israel’s independence. Not expecting to be moved, we nevertheless are. My wife is weeping buckets and I wipe away a covert tear and exit back into the entrance, where the young lady informs us that the seniors are almost done. We are ushered through the glass doors and stand respectfully at the top of the small flight of stairs waiting for the guide in the hall to complete his presentation.

Almost as soon as we arrive in position the Hatikvah begins to play, Israel’s poignant national anthem. We stand to attention looking down at the scene of the birth of the State of Israel, listening to Hatikvah. It is a very emotional moment. The tears are not so covert this time.

The seniors make their way out. We smile as they pass and replace them in the now empty hall. Before us the famous portrait of Theodor Herzl, who began the modern political Zionist movement. Either side, four meter high vertical flags of Israel, just as it was in ’48.

Brass plaques sit on the desk behind which the founding fathers sat. Each plaque with the name of those who sat there on that day, and in front of the desk, a set of wooden chairs, also with the names of that day’s participants.

We move around, take photographs and imagine the scene in this place, so familar from the black and white newsreel that we have watched countless times since our youth.

As we leave, the young lady enquires where we are from. She seems surprised. This is the peak season. So many bookings have been cancelled. She thanks us for coming. We should come again in better times, we say. She places her hand on her heart in agreement.

We exit, blinking, into the heat and light of the day. It’s about 30c and humidity is high.

After some shopping and a light snack in the Dizengoff Centre, it’s time to return ‘home’.

Hailing a taxi in Israel you often wonder who you will get. There is a wide range of characters. This time our driver is one of the more garrulous types. He has little English, but engages my son in conversation in Ivrit. I listen and try to understand.

He learns we are English. This precipitates a demonstration of his skills in mimicry as he performs a cockney accent which Dick van Dyke would be proud of:

‘Ooh yeah, Ars’nal, Chelsea, don’t you know…’ moving from the East End to Kensington as Mr Bean.

I tell him that, although I am from London, we are from Manchester. Undeterred he continues:

‘Manchester United, Man City, Liverpool, ooh yeah, don’t you know’.

I attempt to correct his rather poor grasp of Northern English accents and inform him that I am a follower of Tottenham Hotspur.  I make several attempts to teach him how a Londoner would pronounce it as ‘Totn’m’. He gives it a go, but is more Ossie Ardiles than Glenn Hoddle.

In exasperation, and with a hint of mischief, I teach him to say ‘Come on you Spurs’ if ever he should find an Arsenal fan sitting in the back of his taxi.

The conversation soon shifts to the conflict in Gaza. We tell him the many places where our family lives, including those close to Gaza.

He tells us that he has a farm and rides horses. He is not far from Arik Sharon’s hacienda. He is from Netivot, a frequent target of rockets. Many people from the kibbutzim around Gaza come there to shop, he says.

As distracted drivers go, he is one of the most distracted. His hands frequently leave the wheel. with expansive gestures. He weaves in and out of the heavy rush hour traffic. He seems to notice the current status of traffic lights more my divination than observation, and the distance to the car in front is calculated by an uncanny sixth sense that operates even when his head is turned to me in the back.

He informs us, with gestures, that the Scots and their national culture bemuse him. He asks the English for ‘kilt’ and ‘bagpipes’. He suggests that anyone wearing a kilt in Israel would soon have an inquisitve local lifting it to see what lies below.

From comedy often comes tragedy. I am a little concerned that, as he drives at speeds which, to a Brit, would seem a little reckless, seeing that the stationary traffic ahead is only 10 metres away and the speedometer indicates 50. Added to this, he has produced a newspaper and is opening it, resting it on the steering-wheel, at the centrefold.

There, I can see pictures of the sixty-four Israeli soldiers who lost their lives in Operation Protective Edge. Our driver points to one of the boys:

‘I know his father. I went to the funeral. Twenty years old. From Netivot. My town.’

The mood has changed. He points to another native of his city. I know his story already as the driver informs us that his wife gave birth to their son two days after he was killed.

He rants about Gaza. We should never have left. Oslo, Shmoslo. Rabin. Sharon. You cannot trust foreigners to protect Israel. They stab you in the back as soon as look at you.

I am not comfortable with his xenophobia.

In the evening my wife’s second cousin comes to visit. She tells us that in the Soroka hospital in Beersheva there were 67 births this week, the highest since 1948: exactly the same number of Israelis killed in the conflict.

Coincidence?

Israel Report Day 2

06/08/2014 / / 0 Comments

As I reported in yesterday’s blog, posted this morning, I woke with the knowledge that the ceasefire was to begin at 8.00 am.

I woke some time before 8. Then I heard a boom which sounded 5-10 miles away and another more distant one. Apparently a major barrage across central Israel and the Negev. One rocket hit near Bethlehem seriously damaging a Palestinian house. Fortunately, no-one was injured.

This rather contradicts Hamas’s claim that thir rockets only target Jews. But what would the world have said if that rocket hit the Church of the Nativity?

So far, the ceasefire has held all day.

We decided to rest for most of the morning then set off for Tel Aviv. My main impression here was the number of flags hanging from buildings and flying from cars. Not huge flags, but small statements of patriotism and solidarity.

We visited the port of Tel Aviv and Hayaarkon Park where the river runs through and under a sequence of road and pedestrian bridges and widens into a park with a zoo and other facilities.

We watched people canoeing and rowing, and generally messing about in boats. In the distance the towering downtown skyline, so recently streaked with rocket trails and Iron Dome interceptions. I could not help but wonder what the people of Gaza would have made of that scene. I had thoughts of 1st and 3rd world countries butted up against each other and thought of the accusations of Apartheid. But the faces I met on my walk – black, brown, white, Asian, Oriental, Arab and Jew – gave the lie to that. What we have are two peoples living in disturbingly different worlds in the same small space.

One part of haYaarkon Park is given over to collections of black obelisks, flanking plantations of palm trees, each obelisk engraved with the names of Israelis who died in its various wars and from terror attacks.

On one, relatives of the deceased had stuck small ‘yizkor’ or annual remembrace notes attached to now dried and faded flowers, some flanked by the Israeli flag; very poignant in the early evening heat of a Tel Aviv summer rush hour.

Back ‘home’, Israel’s Channel 10 was presenting, as far as I could make out, my Hebrew being rather primitive, a balanced view of the Gaza aftermath; scenes of devastion in Gaza, interviews with Gazans, discussions in the studio, without the haranguing, sarcasm and naked partisan aggression of the British television interviewer whose default manner is to present a tone and facial expression which can only be described as revulsion, reserved exclusively for representatives of the Israeli government.

Other news stories from the UK shown today were the resignation of Baroness Warsi due to her disagreeing with her government’s policy on Gaza, David Miliband’s defence of her, and the Tricycle’s theatre’s hypocritical cancelling of its eight year hosting of the Jewish Film Festival because it is part-funded by the Israeli Embassy.

Being away from the UK certainly gives a different perspective on your own country’s news output. I feel calmer here, not being constantly bombarded by skewed news coverage of Gaza.

There’s no triumphalism in Israel. Too many died.

Israel Report Day 1

05/08/2014 / / 2 Comments

Over the next few days, depending on whether this war continues, I’ll be blogging my experiences here in Israel on what I see, hear, feel and discuss.

Maybe, if calm returns, I and my wife can actually have a holiday and not  spend our time as close to the nearest air raid shelter as possible.

Monday 4th August.

Manchester airport was relatively quiet. I was surprised. Maybe everyone is already on holiday.

I’m not sure why but our tickets indicated we had the privilege of rapid boarding. Maybe the fact that our original flight had been cancelled, or maybe just a mistake.

We sailed through security and into the maze which is the airport duty free area, designed to force you past every bottle of booze and every perfume sampler.

A very short wait and by no means a full planeload of passengers ensured we were sitting in our seats in record time. We were delayed for an hour due to air traffic control in Greece. Not a great start.

I was very impressed by EasyJet. To help with the kids’ boredom the captain opened the cabin door and invited them to come and look at the cockpit. An orderly queue formed. Brilliant PR.

The passengers were very calm and chatty. No indication that we were flying to a war zone. We found it inexplicable that anyone would want to take children on holiday to Israel at this time. I don’t think people understand what it is like. We don’t understand. But at least we have some idea, some sense of trepidation.

Well before the usual time, the pilot informed us that due to the security situation we should return to our seats and make ready to land. The request we should sit in our allocated seat was a reminder that if the unthinkable happened, we could be identified by seat number.

As we crossed the coastline, not the usual euphoria. I looked south toward Gaza trying to imagine the unimaginable suffering and mayhem just a few miles away. But there were no signs of warfare. Just some unexpected cloud cover.

The pot-faced immigration man – and usually they remain so – even managed a smile as he asked us if we had family in Israel and where they were as we reeled of a list of cities and kibbutzim.

My wife’s cousins picked us up from the airport , which was not empty, but certainly well below its usual bustle. It had taken us no more than 15 minutes from leaving the plane and walking through an eerily quiet airport.

Signs for shelters at every turn reminded us of the reality we had just entered.

I could immediately see the strain on our cousins’ faces. As we drove out of the airport, ‘Z’ turned to me and said he had to tell me something. ‘You are immature and irresponsible to come. There is a war. Everyone is in trauma.’

A typical forthright Israeli statement. ‘So you are pleased to see us, then’ I said. ‘Look, we haven’t seen our son for 18 months. We could not know if he would be called up for reserve duty. We had to see him’. The unspoken implication was ‘and what if then something were to happen to him, and we never saw him again’. But such thoughts remain floating in the air without articulation. But they are, nevertheless, understood.

We learned of a second serious incident in Jerusalem that morning, a shooting following the fatality of a man run over by a tractor which turned over a bus.

Later we discovered the driver of the bus was an Arab who wished his fellow Arab attacker should burn in Hell.

On arriving at our cousins’ home, their son told us that yet another truce was agreed starting tomorrow, Tuesday, morning, and this time Hamas had agreed to it and it could be permanent.

We soon found out what we already knew. Our cousins were not among the 90 something percent of Israelis that supported the government’s efforts in Gaza.

‘I don’t like what they are doing to Hamas’. This was a surprise. I was too tired to discuss. They thought that the way Hamas had been treated, the blockade and the economic pressure on Gaza was similar to how Arafat had been isolated in Ramallah. They should have negotiated.

Their son believed Hamas had shown signs of a gradual realisation that they had to make compromises and forgo their fanatical adherence to a genocidal policy. ‘They can see that they have gained nothing and the way they think is that Allah is not giving them any victory here. So they rationalise that to make concessions and convince themselves that it is His will.’

I had the distinct feeling that it was they who were rationalising their own beliefs that you can negotiate with an enemy that is ideologically hell bent on your annihilation.

‘The Egyptians will open up the border. They will be able to export via El Arish and not have to rely on Israel for their economic welfare. Fatah will come and supervise the crossing. Fatah have been doing a lot to stop terrorism in the Est Bank. But a 3rd Intifada is still possible .’

‘Gaza is like a prison. They need to be able to breathe’.

I write this Tuesday morning. It is 8.00 am. There is supposed to be a truce. I just heard my first explosion, I think. Some way off.  No sirens. Dogs barked. Was that a second even further off?

Internet is down. I’ll post this later.

It’s back.

Prezza on Gaza

30/07/2014 / / 4 Comments

I quite like former Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott.

Here’s a man, by no means perfect, like all of us, but a man who, from humble origins rose to be Deputy Prime Minister.

I respect his lifelong battle for social justice and to better the lives of working people.

Yes, I know about 2-Jags, his affair, his hatred of eggs, especially when aimed at his head.

But there is something to admire in his pugnacity. He’s an old-style socialist and it shows.

His piece in The Daily Mirror today, ‘Israel’s bombardment of Gaza is a war crime – and it must end’, where he weighs in on the conflict on Gaza, is ignorant and provocative because of its ignorance.

And I am not alone in this view because, at the end of the article is a chance to vote if you agree or not, and all day the ‘No’ vote has been over 80%.

So let’s see what he has to say:

Imagine a country claiming the lives of nearly three times as many as were lost in the MH17 plane tragedy in less than three weeks.

Hey, John, heard about Syria? heard about the 170,000 deaths there and millions as refugees? Heard that in one day Assad kills more than in those three weeks?

Of course, comparing a greater evil does not excuse a lesser, but one wonders whether he wrote anything about Syria yet. So let’s check.

Well, I found this: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/09/06/tony-blair-wrong-on-syria_n_3879904.html where he agrees with his party leader Ed Miliband that military intervention in Syria is wrong. So, you might say, his distaste for toppling dictators has allowed Assad free rein to murder thousands of Palestinians, for example, in Yarmouk.

Difficult one, isn’t it John? Tony Blair was wrong on Iraq, he says, so Ed must be right on Syria.

Yet, I have not found that he has ever written about war crimes in Syria or anywhere else. Why is that?

A nation which blasted a hospital, shelled and killed children from a gunboat as they played football on the beach and was responsible for 1,000 deaths, at least 165 of them children, in just two weeks.

The death of those boys is horrifying.

There are no excuses.

Accidents happen in war – I know that’s easy to say when innocent life is lost. Yet, those boys were playing near an area where Hamas had been firing at the Israelis. What parent would allow his kids to be playing in a war zone in an area where Hamas were known to have been located. In those circumstances tragedy can happen.

Is Prescott suggesting it was deliberate?  Did the British never kill children in Afghanistan or Iraq? Does John know that 160 children died building Hamas’s terror tunnels by Hamas’s own admission. Does he care about that deliberate abuse of the children? Does he worry about the hundreds of kids, even babies, dressed in Hamas combat uniforms, toting weapons? Did he see the video of a father showing a kid how to fire a rocket launcher on a beach just like the one the four boys were killed on? What does John have to say about that?

Shelling a hospital? Which hospital is he talking about? Hamas fire from hospitals, store weapons in hospitals, conduct their operations from hospitals. All war crimes. Did John hear the recording of a phone call to someone associated with the Wafa hospital asking time and again if there were any patients in that hospital because Israel wanted to return fire coming from that building but, under international law, could not do so unless the hospital were evacuated completely? When that confirmation was given, the building was attacked. Not before. Does John even wonder why they would do that? Does he know it was being used as a command centre?

Gaza lost a hospital because it lost its protected status when Hamas chose to use it to fire at its enemy.

The Shifa hospital was also struck. Israeli images showed that 4 rockets had been fired from behind the hospital; one was intercepted over Ashkelon, one landed on or near the hospital, one fell out to sea and one also fell short in northern Gaza. In fact, 10% of all rockets fired from Gaza fall short. We do not know what damage they do or who they kill because Hamas are quick to clear up their own mess and we now know that thanks to Italian reporter Gabriele Barbati:

Twitter___gabrielebarbati__Out_of__Gaza_far_from__Hamas____

Let’s just read that again. ‘Out of Gaza far from Hamas retaliation. In other words, Hamas are intimidating journos in Gaza and hiding their crimes and the deaths they themselves cause. Yet, people like John Prescott are all too willing to attribute every death, every explosion to Israel, as if the other side wasn’t firing at all.

Surely it would be branded a pariah state, condemned by the United Nations, the US and the UK. The calls for regime change would be ­deafening.

An outrageous and calumnious statement full of moral equivalence and moral bankruptcy.

‘Regime change’? Is he suggesting Israel is a dictatorship like Iraq? The only democratic country in the Middle East, with a world-renowned independent judiciary, freedom of the press, full rights for all its citizens, freedom of religion? Is he serious?

Israel, a pariah state for defending itself against an Islamo-fascist murderous regime that deliberately uses its own people as political cannon fodder? How dare he suggest Israel can be a pariah state and not Iran or Syria or any number of oppressive regimes funding murder, intolerance, oppression of women and gays?

Israel’s hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu trots out the same excuses. Hamas “militants” in Gaza fired their rockets first. Israel has a right to defend itself. It needs to protect its citizens.

Excuses? Here’s a man who is not keen on a swift retaliation against an aggressor? Think again.

Err.. that was just a little egg, John, not 2000 rockets with high-explosives. And these are ‘excuses’?

And he’s right on all three counts – but as always with Israel this is not the full story. The military action supposedly targeting Hamas is so brutally disproportionate and so grossly indiscriminate that it makes it impossible not to view Israel’s actions as war crimes.

Does it? Who says? That’s opinion. Accusing anyone or any state of war crimes is a serious accusation. You need evidence, legal opinions, full investigations and, in Israel’s case, a ready kangaroo court to jump to conclusions. John needs to look up the laws of proportionality. He also needs to understand that this is asymmetric warfare with an enemy that fires indiscriminately at civilians (war crime) from urban areas (war crime) and then hides underground.

Indiscriminate. 1100 deaths, at least 40% combatants, in over 2000 separate attacks. That doesn’t sound indiscriminate. Warning people and evacuating them (where can they go!? You’d rather they die?) is not indiscriminate. Making phone calls, dropping leaflets is not indiscriminate. What is indiscriminate are the Hamas rockets, especially those dozens that fall short and kill their own people. But even that is a victory because journalists are not allowed to film it so they can blame Israel, and everyone complies nicely – or else!

When you are fighting an enemy that simply wants to murder you and your children, says so repeatedly, and proves its intentions with bombs, mortars, suicide attacks, missiles – what would you do to protect yourself and your family and how would you fight? Just think about it. Are you a military expert? Do you understand how Hamas operates? Really? Do you know that it actually wants people to die so that YOU are shocked because YOU have moral scruples and human empathy, but THEY do not.

THEY intimidate journalists, murder collaborators and drag them through the street; they kill people who simply protest against them. They are evil monsters. YOU try dealing with them without harming a lot of innocents.

 Those who live in Gaza are kept like prisoners behind walls and fences, unable to escape the bombings, and an Israeli economic blockade has forced Palestinians into poverty.

Well, Egypt frequently closes its Rafah crossing and has a border with Gaza where not a lot gets through. Why don’t you mention that. On the other hand Israel does the following:

  • Cogat report just for today when there’s a bloody war going on: http://www.cogat.idf.il/901-11564-en/Cogat.aspx
  • Israel provides, directly or indirectly, all Gaza’s electricity – and Gaza does not pay for it.
  • Thousands of Gazans are treating free in Israeli hospitals.

In fact, there is no siege. But there is a maritime blockade because Iran and others send the rockets and weaponry Hamas uses, and would send much more if ships were allowed to dock unchallenged. Can you imagine what they would send? There is a relatively small list of restricted goods which can be used for building Hamas terror infrastructure. This does not include any food items.

Meanwhile, Israel has allowed in, under international pressure, the very concrete used to produce terror tunnels.

Israel’s Iron Dome defence system easily intercepts missiles launched from Gaza. Three Israeli citizens have died from these ­primitive rockets, with 32 soldiers killed fighting Hamas.

This is the usual argument of a Hamas apologist. They are primitive. Really? Grad and Fajr rockets are primitive? So primitive they can close an airport? And the ‘home-made’ ones may be unsophisticated, but they still can kill. Is John saying that Israel’s actions would be justified if more Israelis were killed? Is Israel to blame that it defends its citizens whilst there are no bomb shelters in Gaza, but an extensive network of tunnels used to murder Israelis, not to protect Gazans.

Britain just allowed the Luftwaffe to bomb it, to send V1’s and V2’s without response, did it John? Does Dresden ring any bells?

Compare that to the toll in Gaza. Of the 1,000-plus to die, more than 80 per cent were ­civilians, mostly women and children.

See above for the ‘fair-play’ idea of warfare. In war you want your people to live, unless you are Hamas. As for the lie about ‘mostly women and children’ no-one has managed to find a dead terrorist yet. But Al Jazeera has. Look at this from Elder of Ziyon. It demonstrates that the demographic of deaths clearly indicates that the claim most are civilians is not just false but an utter distortion. And bear in mind that Hamas uses suicide bombers as young as 14.

Israel brands them terrorists but it is acting as judge, jury and ­executioner in the ­concentration camp that is Gaza

Wow, John. No terrorists in Gaza then. But using the term ‘Concentration Camp’, a clear reference to the Holocaust is beneath him. Yet it is a common image used by ‘critics” of Israel who want a genocidal, pathological, fascist regime to have free access to Israel – and Egypt – import what it chooses and to bring death and destruction to Israel.

Well, Jews actually are well aware of what a concentration camp or a death-camp is and we don’t need lessons from Prezza. Because if he has his way and allows the harmless Hamas regime with its fireworks free rein, there really would be concentration camps, and it would be Israeli Jews that would be in them. Prescott’s apologia for a terror organisation is disgusting.

And Israel flouts international law by continuing to build illegal Jewish settlements. Why? Because it knows it can get away with it.

What has that got to do with Gaza? it’s a whole different question. Hamas is not about settlements or blockades, it’s about genocide of the Jewish people – read their charter John.

What happened to the Jewish people at the hands of the Nazis is appalling. But you would think those atrocities would give Israelis a unique sense of perspective and empathy with the victims of a ghetto.

I’m puking my guts that John would use this well-worn and outrageous comparison between Israel’s actions and the those of the Nazis. This is actually antisemitic by the definition approved by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) :

‘Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.‘

I don’t believe he is antisemitic, but this is shameful and ignorant.

Hamas is wrong to continue its rocket attacks and must ­recognise ­Israel’s right to exist.

That’s the problem, John. They never will and it’s that little factlet on which every argument against Israel’s actions ultimately fail.

But as Channel 4’s Jon Snow said this week: “If you strangle a people, deny them supply for years, extreme reaction is inevitable.

Firstly, they are ‘strangled’ due to their own actions and those of their government. They have adequate supplies. Did you ever see a starving person on all the videos in Gaza? And they seem to have plenty of supplies of guns and mortars and anti-tank rounds and thousands of missiles. And when they do get building materials, they build tunnels. Hardly Israel’s fault.

‘Extreme reaction is inevitable’. NO IT IS NOT. The extreme reaction was Hamas turning Gaza into an armed camp after Israel abandoned the territory in 2005. There were no blockades or sieges then. It was Hamas’s firing of rockets and using Gaza as a proxy base for Iran to attack Israel that led to subsequent events and wars. FACT.

Is it not truly ‘disproportionate’ to want to exterminate every Jew with missiles and guns? The usual causal inversion and moral blindness is alive and well. Someone threw an egg at Prezza and he tried to flatten him. He didn’t try to flatten him first, and then the guy threw the egg. But in the world of Israel-bashing, the right hook came first, and then the egg.

This is the fundamental conflation of two sets of circumstances: sympathy for the plight of Palestinians, especially in Gaza, and the fact that Hamas is governing them.

No one with an ounce of humanity could feel anything but horror at what is happening and what has happened before. It’s heart-breaking. But it is the responsibility for that plight that is the issue, and the responsibility for the necessity for Israel to protect itself and bring quiet and security to its citizens that is always ignored. Oh yes, politicians and Hamas terror apologists always add that qualifier to show they are being ‘fair’ to Israel, but they expect them to do so with hands tied behind their back.

Nevertheless, there is always justification in questioning the military tactics of Israel. Israelis do it. Frequently. They demonstrate against it. Gazans do not have that privilege.

It’s very easy to empathise with the people of Gaza. It’s very easy to see Israel as the bad guy and not the terrorists because, not only do they physically hide behind their population, they give YOU an excuse to ignore and hide their crimes because YOU are too busy being morally outraged by what you see and hear and are fed, by proxy, by Hamas itself.

The question remains: what would you do and how would you do it? And don’t say ‘negotiate’ because Hamas will not. Don’t say ‘lift the blockade’ because that is just an excuse and a ploy.

It’s very simple. Get rid of Hamas and the problem goes away. Stop hating Jews and the problem goes away. Stop firing rockets and trying to kill and kidnap, the problem goes away.

Shame is, a lot of people believe exactly what Prezza believes. But not the readers of this opinion piece though, according to the vote.

** Latest – vote has now swung in favour. I guess it was too good to be true.

This is Israel

29/07/2014 / / 0 Comments

[This is the text of a speech I made yesterday at meeting of my synagogue to offer prayers for peace, and support for Israel]

Dear friends – thank you. Thank you for coming to show your support and love for the State of Israel and the Jewish people.

I shouldn’t be here tonight. I should be in Israel with my wife visiting our son who lives in Tel Aviv, and our family across Israel. But President Obama tried a little BDS (Boycott Divestment and Sanctions) of his own, and our flight was cancelled. So it is beshert that I am here to address you this evening. Im yirtzeh hashem we shall be flying out in the near future.

I want to tell what I and my wife have been doing for the last few weeks every waking moment available to us.

My wife with her phone, I with my iPad have followed every heartbreak, every attack on Israel and the Jewish people, every act of unspeakable evil and every act of unimaginable bravery.

We wept with the families of the fallen, we woke every morning wondering how many more of our beautiful young boys were gone, and how many more families would lose a son, a husband, father a brother.

We watched in awe as 30,000 people braved sirens and rockets to attend the levaya (funeral) of a lone soldier who had no family in Israel. I followed on Twitter calls for people to attend shiva houses (of mourning) of the fallen chayalim bodedim – lone soldiers. It was truly amazing to see. Many of the people I follow on Twitter in Israel actually attended these funerals.

This is Israel. This is the Israel we know and love.

And all through these long weeks we have been phoning relatives in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Netanya, Gan Yavne, Kiryat Ono to ask how they are coping. Did they have to run to a shelter? Are they OK?

You know at that this time more than 2500 rockets have been fired into Israel from Eilat in the South to Rosh Hanikrah in the North. In the last decade at least 12,000 have been fired at Israel.

For weeks, we have sat wondering to ourselves: will our son be called up as a reservist. Would he have to fight? So far, he has not baruch hashem, thank G-d. Very few of us here are completely unaffected by events in Israel; I’m sure many of you have children or grandchildren, relatives and friends in Israel.

I downloaded an app called Red Alert. Every time a rocket is fired into Israel it will sound an alarm that you can configure – you can chose whether it is a wailing siren or a woman saying ‘Tzeva adom tzeva adom’ – Red alert. This so freaked out my wife as my iPad was telling us every few minutes that a rocket was fired at somewhere in Israel that I had to change the noise to be like an email alert. Each time my wife asked – where was that one? Was it Tel Aviv? Was anyone hurt?

This is how we have lived these last few weeks – can you imagine what it is like over there? I’m sure some of you have been and can tell us your own experiences.

We have had to face the surreal knowledge that in a few days we would be entering a war zone ourselves.

As someone who for years now has been involved in hasbara and has used social media to counter lies and distortions and to get the truth about Israel out there, I have been just one of an international network of people who are active on Twitter, on blogs, Facebook and even on the Television and radio here in the UK, Israel, the United States and across the world.

So, what have I learned, then, these last few weeks. Here are some highlights and lowlights.

Well, guess what! Those who say anti-zionism is not anti-semitism have been shown to be seriously deluded. Although criticism of the policies of the Israeli government is a perfectly legitimate exercise, and one mostly performed in Israel itself, the vast majority of anti-Israel bashing is clearly antisemitic.

In France a traumatised Jewish community numbering more than 350,000 has been subjected to what can only be called pogroms. After a so-called pro-Palestinian demo in Paris, congregants in a shul – ironically called ‘de la Roquette’ – were besieged by a baying mob of stone-throwing and knife-wielding Muslims. Only the police saved them from a lynching. Nine synagogues in France have been attacked, even fire bombed. Jewish shops and businesses burned to the ground. Hundreds of French Jews have made aliyah (emigrated) to Israel, where one said he would rather sit in a bomb shelter in Tel Aviv than walk on a street in Paris wearing a kippah.

On Facebook they created a page with the photos and names of French Jews so that they can be attacked. In Paris a Jew was recognised and attacked by fifteen thugs as people looked on.

In Belfast the shul had its windows smashed – twice.

In Manchester, after the pro-Palestinian rally, a convoy of Blackburn Muslims, who had probably never spoken to a Jew in their life, terrorised Jews in Broughton Park, throwing eggs and insults and shouting ‘Heil Hitler’.  Indeed, Hitler’s popularity is at its highest for about 70 years.

On Shabbos, a member of this congregation told us how the Kedem shop in King Street has been besieged for a week, and he urged all of us to support the pro-Israel contingent against an aggressive mob of hardline left-wing activists and Muslims who had tried to block the entrance to the shop and had terrorised staff.

In London and Paris, in Berlin and in Belgium and Holland and even in Cardiff violent pro-Palestinian demonstrators held banners which compared Israel and the Jews to the Nazis, called for ‘death to the Jews’, or chanted ‘Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the Gas’ and other unspeakable horrors, unchallenged by police, or the public. The Hamas, Hizbollah and ISIS flags were freely carried without hindrance. In Bradford and Preston the Town Halls took down the Union Flag, our national flag, and raised the Palestinian in an act of solidarity; something they failed to do for the thousands of Palestinians killed in Syria for the last three years.

In Paris, those ever ready to associate Zionism with Nazism gleefully made the antisemitic quenelle salute, a version of the Nazi salute, and called for another Holocaust – the one they all deny ever happened, of course; yet it is Israelis who are the Nazis?

A Turkish shop in Liège in Belgium bore a sign in the window saying ‘Dogs are welcome, but not Jews’.

The Turkish Prime Minister Recip Tayib Erdogan said what the Israelis are doing in Gaza is 100 times worse than what the Nazis did to the Jews.

And the United States is not immune with violent rallies against Israel across the country, even in Miami.

Meanwhile, in the UK the Liberal Democrat MP, David Ward, tweeted ‘Ich bin ein Palestinian’ and that if he were in Gaza, would he fire a rocket? yes, I probably would, he said. In other words, he would be prepared to commit a war crime by firing a rocket indiscriminately at Israeli civilians, presumably as form of ‘collective punishment’.

After a storm of protests on Twitter, in which I took part, his colleague, ex MEP Edward McMillan-Scott, stood up for Mr Ward and called the Board of Deputies (so that includes me) a ‘ frightful bag of disputatious Jews’ .

Talking of ‘frightful bags’, on BBC Newsnight that evening, Baroness Jenny Tonge thought Israelis are so despicable that she would also be prepared to commit a war crime against Israel were she to be in Gaza. This is the same woman who once said she could empathise with suicide bombers.

The media and social media talk endlessly of ‘proportionality’ without the slightest idea of the actual definition of this term in international law, in the hope that, it seems, more Israelis will be killed to satisfy their desire for some obscene arithmetic idea of ‘fair play’, as if war were a Sunday afternoon cricket match, not about justice and righteousness or self-preservation in the face of a pathological and suicidal enemy.

Without the Iron Dome, can you imagine how many more Gazans would have died, let alone Israelis. I say that because without the Iron Dome Israel would have to have acted with far, far greater force.

Yet they mock the rockets as harmless homemade fireworks – even though many are provided by Iran – in order to accuse Israel of disproportionality. Because Israel protects its citizens with this technology, they expect Israel to sit back and just allow rockets to rain down on them because, unlike any other nation, they don’t believe Israel has a right to protect itself. And these rockets can, and have killed, and wrought destruction, fear and trauma especially to young children. And, if they are so harmless, how come airlines decided it was too dangerous to land at Ben Gurion?

And yet these same pedlars of semantic mendacity are not concerned that in Syria 170,000 people have died, including thousands in the Palestinian refugee camp of Yarmouk, Millions are refugees. Did you see any demos in London or Paris about that?

In Iraq, the most evil gang of criminals since the Nazis, ISIS or ISIL, or whatever acronym of evil they now use, are trying to outdo them, killing thousands, ending 1800 years of Christian life in Mosul in Iraq, spreading terror, destroying mosques and churches and precious historical artifacts, the tombs of saints and prophets. And all in the name of the same god that inspires Hamas and their criminal allies. Where are the mass demonstrations? Where are pogroms against Muslims? Where the outrage? Where are the Methodists? Where the Quakers? All we get is a shrug and a soon-forgotten op-ed in one of the dailies.

Yet, if the State of Israel dares to defend itself against a decade during which barely a day has passed without a rocket, an attempted infiltration to kidnap or murder, or a mortar attack against a school bus, the UNHRC ( a mockery of the words ‘human’ and ‘rights’ but definitely ‘united’ against one state – Israel) the UNHRC, a bunch of gangster states that would make the Mafia blush, is falling over itself to launch a war crimes investigation, whilst completely ignoring the Hamas rockets and terror. There have been 32 UNHRC resolutions, 26 of them against Israel and no more than one or even none at all for Syria, Sudan, Russia, China, Nigeria, Mexico, Sri Lanka or Iran.

Ironically, in the 2014 UN Human Development index, Israel came 19th. France was 20th. Not one of Israel’s neighbours came in the top 50, and the ‘State of Palestine’ has a higher index than most other Arab or even Muslim states. So much for genocide..

This is the world we live in.

But it is at times like this when we should take great pride in Israel which shines like a beacon of hope and goodness; yet much of the world is blind to it. Their ignorance of history, their political ideologies, their religion, yes, their prejudice and culturally acceptable thinly-disguised antisemitism, fuels hatred, violence and death, stoked by the media, politicians, and the Internet.

Israelis, and we who support them, we who have morals and scruples, we who abhor death and embrace life, are forced to witness death and destruction and human suffering visited on the people of Gaza, who are as much the victims of Hamas terror – maybe more so – as the people of Israel.

We take no joy or satisfaction in the death of a single innocent, yet they cheer and jeer the death of an Israeli soldier or a civilian, whilst their apologists toss ancient blood libels at Jews like the sweets the Palestinians hand out to their children to celebrate their cult of death.

Today the famous words of Prime Minister Golda Meir are still true: “We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.”

They use their people as human shields, preventing them from leaving their homes when Israel warns of imminent attack, physically intimidating and beating them so that they will be killed to provide a photo-op for the gullible press, who would rather believe the representative of a terror organisation than a member of the Israeli government.

They hide weapons in schools, mosques and hospitals, they booby trap homes and fire from those same homes and from protected buildings.

But Jeremy Bowen ‘sees no evidence of human shields’.

Did you know that 5 years ago Hamas itself and other observers revealed that 160 children, who they used to build the tunnels, were killed in those tunnels? Yet it is Israel and the Jews that are the child-killers, the baby murderers.

I’m sure many of you would have seen the graphics on social media and heard the words of Bibi Netanyahu – ‘we protect our civilians with our missiles, they protect their missiles with their civilians’.

$100m at least spent on several kilometres of terror tunnels, and not a single bomb shelter in Gaza, except the ones in the basements of hospitals where their cowardly leaders hide. Did you know that Hamas have a command centre in an office next to the emergency room in Shifa hospital?

Another aspect of the anti-Israel hatred, which for so long has permeated the media, is the corruption of the language of the Holocaust and our national suffering, referring to Gaza as a ‘concentration camp’ or the ‘Warsaw ghetto’. The Arab population of both Gaza and the Territories has grown steadily, yet Israel is committing ‘genocide’ a word never used in reference to Syria or Iraq.

Even our own political leaders, even Jewish ones, have characterised Gaza in terms of the Holocaust; Gaza where life expectancy is higher than parts of Glasgow.

Meanwhile, Israel sends through its crossings hundreds of truckloads of medical equipment and aid every single week, and even the cement used to build the terror tunnels. Whilst at other crossings, hundreds of Palestinians are taken for free medical care to the Rambam hospital in Haifa or the Soroka in Beersheva – even wounded terrorists!

This is Israel.

Only Israel would build a field hospital to treat the civilians of their enemy, and only Israel would have it shelled deliberately by that same enemy, who try to prevent their own people from using it.

Only Israel would have utility workers ready to risk their lives to repair pylons and infrastructure damaged by their enemy so that the innocent could watch Hamas TV courtesy of an Israeli technician, and so that terrorists could continue to use that same power for their malign purposes. Electricity which, by the way, Israel provides for free, anyway.

This is Israel.

Dear friends, sometimes I feel that the darkness is closing in on us. We are relatively safe here in the UK, but it can change quickly. Who would have thought that the 1930’s would return in the second decade of the 21st century. My mother a’h used to tell me that she was often told to ‘Go back to Palestine’ now they are telling Israelis to ‘go back to Poland’.

Yet, this is not the 1930’s. Today we have, b’h the State of Israel and every pogrom, every UN resolution, every rocket, every attack on a Jew proves how necessary it is for us to have our own state where we can be the masters of our own destiny. By attacking Israel and calling for its destruction and the murder of every Jew, they strengthen our will and our determination to survive and prosper as a people and to be a light unto the nations.

They spew hate, we generate love. They tear down, we build. They bring death and destruction, we bring life, medical breakthroughs, technology to feed the world. Israel sends water technologists to Africa, rescue and medical teams to Haiti and Japan when disasters strike. Israelis and Jews win Nobel prizes  ‘disproportionately’ to their numbers.

The lovers of death are the absolute antithesis of what we are as a people.

So my message to you tonight is this: stand firm and stand tall and proud of what we are and what we do. Support Israel. Buy Israeli goods, go to Israel for a holiday, tell your colleagues about Israeli achievements. Tell them what they don’t see on the TV or hear on the radio or read in the newspapers. Learn history. Read about Israel. Arm yourself with knowledge, and don’t believe the lies and distortions fed to you by the BBC or SKY News.  Write to the media. Write to your MP. Sign petitions. Respond to calls for action from the Board of Deputies or the Rep Council.

Let me finish with a final story from my online life.

Today, one of the biggest heroes in Israel is the Colonel of the Golani Brigade, which has taken many casualties in Gaza. He led his men from the front rather than from a luxury hotel in Qatar. He was wounded and hospitalised. He begged the doctors to allow him to go back and lead his men. He did just that with the scars still livid on his handsome face. He is a lion of Israel. His name is Ghassan Alian. He is not a Jew, but a Druze.

This is Israel.

Kol haKavod lo. May Hashem bless all the good works of his hands and those of his men and all the IDF.

Chazak ve’amatz

Am Yisrael Chai

Elder of Ziyon: An open condemnation of the murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir

06/07/2014 / / 0 Comments

I have just signed this condemnation:

An open condemnation of the murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir

We unequivocally condemn the horrific murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir. It was unjustifiable under any circumstances. The killing was reprehensible and we hope that the criminals who did this sickening act are found and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Israel is a country run by the rule of law. There are reports that Jews have been arrested for this crime. If a trial finds that Jews are indeed guilty of this unconscionable killing, our condemnation is redoubled. The idea that Jews could do such an act fills us with shame and horror.

The people who murdered Mohammed do not represent us in any way. It is not enough to dissociate ourselves from the dreadful act; we must also ensure that crimes like this are never repeated.

Just as the appalling murders of Naftali Fraenkel, Eyal Yifrach and Gilad Shaar do not in any way justify the hideous murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir, neither does Khdeir’s murder justify the violence, terrorism, destruction and incitement we have seen over the past few days against Israelis and Jews.

We hope and pray that everyone, Arab and Jew, lives in peace and security in the region.

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