October 7 Seen in Context 

ICJ: Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh's powerful closing statement in South Africa case against Israel 

Today is the day that the International Court of Justice makes its decision. I hesitate to speculate as to what the decision might be. Will they issue an interim injunction to Israel to desist from its genocidal activities or will it end up with a fudge or compromise instructing Israel to protect the civilian population and take more care. In which case Israel will proclaim that they are already doing that.

I hesitate to make a prediction but nonetheless I will. The Court has come under an immense amount of political pressure.  The United States has already said that the case that South Africa has brought to be ‘“meritless, counterproductive, and completely without any basis in fact whatsoever.”. The UK under Sunak has played its traditional role, which is one of being America’s faithful lapdog and Keir Starmer has played his normal role of follow my leader.

Happy to report that this video garnered more than 100,000 views within the first couple of hours on IG.

Over the last 111 days, since October 7, Isræl has consistently denied targeting civilians. Well, in this video, I am going to show you that in the history of its… pic.twitter.com/076QZ2QcYp

— Sara El-Yafi (@SaraYafi) January 25, 2024

There is no doubt that if the decision were made on purely legal grounds then South Africa would win hands down. That is the opinion of international law experts. However this is not a court that bases its decisions on legality. It is a political court and its judges are political appointees.

Therefore, although I would love the court to come to a clear-cut decision instructing Israel to stop its genocidal attacks my fear is that the court will fudge the decision and engage in meaningless soundbites. It will criticize Israel without having the courage to issue an injunction instructing it to stop the genocide that is taking place.

Children About To Be Shot

I sincerely hope that I am wrong but I fear otherwise. Israel has already made it crystal clear that it will defy an injunction to stop committing genocide. That means a decision instructing it to desist from further military activities it will go to the Security Council for enforcement.

The United States will then veto the resolution and under the Uniting for Peace resolution 377 (V) it will then go to the General Assembly. It is anyone’s guess what could happen then but theoretically the General Assembly could suspend Israel’s membership of the United Nations. If Israel was suspended it is likely that the United States would walk out and the British poodle could follow them.

This scenario must be playing on the minds of the ICJ which is why I don’t believe that they will deliver the verdict that most people want. No one doubts that legally South Africa has clearly met the test of showing intent on Israel’s part to commit genocide. Indeed it is already doing just that and its spokespersons, from the President and Prime Minister down have made their genocidal intentions clear to all.

No one doubts that Irish lawyer Blinne Ni Ghralaigh made a devastating closing speech. If it was simply about the case that South Africa made then it would win hands down but my fear is that this court will allow political considerations to intervene.

Murder of Man With White Flag

If however the ICJ does do as I predict then that will be seen as the death of international human rights law. If the highest court in the world cannot implement the law when there is such an egregious example of genocide taking place under its very eyes, then international law is meaningless.

The other question I have posed is how October 7^th will come to be seen in years to come. Again I hesitate to make predictions but I am convinced that we are seeing the beginning of the end of Zionism.

Zionism was always an unnatural political creature and Israel even more so. Israel, even its Jewish part, has never been able to decide what its identity was. Was it Jewish first or Israeli first? This is a question on which Israeli Jews themselves are split.

International Court of Justice

October 7 has also made ‘normalisation’ between the treacherous and corrupt Arab regimes and Israel that much harder though one cannot put it past creatures such as Saudi Arabia’s MBS to plough on nonetheless.

However the rise of the Houthis and Hezbollah coupled with the fierce resistance of Hamas and the other militias in Gaza has destroyed the myth of invincibility that the Israeli state likes to cloak itself with. Israel may be a nuclear power but despite the wishes of certain far right Israeli ministers it is unlikely to want to create a radioactive desert in the Middle East.

It is just possible that Israel pre-1967 could have turned into a normal bourgeois state, albeit one with repressive and authoritarian tendencies. After 1967 and the conquering of the territories with the growth of what Yeshayahu Leibowitz called the Judeo-Nazis this became impossible.

Today we see the far right settler parties driving Israel’s political agenda and we saw, pre-October 7 the massive demonstrations in Israel over the judicial reforms. What October 7 postponed will not go away. We are seeing the symptoms of those divisions in the growing political crisis in Israel over the hostages as it becomes clear that Netanyahu, Smotrich and Ben Gvir wish to pursue their war aims regardless of its effect on the hostages.

Given the choice between killing Palestinians and saving the hostages Netanyahu and co. unhesitatingly choose the former.

The relatives of the hostages though are becoming more and more desperate as they know that the longer the war goes on, the more of them will die. These divisions roughly correspond with the divisions over the judicial reforms.

The current government has effectively declared war on the Palestinians, not only in Gaza but the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority is barely able to survive as the Israeli government ignores this Vichy style administration that the Oslo Accords gave birth to. It is doubtful that this bastard child of Oslo will long survive.

Ever since July the war on Jenin in particular, but also Nablus and Tulkarem has gone on. I am told that there hasn’t been one peaceful night in Jenin since July. I know because I fundraise for the Al Tafawk Children’s Centre there.

There is now a war between the settlers, armed by Ben Gvir and the Palestinians. A war whose purpose is ethnic cleansing.

I once asked myself if there is anything that Israel could do which the United States would sanction it for. The answer that I have drawn is no. Whatever protestations made by Biden and Blinken they continue to arm Israel.

The key question that is posed today is how to get rid of the ‘Jewish’ settler-colonial state, a state of Jewish supremacy and Apartheid. War with Lebanon seems increasingly likely and if that happens the conflagration is likely to spread to Iraq and Iran. The whole region is slipping inexorably into war.

The Houthis have shown the way but others in the region are not far behind. The Abraham Accords have been show to be built on sand.

The reality is that if the repressive and rotten Arab regimes had taken a leaf out of the Houthis book and embargoed the oil, as they did in 1973, then the United States would have stopped the genocide in its tracks.

Above all the question of Zionism and its demise is integrally liked with the death of the Arab regimes, especially Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Tony Greenstein  

See also What will the ICJ announce on Israel’s Gaza war? The possible scenarios

 On the Eve of Holocaust Memorial Day Israel has been Found by the International Court of Justice To Have Been Perpetrating a Genocide

Register in advance for this webinar here

http://tinyurl.com/mr49ufvh

ICJ interim ruling on genocide case against Israel - Live

It is a comforting myth, not least to the German State, the heir to the Nazi murderers, to believe that the State of Israel was gifted to the Jews in compensation for the Holocaust.

Like all such myths it carries within it the danger that it will imbue those who claim to inherit the memory of those who died, with the power to repeat what happened before. And thus it has come to pass that Israel has been found to have perpetrated genocide in Gaza in the  name of the Jewish Holocaust.

It is a myth that Israel was created because of the Holocaust. If that were true why is there no Roma or Gypsy state? Why have the Gypsies and Roma not been offered compensation equivalent to Germany’s reparations to Israel? The Gypsies continue to be hounded and persecuted in Europe.

In fact the colonisation of Palestine by Zionist settlers began in 1882 not 1945. The Holocaust was, as far as the Zionist leaders were concerned fortuitous in that it enormously strengthened their project. As Noah Lucas, a critical Zionist historian wrote in The Modern History of Israel:

‘As the European holocaust erupted, Ben-Gurion saw it as a decisive opportunity for Zionism... In conditions of peace,… Zionism could not move the masses of world Jewry. The forces unleashed by Hitler in all their horror must be harnessed to the advantage of Zionism. ... By the end of 1942… the struggle for a Jewish state became the primary concern of the movement.’  

Even now Germany refuses to compensate Namibia for the massacre of more than 70,000 Herero and Nama people between 1904 and 1908, which was the 20^th Century's first genocide.

Namibia: The Price of Genocide | People and Power

It is no surprise that Namibia’s anger boiled over when Germany offered to join Israel’s case at the ICJ. It was in Namibia, then a German colony, that Germany’s extermination program for the Herero and Nama people became the template for the Holocaust.

Eugen Fischer was the Nazi doctor who helped pioneer eugenics in the Third Reich. As director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology (1927-42) Fischer provided the ‘scientific’ rationale for the Nazi’s war of extermination.

On Shark Island in SW Africa Fischer ran medical breeding experiments on the camp’s inmates. Racist ideas developed in the colony were brought back to German institutions along with the Africans’ skulls. In 1939, Fischer declared

When a people wants … to preserve its own nature, it must reject alien racial elements,… The Jew is such an alien and, therefore, when he wants to insinuate himself, he must be warded off.

Fischer conducted medical experiments on children born from the rape of African women. His research inspired Adolf Hitler and in the 1930s, Fischer taught his racist theories to Nazi doctors. One of his students, Joseph Mengele, was responsible for the medical experiments in the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp.

It is therefore appropriate that the German state, which never de-Nazified, has offered its support to Israel at the ICJ.

In March 1988 Professor Yehuda Elkana, a child survivor of Auschwitz, wrote an article in Ha’aretz, The Need to Forget. Elkana, who later became Rector of the Central European University in Budapest, before Netanyahu’s friend, Viktor Orban, the anti-Semitic Prime Minister of Hungary, closed it down wrote of:

a profound existential "Angst" fed by a particular interpretation of the lessons of the Holocaust and the readiness to believe that the whole world is against us, and that we are the eternal victim. In this ancient belief, shared by so many today, I see the tragic and paradoxical victory of Hitler. Two nations, metaphorically speaking, emerged from the ashes of Auschwitz: a minority who assert, "this must never happen again," and a frightened and haunted majority who assert, "this must never happen to us again."

Elkana described how Israel sent children on repeated visits to Israel’s holocaust propaganda centre, Yad Vashem asking:

What did we want those tender youths to do with the experience? We declaimed, insensitively and harshly, and without explanation: "Remember!""Zechor!" To what purpose? What is the child supposed to do with these memories? Many of the pictures of those horrors are apt to be interpreted as a call to hate.

Israel also sends thousands of schoolchildren to Poland every year to visit Auschwitz. As Ha’aretz columnist Gideon Levy observed,

Remembering the Holocaust is now for nationalists only. There’s no universal conclusion or moral lesson.

Levy remarked, prophetically:

I have yet to hear a single teenager come back from Auschwitz and say that we mustn’t abuse others the way we were abused. There has yet to be a school whose pupils came back from Birkenau straight to the Gaza border, saw the barbed-wire fence and said, Never again. The message is always the opposite. Gaza is permitted because of Auschwitz.

Elkana told how Thomas Jefferson wrote that democracy and worship of the past are incompatible.

Democracy fosters the present and the future. Too much of "Zechor!" (Remember) and an addiction. to the past undermine the foundations of democracy.

Elkana’s conclusion caused uproar in Israel:

we must learn to forget! Today I see no more important political and educational task for the leaders of this nation than to take their stand on the side of life, to dedicate themselves to creating our future, and not to be preoccupied from morning to night, with symbols, ceremonies, and lessons of the Holocaust. They must uproot the domination of that historical "remember!" over our lives.

If we are going to commemorate the Holocaust every Holocaust Memorial Day then we have to ask ‘to what purpose?’ If the Holocaust is going to be used, as Israel uses it, to justify its genocide in Gaza and maybe the West Bank too, then Elkana is right. It is best forgotten.

We have seen Israeli politicians proclaim that the breakout from Gaza on October 7 was the greatest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust. Not only is this factually wrong but it is morally and politically wrong too.

Israel sees October 7 through the prism of the Holocaust because it wants to avoid discussing the real reasons of what happened that day. I leave to one side the question of what actually happened, as opposed to the myth of organized rapes, beheaded babies and all the rest.

It is no wonder that when Antonio Gutterez, the UN General Secretary, said that October 7 did not happen in a vacuum Israel’s leaders went berserk, calling for his resignation. Israeli leaders want people to believe that the events of October 7 happened, not because of Israel’s occupation of the Gaza Strip for 57 years and its siege of 17 years but because Palestinians are consumed by hatred of Jews. In other words our old friend, ‘eternal anti-Semitism.’

We are supposed, according to the Zionists, to ignore the ongoing genocide in Gaza, the murder of 30,000+ people including 15,000 children, the murder of 120 journalists, hundreds of doctors and health workers, the destruction of hospitals and homes and instead focus solely on the 700 Israeli civilians, the majority of whom appear to have been murdered by Israel as a result of its Hannibal Doctrine.

The decision of the ICJ, despite the fact that it didn’t order a ceasefire, is welcome. Those who, even now, ignore the death of  Palestinians and instead can only remember October 7 should be treated as the racists and genociders that they are.

On a personal note, I have myself put an end to a 40 year friendship with someone who wrote in a local right-wing rag that ‘nothing the Israeli state has done provides justification for the atrocities of that day.’ The whole article concentrated on attacking Hamas comparing it to ISIS as Netanyahu did.

As the video below from two Israeli hostages show, Hamas’s treatment of its captives is incomparably better than Israel’s treatment of Palestinian prisoners, especially given Israel’s carpet bombing of Gaza.

Hin & Ajam Were 2 Prisoners of Hamas

The article railed against an anti-Semitic doctor in Durban without mentioning that the South Africa Jewish community wholeheartedly supported Apartheid. South Africa and Israel became close military partners. Those Jews, like Ronnie Kasrils and Joe Slovo, who joined the ANC and opposed Apartheid were ostracized by this right-wing Zionist Jewish community.

Tonight the Socialist Labour Network and Jewish Network for Palestine are holding a meeting on Holocaust Memorial Day. Our message is that Never Again applies to everyone, including the Palestinians currently fighting to live in Gaza.

We should also remember the record of the Zionist movement during the Holocaust when they not merely prioritized the building of a ‘Jewish’ State over the rescue of Jews from the Holocaust but they actively opposed all rescue attempts where the destination wasn’t Palestine.

Historian Christopher Sykes wrote of the 1938 Evian Conference that Roosevelt called to find a solution to the Jewish refugee problem and the Zionist attitude to it, that:

From the start they regarded the whole enterprise with hostile indifference... If the 31 nations had done their duty and shown hospitality to those in dire need then the pressure on the National Home and the heightened enthusiasm of Jews with Palestine would both have been relaxed. This was the last thing that the Zionist leaders wished for…. Even in the more terrible days ahead they made no secret of the fact, even when talking to Gentiles, that they did not want Jewish settlements outside Palestine to be successful... The Zionists wanted to do something more for Jews than merely help them to escape danger…. that such was the basic Zionist idea is not a matter of opinion but a fact abundantly provable by evidence... [my emphasis - Crossroads to Israel]

Nor should we forget the response of David Ben-Gurion to the Kindertransport, a scheme whereby the British agreed, after Kristallnacht in November 1938, to admit 10,000 unaccompanied Jewish children to England. He was furious that they weren’t going to Palestine and in a speech to the Israeli Labor Party’s [Mapai] Central Committee on 9 December 1938, he explained his reasoning:

If I knew that it would be possible to save all the children in Germany by bringing them over to England, and only half of them by transporting them to Eretz Yisrael, then I would opt for the second alternative. For we must weigh not only the life of these children, but also the history of the People of Israel.

Likewise Chaim Weizmann, the first President of Israel and then President of the Zionist Organisation told Malcolm MacDonald, the Colonial Secretary that ‘‘We shall fight you - and when I say fight I mean fight.’

We have to reclaim the Nazi Holocaust for everyone, not just for Jews people or the Israeli state.

Tony Greenstein

The Israeli State, instead of being Recompense for the Extermination of Europe’s Jews, is the Embodiment of the Nazi Policies of Lebensraum and Racial Resettlement 

Holocaust Memorial Day Meeting 27.1.24.

Above is the recording of our hugely successful Holocaust Memorial Day meeting last night. 333 people attended from 25 countries and every continent including 218 from the UK, 38 from South Africa, 27 from the United States and 12 from Germany.

Instead of this being a typical Zionist Holocaust Memorial Day meeting, using the memory of the Holocaust to reinforce the racist, genocidal Israeli state, there were a series of speakers who spoke of the liberation of humanity from the imperialist order which led to the Holocaust.

The meeting was chaired by Esther Giles from the Socialist Labour Network. Speakers included the foremost Israeli historian of the Nakba, Ilan Pappe; Ronnie Kasrils,  the former leader of the ANC’s military wing, Umkonte we Sizwe and former Police Minister under Mandela. 

Ghada Kharmi, a Palestinian doctor who was expelled with her family from Jerusalem in 1948 and a prolific author and academic, the latest book being One State, Suzanne Weiss, who as a child was hidden by the Jewish resistance from the Nazis in Auvergne, France; Stephen Kapos, who was hidden by the Holy Cross church group from the Nazis and the fascist Iron Cross in Budapest and Tony Greenstein from the SLN and Jewish Network for Palestine, the first Jewish member of the Labour Party to be expelled and author of Zionism During the Holocaust.

We intend to repeat this meeting next year. Never Again must the Zionists be allowed to lay claim to the memory of the Jewish dead of the Holocaust. They represent the perpetrators not the victims of the Holocaust.

When Yoav Gallant, Israel’s Defence Minister, called Palestinians ‘Human Animals’ he was repeating word for word Himmler’s October 1943 Speeches in Poznan, Poland calling Jews ‘Human Animals’.

It is important that we do not allow the Zionists to colonise HMD and thus trash the memory of the Jews and others who died at the hands of the fascist barbarians. There is no one and nothing that is closer to these fascists than the regime in Tel Aviv whose closest friends today are those very same fascists – from our own Tommy Robinson to people like Geert Wilders, Germany’s Afd and Norway’s Anders Breivik, to say nothing of Trump and Bannon.

The United States and its British Poodle Cut Food Aid to those Already Starving

Channel 4 Interview with Chris Gunnis, former spokesperson for UNRWA

It was no surprise that the war criminals who govern us – Biden, Sunak, Scholtz and the rest immediately cut of all aid to UNWRA, the UN agency responsible for feeding the Palestinian refugees. Israel has long desired to eliminate UNWRA altogether. It is as Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UNWRA said, collective punishment.

But even if the allegations are true, even if some UNWRA staff did participate in October 7, so what? Resistance against an occupier is allowed under international law and is the right of any occupied people.

Most people will understand what the real motive is behind this decision. The leaders of western imperialism don’t even bother to hide their anger at the decision of the International Court of Justice at the Hague, weak as it was, that the case that the United States said was ‘meritless’was upheld by the ICJ who considered genocide ‘plausible’.

The decision to attack UNWRA is clearly in retaliation for against the decision to go to the ICJ. Such is the nature of the ‘rules based order’. See below two articles from Mondoweiss. Naturally Israel’s response was to accuse the ICJ of anti-Semitism!  The go to explanation for all criticism of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

Never before has it been so obvious that Western support has nothing to do with Jews or anti-Semitism and everything to do with Western interests.

However in their desire to support the West’s attack dog in the Middle East the west’s war mongers are risking setting the whole of the region on fire.

If the Arab regimes, the Houthis apart, weren’t so cowardly and subservient to the West, the genocide in Gaza could have been stopped in its tracks long ago. An oil embargo, as in 1973, would have forced the United States to reign in their racist Rottweiler.

Tony Greenstein

UNRWA once again in the crosshairs

On the very day that the ICJ ordered for Israel to ensure the unimpeded entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza, Washington saw fit to cut off all funding to UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees.

The decision came after Israel claimed that 12 UNRWA workers had been involved in the October 7 attack. UNRWA has said that it has terminated the contracts of these workers as it commissions an independent investigation into the allegations — but the United Kingdom, Australia, Italy, and Canada have followed the U.S.’s lead and pulled their funding of the organization.

In an election year during which he is trying to convince the American public that he is the only alternative to the return of Donald Trump to the White House, U.S. President Joe Biden is following his predecessor’s lead, as Trump had partially suspended funding to UNRWA in 2018.

“We call on the countries that announced the cessation of their support for UNRWA to immediately reverse their decision, which entails great political and humanitarian relief risks, as at this particular time and in light of the continuing aggression against the Palestinian people, we need the maximum support for this international organization and not stopping support and assistance to it,”

Palestine Liberation Organization Secretary-General Hussein al-Sheikh wrote on X.

Hamas, meanwhile, called on the United Nations “not to yield to the threats and blackmails.”

“We stress the importance of the role of these agencies in providing relief to our people and documenting the crimes of the occupation, which exceed the most horrific crimes known to humanity in our modern era,”

JEREMY CORBYN: Britain joining other countries in suspending funding for #UNRWA amounts to collective punishment.

FOLLOW OUR LIVE BLOG:https://t.co/qfIcCqdo1Qpic.twitter.com/RjPYGNnJI4

— The Palestine Chronicle (@PalestineChron) January 27, 2024

the movement said in a statement.

Even as the U.S. appears steadfast in siding with Israel, Biden is facing legal trouble at home over his administration’s failure to stop the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Palestinians testified on Friday in front of a federal court, in a case brought forth by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) against Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, arguing that the three high-ranking officials are liable under U.S. law for complicity in Israel’s violations of the Genocide Convention. 

Biden cuts off life-saving aid to Palestinians based on Israeli allegations against UNRWA

The State Department has paused funding for UNRWA after the Israeli government accused 12 employees of being involved in the October 7 attack.

The State Department paused additional funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) after the Israeli government accused 12 UNRWA workers of being involved in the October 7 Hamas attack.

A press statement from State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said the Biden administration was “extremely troubled by the allegations.” Secretary of State Antony Blinken has spoken with United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres “to emphasize the necessity of a thorough and swift investigation of this matter.”

UNRWA has already terminated the staffers and opened an investigation into the allegations. “The Israeli authorities have provided UNRWA with information about the alleged involvement of several UNRWA employees in the horrific attacks on Israel on October 7,”said UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini.

“To protect the agency’s ability to deliver humanitarian assistance, I have taken the decision to immediately terminate the contracts of these staff members and launch an investigation in order to establish the truth without delay.”

UNRWA COMMISSIONER-GENERAL:

The suspension of the agency's funding is shocking and threatens humanitarian work in the region, especially in Gaza.

I call on countries that suspended funding to reconsider their decisions.

FOLLOW OUR LIVE BLOG:https://t.co/qfIcCqdo1Qpic.twitter.com/GLM6gfpgqr

— The Palestine Chronicle (@PalestineChron) January 27, 2024

Many have noted that UNRWA provides life-saving aid to more than 2 million Palestinians in Gaza.

“Based on unproven allegations alone, the U.S. has cut off funding to UNRWA, one of few groups which provides crucial on the ground aid to Palestinians,”said the antiwar group CODEPINK. “Yet, as Israel commits war crime after war crime, the U.S. continues sending weapons.”

“The US is collectively punishing Palestinians, who rely on UNRWA to survive, based on Israeli allegations against 0.0004% of UNRWA’s staff. Outrageous,”said the Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU).

The Biden administration’s announcement comes on the same day that the UN’s top court ordered Israel to prevent genocidal acts Gaza and a U.S. court began hearing a lawsuit accusing Israel of genocide.

NEW: The State Department has put a temporary hold on funding for UNRWA, the main UN agency in Gaza, following allegations that 12 UNRWA employees were involved in Hamas's Oct. 7 attacks in Israel pic.twitter.com/HXtr7AzISa

— Robbie Gramer (@RobbieGramer) January 26, 2024

Commentators questioned the State Department’s timing across social media.

“So, the US State Dept drops a rather significant statement on (unsubstantiated) allegations against UNRWA workers and pulling funding on the day of the ICJ ruling which finds sufficient evidence for plausible genocidal acts—- and decides there’s no need for a press briefing,”

wrote AJ+’s Sana Saeed. “Honestly, this would be masterful manufacturing of the news if it wasn’t so transparent.”

“The US chose to stop funds to UNRWA only an hour after the ICJ decision,” tweetedUSCPR Organizing & Advocacy Director Iman Abid. “Israel kills over 33,000 Palestinians and the US still continues to negotiate an increase in funding to Israel. I don’t know what more you need to know about this administration.”

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant praised the move on Twitter. “Major changes need to take place so that international efforts, funds and humanitarian initiatives don’t fuel Hamas terrorism and the murder of Israelis,” he wrote. “Terrorism under the guise of humanitarian work is a disgrace to the UN and the principles it claims to represent.”

In December, UNRWA announced that Israel’s onslaught against Gaza had killed 142 employees of the organization.

We Need a New Palestine Solidarity Organisation since PSC is neither Democratic, Anti-Zionist or Politically Coherent

In 1982, just before Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, Operation Peace for Galilee, a group of about 15 of us decided, at a meeting held at the University of London Union, to form Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

PSC then was anti-Zionist calling for a democratic, secular state in Palestine. This was a very different period from today. There was a radical Labour administration at the Greater London Council under Ken Livingstone which gave us support.  There was the Miners’ Strike in 1984-5. PSC fitted into all of this activism.

The decay in PSC began with the Oslo Accords, the single greatest political defeat for the Palestinians since the Nakba. It led to the legitimisation of Zionism as the United Nations overturned Resolution 3379 of 10 November 1975, which stated that Zionism was a form of racism.

Caroline Lucas, Brighton's Green MP, signed a statement with Tory racists calling for David Miller to be Sacked

As a result of Oslo, on 16 November 1991 the UN passed Resolution 46/86 overturning Resolution 3379. In exchange for minor concessions the PLO agreed to recognise the Israeli state.

In 1993 PSC voted at an Emergency AGM to endorse the Oslo Accords believing that Israel was going to agree to a Palestinian state. As I predicted at the time, the Oslo Accords, with the Palestinian Authority as Israel’s military subcontractor, substituted the faces of Israeli police for Palestinian ones.

I resigned from PSC and it wasn’t until 2005 that I rejoined at the invitation of PSC’s then General Secretary, Betty Hunter.

On 6 April 2022 I resigned again when PSC removed opposition to Zionism from a new Constitution.  In August 2022 I posted an email exchange I had had with Ben Jamal, PSC’s Director concerning the reasons for my resignation.

I did not take this step lightly but I felt that to remain a member of an organisation which was politically bankrupt and which consistently tried to appease the British Establishment and the Zionists was pointless.

Imagine the Anti-Apartheid Movement confining itself to opposing human rights abuses by the South African state whilst taking no position on Apartheid itself. By refusing to oppose Zionism, PSC refuses to oppose the ideology of the Israeli state that lies at the heart of its Jewish supremacist policies and ethnic cleansing.

PSC’s Disastrous Failure to Oppose the ‘Anti-Semitism’ Attacks on Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Left

PSC’s most egregious error was to ignore the Zionist attacks on Corbyn and the newly resurgent Labour Left. Corbyn had been PSC’s main parliamentary supporter. The failure to stand up to those crying ‘anti-Semitism’ was a fatal error that led to a serious defeat for the whole Palestine solidarity movement. It stemmed from PSC’s desire to present itself to Britain’s pro-Zionist Establishment as a safe and trustworthy pair of hands.

In March 2016 I was singled out by the Jewish Labour Movement  and suspended by the Labour Party. I wrote to PSC Secretary Ben Sofa on 11 April 2016 asking why PSC had been silent over the ‘anti-Semitism’ attaacks. Ben responded on 20 April in what was a master class in complacency. He wrote that

‘I make no apology for the fact that we do not engage in every debate some would wish to involve us in.’

First I was suspended, then Jackie Walker, Ken Livingstone and Marc Wadsworth. More were to follow as Corbyn buckled. Throughout this time PSC did absolutely nothing. As far as they were concerned what was happening in the Labour Party was a foreign country yet, as we have seen, the Zionists’ ‘anti-Semitism’ campaign spread into virtually every area of society.

PSC seemed oblivious to how false allegations of anti-Semitism were being used to undermine solidarity with the Palestinians. They preferred engaging in routine activities to taking on the Zionist enemy.

When the Zionists, who at first pretended that their opposition to ‘anti-Semitism’ had nothing to do with Palestine, proposed that Labour adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism, which conflated anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, PSC continued to do nothing. Seven of the IHRA’s 11 ‘examples’ of anti-Semitism were to do with Israel not Jews. PSC refused to even support a picket of Labour’s National Executive in September 2019 which approved the IHRA.

As Stephen Sedley, a Jewish former Court of Appeal Judge wrote in Defining Anti-Semitism, the IHRA ‘fails the first test of any definition: it is indefinite.’

PSC confined themselves to writing letters to local authorities urging them not to adopt the IHRA. PSC made a written submission to the Chakrabarti Inquiry and it helped commission an Opinion on the IHRA from Hugh Tomlinson QC and that was it.

PSC’s Alliance with the Trade Union Bureaucracy

PSC’s main achievement had been in the trade union movement. Most trade unions were affiliated to it. PSC could have used these affiliations to fight back against the adoption of the IHRA by increasing numbers of civil society groups at the behest of the Jewish Labour Movement and the Israeli Embassy funded Labour Friends of Israel. The trade unions controlled the Labour Party. PSC could have supported Corbyn against his Zionist detractors but they chose not to.

When PSC held a trade union conference in October 2019 I distributed leaflets opposing the IHRA at the conference.  Prior to this I had written, as had Brighton and Hove PSC, to Ben Sofa and Ben Jamal, PSC’s Director, asking that the IHRA be placed on the agenda of the conference. What was Jamal’s response? To throw me out of the conference for not having permission to distribute the leaflets! Suffice to say the IHRA was not on the agenda.

The IHRA and the Sacking of David Miller

At a time when the IHRA was being used to attack activists and academics, PSC sat on the sidelines. Over 150 local authorities had adopted the IHRA. Big Ride for Palestine was banned by Tower Hamlets council.

One particularly outrageous case was where the misnamed Campaign Against Antisemitismattempted to get Rebecca Gould, an academic at Bristol University sacked, because of an article‘Beyond Anti-Semitism’ which she had written on how the Holocaust and ‘the spectre of anti-Semitism’ is used to suppress discussion of Palestinian oppression. Even Kenneth Stern, the person who drafted the IHRA, condemned this attack as ‘McCarthy like’ and ‘chilling’.

Also at Bristol University Professor David Miller was dismissed as a result of a Zionist witchhunt. PSC refused to support David because his research was into the Zionist lobby. Instead they put out an anodyne statement which implicitly criticised him:

When addressing such issues, it is crucial to apply depth, context, and clarity, and to avoid narratives that oversimplify the interlinks between groups which oppose actions in support of Palestinian rights, and Israeli state actors. Doing so obscures our understanding of the way political actors’ function. At worst, it can risk drawing on anti-Semitic tropes about Jewish power.

Whilst some have criticised Professor Miller for lacking such depth and clarity in the way he has couched his remarks, those leading the call for Professor Miller to be sacked are straightforwardly asserting that to define Zionism as a movement and political ideology that is racist is inherently anti-Semitic.

After Miller’s dismissal PSC put out another statement which instead of condemning his dismissal called it ‘deeply concerning and sets a dangerous precedent’. It also failed to call for his reinstatement.

Today David Miller has been vindicated after an Employment Tribunal ruled that he had been unfairly dismissed and that anti-Zionism was a protected belief under the Equality Act 2000.

I have written asking Caroline Lucas to Apologise for Her Previous Support for David Miller's Dismissal

Internationally the Zionist campaign to target anti-Zionists via the IHRA was proceeding apace. The Bundestag in May 2019 condemned BDS as ‘anti-Semitic’. 

Why then did PSC confine its activities to making paper submissions and writing letters? The reason was PSC didn’t want to offend the trade union leaders who had given the IHRA their support and they didn’t want to jeopardise their affiliations by going to rank and file trade union members.

One of the most despicable of Starmer's supporters Lisa Nandy, a vociferous supporter of Israel's genocide in Gaza that PSC put on its platforms

Two States or a Unitary State? A Failure to Explain What PSC Wants to Achieve

PSC accepted that Israel was an Apartheid State but it refused to draw the obvious conclusions, namely that if Israel was an apartheid, state, then it had to go. It was afraid of saying that a Jewish state was an inherently racist state.

This was not a difficult thing to do. In January 2021 B’tselem, had not only declared that Israel was an apartheid state but that there was a regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. Jewish Supremacy was not a phrase PSC used.

This was followed up in April 2021 by Human Rights Watch which declared‘A Threshold Crossed - Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution.’  A year later Amnesty International produced a Report, ‘Israel’s apartheid against Palestinians’.

Declaring for a unitary, democratic secular state was not difficult, except that PSC, under the control of a tiny ex-Trotskyist group Socialist Action, alongside various remnants of what had been the International Marxist Group, were unwilling to do so. 

In 2009 I pointed to the role in PSC of the secretive Socialist Action  group which with Jon Lansman had colluded in the ‘anti-Semitism’ witch-hunt in the Labour Party which the Jewish Chronicle then cited.

Btselem, which started life as a liberal Zionist group, declared that

‘More than 14 million people, roughly half of them Jews and the other half Palestinians, live between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea under a single rule.’

When Jenny Tonge Came Under Criticism From the Right-Wing Press PSC Abandoned Her

There is already a single state in Palestine but one in which half the population have no civil or political rights. PSC Executive’s pretext for refusing to declare in favour of a unitary state was that it was up to the Palestinians to decide this question but Palestinians are in no position to make any decision but it is clear that given the choice Palestinians want to live in the whole of historic Palestine.

An article for the Washington institute for Near Eastern Policy  explained that

the two-state solution (this) is no longer a popular position among Palestinians. Less than 40 percent of the Palestinian public—in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem—supports it over one-state alternatives. Support for a two-state solution has declined steadily since 2018.

Further, most Palestinians believe that a two-state solution is unlikely to emerge from the conflict. Instead, a majority of them say they prefer to reclaim all of historic Palestine, including the pre-1967 Israel. A one-state solution with Arabs and Jews holding equal rights comes in second. Similarly, recent polling from PCPSR finds support among Palestinians and Israeli Jews for a two-state solution has dropped to 43 percent and 42 percent, respectively.

But even if Palestinians did support a two-state solution then that would only be because a state in the whole of Palestine was deemed impossible to achieve. PSC is not addressing Palestinians but British people. When people ask what we would like to see we should be clear – one state with equal rights for Jews and Arabs. 

One state was the demand of the anti-Apartheid movement in South Africa. Only far-right White racists wanted a White state. The two-state solution in Palestine, which the West supports, is an apartheid neo-colonial solution. It leaves a racist Jewish state intact.

The real reason why PSC won’t support a one state solution is the trade unions. All Britain’s unions support 2 States. This allows them to support both the Palestinians and the Zionists. Not for the first time trade union leaders have faced both ways. On the one hand supporting Israel and on the other supporting its victims.

We saw this during the height of the false anti-Semitism campaign. Dave Prentis, the General Secretary of UNISON, pledged his support for the Palestinians and on the other hand wrote in the New Statesman ‘Why Labour must adopt the full IHRA definition of anti-Semitism.’

Why could Prentis and other union leaders do this?  Because historically the unions have been supporters of British imperialism. Instead of confronting unions with the choice of supporting an apartheid state or a democratic state, two states allows them to face both ways at the same time. They can support Israel (dressed up as opposition to ‘anti-Semitism’) and also support the Palestinians. It enables people like Prentis to work openly with the JLM.

Palestine Solidarity Campaign is a Human Rights NGO not a Political, Campaigning Organisation

Because PSC supports a two-state solution i.e. a ‘Jewish’ state and a Palestinian state, it sees its role as primarily one of opposing human rights abuses and in the current context Israel’s genocide. It allows the field to be clear for the Zionists and their ‘anti-Semitism’ campaign.

Since October 7 there have been a number of very large demonstrations in support of the Palestinians in Gaza. PSC has been one of 6 organisations - CND, Stop the War Coalition, Friends of Al Aqsa, the Palestinian Forum and the Muslim Association of Britain organising the demonstrations. By itself PSC is incapable, given its past record, of mobilising more than 5,000 people. In reality the demonstrations built themselves as people spontaneously joined them, appalled as they were by the continuing genocide in Gaza.

PSC’s Strategy of ‘Mainstreaming’

Emily Thornberry at Labour Friends of Israel dinner

The strategy of PSC is to mainstream the issue of Palestine. What this means is attempting to get the British state to adopt a pro-Palestinian position by winning over the Establishment. It is doomed to failure, as we have seen over Gaza, because it fails to take account of the fact that the British state is an imperialist state. The British Establishment is committed to its financial, economic and political interests world wide. Palestinians come very far down their list of priorities.

Anti-imperialism plays no part in PSC’s politics. That is why PSC has put on its platform vile Zionists like Emily Thornberry who declared at an LFI dinner that 'Israel is a Beacon of Freedom and Democracy' before going on to say that supporters of the Palestinians (who she called ‘anti-Semites’) should be ‘drummed out of the party.’

I support the Palestinians that is enough and I support Hamas against the Israeli army https://t.co/ICv99vWQAW

— Tony Greenstein (@TonyGreenstein) November 15, 2023

Palestine Solidarity Campaign as a Wannabee Establishment Group

PSC and its Director Ben Jamal reacted with horror when Palestine Action, which was set up about 4 years ago, began a campaign of direct action against Elbit’s arms factories and those who were trading with it. They immediately attacked it, got the Boycott National Committee to do the same and issued bogus legal advice about the dangers of PSC branches supporting Palestine Action.

However the popularity of PA amongst PSC activists led PSC’s Executive to have to accept support for PA at the 2022 conference. However PSC have done zilch to implement that policy.

When Mick Napier and I were arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000 before Xmas Electronic Intifada contacted them. What was their reaction?  ‘No one is available to comment’. The British State is using ‘terrorism’ against Palestine solidarity activists and PSC has nothing to say about this attack on our freedom to speak out on Palestine.

This statement from the Manchester Palestine Solidarity Campaign is appalling.

And certainly one for the authorities.

It is right there on their website: https://t.co/PWZLSsKaeO

"The brave fighters gave us all a glimpse of a liberated Palestine"@PSCupdates @ManchesterPSC pic.twitter.com/SgSnlNeYab

— Harry Cole (@MrHarryCole) October 25, 2023

PSC Attacks Its Own Members

PSC took fright when the 7 October breakout from Gaza concentration camp happened. They demanded that Manchester PSC take down a post from its website supporting the breakout. Harry Cole, political editor of The Sun, called the Manchester post “appalling” and suggested it was a matter for the police.

Despite the branch complying with PSC’s demands, PSC decided to suspend the officers of Manchester PSC anyway. As a result Manchester PSC has formally cut ties with PSC nationally and is now an independent group.  See UK Palestine Solidarity Campaign punishes Manchester branch

PSC Refuses to Condemn the Palestinian Authority

Despite its role as Israel’s military subcontractor, arresting Palestinians and handing them over to Israel, PSC has refused to utter a word of criticism of this Quisling Authority. A third of the PA’s budget goes on security, the highest in the world. Its security forces operate on behalf of the Israeli military. The PA are used to suppress demonstrations and opposition by Palestinians to Israel’s occupation. Mahmoud Abbas, its notional ‘President’ considers cooperation between the Israeli state and the PA as ‘sacred.

The security services of the PA are a bunch of thugs who in August 2021 murdered Palestinian activist Nizar Banat. My resolution to PSC AGM condemning his murder was opposed by PSC Executive and the sheep present voted it down.

The invasion of Gaza by Israel and the resulting genocide have created a mass movement in support of the Palestinians.  That movement will not always be around although Israel’s image will have been irreparably damaged. It is important that the opportunity should be taken now, when most groups that have sprung up – from Parents for Palestine to School students groups – have no connection with PSC to take steps to form a genuine, anti-imperialist solidarity movement and not a glorified NGO. We have no time to lose.

Tony Greenstein

When Jean Calder joined with the supporters of genocide in Gaza to oppose ‘anti-Semitism’, she symbolised the problems of Western feminism

Braverman’s dream (& apparently Jean Calder’s)

This blog is a follow up to Anita Patel’s Women’s Place UK : Whitewashing Zionism. When you’ve been friends with someone for 40 years it comes as a shock to realise that they have become an ageing reactionary, an Islamaphobe in particular. All in the name of second wave feminism.

I don’t often write blogs about those I know personally and I’m doing it now because, as the old saying used to go, the personal is political or at least it can be.

Jean was elected to Brighton Borough Council for the Labour Party in 1987. Her husband, Andy Winter was elected in the following year. At that time she was a socialist. I can remember her speaking vehemently in opposition to the Gulf War in 1991 and Tony Benn praising the speech. I accompanied her on a fact finding trip to Northern Ireland. She was a strong supporter of the Republican movement.

Although not actively involved in the Palestine solidarity movement she was always opposed to Zionism and the oppression of the Palestinians.

When six Labour Councillors were suspended at the beginning of the 90’s for refusing to implement the Poll tax she and Andy were amongst them. 30 years though is a long time in politics.

Israeli teens tik tok video mocks the lack of drinking water in Gaza - Jean Calder & Andy Winter have no problem with these neo-Nazi videos

Over the years Jean’s feminism, increasingly framed by the belief that Islam was uniquely misogynist, seemed to drive her to the right and like Fay Weldon and other feminists Jean became increasingly Islamaphobic. I can remember her support for the banning by France of face covering by Muslim women. When I pointed out that this was an invitation to racist and sexual attacks by men on women she seemed unperturbed.

We also had disagreements on transgender people. Although I accept that you can’t just say that a transwoman is a woman biologically, clearly people can identify gender wise with the opposite sex. Jean had difficulties accepting that there were many people who genuinely felt that they had been born in the wrong body and that transgender people were a vulnerable minority who were being targeted by the Right and far-Right.

Jean is not alone in this. There are many feminists who see transgender women as their enemy. This was brought home to me at the picket of the drag queen Aida H Dee at Brighton & Hove libraries in 2022 when feminists joined fascists in trying to prevent parents taking their children to listen to story telling.

When Jeremy Corbyn was elected as Labour leader in 2015 I expected Jean to welcome it. Not a bit of it. She had some grudge against Corbyn over child abuse in Islington children’s homes although this was the responsibility of the Council leader Margaret Hodge, who engaged in a cover up. She was then rewarded by being made Children’s Minister by Tony Blair.

There were other things that disturbed me such as a hostility to refugees because Jean saw them as single men. I pointed out that when Jews came to Britain from Czarist Russia in the 19^th and 20^th centuries the men usually came first and when settled brought their families over.

It all came to a head when we were having coffee in the Pavilion Gardens with friends when Jean started joking about Suella Braverman, who lost her job as Home Secretary trying to prevent the demonstrations against genocide in Gaza. All in the name of anti-Semitism of course.

I turned round and said that as far as I was concerned Braverman was a ‘racist bitch’. True it was sexist but if you find racism amusing then you can hardly protest against sexism. That was the last time we talked or met.

I then discovered that Jean had been busy writing articles for Brighton & Hove News, an anti-Palestinian and racist Internet rag as well as on her own blog.

Israeli Teens Get Their Kicks from Palestinian suffering

The article Jean wrote The vital light from candles in the heart of Hove (on her own blog The Canary in the Coalmine), a cliché from Jonathan Freedland, the Guardian’s Zionist gatekeeper. Her articles were an exercise in superficiality. In Yiddish schmaltz– an exaggerated sentimentality. Fat but no meat.

Apparently Jews have a most sensitive antennae when it comes to racism and anti-Semitism is the most dangerous of all forms of racism. A virus no less. Freedland coined this reactionary metaphor when he fronted the fake anti-Semitism narrative against the left when Corbyn was elected labour leader.

It is reactionary because it divorces racism from society. Instead of poverty, housing shortages, pervasive driving racism we have instead a virus that persists regardless of the political and social climate. And if anti-Semitism is a virus then presumably its target is also pathological. Eternal anti-Semitism was the handmaiden of the Eternal Jew, (Der ewige Jude) which the Nazis produced.

As Leon Pinsker, one of the earliest Zionists wrote:

‘Judeophobia is a mental disease. As a mental disease it is hereditary, and as a disease transmitted for two thousand years it is incurable.

This was the basis for the Zionist belief that anti-Semitism could not be fought. If anti-Semitism was incurable or a virus, then there was no point fighting it. Zionism accepted anti-Semitism as the norm, the constant in the relationship between non-Jews and Jews and this laid the basis for the Zionist solution which was to escape from anti-Semitism not fight it.

The vast majority of Jews in Czarist Russia disagreed and fought anti-Semitism which was why so many became revolutionaries. Zionism appealed to the most reactionary Jews and it is with them that Jean Calder has found a political home.

Anti-Semitism today has changed. Now it is the false anti-racism of the Right, having been redefined, not as hostility to Jews but as hostility to Zionism. It is not surprising that this ‘anti-Semitism’ is the only form of racism that Jean’s hero Suella Braverman was concerned about. The woman who said it was her dream to see asylum seekers deported to Rwanda was apparently concerned about ‘anti-Semitism’ when it came to marches against Israel’s genocide.

Braverman was treading a well worn path. Even Donald Trump, when not accusing Jews of being disloyal to ‘their country’ (Israel not America!) was concerned about anti-Semitism. Even Steve Bannon, when not fretting about his daughter going to school with Jews, was opposed to anti-Semitism.

In her article Jean was moved to tears that a small group of Zionists had set up a memorial to remember the Jewish victims of October 7. Not once did she ask why it was that there were no candles or words of sympathy for the thousands of children that Israel has murdered in its genocidal attack on Gaza.

If Calder had retained any of her previous critical faculties she might have questioned the sincerity of these mourners. After all if they were really concerned about Israel’s captives in Gaza then they would have joined us in calling for a ceasefire.

The families of these captives have been unanimous in expressing their fear that it is Israeli bombs, not Hamas, that will kill them. In an article Renewed strikes on Gaza bring fear to families of Israeli hostages the Guardian told how

‘The family of Tal Haimi, who is being held hostage by Hamas, fear that he could be injured or killed by Israeli airstrikes’.

The Zionists that Calder embraced are the most vociferous supporters of the Israeli war on Gaza. Whenever BHPSC has demonstrated in favour of a ceasefire they have opposed us.

CNN reported that

Many, including the families of those hostages still held by Hamas, direct their anger toward Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who dismissed the terms of a ceasefire and hostage deal put forward by Hamas in forthright terms.

Israel admits to killing its own citizens on October 7

"Mass Hannibal"— We killed Israelis on 7 October, says Israeli air force colonel

These Zionists no doubt included Jewish Chronicle columnist Heidi Bachram who described events in solidarity with the people of Gaza as ‘chilling and threatening’ and the chant ‘From the river to the sea Palestine will be free’ as ‘genocidal’. Bachram boasted of having reported me to the police for a speech outside Hove town hall.  Free speech and Zionists don’t go together. Calder said that she

lit a candle and listened as a man said Kaddish for the dead. ... I realised that not since I was a child had I prayed for the Jewish people. I didn’t think I still needed to. I grew up among racists in Apartheid South Africa.

And therein lies the irony. Although Calder left Apartheid, Apartheid has not left her. She says that

Individual Jewish people are not responsible for the actions of the Israeli government, yet they are being condemned as if they are.

Perhaps the reason that a few people wrongly blame Jews for what Israel does is because her Zionist friends insist that Israel is a Jewish state. Every time Zionists defend the actions of Israel in the name of British Jews that cannot help but reinforce the notion that Jews are responsible for what is happening in Gaza.

Washington Post plans hit piece over EI's accurate reporting about 7 October, with Ali Abunimah

Hamas

Calder said that

We also need to question why there have been so few public statements of solidarity in response to the Hamas attack. Faced with the horror of Palestinian casualties in Gaza, many non-Jewish progressives have focused on that, preferring to forget the events of 7th October.

Calder’s article on 22 December was over two months after October 7, when over 20,000 Palestinian civilians had already been murdered. Why I wondered was she more concerned about less than 1200 Israeli dead, a third of them soldiers, than over 20 times that number of Palestinian civilians? People living under occupation are entitled to resist their oppressors.

An Israeli soldier publishes an advertisement for his barber shop from Gaza next to executed Palestinian civilians in Gaza, attaching it to a viral Israeli music comparing Palestinians to animals and "Amalek."pic.twitter.com/GYiwxB4tsZ

— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) February 6, 2024

The final tally of Israeli dead shows that 695 Israeli civilians, including 36 children, as well as 373 security forces and 71 foreigners died, giving a total of 1,139. This figure is dwarfed by the numbers killed by Israel, 27,000+ in Gaza today plus at least 10,000 under the rubble. Yet Calder has nothing to say about dead Palestinians. 37 Israeli children compared to over 11,000 Palestinian children died. Even the Nazis only shot 100 hostages in reprisal for 1 dead soldier. Calder writes that:

The cruelty of the Hamas atrocities was live-streamed and publicised by mocking perpetrators. Even for me, a non-Jew, the assaults brought back terrible images of anti-semitic atrocities of the 1930s and 1940s, many filmed by nazi bureaucrats.

How Israeli army ordered troops to fire on Israelis on 7 October, with Asa Winstanley

This is untrue. The Nazis killed Jews because they were Jews. Hamas killed Israelis, not because they were Jews but because they were their oppressors having occupied Gaza for over half a century. In fact Israeli Palestinians and Thai workers also died on October 7 so Calder’s assertion is simply a lie.

The Lying Israeli Narrative of October 7 that Calder & Winter Have Accepted

There is no doubt that some Israeli civilians were killed by Hamas and other groups, including freelancers. Any murder of civilians is to be condemned but the breakout from Gaza, the international law right of resistance should not be condemned.

Just as we would support the slave revolts in Haiti in 1791 despite the fact that every single French person was killed, so too with October 7. But it is now becoming increasingly clear that most Israeli civilians were killed by the Israeli military.

What we’re now learning about 7 October, with Ali Abunimah

According to Israel’s own statistics of the 1,139 people killed by Palestinian militants, one third – 373 – were soldiers. These were clearly legitimate targets. The question is who killed the 695 Israeli civilians and 71 foreigners?

On 18 November Haaretzreported that Israeli police were conducting an investigation into the attack on the Nova music festival and that an Israeli attack helicopter killed some of the attendees See Israel admits it killed its own at Nova music festival. In a follow up on 12 January 2024 The Cradle shows how Israeli forces trapped and killed ravers at the Nova Festival.

At 6:42 am, a mere 12 minutes after Operation Al-Aqsa Flood was launched, the Southern District Commander of the Israeli Police, Amir Cohen, gave an order code-named “Philistine Horseman,” sending police officers and Border Police who were on alert to the sites of various battles.

Tank fires on Israeli civilian home in Kibbutz Be'eri, 7 October 2023

This included members of the Yamam, and Tequila commando units that have no police duties but conduct military and counter-terrorism operations, including undercover assassinations in the Gaza Strip and occupied-West Bank. 

According to a senior Israeli officer speaking with the New York Times, the first formal reinforcements to southern Israel came from commandos that arrived by helicopter.

Israeli teen ”burned completely” by Israeli tank fire at kibbutz

Sagi Abitbol, a policeman working as a security guard at the festival, was among the first to confront Hamas fighters near Nova, and witnessed the early arrival of these helicopters. 

During the fighting, 59 Israeli police officers were killed, including at least 17 at the Nova festival. 

Israel admits to "immense" amount of "friendly fire" on 7 October, with Asa Winstanley

There is a very detailed article in Electronic Intifada of 20 January which suggests that some of the civilians were actually plain clothes members of Shin Bet, 10 of whom were killed. Winstanley tells how the military

“instructed all its fighting units to perform the Hannibal Directive in practice, although it did so without stating that name explicitly,”

Kibbutz Be'eri homes that Israeli tanks fired shells at killing all inside, Israelis included

The Hannibal Directive states that in the event of Israelis being taken captive, both they and their captors should be killed. The revelations came in a new investigative article by Ronen Bergman and Yoav Zitun, two journalists with extensive sources inside Israel’s military and intelligence establishment.

They also revealed that “some 70 vehicles” driven by Palestinian fighters returning to Gaza were blown up by Israeli helicopter gunships, drones or tanks.

Mother and daughter detail Hamas’ humane treatment during the time they were held

Hamas explicitly instructed its operatives not to kill women, children and the elderly. You can hear this at approximately 3:04. Confirmation of this comes from the Times of Israel of 9 October which quoted the mother of two children.

At 8:20 a.m., terrorists entered Dvir’s home, he lunged at them with an axe, tried to protect my two kids who were with him, and was murdered in front of their eyes,” she posted. “His partner Stav also tried to protect them, but was murdered as well. The terrorist calmed down my Daria and Lavi, covered them in a blanket, took lipstick and wrote on the wall: ‘The al-Qassam [Brigades] people don’t murder children.

All Britain's Prostitute Press ran with the '40 Babies Lie' - Not one has retracted the story or apologise - the myth therefore continues

Yet the Israeli government has painted a narrative that says Hamas deliberately killed children. At first there was the story of the 40 beheaded babies. Almost all the British media published this fake story and variations on it. It was all a lie.

Jo Biden even said that he had personally seen the pictures until it was walked back by his own spokespersons. Yet what was Calder’s response over 2.5 months into Israel’s genocide:

Since 7th October I have expected some form of public statement of solidarity from churches and faith leaders, an expression of grief or horror at what happened that day.

See Israeli forces shot their own civilians, kibbutz survivor says

Solidarity with whom? Those perpetrating a genocide? Yes there certainly should have been a public statement from Calder’s Church of England  but Justin Welby has refused to condemn Israel’s genocide. Coming from a man who has previously covered for child abuser John Smyth who was described by Welby in 2017 as "charming" and "delightful." that is not altogether surprising.

Max Blumenthal: NYT SINKS Hamas Rape 'Daily' Episode Over Internal Roil on Reporting

Calder’s entire focus is on October 7. Like the good ‘Christian’ that she is, she dismisses support for those being starved to death or murdered as ‘worthy and necessary.’ but a distraction.

Israeli Teens Mocking Palestinian Children's suffering

Calder pays lip service to Palestinian suffering, including 75 years of occupation, dispossession and forcible exile of Palestinian refugees. According to her ‘nothing the Israeli state has done provides justification for the atrocities of that day.’

A 17 year  siege of Gaza, where nothing could enter or leave without Israel’s permission, where Israeli leaders used the phrase ‘mowing the lawn’ to describe their periodic attacks on Gaza – Operation Cast Lead in 2008/9 when 1400 Palestinians including 300 children were killed, Operation Pillar of Defence in 2012 when 174 civilians died and Operation Protective Edge in 2014 when 2,200 civilians including 551 children died. 

In the past 15 years, until the latest conflict 6407 Palestinians and 308 Israelis have died. Calder might think the attack on October 7 wasn’t justified but most people would say that the continuing murder of Palestinians, is justification in itself.

During the Great Return protests beginning in March 30 2018 some 234 Palestinians were killed by Israeli snipers and more than 33,000 were wounded. Orly Noy wrote about Razan al-Najar, the 21 year old medic who became a symbol of Israeli atrocities when she was gunned down by a sniper:

Razan a-Najjar died about two-and-a-half years ago, but I can still clearly see her in my mind’s eye. The 21-year-old paramedic was shot and killed by Israeli soldiers during one of the Great Return March protests in Gaza on June 1, 2018. Witnesses say she was shot as she made her way toward the fence that separates Israel and the Gaza Strip to tend to the wounded, donning a white medical coat.

The Guardian refused to print this cartoon by Steve Bell - it was anti-Semitic because the hearth might remind people of Auschwitz furnaces!!

Israel’s B’tselem, in a Report ‘Unwilling and Unable: Israel’s Whitewashed Investigations of the Great March of Return wrote that ‘not a single Israeli soldier or civilian was killed in the Great March of Return protests’. Peaceful demonstrators had been murdered by Israeli snipers in dug outs.

In the Sharpeville Massacre in South Africa, which reverberated around the world after police opened fire on unarmed demonstrators, 69 people were killed and 180 injured. Yet Calder believes that the thousands of Palestinians murdered by Israel up till October 7 provided no justification. Why this disparity? Because ‘anti-Semitism’ and the Holocaust justifies every barbarity. Over 30,000 have been murdered but still Calder believes that we should focus on October 7.

I know this because I have WhatsApped her but she has not responded. Andy Winter, also a South African exile, was no better. He wrote an article‘The terrible cycle of violence upon violence... continues in Israel and Gaza’. The cliché ‘cycle of violence’ is designed to obliterate the causes of that violence which is the Zionist nature of the Israeli State. As B’tselem found in its Report there is ‘A regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea’. Winter condemns

The appalling terrorist attacks on men, women and children in southern Israel a week last Saturday, followed by the unfolding humanitarian crisis and the killing of men, women and children in northern Gaza almost defy words

Although condemning what he calls ‘terrorists’ Winter calls the        genocide an ‘unfolding humanitarian crisis’. Presumably this has been caused by an Act of God or some other natural disaster, Having failed to call out genocide and ethnic cleansing for what it is he lays into the BBC, the Voice of Israel:

But there are words. Terrorism is just one, a word that the BBC shamefully refuses to use when describing the attacks and murders on October 7.

This article appeared first in the Argus.

We have two White South Africans failing to recognise what is obvious to Black S Africans and Palestinians. That not only is Israel an apartheid state but it is far worse than S Africa ever was. The Apartheid regime there did not murder Black South Africans by the thousand. It did not bomb the shanty towns from the air. It did not have the exterminationist mentality of Israel.

As Andrew Feinstein, the former Jewish ANC MP said‘Israeli Apartheid is far more brutal than anything we saw in South Africa’. Navi Pillay, a former UN human rights chief said the same as did Israel’s most famous poet Yitzhak Laor who remarked that ‘the system preserving this apartheid is more ruthless as it is equipped with the lie of being 'temporary.' So too did Nelson Mandela’s grandson Mandla Mandela.

Torture is rampant - Israel doesn't even bother to hide its brutality

Archbishop Desmond Tutu told one activist that

Israel’s apartheid is even worse than South Africa’s. We never had F-16s bomb our Bantustans killing hundreds of children. Remember that.

The reasons for this lie in the different political economies of the two states. S Africa needed Black people in order to exploit their labour. Israel as a Jewish state aimed to be as Jewish as was possible, hence its policy was not exploitation but ethnic cleansing.

Israeli children sing song of annihilation on Israel's national broadcaster Kan

Israel’s Exterminationist Mentality

Despite its many problems today South Africa demonstrates that the legacy of the struggle against apartheid lives on. It was South Africa not any of the miserable Arab regimes which took Israel to the International Court of Justice.

Perhaps the most iniquitous of the 11 examples in the IHRA misdefinition of anti-Semitism is the 10^th which states that

‘Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis’ is anti-Semitic.’

The rationale being that a Jewish state can’t behave like the Nazi state and that it is offensive to accuse Jews of behaving like Nazis. It is testimony to the intellectual poverty of both the political class and academia that this illustration has attracted so little attention and has been given a free pass.

Nazism was neither original nor ideologically coherent. Racial hygiene, rassenhygiene formed the basis of its racial politics and was based on social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest between species was applied to racial differences within humanity.

Eugenics, as Hitler readily acknowledged came from the United States where laws providing for compulsory sterilisation were passed in over 30 states.

What happened in Germany could, given the right set of circumstances, happen in any state. To suggest Jews are immune from this is to suggest that racism is biologically inherited and that some people are immune from this by virtue of their racial inheritance. This in itself is racist.

Extermination and genocide has been only too prevalent in the 20^th century beginning with the Herero/Nama people in Namibia to the Armenian genocide, the extermination in Cambodia, Rwanda and now genocide in Gaza. Anyone who believes that Israeli Jews are exempt from the social, economic and political laws governing every other society is by definition a racist.

The warnings have been flashing in Israel for a long time. Opinion polls have long shown that a majority of Israeli Jews favour the deportation of Israel’s Arab citizens. Mobs, led by Israel’s current Police Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, march through Jerusalem each year chanting‘Death to the Arabs’. Mobs in Germany and Poland used to chant ‘Death to the Jews’.

In January 2018 Ze’ev Sternhell, a child survivor of the Nazi ghetto of Przemyśl  in Poland  wrote an article for Ha’aretz In Israel, Growing Fascism and a Racism Akin to Early Nazism.Maybe the racists who compiled the IHRA would call the late Sternhell an anti-Semite too?

The Nazi and Genocidal Statements of Israel’s Zionist Leaders

The South African Application to the ICJ gives the lie to those who claim it is ‘anti-Semitic’ to say that Israeli leaders cannot be compared to the Nazis.

On 9 October Defence Minister Yoav Gallant described the Palestinians as ‘human animals’. On October 4 1943 Himmler, the Head of the SS in a speech to senior SS officers justifying the Holocaust called the Jews ‘human animals.’

On 16 October 2023, Netanyahu described the attack on Gaza as a “a struggle between the children of light and the children of darkness, between humanity and the law of the jungle.’

On 28 October 2023 Netanyahu invoked the Biblical story of the Amalek:

“you must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember”

The ancient Israelites wiped out every man, woman, child and suckling infant. Its Hitlerite nature is crystal clear. On 10 November 2023, Ben-Gvir, Israel’s Police Minister stated that:

“when we say that Hamas should be destroyed, it also means those who celebrate, those who support, and those who hand out candy — they’re all terrorists, and they should also be destroyed.”

On 1 November 2023, Amichai Eliyahu, Israel’s Heritage Minister posted on Facebook:

“The north of the Gaza Strip, more beautiful than ever. Everything is blown up and flattened, simply a pleasure for the eyes.’

Haaretz: Israeli Army directly involved in publicising its brutal treatment of Palestinians. No other army in the world publicises its atrocities. The aim is to terrorise Palestinians certain of the West"s complicity, unafraid of US&EU public opinionhttps://t.co/RH3JRefeoK

— Yanis Varoufakis (@yanisvaroufakis) February 5, 2024

Nissim Vaturi, the Deputy Speaker of the Knesset ‘tweeted’ on 7 October 2023 that:

“[n]ow we all have one common goal — erasing the Gaza Strip from the face of the earth. Those who are unable will be replaced.’

Giora Eiland, a Reservist Major General, former Head of the National Security Council, and adviser to the Defence Ministerwrote:

Israel should not allow any economic assistance. The people should be told that they have two choices; to stay and to starve, or to leave. If Egypt and other countries prefer that these people will perish in Gaza, this is their choice.

“These animals can no longer live.”

Ezra Yachin, a 95-year-old Israeli army reservist, is seen inciting “every Jew with a weapon” to kill Palestinians and “erase the memory of them” pic.twitter.com/LUQs0XoR5U

— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) October 13, 2023

On 11 October 2023, 95-year old Israeli army reservist Ezra Yachin — a veteran of the Deir Yassin massacre in 1948 —was called up for reserve duty to “boost morale” amongst Israeli troops ahead of the ground invasion.  His message was broadcast on social media inciting other soldiers to genocide while being driven around in an Israeli army vehicle:

“Be triumphant and finish them off and don’t leave anyone behind. Erase the memory of them. Erase them, their families, mothers and children. These animals can no longer live . . . Every Jew with a weapon should go out and kill them. If you have an Arab neighbour, don't wait, go to his home and shoot him . . . We want to invade, not like before, we want to enter and destroy what’s in front of us, and destroy houses, then destroy the one after it. With all of our forces, complete destruction, enter and destroy. As you can see, we will witness things we’ve never dreamed of. Let them drop bombs on them and erase them.

When I said that Israel was ‘Hitler’s bastard offspring’, much to the Jewish Chronicle’s chagrin, I was not exaggerating.

🚨 Urgent: The Palestine Red Crescent ambulance was discovered bombed the Tal al-Hawa area of #Gaza City, resulting in the killing of crew members Yusuf Zeino and Ahmed Al-Madhoun, who had been missing since a rescue mission for the child Hind Rajab 12 days ago.#NotATarget❌… pic.twitter.com/dCgfeevTd8

— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) February 10, 2024

Because Zionism draws no universal lessons from the Holocaust Israelis now see themselves in the position of the Nazis. Only pathetic white liberals like Calder and Winter, cannot or will not see it. Israel has absorbed the lessons of the holocaust but not the ones anti-racists might wish.

Professor Yehuda Elkana, a child survivor of Auschwitz, wrote in an article for Ha’aretz in March 1988:

a profound existential “Angst” fed by a particular interpretation of the lessons of the holocaust … that we are the eternal victim. In this ancient belief… I see the tragic and paradoxical victory of Hitler. Two nations, metaphorically speaking, emerged from the ashes of Auschwitz: a minority who assert, “this must never happen again,” and a frightened and haunted majority who assert, “this must never happen to us again.”[‘The Need to Forget,’Ha’aretz, 2.3.88]

When Hitler came to power his programme was not to exterminate the Jews but to expel them. It was only when he couldn’t expel them that the Nazis turned to extermination. So it is with Israel today.

Adam Keller, an Israeli peace activist wrote describing how ‘the word ‘extermination’ with all its resonance of Auschwitz has entered the language of Israeli politics.’ Keller described how the streets of Tel Aviv were flooded with red stickers reading

"Exterminate Gaza!". Not "Destroy!", not "Flatten!"– but clearly and explicitly "Exterminate Gaza!". "Le-Ha-Sh-Mid!" - "Exterminate!" Every Jewish Israeli knows from a young age exactly what this word means. …. 

Roy Sharon, a radio and TV commentator on the main Israeli broadcasting corporation, spoke very explicitly of his desire to see “a million dead bodies in Gaza”.

Israel’s Ambassador in London Tzipi Hotoveli described all Palestinians as Nazis and compared what Israel was doing to the British bombing of Dresden and Hamburg where 600,000 were killed. She wanted to murder a similar number of Palestinians.

Yet these white liberal racists can only mouth ‘anti-Semitism’ as if they can only hold one idea at a time in their heads. British Jews are not victims of racism. They are privileged and White. Racism operates at the level of the state. Anti-Semitism in Britain is a prejudice, it has no power behind it.

Israeli Teens Get Their Kicks from Palestinian suffering

I would go further. British Jews are probably the most racist section of the White population. Islamaphobia and anti-Arab racism is extremely high amongst them.

It may be uncomfortable for someone who is Jewish to be confronted with anti-Semitic stereotypes but we should remember that one of the reasons that there has been an increase in anti-Semitism is precisely because it is a ‘Jewish’ state that is committing these atrocities. That is why Jewish people have a duty to proclaim that what is happening is ‘not in our name’ as the Jewish Bloc chanted on the demonstrations in London.

When white liberals like Winter and Calder equate anti-Semitism in Britain with the genocidal racism of the Israeli state they are effectively condoning this genocide. British Jews do not suffer economic discrimination, state violence, deportations, attacks on the streets or police stop and search.

The inability of white liberals to recognise Zionism for what it is, a genocidal ideology and movement, and their recourse to ‘anti-Semitism’ as a justification for their position demonstrates that when you scratch a liberal you get the same old racism.

Calder’s feminism has racism embedded in it. I can only recommend that Calder and other White feminists, steeped as they are in the sisterhood of imperialism, read Nesrine Malik’s excellent article on the war against women in Gaza. Malik quotes the charity Care on the conditions women in Gaza face:

“There is no doctor, midwife or nurse to support women during labour. There is no pain medication, anaesthesia or hygiene material when women give birth.” Babies are born on the ground in the wilderness, umbilical cords cut with whatever sharp object there is to hand, and tins filled with hot water keep the newborn warm. C-sections, painful in the aftermath even when drugs are plentiful, are being performed without any anaesthesia at all, by surgeons who do not have any water to wash their hands, let alone sterilise them, and no antibiotics for any resulting infections. In some cases, according to Washington Post reporting, C-sections were performed on women postmortem.

Women captives in foreground

Neither Calder nor Winter allowed the word ‘genocide’ to pollute their articles. Not once did Calder refer to women in Gaza. Her concern was with sentimental mush on a Hove lawn.

Fahya Falash in Palestine Chronicle:  ‘Transported in Cages’ – Shocking Details of How Israel Treats Female Gaza Prisoners quotes Palestinian lawyer Hassan al-Abadi as saying that he was particularly disturbed by the way Israeli forces transported the female detainees from Gaza to the prisons.  According to Abadi, they were placed in trucks carrying cages similar to those used for animal transport. 

“This detail particularly hurt me: these women have been transported in animal trucks. They have been tied, blindfolded and stripped of their head covering, as a way to humiliate them,” al-Abadi said.

Since Calder is so fond of reminiscing about the Holocaust she might care to remember that when Jews were deported to Auschwitz they too were transported in animal trucks.

Abadi also said that when the female detainees arrived at the prison, their clothes were stained with blood. Most of them were also bleeding from their hands, as the plastic chains had been tightly tied around their wrists for days.

Murdoch's Times has not retracted its 40 Babies Beheaded Story - instead it continues with fake news - only one baby died on October 7, killed by Israel!

Upon their arrival, they were distributed into three rooms, each containing six iron beds. Most of them were reportedly forced to sleep on the floor without pillows or mattresses.

“The prisoners told me that the food is also very bad and that the Israeli guards deliberately leave it on their cells’ doors for hours, until it turns cold. The water has a rusty taste as well,”

According to al-Abadi, these women not only suffer due to the extremely cruel conditions of their detention but because they are constantly concerned about their families. They do not know the fate of their children as Israel relentlessly bombards Gaza.

They are not allowed to hear the news or follow what is happening in any way. They are isolated from the outside world and don’t know anything

But there are other forms of violation carried out by Israeli authorities. Al-Abadi told how the prison administration prevents these women from bringing along sanitary pads 

Therefore during their period they are forced to wash their clothes daily and wear them when they are still wet, as the prison administration does not provide them with additional clothes. They only have what they were wearing when arrested.

Rimal Neighborhood, Gaza city |

Israeli soldier Yosee Gamzoo publish a picture showing him torturing a Palestinian civilian in West Gaza city.

I blurred the gunshot on his leg. He is handcuffed and undressed. pic.twitter.com/A4urfpU6Sf

— Younis Tirawi | يونس (@ytirawi) February 4, 2024

Israel doesn’t consider men and women detained in the Gaza Strip to be prisoners of war under the so-called “unlawful combatants” law. Therefore, it prevents them from having contact with lawyers and human rights institutions.

“The female detainees from Gaza are even forbidden from talking to the rest of the prisoners and they have to communicate in secret.”

Winter and Calder, comfortable as they are with their hackneyed clichés about canaries might cast a glance at Yuval Abraham’s article in Israel’s +972 Magazine ‘Inside Israel’s torture camp for Gaza detainees’ before setting pen to paper.

On February 4 in Israeli Army Admits Running Unauthorized Graphic Gaza Influence Op Ha’aretz revealed that a Telegram Channel displaying the vilest videos and stills of the abuse of Palestinians was distributed by them, after having originally denied it.

They uploaded thousands of videos and still images of the killing of terrorists and destruction in the Strip, and encouraged the channel's followers to share the content so that "everyone can see we're screwing them."

An October 11 post read: "Burning their mother… You won't believe the video we got! You can hear their bones crunch. We'll post it right away, get ready." Photos of Palestinian men captured by the IDF in the Strip and the bodies of terrorists were captioned: "Exterminating the roaches… exterminating the Hamas rats… Share this beauty." A video of a soldier allegedly dipping machine gun bullets in pork fat is captioned: "What a man!!!!! Greases bullets with lard. You won't get your virgins." Another caption was: "Garbage juice!!!! Another dead terrorist!! You have to watch it with the sound, you'll die laughing."

On October 14, alongside the caption "Exclusive video of a good night, don't forget to share and repost" was a video of an Israeli vehicle repeatedly driving over the body of a Palestinian. "Very good, Gershon!!! Run him over run him over!!!! Screw the bastards! Flatten them,"the accompanying text read.

Hamas published yesterday an 18-minute long pre-recorded press conference in English about their side of the story.

This has received zero media attention anywhere in the western press.

So in the interest of full transparency, here is the entire press conference. pic.twitter.com/Cd5SyYjImJ

— روني الدنماركي (@Aldanmarki) October 13, 2023

Jordanian Medial Syndicate member Dr Bilal Azzam who visited Gaza, says Palestinian doctors were tortured and abused by israeli troops pic.twitter.com/2qyPi3d805

— Sarah Wilkinson (@swilkinsonbc) February 8, 2024

This is an official production of the Israeli army. The abuses described, which appeal to the sadistic appetite of the average Israeli, are not the work of lone rangers or odd balls.  They represent the official mindset of the army which sought deniability but was forced to admit to its ownership of the contents when it was shown that the information could only have come from official sources.

This demonstrates that the abuses, the tortures, the humiliations are official Israeli policy.

It is easy to virtue signal about ‘anti-Semitism’. Starmer and Sunak do it all the time. Israel is gearing up to perpetrate its biggest ever massacre in Rafah where Israel’s plans to transfer over a million Palestinians into Egypt. Yet all this pair of mediocrities do is harp on about how terrible October 7 was.

There was a time when Andy Winter and Jean Calder were dissonant anti-establishment voices. Those times have long gone. Today they write for local right-wing rags reflecting the views of the British Establishment in all its murderous glory as it extinguishes ancient liberties and freedom of speech.

Anti-Semitism is the false anti-racism of the Right and those who hark back to a past genocide do so in order to justify another genocide. A false memory of the past is used to shape the present and manipulate the future.

As to the question in the title of this essay the answer is simple. You can’t be friends with people who are proud to be racists. We no longer have anything in common.

Tony Greenstein

An open letter to Israelis from Israelis: We deserve the truth about October 7

There is one and only one issue – Labour’s Silence on Genocide in Gaza and the Attack on Rafah

Whatever else you can say about George Galloway he is not without controversy. Politically he has a long record of forming alliances and then falling out with his partners – whether it is the SWP in Respect or the Stalinist Communists Party of Great Britain - Marxist Leninist in his Workers Party.

I say ‘his’ because the Workers Party revolves around George. It is very much his baby and it is highly unlikely that the membership would overrule him on any major issue or indeed have the means to do so.

🚨Twitter deleted the post, so reposting to expose Israeli army crimes!

Last video of kids martyrs of Husouna family massacre
They fled from Gaza to Rafah in search of safety, escaping shelling
Israeli army killed them inside their tent along with all family members last night ! pic.twitter.com/hlW7qWqFJx

— Nour Naim| نور نعيم (@NourNaim88) February 13, 2024

This is what war criminals Keir Starmer & Peter Kyle Support

George is politically eclectic. He is a brilliant speaker, an old-fashioned orator in an age when the leader of the Labour Party freezes like a rabbit caught in a car’s headlights whenever anyone gets to challenge him as Audrey White did when Starmer ventured into Liverpool.

George is not someone that socialists find easy to support. He is anti-abortion for a start and dismissive of issues of sexual orientation and sexual oppression -  all of which he  puts into a basket called ‘wokery’. There is a distinct impression that he panders to some very basic prejudices such as homophobia and transphobia in the belief th at if you ignore these issues then you will get basic workers’ unity.

Likewise George’s attitude to race which is most evidenced in his failure to oppose the Tories scapegoating of asylum seekers. George disgracefully attacked the SNP for having supported demonstrators in Glasgow who freed two refugees who were seized by the Home Office’s Border Unit.

He was also vehemently pro-Brexit and was quite prepared to support a racist like Nigel Farage. Indeed he tried to become a candidate in the European elections for the Brexit Party.

He even formed an alliance in Scotland with Tories and that he even shared a platform with David Clews, a member of the Patriotic Alternative.

Deserted!

So what are his pluses?

George has been a consistent anti-imperialist and was expelled from the Labour Party as an MP for opposing the Iraq War. When summoned to Congress to address allegations regarding oil sanctions he turned in a fine and memorable performance.

On the issue of Palestine George also has a good record. There was a time when he supported the two-state solution. I know because I debated the issue with him at my old college St Mary’s in Strawberry Hill, Twickenham. But as he later admitted I was right and he was wrong on this.

So I understand why it is that many people refuse to support Galloway because of his de facto alliance with racists and reactionaries.

Letter in the Scottish National from anti-racist campaigner Mark Brown

However the by-election in Rochdale is not about Galloway but what he stands for on the one key issue in Britain and indeed the world.  US and British imperialism’s support for the genocide in Gaza. All other issues pale by comparison. The lives of thousands of Palestinians hang in the balance at this moment and Galloway’s disgraceful opportunism over refugees, Brexit and Farage are minor by comparison.

Galloway and only Galloway is able to win this election. If Galloway wins the election it won’t be his previous positions that are highlighted in Britain against the racist imperialists Sunak and Starmer but his position on an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

This is the key dividing line in British politics. It is the most crucial issue that we face today. It would be utter sectarianism for anyone on the left to ignore this. We cannot choose who our representatives are sometimes. Galloway’s victory will be a victory for the Palestinians. What he thinks about Brexit or refugees is frankly irrelevant at this time.

A defeat for Starmer’s candidate, Azhar Ali is now certain now that the Labour Party has withdrawn its support for him, allegedly over his ‘anti-Semitic’ comments about Israel having been forewarned of the October attacks but in reality because of the realisation that he was going to lose.

We need Galloway’s victory to make it crystal clear to that apology for a human being, the robotic Keir Starmer that support for genocide is unacceptable.

GENOCIDE IN GAZA IS THE ONLY ISSUE IN THE ROCHDALE BY-ELECTION

As Israel Murders Patients in Nasser Hospital – They Don’t Even Pretend It’s a Hamas Base – 500 People in Brighton Demonstrate Their Disgust At Our War Criminal Rulers

I used to ask myself if there was anything that the Nazi-Zionist Government in Jerusalem could do that would invoke Western sanctions. Gaza and Rafah prove that there is nothing its Racist Rottweiler can do that would cause the United States to penalise Israel.

Human rights are for Russia, China, Cuba and Iran. They are irrelevant when it’s Israel. International law has been shown to be a paper tiger as the International Court’s ruling on plausible genocide has not only been ignored but the subject to retaliation.

Indeed Israel is now making threats to the life of South Africa’s Foreign Minister, Naledi Pandor, and her family. Israel is the quintessential definition of a terrorist state.

Rami Igra, previously head of the Captive & Missing Division in the Mossad, says there are no uninvolved civilians in Gaza over the age of four, the "humane" Kan reporter Ayala Hasson agrees but clarifies that the 0-4 year old children are innocent and deserve humanitarian aid. pic.twitter.com/y1NtMoJtpW

— B.M. (@ireallyhateyou) February 14, 2024

Invasion of Nasser Hospital

On the bogus excuse that 12 members of UNWRA took part in the October 7 breakout, as if what members of staff do in their spare time is of any relevance, Biden, Sunak and the rest of the blood-soaked western leaders decided to stop funding UNWRA thus contributing to Israel’s Death by Hunger strategy.

Brighton Station Demonstration

As I pointed out in my speech to the sit-in, it was the Nazi Governor of Poland, Hans Frank, who openly boasted of their tactic of starving the Jewish ghettos. 83,000 died in the Warsaw Ghetto alone.

Support for genocide is causing Labour Party leader Keir Starmer a headache as more local councillors resign, this time in Kirklees. ‘Anti-Semitism’ has proven a handy pretext to disown  its candidate in Rochdale to avoid a humiliating defeat in the by election.

Powerful words by 102 years old philosopher Edgar Morin, one of France's most revered intellectual figures, as well as a Jewish WW2 resistant who fought as a lieutenant in De Gaulle's France combattante.pic.twitter.com/0xmKJX0Uu4
Here are his words on Gaza: "I am both astonished…

— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) February 15, 2024

Canadian Parliament Demonstration Against the Supply of Arms for Genocide

We  shall see next Wednesday when the SNP put down a motion calling for an immediate ceasefire whether the death of around 15,000 is enough for Mogadon Man or whether he, Rachel Reeves, Peter Kyle and the other monsters on Labour’s front bench prefer to see yet more kids killed.

Irish MP Speak Out Against Genocide in Gaza

The sit-in was the biggest of the 3 that have been held so far in Brighton. I was pleased to address the demonstrators after a Palestinian woman, Tanuksha. There were a number of other speakers and the chanting made it clear to the  hundreds of passengers what the feeling in Brighton & Hove was.

There was one obnoxious passenger but the Police quickly removed him and another obnoxious woman on a bicycle.

Tony Greenstein

Instead of a Documentary on the Bombing of Every Hospital &University in Gaza the BBC Employed Islamaphobe John Ware as its Witchfinder General

You might think that at a time of genocide in Gaza Panorama might devote a programme to exposing Israeli lies about October 7 or how ethnic cleansing, not defeating Hamas, is the main reason for Israel’s Nazi-style blitzkrieg. Not a bit of it.

Today Panorama will give a helping hand to Israel’s killers by ‘exposing’ how British Muslims support Hamas. All with the aid of its favourite Islamaphobe John Ware.

In July 2019, shortly before the General Election Panorama broadcast Is Labour Anti-Semitic? It didn’t need the question mark since it had already made up its mind. It was a hatchet job on the Corbyn left and who better to front it than Ware?

The program attracted over 2,000 complaints yet Ofcom refused to investigate it. The British Establishment was determined to run with the ‘labour anti-Semitism’ narrative and it brooked no opposition.

If ever there was a reporter unfit to present a documentary on alleged racism in the Labour Party then it is Ware.

The programme failed to explain that the Jews interviewed all happened to be members/officers of the Zionist Jewish Labour Movement. It didn’t even give their names. Not one anti-Zionist Jew or member of Jewish Voice for Labour was interviewed.

On Monday Panorama will broadcast Hamas’s Secret Financial Empires by John Ware and producer Leo Telling. It attacks British Palestinians for funding Hamas. It relies on Israeli intelligence sources and is will be about as reliable as the Israeli allegations that Gaza’s hospitals were Hamas military bases.

Claims of rape by some mainstream media are false, spurious and evil.
They feeds into the genocidal narrative adopted by Zionists to justify the crimes committed by the terrorist apartheid state.

Try another one. @washingtonpost#Gaza#Palestine#Genocide

— Anas Altikriti أنس التكريتي (@anasaltikriti) November 26, 2023

Asa Winstanley of Electronic Intifada documents how:

As “evidence” of such “support” for “terror,” the producer cited four posts to X (formerly Twitter) by Altikriti, where he called into question some of Israel’s most high-profile atrocity propaganda about the Palestinian military assault on 7 October.

These Israeli narratives have been widely discredited and called into question across the world.

While the producer conceded that “there is currently no evidence (at least, of which we are aware) that 40 babies had been beheaded,” he claimed to have “gathered evidence” of other crimes.

Telling’s equivocal wording comes despite the fact that the “40 babies” claim has been definitively proven to be a total fabrication, and not simply an unproven claim.

Allegations of rape made by Israel are false. It’s a lie. Just like the 40 beheaded babies was a lie. Just like every other allegation made Israel turns out to be a lie, including the mass slaughter of Israeli citizens on the 7th of October. That too was a lie. #Gaza#Genocide

— Anas Altikriti أنس التكريتي (@anasaltikriti) December 5, 2023

Just one baby, Mila Cohen (10 months) was killed, by a stray bullet, 36 children in total. Compare that to the 15,000+ Palestinian children who’ve been murdered including 4 babies who were left to die by the Israeli military in Al Shifa when the ventilators were turned off.  Their bodies were left for wild animals to devour. See CNN’s Infants found dead and decomposing in evacuated hospital ICU in Gaza. Here’s what we know.

In 2002, Chris Hedges wrote about Israelis in Gaza for Harper's: "Children have been shot in other conflicts I have covered, but I have never before watched soldiers entice children like mice into a trap and murder them for sport."

Israel, again, breaking new ground... https://t.co/RUVfe16zRL

— corey robin (@CoreyRobin) February 13, 2023

Of course every child is one too many but whereas Hamas went out of their way not to kill children there is evidence that Israeli is deliberately rounding up children like mice and then executing them.

It seems that the hatchet job that Panorama is intending will be as factually inaccurate as all Ware’s previous programmes. Winstanley describes how

Putting the program’s allegations to Altikriti, the producer described one of the campaigner’s tweets as a response to “a post by UK women.”

Yet the tweet Telling cites was actually a response to a pro-Israel lobby group, We Believe in Israel, which was spreading the Israeli propaganda about rape. The group is actually run by a man, Luke Akehurst, and the post in question does not quote women.

Is this like the 40 beheaded babies story?
Where’s your evidence that anyone has committed rape or targeted women specifically?
From what we’ve seen and heard from released hostages (all women, incidentally) is that they we treated with extreme respect and never harmed. https://t.co/9KTrcl5GwW

— Anas Altikriti أنس التكريتي (@anasaltikriti) November 9, 2023

 The programme is going to broadcast how prominent British Palestinians like Anas Altikriti are supporting Hamas. Proof of this is their doubting of Israeli atrocity propaganda such as the story about 40 beheaded babies.

The ‘evidence’ for Ware’s accusations in the program is Israel’s Secret Police Shin Bet who are notorious for routinely using torture and abusing Palestinian children.

During Is Labour Anti-SemiticWare described the interview by Labour Party staff member Ben Westerman of a Jewish member Helen Marks. It was witnessed by another Jewish member Rica Bird. A tape recording proved that Westerman lied when he alleged that Rica had asked if he was from Israel. She had asked what branch of the Labour Party he was from.

After having denied that Westerman lied for so long Ware finally admitted, in the Zionist journal Fathom (where else?) that ‘it cannot be ruled out that Westerman’s recollection has erred’ and that he ‘misremembered’.

This came after the BBC finally admitted that the interview with Izzy Lenga, a JLM officer, had been cut so as to suggest holocaust denial was a feature of Labour Party debate rather than her alleged experiences at University. However the admission was tucked away in Corrections & Clarifications rather than being broadcast.

The programme had two ‘expert witnesses’ Dave Rich from the Zionist Community Security Trust and the second witness was Professor Alan Johnson. Johnson is not Jewish and he has no special knowledge of anti-Semitism. He is Editor of Fathom, the journal of BICOM, the main Israeli propaganda organisation in Britain. He is a Zionist. Why was this information concealed?

The only conclusion is that Ware deliberately set out to mislead viewers. By not providing Johnson’s political and professional background Ware paraded Johnson as a neutral expert when he was nothing of the sort?

It is a testament to how dishonest Is Labour Anti-Semitic was that over 4 years later John Ware is still forced to defend it.

Arzu Merali’s documented how Ware's 2005 "A Question of Leadership" attracted over 600 complaints in just its first week protesting about its hostile and one-sided nature.

John Ware - the BBC's Go to Islamaphobe

The Muslim Council of Britain described the programme thus:

John Ware’s team have made a deeply unfair programme using deliberately garbled quotes in an attempt to malign the Muslim Council of Britain and with the barely concealed goal of drawing British Muslims away from being inspired in their political beliefs and actions by the faith of Islam. It is unfortunate that just when Britain’s 1.6 million Muslims are beginning to make progress in terms of their political participation in the mainstream, there are those who are purposefully trying to sabotage that process,’said Sir Iqbal Sacranie, Secretary-General of the Muslim Council of Britain.

It seems that to qualify as so-called ‘moderates’ Muslims are required to remain silent about Israeli crimes in Palestine, otherwise they are automatically labelled as ‘extremists’.

And that is the gist of it. Ware’s agenda is to defend the Israeli state at all costs. Arzu described Ware as ‘someone who has made a career out of exceptionalising Muslims.’

One senior ex-Panorama journalist described the programme as

the most disgusting Panorama that I have ever seen. The presenter was acting like a prosecuting attorney, not a journalist.

 The Guardian's Madeleine Bunting called the documentary, which dubbed all Muslims as ‘extremist’, as an example of the ‘McCarthyite absurd’. Bunting described Ware’s journalistic method as being one of ‘Branding moderates as extremists’ and gave as an example his targeting of Sir Iqbal Sacranie of the MCB. She described his behaviour as McCarthyite.

Ware doesn’t so much investigate as pillory and scapegoat, substituting his own prejudices for reporting. Ken Livingstone’s description of Hitler having supported Zionism was termed a ‘cranky’ version of history. Since when is it a presenter’s job to pass judgement on a particular view of history?

One wonders what John Ware would call the memo that the German Zionist Federation sent on 21^st June 1933, to Hitler?

‘On the foundation of the new state, which has established the principle of race... fruitful activity for the fatherland is possible. Our acknowledgement of Jewish nationality provides for a clear and sincere relationship to the German people and its national and racial realities....’

Zionist historian, David Cesarani, wrote in The Final Solution:

‘The efforts of the Gestapo are oriented to promoting Zionism as much as possible and lending support to its efforts to promote emigration.’

Maybe Cesarani was also a ‘crank’? Or perhaps the crank is Ware? Ware is a relic of the days of Empire when we ‘civilised the natives’. He wrote of his

horror... that some migrants to this country had brought with them a lot more than just their possessions.

They didn’t understand democracy and dissent. One can only wonder at where they may have got it from! Britain’s former colonies were not a model of democracy.

Racism oozes out of everything Ware writes. He described Islam as an ‘ideology’ which is what Tommy Robinson and the far-Right says. Since the Chief Rabbi stated that Judaism and Zionism are intertwined does not the same apply to Judaism?

In an article for a right-wing magazine Standpoint (27.6.17) Enough is enough of terror — but also of our self-doubtWare wrote of Western civilisation being ‘based on Christianity, which enshrines individualism and freedom.’

One can only wonder what Torquemada’s victims would have made of that. Perhaps Martin Luther’s fulmination that ‘the Jews are our misfortune’ is Ware’s idea of civilisation? This was emblazoned on the masthead of the Nazi paper Der Sturmer.

In the article for Standpoint Ware wrote that the Tory Party’s

‘family quarrel over Europe... risks letting in a Labour leader whose entire political career has been stimulated by disdain for the West, appeasement of extremism, and who would barely understand what fighting for the revival of British values is really all about.’

These bigoted remarks should have rendered Ware as unfit to comment on a greyhound race let alone the Labour Party. Yet the BBC was and is more than happy to employ him.

Ware is of the opinion that the alternative to British values ‘is a diffuse mush with nothing particularly special to defend at all.’ Islamaphobia is just ‘powerful ammunition’ for discrediting Prevent. But it is in the final paragraph that we understand Ware’s motivation when he lambasted the Tory party for

‘risk(ing) letting in a Labour leader whose entire political career has been stimulated by disdain for the West, appeasement of extremism, and who would barely understand what fighting for the revival of British values is really all about.’

This is the man who the BBC believed was the most suitable person to present a programme on ‘Labour anti-Semitism’. The MCB got it right when they described Ware as ‘an agenda-driven pro-Israeli polemicist.’  

In an article Jeremy Corbyn’s gold standard code on antisemitism is far from black and whitein the Jewish Chronicle Ware demonstrated his ignorance, not only about Islam but Zionism too. He opined that

‘any suggestion that ethnic cleansing was a principle war aim by the Jews in 1948 ... is highly contested. The Jews had accepted the UN partition plan. The Arabs had not.... The Arabs’ war aim was the destruction of the Jews’ emergent state fuelled by a religious Jihad. Survival was the Jews’ war aim.’

 Ware knows nothing about the Nakba. He referred to Arab war plans but the Arab armies only invaded in May 1948 as a consequence of the expulsion by then of over 300,000 Palestinian refugees. The ethnic cleansing was well under way.

Josef Weitz, Director of the Jewish National Fund’s Colonisation Department wrote in his diary in 1940, reprinted on 29.9.67 in the Israeli Labour Party daily Davar:

"Between ourselves it must be clear that there is no room for both peoples together in this country...We shall not achieve our goal of being an independent people with the Arabs in this small country. The only solution is a Palestine, at least Western Palestine [west of the Jordan river] without Arabs...And there is no other way than to transfer the Arabs from here to the neighbouring countries, to transfer all of them; not one village, not one tribe, should be left...Only after this transfer will the country be able to absorb the millions of our own brethren. There is no other way out."

Commenting on what he had written in his diary 27 years later Weitz wrote that:

 when the UN passed a resolution to partition Palestine into two states, the War of Independence broke out to our great good fortune; and in this war a twofold miracle happened: a territorial victory and the flight of the Arabs. In the Six Days’ War one great miracle happened: a tremendous territorial victory; but most of the inhabitants of the liberated territories remained ‘stuck’ to their places which may destroy the very foundation of our state.”

Ware cannot help but be aware of the Zionist penchant for ethnic cleansing. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that if you want to establish a ‘Jewish’ state in a land where two-thirds of the population are Palestinian then you have to expel them.

John Ware compliments me when he says  that ‘Greenstein must be one of the most disagreeable individuals I’ve ever set eyes on’

Ware never makes any distinction between Zionists, Israelis and Jews. He is clearly unaware of the Post-Zionist Israeli Historians such as Benny Morris or Ilan Pape otherwise he would not have written such junk.

In the same article Ware makes his own views crystal clear.

So deeply into Labour’s Left has anti-Zionism morphed into antisemitism (sic) — itself a Corbyn legacy — that Jewish Labour members are avoiding meetings.

When Ware embarked on Is Labour Anti-Semitic? his mind had long been made up. Even New Labour’s David Blunkett had savaged Panorama’s The Asylum Game and Ware, for

playing into the hands of a "Powellite anti-immigration agenda" ...

He particularly singled out for criticism the BBC1 Panorama special, the Asylum Game, and its writer and presenter, John Ware, for producing a "poorly researched and overspun documentary" which repeated unchallenged the claims of "the rightwing anti-immigration pressure group, Migration Watch".

In another article for the Jewish Chronicle in November 2016 Why the I-word has closed down debate on extremismWare defended the notorious Islamaphobe Douglas Murray, Associate Director of the Henry Jackson Society and on the board of the far-Right Gatestone Institute. Gaby Hinsliffe in a Review of Murray’s The Strange Death of Europedescribed how

The rightwing journalist and commentator cites Enoch Powell and wants to protect white Christian Europe from ‘outsiders.’ [33]

Ware wrote in the Jewish Chronicle that

Islamophobia — however it is defined — will abate when terrorism carried out in God’s name ceases.

Ware quoted favourably Murray’s assertion that the term “Islamophobia” was ‘a meaningless idea – a crock.” Ware explained the difference between anti-Semitism and what he termed ‘(authentic) Islamophobia’.

‘The former is entirely irrational, the latter reactive.’

Which is exactly how anti-Semitism used to be defended. Ware blamed Muslim radicals

who have brought it on their fellow Muslims — by their promotion of Islam as a political ideology.

What is surprising is that if the BBC and Panorama were seriously interested in exploring racism in British political parties, and the same is equally true for the EHRC, then there is plenty of scope for a programme about the Tory Party. More than half of Conservative Party members questioned for a poll believed Islam is a threat to British life.

In 1987 Ware tried to discredit former army intelligence officer Colin Wallaceon Panorama. Paul Foot, who was a brilliant investigative journalist dismissed Ware as a shoddy reporter. As the article A long history of lies against the leftexplained

In 1987 Ware reported for a Panorama documentary that tried to discredit former army intelligence officer Colin Wallace.

Wallace had exposed a “dirty tricks” campaign against Labour prime minister Howard Wilson.

Ware claimed Wallace was a fantasist. But as investigative journalist Paul Foot wrote, Ware’s own report was riddled with obvious errors.

Wallace’s letter in The Spectator showed how Ware was cavalier in his approach to facts and an establishment journalist:

John Ware, the former Sun reporter who now works for the BBC, no doubt owes much of his skill and flair as a writer to his days with his old newspaper.

Ware was defending the British army against allegations of  illegal activity. As in Palestine Ware went out of his way to defend the colonial authorities. Ware is the go to ‘journalist’ whenever colonial malpractice needs defending. It’s no surprise that the BBC, the old Voice of the British Empire, should solicit his services much as someone solicits a prostitute.

As Robin Ramsay of The Lobster explained Colin Wallace, who was framed for the murder of a man in Arundel (and later cleared) was subject to a concerted attempt at discrediting him. But for Paul Foot’s investigation this would have stuck.

In 2015 Ware produced a documentary Jeremy Corbyn: Labour’s Earthquakeon Corbyn’s first leadership campaign. It featured claims from right wing Labour figures that a Corbyn victory would lead to left wing “thuggery and intimidation”.

The Independent described how Panorama lied when they told Corbyn’s team that their film was about the Labour leadership campaign as a whole, including all four candidates.

‘A source in Mr Corbyn’s campaign accused the BBC of conducting "a complete hatchet job" on Mr Corbyn.’

Ware produced a number of films attacking Muslims and Palestinians. One suggested that Palestinian charity Interpal funded terrorism. Others have targeted the Muslim Council of Britain and Muslim Engagement and Development (Mend).

Interpal successfully suedthe Daily Mail in 2019 and was awarded £120,000 for alleging it funded terrorism. Ware also attacked Mend accusing it of antisemitism due to its members’ criticisms of Israel.

In Panorama or Propaganda Faisal Bodi documented Ware’s Islamaphobic journalism. Arzu Merali also documented the Islamaphobia of Ware in The banality and boredom of anti-Muslim witchhunts. Or beware John Ware for Middle East Eye,

In 'It's the last chance for Panorama' Ware was quoted by James Silver as being:

“A notorious pro-Israeli Islamophobe”, “desperate to discredit Muslims” with “a track record for displaying unfairness and twisting the truth”. Panorama's leading reporter, John Ware, is not quite public enemy number one for many British Muslims - that is an accolade no doubt held by Bush or Blair - but postings such as these on the Muslim Public Affairs Committee website show he comes a close second.

It says everything about the impartiality of the BBC, with its much vaunted ‘balance’, that it has continued to employ John Ware, a bigot for all seasons, whenever it has wanted to attack either the left or Muslims. We can therefore expect no better of Ware’s expose tomorrow of British Muslims and Hamas. Ware is a known liar and that is why the BBC employs him.

Ware not only writes for the anti-Palestinian Jewish Chronicle he owns part of it. In 2020 when the JC was going bankrupt Ware was part of a consortium which put in a bid to save it.

When two members of the consortium, William Shawcross and Rabbi Jonathan Hughes were contacted by the Jewish Newsthey said that they didn’t know who was funding the bid. Clearly Ware has a lot invested, personally and politically in supporting both Zionism and Islamaphobia. As such he is about the worst person imaginable to be producing documentaries on Muslims for the BBC. It is like asking Nick Griffin of the British National Party to produce a documentary on British Jews.

The JC, according to ABC, the media industry’s auditor, had a paid sale of only 6,371 for May/June 2023. If it was any other paper the JC would have been allowed to go to the wall but it is considered too valuable a propaganda organ by the Zionists to be allowed to die a natural death.

To say that there is a conflict of interest between Ware as owner of the JC and Ware as BBC journalist is to put it mildly. Tomorrow night we can look forward to more of the same. I suggest that people get on the phones and start making complaints to the BBC now. To make a complaint go here and to phone in a complaint ring 0843 254 8737

Tony Greenstein

500 People Having Written to Brighton & Hove Councillors Demanding That They Don’t Grant L3Harris Planning Permission to Help Israel Commit Genocide

On Saturday in Brighton 300 people held a demonstration at The Level and then marked 2 miles to an out of the way arms factory owned by L3 Harris on Brighton’s Moulsecoomb Estate.

 Previously the factory was called EDO-MBM. It too supplied weaponry to Israel. It was the subject of a major campaign ten years ago and also a famous trial in which all the protesters, who had caused over £¼ million damage  were acquitted.

The trial was presided over by an extremely sympathetic Judge Bathhurst Norman, whose summing up, as the Guardian reported, quoted favourably

the testimony by Caroline Lucas, the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, that "all democratic paths had been exhausted" before the activists embarked on their action.

Bathhurst Norman, who was born in Haifa during the British Mandate, was later reprimanded by the judicial authorities, after a Zionist complaint, for the sympathy he had shown with the defendants.

The Jewish Chronicle was certainly not amused. It reported that

That case became notorious following the comments of Judge George Bathurst-Norman. He was formally reprimanded by the Office for Judicial Complaints after telling the Hove Crown Court jury: “You may well think that hell on earth would not be an understatement of what the Gazans suffered at that time [during Operation Cast Lead].”

Telling the truth has always been frowned upon by the judicial authorities.

L3Harris is the 12th largest weapons manufacturer in the world. It makes bomb release mechanisms for F-35 fighter jets being used by Israel to kill Palestinians.

Picket of L3Harris Arms Factory in Brighton

L3Harris is a major US weapons developer, which has facilities in the Massachusetts cities and towns of Northampton, Ayer, and Wilmington. L3 Harris supports Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from their homeland, US militarism and imperialism, and the US government's regime of tracking, detentions, and deportations of Black and Brown migrants.

Support for the Israeli ethnic cleansing

As reported by AFSC Investigate, L3Harris is a top supplier of component parts for Lockheed Martin F-35 warplanes, which Lockheed Martin sells to Israel, manufacturing a total of 1,600 components for each of Lockheed Martin's F-35s. Israel used its fleet F35 warplanes during its May 2021 bombing campaign against Palestinians living in Gaza.

L3Harris also produces components for Boeing's Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM) guided bombs, or "smart bombs," which enable increased precision in striking targets. These JDAM-guided bombs have been directly linked to the killing of at least 44 Palestinian civilians in Israel's bombing of al-Wahda street in May 2021. L3 Harris has also previously supplied Israel with "SafeView body scanner machines," which Israel used at the Qalandia, Bethlehem, and Sha’ar Efraim (Irtach) military checkpoints in the West Bank, and the Erez checkpoint in the Gaza Strip.

Together with its so-called "separation wall," Israel's military checkpoints function to immiserate Palestinians who refuse to leave their land to make space for Zionist settlement expansion. Israel's checkpoints also function to fragment Palestinian society, physically separating Palestinians from one another and preventing Palestinians from moving freely across their land to travel to work, to tend their farmland during the day, and to visit loved ones.

L3Harris manufactured the management systems for the Israeli Navy’s fleet of Sa’ar 5 and Sa’ar 6 warships. Israel uses these warships to enforce its naval blockade on the Gaza strip, which denies the nearly 2 million Palestinians living in Gaza access to basic resources necessary to maintain water, sewage, electric, medical and other civilian infrastructure, significant amounts of which Israel destroys each time it bombs Gaza and which Palestinians cannot rebuild due to this blockade.

Israel then delays or denies Palestinians access to exit permits necessary to leave Gaza, preventing Palestinians from receiving life-saving medical care, which Palestinians cannot provide for themselves as the result of Israel's naval blockade which prevents resources from coming into Gaza along with Israel's bombing campaigns which destroy what infrastructure Palestinians attempt to construct in Gaza.

Accordingly, L3Harris bears responsibility not only for equipping the warplanes Israel has used to kill and injure thousands of Palestinians during its bombing campaigns against Gaza, but also for equipping the warships Israel uses to enforce its naval blockade of Gaza, which causes the mass preventable illness, death, and suffering amongst the people of Gaza.

Support for the US militarism and imperialism

L3Harris has derived $36.15 billion to date through US Department of Defense (DoD) contracts for the provision of products and services to the US Army, US Navy, US Air Force, and other branches of the US military. Recent L3Harris business dealings with the US DoD include this $750 million contract to equip the US Marines with "multi-channel handheld and vehicular radio systems," as well as this this $947.3 million contract to support the US Air force's "aircraft electronic warfare system initiative."

Support for US tracking, detentions, and deportations of migrants

As reported by AFSC Investigate, L3Harris equips the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) (a sub-agency within DHS) with advanced surveillance technologies, which DHS and ICE use to enforce the US government's brutal regime of tracking, detentions, and deportations of Black and Brown migrants.

Over the past decade, L3 Harris has provided DHS and ICE with tens of millions of dollars worth of cell-site simulators, known as "Stingrays," and subsequently provided DHS and ICE with an upgraded version of The Stingray known as "The Crossbow."

Stingrays and Crossbows mimic cell phone towers to make cell phones connect to them, allowing DHS and ICE to pinpoint the location of mobile devices or to identify phone numbers in their certain area, and thereby enabling DHS and ICE to more effectively track the movements of the migrants they target. In 2019, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) awarded L3 Harris a 5-year contract worth a potential $3 billion for "tactical communication networks," by extending the contract DHS had previously established with L3 Harris in 2013.

This is reprinted from The Mapping Project

The Suggestion That Opposing Genocide is Anti-Semitic or ‘Threatening’ to Jews and MPs is not only Anti-Semitic But It Paves the Way to a Police State

At 19.55 on February 16, on the eve of the last Palestine Demonstration, the Metropolitan Police issued a tweet changing the time of the demonstration, putting it back by 1½ hours.

The timing was deliberately planned in order to cause maximum disruption to those with pre-booked coaches and transport.

The pretext for this was in order to “accommodate an event at a synagogue along the route.” thus lending credence to allegations that marches against Israel’s genocide were anti-Jewish. The tweet reinforced this with the suggestion that “the impact on nearby congregations will be reduced.”

There was no hint as to what this ‘impact’ might have been but it doesn’t take much imagination to understand that what the Police were doing was to reinforce the message from supporters of Israel’s genocide that the demonstration was anti-Semitic.

Below is a statement from 150 Jews calling this intervention by the Police as an act of malice designed to reinforce the message of Zionist groups and their lapdogs, Sunak and Starmer, that demonstrations against genocide are ‘hate marches.

It’s correct that we’ve made it a condition that the march can’t move off until 1.30pm to accommodate an event at a synagogue along the route.

We’ve also required organisers to move the form up point south on Park Lane (marked by the green dot below) and we’ve blocked the… pic.twitter.com/jRnPkxw5fZ

— Metropolitan Police (@metpoliceuk) February 16, 2024

We have entered the land of Orwell’s double-speak where language that ‘deliberately obscures, disguises, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words’ is employed by our rulers, the political class and their media echo chambers to try and destroy what remains of our democratic right to protest.

Opposition to mass murder, ethnic cleansing and sexual violence is bizarrely called ‘hate’ and support for the starvation of children and the deliberate murder of those queuing for food is a sign of the love that these people feel!

George Orwell wrote about this phenomenon of how the ruling class uses language in an essay Politics and the English Language which is prescient. Orwell wrote:

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties.

Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenceless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification.

Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements.

Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them. Consider for instance some comfortable English professor defending Russian totalitarianism. He cannot say outright, ‘I believe in killing off your opponents when you can get good results by doing so’. Probably, therefore, he will say something like this:

Orwell was writing at the time of the British Empire. He was describing its ‘civilising methods’. Today we don’t need to conjure up mental pictures of Israel’s atrocities in Gaza. They are on the Internet and our TV screens. That is what makes the Tory/Labour attacks on those who support the Palestinians and oppose Israel’s massacre of civilians all the more despicables.

Rishi Sunak, Keir Starmer, Lisa Nandy and all the other war criminals who govern us cannot say they didn’t know. It is impossible for them not to know. They can therefore reasonably be described as blood drenched monsters. Cool, calculated political sadists for whom children starving and being murdered is less important than defeating a resistance movement, Hamas.

As we saw last night with the magnificent victory of George Galloway in Rochdale, despite the opposition of sectarian groups like the Socialist Workers Party, there is no constituency in Britain, besides MPs and Peers, TV and tabloid journalists, who can be mobilised in support of genocide.

Support for an immediate ceasefire commands the support of 71% of British people compared to 12% who wanted the blood letting to go on. This is despite the unanimity of the press and broadcasting media, the FT excepted, in favour of letting Israel’s genocidal rampage continue.

Even in the wake of October 7 and the mass propaganda about Hamas ‘atrocities’ most of which have now been debunked, an opinion poll on 19^th October showed that 76% of British people supported an immediate ceasefire compared to 8% who didn’t.

It is the rich and powerful, those who have access to the airwaves who are the people who shout loudest for a continuation of the genocide and ethnic cleansing. As Galloway proved last night, Sunak, Braverman and Starmer’s support for a continuation of the bloodletting commands next to no support.

Only the Daily Mail could call for restrictions on the right to protest in the name of democracy - Vladimir Putin should pay attention to how the British Establishment justifies repression

So we have the pathetic Sunak slinking out of Downing Street to make an evidence free accusation that it was ‘intimidation’ that had led to the defeat of all the bourgeois parties.

Sunak complained that Galloway supported Hamas and Hezbollah. Neither of these organisations have murdered 30,000 innocent people and injured another 70,000. Neither of these organisations have deliberately starved children to death and left babies to die in incubators. It is an indictment of the murderous twisted values of Sunak and his puppet Starmer that they believe that Hamas is the incarnation of evil whilst Israel is the symbol of all that is sweet and saintly in this world.

These are the values of capitalism and imperialism. No amount of blood shed is enough for these human vampires. Yet if their racist Rottweiler in the Middle East suffers an attack from those it has occupied for 57 years then this is the incarnation of evil.

It is this perversion of human values that leads these creatures to call demonstrations against genocide ‘hate marches.’ And it now appears that the Police, who are an instrument of class rule, there to protect property not people, who are using the pretext of ‘anti-Semitism’ to hem in the marches and provoke confrontations.

A number of people, myself included, have been arrested on the preposterous allegation that supporting the Palestinian right to resist is somehow support for ‘terrorism’. The proscribing of Hamas’s political wing in November 2021 by Sajid David was a nakedly political act. It had not an iota of justification.

If you go to the government website and see how the government justified its proscription of Hamas’s political wing (its military wing was proscribed in 2001) there is nothing saying why it was felt necessary to proscribe the political wing.

Throughout the Troubles in Northern Ireland from 1968 to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, whilst the IRA was proscribed Sinn Fein remained legal despite calls from the Tory right to proscribe it. If Sinn Fein had been proscribed then support for the IRA would never have been channelled in a political direction and the peace agreement would never have been signed. That is what that shallow political lightweight Sajid David was doing when, with a stroke of the pen, he proscribed Hamas political wing.

The government said that at the time when Hamas’s military wing was proscribed in March 2001

it was HM government’s assessment that there was a sufficient distinction between the so called political and military wings of Hamas, such that they should be treated as different organisations, and that only the military wing was concerned in terrorism. The government now assess that the approach of distinguishing between the various parts of Hamas is artificial. Hamas is a complex but single terrorist organisation.

Yet there is nothing to say why the government made this assessment. Absolutely nothing to justify proscribing the political wing. All it says is that:

Hamas commits and participates in terrorism. Hamas has used indiscriminate rocket or mortar attacks, and raids against Israeli targets. During the May 2021 conflict, over 4,000 rockets were fired indiscriminately into Israel. Civilians, including 2 Israeli children, were killed as a result. Palestinian militant groups, including Hamas, frequently use incendiary balloons to launch attacks from Gaza into southern Israel. There was a spate of incendiary balloon attacks from Gaza during June and July 2021, causing fires in communities in southern Israel that resulted in serious damage to property.

Even assuming that the above attacks were ‘terrorist’ as opposed to resistance activities, why were they attributed to Hamas’s 20,000 strong political wing? Hamas was the elected leadership of Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza under the last free elections in 2005.

If Hamas is to be classified as ‘terrorist’ because it killed 2 Israeli children then what should we call Israel which has murdered 15,000+ children in Gaza? The racist hypocrisy of this provision is nauseating.

Any normal person would classify Hamas as a resistance group. That does not mean you have to support it. It is an Islamic group. I’m an atheist. They are conservative socially and politically whereas I’m a socialist. But terrorist? This is the label that was applied to all colonial resistance to British imperialism.

‘Terrorist’ was also the label that the Nazis applied to the French and Polish Resistance. The Tory government and their Labour echo chambers are no different in their approach to Hamas than the Nazis occupiers in Europe were to the Maquis.

There had, before the Police’s decision to impose restrictions on the last Palestine march, been at least 9 previous such demonstrations without any discernible impact other than on the hysterical Braverman, the late and unlamented Home Secretary, who literally lost the plot when she accused the Police of a pro-Palestinian bias. No-one who is Jewish has been attacked or molested in any way prior to or subsequent to the marches.

Braverman wasn’t the only person who lost the plot. The misnamed Campaign Against Antisemitism, which was set up at the behest of Israel’s dirty tricks Minister of Strategic Affairs last time there was Israeli a major attack on Gaza, in the summer of 2014, called for the military to be called in!

The CAA even had the galls to say they were doing it in order to  “uphold the values that our country stands for”.  That is the contempt that Zionists have for democratic rights. But the CAA probably thought that they were still in Israel.

Since Braverman’s resignation the Police have been slowly caving in to the raucous and racist Tory and Zionist lobby with Police officers seeing their role as monitoring the slogans and speech of demonstrators. As if the average thick plod is capable of understanding political nuance.

The most ludicrous arrests were of four members of an obscure Stalinist group who had been selling a book on Nazi-Zionist collaboration with the Star of David intertwined with the Swastika. What business is it of the Police to decide that an artistic front cover of a book infringes the law?  Since when were the police the arbiters of what is acceptable?  This takes us back to the early 60s when the publishers of Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Penguin Books, were prosecuted for gross indecency.

I just hope that those arrested follow through with their threats to sue the Met for false arrest and malicious imprisonment.

In recent years the Met have increasingly taken upon themselves the roles of deciding what is and is not acceptable politically. We all remember the pre-emptive arrests of protesters at the Coronation of Charles III.

The mere fact that the Police took it upon themselves to decide that supporting Republicanism was an arrestable offence points to a deeper malaise in the police. Their ingrained right-wing bias.

As the Undercover Policing Inquiry into police malpractices, including rape by deception, revealed the Met’s Special Demonstration Squad, which infiltrated political groups concentrated solely on left-wing groups despite the fact that it is the far-right that has indulged in terrorism, bomb making and in the case of Darren Copeland the bombing of the Admiral Duncan pub in Soho, which killed 3 people a quarter of a century ago.

The pathetic excuse given for their political prejudice was that the police were too frightened to infiltrate fascist groups. Which, if true, just goes to show how nice we are and how we are the opposite of Braverman’s rhetoric!

Of course the Police response to accusations of bias is that they are only ensuring observance of the law without fear or favour.

If that is the case then it is strange that another law seems to have gone by default.  I refer to the International Criminal Court Act 2001, which makes it an offence to commit war crimes, be it in this country or abroad. It also makes someone who is ancillary to, i.e. helps someone commit a war crime equally guilty of the offence, wherever it is committed.

Given that Sunak, with the support of his faithful lapdog Starmer, has been supplying the Israelis with weapons with which to commit war crimes isn’t it about time that Sunak and Starmer shared a cell together?

With a bit of luck this would do wonders for penal reform as they might get to experience that which they wish to inflict on others. It would, I am sure, be an extremely popular measure since everyone knows that politicians are the biggest crooks.

Speaking of which isn’t it about time that the Police started prosecuting Tory Ministers who set up the VIP channel for their friends and cronies who took advantage of the COVID crisis to trouser billions of pounds? It would make a change from prosecuting shop lifters for petty theft.

As the letter below shows, the Police are fully aware that hundreds of Jews have taken part in the marches, many of them as part of a Jewish bloc.

I know that the habits of colonial divide and rule tactics die hard because at an earlier march the Police suddenly interposed themselves between the Jewish bloc and the rest of the march, because they believed that Jews were in danger from non-Jewish demonstrators.

This is not mere stupidity but a consequence of the false propaganda that the right churns out. The idea that there is anything anti-Semitic about pro-Palestinian marches is levelled by supporters of Israeli genocide in the absence of anything with which to defend what I called Hitler’s bastard offspring.

Because the Met operate within a racist and right-wing milieu, they have convinced themselves that the marches are inherently anti-Semitic. They seriously believed that demonstrators would attacks Jews who support the Palestinians, whereas in fact Jews opposed to genocide have been welcomed on the marches. This is part of the racist mindset of a police force that is notorious for the racists, bigots and Islamaphobes who make up its ranks.

Tony Greenstein 

When A Ruling Class Is Seen As Morally and Politically Bankrupt Then That is When It is Both Weakest & Most Vicious

Victory Speech

The reaction of Rishi Sunak to Galloway’s election victory last Friday morning was a sight to behold. He slithered out of 10 Downing Street to spew his venom at an audience that was no longer listening,bar the media circus that is little more than an echo chamber.

Sunak is an empty suit, a bundle of clichés, spewing racism and threats of state violence under the pretext that he is combating ‘extremist disruption and criminality’. What he meant of course was the mass demonstrations against the genocide in Gaza that he is encouraging and which 76% of the population support.

It is one of the hallmarks of the political dishonesty of our politicians that opposition to genocide is violence and support for genocide is making peace.

Sunak is the least impressive Prime Minister since the last one,  Liz Truss, whose reign was less than the lifespan of a lettuce.

Sunak’s speech

Sunak demonstrated the moral and political turpitude of an elite that has systematically transferred the wealth of the UK from the poorest to the richest. Sunak himself is the richest man in parliament and he is married to the tax-dodging daughter of a billionaire.

Comedian Tez with voting advice to British Muslims pic.twitter.com/ZgqmXWXrej

— Andrew Feinstein (@andrewfeinstein) March 5, 2024

Every action of the government is designed to impoverish the vast majority of people. The NHS is in chaos and underfunded, schools are being privatised, welfare benefits have been systematically cut, Brexit has reduced the volume of trade and yet according to Sunak and Braverman the greatest threat to Britain comes from refugees. Racism and divide and rule  are the order of the day.

Yet it is over Gaza that their moral depravity shines out. In his speech Sunak mentioned October 7, when Palestinian fighters killed 1,139 Israelis, a third of whom were military and police and half the remainder were killed by Israel under the Hannibal Doctrine, which stipulates that in the event of an Israeli being captured it is better to kill both captor and captive than allow the latter to be exchanged for Palestinian prisoners at a later date. A fact carefully hidden by a compliant media.

Galloway Interview with Sky TV

When genocide stalks Gaza, when Israel perpetrates the flour massacre, Sunak says nothing. One Israeli Jewish life is worth more than 100 Palestinian lives. Which is exactly the ratio of hostages killed that the Nazis exacted  when one of them were killed.

Israel is armed to the teeth by Sunak and the US government and soldiers opening fire on starving people waiting for food does not disturb Sunak, Starmer or our political elite in the slightest. Of course if Russia had committed such an atrocity it would have filled the airwaves. Instead Sunak condemned a non-existent violence on the streets of Britain as a pretext for removing yet more of our rights to protest.

Aaron Bushnell’s Brave Sacrifice to Stop Biden’s Genocide

Rochdale is a constituency which has been held by all 3 major parties and was for much of the 19^th century a stronghold of radicalism and the supporters of free trade and opponents of the Corn Laws, notably Richard Cobden. So it is not altogether a surprise that the voters of Rochdale have elected in George Galloway another radical.

There was one issue above all other that dominated the election and that was Gaza. As Galloway said in his victory speech, ‘Keir Starmer this is for Gaza.’

Sunak leads an openly racist party. 58% of whose members say that Islam poses a threat to this country. 43% of members don’t want a Muslim Prime Minister, a survey by YouGov found. Substitute Judaism/Jewish for Islam/Muslim and you get a flavour of the state of the Tory party.

The same study found 45% believe there are “areas in Britain in which non-Muslims are not able to enter” and 67% believe there are areas “that operate under Sharia law”. Conspiracy theories are rife in this racist party yet Sunak’s only concern was the false claim that Jewish school students are fearful’ to wear their uniforms ‘lest it reveal their identity.’

Sunak’s concern for British Jews, almost all whom are White, economically prosperous  and not subject to state repression or discrimination is touching but what he is doing is using Jews as a moral alibi for his support for Israel as a ‘Jewish’ State. When you are enabling genocide it helps to point to distract people’s attention by pointing to a non-existent problem.

Sunak declared that:

It is beyond alarming that last night the Rochdale by-election returned a candidate who dismisses the horror of what happened on October 7^th, who endorses Hezbollah and is endorsed by Nick Griffin, the racist leader of the BNP... you cannot use that to call for the eradication of a state or any kind of hatred or anti-Semitism.... It is the public’s expectation that they [the Police] will not only manage these protests but police them.

We have had 30,000 killed and 70,000 injured in Gaza and rising but this is not enough for Sunak who had nothing to say about Palestinian deaths and injuries.

Calling for the dismantlement of the Apartheid State of Israel is anti-Semitic. Was the destruction of the Nazi and South African states also racist? 

Galloway at University Debate Destroys Zionist Claims That He is Anti-Semitic 

Sunak’s real agenda was left to last. Unable to ban the mass demonstrations outright like Braverman wanted, he called for wholly peaceful mass protests not only to be managed by the police but to be ‘policed’ by them. Which is code for coercion, violence and harassment of marchers by arresting them for chanting things and holding placards he doesn’t like. 

Police repression is Sunak’s response to the political crisis and the mass movement that has arisen since October 7. No doubt the Met, a byword for corruption, racism and misogyny will step up their harassment of protestors and if violence breaks out it will of course be the fault of those who were harassed.

The irony of Sunak talking about racism is breathtaking. He has been forced to suspend the former Vice-Chair of the Tory Party Lee Anderson whom he appointed in the first place because he was a racist. Yet two-thirds of Tory members support him and Sunak himself refuses to call his attack on Sadiq Khan for being in the grip of Islamists Islamaphobic.

Not surprisingly Starmer echoes every word Sunak says. There was a time when the Labour Party was an Opposition party but today we have a choice of identikit politicians whose only interest is in scapegoating minorities.

Starmer has pursued a consistently racist and Islamaphobic policy in the Labour Party, all in the name of opposing ‘anti-Semitism’. Both party leaders are committed to Zionism and support genocide in Israel.

Galloway condemned the SNP for supporting the protesters

The victory of George Galloway should be welcomed by all those on the left who want change. Of course Galloway is not the perfect socialist. His views on refugees leave a lot to be desired as does his attitude to social oppressions and abortion. But where he is right is in stressing the importance of class as opposed to identity politics.

Most people on the left realised that Genocide in Gaza was the main issue in Rochdale and supported Galloway. The SWP did not.

Nine days before the election the headline in Socialist Worker was ‘Galloway is not the answer for Rochdale - We need a better expression of Palestinian liberation than George Galloway’s party.

Presumably the SWP’s decision to march with Glasgow Friends of Israel on March 16 to mark UN anti-racism day is what they mean by a better expression of Palestinian liberation! Supporters of Israel’s genocide will be taking part in an ‘anti-racist’ march.

10 days later the SWP headline was ‘The Rochdale by-election was a referendum on Rishi Sunak’s and Keir Starmer’s support for Israel’s genocide.’ which rather begs the question why, in that case the SWP did not support him!

The claims of Starmer that Labour would have won if they had not suspended their candidate Azhar Ali is more Starmer’s lies. Nothing that Ali said was anti-Semitic. Given the warning Israel had over October 7 it is quite reasonable to believe that it might have let it happen. It certainly is not anti-Semitic to propound such a theory.

The  truth as everyone knows is that Ali was suspended because Starmer knew he was going to lose and he decided that it was preferable to sack him than lose to Galloway.

Never has it been so obvious that whatever else Britain, America, Germany and the West is they are not democracies. Majorities in every European country see Israel’s attack on Gaza as unjustified. Even in Germany 44% oppose Israel’s attack to 35% who support it.

Even in the US 68% support a ceasefire and 43% oppose sending Israel weapons compared to 31% supporting it. Yet the governments of nearly all the countries chose to ignore public opinion. And when, as in the UK, the public is resolutely opposed to the government’s policy the government attacks the marches as ‘hate marches’ and seeks to restrict them.

Rochdale indicates that we face a profound political crisis with both government and opposition in lockstep. You could not put a piece of paper between Sunak and Starmer which is one reason why in Rochdale the two main parties got just 20% between them. No wonder Sunak was so furious.

The question for the left is whether they can get their act together to pose a unified challenge in the next election when the main task will not be defeating Sunak so much as ensuring the defeat of Starmer.

We should be under no illusions that Starmer is the main enemy. He stands for the continuation of the Tory attacks on the working class and poor. There isn’t even one promise that he hasn’t broken. Not one of his 10 pledges that secured his election as leader that he hasn’t torn up.

The call by Andrew Feinstein for a unified left, the Collective, is welcome. What would be even more welcome would be if Jeremy Corbyn, together with those MPs who Starmer has removed the whip from, were to seize this opportunity to give a lead rather than cowering in the shadows. Corbyn hasn’t even declared whether he will restand for parliament. One can only wonder what is keeping him.

Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham Must Stop Obstructing Solidarity with the Palestinians

On Monday at 12.00 p.m Unite members will lobby Unite’s Executive Committee in solidarity with those experiencing genocide in Gaza and for an end to the obstruction of General Secretary Sharon Graham.

Unite has perhaps the best policy of any trade union on Palestine. Yet you would have to go to the United Left website to find it. It is nowhere to be seen on Unite’s own website.

On 16  October Unite put out a statement which

‘unreservedly condemned and expressed its revulsion  at the recent appalling acts of violence by Hamas against innocent civilians in Israel’

But it could only ‘deplore the subsequent suffering and loss of life being endured by civilians in Gaza.’

The difference in tone between ‘revulsion’ at the loss of Israeli compared to ‘deploring’ the loss of Palestinian lives was no accident. Clearly Palestinian lives don’t matter.

This despite 2,750 Palestinians having been killed by October 16, the day when Israel bombed Al Ahli hospital killing a further 500 Palestinians.

Since then Israel has bombed every single hospital and health facility in Gaza, murdering patients and doctors alike.

On November 3^rd after considerable pressure from activists including an online petition  Unite issued a second statement which this time called for an immediate ceasefire.  The statement was however pitiably weak calling on ‘all parties to respect international law’ as if the Palestinians experiencing genocide were equally culpable as the murderers. Nowhere did the statement mention genocide.

Nor did the statement mention the fact that Israel had imposed a Nazi style food, water and fuel blockade on the Gaza strip resulting in starvation according to the United Nations.

A letter on December 19 to Sharon Graham said:

You have done nothing to publicise all the previous national demonstrations. Are you going to ignore the one on January 13 too? There has been no national Unite presence on the marches to date.  

In fact it subsequently turned out that Graham had actually prevented the national Unite banner being taken on demonstrations. The letter demanded that Graham

publicise all future demonstration, that you provide the resources necessary for Unite members to attend, that Unite nationally is present on the march together with its banner and that Unite has a speaker at the rally.

Jim Kelly, Chair of London & Eastern Region Unite Speaking to a Palestine Trade union Rally 

Not only were none of these things done but according to Jim Kelly, Chair of London and Eastern Region, Graham’s representatives had ‘advised’ Peter Kavanagh, the Regional Secretary, not to speak at a Palestine solidarity demonstration. Kelly described how activists on Palestine had had to work in ‘an environment of silence and obstruction’ by union officials, in particular Graham.

Kelly described how Graham had attempted to suppress attempts to mobilise solidarity in support of the Palestinians.  He described an ‘expectation that employees will not speak alongside other General Secretaries’ at demonstrations.

Unite has had no national presence at the London demonstrations calling for an End to Genocide and solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza. Nor has Unite done anything to publicise thee demonstrations.

Kelly highlighted the activity of Unite branches despite Graham’s attempts to stop solidarity. He mentioned St Mungo’s and Doctors in Unite in particular.  Kelly highlighted Graham’s ‘excellent’ speech at the trade union rally in Cheltenham against the government’s anti-union laws but pointed out that fighting racism and international solidarity were equally important for socialists.

Israeli Minister of Heritage Amichai Eliyahu:

“North Gaza is more beautiful than ever. Blowing up and flattening everything is amazing. Once we are finished, we will hand over the lands of Gaza to the fighting soldiers and settlers who lived in Gush Katif."pic.twitter.com/lTlOEwnIce

— S p r i n t e r (@Sprinter99800) November 2, 2023

Since October 7 over 30,000 Palestinians have been murdered in Gaza including at least 13,000 children. Over 70,000 have been injured.  Hospitals, ambulances, homes have been bombed in an attempt to ethnically cleanse Gaza. Israeli Ministers such as Minister of Heritage Amichai Eliyahu have openly called for the annihilation of Palestinians suggesting dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza as well as wiping out the month of Ramadan.

Netanyahu declaring invasion: "You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible"

1 Samuel 15:3

"Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass"pic.twitter.com/5QF9PkGhjJ

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) October 28, 2023

There is a database of 500 genocidal statements by Israeli leaders including Prime Minister Netanyahu who called on soldiers to ‘remember Amalek’ the mythical biblical tribe whose extermination god ordered.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, the Gauleiter of the West Bank, has described 2 million Palestinians in the West Bank as Nazis. This is a recipe for extermination. This was after calling for the Palestinian town of Huwara to be ‘wiped out’.

The description of poor, homeless and starving Palestinians as ‘Nazis’ by those in full combat gear armed to the teeth shows not only a complete disconnect from reality but a fascist mentality.

Sharon Graham and the National Executive have openly ignored Unite policy in support of the Palestinians which states that

‘The time has now come to stop the Israeli ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people and for Unite to take a lead in taking bolder steps like those that were taken against the South African apartheid regime.’

Unite should have been trying to persuade Unite workers not to handle arms shipments to Israel. When it came to Ukraine Graham gave her full support to dockers refusing to unload Russian oil. The Guardian quoted Graham as saying that Essar, the owner of the Stanlow oil refinery

may believe that it is justifiable to transport Russian oil under a flag of convenience but Unite does not. Unite urges the transport secretary, Grant Shapps, to close this loophole immediately.

This comes on top of Graham’s banning of the film ‘Jeremy Corbyn – The Big Lie’ which showed how anti-Semitism had been weaponised in the Labour Party against Jeremy Corbyn.

Former South-East Regional Secretary Sarah Carpenter, who banned Jeremy Corbyn – The Big Lie from Unite premises in Portsmouth with a series of lies, has just been appointed Graham’s new Chief of Staff.

Carpenter got off to a flying start when she threatened Peter Cavanagh, the union’s London regional secretary, with the loss of a discretionary pension bonus if he did not pull back from his support for Palestinians in Gaza.

Carpenter, according to Skwawkbox was appointed by Graham without the position being advertised and without the approval of Unite’s elected executive. See new Unite chief of staff ‘threatens London sec with loss of pension bonus’ for Gaza support

We demand that the National Executive instructs Graham to actively work for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, that she be present with the national banner on future demonstrations, that she should speak at them and above all that she should stop obstructing the work of others.

At a time when Israel is massacring Palestinians waiting for the delivery of food and executing prisoners and torturing captives it is outrageous that our General Secretary, by her silence and obstruction, is effectively giving support to the genocidal war mongers in Tel Aviv.

Unite and its predecessor union have a proud record of giving support to the struggle against Apartheid in South Africa. We expect it to do the same against Apartheid in Israel.

The Shameful Support of the Left Sects for Sharon Graham's Refusal to Support the Palestinians

All the 'revolutionary' left sects - from the SWP to the Socialist Party - even Counterfire - are making excuses for Sharon Graham, complaining it's not her but the United Left on the Executive that is blocking her. This is clearly and obviously not true. It is Graham and Graham alone who has taken the decision not to have a National Unite presence on the demonstrations.

I have to confess I was surprised by the reaction on a Unite Palestine Discussion group by the opposition of Counterfire's Richard Allday, a member of Unite's National Executive, to the lobby. I accused him of being a member of the SWP until he corrected me. Supporters of the SWP had also made it clear on the group that they didn't support the lobby.

Because of her limited support for strikes, on a wholly non-political basis, whilst at the same time supporting Starmer against the left, the left sects have given their unqualified support to Sharon Graham's racism, British nationalism and support for imperialism. Karl Marx, who supported the Fenians and the Irish struggle for liberation, would turn in his grave if he saw who it was who were claiming to act in his name today. As Marx once said:

'a nation that oppresses another nation cannot itself be free'

I Need £1,000 to ensure the continuation of  this Blog

This Blog is one of the longest anti-Zionist, Socialist and pro-Palestinian blogs in existence. In that time I have published 3,384 blogs. The main Blog is on Google’s Blogspot.

About 7 years ago I set up a shadow blog on www.tonygreenstein.com. The reason for this were threats from Zionists that they were going to put pressure on Google to take it down for ‘anti-Semitism’.

That did not happen  but Google have removed a number of blogs until I removed things that offended them. It is therefore extremely useful to have a backup Blog in case Google were ever to remove the blog in its entirety.

I have now been informed by the Sussex Community Internet Project who maintain my blog that my shadow blog needs urgently rebuilding.  The cost is £1,000 and I am therefore appealing to readers to contribute towards this cost.

Unlike many blogs I do not derive any income from the blog. On the contrary I have subsidised it however I am asking viewers to help shoulder the cost.

The blog has specialised in anti-Zionist analysis, in particular of the fascist wing of the  Zionist lobby in Britain focusing on people like Jonathan Hoffman and his band of fascists as well as particularly poisonous sections of the Zionist Lobby such as the CampaignAgainst Antisemitism, the Community Security Trust and UK Lawyers for Israel. 

I am particularly proud of my analysis of what was happening during the Corbyn era when I continually warned Corbyn that people like Ken Livingstone, Jackie Walker, Marc Wadsworth, Chris Williamson and myself were collateral damage and that he was the real target.

Unfortunately Corbyn did not listen until it was too late when he too was suspended and had the Whip withdrawn. 

I have also been extremely critical of Palestine Solidarity Campaign, of which I was the co-founder. Its recent actions in suspending officers of Manchester PSC, resulting in the whole branch going independent and its ultimatum to Birmingham PSC that they were not to invite Palestinian hero Leila Khaled as a speaker confirm me in my belief that PSC nationally has learnt no lessons from its refusal to take seriously the 'anti-Semitism' attacks on the Palestine solidarity movement.

Today the government is threatening further attacks on the Palestine solidarity movement. In its dying days it is threatening all those who dare to exercise basic democratic rights. Sunak and his alter ego Starmer would be at home      governing a fully fledged police state.

Mass marches of hundreds of thousands of people against genocide in Gaza are 'hate marches' whereas those supplying and supporting the genocide are bathed in love. This blog is part of the fightback against those who would abolish all remaining democratic rights. They intend to ban those they term as 'extremists' and they  are blunt when they say that if you oppose capitalism you are an 'extremist'.

Those who are opposed to genocide are now 'extremists' whereas those who support murdering 30,000 Palestinians, mainly women and children, are 'moderates'. Michael Gove is intending to introduce further legislation to ban opponents of the racist Israeli state .

We learn that Sunak, smarting over the victory of George Galloway in Rochdale is threatening further attacks including the possible banning as 'extreme' of Palestine Action, a group that PSC has consistently failed to support. We are living in dark and dangerous times and despite my own recent arrest under the Terrorism Act 2000 I am determined not to cease publication of the blog.

Despite shadow banning and the use of algorithms by Facebook and Twitter I have maintained a hit rate of over 50,000. Last month there were over 65,000 hits compared to more than 100,000 at its height.

These attempts to suppress radical and Palestinian supporting sites have hit all such sites such as The Canary, Skwawkbox, Electronic Intifada etc.

I have partly avoided the efforts to restrict the circulation of my blog by maintaining a large email list though Google Groups recently took down one such group which is why I want to start using Mailchimp to bypass these attempts. Again this will cost money.

As you can see from the top 20 posts – which range from an amazing 165,000 for an article on Churchill to over 105,000 on the attack on and imprisonment of Ahed Tamimi – the blog has remained a thorn in the side of the Zionists and is often quoted by the Zionist press (very rarely favourably!).

So I am asking you for support to ensure that Google, Facebook and Twitter are not able to affect its continuation. In the longer term I may well transfer to substack whilst still maintaining a shadow blog.   The shadow blog has about a third of the hits of the blogspot but it is an essential guarantee that Google cannot take my blog down.

As well as maintaining a blog I have brought out a book on Zionism During the Holocaust about a period in history which the Zionists prefer to rewrite if not  forget. I also contribute articles to a wide variety of publications as well as interviews, talks etc. For example a forthcoming Al Jazeera film on the founder of the Stern Gang, Avraham ‘Yair’ Stern, who proposed a military pact with the Nazis, interviewed me.

I would therefore appeal to you to help me continue this work. I would also like to thank those who have made regular donations to help meet ongoing maintenance costs which are about £750 per year.

If you are able to make a donation please transfer any donations to:

Account:         Brighton & Hove Unemployed Workers Centre (business account)

Account No:   04094107

Sort Code:      090150

Thank you,

Tony Greenstein

Blog, Financial Appeal, Zionism  During the Holocaust,

By Banning Parents for Palestine after Zionist objections. Presumably the Death of 25,000 women & children in Gaza isn’t enough

Genocide in Gaza through the eyes of Israeli soldiers

On 5 November 2023 Anita Patel wrote a guest blog Women’s Place UK : Whitewashing Zionism. Anita wrote, in reference to their statement of 28^th October “Israel & Palestine – Peace, Equality, Freedom, Justice”, that it was:

an evasive and impossible fudge, between advocates of apartheid, ethnic cleansing and genocide on the one hand, and a people who are fighting for their survival on the other.  The statement frames the attack on Gaza as a conflict between two equivalent hostile parties, failing to distinguish the oppressor and the oppressed, and making the same demands of both those parties, on the grounds that all the women involved share the same experience of war.  It is as though Israeli women were not part of the oppressor and Palestinian women were not part of the oppressed people.

Brighton Women's Centre

BWC has provided a good example of how this statement has been interpreted by radical and liberal/bourgeois feminists when they banned Parents for Palestine from having a stall at their celebrations in Brighton Dome.

I understand that it was Zionist Lobby group, UK Lawyers for Israel, which in December 2019, brought the far-right settler NGO Regavim to Britain, that objected. As Israel’s +972 Magazine wrote ‘Why are British Jews opening their doors to far-right settler groups?’

UKLFI  is a far-right Zionist organisation. Listed among its Directors is Daniel Berke, lawyer for Tommy Robinson. As the film below makes clear he is politically close to Robinson. Berke was also the solicitor for Jonathan Hoffman, the link person between British fascists and far-right Zionists.

Regavim was founded in 2006 by Bezalel Smotrich, the then leader of the far-right National Union party. Smotrich calls himself a “proud homophobe” and is an open fascist. Today Smotrich is Israel’s Finance Minister and the Gauleiter of the West Bank.

In February this Judeo-Nazi called for the ‘wiping out’ of the Palestinian  town of Huwara where the settlers had staged a pogrom.

Others involved in alleging ‘anti-Semitism’ and support for Hamas were Sussex Friends of Israel and its alter-ego the Sussex Representative Council.

I have written before on the theme of Zionist Feminism in articles such as

Ahed Tamimi Exposes the Refusal of Western Feminism to Come to Terms with Zionism and Imperialism and

How Identity Politics Turned the Victims of Sabra & Chatilla into the Antisemitic Oppressors of Zionist Feminists - A Reply to Erica Burman

BWC not only refused to talk to P4P about the allegations, they refused to disclose who had made the allegations or what they were. Instead they just went ahead and cancelled P4P’s stall.

This is the kind of ‘justice’ that Palestinians receive in the West Bank where you can be detained without trial (Administrative Detention) without knowing who has made the allegations or what those allegations are. So well done BWC. You are certainly good Zionists.

What BWC did was to cave in to the supporters of genocide in Gaza taking their side. BWC has always been a nest of right-wing radical and Zionist feminism and so it’s no surprise that they were happy to cover for the supporters of Israel.

When I was Secretary of the local Anti-Nazi League 40 years ago I wrote to them suggesting that we work together in combating the National Front which was active in Brighton at that time. Their response was that since fascists and anti-fascists were men they were going to abstain!

In practice BWC has been abstaining from the fight against racism and fascism ever since. Now they have taken it a step further and openly declared their sympathies with those who are perpetrating genocide in Gaza.

🚨Harrowing scenes document the moment Israeli soldiers execute elderly civilian inside a home west of #Gaza City. pic.twitter.com/jZCv0v1nN8

— Nour Naim| نُور (@NourNaim88) March 8, 2024

Little Boy Describing the Execution of his Parents

According to the UN’s Office of  Human Rights

Palestinian women and girls have reportedly been arbitrarily executed in Gaza, often together with family members, including their children, according to information received. “We are shocked by reports of the deliberate targeting and extrajudicial killing of Palestinian women and children in places where they sought refuge, or while fleeing. Some of them were reportedly holding white pieces of cloth when they were killed by the Israeli army or affiliated forces,” the experts said.

The experts expressed serious concern about the arbitrary detention of hundreds of Palestinian women and girls, including human rights defenders, journalists and humanitarian workers, in Gaza and the West Bank since 7 October. Many have reportedly been subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment, denied menstruation pads, food and medicine, and severely beaten. On at least one occasion, Palestinian women detained in Gaza were allegedly kept in a cage in the rain and cold, without food.

The Guardian reported on 22 February that there was evidence of at least two cases of rape of Palestinian women captives, alongside other cases of sexual humiliation and threats of rape. Reem Alsalem, the UN special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, said the true extent of sexual violence could be significantly higher.

In 2020 Save the Children reported that:

Palestinian children in the Israel military detention system face physical and emotional abuse, with four out of five (86%) of them being beaten, and 69% strip-searched, according to new research by Save the Children. Nearly half (42%) are injured at the point of arrest, including gunshot wounds and broken bones. Some report violence of a sexual nature and some are transferred to court or between detention centres in small cages, the child rights organisation said. 

Palestinian women and children are also being starved to death by Israel.  Reports of sexual abuse and violence against women by Israeli soldiers are rife, which is not surprising since the Chief Military Rabbi of Israel, Eyal Karim has ruled that rape is permitted in war.

The haunted face of a 10 year old who died of starvation

In answer to a question on the religious website Kipa when asked if soldiers were permitted to rape women during war. Karim replied that, as part of maintaining fitness for the army and the soldiers' morale during fighting, it is permitted to

"breach" the walls of modesty and "satisfy the evil inclination by lying with attractive Gentile women against their will, out of consideration for the difficulties faced by the soldiers and for overall success."

It is no surprise that the sisters of BWC have, given the choice, chosen to side with those who have forced Palestinian women to have caesarean sections without anaesthetic, who are deprived of basics hygiene such as sanitary towels, wipes and above all, of food. To these racist harridans, Palestinian women are lesser human beings compared to their White counterparts.

The fact that BWC lied when it said in a statement that it had offered to speak to P4P when it hadn’t and then accepted the allegations from the Zionists at face value demonstrates beyond doubt where their sympathies lie.

The Zionist Apologists for Rape & Violence Against Women

Radical feminism has always given cover to imperialism, be it in Ireland or Palestine so we shouldn’t be surprised. The darlings of American feminists – Betty Friedan, Letty Pogrebin and Andrea Dworkin– were all Zionists. American feminism has until recently, and under the pressure of Black Lives Matter and third world women, been a bastion of support for imperialist ventures.  For example Susan Nossel. former head of Amnesty USA justified the Afghan war with feminist arguments.

Feminism as a western movement has, by its very nature, viewed society as primarily divided into men and women. Race and class has been largely absent from Western feminist narratives and it is no accident that the racist trollops of Brighton Women Centre have come to dominate the women’s movement and feminism.

Western feminists such as Betty Friedan fought hard against Palestinian demands for liberation and in practice what was called second wave  feminism ended up in the right-wing feminism of the ‘Blair babes’ who voted overwhelmingly in Parliament for the Iraq War in 2003.

The election of 100 Labour Women MPs in 1997 resulted in a situation where 25% of women MPs (mostly old-style socialists like Alice Mahon) voted against the war compared to 40% of male MPs. So much for the sexist idea that women are more peaceful.

In more recent years it has been female Zionist  MPs such as Margaret Hodge, Louise Ellman, Luciana Berger and Ruth Smeeth who led the ‘anti-Semitism’ fight against Jeremy Corbyn and the left in the Labour Party.

The Zionist counter-picket

This is why on Saturday March 8^th we held a silent picket of the IWT celebrations at the Dome. Opposite us were a group of Zionist women chanting ‘Rape is not Resistance’.  Their message was that the break-out from Gaza on October 7 had been an orgy of rape.

Dabke at Womens Day Celebrations

Allegations of systematic rape have been the main narrative of the Israeli state in order to demonise Hamas and justify its genocide in Gaza. BWC has gone along with this false narrative. It has been comprehensively debunked.

Palestine Solidarity Lobby

However allegations of rape have always been the stock-in-trade of racists and imperialists against indigenous people from Southern Africa ‘the black peril’ to the lynch mobs of the Deep South. Indeed allegations of rape and sexual assault were common to Nazi propaganda against German Jews. So it’s no surprise that Brighton Womens Centre has adopted this narrative.

URGENT!
Further to the disgraceful decision by @BTNWomensCentre& @brightdome to cancel a stall celebrating Palestinian women for #InternationalWomensDay, Parents 4 Palestine are calling for local people to join them in solidarity to protest.
From 10am outside #Brighton Dome. pic.twitter.com/QXIdDO4FrJ

— Brighton PSC (@BrightonPSC) March 9, 2024

On Saturday March 8^th Palestine solidarity activists and other anti-racists therefore held a silent demonstration outside the Dome. Opposite us was a small band of Zionists chanting ‘rape is not resistance’ thereby playing into this deeply racist trope.

Ironically when a woman went up to them to say that she was a victim of rape and she found their demonstration upsetting and disturbing a male Zionist told her that she should be raped again.   It was reported to the Police but the man in question was protected by the Zionist women thus demonstrating that their concern was not rape but support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

The  2 men suspected of telling a woman she should be raped again

People may wish to consider whether a demonstration should be held outside BWC to highlight their complicity in support for genocide but in the meantime you might wish to contact these racists feminists at admin@womenscentre.org.uk.

There was an interesting discussion on Mumsnet in the Feminism thread on BWC’s cancellation of P4P’s stall.

Brighton Women’s Centre cancelled a stall celebrating Palestinian women for #IWD

Fortitudinal · 09/03/2024 12:06

What the fuck? Brighton Women’s Centre and the Dome cancelled this stall at the last minute. How can they possibly justify this? It’s heartbreaking.

Brighton Women’s Centre is a captured male-including organisation now anyway. A long way from its fantastic beginnings as a truly feminist space.

Cynical, corporate-controlled bullshit.

TodayIsNotMyDay · 09/03/2024 14:38

White / Imperial feminism strikes again.

The ”we stand for ALL women” has always been bullshit, but it has been a true mask off during this genocide.

WhereAreWeNow · 09/03/2024 17:41

What reason did they give? That seems really weird.

fakeprofile · 09/03/2024 17:42

What is going on in Brighton?? The blatant misogyny on display in recent years has been shocking

Fortitudinal · 09/03/2024 18:26

I know. I don’t know if they gave any reasoning at all. I suppose in a cowardly bid to avoid anything ‘controversial’ with regards to Israel/Gaza?

It’s fucked up.

TodayIsNotMyDay · Yesterday 12:59

It’s fucked up.

It truly is.

How can someone keep a straight face and claim to support women if they don’t support all women?

The women and girls are going through the worst anyone possibly could*.

I think this IWD has turned into Valentine’s Day #2, it’s mostly just another day to buy stuff and some chant about being strong woman, without any actual substance.

 (*I do not mean to make this into a competition who has it worst)

ssd · Yesterday 13:09

That is really not on.

And that is right. What Brighton Women’s Centre has done is really not on.

Tony Greenstein

For 5 months Sharon Graham has Opposed All Solidarity with the Palestinians, Following Starmer in Refusing to Campaign Against Israel's Ethnic Cleansing

Jonathan Fluxman of Unite Doctors Criticises the Rape Narrative that Israel is using to justify genocide

 Last Monday at  midday about 50 Unite members from as far away as Birmingham, held a lobby of Unite’s national executive which was due to meet an hour later.

The lobby was noisy and vociferous and hundreds of leaflets were distributed. Drivers passing by made clear their opposition to genocide in Gaza by honking.

Jonathan Fluxman of Unite Doctors

There was an open mike and a number of demonstrators spoke including Jonathan Fluxman of Unite doctors. Jonathan, who is from South Africa, condemned the false rape narrative that has been used to demonise both Hamas and the attack of October 7.

He rightly drew our attention to the way rape has always been weaponised against indigenous people as an excuse for murder e.g. in the Deep South and with the ‘Black Peril’ in southern Africa.

It is a sad commentary on Unite, which has a long history of international solidarity stretching from the Spanish Civil War, which Jack Jones a former General Secretary of the TGWU (the precursor of Unite) fought in to the support the union gave to the ANC and the fight against Apartheid in South Africa that we needed to picket a Union Executive Meeting in order that the Union extends solidarity to the Palestinians who have been slaughtered and ethnically cleansed by the Zionist butchers.

Sharon Graham, the ‘non-political’ General Secretary of Unite, has chosen to side with the Zionists and their anti-Semitism smears. As Gail Cartmail, her previous spokesperson admitted, so-called ‘anti-Semitism’ has played a role in their decision.

Graham is a Zionist sympathiser. Even before October 7 she banned, at Starmer and the Zionists’ behest, Jeremy Corbyn – The Big Lie from being shown on Unite premises. The far-right Campaign Against Antisemitism, an Israeli government  front, whose sole mission is to equate opposition to the Israeli state and its genocide with anti-Semitism, boasted of having entered into correspondence with Unite despite the denials of Cartmail.

The reason given for the banning was they didn’t wish to offend Unite’s Jewish members, despite the fact that Jews were prominent in the film. Clearly Graham equates Jews with Zionism and goes along with the false anti-Semitism narrative.

If the CAA is to be believed, and for once I do believe them, Unite under Graham entered into correspondence with the CAA about banning the film. The CAA claimed

Following correspondence with Campaign Against Antisemitism, the Unite union has cancelled the screening of a propaganda film about the antisemitic former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn that was due to be shown alongside a book signing and talk from Asa Winstanley.

Graham was happy to speak with Ukraine flags fluttering around her but she hasn’t been seen dead with a Palestinian flag. Unite has done absolutely nothing nationally since Israel embarked on its genocidal campaign in Gaza.

It is a disgrace that allegedly revolutionary groups like the SWP, Counterfire and the Socialist Party have acted to protect Graham rather than calling her out. Her attraction is that she supports militant action by workers in struggle, which is fine, but strikes alone do not a world change. The question is whether you challenge the imperialist consciousness of British workers who will never overthrow the chains of capitalism whilst they have illusions in British imperialism.

Counterfire’s Richard Allday, the ‘angry trucker’, dismissed the leaflet for the lobby as

negative, insulting, confrontational and counterproductive. I’ve said it before: if the intention is to get the Union to carry out Conference decisions, then let’s concentrate on that and not turn it into a slanging match which will harden the divisions which are part of the problem. 

Thus ignoring completely Sharon Graham’s obstruction of all solidarity work nationally.

These ‘revolutionary’ groups claim to be Marxist and it is therefore instructive to read what Marx wrote in April 1870 in a letter to Sigfrid Meyer and August Vogt

"The ordinary English worker hates the Irish worker as a competitor who lowers his standard of life. In relation to the Irish worker, he regards himself as a member of the ruling nation and consequently, he becomes a tool of the English aristocrats and capitalists against Ireland, thus strengthening their domination over himself.

He cherishes religious, social, and national prejudices against the Irish worker. His attitude towards him is much the same as that of the “poor whites” to the Negroes in the former slave states of the U.S.A.. The Irishman pays him back with interest in his own money. He sees in the English worker both the accomplice and the stupid tool of the English rulers in Ireland.

This antagonism is artificially kept alive and intensified by the press, the pulpit, the comic papers, in short, by all the means at the disposal of the ruling classes. This antagonism is the secret of the impotence of the English working class, despite its organisation. It is the secret by which the capitalist class maintains its power. And the latter is quite aware of this."

Our present day Trotskyists fetishise strikes and ignore the fact that the fight against capitalism is a political struggle not simply economic. The failure to oppose Zionism and Israel isn’t a mistake it is fundamental to opposing British imperialism and its foreign policy and thereby capitalism itself. Sharon Graham is an open British nationalist. She supports NATO in Ukraine and the United States’s watchdog in the Middle East, Israel.

Allday’s post was in response to criticism of the complete inactivity of the national leadership under Graham which has refused to have the national banner on the national demonstration and which has failed to publicise them or indeed anything about the genocide on Unite’s website.

Indeed Graham has gone out her way to obstruct the actions of others ‘advising’ Jim Kelly of the London & Eastern Regional Secretary not to speak at the national demonstration on 13 January 24. She has suspended a senior Unite employee, Simon Dubbins, who organised a Palestine meeting at the Labour Party annual conference in Liverpool last October.

On 16 October 23 Unite put out a statement which

‘unreservedly condemned and expressed its revulsion  at the recent appalling acts of violence by Hamas against innocent civilians in Israel’

But it could only ‘deplore the subsequent suffering and loss of life being endured by civilians in Gaza.’

On November 3^rd after considerable pressure from activists including an online petition Unite issued a second statement which this time called for an immediate ceasefire. The statement was however pitiably weak calling on ‘all parties to respect international law’ as if the Palestinians experiencing genocide were equally culpable as the murderers. Nowhere did the statement mention genocide.

Jim Kelly, Chair of London & Eastern Region Unite Speaking to a London Trade union Rally for Palestine

Unite has done nothing to campaign for a ceasefire such as telling its sponsored MPs that it wouldn’t continue to finance them if they didn’t support an immediate ceasefire.

Nor did the statement mention the fact that Israel had imposed a Nazi style food, water and fuel blockade on the Gaza strip resulting in starvation according to the United Nations.

On Monday there were 2 motions to the Executive. Both were problematic.

Motion 1 from the Passenger National Industrial Sector Committee talked about Israel’s genocide being in ‘retaliation for the 7 October brutal atrocity carried out by Hamas.’ An uprising of an oppressed people against 57 years of occupation was not a brutal atrocity. Israel’s genocidal attack on Gaza was not a retaliation for October 7. 7 October was the pretext for long standing Zionist plans for ethnic cleansing.

Motion 2 from the Unite LE Region also calls October 7 a ‘retaliation for the 7 October brutal atrocity’. It also calls for a two-state solution.

Both motions call for a national Unite presence at the national demonstrations. That there be a prominent national speaker from Unite to speak at all future marches/demonstrations and that Unite’s website and social media platforms advertise prominently all future PSC mobilisations and that they call for Unite to urge members to join it.

The motion instructs Graham to write to all branches nationally, urging members to join these marches and that resources are in place to facilitate members wishing to travel to attend PSC marches/demonstrations.

What the motions don’t do is talk about ethnic cleansing, the Israeli state’s real aim in Gaza nor about the role of British workers in facilitating the genocide by transferring arms to Israel. The key demand, that workers refuse to handle weapons destined for Israel and better still refuse to load or unload Israeli ships, is missing.

Stand Up to Racism/SWP Are Taught a Lesson You Can’t Stand Up to Racism While Marching With Zionists 

Ronnie Barkan, an Israeli Jew and supporter of Palestinian Action and myself were invited by Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign to speak and address a demonstration in Glasgow City Centre, on Saturday.

There were a number of other speakers from Glasgow’s Muslim and Palestinian communities in addition to the Chair of Scottish PSC, Mick Napier, who was the master of ceremonies. We also had children leading the chanting and one reading out her poem. Children also led the demonstration to symbolise the appalling death toll of children in Israel’s monstrous attack.

The civilian who was run over and mutilated by Israeli tank bulldozers was already in custody, with visible marks of bruising and restraints on what remains of his body. pic.twitter.com/HzdKbZatdr

— Ramy Abdu| رامي عبده (@RamAbdu) February 29, 2024

After the initial speeches the march set off on a circular route back to its initial starting point where there were more speeches.

It is very clear that Glasgow, like so many other towns and cities in Britain, has been energised by the genocide and slaughter in Gaza and the complicity of Britain’s political leaders – Sunak and Starmer in that slaughter.

It is a sad reflection of the state of Britain’s democracy that over 70% of people support an immediate ceasefire whereas Starmer and Sunak support the war crimes of Israel and go along with the narrative that Israel’s war is against Hamas rather than against the Palestinians of Gaza as Israel’s leaders themselves admit.

Glasgow Palestine Solidarity March Saturday March 16th 

Nearly 70% of Americans also support a ceasefire but this too has had no effect on the President, Genocide Joe Biden or Congress. It shows how democracy in the West is a charade and that the people who rule us are those with the deepest pockets, like Sunak.

Glasgow Palestine Demonstration 16 March 2024

The elites that govern us do so in their interests not ours. Our views don’t count when the interests of the corporations are at stake. The United States  however suddenly remembered about international law when the Houthis started attacking Israeli ships in the Red Sea. It seems trade is more important than the mere death of thousands of Palestinians.

So it is quite understandable that Rishi Sunak, an empty politician devoid of a single original thought, mediocre even by the standards of British politicians,  when voters in Rochdale gave their verdict on Israel’s slaughter, came dashing out of Downing Street, all scowl and rage, to berate us about the violent mobs and hate stalking our streets.

Why Jewish children were, he told us, afraid to wear their school uniforms such was the level of hate. Anti-Semitism was just around the corner and even worse Jews couldn’t go into the centre of London for fear of mobs of Palestinians and other anti-Semites. Of course anti-Zionist Jews on the march are invisible because we don’t provide the moral alibi that imperialism desires in its forever wars.

If the majority of British Jews and their communal organisations in this country had any self-awareness or understanding of their role as stool pigeons they might realise that Jews are being used and manipulated by crooks like Sunak and Starmer in order to justify further attacks on democratic rights such as freedom of speech and the right to protest. 

However the Zionist leaders of the Jewish community are, like Chief Rabbi Mirvis, bought and paid for. With £15m being tossed to the Mossad Project the Community Security Trust whose primary job is to keep British Jews fearful through the massage and manipulation of 'anti-Semitism' statistics.

There is no evidence that anti-Semitism is increasing, if only because the IHRA misdefinition of anti-Semitism has conflated anti-zionism and anti-Semitism making any statistics meaningless. I suspect that virtually all the alleged incidents of anti-Semitism relate to Gaza and the claims of the Board of Deputies that British Jews support genocide in Gaza.

Very few incidents are likely to occur because of traditional anti-Semitism i.e. irrational hate or hostility to Jews as Jews because of stereotypes that they are rich or engaged in conspiracies against non-Jews. The familiar neo-Nazi tropes of a bygone age.

If there is an increase in anti-Semitism then whose fault is that if not those who go out of their way to associate British Jews with Israel’s crimes? It is Sunak and Starmer who bear the responsibility for any increase in anti-Semitism for associating British Jews with the genocide that is taking place.

Jews are the stool pigeons, the pawns and pets thrown a bone by the British ruling class in exchange for their role in legitimising the crimes of British imperialism in the Middle East. 

But if anyone was to suggest that Jews bear a responsibility for Israel’s actions then that would be called anti-Semitism under the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism which gives as an example of anti-Semitism ‘Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.’  This is usually called having your cake and eating it.

Faced with the unpopularity of Britain’s support for Israel what does Rishi do, with the full support of that waste of space Starmer? He promises to bring in new laws to make protests and demonstrations a criminal offence.

And the Islamaphobe-in-Chief of the Cabinet, Michael Gove, who engineered the infamous Trojan Horse Affair, promises to redefine extremism so that anyone opposed to capitalism and war is, by definition an extremist. Some people might say that supporting the bombing of hospitals and torturing their doctors is a sign of extremism but who am I to question this government fruitcake?

Stand Up to Racism & the SWP + the Police Welcome & Protect Zionists on their 'antiracist' march

None of which excuses the Socialist Workers Party in the guise of Stand Up to Racism for deciding, for a seventh year in a row, that they would hold a March Against Racism in conjunction with genocidal racists in Glasgow Friends of Israel and COFIS.

This year they decided to hold their march and demonstration on the outskirts of Glasgow outside the BBC Scotland offices and what a miserable affair it was.  There were less than 300 of them with some 10 Zionists frothing at the back.

At a time of genocide Palestinians and their supporters had decided that unlike previous years it was best to simply ignore them and their police minders.

Instead people flocked to the SPSC demonstration in the city centre and the SUTR/SWP and the massed ranks of Scotland trade union officials, all 300 of them, were left to enjoy the company of far-right Zionists. This is proof of one thing – that SUTR is a paper campaign backed by trade union bureaucrats and just about no one else.

Stand Up to Racism march 2019 with Zionists - notice the close co-ordination between Police & stewards

If you want to get some idea of the extent of Israel’s war crimes you could do worse than turn to Jonathan Cook’s War on Gaza: Torture, executions, babies left to die, sexual abuse… These are Israel’s crimes in Middle East Eye. (see below).

Jonathan asks ‘Why is the same western media obsessively reheating five-month-old allegations against Hamas so reluctant to focus on Israel’s current, horrifying atrocities?’ and the answer has to be that when it comes to the crimes of Western imperialism’s watchdog in the Middle East anything goes.

If in future years SUTR/SWP don’t learn the lesson of this year then it’s clear that they are best ignored. The SWP should be left with its Zionist friends to oppose ‘racism’.

Tony Greenstein

The Zionist Organisations that SUTR/SWP are Marching With - In Their Own Words

See also:

Why does Stand Up To Racism refuse to stand up to racism when it comes to Israeli Apartheid?

VICTORY – Brighton and Hove Trades Council Votes To Support the Palestinians and NOT to support SUTR’s March in London

Victory in Glasgow as Racist COFIS Kept Off Anti-Racist March

Why is Stand Up To Racism and the SWP Welcoming Racist Zionist Groups onto an anti-racist march?

Statement on the Glasgow march to mark Anti-Racism Day 2024

Scotland Against Criminalising Communities (SACC)

War on Gaza: Torture, executions, babies left to die, sexual abuse… These are Israel’s crimes

Hostages tortured to death. Parents executed in front of their children. Doctors beaten. Babies murdered. Sexual assault weaponised.

No, not Hamas crimes. This is part of an ever-growing list of documented atrocities committed by Israel in the five months since 7 October - quite separate from the carpet bombing of 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza and a famine induced by Israel’s obstruction of aid. 

Last week, an investigation by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz disclosed that some 27 Palestinians seized off Gaza’s streets over the past five months are known to have died during interrogations inside Israel.

Some were denied medical treatment. But most are likely to have been tortured to death.

Three months ago, a Haaretz editorial warned that Israeli jails “must not become execution facilities for Palestinians”.

Israeli soldiers inside an evacuated compound of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in Gaza City on 8 February, 2024 (AFP)

Israeli TV channels have been excitedly taking viewers on tours of detention centres, showing the appalling conditions Palestinians are kept in, as well as the psychological and physical abuse they are subjected to.

An Israeli judge recently called the makeshift cages in which Palestinians are held “unsuitable for humans”.

Remember, a large proportion of the 4,000 or so Palestinians taken hostage by Israel since 7 October - probably the vast majority - are civilians, like the men and boys paraded through Gaza’s streets or held in a stadium stripped of clothing before being dragged off to a dark cell in Israel.

Women abused

According to Israeli media, many dozens of Palestinian women - including pregnant women - have been seized too, but in their case off camera.

Presumably, Israel has wished to avoid undermining its careful messaging that only Hamas weaponises violence against women. 

But according to United Nations legal experts, Palestinian women are suffering the most degrading forms of abuse at the hands of the Israeli military. 

Soldiers are also believed to have taken photos of female detainees in degrading circumstances and then uploaded them online

The experts observed that Palestinian women and girls in detention were reportedly being subjected to “multiple forms of sexual assault, such as being stripped naked and searched by male Israeli army officers.

"At least two female Palestinian detainees were reportedly raped while others were reportedly threatened with rape and sexual violence."

Soldiers are also believed to have taken photos of female detainees in degrading circumstances and then uploaded them online.

Palestinian women and girls in Gaza are also reported by their families to have gone missing after contact with the Israeli army.

“There are disturbing reports of at least one female infant forcibly transferred by the Israeli army into Israel, and of children being separated from their parents, whose whereabouts remain unknown,” they said.

Beatings, waterboarding

A separate report by the UN last week revealed that 21 of its staff - humanitarian aid workers - had been snatched by Israel. They were then tortured to extract confessions, most likely false, of involvement in Hamas’ 7 October attack. Their torture included beatings, waterboarding and threats to family members.

Those confessions were cited by western allies as the grounds - in fact, the only known grounds - for cutting off funding to the UN relief agency Unrwa, the last lifeline for Gaza’s starving population. It was these claims, extracted through torture, that helped Israel rationalise its imposing of a famine on Gaza.

Palestinian men rounded up and stripped by Israeli forces in Gaza before being taken to an undisclosed location (Screengrab/X)

Of the 1,000 detainees subsequently released, 29 were children, one as young as six, and 80 women. Some were reported to have cancer and chronic illnesses such as Alzheimer’s.

According to the UN investigation, Palestinians reported severe punishment beatings, being caged with attack dogs, and suffering sexual assault. Physical evidence - such as broken ribs, dislocated shoulders, bite marks, and burns - was still visible many weeks later. 

Executions, human shields

These horrors, of course, are not just taking place in cells and interrogation rooms inside Israel. Gaza is being subjected to astonishing levels of brutality and sadism from Israeli troops - quite aside from the carpet bombing and enforced starvation of civilians.

Israeli snipers have fired into Gaza’s hospitals, killing medical staff and patients there.

The Israeli military has used Palestinians as human shields, including one man sent into a hospital, his hands bound, to announce an Israeli order to evacuate the premises. Israeli forces executed him on his return.

Those trying to follow such evacuation orders, waving white flags, have been shot at.

Medical facilities have been repeatedly invaded by the Israeli military in stark violation of international law. Those who could not be evacuated, such as premature babies, have been left to die unattended, even while Israeli soldiers were occupying the building.

This week, the BBC interviewed medical staff who reported being tortured, savagely beaten and having attack dogs set on them inside the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis after Israeli soldiers stormed it. 

One, Dr Ahmed Abu Sabha, had his hands broken. He told the BBC: “They put me on a chair and it was like a gallows. I heard sounds of ropes, so I thought I was going to be executed.”

The BBC interviewed medical staff who reported being tortured, savagely beaten and having attack dogs set on them inside the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis

At another stage, he and other detainees were beaten in the back of a truck, while only in their underwear. They were taken to a gravel pit, where they were made to kneel blindfolded. They believed they were about to be executed. 

During his eight days as hostage, Sabha was never questioned. 

Dozens more medics are believed missing, presumed to still be in Israeli detention. 

Photographs published by the BBC also show patients in the grounds of Nasser hospital in beds with their hands bound tightly above their heads. 

Those who died were left to decompose by Israeli soldiers. A doctor there, Dr Hatim Rabaa, told the BBC: “Patients were screaming, ‘Please remove them [the corpses] from here'. I was telling them, 'It isn't in my hands'."

Other examples of murderous cruelty are documented daily. Unarmed Palestinians, including those waving white flags, have been shot dead by Israeli soldiers. Palestinian parents have been executed in cold blood in front of their children. There have been repeated episodes of Israeli forces gunning down en masse desperate Palestinians trying to reach aid, as happened yet again this week. And even Israeli hostages trying to escape their captors have been killed by the very Israeli soldiers they were trying to surrender to.

These are just some of the cases of Israeli sadism and barbarity that have surfaced briefly in western media coverage, soon to be forgotten.

Wiping Gaza off the map

The stomach-turning double standards are impossible to ignore. 

The western establishment media has been chock full of the most lurid allegations of savagery directed against Hamas, sometimes with little or no supporting evidence. Claims that Hamas beheaded babies or put them in ovens - emblazoned on front pages - were later found to be nonsense.

A makeshift sign reading in Hebrew 'help, 3 hostages' using leftover food reportedly shown by Israeli hostages before being shot dead by Israeli soldiers, 17 December 2023 (AFP)

Accusations against Hamas have been endlessly reheated to paint a picture of a supremely dangerous and bestial militant group, in turn rationalising the carpet bombing and starvation of Gaza’s population to “eradicate” it as a terrorist organisation.

But equally barbarous atrocities committed by Israel - not in the heat of battle, but in cold blood - are treated as unfortunate, isolated incidents that cannot be connected, that paint no picture, that reveal nothing of import about the military that carried them out.

If Hamas’ crimes were so savage and sadistic they still need to be reported months after they took place, why does the establishment media never feel the need to express equal horror and indignation at the acts of cruelty and sadism being inflicted by Israel on Gaza - not five months ago, but right now? 

This is part of a pattern of behaviour by the western media that leads to only one possible deduction: Israel’s five-month-long attack on Gaza is not being reported. Rather, it is being selectively narrated - and for the most obscene of purposes. 

War on Gaza: Israel's food-queue slaughter cannot go unpunished

Through consistent and glaring failures in their coverage, establishment media - including supposedly liberal outlets, from the BBC and CNN to the Guardian and New York Times - have smoothed the way for Israel to carry out mass slaughter in Gaza, what the World Court has assessed as plausibly a genocide.

The role of the media has not been to keep us, their audiences, informed about one of the greatest crimes in living memory. It has been to buy time for US President Joe Biden to keep arming his most useful of client states in the oil-rich Middle East, and to do so without damaging his prospects for re-election in November’s US presidential vote. 

If Russian President Vladimir Putin was a madman and a barbarous war criminal for invading Ukraine, as every western media outlet agrees, what does that make Israeli officials, when every one of them supports far worse atrocities in Gaza, directed overwhelmingly at civilians? 

And more to the point, what does that make Biden and the US political class for materially backing Israel to the hilt: sending bombs, vetoing demands for a ceasefire at the United Nations, and freezing desperately needed aid? 

Worrying about the optics, the president expresses his discomfort, but he carries on helping Israel regardless.

While western politicians and commentators worry about some imaginary existential threat those brief events of five months ago pose to the nuclear-armed state of Israel, Israel is quite literally wiping Gaza off the map day by day, quite undisturbed.

Hamas ‘started it’

There have been two, largely implicit defences for this glaring imbalance in western priorities. Neither stands up to even the most cursory scrutiny. 

One is the argument that Hamas “started it” - insinuated in the endless claim that, in destroying Gaza, Israel has been “responding” or “retaliating” to the violence of 7 October.

This is a justification for killing tens of thousands of Palestinians and starving two million more that should never have been let out of the playground. But worse, it is patent nonsense. Hamas did not initiate anything on 7 October, except for handing Israel a pretext to wreck Gaza.

Hamas started nothing on 7 October. It was simply a new, and particularly gruesome phase in what has been decades of Palestinian resistance to Israel’s belligerent occupation of Gaza

The enclave has been under a crushing siege for 17 years, in which its land, sea and air were patrolled constantly by Israel. Its population was denied the essentials of life. They had no freedom of movement apart from inside their cage. 

Long before the current Israeli-induced famine, Israel’s trade restrictions had ensured high levels of malnutrition among Gaza’s children. Most exhibited too the scars of deep psychological trauma from constant and massive attacks by Israel on Gaza.

Biden crows about building a “temporary pier” - weeks or months down the road - to bring aid into Gaza that is desperately needed now. But there is a reason the enclave lacks a seaport and airport. Israel bombed the only airport back in 2001, long before Hamas took charge of Gaza. It has been attacking and killing fishermen trawling just off Gaza's coast for years.

Israel has refused to allow Gaza to connect to the world - and break free of Israeli control - ever since. 

Hamas started nothing on 7 October. It was simply a new, and particularly gruesome phase in what has been decades of Palestinian resistance to Israel’s belligerent occupation of Gaza. 

Bogus narrative

The other implicit defence of western establishments constantly stressing Hamas’ barbarism over Israel’s is that the nature of those atrocities is said to be categorically different - in the apples and pears sense.

Hamas supposedly demonstrated a degree of sadism in its killing spree on 7 October inside Israel that marks it out from Israel’s far larger killing spree in Gaza. 

That has been the basis for every media interview that requires guests to “condemn” Hamas before they are allowed to express concern about the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza. No one is asked to condemn Israel. 

In Gaza, the hospital was our last place of sanctuary. Then Israel bombed it

It is the basis too for permitting Israeli spokespeople to claim unchallenged that Israel targets only Hamas, not civilians, even while some three-quarters of Gaza’s dead are women and children.

On the BBC’s evening news at the weekend, presenter Clive Myrie made precisely this preposterous assertion as he intoned that since 7 October, “Israel launched a relentless bombing campaign targeting members of Hamas.” 

But the latest revelations of the 27 reported deaths in Israeli torture centres and the testimonies of beaten medics from Nasser Hospital confirm how bogus this entire narrative framing by the western media is - one intended to mislead and misinform audiences. 

Israel claims it is targeting Hamas, but its actions tell an entirely different story. Famine will kill off the sick and vulnerable long before it does Hamas fighters. 

The truth is, Israel is not primarily eradicating Hamas. It is eradicating Gaza. Its crimes are at least as cruel and savage as anything Hamas did on 7 October - and its atrocities have been carried out on a far larger scale and for far longer. 

Western establishments and their media have been waging a giant campaign of misdirection for the past five months, as they have against Palestinians over previous years and decades. Western publics have been encouraged to look in the wrong direction. 

Until that changes, the men, women and children of Gaza will continue to pay the heaviest of prices at the hands of a vengeful, sadistic Israeli military.

 Zionist Accusations that Palestinian Men are Sexual Predators Mirrors Nazi Tropes about Jewish men – Western Feminists Are Complicit in how Racists Weaponise Rape 

Excerpt from an Interview on Ha’aretz podcast ‘The Week’9.11.23. - "Mass Hannibal"— We killed Israelis on 7 October, says Israeli air force colonel Nof Erez

Zionism, when it arose was seen by most Jews as a form of Jewish anti-Semitism. Zionist ideologues like Arthur Ruppin accepted the worst stereotypes of  the Nazis and anti-Semites, such as Jews being sexual predators, adopting them as its own.

One medieval myth about Jews was that they poisoned the wells of non-Jews. Thousands of Jews died in the German Empire between 1348 and 1350 and across Europe as a result.

Yet it is an incontrovertible fact that Israeli settlers poison the water of the Palestinians. David Hearst wrote how

the settler attacks come generally at night and where they cannot destroy water cisterns they poison them by putting chicken carcasses in them.

In 1948 Zionist militias infected the waters of Acre and Gaza with dysentery bacteria. According to Ofer Aderet this biological warfare was far more widespread than first known.

Allegations that Jews were disloyal to the countries they lived in and owed their allegiance to a cabal of international Jewish ‘Elders’ was part and part of anti-Semitic discourse.

Zionism does its best to live up to this myth by actively encouraging dual loyalty.  One of their favourite accusations against Jewish anti-Zionists is that they are ‘traitors’ – in other words they have no loyalty to Israel as a ‘Jewish’ state.

When Ilhan Omar accused US Zionists of allegiance to a foreign country, Israel, it was as if the heavens had fallen in. Jonathan Chait wrote that

Accusing Jews of “allegiance to a foreign country” is a historically classic way of delegitimizing their participation in the political system.

Even though it was true it was a case of pure anti-Semitism! Michelle Goldberg in the New York Times accused Omar of waging a series of "microaggressions".  As I wrote at the time:

It is inherent to Zionism that the first loyalty of any Jew is to Israel because their stay in the diaspora is temporary. "The negation of the diaspora" is fundamental to Zionist ideology. The accursed Galut (diaspora) needs to be wound up,

In 2013 Israel’s Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Absorption sent a survey asking American Jews "where their allegiance would lie in the case of a crisis between the two countries." Netanyahu realising the implications had the survey stopped in its tracks but it would have been interesting to see the results.

Jonah Cohen writing in ‘The Lust Libel’ argued that

Antisemites have long depicted the Jews as a perverse, predatory, and pornographic people; horny vampires of the Orient. That ghoulish portrait — which, for short, can be called the ‘lust libel’ — is one of the more enduring of the classical antisemitic stereotypes.

It is no surprise that Zionist hasbara should adopt this anti-Semitic narrative and project it onto the Palestinians. Rape has become the principal ingredient of Zionist propaganda. October 7, instead of being a resistance operation, was organised rape.

Israeli women and many Western Feminists, such as those at Brighton Women’s Centre, are happy to go along with this myth even though its sole purpose is to justify a genocide that has killed over 14,000 children and over10,000 women in Gaza. White western feminists are literally helping to kill Palestinian women and girls at the behest of Jewish Supremacists, women included.

There are good precedents for this in the history of colonialism. The ‘BlackPeril’ was the fear of White South African men that Black men had designs on ‘their’ women. In the Deep South the fear of Black sexual predators fuelled lynching. White women went along with this, as is the case today with western feminists.

Foremost on the minds of Southern Whites was a fear of inter- racial sex, miscegenation. Whites espoused the idea that black men were sexual predators and wanted integration in order to be with white women. And Black women were secretly sluts.

— Reem Alsalem UNSR Violence Against Women and Girls (@UNSRVAW) March 24, 2024

This helps explain Israeli soldiers fascination with the underwear of the Palestinian women they have killed and often raped (Israeli rape of Palestinians never seems to figure in the discourse of Israeli women or Western feminism).

Only today I received a report from a Palestinian woman of rapes near Al Shifa hospital, which Israel has again invaded.

Zionism’s Rape Fraud and October 7

October 7 was a great shock to the Zionists. They repeated ad-nauseum that October 7 ‘was the worst atrocity committed against the Jewish people in a single day since the Holocaust.’  Biden was happy to repeat this.

Except that it wasn’t the worst atrocity against Jews since the Holocaust. That was the murder of at least 3,000 Jews, 12% of the total victims, by Israel’s friends, the neo-Nazi Argentine Junta between 1976 and 1983.

When Hamas and the militants broke out on October 7 they did not kill Israelis because they were Jews but because they were occupiers. The Nazis and the Argentine Junta killed Jews because they were Jews. That simple distinction eludes Zionists.

Yasmin Porat Survivor Speaks: Israeli forces shot their own civilians

October 7 was the nightmare that every settler colonial regime fears, that the natives will rise up and take their revenge on their persecutors. It was the fear of white slavers in the Caribbean, the Apartheid masters in South Africa and the Zionists in Palestine.

Israel used October 7 in order to construct a myth of a second holocaust.  According to France 24 695 Israeli civilians, including 36 children, as well as 373 security forces and 71 foreign workers died. A total of 1,139.

There were undoubtedly atrocities committed, such as civilians or concert goers shot at close range but that was not sufficient for the Zionists.  At first their propaganda was crude but that didn’t stop the western media from adopting it wholesale.

‘40 Beheaded babies’, ‘baked babies’ and even babies hung on clothes lines were invented.  The serious press such as The Telegraph and Timesreported these claims as fact.

Fact Check on the Beheaded Babies

Today, I spoke again with Prime Minister Netanyahu regarding the latest developments in Israel and Gaza.

I continued to affirm that Israel has a right to go after Hamas, a group of terrorists responsible for the worst massacre of the Jewish people since the Holocaust.

And I… pic.twitter.com/pRf9b0VE91

— President Biden (@POTUS) March 19, 2024

A fact check on Al Jazeera showed how the claims were false. This included Genocide Joe’s claim that he had seen them with his own eyes. All this nonsense had to be walked back as Israel admitted it had no proof of these allegations.

As Israeli state propaganda and its advocates got their act together, the claims of atrocities settled on the allegation of mass rape. The attractions of such claims are many.

Unlike the beheaded babies, allegations of rape are difficult to disprove and easy to make. The irony is that senior officers, including the Military Chief Rabbi, Eyal Karim, actually justified raping Palestinian women.

According to Karim ‘wounded terrorists should be killed, gay people are sick and women are sentimental.’  He elaborated that at a time of war it was permitted to satisfy

the evil inclination by lying with attractive Gentile women against their will, out of consideration for the difficulties faces by the soldiers and for overall success could be considered as excusable in order to maintain morale among soldiers and the army during fighting.”

Former Col. Mordechai Kedar, who served in military intelligence for 25 years and a lecturer at Bar Ilan University, declared that.

'The only thing that deters a suicide bomber is the knowledge that if he pulls the trigger or blows himself up, his sister will be raped,'

Israel has not alleged that some rapes were committed but that rape was a deliberate strategy of Hamas on October 7, that it was organised and systematic.  When a group of Zionist women picketed in Brighton they chanted‘resistance is not rape’ – which is of course true but no one is suggesting otherwise.

It is clear that the main aim of Hamas on October 7 was the capture of hostages in order to exchange them for Palestinian prisoners. Something which was entirely justifiable.

No one is suggesting that no one was raped on October 7. Rape and war go together but what is clear is that if rape happened it was perpetrated by the those who came in Hamas’s wake.

"Today he is a baby, tomorrow he is a fighter." - Rabbi Eliyahu Mali, head of the settlers' yeshiva school in occupied Jaffa, incited his students serving in the Israeli occupation forces to kill everyone in Gaza, including babies.

He referenced alleged Jewish principles of war,… pic.twitter.com/FCUJXI73xZ

— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) March 8, 2024

Of the 1,139 Israelis including foreign workers who died on October 7 approximately one-third were soldiers or police and up to half the remainder were killed by Israel itself. Israel was determined that no hostages would be taken who would then have to be exchanged for Palestinian prisoners. If necessary they would kill them themselves. See Israel killed Israelis, confirms new 7 October documentary

As Al Jazeera’s investigation (below) revealed, many of the deaths of Israelis on October 7 occurred because Israel had implemented from 12 pm that day the Hannibal Directive that British papers, including the Guardian have been loathe to mention, despite the fact that it is an accepted fact in Israel.

Al Jazeera investigation finds Israeli military likely involved in October 7 'friendly fire' deaths

A further investigation by Al Jazeera gives a time line of events on October 7 and provides further proof that many civilian casualties were caused by the decision of Israel’s military that anything that moved between Gaza and Israel that day was to be targeted, irrespective of whether their own hostages would die.

October 7 | Al Jazeera Investigations

Rape has long been a favourite obsession of the far-right.  From Nazi Germany to South Africa it has been deployed against the indigenous population. In patriarchal societies rape is a serious offence against a man’s property and if it is a Black man then it’s race defilement too. False allegations of rape were made against Julian Assange because the state knew that such allegations would deter otherwise progressive people from supporting him. People like my own MP Lloyd Russell-Moyle.

Let us see how the Israeli narrative of rape has been debunked.

Scandal grows around fraudulent New York Times "mass rapes" investigation, with Ali Abunimah

The NYT’s Screams without words

On 28 December 2023, 82 days after October 7, ‘Screams without words’ appeared in the New York Times. It was the result of an investigation carried out by Pulitzer prize winner, Jeffrey Gettleman, as well as two freelance staff Adam Sella and Anat Schwart. Schwartz  had no previous journalistic experience and had been an Intelligence officer for the Israeli army. She demonstrated where her sympathies lay when she ‘liked’ a tweet calling for Gaza to be turned into a slaughter house.

Schwartz also liked posts about the long since discredited ’40 beheaded babies’ story and a post calling for Hamas to be labelled as equal to ISIS. Esha Krishnaswarmy revealed that Adam Sella was Schwartz’s nephew! The stench of nepotism and corruption was overwhelming. Sella too is not a journalist.

Why the New York Times article 'Screams without words' is a disgrace to journalism

On December 4 Gettleman, Schwartz and Sella, had written another article for the NYT What We Know About Sexual Violence During the Oct. 7 Attacks in Israel which did not name a single victim. On December 8 the NYT published a correction saying that the Israeli police were relying on witness testimony not autopsies or forensic evidence.

This is the problem with Israel’s rape propaganda. There is no forensic evidence of rape because all those killed were quickly buried. The alleged crime scenes were not quarantined either.

For a week I embedded myself with Jewish Israeli nationalists who believe it’s a worthy cause and religious duty to block desperately needed humanitarian aid at the Gaza border. They enjoyed pastries with the military while confessing to war crimes and cheering for genocide.… pic.twitter.com/YVaXYdVqgt

— Jeremy Loffredo (@loffredojeremy) March 22, 2024

There isn’t one single victim who has come forward. All we have is ‘witnesses’ from Zaka who are proven liars and the Israeli military whose lies set off the 40 beheaded babies story.

Zaka is an ultra orthodox organisation which was founded by a multiple rapist, Meshi Zahav. He committed suicide in June 2022 but not before his colleagues in Zaka had tried to cover them up. Yet despite being discredited in Israel, the NYT and US media continues to quote them as an impartial organisation.

American media keep citing Zaka — though its October 7 atrocity stories are discredited in Israel https://t.co/TppbZAnBZH by @arunindyhttps://t.co/TppbZAnBZH

— The Intercept (@theintercept) February 27, 2024

The NYT ran a puff piece about Zaka on 15 January ‘They Thought They Knew Death, but That Didn’t Prepare Them for Oct. 7’. As the Intercept noted in an article of 27 February

The Times report on Zaka reads like a glowing portrait of selfless volunteers on a “holy mission” to honor the dead and give families closure in accordance with Jewish law. The article could also be read as a whitewash of an organization mired in sexual abuse and financial scandals for decades. The Times never notes that Landau appears to be a serial fabulist, and other Zaka volunteers tell stories that stretch credulity.

The Intercept noted how Reuters, CNN, NYT, BBC, The Guardian, NBC, Politico, WSJ, Washington Post among others

‘fail(ed) to scrutinize Zaka stories. Many volunteers describe extreme crimes that would leave extensive evidence yet aren’t corroborated by reporting.’

Although the NYT has refused to comment on the criticisms of its article the Interceptreported that they had

pulled a high-profile episode of its podcast “The Daily” about sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas on October 7 amid a furious internal debate about the strength of the paper’s original reporting on the subject, Times newsroom sources told The Intercept. The episode had been scheduled for January 9

Interesting interview with 10/7 survivor Raz Cohen, who gave the NYT the quote “screams without words,” for its headline: “‘Screams Without Words:’ How Hamas Weaponized Sexual Violence On Oct. 7.”

He just told Tapper the men he saw were not actually from Hamas, but rather Gazan… https://t.co/XTmn2X5mOp

— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) January 5, 2024

The NYT is also reported to have cut links with Schwartz. Even worse for the NYT a key witness Raz Cohen contradicted a claim in the article that Hamas had committed the rapes.

There were stories such as naked women tied to trees at the Supernova Festival. Zaka’s deputy commander, Greiniman, claimed foreign fighters had taken part in the attack. Another Zaka spokesperson said he saw dozens of dead babies, and children bound together and burned. Yet another volunteer claimed they found a sexually mutilated woman’s corpse under rubble with her organs removed.

Yet only two babies died on October 7. Nor were any children found bound together or burned.

Aaron Mate revealed how former US diplomat, Stuart Seldowitz was on Zaka’s New York Advisory Board.  Seldowitz recently accepted a plea deal for having racially abused a food vendor in New York with his anti-Palestinian rants. His rants included saying that killing 4,000 Palestinian kids wasn’t enough.

But whilst the western media are doing their best to support the fake allegations of rape against Hamas they are ignoring what according to the UN is very credible reports of rape, sexual abuse and torture against Israel in Gaza.

The NYT article was important because it is considered a paper of record. It was used by Zionists to ‘prove’ that October 7 had been a mass rape attack.

When Professor Justin Stebbing of Imperial College, London sent me an email on 21 January saying “thank you for making me hate all jews, i agree with you they should all be gassed” he followed it up with a caption of the NYT article.

On January 4, seven days after the NYT article, Ha’aretz posted an appeal by the police for victims or witnesses to contact them:

Israel's police investigators are having difficulties finding living victims of or witnesses to sexual assault committed by Hamas on October 7

Why would the Police do this if the evidence is so overwhelming?

The Black Dress

BREAKING: GAL ABDUAH’S SISTER DENIES RAPE CLAIMS IN NYT ARTICLE AND SAYS NYT MANIPULATED THE FAMILY

They had no knowledge the article was going to be about rape and were under the impression it was going to be about Gal ABDUAH’S memory. pic.twitter.com/g6EGS7VXyt

— Sulaiman Ahmed (@ShaykhSulaiman) January 2, 2024

The main claims in NYT’s article revolve around Gail Abdush, the woman in the Black Dress, who was allegedly raped at the music festival. Yet almost immediately after the NYT article the Abdush family denied that she had been raped and said they had been interviewed under false pretences.

Ynet asks the photographer of "the woman in the black dress" how @nytimes reached her. She explains the rationale of the Israeli journalists Adam Sella & Anat Schwartz:

"They called me again and again and explained how important it is to Israeli hasbara."https://t.co/gfKmvomWoopic.twitter.com/0Nr55X7A4i

— Tali 🪬🌶️🪁 (@TalulaSha) January 17, 2024

Edan Wesley

The person who took the video of Abdush’s body, Edan Wesley described how Sella and Schwartz called her repeatedly and said how important the video was to Israeli hasbara (propaganda).  As Ali Abunimah pointedout, Schwartz and Sella were telling so-called witnesses that their testimony was essential for the purposes of Israeli State Propaganda. It is clear that Schwart and Sella’s mind had long been made up.

The NYT allegations over the woman in the black dress centred on a video by Eden Wessely.  Shiran Maluka, a friend of Miral Alter, Gail Abdush’s sister, wrote:

Based on what does Eden Wessely conclude that she was raped? Based on the video she took, there is no evidence, it’s not true that half of her body was burned, only her face, and there is nothing but a dress pulled up.

Wesley herself is a dubious character of the Israeli far-right. In the early days of the war, Wessely posted fake news, debunked by the Israeli media, about “Israeli traitors who supported Hamas fighters during the attack on October 7th.” Wessely also shared many posts by the fascist Im Tirtzu, and posts by rapper, Hatzel, a symbol of Israeli fascism. In another post, Wessely shared a picture of Israeli human rights lawyer Lea Tsemel, calling her “the devil incarnate.”

As Mondoweiss concluded:

In the end, it appears that the New York Times manipulated a working-class Mizrahi family in the service of Israeli hasbara in order to score a journalistic achievement, which in reality is nothing more than a repetition of fake news and government propaganda.

The Intercept reported that as well as the NYT, the

Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times’s coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza showed a consistent bias against Palestinians...

Major U.S. newspapers disproportionately emphasized Israeli deaths in the conflict; used emotive language to describe the killings of Israelis, but not Palestinians; ... Pro-Palestinian activists have accused major publications of pro-Israel bias, with the New York Times seeing protests at its headquarters in Manhattan for its coverage of Gaza –– an accusation supported by our analysis.

The Intercept alleged that

The (Israeli) Channel 12 podcast interview with Schwartz, which The Intercept translated from Hebrew, opens a window into the reporting process on the controversial story and suggests that The New York Times’s mission was to bolster a predetermined narrative...

In the podcast interview, Schwartz described her efforts to get confirmation from Israeli hospitals, rape crisis centers etc. In fact she was unable to get a single confirmation.

“She was told there had been no complaints made of sexual assaults,” the Times spokesperson acknowledged.  Yet the NYTheadline was‘‘Screams Without Words’: How Hamas Weaponized Sexual Violence on Oct. 7”

The first eye witness evidence came from an Israeli Air Force paramedic who claimed that two teenage girls at Kibbutz Nahal Oz had been raped and murdered in their bedroom. Problem was that no girls at the Kibbutz fitted the description. He later changed the site of the attacks to Kibbutz Be’eri, but there too no one matched the description of the victims.

Schwartz then contacted Kibbutz Be’eri but that drew a blank so she then contacted Zaka and Yossi Landau told her that

When we go into a house, we use our imagination. The bodies were telling us what happened, that’s what happened.

Landau features in the Times report, though no mention is made of his well-documented track record of disseminating sensational stories of atrocities that were later proven false.

After Zaka, Schwartz’s next port of call was Shari Mendes, who serves in a rabbinical unit of the Israel Defense Forces. The Intercept reported that Mendes

had also spoken about other violence on October 7, telling the Daily Mail in October, “A baby was cut out of a pregnant woman and beheaded and then the mother was beheaded.” No pregnant woman died that day, according to the official Israeli list of those killed in the attacks, and the independent research collective October 7 Fact Check said Mendes’s story was false.

Shari Mendes was a serial liar yet to Schwartz she was a credible witness.

Schwartz quoted on 14 November in her first story for the NYT, Israel’s police chief, Kobi Shabtai that ‘This is the most extensive investigation the State of Israel has ever known,” Yet when “Screams Without Words” appeared forensic evidence of sexual violence was non-existent.

On the Channel 12 podcast Schwartz said her next step was to go to a new holistic therapy facility established to address the trauma of October 7 victims. It was called Merhav Marpe, or Healing Space.

In multiple visits to Merhav Marpe, Schwartz again said that she was told there was no direct evidence of rapes or sexual violence. She expressed frustration with the therapists and counsellors at the facility, saying they engaged in “a conspiracy of silence.” And so it went on. The elusive evidence was simply not there so Schwartz began speculating that it was because Israel was a conservative  society or that survivor guilt played a part. At no time did she question her own basic assumptions.

She interviewed Raz Cohen, who claimed he had seen multiple rapes whilst denying that the perpetrators at the Nova Festival were from Hamas.

The independent site October 7 Fact Check, Mondoweiss, Ali Abunimah and Max Blumenthal of The Grayzone have flagged numerous inconsistencies and contradictions in Cohen’s account. He had initially said“he chose not to look, but he could hear them laughing constantly.”

Coupled with Schwartz’s ‘investigation’ Israel was mounting an intensive public campaign, accusing the international community and feminists of ignoring the widespread, systemic sexual violence of Hamas’s October 7 attack.

The NYT Goes Into Witchhunt Mode as Criticism Mounts

The NYT management which has exposed many state secrets itself, notably the Pentagon Papers and more recently the Wikileaks revelations of Julian Assange didn’t take kindly to being the subject of exposes, notably by The Intercept which gave a blow-by-blow account of dissent within the NYT.

The NYT took a leaf out of Richard Nixon’s book and began a leak inquiry, more commonly known as a witch-hunt. Vanity Fair revealed how ‘at least two dozen staffers, including Daily producers’ had been called into meetings in an attempt to find out how internal details about the podcast’s editorial process got out. The investigation was by Charlotte Behrendt, the paper’s director of policy and internal investigations.

The article quoted staffers as saying that this was the ‘first such internal probe they can recall taking place.’ NYT’s management had been rocked by revelations about the shelving of The Daily podcast. The Nation noted sarcastically that

somewhere in the fiery caverns of Hell, Richard Nixon is enjoying a brief respite from his eternal torment as he learns how The New York Times is mimicking him

Investigations into the scandal surrounding Schwartz’s article and the lack of any elementary fact checking has been conducted by a host of independent sites such as Aaron Maté, October 7 Fact Check, Electronic Intifada and Max Blumenthal.

Where once the NYT could be relied on to subject US Administrations to scrutiny, today they act as little more than court stenographers to Biden and Israel’s far-right government. Woodward and Bernstein have been replaced by Blumenthall, Mate and Abunimah. Today the mainstream press, led by the NYT, acts as a kind of fools’ chorus to the senile Biden and Kissinger protégé Blinken.

As the Nation’s Jet Heer noted

If the Times wanted to serve its readers and the world, it would launch a transparent investigation into this botched article, the biggest failure of journalism at the newspaper since Judith Miller’s infamous and discredited articles on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq in 2002 and 2003. Just as Miller regurgitated war propaganda on behalf of the George W. Bush administration, the Times is now serving as a mouthpiece for Benjamin Netanyahu’s war cabinet.

Heer suggests that the main instigator of “Screams Without Words” was the NYT’s Executive Editor Joe Kahn, a Zionist whose father, Leo Kahn, was a longtime member of the board of CAMERA, a pro-Israel media watchdog. But could Kahn have acted without the approval and perhaps direction of the Sulzberger family, which owns the newspaper?

Heer notes that Watergate proved that a scandal could topple a President and asks ‘what scandal is large enough to bring down the executive editor—or perhaps even the owners—of The New York Times?’

Israel has Struggled to Control the Narrative in Order to Justify Genocide in Gaza

At the beginning of December I wrote a blog on the Israeli hostages who had been released and how their testimonies had conflicted with the Zionist demonisation of Hamas. Yocheved Lifshitz 85 spoke of how well she had been treated.

What do the videos of released Hamas captives tell us | Al Jazeera Newsfeed

Yocheved Lifshitz press conference

Lifshitz said the captives were treated well and received medical care, including medication. The guards kept conditions clean, and hostages were given one meal a day of cheese, cucumber and pita, she said, adding that her captors ate the same.

A family member of Ruth Munder, an elderly woman who was released, told the Jerusalem Post that Munder did not experience any harm during her captivity. In a section ‘How did Hamas Treat the Hostages’ the Jerusalem Post reported that

Initially, there weren't many people with them, but at some point, more individuals were added. They had access to a radio and television, where they heard news from Israel. Ruth heard on the radio that her son [Roi Munder] had been killed… The conditions were far from ideal; 80-year-old men and women lied down on plastic benches similar to those in a hospital, without mattresses.

"Fortunately, they did not endure any unpleasant experiences during their captivity; they were treated in a humane manner," continued the family member.

"Contrary to our fears, they did not encounter the horrifying stories we had imagined. They described the initial moments of their kidnapping when the terrorists were agitated and threatened to harm them, but once they were on motorcycles, they did not harm them."

Lifshitz told the press how she received daily visits from a doctor during her captivity. Lifshitz’s daughter also said that her mother was cared for by a paramedic during her captivity.

On October 24, Lifshitz told the press that she was treated well while in Hamas captivity after she was driven into the Gaza Strip. Her statements caused an uproar in Israel, with some government and diplomatic figures accusing the conference organizers of damaging the country's advocacy efforts by portraying a positive image of Hamas.

Israeli authorities were outraged at the fact that Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv had facilitated Yocheved Lifshitz’s interview. Hospital employee Avi Shoshan was suspended and subsequently dismissed. Why should Israel object to the hostages speaking freely unless they had something to fabricate?

The organisers of the press conference had allowed doubt to be cast upon government lies about Hamas and that was unforgiveable. Ha’aretz reported how Lifshitz started the press conference by recounting the details of the October 7 kidnapping: "Masses mobbed our homes. They beat people, took some hostage." She described it as "very painful.”

It was the statements that followed, however, that drew controversy in Israel. She said that the kidnappers brought a doctor that gave them medical treatment, that the hostages were treated well and the kidnappers were friendly. "We lay on mattresses, they made sure everything was sanitary," she said. "They made sure we wouldn't get sick, and we had a doctor with us every two or three days.”

Ha’aretz reported the story as ‘The problem is you, not Hamas' : Hostages' families lash out at Israeli government.’

"They were very friendly to us," Lifshitz said, "they treated us gently and looked after us." Clearly this dedemonising of Hamas and the portray of its members as human beings could not be allowed again.

Israel’s Channel 12 reported that Israel’s released hostages ‘are expected to receive close supervision, and they will be instructed on what to tell the media and what not."

Blumenthall on what hostages can say

The Israeli govt has imposed strict rules on freed Israelis, closely monitoring or muzzling them entirely

Those released from Hamas custody “are expected to receive close supervision, and they will be instructed on what to tell the media and what not” https://t.co/sj4j5ASH3ipic.twitter.com/E2Ze9B6Hl6

— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) November 29, 2023

 See also:

Screams without proof: questions for NYT about shoddy ‘Hamas mass rape’ report

Grayzone – Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate

“Between the Hammer and the Anvil” - The Story Behind the New York Times October 7 Exposé , The Intercept

Family of key case in New York Times October 7 sexual violence report renounces story, says reporters manipulated them Mondoweiss

The Nation

The Nixonian New York Times Stonewalls on a Discredited Article About Hamas and Rape

Norman Finkelstein

PRAMILA PATTEN’S RAPE FANTASIES: A Critical Analysis of the UN Report on Sexual Violence during the 7 October Attack see also

UN report launders Israel’s fraudulent “mass rape” propaganda – Electronic IntifadaIsraeli Army, Not Hamas, Killed Civilians at Kibbutz Be’eri – Media Reports 

Is the New York Times losing its credibility on Israel-Palestine? | The Listening Post

Hamas 'mass rape' claim lacks evidence. But it's being used to justify genocide

Jonathan Cook

Having Refused to Take Part in the National  Palestine Demonstrations Against Genocide Graham Writes to the Palestinian Trade Unions after Israel Bombed Their Offices Boasting About Her Support

Protest Outside Unite HQ

Unite for Palestine Activist Meeting

Wednesday March 27 2024 6.30 p.m.

Please register here

https://tinyurl.com/4fc49t2y

For once I was lost for words. Never was the saying that Hypocrisy is the Tribute that Vice Pays to Virtue truer. It takes a special kind of gall to have done absolutely nothing in support of the Palestinians as they are bombed and ethnically cleansed in Gaza, to have held hands with the far-right Campaign Against Antisemitismas she banned Jeremy Corbyn – The Big Lie from Unite premises and then to write to the General Secretary of the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions boasting of Unite’s record.

On March 7, as part of its ‘war against Hamas’ Israel bombed the headquarters of the PGFTU in Gaza City. The Federation’s five-story building had attached to it several other facilities providing services to the Palestinians, including a kindergarten that served 380 children, as well as a large automatic bakery.

The PGFTU Offices in Gaza After Israel Bombed Them

In a statement, signed by Basheer Al-Sisi, a member of their General Secretariat, he spoke of how the Federation has “lost thousands of members, union offices, facilities, and other institutions” as a result of the “wholesale slaughter and forced dislocation—ethnic cleansing” committed against the Palestinian people in the last six months.

We send our solidarity greetings to our friends, the Palestine General Federation of Trade Unions at this terrible time.

We demand a #CeasefireNOW#GFTU#GFTU125https://t.co/qbHZmrlmYl

— General Federation of Trade Unions (@GFTU1) March 12, 2024

Palestinian workers from Gaza who were in Israel at the time of October 7 were rounded up, imprisoned and tortured. A number of them died yet Graham kept her silence throughout.

The PGFTU is controlled by Fatah, not Hamas, but that did not stop Israel bombing its offices. The ‘war against Hamas’ is a fiction meant only for stupid westerners and the BBC/Sky.

It is of course welcome that Graham has, at last, written expressing her solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza. But it is long overdue. It is also welcome that she has, for the first time, condemned Israel’s ‘war crimes’ but we will never forget that this only came nearly 6 months after Israel’s attack and with deaths and injuries over 100,000.

Graham even boasted that Unite has donated £50,000 to Medicins Sans Frontiere, which isn’t even a Palestinian organisation when Unite could have donated a much larger sum to Medical Aid for Palestinians, which is permanently on the ground in Gaza, as a host of Unite branches have done.

Demonstration Outside Unite Exec Meeting by Unite Members, March 11

£50,000 is chicken feed. It is reported that Graham and Unite’s legal bill for defending itself in a labour court in Dublin, against its former Regional Organiser Brendan Ogle is over £1m (1.35m Euros) and that is before Graham starts defending herself against a libel action by Ogle which no doubt Unite will pay for.

There have been regular demonstrations in London against genocide in Gaza ever since October 7. Not only has Sharon Graham refused to attend or speak but she has forbidden Unite’s national banner being taken on the march.

Will Sharon Graham be attending the Demonstration next Saturday 30 March. I won’t be holding my breath. Graham even tried to prevent Peter Kavanagh, Regional Organiser for the London & Eastern Region speaking at the demonstration on January 13^th and threatened him with loss of a pension bonus if he did.

This is in addition to suspending Simon Dubbins, a Unite official who organised a meeting on Palestine at the Labour Party Conference in defiance of her wishes.

Graham also didn’t mention that Unite members had staged a demonstration/lobby outside Unite headquarters on March 11^th at the beginning of the Executive Meeting in protest at Unite’s complete inactivity on Palestine.

Suffice to say that Graham also failed to mention that she and her supporters had opposed any discussion of Palestine at the meeting and in response to those who did wish to discuss it told them that ‘Palestine is not a service that Unite offers to its members.’

Perhaps the height of Graham’s hypocrisy was her boast that ‘I am sure you are aware that Unite has a longstanding policy in support for the Palestinian people.’ How would the PGFTU be aware when she has refused to put the policy on Unite’s website. Is Shaher Saed, the General Secretary of the PGFTU expected to be telepathic?

Tonight we will be holding a meeting of Unite activists who do want Unite to start giving real solidarity to the Palestinians – this includes

1.           Unite being present on all future national demonstrations

2.           Instructing dockers and Unite workers to boycott all arm shipments to Israel and all trade with Israel as and until its genocide and ethnic cleansing in Gaza stops.

3.           To fund members wanting to attend the demonstrations and to publicising the demonstrations on the website and internally.

4.           Unite policy on Palestine to be displayed on Unite’s website

5.           That Unite donate £250,000 to Medical Aid for the Palestinians

6.           That an Emergency Executive Committee Meeting be called in order to discuss what Unite can now do on Palestine.

7.           That Unite let Keir Starmer and the Labour Party know that until they reverse their position of support for Israel’s genocide they won’t get another farthing from Unite.

Let us hope that Sharon Graham’s letter to the PGFTU is a sign that she has at last recognised that her previous stance of support for Israel’s genocide is unacceptable and that the Union must revert to its traditional position of support for the oppressed not the oppressor. I fear though that Graham’s letter is about as far as she intends to go and that these are mere empty words.

Tony Greenstein

Israel suffers, not from Holocaust Trauma but the Trauma of Self-Induced Victimisation

Electronic Intifada has just published my article Israel’s Holocaust trauma is a myth. It looks at the claims of Israel’s supporters and Zionism that October 7 represented a ‘second Holocaust’.

In the article I argue that it is not Holocaust trauma but the trauma of settler-colonials, for whom the rising up of the indigenous Palestinians, is their nightmare scenario. I compare Israel’s situation with that of the Caribbean slave owners and South Africa’s Whites.

In the Times of Israel two Israeli holocaust academics, Avinoam Patt and Liat Steir-Livny lazily claim that

Just as the Nazis aimed to annihilate the Jews, Hamas and affiliated terrorist organizations share the same objective: the destruction of Jews.

White 'trauma' in Kenya led Britain to set up a series of concentration camps

It is an evidence free assertion. What do they base this claim on? The 1988  Hamas Charter. It is true that the 1988 Hamas Charter referred to Jews and was anti-Semitic but the point is that it never informed the practice and politics of Hamas and in 2017 was discarded in favour of a ‘“Document of General Principles and Policies’.

Of course the think tanks of US imperialism have done their best to suggest that the changes are cosmetic. As Mandy Rice-Davies of Profumo fame once said, they would say that wouldn’t they. It is in the interests of Zionism to portray Hamas as a genocidal, anti-Semitic organisation.

Matthew Levitt and Maxine Rich of the neo-con Washington Institute for Near East Policy argue in ‘Hamas's Moderate Rhetoric Belies Militant Activities’  

The international community should judge Hamas not by any moderation in the group's rhetoric but by its actions on the ground. So long as the latter remain militant and extreme, the relative moderation of the former means not much at all.

What concerned them was not that Hamas had abandoned its anti-Jewish rhetoric but that they were still militantly opposed to Israel’s occupation, siege and subjugation of the Palestinian people.

This is typical of the dishonesty of western academics who conflate the Nazi’s extermination of Jews with opposition to Israeli settler colonialism. The suggestion being that Hamas and the Palestinians oppose Israel’s Jewish Supremacist regime not because of what it does but because their oppressors happen to be Jewish!

Amira Hass in Ha’aretz explained the background to the original Charter and how it came to be adopted and the fact that it had little influence on Hamas’s day to day practice or ideological outlook.

The new document contains none of the anti-Semitic articles and sentences that characterized the charter. Supporters of the movement, especially in the West, advised it long ago to change these provisions.

One Hamas member told Haaretz that almost immediately after the charter was published in 1988, people in the movement urged that these sections be changed. The charter wasn’t written in a cooperative process, he explained, and it isn’t “scientifically or legally” accurate.

He said the Hamas members deported to Marj El Zhour in Lebanon in 1992-93 were the first to seriously discuss the need for changes. But the changes were never made because doing so required a lengthy, complex process of thought and consultation during difficult periods of military escalation.

The charter itself hasn’t been canceled. It’s a historic document that relates to a particular moment in the organization’s history, and Hamas isn’t renouncing it; nor is the new document called a “charter.” Cancelling the charter would repeat the humiliation undergone by the PLO when it had to announce the repeal of certain provisions of its 1968 charter because they contradicted the Oslo Accords. But the Hamas charter is no longer the organization’s official ideological platform.

As I said in my article

‘Presumably if Gaza’s occupiers had been Christians then the Palestinians would have happily accepted their fate!’.

Levitt and Rich typify the superficiality of the ‘academics’ that adorn American think thanks and universities. To say nothing of Israel’s fake holocaust ‘scholars’ such as Patt and Steir-Livny.

Nazi anti-Semitism targeted Jews because they were Jews and extermination was a culmination of a process that began with ethnic cleansing. When Hamas attacked Jews it was understandable because Israel’s soldiers came to their homes to kill them in the name of ‘the Jews’. That is why Palestinians refer to Yahud (Jew) because that is how their oppressor appears to them.

However Hamas matured in the 30 years between the 1988 Charter and the 2017 document. They learnt to distinguish between Jews and Zionists. Nor was this simply a matter of rhetoric or verbal accommodation.

No less than the Times of Israel quoted a statement of senior Hamas official Basem Naim that the group was “sorry to hear about the terror attack” in 2018 on the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh which claimed 11 lives. Naim explained that

As Palestinians and victims of the terror of Israeli occupation, we know the meaning of terror and its horrific outcomes. This heinous attack, especially in a place of worship, proves that terror has no religion or nationality.