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Not a Happy Xmas from Palestine and Apartheid Israel

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Xmas Banned in Upper Nazareth




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The mayor of a Jewish suburb of Nazareth sparked outrage yesterday after  he refused to allow Christmas trees to be placed in town squares, calling them "provocative".
Predominantly Jewish Nazareth Illit, or Upper Nazareth, is next to the old town of Nazareth, where Jesus is believed to have spent much of his life. It has a sizable Arab Christian minority, as does mostly Muslim Nazareth itself. "The request of the Arabs to put Christmas trees in the squares in the Arab quarter of Nazareth Illit is provocative," Mayor Shimon Gapso told AFP.
"Nazareth Illit is a Jewish city and it will not happen -- not this year and not next year, so long as I am a mayor," he said. 
His decision  has angered the town's Arab and Christian minority, who accused him of racism.
"The racism of not putting a tree up is nothing compared to the real racism that we experience here," said Aziz Dahdal, a 35-year-old Christian resident of Nazareth Illit.
"When we asked the mayor to put up a Christmas tree in the Arab neighborhoods of Nazareth Illit he said this is a Jewish town, not a mixed town," said Shukri Awawdeh, a Muslim Arab member of the town council. Awawdeh said there were 10,000 Arabs, most of them Christian in the town and there was also a large community of Christian Russian immigrants. "We told him that decorating a tree is just to share the happiness and cheer with other people in the town," said Awawdeh.
"People here, Jews, Christians and Muslims live in harmony, but when the mayor does something like that, it does not make things better."
A spokesman from the Mayor of Camden's office in North London said: "I've never thought Christmas trees were a religious symbol. I'm an atheist but we have one at home. They brighten up what is the darkest time of the year. In Camden we have many Muslims, Hindus and people of other faiths  as well as Christians. Many of our streets and of course all our shops are decorated with lights and trees."

Ali Abunimah 25 December 2012

In his Christmas greeting video, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu boasted of Israel’s supposed religious tolerance.
“Today Christian communities around the Middle East are shrinking and in danger. This is of course not true in Israel. Here there’s a strong, growing Christian community that participates fully in the life of our country,” Netanyahu said.
A Xmas reminder in Brighton town centre
Vowing to “continue to protect freedom of religion and thought,” Netanyahu also promised “to safeguard Christian places of worship throughout our country” and not to “tolerate any acts of violence or discrimination against any place of worship.”
Making a pitch for Christian Zionist tourism he urged listeners to “Come see our ancient land with your own eyes. Visit Nazareth and Bethlehem, wade in the Jordan River, stand on the shores of the Sea of Galilee and next year come visit our eternal capital, Jerusalem.”
His inclusion of Bethlehem, in the occupied West Bank, as well as the banks of the Jordan River, can be taken as another affirmation that Israel, despite its rhetoric, has no interest in a “two-state solution” and intends to absorb all of historic Palestine as an exclusively “Jewish state.”
Disappearing Christmas trees
Netanyahu’s professions of tolerance would have come as news to Palestinian Christian students at Safad Academic College in the Galilee. There, students who could not get home for the holidays bought a Christmas tree and set it up outside their dorm.
Nazareth - the Fountain of the Virgin (1894)
But in the evening when they got back from class, they found the tree was gone, Israel’s Walla! News reported.
“This is the saddest Christmas,” said Gabriel Mansour, 24, a third-year political science student, identified by Walla! as a representative of Arab students. “All we wanted to do was provide some good cheer for all the students who remained alone in the dorms, and who were unable to go home to their families.”
When Mansour investigated, he was told by college officials that the tree had been hidden lest it spark riots among the Jewish students.
“I was angry to hear this,” said Mansour of the claim that the tree might spark riots among Jewish students and residents of Safad. “Unfortunately they don’t respect our holidays. We fully respect all Israeli holidays. Why can no one respect our traditions? Why can’t we put up a Christmas tree?”
“I do not think Christmas should be marked with such ostentation,” Walla! quoted an unnamed Jewish student saying. “The college has a distinctly Jewish character. It’s not healthy for anyone to be able to do whatever he wants.”
Caught with a Christmas tree
Yair Netanyahu in flagrante with Christmas tree  Facebook


And there was a mini-scandal when the girlfriend of Yair Netanyahu, the son of the Israeli prime minister, posted a photo of the youth wearing a Santa hat and posing next to a Christmas tree, on Facebook. Under the photo was the caption “My Christian boy.”
The prime minister’s office was forced to issue a statement that the image was a joke and that Yair had been attending a party hosted by “Christian Zionists who love Israel, and whose children served in the IDF,” Israel’s Channel 2 reported. Nevertheless the photo was removed from Facebook.
State rabbis order bans on Christmas
The ban on Christmas at Safad college is no isolated incident. For several years, Shimon Gapso, the notoriously racist mayor of the Israeli settlement of “Upper Nazareth” in the Galilee, has banned Christmas trees, calling them a provocation. “Nazareth Illit [Upper Nazareth] is a Jewish city and it will not happen – not this year and not next year, so long as I am a mayor,” Gapso said.
According to journalist Jonathan Cook in Nazareth, such bans continue and are widespread this year with Israel’s state-financed rabbis warning hotels and restaurants that they will lose their kosher certifications if they put up trees or other Christmas decorations or hold Christmas events.
“In other words,” Cook says, “the rabbinate has been quietly terrorising Israeli hotel owners into ignoring Christmas by threatening to use its powers to put them out of business. Denying a hotel its kashrut (kosher) certificate would lose it most of its Israeli and foreign Jewish clientele.”
Publicly visible Christmas tree could “injure the souls of Jews”
When the Israeli occupation municipality in Jerusalem this year put up a small Christmas tree near the Jaffa Gate, there were strong protests from rabbis. Occupation municipality city council member Rabbi Shmuel Yitzhaki told settler news website Arutz 7 that the display was a “desecration” and a “grave offense against the Jewish people” and that it was “inconceivable” that a Christmas tree should be allowed in a “public place” where it might be seen by Jews on their way to pray at the Western Wall in eastern occupied Jerusalem.
Mina Fenton, a former city council member, said, “There’s a Christian Quarter. They can put it [the tree] up there,” where it couldn’t “injure the souls of Jews.”
Christmas trees as propaganda for ethnic cleansing group JNF
While Israel’s official rabbis, colleges and municipalities discourage or ban displays of Christmas trees, the Jewish National Fund (JNF), the racist state-backed agency actively engaged in ethnically cleansing Palestinians and stealing their land for exclusive use by Jews, has found a way to use Christmas trees to paint a false image of itself as a promoter of multicultural harmony.
The JNF, which misrepresents itself as an environmental charity, now gives away some trees and felled branches particularly to foreign embassies, for use as Christmas trees in private homes, and markets the initiative as outreach to maintain “good relations between religions.” Against the background of the JNF’s true activities, such cynical propaganda should convince no one. But it might be useful in raising donations from Christian Zionists.
Discrimination against Christianity inherent in Israel’s “Law of Return”
The efforts by Netanyahu and the JNF to present Israel as tolerant and friendly to Christians are important to maintain external, especially Christian Zionist support, and to hide a much uglier reality.
Israel claims to be a “Jewish state.” Its blatantly discriminatory “Law of Return” grants the automatic right to those it recognizes as Jews from anywhere in the world to immigrate and receive citizenship even if they have no connection to the country. At the same time, Israel prevents indigenous Palestinian refugees, including those born there, from returning home just because they are not Jews.
But according to the US State Department in its 2011 report on religious freedom around the world, Israel specifically applies a blatantly anti-Christian test in applying this bigoted law:
The question of whether one believes Jesus is the Jewish Messiah has been used to determine whether a Jew was qualified to immigrate. The [Israeli] Supreme Court repeatedly has upheld the right, however, of Israeli Jews who believe Jesus is the Messiah to retain their citizenship. The immigration exclusion was routinely applied only against Messianic Jews, whereas Jews who were atheists were accepted, and Jews who chose to believe in other religions, including Hindus and Buddhists, were not screened out.
In other words a “Jew” can be an atheist, Hindu, or Buddhist – anything at all – and be granted citizenship by Israeli authorities. It is only a belief in Jesus that disqualifies them.
Attacks on Christian holy sites
As for Netanyahu’s promise that Christian holy sites would be protected, he failed to mention that in recent months, Israeli settlers, acting with the collusion of Israeli authorities, have stepped up so-called “price tag” attacks on Christian holy sites.
Meanwhile, Christmas celebrations proceeded this year in Gaza and in Iran, where municipal authorities in Tehran have in recent years put up banners celebrating the birth of Jesus on many main streets. Both Iran and Gaza are Muslim-majority places that Israeli propaganda loves to paint as particularly intolerant of religious minorities.
Few countries live up to their own claims about religious freedom and tolerance and many must do better. But selling Israel in particular, whose whole raison d’être is to privilege Jews qua Jews over the indigenous Palestinian population of any religion, as a paragon of tolerance and pluralism is patently absurd.
Merry Christmas!


The Witchhunt Continues - Labour’s NEC Deselects Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt, PPC for South Thanet at the Behest of Guido Fawkes and the Henry Jackson Society

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Yet more False Anti-Semitism Smears - Elected by the members and removed by the corrupt GMB and Labour's Right inc. Claudia Webbe



Labour's Gutless 'Left' Voted to Endorse Guido Fawkes base accusations

The NEC’s shameful decision to deselect South Thanet’s socialist Parliamentary Prospective Candidate should be seen in perspective. The decision was taken at the behest of Douglas Murray’s far-Right Islamaphobic Henry Jackson Society and the Tory Guido Fawkes.  It is a prime example of the cowardice in the face of adversity.  Such gutlessness can and will only rebound on the left.
One of the defining moments in consolidating the grip of Tony Blair in the Labour Party was the deselection in 1995 of Liz Davies as Leeds North-East PPC. The right-wing press had whipped up the normal storm of lies against Liz. She had broken the whip twice on Islington Council to vote against the closure of a nursery. As Tony Benn noted in his Diary:
Karen Constantine
Karen Constantine
“Liz Davies is due to have her endorsement as a parliamentary candidate for Leeds North East refused by the NEC tomorrow morning… Frank Field, MP, has encouraged Labour voters in the past to ‘Vote Liberal’ and that’s alright. Roger Liddle, who was an SDP councillor until May and voted against Labour, is taken into Blair’s private office. But Liz Davies, who voted against her Labour Council – to save a nursery school – is not allowed to be a candidate.”
When Liz Davies was deselected as Labour PPC Jeremy Corbyn spoke up strongly in her support. Today he has remained silent after a campaign by the same political forces that were responsible for the defenestration of Liz Davies. Today the so-called Left on Labour’s NEC has gone along with these Tory hyenas.
Karen Constantin's baiting of the elected PPC for South Thanet
South Thanet Labour Party is a model party. It was their vigorous campaign which helped see off Nigel Farage when he stood in the 2015 General Election. The area has been a focus of activity by fascists and the NF for many years. South Thanet’s Vice Chair, Jackie Walker, the Black Jewish activist who was scandalously suspended by Iain McNicol’s witch hunters, led the fight against the fascists.
Andrew Cunningham - GMWU NE Regional Official Gaoled for 5 (cut to 4) years in prison
South Thanet recently selected as its PPC a well-known and locally respected socialist activist, Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt. Her main opponent was Karen Constantine, a Labour Councillor who is known locally as ambitious and self serving. Constantine was at one point employed by the GMB, a notoriously corrupt union.
Those with long memories will remember their North-East Regional Secretary Andrew Cunningham who was also Chairman of Durham County Council. In 1974 Cunningham was gaoled for 5 years for graft and corruption, alongside John Poulson and T Dan Smith, former leader of Newcastle Council.  It was a scandal that brought down the Tory Home Secretary of the time, Reginald Maudling. Regional Secretaries in the GMB are unelected and unaccountable. One of their main activities is feathering their own nests.
Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt - deselected by cowards on the NEC
Constantine was supported by the GMB in particular in her bid to become PPC. She had however become extremely unpopular since her involvement in ‘Soapgate’(Feb 2017)  Soapgate could and should have led to her suspension from the Labour Party. It was in essence theft from the poor and was seen as such.  However under Iain McNicol a blind eye was turned to the misdemeanours of the Right.
For example the late Riad al-Taher, an Iraqi member of the Labour Party who had been gaoled for 10 months for breaching UN sanctions on Iraq which were killing thousands of Iraqis, was expelled summarily from the Labour Party. On the other hand Jeremy Newmark, who was Chair of the racist Jewish Labour Movement, was not suspended because his corruption, documented at length by the Jewish Chronicle, was considered ‘private’ by McNicol.
As part of the campaign around fake antisemitism allegations merely alleging that antisemitism is being weaponised is in itself 'antisemitic'
Lush Cosmetics is an ethical company much like Body Shop used to be. Kent Online reported that in early 2017 it donated hundreds of pounds of goods to various charities to support the homeless, vulnerable and disadvantaged.
Karen Constantine got her paws on the goods and instead flogged them to raise funds for Labour’s election campaign, in which she was involved, raising over £400 in a table top sale. Lush gave 100 tonnes of products to 38 charities, including Food For All. FFA handed some of them to Constantine and her agent Kaz Peet. The pair then held a Lush for Labour sale. See Thanet Labour councillor apologises after selling charity Lush products to raise money for election campaign
Lush's stolen goods
Constantine posted “Absolute bargains to be had - there has never been a better time to buy a bath bomb!!!” and Kaz Peet posted: “Many serious bargains to be had at the sale of Lush products - this afternoon at Churchills - all funds to the Labour party KCC campaign.” Undoubtedly this was true!! When they were exposed they were forced to hand over the £415 collected to local charities. 
Douglas Murray of the Henry Jackson Society
This is the intellectual racist who is motivated the NEC to deselect Rebecca
Constantine later exclaimed that she had not known that she could be in breach of electoral law. Selling goods donated to a charity for private purposes is not only a breach of electoral but charitable law and possibly a breach of the Theft Act. David Goodfellow of The Kindness Offensive said:
We make it very clear that anything we donate is used for people in desperate, desperate need. I am a bit surprised as it is made abundantly clear that these should go to the end user.
This should have been an expulsion offence.  Selling goods intended for the homeless for the sake of her election campaign.
Constantine unsurprisingly lost out in her first attempt to become PPC at the 2017 General election. In her second attempt in 2018 she lost out again to Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt. On both occasions her behaviour at LP meetings alienated people. She had a sense of entitlement and expectation that she should become the candidate.
GMB member Stuart McCann resigned because the views of his and other branches were overruled by the GMB region
Although nominated by the corrupt GMB union as their candidate in 2017, no local branches of the GMB were asked for their opinions resulting in the resignation of local GMB representative Stuart McCann. The Isle of Thanet Newsreported in March 2018 McCann, a former President of the Thanet Trades Council, as saying that:
“I am sad to say that as of today I have resigned from all my GMB posts and will also be resigning my membership of said union (Thanet TUC) over what I believe to be corruption at regional level in the nominations from GMB branches for PPC candidate Karen Constantine.’
“My branch is listed as a nominating branch, however I can confirm that W09 Asda Dartford branch has not met to nominate Karen, in fact my branch secretary informs me he hasn’t even heard of her never mind nominating her.”
Frank Macklin, the GMB Regional Organiser complained that Stuart had failed to contact him personally.  At no time did he dispute the accuracy or truthfulness of the allegations which had been made. 
Constantine was selected by Momentum to be their candidate though she has never attended a Momentum meeting and kept her distance from the local group. Her support for Corbyn was initially non-existent and only appeared to develop after she saw which way the wind was blowing. Unfortunately this is symptomatic of Momentum these days.
Since Rebecca was elected, Karen and her supporters have consistently undermined her on a local and national level. Most party members have no doubt that Constantine was behind the smearing reports of the Weekend Furlough, a nasty far-Right blog and that Constantine was their ‘senior Labour source’. 
The Weekend Furlough is published by Sam Armstrong, a shady character who was accused of rape recently while working in Westminster as an aide to Craig Mackinlay MP, ex UKIP and now Tory MP for South Thanet who’s on trial at the moment over his election expenses!!! Like many men accused of rape, Armstrong was acquitted. These are the people the LP are listening to.  
Rebecca's Open Latter Explaining the Background to what happened
However it didn’t matter how nasty, racist and right-wing this blog is. Certain people in the upper echelons of the Labour Party, left-overs from crooked McNicol, were determined to do their best to undermine an elected socialist candidate.  According to the Furlough:
Our first call was to a senior Labour source – one who as a consequence of the result – we thought might be talkative. We made the call on the 10th of April... We were not disappointed.  Over the course of a 30 minute phone call, the individual told us that there was a “big story here” and we should be “grateful” because she was giving us a lot of news.  The individual pointed us in the direction of a lot of different allegations.  We made a note of all of them.  Some did not check out – many did.
It was clear that our source had an axe to grind and would tell us what we wanted to hear in order that we may criticise Dr Gordon-Nesbitt.  She obviously felt hurt by the way that she thought Gordon-Nesbitt had betrayed her.  Clearly at that stage she was disappointed at recent events and wanted to lash out.  Her view was that the PPC election should be re-run. However, while much was unfocused and unpublishable she gave us a lot that was actionable... We ended the phone call, feeling excited.  If just some of what our source had claimed was true, this could be big.  We were amazed that we had gained all of this from an elected official.
It is clear that this ‘elected official’ was Constantine. Who else ‘had an axe to grind’?  The ‘Weekend Furlough’ is a local version of the Tory Guido Fawkes blog. Here’s what Fawkes had to say
Labour’s newly-selected parliamentary candidate in South Thanet runs a pro-Corbyn ‘think tank’ which repeatedly defended Ken Livingstone and Jackie Walker during their anti-Semitism scandals and questioned the “Zionist sympathies” of John Bercow. Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt, a socialist historian who wrote a book praising Castro, was selected in Thanet earlier this month after joining the Labour Party when Corbyn became leader. She also runs a think tank called The Centre for Cultural Change. Whois records show Gordon-Nesbitt registered its website and there are no other staff listed at the organisation. Its Twitter account has repeatedly promoted Gordon-Nesbitt.
As you can see these are really serious charges. The kind of McCarthyism you expect from the rabid Right. It is a sad indictment of the ‘left’ on Labour’s NEC that they took this kind of rubbish seriously. Not only was Rebecca guilty of defending Jackie Walker, who is suspended (& in the eyes of Labour’s witchhunters you are guilty until proven innocent) but she defended Ken Livingstone and worse still wrote a book praising Fidel Castro. For these crimes, Labour’s witchhunters removed Rebecca as the democratically elected PPC.

Armstrong is now communications manager with the cold-war warriors of the Henry Jackson Society, founded by Douglas Murray, author of The Strange Death of Europe: Immigration, Identity, Islam’.  The Guardian Review describes the bookthus:

Think Daily Mail columnist Katie Hopkins, but with longer words, and for people who wouldn’t be seen dead on an English Defence League march – although one of the more ridiculous contentions in this book by the journalist Douglas Murray is that the EDL are actually terribly misunderstood chaps, who have a point, and aren’t really to blame for the way their rallies regularly end in violence.
This is the kind of scum that Labour’s NEC, Claudia Webbe and Lansman listened to when deciding to deselect Rebecca. The whole fake ‘antisemitism’ smears and witchhunt are driven by Zionists like Douglas Murray. For a racist union like the GMB this is no problem. 
The HJC recently held a public meeting called The Left’s Jewish Problem — Jeremy Corbyn, Israel and Antisemitism” which held that ‘antisemitism is a ‘sickness’ at the heart of left-wing British politics that has become increasingly insidious in recent years.’ Speaking at this meeting was Dave Rich of the Zionist Community Security Trust which is responsible for the manipulation of ‘anti-Semitism’ incidents, year by year, in order to create the appearance of ever increasing anti-Semitism in British society. Tony Lerman, the former Director of the Institute of Jewish Policy Research, showed in ‘Anti-Semitism Redefined: Israel’s Imagined National Narrative of Endless External Threat how Israel’s Mossad, took over responsibility for the collation of statistics of anti-Semitism internationally as part of a narrative that the only refuge from anti-Semitism is the emigration of Jews to Israel (‘Aliyah).
Alan Mendoza, the Executive Director of the HJS was ‘aghast’ at Labour’s anti-Semitism crisis.  He explained:
"It is shocking that a party such as Labour, which used to be a big bastion of support for Israel, has now fallen by the wayside. Of course, there are still a good number of Labour MPs who are supportive of Israel. "I think the big change in British politics has come on the right. There is now large support for Israel.’
It is clear that for the Right, Labour’s ‘anti-Semitism crisis’ is not about hatred of Jews but criticism of Israel.
Rebecca, who was the real left candidate, was supported by the grassroots and most local Momentum members. She won PPC democratically and against huge odds. Have a look at the letter she has written about the NEC decision for more details. A number of local LP members have already resigned. The local party is united against the decision of the NEC.
PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION IN SUPPORT OF REBECCA GORDON-NESBITT HERE

Thanet Labour councillor apologises after selling charity Lush products to raise money for election campaign

 By Paul Francis Published: 16:30, 27 February 2017
A Labour councillor sold cosmetics meant to benefit the homeless and disadvantaged to charity to raise money for her election campaign instead.
Karen Constantine, who is already a Thanet councillor and is standing in May's county council election, raised more than £400 in a table top sale of Lush cosmetics and other beauty products that were supposed to have been handed directly to charities serving the homeless, vulnerable and disadvantaged.
Instead, the cosmetics were sold to fund Labour’s county council election campaign for candidates in South Thanet.
Karen Constantine
Under election law, charities are not usually considered as permissible donors.
There is no suggestion that Lush was aware of what happened and its website makes clear that anything it donates should not be resold or raffled as prizes.
The chain of events began when a charity called The Kindness Offensive was offered a 100-tonne consignment of Lush products.
It gave the products to 38 charities, including Food For All. A charity shop run by Food for All offered some to Karen Constantine and her agent Kaz Peet, who then collected them from London.
Lush products were for sale on the stall
Postings on Facebook by Karen Constantine and Kaz Peet then advertised the table sale taking place at a Ramsgate pub on February 18 - making it clear the money made would go towards the Labour party’s campaign costs.
In one, Cllr Constantine said: “Don't forget the Lush for Labour sale at Churchills! 2pm today. Absolute bargains to be had - there has never been a better time to buy a bath bomb!!!”
In another, Kaz Peet posted: “Many serious bargains to be had at the sale of Lush products - this afternoon at Churchills - all funds to the Labour party KCC campaign.”
Cllr Constantine told the KM Group she acted to rectify the situation as soon as she was aware of it but had not known that she could be in breach of electoral law.
"I am sorry that this happened and unreservedly apologise" - Karen Constantine
“We made a mistake. I was absolutely unaware of any issue that could cause problems. As soon as I found out, we arranged for the proceeds to go to charity," she said.
In a statement, she added: “I fully apologise for not knowing the election funding laws regarding charities.
"Once the law was made clear to me and I realised there was a mistake I took immediate steps to ensure monies raised - £415 - were donated to local charities. I am sorry that this happened and unreservedly apologise. This will not happen again."
David Goodfellow of The Kindness Offensive said: “There has clearly been a mistake here. We make it very clear that anything we donate is used for people in desperate, desperate need. I am a bit surprised as it is made abundantly clear that these should go to the end user.”
It is understood that party officials in Ramsgate are due to meet tonight to discuss the issue.
Food For All has been approached for a comment.
A row has broken out in the Thanet Labour Party ranks about the group’s parliamentary candidate nominations for the South of the constituency.
This morning (March 12) former Thanet Trade Union Council President and GMB (General, Municipal, Boilermakers and Allied Trade Union) member Stuart McCann resigned all his roles in protest at a regional level nomination for South Thanet candidate Karen Constantine.
In a statement Mr McCann, who remains a member of the Labour Party, said: “I am sad to say that as of today I have resigned from all my GMB posts and will also be resigning my membership of said union (Thanet TUC) over what I believe to be corruption at regional level in the nominations from GMB branches for PPC candidate Karen Constantine.
“My branch is listed as a nominating branch, however I can confirm that W09 Asda Dartford branch has not met to nominate Karen, in fact my branch secretary informs me he hasn’t even heard of her never mind nominating her.”
Candidates
The resignations centre on the contest for South Thanet’s parliamentary candidate for Labour. The candidate voted in will fight to take the constituency seat from Tory Craig Mackinlay in the scheduled May, 2022, General Election.
Hustings are currently underway and there are six candidates, including Cllr Constantine. The others are Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt, Raushan Ara, Helen Elizabeth Whitehead, Simon Warley and Mohammed Rodwan Abouharb.
The argument is that Cllr Constantine has already been ‘given’ the role as PPC due to regional GMB backing.
Cllr Constantine announced the backing on social media saying UNISON South East Labour Link Committee had voted to nominate her as well as five GMB branches.
GMB response
Frank Macklin, GMB Regional Organiser, responded to the accusation by Mr McCann, in a social media post. He said: “As the officer responsible for Stuart and his workplace, I was made aware of Stuart’s issues via social media.  At no time has Stuart contacted me personally about his issues surrounding the endorsement of Branches for parliamentary candidates
“If Stuart had contacted me I would have given him the same advice that I have now had to do on social media.
I have advised Stuart to raise this matter with the region and if he is unhappy with the response he receives he can then invoke the complaints procedure under the GMB rulebook
“Unfortunately Stuart has chosen not to do this but instead he has chosen to air his grievance on this forum, which is a shame. I have known Stuart for a number of years and I am truly sorry that as a longstanding trade unionist he does not trust his union enough to at least give them the chance to investigate his grievance properly.”
Mr Macklin added that: “Trade union democracy and procedures should be explored to find an amicable resolution.”
A GMB Southern Region spokesman added: “The GMB Southern region can confirm that Karen Constantine has been nominated by the GMB in the Labour Party selection process for Parliamentary candidate in South Thanet.
“Following our internal procedures this nomination has been endorsed by our regional committee. This nomination was submitted to the Labour Party in accordance with the Labour Party selection timetable.
“GMB has very recently become aware of comments made by an ex GMB member regarding this process. The regional political officer has asked for the substance of the complaints (if any) to be clarified to us in writing.”
TUC
The national Trades Union Congress (TUC) declined to comment.
Thanet TUC  is hosting the hustings for candidates at the Red Arrows Club, Newington Road, on March 21 at 7pm.
TTUC President Jon Flaig said: “This is not a matter for Thanet Trades Union Council. We are friends with both Stuart McCann and the GMB and hope they can resolve this matter.”
Cllr Constantine has been asked for comment.
Latest in Guido’s Candidate Watchseries: Labour’s newly-selected parliamentary candidate in South Thanet runs a pro-Corbyn ‘think tank’ which repeatedly defended Ken Livingstone and Jackie Walker during their anti-Semitism scandals and questioned the “Zionist sympathies” of John Bercow. Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt, a socialist historian who wrote a book praising Castro, was selected in Thanet earlier this month after joining the Labour Party when Corbyn became leader. She also runs a think tank called The Centre for Cultural Change. Whois records show Gordon-Nesbitt registered its website and there are no other staff listed at the organisation. Its Twitter account has repeatedly promoted Gordon-Nesbitt.

The Jewish Chronicle’s Labour’s NEC blocks parliamentary candidate over tweets about Hitler and Jewish MPheavily quotes from Guido Fawkes

This is why Israel is a Racist State – For Murdering an Asylum Seeker - 4 months – For Slapping a Soldier - 8 months

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If there was one case which demonstrates why Israel is a racist state and why Zionism is a racist endeavour, then this is it.  You don’t need to have a great understanding of Israel’s laws, policies or regulations. Nowhere in Israeli law is it written down that a lynch mob that brutally murders a defenceless asylum seeker should receive a community sentence or a derisory prison sentence but Israel’s ‘justice’ system doesn’t need to be told what to do.

It comes automatically for Israel’s courts to sentence someone according to their ethnic origin and to make excuses for attacks on Palestinians or non-Jews.  That is, after all, what a racist state is all about. When Palestinians are murdered they are just a statistic.  When a Jewish settler is killed, note I don’t say murdered, then we hear about their family, their children, how wonderful they were, their sense of humour etc.  Palestinians however do not have children or personalities.
Palestinian attacks on Israeli occupiers of their land are acts of ‘terrorism’ for which life sentences of 30 or more years are passed, but the brutal slaying of someone whose only crime was to have escaped repression in his home country of Eritrea, falsely believing Israel’s claims to be a democratic state, is dealt with as if it were a traffic misdemeanour.
However when a year ago, Ahed Tamimi, a 16 year old Palestinian girl, slapped a heavily armed soldier who entered the grounds of her house in Bi’ilin, moments after her 15 year old cousin had nearly had his head blown off by a plastic bullet, she was given 8 months in prison by a military court.
No doubt the Zionists will find some base propaganda reason for the disparity in sentences. Adam Langleben of the Jewish Labour Movement will no doubt treat my criticism as ‘anti-Semitism’ as will Jack Mendel of the Jewish News
After all it well understood in Israel, because the Rabbis have often given expression to it, that a Jewish and non-Jewish life are not the same.  In the wordsof Rabbi Dov Lior, the Chief Rabbi for Kiryat Arab and effectively the Jewish settlers, a Jewish fingernail is worth more than a thousand non-Jewish lives (for some rabbis it is a million to one ratio).  According toformer Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu "the life of one yeshiva boy is worth more than the lives of 1,000 Arabs.”
Momentum's racist head Jon Lansman is obsessed by a non-existent anti-semitism whilst ignoring a state based on lynch law and entrenched discrimination
In prioritising ‘anti-Semitism’ which barely exists over the very real situation of Apartheid violence in Israel Lansman is doing no more nor less than what the Labour Party has done historically, which is to give a free pass to the British Empire and colonialism.  The Labour Party’s opposition to Apartheid in South Africa was very recent and its opposition to colonialism was even more recent.  Lansman stands in a rich, racist tradition as do supporters of his in Momentum.
Lansman and the Jewish Labour Movement will dismiss all this as ‘anti-Semitism’ but we all know the smell of Apartheid. The veterans of the Apartheid struggle in South Africa certainly do.
Labour’s National Executive and the 150+ Councils up and down the country, to say nothing of the SNP government in Edinburgh are all accomplices in Israeli Apartheid and that should be our message for the coming year.
Tony Greenstein

Defendant admitted to abusing a helpless person as part of plea deal reached last month. Nine people assaulted in 2015 an Eritrean asylum seeker they mistook for a terrorist who opened fire at a bus station
An Israeli man convicted of assaulting an Eritrean asylum seeker mistaken for a terrorist in 2015 was sentenced on Tuesday to four months in prison.
Haftom Zarhum died following a beating at the central bus station in the southern city of Be'er Sheva, but an autopsy of his body showed that he died of gunshots and not of the assault by nine people.
Be'er Shvea District Court sentenced the attacker, Evyatar Damari, who admitted to abusing a helpless person as part of a plea agreement reached last month and approved by the court.
At a hearing in the case last month, Damari told the court that he regretted his actions and would not repeat them.







CCTV footage shows Eritrean national shot and beaten in Be'er Sheva, October 18, 2015.


On October 18, 2015, a gunman later identified as Muhannad al-Okbi, a Bedouin from the Negev town of Hura who is an Israeli citizen, opened fire at the Be'er Sheva central bus station, killing a soldier and wounding 10 other people. Damari and eight others attacked Zarhum, mistakenly thinking he was the terrorist.
Security camera footage showed Damari kicking Zarhum after he had been shot. The prosecution in the case had initially sought to have Damari tried for aggravated intentional infliction of personal injury, which if convicted, could have had him sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.


Haftom Zarhum, who was killed by a mob wrongly suspecting him of terrorism on Monday, Oct. 19, 2015.

Damari is in a poor emotional state and has deteriorated while his case has been pending. Two months ago, he threatened a member of the prosecution team in his case, prompting additional charges against him and an order that he remain in detention until that case is disposed of. 
His lawyer, Moshe Sorogovich, had asked the court to limit his client's sentence to just over a month at most and cited the case of another of Zarhum's assailants at the bus station, David Moyal, who in July was sentenced in a plea agreement to 100 days of community service. Moyal had hit Zarhum with a bench.
In addition to Damari and Moyal, two others were charged with assaulting Zarhum: A Golani brigade soldier by the name of Ya'akov Shamba and a prison service employee, Ronen Cohen.
The cases against Shamba and Cohen are still pending. At the trial of Shamba's case last month, two former Israeli army major generals testified that under the circumstances, in the midst of a terrorist attack, Shamba had acted in a level-headed manner as would have been expected of a combat soldier.

This is why Israel is a Racist State – For Murdering an Asylum Seeker - 4 months – For Slapping a Soldier - 8 months

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Israeli Who Attacked Asylum Seeker in 2015 Lynch Sentenced to Four Months in Prison


If there was one case which demonstrates why Israel is a racist state and why Zionism is a racist endeavour, then this is it.  You don’t need to have a great understanding of Israel’s laws, policies or regulations. Nowhere in Israeli law is it written down that a lynch mob that brutally murders a defenceless asylum seeker should receive a community sentence or a derisory prison sentence but Israel’s ‘justice’ system doesn’t need to be told what to do.
It comes automatically for Israel’s courts to sentence someone according to their ethnic origin and to make excuses for attacks on Palestinians or non-Jews.  That is, after all, what a racist state is all about. When Palestinians are murdered they are just a statistic.  When a Jewish settler is killed, note I don’t say murdered, then we hear about their family, their children, how wonderful they were, their sense of humour etc.  Palestinians however do not have children or personalities.
Palestinian attacks on Israeli occupiers of their land are acts of ‘terrorism’ for which life sentences of 30 or more years are passed, but the brutal slaying of someone whose only crime was to have escaped repression in his home country of Eritrea, falsely believing Israel’s claims to be a democratic state, is dealt with as if it were a traffic misdemeanour.
However when a year ago, Ahed Tamimi, a 16 year old Palestinian girl, slapped a heavily armed soldier who entered the grounds of her house in Bi’ilin, moments after her 15 year old cousin had nearly had his head blown off by a plastic bullet, she was given 8 months in prison by a military court.
No doubt the Zionists will find some base propaganda reason for the disparity in sentences. Adam Langleben of the Jewish Labour Movement will no doubt treat my criticism as ‘anti-Semitism’ as will Jack Mendel of the Jewish News.  
After all it well understood in Israel, because the Rabbis have often given expression to it, that a Jewish and non-Jewish life are not the same.  In thewords of Rabbi Dov Lior, the Chief Rabbi for Kiryat Arab and effectively the Jewish settlers, a Jewish fingernail is worth more than a thousand non-Jewish lives (for some rabbis it is a million to one ratio).  According to former Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu "the life of one yeshiva boy is worth more than the lives of 1,000 Arabs.”
Momentum's racist head Jon Lansman is obsessed by a non-existent anti-semitism whilst ignoring a state based on lynch law and entrenched discrimination
In prioritising ‘anti-Semitism’ which barely exists over the very real situation of Apartheid violence in Israel Lansman is doing no more nor less than what the Labour Party has done historically, which is to give a free pass to the British Empire and colonialism.  The Labour Party’s opposition to Apartheid in South Africa was very recent and its opposition to colonialism was even more recent.  Lansman stands in a rich, racist tradition as do supporters of his in Momentum.
Lansman and the Jewish Labour Movement will dismiss all this as ‘anti-Semitism’ but we all know the smell of Apartheid. The veterans of the Apartheid struggle in South Africa certainly do.
Labour’s National Executive and the 150+ Councils up and down the country, to say nothing of the SNP government in Edinburgh are all accomplices in Israeli Apartheid and that should be our message for the coming year.
Tony Greenstein 
Defendant admitted to abusing a helpless person as part of plea deal reached last month. Nine people assaulted in 2015 an Eritrean asylum seeker they mistook for a terrorist who opened fire at a bus station
An Israeli man convicted of assaulting an Eritrean asylum seeker mistaken for a terrorist in 2015 was sentenced on Tuesday to four months in prison.
Haftom Zarhum died following a beating at the central bus station in the southern city of Be'er Sheva, but an autopsy of his body showed that he died of gunshots and not of the assault by nine people.
Be'er Shvea District Court sentenced the attacker, Evyatar Damari, who admitted to abusing a helpless person as part of a plea agreement reached last month and approved by the court.
At a hearing in the case last month, Damari told the court that he regretted his actions and would not repeat them.
CCTV footage shows Eritrean national shot and beaten in Be'er Sheva, October 18, 2015.

On October 18, 2015, a gunman later identified as Muhannad al-Okbi, a Bedouin from the Negev town of Hura who is an Israeli citizen, opened fire at the Be'er Sheva central bus station, killing a soldier and wounding 10 other people. Damari and eight others attacked Zarhum, mistakenly thinking he was the terrorist.
Security camera footage showed Damari kicking Zarhum after he had been shot. The prosecution in the case had initially sought to have Damari tried for aggravated intentional infliction of personal injury, which if convicted, could have had him sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. 



Haftom Zarhum, who was killed by a mob wrongly suspecting him of terrorism on Monday, Oct. 19, 2015.

Damari is in a poor emotional state and has deteriorated while his case has been pending. Two months ago, he threatened a member of the prosecution team in his case, prompting additional charges against him and an order that he remain in detention until that case is disposed of. 
His lawyer, Moshe Sorogovich, had asked the court to limit his client's sentence to just over a month at most and cited the case of another of Zarhum's assailants at the bus station, David Moyal, who in July was sentenced in a plea agreement to 100 days of community service. Moyal had hit Zarhum with a bench.
In addition to Damari and Moyal, two others were charged with assaulting Zarhum: A Golani brigade soldier by the name of Ya'akov Shamba and a prison service employee, Ronen Cohen.
The cases against Shamba and Cohen are still pending. At the trial of Shamba's case last month, two former Israeli army major generals testified that under the circumstances, in the midst of a terrorist attack, Shamba had acted in a level-headed manner as would have been expected of a combat soldier.

BITS & PIECES: - Paul Jonson Victory – The Guardian’s Vendetta Against Julian Assange – Birthright Expels Dissident Teens – Israeli Conscientious Objector Hillel Garmi (19) has been released from military prison

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VICTORY AGAINST THE IHRA – Paul Jonson Reinstated


We should welcome the reinstatement of Paul Jonson.  It is a defeat for the Israeli Government funded Campaign Against Anti-Semitism. This McCarthyite organisation is dedicated to closing down debate and discussion on Palestine and Israel because they know that in any rational discussion, Israel’s racist behaviour and practices are indefensible.

This is also a massive defeat for the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance misdefinition of anti-Semitism which is designed to destroy free speech on Israel/Palestine. 150+ local authorities have adopted the IHRA and we have to make sure that it is NOT used to undermine free speech.

The Guardian’s Vendetta Against Julian Assange 
This is a very disturbing article on how the Guardian is deliberately inventing malicious and fake  stories designed to undermine Julian Assange and Wikileaks.  Patsies like Nick Cohen are doing the Intelligence Services dirty work. None of the allegations against Assange, that he is a sponsored dupe of the Russians stands up.

Birthright Kicks Dissident Jewish Teens off their tours
Birthright or Birthwrong as it is called is a programme sponsored by US billionaire and Trump supporter Sheldon Adelson.  It is designed to acquaint American and other Jewish youngsters with their so-called birthright.  In other words to get them to become the colonisers of the future.

It is based on the lie that Israel is the ‘real home’ of diaspora Jews. Fortunately American Jewish groups like Ifnotnowhave been hard at work informing those who go on these trips that these are propaganda tours and nothing more.  The result of their campaign is that the numbers going on these tours, which are nothing more than cheap bribes, is down by 50% this year and Birthright have now resorted to throwing off the trips those youngsters who challenge the right-wing Zionist narrative which they are fed.  Clearly Israel and its propagandists don’t do debate or discussion.  They want lapdogs who will accept whatever they are told.

Hillel Garmi(19) of Yodfat has been released from military prison
After 7 consecutive terms of imprisonment, Israeli teenager Hillel Garmi has finally been released from the obligation  to serve Israel’s occupation army. Although the experience of these Israeli kids is nothing as compared to Palestinian teenagers, some as young as 12, who are subject to beatings, sleep deprivation and outright torture, we should remember that the pressure on them to conform is massive.
Please support the Refuser Solidarity Network

Socialist Worker 20 December 2018

A council worker suspended from his job for criticising Israel has been reinstated after a campaign was launched to defend him.
Paul Jonson, an anti-social behaviour officer at Dudley council, was suspended from work earlier this year after calling Israel a racist endeavouron Facebook. He faced accusations that his post was antisemitic.
But now he has been told he has no case to answer, and that he has the right to campaign in solidarity with Palestinians. More than 800 people signed a statement defending Paul and the right to speak out against Israel.
It comes as the right to criticise Israel is coming under attack at councils across Britain.
Rob Ferguson, who helped to organise Paul’s defence campaign, told Socialist Worker the victory “is a very significant blow against the attempt to stifle and intimidate free speech on Israel and the Palestinian struggle.”
Supporters of Israel complained that Paul’s post breached the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism.
An example associated with the definition says it could be considered antisemitic to describe the existence of Israel as a “racist endeavour”.
This can make it harder to describe Israel’s systematic discrimination against Arabs as racist, or its attempts to expel Palestinians as ethnic cleansing.
Yet the state has racism at its core.
Some 850,000 Palestinians were forced out of Palestine when Israel was created in 1948. Its founders wanted to ensure the state had a Jewish ethnic majority.
Undermine
Today Israel refuses to allow Palestinians to return because it says their presence would undermine Israel’s existence as a Jewish state. Earlier this year the Israeli government passed a law that says only Jewish people have the right to self-determination there.
Yet supporters of Israel want to clamp down on those who call Israel—or its founding ideology Zionism, which justified Palestinians’ expulsion—racist.
The Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) demanded that Paul was sacked after his Facebook post, which also advertised a lobby outside Labour MP Ian Austin’s surgery in October.
The CAA considers anti-Zionism to be antisemitic, has described the Palestine Solidarity Campaign as being fuelled by antisemitism, and has organised protests where Labour was compared to the Nazi Party.
Austin is listed as one of the CAA’s honorary patrons. He had previously recognised Paul as a council employee and confronted him at a protest in July.
The CAA apparently complained to Dudley council about Paul after the lobby of Austin’s surgery in October.
In a local newspaper article that broke the news of Paul’s suspension, CAA director Stephen Silverman said Paul was “Utterly unfit to hold the office of Anti-Social Behaviour Officer for Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council.
“We are glad that the council has suspended him following our complaint.”
And in November a CAA spokesperson demanded to know why Paul “has still not yet been dismissed as a council employee.”
Campaign
Yet Paul was finally told by council bosses on Wednesday that the accusation of antisemitism “will not be recorded against him,” and that he has the right to campaign for Palestine outside of work.
The campaign to reinstate him won widespread support. Defending the right to criticise Israel was at the heart of it.
As well as collecting signatures in his defence, Paul spoke at meetings of the local trades council, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign meetings, the Stop the War coalition and the Quakers.
The Dudley trades council also released a statement in his support.
The campaign is an example of how to resist attempts to clamp down on solidarity with Palestine in other workplaces.
Labour-controlled Waltham Forest council adopted the IHRA definition last week and incorporated it into its code of conduct for employees.
Rob said, “We need to learn from Paul’s victory and mount opposition to the IHRA definition across the entire trade union movement.”

Guilty by innuendo: the Guardian campaign against Julian Assange that breaks all the rules

An analysis of articles published by the Guardian over several months reveals what appears to be a campaign to link WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with Russia and the Kremlin. But the paper has provided little or no evidence to back up the assertions. And amid recent revelations that Guardian journalists have associated with the psychological operations experts at the Integrity Initiative, we should perhaps be more sceptical than ever before.
Beginnings
This particular campaign by the Guardian appears to have begun with an article on 18 May 2018 from Luke Harding, Dan Collyns and Stephanie Kirchgaessner. It stated that “Assange has a longstanding relationship with RT”, the Russian TV broadcaster; and the headline was Assange’s guest list: the RT reporters, hackers and film-makers who visited embassy. Assange has had hundreds of people visit him at the embassy, but the article was keen to focus on the “senior staff members from RT, the Moscow TV network described by US intelligence agencies as the Kremlin’s ‘principal international propaganda outlet’”.
On the same day, the Guardian published another article, claiming that Assange had visits from “individuals linked to the Kremlin”, but which offered no evidence for this.
On 20 June, Harding and Kirchgaessner wrote a story focusing on “Assange’s alleged ties to Russia”. It claimed that “a longtime US lobbyist for the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska visited Julian Assange nine times at the Ecuadorian embassy”. Yet the article’s sub-heading stated: “It is unclear whether Adam Waldman’s 2017 visits had connection to Oleg Deripaska”.Waldman is a lawyer, and visited Assange in that capacity.
By 21 September, Harding, Collyns and Kirchgaessner wrote about “Assange’s ties to the Kremlin”, without even an “alleged”. Then, on 26 September, Collyns wrote again of Assange’s “ties to the Kremlin”, also offering no evidence.
All these articles followed an opinion piece on 29 March by James Ball, who rhetorically asked if Assange was “working with people at the top of Putin’s government”.
More recently
In the US, special counsel Robert Mueller is investigating alleged Russian interference in the 2016 US election and the release of thousands of files from the US Democratic Party. The Guardian’s coverage of this has also attempted to convey that Assange knowingly sourced information from Russian intelligence. On 16 November, Jon Swaine and Stephanie Kirchgaessner wrote that “the July indictment [by Mueller] said WikiLeaks urged the Russians to give them the first batch of stolen emails”. This implied that WikiLeaks was working with “the Russians”. Then, on 27 November, Harding and Collyns wrote that “WikiLeaks emailed the GRU [Russian military intelligence] via an intermediary seeking the DNC material”. Nick Cohen similarly wrote on 7 October that “GRU agents passed 50,000 documents from the Clinton campaign to WikiLeaks, which presented them as the product of its own investigations”. Again, this all inferred that WikiLeaks was in contact, or actually conniving, with Russian intelligence.
On 17 October, the Guardian carried a story from Associated Press, mentioning“Assange’s relationship with Russian authorities”. It offered no evidence for this “relationship”, other than claiming there was “a growing body of evidence suggesting he [Assange] received material directly from Russia’s military intelligence agency”. Precisely what “growing body of evidence” it was referring to was unclear.
On 22 October, a Guardian opinion piece by Kathleen Hall Jamieson asserted that “it is now clearer than ever” that “the Russian cyber-theft” of thousands of Democratic Party emails was “abetted by Assange’s WikiLeaks” – the suggestion again being that WikiLeaks had been conspiring with Russia. Not even Mueller has claimed that WikiLeaks was involved in any hack of the emails.
The Guardianalso tried to link the Mueller investigation to its RT story. On 6 December, Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Jon Swaine wrote:
The special counsel’s alleged focus on RT is important because the Russian news channel also has a close relationship with the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange… [RT journalist Afshin] Rattansi’s August 2016 interview of Assange was alleged to have been part of Russian propaganda efforts aimed at boosting Trump and denigrating Clinton”.
And on 20 November, the Guardian published a story stating that “Russian Twitter trolls… have begun to advocate on behalf of Julian Assange”.
Then there are the accusations of flat-out “fake” stories
All this is in addition to two recent Guardian stories that faced accusations of being fabricated.
On 27 November, the Guardian published a story on its front page – written by Harding, Collyns and Ecuadorian journalist and former anti-government activist) Fernando Villavicencio – claiming that former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort had held three secret talks with Assange in the Ecuadorian Embassy. (Note: As The Canaryreported, Villavicencio’s name appeared on the print version but was not present on the web version.)
But in an exclusive interview with The Canary, former consul and first secretary at the Ecuadorian Embassy Fidel Narváez refuted that story. And a variety of media outlets, including the Washington Post, subsequently ridiculed it. The article also sought to link Assange to Russia, stating:
A well-placed source has told the Guardian that Manafort went to see Assange around March 2016. Months later WikiLeaks released a stash of Democratic emails stolen by Russian intelligence officers.
An earlier Guardianstory – written by Harding, Kirchgaessner and Collyns and published on 21 September 2018 – was headlined Revealed: Russia’s secret plan to help Julian Assange escape from UK. The article claimed that it “raises new questions about Assange’s ties to the Kremlin”. Narváez also described that piece as a “fake story” in his interview with The Canary. And because the Guardian named him as the link to Russia in the article, the former diplomat has accused the Guardianof causing “irreparable damage to my reputation” and has demanded an apology.
Not good enough
Simply referring to ‘unnamed sources’ (as in the article about the supposed Manafort visits) is just not good enough in the age of fake news. For this reason, The Canary followed up the Guardianstory on Manafort by suggesting likely sources: namely private intelligence contractors organised by Ecuadorian intelligence (Senain), reportedly with some help from Villavicencio. The Guardian, meanwhile, has largely failed to defend its claims.
On the matter of sources, it’s important that journalists are careful with whom they associate. For example, Guardian commentator and BuzzFeedwriter James Ball spoke at an event promoted by the controversialIntegrity Initiative, which claims to specialise in ‘counter-disinformation‘. So did Guardian/Observer journalist Nick Cohen. And at least one other Guardian journalist spoke at that event too. Other mainstream media journalists, meanwhile, are also listed in Integrity’s ‘UK cluster’ activists document (seen by The Canary).
The question that we now need to ask is: if the Guardian story about the Manafort visits was untrue, then how many more claims against Assange in the articles quoted above were also untrue? If the paper had given hard evidence in the first place, we wouldn’t need to ask that question. But it didn’t. So we do.
The Canary contacted the Guardian for comment. But it hadn’t responded by the time of publication.
Whatever the Guardian‘s rationale behind its articles on Assange, they will undoubtedly help to create a hostile climate towards the WikiLeaks founder. And that in turn may enable Ecuador’s new government, at the behest of the US and the UK, to push him out of the embassy in London, leaving him to face potential or likely extradition to the US. 
A day after being kicked off a Birthright Israel trip, three young American Jews went to the exact place Birthright would never take them: the West Bank.
They are meeting with residents of a Bedouin village to ask them about living under Israel’s occupation of the territory, Emily Bloch said. Bloch, 29, along with Shira Tiffany, 29, and Benjamin Doernberg, 29, were dismissed from their Birthright trip Sunday.
We’re just figuring stuff out,” Bloch said. “We didn’t have any plans because we weren’t planning to get kicked off.”
Bloch, Doernberg and Tiffany are all members of IfNotNow, a left-wing group that is opposed to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank. Members of IfNotNow left their Birthright trips over the summer to visit locations in the West Bank. The group has recently passed out packets of information about Israel and its occupation of the West Bank to Birthright participants in airports ahead of their trips.
IfNotNow provided contact information for Bloch, Doernberg and Tiffany to the Forward. Doernberg and Tiffany did not respond to requests for comment from the Forward.
The trio were asked to leave their trip after what Bloch described as a “pretty heated discussion” occurred between her and an Israeli tour guide leading the trip after Bloch asked about the wall that separates Jerusalem from the West Bank. Bloch said she asked about the wall because she is an immigrants’ rights activist in Boston.
The trio were then taken to a Birthright office in Tel Aviv, where they were told they could either go immediately to the airport and fly home, or stay on their own dime, and forfeit their flight home and $250 security deposit.
“I felt like I hadn’t gotten what I’d come here for, so I decided to stay and learn more,” Bloch said.
Bloch said that Birthright staff did not specifically tell them why they were being kicked off the trip, only saying that they had broken the program’s “rules and regulations.” Bloch said she took that to mean that they had infringed recently added language in Birthright’s code of conduct, which includes a ban on “hijack[ing] discussion.”
They’re drawing the line, that if you want to ask questions about the occupation, you’re not welcome anymore,” Bloch said.
In a statement, Birthright called the trio “activists,” and said that the organization has a policy of asking participants to leave when they “disrupt the experience of other participants.”
Birthright Israel always welcomes participants’ views and questions, which are essential to the success of the experience, so long as they are shared in a constructive and respectful manner,” the statement read. “We will not condone any coordinated plans to ruin the experience for others in order to promote a specific agenda.”
Birthright did not immediately respond to further questions asked by the Forward.
After being asked to leave, Bloch said that she, Doernberg and Tiffany stayed at a friend’s home in Tel Aviv, before going to the West Bank Monday morning. They are visiting Umm al-Khair, a Bedouin village near Hebron, which has seen tent homes demolished by the Israeli government.
Bloch says that the trio are self-funded, and may start a GoFundMe campaign to raise money for their travel expenses and flights back to the U.S., as several Birthright participants who were kicked off their trips in August did.
Bloch said that tonight they are staying with an acquaintance in Jerusalem.
“A lot of people have reached out over social media and offered us places to stay, and connections,” she said.
Tomorrow they are planning to go see a main checkpoint between Israel and the West Bank.
“The checkpoint is the gate of the border wall,” Bloch said. “That’s where I think you can often see a lot of what it’s like to live separated, on either side of the wall.”
Bloch said she was disappointed to be kicked off the trip. She said she had previously tried to go on a Birthright trip, in 2014, before it was cancelled because of Israel’s war with Gaza that year, and this is her first time in Israel.
“I wanted to see Israel with my own eyes,” she said. Birthright “is the opportunity presented to so many people in our generation as the way to do that.”
But, she said, they’re not helping American Jews have a “complex and nuanced relationship with Israel.”
“They want unwavering support for their political agenda,” she said.
Ari Feldman is a staff writer at the Forward. Contact him at feldman@forward.com or follow him on Twitter @aefeldman
Israeli conscientious objector Hilel Garmi. (Yoav Eshel)

Conscientious objector freed after 107 days in military prison

Hillel Garmi, who was inspired by one of the leaders of Gaza’s ‘Great Return March,’ served seven prison terms for his refusal to join the Israeli army.
By +972 Magazine Staff 24th December 2018



The Israeli army discharged conscientious objector Hillel Garmi on Sunday after imprisoning him for a total of 107 days. Israel has compulsory military service, and Garmi refused to be drafted due to his opposition to the occupation.
Garmi, 19, from Yodfat in northern Israel, is one of the initiators and signatories of the “Shministim letter,” published earlier this year by dozens of Israeli high school seniors who declared their refusal to serve in the Israeli army. He served seven successive prison terms since July.
Israel's real heroes - Tamar Alon and Ze'evi who both served repeated terms of imprisonment rather than serve in Israel's army
Upon leaving military prison on Monday, Garmi said:
“The five months I spent in prison were dedicated to the struggle against the occupation and the siege, for the sake of the five million Palestinians who actually live under the rule of the Israeli government, but do not enjoy the right to elect it.”
“In all the days and nights I spent in prison, I tried to keep in mind the Palestinians suffering from the ongoing humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, which includes a shortage of drinking water, food, and medicine, or Palestinians under occupation in the West Bank, which includes land grabs, arrests and random searches,” Garmi said.
“There were people who told me that I was shirking my responsibility [to ensure] the security of the citizens of Israel, but I think that it is precisely with this act that I take responsibility for the safety of all the people affected by what I do — both Israelis and Palestinians.”
In his declaration of refusal, Garmi explained that he was inspired by Ahmed Abu Artema, one of the lead organizers of the ‘Great Return March’ protests on the Gaza border. “I was impressed to find people who prefer to deal with the situation between the Jordan River and the sea without resorting to violence,” wrote Garmi. “I, too, believe in civil disobedience – in applying nonviolent pressure to highlight a government’s lack of morality.”
Abu Artema responded to Garmi in a letter published on +972, in which he praised the conscientious objector’s decision for helping to
“end this dark period inflicted on Palestinians, and at the same time mitigate the fears of younger Israeli generations who were born into a complicated situation and a turbulent geographical area deprived of security and peace.”
Earlier this month, an IDF disciplinary body sentenced Israeli conscientious objector Adam Rafaelov to an additional 10 days in military prison for his refusal to be conscripted. Rafaelov, 18, from Kiryat Motzkin in northern Israel, has been sent to prison seven times since July when he was first sentenced. He has served a total of 87 days behind bars. Like Garmi, Rafaelov is being accompanied by “Mesarvot,” a political Israeli network that provides supports for conscientious objectors.
Press Release, 25.12.2018 -

Following 107 days of incarceration, Hillel Garmi (18) of Yodfat has been released from military prison
On Xmas Eve, the IDF’s Conscience Committee decided to exempt conscientious objector Hillel Garmi, of Yodfat in northern Israel from military service. Garmi, one of the initiators of the High School Students’ Letter, was released following seven sentences since his first appearance at the Induction Center this July, when he first declared his refusal to serve.
Haggai Matar - (right) refused to serve in army
Upon his release Garmi said,
The five months I have spent in prison have been dedicated to the struggle against occupation and siege, to the five million Palestinians who effectively live under the rule of the Israeli government but do not have the chance to elect it.”
Garmi added:
Throughout the nights and days I spent in prison, I tried to imagine the suffering of the Palestinians undergoing the ongoing siege of the Gaza Strip, including the lack of drinking water, food and medicine, or that of the Palestinians under occupation in the West Bank, who suffer the theft of their lands, road blockages, arbitrary search and arrest. Some people have told me that my refusal amounts to evading responsibility for the security of the citizens of Israel, but I believe rather that this act is one of taking responsibility for all those affected by my deeds, Israelis and Palestinians, by not joining in the cycle of violence and not hurting any of them, and by convincing others to act likewise.
Upon entering prison Garmi said that his decision to refuse was inspired by the actions of Ahmed Abu-Ratima, the Gazan organizer of the Great Return March, and that Abu-Ratima had written him in support of his act.
Conscientious object Adam Rafaelov (18) of Kiryat Motzkin is currently in prison, having already served 97 days for refusing to join the army.
Garmi and Rafaelov are accompanied by Mesarvot– A political refusing network that writes letters and initiates refusing groups from the last few years to joint action. The network supports conscientious objectors that choose to not enlist in the occupation army, while knowingly acknowledging the gender aspects that the compulsory enlistment brings to Israeli society. The network works in cooperation and assistant from Yesh Gvul Movement.
Dror Mizrahi
Media | Strategy | PR
Cell: +972-50-7248688
TEL AVIV-JAFFA, ISRAEL

On the day that Amos Oz died we should remember that it is Gideon Levy who is one of Israel’s few heroes

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We should no more feel sympathy for dead Jewish settlers than we would have done for German settlers in the Warthegau



Today Amos Oz, novelist and doyen of the Zionist left died aged 79. Israeli newspapers, regardless of political affiliation, are full of sorrow and eulogies.
The President of Israel, Reuven Rivlin said that the news of Oz’s death “bring us sadness” calling him “a literary giant.” Culture Minster Miri Regev, who was accusedof fascism by fellow Minister, Gila Gamliel, and who has apologised for likening African migrants in Israeltohuman beings and who called asylum seekers ‘cancer’ before apologising because of the offence it might cause to cancer patients, by comparing them to refugees, said of Oz that your works, which you’ve left in our hearts, will resonate all over the world.”
Gideon Levy is Israel's true hero
All the world’s media agreed with the New York Times in describing Oz as a ‘peace advocate’. However it is untrue. Oz was a left-Zionist supporter of Apartheid.  His support for a 2 State Solution was based firmly on the idea that Arabs and Jews could not live together in one state. He was an advocate of segregation. It was because he knew that Netanyahu’s plans for a one state Greater Israel, in which the majority of Palestinians would have no rights, would result in Israel being labelled an apartheid state, that he supported two states. It was for this that he was seen as a peace advocate. Oz realised that tarnishing Israel with the Apartheid label would spell its  eventual demise.
Not once has David Friedman tweeted about the 'vile' shooting of Palestinian demonstrators or indeed any Palestinians - only settler lives concern this vile racist
It is not Oz, who never once queried or questioned what a Jewish state meant for those who were not Jewish who merits this praise. Oz never lifted a finger against Israeli racism or settler colonialism.  He preached segregation and separation. It is Gideon Levy and Amira Hass and the activists in groups like Youth Against the Settlements who deserve our support. Amos Oz was self-indulgent, hedonistic, sexist and racist, not least towards Mizrahi Israeli Jews. Oz’s light only shone because of the darkness into which Israel has sunk.
What is certain is that Oz could not have written a searing criticism such as Gideon Levy’s below in which he states outright that he does not have any sympathy with dead Jewish settlers in the West Bank.  Nor should we. 
When Nazi Germany captured Poland Himmler immediately set about a project of settling the Gau of Wartheland with German settlers and evicting the Polish peasants and Jews.  With Nazi Germany's defeat these settlers were evicted. I'm not aware that there is a great deal of sympathy for what became of them.
Site of shooting of settler near settlement of Ofra
Razan al-Najjar - 21 year old medic gunned down by Israeli snipers while tending the wounded - there is no backstory in Israel to this young girl - she has no siblings, parents and nor are there any tears
It is noticeable that when Palestinians die under Israeli bullets, there are no pen portraits of who they are, their children and life. as happens when an Israeli settler is killed.  When Razan al-Najar was struck down in a hail of bullets there were no eulogies to this 21 year old para medic living in Gaza, who had been murdered whilst tending injured demonstrators. Israeli Ministers and the President had nothing to say about a young life cruelly taken away.  She had no family as far as the Zionists were concerned.  Gaza is Hamas and therefore every barbarity is justified.
In the thousands of words of eulogy and in the many obituaries, it is doubtful whether there will many criticisms of Oz. Israeli academic Gabriel Piterberg captured Oz best when he called him a ‘mobilized propagandist’[The Returns of Zionism, p.232 et. seq]. He became one of the chief editors of Siah lohamim (soldier’s talk) which was a recording of the recollections and experiences of 140 Kibbutz officers of the 1967 War of Expansion.  It was ‘one of the most effective propaganda tools in Israeli history.’  It created
Mourning a baby
‘the image of the handsome, dilemma-ridden and existentially soul-searching Israeli soldier, the horrific oxymoron of ‘the purity of arms’ and the unfounded notion of an exalted Jewish morality.’
The text’s editors, Oz and Avraham Shapira, of Kibbutz Jezreel, did two things: one was the omission of entire conversations as if they had not occurred at all; the other was the manipulation of and tampering with statements and conversations that were included.
Conversations with the Sarig family in Kibbutz Beit Hashita were omitted altogether. Beit Hashita belonged to the Kibbutz Hameuchad federation, which was an important part of the Greater Israel movement (Gush Emmunim) that was founded in 1969. Nahum Sarig was a commander of the Negev Brigade which fought in 1948. His son Ran fought in 1967. Ran Sarig explained that:
Amos Oz balanced his criticism of Netanyahu with criticism of those who blamed Israel - it was also the fault of the Palestinians
The greatest thing... was that we were going to make the country complete... This feeling I had was... of, as it were, the completion of father’s deeds 20 years ago. At that time there was constant talk about the injustice [sic] – what Ben Gurion called ‘a lasting regret’ [i.e. halting at what became the 1949 Armistice borders rather than conquering the whole of western Palestine]. I felt regarding this matter, that we were completing the assignment that actually should have been accomplished then [in 1948].’
Shapira admitted 30 years later that he had decided to omit the exchange because of his shock at ‘the manifestation of messianism’.  Since Shapira published it in his journal Shdemot it would seem that the real reason was to preserve the ‘shooting and crying’ image of the Israeli soldier and the propaganda value of the collection.  Piterberg notes that:
‘What is striking here is the extent to which the national religious settlement movement perceived itself as continuing the trail blazed by the labour settlement movement.
One editorial method was to distort direct descriptions of events. E.g.

‘What perhaps added to this terrible feeling was my impression of the enormous gaietyof the soldiers who [were lying in ambush and who]as it happened killed this fallah [peasant in Arabic]

The words in bold were omitted in the published version and the words in square brackets were inserted despite having not been spoken.
Another method was to tamper with testimonies of cleansing, in which outright falsehoods were inserted at the editorial stage and in which ‘expulsion’ was replaced with ‘evacuation’. Oz was well aware of the thorough cleansing of the villages in the Latrun area.
Conversations with soldiers of Merkaz Harav yeshivah were also omitted because their messianism was at odds with the philosophical, reflective Zionist soldier.  Describing how he felt ‘downcast and mourning’ after his encounter at Merkaz Harav, what ‘really hurt was the utter apathy towards our moral crisis.’  And this sums up ‘left’ Zionism. Its concerns are not what happened to the Palestinians but with their own feelings of discomfiture.  That was Oz.
Ariel Hirschfield described Oz’s Black Box as ‘seething with repressed, racist and domineering hatred for the Sephardi, together with admiration of his might and great fear for him.’ Piterberg asked ‘how anyone can see dissent in this literature, aesthetically and/or politically is puzzling.’ 
The original article
Yediot Aharanot, 3 June 2005

Shortly after the war the writer Amoz Oz went with Avraham Shapira from Kibbutz Yizrael to talk to kibbutzniks who participated in the Six Day War. Altogether the two spoke to 140 officers over the course of hundreds of hours. The result was published in the book Siah Lohamim[Soldiers Speak] published in English as ‘The Seventh Day’. The book, which had not been intended for commercial distribution, became a best-seller. A hundred thousand copies were sold. The poet Haim Gouri wrote that the book could shape the soul and the consciousness of an entire generation. The book was supposed to present a portrait of humane and high-souled soldiers. Segev quotes in his book a study that was written by Dr. Alon Gan, himself a kibbutz member, who found that the book was censored and significant parts of it were deliberately distorted, in order to preserve the image that was portrayed in it.

For example, the authors of the book quoted one of the soldiers saying: ‘It was a kind of release [hitparqut] a really abnormal release.’ In reality the soldier said the following words: A release that bordered on cruelty. I know that one company commander  some old guy forty years old raised his hands  then he fired a burst into his belly  it was a kind of release grenades into the house just to burn houses some kind of release like that. Also the words ‘expulsion’ and ‘evacuation’ were omitted. One of the speakers who talked about the occupation of Gaza was quoted in the book thusly: ‘There was no law’; in reality he said: ‘We had to do the most drastic actions  blowing up houses and searching houses  it was a situation in which human life was of no account. You could kill. There was no law.’

Another speaker related that he and his friends had been given an order to kill everyone who came from the east bank of the Jordan. The authors of the book substituted the verb ‘to kill’ with the words ‘to prevent crossing.’ One of the members of Kibbutz Yifat related an argument that broke out among his friends over whether they should execute a wounded Syrian soldier whom they came across. Suddenly one of them broke off the argument, put a rifle to the wounded man’s head and killed him. In the book that moment was described thus: ‘One suggested executing him. Of course we didn’t allow it.’ Another soldier asked himself during the war how he would be able to kill people, and answered, ‘like I kill flies.’ Those words were censored. Some of the speakers described serious war crimes that were omitted from the book. One of the speakers described the treatment of civilians as follows: ‘I felt like a Gestapo man.’
It is astonishing how much this thing is edited, censored and inauthentic, opines Tom Segev. ‘A convergence of interests was created here between a society that needed an image like this and the kibbutz that needed an image like this. They invented this thing.’

Amos Oz

In June 2005, Yediot Ahronot reported (see this article) that Tom Segevwas claiming that Oz, in this 1970 book, censored and faked testimonies of Israeli soldiers about war crimes in the 1967 war -- for example, a soldier told Oz that they got an order to kill every person trying to return to the West Bank from the East Bank of the Jordan but Oz just said that they were told to prevent people crossing the Jordan.


 Ralph Gideon-Yaakov Spiro is an Israeli journalist, left-wingactivist and a survivor of the November 1938 Kristallnachtpogrom in Berlin. He is a campaigner for human rights, prominently involved in public acts against the distribution of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East. He was sacked as a civil servant in the Education Ministry for opposing the Lebanon War.  By way of contrast Amos Oz supported all Israel’s wars yet, for some reason, he is known as a peace activist.
Letter sent to the Nobel Literature Prize Committee
Honorable Committee members
Since the writer Amos Oz is mentioned as a candidate for the 2009 Nobel Literature Prize, I find it important to inform you that Amos Oz supported the 2 latest wars initiated by Israel: The Gaza war (December 2008 January 2009) in which war crimes were committed (as reported just recently in the UN Goldstone report) and the Second Lebanon war (July August 2006 - see Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch reports).
Awarding the prize to Amos Oz, especially so close to those events, contradicts the spirit of Alfred Nobel, and is a slap on the face to Israeli human rights activists and war resisters, as well as being an insult to the Palestinian victims, including hundreds children.
Respectfully,
Gideon Spiro
Tel Aviv

Beneath the veil of sanctimonious and hypocritical unity, and the media’s fake show of national grief to advance its own commercial goals, the truth must be told: Their tragedy isn’t ours
Gideon Levy Dec 16, 2018 2:32 AM

I do not sympathize with people who profiteer from tragedy. I have no sympathy for robbers. I have no sympathy for the settlers. I have no sympathy for the settlers not even when they are hit by tragedy. A pregnant woman was wounded and her newborn baby died of its wounds – what can be worse than that? Driving on their roads is frightening, the violent opposition to their presence is growing – and I feel no sympathy for their tragedy, nor do I feel any compassion or solidarity.
They are to blame, not I, for the fact that I cannot feel the most humane sense of solidarity and pain. It’s not just that they’re settlers, violators of international law and universal justice; it’s not just because of the violence of some of them and the settling of all of them – it’s also the blackmail with which they respond to every tragedy, which prevents me from grieving with them. But beneath the veil of sanctimonious and hypocritical unity, and the media’s fake show of national grief to advance its own commercial goals, the truth must be told: Their tragedy isn’t ours.
Their tragedy isn’t ours because they’ve brought the tragedy upon themselves and the entire country. It’s true that the main blame goes to the governments that gave into them, either eagerly or out of weakness, but the settlers cannot be absolved of blame, either. The extorter – and not just those who have given into extortion – is also to blame. But they are there, generations born on stolen land, children raised in an apartheid existence and trained to think it is biblical justice, and with government support. Perhaps we cannot blame those who are sitting on land usurped by their parents. But their tragedy is not ours because they exploit every tragedy to advance their aims in the most cynical of ways.
When a baby dies they install trailer homes, when soldiers are killed defending them – they do not seek forgiveness from the families of these soldiers, despite their blame for the lives that have been cut short – they only present demands so as to whitewash their crimes. And with these demands the appetite for revenge grows: to imprison even more of their neighbors, to destroy their homes, to kill, to arrest, block roads and exact more revenge. And if that, too, is not enough, their own wild militias raid the Palestinians, throw stones at their vehicles, set their fields on fire and wreak terror on their villages. They are not satisfied with the collective punishment imposed by the army and the Shin Bet security service, exercised with cruelty and sometimes criminality. The settlers’ lust for revenge is never satisfied. How is it possible to identify with the grief of people who behave like that?
It’s impossible to identify with their bereavement, because Israel has decided to avoid looking at all that is done there in the land of Judea. When you are capable of being indifferent to the execution of a psychologically impaired young man by soldiers, you can also be indifferent to the shooting of a pregnant woman by Palestinians. When you ignore the goings on at the Tulkarm refugee camp, you can also ignore what takes place at the Givat Assaf junction. It’s moral blindness to everything. Yesha isn’t here, that’s the price being paid for the lack of interest in what is going on in the territories and for ignoring the occupation, under whose sponsorship the settlements are based. Giant budgets are poured out there without any public opposition – so there is also indifference to the fate of the settlers and their tragedies. The piece of land they have taken over doesn’t interest most Israelis living in the land of denial, and that’s the price.
We have no reason to apologize for the lack of interest and identification. The settlers have brought it on themselves. Those who have never shown any interest in the suffering of their Palestinian neighbors, which they have caused, those who preach all the time that the iron fist must always be tightened, to torture them even more – don’t deserve to be identified with, not even in the hour of their grief. I take no joy in their suffering but I have no sympathy for their pain. The real pain is borne by their victims, those who moan submissively and those who take their fate in their hands and try to resist a violent reality violently and sometimes also murderously. The Palestinians are the victims deserving of pity and solidarity.

The Disabled Palestinian Slowly Walked Away. Then, Israeli Troops Shot Him in the Back of the Head

Mohammad Khabali started to retrace his steps. Security camera footage shows three soldiers moving ahead, to within 80 meters of him. Suddenly two shots are heard. The mentally disabled young man collapses, dead
Mohammed Khabali
Here’s the stick. The bereaved brother removes the black plastic that’s wrapped around it reverently, as if it’s a holy relic. It’s a broomstick, stained with his brother’s blood. It’s the stick he was carrying under his arm as he tried to move away from Israel Defense Forces soldiers approaching him on Jaffa Road in downtown Tul Karm, a street of restaurants and cafés. He was shot from a distance of about 80 meters; the bullet slammed into his head from behind.
How can it be claimed that he endangered anyone from that far away?
Truly understand Israel and the Middle East, from the most trustworthy news source in the region >>
The street was relatively quiet. A small number of young people winding up the night at the coffee houses – and about 30 soldiers opposite them. The security camera at one of the restaurants shows 2:24 A.M. From the video provided by that camera and three others along the street, whose footage was obtained by B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights organization, we see no stone throwing, no large groups milling around. What is seen are three soldiers moving forward, ahead of the rest of their unit. One shot is heard from a distance, and another; two soldiers apparently fired simultaneously. The person seen carrying a stick and walking on the other side of the street, away from the approaching soldiers, falls to the ground, face down. For a second he tries to lift his head – before dying. Another young man is hit in the leg. The soldiers leave in a hurry.
The B'Tselem footage of the incident.
End of operation. End of the short life of Mohammad Khabali, whom everyone here called “Za’atar” affectionately (after the popular seasoning made of wild hyssop). Mentally challenged from birth, he never hurt a soul and helped local café owners clean up at night in return for a free smoke on the narghile; occasionally he would beg for a handout from a passerby. It’s doubtful that the soldier who shot him knew whom he was shooting; it’s even more doubtful that would have cared. He killed Za’atar for no apparent reason and inflicted another disaster on his already unfortunate family, which lives not far away from town in the Tul Karm refugee camp, one of the West Bank’s poorest.
An intimidating pile of garbage greets visitors at the gates of the refugee camp; workers wearing United Nations shirts are loading refuse onto a garbage truck. The Tul Karm camp is the larger of two refugee camps that abut the city on its eastern side. (The other is Nur a-Shams.) Graffiti of a prisoner in an Israel Prisons Service uniform is painted on a wall, a young man in a wheelchair sits in front of one of the houses, the narrow alleys are also littered with garbage.
Neglect is pervasive here. Garbage swirls even around the shattered monument commemorating the 157 inhabitants of the camp who were killed until between 1987 and 2003, during the two intifadas. The monument was erected at the site where at least 10 young people were killed in the second intifada by IDF snipers who positioned themselves on the roof of a high building nearby. A new, more up-to-date monument is planned, we’re told by the camp’s director of services, Faisal Salami. A cluttered store selling scraps, second-hand items and old trinkets is bursting at the seams. It seems like all of Israel’s schmattes have ended up here.
Entering one of the houses, we climb to the second floor: It is the home of the Khabali family and of the camp’s most recent martyr. Exposed electrical cables adorn the walls, on the sink is an old car mirror – the apartment’s only mirror. We will soon be joined by the bereaved father, Khossam Khabali, his legs incapacitated from a childhood disease; he ascends the stairs with great difficulty, leaning on a cane, both legs disfigured. He’s 54 years old and trying in every way possible to provide a living for his nine children, two of whom – the dead son and one of his brothers – have suffered from mental impairment. Khabali works as a guard in the Tul Karm Municipality, hauls fruits and vegetables to the market on a mule-drawn cart, and is an occasional undertaker in the local cemetery. No, he replies, he did not dig his son’s grave.
His face is a study in grief and suffering. Mona, his wife, a heavyset woman of 50, speaks about her dead son in a whisper. The shock is still palpable here.
Last Monday, they relate, Mohammad was at home and in good spirits. He helped his father fix the mule cart. For supper he had makluba, a chicken and rice dish that his mother prepared, and at about 7:30 he left for the cafes on Jaffa Road, as he did every evening. Before leaving, he asked his mother if she needed anything.
Mohammed Khabali's parents (center) at the Tul Karm refugee camp, December 11, 2018.Alex Levac

He would usually get home around 1 A.M., after straightening and cleaning up the cafes. This time he didn’t return. At about 3 A.M., distraught young men arrived at the house and woke up the eldest son, Ala, who roused his parents: Mohammad had been killed. Khossam asked one of his daughters to check on the camp’s Facebook page whether it was a mistake, and discovered, to his horror, that the victim was indeed his Mohammad. In a daze, he hurried to the Thabet Thabet Hospital in the city, where he saw his son’s body, a hole in the back of his neck. Death had claimed him at age 22.
Mohammad attended school until sixth grade, but didn’t understand a thing, his parents say. Already at the age of 3 they noticed he wasn’t developing like the other children and was mentally disabled. He was their second son. Their next child, Ibrahim, who’s now 18, suffers from the same affliction. Ten days before Mohammad was killed, he and Khossam returned from Amman, where they paid condolences on the death of Khossam’s brother. It was Mohammad’s first – and last – trip out of the country.
According to his Aunt Latifa, who came to Tul Karm for the funeral, he was thrilled to be in Amman. Video clips show him dancing and singing at the home of relatives in the Jordanian capital, a day before returning to the refugee camp. There’s also a selfie that Mohammad took. He helped his uncles harvest and sort olives – that too was captured on video and in other photos.
In the last picture taken of him, Mohammad can be seen holding a small Koran and seemingly reading from it, though he didn’t know how to read or write. That shot was taken in one of the Jaffa Road coffee houses, about an hour and a half before soldiers killed him. Some clips show him speaking, but his speech is slurred, unclear. Allah have mercy, his aunt sighs.
Mohammed Khabali's funeral, Tul Karm refugee camp, December 4, 2018.AFP

After father and son returned from Amman, discussions began about the wedding of the eldest, Ala. Mohammad told his parents that he’d like to be the next to get married. Mohammad was never stopped by soldiers, never got into a quarrel with anyone, and appears to have been much loved in the camp and in the city, partly because of his impairment. The narghile was his way of relaxing, his escape.
After leaving the family with a heavy heart, we drive to the scene of the killing. Tul Karm’s main street for entertainment begins at Kadoorie Technical University, at the city’s western edge, and ascends to the town center: stores, computer game arcades, restaurants, cafés – one of which is for women only, its windows blacked out. Some of the places are stylishly designed. There’s Café Bianco, Café Al-Shelal and opposite them a wall painting of Mahmoud Darwish, the Palestinian national poet.
On the night between Monday and Tuesday of this past week, some 200 soldiers invaded the city, according to residents’ estimates, and scattered to a number of sites. Routine. A group of about 30 soldiers raided two houses just off Jaffa Road and then proceeded to the main street. They didn’t detain anyone. The coffee houses were already mostly closed, the A-Sabah hummus restaurant was about to open to welcome workers who set out to their jobs in Israel in the middle of the night.
The soldiers gathered next to the Al-Fadilia boys school, the city’s veteran educational institution, at one end of the street. The young people who emerged from the cafés exchanged curses with the soldiers, some threw stones at them from a distance. According to Abd al-Karim Sa’adi, a field investigator for B’Tselem, who carefully collected evidence immediately after the killing as though he were from a police forensic unit, including footage from all the security cameras on the street, the stones landed halfway between the young people and the soldiers. No one was hit.
A memorial for those killed at the Tul Karm refugee camp. Alex Levac

In Sa’adi’s estimation, no more than 15 or 20 young Palestinians confronted the soldiers, from some distance. One of them told Mohammad, “Za’atar, you should get out of here.” As the video from one camera shows, Za’atar turns around and starts to walk away from the soldiers. Not running but slowly walking. Then he’s shot in the head, from behind.
In a statement to Haaretz this week, the IDF Spokespersons Unit said, “Last week a Military Police investigation was launched. At this stage it can be noted that during operational activity of Israeli soldiers in Tul Karm, a violent riot erupted and dozens of Palestinians hurled rocks towards the fighters. In response, the soldiers used riot-dispersal means and live fire. It was reported that one Palestinian was killed and another injured [in this incident]. When the army finishes its investigation, the conclusions of the probe will be examined by the military prosecutor. The incident is also being probed at the command level.” 
B’Tselem has released the following statement: “Video footage from four security cameras installed on three separate buildings along the street shows that the area was perfectly quiet and that there were no clashes there with soldiers… The video footage and the eyewitness accounts collected by B’Tselem from people who were near Khabali show no absolutely no of sign of any ‘disturbance,’ stone-throwing or use of crowd control measures. Quite the contrary: the soldiers are seen walking unhurriedly, the Palestinians are seen talking amongst themselves, and then the soldiers fatally shoot Khabali in the head from a considerable distance. The lethal shooting was not preceded by a warning, was not justified and constitutes a violation of the law.”
A few faded bloodstains are still visible on the asphalt where Khabali’s body was dragged away after the shooting. He died on the spot, his head bleeding profusely, Sa’adi says.
Fine Italian espresso is served in the café opposite, and two colorful photographs are hanging on the wall. One is of a large drone with the Israel Air Force symbol on its tail, the other of an IAF Fouga early fighter plane in the skies above Israel. The proprietor says he erased the squadron numbers before hanging them. He bought the two pictures in Tul Karm’s flea market.
Mohammad Khabali, aka “Za’atar,” is now buried not far from here, in the martyrs section of the cemetery.

Banning Gilad Atzmon from playing a jazz concert in Islington has nothing to do with opposing anti-Semitism

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I oppose the ban on Atzmon not only because it's an attack on artistic freedom but because it's aimed at upholding not opposing racism


Gilad Atzmon has been banned by Islington Council from playing a jazz concert with the Blockheads under the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. Yet the IHRA policy itself is both racist and anti-semitic.  Ipso facto any ban enacted under it can only be aimed at supporting and entrenching racism and anti-semitism.

I recently wrote about the disparity in sentencing between Israeli Jews  and non-Jews in Israel. An Israeli, Evyatar Damari, who was part of a lynch mob that killed an Eritrean refugee, Haftom Zarhum, in Beer Sheba's bus station received 4 months imprisonment. That was the most severe sentence. Most of the lynch mob either received community service or in the case of members of the prison service were simply not prosecuted.


I contrasted this with 16 year old Ahed Tamimi whose cousin, half an hour before, had been shot in the head by a plastic bullet. Ahed slapped a soldier who invaded the grounds of her house.  She received an 8 months sentence and the Education Minister, Naftali Bennett suggested she should spend the rest of her days in prison. 
Yet if I call this racist then according to the IHRA misdefinition of anti-semitism, which states that calling Israel a 'racist endeavour' is itself anti-semitic, it is me who is anti-Semitic. Not only is the IHRA racist but in suggesting that Jews support Israeli racism it is also anti-Semitic. Yet this is the policy that is being used to ban Gilad Atzmon.  Clearly he isn't being banned on anti-racist grounds.


The Board of Deputies which opposes Atzmon's antisemitism is wholeheartedly in favour of Israeli snipers mowing down unarmed Palestinians - it sees no contradiction
Noone has been a greater critic of Atzmon over the years than me. Nearly 12 years ago I wrote one of the first critiques of Atzmon’s anti-Semitism, The Seamy Side of Solidarity in the Guardian’s Comment is Free, at a time when the Guardian wasn’t afraid of debating issues such as Zionism. I also organised a picketof Jews Against Zionism in June 2005 when Atzmon came to talk on Otto Weiningerat the SWP’s Bookmarks.
Salvador Dalli was an admirer of Zionism, which he saw as a kindred spirit
My blog was initially set up in order to combat the pernicious influence of Atzmon in the Palestine solidarity movement. I have written dozens of articles analysing why Atzmon’s writings are both anti-Semitic and unhelpful to the struggle for Palestinian liberation. I produced A Guide to the Sayings of Gilad Atzmon, the anti-Semitic jazzman and in a review of his book The Wandering Who I described it as  Worthlessand Devoid of All Originality. Other articlesincludedGilad Atzmon Comes Out - Now an open anti-Semite.  I penned a number of articles in Weekly Worker such as Time to say goodbye. Atzmon was not reticent in attacking me either, e.g. The Green(stein)-Eyed Monster.
In a debate with Atzmon, which has been widely quoted, I demonstrated how he was undoubtedly anti-Semitic and sympathetic to the arguments of holocaust denier Paul Eisen. During the course of this debate Atzmon described Eisen’s Holocaust Wars, which was paean to Ernst Zundel, an open Hitler worshipper, as ‘a great text’.
Salvador Dalli's Theatre/Museum at Figueres - Perhaps this too is not kosher?
You might therefore think that I would welcome the decision by Islington Council to ban Atzmon from playing a concert. I don’t. My objection was always to Atzmon’s politics.  I have never objected to his music. Although jazz is not my preferred musical form I recognise that Atzmon is a brilliant performer. For example he won the BBC Jazz Record of the Year in 2003 with Exile. Nor is he a fascist like many of his detractors.
It is utterly indefensible as well as being undemocratic to ban Atzmon’s music. It fits in well with the police state methods of the Israeli state which recently gaoledan Israeli Palestinian poet Dareen Tatour for writing a poem.  This is the same Israeli state which does nothing and says nothing when hundreds of Israeli Jews add ‘death to the Arabs’ to their twitter id.

The Jewish Chronicle's opposition to the antisemitic Atzmon does not apply to the racism of Zionism
The ban on Atzmon has nothing to do with anti-racism and is part of the Zionist attack on freedom of speech for Palestinians and anti-Zionists in Britain. To support it or say nothing is to give comfort to the racist supporters of the Israeli state.


The Article I wrote on Why Atzmon is Antisemitic
The ban on Atzmon is nothing less than cultural McCarthyism. It is wrong in principle. When you prevent someone performing because you disagree with their politics it is a slippery road to an authoritarian state. Perhaps we should ban T.S. Elliot’s poetry and Wastelandsince Elliot was, without doubt, anti-Semitic. Maybe we should also ban the works of Ezra Poundwho was far worse and a sympathiser with the Nazis. Undoubtedly we should ban anything connected with Salvador Dalli since he supported Franco and Hitler. [See When The Surrealists Expelled Salvador Dalí for “the Glorification of Hitlerian Fascism” (1934)] I confess here to having recently visited his theatre-museum in Figueres and found it thoroughly enjoyable (and also learnt that he was something of a Zionist – not unusual in fascist circles).
Salvador Dalli's Museum/Theatre at 
For those doubting Thomases and professional searchers after anti-Semitism in the Jewish Labour Movement and other racist circles we should also ban Charles Dickens. Fagin, who ran a school of pick pockets, is perhaps the most notorious of all Jewish characters in English literature. In 1854 the Jewish Chronicle askedof Dickens why "Jews alone should be excluded from the 'sympathizing heart' of the author.
My review of Atzmon's Wandering Who
Dickens was a racist who also supported the infamous Governor Eyre, who declared Martial Law in Jamaica when there was a Black rebellion in 1865. Over 400 were hanged and 600 flogged (including women). This caused a massive controversy with Darwin on one side and Dickens alongside the white colonists and Tennyson.
And if the ban on Gilad Atzmon stands then we should definitely ban Shakespeare from the syllabus because there is no doubt that the Merchant of Venice with his pound of flesh is also anti-Semitic. Some people even believe that we should rewritethe Merchant of Venice and for good measure we should also ban Wagner’s music.
There is no love lost between Atzmon and myself but principles are somewhat more important
This is the cultural philistinism and barbarism that wretches like the Jewish Labour Movement’s Adam Langleben would have us indulge. The JLM, which is calling for the whip to be withdraw from Chris Williamson MP, whom it terms a ‘Jew baiter’ because he initially opposed the ban on Atzmon, is a group that has war criminal Ivor Caplin, a Defence Minister in Blair’s government at the time of the Iraqi invasion, as its Chair. At least Atzmon doesn’t have the blood of thousands of innocent people on his hands but Langleben, Caplin et al would have Atzmon’s music, which has hurt no one, banned.
‘This is the cultural philistinism and barbarism that wretches like the Jewish Labour Movement’s Adam Langleben would have us indulge.’
Whereas the Nazis banned books, the Zionists would ban music. As Heinrich Heine presciently remarked, those who burn books later burn people. The same is true of those who would ban Atzmon. There is a debate over politics and art but it is not one that the Langlebens and Caplins would even begin to understand.
Chris Williamson wasn't aware of Atzmon's antisemitism but nonetheless he is wrong to support a ban
The relationship between the artist and what they produce has always been a difficult and controversial one. Artists can create great music and art despite themselves because of the influence of society in all its forms upon them.  Their art is greater than them. Art and culture does not belong to the individual who created it but the society in which it is created.
Artists often create what they do despite their own politics and preferences. To expect that only politically correct artists or musicians will produce acceptable music or art is a form of cultural barbarism that reminds one of the Stalinist concept of socialist realism and art as a function of politics. The Nazis and Hitler in particular had a similar attitude to what they termed ‘degenerate’ art.
The reality is that people like Bob Dylan produced great music not because of their own intrinsic worthiness but because of the impact of the wider society upon them and their ability to synthesise that music into the moods of the time.  The genius of Dylan’s music is despite his worthlessness as an individual.
The attempt to ban Atzmon should be laughed out of court but given the intellectual poverty of the Labour Party’s Zionist witchunters and its machine politicians with their endorsement of the incoherent fulminations of the IHRA, the decision of Islington Council has not met with any substantive criticism. People have been intimidated. Even Chris Williamson has been forced to row back and apologisefor his initial opposition to the ban when apprised of Atzmon’s anti-Semitism.
This campaign is utterly hypocritical. Atzmon’s anti-Semitism is not dangerous to Jews. Atzmon’s nonsense is a danger to Palestinians. That was why Ali Abunimah and other Palestinians issued a statement Granting No Quarter: A Call for the Disavowal of the Racism and Antisemitism of Gilad Atzmon because it tarnishes their struggle. ‘Anti-Semitism’ today is primarily either verbal or on social media.  Noone has died because of a Tweet or Facebook post.
What anti-Semitism exists today is either on social media or a reaction to Israel’s murderous barbarities.  Where anti-Semitism does have strong social roots, as in areas of Eastern Europe – Poland, Hungary – then one finds that these regimes are the best friends of Israel!  Indeed the absurdity is that it is European’s far-Right governments which are the strongest supporters of the IHRA, e.g. the neo-Nazi Freedom Party in Austria’s Government. Indeed Israel has been armingthe neo-Nazi Azov Batalion in the Ukraine.
In reality Atzmon, who sees Zionism as the authentic expression of being Jewish, is a Zionist who doesn’t like what Zionism has become.  Unfortunately he expresses his dislike in anti-Semitic terms thus reinforcing Zionism. That is why he spends most of his time attacking Jewish anti-Zionists like me! I fully agree with the statement of Ali Abunimah and the other Palestinians. That is also why I disagree with this stupid, reactionary and counter-productive ban.
Tony Greenstein

Fiasco In Islington

Gilad Atzmon
Jazz saxophonist and writer Gilad Atzmon was recently banned from playing at an assembly hall in Islington, a borough of London, by order of the Islington Town Council. This came about as a result of an e-mail from one person – Martin Rankoff – saying nothing more than that if Atzmon was going to be at the venue on December 21 he would give a ticket that was given to him to someone else.
Rankoff wrote, “Mr Atzmon’s news and beliefs I personally find repulsive and do not wish to be in the same place as him, let alone listen to his music.” Rankoff included links to ADL and Israeli news outlets accusing Atzmon of antisemitism. Incredibly, on the basis of this letter alone, the Islington Council went way out of its way and contacted the show’s promoter to get Atzmon banned—something Rankoff didn’t even ask for.
Imagine the situation in reverse: Gilad Atzmon writes a letter to the Council saying he is uncomfortable with Martin Rankoff appearing in the audience at Islington assembly hall. He refers to Mr. Rankoff’s pro-Israel Twitter page where Rankoff calls Jeremy Corbyn “A F***ing Antisemite and Racist” and where Corbyn is pictured on a bike with a comment suggesting Corbyn should be rammed by a car. Atzmon says that he doesn’t feel safe with Rankoff in the audience. He finds Mr. Rankoff’s support for Israel repulsive because Israel was founded on genocide against the people of Palestine. As proof he provides links to news reports on the slaughter of unarmed protestors in Gaza since March 30, 2018, and a story on the Deir Yassin massacre of 1948.
This imaginary second complaint would have been scorned as an abridgement of Rankoff’s rights. Indeed, since the Islington Council has adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism, in which criticism of Israel is deemed antisemitic, the Council would probably feel obliged to forward the letter to the authorities as evidence of hate speech.
The Council provided a statement on the banning in which it says:
“under the Equality Act 2010, the Council must, in the exercise of its functions, have due regard to the need to foster good relations between different races and religions within the borough. The Council took account of the fact that Mr Atzmon’s presence at the Hall, and knowledge of his presence among residents of the borough, might harm such relationships, as well as the Council’s duty to tackle prejudice and promote understanding within the borough.”
This begs the question — in what way would either the “presence” of Gilad Atzmon or “knowledge of his presence among residents”harm the relationship between different races and religions in the borough? Atzmon was to appear at the venue as a saxophone player in a jazz group. It’s hard to imagine a more severe inversion of the concept of discrimination. On the basis of the feelings of one complainant, the right of a musician to work or even be present in Islington is taken away.
What lies behind this is a familiar tactic. Zionists have no argument to counter critics of Israel, so they try to shut them up by attacking their character and robbing them of their livelihood. Now AIPAC and other lobbies are working to make it illegal to criticize Israel, as we see in the recent case of a Texas speech therapist whose yearly contract was denied because she refused to sign a pledge not to support a boycott of Israel. One might ask, what does a teaching position in Pflugerville, Texas have to do with one’s opinions about a country seven thousand miles away? And why does that country have the right to compel anyone in the US to sign a loyalty oath?
If the BDS movement doesn’t do it, zealotry and fanatacism will be the undoing of the Zionist project. People don’t like being told what they are allowed to think and say. When our words and thoughts are policed, it makes us question all the more. What were once decent leftist positions against racism and discrimination have been twisted into a new kind of totalitarianism, one in which it is racist to question the racist, and discriminatory to question discrimination; one in which we are told to think something doesn’t exist when we can see with our own eyes that it does. The self-righteous members of the Islington Town Council have set a very dangerous precedent, and have been used as fools on top of it.

Corbynism without Corbyn – Lansman’s new strategy begs the question – what is the purpose of Momentum?

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Labour’s biggest problem with ‘anti-Semitism’ is that it doesn't exist – why else was it only apparent when Corbyn became leader?
Above video is of the lynch mob killing of an Eritrean refugee in Israel - the maximum sentence for the murderers was 4 months gaol


With the end of 2018 we are in a politically fluid situation. Theresa May’s government is clearly on the rocks. Whether or not Jeremy Corbyn can take advantage of her difficulties depends on how he reacts to her Brexit crisis. It needs to be said that Corbyn’s present policy of inertia and waiting on events is the worst possible choice. Doing nothing is not a strategy. Brexit will only destroy May and Mogg if Corbyn abandons leftist petty nationalism.
Labour Against Antisemitism's New Year Video is a Textbook Example in The Making of False Allegations of Antisemitism
It is clear that the political Establishment is frightened at the prospect of a Corbyn led government. This includes not only the Tories and Lib-Dems but large parts of the Parliamentary Labour Party. Instead of waging a war against those clustered around the Jewish Labour Movement and Labour Friends of Israel, whose main enemy is Corbyn not May, Momentum and its Dictator Jon Lansman have adopted the ‘anti-Semitism’ campaign whose sole purpose is removing Corbyn.
That well-known anti-racist paper, The Scum, is also aghast at Corbyn's 'race shame'
In my open letter to Lansman below, I make the very simple unarguable point that if anti-Semitism were really a problem in the Labour Party then why are the traditional forces of racism and anti-Semitism so opposed to it? The Tory papers, led by the formerly Hitler-loving Mail, have never been shy to employ anti-Semitism previously.  When the Mail attacked Ed Miliband, the Jewish leader of the Labour Party, because of his ‘alien’ father and his inability to eat a bacon sandwich that was obviously anti-Semitic.  Likewise when the Tory press rounded on George Soros as a ‘puppet master’ (Sun) for having funded the anti-Brexit cause the Zionists had nothing to say.
The absurd list of 'antisemites' by fake anti-racist Zionist site - omits Viktor Orban and the Polish regime, to name but a few genuine but pro-Israel antisemites
We should be clear.  Zionism does not and never has had any objection to anti-Semitism. Zionism starts from the premise that Jews do not belong in the lands where they are born. Their 'natural home' is in Israel. Which is what the anti-Semites also believe.
In these tweets you see a perfect example of malicious and false allegations of anti-Semitism - the US's Simon Wiesenthall Centre is a wholly Zionist propaganda organisation that has nothing to do with opposing racism and everything to do with defending Israel and attacking BDS
Without anti-Semitism there is no Zionism.  Historically Zionism has welcomed anti-Semitism because without it they would not have been able to form their racially exclusive state. That is why today the Israeli state is the best of friends with anti-Semitic regimes such as Orban’s Hungary, Heinz Christian-Strache’s Autsria and Poland’s Morawiecki.
This is abundantly provable from what the Zionists themselves said. For example the founder of Political Zionism Theodor Herzl was explicit in his Diaries that ‘the anti-Semites will become our most dependable friends, the anti-Semitic countries our allies.’
The Left in the Labour Party is identified with Momentum.  Two years ago a coup was launched by Jon Lansman aimed at destroying its democracy. Today Momentum is a toothless tiger, often backing right-wing candidates as in Thanet South. An election machine incapable of mobilising for reselection inside the Labour Party. 
Emily Thornberry at the Zionist Limmud conference is interviewed by fellow racist Jon Lansman
We see the witchhunt, that we thought had gone away under Iain McNicol, come back as people like Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt are deselected as Parliamentary candidates because of attacks from Tory Guido Fawkes.  At the centre of this witchhunt is Lansman and the ‘left’ on the NEC.
My understanding is that Lansman and his supporters are now openly talking of Corbynism without Corbyn.  In other words the British Establishment and the Israeli state’s anti-Semitism campaign would have succeeded in their aim of removing someone who is seen as ‘unreliable’ from the standpoint of British capitalism.
Tony Greenstein

Open Letter to Momentum’s Owner and Dictator – Jon Lansman
Dear Jon,

My apologies for not having been in touch since you expelled me last summer. I’m sure you will understand when I say that absence doesn’t always make the heart grow fonder. It is however comforting to know that you have remained consistent in your lack of principles bar a determination to betray your ex-comrades. Beginning with Jackie Walker, the list has expanded to include Ken Livingstone, Christine Shawcroft, Pete Willsman and now Chris Williamson.
The Jewish Labour Movement's Peter Mason isn't happy about Thornberry's admittedly bizarre explanation of Corbyn's inability to face down his accusers
My attention was drawn to your remarkat the recent Zionist Limmud Conference that the biggest problem in dealing with antisemitism in the Labour Party was that “the most influential antisemitism-deniers, unfortunately, are Jewish anti-Zionists”. Strange that isn’t it?
As I reflected on your comments, knowing full well the depth of your intellect, I wondered what you might say if Jews in Britain were subject to the same treatment as Palestinians in Israel. Perhaps if mobs in Britain were to chant ‘Death to the Jews’ in the same way as mobs in Israel chant ‘Death to the Arabs’ do you think that might be considered a racist endeavour? 
Of course we all know what it’s really about. As soon as it became clear three years ago that Corbyn was going to be the Labour Leader the cries of ‘anti-Semitism’ began. The fact that this campaign was spearheaded by the very same Tories who are in alliance with anti-Semitic parties in the European Parliament was merely coincidental.
Zionist Emily Thornberry is incapable of accepting that if Corbyn was upset by false accusations of anti-Semitism then so were we all!!
Of course if you possessed anything other than a low cunning and the skills of Machiavelli then this would have provided you with some clues as to its provenance. After all this campaign was supported by the same right-wing press that employed ‘journalists’ like Katie Hopkins, who compared refugees to ‘cockroaches’.
If there were any doubt about how genuine was Labour’s ‘anti-Semitism problem’ then it should have been resolved when Board of Deputies President Jonathan Arkush called Corbyn an anti-Semite. This was the same Arkush who welcomed Donald Trump’s election as President.  The same Trump who is both a White Supremacist and an anti-Semite.
It was also no coincidence that the worst ever anti-Semitic attack on American Jewry in Pittsburgh occurred two years into Trump’s Presidency.  Yet the response of Israel was to send their far-Right Education Minister Naftali Bennett to the US to defend Trump and his alt-Right supporters.  Yet for Arkush and the Zionist Board of Deputies it was the Jewish group Jewdas who were the source of virulent anti-Semitism’.
The reason why Jewish anti-Zionists deny there is an anti-Semitism phenomenon in the Labour Party is because there is no evidence for it. What there is, at worst, are clumsy responses and reactions to Israeli war crimes. Crimes carried out by a Jewish state and defended by organisations that call themselves Jewish. But even the most stupid and ill-informed responses, which blame ‘the Rothschilds’ or David Icke’s lizards do not harm a single Jew.  No one has died from a tweet or social media post.
The Board of Deputies attacks on Corby might just have something to do with their support of Israel's murder of Palestinians
However over 200 unarmed Palestinian demonstrators, including 50 children, have died since the summer because Israeli snipers mowed them down. They include Razan al-Najar, a 21 year old medic who was murdered tending the wounded. Yet the vile racist Luke Akehurst, Director of We Believe in Israel, has campaigned in supportof these war crimes.  Why have there been no calls for the expulsion of Akehurst and his supporters in Labour Friends of Israel who also supported these murders?  Is support for the commission of war crimes not an expellable offence? Yet when I was expelled for calling  Louise Ellman MP a supporter of the abuse of Palestinian children it was with the support of Momentum's Emina Ibrahim.
If there were any doubt that the ‘anti-Semitism’ campaign against Corbyn was about Israel then one only need observe that 7 of the 11 illustrations of ‘anti-Semitism’ in the IHRA definition which you supported concern Israel. Holding that the Israeli state is racist is deemed anti-Semitic.
On December 11th Ha’aretz reportedthat Evyatar Damari, who took part in a lynch mob killing of Haftom Zarhum, an Eritrean refugee, received a sentence of 4 months imprisonment. This was the heaviest sentence handed down to the lynch mob.  You can see the video for yourself if you have the stomach.
Also this year a 16 year old girl, Ahed Tamimi received an 8 month sentence for slapping a heavily armed Israeli soldier who invaded the grounds of her home in Bi’ilin, moments after they had nearly killed her cousin.
Eight months if a Palestinian slaps a soldier. months if a Jewish Israeli kills a refugee whom the Israeli government are trying to deport, with the supportof the Israeli Labour Party. Yet if we say then according to the IHRA we are anti-Semites! If anti-racism is anti-Semitism then what you really mean is that racism is an integral part of what it means to be Jewish. Who then is anti-Semitic?
As you are also aware, your friends in the JLM have moved on from targeting Livingstone, Jackie Walker and myself to Chris Williamson MP. Once again you have shown your true colours. At least Jesus was betrayed by a kiss. Your behaviour is more akin to that of a viperous Uriah Heep.
When the JLM attacked Chris you respondedthat “we can’t tolerate this continuing”and stated that it was matter of time before he “does something which results in a complaint being made which will then have to be investigated”.
I understand that as a result of your ill-fated attempt to become Labour’s General Secretary relations between you and Jeremy are, shall we say, at an all-time low. I also understand that you have been putting about the idea of ‘Corbynism without Corbyn’ as you seek to boost the credentials of the openly Zionist Emily Thornberry, with whom you shareda platform at Limmud last week.
The only question that I have to ask, although you may find some difficulty answering it, is why Momentum, an organisation whose purpose is to support a Jeremy Corbyn government, tolerates a racist and a Zionist as its Chair? A person who owes no allegiance to Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party?
Yours as ever,
Tony Greenstein 


Shop Steward Expelled for ‘anti-Semitism’ by a Racist and Corrupt Trade Union

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The GMB Expels Pete Gregson using the IHRA Definition of ‘Anti-Semitism’ which even its author, Kenneth Stern, has Disavowed


When Labour’s National Executive decided on September 4th 2018, to adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism, which conflates anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, Peter Gregson launched his own petition:
The IHRA has been savaged by a host of academic and legal scholars. It is incoherent, open ended, uncertain, illogical and barely literate.
The petition which attracted the ire of the GMB and Rhea Wolfson
According to Geoffrey Robertson QC, the renowned human rights barrister, the IHRA definition is, ‘not fit for purpose’.  Sir Stephen Sedley, the Jewish former Court of Appeal Judge wrotethat the IHRA ‘fails the first test of any definition: it is indefinite.’Hugh Tomlinson QCdeclaredthat the IHRA had
a potential chilling effect on public bodies which, in the absence of definitional clarity, may seek to sanction or prohibit any conduct which has been labelled by third parties as antisemitic without applying any clear criterion of assessment
The GMB under Gary Smith has acted as a scab union effectively inviting Peter's employer to dismiss him
The actual IHRA definition itself is 38 words, the salient part of which states that ‘Anti-Semitism is a certain perception of Jews which may be defined as hatred of Jews.’ What is a ‘certain perception’? Who knows. If anti-Semitism may be defined as hatred of Jews what else might it be defined as? And if anti-Semitism is to be defined in terms of hatred what about someone who simply dislikes Jews but doesn’t hate them. In short the definition is useless as an analytical tool. It is no wonder that David Feldman, who was Vice-Chair of the Chakrabarti Inquiry and Director of the Pears Institute for the Study of Anti-Semitism describedthe IHRA as ‘bewilderingly imprecise.’
The IHRA definition provides 11 illustrations of ‘anti-Semitism’ such as ‘Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.’
In order to make their case stick, the GMB has to lie about Peter's beliefs accusing him of being  a holocaust denier - this accords with Zionist attempts to invent holocaust denial where it doesn't exist
This is the section that Peter Gregson defied with his petition. This illustration is a good example of the incoherence of the definition. There is no connection between the first and second halves of the example. It is a non-sequitur. It is quite possible to support a Jewish right to self-determination and still believe that Israel is a racist state. The language is a good example of bad fourth form English. How can the existence of anything be an endeavour?
Criticism of a union official is impermissible for a cossetted bureaucracy
There is a simple definition of anti-Semitism in the Oxford English Dictionary which, unlike the 500+ words of the IHRA is only 6 words long: ‘Hostility to or prejudice against Jews’ which also catches attitudes that fall short of hatred. As Tony Lerman, a distinguished expert on anti-Semitism and former Director of the Institute of Jewish Policy Research wrote:
The more the definition is held up to the light and subject to public scrutiny, the more we see holes and cracks in its flimsy fabric. Not only is there now overwhelming evidence that it’s not fit for purpose, but it also has the effect of making Jews more vulnerable to antisemitism, not less...’

The drawback of the OED definition for the Zionists is that it doesn’t mention Israel. As the inauguration today of Yair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s new President shows, most fascists, racists and bigots are also ardent supporters of the Israeli state.
Even the person who drew up the IHRA, Kenneth Stern, has become disillusioned at the misuse of his definition, which was never intended to brand people as anti-Semites. In written testimony to the US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee he wrote that:
The definition was not drafted, and was never intended, as a tool to target or chill speech on a college campus. In fact, at a conference in 2010 about the impact of the definition, I highlighted this misuse, and the damage it could do.

Labour’s NEC adopted the IHRA as a way of buying off its Zionist critics. What it has done is to create a whole new set of problems around the rights of free speech. It is no accident that the GMB, which has traditionally been pro-Zionist has been the first to try and implement the IHRA. Traditionally the GMB has been corrupt, racist and politically backward.
Rhea Wolfson

Peter Gregson was suspended because of his petition when former Labour NEC member and the Glasgow GMB Organiser, Rhea Wolfson put in a complaint about ‘anti-Semitism’. He was accused of ‘anti-Semitic’ harassment of Ms Wolfson.  It is very clear from his statementthat all he ever did was engage in political polemic. Nothing that he said was remotely anti-Semitic or indeed abusive.
Gary Smith - represents all that is wrong in  British Trade Unionism - the idea of a fair hearing is alien to someone who acted as judge and jury in his own cause, having organised the kangaroo court too
I wrote on the 28th November to the GMB’s Scottish Regional Secretary, Gary Smith, who was handling the case offering to be a witness in the case.  I happened to know Gary some years ago in Brighton when, as Secretary of the Unemployed Centre, we had organised support for the workers at the Hollingdean Refuse Depot who had occupied the site as part of the campaign to get rid of SITA, a French company which the Labour council had brought in to run the refuse collection. The dispute was successful. At that time Gary was a radical young organiser.  Clearly as he has climbed the GMB’s greasy ladder he has abandoned his radicalism which included support for breaking the law.  Now he is just another apparatchik.
I pointed out to Smith that he could not be both the Prosecutor, the person organising the hearing and deciding who could be called and what would be allowed by way of a defence. I received no reply to this or another email.  Smith had clearly decided that Peter was guilty and he was not going to allow ‘grandstanding’ i.e. any attempt to mount a defence. On the day of the hearing a Rabbi who had travelled up from Manchester at his own expense was barred from the hearing.
The whole procedure that Peter faced has been wholly unfair as the letterfrom his solicitor Daniel Donaldson explains. Donaldson explicitly calls the GMB disciplinary  tribunal a ‘kangaroo court.’ In his letter of 17thDecember to Smith he states, reiterating my own correspondence that:
You are a member of the GMB regional committee, you have conducted the investigation, you have determined the procedure and you are also prosecuting my client before the same committee. This approach to a disciplinary is inherently unfair and therefore unlawful.
This is the kind of justice that they are used to in Rhea Wolfson’s racial paradise in Israel , but it is contrary to British notions of natural justice and due process.
As I said to Smith, this hearing would make a kangaroo hang its head in shame. Gary Smith has become just another right-wing official in the GMB, a union which is a byword for corruption. Peter Gregson is the only shop steward for 24,000 members in the whole of the Lothian NHS. If Gary Smith was actually doing his job instead of harassing the only shop steward that does exist he would ensure that the GMB had some measure of shop floor organisation in peoples’ workplaces. Smith seems completely unconcerned about the effect of expelling Peter on the GMB’s own (lack of) organisation.
In reality GMB officials have never been particularly concerned about the effectiveness of representation for their members. Their main concern has been such mundane matters as how best to claim and inflate their expenses. Living on a far higher salary than their members they are cut off from life on the shop floor.
What is particularly reprehensible is that a member of the union has been expelled for calling out a state which is clearly racist.  I gave as examples to Smith the fact that in Israel Palestinian (but not Jewish) children as young as 12 are routinely detained, usually in night time raids on their homes.
We have recently had the obscene case of the lynch-mob murderer of an asylum seeker sentenced to 4 months imprisonment whereas a 16 year old girl, Ahed Tamimi, was sentenced to 8 months for daring to slap a heavily armed soldier.
As the National’s Martin Hannan reportedPete Gregson was suspended for describing Israel’s actions in ethnically cleansing Palestine of some 700,000 refugees as racist. To the corrupt and racist barons of the GMB ethnic cleansing by a settler colonial state is perfectly acceptable whereas criticism of it is racist. 
This is the upside down world of Gary Smith and the GMB’s General Secretary Tim Roache who on the basis of a fraudulent ‘election’ in 2016 backed Owen Smith in his challenge to Jeremy Corbyn.
Peter Gregson’s petition has now secured over 1,200 signatures from members of the Labour Party. Given that Israel’s Knesset earlier in the year passed the Jewish Nation State Law which explicitly grants national rights to one section of the population, Jews and denies them to non-Jews, it is difficult to know how else to describe the GMB’s decision to expel Peter Gregson other than racist. In the wordsof Ha’aretz’s Mordechai Kremnitzer, the ‘Jewish Nation-state Law Makes Discrimination in Israel Constitutional’.  What is it that Gary Smith or Tim Roache don’t understand about that? How else do you describe opening fire on unarmed demonstrators in Gaza, killing over 200 and wounding 20,000 with the use of high velocity ammunition?
Although Labour Against the Witchhunt didn’t support Peter’s petition because of problems with its wording we recognise that it represents a significant opposition in the Labour Party to the attempt to curtail if not abolish freedom of speech.
Of course the corrupt and racist GMB has never had freedom of speech. The regional barons ruled without opposition. The union exists primarily for the benefit of its highly paid officials not its membership. However even Roache and co. will have difficulty defending this particularly iniquitous decision. If Peter’s expulsion is not revoked then GMB members should join another, genuine trade union.
To see Pete’s website and his page on the IHRA and his Petition please click here
The letter of expulsion is here.  It is fundamentally dishonest. It alleges that Peter is guilty of ‘accusing Israel of inventing or exaggerating the holocaust’ and goes on to say that ‘For our Union holocaust denial or claiming the holocaust was exaggerated is simply unacceptable.’ The only problem is that this is a lie. Nowhere has Pete denied that the Holocaust occurred or that it was exaggerated. Peter specifically refers to the 6 million who died (though the actual figure will never be known). What he has said, which is true, is that Israel uses the Holocaust for political purposes and that it is used to counter Palestinian claims to justice. Which is what Jewish academic Norman Finkelstein, amongst others, wrote in The Holocaust Industry.
Tony Greenstein
Peter's press release on his expulsion
My third email to Gary Smith

It's Capitalism Stupid - Whatever the Problem it's Capitalism that's the Cause

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We are all used to fighting in individual campaigns – whether it is for BDS and the Palestinians, or the NHS or against fascism or austerity in its many manifestations.  But what is the string that ties all this together.  What is it that makes this appalling system of imperialist robbery and exploitation tick?  That one word is capitalism, a society based not on human need but on the making of profit.  Of course by dividing us into separate campaigns and movements capitalism ensures its own survival.  Divide and rule. Racism, is one of its primary weapons.

It is because Jeremy Corbyn is perceived as being anti-capitalist in his own small and muddled way, that he is treated as the enemy within.  That is why all the bile is directed against him, not just by the mass media but by members of his own party too.  Whether it is John Mann or Joan Ryan or Hilary Benn - Corbyn's real problem is his attachment, in a fleeting and hesitant, manner to the idea that there is an alternative to capitalism.
Of course many people will say that its the best system there is, but is it? When trillions of dollars are spent on weapons and yet perhaps half the planet is in perpetual hunger? When a handful of individuals can own as much as whole states put together? When an increasing proportion of the world’s wealth is concentrated in fewer and fewer hands what possible justification is there for a society which is based on the subjugation of other nations? 
The dominant power today is the United States. The two main parties, Republican and Democrat are pro-capitalist.  Both agree that the USA has a right to intervene in other states to enforce its will. The US has hundreds of bases around the world and they are not for ‘peacekeeping’.  
Indeed the only virtue of Donald Trump is that he doesn’t hide behind niceties such as the ‘war for democracy’ or platitudes about defending human rights.  As he has shown over the Khashoggi Affair, all he is concerned about are weapons sales to vile dictatorships. 
As the planet is approaching the point of no return on climate change it is, or should be obvious that capitalism is responsible for our inability to mount any challenge to global warming. The interests of profit directly contradict the needs of humanity and yet the existing Green Parties, in Britain and internationally believe that they can Green capitalism. 


This is what is most pathetic about our own Green Party and its desperate attempts to be seen as part of the Establishment rather than a threat to it.  That was and is why Caroline Lucas has refused to come out in opposition to the IHRA definition of 'antisemitism'. The IHRA is an Establishment formulation and she, for all her day trips to the left, is part of that political establishment. The same is true of the 11 Green Councillors in Brighton, led by erstwhile Republican Liam McCafferty who also demonstrated that when Greens are in a position to make a difference buckled under and voted for the IHRA.

Capitalism is a system not only based on commodity production but the blind accumulation of capital.  It is, in George Soros’s words, amoral. British oil companies think nothing of working with tyrannical governments in Nigeria and elsewhere to sustain death squads and armies that will act against any assertion of power by the indigenous peoples affected by the production of oil for example the Ogoni people. 
American multinationals have always done this in Central and South America. Human Rights directly contradict the needs of capital but it is something that groups like Amnesty International refuse to recognise as they have backed the US war on Afghanistan..
Fracking in this country is another example of where the needs of capital supersede the interests of humanity.  That is why anyone who is seriously opposed to the destruction of the environment or in fighting global warming and climate change must also be anti-capitalist. 
Although the British Labour Party has elected a left-wing MP, Jeremy Corbyn it has met with fierce resistance by the Right whose main purpose, stripping aside all the nonsense about anti-Semitism, is making Labour safe for capitalism.  That is what this is all about really.  Israel is a symbol for all that is rotten and corrupt in world politics.
It is one of the major weaknesses of the pro-Corbyn campaign that many people see the task as being to reform capitalism whilst leaving the beast unchanged.  In many ways that is the weakness of the whole strategy of Corbyn and McDonnell . They wish to tame the beast rather than challenge it. 
The task of socialists is to use the present battles to radicalise people and create a  genuine anti-capitalist movement inside and outside the Labour Party. 
Tony Greenstein 

Labor Are You Ready To Consider That Capitalism Is The Real Problem?


November 19, 2018 Jason Hickel and Martin Kirk
Fifty-one percent of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 no longer support the system of capitalism. , Illustration: Kseniya_Milner/iStock

In February, college sophomore Trevor Hill stood up during a televised town hall meeting in New York and posed a simple question to Nancy Pelosi, the leader of the Democrats in the House of Representatives. He cited a study by Harvard University showing that 51% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 no longer support the system of capitalism, and asked whether the Democrats could embrace this fast-changing reality and stake out a clearer contrast to right-wing economics.

Pelosi was visibly taken aback. “I thank you for your question,” she said, “but I’m sorry to say we’re capitalists, and that’s just the way it is.”
The footage went viral. It was powerful because of the clear contrast it set up. Trevor Hill is no hardened left-winger. He’s just your average millennial—bright, informed, curious about the world, and eager to imagine a better one. But Pelosi, a figurehead of establishment politics, refused to–or was just unable to–entertain his challenge to the status quo.
It’s not only young voters who feel this way. A YouGov poll in 2015 found that 64% of Britons believe that capitalism is unfair, that it makes inequality worse. Even in the U.S., it’s as high as 55%. In Germany, a solid 77% are skeptical of capitalism. Meanwhile, a full three-quarters of people in major capitalist economies believe that big businesses are basically corrupt.
Why do people feel this way? Probably not because they deny the abundant material benefits of modern life that many are able to enjoy. Or because they want to travel back in time and live in the U.S.S.R. It’s because they realize—either consciously or at some gut level—that there’s something fundamentally flawed about a system that has a prime directive to churn nature and humans into capital, and do it more and more each year, regardless of the costs to human well-being and to the environment we depend on.
Because let’s be clear: That’s what capitalism is, at its root. That is the sum total of the plan. We can see this embodied in the imperative to grow GDP, everywhere, year on year, at a compound rate, even though we know that GDP growth, on its own, does nothing to reduce poverty or to make people happier or healthier. Global GDP has grown 630% since 1980, and in that same time, by some measures, inequality, poverty, and hunger have all risen.
We also see this plan in the idea that corporations have a fiduciary duty to grow their stock value for the sake of shareholder returns, which prevents even well-meaning CEO’s from voluntarily doing anything good—like increasing wages or reducing pollution—that might compromise their bottom line.
Just look at the recent case involving American Airlines. Earlier this year, CEO Doug Parker tried to raise his employees salaries to correct for “years of incredibly difficult times” suffered by his employees, only to be slapped down by Wall Street. The day he announced the raise, the company’s shares fell 5.8%. This is not a case of an industry on the brink, fighting for survival, and needing to make hard decisions. On the contrary, airlines have been raking in profits. But the gains are seen as the natural property of the investor class. This is why JP Morgan criticized the wage increase as a “wealth transfer of nearly $1 billion” to workers. How dare they?
What becomes clear here is that ours is a system that is programmed to subordinate life to the imperative of profit.
For a startling example of this, consider the horrifying idea to breed brainless chickens and grow them in huge vertical farms, Matrix-style, attached to tubes and electrodes and stacked one on top of the other, all for the sake of extracting profit out of their bodies as efficiently as possible. Or take the Grenfell Tower disaster in London, where dozens of people were incinerated because the building company chose to use flammable panels in order to save a paltry £5,000 (around $6,500). Over and over again, profit trumps life.
It all proceeds from the same deep logic. It’s the same logic that sold lives for profit in the Atlantic slave trade, it’s the logic that gives us sweatshops and oil spills, and it’s the logic that is right now pushing us headlong toward ecological collapse and climate change.
Gains are seen as the natural property of the investor class.
Once we realize this, we can start connecting the dots between our different struggles. There are people in the U.S. fighting against the Keystone pipeline. There are people in Britain fighting against the privatization of the National Health Service. There are people in India fighting against corporate land grabs. There are people in Brazil fighting against the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. There are people in China fighting against poverty wages. These are all noble and important movements in their own right. But by focusing on all these symptoms we risk missing the underlying cause. And the cause is capitalism. It’s time to name the thing.
What’s so exciting about our present moment is that people are starting to do exactly that. And they are hungry for something different. For some, this means socialism. That YouGov poll showed that Americans under the age of 30 tend to have a more favorable view of socialism than they do of capitalism, which is surprising given the sheer scale of the propaganda out there designed to convince people that socialism is evil. But millennials aren’t bogged down by these dusty old binaries. For them the matter is simple: They can see that capitalism isn’t working for the majority of humanity, and they’re ready to invent something better.
What might a better world look like? There are a million ideas out there. We can start by changing how we understand and measure progress. As Robert Kennedy famously said, GDP “does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play . . . it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.”
We can change that. People want health care and education to be social goods, not market commodities, so we can choose to put public goods back in public hands. People want the fruits of production and the yields of our generous planet to benefit everyone, rather than being siphoned up by the super-rich, so we can change tax laws and introduce potentially transformative measures like a universal basic income. People want to live in balance with the environment on which we all depend for our survival; so we can adopt regenerative agricultural solutions and even choose, as Ecuador did in 2008, to recognize in law, at the level of the nation’s constitution, that nature has “the right to exist, persist, maintain, and regenerate its vital cycles.”
Measures like these could dethrone capitalism’s prime directive and replace it with a more balanced logic, that recognizes the many factors required for a healthy and thriving civilization. If done systematically enough, they could consign one-dimensional capitalism to the dustbin of history.
None of this is actually radical. Our leaders will tell us that these ideas are not feasible, but what is not feasible is the assumption that we can carry on with the status quo. If we keep pounding on the wedge of inequality and chewing through our living planet, the whole thing is going to implode. The choice is stark, and it seems people are waking up to it in large numbers: Either we evolve into a future beyond capitalism, or we won’t have a future at all.


[Dr. Jason Hickel is an anthropologist at the London School of Economics who works on international development and global political economy, with an ethnographic focus on southern Africa.  He writes for the Guardian and Al Jazeera English. His most recent book, The Divide: A Brief History of Global Inequality and Its Solutions, is available now.
Martin Kirk is cofounder and director of strategy for The Rules, a global collective of writers, thinkers, and activists dedicated to challenging the root causes of global poverty and inequality. His work focuses on bringing insights from the cognitive and complexity sciences to bear on issues of public understanding of complex global challenge

Shock Horror - Jeremy Corbyn is accused of ‘nodding’ when a Rabbi said that Zionism and Judaism have nothing in common!!

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The Pathetic Jewish Chronicle and Zionist Board of Deputies Tries to Restart the Fake ‘Anti-Semitism’ Campaign

As I predicteda few weeks ago, with Theresa May in increasing political difficulty, there will be fresh attempts to ignite the fake anti-Semitism allegations against Jeremy Corbyn.
Sure enough the Jewish Chronicle leads this week with an absolutely horrifying example of Corbyn Anti-Semitism. The article is entitled Jeremy Corbyn condemned after footage shows him appearing to agree with 'Zionism has nothing to do with Judaism' claim.  I think you will agree that this latest revelation should be the nail in the coffin of Corbyn.  It is so obviously anti-Semitic that it is difficult to understand why the Labour Party hasn’t arisen as one to demand his head.
My prediction of a few weeks ago
The Board of Deputies unsurprisingly
‘condemned Jeremy Corbyn after footage emerged of him nodding in agreement with the statement that "Zionism and the state of Israel has nothing to do with the religion Judaism". 
Even worse dear reader ‘Mr Corbyn also briefly applauded at the end of the speech.’ This really is the straw that broke the camel’s back. And it is no use saying that this happened 8 years ago. The fact is it happened. Anti-Semitism doesn’t lose its impact just because it occurred a decade or two ago.
I think even the fairest minded observer will agree that Corbyn’s behaviour makes him completely unfit to lead the Labour Party. This behaviour must conflict with most if not all the illustrations of the IHRA misdefinition of anti-Semitism which is designed to catch out bounders and cads who refuse to acknowledge that the Apartheid State of Israel is the physical embodiment of every Jews desire for liberation. I exclude from this a few self-haters and Jewish anti-Semites about whom no more will be said.
The Daily Mail which supported Hitler up to 1939 is terribly exercised by Corbyn's 'antisemitism'
Nor do I wish to hear about the usual litany of anti-Semites who support the ‘Jewish’ State of Israel from Steve Bannon, Bolsinaro of Brazil, Trump, Richard Spencer et al.  Zionism welcomes all support, except that of anti-Zionists! The fact that the Jewish ethno nationalist State of Israel attracts the support of anti-Semites who wish their own country to be a bit like Israel is should be a matter of rejoicing.
However in the interests of objectivity, I thought it would be good to look at the argument that Judaism and Zionism are two distinct entities.  Mind nothing I say is intended to exonerate Jeremy Corbyn in any way whatsoever.  Clearly he is one of the worst anti-Semites alive.  I am surprised that the US Simon Wiesenthall Centre recently voted Corbyn the world’s 4th worst anti-Semite when it is clear that by threatening the very existence of the British Jewish community he deserved the top spot.  There was no justification for awarding the No. 1 slot to the Pittsburgh killer, Robert Bowers. He only killed 11 Jews.  Corbyn would wipe the whole lot out.
The founder of Political Zionism refused to have his own son, Hans circumcised
Why historically Orthodox Judaism was Bitterly Opposed to Zionism
The first Political Zionist was Theodor Herzl who founded the Zionist movement at the First Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland in 1897.  The Congress was supposed to be in Munich Germany, but the Jewish population and the rabbis of Munich bitterly protested at this anti-Semitic gathering and the authorities were forced to ban it.
As Ha’aretz explained in 1897: The First Zionist Council Convenes
Basel was a second choice: Herzl had originally planned to “found” his state in Munich, a larger and more significant city than the quiet Swiss town ... It was the Jews of Munich — particularly the Orthodox and Reform leadership and those who were prominent in the city’s economic life — who were concerned that hosting the meeting would stir up trouble for them.
Hans Herzl ended his life as a Christian
Herzl’s own Chief Rabbi Morris Gudemann of Vienna disagreed with his protégé over the compatibility of Zionism and Judaism.  Which isn’t surprising as Herzl refusedto have his son Hans circumcised, which is an essential ritual for male Jews. Only after his death did the Zionist leadership arrange his circumcision at the age of 15.  They needn’t have bothered since he converted to Christianity before killing himself at the age of 40. Allan Brownfield wrotethat
The chief rabbi of Vienna, Mortiz Gudemann, denounced the mirage of Jewish nationalism. Belief in One God was the unifying factor for Jews, he declared, and Zionism was incompatible with Judaism's teachings. The Jewish Chronicle of London judged that the Zionist scheme's lack of a religious perspective rendered it "cold and comparatively uninviting." The executive of the Association of German Rabbis, representing the Jewish communities of Berlin, Frankfurt, Breslau, Halberstadt and Munich, denounced the "efforts of the so-called Zionists to create a Jewish National State in Palestine" as contrary to the "prophetic message of Judaism and the duty or every Jew to belong without reservation to the fatherland in which he lives . . ."
Herzl, before advocating Zionism had suggested that a solution to what was called the Jewish Question might be the mass conversion of Jews to Catholicism. As might be expected most Orthodox Jews were not enamoured of this. As the Jerusalem Postobserved:
Herzl came to Zionism as a last resort, after concluding that abandoning Judaism altogether simply couldn’t work. (He first turned to international socialism and mass-conversion to Catholicism as possible solutions.)
Chief Rabbi Hermann Adler of Britain was an anti-Zionist
Indeed the Chief Rabbi of Britain, Hermann Adler was bitterly opposed to Zionism which he saw as a nationalist apostasy.  To Adler and other Orthodox Jews Zionism was a form of Jewish idolatory.  It substituted worship of a state and Jewish nationalism for the religion. In 1897 Adler termedpolitical Zionism an "egregious blunder," Adler in a long speech about Zionism spoke about how
‘And if there be a group of enthusiasts who succeed in conquering Palestine by force of arms, or buying it up from its owners, we must not consider this to be even a glimmer of our future hope. This is the path that the leaders of the Jewish people received by tradition throughout history: only to wait, without taking any action."
The Orthodox also held that since God had exiled the Jews from Palestine it was not for man to defy God’s will.  This was the position of Agudat Yisrael, an anti-Zionist Orthodox group set up specifically to combat Zionism.  In 1924 their organiser, Jacob de Haan was murdered by the Zionist terror group Hagannah. Even today Agudat Yisrael, although it takes part in Israeli government coalitions, is formally non-Zionist. See THE GREAT GULF BETWEEN ZIONISM AND JUDAISM
In an excellent article in The Guardian of all places For Haredi Jews secular Zionism remains a religious heresy by Giles Fraser, in response to the claim in The Telegraph by the current Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis that Zionism was a ‘a noble and integral part of Judaism’ he wrote:
The walled neighbourhood of Mea Shearim is just a few minutes’ walk from the old city of Jerusalem. Built in 1874, it is home to Jerusalem’s Haredi or ultra-orthodox community – though that description is sometimes used as a term of abuse. The word Haredi is taken from the book of Isaiah and refers to those who tremble before God. A bit like the Quakers.
The Haredi regard themselves as no-compromise, Torah-faithful Jews, living out the word of God as best they can, until the coming of the messiah. The people who live here wear long black frock coats and broad-rimmed hats. Posters put up at the various entrances to the area demand modesty from visitors: long dresses and sleeves. Another poster declares: “No entry to Zionists”. Mea Shearim is home to some of the most fervently anti-Zionist Jews in the world.
It is clear that Ephraim Mirvis and his predecessor Jonathan Sacks are Zionists in a religious shell. Zionism was always a secular movement that believed that began from a racial not a religious base.  Herzl’s Deputy Max Nordau was quite explicit that Zionism was a question of race not religion. To Nordau the Jews were ‘a race of accursed beggars.
Even Colin Shindler, an ardent Zionist advocate and Professor of Israel Studies at SOAS wrotein the Jewish Chronicle that in Britain:
Orthodoxy also had little time for Zionism. The Kamenitzer Maggid, a brilliant speaker for the Federation of Synagogues, regarded Herzl as a second Shabtai Zevi, the false messiah of the 17th century. Even the Lubavitcher Rebbe of the time announced that religion had been substituted by nationalism. "The Zionists," he argued, "had cast off the yoke of the Torah and mitzvot."
As the Times of Israel reported, the head of the Satmar Hassidic sect Rabbi Aaron Teitelbaum 
‘accused his followers of increasingly admiring Israel for its military and political accomplishments, imploring them to maintain the Hasidic group’s hardline anti-Zionism.
Addressing thousands of Satmar members at Long Island’s Nassau Coliseum, Rabbi Aaron Teitelbaum lamented what he called a “tremendous and terrible spiritual decline” among his followers. …
 “We must yell gevalt, gevalt! To where have we come?” he declared. “We have no part in Zionism. We have no part in their wars. We have no part in the State of Israel.”



The Satmar, one of the largest Hasidic groups in the world, is staunchly anti-Zionist and does not recognize the State of Israel, maintaining a Jewish state should not exist until the Messiah appears.
“We’ll continue to fight God’s war against Zionism and all its aspects,” Teitelbaum said.Rabbis like Sacks and Mirvis are merely ignoramuses prostituting themselves to a nationalist heresy. If Corbyn nodded along with an anti-Zionist rabbi he was in good company!

From Alice Walker’s Color Purple to David Icke’s Shape Shifting Lizards

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Susan Abulhawa’s toleration of anti-Semitism only helps the enemies of Palestine


 A controversy has broken out over an interview that Alice Walker, famous for the Pulitzer prize winning The Color Purple, did for the New York Times. In a written interview Alice Walker: By the Book, on the 13th December, Alice responded to the question What books are on your nightstand?’ by saying that one such book was “And the Truth Shall Set You Free,” by David Icke.
‘In Icke’s books there is the whole of existence, on this planet and several others, to think about. A curious person’s dream come true.’

When Black people and Palestinians start making excuses for anti-Semitism it has but one effect. It confirms the Zionist argument that Palestinian opposition to Israeli settler colonialism is motivated not by outrage at Israel’s behaviour but by hatred of Jews.
Of course the Zionists have leaped upon this. Zionist opposition to the anti-Semitism of people like Louis Farrahkan is not motivated by genuine outrage at his racism but by their own racism. When the Anti-Defamation League, a group that worked with the South Africa Secret Police BOSS and sends US Police for training Israel denouncesFarrakhan we can smell the racist hypocrisy a mile off. [See Lenni Brenner, When Israel Was Apartheid’s Open Ally].
Anti-Semitism amongst Black people in the US is reflective racism. It is equivalent to the Jewish reaction to non-Jews and anti-Semites in Russia and Poland which was often chauvinist. When the ADL home in on Louis Farrahkan and ignores Trump, Bannon, Orban and all the other genuinely anti-Semitic white supremacists we can  be sure that what motivates them is not anti-Semitism but support for Zionism.
Nonetheless the apologetics of Alice Walker are deeply depressing. Walker is a brilliant novelist and anyone who has read her tale of racism, abuse and misogyny cannot help but be moved. 
Reactions to Alice Walker's comments
I don’t know what other planets Icke has visite but what is clear is that he is anti-Semitic. Icke isn’t dangerous in the way that the supporters of Tommy Robinson are or the supporters of Zionism are. He is more mad than bad. He believes that an inter-dimensional race of reptilian creatures control the world. His books, the Robots Rebellion and And the truth shall set you freeendorse the anti-Semitic forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. It is incomprehensible that Alice Walker has chosen to endorse Ike.
Reactions to Alice Walker's comments
Isaac Stanley Baker describes the book in the Washington Post thus;
“And the Truth Shall Set You Free,” which draws on the infamous anti-Semitic forgery “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” includes this judgment: “I strongly believe that a small Jewish clique which has contempt for the mass of Jewish people worked with non-Jews to create the First World War, the Russian Revolution, and the Second World War.” The Nazi extermination, he wrote, was “coldly calculated by the ‘Jewish’ elite.”
It is therefore doubly regrettable that Alice Walker, instead of reassessing what she said, dug herself further into a hole. On her own website she defends Icke, as a fellow victim of censorship and denies that he is an anti-Semite even though he holds that Jews in effect organised their own destruction. How would Alice Walker have described someone who said that Africans were responsible for the slave trade? The fact that some Africans collaborated with the slave traders and some Zionists collaborated with the Nazis does not therefore mean that either the Slave Trade or the Holocaust was a consequence of their victims’ actions. Alice Walker wrote:
I find Icke’s work to be very important to humanity’s conversation, especially at this time.  I do not believe he is anti-Semitic or anti-Jewish.  I do believe he is brave enough to ask the questions others fear to ask, and to speak his own understanding of the truth wherever it might lead.  Many attempts have been made to censor and silence him.  As a woman, and a person of color, as a writer who has been criticized and banned myself, I support his right to share his own thoughts.
Walker compares the ‘attempt to smear’ Icke with the attacks on her and supporters of BDS. It is a confused melange.
But if we can ignore the racist ravings and ramblings of her Zionist critics, whose attacks on Walker are motivated only by their own racism the same cannot be said of her Black Jewish critics.  One such is Nylah Burton in Alice Walker’s Terrible Anti-Semitic Poem Felt Personal — to Her and to Me. Nylah writes about the poem It Is Our (Frightful) Duty To Study The Talmud.

Reactions to Alice Walker's comments
It’s chilling to think that such an acclaimed novelist could regard Icke’s work as “a curious person’s dream come true,” but it turned out that Walker’s endorsement wasn’t an isolated deviation. Readers soon unearthed her poem “It Is Our (Frightful) Duty to Study the Talmud,” published on her website in 2017, which confirmed that Walker had been indulging in virulent anti-Semitism, and that it permeated not just her thinking but her work.

Nylah describes how hostility to others can be blinding to oneself yetit seems that Walker has willingly allowed herself to be blinded. “ She describes ‘Our (Frightful) Duty’ as
‘a terribly written poem filled with terrible things. It oozes deep paranoia, defensiveness, and rage. In every single way, it’s ugly.
The “poem” utterly fails as poetry. It isn’t lyrical. Its lines and stanzas are choppy and graceless. Each stanza seems to end with an aggressive exhale, the kind that a person expels when they finish purging the awful thoughts that consume them. In some places, it reads like a rambling lecture delivered by a tenured professor who isn’t afraid to offend her students anymore. At other times, it reads like a Breitbart article with line breaks. There is no artistry here, but there is plenty of trauma.

The most significant stanza is where Walker writes:
For the study of Israel, of Gaza, of Palestine,
Of the bombed out cities of the Middle East,
Of the creeping Palestination
Of our police, streets, and prisons
In America,
Of war in general,
It is our duty, I believe, to study The Talmud.
It is within this book that,
I believe, we will find answers
To some of the questions
That most perplex us.
Yet she couldn’t be more wrong.  The Talmud explains nothing. Attacks on the Jews in Europe often used selective quotes from the Talmud, a book of disputation and interpretation in just the same way as Zionist and Islamaphobes attack Muslim using the Quoran.

According to the sales pitch for Tommy Robinson’s Mohammed's Koran: Why Muslims Kill For IslamIslam is a religion of war and conquest, ... right up until thousands of innocent Americans were wiped out on 9/11.’

Today in Israel racist rabbis such as Yitzhak Shapira and Yosef Elitzur in Torat Hamelech use the Talmud to justify the right of Jews to murder non-Jews, yeah even their infants and suckling babes. Israel’s bloodthirsty Military Rabbinate likewise use the Talmud and the Torah to justify the slaughter and rape of Palestinians.  No doubt a similar exercise could be mounted with respect to the New Testament. It was Christians not Muslims who perpetrated the Holocaust.
But the point to make is that Israel’s murderous barbarities are not caused by the Talmud anymore than the Holocaust was a product of the New Testament or ISIS was the product of the Quoran.  Murderers often resort to religious texts to excuse their deeds but the same texts also exhort us to love thy neighbour as thy self.

Alice Walker and David Icke
We can of course expect the Zionists to denounce Alice Walker as an ‘anti-Semite’.  Although what Alice has done has provided fuel for the Zionist fire, we can disregard their criticisms of her as the ravings of hypocrites and racists. What is however more painful is the criticism from fellow anti-racists and friends and in this category I put the Israeli educationalist Nurit Peled-Elhanan. In A Letter From Nurit Peled- Elhanan, activist, educator, and friend from Israel and a Poem, she expressed her sorrow at what Alice had written:
Nurit Peled-Elhanan
Dear Alice,
I read your poem and the criticism of it and I must react.
The people who torture and kill Palestinian have never studied the Talmud. It is not studied in Israeli state schools. And no one can read it on their own. The ones who study it are the ultra-orthodox Jews such as the pro-Palestinian Neturei Karta in NY.
The quotes (whether true or false) are surely partial and do not characterize this 12 volume work (thousand pages in every volume) whose writing ended thousands of years ago.
The Talmud is not a prescriptive book. It is an endless interpretation of the Torah, always adapting the Torah to present times so that people can live by it. Ethiopian Jews never studied it and lived by the Torah as is.
In these volumes you read discussion and polemics between different sages about every tiny aspect of human life. And the discussions are brought as they happened, more or less because it was all discussed orally.
But the main thing is that each such discussion ends with: “and so they disagreed” and people would choose the interpretation they wanted. Every argument that is brought is immediately countered by an opposite argument and the discussion that ensued. It is always open ended.
In my time we learned a bit of it and I loved it, because it is Logic, like reading Plato. Today schools don’t teach it anymore.
So in order to know what is in the Talmud – which none of the non-orthodox Israelis or Jews know – you have to read at least a whole chapter, pros and cons etc.
One of the most discussed subjects in the Talmud as in the Torah is the treatment of foreigners, workers, slaves etc. Extremely human and enlightening.
I don’t want you to be trapped in superficial propaganda of ignorant people. And again: the reason for the ruthlessness and violence towards Palestinians is not to be found in ancient writings but in Modern ones. It is Modernity and European Enlightenment that brought slavery, colonialism, Fascism and Totalitarianism, national movements such as Zionism and the way to treat people as superfluous. Auschwitz was not prescribed in any ancient scripture, neither is Israeli colonialism.
Much love
Nurit
To which Alice replied:
Prof. Nurit Peled-Elhanan
***
Dear Nurit,
Thank you, Sister Nurit, for not letting go of my hand, while informing me of your views, which I welcome and respect. Though we may have areas still to discuss, and perhaps always will, given the differences in our backgrounds and cultures, my own grip is as strong.
Can you get my website: alicewalkersgarden.com where you are?  If so, please read the entire poem.  Also read a later poem, below, “Conscious Earthlings.” About the necessity of separating “Jews” from Zionist Nazis. I am including it here.
Also, would you mind if I published your letter to help with the discussion, which seems to be, from what I hear, more about shouting. I am open to continuing our dialogue, if you are.
Love,
Alice

This controversy has not been helped by Palestinian writer and novelist Susan Abulhawa, author of Mornings in Jenin who in the guise of supporting Alice has stumbled in with hobnail boots trampling all in her path. Her In defence of Alice Walker argues that Abulhalwa ‘Alice Walker's real 'offence' is not anti-Semitism; it is her unwavering support for the Palestinian cause.’
Alice Walker and Palestinian Women
Yes that probably is what motivates some, but by no means all, of the criticism of Alice Walker, but whose fault is that? Undoubtedly Alice Walker has been viciously attacked for her support for the Palestinians and that includes the routine cry that she is ‘anti-Semitic’
Alice Walker is a good example of how false accusations of anti-Semitism actually create anti-Semitism. In what must be rank as one of the most fatuous analogies Abulhalwa compares the reaction to Alice Walker’s comments to that of Israeli Palestinian poet Dareen Tatourwhom the Israelis gaoled for 5 months for writing a poem:
I am reminded of Dareen Tatour, who was imprisoned by Israel for a poem she posted on Facebook, on the fanciful claim it called for violence against Jews; and Gunter Grass, whom Israel bannedand lobbied to have his Nobel Prize in Literature rescinded because he wrote a poem arguing that Germany should stop supplying Israel with nuclear submarines. Even the work of Mahmoud Darwish, Palestine’s greatest poet, was denounced as the equivalent of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf.
The Board of DYR still lists Lea Tsemel and Ilan Pappe

Unfortunately Abulhawa has kept company with some pretty dodgy people previously and it was only in 2014 with their attack on BDS that she parted company with the Board of Deir Yassin Remembered. DYR, which was formed about 10 years previously, had been taken over by a right-wing American Professor Daniel MacGowan together with an anti-Semitic Israeli/Swedish fascist Israel Shamir and a British holocaust denier Paul Eisen. Its original purpose was to build a memorial to the village of Deir Yassin in Palestine, where a terrible massacre of up to 254 people had occurred in April 1948, as a means of ‘encouraging’ the Palestinians to flee from their homes.
DYR had originally included people like Jeff Halper, Ilan Pappe and Lea Tsemel, all of them Israeli anti-Zionists.  One by one they all resigned from DYR. Yet if you go to the web page today you will still find some of them listed as members. As Halper remarked, “The Deir Yassin Remembered board is like Hotel California, you can check in any time you like, but you can never leave).” See, Jinjirrie, BDS Attacked by the Deir Yassin Remembered
Below is a very moving article by a Black Jewish American, Nylah Burton, about her feelings concerning what Alice Walker has written.

Alice Walker’s Terrible Anti-Semitic Poem Felt Personal — to Her and to Me

The Intelligencer, 26.12.18.

Photo: Peter Earl McCollough/The New York Times/Redux

When I first read Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, I leaned into every word, inhaling Celie’s tragic and triumphant story. In Celie, I felt the presence and pain of my female family members brought up in rural Alabama. In Walker’s unflinching descriptions of misogyny, domestic violence, homophobia, and incest, I saw an open accounting of issues buried deep within the larger southern black community — and within my own family.
Above all, I was drawn into The Color Purple because it was haunted by ghosts — the ghosts of Alice Walker’s past. Eloquently and bravely, she was able to confront generational trauma by telling a universal tale that still felt faithful to her own story. And it was Walker’s ability to throw open the shutters and allow her ghosts — our ghosts — into her writing that made it so revelatory. It cemented her standing as an acclaimed novelist, a civil-rights icon, and a formidable thought leader in the field of black feminism.
That changed abruptly two weeks ago, afterthe New York Timesinvited Walker to list her favorite books in its weekly “By the Book” column. She took the opportunity to promote David Icke’s And the Truth Shall Set You Free, which contains some of the most hateful anti-Semitic lies ever to be printed between covers. As excerpted in the Washington Post, Icke’s book alleged that a “small Jewish clique” had created the Russian Revolution and both World Wars, and “coldly calculated” the Holocaust to boot. Icke has also accused Jews (among others) of being alien lizard people. After a week of criticism, Walker doubled down in her assessment of Icke’s indefensible work, calling him “brave” and dismissing charges of anti-Semitism as an attack on the pro-Palestinian cause.

It’s chilling to think that such an acclaimed novelist could regard Icke’s work as “a curious person’s dream come true,” but it turned out that Walker’s endorsement wasn’t an isolated deviation. Readers soon unearthed her poem “It Is Our (Frightful) Duty to Study the Talmud,” published on her website in 2017, which confirmed that Walker had been indulging in virulent anti-Semitism, and that it permeated not just her thinking but her work.
The ghosts in The Color Purple helped me to better understand my own identity and the suppressed history of my ancestors — a journey I’m constantly engaged in as a black Jewish woman. But the ghosts in “It Is Our (Frightful) Duty” leave me with more questions than answers. How did Walker’s curiosity curdle into paranoia? How was her commitment to improving the human condition twisted into support for genocide apologists? How could the artist who helped America to better understand black women use her writing to promote the oppression of another group?


Why I am standing for the post of Secretary of Palestine Solidarity Campaign

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Self congratulation, timidity and caution bordering on obsequiousness is not the stuff of a solidarity campaign!

Introduction
Why you may ask, after having co-founded PSC 37 years ago, have I decided now to stand for the position of Secretary? I was a member of the Executive for the first decade of PSC’s existence. At my time of life I have better things to do and if I have any ambition left the position of Secretary of PSC is not one of them.
My reasons are that I feel a responsibility to an organisation which could do so much and yet is trapped by a cautious conservatism in its desire to become part of the political establishment. PSC is an organisation which makes a fetish of routinism but which has few response mechanisms. Every year the Executive presents much the same Annual Report to the AGM which dutifully passes it, because it is unheard of for the AGM to hold the Executive to account. Then another year passes by in which PSC is conspicuous by its absence from the political attacks which the Palestine solidarity movement is living with.
Above all I want to stimulate a debate about where the Palestine solidarity movement in this country is going. We should not be afraid of having such a discussion if we are serious about building towards the day when Israel goes the same way as apartheid South Africa. Nonetheless I have no doubt that the Executive will resent the fact that I have decided to raise these issues and stimulate a wider debate.
This is the first time in living memory that there has been a contest for an officer post, yet I am allowed only 100 words to explain my reasons why. I will be allowed 1 minute to speak from Conference floor. Ideally each candidate should be allowed 5 minutes with questions and answers. Instead we have what is in effect a beauty contest. Hence why I am presenting this manifesto.
The Zionist ‘Anti-Semitism’ Campaign
For over 3 years we have seen an unprecedented wave of attacks on the Palestine solidarity movement and BDS with false allegations of anti-Semitism being the main weapon of attack. Israel’s supporters have been joined in this enterprise by the opponents of Jeremy Corbyn. This is not just a British phenomenon but Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party has enhanced this phenomenon.
And whereas once support for Zionism and Israel was more evident on the Labour left today support for the Palestinians is found almost wholly on the left of the political spectrum. 80% of Tory MPs are members of Conservative Friends of Israel. The Lib-Dems ditched the 2 parliamentarians who supporter the Palestinians – David Ward and Jenny Tonge.
False accusations of ‘Anti-Semitism’ have become the weapon of choice for a whole range of right-wing, Islamaphobic, reactionary and even anti-Semitic politicians. The press, including the Guardian, sings the same Zionist theme tunes. We have the absurdity that non-Jews, often themselves anti-Semitic, can attack Jewish anti- Zionists as ‘anti-Semitic’ because they reject the idea of a Jewish supremacist state. A list of far-Right luminaries from Tommy Robinson,Katie Hopkins, Steve Bannon.and even the neo-Nazi founder of the alt-Right Richard Spencer, all combine Islamaphobia and anti-Semitism but are nonetheless described as ‘friends of the Jews’ by the Zionists.
Until 2015 a regular feature at PSC AGMs was the attendance of Jeremy Corbyn, who was our main parliamentary sponsor. His election as leader of the Labour Party should have been the occasion for great rejoicing. Instead Jeremy has been forced repeatedly onto the backfoot by the onslaught against him. Unlike Stop the War Coalition the voice of PSC was silent at this time as the campaign against him gathered steam.
When the attacks on anti-Zionists in the Labour Party – Jackie Walker, Ken Livingstone and myself – were at their height, PSC was nowhere to be seen. Even though the Israeli Embassy was up to its ears in what was happening, as Al Jazeera’s documentary The Lobby demonstrated, PSC chose to see, say and hear nothing.
A need for debate and reflection
In the wake of the 2005 call for BDS the Zionist movement engaged in a period of internal debate and reflection. The time is long overdue when we need to begin engaging in serious debate about where we are going and how we meet the ideological attacks upon us rather than having puffed up reports whose only purpose is self-congratulation. Is our propaganda as effective as it could be?  Is PSC for example simply concentrating on Israeli human rights abuses to the exclusion of saying anything about what its vision is for a non-racist Palestine?
I have never seen a Report to PSC Conference which said what had gone wrong or which analysed their mistakes. Everything is always rosy in the PSC garden.
Palestine solidarity is not simply a human rights but a political campaign. If all we are concerned about is human rights then what is happening in Burma and Yemen far exceeds the suffering of Palestine. Israel is different because Apartheid and settler colonialism are different. In the words of Albert Luthuli, the President of the ANC and a Nobel Peace Prize winner, you can change your politics but never the colour of your skin. That is the essence of our case against Israel.
On 9th December and again on 31st December (repeated in the Annual Report) PSC boasted that ‘In November we had our biggest Parliamentary Lobby Day ever’ with nearly 3000 PSC members and supporters contacting 600 MPs’on the question of arms sales and the treatment of Palestinian children. Undoubtedly this is a good thing but if this is all we say then it will be futile. There is no point in simply concentrating on human rights abuses to the exclusion of having anything to say about the state that perpetrates those abuses. We alsohave to emphasise that these atrocities stem from the nature of the Israeli state itself as a Zionist and Jewish supremacist state.
Quality is more important than quantity. What is the purpose of lobbying if we don’t aim to build a core group of MP’s who support the aim of a non-racial Israel/Palestine? All but 8 Labour MPs endorsed the IHRA definition without even a free speech caveat.
We should also be having a lobby over the question of a full-scale boycott of settlement produce and sanctions on Israel itself in the wake of the Jewish Nation State Law. The cry we should be taking up is why are sanctions on Iran and Russia ok but it is anti-Semitic if Israel is the target?
ZIONISM
It is not enough to be supporters of Palestinian rights if we are not also opponents of the state that took away those rights. ZIONISMis the official ideology of the Israeli state. It says that when the choice in Israel is between a Jew and a non-Jew then the former has priority. That was the meaning of the Jewish Nation State Law. Discrimination is carried out in the name of the Zionist ideals.Yet Zionism is a word that PSC Executive avoids like the plague. If you go through the whole agenda for the forthcoming PSC AGM, the word is used 4 times – twice in the resolutions and twice in my own 100 words! PSC Executive recoil from describing Israel as it is – Israel Apartheid is a consequence of Zionism. Zionism began from the basis of ‘a land without a people for a people without a land.’ Israel is a Jewish supremacist state just as South Africa was a White Supremacist state and Northern Ireland was a Protestant Supremacist statelet. The Zionists don’t like the term ‘Zionist’.  They say it is a word of abuse.  We should say, ‘yes, Zionism is abusive.’
Without understanding Zionism you cannot understand why Israel does what it does. It is the fact that Israel is a state, not of its own inhabitants but the mythical Jewish People that makes it racist.
Partners
But if PSC Executive are loathe to use the word Zionism, despite there being a World Zionist Organisation and a Zionist Union, they are more than happy to use the word partner.  It occurs no less than 33 times in the Reports. Not once are we told what this partnership entails and whether these are alliances of convenience or genuine partnerships.
I am reminded of Sir Roy Welensky, the Prime Minister of Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) who described his ‘partnership between the Whites and Africans as being between the rider and his horse.
We are told that one of the ‘partners’ is Jewish Voice for Labour. If that is so why did PSC not support the counter-demonstration to the Zionist ‘Enough is Enough’ demonstration on March 26th outside Parliament when the false anti-Semitism campaign was in full swing? A demonstration attended by Norman Tebbit and Ian Paisley. JVL, supported by Labour Against the Witchhunt called a counter demonstration but PSC was nowhere to be seen.
PSC claims that it worked ‘with partners to secure the passing of a motion at Liberty’s AGM condemning the IHRA.  This is not true.  One individual in JVL was responsible for this motion passing and if it were true why has there been no follow-up with these self same partners to ensure that Liberty’s Executive acts on this motion? Liberty has done absolutely nothing about this policy at a time when the IHRA has been used to attack our freedom of speech.
As for the trade union ‘partners’.  Has PSC ever, even once, raised with them the idea that they should oppose the IHRA. In the words of Sir Stephen Sedley, the Jewish former Court of Appeal judge, the IHRA terms anti-Semitic all except anodynecriticism of Israel as anti-Semitic.
The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-Semitism
There has been a concerted attack this year on any criticism of Israel that questions its fundamentally racist nature. The IHRA has been adopted, not only by the Labour Party National Executive but by over 150 local Councils.  At a national level the voice of PSC has been almost wholly absent and it is simply dishonest to pretend otherwise.
When JVL and LAW called a large demonstration outside the Labour Party National Executive Committee meeting on September 4th where was PSC? There were around 300 people on the demonstration and a variety of Momentum and trade union banners but there wasn’t even one PSC banner. Nationally PSC made no attempts to mobilise support for the lobby. It is as if the IHRA was irrelevant.
The IHRA conflates support for the Palestinians with anti-Semitism. Calling Israel a racist state has already led to workers and trade unionists being victimised yet PSC has remained silent.
Most major trade unions are affiliated to PSC.  What attempts did PSC make with UNISON and UNITE to persuade them not to support the IHRA? UNISON’s Dave Prentis has gone out of his way to be friendly to the Jewish Labour Movement. They have a great deal of influence in the Labour Party yet virtually all of them supported the IHRA.
There is no evidence that PSC even raised the IHRA with the trade unions. It is of course good that UNISON has given support to the campaign over child prisoners and pensions but what use is this if UNISON also gives support to a Zionist campaign that alleges opposition to Israel as a Jewish state is anti-Semitic?
The IHRA is part of an international effort to restrict Palestine solidarity.  In the USA it takes the form of direct attacks on those who support BDS. In France BDS has been all but outlawed. We ignore it at our peril.
Israeli Apartheid
It is good that PSC calls Israel an Apartheid state but if we are serious we need to respond to the Zionist argument that Israel is the world’s only Jewish state. We should be clear that we are opposed, in principle, to any religious state especially those which define ethnicity and nationality in terms of religion because from this flows rights and privileges which are accorded to members of that ethnicity. This is what makes Israel different from Iran and Saudi Arabia and for that matter Britain which is also nominally a Christian state.
We should be explicit - Jews are members of all nations. They are not a separate nationality. This is an anti-Semitic and racist idea. One Jewish state is one too many. A Jewish settler-colonial state i cannot be other than an ethno-nationalist i.e. apartheid state.
What is PSC For?
We have to balance actions and campaigns with politics. I say that as someone who has always been an activist. Support for Israel in the West is primarily political, in a way that it wasn’t with South Africa. South Africa had greater resources in terms of mineral wealth than Israel. Israel is more economically vulnerable.
My first actions as a political activist were with the Boycott of the South African Springbok Rugby team in 1970. We didn’t though face a significant pro-Apartheid lobby in Britain. Ministers didn’t fall over themselves to laud South Africa as the ‘only democracy in Africa.’ Israel does possess a powerful lobby. Crucial to destroying support for Israel is destroying the myth that Israel is a democratic state.
We should also recognise where our strengths and weaknesses lie. The majority of British people support the Palestinians. The majority of the elites support Zionism. We should proceed on that basis.
What are we fighting for?
One difference between South Africa and Palestine is that the former possessed a unified national liberation movement. The Palestinians don’t. The PLO is a shell. There is no one organisation we can take a lead from. We have to listen to grassroots Palestinians who tell us that the two state dream is dead (if it ever was alive).
The growing international support for one-state in Israel/Palestine has passed PSC by. It has become obvious that Israel has no intention, if it ever did, of relinquishing control over the Occupied Territories. The Occupation is there to stay. Those who perpetuate the illusion of a two state solution are effectively condoning the continuance of apartheid.
It is extremely welcome that the new American-Palestinian Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, has come out in support of a one-state solution. Is it too much to ask that PSC now has the same courage?
Our role as a solidarity organisation is to convince people that we have a vision. It is not enough simply to oppose what Israel does. What do we want to see is a question that people ask of us.
If Rashida can do it so can PSC
It is time for PSC to stop using the weakness of the Palestinians as an excuse to say nothing, a lamppost to lean on and say loud and clear that we support a single, unitary, democratic state in the whole of Palestine. 2 States is dead.
Today it is the Zionists who support the two state solution. Why? Because they know it will never happen. 2 States means a Palestinian Bantustan. Labour Friends of Israel proudly proclaim that they support an two state solution. If we believe that Israel is an Apartheid state why would we want it to continue?
Israel is NOT a democratic state – that should be our message
In the bulletin sent out on 9thDecember headed ‘An incredible month for the Palestinian solidarity movement.’ there was a photograph of a PSC meeting in the House of Commons with Emily Thornberry, Shadow Foreign Secretary addressing the meeting. This is the same Emily Thornberry who is quoted as stating that
‘People who believe Israel does not have the right to exist should be drummed out of the Labour Party.’
Far from challenging Thornberry to disavow her support for Labour Friends of Israel PSC uncritically gives her a platform. In an interview with The Standard she boasted that “I joined Labour Friends of Israel when I became an MP in 2005. I support the Palestinians’ right to have a state and I support the state of Israel.’
Emily Thornberry supports both the oppressor and the oppressed. At the UK Israel Conference 2017’organised by the main Israel lobby group in this country, BICOM Thornberry gushed:
‘Let me start by thanking BICOM and the Jewish News for inviting me to today’s historic event and once again for giving me the opportunity to emphasise the Labour Party’s long-standing, unstinting and unequivocal support for the State of Israel’ and continued
 ‘even today despite the challenges that we must address in respect of relations and rights of the Palestinian people modern Israel stands out as a beacon of freedom, equality and democracy... in a region where oppression, discrimination and inequality are too often the norm.’
Electronic Intifada described her speech thus:
The UK Labour Party’s shadow foreign minister Emily Thornberry gave a speech last month that could have been written by a pro-Israel lobbyist.
In a groveling address in front of the Israeli ambassador at the Labour Friends of Israel annual dinner, Thornberry attacked BDS, the Palestinian-led boycott divestment and sanctions campaign.
She claimed BDS was “bigotry against the Israeli nation [that] has never been justified.” She said that “boycott of its products, its culture or its academics” was akin to “hatred of the nation and its people.
Instead of appeasing our enemies perhaps PSC could organise a lobby of parliament on the theme ‘it’s time to Boycott the State of Israel’.
The Palestinian Authority – A Quisling Authority
When the Apartheid regime in South Africa sponsored the Inkatha Freedom Party, under Mangosuthu Buthelezi , in order to portray the anti-Apartheid struggle as riven by Black on Black violence, the Anti-Apartheid Movement denounced this apartheid stooge.
Abbas's security forces prevent demonstrations in Ramallah
In Palestine today we have what Electronic Intifada has described as a Vichy regime. The PA openly collaborates with Israeli security forces, something which Mahmoud Abbas has described as ‘sacred’. The PA is an enemy of the Palestinian people yet PSC has never uttered even one word of criticism. On the contrary it maintains close relations with the Palestinian ‘Embassy’ in London. It is no accident that whilst Trump has withdrawn all funding from UNRWA and Palestinian education he has ring-fenced money for the PA’s security forces. Why are we silent? Is the torture of Palestinians by Abbas’s collaborators more acceptable than their torture by Israel’s Shin Bet?
Debate on Oslo Accords in London Labour Briefing October 1993 (date on article is wrong)
In 1993 I published an article on the Oslo Accords. Virtually everything I wrote in the article has come true.  The faces of Israeli police have been replaced by Palestinians. The PA’s primary role is suppressing the Palestinian struggle.  PSC’s purpose is to support the Palestinian struggle, regardless of whether their enemy comes in the guise of a Zionist or a Palestinian.
The need for a Strategy for the Palestinian solidarity movement
Anyone reading the latest Report from PSC Executive to Annual Conference 2019 would think that the movement goes onwards and upwards.  All we need to do is to work a little harder.
There is no sense that the struggle for Palestine liberation is, above all, a political one. Every victory, be it against HSBC or Veolia is of course welcome but the road is going to be a long and hard one. PSC should also stop trying to claim credit for victories like HSBC when it is clear that  War on Want did the original research that laid the basis for our triumph.
We need to soberly assess our strengths and weaknesses and also our opponents’ strengths and weak points. Self-congratulation and pretending that everything is right are the hall marks of a political sect not a genuine solidarity organisation.
PSC should be encouraging its branches to have programmes of internal political education. Most peoples’ knowledge of the history of Zionism and for example Mandate Palestine under the British is poor. Apart from anything else it would be the most effective means of dealing with tropes about ‘Rothschild Zionism’ and other anti-Semitic nonsense that people come out with. For example how many people know that the origins of Zionism are Christian not Jewish? A series of educational fact sheets would not go amiss.
PSC has barely if at all grown in the past decade. It was 5,000 a decade ago. We are told that growth in membership for the past year has been 31% which would be impressive if we had been told the membership figures a year ago!
We could begin by assessing our own strength.  In most branches national PSC members constitute a minority. It would be useful to know the membership of each branch and for that matter how many branches are genuinely active.
Branch development should be at the forefront of PSC’s activities. There should be a branch membership officer. PSC should be more than the sum of its branches.  At the moment the opposite is true.
Civil Liberties for Palestinian supporters are under attack
In the past year or so there have been frequent attacks and disruptions of Palestine meetings. Speakers such as Tom Suarez and Jackie Walker have had meetings either disrupted or banned altogether. There is a concerted campaign, led by the Board of Deputies and the CAA to try and close down our activities. We even had a group of about 30 or so Zionists halting the Balfour Day march last year.
We should launch a national campaign around free speech on Palestine specifically designed to halt the attempts to close down meetings on Palestine/ Zionism under the pretext of ‘anti-Semitism’. We should approach other organisations such as the Quakers and Liberty to highlight the Zionist attempt to suppress Free Speech on Palestine. We could do worse than having a printed leaflet ready for groups and branches facing attempts to prevent them holding meetings.
PSC has so far done nothing about the group of Zionist fascists who I’ve named and shamed on my blog. This should end. We should be devising a strategy to put an end to these disruptions. We should consider forming a stewards group in London to prevent physical attacks on meetings and we should also be working with groups like the Islamic Human Rights Commission whose own Al Quds demonstration has come under attack by a combination of far-Right Zionists and Tommy Robinson supporters this year.
We should give critical support to this demonstration and rebut the suggestion that Hamas or Hizbollah are terrorists. The political use of the ‘terrorist’ label should be opposed. Terrorism means the use of violence against civilian targets and there is none more guilty of terrorism than Israel.
We should also work with and encourage groups of activists like Inminds.  PSC should stop being sectarian.

PSC Executive
The Executive needs a shakeup. It resembles a clique, a self-perpetuating group of friends. We need to open up the Executive to activists in the branches. The Constitution makes provision for 5 Regional representatives but the Executive has ignored this provision. Their election should be a priority in the coming year.
Tony Greenstein

YOU SAW IT HERE FIRST – In August This Blog Exposed James Goddard as a Zionist & Tommy Robinson Supporter

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When Fascist Loudmouth James Goddard Harassed Palestinian Supporters the Guardian and Mail Looked Away but Harassing a Tory MP is Different



James Goddard, the fascist bully who hectored Owen Jones, Anna Soubry and others came to the attention of this blog last August after the Al Quds demonstration on Palestine when he was active, with a mix of fascists and Zionists in opposing this peaceful 33 year old Palestinian demonstration.
We also revealed that Goddard was working with London cabbie Martin Hizer, a supporter of the neo-Nazi Jewish Defence League who bellowed at and threatened liberal Jews who said the Kaddish, the prayer for the dead, at a ceremony in front of Parliament in memory of the scores of young Palestinians who were mowed down by Israeli gunfire. For Hizer no amount of Palestinian deaths is sufficient. Truly is he a good Judeo Nazi.

Goddard also worked with Laurent Kachauda, a fascist convicted of a violent assault on a lone French Jewish woman, Olivia Zemor. Sentenced to 6 months imprisonment he is an organiser of Herut France.
Goddard with London Cabbie Martin Hizer (left) and right on the Zionist demonstration against the Al Quds demonstration
The picture below shows Hizer on the day of the Free Tommy Robinson march on Sat 9 June with James Goddard. Goddard was the main speaker at the rally alongside Dutch fascist MP Geert Wilders and he spent most of his time appealing to the crowd to join in the anti-Palestine demo the next day. Second pic shows Goddard (on left holding EDL flag) at counter-demo on Sun.10 June.
Britain's biggest left-wing bookshop attacked by fascists last August
Goddard was also involved in the Nazi and UKIP invasion of the left-wing Bookmarks shop in London in August.  He is also a wannabee Tommy Robinson. Robinson has made himself a millionaire out of his 'martyr; status and Goddard wants a piece of the action.  Unfortunately both Goddard’s Facebook and Paypal accounts have been taken down.  It’s a tough life for today’s fascists on the make.
UKIP leader Gerard Batten and Goddard
Interestingly these fascists called Anna Soubry, the Tory anti-brexiteer a ‘Nazi’. They called Owen Jones a fascist and Nazi. Now of course Soubry is a Tory not a fascist and Owen Jones is a soggy reformist.  
Once again the spectacle of fully fledged fascists and neo-Nazis calling non-fascists or even anti-fascists Nazis.  Now who does that remind you of? That’s right.  It is the same trick played by the Zionists.  They too accuse anti-fascists of being racists, anti-Semites and Nazis.  Today we have the phenomenon of fascists knowing how objectionable they are calling their opponents ‘fascist’.  But if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, the chances are.... And all the time they make common cause with the supporters of Israel.
James Goddard at a meeting to oppose a mosque in Golders Green - Sharon Klaff speaking

THEODOR HERZL — VISIONARY OR ANTISEMITE?

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The Founder of Political Zionism Re-examined


Theodor Herzl was the founder of Political Zionism.  He wasn’t the first Jewish Zionist. That ‘honour’ belongs with Moses Hess, a one-time associate of Marx who wrote Rome & Jerusalem in 1862. But Hess’s work was published in a void, the time wasn’t ripe. Jews weren’t interested. Hess was open about his rejection of class politics: race struggle is primary and class secondary. It was a principle that became fundamental to Zionism.
The Germans hate the religion of the Jews less than they hate their race- they hate the peculiar faith of the Jews less than their peculiar noses. Reform, conversion, education and emancipation - none of these open the gates of society to the German Jew; hence his desire to deny his racial origin... The tendency of some Jews to deny their racial descent is equally foredoomed to failure. Jewish noses cannot be reformed, the black wavy hair of the Jews will not be changed into blond by conversion or straightened out by constant combing. The Jewish race is one of the primary races of mankind... The Jewish type has conserved its purity through the centuries
Hess’s writings can be found in Arthur Herzberg’s compendium of Zionist writers, The Zionist Idea.  As you can see anti-Semitism was to Zionism what Laurel was to Hardy. They were Siamese twins.  The next major Zionist figure was Leo Pinsker who wrote Autoemancipation in 1882.  He formed the first Zionist group, The Lovers of Zion and in 1882 the first Zionist settlers set off for Palestine, the first Aliyah.  However they were few in number and became like traditional colonial planters rather than Zionist settlers.  They exploited the natives rather than excluded them.
The foremost figure in the foundation of Zionism was Herzl. A Viennese journalist he was irreligious.  His only son Hans was not circumcised.  He advocated mass conversion to Catholicism at first.  He too saw the Jewish Question as a racial not religious matter and he wrote what was the founding pamphlet of the Zionist movement, The Jewish State.
Herzl's memorial
There have been many biographies of Herzl but the best by far is Desmond Stewart’s Herzl Artist and Politician.
Leon Rosselson above
The article below by Leon Rosselson is excellent and well worth reading. His conclusions are impeccable. That whereas Herzl solved the contradiction between being a Jewish and a democratic state by erasing the Jewishness, Israel has erased its democracy.
Leon Rosselson
The future of Israel is that it will become more and more racist and repressive until it becomes a fully functioning police state.  Leon is wrong only in saying it will become a fascist state.  Fascism is a different model of authoritarian state.  Settler colonialism involves an alliance between different settler classes but for Palestinians these are distinctions without a difference.
Theodore Herzl
It is probably ironic that Herzl would probably be the first to throw up his hands in horror if he saw what his Frankenstein has become.  Because, as Leon Rosselsson explains, Herzl was not much of a Jew.  Indeed if he could have become a non-Jew, a Christian, he would have done. But the point about anti-Semitism in the late 19th century was that conversion was no longer enough.  Anti-Semitism had become transformed from feudal religious to racial anti-Semitism.
As Rosselson shows Zionism began from an acceptance of anti-Semitism and its disdain for the gutter ghetto Jew. Indeed much of what the early Zionists said about Jews was no different from the anti-Semites said.
Read and enjoy.
Tony Greenstein
Leon Rosselsson
Herzl is everywhere in Israel. It would be difficult to find a town without a street named after him. He is memorialised in the names of boulevards, parks, squares, a city (Herzliya), a forest, a sprinkling of restaurants, a museum and even a national cemetery — Mount Herzl. His portrait hangs in the plenum hall of the Knesset. His birthday — Herzl Day — is observed as a national holiday. This is to be expected. After all, was he not the founder of the Zionist project and the Jewish state?
What, though, does the average Israeli citizen know about Herzl? Not a lot, I suspect. Do they know he was reprimanded by his rabbi in Vienna for celebrating Christmas with a Christmas tree? Do they know he refused to have his son, Hans, circumcised? That his first solution to ‘the Jewish problem’ was a mass conversion of Austrian Jews to Catholicism?‘It should be done on a Sunday, in St. Stephen’s Cathedral, in the middle of the day, with music and pride, publicly,’ he wrote.
Palestinian refugees
There’s an amusing youtube video in which a journalist presents a number of Israeli students with a quote from Herzl and asks who they thought wrote it. Every one of them says Hitler. They are shocked to discover the truth; the Herzl they’d learned about in school could not have written such an antisemitic statement. This is the quote: AN EXCELLENT IDEA ENTERS MY MIND — TO ATTRACT OUTRIGHT ANTI-SEMITES AND MAKE THEM DESTROYERS OF JEWISH WEALTH.
They didn’t know the half of it. What would they have said about this quotation from an article Herzl wrote in the Deutsche Zeitung newspaper?
The wealthy Jews rule the world. In their hands lies the fate of governments and nations. They start wars between countries and, when they wish, governments make peace. When the wealthy Jews sing, the nations and their leaders dance along and meanwhile the Jews get richer.
This could have come from the notorious antisemitic forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. So what is going on here?
Herzl was born in Budapest in 1860. His parents were secular, assimilated, German-speaking Jews and he himself admired German culture, philosophy, art, literature as the acme of Western civilisation. As a student at Vienna University, he joined the German nationalist fraternity, Albia, whose motto was Honour, Freedom, Fatherland, though he did later resign in protest at the antisemitism that he encountered. Like many educated, German-speaking Jews, he had nothing but contempt for the mass of religious, Torah-abiding, Yiddish-speaking, shtetl-dwelling Eastern European Jews. There is nothing in his writings to suggest that he had any great attachment to Judaism or much interest in or knowledge of Judaic teaching.
And this was his dilemma. He was educated, cultured, rational, an admirer of Germany’s enlightened civilisation, a model citizen of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in all respects except one: he was a Jew, the ‘other’. And even though his Jewishness meant little to him, he could not divest himself of this label and so could not be fully accepted. No wonder he found the idea of converting to Christianity so appealing.
I give praise to every Jewish parent that decides to convert to Christianity,’ he wrote. And again: ‘I have a son and would sooner convert today to Christianity than tomorrow so that he would start being Christian as soon as possible to spare him the injuries and discrimination that I suffered.’
Ben-Gurion reading the Declaration of Israel's Independence
His son, Hans, who wasn’t circumcised at birth, seems to have had an identity crisis for most of his life. He did have himself circumcised when he was 13, after his father’s death. In 1925 he became a Baptist, then, shortly after that, declared himself a Catholic. A year or so later, he wrote in a letter to the London Jewish Daily Bulletin, “I consider myself a member of the House of Israel.” In 1930, when he was 39, he shot himself.
Ultimately, Herzl decided that conversion could not be the answer and that, as he wrote in his diary, it was empty and futile to try and combat antisemitism. In his book, Der Judenstaat, published in 1896, he explains why: ‘The Jewish question exists wherever Jews live in perceptible numbers. Where it (i.e. antisemitism) does not exist, it is carried by Jews in the course of their migration. We naturally move to those places where we are not persecuted and there our presence produces persecution…. The unfortunate Jews are now carrying the seeds of Anti-Semitism into England; they have already introduced it into America.’
In a later chapter, he argues that the immediate cause of antisemitism is
our excessive production of mediocre intellects, who cannot find an outlet downwards or upwards — that is to say, no wholesome outlet in either direction. When we sink, we become a revolutionary proletariat, the subordinate officers of all revolutionary parties; and at the same time, when we rise, there rises also our terrible power of the purse’.
In short, the responsibility for antisemitism lies with the Jews. They carry its seeds within them. It’s their fault for being Jews.
Der Judenstadt translates as The Jewish State but it might more accurately be translated as The State of the Jews because there is almost nothing that is specifically Jewish about Herzl’s vision. Much of the book is concerned with the practical arrangements for transferring Jews to the Jewish state — those who remain behind, he argues, will soon disappear altogether — and for setting up the structures, physical, legal, constitutional, of the new state. He envisages a state that more or less replicates the advanced class-based capitalist societies of Europe. ‘I think a democratic monarchy and an aristocratic republic are the finest forms of a State’ but the Jewish state will be an improvement because ‘we shall learn from the historic mistakes of others … for we are a modern nation and wish to be the most modern in the world’.
And where will this state be? He hovers between Argentina, fertile land, plenty of space, sparse population, mild climate, and Palestine -‘our ever-memorable historic home’. In Palestine, he writes, ‘we should there form a portion of a rampart of Europe against Asia, an outpost of civilisation as opposed to barbarism’. Zionism has always sold its state as an oasis of Western civilisation in a desert of Arab backwardness — ‘a villa in the jungle’, as Ehud Barak put it. Or a state that would further Britain’s imperial interests in a region of great strategic importance, as Weizmann promised Balfour. Or, as one might put it now, America’s post Six Day War watchdog in the Middle East.
Did Herzl know Palestine was already populated? Of course he did. In 1895, he wrote in his diary:
‘We shall try to spirit the penniless population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it employment in our country. But the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.’
Like many early Zionists he thought that the views of the Palestinian population could be discounted and that they had no political rights and should have no say in the matter.
When he discusses the language of the new state, he dismisses Hebrew as impractical. As for Yiddish: ‘We shall give up using those miserable stunted jargons, those Ghetto languages which we still employ, for these were the stealthy tongues of prisoners.’ Instead, ‘every man can preserve the language in which his thoughts are at home’. There will be a ‘federation of tongues’ until the most useful language wins out. The Jewish religion? In its place and no further. ‘We shall keep our priests within the confines of their temples…. They must not interfere in the administration of the state…’ There is no mention of the Sabbath or of celebrating the Jewish festivals. Even the flag has no Jewish symbolism, no Magen David, only seven golden stars on a white background.
Herzl claimed that he was motivated to argue for a Jewish state in order to solve the problem of antisemitism. But his solution was tantamount to removing the Jewish people from the countries where they lived, depositing them in Palestine and erasing as far as possible any expression of their Jewishness.
Herzl's fantasyland
In 1902, Herzl published a novel called Altneuland (Old-Newland). It is set in Palestine where a new Jewish state has been established. He describes this new state as absorbing all the best ideals of every nation. There is no conflict with the indigenous Arab population. One of the heroes is an Arab engineer, Rashid Bey, who says: ‘The Jews have made us prosperous, why should we be angry with them? We live with them as brothers, why should we not love them?’ A Palace of Peace is built in Jerusalem to arbitrate in international disputes. Religion is respected but plays absolutely no part in public affairs. Many languages are spoken, Hebrew is not the main one. Non-Jews have equal rights. A fanatical rabbi named Geyer (a bird that eats carrion in German) forms a party which attempts to disenfranchise non-Jews because ‘this is a Jewish state and only Jews should have the right to citizenship’. In the end, they are defeated by the liberal opposition who argue that ‘it would be immoral to exclude anyone, whatever his origin, his descent or his religion from participating in our achievements …Our motto must be now and ever — Man you are my brother.’
Ahad Ha'am
A fine example of wishful thinking but Herzl’s utopian fantasy is infinitely preferable to the dystopia that is Israel today. It was, though, heavily criticised for imagining a Jewish state that had nothing Jewish about it. Ahad Ha’am (Asher Ginsberg), the writer and founder of cultural Zionism who opposed Herzl’s political Zionism, denounced the book.
Anyone examining this book will find that in their state the Jews have neither renewed nor added anything of their own. Only what they saw fragmented among the enlightened nations of Europe and America, they imitated and put together in their new land.’
He also attacked Herzl’s naivety in portraying the Arab population as welcoming enthusiastically the Jewish colonists.
Ahad Ha’am
So the 1895 Herzl who, in order to bring about his Jewish state, advocated removing the Arab peasants from their land so that they could be replaced by Jews, seven years later imagined a Jewish state where the relationship between Jew and Arab was harmonious and conflict-free and all were equal citizens. Doesn’t this point to the impossible contradiction at the heart of the Zionist project? The state that Herzl most admired, his model state, was a European liberal democracy like Germany. In order to create that model in the state of the Jews, he had to remove from it anything that was exclusively Jewish. The less Jewish, the more democratic. The more Jewish, the more it would exclude non-Jews and therefore the less democratic it would be.
The Zionist parties that fought for and in 1948 succeeded in creating a state were Jewish nationalists. Their state would be not only of the Jews but for the Jews: the nation state of the Jewish people — all of them. They were clear that the state could only survive in that form by, as Herzl had explained, driving out the majority of the non-Jews who lived there. Maximum land, minimum Arabs was the political imperative.
Ze'ev Jabotinsky - leader of the right-wing Revisionist Zionists
They were with Herzl also in his contempt for Jewish life in the diaspora and were determined to create the new pioneering Jew, Hebrew-speaking, self-confident, healthy, sturdy, everything that they believed the diaspora Jew was not. Chazak ve-ematz, they said: be strong and courageous. Israel would represent, as Uri Avnery put it, ‘the total repudiation of all forms of Jewish life in exile, their culture and their language, Yiddish’. From Ben-Gurion on the left to Jabotinsky on the right, they expressed a distaste bordering on shame for the ‘ghetto Jew’ and the ‘money Jew’. David Ben-Gurion (born David Grun) said of diaspora Jews: ‘They have no roots. They are rootless cosmopolitans — there can be nothing worse than that.’ According to Ze’ev (formerly Vladimir) Jabotinsky:
Our starting point is to take the typical Yid of today and to imagine his diametrical opposite … Because the Yid is ugly, sickly, and lacks decorum, we shall endow the ideal image of the Hebrew with masculine beauty. The Yid is trodden upon and easily frightened and, therefore, the Hebrew ought to be proud and independent. The Yid is despised by all and, therefore, the Hebrew ought to charm all. The Yid has accepted submission and, therefore, the Hebrew ought to learn how to command. The Yid wants to conceal his identity from strangers and, therefore, the Hebrew should look the world straight in the eye and declare: “I am a Hebrew!”
Extract from Herzl's Diaries - showing his clear anti-semitism
Jabotinsky
In Israel’s early years, it was possible to believe that it was a democratic state. Of course, you would have to ignore the fact that the Palestinian minority who had not fled or been driven out in the 1947/48 war were living under military rule, subject to curfews, administrative detentions, expulsions and land theft. When I was in Israel in 1958/59, no-one mentioned the word ‘Palestinians’. As ‘Arabs’, they had no presence in public life. And the secular Israelis who I mixed with were not greatly concerned about Jewishness. They considered themselves Israeli first and Jewish a long way after, if at all. For them Jewishness was the religion and its repressive laws which they resented. No politician ever called for Israel to be recognised as a Jewish state. It wasn’t necessary.
But when military rule was lifted in 1966, Palestinians began to play more of a part in public life. They began to organise themselves politically. And then there was the Six Day War and the occupation and the settler movement and over the decades the number of Palestinians in Israel grew and they started to protest against land expropriations and house demolitions so that they began to be viewed as a problem and then as the enemy and as a demographic threat. But a demographic threat to what? To Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people, of course, and to its Jewish character, whatever that may be. It’s not that this self-definition had ever gone away but now it needed to be asserted. And with the two intifadas, anti-Arab racism grew and religious fanaticism, particularly among West Bank settlers; and the demand that Israel be recognised by the Palestinian leadership as a Jewish state became a deliberate political block on any genuine peace negotiations; and inevitably, inexorably, under governments of both left and right, Israel grew to be what it is now, a segregated, racist state where apartheid is enshrined in the recently enacted Nation-State Law.
Herzl, in Altneuland, solved the contradiction between a Jewish state — i.e the nation state of the Jewish people — and a liberal democracy by virtually erasing its Jewishness. Israel has solved the same contradiction by erasing its democracy.

I wonder what Herzl would have made of this manifestation of his solution to antisemitism, this militarised ethnocracy, where the Rabbinate controls the laws pertaining to marriage, divorce and burial, where 50 rabbis from the Orthodox religious establishment declare that Halachic law forbids Jews from renting or selling apartments to non-Jews, where two settler rabbis interpret the commandment Thou shalt not kill as only applying to Jews killing other Jews not to gentiles, where 30% of the Jewish population don’t want to work with ‘Arabs’ and 50% of Israeli Jews would rather not have an ‘Arab’ as a neighbour and 56% of Israeli Jewish high school students believe that ‘Arabs’ should be barred from becoming members of the Knesset.
Not much like Altneuland, then. And it will get worse. Because Jews are not a nation. And if the Israeli nation continues to exclude the quarter of its population that is not Jewish, it will become more religious, more intent on Judaizing land and laws and policies, more repressive and more intolerant of dissident views until it reaches its journey’s end as a fully-formed fascist state.


Zionist Attack on Angela Davies, Symbol of the Black anti-Racist Struggle, Backfires

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Once again the Israel Lobby Abuses the Holocaust to support Racism and Apartheid


It is a familiar tale. A heroine of the Black struggle expresses their support for the Palestinian struggle and the Boycott of Israel and the Zionist lobby immediately uses the memory of the Jewish dead of the Holocaust in order to plead the cause of Israeli Apartheid.
The same people who have nothing to say about Trump’s war against migrants or Netanyahu’s cosying up to anti-Semitic rulers such as Hungary’s Orban, Brazil’s Bolsinaroor Poland’s Mateusz Morawiecki and who either turn the other way when Steve Bannon is in town or who positively welcome him, are up in arms when a Black woman, a legend in her own lifetime, a former Black Panther, prisoner and member of the US Communist Party, is honoured.
When the Birmingham Civil Rights Instituteawarded the Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award to Angela Davies, who has been a symbol of the fight against racism and oppression, these miserable Holocaust hucksters immediately cried ‘anti-Semitism’. Of course Angela Davies hadn’t uttered even one word that was hostile to Jews as Jews.
This didn’t stop the Zionist Birmingham Holocaust Education Center writing to the Executive of the BCRI saying that it found Angela Davies’s support for BDS ‘very troubling as it targets the Jewish people excessively.’ Well yes, it’s probably true that those who are the primary targets of BDS are Jewish. This is not surprising as it is Israeli Jews who are practising a form of Apartheid.  However they are no more targeted becausethey are Jewish than South Africans were targeted because they were White.
The actions against Angela Davies have produced an immediate reaction and caused Israel to be even more associated with White racism.  When the cowardly corporate Directors of the BCRI withdrew the Award they were immediately deluged by an avalanche of protests. The Zionist Holocaust centre began backtracking and the Directors were forced to resign including their Chairman, Mike Oatridge, a former Honda Executive.
As Palestine Legal, saidthe rescinding of the Award put Davis on
"a long list of scholars and activists who have been censored, fired, de-funded, defamed, harassed and targeted with frivolous litigation because of concerted efforts by the Israeli government and anti-Palestinian organizations in the U.S. to silence debate."
The Zionist attempts to humiliate and ban Angela Davies and the reaction to them are a sign of the increasing weakness of political Zionism in the USA. Following on from their inability to promote a Bill in the Senate making support for BDS akin to a crime and the recent election of Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, a supporter of BDS, the Zionist hold is beginning to weaken in the USA as the Jewish community itself becomes more divided. For this we can thank, at least in part, Donald Trump.  Indeed according to Netanyahu, Evangelical Christians are Israel’s best friends. For American Jews that isn’t true.
Tony Greenstein

Angela Davis, Photo Source: Courtesy of Columbia GSAPP. Creative Commons license // Birmingham Watch

PRESS RELEASE                      Tuesday January 8, 2019
Birmingham City Council
Contact: Chiara Perry
Phone: 205-254-2036

On the heels of the news that broke over the weekend that the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute rescinded an award that was to be presented to Dr. Angela Davis, the Birmingham City Council unanimously passed a resolution of support for the civil rights icon.

The BCRI issued a statement saying “supporters and other concerned individuals and organizations, both inside and outside of our local community, began to make requests that we reconsider our decision,”and claimed Davis did not meet the criteria for the Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award.

It has since been reported that Davis’s long-time support of Palestine and calls for a boycott of Israel was seen as an issue for the BCRI board.
Councilor Steven Hoyt issued this statement during today’s City Council meeting regarding the matter (he later called for a resolution of support that was unanimously approved):

“I want to say something about what we’ve experienced in the last couple of days since we learned on Saturday that the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute decided to withdraw an award that was to be given to Dr. Angela Davis.
 It is absolutely embarrassing to withdraw an award and it’s disingenuous that we would be selective in our measure of one’s humanity without considering the totality of their lives. We are products of our experiences, so where is the grace in this matter? She didn’t nominate herself. The nominating committee deemed her worthy and now she’s not. All money isn’t good money, especially if it’s contingent on a partial view akin to “don’t shout until I tell you to shout.”
 Where is the inclusivity? The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute was founded principally to embrace all cultures and all people from all walks of life. In the academic community, professors like Dr. Davis have freedom. Colleges like UAB don’t agree with everything that every professor says. But we are to respect their opinions because sometimes their teachings can provoke new thoughts. So to judge someone by a portion of their work and not the body of their work is just not right.
 Here we are in a society where banks owned slaves. Do we stop using those banks? We have former presidents who owned slaves and yet do we not honor them as founding fathers of the United States of America? So where is the grace? It’s disheartening and embarrassing that you would judge a person by a segment of their life.
 This woman lived it. A bomb couldn’t have gone off at Center Street and she not experience it and yet we’ve forgotten about that part. We let a few people decide how we celebrate the black community. That’s an indictment. We all should be outraged because this was the epicenter of civil rights. Her influence is international and this makes it look like everyone respects her but us. She’s a champion for women’s rights, race relations and here she has an opportunity to be honored by her hometown and this is how it get’s handled. I’m embarrassed to serve in a city that would support this.
 George Wallace said “Segregation now, segregation forever,” but he said he changed his heart. We accepted that and there were a whole lot of black folks that voted for him to be governor.
 But now we have this woman — I want to emphasize, this woman, because they wouldn’t treat a man like that — and you treat her wrong. It’s not right. You can’t mischaracterize a person for one part of their life when their work is so broad and their heart is inclusive.
 There are some things that are in the works where the city still plans to honor her. She’s one of our daughters. It’s important that young people know the body of her work. Not just a piece of it. Sometimes it takes an outside voice. She’s gone into communities around the world to bring awareness to humanitarian issues. Her entire life has been about bringing civil rights to all people. And for that we must honor her and celebrate the life of one of our own.”
This press release was written by Cody Owens, Public Information Officer, in the Birmingham City Council Office of Public Information. For media inquiries please contact the Interim Director of Public Information, Chiara Perry at 205.254.2294.

January 9, 2019
Birmingham Watch
Retired federal judge U.W. Clemon spoke during a Birmingham Committee for Truth and Reconciliation press conference in support of Angela Davis. Jan. 9, 2019.  Source: Solomon Crenshaw Jr. // Birmingham Watch

Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s controversial cancelation of its plan to honor civil rights icon Angela Davis continues to generate aftershocks.
A grassroots collection of civic, religious, legal, educational and business leaders announced Wednesday that it will honor Davis in a day that will conclude with an evening event – A Conversation with Angela Davis.
Earlier in the day, three members of the BCRI board of directors announced their resignation from that body. Chairman Mike Oatridge, first vice chairman Walter Body and secretary Janice Kelsey stepped away, effective immediately.
In a joint statement, the three said it was an honor to be associated with the institution, its leadership, staff and supporters.
As members of this board, we regret the circumstances surrounding the selection process regarding the 2018 Reverend Fred L. Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award and the dissension this has caused,” the release read. “We care deeply about this institution and its continued success. … It is hoped this move will enable the City of Birmingham to create a board structure that will best enable the BCRI to continue its critical mission in the future.”
The BCRI had chosen Davis to receive the Shuttlesworth award during its annual gala next month. But several days ago, the institute rescinded that offer and canceled the gala, saying in a statement that Davis “does not meet all of the criteria on which the award is based.”
Standing in the middle of Kelly Ingram Park and across the street from BCRI on Wednesday, members of the Birmingham Committee for Truth and Reconciliation said it will honor Davis, a Birmingham native, on Feb. 16.
The committee, reconstituted from a civil rights group active in the 1960s, includes 31 persons. Among its members are former Birmingham Mayor Richard Arrington, retired federal judge U.W. Clemon, Birmingham Times founder Jesse Lewis and Woke Vote founder DeJuana Thompson.
During the press conference, Thompson read excerpts from an open letter to Davis, their “shero.”
We want you to know that Birmingham stands with you,” she read. “Dr. Davis, we will not allow any denial of your life, legacy and impact around global human rights to persist because we love you, we honor you and we will fight with you.”
Clemon said later he did not know why BCRI had revoked its invitation to Davis. He added that he thought the move was completely inappropriate “and I so expressed it to everyone that I know.”
“To the extent that it was revoked, it was because of her position on the Palestinian situation,” he said. “Her views are identical to mine. I believe there is a longstanding injustice in the Palestinian relationship with the state of Israel.”
AL.com reported having obtained a Jan. 2 letter from Birmingham Holocaust Education Center to the board of directors of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, expressing “concern and disappointment” with BCRI’s honoring activist Davis with the Fred L. Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award at its annual gala and urging the Institute to “reconsider your decision.”AL.com reported that BHEC cited “recent outspoken support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel.
Reading from a prepared statement at the press conference, retired circuit judge Houston Brown said Birmingham Committee for Truth and Reconciliation believes,
“There can be no healing or reconciliation of our deep divisions without truth and honest dialogue. We look forward to celebrating Dr. Davis and honoring a true icon who once called Birmingham home.”
Details of the Feb. 16 events will be released later. “As far as the committee is concerned, the events will be open to the public,” Clemon said. “We don’t anticipate there will be any charges to the public for contact to Miss Davis.”
Retired circuit judge Houston Brown announces day to honor Angela Davis during Birmingham Committee for Truth and Reconciliation press conference Jan. 9, 2019. The events will be Feb. 16, the same day the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute had planned to honor her during a gala before rescinding its offer last week. Video for BirminghamWatch by Solomon Crenshaw Jr.

Birmingham Institute’s recission of Angela Davis award over BDS becomes an embarrassment to pro-Israel groups that applied pressure

Philip Weiss on 7 Comments
There are two big stories involving Israel and BDS in the American news this week. One is the Senate Republicans pushing a bill to punish supporters of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions and thereby divide the Democratic Party.
The other is the uproar over the decision by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute to rescind an award to Angela Davis because of the activist/scholar’s support for BDS, which one Birmingham Jewish group claimed “targets the Jewish people excessively.”
Davis was to receive the Fred Shuttlesworth prize on February 16. The BCRI changed its mind about the award, and canceled the gala, because of what is being reported as pressure from the Jewish community.
The story is proving to be a giant embarrassment to both the Civil Rights Institute and those Jewish organizations, showing the overreach of the Israel lobby. Angela Davis is now being showered with praise and the Institute is being condemned internationally; so much so that the top three officers of the organization resigned within days of rescinding the award (the chairman is a former Honda executive). And one Jewish organization that applied pressure on the BCRI has tried to back away from its own letter to the Institute!
Roy Johnson, a reporter for AL.com, summarized the scandal on Roland Martin’s show.
This has been a big blow to the institute, it’s been a black eye that certainly extends around the world, the coverage has been global. You had to see some heads roll… The board is in the crosshairs of a lot of people in this city.
Both the Birmingham City Council and the Birmingham School Board made statements in support of Angela Davis, a native daughter of the city. Davis will be honored at a “grassroots” event on February 16, Johnson said; and it sounds like that event will be a gala of its own. “Organizations around the city are coming out in favor of honoring Angela Davis.”
Johnson stated bluntly that the decision was a mistake. He is still trying to determine “how they came to this extremely bad decision, and what were the factors, what were the pressures… and how they could not see this fallout coming.”
As for those pressures: “It came… due to pressure from Jewish organizations, from many Jewish organizations in the city.”
Two of those organizations are the Birmingham Holocaust Education Center and the Birmingham Jewish Federations. The executive director of the Federations publicly condemned the award on the organization’s Facebook page (a post later removed, according to NPR). The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute is surely sensitive to the Federations because, according to federal nonprofit filings, the Institute has received many gifts over the years from people who also give money to the Federations.
As for the Holocaust Education Center (BHEC), Roy Johnson reported at AL.Com that on January 2, its board sent a letter to the Institute, in which it “expressed concern and disappointment” over the award and urged the Institute to “reconsider your decision.”
In the letter, obtained by AL.com, the organization cited
“recent outspoken support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, [which] is very troubling as it targets the Jewish people excessively.
“We do not suggest that Israel should be immune from criticism,” it continued, “but BDS ignores gross human rights transgressions by other countries around the world and focuses solely on Israel, the world’s only Jewish state.”
Johnson reported that the BHEC’s entire executive committee and its director signed the letter but they are now trying to walk it back.
Our intention was to go on record about our concerns in a private letter sent to BCRI leadership,” [Board President Deborah Layman] said in an email to AL.com, responding to query about the BHEC’s letter. “We had no further part in the decision made by BCRI to cancel the event, and we were surprised at their decision.”
Regrets they’ve had a few: “I haven’t run across anyone in the Jewish community that expected that BCRI would comply with their request and then cancel their event,” Johnson said on Roland Martin’s show.
The award had also been slammed in Southern Jewish Life magazine, which headlined its story: “Prominent BDS activist Davis to receive Civil Rights Institute’s Shuttlesworth Award,” and referred to Shuttlesworth as a “towering” figure in the civil rights movement.
The embarrassment is resonating in terms of black-Jewish relations, of course. The two groups were allies during the civil rights struggle, but BDS is evidently pushing the mainstream Jewish organizations apart from black institutions. And people are making the connection between Davis’s rebuke and CNN’s firing of Marc Lamont Hill because he had said at the U.N. that Palestine should be free “from the river to the sea.”
The list of casualties is a long one. I’d add history teacher Joel Doerfler’s resignation from the Riverdale Country School last spring after he came under an onslaught of pressure for his pro-Palestinian views, mounted by donors to the school who met privately with the American Jewish Committee to coordinate their campaign. And of course the firing of Steven Salaita at the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign after he had tweeted his outrage over the Gaza massacre of 2014 and the school’s chancellor sought to “appease among others, pro-Israel donors.” The chancellor later resigned from UIUC largely because of the embarrassment that case caused. But Salaita’s career was in the process derailed.
The Angela Davis case looks to be different because the pushback is so instantaneous, the embarrassment so keen, and the damage is being experienced by the bad guys, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, the Birmingham Holocaust Education Center, and the Jewish Federations.
On that Roland Martin show, Joe Madison of Sirius XM radio says,
“It takes you back to the 60’s and even the 50’s… I’m just so glad that Fred Shuttlesworth is not alive to see this.”
Rina Shah Bharara  says what Rashida Tlaib says (and is being unfairly maligned for saying), this is about the American interest:
“Last I checked this is the United States of America, it’s not Israel. This whole idea of defending Israel at all costs is so confuses me on so many levels. I see it happening most out of the right. It’s coming out of the left as well. The conflict between Israelis and Palestinians… why we can’t inject our American ideals into this… and say this is wrong.”
While William Spriggs, an economist at Howard University says something we are bound to hear more and more as BDS breaks up the Democratic Party’s traditional affiliation with Israel:
“It creates division within the progressive community when we don’t need division.”
More responses. The NPR story on the case quoted Jewish Voice for Peace:
To argue that Angela Davis is unworthy of a civil rights award is beyond shameful. And to dance around the fact that it’s due to her outspoken support of Palestinian rights makes it outrageous.”
A JVP Academic Advisory Council letter in support of Davis–
“The decision seems to stem from a misinformed view that to advocate for Palestinian human rights is somehow offensive to the Jewish community”
has over 350 academic signatures. JVP is also collecting signatures from non-academics.
And here is a National Lawyers Guild statement:emphasizing the ways that the civil rights movement inspired BDS.
it is appalling that the award would be rescinded due to Dr. Angela Davis’s support of Palestinian political prisoners, and the nonviolent Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
The BDS movement is part of a long tradition of freedom movements using economic pressure as a non-violent tactic. This legacy is particularly strong in the American South. In fact, Omar Barghouti, a co-founder of the movement, points out BDS was“ inspired partly by the American civil rights movement.” The well-documented and internationally recognized violations of Palestinian human rights by the Israeli government and military are an intentional consequence of ideological, political, legal, economic, and military systems known better as Zionism.  BDS is not, and should never be confused with, anti-semitism. Rather, it is our moral consciousness put into action. Suggesting that BDS is synonymous with anti-semitism invisibilizes Jews, including members of the NLG Southern Region, who oppose the state of Israel’s human rights record and support BDS as a non-violent resistance strategy.  Palestine matters because ending colonialism matters. Palestine matters because we must stand up and say that all people have the right to dignity, and self-determination. Palestine matters because the fight against global white supremacy won’t be over until the structural inequalities throughout Israel/Palestine are addressed and made right.
The NLG makes the obvious connection to the Republican Party’s efforts to go after BDS, an effort many Democrats will surely join after the shutdown ends!
This week the US Senate attempted to bring bill S1 to the floor that would attempt to silence the BDS movement and chill our freedom of speech. Dr. Angela Davis has always spoken truth to power, and devoted much of her lifelong activism to international solidarity.  By connecting U.S. grassroots campaigns against state violence and racism to movement struggles in other parts of the world, Dr. Davis helps the world become more intimate. She brings us closer to understanding the nature of justice, and that the collective work needed to dismantle systemic injustice requires that we call out all oppression.
I’d note that Alabama Senator Doug Jones was one of four Democratic senators to side with Republicans on that BDS measure in a vote two days ago. And Doug Jones is a former vice chair of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. He surely feels much of the pressure that the BCRI did. I imagine donorsare a concern for him.

Infamy, infamy – the Jewish News has got it in for me!

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What kind of state is it whose Ministers Urge Other Countries not to fund their human rights groups? a Zionist state

Louise Ellman's War Against Palestinian Children

Sometimes I feel like my favourite comedian, Frankie Howard, whose catchphrase in the immortal Up Pompei was ‘infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it in for me.’  Almost every week I seem to provide copy for the Jewish News. I’m not quite sure what I’ve done to deserve it. It’s getting to the stage where, if I catch a cold, the headline in the Jewish News will be something like:
‘Tony Greenstein who was expelled from (insert your favourite organisation) claimed he caught a cold this week. However we have good reason to believe he was just trying to avoid getting expelled from the local chess club.’
The Jewish News Political Editor and according to his own description a 'so-called journalist'
Jack Mendel, the 'so-called journalist' took pride in reporting me to Twitter for having dared to disagree with him and boasted that I had been removed -  however he kept silent when I overturned the ban!
First it was their ‘so-called journalist’ (his description not mine) Jack Mendel @mendelpol. Jack had called Israel the victim of Hamas aggression on Twitter when we all know that the Israeli state has been playing the innocent victim for the past 70 years. When I explained that when Nazi Germany invaded Poland in 1939 it too had claimed victim status Mendelpol saw red (or blue).
This headline is like saying the Pope is a Catholic - perhaps I should have said that the anti-Semitism witchhunt was about genuine antisemitism?
Unable to muster a reply he cried ‘hate  speech, anti-Semitism’ etc. and  complained to Twitter, who promptly banned me. We then had the spectacle of a ‘journalist’ boasting he had managed to censor an opponent. However he who laughs last laughs longest. As a result of a sustained campaign with help from Canary, Mondoweiss and Electronic Intifada Twitter agreed to reverse their decision. @Mendelpol has been very quiet ever since!
Spot the difference between the Jewish Chronicle headline above and the Jewish News one below
Like its sister paper, the Jewish Chronicle, the Jewish News was pleased that my account had been taken down by Medium over a post correctly linking North West Friends of Israel to Tommy Robinson supporters - Free Speech and Zionism being a contradiction in terms
I'm worried that if I blow my nose in public there may be a Jewish News reporter lurking in the bushes

The JN’s latest headline concerns my decision to stand for Secretary of Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Entitled Expelled Labour activist Tony Greenstein standing to be Secretary of PSC (because it is essential that the JN’s readers are reminded that the Fake Anti-Semitism Campaign Managed to Catch At Least One Jew) readers are also told that ‘
According to this headline I've been suspended from UNISON, according to a later article I've been 'booted out' - the problem with Internet Newspapers is that they have no standards

‘Jewish anti-Zionist, who has also been booted out of Unison trade union too, launches a bid to become the secretary of Palestine Solidarity Campaign.’

Of course I sympathise with the author of the article, one Joe Millis. It must be terribly difficult remembering an article which your paper carried all of two months previously Notorious anti-Zionist Tony Greenstein is suspended from Unison union for three yearsStill, if one week is a long time in politics, as Harold Wilson observed, then two months must be an eternity for ‘journalists’ like Millis.
One of many shock horror headlines from the Jewish News - anyone expelled from the Labour Party is an untouchable according to the Zionists
Any cub journalist knows that it’s a cardinal rule of journalism not to mix fact and opinion. That’is how you tell the quality press from the tabloids. Except that all the quality papers, bar the Torygraph, are tabloids these days! The phrase ‘notorious anti-Zionist’ might just suggest a certain bias unless the word ‘anti-Zionist’ is a synonym for notoriety.
Another pathetic Jewish News headline - Momentum is criticised because I hold one of its banners - Momentum isn't the Nazi Party - it can't control its grassroots - this non-story quotes the JLM saying Momentum should 'abide by the party's decisions' - I wasn't aware the Party had decided I was banned from holding a Momentum banner!!
And then there is the other difficulty Millis faced and it is indeed perplexing. How to include all the organisations I have been excluded from.  I was expelled from the SWP’s previous incarnation, the International Socialists in 1973 and if they really want to go back far enough then I was expelled from the King David High School in Liverpool in 1972. It has been a career of expulsions. The only institution that I can think of that didn’t expel me was Brighton Polytechnic.  But although they didn’t expel me (I was Student Union Vice-President for 2 years) they did blacklist me because I’d organised one too many occupations.
Quite when I made the transition from a 'controversial' Jewish anti-Zionist to a 'notorious' one is not known
We only found this out when we occupied Assistant Director, Robin Plummer’soffice in the Art College. When we opened his filing cabinets (his secretary had helpfully left the keys in the desks) we found a memo from Director, Geoffrey Hall asking that any attempt by me to enrol on a course to be referred to him! Oh and I haven’t been expelled, not yet anyway, from the National Autistic Society!
That was why I became the only Jewish student at the Roman Catholic Teacher Training College of St Mary’s College in Strawberry Hill, Twickenham. The person who interviewed me, Father Michael Prior, was both a supporter of liberation theology and the Palestinians (he founded Living Stones). I guess these days Michael would also be considered an anti-Semite.
I was, as I’ve already written, suspended last October for 3 years from UNISON for protesting the refusal of London Regional Organiser, Cllr. Steve Terry, to defend a member who had been sacked for saying that the Zionists collaborated with the Nazis, which is a matter of record. Sacking someone for exercising the right to freedom of expression under Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights was outrageous enough, failing to defend their member was even worse and I pulled no punches in describing Terry’s scabby behaviour for what it was.
But strangely enough in Unison until your appeal is heard you are still a full member. For over 2 months I have heard nothing which means I am still a full member of Unison. So naturally I penned a letter to the Jewish News explaining their errors. However since the Zionist rag doesn’t have a letters page I suspect that it will be disappear into the ether. However you can read it here.
QUESTION: In what state are Human Rights groups Seen As The Enemy? ANSWER: Emily Thornberry’s Beacon of Freedom – ISRAEL
Emily Thornberry and other apologists for Israel pretend that Israel is a beacon of light and freedomin the Middle East. Thornberry witteredin a visit to Israel about how ‘I love the liberal democracy that is Israel. And it’s in contrast to many other countries around it.’  In a grovelling address at Labour Friends of Israel annual dinner’ in November 2017, Thornberry declared that
‘even today... modern Israel stands out as a beacon of freedom, equality and democracy, particularly in respect of women and LGBT communities.’
And she sent on to declare that BDS was ‘bigotry against the Israeli nation.’ The irony of that remark, which betrays Thornberry’s fawning ignorance, is that there is no Israeli nation. That is why Israel is an apartheid state. Israel is not a state of its own inhabitants but a state of its Jewish citizens. There is, in Zionist mythology, a Jewish nation, of which Israeli Jews are a part, but unlike all other states Israeli citizenship is not coterminous with nationality. Israel is different from most other countries – it has no common nationality for all of its citizens.
Another way in which Israel differs from all democratic states is that Israeli ministers, including the Prime Minister, on their trips abroad lobby other governments not to support Israeli human rights organisations, in particular B’tselemand Breaking the Silence. Thus in a visit in October Netanyahu gave Angela Merkel a letter which
lamented the federal funding given by Germany to dozens of organizations, including political foundations and aid groups operating in Palestinian territories.
Amongst the organisations that the Israeli government was targeting was
the leftist Israeli political magazine +972, whose authors “regularly accuse Israel of apartheid”; the Evangelical relief organization Bread for the World that supports initiatives such as the Coalition of Women for Peace, which supported boycott campaigns against Israel; and the international film festival Berlinale, which allegedly regularly welcomed supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement as guests.
Not content with this list of organisations, the letter went on to single out a particular target viz. the Jewish Museum in Berlin which had the audacity to show a special exhibit on Jerusalem that reflected "largely the Muslim-Palestinian view". It is also claimed that the state-funded Berlin Jewish Museum ‘regularly organizes events and discussions with prominent BDS supporters.’ Israel is used to organisations in the Jewish diaspora faithfully following the line laid down by Israel.  So you can understand the anger felt by Netanyahu that some countries take freedom of speech seriously.
Israeli Government Foreign Minister Hotoveli went to Switzerland to Lobby Against an Israeli Human Rights Group Breaking the Silence
Netanyahu is not the only one. In June 2015 the Jerusalem Post reportedthat
‘Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely declared war on the left-wing Breaking the Silence NGO on Tuesday, calling for an “urgent meeting” in the ministry to come up with steps to counter the group’s actions in Switzerland.’
Hotoveli, who is a religious nutcase, was particularly worked up by an exhibition by the soldiers’ group Breaking the Silence which reveals the atrocities and war crimes committed by the army. ‘She said she had also directed Israel’s embassy in Switzerland to immediately consider ways of working against the exhibition.’
This is the ‘democratic’ state that Labour’s Shadow Foreign Secretary believes is a ‘beacon’ in the Middle East. Apart from demonising human rights groups, Israel is a state that uniquely has made torture legal, which uses imprisonment without trial, not just in the Occupied Territories but in Israel itself against Palestinian Israelis, has an all pervasive censorship and of course does little things like confining Palestinians to 3.5% of Israeli land because 93% of land is ‘national’ i.e. Jewish national land.
Naturally Thornberry in her speech to LFI trotted out such things as womens’ equality and LGBT since pinkwashing is an Israeli speciality.
What Thornberry didn’t say was that Israel’s love of gays is strictly for foreign consumption. Within Israel it is a different story. Most Israelis are hostile to gays, especially the Orthodox. In Jerusalem, in 2016 16 year old Shira Banki was stabbed to death and 5 others injured by an Orthodox Jewish assailant who went wild with a knife.  Police had allowed him access to the demonstration despite his having only recently been released from prison for similar stabbins at a previous Gay Pride demonstration.
Israel also refuses to accept the idea of gay marriage because it would cut across the hostility felt across the Zionist spectrum to miscegenation, sex across racial borders. Gay marriage would not fit in with the existing separation of the population. Likewise surrogacy rights for  gay couples have been rejected by the Knesset.
Strangely enough, neither the Jewish News or the JLM commented on Netanyahu's embrace of Brazil's new fascist President - clearly it's a match made in heaven
Of course when Netanyahu recently visited Brazil for a 5 day visit, Israel’s pinkwashing went out the window altogether. As the Jerusalem Post reported
Netanyahu steered clear, as he did throughout his five-day visit to Brazil last week, of any reservations regarding the president’s controversial positions – opponents accuse him of an authoritarian streak – or disparaging comments Bolsonaro has made in the past about gays, women and minorities.’
In fact this report in itself is a bit, how should we say, underwhelming. Bolsonaro hasn’t merely made ‘disparaging comments’he stated explicitly that if he saw 2 men kissing in the street he would hit them, which is a green light for anti-gay violence.  None of this disturbed Netanyahu who was certainly not going to allow gay rights to get in the way of a warm relationship with the new fascist kid on the bloc.  Among Bolsinaro’s more repulsive comments were his statementthat
It is difficult to think of a single repressive regime that  Israel doesn't embrace - because Netanyahu is only following in the footsteps of Israeli Labour governments
"I would prefer my son to die in an accident than show up with a mustachioed man,"
Israel is nonetheless a beacon of light in Emily Thornberry’s eyes. Thornberry is a woman who is being tipped as a replacement when Jeremy Corbyn stand down or is pushed.
Tony Greenstein

Israeli artists urge Germany to reject funding cuts to groups critical of Israel

Israel accused HRW director of supporting BDS

Written by Polina Garaev
Israel accused Human Rights Watch's local director of supporting the campaign to boycott the country
THOMAS COEX (AFP/File)
Israel reportedly made the demand of Germany in October

BERLIN -- Israeli artists are urging German authorities to reject Jerusalem’s demand to cut funding to institutions critical of Israel, including Berlin’s Jewish Museum and the city’s world-famous film festival.

According to German media, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself conveyed the request to Chancellor Angela Merkel during her visit in October.
The demand was passed on in the form of an unsigned seven-page letter from the Israeli government, which was first published in December in the German left-leaning daily Taz. The letter lamented the federal funding given by Germany to dozens of organizations, including political foundations and aid groups operating in Palestinian territories.
Among the organizations mentioned in the letter are the Israeli political magazine +972, whose authors “regularly accuse Israel of apartheid”; the Evangelical relief organization Bread for the World that supports initiatives such as the Coalition of Women for Peace, which supported boycott campaigns against Israel; and the international film festival Berlinale, which allegedly regularly welcomed supporters of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement as guests.
The letter also criticized the Jewish Museum in Berlin, now showing a special exhibit on Jerusalem that reflects "largely the Muslim-Palestinian view". It is also claimed that the state-funded museum, which is not affiliated with the local Jewish community, regularly organizes events and discussions with prominent BDS supporters.


Jerusalem exhibition in Berlin's Jewish Museum
i24NEWS, Polina Garaev
“The German support of non-governmental organizations that intervene in Israel's internal affairs or promote anti-Israel activities, is unique,” read the Israeli letter. “We would like to see the Federal Government tie its further financial support to the complete stop of such activities.”
The German daily FAZ later reported that the letter was handed by Netanyahu directly to Merkel during the intergovernmental consultations that took place in Jerusalem in October. The newspaper also noted that the German Foreign Ministry demanded a high-level meeting in Berlin, to clarify the letter, but that was canceled by the Israeli side.
The request stirred significant controversy, also among Israeli artists. On Sunday, 63 of them – including film director Udi Aloni, whose work has been featured in the Berlinale on multiple occasions – published an open letter in the Taz, proclaiming their support for Berlin’s Jewish museum and calling the Israeli demand “shocking.”
“We reject these attempts to curtail the freedom of cultural expression, which are part of a larger campaign by populist and ultra-rightwing governments worldwide to limit the scope of critical thought – and, where possible silence it altogether,” read their letter.
“We therefore call on the German government, its parliament, its media, and the broad public to resist this specious demand, and, more broadly to beware of the attempts by the Israeli government and its anti-liberal allies to export this damaging culture of fear and censorship to other democratic domains.”
In a previous statement, the museum rejected the accusations of the Israeli government.
“We believe that an open discussion involving sometimes controversial views is essential to enable our visitors to form their own, differentiated judgment,” stated a spokeswoman for the museum.
She also stressed that all speakers participating in its events represent their own private opinions.

Polina Garaev is i24NEWS's correspondent in Germany.

The Jewish Labour Movements Cruella

Dame Louise Ellman MP’sWar Against Palestinian Children
How despicable can one get? Louise Ellman MP, together with Tory and even a DUP MP, is seeking to cut the funding for the education of Palestinian children
You have to hand it to Louise Ellman the Zionist MP for Tel Aviv South (& occasionally Liverpool Riverside). She really doesn’t like Palestinian children. 
When Sarah Champion introduced a debateon January 16th 2016 condemning Israel’s horrific treatment of Palestinian children – torture, beatings, night-time arrests etc. there was Louise Ellman on her feet justifying everything the Israeli army was doing – all in the name of ‘security’ of course – See for example Two-thirds of Palestinian Minors Testify to Abuse in Israeli Detention
Louise Ellman has gone out of her way to defend this - any party that considered itself progressive let alone socialist would have removed her long ago
For the past 70 years Israel has specialised in using ‘security’ as the excuse for ethnic cleansing, demolition of homes and villages, torture, arbitrary detention without trial etc. Ellman is well versed in the black arts of using ‘security’ to explain human rights abuses. See  Louise Ellman - Supporter of Israeli Child Abuse - Night Time Arrests, Beatings and Incarceration of Palestinian Childrenand Palestinian Children are Caged like Animals with the support of Labour's Despicable MPs Louise Ellman and Joan Ryan
Now this despicable woman has gone one step further.  She’s trying to cut off funding for Palestinian schools on the grounds that their curriculum teaches them to ‘hate’ those who fire tear gas at them as they are going to school, who invade their houses night and day, beat up their parents, confiscate their land and keep them in poverty.  Ellman operates on the theory that if it wasn’t for the ‘inciters’ of the Palestinian Authority (Netanyahu’s collaborators) then Palestinians in the West Bank would come to love their occupiers.  Even the Nazis didn’t pretend that those whose countries they occupied would come to love them.
In fact the exact opposite is true.  It is Israeli schools which teach their children to hate Arabs through their portrayal of Arabs as terrorists and ‘baddies’. There are no good role models of Palestinians in the Israeli curriculum. See for example Biased new study skirts around racism in Israeli school booksby Professor Nurit Peled-Elhanan of Tel Aviv University.
Thus it was that in a debatelast week on a motion International Development Assistance (Palestinian National Authority Schools)moved by Louise Ellman and 11 other MPs she began:
 I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to prohibit international development assistance to schools operated by the Palestinian National Authority that do not promote values endorsed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization;
This is incidentally the same UNESCO that Israel has leftbecause it refuses to accept that Jerusalem belongs to the Zionists only. It isn’t as if the West Bank isn’t poverty stricken enough as it is, with the withdrawal of all aid to UNWRA by Trump.  Louise Ellman of the Jewish Labour Movement is trying to do her little bit to make it even more poverty stricken whilst helping the occupation too.
In fairness Ellman wasn’t alone.  Her accomplices in this vile attack on Palestinian children were
Joan Ryan, joan.ryan.mp@parliament.uk, joan@joanryan.org.uk, @joanryanenfield,
Theresa Villiers, theresa@theresavilliers.co.uk,
and Bob Blackman, bob.blackman.mp@parliament.uk.
Guto Bebb, a nasty right-wing Tory MP didn't like being challenged over why he wants to cut the funding for Palestinian education
You may wish to contact them to let them know your feelings. Do be polite to these creatures.

Brexit – Doing Nothing is Not a Political Strategy – Labour has no Option but to Support a Second Referendum

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There is no Lexit - Leaving the EU is a Project of the Right and far-Right
Barring a miracle Theresa May’s deal with Europe, backstop and all, is likely to be rejected by a hefty majority in the Commons tomorrow. It is quite possible that May herself will resign although it is equally possible that she will have to be dragged out of Downing Street kicking and screaming.
Of one thing we can be sure. There is nothing at all progressive or socialist in cutting our ties with the European Union. The problem with the EU is not that it is leading to European integration or the loss of a mythical sovereignty but that capitalism, based as it is on nation states, is incapable of achieving the goal of European integration.
The original 6 members of the EEC
The project for European unity began as a consequence of World War 2 with the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951. A common market in iron and steel was created under the control of a supranational Higher Authority. Iron and steel competition had symbolised the drive to war in previous decades.
At the time the UK, which still had an Empire, refused to join what became the European Common Market. It was only with the humiliation of the Suez War, when the United States forced Britain into retreating that the UK began to orientate to the EEC. As Dean Acheson, Harry Truman’s Secretary of State observed, “Great Britain had lost an Empire and not yet found a role.” It was a way of casting scorn on the special relationship’ with the United States.
Charles de Gaulle - French President
Three times, Britain applied to join the Common Market. The first application, in July 1961 by Harold MacMillan, was vetoedby the French President Charles de Gaulle. The second application in May 1967 under Harold Wilson was also vetoed by de Gaulle. It was only the third application under Ted Heath, by which time de Gaulle was dead, that was successful.
The Labour Party came to power in February 1974, in the wake of the Miners Strike when Ted Heath called a General Election under the banner ‘Who Rules the Country’ – he got a rude shock when the electorate said it wasn’t him! Harold Wilson had held the Labour Party together by promising to renegotiate our terms of entry and then hold a referendum. After gaining minor concessions the referendum in 1975 produced a 2-1 majority in favour of remaining in the EEC.
The left of the Labour Party, Tony Benn, Michael Foot and Barbara Castle joined forces with the Tory Right – people such as Enoch Powell and Teddy Taylor – to campaign on an openly nationalist basisagainst the EEC. The Out campaign warned that the EEC ‘"sets out by stages to merge Britain with France, Germany, Italy and other countries into a single nation," in which Britain would be a "mere province". What a terrible thing!
The opposition of the Labour Left to the EU has always been a pale reflection of the Right, based on a nostalgia for when Britain was ‘great’.  At a time when MAGA is the slogan of Trump and the alt-Right it should not be difficult to see the parallels.
The 1970’s were a time of unparalleled class struggle, the likes of which we haven’t seen since. In 1972 and 1974 the National Union of Miners went on strike twice and and it brought the government of Ted Heath to its knees. The industrial and political struggle against the Industrial Relations Act led to the defiance and then repeal of the Industrial Relations Act by the dockers in 1972 with the gaoling of the Pentonville 5.  When the TUC called a one-day General Strike the courts, in the form of Lord Denning, caved in.
It was in this context that the Labour left, which had made its peace with Labour’s class collaborationist ‘social contract’ with Capital turned its attention to opposition to Britain’s membership of the EEC. The campaign against the EEC, alongside the Tory Right was politically disastrous and weakened the Left. After the referendum Wilson demoted Tony Benn moving him from his powerful position as Minister of Trade and Industry to Minister of Energy.
In short the Labour Left’s opposition to the EU has been a disastrous capitulation to the forces of nationalism and an abandonment of class struggle politics from its inception. The Labour left took its lead from the Communist Party and its British Road to Socialism which posits the Stalinist idea that you can achieve socialism in one country.
There is nothing progressive or socialist and never has been in opposition to the European Union.
Opposition to the EU has at its heart opposition to the free movement of labour. Capital in today’s world can move wherever it wants but workers are forced to stay where they are and compete against each other. Those who argue that free movement of labour undercuts the wages and conditions of native workers are conceding to the idea that British workers and bosses have more in common than with foreign workers. It is no surprise that it is the same anti-trade union right which employs this same argument as it did against Jewish workers in the late 19th and early 20thcenturies.
The socialist argument is quite simple. Organise migrant labour don’t exclude it alongside reactionary and racist Toryism. Class   action and trade union organisation between migrant and indigenous labour is the best way of protecting wages and conditions.
Opposition to the EU is based on the idea that an independent British capitalist state is preferable. It is a harking back to the days of Empire. Only last week Jeremy Hunt visited Singapore sayingthat after Brexit Britain could adopt the Singaporean model of low taxes. Those who argue for Brexit are playing with fire – they are laying the basis for a low wage, low tax economy in which we effectively undercut wages in Europe.  This is the ‘socialist’ solution of our so-called Left.  Unfortunately Jeremy Corbyn has always been part of this left.
General Election
If and when the Commons rejects Theresa May’s Deal tomorrow, it is essential that Labour does more than call for a General Election. It should take over the campaign for a referendum. The defeat of Brexit at a second referendum would almost guarantee the victory of Labour at a General Election. It would also nip in the bud the moves for some form of national coalition between the Labour Right and Tory anti-Brexiteers.
The argument that a second referendum doesn’t respect the first referendum is barely worth arguing against. People are clearly in possession of more information now about the consequences of Brexit, leaving aside the fraudulent use of money at the last referendum. A strong campaign by Labour can not only overturn the 2016 referendum but it will strike a decisive blow against the far-Right in this country which is riding on the coat tails of Brexit.
A successful rejection of Brexit will provide an unstoppable momentum for a General Election. Far from damaging Labour’s chances the rejection of Brexit would enhance them enormously. It should be able to capture significant territory in the anti-Brexit South, London and the Home Counties. By taking head on the anti-migrant narrative in the North, viz. that deindustrialisation and austerity are the product of the EU rather than the politics of the free market and Austerity, Labour can overcome any Tory campaign. Labour should argue that what motivated people to vote No in 2016 were policies that made the working class pay for the financial crisis of 2008-9, Those who say we should ‘respect’ the first referendum result are really saying they have no confidence in being able to challenge this racist and nationalist narrative.
The 2016 Referendum led to an increase in racist attacks and     xenophobia. It was the far-Right who felt emboldened by the result.  We have seen with James Duggard and his far-Right acolytes last week exactly who stands to benefit from Brexit.
All over Europe the far-Right has grown on the back of a Euro-scepticism allied to anti- refugee feeling. The Brexit vote in the 2016 referendum was a visible sign of that and those who say we should ‘respect’ it are in essence saying that we should not challenge the racist Right any longer.
It is also obvious that the alt-Right and Trump in the United States welcomeBrexit as the first instalment in the break up of the European Union. The idea that Britain would become independent is for the birds. It would tie Britain hand and foot to US capitalism.
Socialists should counter the message that Europe is the cause of austerity and unemployment. We should also be clear that we do not accept the neo-liberal policies of Europe and its competition law either but that the place to fight them is inside not outside. We should take our lead from French workers who have been in the forefront of the fight against Macron and his Blairite economic policies. Cutting our ties with Europe is a strange way of building working class alliances with European workers.
Jeremy Corbyn’s strategy of wanting a ‘Jobs First Brexit’ is politically and economically absurd. Brexit has already led to the loss of thousands of jobs and will lead to many more as firms transfer investment to mainland Europe. One may as well talk about a ‘life enhancing suicide’ or a healthy heart attack. It is an oxymoron.
We are entering into the territory of a constitutional crisis with a Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, who is prepared to tear up precedent and existing procedure in order to enable the Commons to override a government that has lost its majority. The Sunday Times at the weekend speculatedon a plot to suspend Standing Order 14 which gives precedence to government motions.  If true then the government will have lost control.
Labour has a golden opportunity to use the ruling class crisis over Brexit to its advantage and ride to power in its wake.  The alternative could also be that the Corbyn phenomenon is derailed entirely.
Tony Greenstein

Death of the Historian of the Hungarian Holocaust

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Randolph Braham, Rudolf Kasztner and the Auschwitz Protocols

Randolf Braham, the historian of the Hungarian Holocaust, who died on November 25th was the most important historian of the Holocaust after the late Raul Hilberg. His two volume Politics of Genocide: The Hungarian Holocaust is a massive and detailed exposition of the background to and the mechanics of how the Hungarian Holocaust was organised. He was a consummate historian.
The Hungarian Holocaust in which over a half a million Jews died, is the catastrophe which could and should have been averted. It is the tragedy for which the Zionist movement above all bears the blame.
Admiral Horthy with Adolf Hitler - according to Netanyahu's good friend Viktor Orban he is an 'exceptional statesman'
Under the leadership of the Prince Regent, Admiral Horthy, Hungary joined the Tripartite Alliance with Germany, Italy and Japan in November 1940. But although Hungary was allied with Nazi Germany it had never been occupied by the Nazis. Hungary joined the Alliance primarily to retrieve the territories that it had lost through the Treaty of Trianon in 1920, a consequence of Hungary being on the losing side in the first world war.
Although there had been 3 Anti-Jewish Laws of increasing ferocity beginning in 1938, the Jews had been largely untouched by the Holocaust until 1944. There had been two massacres of Jews at Kamenetz Podelsk in August 1941 when 16,000 Hungarian Jews had been murdered and in January 1942 Novi Sad when 700 had died, but this apart Hungary’s 725,000 Jews had remained untouched.
Deportation of the Jews of Budapest to the Ghetto which the Hungarian Nazis (Nyilas/Arrow Cross) set up in November 1944
This was to change when on March 19th1944 Nazi Germany occupied Hungary because it feared that Prime Minister Kallay, who had refused to deport the Jews, would end the alliance with Germany.
It was around this time that preparations were made at Auschwitz to receive Hungary’s Jewish population. A ramp at Birkenau, the main killing centre, had been extended almost to the gas chambers themselves in order to make the process of killing that much more efficient.
Image result for rudolf vrba
Rudolf Vrba - Auschwitz escapee
Rudolph Vrba and Alfred Wetzler, two Jews who worked in the Canada section of Auschwitz became aware of these preparations.  They had access to the trains and were part of the camp resistance. 
On April 10th both men escaped, determined to warn the Jews of Hungary.  On April 24th, after a hair raising journey they reached Slovakia via Poland. They established contact with the Judenrat (Jewish Council) and on the following day they both sat down in different rooms and wrote out a description of what was happening in Auschwitz, including detailed maps. Vrba and Wexler produced what became known as the Auschwitz Protocols. [See Vrba’s I Cannot Forgive]
Hungarian Jewish children waiting to board the trains to Auschwitz
This was the first definitive proof of the role of Auschwitz in the Holocaust. Up till then Auschwitz had been thought of as a labour camp only. There had been many clues but since neither the Allies nor Zionists were looking, these clues were overlooked. [two books on this topic are Walter Lacquer’s The Terrible Secretand Martin Gilbert’s Auschwitz and the Allies.
The Protocols were later translated into German, Hungarian and other languages from Slovak. On or around April 29thRudolf Kasztner, the leader of Hungarian Zionism and the head of the Jewish Agency Rescue & Relief Committee in Budapest, known as Vaadah, arrived in Bratislava and was given a copy of the Protocols.
Ferenc Szalasi, leader of the Hungarian Nazis (Nyilas/Arrow Cross) on being returned to Hungary after the war. At least 50,000 Jews in Budapest died because of the savage pogroms initiated by the Arrow Cross. Szalasi was executed by the Peoples Committees set up after the Nazis were defeated.
Kasztner was urged to distribute the Protocols as soon as possible and to warn Hungarian Jewry as to their fate. Hungarian Jews were not like the Jews of Poland.  They were largely secular and mixed throughout the country.
Adolf Eichmann’s Judenkommando consisted of less than 300 SS men. They had relatively little time within which to round up the Jews, not least because the Soviet Union was beginning its offensive in Romania in April 1944. Romania formally switched sides in August 1944 with the coup by King Michael but Romania had become a refuge for Jews much earlier. Eichmann could only carry out the Final Solution in Hungary if he obtained the collaboration of the Jewish leaders in Hungary.
Kasztner decided to not to distribute the Protocols because he had reached an agreement on April 21st with Eichmann that in exchange for his co-operation in the deportations, a train of 600 Prominents, leaders of the Zionist and Jewish community, would be allowed to depart on a special train out of Hungary to safety in Switzerland. This did indeed happen on July 1stand the numbers on it had expanded to 1,684 Jews, mainly Zionists.
Kasztner and his ‘rescue’ Committee together with the Jewish Council worked closely with the Nazis to the extent of compiling lists of Jews, helping with the round ups , ordering them to gather in the building yards prior to deportation and reassuring them that they were going to fictitious places such as Kenyermeze and Waldsee.  
Jews on the Kasztner Train take a break - they were the lucky ones who got out of Hungary at the expense of half a million others
Thus what the Nazis were unable to achieve by themselves they were able to achieve with the help of the Zionist leaders, in particular Kasztner. After the war, those who had survived Auschwitz charged that Kasztner, who was now a senior official in the Israeli Labour Party (Mapai) was a collaborator with the Nazis. Kasztner sued his accuser, Malchiel Greenwald for libel and thus took place the Kasztner Trial from 1954-58.  The trial in the Jerusalem District Court, in which the Prosecutor for Kasztner was Attorney General Chaim Cohen did not go to plan.  Kasztner quickly became in effect the Defendant rather than the Plaintiff. The Judge, Benjamin Halevi upheld the allegations of collaboration and the government of Moshe Shertok fell in 1955.
Munkaks Ghetto in which 24,000 Jews were deported from May 11th to 24th 
Kasztner meanwhile was soon assassinated. The Supreme Court reversed the original verdict on legal and political grounds but they didn’t challenge the facts as found by the lower court and in particular they upheld the charge of collaboration in respect of the testimony that Kasztner gave at Nuremburg on behalf of Col. Becher, Himmler’s personal representative in Germany. It later turned out that Kasztner had given testimony on behalf of 7 Nazis including Hermann Krumey, who had been in charge of organising the Holocaust in Hungary and Dieter Wisliceny, who had presided over the deportations in Slovakia and Greece.
The details of this trial were first published in the book Perfidyby Revisionist Zionist Ben Hecht in 1961. He was, of course, attacked as an anti-Semite. Yad Vashem, Israel’s propaganda Holocaust museum, under Professor Yehuda Bauer defended Kasztner and rehabilitatedhim.
How the Mail treated Bogdanor's book - previously it had screamed 'antisemitism' when the play Perdition directed by Ken Loach was staged
However even such arch-Zionists as Paul Bogdanor have been forced by the weight of evidence to accept what anti-Zionists have long maintained, that Kasztner was a collaborator with the Nazis, although Bogdanor pretends that Kasztner, the leader of Hungarian Zionism, acted without the knowledge of the Jewish Agency. [Kasztner’s Crime, see my review Collaboration that haunts Zionism]
Although Braham was a Zionist he was not an uncritical one. He criticised Yehuda Bauer, the main Zionist professor of the Holocaust, for his partisan historiography. Braham was very critical of the role of Kasztner and found the failure to distribute the Protocols as soon as they were written (April 25) as ‘one of the most baffling enigmas requiring elucidation if one is to understand the extent of the catastrophe in Hungary.’.[Politics of Genocide p. 632]
 ‘Why’ did the Jewish leaders in Hungary, Switzerland, and elsewhere not distribute and publicise the Protocols immediately after they had received copies of them in late April or early May 1944?  Why did the Vaada leaders who continued to  maintain contact with the Jewish leaders in Switzerland... fail to include copies of the Protocols in their lengthy reports on the conditions in Hungary and the status of their negotiations with the SS? Why did the leaders of the AJDC, Jewish Agency, and Hehalutz, for example, fail to publicise the reports they had received from the Vaada leaders in Bratislava and Budapest, including the Weissmandel reports?. [Braham pp. 718-9] Why was the report on Hitler’s resolution to bring about the Final Solution handled as a top secret diplomatic communication? .... Even after June 19, the initiative was taken by a non-establishment Jew, George Mantello....’ [Braham p. 715]
The explanation was simple as even Yad Vashem historian, Professor Israel Gutman eventually conceded. Kasztner received a copy of the Protocols on 29thApril but he had already made a decision, with other Jewish leaders, ‘not to disseminate the report in order not to harm the negotiations with the Nazis.’ [Ruth Linn, p. 72, Escaping Auschwitz, A Culture of Forgetting].

Hungarian Jews were marched down Wesselenyi Street in the heart of Budapest's Jewish Quarter,
Krasniansky of the Jewish Council, aware of Kasztner’s forthcoming visit to Bratislava, had quickly translated the German version of the original Report into Hungarian. He stated that he personally handed the translation to Kasztner toward the end of April. [Linn, p.27.  Braham p. 712]. Braham cites Eric Kulka as claiming that Kasztner frequently quoted from the Protocols without divulging the source, fn. 81 p. 729.  ‘Auschwitz Condoned’ The Wiener Library Bulletin, London, 23, no. 1 (Winter 1968-9] In another version, he recounted how the Protocols were sent to Budapest within 2 weeks. According to Bauer, the report arrived in Budapest ‘perhaps through Kasztner’ at the end of April and were then handed over to the leading members of the Judenrat.’ Bauer, Jews for Sale, pp. 156-7]
In 1946 Kasztner wrote a 300 page Report for the JA, Der Kasztner-Bericht, on his and Vaadah’s activities. It was described by Braham as ‘self-serving’ Kasztner was silent about the failure to inform Hungarian Jewry.’[Braham p. 706] Braham outlined the facts as he saw them:
i.         Vrba and Wetzler told their story of Auschwitz to the Slovakian Jewish Council leaders on April 25-6 1944.
ii.            Freudiger [Chief Rabbi of Hungary] admitted receiving the Protocols between May 5 and 10 1944.
iii.         Kasztner admitted that he knew of the destruction of Hungarian Jewry at Auschwitz.
iv.         The Hungarian Jews were not informed as to their fate.
v.            The deportation of the Jews began in Northern Transylvania and Carpatho-Ruthenia on May 15 and lasted till July 7 1944, though one train left on April 16th. [Braham p.539]
vi.         The Hungarian Jewish leaders were still translating and duplicating the Protocols on June 14-16 and didn’t distribute them until the latter half of June. [Yahil L, The Holocaust:  The Fate of European Jewry, 1932-1945(New York:  OUP, 1990) Yahil suggests that it was only during the second half of June that the Hungarian Jewish leaders started disseminating copies of the report to the Hungarian authorities and Swiss representatives].
vii.       The Hungarian Jewish leaders completely ignored the Protocols in their post-war memoirs and statements. [Braham pp. 718-9]
Braham advances a number of ‘plausibleand to a considerable extent convincing’ claims:
·               Oscar Krasniansky’s contention in 1964 that he handed a copy of the Protocols to Kasztner during his visit to Bratislava in late April 1944.
·               Oscar Neumann’s contention that the Protocols were sent to Hungary, Switzerland and the Vatican ‘shortly ‘ after completion.
·               Vrba’s claim that he was told by Neumann and Krasniansky that the Protocols were handed to Kasztner on April 26th.
·               Kasztner deliberately remained silent in accordance with an agreement with Eichmann which allowed him to save a few thousand ‘prominent’ Jews, including his own family and friends. [Braham p. 719]
Braham was horrified by the current regime under Viktor Orban in Hungary.  A regime which openly uses anti-Semitism in its attacks on George Soros and which is seeking to rehabilitate Admiral Horthy, who presided over the deportation of over 400,000 Jews to Auschwitz.
As is noted below in 2014 Braham resigned from the Hungarian Order of Merit which was awarded to him in 2011. He also instructed that his name not be associated with the Holocaust Memorial Center in Budapest in protest at the rewriting of the history of the Holocaust  by Orban’s government. However this rewriting of the Holocaust, which involved Orban declaring that Admiral Horthy was an ‘exceptional stateman’ has not prevented a close political friendship between Orban and Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli government.  Anti-Semitism and Holocaust revisionism is no obstacle to the Zionist regime in Tel Aviv. ‘Anti-Semitism’ is only of concern to the Israeli government when opposition to Zionism and Israeli racism is on the agenda. See Netanyahu and Orban: An Illiberal Bromance Spanning From D.C. to Jerusalem
Below is an obituary in the Hungarian Spectrum and beneath that is a link to the obituary in the New York Times.
Tony Greenstein
Professor Randolph L. Braham, the preeminent historian of the Hungarian Holocaust, died this morning. He is perhaps best known for his two-volume The Politics of Genocide: The Holocaust in Hungary, a monumental work of historical scholarship, the result of 20 years of work, which covered the unfolding story in minute detail.
During the Kádár regime little time was spent on Holocaust research. It was only after the arrival of the political change in 1990 that serious research began. In 1997 The Politics of Genocide was translated into Hungarian under the title A népírtás politikája: A holocaust Magyarországon. Between 2001 and 2014 Professor Braham published seven volumes in a Hungarian-language series, Tanulmányok a holokausztról (Studies on the Holocaust). In 2007 he, in conjunction with Zoltán Tibori Szabó, professor at Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj/Kolozsvár in Romania, began another major, three-volume undertaking, A magyarországi holokauszt földrajzi enciklopédiája, which came out in English in 2013 under the title The Geographical Encyclopedia of the Holocaust in Hungary.
In March 2014 I was greatly honored when Professor Braham offered me his latest article, “Hungary: The Assault on the Historical Memory of the Holocaust.” Randy Braham, as his friends called him, was a regular reader and supporter of Hungarian Spectrum and found it a worthy place to share his research. A Hungarian translation of that article was eventually published in A holokauszt Magyarországon: hetven év múltán in 2016. As you may gather from the title of the article, it was a description of the assault by Hungarian politicians on the historical memory of the Holocaust, from the immediate post-war years to our days. A large portion of the article was devoted to the Orbán governments, during both the 1998-2002 and the post-2010 periods.
As a reaction to the wholesale falsification of history that was taking place in Hungary, Professor Braham returned all his medals he received and resigned from the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary awarded to him by the Orbán government in 2011. He also forbade having his name used in connection with the Holocaust Memorial Center in Budapest, whose leadership and activities had been greatly interfered with by the Orbán government.
On a personal note. In the past few years Professor Braham and I became close friends. I appreciated his unassuming manner and his sense of humor. I greatly admired his total devotion to the truth and his stand when that truth was assaulted by politicians and pseudo-historians. I’m one of the many who find his death a personal loss.
András Heisler: The Victim Returns: Survival and History
Randolph L. Braham, author of the ultimate historical narrative of the Hungarian Holocaust, is a survivor of the Shoa. As a young Hungarian Jew from Northern Transylvania he lived through the horrors in hiding and in 1945, as a twenty-year-old, he started out for the free world. He left behind the land of the Holocaust, Europe, and Hungary, yet he spent the rest of his long life studying the history of the Hungarian Holocaust. He documented in the most precise detail what happened to his country, his family, and himself.
He believed in the strength of narration and awareness. He owed it not only to the dead but especially to the living to chronicle the story. He knew that something that could happen once could take place again at anytime and anywhere. He believed that if we know the story, if we understand what led to the Holocaust, aware of every little detail of its genesis, if we learn the truth, we will have a chance of guarding against a similar tragedy. He believed in the power of truth. May God grant truth to his belief.
He always raised his voice when one had to speak up. He did it gently but firmly.  He spoke when Romanian nationalists misrepresented the history of their Holocaust, and he took a stand when the enemies of truth did the same in Hungary.
The enemies of truth claim that they are the friends of Hungary, but it isn’t so.  Braham was the real friend of Hungary, one of the greatest Hungarian historians. He was a patriot for whom the mother tongue of truth, the Hungarian language, was his most important working tool and weapon. He offered the truth to his compatriots as the only real healing agent since assessing the past is the only real chance. He knew that only those who take a hard look at the past and who accept and draw lessons from it can have an opportunity to live a meaningful and responsible life.
Last year, at the age of 95, he paid a visit to Hungary. Before his lecture in Goldmark Hall he visited me in my office, where he recited by heart perhaps the most famous love poem of Sándor Petőfi, the great Hungarian national poet. He loved Hungary, and he wanted to shield us against the resurrection of our darkest demons.
The truth by now is known. It is in Randolph L. Braham’s exhaustive works. Never again can we say that we are not familiar with it, that we don’t know about it. Thanks to Professor Braham, we will never be able to free ourselves from the truth. May the time come when every Hungarian will be grateful for that. A few weeks ago he wrote me an open letter in which he asked us to defend “the historical integrity of the Hungarian chapter of the Holocaust.” Dear Braham, I promise that it will be done.
András Heisler, President of the Association of Hungarian Jewish Religious Communities (MAZSIHISZ)
November 25, 2018

Support the Picket of Brighton Fabians and War Criminal Ivor Caplin

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Say No to the pro-Israel Jewish Labour Movement and the Weaponisation of Anti-Semitism




Ivor Caplin was a Defence Minister in 2003 at the time of Blair’s war in Iraq. When the Chilcott Inquiry Report came out Caplin made it clear that he stood by an invasion that is held responsible for up to 1 million Iraqi deaths. The decision of the International Military Tribunal which presided over the trial of the Nazi war criminals at Nuremburg in 1946 made it clear that in accordance with the London Charter, to plan or instigate an aggressive war is a crime according to international law. The Iraq War was a war of aggression and Caplin was integral to the decision to go to war and therefore a war criminal.
It is surprising that Brighton Fabians has nonetheless decided to invite Caplin to speak to them on the topic Why Anti Semitism affects Labour's Political Ambitions". Perhaps for their next meeting they could invite the Yorkshire Ripper to give a lecture on the evils of violence against women? Or perhaps Tommy Robinson could help the Fabians out with a talk on the benefits of multi-racialism?
Fabian advert for meeting next Friday
No group has done more to spread the idea that the Labour Party is an anti-Semitic party than the JLM. They have targeted Jewish anti-Zionists in particular. They have directed their spleen at the non-Zionist Jewish Voice for Labour. Not only have I been expelled but Black-Jewish activist Jackie Walker has been suspended for over two years as a result of the JLM’s false and malicious allegations.
Meanwhile the JLM MPs like Louise Ellman are in the forefront of the attack on Palestinians. Only last week Ellman moved a motionseekingto cut off British funding for Palestinian Education in the West Bank. She did so in the company of a list of parliamentary lepers such as Tory Theresa Villiers, Stephen Crabb, John Howell, Andrew Percy, Guto Bebb and Bob Blackman. Bringing up the rear was Jim Shannon from the sectarian Protestant Democratic Unionist Party. Ellman is an officer of the JLM.
Historically the Fabians supported imperialism and racism, the British Empire in particular. In their 1900 pamphlet Fabianism and the Empire edited by George Bernard Shaw, the Introduction, made their position clear in the light of the forthcoming General Election.
... it is important that voters should make up their minds what Imperialism means. ... if it means a well-considered policy to be pursued by a Commonwealth of the communities flying the British flag, then it is as worthy and as weighty an issue as an election could turn on.   
Compare this with the policy of communists and socialists for the independence of the colonies. In 1929, Fabian architect, Sydney Webb (Lord Passfield) became Colonial Secretary. Zionism was an integral part of the British Empire. It is therefore no surprise that Fabians today should invite the anti-Corbyn JLM as a speaker. When Owen Smith challenged JC for the leadership, no less than 92% of the JLM voted for Smith and a mere 4% voted for Corbyn.
The JLM describes itself as the sister party of the Israeli Labour Party. The ILP was a party of government in Israel for the first 30 years in Israel (&today is almost irrelevant in Israeli politics) was responsible for organising the ethnic cleansing of over ¾ million Palestinians in 1948. Without the removal of the Palestinians there could be no Jewish state.
Today the ILP advocates segregation between Jew and Arab.  It believes in a Jewish state with as large a Jewish majority as possible. It is part of a national consensus that opposes the presence of non-Jews. That is why the ILP supported Netanyahu’s attempts to physically deport Black African asylum seekers back to Africa.
The JLM has assiduously waged a scurrilous campaign in the Labour Party painting the Left as ‘anti-Semitic’. What it and the Zionist meant by this was made clear when they made the adoption of the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism a cardinal principle. The IHRA is based upon 11 illustrations of ‘anti-Semitism’ 7 of which relate to Israel. Calling Israel a racist state is defined as anti-Semitism. 
Traditionally anti-Semitism was understood as hatred of Jews not a state. In the words of the Oxford English Dictionary, anti-Semitism was ‘hostility to or prejudice against Jews’.  That is still how the vast majority of people understand it but the Zionists are not concerned with traditional anti-Semitism but with defending Israel.
That is why a group of us, Labour Party and Palestine solidarity supporters and members are calling on people to demonstrate their opposition to both Ivor Caplin, the JLM and Fabian imperialism.
I should add as a personal note that the late Riad el-Taher, an Iraqi anti-war activist who was elected to the Executive of Hove Labour Party was fingered by Caplin (like many other members) for expulsion from the Labour Party. Riad was ‘administratively’ expelled i.e. without the right of appeal, by Iain McNicol. Riad was gaoled for 10 months in 2011 for having breached British sanctions against Iraq in the 1990’s.  Sanctions which led to the death of an estimated half a million Iraqi children. When confronted with this, US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright breezily declared of these deaths that ‘we think the price is worth it.’
This is the kind of man that the Fabians have invited to speak to them.
Tony Greenstein
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