David Collier who was used by the media to attack Corbyn called Palestinian refugees‘Dripping Poison’
David Collier contribution to a 'debate' on 2 States hosted by far-Right Zionist group 'Campaign for Truth'
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| Collier sitting alongside Tommy Robinson supporter and devotee Brian Thomas |
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| Collier's friend Brian Thomas is the key Zionist supporter of Tommy Robinson - they both went round Israel together in a car |
You may remember David Collier was portrayed in the media just before the local elections as an ‘independent researcher’rather than the virulent racist which he is. Collier was a useful stick to beat Jeremy Corbyn with when he revealed that Corbyn was a member of a Facebook Group Palestine Live. His ‘research’ into Palestine Live demonstrated, so it was claimed that the group was ‘a veritable cesspool of antisemitism’.
Brian Thomas, close Collier friend and right-wing British Zionist who runs campaign to free British fascist Tommy Robinson in Israel
According to Melanie Phillips Collier is ‘a British Jew who devotes much of his life to chronicling the anti-Israel and anti-Jewish attitudes which have become epidemic in political and intellectual life.’ Of course Phillips herself is a far-Right nutcase but her comments are no different from others in the media. Jewish News describedCollier ‘a writer, researcher and activist, who goes undercover to expose online hatred and anti-Semitism.’The neo-liberal GuardiancalledCollier a ‘businessman’ rather than a Zionist activist and blogger. I showedhow Collier’s claims to be an independent researcher were accepted at face value not only by the right-wing press but by the Guardian too.
A modicum of research would show that he is an Israeli, not a British Jew, with a far-Right racist agenda. His claim that his research‘is fully independent. I am not affiliated with any political group or community organisation. I believe this independence is important and adds to the integrity of the work.’ is laughable given that he attempted to brand Free Speech on Israel, a group of mainly anti-Zionist Jews inside the Labour Party, on the basis of no evidence whatsoever, as ‘a group of Jewish Palestine Live members, who created FSOI to deflect accusations of antisemitism.’
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| Our 'independent' researcher is here attacking the Labour Party's newly appointed legal counsel Gordon Nardell QC because he isn't a fully paid-up Zionist |
Leaving aside that the media at no time scrutinised Collier’s claims about Palestine Live, which I understand were based on fake and manipulated images, I know for a fact that Free Speech on Israel had no connection with Palestine Live. I happened to be at its inaugural meeting 3 years ago and can vouch for the fact that Palestine Live never even once entered the conversation. Why should it have done since it is entirely separate from the group.
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| Collier with his far-Right Zionist friends |
Likewise to claimas Collier does that FSOI was created to ‘to deflect accusations of antisemitism’demonstrates where Collier is coming from. FSOI was created not to deflect but to oppose the weaponisation of anti-Semitism by people like Collier.
Collier’s conclusionsin his ‘Report’ that ‘A small, but highly vocal group of Jewish anti-Zionist activists is engaged in using Jewish identity as ‘a weapon’ to deflect accusations of antisemitism.’ is another way of saying that Jews who are not Zionists reject the idea that criticism of Zionism is ‘anti-Semitic’ and are happy to assert that being Jewish does not mean you have to be a Zionist.
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| Collier's fake statistics are completely unsupported |
Collier’s second conclusion was that ‘These Jewish anti-Zionists in turn teach their compatriots to insulate themselves from the charge of antisemitism by substituting the word ‘Zionist’ for ‘Jew’. is purefantasy. Nowhere in his ‘Report’ was even the slightest evidence produced concerning these teaching seminars, because of course they don’t exist. What Collier and his compatriots cannot stand is that some us make a clear distinction between being a Zionist, i.e. a racist and being Jewish. It is a distinction that the Zionist movement, not least far-Right elements like Collier dislike.
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| Collier and the all-weather bigot Melanie Phillips |
Collier associates withfar-Right Zionists in Britain who make common cause in making a hero out of the anti-Muslim fascist prisoner Tommy Robinson, such as Brian Thomas. It is a campaign which is popular amongst the Zionist Right at the moment. [See Ha’aretz, Esther Solomon, 30.5.18. #FreeTommy: Why Israeli Fanboys Back a U.K. Far Right anti-Muslim Campaigner
In a ‘debate’with Melanie Phillips, Brian Thomas and others Collier gave a well received speech on the Palestinian refugees. In it he cannot even bring himself to acknowledge the refugees are human beings. He repeatedly refers to them in the third person, ‘It’ as in ‘it was created’. In other words the Palestinian refugees, rather than being a product of the forcible expulsion by the Zionists in 1948 onwards, are simply a creation by the Arab states designed to do Israel down.
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| The Guardian was as happy as the rightwing press to treat Collier as a neutral researcher |
You can read an extract from Collier's speech below and also listen to the speech.
Transcript of Extract from David Collier's Speech on Palestinian Refugees 18th May 2016
“The Palestinian refugee was forged as a weapon. It was created as an artificial entity inside a paradigm of no to normalisation and it cannot exist outside of that paradigm. It will do everything it can to stop any type of settlement and today, as demographics have changed in the West this weapon has taken up camp here too.
Today it spearheads BDS yet another external movement that does not care about the well being of the people inside Gaza or the West Bank. (applause) So if not now then when. You will never solve anything until you stop the dripping poison from entering the wound.
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| Collier with his fascist friends including Paul Besser (in blue jacket) of Britain First |
First the refugees then everything else. Unwrap this parcel from the outside in. This is not a 2 state solution it is about 2 stages. You tell those British girls that they are British. You tell the Jordanians that they are Jordanian You scrap the ridiculous definition of a Palestinian refugee you dismantle UNWRA and you tell Lebanon (applause) that after 70 years it is about time that it stopped abusing the human rights of those people born within its borders. Taking an addict and feeding his addiction and his delusion simply because everybody is too scared to tell them the truth. It is abuse.
Working to help or to solve or assist the situation of refugees in places like Lebanon is a humanitarian cause. Kicking the can down the road only ensures that the conflict continues and everyone remains trapped. Caught in a perpetual catch-22 with those on the outside working to permanently toxify the environment. If you insist on permitting the artificially sustained and hate infested desires of those on the outside to dictate the terms of the discussions between the Jews of Jerusalem and the Arabs of Ramallah in a deteriorating environment with no type at all of any type of settlement. So if I am asked will I support some empty worthless idea that rejects reality and simply wants to kick the can down the road my answer is simple. No I will not. ‘