Our absurd obsession with Israel is laid bare

[bemildred]

The Arab revolution is consigning skip-loads of articles, books and speeches about the Middle East to the dustbin of history. In a few months, readers will go through libraries or newspaper archives and wonder how so many who claimed expert knowledge could have turned their eyes from tyranny and its consequences.

To a generation of politically active if not morally consistent campaigners, the Middle East has meant Israel and only Israel. In theory, they should have been able to stick by universal principles and support a just settlement for the Palestinians while opposing the dictators who kept Arabs subjugated. Few, however, have been able to oppose oppression in all its forms consistently. The right has been no better than the liberal-left in its Jew obsessions. The briefest reading of Conservative newspapers shows that at all times their first concern about political changes in the Middle East is how they affect Israel. For both sides, the lives of hundreds of millions of Arabs, Berbers and Kurds who were not involved in the conflict could be forgotten.

---

"I've come to know Saif as someone who looks to democracy, civil society and deep liberal values for the core of his inspiration," purred the LSE's David Held as he accepted the cheque. Human Rights Watch, once a reliable opponent of tyranny, went further and described a foundation Saif ran in Libya as a force for freedom, willing to take on the interior ministry in the fight for civil liberties. Meanwhile, and to the surprise of no one, Peter Mandelson, New Labour's butterfly, fluttered round Saif at the country house parties of the plutocracy.

Last week, Saif, the "liberal" promoter of human rights and dining companion of Mandelson, appeared on Libyan television to say that his father's gunmen would fight to the last bullet to keep the Gaddafi crime family in business, a promise he is keeping. The thinking behind so many who flattered him was that the only issue in the Middle East worth taking a stand on was the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and that the oppression of Arabs by Arabs was a minor concern.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/feb/27/nick-cohen-arab-middle-east-conflict

[aquart]

1. Britain is still regretting they let the Jews back in.

[bemildred]

2. Britain kicked the Jews out?

I mean, I know the UK has a long history of anti-semitism, like lots of places, but I was not aware that they ever expelled a lot of Jews. I do not understand which Jews it was that the UK "let back in". I thought the beef (a well founded one) was that they did not let enough Jews in.

[The Magistrate]

6. Back In the Plantagenet Days, Sir...

Some Edward or other, if recollection serves, but it has been a very long time since I read on that period.

[bemildred]

7. Edict of Expulsion, 1290 AD

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Expulsion

[LeftishBrit]

13. England (it wasn't the UK then) kicked out the Jews in 1290 and let them back in 1655

Though most contemporary British Jews are from families that immigrated at a much later stage.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

8. Now there's a truly daft comment.

Jews are probably the single minority group there is least prejudice against in the UK, as a result of holocaust guilt. There is massive, vicious prejudice against many groups here - notably immigrants and Muslims - but relatively little anti-semitism.

[oberliner]

10. Anti-Semitism in the UK remains high in 2010

A Jewish charity which monitors acts of anti-Semitism in the UK says it recorded 639 incidents of violence, threats and abuse last year.

The figure, from the Community Security Trust, is the second highest since it began its work in 1984.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12350913

[Donald Ian Rankin]

11. So about one incident per hundred thousand people?

[oberliner]

12. You may want to check your math

600+ incidents among a Jewish population of 300,000 or so.

And those are just the reported incidents - obviously the casual anti-semitism that British Jews face from time to time would not be captured in those numbers.

Ever been to a Tottenham Hotspur football match?

Alive and unchecked - a wave of anti-Jewish hate

'Spurs are on their way to Belsen, Hitler's gonna gas 'em again...' It's not a song you would expect to hear on a family day out at a Premier League game, but it is one of several anti-Semitic chants still heard at some top-flight grounds. While the message about anti-black abuse is in the public consciousness, campaigners say that anti-Semitism is alive - and unchecked.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2007/oct/28/newsstory.sport2

[LeftishBrit]

14. That's hyperbole.

There is antisemitism here, but less than in most Europaean countries; no more (according to surveys) than in the USA; and much less than some other groups here, including immigrants and Gypsies/Travellers.

Of course there shouldn't be any, but I'd much rather live here than in many other places.

[joshcryer]

3. Too late to rec, saw this cross posted in L/A, and wanted to comment.

Thanks for cross posting it there, I avoid I/P for reasons I won't delve in to but which may become apparent in the next sentence. Palestinians are denied citizenship and in most cases the very right to visit any country in the Arab League (this is not well known as it tends to get buried in the rhetoric). In a democratic Arab world this "unspoken rule" (but strongly enforced rule due to the "right of return") may be reassessed, indeed, on a humans right issue, it should be reassessed, as the Palestinian settlements are a case of Arab oppression of Arabs, too (Israel of course plays a very big role in this, mind you). Simply being born somewhere should not disallow you citizenship elsewhere, such is a fundamental denial of the universal declaration of human rights.

Syrian Ba'athists, Hamas, the Saudi monarchy and Gaddafi eagerly promoted the Protocols, for why wouldn't vicious elites welcome a fantasy that dismissed democracy as a fraud and justified their domination?

Such a good article. Thanks again.

[bemildred]

4. Well, I don't like it entirely, but I thought he makes some points that deserve attention.

[bemildred]

5. I posted it in L/A mainly to demonstrate that sucking up to Ghaddaffi is not a L/A invention. nt

[here_is_to_hope]

9. "Palestinian settlements".....lol

Excuse me while I puke in my own shoes.