Harry's Place

Far too late-the damage is long since done.

One day the actor who played Mohammed Al-Dura will turn up alive and well somewhere too. But again and like the Protocols, blood libels can take centuries to debunk and they never quite disappear.

Are you reading this, Sunny Hundal?

The Massacre of Innocents headline speaks volumes.

If anybody seriously thinks that anti-semitism has no role to play in the reaction to this conflict, I’d like to hear an explanation for this.

“The Massacre of Innocents” is a favoured antisemitic trope. In another form it is “Christ Killers”.

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

Hmm, Google News isn’t buzzing with this story just now. That doesn’t mean it isn’t accurate, as it may well be.

That said, I’d advise a bit of caution before you all go tearing off on another one of your OMFG teh Red Cross bombed itself 2 make Israel look bad bcoz all ur mediaz r belong 2 anty-semites! jags on the basis of an anonymous quote.

So, firstly, one has to ask why the UN stated that deaths occured within the compound, when none had. When John Ging, UNRWA Director of Operations in Gaza, visited the UN school in Jabaliya he stated in a press release, which says an Israeli strike on UNWRA school occurred:

“There’s nowhere safe in Gaza. Everyone here is terrorized and traumatized. These men, women and children are all seeking safety and there is no safety in Gaza at the moment, even in an UNRWA school. This is unacceptable.”

Why indeed?

Perhaps because a factual representation of the “refugees” (the majority of whom were electors responsible for the democrat election of Hamas precisely because Hamas promised to make a war of extermination against Israel) would result in far less largesse being bestowed upon the Palestinians and, as a result, far fewer jobs for the likes of John Ging.

Funny how it works. The Palestinians have been official “refugees” since 1948 regardless of the merits of their individual claims, some of which were very dubious. They have an entire UN agency dedicated to their situation whereas all other refugees in the world are served by a single agency.

And Norm Finkelstein talks about “The Holocaust Industry”!

The point here is not that innocents did not die. They did.

However, in reporting the attacks, which hit many civilians and UN workers, nobody would have thought of using “The Massacre of the Innocents”.

In fact, it is difficult to think of a more laden phrase.

I can’t even think how one would use a racial slur against the Singhalese – what would an equivalent headline say?

Jenin all over again.

“Interesting that racial agitation, in the form of raising the myth of Jews as the killers of Christ, should slip so easily into a modern liberal newspaper.”

After Jenin, anything’s possible.

That said, I’d advise a bit of caution before you all go tearing off on another one of your OMFG teh Red Cross bombed itself 2 make Israel look bad bcoz all ur mediaz r belong 2 anty-semites! jags on the basis of an anonymous quote.

The anonymous person here being John Ging of the UNWRA who admitted in the piece linked to that no-one died in the compound.

John Ging, UNRWA’s operations director in Gaza, acknowledged in an interview this week that all three Israeli mortar shells landed outside the school and that “no one was killed in the school.”

nobody would have thought of using “The Massacre of the Innocents”. In fact, it is difficult to think of a more laden phrase.

Well, from a two-minute internet search it seems that the term has been used to describe the Jabalya incident, the Belgian creche attack and child abuse in Maori towns in the past month alone.

I wouldn’t use it myself*, but from that quick scan it looks like it’s an old standby for incidents in which kids get killed – I’d bet folding money that I first heard the phrase round about the time of the Dunblane massacre.

(*Now that I know what it refers to, that is. I had no idea of the origin until two minutes ago, and I like to think I’m pretty well-read.)

This won’t make any difference to the Israel haters. They will just shift the argument and their view of international law to the proposition that Israel cannot return fire when Hamas shoots mortars from close proximity to civilians. The will also ignore that Hamas doing so is inarguably a war crime.

I thought that this confusion (or lying) about where the people who were killed were located was apparant at the time. Can anyone track down whether Ging’s assertion that the IDF created the confusion by stating that they were returning fire at indivuals launching mortars (true) from the school yard (not true). I certainly wouldn’t take his word for it.

The Independent – Modern? Liberal? A newspaper?

Ive only seen this story in The Globe & Mail, but that does not make it untrue.

Unless the John Ging quotes have been fabricated then I suspect the story is true.

If the John Ging quotes are correct, then he is admitting that the school was not shelled.

Of course, its quite possible that he will realise he has made an ass of himself and either retract or deny the quotes. IF he did say these things this week then quite a few news outlets need to publish some corrections. Although I agree, the damage has long since been done.

MattG

Aha, daft of me – maybe well-read, but not necessarily good at reading. I didn’t realise it was controversial that the shells had landed outside the school – I thought that was common knowledge within hours.

Still, it does seem a bit odd to announce that this news means “It appears that the UN refuge was safe” because there were shells falling in the street outside. I’d say that was pretty unsafe, myself.

Still, it does seem a bit odd to announce that this news means “It appears that the UN refuge was safe” because there were shells falling in the street outside.

Meaning the refuge was safe, the street outside the refuge was not.

Neil it wouldn’t weaken your point any to delete or edit the sentence “It appears that the UN refuge was safe”.

There doesn’t seem to me to be much new here. What would be interesting would be to see if anyone other than the IDF has evidence that “Hamas terrorists” had previously fired from this area, and Israel was returning fire. I haven’t seen any source for this claim, other than the IDF.

Meaning the refuge was safe, the street outside the refuge was not.

Yes, I understand that. I’m just saying that that doesn’t meet the dictionary definition of “safe”, in my opinion. I imagine that the OED doesn’t say Safe – The state of not having artillery barrages landing nearby, but if it did I wouldn’t be able to fault the truth of the statement.

That said, I’d advise a bit of caution before you all go tearing off on another one of your OMFG teh Red Cross bombed itself 2 make Israel look bad bcoz all ur mediaz r belong 2 anty-semites! jags on the basis of an anonymous quote.

Textbook stuff, Flying Rodent.

In one paragraph you’ve managed to change the subject while avoiding the actual issues being discussed, not to mention ascribe a editorial stance to Harry’s Place which is as malevolent as it is false.

So how about The Massacre of Innocents headline?

“Secondly, it is noticable how certain parts of the media leapt onto the story with some glee.”

Glee is quite the word – and not just for the media. The anti-war/hamas-apologist movement is also always fuelled with excitement when they think something like this has happened.

I wonder if the reverse is true, and that they’ll actually feel unhappy that it did not happen how they hoped?

Neil it wouldn’t weaken your point any to delete or edit the sentence “It appears that the UN refuge was safe”.

You are right, it wouldn’t. However, in the context of John Ging’s comments immediately preceding it and the erroneous Un statements that the school was hit I think my comment is clear enough.

Yes, I understand that. I’m just saying that that doesn’t meet the dictionary definition of “safe”, in my opinion.

OK flanks, in your opinion it was not safe. In reality, it was safe. Considering there was a war going on an’ all.

Safe is obviously a relative term in war Flying Rodent. I think that rather obvious point does not detract from the point that Israel did not bomb the UN refuge.

… nobody would have thought of using “The Massacre of the Innocents”.

“The Massacre of Innocents” is a favoured antisemitic trope. In another form it is “Christ Killers”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Innocents

This is nonsense. The phrase long ago (centuries) passed into common usage and is no more intrinsicly related to Jewish history than the word “armageddon”.

That’s why Brett had to refer to the Wikipedia article, because most people would have never heard of it in the specific context of Herod’s (apocryphal) actions, and would not realise at all that it’s a “favored anti-Semitic trope”.

Here is the expression used about events in 19th century New Orleans. Here it’s used by a popular beat combo singing about Sarajevo. Here it’s used about an atrocity against Tamils. And here it’s used about the Omagh bomb.

So will you people please stop pissing your pants and imagining anti-Semites around every corner? Do you not realise the damage you are doing to an otherwise worthy cause, you morons?

… nobody would have thought of using “The Massacre of the Innocents”.

“The Massacre of Innocents” is a favoured antisemitic trope. In another form it is “Christ Killers”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Innocents

This is nonsense. The phrase long ago (centuries) passed into common usage and is no more intrinsicly related to Jewish history than the word “armageddon”.

That’s why Brett had to refer to the Wikipedia article, because most people would have never heard of it in the specific context of Herod’s (apocryphal) actions, and would not realise at all that it’s a “favored anti-Semitic trope”.

Here is the expression used about events in 19th century New Orleans. Here it’s used by a popular beat combo singing about Sarajevo.

Here is the expression used about events in 19th century New Orleans.

Here it’s used about an atrocity against Tamils.

<a href=”http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?in_article_id=136335&in_page_id=34&in_a_source=”Hhere it’s used about the Omagh bomb.

So will you people please stop pissing your pants and imagining anti-Semites around every corner? Do you not realise the damage you are doing to an otherwise worthy cause, you morons?

“So will you people please stop pissing your pants…”

Love such talk from the ‘Voice Of Reason’! ;-)

Voice of reason,

Do you not accept that a phrase can have a different meaning when applied to some groups and not when applied to others?

The Massacre of Innocents headline speaks volumes.

According to papers like the Independent and Guardian it seems like ALL Gazans are ‘innocents’ even if they belong to Hamas. I bet Indy and Graun can’t tell us how many Hamas were killed.

What would be interesting would be to see if anyone other than the IDF has evidence that “Hamas terrorists” had previously fired from this area, and Israel was returning fire. I haven’t seen any source for this claim, other than the IDF.

Two residents of the area who spoke by telephone said they saw a small group of militants firing mortar rounds from a street near the school, where 350 people had gathered to get away from the shelling. They spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

The authors of the report as well as the editors of the Independent know well the provenance of the term, and it is extremely unlikely their choice was accidental.

The fact that voice of reaon can only find one contemporary example of its use in an (to us) obscure Tamil journal itself, I think, speaks volumes.

It is no more accidental than Dave Brown’s choice of baby eating as a motif to apply to Ariel Sharon (never applied to any other ethnic or national group or state army even though it had killed far more children).

Let’s be clear, Neil: you, David T and Brett have all suggested that the expression “the massacre of innocents” is an “anti-Semitic trope” and the usage of it is clear evidence that national newspapers are demonizing Jews.

This is utter twaddle. Instead of lecturing journalists about their use of language, perhaps you would be better off learning some of the very basics of their craft, such as researching a point before publishing it. It took me all of 20 seconds Googling to discover that the expression you object to, far from being an indication of anti-Semitic thinking, has been used many times about many different tragic events, none of them involving Israel or the Jews.

As far as I am concerned, you owe the Independent an apology and should immediately retract your absurd allegation. You have absolutely no idea what was going through the mind of the sub-editor who wrote the headline. You have no idea at all whether or not they are Jewish themselves, or whether they personally condemn or support Israel, or anything else. They were doing their job – thinking up striking uses of the English language to attract the reader’s attention.

I’m not sure what has happened to HP recently but the site is turning into a mirror image of the paranoid and obsessive nutters like recent guest-poster Hasbara Buster. This kind of knee-jerk nonsense in the last few days, if it carries on, is going to make HP a laughing stock and earn the site the kind of reputation that the likes of Melanie Phillips enjoys.

According to papers like the Independent and Guardian it seems like ALL Gazans are ‘innocents’ even if they belong to Hamas.

Maven, the headline was used about a specific incident where it was alleged a school sheltering non-combatants was shelled, not about the Gaza operation in toto.

Clearly the HP hysterics are on very weak ground indeed if they have to grossly and transparently distort the facts of the matter to sustain their increasingly absurd theories.

If you find yourself conflating the rantings of a lunatic extreme-left fringe (which David T still likes to maintain comradely relations with, note) and the generally sensible and well-meaning (if sometimes mistaken) people who write for the national newspapers, then you are obviously on a sad, downward spiral into the nether regions that David Icke and the Troofers inhabit.

Mike has you people pretty much skewered, in my opinion. You should pay more attention to what he is saying before it’s too late.

“Do you not accept that a phrase can have a different meaning when applied to some groups and not when applied to others?”

Exactly.
Comparing on one hand Bush to a chimp and doing the same with Obama would sound apparently identical, wouldn’t it? But do both have the same meaning? Are both comparisons racist? Only one (and if so, which one)? Or none of them?

A military operation where 42 civilians standing in an open space are killed in the course of eliminating two terrorists somewhere nearby (presumably) is an utter disaster for Israel and certain prima face evidence of a war crime.

But that only gets mentioned in passing in Neil’s post, because the really shocking thing is the poor choice of wording in the headline of a newspaper report about it.

(And I say that as a much stronger supporter of Israel than any of the milksop socialists and other congenital bleeding hearts in this thread.)

No VoR, the really shocking thing is that for a long time, we all had to just accept that Israel had bombed a place where they knew civilians were taking refuge, and now this turns out not to be the case at all.

Let’s be clear, Neil: you, David T and Brett have all suggested that the expression “the massacre of innocents” is an “anti-Semitic trope” and the usage of it is clear evidence that national newspapers are demonizing Jews.

I have not stated that national newspapers are demonizing Jews. I have said that one headline has slipped into one newspaper.

As for your views on the fact checking done by newspapers, it is a shame that none of them did so in the case of the allegation that the Israeli army had killed people in the UN refuge, isn’t it?

that only gets mentioned in passing in Neil’s post, because the really shocking thing is the poor choice of wording in the headline of a newspaper report about it.

1. How many times do you want me to say innocent people have died in the post?

2. The main aspect of this post is the incorrect reporting of an alleged assault on a UN refuge by the Israeli army by both the UN and the press. The headline is only mentioned in passing.

The fact that voice of reaon can only find one contemporary example of its use in an (to us) obscure Tamil journal itself, I think, speaks volumes.

Actually, I found it used about the siege of Sarajevo, a 19th century race riot in Louisiana, the Omagh bombing, and the Sri Lankan conflict, all in the first two pages of the Google results, and without trying very hard.

What speaks volumes is that you people didn’t try at all before posting this idiotic crap. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

(Oh, and I’ve just looked at the third page in Google, and found it used on samizdata.net about atrocities committed by Palestinian suicide bombers. Fancy that.)

we all had to just accept that Israel had bombed a place where they knew civilians were taking refuge, and now this turns out not to be the case at all.

Actually, bissli, Israel still bombed a place where civilians were taking refuge – the surrounding streets.

But they got two Hamas terrorists as well so the operation must be counted a great success and all that remains is to mop up a few Fleet Street sub-editors.

I’m slightly confused.

The Independent, Guardian and BBC articles all stated that the shells exploded outside the school.

The globe&mail article supports this, so where is the revelation? That the UN jumped to conclusions and accused Israel of shelling the school?

Meaning the refuge was safe, the street outside the refuge was not.

It wasn’t very safe if 12 people inside the refuge were hit by shrapnel.

Actually, bissli, Israel still bombed a place where civilians were taking refuge – the surrounding streets.

That’s not a very honest assessment.

That’s not a very honest assessment.

Actually, it’s a simple description of what happened, bissli. You object because it makes no reference to Israel’s motivation in launching the attack.

Neither will the court.

But they got two Hamas terrorists as well so the operation must be counted a great success and all that remains is to mop up a few Fleet Street sub-editors.

And sarcasm is still the lowest form of wit.

Sitting in your armchairs in the Uk or wherever whilst you pontificate on whether a war crime was or was not committed. Ask yourself why were mortars fired toward israeli soldiers from an area filled with civilians if not either to ensure if the israelis had known the civilians were sheltering there to prevent Israeli retaliation or if they did not know which appears to be the case to ensure as many innocent civilians as possible can be killed to provide excellent pr for useful idiots like you to exploit.

That’s not a very honest assessment.
Actually, it’s a simple description of what happened, bissli. You object because it makes no reference to Israel’s motivation in launching the attack.
Neither will the court.
“”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”"”
Firing from an area where civilians are located is illegal precisely because a completely-justified response would endanger them. A court would therefore have to scrutinize Israel’s motivation. On the other hand, Hamas’ motive in firing from such areas would be completely irrelevant because doing so would be illegal in any circumstance.

Well done job. There is of course a pattern here: The UN also accused Israel of shelling an aid convoy, killing a driver and wounding two; as a reaction, the UN announced with some drama that they would suspend the distribution of aid in Gaza. When the Israeli military investigated the incident, it was established that there had been no shelling and no shooting from the IDF; and in any case, the 2 wounded had gunshot wounds, i.e. the UN allegation of an IDF shelling of the convoy was clearly fabricated. Confronted with these results of the investigation, all the UN had to say was that they had never accused Israel of “deliberately targeting” the UN convoy… They couldn’t get themselves to acknowledge that the UN personnel hadn’t been fired on by Israel at all, and that it was obviously Hamas that was to blame for the incident.

Sea Kitten, it’s not honest to say that the people who were in the street, who had left the refuge of the UN school, were actually seeking refuge.

The globe&mail article supports this, so where is the revelation?

That contrary to the first reports, none of the dead and only a few of the injured were taking shelter in the school.

The point here is not that innocents did not die. They did.
David T 29 January 2009, 4:51 pm,

One narrative would could be that Hamas fired their rockets from within a civilian crowd, i.e. the rocket fire was from their because civilians were there.

A Second possibility was that the civilians were there because that is where the rockets were being fired from, i.e. the civilians were their to provide cover for the rocketeers.

In the fist scenario there are “innocents”, in the second there are only combatants.

And didn’t one of the Hamas leaders boast about calling up all his friends when he knew his house was about to be bombed?

The only innocents are the ones who cannot make the decisons on their own. They are the true vicitims.

According to papers like the Independent and Guardian it seems like ALL Gazans are ‘innocents’ even if they belong to Hamas.

Maven, the headline was used about a specific incident where it was alleged a school sheltering non-combatants was shelled, not about the Gaza operation in toto.

Surely the point is valid. I took the comment to be the general media position that ALL Gazan deaths are of “innocents’ when in fact that isn’t true.

here. What would be interesting would be to see if anyone other than the IDF has evidence that “Hamas terrorists” had previously fired from this area,

TheIrie,

Wasn’t their some youtube/radio piece going around where Chris Gunness acknowledges that missiles were launched from outside the UN school? (http://www.reuters.com/article/middleeastCrisis/idUSL7122987)

Man, I feel sorry for you all. Refighting old Public Relations Battles that Israel has lost so long ago (in medialand time) they might as well be the Lebanon debacle all over again.

Hamas are not aliens from Mars, or Nazis from an uncompromised sepia tinged past, or any other form of sub-human demon you seek to invoke. They are the democratically elected government of Gaza and the West Bank and it looks like Obama really does want them to be a Partner in Peace.
Many commentators – impartial, aware of global trends, mindful of historical precedents, sensitive to the economic realities of these fretful times – see them as an intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.
Is the next Israeli government up to the task this time round?
If not, must Israelis wait for this generation of leaders to pass away before they get politicians equipped for the challenge?

Discuss.

Or probably not. Have you seen that Islamofascist Imam on Youtube saying that all British Jews get free tellys coz they run the BBC? Wicked!

The Irie, try listening to this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0BRJS6WnMs

“It took me all of 20 seconds Googling to discover that the expression you object to, far from being an indication of anti-Semitic thinking, has been used many times about many different tragic events, none of them involving Israel or the Jews.”

Fascinating.
You managed to miss this then,which I found in about 5 seconds after putting “Massacre of innocents” into Google.
As reading is clearly not your strong point,it says :
“The Massacre of the Innocents is an episode of mass infanticide by the King of Judea, Herod the Great, that appears in the Gospel of Matthew 2:16-18. King Herod ordered the execution of all young male children in the village of Bethlehem, so as to avoid the loss of his throne to a newborn King of the Jews whose birth had been announced to him by the Magi.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Innocents

The phrase’s provenance is clear.

The article I quoted is from the number 1 Google search result.
Number 2?
Yes,the non-bombed UN school.
Yes,the Independent.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&channel=s&hl=en&q=%22massacre+of+innocents%22&meta=&btnG=Google+Search

Man, I feel sorry for you all. Refighting old Public Relations Battles that Israel has lost so long ago (in medialand time) they might as well be the Lebanon debacle all over again.

Yeah, fuck it – the facts don’t matter at all, do they?

it looks like Obama really does want them to be a Partner in Peace

Riiight… That’ll be why he’s pointedly decided not to talk to them, then.

an intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.

They sound wonderful!

Many commentators – impartial, aware of global trends, mindful of historical precedents, sensitive to the economic realities of these fretful times – see them as an intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.

This is the same Hamas which refused to change its Charter – you know, the bit where Rotorians and all Jews everywhere are part of a global conspiracy that must and will be fought until utterly wiped out – meaning Western Governments were unable to release the billions in aid meant for the people of Gaza?

That Hamas?

What a vile person you are – particularly as you, no doubt, pretend to have the Palestinian people’s best interest at heart.

Fucking racist.

Hi, Mark, did you miss my Youtube link?

Hi, Phomsey, it really is a hoot that Youtube avoiding-reality thingy. Treat yourself.

A quick google will find “Massacre of the Innocents” applied to Beslan. It was used about Dunblane. It’s used whenever children are killed. It does not speak volumes. Even in its original form, ie Herod’s soldiers klling the children of Bethlehem and Rachel weeping for her children* the blame is not put on Jews (just this once) but on the evil King Herod.
*Matthew 2:18

This post actually has next to nothing to do with Hamas.

I don’t quite know what point you’re trying to make, besides presenting yourself as an utter berk.

“Voice of reason” has to be Benji, surely?

I was thinking the “me to” was Benji. “It” is certainly repeating alot of memes that are on a loop inside Benji’s head.

The question becomes why is Benji resorting to so many pseudonyms?

Also, why are youtube links not getting through?

sorry, “me here”

Many commentators – impartial, aware of global trends, mindful of historical precedents, sensitive to the economic realities of these fretful times – see them as an intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.

A lie

Um, Herman which part is a lie, that many commentators are unaware of the “global trend…”?

Perhaps you mean that no such trend exists?

Hi, Joe, not sure who benji is, but not me. He’s too well reasoned and intense for me. (But I smell that awful bullying stink of the Boys Changing Rooms – wet flicking towels and all. Poor benji. Hope his mum loves him.)
And, Herman, I do ask you to consider the possibility that Hamas replaced a corrupt and servile Fatah by democratic means and not by magic. And it may help if you read outside the core curriculum because you may find yourself at a loss when the exam comes. (Like the SWP when the Berlin Wall fell down.)

And, Herman, I do ask you to consider the possibility that Hamas replaced a corrupt and servile Fatah by democratic means and not by magic.

Duly noted. And irrelevant.

No impartial commentator sees Hamas as an “intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.” To argue this is to reveal yourself as a 6th former who just discovered politics, and thinks terrorism is cool. You’ve got a Che Guevara poster in your bedroom haven’t you?

Well then “me here”,
1) Hamas won a majority of seats in the PA legilative assembly, they did not win executive government, which are still held in the hands of Abbas.

2) Hamas gained control of Gaza via uprising, shooting and throwing their political rivals off rooves.

3) Hamas will not be a negotiating partner till:
a) it acknowledges its obligations under previous treaties with Israel,
b) it negotiaties in good faith for a perminant end of hostilities with Israel. This means recognized borders inperpetuaty, and a perminant end to claims and conflict. As Hamas is only after an interim ceasefire and it already controls its territories, what is left to discuss?

Jeezzz, Hermam, the sixth form? I wish. That was several lifetimes ago.

Che Guevara? Poster? Bedroom wall? Nah. Sorry. But his sainthood has imspired many to enter the struggle for social justice, so fair play on the guy.

Terrorism cool? State? Individual? Or somewhere in between? One man’s Terrorist is another etc etc…The Stern Gang or Lohamei Herut Israel… all a matter of perspective etc&etc.

But the question of impartial? Sure thing. Realpolitik, bums on seats players, looking to forge a peace process from recalcitrant beligerents. And why would they bother? Because its been too long, too much blood, too much gold wasted, opportunity costs way too high, too many innocents slaughtered, too much at stake, too much distortion for the empire’s own political process, too embarrassing, just too dangerous, just too much of a waste of time, just too much of a wild card at the poker game with far more valuable real estate owners than just Israel, just got a cold chill from the markets that fuck knows where it could end…

So, is the next elected Government of Israel going to be amenable to change? A simple question. Does it have to be multiple choice? Peace or war?

Oh, Joe Joe Joe! Go google those questions and find out the answers for yourself. One sided justifications everyone of them.

Take a deep breath and read some of the devil’s brew – anything from Counterpunch or Finkelstein or Fisk, you know you want to really. Go on. No one will see.

Man, I thought we had something there, I sneak of a smile, a nod, but no… shame & pity.

Sorry. Can’t play anymore. Too tired. Bored. Fish in a barrel. Mum says I have to go to bed. Any fule kno its a weakday.

Re. the UN – a former legal advisor to UNRWA has written a report:
‘Fixing UNRWA : repairing the UN’s troubled system of aid to Palestinian refugees’.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3662945,00.html
It is painfully obvious that the UN in Gaza is by no means objective, mainly due to the high proportion of local employees who have an evening hobby with Hamas.
What is worse is that UN officials at HQ seem to take every statement that comes out of UNRWA Gaza at face value and rush to make inflammatory official statements without first checking the facts.
Possible reasons for this?
a) they are naive as to why certain information is being fed to them and by whom.
b) they have an agenda.
Personally I think that the Jabalyia story was an attempt to pressurise Israel into cutting short the operation through public outcry. This is not a new tactic – it was employed by Hizbollah at Kfar Kanna.
Reports seem to show a growing rift in Hamas in Gaza.There seems to be one faction ready to reach an agreement with Israel in return for a pullback to ‘67 borders, whilst another group is determined to carry on as before. Also interesting are the different messages coming from Hamas Syria and Hamas Gaza.

I am concerned, you owe the Independent an apology

VoR

I wouldnt lose too much sleep over it.

Anyone who has had to wade through the biased bigoted sewage that The Independent/Guardian headline writers and commentators churn out daily doesnt owe either paper anything.

I find the allusions to the Massacre of the Holy Innocents very illuminating. Presumably, the sub-editors at the Indie have little or no grasp of history. Herod, who presided over the slaughter, was not a Jew. His conversion to Judaism was generally treated with suspicion and contempt by the population.

His victims, however, most assuredly were Jewish.

“The teacher, who refused to give his name because he said UNRWA had told the staff not to talk to the news media, was adamant..”

UNRWA is a major part of the problem. I suspect it is acting as a magnet for all the antisemites in that line of work. They get to form a cosy echo chamber of their own POV, and they aren’t getting “rotated out” to deal with other crises in other parts of the world. That allows the prevailing mindset to flourish, and fester comfortably in the pockets of the Palestinian terrorist cadre.

Let’s be clear, Neil: you, David T and Brett have all suggested that the expression “the massacre of innocents” is an “anti-Semitic trope” and the usage of it is clear evidence that national newspapers are demonizing Jews.

This sort of bullshit is precisely why I no longer take Harry’s Place seriously nor have respect for the authors who say these preposterous things.

This place now uses paranoia to make militaristic arguments in exactly the same way that fascists, or any kind of authoritarian polity, does. Utterly disgusting and loathsome beyond measure. Essentially – “you’re offended, so fucking what?” has now become my standard response to the endless whining and whinging that has infected this place of late, in combination with an odious amorality that doesn’t give a shit about hundred of innocents being killed in Gaza….but manufactures tears over a broken window in a multinational coffee shop. For fucks sake, get a life!

People who think like this frankly really need to get a life. They are making the likes of Melanie Phillips or the people at Debka look like they are reasonable, decent, honourable people (which they are not)

OK, KBPlayer,

I take back that the term hasn’t been used by other mainstream newspapers, such as The New York Times, for Beslan, or The Guardian for a Baghdad suicide bombing: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2005/jul/15/iraq.iraq – 72k – , or of a bombing in Haiti: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/jul/16/theobserver.worldnews – 80k, or, again, here, of the Madrid bombings: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2004/mar/12/spain.rostaylor .

Elsewhere, The Belfast Telegraph of the Omagh bombing: http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/omagh-bomb-was-massacre-of-the-innocents-13875235.html –

However, the only time The Independent has used it as a headline, as far as I can see, is of this Israeli action. I do not believe that is a coincidence. After all, it has hardly been short of opportunities to use the term. Why wait until now, to apply it to an Israeli Jewish action?

I think the allusion to Mt 2, 16-18 is quite intentional. It may even be, as was Dave Brown’s effort, the conscious or deliberate breaking of a taboo i.e. applying traditional European Christian anti-Jewish themes or epithets to Israeli Jews.

Note this only other use of the term that I can find to appear in The Indendent, albeit in the letters page, of Qana, in 1995: http://www.independent.ie/opinion/letters/qana-was-not-a-massacre-81643.html

It’s odd. To say the least.

Further, while Mt 2, 16-18 only attributes blame to Herod for the massacre, Mt 2, 3 suggests that ‘all Jerusalem’ shares his fear of the birth of Christ. And that Herod and ‘the Jews’ were one in their hostility to Christ is a commonplace of most post-apostolic i.e. patristic Christian literature i.e. what has been Christianity for most of Christian history.

Your distinction, KBPlayer, between Herod and ‘the Jews’ is a modern one, stemming from post-Enlightenment criticism, and has little to do with how Herod and ‘Jews’ have been received in European Christian cultural history for most of that history.

Is ‘me here’ on acid or weed, or both?

Gene – those two anonymous sources are not particularly convincing, especially given the lengths that we know Israel will go to to sell its wars to the world. Joe – your link has no evidence either. What is does say is “The Israeli army said on Wednesday it stood by its statement of the day before in which said mortars had been fired “from within” the school, but then issued another statement dropping the word “within” to say “mortar fire from” the school.”

I wonder whether Neil thinks “it would have been nice for the IDF to get its facts right or at least shut up until the facts where clear.”

I find the allusions to the Massacre of the Holy Innocents very illuminating.

Well, it’s not. It illuminates an idle journalist or sub editor grabbing for the nearest cliche. You may as well start writing about the Greek element of the word “tragedy” when some headliner writes “tragedy in Turkey” about a bus crash.

To paraphrase Venichka’s comment, get a grip.

Me here – boiling your sarcastic comment down to the question of elections in Israel – as if the people of Israel could vote in “peace” – or will be responsible if further war ensues or continues – Kadima, committed to withdrawal from most of the West Bank and to the 2 state peace process, won the majority in the last election.

The withdrawal from Gaza worked so well that thousands of rockets fell on Israel, people were kidnapped and killed in other terrorist attacks, there were attacks on the crossings into Egypt and Israel, infrastructure that could have brought prosperity to Gaza was destroyed.

Hamas took over the Gaza Strip in a tremendously violent incident involving the torture and murder of people who disagree with its philosophy. Misojudaic propaganda is taught to children, who are decked out in suicide bomber vests. Peace is hardly the object of such demonstrations.

So. Kadima was elected once already and personally I hope will be elected again because I would like to think that Israel and people of good will around the world have SOME control over this situation and the many others which bedevil us.

But in fact I think we do not. After a certain point some realities have to be faced:

The peaceniks – even if we are the majority – let’s be idealistic and say the peaceniks are the majority on both sides of this situation – or other wars – haven’t been able to control the extremists.

Even the mighty US hasn’t been able to corral the Taliban, which along with other parties threatens not only Afghanistan but Pakistan itself. This could spill into war with India.

So it isn’t just the Arab-Israeli conflict which is dangerous – and which people are “tired” of, which is too costly. Several people running for office in Iraq were just murdered.

Second: please read the fine print about the “moderate” Arab position on ROR – plus the insistence openly stated in the “Saudi Peace Plan” that tiny Israel withdraw from “every inch” of the West Bank and East Jerusalem regardless of the fact that this land is sacred to Jews – that Jews lived there for thousands of years until ethnically cleansed by the Arab Legion.

The alternative – make land swaps in exactly the same amount of land appropriated – regardless of the fact that Israel has proposed making land swaps and the Arab Israelis who live in portions of the Galilee, for example, don’t want to be “swapped” to the Palestinians and furthermore that UN 242 and other resolutions refer to “secure” and “defensible” borders.

Either way, Israel is reduced to indefensible borders and/or overwhelmed demographically by the “return” of millions of people who do not share Israel’s purpose or philosophy.

Even the “moderate” Arab position leaves the Israelis in a hopeless position and even if that were not the case the extremists are guaranteed to spoil any real peace process (again) because “the occupation” doesn’t really refer to the West Bank does it.

Be honest here. “The occupation” refers to Israel within any borders at all. PLO was formed when Jordan and Egypt were in possession of the West Bank, East Jerusalem and The Gaza Strip.

So how much control do you really think the voters of Israel have over this situation? They are quite justifiably concerned now that voting for further withdrawals will result in attacks on Tel Aviv. It’s only 9 miles wide after all, across the waist of Israel.

And I also want you to ask yourselves this: how many times can the State of Israel be responsible for ethnically cleansing Jews from their homes? Should this be demanded of anybody, any state?

Isn’t this especially brutal in the case of Jews being forced to “cleanse” Judea and Jerusalem of Jews”? Will making new victims create “justice”? For whom?

Also – I don’t think it’s fair or correct to compare Irgun or Stern Gang – bad as they were – to modern day Hamas. Their primary enemy was The British Empire during a time when the Jewish people were being exterminated and blockaded, prevented from finding sanctuary, refugee ships were sunk on the high seas and turned away from “civilized” nations like the US. Even in spite of that Irgun fought for the Allies during the war, their leader died in the uniform of a British officer – in exchange for which the Yishuv was blockaded after the war – but I’m sure you know all that – right?

And meanwhile hundreds of millions of people were involved in a global struggle that saw atomic weapons and firebombings as well as slavery and torture and death camps on a massive scale – the situation is NOT equivalent to the Arab/Israeli struggle in any way, shape or form, though the ugly footprint of the Nazis can still be read today.

Can we bear these facts in mind please, when making the astonishing assumption that Israel holds all the cards and it’s Israel’s fault, or the fault of the people who live there, who were born there, who are trying to find sanctuary there, that peace remains elusive?

How can peace NOT be elusive when war – holy war – is the sworn duty of some of the largest players in the region?

Venichka, I think it is perfectly possible to find the loss of Palestinian civilian life disturbing and note The Independent’s usage in describing it.

The loss of life was appalling. But, and it is, admittedly, the butt of a gun, that is inevitable when fighting or attacking Hamas on its own turf. And, in the circumstances, I think Israel did well. Certainly better and more carefully than the UK or UN in comparable urban warfare.

I am, to some degree, a hypocrite in all this, for I would not want myself or mine to be themselves victims to such an assault. But that is the hypocrisy many share in conflicts, where one sympathises more, or less, with one side, or another.

So, people on this thread have, in a few minutes’ Googling, found the phrase “Massacre of the Innocents” being used to describe –

1) The Jabalya artillery attack
2) Child abuse in Maori towns
3) Last week’s Belgian creche attack
4) An atrocity against the Tamils
5) A race riot in 19th century New Orleans
6) The Omagh bombing
7) The Dunblane massacre
8) The Seige of Sarajevo
9) A Palestinian suicide attack
10) Beslan

I think it’s entirely obvious that “Massacre of the Innocents” is indicative of deep-seated anti-semitic hate and that anyone using that phrase should be shot. In fact, since I’ve just used it, I’d better remember to shoot myself too, racist that I am.

(Cue exactly the kind of special pleading about context and ethnicity that would have half the commenters in this thread puking up their bumholes and spitting them across the room in outrage if the same arguments were applied to them-other-’uns)

Israel was not especially ‘disproportionate’ in her use of force (whatever that means), compared to say, Russia in Grodzny, or the US and UK in Iraq. But it was closely recorded and reported, in a conflict where it is perfectly possible, I think, to find the situation of both parties sympathetic. That is what is uniquely ‘grabbing’ about the Palestinian-Israel conflict: both are, to one degree or another, ‘right’. That is the tension, I think, that is both compelling and disturbing.

Short-sighted (you indeed are),

This is the only time The Independent has used it as a headline.

To suggest that the people here care more for Starbucks than for dead Palestinians is fucking mental.

http://www.google.com/search?q=massacre+of+the+innocents

Au contraire – Google really is handy to help you avoid such elementary errors.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/van-persie-leads-massacre-of-the-innocents-514224.html

Note that this is a report from a football game – Arsenal v Sunderland, as it happens. Add that one to the list, if you like.

The loss of Palestinian life was appalling, not because Israel was especially ‘disproportionate’, in the circumstances, but because, in an absolute sense any loss of innocent life is appalling. That is why there is a universal taboo on killing, that is, perhaps, honoured more in the rather than in the observance.

I think it brought home that it is possible to sympathise, or even identify with, either party, for all kinds or reasons, whether by kinship or imaginative empathy, perfectly legitimately. It is truly a tragedy.

Which is why I hope for a permanent cease-fire soon and George Mitchell to bang heads together as President Barak Obama intends him to do.

http://wotnews.com.au/like/massacre_of_the_innocents/2885816/

http://www.herald.ie/world-news/massacre-of-the-innocents-1594174.html

http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/TPV3/News.php/2009/01/24/massacre-of-the-innocents-2009

http://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/letters-to-the-editor/Israel-must-end-massacre-of.4866208.jp

http://www.soschildrensvillages.org.uk/charity-news/gaza-update-.htm

http://theduckshoot.com/blog/gaza-the-massacre-of-the-innocents/

http://www.cmaq.net/node/31970

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=DYpTd6JBjvA

I could carry on. That’s just from the first page of Google.

That is why there is a universal taboo on killing, that is, perhaps, honoured more in the BREACH rather than in the observance.

How about this:

Dear Friends,

We are amidst our celebrations in the West, about to begin next week in the Eastern Church, of the great and wondrous events of Christmas—in His boundless love for His creation, God becoming human in Jesus Christ. In every Church throughout the world, we hear the angels’ song of Bethlehem sung again and again: “Glory be to God in the Highest Heaven, and on earth peace and goodwill toward all people.”i

Authentic Christianity calls us beyond an avaricious consumerism and gratuitous sentimentalism to a living faith in light of the suffering and cruelty amidst which Jesus was born. “The cradle of Bethlehem lies in the shadow of the cross:”ii The liturgy on the fourth day of Christmas is of The Holy Innocents — the slaughter of infants in Bethlehem by Herod’s army when confronted by the birth of the Prince of Peace.

In Bethlehem, now having endured over 40 years of brutal and illegal military occupation by Israel, and choked by the Apartheid Wall with its mocking “Peace” banner, the angels’ song rings hollow. In Gaza, the siege on all sides has created the world’s largest prison. 1.5 million civilians are prevented from freely accessing even food and medical supplies. Gaza’s Near East Council of Churches’ Christmas Card received last week depicted imprisoned children with the prayer, “End the Siege of Gaza. End Israeli Occupation.” We recall with shame the Canadian government being the first to call for actions that ultimately led to the siege, at the behest of the Canadian pro-Occupation Israel lobby.

We continue to demand that the senseless rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel stop. On this eve of the Holy Innocents, the government of Israel has deliberativelyiii committed a murderous massacre of unarmed civilians.

Is that clear enough for you?

http://www.sabeel.ca/Gaza2009-RobertAssaly.html

How about this page, illustrated with a quotation from the Gospel of Matthew, and an illustration of Ehud the Great.

http://mundosonhos.wordpress.com/2009/01/24/

Sorry, you were talking about football…

Go on Flying Rodent.

Tell us how there’s no anti-semitism here, how the comparisons with Herod and the Gospels are illusory.

“Massacre of the innocents” is no more antisemitic than “judgement of Solomon”. These are biblical phrases which are part of ordinary English and have no historical or religious resonance at all among the people who use them.

Really?

I could carry on.

No doubt you could. I’ll just observe that I have used phrases such as Breathing one’s last; one fell swoop; in my mind’s eye; more in sorrow than in anger; my mind’s eye; vanish into thin air; to be in a pickle; the milk of human kindness; play fast and loose; cold comfort; flesh and blood; the salad days; foul play; cruel to be kind and tower of strength.

Common phrases that would roll off the tongue (zing!), and yet all of them are original inventions of William Shakespeare. Could you identify any of them from his works? I certainly couldn’t – I only know about it because I read about it in a rather obscure book.

Many commentators – impartial, aware of global trends, mindful of historical precedents, sensitive to the economic realities of these fretful times – see them as an intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.

Many commentators, mindful of how difficult it would be to be seen to treat with a genocidal racist party, that repeatedly states and acts on its desire to kill Jews for the sake of the Glory of God, have set out to whitewash Hamas.

Hamas, sadly, doesn’t have the wit to do it, itself. So retired British diplomats are brought in to do the job for them.

“These are biblical phrases which are part of ordinary English and have no historical or religious resonance at all among the people who use them.”

Then, Mr not-so-literate-in-English, why did The Independent wait all these years to apply Massacre of Innocent to, and only to, Israeli Jews?

Why did it wait all these years to apply the visual motif of infanticidal cannibalism to, and only to, an Israeli Jewish statesman?

Sophia – good post!
Venichka – the people who need to get a life are the ones who go round smashing shop windows and occupying universities. These ‘armchair warriors’ seem to think they are hastening the coming of the revolution by commiting criminal acts.

“These are biblical phrases which are part of ordinary English and have no historical or religious resonance at all among the people who use them.”

Codswallop. The article’s authors deliberately chose a Gospel motif that, when applied to Jews, would be especially cutting. And one deduces that from the fact The Independent has applied it to no other ethnic or national group. Ditto for Dave Brown.

The loss of Palestinian life was appalling, not because Israel was especially ‘disproportionate’, in the circumstances, but because, in an absolute sense any loss of innocent life is appalling.

Zkharya 29 January 2009, 10:09 pm

The loss of Palestinian life is all the more appalling because it resulted from the direct and premeditated actions of the very people that are meant to be the leaders of the Palestinian people.

This war was avoidable, but rather than seek conciliation, Hamas deliberately sort belligerence. Rather than seek to protect the Palestinian people, Hamas actively placed the Palestinian people in harms way. Rather than surrender, in the interest of the Palestinian people, Hamas sort to prolong the conflict, to exacerbate their suffering and increase the numbers of their death.

We are all Hamas now, I believe the chant was.

The good Samaritan; tower of Babel; Sodom and Gomorrah; if I perish, I perish; lines in pleasant places; hiding your light under a bushel; the wise virgins; – these are all fragments of Bible-speak which waft around our heads.

Try searching “massacre of the innocents” in news. I got references to most of Israel’s wars. Hey, surprise, including Jenin.

Found this too, a Lebanese satire of Hezbollah’s Nasrallah.

It’s a novel explanation for the recent rockets into Israel from Lebanon that no one claimed responsibility for.

You haven’t answered my question, KB Player.

I did a quick google first with the words “massacre of the innocents” and “independent” and in the twinkling of an eye got this:-

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/van-persie-leads-massacre-of-the-innocents-514224.html

It’s about football.

OK, KB Player, but here the use is tongue in cheek.

And you still haven’t answered my question.

Some of the posters in this thread remind me of those scary people who work for photo developers, process some snaps taken by parents of toddlers in the bath, and report them as child pornography to the police.

In other words, to see the obscenity here, you have to striving hard to find it and have it always foremost in your mind, don’t you?

The next stage will be to accuse myself, KB Player, Rodent and others of being “in league” with the growing mass movement of British anti-Semites proven to exist by some choice phrases of Independent sub-editors. Certainly people like Zkharya are determined to see anti-Semitism at work here, no matter how many times it’s pointed out to him that “massacre of the innocents” is about as dangerous as “sick as a parrot” and “game of two halves” as far as cliches go.

But please don’t crucify me for point this out, folks!

Sorry if I’m retreading old ground here, but Herod was a non-Jew who killed Jews(The whole point being that this is a pre-Christian time in Bethlehem! Jesus (also a Jew) is newborn.)Or, to be more precise, Herod was a Roman stooge, named as ‘King of the Jews’. However, I can see that people here are getting into the post-modern soup of claiming to be able to say what a given metaphor, motif, trope, meme etc really, really means. Well, as HP has more or less worked out a rationale for saying that any criticism of Israel is anti-semitic (what about Sri Lanka etc?), then it wouldn’t be difficult to dub any description of any dead Gazan (and you’ve got plenty to choose from, after all) as anti-semitic. Incidentally, the phrase ‘massacre of the innocents’ is also loaded with connotations from the European religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries – see anachronistic paintings and descriptions of eg massacres of Protestants by Catholics in the ‘Low Countries’ and of course Paris. Breughel’s is clearly Spanish troops killing the Dutch. This ties in with the iconography that commemorated ‘Bloody Mary’’s reign that ended up in Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. The judeocentric fervour here forgets that there have been many times in Europe when, in the iconography of death, slaughter and the killing of innocents, the image of Jews was not summoned into the collective imagination either as victim or perpetrator. The religious point about Herod was that he was such an extreme tyrant that he was even willing to kill ‘his own people’. This is the trope that can be translated very well into times when a monarch or ruler could kill his own people (eg if they were protestant) in order that he could maintain his rule.

When in doubt refer to ‘Elephants and the Jewish Question’. It’s a really important text.

Hi Michael, glad to see you find me as fascinating as ever.

Thanks for that. All very interesting, and irrelevant.

I don’t think that the fact that The Independent has only ever headlined an Israeli Jewish action (non-tongue-in-cheek) with ‘Massacre of Innocent’ and none else is purely co-incidental.

The authors know full well the provenance of the expression, as did those who, as you observe, applied it elsewhere. But The Independent has never applied it, as a headline, elsewhere.

Gosh, Michael, you sure can pour out those words.

Yeah, Michael, the author of that headline was not alluding to the 30 Years War.

ref: “the kind of reputation that the likes of Melanie Phillips enjoys.”

Well VOR, you should be old enough to have learned that just because the conventional wisdom pegs somebody like Ms. Phillips as a whacko doesn’t in itself undercut the correctness of her analysis… harsh as it may well be.

Z., you don’t know what the author was alluding to. This is known as the ‘intentional fallacy’. Or to be more accurate – you imagining that a) you know the author’s intention and/or b) that knowing it will give you an insight into its ‘true’ meaning.

It’s a fallacy for the reasons that others have pointed out. Phrases mean what they mean through a set of social processes. You and others here have decided that the phrase means ‘jews killing babies’. Well, all you can prove by the methods you’ve adopted is that that’s what you think it means TO YOU. I pointed out another set of allusions (indeed it’s the one that always springs to my mind!) which is the European killing of innocents that went on during religious wars (not just thirty years for christ’s sake! More like two hundred years. You know that, and just thought you’d diminish my point. Cheap and silly.) and which were turned into many, many iconographic images which sit in art galleries and books for millions of people to view.

I repeat, Herod was a monarch who is seen in the bible as someone who was so desperate to hang on to power, he killed his own. It’s not a story about Jews killing non-Jews. That, you’ll remember is the plagues in Egypt. If you were a newspaper writer wanting to summon up a biblical image about Jews killing non-Jews, then that’s your image.

By the way, you do acknowledge that there were some innocent people who were massacred in Gaza, don’t you? (!) Oh shit, I’ve said something antisemitic.

(by the way, on brevity, z. If your brevity helped you say anything useful or interesting, I would be the first to acknowlege it. I love pithiness. If you think a three or four paragraphs is long, then there are classes to help you over that. Mind you, my sons, when they were teenagers, had similar problems. Are you a teenager?)

There are some people commenting here who are being willfully stupid. I don’t mean the clearly demented VoR and “me here”, or the now-well-on-his-way-at-least Ven, but those such as Flying Rodent and Michael Rosen who, whatever else you might want to say about them, are clearly not thick.

If I referred to a black man as “boy”, would Flying Rodent or Michael Rosen permit a defence of my comment on the basis I cold turn up 50 million Google results showing use of “boy” in unequivocally non-racist contexts? I don’t bloody think so. And with good reason, too.

Now, consider this for a few minutes and then go back to that Indy headline.

Michael,

I haven’t time to dissect your waffle. I have PhD to write.

I iterate:

I don’t think that the fact that The Independent has only ever headlined an Israeli Jewish action (non-tongue-in-cheek) with ‘Massacre of Innocent’ and none else is purely co-incidental.

The authors know full well the provenance of the expression, as did those who, as you observe, applied it elsewhere. But The Independent has never applied it, as a headline, elsewhere.

And yes, Michael, I know the Wars of Religion lasted from the 15th to the 16th century. By referring to a part, The 30 Years War, I was alluding to the whole.

And the authors were alluding to none of them.

Oh Brownie, you’ve got so heated, that you’ve forgotten the rule: ‘context is all’. We live in a world where people do not necessarily know all the connotations of a word like ‘boy’. So, it’s not hard to imagine that in those parts of the English speaking world where people us the word ‘boy’ or even ‘boyo’ they could quite unknowingly and utterly non-racistly use the word ‘boy’ when talking to black person. The ‘boy’ usage was American and is only known to those of us on this side of the pond through films, plays, novels, biographies, autobiographies and antiracist writings and the like. Incredible though it may seem, there are millions of people who live outside of that particular loop. A word like ‘boy’ which is in daily usage in other contexts, can easily end up in the situation you describe (white person, black person conversation in eg the UK) and one or other of the participants not be aware of the US slavery and post-slavery connections. The fact that you seem to think that its meaning is tied up and certain explains why you might think that there is only one meaning to the Masscacre of the Innocents.

I repeat, Herod was a monarch who is seen in the bible as someone who was so desperate to hang on to power, he killed his own. It’s not a story about Jews killing non-Jews.

And Jews don’t actually put the blood of Christian babies in their matzah, but that doesn’t stop it from being an antisemitic myth.

Z. , you’re still thrashing around in the mud of the intentional fallacy. (and remember Herod was killing his own, Z. Not Jew on non-Jew. Hard for you to grasp. Jews did kill non-Jews in the bible. If a journo wanted to make that point, that was the place to go.

I like the way that you want to say you’re not participating in this conversation because you’ve got a Ph.D to do. You’re beginning to sound like those folk who HPers like to mock: ie the posters who say it’s not worth having a conversation but carry on all the same.

And yes, of course you knew (and I told you that I knew you knew!)that the religious wars were more than thirty years – which means that the only reason why you pretended that it was thirty years was, as I said, to be cheap and silly. Well done. You succeeded.

bissli, that’s a great point about anti-semitic myths. But the Herod story is not an antisemitic myth. Herod in the bible is a quisling who kills his own. He was a false ‘king of the Jews’. Jesus, in the bible, is the true king of the Jews. Herod is trying to kill the real king of the Jews, so kills all the other Jews.

So, apols but I haven’t followed you on this one.

In connection to the original theme…It was Susan Rice’s first day at the UN today and this is what she said:
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3664174,00.html

OK, Michael, you win. By your sheer volume of words, you win.

I iterate:

I don’t think that the fact that The Independent has only ever headlined an Israeli Jewish action (non-tongue-in-cheek) with ‘Massacre of Innocent’ and none else is purely co-incidental.

The authors know full well the provenance of the expression, as did those who, as you observe, applied it elsewhere. But The Independent has never applied it, as a headline, elsewhere.

z., a weak and phony riposte. If you really are doing a Ph.D., you had better do better than that or you’ll get roasted in the viva. Who’s your supervisor?

If I really am doing a PhD, I shouldn’t waste my time dissecting your waffle.

And I did ask you Z., whether it’s your view that any ‘innocents’ were ‘massacred’ in Gaza? I’m not going to get all HP-ish and modernitybloggish if you don’t answer.

Z., a conditional sentence with a ’should’ in the main clause, needs a past or subjunctive in the conditional clause…’If I was/were doing a Ph.D, I shouldn’t..etc.’

The sentence as written doesn’t actually make sense.

Alternative:
‘If I really am doing a Ph.D. (ie at this very moment), I shouldn’t be wasting my time dissecting your waffle.’

(two present continous tenses needed).

Oh Brownie, you’ve got so heated, that you’ve forgotten the rule: ‘context is all’.

Hardly, given the very essence of my point is that in one specific context, my use of “boy” would be unequivocally racist, yet in a billion other contexts it would not be.

Seriously, why start your comment with “context is all” and then craft a counter-argument that completely ignores the specific context I provided?

We live in a world where people do not necessarily know all the connotations of a word like ‘boy’. So, it’s not hard to imagine that in those parts of the English speaking world where people us the word ‘boy’ or even ‘boyo’ they could quite unknowingly and utterly non-racistly use the word ‘boy’ when talking to black person.

Absolutely, but my analogy quite clearly stated that it was *I* referring to the black man as “boy”, not some goat-herder from Mongolia. There’s a reasonable expectation I’m aware of the connotations of “boy” as directed at a black man, just as there is a reasonable expectation that the subbies on the Indy are aware of the provenance of “massacre of the innocents”….but chose to use it anyway in describing Israeli actions.

The fact that you seem to think that its meaning is tied up and certain explains why you might think that there is only one meaning to the Masscacre of the Innocents.

I’m afraid you misunderstand. I don’t need to be convinced that “massacre of the innocents” can have multiple applications and need not imply anything other than that there were some “innocents” who’ve been “massacred”. I do, however, need to be convinced that the subbies on the Indy were unaware of the specifically Jewish provenance of this phrase and the implications of its use to describe acts by the Jewish state.

Clear?

Odd, all the commentors who insist that the phrase “Massacre of the innocents” has no resonance to the well known “Massacre of the Innocents”

Boggle.

Are you sure you don’t all wish to start over?

Michael, sorry if you’re finding it hard to follow arguments tonight, bit tired? Anyway, my point was that you can keep banging on about what the bible actually says till the cows come home, but the term still has antisemitic connotations. I don’t know whether the Indy writer knew this, but shame on them if they didn’t, and shame on them if they did.

Er…christian provenance of the phrase, I think you’ll find. That’s to say it’s Matthew (post Christ) and in English doesn’t appear until first English translations of the bible ie in Christian Europe precisely at the time there are religious massacres of ‘innocents’ going on! Thre phrase is not a ‘Jewish’ phrase at all. Having pointed out to me how hip you are to ‘context is all’ you then conclude by implying that ‘provenance’ is all. Which it most certainly is not. As you had just proved.

I thought your use of ‘I’ in the ‘boy’ example wasn’t actually ‘you, ‘Brownie” but the generalised ‘I’ meaning ‘one’. Apols. Misunderstood.

bissli, no. I was only half banging on about what the bible says. Ie that Herod killed Jews. But my other half was to point out that its meaning in English was first circulated when the massacres were Catholics on Protestants. I’m suggesting that its meaning is primarily of a king killing his own people. Which is what happened in Europe in for two hundred years. Try the plagues. (didn’t you hear that someone described the bankers who are bringing down the world economic system as ‘locusts’. You want an image of the eternal Jew destroying the non-Jewish world? That’s it. And you guys missed it?! Nebekh)

and remember Herod was killing his own, Z. Not Jew on non-Jew.

Oh fer Christ’s (geddit?) sake, Miichael, don’t be so obtuse. Herod was King of Judea and he killed lots of babies (allegedly). There’s your anti-Semitic trope in a nutshell.

Tune in next week, where Michael Rosen argues that invoking the ‘Irish as thick’ meme is not in fact a racist* stereotype because, guess what, the Irish are not thick!

*Yeah, I know “Irish” is not a race.

who were the babies, Brownie? Romans? Christians?

In, say the iconic Breughel picture of the Massacre of the Innocents who is doing the massacring? And who are the innocents? Take a shufti. I think the pic is online. It used to be.

Michael, with your Biblical references you’re effectively arguing that a racist slur cannot be a racist slur if the alleged facts at the core of the slur are not true. This is buffoonery and I think you know it is.

Does it have to be proven that black men actually do have larger penises for the well-hung black man to gain currency as a racist stereotype?

I don’t believe this point genuinely escapes you, so I’m going to get some sleep now. Ta-da.

Mehere wrote: “Hamas are not … Nazis …”

That’s debatable.

They are the democratically elected government …

So were the Nazis.

Hey Brownie. Er…Moses…tenth plague…? Jewish text. Jewish story. Jewish bloke. Death of the first born. Non-Jews….Anti-semitic trope? ahem ahem?

Michael, it’s the New Testament stuff which gets the lynchmobs out, the plagues haven’t historically been used as a stick to beat Jews with.

who were the babies, Brownie? Romans? Christians?

Er, I think the point is that an anti-Semite doesn’t give a fuck. It works as an anti-Semitic trope, is the thing.

You do realise you’ve made me use “trope” and “meme” in the same thread?

I disgust myself. I really am going to bed

“Michael, with your Biblical references you’re effectively arguing that a racist slur cannot be a racist slur if the alleged facts at the core of the slur are not true. ”

No, Brownie. You claim that the Herod story is of Jewish provenance (! bollocks!) and yet it’s an antisemitic trope. I said that it isn’t because the story is usually told as a corrupt king killing his own.

I’ve given you an example from the Jewish bible where a Jew (moses) kills the first born non-Jews. By your great divining, (see above) this would mean that this in an antisemtic stories. Oh sheesh, those jewish scribes must have been self-hating. I geddit. Gilad Atzmon wrote Exodus.

not ‘this in an antisemtic stories’ (!)

but
‘this is an antisemitic story’.

yes, bissli, tired.

Rosen wrote, “But the Herod story is not an antisemitic myth.”

To a certain extent, the entire New Testament is an anti-Semitic myth. A reference to a famous massacre of innocents, in the document which for two millennia has been the primary source of anti-Semitism in the West, is unquestionably anti-Semitic.

bissli, that’s because according to the NT the Jews kill Jesus. Herod doesn’t kill Jesus. He kills Jewish babies.

bissli, ‘locusts’, bissli, ‘locusts’. Plague of, bissli. Moses, bissli. Visited on non-Jews, bissli.

According to Brownie’s logic the OT is anti-semitic too! Jewish prophet and founding father kills all first born non-jewish babies by invoking Jewish God. There’s Brownie’s trope. Done deal. Exodus: antisemitic. ’s obvierse, mate.

Oh dear. I was rather hoping how one of the biblical scholars here would dive in and explain how Herod killing Jewish babies is antisemitic (as is Breughel’s painting of sixteenth century Spanish soldiers killing Dutch peasants in his ‘massacre of the innocents’ representation of the biblical scene) but Moses killing non-Jewish first born is not antisemitic – either in its original purpose and meaning or in how the story was understood and interpreted by antisemites.

I’m awake!

I said that it isn’t [an anti-Semitic trope] because the story is usually told as a corrupt king killing his own.

Unless I’m misinterpreting you, you appear to be saying that no use of “massacre of the innocents” can ever be considered anti-Semitic (given the relevant historical facts of the case). In other words, it has nothing to do with context in this instance, as the phrase is necessarily non-anti-Semitic.

It’s a point of view, although it’s hardly worth debating it on this occasion. If you don’t think the phrase can ever be anti-Semitic, then a discussion about whether its use by the Indy in a specific instance – to describe Israeli actions – flirted with anti-Semitism, doesn’t even get off the ground.

I’ve given you an example from the Jewish bible where a Jew (moses) kills the first born non-Jews. By your great divining, (see above) this would mean that this in an antisemtic stories. Oh sheesh, those jewish scribes must have been self-hating. I geddit.

This is absurd. So the anti-Semites missed a trick with the Moses thing. So what? Most racists are thick. Who knew, eh?

And I am not “divining” anything. Some stories gain currency as racist myths and others do not. Go figure. However this happens, it’s not dictated by me.

And now I’ve used “go figure”. If only the former King of Judea were here to slay me.

Night.

bissli, that’s because according to the NT the Jews kill Jesus. Herod doesn’t kill Jesus. He kills Jewish babies.

No, he kills holy innocents, martyrs for Christ. It’s about what they represent. They don’t represent Jewish babies, they represent Christian babies. Holy, innocent babies. Killed by the King of the Jews.

Giving blood in a few hours, best get some sleep. Night!

This is rather curious. It seems like only yesterday Brownie was defending Morgoth’s use of the word ‘chimp’ to describe Sunny.

Bissli wrote, “Michael, it’s the New Testament stuff which gets the lynchmobs out”

Precisely – as a historical matter, such terminology has killed hundreds of thousands of Jews in the past. Yet, Michael ignored your point.

According to Brownie’s logic the OT is anti-semitic too! Jewish prophet and founding father kills all first born non-jewish babies by invoking Jewish God. There’s Brownie’s trope. Done deal. Exodus: antisemitic. ’s obvierse, mate.

Michael, quit with the misrepresentation bollocks. This is your willful distortion and not my “logic” at all. As before, some stories evolve into racist myths and others do not. Wacky, I know, but there you go.

I really am going to bed now. I truly hope I can wake up tomorrow morning to read this thread and discover you haven’t behaved like an utter cad in my absence.

Don’t let me down, Michael.

I’m saying that my evangelical head teacher and RE teachers of the 1950s told the Herod story as a corrupt king killing his own. I’m also saying that the key theme that runs through European history around the ‘meme’ of massacres of innocents is primarily that of protestant victimology about Protestants having been ‘massacred’ by Catholics eg under Bloody Mary or in Paris or as with the Breughel painting supposedly depicting the ‘Massacre of the Innocents’ Spanish (ie Catholic) soldiers massacring Dutch peasants.

I didn’t say anything about ‘truth’. I said, as you said, how the story was ‘told’. You’ve quoted me using the world ‘told’ in italics.

I’m suggesting that you have been massively reductive and misleading in saying, ‘King of Judea kills babies’ there’s your antisemitic trope.

If you were a newspaper editor of a broadsheet and were seriously intending to rake up antisemitic feelings, then accusing Israel of visiting plagues upon the Egyptians would do the job. However,by your reductive and misleading logic, this image is itself antisemitic. (not my logic. Yours!)

Philo-semite: ‘terminology’ doesn’t kill people. It’s the fallacy of linguistic or cultural determinism to suggest it does. Not even laws or even army instructions kill people. Human beings wielding weapons and poison kill people. They may or may not be influenced by ‘terminology’. They may be ‘just obeying orders’ and the people wouldn’t have been killed if they had refused to obey orders – again for reasons that have or had nothing to do with ideology.

As for the NT being ‘unquestionably antisemitic’ – well, let’s remember that the reason why some people tried to save Jews during the war was because they were Christians and interpreted the NT in such a way as to justify the act of trying to save Jews.

Just to waste my time:

Herod and the Jews have been conflated for most of Christian history, certainly since the church fathers and, arguably, in the gospel of Matthew itself: Jerusalem is afraid at the news of the birth of Christ along with Herod ‘king of the Jews’. The ‘chief priests and scribes of the people’ who inform Herod of Christ’s birth in Bethlehem are said in the church fathers to be accomplice to Herod’s hostility.

In the Gospels, the representatives of Herod, the ‘Herodians’ are said to collaborate with the Pharisees in tempting Jesus. They are all Jews, they are all bad. There is none of you retrojected post-Enlightenment Protestant or other biblical criticism.

There is nothing of his being an Idumaean (well, Jesus does call him a ‘fox’, that is ‘unclean’ and possibly non-Jewish -but that is way too sophisticated for the church fathers and, in any case, makes Jesus too nationally a Judean). Yes, that is mentioned in some church fathers, but it certainly is unimportant in popular discourse: he is the king of the Jews who seeks to murder Christ. The victims of Bethlehem are not seen as being part of the ‘the Jews’, they are in martyred saintly category all on their own (the feast of the massacre of the innocents as a western church feast dates to 485).

In modern Palestinian Christian nationalist discourse they are not seen as ‘Jews’ or ‘Judaeans’, they are seen as proto-Palestinian Christian martyrs, victims of the ‘Zionist’ (or Roman, depending on the adapted context) Herod: head of a nationalist, racist, Jewish state.

In all subsequent Christian literature, into the mediaeval period, both Jews and Herod, king of the Jews, are hostile to Christ. The distinction between Herod and Jews, and a view that is sympathetic to Jews, dates to the Reformation, and evolves, it so happens, along with philo-Judaism and proto-pro-Zionism.

But that is not what the article authors had in mind.

To answer your question, Michael, yes, innocents were killed, as they have been in other incidents, and worse. Yet, no Independent headline ran ‘Massacre of Innocents’. And that is because when the killers happened to be Jewish national representatives of a Jewish state, even as Herod was head of a quasi-Jewish state in Judea, this was the most suitable motif that sprang to mind, it seems.

A motif the Independent had never used in any other (non-tongue-in-cheek) headline.

‘Herod: head of a nationalist, racist, Jewish state.’

Yes, paradoxical given anti-Roman client Herodian zealots are also regarded as ‘Zionist’, but who says Palestinian Christian nationalism is logical anymore than traditional Christian anti-Judaism.

And yes, Michael, I think I do have some idea of authorial intent and meaning. ’sorry. ‘and it ain’t The Wars of Religion or Breugel.

Further, I didn’t say it was ‘antisemitic’. I said it was ‘odd’, nor ‘co-incidental’.

So were the Nazis.

Not exactly. They were the largest party, yes, but the same was true of the SDP for many years and they never got anywhere. It was the severe error of Hitler being made Chancellor (that was decided behind closed doors, in whispered voices, rather than by the German public) that led to the end of German democracy until after the end of the Second World War, rather than some massive landslide triumph of popular fantasy (which did occur, but only in the same way that they did for Saddam). But I get sick of talking about them online, really.

Well, I think nothing less than a very stiffly worded letter to the Press Complaints Commission is in order, signed by David T, Brett, Neil D and Brownie, demanding that they apologise for this headline and make damn sure that in future there are no further references in the Independent to any expressions derived from the Bible or any other foundational text of anti-Semitism.

And if an acknowledgement isn’t forthcoming in two weeks then you can be bloody sure that plane tickets will be bought, <a href=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDthMGtZKa4″it’s that serious.

Well, I think nothing less than a very stiffly worded letter to the Press Complaints Commission is in order, signed by David T, Brett, Neil D and Brownie, demanding that they apologise for this headline and make damn sure that in future there are no further references in the Independent to any expressions derived from the Bible or any other foundational text of anti-Semitism.

And if an acknowledgement isn’t forthcoming in two weeks then you can be bloody sure that plane tickets will be bought, it’s that serious.

Please, please, stop debating. The Jews may not have killed kids inside that UNRWA school, but they killed Christ, didn’t they? So, can we start our pogrom yet?

Once again, the Great Google is handy for perspective. Can anyone identify the origin of the following common phrases?

The sweat of your brow; My brother’s keeper; scapegoat; pride goes before a fall; spare the rod and spoil the child; skin and bones; the apple of my eye; whitewashing; a time and place for everything; man cannot live on bread alone; the left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing; with us or against us; head on a platter; the blind leading the blind; Do as I say, not as I do; He who lives by the sword dies by the sword; Money is the root of all evil; Nursing a grudge; Physician, heal thyself; The truth shall set you free; Old wives’ tales; The salt of the earth; Stumbling block; Out of the mouths of babes; A leopard can’t change its spots; How the mighty have fallen; Laughing stock; Keep your head; Straight from the horse’s mouth; It is better to give than to receive; Turn the other cheek; Bear false witness; Lamb to the slaughter; Fly in the ointment; Ivory tower; Pearls before swine; No rest for the wicked; Fight the good fight; Flesh and blood; Beat swords into ploughshares; A man after my own heart; As you sow, so shall you reap; Eat, drink and be merry; The fat of the land; Many are called but few are chosen; The blind leading the blind; Cast the first stone; The powers that be; The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak; The wages of sin.

They’re all biblical sayings and metaphors. If you’d pressed me, I could’ve guessed that many of them were biblical, but I bet every one of us has used a number of these phrases without giving their origin a second thought.

Joe – the source is still the Israeli military. I think there should be an independent investigation to clear the facts of the matter up.

I think there should be an independent investigation to clear the facts of the matter up.

TheIrie, 6 January 2009, 8:04 pm –

This is inhumane. And a war crime. If there was any justice in this world, the Israel regime would be in the Hague.

This is undoubtedly the weirdest exchange I have yet seen on HP. I’ve been coming here on and off for several months, have made a few comments recently and generally found the place pretty reasonable (with a few exceptions) until a few weeks ago. Something has changed. The obsession with finding anti-semitism absolutely everywhere that now characterises so many of the contributions here is worrying. There is a lot of anti-semitism out there but crying wolf is certainly not the best way to tackle it. HP filled a niche that needed to be filled. We don’t need another LGF.

Perhaps the best way to clear this up is for Dave T and his colleagues to produce a list of ‘well-known anti-semitic tropes and phrases’ that sub-editors can refer to those moment when they are desperately searching for a vaguely resonant headline while deadline approaches. This could then be circulated among national newspapers to avoid upsetting the sort of people who read newspapers in order to find things to get upset about.

Of course, bearing in mind that for most normal people, even the phrase ‘blood libel’ is not actually very well-known at all, this may be a somewhat contentious document, but at least it would give us a place to start.

The only problem is that other special interest groups may also want to take similar action, but I’m sure Harry’s Place won’t have a problem with that given their well-known sympathy for wanton allegations of racism and Islamophobia and famous posts in support of feminists who think that some bloggers may be sexist.

Flying Rod., remember that the HP orthodoxy emerging here is that if the phrase comes from the New Testament, it’s antisemitic and ’caused’ the deaths of millions of Jews. If it’s from the Old Testament it’s OK, though it could (and probably) is being used antsemitically unless it’s a rabbi talking. So, Moses doing for Egypt’s first born is not an ‘antisemitic trope’ (!), even though that is Judaism’s founding father killing Egyptians, but the ‘Massacre of the Innocents’ is obviously antisemitic because a) HP says it is and b) because a Jewish king killing people is antisemitic. Yes.

The fact that the image and idea behind the phrase was used for two hundred years as a way of describing Catholics killing Protestants in Europe is, according to HP, irrelevant. Or even, that Catholics used the image in medieval and late medieval times in a way that was very different from Protestants – irrelevant.

And the fact that people ‘used’ the New Testament as a rationale for saving Jews in WW2, also irrelevant, because, care of HP essentialist argument, the New Testament IS antisemitic.

What does David T call it? Moonbattery. Oh no, that’s something else.

me here

Hamas are not aliens from Mars, or Nazis from an uncompromised sepia tinged past, or any other form of sub-human demon you seek to invoke. They are the democratically elected government of Gaza and the West Bank and it looks like Obama really does want them to be a Partner in Peace.

No they are not. They usurped power in Gaza and are not in control in the West Bank. Obama has refused to talk to non-state leaders, as such, no Hamas.

Many commentators – impartial, aware of global trends, mindful of historical precedents, sensitive to the economic realities of these fretful times – see them as an intelligent and disciplined resistance movment able to deliver concessions, compromises and peace.

They are not committed to peace. They are not willing to compromise. I imagine what you might be referring to is the ‘10 year truce’ idea. Let’s examine briefly: Israel give in to ALL of Hamas demands (anything less than 100% is unacceptable), so Hamas (and only Hamas, IJ, PFLP and co. are not part of the deal) cease their fire for 10 whole years.

I can see why that is SUCH an attractive proposition for Israel. Come 2019 and what happens?

They are not sensitive to economic hardship: They hold aid convoys at gun point, steal it and sell it to the highest bidder.

Is the next Israeli government up to the task this time round?
If not, must Israelis wait for this generation of leaders to pass away before they get politicians equipped for the challenge?

The problem is, your idea of a just settlement and Israel’s idea of a just settlement are very different. Israel will not (quite rightly) be making anymore unilateral peace initiatives. Where is the impetus for the Israel to leave the WB when the best they can hope for is 10 years of relative calm followed by rockets in Tel Aviv and essentially 100% of their citizens in the line of rocket fire?

The palestinian leadership need to understand that there are a few things that they will never, ever get. They will never get a right of return (although i hope they do get compensation) and they will never get the old city of jerusalem. Palestinian negotiators know that, yet they still seem to reject deals on the basis of these 2 factors. They seem to want their people to rot in refugee camps.

I find it amazing that the main issue grabbing people’s attention here is the quite peripheral – and somewhat arcane – issue of language used in one headline, while the central issue – the UN spokesperson deliberately misdirecting, distrorting, and frankly, lying, about an incident, is largely ignored.

But please don’t crucify me for point this out, folks!

Let me guess, Bugs. You don’t know what the word “crucified” means and you can Google ten thousand instances of it not referring to the killing of God’s Son (sic) by The Jews (sic).

I thought it was the Romans?

So, Moses doing for Egypt’s first born is not an ‘antisemitic trope’ (!), even though that is Judaism’s founding father killing Egyptians

Michael, read the Torah will you? (Hint – it wasn’t Moses)

Sheesh, bissli. I know that but Moses is the ambassador between God, the Israelites and the Pharaoh and, yes, bissli, I know I should have put quotes round ‘killing’ meaning that it is the Jewish God (who communicates through the Jews’ leader), who does the killing in order to save ‘His’ people from slaveryand not actually Moses himself. If you were an antisemite you could easily (if you wanted to) blur the distinction between ‘the Jews’, ‘Moses’, ‘the Jewish God’ killing non-Jews. That was my only point. Just as, if you really wanted to, claim that Herod was a Jewish king who killed er…Jewish babies…and was therefore a carrier of an ‘antisemitic trope’. If you wanted to. Or if you wanted to be paranoid about it.

It was actually the Angel of Death, but got to scoot!

“The fact that the image and idea behind the phrase was used for two hundred years as a way of describing Catholics killing Protestants in Europe is, according to HP, irrelevant.”

In that case, according to Michael Rosen, the fact that for 2000 years it has also referred to the massacre of proto-Christian saints by Herod, king of Judea, and has only ever been used as a (non-tongue-in-cheek) headline by The Independent of an alleged massacre of Palestinian Christians and Muslims (who also believe ‘the Jews’ persecuted both a Jesus whom they allegedly revere, and any innocent saints associated with him; and who also live in the land of Judea as ruled by Herod) again by soldiers of a national Jewish or Judean state, is also “irrelevent”.

z., it is your side of the argument to reduce the meaning of a phrase down to one text. I didn’t ever say that the phrase did not ever signify your meaning. I said that it signified various things and one very powerful image is the one represented by eg Breughel. The largely Catholic idea of the holy innocents was not the one I was taught at school. It was bad king is so crazed with jealousy that he even kills his own.

You were the one crying irrelevance, not me.

Anyway, innocents were massacred and the people doing the massacring were mostly Jewish soldiers under instructions from entirely Jewish generals and politicians. That’s the real shit.

“That was my only point. Just as, if you really wanted to, claim that Herod was a Jewish king who killed er…Jewish babies”

In early and most subsequent Christian (and, arguably, Islamic) tradition ‘the Jews’ persecuted the early church who were also Jewish. Except that is irrelevant for those who wish to draw an analogy between, say, that, and the way Israeli Jews treat, say, Palestinian Christians (who, by and large, call Jesus and his followers ‘Palestinians’, not ‘Jews’ or ‘Judeans’ -and that is how they are in Palestinian Islamic national discourse, too, for the most part).

It’s been irrelevant for most of Christian history too: The feast of the massacre of the innocents, for instance, has been a Catholic (then Orthodox) feast day since at least the 5th century, and almost certainly enters English as a translation of the Latin.

The saintly victims of ‘the Jews’ have not been regarded as ‘Jews’, but as a class all their own.

“You were the one crying irrelevance, not me.”

No, Michael, it is you. But if you implicitly acknowledge that what I have said is relevant, I can live with that.

“Anyway, innocents were massacred and the people doing the massacring were mostly Jewish soldiers under instructions from entirely Jewish generals and politicians. That’s the real shit.”

For the journalists, yes. That is why they chose the analogy of a New Testament/biblical allusion to a Jewish king whose Jewish soldiers also killed ‘Palestinians’ (as they are in Palestinian national discourse).

An analogy The Independent has never used of any other situation.

“z., it is your side of the argument to reduce the meaning of a phrase down to one text.”

Well, most things have a primary contextual meaning. But Breugel and the Wars of Religion are not why The Independent chose the headline. That is to say, I do not think they are relevant to the discussion, or matter.

So, yes, I admit, I did say that was irrelevant, to all intents and purposes.

And that should be ‘Brueghel’, throughout. I’m tired, I was up ’til 4am working.

And I’m not saying that is ‘antisemitic’, per se. I am saying it is odd. And if it is a co-incidence, it is a strange one.

301 Red Rock Road, RR#5, Killaloe, ON. K0J 2A0

Egads! Have driven by there 100s of times. It’s day-glo country, ‘home-grown’ heaven, populated by individuals for whom the 60s never ended. That the “Rev.” Assaly is into Liberation Theology says it all.

Bet he’s got a great view of Round Lake.

“And I’m not saying that is ‘antisemitic’, per se. I am saying it is odd. And if it is a co-incidence, it is a strange one”.

Perhaps. But it might just be an inept figure of speech. Didn’t Obama talk about “massacring innocents” in the inaugural when referring to terrorists groups?

“But it might just be an inept figure of speech.”

I do not think there was anything inept about it.

“Didn’t Obama talk about “massacring innocents” in the inaugural when referring to terrorists groups?”

As did The Guardian, The Belfast Times etc. But this is the first time The Independent has headlined (tongue-not-in-cheek) with it.

The obsession with finding anti-semitism absolutely everywhere that now characterises so many of the contributions here is worrying. There is a lot of anti-semitism out there but crying wolf is certainly not the best way to tackle it. HP filled a niche that needed to be filled. We don’t need another LGF.

Hear hear!

Every HP post is tagged with a number of categories, you will notice. I challenge the site maintainers to produce a list of categories by number of posts that fall into them. I predict that it will show that the site is obsessed with Israel/Palestine and anti-Semitism, and that this obsession has reached a fever pitch in the last month.

Interesting that racial agitation, in the form of raising the myth of Jews as the killers of Christ, should slip so easily into a modern liberal newspaper

What ‘liberal’ newspaper? The ‘Indepdendent’ has been publishing screeching antisemitic blood libel, simply dripping with Joo-hatred, for years and years.

I predict that it will show that the site is obsessed with Israel/Palestine and anti-Semitism, and that this obsession has reached a fever pitch in the last month.

Voice of ‘reason’ … right … whatever.
Antisemitism has been increasing in the UK. The facts are there. The attempt to shut up those who protest about it, is itself very dodgy, to say the least.

They (Hamas) are the democratically elected government

Check your facts. They are not. There was a minor incident of a bloody coup, or in simple words: they murdered their political opponents.

You claim that the Herod story is … an antisemitic trope. I said that it isn’t because the story is usually told as a corrupt king killing his own.

Well, it isn’t. It is often used as a stick to beat the Joos with. Sorry if this inconvenient fact does not sit well with your agenda of excusing the Independent’s antisemitic story.

I’ve given you an example from the Jewish bible where a Jew (moses) kills the first born non-Jews. By your great divining, (see above) this would mean that this in an antisemtic stories. Oh sheesh, those jewish scribes must have been self-hating

Oh, very clever. Concepts such as ‘context’ and ‘intention’ don’t seem to exist in your universe, I see.

What an insane thread!

Then, Mr not-so-literate-in-English, why did The Independent wait all these years to apply Massacre of Innocent to, and only to, Israeli Jews?

Sheer malice of course. The editorial staff have been laying their plots for years. (That was sarcasm.) Because it’s in the list of lazy journalistic cliches would be my guess. You’re lucky I bothered to answer your abusively worded question. And it’s Ms not-so-literate-in-English, BTW.

I’ve seen a lovely Brueghel picture of The Massacre of the Innocents, where the massacre is happening in a Flemish village in the snow. The people in it were the usual Flemish? Dutch or whoever populate Brueghel’s pictures. When characters from the Bible were portrayed they would be wearing the same clothes as the artist’s contemporaries, and translated into terms of power and position that the artist would find in his own society.

In medieval literature there is a lot of antisemitic stuff – the story of St. Hugh of Lincoln (blood libel) is one that turns up in Chaucer. Herod turns up as well – he was popular as a comic villain in medieval mystery plays – but there’s nothing specifically Jewish about him. He’s a wicked king, that’s all.

As for biblical knowledge among your average Independent reader, I doubt if there’s much these days.

KB, yes, it’s the point I’ve been making above but they’re not listening. This site is where Christianity is viewed through the prism of Judaism. When you tell’em what we were told in RE lessons in state schools in the fifties, or what Protestant early modern Europe looked at in their paintings, they either don’t believe you or think you’re lying.

Can I make a suggestion?
When you have a legitimate point to make about the media making an untrue allegation that a UN area was bombed, when the UN area was not bombed, then just make that point.

If you mix it with the risible claim that the phrase “the massacre of innocents” is not a journalists’ cliché but actually an antisemitic code, then you will only achieve two things, as this thread has demonstrated:
(1) you will make yourselves look like nutcases, which only pleases your ideological foes and embarrasses your mostly-allies (usually it’s 9/11 troofers, One World Conspiracy theorists, Illuminati beliers and David Icke who do this “I can read the secret code that proves the hidden agenda” thing);
(2) you will lose the sensible point you make, because when there’s a sensible point and a startlingly lunatic claim in the same post, it’s the startling bit that will attract all the attention.

Look, you may well know, utterly, in your heart of hearts, that when a subeditor reaches for a standard journalist’s cliché for a situation in which children get killed, it’s because that subeditor knows his or her Bible deeply and is an antisemite, and they used the cliché just to taunt you. Fine; I congratulate you on your perception of the secret patterns behind reality, mind-reading powers, etc.

Still, when you have sensible things to say, I suggest that you keep your code-breaking knowledge to yourself. Because it’s the kind of revelation about your thought processes that makes people start to sidle away from you and find a seat further along the bus.

So that’s my suggestion: only type the sensible sane stuff here. Say the crazy stuff in the pub or at home or somewhere, if you need to, but don’t type it.

Also, though I’ve probably got this wrong, I understood that Herod was Edomite, what the Romans called Idumaean, and his placement over the Jewish people was resented because he was an outsider, and didn’t follow Jewish religious practices, and so on. The unpopularity of his wife Herodias is an extreme example.

Now, we’re assuming, for the sake of argument, that headline writers don’t draw on pop culture and journalists clichés, but instead on their deep knowledge of the Bible.

If that’s right, then wouldn’t the phrase “massacre of innocents” be about a non-Jewish guy killing Jewish babies?

I really don’t know about the Herod thing, and I’m genuinely asking for information.

no matter how many times it’s pointed out to him that “massacre of the innocents” is about as dangerous as “sick as a parrot” and “game of two halves” as far as cliches go.

Perhaps you need to look up ‘massacre’. Let me help you: it means deliberate slaughter. The Independent’s hacks had exactly nil evidence for their position that Israel had slaughtered civilians deliberately. The only basis for that assertion was that their paper’s policy towards Israel is one of deranged hatred. That is why they printed this outright lie, just as they had printed a great many outright lies from the poison pen of Fisk and others. These people are not journalists: they present toxic lies about the Jews in the guise of journalism, but it is nothing of the sort.

KB, yes, it’s the point I’ve been making above but they’re not listening

As perfect a case of pots and kettles as I have seen on HP.

Now that HP has conclusively cleared this up, what about the other two attacks (both using WP) on UN facilities?

Michael,

“KB, yes, it’s the point I’ve been making above but they’re not listening.”

Actually, I think “they” are. They are simply paying insufficient reverence to the authority of Mr Rosen English teacher.

“This site is where Christianity is viewed through the prism of Judaism.”

No. Through the prism of what has been Christianity for most of Christian history, certainly in those parts of European Christendom whence most Palestinian then Israeli Jews originiated.

Certainly the Christianity of Palestinian Christians, ancient, medieval and modern:

“In the Christian tradition, Herod’s cold-blooded action is known as the Massacre of the Innocents, and its victims are regarded by the church as martyrs. It is so bering reminder that the coming of the One whose life represents goodness and truth, peace and justice to the world, provoked an evil response from the ruling power. The innocents were helplessly caught between the domination of violent man and the reign of the Prince of Peace.

The Christmas message for this year takes cognizance of the story of King Herod, the baby Jesus, and the massacre of the innocents. The events of the past two months of protest in Palestine have seen the killing of many children, youths, and even elderly people by the Israeli army. We have witnessed the destruction of many homes and businesses and a siege imposed on three million Palestinians. The state of Israel has been brutally gunning down hundreds of people and injuring thousands whose only crime is their desire for a life of freedom and the independence of their own country from the oppressive occupation. King Herod allowed himself to stoop down to the basest of all feelings. He stripped himself of all semblance of humanity when he ordered the killing of innocent children.

This scenario is being repeated in a different guise. Almost 40%of those killed have been less than 18 years old. Some younger teenagers died by bullets fired from further away than their stones of protest could possibly reach. These young Palestinians posed minimal threat, no real danger to their killers. Why do Israeli soldiers target protesters in the upper parts of their body, given the use of such powerful weapons? This expresses the intent to destroy, not deter. These deaths are a crime against the value of human life. They dehumanize not only the killers, but also those who command them. At this Christmas time, when we remember the message of peace and love that came down from God to earth in the birth of Jesus Christ ,our celebrations are marred by the destructive powers of the modern day “Herods” who are represented in the Israeli government. The message of this Christmas is already overshadowed by the sound of war, violence, and state terror. Indeed, violence breeds violence, and innocent people have been killed on both sides. But the original sin is the violence of the Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank including East Jerusalem. When the Israeli leadership calls daily for the termination of the violence, for us this means, the occupation must end. It is the occupation that is evil and violent. It is partheid in its ugliest form. Once the occupation ends, the violence will end. There is no other proper sequence. The sooner the Israeli leadership understands this, the quicker we will achievement an enduring peace. Our faith tells us that ultimately, it is not the “Herods” of this world that contribute to the well being of society. The “Herods” will come and go. Indeed, while they are with us, they use all kinds of destructive force to kill, maim, and create havoc.”

http://www.palestina-balsam.it/d05.html

From Sabeel’s Fifth Station of the Cross:
“Two entries include references to those responsible for Christ’s death and suffering. Station Five (which compares the stress and humiliation caused by the occupation to Simon of Cyrene carrying Jesus’ cross) states: “Those in power offer greater accusations and condemnations, including mockery and ridicule. Yes, there are the chief priests, the Herods, the Pilates and the soldiers.” And Station Seven (which compares home demolitions to Jesus’ second fall) includes a passage from Father Rafiq Khoury, a Catholic Priest in Jerusalem who writes:

The greatest victory for Herod is to kill the will for life in us. This is the real victory of Herod over the infant Jesus. It is the eternal conflict between Herod – the authority and the infant – the dream. Rockets, tanks, and the bulldozers can limit our external movement, put us in the corner and demolish our houses. However, they are unable to kill the will for life in us. If they succeed, then this is their real victory.”
http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_context=2&x_outlet=118&x_article=1409

As opposed to looking at it through the prism of modern biblical criticism or even the Protestant Reformation (only pertinent to Protestant north western Europe).

In any case, that is irrelevent to my point that The Independent chose, for the first time, to apply to this particular context.

“When you tell’em what we were told in RE lessons in state schools in the fifties, or what Protestant early modern Europe looked at in their paintings”

All being in the minority of Christian history, only pertinent to part of historical European Christendom and not necessarily to all strata of such societies and even only to the more educated in certain contexts and situations.

Michael has already said he thinks ‘Massacre of the Innocents’ is appropriate because innocents were allegedly massacred by Jewish soldiers under Jewish general.
Which I think rather proves my point. As Hyam Maccoby said of someone who attempted to ‘explain’ antisemitism by reference to Judaism’s alleged ‘lachrymose endogamy’: ‘That is not so much an explanation of antisemitism as a manifestation of it’.

The article’s authors were not thinking of Brueghel nor even Michael’s R.E. lesson, at least not in the way he says.

“they either don’t believe you or think you’re lying.”

No. It’s simply that Michael Rosen’s small revolution of the universe does not necessarilly reflect Christendom, Christianity or Christian history as a whole.

KB,

“Because it’s in the list of lazy journalistic cliches would be my guess.”

I disagree, for the reasons I have stated.

“Herod turns up as well – he was popular as a comic villain in medieval mystery plays – but there’s nothing specifically Jewish about him.”

Rubbish:

21 HEROWDYS Now sees of 3oure talkyng and gevyth lordly audyence!
22 Not o word, I charge 3ou þat ben here present;
23 Noon so hardy to presume in my hey presence
24 To onlose hese lyppys ageyn myn intent!
25 I am Herowde, of Jewys kyng most reverent,
26 þe lawys of Mahownde my powere xal fortefye;
27 Reverens to þat lord of grace moost excyllent,
28 For by his powere allþinge doth multyplye.

58 REX HEROW[DE] Now be gloryous Mahownd, my sovereyn savyour,
59 These promessys I make as I am trewe knyth:
60 þoo þat excede his lawys be ony errour,
61 To þe most xamefullest deth I xal hem dyth!
62 But o thyng is sore in my gret delyte:
63 þere is on Jesus of Nazareth, as men me tellyth.
64 Of þat man I desyre to han a sythte,
65 For with many gret wondrys oure lawe he fellyth.

66 The Son of God hymself he callyth,
67 And Kyng of Jewys he seyth is he;
68 And many woundrys of hym befallyth.
69 My hert desyryth hym for to se.
70 Serys, yf þat he come in his cowntré,
71 With oure jurresdyccyon loke 3e aspye,
72 And anon þat he be brouth onto me;
73 And he trewth myself þan xal trye.
http://www.umm.maine.edu/faculty/necastro/drama/ntown/29_herod_annas_caiphas.html

Mine’s a Newt:

thanks for your advice. I can only speculate as to the poverty of your life that drives you to take such an interest in mine.

Herod and the Jews have been conflated for most of Christian history, certainly since the church fathers and, arguably, in Matthew’s and the other gospels themselves: Jerusalem is afraid at the news of the birth of Christ along with Herod ‘king of the Jews’. The ‘chief priests and scribes of the people’ who inform Herod of Christ’s birth in Bethlehem are said in the church fathers to be accomplice to Herod’s hostility.

In the Gospels, the representatives of Herod, the ‘Herodians’ are said to collaborate with the Pharisees in tempting Jesus. They are all Jews, they are all bad. There is none of your retrojected post-Enlightenment Protestant or other biblical criticism and academic studies, with its more sophisticated historical distinction. Christianity, from its inception, was not about ‘history’, least of all with regard to Jews, as Michael, KB or you mean it.

Nothing is made in the Gospels of Herod’s being an Idumaean (well, Jesus does call him a ‘fox’, that is ‘unclean’ and possibly non-Jewish; the wise men implicitly insult him by saying ‘Where is he that is born of the Jews?’ -but that is way too sophisticated for the church fathers and, in any case, makes Jesus too nationally a Judean). At least nothing which makes ‘the Jews’ less complicit with his hostility.

Yes, to those church fathers who read Josephus, it is known Herod was Idumean by birth but it certainly is unimportant in popular discourse: he is the king of the Jews who seeks to murder Christ. The victims of Bethlehem are not seen as being part of the ‘the Jews’, they are in martyred saintly category all on their own (the feast of the massacre of the innocents as a western church feast dates to 485).

In modern Palestinian Christian nationalist discourse they are not seen as ‘Jews’ or ‘Judaeans’, they are seen as proto-Palestinian Christian martyrs, victims of the ‘Zionist’ (or Roman, depending on the adapted context) ‘imperialist’ Herod: head of a nationalist, racist, colonialist, imperialist Jewish state.

In all subsequent Christian literature, into the mediaeval period, both Jews and Herod, king of the Jews, are hostile to Christ. The distinction between Herod and Jews, and a view that is sympathetic to Jews, dates to the Reformation, and evolves, it so happens, along with philo-Judaism and proto-pro-Zionism.

But that is not what the article authors had in mind.

As an addendum:

Idumaea was forcibly converted in the 2nd century BCE: they all became Jews. That is why they are no longer mentioned as a people after their last recorded appearance: the 20 000 volunteers who fight for Jerusalem during the 1st revolt.

The rabbinic and popular Jewish reception of Herod is complicated. But, in his rebuilding of the Temple, he is seen as having repented of his former persecution of the rabbis.

Talmud-Bava Basra 3b-4a

z., but we weren’t talking about Palestinian Christians, nor, for that matter even Catholic Christians. At least I wasn’t. (You do know that Christianity is divided into sects who really don’t agree on very much, don’t you?) I was talking specifically about British Protestants. That’s what I was fed day in day out when I was at state school in the London suburbs. All I can tell you is that we were told that Herod wanted to carry on being the king of the Jews and didn’t want some newborn babe to threaten that – who it had been announced was ‘King of the Jews’. All the Catholic sacrificial stuff about Herod’s victims being, proxy Christians by virtue of having died FOR Jesus was never told to us lot. I first met the phrase in relation to the St Bartholomew day massacres when I was doing A-level history. YOu say that the Breughel painting is irrelevant, but ask yourself why would a painter think it important to paint this story as a contemporary one of Spanish (Catholic)troops killing Protestant (Dutch) babies? Because in the Protestant tradition it’s a mostly a story about unbridled tyranny (which should be opposed), and not the quietism implied by the notion of sacrifice for a higher end.

Meanwhile, Israel has just killed hundreds of innocent people. And with blockades of various kinds stretching back in time and forwards, has killed and will kill many more. Hundreds.

In Gaza.

“I was in Gaza earlier this week as a member of a human rights mission focussed on gathering evidence of war crimes followed by preparing cases for court in a number of jurisdictions. This involved our delegation visiting several sites of massacre and mass destruction in company with a military expert and listening to the eye witness accounts of the carnage wreaked upon the Palestinian people by the Israeli Defence Forces. Several of you will clearly know a good deal about what has been going on in Gaza both recently and prior to the latest attack by Israel. Forgive me if some of what I say seems obvious or trite but there are certain things that merit repetition. ——————–

Firstly, the current onslaught must be understood in the context of the wider history of the Palestinian Territory. As many of you know, over 75 %of the over 1.5 million people living in Gaza are refugees from 1948 and 1967, many of them refugees twice over. A huge number have now been internally displaced once again. Gaza has been occupied since 1967, and has remained so despite the withdrawal of Israeli troops and settlers in 2005. Since that withdrawal, Gaza has effectively been blockaded to varying degrees, amounting to a strangulation of the territory since Hamas came into power in 2007. The citizens of Gaza have been living in a de facto prison in which they have been deprived of basic amenities, of access to clean water, food aid, work and of any hope. They cannot get out, andf or months before their long-planned onslaught, few were allowed in to help them. Here are just some aspects of the way the blockade impacted on the people of Gaza, even before the current attacks.

1. Palestinians were and remain trapped in Gaza. Scores of chronically ill Palestinians have died, due to Israel’s refusal to allow them to travel to Israel, the West Bank or Egypt for treatment. Students with scholarships to study abroad have been denied exit permits. Families were separated, those on the outside unable to get in and those in Gaza unableto leave.

2. 90 percent of Gazan industry had collapsed as a direct result of the blockade, from the construction industry to the fishing industry to the export and agricultural industry. Prior to the bombing, 70 percent of Gazans were unemployed: o No construction materials have been allowed into Gaza for several years.Thousands of building projects were unfinished and uninhabitable, including the half-finished wing of a hospital in Gaza City and many large apartment blocks intended as housing for the worst off. The two remaining cementfactories in Gaza were attacked and destroyed 3 weeks ago.

o The blockade has devastated agriculture in the territory. The exporti ndustry on which a significant proportion of the population was dependentis now non-existent. Israel has also put a stop to imports of farming tools, equipment and fertilisers etc, crippling in the process Gaza’s ability to produce food even for its own citizens. Instead Gaza is now forced to buy surplus (and often low grade) meat, chicken and fruit from Israel’s own producers as a consequence of preventing people from producing their own.

o Israel also imposes tight restrictions on fishing, illegal under signed agreements and international law, effectively decimating the industry and depriving 40,000 people of their livelihoods and depriving the population of access to food not-dependent on border openings. Even when permitted,fishing is limited to 300 meters from the coast in waters grossly contaminated by the untreated sewage being pumped into the sea, due to lack of electricity and Israel’s refusal to allow vital spare parts for the sewerage system into Gaza. Fishermen are regularly shot and wounded or killed, and their boats damaged beyond repair, even when within the 300 meter line.

o Israel controls all the water, gas, electricity and fuel coming into Gaza. Even prior to bombing and destroying water mains across the strip,it had deliberately run down the infrastructure and reduced the supply to well below the needs of the population. Damaged water mains andi nsufficient electricity for the waste treatment plants mean that the mains water is undrinkable. The sewers are breeding grounds for death and disease.

o The Gaza economy has been further decimated by appropriation by Israel all the customs duty on imported goods. To this day the Israelis take for themselves the hundreds of millions of dollars of import tax due to the Palestinian Authority. This is the background against which rockets have been launched into Israel from Gaza. It is important to note, however, that in the five month ceasefire that preceded the December 27 onslaught, Hamas did not fire a single rocket from Gaza into the West Bank, as acknowledged by the Israeli administration. However, rather than ameliorating the blockade during that time, as agreed under the ceasefire provisions, the restrictions on the strip intensified. In the context of the above, has the Israeli response to the renewed rocket attacks that followed the killing of six Hamas members by the Israeli Armybeen lawful, necessary or proportionate?

1. The Israeli Army has destroyed with mortar, artillery and tank shelling much of what remained of Gaza’s already devastated agricultural production and food industry. They specifically targeted chicken, cattle and sheepf arms. In one large area two of my colleagues on the human rights mission saw hundreds of dead cows with their heads and limbs blown off lying in fields. All the farmhouses in the surrounding area had been bombed and then bulldozed. The families are now forced to live in the open with the stench of death permanently in their nostrils. Some said that relatives of theirs are still buried beneath the rubble because there is no way currently of getting the bodies out. I saw a chicken factory that had been razed to the ground, leaving the buildings flattened and the dead animals in piles in their cages or strewn on the ground. I also saw orchards of orange and lemon trees and seas of poly-tunnels that had been shelled out of existence. This level of destruction and the use of the untargeted weaponry that caused it, some in built up areas, undoubtedly amounts to a war crime, as confirmed by the military expert in our delegation.

2. The Israeli Army has systematically used inaccurate and highly destructive weapons in Gaza City, one of the most densely populated areas in the world. They have deliberately targeted blocks of flats and multi-occupation houses, killing over 1,000 civilians and wounded thousands of others. One man told us his story. He went to the mosque for morning prayers leaving his wife and four children in bed in the fourth floor of their apartment block. His two brothers and their families lived on the same block. On his way back from the mosque mortars and bombs began tofall. He ran home to find the entire block had become a pile of rubble.Of his family only one child and one of his brothers survived. 22 otherswere killed. I climbed to a high point of the rubble and watched the man standing and staring silently into the crater that had destroyed his entire existence.

3. Despite its denials, it is now clear that the Israeli Army has used white phosphorous in contravention of the laws of war. The use of phosphorus is only lawful under international rules of engagement when used as a smokescreen cover in open areas for combatants who are caught in the open and are under fire. However, the evidence on the ground makes clear that the Israeli Army systematically and unlawfully fired phosphorus shells directly over and into populated urban areas. We visited the site of a family devastated by the illegal use of phosphorous. The man we spoke to told us how his wife and three children were asleep in a bedroom of their house. A phosphorous shell came through the roof of the house exploding in the room where the family was sleeping. On impact the mother and children were engulfed in toxic flames smoke and fumes. They died an unimaginable death in that room. I stood in it and saw the traces of white phosphorus on the walls in the otherwise completely blackened room. A woman came into the room and held up a piece of child’s clothing covered in phosphorus burns. The man next to me then showed us a picture of the body of a 10-month old child who had been in the room during the attack. The heat had been so intense that it had burned the baby’s legs off. The child’s uncle just stared at the ground for a while before he went on to tell us what happened next. As in many sites of death and injury, the Israelis were not allowing ambulances or doctors into the area even when there were many injured people in need of urgent medical attention. In this case a man who had a tractor offered to take some of the injured to hospital in his trailer. As men, women and children were being placed on the trailer IDF troops came upthe street and first shot the tractor driver dead. They then shot and killed two people who were tending to the wounded in the trailer. The remaining wounded were left there to die.

4. Zaytoun. The district of Zaytoun covers a large area on the edge of Gaza City. Yesterday the Times reported that Israeli soldiers were being quoted as saying they had been ordered to ³fire on everything that moves²in Zaytoun. That is all too evident from the situation on the ground. The Israeli Army clearly did indeed attempt to kill everyone and everything inthe area. There can be no other explanation for what we all saw. From the border with Israel to the sea, not a single house has escaped unscathed.There are flattened buildings as far as the eye can see. This is the story of the Al Samouni family told by several eye witnesses.The Al Samouni family area contained about 15 houses, each surrounded by a plot of land which was used as a smallholding for subsistence farming chickens, goats and small industry. On 5th January a brigade of tanks surrounded the area. A large number of soldiers ordered people out of one house in particular, shouting at them from outside. The woman who told ust his story said that her husband had been the first one out, and was holding their baby as he went. The soldiers told him to put his hands in the air and he protested that he was holding his baby. They screamed at him to obey them. His hands went up and the baby fell to the ground.Within seconds the soldiers had fired at least 30 bullets into his head and body. They stepped over him and entered the house. A soldier than fireda utomatic rounds into the walls above the heads of several people who were sitting or lying on the floor. They were not hit but were told to leave and go into a neighbouring building. They then ordered other people inother houses to leave and go into the same neighbouring building. Over sixty people, including a large number of children, were gathered in the house without food or water.. After two days, a number of men decided toleave the building to try to get food and water, but quickly retreated on seeing the Israeli soldiers still in close proximity. Some five minutes later, the building was shelled, killing a large number of the family members gathered in the house, including women and children, and wounding many others. Approximately 20 of the survivors left, raising white flags and carrying the bodies of four of the dead. Despite being shot at, they continued to walk and to try to contact medical services to come and save them and those remaining in the house. The Red Crescent was only permitted access to the house a number of days later, where they found starving children next to the bodies of their dead parents. When they returned ashort while later to collect further casualties, the building into which the people had been herded was now a pile of rubble. In total, 29 members of the Al Samouni family were slaughtered, including over 10 children and seven women, many of whom lay dead beneath the rubble. This time the Red Crescent were refused access to the site when they tried to enter. Our military expert was present when many of the bodies were eventually pulled out of the rubble. He confirmed that none of them were in any kind of combat uniform and that none appeared to be militants. Prior to the massacre the IDF took over the first house as a command post. I went inside and saw that it was a highly strategic location from which a large area could be monitored and operations controlled. They had blasted holes for their machine guns in each of the upstairs rooms. The military expert told us that it looked as if most of the buildings had been destroyed by anti-tank mines and then finished off by bulldozers. People have set up small tents on the rubble of their houses, but aid has yet to reach them. A child told us that every child in the settlement is now either an orphan or has lost at least one parent. The woman whose husband was shot at near point blank range also lost both her mother and father. Inside their command post the Israelis have scrawled graffiti on some walls which says things like ‘1 Arab down, 999,999 to go’, alongside Stars ofDavid, slogans such as ‘make war not peace’ and a chilling drawing of a tombstone on which it is written Arabs 1948-2008. When they exited the house they started fires in the remaining rooms and left human shit in many of the rooms.

5. The use of flechette missiles. These are projectiles the size of 4-inch nails with four tail fins. They work by being jettisoned sideways from a missile before it hits a target. Each missile contains 80,000 flechettes. On impact these lethal items tend to bend rather than go straight into their target so when they hit people the wound is over awider area. On the 6th January a family were holding a wake for an ambulance worker killed as he tried to access the victims of an Israeli attack. Traditional mourning tents had been erected and a large number ofpeople were milling around in a wide residential street with a couple of shops in it and houses on both sides. As the local population were payingt heir respects to the mourning family a missile was launched at low level from the Israeli border about 800 meters away. It was aimed directly at the crowded street. Its forward trajectory ejected its flechettes over its range of about 100m and 150m either side. A large number of people in the crowd were hit. Many were injured, including the teenager who gave us this account, who was hit by three flechettes, one of which was still embedded in his leg. Given the extent and nature of injuries in Gaza, he is still not considered a high enough priority for it to be removed. He showed us his brother’s X-rays, which showed a flechette embedded in his right lung. He is still ill in hospital. A number of others were killed, including a pregnant mother and two young members of this young man’s family. I saw several flechettes still buried in the walls of the houses. Photographs of the deceased victims show dozens of flechettes deeply embedded in their faces and bodies.

The objective of the 22-day attack seems to have been to kill, destroy and disable as much of the population and infrastructure of Gaza as waspossible. The Israeli Army targeted the essential services and institutions with astonishing accuracy, leaving the buildings on either side untouched in most cases. Over 60 mosques in Gaza were hit. Some are still standing, some reduced to rubble. Nearly every Palestinian Authority ministry was destroyed, including the Ministry of Justice and the Ministryo f the Interior. This means that all records in Gaza have been destroyed,all records of births and deaths, all records of entitlements and finances.The territory has been reduced to chaos. All 13 police stations in GazaCity were destroyed in one 3-minute strike. The policy cadet school was struck during a graduation parade. Some 40 teenage cadets were killed. We saw their hats and boots, riddled with shrapnel and bullet holes, lying strewn over the parade ground. Shell after shell rained down on those participating in and watching the parade, as they attempted to flee, as demonstrated by the craters in the ground, the last one striking just bythe gate. Every aspect of Gazan society was hit, including money changers, ambulance stations, hospitals, schools. I saw a number of the 40+ schools that had been attacked by missiles, including two schools – one of them the American school, whose students were some of the elite of the youth of Gaza – which had been razed to the ground. Over 50 UN installations were also hit,including two schools where children were beheaded by the force of the blasts, and of course, the UNWRA compound warehouse which had contained as ignificant quantity of medical supplies for those injured in the attacks. These are only a fraction of the atrocities the Palestinian population hasendured at the hands of the Israelis. Nowhere in Gaza was safe during the bombings. There was nowhere to go. Every adult in Gaza contemplated not only their own death but that of their children, and made the decision about where and when they should die. Many uprooted their families from one area to another in a vain attempt to find safe haven. Others remained at home as the bombs rained down, preferring to die where they lived, rather than face the prospect of being shot as they fled. Although children were some of the greatest casualties of the war, adults have had to face up to their total and utter impotence and their inability to protect their children and those they love. The longterm impact will be huge. As a start, Gaza needs an army of psychiatrists. There is a dire need for aid in Gaza. Unfortunately and despite claims by Israel and its friends the aid is coming in far too slowly at all crossing points. The Israeli Army, again despite the claims to the contrary, is actually attacking authorised supply lines. On Tuesday night, still duringt he ceasefire, missiles whistled over the flat I was staying in followed by dull thuds in the distance. The next morning the TV news media reported missile attacks on supply lines. Shelling is also continuing from gunboats off the Gazan shore, unreported in the media. Egypt is refusing to allow food in. Many of the areas of Gaza most affected by the attacks have yet to be accessed by humanitarian aid. ”

Steven Kamlish QC

Michael,

I said The Independent’s choice of headline was odd, for the reasons I have stated.

None of the issue of the reception of the Massacre of the Innocents, traditional, historical, both or neither, is particularly important, for that, in my view. I only got into that because you and others raised it. It wasn’t part of my original argument. You tend to merge everbody else’s particular point of view or concerns into one gestalt entity, often called ‘HP’, which makes addressing you both difficult and tiresome.

Without meaning to sound arrogant, I almost certainly know all those ways of reading the Gospels better than you. But just as there is a difference between ancient, medieval and modern readings (sometimes, but not always), there is a difference between contexts, between state schools in liberal European democracies, Protestandom and Catholic- and Orthodoxdom, academic and popular, reflection and prejudice. As well, of course, as differences in social, political and religious geography, and where people come from, or whence their culture and upbringing.

My experience, when growing up, is that most Christian children and parents whom I knew, when they spoke of Herod, spoke of him as the king of the Jews responsible for the massacre at Bethlehem. There certainly was no sophisticated reading as you suggest. When I grew up, and read the Gospels for myself, I formed my readings, some of them very similar to yours.

But none of that is necessarily relevant to traditional readings in other circumstances. And, anyhow, I do not think the issue is especially relevent to my argument, so I am not sure why I am getting into. Likely because, as I said, you tend to mix up everybody else’s views contrary to yours all together.

I think Palestinian Christian nationalist discourse is more relevant than your education, actually.

You yourself said you thought the headline was appropriate because of an alleged massacre by Jewish soldiers under Jewish generals.

I said I thought The Independent’s editors or those journalists agreed.

As for the rest, I do not think it relevant either. Sure, call that ‘feeble’, ‘phony’ or whatever you like. I don’t care.

Israel has killed innocent people, as I have already acknowledged. What was odd, in my view, was the Independent choosing to headline so, for the first time, the fact that Israeli Jews had done so.

“z., but we weren’t talking about Palestinian Christians, nor, for that matter even Catholic Christians. At least I wasn’t.”

Exactly, you confused “I” with “we”.

Is this the same Stephen Kalmish QC who defended the fifth 21/7 bomber Manfo Kwaku Asiedu?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6661597.stm

“I first met the phrase in relation to the St Bartholomew day massacres when I was doing A-level history.”

Well, that is certainly atypical of Christianity, Christendom and Christian history as a whole.

“YOu say that the Breughel painting is irrelevant,”

Well, if the following formula would make you happier: A good deal less relevant than its traditional reception for most of Christian history.

“but ask yourself why would a painter think it important to paint this story as a contemporary one of Spanish (Catholic)troops killing Protestant (Dutch) babies?”

Because Christian history is full of cultural Christians using Christian and biblical types to describe contemporary events. That isn’t just a Protestant thing: it is what the Renaissance is predicated on, in no small part.

“Because in the Protestant tradition it’s a mostly a story about unbridled tyranny (which should be opposed), and not the quietism implied by the notion of sacrifice for a higher end.”

See answer above.

And, I should have said, the projection of biblical types is rooted in Christianity itself.

First the Jewish church projects on itself the type of Israel to define itself against other Jews, then the gentile church against all Jews, then Catholics against schizmatics, then Catholics against Orthodox, Protestants against Catholics, traditional Anglicans against liberals etc and so forth.

You identify with the good guys defined against the bad guys. OK, that’s a little simplistic, but it does for the argument.

That’s what I was fed day in day out when I was at state school in the London suburbs.

So that’s that: there can be NO other interpretation of the phrase ‘massacre of the innocents’? It can NEVER be used to suggest anything else but a particular Protestant/Catholic war?

Meanwhile, Israel has just killed hundreds of innocent people.

Yes, in order to defend its own innocent civilians from a genocidal enemy, an enemy who has chosed to shell them for years despite appeals to desist. All that needed to happen for these people not to die was for Hamas to stop murdering Israeli civilians. But your ilk will always blame Israel for fighting back. I think that’s despicable.

“So that’s that: there can be NO other interpretation of the phrase ‘massacre of the innocents’? It can NEVER be used to suggest anything else but a particular Protestant/Catholic war?”

Wind back on the thread, and you’ll see that it was me suggesting that there are multiple ways of interpreting a phrase like ‘M of the Is’ and that it was z. and others who were pushing for the one. I’m more than happy to state that z’s interpretation exists. All I disputed was that it was either the only one, or indeed necessarily the main one, or in fact that that is how readers would interpret it. And z., I don’t think there was anything subtle about the way I was taught that story. It was about goodies and baddies. Herod – baddie. Jesus – goodie. Baddie tries to kill goodie. In so doing, kills his own people’s babies. The nuanced version is the Catholic one, which talks of sacrifice (for Jesus and therefore indirectly for us) and so prefigures the self-sacrifice of the crucifixion. We didn’t get that.

re Breughel – z writes “Because Christian history is full of cultural Christians using Christian and biblical types to describe contemporary events”

er no. Breughel’s painting first uses contemporary types to tell biblical events. And it’s Catholic versus Protestant events. In other words the phrase (M of the Is) is being recycled in conditions well away from the Jewish contexts of its origination as long ago as the sixteenth century. The picture casts light on the biblical events, and the contemporary events at the same time – without ‘mentioning’ Jews. This is how the phrase we are arguing about escaped from its original context and has continued to do so ever since.

I’m glad z., that you have introduced the word ‘reception’. Now we’re cooking.

N.O. writes: “All that needed to happen for these people not to die was for Hamas to stop murdering Israeli civilians.”

They had stopped – even though the blockade was killing/murdering Gazan civilians. Any attempted breaks in the ceasefire came from groups who Hamas disowned. The first major break in the ceasefire came from Israel in response to alleged Hamas tunnel building. The onslaught that ensued was brought about as a final fling of the outgoing Israel-US govt relationship and brought to a close exactly as that form of the relationship came to an end.

@ Zkhara,
Sorry, this thread’s gone to bed, but so had I when you replied to me. Thanks for the views on Herod as Idumaean. As we both know, that issue wouldn’t have gone through the Independent’s headline writer’s head, and isn’t germaine, but sometimes the abstruse issues are more interesting than the important ones.

But on the main issue, you were also helful, though perhaps inadvertently so. You wrote:
“Mine’s a Newt:
thanks for your advice. I can only speculate as to the poverty of your life that drives you to take such an interest in mine.”

The thing is, I wasn’t addressing you at all in my post suggesting that HP stop the “secret-code” stuff. And I’ve never thought about your life. You leaped, with the utmost confidence, to a wrong and unsupported idea about meaning. Which demonstrates how easy it is to do.

My post addressed the author of the post, Neil D, to make a point about HP’s credibility. I’m concerned that “secret code” claims, when they get this far-fetched, reduces down HP’s credibility. That’s bad because I go to HP for the sensible, not for nutso conspiracy theorising.

I’m not worried about what commenters say, and that’s why I didn’t address you. But you illustrated my point about jumping to unwarranted conclusions quite well.

So we should all be a little more sceptical about ideas like “massacre of the innocents” being coded anti-semitism instead of what it actually is: a journalist’s cliché.

Similarly, and this _is_ advice to you, Zhkara: don’t rest so much of your case on a single, easily falsifiable factual claim, unless you’ve checked that what you say is true.

When it became clear, from several other posters, that the phrase “massaxcre of the innocents” is a standard journalist’s phrase for any situation in which children are killed, you retreated to placing utmost importance on this being “the first time” the Independent has used the phrase non-ironically in a headline.

But that’s not true either, as a simple check would have shown you. For example, this, about the Omagh bombing being a massacre of the innocents.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/omagh-a-massacre-of-the-innocents-1341302.html?start=1

So on this ludicrous claim about the antisemitic meaning of the phrase “massacre of the innocents” in newspaper headlines, you’re left with nothing at all. But that’s okay, because that’s where this started.

Michael Rosen -” They had stopped -even thogh the blockade was killing/murdering Gazan civilians”

Rockets fired into Israel from Gaza in 2008:
Feb. -262
Mar. – 292
Apr. – 502
May – 425
June – 235 (ceasefire – 19th June)
July – 20
Aug. – 8
Sept. -2
Oct. – 2
Nov. – 193 (4th Nov Israel discovers tunnel for kidnapping soldiers)
Dec. – 370 (up to Dec. 27th.)

An average of 3,911 truckloads of aid was sent into Gaza by Israel PER MONTH between July and October 2008.
This stopped after Israel discovered the tunnel which by Hamas’ own admission was designed to be used to kidnap more Israeli soldiers from INSIDE Israel.There was nothing “alleged” about it.
Israel repeatedly said it would resume aid supplies if the rockets stopped. They did not. These were not “attempted” breaks of the ceasefire – and Hamas did not disown them.
In December, Khaled Abdel Shaafi, director of the UN development programme in Gaza said “This is not a humanitarian crisis…..people aren’t starving”.

Mr. Rosen: you are supposed to be an intellegent and educated man. Why on earth are you buying into and spreading libellous propoganda without checking your facts?

“er no. Breughel’s painting first uses contemporary types to tell biblical events.”

Well, actually

a) I used the word ‘describe’ and

b) the Herod in the quotation from the passion play above pays reverance to ‘Mahownde’: Muhammed. In mediaeval Christian artistic/literary discourse, Herod was a type used to depict Islam.

But he is still ‘of Jewys kyng most reverent’ and seeks to punish Christ for ‘For with many gret wondrys oure lawe he fellyth’.

I confess, I didn’t know that Brueghel was the first person to visually depict a contemporary historical event as a biblical type. He certainly is not the first person to depict historical or contemporary persons as biblical types e.g. the Medici as the Magi by Boticelli. Christian history and culture is replete with biblical types being applied to historical and contemporary persons. Late antique Christian authors seek to identify the person of the antichrist with the latest pagan emperor, or tribes attacking Rome with, say, Gog and Magog.

These concerns continue into the mediaeval period, with ‘Christendom’ substituted for ‘Rome’, and ‘Islam’ substituted for various kinds of Goth.

The later Inferno of Dante depicts contemporary and historical persons as biblical types.

None of which I sought to dispute or deny. As I also said, had you read me, the Renaissance is predicated on depicting contemporary persons and events (in the latter Renaissance, according to you) with biblical (and I should have said, classical) types (in literary art, I should have specified, as well as painting) -and vice versa, for it is a two-way process, or ‘dialogue’ with the past (E.H.Carr, and all that).

If what you say regarding Brueghel visually is true, and I confess I hadn’t thought of it before, nor have any reason to dispute it, it is interesting.

But, as I said, the first time the Independent chose to headline with Massacre of Innocents was upon Israeli Jews.

Which is, I think, also odd-to-interesting.

Mine’s a Newt,

that headline is from the Irish Independent.

And I didn’t say ‘antisemitic’. I said ‘odd’.

Further, Mine’s a Newt,

you’ve just said that I was reading antisemitism into the phrase ergo you were addressing me. You talked about how “I”/”we”/HP should conduct ourselves when sitting on the bus or in the pub. That is taking an interest in ‘my’ life, and how ‘I’ should conduct it.

Further, clearly, for The Independent, ‘Massacre of Innocents’ as a headline is not a journalistic cliché, for they only used it once, regarding Israeli Jews.

“reverEnce to ‘Mahownde”

Israeli Nurse:

http://www.thedailybanter.com/tdb/2009/01/israel-admits-hamas-did-not-break-cease-fire.html

Israeli Nurse:

http://74.125.77.132/search?q=cache:TDyS5v7N6tcJ:www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/07/gaza-israel-palestine+avi+shlaim+broke+the+ceasefire&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=uk

Meanwhile….

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/01/gaza-food-crisis

z., customary use of the phrase in Christian circles with clearly absolutely zero reference to Jews:

[note that this takes place in the Northern Irish Assembly where its past use in Catholic-Protestant conflict is still very near the surface. It was also used by both sides during the Spanish Civil War.]

Northern Ireland Assembly
Tuesday 20 June 2000 (continued)

Mr Speaker:

Order. I am afraid that the time is up.

Mr Boyd:

I support the motion introduced by the hon Member for South Down, Jim Wells, opposing the extension of the Abortion Act 1967 to Northern Ireland. I oppose the Women’s Coalition amendment because I believe that the majority of Members have considered the issue very carefully.

The Northern Ireland Unionist Party is committed to the biblical principle of the sanctity of human life. The basis of Christian morality is that human life is sacred. We have pledged to protect the life of the unborn child. Following the Abortion Act 1967, five million abortions have taken place in Great Britain, where one baby is killed by abortion every three minutes. That is 500 every day, seven days a week. To put it bluntly, it is a massacre of the innocents that all too often leaves mothers mentally or physically scarred for life.

Michael,

I already acknowledged its ‘figurative’ use.

Yet, this is the first time The Independent headlined with it.

Z., there is a sea of texts. These circulate freely in our world taking on and losing meanings as they go. You cite one example in one situation. All that I and others are trying to suggest is that a given text (M of the Is, in this case) doesn’t have one meaning and its usage in one circumstance does not signify one meaning. You have placed a judaic meaning over its usage in the Ind. that day in that context but all that I am saying is that the phrase has many other connotations, particularly (as one example) to such people who have seen and used the phrase within a Prot/Catholic context. What’s more, even within its biblical context of eg school assemblies c. 1955, north London, the story was largely drained of the notion that this was judaic tyranny visited on quasi-christian innocents – a meaning I’m quite happy to acknowledge of course…but in the sea of texts.

Hasn’t someone (above) given you another example from the Independent re the Omagh bombing – no Jews involved?

“You have placed a judaic meaning over its usage in the Ind. that day in that context”

No. The Independent did, by virtue of using it first and only of Israeli Jews.

“Hasn’t someone (above) given you another example from the Independent re the Omagh bombing – no Jews involved?”

a) The Irish Independent

b) hardly contemporary, it is describing a situation 8 years ago.

’sorry 10 years ago.

“Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men, was exceeding wroth, and sent forth, and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying,

In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.”

In the English speaking Protestant world the verse about Rachel weeping for her children was much quoted – Rachel, not as a Jew, or a victim of a bad Jewish king, but simply as the universal figure of the mother whose children have been killed. The Protestant English speakers had a majestic translation of the Bible and if you read eg Mark Twain it is the book that most people would know, if only in fragments. They took bits of it and made it applicable to themselves. It phrases and characters are part of our language. Some figures, like Rachel weeping, become elemental and iconic.

Eg last night I was watching that excellent series John Adams, John Adams curses his son as “Absalom,” that is, after the wayward son of King David who broke his father’s heart. That curse would come naturally to an English speaking Protestant, and with no thoughts of King David being a Jew, simply as a universal father out of his mind with grief over a rebellious son.

What an Independent headline writer thinks or doesn’t think I don’t know, but I would guess there may be some bits of English speaking Protestantism swirling around in his head. Or possibly he or she had read “Massacre of the Innocents”, thought that sounded good, and bunged it down.

Oh, and a link to Thomas Tomkins’s (1572 – 1656) beautiful motet When David Heard. I suppose someone is going to say it’s antisemitic. . .

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=Oc6v40T2cEk

BTW whatever you think about Michael Rosen’s politics, his job does require him to know a good deal about language, unless he has been swindling his employers all these years.

To Palestinian Christian nationalists, the victims of Bethlehem are proto-Palestinian Christian martyrs, victim of a Zionist-imperialist Herod, king of the ‘Zionists’.

Asserting the gravitas of Michael Rosen’s authority is not an argument.

“What an Independent headline writer thinks or doesn’t think I don’t know, but I would guess there may be some bits of English speaking Protestantism swirling around in his head. Or possibly he or she had read “Massacre of the Innocents”, thought that sounded good, and bunged it down.”

I think it more likely a deliberate choice for the reasons I have stated.

You’re a case, Z. If I called you a silly bugger, you’d come back and say solemnly, I don’t engage in that particular sort of sexual congress, and thus show yourself to be the silly bugger I thought you were.

I think you’re projecting, KB.

Z wrote:
“To Palestinian Christian nationalists, the victims of Bethlehem are proto-Palestinian Christian martyrs, victim of a Zionist-imperialist Herod, king of the ‘Zionists’.”

But then, Z., you may have noticed that headline writers for the Independent are probably not Palestinian Christian nationalists, or proto-Palestinian Christian martyrs, or victims of a Zionist-imperialist, king of the ‘zionists’. Headline writers for the Independent are probably British university educated people in their forties who live in London. If they had an education anything like mine, then the first two main occasions on which they would have met the phrase would have been the St Bartholomew’s day massacres in Paris (Catholic on Protestant) and/or Breughel’s painting and/or Rubens’ painting. I didn’t even connect the phrase to the Herod episode until all this blew! If I had been on Univ Challenge a few weeks ago and I had been asked what M of the Is referred to, I would have been dead chuffed to have got the question because I would have barked out ‘St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, Paris, 15 hundred and er…er…er….do I have to get the exact date, Jeremy?’ The Herod episode, as far as I knew, didn’t have a name! But stick with it, z., the indie is out to get Jews. Do I detect a process here? Keep going on about the world conspiracy against the Jews and you won’t have to investigate or bother yourself too much over what some Jews (not ‘The Jews’, note) did in Gaza. You won’t have to confront the bombings and strafings and killings of a poverty-stricken people, weakened by a blockade, coralled in a space from which there was no escape. No matter what you might think about Hamas or the pretext for the Israeli attack, (which we’ll disagree about) it was a horror meted out on thousands of people, most of whom are just very, very poor civilians. And you, more than me, I suspect, regard ‘the Jews’ as some kind of family. And it was ’some Jews’ doing this stuff. So, what do you say to your family members? Isn’t that what Avi Shlaim is trying to do, (quoted above)? For which he gets called here ‘Avi Slime’!

David Adler:

“Can you imagine a journalist for a liberal newspaper referring in neutral, even vaguely congratulatory terms to an artist’s “provocatively anti-gay rhetoric,” or “provocatively anti-black rhetoric,” or “provocatively anti-Arab rhetoric”?”