Harry's Place

Hmmm … reconciliation and understanding.

Perhaps the Islamist Wing of the Conservative Party can help here:

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/4171

A crushingly sad story. I have a memory of reading a book (Revenge?) about an Israeli woman whose father had been murdered decades ago seeking out Palestinian Arabs as a similar aim.

Remember: it is precisely these sorts of initiatives that threaten the murderers and fanatics most deeply.

Err, no. The sort of initative that threatens the murderers and fanatics most deeply is to kill them. And keep killing them until there are none left.

The sort of initative that threatens the murderers and fanatics most deeply…

…are the initiatives taken by the various power factions within their own organisation, or by whatever clan their ancestors offended fifty years ago.

Hamas “activists”???

Err, no. The sort of initative that threatens the murderers and fanatics most deeply is to kill them. And keep killing them until there are none left.

Watches the infinite mirrors of insanity race off into the distance.

“Lets murder all the murdering fanatics” says murdering fanatic…

To the last Israeli tear and drop of Palestinian blood…

Just the kind of depressing comments thread that means I really can’t bear to post to HP much these days.

P

The sort of initative that threatens the murderers and fanatics most deeply is to kill them. And keep killing them until there are none left.

I bet you’re just a big softie in real life who wouldn’t hurt a fly. Now wrap up cosy and warm as it’s getting a wee bit chilly out. Would you like me to fetch you a blanky and a hot water bottle?

What Paul Moloney said.

What Paul, S and, heaven help me, Deathy said.

‘murderers and fanatics’

On both sides yes?

Aw look HP editors, your reasonable, non-psychotic commenters are buggering off. Who’d have thought it? Soon it’ll just be you and an army of morgoths.

Ah yes, the typical liberal brain-damanged mentality of “but we just want to understaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnnnnd you” when confronted with mass-murdering nutters.

Is it any wonder that if liberals had had their way, first Nazism, then Communism and now Islam would have won?

If Liberals loath themselves and Western Civilisation so much, can they do the world a favour and top themselves all off?

Err, no. The sort of initative that threatens the murderers and fanatics most deeply is to kill them. And keep killing them until there are none left.’

What? You mean like in Afghanistan?

Go away, Moggie.

What? You mean like in Afghanistan?

The problem isn’t Afghanistan. The problem is, and always has been Pakistan.

On both sides yes?

The usual dumb moral relativism: “The aggressors and their victims are all of a kind”.

The usual dumb moral relativism: “The aggressors and their victims are all of a kind”.

Precisely. Liberal self-loathing at its “best”. Liberal narcissim at its “best” – we’re meant to mollycuddle murdering fanatics just so liberals can feel better about themselves.

Try having close relatives murdered by unrepentant terrorists and then come telling me that I should have sympathy with similar unreconstructed murdering fascists, Alec M. Until then, just fuck off.

The problem is, and always has been Pakistan.

…yes but mainly Saudi Arabia which has made it its business to skew Pakistan (and therefore Afganistan) towards its own brand of extremism. And, unlike Pakistan and Afganistan, the West regretfully needs Saudi Arabia.

Aw look HP editors, your reasonable, non-psychotic commenters are buggering off.

Because hugging it out is unlikely to solve the mideast conflict and as usual the left has no meaningful solution, beyond appeasement, to undiluted terror.

The usual dumb moral relativism: “The aggressors and their victims are all of a kind”.

If it helps directly affected individuals to feel better doing this sort of thing, then I hope it works for them but with a broader perspective I have to say I tend to agree with Mr Bennett.

B

If we can find other people who’ve had close relatives murdered by terrorists, and don’t want to strike out wildly against uninvolved members of their social/ethnic group, can we tell Moggie to put a sock in it?

Let’s start with Yitzhak Frankenthal.

Human to human interaction is always good, and I believe essential to long term peace. I have a difficult time with the phrase “Hamas activists”, especially when used in the same sentence as “was kidnapped and murdered by”.

Stan

On a strict interpretation, individuals like Morgoth or Gordon Bennett are sociopaths, having a basic disconnect between actions and their consequences. But strict interpretation will be wrong. After all, even if on the face of it they display the typical mentality of a concentration camp guard (while poisoning this thread), this is a make-believe world for them. In all likelihood, their reaction to being attacked by a mosquito will be to flee or to move into fetal position. For them all this brave talk of mass murder of this-or-that sort of people is a typical masturbatory practice. They might well be in need of professional counseling but I don’t believe that they represent imminent danger to others.

Ah, the masturabatory projective ramblings of S.O. Muffin make an appearance. Has he run out of Jews to blame for defending themselves?

Of course, the striking thing about Liberal Narcissists like S.O. Muffin is their desperate need to paint anyone who disagrees with them as being mentally ill in some sort of way. After all, Liberals, like Theists, think that their Liberalism (in their case) is a “Revealed Truth”, and that anyone who dissents from it is obviously therefore either a sociopath or even worse, a racist.

“Of course, the striking thing about Liberal Narcissists like S.O. Muffin is their desperate need to paint anyone who disagrees with them as being mentally ill in some sort of way. After all, Liberals, like Theists, think that their Liberalism (in their case) is a “Revealed Truth”, and that anyone who dissents from it is obviously therefore either a sociopath or even worse, a racist.”

Yes, because it couldn’t be any of the incredibly sane and constructive things you’ve said that would give people that impression.

But you are mentally ill.

In a world where billions actually think they have a direct line to a sky-fairy who watches their every move and who will punish them for eating a bacon sandwich or having a good wank, I’m the paragon of sanity and constructiveness.

Plus you know my dinner parties are going to be a fuckload more fun than those of that hairy gobshite Rowan Williams, for example.

anyone who dissents from it is obviously therefore either a sociopath or even worse, a racist

More like “anyone who several times daily gives voice to their enthusiasm for killing, barricading, displacing, and sterilising millions of people is obviously therefore either a sociopath or even worse, a racist”.

Froth…troll…poisoning threads…splutter…more random ideological snobbery here…bah…woof

Palestinians who make efforts to reconcile and cooperate with Israelis are of course doing precisely what Hamas doesn’t want them to do.

All the more reason for some (thankfully not many) to mock and sneer at them, apparently.

I feel like some odd voice of sanity pointing out that we need both the feel-good citizen activists and the hard-nosed military responses.

The only way to succeed is for society to work responsibly on all levels.

Our “SO Muffins” and our Morgoths are equally unrealistic and unbalanced. To put it cynically, you need both the good cop and the bad cop.

Palestinians who make efforts to reconcile and cooperate with Israelis

If they wanted to reconcile and cooperate they’d stop squatting in Israel and move to the East Bank of the River Jordan, where they already have their own state.

The writer Frimet Roth wrote this in 2002 – Yitzhak Frankenthal, the founder of Parents Circle, takes issue with those who label his sons” killers as “ruthless Palestinian murderers”. He prefers to describe to them as “Palestinian fighters who believed in the ethical basis of their struggle against the occupation.” In quintessential Stockholm Syndrome form, he assures us: “Had I myself been born into the political and ethical chaos that is the Palestinians” daily reality, I would certainly have tried to kill and hurt the occupier” and would have killed as many on the other side as I possibly could” had I not, I would have betrayed my essence as a free man.”

Their bereaved status renders such activists almost untouchable. The journalist Avi Davis, who violated the taboo, nevertheless felt obliged to preface his critical article thus: “While it is difficult to criticize a man who has lost his son, the words spoken by (Yitzhak) Frankenthal are a pitiful reminder that there are still those who fail to understand that the moral high ground they so proudly occupy is rapidly being dwarfed by the pile of Jewish corpses the Palestinians have collected”“

I owe Mr. Frankenthal no such apology. One of those corpses is my own 15-year-old daughter, Malki. Like the child of Nurit Peled-Elchanan, a suicide bomber thirsty for the blood of Jewish children murdered my Malki. He found many of them in Sbarro”s Pizzeria one hot August afternoon last year. Fifteen innocents, eight of them children, perished there at his hands.

Unlike Ms. Peled-Elchanan, I do not blame myself or my own people for my child”s death. She says: “Our children die because the Jewish mother has disappeared, and her place has been taken by mothers who send their children voluntarily to kill and to be killed.”

I completely disagree. It is one thing for a victim of the Stockholm Syndrome to excuse and identify with his own oppressors. It is quite another to drag along unwilling third parties. She and her colleagues at Parents” Circle are not only self-blaming. They indict other bereaved parents like me for our own children”s murders.

That they suffer from severe Stockhom symptoms does not diminish the harm they cause the rest of us. In awarding their coveted “bereaved-parents” stamp-of-approval” to various pro-Palestinian entities, they play into the hands of our enemies.

Pro-Palestinians restrain their own censure of Israel, lest they be branded rabid anti-Semites. But they welcome Israeli parents who are ready to do their dirty work. They encourage such assistance with various awards. Nurit Peled-Elchanan received the Sacharov Peace Prize from the European Parliament while Yitzchak Frankenthal was given the International Activist Award of the Gleitsman Foundation.

But do Parents Circle”s “friends” appreciate their efforts” Do international “peace activists” share the pain of their loss” Consider the evidence. An organization called the Global Ministries mentioned Ms. Peled-Elchanan in its Middle East and Europe Newsletter. In urging readers to pray for her and others who work for peace in Israel and Palestine they wrote: “Dr. Nurit Peled-Elchanan “ Israeli. Her daughter was killed in 1997 by a bomb.”

“By a bomb”. Did this bomb fall from the clear blue sky” Didn”t anybody detonate it” Was there no hatred involved” No terrorists” Evidently not. “Her daughter was killed”. History has been sanitized.

It is a puerile fantasy world in which this history unfolds. A world purged of nasty words. A world in which peace is won by the mere act of wishing for it. As Zvi Shahak, whose daughter was murdered by a Gazan while she celebrated Purim in Tel Aviv, has mused: “If the killer had read her poems, perhaps she”d be alive today.”

Last month, the New York Times saw fit to include the following quote of Frankenthal in its editorial: “It is unethical to kill innocent Israeli or Palestinian women or children. It is also unethical to control another nation and to lead it to lose its humaneness.”

It is likely that, before long, other, far more inflammatory quotes will find their way into respectable publications. And I”ll wager that this choice nugget of Ms. Peled-Elchanan”s is snapped up first: “Our children die,” she writes “because they are brought up to believe that serving as killers in a murderous army means to serve the good of the nation.”

With the High Holyday season just behind us, it is worthwhile to note that Judaism does not only encourage forgiveness, it is absolutely mandated “ provided the transgressor has begged us for it. In fact, if he does so three times and we steadfastly refuse, the sinner”s slate of wrongs toward us is wiped clean. We, the victims, bear the guilt in his stead.

Israelis have not sensed the slightest hint of remorse from the Palestinians. The latter remain a people who, according to the latest polls, still fail entirely to acknowledge the immorality of murdering innocent civilians. The relatively small percentage that does oppose suicide bombings today limit their objection to attacks taking place over the Green Line. They base it on the failure of bombings “within Israel” to further their cause.

Clearly, begging forgiveness of their Jewish victims is not a mission they are about to undertake. But when and if they ever do, I”d like to see the members of Parents Circle lined up with them, remorseful as well “ because the pain they have caused their own people is almost as profound.

Josh

I feel like some odd voice of sanity pointing out that we need both the feel-good citizen activists and the hard-nosed military responses.

A very intelligent comment.

The article is “feel-good” but avoids the major problem: What does each side want?

If the Palestnians want a demilitarised state in Gaza and the West Bank, that’s attainable. If they want either to destroy Israel or to rocket Israel from a West Bank state, that’s not attainabe.

“Feel-good” is irrelevant either way. That’s precisely why a number of such projects have taken place over the past few decades, with few results.

Nachman,

Thank you for that well written, measured and thoughtful comment.

Yossi I just reprinted what Frimet Roth a bereaved parent wrote seven years ago – unfortunately the same still holds true. The person responsible for this post may not have known of Mr Frankenthal’s history and the extreme hurt he has caused to many of the other bereaved families who do not blame Israel for the fact that their loved ones were murdered or maimed by Arab terrorists.

Palestinians who make efforts to reconcile and cooperate with Israelis are of course doing precisely what Hamas doesn’t want them to do.

Joining a victims-support group isn’t ‘cooperating with Israelis’.

Nachman – v interesting quote.

I’d need to see rather more substantive evidence that the Palestinian-in-the-street is doing something more proactive towards peace than anecdotal stories of holding hands with Israeli peaceniks before I believe the destruction of Israel isn’t their most popular choice for the ending of the conflict.

Look, Israelis want peace and have a responsive democracy – so if the Palestinians were their equals there would be peace.

So, the goal to create peace is to defang Palestinian society.

Military solutions alone would work, but would be more brutal than Israelis are willing to support, so for the foreseeable future, military responses will be limited, responsive, and short.

Social solutions – convincing Palestinian society to abandon Jihad are probably not sufficient, though it would be an interesting experiment to attempt an all out war of ideas… The Thai tried a campaign of getting children to make millions of paper cranes as a peace offering to the southern thai Jihadis who responded comically and horribly. They cited Mohammad’s own fear of birds and preached that the birds were being made as a magical curse on Muslims. Proof that Buddhists are in league with Satan.

One can only hope that a combination of public relations and military threat are more effective than either alone.

Still, I think that the Israelis might well try harder to break into Arab culture. …

Here’s an idea, broadcast a number of Arabic language channels into the Palestinian territories and simply create a friendly, secular alternative to Palestinian media.

Also, if Israeli created media for Palestine allowed call-in shows, then that would create an uncensored forum for Palestinians to broadcast from.

A close friend of mine works with the Parents’ Circle. He told me that they found it very hard to develop the work, because although there were many bereaved Israeli parents who were interested in working with them, the number of Palestinians willing to do so was tiny and certainly not growing. Whether this was because of the parents’ own hostility to the project, or because of perceived or real threats from the organized Palestinian “boycott Israel/Israelis except for shared work to oppose the occupation” is not clear.

A 23yr old distant cousin of mine was murdered by a terrorist who broke into the West Bank yeshiva settlement at which he was helping in the kitchen on Friday night. He was shot down, but managed to save the people in the dining hall by locking the door and throwing away the key as he died. His parents have no interest in working with the parents of Palestinian terrorists who have been killed, but they do work in their son’s memory on commemorating his death and those of others like him in the service of others. They read from his writings about the need to work on giving of oneself to others and of showing love through community service.

Although I personally admire people who do what the Parents’ Group does, I personally don’t think they achieve anything to advance the prospect of peace or to improve relations between Israelis and Palestinians. Those who are already inclined to see the other side as undergoing suffering will already be doing so. Those who do not often react with indignation to the moral equivalence being made between the very different causes and methods of killing in each case.

I have equal misgivings about the South African Truth and Reconciliation Campaign, particularly as it put so much pressure on bereaved and even more impoverished black South African parents and spouses to “forgive” or be reconciled with the murderers of their loved ones for political reasons and the presumed greater good of the people of South Africa.

Plus you know my dinner parties are going to be a fuckload more fun than those of that hairy gobshite Rowan Williams, for example.

I thought the Hairy Gobshite was Dave Lee Travis’s nickname.

Judy regarding the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) according to its Legal Inquiry, 1978 was a time when “a climate of state lawlessness prevailed.” The TRC also investigated how the apartheid judiciary buttressed, “aided” and “abetted” the crime of apartheid. Did you know that Goldstone (yes that Goldstone) was appointed as a standing judge to the Transvaal Supreme Court by the Minister of Justice, Jimmy Kruger, the Himmler of apartheid in 1978. Goldstone’s tenure as a judge was marked by the most horrifying, viscous, sadistic, and brutal application of apartheid. During his watch Judge Goldstone masked violations of human rights under the rule of law permitting his political masters to persecute and murder with impunity. By giving the impression of being a leading light of the legal establishment while subverting and perverting the most basic standards of justice he became a willing accomplice in crimes against humanity. Judges were tried and convicted after WWII for exactly this but somehow Goldstone has managed to evade all responsibility and persuaded the UN Human Anti-Israel Rights Council or HAIR for short that he was fit and proper to investigate and sit in judgement upon others.The question becomes not why was Judge Goldstone sitting as a representative of HAIR in judgement on Israel but why this Theobold Jew isn’t still serving time in jail for providing Apartheid South Africa with the veneer of legitimacy that permitted the regime to go on arresting, torturing, and murdering blacks.

Israelis increasingly resemble any European imperialist nation you care to name. Their words could have been spoken by British apologists in Kenya, Rhodesia, Cyprus, by the French in Algeria, by the Belgians in the Congo. What is the difference?

nodrog, WTF, you’re not LGF’s original Gordon are you?

For a start, nodrog, neither the British nor the French nor the Belgians had any historical relationship to the countries they conquered and set out to use for the extraction and exploitation of whatever natural resources were available.

The Jews have an unbroken historical relationship with Israel as their country of origin and there has been an unbroken Jewish presence in Israel, including a continuing relationship with the holy places of the Jewish people, since the days of the Romans.

The Jews set out to return to their homeland the same way that ex US slaves went to Liberia to return to Africa. Only the Jews had a much closer relationship with Israel than many of the returning slaves had to Liberia, since many of them came from very different areas of Africa.

Israel has never been and will never be a colony remitting the profits to any motherland or fatherland. Israel is a country for its people–both Jews and non Jews.

The Jews who immigrated to Israel before WWII scorned the idea of using Arabs as cheap labour. They were determined to do both the dirty work and the prestigious work themselves. No colonialist regime ever did that.

No imperialist regime ever had all the people of its country voting on an equal one man, one vote basis. Or had a relationship where it tried to work through dialogue and agreement with the organized proxy armies and terrorists of a large number of wealthy and well armed powers committed since before its foundation to eliminate it.

Josh; no. Is there really a notorious Gordon out there? How reassuring.
Judy; I hear what you say. But still I hear the conqueror’s voice.

Given what happened to the Beaker Folk, nodrog is the voice of a conqueror himself.

I think it’s worth reminding readers here that Morgoth is a) a Satanist and b) a Randroid

That’s before we get to the right wing lunacy and the violent revenge fantasies.

Morgoth; I love you dearly but you are quite incoherent. Take more water with it.
Judy; I wish Israel well. Only democracy in the Middle East, beacon of western values,etc,etc. But still a colonial power.

On a strict interpretation, individuals like Morgoth or Gordon Bennett are sociopaths, having a basic disconnect between actions and their consequences. But strict interpretation will be wrong. After all, even if on the face of it they display the typical mentality of a concentration camp guard (while poisoning this thread), this is a make-believe world for them. In all likelihood, their reaction to being attacked by a mosquito will be to flee or to move into fetal position. For them all this brave talk of mass murder of this-or-that sort of people is a typical masturbatory practice. They might well be in need of professional counseling but I don’t believe that they represent imminent danger to others.

You are a complete idiot. I have never advocated mass-murder in my life. You must be confusing me with your imaginary friend.
What a complete and utter tosspot you are.

I think it’s worth reminding readers here that FlyingRodent is a fuckwit.

Israelis increasingly resemble any European imperialist nation you care to name. Their words could have been spoken by British apologists in Kenya, Rhodesia, Cyprus, by the French in Algeria, by the Belgians in the Congo. What is the difference?

Just this tiny difference: Israelis are living in their own historical homeland. The Belgians and the French and the British had no business being in the entire African continent in the first place.
Next!

Judy; I hear what you say. But still I hear the conqueror’s voice.

This crap is only a quarter of a step from the old, “the Jews have been kicked out of every country, why do you think that is. No smoke without fire etc. etc.”

Thanks for playing the “the victim can always be blamed” game.

COLONIZE n. settle, occupy, people, pioneer, found, populate.

Ah nodrog the Jews did none of those things they “returned”.

as a free people in their own land

no no no nodrog.
You can’t hide behind “COLONIZE n. settle, occupy, people, pioneer, found, populate.”
You said Israel is a COLONIAL POWER.
Which it is not. (Unless you care to explain why it is?)

No. They returned and colonized.

Colonized as in came from somewhere and settled somewhere else.

Palestinian Muslims and Christians, having kept Jews to a tiny number in the land, in a state of apartheid, tried to keep anymore out. Then tried to dispossess them. Then tried to eliminate them.

telavivit, nodrog can believe 17 stupid things before breakfast. He’s already proved it by flatly refusing to listen to people who know the true history of Israel, and insisting on believing and spouting the lies he’s been fed.

Morgoth murder watch:

1-Men and women of any faith who don’t renounce their beliefs.
2-Any Palestinian west of the Jordan River

Who’s next?

Morgoth has dinner parties!! Cripes.

FlyingRodent is a fuckwit.

Ho ho, no doubt – but then, at least I don’t get half my politics from wingnut sci-fi novels, hilarious Led Zeppelin magick blah and Twilight.

If I did, I’d spend a lot less time denouncing everyone else’s views and a lot more shutting the fuck up.

Morgoth has dinner parties!! Cripes.

He does a very nice Flambéed Jordegyptian with cuckoo spunk jus on a chickpea mash. It qualifies as a veggie dish apparently.

Both – the sense in which anti-Israel commenters use the term is in the sense of Britain colonizing Africa/India et al – unless you come up with a better word the word is the antithesis of what the Jews did when they returned to their homeland to exercise the right of every people to self determination in their own land.

nodrog so the fuck what, 99% of humanity came from somewhere else.. Also most people have ancestors who were abused, killed, expelled from somewhere.

None of this is an excuse for the Muslims’ eternal war on Jews.

But feel free to keep making excuses for haters and blaming every innocent person you can find.

If you are a ‘flea-bitten Arab’ (Arthur Koestler) kicked off your land I guess the definition of ‘colonist’ doesn’t mean much.
As I said before, I wish Israel nothing but well. If I were Israeli I would try to be realistic about my situation and look beyond the narrow perceptions expounded by such as Nachman.

nodrog, compared to Nachman’s knowledge and understanding you are but a flea-bitten dog howling his head off while the caravan moves on.

I am realistic about my situation that is why I live in Israel but not as a colonizer! I didn’t kick any Arab off his land to do it either. So what is your point precisely i.e the narrow perceptions I have expounded?

I’m sorry that some people see my comments as anti-Israel. Fortunately for them Israel’s military and political leaders, I’m sure, would understand what I have said.

Judy – you have just made my heart leap. According to your description above, I think your cousin was my son’s commander and good friend. His selfless actions, which resulted in so many lives being saved, continue to be an example to my son to this day.
יהיה זכרו ברוך

Josh Scholar has it right, neither trying to reconcile or trying to kill the terrorists by themsevles will bring about peace for Israelis and Palestinians. Only by a combination of both will Israel be able some day to make peace with the Palestinians. I admit currently military action is probably going to be the larger part of Israeli strategy but there is a role for groups promoting reconciliation like shared grief as well. Israel can try to win military the conflict with the Palestinians but that would involve brutality on the scale of the Russians in Chechen, something that Israelis are not likely to support as Josh Scholar pointed out, nor is it likely that the US would allow it.

Morgoth reminds me of Frank Gorshin’s charecter, Commissioner Bele in the Star Trek episode, “Let that be Your Last Battlefield”. For those who are unfamilar with this episode, you can read about it at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_That_Be_Your_Last_Battlefield
It is too bad that we cannot send the Morgoths of the world to an alternate reality where Orwell’s “1984″ is reality. Certainly the Morgoths would be happly employed by either Oceania, Eurasia or East Asia shouting hate-filled speeches at the top of their lungs.

Thank you for commenting here, Nachman. I have read many things you have written and they are always profound and true. Malkie and the others murdered that day (and in other attacks) are not forgotten; I think of them often and have told my children about Malkie and others. The same is so with Judy’s cousin, who locked the door and threw the key away even though he knew it would cost him his life. His bravery that day saved many others.

You’re too kind, David.

Israel’s military and political leaders, I’m sure, would understand what I have said.

Well, if no one else, at least MK’s Mohammad Barakeh, Dov Khenin, Ibrahim Sarsur, Ahmad Tibi, Afou Agbaria, Hanna Swaid, Talab El-Sana and Masud Ganaim might understand what you said.

nodrog,

Why do you post nothing about New Zealand or Australia?
No historical reason at all from them to colonize their
islands. But, I guess, since they aren’t Jews they don’t
bother you.

So WHERE do you live?

When you excoriate true colonialists with the same zeal
you use to wrongly smear the historical inheritors of the
Holy Land I might consider you to have some sense of
morality.

Until you do so you are nothing more than a common,
garden variety Jew hater.

—-

Europe 1930’s – Jews to Palestine
Europe 2000’s – Jews out of Palestine
Europe to Jews –
‘Don’t be here … Don’t be there … Just Don’t Be!”

Gordon Bennet 24 November 2009, 12:55 pm
On both sides yes?

The usual dumb moral relativism: “The aggressors and their victims are all of a kind”.

Yes how silly of me I should have written,

‘murderers and fanatics’

You mean the Israelis, yes?

Nachman, while I have been active and forthright in my condemnation of Goldstone regarding his Gaza report, his record as a judge in SA is more complex than your diatribe allows. While he did make some shameful decisions (in accordance with the correct application of the law as it was) he presided over at least two brave landmark decisions which went against the regime. In the first, he issued a judgment against the eviction of an Asian woman under the notorious Group Areas Act, a core Apartheid law that determined where people could live according to their race. His judgment ended the evictions enacted under that law.
In the second, he upheld the application of Beverley Traub and others, trainee doctors who had been denied posts as punishment for whistle blowing the scandalous conditions at Baragwanath, the segregated main hospital for black patients. My husband acted as advocate for Traub.

In the last years of Apartheid, as the chair of a commission into the use of violence by the secret agents of the Apartheid government against its opponents, he uncovered murder squads set up by the government and revealed the details of their despicable acts of violence.

There is always the debate whether a judge of conscience should have accepted a post in such a regime at all, or if he could argue he would be in a position to mitigate the effects of the laws whereas a more hardline judge would not. Whichever, opposition to his Gaza report is not best served by indiscriminate accusations which can be latched onto by his supporters as smears and thus aid dismissal of any criticism of him.

The story of Judy’s relative makes one stop in one’s tracks, and the connection to Israelinurse’s son makes one realise how intertwined the fate of the Jewish people in Israel is.

On a more petty note, any analogies between the resettlement of the ex slaves in Liberia and the Jewish return to Israel would be misguided. The ex slaves set up a minority regime which was discriminatory and oppressive of the indigenous black population, and this fired the lengthy conflict which is only now being defused.

I’m sorry that some people see my comments as anti-Israel

No, only as anti-history, anti-truth and anti-morality.
The nonsense you post is too laughable and absurd to be worthy of the name ‘anti-Israel’.

So Morgoth, to settle a bet: you have never heard of the Jewish religion, right?

Josh/Judy/Morgoth/Gordon Bennet/Nachman/Anon: Clearly I’ve strayed into Paranoia Park. There’s none so blind as those who WILL not see. Goodbye.

Judy & Nachman, thank you for your beautiful comments about Israel’s heroes.

Amie: Thank you for setting the record straight about Goldstone’s role as a judge who helped to end Apartheid and expose its horrors.
Also for pointing out that Liberia was minority settler state like Rhodesia and South Africa; unlike Israel which like the US is a majority settler state.

Morgoth: “You’re too kind, David.”
Yes, plenty of folks have mentioned that. (dry remark)

There’s none so blind as those who WILL not see.

I do sympathise with you. But I am told there is a good eye doctor round the corner from you – do try him.