Have the anti-Zionists overdone it?

[notfullofit]

By HAVIV RETTIG
June 13, 2008 15:40

Are we witnessing the beginning of a backlash against anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism, at least in the English-speaking world?

On Wednesday, the UK's minister for higher education, Bill Rammell, told Britons that only a small minority of the country's academics support a boycott of Israel.

Coming a day after Ambassador to Britain Ron Prosor's accusation that "Britain has become a hotbed for radical anti-Israeli views and a haven for disingenuous calls for a one-state solution," the minister's confidence should offer some reassurance to worried Jews, right?

Perhaps it was merely bad timing, then, that the following day Prosor was the subject of a new boycott, with the refusal of Welsh Assembly Presiding Officer Dafydd Elis-Thomas to meet the ambassador when he arrives in Cardiff at the end of the month to meet with First Minister Rhodri Morgan, head of the Welsh government.

Edited to 4 paragraphs to conform to DU's policy for fair use of copyrighted material

Lithos
DU Moderator

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1212659723531&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[truedelphi]

1. Maybe the war against Lebanon helped sway Eli-Thomas to his current attitude

When I watched Anthony Bourdain's "No reservations" episode featuring the bombardment that Lebanon experienced (at the height of tourist sweason none the less!) I can say I have some sympathy for Eli-Thomas' position.

[Vegasaurus]

2. Of course it is anti-semitism

The fact that the UN finds Israel more contemptible than all the truly contemptible countries in the world (there is a mass genocide occurring at this moment, as well as horrific crimes against humanity all over the Middle east and Africa) is true anti=semitism.

All the more reason why Jews need their own country.

[shaayecanaan]

5. Does the fact that South Africa...

was criticised more than, say, truly horrific countries such as the DR Congo, Ethiopia, Uganda, etc constitute evidence of anti-whiteism?

Or the fact that the remaining white Boer farmers are being killed off at the rate of a couple hundred each year, and that those killings garner far less attention than say, an equivalent killing of Jewish settlers by Palestinian Arabs?

What about the civil war in Sri Lanka? If the Tamil Tigers explode a bomb in a Colombo cafe and it gets less media attention than a suicide bombing in a Tel Aviv pizzaria, does that mean that the world cares less for Indians than it does for Jews?

[Zionismisnotracism]

7. The situation in South Africa is not analogous

as much as people may like to believe it to be. Israel has legitimated claims of grievances in this conflict whereas the White South Africans did not.

That, in itself, is part of the reason the anti-Zionists fail to gain traction-they assume everyone sees this situation as completely one sided when, in reality, most see it either as a mutual conflict or more the fault of the Palestinians.

[shaayecanaan]

9. I would think that families of the 2000 Boer farmers murdered

since the end of apartheid would be understandably aggrieved. Whether or not you would consider those grievances legitimate is up to you.

Do you consider that an Israeli murdered by Arabs has more right to feel aggrieved than a South African farmer murdered by Blacks, and if so, why?

[azurnoir]

10. Your asking a dead horse, so to speak

But having never heard of this I looked it up, what I found was confusing, but HRW disagrees that Boer's are being exclusively targeted because 61% of the victims are white and theft is involved in most cases.

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

But on to your question I think this gets less attention because in western media white south africans are considered "bad guys" and israeli jews are the "good guys". These things are for the obvious reasons, in the west arabs are supposedly to blame for our economic ills and don't forget terra', however erroneous this notions may be.

[Violet_Crumble]

3. His argument that criticism of Israel = antisemitism is rubbish...

..but rubbish is to be expected from opinion pieces in JP...

This is the statement that the author claims is bigoted: "I am unwilling to accept the invitation to meet the ambassador, because of my objection to the failure of the State of Israel to meet its international obligations to the Palestinian people of the Holy Lands . I would invite other colleagues to the same."

And his argument for saying it's bigoted? Because he thinks that statement is too general. So according to his 'logic' anyone who's critical of Israel but who doesn't go into minute detail with their criticism is being bigoted. That's totally ridiculous...

[Zionismisnotracism]

8. Not bigotted-childish

This is akin to GW's comments about appeasement regarding talking to Iran.

[Violet_Crumble]

4. I don't think we're allowed to post entire articles at DU...

It's a copyright thing. From the rules:


Copyrights: Do not copy-and-paste entire articles onto this discussion forum. When referencing copyrighted work, post a short excerpt (not exceeding 4 paragraphs) with a link back to the original.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/forums/rules.html

[notfullofit]

6. Thank you for that, I was not aware, my bad. nt