Monday, July 05, 2010

Worse than a Gestapo!

Although nothing to get worked up about, the elaborate attempt at insulting reprinted below was penned clearly with some effort put in by 'Nick K' at Richard Millett's blog. It should stand at as a testimony to the willingness to open debate being reflexively replaced by Zionists with accusations of the most fantastical and comical variety. I thought over at Richard's when one commenter openly, very convincingly and repeatedly threatened me with physical violence I'd kind of heard it all (why does a respectable blogger like Richard Millett allow this kind of 'commenting'?) But I was wrong: they broke the mould when they made 'Nick K'. Take it away, Nick:

[snip]I don’t think Gert was invited, which brings me to the thrust of this entry.

Most evil doers believe they act in good faith and they would be quick to deny any pejorative intent. Gert is of this ilk.

Yet his hating credentials are impeccable and beyond reproach. A self-proclaimed anti-Zionist, (Zionism being defined as Jewish self-determination in its ancestral homeland), he extends that same right of self-determination to all except the Jew. He has qualified his denial by maintaining that he would also deny it to others, but he appears to be a bit short on examples of the non-deserving self-determiners. When pushed he will no doubt do the mandatory Google search and sideline the Crimean Tartars or Kyrgystan Tajiks, or perhaps the Egyptian Coptics, or even the Dr. Who Daleks, as a credible defense to his prominent Jewish exclusion. [Edit: these aren't the examples I had in mind at all]. But you can’t really blame him. A nuclear capability in the hands of a sovereign Dalek state might make good TV but would be a recipe for global instability.

He wields the term anti-Zionist with a deep inbred loathing that would not be out of sorts on the editorial pages of Der Sturmer. He spews his vitriol with the nonchalance of an unemployed Millwall skinhead – lehavdil. When cornered he concedes not wanting Israel wiped off the planet (thank you) [Edit: there was no 'cornering': I've never been opposed to the existence of Israel], then elucidates with some lofty and winging hullaballoo about Israel’s justification lying solely in its de facto existence [Edit: that is true of most, if not all states].

But to go as far as calling him Gestapo Gert, as one venerable contributor [Edit: this is the same 'venerable' contributor mentioned in the intro] has done, would be a slight on a small number of card-carrying Gestapo members. Most notably in 1940 Gestapo chief, Rudolf Diels refused to arrest Jews, lost his job and risked his own imprisonment. Gert does not seem to have that problem, as he does not have a job [Edit: baseless conjecture, not to mention irrelevant and private].

He has attributed the recent raid on a UN summer camp in Gaza by armed Palestinians, to Israel’s marginalization of the Hamas [Edit: this is a complete lie: I disagree totally with Hamas' behaviour re. the summer camp]. The Nazi who could have come up with that gem has not yet been born. Sadly Gert has.

Gert, you are a bad man, a very bad man.

Mwhahahahaha!

Update: It appears that my status of 'worse than Gestapo' has now been upgraded to 'ontological genocidaire'. Nick K again:

While selective or even near blanket criticism of a country’s policies can be legitimate and rooted in honor, Gert’s crass questioning of Israel’s very existence is nothing less than ontological genocide, the harbinger of its physical cousin.

Let it never be said that blanket accusations of antisemitism (and more) aren't regularly used to try and shut up critics of Israel and to railroad/shut down any meaningful debate on Israel/Palestine...

7 Comments:

At 10:12 PM, Blogger Ernie Halfdram said...

Gert, if you've never been opposed to the existence of Israel, what does it mean to you to oppose Zionism? Just askin'.

 
At 1:14 PM, Blogger Gert said...

Ernie:

Opposing the existence of the state of Israel is a bit like the many Israelis that still hope the Palestinians will magically disappear: that's simply not gonna happen.

I believe the following:

1. Israel shouldn't have been created to begin with but wishing its disappearance or destruction is immoral in my opinion. There is now such a people called the Israeli people to whom Israel is a home.
2. The occupation and Israeli colonisation of remaining Palestinian land must stop immediately.
3. Right of return of Palestinian refugees must be honoured in some way.

I'm in favour of one secular state with equal rights for all regardless of creed, colour or ethnic background. But I'm not optimistic: the 'world' and the powers that rule it will continue to pursue the partitioning project.

 
At 2:28 PM, Blogger Emmanuel said...

In fairness, both sides of the Zionist/Anti-Zionist divide have intolerant commenters who accuse people from the other side of being Nazis. Look at the comments on Mondoweiss - anyone who opposes the right of return and/or the one-state solution can expect to be called a colonialist judeo-Nazi over there.

By the way, I don't understand what the difference is between the destruction of Israel (which you oppose) and the one-state solution (which you support). I assume that the difference is that you oppose driving out the Jews, but I'd say that even if the Jews stay, it would be a de facto destruction of Israel.

"Opposing the existence of the state of Israel is a bit like the many Israelis that still hope the Palestinians will magically disappear: that's simply not gonna happen."

"Simply not gonna happen" also applies to the vision of one secular state. Most Israelis and West Bank Palestinians don't want the "one state" part, and Hamas definitely doesn't want the "secular" part.

 
At 4:36 PM, Blogger Gert said...

Emm:

"By the way, I don't understand what the difference is between the destruction of Israel (which you oppose) and the one-state solution (which you support). I assume that the difference is that you oppose driving out the Jews, but I'd say that even if the Jews stay, it would be a de facto destruction of Israel."

Guess it's your turn to be the jingoist/Manichean: how a democratic and secular state for all that currently live in Israel/Palestine can be point blank equated with 'destruction of Israel' is a completely mystery to me.

And while one staters are routinely depicted by their opponents as 'wannabe genocidaires' it should be noted that most who advocate it do so in despair of the current quagmire and the multitude of obstacles to overcome to achieve a 'just' two state option.

Even some on the Right in Israel are starting to wake up to the idea that annexing the WB and citizenship for all of those who live in it may be the only practical solution...

I remain deeply pessimistic about it all.

 
At 6:29 PM, Blogger Emmanuel said...

I guess the word "destruction" sounds violent. What I mean by it is that it wouldn't be the same country at all as it is today. The whole political system would be different, and the composition of the population, too, with Arabs probably being in the majority, if not immediately then after not too long a time.

About the right wingers who support one state with citizenship for Palestinians - they are very few, and their "one state" is very different from what "one-stater" Palestinians demand (no right of return for example - which with the two-state solution would at least exist in the Palestinian state).

 
At 10:20 PM, Blogger Ernie Halfdram said...

Well, as far as I'm concerned, the principal obstacle to a just partition is that partition between the colonisers and the colonised is inherently unjust. Apart from that, without the ethnic cleansing of the non Jewish population of the Jewish partition and prohibition of return to it, it would be kind of meaningless.

Uncharacteristically, I agree with Emmanuel. One democratic state, even without return (although that's one of the main reasons for advocating one state) would have a non Jewish majority, would not be a Jewish state, and almost certainly wouldn't be called 'Israel' or retain any of the trappings of Zionism. Perhaps you'd prefer to call it 'dissolution' or something rather than 'destruction' or 'disappearance'. But it's a distinction without a difference - whatever you call it, it would mean the end of Israel as a Jewish ethnocracy, which is, after all, the point.

Anyhow, if it's immoral to advocate Israel's disappearance, I can't see how it would be any less immoral to advocate its transformation into something other than a Jewish ethnocracy. But then, I don't concern myself much with morality and wouldn't want to embroil myself in a moral argument.

One of the things that does concern me is defeating racism and colonialism, and while the disappearance of the Jewish ethnocracy is not a sufficient condition for this, it is definitely a necessary condition. If that's immoral, so be it. As for the refugees, honouring their right of return 'in some way' doesn't strike me as nearly good enough. UNGAR 194 would be a start, but it didn't envisage this situation persisting for six decades. In my view, the refugees and their descendants need to be welcome to settle where they were expelled from or wherever they like in the area of Mandatory Palestine and be offered just redress for their expulsion, their losses, and their victimisation. Furthermore, it is Israel and not The International Community that needs to shoulder the lion's share of the economic burden however inconvenient they may find it.

 
At 4:01 PM, Blogger Emmanuel said...

"Apart from that, without the ethnic cleansing of the non Jewish population of the Jewish partition and prohibition of return to it, it would be kind of meaningless."

From this it sounds like partition is supposed to create two ethnically pure states - a purely Jewish state and a purely Palestinian state. That's not the case. One state would have a Jewish majority and the other a Palestinian majority. Israel would still have an Arab (and other non-Jewish) minority, which should have equal rights. Palestine might also have a Jewish minority.

I'd say that each side having its right of self-determination recognized and implemented is far from meaningless.

 

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