Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Siege of Ahava continues...

Richard Millett, self-professed 'independent [cough!] journalist [cough!]', Press TV's resident Zio and Hasbarah parrot, reports:

Whoever can categorically say that the occupation is either legal or illegal is better than some of the wisest legal brains in the world.

But for these self-proclaimed lawyers there is no doubt; Israel’s occupation is illegal. However, when you ask many anti-Israel activists to cite any relevant court decisions or resolutions they go mysteriously blank.

And while some of these anti-Israel protestors may be motivated by dark forces others are not even anti-Zionist. However misguided, the latter honestly hold the belief that Israel is at fault by occupying the Palestinians. For them, if Israel unilaterally withdraws from the West Bank then peace would miraculously break out.

And when I say “dark forces” one cannot help but recall the notorious imagery of Jewish shops being singled out for boycott in Germany in the 1930s.

Whether or not Millett accepts what the 'wisest legal brains' have to say about the 42 year long Occupations is of course totally beside the point: Millett claims to be a strong proponent of the 'Two Sate Solution' and such a thing cannot arise without Israel withdrawing the majority of the 'disputed territories' (disputed in reality by Israel only). Millett's a hypocrite.

But what have we here? In the email notification of Millet's latest post (at the time of writing the one being discussed here) I found the following passage, later obviously massaged away:

I immediately recalled the worryingly similar Nazi rhetoric of the Jewish octopus controlling the world with its tentacles. Call me paranoid.

Here Millett, otherwise not exactly a master of le mot juste, hits the right spot with "paranoid". Not quite sure which of the two fairly synonymous attempts at conjuring up antisemitic imagery really is the most paranoid: "Jewish shops being singled out for boycott in Germany in the 1930s" or "similar Nazi rhetoric of the Jewish octopus controlling the world with its tentacles".

Millett, try and get it through your thick skull: Ahava is being targeted due to its connection with the Occupation, as is Veolia (the latter, as far as I know, not being a 'Jewish company'). Ahava may or may not be run by British Jews (there's no reason why a non-Jewish marketer wouldn't want to peddle 'Dead Sea Skin Care Products') but that's immaterial.

The moment British Jewish shops start being targeted simply for being Jewish, Millett will have my unconditional support in combating that phenomenon. For now shops and companies, under Jewish management or not, that profit from the Occupation of Palestinian land are perfectly legitimate targets of BDS.

6 Comments:

At 9:30 PM, Blogger richard millett said...

i was merely talking about the imagery, i wasn't syaing it was targeted because it was Jewish. Stop putting words into my mouth please.

 
At 9:50 PM, Blogger Gert said...

Richard, please don't be disingenuous: by invoking the imagery you are de facto invoking antisemitism: has there been another people whose shops have been boycotted? The problem is that the reasons for this boycott and the Nazi German one are completely different, as evidenced by the type of business that is affected in the case of BDS.

 
At 11:14 PM, Blogger richard millett said...

I am recalling the imagery alone. I am invoking what went on for me based on what i saw on saturday, that's all. I wasn't trying to be clever or anything. I am not being disingenuous as you suspect. I am simply expressing how I felt. You won't even allow someone to express themselves without telling them those feelings are wrong or "disingenuous". You just argue for argument's sake. There is not an ounce of humanity in you.

 
At 2:21 PM, Blogger Gert said...

Richard:

Call it the Law of Unintended Consequences: it's completely impossible to invoke the boycott of Jewish shops in Weimar and not make people think of antisemitism. It'd be like putting a picture of a seductive naked woman on your blog and then complaining that your readers think of sex.

Except: I don't believe the consequence was unintended here: you write in a public space, fermozessakes!

"There is not an ounce of humanity in you."

I try not to be guided in rational matters by emotions.

 
At 3:12 PM, Blogger richard millett said...

I wasn't making a statement, I was posing a possibly quandry for me. That is why I posed the original rhetorical question about the possibility of being paranoid. But I thought it fatuous so i deleted it. Try to cut people some slack sometimes maybe. It's you who is obviously paranoid.

 
At 3:40 PM, Blogger Gert said...

Try to cut people some slack sometimes maybe.

After all that slack you've cut me? But I'll try. Promise...

 

Post a Comment

<< Home