Yes he’s here at last. Our man from the Cancer on the grand topic of the day and what a treat it is.
If anyone has any idea what on earth he’s talking about, feel free to explain because he’s gone through the looking glass and on down the K-hole with this one.
During World War II, after the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939, Jewish ghettos were set up to control the millions of Polish Jews. Inside the ghettos they lived on starvation rations before, in 1941, shipment to extermination camps began.
Despite being trapped in effective death camps, Jewish resistance groups managed to operate. In January 1943, German forces tried to level the Warsaw ghetto, but were beaten off by Jewish resistance fighters. Another attempt to destroy the ghetto led to the uprising of April 1943. For one month, the Jews fought off the German army but their resistance was eventually crushed.
Today, conditions in Gaza are very similar to the Warsaw ghetto.
Farooq Siddique, ‘A Muslim in Bristol’ Evening Post, Tuesday 6 January 2009
I [have been] criticised for comparing the suffering and resistance of the Palestinians in the Gaza ghetto today to the suffering and resistance of the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto of World War II . Let me make it clear, I was not referring to the Holocaust.
Farooq Siddique, ‘A Muslim in Bristol’ Evening Post, Tuesday 13 January 2009
Well that’s cleared that up hasn’t it? Farooq was referring to that other Warsaw ghetto during World War II. You know, the one that had absolutely nothing to do with the Holocaust. How stupid of us to think otherwise.
Does Siddique think we’re all as thick and ignorant as he plainly is? And has he any idea what damage his embarrassing and insensitive outbursts and arse-about-face excuses are doing to the decent Muslim community he purports to represent?
It’s oh so clever to compare the israelis to the Nazis isn’t it?
Just one thing- lots of states have treated a minority or enemy population the way Israel treats Palestinians, Britain included.
The thing that stood out about the Nazis was the extermination camps. Whatever Israel is doing to palestinians, it is not rounding them up and sending them to extermination camps.
Israelis don’t want to exterminate Palestinians. They just don’t want them to be able to threaten Israel. I don’t doubt that in a lot of Israelis that translates as wishing they would all f*** off for good, but they don’t actually think they’re on a mission to rid the world of them.
So the constant comparisons with the Nazis are actually bollocks.
It certainly is ethnic cleansing though, which has been both the theory and practice of the Israeli state since its foundation in 1948.
I do understand the Warsaw Ghetto comparisons and don’t think they are either unfair or anti- semitic, the difference as Jozer says is that extermination isn’t the aim – a very big difference!
Regardless of whether the columnist was comparing the situation in Gaza to the Holocaust, Israeli Ministers unambiguously have: An Israeli minister today warned of increasingly bitter conflict in the Gaza Strip, saying the Palestinians could bring on themselves what he called a “holocaust”. The more Qassam [rocket] fire intensifies and the rockets reach a longer range, they will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah because we will use all our might to defend ourselves,” Matan Vilnai, Israel’s deputy defence minister, told army radio.
That’s very true Snowflake! – Whatever Mr Siddique said its nothing like as offensive as that!
snowflake/rosso
Hamas commander Mahmoud Zahar said: ‘The Zionists have legitimised the killing of their children by killing our children. They have legitimised the killing of their people all over the world by killing our people.’
is this statement not offensive then??? š
take your blinkers off & see both sides of the extremists conflict !!
is this statement not offensive then??? the targeting of civilians is unacceptable, but so to is ignorance of the root causes of the conflict and the conflation of the violence of the colonised and oppressed with the violence of the colonisers and oppressor. Think about Israel’s barbarity when you wanna dictate the forms of resistance that colonised and brutalised people take. Besides, I thought this topic (and Palest’whine’ 1) was about the illegitimacy of conflating what’s happening in Gaza with what the Nazi’s did. Which is more offensive, redzone, making analogies with the Holocaust, or threatening a people with a Holocaust, enacting policies of starvation and then killing almost 1000 of them? Everyone posting here who had their delicate decency affronted by the analogies ought think about that one.
Sorry, the starvation link above that’s not working was about the policy of putting Palestinians ‘on a diet’ to force them into a more amenable politics – collective punishment, in other words: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/apr/16/israel
Shoah: Didn’t Reuters – the source – later admit it was mistranslated? My Hebrew isn’t up to arguing the toss, mind.
Siddique actually peddled this same argument in his column this week to try and cover his arse, which makes me very unsure about it because Siddique is a well-known peddler of myths and lies. 9/11 Truth nonsense for instance.
Besides, the argument that they do it so we can do it is straight out of the playground as far as I’m concerned.
I’m not affronted by Siddique, by the way. I just think he’s a wanker.
Regardless, anyone know why he’s saying his reference to the holocaust isn’t?
Indeed it wouldn’t suprise me if what the guy said meant ‘disaster’ or ‘catastrophe’, and some smartarse translated that as ‘shoah’ which is a Hebrew word meaning suchlike, but has come to refer specifically to the Nazi terror.
The statement from the Hamarse leader shows what the Israelis are about here. Just remember that this is the leader of the party Gaza Palestinians have elected to govern them. “Whahey! I’ve got an excuse to kill Jews & kids”. What a turd. What a sorry ‘people’, with their pathetic fantasies of ‘Muslim Brotherhood’ that bear no relation to what their ‘Muslim Brothers’ have actually done for them.
Most Israelis don’t actually want to kill Palestinian civillians. They’ve just given up caring if it happens when they attack the Hamarse/Fatar/Hizbullshit Islamo-bigot goons. Hamarse WANT Israeli AND Palestinian civillian casualties. There can be no other explanation for their strategically pointless obsolete rocket attacks.
Something from our Indymedia friends:
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/01/418334.html?c=all
(Note the “hidden” comments)
https://publish.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/01/418460.html?c=all
http://news.google.co.uk/news?q=starbucks%20whitechapel&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wn
I think the time has come to call for boycott of Indymedia. Also I think that any anti-fascsits worthy of the name need to keep an eye on the situation.
I’ve read that a Tesco truck driver has been attacked, that antisemitic grafitti and verbal abuse is cropping up, and Indymedia are feeding directly into this, whipping people up into a frenzy of hatred.
This has to end NOW.
More here.
But I suppose this is just people being “concerned about the disproportionate response of Israel” is it Councillor Hopkins?
Does not make anyone anti -semitic does it? Perish the thought.
Apparently a synagogue has gone up:
http://news.google.co.uk/news?q=synagogue%20arson&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wn
http://www.harrowtimes.co.uk/news/4023841.Anti_semitism_fears_after_synagogue_fire/
Indymedia are promoting this sort of shit and suppressing all criticism. I’m hopping mad.
best way to subdue those thugs of the indymedia is to throw a bar of soap at them, it has the same effect as kryptonite to superman š
bunch of wankers they are!!!!!
Dear dear dear Bristol Blogger ( The Award-Winning One–to distinguish it from all the other useless Bristol Bloggers)–so provincial…”of & for the left”..God help us all.
Good point CP. Us carrot crunchers can’t really keep up with you cool, sophisticated, metropolitan city folk with your cutting edge anti-semitism.
When does Hoxton declare the first pogrom?
It adds to the problem and anger when views are misrepresented.
Our party ,locally and nationally,has clearly said that the response of Israel is disproportionate.
That leads to the condemming of the actions of Israel(and of course of hamas) and a call for the banning of arms exports to Israel.
It does not condone abuse or worse against Jews or any other group and to suggest otherwise is not only false but looks ridiculous.
We were in the forefront of the moves against the old South Africa but that did not mean we hated all white people.(and no I am not saying that Israel is the same as South africa was)
The actions of Israel are recruiting allies for Hamas and will radicalise many Muslims around the world.
That should be a cause of concern to everyone.
Redzone,
I have relatives in Israel and despise the racism of Hamas. The fact, remains that the Israeli government broke the ceasefire and the people of Gaza are bearing the brunt of this.
Gary, Agree with what you say here!
RV said “the Israeli government broke the ceasefire”
I’ve got no axe to grind on this, but weren’t rockets being fired from Gaza into Israel? Didn’t that constitute a breaking of the ceasefire?
“anyone know why heās saying his reference to the holocaust isnāt?”
I think perhaps he means the holocaust to be the systematic and industrial destruction of Jews rather than a policy of discrimination and persecution of the community which resulted in death and misery.
All the thin edge of the same coin if you get my meaning.
Gary – āDisproportionateā is nonsense. Chamberlain was doubtless trying to be proportionate when he appeased Hitler, and if Britain and the US had carried on appeasing the Nazi bully then we would have lost the war and the Nazis would have won. The fact is that Israel is a tiny country surrounded by Islamic states where the Protocols of the Elders of Zion are sold on street stalls and widely believed, and where the blood libel is regularly trotted out in popular books and TV shows.
We cannot afford to keep on appeasing the Islamist bullies in Palestine – or in Britain for that matter.
If everyone cycled there’d be no more war.
If wishes were bicycles Des…
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_infantry
Nice thought Des, but as you may have noticed not all cyclists are peace loving hippies.
Where the **** were all these campaigners during the Rwandad ethnocide, or whem Rhubabwe’s goon state is killing thousands? When East Timor was being crushed? For that matter very few of them even bother to resist the Iraq & Afghan wars anymore, but if Israel dares th stand up to Iran & Syria’s proxy militia thugs all hell breaks loose in leftie land.
You have to wonder what really motivates them.
No Gary, it adds to your problems when just two days ago you were saying discussion of antisemitism in this country was a distraction from you and your colleagues’ ill-informed and soppy moralising on Gaza.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think you accused me of lacking “basic humanity and compassion” and “hatred and historic point scoring” by bringing up the very real issue of antisemitism.
Now evidence of this antisemitism emerges, you look like a tit who doesn’t know what they’re talking about don’t you?
As for this:
Have you got any evidence to back up this claim? Or is it some crap you read in The Guardian? Or did publicly funded Jew-baiter Siddique tell you this?
It’s a bit simplistic isn’t it?
The reasons for radicalisation – that concern me anyway – are far more complex than knee-jerk responses to Israeli and US foreign policy.
If you’re playing the radicalisation blame game Gary why not take the time to look at the wider context?
For instance, what role does ultra-Conservative Deobandi Islam play in all this? Their colleges educate 80% of British Muslim clerics. What are they all about Gary?
You ever stopped to wonder why a Muslim population largely from Pakistan thinks the most important foreign policy issue affecting them is a local territorial dispute between Arabs and Jews in a part of the world with which they have little or no connection?
And have you ever wondered why this particular issue is blown up into global proportions, while, say Darfur isn’t?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SILJxPTqjAM
Who broke the ceasfire?
RV, based on what that video says, wasn’t the response of the Palestinians disproportionate? 120 rockets fired at Israelis following one isolated incident of an Israeli incursion to stop a tunnel being built?
6 people were killed in that “isolated incident” which came after a long period where the ceasefire was observed by both sides.
So what would have been a proportionate response? Firing rockets until 6 Israelis are killed? Then what should the Israelis do? Kill 6 more Palestinians?
No everyone should stop killing each other.
I just feel that the resposibility for the wider situation lies mostly in the hands of the policies of the Israeli Government. Its an opinion based on what I’ve read of the history of the area, mainly from reading Israeli historians like Illan Pappe and Benny Morris. –
I have been involved off and on with Palestinian solidarity for a few years and the vast majority of people I have come across despise anti -semitism. There are some exceptions and there are some who would sweep this under the carpet, something I think is both appauling and counterproductive.
My remarks about basic humanity being lost amongst the hatred and historic point scoring were not aimed at any individual . All too common unfortunately . It was only when the emphasis on this reduced that there was any signs of progress in Ulster.
Misrepresentation of others views also seems become common when people talk about this subject.
Still BB I suppose I should be glad that I am not labelled a holocaust denier because I am not happy that the United nations HQ or schools in Gaza city are being shelled.
The ,as you say,diplomatic words of Abdul Malik were applauded by all our group in the council chamber on Tuesday. Less balanced comments would not have been.
Perhaps the EP.should swap columnists.
I’ve got news for you Gary. Human beings aren’t as humanitarian as we like to flatter ourselves. That’s why human beings have been exterminating, slaughtering, torturing, raping, maiming, enslaving and controlling each other and anything else we can get our hands on since the year dot.
This is the most sensible thing you’ve said by quite a long way.
On the subject of Northern Ireland, if you really want to draw parallels, then fine but drop the misty-eyed sentimentality.
It wasn’t some miraculous and unexplained reduction in hatred and historic point scoring that kick-started the peace process but the effective military defeat of the IRA. It was only when they knew they could not win that they came to the table.
This wasn’t Mary Poppins Gary. You need to be acknowledging the darker side here. Britain wore down the will of the IRA to resist by force. Among the methods used to do this were interrogation techniques amounting to torture, mass internment without trial, juryless courts and deniable assassinations.
You should also note it took 20 years to get to talks. British overtures to the IRA were persistently rejected because they viewed it as a sign that their military strategy was working.
But if you decide you still want to draw this parallel, then perhaps you need to tell us where we are in that cycle (much of which was extraordinarily violent). Or maybe decide if the cycle’s relevant …
Possibly not. As I see that Hamas’s string-puller and arms supplier-in-chief, Iran’s President Ahmadinejad – who is a Holocaust denier by the way – and who calls a lot of the shots out there, has now announced that Israel’s continued existence is “not feasible”.
Good timing that.
I don’t understand why everyone can’t just get along.
Who’s the one in the parallel universe? The major breakthrough in Northern Ireland happened when the British government openly declared that it had no longer any long term strategic interest in the place and when it consequently ceased automatically to support the Unionists. In other words, as a main player in the situation, it took a unilateral decision to break the historic deadlock. The equivalent in Palestine would be a decision by the Israelis to withdraw from all the occupied territories (including parts of Syria) and engage in meaningful discussions to establish peace.
On a secondary level, I’m intrigued that you seem to ignore some of the more sensitive and thoughtful posts in favour of continuing (and increasingly perplexing) attacks on utterly irrelevant leftish groupuscles.
Politicians say all kinds of things for all kinds of reasons. The Good Friday Agreement says:
That adds up to a de facto long term strategic interest in the place for Britain.
No. the equivalent in Palestine would be for the Palestinians to renounce violence and recognise Israel. And mean it of course.
CP, sorry, but Blogger is right. Itās strength not weakness that brings about negotiation.
As a matter of history, from the late 1980ās onward, Loyalist paramilitaries began a devastating assassination campaign against Republicans. This understandably pissed off PIRA who fought back. Their fight back culminated in the 1993 attempt to wipe out the entire UDA and UVF leadership who they (wrongly) believed were meeting above a fish shop on the Shankill Road. The bomber succeeded in killing 9 Protestant civilians (as well as himself), and injuring a further 58. The result of this was that UVF and UDA both retaliated with a series of savage revenge killings of Roman Catholic civilians with no paramilitary connections.
Though supporters of the republican movement like to claim that the retaliation by Loyalists had no bearing on the declaring of a ceasefire, and that they forced the UDA and UVF to stop, this is contradicted by the simple fact that PIRA began its ceasefire 6 weeks before either UVA or UDF.
A close examination of the evidence shows pretty clearly that the costs to the Republican leadership of fighting the long war had become all too heavy.
I am reminded of the story of when Ronald Reagan first entered the Whitehouse. The USA had decided up till then that it was all about maintaining a balance of power. Reagan however thought different and called the head of the CIA into the Oval Office, asking him āDo you want to win the cold war?ā The answer was āYesā so, Reagan replied āO.K. letās do itā. In less than a decade the USSR was no more… pacifist Greenham wimmin who fondly imagine that they faced down Cruise missiles didnāt really have much to do with ending anything.
Historical revisionism ultimately offers no help in finding genuine solutions to problems.
I had no wish to open a thread on the politics of N.I nor to equate the situation there to that in Palestine other than to point out that the NI peace settlement came about because of the willingness of the major player (the British Government) to pursue a political rather than a purely military settlement, to persuade all other parties to pursue peaceful means and to include the widest ranger of activists in the process. I want also to restate the fundamentals of the Israeli/Palestine conflict, namely the illegal occupation by Israel of Palestinian territory, its use of the armed forces and the settler militias to terrorise and displace the Palestinian population and its refusal to stop the illegal settlements. The problem, in other words, is not religious (nor was that in N.I.), nor is it some sort of ethnic struggle still less one of fundamental good v evil. It’s a political problem, centred on a continuing injustice and it requires a political solution. As with N.I., those in the strongest position to advance the solution are those in the positions of greatest power viz Israel and it’s backer, America.
In the end any solution will indeed require recognition of Israel. However at present the Israeli government insists that that means accepting its existence as an exclusively Jewish state: another stumbling block is the question of which geographic Israel to recognise…the one that includes all the existing illegally occupied and settled lands, or something else?
Agree with this:
But we could argue around the detail forever couldn’t we?
Yes – and my typing’s too slow & too inaccurate to make that a worthwhile endeavour!
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Despite the Bristol Blogger having shown me so much affection in recent times, i rarely respond to crticism of my columns, but on this occasion i felt morally obliged; The term holocaust originally derived from the Greek word holĆ³kauston, meaning a “completely (holos) burnt (kaustos)” sacrificial offering to a god. It is in this context that said i was NOT referring to the Holocaust i.e the gas chambers. However the conditions being suffered by the Palestinians in the Gaza ghetto of Israeli making, is little different to that suffered by the Jews in the ghettoes of WWII. Also, in reference to the term Shoah; The biblical word Shoah (ש×××) (also spelled Sho’ah and Shoa), meaning “calamity,” became the standard Hebrew term for the Holocaust as early as the 1940s.[9] Shoah is preferred by many Jews for a number of reasons, including the theologically offensive nature of the word holocaust, as a Greek pagan custom. I hope this clarifies for you and your readers, my position and comparison in this respect.
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