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ISRAEL;WHEN WILL THE WEST DO SOMETHING... PART II

750 replies

UCM · 27/07/2006 23:53

Here goes....

OP posts:
LucyJu · 02/08/2006 09:12

I think it is offensive in the extreme to equate Zionism with National socialism. (And I am speaking as someone who would describe herself as anti-Zionist).

Yes, Israel has some very serious questions to answer about human rights abuses. I am appalled by the way the Palestinians are treated and by the current wave of attacks against Lebanon.

But to compare Israel with the Nazis? Have they set up extermination camps for all Arabs (and indeed all Arab sympathisers, for that matter)? Do they have an ultimate goal of complete world domination? And a world free of Arabs?

Yes, many Israelis hate Palestinians. Many see them as terrorists, threatening their very existence. Similarly, many Palestinians hate Israelis, seeing them as oppressors who have stolen their land. In both cases, this is surely an understandable reaction. I believe it is fear and lack of understanding that has led to this hatred, rather than any incipient anti-Arab (or anti-Jewish) sentiments.

I think this careless comparison is extremely hurtful and offensive. Have you really no idea what the Holocaust meant for the Jewish people?

Mud · 02/08/2006 09:36

try mideastweb) for a balanced (Arab AND Israeli) history of the region

Mud · 02/08/2006 09:36

bollocks links - did that work?

DominiConnor · 02/08/2006 09:53

As for the final question about what Jews think about the Holocaust. I don't think there's anyone who ever watches TV or reads pretty much anything who hasn't been told at really great length about it. A lot. With subtitles if your hearing is slow. If you're hard of thinking then they make simplistic movies to make sure.

But if you don't want to be compared to Nazis, don't act like them.

You don't want to be offended ?
Fine. Then don't do things that when people tell you about what you've done, they huirt your feelings.

It is a sad reflection upon the whole human race, not just Jews that the people you'd think would least be into putting people into camps and murdering them do it with such efficiency.
And it reflects badly upon us, that just like in the 1930s we do fuck all about it.

As for it not being true, one has to look at Nazi ideologoy if one is to deny that Israeli policy is not the same.

Like Israel, Germany in the 20s and 30s regarded itself as vulnerable. Germany had lost a terrible war, and any rational person with socilist Russia near it's borders would be at least a bit paranoid.
Lebensraum was also borne of this rather odd inferiority complex. Germany couldn't win wars because it felt trapped, and later WWII showed that they were right. The lack of an overseas empire and the need to fight on at least two fronts fatally compromised it's abllity to win wars.
Germany, like Israel was openly contemptuous of the League of Nations, the even more crap predecessor of the UN.
Germany, like Israel wanted secure borders and to put settlers into territories in places it regarded as rightfully theirs. Historically Germans had lived in many of the places they later occupied, and of course just like Jews they had codified their delusional framework into a book.
Germany didn't want "the world", they wanted to be like Britain, but on land, having an empire from the Atalnatic to the Ukraine. Note that the Ukranians actually fought for the Nazis.
They wanted the security that they felt comes from strength and size. They were wrong of course, a lesson that Israel doesn't yet seem to have learned.
The Nazis, like Israel enjoyed strong support from many people overseas. The Kennedy family in particular orchestrated American support, but many people saw that Germany (unlike Britain or America) actually managed to feed people, and economically compared to most European countries was in good shape. Entertainingly they had adopted Keynesian boosting of the economy, a doctrine that for 40 years after WWII was invariably to be adopted by those labelling themselves as socialists. Nazis, like most socialists were patholigically innumerate, and didn't realise that it couldn't work in the long term, which is why Britain's economy nearly collpased in the 70s, and Germany lost WWII for it's inabiltiy to produce modern effective weapons.
Nazi Germany had a pensions and healthcare system far in advance of anyone else. Recall that it was Natgiona *Socialism", a fact the BBC tends to forget.
Thus it parallels the often repeated (and false) claim that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. (The PA and Iran are both democracies) They just vote for bad people, is all.

The persecution of Jews before WWII was bad, but not very different from the way Arabs are treated in present day Israel. Their propery was confiscated and they were beaten up by state forces. Like many Arabs in Israel, citizenship was denied to German Jews in the country of their birth. Arabs are denied the abiltiy to serve in the army, though we do know that for some reason some Jews did join the German army. It may sound odd that the right to get shot at for low pay is something to fret over, but if you look at the ise of many subject races like blacks in America or S.Africa, the dominant race really didn't want them armed. Britain actually had Jewish military units, one of which a relative of mine served in.

Germany had an ID card system which recorded race.
So does Israel, with much the same effect, or making official harassment easier. A good % of people working against the fuckwit Blair and his ID card are Jewish. This is not a coincidence.

Also for many years, the Germans never really wanted to eliminate Jews. They just wanted them to go away. They allowed many to escape, and countries like the USA and America shamefully turned many away. Even when they finally decided to create death camps, it was secret. This is an oddly inconsistent decision for the Nazis. They were big on loudly staing their policy, but it seems clear that Germans liked to pretend (and still do) that it was nothing to do with "ordinary" Germans.

Certainly the herding of Jews, gypsies, gays etc into camps was not unlike the way both Britain and the USA dealt with undesirables at the time. Look at Japanese and Indians in the USA, or Afrikaners under the British.
Thus Israel is following a well worn path that is not unique to the Nazis.
It never ends well. not once.

Israel has bombed refugee camps, we have the video. Sharon actively encouraged gangs of armed men in his client factions to enter the camps and murder many unarmed civilians.
Israel is different from Nazi Germany, in that even the Nazis never thought to make torture legal.

Israel, like Nazi Germany has attacked refugees on the roads, fleeing from war.
Of course most other military powers have done the same thing, but that doesdn't make it good.

LucyJu · 02/08/2006 10:13

Despite what you might seem to assume, DominiConnor, I am neither Jewish nor Israeli. In fact, I would describe myself as pro-Arab. Nevertheless, I think that comparing Israel with the Nazis is extremely offensive.

Heathcliffscathy · 02/08/2006 10:30

i know there is going to be total indignation and much sorrowful headshaking accompanied by accusations of ingrained anti-semitism. but actually read the posts. no one is arguing equivalency (well, I certainly am not). I'm pointing out the (to me, and to some israelis, read my post) glaringly obvious parallels and the fact that like I said, the abused has become the abuser. it happens so often on an individual level that it is no surprise at all that it happens at state level too.

lisalisa · 02/08/2006 12:16

Message withdrawn

Heathcliffscathy · 02/08/2006 12:21

lisalisa as I suspected would be the case, you have not read my posts. did you read the line saying 'i'm not arguing equivalency'?

however, i am surprised that you have decided to argue the point rather than shutting me down, and i want to thank you for that.

mimoyello · 02/08/2006 12:25

Mud - you don't just sound like a Zionist, you are also quite pathetic, aren't you ?

Caligula · 02/08/2006 12:29

FFS, that fence is needed. For how long? Forever?

I agree with Lisalisa that of course Israel is not doing to the Palestinians what the Nazis did to the Jews in WWII.

But LL, the Nazis started out with the language and ideas of inferiority and the "little" discriminations and harassments of every day life, making it difficult and inconvenient, and then later impossible to continue normal life. Then built up to the horror of the Final Solution. If you ignore the start of persecutions, you risk repeating the same mistakes as the past. Just because the Israelis haven't got to the stage of destruction the Nazis got to, doesn't mean that the way they behave is in any way acceptable or to be countenanced. Israeli members of the government (I can't remember who) have referred to Palestinians as "cockroaches" (and not been sacked as a result). Israeli spokespersons regularly declare that a Jewish life is worth 100 (or whatever the multiple is, it doesn't really matter, it's the principle that counts) of Palestinian lives. Those ideas are a basis for inhumanity. People act on ideas, the actions don't come from nowhere. And that's why ideas have to be examined, because if specific situations come along (like war in the case of the Nazis) the ideas can build up a horrifying and unstoppable momentum of their own.

mimoyello · 02/08/2006 12:33

lisalisa - you have tried to counter-claim in your post, but millions of people who see the daily slaughter of Arabs by Israel are not convinced.

Judaism DOES say that the Jews are "the chosen people", a racsit premise if there ever was one.

You do not have to have an EXACT match to fascism inorder to behave like one, do ?

By the way, Nazi German has not been and is not the ONLY fascist movement to exist.

I can provide you with a global list oif fascists if you like ? Some of them live right here in the UK.

Kiskidee · 02/08/2006 12:33

sorry but the Holocaust was not only about the macabre and grotesque - the gas chambers, the making of soap of human fat, and lab testing on twins - it was also about the aspects of the Third Reich that affected every single element of a Jew's life - the ID cards, the Ghettos, the removal from jobs, and dispossession of property random stop and search, false imprisonment, imprisonment without charge, shooting to kill for minor offenses. Give intelligent people the credit they are due because these are the aspects of a Palestinian's life that Sophable and the israeli psychoanalyst are alluding to.

Are you saying that it is ok for Israel to carry out these acts, acts of ethnic cleansing and genocide that were everyday occurences of all over Occupied Europe, on the Palestinians? That it is OK for Israel to to act as it is currently behaving as long as they do not have gas chambers, concentration camps and macabre experiments on twins and human body parts? That is is ok because it was Arab countries who instigated the 6 Day War, the Yom Kippur War etc?

Btw, it is not only Muslims who are currently being bombed and descriminated against by Israel in the West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon - this area is full of Christians - the people who were descended from the first followers of Jesus. Is it ok because they get in the way? Is it ok because they are Arabs too?

mimoyello · 02/08/2006 12:42

Mud you are very very rude. It is an interesting ploy being rude to me when you don't actually have anything interesting to say, but I am afraid the "mud" just don't stick !

DominiConnor · 02/08/2006 13:24

It is true to say that Israel is nowhere near as bad as the Holocaust.
But it is as bad as Germany was in the 1930s under Nazi rule.

Most people in Germany and elsewhere just thought the Nazis had pretty much the right idea, and were just a little bigoted towards the Nazis.
Do not forget that in the USA, there were limits on how many Jewish kids could go to college, and in many countries it was seen as quite reasonable to ban them from restuarants ,etc.

Thus Germany at the beginning was not seen as exceptionally bad. In the ealry 1930s, if you'd had to pick which country was going to exterminate it's Jews you'd easily have picked France based upon it's track record, and maybe Italy second.

Thus although it's unfair to compare today's Israel with 1944 Germany, the similarities with 1930s Germany are just too strong.

fistfullofnappies · 02/08/2006 13:28

you are right, mimoyello. have taken part in these mn arguments before, so can only admire your courage

ruty · 02/08/2006 13:50

Agree with Caligula. Reading lisalisa's posts helps me understand how Israel can do the things they do, especially her opinions on the wall. Do you know how many Palestian farmers' land and livelihoods have been destroyed by that wall? Do you know how that impacts on their families? Do you ever think about what options are left to people when you drive them into a situation where there is no hope? Do you care? Obviously not.

saadia · 02/08/2006 13:57

ruty I was thinking the same thing - that lisalisa's views really demonstrate the Israeli mentality and also show how little scope there is for dialogue.

mimoyello · 02/08/2006 13:59

Fistfull - thanks. It is not courage in my case, it's pure outrage.

That a country as brutal as Israel has the backing of the world's Numero Uno "democracy" plus the backing of my own country (because of a Numero Uno a*hole called Blair), I am horrified.

I don't accept "my country/religion right or wrong" as some Israelis and some people of the Jewish faith seem to do.

If my country and my Govt. (the UK) brutalises and murders innocent people and runs them out of their homes (which it is doing right now in several different countries) than I will say so.

This doesn't require courage, it just requires a bit of humanity.

donnie · 02/08/2006 14:48

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donnie · 02/08/2006 14:55

ps the ' piles of rotting corpses' are currently in Gaza, south Lebanon etc.

so are the unmarked graves

so are the orphaned children.

lisalisa · 02/08/2006 15:21

Message withdrawn

lisalisa · 02/08/2006 15:23

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donnie · 02/08/2006 15:25

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Uwila · 02/08/2006 15:45

Donnie, I don't think Lisa has said those things. I think she has said that Irael's action are a matter of defense, not aggression.

I must confess ignorance and point out that I don't really know where I think the blame lies in this conflict. But, I do think the Lisa's beliefs are probably held by many Iraelis.

Just as the protrayal on this thread earlier marked Bush supports as bunch of ultra right-wing fanatical Christian fascists (and that is certainly not true) I think it is al untrue to suggest Lisa's views are not held by many many Israelis.

And I just have to add that making soap out of human flesh is the grossest thing I have ever heard. I didn't know that before this thread. MAkes me sick to think about it.

mimoyello · 02/08/2006 16:04

I have just read something LL said further down this thread, that only a very small minority of Jews outside Israel do NOT support Israel, and that this small minority belong to some "sect" with "outlandish views".

This is utterly untrue. There are many many intelligent LIBERAL non-Israeli Jews who detest what Israel represents. I went to school with one, an Orthodox Jew from New York whose granparents had been killed by Hitler. I doubt she would support Israels' current activities.

Indeed if those who support Israel on this thread were open-minded enough to read some decent books, they would know as a matter of fact that many many Jews in this country including several prominent Jews in govt. opposed the Zionist drive to create a homeland in Palestine (I am talking 1920's Balfour Declaration).

It is utter nonsense to put such people in the category of a "sect" with outlandish views and I would imagine highly offensive to the intelligence and humanity of such Jews who are honest enough to realise that Israel is what it is.

As for the holocaust, no one denies it, it is well documented and withing living memory.

However, it is a Zionist conspiracy that puts it at the TOP of all genocide lists. There are many thousands of episodes in history similar to what the Jews suffered at the hands of Hitler.

The one that always sticks in my mind and is also within living memory is the deliberate state sponsored massacre of 1.5 million Armenians Christains by Ataturk of Turkey.

The Armenians I know always bemoan the fact that people have never heard of their holocaust.

What does this tell you about whitewashing history ?