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Jewish dissident Israel Shamir

Ian Buckley | 23.08.2002 22:15

Ian Buckley looks at the writings of Jewish dissident Israel Shamir.

Readers may recall that I briefly mentioned Israel Shamir in these pages a little while ago. Shamir, a very elegant stylist, produces some of the most interesting and outspoken articles available today on the theme of Zionism and its impact on world affairs. His boldness has already cost him his post on the Jerusalem Haaretz newspaper.

Naturally, Shamir - despite being Jewish himself - has been derided as an ‘anti-Semite’ a ‘self-hater’ and also as an associate of so called far-right extremists (do they mean us?). Of his association with the Spotlight, he wittily commented that this US populist/nationalist paper had never called for the extermination of anyone -- which was rather more than could be said of some Israeli papers. Shamir's work definitely deserves to be better known.

The cynical ‘anti-Semitism’ slur is so often used as a means of controlling well-meaning but timid people who have just begun to wake up. Shamir deals with this matter in a typically clear and robust fashion:-

‘I met with many people who have been branded with the scarlet letter of the anti-Semite. These so-called anti-Semites object to the policies of the organised Jewish community, of the unholy alliance of Sharon and Abe Foxman, Gusinsky and Mark Rich, Conrad Black and William Safire. I concur with them wholeheartedly, as it is not a question of prejudice.

‘The professional ‘anti-Semitism-fighters’ know this very well. Their true purpose is not to fight anti-Semitism, but to frighten ordinary Jews into submission.’

There's racism and racism
Cherie Blair for one could have saved herself some embarrassment if she had read Shamir instead of ridiculous feminist tracts and tedious legal gobbledegook, for:-

‘An offence to the Jewish community is not considered a form of racism, as ordinary racism is tolerated with great ease, especially if it is directed towards Arabs (new enemies of Jews) or Blacks (old enemies of Jews). It is treated as a lese majesté (in the years of Jewish ascendancy in the Soviet Union (1917-1937), people were shot for an anti-Jewish remark).’

Now it's not generally considered to be ‘anti-British’ to state that Britain dominated India during the early part of the 20th century - that would be regarded as a bald statement of simple fact, and not a very interesting one at that.

So why should Shamir's comments about the Soviet Union cause great shrieks of annoyance? His blunt statement forms a neat contrast with the Gulag Archipelago, where Alexander Solzhenitsyn was surely trying to get the same information across in a very restrained, almost coded manner.

All nations and peoples - including the British - have discreditable episodes in their history, but in one special case we are supposed to suspend our critical facilities and judgement. It's not ‘bigotry’ or ‘hate’ to insist on a level playing field, and that the same standards should apply to everyone, which assuredly is not the case in Israel:

‘For years, the Jews protested the discrimination in employment and education. In our own state we created the system of total national discrimination. In our state-owned Electric company, out of 13,000 employees there are six Gentiles, 0.046 per cent. Gentiles form forty percent of the population between the Jordan River and the sea, but only one out of four has the right to vote. There are no Gentiles in the Supreme court, in the Government, in the Air Force, in the secret services. There is not even one Gentile on the board of the main Israeli liberal newspaper, Haaretz.’

Shamir's major message - which he hammers home time and time again - is that while Israel may present itself as a democratic and liberal state, it is in fact nothing of the sort. He also goes on to point out correctly that US support for this state causes some ludicrous policy distortions, which in turn are the major cause of conflict and instability in the contemporary world.

Indeed, America is already metamorphising into a sort of Greater Israel, with its recalcitrant and disillusioned ordinary citizens cast in the role of Palestinians. Given the present baleful trend of increasing ‘homeland security’, one can easily imagine a scenario in which the rights to free speech and to bear arms are cast aside. Goodbye, First and Second Amendments, you're out of date now in the one-time land of the free and home of the brave. That America has now become transformed into a sort of blundering Frankenstein monster for the Republic of Israel, a dog that's wagged by the tail.

The great British public gets agitated by possibly fake pictures of a Palestinian toddler dressed as a suicide bomber, but fails to note the utter madness on the other side of the conflict. If anyone doubts this, just consider carefully. the following words of Nick Cohen, who is incidentally a bitter opponent of British nationalism:-

‘If you have access to an internet search engine, type in Third Temple and you will find serious proposals from Jewish fundamentalists to demolish one of the holiest Islamic sites and replace it with a successor to Solomon's temple, levelled by the Babylonians, and the second temple, levelled by the Romans. Christian fundamentalists are as keen to get the bulldozers moving because they've been avowed that Christ won't come again until the Third Temple is up.’

In the books of Rabbi Chaim Richman, the construction of this temple is treated almost as a fait accompli, with only one element missing - the ashes of the red heifer required for its ceremonial purification. Richman babbles on about the "exciting drama" of finding the red heifer required for Israel's coming Third Temple - to say the least, a highly novel way to describe World War Three!

Naturally, the media take care not to publicise this story much - along with other similar ones, presumably thinking that the cumulative effect of such items would be to disturb the masses.

As Shamir asks in his essay ‘Joseph Revisited’: "If the Jewish media lords cheat you about Palestine, why do you think they are honest in any other way? Perhaps the suffering of the Palestinians should help the Europeans and Americans to notice the reefs ahoy their own ship."

Zionist-dominated America still continues on its pre-determined course, with Britain in servile attendance, its latest heroic exploit being the obliteration bombing of an Afghan wedding party. But, assuredly, to use Shamir's analogy, more and more Europeans are noticing the reefs.

The Club
The British working-class lads - from Newcastle, Liverpool, Glasgow or South Wales - who go off on these senseless globalist wars usually choose this option merely as an alternative to the Job Centre queue. They are doubly the victims of what Shamir terms ‘The Club’ the neo-liberal élite who have consolidated their power over us during the last twenty years. As Shamir puts it in ‘The New Complaint of Portnoy’:-

‘Ordinary people still own most of the body parts of America and they are the muscle but the nerve system and brain have been taken over by the club of media lords and the managers of finance and trade, a new dominant power in the world.’

From a wrecked and poverty-stricken Argentina - under Peron one of the richest countries in the world - to a tattered United Kingdom, beset by collapsing public services, rampant poverty and racial conflict - ‘The Club’ still rules.

But its days are surely numbered. It is just as well that this is so, since a final doomsday conflict could well be unleashed as a consequence of ‘The Club's’ prejudices and preoccupations. Even without war, the present system has nothing to offer us except slavery and degradation. Shamir gives a chilling and succinct description of the forces that only nationalism now resists:-

‘The New World Order is, in religious terms, the beginning of the Kingdom of Anti-Christ, based on removal of all spiritual elements from our life. In practical terms, it is an ambitious attempt of total enslavement of Man.’

Most of Shamir's articles are available from the internet at  http://shamir.mediamonitors.net/archive.html.

All are interesting, but I would especially recommend ‘Apocalypse Now.’

Ian Buckley

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