the andrew wilkie

brian | 03.11.2003 07:48 | Repression | Oxford

is wilkie really an antisemite, or a victim of the anti-anti-semites?

ive just had a look at the letter that inflamed the anti-anti-semites, and it doesnt appear to me to be at all what i wouldhave expected from the rancour it incited:

Dear Amit Duvshani,

Thank you for contacting me, but I don't think this would work. I have a huge problem with the way that the Israelis take the moral high ground from their appalling treatment in the Holocaust, and then inflict gross human rights abuses on the Palestinians because they (the Palestinians) wish to live in their own country.

I am sure that you are perfectly nice at a personal level, but no way would I take on somebody who had served in the Israeli army. As you may be aware, I am not the only UK scientist with these views but I'm sure you will find another suitable lab if you look around.

Yours sincerely,
Andrew Wilkie

Nuffield Professor of Pathology,
Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine,
The John Radcliffe,
Headington,
Oxford OX3 9DS,
UK.

http://www.mandrus.org/

And thats it! What exactly is anti-semitic in this? Nothing, but the oversensitie anti-anti-semites found it very useful in their war against the palestinians.

brian

Comments

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nice chap but ..

03.11.2003 13:56

"I am sure that you are perfectly nice at a personal level, but no way would I take on somebody who had served in the Israeli army. "

Now what if he'd send to someone from China: nice chap but I can't take you because of the oppression in Tibet?

or from Zimbabwe: "no way would I take someone spoonsored by Robert Mugabe"?

or from Russia: "no way I'd take someone after the way the Russians have behaved in Chechna"?

You can find something about most of the countries in the world that would allow you turn away applicants.

The applicant wanted to do a PhD in biochemistry. What relevance does this have to any territorial dispute?

The last two people to mix science and politics were Hitler and Stalin. Not an impressive precedent.

sceptic

nice try

03.11.2003 21:53

but your attempt to link Wilkie to stalin and hitler is so absurd as to show how desperate you are to demonise anyone who shows any sign of conscience. This is just what Wilkies hysterical critics are doing: milking the holocaust for all its worth to repress criticism of israel. No wonder israel is hated. The critics of wilkie are only going to cause real anti-jewish feeling to arise.

brian

holocaust?

03.11.2003 22:50

who mentioned the holocaust? I didn't.

but if Wilkie is allowed to turn away an Israeli, then other researchers should also be able to turn away Chinese [Tibet], Russians [Chechnya], Americans [Iraq], Indians [Kashmir], Turks [Cyprus] .... need I go on?

sceptic

mixed feelings

04.11.2003 15:17

Like felicity (never thought I'd say that! :) I agree with his views about Israel, but when a country conscripts people, you can't really judge them *solely* on the fact that they have served in the army; everyone has choices, but not everyone is brave enough to be a refusenik.

Having said that, it is true that Zionists will seize on anything critical of Israel and call it anti-semitic, as most of us have probably seen.

Not black and white...

04.11.2003 16:09

This is definitely nothing to do with anti-semitism, even if the right would like to think that. The reason OUSU have given for the uproar is that a student should be considered on academic grounds alone, not any other factors.
But the problem is that this is a post-grad, not an undergraduate thing. In a post-grad situation you are much more closely involved with the tutor, there is much more interaction than at undergraduate level. To take on a student some aspect of whom makes you feel profoundly uncomfortable is not only going to compromise your ability to work with them, but probably also their degree course.
Not that I'm trying to argue that it's a totally okay thing to do - I'm just trying to say that people should actually look at the situation before screaming "anti-semite" which is just what Israel don't like to do.

Caroline

WMD research

05.11.2003 12:02

This has everything to do with biochemical WMDs.
Israel of course is the thrid largest active producer of such shit at present.
Also Israel is always battle ready to deploy such shit.

I am suing this Wilkie prick for passing on the trouble to another UK lab and not exposign UK's biochemical WMD shit doings.
Maybe Wilkie was scared by what happened to chemical Kelly still no excuse for not coming out with the truth.
Crime against humanity.
Wilkie is a pig.b

ram

Secret connection

08.11.2003 21:56

Here is one connection.

Large distances to secret bunkers are no problem.

http://www.jr2.ox.ac.uk/ndm/groups/telepathology.htm

Remember Chemical Kelly who was first introduced as an agriculture scientist.
True, except Kelly had an inhuman interest in mass cold blooded murder of innocents through the otherwise unremarkable verterinary bacterium Anthrax!

ram