The acceptance of atrocities against Palestinian civilians
Jewish Voices in the Wilderness | 03.03.2008 07:12 | Palestine | Repression
The extraordinary acceptance of mass killings of men, women and children by the Israeli Defence Forces, on a now daily basis, is becoming ever more repugnant to thinking Jews around the world who refuse to allow such atrocities to be carried out in their name.
‘Where is the conscience of World Jewry; why are its voices silent?’
is a question increasingly being posed by many Jews worldwide referring to the daily killings of Palestinian children and other civilians by the indiscriminate air strikes of the IDF. The answer seems to lie in our extraordinary naivety and ignorance as we listen to the weekly exhortations of our (right-wing) rabbis to support every action of the Israeli government. That the Israeli political system has been proved to be endemically corrupt and that those Palestinian children are just as valuable as our own children, has been blocked from our minds as we mentally regurgitate the propaganda that we have been fed over the last decades. As Jews, we supinely listen to a motley assortment of ex government ministers and retired military men sent over by the Israeli government to appeal for money and who reiterate the urgent plight of Israel as she waits to be ‘wiped of the map’. We unthinkingly accept this emotional and political nonsense, as gospel, and discuss it endlessly over the bridge table and at bar-mitzvah parties, not bothering to realise that these killings by the IDF are of real people who bleed as we bleed and who are human, just as we are human. Sharon, Barak and Olmert are, (or were), power-hungry politicians who care not one iota either for the truth or for the value of human life – and we ingenuously still believe that Israel is a beacon of integrity and a ‘light unto the nations’, where human life is sacrosanct. The truth is more mundane yet more sinister: Israeli politicians believe their own misinformation and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in the U S ensures that they are allowed to do so.
is a question increasingly being posed by many Jews worldwide referring to the daily killings of Palestinian children and other civilians by the indiscriminate air strikes of the IDF. The answer seems to lie in our extraordinary naivety and ignorance as we listen to the weekly exhortations of our (right-wing) rabbis to support every action of the Israeli government. That the Israeli political system has been proved to be endemically corrupt and that those Palestinian children are just as valuable as our own children, has been blocked from our minds as we mentally regurgitate the propaganda that we have been fed over the last decades. As Jews, we supinely listen to a motley assortment of ex government ministers and retired military men sent over by the Israeli government to appeal for money and who reiterate the urgent plight of Israel as she waits to be ‘wiped of the map’. We unthinkingly accept this emotional and political nonsense, as gospel, and discuss it endlessly over the bridge table and at bar-mitzvah parties, not bothering to realise that these killings by the IDF are of real people who bleed as we bleed and who are human, just as we are human. Sharon, Barak and Olmert are, (or were), power-hungry politicians who care not one iota either for the truth or for the value of human life – and we ingenuously still believe that Israel is a beacon of integrity and a ‘light unto the nations’, where human life is sacrosanct. The truth is more mundane yet more sinister: Israeli politicians believe their own misinformation and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in the U S ensures that they are allowed to do so.
Jewish Voices in the Wilderness
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where is our concience
03.03.2008 13:30
It is with ordinary Palestinians suffering under the rule of Hamas
jewish and proud
acceptance even on the left of some countries
03.03.2008 16:10
Against the background of a public campaign against islamophobia in Holland, Denmark and Germany, many liberal intellectuals - and in Germany even a considerable layer of the radical left - seem to accept the killing fields of Gaza.
On the other hand, in Germany, official versions to explain a recent misterious series of arson attacks on Turkish inhabited housing blocks as "accidents" and deny any racist background cause no public outrcy - as compared to similar events in the 1990ies.
In Germany an athmosphere of moral blackmailing and intimidation is developing in which it is difficult to spreak out against the atrocities. Arabs - and muslim in general are seen as some kind of evil and sinister subhuman untermensh. A Nazi term which came up during the attack on Soviet Russia.
Problaby the human psyche just works in that way, in order to make it easier to accept and justify atrocities to yourself. Makes you sleep better.
The Arab as the new Untermensch
2pm israeli embassy 15th march
03.03.2008 17:05
no organisation required
jackslucid
e-mail:
jackslucid@hotmail.com
@ jewish and proud
03.03.2008 22:07
Hamas has been democratically elected.
They have been denied power by a cabal involving the Israel government, the international community and Fatah.
Hamas offered truces that Israel rejected.
Hamas offered to share power with Fatah which it rejected.
Hamas actually stopped the firing of rockets into Israel which resumed only after new Israeli agressions and murders in Gaza.
Each week it seems that new Palestinian land is grabbed by Israel in the West Bank.
Each week it seems that new Palestinian homes are destroyed by the Israeli army in the West Bank.
Each week it seems that tens if not hundreds of Palestinians are abducted by Israeli forces in the West Bank.
Each week it seems that scores of Palestinians are murdered by the Israeli army both in Gaza and the West Bank.
Israel currently creates new illegal settlements in East Jerusalem.
What happens to Sderot and now Ashkelon is only the product of the above injustice and relentless aggression by Israel.
What should Hamas do ? Say thank you like Abbas generally does or resist/retaliate ?
By firing at Sderot and killing just only one or two Israeli with their primitive rockets (vs hundreds if not thousands of Palestinians killed during the same period by Israel with some of the the most sophisticated weapon systems that do exist on earth) Hamas managed to shift the Sderot authorities and Israeli public opinion in favor of direct peace talks with them as polls indicated last week.
Olmert choose an escalation in the massacres.
Now Ashkelon is also a target.
skunk