Posted: Wed Aug 31, 2005 6:06 pm Post subject: The war within the west - by Melanie Phillips
A scholarly and sobering article by Suzanne Gershowitz and Emanuele Ottolenghi in the Middle East Quarterly makes a parallel point to Carson (see this post), but this time about Ariel Sharon and the way he is viewed by Europe. The demonisation of Sharon and of Israel are not examples of national self-immolation by a country’s own elite (although there’s plenty of that going on within Israel too) but rather the Europe-wide scapegoating of a country and a leader who, with monstrous injustice, have been turned into pariahs on account of just about everything they do, especially their struggle against annihilatory terror, while their aggressors are indulged. As the article records, this European savagery towards Sharon and, through him, towards Israel, is based on systematic distortions and lies – not least about the Sabra and Shatila massacres in 1982, the point at which the Europeans gleefully fabricated their first Jewish war criminal:
‘The European press exaggerated Sharon's role in the Sabra and Shatila massacres and used it as original sin to cast blame upon Sharon and, by extension, Israel for subsequent events regardless of fact. In an October 2 editorial, the French establishment daily Le Monde declared that Sharon's "provocation" was "enormous," and cited his role in covering up "the massacre by his Lebanese allies of a thousand [sic] women, children, and old Palestinian men in the camps of Sabra and Shatila." Von Heiko Flottau of the German Sueddeutsche Zeitung described how Sharon's troops "watched" as the massacre unfolded. Alexandra Schwartzbrod of the French Libération declared Sharon to be "responsible" for the massacres. Seldom is any other detail of Sharon's career, such as his coordination of the dismantling of the Sinai settlement of Yamit, mentioned.
‘Sharon was defense minister during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. But he was not at the camps during the raid, nor did he order the Lebanese troops to wage such an atrocity. The Israeli army ordered the Lebanese Phalangists out of the camps as soon as they heard that the massacre took place. While the Kahan Commission found Sharon one of the persons "indirectly responsible" for the massacre because he did not foresee the possibility that Lebanese troops might wage a massacre, it labeled "baseless libel" the accusation that Israeli troops were in the camps at the time of the massacre.
‘Both the fundamental bias and ignorance of the European media is exposed by the fact that few raised concerns that Elie Hobeika, the Phalangist leader who ordered the massacre, subsequently became a minister in the Syrian-dominated Lebanese government in which capacity he met with a number of EU officials. Karen Coleman, foreign affairs editor for Dublin's NewsTalk 106 FM radio, condemned Sharon for perpetrating the massacre but had not heard of "allegations" of Hobeika's involvement. Hobeika subsequently held several Lebanese ministerial positions under pro-Syrian governments in which capacity he met with European officials and journalists who did not mention his past. For example, in February 1998, a German news agency covered a pan-Mediterranean energy conference in Beirut opened by the head of the European Commission and featuring then minister of water and electricity Hobeika; it made no mention of his past.’
This demonisation, the authors suggest, has unleashed an irrational hatred of Israel and resurgence of anti-Jewish feeling, and calls into question Europe’s fitness to exercise any role in the search for peace in the Middle East:
‘Israel is a controversial nation and Sharon a controversial figure. But the European media's demonization of Sharon has become irrational. This bias has become so customary that, within Europe, the legitimacy of Israel-bashing and Sharon-baiting has enabled a mainstream airing of conspiracies. Recently, for example, a Guardian column suggested Israeli rather than Syrian responsibility for the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.
‘Hatred of Sharon and condemnation of Israel have also made anti-Zionism mainstream. In a May 2001 European parliament session, Paul Marie Coûteaux, a French deputy, said Europe "must consider giving the Arab side a large enough force, including a large enough nuclear force, to persuade Israel that it cannot simply do whatever it wants." The president of the British Humanist Association, Claire Rayner, said in April 2002 that the idea of a homeland for the Jewish people was a "load of crap." In a 2004 lecture in Alexandria, Egypt, former French prime minister Michel Rocard called the Balfour Declaration, which allowed for Israel's creation, a "historic mistake."
‘The growing legitimacy of anti-Zionism has contributed to a resurgence of European anti-Semitism, again often wrapped with and, in many European eyes, legitimized by the caricature of Sharon. Violent anti-Semitic incidents in Europe have risen in proportion to the violence between Israel and the Palestinians, which suggest a relationship between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. In Dublin, there were banners of swastikas over stars of David which read "Stop the Palestinian Holocaust"; in Paris, posters read "Hitler Has a Son: Sharon"; in Berlin, they read, "Stop the Genocide in Palestine" and "Sharon Is a Child Murderer." The European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia has shown that during the second Palestinian uprising, anti-Semitic incidents increased by more than 600 percent in France alone.
‘Israel has often been isolated. Pilloried in the United Nations, both European and U.S. media put the Jewish state's actions under a magnifying glass. Media influences public opinion, and its bias in Europe has encouraged prominent Europeans to speak out openly against Israel. This in turn colors European policy already ambivalent about Israel. A vicious cycle ensues.
‘The monomaniacal criticism has taken a new edge under Sharon that threatens to undercut the productiveness of any European contribution to regional peace. Many European officials, diplomats, and journalists translate their hatred of Sharon into skepticism for any position he takes. They dismiss the security fence because Sharon implemented it, even if it was Nobel Laureate Yitzhak Rabin who first declared, "We have to decide on separation as a philosophy." Likewise, while Sharon pursues unilateral disengagement from Gaza, a concession more significant than Menachem Begin's decision to withdraw from the Sinai, European commentators cast doubt upon Sharon's motives. As the Israeli government begins to face other issues—such as the future of Jerusalem, defensible borders, the Iranian nuclear bomb, and demographic requirements to remain a Jewish state—Europe's media-driven hatred of Sharon has emboldened forces questioning Israel's legitimacy and, in the process, both undercuts peaceful solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and jeopardizes the lives of Israel's six million citizens.’
One of the many double standards employed by Europe to judge the Middle East conflict is that Israel’s military measures to defend itself against terror are condemned while similar measures taken by the west are upheld (targeted killings of Hamas leaders, say, get the big thumbs down while the coalition does its best to kill leaders of al Qaeda) on the grounds that Israel’s war is completely different from and has nothing to do with Islamic terror against the west; and yet in the next breath the same critics claim that Israel’s policies are the principal cause of the global jihad. The fact is that Israel is in the front line of the same war that we are all having to fight to defend the free world; that the demonisation of Israel and Sharon is simply a more extreme version of the demonisation of America and Bush, by the same ideological idiots; and that until and unless Britain and Europe stop gunning for America and Israel and start identifying the real enemy who threatens us all, we will not win this war.
Posted: Wed Aug 31, 2005 6:20 pm Post subject: Re: The war within the west - by Melanie Phillips
Nannette wrote:
A scholarly and sobering article by Suzanne Gershowitz and Emanuele Ottolenghi in the Middle East Quarterly makes a parallel point to Carson (see this post), but this time about Ariel Sharon and the way he is viewed by Europe. The demonisation of Sharon and of Israel are not examples of national self-immolation by a country’s own elite (although there’s plenty of that going on within Israel too) but rather the Europe-wide scapegoating of a country and a leader who, with monstrous injustice, have been turned into pariahs on account of just about everything they do, especially their struggle against annihilatory terror, while their aggressors are indulged. As the article records, this European savagery towards Sharon and, through him, towards Israel, is based on systematic distortions and lies – not least about the Sabra and Shatila massacres in 1982, the point at which the Europeans gleefully fabricated their first Jewish war criminal:
‘The European press exaggerated Sharon's role in the Sabra and Shatila massacres and used it as original sin to cast blame upon Sharon and, by extension, Israel for subsequent events regardless of fact. In an October 2 editorial, the French establishment daily Le Monde declared that Sharon's "provocation" was "enormous," and cited his role in covering up "the massacre by his Lebanese allies of a thousand [sic] women, children, and old Palestinian men in the camps of Sabra and Shatila." Von Heiko Flottau of the German Sueddeutsche Zeitung described how Sharon's troops "watched" as the massacre unfolded. Alexandra Schwartzbrod of the French Libération declared Sharon to be "responsible" for the massacres. Seldom is any other detail of Sharon's career, such as his coordination of the dismantling of the Sinai settlement of Yamit, mentioned.
‘Sharon was defense minister during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. But he was not at the camps during the raid, nor did he order the Lebanese troops to wage such an atrocity. The Israeli army ordered the Lebanese Phalangists out of the camps as soon as they heard that the massacre took place. While the Kahan Commission found Sharon one of the persons "indirectly responsible" for the massacre because he did not foresee the possibility that Lebanese troops might wage a massacre, it labeled "baseless libel" the accusation that Israeli troops were in the camps at the time of the massacre.
‘Both the fundamental bias and ignorance of the European media is exposed by the fact that few raised concerns that Elie Hobeika, the Phalangist leader who ordered the massacre, subsequently became a minister in the Syrian-dominated Lebanese government in which capacity he met with a number of EU officials. Karen Coleman, foreign affairs editor for Dublin's NewsTalk 106 FM radio, condemned Sharon for perpetrating the massacre but had not heard of "allegations" of Hobeika's involvement. Hobeika subsequently held several Lebanese ministerial positions under pro-Syrian governments in which capacity he met with European officials and journalists who did not mention his past. For example, in February 1998, a German news agency covered a pan-Mediterranean energy conference in Beirut opened by the head of the European Commission and featuring then minister of water and electricity Hobeika; it made no mention of his past.’
This demonisation, the authors suggest, has unleashed an irrational hatred of Israel and resurgence of anti-Jewish feeling, and calls into question Europe’s fitness to exercise any role in the search for peace in the Middle East:
‘Israel is a controversial nation and Sharon a controversial figure. But the European media's demonization of Sharon has become irrational. This bias has become so customary that, within Europe, the legitimacy of Israel-bashing and Sharon-baiting has enabled a mainstream airing of conspiracies. Recently, for example, a Guardian column suggested Israeli rather than Syrian responsibility for the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.
‘Hatred of Sharon and condemnation of Israel have also made anti-Zionism mainstream. In a May 2001 European parliament session, Paul Marie Coûteaux, a French deputy, said Europe "must consider giving the Arab side a large enough force, including a large enough nuclear force, to persuade Israel that it cannot simply do whatever it wants." The president of the British Humanist Association, Claire Rayner, said in April 2002 that the idea of a homeland for the Jewish people was a "load of crap." In a 2004 lecture in Alexandria, Egypt, former French prime minister Michel Rocard called the Balfour Declaration, which allowed for Israel's creation, a "historic mistake."
‘The growing legitimacy of anti-Zionism has contributed to a resurgence of European anti-Semitism, again often wrapped with and, in many European eyes, legitimized by the caricature of Sharon. Violent anti-Semitic incidents in Europe have risen in proportion to the violence between Israel and the Palestinians, which suggest a relationship between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. In Dublin, there were banners of swastikas over stars of David which read "Stop the Palestinian Holocaust"; in Paris, posters read "Hitler Has a Son: Sharon"; in Berlin, they read, "Stop the Genocide in Palestine" and "Sharon Is a Child Murderer." The European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia has shown that during the second Palestinian uprising, anti-Semitic incidents increased by more than 600 percent in France alone.
‘Israel has often been isolated. Pilloried in the United Nations, both European and U.S. media put the Jewish state's actions under a magnifying glass. Media influences public opinion, and its bias in Europe has encouraged prominent Europeans to speak out openly against Israel. This in turn colors European policy already ambivalent about Israel. A vicious cycle ensues.
‘The monomaniacal criticism has taken a new edge under Sharon that threatens to undercut the productiveness of any European contribution to regional peace. Many European officials, diplomats, and journalists translate their hatred of Sharon into skepticism for any position he takes. They dismiss the security fence because Sharon implemented it, even if it was Nobel Laureate Yitzhak Rabin who first declared, "We have to decide on separation as a philosophy." Likewise, while Sharon pursues unilateral disengagement from Gaza, a concession more significant than Menachem Begin's decision to withdraw from the Sinai, European commentators cast doubt upon Sharon's motives. As the Israeli government begins to face other issues—such as the future of Jerusalem, defensible borders, the Iranian nuclear bomb, and demographic requirements to remain a Jewish state—Europe's media-driven hatred of Sharon has emboldened forces questioning Israel's legitimacy and, in the process, both undercuts peaceful solutions to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and jeopardizes the lives of Israel's six million citizens.’
One of the many double standards employed by Europe to judge the Middle East conflict is that Israel’s military measures to defend itself against terror are condemned while similar measures taken by the west are upheld (targeted killings of Hamas leaders, say, get the big thumbs down while the coalition does its best to kill leaders of al Qaeda) on the grounds that Israel’s war is completely different from and has nothing to do with Islamic terror against the west; and yet in the next breath the same critics claim that Israel’s policies are the principal cause of the global jihad. The fact is that Israel is in the front line of the same war that we are all having to fight to defend the free world; that the demonisation of Israel and Sharon is simply a more extreme version of the demonisation of America and Bush, by the same ideological idiots; and that until and unless Britain and Europe stop gunning for America and Israel and start identifying the real enemy who threatens us all, we will not win this war.
1. Sharon did help incite this whole last antifada-thing when he charged up the Temple Mount!
2. The Un-Yarmukle world can generally differentiate between the right of an "occupied" entity to try to liberate itself and not be labeled Terrorist so long as civilians are not targheted (and this may be debatable) and a true terrorist act against any innocent entity outside the two parties in contention (for example in EUrope).....ONLY the Yarmukloids DO NOT UNDERSTAND THAT!
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