Outstanding, anti-racist, humanitarian Jewish American scholar Professor Bertell Ollman is a professor of politics at New York University where he teaches both dialectical methodology and socialist theory. He is the author or co-author of numerous scholarly books (for a detailed biography see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertell_Ollman ).
Professor Bertell Ollman on required actions against racist Zionism: “Politically, this means avoiding any association with this "rogue state" whatsoever (as we did with South Africa earlier), boycotting it economically and otherwise (keeping it out of the Olympics, for example), bringing pressure on our politicians to stop all U.S. aid (private as well as public) to Israel, supporting various sanctions (including trade sanctions) against it, calling for the strongest possible resolutions at the U.N. and in all other available forums denouncing Zionist human rights abuses, and, of course, confronting head-on the Zionist lobby that would oppose all this. Similar steps should be taken in Europe and elsewhere, but, given America's power in the world in general and in Israel in particular, it is in our country that the fate of the Palestinian people—and ultimately that of Judaism and what's left of the Jewish people—will be decided.” [1].
Professor Bertell Ollman on the fight against anti-Semitism: “An all out struggle against Zionism by Jews, therefore, is also the most effective way to fight against real anti-Semitism. Furthermore, if Zionism is indeed a particularly virulent form of nationalism and, increasingly, of racism and if Israel is acting toward its captive minority in ways that resemble more and more how the Nazis treated their Jews, then we must also say so. For obvious reasons, the Zionists are very sensitive about being compared to the Nazis (not so sensitive that it has restrained them in their actions but enough to bellow "unfair" and to charge "anti-Semitism" when it happens). Yet, the facts on the ground, when not obscured by one or another Zionist rationalization, show that the Zionists are the worst anti-Semites in the world today, oppressing a Semitic people as no nation has done since the Nazis.” [1].
[1]. Bertell Ollman, “Letter of Resignation from the Jewish People”, Dialectical Marxism, 2004: http://www.nyu.edu/projects/ollman/docs/resignation.php .
Jonathan Ophir (anti-racist Jewish Israeli musician, conductor and writer based in Denmark) (2020): “Peter Beinart, Prince of ‘Liberal-Zionism’, published a nearly 7K-word essay in Jewish Currents titled “Yavne: A Jewish Case for Equality in Israel-Palestine”, explaining why he is abandoning the two-state solution. It was followed up by his much shorter piece in the New York Times titled “I No Longer Believe in a Jewish State”. I don’t need to write an essay to explain just how deeply this cuts into the Zionist heart. Equality between Jews and Palestinians is anathema to Zionism, and abandoning the Jewish State is relinquishing the conceptual means by which this inequality is maintained. These advocacies in general are not novel. Many others as well as this writer have been making them for years. But the person who is now voicing them is part of this story which makes it that much more explosive. The prince has just abandoned the castle. Even though Beinart seems keen to soften the blow by suggesting that Zionism continue more as “essence” rather than “form”, that is, become a kind of cultural signifier without a Jewish nation-state as such, for Zionists today, this is still very much tantamount to a death blow… And if it’s Apartheid, no matter what you do, then it’s logical that the goal needs to change from managing it, to abolishing it. When the goal is abolishing it, then we are called on to imagine a future without Apartheid. This is where the “pragmatists” of the status quo orthodoxies will come in to demolish these imaginings as “unrealistic” or worse. People once talked that way about Apartheid South Africa, too, until it wasn’t Apartheid anymore” (Jonathan Ophir, “Peter Beinart’s defection is a desperate crisis for liberal Zionists”, Mondoweiss, 20 July 2020: https://mondoweiss.net/2020/07/peter-beinarts-defection-makes-liberal-zionists-reactionary/ ).
Orthodox Jewish protestor: “Israel is not a Jewish state” (Rabbi Weiss, Orthodox Jewish humanitarian on YouTube, “Zionism is racism and racism is bad”, 2008: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahHIOMwEL_o&t=2s ).
Outstanding Jewish Israeli historian Ilan Pappé is Professor of history at the University of Exeter (UK) and co-Director of the Exeter Center for Ethno-Political Studies. He was formerly a Senior Lecturer in political science at Haifa University (1984-2007), and Chair of the Emil Touma Institute for Palestinian and Israeli Studies in Haifa (2000-2008). He is the author of “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine” (2006) and many other scholarly books (for details see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilan_Papp%C3%A9 ).
Professor Ilan Pappé in his book “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine”: "When it created its nation-state, the Zionist movement did not wage a war that `tragically but inevitably' led to the expulsion of `parts of' the indigenous population, but the other way round: the main goal was the ethnic cleansing of all of Palestine, which the movement coveted for its new state. A few weeks after the ethnic cleansing operations began, the neighbouring Arab states sent a small army - small in comparison to their overall military might - to try, in vain, to prevent the ethnic cleansing. The war with the regular Arab armies did not bring the ethnic cleansing operations to a halt until their successful completion in the autumn of 1948 … [after expelling 800,000 people, destroying 531 villages and empty eleven urban neighbourhoods] a clear-cut case of an ethnic cleansing operation, regarded under international law today as a crime against humanity." [1].
Professor Ilan Pappé in reviewing Alan Hart’s “Zionism, the real enemy of the Jews” (Clarity Press, 2009): ““In this extraordinary book, Alan Hart has succeeded in elucidating for us the immediate and long term dangers involved in the unconditional Western support for Zionism and its oppressive policies against the Palestinians. The author provides us with a chilling exposure of how this embrace developed and continues to endanger the Jewish existence and fuels the anti-Semitism that refuses to disappear. Motivated by a genuine concern for peace in Israel and Palestine and beyond in the world at large, Alan Hart has written not only a strong indictment of Zionism, based on both research and personal experience, but also provided us with a charter for a better future” [2].
Professor Ilan Pappé re Apartheid Israel and Apartheid South Africa, 2008: “There are similarities and dissimilarities. The colonialist history has many chapters in common and some of the features of the Apartheid system can be found in the Israeli policies towards its own Palestinian minority and towards those in the occupied territories. Some aspects of the occupation, however, are worse than the apartheid reality of South Africa and some aspects in the lives of Palestinian citizens in Israel are not as bad as they were in the hey days of Apartheid. The main point of comparison to my mind is political inspiration. The anti-Apartheid movement, the ANC, the solidarity networks developed throughout the years in the West, should inspire a more focused and effect pro-Palestinian campaign”. [3].
Professor Ilan Pappé to Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a New Hampshire student group promoting divestment in Israel: “I was thrilled to learn about the courageous step the college has taken. I am confident that history would judge it to be in hindsight one of the definitive moments in the non violent struggle to tend the occupation and the oppression in Palestine and Israel.” [4].
[1]. Ilan Pappe, “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine” (Oneworld publications, 2006); Amazon reviews: http://www.amazon.com/Ethnic-Cleansing-Palestine-Ilan-Pappe/dp/1851684670 .
[2]. Ilan Pappe, review of Alan Hart’s book “Zionism, the real enemy of the Jews” (Clarity Press, 2009), Clarity Press: http://www.claritypress.com/files/Hart-I.html .
[3]. Interviews with Professors Noam Chomsky and Ilan Pappé, OpEd News, 25 September 2008: http://www.opednews.com/articles/Noam-Chomsky-Ilan-Pappe-In-by-Duffer2205-080925-957.html .
[4]. Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a New Hampshire student group promoting divestment in Israel, “Endorsements“, 2009: http://www.hsjp.org/endorsements/ .
Ilan Pappé (anti-racist Jewish Israel history professor): “Before choosing the title for my book The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, I thought a lot because I knew the connotations, I realised that for too many people it would be too radical. I remember even my publisher had reservations about it. But then I checked the American State Department website about ethnic cleansing and the description of what ethnic cleansing is, and it fitted so well with what was and is going on in Palestine. This description does not only describe an act of expulsion but also its legal implications, which is in this specific case, is a crime against humanity. It also says very clearly that the only way to compensate for ethnic cleansing is to ask the people who were expelled whether they want to return or not… The Zionist goal from the very beginning was to have as much of Palestine as possible with as few Palestinians in it as possible. There is no actual difference between what we today call left and right Zionism. The only difference is that the right wing speak their mind more, in the fact that they continuously let us know they want to take more and more land from the Palestinians. They do not care if it is not the right historical moment or if they have enough resources to do it or if the international atmosphere is not good. Whereas the left, the pragmatic left, say that they cannot take land all the time. So, for example, you need to look for good historical moments. Some of the left says that it’s enough to have 90% of historic Palestine for Israelis, with the last 10% for the Palestinians, who would also be denied Israeli citizenship. This is the two state solution vision from the Israeli perspective” (“Interview with Ilan Pappe: “The Zionist goal from the very beginning was to have as much of Palestine as possible with as few Palestinians in it as possible””, International Solidarity Movement, 2 July 2013: https://palsolidarity.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/pappe1-Copy.jpg ).
Dr Tamas Pataki is an Honorary Research Fellow in the School of Philosophical and Historical, the University of Melbourne (see: http://www.findanexpert.unimelb.edu.au/org/org101.html ).
Dr Tamas Pataki as a signatory on the "Petition Against the Right of Return to Israel on Behalf of Australian Jews” (March 2010): “We are Jews from Australia, who, like Jewish people throughout the world, have an automatic right to Israeli citizenship under Israel’s “law of return.” While this law may seem intended to enable a Jewish homeland, we submit that it is in fact a form of racist privilege that abets the colonial oppression of the Palestinians.
Today there are more than seven million Palestinian refugees around the world. Israel denies their right to return to their homes and land—a right recognized and undisputed by UN Resolution 194, the Geneva Convention, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Meanwhile, we are invited to live on that same land simply because we are Jewish, thereby potentially taking the place of Palestinians who would dearly love to return to their ancestral lands.
We renounce this “right” to “return” offered to us by Israeli law. It is not right that we may “return” to a state that is not ours while Palestinians are excluded and continuously dispossessed.’ [1].
[1]. Antony Loewenstein, "Prominent Australian Jews reject the Israeli "right of return", Media release, 3 March 2010:
Miko Peled (Jewish Israeli peace activist, author, karate instructor and author of “The General’s Son: Journey of an Israeli in Palestine): “Just as people of conscience around the world hope to see the old tyrants like Mubarak and Qaddafi toppled, so must they act so that Zionist Israel will be transformed into a secular, tolerant, pluralistic democracy. A democracy in which all citizens enjoy equal rights and have a say in their future. As the drastic changes in the Middle East took place with little warning, one may expect that little warning will be given and that change will happen within Israel/Palestine sooner rather than later. Those who stand beside Zionist Israel now will later come to regret it and the stain of shame will be hard to erase. As it is the Zionist state will go down in history as the lowest and most shameful chapter in the long history of the Jewish people “ (Miko Peled, “Israel Is No “Island of Stability””, 12 April 2011: https://mikopeled.com/2011/04/14/israel-is-no-island-of-stability-april-12-2011-by-miko-peled/ ; see Miko Peled quotes: http://www.thehypertexts.com/Miko%20Peled%20Quotes%20Articles%20Essays.htm ).
Miko Peled: “Israel is faced with two options: Continue to exist as a Jewish state while controlling the Palestinians through military force and racist laws, or undertake a deep transformation into a real democracy where Israelis and Palestinians live as equals in a shared state, their shared homeland. For Israelis and Palestinians alike, the latter path promises a bright future” (Miko Peled in Miko Peled quotes: http://www.thehypertexts.com/Miko%20Peled%20Quotes%20Articles%20Essays.htm ).
Harold Pinter (1930-2008) was an outstanding Jewish British playwright and winner of the 2005 Nobel Prize for Literature (for biography see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Pinter ). For his 2005 Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech slamming US atrocities in Latin America and Asia and calling for arraignment and Bush and Blair before the International Criminal Court see “Art, Truth and Politics”: http://www.countercurrents.org/arts-pinter081205.htm .
Harold Pinter and other outstanding writers: “The latest chapter of the conflict between Israel and Palestine began when Israeli forces abducted two civilians, a doctor and his brother, from Gaza. An incident scarcely reported anywhere, except in the Turkish press. The following day the Palestinians took an Israeli soldier prisoner - and proposed a negotiated exchange against prisoners taken by the Israelis - there are approximately 10,000 in Israeli jails.
That this "kidnapping" was considered an outrage, whereas the illegal military occupation of the West Bank and the systematic appropriation of its natural resources - most particularly that of water - by the Israeli Defence (!) Forces is considered a regrettable but realistic fact of life, is typical of the double standards repeatedly employed by the West in face of what has befallen the Palestinians, on the land allotted to them by international agreements, during the last seventy years.
Today outrage follows outrage; makeshift missiles cross sophisticated ones. The latter usually find their target situated where the disinherited and crowded poor live, waiting for what was once called Justice. Both categories of missile rip bodies apart horribly - who but field commanders can forget this for a moment?
Each provocation and counter-provocation is contested and preached over. But the subsequent arguments, accusations and vows, all serve as a distraction in order to divert world attention from a long-term military, economic and geographic practice whose political aim is nothing less than the liquidation of the Palestinian nation.
This has to be said loud and clear for the practice, only half declared and often covert, is advancing fast these days, and, in our opinion, it must be unceasingly and eternally recognised for what it is and resisted.
(Signed) Tariq Ali, Russell Banks, John Berger, Noam Chomsky, Richard Falk, Eduardo Galeano, Charles Glass, Naomi Klein, W.J.T. Mitchell, Harold Pinter, Arundhati Roy. Jose Saramago, Giiuliana Sgrena, Gore Vidal, Howard Zinn.” [1].
[1]. Letter from Harold Pinter,with Tariq Ali, Russell Banks, John Berger, Noam Chomsky, Richard Falk, Eduardo Galeano, Charles Glass, Naomi Klein, W.J.T. Mitchell, Arundhati Roy. Jose Saramago, Giiuliana Sgrena, Gore Vidal, and Howard Zinn re Palestine, Peninsular Peace and Justice Centre, Palo Alto, California, USA, 19 July 2006: http://peaceandjustice.org/article.php?story=20060726115326120&query=zinn .
Gabriel Piterberg is Professor of History at the University of California, Los Angeles and is the author of “The Returns of Zionism: Myths, Politics and Scholarship in Israel”. Gabriel Piterberg was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and grew up in Israel. He graduated at Tel Aviv University, where he majored in Middle East history and political science (BA), and Middle East and European history (MA). His D.Phil. in the history of the Ottoman Empire is from the University of Oxford. He taught at the University of Durham, England, and Ben Gurion University of the Negev in Israel (see: http://www.history.ucla.edu/people/faculty?lid=996 ).
Gabriel Piterberg: on the British Empire and British Protestant basis for racist Zionism and the ethnic cleansing of Palestine (2009): “ the return to the Old Testament as an unmediated source of authority is a Protestant phenomenon, it is not a Jewish precept or principle. And so the idea that you return to the Old Testament as a source of authority for narrative veracity, for political legitimacy, for ideologies of settlement, is originally Protestant. Secondly, the specific idea that the Jews should be restored to their homeland, which is theirs by Biblical right, is something that when we come to modernity, emerged in England from the late 18th century to the middle of the 19th century, and this has been well-documented and it's from sources which are Low Church Evangelical Protestant Anglicanism that this idea that the Bible should not be interpreted - by Bible I mean Old Testament - should not be interpreted allegorically but literally. And when it says that the Jews should be restored to the homeland that had been promised to them by God, then it means doing so literally. And I think, at least in ideational, intellectual terms, but later also politically, because Britain became such a powerful - was such a powerful Empire that conquered Palestine eventually - this is the real origin of Zionism, both as an idea and as a political possibility… I think what is called ordinarily the Palestinian-Israeli, or Palestinian-Zionist conflict is not a conflict just between two national movements vying for the same piece of land, it is a conflict between a national movement of settlers and a national movement of indigenous people. If we remove for a moment ethical considerations and look at it cold-bloodedly, then in cases like Australia and the US, the situation has been resolved because the settlers exterminated the native population, which does no longer exist as a politically viable issue or movement or agency. What happened in Palestine is that the major attempt by the settlers to ethnically cleanse the territory over which there was conflict succeeded but was not completed. The native population has been sorely and heavily defeated but it is still there. Now what's happening with the settlers is that they can't come to terms on the one hand with the existence of indigenous people as equal human beings with whom you somehow have to resign yourself to achieving some sort of liveable arrangement, be it two States, one State, that matters less, but at the same time they can't really remove them, and with the passage of time, however violent they become, they cannot achieve that. And I think this creates a situation which is not only stuck without resolution, but is becoming dynamically more and more explosive. Because of this tension between exponentially growing power of the settler-state, and inability to accept the existence of the indigenous people as equal human beings, but also at the same time the inability to remove them, irrevocably this is also clear, and I think this is the - basically this is the gist of the conflict.” [1].
[1]. Professor Gabriel Piterberg interviewed by Gary Bryson in “Voices of Dissent” , ABC Radio National, “Encounter”, 22 March 2009: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/encounter/voices-of-dissent/3135248 .
Sasha Polakow-Suransky is a Jewish South African, Senior Editor at Foreign Affairs in the US and author of the “The Unspoken Alliance: Israel's Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa” that exposed extensive military and intelligence links and Apartheid Israeli assistance in the development of Apartheid South Africa’s nuclear weapons (see: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sasha-polakowsuransky/hypocrisy-now-the-pro-isr_b_573129.html ).
Sasha Polakow-Suransky on Apartheid Israel-Apartheid South Africa links (2010): “After all, Israel was the most significant arms supplier to that regime throughout the 1980s and served as a lifeline for the apartheid government during a period when Pretoria faced growing international condemnation and heightened domestic unrest (i.e. protests by 80 percent of the population demanding their democratic rights). Anyone who served in the Israeli army during the late 1980s, as Goldberg did, should be well aware of this history. During these years, military intelligence officials from the two countries held annual intelligence-sharing conferences and South African military representatives came to the West Bank to view the anti-riot equipment the Israeli army was using against Palestinians. When foreign journalists in the West Bank encountered visiting South African military officials, the Israeli military censor was quickly ordered to hush it up. Back in South Africa, a large contingent of Israeli rocketry experts was holed up in the seaside town of Arniston helping the South African government put the finishing touches on ballistic missiles intended to carry its next generation of nuclear weapons.’ [1].
[1]. Sasha Polakow-Suransky , “Hypocrisy now!: the pro-Israel crowd’s sins of omission. Huffington Post, 12 May 2010: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sasha-polakowsuransky/hypocrisy-now-the-pro-isr_b_573129.html .
Gideon Polya (anti-racist Jewish Hungarian-origin Australian scientist, writer, artist, climate activist and humanitarian) (2017): “Netanyahu is the PM of nuclear terrorist, racist Zionist-run, genocidally racist, serial invader, serial war criminal, women-abusing, children-abusing, democracy-by-genocide, ethnic cleansing, pathologically mendacious, neo-Nazi, anti-Arab anti-Semitic and indeed anti-Jewish anti-Semitic, race-based kleptocracy Apartheid Israel. Netanyahu has been invited to visit pro-Zionist, US-lackey, climate criminal Australia, the world’s leading supporter of Apartheid Israel after the US, and will address the Australian Federal Parliament in February 2017…
Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention states that :“In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such: a) Killing members of the group; b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group”. Apartheid Israel is guilty of violating all these elements of the UN Genocide Convention: (1) since 1936 there have been 2 million Palestinian deaths from Zionist violence (0.1 million) or Zionist-imposed deprivation (1.9 million ); (2) there are 7 million Palestinian refugees and all of the 12 million Palestinians are excluded from all or part of Palestine; (3) of 12 million Palestinians (half of them children), 6 million are forbidden to even step foot in their own country on pain of death, 4.7 million are highly abusively and violently held hostage with zero human rights under Israeli guns in the Gaza Concentration Camp (2.0 million) or in ever-dwindling West Bank Bantustan ghettoes (2.7 million), and 1.7 million live as Third Class citizens as Israeli Palestinians under Nazi-style Apartheid Israeli race laws; (4) 90% of Palestine has now been ethnically cleansed of Indigenous Palestinian inhabitants (this making a 2-State Solution impossible); (5) the huge disparity in annual GDP per capita between Occupied Palestinians ($2,800) and Israel-proper ($38,000) is reflected in huge differential avoidable mortality of over 4,000 avoidable deaths per year for Occupied Palestinians versus zero (0) for Israelis; (6) through imposed deprivation, each year Apartheid Israel passively murders about 2,700 under-5 year old Palestinian infants and passively murders about 4,200 Occupied Palestinians in general; (7) Apartheid Israel violently kills an average of about 500 Occupied Palestinians each year (3,900 Gaza Palestinian violently killed in 2008-2014 in response to 32 Israeli deaths from home-made Gaza rockets since 2004); and (8) Occupied Palestinians are deprived of essentially all human rights by Apartheid Israel, of which the most fundamental is the right to live unmolested in their own country…
Decent people around the world urge and apply comprehensive Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against genocidally racist Apartheid Israel and all its racist supporters” (Gideon Polya, “Australia welcomes genocidal racist and serial war criminal Netanyahu”, Countercurrents, 10 February 2017: http://www.countercurrents.org/2017/02/10/australia-welcomes-genocidal-racist-and-serial-war-criminal-netanyahu/ ) ..
Dr Gideon Polya in a letter sent to Australian MPs, Australian media and global Alternative media (26 October 2017):
Dear etc,
There are 3 racist Zionism- and Apartheid Israel-related centenaries this week, namely (1) the victorious 31 October 1917 charge of the Australian Light Horse at Beersheba that led to conquest of Palestine by Britain and a massive Palestinian Famine (100,000 deaths), (2) the nefarious and racist UK Balfour Declaration of 2 November 1917 that gave Palestine to the Zionists as a Jewish Homeland as an inducement for Zionists to help keep Russia in WW1, and (3) commencement from these 2 events of the Palestinian Genocide (2 million Palestinian deaths from violence, 0.1 million, or imposed deprivation, 1.9 million, since WW1, an exiled Palestinian Diaspora of 7 million, and gross human rights abuse of Apartheid Israel’s 7 million Palestinian subjects who are 50% of the population of Zionist-ruled Palestine but 74% of whom cannot vote for the government ruling them). US lackey, pro-Apartheid Australia is second only to pro-Apartheid Trump America as a supporter of Apartheid Israel (those supporting the former Nazi Germany are pro-Nazi and those supporting Apartheid Israel or the former Apartheid South Africa are pro-Apartheid).
Humanity must resolve to rigorously and comprehensively apply Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against Apartheid Israel and all those people, politicians, parties, companies, corporations and countries who support the genocidal Zionist enterprise. The racist Zionists and all their pro-Apartheid supporters must be sidelined from public life worldwide as have been like racists such as the Nazis, neo-Nazis, Apartheiders and Ku Klux Klan. The century-long, neo-Nazi and genocidal evil of Apartheid Israel and its ongoing Palestinian Genocide must be brought to an end immediately. The Zionist ethnic cleansing of 90% of Palestine means that the Two-State Solution is dead. The World must demand an end to race-based Apartheid Israel after the example of post-Apartheid South Africa and its replacement by a Unitary State in Palestine with return of all refugees, zero tolerance for racism, equal rights for all, all human rights for all, one-person-one-vote, justice, goodwill, reconciliation, airport-level security, nuclear weapons removal, internationally-guaranteed national security initially based on the present armed forces, and untrammelled access for all citizens to all of the Holy Land – see Gideon Polya, “100th Anniversary Of Australian Beersheba Charge, UK Balfour Declaration & Palestinian Genocide Commencement”, Countercurrents, 25 October 2017: http://www.countercurrents.org/2017/10/25/100th-anniversary-of-australian-beersheba-charge-uk-balfour-declaration-palestinian-genocide-commencement/ .
Yours sincerely, Dr Gideon Polya, Melbourne, Australia.
Editor: Professor Mazin Qumsiyeh is an eminent Palestinian scholar (Bethlehem University, Palestine Museum of Natural History, Bir Zeit University; see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazin_Qumsiyeh , https://www.bethlehem.edu/news/employees/mazin-qumsiyeh/ and http://qumsiyeh.org/aboutqumsiyeh/ ) and human rights activist. A dozen years ago he created an alphabetically-organized Honor List of people who support the cause of human rights for Palestinians ( http://qumsiyeh.org/honorlist/ ) - side-by-side under “P” were 2 Australians, my truth-telling, expatriate Australian hero, John Pilger, and, I am very honored to say, Gideon Polya.
Dr Gideon Polya update of the Palestinian Genocide (2019):
PALESTINIAN GENOCIDE UPDATE (2019)
2.2 million Palestinian have died from violence, 0.1 million, or from imposed deprivation, 2.1 million, since the British invasion of the Ottoman Empire in 1914 in WW1. The details are set out below in a 2019 update on the ongoing Palestinian Genocide [1].
In 1880 there were about 500,000 Arab Palestinians and about 25,000 Jews living in Palestine of whom half were immigrants [2, 3]. The genocidally racist British invaders and genocidally racist Zionist colonizers have been variously responsible for a Palestinian Genocide involving successive mass expulsions (800,000 in 1948 and 400,00 Arabs in 1967) , ethnic cleansing of 90% of the land of Palestine and an estimated 2.2 million Palestinian deaths since 1914 from violence (0.1 million) or from violently-imposed deprivation (2.1 million) [1, 4-7].
There are now 7 million Palestinian refugees, and of 14 million Palestinians (half of them children, three quarters women and children) about 50% are forbidden to even step foot in their own country on pain of death, only 1.9 million Palestinian Israelis are permitted to vote for the government ruling all of the former Mandated Palestine, and 5 million Palestinians have zero human rights [8] as Occupied Palestinians in West Bank ghettoes or Bantustans (3 million) or in the Gaza Concentration Camp (2.0 million). However the “lucky” Israeli Palestinians are Third Class citizens subject to over 60 Nazi-style, race-based laws [9, 10].
The land of Palestine has now been 90% ethnically cleansed [1, 4-7]. While Indigenous Palestinians represent 50% of Apartheid Israeli subjects, nearly three quarters cannot vote for the government ruling them - egregious Apartheid that is declared by the UN to be a crime against Humanity [11].
The human death toll in the Palestinian Genocide is set out below.
(1). Violent Palestinian deaths since 1920 add up to about 0.1 million [12].
(2). About 0.1 million Palestinians died in a WW1 Palestinian Famine associated with British-imposed war and as assessed from a marked demographic deficit of 0.1 million in WW1 (1914-1918) [2, 3].
(3) The Palestinian population was 689,000 in 1918 and 1,308,000 in 1946 for an average of 1,000,000. Assuming the same avoidable mortality in brutally British-occupied Palestine (famine, displacement of tenant farmers, violence, invasion and misrule by genocidal racists) as in pre-Independence, British-occupied India (an average of 30 avoidable deaths from deprivation per thousand of population per year, 1920-1947) [13], this yields 1,000 thousand x (30 avoidable deaths per thousand per year) x 30 years = 900,000 avoidable deaths in the period 1918-1948
(4). The total Palestinian population (inside and outside Palestine) was 2,250,000 in 1948 and 7,574,000 in 2000 for an average of 4,912,000. Generously applying the post-Independence Indian avoidable mortality rate in 2003 of 3.5 avoidable deaths per thousand of population per year [14] to Palestinians yields 4,912 thousand x (3.5 avoidable deaths per thousand per year) x 52 years = 894,000 Palestinian avoidable deaths from deprivation in the period 1948-2000.
(5) The per capita GDP for 5 million Occupied Palestinians is US$3,000 as compared to US$40,000 for Israelis [15]. Poverty kills, and for impoverished, high birth rate countries the avoidable deaths are 1.4 times the under-5 infant deaths [14]. In circa 2010 about 3,000 under-5 year old Palestinian infants died each year, this indicating that this century an average of 4,200 Occupied Palestinians died avoidably from deprivation each year, 12,000 Palestinians as a whole died thus each year, and 0.23 million died thus this century.
Thus one can estimate 900,000 + 894,000 + 230,000 = 2,024,000 Palestinian avoidable deaths from deprivation in the period 1918-2019, with a further 0.1 million dying in the WW1 Palestinian Famine and 0.1 million violent Palestinian deaths. Thus while only 4,000 Zionists were killed by Palestinians in the period 1920-2019 [16-20], since the British invasion of the Middle East in 1914 about 2.2 million Palestinians have died from violence, 0.1 million, or from imposed deprivation, 2.1 million.
The total number of violent and non-violent avoidable deaths from deprivation in the Palestinian Genocide (2.2 million) is of same order of magnitude as the number of victims of the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5-6 million killed by violence or imposed deprivation) [21-23].
[1]. “Palestinian Genocide”:
[2]. Justin McCarty, “Palestine population: during the Ottoman and British mandate period”, Palestine Remembered: 8 September 2001: http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story559.html .
[3]. “Historic population of Israel/Palestine”: http://palestineisraelpopulation.blogspot.com.au/ .
[4]. Gideon Polya, “70th anniversary of Apartheid Israel & commencement of large-scale Palestinian Genocide”, Countercurrents, 11 May 2018: https://countercurrents.org/2018/05/11/70th-anniversary-of-apartheid-israel-commencement-of-large-scale-palestinian-genocide/ .
[5]. Gideon Polya, “Apartheid Israel’s Palestinian Genocide & Australia’s Aboriginal Genocide compared”, Countercurrents, 20 February 2018: https://countercurrents.org/2018/02/20/apartheid-israels-palestinian-genocide-australias-aboriginal-genocide-compared/ .
[6]. Gideon Polya, “Israeli-Palestinian & Middle East conflict – from oil to climate genocide”, Countercurrents, 21 August 2017: https://countercurrents.org/2017/08/21/israeli-palestinian-middle-east-conflict-from-oil-to-climate-genocide/ .
[7]. Gideon Polya, “End 50 Years Of Genocidal Occupation & Human Rights Abuse By US-Backed Apartheid Israel”, Countercurrents, 9 June 2017: https://countercurrents.org/2017/06/09/end-50-years-of-genocidal-occupation-human-rights-abuse-by-us-backed-apartheid-israel/ .
[8]. Gideon Polya, “Universal Declaration of Human Rights & Palestinians. Apartheid Israel violates ALL Palestinian Human Rights”, Palestine Genocide Essays, 24 January 2009: https://sites.google.com/site/palestinegenocideessays/universal-declaration-of-human-rights-palestinians .
[9]. Susan Abulhawa, “Israel’s “nation-sate law” parallels the Nazi Nuremburg Laws”, Al Jazeera, 27 July 2018: https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/israel-nation-state-law-parallels-nazi-nuremberg-laws-180725084739536.html .
[10]. “Discriminatory laws in Israel:, Adalah, https://www.adalah.org/en/law/index?page=4 .
[11]. John Dugard, “International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the crime of Apartheid”, Audiovisual Library of International Law: http://untreaty.un.org/cod/avl/ha/cspca/cspca.html.
[12]. “Palestinian casualties of war”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_casualties_of_war .
[13]. Gideon Polya, “Economist Mahima Khanna, Cambridge Stevenson Prize And Dire Indian Poverty”, Countercurrents, 20 November, 2011: https://countercurrents.org/polya201111.htm .
[14]. Gideon Polya, “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950”, that includes a succinct history of every country and is now available for free perusal on the web: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ .
[15]. “List of countries by GDP (nominal) per capita”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita .
[16]. Gideon Polya, “Israelis kill ten times more Israelis in Apartheid than do terrorists”, Countercurrents, 1 March 2017: https://countercurrents.org/2017/03/israelis-kill-ten-times-more-israelis-in-apartheid-israel-than-do-terrorists .
[17]. Gideon Polya, “Sharpeville Massacre & Gaza Massacres compared – Boycott Apartheid Israel & all its supporters”, Countercurrents, 6 May 2018: https://countercurrents.org/2018/05/06/sharpeville-massacre-gaza-massacres-compared-boycott-apartheid-israel-all-its-supporters/ .
[18]. Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Terrorism deaths in Israel – 1920-1999”, 1 January 2000: http://mfa.gov.il/mfa/foreignpolicy/terrorism/palestinian/pages/terrorism%20deaths%20in%20israel%20-%201920-1999.aspx .
[19]. Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Victims of Palestinian violence and terrorism since September 2000” : http://mfa.gov.il/MFA/ForeignPolicy/Terrorism/Palestinian/Pages/Victims%20of%20Palestinian%20Violence%20and%20Terrorism%20sinc.aspx .
[20]. “Crime in Israel”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Israel .
[21]. Gideon Polya , “UK Zionist Historian Sir Martin Gilbert (1936-2015) Variously Ignored Or Minimized WW2 Bengali Holocaust”, Countercurrents, 19 February, 2015: https://countercurrents.org/polya190215.htm .
[22]. Martin Gilbert, “Jewish History Atlas” (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1969).
[23]. Martin Gilbert “Atlas of the Holocaust”(Michael Joseph, London, 1982).
Obnoxious Zionist smearing of Dr Gideon Polya in a succession of "Reports on anti-semitism in Australia" - you be the judge.
Antisemitism Report 2009, 1 October 2008 – 30 September 2009, pages 63-64 : https://wjc-org-website.s3.amazonaws.com/production/document/file/49/781a970bf9cafeaf4de310e62986fa8bc347f5b9.pdf .
QUOTE. “An individual of concern who maintains a blog, contributes to other blogs and has been published in the fringe left-wing press is Gideon Polya. In his ―MWC News‖ Polya claimed ―These sacred injunctions from the WW2 holocausts of of ―zero tolerance for racism‖, ―never again to anyone‖ and ―bear witness‖ are grossly violated by the anti-Arab anti-Semitic Zionist fanatics running Apartheid Israel and their genocidal, anti-Arab, anti-Semitic, war-mongering, Bush-ite, neo-Bush-ite and neo-con supporters (excess deaths in the 1990-2009 Bush Wars now total 9-11 million, mostly women and children; see ―9-11 Excuse for US Global Genocide. The real 9-11 atrocity: Millions (9-11 million) Dead in Bush Wars‖).‖ (12/11/08). In a letter in New Matilda, Gideon Polya wrote ―We are ALL Palestinian (see ―We are all Palestinian. Apartheid Israel‘s Gaza Concentration Camp & Palestinian Genocide‖ http://mwcnews.net/content/view/19915/42)and ALL decent people must adhere to the sacred messages from the Jewish Holocaust of ―Zero tolerance for racism‖, ―never again anyone‖ and ―bear witness‖. Yet in Australia we live under Zionist-promoted anti-Terrorism laws that potentially proscribe up to life imprisonment for a Muslim (or indeed anyone) who gives a donation to a direly deprived Gaza hospital –because the Lib-Labs view the overwhelmingly democratically-elected Hamas who control such hospitals in the Gaza Concentration Camp as ―terrorists‖ (see ―Australian Anti-Terrorism Act 2005‖: http://en.wikipedia.org/wik/AustralianAnti-Terrorism Act 2005).‖ (27/11/08).
On MWC News, Gideon Polya wrote ―Should the Israeli air force make rocket strikes on Tel Aviv apartments or suburbs in which Israeli-effected homicides occur? Yet such dispassionate analysis is resolutely IGNORED by the racist, anti-Arab anti-Semitic, Islamophobic, holocaust-ignoring Mainstream media of the Western Murdochracies who, at best, put the overwhelmingly democratically-elected Hamas administration of the Gaza Concentration Camp on the same moral footing as Apartheid Israel that polices its Gaza Concentration Camp using air force bombing employing state-of-the-art US aircraft and US bombs. Even the German Nazis in Nazi-occupied Europe (1939-1945; 30 million Slav, Jewish and Roma Dead) or the British during the Kenyan Holocaust (1952-1960; over 1 million Kenyan deaths) declined to police their concentration camps using tanks and aircraft. Even Apartheid South Africa (except for the police shootings in the Sharpeville Massacre) stopped short of this Israeli level of barbarity in administering its Bantustan Concentration Camps. Another way of seeing racist, genocidal Apartheid Israeli perfidy is by assessing population changes in Palestine since the racist, Zionist colonial invasion, occupation and genocide proposal got going in the late 19th century. Thus, according to a demographic analysis ―Population of Ottoman and Mandate Palestine‖, there were only about 25,000 Jews as compared to 450,000 Arabs in Palestine in 1880 and even by 1946 the Jews represented only 1/3 of the Mandate Palestine population‖. (29/12/08)….
Gideon Polya posted on article on ―Counter Currents.org‖ in which an attack on Winston Churchill became the pretext for attacking Zionism, including ―The fundamental messages from the Nazi German Jewish Holocaust ) (5-6 million dead, 1 in 6 dying from deprivation) and the contemporaneous but ―forgotten‖ (and when mentioned mostly ―excused‖) British Bengali Holocaust (6—7 million dead) are ―zero tolerance for racism‖, never again to anyone‖ and ―bear witness‖. Yet in the last few weeks, as of Day 23 the racist Zionists (RZs) running Apartheid Israel have killed 1,310 Gazan inmates of the Israeli Gaza Concentration Camp as reprisals for zero (0) Israelis killed by rockets from brutally and murderously blockaded Gaza in the previous year –a reprisals ―death ratio‖ of 1,310/0 = infinity. Occupied Palestinian violent and non-violent excess deaths since September 2000 total about 6,100 and 35,400, respectively, as compared to 1,185 Israeli deaths (see ―Palestinian-Israeli death ratios. Nazi-style Israeli Gaza war-crimes‖ on MWC News).UK, US, White Australian and Israeli state terrorism against the non-European and Muslim world will simply continue as long as the deadly consequences of these present and past imperialist excesses are simply ignored by Mainstream media, academics and politicians in the Western Murdochcracies. The REALITY behind this Zionist-Bush-ite ―terror hysteria‖ big lie is astounding: 7,000 Westerners killed by Muslim-origin non-state terrorists in 40 years (including Israelis and assuming, against substantial evidence to the contrary, no US or Israeli involvement in the 9/11 atrocity) versus 9-11 million violent and non-violent avoidable deaths associated so far with the Bush Wars, 1990-2009.‖ (23/1/09).Gideon Polya on ―Countercurrents.org‖ wrote ―The Gaza Strip is a self-governing Apartheid Israeli Concentration Camp ruled by the Hamas Government which won 76 out of 132 seats in the Occupied Palestinian Parliamentary elections held under Israeli guns in 2006. The Israelis responded by killing or arresting as many Hamas MPs as they could find , the remainder fleeing to Gaza. In 2006, and then again in 2008-2009, the Apartheid Israelis devastated what the Catholic Church describes as the Gaza Concentration Camp. In the 2008-2009 Gaza Massacre Apartheid Israel killed 1,400 Gazans (40% of them children) and severely wounded 5,450 (60% of them children) in reprisals for zero (0) Israeli deaths from Gaza missiles in the preceding year.‖ in an article based on ―Now a team of pro-war, pro-coal, pro-Zionist, right-wing Apartheid Australian politicians from both major political parties and led by Australian Deputy PM Julia Gillard, is visiting Apartheid Israel with attendant expressions of ―mutual admiration‖ between Apartheid Australia and Apartheid Israel . .‖ (29/6/09).Using fabricated statistics, Gideon Polya claimed that Australia is ―complicit‖ in ―genocides‖ worse than Nazism, including ―Palestinian Genocide‖. (Green Left Weekly 29/8/09)”. END QUOTE.
Antisemitism Report 2010, 1 October 2009 – 30 September 2010, pages 36, 58-61: https://www.ecaj.org.au/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2010-ECAJ-Antisemitism-Report.pdf .
QUOTE: “* In response to a general news article about education funding in The Sydney Morning Herald On-line (31/3/10) Gideon Polya claimed ―the new History curriculum, that Labor wants to foist on all Australian children includes the egregious Zionist untruth that there was only one holocaust is WW2 . . .‖ [page 36]
Green Left Weekly(31/3/10) published a letter by Gideon Polya which concluded ―Nevertheless a ruthless, criminal, anti-Arab anti-Semitic and anti-Jewish and anti-Semitic racist Zionism has come to have a dominant and malignant influence in Australia. A detailed and documented analysis of 50 areas of racist Zionist and Israeli state terrorism threats to Australians (and indeed the World) is being disseminated in the national interest to Australian law officers, MPs, citizens and media. Dr. Gideon Polya –Macleod, Victoria.‖ [page 58]
An individual who is prolific in his intellectually offensive outpourings, maintaining a blog, contributing to other blogs and publishing in the fringe left-wing press is Gideon Polya. For example:* Green Left Weekly published a letter from Gideon Polya which included ―If those helping several thousand desperate refugees find haven in Australia are ―scum‖, how then do you describe the genocidal racist Zionists, pro-Zionists, warmongers, war criminals and war-makers of the US alliance (including Australia)who created the estimated 18-20 million Muslim refugees in the first place?‖ (18/11/09). * On CounterCurrents, Gideon Polya wrote ―Unfortunately the racist Zionists (RZs) (who were complicit in the Jewish Holocaust by collaboration with the Nazis, opposing placement of Jewish refugees anywhere but Palestine and persuading Churchill to oppose the Joel Brand scheme to save 0.7 million Hungarian Jews) have appropriated the term Holocaust to mean only the WW2 Jewish Holocaust to the exclusion of all other holocausts(see the testimony of outstanding humanitarian Jews Joel Brand: http://sites.google.com/site/jewsagainstracistzionism/brand-joel-exposing-zionist-complicity-in-nazi-mass-murder-of-hungarian-jews and Lenny Brenner: http://sites.google.com/site/jewsagainstracistzionism/brenner-lenni-exposing-zionist-collaboration-and-complicity-with-the-nazis)‖ and ―The horrible reality in today‟s world is an ongoing Muslim Holocaust and Muslim Genocide that is remorselessly ignored by academics, journalists, politicians and media in the lying, holocaust complicit, holocaust ignoring, genocide complicit, genocide ignoring, Zionist-beholden neocon-beholden, US imperialism-beholden Western Murdochtracies. The parts of this ongoing Muslim Holocaust and Muslim Genocide are summarized below. Palestinian Holocaust, Palestinian Genocide (0.3 million post-invasion violent and non-violent excess deaths. 0.2 million post/invasion under-5 infant deaths, 7 million refugees): http://sites.google.com/site/palestinian genocide/.‖ (6/3/10). * In an article purportedly on the Armenian Genocide, Gideon Polya in MWC blamed ―Zionists‖ for WWI, writing ―One wonders whether a kind of racist hubris persuaded the British to launch an attack on the Ottoman Empire at its very core while knowing that the well-armed and well-trained Turks would fight ferociously to defend the Turkish Homeland. Pro-Zionist warmonger Churchill had a contempt for the non-European and Muslim Subjects of the British Empire and was the architect of the disastrous Gallipoli adventure that killed 131,000 (87,000 Ottoman and 44,000 Allied soldiers, including 8,700 Australians and 2,700 New Zealanders) and wounded 262,000 (including 165,000 Ottoman and 97,000 Allied soldiers, including 19,400 Australians and 4,800 New Zealanders). Explanations for the Allied war against Turkey in general lie in the Middle East oil resources (oil was discovered in Iran in 1909), and the seizure of the Middle East in a final carve-up of the world by Western European colonial powers. The Allied seizure of Palestine was quickly followed by the 1917 Balfour Declaration of the racist Zionist dream of a Jewish Homeland that nevertheless provided that there should be no detriment to either Jews or indigenous Palestinians. In the event 5-6 million Jews perished in the racist Zionist-complicit Jewish Holocaust and indigenous Palestinians hae been deprived of the land that was their Homeland for thousands of years(see Shlomo Sand, ―The Invention of the Jewish People‖, Verso, London, 2009). In 2010 there are 7 million Palestinian refugees, most forbidden to even set foot in their Homeland; 4 million Occupied Palestinians are abusively imprisoned in their own Land, completely deprived of Human Rights and with 1.5 incarcerated in the Gaza Concentration Camp; and 1.5 ―lucky‖ Arab Israelis live as second class citizens subject to numerous egregious violations of Human Rights by racist Zionist-run Apartheid Israel. However the corereason for the issuance of the Balfour Declaration according to pro-Zionist British historian Professor Sir Martin Gilbert (a pro-Zionist and pro-Iraq War member of the current Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War) was to get Russian Zionists to try to keep Russia in the First World War (see Martin Gilbert‘s monumental ―First World War‖, p373).‖ (26/4/10).
* Gideon Polya in CounterCurrents.org wrote ―Thus Apartheid Australia firmly supports Apartheid Israel.Apartheid Australia supported Apartheid Israelwhen it was bombing 25,000 Australian citizens in Lebanon in 2006, and when it was massacring 1,400 Gazans in 2008-2009 in retaliation for zero Israeli deaths from Gaza rockets in 2008. Apartheid Australia refused to support the UN Declaration on Indigenous Rights (a decision recently reversed by the spin-driven Apartheid Labor Government); declared Hamas, democratically elected in 2006 with an overwhelming 76 out of 132 seats majority, to be ―terrorists‖; and withdrew from the UN Anti-racism Conference because it feared that Apartheid Israel –the world‘s only surviving race-based Apartheid state –would come in for criticism. Apartheid Australia makes donations towards the Palestinian Genocide tax deductible –whereas donations to hospitals or orphanages in Israeli-blockaded Gaza potentially attract life imprisonment under Apartheid Australia‘s Arab-, Asian-, African-and Muslim-directed Anti-Terrorism Laws (see ―Anti-terrorism Act 2005‖: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Terrorism_Act_2005).. (11/4/10). * Gideon Polya‘s take on the change in leadership in Australia in Countercurrents.org: ―In the event, pro-Zionist Kevin Rudd was clearly found to be insufficiently pro-Zionist. Several weeks later he was ignominiously removed from power. Pro-war, pro-Zionist, pro-Israel Julia Gillard‟s elevation was very warmly welcomed by major Zionist organizations (see:http://www.jwire.com.au/news/congratulations-to-julia-gillard-from-organizations (see: http://www.jwire.com.au/news/congratulations-to-julia-gillard-from-aijac/10039#more-10039).‖ (27/6/10). * Gideon Polya on CounterCurrents wrote ―Culpability. The ongoing Palestinian Genocide is effected by the race-based, nuclear terrorist, anti-Arab, anti-Semitic, colonial state of Israelwith US, UK, EU, New Zealand, Canadian and Australian complicity through support that is variouslyfinancial, military, diplomatic and/or legislative. Thus the US is a major provider of military aid to Israel and its Security Council veto and support for Israel means that Israel can defy all UN Resolutions with impunity. At the other extreme, Australia has declared Hamas to be a terrorist organisation (noting that Hamas won 76 out of 132 seats in the 2006 Occupied Palestinian Territory elections with the US-and Israel-backed Fatah winning 43), permits free passage to Israeli war criminals, makes Muslim religious zakkat alms-giving obligations to Gaza potentially criminal, and has made financial donations towards the ongoing Palestinian Genocide tax deductible.‖ 9/1/10). END QUOTE
“2012 Report on antisemitism in Australia”: https://www.ecaj.org.au/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2012-ECAJ-Antisemitism-Report.pdf ; pages 73-74.
QUOTE. “Another self-identified Jewish Australian, Gideon Polya, was very active in posting material of the following type
.·On "the Conversation", in response to an article on "the politics of diaspora", Gideon Polya wrote "There is a huge difference between the Jewish Diaspora in Australia and other Diasporas. The Zionist Lobby, which has substantial Jewish support in Australia, has secured the near-total support of the Coalition and Labor (there are a few decent, anti-racist Labor MPs who, like the Greens, are opposed to the ongoing Palestinian Genocide and gross human rights abuses by US-, UK-and EU-supported Apartheid Israel)." (5/2/12).
·Gideon Polya wrote in New Matilda (23/6/12) “The 1950-2005 avoidable deaths from deprivation total 82 million in countries occupied by the US in the post-1945 era, 38 million for Asian countries invaded by the US since 1950 and total 12 million for Muslims killed in the post-1990 Zionist-backed IS war on Muslims . . . the yellow, Neocon American and Zionist (NAZI)-beholden Australian Labor Government has INVITED 2,500 cowardly,74yellow, mother-violating, child-killing US storm troopers to occupy our country, and to be above Australia law when they rape our men, women and children, run over cyclists etc.”
·On New Matilda’s website, Gideon Polya posted “Race-based Apartheid Israel is a democracy-by-genocide and no more a democracy than race-based Apartheid South Africa. . . Even Syria under the brutal Assad dictatorship is more democratic than democracy-by-genocide Apartheid Israel because the Assad regime evidently has the support of about 50% of Syrians and has the merit of being an Indigenous Syrian government rather than being a government of racist, genocidal, neo-fascist colonisers.” and “The support of the Lib-Labs (Liberal-Labourals) for race-based, genocidally racist and anti-democratic, democracy-by-genocide Apartheid Israel means that they (with a couple of notable exceptions) are unfit to be candidates in democratic elections in Australia.” (1/9/12).
·Gideon Polya on Countercurrents.org (28/12/11) wrote “Thus in 2010 the then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who had been elected with a huge majority in 2007, was deposed in a pro-Zionist-led overnight Coup. The impetus for PM Rudd’s demise came from a $23 million Mining Industry campaign against his proposed Mining Tax but the people who did the dirty work of deposing a democratically-elected Australian Prime Minister were mostly members of the extreme pro-Zionist faction of the Australian Labor Party (the ALP, aka the Apartheid Labor Party and the Apartheid Israel-supporting Labor Party)” “The failure of the ABC to report the “Petition Against the Right of Return to Israel on Behalf of Australian Jews” signed by outstanding anti-racist Australian Jewish intellectuals is a further instance of lying by omission by the Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI)-beholden ABC. .. and of its entrenched anti-Arab anti-Semitism and inherent anti-Jewish anti-Semitism that threatens Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims and decent, anti-racist Jews.”
·On mwcnews.net (25/5/12), Gideon Polya wrote “Only a dozen of my wider family survived the racist Zionist-complicit Jewish Holocaust in Hungary in 1944-1945 –the racist Zionists collaborated with the Nazis before and during the war and got Churchill to veto the Joel Brand plan to save 0.7 million Hungarian Jews. I am absolutely obliged to oppose any racism and also obliged to endorse the words of outstanding Jewish Canadian writer Naomi Klein “There is a debate among Jews –I’m a Jew by the way. The debate boils down to the question: “Never again to everyone, or never again to us” (Some Jews) even think we get one get-away-with-genocide-free card...There is another strain in the Jewish tradition that say(s), ‘Never again to anyone’” (see Yotam Feldman, “Naomi Klein: oppose the state not the people”, Haaretz, 2 July 2007).”
·On Australians for Palestine (27/5/12) Gideon Polya wrote “However, lying, defamation, intimidation, censorship and traitorously subversive corruption (including the use of the proceeds of crime) mean that the racist Zionist agenda is dominant in Australian public life, and most disgracefully so in the transiently anti-racist Australian Labor Party which has now become an unprincipled and terminally disreputable Apartheid Labor Party and an Apartheid Israel-supporting Labor Party that has utterly betrayed decent, anti-racist, pro-equity and pro-environment Labor voters.” . . . Decent, anti-racist Australians must finally find the courage to speak out in the national interest against not only the racism, terrorism and genocide of nuclear terrorist Apartheid Israel but also against the sheer folly of investing Australian superannuation funds in a ruthless rogue state based on theft and mendacity.”” END QUOTE
Gideon Polya quoted in section 9, Online media in “Report on antisemitism in Australia, November 2011”, 6 November 2011: https://aijac.org.au/resource/report-on-antisemitism-in-australia-november-201/ :
“Gideon Polya posted an article “Pro-Zionist Australian Holocaust Denial”, which was based on the argument “The first World War 2 atrocity to be described as a “holocaust” (by N.G. Jog in his 1944 book “Churchill’s Blindspot: India”) was the “forgotten” man-made Bengali Holocaust in which 6-7 million Indians were deliberately starved to death by the British under Winston Churchill. This atrocity has been white-washed out of British history by Churchill himself and by several generations of cowardly, lying, and holocaust ignoring English-speaking politicians, academics, journalists and editors. In contrast, everyone is aware of the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5-6 million dead, 1 in 6 dying from deprivation) but due to Zionist perversion of our culture few are aware that the Jewish Holocaust was part of a wider WW2 Holocaust in which 30 million Slavs, Jews and Gypsies died because they were all regarded as untermenschen (sub-humans) by the Nazis just as the British until recently regarded Indians and indeed all non-Europeans as untermenschen. The Zionists in their lying, murderous, ends-justify-the-means prosecution of the ongoing Palestinian Genocide have been the World’s worst anti-Semites and holocaust deniers for a century.” (MWC News, 9/6/11).”
Report on anti-semitism in Australia 2015 – 1 October 2014 - 30 September 2015 : https://www.ecaj.org.au/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/ECAJ-Antisemitism-Report-2015.pdf .
QUOTES: “Gideon Polya: The worm is turning [...] While the Zionist-subverted Coalition and Labor Rights [...] US Government’s Zionist-complicit 9-11 false-flag atrocity. The Australian “terror hysteria” response to Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI) propaganda [...] The ugly reality that even the Zionist-subverted Yellow Press of White Australia cannot hide is of Israeli and dual citizen Australian-Israeli […]” [p62].
Dr Gideon Polya This is what the cowardly, dirty, racist and traitorous ALP is backing in its blind support for neo-Nazi Apartheid Israel: [...] A substantially Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI) –perverted and subverted ALP dances to the tune of traitorous and genocidally racist Zionists with a prime loyalty to a nuclear terrorist, genocidally racist, democracy-by-genocide Apartheid Israel. [...] [p97]
Dr Gideon Polya There have been about 20 schemes for Jewish colonization of other countries and there was considerable support for race-based Jewish colonization of the Kimberley. After it had been finally subdued by genocidal White Australians.. Fortunately for us John Curtin vetoed this plan in 1944 on Australia Intelligence advice [...] if Curtin had not vetoed the plan for race-based Jewish settlement of NW Australia then [...] what White Australians could have suffered in a Nazi-style Apartheid Australia if treated the same way as the Palestinians by the racist Zionists: [ ...]1. 90% of Australia ethnically cleansed of Australians 2. 12 million Australians forbidden to step foot anywhere in Australia on pain of being shot (although Jews from around the world could get citizenship of an Apartheid Australia) .[p97]
Dr Gideon Polya The genocidally racist Zionists have falsely mal-appropriated the Jewish Holocaust to the extent that the term “The Holocaust” is now generally but falsely synonymous with the Jewish Holocaust to the exclusion of the 25 million non-Jewish Slavs, Gypsies and others who also died in the WW2 European Holocaust as a result of Nazi German imperialism [p98]
Dr Gideon Polya Zionist-beholden Sydney University is skating on thin ice in its serious threats against free speech and the right –indeed duty –of decent students and of decent staff like Professor Jake Lynch to peacefully protest and “bear witness: against the horrendous crimes of nuclear terrorist, serial war criminal, genocidally racist, democracy-by-genocide, racist Zionist -run Apartheid Israel and its ongoing Palestinian Genocide [...] Sydney University is one of a number of Zionist-subverted and perverted Australian universities that have military research links with the race-based, racist, genocidal, nuclear terrorist rogue state of Apartheid Israel [...] [p99]” END QUOTES.
Natalie Portman (anti-racist Jewish Israeli-American actress) on Apartheid Israel’s racist nation-state law (2018): "The Nation-State law is racist. It is a mistake and I don't agree with it ... [people's] lives are [being] affected on a personal level by decisions made by politicians. I only hope that we will be able to truly love our neighbours and that we can work together” (“Natalie Portman slams Israel’s “racist” nation-state law”, Al Jazeera, 13 December 2018: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/12/natalie-portman-slams-israel-racist-nation-state-law-181213080811163.html ).
Vivienne Porzsolt is an anti-racist Jewish Australian human rights and peace activist. According to “Overland”: “Vivienne Porzsolt is a secular Jew, the daughter of refugees from Nazism and grew up in New Zealand. She has been active for many years for a just resolution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and is spokesperson for Jews against the Occupation Sydney. She took part in the Gaza freedom March December 2009/January 2010 and hopes to sail on the next flotilla to seek to break the illegal blockade of Gaza.” (see: http://overland.org.au/blogs/author/vivienne-porzsolt/ ).
Vivienne Porzsolt on Zionist violation of the humanist Jewish tradition (2012): “I have always been disgusted by the bystander to inhuman acts, even more than by the perpetrator who must be accountable for what he or she does… I mourn the occlusion of the rich progressive humanist Jewish traditions which were so strong among Jews before the Nazi Holocaust. These have been virtually banished by the shrill adherence to Zionism and preoccupation with Israel as the heart of Jewish identity. This preoccupation has drained Jewish worldwide of feeling, of humanity, of hope for a better world. It has been replaced by fear, by aggression and harsh ethnocentricity – a shocking and ironic posthumous victory for Hitler. Yet progressive humanism has not disappeared , and already we see signs of a rebirth of that spirit… I draw strength from my deep hope and belief in the possibility of a better future for both Palestinians and Israelis , where the past can be acknowledged and, where possible, remedied or compensated for, where reconciliation can occur on the basis of international law, justice and mutual respect and where the two peoples can flourish side by side.” [1, 2].
Vivienne Porzsolt (of Jews against the Occupation which organised an Open Letter signed by 164 anti-racist Jewish Australian protesting the mass killing in Gaza by Israel; see “An appeal from Australian Jews to the Australian Jewish community: “We cannot remain silent””, Green Left Weekly, 15 August 2014: https://www.greenleft.org.au/node/57093 ): “Silence is consent and as Jews, we must oppose atrocities taken in our name. Our public stand demonstrates that many Jews reject the brutal occupation of the Palestinians by Israel. The outrage that all people of humanity feel at the conduct of the State of Israel against the Palestinians can too easily be directed to Jews in general. As we have seen with the ugly cartoon by Le Lievre and the antisemitic attack on the Jewish children on a Bondi bus, old antisemitic tropes re-emerge, fuelled by the atrocities committed by Israel. No racism, including anti-Semitism, is ever excusable. However, the Jewish community leadership promotes the identification of Jews with Israel and all its actions. They label Jewish critics of Israel as ‘self-hating’ and ‘not real Jews’. They debase the charge of anti-Semitism by applying it to all criticism of Israel. It is not surprising then that some may hold Jews in general responsible for Israel's actions.” [3].
[1]. Vivienne Porzsolt, “A secular Jew from the end of the earth” in “Beyond Tribal Loyalties. Personal Stories of Jewish Peace Activists”, edited by Avigail Abarbanel (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012) (pp 50, 53-54).
[2]. Vivienne Porzsolt quoted in Gideon Polya, “Book Review: “Beyond Tribal Loyalties”. Stories of anti-racist Jews”, MWC News, 18 January 2012: http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/24184-gideonpolya-beyond-tribal-loyalties.html .
[3]. Vivienne Porzsolt, quoted in “An appeal from Australian Jews to the Australian Jewish community: “We cannot remain silent””, Green Left Weekly, 15 August 2014: https://www.greenleft.org.au/node/57093 .
Progressive German rabbis’ opposition to Zionism as summarized by Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok (2010): “After Herzl issued his summons to the First Zionist Congress [1897, Basle, Switzerland], the Progressive German rabbis made a statement declaring that the Jewish faith obligated all Jews to serve the countries in which they live” (Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok, “Judaism: A Beginner’s Guide”, Oneworld, 2010).
Sefi Rachlevsky (anti-racist Jewish Israeli columnist in the Israeli daily Haaretz) on “anti-democratic racism” i.e. Nazi-style Apartheid and genocide (2011): “If there is one country in the world that should have heeded the commandment 'Thou shall not fall into the chasm of anti-democratic racism,' it is Israel. The traumas of World War II of the horrors that racism and hatred wreaked on democracy, along with the fact that Israel sits on the seam of the Islamic world, should have kept it away from that path. But the regime threatens to turn Israel into a rising anti-democratic power after all… The fact that Jews were the ultimate victim of the anti-democratic and racist world has led many of them to embrace precisely that world. However, Israelis should not defend the country's uniqueness but rather defend their identity and their lives. If the regime that encourages incitement, racism and anti-democracy is not toppled soon, we will find that the future is already here” (Sefi Rachlevsky, “The anti-democratic racism of Israel must end”, Haaretz, 23 March 2011: http://www.haaretz.com/the-anti-democratic-racism-of-israel-must-end-1.351247 ).
[Editor: As exampled by genocide-based, democracy-by-genocide Apartheid Israel’s ongoing Palestinian Genocide, the ultimate in racism and Apartheid is genocide and ethnic cleansing] .
Reform Jews’ opposition to Zionism as summarized by Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok (2010): Opposition to Zionism came from the two extreme wings of the religious spectrum [Reform and Orthodox]. On the one hand, the nineteenth-century Reformers saw assimilation, not the creation of a Jewish homeland, as the solution to anti-Semitism. Reform Jews had consistently stressed the universal message of Judaism [obey God’s ethical laws and He will look after you]. They understood the Jewish heritage as a call to ethical monotheism. In the words of the biblical prophet Micah, the Jew was to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God (6:8). The mission of Judaism was to bring the knowledge of the One God and His ethical will to the nations of the world. They were uneasy with the particularistic elements of the tradition and they had already abandoned prayers for the restoration of the sacrificial system in the Temple in Jerusalem.
After Herzl issued his summons to the First Zionist Congress [1897, Basel, Switzerland], the Progressive German rabbis made a statement declaring that the Jewish faith obligated all Jews to serve the countries in which they live. The American Reformers were even more downright. Isaac Mayer Wise (1819-1900) , the first president of the American Reform rabbinical college declared: “We denounce the whole question of the Jewish State as foreign to the spirit of the modern Jew of this land, who looks upon America as his Palestine and whose interests are centred here.” These early Reformers believed that the salvation of the Jews lay not in the return to the Promised Land, but in the emergence of a liberal, educated and pluralistic society”
Many members of the American Reform Movement persisted in their opposition to Zionism right up until World War II. As late as 1942, a number of American anti-Zionists gathered together to formulate a program of action. This body asserted that the political aspirations of the Zionists were contrary to the universalistic spirit of Judaism and that Zionism threatened Jewry in that it called into question the loyalty of the Jews to the countries in which they lived. Even after World War II, the American reform liturgy for the Passover meal ended not with “Next Year in Jerusalem”, but with “God Bless America!”
Reform Jews therefore objected to Zionism because it undermined Jewish allegiance to host nations and because it emphasized the ethnic, nationalistic spirit of Judaism (Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok, “Judaism: A Beginner’s Guide”, Oneworld, 2010).
The late Professor Tanya Reinhart (1943-2007 ) was Emeritus Professor of Linguistics and Media Studies at Tel-Aviv University and Professor of Linguistics at the University of Utrecht in The Netherlands. She was an outspoken critic of Israel's oppression of the Palestinians. She wrote for Israel's biggest daily, Yediot Aharonot, and is also the author of Israel/Palestine: How to End the War of 1948 and the follow-up TheRoad Map to Nowhere - Israel/Palestine since 2003. In 2007 she became Global Distinguished Professor at New York University (for biographical details see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanya_Reinhart ).
Professor Tanya Reinhart, interviewed about her book “Israel/Palestine: How To End the War of 1948"
(Seven Stories Press/ Open Media Series 2002): “In the present political atmosphere in the US and Europe, anybody who dares express criticism of Israel is immediately silenced as an anti-Semite. Part of the reason why the Israeli and Jewish lobby has been so successful in forcing this accusation is the massive lack of knowledge about what is really happening. Without the facts, the dominant narrative remains that Israel is struggling to defend its mere existence. Attention focuses only on the horrible and despicable Palestinian terror, so that if you criticize Israel, you are accused of justifying terror. My hope, then, is to give the readers the weapons to face such accusations a detailed knowledge of the facts.
My second hope is to restore hope. As I said, a sane and rational solution is still possible. People have managed in the past to move from a history of bloodshed into peaceful coexistence, Europe is being the most well known example. After two years of horror, a majority in both the Israeli and Palestinian people is still willing to open a new page. I show this in detail in the book, and I end the book with the story of the many Palestinian and Israeli activists who are struggling together for the only future worth living a future based on basic human values. What is needed to give hope a chance is for the people of the world to intervene and stop the Israeli military Junta, which does not even represent the Israeli majority.
Finally, and perhaps most important, I try to give some picture of the Palestinian tragedy the best I can from my privileged position as a member of the oppressing society. With the U.S. backing, and the silence of the Western world, there is a serious danger that what we have seen so far is only the beginning, and that under the umbrella of a war in Iraq, the Palestinian people may be destined to a choice between annihilation or a second exile. Arundhati Roy's description of the situation in Afghanistan at the time seems so painfully applicable to what the Palestinians are enduring: "Witness the infinite justice of the new century. Civilians starving to death while they are waiting to be killed." [1].
In a lecture titled "Open Air Prisons: The Israeli occupation of Palestine", Professor Reinhart explored the effects of Israel's policies on Palestine: “[Israeli policies] threaten not just the Palestinians and its Arab neighbours, but also the Israelis themselves. In the long run, this war over land is suicidal." [2].
[1]. ZNet interview with Tany Reinhart, 8 November 2002: http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/11426 .
[2]. "Controversial author and academic Tanya Reinhart to speak at Sydney Ideas", The University of Sydney, 26 September 2006: http://www.usyd.edu.au/news/84.html?newsstoryid=1333 .
Stephen Robert in his own words: “I grew up in a small town in Massachusetts where my parents headed our local synagogue, Hadassah and the United Jewish Appeal. My first trip abroad after university, in 1962, included a week-long visit to Israel… I’ve been a contributor and fundraiser for the UJA-Federation of New York, a governor of the American Jewish Committee, which is dedicated to fighting anti-Semitism, and a founding director of the Museum of Jewish Heritage—A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. I’ve made five additional visits to Israel since 1962, the last this summer as part of a humanitarian aid trip to East Jerusalem and the West Bank. As a Jew who has been an ardent supporter of Israel since its independence, it pains me to record what I saw there… An investment banker much of my adult life” (see: http://www.thenation.com/article/162756/apartheid-steroids ).
Stephen Robert on Israeli Apartheid and gross human rights abuse (2014): “What I witnessed in the West Bank—home to about 2.5 million Palestinians and 400,000 Israeli settlers—exceeded my worst expectations. While the world’s statesmen have dithered, Israel has created a system of apartheid on steroids, a horrifying prison with concrete walls as high as twenty-six feet, topped with body-ravaging coils of razor wire. Spaced along these walls are imposing guard towers that harbor bunkers from which trespassers can be shot by Israeli soldiers. From this physical segregation—one land for Israelis; another, unequal land for Palestinians—flows a torrent of misery, violence and human rights abuses. The West Bank suffers from acute shortages of water, housing, jobs and healthcare. Palestinian children are separated from their parents, denied access to hospitals and stoned and beaten by Jewish settlers. Human rights sanctioned by international law, including the right to health, the prohibition on transferring populations into occupied territories and equal treatment before the law are routinely violated. David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister, once said that Israel will be judged by how it treats the Arabs. This is a moral test Israel now resoundingly fails—a failure that threatens to undermine all of its accomplishments and, as is increasingly clear, its future… With respect to fairness, the Israelis have done very well. Before the 1947 partition, the Jewish community owned only 6 percent of the land and comprised 35 percent of the population. The UN partition awarded them 55 percent of the land. The Palestinians, who had owned 94 percent of the land, were awarded 45 percent in the partition; Jerusalem was to be put under international supervision. After the 1948 war, however, the armistice line allocated Israel 78 percent of the land. Now many in the international community are advocating a return to those borders (with some land swaps) as a pillar of a peace agreement. Israel should be rejoicing under these terms, since they would receive 78 percent of the land available in 1947. An investment banker much of my adult life, I’d take this deal in a heartbeat.” [1].
[1]. Stephen Robert, “Apartheid on steroids”, The Nation, 12 August 2011: http://www.thenation.com/article/162756/apartheid-steroids .
Professor William Robinson is an eminent professor of professor of sociology at the University of California, Santa Barbara (USCB) where he researches political economy, globalization, Latin America and historical materialism. He is a member of the International Parliamentary and Civil Society Mission to Investigate the Political Transition in Iraq. Following 2 students’ complaints about teaching material entitled “Parallel images of Nazis and Israelis” (comparing the Israeli siege of Gaza with the Nazi siege of the Warsaw Ghetto) he was charged by the University of California , Santa Barbara – charges were dismissed in May 2009. The Committee to Defend Academic Freedom at USCB (see below) has defended Professor Robinson's defense calling the allegations “flagrant and baseless affronts to academic freedom … [which] have been brought in order to silence any criticism of Israeli policies and practices." (see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_I._Robinson ).
The Committee to Defend Academic Freedom at UCSB (CDAF-SB): “The Committee to Defend Academic Freedom at UCSB (CDAF-SB) strongly opposes the flagrant and baseless affronts to academic freedom on this campus and to Professor Robinson in particular. We believe these allegations have been brought in order to silence any criticism of Israeli policies and practices. Furthermore, we consider the umbrage against Professor Robinson to have been fomented by non-university forces that have infiltrated the academic setting to wage a war of political repression. We find this non-academic infiltration to be an unacceptable attack on the scholarly exchange of ideas that is the most compelling interest of the university.
Accordingly, we demand the immediate dismissal of all of the charges against Professor Robinson as frivolous, unfounded, and malicious. Any further consideration of these baseless attacks is unacceptable. As a coordinated group of undergraduate and graduate students, we will not accept any resolution of this matter that is unfavorable to Professor Robinson and academic freedom.
CDAF-UCSB also insists that the attack on Professor Robinson’s academic freedom, one that ominously recalls similar campaigns against other critical academics across the nation, be publicly condemned. This condemnation is essential to preserve full and fair discussion within the most important of the U.S.’s civic institutions. Any genuine consideration of these absurd attacks will have a severe chilling effect on the production and dissemination of scholarly research in all disciplines. Further, the attacks must be condemned to protect faculty and students from wasting valuable time and energy defending themselves against frivolous allegations and political repression.
In fact, a critique of the Israeli state, its policies, and the leaders responsible is not and should not be considered an affront to Jewish people as a collective, the Jewish religion, or Jewish heritage. Conflating the state of Israel with the Jewish people essentializes the assorted political opinions of a diverse religious group by reducing them to the set of policies espoused by the prevailing regime. The charge of anti-Semitism is made in bad faith; its real purpose is to automatically vilify and stifle any honest critiques of the state of Israel’s policies and practices.
In sum, these attacks must be firmly repelled in order to preserve the fundamental, free speech right to dissent, to protect academic freedom that enables scholars to produce new knowledge, and to promote the free exchange of ideas in fulfillment of the university’s purpose to educate.” (see: http://sb4af.wordpress.com/robinson-case/charges-responses/cdaf-ucsb-response/ ; for other opinions see Israeli YNet “Jewish prof. equates Israel with Nazis”: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3708479,00.html ).
Professor William Robinson (in response to Official Charges by the Charges Officer of the University of California , Santa Barbara), 2009: “I asked you on 3 April to produce a charges sheet for the basis of your decision to constitute an ad hoc committee investigation and you responded with a “summary of the allegations.” I find your charges sheet ludicrous, at best, if not a dereliction of your responsibilities as Charges Officer, including your responsibility to uphold academic freedom … Remarkably, your charges sheet says absolutely nothing about anti-Semitism. Yet this is the crux of the students’ complaints – that the course material I introduced was anti-Semitic. In my correspondence with you and in correspondence of several of my colleagues with you on this matter you have been asked what, if anything, you found anti-Semitic about the course material in question. You have chosen not to reply. Why? If anti-Semitism is the core of the students’ complaint is it not incumbent on you to inspect the course material and indicate in the charges sheet what you found may constitute anti-Semitism? Moreover, as I have pointed out in previous correspondence with you, the students’ letters are explicit in charging me with anti-Semitism for no other reason than because the course material in question is critical of the policies of the Israeli state ...” [1].
Hilary Rose is a feminist sociologist of science and emerita professor at Bradford University, UK. She is married to neuroscientist Steven Rose, emeritus professor of neuroscience at the Open University. They recently co-authored Genes, Cells and Brains: the Promethean promises of the new biology, and were among the co-founders of BRICUP, the British Committee for the Universities of Palestine (see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/political-science/2013/may/13/stephen-hawking-boycott-israel-science ). .
Hilary Rose and Steven Rose on brilliant UK physicist Stephen Hawking’s boycott of Apartheid Israel (2013): “That the world's most famous scientist had recognised the justice of the Palestinian cause is potentially a turning point for the BDS campaign. And that his stand was approved by a majority of two to one in the Guardian poll that followed his announcement shows just how far public opinion has turned against Israel's relentless land-grabbing and oppression. Hawking's public refusal follows that of prominent singers, artists and writers, from Brian Eno to Mike Leigh, Alice Walker and Adrienne Rich, all of whom have publicly rejected invitations to perform in Israel. But what winds Israel up is the fact that this rejection is by a famous scientist and that science and technology drive its economy. Hawking's decision threatens to open a floodgate with more and more scientists coming to regard Israel as a pariah state…
That Israel, a Middle East country, has managed to secure membership of the European Research Area and the many collaborative links with European labs underlines the importance of these links. When European parliamentarians challenged its membership on the grounds of Israel's numerous breaches of UN resolutions and of the European Human Rights conventions, the European Commission responded to the effect that research trumped human rights.
Israel's science and technology are not just a source of prestige and technological innovation, but underpin its military strength. It was an Israeli engineer who developed the drones that the US now employs in quantity. Israeli home-produced chemical weapons minimally match those of Syria, and Israeli universities amply supply the Israel Defence Forces with the sociological, psychological and technological methods it employs to suppress Palestinian protests against the occupation.
The complicity of Israeli academia in Israeli state policy is incontrovertible. However, this is the first time that a scientist of Hawking's status has taken so public a stand – and the hyperventilating response of the Jerusalem conference organisers (it is worth noting that the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where the conference Hawking refused to attend was to be held, is built on illegally annexed Palestinian land) has only added to its public impact.” [1].
[1]. Hilary Rose and Steven Rose, “Stephen Hawking ‘s boycott hits Israel where it hurts: science”, Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/political-science/2013/may/13/stephen-hawking-boycott-israel-science .
Outstanding Jewish British academic Professor Steven Rose is a Professor of Biology and Neurobiology at the Open University and the University of London.(for biographical data see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Rose ).
Professor Steven Rose advocating a cultural boycott of Apartheid Israel in a letter to the UK Guardian signed by 95 creative writers and artists (2006): “There is a fragile ceasefire in Lebanon, albeit daily violated by Israeli overflights. Meanwhile the day-to-day brutality of the Israeli army in Gaza and the West Bank continues. Ten Palestinians are killed for every Israeli death; more than 200, many of them children, have been killed since the summer. UN resolutions are flouted, human rights violated as Palestinian land is stolen, houses demolished and crops destroyed. For archbishop Desmond Tutu, as for the Jewish former ANC military commander now South African minister of security, Ronnie Kasrils, the situation of the Palestinians is worse than that of black South Africans under apartheid.
Meanwhile, western governments refer to Israel's legitimate right of self-defence, and continue to supply weaponry. The challenge of apartheid was fought better. The non-violent international response to apartheid was a campaign of boycott, divestment and UN-imposed sanctions which enabled the regime to change without bloodshed.
Today, Palestinians teachers, writers, film-makers and non-governmental organisations have called for a comparable academic and cultural boycott of Israel as offering another path to a just peace. This call has been endorsed internationally by university teachers in many European countries, by film-makers and architects, and by some brave Israeli dissidents. It is now time for others to join the campaign - as Primo Levi asked: "If not now, when?" We call on creative writers and artists to support our Palestinian and Israeli colleagues by endorsing the boycott call. Read the Palestinian call pacbi.org.
John Berger
Brian Eno
Sophie Fiennes
Eduardo Galeano
Reem Kelani
Leon Rosselson
Steven Rose
Arundhati Roy
Ahdaf Soueif
Elia Suleiman
and 85 others." [1].
Professor Steven Rose in calling for a boycott of Israeli Universities: “The University and College Union annual congress last week voted by a two-thirds majority to organise a campus tour for Palestinian academic trade unionists to explain why they had called for an academic and cultural boycott of Israel, and to encourage UCU members to consider the moral implications of links with Israeli universities. Not surprisingly, this overwhelming vote met with a roar of hostility from what we have learned to call the Israel lobby … Academic freedom, it appears, applies to Israelis but not Palestinians, whose universities have been arbitrarily closed, Bir Zeit for a full four years. Students and teachers have been killed or imprisoned. Attendance at university is made hazardous or impossible by the everyday imposition of checkpoints. Research is blocked by Israeli refusal to allow books or equipment to be imported. Even within Israel itself, some universities sit on illegally expropriated land, Arab student unions are not recognised and there are increasing covert restrictions on Arab-Israelis (20 per cent of the population) entering university at all.” [2].
Hilary Rose and Steven Rose on Stephen Hawking’s boycott of Apartheid Israel (2013): “That the world's most famous scientist had recognised the justice of the Palestinian cause is potentially a turning point for the BDS campaign. And that his stand was approved by a majority of two to one in the Guardian poll that followed his announcement shows just how far public opinion has turned against Israel's relentless land-grabbing and oppression. Hawking's public refusal follows that of prominent singers, artists and writers, from Brian Eno to Mike Leigh, Alice Walker and Adrienne Rich, all of whom have publicly rejected invitations to perform in Israel. But what winds Israel up is the fact that this rejection is by a famous scientist and that science and technology drive its economy. Hawking's decision threatens to open a floodgate with more and more scientists coming to regard Israel as a pariah state…
That Israel, a Middle East country, has managed to secure membership of the European Research Area and the many collaborative links with European labs underlines the importance of these links. When European parliamentarians challenged its membership on the grounds of Israel's numerous breaches of UN resolutions and of the European Human Rights conventions, the European Commission responded to the effect that research trumped human rights.
Israel's science and technology are not just a source of prestige and technological innovation, but underpin its military strength. It was an Israeli engineer who developed the drones that the US now employs in quantity. Israeli home-produced chemical weapons minimally match those of Syria, and Israeli universities amply supply the Israel Defence Forces with the sociological, psychological and technological methods it employs to suppress Palestinian protests against the occupation.
The complicity of Israeli academia in Israeli state policy is incontrovertible. However, this is the first time that a scientist of Hawking's status has taken so public a stand – and the hyperventilating response of the Jerusalem conference organisers (it is worth noting that the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where the conference Hawking refused to attend was to be held, is built on illegally annexed Palestinian land) has only added to its public impact.” [3].
Steven Rose (Jewish British biology professor at the UK Open University), co-signatory of an Open Letter re the 2014 Gaza Massacre (2014): “We demand that Britain will not buy or supply military equipment that has, or could be, used or tested as part of Israel's illegal occupation or as part of its collective punishment of the Palestinian people” [4].
[1]. Letter to the Guardian signed by 95 creative writers and artists, “Israel boycott may be the way to peace”, Guardian, 15 December 2006: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/dec/15/israel.guardianletters .
[2]. Steven Rose,”Why pick on Israel? Because its actions are wrong. Academic freedom, it appears, applies to Israelis but not to Palestinians”, The Independent, 4 June 2007: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/steven-rose-why-pick-on-israel-because-its-actions-are-wrong-451648.html .
[3]. Hilary Rose and Steven Rose, “Stephen Hawking ‘s boycott hits Israel where it hurts: science”, Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/political-science/2013/may/13/stephen-hawking-boycott-israel-science .
[4]. Palestine Solidarity Campaign, “MPs, actors, authors and musicians among 21,000 demanding arms embargo on Israel”, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, 23 July 2014: https://www.palestinecampaign.org/mps-actors-authors-musicians-among-21000-demanding-arms-embargo-israel/ .
Rabbi Brant Rosen is the Rabbi of Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation (JRC) in Evanston, IL. He is the the co-founder of Ta'anit Tzedek -- Jewish Fast for Gaza and serves as the Chairperson of the Jewish Voice for Peace Rabbinical Council. He blogs regularly at Shalom Rav. He is the author of “Wrestling in the Daylight: A Rabbi's Path to Palestinian Solidarity” (www.rabbibrant.com ).
Rabbi Brant Rosen on his path from being a liberal Zionist to being in resolute solidarity with the horribly oppressed Palestinian people after the 2008/2009 Gaza Massacre (2012): “Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the break of dawn. —Genesis 32:25. This well-known Biblical episode leaves behind tantalizing questions. Who is the mysterious “man” with whom Jacob wrestles? What is his identity, and where did he come from? One popular interpretation suggests that the night stranger with whom Jacob struggles at this critical moment is none other than Jacob himself—perhaps his alter ego or his shadow self… On December 28, 2008, I read the first news report of Israel’s military assault on Gaza—a campaign that would soon be well-known as Operation Cast Lead. On the first day of operations, the Israeli Air Force destroyed Hamas security facilities in Gaza, killing more than 225 people, most of whom were new police cadets participating in a graduation ceremony. Numerous civilians, including children, were also among the dead. By the end of the day, it was clear we were only witnessing the beginning of a much longer and even more violent military campaign that would drive much farther into Gaza… After staring at my screen for what seemed like an eternity, I logged on to my blog and typed out a post entitled “Outrage in Gaza: No More Apologies.” I ended with a declaration—and a question: What Israel has been doing to the people of Gaza is an outrage. It has brought neither safety nor security to the people of Israel and it has wrought nothing but misery and tragedy upon the people of Gaza. There, I’ve said it. Now what do I do?.” [1, 2]
[1]. Rabbi Brant Rosen, “Wrestling in the Daylight: A Rabbi's Path to Palestinian Solidarity”, an excerpt from his new book published in Mondoweiss, 5 September 2012: http://mondoweiss.net/2012/09/wrestling-in-the-daylight-a-rabbis-path-to-palestinian-solidarity.html .
[2]. Rabbi Brant Rosen “Wrestling in the Daylight: A Rabbi's Path to Palestinian Solidarity”, Just World Books, 2012: http://justworldbooks.com/wrestling-in-the-daylight-a-rabbis-path-to-palestinian-solidarity/ .
Lessing J. Rosenwald (anti-racist Jewish American, president of the American Council for Judaism and chairman of Sears, Roebuck & Company) equating the Zionist ideal of Jewish statehood with racism: "The concept of a racial state -- the Hitlerian concept" (“Jewish Intellectuals Who Have Opposed Zionism and/or Israeli Racism, Injustices, Occupation, Apartheid and/or Ethnic Cleansing”, Hypertext: http://www.thehypertexts.com/Jewish%20Intellectuals%20Who%20Opposed%20Zionism%20Israel%20Racism%20Injustices%20Apartheid%20Ethnic%20Cleansing.htm ).
Leon Rosselson (born 22 June 1934, Harrow, Middlesex) is a Jewish British songwriter and writer of children's books. He sings satirical and political songs and performed satirical songs in the BBC's TV programme of the early 1960s, “That Was The Week That Was” (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Rosselson ).
Leon Rosselson advocating a cultural boycott of Apartheid Israel in a letter to the UK Guardian signed by 95 creative writers and artists (2006): “There is a fragile ceasefire in Lebanon, albeit daily violated by Israeli overflights. Meanwhile the day-to-day brutality of the Israeli army in Gaza and the West Bank continues. Ten Palestinians are killed for every Israeli death; more than 200, many of them children, have been killed since the summer. UN resolutions are flouted, human rights violated as Palestinian land is stolen, houses demolished and crops destroyed. For archbishop Desmond Tutu, as for the Jewish former ANC military commander now South African minister of security, Ronnie Kasrils, the situation of the Palestinians is worse than that of black South Africans under apartheid.
Meanwhile, western governments refer to Israel's legitimate right of self-defence, and continue to supply weaponry. The challenge of apartheid was fought better. The non-violent international response to apartheid was a campaign of boycott, divestment and UN-imposed sanctions which enabled the regime to change without bloodshed.
Today, Palestinians teachers, writers, film-makers and non-governmental organisations have called for a comparable academic and cultural boycott of Israel as offering another path to a just peace. This call has been endorsed internationally by university teachers in many European countries, by film-makers and architects, and by some brave Israeli dissidents. It is now time for others to join the campaign - as Primo Levi asked: "If not now, when?" We call on creative writers and artists to support our Palestinian and Israeli colleagues by endorsing the boycott call. Read the Palestinian call pacbi.org.
John Berger
Brian Eno
Sophie Fiennes
Eduardo Galeano
Reem Kelani
Leon Rosselson
Steven Rose
Arundhati Roy
Ahdaf Soueif
Elia Suleiman
and 85 others." [1].
[1]. Letter to the Guardian signed by 95 creative writers and artists, “Israel boycott may be the way to peace”, Guardian, 15 December 2006: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/dec/15/israel.guardianletters .
Moriel Rothman-Zecher (an American-Israeli activist and writer who is active with Rabbis for Human Rights) (2012): “At various junctures in the process of peace-processing, Israeli leaders have waxed righteous about the need for the Palestinians to “recognize Israel as a Jewish State.” This demand is absurd on many levels, from its implicit requirement that Palestinian leaders give their seal of approval to the maintenance of Palestinian-Israelis’ second-class status to its rhetorical slight-of-hand distraction from the fact that Palestinian leaders have already recognized Israel’s right to exist as an Israeli State. But there is also an even more basic absurdity to this demand: Israel is not a Jewish state. Yes: Israel is a state in which people who are Jews are given more rights and privileges than people who are not Jews (let alone the Israeli-controlled West Bank and East Jerusalem, where the majority of non-Jews are barely given rights and privileges at all). Yes: Israel is a state in which archaic, hyper-masculine and exclusionary readings of Jewish texts are wielded against women and non-Orthodox Jews, as well as against non-Jews. But Israel is not a Jewish state in any value-based — or valuable — way… Jewish history has been transformed by Israeli policy from a rich, complex legacy of human suffering and triumph to a stale combination of archeological findings and Biblical quotes, wielded together as weapons against human beings who happen to not be Jews, to expel them from their homes and to strip them of their land and their dignity. I refuse to accept such a perversion of my history, religion and culture. Israel is not a Jewish state” (Moriel Rothman-Zecher, “Israel is not a Jewish state: on the destruction of Susya and the expulsion of South Sudanese”, The World Post, 20 August 2012: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/moriel-rothman/israel-is-not-a-jewish-state_b_1603422.html ).
Outstanding anti-racist Jewish Israeli Professor Shlomo Sand is a professor of history at Tel Aviv University and author of “When and how was the Jewish people invented?” (for biographical details see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shlomo_Sand ), a book that argues for a non-racist state in Palestine and the following Jewish origins for North African Jews (Berber and other converts to Judaism in the 6th century AD), Jews of Yemen (remnants of the Himyar Kingdom in the Arab Peninsula remnants, converts to Judaism in the 4th century) and the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe (refugees from the Kingdom of the Khazars, converts to Judaism in the 8th century).
Professor Shlomo Sand on a future non-racist state in Palestine: “"We must begin to work hard to transform our place into an Israeli republic where ethnic origin, as well as faith, will not be relevant in the eyes of the law. Anyone who is acquainted with the young elites of the Israeli Arab community can see that they will not agree to live in a country that declares it is not theirs. If I were a Palestinian I would rebel against a state like that, but even as an Israeli [Jewish Israeli] I am rebelling against it." [1].
Professor Shlomo Sand in “Israel deliberately forgets its history”, Le Monde Diplomatique, 2008: “During the 5th century, in modern Yemen, a vigorous Jewish kingdom emerged in Himyar, whose descendants preserved their faith through the Islamic conquest and down to the present day. Arab chronicles tell of the existence, during the 7th century, of Judaised Berber tribes; and at the end of the century the legendary Jewish queen Dihya contested the Arab advance into northwest Africa. Jewish Berbers participated in the conquest of the Iberian peninsula and helped establish the unique symbiosis between Jews and Muslims that characterised Hispano-Arabic culture. The most significant mass conversion occurred in the 8th century, in the massive Khazar kingdom between the Black and Caspian seas. The expansion of Judaism from the Caucasus into modern Ukraine created a multiplicity of communities, many of which retreated from the 13th century Mongol invasions into eastern Europe. There, with Jews from the Slavic lands to the south and from what is now modern Germany, they formed the basis of Yiddish culture… By validating an essentialist, ethnocentric definition of Judaism it [Zionism] encourages a segregation that separates Jews from non-Jews – whether Arabs, Russian immigrants or foreign workers. Sixty years after its foundation, Israel refuses to accept that it should exist for the sake of its citizens. For almost a quarter of the population, who are not regarded as Jews, this is not their state legally. At the same time, Israel presents itself as the homeland of Jews throughout the world, even if these are no longer persecuted refugees, but the full and equal citizens of other countries. A global ethnocracy invokes the myth of the eternal nation, reconstituted on the land of its ancestors, to justify internal discrimination against its own citizens.” [2].
[1]. Shlomo Sand quoted in Ofri Ilani, “Shattering a “national mythology”, Haaretz, 21 March 2008: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/966952.html .
[2]. Shlomo Sand, “Israel deliberately forgets its history”, Le Monde Diplomatique, September 2008: http://mondediplo.com/2008/09/07israel .
Alexei Sayle (Jewish-British stand-up comedian, actor and author), co-signatory of an Open Letter re the 2014 Gaza Massacre (2014): “We demand that Britain will not buy or supply military equipment that has, or could be, used or tested as part of Israel's illegal occupation or as part of its collective punishment of the Palestinian people” (Palestine Solidarity Campaign, “MPs, actors, authors and musicians among 21,000 demanding arms embargo on Israel”, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, 23 July 2014: https://www.palestinecampaign.org/mps-actors-authors-musicians-among-21000-demanding-arms-embargo-israel/ ).
Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn (1866-1920) (major Russian Orthodox Jewish rabbi, leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch branch of Hasidic Judaism and strong opponent of Zionism): ”[the Zionists] make the impression… that the whole purpose of the Torah … is merely to strengthen collective feeling. This theory can easily be adopted by young people who regard themselves as instruments prepared for the fulfilment of the Zionist ideal. They naturally regard themselves as completely liberated from the Torah and the commandments for now, they think, nationalism has replaced religion, and is the best means for the preservation of society” (Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok, “Judaism: A Beginner’s Guide”, Oneworld, 2010).
Amos Schocken (anti-racist Jewish Israeli writer) on Israeli Apartheid (2016): “There are many differences between conditions in South Africa during the apartheid era and those current in the land from the Jordan River to the sea, especially in the territories that Israel controls beyond its internationally recognized borders. However, there is one important feature they share: two peoples living on one piece of land. One people has all the rights and protections, while the other is deprived of numerous rights and lives under the former's control… Israel as an apartheid state is not a viable situation, not only because of the corruption of values but also because this predicament is liable to lead Israel, like South Africa in its time, to banishment from the family of nations. It is not for nothing that Israel insists on defining itself as the only democracy in the Middle East, although in fact it is only a democracy for part of its residents, and therefore is not a democracy. (South Africa was a democracy for white people only, and therefore not a democracy)… The growing delegitimization of Israel is this country's own handiwork” (Amos Schocken, “Only international pressure will end Israeli Apartheid. The growing delegitimization of Israel is this country's own handiwork. Should Israel decide to end apartheid, it will return to being legitimate in every respect”, Haaretz, 22 January 2016: http://live.sekindo.com/content/video/splayer/assets/closeBtn.png ).
Search is a US national non-profit human rights and educational organization, founded in 1972, which seeks a just Israeli-Palestinian peace based on the inalienable rights of both peoples. Search’s focus is on improving media coverage on Palestine/Israel (see: http://www.searchforjustice.org/about.html ).
Search on its Mission and Perspective: “SEARCH seeks to improve American media coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict by disseminating information about the issue and by urging journalists to cover the conflict accurately and to support a just peace in their editorials. SEARCH believes that justice for Palestinians and security for Israeli Jews are not mutually exclusive, but interdependent. The attainment of Palestinian rightsis therefore a desirable goal in itself, as well as a means of securing Israel’s future. That future cannot be assured while Palestinian rights are denied. SEARCH seeks a US policy committed to the rights of both peoples. Unfortunately, US policy, which includes aid to Israel of over three billion dollars a year, enables Israel to disregard international law, human rights, and democratic values. No peace is possible without a change in US policy. A prerequisite for such change is a US public both better informed and insistent on a just resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. [1].
[1]. Search, “About Search“: http://www.searchforjustice.org/about.html .
Glyn Secker (Jews for Justice for Palestinians) (2017): “[Israel a] terror state” (Steve Sweeney, “Protesters greet “war criminal” Netanyahu”, Morning Star, 7 February 2017: https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-535e-Protests-greet-war-criminal-Netanyahu#.WJ-HI_Ire70 ).
Abraham Serfaty (anti-racist Jewish Moroccan mining engineer, dissident, communist, anti-Zionist, author and pro-democracy activist) in his “Prison Writings on Palestine” (1992): “Zionism is above all a racist ideology. It is the Jewish reversal of Hitlerism.... It proclaims the state of Israel "Jewish above everything" just as Hitler proclaimed an Aryan Germany” (Abraham Serfaty quoted in “Abraham Serfaty, communist, anti-Zionist, democracy activist, Moroccan Jew, dies aged 84”, Jews sans Frontiere, 18 November 2010: http://jewssansfrontieres.blogspot.com.au/2010/11/abraham-serfaty-communist-anti-zionist.html ).
Michael Sfard (legal adviser to Israeli human rights organization Yesh Din) (2020): “People should ultimately ask themselves what the end goal of Israel’s policy is. Twenty years ago, most people would say it was two states — but I’m sure that’s not their answer today. And if one democratic binational state is also not their answer, then they have no escape route from apartheid” (Michael Sfard quoted in Jonathan Ophir, “Peter Beinart’s defection is a desperate crisis for liberal Zionists”, Mondoweiss, 20 July 2020: https://mondoweiss.net/2020/07/peter-beinarts-defection-makes-liberal-zionists-reactionary/ ).
Israel Shahak (1933–2001), née Himmelstaub, was a Polish Jewish Holocaust survivor, Israeli Professor of Chemistry, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, former president of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights, historian, author and an outstanding anti-racist critic of Israeli policies (for biographical details see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Shahak ).
Israel Shahak on the racism of Zionism and the State of Israel (1975): “It is my considered opinion that the State of Israel is a racist state in the full meaning of this term: In this state people are discriminated against, in the most permanent and legal way and in the most important areas of life, only because of their origin. This racist discrimination began in Zionism and is carried out today mainly in cooperation with the institutions of the Zionist movement. I will prove this view by quoting facts, laws and regulations which have force in Israel (and which are known really to anybody) and are enforced by the government. I will therefore ignore the racism of the individuals in this article and also the declared or undeclared explanations by which this racism is sometimes "justified"). In the State of Israel, one who is not a Jew is discriminated against, only because he is not a Jew, in these areas of life: … In almost every area of life in the State of Israel there exists a similar racist separation between "Jews" and "non-Jews," a separation that necessarily causes discrimination. I am quite prepared to bring further examples if other opportunities will be given me. Here I want to finish with two chief conclusions:
A) I do not wish to debate any justifications for that racist policy. The most important fact is that it exists. Therefore the first step consists in admitting the truth: The State of Israel is a racist state, and its racism is a necessary consequence of the racism of the Zionist movement. Facts are facts. After this we can debate, if we wish to do so, why such a racism is "forbidden" against the Jews and becomes a good deed when it is carried out by the Jews.
B) I do know the fact that the State of Israel is not the only racist state, and similarly the Zionist organization is not the only racist organization. I know for example that the paragraph six of the 1968 Palestinian Covenant can be considered also as a racist declaration and I have said so many times to Palestinian-Arab audiences in neutral countries. Usually I encounter a great deal of sympathetic understanding. But justice begins at home. The primary duty of all citizens of Israel, and also of all those Jews in the Diaspora who define themselves as the "supporters of Israel" is to struggle against the racism and the discrimination which Zionism has established in the State of Israel, and which is directed against all the non-Jews who live in it." [1].
[1]. Israel Shahak, “ The racist nature of Zionism and of the Zionist State of Israel”, first published in Hebrew in Pi-Ha'aton, (weekly paper of the students in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), 1975: http://www.geocities.com/alabasters_archive/racist_israel.html .
Israel Shamir (also known by the names Jöran Jermas and Adam Ermash, is a citizen of Sweden and Russia, a writer, a journalist and a commentator on Arab–Israeli relations and Jewish culture) on racist Zionism (2004): “Wendy [Campbell] made a new documentary called "Neturei Karta: Jews Against Zionism" … Wendy describes her film as an "interview with the engaging Rabbi Weiss of the Ultra Orthodox Jewish group called Neturei Karta (which means "Guardians of the City" in the ancient Aramaic language), which was formed in the 1930's before Israel was created in 1948, to protest the new movement called Zionism. Rabbi Weiss, who is based just north of New York City, explains why his worldwide organization believes that Zionism is the exact opposite of Judaism and why they pray for the peaceful dismantling of the Zionist state of Israel. Mainstream media has always ignored the activism of the Neturei Karta and other anti-Zionism groups, so this film may be somewhat shocking, but very enlightening, for many people who have always thought that all Jews are pro-Israel and Zionists. Rabbi Weiss provides a fascinating and concise history of Judaism and how Zionism has been aggressively seeking to transform it, revealing their intimidation tactics and falsehoods. He explains how the only way that true peace can be achieved is through achieving justice for the Palestinian people, by apologizing for having oppressed them and for stealing their land. He advocates making amends with them by providing reparations and allowing them equal rights. According to Rabbi Weiss, Zionism is blatant racism and against true Jewish values. He asserts that Judaism is a religion, but Zionism has attempted to replace religion with nationalism” (Israel Shamir , “To those who think all Jews are pro-Israel & Zionists”, Rense.com, 6 March 2004: http://www.rense.com/general50/pro.htm ).
Jewish Israeli Professor Avi Shlaim, is Professor of International Relations at prestigious Oxford University, UK ,and the author of “The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World” and of “Lion of Jordan: King Hussein's Life in War and Peace” (for biographical details of this eminent Jewish scholar see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avi_Shlaim ).
In a recent article entitled “How Israel brought Gaza to the brink of humanitarian catastrophe” published in the UK Guardian (7 January 2009) , Professor Avi Shlaim reviewed Israeli conduct over 6 decades: “The only way to make sense of Israel's senseless war in Gaza is through understanding the historical context. Establishing the state of Israel in May 1948 involved a monumental injustice to the Palestinians … This brief review of Israel's record over the past four decades makes it difficult to resist the conclusion that it has become a rogue state with "an utterly unscrupulous set of leaders". A rogue state habitually violates international law, possesses weapons of mass destruction and practises terrorism - the use of violence against civilians for political purposes. Israel fulfils all of these three criteria; the cap fits and it must wear it. Israel's real aim is not peaceful coexistence with its Palestinian neighbours but military domination. It keeps compounding the mistakes of the past with new and more disastrous ones. Politicians, like everyone else, are of course free to repeat the lies and mistakes of the past. But it is not mandatory to do so. “. [1].
[1]. Avi Shlaim, ““How Israel brought Gaza to the brink of humanitarian catastrophe”, Guardian, 7 January 2009: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/07/gaza-israel-palestine .
Avi Shlaim (emeritus professor of international relations at Oxford University and the author of “The Iron Wall: Israel and the Arab World”) (2018): “As Ahmad Tibi, the Palestinian member of the Knesset, has often remarked, Israel is a democracy for the Jews, but a Jewish state for the Arabs. Israel within its original borders is still a democracy in the narrow sense that its Palestinian citizens have the right to vote. Greater Israel, Israel plus its colonies on the West Bank, is emphatically not a democracy; it is an ethnocracy, a political system in which one ethnic group rules over another. There is another name for this state of affairs – apartheid. Any doubt on this score was finally removed by the recent law which declares Israel to be “the nation-state of the Jewish people”. As a “basic law”, this becomes part of the country’s constitution. It asserts that the Jewish people have an exclusive right to national self-determination in the state of Israel. This law stands in complete contradiction to the 1948 declaration of independence, which recognises the full equality of all the state’s citizens “without distinction of religion, race, or sex”. Arabic was demoted to a “special language”, from being an official language alongside Hebrew” (Avi Shlaim, “Palestinians still live under apartheid in Israel, 25 years after the Oslo accord”, The Guardian, 13 September 2018: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/sep/13/palestinians-still-face-apartheid-israel-25-years-after-oslo-accord ).
Henry Siegman (anti-racist Jewish American scholar and director of the U.S./Middle East Project): “Israel has crossed the threshold from ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’ to the only apartheid regime in the Western world” (David Wilson, “From Albert Einstein to Noam Chomsky: famous Jews who have opposed Israel”, Stop the War Coalition, 12 August 2014: http://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-comment/1307-from-albert-einstein-to-noam-chomsky-famous-jews-who-have-opposed-israel ).
Henry Siegman (Jewish American President of the U.S./Middle East Project (USMEP), former research professor at the Sir Joseph Hotung Middle East Program of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, a former Senior Fellow on the Middle East at the Council on Foreign Relations, and a former National Director of the American Jewish Congress) (2018): “Trump’s move on Jerusalem achieved what years of Israel’s settlements failed to do—shatter the illusion of a two-state outcome, and allow the Palestinian national movement to turn into a struggle for rights, which is to say a struggle to end Israel’s de facto apartheid regime, a course I have advocated for over a decade, and now increasingly embraced by younger Palestinians. What is particularly significant is that this younger generation is opting for a struggle for equal rights in a single state not because they despair of achieving a state of their own, but because it is their preferred solution. It is the right choice, for their struggle for a state of their own is one Palestinians cannot win, while a struggle to maintain an apartheid regime is one Israel cannot win. If after what undoubtedly would be a long and bitter anti-apartheid struggle Palestinians prevail, they will be in the clear majority. Having established the principle that the majority can impose on the minority the religious and cultural identity of the State, Israel will not be in a strong position to deny Palestinians that same right. That will lead in time to a significant exodus of Israel’s Jews. If Palestinians do not prevail, then the undeniable apartheid character of the state and the cost of the ongoing struggle will lead to the same result—an exodus of Israel’s Jews over time, creating an even greater demographic imbalance between the country’s Jewish and Arab populations. Palestinians will not leave because they will have nowhere to go. The outcome is therefore likely to be the end of Israel as a Jewish state. If so, it will be an outcome brought about not by BDS movements but by Israelis themselves, not only because of their rejection of the two-state solution, but because of their insistence on defining Israel’s national identity and territorial claims in religious terms” (Henry Siegman, “The implications of President Trump’s Jerusalem ploy”, The National Interest, 23 January 2018: http://nationalinterest.org/feature/the-implications-president-trumps-jerusalem-ploy-24192 ) .
Dr Jordy Silverstein (anti-racist Jewish Australian historian and member of the Australian Jewish Democratic Society, AJDS) on visit of Apartheid Israeli president to the Australian Federal Parliament (2020): “As President of Israel, Rivlin must be held responsible for what Israel does, including attempting to dodge accountability in the International Criminal Court” ( “Israeli president in Federal Parliament: groups call on Australia and Israel to stop blocking International Criminal Court”, Medianet, 25 February 2020: https://www.medianet.com.au/releases/184593/ ).
Professor Peter Singer (born 6 July 1946) is a leading philosopher and ethicist. Professor Singer is an Australian philosopher who is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University and Laureate Professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the University of Melbourne. He is particularly famous for his book "Animal Liberation" (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Singer ).
In March 2010 Professor Peter Singer and a large number of other decent, anti-racist Australian Jews signed a petition against the racist and genocidal Israeli "law of return" that gives all Jews (as defined by the racist Zionists running Apartheid Israel) the "right" to live in Palestine with Israeli citizenship to the exclusion of 7 million Palestinians forbidden to live in the land inhabited continuously by their Palestinian forebears since the literal dawn of history. According to outstanding Jewish Australian writer Antony Loewenstein "Some of the key signatories include world-renowned ethicist Peter Singer, actor Miriam Margolyes, legendary feminist campaigner Eva Cox, La Trobe University’s Dennis Altman, Monash University’s Andrew Benjamin, Sydney University’s David Goodman and John Docker, legal scholar GJ Lindell, best-selling author and journalist Antony Loewenstein, writers Susan Varga and Sara Dowse, ANU’s Ned Curthoys and many others" (see:
).
The petition is reproduced below.
"Petition Against the Right of Return to Israel on Behalf of Australian Jews
March 2010
We are Jews from Australia, who, like Jewish people throughout the world, have an automatic right to Israeli citizenship under Israel’s “law of return.” While this law may seem intended to enable a Jewish homeland, we submit that it is in fact a form of racist privilege that abets the colonial oppression of the Palestinians.
Today there are more than seven million Palestinian refugees around the world. Israel denies their right to return to their homes and land—a right recognized and undisputed by UN Resolution 194, the Geneva Convention, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Meanwhile, we are invited to live on that same land simply because we are Jewish, thereby potentially taking the place of Palestinians who would dearly love to return to their ancestral lands.
We renounce this “right” to “return” offered to us by Israeli law. It is not right that we may “return” to a state that is not ours while Palestinians are excluded and continuously dispossessed.
Signed:
Professor Peter Singer – Princeton University
Miriam Margolyes (OBE) – renowned actor
Eva Cox (AO) – National Chair of the Women’s Electoral Lobby.
Professor Dennis Altman – Professor of Politics, La Trobe University
Professor Andrew Benjamin – Monash University
Sara Dowse – writer
GJ Lindell – Adjunct Professor of Law, University of Adelaide
Susan Varga – writer
Antony Loewenstein – writer, journalist, author of My Israel Question
Professor David SG Goodman – Professor of Chinese Politics, University of Sydney
Professor John Docker – Sydney University
Jean McClean – advisor to Vice-Chancellor at Victoria University on East-Timor
Dr Peter Slezak – University of New South Wales
Dr Tony Balint – Blue Horizon Clinic
Dr Ron Witton – University of Wollongong
Dr Ned Curthoys – Australian National University
Dr Rick Kuhn – Australian National University
Dr. Tamas Pataki
Russell Bancroft – Manager Industrial Relations, Government Branch
Alice Beauchamp
Toni Beauchamp
Wendy Crew
Bronwyn Dahlstrom
Nicole Erlich – PhD candidate, University of Queensland
Marshall Harris
David Hermolin
Sylvie Leber
Jeffrey Loewenstein
Stefan Moore
Martin Munz
Vivienne Porzsolt
Joe Rich
Margot Salom
Rene Tsukasov
Nic Witton." [1].
[1]. Antony Loewenstein, "Prominent Australian Jews reject the Israeli "right of return", Media release, 3 March 2010:
Dr Peter Slezak is an Associate Professor in philosophy in the School of History and Philosophy, University of New South Wales and is involved with Independent Australian Jewish Voices (see: http://hist-phil.arts.unsw.edu.au/staff/peter-slezak-160.html and http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/encounter/voices-of-dissent/3135248 ).
Dr Peter Slezak on false Zionist defamation of decent anti-racist Jews (2009): “We've all been brought up with terrible lies and myths about the whole history of Israel, and increasingly they're becoming exposed for what they are, and I'm finding with a lot of Jewish people, coming to face that is very difficult. One of the problems they express is that they don't know how to reconcile being a Jew, and a loyal Jew, so to speak, or a loyal supporter of Israel, with the criticism that they now feel they must make. That's the awkwardness. And there is a model for that, there are lots of Jews around the world now have come out - admirable people of all walks of life - who are able to show that it's possible to be Jewish and even committed to Israel, and yet be critical. Within Israel itself there's an enormous amount… Well as a Jew, the usual phrase is 'self-hating Jew', it's a version of anti-Semitism, it would be too paradoxical to be anti-Semitic as such, but there's this bizarre psychological category that's standardly used now, and it's meant to stop people thinking about what you're saying. It's to dismiss you as some kind of deranged human being that has some kind of self-hatred, as if that explains anything, and of course it's such a well-known slogan, but it's used seriously, and it's effective. People then think we don't have to listen to what these people say, as if the content of their criticisms ought not to be addressed seriously. the idea is somehow is that you're only a real Jew if you are supporting the State of Israel. That's bizarre, and really ought not to be tolerated… The slogan 'Never again' unfortunately has come to mean for Jews 'Never again to Jews'. That's very sad to have to say that. They haven't been sensitive to the idea that one should stand up for oppressed and under-privileged people whose rights are being violated, they are too obsessed in a way, with their own suffering. So that's the other side to it, and this is a complicated psychological problem, certainly one can't in any way minimise the horror of that, but in fact I think that the way in which the Holocaust has been turned into a justification for creating a state that somehow asserts its rights over the indigenous people, can't be warranted.” [1].
Dr Peter Slezak as a signatory on the "Petition Against the Right of Return to Israel on Behalf of Australian Jews” (March 2010): “We are Jews from Australia, who, like Jewish people throughout the world, have an automatic right to Israeli citizenship under Israel’s “law of return.” While this law may seem intended to enable a Jewish homeland, we submit that it is in fact a form of racist privilege that abets the colonial oppression of the Palestinians.
Today there are more than seven million Palestinian refugees around the world. Israel denies their right to return to their homes and land—a right recognized and undisputed by UN Resolution 194, the Geneva Convention, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Meanwhile, we are invited to live on that same land simply because we are Jewish, thereby potentially taking the place of Palestinians who would dearly love to return to their ancestral lands.
We renounce this “right” to “return” offered to us by Israeli law. It is not right that we may “return” to a state that is not ours while Palestinians are excluded and continuously dispossessed.’ [2].
Professor Peter Slezak on the Jewish Holocaust and the Zionist crimes against Palestinians (2012): “I am a secular, atheist, assimilated, non-Zionist Jew… Both my parents survived the Holocaust … My eighty-three year-old mother is a survivor of the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz. I grew up with her questions: Why didn’t anyone help the Jews? Why didn’t anyone else care? Why did the world allow it to happen? These are the same questions we must ask today about the crimes against the Palestinians. So I’m here because the State if Israel does not represent all Jews. If we have learned the real meaning of the slogan “never again”, we can’t remain silent when the crimes are being committed in our name. We must universalize the lessons of our own tragedy to include others in our moral universe… right now we are all Palestinians.” [3, 4].
[1]. Dr Peter Slezak interviewed by Gary Bryson in “Voices of Dissent” , ABC Radio National, “Encounter”, 22 March 2009: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/encounter/voices-of-dissent/3135248 .
[2]. Antony Loewenstein, "Prominent Australian Jews reject the Israeli "right of return", Media release, 3 March 2010:
[3]. Peter Slezak, “A troublemaker in exile” in “Beyond Tribal Loyalties. Personal Stories of Jewish Peace Activists”, edited by Avigail Abarbanel (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012) (pp 65 & 83).
[4]. Peter Slezak quoted in Gideon Polya, “Book Review: “Beyond Tribal Loyalties”. Stories of anti-racist Jews”, MWC News, 18 January 2012: http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/24184-gideonpolya-beyond-tribal-loyalties.html .
Dr Jill Stein is an anti-racist Jewish American physician and the US Green Party candidate for President of the United States. As reported by Wikipedia: “Stein has accused the Israeli government of "apartheid, assassination, illegal settlements, blockades, building of nuclear bombs, indefinite detention, collective punishment, and defiance of international law.” She supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel and regards Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a "war criminal"” )( Jill Stein”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jill_Stein ).
Jill Stein US Green Party campaign for the US Presidency (2016): “The Jill Stein campaign calls for ending support for governments committing war crimes and massive human rights violations, including Israel and Saudi Arabia.
It supports the BDS movement as a peaceful, nonviolent set of actions organized by civil society across the world aimed to end Israeli apartheid, occupation, war crimes, and systematic human rights abuses.
US foreign policy requires an emergency overhaul, from a program of total global military and economic domination, to a policy promoting international law, human rights and diplomacy. We must cease and desist from being, in the words of Martin Luther King, the greatest purveyor of violence world over. Our foreign policy currently serves war profiteers and fossil fuel companies, but not the American people or the cause of global justice, peace and security. Our failed wars of the past 14 years have cost us 5 trillion dollars, left over a million people dead in Iraq alone, and killed or maimed tens of thousands of US service men and women. Yet we – and the Middle East – are far less secure, not more secure.
In addition to ending our catastrophic and immoral wars for oil and markets, we must stop aiding and abetting the human rights violations and war crimes of our allies who are also massively defying international law. This includes the Israeli government and the rulers of Saudi Arabia.
With regard to Israel, the United States has encouraged the worst tendencies of the Israeli government as it pursues policies of occupation, apartheid, assassination, illegal settlements, demolitions, blockades, building of nuclear bombs, indefinite detention, collective punishment, and defiance of international law. Instead of allying with the courageous proponents of peace and human rights within Palestine and Israel, our government has rewarded consistent abusers of human rights.
Therefore, the Stein campaign calls for ending military and economic support for the Israeli government while it is committing war crimes and defying international law.
In addition, the Stein campaign supports actions of nonviolent resistance to the policies of the occupation and of the Israeli apartheid regime, including those of the global boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaign, which was endorsed by the Green Party of the United States in 2005 and is supported by thousands of civil society peace activists and organizations.
Consistency in U.S. policy regarding human rights and international law will begin, but not end, with Palestine and Israel. I will apply this same approach to other nations, such as Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Egypt, among others.
Finally, we call for establishment of a Palestine and Israel Truth and Reconciliation Commission as the vehicle for shifting from an era of US support of human rights and international law violations to one based on justice and truth bringing all parties together as equals to seek workable solutions. A dedicated commitment to justice will further the security of all parties, Palestinians, Israelis, and all people in the region, much better than the current policies of politically, economically and militarily supporting the systemic and institutionalized abuse of one side against the other” (“Jill2016”: http://www.jill2016.com/statement_on_us_foreign_policy_palestine_israel_and_bds ).
Dr Isaac Nachman Steinberg (1882-1957) was a Latvian-born Russian lawyer, People’s Commissar (Narkom) for Justice in V.I. Lenin’s Bolshevik Government, and thence in the UK a leading member of the Freeland League that opposed Zionist colonisation of Palestine but advocated settlement of Jewish refugees in Australia (the Kimberley region of NW Australia), Suriname (Saramacca region) and the UK (all of these humane propositions being opposed by the Zionists). The Freeland League became a major advocate for retention of Yiddish language and culture. (see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Nachman_Steinberg ; “An Unpromised Land” by Leon Gettler, Freemantle Arts Centre Press, 1993; Gideon Polya ““An Unpromised Land” by Leon Gettler, How Australia escaped becoming Apartheid Israel”: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/31744/26/ ;
"The Age" newspaper, Melbourne, “Colonization of Jews”, 16 January 1946: “WASHINGTON. Jan. 15 (A.A.P.) Dr. Isaac Steinberg, secretary of the Free-land League, testifying before the Anglo-American Committee on Palestine, mentioned Australia as a possible area for Jewish colonisation” (see: http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1300&dat=19460116&id=8QQTAAAAIBAJ&sjid=Q5cDAAAAIBAJ&pg=849,842636 ).
Dr Isaac Steinberg, on Zionism, 1948: “Yet believing in a state means also believing in all, its – be they even democratic instruments – army, police, diplomacy, censorship and loud patriotism. A people which for many years lived outside these state attributes, which has not absorbed into its system the ”sweet poison” of those state instruments of power and conquest, has, suddenly, in a day, become bewitched by state instincts. Instead of following that historical, political sense which kept them always at a distance from the state machine, Jews suddenly felt a lust for their own state responsibility in a world which is gorged and oversatiated with statehoods”. [1].
[1]. Dr Isaac Steinberg, “This is not the way (The Failure of Jewish Diplomacy)”, Australian Jewish Forum, April-May 1948, pp. 6-8; quoted in Cahpeter 8, p. 134, Leon Gettler, “An Unpromised Land”, Freemantle Arts Centre Press, 1993.
Isador Feinstein Stone (1907-1989) was born in Philadelphia on 24th December, 1907 to a Russian Jewish family. He studied philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and moved to The New York Post in 1933, shortly after beginning his career as a journalist. His first book, “The Court Disposes” (1937), was a defense of Franklin Roosevelt's attempt to expand the Supreme Court. In 1939, Stone became associate editor of The Nation. “Business as Unusual (1941)”attacked the US failure to prepare for war. “Underground to Palestine” (1946) dealt with the migration of Eastern European Jews at the end of WW2. In 1953 he began his own journal, “I. F. Stone's Weekly”, which in 1967 became “I. F. Stone's Bi-Weekly”. He famously published “The Hidden History of the Korean War, 1950-1951”. He led the attack on McCarthyism and racial discrimination in the United States and, in 1964, he was the only American journalist to challenge President Johnson's account of the Gulf of Tonkin incident and throughout the 1960s he exposed the evil of the Vietnam War (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I._F._Stone and http://www.bintjbeil.com/E/occupation/holy_war_stone.html .
I. F. Stone on race-based Israel (1967): “There is a good deal of simplistic sophistry in the Zionist case. The whole earth would have to be reshuffled if claims 2,000 years old to irredenta were suddenly to be allowed. Zionism from its beginning tried to gain its aims by offering to serve as outpost in the Arab world for one of the great empires. Herzl sought to win first the Sultan and then the Kaiser by such arguments. Considerations of imperial strategy finally won the Balfour Declaration from Britain. The fact that the Jewish community in Palestine afterward fought the British is no more evidence of its not being a colonial implantation than similar wars of British colonists against the mother country, from the American Revolution to Rhodesia. In the case of Palestine, as of other such struggles, the Mother Country was assailed because it showed more concern for the native majority than was palatable to the colonist minority. The argument that the refugees ran away "voluntarily" or because their leaders urged them to do so until after the fighting was over not only rests on a myth but is irrelevant. Have refugees no right to return? Have German Jews no right to recover their properties because they too fled? The myth that the Arab refugees fled because the Arab radios urged them to do so was analyzed by Erskine B. Childers in the London Spectator May 12, 1961. An examination of British and US radio monitoring records turned up no such appeals; on the contrary there were appeals and "even orders to the civilians of Palestine, to stay put." The most balanced and humane discussion of the question may be found in Christopher Sykes's book Crossroads to Israel: 1917-48 (at pages 350-57). "It can be said with a high degree of certainty," Mr. Sykes wrote, "that most of the time in the first half of 1948 the mass exodus was the natural, thoughtless, pitiful movement of ignorant people who had been badly led and who in the day of trial found themselves forsaken by their leaders…. But if the exodus was by and large an accident of war in the first stage, in the later stages it was consciously and mercilessly helped on by Jewish threats and aggression toward Arab populations…It is to be noted, however, that where the Arabs had leaders who refused to be stampeded into panic flight, the people came to no harm." Jewish terrorism, not only by the Irgun, in such savage massacres as Deir Yassin, but in milder form by the Haganah, itself "encouraged" Arabs to leave areas the Jews wished to take over for strategic or demographic reasons. They tried to make as much of Israel as free of Arabs as possible. The effort to equate the expulsion of the Arabs from Palestine with the new Jewish immigration out of the Arab countries is not so simple nor so equitable as it is made to appear in Zionist propaganda. The Palestinian Arabs feel about this "swap" as German Jews would if denied restitution on the grounds that they had been "swapped" for German refugees from the Sudetenland. In a sanely conceived settlement, some allowance should equitably be made for Jewish properties left behind in Arab countries. What is objectionable in the simplified version of this question is the idea that Palestinian Arabs whom Israel didn't want should have no objection to being "exchanged" for Arabic Jews it did want. One uprooting cannot morally be equated with the other.” [1].
I.F. Stone (famed anti-racist Jewish American journalist): “Israel is creating a kind of moral schizophrenia in world Jewry. In the outside world the welfare of Jewry depends on the maintenance of secular, non-racial, pluralistic societies. In Israel, Jewry finds itself defending a society in which mixed marriages cannot be legalized, in which the ideal is racial and exclusionist” (David Wilson, “From Albert Einstein to Noam Chomsky: famous Jews who have opposed Israel”, Stop the War Coalition, 12 August 2014: http://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-comment/1307-from-albert-einstein-to-noam-chomsky-famous-jews-who-have-opposed-israel ).
Judith Stone on race-based Israeli colonization of Palestine: “I am a Jew. I was a participant in the Rally for the Right of Return to Palestine. It was the right thing to do... We Jews are suing for restitution, lost wages, compensation for homes, land, slave labor and back wages in Europe. Am I a traitor of a Jew for supporting the right of return of the Palestinian refugees to their birthplace and compensation for what was taken that cannot be returned? The Jewish dead cannot be brought back to life and neither can the Palestinian massacred be resurrected. David Ben Gurion said, "Let us not ignore the truth among ourselves...politically, we are the aggressors and they defend themselves...The country is theirs, because they inhabit it, whereas we want to come here and settle down, and in their view we want to take away from them their country..." Palestine is a land that has been occupied and emptied of its people. It's cultural and physical landmarks have been obliterated and replaced by tidy Hebrew signs. The history of a people was the first thing eradicated by the occupiers. The history of the indigenous people has been all but eradicated as though they never existed. And all this has been hailed by the world as a miraculous act of G-d. We must recognize that Israel's existence is not even a question of legality so much as it is an illegal fait accompli realized through the use of force while supported by the Western powers. The UN missions directed at Israel in attempting to correct its violations of have thus far been futile.In Hertzl's "The Jewish State," the father of Zionism said, "...We must investigate and take possession of the new Jewish country by means of every modern expedient." I guess I agree with Ehud Barak (3 June 1998) when he said, "If I were a Palestinian, I'd also join a terror group." I'd go a step further perhaps. Rather than throwing little stones in desperation, I'd hurtle a boulder. Hopefully, somewhere deep inside, every Jew of conscience knows that this was no war; that this was not G-d's restitution of the holy land to it's rightful owners. We know that a human atrocity was and continues to be perpetuated against an innocent people who couldn't come up with the arms and money to defend themselves against the western powers bent upon their demise as a people.We cannot continue to say, "But what were we to do?" Zionism is not synonymous with Judaism. I wholly support the rally of the right of return of the Palestinian people.” [1].
[1]. Judith Stone, “Quest for Justice” Kansas City Jewish Chronicle: http://qumsiyeh.org/judithstone/ and http://www.ummah.com/waragainstislam/quest.htm [the article was sent to Debbie Ducro, the American-Jewish editorof the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle and who the published it, and was fired the next day].
Strictly Orthodox Jewish disapproval of Zionism as summarized by Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok (2010): “Many of the Strictly Orthodox disapproved of Zionism for completely different reasons. Although the Torah teaches that it is the duty of all Jews to pray for the return to Zion, this ingathering must be preceded by the messianic redemption. Only when God has sent His long-promised “anointed one” will the exiles of Israel return to the Holy Land and all nations will turn to Jerusalem to learn of the One God.
The neo-Orthodox leader, Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808-88), had taught that it was forbidden to accelerate divine deliverance and that it would happen in God’s good time. The Zionist movement was thus perceived as an evil conspiracy against God’s will and yet another episode in the long history of false messianic hopes” (Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok, “Judaism: A Beginner’s Guide”, Oneworld, 2010).
In 1912, a group of Strictly Orthodox Jews founded the Agudat Israel to preserve Torah Judaism. This organization was determined in its opposition to Zionism, which they saw as a threat to Orthodoxy. As Rabbi Dov Schneerson (1866-1920) put it”[the Zionists] make the impression… that the whole purpose of the Torah … is merely to strengthen collective feeling. This theory can easily be adopted by young people who regard themselves as instruments prepared for the fulfilment of the Zionist ideal. They naturally regard themselves as completely liberated from the Torah and the commandments for now, they think, nationalism has replaced religion, and is the best means for the preservation of society.”
Nonetheless, the Orthodox anti-Zionists did accept that it was desirable to return t the Promised Land, and among the early settlers there was a strong Orthodox presence. In the early days, its leaders used to campaign against the Zionists, protesting t the British Government and the League of Nations about their nationalistic aspirations,. On occasions they even joined forces with the Arab leaders who were disturbed by the increased Jewish presence in Palestine. So deep was the rift between Zionists and the ultra-Orthodox that a member of the Agudat Israel executive was assassinated by the Jewish underground military organization in 1924. In response, one Orthodox spokesman declared that the Zionists were “evil men and ruffians” and that Hell had entered Israel with Theodor Herzl” (Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Lavinia Cohn-Sherbok, “Judaism: A Beginner’s Guide”, Oneworld, 2010).
Arthur Hays Sulzberger ( anti-racist Jewish American publisher of The New York Times from 1935-1961, claimed that Zionism was to blame for some of the Jewish deaths in the Holocaust (1946): “ [WW2 refugee crisis] “a manageable, social and economic problem [until] the clamor for statehood introduced an insoluble political element… It is my judgment that thousands dead might now be alive [if] less [Zionist] emphasis on statehood” (“Jewish Intellectuals Who Have Opposed Zionism and/or Israeli Racism, Injustices, Occupation, Apartheid and/or Ethnic Cleansing”, Hypertext: http://www.thehypertexts.com/Jewish%20Intellectuals%20Who%20Opposed%20Zionism%20Israel%20Racism%20Injustices%20Apartheid%20Ethnic%20Cleansing.htm ).
Cecilie Surasky is communications director for Jewish Voice for Peace and a New Voices fellow with the Academy of Educational Development (see: http://qumsiyeh.org/ceciliesurasky/ ).
Cecilie Surasky on the obligation of decent Jews to stand up for human rights of the Palestinians (2005): Every time a Gazan father faints as he watches his family home demolished; every time a Jew, Muslim or Christian is violently attacked by armed Israelis because they are non-violently protesting the separation wall; every time a rain of Israeli army bullets flies into the body of a young child on her way to school; every time a young Palestinian man is made to play violin by Israeli soldiers, or a pregnant woman dies at a checkpoint, Jews like us must speak out.
Remaining silent is no longer an option. We can no longer let our trauma, our deep fear of anti-Jewish hatred implanted in us through generations of persecution, make us remain quiet at the expense of truth.
Our continued silence perpetuates the fiction that all Jews are of one mind when it comes to Israel - that we think it can do no wrong; that we believe the Israeli government is innocent of war crimes; that we believe US military support for Israel's illegal occupation is a sign of our special relationship, and not a cynical use of Jewish suffering to provide moral cover for strategic interests in an oil-rich region.
Our silence puts us in more danger, not less. Through it, we give our consent not only to the obliteration of the Palestinian people, but to the end of our own people. If not our bodies, then certainly our spirit…
From fear of being socially shunned, and the systematic pressure campaigns launched a few years ago against most major newspapers for being "anti-Israel", to the Jewish community council that trained others how to neutralise Jewish peace groups by meeting behind closed doors and using pro-peace buzzwords to co-opt their views, there are all too many examples of the mainstream Jewish community silencing dissent and principled Jews staying in the closet.
This phenomenon is all the more puzzling because many would say that questioning and dissent is encoded in Jewish DNA. From Emma Goldman and Saul Alinsky to Betty Freidan, Larry Kramer and refuseniks like Yoni Ben-Artzi, we find a long list of remarkable outspoken Jews whose willingness to stand up for what is right and to question the status quo made history, but also made them enemies. They stand as our heroes not only because of what they achieved, but because of what they faced in order to make all of us better as human beings and citizens of the world.
The atmosphere of intimidation in the American Jewish world has had a corrosive effect not just on our families and communities, but on the very tradition which binds us together. We are famous for speaking our minds when we perceive that an injustice is taking place. That is not true when the perpetrator is Israel. Suddenly, we allow our fears of being ostracised from our communities and families to silence us. And as a result, history will show that much of the mainstream Jewish leadership has failed us, and failed us profoundly. Perhaps we will have failed ourselves.
But courage does not mean being fearless, it means acting in the face of fear. And Jews like me have to ask: If we no longer stand up for moral courage and call injustice when we see it, regardless of who commits it, then what do we stand for?” [1].
[1]. Cecilie Surasky, “Speaking out about Israel to save the Jewish soul”, Jordan Times, 1 February 2005: http://qumsiyeh.org/ceciliesurasky/ .
Dr Marcelo Svirsky is a faculty member, Law, Humanities and the Arts, University of Wollongong, Australia with Research Interests in Critical Theory, Middle East Studies, Palestine, and Decolonialization. He is the author of “After Israel: towards cultural transformation” (see: https://uow.academia.edu/MarceloSvirsky ).
Dr Marcelo Svirsky on the ethnic cleansing of Palestine (2014): “Founded in 1951, first as a transit camp for Jewish immigrants, Sderot is located about a kilometre from the Gaza Strip and a few more strides from the city of Beit Hanoun. As with almost the entirety of Israel’s settled areas, Sderot was built on Palestinian land seized by the Jewish armed forces at the onset of the ethnic cleansing of Palestine that gave birth to the state of Israel. The original owners of that particular tract of land, most of whom lived in the village of Najd, were expelled to Gaza during two consecutive days in May 1948, and their village was later destroyed. It’s not implausible to assume that the descendants of refugees from Najd could be among those launching rockets at Sderot today. For their part, descendants of the Jewish immigrants to Sderot can be found gathering on the hillsides of the city to watch and cheer as the Israeli army drops bombs on Gaza”. [1].
[1]. Marcelo Svirsky, “From Auschwitz to Sderot: the decline of our humanity”, New Matilda, 1 August 2014: https://newmatilda.com/2014/08/01/auschwitz-sderot-decline-our-humanity .
Leon Trotsky (famed Jewish Russian Communist leader) (1940): “The attempt to solve the Jewish question through the migration of Jews to Palestine can now be seen for what it is, a tragic mockery of the Jewish people. Interested in winning the sympathies of the Arabs who are more numerous than the Jews, the British government has sharply altered its policy toward the Jews, and has actually renounced [via the 1939 White Paper] its promise to help them found their “own home” in a foreign land. The future development of military events may well transform Palestine into a bloody trap for several hundred thousand Jews. Never was it so clear as it is today that the salvation of the Jewish people is bound up inseparably with the overthrow of the capitalist system” (Leon Trotsky, “On the Jewish problem”, July1940: https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1940/xx/jewish.htm ).
True Torah Jews Against Zionism educate people about Zionist wrongs including Zionist contradiction of traditional Judaism which holds that return to Zion (Jerusalem) can only happen when the Moschiach (Messiah) reveals the glory of the Lord ) (Adonai) to the whole World (see: http://www.jewsagainstzionism.com/ ). Judaism is a beautiful Kingdom of the Mind whereas Zionism is ugly, violent and bloody racism.
True Torah Jews Against Zionism: “Traditional Jews are not Zionists. Although there are those who refuse to accept the teachings of out Rabbis and will continue to support the Zionist state, and will continue to support the state, there are also many who are totally unaware of the history of Zionism and its contradiction to the beliefs of Torah-True Jews.” [1].
True Torah Jews Against Zionism on Zionist promotion of anti-Semitism: “Theodor Herzl (1860-1904), the founder of modern Zionism, recognized that anti-Semitism would further his cause, the creation of a separate state for Jews. To solve the Jewish Question, he maintained “we must, above all, make it an international political issue.” Herzl wrote that Zionism offered the world a welcome “final solution of the Jewish question.” In his “Diaries”, page 19, Herzl stated “Anti-Semites will become our surest friends, anti-Semitic countries our allies.”” [2].
[1]. True Torah Jews Against Zionism, “Traditional Jews are not Zionists”: http://www.jewsagainstzionism.com/ .
[2]. True Torah Jews Against Zionism, “Zionist promotes anti-Semitism”: http://www.jewsagainstzionism.com/antisemitism/zionismpromotes.cfm .