Side note: Some may claim that I ought to apologize for the acronym SLC ( derived from terminology used by the French ambassador to London). Why should I? I would not hesitate to call Saudi Arabia a Krappy Kingdom. For that matter, my own nation has often functioned as a Shitty Big Country, especially when it tolerated slavery and committed genocide against the Indians. Indeed, if you compare the eradication of the Indians to the current attempted eradication of the Palestinians, you will find one of the more exact parallels to be found in the chronicles of shittiness.
Back to the Megaphonies.
When last we encountered these clowns, they really did not have their act together. They were using young people with poor judgment and inferior writing skills to do the actual dirty work of blog-spamming. Usually, they resorted to one simple argument: Anyone who dares to criticize the SLC on any score must be a Jew-hater.
Ridiculous.
Of course, I go further. I do not merely question Israel's policies; I call for that cessation of that country's government, to be replaced by a multi-ethnic democracy (set up under UN auspices) in which every person has an equal vote, regardless or religion or background. In short, I do not believe that a "Jewish state" has a right to exist.
I also do not think that an Islamic state should exist -- there, or anywhere else.
Is it inherently anti-Semitic to argue that a Jewish state should not exist? Let's put the matter into perspective: I also do not believe that a separate nation for American blacks -- the demented dream of Louis Farrakhan -- has a right to exist. Most Americans, including our current President-elect, would agree with my stance. Are we all haters of black people?
When you get right down to it, the theoretical black utopia proposed by Farrakhan is just as absurd an idea as was the Jewish utopia proposed by Theodore Herzl. Alas, theory became reality in the latter instance, much to the dismay of that land's rightful inhabitants.
They are not bigots who insist that Farrakhan-land should never be. They are not bigots who insist that Herzl-land should never have been.
We are realists. We understand that sick, racist dreams of ethnic purity can never be the basis for a nation. Hitler taught us this lesson. Milosevic of Yugoslavia and the Hutus of Rwanda gave us refresher courses. Farrakahn's opponents are not bigots: Farrakhan is a bigot, because he wants to build a nation on the basis of race. Israel's opponents are not bigots: The Israelis are bigots, because they have tried to build a nation on the basis of race and religion.
I've digressed again, haven't I? Back, once more, to the megaphonies.
They are getting better at it. They are no longer leaving it to kids; now the SLC foreign ministry is running the show. See this piece for the latest:
A reader of my blog has received the following email which documents both the efforts and the agency that originated them. The solicitation to become a pro-Israel "media volunteer" also includes a list of media links which the ministry would like addressed by pro-Israel comments...
The foreign ministry shouldn't get a pass on this one. It may view such hasbara as maximising its efforts to "explain" Israel's position in the world media. I view it as a cynical attempt to flood the web and news media with favorable flackery in a vain attempt to tilt public opinion toward Israel.
Not to mention that this is such cheap pennyante stuff. What do they gain by this? How effective can it be and how many can be convinced? By the way, I've even noticed the hasbaraniks in my own blog. You can see them a mile away because they've never published a comment before yet write something like: "I've enjoyed your blog for a long time, but anyone with a brain in their head knows that Hamas is out to destroy Israel blah, blah blah." Pretty formulaic stuff. Also, you can Google a few phrases of the comment and if you find it appears elsewhere on the web you know you either have a hasbaranik or someone who has repetition compulsion.Guys, we're onto you. Just stop it. You aren't fooling anyone.
13 comments:
This comment evinced an almost immediate response from a Megaphony -- in Boise, Idaho, of all places!
66-193-42-62.static.twtelecom.net
Do they want to be seen to be calling the shots? Few photos were allowed out of Jenin while the massacre was still going on. OK so Gaza is much bigger. The hypothesis that they do want to be recognised as so mighty that no-one can do anything about them can be made to yield a prediction: I predict that Bush will pardon Weissman and Rosen before leaving office...
b
Between The Jewish Agency bribing the leaders of some Arab nations to expel the Jewish population and the Arab -Israeli conflict causing Jews to be expelled,to the Mossad scaring the Jewish population to flee to Palestine by using false flag attacks, we would see large populations of the Jews in Yemen, Iraq and elsewhere.
I agree with you on the one-state solution NOW!
Joseph, while I agree with you that a one-state solution is the only real solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, I have to disagree with this part of your statement: "that a separate nation for American blacks -- the demented dream of Louis Farrakhan."
A separate nation for American Blacks was the "demented dream" of white Americans as far back as the 1800's when Thomas Jefferson first proposed it and the "colonization" came to fruition with the founding of Liberia. It's capital, Monrovia, is named after James Monroe because as president, he made it happen! And while there were freed Blacks in agreement, which I can certainly understand given the times, this was totally a white American construct.
So, no matter how one feels about Farrakhan, he can't be blamed for that demented dream. I don't speak for him, but as a Black woman, I'm certain his ideas were in line with Blacks of that day who also sought to escape the racism, discrimination and indeed, death of the day - simply due to the color of their skin.
Actually, I specifically meant the official NOI stance that America should give black people one or more states. I'm probably wrong to ascribe that idea to Farrakhan, since it was espoused by Elijah Muhammed before him -- and by Fard before that, presumably.
Farrakhan still strives for that goal, however. Not log ago, I saw a video on YouTube in which he talks about his plans in great detail while addressing a very large NOI gathering.
A "demented dream" is a "demented dream" no matter the dreamer, no?
We could go back and forth forever on why many Blacks, past and present, did and do get onboard with Farrakhan (while I'm not one of them, having been born 52 years ago in the Deep South and raised there until I got the hell out, I can certainly understand why), but as you so clearly stated here:
"Indeed, if you compare the eradication of the Indians to the current attempted eradication of the Palestinians, you will find one of the more exact parallels to be found in the chronicles of shittiness."
...my point was, from your point above, to the massacre and burning of an entire town of Black residents in Rosewood, FL (toss in living under slavery, Jim Crow & James Crow, Esq.), to the overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom in the late 1800's (read land-grab), to the Phillipines, etc., etc., etc. - America has more than a little bit of experience in the kind of behavior being exhibited by the Israelis against the Palestinians.
Deb, your entirely justifiable litany of offenses bring to mind my conflict about repeating the French ambassador's characterization of Israel as a "shitty little country."
I would have no problem calling my OWN country "shitty," based on the atrocities you cite, and other sad events. (I'd like to think that shittiness on that level is a thing of the past, but maybe I am being naive.)
What does it say about us that calling any nation EXCEPT Israel "shitty" is acceptable? Yet that's how deep the brainwashing runs...
Joseph,
I know it should be in the past. I've been interracially married for 28 years and I know it can be,if you really want it. But I assure you, it is very much still here (one of the many reasons I cannot get behind Obama).
"What does it say about us that calling any nation EXCEPT Israel "shitty" is acceptable? Yet that's how deep the brainwashing runs...
It says we are indeed brainwashed (well some of us)- with fear, loathing, greed, hubris, ptivilege, etc., etc., etc. All of which we are certain to regret as time goes by.
Here's the Angry Arab's take on that:
"What is difficult about living in the US for Arabs and for those who care about Palestinian rights is that you realize that there is no threshold of murder, of terrorism, of killing, of massacres that would not be justified here in the US: by the white house, the congress, the media, and public opinion. Think about it: is there any threshold of the killing of children that would really change the perspectives of US mainstream media and culture? I think that American support for Israeli wars and terrorism is such that even the nuking of Gaza would find support among liberals and conservatives alike in the US, and I am sure that Obama would come out with statements of justification. Those who are waiting for Obama to speak against Israel are so naive. Remember: I told you so, damn it."
A great site btw. He's angry and unapologetic about it.
http://angryarab.blogspot.com/
Study in hasbara #793: ADL adverts in the international print media are depicting Gaza alongside London, with missiles raining down on the British capital.
Warning: this advert may be aimed at more than one market. Few countries have the capability of deliverying missiles to several European capitals. One of them is Israel.
The Reuters article about the advert is worth reading. It cites an Israeli propaganda chief as saying the propaganda war isn't going as well as they expected. Apparently the Time magazine front cover with the Star of David and the barbed wire was a big knock for them.
Yeah, right.
D'you know what? I don't believe the guy. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I think it bloody unlikely that a Zionist propaganda expert is so stupid as to tell a major media outlet that he doesn't think his propaganda is being as successful as he's hoped. During a massacre which is intensifying as he speaks.
We are talking about the interests that caused practically the entire US House of Representatives to sing out that "Israel has the right to defend itself against attacks from Gaza".
The US abstention at the UN Security Council vote calling for a ceasefire may also have been a ploy. Coming, as it did, a few days after the US used their veto, for the umpteenth time, to prevent the passing of a motion not favoured by the Zionists.
Part of the obscenely sick 'game' may be to encourage the belief that the war isn't going wholly as expected. Propaganda is one of the fronts in that war. In these schizoid post-modern conditions, are we getting misleading propaganda about misleading propaganda?
Sadly I think xymphora may be mistaken to think the tide might be turning.
Rather, I believe that part of the propaganda is precisely to make clear to the world that we can do what the hell we like; and the hell with all conventions and whatever anyone else might think of us.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if terror attacks occur outside Israel. You know, the kind where the security services find a Koran containing a piece of paper with a bomb drawn on it next to an arrow. That kind of thing.
Let the world eat shit is the next stage on from the neocon years in which the 'weak neurotic' memes, as sold by e.g. Woody Allen in the aftermath of the Six Day War, became a thing of the past.
Who can stop the Israeli military? is what needs to be asked. A one-state solution seems about as likely as Obama-led government projects to alleviate mass unemployment and the effects of the unprecedently severe depression which has begun to unfold. (Both, of course, being both desirable and right).
Study in hasbara #794 : today's Reuters report of statement by Turkish PM Tayyip Erdogan, and how he put what he said...
Headline: "Turkish PM stands by criticism of Israeli offensive"
First sentence: "Turkey's prime minister defended his outspoken criticism of Israel's Gaza offensive on Tuesday and said it did not mean he was anti-Semitic".
Compare the hypothetical: "Israel's prime minister Ehud Olmert defended his outspoken criticism of Iraq's Halabjah offensive and said it did not mean he was anti-Arab".
"There are people who are disturbed by me speaking of my discomfort over the killing of civilians, [including] children ... If we do not state what is just and lawful, then we will lose our self-respect," he said.
"I am (also) a leader who has said that anti-Semitism is a crime against humanity," he said.
If he stopped buying weapons from Israel or chucked out the Zionist diplomats, I'd be less inclined to think his main aim was to placate the Turkish street...
b
On the same theme, read this.
(In my browser, the scroll bar appears on the right, presumably a Hebrew-language thing, although the main article is in English).
The article starts off by saying the Zionists are attacking Gaza in order to defend innocent people from Hamas "terrorists".
Then it describes terror attacks in Los Angeles, London, Rome, Amman, Vienna, and Paris. (Arguably the talk of the Tower of Pisa being blown up in, er, Paris, shows a certain naivety, but...)
Anyway, you get national states of emergency, supported by the UN Security Council.
Some kind of Zionist equivalent of the Turner diaries? Or??
b
I may have got a twisted view of Turkish prime minister Erdogan's intervention. He is at least calling for economic sanctions to be imposed on Israel, even if he has not expelled the Israeli ambassador.
b
They Arabs must have created the same kind of software because they use the same kind of ignorant people with poor writing skill to spam blogs and other post comments of serious intellectuals trying to make a serious point.
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