The Left demands an anti-Settler Litmus Test for Diplomatic Appointments

By Steven Plaut

The latest tactic of Israel's anti-democratic Fascist Left is a campaign to recruit foreign governments to refuse to accept Israeli diplomats posted to serve there if the diplomat holds opinions contrary to those of the Radical Left.  The Radical Left represents at most 4% of Israelis.

The current brouhaha involves Dani Dayan, who used to be head of the Yesha (West Bank) regional council and is a "settler" who lives on the "wrong" side of the pre-1967 Green Line border.   The Brazil government muttered a bit at the idea of such a "settler" being appointed as Israeli Ambassador to the country.   But the personal opinions of diplomats are generally not an issue in approving such appointments. 

Things escalated when several Israeli far-leftist ex-members of the diplomatic corps, led by Alon Liel (who these days teaches at Tel Aviv University), interfered and issued their own call to Brazil to refuse to approve the appointment (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/200917#.VgVUs8uqpHw ).  Liel is an anti-Zionist who is a leading figure in the BDS terrorism movement that calls for a world boycott of Israel.  A petition of ultra-leftists is circulating in Israel (http://www.atzuma.co.il/notodayan ) to support the campaign for Brazil to BDS away Dayan.  Liel's sidekick Amiram Goldblum, a founder of Peace Now, who together with Liel fabricated the now-infamous "apartheid" pseudo-survey, appeared on a Channel One TV newscast (http://www.iba.org.il/program.aspx?scode=188675 ) to defend those calling on Brazil to reject Dayan.  The Channel One MC then referred to such people as "shtinkers," Hebrew slang for informers or rats.  Goldblum and Liel had earlier initiated petitions to EU governments to unilaterally recognize "Palestine."

   The Channel One MC blasted Goldblum and his friends, claiming they were evidently incapable of persuading the Israeli public of the correctness of their positions and so were using illegitimate tactics to coerce Israel into accepting the Left's agenda, using foreign pressures and extortion.  Some in Israel are denouncing the leftists involved in the campaign to get Brazil to reject Dayan as traitors (see http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/201040#.VgVUK8uqpHx ).  These leftists are the same people who foam at the mouth whenever anyone suggests that Supreme Court appointees be people who oppose judicial activism and who therefore support the rule of law.

    More generally, the Far Left in Israel has never had any respect for the rule of law and democracy.  Since it cannot convince more than 4% of Israelis of the correctness of its agenda, it resorts to underhanded anti-democratic tactics involving recruitment of pressures from foreign entities to coerce Israel.   The Left opposes Israeli sovereignty and supports efforts to undermine that sovereignty.   Imagine if someone were to suggest a campaign against all civil servant and judicial appointments of anyone who is NOT in favor of expanding settlements!   Why is the fascist campaign by the Far Left to have an anti-settler litmus test for diplomatic appointees any less objectionable?

1.  Try the Syrian Solution!!

So let us see if we have this clear now.  The entire world seems convinced that a reasonable solution to the problem of Syria is now to empty out Syria of people and assist them all to move as migrants or "refugees" to Europe.

SO it occurs to me.  Why is that NOT a solution to the problem of the Gaza Strip?

2.  JORDAN QUEEN: IF EUROPE DOESN'T TAKE MUSLIM REFUGEES, THEY'LL TURN INTO TERRORISTS

Take a few million of these people... or they'll turn into terrorists and kill you.

 http://www.frontpagemag.com/point/260162/jordan-queen-if-europe-doesnt-take-muslim-refugees-daniel-greenfield#.VfuFrZzpHcw.facebook

3.  So Iceland's capital Reykjavik is boycotting the Jews of Israel?

      Let us understand this.  The Jews have made unparalleled contributions to civilization for at least 3000 years.  The main cultural contribution of Iceland to humanity is a belief in elves and a lot of cute elf houses.

The internet suffix for web sites in Iceland is IS.

Anyone see anything symbolic in that?

Here is the email address of the Mayor of Reykjavik, Dagur B. Eggertsson, if you would like to write to him: borgarstjori@reykjavik.is

4.  Jews Against Themselves. Edward Alexander. Published by Transaction Publishers, 2015. $24.95 pp.178 

Send the "Refugees" to Iceland!!!

   I suppose that by now all have heard that a complete BDS boycott of Israeli products was adopted by the municipality of Reykjavik, the rather dreary capital of Iceland.   The Icelandeers are upset at continuing Israeli "occupation" of the "Palestinians."  Iceland has no Jewish community at all, although may have a sprinkling of individual Jews, and the wife of the President there is supposed to be an ex-Israeli.   Reykjavik is most memorable for that quip in an episode of the Sopranos where gangster Tony Soprano responds to an Icelandic stewardess saying "Reykjavik," by commenting, "And if you do you will clean it up."

   Under the circumstances, it occurs to me that a great historic opportunity now presents itself for righting historic wrongs and for achieving social justice.  Why should we not take all the "refugees" now crowding train stations in Hungary, Serbia, and the Greek islands and simply ship them all off to Iceland?  Why should these people be denied the pleasure of listening to Björk Guðmundsdóttir or of lunching on skyr, hangikjöt, kleinur, laufabrauð and bollur?

   Iceland is mainly empty so there is lots of room free for 700 or 800 thousand Middle Eastern "refugees" and migrants.   I am sure the Icelandeers will accommodate the Levantines by prohibiting pork consumption and requiring headscarves, which would be no burden, given the weather.   Unlike Hungary, no nasty Icelandic journalist will intentionally trip Syrian migrants carrying their children and knock them down on to the grass, since there is no grass in Iceland.  And after all those international bailouts of Iceland, surely no Icelandeers will complain.  (Remember the quip:  What is the capital of Iceland?  Answer, around 40 dollars.)

   There is however one concern.  Iceland becomes uninhabitable every century or so due to multiple explosions of violent volcanoes and the flooding from glacial melt-off.   What would happen if this were to occur after the Middle East migrants are ensconced on the island?   I mean, at that point, the whole world would have to go searching for places of refuge whither the Syrian "refugees" in Iceland could go to escape and live in safety.

    I am thinking here maybe Syria?

The Plight of the Trek to Freedom

By Steven Plaut

Keleti Station, Budapest

     Comrades, it is time to reveal the heroic struggle we have been undertaking to allow the banned and tormented refugees from reaching European shores.   It became clear that no European country was prepared to admit our "cargo" and allow us to seek opportunity in the EU, preferring that we be condemned to suffering and hardship.

   The refugees and migrants in question are our cases of AHAVA cosmetics, which are banned from the EU because they are extracted from a part of the Dead Sea that technically lies outside the pre-1967 Green Line and so is deemed to be in "Palestinian" territory.   Our migrants are bottles stigmatized and branded with a mark that shows they are the products of "occupation."   Unlike al-Qaeda and ISIS migrants from Syria.

   It all began a month ago with a perilous midnight boat journal from a port somewhere in the Eastern Mediterranean, in an over-crowded dinghy.  Through shark-infested waters we rowed and sailed, hoping our cosmetic refugees might reach safety.  Passing coast guard ships from Turkey failed to identify us or stop us.

    Eventually we reached the shores of one of the Greek islands, Lesbos, and sneaked ashore in the early hours before dawn.   It took considerable ingenuity and more than a bit of bribery before we found a Greek lorry driver willing to help us smuggle our cosmetic migrants across the borders into Macedonia.  The Macedonians frankly did not know what to make of us and did not care very much just as long as we left Macedonia as quickly as possible.

      In exchange for a few bottles of AHAVA cosmetics, we found some peasant women who agreed to help us transport our suffering cargo across into Serbia.  Eventually we reached the tents set up at the Serbian international border with Hungary.  But the Hungarian police were too busy trying to control the crowds of Syrian and Afghan "migrants."  When they were distracted, away we crept, crossing into Hungary with almost no one taking any notice. 

   Days later and numerous adventures later, we finally reached the Keleti (East) Station inside Budapest, from which all the trains were departing for Austria and Germany.  And so now here we wait.   We are begging the world to take pity on our bottles of cosmetics and allow them to be placed on one of the few trains that are being permitted to cross the border.  A special plea has been sent to Angela Merkel with the offer of providing her with a lifetime of free facial cream in exchange for refuge.

   We will keep you informed!

There has been an interesting twist in the Israeli media in recent days.   The Israeli media, which in any case understand very little about the United States politics, have discovered a candidate with whom they wish to identify and over whom they can enthuse.

That candidate is Bernie Sanders.  A typical "news story" this week had Channel One news talking head spouting out his excitement.  Will the next US president be a Jewish socialist, he asks?   Most of the rest of the media share his excitement.

Huh?   Why should these media chatterers in Israeli be so focused on a character like Sanders?  It is not, let us emphasize, because Sanders is Jewish.  That does not interest the Israeli media much and in any case Bernie is not particularly Jewish nor particularly pro-Israel.

Instead, it is because Bernie is a socialist.

To understand this, one needs to understand that the word "socialist" in Israel, unlike in all the primary states in the US other than New Hampshire and Vermont, is considered to be a compliment.  Americans may think that socialists are immature people choosing feel-good political positions about equality in the hope that this will result in their having a lot of friends, but Israelis really like the term.  In the Israeli media, there is no term more damning than "capitalist" and the media rarely use the word capitalist by itself, usually replacing it with "piggish capitalism."  The Israeli media are dominated by the Left, meaning those who vote Labor or further Left, and they just love the feel-good ideas of socialism and equality.  Nothing excites them more than redistributing those things it has no idea of how to get produced in the first place. 

In America, such "socialism" might get you some New Hampshire votes against an imploding Hillary campaign, but little else.  Bernie will be a forgotten old chatterer in a year.   But in Israel, much of the public still lives in the fantasy world of "good socialism," including Likud voters.  Never mind that the Israeli economy is one of the more successful capitalist economies on the planet.

Radical Left calls for converting V-E Day into Day of Mourning

By Steven Plaut

   In an amazing development, the Israeli Radical Left, led by groups like Peace Now and the Meretz Party, along with numerous tenured radical academics from the universities, has announced that it is calling on the world to convert May 8 of V-E Day into a day of international mourning and contrition.   V-E Day is the day, still celebrated in many places, on which Nazi Germany surrendered, ending World War II in Europe.  While generally celebrated as a day of happiness and merriment, the radical Israeli Leftists believe that such displays are insensitive because they overlook the real human tragedies and suffering of the German people when they lost the war.   Hence, they are proposing that V-E Day be renamed Katastrophe Day to display sensitivity and identification with the German "Other."

    Such an ideological position is largely consistent with the politics of the Radical Left in recent times.  For years, the radicals have referred to Israel's victory in it War of Independence against Arab armies and militias as "Nakba Day," where Nakba is the Arabic word for catastrophe.  Leftists have held Nakba Day mourning commemorations on the anniversaries of Israel's victory in the War of Independence, in which they mourn the existence of Israel and the "suffering" its existence has caused to Arabs.  Israeli universities have had to cope with demands by radical faculty and students and from Arab student unions demanding to hold such mourning ceremonies each year.   Leftist bureaucrats in the Ministry of Education have added "Nakba narratives" to textbooks about the country's creation, in which the "suffering" of Arabs as a result of Israel's emerging victorious are emphasized.  The radical anti-Israel daily Haaretz has been particularly shrill about the need for Israelis to adopt the "Nakba narrative" as their own.  What could be a more effective way to promote peace than through such sensitivity?

    Hence the new initiative is entirely consistent with the years of campaigning by the Radical Left for turning Israeli Independence Day into a day of mourning.   According to a Peace Now activist, V-E Day celebrations throughout the world have long ignored the human costs to the ordinary German.  The end of the war was a "victory" only in the eyes of the victors, while the civilians on the losing side suffered.  The world has long ignored the fact that between 12 and 14 million Germans became refugees as a result of the V-E victory, including the Volkdeutsche populations of many European countries.  German civilians living in areas falling to the Allies also suffered, worst of all in the Soviet controlled zone.  Peace requires that their "narrative" be heard alongside the official one.  Some universities have held conferences on Critical Theories of the Allied Victory, in which the alternative narratives are given prominence and the sufferings of the Germans are emphasized.   

    According to the proposal by the radical leftists, Katastrophe Day mourning events will emphasize the role of the Potsdam Conference in condemning such ordinary Germans to suffering.  Similarly, textbooks in which World War II is discussed would have to be edited to allow presentation of all narratives.  In some cases, leftists have proposed that flags be lowered to half mast on Katastrophe Day.  Some Israeli politicians have proposed a law that would prohibit any use of public funds for either Nakba Day or Katastrophe Day mourning events, but the Left, led by the academic radicals, has been quick in denouncing such measures as anti-democratic and violations of academic freedom.  Petitions signed by hundreds of intellectuals from around the world have condemned these "anti-democratic" proposals, while endorsing and defending their Israeli leftist academic colleagues who have promoted such events.

   Moreover, nothing was ever done by the world community to redress the suffering of the millions of displaced German refugees, forced to flee their homes as a result of the Allied victory.  V-E Day events converted into Katastrophe Day commemorations will emphasize that these refugees have yet to be granted their Right of Return to their pre-war homelands, and have never been compensated for lost property.  Why should they not be granted the same sort of assistance and aid that Palestinians have enjoyed for  67 years?  Why was there never an UNRWA established to assist them?   

   The radical Israeli Left has long been successful in converting Palestinian Arabs into innocent victims, deserving of understanding and empathy and assistance and financing, not to mention self-determination and statehood.   Why should the Left not capitalize on its victory with a similar campaign on behalf of the massively suffering Volkdeutsche and the other German victims of the V-E Day "victories"?  It is time to feel the pain of the Teutonic Other!!