They never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity: Secular "Anti-Zionist" Jewish groups echo Zionist groups
By Mary Rizzo • Feb 2nd, 2009 at 8:52 • Category: Analysis, Features, Israel, Mary's Choice, Newswire, Opinions and Letters, Palestine, Religion, Resistance, War, Zionism
WRITTEN BY MARY RIZZO – A very strange thing is happening at this moment within a circle of people who like to consider themselves at the cutting edge of the struggle for the Palestine, and we are referring to the individuals who classify themselves as Secular Anti-Zionist Jews, and consider themselves to be the "independent" Jewish voices, and as thus, the avant-garde of "the Pro-Palestinian movement". Following what can only be classified as a unique international event of major media importance, and perhaps also of a certain historical significance, they are protesting and stomping their feet in anger at the intervention of Erdogan on a stage shared by the General Secretary of the UN, the leader of the Arab League and the President of Israel.
These unhappy critics are in a few marginal sites and tiny discussion groups to practically take up the cause of the American Jewish Committee in criticising Erdogan. The interesting and very positive fact that Erdogan would not allow the stream of lies uttered by Shimon Peres to go unchallenged in the World Economic Forum (Davos) Conference on Gaza seems to have eluded them all. They hardly seem to notice that Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan obviously had come prepared for the sort of arguments he would be hearing, the kind of justifications that Israel gives for its killing sprees, as he took paper from his folder and read off of a sheet, (or tried hard to before the moderator attempted to stifle the Prime Minister and whisk the waiting public to their dinner) three quotes: the first, from the Jewish Torah, the second, from Gilad Atzmon and the third from Avi Shlaim.
Obviously, the Torah is quite authoritative, and even if some atheist Jews don’t mind that God, someone they claim does not exist, is being quoted, what counts is the message, after all. They have decided that Erdogan did something terrible in quoting Gilad Atzmon. What is their problem, with the message or the messenger?
First of all, the message: It stated pretty much the facts that everyone who claims they are for the Palestinians should know by now: "Israel’s barbarity exceeds ordinary cruelty." If anyone is ready to state that Israel used anything less than the most crude disproportionate force, may they speak now or forever hope for "peace".
It is also surprising that rather than state what Erdogan did "right", they are bringing up Kurds, Armenia and other atrocious aspects of Turkish affairs, past or present. This is true of the attacks on Erdogan in the Zionist media right now, and it’s being echoed by those who for a long time have been claiming they are the forefront of the movement, even without the credentials for it, unless their being Jewish so they can add their name to an appeal is the dubious credential. It does seem odd that while the discourse is Palestine, they are very happy to drag it to Anti-Semitism, which obviously did not appear at all in what they are trying to destroy, or to geo-political arenas far from Israel and Palestine. There is NO difference between the Zionist campaign and the anti-Zionist Jewish campaign. Both are to decide what the parameters of discourse are and to destroy the messenger, while making the issue of how Jews feel about themselves and how they think the world should speak about them THE issue.
The messenger: Erdogan is being scoffed at for his belonging to an Islamist party. Well, why should anyone be surprised that this is a deadly sin for Jews who are Zionists and anti-Zionists alike. It is as if it automatically means totalitarian religious regime that is the enemy, and thus, the conditional support or the open criticism of Hamas and Hezbollah. Whether or not that is the case of Turkey, one has only to go there to find out. Women there are actually prohibited from wearing hijab (how fundamentalist is that?) in public offices, to cite but one example of the secular character of this state. Oh, the other problem, that he’s bourgeois. Well, it seems that the only ones acceptable are ones that are just like them, Secular Marxists. Or Secular Liberals. Or Jewish Atheists. Or secular Jewish Liberals… well, you get the picture.
Well, they wonder, how could Erdogan have gotten such an "obscure" writer fall into his folder and be carried from Ankara to Davos and directly to the stage? The critics maybe don’t know that papers by Gilad Atzmon are widely circulated, and not only in the alternative media, but actually they have entered the public discourse through the front door. One of his recent papers was read aloud in full on SkyTurk. Walking around Florence, today we found his papers in Italian stuck under windscreen wipers, turn on your radio and you are hearing him interviewed about Gaza. I suppose it is great to be published in Socialist Unity, but if the argument used is that Atzmon is fringe, margin, obscure, well, that argument once and for all has bit the dust. It is not out of a sense of pride, and we admit, it is indeed a matter of pride to hear your words or words of your friends and allies used to tear down the shameful wall of lies by Peres, while he can just sit and take it. It feels incredibly good. It is enabling. If we can do it, not financed by anyone or doing anyone’s business, everyone’s voice can be heard. As a matter of fact, Erdogan made a lot of people happy. Almost across the board Palestinians and Turks admired his bravery and determination. When he returned home, he was welcomed "As a World Leader". Yet, some will try to undermine that by calling it demagogy, with Turkey nearing elections.
Let’s stop to think for a moment. If it is an electoral tactic to be as bloodthirsty as possible to win votes in Israel, and expressing the humanitarian cries for a beleaguered people in Turkey is the "winning choice". Which country would you rather live in?
And if it is indeed so that the people as a whole believe that Israel is killing and killing in a way that exceeds anything necessary, then the discourse of Atzmon is by no means marginal or fringe, it is at the heart of the discourse. No one has to bombard people with information or letters or campaigns to know how to call things as they see it. They don’t need this Jewish organisation or that one to tell them who to listen to and how to think, cornering them into some kind of bizarre admission that identifying with these words is in some way damaging to Jews and anti-Semitic and some of these movement "leaders" will say, damaging to the movement or cause. In fact, the conclusion to draw is that these writings must be touching nerves, touching the deepest feelings of humanitarian concern and not ones of political or personal expediency. The diffusion of these writings has been by spontaneous proliferation, there is no press office or political group lobbying, there’s just a person at his own computer and the spread of information from there.
There is a rottenness of the "movement" if it does not recognise when the moment to put aside their personal qualms or conflicts with Atzmon and accept that something magnificent has happened, and the humanitarians of the world feel it and know it. Persisting in the campaign to silence Atzmon now would not only be LESS effective than it was before, but it drops down the final mask, that these people operate as crypto Zionists. Their agenda, and the agenda of the American Jewish Committee is one and the same.
Mary Rizzo is an art restorer, translator and writer living in Italy. Editor and co-founder of Palestine Think Tank, co-founder of Tlaxcala translations collective. Her personal blog is Peacepalestine.
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Let us hope that Erdogan and the Turkish government continue to expose Israel's calumny and endless lying. The diseased sociopathology that is now Israel represents a dire threat to all humanity. It is urgent that the world community take steps to contain this threat and move to isolate an obviously psychopathic 'Jews only' state.
Thank you Palestine Think Tank and Mary Rizzo and Gilad Atzmon and everybody who watched and applauded Prime Minister Erdogan. Thank you. I am so relieved that this is happening and I am profoundly grateful to Palestine Think Tank. The World is grateful because if the Jews are not stopped, God help us all. There is no future unless they are stopped – and removed from Palestine. Please publicize Birobidjan widely so that the World can learn that the Jews have had a "homeland" since 1928! htttp://www.birobidjan.co.uk. There never any ned for the Jews to invade Palestine, no need for the Jews to steal the land, no need for the Jews to drive people out of their houses and off their land, no need for the Jews to uproot ancient olive trees, no need for the Jews to be in the middle east at all. The land handed to them, The Jewish Autonomous Region on Russia's border with China is a peasant country with a modern capital.
They should all be returned there asap. Then the World has a chance for peace and a chance of surviving. Otherwise there is no future, no hope at all for anyone. The young of today have no future unless this is not dealt with sensibly. The World can look forward to abject slavery or death – unless the Jews are put in their place – literally.
Aha – Erdogan – good old "Jewish Friend" turned into "an anti-Semite Muslim". Erdogan was honoured by Abbe Foxman, national director of Israel Lobby aka ADL – for Kemalist Turkish government's saving tens of thousands of European Jews in 1940s – when Zionist Jewish lobby groups in Britain, the US and Canada were opposing Jewish immigration to these countries – for the simple reason that the Nazi victims must be forced to flee to Palestine and steal Arab properties for the future Zionazi state.
Erdogan's government is not anti-Jewish. In fact it was ADL which pressured Congressmen to vote against the so-called "Turkish Genocide of Armenian people" bill. But then the Jewish lobby groups are known for their criteria of "friends" or "enemies" based on who loves Israel the most. AJC dumped Pakistan's Musharraf when AJC realized that the dictator could not convince Pakistanis to recognize Israel. AJC found a willing partner in Benazir Bhutto.
http://rehmat1.wordpress.com/2009/01/31/wef-erdogan-peres-and-gaza/
@Isabella – Isabella, I believe you're talking about Zionists. there are plenty of Jews who are outraged, and would like to coordinate with Palestinians to fight for human rights and equality. However, as long is it's an "US vs. THEM" struggle, the Zionists will always win the PR game.
Gilad, i hope all this is not going to your head and that you are not going to do a Glenda Jackson on us and go into full time politics. you're to good a musician to be wasted on the f____g zionists. on a more serious note, i was wondering if no.2 comment is of the kind one would want to associate with this site.
Yes, but does it really matter what Greenstein and the girls talk about amongst themselves? I hadn't heard of this, but I did wonder, when I read that Erdogan had mentioned GA, how long it would take the thought police to get on the case. However, I hope Erdogan's mention will encourage more people to read GA, and perhaps ask themselve, for instance, why the Palestine Solidarity Campaign is 'committed to fighting antisemitism'. Greenstein himself gives Gilad a lot of publicity – I had heard of Gilad but didn't know he was a writer till I read Greenstein's diatribes against him on SU.
I agree with Mr. Zuckerman that Comment #2 should have been moderated out.
Hopefully Mr. Erdogan will keep up his high profile criticism of Israel. Unthinking politicians of the U.S. and other places may be brought up short by it — let's hope anyway.
Comment 3 by amos zukerman and Comment 4 by Linda J reek heavily of ADL-censorship. It seems to me their authors want to turn this comments section into another kosher jewnazi talkback…
I have to state once very clearly that the comments represent ONLY the view of the person who is writing that comment and they do not reflect on the site, on the others commenting, on anyone in the entire world except for that individual. Sometimes comments are there to incite or cause problems, to create a straw man to knock down because people who don't think to intensely tend to believe a comment section is part of the site or blog itself, or allowing a comment up is the site or blog endorsing the content. Not true. Then there are those who put strange comments on because they think this is how to bring a site down. This happened with a few posters at Peacepalestine, where I would see a person make one type of comment, then on another day, its opposite with a different user name, playing some kind of game. I can only guess that the first time someone uses a board; if they are not violating the rules: which are very few, look at the listing here, we allow them in THE FIRST TIME. This also allows us to create a database of who is abusing this feature, because all comments give the editors information about who is making them. They might appear anonymous here, but we have their IP number.
So, we can take comment 2 any way we want, silly, mad, informative, helpful, damaging.. It's not the comment of anyone but that person. It may at a later date be eliminated should the IP number user violate rules in the future. I am considering blocking a few users here who really do not treat others with respect. They know who they are.
@lafayette sennacherib –
I know, Greenie really has an obsession with Gilad, and it was funny that he said on Harry's Place, "If Erdogan had quoted ME, I'd be red with embarassment!"
As if anyone outside of Socialist Unity users reads Greenie! In fact, we basically put him on the map over the past few years, but his exhibitions are still amusing in their madness.
let the comment 2 stay as is. let us not deter free speech. i also have read that USSR had given the 'jews' an autonomous region.
and these are not even shemitic; thus had no right to palestine. as for their crimes, some are unprecendented. thnx
I realized after I posted my remark about #2 there is no moderation on this list. Sorry for the misunderstanding. Free speech shall reign. People should be able to show their stupidity or not.
@Linda J –
@Linda J -
No, Linda, there is some moderation, but we had to decide to allow people to show their stupidity or not because what to one is stupidity, to another is reasonable. I would like only comments that are reasonable and intelligent and stimulating to appear, because while i haven't got much chance to respond to the things said here, as I used to do on Peacepalestine, I do like when people engage in their own discourse and present their arguments. But, yes, a certain level of difference of view and even some wacky ideas should have their room. I didn't see any incitement to hatred and I did see instead a totally unorthodox view about how to deal with the immigration problem that is at the core of things. I do not endorse this view, I just allow it to be there and people can ignore it, support it or crticise it.
by the way, i like your site!
I think this about describes what I have been trying to tell groups like this for far too long now:
Controlled Dissent:
http://prothink.tv/?p=82
Well, the Wise One, I looked at your video. I am completely against guns and firearms being put at the disposal of any US civilian.. Sure, I want them to protect their constitution, but I don't think that's the way, and I don't agree with your argumentation either. But, it's there if anyone wants to see it, they can make up their minds themselves.
http://www.counterpunch.org/atzmon06172005.html
four years ago I wrote that article….
"who's afraid of Gilad Atzmon?"… it could have been written TODAY, just change a few details and increase the noise of the thought police by a thousand!!!
Great article, Mary. You nailed it!
I think the beauty of allowing people to express themselves openly and honestly allows for gentle correction when they are less than articulate or couch their views in a manner that is counter-productive (and if they're adamant in their views, so be it – I'd rather know how they truly feel).
I consider it a sign of respect to offer my own views in a frank and honest fashion. Others have generously pointed out where they disagree or think I need to sharpen my arguments. I am eternally grateful to the likes of Mary, Gilad, Philip Weiss, and Dr. Norman Finkelstein (and countless others who I haven't mentioned) who have shown that one can stand firm in the debate of divisive issues by having the facts at hand and not falling prey to the smear tactics so often employed by Zionists and their supporters. As I once wrote Dr. Finkelstein, it is a tribute to his abilities that he is able to educate others in order that they may effectively and confidently spread the message as well. I could say the same thing about so many here at PTT, including so many of the commentors.
People are coming forward more and more to support justice and an end to aggression. Changes are slowly but surely taking place even in my own campus paper where many of the pro-Zionist voices post anonymously whereas those supporting for justice in Palestine identify themselves. It did not happen this way a short time ago.
I am heartened by those fighting the good (non-violent) fight as best they can. Palestinian endurance is a remarkable thing and it is my hope that the voices speaking out in soldarity with them helps in that regard. I cannot in any way imagine myself in similar circumstances. It is too horrible to contemplate.
Kind of odd having a thread about free speech on a moderated site no? You can say you don't agree with content but then you choose what to post and choose which comments contradictory to the group think you don't want to post.
This really makes what you choose to post in comments more like propaganda then free speech. Sorry but that's how I feel.
That there are very often very hateful things said about Jews and others on this site that I see and never or very rarely anything contradictory to that tone, it says a lot.
@kevin – "it says a lot." – Yeah, your comment says quite a lot about you…
@kevin –
I've seen the types of comments Mary lets through on her site and has always demonstrated allowing the greatest leeway in opposing views. This does not mean she ignores endless spamming and troll posts that seek to flood the site with mindless nonsense.
On the other hand, I have been banned from many sites that are either outwardly pro-Zionist or pretending to be unbiased while doing considerable gatekeeping for Zionists. My comments were always within the guidelines and would attermpt to address each and every challenge put to my views and assertions. I think this is what upset them most and hence why my comments were deleted and/or I was banned. These same sites most often left up clearly racist or over-the-top hate rhetoric. I wonder why that stayed while a rational attempt at discourse was eliminated?
Don't forget that often hate speech can be planted, allowing others to claim that it represents ALL posters of a particular site.
Free speech and moderated content are not incompatible, though many abuse the moderation. I'd guess that you'd probably be able to make your views public, and your welcome here would be determined by how you interacted with others who might take issue with some of your own assertions. Try it and see what happens instead of making blanket claims that PTT is somehow being hypocritical.
Thanks LT you may be right. I do recall reading some pretty horrible things said in the comments of some posts I never bothered to catalog them. I don't really see the purpose I'm not on a witch hunt just stating an opinion.
Still I stand by my assertion that a thread on free speech on a site that moderates is a little on the hypocritical side. When we are talking Israel and Gaza one of those places has much freer speech then the other and I don't think it is Gaza that has a better name when it comes to this. I wouldn't like to see the results of a pro-Israel rally in Gaza from secular Palestinians. I've seen the results of a pro-Fatah wedding in Gaza where they were simply playing music on the street where Hamas police came and almost beat the groom to death on his wedding day right in front of his bride.
So the topic of free speech with Jews/Zionists and a moderated site is a little on the odd side to me. I do of course realize some people can be very very rude on web sites. I would feel better if instead of moderation the site owners could just ban people or even better just make them look foolish in their assertions to shut them up. Of course none of these options may always be possible
@kevin – "I've seen the results of a pro-Fatah wedding in Gaza where they were simply playing music on the street where Hamas police came and almost beat the groom to death on his wedding day right in front of his bride."
Yeah, but you've been enjoying the genocide of the Palestinians by the hands of the jewnazis for quite a long long time, having no qualms about the jewnazi variant of free speech or free murder…
Kevin, this isn't an article about Free Speech. It is about those who are constantly gatekeeping, telling who and what and how to say what… have an opportunity to show solidarity, stuff that goes beyond their little world and personal biases, and praise Erdogan for his stance, not spend time going on about Anti Semitism, when that is not the issue, but it is something that they WANT to be an issue, and I will never figure out why this is the major obsession they have, going so far as to invent things or distort them.
Why is this site moderated and why are there rules?
I can give you a few reasons and there are many more besides that I won't go into here.
1) this is a site that has been often hacked, attacked and screwed around with. It stands to reason that it bothers some people and they look for any pretext to close it. My previous site underwent this from one of these Gatekeepers who stated he was "proud to close down Peacepalestine!" This was a victory for him. He did not succeed, but knowing these campaigns exist by the Zionists and the Secular Anti Zionist Jews is reason enough to consider the site in danger territory for those who would attack it, and needing of protection in that case.
2) there are many false posters: using various IDs, same IP, or same ID, various IPs, attacks of all kinds to the site, to the editors, to other posters. These have to be dealt with one by one and choices must be made. There are rules right here, and if one does not like them, they simply don't bother to post here and post on another of the thousands of places to post!
3) there are those who create false personas, to get "in the site" and then they post inflammatory material later, which could result in trouble. Not for me, because comments are the property of the person making them, not of the editor. But it simply makes a mess or confusion and it's best to avoid it. Many of these are the very ones who later complain about those posts!!! So, it's a game.
4) this is a pro-palestinian site, it is a site for all ages and a site that seeks to inform. Therefore, we try to consider if the comment offends Palestinians, offends children or women or Muslims or Jews or Arabs. Personally, I don't think Israelis can be offended… that is because they call simple reporting on what they do offensive, and the point here is to expose Israeli wrong-doing. If they turned into a law-abiding nation where rather than 94% of them approving genocide against Gazans, well, things will change and this board will then become different and its approach will no longer need to offend them. I consider their actions offensive, and will never tire of stating that.
How exactly was Erdogan prepared for Peres' "lies"? Erdogan got his turn to speak, rambled the whole time, and then tried to continue his rambling when it was not his turn. Nothing he said many any sense, he did not present any coherent arguments.
I expect this comment will be deleted, because apparently I am just spouting "Zionist propaganda", and it is clear that the author of this article cannot handle any legitimate contradictions to her statements.
A free Palestine? What about Land for Peace? You blew that! (Twice.) And then there are the SIX wars that you have lost to Israel. I'm no Jew. I'm a Catholic American. But if you really hate Israel, (which if your religion is really peaceful, you wouldn't hate anyone and praise suicide bombers), why don't you just leave. No one is making you stay. But you're not happy with that. you need to "kill the infidels". Religion of peace my ass. As for the cartoon, if anyone has actually seen Anti-Zionist gatherings, they're usually violent, full of shouting and burning Israeli and American flags.
God Bless America