Smith Did the Israel Lobby’s Dirty Work Targeting a Black Opponent of Israeli Apartheid with a Series of Zionist Lies
It was only in August that I wrote
a blog Focus on the Corrupt GMB with an emphasis
on General Secretary, Gary Smith. Smith is unfortunately in a long line of right-wing
misogynists, racists and general reactionaries to hold the post.
On 16 May 2022 Smith took time out
of his busy schedule selling out his members, to write
a letter to the Regional Secretary of South Wales TUC, calling for Lowkey, the well known Black
anti-racist to
be cancelled at the forthcoming Tolpuddle Festival in July.
This is GENUINE racism unlike the fake 'antisemitism' that the Zionists shout about, usually involving Israel
This is of course understandable. Lowkey
has been one of the foremost advocates for the Palestinians and opponents of Zionism,
whose project in Israel is now led by open fascists.
You might think that the GMB had better
things to do than support the Zionist lobby’s witchhunting of a Black
anti-racist rapper. However you would be wrong. The GMB under Gary Smith takes
a particular pride in being a symbol of racism, sexism and militarism in the trade
union movement. Politically it is bankrupt.
In August 2020 the GMB was found,
by a Report that it was forced to commission, to be institutionally sexist. It found,
paragraph 3 that:
The immediate
trigger for the
investigation was the receipt of an
undated letter addressed to Barbara
Plant, the
President of the GMB. The letter contained allegations
of a “serious sexual assault (rape)”,
drug use and
sexually predatory behaviour, by
a senior man
within the GMB.
The letter also alleged that a number
of named people were aware of the incident (the alleged rape) and
those included senior members of staff.
Gary Smith, a careerist who was originally based in Brighton - he wouldn't know what anti-racism was if it bit him on his nether regions
Karen Monaghan QC, who wrote the
report, hinted very strongly that the union was also institutionally racist. At
paragraph 115, although strictly beyond her terms of reference, Monaghan
observed that:
I was also contacted by a number of
people from Black and minority
ethnic groups. They recognised that this investigation is concerned with
sexual harassment but wanted to draw to my attention the very
real and
serious problems that exist for members and employees from Black
and minority ethnic
groups. Having read written
communications and
spoken to some who contacted me, I am satisfied that the GMB is not a comfortable
place to be for many employees and members from
Black and
minority ethnic groups.
Tim Roache - previous GMB General Secretary resigned under a cloud
The unnamed ‘senior man’ within the GMB is believed to be Tim Roache, the former General Secretary and as vicious a right-winger as Gary Smith. Roache resigned abruptly in April 2020, just 5 months after having been ‘reelected’ and at the same time as Monaghan began her investigation.
Despite these damning findings, Labour List asked, in April
1921, ‘Has anything changed in the
GMB after the report on institutional sexism?’ It went
on to inform readers that
A number of staffers have reached out to LabourList
to tell us they believe things are “worse”, not better.
LabourList can reveal today that a group of women working at the GMB
have lodged a formal dispute with the organisation, as they say the grievances
of female staffers are not being heard fairly.
Who is responsible
for the implementation of the Report if not the General Secretary, Gary Smith.
However I understand that Smith too is currently under investigation for sexual
harassment and he might therefore not be best suited to take this forward.
However this has not stopped Smith,
an ardent Starmerite from launching a McCarthyist attack on Lowkey on behalf of
the Apartheid State’s lobby in this country.
Gary Smith's Lying Letter
Lowkey has been a dedicated fighter
against racism and oppression, in particular Zionism and Israeli apartheid. It
was this last which motivated Smith. The ‘anti-Semitism’ that Lowkey was
accused of is of the kind that got Chris Williamson suspended, in other words a
deliberate distortion of what Lowkey actually said. Indeed it is far worse than
what happened to Chris Williamson
Smith’s letter was full of lies and
innuendo. Smith had ‘severe doubts about the suitability of Mr Dennis (Lowkey)
as a performer at the TUC’s Tolpuddle Festival. Smith gave 3 reasons:
According to Gary Smith, mentioning Israel's supply of weaponry to neo-Nazis is 'antisemitic' - the truth has now become antisemitic
Lie No. 1 Lowkey had ‘promoted conspiracy theories’
that Israel had plotted to promote conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
What Lowkey
has done is to highlight Israeli arms shipments to Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov
battalion. Highly embarrassing to the Zionists but anti-Semitic? If this is anti-Semitism
then presumably the article
in Ha’aretz Rights Groups Demand Israel
Stop Arming neo-Nazis in Ukraine is also anti-Semitic.
Ha’aretz noted that:
In the past, Israel has
armed anti-Semitic
regimes, such as the generals’ regime in Argentina, which murdered thousands of
Jews in camps while its soldiers stood in watchtowers guarding the abducted
prisoners with their Uzi submachine guns.
According to a freedom of
information petition to Israel's defense ministry from last January, Israel
also armed Bolivia's military regimes, knowing that Nazi war criminal Klaus
Barbie was part of the regime.… Barbie's death squads used Israeli Uzis….
The Azov militia was
established in Ukraine following the Russian invasion of the Crimean peninsula
in 2014. The militia’s emblems are well-known national socialist ones. Its
members use the Nazi salute and carry swastikas and SS insignias.
Moreover, some of them
openly admit they have neo-Nazi sentiments and that they are Holocaust deniers.
One militia member said in an interview that he was fighting Russia since Putin
was a Jew. An Azov sergeant said that he was a national socialist, although he
was not in favor of genocide, and as long as minorities in Ukraine did not
demand special rights he would have no problem with them.
“Our nation’s historic
mission at this critical juncture is to lead the final march of the white race
towards its survival” Biletsky has
said. “This is a march against sub-humans who are led by the Semite race.”
According to reports by human rights groups militia members are suspected of
war crimes, torture and sexual violence.
This kind of anti-Semitism is of no concern to Israel or its defenders
here. Lowkey highlighted how corrupt Ukrainian
oligarch, Igor Kolomoisky
who funded Zelensky’s Presidential victory in 2019 is a citizen of 3 countries –
Israel, Cyprus and Ukraine – as well as being the main funder of the Azov
Battalion.
Lie No. 2 Lowkey ‘had appeared recently alongside
the disgraced figures of Chris Williamson and David Miller on Iranian state
television.’
What you might ask is anti-Semitic about
that? Many people have appeared on Press TV e.g. Jeremy Corbyn. That should not
be taken as support for the regime. Smith has appeared on the BBC which has a
far bloodier record for condoning western war crimes.
Lie
No. 3 Lowkey’s third ‘crime’ was having
given voice to ‘9/11 conspiracy theories.’
Even if he had supported 9/11
conspiracy theories it would not be anti-Semitic. But Smith lied again.
What Lowkey
did do was to adapt Adrian Mitchell’s poem ‘To
Whom It May Concern (Tell Me Lies About Vietnam) and in it mention Building
7, which was not hit by the planes in 9/11 but nonetheless collapsed. It was
even published in 2009 on Stop the War Committee’s website.
Why this should be construed as anti-Semitic.
But when you’re desperate to defend an apartheid regime which tortures and
sexually molests children, which executes journalists and which openly refuses
to recognise that Palestinians have any rights, then of course ‘anti-Semitism’
is all you have got left.
It is no surprise that Gary Smith
has become the Zionists’ errand boy. The GMB is to the fore in the trade union movement
in demanding an expansion of the War Budget so that even more billions are
taken away from the NHS and social security and ploughed into Trident.
Smith’s letter was pretty thin
gruel compared to the expense-paid dinners that Gary Smith consumes. Any
semi-literate and politically aware TUC bureaucrat would have chucked this in
the bin.
Kevin Rowan - another TUC bureaucrat whose main task is ensuring constitutional stability and stopping workers challenge capitalism
Not however Kevin Rowan, who has spent
most of his working life at the TUC, first as Northern Secretary for 10 years
and since April 2013 as Head of Services. From University to TUC bureaucrat.
On 17 September 2022, in response
to a query from a member of Brighton and Hove Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Kevin
Rowan of the TUC wrote:
Following the invitation to Lowkey to perform at
Tolpuddle, comments he made regarding the religious heritage of President
Zelensky were brough to our attention [he doesn’t say who by!]. Those statements
are not congruent with the TUC’s opposition to anti-Semitism.
Well of course, if Lowkey had
attacked or criticised Zelensky because he was Jewish then that would be anti-Semitic.
But it was just another lie. It’s almost as if today’s Zionists get special
training in a school for liars, but then again why bother when there are so
many gullible fools like Rowan and Smith around?
There is
no foundation to this allegation. Rowan is the TUC’s Head of Learning and one
might have hoped that before opening his big mouth he might have taken the
trouble to find out the facts.
In fact, when Russia invaded Ukraine last February, using the excuse that it was ‘de-Nazifying’ Ukraine media pundit after media pundit rushed to assure us that there were no Nazis in Ukraine. Their refrain was ‘Zelensky himself is Jewish.’
Media pundits
like the BBC’s Ros Atkins repeatedly
emphasised Zelensky’s Jewishness. Above is a series of clips from different
media pundits, each emphasising Zelensky’s Jewishness in order that they could kosher
the rag tag neo-Nazi militias that had been integrated both into Ukraine’s army
and its state structures.
What was Lowkey’s
‘anti-Semitic’ response? Did he blame the conflict between NATO/Ukraine and
Russia on Zelensky being Jewish? Not at all. He merely stated that Zelensky’s Jewishness
was irrelevant to whether neo-Nazis were operating, with western support, in Ukraine.
How is this in any way anti-Semitic?
The Union
of Jewish Students however was determined to run with these lies. Responding to
a tweet
by LBC’s far-right Political Editor, Theo Usherwood, they claimed that poor little
fragile Jewish students would be put under intolerable stress if they had to
listen to a Black man perform songs that might upset their racist souls.
‘How are Jewish students
supposed to feel included in the wider student movement when NUS chooses this
figure to perform?’
Unfortunately,
as with UJS’s targeting of NUS’s Black President Shaima Dallai, who was sacked,
NUS caved in again.
Instead of having the courage to tell
UJS to fuck off back to their Apartheid Laager, NUS cancelled
Lowkey. In other words White students claiming to be oppressed take precedence
over Black students who are oppressed.
The Union of Jewish Students is one
of the last bastions of ‘left’ Zionism in Britain. Except that there is nothing
left about it. The only role that ‘left’ Zionists have today is in koshering
their neo-Nazi counterparts in Israel because the Labour Zionists are almost
completely eliminated from the Knesset.
UJS has embedded
in its constitution support for Zionism and the Israeli state. It is affiliated
to the settlement funding, land thieving World Zionist Organisation. Clause
2.1.1. of its Constitution states that one of its Objects is
inspiring
Jewish students to make an enduring commitment to their Jewish identity,
Israel, and the community.’
UJS is funded by the Israeli state. If anything NUS should
register it as a foreign agent and treat it accordingly.
On 18 September I sent
an email, as Secretary of my Unite Branch, to Nigel Costley who is Regional
Secretary for South-West TUC,
which includes Tolpuddle. I concluded my letter by saying:
Lowkey is a well-known Black
anti-racist performer. To no platform a Black person at the behest of the
supporters of apartheid, could be construed by some as an act of racism in itself.
I should add that I have met Lowkey on
a number of occasions and I have never experienced anything in the way of
anti-Semitism. I am myself Jewish and probably a better judge of what is
anti-Semitic than Gary Smith or indeed you, so I would welcome clarification of
what Lowkey is alleged to have said and not just hearsay or rumours.
Referring to Rowan’s
letter I asked, given the allegations of anti-Semitism, ‘I would like to
know exactly what these comments were.’
Of course Costley is another TUC bureaucrat. The idea of answering to ordinary
union members or justifying their actions is something alien. Given his inability
to provide any answers he responded:
If you were
at this year’s festival you will have heard music supporting Palestine, stalls,
a discussion session for solidarity with Palestine and supporting comments from
the main stage.
The festival
has a proud record of such support.
We are not, however, going to debate which
musicians did or did not appear on the programme.
It
was of course no answer. It is irrelevant which other musicians appeared. The
whole point of solidarity with the oppressed is to defy the demands of racists
not to accede to them. When it comes to standing up to Zionist racism the TUC
is a wet blanket.
Background
The
background to this is that Gary Smith and the GMB are as thick
as thieves with the Jewish Labour Movement, which works closely with UJS. The
JLM proudly declares that it is
the ‘sister party’ of the ethnic cleansing Israeli Labor Party. 2022 has
been the
most deadly for Palestinians since 2005 yet it is the one year in the last
20 that the Israeli Labor Party has been in a governing coalition.
It is the year when
Shireen Abu-Akleh, the Al Jazeera Journalist was executed by the Israeli
military, as all independent investigations (CNN,
Forensic
Architecture, B’Tselem,
NYT)
have shown. It has been a year when all Palestinian human rights organisations
were banned.
It has been the year of unbridled violence by Israeli settlers in the West Bank,
the burning of crops, the demolition of homes and the murder of over 60
Palestinian children. Yet throughout all this the JLM has been silent and complicit.
Yet these are the racists that Gary Smith embraces.
Gary Smith and the GMB purport to
support the Palestinians yet when the Zionists cry ‘anti-Semitism’ Smith has jumps
to his fee and does their bidding. If Smith had any shame then an apology would
be due to Lowkey for defaming him.
Unfortunately most trade union leaders
are a parasitic caste living a good life at the expense of their members. Not
for them the average wage of a worker.
Last year UJS and the Board of
Deputies tried
to cancel Ken Loach, the world famous film producer who 25
years ago produced a play Perdition telling the truth about the Kasztner
Affair in Israel. For 4 long years (1954-8) the Israeli state was convulsed
by the Kasztner trial which led to the downfall of Israel’s second government.
Kasztner was the leader of Hungarian
Zionism and he made a deal with Adolf Eichmann – ‘allow me to save 600 leading Zionists
on a train out of Hungary and we will help you round up the remainder of Hungary’s
half a million Jews.’ That was it in a nutshell and it therefore meant
suppressing the Auschwitz Protocols which 2 escapees from Auschwitz had
brought to Slovakia and had written down their experiences of Auschwitz.
Not surprisingly UJS termed referring
to historical facts about Zionist Collaboration with the Nazis as ‘anti-Semitic’.
The JLM made similar accusations about Ken Livingstone who referred
to the Nazis supporting Zionism.
Zionism today doesn’t like to be
reminded of its crimes during the holocaust such as when they actively opposed
the rescue of Jews to destinations other than Palestine, as my recent book Zionism
During the Holocaust explains.
Palestine
Solidarity Campaign
Lowkey is a Patron of Palestine
Solidarity Campaign but you would hardly know it. Apart from having signed a
petition in his support PSC seems to have done absolutely nothing to fightback
against the continued witch-hunting of people like Lowkey and Shahd Abusalama.
It is about time that Ben Jamal, PSC’s Director who is reputedly on £50,000 a
year, started defending activists in this country rather than trying to appease
the trade union right.
The GMB is affiliated to PSC. It
has policy in support of Boycott Divestment and Sanctions. It has also done
absolutely nothing to implement this policy. It is dead in the water. But for the price of an affiliation PSC has
refused to criticise Gary Smith or the GMB.
One wonders when the docile sheep who
make up PSC’s membership might find their bark and demand action from an
organisation that seems to be concerned more with building its own organisation
than building solidarity with the Palestinians.
Meanwhile back in Brighton and Hove
Unite SE/6246 branch has passed a motion condemning the TUC’s cowardice in the
face of the Zionist accusations of ‘anti-Semitism’ and Brighton and Hove District Trades Union Council has passed policy on
condemning their banning of Lowkey and instructed the Secretary to write to the
TUC demanding no further recurrence.
It would obviously be good if other
trade union branches and trades councils could do likewise.
Tony
Greenstein
"calling for Lowkey, the well known Black anti-racist"
ReplyDeleteLowkeys Iraqi, not Black.
Typically pedantic comment. Lowkey may be of Iraqi descent but when it comes to British racism he's Black. They are not counterposed
DeleteIn what way are British Iraqi's, like Lowkey, racialised as Black like people of African descent ?
DeleteMaybe in antiquity he'd be referred to using the more inclusive terms for pigmented populations - like Ethiopian - but in todays west the term 'black' is specific to people of African descent, excluding North and some East Africans like Somalis.
Lowkey is likely to suffer the same discrimination as any African or West Indies derived person. Black is political not just a pigment
DeleteThe GMB union is driven by Zionists, Tony- as you well know, when you sought to defend me against expulsion in 2019. My crime? I had declared that "Israel was a racist endeavour" and that it "exaggerated the Holocaust for political ends". Of course to say both these things is to breach the IHRA Definition of Antisemitism which Rhea Wolfson, Scottish GMB Organiser, senior JLM player and Momentum activist, put to use in convincing Gary Smith to expel me. I was their own shop steward for 24,000 NHS Lothian staff, but hey- who needs to support the workers when Israel's reputation is at stake? Thanks for exposing more of Gary Smith's actions in destroying the lives of any who fight for Palestine
ReplyDeleteYes Peter and I found it very difficult to defend your comment that Israel 'exaggerates' the Holocaust. Israel exploits the holocaust but I am not aware that it exaggerates it. Your recent article on the anti-Semitic Redress site that 'race is the issue' in Palestine is simply dire
DeleteI use the term “exaggerates” because it can mean “overemphasise” – and because the IHRA Definition proscribes it. Why should I not point this out? And why should it equate to antisemitism? Do you not agree that the IHRA incorporated this term in order to stop folk from pointing out the blindingly obvious? When Israeli universities ignore any who died in the Holocaust who were not Jewish- is that not tantamount to exaggeration, in ignoring two key factors- that most of those who were massacred opposed Zionism and that at least half were not Jews at all?
ReplyDeleteI also need to point out that your refusal to see race as a factor on the colonial project that is Israel also ignores the blindingly obvious. Firstly I ask you- What is a Jew?
1. An adherent of Judaism as a religion or culture.
2. A member of the widely dispersed people originally descended from the ancient Hebrews and sharing an ethnic heritage based on Judaism.
3. A native or inhabitant of the ancient kingdom of Judah.
Ashkenazis who follow 1. Judaism are obviously Jews. But many Ashkenazis reject the teaching of the Judaic faith. They think wearing a kippah and getting circumcised makes them Jewish.
So those who don’t follow Judaism, are assuming a heritage based on 2 or 3 to which they are not entitled. Ashkenazis hail from Khazakstan, as DNA testing proves. Most of those who govern Israel are Ashkenazis – they neither follow the Judaic faith (which forbids Jews from emigrating en masse to Palestine) nor are descended from the ancient Hebrews.
Yet they proclaim a racial right to inhabit Palestine. An argument which we in the west allow.
You think it is dire to point this out?
Peter,
ReplyDeleteknow what your explanation is for your use of 'exaggerate' (the Holocaust) was and it was not convincing. To most people 'to exaggerate' means to inflate size or numbers. If you meant 'overemphasise' then why didn't you use that word?
The fact that the IHRA use this term is not in itself a reason to use it. As Trotsky once said, just because the ruling class say X it doesn't mean we automatically say Y.
The 5th IHRA illustration of 'antisemitism' says:
'Accusing the Jews as a people, or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.'
This is probably the least objectionable of all the illustrations if one leaves out the nonsense about the 'Jews as a people' or 'Israel as a state'. If you say that the Holocaust did not happen or that there were 'only' a few hundred thousand dead that is anti-Semitic. I leave to one side people in the 3rd world who question the holocaust because they do so as a reaction to Israel's exploitation of the Holocaust.
You like a fool step into the trap that was ready made for you.
(cont)
ReplyDeleteIt's not just Israeli universities but the Zionist movement as a whole which insists that the Holocaust is a Jewish only phenomenon - but what has that go to do with exaggeration? You use words with blind indifference to their meaning. You are guilty of what Malapropism (see Sheridan's The Rivals)
My book goes into this at length and not once does it use such an inappropriate adjective. You insist on making a rod for your own back.
The behaviour of Zionists who pretend that only Jews died in the Holocaust is racist, chauvinist, selective, ahistorical and just plain bigoted. In short people like the Zionist holocaust historians like Yehuda Bauer are despicable for trying to reserve the Holocaust as a Jewish only event. However they don't exaggerate the Holocaust. If anything they minimise it.
The question of who is a Jew is irrelevant. It is a problem that the Israeli state has wrestled with for 70+ years and not come up with a solution other than to mirror the Nuremburg Laws. Now the new far-far-Right government is threatening to dismantle that accord.
The question of how to define a race, because to the Zionists Jews are a race, is impossible to answer for the simple reason that there are no races. Hence the whole basis of your argument falls flat. Races are a political and social construction.
Tony,
ReplyDeleteIf there is one thing in this world that I can be sure of, is that you will sneer at all that I do and say. The last line of any of your diatribes against me invariably ends with the phrase that whatever I do I represent no-one bar myself and that my activities damage the Palestinian cause. Pray, tell me, in the past 20 years that you have been proselytising on Palestine, what have you yourself achieved? You have made capital out of Zionism, it has provided you with a platform, made you famous, allowed you to write books and articles, but have you really achieved any change?
It feels as if only a few blessed souls get your support and I am clearly not one of them. Your condemnations are wearing thin, though. People know you dislike all that I say and do and are learning to pay no heed. If you don’t believe me, might I remind you of your efforts to get me removed from the bill for the Resist event in Liverpool on the 25th September? You failed, because the Resist steering group don’t see me as a dangerous anti-Semite, as you do. You love to “no-platform” anybody who doesn’t meet your very narrow criteria, but sadly you are crying wolf so often that political activists are learning to ignore you. I’ve pointed out to you in the past that your splittist ways are destructive to Palestinian solidarity and what you’ve written above just confirms that. You delight in attacking and dividing – maybe the term “friendly fire” might fit, but what you do in attacking fellow travellers is not friendly in the slightest.
But I’d like to feed back to you on some of the points you have attacked me on. Regarding using the term “exaggerates” when describing how Israel uses the Holocaust- don’t you think you are missing the point here? Israel supporters have put this clause into the IHRA Definition because they wanted to head off any suggestions that this might be a truism. They wanted to ensure that any suggestion that they exploit the Holocaust was put completely out of bounds. They chose the word “exaggerate” carefully, to prevent critics even considering they use the deaths of millions of Jews to justify their colonial project. I know a Jewish man in the USA who is adamant that the Holocaust didn’t happen- that there were no gas chambers in Auschwitz. Does that make him antisemitic? According to you, it does! But this man has no hostility or prejudice against Jewish people.
According to the OED, he is no antisemite. But according to you, he is. You seem to accept the IHRA Definition, which is very sad. Holocaust denial has nothing to do with antisemitism. Only you and the Zionist movement think it does. Denying the Holocaust may be upsetting for us, but it doesn’t mean the doubter is automatically a Nazi. The world is far more complex than you think.
Also, you seem to have a dubious grasp of grammar. Saying “Israel exaggerates the Holocaust for political ends” is very different from saying “The Holocaust was exaggerated”. In the first, the subject is acting on the object in a manipulative way; the second is a generalised statement purporting to be a truism. Another example might be “Trump exaggerates racism in the US for political ends” which is not the same as saying “Racism in the US is exaggerated”.
But my point here is that making comments about Israel is not – and cannot be- antisemitic. When I said “exaggerates” to Gary Smith, I wanted to provoke further debate about the IHRA definition, and I felt it was important to do so. Rather than arguing with me, you ought to recognise what is and isn’t antisemitism. I don’t think saying “Israel exaggerates the Holocaust for political ends” is antisemitic, but it feels like you do.
Peter,
DeleteNothing I say will convince you of your wrongheadedness.
Yes I thought it would be damaging to Resist to have you on the platform and so it proved. Re sist is no more.
I don't say that ALL holocaust deniers are anti-Semitic. I specifically excepted those in the 3rd world and the Arab world whose holocaust denial is a reaction to Israel justifying its war crimes wrt the holocaust. Nor would I say every European holocaust denier is an antisemite. I suspect your American friend isn't either.
But there is no doubt that when Richard Harwood/Verall of the National Front wrote 'Did 6 Million Really Die?' he didn't write it as an academic treatise but in order to try to legitimise the Nazis and their rule. The NF was a byword for antisemitism (yes they had a few Jews in their ranks and many Jews in this country even voted for them).
But the bulk of holocaust denial in this and European countries is antisemitic. Further than that I would say that the Zionists have, at times deliberately sought to magnify holocaust denial as a phenomenon to create the appearance of growing antisemitism.
However any supporter of Palestine solidarity who associates himself, however remotely with holocaust denial is no friend of the Palestinians.
You seem to think that saying 'Israel exaggerates the Holocaust for political ends' is 'very different' from saying that 'The Holocaust was exaggerated.'
Try reading it again. In both cases the Holocaust is exaggerated i.e. its numbers are inflated. Whether it is done for political or other ends. I really think you need to get a command over the English language. It might help you avoid some of the pitfalls you fall into!
You think I have made a rod for my own back, but this is a rod that you and the Zionists wield with glee. However, what I say about Israel has nothing to do with antisemitism and everything to do with Israel. It often feels to me that you enthusiastically do the Zionists’ dirty work for them. Indeed, why should they attack me, when they have you to do it for them?
ReplyDeleteAbout race. You say there are no races, but this is clearly not a view held by the rest of humanity. For instance, medics will tell you that ethnicities carry vulnerabilities. White people can’t take the sun; black people are more vulnerable to COVID. So ethnicity is definitely a thing. Try telling a black person there are no races. Yours is the view of a privileged white person who has never had to put up with being discriminated against because of the colour of your skin. Are you really denying that racism exists? If there are no races, then what is racism?
You keep repeating your theory that the British only created Israel to protect their Suez asset. It’s as if you think antisemitism had nothing to do with the creation of Israel. This is naïve in the extreme. Britain, up to the end of the war, was institutionally antisemitic. This is why so many Jews suffering at the hands of the Nazis were kept out of the UK. From 1917 onwards Britain saw Palestine as a convenient way of getting the Jews out of Europe- Hitler and Churchill were generally at one on this. There were plenty of evangelical Christians like Balfour who believed Jews belonged in Palestine. The Zionists used the bible to justify their claim, conveniently missing out the bits that decreed they could not go there en masse until the Messiah came.
Would the USA turn off the taps if they realised that Israel was not the Jewish state? If they realised that it was just a colony of (mostly) Europeans who were running an apartheid state little different from what South Africa was? Well, actually yes, I think they would. Apartheid South Africa only ended because the USA pulled the plug on the Rand. At that point Mandela’s stock magically rose, because the apartheid whites realised he was the only one that could prevent them losing everything.
Our energy needs to be focussed in making clear that Zionists have no claim to the land they say is theirs.
Amazingly you agree with me that most European Jews never came from the Middle East and so their claim of a racial connection is false. You also agree with me that if anybody is descended from the ancient Hebrews it is the Palestinians. They are victimised because they converted to Islam in the 9th Century.
I think the Palestinians would disagree with you on the matter of racial origins- they know they originate from Palestine- and they know the Zionists do not. You’ll be saying next that the Black South Africans were not aware that they were of the land, with far more rights to be there than the white settlers (or invaders, as they would see them) who treated them as lesser mortals. Race and racism go tother, you know- in spite of your wishful thinking.
You make a common mistake in believing that race and racism are the same or dependent on each other. 'Race' is an artificial construct by the supporters of European colonialism, Galton etc. to 'prove' that Europeans were biologically superior and therefore justified in colonising the 'backward' tribes and peoples of Africa etc.
DeleteThere is only one race, the human race. Racism is of course based on the false notion of races but it is the arbitrary discrimination against other peoples based on arbitrary factors such as colour, religion, appearance etc.
The Nazis believed the Jews to be a race, something only the Zionists still cling to. Or do you?
Yes ethnicities have different characteristics but ethnicity is no the same as race. Jews e.g. have a heightened susceptibility to Tays-Sachs syndrome but no one bar you would argue that they were a race.
Your confusion of race and ethnicity is typical of your political confusion.
You ask 'Would the USA turn off the taps if they realised that Israel was not the Jewish state? If they realised that it was just a colony of (mostly) Europeans who were running an apartheid state little different from what South Africa was?' Well obviously the answer is NO.
The US doesn't support Israel because it is Jewish but because it serves their interests.
The Zionists had no claim to Palestine because another people lived there. Period. It has nothing to do with false claims of a bogus racial heritage.
You note that there were many Jews in Jerusalem in 1850 but that there were no political implications. But of course then they were under the Ottoman empire, who had three court systems- one for Muslims, one for non-Muslims and the “trade court”. The state tended not to interfere with non-Muslim religious legal systems, and Jews and Christians could also use Islamic Courts if they so wished. It has been noted by so many people that under the Islamic caliphate, Christians and Jews did not suffer persecution, because Islam recognises and respects Judaic and Christian prophets; Jesus and rest feature in the Koran. The reason there were no political implications from the Jews 50% occupancy of Jerusalem is because they did not oppose Ottoman rule. They did not challenge the Arabs rights to be there- they accepted them- and they accepted Islam as the dominant religion.
ReplyDeleteYou disagree with my view that until 1940 most Jews refused to move to Israel on religious grounds. But this is precisely why, in 2,000 years of diaspora, the Jews did not wish to move en masse to Palestine. They accepted the teachings of the Torah, that there could be no return until the Messiah came. This is why most Hassidic Jews would not recognise Israel. Try googling this- it explains why Jews generally were antagonistic to the Zionist movement before WW2. I am astonished that you, the son of a rabbi, don’t know this. The Satmar sect are the only Hassidic Jews left now that utterly reject Israel- but back in 1940 their view was the one most Jews followed.
Hitler was able to gas the Jews who would not (or could not) flee to Palestine. The Zionists frequently took the role of the kapos, they helped the Nazis by encouraging the Jews not to resist fascism. Your own book describes the Judenrate, 67% Zionists, who, you wrote, “communicated the Nazis’ orders to the Jewish population and supplied information, money and labour to the Nazi occupiers”. Their “Jewish Police were ‘the most conspicuous Jewish instrument in the destructive machine.” You go on to say “The Judenrate were nearly always hostile to resistance”.
After an appeal from the Jewish Rescue Committee in Czechoslovakia, the Zionist "Jewish" Agency Executive Offices in Switzerland, refused- they responded to say that “Eretz Yisroel will be ours only by paying with blood” – and they were talking about the blood of those headed to the gas chambers.
I think this shows the Zionists “de facto” support for the Holocaust- they were determined to profit from it. In page 60 of your book you note that Ben Gurion said in 1941 that “all the significant steps in the progress of Zionism were always related to the intensification of Jewish distress.”
Do you really think it antisemitic to point out that Zionists made the Nazis job simpler? That they opposed the Nazi boycott in 1933; that they assisted in the Judenrate in keeping the Jews submissive and that (as you have pointed out), they knew they would profit from the slaughter. If you think me antisemitic for believing these things, then I am afraid that it is you yourself who have made me so.
Again, I think it is essential that you understand it is not antisemitic to condemn Zionists. It is antisemitic to condemn Jews, but by your criticism of me, I begin to fear that you do not know the difference. The Zionists were not accomplices in the Holocaust, but they were complicit. Look up the meaning: in the Havara agreement, in the Judenrate, they were “involved with others in an activity that is unlawful or morally wrong”. This is what complicit means.
Is it antisemitic to view this as support? Were they aiding the cause or policy of Nazism? I’m afraid, by opposing a worldwide boycott in 1933, when the Nazis could have been stopped, their action certainly supported the Nazis. And so they must partly bear responsibility for all that followed.
ReplyDeleteAnd I certainly never said the Jews murdered themselves. That is just plain silly.
As regards the remainder of your attacks, I’d like to point out that there are 60 members of the Campaign Against Bogus Antisemitism and that we hold regular Zoom meetings, that the members comment on anything I publish before I publish- and that I amend anything that goes out under the CABA banner accordingly. This is not just me, Tony.
And CABA has now changed its name to One Democratic Palestine- which you will no doubt, see fit to condemn in your reply. But only if you publish this response of mine on your blog. Which I suspect you won’t.
Yes the Zionists bear a very heavy responsibility for the fact that thousands, hundreds of thousands, of Jews who could have been saved died under Nazi occupation. People like Ben Gurion and Stephen Wise were war criminals in their own right. They certainly bear a moral responsibility for there not being more survivors.
ReplyDeleteHowever that is not the same as saying that Hitler gassed the Jews 'With Zionist support.' That is the Zionist accusation and once again you play into their hands.
Incidentally I know that Neturei Karta and you have friendly relations. However the idea that the Jews didn't move to Palestine for 2000 years for religious reasons is false. The reason they didn't move there was because there was no reason to do so, economically or politically. But then again I am a Marxist where as you borrow ideas from wherever you can find them
I should add that despite Peter Gregson's forecast I have published all his responses. However this discussion is now closed.
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