Palestine solidarity and Jewish opposition to Zionism

Yitzhak Luden stands in the Yiddish community center(photo: Alon Aviram) 14th November 2012

First session on the Bund with Tony Lerman and David Rosenberg

Reem Kilani

Member of the audience contributing to debate

Panel for last session

 Jews 4 Boycotting Israeli Goods AGM & National Meeting

I have often found myself thinking, as I have another AGM or meeting to attend, that I’m doing it more out of a sense of duty than because I really want to be there.  And then having gone I wished I hadn’t!

 

Saturday was different and was one of the most enjoyable meetings I’ve been to for a long time.  It was the second annual conference that J-Big has organised since it was founded in early 2010 and it was packed to the rafters, with people standing.   Nearly a 100 people attended and the conference was filmed throughout.  A short AGM was also held in the morning.  In its 3 years, J-Big has made an impact far above its (increasing numbers) and is in constant demand to send speakers or attend a picket/demonstration with our banner.   Truly J-Big has come of age.

Naomi introduces Antony Lerman and David Rosenberg

Anti-Semites such as Gilad Atzmon have tried to portray us as being only concerned with anti-Semitism and Jews.  We are according him, only in the Palestine solidarity movement as gatekeepers to keep the non-Jews in line!  Yesterday would have been a sore disappointment to Atzmon and his declining band of supporters.  Yes we are opposed to all manifestations of anti-Semitism, and all other forms of racism within the Palestine solidarity movement, but our main priority is symbolised by our slogan ‘Koshering the Boycott’.  And to nail another lie, there were a number of non-Jewish people who attended as equal participants.

The film 'Bundayim' produced by Eran Torbiner

The Conference started off, nearly on time, with a showing of the film Bundayim¸ a film on the Israeli remnants of the The Bund.  After the holocaust, some of the remnants of the Bund, the General Jewish Workers Union of Russia, Lithuania and Poland, emigrated to Israel and mainly to Tel Aviv.  There they established a library and a meeting place.  Moshe Machover told me that when Matzpen was first established in 1962 they were welcomed and held their first meeting in the Bund premises.

Bund leader in Israel

The film was, for me, an incredibly sad and moving film.  Here we saw the remnants of the mass organisation of the Jewish working class in Poland, murdered in the holocaust, holding on to their socialist principles without conceding anything to Zionism.  Those who formed the Israeli section of the Bund were either anti-Zionists or non-Zionists and Eran Torbiner, who produced the film, is a member of Israel’s Boycott from Within.

The film showed a group of about 60 people who were steadily growing older and dying off, with very few young people joining them.  Zionist nationalism, the idea that the Jewish worker has more in common with  the Jewish capitalist and boss, the fundamental idea of the Zionist concept of the ‘Jewish people’ was antithetical to the idea of socialism.  The Bund in Poland had organised autonomously, because of the particular oppression suffered by Polish Jews, but they also worked closely with the Polish Socialist Party to tackle the common enemy.  The Bund in Israel kept the memory of socialism and international solidarity alive.

Today the Zionists friends are those such as Michal Kaminiski MEP for the Law & Justice Party whose was opposed to Poland apologising for the pogrom by Poles in Jedwabne in 1941 when up to 600 Jews were burn alive in their homes and synagogue.

Afterwards there was a panel consisting of Tony Lerman, founder of the Institute of Jewish Policy Research, former member of the academic Jewish establishment and recent author of the Making and Unmaking of a Zionist. http://azvsas.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/review-making-and-unmaking-of-zionist.html and David Rosenberg, Secretary and founder member of the Jewish Socialists Group.

Audience discussion in first plenary

Tony gave a fascinating account of his own upbringing in the ‘socialist’ Zionist group Habonim-Dror and his own growing disillusionment with Zionism.  His recent book 'The Making and Unmaking of a Zionist' has been pilloried by the Jewish Establishment and its treatment in the Jewish Chronicle, where a hack Zionist Professor Hochauser, was wheeled out to make a personal attack on Lerman whilst ignoring the contents of the book itself, was par for the course.

David Rosenberg gave the background to the Bund in Poland describing how the Zionists and anti-Semites were agreed that Jews did not belong in the country where they had been born.  How in the fight against anti-Semitism, the Zionist groups were entirely missing with the exception of Left Poalei Zion, a group which I would characterise as non-Zionist.

Mad Mel P in all her glory

David described how, in the last municipal elections in 1938 before the Nazi invasion, out of 20 Jewish Council in Warsaw, the Bund won 17 (he said 16 but everything I’ve read says 17) compared to just one seat for the Zionists.  The Zionists and the Orthodox Jewish parties had simply become irrelevant as the Nazi menace loomed.

After a break there was a further panel discussion arising out of the production of a new 4 page pamphlet, Zionism and Antisemitism: Racist Political Twins which detailed how, ever since the Zionist movement was formed, it has worked hand-in-glove with anti-Semites.  Michael Deas of the Boycott National Committee was ill but his place as Chair of the discussion was taken by Michael Kalmanovitch of the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Organisation.

John Rose, author of Myths of Zionism, speaking - Michael Kamanovitch of IJAN to his left

2nd plenary with speaker from Anarchists Against the Wall

The first speaker was John Rose, an academic, member of the SWP and author of The Myths of Zionism, a book which unpicks the Zionist myths used to perpetuate the idea that Israeli Jews confront eternal Arab hatred and Israel therefore has the right to "defend itself" by any means.  It is an important book because ever since its foundation, the Israeli state has used the ‘existentialist’ threat of the surrounding Arab states in order to maintain the fiction that it is perpetually under attack and to justify its permanent state of emergency.

Speaker from Anarchists Against the Wall

The next speaker was an Israeli speaker from Anarchists Against the Wall who described most the increasingly racist nature of Israeli society and the vital role that anti-Zionist and sympathetic Israelis play in trying to halt the demolitions.

Sue Blackwell speaking

Sue Blackwell, from BRICUP (British Committee for the Universities of Palestine) spoke about the attack by Zionists in her trade union, UCU and in particular the most recent employment tribunal proceedings for race discrimination initiated by a disaffected Zionist – Ronnie Fraser.  The tribunal  proceedings we were told, by Prof. Jonathan Rosenhead of Bricup, had been transcribed by a note-taker and Sue  described how the proceedings didn’t quite follow the reporting of the Jewish Chronicle.  For example one of the examples Sue gave of the terrible ‘anti-Semitism’ that Fraser gave was the fact that at one UCU conference, no one applauded his speech!  Truly on a par with the  pogroms of Kishinev.  Perhaps he hadn’t thought of the more obvious explanation.

Sue also explained that from its very inception, many Jewish academics had given their support to the campaign to boycott Israeli universities and how, when Fraser launched his tribunal proceedings, represented by Anthony Julius of Mishcon de Reya (whose main claim to fame was that he was the solicitor for the Princess Dianne trust fund – from which he trousered some £2m for professional services).

The financing of Fraser's litigation is murky.  Anthony Julius is, apparently, representing Fraser pro bono.  But a figure of £50,000 was also mentioned as having been paid to Engage, the 'left-wing' Zionists who were created to oppose the academic boycott.  According to Fraser this originated from the "Friends" of the various Israeli universities and was channeled through the Fair Play Campaign
Group, which was set up by the Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council to fight the academic boycott.  It is possible that all that money came from donors in the UK and only went through bank accounts in the UK.  David Hirsh in his evidence denied that the money came via the Fair Play Campaign Group, though he did not deny the figure of 50K - he estimated it was spread
over 3 years. 

I spoke last and began by noting that when I had ‘come out’ as an anti-Zionist at the tender age of 16, there had been no role models.  There were virtually no Jewish anti-Zionists around and none that I knew.  Today, as this conference demonstrated, Jews in increasing numbers were rejecting Zionism and the racism and chauvinism it stood for.

Tony Greenstein - speaking in the last session

I paid tribute to Les Levidow, to an enthusiastic round of applause, for having taken on the thankless task of producing our pamphlet.  It should be invaluable.  Next time you are accused of ‘anti-Semitism’ you can cite Israel’s first Minister of Justice, Pinhas Rosenbluth, that Palestine is an ‘Institute for the Fumigation of Jewish Vermin’.  Only the Nazis and their ilk referred to Jews as ‘vermin’ but the Zionists shared the anti-Semitic idea that Jews were strangers in other peoples’ lands and had developed ‘asocial’ characteristics as a result of their ‘exile’.  I also pointed out that the main friends of Zionism today were the establishment and right-wing.  It is no accident that the English Defence League marches with Israeli flags, that Nick Griffin calls the BNP the most pro-Israeli political party and that most European far-right or fascist parties support Israel.  As we know, Andres Breivik, the fascist mass murderer from Norway, was a devoted supporter of Zionism and Israel.
In the evening we had a cabaret act from Melanie Philips aka our very own Debora Fink and then the noted Palestinian musician Reem Kilani performed as did other Palestinian artists.

Audience members dancing to the band

I also cited, in an earlier contribution, the fact that the Zionists, when faced with a choice of saving Jews or building a Jewish state had without hesitation opted for the latter.  Even Shabtai Teveth, the official biographer of David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first Prime Minister, had noted his complete indifference and worse to the holocaust.  He wrote in The Burning Ground 1886-1948 p. 851 that:

'If there was a line in Ben-Gurion's mind between the beneficial disaster and an all-destroying catastrophe, it must have been a very fine one.'  Ben-Gurion's whole philosophy had been to turn the disaster of the holocaust to 'positive' effect by erecting a 'Jewish' state.  Rescue was the last thing on his mind.  And if it be though that the first Prime Minister and Chair of the Jewish Agency was an aberration I referred to the President of the Zionist Organisation and first  President of the Israeli state, Chaim Weizmann, who remarked of William Evans-Gordon, who founded the British Brothers League, an anti-Semitic group dedicated to keeping the Jewish refugees from the pogroms out of Britain, that the Jews were sometimes hard on him!  [Trial & Error, Autobiography of Chaim Weizmann).

I also touched on the 'Zionisation' of the holocaust.  How according to Zionist ideologues like Anita Shapira, the 'Princess of Zionism', Jewish history could only be understood on 'national' ground.  So only Zionist historians based in Israel could understand the true meaning of the extermination of the Jews by the Nazis, even though it had taken place in Europe not Palestine.

Reem Kilani - the noted Palestinian musician - was abled to come at the last minute and perform

Leila contributes to debate

 Despite its ritual accusations of 'anti-Semitism' Zionism is and  remains a Jewish mirror image of anti-Semitism.

Moshe Machover, a founder of Matzpen, gave a very moving and inspiring tribute to his late comrade Akiva Orr, who died on February 9th 2013.  Akiva who had been born in Berlin in 1931 and come to Palestine in 1934, was the child on non-Zionist parents.  Akiva had served in the Israeli navy during the 1948 war but see little action but he had later joined the Merchant Navy and been one of the leaders of the 1950-1 Seaman's Strike in Israel when the Israeli navy was deployed to defeat the strikers.  Their enemy was Histadrut, which owned both the main shipping line (Zim) and was also the workers' trade union.  The strikers were castigated as no different from the fedayeen (guerillas).  Akiva became a noted speaker and authored 'The UnJewish State'.

Leila and Mad Mel P

In the evening we had a variety of entertainers including Mad Mel Phillips aka Deborah Fink, a Palestinian band and a guess appearance from Reem Kilani, the noted Palestinian singer songwriter.

Entertainment in the evening

Entertainment was provided in the evening by a band

A number of us retired at 7.30 to a nearby restaurant after a thoroughly enjoyable day.  On Sunday there was a second conference, organised by Glynn Secker, with people like Ilan Pappe and Moshe Machover speaking.

Tony Greenstein

The Murder of Prisoner X

The ‘only democracy in the Middle East’ imprisons a man secretly without trial and doesn’t announce the death for 3 years – for ‘national security reasons’

Israel's maximum security Ayalon prison where Prisoner X was hanged

Many are the rumours about Prisoner X, who we learn died 3 years ago in Israel’s top security Ayalon prison. What we do know is that he was an Australian and almost certainly worked for Mossad (equivalent of MI6). The reports below outline what is believed to have happened but what is known is that he was imprisoned without trial in 2010 for 10 months, in a cell in which it would have been impossible to commit suicide. News of his detention was subject to Israel’s draconian censorship laws and 3 years later Israeli officials are remaining tight-lipped about any details of the matter. Israeli papers have been forbidden even now to name him.

But none of this has prevented the Prime Minister of ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’ Netanyahu from proclaiming that ‘We are an exemplary democratic state, and we protect the rights of the interrogated and individual rights no less than any other country’. 

Zygier with cronies and accomplices

I sometimes wonder whether people like Netanyahu deliberately twist words into their opposite deliberately or whether lying comes naturally to such creatures. An ‘exemplary’ democratic state never detains people secretly and without trial. That is the stuff of police states and states where there is a thin veneer of democracy covering the mailed fist.

The fate of Ben Zygier is of no concern to me. He sounds as if he was a reprehensible person who was also greedy. What is of concern is that Netanyahu and the gamut of Israeli politicians justify what they do on account of being under attack whereas of course it is Israel which regularly attacks its neighbours whilst imagining it is the one under attack.

The laws under which Zygier was detained were the Emergency Defence Regulations of the British, who had used them when they ruled over Palestine.  At the time the Zionists, in particular the first Justice Minister, Pinhas Rosenbluth, described them as 'Nazi' in character.

Tony Greenstein

'Prisoner X' took part in Mossad operation of killing Hamas operative in Dubai?

February 14, 2013 22:25

Australian newspapers lead their front pages in Australia on February 14, 2013, with the story of Ben Zygier as Israel confirms it jailed a foreigner in solitary confinement on security grounds who later committed suicide, with Australia admitting it knew one of its citizens had been detained (AFP Photo / William West)

Another layer has been added to Israel’s ‘Prisoner X’ spy story, as new details shed light on Ben Zygier’s dealings with Mossad. An Israeli lawyer says the man – who took his own life in a jail cell – did not seem like he was at risk of suicide.

Zygier’s associations with Mossad are still cloudy, as media agencies report different accounts of his previous work with the organization.

According to Kuwaiti newspaper Al Jarida, Zygier reportedly took part in the 2010 killing of Hamas operative Mahmoud al-Mahbouh in Dubai and offered the government information about the operation in return for the United Arab Emirates’ protection.

Australia’s Fairfax Media reports that Australian security officials suspected Zygier may have been about to disclose Israeli intelligence operations – including the use of fraudulent Australian passports – to the Australian government or the media.

The Israeli government has not confirmed or denied Zygier’s association with Mossad. However, Zygier himself reportedly confided in at least two friends that he had been recruited by Mossad.

"He told me he’d just been recruited," a friend close to Zygier told Haaretz. "I was in shock. It’s the sort of thing people usually joke about but I had no reason to doubt him at all."
Zygier’s suicide has shed light on Mossad’s recruitment of foreign-born Jews who could spy under cover on their native passports.

Mossad has come under criticism many times for using the passports and identities of citizens of foreign countries. And despite repeated promises to stop the practices, it seems the organization is refusing to change its ways.

Just one year ago, The Times of London published two accounts of young men who had emigrated to Israel from Britain and France. During their IDF service, both men were approached by a woman who identified herself as a Mossad official who asked the gentlemen to "lend" their passports for about 18 months while they were still in the army. Once the men reclaimed their passports, they contained stamps from countries including Russia, Azerbaijan, and Turkey, Haaretz reports.

Australian newspapers lead their front pages in Australia on February 14, 2013, with the story of Ben Zygier as Israel confirms it jailed a foreigner in solitary confinement on security grounds who later committed suicide, with Australia admitting it knew one of its citizens had been detained

(AFP Photo / William West)

­Suspicions from Australia
Zygier was one of at least three Australian-Israeli citizens under investigation by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization over suspicions of espionage for Israel, according to Australian media.

Canberra complained to Tel Aviv in 2010 after Dubai said forged Australian passports were used by the Mossad team. Mahbouh’s killers also had British, Irish, French, and German passports, according to authorities in the United Arab Emirates.

In at least seven cases, it turned out that the passports belonged to Jews who had emigrated to Israel from Britain and Germany. These people were unaware that their identities were being used by Mossad officials in Dubai, Haaretz reported. The identities of at least three Australians had also been used.
­
More questions than answers

While media agencies report that Prisoner X was, in fact, 34-year-old Ben Zygier, the Israeli government has failed to mention Zygier by name – stating only that a man with dual citizenship was held under a false name for "security reasons."

Attorney Avigdor Feldman, who met with Zygier a day before he committed suicide, said this very fact raised a red flag.

"I saw this as something inappropriate but I did not take legal measures, based on the assumption that he was in the good hands of the lawyers who were representing him," he told Channel 10 Television.

Fedman said Zygier was charged with "grave crimes" and that there were ongoing negotiations for a plea bargain. He did not elaborate as to which "crimes" Zygier had allegedly committed, but said "his status was ‘detained until the completion of proceedings,'" Haaretz reported.
"His interrogators told him he could expect lengthy jail-time and be ostracized from his family and the Jewish community,"   Feldman said. "There was no heart string they did not pull, and I  suppose that ultimately brought about the tragic end."

But despite Zygier’s situation, Feldman did not believe Zygier was at risk of taking his own life.
"To my mind, he sounded rational and focused and he spoke to the point. He did not display any special feeling of self-pity", he said.

The headstone of Ben Zygier is photographed in the Chevra Kadisha Jewish Cemetery, in Melbourne on February 14, 2013 (AFP Photo / Martin Philbey)

The attorney was hired by the prisoner’s family to help negotiate a plea bargain. During their meeting, Zygier maintained his innocence to Feldman, but was anxious about the trial.

"He was facing a judiciary crossroads and he asked me to give my opinion about his decision as well…he had been informed that he could very likely expect to be sentenced to an extremely lengthy prison term and to be shunned by his family – and this affects a person’s soul," said the attorney.

Feldman remains critical of how the authorities handled Zygier’s detention. "Those responsible for him should have taken clear steps to watch over him, especially because he was far from the public eye. The end of the affair is something that needs to be investigated."

Yet, an Israeli court maintains that no rights were broken during the detention.
"The proceedings on the matter were followed by the most senior Justice Ministry officials and the prisoners' individual rights were kept, subject to the provisions set by law" the Israeli court statement said.

However, Israel's Justice Ministry says a court has ordered an inquiry into possible negligence in Zygier's death.

The fresh details come after the Israeli government eased a gag order relating to the case. It was lifted after activists, journalists, and politicians protested the order which prevented journalists from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) from reporting about Zygier.

The top-secret case has raised more questions than answers. Australia and Israel must now try to determine what circumstances caused 34-year-old Zygier to move to Israel, supposedly be recruited by Mossad, find himself detained in 2010, jailed secretly for months, and, uiltimately, take his own life.

Despite the new information, no concrete answers have been given by the Israeli government regarding why Zygier was detained, whether he was working for Mossad, or why he resorted to suicide. And of course the question on everyone’s minds remains: Why is it all such a big secret? 　

Israel's 'Prisoner X' May Have Passed State Secrets

by Krishnadev Calamur

February 18, 2013
Last week we told you about "Prisoner X," the mysterious Israeli-Australian citizen who worked for Israel's spy agency Mossad. Australian media broke the story of how the man identified as Ben Zygier languished for months in an Israeli prison until he was found dead of an apparent suicide. Now we have new details on the case.

The Australian Broadcasting Corp. has been covering the story. Here's its report:

"Suspected Mossad agent Ben Zygier was arrested by his own spymasters after they believed he told Australia's domestic intelligence agency about every aspect of his work with the Israelis, sources say.

"The ABC's Foreign Correspondent program understands that Zygier met with ASIO officers in Australia and gave comprehensive detail about a number of Mossad operations, including plans for a top-secret mission in Italy that had been years in the making.

"It is unknown who initiated the contact.

"Sources have told the ABC that on one of four trips back to Australia in the years before his death in 2010, Mr. Zygier — who also used the surnames Alon, Allen and Burrowes — applied for a work visa to Italy."

Zygier is believed to have been arrested in 2010 and held in Israel's maximum-security Ayalon prison. He apparently took his own life 10 months later.

NPR's Larry Abramson discussed the case last week with Robert Siegel, host of All Things Considered. Here's what he said

"He was Ben Zygier ... an Australian Jew, migrated to Israel around the age of 18. He joined the army and then the Mossad. And now, we don't really know what he was doing for the Mossad, of course, because that's all secret. But when he was 34, in 2010, he was arrested, and we don't know exactly why. He was held in Israel's famous Ayalon prison and apparently faced some serious charges.

"He was held under a false name, which is not unheard of in Israel, but it's rare. And apparently, that was with his own consent, partly to protect his own family. He was in a specially designed cell meant to protect against suicide, but he managed to hang himself somehow in 2010. A handful of people knew that this was going on in Israel, but thanks to a judicial gag order, most Israelis knew nothing about this until this past week."

As Larry said in that conversation, Zygier was one of three Australian émigrés who traveled back and forth from Australia, changing their names and getting new passports. Zygier is said to have changed his name three times.

"These men may have been using these passports to go to places that Israelis can't normally go to, like Syria and Iran for their Mossad work," Larry said.

There has been a strong reaction to the case in Israel. As Larry told Robert:
"Well, you know, Israelis are used to a lot of secrecy here, but I think even they are sometimes surprised at some of the goings-on and the fact that somebody was held, you know, all these years ago, committed suicide, and nobody knew about it. There has been outrage about the idea that in a democracy like Israel you can still have secret arrests and a secret trial, but it does turn out that Zygier did have access to attorneys."

On Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made his first comment about the case. He noted that Israel is "not like other states."

"We are an exemplary democratic state, and we protect the rights of the interrogated and individual rights no less than any other country," he said. "But we are also more threatened and face more challenges, and thus we must maintain the proper activities of our security services. Therefore I ask of everyone: Let the security forces continue to do their work undisturbed, so that we can continue to live in security and tranquility in the State of Israel." 

Prisoner X Was From My Shtetl

Melbourne’s Jews confront the mysterious death of one of their own, Ben Zygier, in an Israeli prison

On Tuesday morning East Coast time, an Australian news program ran an explosive story claiming that Israel’s Prisoner X, the Jewish state’s most infamous prisoner, was an Australian citizen named Ben Zygier. The story has all the hallmarks of a classic spy novel: forged passports, espionage, information suppression, and accusations of treason. But the tale of Prisoner X—who died under mysterious circumstances in 2010 in solitary confinement, having allegedly hanged himself in the maximum security cell built for Yitzhak Rabin’s assassin—is not only riveting for its John Le Carré flourishes. To me, it’s also shocking because Ben Zygier is a Jew from the small, tight-knit community in Melbourne where I grew up.

The question of how Zygier, raised by a prominent Zionist family, came to be imprisoned by the Israeli government in the harshest, most isolating conditions possible is one that is now dominating conversations in every quarter of the Melbourne Jewish community. Worldwide, there’s been a tsunami of media coverage, speculating on everything from the reason for his imprisonment—the dominant narrative was that he was a Mossad agent who betrayed Israel—to the whereabouts of hisIsraeli wife and two young children. But among Melbourne’s Jews these questions have a slightly different tenor—one of distress and sympathy for the Zygier family. In quiet conversations, everyone is wondering: How did this happen to one of ours?
People often describe the Melbourne Jewish community as a shtetl or a village, and it’s not hard to see why. Affectionately known as the "Bagel Belt," it’s a cluster of affluent, upper-middle-class suburbs about 10 kilometers south-east of the city. Malvern—where the Zygier family lives—is a lovely, leafy grid of Victorian homes and private schools. From there it’s a short drive to East Saint Kilda, known for its full-scale replica of 770 Eastern Parkway, the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s headquarters, and Elsternwick, where I grew up, which has three Jewish bakeries and one bagel shop within 100 meters of each other.

The proximity isn’t just geographic. Jewish Melbourne is a place where everyone knows everything about everyone else: What they cooked for Shabbos dinner, what their university entrance exam score was, why they’re embroiled in a broyges (dispute) with the president of their shul. It’s not dissimilar to Teaneck or Skokie, but it’s also very unique, because the community is mostly comprised of the children and grandchildren of Polish Holocaust survivors. The trauma of the war—and the threat, whether real or imagined, of the re-emergence of virulent anti-Semitism—runs deep in the bones of the community, which has trained its own private security group, the CSG, to protect its schools, synagogues, institutions, and events. That history helps explain the depth of Zionist commitment among Jews from Melbourne, and Australia generally. (The Jewish Agency estimates that 9,000 Jews have made aliyah from Australia, a high percentage for a community now numbering 97,000.)
The Zygier name is well-known in the community: Geoffrey Zygier, Ben’s father, was once the head of the JCCV, the most important Jewish organization in the state of Victoria, of which Melbourne is the capital. He’s currently the executive director of the B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission, the Australian equivalent of the ADL. The JCCV and the ADC, like almost every Jewish institution in Australia, are politically conservative and ardently pro-Israel. David Langsam, a Jewish journalist in Melbourne acquainted with Zygier, described him as "an exceptionally decent man … generous and polite, even when disagreeing on Middle East policy."
Ben attended Bialik, a secular Zionist day school with a reputation for academic excellence and privilege, and was a member of Hashomer Hatzair, or Hashy, as it’s known in Australia. After high school he went to Israel with Hashy on Shnat, a gap-year program popular with graduates of Zionist youth movements, who return home to lead meetings and camps for children in their communities. It’s not uncommon for "Shnatties" to return to Australia vowing to make aliyah and serve in the IDF, and many of them—including Ben Zygier and a number of my friends—have done so.
Though many people from my community were to connected to Ben Zygier, most people were reluctant to speak on the record about the Prisoner X story, citing personal connections to Ben’s family or a desire to remain respectfully quiet in light of the their grief. Melbourne Jews are tight-knit and extremely protective of their privacy as a community, so it isn’t surprising to see people are closing ranks in support of the Zygier family. The sympathy for their loss is profound, even urgent: Not only did they suffer the death of their child in 2010, they’re now witnessing a global interrogation of his character.

At the time of Ben’s death, I remember hearing vague reports of a young Australian man who had died in mysterious circumstances in Israel. People in the community have told me that there were rumors circulating that he had committed suicide—but even the word rumor seems too sensationalist, as his death was only discussed in the most discreet language, with utmost respect for the family’s grief and privacy. Given the family’s silence, all we know now is what the papers are reporting: Zygier was arrested and held in detention for several months in 2010, presumably for having grievously compromised Israeli state security. He was found hanged in his cell in December of that year.

On Facebook there are tornadoes of conjecture whirling around and around on repeat. "Those who know what’s going on aren’t saying anything," said Langsam, "and those who don’t know what’s going on are discussing it nonstop on social media." On Thursday, anonymous statements from friends started to trickle into the media, but the veil of secrecy cast over the case by the Israeli government seems to have been extended by default to Melbourne.

Anthony Frosh, an editor of a popular community blog, Galus Australis, told me that "there are two prevailing reactions right now: those who are defensive of Israel, who say it’s a media beat-up that has been sensationalized, and those who think we have a responsibility to demand justice." How will this scandal affect the faith of Australian Jews in Israel, the country many have given their children to? And on the flip side, how will this affect the relationship between the Jewish community and the Australian government, which was strained in 2010 by the revelation that several Jewish Australians had willingly handed their passports over to the Israeli government for use in security exercises?

It seems that a rupture is unlikely to occur. There’s certainly a diversity of political opinion in the Australian Jewish community, but the majority of the people, and certainly the leadership, tends toward defending Israel at all costs.

I was up late last night trawling the Internet for fresh news on the case of Prisoner X. Mostly I read the same information again and again, recycled by different media outlets and news agencies, and I found myself seriously pondering for the first time the phrase "X marks the spot." As a symbol it seeks to nullify and eliminate, but it also draws attention to itself; to what lies beneath the surface. It’s an apt metaphor for not just the disappearance of Ben Zygier, but for his community’s response to his disappearance: seeing but not seeing, speaking but not speaking

Lubavitch Rabbi: Jewish Children in the Holocaust were responsible for their Own Deaths in the Holocaust

Rabbi Manis Friedman Agrees with Pastor Hagee - It wasn't Hitler but the Victims Who Were Responsible for their Deaths

The poisonous Rabbi Manis Friedman of Lubavitch/Chabad

It is fair to say that the Orthodox Hasidic sect, Lubavitch, the antics of whose rabbis this blog has regularly covered, [see e.g. ‘Big Questions – Gerald Scarfe's Cartoon and 'anti-Semitism'] are embarrassed by the latest words of wisdom of Rabbi Manis Friedman. According to Friedman ‘Not a single Jewish child died because of the Nazis … they died in their relationship with God’ It’s not that Chabad’s leaders disagree with him, quite the contrary. It’s simply that there are some things that are best left unsaid. It is an article of faith for many if not most Orthodox Zionist sects and Lubavitch is the most Zionist of all, that it was the sins of the Jews themselves that was responsible for the holocaust.

Michal Kaminski, the rightwing Polish leader, speaks at the European Conservatives and Reformists Group event at the Tory party conference in Manchester. Photograph: Martin Argles

The idea that even Jewish children were responsible for their own murder is something that even the most rabid anti-Semites would shrink from saying. Not however Chabad Rabbi Manis Friedman, who has previously justified the murder of non-Jewish children [see ‘Chabad rabbi: Jews should kill Arab men, women and children during war and the sexual abuse of children in general.

Witness the hypocritical denunciations of the anti-Semitic jazzman, Gilad Atzmon, by the Zionists for what he said in his article Saying No to the Hunters of Goliath 

The real Zionist attitude to the Jews of the Holocaust

'the Jewish state and the sons of Israel are at least as unpopular in the Middle East as their grandparents were in Europe just six decades ago. Seemingly, it is the personification of WW2 and the Holocaust that blinded the Israelis and their supporters from internalising the real meaning of the conditions and the events that led towards their destruction in the first place.’ 

Atzmon meant to draw a straight line between the racism of the Israeli state today and the reason for anti-Semitism in Europe in order to find some ‘explanation’ or justification for the holocaust.
That Atzmon’s comments were anti-Semitic is undoubted. But it would be fair to say that they are minor and trivial in comparison with the deep racism and anti-Semitism of Rabbi Manis Friedman and the other Zionist rabbis, inside and outside Lubavitch. [see Why are John Mearsheimer and Richard Falk Endorsing a Blatantly Anti-Semitic Book?]

John Hagee

Indeed the nearest comparison to Rabbi Manis Friedman’s comments that I can think of are the comments of Pastor John Hagee of Christians United for Israel:

‘"Theodore Herzl is the father of Zionism. He was a Jew who at the turn of the 19th century said, this land is our land, God wants us to live there. So he went to the Jews of Europe and said 'I want you to come and join me in the land of Israel.' So few went that Hertzel went into depression. Those who came founded Israel; those who did not went through the hell of the holocaust.

"Then god sent a hunter. A hunter is someone with a gun and he forces you. Hitler was a hunter. And the Bible says -- Jeremiah writing -- 'They shall hunt them from every mountain and from every hill and from the holes of the rocks,' meaning there's no place to hide. And that might be offensive to some people but don't let your heart be offended. I didn't write it, Jeremiah wrote it. It was the truth and it is the truth. How did it happen? Because God allowed it to happen. Why did it happen? Because God said my top priority for the Jewish people is to get them to come back to the land of Israel."

It’s ironic that both Atzmon and Hagee use the metaphor of the Hunter.  The clear message is that Hitler was fulfilling god’s desires to force the Jews to Israel – a key part of the whole Christian evangelical belief that the second coming of Jesus can only occur when the Jews return to the Holy Land. It is difficult to think of a more anti-Semitic diatribe. 

In another sermon, Hagee blamed American economic problems on the fact that the  Federal Reserve System is controlled by "a group of Class A stockholders, including the Rothschilds." In the same series, Hagee further asserted that the Rothschilds, who are Jewish, were part of a wide-ranging conspiracy of "international power brokers based in Europe’ .  As is normally the case a good anti-Semite is also a good Zionist.  On page 149 of his book Jerusalem Countdown, in a chapter entitled 'Who Is a Jew?', Hagee writes:

"It was Esau's descendants who produced the half-breed Jews of history who have persecuted and murdered the Jews beyond human comprehension ... Adolf Hitler was a distant descendant of Esau."[45] 

However this did not stop leading Zionists from defending him, Israel firsters, for whom any amount of anti-Semitism can be excused so long as the purveyor is a Zionist.  Indeed they rushed to defend Hagee. See ‘Jewish allies of the Rev. John Hagee rushed to his defense yesterday to say the Texas evangelist is not anti-Semitic despite Sen. John McCain campaign’s repudiation Thursday of the evangelist’s endorsement' and Jews defend Hagee’s words.

In much the same way, the capitalists of the Jewish Leadership Council in this country supported the anti-Semitic Polish MEP Michal Kaminski against charges of anti-Semitism.  Hagee had defended the actions of Poles in murdering hundreds of Jews in Jedwabne in 1941. 

As the Jewish Chronicle reported 'the decision by Vivian Wineman, president of the Board of Deputies, to send a letter to David Cameron seeking reassurances about the Tories’ new allies, has caused a rift with the Jewish Leadership Council. One JLC member described colleagues as “livid” at the timing of the letter. Another said he was “incandescent”.

The Guardian reported how Dean Godson, a research director at the Tory Policy Exchange thinktank, bitterly attacked Wineman, President of the Board of Deputies and Labour peer Greville Janner (who criticised the Tories' links with Robert Zile of Latvia, another MEP, who has regularly attended commemorations of the Waffen-SS).  Is Michal Kaminski fit to lead the Tories in Europe?

And according to Los Angeles talk show  host Dennis Prager, "John Hagee is one of the Jewish people’s best friends," "Identifying John Hagee with anti-Semitism would be like identifying Raoul Wallenberg, the great Swede who saved thousands of Jews in the Holocaust, with anti-Semitism."

Even more remarkable is the Letter of Support from Leading figures in Netanya Academic College - May 27, 2008 for Hagee:

Dear Pastor Hagee,

We saw the different publications vilifying your character, and we all felt the need to object and protest thus expressing personally our recognition and esteem to your enterprise, your doing and to your unconditional love to the People of Israel and to the State of Israel.

We all feel that these publications remind us the darkest times of our nation, when rivals from inside and out tried to besmirch the Holy Scriptures, our public systems and the leadership of the Jewish nation. These publications were in the focus of terrible slanders that ended in many disasters for our People.

We see in you a man of truth and a true friend, whose doings and sayings always come from a loving heart and out of true faith. We see you as the appropriate and desirable leader to your flock in these difficult times, and we stand by you.  

Orthodox Rabbi Aryeh Scheinberg, of Congregation Rodfei Sholom in San Antonio, appeared at an afternoon press conference yesterday to say Mr. Hagee's "words were twisted and used to attack him for being anti-Semitic."

Likewise David Saperstein in the Washington Post Hagee's Jewish Endorsers ‘Nonetheless, it had become common to find Jewish leaders joining in Pastor Hagee's "Salute to Israel" events around the country and paying public tribute and homage to the pastor for his efforts.’  See John Hagee
What is the basis of this racism? It is the idea that Jews, or anyone else, as individuals count for nothing. What matters is the achievement of a state, a racial state, because no one can pretend that Jews worldwide form a nation except Zionist lunatics and neo-Nazis (it is a fundamental part of the international Jewish conspiracy theory that the Nazis were wedded too that Jewry, wherever it lived, constituted an organic body, a conspiracy. Hence the Nuremburg Laws made it clear that there were no Germans of the Jewish faith but Jews living as aliens in Germany. Something else that the Zionists agree with too.

Hence it is common amongst the religious orthodox, such as Mr Avraham Greenbaum, former Deputy Director-General of the religious University of Bar-Ilan in Tel Aviv, to make a comparison between ‘assimilation’ i.e. Jews marrying non-Jews or simply integrating into the host community and Hitler’s extermination of Europe’s Jews. After all both were ‘lost’ to Judaism, except for the minor fact that those who were assimilated did so freely and without persecution, whereas those who died in the holocaust were anything but free.

But a racist movement such as Zionism, whose racism today is of course expressed vs the Palestinians, began its journey as a movement which assimilated to itself the anti-Semitic perspective.

Tony Greenstein

Survivors Outraged Over Holocaust Remarks Made By Chabad's Rabbi Manis Friedman

"Who in fact died and who remained alive had nothing to do with the Nazis," Rabbi Manis Friedman stated in a speech delivered in Melbourne in the 1980s. "Not a single Jewish child died because of the Nazis … they died in their relationship with God.…Bad things did not happen to our grandparents … No evil befell them."
Timna Jacks • Australian Jewish News
HOLOCAUST survivors have expressed their outrage that the US rabbi who apologised last week for likening sexual abuse to diarrhoea, has failed to say sorry for claiming the Shoah was part of a Divine plan and that the Nazis weren’t to blame.

"Who in fact died and who remained alive had nothing to do with the Nazis," Rabbi Manis Friedman stated in a speech delivered in Melbourne in the 1980s. "Not a single Jewish child died because of the Nazis … they died in their relationship with God."

Rabbi Friedman’s address – a transcript of which was obtained this week by The AJN from the Jewish Holocaust Centre’s (JHC) archives – was part of a 90-minute lecture delivered before community members at a Toorak home during a trip sponsored by the Yeshivah Centre’s Women of Valour Committee in Melbourne.

"Bad things did not happen to our grandparents … No evil befell them," Rabbi Friedman said.

The rabbi was at the centre of a controversy two weeks ago, for a clip on YouTube, in which he said victims of sexual abuse learn "an important lesson" from the crime and that they’re "not that damaged".

The issue stirred the memories of Shoah survivors and educators, who contacted The AJN to discuss the rabbi’s track record. Survivor and JHC guide Moshe Fiszman, still enraged by Rabbi Friedman’s remarks about the Holocaust, said the comments were "immoral".

"For someone who witnessed all that hell, who went through as many camps as I went through … to read and hear that is just … I don’t know. I cannot explain to you how I feel, there is no way," the 91-year-old said.

At the time, survivors lodged complaints against the rabbi with Chabad authorities and Rabbi Friedman has not been invited back to Melbourne.

Holocaust survivor and guide at the JHC Abe Goldberg said Rabbi Friedman’s implication that the Holocaust was part of a Divine plan is "blasphemy".

"There is no question that Hitler was the one responsible for it."

Referring to Rabbi Friedman’s official apology for comments he made about sexual abuse, Goldberg said: "Suddenly he is apologising? He never apologised before. Why does he only apologise now?"

Rabbi Friedman has failed to respond to requests for a comment on his remarks about the Holocaust.

J-Big Conference on Palestine Solidarity, BDS and Jewish Opposition to Zionism

 Palestine solidarity and Jewish opposition to Zionism

Saturday 2 March 2013, 24 Greencoat Place, London SW1P 1RD

£10 (concessions £5)  Reservations by email to jews4big@gmail.com
Cheques to J-BIG, 4 Crestway Parade, The Crestway, Brighton, BN1 7BL
Bank transfers to Unity Trust Bank, sort code 08-60-01, account number 20241234

CONFERENCE PROGRAMME

1.00   Welcome, registration, tea and coffee

1.15   Jewish values are not at odds with Palestinian rights
  
BUNDA’IM, a short film (48 minutes) introducing the last comrades of the Bund mass movement. Exterminated in Europe and ignored in Israel, its ideas live on.
The screening will be immediately followed by discussion with:
 David Rosenberg – Editorial Committee, Jewish Socialist magazine
 Antony Lerman – author of The Making and Unmaking of a Zionist

This session will deal with aspects of Zionism and Bundism in pre-WWII Poland, how Zionist leaders have marginalised Bundism in the diaspora, the relationship between Zionism and the universalist, humanitarian philosophy central to much Jewish thinking,  Zionist attacks on proponents of Jewish universalism, conflating antisemitism with opposition to Zionism.

3.15 Refreshment break

3.45 Panel discussion – BDS: imperative for all who uphold Palestinian rights, Jew or non-Jew

Sue Blackwell, British Committee for the Universities of Palestine (BRICUP)
The Universities and Colleges Union faces concerted Zionist attack for its willingness to debate BDS and refusal to apply the so-called EUMC working definition of antisemitism which seeks to outlaw criticism of Israel.

Michael Deas, coordinator in Europe for the Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC)
Why BDS is central to the anti-racist, anti-colonialist Palestinian struggle; the PACBI and BNC calls; defending the movement against Zionist attack.

John Rose, author of The Myths of Zionism
Unpicking the Zionist myths used to perpetuate the idea that Israeli Jews confront eternal Arab hatred and Israel therefore has the right to "defend itself" by any means.

Tony Greenstein or Les Levidow , Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods (J-BIG)
Why it was necessary for J-BIG to publish Zionism and Antisemitism: Racist Political Twins.

5.30  Refreshment break

6.00  Entertainment compered by Deborah Fink, “The Diva with a Difference”
Music from Leon Rosselson and others (including possible guest appearance from Reem Kelani)

7 pm - Finish