A Jew in Bristol
[Bristol] Maccabean | 08.06.2010 19:22
For years the small Jewish community in Bristol has kept a low profile. In recent years a real feeling of unease has prevailed as a result of the viciousness in which the media and so called local 'peace activists' have potrayed Israel.
In 2008 Israel invaded Gaza to stop the relentless missile attacks against Israeli cities and civilians. Since 2001 over 12000 missiles were fired from Gaza. That’s twelve thousand! During this long overdue action the media (which ignored the plights of hundreds of thousands of Israelis living in fear and bomb shelters for years) and peace activist immediately went into overdrive to condemn and demonise Israel.
In Bristol a protest match was organised against Israel. I was obviously upset at the vicious one sided nature of these so called peace activists and decided to gather my Israeli flag and print out a fact sheet to hand out to better inform those that were interested.
My arrival was at first met with confusion and curiosity. As soon as they realised what I was doing things changed. I was soon met with angry looks and when I tried to engage the participants in a calm and reasoned manner I met with anger and hostility. As the march began and I followed the hostility grew to a truly disturbing level. I was accused of being a 'dirty Jew baby killer' and a 'cockroach'. As the police witnessed this hostility they were forced to escort me alongside the protesters.
What I met that day was not a reasonable act of protesting a war. I saw the face of deep-rooted and vicious anti-Semitism. I was there to show my support for Israel and the material I was handing out was not inflammatory it was a simple list of facts pertaining to what Israel had and was willing to sacrifice for Peace and what they endured at the hands of the Hamas terrorist organisation who took over Gaza in a bloody coup and were using it as a base for terror against Israel.
After the recent flotilla incident once again we saw this explosion of condemnation and vilification of Israel with no regards to the facts of the situation. It is a very scary time for those of us who understand what is happening and its roots. We are being pushed into a corner as the media and activist can do and say what they want against Israel with impunity. It is so blatantly one sided and inflammatory and at times is reminiscent of the anti semetic blood libels that resulted in a bloody history for the Jews.
I want Peace in Israel as do the vast majority of Israelis. We have shown our willingness to compromise again and again for peace and each time have been met with cynical violence. The fact is that a large part of the Islamic world still does not accept the nationhood of Israel. Only the complete annihilation of the Jewish people will change that fact. Unfortunately some of our neighbours still publically state that desire.
I feel obligated as a Jewish Israeli in Bristol to take a stand and not let this dangerous attitude go unanswered. If you are a peace activist in Bristol and would rather have a level and informed understanding from someone who has lived and worked with both sides I welcome you to contact me and we can talk. If you prefer to propagate sifted truths and hate filled libels then that is your choice but if I can I will answer that as well. Shalom.
In 2008 Israel invaded Gaza to stop the relentless missile attacks against Israeli cities and civilians. Since 2001 over 12000 missiles were fired from Gaza. That’s twelve thousand! During this long overdue action the media (which ignored the plights of hundreds of thousands of Israelis living in fear and bomb shelters for years) and peace activist immediately went into overdrive to condemn and demonise Israel.
In Bristol a protest match was organised against Israel. I was obviously upset at the vicious one sided nature of these so called peace activists and decided to gather my Israeli flag and print out a fact sheet to hand out to better inform those that were interested.
My arrival was at first met with confusion and curiosity. As soon as they realised what I was doing things changed. I was soon met with angry looks and when I tried to engage the participants in a calm and reasoned manner I met with anger and hostility. As the march began and I followed the hostility grew to a truly disturbing level. I was accused of being a 'dirty Jew baby killer' and a 'cockroach'. As the police witnessed this hostility they were forced to escort me alongside the protesters.
What I met that day was not a reasonable act of protesting a war. I saw the face of deep-rooted and vicious anti-Semitism. I was there to show my support for Israel and the material I was handing out was not inflammatory it was a simple list of facts pertaining to what Israel had and was willing to sacrifice for Peace and what they endured at the hands of the Hamas terrorist organisation who took over Gaza in a bloody coup and were using it as a base for terror against Israel.
After the recent flotilla incident once again we saw this explosion of condemnation and vilification of Israel with no regards to the facts of the situation. It is a very scary time for those of us who understand what is happening and its roots. We are being pushed into a corner as the media and activist can do and say what they want against Israel with impunity. It is so blatantly one sided and inflammatory and at times is reminiscent of the anti semetic blood libels that resulted in a bloody history for the Jews.
I want Peace in Israel as do the vast majority of Israelis. We have shown our willingness to compromise again and again for peace and each time have been met with cynical violence. The fact is that a large part of the Islamic world still does not accept the nationhood of Israel. Only the complete annihilation of the Jewish people will change that fact. Unfortunately some of our neighbours still publically state that desire.
I feel obligated as a Jewish Israeli in Bristol to take a stand and not let this dangerous attitude go unanswered. If you are a peace activist in Bristol and would rather have a level and informed understanding from someone who has lived and worked with both sides I welcome you to contact me and we can talk. If you prefer to propagate sifted truths and hate filled libels then that is your choice but if I can I will answer that as well. Shalom.
[Bristol] Maccabean
Original article on IMC Bristol:
http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/692586
Comments
Hide the following 21 comments
You're so lucky to live n country where its just unkind words thrown at you
08.06.2010 20:01
Bristol Cities
A counterpoint
08.06.2010 20:31
It is a little more complicated than that. The Goldstone Report covers it
"My arrival was at first met with confusion and curiosity. As soon as they realised what I was doing things changed. I was soon met with angry looks and when I tried to engage the participants in a calm and reasoned manner I met with anger and hostility."
I am sorry to hear that. While I do not think that is acceptable, it is perhaps understandable following the murder of nine people on the high seas recently.
"the Hamas terrorist organisation who took over Gaza in a bloody coup"
They won what international observers considered a free and fair election in 2006. After some wrangling they became senior partners in a government of national unity with Fatah, which broke up in 2007 after some terrible fighting. The end result was Fatah running the West Bank and Hamas running Gaza. It is possible to argue that Hamas staged a coup, but not convincingly as they had won the election.
"We are being pushed into a corner as the media and activist can do and say what they want against Israel with impunity. It is so blatantly one sided and inflammatory"
That will be why the mainstream media reported the Israeli claims uncritically for several days and mostly lost interest when the flotilla members were finally released from their false imprisonment. That will also be why discussions in the Guardian are full of people defending Israel.
"I want Peace in Israel as do the vast majority of Israelis. We have shown our willingness to compromise again and again for peace and each time have been met with cynical violence."
I think this is a one sided view. The Goldstone Report is good on the recent history.
A Person
Re
08.06.2010 21:27
If Israel wants a real and lasting peace, it means giving something up, which they seem unwilling to do. Look at Ireland, the Unionists have had to accept working with Catholic organisations, however much they didn't like it. Israel needs to work with Hamas, however much they don't like it, or the violence will continue.
Of course, Palestinians are suffering terribly, and Israel basically isn't, so there's no pressure on them to change, why would they when they are doing so well out of it. White South Africans also didn't want anything to change, when they were benefitted from the status quo. Being a privileged group in a society is great if you're part of that group, not so great if you aren't.
Taking all that into account, you have to accept that people will abuse you, as we did white South Africans in the 1980's.....and why did you even go down to such a demo, you don't need to produce PR for Israel - there's a whole Israeli state propoganda machine doing that. It makes me think you went just to get abused, so you could be outraged later about it.
AC
SHAME ON YOU
08.06.2010 22:16
PALESTINE IS LIKE A GHETTO. ISRAEL SHOULD KNOW BETTER.
How many have been killed by the rockets 20? 30? How many thousands have been killed by Israels rockets in Lebanon and Palestine? 3000? 4000 ?
We all want peace but the bully must stop first and thats Israel. . . . . .
A Jew
A Jew
Poor analogy
08.06.2010 22:59
There was only peace in Northern Ireland when the IRA accepted it had to give up its armed campaign and Sinn Fein had to work within the UK structures.
Hamas on the other hand offers nothing apart from a temporary truce (presumably to better rearm itself) and demands nothing short of Islamic rule over the whole of historic Palestine (ie Israel would disappear - a demand far more extreme and unrealistic than anything the IRA ever demanded). If it were to call off its armed campaign, which is increasingly ineffective in any case, then perhaps the Northern Ireland analogy would work.
Bristolian
A few things
09.06.2010 01:25
To A Jew. Yes many more Palestinians were killed in Cast Lead than had been killed by Qassam fire although 12000 Qassams hsve been fired. So, if someone repeatedly jabs you with the point of a pencil and eventually you punch them, do you at once become the bully?
Re the Goldstone Report. One of its remarks was that Israel could instead have tried to selectively strike at/assassinate Hamas officials.
So naturally, most of those who condemned Cast Lead welcomed the assassination of Mabhouh and have vocally condemned the ongoing Qassam fire that has killed a Thai worker... NOT.
To AC. "If Israel wants a real and lasting peace, it means giving something up, which they seem unwilling to do. Look at Ireland, the Unionists have had to accept working with Catholic organisations, however much they didn't like it. Israel needs to work with Hamas, however much they don't like it, or the violence will continue."
Hamas always rejected the principle of negotiations with Israel and sent suicide bombers into Israel during the Oslo peace process, so that would seem to make them more like the Real and Continuity IRA don't you think?
Furthermore, the IRA, RIRA and CIRA are all Republican not Catholic groups, whereas Hamas is Islamist.
Another Jew
facts
09.06.2010 07:39
September 29, 2000 - Present
124 Israeli children have been killed by Palestinians and 1,441 Palestinian children have been killed by Israelis since September 29, 2000.
Israelis and Palestinians Killed
September 29, 2000 - Present
1,072 Israelis and at least 6,348 Palestinians have been killed since September 29, 2000.
Daily U.S. Military Aid to Israel and the Palestinians
Fiscal Year 2009
During Fiscal Year 2009, the U.S. provided Israel with at least $7.0 million per day in military aid and $0 in military aid to the Palestinians.
UN Resolutions Targeting Israel and the Palestinians
1955 - 1992
Israel has been targeted by at least 65 UN resolutions and the Palestinians have been targeted by none.
Current Number of Political Prisoners and Detainees
1 Israeli is being held prisoner by Palestinians, while 7,383 Palestinians are currently imprisoned by Israel.
Demolitions of Israeli and Palestinian Homes
1967 - Present
0 Israeli homes have been demolished by Palestinians and 24,145 Palestinian homes have been demolished by Israel since 1967.
Current Israeli and Palestinian Unemployment Rates
The Israeli unemployment rate is 6.1%, while the Palestinian unemployment in the West Bank is 16.3% and 41.3% in Gaza.
Current Illegal Settlements on the Other’s Land
Israel currently has 223 Jewish-only settlements and ‘outposts’ built on confiscated Palestinian land. Palestinians do not have any settlements on Israeli land.
witness
Guilt trip
09.06.2010 08:09
The writer characterises himself as a Jew. He then says criticism of his point of view is anti-semitism. This slime-bag tactic should be condemned. We should ignore the cries of anti-Semitism when anyone criticises Israel.
Not all Jews agree with Israeli aims and policies and would back their criminal action against the flotilla. The writer wants to hide behind Jews and the unprovoked prejudice they have suffered while supporting Zionism.writer should describe himself as a Zionist.
The Israeli actions were murderous and criminal. The Zionist was defending such actions. Why should people not express anger towards murderers and criminals?
And was he defending the crimes or not. The writer is not clear about this. He is deliberately ambiguous so that he could slime his way out of the allegation that he was defending murder.
There is still much ignorance about how Israel came about. Terrorism against British soldiers was a tactic. Slaughtering over 300,000 to force Palestinians out of their country was another. After Kristallnacht, Ben Gurion in London said if he had a choice between saving all Jewish children in Europe and sending them to the US or saving half and bringing them to Israel, he would do the latter. Another issue is Zionism relationship with Nazis. This is well documented but not well known.
Hitler was a supporter of Zionism and was a God send to them.
insidejob
Pencil Jabbing?
09.06.2010 10:35
"If someone repeatedly jabs you with the point of a pencil and eventually you punch them, do you at once become the bully?"
Well, if you are strangling someone much weaker than you, and all they can manage is to repeatedly jab you with the point of a pencil, and then you punch them... I'll let you work out the rest!
Squatticus
It is antisemitic
09.06.2010 11:19
Neptune
some advice
09.06.2010 12:27
I like to say, "Fuck Hamas! Fuck Benjamin Netanyahu, and Fuck Ariel Sharon"
Basically Hamas exploit the poor people in Palestine to supporting their own extremist agenda.
My mate has been a photographer in Palestine for a few years, his dad was an NGO who sadly passed away whilst working in Gaza due to health problems. At the time the PLO were keen to exploit this and produce martyr posters of his dad, and use it as part of their own political objectives.
My mate points out that Hamas, and the PLO like provoking Israel into commiting "mistakes" so Hamas and the PFLP and PLO etc, can have some crocodile tears and use the media as their key weapon.
anyway my mate points out the huge difference in living conditions between the wealthy Israeli's and the Palestinian ghettos.
The biggest mistake is was to create a country which favours one religion over another, really stupid in that part of the world.
There's an old joke, two rabbis are in downtown Tel Aviv, with bullets flying over their heads, and one says to the other "If the British wanted to give us a country that wasn't there's to give away, why didn't they give us Switzerland?!"
Anyway look at every Stop the War March, in London if you go one of these you become part of the SWP's own agenda of trying to project themselves as a "leading revolutionary" force of the loonly left in the UK.
Also what about all the radical muslim groups who were at the Israeli embassy protests last year? they were there shouting on about how Palestine should be a Islamic State!
Again they were exploiting the issue to get an angry crowd behind them and their ideas.
Lots of arseholes wanting to exploit the issue for their own gain!
So as a Jew you could say I'm Jewish, not Israeli, I have respect for the civilians on both sides of the wall, but I don't have respect for the politiicans and religious nutters who crave violence and murder for their own egos to get in the history books!
This is why I don't like people from the meditarian sea, too much olive oil clearly drives you crazy!
joe blogs
Anti-semitic slur
09.06.2010 13:14
If someone on an anti-Zionist protest, went up to anyone who happened to be Jewish and yelled at them: "dirty Jew baby killer", that would be anti-semitic.
But to yell that at someone who is defending what was done to the Gaza flotilla? I would give the person who yelled the benefit of the doubt.
Well done Turkey's PM for saying that Israeli government are liars. It is these liars who use the anti-semitic slur to defend their criminal behaviour. They also drag up the Holocaust to defend their criminality. Jews suffered during the Holocaust partly because Zionists wanted them to. Jewish suffering gave the Zionists Israel. This is well documented.
We are in the dark about the extent of Israeli crimes and I'm not just talking about what is done to Palestinians. Only recently was it possible to extradite someone in Israel from illegality committed abroad. There was a substantial reason for that.
We should not allow the anti-semitic slur and the Holocaust card to condemn Israeli crimes.
insidejob
re: Anti-semitic slur
09.06.2010 13:50
True, but we only have the original poster's word that this even happened. We know that Israel funds an army of internet propagandists, some subtle and some not so subtle. Maybe this person is genuine, but it could just be a nationalist student in Tel Aviv pretending to be from Bristol. Who knows?
Even if someone did say this, then clearly it was wrong, but it doesn't invalidate the main point, which is that Zionism and the recent attacks in particular are not good. Maybe this post is just an attempt to distract from this? That's a well-known disinformation tactic.
anon
Trouble!
10.06.2010 10:33
So the original poster is saying that Israel was right to kill over 1400 people (400 of them children) because a few dozen Israeli's have been killed in the past by these rockets!
It was right to use illegal weapons outlawed around the world to do it?
And the original poster then went to an anti-war march and was astounded to find a hostile reaction while handing out pro-war leaflets!
An anti-war march is about standing against war. If you turn up trying to convince people that murder is the right thing to do then you must expect a hostile reaction. Why did you go to this march? And why have you posted your tale here?
You are very fortunate to live here in the UK. If you went onto an Israeli street provoking people with your support of Hamas, you would be beaten, quite possibly to death!
But if you went onto an Israeli street and were killed by a rocket while protesting in support of the Israeli Government, your Government would then kill 100 people in Gaza in retaliation. And would then tell the rest of the world that it did this for its own security, not in order to placate your family...the fundamental supporters of Israel.
Samuel.
Sam
time to get the facts
10.06.2010 11:59
malachi
Rise of the Gentiles!
10.06.2010 13:16
Having met a good number of ordinary Jews on marches (I mean those Jews who actually turned up to march because they hated what Israel was doing, not turned up to piss people off!), its pretty obvious now the walls are closing in on the Zionists. There is a sense that the end is near.
The idea that ordinary Jews are just waiting for God to show up while the Zionists get on with the job of 'nation-making' in the heart the 'holy-land' is very entertaining!
Tell me, when the nation of Israel is finally finished, and the 'infidels' are finally swept away, how many Jews will say "This land is given to us by God", and how many will say "Thank God for the Zionists".
How many of them will be wrong?
Samuel
Some responses
11.06.2010 00:42
So, how do you propose that Israel should have responded to the Qassam fire? Vacated a large swathe of its south where life was becoming intolerable? Opened up Gaza's borders and Hamas would have said oh how nice we've got what we wanted we'll leave Israel alone now?
To the commenters that Zionists aren't "REAL"/"ordinary" Jews. Most of the Orthodox Jews who opposed a man-made Jewish state shut up about it after the Israel War of Independence, they realised it was practically necessary to save Jewish life.
You do not need to support the settlement movement to be a Zionist, there are many shades of Zionism.
Anyway, does this mean that Muslims who want an Islamic state anywhere and Sharia Law also aren't "REAL"/"ordinary" Muslims? Are Hamas not "REAL"/"ordinary" Muslims? If not, then why are you so confident and trusting of them?
Another Jew
Stop the rockets?
11.06.2010 06:55
Ashley
Nazi Zionists?
11.06.2010 17:28
A remark Ben-Gurion made soon after Kristallnacht in reaction to a British decision not to permit 10,000 Austrian and German Jewish children to go to Palestine but instead to offer them refuge in Britain. He stated: ''Were I to know that all German Jewish children could be rescued by transferring them to England and only half by transfer to Palestine, I would opt for the latter, because our concern is not only the personal interest of these children, but the historic interest of the Jewish people.''
During the 1940s, Peter Bergson, nephew of a Palestinian rabbi, organised a campaign in the US to save European Jews from the Nazis.
In an article published, David S. Wyman, Institute for Holocaust Studies, wrote:
“Bergson’s hard-hitting approach rattled some mainstream American Jewish leaders, who feared that loud protests might provoke antisemitism. …Yet there were also pockets of sympathy for the Bergson group within the Jewish leadership.”
Pockets of sympathy?
He also writes: “[the Bergson march] was to be the only rally in Washington on the rescue issue during the entire period of the Holocaust [but t]he idea of Jews marching through streets of the nation’s capital, promoting specifically Jewish requests such as rescue, especially during wartime, was anathema to mainstream Jewish leaders.”
Rescue an anathema? This is from someone who writes about the Holocaust.
The US Jewish lobby did not want to save European Jews from the Nazis. Indeed, there was a propaganda effort against him by Zionist organisations.
Rapoport, Louis, 1999, ‘Shake heaven and earth: Peter Bergson and the struggle to rescue the Jews of Europe, Gefen, Jerusalem and New York’ (p.viii):
“The record of their achievements refutes those who claim that ‘nothing could be done.’ Something was done, and a great deal more could have been achieved had the establishment Zionist and Jewish organizations not concentrated so much of their efforts on destroying the ‘Bergson group’
Jewish efforts to destroy the attempt to rescue Jews from Nazi Europe?
insidejob
Nice to see the BNP posting on Indymedia
12.06.2010 16:52
hand job
Disagree with Zionism, you're a Nazi
13.06.2010 16:54
12.06.2010 16:52
... forhat post from "inside jobbey" couldn't have come from anyone else, surely?
hand job
Handjob
Are you saying that David Wyman is a BNP supporter? Louis Rapport was a Jerusalem Post editor. Presumably, he’s not a BNP supporter either. David Ben
Two can play at the BNP slur game.
BNP leader Nick Griffin, friend of Israel?
By Miriam Shaviv
October 23, 2009
For supporters of Israel, it was the shot heard around the UK.
Last night, BNP leader Nick Griffin told the entire country on Question Time that the BNP was the only party to support Israel in its war "against the terrorists" during Operation Cast Lead.
Insidejob