Anti-Semitic juries in the UK may start decriminalising crimes committed against Israeli interests
The eminent Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz frequently provides a useful analogy about Israel’s predicament in the tribunals of international law. It is analogous, he argues, to the position that black people faced in the American south of the 1930s. The legal system would work fine in judging a case between a white man and another white man. A black man facing another black man may get a lesser degree of justice due to the insouciance of the system, but a reasonable degree of fairness could still be expected. Put a white man against a black man, however, and the black man never stood a chance due to the weight of the prejudices against him.
Dershowitz’s analogy is powerful and striking. But a decision taken in a British court this week suggests that analogies with America in the 1930s are no longer necessary. Bigotry against the Jewish state is now so entrenched in contemporary British society that juries have begun to acquit criminals merely if they can show that they acted against Israeli interests. No other defence is necessary.
This extraordinary moment in modern British legal history took place this week in the southern English coastal city of Brighton — a city known for its strong affiliations with the Green Party and other leftist causes. It transpired in a case involving five defendants who had broken into the EDO MBM owned arms factory in January 2009 at the time of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza.
The five admitted breaking into the factory — which was exporting military equipment at the time to Israel — and causing £180,000 ($275,000) worth of damage. Despite actually admitting to an offence that would usually carry a substantial jail sentence, the jury acquitted them, accepting their defence that although they had committed a crime they were doing so in order to prevent the greater offence of Israeli “war crimes”.
The Judge in the case, George Bathurst-Norman, was quite explicit in his summing up for the jury in encouraging them to employ their political prejudices against Israel in their decision:
“You may well think that hell on earth would not be an understatement of what the Gazans suffered in that time,” the Guardian quoted him as saying.
As the Guardian goes on to say: “The judge highlighted the testimony by Caroline Lucas, the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, that “all democratic paths had been exhausted” before the activists embarked on their action.”
What we have here is yet another example of how the hysterical campaign against the state of Israel is not merely resulting in gross injustice against the Middle East’s only western-style democracy, it is undermining western-style democracy at home.
Bigotry does not merely cause pain and suffering to its victims, it degrades its perpetrators from within. The rule of law itself is now under threat in Great Britain, and judges and juries are applauding as it goes.
July 2nd, 2010 at 9:43 am
“The Judge in the case, George Bathurst-Norman”
Something very odd about George Bathurst-Norman. From thePeeerage.com:
“George Alfred Bathurst Norman was born on 15 January 1939 at Tel Aviv, Israel.”
http://thepeerage.com/p17279.htm
One anti-Zionist poster has suggested that Bathurst-Norman was actually born in the Arab town of Jaffa.
July 2nd, 2010 at 10:14 am
Something else that’s very odd is that Bathurst-Norman retired in 2004 and was “brought out of retirement” for this case.
Who brought him out of retirement and why?
A quick Google search finds more odd stuff about this judge.
http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=george_bathurst_norman_1
Abu Bakr Siddiqui, a procurement agent for the A. Q. Khan network, receives what an individual familiar with the case describes as a “remarkably lenient” sentence for assistance he gave the network. The judge, George Bathurst-Norman, acknowledges that the crimes Siddiqui committed (see August 29, 2001) would usually carry a “very substantial” prison term, but says that there are “exceptional circumstances,” claiming that Siddiqui had been too trusting and had been “blinded” to facts that were “absolutely staring [him] in the face.” Siddiqui gets a twelve-month suspended sentence and a fine of £6,000 (about $10,000).
July 2nd, 2010 at 10:17 am
Here is the quote from that anti-Zionist poster I mention above:
“Perhaps the fact that His Honour was born in the Arab town of Jaffa opposite Tel Aviv might have something to do with it! Judge George Bathurst-Norman was brought out of retirement to hear the case.”
http://azvsas.blogspot.com/2010/07/magnificent-victory-for-decommissioners.html
Brought out of retirement? Why?
July 2nd, 2010 at 1:06 pm
@joshua
“George Alfred Bathurst Norman was born on 15 January 1939 at Tel Aviv, Israel.”
Hmmm. Ten years before Israel existed. That is very odd. I wonder what his barrister father Charles was doing in Tel Aviv. Hanging Jewish freedom fighters perhaps?
July 2nd, 2010 at 2:15 pm
I wonder what the modern day Kristalnacht will look like. I don’t think we’ll have to wait much longer to see.
July 2nd, 2010 at 3:29 pm
Unbelievable. I am hoping to do a part time degree in History. I would llike to specialise in the Holocaust and propaganda against the Jews. My son says I will fail my degree if I bring Israel in and suggest that Nazisim has never died, and is gaining ground, with the rabid anti-zionist lobby and lefties, at an alarming rate. Justice has truly fallen in this land as the liberals, humanists with Islamists form strong bonds and the Judeo-christian heritage is ridiculed and scorned. We are giving up justice and freedom whilst supporting the Caliphate in waiting which will prove to be to our great detriment. I perused History books in Blackwells in Newcastle and have no hope when I saw the titles stocked concerning Israel.
July 2nd, 2010 at 3:38 pm
In 1939, Tel Aviv was part of the Palestine Mandate. There was no “Israel” at the time.
Bathurst-Norman’s birth likely occured in Jaffa, which was then an Arab town.
July 2nd, 2010 at 9:34 pm
http://thejc.com/blogpost/delegitimisation-israel-uk-plumbs-new-depths
I have complained to the Office of Judicial Complaints.
Please do likewise
The form can be found from this link
http://tinyurl.com/2appu3d
July 3rd, 2010 at 5:27 am
How very odd that a sitting judge wasn’t able to find time in his court schedule to hear this case, and that one had to be pulled from retirement. I think this begs two questions: #1 Why was this particular judge asked to sit in judgment, and who asked/appointed him?
July 3rd, 2010 at 11:46 am
Since when is this a country where citizens need to resort to sabotage? And what similarly high-minded Iranians can we expect to sabotage the arms exporters in Iran who are supporting Hamas in its “war crimes”?
July 3rd, 2010 at 12:34 pm
Well, I always say, scratch an angle, find a saxon.
Odd how small the effect of nearly two thousand years of christian morality, mores and justice has had on the pagan peoples of Europe, including its catholic, anglican and governmental institutions. And how great an effect Judaism and its moral teachings has had, and continues to have, on the overwhelming majority of Jewish people, despite a two thousand year lack of political power.
I guess something got lost translating judaism to christianity.
July 3rd, 2010 at 2:28 pm
This is but another example of British institutional permissiveness of the overall crime of economic sabotage which former Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government endeavored to put an end to.
However, the Blair government’s then-focus was on violent animal rights and environmental activists.
Apparently, there are many more miscreants within British society today and the governmental authorities are beyond themselves in trying to render them accountable for their behaviors. Hence, it has become commonplace for governmental authorities to not merely tolerate them, but actually, to provide them with a political platform. The problem is that the British have not learned the Chamberlain lessons of mollification and appeasement…
For an interesting article published in the New Zealand Rural News during June 2006 about economic sabotage in the United Kingdom, see:
Economic sabotage a form of free speech?
http://www.itssd.org/Publications/Rural%20News%20–%20Rural%20News_co_nz.pdf
July 3rd, 2010 at 2:32 pm
Economic Saboteurs Now Include Among Their Ranks NASA Scientist James Hanson?? Common Sense Has Gone With the Wind!
http://itssdjournaleconomicsabotage.blogspot.com/2008/09/economic-sabotageurs-now-include-among.html
July 3rd, 2010 at 2:43 pm
In the UK ‘Economic Sabotage’ is Still a Form of Free Speech ©
http://www.itssd.org/Publications/AgBioViewArchivesJune15-EconomicSabotage2.pdf
July 3rd, 2010 at 2:46 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_terrorism
July 3rd, 2010 at 2:52 pm
The fatuous, self-serving, smug, self-righteous comments of these ‘fun revolutionaries’(come back Peter Simple/Michael Wharton - we need you more than ever!) basking in their self-satisfaction after the ‘trial’ are minor classics of their kind:
After being acquitted, one of them, Robert Nicholls, told the Guardian: “I’m joyful really, at being a free man. The action was impulsive really, we just wanted to do something that would make a real difference to the people of Palestine (sic).”
Another, Ornella Saibene, said: “I’ve felt very peaceful all the way through the trial because I’m proud of what I’ve done. It was the right thing to do.”
Ah - Mr.Nicholls felt joyful “at being a free man”. I wonder how long this free man would enjoy his liberty to play around with the established legal system under a truly repressive regime like Hamas (or Hezbollah or Iran or Chinless Wonder Syria) or just how long Miss Saibene’s peace of mind would last in the same conditions (especially if denied her regular supply of peace-inducing bigotry.)
The storm clouds are gathering, indeed…
July 3rd, 2010 at 4:46 pm
‘The five admitted breaking into the factory — which was exporting military equipment at the time to Israel’
I do not believe it WAS, at the time, Robin. I believe that at the time the factory was not manufacturing for Israel, and may, in fact, have been decommissioned.
July 3rd, 2010 at 4:48 pm
Here is M. Phillip’s take. Norman was, apparently, born in Arab Haifa or Tel Aviv, and was actually called from retirement specifically for this case:
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/6117164/the-hellish-histrionics-of-hove-propaganda-court.thtml
July 3rd, 2010 at 5:59 pm
I am coming perilously close to leaving the UK now, for Israel where, even should there ever be a doomsday scenario, I would feel that I am among people who matter.
All my life I have been a proud, British Jew. I have supported Israel when I believe she has been wronged, and have thought of myself as a British citizen, protected by British law.
Not any longer.
Britain cares more about fending off Islamist antagonisms than it does about protecting the rights of its citizens, regardless of colour or creed.
And British Jew-hatred feeds well and thrives in such a facilitative environment.
July 3rd, 2010 at 7:27 pm
The best thing about the judgement is that the Judge accepted at the beginning of the trial that the Goldstone Report could be used in evidence.
A great day for English justice.
Universal Jurisdiction forever!!!!
July 3rd, 2010 at 8:37 pm
You have just been cited in Jonny Paul’s article in the Jerusalem Post. Here it is: http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=180316
Further: Caroline Lucas is a notorious rabble rouser provocateur. Evidence? She recently took part in a demonstration in London on behalf of the Gaza flotilla participants encouraging them. The demo was attended by some 2 thousand Islamist or Islamofascist supporters beside Galloway and such figures. Antisemitism as a motivation at least partly for that whole charade cannot easily be discarded imo. She is deep into the BDS business favouring boycotting Israeli goods. Many serious people are convinced that the practice of singling out Israel of all countries for opprobrium and hate is antisemitic. I’m one of them — though I am a simple “commoner” not a serious high-flying person.
Moreover, she often appeared as an interviewee in the weekly EU-magazine program of the BBC when she was an EMP for the greens living and working in Brussels. The woman is clearly a radical espousing far-leftist causes which are often not commensurate with bona fide environmentalist causes. Her position often underlined the problematic nature of her party. Her past provides, at least, ground for concern. Clearly Britain is filled with tons of unsavoury and undesirable figures in the political sector nowadays.
The British Green party is an extremist fringe political force. It engages in radical politics and its antisemocratic by its very nature. Just read their party manifesto and documents. It’s much smaller than its European counterparts. Not accidentally. I think they are the other side of the same coin with the BNP. The British greens are actuallyeven further to the left than its more mainstream counterparts on the continent, most of all the French or German Greens.
Britain is getting radicalised at an alarming rate, and in the end it will be the biggest loser of it all, not Israel.
Britain is doing a “Sweden” turning into another failed state in the West. The clock is ticking. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock…
July 3rd, 2010 at 11:11 pm
You have to understand that UK citizens, who form the jury in these cases, are not prepared to kow-tow to Israel and the zionist lobby in the way of their US counterparts.
The Gazan massacre in 2009 has convinced a majority in the UK that the Jewish state is a criminal state and should be resisted. Hence the ‘not guilty’ verdict….of the jury and not the Judge.
July 4th, 2010 at 5:56 am
It is extraordinary that a few brave souls like you are rapidly becoming all that stands between the rule of law and the rule of the street in Britain.
Although Dershowitz’s analogy is apt, Britain increasingly resembles Germany the early 1930′s before Hitler seized power – the groundwork for Islamofascism is being laid, and the British Quislings like Galloway, helped by a gang of useful idiots, are laying the road to their own destruction. It is shocking, and one can only hope that the warnings issued in the media by people like you, Melanie Phillips, Dennis MacEoin and Jomathan Hoffman will have the right effect in time and save Britain from its supine leadership.
July 4th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
AKUS, awfully sorry to say to you, but barring this latest incident in Britain, the great US is not any better one inch! Thank you. Wait until Obama will be impeached, if at all.
July 4th, 2010 at 12:26 pm
“The Gazan massacre in 2009 has convinced a majority in the UK that the Jewish state is a criminal state and should be resisted.”
We all know what you mean by “resistance”. There is no doubt in my mind that Bathurst-Norman has in effect issued a licence to kill. If this does not finally convince the vast majority of Jews in Britain who are supporters of the Jewish state that Britain is no longer a fit and proper place in which to live, I am afraid nothing will.
July 4th, 2010 at 12:27 pm
“A great day for English justice.”
Only if you are a hypocrite and an anti-Semite.
July 4th, 2010 at 1:08 pm
I think you’re missing the point here. While the Israeli state continues to behave like the discredited Stormont regime in Northern Ireland did up to 1972, it will continue to be liable to be the target for all manner of accusations - some of which may appear to (and may well in fact be) anti-Semitic in character. Whilst the state’s idea of conflict resolution involves overwhelming military suppression, it will always be a target for anti-arms trade activists. It would be disingenuous to suggest that these activists are motivated by anti-Semitism. Similar actions against British firms dealing with Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Zimbabwe etc surely suggest their motives are entirely different. As for the nonsense about Angles and Saxons - it’s not really worthy of serious comment is it?
Robin Shepherd says: Are you the same Chris Bagshaw I was at school with? I’m not sure I understand your point anyway. The point at issue in this particular case is the rule of law, and how it is being undermined by political prejudice — however fashionable that prejudice may be. And Israel’s strategy for conflict resolution is not based on “military suppression”. It is a highly targeted (see Richard Kemp’s analysis of Cast Lead) approach in dealing with terror groups which employ their own civilian populations as human shields. As for arms firms dealing with other countries, can you provide an instance where defendants were acquitted despite admitting to the offence and where the judge effectively encouraged the jury to acquit for political reasons?
July 4th, 2010 at 1:08 pm
Surely the O.J. Simpson trial is precedent here. EDO MBM should sue the defendants for actual and punitive damages in a tort (civil) suit. Double jeopardy doesn’t apply in a transfer from a criminal case to a civil case.
The burden of proof in a civil case is what a reasonable person faced with the evidence would believe. No reasonable person could accept less than, “You broke it - you pay for it”.
July 4th, 2010 at 2:06 pm
I don’t think that the main point here concerns Israel. It rather concerns Britain.
To me, the main point is that the defense were allowed to bring charges against a third party (Israel), which was not represented in court. These charged could not be proven or disporoven in any judicial manner, which did not prevent the judge from instructing the jury to act on them. This is a bankrupt justice system.
I don’t care if the judge and jury did it because they hate me as an Israeli or for any other reason. Hatred is not an offence in itself, but only if it leads to illegal action. They are welcome to hate me or anybody else to their hearts’ content, but they are not allowed to distort the justice system.
If I were a Brit, this would worry me.
July 4th, 2010 at 2:22 pm
I don’t think this perversion of justice can be pinned on the jury, or at least solely on the jury. After all, they decided based on the judge’s direction. It seems he has background and form.
Who would have thought that the vaunted British justice system would come to this?
July 4th, 2010 at 2:45 pm
“Whilst the state’s idea of conflict resolution involves overwhelming military suppression,”
I believe you are confusing Israel with Britain and how that latter nation dealt with conflicts with Germany, Malaya, Kenya, Serbia, Iraq and Afghanistan.
“It would be disingenuous to suggest that these activists are motivated by anti-Semitism.”
Nothing else can possibly explain the hostility and level of anger directed towards Israel. Besides, it fits in with Britain’s long history of anti-Semitism.
Before the State of Israel existed and Jews were not allowed to defend themselves, the nations of the world did not lift a finger to aid the Jews even when they were subjected to genocide. Indeed, a very good argument can be made that those nations actually collaborated in the destruction of the Jewish people (yes, they might have fought a war against the perpetrators, but that was in spite of the Jews and not because of the Jews). Now Jews do have a state of their own, those same nations are doing everything in their power to make certain that the Jewish state is unable to defend itself. Yes, they might utter platitudes about the right of Israel to defend itself, but when we get down to it they object to every single method Israel might employ towards those ends. The hypocrisy is sickening. One can imagine what the reaction of the British state and people would be if just one rocket was fired from France towards Brighton never mind many thousands. With regard to all this, Mark Steyn put it best back in 2006 (link no longer live):
“The standard defense is that it’s not anti-Semitic to criticize Israeli policies, but, as Miss Campbell’s letter suggests, what’s being questioned is not Israel’s policies but the right of Israel to have policies, especially on national security. If, say, some fellows in Mexico had kidnapped California State Troopers and were lobbing rockets randomly into residential areas of San Diego and Los Angeles, even La-La-Land libs would be demanding the US respond. It’s only the Israelis the world wishes to deny the conventional rights of sovereignty. In other words, it’s the legitimacy of the state that’s at issue. In effect, Israel has become the geopolitical version of the European Jew who’s allowed to operate a store in the town but not to exercise full ownership rights: in the old days, Jews faced property restrictions; now they face sovereignty restrictions.”
Sources include:
1) A State Beyond the Pale: Europe’s Problem With Israel by Robin Shepherd
http://tinyurl.com/3xtjyhn
2) Trials of the Diaspora: A History of Anti-Semitism in England by Anthony Julius
http://tinyurl.com/338nmyx
3) What the Nazis Planned, What the British and Americans Knew
http://tinyurl.com/356v2ev
4) Britain’s Holocaust shame
http://tinyurl.com/67mfff
5) SS Struma
http://tinyurl.com/243m9jy
July 4th, 2010 at 2:57 pm
“As for arms firms dealing with other countries, can you provide an instance where defendants were acquitted despite admitting to the offence and where the judge effectively encouraged the jury to acquit for political reasons?”
This is the kind of justice a Jew might have expected in an Arab courtroom before the vast majority were ethnically cleansed in the 1940s and 1950s (kill a Jew, get off scot-free). It is also reminiscent of the the sort of justice dispensed in Poland during the 1930s. One particular case springs to mind that involved a Jewish carter who was set upon one day by a group of non-Jewish Polish thugs. When the police arrived the Jewish man was arrested and the thugs were sent on their way. The carter was found guilty of assault by a court and sentenced to a lengthy term of imprisonment.
July 4th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
On another site a poster called Dale has indicated that the Judge had before him details of all previous attempts during the previous six years by the “Smash EDO” hooligans to target the EDO factory in Hove. I have asked him to advise me how he is aware of these facts. If as he says the judge was aware of these facts why did the Judge single out the situation in Gaza as giving these vandals legal justification for carrying out criminal damage - when it is obvious that they had been targetting the factory long before Caste Lead - as I said a classic anti-Semitic plot - blame the Jewish State. Further in order to use this defence whatever the defendant’s state of mind, the defendant’s act has to have been in order to protect his own property or right or interest, or that of anyone else. As a consequence of this decision any anti-war protestor may carry out such acts without fear of punishment. Any person carrying out the destruction of a factory producing a country’s arms being produced in the UK even if the war being prosecuted by that country is wholly lawful, (and I include in this Israel’s attack on Hamas in Gaza), may merely say in his defence that he genuinely believed that the arms produced were going to be used to cause damage to another’s property (as they surely were) - this shows how ludicrous the acceptance by the judge in this case of such a defence is.
July 4th, 2010 at 6:36 pm
These events occurred in Jnuary 2009. The trial was originally scheduled for october 2009. The prosecution dragged their feet and claimed they were not ” ready “. It was rescheduled for early May 2010.The appoiunted trial judge became ill and the trial was postphoned until early June.The trial was originally predicted to last seven to nine weeks.No serving judge could be found that had a clear seven to nine week schedule. This is why a retired judge was ” reactivated “, not for any sinister reason.
July 4th, 2010 at 7:09 pm
Probably this comment will be “filtered” as well, but if not, I have two urgent remarks to make public here.
1. Britain has been sent to the floor, it seems it’s barely functioning properly. (Just take a peep at the popular video on YouTube London scene where the bobbies are pursued by Islamist keffiya-covered thugs, screaming: “Run pigs, run!” during a Gaza-war protest demonstration and they are forced to retreat!)
2. All British Jews (with the exception of the, hmmm, not quite useful Satmar allies of Al Qaida on pro-Pal demos) should get out of Britain ASAP and come to Israel! Is this a country you want to live in? What for?
July 4th, 2010 at 11:03 pm
Robin Shepherd has a superb piece about this at the Jerusalem Post:
The banality of Methodist evil
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Op-EdContributors/Article.aspx?id=180425
July 5th, 2010 at 6:37 am
WHILE WE JEWS MAY WEEP AND WALE AND KNASH OUR TEETH, THE UNFORTUNATE
REALITY IS AND HAS BEEN,A SIGNIFICANT EROSION OF JUDICIAL AND MORAL
CONDUCT TOWARD JEWS AND THE STATE OF ISRAEL FOR SEVERAL YEARS!!
THE FACTS ARE CLEAR AS GREAT BRITAIN HAS BEEN CO-OPTED BY ISLAMIC
FUNDAMENTALISTS,EXTREME LEFTISTS AND DEGENERATES!!!
JEWS LIVING IN THE UK, “BEWARE”!!! DO NOT FALL PREY TO YOUR “LOYALTY”
AND “PATRIOTIC” NATURE FOR A CO-OPTED “ISLAMIC” STATE!! THE UK IS A
PATHETIC COWARD AND ISLAMIC “JUSTICE” WILL BE ITS REWARD AS IT IS OBVIOUS THE LESSONS OF HISTORY ARE LOST ON IT!!
I WILL NEVER YIELD TO A “BARBARIAN” ISLAMIC CULTURE, I WILL,HOWEVER,
TAKE IT OUT LIKE A CANCER!!
July 5th, 2010 at 9:57 am
Do we actually know what “all democratic paths had been exhausted” means and,if so, what were these exhaustible democratic paths?
This seems to be key to the defence because they didn’t, apparently, take the course of action that they did until, so they claim, they had exhausted these paths.
Of course, it is no defence at all. If I were to lobby my MP, demonstrate outside the gates of Downing Street and then trash the offices of the Free Gaza Movement because “I had exhausted all democratic means” of protesting against UK citizens supporting an anti-Semitic, Islamist regime in Gaza by joining the ‘Freedom Flotilla’, I would have expected a custodial sentence.
Is there not a case for asking Ken Clarke, the Lord Chancellor, to review this judgement and overturn the aquittal or call a mistrial due to the prejudicial direction of the judge (pr whatever the legal term is). This case cannot be allowed to set a precedent.
July 5th, 2010 at 11:24 am
Anat writes:
“Hatred is not an offence in itself, but only if it leads to illegal action.”
The problem is that when hatred is directed at certain people it inevitably leads to illegal action. I believe that this crime (and it is a crime whatever the judge and jury might have said) is a direct result of the campaign of hatred against the Jewish state that has been whipped up by the Guardian, BBC and Independent.
July 5th, 2010 at 1:00 pm
What are the chances of the Crown appealing the decision on the basis of the judge’s direction to the jury?
July 5th, 2010 at 2:46 pm
Josua at 11:24
I agree. But my point was different. I shall survive their hatred of me, but the British judicial system may not.
July 5th, 2010 at 6:25 pm
“I shall survive their hatred of me”
My point is that you may not.
July 5th, 2010 at 7:47 pm
Re: Ray Cook - Bang on and BINGO!!!
Exactly as you say!
I mean I can’t count on my ten fingers how many times I actually fantasized in the past whenever I was agitated, frustrated and angry because of an anti-Israeli or antisemitic bad news, very-very angry, WHAT IF I resorted to “action” (violence) against the grievance-causing party to vent my anger at them, bearing in mind the ever-handy “rational” “explanation” of “root causes” and “justified grievances” blahblah put on for a show by the far-left zombies.
Indeed I did learn, just listen! that an Independent columnist (I forgot his name, unfortunately, he is a very erudite Jewish writer) took Caroline Lucas to task when this latter offered the cheap and empty platitude of Marxist-radical “explanation” for the Mumbai killing spree and the Holzberg couple’s brutal slaying. Caroline the brilliant told to the BBC Radio that we should just see what are the “root causes” for the attack, which she “of course” condemn to the fullest, of course (!)…, but still, I*S*R*A*E*L caould well be behind the whole “story” as the chief culprit.
And now flowing into a personal appeal to
Miss Lucas in the form of a letter:
I wanna turn to you very seriously and honestly: Will you offer me dear Caroline defence, support and aid and abettment in court if I just happen to decide to “do something” in Britain that in normal circumstances, and lest’s add: normal countries - not like Britain - subject to judicial punishment, but my “root causes” and justified grievances whisper in my ears that I should not rest but come to England, Brighton possibly and say beat up a few over-60 pensioners, ladies and/or their keffiyeh-wearing granddaughters whom are habitually marching up and down in the city? I hope that you will do in fact give me this defence and support, since in the Orwellian world of Britain I am perfectly and totally justified to do as I please to satisfy my needs, in the name of the greater good of giving courage to Israeli Jews in Sderot, little children and babies, you know those poor souls daily rocketed from your Gaza acolytes, and whose P.T.S.D’s are accute for the last 5 years and continue to be so for God knows how long.
So, all in all, will you stand by me sweet Carol if I do what I will in Brighton - indefence of Israel and trying to avert emotional pain and sufforing caused to them by antisemitic Islamofascist demonstrators and their allies on the Stalinist far-left?
Don’t hesitate to answer! I NEED you and need you NOW - I’m more than sure that I can take for granted your kind-heartedness, your unüberable (for English speakers: insurmountable) humanistic spirit and understanding of my predicament!
Let’s meet in Hove Crown Court,
Yours Truely,
Gábor Fränkl
July 6th, 2010 at 6:49 am
Caroline Lucas’ argument that “all democratic paths had been exhausted” is completely illogical. It suggests that if you try to achieve something by democratic means and they don’t work then you are justified in resorting to violence and vandalism. There is nothing illegal about exporting arms to Israel. If people want to campaign for an arms embargo, fine. But I’m stunned by this judge’s apparent disregard for law.
July 6th, 2010 at 8:46 am
I have just come back from a short break away from the news and internet and have gone through my emails just now and have caught this shocking story. Words fail me.
Jonathan, I will be writing to the Office for Judicial Complaints and will alert my friends to do likewise.
In the meantime here’s Caroline Glick’s take on the case:
http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=180523
July 6th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
As an American lawyer who has been stuck in London for the last few years, debating on whether to move back to the US, I can honestly state that this incident is the straw that has broken the proverbial camel’s back for me. After reading this article, I have just decided to move back to the US. Of course there are other reasons for my move as well, but I find this action so utterly disgusting and frightening that I am no longer thinking of “if” I should move back but rather “how soon” can I move back before the next Krystalnacht.
And as a lawyer, I can only say that this complete break with the Rule of Law is despicable and I am ashamed to be part of any judicial system that could issue a decision based upon the prejudices of a judge.
July 9th, 2010 at 1:42 pm
There is no evidence that that or any other EDO factory was producing weapons for Israel:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_EDO_Corporation
It seems all that is necessary to break the law is a belief that you are acting in a higher cause.
July 9th, 2010 at 1:44 pm
Further, the impetus to actually attack the factory, was Israel. Not UK, US or NATO actions, in which EDO products were used, but only Israel’s in which they were not actually used.
Norman is encouraging Israeli and Jewish companies to take defence of their lives and property, and perhaps also the law, into their own hands.
July 10th, 2010 at 6:12 pm
My parents were both born in the UK as was I, my wife and my children. We were all schooled and grew up here and in many respects, the UK has been a great place for Jews to live and flourish.
Some years ago, the Guinness trial that involved dirty dealings in the City of London’s financial heart, eventually found 4 guilty parties, all Jews or of Jewish ancestry. Neither the Guinness family whose business was at the centre of this affair, nor any other individual was apparently found guilty. I didn’t go into this trial in depth. My natural cynicism suggested that if only Jews were found guilty, something here was not right.
From that point on, my belief in Jews in the UK getting a ‘fair shake’, disappeared.
Now this new appalling travesty of justice by our legal system underlines yet again that the rule of law, a fair and unbiased judiciary and a system in which one can have faith, is breaking down and will render normal life for many types of people, but in particular Jews, getting out of reach.
I don’t think we are quite there yet and it will take a few more such incidents, events and signs to convince me that all is lost, but my instincts are to move to Israel. Even though I owe my country of birth, the UK, so much, I am losing faith that I and my family can continue to live here safely and comfortably, as we have in the past. It seems to me that the Golden Age that UK Jews have enjoyed through the 20th and early 21st centuries may be coming to an end.
The madness of political correctness, human rights legislation, EU lack of democracy and the left wing media’s unbalanced coverage of world events means that my non Jewish compatriots must also look to see the writing on the wall. We Jews may find ourselves in the forefront of unfair treatment, but if we are first, others will surely follow.
How sad that the UK I grew up in is changing to something I no longer recognise or understand.
July 13th, 2010 at 10:34 pm
My bad, this one could’ve been sent with the “staus quo alter ego”… :-))) LOL.
July 13th, 2010 at 10:35 pm
zkharya: Believe me when I say that I really want to be the very last man walking on earth to be these devils’ advocate and “defend” these creeps, but it is actually true that they’ve been bombarding them for years on account of their supplying the US/UK Armies in the context of Iraq and Afghanistan, and not just because of Israel. The hapless Lucas spoke on their behalf also alluded to this in her otherwise outrageous and morally/politically obscene defense testimony.
July 13th, 2010 at 10:40 pm
cityca, it’s very revealing the sense you betray. Here in Hungary - in spite of as rumour has it, Russian,- and Iranian-financed neo-Nazis in parliament, there is actually NONE of THIS sense among Jews as far as I know and how I sensor the public debate… So far! At least certainly NOT in the mainstream and judicial/academic/reasonable journalistic circles. This country is better than Britain and actually, more, not less democratic! In both good and bad sense.
July 14th, 2010 at 12:38 pm
Gabor Frankl
My sense of disconnection may well be due to my age, my right of centre politics and the changing demographics in the UK.
I was at my daughter’s graduation yesterday - she just qualified as a doctor, and I was struck by the makeup of the graduates. Out of a year of 400, perhaps as many as 50% had Islamic names, while only 4 were Jewish, the remainder being white, Indian Asian or of Chinese origin. The medical school is located in the Midlands, close to major Muslim towns and cities and so this may have a bearing.
Above all, it is the incessant anti-Israel agenda of the main stream media that I believe is poisoning opinion against Israel and by default, against Jews. The so-called intelligentsia are having the barriers to their racism broken down for them by using Israel and Zionism as an excuse to include Jews in their hatred. Academics, legislators and journalists seem to have lost any sense of logic, reason and objectivity when it comes to Israel.
Israel hating judges are unfortunately just the tip of the iceberg.
July 15th, 2010 at 12:08 am
cityca
I understand. Kind of frightening.
It’s worrying - to be precise, the reality itself is worrying -, that you would characterise - correctly - Birminhgam, Leeds, Sheffield, Leicester and a slew of others as “Muslim cities”. You are certainly kind of right.
To myself: what “normal” people would wish to actualy live their life in these totally, really totally horrible and imv uninhabitable places - anywhere North of the line of Northampton-Peterborough? Try Bristol or around in the Southwest - I like that…, that’s still much better, but the amount of rain is also more, alas. OK. Stop. Correct my arrogance please if I am wrong.
July 15th, 2010 at 12:19 am
“The so-called intelligentsia are having the barriers to their racism broken down for them by using Israel and Zionism as an excuse to include Jews in their hatred. Academics, legislators and journalists seem to have lost any sense of logic, reason and objectivity when it comes to Israel.
Israel hating judges are unfortunately just the tip of the iceberg.”
Yes, the overwhelming majority of them are antisemites, no doubt about that. These people and societal strata there are simple Jew-haters, again, absolutely no doubt.
Funny that. As I expressed my guesses and thougts here on this blog in the past, the total upside down situation to most Eastern, - and Central European classes/societies, well, mostly. In England, the higher you climb the ladder the more likely of the higher levels of anti-Semitism grppwing (exponentially?).
Almost unique in the world as so much that England is unique in, or, at least, showing it in a much starker relief than in other Western states, minus perhaps the Scandinavians & some others. But that’s only my impressions/imaginations.
July 16th, 2010 at 8:46 am
Then this should work for Israelis since they have been threatened with genocide, extermination and being driven into the sea. I have never heard Israel talk about driving the Gazans into the sea or the Arab-Palestinians either. They should be acquitted against any crimes against Arab –Palestinians since they are also driven by the fact that “all democratic paths had been exhausted” before the Israel embarked on their action.” It is the ‘what is good for the Arab-Palestinian is good for the Israelis’. Otherwise it is racism and discrimination against Israel.
July 16th, 2010 at 10:09 pm
Independent watchdog finds “no evidence” EDO supplied components to Israel
In November 2009, an independent panel found no evidence that EDO had ever supplied components to Israel:
“In May managing director Paul Hills told The Argus: “I would and have stood up in court and sworn under oath that we don’t supply to Israel, which is one of the things Smash EDO accuse us of. “ The tribunal concluded: “There was no dispute that the ERU151 and the ZRFAU are components which can be incorporated into VER-2 bomb racks for use with F-16 combat aircraft, that those aircraft are used by the Israeli air force, and that from 1998 EDO owned the right to manufacture the ERU151 and the ZRFAU.””
The panel held a closed session to quiz a BIS civil servant about the confidential information and examined copies of all the export licences SMASHEDO had requested.
After examining the documents, it concluded the information did not confirm SMASHEDO’s claims that EDO supplied Israel and should remain confidential.
http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/4734080.Watchdog_rule__no_evidence__that_Brighton_s_EDO_supply_Israeli_air_force/
July 17th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
Judge Bathurst-Norman admits that none of the items Smash EDO alleged were manufactured in EDO Brighton:
“That leads me conveniently to Mr. Hills.I am going to
divide his evidence into three parts.I am going to begin by
identifying the weapons we are concerned with.Firstly, there
is the ZRFAU, the Arming Unit.This has the effect, when
connected to a bomb, of turning a dumb bomb, that is one which
is to say an unguided one which you just drop and hope, into a
smart bomb, one which can be guided towards its target.
Next there is the ERU-151, a bomb release unit, into
which the ZRFAU fits, the ERU-151 shoots the bomb away from
the plane without the risk of the plane being blown up.Then
that has an FRCS cable attached to it.The purpose of that
cable is to send a signal to the bomb release unit to release
the bomb.The advantage it has over other types of release is
it is reusable.Then there is the VER-2, the actual bomb
rack, which holds two missiles and which were used with the
ERU-151 and enables an F16 to carry two missiles under each
wing.We have also heard about storage pallets for such bombs
or missiles being made under sub-contract for MBM Brighton and
sent to General Dynamics in Texas in the United States.
Now all the weapons I have described are for use with
the F16 fighter bombers.In addition, there is the RAIDER,
which is a smart multiple store carrier.This enables an F16
to carry not only the missiles under each wing but also to
carry two under the belly of the plane without thereby
increasing the plane’s bomb load in safety.The RAIDER was
developed between MBM and General Dynamics in the United
Kingdom.General Dynamics (UK) of course, is part of General
Dynamics in the United States, a major arms company who supply
Israel.Only the MALTS, which Mr. Hills has accepted was made
in Brighton, that was a practise bomb carrier.”
http://www.thejc.com/35771/judge-bathurst-norman-full-summing
July 26th, 2010 at 11:50 pm
Good direction by the judge - reasonable and fair. EDO does supply weapons for the Israeli dehumanisation of Palestine
http://www.smashedo.org.uk/How%20EDO%20Supplies%20the%20Israeli%20Military.htm
July 27th, 2010 at 4:19 pm
My father witnessed mobs of Europeans yelling, “Go back to Palestine where you belong!” and then proceeded to murder his mother and 5 year old sister. Now he lives there, and much of the world yells, “Get out of Palestine, you don’t belong there!”
Were he to move to the moon, suddenly blocked moonlight would undoubtedly be a hot issue of the day to miscreant haters like eartheart and the judge.
July 27th, 2010 at 8:25 pm
eartheart - don’t make us laugh! So you bring a referral from the GUILTY - guilty but reasonably, not British standards - party to buttress your claims supporting the exact same party? You cannot possibly be that idiot, funny man!