Comments on: Respected British commentator warns that Israel may precipitate “the end of the world”

By: Norman Duke

Norman Duke — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 01:15:10 +0000

The growing hatred of Israel that we are seeing today is a fulfillment of Bible prophecy. Read Psalm 83. What is it all leading to? Read Isaiah 2

By: AKUS

AKUS — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 01:55:02 +0000

Robin, thanks to CiFWatch I have been introduced to your blog, which is now tacked firmly to the toolbar on my browser so I’ll see it and read it regularly.

Your commentary about “widely celebrated British commentator Yasmin Alibhai-Brown” whom I had never heard of - I don’t think sshe is as widely respected as yu give her credit for, and not just because I have not heard of her - has an interesting little point.

I refer to the demand by Ms Alibhai-Brown that “America must stop groveling to “fanatic and aggressive” Israel”. This is an excellent example of the bizarre belief that Israel, a country barely the size of one of America’s smaller states, and with a population less than that of several American metro areas, somehow “controls” the US.

Indeed, a smell of something other than an interest in political science wafts from demands like hers.

By: Joshua

Joshua — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 19:08:06 +0000

“Johan Hari is another who shares this platform in the Independent and wears his Israel-hating credentials so proudly on his sleeve.”

Here’s what Hari wrote on Israel’s 60th birthday:

“I would love to be able to crash the birthday party with words of reassurance…..But I can’t do it. Whenever I try to mouth these words, a remembered smell fills my nostrils. It is the smell of shit.”

http://tinyurl.com/6597to

So many lies, so much hatred.

By: Jonathan Hoffman

Jonathan Hoffman — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 18:35:18 +0000

Alibhai-Brown: “History has made too many Israelis fear all humanity in perpetuity…”

Jim Riordan (10 days ago): “Jews keep on thinking the world is out to get them”

http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/jimriordan/Jews-keep-on-thinking-the.5667658.jp

Robin Shepherd: ‘The more one enters the world of the Israel-haters, the more obvious it becomes that it is a pathological condition, itself reflective of multi-layered pathologies inside it and constitutive of it’

(”A State Beyond The Pale”)

By: Wandering Jew

Wandering Jew — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 18:12:04 +0000

As far back as 2003 I wrote an email to her. It wasn’t exactly fan mail and I have never received a reply.

Here it is, the article seems to be unavailable now but it dealt with her losing her “Jewish friends”.

8th March 2003

Dear Ms Alibhai-Brown,

While I accept that not all legitimate criticism of Israel should be construed as anti-Semitic your article of 6 March 2003 in The Independent http://argument.independent.co.uk/regular_columnists/yasmin_alibhai_brown/story.jsp?story=384215 clearly is. One particular phrase among many illustrates this well enough I believe, and it is this phrase above all that has prompted me to write to you:

You write, “Palestinians were not responsible for the Holocaust, yet today they are being made to pay the highest price for it.”

To suggest that Israeli’s defence of itself is in any way comparable to the policy of Nazi Germany to exterminate Jews is an insult to the memory of those victims, it is another example of the misuse of a very powerful word, only too common in these times.

In my humble opinion “the price” being imposed on the Palestinians, if that is how you choose to describe their suffering, is to be blamed on their own corrupt leadership. To suggest that Israel in defending itself from Palestinian terrorists today is in some way avenging itself for the crimes of others in the past is simply absurd, and yet another attempt to connect Israel to just about anything which would demonise The Jewish State.

I am aware of a connection between Iraq and Israel. The payments made directly by Saddam to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers and to the families of “fallen” Palestinian “fighters for example. Isn’t it about time the world community made the connection between Iraqi sponsorship and Palestinian terrorism?

Israel is not making Palestinians pay for anything, Israel is defending itself. Perhaps I’ve overlooked it, but I don’t seem to find in your articles any condemnation of Palestinian terrorism. No doubt like Cherie Blair you understand them and feel that their actions are quite acceptable.

There is no spiral of violence. There is instead a constant effort by the Palestinian Authority to destroy the State of Israel and murder, or massacre, whichever you prefer, innocent Israelis.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2831515.stm
Friday, 7 March, 2003, 22:32 GMT
“A day of violence across the Palestinian territories has left at least two Israeli civilians and seven Palestinian gunmen dead.”

Please note Ms Alibhai-Brown, that’s at least two ISRAELI CIVILIANS and seven PALESTINIAN GUNMEN dead. Perhaps this is why there is an imbalance in the body counts on each side?

As a Jew I am proud and glad to count my friends from all walks of life, all religions, and racial and cultural backgrounds, but like you I too find I am losing them, perhaps for the same reason that you are losing your Jewish friends.

Shalom, may peace be with you.

Wandering Jew

“In the game of cat and mouse it serves no purpose
for the mouse to say, ‘I’m not playing!’.”

- Itzak Rabin

By: Joshua

Joshua — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 14:21:20 +0000

“but to be fair to Robin, I’m sure he meant to write, “‘Respected’ British commentator”.”

Nah, I don’t believe that for a moment. I think he meant to suggest that, until this piece, he held her in the absolute highest regard. :-)

Robin Shepherd says: I actually used to write fan mail. I’m so disillusioned….

By: Jonny Moses

Jonny Moses — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 13:24:02 +0000

Robin, thanks for your insight. Johan Hari is another who shares this platform in the Independent and wears his Israel-hating credentials so proudly on his sleeve. I’m just glad there are people like you around who are committed and articulate enough to provide an antidote to this morally bankrupt and hysterical narrative that is lapped up with such smug satisfaction by the majority of the liberal-left.

By: Miv Tucker

Miv Tucker — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 12:09:40 +0000

Joshua,

I can’t fault a word you’ve written, but to be fair to Robin, I’m sure he meant to write, “‘Respected’ British commentator”.

Cheers.

By: Joshua

Joshua — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 10:38:05 +0000

“Respected British commentator”

Not by decent people:

1) Yasmin Alibhai-Brown is a disgrace by Stephen Pollard

“Long standing readers will be aware of my contempt for the Yazzmonster. I haven’t mentioned her witterings of late because I have grown bored by her monstrous ego and jaw dropping stupdity. Shooting fish in a barrel can grow dull.

But her piece today is so utterly vile that I feel I have to give her what was once called the oxygen of publicity, if only so that those of you who see and hear her when she pops up on the airwaves are aware of the sort of person she is.

Her piece is one long tirade of bigotry”

http://tinyurl.com/yb5wuzv (cache)

2) And here’s Professor Norman Geras on the “moral disgrace” that has “infected wide sections of the Western media and left-liberal opinion”.

Yasmin rides again

http://tinyurl.com/aoqac

3) Melanie Phillips nails the true measure of the woman:

Here we go again

“Even after this ludicrous theory had run into the sand, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown in the Independent fearlessly risked what she described as ‘the wrath of Moses’ to suggest that LFI headed a Jewish conspiracy to manipulate the British government into support for Israel.

The ‘wrath of Moses’, eh? Yasmin’s got the Goebbeldegook for Jews off pat. But we can’t call this poison by its proper name, because that would only prove her claim that the all-powerful Jews use such labels to suppress the evidence of their perfidy.”

http://tinyurl.com/yby25gs

By: Wandering Jew

Wandering Jew — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 09:11:16 +0000

HonestReporting picks up on her article here:
http://tinyurl.com/ydxepte