1. German Judeophobia (Anti-Semitism) is Alive and Kicking!!
(a) Guenter Grass, German Poet Attacks Israel.
Israel-Iran History, Holocaust Perverted in Grass's Poem
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-04
-09/israel-iran-history-holocaust-
perverted-in-grass-s-poem.html
Extracts:
Guenter Grass, the German writer and recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature,
brought forth last week an odious little poem that focuses on the threat to
world peace posed by the Jewish state...
The poem, published in the German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung and elsewhere,
was titled 'What Must Be Said,' which is quite a vainglorious title. There is
very little in the world that is safer (or less novel) than criticizing Israel
in a European newspaper.
In this poem, Grass suggests that Germans haven't been saying 'what must be
said' about the various sins of the Jews. Of course, many post-Nazi German
intellectuals, and intellectuals across Europe, have been saying quite nasty
things about Jews and the Jewish state for some time, without noticeable
consequence. (No fatwas have been issued against European critics of Jews, and
no opponent of Israel has been murdered for his criticism.)
The German historian Ernst Nolte argued in a 2004 speech that 'the only
difference between Israel and theThird Reich is Auschwitz,' a statement exceeded
in intemperance by Grass's fellow Nobel Prize recipient, the late Portuguese
novelist Jose Saramago, who once compared Ramallah, the de facto capital of the
Palestinian West Bank, to Auschwitz, and who accused Jews of worshipping
a'spiteful' god.
Grass, in his writing, shows himself to be a man tired of hearing about the
Holocaust, tired of thinking about the Holocaust, tired of carrying around the
moral burden of the Holocaust. This is in some ways an understandable feeling
for young Germans, at least, to hold. They didn't commit the deeds, and would
like the world to judge them for their actions, not those of their parents and
grandparents.
Grass, however, is a former member of the Waffen SS, and being a former member
of the Waffen SS means having to say you're sorry. Unfortunately, all the
harshness directed against Grass after he revealed this fact in 2006 -- six
decades afterward -- seems to have made him angry at the SS's victims. Thus, our
poem.
(b) Extracts from an article by DANIEL JONAH GOLDHAGEN
URL:
http://www.jpost.com/LandedPages/
PrintArticle.aspx'id=265603
Source:
Grass: Ignorant or Calculating Cynic'
By DANIEL JONAH GOLDHAGEN
10/04/2012
Extracts:
As any student of prejudice knows, anti-Semitism is a great leveler. The
professor, in this case, the Nobel
Prize winner, and the Ungebildete [ordinary person] speak the same nonsense.
From whoever's mouth it spills, it is that nonsense that needs to be exposed.
There is a widespread view in Germany and elsewhere, peddled by
anti-Semites, that one may not speak the truth about Israel. But this is
manifestly false....
On a regular basis, Israel is attacked and decried for things it actually
does and for things invented about it in media across the world, including
in the United States, including in Germany, including in Israel itself....
In fact, it is abundantly clear to me ' as someone who is just finishing
writing a book on contemporary anti-Semitism ' that there is far more open
and thinly coded expression of anti- Semitism in Germany and in Europe
than there is any attempt, certainly any success, at preventing its
expression or, for that matter, in preventing criticism, just or unjust,
of Israel.
There is a widespread view in Germany and Europe that Israel is a
Nazi-like state. One hears and reads this again and again. This view finds
pointed expression in the widespread belief in Germany that Israel is
conducting a war of extermination against the Palestinians. How do we
know? Germans say so. Year after year, scientific surveys of Germans show
that 40 percent-50% of Germans believe this. The perversity of this, on
so many levels, is stunning.
Do Germans need to be reminded of what the Nazis and Germans of the time
actually did? Summary: They created death factories. They slaughtered six
million Jews as part of a formal plan to annihilate every single Jew in
Europe. They slaughtered millions of non-Jews and would have slaughtered
millions more. They sought to turn most of Central and Eastern Europe into
a vast slave plantation.
Or do Germans need to be educated about what Israel has done and is doing?
Take one salient fact: From 1990 to 2010, the Palestinian population under
Israeli occupation more than doubled.
Some war of extermination! Only a deeply prejudiced person, who is either
cynically lying or loosely in touch with reality about the object of his
prejudicial description, could say that Israel is conducting a war of
extermination against Palestinians.
Israel's occupation of the West Bank, and previously of Gaza, can be
roundly criticized and even condemned on several grounds, but for anyone
to liken it and Israel's practices to Nazi Germany and its
exterminationist programs is patent nonsense.
Grass takes the common perversity 'the inversion of the people of the
victims into perpetrators' to a new level, though. He says that Germans'
responsibility is to prevent another genocide.
Okay. But he says this not with reference to a possible genocide of the
people actually regularly threatened, the same people whom Germans once
slaughtered, namely the Jews, against whom a nuclear weapon in the hands
of the millennial Iranian regime might well be used.
Instead, according to Grass, Germans have the responsibility to turn
against the country of the once and potential victim people, in order to
stop them from defending themselves and from allegedly committing a future
genocide of Grass's invention.
Grass's bald assertion that Israel threatens the preemptive annihilation
of the Iranian people, which he cleverly presents as a fact and then
argues that it must be resisted, is either an anti-Semitic fantasy or a
grotesque cynical fabrication that plays on many Germans projections of
Nazism onto Jews and Israel. Israeli leaders have never publicly mentioned
or even hinted that they would consider such a monstrous thing as a
preemptive nuclear strike against the Iranian people, let alone a barrage
of nuclear detonations to wipe out the Iranian people, akin to what
Germans actually were doing to Jews while Grass was serving the Nazi
regime as a member of the Waffen-SS. There is not a shred of evidence, a
whispered word, or any reason to believe that Israeli leaders have for one
micromoment contemplated such an act....
(Secretary of State Hillary Clinton just urged Israel on American national
television not to take 'unilateral action against Iran.') But it is only
discussed and only considered in terms of a surgical mission against
Iran's nuclear production facilities with conventional weapons.
The issue of how to do this without killing many innocent civilians is a
major consideration, and one of the major reasons ' among others,
including the possibility of a wider conflict ' that people, including in
Israel, argue against such an initiative.
In demonizing Israel, there is a widespread practice in Germany... of ignoring
the context in which Israel exists
and acts. That context is that Israel has been existentially threatened
for its entire existence and continues to be so today, both by states that
wish merely to defeat it or to have it relinquish the West Bank (Gaza it
already gave back), and by states, often supported by their publics, that
wish to destroy it and eliminate or exterminate its Jews. Why does Grass
fail to mention that Iranian leaders, and not just Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,
have routinely threatened to destroy Israel and kill Jews, and
occasionally even hinted that it could be done with nuclear weapons' As
the 'moderate' former Iranian president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani
explained already in 2001, 'the use of even one nuclear bomb inside Israel
will destroy everything.' Why does Grass fail to mention that the Iranian
leaders speak of Israel using Nazi-like language and metaphors, of cancer
and pestilence which must be utterly eradicated' Do I have to say that
such speech has been shown to be the rhetorical prelude to genocide' There
is no Israeli crime here, no planned crime, no German role in it, no need
to finally speak out, no special German responsibility or moral authority
in this matter, no 'silence' over the nonexistent truth, no intimidation
for not speaking out.
The writer is the author of Hitler's Willing Executioner: Ordinary Germans
and the Holocaust and Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the
Ongoing Assault on Humanity.
2. UK MPs: We speak up for Israel, and get death threats!
Jennifer Lipman - Jewish Chronicle Online, April 4th, 2012
http://www.israelunitycoalition.org/news/'p=7993
Extracts:
MPs who have spoken in support of Israel have been forced to limit the
information they make available to constituents and take other security
precautions after being sent death threats or abusive messages by post, by phone
or online, a JC investigation has revealed.
Two years after Labour's Stephen Timms was stabbed by a radicalised student,
security remains a key concern, especially for MPs who are vocal about
controversial topics such as Israel ' and suffer threats as a consequence. Two
weeks ago Conservative MP John Howell was forced to seek police protection after
becoming the target of a campaign by pro-Palestinians.
Louise Ellman, Labour MP for Liverpool Riverside, has been dealing with death
threats for a decade. The problem has worsened in recent years and she now
receives emails as well as letters.
'It's very unpleasant and I am concerned ' so I take advice from the police and
the CST,' said Mrs Ellman. 'You are vulnerable as an MP, people approach you and
you're in public places.'
Lee Scott, Ilford North MP, said he dealt with death threats and abusive
communications 'on a fairly regular basis', including a recent email that said
he should be 'stoned to death'.
Their cases are by no means unique. Former Labour MP Andrew Dismore also
received death threats.
Mr Dismore, along with Mr Scott, Mike Gapes and Denis MacShane were all targeted
at the last election by Muslim group MPAC for their support of Israel. Richard
Harrington, now MP for Watford, also faced hostility during his campaign, while
in October 2011 members of the now-banned group Muslims Against Crusades stormed
Finchley and Golders Green MP Mike Freer's constituency surgery shouting that he
was a 'Jewish homosexual pig'.
Several others, including Harlow MP Robert Halfon, reported receiving abusive
communications in light of public comments about the Middle East ' many of them
anonymous and online ' and those who regularly defend Israel, including Harrow
East MP Bob Blackman, said they could 'see it coming'.
'Whenever I say anything about Israel I get some really nasty messages and I've
had lots of nasty stuff written on blogs,' said Mr Halfon.
Not long ago somebody attempted to pour petrol through the letter box of Mr
Blackman's constituency office and light it. Although police have not yet
ascertained the motive, the MP said that it is a reminder that 'there are people
who will pursue threats'.
He only publicises details of his movements after the event. 'You have to be
careful, because it only takes one unhinged individual,' he said.
According to the Serjeant at Arms, 80 MPs are currently facing extreme threats
on various issues. It is not clear what proportions of those relate to Israel,
but Mr Scott said he believed that the number of those who do not report threats
or abuse on Israel could be substantial.
Henley MP Mr Howell, who backs the two-state solution, was bombarded with 30
abusive messages and death threats from anti-Israel activists last month,
including one saying that he deserved to die, and another saying: 'You will
suffer the consequences of this corruption.'
He was targeted after an anti-Israel constituent, Harry Fear, contacted him
about Israel's actions in Gaza. The MP responding asking him what his position
was on the 100 rockets that had landed in Israel that weekend.
The comment was circulated online by Mr Fear, along with the MP's contact
information and an appeal for people to write to Mr Howell 'civilly, expressing
discontent'.
Mr Howell, who was offered police protection, has since removed details of his
constituency surgeries and contact information from his website. He expressed
concern for his wife, son and his staff, saying that although he did not want to
appear to be a drama queen, 'you have to take seriously a threat when it says,
'I would like to see you dead'.
Mr Scott suggested that the threats only came to public attention 'because John
had never ever had anything like this in his life before that this came out'.
CST has tried to encourage MPs to report abusive material, but Mark Gardner said
he believed 'that this is a problem that largely goes unreported and certainly
unprosecuted.
3. PA Minister Touts Palestinian Unity as a Means to Destroy Israel
http://www.algemeiner.com/2012/04/10/
pa-minister-touts-palestinian-unity-
as-a-means-to-destroy-israel/
April 10, 2012
Palestinian Authority (PA) Minister of Social Affairs Majida Al-Masri touted
reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas as a means 'to turn to the struggle for
the liberation of Palestine, all of Palestine,' Palestinian Media Watch reported.
Al-Masri was one of three PA ministers attending a rally during which he urged
Palestinians 'to push ahead with reconciliation [between Fatah and Hamas] and to
end the state of division, so that we will be able to stand against the
occupation, to halt its activities against our prisoners,' according to the
official PA daily publication.
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