From The Department of Some-of-My-Best-Friends-are-Jewish:
A one-day conference on ‘Justice for Palestine’, scheduled to take place on Thursday, January 29 @ The Theatrette, NSW Parliament House in Macquarie Street, Sydney, was cancelled following the publication of anti-Semitic remarks by the principal organiser, Maqsood Alshams (former Honorary National Coordinator of the ‘Coalition for Justice for Refugees’, currently Project Director with the ‘Asia Pacific Human Rights Institute’). The conference was titled “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”, and organised by the Institute and the “Edmund Rice Centre in association with Jumbunna Indigenous House of Learning – University of Technology Sydney and Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Sydney”. The cancellation appears to have been triggered by the withdrawal of two speakers — Antony Loewenstein and Peter Manning — and, one assumes, the negative publicity attached to Alshams’ outburst.
Alshams, after having first declared that “Only Me, You and Us together can turn today’s dream into a reality tomorrow. And let us get it done!”, initially defended his right to a private argument (Rights activist apologises for anti-Semitic comments, Erik Jensen, January 28, 2009), but later apologised to the motherf—– bastards. Alshams explained that he was “intoxicated and angry” when he wrote the email messages to Richard Benkin, “a human rights activist based in Chicago” and “Sydney management consultant”, Anna Berger (Rights activist apologises for anti-Semitic comments, Erik Jensen, January 28, 2009).
Speaking of motherf—– Jewish bastards, one rather notorious example is Noam Chomsky. See “Exterminate all the Brutes”: Gaza 2009, chomsky.info, January 19, 2009.
On Saturday December 27, the latest US-Israeli attack on helpless Palestinians was launched. The attack had been meticulously planned, for over 6 months according to the Israeli press. The planning had two components: military and propaganda. It was based on the lessons of Israel’s 2006 invasion of Lebanon, which was considered to be poorly planned and badly advertised. We may, therefore, be fairly confident that most of what has been done and said was pre-planned and intended.
That surely includes the timing of the assault: shortly before noon, when children were returning from school and crowds were milling in the streets of densely populated Gaza City. It took only a few minutes to kill over 225 people and wound 700, an auspicious opening to the mass slaughter of defenseless civilians trapped in a tiny cage with nowhere to flee…
What a bastard.
He’s not alone of course. Antony Lowenstein is a right bastard, and so is the IAJV: Independent Australian Jewish Voices.
On a lighter note, Old Jews Telling Jokes (“A new (old) joke every Tuesday and Thursday!”).
So that conference DID get cancelled after all, did it? Good.
Maqsood Alshams is also part of this facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=33035913111
Damn what an idiot. And hypocrite. And anti-Semite. Clowns like this should never be welcome in the pro-Palestine community and should be swiftly dealt with when they’re discovered.
I don’t believe his credibility has been helped any, nor his social standing.
Never ceases to amaze me, as someone of Jewish heritage, that left wing politics is often rife with anti Semitism despite claiming to be an egalitarian political position.
Under the guise of wanting “justice” and “peace” and supposedly taking the moral high ground on Middle Eastern issues, the far left take to the streets in support of left wing Middle Eastern dictators and violent paramilitary groups calling for the destruction of Israel.
Funny how anti Semitism is suddenly ok provided you cloak it in a self righteous call for justice.
Huh?
Over the last few decades Labor has continued to support the right of Israel to defend its borders and citizens against terrorist attack (except for McLean).
At the same time, we had the far left rallying on the streets in support of Arafat and the PLO, waving pictures of the Star of David painted over with the Swastika and in the ’80s chanting particularly extreme slogans some of which alluded to “pushing the Zionists back into the sea” (no, it was many years ago so forgive me for not giving you an exact example).
So, Labor showed itself to be the true party of tolerance and negotiation while the extreme left has been content to show intolerance, indeed, anti [S]emitism, when it suited their declarations of calling for “justice” for the Palestinians. You can’t just point to the fact that a couple of leaders of the communist revolution were of Jewish heritage to make the claim you’re not anti Semitic…
I don’t recall left wing demonstrations against leaders calling for the annihilation of Israel.
“Over the last few decades Labor has continued to support the right of Israel to defend its borders and citizens against terrorist attack (except for McLean).”
Except for McLean? Jean McLean?
Right. So, according to you, Monkey Chops, Jean McLean, unlike all other Labor MPs, did not support the right of the Israeli state to defend either it borders or its citizens from terrorists.
You’re welcome to provide evidence for this assertion.
Of more relevance, however, I think, are the attitudes of currently serving MPs. In this context, the comments of AWU boss Paul Howe are germane: “Our union cannot understand those union leaders here in Australia, and Labor MPs such as Julia Irwin, who line up in support of Hamas…”
In March 2008, Irwin refused to support a Parliamentary motion congratulating Israel on its 60th birthday. (Irwin is “a Labor backbencher whose Sydney seat includes the diverse areas of Liverpool and Cabramatta”.)
Regarding the position of the ‘far left’ — and as far as I can tell, for you this consists of anyone from members of the Socialist Left faction of the ALP, through to the Greens, through to Marxists, left-wing radicals and progressives (whether members of parties or not) of liquorice all sorts, through to anarchists — I believe this can best be ascertained not through a reliance upon your faulty memory of street demonstrations in the 1980s, but by reference to their publicly-stated positions, available in numerous publications, printed and online. Thus, regarding ‘far left’ analysis of the current situation in Israel and the Occupied Territories — as well as the person of Arafat, and the PLO’s activities in the 1980s — there have been and remain differences of opinion. Nevertheless, you seem to believe that these may be condensed into images of wild-eyed leftists “waving pictures of the Star of David painted over with the Swastika” and chanting slogans like ‘push the Zionists back into the sea’.
This can hardly be taken seriously.
“You can’t just point to the fact that a couple of leaders of the communist revolution were of Jewish heritage to make the claim you’re not anti Semitic…”
Actually, I can do that. The point, however, is that I don’t. If you believe me to be ‘anti Semitic’, feel free to explain why.
Apologies for the typo, I was actually referring to Leo McLeay who left parliament in 2004…
Differences of opinion amongst my poorly generalised far Left regarding Israel’s right to exist? I’d be more than grateful for you to point me to a link by a left wing extremist (oh sorry, “progressive”) website that supports Israel being able to retaliate with force against Arab terrorists assaulting the Jewish state. Speaking of which, why is it ok for the left (including those half wits in Israel) to call for a Palestinian state, yet the moves to protect a “Jewish state” are seen to be an act of racism?
Did I accuse you of anti Semitism Andy? I have been referring to the attitudes expressed by extremist [groups] such as Resistance and Green Left towards Israel’s right to exist, which seem little different to those one would expect from the likes of our own right wing ratbag, “Herr Doktor”…
Sounds like you’re a wee bit over sensitive in the guilt by association stakes here Andy. Maybe another trip to the beach is needed?
Monkey Chops : You claim that Leo McLeay did not support the right of the Israeli state to defend its citizens from terrorist attack. In his own words:
“Differences of opinion amongst my poorly generalised far Left regarding Israel’s right to exist?”
Actually, differences of opinion regarding a wide range of issues.
You’ve claimed that left-wing politics is rife with anti-Semitism and that “the far left take to the streets in support of left wing Middle Eastern dictators and violent paramilitary groups calling for the destruction of Israel”. After having referred to memories of such demonstrations in the 1980s, you are now more specific, and cite the views of “extremist [groups] such as Resistance and Green Left“.
Resistance is the yoof wing of the Democratic Socialist Perspective; the Green Left its paper. The ideological positions of Resistance are identical to those of the DSP. The DSP describes Israel as an Apartheid state, and, to the best of my knowledge, advocates a ‘one-state’ solution, in which non-Jews are accorded full citizenship rights, legal and political equality. (In any case, the surest way of ascertaining their position is to write them.) In the meantime, the following is the position of their electoral front on Palestine, adopted at its Sixth National Conference, December 6-7, 2008:
The Socialist Alliance supports:
• The Palestinian right to self determination.
• Israeli withdrawal from the Occupied Territories.
• Equal civil and democratic rights for all inhabitants of historic Palestine.
• Right of return for Palestinian refugees.
• An end to Israeli aggression against other countries in the region.
• An end to the restriction of movement of people and supplies (including medical supplies) around Palestine and between Palestine and Israel.
Jews are money-hungry evil bastards.
The jews are the root cause for the problems in America. The jew bastards control the media, politics, everything in America.
Rachel,
The Department of Some-of-My-Best-Friends-are-Jewish
Best video out there on this type of reasoning, Picnicface, a great Canadian comedy team:
Rachel: If that’s true, why do people like you insist that it is white people who are the master race? Also: kill yourself.
Found this blog from the US. Bravo!
The REAL bastard was not… http://jesusneverexisted.com