Uri Avnery |
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herjihad
Senior Member Joined: 26 January 2005 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2473 |
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Bismillah, Even my father-in-law would love to go home accompanied by his children to live the rest of his long life and die there on his own land, knowing that his children and grandchildren could continue to live on the land that he and they love. The electric car sounds good, but rather than Prozac, most of them would rather have strong cups of Arabic coffee sipped under their olive trees. Salaamu Alaykum Edited by herjihad |
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Al-Hamdulillah (From a Married Muslimah) La Howla Wa La Quwata Illa BiLLah - There is no Effort or Power except with Allah's Will.
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Daniel Dworsky
Senior Member Joined: 17 March 2005 Location: Israel Status: Offline Points: 777 |
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I meant the settlers but now that I think about it Haldol (Antihallucinogenic)
seems more appropriate Edited by Daniel Dworsky |
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Daniel Dworsky
Senior Member Joined: 17 March 2005 Location: Israel Status: Offline Points: 777 |
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Uri Avnery
2.9.06 When Napoleon Won at Waterloo NAPOLEON WON the battle of Waterloo. The German Wehrmacht won World War II. The United States won in Vietnam, and the Soviets in Afghanistan. The Zealots won against the Romans, and Ehud Olmert won the Second Lebanon War. You didn't know that? Well, during the last few days the Israeli media has paraded a long series of experts, who did not leave any room for doubt: the war has brought us huge achievements, Hizbullah was routed, Olmert is the great victor. The TV talk-show hosts and anchormen put their microphones at the service of professors, publicity experts, "security personnel" and "strategists" (a title not denoting generals, but advisers of politicians). All of them agreed on the outcome: an honest-to-goodness victory. Yesterday I switched on the TV and saw a person radiating self-assurance and explaining how our victory in Lebanon opens the way for the inevitable war with Iran. The analysis, composed almost entirely of clich�s, was worthy of a high-school pupil. I was shocked to learn that the man was a former chief of the Mossad. Anyway, we won this war and we are going to win the next one. So there is no need at all for a commission of inquiry. What is there to inquire into? All we need is a few committees to clear up the minor slips that occurred here and there. Resignations are absolutely out. Why, what happened? Victors do not resign! Did Napoleon resign after Waterloo? Did Presidents Johnson and Nixon resign after what happened in Vietnam? Did the Zealots resign after the destruction of the Temple? JOKING ASIDE, the parade of Olmert's stooges on TV, on the radio and in the newspapers tells us something. Not about the achievements of Olmert as a statesman and strategist, but about the integrity of the media. When the war broke out, the media people fell into line and and marched in step as a propaganda battalion. All the media, without exception, became organs of the war effort, fawning on Olmert, Peretz and Halutz, waxing enthusiastic at the sight of the devastation in Lebanon and singing the praises of the "steadfastness of the civilian population" in the north of Israel. The public was exposed to an incessant rain of victory reports, going on (literally) from early in the morning to late at night. The government and army spokespersons, together with Olmert's spin team, decided what to publish and when, and, more importantly, what to suppress. That found its expression in the "word laundry". Instead of accurate words came misleading expressions: when heavy battles were raging in Lebanon, the media spoke about "exchanges of fire". The cowardly Hassan Nasrallah was "hiding" in his bunker, while our brave Chief-of- Staff was directing operations from his underground command post (nicknamed "the hole"). The chicken-hearted "terrorists" of Hizbullah were hiding behind women and children and operating from within villages, quite unlike our Ministry of Defense and General Staff which are located in the heart of the most densely populated area in Israel. Our soldiers were not captured in a military action, but "abducted" like the victims of gangsters, while our army "arrests" the leaders of Hamas. Hizbullah, as is well known, is "financed" by Iran and Syria, quite unlike Israel, which "receives generous support" from our great friend and ally, the United States. There was, of course, a difference of night and day between Hizbullah and us. How can one compare? After all, Hizbullah launched rockets at us with the express intent of killing civilians, and did indeed kill some thirty of them. While our military, "the most moral army in the world", took great care not to hurt civilians, and therefore only about 800 Lebanese civilians, half of them children, lost their lives in the bombardments which were all directed at purely military targets. No general could compare with the military correspondents and commentators, who appeared daily on TV, striking impressive military poses, who reported on the fighting and demanded a deeper advance into Lebanon. Only very observant viewers noticed that they did not accompany the fighters at all and did not share the dangers and pains of battle, something that is essential for honest reporting in war. During the entire war I saw only two correspondent's reports that really reflected the spirit of the soldiers - one by Itay Angel and the other by Nahum Barnea. The deaths of soldiers were generally announced only after midnight, when most people were asleep. During the day the media spoke only about soldiers being "hurt". The official pretext was that the army had first to inform the families. That's true - but only for announcing the names of the fallen soldiers. It does not apply at all to the number of the dead. (The public quickly caught on and realized that "hurt" meant "killed'.) OF COURSE, among the almost one thousand people invited to the TV studios during the war to air their views, there were next to no voices criticizing the war itself. Two or three, who were invited for alibi purposes, were shown up as ridiculous weirdos. Two or three Arab citizens were also invited, but the talk-masters fell on them like hounds on their prey. For weeks, the media suppressed the fact that hundreds of thousands of Israelis had abandoned the bombarded North, leaving only the poorest behind. That would have shaken the legend of the "steadfastness of the rear". All the media (except the internet sites) completely suppressed the news about the demonstrations against the war that took place almost daily and that grew rapidly from dozens to hundreds, and from hundreds to thousands. (Channel 1 alone devoted several seconds to the small demonstration of Meretz and Peace Now that took place just before the end of the war. Both had supported the war enthusiastically almost to the finish.) I don't say these things as a professor for communications or a disgruntled politician. I am a media-person from head to foot. Since the age of 17 I have been a working journalist, reporter, columnist and editor, and I know very well how media with integrity should behave. (The only prize I ever got in my own country was awarded by the Journalists' Association for my "life work in journalism".) I do not think, by the way, that the behavior of our media was worse than that of their American colleagues at the start of the Iraq war, or the British media during the ridiculous Falklands/Malvinas war. But the scandals of others are no consolation for our own. Against the background of this pervasive brainwashing, one has to salute the few - who can be counted on the fingers of both hands - who did not join the general chorus and did indeed voice criticism in the written media, as much as they were allowed to. The names are well-known, and I shall not list them here, for fear of overlooking somebody and committing an unforgivable sin. They can hold their head high. The trouble is that their comments appeared only in the op-ed pages, which have a limited impact, and were completely absent from the news pages and news programs, which shape public opinion on a daily basis. When the media people now passionately debate the need for all kinds of inquiry commissions and examination committees, perhaps they should set a personal example and establish a Commission of Inquiry to investigate the actions of the media themselves at the time of supreme test. I N GOETHE'S "Faust", the devil presents himself as the "force that always strives for the bad and always produces the good." I do not wish, God forbid, to compare the media to the devil, but the result is the same: by its enthusiastic support for the war, the media deepened the feeling of failure that came afterwards and which may in the end have a beneficial impact. The media called Hizbullah a "terror organization", evoking the image of a small group of "terrorists" with negligible capabilities. When it became clear that this is an efficient and well-trained military force with brave and determined fighters, effective missiles and other weapons, that could hold out against our huge military machine for 33 days without breaking, the disappointment was even more bitter. After the media had glorified our military commanders as supermen and treated every one of their boasts with adulation, almost as if they were divine revelations, the disappointment was even greater when severe failures in strategy, tactics, intelligence and logistics showed up in all levels of the senior command. That contributed to the profound change in public opinion that set in at the end of the war. As elevated as the self-confidence had been, so deep was the sense of failure. The Gods had failed. The intoxication of war was replaced by the hangover of the morning after. And who is that running in front of the mob clamoring for revenge, all the way to the Place de la Guillotine? The media, of course. I don't know of a single talk-show host, anchorman. commentator, reporter or editor, who has confessed his guilt and begged for forgiveness for his part in the brainwashing. Everything that was said, written or photographed has been wiped off the slate. It just never happened. Now, when the damage cannot be repaired anymore, the media are pushing to the head of those who demand the truth and clamor for punishment for all the scandalous decisions that were taken by the government and the general staff: prolonging the war unnecessarily after the first six days, abandoning the rear, neglecting the reserves, not sending the land army into Lebanon on day X and sending them into Lebanon on day Y, not accepting G8's call for a cease-fire, and so on. But, just a moment --- During the last few days, the wheel may be turning again. What? We did not lose the war after all? Wait, wait, we did win? Nasrallah has apologized? (By strict orders from above, the full interview of Nasrallah was not broadcast at all, but the one passage in which he admitted to a mistake was broadcast over and over again.) The sensitive nose of the media people has detected a change of the wind. Some of them have already altered course. If there is a new wave in public opinion, one should ride it, no? WE CALL this the "Altalena Effect". For those who don't know, or who have already forgotten: Altalena was a small ship that arrived off the coast of Israel in the middle of the 1948 war, carrying a group of Irgun men and quantities of weapons, it was not clear for whom. David Ben-Gurion was afraid of a putsch and ordered the shelling of the ship, off the coast of Tel-Aviv. Some of the men were killed, Menachem Begin, who had gone aboard, was pushed into the water and saved. The ship sank, the Irgun was dispersed and its members joined the new Israeli army. 29 years later Begin came to power. All the careerists joined him in haste. And then it appeared, retroactively, that practically everybody had been on board the Altalena. The little ship expanded into a huge aircraft carrier - until the Likud lost power and Altalena shrunk back to the size of a fishing boat. The Second Lebanon War was a mighty Altalena. All the media crowded onto its deck. But the day after the war was over, we learned that this was an optical illusion: absolutely nobody had been there, except Captain Olmert, First Officer Peretz and Helmsman Halutz. However, that can change any minute now, if the trusting public can be convinced that we won the war after all. As has been said before: in Israel nothing changes, except the past. |
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herjihad
Senior Member Joined: 26 January 2005 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2473 |
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Bismillah, Thanks for posting these, Daniel. Salaamu Alaykum |
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Al-Hamdulillah (From a Married Muslimah) La Howla Wa La Quwata Illa BiLLah - There is no Effort or Power except with Allah's Will.
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Daniel Dworsky
Senior Member Joined: 17 March 2005 Location: Israel Status: Offline Points: 777 |
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Uri Avnery
6.9.06 "Left, But�" I ONCE saw a nice sketch in a political cabaret: on the stage several people were speaking in unconnected sentences, all of which ended with the word "but". For example: "Some of my best friends are Jews, but�", "I have nothing against blacks, but�", "I really detest racism, but�" During the recent war, I frequently heard similar phrases: "I am a leftist, but�" These words were invariably - but invariably! - followed by a rightist statement. It seems that we have a whole community of "leftists-but", who propose the annihilation of entire Lebanese villages, the turning of Lebanon into a heap of ruins, the destruction over the heads of its inhabitants of any building where Hassan Nasrallah may (or may not) be staying. And, while we are at it, also to wipe Gaza from the face of the earth. Encountering such sentences on TV, on the radio and in the papers, I am sometimes tempted to pray: Dear God, give me honest to goodness fascists instead of these leftists-but. WHILE ANALYZING the Second Lebanon War, it is impossible to ignore the role played by the Leftists, with or without quotation marks, during the fighting. The day before yesterday I saw on TV an interview with the playwright Joshua Sobol, a likeable person known as a regular leftist. He explained that this war has brought us important benefits, and sang the praises of the Minister of Defense, Amir Peretz. Sobol is not alone. When the government started this war, an impressive line-up of writers supported it. Amos Oz, A.B.Yehoshua and David Grossman, who regularly appear as a political trio, were united again in their support of the government and used all their considerable verbal talents to justify the war. They were not satisfied with that: some days after the beginning of the war, the three published a joint ad in the papers, expressing their enthusiastic backing for the operation. Their support was not purely passive. Amos Oz, a writer with considerable literary prestige throughout the world, wrote an article in favor of the war, which appeared in several respected foreign newspapers. I wouldn't be surprised if "somebody" helped to distribute it. His two comrades, too, were active in propagating the war, together with a long row of writers like Yoram Kaniuk, assorted artists and intellectuals, real or imagined. All of them volunteered for the propaganda reserves without waiting to be drafted. I doubt that the war would have attained its monstrous dimensions without the massive support of Leftists-but, which made it possible to form a "wall to wall consensus ", ignoring the protest of the consistent peace camp. This consensus carried away the Meretz party, whose guru Amos Oz is, and Peace Now, in whose mass rallies Amos Oz used to be the main speaker (when they were still able to stage mass rallies). Some people are now pretending that this group was really against the war. To whit: some days before the end they published a second tripartite ad, this time calling for its termination. At the same time, Meretz and Peace Now also changed course. But not one of them apologized or showed remorse for their prior support for the killing and devastation. Their new position was: the war was indeed very good, but now the time has come to put an end to it. WHAT IS the logic of this position? The government decided on the attack in apparent response to the action of Hizbullah, which captured two Israeli soldiers on the Israeli side of the border and proposed exchanging them for Lebanese prisoners held in Israel. In this action, several comrades of the captured soldiers were killed, and some more soldiers died when their tank hit a mine while pursuing the captors on the Lebanese side of the border. The Israeli public reacted, of course, with fury and cries for revenge. But one would have expected intellectuals, and especially "leftist" ones, to keep a cool head, even - and perhaps especially - during times of emotional upheaval. In similar circumstances, even Ariel Sharon avoided extreme reactions and agreed to exchange prisoners. Those who did not possess the courage for that ("oz" in Hebrew means strength and courage), or those who really believed that the Hizbullah action must be met with a strong reaction, could have justified a limited military reprisal. On that day it was legitimate to join those who demanded such a reasonable reaction. But already after 48 hours, it was clear that the reaction was not proportional but massive. It was not designed to "send a message" to Hizbullah and all the Lebanese people that such a provocation would not go unpunished. It had quite different aims. On the second or third day of the war, it was already quite clear to any thinking person - and don't intellectuals pride themselves on being just that? - that this was a real war, which went far beyond the problem of the two captured soldiers. The systematic bombardment of the Lebanese infrastructure bore witness to the fact that it was prepared well in advance and that its aim was the annihilation of Hizbullah and the changing of the political realities in Lebanon. For that it was enough to listen to the declarations of Olmert, Peretz and Halutz. THAT WAS the real test of the intellectuals. One can forgive them for their first reaction. One can say that they were carried away, as happens to people at the beginning of a war. One can say that they did not understand the context (a terrible accusation, when thrown in the face of intellectuals). But from the third day on, such justifications and excuses do not stand up anymore. The army chiefs did not hide the horrible devastation they were causing in Lebanon - on the contrary, they boasted about it. It was clear that appalling suffering was being caused to hundreds of thousands, that civilians were being killed in large numbers, that many, many people were losing all their possessions in the villages and towns that were being systematically destroyed. At the same time, great suffering was caused to the population of Northern Israel. How could writers with a conscience, and even more so "leftists" with a humane outlook, keep quiet while these atrocities were being committed? How could they go on serving the propaganda machine of the war? True, the writers could not know that already on the sixth day of the war the army chiefs had told the government that all achievable aims of the war had by now been achieved, and that nothing more could be attained (such as the return of the prisoners, the restoration of the army's deterring power, the disarming of Hizbullah etc.) In other words, that even from a purely military point of view, there was no point continuing the horror, which nevertheless went on for another 27 days and nights. But if any protest from the famous writers, even a faint one, had been heard, it could have induced the political and military leaders to think again. But there was no such protest. When the writers did wake up after all, in the 5th (fifth!) week of the war, and called for its termination, it was too late. There was no need for them anymore. The cumbersome machinery of the UN was already engaged in achieving the cessation of hostilities. One tragic event was the death in combat of David Grossman's son, Uri, in those last hours of the war. WHAT CAUSED the "Left-but" to behave like that? One can find superficial reasons. It is very hard for leftists to rise up against a government in which the Labor party plays an important role. That was also true in 2000, when the Labor leader, Ehud Barak, wrecked the Camp David summit and returned with the fatal slogan: "We have no partner! There is no one to talk with!" But that was not true in the First Lebanon War, in 1982, when the Likud was in power. Because even then the "Left-but", under the leadership of Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin, did support the war. During the siege of Beirut, Rabin was the guest of Sharon, and, standing on the ruins, proposed cutting off the supply of water and medicines to the population of the besieged Western part of the city (where I was meeting with Yasser Arafat at the same time). Only after the third week of the war, did Peace Now join the protest against it. After the Sabra and Shatila massacre, Peace Now called for the protest rally on which its reputation has rested since - the rally with the fabled 400 thousand protesters. That was its brightest spot and the beginning of its eclipse. Because, in order to assure the dimensions of the demonstration, Peace Now made a pact - not with the devil, but with hypocrisy. In return for the help of the Labor Party, they invited Peres and Rabin to be the main speakers - in spite of the fact that on the eve of the war, the two had met with Menachem Begin and publicly requested him to invade Lebanon. BUT THERE are more profound causes for the behavior of the "Left-but" in times of war. From the beginning of the Jewish Labor Movement in the country, the Left has suffered from an internal contradiction: it was both socialist and nationalist. Of the two components, nationalism was by far the more important. Therefore, membership in the trade union organization (Histadrut) was based on a strictly national classification: not a single Arab was allowed to become a member in the body whose official name was "The General Organization of the Hebrew Workers in Eretz-Israel". Only years after the foundation of the State of Israel were Arabs allowed to join. One of the most important tasks of the Histadrut was to prevent by all means, including violence, the employment of Arabs in Jewish working places. For that, blood was shed. That is true also for the most glorious of socialist creations: the kibbutz. No Arab was ever allowed to become a member. That was no accident: the kibbutzim saw themselves not only as a realization of a socialist dream, but also as fortresses in the Jewish struggle for the country. The creation of a new kibbutz, like Hanita on the Lebanese border in 1938, was celebrated as a national victory. The most leftist part of the kibbutz movement, Hashomer Hatsa'ir, (the basis of the late Mapam party, now Meretz) had an official slogan: "For Zionism, Socialism and the Brotherhood of Peoples". The order was not accidental, either: it expressed the real priorities. Hashomer Hatsa'ir did indeed adore Stalin, "the sun of the peoples", until his death, but its main creations were the settlements, generally on land bought from rich absentee landowners, after the Fellahin, who had tended them for generations, had been evicted. After the founding of Israel, the Hashomer Hatza'ir kibbutzim were settled on the lands of the refugees and lands expropriated from the Arab citizens of Israel proper. The kibbutz Bar'am is sitting on the land of the village Bir'am, from which the Arab inhabitants were evicted after the end of the fighting in 1948. Much Zionism, very little Brotherhood of Peoples. In every real test, this internal contradiction of the "Zionist Left" (as they like to call themselves) becomes obvious. That is the root of the split personality of the "Left-but". When the guns are roaring and the flag goes up the pole, the "Left-but" stands at attention and salutes. |
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Whisper
Senior Member Male Joined: 25 July 2004 Location: United Kingdom Status: Offline Points: 4752 |
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I have been thinking for the past five years or so (since I have come to know Uri Avenry) what could we do or not do with this man? Gush Shalom, if my life be spared for saying so, is doing far more for the struggle against occupations than all the Muselims of our world put together. Jinkuye, Daniaal. |
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Servetus
Senior Member Male Joined: 04 April 2001 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 2109 |
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Servie�s cryptogram (#23): Gush Emunim (Avigdor Eskin) est Gush Shalom (Uri Avnery) inversus. (Israel�s Gush Emunim, or �Block of the Faithful,� as respresented by Avigdor Eskin (and others) is Gush Shalom, or �The Peace Block,� inverted.) |
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Daniel Dworsky
Senior Member Joined: 17 March 2005 Location: Israel Status: Offline Points: 777 |
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Close Luke Skywalker. Emunim believers means Ameenim Faithful is Edited by Daniel Dworsky |
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