Malcolm Hoenlein didn't like Ron Kessler's report on his comments about Jews being not crazy about Obama, apparently. And questioning what Obama "believes." He "backtracked," Newsmax.com says. Well, Newsmax.com is now releasing the transcript of the original interview. Here's a bit on the Nakba:
Hoenlein: Second, the idea that the sort of indirect equating of the Holocaust and the suffering of the Jews with what Palestinians endured. The Palestinian refugee problem, or dislocation as he said, didn’t come about because of the creation of the Jewish state, it came about because the Arab states declared war on Israel, and warned the Arabs that they would suffer the same fate as the Jews if they didn’t get out. And then kept them as political pawns.
Kessler: And then to compare killing 6 million Jews with just displacing people…["just displacing people" is Orwellian speech for expulsion, ethnic cleansing]
Hoenlein: I’m saying there’s no comparison between the Holocaust, even if it was an indirect one, and he didn’t intend it to be an explicit one. I mean there is no comparison between that and what happened to Palestinians.
How typical, that reporter and source agree in dismissing the Palestinian experience.
Now Kessler wants to know if Hoenlein voted for Obama:
Kessler: Could I ask did you vote for Obama and now do you regret it?
Hoenlein: I never discuss how I vote.
Kessler: But have you heard that from some Jewish leaders, just privately? Hoenlein: That they’re saying that?
Kessler: Yeah.
Hoenlein: Let’s say there’s a lot of questioning going on about what he really believes, what does he really stand for. I think there’s a lot of uncertainty right now.
Related posts:
- Hoenlein says Obama parroted Muslim ‘propaganda’ (and left out the Jewish religious propaganda)
- Dershowitz says, actually Nakba was Palestinians prolonging the Holocaust
- Avnery invokes Obama in urging Israelis to recognize the Nakba
- In Jerusalem, American Jewish Leader Frets Over Obama, ‘Change’ Agenda, Ron Paul, and Walt & Mearsheimer
- Jewish Division: RJC Blasts Obama Over Dividing Jerusalem
{ 36 comments }
As candidate, Obama's middle name didn't bother me. I expected him to be honest. As President, his treacherous character quickly became obvious. His middle name means something, after all. In the same way that Hillary is Secretary Rodham-Clinton, Barak is President Hussein-Obama. Why is it that Jews are so often unfairly suspected and accused of dual loyalties but a former Muslim in the White House with a plainly revolutionary agenda is not accused the same way? I fear that President Hussein-Obama may do grave damage… to the USA. Everything he's said and done so far points in that direction.
"And then to compare killing 6 million Jews with just displacing people…" So the Jews who survived the camps have no complaints? Have no rights to compensation? And now two wrongs make a right?
If Obama's middle name means something, it means he will put the interests of the US ahead of the interests of Israel. Is that what you call treason? How utterly Orwellian!
How radical Yeshivas train Jewish students for treason: Hate-Filled Curriculum of Radical Yeshivas.
The Palestinian refugee problem, or dislocation as he said, didn’t come about because of the creation of the Jewish state, it came about because the Arab states declared war on Israel, and warned the Arabs that they would suffer the same fate as the Jews if they didn’t get out. And then kept them as political pawns. No one loses his home because a bunch of guys wage war. By that standard, Americans should occupy half of Germany's land. But then again, the Zionists have never shown much knack for such revolutionary principles as the right to property and the right to liberty.
The treachery in the US government comes from our home-grown and dual citizen Zionists. They need to swear allegiance in public before serving in any capacity for our government on any level. I'm sure Jake in Jerusalem understands this Liebermanesque POV very well.
Anybody recall the natives of the Palestine Mandate declaring economic war on World Jewry before they were displaced? I don't see it in the banner headlines in the press archives…
Littlehorn, his name choice, might be interested in learning about the fate of several million Germans from Silesia and the Polish corridor.
The Sunday prior to the November 2004 presidential vote the Paxson TV channel in my city broadcast the anti-Kerry Swift Boat movie several times for the entire afternoon. The broadcast was sponsored by NewsMax, which was selling DVD's of the Swift Boat movie. I called NewsMax's 1-800 number to complain. Afterwards I received telephone calls from others who had called NewsMax to complain about the Swift Boat movie broadcast in other cities. NewsMax had given out my home telephone number and told the other callers I was the person in charge of complaints. That was interesting and I met some people as outraged as I was. Fuck with NewsMax using a pay as you go cell phone. Watching the scene of Warsaw Ghetto inhabitants during the street crossing in the movie "The Pianist," portrays what Palestinians go through.
I think given the agonizing length of the slow strangulation of the Palestinian people — three generations — and the premeditated, tortuous, almost gleefully sadistic techniques, the totality of the enterprise is probably in the same ball park as the Holocaust, and certainly can't be dismissed as "displacement." On top of that is the obvious fact that Israel has strangled the Palestinians not for security, but because it covets the West Bank, and has gone to elaborate lengths to conceal this premeditated motive. The entire enterprise has been as sinister and calculated as a cult systematically plotting the abduction, torture, murder and disposal of the bodies of tens of thousands of victims, with Zionist accomplices in the US financing the whole sordid business by co-opting US taxpayer resources. I think it's the State-organized, premeditated evil on an epic scale, which was a factor in the Nazi holocuast (and the Soviet one before that), that puts all of these in the same ball park.
I've yet to see Obama propose harm to Israel in any way. However, if it turns out that Obama is an example of a Black man using Jewish concerns and backing to gain political power, while serving his own interests, I salute him for turning the tables. I look forward to hearing Blacks go on about how they saved the Jews from themselves for the next forty years!
Racist genocidal Zionists like to learn good international practices from the Soviets. No one should be surprised that Soviet policies of alienization, ethnic cleansing and genocide were for the most part planned and implemented by Soviet Ashkenazim. Yet there are decent Jews that understand the criminality of such actions. Rafael Lemkin, who was the originator of the concept on an international anti-genocide convention, specifically labeled the treatment of the Ostdeutsch population in the aftermath of WW2 as genocide. Yet there is a specific difference why the forced displacement of a German diaspora population from the periphery of German settlement has not created the same sort of worldwide outrage that Zionism has caused. I discuss that difference here.
Another effort by Neocons to speak falsely as if for the entire Jewish community – "did you vote for Obama, and now do you regret it? Do you at least know of any Jews who are saying that?" And from such a (likely minority) view, to spin a meme of betrayal based in Anti-Semitism, where Obama, like Carter, represent Israel's true friends in the US, those who care enough to intervene when their friend is behaving badly. Yet these Neocons never get held accountable for the death, destruction and ruin they have caused, and they remain intent on wreaking more havoc. Calling Carter, Tutu and Obama Anti-Semites is despicable, and ought not to be tolerated by self-respecting Jews. It ought not to be tolerated.
The ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians was well underway before the entry of any Arab armies into Palestine as was the Hagana-Irgun-Stern invasion of areas assigned to the Palestinians by the UN partition. Deir Yassin was in the intended international Jerusalem zone. The massacre there, which was skillfully used by the Hagana to panic Palestinian peasants into flight, happened on 9 April, 1948, five weeks before the British withdrawal, the Israeli declaration of statehood, and the uncoordinated chaotic entry of Arab armies. Whatever the rhetoric, the main purpose and accomplishment of the "invasion" of the Arab armies was to halt the Israeli advance and consolidate a hold on what was left of the sectors assigned to the Palestinians. OK, so the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians wasn't as terrible a crime as the Holocaust. But someone help this pigeon. Is a lie denying the fact of a smaller tragedy less dishonest (or delusional) than the lie denying a big tragedy? Are Zionists who lie about the circumstances of the Nakba to be compared to those who engage in Holocaust denial? Or is the denial of a smaller crime not as bad as the denial of a bigger one?
"Just displacing", right. The good old "not Hitler" standard, also recently updated as the "not Saddam" standard. Everything clearly below the level of full-blown eliminationist genocide is "just" something less, and thus somehow morally negotiable.
79% of American Jews supported the IDF Gaza Rampage. The other 21% have an ethical obligation to follow the example of Marlene Dietrich by dissociating themselves from Jewish identity and by categorically condemning pro-Israel Jews as murderous racist genocide supporters.
Expulsion of the Palestinians did not begin with the war of 1948, but in the period between the partition resolution and the withdrawal of the British. We talk about 750,000 Palestinians who were made refugees "in the war", but in fact probably one-third of all Palestinian refugees were made refugees while they were still under the "protection" of the British Mandate; while they were living in areas defined by the UN as part of "Arab Palestine" but which Zionists wanted for "Jewish Palestine"; before Israel's war of independence, and before there was a single outside Arab soldier in Palestine. In fact the restoration of Palestinian refugees who had already been expelled was one of the justifications the Arab states used for military intervention in the first place. (And the prior expansion of Zionists into Arab Palestine explains why, when military intervention did come, Arab armies did not invade Israel/"Jewish Palestine" per se, but fought overwhelmingly in land earmarked for Arab Palestine, into which Zionists had already expanded at the expense of the Palestinian population during the last months of the Mandate). The re-ordering of history to make the expulsion of Palestinians subsequent to Arab intervention, rather than preceding it, is a reflection of how difficult many Zionists find it to acknowledge that Zionism in Palestine could only ever be realized by the expulsion of the existing population. You simply cannot make a Jewish state in a land that was so overwhelmingly Muslim and Christian, unless you are prepared from the beginning to get rid of people of the "wrong" religion. And reliance on ethnic cleansing is not an attractive ideological feature, which is why Zionism relied on fantasies like "a land without a people" and, in this case, "we never meant to get rid of the Arabs, it was an unplanned consequence of a war they started". Holding on to these fantasies is the only way for Zionists to assert a moral high ground vis a vis the Palestinians that they simply don't have, and it seems to particularly affect Zionists who also want to be considered liberal. Hardline Zionists seem to find it less difficult to acknowledge Zionism as a zero sum game that can only be "us or them", and to say "yes we expelled them, so what?".
(shakes virtual fist at homingpigeon for saying this first. i need to type faster).
Jake wrote: "As President, his treacherous character…." Totally revealing choice of words: A guy in Jerusalem feels that the American President owes Israel some duty, with a violation of a duty of course being the only way one can commit "treachery." No wonder you damn near never see the slightest appreciation amongst Israelis for all the U.S. has done for it in the past, not to mention the billions given to it; it was all *owed* by us apparently.
The present is more relevant, which demands reform. Obama is squarely behind Israel's health and security. He's not behind Israel's expansion. Sounds right to me.
It's a recurring theme in Zionist discourse that "history" only ever begins when a Zionist is on the receiving end. Thus, the entry of Arab armies caused the refugee problem… even if thousands of Palestinians had already been expelled at the hand of Zionist militias. Likewise, the I/P conflict only began with the Arab rejection of partition in 1947… and was completely unrelated to the immigration of Zionist settlers over the previous 65 years, seeking to establish a Jewish state in Palestine against the wishes of the overwhelmingly non-Jewish preexisting population. More recently, US news media consistently referred during the second intifada to suicide bombings as ending "a period of calm", regardless of how many hundreds of Palestinians had been killed or wounded or imprisoned or how many had had their land and livelihoods destroyed by the Occupation during the "calm" period. And they repeatedly rationalized Israel's invasion of Gaza at the end of last year by saying that Hamas had "broken the ceasefire", as if the IDF incursion into Gaza on 4 Nov in which 6 people were killed – and which was the immediate cause of Hamas resuming rocket fire – didn't really count as breaking the ceasefire. As long as it is only large numbers of Palestinians being killed in the name of Zionism, this is considered a normal and "calm" situation, and certainly not a casus belli. It has been this way for decades because in this country Zionism is the normative way of looking at the Middle East and interpreting what is going on there, so we find it hard to acknowledge that Zionism might just be an inherently violent and destabilizing ideology when it is implemented in a land where most people are not Jewish. But as soon as a single Israeli is killed, this is automatically presented as an action that comes out of nowhere, with no context or cause, that simply confirms the eternal victimhood of Israelis and the irrational hatefulness of The Arabs, and provides a pretext for yet more violence to remove the Palestinians from their land (even though it is the underlying exigencies of Zionism that motivate the removal of the Palestinians from their land, and the "security measures" arising out of individual "terrorist" attacks are no more than the immediate convenient excuse).
'It's a recurring theme in Zionist discourse that "history" only ever begins when a Zionist is on the receiving end.' It's a recurring theme in Jewish discourse that "history" only ever begins when Jews are on the receiving end, too. Ignore, paper over, or actively suppress any Jewish provocation, and highlight and exploit the consequential and predictable blowback to the maximum. Sidebar: The US government, Left/Right Statists, and media all behaved the exact same way re provocative and murderous US Mideast policies and the 9/11 blowback. "Everything changed after 9/11," went the narrative, just as "Everything changed after the Holocaust." Meanwhile, the entire narrative studiously refuses to examine what took place before each. (See Thorsprovin above …"No one should be surprised that Soviet policies of alienization, ethnic cleansing and genocide were for the most part planned and implemented by Soviet Ashkenazim." …)
Except, he probably won't follow the rule of law. All settlements are illegal. All of Gaza and the West Bank and East Jerusalem belong to the Palestinians. The Occupation is illegal. The right of return. You don't want to focus on the history of the conflict because it suits Israel's advantages. Who are you kidding Witless?
Great comment, Diane.
I agree.
If the present is more relevant, Witty, let's not hear of ancient Israel or any biblical crap, and let's not hear of the Shoah; please let us just focus on what the state of Israel has been doing for the last four decades or so. What do you see? Why should we could any slack to this rogue state of israel, especially by Americans who (along with German reparations and giving free submarines etc to it) are funding it's endless welfare dole at our expense completely.
could=cut
You are correct – provided that you see supporting Arab dictatorships, ignoring Iranian nuclear plans and coddling Islamo-Fascism as "US interests". Of course, if you believe in Truth, Justice and the American Way, then President Hussein-Obama shouldn't really be bowing to those Islamo-Fascist, Holocaust-denying, Genocidal "friends" in the Middle East.
Sin, you misunderstood – and I think you normally comprehend written statements better than that. President Hussein-Obama owes Israeli little. His primary duty is to the United States of America, the citizens of the USA, the flag and all that these stand for. The question is: Do President Hussein-Obama's policies and actions further the interests of the USA? Judging by the appeasement of dictators by other leaders and other American presidents in the past, Hussein-Obama is on the wrong track. His ANTI-HISTORICAL equivalence of Jewish and Arab suffering, his ANTI-HISTORICAL explanation of the establishment of Israel following WW II, his EQUATING Jewish towns and villages with Palestinean terrorism – all point to someone who is either extraordinarly ignorant of history and determined to make terrible mistakes all over again, or else someone who has adopted the wicked views of evil people, especially in the Islamic world. Either way, President Hussein-Obama is NOT working in the interests of the USA. I can see all this now. Others may take time to recognize this. But it's all true. This is a sad time for the US of A.
As for appreciation of what the US does for Israel, Israelis DO appreciate it. And the leaders in govt in Israel are very, very aware of what the US has done for Israel, in political support at the UN, economic support, and military support. No one here thinks that the USA OWES Israel. Your last comment suggests that you have been watching too many Jew-Hate-Fest videos at MondoLies…..
In the 1920's, the Arabs (not just in Israel) were massacring Jews wherever they could. Check out Hebron and Gush Etzion, for example. The British soldiers were pretty much powerless to protect the Jews from attacking Arab murder-mobs. During WW II, the High Islamic Authority in the British Mandate, Sheikh Hajj Amin al-Husseini (no relation to the US president, AFAIK), spent most of the War in Germany. He had been found guilty of murder and sentenced to death by the British but stayed under protection of the Nazis through the 1940's. He was very enthusiastic about the Nazis' Final Solution to the Jewish Problem and helped plan the Nazi invasion of the Middle East to bring the Final Solution to Israel. All of this happened long before the State of Israel was established, long before those Arabs began calling themselves "Palestineans', long before they described themselves as "refugees". And it's all easy to confim…
Ed, you have really taken a flight of fantasy here…. There are no crematoria here, there are no "gleefully sadistic techniques" for hurting Arabs, Israel is not "sinister and calculated", there has been no "cult systematically plotting the abduction, torture, murder and disposal of the bodies of tens of thousands of victims"… Are you posting from Roswell????
I Love it that you get all these supportive comments! All MondoLiars! How lovely! The Arabs killed at Deir Yassin were almost all, what are called today, ARMED COMBATANTS. There was no massacre….
Shouldn't President Hussein-Obama be more concerned with the health and security of the US of A? As for being "squarely behind Israel's health and security", his words and actions to date debunk your claim. He is coddling the Islamo-Fascists of the Middle East, he is going to lose Iran, lose influence in the M.E. and may yet to try to rehabilitate himself by sacrificing Israel. That Hussein-Obama is no friend of Israel is a given. That he is a threat to the USA is becoming more apparent every day.
Jake in Jerusalem wrote: "Sin, you misunderstood." Well, glad you corrected me and glad to hear what you have said. And of course I apologize accordingly for misreading you. As to the question of the appreciation in Israel for what the U.S. has done for it am also glad to hear what you see and hear over there. All I can say is that I read an awful lot of the comments to various article in the J'Post and Ha'artz and etc. and boy any gratitude sure is tough to see. Just the other day read yet another article about Jonathan Pollard and while I have no problem with Israelis wanting him there, man o man the slanders and vituperation poured on American officials and the American government; anti-semites, liars, cruel-spirited … you name it. Hard to find a molecule even of recognition that hey, given all the U.S. has done for Israel of course there's gonna be some hard feelings when its found that Israel has recruited our own citizens to be used against us, and then that the secrets he got may well have been sold to our enemy at the time, the Soviets. In any event apologies again for misunderstanding you.
On the topic of Pollard, there is lots of skullduggery in that business and even without access to all the secret evidence, it is plain to see that Pollard has been railroaded and locked away to cover for other people's failures. I won't get into it here, but there are REAL spies in the USA for UNFRIENDLY countries who have been caught and received MUCH LIGHTER sentences. This is a giant topic all on it's own. As for spying, do you believe that the US isn't spying on Israel, as well? There have been senators who have admitted as such. I am certain that the US does LOTS of spying on Israel – and I won't reveal my sources. The US treats Israel like some servant country – and Israel has to take it. Hussein-Obama is exploiting this to the utmost – apparently in the service of some Islamic agenda. While we're at it, most countries spy on most other countries. If you don't understand this, you shouldn't be playing with matches yet…. Pollard was simply screwed unfairly by powerful antisemites in Washington – and that is what his supporters have been trying to say.
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