Israel/Sri Lanka comparison is important

by on February 7, 2010 9

I don’t have time to do the math here, but you should read Bill Weinberg’s smart post comparing Israel’s conduct in Gaza with Sri Lanka’s government’s massacring of 20-30,000 Tamils last year. Makes Israel look abstemious. Judge Goldstone scored the failure of the int’l community to do jack about Sri Lanka at Yale 2 weeks back. Of course we single Israel out. Yes we do. The reasons are obvious. Don’t have time to spell them out here. It is justifiable but it does mean that when we remove the beam from our eye, we need to get on the beam in others’.

About Philip Weiss

Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in Gaza, Israel/Palestine, US Politics

{ 9 comments... read them below or add one }

  1. Colin Murray says:
    February 7, 2010 at 11:33 am

    “The reasons are obvious.”

    We are justified in singling Israel out because we Americans politically, financially, diplomatically, and militarily subsidize Israeli occupation, ethnic cleansing, and colonization. We do so mostly unknowingly and unwillingly in direct contravention of both our fundamental values, which are unfortunately not shared by most Israelis, and of our own interests, the primary of which is global economic stability rooted in secure and reliable extraction and distribution of the energy resources upon which modern human civilization depends for its very existence.

    We have nothing to do with Sri Lanka. There is no Sri Lankan Lobby browbeating, bribing, and blackmailing American politicians to pay for and defend its crimes. Justice starts at home.

    “It is justifiable but it does mean that when we remove the beam from our eye, we need to get on the beam in others’.”

    I agree, and we will have a much easier time of it when we can rebuild enough moral authority to lead effectively.

  2. potsherd says:
    February 7, 2010 at 11:53 am

    The comments are fascinating. So the US tried to intervene on behalf of the “terrorists” instead of the repressive government?

    It really does depend on whose lobby has the lever.

  3. MHughes976 says:
    February 7, 2010 at 12:20 pm

    I’ve just had a look at an article by Shamindra Ferdinando for a paper called ‘Sunday Island’ published through ‘the Official News Portal of the Government of Sri Lanka’, making it clear that President Rajipaska managed to obtain military hardware from the United States and built up a coalition of willing supporters ranging from Israel (who else could have made the SL army so effective?) to Iran. He silences human rights protests from the US by threatening to get closer to China, from India by threatening to get closer to Pakistan. If Israel becomes uneasy he sends a greeting card to Ahmedinejad. What a politician!
    Ferdinando remarks that SL politicians and military men will not be setting foot in the UK until the unpleasantness over Livni is resolved, since the Tamil diaspora is without many guns but still has plenty of lawyers.
    Not that the Tamil Tigers were nice people.

  4. DICKERSON3870 says:
    February 7, 2010 at 1:14 pm

    RE: “Israel/Sri Lanka comparison is important” – Weiss
    SEE: ‘Gaza II’ unfolding in the East, Online Journal, 05/08/09
    (EXCERPT) ….However, there is more to the comparisons between Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip and Sri Lanka’s attack on the narrow strip of the Jaffna peninsula. In May 2000, a day after India refused to give Sri Lanka any military assistance in its war against the Tamil Tigers, Sri Lanka and Israel resumed diplomatic relations. Although the corporate media are focusing on Sri Lanka’s military assistance from China, little mention is being made of the island nation’s military links with Israel.
    After the establishment of diplomatic ties between Jerusalem and Colombo, Israeli military technicians arrived to maintain Sri Lanka’s Israeli-made Kfir fighter-bombers and Russian MiG-27 aircraft and provided Sri Lanka with Dvora fast naval attack craft. Israeli arms and ammunition also began flooding into Sri Lanka.
    Soon, Israeli military advisers and “consultants” were regular visitors to Colombo’s new Access Lanka Building, owned by relatives of Sri Lanka’s top military officers. Among Israel’s security exports to Sri Lanka was state-of-the-art electronic and imagery surveillance equipment. Israeli Air Force pilots reportedly flew Sri Lankan attack aircraft against Tamil Tiger targets on the Jaffna peninsula. Israeli military personnel were also reported to have taken part in Sri Lankan military attacks on Tamil units…. – Wayne Madsen
    ENTIRETY – link to onlinejournal.com

  5. The Hasbara Buster says:
    February 7, 2010 at 1:49 pm

    To those who claim that we should have focused on Sri Lanka not Israel, my answer is that they should have set up blogs to slam the Tamil Tigers before they said anything about Hamas. After all, victims from Tamil terror acts far outnumbered those from Palestinian suicide bombings. I have yet to see any of them complaining that an attack on a Jerusalem yeshiva got wide coverage while the bombing of two buses by the Tigers didn’t make it to the newspapers’ covers. See here.

    • Donald says:
      February 7, 2010 at 2:11 pm

      Agreed. That’s been my response–if Israel’s crimes are too small to matter much(a stupid claim anyway, for all sorts of reasons), then Hamas’s crimes are so trivial they don’t matter at all (also a stupid claim).

    • Shmuel says:
      February 7, 2010 at 2:23 pm

      You’re right HB. It has nothing to do with being singled out (Israel would not even exist were it not for special international – i.e. Western – treatment), but with being singled out when it’s not convenient.

  6. Cliff says:
    February 7, 2010 at 2:18 pm

    Speaking of comparisons, since this is all in the realm of the ‘How to make a case for Israel and win’ meme (from Jews Sans Frontiers), here is a quote from Elie Wiesal that I found in Beyond Chutzpah. I was reading the book again today to look at Fink’s analysis of the separation wall.

    At the conference Wiesal justified his failure to speak out on behalf of the Palestinians on the ground that “I cannot associate myself with people who educate their children to wear explosives and kill” – as if this apologist for Israeli breaches of international law supported Palestinian rights before the suicide bombings.

    link to sabbah.biz

  7. RoHa says:
    February 9, 2010 at 3:38 am

    The situation of the Tamils is actually a bit (but not a lot) more like that of the Zionists than that of the Palestinians. (So, of course, blowing Tamil children to shreds and burning their parents to crisps is perfectly justified.)

    The Sinhalese were the natives.

    The Tamils started out as immigrants (brought in as coolies by the British) but eventually established themselves.

    The Tamils maintained themselves as a separate group instead of assimilating with the Sinhalese. (Does anyone know whether the Sinhalese discouraged assimilation?)

    Some of the Tamils tried to carve off a bit of Sri Lanka as a separate state.

    Not the best formula for old-style hippie Peace and Love.

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