Michael Ignatieff's statement recalls the campaign against Jimmy Carter, who dared to use that word in his book title. Note that Israeli leaders/war-makers Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert have both used "apartheid" word in Israel:
The activities planned for the week will single out Jewish and Israeli students. They will be made to feel ostracized and even physically threatened in the very place where freedom should be paramount -- on a university campus.
Let us be clear: criticism of Israeli government policy is legitimate. Wholesale condemnation of the State of Israel and the Jewish people is not legitimate. Not now, not ever.
The very premise of Israeli Apartheid Week runs counter to our shared values of mutual respect and tolerance, regardless of nationality, race or creed. It is an attempt to heighten the tensions in our communities around the tragic conflict in the Middle East.
On behalf of the Liberal party of Canada and the Parliamentary caucus, I urge all Canadians to join with us in condemning Israeli Apartheid Week, and to reject, in principle, all forms of anti-Semitism, racism and intolerance, both within this country and around the world.”
The more they play the anti-semitic card, the less meaning it becomes and one find day, people will simple don’t care.
On Jimmy Carter book, ” Palestine – Peace Not Apartheid” on page 167 – 169, he ( ie Jimmy Carter ) was suprised to find out, in a meeting with the church leaders in Palestine, that they ( ie local Christians ) are being abused & discriminated by the Israeli Government.
This is why the pro Israeli lobby in the US like Alan Dershowitz attacks the book. He is afraid that Americans will find out the fate of Palestinian Christians.
criticism of Israeli government policy is legitimate. – Doh.
Wholesale condemnation of the State of Israel … is not legitimate. Not now, not ever. – Why not?
… and the Jewish people – Whoa! How’d he get there?
Because Israel claims to be the state of the Jewish people and BYahoo claims to be the leader of the Jewish people – even if they don’t have a vote in the matter.
I would hope (but not hold my breath) that the leader of the Canadian Liberal Party would have sources of information beyond the propagandistic falsehoods uttered by the exponents and ideologues of foreign rogue states.
Shmuel,
You ought to write an op-ed for The Globe & Mail, and you would get published, especially because of your name and your background. The Globe & Mail is the Canadian NYT. Given your writing and thinking skills you could wipe up the floor with these guys. At the very least, write a letter to the ed.
Iggy was only called in from Boston to be head of the Liberal Party after 30 years of living in Boston in 2006 (not sure of year, but super recent.) He was literally handed a riding and ran for PM within 45 days, which he failed to get. Any guesses who engineered this?
MRW – I don’t think they’re accepting articles/letters not directly related to olympic hockey right now, but I’ll give it a try tomorrow. Canada is getting scary.
Shmuel,
You’re right that Canada is getting scary, but if I had your name I would be walking calmly to the beginning of the line. HOWEVER. Harper only has a 42% 44%, or something like that, majority.
Hhell, with your grandfather’s connection to Canada, and your Jerusalem-living years, and your first name, you is golden. You is the goldee.
Stupid goddam typing thing.
It’s not a matter of information but of influence.
MRW,
I’ve written about 350 words. The G&M website is a mess. Do you think you (or anyone else) could give me hand in figuring out where to send it? Past my bedtime now. I’ll get on it in the morning.
Thanks, Shmuel, for this great quote that I’ve included in my blogpost here. I’m trying to follow the repercussions from that outrageous move from our parliamentarians & shall be updating the links in the next couple of days. Thanks also to MRW (and Mondoweiss obviously). You guys are the best!
Check this. You might like it. I don’t know how long the video will remain available. You know how that works.
Thanks for your support. BTW, Shmuel, if you can’t publish your letter in the Globe and Mail, try the Toronto Star. It is a bit more balanced. Take care!
This is the letter I sent to the Globe and Mail:
Shmuel, Globe & Mail contact page. You can click editorial names, whihc they call Commentary.
link to v1.theglobeandmail.com
Letters to the Editor email is letters@globeandmail.com, but i would send to one of the editors if I were you.
They note:
Sorry, Shmuel, my contact page for the G&M is locked in Moderation because of the number of links. I forgot. I just woke up about 1.5 hours ago — huge miracle, I went to sleep before dark — and missed your appeal for help earlier.
Your letter is great. If they dont print it, and I believe they will notify you if you do, I will get you email addresses for papers across Canada. We’ll get you into Lexis-Nexis times 10 on the same topic. ;-)
Shmuel, I reread your letter. Double great.
Great letter, Shmuel.
I was wondering whether this letter could/should be generalized slightly and be used to send a response to the Liberal Party and Michael Ignatieff, and/or newspapers in Canada.
I meant a response with many signatures.
Thanks, Bruce. I was about to ask what you meant by “generalized”. Any thoughts on how to go about it? An open letter to Ignatieff? Signed by whom? Signatures collected how? Published where?
In Europe, the situation is slightly different (the “A” word, for example, is quite acceptable even on the moderate left), but this canard of “Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state” and related conflation of questioning that “right” with anti-Semitism has spread like wildfire.
Signing of the letter could be open to anybody, or could be from Jews offended by Ignatieff’s conflating anti-Zionism (or in his case anti-not-extremely-pro-Zionism) with anti-Semitism. I see advantages with both.
There are some websites/tools which make it very easy to set up one of these petitions/letters.
Should this be organized from Mondoweiss? If yes, we’d have to check with Phil & Adam.
I’m currently at the other end of Europe from you, and up here I/P, BDS, “Israel as a Jewish state” and “apartheid in Israel” is wrapped up in domestic politics of left vs right and the so-called “clash of civilizations” with Muslim immigrants. There is definitely no consensus on I/P in Europe. In fact, the view is as polarized as twenty years ago, which surprised me.
Thanks, MRW. I managed to find that info, but only after I had sent the piece as a letter (bleary-eyed pre-first-coffee). I also missed the fine print that says that letters should be under 200 words (mine’s about 380). I guess I’ll just wait a bit, and see what they do with it.
Shmuel,
Here in a series of post (because of the two-link limit) are the email addresses to the rest of Canada’s main English-speaking papers. I am not including the Toronto Star, however. CanWest is Iggy Asper’s rout of the privately-held Canadian papers in the late 80s. He’s dead; his kids ran it into receivership lately, but I am sure the powers-that-be will rescue them.
The OTTAWA CITIZEN
letters@thecitizen.canwest.com
The MONTREAL GAZETTE
letters@thegazette.canwest.com
Winnipeg’s was Asper’s hometown.
The WINNIPEG SUN
letters@wpgsun.com
The REGINA LEADER-POST
letters@leaderpost.canwest.com
Bruce: There are some websites/tools which make it very easy to set up one of these petitions/letters.
I’ve signed about a million of those, but I really doubt their level of exposure and efficacy – unless something is done with them in the real world.
Shmuel-3,
The EDMONTON JOURNAL
letters@thejournal.canwest.com
The CALGARY HERALD
letters@theherald.canwest.com
Shmuel-4,
The VANCOUVER SUN
sunletters@vancouversun.com
The VICTORIA ADVOCATE
link to victoriaadvocate.com
Shmuel-5,
The HALIFAX HERALD
letters@herald.ca
Shmuel,
“I’ve signed about a million of those, but I really doubt their level of exposure and efficacy – unless something is done with them in the real world.”
I agree in this instance. You’re much better getting a letter into local papers, considering Canada’s breadth, size, and small population. It’s very exotic to have someone from Rome read your hometown rag and comment….and it’s obvious to me that Ignatieff is about to pull a no-confidence vote and precipitate an election.
Thanks MRW. So do you think I should blitz, or wait for some sort of answer from the G&M and take it from there? My experience is mostly from Israel – a small country with few papers, and even fewer willing to publish the kind of stuff I like to write ;-)
Shmuel,
I would blitz but separately. There’s no way a paper will print if they see every other paper in the cc or bcc field. ;-) maybe wait 24 hours to give the G&M a chance to print it, then fuckim.
[I noticed some of the papers said they would not notify letter writers; maybe G&M is the same?]
This may prove useful although many of the addresses are now outdated.
ditto the letter shmuel.. thanks… bruce – those are good ideas too… i hope someone follows thru with them…
Shmuel,
Change the Victoria one to
The VICTORIA TIMES-COLONIST
letters@tc.canwest.com
Done. Thanks for your help, MRW.
Beautiful, Shmuel, just beautiful!
Meh. Canada’s playing “follow the leader” with the US and flushing itself down the crapper too. When we say jump, they ask, “Is this high enough?”
Canada’s pushing ahead in the jumping line, they have their own Lobby now.
They’ve had it for quite a while. The power for it is in Ottawa. The money is in TO and Montreal.
harper was doing a similar ploy for the zionists a few months ago… unfortunately it is tit for tat in politics here in canada as well so i guess iggy felt he had to jump in…. one of them wants to be a bonehead leader and the other follows in like fashion… it’s the way of politicians, especially if there is a possibility of increasing your election, or election payroll chances… who cares about principles? these 2 don’t… principles are just a passing afterthought…
No surprise that Ignatieff should take this line. He was also an avid supporter of the war against Iraq. Like many of those who casually slander Israel’s critics as anti-Semitic, Ignatieff is telling us more about his own anti-Arab racism than he is about any critic of Israel’s war crimes.
Iggy is really playing to the TO crowd, isn’t he. Major Jewish money moved into Ontario politics since 1990, with Toronto (TO) as its hub; however, the protests against Israeli apartheid have been far more vocal across Canada for the past few years than reported in the press here. Even in conservative Alberta, which was populated by Eastern Europeans after WWII, the 1956 Hungarian and 1968 Czech revolutions, etc. [I think half the Ukraine -- Stalin's Jewish ghetto, albeit from poor to stinking rich -- moved to Edmonton and converted to Christianity. ;-) But it is definitely NOT Iggy country. And the university there has been the scene of strong anti-apartheid demonstrations.]
Canada has strong hate laws, and liberal immigration policies to offset its extraordinarily low fertility rates, which makes Iggy’s pronouncement a political ploy that forces here are making use of for American purposes. See! See! Canadians say it’s not legitimate! The hate laws in place for years would have put Lou Dobbs in jail for his comments about Latinos on CNN (when he still had his show); but moreover, it’s in the Canadian psyche not to put up with ‘anti-nationals’ comments. There are way more Muslims proportionally in Canada than in the US. One of their top ‘runaway-success’ TV series was called (if I remember correctly) “The Best Little Mosque on the Prairies.” Something like that.
Another thing: there must be an election coming up, again.
Dont forget that Canadians allow the JDL, legally characterized as a terrorist group in the US, a public voice in Ontario. The head of the JDL in Canada can make all sorts of statements in the name if Jews (or Kahane) and Canadians are nary the wiser. And this rat bastard is in Toronto stirring up froth.
CAN WE PLEASE GET A PREVIEW OPTION, oh blog Gods?
“They will be made to feel ostracized and even physically threatened in the very place where freedom should be paramount — on a university campus.”
This is terrible news. Ignatieff must have some inside information that the PC police will not prevent people this time around from asserting the documented and never-challenged fact that Israel is an apartheid state. Those poor Jewish children on college campuses – that is, the ones who are still Zionists – need to be protected from hateful ideas such as “Palestinians have equal rights, eh”?,” “Israel’s pretexts for going to war against defenseless Palestinians are pretty darn lame, eh?,” and ” Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice, eh?”
This campaign against the apartheid word reminds me of the ‘zionism is racism’ debate that raged in the 70s. I am only speaking for myself and recalling impressions that were created at that time. Namely, I reacted very negatively to anyone who stated ‘zionism is racism’ even though I more or less thought the slogan was accurate. Not sure why the negative feelings arose but there was something about the anti campaign that made me want to avoid discussing ‘zionism is racism’, maybe it had something to do with avoiding fighting words that would immediately result in a shouting match with the average American Jew.
In any case, this current anti campaign against ‘Israel is an apartheid state’ is probably designed to evoke strongly negative feelings in anyone tempted to use the term. It will be interesting to see if today the Zionists succeed in shutting down this debate with their antisemitism accusations. Believe me folks, there are still very few people willing to stand in public against that charge no matter how groundless it may be.
My response to the “zionism is racism” line is that it seriously over-reaches (and by so doing, provides easy cover for those who really are anti-Semitic). There are variations on zionism just as there are on any other nationalist movement or socialism or capitalism or take-your-pick. I would say that the expression “Jewish nationalism is racism” should raise alarms over anti-Semitism. But “zionism as understood by Netanyahu is racism” is just a statement of fact. Likewise, unfortunately, “Israel is an apartheid state” may be too simplistic, but things are now bad enough that it is reasonably accurate statement of fact.
As for the resilience of the current debate, I think you’re right. The charge of anti-Semitism has massive power to silence. And the mainstream media is silent anyway. There’s a good essay by Alison Weir in a recent online issue of Counterpunch detailing the many connections between the US media and Israeli government and military. They have many reasons to remain silent, or to join the campaign of slander against critics of Israel.
What else you can expect from a ZOG Haevard boy? Canadians, loke Americans have to chose between the two major evils – Liberal or Consevatives which are both controlled by the Zionist lobby groups. Michael Ignatieff is trying to show that he could be a better choice for Israel then the current pro-Israeli prime minister Stephen Harper.
“Canada is definitely an ally. Today it’s hard to point out our most loyal ally, but Canada is undoubtedly an exception, in the positive sense. Canada was the first to boycott the Durban II conference that was held in Switzerland. In Canada I met with the head of the opposition and of course with my colleague, the foreign minister. I also had meetings with four other ministers, including the minister of finance and the minister entrusted with matters of international trade. It’s hard to find a country friendlier to Israel than Canada these days. Members both of the coalition and the opposition are loyal friends to us, both with regard to their worldview and their estimation of the situation in everything related to the Middle East, North Korea, Iran, Sudan and Somalia. No other country in the world has demonstrated such full understanding of us,” – Avigdor Lieberman, Radio Reka on June 25, 2009.
link to rehmat1.wordpress.com
Suddenly while reading these posts in about Israel and Zionism it dawned on me of how silly all of this sounds. Everyone in power standing up straight and tall for the little rogue state, my recommendation is that we get our own governments under control, because this is beginning to look like this preposterous flick –
ITS A GOOD LIFE
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Seems a Progressive Conservative politician (Peter Shurman) in Canada has recommended that the week be called “Israel Genocide Week.”
This is good, it demonstrates the absurdity of this position.
“Equality for Palestinians means genocide for Israelis.”
The irony for Michael Ignatieff and his attacks on Jimmy Carter is that Barak has essentially confirmed everything that Carter predicted. As Barak said,without a Palestinian state, Israel can be a democracy or an aparheid Jewish state, but not both.
Is the following argument valid -
1. Anti-Semitism is not fair-minded.
2. So anti-Semitism is a form of prejudice.
3. Prejudice is, by common consent, a way of thought dependent on refusing to question at least one premise of an argument.
4. Iggy-style rules of thought amount to the demand that ‘Israel is not to be condemned wholesale’ never be questioned, ‘now or ever’.
5. Iggy demands ways of thought that amount to prejudice.
6. So those who reject Iggy’s rules are – unless we know something to their discredit beyond the fact that their objections to Israel are ‘wholesale’ – rejecting, not expressing, prejudice.
7. So those who object to Israel ‘wholesale’ are not necessarily anti-Semites and Iggy-style rhetoric is vicious and unfair.
- ?
Airtight logical argument MHughes. Here’s my version in verse:
This little Iggy went to market.
This little Iggy stayed home.
This little Iggy said criticism of Israel is legitimate
This little Iggy said wait a minute that’s not what I meant.
And this little Iggy cried oui oui oui
(but also non non non)
All the way home.
Good one, Shmuel.