Mairav Zonszein reports at +972:
According to a report in Israel National News, the commander of Israel Army Radio, the national radio station in Israel operated by the Israel Defense Forces, has determined that all the station’s reporters should refer to the West Bank as “Judea and Samaria.” The report states the decision was made as a result of complaints made by Israel Media Watch that the radio station’s referral to the area as the “West Bank” gives the impression to listeners that the territory does not in fact belong to Israel.
Even Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon refers to the area as “the West Bank” in his famous “hasbara” (PR) video explaining why the land is in fact not occupied – but I am all for calling the area “Judea and Samaria.” Since Israel looks like a theocracy and acts like a theocracy, it might as well talk like one too.
I shot the picture below in Gaza two years ago– a common feature of rubbish bins after the Israeli onslaught of ’08-’09, a star of David scratched on to the sides of them. I believe it’s anti-Semitic, and god knows it made me upset. But then isn’t such a response the natural result of Jewish colonists appropriating religious symbols as they take your land?
Rubbish bin
When will American Jews waken to the threat that this type of rhetoric represents to our position in diverse societies? I don’t like Islamist radicalism, I think it’s a real issue. But this army radio language is the Jewish equivalent. And it’s what Ambassador Howard Gutman was saying when he said that some of Israel’s actions contribute to anti-Semitism.
Its another way of saying “a land without a people,” and pretty much the last thing any Jew with a sense of history should be participating in.
Israel descends into the abyss of religious extremism, guided and driven by its politicians and its Israel Destruction Forces. Israel = Iran.
Hi Philip,
Q: …some of Israel’s actions contribute to anti-Semitism.
R: Perhaps you’re a bit PC here? Over the past three decades almost all of Israel’s actions have made me look [and feel] like a complete idiot and one who cannot defend its idiosyncratic nature to boot.
–“Think of the press (MainStreamMedia) as a great keyboard on which the government can play.”
— “The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success, UNLESS one fundamental principle is borne in mind CONSTANTLY – it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them OVER AND OVER.”
Joseph Goebbels –propagandists’ guru
Now, it is time to install , over and over, a new point into heads of brainwashed public, so they can recite it as necessary.
“No West Bank ,but Judea and Samaria”: propaganda specialists said so.
I think the Arab Spring will become in some ways an extended lifeline to Israel.
Israel may not longer claim to be the only democracy in the Middle East. However, it may now claim to be the only secular (and to some extent liberal) democracy in the Middle East. Surrounded by a sea of Islamism, it will make the case that whatever it’s fault the other guys are worse.
And to some extent that’s still true. At least within Israel proper, it is. The occupation will continue to tear away at the fabric of it’s society but I do not actually think that the BDS movement will be that successful in the short run.
Whatever we may otherwise disagree on, it’s patently clear that the liberals have lost – and lost bigtime. The vote of the Islamists have ranged from 40 % to 70 %. In every country where there have been semi-free elections, without any exception, the single biggest party has been an Islamist party. Often, the second-biggest have been one too.
If you’re opposed to something, you need something to latch onto. What can the muslim brotherhood give? People on the left should not underestimate the other side. The most influential is Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the spiritual leader of the muslim brotherhood and their leading intellectual on religious matters(which makes him hugely important as they are a religious party).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yusuf_al-Qaradawi
He has praised Hitler and made comments that he thinks Jews have lied about the Holocaust to gain the sympathy of the world.
I could go on and on, but my point is that in the Middle East you are increasingly going to get two sides that are reactionary, but Israel will be able to play the Western game better than the Muslim Brotherhood and come across as much less so.
And if the left doesn’t spend time on the muslim brotherhood in equal amounts then the Zionist right-wingers will claim – with some justification – that there is a bias. Naturally, I admit to being much more interested in Israel for both personal and cultural reasons, but the point still stands.
The pessimists were proven right. The Arab Spring basically empowered the Islamists and not the liberal secular forces. It remains to be seen if these liberal secularists can grow more powerful in the years to come, but I highly doubt it. If you look at the history of the Arab world since the 50s, secular nationalism has had it’s rise and fall(and they weren’t exactly very friendly to Israel to begin with), and from the 70s onwards Islamism has gained ground at a steady pace.
We’re now reaching the long arc of Islamist domination of Middle Eastern life. Iran will not remain a nutty outsider but increasingly the norm. Some may be more moderate and others may be more crazy, but the pattern is the same.
And against this backdrop, Israel has a golden opportunity to smear their neighbours. Whatever Israel’s faults, it’s unlikely that a larger mass of people in the Western world will side with the Muslim Brotherhood, whose influential intellectuals praise Hitler and the Holocaust – and then expressing hope that Muslims will carry out the next Holocaust.
I’m sorry, but it just won’t happen, people won’t be able to support that, and frankly they should not either or they would be morally bankrupt. As bad as Danny Ayalon is, he isn’t exactly praising Stalin’s purges and Pinochet’s mass executions.
So will Israel be a paragon of virtue? Of course not, but the Arab “Spring” will give it ample cover for at least several years down the road. If there’s a war in Iran, look for a 1948- or 1967-style ethnic cleansing of the West bank and/or Israel proper.
This is like a burning building with no exists. There isn’t a way out here, because as bad as Israel is, the alternative is Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood. All those who seek liberal democracy will lose, on both sides. At least in the next decade and perhaps beyond.