Cecil Rhodes said: “To be born English is to win first prize in the lottery of life.” This is often seen as an expression of gloating triumphalism: but I would rather view it as a precursor of a well-known arachnid-related character’s catchphrase: “With great power comes great responsibility”.
So I was very depressed to see the harmless telly of the 1970s disembowelled by the sneers and exaggerated shock of a bunch of young whippersnappers in ‘It Was Alright In The 1970s’ (Ch4, 16th & 23rd Nov). They even managed to parade a couple of chaps who had actually been in the 1970s progs to shamefacedly condemn them, like Western hostages of the IS about to be beheaded.
The 1970s was the time of my teens and young adulthood. It was a golden era of galloping progress: we looked back at the war and the 1950s and saw how far we had come in terms of free speech, mod cons and technological development in every sphere. Everything seemed possible. I was looking forward to a life where I didn’t have to do anything I didn’t want to and might actually have a rich and enjoyable sex life, rather than the pre-60s norm of one fumbling and awkward shag leading to a couple with nothing in common being chained together for a lifetime for the sake of the child.
Didn’t quite work out like that, did it? Today the universe of public discourse seems to be hurtling back to a pre-Enlightenment mindset, where the rational separation between words and actions is being erased. We seem to have lost all psychological robustness.
I was much happier in a world where I could be unthinkingly happy to be male, heterosexual, British and white(-ish). I shall check my privilege when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Author: ricooper
House of Commons Debate on Recognition of Palestinian Statehood
I’m watching this with a sense of utter despair. My own shul’s MP (Mike Hancock) made egregious, mendacious, mischievous and borderline antisemitic comments (in that he denies the facts surrounding the birth of the State of Israel) about Israel’s War of Independence.
The same buzzwords keep coming up: disproportionate, settlements.
The most powerful proponent of the motion, it soon became apparent, was no MP but the BBC: speaker after speaker prayed in favour of the motion the film ‘The Gatekeepers’ and subsequent debate, screened on BBC2 48 hours previously.
The division was not across party lines, but something both older and newer, and far more visceral. The voices in favour were mainly regional, with a preponderance from Scotland; those opposed were uniformly (with the honourable exception of Louise Ellman) received pronunciation from the shires.
As I listened, I was reminded inescapably of Yeats’ famous lines: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are filled with passionate intensity.” The pro voices were clear and forceful: the antis were factually correct, but dull, dull, dull, in some cases obviously reading briefs.
Much was made of the second part of the Balfour Declaration, that “nothing should be done which might prejudice the rights of the non-Jewish communities”, and Britain’s historic responsibility and importance as the holder of the Mandate from 1920 to 1947.
So: the motion was amended to read: “That this House believes that the Government should recognise the state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel as a contribution to securing a negotiated two state solution.” It was passed 247 to 12.
Not one word was spoken about the White Paper of 1939 which shut the doors of Palestine forever to the millions of doomed Jews of Hitler’s Europe. By that act, the people of Britain, whether they know it or not, forfeited their right to dare to pass judgment on Israel.
Archive on 4: Media and the Middle East
I thought this heavily-trailed BBC Radio 4 programme crossed the line from anti-Zionism into antisemitism. Listen to it and judge for yourself:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04gnhnv
This is what I wrote to the BBC:
John Lloyd so slanted this programme against not just Israel, but Jews in general, and so made excuses for Arab violence, that I consider it slips from anti-Zionism into anti-Semitism. The Holocaust is belittled; the biblical origins of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel are sneered at, and the Jewish connection to that land from which they were expelled against their will, and to which they wanted to return but were prevented for nearly 1,900 years, is never mentioned. Instead Mr. Lloyd damns all the Jews of Israel as European colonial occupiers. The 800,000 Israeli Jews from Arab lands are airbrushed out of existence. 23 minutes in he quotes Tim Llewellyn approvingly: “Israel is an occupier and the Palestinians are victims”. He damns Irgun as wantonly murderous terrorists while soft-pedalling the murder of the Munich athletes, implying that the very establishment of Israel as a Jewish state in 1948 was a crime against humanity. This fits the EUMC definition of anti-Semitism.
The Liars of Saudi Arabia
Sometimes you just have to call out a liar. The fact is that for more than 20 years the al-Saud ruling family of Arabia have organised a devil’s pact, first with al-Qaeda and now with ‘Islamic State’, whereby they fund the terrorists to the hilt in return for them refraining from overthrowing the House of Saud and taking their fundamentalist mass-murdering ways out to wherever they choose around the world. The only word of truth in this ‘Guardian’ article is the date. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/17/saudi-arabia-not-support-islamic-state-terrorists
Israel & Gaza – a Cymru Perspective
Imagine, if you will, that Plaid Cymru decided to adopt an extremist militant policy. Mindful that the whole of the island of Britain had once been their land, they decided to declare war on the United Kingdom. Not having access to any heavy weaponry, they resorted to such small arms, mortars and missiles as they could smuggle in or manufacture, and a campaign of suicide bombing, in an effort to demoralise and terrorise the British into dismantling the United Kingdom and re-instating the rule of the Romano-British Welsh over the whole island.
Now imagine another scenario. After the Anglo-Saxon invasion of the 5th to 7th centuries, a remnant of the Romano-British Welsh are driven to the Welsh and Cornish fastnesses, but the majority spread across the world, particularly to Patagonia and Pennsylvania, where they flourish and make enormous contributions to the nations in which they settle, most of all by bringing the incalculable blessing of Welsh (or ‘Bourbon’) whiskey to the USA. However, in the late 19th century, an international Plaid Cymru movement springs up with the aim of returning the worldwide Welsh to a re-established State of Britannia Superior. Since they have by now become Americans, they have the will-power and the weaponry – and they overthrow the rudderless and divided United Kingdom.
The first paragraph is how Israel sees Hamas. The second is how Arabs see Israel.
Israel and Gaza
Hamas can’t lose, because Hamas can’t win.
Furthermore, Israel can’t win – because Israel can’t lose.
Let me explain.
Hamas’s objective is clearly set out in their Charter, and nothing they’ve said or done contradicts it. Their goal is the overthrow of the State of Israel (or ‘Zionist Entity’, as they call it) and its replacement with a unitary State of Palestine, governed according to Sharia law, in which non-Muslims are dhimmis – second-class citizens, with the same level of rights as non-whites in South Africa or Mississippi in the 1960s.
Obviously Israel will never acquiesce to this, so Hamas will continue its ‘resistance’ in perpetuity. It is this interminable state of conflict which is Hamas’s true and achievable goal. If in this conflict children and other vulnerable Palestinian Arabs are killed, so much the better: each death makes Hamas look like the underdogs and Israel like murderers, thus encouraging the rest of the world to side with Hamas against Israel.
For the same reason, Israel can never give in to any of Hamas’s demands, since they are all about giving Hamas access to better weaponry, sited where it can attack Israel’s heartland with impunity. Israel can only survive by maintaining overwhelming military superiority: with equality of arms, Hamas (and indeed Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, Uncle Tom Tanzim and all) would inflict on Israel the same level of massacre that the Little Giraffe is visiting on his own subjects in Syria. But this is a story that the outside world just doesn’t want to hear: for them, Israel is fatally condemned by its willingness and ability to defend its own citizens of all races and creeds.
Rally For Israel In Kensington
I went to the rally in support of Israel outside the Israeli Embassy in Kensington this afternoon. I reckon between 3,000 and 4,000 attended, mainly British Jews but also a lot of Israelis, Christian Friends of Israel, and some Spaniards, Brazilians and Irish. There was a massive police presence, but it was all good-humoured, with songs and level-headed, encouraging speeches from Vivian Wineman and Louise Ellman, MP amongst others. The most notable part was that all the chants and placards were positive. As you can see, they supported Israel and condemned Hamas with wry humour, but did not call for harm to come to Muslims, Arabs or the Palestinian people. The best part was the mighty rolling thunder of Jews on Bikes!
Louise Ellman, MP
Operation Protective Edge
Here are some sensible comments on the latest developments in the Arab-Israeli conflict:
http://www.thejc.com/news/world-news/120481/i-begged-hamas-a-ceasefire-they-said-no-bring-it
My Thoughts on Saudi Arabia in December 2002
In the light of Roger Boyes’ article in yesterday’s ‘The Times’ (Time to tell the Saudis some home truths) I thought I might post the column I wrote for Wessex Jewish News in the winter of 2002. Here it is, as published:
A year and more after the September 11th attack on the World Trade Centre, the picture is starting to become clearer. First we thought that the threat to the civilized world was one mad fundamentalist Moslem terrorist called Osama. Polish off him and his hundred or so fanatical followers, the thinking went, and we’ll be safe. Then the pendulum swung the other way: over a billion Moslems were poised to engulf us in an apocalyptic clash of civilizations, and we were being faced with the biggest threat since Hitler.
In fact neither of these extremes is true. The enemy is neither a tiny uncatchable guerrilla band nor half the world. It is a large but finite and geographically localised political unit. But it is not Saddam’s Iraq.
The enemy is a creed, a party and a state. Its name is Wahhabism and its state is Saudi Arabia. This evil cult – it is a perversion of true Islam that should not be dignified with the name religion – enforces sharia law without one iota of the mercy that Mohammed intended when he propounded it. Wahhabism relates to Islam as the Inquisition in Spain related to Roman Catholicism, or Pol Pot’s re-education committees related to Socialism. It is the creed of the Taliban. It has also taken hold of Somalia, northern Nigeria and some other petty states; but it is in Saudi Arabia that it poses the greatest threat, and it is there that it must be eradicated.
Everything that antisemites say about Jews is in fact true about the Saudis. They own great swathes of Manhattan, Frankfurt and the City of London. Their financial clout is unparalleled: not the paltry £100 million or so of Bin Laden, but £100 billion or more. Our elected leaders take their suggestions as orders they dare not disobey.
The duty of America and its allies is clear. Once we have polished off Saddam and taken control of his oil, we must turn our attention to Saudi Arabia. The House of Saud must go the way of the Chrysanthemum Throne. General MacArthur’s Japan must be our template for a new order in the Middle East. It is blindingly obvious that the rulers of that region are utterly unfit to control all that oil, which we in the civilised nations need to run the world. It must be supplied to us at a fair price; and the profits from it must go to re-shaping the nations of that region into liberal democracies with freedom of speech, equality of opportunity, a free market economy and equal rights for all.
ADL reports that 26% of the world harbours antisemitic feelings
This is a guest post by Mum (Mrs. Anne Cooper)
Writing in The Jewish Chronicle (23 May 2013) Prof. Geoffrey Alderman says:
“Devotees of what is termed ‘interfaith dialogue’ need to ponder these conclusions [26% of the world harbours anti-Semitic feelings, rising to 74% in the Middle East and North Africa http://global100.adl.org/ ]. They need to ask themselves whether there is any advantage whatsoever to be gained by seeking an exchange of ideas – a reconciliation of dogmas – with belief systems whose foundations rest, at least in significant measure, on such hatred.”
Let us consider Prof. Richard Dawkins famous quote from The God Delusion (Bantam, 2006): “The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”
The Almighty is portrayed by Christians as a terrifying Judge Jeffries: no wonder they worship Jesus by comparison. Moslems see Allah as a despotic tribal chief whose lightest word must be obeyed absolutely, while being deemed compassionate and merciful. Both religions are heresies of Judaism, if I may use such an archaic word.
The error of Christianity and Islam stems from the fact their founding fathers interpreted Judaism through the eyes of their own cultures, European and Arabic respectively. But because it is indigenous to us Jews, we read our Tanach as family history. Because our innate character includes violent emotions, fierce temper and loud rants by our dear old Dad, we do not react in terror of His Wrath like Christians. We wait for it to calm down and it will all blow over. We know that we are loved.
Our Scriptures were written uniquely by Jews, for Jews. That is the great divide.
Perhaps, like Edward Lear’s Pobbles who are happier without their toes, Christianity and Islam should leave the ‘Old Testament’ to us. Their own texts will suffice.
CoopersColumn 