Some have excitedly pointed to the BNP’s apparent Damascene conversion to support for Israel as proof of their Zionism = Nazism fantasies, while for others the BNP is seen to be ‘cleaning up its act’ and to now be a pro-Western as opposed to pro-racist organisation. But beneath the rhetoric of anti-Jihadism and support for Israel has the BNP really changed?

Many far-right hardliners see Griffin’s attempts at rehabilitation to be an entirely cynical attempt at repackaging the BNP in the hope of short-term gains. Veteran Fascist and Mosley cultist Robert Edwards, for example, is distinctly unimpressed and unconvinced by Griffin’s new approach. Writing on his ‘Europe a Nation’ blog, Edwards notes:

The leader of the British National Party has taken up the cause of Israel after years of trying to expose the wicked Jewish influence in the British media and poking fun at the “Holohoax”, as he then dubbed it. The term “wicked” is now reserved for another religious group, like swapping the latest designer fashion for another. The intention is the same but without the dreaded “anti-Semitic” label. The BNP’s line is that Israeli Jews are just like us Europeans and hate Arabs and other Muslims with the same intensity as the leaders of that party.

Edwards’ observations are damning:

The BNP, under Nick Griffin, has struggled for the past several years in order to re-invent itself, bending over backwards to follow similar groups on the continent that have adopted a stridently pro-Israel line. They think that being anti-Muslim and pro-Jewish will open the doors to mainstream politics, when recent election results have proven that this is not the case.

[…]

Quite often, this transformation took the form of attacking nationalistic critics of Israel by labelling them anti-Semites with the implication that they are largely influenced by the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion. The BNP’s leader, Nick Griffin, was the author of a booklet entitled ‘The Mindbenders’, an exposé of alleged disproportionate Jewish influence in the British media. This was published within recent memory with the BNP now attempting to erase aspects of its history by saying Griffin had nothing to do with it. Unfortunately for him, we have the following quote in stark contradiction to the latest ‘in denial’ struggle of conscience. In issue number 3, on page 11, of The Patriot 1999, he declares, “I have been busy writing The Mindbenders”. Indelible, unambiguous and unequivocal! What makes people like Griffin believe that political somersaults and twisted contortions will benefit them in the long run when inconsistency and downright opportunism does not go unnoticed and will surely follow them for the rest of their lives? John Tyndall could never shake off his penchant for Nazi uniforms in the early 1960s, paraded for the whole world on the front page of the Daily Mirror. It was a propaganda gift to his enemies on the extreme-left and to his own internal rivals. They used it against him time and again. After years of servility to JT, Griffin decided to challenge him on the issue of modernising the party and ridding it of the old guard anti-Semites, even though he was one himself, referring to the ‘Holohoax’ in his Rune magazine. Tyndall was given the ‘let’s get rid of the Nazis’ treatment that became more acrimonious as time went by. Griffin, as we all know, won the contest. The Griffin gang also discovered a substitute for the old anti-Semitism in the form of a wildly exaggerated anti-Islamism, with the foul-mouthed Lee Barnes appointing himself the BNP’s Witch-Finder General. On April 9, 2006, Barnes informed me, “Islam is a direct threat to our safety. Jewish power is a mere political threat. When faced with two tigers trying to destroy you but you have only one bullet in your rifle what do you do?”

That Griffin’s turn away from anti-Semitism and towards anti-Muslim vitriol is little more than a superficial political trick is strongly suggested by a March 2006 report by The Nation on an American ‘white nationalist’ gathering attended by Griffin:

Many attendees of the American Renaissance conference were so fixated on the “Jewish question,” they seemed deaf to the latest tactics promoted by the conference’s European speakers … Speaking on the conference’s first day, Griffin suggested his move away from anti-Semitism was purely tactical. “The proper enemy to any political movement isn’t necessarily the most evil and the worst,” he advised. “The proper enemy is the one we can most easily defeat.”

The same month, Griffin wrote an article for the BNP website in which he tried to explain these tactics:

Particularly in the United States, in Germany, and among small theoretical groups in most European countries (Britain included), there are a fair few sincere people who are quite convinced that we shouldn’t be nasty to Islam and that “the real enemy is the Jew.”

So here’s my warning to these people: The enemy of your old enemy may turn out not to be your friend, but something much worse. And, on top of that piece of facts-of-life commonsense, there is a piece of plain realpolitik that those who attack the BNP stance on Islam should also take into account:

They are perilously close to entrenching themselves in political dead ground from which there can be no escape. Instead of working to take advantage of the biggest crisis that the genocidal multi-culti ‘experiment’ has ever faced, they are in danger of turning themselves into a despised, powerless and doomed cartoon caricature – a composite of Tokyo Rose, Lord Haw Haw and Jane Fonda. Truly, they are living examples of the old adage that history repeats itself, first as tragedy, and then as farce.

So it is that Griffin, a man with a long history of promoting anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, has woken up to modern political realities and can see that the kind of ideas he spent much of the ’90s promulgating will get the BNP nowhere. For Griffin, the contemporary rise of Jihadism and Islamism provides the perfect opportunity to ‘take advantage of’ for political gain and it is precisely for this reason that he has started making statements against anti-Semitism and taking a superficially pro-Israel stance. The vast majority of British citizens don’t buy into the kind of anti-Semitic drivel that was formerly central to BNP ideology, but many ordinary people have become fearful of Muslims in the aftermath of 9/11, Madrid, and 7/7. For Griffin, this fear represents the BNP’s biggest hope yet for converting people to its cause. By de-emphasising racism and playing up the notion that the BNP is the one great British bulwark against Jihadism the BNP has discovered a trojan horse issue to mask its real agenda. The BNP’s ‘pro-Israel’ turn must be understood in this context and seen for the cynical and shallow political trick that it is.

The post On the British National Party’s “Pro-Israel” Turn appeared first on Jewcy.

At the time, it was claimed that the book shop was run independently and that officials at the mosque were unaware of what was being sold there. Obviously such a plea of ignorance today cannot be taken seriously. Yet, looking at the Darussalam store’s website, it’s seems that not much has changed.

In the books section, we find Explanation of Important Lessons (For Every Muslim) by former Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia Abdul-Aziz bin Abdullah bin Baz. In addition to Explanation of Important Lessons, Abdul-Aziz bin Abdullah bin Baz was the author of numerous texts, including ‘Risk of Women Participation with Men at Work’, ‘Warning Of Intermingling Between Men And Women’, and ‘Ruling On The Fast Of One Who Thinks (About Intercourse) Then Ejaculates’.

In his work ‘The Ideological Attack‘, the Sheikh had this to say about the ‘Zionist war’:

The jews strive their utmost to corrupt the beliefs, morals and manners of the Muslims. The jews scheme and crave after possessing the Muslim lands, as well as the lands of others. They have fulfilled some of their plans and continue striving hard to implement the rest of them. Even though they do engage the Muslims in warfare involving strength and arms and have occupied some of their lands, they also fight them by spreading destructive thoughts, beliefs and ideologies; such as Freemasonry, Qadiaanisim, Bahaaism, Teejaanism and others – seeking the support of the christians and others, in order to fulfill their objectives.

And

when we have the ability, it is obligatory to fight the jews until they enter into Islaam, or until they give the jizyah (a tax levied from those non-Muslims who are permitted to live under the protection of the Muslim state) in servility.

According to bin Abdullah bin Baz, ‘the means utilized by the enemies of Islaam today’ for ’spreading corruption in the Muslim societies’ include the building of churches:

The building of churches and temples in the Muslim lands and spending great amounts of wealth on them: beautifying them, making them very conspicuous and noticeable, and building them in the largest and the best locations.

This is intolerable for the true Muslim, he says:

The Muslim whose mind has not been corrupted cannot bear to see the unbelievers wielding authority, and ordering and prohibiting in his own country. Therefore such a Muslim strives his utmost to expel and distance them – even if he has to sacrifice his own life, or his most cherished possession for this cause; and this is what happened after the major conquest of the crusaders. As for the Muslim who is exposed to this filthy attack, he becomes ill in thought and desensitized to this disease; he may not even see any danger with the presence of christians in the lands of the Muslims. Indeed, he may even think that their presence is a source of goodness, which aids and advances civilization.

Another book on offer is Islamic Belief in the light of Quraan and Sunnah by Jameel Zeeno. It turns out Zeeno isn’t exactly a moderate. For example, here’s what you can find in his book Islamic Guidelines for Individual and Social Reform:

[A]nti-Semitism is omnipresent throughout Zino’s book.  Most shocking is page 167, which is entitled “Act upon these Ahadith.”  The first hadith that readers are instructed to “act upon” reads:  “The Last Hour will not appear unless the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them.” And, of course, sinister and secretive conspiracies are imputed to the Jews.  In a passage denouncing fortunetellers, Zino writes, “If they know the Unseen, let them talk about the secret schemes of the Jews so that we combat them.” And, incidentally, Zino mentions in an offhand manner a hadith that says:  “Whoever apostatizes from Islam should be killed.” In other words, those who convert out of Islam deserve death.

Darussalam also offers An Explanation of Four Principles of Shirk by Abu Ammar Yasir Qadhi. Here’s Qadhi on the Holocaust:

All of these Polish Jews which Hitler was supposedly trying to exterminate, that’s another point, by the way, Hitler never intended to mass-destroy the Jews. There are a number of books out on this written by Christians, you should read them. The Hoax of the Holocaust, I advise you to read this book and write this down, the Hoax of the Holocaust, a very good book. All of this is false propaganda and I know it sounds so far-fetched, but read it. The evidences [sic] are very strong. And they’re talking about newspaper articles, clippings, everything and look up yourself what Hitler really wanted to do. We’re not defending Hitler, by the way, but the Jews, the way that they portray him, also is not correct.

Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyya’s Among the Punishments and Remedies for Sin: Further Selections from the Illness and the Cure is also on sale. Here’s Al-Jawziyyah on ‘The Bitter Consequences of Sins‘:

It is essential to know that sins and acts of disobedience are, necessarily, very harmful. Their harmful effects upon the heart are akin to the harmful effects of poison upon the body, though the effects vary in their levels and intensities. So is there any evil or harm in this world, or in the Hereafter, except that it is due to sins and disobedience?

[…]

What was it that caused the town of the homosexuals to be raised­ up and turned upside down, such that they were all destroyed? Then stones from the sky pelted down upon them so that they suffered a combined punishment, the like of which was not given to any other nation! And for their brothers will be its like; and it is not far off from the transgressors!

Al-Jawziyyah is an inspiration to Muslim homophobes, and it’s not hard to see why:

Imam Ibnul Qayyim said that the punishment for homosexuality during and after life would not be so great unless the sin itself is unspeakable. The companions of the prophet, sallallahu alayhe wa sallam, were in agreement that the punishment for homosexual offense should be greater that for adultery and that the offender should be put to death in all cases based on the Sunnah. The Sunnah has made this clear beyond the shadow of a doubt, and the companions of the Prophet, sallallahu alaihe wa sallam, and the Caliphs, may Allah be pleased with them, followed the teachings of the Sunnah.

[…]

Ibnul Qayyim said, “ The partner in homosexual activity is better off dead than to take part in this horrible deed. He is being ruined beyond salvation, all the good in his life is being drained. The ground sucks all shame from his face and thereafter, he has no shame of Allah or the people. The sperm of his partner takes over his heart and soul as poison takes over the body.”

In a section devoted to Family, Women, and Marriage, we find a book entitled Four Essays on the Obligation of Veiling written by ‘Esteem Scholors’ [sic]. Amongst those scholars is Saalih Al-Fawzaan. His contribution to the book is an essay entitled ‘Advice to the Muslim Woman’, in which he informs his readers:

As for what we hear about today from some ignoramuses that a husband’s brother, paternal uncle or other male relative can greet his wife, shake her hand, be alone with her and enter into her presence – this is baseless. It is not permissible for a non-mahram to enter into the presence of a woman (without Hijaab), nor to shake her hand, nor to be alone in privacy with her unless there is someone else in the house through which the privacy will be removed. But as for him entering into a house that has no one in it but her, and he is not one of her mahaarim, then this is the forbidden type of privacy and it is dangerous.

In addition to books, the Darussalam store also offers CDs and DVDs. For example, ‘A Guide for the New Muslim‘, a 12 CD set by Jamaal Zarabozo. Zarabozo is no moderate either:

In the past, Zarabozo has accused Muslim modernists of breaking Islamic principles by opposing the stoning of adulterers and the killing of “apostates.” In another fatwa, he warned against visiting a Christian church to “watch people commit the greatest sin … You have no way of knowing what evil Satan may put into your heart by attending the gatherings wherein shirk (idolatry) is being committed.”

The store offers DVDs of preachers including Khalid Yasin and Bilal Philips.

Here’s Yasin on AIDS and homosexuality:

An AIDS virus, that is a classic disease that was created in Fort McKinley, United States. Fort McKinley, the AIDS virus, 63,000 gallons. Missionaries from the World Health Organisation and Christian groups went into Africa and inoculated people for diphtheria, malaria, yellow fever and they put in the medicine the AIDS virus.

The Koran gives a very clear position regarding homosexuality, lesbianism and bestiality — that these are aberrations, they are immoralities and if they are tried, convicted, they are punishable by death.

And here’s Philips on child marriage, as seen in the ‘Dispatches: Undercover Mosque‘ documentary:

The Prophet Mohammed practically outlined the rules regarding marriage prior to puberty, with his practice he clarified what is permissible and that is why we shouldn’t have any issues about an older man marrying a younger woman, which is looked down upon by this society today, but we know that Prophet Mohammed practised it, it wasn’t abuse or exploitation, it was marriage.

Looking at the backgrounds of the authors and preachers cited above we find the following:

• Abdul-Aziz bin Abdullah bin Baz: Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia from 1993 until his death in 1999.
• Jameel Zeeno: Teaches at Dar-ul-Hadith al-khairiyah in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.
• Abu Ammar Yasir Qadhi: Carried out his Islamic studies at the Islamic University of Madinah, Saudi Arabia.
• Saalih Al-Fawzaan: Member of the Permanent Committee for Islaamic Research and Fataawa and member of the Council of Senior Scholars, both in Saudi Arabia.
• Jamaal Zarabozo: Convert who studied Islam with Dr. Mustafa Azami (Professor Emeritus at King Sa’ud University, Saudi Arabia) and with graduates from the Saudi Imam Muhammad University.
• Khalid Yasin: Convert who studied the Qur’an and Islamic legislature in Medina, Saudi Arabia.
• Bilal Philips: Convert who studied for his BA at the College of Islamic Disciplines at the Islamic University of Madeenah, Saudi Arabia, and studied for an MA in Islamic Theology at the University of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

The London Central Mosque has done little or nothing about the material being sold on its premises. The Darussalam book shop continues to promote the Saudi Wahhabi brand of Islam and continues to offer material produced by authors and speakers who hold anti-Semitic, anti-Christian, homophobic, and extreme socially conservative views, and who do nothing to promote social cohesion and tolerance.

The post Wahhabism at Regent’s Park appeared first on Jewcy.

Sheikh Omar Bakri Mohammad is a prominent scholar in the Muslim world today for his uncompromising stance on the vital issues which affect the Muslim world. He is recognized as one of the leading figures struggling against the British crusade against Islam and Muslims.

Their list of ‘great site[s] … for you to enjoy’ include Choudary’s Islam For The UK, Al Ghurabaa (now proscribed and defunct), and The Saviour Sect (also proscribed and defunct).

Here’s their latest propaganda image, used to illustrate a piece on ‘Jewbama‘ and now strangely absent from their site (via Muslims Against Sharia):

Their use of that particular ‘Jew’ cartoon is interesting. It’s not the first time they’ve made use of it. Here they are at the 2008 New York Israel Day parade:

Now where might they have got such an image?

From the website of Tom Metzger’s ‘White Aryan Resistance’. Here’s the original:

As you can see, they also promote Holocaust denial. The WAR website features a notorious article called ‘66 Questions and Answers on the “Holocaust”‘, as does the Islamic Thinkers Society website.

The ITS page also includes this claim:

The Holocaust media campaign portrays Jews as totally innocent victims, and non-Jews as mortally retarded and unreliable beings who can easily turn into murderous Nazis under the right circumstances.

‘Unreliable beings who can easily turn into murderous Nazis under the right circumstances’ would of course be a rather good description of the members and supporters of Al-Muhajiroun. These guys are essentially the Islamist equivalent of Combat 18. Interestingly enough, British Islamist Abdul-Aziz ibn Myatt is none other than David Myatt, former ‘ideological heavyweight‘ of C18 and author of numerous texts including ‘A Practical Guide to Aryan Revolution’. In 2003, Omar Bakri Muhammad stated of Myatt: ‘we both share a lot in common and I am sure he can help the Islamic cause’.

Islam For The UK continues to promote Bakri Muhammad’s ravings via its website and their American allies use anti-Semitic material lifted from neo-Nazi websites.

Why are Al-Muhajiroun front groups still operating openly in the UK? It’s time to shut them down for good.

The post It’s Time to Shut Down Al-Muhajiroun appeared first on Jewcy.

From the Jerusalem Post:

Hamas militiamen have rounded up hundreds of Fatah activists on suspicion of “collaboration” with Israel during Operation Cast Lead, Fatah members in the Gaza Strip told The Jerusalem Post on Monday.

They said the Hamas crackdown on Fatah intensified after the cease-fire went into effect early Sunday morning.

The Fatah members and eyewitnesses said the detainees were being held in school buildings and hospitals that Hamas had turned into make-shift interrogation centers.

[…]

A Fatah official in Ramallah told the Post that at least 100 of his men had been killed or wounded as a result of the massive Hamas crackdown. Some had been brutally tortured, he added.

The official said that the perpetrators belonged to Hamas’s armed wing, Izaddin Kassam, and to the movement’s Internal Security Force.

According to the official, at least three of the detainees had their eyes put out by their interrogators, who accused them of providing Israel with wartime information about the location of Hamas militiamen and officials.

[…]

“They were afraid to confront the Israeli army and many Hamas militiamen even ran away during the fighting,” he said. “Hamas is now venting its anger and frustration against our Fatah members there.”

Eyewitnesses said that Hamas militiamen had turned a number of hospitals and schools into temporary detention centers where dozens of Fatah members and supporters were being held on suspicion of helping Israel during the war.

The eyewitnesses said that a children’s hospital and a mental health center in Gaza City, as well as a number of school buildings in Khan Yunis and Rafah, were among the places that Hamas had turned into “torture centers.”

A Fatah activist in Gaza City claimed that as many as 80 members of his faction were either shot in the legs or had their hands broken for allegedly defying Hamas’s house-arrest orders.

“What’s happening in the Gaza Strip is a new massacre that is being carried out by Hamas against Fatah,” he said. “Where were these [Hamas] cowards when the Israeli army was here?”

[…]

Relatives of Abed al-Gharabli, a former Fatah security officer who spent 12 years in Israeli prisons, said he was kidnapped by a group of Hamas militiamen who shot him in both legs after severely torturing him.

Ziad Abu Hayeh, one of the commanders of Fatah’s armed wing, the Aksa Martyrs Brigades, is reported to have lost his sight after Hamas gunmen put out his eyes. According to Fatah activists, Abu Hayeh was kidnapped from his home in Khan Yunis by Hamas militiamen.

The Fatah men said that in a number of incidents, Hamas militiamen had kidnapped Fatah activists while they were attending the funerals of people killed during the war. In other cases, activists were detained and shot in the legs after they were spotted smiling in public – an act interpreted by Hamas as an expression of joy over Israel’s military offensive.

On Saturday night, three brothers from the Subuh family were abducted by Hamas militiamen and taken to the Abdel Aziz Rantisi Mosque in Khan Yunis, where they were shot in the legs, a local journalist told the Post.

In a more recent incident, Hamas gunmen shot and killed 80-year-old Hisham Tawfik Najjar after storming his home and beating his four sons – all Fatah activists.

Fahmi Za’areer, a Fatah spokesman in the West Bank, revealed that at least 16 Fatah activists had been executed by Hamas in the past few days. He strongly condemned the Hamas clampdown on Fatah and warned against a bloodbath in the Gaza Strip.

The post Torture and Executions in Gaza appeared first on Jewcy.

I saw him last in Gaza two years ago, at a mosque in the Jabalya Refugee Camp … He was one of the more Islamically-learned Hamas leaders I’ve met … In particular, Rayyan was interested in the hadith, the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad, with a special interest in hadith that painted Jews in a negative light.

And what did this learned Hamas leader have to say?

This is what he said when I asked him if he could envision a 50-year hudna (or cease-fire) with Israel: “The only reason to have a hudna is to prepare yourself for the final battle. We don’t need 50 years to prepare ourselves for the final battle with Israel.” There is no chance, he said, that true Islam would ever allow a Jewish state to survive in the Muslim Middle East. “Israel is an impossibility. It is an offense against God.”

I asked him if he believed, as some Hamas theologians do (and certainly as many Hezbollah leaders do) that Jews are the “sons of pigs and apes.” He gave me an interesting answer that reflects a myopic reading of the Koran. “Allah changed disobedient Jews into apes and pigs, it is true, but he specifically said these apes and pigs did not have the ability to reproduce. So it is not literally true that Jews today are descended from pigs and apes, but it is true that some of the ancestors of Jews were transformed into pigs and apes, and it is true that Allah continually makes the Jews pay for their crimes in many different ways. They are a cursed people.”

What are our crimes? I asked Rayyan. “You are murderers of the prophets and you have closed your ears to the Messenger of Allah,” he said. “Jews tried to kill the Prophet, peace be unto him. All throughout history, you have stood in opposition to the word of God.”

And here’s some more on Rayyan from the BBC:

“We will never recognise Israel,” he told Reuters news agency in early 2007. “There is nothing called Israel, neither in reality nor in the imagination.”

[…]

When Hamas seized control of Gaza in June 2007, he said there would be no dialogue with Fatah, the secular Palestinian movement it ousted, “only the sword and the rifle”.

Operation Cast Lead was launched to combat men like Rayyan, someone who drew his inspiration not simply from injustices against Palestinians but from an extreme and vitriolic form of Islamist theology, a man for whom hatred of Jews was a duty to God, and a man who presented not simply Israel itself, but the Jewish people as a whole throughout history as ‘cursed’ enemies.

Nizar Rayyan is a reminder of exactly what Israel is up against in its fight against Hamas, a group that puts out TV shows aimed at indoctrinating children with ideas of anti-Jewish genocide:

And a group whose ideology promotes a hateful and supremacist version of Islam:

Those who delude themselves that Hamas is simply a ‘resistance movement’ would do well to listen to the words of Nizar Rayyan and to take seriously the real message being promoted by Hamas, a message that presents cease-fires as re-arming periods and which proclaims the long-term existence of Israel to be ‘an impossibility’.

The post ‘Israel is an Impossibility. It is an Offense Against God.’ appeared first on Jewcy.

Here’s Hamas:

[T]he exiled leader of Hamas, Khaled Meshaal, called for a new intifada, or uprising, against Israel, in response to the attacks. The movement’s Gaza leader, Ismail Haniyeh, said there would be no white flags and no surrender. "Palestine has never witnessed an uglier massacre," he said.

And here’s Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert:

Mr Olmert appealed to Palestinians in Gaza, saying "You – the citizens of Gaza – are not our enemies. Hamas, Jihad and the other terrorist organisations are your enemies, as they are our enemies. They have brought disaster on you and they try to bring disaster to the people of Israel. And it is our common goal to make every possible effort to stop them."

The Hamas response calls for further attacks on Israel, making no distinction between military and civilian targets. The Israeli response clearly defines the enemy – Palestinian Islamist terrorists who regularly launch assaults on civilian targets, as opposed to the Palestinian people as a whole.

When 25 mortal shells pounded Israel recently, the immediate Israeli response was to re-affirm a commitment to humanitarianism:

Despite the mortar shell fire, Israel began transferring humanitarian aid to Gaza on Friday morning. The army said the first of an expected 90 trucks started to deliver medicine, fuel, cooking gas and other vital goods to the Strip on Friday. Defense Minister Ehud Barak decided Thursday to open the Kerem Shalom and Sufa crossings to allow the transfer of humanitarian supplies to Gaza.

And then there was this news:

[A] seriously wounded 35-year-old Palestinian man, hurt by a misfired rocket on Tuesday, was taken to an Israeli hospital for treatment … The man was apparently injured in the head after a rocket directly hit his home. He received initial treatment at a hospital in Gaza, but it was later decided to transfer him for treatment in Israel. A Magen David Adom ambulance evacuated the man from Gaza to the Sourasky Medical Center in Tel Aviv.

Yet, once again, Israel is being harshly attacked for its defensive actions against Palestinian terrorists who, in contrast to the Israel seen above, have no time for humanitarianism – quite the opposite, in fact. Here in the UK, a blogger for The Daily Telegraph, a leading conservative broad sheet, has claimed that ‘Israel is addicted to violence’. For him, Israel has committed acts of ‘slaughter’:

The attack on the Gaza strip is proof that Israel is addicted to violence. Slaughtering 155 civilians, many of whom are women and children, can not be justified.

Here we go again. Big bad Israel has been ‘slaughtering civilians’ and, according to Hamas, ‘Palestine has never witnessed an uglier massacre’. Slaughter? Massacre? Even the notoriously biased BBC is more honest:

Israeli F-16 bombers have pounded key targets across the Gaza Strip, killing at least 225 people, local medics say. Most of those killed were policemen in the Hamas militant movement, which controls Gaza, but women and children also died, the Gaza officials said.

Most were members of Hamas, affirms the BBC, although women and children also died, according to ‘Gaza officials’. If most of those dead are members of Hamas, this cannot possibly be described as a ‘massacre’, as Hamas members have made themselves legitimate military targets through their continual shelling of Israeli civilians.

The fact that there should be a knee-jerk response with talk of ‘slaughter’ is very telling. When Hamas proclaims that ‘Palestine has never witnessed an uglier massacre’ you can immediately guarantee that Western commentators will be falling over themselves to offer the most vitriolic condemnation of Israel. Of course, we have seen the claim that ‘Palestine has never witnessed an uglier massacre’ before. Last time it was the supposed Jenin ‘massacre’, even referred to as the Palestinians’ ‘9/11’ by The Guardian, Britain’s leading ‘left-liberal’ newspaper.

At the time, the Palestinian news agency Wafa announced that the State of Israel had committed the ‘massacre of the 21st century’ at the Palestinian refugee camp in Jenin, with reports of ‘hundreds’ dead. The final fatality figures were 75 deaths: 26 Palestinian terrorists, 23 Israeli Defence Force soldiers and 26 civilians. Those figures in no way constituted a ‘massacre’ and the Israel that is supposedly ‘addicted to violence’ was smeared for what was in fact a very difficult operation, carried out with care. Michael Gove summarises the operation well in his book Celsius 7/7:

The Israeli Defence Force had to work its way through booby-trapped homes, negotiate situations where terrorists were using civilians as human shields, and counter an enemy prepared to endanger other Palestinians in order to evade capture. In the process the IDF had to be bound by an ethical code that requires it to minimize the risk to innocent life. In the process of observing that code, IDF soldiers exposed themselves to proportionately greater risk. Which is why 23 of them died. And their posthumous reward? To be smeared across the world media as war criminals.

The civilians who died at Jenin were being used as human shields by terrorists. That this may have been the case in Gaza goes largely unconsidered. Equally important to consider is the fact that there are female as well as male members of Hamas. Hamas has produced female suicide bombers in the past and will no doubt do so again in the future. Emotive language about the death of ‘women’ needs to be treated critically, given this fact. Are we talking about helpless cowering housewives, or are we talking about people every bit as fanatically devoted to terrorism as their male counterparts?

The common idea that Israel is ‘addicted to violence’ is spurious in the light of the following facts that have already been noted:

1. Israel seeks to target specific terrorist groups, not civilians or ‘the Palestinians’ as some monolithic group.

2. Israel is committed to making every effort to avoid killing civilians, even to the extent that it is sometimes willing to risk the lives of its own soldiers, rather than risk harming Palestinian innocents (as was the case in Jenin).

3. Israel regularly undertakes humanitarian actions in an attempt to help innocent Palestinians.

If anyone involved in the Middle East conflict is ‘addicted to violence’, it is Hamas, not Israel. The foundational Covenant of Hamas, which it has yet to repudiate or revise, states that ‘[t]here is no solution to the Palestinian problem except by jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are a waste of time and a farce’. The Covenant states of Hamas that ‘Jihad [is] its way, and death for the sake of Allah its loftiest desire’.

Hamas is a movement that sees death as its ‘loftiest desire’ and, as we know, it doesn’t hesitate to put this ideology into practice on a regular basis. Hamas really is addicted to violence. Anti-Semitism and calls to violence lie at the heart of its foundational document. Now, here are the foundational aims of the State of Israel, as found in The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel:

it will foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions; and it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

We could argue for a long time about the extent to which these aims have been adhered to, but the key point is this: Hamas is an Islamist terrorist organisation whose foundational statement calls for the destruction of Israel – ‘Israel will exist, and will continue to exist, until Islam abolishes it’ – and claims that because ‘Palestine’ is a land ‘that the Muslims have conquered by force’, it must be ruled theocratically for ‘as long as the heaven and earth exist’. Israel, on the other hand, is a country whose foundational statement calls for ‘complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex’, as well as ‘freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture’. These foundational ideals continue to manifest themselves very clearly, and continue to influence the essential approaches of Hamas and Israel. While Hamas seeks to indoctrinate children with conspiracy theories about Jews and teachings expressing Islamic supremacism, Israel seeks to provide children with a real education. While Hamas supporters use genocidal language regarding ‘the Jews’ and glory in religious fanaticism, such religious lunacy is excluded from Israel’s official policies. Of course there are religious extremists in Israel, but the key difference is that their views are not reflected in Israeli actions regarding the Palestinians. When Ehud Olmert speaks of the Gaza operation, he speaks of seeking to target only those who wish to kill Israeli civilians; he does not cite religious texts and call for genocide. According to the results of a Harvard University poll released earlier this year, 68% of Jewish citizens support teaching conversational Arabic in Jewish schools to help bring Arab and Jewish citizens together, and 69% believe contributing to coexistence is a personal responsibility. 73% of Israeli Jews ‘want to live in a society in which Arab and Jewish citizens have mutual respect and equal opportunities’ and 77% of the State of Israel’s Arab citizens ‘would rather live in the Jewish state than in any other country in the world’. Naturally, these figures could – and should – be higher, but imagine the results of a similar poll of Hamas’ members and supporters who adhere to the group’s foundational principles: 100% would be in favour of the destruction of Israel and the establishment of a theocracy; 100% would claim that seeking peace is inferior to ‘jihad’; 100% would justify attacks on Israeli civilians. The continuing attacks on Israel from those who claim to favour civilised values are based on a perverse inversion of reality. When theocratic devotees of a Jihadist death cult launch murderous attacks on Israeli civilians, the fashionable approach is to ‘understand’ these criminal actions. And when Israel, in a very limited way, fights back against this violence being directed at its civilian population it encounters a firestorm of criticism and abuse, being accused of ‘racism’ and painted as a bloodthirsty monster that delights in ‘slaughtering’ and ‘massacring’ women and children. All too many in the West have become apologists for terrorism and theocracy, and seem to get some kind of twisted pleasure from spewing bile towards a democratic nation that is based on the principles of secularism and humanism. Ismail Haniyeh is a terrorist propagandist committed to ‘jihad’ against civilians. Ehud Olmert is a democrat committed to halting attacks on civilians. Guess whose side Western ‘progressives’ are going to come down on?

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In Saudi Arabia, a newspaper reported that a man had offered $10 million to buy just one of what has almost certainly become the world’s most famous pair of black dress shoes.

A daughter of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the Libyan leader, reportedly awarded the shoe thrower, Muntader al-Zaidi, a 29-year-old journalist, a medal of courage.

[…]

In Syria, Mr. Zaidi’s picture was shown all day on state television, with Syrians calling in to share their admiration for his gesture and his bravery. In central Damascus, a huge banner hung over a street, reading, “Oh, heroic journalist, thank you so much for what you have done.”

Likewise, in some areas of Iraq, al-Zaidi is finding support:

Protestors in Sadr City, the bastion of radical anti-US cleric Moqtada al-Sadr … threw shoes at passing US military vehicles, while in the holy Shiite city of Najaf, the crowds chanted “Down with America”.

And there’s more:

Saddam Hussein’s former lawyer Khalil al-Dulaimi said he was forming a team to defend Zaidi and that around 200 lawyers, including Americans, had offered their services for free.

And more:

Venezuela’s anti-U.S. President Hugo Chavez said on Monday that an Iraqi reporter who flung his shoes at U.S. President George W. Bush was courageous.

So, al-Zaidi has found fans among anti-democratic regimes, followers of an Islamist demagogue, the lunatic Chavez, and the lawyer of Iraq’s former dictator. But, still, al-Zaidi is a progressive, right? An Iraqi David against an American Goliath, a selfless supporter of the oppressed, a man whose feelings welled up so strongly he felt he had to do something.

Maybe not.

Al-Zeidi may have also been motivated by what a colleague described as a boastful, showoff personality.

“He was very boastful, arrogant and always showing off,” said Zanko Ahmed, a Kurdish journalist who attended a journalism training course with al-Zeidi in Lebanon. “He tried to raise topics to show that nobody is as smart as he is.”

Ahmed recalled that al-Zeidi spoke glowingly of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose followers organized protests Monday to demand his release.

“Regrettably, he didn’t learn anything from the course in Lebanon, where we were taught ethics of journalism and how to be detached and neutral,” Ahmed said.

Then there’s this:

Zaidi’s colleagues in Baghdad, where he had worked for three years, said he had long been planning to throw shoes at Bush if ever he got the chance.

“Muntazer detested America. He detested the US soldiers, he detested Bush,” said one on condition of anonymity.

So, it seems that al-Zaidi may in fact be a showoff who had long been planning this supposedly ’spontaneous’ protest. Al-Zaidi’s apparent support for Muqtada al-Sadr also challenges the claim that he is just representing ‘ordinary Iraqis’, and it turns out that he has another anti-American hero:

A day after the incident, al-Zeidi’s three brothers and one sister gathered in al-Zeidi’s simple, one-bedroom apartment in west Baghdad. The home was decorated with a poster of Latin American revolutionary leader Che Guevara, who is widely lionized in the Middle East.

Let’s take these one at a time. Al-Zaidi is remembered as someone who spoke ‘glowingly’ of Muqtada al-Sadr. Al-Sadr is an Islamist extremist. Of course, this isn’t something that bothers everyone on the ‘progressive Left’. Indeed, in 2006 the Socialist Workers Party and the Stop The War Coalition invited his representative to speak at the anti-war rally in London.

Al-Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army, is a disgusting clerical fascist outfit with a particular love for killing gay people, as Peter Tatchell reported in 2007:

The Madhi Army has been involved in the torture and execution of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Iraqis – and many other Iraqis, especially women, who do not conform to its harsh, perverse interpretation of Islam … Muqtada al-Sadr’s men have adopted a new tactic, borrowed from the Iranian secret police. They are posing as gays in online chatrooms, in order to lure gay men, arrange dates and kill them.

Al-Sadr’s backers are worth noting:

According to Asharq al-Awsat, a London-based pan-Arab newspaper, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force established three military training camps in Qasr-i Shirin, ‘Ilam, and Hamid, on the Iranian side of the Iran-Iraq border to train Jaysh al-Mahdi elements. A former Quds Force official cited in Asharq al-Awsat claims the Iranians have trained between 800 and 1,200 Iraqi supporters of Muqtada in espionage and reconnoitering in addition to standard military arts. There are also reports that the Iranian embassy in Baghdad has distributed 400 international cell phones to supporters of Muqtada as well as to clerics in Sadr City and Najaf. In addition to communications and logistical support, Iran provides $80 million a month in direct aid to Muqtada’s movement. The Iranian support is controversial. According to one critic, “Behind al-Sadr’s phenomenon and money are the most extremist and anti-democratic governing bodies in Iran which seek to settle its account with the international community with the blood of the Iraqis.”

The Iranian regime is also providing a route into Iraq for extremists linked to al-Sadr. For example, there is this report, from February of this year:

The Sadrist Shi’ites in Iraq, led by Muqtada Al-Sadr, have declared a three-day mourning period for Imad Mughniya.

An Iraqi security source said that Mughniya had entered Iraq via Iran, and had trained some 500 members of the Mahdi Army, which belongs to the Sadrists.

He added that he had also trained a number of squads in planning and carrying out assassinations within Iraq.

These are the credentials of one of the men al-Zaidi is said to admire. Then there’s Che Guevara. Things don’t get any better here. Che was a man who considered Americans ‘fit only for extermination’, wanted to launch a nuclear attack on New York City, and set up forced labour camps for gay men.

So, what are we to make of all this? The picture of Muntadhar al-Zaidi that emerges is far from one of an average Iraqi man opposed to American ‘tyranny’. Instead, we find an admirer of violent religious and political extremists, and a self-publicist with ‘revolutionary’ pretensions. An ideal candidate for membership of the Socialist Workers Party, no doubt, but not a man worthy of support, no matter what we might think of George Bush.

Once again, Azarmehr of the excellent ‘For a democratic secular Iran’ blog hits the nail on the head:

What would have happened if the Arab so called journalist who threw his shoe at President Bush, as he claimed ‘for all the mothers and orphans of Iraq?’, had thrown his shoe at Saddam Hussein? For Saddam certainly made thousands of mothers mourn for their sons and thousands of Iraqis had become orphans as a result of Saddam’s massacres.

If Muntazer al-Zaidi was critical of Bush’s policies, as he had a legitimate right to, he could have posed them as questions during the press conference in a civilised manner, something he would have never dared under Saddam.

It seems very likely that this wasn’t really about Iraq and it wasn’t about Bush; instead, it was all about al-Zaidi and his desire to be seen as some kind of anti-American hero. It seems he’s got his way, as Azarmehr notes:

it shows how twisted the values of some people are when as a result of throwing his shoe, Muntazer al-Zaidi becomes a hero and a poem on an Islamist website praises him as “a hero with a lion’s heart”.

Indeed.

A big focus online at the moment is on the allegedly harsh treatment meted out on al-Zaidi immediately following the shoe throwing incident. This also needs to be put into perspective. Iraq is still a volatile country and in the current climate throwing any kind of missile at the President of the USA is unlikely to be taken lightly. If this beating happened after al-Zaidi had been taken into custody this is of course totally unacceptable, but if he sustained his injuries while being wrestled away this is not entirely without justification. For all the authorities knew, al-Zaidi could have been a suicide bomber.

We’re talking about a country in which in recent weeks terrorist murderers have killed 15 people, including civilians, in attacks aimed at an Iraqi police academy, a suicide bomber in Mosul has killed 14 and wounded 30, and a women’s rights activist has been beheaded.

Muntadhar al-Zaidi’s ‘protest’ was juvenile and irresponsible and did nothing to further the cause of democracy and stability in Iraq. What is a promising sign of improvements is the fact that a judge is investigating the alleged abuse of al-Zaidi. Under Saddam, such abuse would have been only a prelude to further torments, quite possibly extended to al-Zaidi’s family as well. This is something those who cheer on the Iraqi ‘resistance’ would do well to remember.

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