JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

10/08/09 11:46 AM

How are these maniacal ravings news?

10/08/09 12:08 PM

Majority Khazar Jews have nothing historical in Israel. The few Sabras are trying to get out of the Palestine/Israel land mess. Without war Israel falls apart. The Goldstone report is a nail in Israel’s coffin. When a bolt of compassion strikes your heart it may heal you or kill you, your choice.  The LAW is: “Don’t do to others what you don’t want them do to you.”

10/08/09 12:23 PM

Alexander Baldal, you are not a Khazar, but an anti-Semitic political moron. The
Goldstone report is a nail in the “peace process” and the hopes of the Islamic
Khazars called “Palestinians” for a state of their own.Sure the Law is as you
cited. Hamas should have known that before it fired 8000 rockets on Israeli
civilians. And you look for some Nazi blog to post there your hogwash and stay
the hell out of Jewish sites.

10/08/09 12:31 PM

The U.N. Blood Libel - This is a must-watch video by Eye on the UN’s Anne Bayefsky of responses to the Goldstone Report by Human Rights Council members Iran, Libya, Yemen, Venezuela, and Sudan. Do not miss her j’accuse moment at the end, nor the disgusting pusillanimity of the Council’s president, Alex Van Meeuwen.
http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com/2009/10/un-blood-libel.html#links

10/08/09 10:54 PM

‘The Times’ lets everyone off the hook on Goldstone
by James North and Philip Weiss
Mondoweiss
October 8, 2009

The New York Times is covering the Goldstone Report. Where is it covering it? Well: the furor over the report among Palestinians. We’re pretty sure this is a good story. Neil MacFarquhar is on it. But it’s really not The Story, it’s just an angle of a hugely-important international story, and the only angle the Times is covering.

Here’s what the Times refuses to cover:

–the furor over the Goldstone report on the part of the Israel lobby in the U.S., and the pressure it’s put on the Obama administration, number one. Even J Street has been quiet about the Goldstone report, while it puts out a statement applauding an Israeli Nobelist.

–and what about the political jockeying over the report, the decision by the Obama administration to bury it and make the Palestinian Authority do the dirty work? Important story. Nothing. Mike Hanna of the Century Foundation said two weeks ago that the report’s troubling findings were going to be very “tricky” diplomatically for the Obama administration. He was right. He knows what’s gone down. Why isn’t the Times calling him for comment?

–the incredible discomfort that Goldstone, a Jewish judge who denounced apartheid, has created among liberal American Jews who know that Gaza was a horror but are afraid to face these facts. Nine dead Israelis, 1400 dead Palestinians: of whom the majority were civiilans. The Israelis destroyed the only remaining flour mill, destroyed chicken farms with bulldozers, and dropped white phosphorus on children. American Jews were never silent about napalm in Vietnam. Here they are tonguetied and helpless, and the Times is helping them to avoid this important question by suppressing the news.

–Nothing in the Times about the many Jews here who have supported Goldstone, including Jews Say No!

–No editorial yet in the Times.

This is about discourse suppression. It is related to the fact that the New Yorker, the leading cranial IV for the Establishment, has said nothing at all about Gaza in 10 months. No: Gaza and the persecution of the Palestinians there is an untidy embarrassment to the liberal Establishment.

The New Republic has actually been more responsible than the Times and the New Yorker here. By publishing raving maniacs like Michael Oren and Yossi Klein Halevi, it has at least informed its readers where it hurts, that this is ideologically disputed territory. The Times has told its readers, Only Palestinians care about this. More mush from the wimp.

One other point. Mainstream liberals are quick to call for people to speak out on Third World countries and once upon a time in Eastern Europe when human rights are suppressed. It’s easy to condemn the Soviet Writers Union or ministries in Africa for not speaking out against genocide. What’s hard is to report and speak out on issues that cause your own readers to squirm. The true measure of intellectual courage is, you go ahead and do it anyway. The Washington Post, the Times, the New Yorker and others have failed this test.
__
http://mondoweiss.net/2009/10/the-times-shows-zero-intellectual-courage-on-goldstone.html#more-9776

10/09/09 04:20 PM

TO: “NC”,
Please consider that the incurable, Jew-hating puke,
“Alelxander (sic) Baldal, is in reality just another of the paid Pali stooges who contaminate this site just to see how far and long they will be allowed to smear Israel and the Jews. Like most virulent anti-Semites he is a liar, slanderer and only semi-literate. Proof: The imbicile doesn’t even know how to spell his own first name correctly! As to your suggestion that he “stay the hell out of Jewish sites”, that will only happen when JTA makes it happen. Don’t hold your breath!

10/09/09 09:13 PM

Beyond Chutzpah – Jewish Responses to the Goldstone Report
Jerry Haber
Magnes Zionist
Friday, October 9, 2009

Jews worldwide are on the eve of the holiday celebrating the completion of the public reading of the Torah in synagogue. It is a lovely holiday, the Rejoicing of the Torah, and Jews are to supposed to be happy (whether they actually are happy while waiting for all the dancing to stop is something else.)

But I am writing these words on Hoshana Rabbah, the last day of the festival of Sukkot, which, according to tradition, is the last opportunity for Jews to repent their sins of the past year and make amends for it.

When it comes to Israel and its Jewish supporters, we are not in a repentance mode. On the contrary, self-righteousness , moral superiority, smugness, and condescension are the order of the days.

It used to be that the classic example of chutzpah was the man who murders his parents and then pleads for clemency on the grounds that he is an orphan.

Now the example of chutzpah should be the state that refuses to cooperate with the human rights committee and then criticizes its report as “one-sided” and “biased”.

Is the Goldstone Report one-sided? Not as much as one would expect, given that Judge Goldstone was barred from entering Israel, not allowed to interview Israelis in Sderot, not allowed to speak with the Israel Defense Forces. That the investigating panel paid for Israelis to fly to Geneva to give testimony to his committee has not been mentioned in the hysterical Jewish reaction to the report. Or that the report was based also on the Israeli human rights organizations, and even on the testimony of Israeli soldiers who supported the operation. We hear a lot about the bias of the report of its original mandate, or that it took testimony from (gasp) Palestinians (and we all know how much Arabs exaggerate, right?)

I have not, I confess, read through all of the report. As I wrote before, what I read of it did not strike me as new; the incidents described were already described in real time, and we have had further confirmation of incidents from Palestinians and Israelis and foreign aid workers. I assume that there are errors, only because testimonies contain errors. The report called for both sides to do a serious investigation (and no military investigation can be a serious one), and that call has been echoed by voices of civil society. No doubt a sober examination of some parts of the report – as any report – would raise further questions. Nobody is perfect. But there is condemnation of Hamas rocket fire, and there is considerable examination of the destruction in Southern Israel (including the psychological trauma) that followed in its wake. And, of course, the report condemns Hamas and finds no justification for its actions.

So I am at a loss to explain the hysterical reaction of Israelis and American Jews who – I thought – were a tad more intelligent than ZOA and the Standwithus crowd.

Let’s begin with Ambassador Michael Oren’s hatchet job in the New Republic, “Deep Denial: Why the Holocaust Still Matters” [ http://www.tnr.com/article/world/deep-denial?page=0,1 ]. After explaining the relevance of the references to the Holocaust by the Israeli Prime Minister (when will the Holocaust never be relevant to an Israeli prime minister?) he writes that the Goldstone Report portrays Israel as a Nazi state, and that it “takes up where Ahmadinejad leaves off”!

[Oren:]
“The Goldstone Report goes further than Ahmadinejad and the Holocaust deniers by stripping the Jews not only of the ability and the need but of the right to defend themselves. If a country can be pummeled by thousands of rockets and still not be justified in protecting its inhabitants, then at issue is not the methods by which that country survives but whether it can survive at all. But more insidiously, the report does not only hamstring Israel; it portrays the Jews as the deliberate murderers of innocents--as Nazis. And a Nazi state not only lacks the need and right to defend itself; it must rather be destroyed”

Ribono shel olam! Oy to the ears that hear such shtuyot (imbecilities)! This man is supposed to be representing the Jewish State in America? My God, I don’t hear such narrishkeit in my shul; no, wait, that is unfair to my shul, I don’t even hear it among the Hebron settlers!

I see nothing in the Goldstone Report that criticizes Israel for its decision to go to war, or that even hints that the military option was not justifiable. Everything that the report discusses with respect to Israel has to do with the IDF’s conduct of the operation. So Oren is dead wrong on that point.

As for the report portraying “Jews as the deliberate murder of innocents,” that is also a libel. The report claims that there is considerable evidence that Israel – not “Jews” – deliberately bombed civilian facilities. And Israel admits to this; it only claims that the civilian facilities were, in some cases, harboring terrorists or weapons, and thus proper targets. So the question is, did the IDF deliberately bomb such facilities, and if so, what was their justification for doing so? I would like to remind my dear readers that the IDF routinely impresses upon Palestinians its power. It is called “le-hafgin nokhekhut”, to demonstrate the army’s presence. In the Gaza Op we had the phrase, “baal-habayit hishtagea’”, “the boss has gone berserk.” There are times when the military can’t pull its punches. It is called harta’a ‘deterrence’.

Now it is perfectly legitimate for the IDF to dispute this or that incident; it has the obligation to do so. But who says that Israel or the IDF are immune from such criticism?

And as for the Nazi comparison… Puhleese. I guess Oren thinks that the Allies were Nazis when they carpet bombed Dresden.

So you think it is only Oren? Let’s go to his neocon Israeli buddy, Haaretz’s Ari Shavit. In this op-ed [ http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1119643.html ] Goldstone isn’t just accusing the Israelis of being Nazis, he is bringing about their destruction through the next war, the “Goldstone War”

[Shavit:]
“Nobody knows yet when the next war will break out. Maybe in a decade, maybe in a year, or maybe even next month. It is also not clear where the next war will erupt - perhaps on the Gaza border, perhaps the West Bank, or maybe in Jerusalem.

But it is already clear what the next war’s name will be - the Goldstone War. It will be the war brought upon us by the Goldstone report, Judge Goldstone and his Goldstoner followers”

Now, let’s follow Shavit’s line of thought, which Is truly “Orenian.” It goes like this: Israel, in the absence of peace, has to beat up the Palestinians every once in a while. The moral cost is “intolerable” but what to do, somebody has to teach those guys a lesson in deterrence (the magic word) and hope that the moderates will emerge.

But then comes along Goldstone and the human-righters and out goes the deterrence. Because – and here’s the kicker – the Gazans know that after they are bombed to smithereens, they will be defended by the UN! And while this may be cold comfort to rational people, those terrorists might actually think that future Goldstoners will protect them. So they will terrorize Israel knowing that – even though they are condemned by the human rights people, at least the adversary Israel will also be condemned!

One wonders whether mainland China’s newspapers has a spot reserved for Shavit?

And finally, let’s not forget the liberal-minded American Jewish newspaper the Forward. Here, at least, you would expect less hysteria, maybe, even fair-mindedness?

Think again. Although it is the first in-depth Jewish journalistic account [ http://www.forward.com/articles/116269/ ] to actually look at the report, it is more one-sided than the report itself. At least Goldstone’s committee took testimony from Israelis, and not just “Goldstoners” like the human rights organizations. And the committee was boycotted by Israel, as I mentioned above.

But, aside from getting reactions from Goldstone, the Forward’s article bases itself entirely on Israeli sources, some of which are associated with the ultra rightwing think-tank, the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, none of which are on the left of the spectrum. Not a single Palestinian is interviewed, nor are reactions to specific claims solicited from Israeli human rights groups.

But worse, the Forward (and most Israelis) seems to assume that it is permitted to kill summarily members of the Hamas organization because it is considered to be a terrorist organization. But in a war, there is immunity for fighters who are not actively contributing to the war effort, much less simply members of a militant organization. The fact that Hamas websites, for its own propaganda purposes, claims certain people to proud fighters in their organization (remember the competition between Hamas and Fatah over the suicide bombers?) does not mean that they can be killed with impunity.

For if you think it does, then you are justifying the murder of the Israeli soldiers at the Beit Lid intersection, when they were waiting for a bus.

From a moral point of view, merely putting on a uniform doesn’t mean that you are a legitimate target. And if you don’t put on a uniform, and simply join an organization, even a military one, then you are certainly not a legitimate target.

And of course, there is no mention in the Forward of the white phosphorus use, the killing of civilians reported by Israeli soldiers in the Breaking the Silence testimonies.

From Gal Beckerman’s article, it seems that the real problem of the Goldstone panel was that that it did not listen to all the evidence from Israel but rushed to judgment.

And that, considering Israel’s boycott of the committee, is beyond chutzpah.
_____
http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com/2009/10/beyond-chutzpah-jewish-responses-to.html

10/11/09 12:26 PM

JEWish media is at fault.
I’m damn foreign born US citizen.  I know right, I know left.  Hope to destinguish right and wrong.  My Russian expirience helps me feel antisemite in a mile distance.  I believe Jewish mental capabilities are steps ahead of the rest of the World (see my theory in jpeoplemeet.com).
I still cannot understand why we’re so stupid in mass (78% of Jews).
Since “westernization” of America, Arab horseback riders were catching africans by the tribes and selling them to the West.  Even today, when slave trade is long over, millions of native africans are killed by Arabs.
WHERE WERE JEWISH MEDIA?
So called “african-americans- (AA)” now accept Arab names, muslim religion… and blame Jews for slavery.  Some of AA going so far as to hunt white americans on the bust stops (Chicago) or shooting their comrads in the back on the front line in the sands.
WHERE WERE JEWISH MEDIA?
Candidate Barak (not Barry any more) Obama toast on goodbye party of his close friend, Arafat speech writer was known well before election.  All America saw happy palestinians dancing on 9/11.
WHERE WERE JEWISH MEDIA?
I remember conversations with a few Jewish democrat-idiots.  They needed “change”.  All my intends of a reference to the subject toast were in wain.
WHERE WERE JEWISH MEDIA?
Unable to defeat and erase Israel on the battlefield, Arabs came up with a piece idea with Israel in ‘67 indefefenceable boarders.  Barak Obama supports it.  His capo-team keeps silence.
Mr. Clinton has already shown how far could go America to protect muslims.  Do you think Nobile “winner” Obama will stop short?
Rumors: Cometee discussing about rewarding Hitler posthumously.
Guess where will be anything Jewish?  Ask a capo-team.
..................
When it were some problems in Los Angeles, armed National Guards were moved in ready against own citizens.
After eight years of rocket rain IDF stopped half way instead of radically illiminating Hamas and alike.
While staying with the boot on Hamas throat, our Barac negotiated everything, but Shalit freedom.
Arab bandits killing and harming Israelies today, but army plays with robber bullets.
Is not it time to show intend and delivery at once.  This Iscariots-Goldstones and other waste will betrade Israel.
Looks like, now or never, Mr. Netaniahu.

10/15/09 05:01 PM

“It’s so sad that a respected member of the tribe would bash Israel so unfairly”
Rabbi Brian Walt - October 15, 2009 -

“He sold us out,” says Ze’ev Krengel, Chair of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies.  “It’s so sad that a respected, elder member of the tribe would bash Israel so unfairly.”

I grew up as a committed Jew in South Africa under Apartheid.  One of the most disturbing realities of Jewish life was the shameful silence of synagogues and Jewish communal organizations, including the Jewish Board of Deputies, about the cruel racism of Apartheid.  Individual Jews played a very important role as activists against Apartheid, but the more Jews were connected with Jewish life the less likely they were as individuals to be active opponents of Apartheid.  Jewish communal institutions and leaders, including most of the rabbis, were shamefully silent about Apartheid.

As a rabbi, and as a Jew who grew up in South Africa, I have always been so proud of those Jews who broke the silence of our community with courageous and principled opposition to Apartheid and those, who since the transformation of South Africa, have become human rights advocates in South Africa or around the world.

Judge Richard Goldstone is one those Jews.  As a judge he issued a judgement against the eviction of an Asian woman under the notorious Group Areas Act, a core Apartheid law that determined where people could live according to their race.  His judgement ended the evictions enacted under that law.  In the last years of Apartheid, as the chair of a commission into the use of violence by the secret agents of the Apartheid government against its opponents, he uncovered murder squads set up by the government and revealed the details of their despicable acts of violence.  In the early years of the new democratic South Africa, he served as a judge on the Constitutional Court.

In the international arena he became the chief prosecutor in the International Criminal Tribunals on Yugoslavia and Rwanda.  Judge Goldstone is also a committed Jew and Zionist, a member of the Board of Trustees of Hebrew University, a president emeritus of World ORT, to name just two of his Jewish communal commitments.

The vilification of Judge Goldstone is just shocking.  Israeli and American Jews have accused him of being an “anti-Semitic” and much worse.  “He sold us out,” says Ze’ev Krengel, Chair of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies.  “It’s so sad that a respected, elder member of the tribe would bash Israel so unfairly.” Among South African Jews there is fury and a barrage of public criticism.

The attacks on Goldstone are unfounded.  Jews in South Africa were so proud of Judge Goldstone when he was a member of the Constitutional Court or prosecuting the crimes in Rwanda and Yugoslavia.  How does one justify celebrating Goldstone’s dedication to the rule of law in South Africa, Yugoslavia, Rwanda and anywhere else in the world, but not in relation to Israel.  A commitment to human rights means a commitment to the human rights of all human beings and it must include those living in Israel, those living under Israeli military occupation in the West Bank, and those living in under an Israeli blockade in the Gaza Strip.  We can’t expect Israel or the members of our “tribe” to get a “pass” on human rights violations.

For Jews, it is profoundly upsetting to even imagine that the Israeli forces may have committed such egregious violations of human rights in Gaza as detailed in the Goldstone Report.  Reading the report is painful.  It breaks our heart to think that Israel may be guilty of war crimes or of crimes against humanity.

The way to counter these claims is by a credible investigation but the government of Israel has steadfastly refused to initiate such an investigation.  It has refused to do so not only in relation to the Goldstone report, but also in response to reports by many highly respected Israeli and international human rights organizations that have issued numerous disturbing reports about Israeli actions in Gaza.  All these detailed reports support the findings of the Goldstone Report.  Until the government of Israel agrees to launch a credible, transparent investigation that contradicts the findings of the Goldstone Report, we have no choice but to confront the painful reality of the evidence presented by the Goldstone report and the reports of Israeli, American and international human rights organizations.  Most Jews haven’t read any of these reports.  If we care about Jewish ethics, Israel and the Jewish people it is time we do so.

Attacks on Judge Goldstone constitute an attempt at deflection, to turn our attention from the disturbing substance of the report, by attacking the messenger.  The statements by Israeli leaders, Prime Minister Netanyahu, and most recently, Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to the Unites States, claiming that the report denies Israel the right to defend itself, is also an attempt to deflect attention from the report. Personally, Judge Goldstone is a Zionist and has repeatedly affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself and that the report does not address the issue of the right to wage war by either side.  The report focused solely on how Israel and Hamas acted during the war and particularly on the question of whether appropriate efforts were made by both sides to minimize harm to civilians.  This was the sole focus of the report, not whether either side was justified in their attack.

Other efforts at deflection include a consistent focus on the original mandate of the mission and the bias of the United Nations Human Rights Commission.  Judge Goldstone has made it clear that he only agreed to take on leadership of the mission once the mandate was changed to investigate the actions of both Hamas and Israel.  This change was accepted by the President of the Human Rights Commission and by the commission.  It is true that the Human Rights Commission has focused an unfair amount of attention to human rights violations by Israel.  The substance of the Goldstone report stands regardless of the nature or history of the Human Rights Commission.

In the face of a barrage of criticism, Goldstone has upheld the highest ethical traditions of our people and our history.  He took on the mission because “I believe in the rule of law and the laws of war and the principle that in armed conflict civilians should to the greatest extent possible be protected from harm.”

The report that he has prepared is very painful and disturbing to us as Jews who care deeply about Judaism and Israel. Unfortunately attacking the messenger will not free us from confronting the painful truth of what happened in Gaza.  Israel’s actions in Gaza violated international law and Jewish ethics.  This was true before the war when Israel imposed a blockade on Gaza and it is true today as the blockade continues.

I hope that Israel follows the recommendation of the Goldstone Report and launches a credible investigation of the charges.  If it doesn’t, I must support the report’s recommendation that the charges against Hamas and Israel be transferred to the Security Council and ultimately to the International Criminal Court.  I am sure that making this particular recommendation was not easy for Judge Goldstone.  For all who care deeply about Israel, this is very painful.  If we believe in human rights, we cannot expect the State of Israel to be exempt from international law.

The experience of living as a Jew under Apartheid has inspired many South African Jews to become dedicated defenders of the human rights of all.  In our tradition ethics has always been at the core of our faith and our understanding of what it means to be Jewish.

A true moral hero is one who follows the principles he believes in, especially when it is uncomfortable or painful. Judge Goldstone has done just that.  As a Jew who grew up in South Africa, I am proud and grateful. 

http://rabbibrian.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/its-so-sad-that-a-respected-member-of-the-tribe-would-bash-israel-so-unfairly/