Wolf's World

It’s really quite simple.  If it is critical of Israel, it is a myth. If it gives Israel a pass, it is fact.

Wolf Blitzer published a book, in which he promoted one piece of Zionist propaganda after another and denounced Palestinian views as “spurious myths.” It is a myth that Arab citizens were “massacred” at Deir Yassin, a “myth” that Palestinian refugees “were major victims of the 1948 war,” and a “myth” that “Jewish atrocities” caused the Palestinians to flee.[1]

I read his book.[2] He declares that “Arabs formed a majority of the population in Palestine in 1948 is a myth.”  Then once he gets rid of the Palestinian population, it’s anything goes; that Palestinians were the victims of the establishment of the State of Israel, that the Palestinian question is the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict, that Israel discriminates against its Arab citizens, it’s all a myth. 

In reality, at the founding of the State of Israel, numerous acts of violence were designed to frighten Arabs into fleeing for their lives. One of the best documented examples was the village of Deir Yassin.  On April 9, 1948, the Stern gang, headed by Yitzak Shamir, and the Irgun, headed by Menachem Begin, conducted the massacre of the Arab village of Deir Yassin.  Jews claim only 100 people were killed, Arabs say it was 250.  The commander of the Haganah, Zvi Ankori described what he witnessed:

I saw cut-off genitalia and women’s crushed stomachs. It was direct murder. Soldiers shot everyone they saw, including women and children. Parents begged commanders to stop the slaughter, to please stop shooting.[3]

No one denies that most of those slashed to death were women and children. Jewish terrorist shot people in their homes and threw their bodies into the streets as a message to neighboring Arab villages. Survivors of the raid tell stories of Israeli soldiers starting to kill early in the morning and continuing all day. They killed everyone they saw, including old people and children. One pregnant woman had her stomach cut open with a butcher’s knife.[4]

Rather than hiding its face in shame, Israel’s leaders promoted the massacre to frighten other villages into fleeing their homes and leaving them for Israeli Jews to occupy, “free of charge.” 

Yet, Blitzer claims that the massacre of innocent Arabs in Deir Yassin did not happen, It’s all a myth.

Blitzer, pro-Israeli lobbyist for AIPAC-turned-news-anchor, has become the face of CNN and CNN has become the propagandist for Israel.

The Day after the violent murders of four Rabbis in a Jerusalem synagogue, CNN hosted eight Jewish Israelis, three Jewish Americans but, not a single Palestinian to comment on the violence in Israel… the next day, CNN hosted seven pro-Israel guests including Alan Dershowitz, twice. While 15 pro-Israel guests were hosted in just two days, not a single Palestinian or Arab was asked to comment on the violence in Israel-Palestine. “This one-sided narrative allows the erroneous and self-serving assertions of the most right-wing and hyper-nationalistic government in Israel’s history to go unchecked.”[5]

I guess when Dershowitz said that Israel “has never attacked a mosque,” he forgot about the 73 mosques in Gaza that were completely demolished during Israel’s bombardment in 2014 and the 205 others partially destroyed when they were deliberately targeted by Israeli bombers.

So, I say shame on CNN for committing itself more to propaganda than to news. But, I say shame on us more if we allow CNN to dupe us with Wolf’s world.

Thomas Are

September 26, 2017

[1] Charlottesville is Moment of Truth for empowered U.S. Zionists (Who name Their Children after Israeli Generals.) Mondoweiss, 8/18/2017.

[2] Wolf Blitzer, Myth and Facts 1976, A Concise Record of the Arab-Israeli Conflict., Near East Research, Inc. 1976

[3].Lanni Brenner, The Iron Wall: Zionist Revolutions From Jabotinsky to Shamir, (Zed Books, Ltd. 1984). P. 97. And Ralph Schoenman, The Hidden History of Zionism, (Veritas Press, Santa Barbara, California, 1988) p.33.

[4].Quoted in David Hirst, The Gun and the Olive Branch: The Root of Violance on the Middle East, Faber and Faber, 1977) p. 141. Cited in Clifford Wright, Facts and Fables: The Arab-Isreli Conflict, (London, Kegan Paul International. 1989) p.19

[5] CJ Werleman, CNN is Israel’s Biggest Cheerleader-in-Chief.  Middle East Eye, February 13, 2015.

Israel's Greatest Fear

Already you know that I am in over my head. Who could possibly name Israel’s greatest fear? There are just too many from which to choose. However, somewhere in the list would be Israel’s fear of education. I don’t know what Israel fears most.

AN EDUCATED PALESTINIAN?

Why else would Israel go to such lengths to destroy Palestinian schools:

The night before the new school year started, Israeli bulldozers arrived on the outskirts of the Palestinian city of Bethlehem to demolish several caravans recently erected as a school for some 100 students… In the meantime, children study in a tent, without water or bathrooms.[1]

In addition to destroying school buildings, Israel is determined to control the curriculum:

Israel puts financial pressure on Palestinian schools in occupied East Jerusalem in an effort to make them switch over to an Israeli-controlled curriculum, one that teaches that Al-Aqsa is not their holy place, that the Palestinian flag is not their flag, that their land belongs to the settlers and that Ariel Sharon is a hero.[2]

Yet, perhaps more frightening to Israel than an educated Palestinian is an

AN EDUCATED ISRAELI.

Just a little investigation will reveal that Palestine was not a land without a people, that Palestinians did not voluntarily leave their homes in 1948, that Israel chose the war of 1967, that the IDF, Israel Defense Force, is not the most moral army on the globe and that Israel is not a democracy. And most of all, that Zionism is a violation of Judaism.  

However, probably, most frightening to Israel is an

AN EDUCATED AMERICAN.

I have in mind Brant Rosen, who serves a congregation in Evanston, Il. and is fearless in speaking out against Israel from his Jewish heart:

My primary religious motivation comes from my inherited Jewish tradition, in which God commands me to stand with the oppressed and to call out the oppressor…I simply don’t agree with the “official” Jewish community position that Israel’s actions are justified acts of self-defense. Rosen speaks not only as a Jew, but as an American:

I am also the citizen of a nation whose government has essentially given Israel a blank check to take numerous measures that I believe are counter to the cause of peace, including the expropriation of Palestinian lands, destruction of homes, injustice in military courts and widespread building of settlements in occupied Palestinian territory, to name a few.[3]

From every angle, education is Israel’s enemy and it’s an enemy that will never be defeated. You just cannot wall out intelligence.

Thomas Are

September 12, 2017

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[1] RT News, So sad our school is destroyed: Israel razes EU-funded schools for Palestinian Children. Aug 29, 2017.

[2] Al Jazeera English, How Israel is turning Palestinians into Zionists, August 31, 2017.

[3] Brant Rosen, Wrestling in the Daylight, (Just Word Books, 2012) p. 42.

Normal Society

It all sounded so polite and gracious, when the Zionists were seeking recognition and power. Yitzak Epstein, Jewish activist spelled out how Jews moving into Palestine would improve the lives everyone, including Arab farmers:

The residents will benefit from new scientific farming methods, better health care and education, and will recognize “us as their benefactors and comforters”.

Haim Kalvarisky, expounding on the Balfour Declaration addressed the Arab resistance to Zionist intrusion into their land by declaring:

Palestine constitutes the homeland of all its residents, Jews, Muslims and Christians are citizens on equal footing. Its government would not discriminate against anyone, its administration will be open to all, its schools will promote bilingual education and social services will be provided by the state with no distinction between people on the basis of religious origins.

Bret Shalom, organized in 1925, based on “absolute political equality,” declared:

Although Palestine was the only place where Jews could become a nation-state, they have to operate together and in equality with the Arabs.[i]

Then came Israel with power.

Arnon Soffer, professor at Haifa University, just looking at Gaza, offered a much less optimistic prognosis:

When 2.5 million people live in a closed off Gaza, it’s going to be a human catastrophe. Those people will be even bigger animals than they are today. The pressure at the border will be awful. It’s going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day.

He goes on to express concern:

If we don’t kill, we will cease to exist. The only thing that concerns me is how to ensure that the boys and men who are going to have to do the killing will be able to return home to their families and be normal human beings.[ii]

His concern was right on target. Of all the things that can be said of Israel today, being a “normal society” is not one of them.  

Thomas Are

September 1, 2017

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[i] These quotes are taken from Chapter One of Ran Greenstein’s book, Zionism and Its Discontents, (Pluto Press, 2014)  p. 3-18.

[ii] The Gaza Massacre is the Price of a “Jewish State.” , Electronic Intifada, July 25, 2014.