Israel 60: The Demonization Begins

Where were all of these "Champions of Justice" when the Germans were slaughtering Jews during the Holocaust? Did anyone complain when President Roosevelt refused to let the Nazi ship, St. Luis land and let its cargo of Jews destined for European gas chambers land in the United States, or did he say, "We don't need any more refugee problems? Where was the outrage???

Posted by: Mr. Leslie B. Kramer at Apr 15, 2008 4:51:52 PM

SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH WILL PROBABLY REVEAL THAT THE EVOLUTIONARY PROCESSES ARE INFLUENCED OVER THE YEARS BY THE ENVIRONMENT, AND THEREBY BECOME PART OF THE HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY. ANTI-SEMITISM IS A POSSIBLE EXAMPLE. THERE IS AN OLD EXPRESSION THAT THEY SUCK IT UP IN THEIR MOTHER'S MILK. PERHAPS THE PRESENCE OF IT IN THEIR GENES WOULD BE A MORE ACCURATE ASSESSMENT.
REGARDS MORT LEVY.

Posted by: MOrtimer Levy at Apr 15, 2008 5:51:36 PM

Instead of the 60 year celebration of Israel,why not say 3000years plus 60.
Many people in this world think Israel was dropped into the middle east after the 2nd world war and took the land away from the Arabs.We have been there 3000 years.The Jews were the original Palestinians since Biblical times.Let us remind the world we have had a state their since time immemorial.

Posted by: Melvin Lavin at Apr 15, 2008 6:31:31 PM

Does Honest Reporting do anything about these horrific articles? Do you contact the editors or write Oped pieces countering them?

Posted by: Aimee Fried at Apr 15, 2008 7:03:52 PM

It was my privilige to visit Israel in January 2008. We had a Muslim taxi driver who took us throughout the country. I did not see any of the discrimination that people speak of. I saw Muslims, Christians, Greek Orthodox and Jews living together in peace.

Posted by: Sandra Cherry at Apr 15, 2008 7:27:03 PM

To what "archives" is Edith Garwood referring? It sounds like a bunch of documents where every reference to "Arab" was replaced by "Israeli."

Posted by: Gary Katz at Apr 15, 2008 7:33:44 PM

Israel wasn't born out of sin, it was born out of terrorism. Two future Israeli PM's were behind the terrorist bombing of the King David Hotel and the cowardly assassinations of Lord Moyne and Count Bernadotte. Zionists initiate Plan Dalet to ethnicaly cleanse Palestine before the U.N. even granted the partioning of Palestine. In addition the U.N. vote to create the partition was voted on by the General Council. this vote is nonbinding. The only binding vote in the U.N. is from the Security Council, which never voted on the approval of Palestine's partion. As soon as the General Council voted Ben-Gurion announced the creation of Israel as a fete accompli. In addition to its founding years Israel has continued to ethnically cleanse the Palestine terrorties. the country refuses to join the IAEA, sign a nuclear non-proliferation treaty and allow inspections of its nuclear facilities. Israel has a 60 year history of violating international law and countless U.N. resolutions as well as employing apartheid policies. these are all acts of a rogue nation that has employed the evnts of WWII for 6 decades as a lame excuse to continue their unlawful and belligerent actions.

Posted by: Jack Olson at Apr 15, 2008 8:23:36 PM

Edith Garwood'sarticle of April 11,2008, contains many false and inflamitory charges. It is easy to make charges but takes more paragraphs than a letter to the editor would permit. Suffice itto say that if Ms. Garwood would study her history, she would find that the modern State of Israel was created by act of the United Nation and that there would have been no refugee problem had not the armies of seven Arab nations attacked and invaded the infant state

Posted by: Lee Kelberg at Apr 15, 2008 9:50:04 PM

I fought in Israel’s War of Independence 60 years ago as a 16 year-old Machal volunteer from England. Now, this may not sit well with some, but the sad fact is that much of this anti-Israel rhetoric and subsequent demonization that you allude to originated in Israel’s esteemed universities. One of these anti-Zionist historians,  Benny Morris of the University of Beer Sheva, wrote in his book 1948 and After,  that "Israel was born in original sin," and that we [the IDF soldiers] were guilty of "looting, rape, and murder."
If there were excesses in the heat of battle, and there probably were some, they didn't happen in my unit or in any other unit that I know of, but these "new historians" are highly selective, for while those of us who fought for Israel's very existence in 1948 are now accused of committing  these terrible acts, there is not one mention of the barbaric treatment routinely meted out to captured Jewish soldiers and civilians by enemy soldiers and local Arab gangs. Morris, along with revisionist Israeli historians Tom Segev, Eyal Naveh, and others, whose rabidly anti-Zionist and anti-Israel polemics are are now being quoted by the likes of Edith Garwood, Bill Slavick, and others in the news media and on our campuses to demonize Israel and put into question Israel's very legitimacy and right to exist as a Jewish national homeland. Israel may not be a perfect stae--but she’s a damn site more perfect than most!

Posted by: Dr. Jason Fenton at Apr 15, 2008 10:04:08 PM

Why isn't Honest Reporting getting their own op-eds written and published? or news articles covering the good things in Israel or evil committed by the Palestinians? If they report success in this area, I will send $100. Complaining about Palestian propaganda after it is published does not influence any hearts or minds.

Posted by: Roberta Silverman at Apr 15, 2008 10:32:57 PM

If the ones who are shaping today's public opinion do not have a hidden anti-Israeli/Pro-Arab agenda or are not outrageously unfair in their approach to any news and information that they disperse to us about all the conflicts that exist between Jews & Arabs or Muslims & non-Muslims, then I would like to know why else they stubbornly refuse to mention, much less highlite, the current and historical realities that make us look unfavourably upon Arabs and Muslims. I would like to know why virtually no one today is aware of the vast amounts of pro-Israeli/Jewish/Christin or anti-Arab/Muslim information that can be found at:

www.wilderness-cry.net/tcn/palestinians/truth.html; www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=28222; http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2006/07/history-lesson.html; http://filasteen.wordpress.com/2007/11/29/international-day-of-solidarity-with-the-palestinian-people; www.masada2000.org; www.faithfreedom.org;
www.6thcolumnagainstjihad.com; www.prophetofdoom.net; and numerous other places.

Posted by: Dawn Stricson at Apr 15, 2008 10:44:52 PM

What can people do about all these distortions? Seems like if you repeat lies enough time, people who don't know otherwise begin to believe the lies. Like the old saying "if you throw enough mud, some of it will eventually stick."

So what can WE, just folks, do about these frustrating reports?

Posted by: Susan G. at Apr 16, 2008 10:02:52 AM

I tried to answer the terrible things the "Charleston Observer" wrote about Israel with 2 of my stories:
1. My sister "adopted" a 15-year-old Arab girl whose mother had died when she was 8. Her Arab father wanted her to work in the fields to bring some money home, but my sister persuaded him to let his daughter study. She now has a Master's in nursing. When she was the assistant head of a hospital ward for premies, a neighbor of ours was there with his tiny son. Another father of a premie there asked our neighbor how it was the "best nurse in the ward" was so friendly to him and his wife. They were neighbors, that's why!
My very good friend is a Bedouin who didn't finish her Master's in education because her 5 children were born in 7 years. She says she and I are "Co-Existance"; we're on the phone together every week.
I can go on!
Yours truly, Naomi Kubitsky,
P.O.B.162, Ganei Omer
Israel 84965

Posted by: Naomi Kubitsky at Apr 16, 2008 8:14:45 PM

If Jack Olson thinks Israel is so terrible, he should try to build a church in Saudi Arabia. He should try to set foot in Mecca. If he wants to discuss ethnic cleansing, he could talk to Christians in Arab countries such as Iraq. Or perhaps he should try moving to southern Lebanon. He could ask any Palestinian what would happen if the Palestinian tried to sell his property to a Jew (the Palestinian would soon be murdered). Mr. Olson is typical of the people who demonize Israel, while ignoring everyone else who's much worse.

Posted by: Gary Katz at Apr 17, 2008 12:18:57 AM

I agree with Roberta Silverman's post on April 15 at 10:32PM. However, I'd like to add, that HR is already doing a crucial and very important job by countering all this anti-Israel propaganda. And with our help, Roberta, such help as writing letters to editors, signing petitions, and, yes, contributing money to HR, it managed a few rather impressive victories over such behemoths of media as Times of London and Reuters, most recently.
Countering lies and bias in the press is important, HR probably sees itself as someting like a watchdog. Which is fine. But there is enough positive, pro-Israel material both in the old-fashioned media and on the internet sites. HR should, in addition to its watchdog role, just as Roberta seems to suggest, try to provide such information with a much wider, larger forum.

Posted by: 847-412-1770 at Apr 17, 2008 5:58:32 PM

It is terribly upsetting that people like Jack Olsen who ever he is, think as they do. He is so clearly anti-semitic as to be be totally absent of logic and reason. Israel had freedom fighters, sure, but they did not choose to blow up innocent people. They had good reason to distrust the British alas. Churchill was very clear that the Jewish people had a right to their homeland. The Jews were in Israel/Pelestine long before the Moslem religion was ever thought of.
I repeat, even Arafat said that there were no true Palestinian Arabs, they were South Syrians and nomads. The concept of the Palestinian as attributed to arabs was a politically motivated ploy, as he also admitted to. The world and its propogandists, like Olsen, born to be anti Jewish, sucks up this ploy eagerly, happy to find reasons real or imagined, to hate the Jews and Israel.

Posted by: jacqueline at Apr 18, 2008 3:11:32 PM

Israeli PR is absolutely useless in this regard. Rebuttals are a waste of time; we ae not in a (logical) discussion but in an (emotional) argument, and in an argument when you're on the defensive you've lost. Instead of refuting their outlandish claims, we should be providing the world with details of their bizarre culture, barbaric customs and shameful history.

There are two reasons we fail to do this: one is that most Jews are liberals, and therefore too wimpy to even think of offending another ethnic group, and two, the Israelis themselves have an in-your-face attitude as in, "We don't give a damn what the rest of the world thinks."

Posted by: 914-967-8499 at Apr 20, 2008 11:46:13 PM

Only God could have kept Israel going for 60 years surrounded as it is by millions of Muslims who want to drive it into the sea. God has promised to "Keep Israel" So say no more!!!! Just "pray for the peace of Jerusalem!

Posted by: Amber Mailer at Apr 21, 2008 8:18:45 AM