Was Shimon Peres Right about Britain Having a Problem With Jews?
I have spent a few weeks thinking a lot about an encounter I had on July 16 at a private London house party I attended following the pre-Prom concert on the BBC First Night.
The encounter has hung over me for weeks, even affecting my normal work patterns. I decided to write about it after hearing about the outrage that Israeli President Shimon Peres has caused for daring to suggest that Britain has a problem with Jews.
A friend and I arrived at the party and were having a lovely time when a young man in a baseball hat sauntered over to me and said, “I have some questions for you.” I had no problem with this and sat down next to him on a bench in a cramped corner. He proceeded to spend what seemed like an eternity traducing Americans, Jews, Zionism, and Israel until I began to suspect he was a Nazi. When I attempted to defend my ancient heritage (I told him this will be the 5,771st Jewish New Year), of which I am as proud as would be a person of Egyptian, Indian, Chinese or Persian descent, he became irate. I thought he was going to strike me.
He was fixated on the Jewish lobby so I reminded him that many American banks are Protestant-run. When I reminded him of the good that Jews do, like writing virtually every Broadway and West End show, he erupted and said I was self-obsessed. “It’s always me, me , me — the Jews, the Jews,” he shouted. It is unheard of for me to scream and shout at a genteel summer garden party, but I suddenly found myself bellowing at the top of my lungs: “Listen, I am damned proud of my Jewish heritage and burst with pride at being an American.” It was impossible for me to get away from him because every seat was taken and I was hemmed in. Meanwhile, his little girl sat down across his lap and glowered at me as he ranted in an endless stream of the f word.
I have been on Any Questions?, Woman’s Hour, and other debate shows with tough British hosts Ken Livingstone, Jeremy Vine and Andrew Gilligan but frankly have never been so frightened by such an opponent. He never let me finish a sentence and probably missed my saying his views were “alarming.” When I came home I took an aspirin as I really and truly thought I might have a heart attack.
Dear Carol, When confronted with a ranting anti-American across the pond, do not try to defend the U.S., it needs no defense, just tell the ranter that you could care less about what an Englishman says about your country. Just ask him this: America is where the rest of the world goes to get away from the rest of the world, so why would I care what the rest of the world thinks? Then tell him to piss off.
Also, not everyone in England is an anti-semite but everyone on the left is.
Right on! Except America is hardly defensable today. It will be a losing argument.
You have to go on the offensive with Brits. They have thick skins. Just say, as I did at a recent gathering in which a Brit lady was hammering me with arrogant smirks, “blah-blah-blah . . . in YOUR war” referring whatever to HER war, WWII, since ALL the wars since were American wars or Bush’s war, etc.
Going on the offensive can indeed be the wise move sometimes. After the first Rodney King trial a Brit who had lived for many years in the US came up to me at kiddush and said heatedly “Your system of justice in this country stinks!” I calmly replied “It’s based on the British system, you know.” He didn’t say another word.
Also, not everyone in England is an anti-semite but everyone on the left is.
Isn’t that almost the same thing?
The answer to your question BRIANH is unfortunately a resounding YES. they don’t think they are of course which is sublime ILLOGICAL HYPOCRISY both of which traits, lack of logical thinking ability and hypocrisy, that left wing moonbats share with Muslims.
livingstone is a loser and a lover of islamic terrorists, he invited some to London when he was mayor, Vine is a decent bloke and more than likely despite being with the BBC a pro Israel man. England has many friends of israel, we don’t have a voice due to the majority of our media having a leftist agenda along with a sizeable muslim population that the government fears. America has a similar growing and vocal muslim population and plenty youtube vids will show what they get up to, even America is becoming wary, especially under a muslim president. There are many supporters of israel in England who engage with the media and general population, let he who is without sin throw the first stone.
The British have always had problems with anyone who successfully confronted their vaunted imperial army like the Jews of Mandatory Palestinian managed to do. And for good measure not only did those miserable, cosmopolitan, and war ravaged Jews throw the British brutes out, they did it with only a badly armed, poorly trained, and really rag tag militia. This is something I would mention the next time some foul mouthed Brit decides to go on a rampage against Israel. I would also mention that the modern Israeli Defence Forces could probably hammer the worthless and class ridden modern British Army into the ground in short order.
Probably more than even the centuries long history of British anti Semitism largely characterized by the myth of the Jewish murder of Hugh of Lincoln, a medieval blood libel against the Jews of England, the expulsion of the British from Palestine is probably the blackest hit Britain has ever suffered and it probably rankles them the most.
I suppose I should be just thrilled that Shimon Peres has belatedly come to the conclusion that the British and at least some parts of the British Jewish community are deeply and immutably anti Semitic, something which Mr. Peres spent most his professional and political life denying, and thus by extension, encouraging.
“I would also mention that the modern Israeli Defence Forces could probably hammer the worthless and class ridden modern British Army into the ground in short order.”
You are probably correct, since the Brits have really let their military rot; unfortunately for Israel, the Brits have a large nuclear arsenal, and if the above were to happen, the UK would beat Iran to “wiping Israel off the map” – a fate which no doubt a vast majority in Islamo-Nazi Britain now support.
I am not even convinced that the Brutish nuclear arsenal is all it’s knocked up to be and in any event, the Israeli nuclear arsenal probably has enough deliverable megatons to leave most of Great Britain a glowing and smoking memory too.
Negative. At this point in time Israel may have a larger nuclear arsenal then the UK.
Don’t you know that everything is the Joooooos fault?
Dear God, have you been sleeping at the switch.
Doing a film about black GI babies….my guess, without seeing this film, is that you’ve been spouting your own share of anti-Americanism and jumping on the “Oh, those evil racist Americans” band wagon yourself. Maybe its time you realized that your fellow ‘artistes’ are only saving you for last. Goodness only knows what they’ve been saying behind your back, for years.
My other guess is that your usefulness as a useful idiot is coming to an end and it is time to purge their ranks of the likes of you.
Time to rethink all of your professional relationships past and present.
I am visiting London at the moment and had a fun evening two nights ago explaining to a smart 18 year old why the BBC1 news item we had just watched was 100% suspect, probably stating the opposite of what was true and, I hope, giving her an idea of how much fun it is to poke holes in all British reported news items these days.
Anyone over 30 here is a bit of a waste of time I find – didn’t Dylan predict this years ago? The kids are cool though, they get that the internet and access to the direct source is driving the brainwashed kool aid drinkers crazy.
I had a run in with a very well educated, upper class 50 year old at a garden party last year, couldn’t argue compellingly, just spluttered with bulging eyes. He’s since had a nervous breakdown and takes his NHS medication regularly.
My advice, see the humour in it all, laugh in their faces and thank God for young people and the internet.
Carol,
Why do you waste time aruging with Nazi morons like this idiot? Insult them, even pour drinks on them, kick them or hit them, but don’t try to argue rationally with them. Same with that finanical advisor that spewed anti-Semitic garbage. He should have been told to f**k off and been fired, with a complaint to his employer if he was not self-employed.
In a lot of ways, you remind me of Bruce Bawer – both of you have benefited until now staying in Europe – you as a Jew in England, Bruce as a gay man in Norway — but both of you face increasing and perhaps mortal threats from Islam and the left.
It is time for both of you to come home. Any financial benefit you would derive from staying in Europe would be neutralized because you could be killed.
Carol,
I echo Erics’ sentiments completely. Anti-semitism is a disease of the mind and soul. Rational dialogue with an anti-semite is impossible. Additionally the very fact that a man would would dialogue with a woman in a threatening manner speaks volumes about his manhood or, more correctly, his lack of manhood. Anti-semites always prey on the weak because they are cowards. That is why they mostly travel in groups. Get one alone, one and one, and they are spineless.
Being large , muscular, a 40 plus year practitioner of the martial arts with military experience to boot, I have dissuaded such tirades with a look. When a look was not enough I have been known to take another tack. I only wish i would have been sitting next to you so that I had had the opportunity to interject and intercede.
There are two comments you might want to consider making in the future should such a situation arise once again.
” Jesus was a Jewish settler.”
” If not for America you would be speaking German. ”
If that doesn’t work simply leave. I hope you excuse my being a bit old fashioned but sometimes a mans’ job is a mans’ job.
Shabbat Shalom, MBY
Britain has a long track record of abusing her colonies. Scotland. Ireland. The United States. India. Portions of Africa. Palestine (pre-1948 Israel).
There are a couple of numbers which you might want to remind your British detractors of as an American:
1789 and 1814 The years in which Britain’s vaunted Army lost not once, but TWICE to inferior American forces. Anytime they want to go another round, it can be arranged.
As for Israel, as a Christian, I support Israel. I don’t say Israel right or wrong, I don’t believe Israel is the chosen people, but I DO believe that God has plans for them in the future. Israel is an island of righteousness in the sea of godlessness which is the Middle East.
Constitutionalist, Like many you misunderstand the term ” Chosen People “. It does not mean superiority. It simply means that Jews were chosen to carry a greater burden than non-Jews. For the non-Jew there are only Seven Commandments, known as the Noahide Laws, that are obligatory. For the Jew there are 613 commandments.
I hope that clears things up.
“Constitutionalist, Like many you misunderstand the term ” Chosen People “. It does not mean superiority.”
I am sure that can only be true if “Jewish/Israeli” psychology is distinct from that of the rest of humanity–and every tribe has at some point in it’s history called itself “people” and everyone else something else–and I am certain it is not so distinct. You may well believe what you are saying is all that can be meaningfully said about the religious (and ridiculous) notion that the “Jews” are God’s chosen people. If you do believe it, I know you are deluded. Nothing supernatural has ever happened.
I’m a bit confused of how ‘britain abuses her colonies’ such as ‘scotland’ which is part of britain. You don’t seem to understand what britain or the uk of GB is. If your referring to the British empire, it was just that , british! which is why you find edinburgh, glasgow, etc all a round the world, yes the scottish are part of the british empire, equal partners in building that empire with the welsh and irish also..so if the scottish were abusing the scottish according to your theory im really confused.
“Jesus was a Jewish settler” is a nifty comeback, but only in the highly unlikely event that you’re addressing a Christian. (What’s the percentage of Brits that attend church weekly now? Is it 5%? Something like that.)
For many members of the ruling class, the fact that Jesus was a Jew is more an argument FOR Jew-hatred than against it.
I remember when the European Union’s constitution erased Jerusalem from the Athens-Rome-Jerusalem triad on which Western Civilization has traditionally been said to be based. This was mostly seen, rightly, as anti-Christian, but was it not also anti-Jewish? There are more than a few instances in the modern world where those two hatreds have overlapped.
Athena, point taken. But like you said, its a nifty comeback.
Oh yeah? Where was he “settling” except the land where his ancestors were just the most recent set of conquerors, and that quite some time before him? Settler, my foot.
As comeback, I think it can only work with someone ignorant of history.
Wow! What an encounter!!! I know what you went through. How can I say this? I am a minority within a minority within a minority. I am Jewish. I am a woman. I am a Black American. Not only have I met my share of judeophobic people but I have to deal with Jews who feel no shame in questioning my Jewishness, Blacks who see me as an enemy at best and a misguided Black as well. As a Jewish Black woman, I think that I have heard and seen it all. I wish that I had a forum like you do here at PJMedia. Imagine a column concerning JOC’s or Jews of Color. Sigh….
Concerning Black GI babies…I love it. I would like to know how they were able to live in a world that may have focused more on their “blackness” than on what they had to offer. I really would love to know about the German and Asian GI babies.
English society has always had an undercurrent of judeophobia running through it. You seem to have been given a large dose of it. Honey, it is going to get worse. Maybe this Jewish Black woman could help you out. Just a thought.
Ann,
There is a little known fact about the Nazis and WWII. At the end of WWI, the French occupied part of Germany as part of their repayment plan to France. France used Sudanese volunteers as the occupying force in the region. As a result of this occupation, there were a number of German children who had been fathered by the Sudanese. When Hitler’s forces reoccupied that land, they took swift action against those children and murdered them all. In truth the very first victims of Hitler were those black babies.
Shabbat Shalom
Ann,
There is a little known fact about the Nazis and WWII. At the end of WWI, the French occupied part of Germany as part of their repayment plan to France. France used Sudanese volunteers as the occupying force in the region. As a result of this occupation, there were a number of German children who had been fathered by the Sudanese. When Hitler’s forces reoccupied that land, they took swift action against those children and murdered them all. In truth the very first victims of Hitler were those black babies.
Shabbat Shalom
G-d bless you. Stay strong.
There was an article published here a few weeks back (maybe it was Caroline Gould’s) that stated just the opposite; that the British right were as anti-Israel/Semitic as the left, just not as rabid.
As for this article, does the author care to name names? Let me guess – it was Zombie Lord Haw-Haw. By the way, what was the reaction of everyone else at the party?
The British new PM (Cameron) demonstrated in spades that even the right in the UK are a bunch of antisemites (when he compared Gza to a prison and condemned Israel for the flotilla debacle). Brits simply know that it is a matter of time before Sharia law is implemented in their country and in a sort of pre-Stockholm Syndrome, are trying to prove their credentials to Muslims. So they are effectively demonizing Jews and Israel in order to appease those who will soon be their masters.
The UK society and culture are pretty much done. Demography killed it.
““It’s always me, me , me — the Jews, the Jews,” he shouted.”
Well there is the willful primitivism that you think of yourselves as God’s chosen people. That’s nothing anyone should begin to respect. It’s as silly as Papal infallibility, Mormon’s sacred underwear, or snake handling.
Nobody’s being asked to “respect” that. Jews aren’t like Muslims – we don’t force our religious views on anyone else. We pretty much just want to be left alone to live in peace and practise our own religion. Of course nobody’s expecting you to believe that the Jews are God’s chosen people if you’re not even Jewish.
Oh, and the whole “chosen” thing isn’t about superiority, but responsibility. Even a lapsed Jew like me knows that. (Not claiming to speak for all Jews here, either – it was just that “we” looked a lot better than “they” in that paragraph.)
Claire, in my experience, people who criticise Jews for the chosen people concept could not care less what the concept really means — they are simply looking for a reason to bash Jews. You and I could explain all day to this gentleman why your explanation is correct and give him stacks of books to back it up, and he would still dismiss it as so much apologia.
Mr. Perkins, The Bible deserves greater study than a comic book. I explained the concept of ” Chosen people ” in another post. perhaps if you read it you will find your misconception corrected.
I can only reply that the misconception is yours, sir. And I think mine is not the comic book misunderstanding. If you are what you claim, I believe you have yourself decided not to learn much of your own history.
No, Tom Perkins, the misconception is yours. If you want to know what the Jewish religion says about the chosen people concept, the information is easy to find. Instead, as I predicted to Clare, you are more interested in what people who hate Jews want the term to mean.
To Jews (as opposed to Jew-haters), the term means responsbility to live in accordance with special laws that G-d ordained for us, which are more strict than the laws that He ordained for humanity in general, in order to serve our role as His witnesses in this world. If choseness implied the kind of racist superiority that you posit, it would be impossible for a non-Jew to become Jewish. But it is possible — anyone who wishes to can become equally chosen by joining the Jewish people in accordance with those laws.
Because you do not like Jews and are offended by the mere fact of our existence, you will continue to insist that the racist understanding that you attribute to the term is correct, and that the Jews who think it means something else are either lying to you or to ourselves.
We have a special prayer for your kind, written by a man named Shmul ha-Katan. No more need be said. Those who understand will understand me.
WTF the Brits are on their own this time.
As a stranger in a strange land, I do not usually offer opinions unless explicitly asked. I nod and listen. I learn much much more that way.
Nevertheless, history shows that when intolerance and misinformation becomes commonplace in a country, terrible things such as civil war or genocide will happen. I do not wish this sort of thing upon our allies across the pond. However, it seems they’re headed that way.
As foreigners, we do not need to defend ourselves against such verbal hatred, but we do need to take note of it and pay attention to who is saying it. When words become action, we’ll know what to do. Meanwhile, keep your guns clean, practice defensive arts, make sure you have plenty of fresh ammo and supplies, and prepare. Just. In. Case.
I have been the only regular American to participate in the past 4 years in what I believe is the most popular center-right blog for the UK, Tim Montgomerie’s Conservativehome. I stopped attending recently after the Gulf oil leak because of the infuriation over Obama’s usage of “British” instead of “Beyond” when naming BP. It was again sinking into the all too typical big bad American syndrome with passing regard at best for the real victims and ongoing devastation. There are many members there and for sure not everyone is anti-American but considering the conservative bent you would think by and large it would be positive. There is a lot of raw prejudice toward this country of which most Americans have no clue. There is a lot against the Jews of Israel too. The attitude can be similar to the hater described in this article where there is no regard for any reasoning except the raw emotional conclusion the Jews and/or Americans are bad people or less intelligent and civilized.
This is no longer Great Britain as we still tend to think. This is Great Victim, with a lot of scapegoat blame toward America and… Americans personally for so much that is not right in the UK and the world. We have been portrayed by their BBC, Guardian, Independent etc. as big bad and uncivilized ugly, taking advantage of them while they play the victim/enlightened ones. Its a very different perception than how most here feel about Brits.
It does need to be said not everyone there feels this way, some are outstanding allies and friends. But my impression over the years, especially when considering the feelings expressed in other very popular platforms as well such as the BBC’s, is most in the UK think they are superior and don’t really want a close relationship.
I do think we need to wake up.
I sympathize with the Brits on that one.
Actually, I think Obama hates the U.K. even more than he does the Jews, which is saying a lot.
Steevo
sorry that’s been your experience.
Some of us Brits are very pro-US and are friends of Israel too. Some of us even consider ourselves true patriots for feeling so. The story above is a reminder that the idea of Britishness many of us have is a thing of the past, if it ever existed in tangible form at all.
Which is probably why I live in Canada.
Tim.
Understood Tim and sorry for your experience. All the best in Canada…
I met this attitude repeatedly in London in 2003, either just after the U.S. — and the U.K. — went into Iraq to remove Saddam. One encounter I enjoyed because I left them speechless. It was three women trashing American and Pres. Bush. I asked them, “Would you want to live under Saddam Hussein?” They relied not. I retorted, “I would like to think if a Saddam ever came to power here, the British still have the character to rise up against him. And if you asked America for help, I would hope that we would still be willing to give it to you.” (Meaning that we had not become like these women had.) “You are a disgrace to Winston Churchill — and racist. You reject the idea of yourselves living under Saddam but you think it quite fit that Iraqis should have to live under such a horror. You even seem to believe that this absurd thinking makes you more intellectual and moral. Now you dance with devil and call us evil. Why should Americans care what you think?” It shut them up.
Another time, I was in a “gentleman’s” home for a business meeting — which his views made me decide I would not deal with him. His comments were offensively anti-Israel with the line “That’s how most people here [England] feel.” I said, “Jews were writing the Bible when you people danced around Maypoles naked and lived in thatched houses. You think we’re an anachronism. We see you as another empire fallen in the dust while we continue to make history. We have Israel because of people like you. We have our own army because of people like you. Your opinion is so hateful because you are frustrated. We think of you as traif — unwholesome junk. We don’t care what you think. You kept the Jews out of pre-State Israel but now you are overrun by Muslims who hate your culture and want to erase what you were. The more you hate us, the worse it will be for you. Millions of the Muslims you love hate you — and you respond by hating Jews. It’s time to change your national anthem.” He called me a “stupid American Jew.” Well, I am a Jewish American….
“Jews were writing the Bible when you people danced around Maypoles naked and lived in thatched houses.”
So, how are maypoles different from sacrifing small animals in the temple? Not yet to mention scapegoats. And as for writing the Bible, no, it was the Torah–later to be much improved on. And also as for writing it, also rewriting it as required–King James I wasn’t the only one to edit the good book for political purposes. It’s a religious text, God didn’t actually write it; people did, people are flawed.
“You think we’re an anachronism. We see you as another empire fallen in the dust while we continue to make history.”
Yeah, that 1600 year interregnum was all part of the plan. In a pig’s eye.
“We have Israel because of people like you. We have our own army because of people like you.”
No. Israel exists because illegal immigration into Palestine was successful in driving out enough of the original inhabitants with force–the Irgun murdering civilians without compunction. You have your own army, because killing people is what you had to do to take the territory and associated chance at sovereignty from the original inhabitants. It would have been far more moral–like at all moral–to go someplace else where you didn’t have to kill people to be safe. Which, by the way, you’ve collected quite a few of you into a “one bomb” state, as one of our enemies put it. Brilliant.
“Your opinion is so hateful because you are frustrated.”
Speaking for myself, I am frustrated the body politic in the State of Israel continues to act as though God actually did sign a deed out to persons of Hebrew descent and converted to that religion. It doesn’t make the real strategic contests my nation is engaged in (vs. China, Russia, Islam) any easier. Thanks, guys. Here’s another set of checks, one for you, one to keep Egypt sorta quiet.
“We think of you as traif — unwholesome junk. We don’t care what you think.”
Hubris.
“You kept the Jews out of pre-State Israel but now you are overrun by Muslims who hate your culture and want to erase what you were.”
I don’t think the first was anything but the British’s job–what they were supposed to do–and I sincerely doubt the Muslims in Britain will succeed in the latter. Israel will be lucky if the Muslims aren’t expelled from Europe and into someplace closer to home.
“The more you hate us, the worse it will be for you.”
Some people are anti-Semitic in the classic sense, and the British people being described here sound much like it. There is a sense I have though, that the “Anti-Semite” card is way overplayed that same way the Race card is here. The fact is there is a very great deal to criticize in the course of Israel’s Founding, in many ways, it was a crime against humanity, just like most exercises in ethnic cleansing are. The only aspects of it that redeem it in any sense are the depravity of the Palestinians and Moslems generally–and that is a relative thing, not an absolute. Its juxtaposition temporally to the Holocaust (although the ethnic cleansing was underway prior to that, and two wrongs don’t make a right even if one is far worse and the second done in part in opposition to the first). And the fact much of it is far enough into history that it would be a greater injustice to undo it.
That last is the only reason I can tolerate my nation’s support for the Israeli state, and that support erodes when I see more theocratically aligned settlements enlarging the older crime with newer ones. I don’t like that, why should I?
“Millions of the Muslims you love hate you — and you respond by hating Jews. It’s time to change your national anthem.” He called me a “stupid American Jew.””
Speaking for myself, I can’t think of any Muslims I love, and I think their religion is a far more dangerous and pathetic anachronism than much of Judaism–some of Judaism is on a par with it for pathetic (aside, I don’t have much use for organized religion, if you haven’t picked up on that). As for that man’s last words you quote, I think he might have been not too far off the mark. You don’t sound that bright to me.
You’ve heard of concern trolling?
This isn’t it.
I’m concerned that the US is supporting a nation I fear is Jonestown writ quite large, and is distracting itself from larger strategic issues to do it. This nation is one which has never failed to trade shared technology to our enemies (China) when it was convenient, and one which overall HAS TO HAVE BEEN AT PEACE WITH ITS ENEMIES FOR A GENERATION’S TIME by the time technology becomes cheap enough to permit its destruction in a garage lab, or that destruction will be accomplished.
A 5 axis CNC mill with an accuracy of +/- 0.001 inch can be built by a hobbyist for the price of a high end hobby built car, and 50 years ago, I think no such mills existed. Have you seen what can be done now with a few thousand in DNA manipulative gear?
My concern is not misplaced.
The overriding strategic goal of Israel must not be its own expansion, or even retention of the Golan Heights, or production at Dimona. It has to be bringing the Palestinians to a healthy accomodation with the existence of Israel. If the Israels don’t get that, then in the long run they are done.
And lately, I don’t see that they are trying.
That’s frustrating.
I hope none of the 6th Fleet gets nuked pulling refugees off the beach.
On behalf of the many supporters of Israel in the U.K (we tend to be thoughtful, quiet types)I would like to say sorry to Carol and hope she stays.
Come and visit me in Lewes, the home of freedom.(Ask me why)
The BBC and the Guardian are the two biggest culprits in spreading anti Israeli propaganda.Also, the young have no memory of 67 etc and only see a highly competent IDF against amateur looking,seemingly chaotic palestinians. People don’t let facts get in the way of their prejudice.
Eric .R ,I know you hate England, do you also hate the nationals who form much of the British Army? I mean Welsh,Scots,Irish, New Zealand,Gurkas,Soloman Islanders,Barbadians,Jamaicans? You may be right that the IDF is a superior force to the British Army but is the B.Army really worthless? Would you say that to the mothers of those troops killed in Afghanistan etc?
Class ridden? That is true and shameful. Britain is slowly becoming less class ridden though. The U.S. seems to be going in the other direction!
Today it was announced the Defence budget has a £37b deficit so the forces will get even smaller soon.
We need to admit we are a small island with an interesting history but our future is up to us. We should try not to tell people in other countries what to do,especially when we seem to be failing in their eyes. I think Cameron realises this, that is why he is devoting time to boosting trade. I think we are foolish to neglect the opportunity to do more trade with Israel but maybe it is too late and relations have got too bad to recover. I hope not.
I intend to visit Israel within a year or two with my family,will I be welcome?
“Eric .R ,I know you hate England, do you also hate the nationals who form much of the British Army? I mean Welsh,Scots,Irish, New Zealand,Gurkas,Soloman Islanders,Barbadians,Jamaicans? You may be right that the IDF is a superior force to the British Army but is the B.Army really worthless? Would you say that to the mothers of those troops killed in Afghanistan etc?”
Well, even as Britain fought Nazi Germany, the country was rife with anti-Semitism (it did nothing to bomb Auschwitz even as RAF bombers flew over it — and yes, the USAF was guilty of that too), kept Jews out of Palestine, thus condemning them to death, and took in no Jewish refugees after 1938. Even when Britain was (or is) seemingly fighting a noble cause, it does nothing to stop its Jew-hatred.
I did not say the British Army was worthless; it is probably among the 10 best in the world, but Israel ranks probably 2nd or 3rd.
And as for non-English in the British Army — well, hopefully all those Nepalese Gurkhas are not infected with this hate.
As a Brit I was very depressed by this confrontation with such a yob. I would have been tempted to hit him for his loud-mouthed ignorance. It is plain stupidity, stupidity on stilts, and I regret to say there is a lot of it in England today.
It’s folks like yourself who motivated me to participate in a Brit forum for years. Now I no longer do because the anti-American prejudice is a bit much as the coming of Obama didn’t stop what was excused as Bush’s fault. The “special relationship” that had existed for generations in my opinion is history but I’ll always remember those Brits I’ve come to know who are honorable indeed.
Thanks for posting.
Steevo,
Just to put a different light on your comments. I lived for seven years in the States, and many of my relatives live there. I have spent the last twenty years defending America in all forums from the crass prejudice of many of my countrymen. How shocked was I when the moment after the BP oil spill, American conservatives went directly into Brit-bashing as ducks do to water. FOX could hardly contain its vitriol. I think Shepard Smith still has a little Union Jack which he urinates on every once in a while. I found it very hard to stomach. Esp as BP is one of the largest employers in Louisiana. And employs twice as many Americans as Brits. And it wasn’t even a BP rig, but a TransOcean rig. But whatever. Interesting to see what lay just beneath the surface of many Conservative Americans.
I no longer rush to defend the US. As far as I’m concerned, the US is a pretty unlovable place.
Oh, and I think you’ll find that the reason English people don’t speak German currently has vastly more to do with Zhukov and the 4 million Russian warriors than a few hundred thousand tardy yanks.
But Andrew, there was no anti-British (as with the British people) anger. It was against the company. And Obama was bashed plenty for his attempts at playing politics with this and hoping to play on populist anger. If it was Shell, Conoco etc. it would have been the same. Do you know what happened to Exxon and its reputation for over a decade?
“Oh, and I think you’ll find that the reason English people don’t speak German currently has vastly more to do with Zhukov and the 4 million Russian warriors than a few hundred thousand tardy yanks.” I’m quite knowledgeable of WWII, I know the Russian effort has not received its just due. I don’t even bring up a war of generations ago when discussing current relations with the UK.
“Oh, and I think you’ll find that the reason English people don’t speak German currently has vastly more to do with Zhukov and the 4 million Russian warriors than a few hundred thousand tardy yanks.”
Ah! I see you have absorbed the now-fashionable meme! Yes! It was good old Stalin who saved you, the same Stalin who was firmly allied with Hitler against you until 1941, the same Stalin whose faithful servants in the US did all they could to fight American aid to Britain! Well, I’ll admit you can’t say he was “tardy,” tardy to help his friend Adolf, that is.
Do you really think those wonderful “warriors” were the least bit interested in the fate of Brits? And who the hell do you think fed and supplied them?
Winston Churchill is surely rolling over in his grave at this pathetic revisionism, a revisionism you wouldn’t dare to spew if the WWII generation weren’t now dying out. We’ve got slime like Pat Buchanan telling us Churchill was just a warmonger and he shouldn’t have “forced” Hitler to be an extremist. We’ve got lefties like you claiming that Roosevelt’s aid policy and American entry into the European war was unnecessary. You had Uncle Joe and the French! Please.
The greatest heroism of the European war may indeed have been that of the isolated, determined British. It really was your “finest hour.” But without the USA, there would have been no victory. We used to recognize this and remember each other’s role fondly.
Times have not changed for the better. Very sad.
“the same Stalin who was firmly allied with Hitler against you until 1941″
True, that.
The warmonger was Wilson, who should have kept on keeping us out. Once we went into WWI, WWII and all it’s follow on stupidity and evil was all but unavoidable.
Just remind this oaf that without America he would be speaking German right now.
…. the modern Israeli Defence Forces could probably hammer the worthless … British Army into the ground in short order ….
“Probably?”
Oh!
I get it.
You mean the IDF would probably need three days?
For your next negative interaction with them, Carol, remember to note to our lily-pure Brit friends something that Adolph Hitler (no less!) said. He responded to one of Churchill’s “Champion of Democracy” speeches by sourly noting that yes, the Brits were the “Champions of Democracy” – for White Europeans. But were otherwise, at the same time, holding 400 million people in thrall around the globe. That was OK, of course, because they were all “primitives.”
Some “Champions of Democracy,” huh?
“I was commissioning editor for drama at Anglia for the British television network ITV for ten years and practiced a rule that when I socialized I was still an ambassador of the company. He ought to do the same.”
Well Carol, he IS doing the same. The “creative director of one of the main British television networks” spouting the anti-Jewish & anti-American “party line” is their perfect ambassador.
Carol, why are you surprised? (1) the demographic balance has shifted in the UK (starting in the 1970′s) with the influx of a lot of people who hate us — this is not my parents’ England (shoah refugees from the Third Reich, loyal to the King & Winnie until the day they died); (2) the size of the the UK’s Jewish population has shrunk 50% in the last 50 years; (3) the “court Jews” of Britain, business leaders, rabbinic leaders, political leaders as well as the Jewish Chronicle have been overwhelmingly deferential during that time. Brits maintain a snooty superiority to Yanks anyway, unjustified IMHO.
By the way, Canadian Jews (I am an ex-Torontonian too) had better watch out! Its there too if anyone cares to leave Bathurst and Lawrence and wonder about the city listening to the conversation in Tim Horton’s donuts in Scarborough, Woodbridge or the Annex.
Keep a packed suitcase under your bed, folks.
We weren’t thrown out of Palistine – we left. We were tired, after all we had fought the Germans for six years, not 3 years like some people I could mention. Furthermore, the USA wanted us to leave. And finally, we really couldn’t see much difference between the Jews and the Arabs – both lots a pain in the ass. That is rather how we feel now. As usual, Ms Gould is carrying out her task of stirring up anti-semitism and anti-Americanism. Please please Americans, take her back!
Yeah, you fought them for 6 years but if you had the balls to stand up to Hitler in ’36 you wouldn’t have fought them at all. Thanks for getting all those American boys killed by being such wimps.
So if you couldn’t see much difference between Jews and Arabs, why did you consistently side with the Arabs?
Because the Arabs had the strategic high ground at the time, which was when Britain was into cutting her losses, and the weight of history as being the strong horse–they’d held the place for nigh on a millenia, and the more recent centuries at that. Menachem Ben Yakov’s feeling it was about oil is precious. The Palestinians didn’t have any, and none of the other Arabs gave a particular cr@p about the trans-Jordan at the time, they had lots of irons in the fire. Oil wasn’t it.
… such hateful bile. It says a lot about YOU. As an American, I’m proud to be held in contempt by clods like the bigot above. Have fun under your new Muslim overlords!
Bravo Morton!
Whether the Brits were thrown out or left is less consequential than the harm they created in violating the trust placed in them. Most of todays problems in the Middle east were caused by Britain illegally dividing Palestine in the first place. As far as not knowing the difference between Jews and Arabs that is pure baloney. The Brits were busy sinking Jewish refugee ships and seeking to curry favor with the Arabs for one reason only, oil. Those days are long gone but your sniffing the air with an unwarranted and unseemly arrogance means you have neither studied history or learned from it. Pfeh!
So, “michael (in England),” Ms. Gould was right about you limeys. Thanks for confirming that you poofter twit.
Britain will lose her Jews and be left with nothing but moslems. As you Brits say “The best of British luck ol’boy.”
Know what would have been funny? A can of mace in your purse. Europe is lost.
I just stopped watching BBC MI5 TV show because of it Anti-Israely and anti-Amerin bias
It’s tough being an also-ran.
My ten years in Europe I saw the same anti-semitism in ALL western European countries.
Just like in America, though, it was spurred on by the young, liberal, near-hippie, pseudo-intellectual Jewish left — who have a centuries old habit of feeding the crocodiles with their elders, hoping the crocodiles will save them for last.
I hope that genre didn’t include you, Carol. Carry on “bellowing” at garden parties. It works. And remember to refer to WWII as “YOUR war” when it comes up.
Context is often a nice thing not to ignore. Carol is speaking of the urban, progressive leftist, secular personality – a type of slime-ball distinctly different from the England that lives outside the major urban centres. Very much like the US, urban Britain does not speak and cannot coherently speak for the mass of people in rural and less “ethereal” environments. These urbanites are those who believe ‘they’ are part of the “ruling class”, particularly the BBC which continues to delude itself that it sets the informational and moral tone of the country; much like the establishment Church whose leaders lost their path years ago and have degenerated into a clique of social workers.
Having spent most of my time in the Shires, I cannot speak to Carol’s experiences except for limited exposure to such urban troglodytes. It is not that all London area dwellers are slaves of secular simpleton mentality, but that those of sufficient arrogance to abandon G-d are also sufficiently uninformed and insensitive to perceiving much beyond their prodigious noses. It is, as we often see in the US, a matter of secular urban (they like to believe it is urbane, but it isn’t) “betters” versus the people who appreciate what constitutes a human life in the more rural areas of both countries.
The former is composed of “wags” who pretend to exhibit an appreciation of the arts and refined culture but know nothing about being human. The latter, rural, culture sniffs at the ‘artsy-fartsy’ because none of the effete are up with the sun to feed the chickens and milk the cows, getting their hands dirty in the bargain. However, as far from innately relating to a Chopin etude as country folk might be, they understand and can relate to people as humans, refraining from the ‘holier-than-thou’ attitude of their “betters” in most matters.
It is not a pure and absolute difference, but my England relates to people and is not as concerned whether one wears a kippah or not as it is interested in whether one performs acts of community support without the requisite public laud deemed publicity necessary in more urban environments. Further, such principles as Truth, Kindness, and Consideration are not out of fashion in the country where they are virtually sneered at by those in the city who may well think Sharia Law means nothing more than that you can beat your wife when you want to.
I’m sorry for Carol’s experience as it was obviously unnerving. But it is also inherent in any society which has forsaken G-d and his kindness for the illusory arrogance of social engineering and momentary cultural fashion. It is the same in the US, Canada, and many but not all Western countries overtaken by the false romance of social engineering.
In my small English village my wife helps run the village hall. Every Saturday a small Jewish group meets for prayers and discussions. One a month, a Muslim guy rents the hall for something or other. Now and again, Hindu festivals are held. Most of the time the users are typical English Christians. Which means they believe in tolerance and decency. Ms Gould is a member of the Guardian Reading Classes. They don’t believe in tolerance or decency. They believe only in that they are right. Currently they are pro-Muslim, a couple of years ago it was Muesli. Unlike many posters on this site, I was a member of the UK military all my life; I visited the US more than 50 times and Israel 3 times. I met plenty of Americans and Israelis who were just like me – but not like some of the posters on here or Ms Gould. Lucky me.
When I reminded him of the good that Jews do, like writing virtually every Broadway and West End show,
C’mon Carol, ethnic pride is fine but saying “virtually every” and giving a link to people who have been dead for decades while not considering that the most successful and prominent living person in theater is Andrew Lloyd Webber is simply not thinking.
Ms Gould,
I am sorry you had to endure this appallingly bad mannered attack. Current British society is sick, this is a society of “also rans”, they know they do not have the brains or the energy to compete in the World, unlike their great generations of the past who brought trade, technology and good government to a large part of the World. When the leaders of a society (and the leaders of Britain are drawn from a small part of the population) realise that they are failures they tend to become envious, self-pitying, petty and nihilistic, that is what you saw.
England and most of Western Europe will be under the rule of islam by 2050, what a pity.
Last Westerner out remember to turn off the lights.
Maybe not, Mel. Islam is just no fun. Between millions of Muslim women going rogue and the more gentle souls being seduced by the Gospel, it’s a toss up who will prevail.
I would like that ‘creative director’ to be named, please.
He was fixated on the Jewish lobby so I reminded him that many American banks are Protestant-run.
This is a strange sentence. I doubt Gould can explain it. She sounds like that airhead Maureen Dowd blaming the recession on the one or two blue-eyed WASPs still left on Wall Street.
Most of the time the users are typical English Christians. Which means they believe in tolerance and decency. Ms Gould is a member of the Guardian Reading Classes. They don’t believe in tolerance or decency.
Nor does Ms Gould. Maybe she doesn’t find actual Christian English people diverse enough so she sticks with Guardian readers. At least it gives her something to write about. Not that I believe a word she writes.
Her words only make sense if she is on the Planet Zog!
After the judicial powdered wigs are replaced by turbans, will they call again for our help?
Hello, Gunthorp 32…
….Re: “…again…”, thanks for mentioning that which is so blithely overlooked.
Britain and Europe have a stream of anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism that runs through all of their classes, I don’t think anything will ever eliminate these prejudices.
The British thing in the 30′s and 40′s was to hope the Germans and/or Arabs would wipe out the Jews, leaving the British facilitators with clean hands.
Lies. In the 30s the British allowed hundreds of thousands of Jews to move to Palestine from Germany.
“Carol, You aren’t a Zionist, are you?”
Zionism, to succeed in anything like the time frame it was attempted in, always was predicated on the notion it was just to simply shoot the enemies of zionism until they were all dead or shut up, delusions to the contrary notwithstanding. And that was what done in a time frame when that sort of behavior simply isn’t kosher anymore.
There are consequences to that which are not avoidable simply because most people who oppose zionism are abjectly bestial. Lumberyards in palestinian’s eyes don’t mean splinters aren’t in Israel’s.
Bottom line, I am certain the imposition of the state of Israel in the way it was done is not a part of repairing the world, it was a part of making it worse.
Mr. Perkins, Let me kindly and respectfully suggest you get yourself to a library. There are books there. Reading some might help.
@ Menachem Ben Yakov,
You are certainly free to dismiss me as ignorant if you like, or need to. I will simply write that Zionism can never have been justly undertaken at the time it was undertaken, and it was not undertaken justly.
For it’s aims to be met in the near term post-WWII, people who were Jewish had to have sovereignty over the territory, and to have that they’d have to kill people who could justly oppose that. That the overwhelming majority of the people who so opposed it have used grotesquely immoral means to do it, and especially so as decades advanced, doesn’t improve the first fact.
The most Israel has going for it, morally, is that it would be a greater injustice for it to be ended then for it to continue as justly as it can. That’s far less to say for it than anyone ought to like.
Of course, it first has to adopt a course as just as it might, which excludes the Eretzing of Israel, which as yet is ongoing.
Tom,
This is just abysmal, it’s hatred of Jews and their supporters disguised perfunctorily in ‘analysis’ that blows away like smoke after about the fifth word…. you’ve said NOTHING except “Jews suck”.
At least next time do it with fewer words, for all our sakes.
dave in dallas, show once where.
Remember lying doesn’t help you a bit.
Off the top of my head the title of the book is ‘history of zionism and the Jewish people” by Howard Sachar. If you see anything similar by that author, that’s the book. It’s in my garage and I haven’t read it in awhile but it will enlighten arrogant anti-semites such as yourself about the actual history of the decisionmaking and organizing which led to the declaration of Israel as a Jewish state. Sachar, incidentally, doesn’t seem to like Jews any more than you do. It is not a slanted history by any means, unless slightly slanted against the zionists. Had I known when I bought it, I might not have. But it is thorough and interesting.
Perhaps not to you, though, as you seem to know all you need to know. “shoot them until they’re dead or shut up”… REALLY? Your working concept of what a Jewish person is could use a little polish, along with a bucket or two of humanity, and maybe some sympathy for a genuine struggle against odds in a world out to exterminate that people. Their success is an astonishingly unlikely thing, and their grip on their own fate is tenuous as it has always been.
But your position is as old as time. Tiresome, shopworn, wrong. And based on inexcusable lies, which are not helpful no matter who is telling them, TOM.
This is what you wrote:
“Tom,
This is just abysmal, it’s hatred of Jews and their supporters disguised perfunctorily in ‘analysis’ that blows away like smoke after about the fifth word…. you’ve said NOTHING except “Jews suck”.
At least next time do it with fewer words, for all our sakes.”
Back it up.
This is what you wrote:
“Tom,
This is just abysmal, it’s hatred of Jews and their supporters disguised perfunctorily in ‘analysis’ that blows away like smoke after about the fifth word…. you’ve said NOTHING except “Jews suck”.
At least next time do it with fewer words, for all our sakes.”
Back it up. One quote. Try hard.
@Dave in Dallas.
Couldn’t find one quote, could you? You lie like a rug.
Here’s a quote, “The most Israel has going for it, morally, is that it would be a greater injustice for it to be ended then for it to continue as justly as it can. That’s far less to say for it than anyone ought to like.”
I actually support Israel in becoming a safe secure state, as long as it is a just one. I hope it is a shining city on a hill to all humanity. It’s policies with regard to constructing settlements is such that it is as if the US were still killing the Amerindians for land.
Here’s another quote, “The overriding strategic goal of Israel must not be its own expansion, or even retention of the Golan Heights, or production at Dimona. It has to be bringing the Palestinians to a healthy accomodation with the existence of Israel. If the Israels don’t get that, then in the long run they are done.”
And I don’t want them to be done.
To anyone who wants me to read their specific, favorite book on the origins of either Israel or the Arab-Israeli conflict, I simply won’t, not anymore than I need to read yet another book about the American Revolution or the Civil War. The facts are far more simple, if you will admit or no. Pls see the below.
@Menachem Ben Yakov, let’s see if your “comic book” reading of history so much as includes incontrovertible facts.
There was group of native jews in the Mandate at the time it was granted, far fewer than could give them sovereignty over the area when the British left. The British, every bit as much as the federal government does today with respect to illegal immigrants here, the British had a duty to prevent illegal immigration from changing the political facts on the ground out from under the indigenous inhabitants. Jews emigrated into the area illegally, and when the British proved unable to prevent it, Arabs reacted violently and indiscriminately to oppose that immigration. That was perfectly predictable. Jews immigrating into the area also acted in self-defense (from their perspective), and many did so in an organized, cohesive, and equally indiscriminate manner. Crimes against humanity every bit as awful as what AlQaeda did so very frequently in Iraq. What happened to the four contractors in Iraq has a parallel close to what happened to the two Sergeants in Palestine.
Pretending the circumstances of the founding of Israel are otherwise do not help anyone, except those who find it self serving, and that act gets stale.
That fact does not excuse what Mrs. Gould experienced; yet my experience here in this thread confirms for me–and any one reading–the “anti-Semite” card is being drastically overplayed.
Tom. Here is another book for you to read. Joan Peters is the author and it is called From Time Immemorial-the origins of the Arab-Jewish Conflict 1984 I dare you to read this well-researched book (7 years). Joan Peters is not Jewish and perhaps that will make it easier for you.
Lest we forget….
…on the eve of the Normandy Invasions when American GI’s were all over the south of England, the saying was…
…”…over sexed, overpaid, over fed and over here..”
It rankled the Brits that we’d come again to their aid.
Not only are there virtually no pro-American pro-Israel British, there are also virtually no conservatives left either. As one of the few left, I am seriously considering re-location.
And I, an American, am a pro-Israel Anglophile. I treasure the gifts that Britain has given us, our wonderful language; so many of our laws and institutions; and the Enlightenment of Locke, Burke and Adam Smith, as opposed to that of Voltaire and Rousseau.
It pains me deeply to see Britain commit suicide, as I believe it is doing.
True Story:
I was living outside London during the Katrina mess. A man was fixing my dishwasher and made some such comment, “American is such a racist country, look how they treated Blacks during Katrina.”
I said, “Excuse me, didn’t you call the Irish “pigs” for close to a thousand years.”
Shut him up.
Post script:
The next time he visited was after the Tube bombings. On that day he told me he thought all people in the UK with ties to Pakistan should be deported.
I told him he was mad.
Katrina happened after 7/7.
I don’t claim to know the motivations for it, but I recently came back from a 6 month job in Ireland, where the news had significant disdain for Jews when ever it could be carried off without too much difficulty. Surprising, considering how often they play much better documentaries on Nazi abuses of Jews than are made from America.
Hey, Britain, enjoy becoming “Britistan.”
I’m glad I got to see Westminster Abbey before it gets minarets put on it.
Its international. You don’t have to travel to England to find people who hate Israel and who hate America, just visit your nearest left-wing academic campus.
Remember who is fighting alongside American troops in Afghanistan. There are enough people in the UK looking for reasons to fan anti-American sentiment to make withdrawal popular and Obama and Co are giving it to them in spades.
Hilary Clinton suggested the UK negotiate with Argentina about handing over the Falkland Islands! Imagine the British PM making a speech suggesting that America negotiates with Mexico over the return of Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and California.After all, Mexico has a much stronger case than the Argies do.
Thank you for writing this, it sounds like a horrifying incident. I do have a question for you, however: why are you protecting this person by withholding his name? Unrepentant racists like that should’t protected, their names and actions should be made public, and let the chips fall where they may.
What if the rabbi who filmed Helen Thomas decided to just forget the whole incident? I realize you don’t have a tape of what he said, but you’re not doing the world any favors by protecting him in this way (and that’s exactly what you’re doing – protecting him).
I have the feeling that in some way you’re embarrassed about what happened, perhaps even because in some underlying way you identified with what he was saying – I’m not saying this to be down on you in any way, as it is indeed difficult to resist absorbing at least some of the dominant view on some level. But I think it’s important that overt racism, especially on the part of powerful people (and this man has a very influential position) be outed, not protected. Please consider revising your piece to be wholly truthful. Don’t give racism your protection.
Sorry, I am Luddite when it comes to web tech and accidentally clicked on the ‘f’ at the top thinking it would take me to facebook but instead it says ‘Carol Gould likes this.’ I hope I am not thrown off PJM for voting for my own story by mistake!
By the way, the PJM image on this story depicts two Muslim women with an anti-Jewish placard but the irony is that I find non-Muslim people much more scary to debate than Muslims. I enjoy being on Arab and Persian TV and despite our deeply opposing views am always treated with graciousness at their studios.
Hah, like you’d be the first of us to do that.
Hatred of Jews is thoroughly biblical. Every time I read a story of unreasonable, unappeaseable, spittle-flecked hatred of Jews, it makes me want to pick up the Bible again and look for stuff I haven’t picked up on yet.
If one was to abandon, for the moment, one’s skepticism, one could easily believe this dark monster of irrational hatred that spans centuries and even millenia with astonishing consistency is itself not strictly human in origin.
The devil makes them do it.
)
I challenge anyone to offer a genuinely rational, thoughtful explanation of Jew hatred in this sort of manifestation. What Carol has described in this story is just vibrating acidic pure evil, contaminating souls and spreading from one to another like the black oil in the eyeballs of the X Files victims.
Only there is a profound degree of voluntarism in the profession of this hatred, AND an expectation that it is shared.
VILE. CONTEMPTIBLE. SICKENING… evil.
You’re not less scummy than they are, Dave. You’re part of the problem.
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/was-shimon-peres-right-about-britain-having-a-problem-with-jews/#comment-609425
Carol you have had encountered in Britain the members of the ‘political-correct’ leftist church. In the name of a sick multi cultural ideology they are ready to betray their country. Indeed many of them hold key positions in the media and universities. In the seventies is was very popular to be against the US, but we are living now in 2010. The seventies are already 40 years away from us. Frankly it is not clear who is more dangerous to our society: The creeping Sharia or the senile left wingers who help the political Islam to ruin the foundations of our society. Any way Europe and Britain will have to fight the next war all alone by themselves. There will be no USA to send troops abroad as it had been in WWII.
Thomasson
The Netherlands
“I gave him a quick history lesson about Theodore Herzl and the persecution of the Jews across nineteenth-century Europe when the Dreyfus trial unfolded. He admitted that even at his advanced age he knew nothing of any of this.”
I cannot believe that he would be so ignorant! This is really scary. And I thought Europeans were supposed to be so knowledgeable.
Idiotic anti-americanism is vile, as are the anti-jewish rants which can be found throughout the world; for sheer numbers, however, I believe there’s more anti-americanism in America than in the whole of Britain.
“I gave him a quick history lesson about Theodore Herzl and the persecution of the Jews across nineteenth-century Europe when the Dreyfus trial unfolded. He admitted that even at his advanced age he knew nothing of any of this.”
I cannot believe that he would be so ignorant! This is really scary. And I thought Europeans were supposed to be so knowledgeable about history.
As for Britain letting hundreds of thousands of Jews into Palestine (from a comment above), that’s another example of historical ignorance. The Brits may have done so cumulatively over a couple of decades. But they did so grudgingly, since they did not want to offend the Arabs, who naturally opposed immigration of Jews to Palestine. In fact, the 1939 White Paper came just in time to condemn millions of Jews in Europe to having no escape from the Nazi onslaught.
“And I thought Europeans were supposed to be so knowledgeable about history.”
Why did you think that?
“But they did so grudgingly, since they did not want to offend the Arabs, who naturally opposed immigration of Jews to Palestine.”
An excellent admission! Naturally why? Because they reasonably felt they had a right to the sovereignty their once numbers would have given them.
They were deprived of it by their losing a war. The illegal immigrants into Palestine had several terrorist groups among them who slaughtered men, women, and children without mercy. This was done by each side and without any scruples I can identify whatsoever, other than a calculation as to whether it could be gotten away with at the time.
This was perfectly predictable and even inevitable if settlement was pursued into Palestine. It’s not on the heads of the British.
‘Americans “run about shooting each other.”’
Yeah, and Europeans run around shooting each other by the millions every time they have one of their idiotic wars. Except on off-days when they’re too busy packing millions of people off to the gas chambers to do any shooting.
Britain, unlike the United States, has more than hate and greed. Instead of a right to own devices of death, they have a right to care when they are sick. It is only natural that some Britons and other Europeans will have compassion for the victims of Zionazi genocide in Israel’s own Auschwitz(West Bank) and Dachau(Gaza Strip), while in America there is only callousness amoung the people and greed amoung the munitions kingpins at Lockheed and General Dynamics who get rich off the slaughter and ultimately make it all possible.
Carol, I am about to repeat myself, but at least I do it on my own time and at my own expense, unlike you. You trot out the same c*ap apology for an article every time. As I pointed out previously, you have acquired a very peculiar set of “friends” in the UK. Don’t you think that may say something either about your choice of friends, or about your attitude to the truth? Do you acquire your “friends” by advertising for them in the “Guardian”? Have you ever strayed more than ten miles from the centre of London?
Pajamasmedia is all about telling the news that the MSM deliberately chooses to ignore, isn’t it? It’s why I admire PJM and why I wish we had something similar in the UK. Carol Gould isn’t an investigative reporter. She’s just another Louise Gray (Google it, with “Telegraph”).
You’ve said it before – and so have I. Ms Gould is a member of the Guardian Reading Classes. The GRC specialise in hatred and spite – its what they do. It is their reason for being. I expect she is really pleased about this article – stacks of bile in the responses!
I have been pro-American all my life but now, with sadness, I think we should de-couple from our military alliance with the USA. The internal politics of the World’s only super-power are destabilising the world.
There’s way too many people in the UK who think like this guy. And the mainland Euros are way worse.
The only time they want us around is when THEIR backs are up against the wall. If we get in a real war (not some Mickey Mouse crap like Afghanistan), these guys aren’t going to back us up. They’re going to knife us in the back and bail the first chance they get, defensive alliance or no defensive alliance.
We were fools to ever get involved in Europe’s political squabbles in the first place, and we need permanent alliances with guys like the British, French and Germans like we need a third eye. We ought to pull out of there and stay out.
Let ‘em go back to slaughtering each other by the millions. It’s none of our business.
As far as the opinions of Europeans of Americans or Jews, I could give a damn. They can think whatever they like as long as they stay on their side of the Atlantic.
Is the British establishment anti-Semite, yes without any doubt, are the new Brits anti-semite, well as most of them are Muslims and that is a religious duty then yes. Are the real Brits anti-Semite, my experience is that anyone born prior to the 60′s is in the main pro-Israel, after that it gets to be a very difficult one, the news media is entirely anti-semite as this guy was, they have indoctrinated the population to be anti-Israel. I had always been a staunch supporter of Israel until in the early 90′s the media’s distortion of facts was changing my attitude to Israel, but then in 1997 I made the decision to have a good long look at Islam and at that point the facts all fell into place and I broke away from the media’s indoctrination, I support Israel 100%.
While America is governed by Obama the special relationship is dead, as he is anti-British, but when the chickens come home to roost and we stand again shoulder to shoulder as we will at some point have to do, then we shall see.
On a positive note, there are thousands of British tourists to Israel every year (and there a lot more closer and cheaper countries to visit) and hundreds of young Brits flock to kibbutzim as volunteers. I even met a young non-Jewish man from the U.K. visiting Israel because he was so enamoured with the army, that he wanted to convert and live in Israel. I never encountered anti-semitism from the non-Jewish tourists in Israel, however I did experience plenty in the U.K.itself.
I think the hatred of Jews in Britain is based on a simple fact. The British are used to see themselves as superior to other nations.That includes of course the Americans, the Irish and nations of western Europe. Natives in the colonies were regarded as people with less intelligence and less of everything. Somehow, the Jews who are of non European origin, do not fit that picture. It is very difficult to get used to an intelligent ‘sand nigger’. Especially when he is a though player in the world of technology, art and science. We can compare it to the rise of the Japanese industry in the sixties when Sony and Yamaha had taken a great deal of the market that had been till than the sole playground of European firms. The way leftists, in the name of cultural relativism, are pampering the Muslim immigrants can be seen as patronizing them. Leftists do not see Muslims as equals. The endless grubbing in the Palestinian question, gives them the basis of their superiority.
Come home to Israel, Ms. Gould. You deserve better than British trash, and you do not deserve to drown in the sinking economy of a morally decadent nation. Come home to your roots and plant them here.
Better she should reside in America, where she could find actual security.
Carol, you are far too civilised (for a Brit to say that of a Yank is quite something, n’est-ce pas?)
You should have named and shamed the anti-Semitic b*****d here so that everyone knows who he is and, if possible, can avoid his productions.
I know many people now, myself included, who have stopped watching Mel Gibson’s films since he came out of the AS closet.
I know that it wouldn’t make much commericial difference but it is something that needs to be done.
@ saskatoona, dave in dallas, and Menachen ben yakov,
Couldn’t find one quote, could you? You lie like a rug.
Here’s a quote, “The most Israel has going for it, morally, is that it would be a greater injustice for it to be ended then for it to continue as justly as it can. That’s far less to say for it than anyone ought to like.”
I support Israel in becoming a safe secure state, as long as it is a just one. I hope it is a shining city on a hill to all humanity. It’s policies with regard to constructing settlements is such that it is as if the US were still killing the Amerindians for land.
Here’s another quote, “The overriding strategic goal of Israel must not be its own expansion, or even retention of the Golan Heights, or production at Dimona. It has to be bringing the Palestinians to a healthy accomodation with the existence of Israel. If the Israels don’t get that, then in the long run they are done.”
And I don’t want them to be done.
To anyone who wants me to read their specific, favorite book on the origins of either Israel or the Arab-Israeli conflict, I simply won’t, not anymore than I need to read yet another book about the American Revolution or the Civil War. The facts are far more simple, if you will admit it or no. Pls see the below.
@Menachem Ben Yakov, let’s see if your “comic book” reading of history so much as includes incontrovertible facts.
There was group of native jews in the Mandate at the time it was granted, far fewer than could give them sovereignty over the area when the British left. The British, every bit as much as the federal government does today with respect to illegal immigrants here, the British had a duty to prevent illegal immigration from changing the political facts on the ground out from under the indigenous inhabitants. Jews emigrated into the area illegally, and when the British proved unable to prevent it, Arabs reacted violently and indiscriminately to oppose that immigration. That was perfectly predictable, and the likelihood of it had to have been accepted beforehand by the immigrants. Jews immigrating into the area also acted in self-defense (from their perspective), and many did so in an organized, cohesive, and equally indiscriminate manner. Crimes against humanity every bit as awful as what AlQaeda did so very frequently in Iraq. What happened to the four contractors in Iraq has a parallel close to what happened to the two Sergeants in Palestine, in 1938 if I recall.
Pretending the circumstances of the founding of Israel are otherwise do not help anyone, except those who find it self serving, and that act gets stale.
Those facts do not excuse what Mrs. Gould experienced; yet my experience here in this thread confirms for me–and any one reading–the “anti-Semite” card is being drastically overplayed.
“in 1938 if I recall” != “in 1948 if I recall”, I believe Menachem Begin was in charge of the murderers, or claimed to be.
Tom Perkins is pouting and stamping his feet. He is refusung to read another book on the Arab-Israeli conflict. He thinks the facts are simple and that he knows everything he needs to know. Tom read the damn Joan Peters book I recommended to you. She was very pro Palestinian prior to her seven years of research. She went back quite a way in time. She found statistics and old census material. You will be enlightened and if you can let go of your hidden agenda, you may see things a whole lot differently/and stop beating up on Israel and start expecting some decency and morality from Palestinian Arabs and the other Arabs in the region.
Blahblahblah.
You’ve read the book, refute my points. Demolish my argument.
Should be easy for you.
I expect silence, I’ll be surprised if you even make an unsubstantial reply.
Like the one you just made.
“You will be enlightened and if you can let go of your hidden agenda, you may see things a whole lot differently/and stop beating up on Israel and start expecting some decency and morality from Palestinian Arabs and the other Arabs in the region.”
I have no hidden agenda, I’ve written the complete and utter truth here insofar as I know it–both with respect to human nature which I believe is universal, and the specific facts which I begin to suspect I know better than the three of you–and I expect no decency out of the Palestinians, Arabs, or Islamists of any sort.
What you aren’t listening to is, I am saying who I am disappointed in, and with good reason should be.
As far back as 1985 when I first visited London I encountered anti-semitism. I distinctly remember some comments against Jews by a group of people seated next to mine in a posh restaurant. It was vile, and we could not change tables as the place was full. (thankfully, we were almost finished our meal when they arrived) Nazi skin heads roaming the streets and a taxi driver who railed against Jews all the way to the airport, despite my telling him that I was Jewish. I couldn’t wait to get out of London, and this was before the Moslem onslaught. I can’t even imagine what it’s like today. I’m glad I went to Europe when I did, because I will never step foot in it again.
I hope you will not be discouraged by this disturbance. I (as an American) have had similar incidents in England, and they are so upsetting they tend to overshadow the vast pre-ponderance of truly marvellous experiences I’ve had with our British Cousins with their delightful blend of common sense, humor and zest for life–a heritage that we Americans share.
Invariably the incident involved some pompous bore whose view of the world was shockingly shallow, although they seemed to be operating under the assumption that they were better informed. I can only assume they underestimate the number of competing media-oulets in America and the strength of the US law (which is a lot different than England) regarding the media.
I think it’s important to remember that there is a segment of British society that confuses class (upper but of course!), intelligence, sophistication and anti-Semitism. Periodically this group comes power. But always remember: many British intellects and leaders have felt their wrath worse than any expat ever will. Think about Winston Churchhill’s travails, and his unceremonious defenestration after leading his country through WW2.
My trick was always to look at these situations like an anthropologist. These bores are incredibly predictable. They also seem to be the only Brits born with no sense of humor. This is their vulnerability, so you can easily de-fang them with humor. Another strategy is to change the subject from anti-Semitism: get them talking about America’s weight problem. They cannot RESIST this subject, they will be like a fish to the bait!! That’ll really get em going and they get to feel superior too!!
Sad reflection on where British “intellectuals” have arrived at today – but then why be surprised – the ‘Grauniad’ (sic) pours out its poison against Israel and its supporters (the Jews) every day. But hey – we have survived worse and after all, goyim will be goyim!
Maybe the Brits will wise up now-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1160958/HE-coward-mocking-victims-friendly-Families-dead-soldiers-react-fury-Muslim-hate-preacher.html
“Britain will lose her Jews”
We should be so lucky. Unfortunately you won’t leave till the muslims you brought to our once beautiful land have chased you out. The muslims you brought because you thought turning the English into an ethnic minority would make jews safer. Please leave. The sooner you leave the sooner we’ll have a (very) slim chance of repairing the damage we brought on our heads through the terrible mistake of letting you in.
A lesson learned too late by so many nations in history.
The main problem I have with Jews is that like immigrants in general they ally themselves to left wing liberal causes against the interests of the British people – for example mass immigration – the majority of the time. There are exceptions of course (Michael Howard being a notable one).
In polls taken over the past few years a constistent figure of around 80% of British people express a desire to see immigration numbers hugely reduced if not stopped altogether, but immigrants of all origins express a desire to see mass immigration continue and bugger what the English think. This strikes me as being a treacherous and ungrateful attitude to take, and is in itself a vindication of English nationalist views.
I admire Israel and the IDF for the resolve that they show in dealing with the islamist threat and defending their national interests unapologetically, but it seems our own left wing liberal Jewish politicians such as Straw, the Millibands and Mandelson were (before they were kicked out at the last election) impeding the ability of the English to do the same.
I understand that Israel has it’s own liberals and that their absurd sense of guilt undermines the national confidence of the country just as liberals do here. I wouldn’t say anything if the numbers of right wing and left wing Jews were the same, but judging by the list of Jewish British parliamentarians, left wing Jews outnumber right wing Jews by a factor of 2 to 1.
Also with regard to the US influence on the British Empire, I wouldn’t blame the US for it’s actual collapse. It seems more appropriate to point the finger at the Germans, who we had to fight twice in major conflicts within the space of 30 years. To secure the help of Indian military in WW2 we had to promise to give them their freedom. The US forced the Empire to open up it’s colonies to outside trade, which screwed the British though, but only because we weren’t set up to compete when superior foreign goods flooded the colonial markets.
If the Empire hadn’t been dismantled after WW2 though, the US and British Empire may have ended up going to war. The US Army and presidents like Roosevelt were against imperialism and even investigated scenarios where the US went to war against the British Empire.
“War Plan Red, also known as the Atlantic Strategic War Plan, was a plan for the United States to make war with Great Britain (the “Red” forces). It was developed by the United States Army during the mid 1920s, approved in May 1930 by the Secretary of War and the Secretary of Navy, updated in 1934-35, and officially withdrawn in 1939, following the outbreak of the Second World War, when it and others like it were replaced by the five “Rainbow” plans created to deal with the Axis threat.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Plan_Red
Maybe she doesn’t find actual Christian English people diverse enough so she sticks with Guardian readers. At least it gives her something to write about. Not that I believe a word she writes.
Me neither. She positively stalks anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism. After all, it’s her bread and butter. If this whiney princess went back to the America she claims to love and tried to make a living, they’d see through her. As it is, she can tell lies to an American audience ignorant and arrogant enough to believe her.
By the way, America did not save Britain. It entered the war when it was expedient for it to do so – when Germany declared war on it and when the Japs bombed Pearl Harbour – not a moment before. And we’ve paid back those land lease loans with interest. And America – the government, not just a few nutters – supported the IRA and refused to extradite a single terrorist, yet still our soldiers died in your war.
We owe you nothing. Nothing at all. And Carol, don’t shut the door on your way out.