Corbyn's article includes a single statement about Israel, which says, in its entirety, as follows:
This has been a difficult year in the Middle East, with the killing of many unarmed Palestinian protesters in Gaza, and Israel’s new nation-state law relegating Palestinian citizens of Israel to second-class status.
Those are the only two reasons why it has been a difficult year in the Middle East?!
How about the intentional stabbings of various civilians in Israel?
How about the hundreds of rockets launched into Israel, aimed at civilian populations?!
How about the attempt to storm the border with mobs of people armed with butcher knives and firebombs, explicitly stating that their goal is to massacre as many civilians as possible?
And if we're talking about the Middle East, how about the hundreds of thousands of people massacred in Syria?
Even in an article specifically aimed at reassuring people about him not being antisemitic, Jeremy Corbyn cannot find anything to criticize about the Arab terrorist dictatorships, and cannot show any support or sympathy for Israel, the only free country in the Middle East, constantly facing terrible threats. Whether or not you label this antisemitism, it is this attitude which makes him so loathsome and so dangerous to the free world.
G-d help the Jewish people of Britain and the whole country if this lunatic gets elected.
ReplyDeleteThe UK currently has its worst PM since Chamberlain and the Leader of the Opposition is far, far worse. The UK is cursed. :(
DeleteHi
DeleteDepressing but true. I don't feel I have a political home anymore.
Natan, please don't post my email address!!
ReplyDeleteIt is not unthinkable that Corbyn will be the next prime minister of the UK and in the near future. With Brexit threatening to destroy the Conservative party, Corbyn will have to sacrifice a child on live television to not win the election.
ReplyDeleteAnd it's not just about Israel. The UK under Corbyn will quickly spin into an economic disaster and who gets blamed when that happens? The local Jews, that's who.
I have been getting it from both sides on the "nation-state" law -- from right wing friends who think I should be rejoicing over its adoption and from more liberal friends who think it is an abomination. I have refused to support or condemn it because I think that diaspora Jews should stay out of Israeli politics! (I also think Israelis should stay out of US politics.)
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, minutes before you wrote this you were busy commenting on British politics....
DeleteMore worrying than Corbyn himself (every nation has its far-left extremists) is the fact that his approval rating as preferred leader has recently been on the rise. While Labour has suffered in areas with a strong Jewish population, it is still in with a good chance of winning the next election. This means that anti-Semitism doesn't bother British voters enough to make Corbyn unelectable. Indeed, anti-Semitism in the Labour Party probably bolsters its support in certain communities. I would advise British Jews to make aliyah at the first opportunity, as we did.
ReplyDeleteI don't know the situation in Britain, but in America (& Canada) accusations of "anti-Semitism", along with its sister accusations "racism" and "sexist" have grown so commonplace that they have become meaningless. While officialdom as always is slower to recognize change, among the population at large no one cares anymore. That's what happens when one group levies the same charges, over and over and over, on increasingly minor and minor and minor disagreements. In short, the boy cried wolf. And so when REAL wolves at last arrive, no one actually believes it or cares.
DeletePerhaps something similar has occurred across the pond.
Why is it necessary to have a knee-jerk reaction and suggest aliya? Is it a utopia where there are no people who dislike Jews? Because as I see it the UK has a lower incidence of Jews being murdered for their beliefs.
DeleteI did not recommend aliyah as a knee-jerk reaction. We thought very hard before making aliyah. I did not suggest that Israel is a utopia where no one dislikes Jews. That's a strawman.
DeleteMurder rates are one thing, but I can walk the streets in most places in Israel looking recognizably Jewish (and religious) and not be worried about an anti-Semitic taunt being shouted from a passing car. As Rav Soloveitchik put it, in Israel, Jewish blood isn't ownerless.
You started by saying "make aliya at first opportunity, as we did" and have now changed to saying you "thought long and hard before making aliya". The former version sounds a little revisionist to me...
DeleteOne can walk in most places in London and the UK without concerns about anti-semitic taunts. But even if that were not true the old adage remains true "car-rammings, stabbings, shootings and missiles may break my bones but words can never hurt me".
Jewish blood may not be ownerless in Eretz Yisroel but it is nonethless being stolen left, right and centre. So i dont see it as an improvement.
Agreed, he’s anti Israel, to me the same as being anti Semitic. And you can be as crazy as you want, as long as you “embrace” minorities-except Jews.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the nation State law, I think with so many Jews not understanding what modern day Zionism is, the state tried to re-define it. Problem being, Imho, that the state can therefore decide what being Jewish is, and I think that needs to be left in the realm of Halacha. But since Halacha is not a democracy, (even if the Halacha does follow the Rove) it gets murky, getting right left and middle mixed up.
Corbyn, the big anti-Jewish threat, is backed by millions of smaller threats, his socialist voters. Voters for other parties are not immune to these attitudes, either.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure what the points you bring up have to do with the point he was trying to get across, which is that disagreements about Israel are no excuse for anti-semitism. In that vein what he said makes perfect sense-the Israeli policies we disagree about (and it has been a difficult year in that sense) shouldn't bring us apart.
ReplyDeleteHe's certainly not an Israel lover, just not sure that this has any special significance.
Hi
ReplyDeleteThe really sad thing are the supporters of "JC", who are obnoxious and hypocritical. In their conspiracy theory addled world one finds nothing to distinguish between the leftist and the traditional far right . Incidentally what's shocking is that Jewish Labour MPs are still in the party. G-d help us all if he and his ilk ever gain power in the UK.
"and it has been a difficult year in that sense"
ReplyDeleteTo me and many others, this is the thing that has "special significance."