EDITOR: French Jews are up to date with current developments…
It is good to read below that some French Jews have found it not only possible, but also necessary to support the Front National of Marine Le Pen. Well, they say, if she is against the Muslims, then it is good for the Jews! Perfect logic, isn’t it? What is even more impressive, are the hints that the CRIF is also supportive of their actions. This fits well with the many reports of the support of Euro fascism given to the Zionist state of Israel, as part of their crusade against Islam and Muslims in Europe. It is also good to know that in this round of the modern crusades, the Jews, at least in France and Israel, seem to be with the crusaders… There is no low which the deep hatred of Arabs and Muslims so carefully developed by Zionism, may not sink to. Soon the sons and daughters of Jewish refugees from Algeria and Morocco, where they never suffered what Jews in Europe suffered, are now preparing to fight against the human rights of their former co-citizens of the Maghreb! What could be more logical?… Trust Zionism to turn every misfortune into a catastrophe.
Amid elections, France’s Jews debate support of rightist Le Pen: Haaretz
On supporter says told by right-wing leader that it’s important that Jews participate in the National Front; Jewish journalist: Few Jews will vote for Le Pen.
By Shirli Sitbon
A few years ago, policeman Michel Thooris worked for the Jewish Crif, the umbrella organization for France’s Jewish groups, helping it fight anti-Semitism in the vigilance bureau. Now, he’s running for parliament for the National Front, yet he says there’s no contradiction between the two.
“I’m not going to share with you what Crif officials told me. But my belief is that it’s natural to turn to [Marine] Le Pen when you’re Jewish. She fights crime and Islamism and that means she defends Jews,” Thooris told Haaretz.
Not so long ago, the whole Jewish community condemned Le Pen supporters, such as Richard Sulzer who has long worked for the Le Pens. “He was a respected professor, but when he chose Le Pen, his wife left him,” said one Jewish community leader. Yet, Le Pen’s new supporters say their own situation isn’t as tough.
“People’s attitudes have changed because the National Front has changed,” said Thooris. “Marine Le Pen expressed her horror at the holocaust. Jews know that.”
Another Le Pen supporter Michel Ciardi, who created an association supporting Le Pen, said his family wasn’t as supportive.
“My children told me they don’t share my views, but I don’t share theirs either,” said Ciardi. He called his associations the French Jews Union, putting the word French first, unlike most Jewish groups.
“I created the association 6 months ago when I met with Le Pen,” Ciardi said. “I was invited to dine with her at a Jewish friend’s house and I was thrilled. She has so much ambition for our country. She told me that it’s important that we, Jews participate in the National Front.”
“We Jewish Le Pen supporters show the racist anti-Semitic National Front supporters that we belong in the party too. They must accept it,” he added.
Ciardi says his association, supported by another pro-Le Pen group Riposte Laique, has 150 members, but Jewish journalist Michel Zerbib who looked into the group says the group is an empty shell.
“I looked for people, but couldn’t find any. I think it’s an isolated initiative,” Said Zerbib, adding that he believed few Jews voted for Le Pen.
“It was absolutely no surprise that Le Pen got such a good score, but what did surprise me was that 7 or 8 percent of the Jews voted for her. It’s still a lot – but much less than the rest of the population – about a third.”
French poll institutes are not allowed to survey by communities. They can’t tell how many Jews, Muslims, Christians or foreigners voted for Le Pen, yet Jewish organisations came up with their own methods to tell what Jews vote.
“We take results in areas where there’s a big Jewish community, and analyse the figures. It’s not scientific but we realised that in Jewish neighbourhoods people voted much less for Le Pen,” said Zerbib, who has always refused to invite Le Pen to his station. “It may seem strange as journalists, but we also have a responsibility.”
The exact figures are difficult to know, but Michel Thooris himself admitted some people are still repelled by the extremist party.
“We run for Le Pen not for the National Front. It’s a way to catch some votes wouldn’t have gotten otherwise.” Like many Le Pen supporters, Thooris says he’s not certain to vote for Sarkozy in the runoff and hopes Sarkozy’s party would collapse after the election. “Hollande and Sarkozy are the same. They’re for Catherin Ashton’s Europe,” he added.
EDITOR: The right entrance to the Israeli Air force base
Blow you can read about a creative use of history – making the famous Arbeit Macht Frei wrought iron iconic gateway in Auschwitz, into the entry gate into an IAF base! Well, I say, why not? Now that Jews are so liberated, that they can stand in Parliamentary elections on the Nazi side against the Muslims of Europe (and elsewhere…) why not start using Nazi insignia? The next one to adopt, I think, Is Blut und Boden, and maybe also Lebensraum – all good healthy concepts which Zionism has been using in their Hebrew transliterations for some years. There may be some money owed to the Nazis on copyright, huh?
IDF soldiers erect replica of infamous Auschwitz sign for Holocaust Day: Haaretz
Israel Air Force base near Mitzpe Ramon reconstructs ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ sign as part of the base’s Holocaust Remembrance Day events.
By Ofer Aderet
Soldiers serving on an Israel Air Force base in southern Israel found an unusual and controversial way to mark Holocaust Remembrance Day last week, erecting a replica of the infamous Auschwitz “Arbeit Macht Frei” sign.
Alongside the replica, the soldiers at the IAF base near Mitzpe Ramon placed lines of barbed wire, mimicking the death camp’s fence. As part of the Holocaust Remembrance Day activities, the base was also visited by a Holocaust survivor who shared his story with the troops.
In a photo circulating among Facebook users, and which can be seen here, a soldier wearing an IAF uniform is seen standing next to the replica.
Testimonies of other IDF soldiers, which were passed on to Haaretz, indicate that this was not the first time in which educational officers, especially in the IAF, arranged Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremonies with the aid of unusual accessories.
In the past, one testimony claimed, one of the bases brought in an empty train car, meant to represent the trains which led the Jews to the death camps during the Holocaust.
The IDF Spokesman’s Unit said in response, “The sign was set up for a Holocaust Day ceremony on the base, and essentially served as the entrance to the base. The picture shows part of the ceremony’s set for Holocaust Remembrance Day, in the framework of educational activity to mark the day.”
“The set was taken down following the ceremony. Any attempt to take a certain part of the set and distort its meaning is baseless. Moreover, there was no intention at all to hurt the feelings of any of the participants in the ceremony.”
EDITOR: The Architects of Oslo notice that the building is somewhat faulty…
Good timing. It only took this couple 20 years to notice what the rest of us have understood in the 1990s. Of course, being responsible for this debacle, they took longer to notice…
Look beyond the Oslo accords, say architects of Middle East peace plan: Guardian
Former Israeli minister Yossi Beilin and ex-Palestinian PM Ahmed Qurei question usefulness of two-state plan they drew up
Harriet Sherwood in Jerusalem
Two of the architects of the Oslo accords, which were intended as the basis of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict almost 20 years ago, have radically changed their position following the long-term impasse between the two sides.
Yossi Beilin, a former Israeli minister who worked in secret on the accords before the historic signing ceremony at the White House in September 1993, has called on the Palestinians to dismantle their governing body, which was set up under Oslo, saying it had become a fig leaf and a farce.
Ahmed Qurei, the former Palestinian prime minister who was one of the key negotiators in the Oslo process, said the two-state solution was defunct, and the option of one single democratic state for both Israelis and Palestinians must now be considered.
Both men reflect a view held by many observers of the stalled peace process, that the window of opportunity to create a Palestinian state has closed or is about to close. The alternatives to two states, they say, are a continuation and entrenchment of the status quo, or one state which denies equality to a large and rapidly growing minority, or one binational state of equals which would no longer be Jewish in character.
Beilin, who served in the Israeli parliament for both Labour and the leftwing Meretz parties, wrote an open letter to the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, this month urging him to dissolve the Palestinian Authority. The Oslo accords, he said, had become “a device that has allowed the parties to block a two-state solution”.
The agreement, which had been “a tremendous victory for the peace camps on both sides”, had been thwarted by its adversaries who did not want to advance two states for two peoples.
“I feel a responsibility,” he said. “I pushed for something in 1992.” But Oslo was intended to be an interim process, a “corridor” to a permanent agreement. “The extremists on both sides were very much against it until they learned that this idea might not be a corridor but a living room – and the most convenient living room in the world – to continue the settlements or not to divide the land. I feel the responsibility for the perpetuation of my corridor.
“No one thought the PA would be there for 20 years. It should have ended. So I find myself in a bizarre situation in which I am actually asking to put an end to it. But the bottom line is that, paradoxically, all those who cursed Oslo are now cherishing it.”
Despite pressure from Barack Obama, Abbas included a veiled threat to dissolve the PA in the final version of a letter delivered last week to the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu. If there was no breakthrough in peace talks, the letter said, the Palestinians would “seek the full and complete implementation of international law as it pertains to the powers and responsibilities of Israel as the occupying power in all of the occupied Palestinian territory”.
In other words, according to Beilin, they would “end the farce” and deny Netanyahu a “fig leaf” for the occupation. “It is implicit, but it is very clear,” he said.
Despite Beilin’s dismay at the long-term outcome of Oslo, he insisted the two-state solution was “in trouble but not dead”. A one-state outcome “is not an option because it means a Jewish minority dominating a Palestinian majority in a few years from now, and this is something that neither Israelis and for sure not the world will accept”. He added: “Or is it possible to have one state in which a Palestinian will be the prime minister or president? No, Israelis will not accept that.”
In contrast, Qurei said a two-state solution had been killed by Israel’s policy of settlement expansion in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and that a “one-state solution, despite the endless problems it embraces, is one of the solutions that we should be contemplating”.
In an article published in the Palestinian media, he wrote: “We must seriously think about closing [the book on] the two-state solution and turning over a new leaf.” A one-state solution would allow Palestinians “to expand our manoeuvring room and to continue [our] comprehensive diplomatic campaign to take [back] the basic rights of freedom, independence and human honour that we have been denied”.
Other prominent Palestinians have also recently espoused the idea of a one-state solution. Sari Nusseibeh, president of al-Quds University in Jerusalem and former advocate for a two-state solution, now argues for a Palestinian-Israeli federation between the Jordan river and the Mediterranean, rather than separation.
There is support – albeit limited – for the one-state idea among both Palestinians and Israelis, and from the right and left. Some rightwing pro-settler Israelis are in favour of annexing the West Bank and forcing Palestinians who stay to live under Israeli rule. Some on the left see a state in which an eventual majority of Palestinians have equal rights as their only chance for self-determination, even if it is at the expense of a Jewish homeland.
According to Beilin, there is another possible scenario, in which a rightwing Israeli government unilaterally withdraws from the West Bank to the separation barrier in a move comparable to the withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. “It’s not totally unrealistic, but it will not happen tomorrow. The Palestinians would not accept it as a peace plan, but they will take whatever is given. If Israel says it is yours, what will they say?”
A trigger for this could be the point when the Palestinian population in Israel and the Palestinian territories outstrips the Jewish population. “Then the whole world will say now there is a minority of Jews dominating a majority of Palestinians, and the South African example will be raised again. Under such international pressure, someone like Netanyahu might take this decision. Like [Israel’s withdrawal from] Gaza, the world will not love it but they will say it is better than the previous situation. And this would also be the reaction of somebody like myself. I will not love it but I will say at least Israel got out of 92% of the West Bank.”