Monessa Shapiro to the Citizen

“So why did Netanyahu say it?  In particular why now?”  asks Gwynne Dyer.

Let’s examine the facts.  There have been 778 terror attacks in Israel in the past 6 weeks.   11 Israelis have been murdered and at least 100 injured, some of them still fighting for their lives.  Any leader of any country whose civilians were being bombarded on a daily basis with such dastardly acts of barbarism, would theorise as to the causes.

It just so happens that in this case Netanyahu was not far off the mark.  Paul Trewelha, editor of the ANC underground journal Freedom Fighter and himself a political prisoner, in his article: ‘Hamas: The ANC has shamed South Africa’ , discusses the inextricable link between Haj Amin al-Husseini, Hitler and modern day Islamist Jihad.   He says that Hamas’s vision is a “programme of ideological struggle to establish a world-wide religious dictatorship by means of war.   It is the same programme as that of the Nazi Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, in promoting his military pact with Hitler and Himmler, with the aim of supplementing the Nazi drive with a genocidal jihad across the Caucasus, the Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa.” (Politicsweb)

Trewelha goes on to discuss the recently published book by Dr Wolfgang G Schwanitz and Prof Barry Rubin: ‘Nazis, Islamists and the Making of the Modern Middle East.’   In this book, according to the publishers, the authors “.. uncover for the first time the complete story of this dangerous alliance (that of the Third Reich leaders, Arab nationalists, and Muslim religious authorities) and explore its continuing impact on Arab politics in the twenty-first century.”

Trewelha describes the book as an “essential read of our time.”  I am going to buy it.  Perhaps Gwynne Dyer should as well.  Then he won’t have the temerity to blame the barbaric stabbings, car-rammings, and other heinous acts against innocent men, women and children on settlements and statelessness.

Monessa Shapiro to the Mercury and Pretoria News

“Its troubling that  international solidarity has not always been there for the Palestinians,”  writes Janet Smith,  and “It was an important moment to see thousands of South Africans come out onto the street, especially in Cape Town, in protest at the war in Gaza last year.”  In these two sentences Ms Smith affirms for all who and what she is.   For journalism, requires objectivity, the objective reporting of facts.  It is not commentating or the offering of an opinion.  That is the role of the political commentator or the role of an op-ed writer.

But then Janet Smith’s entire 2 page interview with Khaled Mish’al is tainted by her views and opinions.  “Armed struggle is familiar to South Africans” she tells Mish’al.   Come, come, Ms Smith.  I grew up in Apartheid South Africa.   That the ANC resorted to armed struggle, I do not dispute and that there were acts of violence I also do not dispute but the ANC saw civilian deaths as necessary but unfortunate collateral damage.  Civilians as such were never targeted. So to liken the random stabbing of babies and women waiting at bus stops (as is happening on a daily basis in Israel) to what took place in South Africa is completely disingenuous.

“Your armed struggle doesn’t exist ubiquitously….it exists as part of warfare and on specific targets.”   So Ms Smith you are opining that  random rockets fired indiscriminately into civilian areas are not ubiquitous?  Are nursery schools, houses and hospitals specific targets? Would your line of questioning have been similar  had rockets been fired from across the border into your city?

And then Ms Smith, you, like Khalid Mish’al, find the Al-Aqsa Mosque a problem.  Surely objective journalism would question why Jews should not be allowed in the Mosque or within its vicinity?  Does it not seem strange to you that I, as a Jew, can enter any mosque, any church or any synagogue but I cannot enter Al-Aqsa or walk in it’s vicinity?

And surely Ms Smith, a question that should have been paramount in your mind is how in the 22^nd century it is possible for an organization to call for the total annihilation of an entire people.  Perhaps it was just an innocent lapse of memory on your part but let me remind you that the Hamas Charter calls for the murder of all Jews everywhere, me included.

So Ms Smith, let’s be honest, your visit to Khalid Mish’al, was not to investigate and discover an objective truth.  It was instead to reaffirm your existing beliefs.  How tragic that journalism contained in a reputable newspaper like The Pretoria News has sunk to such a deplorable level.

Allan Wolman to The Star

At the height of one of the most momentous moments in democratic South African history, when our countries students are protesting against their university fees, we read Shanon Ebrahim’s ( The Star Friday 23 Oct.) all too familiar rant about the Jews. The student protests are of no earthly interest to this one eyed excuse for a journalist.

 

But this time her hatred of Jews is discreetly camouflaged behind an article about Canada’s political transformation. It doesn’t take a genius to decipher what she is saying about the influence of the Jews under the Conservative rule of what she calls “right wing” Steven Harper. She goes on to tell her readers about Harpers foreign policy being “militaristic” and “the prime minister who loves going to war”.

 

Hello Ms. Ebrahim, what planet are you living on – and when did Canada go to war? (the last time I heard was on the beaches of Normandy in 1944). Yet she claims that Canadian troops were deployed to fight in Syria – how could the editor of The Star allow such a distortion of fact to be printed?

 

Yes Ottawa symbolically supported US led strikes (under the Obama administration) against Syria, where not a single Canadian military aircraft or soldier left Canadian soil. It was that country that has been actively calling on the international community to come together and defend the rights of the Syrian people to determine their own future, and to prevent 240,000 people being slaughtered

 

No it’s not really about Canada – and how many readers of this newspaper are really interested in that country? No it’s simply Shannon Ebrahim’s hatred for Jews veiled in the guise of the Canadian elections.

Don Krausz to the Cape Times: Lekota’s Freebie View

Dear Sir/Madam,

 

        RE: LEKOTA’S FREEBIE VIEW  by Madiny Darries – 19-10-15.

 

        It is hard to tell whether Madiny Darries is joking or just plain stupid. He takes issue with Mosiuoa Lekota’s statement that he       saw no evidence of apartheid during his recent visit to Israel. Darries ridicules Lekota: ” so there are no “whites only” or ” Slegs Blankes” signs.” And if South Africa under apartheid had not had such signs, then, I suppose, it would not have been an apartheid state, with legislated restriction on non-whites, curfews, votes for whites only, separate amenities and transport, bantustans and prohibitions against social intercourse, none of which can be found in Israel?

 

        The man is not only viciously biased but plain ignorant. He writes of a 700 km “apartheid” wall. That barrier consists mainly of a wire fence with only some 30 km being wall. He prefers not to know that it was erected after the second Intifada in answer to Palestinian suicide murders which claimed at least one thousand Israeli civilian lives, men, women and children. Which were perpetrated in discos, at religious functions, on public transport. By preventing the terrorists from gaining access to civilian areas that wall is estimated to have saved 900 lives. But to those averse to the truth calling it an apartheid wall sounds much more offensive.

 

Next we have a litany of lies and distortions. There used to be a free flow of traffic between Israel and the Palestinian territories until the spate of inhuman terrorist attacks forced Israel to have guarded entry points and stringent inspection for weapons, explosives and known terrorists. To get some perspective thereon one should know that since the State’s establishment in May 1948 terrorist attacks on Israelis have taken an estimated 3,817 lives and left 25,000 wounded. I have no doubt that these checkpoints are inconvenient for those that have to use them but if they save life and prevent injury, would Darries still call them inhumane?

 

And what spasm of prejudice makes Darries aver that only white Israelis live in the settlements which unbiased legal experts do not consider illegal in view of previous history? (cf: Howard Grief – The Legal Foundation and Borders of Israel under International Law).

Apart from being convinced that the settlements are illegal without offering one shred of proof, Darries next informs us of the atrocities committed by the illegitimate Zionist state on the people of Palestine. Once again, you are expected to take him at his word. And yet he says nothing of the combined, unprovoked and genocidal attack by the local Palestinians and neighbouring states on nascent Israel in May 1948. There were about 600,000 Jews living there. According to the British Encyclopaedia that attack killed 6,000 of them and wounded 30,000, 1% of Israel’s Jews, equivalent to SA losing 500,000 of its citizens on the battlefield.

 

Finally Lekota is taken to task for accepting an all-expenses paid trip to Israel. Darries is entitled to be annoyed, for such a trip enabled Lekota, his companions and students to see matters for themselves and put the carefully prepared propaganda and distortions that South Africans are fed into realistic perspective.  I remember the ex editor of the Sunday Times, Mondli Makhanya going on such a trip and returning as an avowed anti-Israeli. I wonder whether he had to pay for his trip.

Victor Gordon to The Star

THE STAR

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Refers:  “We’re outraged at the helplessness of the West”

Considering that senior journalist Janet Smith travelled all the way to Doha to interview Hamas leader Kalid Mishal it was indeed a wasted effort. All Smith did was to ask this notorious terrorist four carefully constructed questions, benign in all respects, and led him to provide some obvious, convoluted  answers.

It was not only what Smith asked and what Mishal answered, but what she failed to follow up on and what he failed to say. If this was Smith’s idea of investigative journalism she has little idea of its true meaning.

But past exposure to articles by Smith focused on the Israel/Palestinian conflict had me forewarned that on “Planet Smith” there is only one villain and one victim. Her bias is palpable.

Quite clearly, Smith is no Christiana Amanpour. When a man like Mishal states that freedom and democracy is his greatest wish for his people the obvious question is – “If that is so, Mr. Mishal, why have you failed to hold elections for the past 9 years ever since you were voted into power by democratic process? And, if democracy means so much to you, sir, why did you throw members of the opposition Fatah party off the roofs of buildings to their deaths, bound hand and foot?”

Stating that “we belong in a part of the world which has all religions living together … Muslim and Christian”, the obvious follow-up would be that the impressive sounding phrase, “all religions” clearly has no place for Jews. This places a huge dent on any hopes for an all inclusive peace, as Jews will not simply disappear from what they regard as their homeland.

Claiming that the Hamas’ “(armed) struggle for freedom of the Palestinians … is not very different to the armed struggle of the ANC”-  Smith leads Mishal to sanctimoniously state that Hamas is open to all options in its effort to “reclaim our land”, including diplomatic engagement and “negotiation with the enemy”.

Instead of challenging Mishal to explain when this diplomatic engagement and negotiation has (or will) ever take(n) place (in view of Hamas’ commitment to never negotiate with Israel), Smith remains mute, thereby turning falsehood into reality.

One can only wonder how the struggle for freedom by the ANC can be remotely compared to the savage methods used by Hamas. While the ANC never called for the murder and destruction of white South Africans, Hamas has the exact opposite intent when it comes to every Jew worldwide and states it openly. The ANC should find the comparison offensive.

Smith then poses a question by providing its answer. She tells Mishal, “You don’t have militia daily  going into Israel. (Your armed struggle) exists as part of warfare and on specific targets. Is that correct?” Mishal naturally agrees, while both ignore the almost daily indiscriminate rocket fire (14,000 missiles) into Israel over the past 8 years and the many tunnels designed to attack or kidnap Israeli civilians and soldiers.

Mishal freely rewrites history claiming that when the British ended their mandate over Palestine “they gave our land to those (Jewish) guerrilla groups in Palestine.” In fact, the British handed the problem of Palestine over to the newly formed United Nations to find a solution. Nothing was “handed over” to the Jews. In contrast, the British armed, trained and led the Jordanian army against Israel in the 1948 War of Independence. Again, no challenge from Smith.

The remainder of the interview focuses  on  Mishal’s commitment to regaining what he regards as his – the land of Israel. Never does Smith suggest that the existence of a Jewish State after a 3500- year association just might have some validity, especially considering that it represents less than 1% of the land devoted to Arab occupation. Surely, at the very least, this display of greed deserves a question?

But almost amusing is the Hamas’ leader’s plea for the “fulfilment of their dreams of democracy”. He forgets that Hamas attained power after a democratic election in 2006 after which, 9 years later, never has another election been held. He also fails to understand that winning a democratically staged election is one thing but throwing the opposition off rooftops does little for one’s cause.

With the entire tone of Janet Smith’s article is firmly supportive of the usual Palestinian “victim mentality”, this experienced journalist should realise that by promoting this legacy she does those she is committed to help no favours. Instead she promotes their feelings of helplessness and their ongoing and unproductive hostility towards those whom they view as oppressors but who, in truth, would be more than willing to foster mutual peace and stability.

Monessa Shapiro to The Cape Times

A few points mentioned in Janet Smith’s interview with Khalid Mishal need clarification. 

A “Hudna” is not a ceasefire – not a  ‘now let’s make peace’ time.  It is simply a cessation of violence for a certain period.  No country would agree to the cessation of violence for a set interval with an avowed enemy, hell-bent on that country’s annihilation.   Hamas’s ten year “hudna” – period of quiet – would have resulted in it acquiring more arms, training more terrorists and continuing the education of  its youth in the art of murdering Jews.

Ms Smith states that the Hamas Charter has been altered in recent years.   Where and when?   In the introduction to the Charter it states: ”Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it….”  Article 7 still reads:  “the day of judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind the stones and trees.  The stones and trees will say “O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.”  Perhaps Ms Smith, you have somewhere found an abridged version.

Both Mishal and Smith must agree that had Israel wanted to cleanse Israel of Arabs she has done a pretty bad job of it.   Today there are 1,746,000 Arabs living in Israel.  In 1948 there were a mere 156,000.   And as for talking of wanting to live in a democracy – how can Mishal have the gall to suggest this when the last elections in the Gaza strip were in 2006!

Debbie Mankowitz: re Mashaal’s visit to SA

Dear Editor

 

South Africans managed to secure their freedom from one of the most vicious and racist regimes in modern history, Apartheid. Out of the abyss, they created an incredibly and much-admired sophisticated Constitution with a Bill of Rights enshrined as a cornerstone of the democracy in South Africa. It enshrines the rights of all people in our country and affirms the democratic values of human dignity, equality and freedom.  These freedoms, besides many others, include the right to fair trial, the right to conscience, and freedom of association which also include religious rights.  Hamas, a terror entity designated as such by the United States government in 1997, does not have a Bill of Rights enshrined in its constitution, but has instead a Covenant that very clearly outlines its intent towards Jews, their State of Israel and any future peace deals with Israel.

 

Since its democratic election to power Hamas, an extremist fundamentalist Islamic organization, hastransformed the Gaza Strip into an Islamist micro-state.  

 

Its Covenant  is  a  comprehensive manifesto comprised of 36 separate articles, all of which promote the basic HAMAS goal of destroying the  State  of  Israel  through  Jihad(Islamic  Holy  War).

 

Its fundamentalist Islamic approach, and its concomitant religious intolerance, are expressed through Article 11 which states that,  “The  land  of  Palestine (Israel)  is  an  Islamic  Waqf  (Holy Possession) consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgment Day. No one can renounce it or any part, or  abandon  it  or  any  part  of  it.” 

 

Article 13 states that Palestine (Israel) is an Islamic land, and that the liberation of Palestine (Israel) is the individual duty of every Muslim.

Article 6 clearly articulates the expansionist and colonialist aspirations of Hamas which, as an offshoot of the Islamic Brotherhood, states that the banner of Islam needs to be raised over every inch of Palestine (Israel).

 

The Covenant’s preamble unequivocally states Hamas’s racist and apocalyptic  intent that  Israel will only exist until Islam will obliterate it. The continued  belligerence towards Israel and Jews is also detailed in the terror organisation’s approach to negotiation, and /or possible peace deals, and this is clarified as such:

“Peace initiatives,   and   so-called   peaceful  solutions   and international conferences are in contradiction to the  principles  of the Islamic Resistance Movement… Those conferences are no more than a means to appoint the  infidels  as  arbitrators  in  the  lands  of Islam… There is no solution for the Palestinian problem  except  by Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are but a waste of time, an exercise in futility” (Article 13).

 

In contrast to this intolerable stance, President Zuma expressed on 16th October 2014 that he rejected all forms of anti-Semitism and intolerance,  and reiterated his support for the two-state solution of Israel and Palestine living side by side in peaceful co-existence. He also emphasised South Africa’s willingness to support both sides to find a solution.

But the question now arises:  was this not then an exercise in futility, now that the ANC has fully disregarded its founding core values,  and South Africa’s own Bill of Rights, by inviting and embracing publicly Khaled Meshaal, an outspoken and virulent proponent of racism and terror and arch-representative of Hamas ideology and leadership?

Don krausz to The Star

The Letters Editor,

The Star.

 

Dear Sir,

 

RE: ARTICLES ON ISRAEL/PALESTINE BY JANET SMITH AND

SHANNON EBRAHIM – 15-10-2015.

 

I saw five items in Ebrahim’s and twenty nine in Smith’s article that were open to question or correction. Dealing with them adequately would require an op-ed, +/- 800 words, and that I leave to the experts.

 

I would like to start with some quotations for your consideration:

 

How do wars start? Diplomats tell lies to journalists and then believe what they read.   (Karl Kraus)

 

Lies repeated often enough will eventually be believed. (Joseph Goebbels)

 

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools…       (Rudyard Kipling.)

 

I believe that there are usually three sides to every situation, yours, mine and the truth which is why we need lawyers and judges. I also think that anyone who states the opposite may be lying.

 

The arguments advanced by Ebrahim and Khalid Mishal are not new. What strikes one immediately is how totally one sided they are. Once again the sheep are bleating: “Four legs good, two legs bad.”

 

Ebrahim complains of the attitude of Israelis to Palestinians and writes of all the children that have been deliberately killed by Israelis. Mishal also mentions killings. Yet neither of these two nor for that matter any of their predecessors have admitted to the thousands of Israelis that have been killed by Palestinians and their Arab neighbours. According to the Internet’s unverified statistics 3,817 Jews were killed and 25,000 wounded in terrorist attacks since 1948 alone. This figure does not include the Israeli fallen in all the wars forced on the country. During the totally unprovoked and declared genocidal attack in 1948, 6,000 Israelis died and 30,000 were wounded according to the British Encyclopaedia, one percent out of a population of some 600,000.

 

Much has been made of the wars involving Gaza and the subsequent destruction and “disproportionate” death toll. And where and when have these righteous souls admitted to the more than 14,000 missiles and mortar bombs that they manufactured and imported in order to launch them into Israeli residential areas? It was when the numbers of these missiles reached 80 per day that Israel counter attacked. The casualty rate of these armaments is one matter; each and every one was fired with the intention to kill and maim.

 

Mishal speaks of “our land.” By 1880 the entire population of Palestine was probably about 500,000 and was part ofSouthern Syria, governed by the Ottomans. The Jewish State partitioned by the UN in 1947 contained between 100,000 and 150,000 Jews living on land purchased from absentee Arab landlords. Historians have concluded that only “several thousand Arab families were displaced by land sales between 1880 and the late 1930’s.” Let Mishal prove otherwise from census reports, land transfer records, or demographic reports.

 

The 1980’s and 90’s witnessed massive airlifts of black Jews from Ethiopia and Eritrea.

They have the same civic rights as any other Israelis. Not bad for an apartheid country.

Allan Wolman to The star

The Two State Solution is dead writes Shanon  Ebrahim quoting an Israeli minister – not the first time she has mentioned this, and will probably continue to repeat this until people start to believe her. She quotes some racist statement by another minister but if that were true why are we only reading about that now?

On she goes throughout her article about Jews taking over parts of East Jerusalem and of course details her normal rant about the “Judaisation” of Palestinian land, again Shanon, we’ve heard this all before from you, its time to dig up a different and more credible story.

In the wake of knife and car ramming attacks this past week Ebrahim then employs her journalistic somersaults by telling her readers that it is the settlers who are guilty of  “well documented” hit and run by settlers on Palestinian children.

“Well documented” indeed, if just one incident of this nature had occurred, wouldn’t the entire press corps stationed in Israel (and there are more journalists in that country than in any other conflict area in the world) have reported this let alone the 6 “examples” she cites. Just as the print and electronic media are splashing the current unrest across the opinion pages, wouldn’t we have read or seen on our screen these attacks that she is telling us?

Yes she even details names and ages of these poor victims. But why then was it never reported at that time? When a knife wielding Palestinian stabs an Israeli – oops sorry an “alleged attacker” is shot by an Israeli, this is front page news.

One can only wonder if 45 children a week were killed by Israel that Ebrahim claims, why hasn’t she ever reported this previously?

Its time for some honest reporting

 

Don Krausz: RE: SHANNON EBRAHIM’S ARTICLE RE OMAR al BASHIR AND THE ICC.

Dear Sir,

 

RE: SHANNON EBRAHIM’S ARTICLE RE OMAR al BASHIR AND THE ICC.

 

Please correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding of this article is that allowing Omar al Bashir to appear before a court, any court, is more a matter of politics than justice.

 

Let us start by examining why this man stands accused.

According to the internet “He is accused of committing crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes inDarfur. The prosecution evidence shows that this man masterminded and implemented a plan to destroy in substantial part the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa groups, on account of their ethnicity. Members of the three groups, historically influential in Darfur, were challenging the marginalisation of the province and were engaging in rebellion.”

 

“Al Bashir failed to defeat the armed movements and so went after the people. His motives were largely political. His alibi was a ‘counterinsurgency.’ His intent was genocide,” the Prosecutor said.

 

Do you remember reading about the Janjaweed? They were a militia which, on al Bashir’s orders, attacked and destroyed villages.  

 

For over 5 years millions of civilians were uprooted from lands they occupied for centuries, all their means of survival destroyed and their land despoiled. “In the camps al Bashir’s forces kill the men and rape the women. He wants to end the history of the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa people,” said the Prosecutor. “I don’t have the luxury to look away.

I have the evidence!”

 

Now we don’t have to believe every word that is written, but can insist on seeing the evidence placed before a court. Stating that the ICC court consists of people that are not qualified to dispense justice or are prejudiced against African heads of State is just not good enough. If the accusations are true then al Bashir must not be free to travel to and fro, protected by people that see no wrong in his deeds.

 

We might as well denounce the Nuremberg Court for judging the German War Criminals, as many a Nazi has done. Yes, Russians were amongst the judges and the hands of  the Communists were far from clean. Twenty million people are said to have died in their Gulag.

 

But the alternative of allowing such monsters to escape punishment or welcomed the world over is totally unacceptable. It goes against every sense of morality and justice!