Eretz Israel is our unforgettable historic homeland...The Jews who will it shall achieve their State...And whatever we attempt there for our own benefit will redound mightily and beneficially to the good of all mankind. (Theodor Herzl, DerJudenstaat, 1896)

We offer peace and amity to all the neighbouring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all. The State of Israel is ready to contribute its full share to the peaceful progress and development of the Middle East.
(From Proclamation of the State of Israel, 5 Iyar 5708; 14 May 1948)

With a liberal democratic political system operating under the rule of law, a flourishing market economy producing technological innovation to the benefit of the wider world, and a population as educated and cultured as anywhere in Europe or North America, Israel is a normal Western country with a right to be treated as such in the community of nations.... For the global jihad, Israel may be the first objective. But it will not be the last. (Friends of Israel Initiative)

Thursday 14 April 2016

David Singer: Internet Intifada On Free Speech Intensifies

Here's the latest article by Sydney lawyer and international affairs analyst David Singer.

He writes:

An increasing number of anti-Jewish and anti-Israel websites are banning comments made by me in response to articles or readers’ comments published on their sites.

These websites have:
1. Simply not posted my comments or
2. Deleted all published comments – including mine – when factual errors pointed out by me cannot be successfully challenged or denied - thereby exposing the unquestionable venom and hate being spewed out on these websites
The latest novel attempt to blatantly silence me recently reared its ugly head when I attempted to respond to this reader’s offensive and unsubstantiated comment:
Wow — “smug” is the perfect word for this effing Zionist.
Great post — thank you!
Go BDS! Go every other effort to expose and dispose of the criminally psychotic ideology Zionism and its every adherent! Viva Palestine!
My response was not published.

Mysteriously however another even more offensive comment was posted by the same reader responding to my unpublished comment:
David Singer, I found your
RIP Palestine. All this nonsense could have been avoided had the Arabs accepted the 1947 UN Partition Plan or created a second Arab state in former Palestine – in addition to Jordan – between 1948 and 1967 after all the Jews living in the West Bank and Gaza had been driven out by six invading Arab armies.
The Arabs need to step up to the plate and accept the consequences of those decisions which have caused so much grief to Jews and Arabs since.
at my incoming e-mail site. Now, why should the already dispossessed, scattered Palestinian polity — you know the stats: at least 750,000 cleansed from their land, up to 500 villages razed by Zioterrorists by 1949 — have accepted an illegal move engineered by Zionist schemers (who bragged of “having it all” even then) and foisted on the fledgling UN (the GA at that) in November 1947? The Palestinians wanted justice and their own independent state then and they’ve steadfastly sought justice and fulfillment of their legitimate aspirations ever since. “nonsense,” bullshit!
Enough, already, of your “singing,” Singer.
Well might you ask – how did my unpublished comment make its way into this crude reader’s email box without it being published on-line first?

The saga does not end there.

I then endeavoured to post the following response:
You state:
"The Palestinians wanted justice and their own independent state then and they’ve steadfastly sought justice and fulfillment of their legitimate aspirations ever since"
The Palestinian Arabs could have had their own independent State in 1947 in a much larger share of former Palestine than is available to them now under any negotiated settlement in 2016 - if they had not rejected the UN Partition Plan.
Do you agree?
You are also silent on the fact that they could have also had their own independent State in all the West Bank and Gaza and even East Jerusalem between 1948 and 1967 when not one Jew lived there and Jordan and Egypt were the occupiers. That could have happened with the stroke of an Arab League pen.
Do you agree?
Those golden opportunities will not return.
The Palestinian Arabs and their Arab brethren in the Arab League have blown it well and truly.
They will have to settle for a lot less than 100 per cent of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem if they want to make peace with Israel.
Do you agree?
These comments have not been published.

Suppressing free speech on these insidious websites must be continually exposed and roundly condemned.

Deliberately manipulating these hate-filled websites perpetuates an unchallenged aura of lies and distortions that are misleadingly and deceptively influencing readers’ opinions on the Arab-Jewish conflict.

8 comments:

  1. Not too surprised, the webmaster doesn't like opposing views. I agree it shouldn't be that way, but people are people. Even Daphne reviews comments. Any comments not posted are just oversights.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sometime I find comments in the Spam box I've overlooked, but not often. I try to guard against defamatory comments. I used to have a far-out heavy duty antisemite who runs his own conspiracy theory website - he was visiting daily with the most vile comments.

      Delete
    2. These webmasters are deliberately manipulating their websites to prevent the correction of lies and distortions appearing either in articles they publish or readers' comments. In so doing these lies and distortions become repeated over and over on other websites or the same website and become accepted truth by readers who see nothing to rebut or counter them.

      Goebbels would have had a field day if the internet had been around in his time.

      Delete
    3. Daphne
      Obviously defamatory remarks must be excluded and so can vile posts you deem to be offensive or amounting to hate speech or incitement to violence.

      You will note however that it is the vile remarks that are being published on these websites whilst my remarks which go to factually correcting lies and distortions are rejected.

      That is banning free speech and should not be tolerated under any circumstances.

      One can only conclude these websites want to keep their readers in the dark and suppress any discussion of the views appearing on those websites.

      That is totally unacceptable.

      I intend to keep on sending comments to these websites and to report - as I have in my last few articles - on the way they are handled.

      Delete
  2. Exactly. Review of comments to prevent spam or hijacking of the blog (as happened on a recent EoZ post). But as David Singer points out, in his case it sounds like censorship of an opposing point of view.

    ReplyDelete
  3. 'Liberal' websites like Mediaite and The Hill do this all the time. The weird thing is that they don't delete the downstream comments as well. The Hill also deletes things days and weeks after the fact long after the article is no longer easy to find. Other sites just ban you outright. And then there's places like Salon which shadow ban - they flip a switch so that you are you the only person who can see your comments (Fark.com is a very very heavy user of this as well because it drives more ad revenue their way). And last not least Mosaic which is a serious Jewish journal doesn't seem to publish any comments by anyone at all even though they provide for it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Interesting, Trudy. Thanks. Stephen Sizer has never, so far as I'm aware, ever had a Comments facility on his blog.

      Delete
    2. There is a far more insidious practice developing here using a variety of banning techniques I have encountered and documented over recent weeks.

      These sites clearly do not like the facts to spoil their lies and distortions.

      One should not give up trying to answer any such lies and distortions. That is what they want you to do. Keep posting and report any refusals to publish with a copy of your unpublished comments to me at dsinger2000@gmail.com. I will compile a dossier for future action to try and end this disgraceful behaviour.

      Delete

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