Daphne Anson: A London Professor Defends Palestinian Terror

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, 27 January 2011

A London Professor Defends Palestinian Terror

London’s University College (UCL), was founded in the 1820s in order to provide non-Anglicans with the university degrees denied to them by Oxford and Cambridge at that time. Prominent among its founders was a celebrated Jewish philanthropist and civil rights promoter, Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid. Alas, today University College is one of the cesspools of anti-Israel activism that are such a feature of England’s once so green and pleasant land, especially in that “mecca of delegitimisation,” Londonistan.

Edgar (“Ted”) Honderich (born 30 January 1933), formerly Grote Professor of Mind and Logic at UCL – no folks, he’s not Jewish – is the author of two post 9/11 books in which he assails Israel. He’s an arch-opponent of what he calls “neo-Zionism” – to describe Israel’s “expansionist” actions from 1967, it would seem – as witness an interview he gave to that anti-Zionist and increasingly antisemitic rag the Guardian (which needless to say lapped that word up) a few years ago http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2005/mar/22/academicexperts.highereducationprofile – and is on record as saying:

“You could define 'terrorism' to pick out only and exactly Palestinian self-defence – which of course it also is – and hence use 'non-terrorism' to cover neo-Zionism. That would not commit you to condemning the first and justifying the second. My further and connected aspiration or hope is to contribute to the struggle against neo-Zionism, a struggle I regard as in a sense sacred....

I know full well, and have never doubted, the resolute rapacity of at least many leaders of the Jewish people from before 1948 to 1967 and of course after. That does not affect what is to me the fact that a certain project, a certain possible line of action, Zionism in my definition, was right in 1948, for certain reasons which include the Holocaust, and is right now, partly for the reason of the Jewish homeland that has come into existence. Maybe there are general questions in moral philosophy here, but I don't quite see what they are. I am of course a consequentialist. That is, I judge the rightness of actions by their probable consequences. Maybe things become clearer when I allow that I think that I would in 1947 have supported actions of Ben Gurion, taking them as likely to forward Zionism in my sense, as distinct from neo-Zionism, even if I know his own intentions were otherwise, in fact rapacious....

My concern for and empathy with the Palestinians, as you will guess, is not small. My feeling for the Palestinians of 1948 is not slight. But the Jews in 1948 also existed. They could weep too. The plain necessity, more often admitted than stuck to, is to keep two sets of human facts in view. Certainly an injustice of terrible proportions -- an inhumanity – was done to the Palestinians. Certainly Israel has not come within sight of compensating them. It has not done anything like what has been done by the Germans for the Jews for a related reason – the Holocaust.” http://www.stateofnature.org/tedHonderich.html

Emeritus Professor Honderich has written a letter to the Guardian (26 January) in the light of its publication of “The Palestine Papers”. Pontificates Honderich:

“The revelations in detail (Report, 25 January) of the intransigent greed, the escape from decency, of Israeli governments in negotiation with our selected leaders of the Palestinians, serve one purpose among others. They provide a further part of what is now an overwhelming argument for a certain proposition. It is that the Palestinians have a moral right to their terrorism within historic Palestine against neo-Zionism. The latter, neither Zionism nor of course Jewishness, is the taking from the Palestinians of at least their autonomy in the last one-fifth of their historic homeland. Terrorism, as in this case, can as exactly be self-defence, a freedom struggle, martyrdom, the conclusion of an argument based on true humanity, etc.”

Some mind. Some logic.

Read more:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/26/critics-should-respect-my-decision?INTCMP=SRCH
http://justjournalism.com/the-wire/palestine-papers-ucl-professor-declares-support-for-palestinian-terrorism/

8 comments:

Daphne Anson27 January 2011 at 23:22
LOL! Golly, your comment was quick off the mark, Juniper!
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merachefet28 January 2011 at 02:08
i wrote a letter to the guardian in response and hope it will be published (i highly encourage others especially those in the UK to do so). meanwhile i have posted it here: http://ruchoshelmashiach.blogspot.com/2011/01/uk-philosopher-legitimizes-palestinian.html
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Daphne Anson28 January 2011 at 02:43
Thank you, rsm. I see that the great Melanie Phillips has blogged about this too.
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Miranda W28 January 2011 at 03:22
'a moral right to their terrorism' - what immoral tosh!
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Daphne Anson28 January 2011 at 03:28
Indeed, Miranda.
Perhaps it could be termed "pretzel philosophy" since it entails so much in the way of acrobatics from good to bad and a consequent tying up of the brain matter in knots.
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Anonymous28 January 2011 at 17:40
Daphne, born 1933, justifies killing Jews - should we say Heil Herr H?
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Daphne Anson28 January 2011 at 20:07
Heil, I hope not!
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Anonymous30 January 2011 at 06:28
The professor's talking horsesh*t!
Herbert S.
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The division of Judea and Samaria (West Bank) into three separate areas “A”, “B” and “C” was agreed on by Israel and the PLO pursuant to the Oslo Accords.
95% of the West Bank Arabs live in Areas A and B and their daily lives are under the total administration and control of the PLO since the Palestinian Authority was disbanded by Abbas in January 2013. The PLO has total security control in A and shares security control in B with Israel. Israel has total administrative and security control in C.
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