Daphne Anson: What's So Heinous About Magid's Message?

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)

Sunday 18 August 2013

What's So Heinous About Magid's Message?

Much has been written regarding Australian Jewish News publisher Robert Magid's latest foray into the debate over asylum seekers and immigration policy, reminiscent of the earlier furore that greeted his views. The usual suspects have been out in force: the leftwing oh-so-democratic Australian Jewish Democratic Society has gone so far as to open a petition against him. On the left-leaning Galus Australis site a rabbi has written a rejoinder to Magid, a number of commenters (including this blogger) have reacted indignantly to Magid's views, and so have communal representatives.

As the ABC (itself obviously biased towards so-called asylum seekers, as news bulletin after news bulletin, both before and after Kevin Rudd's opportunistic "get tough" policy was announced in the lead-up to the imminent federal election, has made abundantly clear) explained in a recent Lateline programme that trotted out two no doubt well-meaning Jewish opponents of Magid's position:

'An article by the publisher of Australia's major Jewish newspaper has sparked fierce debate in the Jewish community about refugee policy.

In a piece titled Curb Your Compassion, Robert Magid argued that the Holocaust experience was generating misplaced sympathy among Jews towards asylum seekers....

He was accused of stoking anti-Muslim sentiment when he warned of an increase of Islamic extremism in Australia if authorities couldn't verify the identities of asylum seekers arriving by boat. He also warned Jews should curb their enthusiasm for supporting boat people.'

Magid (himself the son of immigrant parents, the much-admired and well-remembered philanthropists Isadore and Ira Magid) told Lateline:

'.... Nothing I've said had anything to do with racial hatred. Last thing I would be accused of if anyone knows me is of racial hatred....

What's happened is the whole thing is skewed because we see images of people on boats fearing to be drowned and we feel compassion towards them but we don't see the people who are waiting many years and who are eligible to come but are prevented from coming as a result of the queue jumping. ...

To bring that [Holocaust] analogy to the situation of people who pay smugglers rather than wait for their turn to be accepted as refugees is not the kind of compassion that I support.'

He's reasonably observed:

“It’s not a question of who’s more compassionate. The Jews who had the gas chambers behind them would have gone to any country. I feel a hell of a lot more sympathy for people starving in Darfur.

These are the people who should have first priority, not people who have the money and cunning to jump the queue.”

What's so heinous about that?

And he's warned:

"If al-Qaida or another jihad organization wished to create a network of terrorists in Australia, undocumented illegal immigration would ensure the Australian authorities had no way of verifying their bona fides."

Again, what's so heinous about that?

Warning sign, Sydney: http://al-qods.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/MG_2060.jpg

1 comment:

JoshVoice26 August 2013 at 20:36
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Jews were given the legal right to settle in the West Bank under article 6 of the Mandate for Palestine and article 80 of the UN Charter. They did so for decades until they were driven out in 1947 and not able to return there until 1967.
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