In Australia, Sizer's Charm Offensive Rumbles On

Seen below enjoying a barbecued Bush brekkie, our old cobber the ex-vicar of Virginia Water, now CEO of the so-called Peacemakers Mediators outfit, is, as regular readers of my blog will know, on a "tour" of Australia.

Needless to say, this news from the United States, to which he alerted his Facebook faithful around the start of his visit here, has not warmed the cockles of his heart, nor of his followers:

It's precisely that sort of thing, Christian support for Israel and Zionism, that the ex-Surrey vicar has come to Oz to endeavour to prevent and undermine, for his tour is under the auspices of such groups as Palestine Israel Ecumenical Network and Fighting Fathers Ministries:

I note with interest  that he's given an interview to a Christian magazine in this country, Sight, and that the subsequent article, by David Adams, is headed 'Middle East: Anglican "Peacemaker" calls for Christians to be part of the solution in ending Israel-Palestine conflict'.  It begins:

'Christians in the West need to cease giving uncritical, one-sided support to Israel in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and instead engage with Christians in the Middle Eastern church who are working for peace and reconciliation.

That’s according to Rev Dr Stephen Sizer, an Anglican minister and founder of the UK-based Peacemaker Trust, a non-denominational Christian charity which works with churches in East Africa and the Middle East, particularly in areas where the church is marginalized or persecuted or where there are religious tensions, on projects based around evangelism, discipleship and issues of justice and peace.'

Well, the church is hardly 'marginalised or persecuted' in Israel, so it is surprising indeed that Adams was not more searching in his interview with our old cobber, asking him why in particular he focuses so much time and effort in knocking the Jewish State.  Inter alia, Adams writes that

'Rev Dr Sizer is spending a couple of weeks in Australia speaking at a series of events on a mission to “deconstruct” how the Bible has, in his words, been "misused" to justify what he describes as the “apartheid regime in Israel today” and how Christians can be involved in bringing peace to the region.'

He can hardly be unaware of the ex-vicar's lack of impartiality on this issue, as that quoted sentence and other passages in the article make clear. Yet he naively writes of Sizer's "stance of not taking sides"!

Blithely, the article tells us that Sizer

'rejects the idea that he is anti-Israel – saying he has always been opposed to racism and anti-Semitism – and says that he wants to see Israel “survive and prosper as a nation for its citizens, for those who choose to live there or who were born there”....

He says that he prays a solution to the situation in Israel and the Palestinian territories can be reached without further bloodshed but he believes that such a solution will only came about when Israel either gives up the West Bank and allows “an independent, sovereign Palestinian state” or embraces a one state solution “whereby everyone within Israel and the Occupied Territories has equal rights and the right to vote, the right to education, healthcare and so on”....'

This presumably means that Sizer has reneged on his apparently unequivocal declaration of support for a one-state solution.

And his support for the so-called Palestinian Arab "Right of Return", which would doom Israel's existence in one fell swoop.  I mean, a man of the cloth would hardly be likely to lie, would he?


As for Adams and perhaps the majority of Christians in Australia who are coming under Sizer's current charm offensive, I've a sneaking suspicion that they are unaware of some of our pro-Iran old cobber's excesses.

Like his cosying up to Arafat:

His notorious 9/11 post:

 His vocal support in London for Al Quds Day:

Maybe Olivier Melnick's post here would be a good introductory starting point.

Betsy Childs's post here is a cracker too.

In Oz, Waters Drizzles & Sizer Sizzles

How odd it seems that old friend the ex-vicar of Virginia Water, now CEO of the so-called Peacemaker Mediators outfit, seems so unconcerned about the lack of churches in the land that's exported Wahhabism to the West:

But I digress.  A couple of days after posting the above, and about as long after my post here, Stephen Sizer flew into a rainy Sydney, to the delight of his Aussie counterpart, Father Dave Smith of Holy Trinity Church, Dulwich Hill, seen below at an Australia Palestine Advocacy Network function some time ago.

Incidentally, have you seen aged rocker Roger Waters's outrageous remarks at APAN's recent function, alleging Israel has never wanted peace with the Palestinian Arabs and was always intent on land grabbing?

Warning: the above's 72 minutes long, I'm given to understand.  This first still comes at around 1:30 if you want to see the outrageous bit to which I refer:

Needless to say, APAN is delighted that Sizer has come to Australia.

But again I digress.  Here are the two anti-Israel Anglican clerics all smiles at breakfast on Sizer's first day in town.

And our old friend, a seasoned traveller in spreading the anti-Christian Zionism cause, seems to have wasted little time in meeting people who matter and in attempting to widen a fan base here.

See what I mean?

And

(For Lynn Arnold see here)

I don't think this Sizer fan (below, one of the many evident antisemites among the vicar's Facebook friends) is Aussie, but he's delighted anyway:

Permit me a cynical, ironic smile while I recall that disgusting 9/11 post of Sizer's, and not only it, as so many images I've reproduced over the years indicate:

But we smile at Sizer's "Australian tour" at our peril.  In the anti-Israel propaganda stakes the urbane and softly spoken ex-vicar's a pro.  What he's spreading and who he's influencing during his time in the southern hemisphere should have friends of Israel worried.

Israel-Bashing English ChristiansTwinkling Among Tinkling Teacups

2 November 2017.  Tick tock. Tick tock.

In the countdown to the centenary of the Balfour Declaration anti-Israel initiatives in the UK are coming thick and fast, and Christian Israel-bashers are joining in with gusto.

Our old friend Stephen Sizer, the ex-vicar of Virginia Water and now based in Southampton as CEO of the so-called Peacemaker Mediators organisation, has been very active, with Peacemaker Mediators leaving little doubt that it has Israel and Israel's supporters centrally in its sights.

Sizer has recently been to Amersfoort in the Netherlands for the Kairos/Sabeel Conference.

It was there that he presented his analysis of Walter Bruggemann's Chosen? that he'd begun in note form while in Kigali awaiting a delayed flight to Doha, sustained by cups of refreshing African tea. (Photo above)

Should you be so inclined, you can view the analysis here

One of his allies, Robert Cohen, who's married to an Anglican vicar (of the double X chromosome variety) and blogs against Israel at Micah's Paradigm Shift and Pantheos, was recently in posh Cheltenham for a churchy Israel-bashing shmooze which apparently had the local Conservative MP purring:

Funny of Cohen to term organiser Symon"brave"; I'm sure there were no Israeli suicide bombers on hand to vent disapproval).

From here:

Reverting to our old friend, in whose name the Balfour Project website was (and perhps still is) rumoured to be registered, he's been full of excitement over this.  And so, evidently, has antisemite and  9/11 troofer Tony Gratrex, long associated with the Reading Palestine Solidarity Campaign:

(See more on that event, due to take place on 31 October, here)

Sizer gloats on the Peacemaker Mediators' website:

Antisemitism: Stephen Sizer speaks out

See Jewish Chronicle: click HERE

As is clearly evident (see, for example, the Jewish Chronicle here and here) certain sections of the British Left, especially Corbynistas, are despicably opposed to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's Definition of Antisemitism.

To quote Board of Deputies president Jonathan Arkush:

"The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism is endorsed by the Jewish community in the UK and across Europe.

In the UK it is also supported by the government, the Labour Party and the National Union of Students – among many other bodies.

It beggars belief that anyone ... would want to dictate to Jews what constitutes antisemitic abuse against them."

A day or two ago on social media a follower of the Peacemaker Mediators' CEO asks him a question.  To which the ex-vicar, a Corbynista in case you didn't know, made an obtuse yet predictable reply:

Seems promising, this comment of Sizer's:

Until we reflect on the sting in the tail.  His ex-Reverence is one of the "Likers" of this comment in response:

And he's one of the four Likes for Hugh Walker's comment "... nobody likes exceptionalism":

The ex-vicar must surely feel it's reasonable to suspect of antisemitism someone who posts links to articles which claim that Israel was responsible for 9/11.

Nu, Mr Sizer?

How about those who, like Press TV  presenter Yvonne Ridley, talk of Israel's "dark arts" (an abominable phrase that conjures up medieval accusations that Jews poisoned wells and murdered Christian children at Passover) yet is apparently liked by Baroness Tonge, one of Sizer's Press TV and Peacemaker Mediators buddies.

 Anything you'd like to add in the way of enlightenment, Mr Sizer?

Nah. I guess not.

How about those who bear false witness against the aims of Zionism, like your friend Cozzens?  A contemptible bunch?

Silly me!  A redundant question on my part, as this old post of yours reveals:

And the economic cudgel against the Jewish State?

BDS is, in fact, as US Senator Chuck Schumer observed recently, just a repackaging of an old hatred:

'Antisemitism is a word that has been used throughout history when Jewish people are judged and measured by one standard and the rest by another.

When everyone else was allowed to farm and Jews could not; when anyone else could live in Moscow and Jews could not; when others could become academics or tradesmen and Jews could not,” he said. “The word to describe all of these acts is antisemitism. So it is with anti-Zionism; the idea that all other peoples can seek and defend their right to self-determination but Jews cannot; that other nations have a right to exist, but the Jewish state of Israel does not.

The global BDS movement is a deeply biased campaign that I would say, in similar words to Mr. [Emmanuel] Macron, is a "reinvented form of antisemitism" because it seeks to impose boycotts on Israel and not on any other nation.'

Stephen Sizer, this is not the first time you have advocated a single state to replace the legally constituted sovereign state of Israel.  Do not be surprised to find this extraordinary advocacy labelled antisemitism.  Once again, your lack of sympathy, of empathy, for the Jews of Israel, seems predicated on prejudice if not malice, and this blatant lack of objectivity gives the lie to any claim that your so-called Peacemaker Mediators as anything but a biased and mischievous body.

How can a body already blindly prejudiced against one side in a dispute "mediate" a just solution?

It is both a sad and a laughable presumption.

Finally, I draw to your attention, Mr Sizer, this article by Moshe Arens, in which Arens tells us baldly

"The leader of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement, whose battle cry is 'Al-Aqsa is in danger,' is the one most responsible for the current spate of violence"

 It's none other that Raed Salah whom Arens characterises as "Israel's inciter-in-chief"

Another of your anti-Israel chums from way back, eh, ex-vicar?

Deep sigh.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         Not a wonderful advertisement for the integrity of Peacemaker Mediators, is it?


Certainly it's not calculated to make Israel ever entrust your mob with negotiations for a "peace settlement"!

Antisemitism Should be Bad for the Image, Mr Peacemaker Mediator!

Now that he's no longer the vicar of Virginia Water, Stephen Sizer, CEO of the so-called Peacemaker Mediators organisation, has no diocesan overlord to rein him in. 

And as the centenary of the Balfour Declaration draws ever closer, our old friend is keenly posting anti-Israel material.
 
 Here's something he's dragged up from 2010.

 It's sparked some lively discussion between our old mate and his friends, who include this chap Cozzens, who's contributed the following:

A skim of his Facebook page shows that Cozzens, who frequently comments on Sizer's posts, is unlikely ever to be mistaken for a Judeophile.  In fact, with this unpleasant introduction, he has in the past 24 hours linked on that page to an article that invokes that antisemitic forgery "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion".

Surely, in view of his own notorious brush with the "Israel did 9/11" trope, Stephen Sizer should long since have given a Facebook friend and commentator like this (and Cozzens is not the only one) the old heave-ho.

How about it, Mr Sizer?  Surely you and the rest of the Peacemaker Mediators are not unconcerned at that body's CEO being seen in such company?