Not A Man-Bites-Dog Story: In Britain, "black" leftist students endorse BDS

Reports Middle East Monitor:

'The UK's National Union of Student's Black Students conference has endorsed the Palestinian call for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) at their national conference at the University of Warwick. The annual gathering passed Motion 402: Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions by an "overwhelming" majority, according to NUS National Black Students' Officer Aaron Kiely [pictured left and below] ....

 The motion condemns Israel's "multitude of human rights and international law violations", describing "Israeli expansion on Palestinian land" as "a settler-colonial project, predicated on the ethnic cleansing and expulsion of its indigenous people". The motion also slams "systemic" racism in Israeli state policy, including "anti-Arab, anti-African and anti-migrant discrimination"....'

The report adds:

'The motion commits the Black Students campaign to lobbying "institutions to adopt academic boycott of Israeli universities", disseminating "resources and materials on how to run successful BDS campaigns", and supporting "the annual Israeli Apartheid Week initiative".

The Black Students conference awarded Student of the Year to Malaka Mohammed, a Palestinian from the Gaza Strip recognised for her achievement in defying the blockade to study at Sheffield University, and then going on to win a full time sabbatical role in her student union with a record number of votes. Conference also gave an award for international peace and justice to King's College London for their campaign work for Palestine including right to education and BDS.'

(Read more here and here)

Hardly a man-bites-dog story, for this result was probably inevitable, given the idiosyncratic but no-longer-unusual-these-days (I'm thinking of the UK's National Black Police Association, which has a high-profile Iranian member) definition of what constitutes "black" to include Asians (for many of whom read "Muslims") and Arabs as well as the apparent far left bent of the "black" group leaders like Mr Kiely (see this post) himself.

We're told here:

'The role of Black students in leading the left to secure victories in NUS must not be underestimated. Piers Telemacque and three of newly elected Block of 15 left wingers are all members of the NUS Black Students’ Committee (Aaron Kiely, Zarah Sultana and Abdi-aziz Suleiman). It was the NUS Black Students’ Campaign that successfully proposed, alongside others, NUS’ new free education policy – and has been the main section of NUS that has consistently argued for free education for the past decade whilst the majority of the NUS leadership capitulated to tuition fees and student debt.'

That's on the website of UK-based Student Broad Left.  And this, that website's masthead, is all too eloquent regarding the obsession with Palestine that characterises the far left in general.  I mean, despite an international section, Palestine's a category all to itself!

Who's Afraid of Nigel Farage? Dirty tricks in Tower Hamlets?

Who's afraid of Nigel Farage?

We know that these chaps are.

Miliband, too, is shaking in his shoes, awaiting the results of the English local government elections and elections for the European Parliament that are expected to show big gains for Farage's UKIP thanks to a disillusioned populace.

Meanwhile, in the Londonistan borough of Tower Hamlets on polling day:

Hat tip: Vlad Tepes blog  (See also my previous post)
Update: more videos showing alleged intimidation of voters by Muslims elements in the borough here

Go Get 'Em, UKIP!

In Londonistan last week, the fruit of mass immigration

From Anshel Pfeffer, a columnist for Ha'aretz, the Israeli newspaper that inclines so far to the Left that it frequently acts as a propaganda sheet against the interests of its own country, comes a sanctimonious article condemning Anglo-Jews for not bad-mouthing Nigel Farage's United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP), which is tipped to wipe the floor with other British parties in the European elections that begin today.

Writes Pfeffer, inter alia:

'[T]he United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) ... has been riding on a sinister wave of xenophobia and fearmongering over millions upon millions of rapacious Eastern European immigrants about to descend upon Britain, snapping up all the jobs.

Of course this wave hasn't engulfed all of British society, but it's large enough to ensure UKIP in most polls at least a quarter of the votes and most likely the first place, overtaking the established parties of power and opposition.

.... But as hard as I tried, I couldn't find anywhere else a response of any sort from a figure of authority in the British Jewish community to UKIP and its ugly scare campaign. Nothing from the Board of Deputies, its competition the Jewish Leadership Council, the Chief Rabbi or any other rabbi or lay-leader of any of the various religious denominations that comprise British Jewry.

Normally it wouldn't be the place of these worthies to weigh in on party-political issues.... But when a party that is basing its entire campaign on stoking fears against immigration seems on the verge of winning these elections there is complete and utterly shameful silence. 

.... [T]o remain silent in the face of a successful party whipping up ordinary Britons into a frenzy against immigrants is a betrayal of our immigrant ancestors and the values of British society that allowed them to settle and flourish in its midst....'

Perhaps Mr Pfeffer should consider what it is that UKIP opposes: the bureaucratic behemoth that is the burgeoning European Superstate, as totalitarian and unaccountable as the old USSR, that has been imposed on Briton by stealth, originationg as it did in a Common Market that seemed to many to make good sense as the economic arm of NATO, but which has become a tyrannical monster governing by decree and subjugating the Mother of Parliaments to its whim.

Membership of this odious institution undermined Britain's special relationship with the former Dominions (visitors from Australia and other Commonwealth countries, whose ancestors fought for Britain in Britain's wars, have to queue at docks and airports with other "aliens" awaiting immigration checks while citizens of former enemy states, cluching their EU passports, march right in).

It means that Britain has no effective control over its own Borders and  who crosses those Borders, and that legislation made by MPs can be subverted by decision-makers in Brussels and Strasbourg.

UKIP seeks Britain's withdrawal from the European Union precisely in order to claw back the country's sovereignty and restore some semblance of control over immigration policy.  The migration of Roma mendicants and pickpockets (yes, I know it's unpolitically correct to say that, but it's honest, and I feel entitled, having thwarted an attempt by two Roma boys to rob me in London in broad daylight) and of Islamists from other EU countries such as France, Belgium and the Netherlands, and obstacles to the removal of foreign miscreants and security threats on the grounds of their "human rights" will continue so long as Britain remains a vassal.

Anglo-Jewry is an integral part of Great Britain, with a long and proud history of belonging and of contributions to all spheres of British life that belie its small size.  Its members are entitled to vote for whoever they wish.  Despite Anshel Pfeffer, that includes UKIP.

Some decades ago an Aussie politician, Don Chipp, who founded a new party, famously said that it was to "keep the bastards [the other parties and their leaders] honest".

Today's Britain badly needs a politician and a party to "keep the bastards honest".  It appears to have found them in Farage and UKIP.  The other parties are running scared, and so they should.

Love him or hate him, Pat Condell is to-the-point and on-the-ball regarding the evils of EU membership here:

See also my next post.

"Who Speaks For The Thousands of Women Oppressed & Abused [By Islam] Every Day?" (video)

Evidently not the western liberals who readily betray the rights of girls and women on the altar of appeasement and political correctness when the oppressors are of the Islamic sort.

It's great to see the ever courageous Chloé Valdary giving Fred Lawrence and Brandeis University a  (polite) blast.

"The Descendents of Asian Nomads": Scottish PSC chief gets a bee in his bonnet

Some time ago Mick Napier, who heads the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign, brought to the attention of his followers on Facebook (who include my trusty informant reader P) a Palestinian coin of some sort dated 1927, which he, in common with a number of anti-Israel activists (see left) seemed to think proved the existence of a sovereign Arab entity at that juncture minting its own coinage.  I blogged about this strange misconception here.

Now, Mr Napier has waxed fantastical on Facebook regarding the fur hat, or shtriemel, worn by many Chasidim.

Hat tip (no pun intended): reader P

He evidently believes that since this item of apparel originated, according to one source, among the Tatars, the Jewish wearers themselves are of similar origin with no biological claim to Eretz Israel: as he writes on Facebook:

"Zionist project to 'return' Jews to Palestine (and expel the natives) is mad, but it is also based on 'returning' the descendents of Asian nomads to the shores of the Mediterranean. The Jewish hat widely seen in Jerusalem - of Asian steppe or Palestinian/Mediterranean origin? Compare it to the examples at bottom of Mongol and Tatar headgear. Encyclopedia Britannica states the obvious - that the Jewish headgear (called a shtreimel) is of Asian Steppe, Tatar, origin.

Scots should equally 'return' to Brazil."

It's widely believed that the fur hats and black caftans associated today with members of Strictly Orthodox sects both in and outside Israel mimics the costume of the Polish and Russian nobility of two centuries and more ago.

Jews similarly attired can be seen in depictions of the Holy Land in the nineteenth century.

But equally, so can Jews attired like the denizens of the Ottoman Empire, of which Palestine was then a mere and rather backward province.

What headgear Jews wore in Biblical times, the Jewish Encyclopedia (New York, 1904; online), tells us, is largely unknown:

'Neither the monuments nor the written documents of Biblical times give any information of value concerning head-gear. On the marble relief of Sennacherib the Israelites appear uncovered; and while on the Shalmaneser stele Jehu's ambassadors have head-coverings, these are evidently patterned after the Assyrian fashion. Only one passage of the older literature (I Kings xx. 31) makes mention of "ḥabalim" that are wound around the head; these recall the Syrians on Egyptian monuments, who appear with a rope coiled around their long, flowing hair, as is still the custom here and there in Arabia. This custom, probably a very ancient one, did not long obtain, since it afforded no protection against the sun. It may be assumed, therefore, that even the ancient Hebrews had a style of head-covering still used by the Bedouins. This consists of a square woolen cloth ("kaffiyyah"), folded triangularly, and laid upon the head, over which one corner depends to protect the nape of the neck, while the two side corners are crossed under the chin and also hang down the back. A heavy woolen cord ("'aḳal") holds the cloth firmly on the head. In later times both men and women wore a covering more closely resembling the turban of the modern fellaheen of Palestine.

The cap (ṭaḳiyyah), often the only head-covering worn by boys, is generally made of two or three thicknesses of cotton cloth, intended to protect the rest of the head-covering against perspiration; over this are placed one, and often two, felt caps ("lubbadah"), and then the Turkish national head-covering ("ṭarbush"); finally a fringed cloth of unbleached cotton, a colored figured mandil, a yellow and red striped kaffiyyah, a black cashmere shawl, a piece of white muslin, or a green cloth is wound around this. This style of head-covering not only protects against the sun, but is also an admirable pillow, and serves as a repository for valuable documents (compare "Zeit. Deutsch. Paläst. Ver." iv. 57 et seq.). The use of a similar head-covering among the Hebrews seems to be indicated by the noun "ẓanif" (from the verb "ẓanaf"; Job xxix. 14; Isa. iii. 23), as well as by the verb "ḥabash," applied to the act of arranging the "ẓanif"; for the verb "ḥabash" means literally "to wind around," and the verb "ẓanaf" similarly signifies "to wind into a ball." It is possible that the various classes gradually came to use different forms of the turban.'

In the Diaspora, Jews wore various types of head coverings, dependent on time and place: 

'In Eastern countries both law and custom compel a distinct difference in costume between Jew and Moslem, which difference was also enforced by Jewish law....  In Egypt, Jews were obliged to wear yellow turbans....

.... The native Algerian Jew wears a "ṭarbush" or oblong turban with silken tassel, a "ṣadriyyah" or vest with large sleeves, and "sarwal" or pantaloons fastened by a "ḥizam" (girdle), all being covered by a mantle, a burnus, and a large silk handkerchief, the tassels of which hang down to his feet....The costume of Tunis ... was described by Mordecai Noah as follows ("Travels in the Barbary States," p. 311, New York, 1819):

"The Barbary Jews wear a blue frock, without a collar or sleeves, loose linen sleeves being substituted, with wide drawers of the same article, no stockings, excepting in winter, and black slippers, a small black skull-cap on their head, which is shaved, and around which a blue silk handkerchief is bound; they are permitted to wear no colors. The Italian Jews dress like Christian residents, with the addition of a haick, or bournouse, thrown over their heads...."

Whatever the costume, in almost every case the outer garment is supported by a belt or girdle. This has Biblical authority, and besides enables the ultra pious to carry a handkerchief as a girdle on Sabbath; on other occasions the handkerchief is tucked inside the girdle, as is seen in a curious caricature of an English Jew of the Stock Exchange, as well-as in a figure after Hans Burgkmair showing a Jewish pedler of the sixteenth century wearing a relatively modern felt hat.... In the eighteenth century the Jew generally wore the ordinary three-cornered hat of the time, and even had his hair powdered...

 In Turkey the costume of the Jews was mainly distinguished by the black turban, but the outer garment was an "'antari," a robe opening in front, of silk or figured calico, reaching a little below the knee and fastened round the waist by a sash passing twice round the body; over this was a "jubbah" lined with cats' fur. Some wore the "bunneṭah," or conical hat; some the "meminah," a cap of dark cloth round which a piece of silk was twisted several times like a turban. The modern Turkish Jew adopts mainly European dress with a fez. An especially dignified dress is that of the Jew of Salonica.... His 'antari is covered by a "kundi," a long, showy, varicolored mantle lined with fur. The 'antarireaches to his feet, and the sleeves are longer than that of the jubbah, under which is to be seen the "salṭah" or cloth fur-lined vest. The Jews of Brusa wear a high cap of pasteboard covered with black material, resembling the cylindrical hats worn by Greek priests. Around this is wound a piece of light-colored cotton to form a turban. This is the only distinction between Jewish and non-Jewish dress in Brusa....

The Jews of the Caucasus are distinguished mainly by their head-dress, the men wearing a kind of busby, mushroom-shaped and made of fur.... The men carry weapons freely, which is quite exceptional among Jews.

The Jews of Cochin are in no way distinguished in their dress from the Hindus of their district.... [B]oth classes [black Jews, and white] wear a cap resembling a smoking-cap. In earlier times the men used to wear the gored pantaloons and white turbans of the Mohammedans of India....

The Ḥasidim of Galicia tend to distinguish themselves in dress as well as in customs; besides the fur hat and the old-fashioned "paletot" reaching to the ankles, the modern Ḥasid is invariably to be recognized by the pair of white socks into which the trousers are tucked....'

Whether Mick Napier considers all Jews "the descendents of Asian nomads" or just the ones who wear the shtriemel is unclear.

By  "the descendents of Arab nomads" he is perghaps thinking of the Jews-are-Khazars myth, beloved by anti-Israel elements; I have blogged about that particular nasty piece of Israel demonisation and the nonsense it is here

To try to deny the Jewish origins of those whose forefathers and mothers have lived, died, and in many cases suffered martyrdom as Jews is exceedingly distasteful and mean-minded, and whether those who do so are consciously antisemitic or not their strategy has, by placing the Jews' ancient genetic ancestry above their recorded  history, religion, and tradition, unpleasant racist overtones.

In any case, scientific investigation is on the shtriemel-wearers' side, not that of Mr Napier and his ilk (see, for instance, here and here).

Leaving The Truth Trouserless: David Singer on the Malcolm Fraser allegations

In this, his latest article, titled "Palestine – Fraser Must Tell The Naked And Unadorned Truth", Sydney lawyer and international affairs analyst David Singer turns his attention to last week's preposterous claims by Malcolm Fraser.

Writes David Singer:

Former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser convincingly exposed the falsity of his own and former Foreign Minister Bob Carr’s unsubstantiated claim that the pro-Israel Australian Jewish community wielded too much power – with these few well-chosen words to the ABC’s Jon Faine:

“Fraser: Um, I once said that Israel had exercised excessive power in relation to Lebanon. I got some pretty furious phone calls as a result, and people asked to come up and see me. And I thought it was going to be two or three [of them] and I found, well, there were so many they wouldn’t fit in my office. So I said “Let’s go into the Cabinet Room”. They all explained Israel’s position, which I understood. And at the end of that discussion I said, “Well, gentlemen, I am glad to have listened to you, but you know the Australian government’s position”. I said that “The power Israel used was excessive. That view has not changed. But I have heard you. Thank you.” But it’s a continuum, it’s a continuum.”

There could be no clearer case of the total ineffectiveness of those Jewish representatives sitting in the Cabinet Room  – whom Fraser had properly met, courteously listened to and then rebuffed.

These lobbyists again had not got to first base.

Yes Prime Minister – contrary to your highly damaging allegations  – lobbying you on this occasion on this particular issue once again had failed to change your mind.

Yet you misleadingly use this meeting to suggest there is an organised Jewish lobby that exercises too much power over Australian Governments.

Such an offensive suggestion is utterly false – as your own recollection confirms.

Maybe you felt uncomfortable when confronting the larger than anticipated number of lobbyists who had unexpectedly filed into your office. Numbers may be a turn-off  – as can be exasperation resulting from meetings over the same issue.

You admitted having received some pretty furious phone calls from these people. Prime Ministers would not probably appreciate such calls and their tenor.

Larger than expected noisy interest groups combined could have been even more counter-productive. Personal impressions created by lobbyists can be the kiss of death negating detailed well-researched fact-based arguments.

The indisputable fact however remains that the representations made by this group of lobbyists – for whatever reasons – were once again rejected. But my most serious criticisms - Prime Minister – are reserved for these following comments you made:

“The Jewish community…well not all the community…because I have had many letters, I’ve got many letters in my office in the files that say “No we don’t agree with the publicly proclaimed leaders of the community in Melbourne. We take a different view.” But they’re not going to say so publicly. The Jewish community seek to get Australia to support policies as defined by Israel. Look, Israel years ago, during one of the wars, killed 30 or 40 Americans on a spy ship in the western (sic) Mediterranean.

Faine: That was a mistaken missile hit, if I remember correctly, or an air strike. I can’t remember.

Fraser: Well, the Americans tried to cover it up. It wasn’t a mistake. It was deliberate.

Faine: You believe so?

Fraser: Yes.

Faine: Based on what?

Fraser: Information I have. I am not going to tell you the source."

You revealed there were an undisclosed number of publicity shy Australian Jewish citizens who had previously written to you requesting you not to accept the views of the organised Jewish community leaders supporting policies as defined by Israel differing from theirs.

That argument was your perfect entitlement to accept and theirs to make  – but you can’t have it both ways.

Being ready to reject the views of these community leaders knowing this could lead to possibly losing votes if the majority of Jewish voters they represented were unhappy with your decision does indeed suggest you were a politician of principle – a rare phenomenon in politics.

So why allege excessive power-wielding when you were prepared to dismiss their submissions even if it cost you votes in sending them back to Melbourne empty-handed – which is what you actually did?

But far worse – you told the interviewer you believed that the Americans had deliberately covered up an attack on the USS Liberty on 8 June 1967 at the height of the Six Day War.

When asked to provide the evidence to substantiate your claim  – you refused to reveal the source. Prime Minister  – six American investigations into these claims resulted in the following findings:

C.I.A. report June 13, 1967 No malice; attack a mistake

U.S. Navy Court of Inquiry June 18, 1967 Mistaken identity

Report by Clark Clifford July 18, 1967 No evidence ship was known to be American

Senate Select Committee on Intelligence 1979/1981 No merit to claims attack was intentional

National Security Agency 1981 Mistaken identity

House Armed Services Committee 1991/1992 No support for claims attack was intentional

Refusing to substantiate your highly damaging claim on public radio after it was challenged as being factually inaccurate - is surely conduct unbecoming of a former Prime Minister.

Prime Minister – On 14th October 1986 you were discovered in the foyer of a seedy Memphis hotel wearing only a towel and a dazed expression.

Have you been caught out with no clothes on once again? Will remaining silent on America’s cover up enhance your credibility?

Do we believe you or six American investigations?

"The Jews – Once So Oppressed, Now So Oppressive": Odious article by ABC broadcaster Peter Goers

Adelaide-based Peter Goers is a broadcaster with the ABC, Australia's answer to the BBC.

In Adelaide's Sunday Mail a couple of years ago he wrote, inter alia, when regretting the rise of militant atheism:

'I write as a poor Christian, happily raised a Methodist thanks to the quiet and nurturing faith not of the fathers but the mothers.

I will never deny the beautiful faith of my mother and grandmother and my Sunday school education, which was a blessing.

That said, I'm also a bit of an agnostic as are all reasonable people of reasonable faith. None of us knows if there is a God, but there's always hope.

I have enormous respect for agnostics and for people of quiet, personal, fulfilling faith which must always question. I do not believe in proselytising.'

He continued:

Muslims do not proselytise and some of the best Christians I've ever known are Muslims. We would do well to learn from moderate Islam.'  [Emphasis added]

He had nothing to say in that article about Jews, who of course, unlike Muslims and indeed Christians, famously do not proselytise.

Evidently in that astonishing blanket claim about Muslims he has never encountered any of the Islamic proselytisers who spruik their conversionist pamphlets on busy shopping streets in Australian capital cities as they do in the dear old Motherland. But at least his comment indicates where his sympathies apparently lay, and this may be instructive in light of his latest article, referred to below.

(Indeed, in another article he wrote that Australia 

"may be better off as a Muslim nation. Christianity has never been less popular and Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. It's a religion of peace, love, family values and respect, and the only faith to give women equality in its holy book." [!!!!!!! Emphasis added])

Last week Goers visited Palestine with the Australian Friends of Palestine (its home page carries that set of misleadingly mendacious maps) and South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon, who found the situation in Hebron "heart-breaking" according to press reports. 

In today's Adelaide Sunday Mail Goers has an article entitled "The Shame of Israel's Palestinian Apartheid" in which he demonises Israel from start to finish.  It is as offensive an article as any that I have ever read in Australia (and, believe me, I've read a lot of newspaper articles dealing with Jews and Israel, and should be protested by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry).

The article begins on a hyperbolic note, and continues in lacrymose mood:

"Jesus wept. In Palestine, Jesus wept and so did I. I weep for the Palestinians living under the Israeli apartheid ...'

I'm not begrudging Goers his sympathy towards Palestinians.  But this is a damning dangerous article.

There is not one word of understanding for Israel's predicament, no word of sympathy for Israeli civilians suffering terrorist attacks, no attempt to explain why Israel erected its security barrier or how that barrier has reduced suicide bombings, no attempt to set the "refugee"issue in context, no attempt to empathise at all with a country that Goers, in a picturesque analogy, accurately describes as tiny.

He has swallowed the Palestinian narrative hook, line, and sinker.

But it is not only Israel that is demonised by Goers.  So, too, are the Jews.  And Jesus, the Judean, the Jew, is decribed as a Palestinian!

'I weep for those who must live behind the wall.... 

I weep for all 720km of this barbaric wall in Israel, a tiny country twice the size of Kangaroo Island.

I weep for the worshippers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third most holy place in Islam. It’s in the Old City of Jerusalem, next to the Dome of the Rock – one of he most thrillingly beautiful structures in the world....

I weep for the many Israelis who want to destroy the 1400-year-old Dome of the Rock, the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Christian churches in this land whence prophets come.

I weep for the Palestinians who are second-class citizens in their own land. Intimidated, harassed, removed....

I weep for the settlements and the 630,000 intrusive settlers in Palestinian territory. I weep for faith, killed by fundamentalism. I weep for the illegal military occupation of Palestine for 47 years after millennia of occupations of this land as old as time. Jesus was a Palestinian born under another occupation.

 I weep for this apartheid....

I weep for Palestinian refugees....

I weep for the oppressive, bellicose Israelis. The Jews – once so oppressed, now so oppressive. Recently the most distinguished Israeli writer Amos Oz decried some of his countrymen as “Hebrew neo-Nazis”. I weep that the Palestinians are “the Jews of the Jews”....

I weep for greed ...

I weep for the 1004 Palestinian children arrested, tortured, abused and abducted last year....

I weep for the pain and cost of all this useless persecution ...

I weep for this land of endless repression....'

See all of Goers' outrageous article here