The Israel-based ZAKA International Rescue Unit delegation, who were in Mexico assisting in the recovery efforts following the helicopter crash on Sunday, flew to the Haiti earthquake disaster area in a Mexican air force Hercules together with the Mexican official aid delegation.
The Church in Wales (C-i-W) has a long history of standing with suffering Palestinians. When a C-i-W funded health centre in Gaza was destroyed by an Israeli rocket last year during Operation Cast Lead, the 'Biggest Coffee Morning' fund raising effort was just one example of its Christian response to their hardship.
But for some senior figures in the Church in Wales, support for Palestinians has included support for those who oppose Israel’s existence, to the consternation of some clergy and lay members.
An example was Archbishop Barry Morgan’s statement on the death of Yasser Arafat, when he said that he would remember Arafat not for the many civilian murders for which he was responsible, but for his perseverance and resolve.
Other concerns include the frequent input from Canon Naim Ateek of Sabeel Centre, whose attitude towards Israel's right to exist has been markedly ambivalent. Ateek revived the accusation of deicide against the Jewish state, likening Israelis to 'Herods' in his 2000 Christmas message and Palestinians to the crucified Christ dying at the hands of the Jewish state at Easter 2001.
Church in Wales policies do not distinguish between Palestinian attacks on Israeli citizens and Israel’s use of force to defend them, instead calling both 'revenge violence'. Palestinian aggression is blamed on Israel’s resolve to place their citizens' safety above any other consideration and Israel's 'Security First' policy condemned.
Many members of the Church of Wales are dismayed at the level of disrespect towards Jews and Jewishness tolerated in Church in Wales publications. A few years ago for example, after complaints about an Irish joke that appeared in a C.i.W. parish magazine, an apology from the vicar appeared in an official press release. In another incident Archbishop Barry Morgan himself collected up copies of the C-i-W Welsh language magazine Y Llan which contained an offensive cartoon and went on TV to apologize to Welsh Muslims.
However no such apologies were deemed necessary when Y Llan ran an article in which a fictitious contemporary of Jesus opined that none of His disciples were of any use except Judas. The name of this 'contemporary'? Abel Cohen.
And why was the phrase 'the Jews are cowards' allowed to remain on the Church in Wales Jubilee Fund website for a year in 2002-3, despite numerous complaints - including Archbishop Rowan Williams' description of the comments as 'deplorable' and 'inflammatory language about Jews'.
Last year, St David’s Diocese produced a series of short films for use in the 'Menter' teaching course. Filmed in the Holy Land and Wales, Menter contains inspiring material for those wishing to learn or reflect upon the Christian faith. But the word 'Israel' appears only once.
Neither the Law nor the Prophets nor Jesus or His disciples are identified as Jewish. No Jews contribute or are interviewed. Instead only a Palestinian Anglican is described as 'indigenous' and there are frequent shots of Arab Israelis and Palestinians. It is as though there are no Jews today's Holy Land.
And in his 2009 Christmas message Dominic Walker, Bishop of Monmouth, wrote that 'God so loved the world that he sent Jesus to be born in Palestine'. Yet Jesus was a Jew, born in Bethlehem of Judea more than one hundred years before the Romans expelled the Jewish population from the province of Judea and renamed it Palaestina after Israel's great enemies, the Philistines.
The Scriptures themselves say that 'Salvation comes from the Jews', and senior figures in the Church of Wales might reflect on whether they are in danger of uprooting Jesus from the Jewish soil which bore Him.
While Palestinian Christians in the West Bank celebrate Christmas in Bethlehem, Palestinians in Gaza, no matter their religious affiliation or political bent, are suffering in squalor and growing ignorance. Thousands are trying to flee.
Gaza has never been a prosperous enclave; the 140-square-mile territory has always been a poor, dependent state. But for Hamas, the radical Islamic terrorist group that seized control of Gaza in 2007, the long-term pursuit of a political impossibility trumps even the slightest concern for the welfare of the group's 1.5 million "constituents."
UN Watch does valuable work following events at the UN. We publish here this important item which deserves wide circulation.
GENEVA, October 16, 2009 -- Today's emergency UN Human Rights Council debate on the Goldstone Report predictably saw a line-up of the world's worst abusers condemn democratic Israel for human rights violations. In a heated lynch mob atmosphere, Kuwait slammed Israel for “intentional killing, intentional destruction of civilian objects, intentional scorched-earth policy,” saying Israel “embodied the Agatha Christie novel, 'Escaped with Murder'.” Pakistan said the “horrors of Israeli occupation continue to haunt the international community’s conscience.” The Arab League said, “We must condemn Israel and force Israel to accept international legitimacy." Ahmadinejad’s Iran said “the atrocities committed against Palestinians during the aggressions on Gaza should be taken seriously” and followed up by the international community “to put an end to absolute impunity and defiance of the law.”
What the world's assembled representatives did not expect, however, was the speech that followed (see text below), organized by UN Watch. We invited as our speaker a man who repeatedly put his life on the line to defend the democratic world from the murderous Saddam Hussein, Al Qaeda, and the Taleban. The moment he began his first sentence, the room fell silent. Judge Goldstone, author of the distorted report that prompted today's one-sided condemnation of Israel but not Hamas, had refused to hear Col. Kemp's testimony during his "fact-finding" hearings. But UN Watch made sure today that this hero's voice would be heard -- at the U.N., and around the world
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UN Watch Oral Statement Delivered by Colonel Richard Kemp UN Human Rights Council 12th Special Session, 16 October 2009 Debate on Goldstone Report
Thank you, Mr. President.
I am the former commander of the British forces in Afghanistan. I served with NATO and the United Nations; commanded troops in Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Macedonia; and participated in the Gulf War. I spent considerable time in Iraq since the 2003 invasion, and worked on international terrorism for the UK Government’s Joint Intelligence Committee.
Mr. President, based on my knowledge and experience, I can say this: During Operation Cast Lead, the Israeli Defence Forces did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.
Israel did so while facing an enemy that deliberately positioned its military capability behind the human shield of the civilian population.
Hamas, like Hizballah, are expert at driving the media agenda. Both will always have people ready to give interviews condemning Israeli forces for war crimes. They are adept at staging and distorting incidents.
The IDF faces a challenge that we British do not have to face to the same extent. It is the automatic, Pavlovian presumption by many in the international media, and international human rights groups, that the IDF are in the wrong, that they are abusing human rights.
The truth is that the IDF took extraordinary measures to give Gaza civilians notice of targeted areas, dropping over 2 million leaflets, and making over 100,000 phone calls. Many missions that could have taken out Hamas military capability were aborted to prevent civilian casualties. During the conflict, the IDF allowed huge amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza. To deliver aid virtually into your enemy's hands is, to the military tactician, normally quite unthinkable. But the IDF took on those risks.
Despite all of this, of course innocent civilians were killed. War is chaos and full of mistakes. There have been mistakes by the British, American and other forces in Afghanistan and in Iraq, many of which can be put down to human error. But mistakes are not war crimes.
More than anything, the civilian casualties were a consequence of Hamas’ way of fighting. Hamas deliberately tried to sacrifice their own civilians.
Mr. President, Israel had no choice apart from defending its people, to stop Hamas from attacking them with rockets.
And I say this again: the IDF did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.
The Today Programme on BBC Radio is considered to be the UK's flagship news and current affairs radio programme. As the BBC is funded by the general public through a licence fee we expect high standards of reporting and editorial control. Unfortunately the BBC frequently fails, especially with regard to the reporting of Israel and the Palestinians. This letter to the Today Programme was written by leading AFI member, Fran Waddams:
17 October 2009
Today Programme Room G630 Stage 6 TV Centre Wood Lane London W12 7RS
Dear Sir Madam
I listened with increasing dismay to Katya Adler’s report on Gaza’s schoolchildren (Today, Tuesday 13 October 2009)
Adler’s message was clear. Israelis are the stuff of children’s nightmares; Israelis don’t recognise the right of Gaza’s children to an education; Israelis don’t want a rebuilt Gaza; No Israeli voice was permitted to interrupt this litany of blame shaped in the most emotive language and delivered mainly by children.
No one denies the reality of Palestinian suffering; but Adler’s presentation of its causes is two-dimensional. Below is essential context that listeners were denied:
Operation Cast Lead was an act of self-defense to stop the hail of rockets and mortars from Gaza whose intent was the murder of Israeli civilians -- over 12,000 since 2001. Dozens of Israelis have died in these attacks and thousands left traumatised including many schoolchildren. Where were their voices? Do Israeli victims not matter to the BBC? Does their suffering over the past decade not count?
We were invited to sympathise with the ‘high value’ that Gazans place upon education. But we were not told that in Hamas-run schools -- many named after suicide bombers -- pupils, far from learning how to live in peace with their Jewish neighbours or to build a stable society, are taught to hate Jews and aspire to martyrdom in the cause of Israel’s destruction. Nor were we told about damage to Israeli schools sustained during rocket attacks often timed to coincide with the Israeli school run. Why not?
The recent UNHCR report castigated Hamas’ routine use of civilian centres, including schools and mosques as launchpads for attacks, and their use of civilians as human shields during Operation Cast Lead calling them war crimes. These crimes contributed significantly to the death and destruction bewailed in Adler’s report. A 5-second reference to ‘masked Palestinian gunmen firing from the streets’ at the end of the piece is not sufficient to alert listeners to the reasons why some Gazan residential areas became targets for IDF forces.
Far from imposing a 'blockade' of goods, dozens of trucks carrying food, oil and other essentials enter Gaza every day from Israel. True, Israel places limits upon building materials. But why were we told that Israel does this to 'punish Hamas' without hearing Israel's (demonstrably true) riposte that Hamas will continue to hijack them to build tunnels for importing weapons and exporting terrorism -- as they have in the past? Can’t we be trusted to make up our own minds about where the truth lies?
We expect the BBC to report impartially and in context in accordance with its Charter and guidelines. Journalism like this -- partial and devoid of context -- becomes propaganda, not neutral reporting.
It raises further questions about the validity of the BBC's Licence Fee -- why should audiences be forced to fund reporting that is basically propaganda?
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's Speech at the UN General Assembly (24 September):
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, Nearly 62 years ago, the United Nations recognized the right of the Jews, an ancient people 3,500 years-old, to a state of their own in their ancestral homeland.
I stand here today as the Prime Minister of Israel, the Jewish state, and I speak to you on behalf of my country and my people.
The United Nations was founded after the carnage of World War II and the horrors of the Holocaust. It was charged with preventing the recurrence of such horrendous events. Nothing has undermined that central mission more than the systematic assault on the truth.
Yesterday the President of Iran stood at this very podium, spewing his latest anti-Semitic rants. Just a few days earlier, he again claimed that the Holocaust is a lie.
Last month, I went to a villa in a suburb of Berlin called Wannsee. There, on January 20, 1942, after a hearty meal, senior Nazi officials met and decided how to exterminate the Jewish people. The detailed minutes of that meeting have been preserved by successive German governments.
Here is a copy of those minutes, in which the Nazis issued precise instructions on how to carry out the extermination of the Jews. Is this a lie?
A day before I was in Wannsee, I was given in Berlin the original construction plans for the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. Those plans are signed by Hitler's deputy, Heinrich Himmler himself. Here is a copy of the plans for Auschwitz-Birkenau, where one million Jews were murdered. Is this too a lie?
This June, President Obama visited the Buchenwald concentration camp. Did President Obama pay tribute to a lie? And what of the Auschwitz survivors whose arms still bear the tattooed numbers branded on them by the Nazis? Are those tattoos a lie?
One-third of all Jews perished in the conflagration. Nearly every Jewish family was affected, including my own. My wife's grandparents, her father's two sisters and three brothers, and all the aunts, uncles and cousins were all murdered by the Nazis. Is that also a lie?
Yesterday, the man who calls the Holocaust a lie spoke from this podium. To those who refused to come here and to those who left this room in protest, I commend you. You stood up for moral clarity and you brought honor to your countries.
But to those who gave this Holocaust-denier a hearing, I say on behalf of my people, the Jewish people, and decent people everywhere: Have you no shame? Have you no decency?
A mere six decades after the Holocaust, you give legitimacy to a man who denies that the murder of six million Jews took place and pledges to wipe out the Jewish state. What a disgrace! What a mockery of the charter of the United Nations!
This article, from the Summer 2009 edition of City Journal, looks at the accomplishments of Jewish and Israeli people in the field of technological innovation and suggests that hope for the future rests in creativity and prosperity.
Silicon Israel: How market capitalism saved the Jewish state
By George Gilder
The most precious resource in the world economy is human genius, which we may define as the ability to devise significant inventions that enhance survival and prosperity. At any one time, genius is embodied in just a few score thousand people, a creative minority that accounts for most human accomplishment and wealth. Cities and nations rise and thrive when they welcome entrepreneurial and technical genius; when they overtax, criminalize, or ostracize it, they wither.
During the twentieth century, an astounding proportion of geniuses have been Jewish, and the fate of nations from Russia westward has largely reflected how they have treated their Jews. When Jews lived in Vienna and Budapest early in the century, these cities of the Hapsburg Empire were world centers of intellectual activity and economic growth; then the Nazis came to power, the Jews fled or were killed, and growth and culture disappeared with them. When Jews came to New York and Los Angeles, those cities towered over the global economy and culture. When Jews escaped Europe for Los Alamos and, more recently, for Silicon Valley, the world’s economy and military balance shifted decisively. Thus many nations have faced a crucial moral test: Will they admire, reward, and emulate a minority that has achieved towering accomplishments? Or will they writhe in resentment and plot its destruction?
This key article by Daniel Pipes on the 'peace process' has just been published:
When Barack Obama announced in June 2009 about Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy, "I'm confident that if we stick with it, having started early, that we can make some serious progress this year," he displayed a touching, if naïve optimism.
Indeed, his determination fits a well-established pattern of determination by politicians to "solve" the Arab-Israeli conflict; there were fourteen U.S. government initiatives just during the two George W. Bush administrations. Might this time be different? Will trying harder or being more clever end the conflict?
No, there is no chance whatever of this effort working.
Without looking at the specifics of the Obama approach — which are in themselves problematic — I shall argue three points: that past Israeli-Palestinian negotiations have failed; that their failure resulted from an Israeli illusion about avoiding war; and that Washington should urge Jerusalem to forego negotiations and return instead to its earlier and more successful policy of fighting for victory.
We wholeheartedly recommend this article by Gerald M Adler in the Journal Online, the members' magazine of the Law Society of Scotland. It is a response to an earlier article in the journal by Fraser Ritchie.
Fraser Ritchie’s article “Unequal before the law” (Journal, June 2009, 22; for fuller version click here) purports to describe an adverse humanitarian situation prevailing in and around the Arab village of Jayyous, located in “Israeli occupied Palestinian Territory” on the West Bank (OPT) and situated close to the Jewish settlement of Zufin. He raises three separate legal issues from which he draws certain conclusions. However, when subjected to rigorous examination, these conclusions prove to be unsubstantiated or misinterpreted, resulting from errors and omissions of fact and law.
You can download Anglican Friends of Israel's short pamphlet about Israel's 60th anniversary here. Please contact us if you would like to order copies for distribution to your church or organization.
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