Colonel Desmond Travers, part of the UN ‘fact-finding’ mission to Gaza, which found both Israel and Hamas guilty of war crimes, is challenged by Jonathan Hoffman during a talk at LSE. Note how Travers completely dodges the second-half of Jonathan’s question. (Video by Jonathan Sacerdoti).
My post on ‘The Goldstone Test’ is here.
In 1982 Ehud Barak was a major general in the Israel Defence Force (IDF). He visited an infantry battalion during the early weeks of the first Lebanon war and told them to remember the women and babies that were waiting for them back at home. Little could he have known that in 2000, as he became Prime Minister and the babies of 1982 were being drafted to the IDF, that Israel would still be in Lebanon.
Every week it seems another of my Israeli friends proudly announces on Facebook the birth of a child. It makes me wonder what will be going on when those children reach 18 and are drafted into the IDF. I’m interested to hear your predictions. What will the situation be for Israel and its neighbours in 2028?
“I’ve been longing for my freedom for a long time,” said Gilad Shalit in this video last year. He has now been held for 1352 days.
Regular readers will remember with a wince the silly outbursts that singer Annie Lennox made during Operation Cast Lead. Lennox slammed Israel, totally ignored the Hamas rockets and complained that the television news reports of the operation ruined her Christmas ‘as a mother’. Well, exactly. It’s all about you isn’t it Annie? She didn’t leave it there, either. She also promoted and attended an anti-Israel demonstration that was co-organised by the British Muslim Initiative, whose President was quoted on Al Jazeera television as saying he hates “the evil Jew”. Nice.
Lennox was roundly mocked for the naivety of her remarks and has unsurprisingly proved reticent to comment on the issue ever since. However, this coming week she will appear on the BBC’s Hard Talk programme where she will tell viewers that she has changed her mind and has now decided ‘both sides are right and both sides are wrong’. Gee, thanks for that Annie.
I will close with a tale from a showbiz gathering of celebrities like Simon Cowell and leading journalists like Rebekah Wade and Piers Morgan. Cowell mischievously proposed that they compile a top 10 of showbiz divas. At number six was Annie Lennox. Her (unnamed) nominator explained: ‘She was breathtakingly grand and offensive to me. I was shocked. But then other big stars told me she’s always like that.’
Here is my latest column for Jewish News:
I first visited Israel in 2006 and on my return I wrote in these very hallowed pages about how tearfully thrilling it had been for me, a gentile philosemite, to finally meet my heroes. I went again in 2007 and then made my third visit to Israel last week. Here are some highlights…
1 As he had driven me through the sleet of east Berkshire to reach Heathrow Airport my taxi driver had spluttered on at me about Ashley Cole. The taxi driver who took me to my hotel in Tel Aviv put a beautiful classical music CD on as we cruised down Menachem Begin Road and we both played air piano. When I told him the name of my blog – Oy Va Goy – he nearly crashed the car laughing.
2 The following day I took the bus to Jerusalem and walked through the Kotel tunnels with my good friend Tal (pictured with me below). I really recommend a walk through the tunnels, though they are cramped. At one point we were followed down a very claustrophobia-inducing section by a large gang of young Israeli soldiers. I thought for a moment I was about to cop it for the British Mandate.
3 Ze’ev Jabotinsky is one of my heroes so I was excited to visit the Jabotinsky Museum. The cheerful guide took me to the presentation room and asked me to choose from two videos, explaining: “One is for your heart, one is for your brain.” I said “I have a very large brain so the brain one please.” He told me to sit in the third row for the best view. As I sat down he sighed: “No, that’s the fourth row. Not such a big brain, then…”
4 As it was a short trip I was only in the country for three lunches and three suppers. Of those six meals I ate shawarma in laffa for four of them. The physiological effects were far from ideal.
5 I lost count of how many iced coffees I bought from Aroma. Addictive – horribly unforgivably addictive.
6 A tip: if you want to pause for a moment in Mahane Yehuda Market to savour your halva-filled Hamantash then don’t worry about inconveniencing your fellows pedestrians – they’ll just barge straight through you. (cf Carmel Market the following day.)
7 The free internet wireless I discovered on the corner of Ben Yehuda and Frishman was handy for posting smug weather boasts on Twitter. I wasn’t the only one who regularly paused there for an iPhone session – I saw the same glamorous Jewess several times. I even got a smile out of her on the last day.
8 On my final evening in Tel Aviv I was punished for all my Twitter weather-boasts when there was what can only be described as a biblical rain storm. With the roads of the city having little drainage whole blocks turned into a river. So we took refuge in a great business just off Dizengoff Square which combines a cafe, a DVD store and a launderette. The rain was perfectly-timed – the heavens opened just after I had bought souvenirs for me and just as I was about to look for presents for friends. Not my fault I came back empty-handed, people – take it up with the big guy.
9 As I arrived at Ben Gurion for my return flight I remembered my first trip when I received a 150-minute questioning and search at the airport. I love Israelis and I love talking about myself so I was secretly hoping for more of the same this time. To my disappointment they whizzed me through check-in with barely a whimper. What am I – chopped liver?
10 As my flight home lifted off the land of Israel I was gripped by one thought. Come back. Come back soon.
You can read Jewish News online here.
The moaning of Israel-bashers about the assasination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh has revealed just how disingenuous their complaints about defensive actions such as Operation Cast Lead are.
Whenever Israel is forced into military action its opponents claim they are not opposed to terrorists being targetted, but merely concerned about civilians caught in the crossfire. But then when they believe that Israel has eliminated a terrorist with zero collateral damage they still complain.
It’s all very strange. One wonders what it was about the demise of a vile antisemitic terrorist that so saddened them…
Here is a small selection of photographs from my recent visit to Israel. I am writing my next Jewish News column about the trip and I will post that here on Wednesday.
At the Kotel (Western Wall) in Jerusalem
Graffiti for Gilad Shalit in Tel Aviv/Yaffo
Loving Shenkin Street with the lovely Hadar
With my good friend Tal at Cafe Hillel
The ridiculous play My Name Is Rachel Corrie continues to tour the UK and the world. Now Corrie’s parents are to sue the Israeli Defence Ministry. The case is due to start on March 10 in Haifa.
Enough already. It’s time for this grotesque, hagiographical roadshow of distortion and omission to stop. As Tom Gross wrote, what about the forgotten Rachels?
I see that former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ming Campbell reckons the Israeli government “has some explaining to do”.
Blimey, I bet Bibi’s cacking it…
So I fly to Israel next week and I am very excited to be returning for my third visit to my favourite country.
I’ve got lots planned including a visit to Jerusalem with my good friend Tal where we will say hi to a few readers of this blog. I will spend a couple of days in Tel Aviv where I will be hanging out with the extended Beyond Beseder crew, some of who I met in London last summer. I am also meeting up again with a few of the friends I made out there while researching my Six Day Phwoar feature in 2006.
I’m so excited and I just can’t hide it. I will tell you all about how it went right here.
Amazing things are created in Israel. Here’s one of the next marvels, the roll-up computer…
I will be in Israel during the final week of February. I have lots set up and will divide my time between Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Efrat. I might be visiting Sderot, also.
Anyway, I’m coming back, people!
Robert Fisk has such a history of distorted reporting of Israel that a new term was coined in his dishonour: ‘fisking’, meaning the effortless dissection of biased journalism such as his. In today’s Independent he has written a lengthy article – actually it’s more of a tantrum, the caffeine seems to kick-in between paragraphs four and five – full of holes.
Take for instance his use of language about Operation Cast Lead: Israeli missiles ’slaughtered’, while Hamas rockets ‘fell on Sderot’, as if the latter happened by accident. If you fancy a giggle then click here to see an ageing anti-Israel bigot throw his toys out of the pram.
He’s quite a guy is Mr Fisk. When the Taliban beat him up in 2002 he said he deserved it. He might think that, I couldn’t possibly comment.
This contains some upsetting scenes, but is an ultimately uplifting short film.
