Vanessa: Politics before compassion

The silver-spoon British Actress continues the journey she started when she embarked on her crusade against Zionists and their supporters. Her first public stand was courageously taken when she accepted her Oscar award, and declared her admiration for Jane Fonda for standing firm and refusing to be intimidated by a bunch of Zionist hoodlums.

She also pledged, with some self-defeating illogic, to continue to fight against antisemitism and fascism...

She has proven stalwart in her dedication to fight the Zionists and to advance the cause of antisemites in the world, in her latest act of extreme bravery:

The Telegraph: Two suspected al-Qa'eda operatives released from Guantanamo Bay have walked free from court although they are still wanted in Spain on terrorism-related offences.
One of the men, who is accused of distributing extremist propaganda produced by Osama bin Laden, had half of his £50,000 bail surety met by the actress Vanessa Redgrave.

Jamil el-Banna, 45, who was said during a brief court hearing to have helped run a cell called the Islamic Alliance, recruiting people to fight jihad in Afghanistan and Indonesia, returned to his London home tonight.
The other man, Omar Deghayes, 38, a Libyan national freed from Guantanamo and allowed into the UK because he once lived here, is said to have had links to the same al-Qa'eda cell. He was also released on bail. Spain issued European arrest warrants for both men within hours of their arrival in Britain last night from the Cuban detention centre.

Miss Redgrave said: "It is a profound honour and I am glad to be alive to be able to do this.' She added: "Guantanamo Bay is a concentration camp. It is a disgrace that these men have been kept there all these years."

Roger L. Simon blogs about it here.

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On the matter of these outlandish analogies I rely on Olivar Kamm's rule of thumb:

"Historical analogies are never exact but sometimes useful. If they are to be useful, then the precedent needs at a minimum to be stated accurately."

So let's see what is the precedent that should be accurately stated in Redgrave's analogy?

What is a concentration camp?

"Prior to and during World War II, Nazi Germany maintained concentration camps.. throughout the territories it controlled... The two principal groups of prisoners in the camps, both numbering in the millions, were Jews and Soviet prisoners of war (POWs). Large numbers of Roma (or Gypsies), Poles, political prisoners, homosexuals, people with disabilities, Jehovah's Witnesses and others—including common criminals—were also sent to the camps. In addition, a small number of Western Allied POWs were sent to concentration camps for various reasons.[1] Western Allied POWs who were Jews, or whom the Nazis believed to be Jewish, were usually sent to ordinary POW camps; however, a small number were sent to concentration camps under anti-semitic policies.[2]

In these concentration camps, millions of prisoners died through mistreatment, disease, starvation, and overwork, or were executed as unfit for labour; though they were not extermination or death camps which started in 1942.

Death camps were established for the sole purpose of carrying out the industrialized murder of the Jews of Europe—the Final Solution. These camps were located in occupied Poland and Belarus, on the territory of the General Government. Over three million Jews would die in them, primarily by poison gas, usually in gas chambers, although many prisoners were killed in mass shootings and by other means. These death camps, including Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka, and Auschwitz-Birkenau, are commonly but erroneously referred to as concentration camps, but Holocaust scholars draw a distinction between concentration camps (described in this article) and these extermination camps"

And what is Guantanamo Bay?

"Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a cooperative military prison and detention camp under the leadership of Joint Task Force Guantanamo since 2002.[1] The prison, established at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, holds people accused by the United States government of being terrorist operatives, as well as those no longer considered suspects who are being held pending relocation elsewhere. The detainment areas consist of three camps ... The detainees held by the United States were classified as enemy combatants.

Since the beginning of the War in Afghanistan, 775 detainees have been brought to Guantanamo, approximately 420 of which have been released. As of August 09, 2007, approximately 355 detainees remain"

(Source: Wikipaedia)

Death at Guantanamo Bay:

"Three detainees at U.S. Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, died of apparent suicides early this morning, military officials reported today...

The detainees appear to have hanged themselves with nooses made from clothing and bed sheets, Harris said."

[www.defenselink.mil/news/newsart...]


Clearly, Redgrave knows nothing about either the Concentration Camps or Gitmo, or else she would not be making such an uninformed analogy.

But she is nothing if not consistent about the pledge she made in 1977.

Never mind the enthusiastic analogy. It is after all just speech and speech is free.

What about the choice of bestowing her charity upon a detainee accused of “producing extremist propaganda for Osama bin Laden,” ? Yes, the very Bin Laden who issued a fatwa urging for a Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders.

Bin Laden is less choosy in his words. He is not shy about calling those who occupy Palestine "Jews" and offers his own solution to the Jewish problem.

Vanessa is a bit more discreet. She calls those same Jews "Zionist hoodlums", and pushes for a destruction of Israel, by way of solving her antisemitic problem.

It's not the first time that she donates money to a good cause. She was also an intrepid mover and shaker of the production of Rachel Corrie's play. Another terrorist sympathiser who was killed while actively defending a weapons cache meant for Israeli women and children.

Tariq Ramadan was banned from the USA for similar affiliations.

I somehow don't see Vanessa being banned from entering the USA. She is, after all, white, blond and British, while he is a Swiss, brown skinned, black haired Middle Easterner.

As I always say, antisemitism is not for Jews to cure. There is nothing Jews can do, short of commit sui-genocide, to cure this disease. It is up to non-Jews to identify this malignancy and extirpate the disease.

___________

As an Afterthought:

I can never quite understand the priorities of these people, who are willing to give so much money to such dubious causes. If I were Vanessa and had $50,000 to spare, I would ask myself: who is in most need of benefiting from this money? Would it be a suspected terrorist, or an entire year's supply of food and medication to a few thousands starving children in Africa? The answer is a no brainer, of course: The suspected terrorist.

Such is the choice of someone who puts her politics before her compassion.