Comment trail:

A stroll through the Arab street (continued from here)

@Dubai Jazz, the ornery music continues, again resorting to the talented caricaturist who won Achmadinejad's Holocaust-denial cartoon competition. Make no mistake, in some circles such an honour carries a lot of weight. This time the bilious and antisemitic cartoonist, who would not have felt out of place in the company of Julius Streicher makes a comment on the so-called "Apartheid Wall" which Israel has erected in order to separate the terrorists and various suicide bombers from their intended victims.

I left the following comment on Dubai Jazz's thread but, based on his past record of very little tolerance for Jews or others who do not quite share his views, the comment will in all probability be deleted:

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Here is the "obligatory Jew"* to provide some balance and facts:

"The barrier is necessary to protect Israeli civilians from Palestinian terrorism, including the suicide bombing attacks that increased significantly during the Al-Aqsa Intifada;[4] The significantly reduced number of incidents of suicide bombings from 2002 to 2005 has been partly attributed to the barrier;[5]" (wiki)

The Berlin Wall was intended as a prison for East Germans, keeping them locked into the Soviet part of Germany. The Separation barrier is intended to keep terrorists from entering into Israel or the Israeli settlements it encircles.

It is indisputable that the presence of the fence (as well as the increased number of checkpoints) prevented many atrocities from taking place. It allowed a certain pacification of the population which in turn saved not only Israeli life but the life of Palestinians as well.

Most importantly, it is not an irremovable fixture. When (if) the Palestinians decide that they want their own statehood, and the final borders are negotiated, then the barrier can come down, a lot faster than it went up.

However, I'm sort of puzzled by this commiseration with Palestinians about their inability to reach their fields easily when I consider that a Syrian national of such high morals and international sensibilities like DJ would be so much more concerned about oppression and real apartheid in his own backyard:

"So how does Syria treat this minority?

Roughly 300,000 of them are denied citizenship thus denying them the right to education, employment, property ownership, and even marriage.

Nor are they allowed to speak, write or print their own language and their culture cannot be expressed openly.

Odd, isn’t it? Mind you, as everybody knows the Zionist Entity is much much worse. Palestinians have no access to education, cannot work, purchase property or get married. It even bans Palestinians outright from speaking, reading and writing Arabic.

Oh wait. I may be wrong here….

Stateless Kurds who try to leave the country for work risk torture and imprisonment.

To be honest, it reminds me of a two-tier political system in which one group in a country is denied the rights that another enjoys. Though I seem to have forgotten its name. Ap… App… Ah! Apartheid! That’s it!"

http://www.hurryupharry.org/2009/12/14/welcome-to-syria/

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* "obligatory Jew" :)

You guys make it so easy to knock you down. You simply are incapable in keeping the entrenched animus a little better restrained. This incontinent need to express the contempt for Jews which you have been and are being fed by your educators and your state media.

Those uppity Jews, nudge nudge wink wink, eh?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ona-RhLfRfc

***

Here is one response to my comment (which had been deleted from the thread):

Oh where did CC's comment go ya DJ?

I wanna reply to it.. can I?

If not, please feel free to delete my comment.. otherwise, here is my reply to CC:

""The barrier is necessary to protect Israeli civilians from Palestinian terrorism, including the suicide bombing attacks that increased significantly during the Al-Aqsa Intifada;[4] The significantly reduced number of incidents of suicide bombings from 2002 to 2005 has been partly attributed to the barrier;[5]" (wiki)

The Berlin Wall was intended as a prison for East Germans, keeping them locked into the Soviet part of Germany. The Separation barrier is intended to keep terrorists from entering into Israel or the Israeli settlements it encircles."

Well well.. The State of Israel was itself born as a terrorist state. No one supported it except the big powers of the UK and USA (the biggest colonialists in modern history). After all, Israel is better and cheaper than combined UK/USA military bases in various Arab countries.

One of the main issues with the apartheid wall is that it is seen as a land grab as it is mainly built on contested Palestinian lands. The fact that it stops suicide bombers is irrelevant if it's built on the wrong piece of land.

I could go on and on about how Israel has directly made life hell for Palestinians and Lebanese and Syrians during its occupation of their land. After all Israel controls everything (including cement!) in a land that doesn't belong to her (e.g. Gaza)!

However, I will write to you about the epitome of irony. The Jewish people have produced some of the most brilliant minds in the world in the last 200 years. You have consistently punched way above your weight in the arts, music, science, politics, etc (the list truly does go on and on). Look at the Nobel prize for instance.

With about 180 Jewish winners (out of 829 total). This makes about 20% of the Nobel Prize winners Jewish while Jews make about 0.25% of the world population!

(Sources: 1, 2-I double checked the numbers here, and 3-further checks here at nobelprize.org)

To do some maths: 20% / 0.25% = x80! Thus Jews are about 80 times smarter than the rest of the world, on average!

So, with such a smart race, why are they so impotent in finding a solution towards a peaceful realization for their 2000 years of dreaming of a state?

Peace,

BuJ

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Note the inability to address directly the argument I made in response to the argument made in the Latuff cartoon:

A blames B for stealing a loaf of bread.

B says he did not steal it but bought the bread and here is the recipt as proof.

A responds by saying: who cares that you have a receipt? Your father was a thief and besides, if you are so smart, why do you have to steal bread instead of making it?

The whole exchange may seem non-sequitur and irrelevant but it makes perfect sense, for those brought up on the tradition that irrational thinking is the only rational way to think.

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Another stop in the Arab street, here:

The topic: Sayed al-Qimni

My Comment:

Why are you so concerned about the sentiments of people who recommend that apostates should be executed? Shouldn't it be the other way around?

Is Rose hinting that the man might be Jewish or have some favourable inclination towards Jews, and that this fact somehow has any bearing on what he is being put through?

The Inquisition used to persecute Mooriscos, for the same exact reason.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Inquisition#Repression_of_Moriscos

Does the golden rule means anything, or not?

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Update, two hours later:

As fully expected, both comments were deleted:

Here and here.

More from DJ's democratic mind, here.

I have to wonder at what point does the tension between what is averred and what is practiced snaps? And what would be the result of such a breakage? An epiphany? Or a withdrawal into complete La La land?

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UpdateII:

@ Buj al arab's blog, the blogger fumes at the British legal for failing to prosecute Tzippi Livni for "crimes against humanity". My comment:

Buj: I wonder why you put so much faith in the good judgment and moral righteousness of a country which only last week you assessed as declining into third-worldism. This Livni fiasco, in my humble opinion, is exactly one of the symptoms that characterises this decline in which UK legal system acts more like the legal system that can be found in Arab countries: clearly political, skewed and corrupt. If this were not so, one would wonder why LIvni deserves such attention when the UK fails to prosecute its own suspects, like Tony Blair's involvement in the Iraq war, or all the other heads of states who comprise the occupation forces in Afghanistan. I mean, why choose to focus on Israel first, when these other events took place earlier and are responsible for killing civilians in much much greater numbers than little Israel's defensive war has ever done or will do?

Can you answer this question?

Signed:

Obligatory Jew :)

I would also like to point to the illustration chosen by the worthy Buj for adorning his learned opinion: Livni as Hitler. It is a staple of the Arab street that every criticism involving Israel should be couched in Nazi terms. It is also a mark of great cognitive dissonance: The Arab street likes to believe that the Holocaust is a Zionist invention. If so then it makes sense to conclude that it never took place. Yet the choice tropes of Arab antisemitic discourse (which this post by Buj is one example, given his choice of illustration) is the swastika and Hilter. These symbols being deeply offensive to Jews and Israelis, Arab bloggers will use them. The question why they would choose to insult and pain Jews by symbols of an event that they claim never took place remains one of the usual enigmas; don't look for logic, historicity or proper perspective when you read or scrutinize Arab bloggers' premises. It's all about raging hormones, irrational leaps, distorted view of reality, and thundering lacunae.

And this is the kind of thinking Israeli politicians have to deal with, when they try to negotiate peace.