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Ben White, Ali Abunimah and ‘Comment is Free’ moderators’ egregious double standards


The Guardian’s ‘10 Simple Guidelines‘ for commenting beneath the line include the following:

1. We welcome debate and dissent, but personal attacks (on authors, other users or any individual), persistent trolling and mindless abuse will not be tolerated. The key to maintaining the Guardian website as an inviting space is to focus on intelligent discussion of topics.

8. Keep it relevant. We know that some conversations can be wide-ranging, but if you post something which is unrelated to the original topic (“off-topic”) then it may be removed, in order to keep the thread on track. This also applies to queries or comments about moderation, which should not be posted as comments.

Simple, no? Guardian readers must keep their comments on-topic and free of personal attacks against the author.

However, evidently Guardian moderators can make exceptions depending on the particular Guardian commenter.

The inaugural post at Josh Trevino’s new column on American politics at ‘Comment is Free’ (‘On politics, power and persuasion’, August 20th) was titled ‘Romney-Ryan, counterintuitive champions of Medicare‘ and elicited the following comments from professional Israel hater and friend of antisemites the world-over, Ben White. (Links to comments are here and here.)

White, of course, is referring to the row – which we’ve been covering – over a couple of Tweets by Trevino relating to the terrorist linked Mavi Marmara.

About 20 minutes later, Ali Abunimah, co-founder of the blog which instigated the row and a person whose Tweets have included support for the launching of a violent Third Intifada, endorsement of the Israel-Nazi analogy and, most recently, a bizarre conspiracy theory, commented thus:

So then someone named ‘Adam Levick’ weighed in, asking if moderators would delete White’s comments, which clearly ran afoul of the Guardian’s ‘community standards’. 

Within about 10 minutes the comment disappeared without a trace.

Subsequent attempts by this commenter to inquire about the comments of Abunimah elicited this message:

That’s right. The user privileges of ‘Adam Levick’ were suspended for what was evidently ‘Comment is Free’ apostasy, while the comments by White and Abunimah cited above have, as of the time of writing, not been deleted. 

If you want to complain about the Guardian’s double standards – and failure to abide by their own rules – please consider emailing or Tweeting ‘Comment is Free’ editor Becky Gardiner.

becky.gardiner@guardian.co.uk 

@becky_gardiner

172 replies »

  1. I reported White’s off-topic posts as soon as I read the article/thread a couple of hours ago. They are still up there!

    No surprise that Adam’s response was deleted. OK – it was an off-topic response to an off-topic post. But what if Adam had posted the same BTL on an article penned by White himself? Would it have taken the mods any more than the same 10 mins to remove it?

    And if they’re so quick on the trigger – how come White’s rubbish is still standing?

    Add to that the fact that this is – I believe – Trevino’s debut article at the G.! Shouldn’t they be be making a special effort to protect him?

    • WOW I just checked in at the Groan and the thread. I guess 80% of comments are off topic. So much for that liberal balanced moderation. It is a mud slinging fest and a free fire zone. They are bulldozing the Groans high principals. I’d say they are shooting them in the unarmed head. Down right flattening the discourse. You know, like storming public discourse and screaming it down. Demolished. Uprooted.

    • Here is Becky Gardiners reply to me after asking about the off topic torrent :

      Dear Daniel
      Joshua Trevino is not a one-off contributer but will be blogging regularly. His appointment as a regular columnist has caused controversy and was being discussed all over the internet, as I am sure you are aware. Therefore it was decided, in consultation with Joshua, that some discussion about the appointment was inevitable and was not strictly off topic, and would be allowed in the debut column so long as it complied with our community standards etc. 
      best wishes
      Becky 

      • Word-for-word the same reply I got from her as well!
        What compliance with “community standards”?

        And will it be OK for posters to attack Ben White below his columns and include his more unsavory past comments (which would at least be on topic – unlike in Trevino’s case)?

  2. Oh, NOW I get it.

    CiFWatch spends all of its time criticising CiF content, its writers, its editor, without much of an impact.

    When a pro-murder writer is appointed and criticised, rather than joining in the criticism, CiFWatch does a 180 and decides to publish article after article defending the man, offering apologea for his incitement.

    So what, do we conclude, is the motivation? Could it possibly be jealousy? Could it be that critics such as Abunimah and White have stolen your thunder?

    I’m still perplexed that when you actually have something to criticise a contributor at CiF about, you decide to do a 180 and defend him. Most odd.

    • CiFWatch does a 180 and decides to publish article after article defending the man, offering apologea for his incitement.

      CiFW has done nowt of the kind.

      This one is more a question of form than content.

    • ‘Avram’,
      There is no pro murder writer. When soldiers use lethal force in armed conflict it is not murder. Get over it and move on.

      You again, as always, take things out of context and make up your own agenda. This is a site about the Groan and Israel and so every piece will be about the Groan and Israel.

      CifWatch does have an impact for it constantly keeps a record of the Groan’s mistakes. Adam does a commendable job. Unlike Ali & Co this site does have an impact for it clearly proves an anti Semitic and anti Zionist bias coupled with complete ignorance about Hebrew’s at the Groan.

      ‘Avram’ you are beginning to read like a troll. This however is superseded by your anti Semitic cock ups which invariably happen when you spread your rubbish on these pages. You have no idea what it feels like to the majority here when people like you out themselves through their moral indignation as anti Semites . Blogs like Cif Watch do a terrific job at luring antisemites out of their holes.

      • “There is no pro murder writer.”

        And if a Muslim writer at CiF had written “Dear Flotilla: If you end up killing a few Jews, most Muslims are cool with that” – would you be defending them?

        Pure racism.

              • ?? I assert that a if a Muslim contributor had made such a tweet, CiFWatch would be all over it like a rash.

                But with Trevino, CiFWatch issues a salvo of articles in his defence.

                I suggest that this might be about ethnicity.

                • If a Muslim contributor had said the exact same thing Trevino did in the same context (i.e. about Americans on the flotilla)?

                  You’re talking nonsense.

                  And besides: CiFWatch has not issued “a salvo of articles in his defence”.

                  • Am I?

                    If a Muslim contributor had tweeted “Dear Flotilla: If you end up killing some Jews, most Muslims would be OK with it. Including me” – you know as well as I do what the CiFWatch response would be.

                    Instead, we have a salvo of articles (without any criticism of Trevino’s incitement) criticising the criticism of Trevino’s incitement and attempting to distract from his incitement.

                    That is a puzzling position for CiFWatch to take.

                    • I don’t think so. I think CiFWatch has made a massive error here.

                      The fact that not one person has been able to answer my hypothetical question about a Muslim CiF contributor tells me I might be right.

                      Adam is normally quite careful to maintain plausible deniability when it comes to racism. This is over that line.

                    • @ Avram

                      You were making the accusation of “pure racism” – the direct comparison being a Muslim writer posting exactly the same tweet as Trevino.

                      Have you come across a Muslim writer saying “If you end up shooting any Americans on the new Gaza flotilla – well, most Americans are cool with that”? If such a writer were now in Trevino’s position and CiFW were to condemn them – yes, that would obviously be bigotry.

                      Bear in mind that CiFW regularly condemns Jewish, Christian and other non-Muslim writers. Hardly “pure racism” – which is why I called you deeply dishonest.

              • Precisely. ‘avram’ decontextualizes , then inserts and makes up another story bouncing that one of the one he made up already. I am getting dizzy here. ‘Avram’ is a great example on how the Lefts skews discourse and then tries to take over the debate. Is this not trolling? One gets ones comments erased on other blogs for this sort of nonsense, see 972.

        • Cif is much more subtle as to publish something like that. They give a stage to Hamas and other murdering antisemites and get much flak for it. And again there is no murder story. You interprete , there is a difference. I don’t answer anti Semites questions.
          You chose to ignore my valid points and again take things out of context.

          • All I did was take Trevino’s tweet, and replace the actors with Jews and Muslims. If no murder was intended, would you be defending a Muslim contributor who had made that tweet?

            We both know why you won’t answer.

            • Arab media is FULL of antisemitism. The iranians have been screaming for Jewish blood repeatedly during the last days.
              And I am not defending Trevino, again you twist words all the time. He did not call for a murder. Since we can not agree on the facts here it is pointless to go on. Ditto your enthusiasm for Marxist academic onanism.

              • I just want to be clear – if a Muslim CiF contributor had tweeted “Dear Flotilla: If you end up killing a few Jews, that’s fine with most Muslims. Including me.” – would you be defending that contributor?

                • You have still to explain the “pure racism” charge – presumably because you’ve already been backtracking and know you were talking nonsense.

                    • It would help if you actually explained your charge of “pure racism” as originally made yesterday at 7:54 am. The onus is on you.

                    • You’re such a victim.

                      Would it surprise you that most folks won’t respond to an idiot who has developed a strawman argument?

                      I guess you’re pro-Murder because you think it’s wrong that not enough IDF died during your precious Flotilla incident.

                      Oh well. Live to fight another day, Tough Guy. Cry on.

        • Totally different statement. Makes no sense. But it fits in with the other nonsense you give off. So I understand.

    • Simple question: Do you agree or disagree that Guardian editors violated their own community standards by failing to delete off-topic comments, containing ad hominem attacks, by Abunimah and White? That was, after all, the point of my post.

      I’ll get to your Trevino related point after I get an answer to this.

      • Probably. I have no idea what their standards are, having never read CiF. But I’ll happily agree with you.

        • Ok, as for Trevino: I wouldn’t Tweet what he did, but I share his impatience with those who suggest that we should feign sympathy for terrorists and their sympathizers like those on the Mavi Marmara. As the Palmer commission (and videos of the “crew” on board just prior to the boarding by the IDF) can testify to: the pro-Hamas ‘activists’ planned a violent provocation the entire time. IHH is the party responsible for the deaths on May 31, not the IDF. And, finally, to characterize Trevino’s Tweet as ‘incitement’…I mean come on. Who did he incite? The IDF. Seriously?

          • So the question stands. If a Muslim CiF contributor had tweeted the following:

            “Dear Flotilla: If you end up killing a few Jews, most Muslims would be OK with it. Including me.”

            Would you be offering the same apologea and the same “compassionate” understanding?

            • Trevino never mentioned anything about Muslims. But, of course, you knew that. There’s a huge moral difference between expressing hate for terrorists who happen to be Muslim vs. such hate for Muslims as such. There’s nothing which could possibly be characterized as racist in Trevino’s Tweets. He holds those who are in any way sympathetic towards Hamas in contempt, as do I.

              • “Trevino never mentioned anything about Muslims. ”

                Never claimed he did. My question was hypothetical.

                “There’s a huge moral difference between expressing hate for terrorists who happen to be Muslim”

                His “hate”, as you put it, was not for terrorists, but for civilians (who happened to be American) attempting to transport humanitarian aid. Regardless of what you think of the flotilla’s merits – Trevino was “cool” with these people being murdered.

                Now, had a Muslim CiF contributor tweeted:

                “Dear flotilla: If you end up killing some Jews, most Muslims would be OK with it. Including me.”

                You know that you would not be lending that person your sympathy and apologea.

                If I had then come on here and told you that expressing hate for soldiers (who happened to be Jewish) defending an inhuman blockade was morally very different to hating Jews “as such” – you would be having a field day.

                Inciting the murder of American political activists is pretty terrible. The “pass” that you are giving him is an example of an “egregious double standard”.

          • In an article bemoaning CiF’s “egregious double standards”, you’re in a precariously balanced glass house.

    • No, you don’t “get it” Avram. You may think you do, but you don’t and your probably never will. You don’t come here to participate in debate but rather
      you are stuck at the Oedipal rage stage. That is not meant to be insulting, rather a description of your psychological state as evidenced in the content of your posts.

    • Actually, you totally do not get it.

      What is at issue here is that Ben White and several others are allowed to get away with ad hominem attacks on Trevino that are flagrantly in contradiction to the sacred community standards that are enforced against others commenters who have opposing views about articles that people like White and Abunimeh write.

      Were White’s comments created by someone else, and directed at him or any of the Guardian’s pet Hamas columnists, they would be deleted instantly and quite possibly the commenter would have his or her “commenting privileges” withdrawn.

  3. Perhaps it’s not jealousy. Perhaps it is racism.

    Would CiFWatch publish article after article (after article (after article) ) defending a Muslim contributor who had incited murder? I doubt it.

    So jealousy or racism. The two most plausible explanations for CiFWatch’s bizarre 180.

    • Had Trevino actually called for murder, I sincerely doubt he’d be with the Groan now. Or any other paper. So once again we are at the point where this non murder story is warmed up again and again by Ali ( covered in fungus by now it is so old ) and Leftys like you are jumping off the cliff thinking there is actually a story at the bottom.

      On another illogical point of your’s where you agree with Pape academically yet not politically. Pape like Shlomo Sand is a Marxist/socialist. So their ‘academic’ approach is through Marxism, separating Pape’s academia from his politics is impossible. Pape has become a political player through and through. To claim otherwise is either a lie or stupid.

      • You didn’t answer my question about whether you would be defending a Muslim contributor had they issued the same tweet about Jews.

        And if you are completely ignorant of any kind of scholarly methods, probably best not to comment on them. Marxist theory is a perfectly common prism through which to analyse all manner of phenomena.

        I also disagree with Morris politically (he is a staunch Zionist), but I think he is a first rate historian. If you only accept knowledge from people you agree with politically….well, take a look around on this blog if you want to see what can happen to you.

        • Marxism is a common prism? What? Marxism has failed with terrible results across the globe. Why would I follow or agree with someone’s Marxist prism when it clearly has nothing new to add? It is academic onanism regardless of the topic at hand. Marxism is dead as disco and attempting to sell a Marxist solution to the I/P question when the majority of PLO apparatchiks went through commie school in Leipzig, east Berlin , Moscow, Sofia etc…??
          If you use a broken tool, Marxism , to attempt to find a solution how do you expect to get a satisfactory answer?
          Speaking of the Marxist approach, most of the rabid anti zionists are in fact Marxists. As can be seen on the various speakers lists when anti zionists come together for Israeli hate feasts.

          The Soviets of course only used the Pal’s and wider Arab fools during the cold war. All those Arabs who studied behind the iron curtain were there as tools. The Marxist’s never gave a flying monkey about the Arabs, they instrumentalised them against their western enemy. The Arabs, getting free board and lodging and weapons bought into this charade. They even ended up attempting their own version, the Ba’ath idea, which indecently also was still born and produced Saadam and Assad and Nasser, all AAA mofos in their own right.

          I think it is safe to say that no Marxist academic gets any serious traction in our time, unless they are on Press TV and RT TV. Why would they? A good university will not have some goof ball wasting precious money on ideas that the majority of students don’t want to hear.
          In fact there is a small group of former Pal fighters and activist from the 70s who have ended up at second or third grade universities across the USA. One of them is this angry man http://angryarab.net/ . Another would be Nada Elia.

          • “Marxism is a common prism? What? Marxism has failed with terrible results across the globe.”

            lol – I’m not going to try to teach you the basics of Critical Theory, it’s not my place. Perhaps start with this:

            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory

            Then maybe Google “Antonio Gramsci” and take it from there.

              • ??

                I’m not sure how you got from one of the prominent frameworks of critical analysis to the existence of Israel.

                • Yes, I know you don’t understand. Or maybe you don’t want to understand. A mate of Gramsci’s was Georg Lukacs another communist. The thing about all this Marxist stuff is that it never went beyond the lecture hall or reeducation camps. I am a rational man. So to engage you after 1989 on a serious discussion on Marxist ideas would be a waste of time. You see, I grew up very very close to the iron curtain. I fact I used to throw stones across it. My family and I crossed it dozens of times. You insult those who were murdered persecuted and tortured by peddling Pape and others who push this crap. You insult humanity.

                  • Take it up with the journals, academics and humanities departments in Universities across the world (including Israel) that use Critical Theory.

                    If you don’t understand what it is, that’s fine. But don’t pretend that you do and then criticise based on your ignorance.

                    • We already know that you are a imposter, not a marxist as you just post links but cannot deliver an critical analysis.

                      Critical Theorists and their positions to Israel:

                      Am 5. Juni 1967, dem Tag des Ausbruchs des Sechs-Tage-Krieges, schrieb Adorno an seine Wiener Freundin Lotte Tobisch: “Wir machen uns schreckliche Sorgen wegen Israel. (…) In einem Eck meines Bewußtseins habe ich mir immer vorgestellt, daß das auf die Dauer nicht gut gehen wird, aber daß sich das so rasch aktualisiert, hat mich doch völlig überrascht. Man kann nur hoffen, daß die Israelis einstweilen immer noch militärisch den Arabern soweit überlegen sind, daß sie die Situation halten können.” (Adorno/Tobisch 2003: 197) Einen Tag später sprach er öffentlich, als er sich zu der Ermordung des Studenten Benno Ohnesorg in Berlin äußerte, auch von dem “Furchtbaren, das Israel, der Heimstätte zahlloser vor dem Grauen geflüchteter Juden, droht.” (zit. n. Kraushaar 1998: 241) Zwei Jahre später war Adorno vom Niederbrüllen des israelischen Botschafters in Frankfurt durch deutsche linke und arabisch-nationalistische Studenten dermaßen entsetzt, daß er in einem Brief an Herbert Marcuse gar von der Gefahr eines Umschlagens der Studentenbewegung in Faschismus sprach (vgl. ebd.: 652)

                      “Das faschistische Wunschbild heute verschmilzt ohne Frage mit dem Nationalismus der sogenannten unterentwickelten Länder (…). Einverständnis mit denen, die in der imperialistischen Konkurrenz sich zu kurz gekommen fühlten, und selber an den Tisch wollen, drückte schon während des Krieges in den slogans von den westlichen Plutokratien und den proletarischen Nationen sich aus.” (1959: 565)

                      Marcuse, der für die regressiven Tendenzen in der Studentenbewegung sehr viel weniger sensibilisiert war als Adorno und Horkheimer, erklärte sich mit dem Grundmotiv der zionistischen Bewegung solidarisch: “Ich kann nicht vergessen, daß die Juden jahrhundertelang zu den Verfolgten und Unterdrückten gehörten, daß sechs Millionen von ihnen vor nicht allzu langer Zeit vernichtet worden sind. Das ist eine Tatsache. Wenn endlich für diese Menschen ein Bereich geschaffen wird, in dem sie vor Verfolgung und Unterdrückung keine Angst mehr zu haben brauchen, so ist das ein Ziel, mit dem ich mich identisch erklären muß.” (2004: 142)

                      Max Horkheimer war sich bereits im Klaren darüber, daß der Antizionismus als Platzhalter für den Antisemitismus dienen mußte und sah die diesbezüglichen Überschneidungen zwischen staatssozialistischer und nationalsozialistischer Propaganda. 1969 schrieb er in einem Brief an Zachariah Shuster: “In der Nationalzeitung wird das Wort `Juden`, wie in den Zeitungen des Ostblocks, durch `Zionisten` (…) ersetzt.” (1949-1973: 725) Wie man in einer Notiz aus dem Jahre 1970 nachlesen kann, registrierte Horkheimer, auch wenn das in der öffentlichen Auseinandersetzung mit der Studentenbewegung kaum eine Rolle spielte, die Verbrüderung der deutschen Linken mit der damals noch viel unumwundener auf Vernichtung setzenden palästinensischen Nationalbewegung (vgl. 1949-1969: 539)

                      Besonders deutlich formulierte er seine Befürchtungen in einer längeren Notiz aus dem Jahr 1960, die den Titel Vom Sinn des Neonazismus trägt: “Um die Jahreswende 1959/60 sind in sehr vielen westlichen oder zum Westen haltenden Ländern Synagogen und andere Gebäude mit pronationalistischen, antisemitischen Losungen und Symbolen bedeckt worden. (…) Ich habe eine Vorstellung vom Sinn der Aktion. Sie geht von Nasser und seinen nazistischen Beratern aus, hinter denen mutmaßlich auch manche Gruppen in Deutschland stehen. Trotz Wirtschaftswunder und Aufrüstung ist die Bundesrepublik allein zu schwach, um den Traum vom Dritten Machtfaktor oder wenigstens des Züngleins an der Waage zu verwirklichen. Nicht wenige mächtige Männer mögen deshalb einen Sinn, ja ein Interesse an Nassers Ideen haben, das Feldgeschrei gegen Israel, das die arabischen Völker einigen sollte, auch auf weitere Nationen auszudehnen. (…) Der Plan ist die starke, Rußland wie Amerika gegenüber machtvolle, dritte Gewalt darzustellen, einen faschistischen Block, der Staaten der alten Welt mit den sogenannten unterentwickelten Völkern zusammenfaßt.” (1949-1969: 100)

                      Adam, if you want to, I try a translation.

            • The reason why Marxism failed, or at least one of them is that it was always a simple idea that has been disproven after being tried out on hundreds of million of people across the globe. It is not my place here to explain to you WHY it failed. But try googling democracy and personal responsibility and human nature.

              • Please, before you make a bigger fool of yourself, learn what Critical Theory is.

                p.s. There has never been a Marxist state.

                • There has never been a Marxist state.

                  But if a give up my personal freedoms you will make it happen? You and Ali ? When posters like you jump from detail to detail always changing the topic at hand it usually means they are WAY oudda depth. You lost the tweet argument, the Marxist point and are now going for the critical theory. What next? Solar power?
                  But as I recall there never was a call for murder, although some twisted Marxist would have found one, but you came up with anyway. Then there is the racist thing, which you bounced of another mirage you made up and so Marxist theory goes.

                  About your non existent Marxist state, I guess all those imprisoned souls behind the iron curtain should have held tight a few more years and then there would have been a Marxist state ? The Socialist state being the glorious precursor? Along with your truly sick and twisted analogies of 48 and the Shoa you tick all the boxes. You people never change. Your creativity is limited only by how many times you can rearrange the word and dead bodies that you stumbled over on the way to Cif Watch.
                  Btw? How is the situation in the Arab region as of now? You have anything warped to tell us here? Are the Arabs closer to freedom? Or may there be another 20.000 murdered in Aleppo? What does the Marxist prism say? Critical theorists? Answers? Suggestions? Tips? Routes? Solutions?

                  • Can I offer you a piece of advice? It’s a basic piece of military wisdom – don’t reinforce failure.

                    You could have just said you don’t know what one of the most pervasive tools of critical theory was. You didn’t have to did yourself a big hole.

                    Stop digging.

                    • Failure?
                      What ? like Marx? And Arab political theory of the last one hundred years? You mean that failure? I dig the way you change the topic then turn the tables. Like a neo nazi. Speaking of critical theory, not much in sight across the Arab world. Don’t criticize! Follow the patriarch. Shut up and sit down.
                      ‘Avram’ you are trying to peddle a dead baby. It stinks to high heaven. No word twisting will make the propaganda and inner decay go away.

                    • Your second Nazi analogy. And anti-Arab racism to boot.

                      Seems I had you pegged correctly after all.

                      Shalom.

                    • No Anti Arab racism, just watching the news out of Arabia where murder torture and a systemic political failure across the social spectrum is a daily accurance. Pointing out the obvious is hardly racism.

        • I repost my post from yesterday:

          The tweet :
          “Dear IDF: If you end up shooting any Americans on the new Gaza flotilla – well, most Americans are cool with that. Including me.”

          This is obviously not a call to murder. Trevino writes ‘if you end up’, this to me means should the situation escalate, as it did on the Marvi Marmara, he would be ,cool’ should some Americans get lunched. Recalling the three hikers who spent a year in an Iranian prison, I know that many Americans had very little sympathy with them. Those who know the USA, know that personal responsibility is held very high in that nation. So if you knowingly end up in a potentially lethal situation you need to take responsibility. This is in stark contrast with Ali’s socialist world view.”
          _________________________
          ‘Avram’, where does Trevino call for murder? And my answer to your last question would be I am not going to answer that because you are decontextualizing and twisting words. Stick to the subject matter.
          Since Trevino does NOT call for murder. Had he done so, I doubt he’d be writing for any news papers. Trevino would most likely have faced criminal charges in the USA. You are following Ali’s line of argument which is always fundamentally flawed.

          Or put more simply, I do not think there was a call for murder.

          • I used the same phrasing:

            “Dear Flotilla: If you end up killing some Jews, most Muslims would be OK with that. Including me.”

            You know as well as I do that your apologea would be absent.

            • Onanism. Stick to the subject at hand and don’t twist it like a Marxist or Islamist. It was a very simple tweet. How come the Groan which loves to hate does not follow your line? How come you are the only one going on about this?

    • Avram, a propos my previous post, do you have a psychiatrist? Is it time, do you think, to hook up with one, or, if you have one, to make an appointment? Because you are still doing it and contributing nothing to debate here.

  4. We have to remember that the Guardian’s Cif isn’t a level playing field, and isn’t really intended to be, but obviously the moderators can’t publicly say so. It’s a horrible feeling of injustice to be unfairly deleted from a Cif thread, as has happened to me on a few occasions. However, given how rarely I post on Cif threads that means relatively it’s happened to me quite a lot.
    The sheer injustice of not being allowed to respond to some anti-Israel, or untrue pro-Islamic claim, no matter how on-topic, factual and moderately phrased one’s response might be, makes a mockery of the very title ‘Comment is free’ (although I’ve never actually been banned myself).
    The mere fact that Adam Levick has been barred for a comment that could hardly be described as offensive or inaccurate is proof of how rattled the Guardian must be over the existence of Cifwatch.
    Keep up the good work, Adam and all the team, and many thanks for all you have achieved so far.

  5. First time I have been able to go from top to bottom on an CiF article and report every single one for being off topic.

  6. Ali Abunimah is a known liar.
    He posted this nonsense this year.

    http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2012/02/now-twitter-helps-fuel-hateful-arab.html
    Febuary 12, 2012
    Now Twitter helps fuel hateful Arab incitement Friday night, I discovered that on his Electronic Intifada blog, Ali Abunimah had put up a post claiming that Likud leaders were planning to go to Al-Aqsa early Sunday morning and that they were calling for “cleansing” Jerusalem and building a Jewish temple instead of the mosque. At the bottom of the post, Abunimah added an update that half-heartedly acknowledged that there was no basis to the story.

    “There’s certainly no doubt that whoever published this flyer […] is tapping into a history of calls and growing support for destroying Al-Aqsa. Feiglin’s supporters too are clear about their desire to take over the Temple Mount.”
    In response, I wrote a post pointing out that spurious claims about Jewish threats to the Al-Aqsa mosque had been used by Arab agitators for almost a hundred years: it was the notorious mufti Haj Amin al Husseini who first used this libel in the 1920s. In the almost 100 years that have passed since then, it was of course only sites sacred to Jews that were desecrated and destroyed in Jerusalem.

    When I wrote this post last night, I noted that Abunimah’s post had about 100 tweets and some 150 Facebook endorsements. Some 24 hours later, it had 381 tweets and 523 Facebook “likes”, and there were the beginnings of a Twitter intifada: word of the evil designs of the wicked Likudniks had reached the popular Egyptian-American writer Mona Eltahawy, who send out a tweet about it – and she has more than 100 000 followers…

    Luckily, by that time, Anne-Marie Slaughter, former Director of Policy Planning at the U.S. State Department and professor at Princeton, had also gotten word of the story and found out that it was a hoax. Realizing that it was a very dangerous hoax, she sent out multiple tweets to alert her more than 20 000 followers.

    Mona Eltahawy quickly deleted her original tweet and also helped to get out the message that it was a hoax, but by that time, the Al-Aqsa libel was already spreading like wildfire. As one tweet by a professor of sociology put it: “Scared of all the fake rumors about Al #Aqsa. First rule of sociology is if enough people believe something, it will have real consequences.”

    Maybe Ali Abunimah will be pleased by the thought that just like with his #IsraelHates- campaign, he once again managed to cause a stir in the Twittersphere – and this time around, there was even the specter of going beyond a merely verbal “Electronic Intifada” to a real intifada of senseless violence and bloodshed.
    The Al Aqsa Heritage Foundation and various Muslim firebrands are well-known for creating false rumors about supposed Israeli designs on the Temple Mount. They do it practically every week on their website, and many of those make it into the mainstream Palestinian Arab press. Here are just a few I have documented over the years:

    November 2008: Israel Antiquities Authority drawing up plans to build the Third Temple
    April 2009: Israel is building a subway to the Temple Mount
    June 2009: Netanyahu is planning to build the Third Temple
    September 2009: Israel will give exclusive access to Jews to the Al Aqsa Mosque for 50 days a year
    February 2010: Cracks on the Temple Mount is from Israeli construction and plans to destroy it
    March 2010: Israel will start construction of the Third Temple on March 16, 2010

    Now we have Twitter and inciters like Abiminah who are willing to help these rumors spread even faster. And it would be funny if it wasn’t true that sometimes rumors like these lead to deadly results.

    • You should search for Ali’s tv appearances on YouTube. The man is like a Communist Commisar laying down the party line. He speaks like a robot squeeeeezing every broadcast second so he can fill it with his sickening made up discourse. Here’s a man who understands media and tries hard to introduce and entire new discourse, logic and dictionary into three minutes of airtime. His dedication is frightening.
      Ali is a son of Goebbels. No doubt about it.

  7. As you pointed out earlier(in a different post), White at the Guardian is somewhat of a unique entity – on the hand, his “letters to the editor”, are published very modestly, without identifying his long standing anti-Israel campaigns, and those that were flavoured with a generous dose of anti-Semitism; you’d think that this was just “another concerned citizen”.
    Nor has his cosying up to Hamas been mentioned…

    Still, I think that for all the outrage exhibited by bigots like White, Abunimah, and others, the Guardian(as I believe you yourself indicated), will treat this with a despondent yawn…
    If there’s anything institutions like this don’t like, it’s inside criticism, or reproach, from their supposed compeers.
    Trevino(whose employment at the Guardian is in itself, very suspicious. And, as we’ve already discussed, likely motivated by an overwhelming desire to discredit the Right), will most likely stay, for the above reasons, and continue to vex the readership in general, for this, and other inflammatory statements he may make in future.
    Mission Accomplished – for the Guardian.

    As for our resident troll, “Avram”, here… He ought to be very careful with labelling others racists, after having in engaged in blatant Holocaust Trivialization(by equating it with the Pal. Exodus), Israel-as-Nazis analogies(Begin-Nazis), fabricated, decontextualized quotes, and now, been caught shamefully shilling for Rashid K’s PLO past(And lying very brazenly about it, too); an anti-Semite should not cast the first stone.
    His apologies(for the above), have not been quite so forthcoming, as his manufactured consternation here. Especially, since he averred, that he has never read/doesn’t read CiF…
    Amazing how these trolls turn up, eh?

    • After defending Joan Peters’ well known hoax, your credibility as an honest interlocutor has somewhat…gone.

      Should we even look at your baseless claims in more detail? Or should we just chock it up to a hasbarist’s “flirtatious” relationship with the truth?

      • “Avram”…
        I have not defended anything, and you know it. This isn’t helping you, at all ;).
        Now about, the long overdue penance:
        Where’s the one for minimizing the Holocaust, and ginning up the Pal. Exodus?
        Where’s the one for Israeli-as-Nazis(Begin, etc)?
        Lying, decontextualizing, falsifying quotes?
        Denying Khalidi’s PLO connection(not in itself a crime, but for your blather, it should be atoned).
        And let’s just say, your anti-Semitism in general(as defined by the EUMC)?
        I eagerly await to see you wriggle out of this one again.
        Since you’ve fled from the last thread, it wouldn’t surprise if you did the same, in this one.
        Keep the hatred going, “Avram”. :D
        P.S.
        I do have another question though:
        If you don’t read CiF, as you yourself profess, what in God’s name are you doing here?
        Hummm… Like I said… does it have anything to do with “Juice” ;)?

      • ‘Avram’,
        Referring to former and or current PLO members, referring to Pape, Finkelstein and the other usual suspects yourself and then you try and make a big deal oudda Peters who was never an academic in the first place……..go figure.

    • Can I point out that the previous post constituted a rhetorical question. I have little appetite for your childish addiction to using ad hominems to deflect from your inability to engage substantively with a subject.

  8. My nazi analogy regarding the in blog troll ‘Avram’ should be seen as a direct comparison with the discussions one can have with neo nazis.
    Nazis love to constantly change horses in mid discourse. They introduce bogus arguments and quotes. When ever the discourse gets to tight for a nazi or Islamist for that matter a new angle of approach will appear. What about this? What about that? Suddenly a definition will be a necessity leading to some strange space where the originating topic is left outside. Faux lines are loved, as can be seen in the critical theory crap upstairs. Splitting hairs on one hand and pushing aside one hundred years of history on the other is no problem. Similar to all totalitarian ideas, one or two hundred years of acedemic discourse goes overboard and some hill billy professor will be quoted out of context. It is the same M.O. All over the anti democratic left and the Islamist’s and nazi’s.
    And at the end of it all, we still have no proof for a call to murder from a year ago. Which proves my point that I was following a phantom/troll all along.

    I need to commend Adam at this point for allowing trolling on his great blog. On any other left wing blog ‘Avram’s’ style wouldn’t get a foot in the door.

  9. ‘avram’,
    Commentary pretty much nailed you to the door in every way possible. The Peters slip up is an oversight, which hardly dents his line of argument. Sinking your teeth into Peters like a rabid terrier is laughable since you quote people nobody who has an honest interest in the ME would dare touch with a barge pole. Again you take things out of context. Is that accepted in your much loved Marxist academia?

    • I’ll add this, if I may, Daniel(and thank you, by the way), to further thrash, little “Avram”:
      He brought up Peters, not I.
      If she were “Avram”-‘s contemporary, I could well ascribe that to a possible case of the Hot-n’-heavy… :D
      But as the woman is over 70… I am worried :O.

      • That is correct. “Avram” brought up Peters as yet another example of his “Trojan Horse, let’s get onto ground where I’m more comfortable so I can bait you” type of argument. He tried to get Commentary101 to defend Peter’s, and from there has been over and over again alleging that Commentary101 defends Peters, when in fact he doesn’t.
        Daniel and Commentary101, you guys are great!
        I lost my taste for debating the “Avrams” many years ago, because one never gets very far, so impregnable to reality are they. They hope simply to fake you into taking a stand which you don’t, or to frustrate you, and take that as a sign of victory. The best one can hope to do is to “out” them. On this score, you both did exemplary.

        Avram,
        You told Adam you didn’t know the CiF guidelines. The two most relevant ones to Adam’s argument were #’s 1 and 8 in bold type at the top of the article. You could have simply scrolled to the top and looked them over, before displaying your wonton ignorance yet again.
        P.S. Did you ever link to the two Martin Kramer articles about former PLO spokesperson, and currently lazy propagandist “historian” Rashid Khalidi?
        No, I didn’t think so.

        • “That is correct. “Avram” brought up Peters as yet another example of his “Trojan Horse,”

          I brought it up, stating quite clearly that it was a hoax. It never occurred to me that there were people who still believed it wasn’t a hoax.

          “He tried to get Commentary101 to defend Peter’s, and from there has been over and over again alleging that Commentary101 defends Peters”

          He leapt straight to its defence:

          ““Joan Peters’ Hoax”? Would you care to illustrate how it’s a Hoax? And who has alleged that against it?”

          Admittedly, he did U-turn rather quickly on it.

          “P.S. Did you ever link to the two Martin Kramer articles about former PLO spokesperson, and currently lazy propagandist “historian” Rashid Khalidi?”

          Khalidi point blank stated he wasn’t part of the PLO. In his quest for the eternal ad hominem, the Joan Peters fan cited the opinion of a couple of random bloggers to make his case.

          In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, why would I not believe Khalidi? And secondly, why would it matter?

          Joan Peters’ defender lacks the ability to engage substantively with an Oxford and Yale scholar like Khalidi, so what does he do? He falls back to familiar ground; the childish ad hominem.

          • So, “Avram”, you’re back to favourite routine of quoting out of context?
            Did you happen to miss this:
            “I have no links, nor do I recognize the validity of Peters’ work; I support the underlying argument…”.
            Which you can neither deny, nor refute.
            As for your “venerable” pal, (and apparently, you are his emissary-incarnate), Rashid-“WAFA of the PLO”-Khalidi:
            I’ve asked you this, before – if Kramer(a recognized, Princeton-educated, well-published Historian) is a “random blogger” — what does that make Khalidi? A pamphleteer for the PLO – certainly! ;).
            Secondly, Kramer dug up newspapers, 3 of them, 1976, 1978, and then, 1984. All of them point out to Khalidi’s involvement with the PLO, very intimately.(Kampeas, who held a position similar to yours, had to recognize the preponderance of the facts).
            So you’ve also switched, without flinching, to another one of your favourites: Lying… callously, too(But hey, at least you and Rashid K. now have something in common). :D
            http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/2008/10/khalidi-of-the-plo/
            But “Avram”, all of this is piffle, compared to what you owe humanity at large:(and I hate resolutely to quote myself, but nonetheless):
            Where are your apologies, for the following?
            1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
            2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
            3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s diveIs the PLO hiring. Your rants, including outright prevaricationsstiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
            4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.

            Clear that up first.
            Is the PLO hiring? Your rants, including outright dissemblance, could come in handy. Ask Rashid K. for a friendly recommendation and referral :D…

        • Similar case when he tried to bring up the partition plan. He brought it up, then dropped it just as quickly when he realised that he wasn’t actually able to tell me what it was.

          • “Avram”… I am afraid you’ve been ensnared by your own prevarications.
            I am waiting for you, expressly, to state your position on UNGA 181(I know, by the bye, exactly what you’re going to say).
            Why?
            Because you and I, as you so expediently forget, have had a discussion on just this very nature of UNGA resolutions(and their applicability). You, back then, attested to something else entirely.
            If you would like, for the umpteenth time, to present before this audience your hypocrisy, I welcome it!
            Don’t cry however, thereafter, if you’re displeased with the results ;).

    • “Commentary pretty much nailed you to the door in every way possible.”

      As far as I can tell, your idol Commentary “Joan Peters” 101 doesn’t actually have any arguments. If you read his posts carefully, he attempts at every turn to steer the conversation away from substantive debate to ad hominem attack.

      Although it is childish, it is a very common tactic used by hasabarists. The fact that he is quite clumsy at it probably just shows that he is new to it.

      • “Avram”… I thought anti-Semites had better puns up their sleeves?
        What’s wrong… a Jew Zionist ate your tongue?
        Is that why you won’t retract your utterly scurrilous comments, including:
        1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
        2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
        3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and document.
        4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
        Until we hear any word of contrition, on your part, for these acts of deceit, and anti-Semitism, what is there really to discuss?
        And furthermore, how laughable, unfathomably picaresque it is, for you to brand others as “Racists”, when you’re the most shallow, and despicable of them all?
        I don’t look forward to a response any more…(But I can still hope, can I not? :D).

      • “As far as I can tell ..”
        Which won`t take very far as you are known for being differently gifted.
        :-)

  10. This Guardian brought out all it’s big guns on that thread,they were skating all over the place,trying to answer their loyal readers why was Josh allowed to write for the Guardian…..Abu-Nimah had numerous posts there trying to hold back the tide.

  11. After reading the debate with Avram and most of the commentators here (about the moral equivalence of Tervino’s Tweet and Avram’s “Dear Flotilla: If you end up killing a few Jews, most Muslims are cool with that”), I think that there are 2 points to be made here.

    One: there is no moral equivalence between Tervino’s tweet and Avram example, and I’m sure Avram knows it. Tervino’s Tweet is not racist but it IS hateful, while Avram example is also racist on top of being hateful.

    Second: That being said, Adam IS guilty of double standards. A true moral equivalence example of Tervino’s tweet is writing the exact same thing Tervino wrote but regarding a pro-Israel demonstration of right wing extremists (Like a mixture of BNP supporters and just plain right wing, Jewish and non-Jewish). Confronted with that example, and based on his past reactions to similar events, Adam would criticize the offender harshly and would probably also attribute him racist agenda. This is the real double standards of Adam and he “sins” in that manner too often. I really don’t understand why Adam doesn’t come against ANY example of hatred (which Tervino obviously is guilty of).

    And on a more personal note, I think it’s a shame that the important work Adam is trying to do and his valid points about the dreadful guardian and other offenders, is, time after time, gets lost and hampered by his obvious double standards and his often childish behavior, which often serves as a lever to attack his valid points – like in this post when he just can’t help himself attacking Ben White personally on the comment he made in the Guardian (the Azzam Tamimi comment and the links). The only thing he accomplished is giving the moderators a vaild reason to block him and a reason for everyone else who doesn’t agree with his views to disregard him as a troll. Would have it been so bad to just stick with the first paragraph of the comment and drop the personal attack on Ben White? If he had done so, he would have a genuine and valid argument. Now he only has his self-righteous fuzzy feeling and nothing else.

    Good luck.

    • Good points well made.

      I agree that Trevino’s tweet wasn’t racist, whereas the example I gave was. In my view, ethnicities and nationalities are both contrived societal constructs that I have a dim view of.

      Trevino’s hatred is directed from “us” towards “them”. All I did was pick a different “us” and a different “them” to illustrate my point – namely that what Adam refused to attack in an Orthodox Christian, pro-Israel CiF contributor, he wouldn’t hesitate to criticise in a Muslim contributor. This is Adam’s “us” and “them”.

      And in an article bemoaning CiF’s “egregious double standards”…well, you know my point.

    • And I also agree with you on CiFWatch’s aims. I wish more people would criticise the media.

      But like with so many other efforts, it is cheapened by its unrelenting apologea for Israeli policy and its supporters. Another great example is UN Watch.

      UN Watch do some really great work in highlighting human rights abuses that do not receive the attention the sorely need. But as with CiFWatch, their work is cheapened by their constant apologea for Israeli policy. Like CiFWatch, they fall foul of the exact same double standards they see in others.

      • Avram,
        I’m sorry, but you are no better. You may be less childish and more open to the “other”, but you are also contextualizing the situation as “us” and “them”.
        You are referring to pro-Israel commentators as “Hasbra”, which is basically a way to defame someone as a propagandist, and catalogue him as “Them”. I often defended Israel, am I “Hasbara”? What one has to do to be pro-Israel and not “Hasbara”? to be critical of Israel? Have you bothered to check if the person you refer to as “Hasbara” maybe have been critical of Israel on some of Israel policies in the past? Why do you feel the need to belittle the person you are debating with the title “Hasbara” instead of focusing on the subject at hand? Isn’t this an “us” and “them” mentality?
        You are also talking about Israel polices (note the plural) as if the only moral thing to do is come against all of Israel policies. In my innocence I thought that every policy should be debated and to be decided upon (right or wrong) on the merits of the points at hand. Isn’t your claims, as “constant apologea[sic] for Israeli policy”, are an “us” and “them” mentality?
        Avram, check your self before criticizing others.

        • “You are referring to pro-Israel commentators as “Hasbra””

          Hasbara is seen as a perfectly respectable, even honourable occupation in Israel.

          “I often defended Israel, am I “Hasbara”?”

          I too have defended Israel, against the charge of Apartheid for example. Am I a hasbarist? Defence of Israel and Hasbara look very different. If you’re familiar with the conflict and the propaganda, you will know it when you see it.

          “You are also talking about Israel polices (note the plural) as if the only moral thing to do is come against all of Israel policies.”

          Quite the opposite. But we’re not talking about policies over fuel duty or social security are we? We’re talking about Israeli policies which directly impact the conflict.

          • Well, it’s obvious we are talking about policies regarding the conflict, and yet there are many policies regarding the conflict (the wall, the blockade of Gaza, water, money, checkpoints and many many more.). Some I agree with, some not and some partially.
            Are you contending that every single policy regarding the conflict is wrong?

            And as for “Hasbara”, I think you are being Disingenuous. You are not typecasting someone as “Hasbara” because you want to label him as “respectable” or “honorable”

            • Are you contending that every single policy regarding the conflict is wrong?

              Not at all. Nor am I minded to accept blanket support for them either.

              You are not typecasting someone as “Hasbara” because you want to label him as “respectable” or “honorable”

              No, I am not. Hasbara is characterised by adherence to fixed talking points, avoiding substantive debate, and dishonesty.

              There is a difference between supporting Israel with honesty, and employing Hasbara. I know the subject well enough to be able to tell them apart.

              The hasbara employed here is what Neil Lazarus called “Hasbara 2.0″ or “grassroots hasbara”.

              • As you wrote, UN Watch mission is to ” highlighting human rights abuses that do not receive the attention they sorely need”. Israel is not being highlighted by UN Watch because it gets enough attention. can you refer me to an example of a blanket support for Israel by UN Watch?

                • can you refer me to an example of a blanket support for Israel by UN Watch

                  UN Watch is very different to CiFWatch in its style of pro-Israel advocacy.

                  UN Watch doesn’t often (that I’m aware of) delve into the details of Israeli policy, unlike CiFWatch. What it usually does is defend Israeli policies from often entirely legitimate criticism by pointing out other human rights issues NOT being covered, or by directly criticising the institutions doing the criticising.

                  For those of you unfamiliar with UN Watch, it is the Geneva branch of the American Jewish Committee, and in a wonderfully hypocritical way, mentions one country and one country alone in its mission statement – hypocritical because it makes precisely the same criticism of the Human RIghts Council.

                  CiFWatch will, on the other hand, delve into detail, often relying on tired hasbara to defend Israeli policy.

                  • This is all good and well, exept for the fact that it is not what I asked.
                    Can you provide an example (UN sesion, press release, article) that demostrate how UN Watch deflect legitimate criticism of Israel.

                    • It’s more their pattern of attack rather than any one particular release, like I said – very different to CiFWatch. Here’s an example:

                      “http://blog.unwatch.org/index.php/2012/07/03/hate-israel-day-at-the-u-n/”

              • I knew it would be something along these lines.
                Well, Avram, you failed completely with your point. The fact is that UN Watch, to my knowledge, never says that it is not legitimate to criticize Israel. They point to the fact that time after time Israel Is singled out for criticism, as seen in the link you provided. Israel gets a whole day in the human rights council.
                When considering all the human rights violations in the world right now, and considering the fact that no other human rights violator has gotten a whole day for itself (not to mention that most even don’t get to be mentioned in a session), and considering the fact that it is not the first time Israel is singled out in this way (this is an understatement) – all of these points makes the mere concept of dedicating a whole day for Israel an illegitimate move.
                Moreover, lets consider the “legitimate criticism” itself: “Gaza blockade is an effective genocide” (what genocide? Not to mention that the UN itself concluded the blockade to be legal), “the de facto authority in Gaza do not engage in retaliation” (Oh, that’s right, I forgot… they only engage in attacking first… what a joke), “Israel refuse to cooperate with Richard Falk” (remind me who he is? Oh… the one who likes to flirt with anti-Semitism.. I wonder why Israel doesn’t want anything to do with him).
                If you consider these, and other claims raised in that session, as legitimate criticism, then I have to say that you are a blinded extremist in a moderate peacenik cloths.
                This whole human rights council is a joke, for known reasons, and to think Israel or its advocats can do anything to really address its “criticism” in a productive and meaningful way is…. Well I am not sure what it is but it certainly not intelligent.

                • “The fact is that UN Watch, to my knowledge, never says that it is not legitimate to criticize Israel.”

                  That’s a test that is easily passed don’t you think? Does any pro-Israel site say that it is not legitimate to criticise Israel? Would they be so clumsy?

                  Here’s another good example on a subject I know well enough to know is entirely dishonest:

                  http://www.unwatch.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=bdKKISNqEmG&b=1317489&ct=9360301

                  Surrounding Goldstone’s “retraction”. The fact that there was no retraction speaks volumes about their honesty on the subject.

                  • Avram, I think it speaks volume about your honesty then theirs. First of all, the word “retraction” doesn’t appear on the article. Second of all I red it and found it to be fairly accurate description of what happened. Can you be specific about what is not honest in the article?

                    Secondly, the fact of the matter is that you choose a poor target for your complaints about deflecting legitimate criticism. The criticism of the UN human rights council (and usually many of the rest of UN institutions) is NOT legitimate. There reasons for this are plenty and numerous, but I would summarize it like this:
                    If you see someone grabbing a woman’s bottom and you want to criticize him, then criticize him about grabbing that woman bottom, and he would be able to engage your criticism productively and intelligently.
                    But if you criticize him by accusing him of raping that woman, don’t be surprised if he ignores your criticism and accuse you of being biased.

                    • “Retraction” is the word used by Hasbarists to describe Goldstone’s op-ed, and was described as such here:

                      http://www.unwatch.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=bdKKISNqEmG&b=1314451&ct=11584775

                      In the case of the Goldstone op-ed, his central claim was that the McGowan-Davis report had exonerated Israel of some of the most serious allegations.

                      Virtually no one took the time to read the McGowan-Davis report. I did. I went through it line by line and contrasted it with the op-ed.

                      Not only did the McGowan-Davis report not back up what Goldstone wrote, in some cases, it said the polar opposite.

                      The fact remains that Israel is the last unresolved act of European colonialism where the indigenous peoples have yet to attained self determination.

                      Obvious exceptions include North America where the colonialists all but wiped out the indigenous populations.

                    • Avram: “Israel is the last unresolved act of European colonialism”

                      Please explain in what sense modern Israel was/is an act of European colonialism.

                  • It seems you are getting a bit confused..
                    Now you say that the “retraction” is not in the article you provided but in the briefing.. ok. so I read the briefing. it specifically say the goldstone retracted his claim (not the whole report) that Israel deliberately targeted civilians. what’s wrong with that? granted, in the op-ed he did it squeamishly, but I think any intelligent person would admit that the implications of what he wrote was basically a retraction of that specific claim. Maybe you could debate the claim that it’s a retraction, but to say it’s dishonest to do so is….. dishonest.
                    Also, now I don’t understand what and who you accuse o being dishonest… because I thought you accused UN Watch, but in your last comment it seems you accuse Goldstone himself for being dishonest about the McGowan-Davis report. I didn’t read it so I can’t comment about the accuracy of your claim, but never mind that. I thought we are talking about the honesty of UN Watch, weren’t we?
                    Lastly, you said “Israel is the last unresolved act of European colonialism”. Really? Well, could you be specific about which European power Israel is supposed to be working for? Could I have a source which describes the natural resources or money Israel transfers to that power? It’s strange. As an Israeli I always thought Israel was an independent state.. wait, the Syria is also colony of Europe (it was created by the British mandate and most of its indigenous people does not have self-determination.

                    • The ‘colony’ trope is also classic commie talk. I guess the Mizrahi shoulda stayed with National Socialist Nasser to suffer the same fate as the Greek mercantile class in Nassers Egypt. Namely the expulsion of all Greek Egyptians and the nationalization/robbing of all Ethnic Greek assets in that nation. This along with Nassers hyper antisemitism made Egypt into what it is today, a bleedin’ basket case of a nation. This is mainly due to Nassers racist pro Arab nationalism and his cleansing of all political opposition along with the decapitation of the only class of people who knew how to make a buck in that country, namely the Jews and GreekEgyptians.
                      In classic Arab fashion it was a celebrated act of self emasculation cheered by the Arab street…….” look mummy! I am cutting of my testicals! Only now am I free! ”
                      Nassers colonialism in the Yemen is another topic. And his use of chemical warfare in that glorious war.

                    • “it specifically say the goldstone retracted his claim (not the whole report) that Israel deliberately targeted civilians. what’s wrong with that?”

                      Again, that’s not what he said. What he said was that the McGowan Davis report accepts that Israel had found that it had not intentionally targeted civilians.

                      You just have to read the op-ed very carefully to notice that is what he is saying.

                    • If you don’t accept that the colonisation and subsequent conquest of Palestine by European Jews was an act of European colonialism, there’s probably not much I can do to convince you.

                      Although I’m curious to know what else you would describe it as.

                    • Avram, the divergently gifted one, doesn`t understand the tem colonialism, as there is no motherland and its colonies, there is only the state Israel.
                      But I don´t blame such a gifted one to miss the correct understanding.

                      European Jews peacefully immigrated to the British mandate, Jews of Arab countries were forced to immigrate to Israel.
                      Arab immigration to the British mandate got strong in the twenties, a fatality in retrospective.
                      Why Arabs think Israel is their land is still a puzzle when it was Osman land for centuries.
                      On the other side there are some lunatics who already claim Spain.

                    • I wont go in to your half baked version of history (the parts where you “rushed” or missed completly are very importent historaclly) because even if I would accept your version of history, it just tells me that you don’t really know what colonialism is… which just means you belong to the ignorant group I mentioned in my post..

                    • @Roy – Whilst acknowledging that it was only a 2 minute potted history, it is perhaps telling that you managed to leave out ANY mention of the imperial power, the Balfour Declaration, the UN, the League of Nations, and perplexingly – Zionism!

                      I know that perhaps you wanted to give a history which supported the notion that Israel was not a colonial state, but it’s impossible to consider the events from Herzl to 1948 without considering the involvement of the world powers.

                      The history that you presented was one of almost benign natural migration, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

                    • Avram,
                      I wasn’t trying to recount history. It thought it was obvious but probably me writing “let’s review the basics of what happened” was misleading. Sorry for that.
                      I just gave a breakdown of the Jewish population in Palestine until 1948. The reason I focused on that was that one of the primary components of colonialism is the population who is being sent to colonize a land on behalf of an imperialist power. I wanted to emphasize the important fact that Britain did not send the Jews to Palestine. The Jews went to Palestine on their own accord either for ideology (Zionism) or because of persecution. The notion that because Britain supported the Jewish national endeavor (more on that later) does not mean it was a colonialist endeavor. Imperialist powers supported many nationalistic endeavors (Syria and Jordan are just in the top of my head) but those eventual countries are colonies nor they ever been colonies. Half of the Jewish population in Israel today is not European and most of those from Europe were not British.
                      You are (I think wittingly) mistaking similarities between situations (Israel and one of the true European colonies of past) to be the same thing. Those who say Israel is apartheid or Nazis are doing the exact same thing. Taking one or two or three things which are similar and saying that because of these weak similarities the 2 situation are the same.
                      The problem you are facing is that colonialism, as apartheid, as Nazism all has very distinct definitions, and Israel just don’t fit those definitions. The fact that it was supported to some extent by imperialist powers, in itself certainly doesn’t mean it is, or ever been, a colonialist state.
                      And what is more troubling in your analysis is that you are so hung on the notion that Zionism was supported by Britain, when in reality this so called support was overshadowed by Britain efforts on the ground. They often tried to deny Jews access to Palestine, they didn’t support the Jews militaristically and many times went back on their promises to the Jews. If it was a colonialist endeavor then it was a very poor one (and its not like Britain didn’t have experience in colonialisation mind you).
                      You are so obsessed about this one thing (Britain so called support of Zionism) and you neglect the abundant facts that just don’t fit your colonialism theory. One of the more important fact is that in all Zionist writings there isn’t one mere mentions of Zionist support or loyalty to Britain. On the contrary.

                    • “The reason I focused on that was that one of the primary components of colonialism is the population who is being sent to colonize a land on behalf of an imperialist power.”

                      That’s certainly a common form of colonialism, but not the only form by any means. Settler colonialism is another. It differs in the ways you note above, but also in other ways – for example, it tends to endure, rather than subside, and the erasing of the native is a common component.

                      “I wanted to emphasize the important fact that Britain did not send the Jews to Palestine.”

                      Not send, but certainly facilitate and coerce.

                      “The notion that because Britain supported the Jewish national endeavor (more on that later) does not mean it was a colonialist endeavor.”

                      No, the fact that it involved colonisation makes it a colonial endeavour. Zionist leaders were not so ashamed of describing it in such terms.

                      “Imperialist powers supported many nationalistic endeavors (Syria and Jordan are just in the top of my head) but those eventual countries are colonies nor they ever been colonies.”

                      I agree, but they were not colonial settler states. Imperial and ridiculous creations yes, but not colonial.

                      I’m not going to tackle your comments on Nazism and Apartheid since I most likely agree with you.

                      And your comments about Zionism’s relationship with Britain relate primarily from your lack of understanding of “settler colonialism”. And by the way, that’s not in any way intended to be a criticism.

                      In support, you might read this, from the Journal of Genocide Research:

                      http://www.kooriweb.org/foley/resources/pdfs/89.pdf

                      For an different viewpoint, opposing designating Israel as a settler colonialist state, you might read this from the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs:

                      http://jcpa.org/article/is-israel-a-colonial-state-the-political-psychology-of-palestinian-nomenclature/

                    • Patrick Wolfe and his credentials
                      http://www.latrobe.edu.au/humanities/about/staff/profile?uname=PWolfe
                      inter alia
                      Islamophobia, and Indian nationalism
                      Palestine, Project Europe and the (Un-making of the New Jew In memory of Edward W. Said’
                      Islam, Europe and Indian Nationalism: towards a postcolonial transnationalism’
                      Can the Muslim Speak? An Indebted Critique’

                      Only two citations of his contribution
                      http://www.kooriweb.org/foley/resources/pdfs/89.pdf
                      which highlight his “scientific approach” versus Israel:

                      “The concept of productivization was developed in response to the selfloathing that discriminatory exclusions from productive industry encouraged in Eastern European Jewry (in this sense, as Shafir acutely observes, Zionism mirrored the persecutors’ anti-Semitism13).”

                      “Nonetheless, as Palestinians becomemore and more dispensable,
                      Gaza and the West Bank become less and less like Bantustans and more and more like reservations (or, for that matter, like theWarsaw Ghetto). Porous borders do not offer a way out.”

                      This demonstrates the New anti-Semitism, using Nazism to denounce Israel. Originally this denounciation had two sources:
                      An invention of right extremist revisionists to demonstrate that Jews are not better than Nazis.
                      Secondly the Soviet anti-Zionism which developed during the show trials in the fifties in the Soviet bloc.
                      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noel_Field
                      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_Sl%C3%A1nsk%C3%BD

                      This Soviet anti-Zionism developed a surrogate marxism theory of Zionist productivity, as seen above in its last appearance, in order to legitimate anti-Semitism in disguise of anti-Zionism and to harmonize Marxism with anti-Zionism.

                      So to develope the analogy between Israel and NS this “genocide researcher” takes up the denounciations of the genocidal Stalinists and post-Nazis.
                      What a despicable low-lifer.
                      But we should also remember the New Left of the sixties who would make no fuss about anti-Semitism and analogies, but chanted USA-Israel-SS.
                      That`s why the critical theorists Adorno and Horkheimer thought of them as new phenomen of Völkische Faschisten in connection with Third Worldism. How prophetic.
                      Which brings me to Godard, the anti-Semitic filmmaker, a has-been ardent maoist, as most of the French radicals in the sixties, like the artner of Foucault or Glucksmann who underwent a radical change.
                      Godard despite being has-been never lost his goal to denounce the middle class in his films.
                      Maoism already illustrated very clearly the amalgamation of marxism and Völkisches.

                    • Some more info about the dr Patrick Wolfe who is an ozzy pal activist. ‘coincedently’ another socialist/Marxist academic :
                      “The sessions will be moderated by DR PATRICK WOLFE, one of the worlds
                      premier scholars of settler colonialism. Patrick is currently working on a
                      comparative history of settler-colonial regimes of race in Australia, the USA,
                      Brazil and Palestine/Israel. He understand the issues very well and recently

                      took part in a panel discussion in London with Omar Barghouti, the most
                      well known Palestinian spokesperson globally for BDS and Israeli professor
                      Ilan Pappe, author of the seminal work The Ethnic Cleaning of Palestine.”
                      I rest my case.
                      As I had said from the beginng, ‘Avram’ is a communist who’s entire world view is made up of Marxist academics. The entire anti Israel discourse is staffed and led by Marxist academia.

                  • Regarding colonization:
                    Well, let’s review the basics of what happened. The Jewish community in Palestine (and later Israel) consisted of Jews who were native to the land, immigrants from Europe who came of their own accord to build a life and a country in the area, people who fled persecution in Europe, refuges from Europe who had nowhere else to go, refuges from Arab lands who had nowhere else to go (or at least it was the most logical solution for them to come here). Until the independence war they built their communities on purchased land which was bought from Jewish money (and not by European governments). The Jewish community in Palestine built their army from scratch and didn’t receive any support from the armies of European powers. Lastly, the conquest which you are talking about was a result of, at the very least, a civil war (if you regard Benny Morris as a good historian so much, you should know that). If this is colonization, it is a very strange one indeed. How would I call it? Well, a quest for self-determination for the Jewish people. If this is colonization, please elaborate on the merits of your claim. What characteristics does Israel have that makes it a colony?

                    But the fact of the matter is that I’m playing dumb here. I know that your use of the word “colonialism” is not based on fact but it serves the same purpose as other people using the word “Nazism” or “apartheid” regarding Israel. You say you defended Israel against the use of the word “apartheid” but the fact of the matter is that you are not different from them. You all know (besides the really ignorant ones) that Israel is not a colonialism / apartheid/ Nazism, and when debated, after long posts and rebuttals, you (not you specifically but those who use these words, you included) always, always, admit in the end that you didn’t really mean colonialism / apartheid/ Nazism per se, but used those words as a shortcut to account for related characteristics of Israel to colonialism / apartheid/ Nazism. The problem with this is that people usually use singular words or phrases that convey something much more complex as a way to simplify communication. For example, if I say something like “my teacher, Tamar, is a Nazi” all the people that would hear this would immediately understand that I don’t really mean Tamar is a Nazi, but that she is a harsh teacher without the need for me to further explain (at least in Israel they would understand this). But with your use of the words colonialism / apartheid/ Nazism in relation to Israel it seems that for people to really understand what you mean you need thousands more words just to explain it… so please, let’s not be naïve. The use of the words colonialism / apartheid/ Nazism is done deliberately to defame, and not to convey complex principles.

                    • “Well, let’s review the basics of what happened.”

                      Oh let’s.

                      Zionism was a political ideology bent on establishing a Jewish State in an area of the world that was overwhelmingly non-Jewish. It was, as you know, predominantly Muslim and to a lesser extent, Christian Arab.

                      Zionism was originally viewed by many European Jews as being aligned with anti-Semitism, and at the turn of the century spoke for a vanishingly small fraction of European Jews.

                      Over 1915/1916, the British entered into a secret treaty with the Sharif of Mecca committing to the facilitation of Arab independence across an area including Transjordan and Palestine.

                      (I’m simplifying here a little, as the inclusion of Palestine is a matter of scholarly debate)

                      In 1917, Zionism won the backing of one of the world’s great imperial powers when a British anti-Semite and serving MP published a letter in a British newspaper announcing support for the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine in such a manner that did not impact on the rights of the indigenous majority.

                      In 1922, Palestine was placed under a class A mandate at the LoN, under which Britain was to give its “best efforts” to secure a Jewish homeland in Palestine in a way that did not impact on the rights of the indigenous majority.

                      (A class A mandate being the category of mandate used for peoples who were ready for self-governance – to use that wonderful imperial phrase)

                      To try and manage their conflicting pledges to both the Zionist movement and the indigenous majority, the British exercised an option to separate off Transjordan from the considerations of the Balfour declaration.

                      The British were now left with how to satisfy both the right to self determination of the indigenous majority of Palestine with their commitments to the Yishuv and European Zionists.

                      Up to 1939, Zionism had failed as a national ideology, with most Jews leaving Europe for the Americas.

                      After the end of WWII, those countries most able to absorb Jewish refugees shut their doors, leaving Palestine as the only option.

                      In 1947, the UN General Assembly voted in favour of issuing a recommendation to the Mandatory power that Palestine be partitioned, with 55% of the land mass and 85% of the agricultural land being turned over to the newly arrived Jewish minority.

                      The expulsions of Palestine’s indigenous Arabs began.

                      The British, knowing that partition could only be implemented by force, declined to implement it, punting the matter back to the UN.

                      A decision was made to put to the vote the placement of Palestine into the UN Trusteeship system, and a draft text was prepared.

                      Unfortunately for all concerned, sensing that political support for partition had vanished, when the Mandate expired, the Zionist groups in Palestine unilaterally declared Israel to exist on what was, at that time, predominantly Arab land.

                      Job done. War ensued, more expulsions took place, and we are where we are.

                      There’s a chance I may have rushed the last bit, but I shortly have a train to catch :)

                      So, a fair amount of tragedy all round. But a European colonial movement to be sure, and another legacy of British imperialism.

                    • I have come up with a new term for posters like ‘Avram’, Zombie Troll. A zombie troll is a troll who gets proven wrong and beaten countless times yet just keeps coming back. I wish this were possible at mondoscheiss or 972.
                      Regarding zombie trolls history of colonialism, I think it’s great when you simply start making shit up as you go along. Why not? That Zionism was a non starter till 1939 is a thigh slapper. Never mind that it had been around since 70 AD.
                      Zombie troll outes himself as a child of Pape, Finkelstein and various anti Semitic conspiracy specialists. No wonder why you dig dem Arabs, they just make up their own history as they see fit.

                  • Regarding Goldstone:
                    Ok. Fair enough. I re-read Goldstone op-ed and read the conclusions of the McGowan-Davis report, and I’m happy to report that you are right. His statement that “they also indicate that civilians were not intentionally targeted as a matter of policy” is false.
                    But that was just a fraction of what he said. The crux of his arguments is that the McGowan-Davis report reveals information he was not exposed to, and in light of this new information his conclusions about deliberate policy of targeting civilians would have been different. This IS a retraction.
                    Moreover, again, what is the relevance of the fact that Goldstone was wrong in his article to the honesty of UN Watch who reported about his op-ed faithfully?
                    The only one who comes out of it as dishonest is you, when you wrote me that “Not only did the McGowan-Davis report not back up what Goldstone wrote, in some cases, it said the polar opposite”. Well, the fact of the matter is that the McGowan-Davis report didn’t said the polar opposite of what Goldstone wrote because it had NOTHING to say about the existence or absence of a deliberate policy of targeting civilians.
                    Any more musings you would like to share?

            • Sorry for interfering, but nobody on the blog takes him seriously as he was constantly exposed for making up, conning and linking to anti-Semite sites as “proof” of his assumptions.
              Just a hint.

                • Roy,
                  ‘avram’ refered to Pape and other such academic heavy weights.
                  I think you in remarkably short time pulled the mask of his face.

                  ‘Avram’ wrote : “In my view, ethnicities and nationalities are both contrived societal constructs that I have a dim view of.” he is channeling Shlomo Sand here. The above quote comes straight oudda the communist world view and it’s inability to understand the Hebrews as a people. It is pure far left rubbish which has been peddled from 1917 to Pol Pot. Needles to say the Arabs who studied behind the iron curtain cherry picked that thought and denied the Jews their nation and in that lies the crux. He lives in political la la land. It’s like the baked seventeen year old who says ‘ why can’t we all just get along? ‘.

                  • Hi Daniel.
                    Thank you.
                    He may be what you say he is (I tend to believe you).
                    Still, I think it’s importent to dismantel the claims of people like this. and because they live in a “la la land reality” it shouldnt be hard to do so.

                • You’ll get to meet our supreme defender of the Joan Peters hoax. He is the very model of a modern major hasbarist.

                  Have a look through his list of allegations and note the techniques.

                  For example, if I compare the intentionalist-functionalist debate in studies of the Nazi Genocide with the very similar debate in studies of the expulsions of Arabs in 47/48 (i.e. central plan or accident of war) – he accuses me of comparing the Holocaust to the Nakba. Sigh.

                  There’s a fun example of one of the fastest U-turns ever here:

                  http://cifwatch.com/2012/08/20/josh-trevino-guardian-gig-outs-ali-abunimahs-double-standards/comment-page-1/#comment-83424

                  Where he defends the Joan Peters hoax with:

                  ““Joan Peters’ Hoax”? Would you care to illustrate how it’s a Hoax? And who has alleged that against it?”

                  Then very quickly switched to acknowledging serious problems with it, and finally to denying recognising the validity of Peters’ work.

                  Perplexingly, even though the book was shown to be a largely fabricated hoax, he goes on to say that he supports the book’s underlying argument.

                  If you’re not familiar with the book, it’s underlying arguments are that Palestine was a deserted wasteland until Jews made the desert bloom, Jordan is the Palestinian state etc.

                  • And of course, you’ll find “Avram”-‘s great defence, which he has repeatedly utilized:
                    “I have not read X/Y/Z… but I know its contents”…
                    How? Why, surely he’s very clairvoyant.
                    Joan Peters talks of nothing of the sort…(Certainly doesn’t touch on Jordan).
                    Rather, she attempted to suggest mass-immigration to Palestine after 1914. Given the Ottoman and later British records at the time, there was a massive surge in Population during those dates, which can be accounted for, by an external influx.
                    This view is supported, to varying extents, by M. Gilbert and F. Gottheil.
                    All publishing their critiques, and establishing this idea, as early as 1974, 10 years before Peters published anything.
                    And… as I have demonstrated, and even frantic “Avram” couldn’t twist, I defended nothing, and no one.
                    Now then, where are “Avram”-‘s very tardy apologies, for comparing Israelis to Nazis?
                    Alan A. Hart?
                    Lilienthal?
                    Quoting out of context(of which, I too, have become a victim;
                    Note that by asking who “alleged [that] against Peters” — I was referring to an earlier point made by “Avram” here, about the scholarly value of Khalidi, Finkelstein et al. Not surprisingly, theirs has plummeted to “Avram”-‘s level by now :D)?
                    Denigrating the memory of the Holocaust?
                    I guess we won’t see that, any time soon ;).

                    • “he has repeatedly utilized:
                      “I have not read X/Y/Z… but I know its contents”…

                      Really?

                      Didn’t you critique Brenner’s book before admitting you hadn’t read it?

                      I’m going to break with my new rule of ignoring any and all ad hominems from you (which unfortunately is 98.3% of what you write) for this gem.

                      “Joan Peters talks of nothing of the sort…(Certainly doesn’t touch on Jordan).”

                      This quote from the Joan Peters hoax is brought to you by the letter H:

                      “”Jordan” was no less a “Palestinian state” than was the Jewish-settled fraction named “Israel”.

                    • Where did I admit I had not read it(Brenner’s)?… Personally, I wish I hadn’t. One of the most bizarre, and revolting forgeries extant.
                      Now, I don’t know where you get your quotes from(it would be helpful if you mentioned, either a chapter, a page, or anything of that sort), but the only mentions of the word Jordan in that book(Peters’), other than the Trans-Jordan created with the British Mandate is this:
                      “The centuries-old traditional use of the term “Palestinian” to describe Jews provides forceful repudiation of the present popular usage of “Palestinian” — to denote exclusively the Arab refugees. The psychological propaganda benefit derived by the Arabs from annexing the word “Palestinian,” to designate only Arabs, is considerable: if the Arab refugees are seen as the “Palestinians,” the world reaction becomes conditioned to identifying the Arab “Palestinian” refugees with Palestine. Although the greatest bulk of Palestine is known today as Jordan, this fact has become obscured. There appears today no popularly known “Palestine” except the smaller area which became Israel, so the perceived connection between Arab Palestinian refugees and Israel will follow…”
                      (There, I even highlighted it for you).
                      I guess this “quote” was brought to you, by “Avram”-‘s mendacity?… :D
                      And the apologies you are to issue?
                      Qui tollis?

                    • Struggling a bit? To flesh out the quote from the Joan Peters hoax:

                      “The “homelands” to which Arab refugees moved in 1948 included lands that many Arab refugees had only recently left in order to gain the economic advantages of the small Jewish region within Palestine.”

                      i.e., the Jews had made the desert bloom. She continues:

                      “Those “homelands” where many Arab refugees of 1948 originated included the greater part of “Palestine”—Jordan today—to which the Jews claimed historic rights: “Jordan” was no less a “Palestinian state” than was the Jewish-settled fraction named “Israel.””

                      To remind you of your quote:

                      “Would you care to illustrate how it’s a Hoax?”

                      Clearly suggesting that you were of the contrary opinion, before:

                      “And who has alleged that against it?”

                      Undoubtedly a precursor to yet-another-ad-hominem, in this instance against Finkelstein.

                    • @Avram…Wow, you’ve outdone yourself.
                      Are you now claiming that Jewish immigration had no beneficial effect on the rather economically barren, and largely stagnant Mandatory Palestine?
                      Are you furthermore averring, that when often times Jews had had to purchase inarrable and arid lands(out of necessity), they did not transform those lands into vibrant communities(and agricultural hubs)?
                      (See Mashabei Sade or Hatzerim. Places sere, and dry).
                      —-
                      Now for the Peters’ quote(which I was unable to find, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt; though you’re not exactly helping yourself, by constantly referring to a book you denounce):

                      “Jordan” was no less a “Palestinian state” than was the Jewish-settled fraction named “Israel.””

                      Are you aware of the conjunction: no less than?
                      It means, “Avram”, in case you’re thus challenged: that If the Pals. insist on carving up the territory west of the Jordan river, they should also demand what could also be counted as rightfully theirs: What’s east of the Jordan river.
                      Nowhere does it say, here, or thereafter, that “Jordan is exclusively Palestine” – as you claim.
                      Furthermore, this can be seen in connection with Peters’ criticism of the Pal. self-determination ambitions prior to the Six-Day war:
                      The book reads, in section “Arab Nationalism:(Chapter 4)”:

                      During the years that Jordan occupied the West Bank, from 1948-1967, the cause of “Palestinian Nationalism” was unheralded. Until 1970s, the PLO only focused on Pan-Arab
                      issues.

                      (I would ask you, in future, to provide a placename, or location of your citations, next time)
                      This sentiment of the Pals., which did not foment in any indignation against Jordan, which supposedly occupied their lands, is evident.
                      You can’t deny that.
                      —-
                      I have every right to criticise and rebuke Finkelstein’s quasi-Academic credentials; Why, you ask?
                      Well he was denied tenure at DePaul university(not the best institution).
                      This, while a fellow Israel-basher of his, albeit much more extreme, and anti-Semitic, Joseph Massad, got his at Columbia(a far more prestigious venue).
                      What does that tell us? Despite Massad’s contumelies, Columbia found it worthwhile to have a bigot like Massad on its tenured staff, by defending his “academic record”.
                      DePaul couldn’t even do that for Finkelstein(with his anti-Israel slant, and Holocaust exploitation, with the “Holocaust industry”), because he simply doesn’t have an academic record.(Nothing to support him, you see).

                      Finally, you’re in no place to ask anyone to apologise(especially, since there’s nothing to warrant it).
                      I am waiting for you to recant the following:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      Don’t bother responding, without it.

                  • Your little wikipedia knowledge is already exposed.
                    The debate Functionalism versus Interntionalism ceased long ago as every interested historian and layman alike know.
                    But there is still the debate if people like you who bring up the analogy Nazi-Israel are just plain idiots, though misguided, or just typical anti-Semites.
                    You make a case for both.

                  • “Now for the Peters’ quote(which I was unable to find, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt; though you’re not exactly helping yourself, by constantly referring to a book you denounce)”

                    Page three hundred and ninety something, from memory. Graceless as ever in the patented C101 climb down I see.

                    “I have every right to criticise and rebuke Finkelstein’s quasi-Academic credentials; Why, you ask?”

                    And what followed? A string of ad hominem attacks. What a shock?

                    And what was missing? Any substantive content. What a shock?

                    The destruction of the Joan Peters hoax was largely reproduced in Finkelstein’s Image and Reality book. Buy it. Read it. If you have any criticisms, I’ll be happy to talk about them.

                    But I won’t dignify your intellectually feeble ad hominems with a response.

                    • Guess what, “Avram”… You’re back to your lying traits.
                      I have the book RIGHT BEFORE MY EYES..
                      And what does Page 190-something, say? Well, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.
                      So, classical, “patented”, perjury by “Avram”… am I surprised? Why hardly…
                      So Finkelstein *is* tenured at DePaul, he *has not been* severely castigated by the man who supposedly inspired his “Holocaust Industry” conspiracy-theory, Peter Novick(hardly a Zionist, to boot)?
                      This what Novick says about one of your other propagandists(the previous one, of course being, Rashid-PLO-Khalidi):


                      “…[The] book is replete with “false accusations”, “egregious misrepresentations”, “absurd claims” and “repeated mis-statements”…”

                      So, once again, another one of your lodestars goes up in flames(DePaul certainly saw right, with that):
                      Yet again, I will repeat it, till you cave:
                      Where’s the apology for the following:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      Like I said, there’s no use for you to reply, if you won’t apologise.
                      You’ve expended any shred of decency you may have had left.
                      Do the honourable thing, then we may go forward.
                      P.S.
                      By lying, unequivocally(hoping no one would catch you in the process), about the location of your supposed “quote”, you have added another sin for you to atone.
                      Don’t compound your bog, any further.

                    • “And what does Page 190-something, say? Well, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.
                      So, classical, “patented”, perjury by “Avram”… am I surprised? Why hardly…”

                      So we can add “reading” to the list of things you can’t do.

                      Read my comment again.

                      Seriously, you are having an off day today. Go for a walk have a beer. If you feel like retracting, I won’t think less of you.

                      “By lying, unequivocally(hoping no one would catch you in the process), about the location of your supposed “quote”, you have added another sin for you to atone.”

                      [Insert C101 climb down here]

                    • “Avram”, if you’re going to lie so tawdrily, at least insert some jokes in there, for the hell of it, eh :D?
                      Just give us an *accurate* placename, otherwise, admit you’re lying(it’s not on page 190-something; Having tested all through 190-200).
                      Once again, we have our “little list” of “Avram”-‘s misdeeds(Harken, it even rhymes(Approximate, but still there)!):
                      Atone for the following(updated):
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      5. Creating a factitious citation, reminiscent of Pappe, and the JPS.

                      It’s worthwhile to get it off your chest now, before you slip up, again, and add item No. 6.
                      Don’t be reticent now, “Avram”…

                    • Read mine again, http://cifwatch.com/2012/08/21/ben-white-ali-abunimah-and-comment-is-free-moderators-egregious-double-standards/comment-page-1/#comment-83837
                      with an added emphasis on:


                      Just give us an *accurate* placename, otherwise, admit you’re lying…

                      I reiterate:
                      Atone for the following:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      5. Creating a factitious citation, reminiscent of Pappe, and the JPS.

                      And please don’t do a post-“JPS brouhaha” absconding.
                      I would hate to see that you polluted these threads, sans respite.

                    • “Avram”… well, I expect your flight any moment now:
                      I’ll ask you again:


                      It’s not in 190-200.
                      Just give us an *accurate* placename, otherwise, admit you’re lying…

                      And of course, don’t forget your now harshly delayed penance:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      5. Creating a factitious citation, reminiscent of Pappe, and the JPS.

                      Don’t deflect any more “Avram”. The jig is long since up.
                      Do the right thing, apologize.
                      And if you are still contemplating jettisoning: Bon Voyage! ;).

                    • At some point someone’s going to come to your rescue and give you the piece of information that you seem unable to extract from the page.

                      I could repeat myself and copy the exact comment where I tell you where to find the quote – but having written it once, and having then linked to it again, it’s just too much fun watching you in action.

                      Someone, please take mercy on him.

                    • Well “Avram”… I can already see your muffled cries for help;
                      Alas: “Abandon Hope, all Ye who enter!”
                      Nothing but a sincere apology can save you now!

                      Just give us an *accurate* placename, otherwise, admit you’re lying…

                      I reiterate:
                      Atone for the following:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      5. Creating a factitious citation, reminiscent of Pappe, and the JPS.

                      And “Avram”, if you are still aiming for your tried(but miserably executed) obfuscation techniques, make them *at least* germane and lively.
                      There’s nothing quite so terrible as liar(such as yourself). But do you know what’s worse? A boring one :D.

                    • Admittedly it was a little cruel to leave you over night to struggle with basic reading comprehension, although I had assumed that someone would come to your aid. Perhaps the regulars on here are starting to distance themselves from you.

                      I hope it didn’t cost you any sleep.

                      I linked you to the relevant comment here:

                      http://cifwatch.com/2012/08/21/ben-white-ali-abunimah-and-comment-is-free-moderators-egregious-double-standards/comment-page-1/#comment-83810

                      In which I stated:

                      “Page three hundred and ninety something, from memory.”

                      Even after multiple attempts, you were still reading “190-something”.

                      So you let fly your latest baseless ad hominems about “lying” and “perjury”.

                      Yet more proof that when you stray from the ad hominem, you just can’t cope.

                      I won’t ask you again for another humiliating climb down. I think the record is clear. You are not able to engage in *any* kind of substantive debate without making rudimentary mistakes like defending the Joan Peters hoax, claiming she doesn’t mention Jordan, claiming the quote didn’t exist etc.

                      Take my advice – stick to the ad hominems and avoid discussing substance. Your sense of self-worth will suffer less.

                      Shalom.

                    • Fantastic, the divergently gifted one is still around trying to make the best of his lies.
                      I suggest we treat him as the residential troll, not ignoring him, as he is clearly mentally deranged by a paranoid obsession with Jews, but offering him all our medical help and help him in his daily life to cope with reality.
                      Or should we treat him as con? But that would indicate that he deliberately cites anti-Semite literature, fakes and lies.
                      And that would mean that he is an ardent anti-Semite with whom to argue won`t help anyway `cause anti-Semitism is a surrogate religion for haters.
                      He might even blow himself up in order to kill some of us if we continue to demonstrate his disabilities of intellect and decency as we constantly do. At one point he will go bananas.

                    • Now, “Avram”… Aren’t you aware that digging yourself deeper, is a faux-pas? ;)
                      I did however check my Own(!) comments, and it turns out, that you’re half right:
                      I should’ve written:

                      It’s not in:
                      190-200
                      290-300
                      390-400

                      (Plus, I am convinced that this omission could be the product of what YOU had done to the formatting here. What DID you do?)
                      So, in effect, you should be THANKING ME… :D(I assumed you had made a mistake, and to be safe, checked all those sections).
                      So, lying once more “Avram”? Are you going for the Pappe/Khalidi record? :D
                      Finally, let us not forget, the debt you owe us all:
                      A. Provide an *accurate* placename, or once again, confess to dissemblance-(and I repeat, this time punctiliously: it’s not to be found in 190-200, 290-300, 390-400).
                      (the 390-400 part, you can see for yourself, if you don’t believe me:

                      Those pages are available on preview.
                      Several are utterly blank, 2 contain maps).

                      Shall we see a JPS-styled scurry now? It won’t baffle me, that’s for sure.

                      And more importantly, your apologies are now reprehensibly late:
                      For these grave delinquencies:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      5. Creating a factitious citation, reminiscent of Pappe, and the JPS.

                      Like I said “Avram”… It’s best to rue these statements now, ‘ere you inadvertently forge Item No. 6. ;).

                    • I admit that you are bringing out the mischief in me. I know exactly which page it is on, and it is definitely in the range I said it was in.

                      But it serves my purpose to give you enough rope to hang yourself with.

                      Now everyone can see that not only are you addicted to completely baseless ad hominems, but you also lack the basic research skills found in most high school students.

                      Pages 392-393.

                      If you’re still stuck, search for the word “Jordan” in the “Search inside this book”.

                      Sheesh.

                      Again, I’m going to ask for neither a climb down, nor an apology. You’re done.

                    • Now, now, “Avram”… don’t tell me after such frequent recurrence, you can’t handle being exposed. :D
                      See, for yourself, pages 392-393… Is anything remotely similar there?
                      393 is Blank. 394 is maps.
                      And please, before this audience, now accustomed to your lies:
                      Atone for the following:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.
                      5. Creating a factitious citation, reminiscent of Pappe, and the JPS.
                      Don’t waste anyone’s time any further…
                      Recant the above, or disappear(like you usually do, ignominiously)!

                    • “See, for yourself, pages 392-393… Is anything remotely similar there?
                      393 is Blank. 394 is maps.”

                      So p393 is blank is it? I can only assume that this is some sort of hysterical blindness which protects your brain from unwanted information.

                      For those interested, here is p393 of the Joan Peters hoax:

                      http://tinypic.com/r/v83r5c/6

                    • Well, “Avram”, I am an honest person – *I* can admit when I am wrong.
                      The edition I have in my hands, is the 1985 one(that you recall from your Finkelstein slobbering).
                      I hope you didn’t go through too much trouble, to produce this one.
                      Thanks for clearing that up.
                      Consider point 5. effectively revoked from the following. I tender my unreserved apologies(though after you had previously falsified quotes from Ma’ariv — you must admit I was in my right to suspect incredulity on your part).
                      Still, this remains unresolved:
                      Apologies are needed for:
                      1. Israel-as-Nazis(anti-Semitic).
                      2. Falsification, decontextualization, misquoting, and fabrication of citations, speeches, dogma, &c.
                      3. Asseverating, with undue fervour, Khalidi’s divestiture from the PLO, whereas, since 1974, this is ridiculous, and documented.
                      4. Most egregious:Banalizing of the Holocaust, and using it to prop up the Pal. Exodus.

                      Be couth yourself; I can certainly submit when I am mistaken.
                      Now let’s hear you.(Though, I have no doubt you’ll now flee).

                    • Concerning Peters the central thesis was never refuted about which the icon of the left extremists, Chomsky, lied deliberately.
                      http://www.chomsky.info/books/power01.htm
                      “So after the Peters book got blown out of the water in England, the New York Review assigned it to a good person actually, in fact Israel’s leading specialist on Palestinian nationalism [Yehoshua Porath], someone who knows a lot about the subject. And he wrote a review, which they then didn’t publish—it went on for almost a year without the thing being published; nobody knows exactly what was going on, but you can guess that there must have been a lot of pressure not to publish it. Eventually it was even written up in the New York Times that this review wasn’t getting published, so finally some version of it did appear. It was critical, it said the book is nonsense and so on, but it cut corners, the guy didn’t say what he knew.”
                      In reality it was published as intended. But you know Chomsky, even then there must be the hidden hand behind, aka Lobby aka Elders.

                      http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1986/jan/16/mrs-peterss-palestine/?pagination=false

                      And Sanders and Pipes showed that the central thesis of Peters is still valid.
                      http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1986/mar/27/mrs-peterss-palestine-an-exchange/

                      Porath in his answer goes lengths but cannot refute Arab immigration by facts, only by speculations about drafting which he could not back up with figures.
                      Besides, his explanation of military draft is quite absurd concerning the gap of figures he wants to diminish and the possibilities of the Ottoman Empire,
                      Why the given statistics he and Peters mentioned are sometimes accurate and sometimes flawed in his esteem is easily explained:
                      He gives them credit when they bolster his arguments and dismissing the same as flawed when not.
                      The hoaxing is on the side of Finkelstein, Hourani, Chomsky and their likes, the coalition of Left extremism and Oriental Studies.

  12. For me hasbara comes in many forms. It can be an informed comment at a European dinner table. It can be a post at Cif. Or it can be giving an Israeli product as a present to someone outside Israel. It can also come in the form of Israeli music or say an art exhibition. That hasbara has been demonized in such a way again reminds of the communist m.o. of ridiculing say coca cola or any other feature which may be associated in a positive manner with the west during the cold war.
    A large part of ‘Avrams’ approach and people like him is to demonize Israel on all fronts. In extreme cases this then leads to the Arab anti-normalization campaign. Norman Finkelstein recently pointed out the cult factor in this dynamic and its detrimental effect in drawing a critical mass of people to the anti Israel movement. He also clearly stated that bds and for me those in its periphery leave a sickening ambiguity regarding the TSS.
    What people like ‘Avram’ are trying to do is use the classic cold war tactic of communist propaganda whereby the public discourse is laced with ambiguity, in effect working with half truths and sometimes lies and hyperbilee . Or as in the case of extreemist Abunimah, he leaves no public forum without introducing an entire new dictionary when it gives him access to a wider audience which he thinks he can influence.

    The lefts faux outrage about hasbara or their perception of say Fox News is again terribly hypocritical since it knows all to well how to manipulate its press and the public. This can be seen when pro pal advocates get five minutes on a major network and then fall over themselves to crudely squeeze in their propaganda. It is appearances like these which even the communist Finkelstein now admits are counter productive. As is hard core right wing hasbara which is often simple BS.

    Going back to Trevino’s tweet. When an activist or demonstrator goes to an event, be it the flotilla or a demonstration in the west we take a calculated risk. Regardless of the aims of the event. This risk may entail getting caught in a scrum of people, getting hit by a police man or breaking ones ankle on the curb or meeting a bottle thrown by an anarchist.

    When I knowingly for the simple reason of PR, and that is what these flotillas are about, sail into an armed conflict be it Greenpeace in the south pacific or those fools on the flotilla I need to be prepared for all eventualities, including death. The people on these boats wish to see Israel destroyed and work in the intellectual fog of splitting hairs ( ‘Avram’ ) and the proximity of terror. As did for example the student left in Europe during the terror of the seventies ( my parents ).
    So when I get on a boat and knowingly breach a blockade and will in all likely hood be met by special forces don’t come crying to me when your friend gets a bullet in the head after meeting a marine with iron bar in hand.
    You can tell auntie Aimee Goodman about it later. But if you watch the news and read the news papers for a few years before hand, you will know that death was on the table. I/P is not a nuclear waste convoy in Europe or an animal rights protest in Devon. It is a war zone. And in war people can get killed. Either in a cafe or on cruise ships.

    Mess with best die like the rest.

  13. They are as mad as cut snakes over there in the Guardian,they are really pissed off with the Guardian for having this Josh Trevino writing for the Guardian….

    These two nasty racist Ben White and Ali Abunimah complaining about Trevino,this could only happen in that racist rag the Guardian

  14. ‘Avram’,
    Can you quote from The emperors clothes? Or have you not read that to one of your many kids?

  15. “If you don’t accept that the colonisation and subsequent conquest of Palestine by European Jews was an act of European colonialism, there’s probably not much I can do to convince you.

    Although I’m curious to know what else you would describe it as.”

    Me thinks we have hit rock bottom. End of the line.
    Over and out.

  16. They are going ape shit over at the Groan-Trevino thread. So funny. The entire EI brigade is speed posting from across the globe, and half of the Groan’s board is there defending off topic posts by the hundreds. Ali is taking screen shots faster than he can say ‘dirty Jew’, lest his pseudo humanism is ‘airbrushed’ out of the picture.
    Ali’s m.o. is beautifully dissected by the man himself. He not only sees himself as a defender of Pals, but also of Iran and the Ummah in the USA. No burden is too great for his humble ego. I can see this guy managing a platoon of political commissars no sweat.
    I’d looooove to see the FBI’s take on this man. Maybe Assange can hack into their main server and spill it.
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