Harry's Place

…and perhaps the most notorious racist and anti-semite in the world.

While Mr. Duke definitely is a front runner in this competition, he’s not anywhere near getting a gold medal. Many Muslim leaders have easily pulled head of him on points. He’s bronze material at best.

The original author of the piece, Joe Quinn, has written a book which claims that Israel was behind the September 11th attacks. All too familiar.

Geez, A doctorate holder who is gormless enough that she shouldn’t be paid to count paper clips. Who woulda thought?

When it comes to neo-nazi style racism, we need to remember the Hindu Nazi RSS with their orange-and-white swastikas. It was one of their members who assainiated Mahamata Ghandi. You might call them India’s Aryan Supremacists.

Interesting to see how many neo-nazis and their fellow travellers have embraced the Palestinian Cause.

The UCU has a near-psychosexual obsession with Israel and Jews, it’s true. Whilst few of its members would actually feel, even in deep introspection, that they were antisemitic, and would genuinely bristle at the accusation, any dispassionate observer has to note that the organisation is saturated with the miasma of centuries-old Jewphobia. All the signature themes and symptoms are there, writ neon-sign-on-piccadilly-circus large. But the very irrational depth of this obsession, I hope, mitigates against its eventual effectiveness. I feel the same with people like TheIrie, whom I feel really, really don’t think they’re antisemitic: the very depth of their denial causes such cognitive dissonance that they’d go mad before they actually put into practice the worst excesses of their Id’s desire. Or is this wishful thinking?

Look, as loathsome as some of the policies which David Duke espouses are, at least he has never (to my knowledge) advocated be-headings, violence in general or evenly actively instigated violence in person. I would not, considering all the jihadist olympic
caliber haters out there, even put him in the running to make the olympic “all-hate-all-the-time” team, let alone medal.

But it is quite acceptable to disagree with Israel and the actions of its government? And one can do so without being a racist?

I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.

BTW, I’ve never understood (perhaps because I’ve never taken the time) why so many (Americans, mainly it seems) who oppose special pleadings programs for blacks as does Duke also are anti-semitic–as is Duke. Setting aside the historical connection in America of Jewish support for black causes, there seems to be no good logical reason for a white like Duke to hate Jews on their own merits excepting for their support for black civil rights. But this Jewish support for blacks is not really the source of Duke’s ire, it seems, nor of others like Duke. Is it something in the water?

The anti-semitism expressed as criticism of Israel dominates in humanities circles, I believe.

Not wanting to derail this thread, and all, but of what possible use are these so-called ‘academics’?

Who’d even want to trust anything they’d present as ‘research’?

To judge from the intelligence of some humanities profs I’ve encountered, it should be a capitol offense for some to even hold a piece of chalk.

Higher academic studies have to be of use to a society; the hard sciences bring technological and material benefits, whereas the soft social sciences enhance our understanding of the world….something crucial to our security.

Take the Islamic Studies faculties as an example. Many are populated by ‘academics’ intent on deliberately promoting an agenda of misunderstanding, and some even actively work to undermine our long-term interests.

The increasing anti-semitism we see in colleges and universities is a direct consequence of the degradation of higher learning, a degradation resulting from the hiring of ignorant and incompetant *minds* whose levels of intelligence are wanting.

Many, many humanities faculties are now just chock-full of idiots.

Merseymike, even by your usual, rather bovine, standards witnessed at Luke Akehurst’s blog and Susan Press’ execrable effort, this is truly special.

Do you not understand who David Duke is? How can you possibly raise your pathetic, tired diversion in the face of some malign cow quoting David Duke?

The mind quite frankly boggles. Extraordinary. Quite extraordinary.

(In response to a couple of the other posts, I would put David Duke right up there in the pantheon of evil hating bastards, but then I am not obsessed by Muslims.)

I should hastily add that I’m well aware of the historical anti-Jewish basis at the root of the founding of the KKK; rather it seems in modern times that some of the strongest support in the US for Israel are the evangelicals whose cultural well-springs draw from much of the same cultural sources historically as Dukes crowd. Or is it simply the fulfilling of the prophesy thing with the evangelicals in their support for Israel, as opposed to any intrinsic admiration for Israel as a democracy under attack?

@John P
As a university lecturer – though not a member of the UCU – I strongly disagree with your suggestion that most humanities lecturers are anti-semitic. Otherwise why would activists in favour of (anti-Israel) Motion 25 not want to allow UCU members a vote on the issue? (Those opposed to Motion 25 have of course repeatedly called for a vote.)

“The facts are speaking for themselves”

And this fractured sentence is written by a British academic?

“the very depth of their denial causes such cognitive dissonance that they’d go mad before they actually put into practice the worst excesses of their Id’s desire”

They’d GO mad? Care to rephrase that? ;-)

Thumbs up, otherwise!

“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region”

It’s the Jews’ homeland. You don’t like it? Well, tough toenails.

I still await a court case for someone accused of Antisemitism.

You don’t need to be ‘obsessed’ by Muslims, Ben, to look around you and see who is at the forefront of actual, physical genocidal programmes against the Jews. It isn’t Duke. It’s people with suspiciously Arab- and Farsi-sounding names.

The British far left seem to take another step towards open support for fascism every week at the moment.

Ms. Delich seems to have some “form”?

http://boycotted-uk-academic.blogspot.com/2008/03/hydra-of-british-academia.html

I think its inappropriate to discuss political matters during the olympics.

“BTW, I’ve never understood (perhaps because I’ve never taken the time) why so many (Americans, mainly it seems) who oppose special pleadings programs for blacks as does Duke also are anti-semitic–as is Duke.”

The KKK formed as a resistance gorup against the presence of federal troops during reconstruction and quickly developed an ideology that identified blacks, Jews and later Catholics as the threat to Anglo-Saxon America. The latest incarnation of this was the Christian Identity Movement, which is now losing adherents to a neo-pagan racsit ideology called Asatru. Anyway, the animus was anti-immigrant – Jews and Catholics as of 100 years ago, and then fo course anti-black. It has always flirted with neo-Nazi groups in America, including the outright Nazi German-American Bund back in the 30’s, but the cultural distance between the adherents has usually been too great for a real merger of the two streams of filth.

“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.”
Certainly, Merseymike. However, Israel was created and unless you advocate the destruction of Israel as an entity as a precursor to peace any attempts to make peace, or merely to reduce violence, in the Middle East has to accept that fact.

“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.”
Certainly, Merseymike. However, Israel was created and unless you advocate the destruction of Israel as an entity as a precursor to peace any attempts to make peace, or merely to reduce violence, in the Middle East has to accept that fact.

At the time of creation of The Jewish National home in 1922 there weren’t hostile neighbours. It is the actions of what became hostile neighbours that forced the creation of Israel.

Certainly, eh? Yes, those pesky Joos certainly have a habit of messing up everything for others by insisting on having the same rights as everybody else. What a bunch of ungrateful scum.

Ms Delich works at the Sheffield College which mainly teaches vocational courses. Calling her an ‘academic’ is pushing it, particularly if she’s a devotee of David Duke.

Merseytrout wrote:
“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.”

Pesky Jews, eh? Why didn’t they just roll over and die?

“At the time of creation of The Jewish National home in 1922 there weren’t hostile neighbours. It is the actions of what became hostile neighbours that forced the creation of Israel.”
The action of hostile neighbours a long way from what became Israel.

“those pesky Joos certainly have a habit of messing up everything for others by insisting on having the same rights as everybody else. What a bunch of ungrateful scum.”
As the one right they insisted on in Israel/Palestine after WWII was the right for completely unrestrained immigration- a right not allowed anywhere else in the world- their neighbours had very good reason to worry they were not demanding “the same rights as everybody else”; especially as those countries most in favour of igranting that right there did not permit jews to enter them on such a basis.

… irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.

What you say is true as far as it goes, but the rights and wrongs are way more important. Lose sight of that, and nothing is worth fighting for. However, the Arab objection to Israel is more than mere hostility, it is because Israel is a dhimmi state. To a Muslim, and particularly an Arab Muslim, the thought of dhimmis gaining power and kicking their sorry asses is just too much to bear. If one worm can turn, the whole pack of cards could collapse.

Here are a few emails responding to Delich’s email:

From Mike Cushman, one of the leaders of the boycott campaign:

It is clear then Jenna has made a serious error and she has owned up to that and apologised so why are people still trying to beat her up about this (that’s a rhetorical question).

I have taught sessions on web searching, web use and how to establish the provence and authenticity of information. This has made me crucially aware of how difficult it is to set out rules, or even guidelines, for avoiding errors. One example I use is about MMR – many of the most difficult issues (other than political ones) come in health information. The most basic rules is that items from high qulaity peer reviewed sites are ones we are inclined to trust – and of course the Wakefield article that caused all the trouble was in the Lancet, as
prestigious and authoritative as they come.

This is not about whether Jenna is a racist or an anti-semite it is about trying to shoot the messanger. If I were to be inclined to use biblical references I might start talking about people without sin casting the first stone.

Mike

From Simon Rushton:

I was walking through Cardiff this evening and I was stopped by
someone from the Iran Liberty Association. I listed to what they had
to say and was ready to give some money there and then which isn’t
something I’d normally do. Then I got pressurised. At that point I
asked for a leaflet and said I’d go away and think about it. I just
got home and typed “iran liberty association” into google. If you do
the same you will find the fifth link starts, “Hi, I wondered if you
could tell me anything about the Iran Liberty Association? Are they a
genuine outfit? They were talking to people in the town centre. ..”.
That was exactly the question I had so I clicked the link.

http://hurryupharry.bloghouse.net/archives/2007/04/19/secular_motion.php

this then resolves to

http://www.hurryupharry.org/

I was rather taken aback by what I saw. I will append the text
below. I have deleted the picture of Jenna Delich which appears in
the middle of the text.

I presume that Matt will take appropriate action.

Oh, and if anyone knows anything useful about the Iran Liberty
Association that might influence a decision to make a donation do
contact me off list.

simon

From Mike Cushman:

I have complained about list members publishing to Hurry up harry before
but no action has been taken and nobody who is praised by hurry up harry
has dissociated themselves from this scurrilous site or deplored the
leaking of our postings to it.

In deleting, for good reasons, Jenna’s photo unfortunately Simon also
deleted the caption. “Sheffield-based academic, Jenna Delich – links to
far right websites associated with the Klu Klux Klan”. This is a
potentially libellous statement and I would urge Jenna to contact
hurryupharry’s ISP

Details from http://whois.domaintools.com/

Tech Organization:Daily Internet Services Limited
Tech Street1:9 Regan Way
Tech Street2:Chetwynd Business Park
Tech Street3:Chilwell
Tech City:Nottingham
Tech State/Province:Nottinghamshire
Tech Postal Code:NG96RR
Tech Country:GB
Tech Phone:+44.8454662100
Tech Phone Ext.:
Tech FAX:+44.1159725140
Tech FAX Ext.:
Tech Email: domains@daily.co.uk

People who have had their names and details on this blog in the past
have received threatening and obscene e-mails.

I would hope that UCU centrally or failing that Jenna’s branch will
pursue this on her behalf.

Mike

From Jimmy Donaghey:

Simon and all,

this is not the only website with extracts from the list and that message is reproduced on at least one other site.

As people know, I am strongly anti boycott but the conditions of the list is that it is not reproduced elsewhere and this sort of thing cannot be condoned. People on the list often are critical of their university managements on this list. To keep things simple, what’s on the list should stay on the list and if exception is made for one topic, it can be made for all. Matt has told us those are the rules and those should be respected whether it concerns the middle east, personal cases, pay bargaining or the colour which doors are painted in our workplaces.

Regards

Jimmy Donaghey
School of Management
Queen’s University Belfast

Cushman wrote:

“This has made me crucially aware of how difficult it is to set out rules, or even guidelines, for avoiding errors. “

Well, Mr. Cushman, I’ll explain a really, simple technique:

1. find a link
2. go to the home page of that link
3. if it says “David Duke”, “White Power”, “Aryan Nation” “Hitler”, “National Socialism is good” or “KKK”* then bin that link, it is from a neo-Nazi web site or their friends
4. goto step 1

I hope that Mr. Cushman manages to learn that process, I will happily explain any points that he misses. It is all very very basic, and anyone purporting to be an “anti-racist” should be able to grasp it.

-
* extending on to include any sites that rant about Jews, New World Order, 9/11 and dancing Jews, etc [even if they use the transparent tactics of switching "Zionist" for the word "Jew"]

I really do not understand why they are fussing.

One of their comrades, so it turns out, gets her information on Israel-Palestine from the website of one of the most notorious neo Nazis in the world. She must have read the article on a website absolutely overflowing with banners advertising various extreme, racist and conspiracist views. Still, this will have not run any alarm bells in her head.

I do not know whether this woman is a neo Nazi. However, what is beyond doubt is that she does not recognise a neo Nazi website when she sees it

Furthermore, the article which she has recommended is by a Jews Caused 911 nut. And, again she reads Quinn’s article and thinks ‘yup, this is pretty much what I believe’.

Still, it is nice to see that the UCU activists are furious, not with the politics of their chum, but with us for pointing it out.

What a nasty group of misfits they are.

And again, there’s the complaint that their ‘private’ exchanges get published elsewhere.

Well, here’s a clue. If you’ve got an email list with 700 people on it, it isn’t private. It is very public.

Again, I don’t know why these SWPers and assorted loons object to their politics being made public. They’ve shown little sign of being ashamed of their views. In fact, they broadcast them publicly at every opportunity.

“As the one right they insisted on in Israel/Palestine after WWII was the right for completely unrestrained immigration- a right not allowed anywhere else in the world- their neighbours had very good reason to worry they were not demanding “the same rights as everybody else” ”

They demanded the right to national independence in their own homeland. No doubt you’ll tell us that you object to the Finns having this right in Finland and the Chinese in China and so on. Unless and until you do, the conclusion must be that you think Jews are worth less than others. Not that there is much doubt about that.

David T,

what I don’t understand is, have any of these pro-boycotters got any common sense?

by attacking HP they only highlight the borderline racism on the UCU activists list and potentially make the FULL contents** of it subject to wider scrutiny?

which, in turn, could possibly reveal other vile and racist comments from these pro-boycotters?

which is not a smart move in their position

—

** remember Mr. Cushman, that the List would be backed up and multiple copies kept so deleting a few comments on it won’t make them vanish or outside of the law

Let’s have a selection of posts from the activists list responding to Delich’s ‘David Duke’ post.

Was it generally praised?

threatening to use the British libel laws against HP is not the way trade unionists used to sort things out, but then again they didn’t post articles from the David Duke web site either

there was a time, not too long ago, when trade unionists were in the forefront of opposing David Duke and his neo-Nazi followers, how times have changed?

I shall be re-posting the HP post

so Mr. Cushman if you want to sue HP, sue me too and then I’ll explain in person why it is a bad idea to post from Ku Klux Klan web sites and how to spot them, it is not hard, in fact it is rather elementary for anti-racists or anyone with a modicum of common sense

Funny I thought UCU was a union for academic professionals. Presumably nowadays if a student bases an essay or exam answer entirely on a piece by a 911 conspiracy nut on a Nazi website then they will get an ‘A’. No wonder the exam results get better each year. I don’t know which is the bigger scandal, the way these anti-Jewish fanatics operate a self-protective secret society inside the academic establishment, or the fact that they are clearly such horseshit academics that I wouldn’t hire them to wash my car.

And they can’t even run a racist secret society properly. What a bunch of oisvorfs.

How many times do these “mistakes” have to happen before people realise that there’s a simple and obvious reason why the comrades keep managing to link to or sound like neo-Nazis? Personally, I don’t see a substantive difference between this and some of the left’s support for reactionary and racist Islamist organisations, except that you can’t help hoping that David Duke’s whiteness, as irrelevant as it should be, might just give them pause to reflect on the cesspool into which they’ve strayed.

But it won’t. My money says they’ll shoot the messenger.

The idiotic points about privacy also leave aside the fact that most of the subscribers would have used their work email address. So hard cheese – if you want to use public, tax-funded infrastructure to bat around idiocy then I want to know about it.

As a defrocked academic, and something of a snob, I’m appalled that my former colleagues should have linked up with cake-decorating instructors from the local tech.

“I should hastily add that I’m well aware of the historical anti-Jewish basis at the root of the founding of the KKK; rather it seems in modern times that some of the strongest support in the US for Israel are the evangelicals whose cultural well-springs draw from much of the same cultural sources historically as Dukes crowd. Or is it simply the fulfilling of the prophesy thing with the evangelicals in their support for Israel, as opposed to any intrinsic admiration for Israel as a democracy under attack?’

You have it jumbled a little – a lot of correct bits in the wriong places.

These people don’t have a great deal in common except language and ethnicity. White Supremacists these days, and the KKK as far badck as the 20’s were nearly antion-wide, while the modern-day Evangelical movement is primarily or pretty solidly Southern aad Southern Diaspora.

Admiration for Israel as a democracy under attack has nothing to do with their support for Israel. It has to do with American Protestantism’s historical self-identification, going back to the Puritans, with Ancient Israel AND also with the prophesy with the return of the Jews to Zion and the rebuilding fo the temple as a prelude to the Second Coming.

““This has made me crucially aware of how difficult it is to set out rules, or even guidelines, for avoiding errors. “
Well, Mr. Cushman, I’ll explain a really, simple technique:”

It’s even simpler than that. When you hit one of these sites, you feel queasy and hope to God no one has been watchng you. It’s like hitting a child porn sight by mistake. There is not much mistaking one.

Well done David T. and Harry’s Place for pointing out this disgusting woman to a wide audience.

Another thing.

I’ve never complained about the vituperative attacks leveled both at this blog and at me, personally. I find them both silly and sinister: but I accept that if you chose to argue your case, you must accept the barbs thrown at you. It is fair game.

Ultimately, though, I’m just a bloke writing what he thinks on a website read by a handful of people.

The UCU activists list, by contrast, consists of a group of political agitators, who have sought repeatedly to implement what – according to their own legal advice – is a discriminatory and unlawful boycott of their peers: all of whom are Israeli, and most of whom are Jews. Their conduct has driven a number of their colleagues and comrades from the union which is supposed to be protecting them. And, so it seems, this worries them not a bit.

This, I should add, is taking place in a public sector union, working in the field of education: this country’s intellectual gold reserves, so to speak.

In doing so, they are wrecking their union and poisoning academia.

And when one of their fellow activists promotes the writings of a conspiracy nut, linking to a neo Nazi website, it is supposed somehow to be wrong to point this out.

“How many times do these “mistakes” have to happen before people realise that there’s a simple and obvious reason why the comrades keep managing to link to or sound like neo-Nazis? ”

Good question.

And are we seriously expected to believe that she was promoting David Duke’s website in ignorance? Everyone has heard of that creep.

Well it doesn’t pass muster. The only “mistake” was that this little adventure leaked out into the public domain. But it does help us to know this about folk like her, and where they are coming from.

We are better off knowing because rational arguments related to Israeli and Palestinian statehood, and governance, are going to be utterly wasted on people who simply hate Jews, but don’t want to get caught saying it out loud.

I’m not even sure who this campaign of theirs is really directed against anyway. It seems to me it will have minimal impact on Israel, but has already proved quite effective in establishing a hostile atmosphere for British Jews in our own academic institutions.

I see my message to the list has been reproduced. Now for a few points that are important to make
1. The reaon this discussion goes on so much on the activists list is because there are people who do take on the pro-boycotters. The picture being painted of the list is completely inaccurate.
2. I posted a lengthy response the other day and an anti-boycott list member sent me an offlist e-mail saying they appreciated what I was doing but they would no longer be posting on the topic because they did not want to run the risk of what they said posted on websites. So well done!
3. I will repeat that we discuss many work related issues that need to be private and drawing lines in the sand is practically impossible- thus all should remain private. You go on about 700 people not being secret. Well put it this way, it is clear that except for a few exceptions, most people do respect the rules and the ignorance shown about the debate on the list demonstrates just how much the vast bulk of people respect the rules.

In conclusion, the actions of sites like this does nothing to defeat the boycott movement but what it does do is make people in the centre on this issue be determined that they will not be bullied by outsiders into taking a stance. Everytime you post stuff from the list or talk about the list, you simply strengthen the hand of the boycotters.

“Criticism of Israel cannot be construed as anti-semitic.”

Checkmate, Ziocons!

Jim “I will repeat that we discuss many work related issues that need to be private and drawing lines in the sand is practically impossible- thus all should remain private. You go on about 700 people not being secret. Well put it this way, it is clear that except for a few exceptions, most people do respect the rules and the ignorance shown about the debate on the list demonstrates just how much the vast bulk of people respect the rules.”

But Jim this isn’t a work related issue. UCU has done absolutely nothing to stop this kind of antisemitism on the activist’s list. Absolutely nothing , infact it has dismissed complaints of antisemitism on the list.

There comes a point Jim when you have to take a stand against what is happening in UCU. If that means publishing an example of this antisemitism on the list then so be it.

You say it’s only a few exceoptions – what difference does that make ? The BNP are relatively small as well , but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take them on.

I’m afraid Jim that your approach of “My union , right or wrong” is wrong. Take an anti-racist approach Jim and face up to the problem and act to solve it. It’s not going away , it’s getting worse and Jewish UCU members are feeling increasingly uncomfortable.

Jimmy Donaghey,

remember if people published racist filth or point others to it, then they can not expect those comments to go unanswered.

surely that’s an obvious point? even Mr. Cushman should understand that

btw, if you see him, please remind Mr. Cushman that there is a fairly simple algorithm for avoiding this type of “mistake”, my comment of 22 August 2008, 10:04 pm details it

so here’s the lesson: a union activist’s list shouldn’t be used to propagate anti-Jewish racism

PS: if pro-boycotters decided to sue HP then they can sue me too.

I shall re-post all of the HP threads relating to this matter. You might remember that old fashioned trade union notion: attack one of us and you attack us all :)

You go on about 700 people not being secret. Well put it this way, it is clear that except for a few exceptions, most people do respect the rules and the ignorance shown about the debate on the list demonstrates just how much the vast bulk of people respect the rules.

So ignorance is your goal? How quaint for a union composed of academics.

Frankly, this is disingenuous. There are quite a few people at Engage who are also recipients of the postings from the UCU activists’ list. They paint quite a different picture than you do. Antisemitism is quite clearly the order of the day, and David Duke would find himself feeling quite at home on your list.

This is why I don’t belong to UCU and don’t see why the leadership of this union, who share none of my values or indeed interest in teaching and research, the proper focus of those in our profession, should be representing me to the government and to the public.

Cushman “This is a
potentially libellous statement and I would urge Jenna to contact
hurryupharry’s ISP”

Go ahead and sue. In your dreams.

Jim “In conclusion, the actions of sites like this does nothing to defeat the boycott movement ”

You don’t get it Jim , do you ?
It’s about antisemitism not the boycott.

There are those of us who are trying to fight this in the union which is a long term battle. Then there are those who sit outside the union, with their annonymous computer handles and call the action of people antisemitic! To use Camilla Bassi’s phrase, doing this is “bottling out of the fight”. As for quisquis saying UCU does not represent the profession- ok- well why not take a positive step and fight to make it represent the profession from inside rather than sitting outside and criticising. Remember every pro-boycott person only has the same democratic right as you would hav if you join. However, I suppose it is easier to use a nom de plume and not get involvedin the real fight.

Goodnight!

Jimmy Donaghey, if you’re fighting the boycott from within then that is to be applauded. However, the significance of, and public interest in the UCU’s antisemitic boycott stretch well beyond the confines of the activists’ list, and there’s little to suggest that you anti-boycotters are making much progress.

If there were an exposé in a national newspaper that leaked Conservative Party internal memos that were promulgating neo-Nazi literature, for example, would you write to that paper chastising it for failing to respect the private nature of such correspondence? If not, then this sounds like special pleading.

That other anti-boycotters disagree with your view that exposing the antisemitism on the activists’ list is counter-productive is apparent by the existence of such leaks. I suggest that it’s them with whom you should be debating tactics.

Jim “There are those of us who are trying to fight this in the union which is a long term battle.”

Jim , Kindly tell me what you have done to stop this kind of antisemitism on the activist’s list ? What has the leadership of UCU done Jim except dismiss claims of antisemitism on the activists’ list ?

You’re loyalty to UCU , your beliefs in Trade Unionism are admirable Jim , but the reality is that you have achieved nothing to defeat antisemitism in the union or on the activists’ list.

And now you blame other people for your failure and lack of success.

Good luck to those who want to fight this from the inside. I sincerely hope they win, while seeing clearly that this is not very likely.

And maybe it’s shortsighted of me, but I’m afraid I wouldn’t dream of associating with the charlatans who run the union. I notice from the various institutional websites of the leading lights of the union that they don’t actually appear to do any research. Indeed, it’s amazing they’ve managed to survive successive RAEs. I’ve got better things to do, like practice my profession, do my work, educate my students and add to the world’s knowledge about my subject. Strangely enough I don’t find it worthwhile to get involved when this means having my religion and ethnicity constantly thrown in my face.

Sorry, but that’s just the way it is.

Jimmy Donaghey wrote:

“Remember every pro-boycott person only has the same democratic right as you would hav if you join. “

oh I see, but fortunately I was bashing the fascist a few decades before Mr. Cushman even got his MSc in ‘Analysis, design and management of information systems’, so please don’t try to lecture us on these basic topics.

it is simple: if UCU members use the UCU activists list to promote anti-Jewish racism then it should be in the open

as we used to say: Open the Books!

this racist filth and profound ignorance needs to see the light of day, not be kept behind grubby private exchanges that are somehow seen as privileged

“There are those of us who are trying to fight this in the union which is a long term battle. Then there are those who sit outside the union”…………….

But……

There are also those who have been bullied on the list to such an extent that they have felt the need to withdraw from the list (but not their membership of the Union).

And there are also those who have left the Union who have taken a principled position to leave the Union completely because of the incessant antisemitism.

And there are also those who have been forced off the list – and remain off the list – because of a footnote.

“Then there are those who sit outside the union, with their annonymous computer handles and call the action of people antisemitic!”

Perhaps I misunderstand you, but if you don’t consider the UCU’s boycott proposals antisemitic, then I don’t know why you would devote much energy to “battling” it. There are certainly reasons to oppose it other than its antisemitic nature, such as its counter-productivity, but if it weren’t antisemitic it would be little more than another example of pointless gesture politics, and of little interest outside your union.

“Remember every pro-boycott person only has the same democratic right as you would hav if you join.”

So why is it then, that when a majority of members opposes the boycott, UCU keeps adopting pro-boycott policies?

“However, I suppose it is easier to use a nom de plume and not get involvedin the real fight.”

Perhaps. Perhaps some people think they can fight more effectively outside the union. Perhaps those using nom de plumes are also involved in “the real fight”. Perhaps some people feel less sullied simply to walk away from a union that doesn’t care enough about antisemitism to put an end to these discriminatory policies, than to stick around for this perpetual and degrading “fight”.

Jimmy Donaghey

As people know, I am strongly anti boycott but the conditions of the list is that it is not reproduced elsewhere and this sort of thing cannot be condoned.

It took several readings for me to realise that what you believed “cannot be condoned” was NOT Jenna Delich’s approving links to racist hate sites via the UCU activists email list.

No.. the far more crucial and immediate issue was ensuring the list’s secrecy.

Which made me wonder – what on earth could be at stake, that any normal, non-racist, UCU activist would consider more important than the fact that Jenna Delich is disseminating race-hate literature via this clearly honorable and transparent democratic tool of debate…?

Issues of National Security? List members who are in Witness Protection programs? What…?

People on the list often are critical of their university managements on this list.

Bitching about the boss.

You’re more concerned about being busted for bitching about your employers than you are about someone disseminating race-hate literature on your “list”?!

This is insane.

You must realise this.

It’s perfectly reasonable that if an organisation of which you’re a member strays to far away from your core values, you would wish disassociate yourself from it and cease funding it.

I think those who argue to stay and fight should be clear – in their own minds, at least – at what point, if any, they would be prepared to walk away.

There are those of us who are trying to fight this in the union which is a long term battle. Then there are those who sit outside the union, with their annonymous computer handles and call the action of people antisemitic!

David Duke is antisemitic.

Linking to David Duke’s website and disseminating, with approval, the ideology espoused there – almost certainly antisemitic.

This is horrific stuff, Mr Donaghey. You simply can’t debate with people who openly source race-hate websites as research tools for their arguments.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salah_Choudhury
here’s a muslim who has a hundred times the intellect of these UCU idiots.
And of course he is not sitting in his ivory tower pontificating like Delich -he his facing real intimidation from those she loves to support.

I think Harry’s Place is in danger of losing all credibility – which would be very sad.

Your banner says you want people to hear things they don’t want to hear.

But you want to protect Jews and anti-racists from verbal “viciousness”.

If you think free speech has merit in itself, might you not encourage people to sound off about whatever it is that is making them anxious and upset?

No doubt Ms. Delich is not an heir of the enlightenment, but why not let her have her say?

People who believe there is a Jewish conspiracy etc etc should be free to say so as long as they don’t advocate violence or conspire to overthrow our democratic constitution(s).

The opinions may be unhealthy. But expressing them is healthy.

Roger
22 August 2008, 9:15 pm

“As the one right they insisted on in Israel/Palestine after WWII was the right for completely unrestrained immigration- a right not allowed anywhere else in the world- their neighbours had very good reason to worry they were not demanding “the same rights as everybody else”; especially as those countries most in favour of igranting that right there did not permit jews to enter them on such a basis.”

Just how totally and completely ignorant of 19th and 20th century history are you, Roger?

Jews from eastern Europe started immigrating to Israel with purchases of desolate lands in the mid to late 1800s, starting with Moses Montefiore’s purchase for the assistance of Syrian Jews who were subjected to a pogrom there due to a blood libel about a missing priest.

By the early 20th century, non-Jewish immigrants started to come into the area to take advantage of the much improved economy that came about from Zionist Jewish enterprise, particularly the communal farms.

Guess who found this development upsetting?

If you guessed the Jews, you continue on your 180 degree wrong path. By the 1930s, the Mufti of Jerusalem, installed by the British, was joining forces with the Nazis. Jews desperately fleeing the deportations to the “work camps” were barred while Muslims from all over Asia Minor were gaining unrestricted entry.

On the other hand, Jewish communities in other parts of Asia Minor and north Africa with roots as ancient as the Babylonian exile were subjected, not just to the systemic racism of dhimmi status known for centuries, but outright pogroms like the Farhud in Iraq of the 1940s, resulting in the flight of about a million of them over a few decades.

Nearly Oxfordian: “You don’t need to be ‘obsessed’ by Muslims, Ben, to look around you and see who is at the forefront of actual, physical genocidal programmes against the Jews.”

I thank you for your concern, NO, but I don’t think I need to cleave to the, perhaps, over-zealous regarding what most around here know is my rather hard-line attitude to Islamist reaction. I need no lectures. Perhaps what others need to realise is that David Duke is entirely at one with your average two-bit Islamist bully pulpit scumbag (though not with the tiny minority of active al-qaeda-ists, of course). Perhaps others need to consider whether their positions are in fact of a piece with a consistent progressive line on these matters, or whether their views are in fact beset by an unhealthy particularism.

DT: “Ultimately, though, I’m just a bloke writing what he thinks on a website read by a handful of people.”

I wouldn’t do your own efforts and those of other HP authors down, David. I myself – and I’m sure many of us do – know plenty of people in the party, from both university days and people I’ve met since, who read and take account of HP views. HP helps to set an intellectual trend. It is part of forming a particular zeitgeist within the party. If you think back to the days of 2003, we were entirely disorganised. I wouldn’t even have considered myself sympathetic to the leadership on the relevant issues. Now, the progressive and democratic centre-left has never been more confident, more organised, more aggressive – in Parliament, in the party, in the media and in academia. We are, I think, well-placed to weather a general election defeat and come out on top. HP has contributed to that state of affairs.

Jimmy Donaghey: “I will repeat that we discuss many work related issues that need to be private and drawing lines in the sand is practically impossible- thus all should remain private… Everytime you post stuff from the list or talk about the list, you simply strengthen the hand of the boycotters.”

As a trade union member myself, I appreciate youir concerns. But, as a trade union member, you will understand that the role of a trade unionist is greater simply than protecting his own working conditions. The role of a trade unionist is to promote progressive politics and the brotherhood of mankind (to sound a tad romantic there).

I hope that academics achieve sensible and just improvements to their pay and conditions, but I am more concerned, as a progressive and a Labour man, by the fact that UCU has largely placed itself outside the supportive fold. Vile anti-semitism and right wing reaction are grave charges for one part of the left to make against another, but those charges are, sadly, those of unanswerable force.

The party and the movement is bigger than UCU. You yourself must surely agree. And the party and the wider movement have, themselves, a moral requirement to consider whether speaking out against the right who have captured UCU is necessary or not. It seems to me that any decent trade unionist, any party member, and sympathiser with the left, would consider it quite necessary to engage in a political critique of an organisation which has a mailing list on which a regular contributor has been found not guilty of reactionary politics, but then links David Duke. David Duke, for fuck’s sake! This is about as clear as it gets. UCU is on its own, until it deals with its own augean stables. It is to be hoped that the union will break free of the influence of the extreme right SWP (and, yes, I think that is the correct analysis for a totalitarian group that tolerates anti-semitism) and returns to the proper fold. Until then, no bleating, no whining, no privileges. Please. You debase yourselves by even imagining that the correct elements of the movement would consider your special pleading.

“No doubt Ms. Delich is not an heir of the enlightenment, but why not let her have her say?”

Ms Delich is one of two things. An anti-semite. Or a damn ignorant, disgusting, fool.

In neither capacity is she fit to be a part of the labour movement. She must be expelled from the UCU. One imagines that such vile filth are not members of the these days terribly sensible Labour Party, but if she is, then she should have her membership of that revoked as well, to state a blindingly and ferociously obvious truth.

UCU must deal with its reactionary elements if it is to be a proper part of the labour movement.

Ms Delich is, of course, entitled to spout her extreme right reactionary filth, but not from anywhere within the wider labour movement.

I am not by nature a terribly vindictive individual; in fact, I am inclined to take a very Catholic view of personal shortcomings and mistakes.

But Ms Delich is – whether she realises it or not – far right filth, whether by accident or design.

Jimmy

“Then there are those who sit outside the union, with their annonymous computer handles and call the action of people antisemitic!”

What else shall we call it, Jimmy, when a UCU acticist links to a neo-nazi website that includes claims that Israel and the US blew up the twin towers, but that no-one is allowed to know this because of the Jews absolute control of the “international media”? A positive contribution to finding peace in the Middle East?

And, one other thing. Screw your “Loyalty to the Party” crap.

Loyalty, like trust, is to be earned. I cannot be demanded by the mere fact that the UCU is a Union.

Like trust, loyalty is a two-way street. UCU has abused that trust and the loyalty of its members (both Jews and non-Jews) by refusing to do anything about the antisemitism that has infected it for the past years, and which, as we have clearly seen, continues to do so.

Perhaps you need to look to yourself and your call for blind obedience before you even think of judging others.

Jimmy,
I’m sure the British State are still kicking themselves for not fixing it that so that you were on the jury for the Clive Ponting trial. Your argument and their’s is identical.

David–

They’re fussing because they’ve been exposed.

They don’t like the idea that other people know that “distinguished British academics” read David Duke and believe what they read and that other “distinguished British academics” are:

1. Not only unwilling to call this sort of bahavior racist but

2. Are not willing to in any way. shape or form penalize the offender(by for example banning her from the UCU list).

I am sure there will now be howls of free speech suppression coming from the UCU. And to those howlers, I have but one question: Can David Hirsh post yet?

Regards,

Inna

“They demanded the right to national independence in their own homeland. No doubt you’ll tell us that you object to the Finns having this right in Finland and the Chinese in China and so on. Unless and until you do, the conclusion must be that you think Jews are worth less than others. Not that there is much doubt about that.”
As it was a “national homeland” mainly inhabited by other people at the time and as most lived elsewhere and had ancestors who had lived elsewhere for several hundred years, yes, NO, it was rather different to China or Finland. Especially as many of the jews who went to Israel went there because they couldn’t go to the USA and other countries.

They couldn’t get that green card, so they went to the land of milk and honey that is the strip of sieged land they call Israel?

Yeah. That was it, you insightful, intelligent… creature, you.

Why are you a cunt? I’m sorry for putting that out there, but, you know, I’m really just genuinely interested. I actually don’t understand. Please enlighten me – you’ll make me ever so happy. :)

Lynne T,
Do you deny that the one right demanded for jews after WWII was the right for unrestricted numbers to enter Palestine as a jewish homeland and that this was encouraged by the restrictions imposed on jewish immigration by the USA and other countries? The previous history of the area and the reasons why jews were so eager- or, sometimes, reluctant- to go there at different times are irrelevant to the fact that Israel exists now and any practical attempt to make peace in the Middle East must accept that fact.

“They couldn’t get that green card, so they went to the land of milk and honey that is the strip of sieged land they call Israel?

Yeah. That was it, you insightful, intelligent… creature, you.”
…as the alternatives were remaining in devastated countries where their freinds and neighbours had been murdered- often with the acceptance or assistance of their gentile friends and neighbours- or in refugee camps all over Europe, yes, Israel looked like the best option. Furthermore after the previous few years it looked very much as though the bases of Zionism- that jews would never be accepted as equals by gentiles and that jews would never be safe in the world until they were citizens of a jewish nation- were completely and obviously true.

“Why are you a cunt? I’m sorry for putting that out there, but, you know, I’m really just genuinely interested. I actually don’t understand. Please enlighten me – you’ll make me ever so happy. :)”
I doubt it, You’re rather a sad little chap, as your posts show.

Well, it is, as someone posted above, as clear as it gets. A UCU member posts KKK material and the response is to furiously demand secrecy. Is the UCU planning to become a Secret Order of the KKK?

And then, people still think that the obsession about Israel has anything to do with “Justice for Palestinians”. Well, why not “Justice for Aryans”?

It’s not that I want to be deliberately… inconvenient, I suppose.

Just that surely “You’re rather a sad little chap, as your posts show” does require some vague sort of back up.

You seem, in any case, to have gone from anti-Zionist to pro-Zionist tropes in the space of one post, which is quite exciting. I’m not interested in having an argument for the sake of it, so if I got you wrong then I apologise. But your first post does still make me wonder.

Actually, Roger, having digested the full contents of all your three posts together, I think you deserve an apology from me. So you have it. I apologise, because you’re clearly not dreadful after all.

Ah, Benny, you can’t help being…inconvenient, you suppose. Any more than you can help being offensive, sad and stupid as your later remarks show.

“Pro-zionism” and “anti-zionism” are irrelevant to the topic I commented on- that the very fact that Israel exists has to be accepted as a basis for any present settlement in the Middle East. It doesn’t matter if people believe it always was the “Jewish national home” and every gentile who’s been there since the emperor Vespasian’s rule were illegal immigrants or if they believe that all of the jews who went there were illegal immigrants and agents of the illuminati or whatever other historical myth they go in for. Any settlement has to begin with the way things are now, not “rights” which were created or invented long ago for ad hoc purposes.

If fascist insanity is the only thing these ‘academics’ understand then why is it their houses don’t mysteriously burn down. At some point you have to wonder if you’re tolerating yourselves to death. And no, there hasn’t been any material difference between the extreme left and the extreme right for a very long time.

Another question is where do these people stop, if Israel no longer existed then they would be going after India.

As usual…what Fabian said.

Second rate lecturers/tutors, surrounded by over-achieving ‘yids’ seek solace in the ‘fact’ that the jews are only where they are cos its all a big conspiracy and they control everything.

Second rate lecturers (plus TheIriot) find that the ‘palestinian cause’ is a handy little avenue for the fact that they don’t like jews.

Fellow second-rate lecturers get angry that one of their own is found liking the stuff on fascist website. Thick, ignorant and found-out, aformentioned lecturers talk about legal action and flap about like the nothings they are.

Good work Harry. Suing HP for speaking the truth….havent we heard that before……

Saw this posted on the Engage thread on the same topic:

“Gosh,
Is this what it has come to?
You can’t even link to a neo-nazi website these days without being labelled an “antisemite”.
It’s political correctness gone mad! ”

tee-hee.

Although the above quote is not quite as funny as this!

“I have taught sessions on web searching, web use and how to establish the provence and authenticity of information. This has made me crucially aware of how difficult it is to set out rules, or even guidelines, for avoiding errors.”

Having been to the source site in question, one cannot help but feel that the person who was not aware of the nature of the site she was on is less in need of ’sessions on web searching’ than in need of potty training.

Admittedly the anti-semiticism of these people is very, very dangerous. But their stupidity is mind-numbing.

Received the legal fax yet DavidT?

“anti-semitism”

I dunno, a unviversity educations aint wot it was.

Matt

Field states:

I think Harry’s Place is in danger of losing all credibility – which would be very sad….If you think free speech has merit in itself, might you not encourage people to sound off about whatever it is that is making them anxious and upset? No doubt Ms. Delich is not an heir of the enlightenment, but why not let her have her say?….The opinions may be unhealthy. But expressing them is healthy.

The right of free speech works two ways: just as Ms. Delich is free to espouse any rubbish she so wishes, Harry’s Place is free to expose it.

“Israel looked like the best option.”

Actually, for most it was the ONLY option. For even after the Holocaust was filling up the newsreels, Wester European governments were refusing to let Jews enter and the Holocaust survivors were being murdered in the states where they had lived.

There was (literally) only one place they could go to in all the world.

Regards,

Inna

Here is an exchange between David Hirsh and Jimmy Donnaghey on the Engage website from June 21 2007.

http://www.engageonline.org.uk/blog/article.php?id=1164

“In conclusion, the actions of sites like this does nothing to defeat the boycott movement but what it does do is make people in the centre on this issue be determined that they will not be bullied by outsiders into taking a stance. Everytime you post stuff from the list or talk about the list, you simply strengthen the hand of the boycotters”

Rarely have I read such a load of special pleading horse manure. You go on about ‘privacy’ and ‘lines in the sand’ and ‘respecting rules’, when the fact is that what people are discussing here is an ILLEGAL RACIST BOYCOTT. This is a public sector union, which has embarked on what it has been told by its own lawyer is an illegal act. Oh, and by the way, it’s a British public sector union, not one in the Soviet Union. The attempt to turn the debate on its head and blame those who are exposing this illegal racist campaign does not sit well with the word ‘respect’.

“Then there are those who sit outside the union, with their annonymous computer handles and call the action of people antisemitic!”

And how exactly do you know that IRL none of us are UCU members?
The twisting and turning and irrelevant arguments (from an ‘academic’) just go on and on.
If you sue Modernity, you’ll have to sue me too.
Go on, make my day.

Field has lost the plot completely. He wants to protect the right of academics in publicly funded universities to use computer infrastructure paid for by me to disseminate antisemitism, but he objects to my right to use my computer on this blog to object to this antisemitism.

“I thank you for your concern, NO, but I don’t think I need to cleave to the, perhaps, over-zealous regarding what most around here know is my rather hard-line attitude to Islamist reaction. I need no lectures”

You protest far too much. I didn’t lecture. I made a simple observation, as you do several times a day on this blog. Your virulent and sneering reaction to a comment that was in very mild disagreement with you is quite revealing.

“As it was a “national homeland” mainly inhabited by other people at the time and as most lived elsewhere and had ancestors who had lived elsewhere for several hundred years, yes, NO, it was rather different to China or Finland. Especially as many of the jews who went to Israel went there because they couldn’t go to the USA and other countries”

This dumb, illiterate, ignorant, patronising, sneering bovine manure just shrieks antisemitism. Do you know ANYTHING about the history of the Jews and the Middle East? Well, evidently not …
And the phrase ‘rights invented later for ad hoc purposes’, or however you phrased that drivel, is just more of the same.

Do yourself a favour and enroll on an evening course, or even spend a couple of weekends at your local library, reading up on the history before making such a public fool of yourself.

Jimmy Donaghey:

“There are those of us who are trying to fight this in the union which is a long term battle. Then there are those who sit outside the union, with their annonymous computer handles and call the action of people antisemitic! To use Camilla Bassi’s phrase, doing this is “bottling out of the fight”.”

This, written by the man who shrilly insisted on the exclusion of David Hirsh from the union discussion on the basis of an insignificant technicality.

Donaghey has the “bottle” to cosy up to the union leadership and encourage the witch-hunt of Jewish union activists out of the argument.

Indeed, Silly Little Boy. The first post was highly funny, and indicated a paradox in the argument. The second was hugely ironic. And funny.

Jimmy, you’re worse than IOC tae kwondo judges. Seriously.

Apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier (click here and then follow the link to the comments section):

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

Seeing as UCU has gone as far as it can to initiate a boycott whilst “cower[ing] in the shadow of an (unpublished) legal opinion regarding the illegality of last year’s boycott motions“, and given that Sally Hunt has failed to deliver a referendum on the issue, and is, in actual fact, in full support of this clandestine boycott, it appears that Jimmy Donaghey’s only concern here is to avoid damaging the union. It is a mystery as to why he doesn’t consider the driving of Jews and anti-racists from UCU a more worrisome type of damage, or why he behaves as though the anti-boycotters are a bigger menace to the union than the boycotters.

Apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier (click here and then follow the link to the comment section):

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

Seeing as UCU has gone as far as it can to initiate a boycott whilst “cower[ing] in the shadow of an (unpublished) legal opinion regarding the illegality of last year’s boycott motions“, and given that Sally Hunt has failed to deliver a referendum on the issue, and is, in actual fact, in full support of this clandestine boycott, it appears that Jimmy Donaghey’s only concern here is to avoid damaging the union. It is a mystery as to why he doesn’t consider the driving of Jews and anti-racists from UCU as a more worrisome type of damage, or why behaves as though the anti-boycotters are a bigger menace to the union than the boycotters.

Apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier (click here and then follow the link to the comment section):

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

Seeing as UCU has gone as far as it can to initiate a boycott whilst “cower[ing] in the shadow of an (unpublished) legal opinion regarding the illegality of last year’s boycott motions“, and given that Sally Hunt has failed to deliver a referendum on the issue, and is, in actual fact, in full support of this clandestine boycott, it appears that Jimmy Donaghey’s only concern here is to avoid damaging the union. It’s a mystery as to why he doesn’t consider the driving of Jews and anti-racists from UCU as a more worrisome type of damage, or why behaves as though the anti-boycotters are a bigger menace to the union than the boycotters.

Jimmy Donaghey, I want the UCU to get the boycott, revel in their neo-nazi links and to reveal themselves in their true garb. I am not interested in your attempts to add bromide to their psychosexual obsessions against the Jews. Let them get everything they desire, and more. Why should I care that you’re trying to turn this rusted, leaky ship from within, when I and most other people who see it for what it is just want it to scuttle itself at the earliest opportunity.

Your pleading begs the question that we *care* that the UCU can reform itself sufficiently so that it keeps its Jew Obsession just bubbling under.

Mr Donaghey has a lot in common with the Teamster’s boss,

“I may have many faults, but being wrong ain’t one of them.”
Jimmy Hoffa

This, apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier (click here and then follow the link to the comment section):

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

Seeing as UCU has gone as far as it can to initiate a boycott whilst “cower[ing] in the shadow of an (unpublished) legal opinion regarding the illegality of last year’s boycott motions“, and given that Sally Hunt has failed to deliver a referendum on the issue, and is, in actual fact, in full support of this clandestine boycott, it appears that Jimmy Donaghey’s only concern here is to avoid damaging the union. It is a mystery as to why he doesn’t consider the driving of Jews and anti-racists from UCU as a more worrisome type of damage, or why behaves as though the anti-boycotters are a bigger menace to the union than the boycotters.

The goings on the UCU “closed” list are, actually, far worse than it seems.

There is little doubt that most of the “UCU activists” in support of the boycott did so originally not because they were anti-Semites. But, once their campaigning segued into obssesion, and in the course of heated dicussions when voices are raised, they became increasingly open to anti-Semitic arguments. (Similar process happened to some, but not all, SPC activists.) In a march of thousand steps they are slowly becoming a mob indistinguishable from classical far-Right anti-Semites, willing to believe and bolster their argument by any anti-Jewish canard or conspiracy theory. But, of course, they live in denial of their own racism. A very convenient denial.

And all this business of “secrecy” is, frankly, contemptible. Why aren’t UCU activists willing for this link to David Duke’s website and an openly anti-Semitic conspiracy theory become public? If it is so outrageous for the public to know about it, perhaps it is a little bit outrageous to post it at the first place?

Suppose, for the sake of argument, that a closed activist list of a trade union allowed a post with explicitly and unmistakably anti-Muslim or anti-Black racist statement. Should this, in Mike Cushman’s view, remain a secret or should it be exposed for all to see? Because if it should be a secret than Cushman is a consistent racist, while if it shouldn’t he is a total hypocrite. Not a nice choice, but then he is not a nice man.

At a slight tangent, why does Sheffield College not filter hate websites? I am absolutely sure that my workplace would not let me access the site in question. I appreciate that a university may not wish to install such a filter, as there can be legitimate reasons for certain students to access Duke’s site. However, Sheffield College offers the following courses:

* Art & Design 18+ Foundation
* Art & Design 18+ Pre-Degree
* Creative Art Practices Foundation Degree
* Design Fashion Higher National Diploma
* Fine Arts Higher National Diploma
* Graphic Design Foundation Degree
* Media Production Foundation Degree
* Performing Arts Foundation Degree
* Photography Foundation Degree
* Applied Computing Foundation Degree
* Business Foundation Degree
* e-Communications Foundation Degree
* Business Hospitality Foundation Degree
* Civil Engineering Higher National Certificate
* Construction Higher National Certificate
* Manufacturing Engineering Higher National Certificate
* Health & Social Care Foundation Degree
* Manage Health Care Services Foundation Degree
* Medical Foundation Programme (for preparation of the Medical Degree course at the University of Sheffield)
* Leisure Management Foundation Degree
* Sports Coaching & Exercise Foundation Degree
* Tourism & Events Management Foundation Degree

…so I find it unlikely that someone studying at Sheffield College has any legitimate reason whatsoever to end up on a KKK website.

Given the above, perhaps Delich has committed gross misconduct in the workplace, by accessing hate websites and posting the link to 700 of her colleagues and fellow union members.

I expected to get abuse for what I said and as expected this has happened. If you cannot see the irony of you giving names and addresses of people on this site and not being willing to put your own name to your own comment, then that says it all.

As for the person who linked to the engage person, the facts are undisputed:
1. I was invited to an engage event
2. I realised it was not to work inside the union so I said no
3. I was aked by engage if my declining of the invitation could be published
4. I said no
5. I got an e-mail saying that’s ok but we’ll publish our response to you anyway

What i believed was private correspondence was not treated as such.

Finally, for the academics out there you have a choice- if you think UCU’s position is relevant, join the fight to reform it. Go to meetings, put forwardmotions in your name as a member. Support people in elections who can bring it forward. If you think it is irrelevant, then treat it with the contempt you think it deserves and don’t bother with it at all. However, you can always take the easy way out and sit behind a computer and your alias and post messages while naming other people. For some of us, the issue is about creating a union that will not go down this path on any issue in the future whether it be Israel, Austra, Brazil or Tanzania.

What abuse?

Apart from “Nearly Oxfordian’s”, that is. He / she is that way with everyone.

Apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier (click here and then follow the link to the comment section):

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

Seeing as UCU has gone as far as it can to initiate a boycott whilst “cower[ing] in the shadow of an (unpublished) legal opinion regarding the illegality of last year’s boycott motions“, and given that Sally Hunt has failed to deliver a referendum on the issue, and is, in actual fact, in full support of this clandestine boycott, it appears that Jimmy Donaghey’s only concern here is to avoid damaging the union. It is a mystery as to why he doesn’t consider the driving of Jews and anti-racists from UCU as a more worrisome type of damage, or why behaves as though the anti-boycotters are a bigger menace to the union than the boycotters.

“Finally, for the academics out there you have a choice- if you think UCU’s position is relevant, join the fight to reform it. Go to meetings, put forwardmotions in your name as a member. Support people in elections who can bring it forward. If you think it is irrelevant, then treat it with the contempt you think it deserves and don’t bother with it at all.”

And if you think it is relevant, go to a meeting of your local branch which decides overwhelmingly against the boycott, only for its “representatives” to vote in its favour?

You are defending the indefensible, Jimmy Donaghey: a “union” that flouts each and every principle of union democracy, is run on a day-by-day basis by unelected activists and, even when it comes to bread-and-butter issues, does nothing, or very little, on matters that matter to real academics. (In fairness, real academics form a minority of its membership.)

Jim

Firstly please cut out the rubbish about getting abuse. You’re a political activist , a tough debater. The idea that you are being abused on this site is ridiculous. Yet you don’t seem to care about the actual real abuse towards Jewish UCU members taking place on the activist list.

Jim , you have failed to achieve anything in UCU by your softly , softly approach. You then blame other people for your own failures. The idea that people should not know what’s going on inside the UCU is frankly pathetic. It’s the equivalent of saying that any discussion of institutionalised racism in the police force should have been kept out of the public domain.

So Jim , i’d like to know what are you going to do about Delitch and antisemitism on the activist list. I’d like an answer to this please.

[blockquote]I expected to get abuse for what I said and as expected this has happened.[/blockquote]

Oh, dry your eyes. Criticism of Jimmy is not, by itself, abuse. Abuse is the opening of the sluice gates which occurs on your precious list, e.g. promoting white supremacists and virulent antisemites and/or swithering to defend such members. This is to say that you’re acting as a faciliator for antisemitism. Go on, sue me as well. This is my real name.

And, can we just check that you did indeed call for David Hirsch’s expulsion from the list for a typo whilst you sit here crying foul when promoting of white supremacists and virulent antisemites are revealed?

Given the above, perhaps Delich has committed gross misconduct in the workplace, by accessing hate websites and posting the link to 700 of her colleagues and fellow union members.

Worth repeating. I once did click on a link provided – accidentially!!!! – and it was blocked by my system (which is why I’d prefer to see URLs split into two lines). Whom to complain to?

Jim. Will you be putting the same effort into getting Delitch banned from the activist list as you did in your efforts re Hirsh ?

Jimmy, you represent a false dichotomy of either “ignore the union or support it”. What about the option of ridicule it and help it to its eventual self-destruction? That seems a fairly obvious third option, and one which I favour.

As for your obsession with our using anonymous monickers: this isn’t the official mailing list of a politically powerful union. It’s a website and a forum. Try to understand the difference.

Do you know who I am? I am Alec Macpherson! I demand you recognize this!

For the shrill and abusive Jim to whine about ‘abuse’ when he cannot counter the arguments against his position is beyond parody. But then, we already know that he is a puffed-up nonentity with a closed mind and in complete denial.

Tim, please keep your silly personal agenda out of this debate. I was not being ‘abusive’ towards Jim. If he can’t take robust argument when he dishes out far worse in his ongoing vendetta (and barely veiled threats) against this site, he shouldn’t be a ‘political activist’, or whatever else he thinks he is.

Someone take the sunny delight from Nearly. S/he’s get hyper again.

Am I missing something here.
I thought rooting out nazi and racist propagandists was something a union should be proud of?

Tim, not when the Court Anti-Boycotter gets stroked by the list managers.

“So Jim , i’d like to know what are you going to do about Delitch and antisemitism on the activist list. I’d like an answer to this please.”

Me too.

Nonsense, Alec. I am as cool as a cucumber (now, which film is that from?).

Let’s not fall out, eh? I agree with a lot of what you say.

For the sake of sparing posters’ fingers: I am a bloke.

What I find truly startling is that a political activist didn’t recognise the name David Duke in the first place.

If she’s that ignorant, how much credence should we place in anything else she says?

(A rhetorical question, of course)

I like Nearly Oxfordian. He is sick of the level of implicit and explicit antisemitism in GB, and has no patience to deal with it calmly.

I live far from you, so I don’t need to shout all the time. Sometimes I shout, sometimes I laugh and sometimes I hold my head in shame of the things British people say and accept about Israel only 60 years after the Holocaust.

Fabian, “Nearly Oxfordian” only shouts, and he does it at everyone, all the time.

Thank you, Fabian.

Tim, you are talking nonsense. Every single part of your statement is false.

For some reason a post of mine keeps getting blocked, so I’ll try it a bit at a time:

Apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier (click here and then follow the link to the comment section):

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

For some reason a post of mine keeps getting blocked, so I’ll try it a bit at a time:

Apparently from Jimmy Donaghey’s letter to David Hirsh, June 2007 or earlier:

“I must make clear that until UCU actually initiate a boycott (which I still believe will not happen), I am reluctant to do anything which I feel may damage the union. I have total faith in Sally Hunt to deliver a referendum on the issue and, when this happens, I am entirely confident, no boycott will be forthcoming.”

Seeing as UCU has gone as far as it can to initiate a boycott whilst “cower[ing] in the shadow of an (unpublished) legal opinion regarding the illegality of last year’s boycott motions“, and given that Sally Hunt has failed to deliver a referendum on the issue, and is, in actual fact, in full support of this clandestine boycott, it appears that Jimmy Donaghey’s only concern here is to avoid damaging the union. It is a mystery as to why he doesn’t consider the driving of Jews and anti-racists from UCU as a more worrisome type of damage, or why behaves as though the anti-boycotters are a bigger menace to the union than the boycotters.

Interesting. I had to do something similar on another thread, i.e. break up a post into bits when it got blocked (automatically) for no obvious reason.

As to rest: absolutely. It is a mystery indeed, given those facts.

Tim A, it’s because he’s an opportunistic prima donna. In my opinion.

Well, for pomposity and silliness, Alec, that takes some beating.

No, for sardonism and playful teasing of Jimmy in daring the disconnected fool to sue me, it was a good try, Nearly.

so Jimmy Donaghey are you going to engage with the points being made here? in particular Muffin’s:

“Suppose, for the sake of argument, that a closed activist list of a trade union allowed a post with explicitly and unmistakably anti-Muslim or anti-Black racist statement.”

Your latest post (and the one before it) are a little obscure, Alec, to put it mildly, since you didn’t make it clear who you were talking about.

If you were talking about me – and Tim certainly was – then turning this thread into an opportunistic stomping ground for his and your personal agenda and then complaining about ‘opportunism’ is beyond parody.

Mod: what Muffin wrote was not necessary.
I am sure it wasn’t is intention, but it seems that the day has come in which one has to “explain” antisemitism by analogy with other kinds of racism. As if it wasn’t clear.

*his* intention.

“What I find truly startling is that a political activist didn’t recognise the name David Duke in the first place”.

Even if she had not heard of him, the graphical links to things like this make his ethos utterly clear:

http://www.davidduke.com/general/jewish-supremacism_129.html

Now, on seeing something like this, a person of normal ethical bent would quickly close the web-browser and feel slightly dirty.

She did not.

As such, there’s some equivalent of colour-blindness here. They look, and even this most pure, Platonic example of clearcut, dictionary-definition, acid-drenched antisemitism reveals itself as nothing more than.. what? Anti-imperialism? Anti-zionist anguish? Who knows. But it’s utterly fascinating.

Now, let’s imagine what would happen on that mailing list if she’d posted a link from the BNP discussing Muslims. Can you even begin to think that anyone on that list would dare to call it an innocent mistake? Would Jimmy have blazed into Harry’s Place with his deplorable defence? Of course not. But then, to the UCU, Jews are always fair game. Jimmy is defending a Jew-hating, Neo-Nazi quoting, oppressive clique. The sooner it disintegrates and its members are repudiated for the nasty little bigots they are, the better.

Modernity, is that the triumph of hope over experience shining through your question? ;-)

No, Fabian, it wasn’t necessary, you are right. Yet, we are dealing here in the UCU context with individuals who, while waving the flag of anti-racism, in reality exhibit racism of the worst possible kind. It is reasonable to find out whether those defending them (e.g. Jimmy) would defend any racist with equal gusto, or just defend anti-Semites.

And, incidentally, in case Jimmy claims that he is not defending anything except the sacred confidentiality of the UCU list, it is legitimate to know whether this confidentiality is equally sacred were the open racism to be directed toward another ethnicity or group.

Jimmy states,

“For some of us, the issue is about creating a union that will not go down this path on any issue in the future whether it be Israel, Austra, Brazil or Tanzania.”

Well, for some of “us” the issue is whether an already created Union that represents thousands of employees does or does not facilitate antisemitism.

Unless, of course, you believe that antisemitism is a legitimate “UCU position” around which the membership should have a “choice”.

“Finally, for the academics out there you have a choice- if you think UCU’s position is relevant, join the fight to reform it.”

What an excellent idea.

Fabian, what “muffin” wrote shouldn’t be necessary, but sometimes is in the context of anti-racist antisemitism, it is. Analogies are a means of pointing out inconsistencies and double standards. This whole debate is about the double standards displayed when it comes to defending Jews against racism. Sometimes otherwise good people benefit from having it pointed out to them – sometimes they close their ears and call it “abuse”.

Fabian,

agreed such analogies shouldn’t be necessary, but they are

It seems to me that those so eager to attack Israel and “Zionists” don’t see themselves as articulating any form of racism, but it’s only when you bring up these examples that there is the possibility of them seeing why their conduct is so offensive.

If someone can unconsciously post from David Duke’s web site and then have it defended as Mr. Cushman and Jimmy Donaghey have done, then it seems that they haven’t thought through the implications of their actions.

Pro-boycotters need to be reminded that they are increasingly making UCU, a Jew-free trade union, as people decide with their feet and leave the UCU.

That’s the consequence of turning UCU into an organisation, which is perceived by many, to be hostile to Jews. Mr. Cushman and Jimmy Donaghey and should bear that in mind.

ps: Nearly Ox, I am ever hopeful

I am with muffin, if only to deny the UCU the excuse that it was all an honest mistake. Had it been an honest mistake (which I don’t believe for a moment), their subsequent behaviour would have been different. Muffin and Fabian and I and many others here know that there is a double standard in operation. We know that it should be the case that it goes without saying. Sadly, it doesn’t go without saying, given the people we are dealing with.

Yes to all that from modernity, or a least, I wish it were all so. I am less sanguine than modernity seems to be about those people who don’t see themselves as articulating any form of [antisemitic] racism, (a) being genuinely innocent and only doing this articulation out of noble motives and intentions, (b) being open to having their eyes opened to why their conduct is so offensive.

Sure, some of them may be. But imo that would brand them as … ahem … not very intellectually aware, and after all they are academics, so we are told (or am I expecting too much from your average Sheffield college lecturer? Maybe I am). The alternative is that they know perfectly well what they are doing, and are quite knowlingly cloaking their antisemitism with ‘anti-Zionism’ and other such silliness.

I think the “honest mistake” excuse stands up insofar as I’m sure Delich had absolutely no idea who David Duke is and why it might have been a bit of a PR catastrophe to link approvingly to anything associated with him (let alone his own website – the fact that his name’s in the URL means she can’t say “Oh my God, I never knew it had anything to do with David Duke!”).

On the other hand, there’s nothing remotely honest about her motives in general – she was clearly trawling the web for the grossest anti-Israel smears she could find, and wasn’t remotely discriminating about where they came from. It’s already clear from http://boycotted-uk-academic.blogspot.com/2008/03/hydra-of-british-academia.html that she’s not exactly open to reasoned argument that doesn’t already support her bigoted views, so it’s not too surprising that her mentality has led her down this spectacularly unfortunate alley.

Since I, among others, am being scolded for “hiding” behind a pseudonym on this website, I wonder whether Mr. Donaghey would care to elaborate further on the openness with which the affairs of the UCU Activist List are conducted? I’m sure we all would be impressed by their own frank courageous display of their views to the outside world, beginning with the bulk of their own members.

As for the power I’d have if I only had the sense to join UCU — forget it. The leadership knows perfectly well that most UCU members wouldn’t support a boycott, so they won’t put the proposal to a vote. So if you’re going to suggest that I should get involved, my joining would not, as you claim, give me the same voice as anyone else in what happens over the boycott. Quite evidently the only thing I could do that would have an effect would be to hold union office, indeed to become one of the top dogs in the union. There are so many reasons why I don’t want to do that that it would take forever to list them. But to be brief, I got into the profession, unlike most of those at the top of the union, in order to practice it, to teach and research, not to spend my time on wild-eyed political campaigns. I’m interested in my academic subject, not in making a name for myself in the SWP.

Anyway, presumably they wouldn’t have me. I’m a Jew.

What disturbs me, beyond the racism, of course, is that the actual interests of the profession, which is not in such a good state in this country, are not being served by the recognised union being run by people who don’t care about issues such as research funding, student numbers, government over-management of research, and so on. These are the things the union should be worrying about, along with pay and conditions, not spending time, money, and energy blackening the name of the whole profession in Britain by becoming obsessed by their leaders’ racist politics.

Well, the IOC tae kwondo judges have admitted their mistake. Will Jimmy?

Delich apologises. It would be funny if it wasn’t so sad. She can’t see why this article is antisemitic:

Hello John,

I didn’t realise who David Duke was nor did I hear of him. I just looked
at the article not the website where it appeared. Apologies for picking
up that website as I personallly am strongly against any racists,
anti-semitists and the likes of them. I just found the article quite
powerful, and none are saying that Joe Quinn (the author of the article) is a racist or anti-semitist, and the article is quite interesting. So, perhaps we should focus on the article itself and not where it appeared (if we look at it in a broader sense, the website itself appeard on Google and so did the article)? Anyone can put anything on their website. That’s how some of us ended up being quoted and commented on on Hydra website awhile ago.

Sincere apologies once again though for picking the wrong website, but
it’s the article that I found interesting as it gives some amazing facts
and it was not written by David Duke (who, I most certainly agree, has
no place in UCU but is the author of the website and not the article).

Regards

Jenna

JENNA DELICH

Then Delich gets angry with some (Jew) who doesn’t think her apology was sufficient:

Stephen,

‘Given that the offending posting by Delich quoting the ultra racist site of David Duke was made in response to my posting, your acceptance of her apology is on behalf of yourself and certainly not me and no doubt many others on this site.

I am deeply and personally offended that a contribution from Delich showing that she consults racist sites and then has the audacity to
quote articles found on them in a debate on a trade union site in response to a posting from a Jewish member, which from previous discussions she and long standing members of this list are perfectly aware is the case.. ‘

Twist to fit again?! I am PERSONALLY AND DEEPLY offended by such attempts and claims. First of all, my post was NOT in repsonse to a Jewish member but to John Porter.

I DO NOT know who Dave Duke is, as I am not interested in any kind of racists and fascists and the likes of them. I don’t like to even read
about them. That explains why I don’t know who he is (I really do not want to know him or know of him and the likes of him).

I personally have always been speaking from a humanitarian level and have been interested in articles that are publishing facts on humanitarian disaster that’s been going on there for decades, and is now worse than ever.

As for quoting the article that was found on David Duke’s website, apart from not knowing who he was (otherwise I would not have posted it), and the fact that he wasn’t the author of the article I’d like to draw a parallel by saying that our quotes were found on HYDRA site. So, some had the audacity to quote us without our consent. The same happened with the article that had been ripped off another website (as N. R Clark stated in his post of yesterday). The way I come across things is by simply typing ‘killing in West Bank and Gaza’ and similar NOT by going on particular website to consult them.

As John Porter said, the article itself is fairly accurate. So, instead of attacking me or John and being offensive to us, perhaps it’d be worth offering facts that would prove the article wrong / incorrect.

‘Yet again such a level of profound ignorance from somebody who posts to this site on a regular basis is hard to comprehend. ‘

Is it so difficult to comprehend that someone who is not interested in racists and fascists do not even read about them. So, why would you keep insisting that I do something I never would (i.e. learn who Dave Duke or the likes of him are).? I am aware of a number of the likes of Duke who were butchering my people in the very recent history, and reading about more of them in the world would be too painful for me. You have picked on me and offended me too many times (on and off the DAN list) that I’d past caring to mention. But with another one of your insiults – accusing me of something that’s completely untrue (i.e. consulting racist/facist website) is extremely offensive for me- in my view such an individual is not worth my further consideration.

Jenna

Extraordinary that someone teaching in a university should be so ill-informed about world affairs, or should choose to remain ill-informed about world affairs, especially when she spends a good bit of her time pontificating about world affairs.

Why does this not surprise me? The possession of strong opinions combined with supreme ignorance is the hallmark of these people.

Go read some books, Jenna. You might enjoy them.

“if we look at it in a broader sense, the website itself appeard on Google”

This is one of her excuses? Unbelievable. This is a faculy member at an institute of higher education in 2008, and she can’t string two arguments together.

The straightforward explanation here is that Jenna Delich hadn’t heard of David Duke and linked to one article on his site without bothering to look at the rest of it.

The article itself gives no indication of the racist character of Duke’s politics. It originated as an editorial on a radical website, Signs of the Times – http://tinyurl.com/4gqvhg – and was later reproduced by Duke on his own site.

So it is far from “reasonable to infer that Jenna Delich reads and takes her information on world events from neo Nazis”, as David T claims, or to imply that Jenna Delich shares Duke’s racist views.

And if David T wants to take a stand against racist filth, he could make a start rather closer to home – by erasing the vile anti-Muslim comments that disfigure his own site.

Any update on whether or not she can be reported for disseminating hate material?

Will UCU take any action against Delich ? Will UCU look at Delich’s previous emails on the list ?

What will UCU do to ensure this kind of thing doesn’t happen again ?

Will Delitch receive the same kind of punishment that Hirsh has endured ?

She should have heard of him. He is extremely well-known. And even if she really hasn’t heard of him, she agreed with his views, to the extent that she urged others to read them.

I shudder at her stupidity. How dare she claim that she did not recognise the website for what it was. Did the myriad gaudy links to Nazi literature down the side of the whole article not cause her *any* pause?

No, this is mendacity, not just stupidity. Her obsession with Jew-demonisation has turned her “colour blind” to the most blatant antisemitism. If she cannot identify antisemitism on David Duke’s website, then she wouldn’t identify it in Mein Kampf. To remember that the poison of her ethos might be embedded in the developing minds is sickening.

Here’s the truly frightening thing: a woman who speaks in this childlike, broken stutter about her professed ignorance has read this ridiculously parodic article, full of misleading, contextless brushstrokes of hate, and has distilled from it some sort of “truth”. She does not only admit, but seems *proud* that she has embedded her hateful “truth” neither within the depths of any contextual understanding nor along the breadth of any perspicacity. Instead, she dives headfirst into atavistic emotionalism and satisfies her thirst for leftist dipolar parody by wallowing in the basest implications of the article’s claims.

Thus, she allows a nation of people to be redwashed into a horrific jumble of dehumanising generalisations, and is proud that her lack of knowledge provides a dearth of sceptical bedrock, and that her lack of inquisitiveness provides has removed any dialectic barrier to the osmotic excesses of this article.

She should be horrified by herself. She should be ashamed of herself. She should sit in a dark, quiet room and meditate on what this reveals about her whole epistemology. But she won’t. She will lie there, stubborn and misconceiving, sorry for herself and wallowing in self pity that, once again, the nasty “Zionists” have “abused” her “innocent” “mistake”.

Non-sequiturs from Anon. Condemning the racism of UCU, as shown both by disseminating this stuff and by trying to cover this up when called on it, is not a function of action on alleged ‘vile anti-Muslim comments that disfigure xxx’s site’.

Let’s wait and see if Jimmy chastizes Anon for not revealing himself.

Now, Anon, please point to which anti-Muslim comments are allowed to stand (in the sense of not being challenged); as opposed to the harassment of opponentr of anti-Jewish comments at UCU. Then explain what relevance they have, and who is suggesting erasing her comments. (Love your excusing her but not HP!)

Plenty anti-Jewish comments are posted on HP. That okay?

In any case it is an obviously anti-semitic article independently of where it is hosted.

If a person wants to talk about Israel and Palestine then they should ensure that they are capable of understanding the very basics of antisemitism.

If they are not capable, they should just remain quiet.

Or, we could distill Post’s excellent comments into the following:

She is not ashamed of anything she has done, only sorry she was caught.

I was about to ask the question of whether there is anything in the article itself (leaving aside prominent adverts for books on “Jewish Supremacism”) that would sound the antisemitism alarm bells of your average Swuppie. My conclusion was that there isn’t and that Delich would be admonished as guilty of nothing more that naivety.

So, the excuses begin: “The article itself gives no indication of the racist character of Duke’s politics.” (“Anon”)

Well, what about the racist character of Joe Quinn’s article?

“Yet the Israeli government does a very good job of convincing the whole world that it is the victim in the conflict. How can this be? Israeli control of the press? Could that ubiquitous “conspiracy theory” actually be closer to a conspiracy fact? I don’t really care…”

[...]

“Somebody, please tell me how it comes to pass, if not by control of the mainstream press, and very significant control at that.”

Maybe there’s just about enough to raise the hackles of the Mark Elves and Tony Greensteins, but to many people on the UCU activists’ list there would be no reason to imagine that Joe Quinn is anything other than guilty by association.

Anon: “It originated as an editorial on a radical website, Signs of the Times – http://tinyurl.com/4gqvhg – and was later reproduced by Duke on his own site.”

How on earth does that exonerate Delich from promulgating an antisemitic article that she found on a conspicuously antisemitic website?

“even if she really hasn’t heard of him, she agreed with his views, to the extent that she urged others to read them”

They’re not Duke’s views, you idiot. The article is not written by David Duke. It was not written for his website. It was an editorial from Signs of the Times that Duke reproduced on his site.

Irrelevant. The article speaks for itself, and is hosted on an overtly antisemitic site.
Come on, Anon, you can do better.
Or can you?

“Extraordinary that someone teaching in a university should be so ill-informed about world affairs, or should choose to remain ill-informed about world affairs, especially when she spends a good bit of her time pontificating about world affairs.”

Indeed. And she also writes like a petulant teenager.

I’m also intrigued by her comment that “I am not interested in any kind of racists and fascists and the likes of them. I don’t like to even read
about them. That explains why I don’t know who he is (I really do not want to know him or know of him and the likes of him).”

But surely if she’s choosing to tubthump noisily and aggressively on behalf of the Palestinian cause, that means by definition that she must have read a great deal about various racists and fascists, given that the elected Palestinian administration is demonstrably full of them?

Which means that either she chooses not to read (or think about) what Hamas and their fellow travellers have been saying, or she doesn’t think that they’re racists and fascists, despite the overwhelming evidence. Or, of course, that she’s cynically dissembling in the rather futile hope that no-one will challenge her.

“They’re not Duke’s views, you idiot.”

Are you arguing that this article is not antisemitic, and that Israeli control of the media is “conspiracy fact”?

So, anon, she finds an article on a neo-Nazi website, bestrewn with big, colourful links to other Nazi material. The article itself, whatever its authorship, includes canards about Jewish supremacism, the Yids controlling the world media and so on. And no alarm bells go off. Nothing. No checks. No slight pause. Just a wordless acceptance of the whole thing. To quote her:

“No comment necessary. The facts are speaking for themselves”.

Anon might be Mike Cushman, one of the “as a Jew” leaders of the boycott campaign. In any case, Anon makes the same apology for Delich as Mike Cushman does onlist:

“It is clear then Jenna has made a serious error and she has owned up to that and apologised so why are people still trying to beat her up about this (that’s a rhetorical question).

I have taught sessions on web searching, web use and how to establish the provence and authenticity of information. This has made me crucially aware of how difficult it is to set out rules, or even guidelines, for avoiding errors. One example I use is about MMR – many of the most difficult issues (other than political ones) come in health information. The most basic rules is that items from high qulaity peer reviewed sites are ones we are inclined to trust – and of course the Wakefield article that caused all the trouble was in the Lancet, as prestigious and authoritative as they come.

This is not about whether Jenna is a racist or an anti-semite it is about trying to shoot the messanger. If I were to be inclined to use biblical references I might start talking about people without sin casting the first stone.

Mike”

What would motivate an experienced Jewish socialist who works at the LSE to run around apologizing for somebody who posts antisemitic articles from David Duke’s website on the union e-list?

I took a quick look at Signs of The Time website. Just checking the links raises alarms – Jewish Tribal Review , very nice indeed.

Quinn is a 911 conspiracy theorist who argues that Israel was behind 911.

Dear Jenna.
Adolf Hitler was a very bad man who lived in the middle part of the last century.
KKK is not a breakfast serial
Tim

I love the fact that Cushman knows how to establish the provence of information. I’m not bad at the languedoc of information myself.

“Criticism of Israel cannot be construed as anti-semitic.”

This shallow, reflexive defence is now starting to sound more like an edict, or even a prophecy.

Anon, this is Duke’s personal site. All content is approved by him. He thinks whatever goes up is kosher (hoho). Get it?

I have an article by a chap called Kenny Smith. Haven’t heard of him, but I’m struck by his views on immigration.

Cushman is an unbelievable prick. You should have seen him performing at UCU Congress.

There was a motion proposed to re-affiliate to the Cuban Solidarity Campaign. The mover told Congress that there has never been a single documented case of torture in a Cuban prison.

Cushman, the darling of Congress heckles: “What about Guantanamo Bay?”

All the comrades applaud and burst out laughing at his hilarious and sharply political wit.

Who tortures people in Cuban jails? Only ever the Americans. Never the Castro regime.

This idiot is considered funny and political amongst UCU activists.

Talking of Mike Cushman, he adds the following anti-semitic headline to an ordinary article from this weeks Jewish Chronicle and sends it around the activist list:

“Israelis as mercenaries”

He introduces it thus: “An article from that well known anti-semitic hatesheet the Jewish Chronicle”

http://thejc.com/articles/an-arms-role-be-ashamed

This sort of vileness is entirely routine on the UCU activist list.

“Dear Jenna.
Adolf Hitler was a very bad man who lived in the middle part of the last century.
KKK is not a breakfast serial
Tim”

I’m loving that (though have disturbing image of ‘anon’ scribbling notes to self in background).

Watching the boycotter tribe wriggling on this thread is priceless.

Take the rap guys, you’ve been rumbled!

Kinda ruined my Saturday plans, but heck what fun.

I particularly like the..

‘yes it turns out the pics I sent you were indeed from a Kiddyporn site but i had no idea and the chick in the pic was actually 16…and it was on google….and well…..you know how confusing all this internet thing can be….’

rationale of anon, donwhatever and the like.

I struggle to believe that they even believe the crap they are coming out with, but as far as Im concerned they can just keep digging.

Good stuff.

Matt

Oh..and…

received the fax from Delich solicitors yet David?

Watch that machine and get the kettle on….

Here are some links to Quinn’s articles and books which explain how Israel was responsible for 911.

So, we’re talking about a UCU “activist” posting a link to an article by a neo Nazi on a neo Nazi website which is clearly identifiable as a neo Nazi website, not only because it belongs to a leading neo Nazi but by virtue of the neo Nazi material posted all over the site.

How do the extremists in UCU react to this? They see nothing wrong at all. No harm done. She just read a good article on a bad website.

Things are now so fucked on the extreme Left that they are now in basic agreement with neo Nazis.

Let’s cut to the chase here. Jenna Delich is a semi-literate idiot. She should have no place in an academic union as she is evidently not intelligent enough to be an academic.

The problem for academics is that they have no union just for them. UCU is after all called UCU for a reason (University and Colleges Union).

People like Delich should have their own union. One that has no intellectual credibility attached.

Well, a lot of people talk about their political opponents in terms of conspiracies. Here’s Abe Foxman of the ADL, for example, on the threat posed to US domestic policy by the evangelical Christian conspiracy:

“… the religious right has operated on many fronts. Evangelical Christians have supported efforts to overturn court rulings and rewrite laws to introduce official, sectarian prayer into public schools. They’ve promoted candidates for local school boards, sometimes using stealth tactics to disguise their intentions, with the goal of eliminating evolution, sex education, and other ‘anti-Christian’ subjects from public high schools. They’ve looked for opportunities to restrict abortion rights and to make it more difficult for women to exercise those rights. They’ve sought tax dollars to support religious schools and sectarian social service agencies. They’ve even worked to alter the federal tax code to reward stay-at-home moms and penalize working women…. The point is that many leaders of the religious right have adopted these positions as part of a broader strategy to transform American government into a wholly owned subsidiary of the evangelical movement.”

(Never Again? The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism, 2003, p.140)

However if you were to refer, in far milder terms than these, to the efforts of the Zionist lobby to influence US foreign policy, Foxman would of course denounce you as an antisemite promoting racist conspiracy theories.

Anon – Keep digging. Idiot.

we’ve been here before

“This has made me crucially aware of how difficult it is to set out rules, even guidelines, for avoiding errors. “

so Anon or your friend Mr. Cushman, here’s a very simple algorithm

1. find a link
2. go to the home page of that link
3. if it says “David Duke”, “White Power”, “Aryan Nation” “Hitler”, “National Socialism is good” or “KKK”* then bin that link, it is from a neo-Nazi web site or their friends and goto step 1

4. having found a link, verify the author
5. throw their name into google with the selection of the following key words: 9/11, New World Order, supremacy, revisionism, Siberia, truth, Illuminati, Israel, etc
6. read the results and if the links are predominately to places like Jewish Tribal Review, Jew Watch, Stormfront, National Vanguard, Ziopedia, Rense, or sites that talk about National Socialism a lot then bin that link and goto step 1

7. having found an article, look up the authors previous works, does he/she essentialise different ethnic groupings? does he/she appear paranoid? or use conspiracy theories?

8. Now read the article and look for discrepancies, is one work quoted a lot? does the author entertain counter arguments? does the article read like a screed? cross reference any works cited and see if the article represent the arguments accurately?

9. at this point by using the above method and some common sense you probably will have filtered out 95% of the neo-Nazi filth

wasn’t that easy Anon or Mr. Cushman?

finally, if they use words like “International Jewry” or have references to mind control, watch out, oh and if they post stuff from David Duke that is really, really a no no!

-
* extending on to include any sites that rant about Jews, New World Order, 9/11 and dancing Jews, etc [even if they use the transparent tactics of switching “Zionist” for the word “Jew”]

Here are links to some of the many books and articles by the author of the piece, Joe Quinn, explaining that Israel planned 911 and then covered it up through Jewish control of the media.

So, a UCU activist reads an article by one neo Nazi on the website of another, very famous neo Nazi. The website is full of prominently displayed neo Nazi material.

But the extremists in UCU see nothing wrong with this. In fact, their response is to attack us for pointing this out.

Sections of the far Left read a fascist argument and think:

“Yup, that’s basically where I stand”

Anon, do they teach rhetoric at your educational establishment? If so, ask the head honcho to explain to you the tu qouque fallacy. It seems to be the only weapon in your current arsenal, and it’s a bit of a boomerang.

Here are links to some of the many books and articles by the author of the piece, Joe Quinn, explaining that Israel planned 911 and then covered it up through Jewish control of the media.

So, a UCU activist reads an article by one neo Nazi on the website of another, very famous neo Nazi. The website is full of prominently displayed neo Nazi material.

But the extremists in UCU see nothing wrong with this. In fact, their response is to attack us for pointing this out.

Sections of the far Left read a fascist argument and think:

“Yup, that’s basically where I stand”

“However if you were to refer, in far milder terms than these, to the efforts of the Zionist lobby to influence US foreign policy”

Here we go again: pathetic wriggling, deflection, self-righteousness and whining.
This is IRRELEVANT, idiot. You have been found out. A really stupid ‘academic’, or whatever she claims to be, visited a Nazi porn site and swallowed the whole antisemitic narrative, lock stock and barrel, and instead of your vile union apologising for it, you attempt to rationalise it by throwing mud at others.

It won’t work.

But do keep digging. It is hilarious to behold grown ‘academics’ making such fools of themselves.

LOL, modernity.
Mind you, he probably does need those instructions.
Hilarious that grown ‘academics’ like anon can be so stupid.

Still waiting for Jimmy to object to ‘Anon’.

“However if you were to refer, in far milder terms than these, to the efforts of the Zionist lobby to influence US foreign policy, Foxman would of course denounce you as an antisemite promoting racist conspiracy theories”

And once again: this is irrelevant.
All you are doing is deflecting, rationalising, blaming those who have outed your ridiculous union for defending a member who visited a Nazi site, bought into the antisemitic narrative and has disseminated its hate speech on a publicly-funded network.
But do keep digging.

“Yup, that’s basically where I stand”

Obviously. The far left is the same as the far right.

Marxism is a big conspiracy theory of capitalists controlling the state to help in the exploitation of the working class. And is then any wonder than some put names and.. mmm… noses to the conspirators?

Actually, I bet that an awful lot of people on the far ‘Left’ avidly read and take their lead from neo Nazi and extremist conspiracy nut sites.

Most know that, at the moment, they’ll be lambasted for admitting that this is their source material.

A few make mistakes and are caught out circulating this material, and blush with embarasment.

Others don’t really care.

Thanks once more David T. and Harry’s Place for exposing this truly disgusting woman and her atrocious apologists’ ghastly views. No wonder Eve Garrard and others have voted with their feet and explained so eloquently why they have done so on the Engage website.

> Sections of the far Left read a fascist argument and think:
>
> “Yup, that’s basically where I stand”

Not just basically, but completely. She utterly and precisely agrees with everything that this Neonazi has said, explicitly and with no “problematising” or nuance. Again, to quote her directly:

“No comment necessary. The facts are speaking for themselves.”

Anon, stop and think for a moment that this dollop of virulently right-wing, conspiracy-theory ridden, fascist poison, written by one Nazi and published by another, is accepted and lapped up by one of your members, and transmitted through your organisation’s mailing lists, and that when the horror of this is pointed out, oh irony of ironies, you blame the “Zionists”!

UCU, nosce te ipsum!

At the very minimum, as a member of an academic union who posted an article from a neo-nazi website and claims to have been oblivious that it was a racist website when she posted, Jenna Delich ought to be compelled to compose an essay explaining how a critical thinking academic should establish what is or what is not a fact and go on to explain why in her opinion, all the claims made in the Joe Quinn piece, including the claim of Israeli control of “a very significant” portion of the media in the English speaking world are facts which speaks for themselves.

Ibnaz, do you volunteer to mark it? ;-)
Fractured English and all?
I know I wouldn’t.

Old Jenna seems to be quite a fan of Google.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=Jenna+Delich+&btnG=Google+Search&meta=

This is just as well, because from now on every time she types in her name she will be confronted by her empathy with neo-nazis.

So too will any of her prospective students.

Priceless.

Jenna has form:

http://cemkumar.googlepages.com/jennydelich

“I just found the article quite
powerful, and none are saying that Joe Quinn (the author of the article) is a racist or anti-semitist, and the article is quite interesting. So, perhaps we should focus on the article itself and not where it appeared.”

The entire thrust of Quinn’s argument is “”truths” about Israel you are not allowed to know because of Zionist control of the world media.”

Rather than exonerating her, her apology offers us a view of her racist beliefs in even greater relief.

Jenna Delich obviously believes Quinn’s argument (she sees nothing wrong with it[ indeed, it is praised as “powerful” and “interesting”). To believe this argument is now, as it as been for the past 150 years, (see the Protocols) a defining feature of antisemitism. Therefore, Jenna Delich is an antisemite. QED

NIMN: furthermore, the man is a racist and an antisemite, explicitly so. Where she gets her “none are saying” from, I don’t know. She has dug a very deep hole for herself indeed.

I assume this is not the same one:

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jenna_Delich/500649128

Post, to say ‘none are saying’ as a supposed way out of her situation is in itself a damning criticism of her analytical faculties. This is a rational argument from a so-called academic? The mind boggles.

Post, to say ‘none are saying’ as a supposed way out of her situation is in itself a damning criticism of her analytical faculties. This is a rational argument from a so-called academic? The mind boggles.

Jenna–

You belong to an activist list? I presume this activist list has to do with politics and not knitting? I mean, I can understand you never hearing who (say) Frank Frazetta is (he’s a famous illustrator) because presumably you don’t belong to an illustrator list. (If you do and you have never heard of Frank Frazetta, that would be most surprising and would indicate that you really have no business being on that list to begin with.)

Similarly, people who belong to political activist lists and who have not heard of some major political figures on the left and right, really have no business being on any activist list. If only because their ignorance precludes them from being able to judge political and social events with any sort of accuracy.

So, if you are right and you have never heard of David Duke (and presumably or a whole host of other racists) then you have no way of knowing if and when (for example) far right conspiracy theories “bleed into” so called respectable discourse. Worse than that, in your profound ignorance you help the racists and the bigots become the respectable ones.

So–if you have never heard of David Duke, may I recommend that you take some time out of your ignorant “activism” and go and study?

Regards,

Inna

Here is the germinal theme that Delich doesn’t sees as “interesting” and “powerful”.

“Yet the Israeli government does a very good job of convincing the whole world that it is the victim in the conflict. How can this be? Israeli control of the press? Could that ubiquitous “conspiracy theory” actually be closer to a conspiracy fact? I don’t really care, all I want is for someone to explain to me how, in a situation where there is massive evidence that 1.4 million completely isolated Palestinian civilians in the Gaza strip are being systematically murdered and starved by the state of Israel with its shiny 21st century military and all the tax dollars and support America can muster, yet somehow the entire world believes that those 1.4 million dispossessed are “evil terrorists” and “only have themselves to blame”.

Somebody, please tell me how it comes to pass, if not by control of the mainstream press, and very significant control at that.”

Whilst such a “viewpoint” is seen as “legitimate comment” in the confines of the UCU activist list (along with neo-nazi groups) in the real world, it is known quite simply as antisemitism.

Here is the germinal theme that Delich sees as “interesting” and “powerful”.

Yet the Israeli government does a very good job of convincing the whole world that it is the victim in the conflict. How can this be? Israeli control of the press? Could that ubiquitous “conspiracy theory” actually be closer to a conspiracy fact? I don’t really care, all I want is for someone to explain to me how, in a situation where there is massive evidence that 1.4 million completely isolated Palestinian civilians in the Gaza strip are being systematically murdered and starved by the state of Israel with its shiny 21st century military and all the tax dollars and support America can muster, yet somehow the entire world believes that those 1.4 million dispossessed are “evil terrorists” and “only have themselves to blame”.
Somebody, please tell me how it comes to pass, if not by control of the mainstream press, and very significant control at that.”
Whilst such a “viewpoint” is seen as “legitimate comment” in the confines of the UCU activist list (along with neo-nazi groups) in the real world, it is known quite simply as antisemitism.

‘“As it was a “national homeland” mainly inhabited by other people at the time and as most lived elsewhere and had ancestors who had lived elsewhere for several hundred years, yes, NO, it was rather different to China or Finland. Especially as many of the jews who went to Israel went there because they couldn’t go to the USA and other countries”

This dumb, illiterate, ignorant, patronising, sneering bovine manure just shrieks antisemitism.’
And this sentence just shrieks an inability to debate reasonably. Is anything I said untrue? Or was the fact that I told truths you don’t like antisemitic?
‘Do you know ANYTHING about the history of the Jews and the Middle East? Well, evidently not …’

Are you saying that the great majority of the present population of Israel are not descended from immigrants who came from Europe after 1945 and later still from Arab countries? If so, please produce evidence for your claim. If not, then it was a “national homeland” mainly inhabited by other people at the time and as most lived elsewhere and had ancestors who had lived elsewhere for several hundred years.
‘And the phrase ‘rights invented later for ad hoc purposes’, or however you phrased that drivel, is just more of the same.’
Well, do you insist on all of the supposed ancestral rights of all previous inhabitants being considered equally? If not, why not?

‘Do yourself a favour and enroll on an evening course, or even spend a couple of weekends at your local library, reading up on the history before making such a public fool of yourself.’

Thinkcarefully before you post, NO. It won’t stop you being an offensive and unobservant little prick incapable of understanding what he reads, but it won’t damage the cause you claim to support if you don’t post at all. Unless, perhaps, you are a black propagandist intent on making Israel’s supporters look like offensive and unobservant little pricks incapable of understanding what they read. In that case you’re doing a very good job of it.

What relevance does Roger’s postings on Israel have for a discussion on the posting of race-hate literature on the UCU activist list?

I am aware that over the years, those opposing antisemitism on the same list have been accused of raising the question of Jew-hatred to silence debate on Isarael.

I am aware that this is happening now (comments from Haim Beersheeth only yesterday and Keith Hammond (constantly) exemplify this tactic).

It would appear Roger is operating a reverse version of this (false) allegation – raising the matter of Israel to deflect from the presence of antisemitism within the UCU activist list. I note that not one of his posts has dealt with the topic at hand. One wonders if he joins discussions on football blogs with similar comments about Israel and Palestine, but stays quiet about the game of soccer.

“Thinkcarefully before you post, NO. It won’t stop you being an offensive and unobservant little prick”

Better than an ignorant antisemitic prick like you.

Actually, FO, this was my first post in its entirety:

“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.”
Certainly, Merseymike. However, Israel was created and unless you advocate the destruction of Israel as an entity as a precursor to peace any attempts to make peace, or merely to reduce violence, in the Middle East has to accept that fact.

If you follow on from there you will find that assorted nutters think or pretend that it and various follow-ups are evidence of antisemitism and I have dealt with their delusions.

“Especially as many of the jews who went to Israel went there because they couldn’t go to the USA and other countries”

Does that include the founders of Rosh Pina, Rishon LeZion, Petah Tikva or dozens of other towns, or maybe those of Tel-Aviv? Did they really prefer to go to the USA?
Your ignorance is gob-smacking.

I realise that some here are enjoying a little shadenfreude for having caught out the UCU, but I get little cheer. You might think that propagating antisemitic race hate literature written by neo-Nazis and published on an overtly neo-Nazi site would be a shock for their collective systems. It’s not.

They’ve made excuses for brown-skinned, openly genocidal movements. They take pleasure in comparing Israel to Nazi Germany specifically and consistently, in a way that can only make sense understood as the frisson of telling Jews that they’re worse than their murderers.

They are already way beyond the point of no return. There are no more antisemitic taboos left that won’t be explained away. “Criticism of Israel cannot be construed as antisemitism.” Excuses will be made for anyone who promotes vile, racist filth, so long as it’s directed at Jews and couched in terms of anti-Zionism.

I wouldn’t blame anyone for staying in UCU and trying, against the odds, to change it from within; but the rank and file is indifferent to the antisemitism promoted in its name, the leadership will continue to promote antisemitism or defend the indefensible, and anyone who points out their “mistakes” will be portrayed as the real villains.

As I’ve already said, anti-boycotters should have some idea of where the point lies at which they’ll be prepared to cut their losses. Jimmy Donaghey’s expectations of a year ago were confounded, but he’s still there, adamant that the real enemy is anyone who considers the UCU’s antisemitism something more than an in internal matter. The only good argument I can think of to pay dues is to continue exposing this cesspool of supposedly progressive thought.

Jenna Delich is just one semi-literate antisemite, but the knee-jerk defence she’s received should make it clear to anyone who hasn’t already been poisoned, that the UCU is an antisemitic organisation. The only proven method for tempering this reflex is the threat of financial penalty. Hit them where it hurts. Boycott the UCU.

So now we know, NO, truths are antisemitic if you don’t like them.

I have just read, and agree with every word Roger has said. He hasn’t derailed anything, and at every stage has been responding to others’ comments, provocations or misunderstandings. Where he has remained agnostic or silent, others have presumed darker motives – perhaps correctly, though there’s nothing on this thread to suggest it.

Roger’s most astute point:

“Thinkcarefully before you post, ["Nearly Oxfordian"]. It won’t stop you being an offensive and unobservant little prick incapable of understanding what he reads, but it won’t damage the cause you claim to support if you don’t post at all. Unless, perhaps, you are a black propagandist intent on making Israel’s supporters look like offensive and unobservant little pricks incapable of understanding what they read. In that case you’re doing a very good job of it.”

“Nearly Oxfordian”:

“Better than an ignorant antisemitic prick like you.”

That is a disgusting allegation to make unless you have something to back it up.

““Especially as many of the jews who went to Israel went there because they couldn’t go to the USA and other countries”

Does that include the founders of Rosh Pina, Rishon LeZion, Petah Tikva or dozens of other towns, or maybe those of Tel-Aviv? “‘

Obviously not, as even someone as stupid as you should know, NO. All of these places were founded long before the great immigration into Palestine/Israel after WWII. All the same, in that period- say 1870-1930- how many jews went to “the Jewish National Homeland” and how many to the USA? Do you think the difference in numbers going to the two places reflects peoples’ preferences perhaps?
How many of those who decided to go to Israel from Europe after 1945 would have gone to the USA or the UK, Australia, Canada or other destinations had they been open to them? I think probably about the same ratios as had done so before.

Roger was, I think, only replying to an off topic discussion that was started by somebody called ‘Merseymike’, on the wisdom of the creation of Israel .

I haven’t been following this sub-thread closely for a number of reasons. One is that it is off topic. The other is that it is a bit of an ‘old favourite’, and I don’t think I’ve heard any novel arguments on this subject for some time. Finally, I’m more interested in ‘what happens next’ arguments rather than hypothetical discussions of how things might have been done differently generation ago.

However, I don’t think there’s anything he has said that is in any sense improper to argue: even if you might not agree with some or all of it.

In fact, I’ve been rather taken aback by the bad tempered nature of some of the discussion.

Now, you’re free to argue with each other as you want. But might it not be a good idea to get a little perspective, shake hands, and be a bit chummier?

Yes, I am Prince Pompous… But still!

Thanks for the defence, TA.
As to: “Where he has remained agnostic or silent, others have presumed darker motives – perhaps correctly, though there’s nothing on this thread to suggest it.”

Of that of which one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.
I said nothing there because others had already said what I thought so I felt no need to. If it is necessary to say so, I think all academic boycotts are unjustified. I am not an academic myself, so I could not affect the attitude of the UCU and its members so I did not need to speak further.
In the case of Jenna Delich’s post, I think that the article she refers to was so obviously antisemitic that if she actually read it and agrees with it then she is either antisemitic herself or so astonishingly stupid and ignorant that she might as well be. Again, other people had said this already so I didn’t bother.

“Roger was, I think, only replying to an off topic discussion…,a bit of an ‘old favourite’, and I don’t think I’ve heard any novel arguments on this subject for some time.”

My apologies: I am an irregular visitor and hadn’t come across previous mentions of that topic so thought that someone should point out that the wisdom and/or morality of founding Israel are completely irrelevant to the present state of the world and contemporary antisemitism.

Roger

You have absolutely no obligation or cause to justify yourself at all. Frankly, I think you’re owed an apology.

Old Jenna seems to be quite a fan of Google.

Here’s Her record on Google Scholar.

You’re welcome, Roger. I wasn’t trying to imply that you had darker motives, although I thought that given the level of hostility to which you were subjected that there might have been some history to this spat.

As for your silence, I meant your refusal to be drawn into a position on the rights or wrongs of Jewish immigration to Palestine. You seemed to be rubbing some people up the wrong way despite having offered no judgement.

Roger,
My bad. I appreciate your clarification.
FO

quisquis:”I’m not bad at the languedoc of information myself.”
I was just going to point out the illiteracy of Mr Cushman and his course on how to establish the provence of a web link, but you have done so much more elegantly and wittily.

I shall cherish and cite Ms Delich’s maxim at every opportunity: It’s on Google, so it must be alright.

“Jenna has form:

http://cemkumar.googlepages.com/jennydelich“

I saw that earlier. I wonder whose idea was the title:

UCU & Zionist Mafia Exposed- Thomson Solicitor’s Biased Advice.

Reading the mail, there’s no mention of Zionists, Jews, or whathave you, so I’ve no idea why that title was chosen.

P.

Paul–

Haven’t you heard? All lawyers are Jews and Jews run everything anyway. UCU included.

(Oh sorry–did I say Jews? I meant Zionists of course)

Once you realize that, then you realize that all bad things (be it the rain or the cold or anything at all frankly) are due to the malign influence of the Joos.

NOW do you understand the title?

Regards,

Inna

Off topic:

“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region”

I simply don’t think the historical record demonstrates that the people you refer to as hostile wouldn’t be any less detrimental to peace in the region with or without the presence of the state of Israel… that is, if the upshot and unstated intention behind your remark was to link the state of Israel’s presence in the region as the primary causal factor of violence in the region.

If you intended your comment to link Israel’s creation and presence to the causal factor impeding peace in the region I wonder whether you would actually expect that the illiberal pan-Arabist and Islamist leaderships in the region would not have been capable of finding other suitable pretexts that would have allowed them to glorify and sanction resistance against enemies other than Zionists to keep them in power in the absence of Israel’s creation and presence?

On topic:

Ibnaz, do you volunteer to mark it? ;-)

No, I would ask the solicitors at Thompson’s who were defamed by the author(s) of this webpage to choose the marker.

btw, it’s Lbnaz (not Ibnaz) which is an acronym for left but not antizionist typed in small case letters.

It makes me sick to my stomach that a person in such a position of responsibility would disseminate such hateful literature. As for the central tenet of her rebuttal, i.e she did not know that it was from an anti Semitic source, ignorance is often no defence. If she was linking to the site and posting this to colleagues then she bears FULL responsibility for the material she is linking to. She obviously is too bigoted to even perform a cursory check of the provenance of her ‘evidence’. Since when did left wing academia become so anti-Semitic?

I have personally disagreed with Israeli actions in Palestine previously, i have disagreed with the responses the Israeli state has taken to certain events, i even went so far as too boycott Israeli oranges when i was a teenager! However as I matured, and as i read around the subject i realised that this was not a simple, ‘big bad guy, vs little good guy’ problem, my world view changed and i saw that this is not going to be solved with polarisation of views on either side.

This polarisation of views must NEVER be used as an excuse for racism, or anti Semitism of any kind. The Holocaust was a truly horrific event perpetrated against the Jewish people, and as such anybody who links themselves with them either consciously or unconsciously deserves the deepest opprobrium possible. This woman, this obviously bigoted and hate filled woman deserves to be stripped of her position lest she fill others with the hate filled lies that she peddles.

It is possible to disagree strongly with the position that Israel takes without lurching into anti-Semitism.

On a similar theme my theory about the hatred for Israel amongst certain left wing academics is that whilst at University it was ‘cool’ to be pro palistianian, it was the political equivalent of sticking two fingers up to the man, or smoking dope. It was an act of teenage rebellion that many people grow out of, however obviously some people don’t and go on to make other more sinister connections. (George Galloway and Claire Short im looking at you)

“Sheffield-based academic, Jenna Delich – links to far right websites associated with the Klu Klux Klan”.

Cushman said that this caption is a potentially libellous statement.

I agree. As an academic I resent being associated with semi-literate, idiotic, racist scum like Jenna Delich.

Absolutely. Academic as a label is being misused here by a lot of people, maybe wilfully. I think that Jena may be some kind of school liaison person for Sheffield college (a google search suggests that she is the person to contaxct if you want a tour of the college or something). She is not remotely associated with any kind of research or critical thinking. I hate how this ignorant, racist, hateful woman is associated with academia in any way – and it is association only, as she is clearly not an academic at all. Sheffield College may be a fine and useful institution, but the strengths that it may have do not lie in the arts or social sciences. Mike Cushman doesn’t have that impressive a CV either.

“Cushman said that this caption is a potentially libellous statement.”

Er… how? Unless it could be proved that the original Delich post was made maliciously by someone else, it appears to be a statement of unchallengeable fact.

And since Delich has already admitted culpability, that closes off that loophole. So there’s no libel whatsoever, potential or otherwise.

Unless of course the “libel” refers to Delich being described as an “academic”, which is the only potential falsehood I can see. But I don’t know what Delich actually does at Sheffield, so even that may be true – and in any case, when has anyone ever sued over someone elevating their reputation above what it actually merits?

“Academic as a label is being misused here by a lot of people, maybe wilfully”

Can’t speak for others, but I have been using it ironically ;-)

Tim A. Do you agree with Merseymark and Roger, that the
creation of Israel was “detrimental to peace”?

Merseymike. Not Merseymark.

Has anyone in the UCU leadership commented on this sad affair yet?

is the pope jewish?

Thomas, yes I do, but I would qualify it by pointing out that it was absolutely necessary as a means of avoiding further persecution and genocide. Whilst I don’t imagine for one moment that there would currently be peace in a Middle East in which Israel had never been created, I think that Jewish hegemony in any part of the region would always have been particularly galling to some Muslims: that is not the fault of the Jews.

I don’t find the counterfactuals particularly enlightening here. Should America and the UK have allowed unrestricted immigration to people fleeing from genocide? Of course, but then so should everywhere else, including the countries that were committing the genocide, that shouldn’t have been murdering their Jews.

But Britain and America did not open their borders – in fact Britain didn’t even allow unfettered access to Palestine, which might have saved millions of lives. I would take issue with that before I complained about the restrictions on Jewish asylum in America or Britain, and perhaps Roger disagrees with me there. However, the facts on the ground are what are important now, which I believe was the salient point Roger was making.

It’s not a discussion I particularly wanted to get into, but I was disgusted by the abuse he was taking for the crime of not waving the Zionist flag. He was called an antisemite, for nothing. “Nearly Oxfordian” should be ashamed of that, and rather than pontificating off-topic about what should or shouldn’t have happened sixty years ago, you should have a good look at the kind of people who are ostensibly on your team.

The most common libel against Jews these days is that they cry antisemitism to deflect criticism away from Israel. Serious commentators don’t do that, and intelligent people can debate where to draw the line between criticism of Israel and antisemitism. But when you throw around accusations of antisemitism willy-nilly, you only lend credibility to those who sneer at the suggestion that it might actually exist. With friends like that…

“But when you throw around accusations of antisemitism willy-nilly, you only lend credibility to those who sneer at the suggestion that it might actually exist.”

Absolutely, as I pointed out six years ago to a somewhat intemperate Israeli who called me an antisemite for having the temerity to criticise Ariel Sharon’s policies. Since I was actively engaged in promoting films of specifically Jewish interest at the time, the accusation came perilously close to being professionally defamatory.

To be fair, he did have the good grace to apologise and admit that the point most recently made by Tim Allon above is essentially a fair one.

Well, I certainly will not apologise for daring to have opinions that differ from yours …

Roger thinks that the fact that some Jews went to America instead of Israel proves his thesis, and calls ME stupid.
You couldn’t make it up.

“Sheffield-based academic, Jenna Delich – links to far right websites associated with the Klu Klux Klan”.

Cushman said that this caption is a potentially libellous statement.

How on earth can that be a libellous comment? It’s a statement of fact. David Duke is a former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. He has a far right web site. Jenna Delich linked to it. Q E fucking D.

What happened to British academia lately?

P.

I think Cushman’s comment was made before Delich ‘fessed up, thus removing all possible doubt that it was indeed her responsible for the linkage.

So, bending over backwards to be fair (oh the irony), Cushman’s “potentially” had a smidgen of justification 24 hours ago, but there’s not the remotest chance of a libel suit now. Unless they want to waste a great deal of money and attract even more ridicule – not to mention deeply unwanted publicity.

Thanks, ami.

Tim, my point is this: The claim, that carving out a tiny fraction
of the vast former Osmannic Empire as a Jewish homeland,could be
percieved as “detrimental to peace” or in any other sense “wrong”,
should not stand uncountered.
I take from your above post, that you, more or less, agree.
To suggest, that the creation of Israel was in the first place
a bad idea, which we must none the less accept, because we
cannot stomach its undoing (Roger’s P.o.V. as I read him – not your’s), is in my view a feeble defence of Israels right to exist.

I think that the kind of arguments used by Rogers (that the
creation of Israel was “detrimental to peace”) are of the same kind that “the creation of music was detrimental to sleeping peacefully at night.”

They:
1. Don’t advance any useful point of view.
2. Equivocate blame.
3. Ignores positive consequences.
4. Makes it seem as if those who advance the view had at the time a better alternative.
5. Forgets that Israel is music for the Jews, if you excuse me the forced poetry.

In this sense, the argument is enervating and I understand why N.O. is pissed off. I am also, a little. Then I remember that I don’t really know why Great Britain has a right to exist, after all the piracy it encouraged, the expulsion of the Jews in 1290, the invasions of Buenos Aires in 1806 and 1807, the support for the war of extermination against Paraguay, the attempt to opress the rebellion in the U.S. and the antisemitism of Shakespeare and Dickens among other things. I would like an Englishman to provide me good reasons why the US should still support that country.

“Nearly Oxfordian”: “Well, I certainly will not apologise for daring to have opinions that differ from yours…”

This is the second time (21 August 2008, 3:20 pm) that you’ve used the paranoid defence that my problem with you is that you have an opinion different to mine, when, in fact, my problem with you concerns what those opinions are, and how you put them across.

You should apologise not for holding different opinions to me, but for asserting that someone is an antisemite, seemingly without cause, and without displaying the slightest urge to justify such a serious allegation. I assume from your silence on the matter, as I’ve assumed from the start, that you have no justification, and I’m happy enough just to leave it at that, so that everyone else who’s reading can get the measure of you.

This is a website that deals a lot with antisemitism, and this thread is specifically about antisemitism. It is quite extraordinary for you to be making an accusation of antisemitism here, and there being not a single person prepared to back you up. You’d do well to ponder that and the likely damage you do to the cause you purport to support.

Fabian,

more like England’s right to exist?

you forget the English conquest and occupation of Ireland, annexation of French lands, English ethnic cleansing in Scotland and Ireland, etc

it is a very, very long list of English crimes

Yes, well, mod. I was born very far from you. GB, UK, England, Scotland, Ireland, Walland, Lalaland, are all the same to me.
From my level of complete ignorance, I want to declare that I just don’t think they ever contributed to peace in the region.
M’key?

I have seen Braveheart.
You would never catch me near an English dog.
They use pointy things on those who they disagree with.

Thomas, I agree with you, and if I had to guess Roger’s position, I would probably concur. However, Roger did not elucidate on the matter, and for this he received abuse. Yes, the fact of Israel’s existence alone is not a strong defence for its continued existence, so effectively Roger took a load of abuse for not defending Israel strongly enough; if you read exactly what he said, he did not repudiate what you would consider to be the stronger arguments, he just didn’t explicitly state them. He’s being called an antisemite for what you are assuming his position to be.

I don’t want to get into this any more. I have no interest in second-guessing what’s in Roger’s guess, but I’m sure there is nothing so bad there that merits the kind of treatment he’s received here.

Fabian, do you think that Roger is an antisemite, and if so, could you please show why? If not, I wouldn’t waste another breath on defending “Nearly Oxfordian”, because you’re only going to come out of it sullied. I get angry all the time about all sorts of things that I shouldn’t. This is not the same as throwing unprovoked abuse and slander at people.

caro hombre, por suposto.

If you allow me, mod: “Claro, hombre, por supuesto.”

From Robert Fine on Engage:

dear jenna and friends in UCU,

i’d like to communicate my own take on the unfortunate citation that was made from david duke’s website.

one thing to say is that we should be ever-wary of the notion that ‘the facts are speaking for themselves’. facts don’t speak for themselves. they need to be assessed, interpreted and understood. they always emerge as part of a discourse. what constitutes a ‘fact’ is itself a site of political contestation. awareness of the disputed character of what are and are not facts is the bread and butter of intellectual and political life.

a basic lesson is to check our sources before we circulate them as truths. it seems to me that this is always necessary but particularly obligatory when a) we are using notoriously unreliable web sources and b) when we use them to denounce other people or another people. if we don’t check our sources, we are at risk of doing what so many have done in so many different fields – i.e. simply re-circulate falsehoods or partial truths that someone once invented and are now taken as gospel.

one positive outcome of this episode for me and doubtless many others is that we have now had the unpleasure of perusing david duke’s website. i knew of him as an american nazi demagogue but never before did i read what he has to say. what strikes me as significant about his hyperbolic anti-israel and antizionist polemics is that some elements of his discourse (certainly not all) are not a million miles away from those of left wing and antiracist critics of israel.

david duke himself is of course explicitly antisemitic as well as racist. in itself this indicates that UCU’s stated policy that ‘criticism of israel is not as such antisemitic’, while not literally wrong, fails to address the claim that some criticism of israel and zionism is antisemitic and rightly felt to be antisemitic by many people within and without our union.

even more to the point the convergences that are apparent between david duke’s discourse on israel and that of antiracist and left critics of israel – convergences that led to this unfortunate citation in the first place – should at least make us self-aware that what now passes as ‘critical’ ways of speaking and writing about israel may be more problematic than their authors acknowledge. the excesses of current antizionist polemics, includiing those that have underwritten the boycott calls of israeli academe within our union, are visible in david duke’s rantings – albeit in a cruder form of expression.

it may be noted, by the way, that one reason david duke is so keen to represent ‘israel’ as murderously racist toward palestinians and the US establishment as collusive in this racism is to denounce their hypocrisy and legitimate the racism toward black people in america he stands for. duke exemplifies why it is so necessary to read ‘the facts’ in their context and consider the interests of those who participate in the politics of denunciation.

the point is not just to say sorry about inadvertently circulating nazi propaganda but to learn something about the language some members of this union are using in their eagerness to denounce one particular nation among nations. any student of antisemitism in the past would know that one of the most important political functions of antisemitism has been to construct a bridge between the left and the right. is it too much to ask for some recognition of this history alonside the anti-israeli enthusiasm of some of our members?

a final point i want to make is that anger with the messengers (those who experience and articulate antisemitism in the union’s deliberations and policies over israel and in their own treatment by fellow members of the union) is a failure to recognise what this incident reveals.

best, robert fine
warwick UCU

http://www.engageonline.org.uk/blog/article.php?id=2059

Has Robert Fine joined the boycott capital letters brigade?

Tim: I think Roger’s argument is not explicitly antisemitic. But it is paternalistic and arrogant, for the reasons I have listed in my comment (24 August 2008, 1:42 pm). And when you make paternalistic and arrogant remarks about Jewish cultural and political creations, you shouldn’t be surprised if you get by return an accusation of antisemitism. That is my position regarding Roger, who, probably is not antisemite, he is just a guy who lives metaphorically speaking closest to the top of the world, (in terms of security, resources, and opportunities for the future), and looks below to those struggling to survive, with war, with terrorism, etc, with a little disdain.

Masterly as usual, Fabian. I think the difference between us is that you are tad more forgiving towards such people than I am. Perhaps a difference in temperament.

“Has Robert Fine joined the boycott capital letters brigade?”

Clearly – so here’s a readable version:

Dear Jenna and friends in UCU,

I’d like to communicate my own take on the unfortunate citation that was made from David Duke’s website.

One thing to say is that we should be ever-wary of the notion that ‘the facts are speaking for themselves’. Facts don’t speak for themselves. They need to be assessed, interpreted and understood. They always emerge as part of a discourse. What constitutes a ‘fact’ is itself a site of political contestation. Awareness of the disputed character of what are and are not facts is the bread and butter of intellectual and political life.

A basic lesson is to check our sources before we circulate them as truths. It seems to me that this is always necessary but particularly obligatory when:

a) we are using notoriously unreliable web sources and
b) when we use them to denounce other people or another people.

If we don’t check our sources, we are at risk of doing what so many have done in so many different fields – i.e. simply re-circulate falsehoods or partial truths that someone once invented and are now taken as gospel.

One positive outcome of this episode for me and doubtless many others is that we have now had the unpleasure of perusing David Duke’s website. I knew of him as an american nazi demagogue but never before did I read what he has to say. What strikes me as significant about his hyperbolic anti-Israel and anti-Zionist polemics is that some elements of his discourse (certainly not all) are not a million miles away from those of left wing and antiracist critics of Israel.

David Duke himself is of course explicitly antisemitic as well as racist. In itself this indicates that UCU’s stated policy that ‘criticism of Israel is not as such antisemitic’, while not literally wrong, fails to address the claim that some criticism of Israel and Zionism is antisemitic and rightly felt to be antisemitic by many people within and without our union.

Even more to the point the convergences that are apparent between David Duke’s discourse on Israel and that of antiracist and left critics of Israel – convergences that led to this unfortunate citation in the first place – should at least make us self-aware that what now passes as ‘critical’ ways of speaking and writing about Israel may be more problematic than their authors acknowledge. The excesses of current anti-Zionist polemics, includiing those that have underwritten the boycott calls of Israeli academe within our union, are visible in David Duke’s rantings – albeit in a cruder form of expression.

It may be noted, by the way, that one reason David Duke is so keen to represent ‘Israel’ as murderously racist toward Palestinians and the US establishment as collusive in this racism is to denounce their hypocrisy and legitimate the racism toward black people in America he stands for. Duke exemplifies why it is so necessary to read ‘the facts’ in their context and consider the interests of those who participate in the politics of denunciation.

The point is not just to say sorry about inadvertently circulating Nazi propaganda but to learn something about the language some members of this union are using in their eagerness to denounce one particular nation among nations. Any student of antisemitism in the past would know that one of the most important political functions of antisemitism has been to construct a bridge between the left and the right. Is it too much to ask for some recognition of this history alonside the anti-Israeli enthusiasm of some of our members?

A final point i want to make is that anger with the messengers (those who experience and articulate antisemitism in the union’s deliberations and policies over Israel and in their own treatment by fellow members of the union) is a failure to recognise what this incident reveals.

Best, Robert Fine
warwick UCU

I mean, just look at it this way: I think that this argument about the merits or demerits of the creation of a certain State comes too easily to the mouths (or the keyboards) of certain people, who are not even the main actors in the conflict.

If I can speak of my experience, what I remember and what I have read, in the worst moment of the Malvina’s war, the English were depicted as Pirates, the “Little Prince” (Charles) was mocked openly, Tatcher was little less than demonized, music in English was banned from the radios, and there was a push for the elimination of English words in marquees and advertisings. I am talking of the years of the nationalistic Galtieri dictatorship in Argentina, at war with your country. I was a child then.
But not even in those times, anybody ever started wondering about the merits or demerits of the creation of the UK. It was a given. “That state is at war with us. They are wrong and we are right. They ocuppy a plot of land that is ours. They don’t behave nicely and they have a shitty government. They are ridiculous. We should reinvigorate our own national being.” (Argentinian rock lived its golden era then). All those feelings were expressed.
But to start digging in the past to consider the right to exist of your country, that never happened.

And it is so easily spoken by some people in your country regarding Israel, that is fucking amazing to watch. And you don’t even realize it!

Tim, the moment that Roger called me a ‘prick’ (and please do check what is the worst thing that I had written about him personally, as distinct from what I had written about his views, prior to that point in time), he lost any right to demand an apology from me.

Your pop psychology is silly. There is nothing ‘paranoid’ about what I write. The difficulty is yours, in having such a problem in accepting that I may disagree with you.

You mean the Falklands war, Fabian ;-)))

Grrrrr…. :)

…though it was pretty common in left-wing circles to refer to “las Malvinas”. In fact, didn’t such a reference end up in an Elvis Costello song that year?

Fabian, I don’t think that your points hold, because at every juncture Roger was simply refuting the arguments of others. All five of your reasons can be dismissed by the fact that he was responding to specific comments, and had every right to remain silent or agnostic on anything outside of that.

As for point 4, you’re factually wrong. You state, “Makes it seem as if those who advance the view had at the time a better alternative.”

It’s not clear, but it sounds as though you’re saying that Roger was implying that during the great waves of immigration to Palestine, the Jews had better options. In fact, he explicitly states the opposite:

“…as the alternatives were remaining in devastated countries where their freinds and neighbours had been murdered- often with the acceptance or assistance of their gentile friends and neighbours- or in refugee camps all over Europe, yes, Israel looked like the best option. Furthermore after the previous few years it looked very much as though the bases of Zionism- that jews would never be accepted as equals by gentiles and that jews would never be safe in the world until they were citizens of a jewish nation- were completely and obviously true.”

He’s not arguing that they had other options, but that they should have had other options. Do you disagree?

In context – that he was responding to specific arguments and refusing to be drawn on historical justifications of Zionsim – it is quite unreasonable to call his remarks “paternalistic and arrogant”; as a defence of “Nearly Oxfordian’s” slurs, it’s not unlike defending a rapist by telling his victim that she shouldn’t be surprised to get raped if she’s wont to wear a short skirt.

Tim, as you are probably aware, I have not suggested, that
Roger is an anti semite. I agree, that one should be economic
in the use of that word. I find it a little bit odd, when you say,that
he’s being called an antisemite for what I am assuming his position to be. The fact, that he has been called so, has nothing to do
with me.

Indeed, Tim, I have read again Roger’s comments, and except for the first one, in which he -sadly- agrees with Merseymike, he has a position I can -mostly- respect, although I disagree.
It seems that my words apply more to the Merseymike (see for example this he has written on his blog
http://merseymike.blogspot.com/2008/07/israel.html )
than to Roger.

I still don’t understand why Rogers agrees with Merseymike. Historically speaking, Arab nationalism was encouraged by the most reactionary of the families in the region, the Husseinis. They killed and subdued the more moderate Nahashibis, who could have reached an accomodation with the Jews. Hell, even Jordan could have reached an accomodation with a Jewish state before 1948 (and it has now). So it is factually not accurate to say that the presence of Israel is morally responsible for the lack of peace in the region. As one of the causal factors, ok, yes, eventually. But morally it is not. Since it is the only factor named by Merseymike, and accepted by Roger, it seemed a little suspicious. Why not mention the rise of Arab nationalism as the factor causing instability in the region? If we are going to engage in counterfactuals, had Hitler been confronted in time, the Holocaust wouldn’t have taken place. The number of Jews in the world today would be far higher than it is now. Lets say that they were allowed to immigrate to Eretz Israel and that the Arabs of the region had accepted them. Today you could have had a stronger Israel, as Jewish as it is today, with a sizeable (and bigger) Arab minority, living in peace. Druze are not demanding their own state, so there was nothing inevitable in the Palestinian Arabs demanding theirs then. Which means that there was nothing causally inevitable in the fact that by creating a Jewish state you would have unstability in the region, as Merseymike statement, and Roger’s agreement seemed to indicate.
Therefore, I disagree, but I respect his opinions, based in his later comments.

“He’s not arguing that they had other options, but that they should have had other options. Do you disagree?” Of course not.

“to call his remarks “paternalistic and arrogant”; as a defence of “Nearly Oxfordian’s” slurs, it’s not unlike defending a rapist by telling his victim that she shouldn’t be surprised to get raped if she’s wont to wear a short skirt.”

I don’t really catch your analogy. I think it is forced. But please apply my words to Merseymike instead of Roger.

The first reference either of you makes to the other is when you impute to Roger the following thinking: “Pesky Joos”; “What a bunch of ungrateful scum”. It is impossible to read this as anything other than an accusation of antisemitism.

Surprisingly, his response polite and rational.

Your rejoinder is, “… the conclusion must be that you think Jews are worth less than others. Not that there is much doubt about that.” In other words, “antisemite!”

Again, he responds politely, dealing only with your argument, and ignoring your abuse.

You abusive response: “This dumb, illiterate, ignorant, patronising, sneering bovine manure just shrieks antisemitism… drivel… making such a public fool of yourself.”

Having dealt with what substance there was to your arguments for a third time, Roger finally responds to your smears:

“Thinkcarefully before you post, NO. It won’t stop you being an offensive and unobservant little prick incapable of understanding what he reads, but it won’t damage the cause you claim to support if you don’t post at all. Unless, perhaps, you are a black propagandist intent on making Israel’s supporters look like offensive and unobservant little pricks incapable of understanding what they read. In that case you’re doing a very good job of it.”

It’s hard to argue with any of that.

“Nearly Oxfordian”:

“Tim, the moment that Roger called me a ‘prick’ (and please do check what is the worst thing that I had written about him personally, as distinct from what I had written about his views, prior to that point in time), he lost any right to demand an apology from me.”

So, you don’t consider unsubstantiated accusations of antisemitism to be personal? If that’s so, I have no idea what you have in mind when you imply that there might have been something to apologise for before he called you a prick. Please explain.

“Your pop psychology is silly. There is nothing ‘paranoid’ about what I write. The difficulty is yours, in having such a problem in accepting that I may disagree with you.”

I have explained over and over why I think your views are disgusting, you’ve refused to explain why you’ve accused Roger of being an antisemite, and yet you still imagine that it’s the fact and not the substance of our disagreement that motivates my responses to you. And you accuse me of pop psychology!

I repeat, that whatever you believe in, you are a liability to that cause.

“I find it a little bit odd, when you say,that
he’s being called an antisemite for what I am assuming his position to be. The fact, that he has been called so, has nothing to do
with me.”

Roger, I didn’t mean to imply that at all. There are several people here making the assumption. One of them is calling him an antisemite. Others think it’s more important to pontificate on things that he hasn’t said than to condemn the unwarranted abuse he’s received.

Sorry, that should have been addressed to Roger.

Tim,

A quick question if I may. What is the html code for making the text smaller as I think you have done in your quotations?

Roger. Over.

thanks fabian :) obviously my spoken Spanish is a little better, but not much!

Fabian, the narrow point on which Roger agreed with “Merseymike” was way too ambiguous to draw any conclusions on what underpinned Roger’s consent:

“I simply think that it was blatantly obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.”

This is basically correct. I can consent to this on the basis that lives of many Jews and solving their refugee crisis trump the sensitivities of people whose hostility was often antisemitic. I don’t imagine for a moment that was what “MerseyMike” had in mind, I don’t have a clue what Roger’s thinking was, and so I can agree with him and defend him from the revolting abuse he’s received for basically saying, “yes… but it’s irrelevant anyway!”

I think that girls should be able to walk the street in short skirts without getting raped, but if they do get raped, my anger will be with the rapist. Likewise, people who are not antisemitic should be able to say things that are not antisemitic, without receiving abuse and accusations of antisemitism. My anger will be reserved for the accuser.

In both cases, what I do not do is to defend the guilty by telling the victim that they “shouldn’t be surprised” to get what they got. I hope that’s clear.

Tim: I need to go out. I agree 100% with your last comment.

Except for the fact that I don’t consider the matter of the creation of Israel –> war is so obvious and inevitable.

Mikey, it’s “blockquote” inside “”. The smaller text size is a side-effect of fitting the blockquote inside the little box. Be careful, because if you put a second box inside the first one, it becomes smaller still:

Like

this

Fabian, hindsight is of course 20/20, so talk of inevitability is pretty fatuous. However, Jewish history is full of so many instances of refugee numbers reaching a critical mass resulting in pogroms, expulsion or genocide that on one level I can agree that great hostility was a fair bet. Still, I don’t think that in 1948 I could have possibly imagined the problem as intractable as it is.

Sorry, Mikey, it’s “blockquote” inside the “less than” and “greater than” signs.

like those who have given up on this list because they feel the brunt of both real and possibly imagined antisemitic attacks, I can no longer take the comments that imply that it is impossible for me to venture an opinion without risking the label of antisemitic. I don’t believe I am, but there is no where to find out if any bits of me actually are, since no one allows the freedom to discuss things.
au revoir,

Dorothy

Matt, please remove me from the list and never, ever reinstate me even if I grovel…

Dorothy Wright
Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:55:58 +0500

We are all, or nearly all, opposed to anti-semitism and would support
UCU activity to counter this as all other kinds of racism. The trouble
is that the knee-jerk response of anti-boycotters to allege or imply
anti-Semitism among boycott supporters, as Dorothy points out, does tend
to undermine the credibility of the term. Like the boy who cried ‘wolf’.

Jonathan Rosenhead
Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:48:37 +0500

I do not consider criticism of Israeli athrocities and crimes against humanity to have anything to do with anti-semitism. I strongly believe that any such politics does deserve all sorts of boycott including the academic one. And the calls for boycott canot in any way be interpreted as something that is to do with anti-semitism. Trying to do so is nothing but an attempt to silence anyone who dares criticise Israel and do something using peaceful political means to stop the Israeli athrocities, and is definitely something I canot accept.
It is one’s democratic right to express their views and opinions. That is something anyone who (supposedly) lives in a democratic society is fully entitled to.

JENNA DELICH
Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:49:43 +0500

Haim, you are making very valid points as you always do! But just to add a little question to your last two sentences: perhaps we should start by asking if some ready to recognise any racism and inequality other than anti-semitism?

JENNA DELICH
Sat, 26 Jul 2008 21:38:49 +0500

I’m sorry but your position is untenable. How can you argue that the “never-naturalised” Palestinians cannot go home when Israel has a right of return for all Jews – the vast majority of whom have never lived in the Middle East! That position is discriminatory.

And actually many Palestinians talk of living in peace with Jews and Christians and atheists – all together in one state. It is the dream of many people I have met in the West Bank.

No-one in UCU is trying to “force” a solution but I am afraid the current position in Israel IS only held by force – hence the Wall and the Israeli army incursions. It is that use of force which many of us are trying to curb.

Karen Evans
Wed, 6 Aug 2008 10:22:14 +0500

like those who have given up on this list because they feel the brunt of both real and possibly imagined antisemitic attacks, I can no longer take the comments that imply that it is impossible for me to venture an opinion without risking the label of antisemitic. I don’t believe I am, but there is no where to find out if any bits of me actually are, since no one allows the freedom to discuss things.
au revoir,

Dorothy

Matt, please remove me from the list and never, ever reinstate me even if I grovel…

Dorothy Wright
Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:55:58 +0500

We are all, or nearly all, opposed to anti-semitism and would support
UCU activity to counter this as all other kinds of racism. The trouble
is that the knee-jerk response of anti-boycotters to allege or imply
anti-Semitism among boycott supporters, as Dorothy points out, does tend
to undermine the credibility of the term. Like the boy who cried ‘wolf’.

Jonathan Rosenhead
Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:48:37 +0500

I do not consider criticism of Israeli athrocities and crimes against humanity to have anything to do with anti-semitism. I strongly believe that any such politics does deserve all sorts of boycott including the academic one. And the calls for boycott canot in any way be interpreted as something that is to do with anti-semitism. Trying to do so is nothing but an attempt to silence anyone who dares criticise Israel and do something using peaceful political means to stop the Israeli athrocities, and is definitely something I canot accept.
It is one’s democratic right to express their views and opinions. That is something anyone who (supposedly) lives in a democratic society is fully entitled to.

JENNA DELICH
Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:49:43 +0500

Haim, you are making very valid points as you always do! But just to add a little question to your last two sentences: perhaps we should start by asking if some ready to recognise any racism and inequality other than anti-semitism?

JENNA DELICH
Sat, 26 Jul 2008 21:38:49 +0500

like those who have given up on this list because they feel the brunt of both real and possibly imagined antisemitic attacks, I can no longer take the comments that imply that it is impossible for me to venture an opinion without risking the label of antisemitic. I don’t believe I am, but there is no where to find out if any bits of me actually are, since no one allows the freedom to discuss things.
au revoir,

Dorothy

Matt, please remove me from the list and never, ever reinstate me even if I grovel…

Dorothy Wright
Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:55:58 +0500

We are all, or nearly all, opposed to anti-semitism and would support
UCU activity to counter this as all other kinds of racism. The trouble
is that the knee-jerk response of anti-boycotters to allege or imply
anti-Semitism among boycott supporters, as Dorothy points out, does tend
to undermine the credibility of the term. Like the boy who cried ‘wolf’.

Jonathan Rosenhead
Wed, 23 Jul 2008 14:48:37 +0500

Well, my original post was meant to make people stick to the title’s topic. I wasn’t exactly successful.
I’ll make a few more things plain. I hadn’t mentioned them before because I tried to stick only to specific points.
First of all, when I said that it was
“obvious that the creation of Israel, surrounded by so many hostile countries, would be detrimental to peace in that region, irrespective of the rights and wrongs of the situation.” However, Israel was created and unless you advocate the destruction of Israel as an entity as a precursor to peace any attempts to make peace, or merely to reduce violence, in the Middle East has to accept that fact. ”

I meant exactly that and no more. Whether the creation of Israel was a good or bad idea or a good or bad thing or legal or illegal is as irrelevant as whether the expulsion of the jews from Israel by the Roman emperors or the muslim conquest of Jerusalem or the crusader conquest of Jerusalem were good or bad ideas or things. They are all past and irrevocable and completely irrelevant to the present position in the middle East and the contemporary antisemitism inspired, excused or justified by it except that people seem to prefer to discuss them rather than trying to find the least bad solution to the present situation.

OT, but raised by others, it may be that the creation of Israel was not “detrimental to peace in that region”, but actually helped make the Middle East more peaceful than it would otherwise have been by creating a common focus of hostility and distracting the arab countries from their mutual hatreds. However, the appearance of a jewish state in the Middle East would be- and was- greeted with hostility and this could have been anticipated, which I think was Merseymike’s point, however expressed. Ecen so, it’s an historically intersting point. Again, though, it is completely irrelevant to the present situation. I’d better also make it clear again that I was specifically discussing the period after WWII when there was mass immigration into Palestine and it became plain that what would come into existence was not a vaguely defined “Jewish National Home” for dreamers, idealists and harmless fanatics- which had already inspired hatred enough- but a genuine jewish state with a majority jewish population and aspirations to have control over its territory and to deal with other surrounding states on equal terms and which inevitably increased hostility among all those directly or indirectly affected.

“Roger thinks that the fact that some Jews went to America instead of Israel proves his thesis, and calls ME stupid.
You couldn’t make it up.”
No, NO, my “thesis”- or the one you seem to be concerned about- is that in the period c.1870-1930 many more jews went to other places than Palestine when they could choose where to go and this is evidence that if they could have gone to those places after 1945 many more jews would have done so then. I didn’t make it up. Again, I don’t think the reasons for the establishment of the state of Israel matter, because they cannot be affected by contemporary matters, ‘though the obsession with those reasons- among Israelis and arabs, and- especially relevant here- antisemites does matter because that does affect contemporary matters.

“I’d better also make it clear again that I was specifically discussing the period after WWII when there was mass immigration into Palestine and it became plain that what would come into existence was not a vaguely defined “Jewish National Home” for dreamers, idealists and harmless fanatics- which had already inspired hatred enough- but a genuine jewish state with a majority jewish population and aspirations to have control over its territory and to deal with other surrounding states on equal terms”

That is what a Jewish national home had always meant. What else is a national home? The clue is in the words ‘Jewish’, ‘national’, ‘home’: Jewish majority, control (not ‘aspirations to have control’) over its territory and equal terms with surrounding states. Without those things, and certainly with someone else controlling one’s territory, this is not a national home but an occupied country.
Let me emphasise: it was the sneering, patronising comment about Jews who went to their ancient national homeland ‘because they couldn’t get a green card to America’, a comment as ignorant as it is condescending, that I find objectionable.

It is completely OT but fascinating, so I can’t stop myself from joining the debate and, out of character, agree (I believe) with Fabian.

What would have happened were Israel not established in 1948, would the Middle East been more peaceful? Well, answering this sort of “what if” questions is not an exact science (not even an inexact science) but we know enough to formulate viable conjectures.

The Ottoman Empire collapsed after WWI and this had nothing to do with Jews or Zionism. The dividing line between British and French spheres of imperial influence, the Sykes–Picot Line, had nothing with Zionism either.

Under Ottoman rule, Palestine was part of the Syrian Province, which after WWI found itself on the “wrong” side of Sykes–Picot. This already was a prescription for long-term conflict. Who rules Palestine? Who lays claims to it? The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan renounced its claim for Palestine only in 1980ties and Syria only in 1990ties. Had there not been a single Jew in Palestine, had even the relatively small pre-1890 Jewish presence there melted away, there would still have been an almighty conflict over a stretch of land that was an epicentre of conflict for the last four thousand years. This is certain.

And something else is equally certain: there would have been no Palestinian nation, or at least no Palestinian nation that engaged in fight for independence and has a voice over its future. The Palestinians would have been playthings and subjects of neighbouring states, similarly to Kurds and other Middle-Eastern minorities. And similarly to Kurds and other Middle-Eastern minorities, the faux-Left would have not given a damn about their fate.

my “thesis”- or the one you seem to be concerned about- is that in the period c.1870-1930 many more jews went to other places than Palestine when they could choose where to go and this is evidence that if they could have gone to those places after 1945 many more jews would have done so then.

This is astonishing historical ignorance. In the period 1870–1948 Jewish immigration to Palestine (or South-Syrian Sub-Province, under the Ottoman rule) was strictly controlled and restricted. This control became absolutely harsh and unyielding as the clouds started gathering over European Jewry in late 1930ties and immigration was stopped completely before the start of WWII. Even when British authorities knew full well of Auschwitz’s gas chambers, this total ban continued: an unforgivable British contribution to the Final Solution.

How can anybody compare in good faith Jewish immigration rates under these circumstances?

“blockquote” Mikey, it’s “blockquote” inside “”. The smaller text size is a side-effect of fitting the blockquote inside the little box.”/bockquote”

Thanks Tim

Sorry, Mikey, it’s “blockquote” inside the “less than” and “greater than” signs.

is the text smaller?

Well–it’s nice to see some disagreement on the list! (For example, should we be opposed to anti-Semitism or should we be be opposed to anti-Semitism only if it’s coupled with opposition to other racism or should we force the single state solution on the Jews or not)

Regards,

Inna

Blockquote

blockquote

blockquote

blockquote

I know it’s been said, but a preview button would be nice.

“Nearly Oxfordian”:

“Let me emphasise: it was the sneering, patronising comment about Jews who went to their ancient national homeland ‘because they couldn’t get a green card to America’, a comment as ignorant as it is condescending, that I find objectionable.”

That’s not emphasis. It’s the first time you’ve attempted any explanation of why Roger is supposedly an antisemite. Roger’s use of inverted commas should have been a giveaway that the words were not his, but – much like your own smears – lines invented by Ben to illustrate what Roger was really thinking, which is much easier to disagree with than grappling with what he actually wrote.

Incidentally, Ben had the sense to stop digging and apologise for his behaviour.

Muffin, it’s unfair to accuse someone of ignorance and bad faith in the same argument.

Mikey, I see what you mean. I don’t know why my text is getting smaller, or why there’s a gap on top of your blockquote missing from mine.

Tim, I give up. On a different matter and back to the subject matter -

Joe Quinn who wrote the article that Jenna Delich is not just a 9/11 conspiracy theorist – he has the following to say:

There is much evidence to warrant an in-depth investigation of the role played by agents of Israel in the 9-11 attacks.Yet the ubiquitous, tiresome and completely baseless threat of being labelled “anti-Semitic” for criticising the actions of the Israeli government effectively prevents all but the most courageous from following the leads. Coincidence? We think not….

Just what level of power do Israeli interests wield in the halls of power in the US that any investigation into Israeli spying activities on US soil against US intelligence agencies can be so completely quashed? Would this constitute a level of power and control that would allow those interests to carry off a terrorist attack like 9-11 and have it blamed on “Arab terrorists”?

Most assuredly….

Moreover, in the same article Joe Quinn links to the web site of the Holocaust Denier David Irving with his following comment:

On the morning of September 11th and just as the WTC towers were crumbling the 5 Israelis were caught doing the “happy dance” as they videotaped the Twin Towers fall.

The latin phrase, Res ipsa loquitur, (the thing speaks for itself) comes to mind.

Jonathan Rosenhead’s right. It’s like the boy who cried wolf. And this time it was a wolf.

Mikey, let

me

try

again

In all my other comments I’ve not used a line break or even a space to separate the end of my own comments and the start of the blockquote. As well as that, I’ve used italics and inverted commas…

“… but I don’t imagine that’s got anything to do with it.”

I don’t know why, but I’m still somehow shocked that the activists are managing to blame anti-boycotters for this “mistake”, as though by supposedly abusing the term “antisemitism” they’ve made it downright impossible for people like poor Jenna Delich to recognise a neo-Nazi hate site. How does that work? This wolf of which Angus and Jonathan Rosehead talk: when was the last time the villagers all rallied to the cry of the shepherd?

Following up on SO Muffin’s comment, not only was Jewish immigration to Mandate Palestine meticulously counted and restricted, there never was any serious counting of either Muslim or Christian immigration into Mandate Palestine, lest it frustrate the Mufti and his acolytes who were busy hiring out of state jihadist mujahideen to enter Palestine to fight their Muslim political opponents, the Jews and the British.

Muffin, it’s unfair to accuse someone of ignorance and bad faith in the same argument.

Fair point, Tim. You are right, my last sentence from that post is thereby withdrawn.

there never was any serious counting of either Muslim or Christian immigration into Mandate Palestine

Well, lbnaz, this is an interesting point. Arab immigration to Mandate Palestine was, as a matter of fact, greater than Jewish, mostly for economic reason: this was the most prosperous area in the Middle East! (For statistics see for example the monumental work of Yehoshua Porat on the history of Palestinian people.) The reason it was allowed was actually not that sinister: while it was very easy to stop the sea-borne Jewish immigration, Arab immigration was virtually all through the long and porous land borders.

Before anybody jumps and claims that this somehow diminishes Palestinian claim to nationhood, I hasten to say that this is completely irrelevant to this argument. Palestinians exist, as people. Perhaps in a different historical scenario they would have been Syrians or Jordanians or whatsoever, but we don’t live in any other scenario. They exist, Israeli people exist and both sides must find a way to exist side by side.

You got to love the tinking on the UCU list.

Let’s take Rosenhead.

1.We all oppose antisemitism.

2. Trouble is, there is no antisemitism.
(Anyone can make a mistake and find Jewish conspiracy articles “interesting” and “powerful”.)

3. Not only is there no antisemitism to oppose, the real problem is lies told by dishonest Jews (sorry, anti-boycotters) to silence debate about their nasty Jewish state.

4. We all oppose antisemitism

Acutally Jonathan, you don’t “oppose” antisemitism at all. In fact, as your own wods show, you defend antisemitism and you perpetuate antisemitism. You think the Jews exploit antisemitism. You think Jews lie about antisemitism. A real sheep in wolf’s clothes.

Poor old Dorothy,
Saw this over at Engage

“Gosh,
Is this what it has come to?
You can’t even link to a neo-nazi website these days without being labelled an “antisemite”.
It’s political correctness gone mad!”