Category: israel

Not a self-hating Jew

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Ronit Lentin

In early March 2016 an Israeli bombardment of Gaza murdered two little children. According to Middle East Eye Yasin Abu Hussa, aged ten, died in a raid targeting a base of the Hamas movement military wing in Beit Lahia in the North of the Gaza Srip, one of four strikes the Israeli military said it carried out in response to rocket fire into Israel. Hours later after her big brother was klled, Israa’ Abu Hussa died from her wounds.

I shared the horrific story on my Facebook page, to be met with furious comments by Zionists who blamed Hamas, not Israel, for the children’s death, claiming that Israel is ‘only defending itself against Hamas rockets’ and that ‘Hamas operates from civilian neighbourhoods and is therefore responsible for these deaths’. Before I could remind them there are hardly any areas in the crowded Gaza enclave without civilians, and that Palestinians have every right to defend themselves against Israeli occupation, siege and aggression, the comments became personal.

‘Ronit’, said one Sheila Elle whose profile picture is Israel’s flag, ‘an Israeli name? Dubliners on a whole love you. Hope you don’t have to go crawling back on all fours’.

Astounded by the assumption that Jews are in imminent danger and need to seek refuge in the state that calls itself ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’, I replied that I had ‘no plans to crawl back – Ireland is home, have lived here for years, have citizenship’, and asked her whether she is expecting another Holocaust in the near future.

When challenged, I explained I was asking whether she expects Jews to be banished from their countries of residence, because I don’t, and stressed that the fact that it is Israel that is committing genocide at present makes me very sad, having been brought up after the Nazi Holocaust by parents who genuinely believed that a better world was possible.

Elle was having none of it, writing she was glad my parents aren’t alive to see what a horrible person I have become, ending with a piece of advice: ‘change your name before it gets you killed by an antisemite who makes a mistake and thinks you’re a Jewess’.

Continue reading “Not a self-hating Jew”

Holocaust denial and Israel’s ongoing war against the Palestinians

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Ronit Lentin

As if things in Palestine are not bad enough, with summary executions by trigger happy Israeli security forces of Palestinians suspected of violence against Israeli Jews and even of a migrant worker whose identity was mistaken for Palestinian, and with Israelis fearful of acts of violence to which, I believe, Palestinians are fully entitled in resisting occupation and siege – Israel’s prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has on October 20 managed to further fan the flames.

Not known to mince his words, Netanyahu distorted historical facts when he claimed in a speech to Jewish leaders last week that it was not the Nazi leader Adolf Hitler who was responsible for the extermination of six million Jewish Europeans. Rather, Netanyahu insisted, it was actually the Palestinian religious Mufti Haj Amin Al-Husseini who should be charged with the responsibility for the Final Solution. Netanyahu’s speech presented a simplified version of events, arguing that Hitler merely wanted to expel the Jews, not annihilate them. By contrast to this benevolent portrayal, Al-Husseini, who was sympathetic to the Nazi cause, and having instigated attacks on Zionist settler colonials in Palestine, suggested to Hitler to ‘burn the Jews’ rather than expel them. Continue reading “Holocaust denial and Israel’s ongoing war against the Palestinians”

Israel’s war against the Palestinians, and Palestinian right of resistance

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Ronit Lentin

In a letter to The Examiner, a Dr Kevin McCarthy from UCC stated, regarding the killing of Jewish settlers Eiran and Naama Henkin in the occupied West Bank on 1 October, that ‘there is nothing heroic about murdering parents in front of their children’. However, the Israeli occupation forces are being neither heroic nor moral to murder Palestinian children and adults, an everyday practice, which has escalated in recent weeks. In fact, according to the Red Crescent, at least 1,289 Palestinians have been left wounded in clashes with the Israeli occupation troops across the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem in the past few days. And in Nazareth and Haifa, inside the state of Israel, a.k.a. occupied 1948 Palestine, Palestinian citizens who were planning demonstrations have been rounded up and arrested. Furthermore, since 2000 Israel has murdered almost 2,000 children (an average of one child every three days), including a schoolboy shot dead just a few days ago.

As an Israeli Jew (and Irish citizen) who supports the Palestinians’ right to self-determination, I totally agree with Israeli journalist Amira Hass when she writes in Ha’aretz (7 October) that Israel’s PM Binyamin Netanyahu is intensifying the war against the occupied Palestinians in East Jerusalem and the West Bank with ‘orgies of collective punishment’. Zionists and their supporters claim that Netanyahu offered to open negotiations with the Palestinians ‘without pre-conditions’, but they don’t mention that these talks would not be discussing the illegal annexation of East Jerusalem, the illegal settlements, Israeli control of the Jordan valley and the right of return for refugees, or refer to international law. Indeed Netanyahu’s top diplomat said last week that “[Handovers of] Judea and Samaria aren’t even on the list of options we’re offering the Palestinians”. I have little doubt that the present escalation aims to disconnect Jerusalem from the rest of occupied Palestine and provoke a third Intifada, which would provide an excuse for Israel to annex the West Bank and attack Gaza yet again. Continue reading “Israel’s war against the Palestinians, and Palestinian right of resistance”