What she said that caused her a bit of a trolley is that Israel should go back home to Poland, Germany and the US. It doesn’t take a genius to recognize the context which she had in mind in speaking that way. First, Thomas has a thing about empires occupying other lands (which she makes a note of whenever she got a chance at the WH in regards to Iraq and Afghanistan). And that is exactly what has been happening in this section of the MidEast for the last sixty years.
Secondly, the state of Israel is running a pogrom of their own against the Palestinians. The situations of which were so inhumanely horrible, the events that we are all rightly recalled to never forget, the huge, mechanized ethnic cleansing that European Jews were forced into roughly three generations ago, are being repeated and conveniently forgotten by those same people whom were attacked in the first place.
The victims are now the victimizers. This is tragic human history, an epoch that continually turns again and again. But saying that doesn't excuse the state of Israel for its crimes against humanity.
The Holocaust was a large-scale setting (a horrible exaggeration) for what Zionists are putting the Palestinian people through now. Instead of using trains, they’re using bulldozers. Instead of establishing ghettos, they’re instituting blockades . Instead of gas chambers, they arm settlers*.
Many Palestinians may *say* that they want to wipe Israel off the map, but Israel is *actually* wiping Palestine off the map.
As per the flotilla, it would be best if Palestinians and their allies (and certainly their governing bodies) practiced non-violence. They would certainly win more support for their side if people could see how they are being victimized.
But then again, I would like for MY government to practice non-violence - as well as Israel. And if you send soldiers to attack a boat flying another nation’s flags in the high seas, why shouldn’t you expect to get attacked? That’s a bit like forcefully entering someone’s house and complaining that they shot you.
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*Those very same settlers, in turn for cheap property, are turned into agents of the state. I blame the state and those that blindingly support the state for that action. Brother should never be turned against brother.
*Those very same settlers, in turn for cheap property, are turned into agents of the state. I blame the state and those that blindingly support the state for that action. Brother should never be turned against brother.
Yes Jason, very well said. Though I do think that Helen Thomas was wrong for her comments, her perspective on this issue has been badly mishandled by the lame-stream media and totally exploited by the far Right as yet another reason to come to the aid of Israel and bash anyone who dares question its actions.
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