Indeed shocking doesn't begin to describe it.

Too many people emailed this for me to give one person a hat tip. Thanks everyone.

Wow

But the Independent is a progressive newspaper!!

I don't find this astonishing in the least.

This is Europe.

It's what they do.

Perhaps this is dumb, but is there a way of knowing these are Apache helicopters?

Reminds me of the time the Palestinian spokescreature waxed indignant about the American weapons the Israelis were using, while gesturing toward a Russian plane.

Oh my God, this is the newest low. I didn't think it was possible.

Now subtle! NOT! Disgusting!

#6

The drawing looks like an Apache in a front profile shot, so yeah, they are Apaches (although they could be Mi-24, a nasty Russian flying tank, except for the fixed undercarriage...)

Looks like a decent attempt to commit Apaches to print...

Note, it's not the AH-64D variant, which the US Army loves to use. Seems like they're trying to convey IDF Apaches, to me, at least...

Thank God I own a gun. thank god I live in America and am free.

Thank God I don't live in Europe where leftist socialists continue their complicity with Hitler.

Oops, meant to say "how" in post #8. Gotta proofread.

Clutch is right, that's an Apache. Let's hope we give the Israelis the Comanche.

And, on topic (I ALWAYS comment on a comment first, sorry), this is nauseating.

What? No U.S. flag?

Even anti-Semites can't do their job properly today. Sic transit...

I think that "Dave Brown" must really be an alias for Ali Bin Hassan. I mean, would a EUropean draw such a vile thing?

Ah, the latest variation of blood libel.

I guess it’s too much to expect sophisticated Europe to get past this medieval bit of idiocy.

What? Do you mean to tell me that there still exists anti-Semitism in today's world? I am shocked and appalled!

Oh well, they still hate us. Ho hum.

Honestreporting.com has e-mailed this to its subscribers along with the e-mail address for complaints:

newseditor@independent.co.uk

the disgusting cartoon is pusposely reminiscent of Goya's painting of Chronos eating his children.

Them sophisticated Europeans.

Reminds me of an old painting I saw. Titans eating their children or something along those lines. Can't find it on the web but I'm sure the intended parallel with Greek Mythology is there somehow.

This is without a doubt the most detailed rendering of the sickness of modern anti-semitism.

How ANYONE can look at this as ANYTHING but that is simply stunning.

ruprecht. see #20

This cartoon attacks such a small subset of Jews (Likud and their supporters), that it couldn't really be called anti-semitic.

More vituperation for Israel's Ajax.

[Link: www.nationalreview.com...]

Ignore the troll in #24, everyone. The idiot's insulting the memory of "Sod-off" Baldrick.

But, as others have said -- what can we expect from Europe's "progressives"?

It is NOT FUCKING EUROPE, it's ENGLAND, which is why its so shocking. If it were France, nobody would be surprised.

Socrates, UK

#24 a small subset? Really? Sharon's Likud seen sweeping to victory

Baldrick,

Oh that's right the Pali's only kill Likud, the fake Jews. So I'm assuming that Likud means that they're just poking good natured fun at a single party, not at the whole nation. Hmm... who recently swept the Isreali elections? And the nation itself elected them? Get real, saying this is political is pointless.

This is not a political statement, it's grotesque anti-Semitism.

Bunch of cock-sucking Limey motherfuckers. What can you expect from a mess of anti-Semitic queers who spend all of their time buggering each other in public school?

Kiss my Jewish ass, you Nazi bastards.

Sorry, need to remind myself of the LGF prayer... I suppose everybody can get baited on stuff like this though.

Of course, Sharon does not have a Jewish hook nose in real life. But why let facts stand in the way of some good blood libel?

Re #24. This is comical today. Haven't you got the word? Likud and its supporters may have a majority. Your precious Israeli Labor party is near extinction. Better--far better--that Labor become extinct than Israel itself be, as it would had Labor won.

...right, England's where the Nazis came from. I forgot.

Look, I'm English and I'm shocked by this too okay. We aren't all trendy lefty terrorist sympathisers you know.

Socrates

nik and ruprecht; I think the painting is more commonly known as "Saturn [Roman version of Chronos] Devouring His Children". I think somewhere Goya is turning over in his grave.

And of COURSE the helicopters are Apaches. The idiotarians are always shrieking about F-16'S AND APACHES!!! being used against the poor, defenseless Palestinian lambies.

I don't think Baldrick is being a troll here. But I do think (s)he's wrong. Figure it out, Baldrick; Sharon eating a Palestinian baby, Jews using Arab babies' blood to make Passover matzahs, etc. The, ahem, "artist" wasn't quite dumb enough to make the "blood libel" directly, but (s)he was almost certainly aware of it, and the subtext is too blatant to ignore.

A charming illustration of: "The Dark Ages ended only yesterday - and only in some places. The rest are still dark."

I look forward to some comment of shock and horror on the part of Her Majesty's government. After all, such a comment would be made if the illustrtaion depicted any other leader!

This cartoon attacks such a small subset of Jews (Likud and their supporters)...

This tiny subset of Jews has apparently just propelled Likud to one of the biggest electoral victories in Israel's history --- doubling their seats in the Knesset.

The boys at the Independent had their fingers crossed, hoping that Sharon would have to share power with Labour. Frightfully sorry, chaps. With Labour down to 18 seats (or less) there's no reason for Sharon to invite them into the government.

Rik

the disgusting cartoon is pusposely reminiscent of Goya's painting of Chronos eating his children.

Exactly. It's the european version of plausible deniability as regards anti-semitism.

Like putting the word 'sherriff' in the yellow star stuck to Rumsfeld.

"What, you're accusing us of anti-semitism? Ridiculous."

I am just as disgusted as the rest of you but please, consider the source, this is the Independent after all. And Maccabbee tone it down. There are lots of "Limey's" even Jewish ones who post here (including me) who do not deserve your vitriol.

With Labour down to 18 seats (or less) there's no reason for Sharon to invite them into the government.

And, apparently Labour's slapping itself on the back, pleased that it won't HAVE to be part of the government. No doubt they're looking at being shut out as being their chance to spit on everything the government does, much like the US Democrats are doing now.

(Speaking of which -- isn't it amazing how many Democrats who voted for the authorization of force back in October have suddenly gone all weak-spined?)

Hey, Dom,

What is your view of "The Independent", this cartoon, and the cartoonist Dave Brown? Would you describe this cartoon as antisemitic?

Simon Says,"Don't be a useful idiot for the Axis of Weasels".

The boys at the Independent had their fingers crossed, hoping that Sharon would have to share power with Labour.

Yes, and I think that's the real answer to Baldrick. Do you think if Labor was leading in the polls a cartoon of Mitzna would have run? Not on your life, because Mitzna is "the good Jew" who's willing to give the country away. But put someone in there as PM who's willing to defend himself amidst the incessant nattering bullshit about Arafat and The Most Oppressed People Who Ever Lived and you get a blood libel. Filthy bastards.

Horrible. A horrible cartoon. It is not only anti-Semitic but also extremely tasteless (anti-Semitism implies tastelessness, OK). Reminds me of the cover of some Spanish magazine last year where Sharon was shown as a pig... fuck those anti-Semites

Is this what it was like in Germany in 1930?
Anti-Semitism seems rampant in from the Arctic Circle to the Cape of Good Hope.
Is it just me or is it shitty scary out there?
And the threat of a vengeful Saddam throwing something towards Tel Aviv after he is attacked worries me, too.

(keeping my 1911 .45 locked and loaded)

Sorry, Socrates, I let my anger get in the way of my better judgement.

How's this:

"A bunch of anti-Semitic pomo multi-culti progressives buggering each other in public school."

Here's the Goya painting this slimebag cartoonist mimicked:

[Link: mrs.umn.edu...]

...

Just wrote an email to the editor of the Independent. Don't expect much response, but at least I feel better for having written to them. I do hope they get LOTS of negative feedback on it, though, so they know they've crossed the line.

It's important, when dealing with this kind of stuff, to winnow out the real anti-semitism from just strong political rhetoric.
It is a grotesque, overblown, offensive cartoon.
It is not anti-semitic in the way described.
Why? The cartoonist has redrawn Goya's painting and replaced Saturn with Sharon. Blood-libel doesn't enter into it. Remember, Saturn/Kronos ate his own children, not the children of gentiles.
Second, Sharon just looks like Sharon here, not like the hook-nosed, bearded, ewige jude of Der Stürmer.
Whatever you might think of people who hate Sharon and Likud this much, they're allowed to do it. Save your protests for the real anti-semites. There are enough of them around.

Perhaps some artistically-inclined LGFer could respond with a Goya-inspired Los fusilamientos de la Moncloa cartoon, showing Hamas psychopaths shooting down Israeli grandmothers, pregnant women and toddlers at close range, the way they like to do. See:

[Link: www.ihmadrid.es...]

Robert Crawford:

And, apparently Labour's slapping itself on the back, pleased that it won't HAVE to be part of the government.

Here's a quote from Mitzna: "Sharon hopes the Labour Party will again serve as a fig leaf to his failed policy ... We do not intend to join, but to replace him."

I'm sure Sharon will be sobbing into his pillow over this snub.

25 Joshua Chamberlain

great writing...

but I must disagree with Hanson..

Sharon will be honored in his lifetime....like Ben Gurion and Menachem Begin.

People will come to him, to feel his presence, as I went to see Menachem Begin.

no matter how the world needs to paint Sharon....

Hanson says...

Most Israelis will learn that peacemaking will come easier for his absence.

I dont agree...

His 'hard line', his refusal to accept more lies is the only way, to some sort of peace.

I think Fiske must have crept into the art-department

Agnoton #50,

It's important, when dealing with this kind of stuff, to winnow out the real anti-semitism from just strong political rhetoric.

Here's a simple test for you to use in the future: Could you imagine the same negative thing being said about Arafat? Arafat is objectively more evil than Sharon is, so this should be the case. Furthermore, given that the conflict has had a bit of time to occur, did The Independent publish any such cartoon even mildly critical of Arafat? They may well have but I am not aware of it.

It is not anti-semitic in the way described.

It may well be debatable as to whether it is antisemitic in the way described. No thinking person should believe that it is not antisemitic. Saturn replaced by Sharon suggests that the cartoonist believes that Sharon is similar to the putative god of war. No thinking person can honestly argue that it is Sharon initiating the violence, which is what is implied by this. Further, no thinking person can honestly argue that Sharon is sacrificing his people in order to win the election - it's not Sharon who's commanding Fatah, IIRC.

20 rik Good call on the Goya.

I think Goya would have been insulted to see his art used this way. Here is a drawing as eyewitness to the Inquisition:
[Link: eeweems.com...]

Well yes, I think it's still important to include the "Buggering" and "Public School" ;o)

Bastards.

I've written a strongly-worded complaint to the Editor. I suggest you all do the same.

Socrates

Agnoton...if this isn't anti-semitic, it's the next best thing. I still think it's more than " strong political rhetoric". How many people, seeing this cartoon, are going to realize that it is copied from a Goya painting? C'mon, now, you and I both know that the political cartoonist is depicting Sharon, and by association, the Israelis as bloodthirsty murderers of palestinians. Don't give this guy a pass.

How interesting. I'm willing to bet my LIFE that the Independent didn't run a similar cartoon back in the 70's, when Idi Amin, who was a Muslim, was running Uganda. He was a Muslim, who also happened to be a CANNIBAL, who actually DID EAT BABIES! But the world press wouldn't dare assume that such behavior was a trait of Muslims, nor would it ever allow such a cartoon to be published about Mr. Amin.

I'm starting to think Ann Coulter was onto something when she said, about the various Arab "nations": "We should invade them, kill their leaders, and convert them to Christianity." I would add British leftists to the group that needs re-educating, as well as leftists worldwide.

Scum.

I am not familiar with the Goya painting, but I am horribly offended by it. This is what I wrote:

Dear Sirs:

Your country commemorated "Holocaust Remembrance Day" on January 27, 2003, the 58th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz by Russian soldiers. On this very same day, your editorial page featured a grotesque "cartoon" by one Dave Brown, featuring a hideous, hooked-nose caricature of the Prime Minister of Israel gorging himself on the blood of a Palestinian baby, implying that barbaric blood-lust and destruction was being used as an election ploy.

This is an insult not only to the latest effort of a democratically elected leader to defend his country from the 1,400 rockets and mortar shells lobbed by Palestinian terrorists at Israeli civilians over the past two years, it is an affront to all decent people everywhere. It is this very same dehumanization of Jews that allowed for the death of one million innocents at Auschwitz alone, and would have made Hitler proud. Further, it is a searing insult to a small nation, founded in no small part by those who survived death at the hands of the Nazis (and further to a British mandate), to have their efforts to defend themselves from terror mocked and demeaned by this disgraceful cartoon.

You owe your readers and the civilized world at large an apology.

I don't expect a reply, but I, too, feel a whole lot better.

I know I've posted similar thoughts before, but can somebody please enlighten me...what, exactly, is the big deal with cartoons such as those? It's not like anti-Semitism is a new phenomenon that we're just now coming to appreciate - people have hated Jews for millennia. Why should now be any different?

#50
Shall we have a competition on plausible deniability?

This is definitely anti-semitism. Mitzna, Barak are not mentioned because to do so would be a reminder that Israel did try a two-state solution and faced vicious suicide bombers as its hearty Arabic thank you. One thing that bothers me about this stuff is that when the Oslo "process" was occurring one reason the Israeli right was against it was because they said that if the Palestinians got a state and decided to use it to attack Israel all the "junk" meaning this kind of cartoon would reoccur. The liberal segment said this was merely the old shtetl mentality and in the modern world that simply would not happen. So we went from "shtetl mentality" then to "peace of the brave"" and now this.

Note to Self: Listen to the "inner shtetl".

Oops, forgot to mention that Actual Cannibal Muslim Former Dictator Idi Amin lives in Saudi Arabia. Stray children beware.

Avi: I think our generation understands just how hideous anti-semitism is. We were raised on Holocaust films in our history classes, we saw the TV series The Holocaust as kids. We understand in our guts just how evil it is when it rears its head, and I also think we understand that such things as the Holocaust could happen again. We just get shocked I guess at how brazen the anti-semites can be and are, as well as shocked at how nobody seems to be able to do anything about it.

#55:
Saturn was not the god of War.
Is there, by the way, anything at all in the cartoon that indicates that's a Palestinian baby in Sharon's maw?

Whatz this?

I take that cartoon as anti-Sharon and anti-likud.

Who sez hating Sharon is the same as being anti-semite?

Thatz a really really bad position to take because it allows people to blame all jewish people for the actions of a few of them.

In any group of people you can find horrid people, people that do stupid things, and people so caught up in there own shtuf that they can't see how what they are doing effects others.

Sheesh!

61 Avi

I think the effort to hold journalists and publishers to their code of impartiality is worth it. It may seem like pissing into the wind in the current environment, but groups like honestreporting have some impact.

Sharkman,

We just get shocked I guess at how brazen the anti-semites can be and are, as well as shocked at how nobody seems to be able to do anything about it.

After the Nazis videotaped and recorded everything they did againt the Jews, and after all the countries of the world knew what was happening during the Holocaust and did virutally nothing, how is this cartoon at all shocking?

Agnoton #65,

Oops, my bad.

Hmmm, I'm thinking about the few Jewish LGFers that love to harp on how a dangerous and bigoted undercurrent against them lurks just one micron under the skin of America. The same ones that leap to the defense of the liberal left that would love nothing more than to see Israel destroyed and the Arab dictators shielded. Behold! Drink this in, print up a few copies. This is your fellow travellers' idea of a fair-minded neutral press. I can only shudder at the thought of what they hold in their hearts that they deem too controversial for public dissemination.

Yes, there are some wonderful Brits, but anyone want to take odds on the number that turn out in vehement protest of this? The reams of paper, hours of speeches by politicians and news coverage denouncing this and attacking anyone even remotely connected to it? Anyone want to bet that the BBC gives this more coverage than they gave over foreign politician Trent Lott's remarks?

God I miss Britain. Still one of the best nations in the world, but dear God how she's fallen.

Saturn was the God of agriculture in Roman religion.

Hey Maccabee tell us how you really feel?

This cartoon is unsurprising. Anyone who has listened to Roger Waters' records (+ Pink Floyd's The Final Cut) is well aware of the British phenomenon of antisemitism redirected as anti-Israeli liberalism/pacifism. This guy has been spewing it for more than 20 years.

"Of course this cartoon is hideous and offensive, still there's no way it can be construed as being a negative portrayal of Jews, rather a political statement about Sharon ... but ... one must also wonder about what kind of people could elect such a monster to lead them."

Uh huh. Sure.

Ummm, I broke LGF. And I'm sorry. :(

Avi:

I think I said: "We just get shocked I guess at how brazen the anti-semites can be and are, as well as shocked at how nobody seems to be able to do anything about it." Which is a sentence that answers your question: "How is this cartoon at all shocking?" It isn't the substance of the cartoon, it is how brazen people who publish this stuff are to do so. The world was supposed to have learned something from the Holocaust. Perhaps you are numb to this kind of crap, but I'm not, and I hope that I never lose my disgust as such evil.

#60 david
great letter, I wrote one similar yet not as compelling.
this cartoon should appall you no matter what your religion or nationality. miserable, hateful people. disgusting.

can you all imagine the response, had this cartoon depicted BLack Africans eating actual pygmies..?

is SHaron really the most voratious killer on the planet...of superhuman proportion..?

Sharkman,

So which is it? Are you shocked at the delivery, or at the content? First you said:

It isn't the substance of the cartoon, it is how brazen people who publish this stuff are to do so.

which sounds like you're not surprised by the subject of the cartoon, but the public nature of the anti-Semitism.

You follow up with this, however:

The world was supposed to have learned something from the Holocaust. Perhaps you are numb to this kind of crap, but I'm not, and I hope that I never lose my disgust as such evil.

So what was it that they were supposed to learn? "Gentlemen, we understand that you're going to anti-Semitic, but at least, try to be quiet about it"?

I'm certainly not numb to the anti-Semitism apparent in the cartoon, I'm just not at all surprised by it. As I said above, we've been hated for generations, why should now be any different?

Terrible cartoon. Now we should adjust somewhat with Bush's head and Saddam tattooed across the butt of the "child". Forgive me, couldn't help it. Sorry. Bad cartoon all around -- distasteful to say the least. Makes me want to spit and gargle and spit and gargle.

If this cartoon by that rag Independent is not Anti-Semtic, I do not know what is! David (#60) thanks for re-printing your letter to the Independent. Your were more calmer and rational then my own letter. I do not recall when I have been more disgusted and angery! I hope every LGFer writes a letter to the Independent. David's is a good model. Israel shall outlive all those who try to destroy her, as she has many times before.
Those who embrace death shall die, but those who embrace life shall live. As it was in the old days so shall it be again.

You Americans have been far too nice to the Europeans, the British, the Middle Easterners, and my fellow Canadians of a lefty persuasion for far too long. These people should be insulted day and night for their own good. Look at the mileage Rummy's simple description of France and Germany as Old Europe got. Every time anti-semitic/anti-American, anti logic and civilization Euro twits sound off with their hatred, just ask how the EU headquarters in Brussels pedophile scandal is getting on. You won't get an answer but the rat-like scurrying will give you a wry chuckle. This Dave Brown is a psychopath pure and simple and the paper which published his vileness is guilty. What is it with these pedophilic Euro scum? Because make no mistake the underlying symbolism in this piece of filth is meant to appeal to the pedo culture. rampant throughout EU governance.

#73 IWuvLGF,

Can you elaborate a little on your reference to "The Final Cut"? (You can email that to me if you prefer.)
As you can see, I'm quite a Pink Floyd fan, and I've spent a lot of time listening to "The Final Cut", but have not done so lately.

I want to apologize to all of those right-thinking Brits I insulted with my first comment. I was too angry to see straight.

Those posters who doubt the blatant anti-Semitism displayed by this "cartoon" need to study a little history. Depicting the Jews as cannibals or vampires that prey on gentiles is the oldest canard in the book. Just look at back issues of "Der Sturmer", the infamous WWII Nazi hate sheet, or just pop over to MEMRI and look under "cartoons". The cartoon in question is a pale imitation of the kind of filth that appears in PA and Arab newspapers daily.

As to why people are upset over this, it is quite simple. We expect the anti-Semitic lunatic fringe to act as they have always acted and to publish what they have always published. We do not, however, expect to see it paraded so (dare I say it) proudly in the mainstream British press.

Just another example of Europe effectively saying to their increasing Muslim hordes "Please don't hurt us"

Won't work.

Poor timing, bad idea? Stupid artist? INDEPENDENT thinker? Irresponsible journalism is affecting everybody these days. That's why there's LITTLE GREEN FOOTBALLS.

#45: God bless America. God bless conservative Christians. God bless the second amendment.

Muslims will not shoot a Limey in battle now.

#84 Macabbee--you could also apologise to gays for the unflattering comparison to anti-Semitic leftists... :)

Agnoton ## 50, 65—

Are you seriously suggesting that this is not a blood libel? It is just a cartoon version of Erekat's blood libel that I remarked upon two days ago. Erekat's thesis, and the thesis of this cartoon, is that Israeli voters are such bloodthirsty monsters that they can be wooed by wanton murder.

Not unrelated point—there was a piece on NPR Morning Edition today reporting on Israel's release of the two armed Arab teenagers who had infiltrated a settlement earlier this month. The father, asked by the interviewer if he was proud of his sons, responded that he was grateful that they were still alive, and also very surprised that they had not been killed in the course of their venture. Of course he was surprised; Palestinians are taught by their leaders, secular and religious, that the Israelis are murderous monsters who drink Arab children's blood. A transcript of this interview should show up here in a day or two.

Also, there is a history of the blood libel in England since 1144 with the case of (St.) William of Norwich. Found the body of a brutally murdered child in the woods? Obviously only Jews could do such a thing. Case closed!

Hugh of Lincoln and others followed, provoking or nearly provoking massacres of Jews until the lot of them were run out of the country.

Ben F #90,

Here's the real question: Why do you listen to National "palestinian" Radio (NPR)? ;)

Avi: Make a point of actually reading my posts and thinking about them, so I don't have to explain this another four times. The entire world was supposed to have learned from the Holocaust that Anti-Semitism, as well as all other kinds of ethnic hatred, are always wrong, objectively. I'm not surprised that some people still are anti-Semitic. Humans are very tribe and race oriented and always have been. There are a lot of ethnic hatreds out there, not just anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism just went to the farthest extreme in its manifestation. Humans are also pretty stupid and evil as a general rule. What surprises me, and what I was trying to say in my obviously very convoluted and difficuult to read posts, is that people who KNOW, objectively, that their anti-Semitism is wrong, STILL are able to publish their slime without anyone being able to do anything about it.

TO REPEAT: I am surprised that something that everyone KNOWS is wrong, IS STILL PUBLISHED IN THE MAINSTREAM. NOT SURPRISED THAT PEOPLE ARE STILL EVIL OR THAT PEOPLE ARE STILL RACIST OR TRYING TO SUGGEST THAT IT IS OK TO BE EITHER EVIL OR RACIST AS LONG AS IT IS KEPT QUIET.

I will be just as glad to press the button that turns EUwwww into a parking lot, as I would to press that which will turn the dar-al-satan into a parking lot.

(incidentally is Europe considered part of the dar-al-satan yet? from what I understand there already huge swaths of shari'a in Europe - and that "once you go shari'a, that's what you'll yearn!" [obscure MIIB reference] and that it forever remains the dar-al-satan)

Macabbee: thanks for the apology. You say:

We do not, however, expect to see it paraded so (dare I say it) proudly in the mainstream British press.

I don't know how much you know about the press in the UK but the Independent hardly flies off the shelves. It has extremely low circulation and is read by leftie academics who have spent their entire lives in ivory towers and maybe a few left over communist romanticists from the 50's. It is not considered "mainstream" at all, however none of that excuses the publication of this disgusting anti semitic crap.

Ben F., #90:

They let them GO? What the hell FOR?

Fay:

I see. It sounds like "The Nation". We expect them to act like loonies, of course, but over here across the pond not even The Nation would dare print something like that.

#92 Avi—

If I were to boycott every media outlet that puts out anti-Israeli garbage from time to time, there would not be much around to read and listen to.

NPR has done some appalling reporting, but it has also done some damned good reporting. I give them credit for having the guts to put up the transcripts of their Middle East reporting on-line. I think that that archive is a valuable resource.

In addition, I happen to know one of NPR's senior editors, who happens to be married to a very politically active rabbi, and they are both fine and intelligent people and in no way shape or form self-hating Jews.

This "cartoon" is undefensible. Not just the eating babies part either...every time I've read of IAF Apaches firing missles, its the targeted killing of hamas and islamic jihad cadres. I have no doubt that the leaders of hamas et al PURPOSELY hide in residential neighborhoods with as many women and children as possible. I'm surprised the "cartoonist" didn't label the rubble "Jenin".

(BTW, if you still think Jenin was "destroyed", go look at the aireal photographs...)

Macabbee:
I am not familiar with the Nation, although I am on this side of the pond. I'm a Brit but I live in Canada.

Ah! So #82 shows us the connection between the arabs and EUrotrash. The common love of sex with little boys.

#98 should have been addressed to Ariel, not Avi.

Incidentally, here is Sharon's victory speech. Ha'aretz must have cut out the parts where Sharon talked about murdering Arab children and evicting the Palestinians from Greater Israel. But I'm sure the Independent will run the unexpurgated version, accompanied by a suitable illustration.

Ben F #98,

That was Ariel, actually, not Avi.

I know that it's impractical to boycott every media outlet that makes anti-Israeli statements. NPR has been a leader in making those kinds of statements however, so I would encourage you to consider boycotting them. I, for one, will never make a donation to them. For a complete dossier on their reporting, see CAMERA's reports. This is an example of one of their NPR critiques, where they note:

As Israel endured the blows of unprecedented Palestinian terrorist attacks in the last terrible days of March 2002, National Public Radio continued its long pattern of sharply underreporting and depersonalizing violence against the people of that nation while emphasizing the feelings, perspectives and accusations of the Palestinians. In a 10-day period from March 27 through April 5, not one of the terror victims was mentioned by name, not one bereaved family was interviewed, not one injured survivor was the focus of a story.

NPR did, however, give listeners the full name of the killer who detonated himself in the midst of a Passover seder.

And NPR did report in touching detail, and with the inclusion of their names, the personal story of two Palestinians, a father and son, injured in an Israeli counter-strike against the terror campaign.

In that period, the network presented 62 Palestinians or other Arabs giving their views, often filled with bitter accusation against Israel, but just 32 Israelis were interviewed. Numerous anti-Israel speakers, some extreme, were also heard blasting the Jewish state, especially as the Israeli military moved into West Bank towns to uproot the terror bases.

Ben F #90:
Are you seriously suggesting that this cartoon implies that The Independent and its readership think Jews are marauding cannibalistic giants?
The cartoon makes a crude and unconvicing point about Sharon's politics by invoking the well-known (yes, to intelligent people) image of Saturn devouring his own offspring.
The comparison with the virulent anti-semitic images of the European past and Middle Eastern present is too strained.

Fay:

The Nation is one of the last holdouts of the orthodox Communist world-view, essentially.

To the staff of the Independent... A warm Glasgow greeting that will go to the bottom of their sweet little hearts:

FUCK YOU!!!!!!!

Looks like the wrong side won at Culloden after all...

Anyone wanting to complain to the UK Press complaints council (a monitor of Press abuse) can find info at their website:

Press Complaints Council

Don't take this one laying down.

I also wrote a letter of protest. I also expect no response. I ended by asking the editor if he had no shame.

To say that this vicious, libelous repetition of the blood libel is not antisemitic is a prime example of ostrich-like behavior.

There is a context to this which can't be ignored or wished away. I don't know if you guys remember this, but a while ago, Arab student groups were putting up posters showing a picture of "canned Palestinian baby meat" that Sharon supposedly eats. So the idea of Sharon eating Arab babies is not being evoked in a vacuum - it's a common part of Arab propaganda and derives from the European medieval blood libel.

It's not a question of hating Sharon. It's a question of choosing this particular kind of hateful imagery to attack a Jew.

Please don't insult our intelligence by trying to pretend that this outrage is mere "criticism."

Ugh. I still feel ill.

Press complaints council:

http://www.pcc.org.uk/

I challenge these bastards to put a similar cartoon slandering the Muslims in their newspaper. They're too cowardly to do such a thing because they know that there would be fatwas and bombs and all kinds of little goodies as a result.

Go ahead guys, show Mohammed eating one of his victims and see what happens,

The cartoon is definitely anti-Semitic. It deliberately falsifies the actual situation of a relatively small handful of Jews being aggressively over-run by 100 million Arabs.

Perhaps this is where the Independent gets its inspiration for its political cartoons:

[Link: www.calvin.edu...]

#11   GoctoBert  
Thank God I own a gun. thank god I live in America and am free.

Thank God I don't live in Europe where leftist socialists continue their complicity with Hitler.

I've been giving thought to the idea of purchasing a gun for years.

You should hear the sound of silence when I tell that to liberal/idiotarian friends.

Sure wish my grandparents and uncle in Lithuania had had one 62 years ago.

#104 - Agnoton - Let's not over extend our intellects mulling over the variety of shades of gray in this cartoon. It is exactly what it is, and it tells exactly the story it's meant to tell.
If anything it cleverly - somewhat ambiguously - uses a well-known work of art to condone Jew-hating.

#83 PDM. Final Cut: "Post-war Dream" (?):

Brezhnev took Afghanistan,
Begin took Beirut.
Galtierri took the union jack.
And Magy after lunch one day, took a cruiser with all hands, apparently to make him give it back..
(from memory)

Maybe this is what IWuvLGF was referring to. I'm sure there's more since the Final Cut was recorded during or shortly after the war in Lebanon.
____

As for the demonization of Sharon, the Israelis aren't buying this bullshit. And that's all that matters. Sharon just won his greatest political victory. With 90% of the votes counted, Likud has won 37 (!!!) seats. This is more than any pre-eleciton poll predicted. The Israeli left has been crushed for bringing on the Oslo disaster. Expect the break-up of the Labor party in the next few days.

Its purpose is to incite hate crimes.

*sigh* We should have burned down London after the War of 1812 and be done with the whole lot of them. The island would have made a great free-range prison.

Unbelievably grotesque, disgusting and nauseating. Are these the "allies" we have in the fight against Islamic Terror?

The final cut is just a big nihilist whinefest about how evil imperial super powers are gonna blow up the world and everythings not as cool now as people thouigh it would be back in the forties and how he doesn't really trust his wife it's all Thatcher's fault ! It's a poster for international socialism written before the close of the cold war.

As to examples of possible anti-semitism/anti-zionism/anti-westernism/anti-ca pitalism:

Well there's the Get your filthy hands off my Desert song on Final Cut.
______________________________________

"Breshnev took Afghanistan, Begin took Beirut.. Galtieri took the Union Jack! And Maggie over lunch one day took a cruiser with hands...apparently to make him give it back."
______________________________________

Then There's the Fletcher Memorial Home song also on Final Cut

"The fletcher memorial home
Take all your overgrown infants away somewhere
and build them a home a lttle place of their own
the fletcher memorial
home for incurable tyrants and kings

And they can appear tothemselves every day
on closed circuit t.v.
to make sure they're still real
It's the only connection they feel
"ladies and gentelmen, please welcome reagan and haig
mr. begin and friends mrs. thatcher and paisley
mr. brezhnev and party
the gost of mccarthy
the memories of nixon
and now adding colour a group of anonymous latin-
american meat packing glitterati"

did they expect us to treat them with any respect

they can polish their medals and sharpen their
smiles, and amuse themselves playing games for a while
boom boom, bang bang, lie down you're dead

safe in the permanent gaze of a gold glass eye
with their favourite toys
they'll be good girls and boys
in the fletcher memorial home for colonial
wasters of life and limb

is everyone in?
are you having a nice time?
now the final solution can be applied "
____________________________________

Margaret Thatcher is a BIG supporter of Israel BTW.

So yeah. Waters is a wildly pinko utopian twerp and sort of a talented Michael Moore...Don't get me wrong...musically I like Pink Floyd very much. I'd NEVER consider letting them inform me as to morality or anything else of importance however.

OT

sorry i am having an argument on another forum regarding israels supposed current state of breach on UN resolutions against it

i remember a good post or link i found here some time back that argued the contrary

if any one has a link or info i would be eternally grateful

#120 that's a good subject for the next thread.

2G:

Sure wish my grandparents and uncle in Lithuania had had one (a gun) 62 years ago.

No one who lives in the Maine countryside doesn't have a firearm or two.

Even this ex-liberal, ex-gun control, ex-canadian.

Apart from a 20 guage winchester wingmaster, which is de rigeur around here, I'm also the owner of an Israel Military Industries .357 Timberwolf, an awesomely accurate little rifle with an unusual pump action. Its a true woodsman's rifle, not military or Uzi-like at all, but underneath its classic exterior, it's pure Israeli lethality. Now discontinued and somewhat of a collector's item now.

Just knowing the same guys that made this are also making many of the weapons sending jihadis to their raisins is comforting.

Here is my letter of complaint

Spreading Jewish blood libels and promoting as well as inciting hate crimes against the smallest most widely persecuted religious minority throught history and continuing to the present with the use of your government funded and tax payer money is not only illegal, unlawful, but it is also immoral and heinously wrong.

This depicts the complicit nature and awful truth of the british country in regards to the acts of horrible hate crimes and blood libels that are as ancient as time bringing brought to modern light in your sick disgusting country's run paper.

The hideous poltical image displays your people's view to the rest of the world and to all religious peeple of good will and your blatant support of those terrorists and anti-semites of ill intent throughout the world.

I will not visit or do business with your country from hence forth and I will advise all of my business associates, friends, and families to do the same. I expect an immediate public apology and dave brown's resignation and dismissal.

Thank you for your consideration and I hope you can rise above the gutteral anti-semistism that has and does pervade your region for over 2,000 years and continues to our present modern living history with no end or recourse in sight due to these vile gross and outrageous public anti-semitic depictions proudly and officially sponsored by your sick paper and government.

#65 Agnoton says

Is there, by the way, anything at all in the cartoon that indicates that's a Palestinian baby in Sharon's maw?

Do you need a “Jenin city limits” sign to conclude that the ravaged village to the right of Sharon is meant to be a Palestinian city?

Also, The Final Cut is far from Pink Floyd's best album. It's far better than anything released after Waters left of course, and a lot of the lyrics are actually very decent, but the music is extremely weak. It might as well have been a Waters spoken word album.

Susan #112 ... Thanks for the historical reference to Nazi cartoons.

As an antidote those cartoons, I'll again post a reference to the work of Arthur Szyk, a Jewish artist who produced many powerful anti-Nazi and pro-Israel illustrations.

Law Student:

... incidentally is Europe considered part of the dar-al-satan yet?

Not really, so far as I'm concerned. They remain in the "The dog ate my homework" Remedial History Class.

#104 Agnoton asks:

Are you seriously suggesting that this cartoon implies that The Independent and its readership think Jews are marauding cannibalistic giants?

No. I am suggesting that the cartoon illustrates the Palestinian spin on last weekend's Israeli incursion into Gaza City.

From an NPR report:

GRADSTEIN: But Palestinian officials said most of the dead were civilians, including three Palestinians killed by an Israeli missile. After the Israeli raid, Hamas spokesman Abdel Aziz Rantisi said Hamas will retaliate and, quote, "shed Jewish blood in Jaffa and Tel Aviv." Palestinian Cabinet Minister Saeb Erekat says the Israeli raid, which came just two days before Israel's parliamentary elections, was an attempt by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to win more support.

Mr. EREKAT: And I believe that this is Sharon's way of ending his election campaign by more Palestinian blood, by more escalation and by also specifying that his priorities when he forms the next government in Israel after the election will be to reoccupy Gaza fully. I think what he's doing now is preparing the ground for reoccupation of Gaza.

From an AP article:

The Palestinians accused Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of ordering the raid — the deepest into Gaza City in more than two years of fighting — to win more votes.

. . .

Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat said the Gaza raid was driven by Israeli politics. "We believe he wanted to end the election campaign on this note with more Palestinian blood and destruction," he said.

As far as I am concerned, the claim that Israeli voters crave Palestinian blood is an antisemitic blood libel. It is particularly perverse given the undisputed fact that Hamas and Fatah (Tanzim and Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade) actually do compete for popularity on the Palestinian street by seeing who can kill the most Jews.

#113

Go see: [Link: www.jpfo.org...]

Bottom line, your enemies are already armed. Laws will not disarm them.

Study the issue, and make sure and get some training...be responsible, but by all means if the decision is right for you, purchase firearms.

Sentiment and wishfull thinking are no substitute.

#120 millersnose, try this site, and if it's in their pay archives, then check out the summary at my place.

They forgot to show arafat with his angel wings

#126

Forkum, thanks!! That's some amazing work. I used to cartoon myself, have a degree in Illustration which I've never really used. Maybe I will get back into it.

On the way home from work I had a couple of ideas, like this one:

A cartoon of the front gate of Auschwitz with a big banner emblazoned across the front: "Under New Management: Re-Opening Soon" And show the EU flag flying from somewhere from within the compound.

Like it?

My first thought (even before my previous post) was in agreement with our new and popular friend hans.

This is horrible.

What horrible mind so poisoned could produce such an image? What horrible instititution could present it? This is completely disgusting. This is far beyond the bounds of legitimate political commentary. This reflects on all British. Say what you want. I'm ... repulsed ... what an ugly society. I'd cover the entire country with puke a hundred feet high if I could ... they would all deserve it for not burning that filthy stinking rag-shitting house of festering garbage-minded so-called reporters and their slime-covered no-editing arab-loving terrorist-dick-sucking bastards to the ground.

It's everything I can do to keep from spewing out some cussing that would put that picture to shame.

Oh well, I'm probably banned now. 'bye

:(

#104 Agnoton:

"The cartoon makes a crude and unconvicing point about Sharon's politics by invoking the well-known (yes, to intelligent people) image of Saturn devouring his own offspring."

Right. Intelligent people certainly would regard a Palestinian baby as Sharon's offspring.

#133,

JImmy the Dimmy, what do you expect from a newspaper that prints Robert Fisk? I went on the Independent and looked at their forum -- talk about your sick pups.

#132 Susan

Great concept. Draw it, link it, and they will come. (I know I will.)

FWIW: The first thing that sprang to my mind upon seeing the cartoon was the 'blood libel'. It was not until the link to Goya's "Saturn..." was posted that I recalled having seen the painting before, and even then I was unaware that Saturn was depicted devouring his OWN children. I consider myself fairly representative of the 'hoi poloi' (i.e. a barbarian) and thus believe that the paper should have exhibited more of the cultural sensitivity they insist upon when dealing with delicate muslim sensibilities.

Well stated, fidens.

#115 nik, #119 Emery Calame,
Thank you for commenting on Final Cut. It's still a stretch to call any of it anti-Semitic, but Emery, "nihilist whinefest"... no doubt.
Oddly enough, the font in the cartoon above looks like the same font on the cover of The Wall.

#125 Ayanami, Final cut was the worst of the pre-break up stuff. I prefer the stuff they did when they were just making music on drugs without political or social commentary.

#132 Susan,
I agree with me2 (#137). If you make it, please post it. If you do not have a server to put it on, I will be glad to host it for you.

Chronos was a Titan. He was warned that one day one of his children would over throw him, just as he had overthrown his father - the Sky, and separated him forever from his wife (Chronos' mother - the Earth). To prevent this, he ate them (or rather swallowed them whole).

His wife Rhea, also his sister, and also a Titan, fed him a stone wrapped in a blanket instead of baby #6. The infant was Zeus (Roman Jupiter) and in the course of time, grew to godhood, killed his father and cut him open, freeing his 3 sisters - Hera, Ceres, and ?? - and 2 brothers - Posiden and Hades - and established the Olympians.

So if you took 2 years of Latain in High School and read lots of Greek (and Roman) mythology, you would know that "Saturn ate his own children". However, the idea the the cartoonist knew this bit of trivia when he drew this ... is not proven simply because other people knew this bit of trivia.

He might have simply said "hey where that picture of a guy eating kids?" and drew likewise....

#98 - anonymously says what fine people a senior NPR editor is. that editor is ellen weiss, who was exec producer for many years of (NOT) ALL things considered.
She is married to the ultra-lib activist reform rabbi (at least he is a rabbi as opposed to his chaver Michael Lerner) David Saperstein.

Weiss was responsible for producing some of the most biased and obsessively anti-israel reporting that can be found outside al jazeera, al-alharam, etc.

Just today NPR's reporting include the use of hard-line to describe the religious parties (hey, isnt' Labor being hard line in not wanting to be part of a national unitycoalition,
isnt Meretz hard-line in their appeasement policies). but what took the cake waqs Peter Kenyon's fawning piece and psychobabble why kids become suicide bombers.
utter rubbish. not a word about the vicious anti-semitism artiuculated by imans, arafatrniks, schooltexts. you wouldnever know that listening from national palestine radio. NPR should beboycotted, and congressional hearings to study out tax dollars going to support this biased network are needed!

again, NPR is the most obsessively biased anti-israel media outside the arab-islamic world.

Susan #132 ... I like it. That is a very powerful idea. I'd be tempted to put a question mark after "soon," to make it more of a warning, but that's just me. Definitely get out your quills and make it real.

132 Great
Patton and the rest of the scum could be dressed up as nazi guards saying "why do the Jews complain that I am anti Semitic?"

I guess we can now give up waiting till the journalistic scum have gone so far they have alienated the public and the backlash becomes embarrassing.

#126 Forkum,

Thanks for the link to Arthur Szyk. Very moving stuff. What happened to those children is so profoundly sad. It magnifies the vileness of the Sharon “cartoon” leading this thread.

#130 Meryl Yourish

ten thousand thanks for your help

Art (in this case a cartoon) is always a projection of what is inside the artist. In his case, a hedious pervert.

There is a place where the political spectrum makes a full circle, The place where the far right meets the far left, the place where Ribentrop meets Molotov, the place Where Pat Buchanan meets Noam Chomsky and the Der Sturmer meets the Independent … all are one in the twilight zone….. (make your own background music…)

Ooh, excellent metaphor Lizzel, Serling would be proud.

does anyone have the original link as it is required in order to complain to the press complaints commission.. I couldn't find the cartoon on the independent's website

thanks

I rather like the caterwauling of Roger Waters. I just don't take him with even a quarter of the seriousness he'd like to think he deserves.

Sadly his plaintive "Deranged cry from the Id" style of music has been beaten to death by the endless parade of post Nirvana grungers and that idiot Billy Corrigan. Most of those "follow up bands" were pale immitations at best anyway.

Personally My favorite Pink Floyd CD is currently Meddle. Wish you Were Here is close second. Then I guess I'd have to say Dark Side of the Moon. Animals is Okay. The Wall is okay though the movie is better than the CD that spawned it.

I like Division Bell and Momentary Lapse of Reason and even D. Gilmore's two solo efforts. but they aren't all that special. Not bad at all though. I feel the same way about the early gibberish days with Syd(who broke down) Barrette. I'm not wild about the greatest hit concert mix compilations post Waters.

Radio KAOS, Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking and Amused to Death are okay if a bit maudlin and corny and full of slightly stale 30 year old piss and vinegar.

Frankly I think of the whole kaboodle of Floyd and related stuff as pleasantly depressing nostalgia that I save for lonely rainy days when I wish to feel sorry for myself.

To those on this string who claim not to see the anti-semitism in this "political" cartoon, I suggest you take a look at this MEMRI archive of Arab cartoons. Perhaps you will see the similarity.

Gee, that sounds polite.

Of course it's anti-semetic you idiots, it's designed to evoke a viseral, emotional loathing of Sharon, Israel and Jews.

#70 hans z bee

Saturn was hardly a god of agriculture, he was the ruler of the Titans and the father of (yeah, he ate the rest of his kids) Zeus.

Cronus

Actually Saturn WAS a god of agriculture and judgement. Specifically he was a cthonic god meaning he was a vengeful threatening character associated with the deep places of the earth and alternately with the moon.

He is often associated with the Celtic God Crom Cruach (Lord of the crook) who also was said to have a sickle( waning moon) and who's great idol ruled over the Mag Slecht until St. Patrick called on God to topple it.

The Greeks did not really worship Chronus but the Romans did worship Saturn and his holiday became the foundation of the Christian season of Christmas. Ever hear of Saturnalia?

Anyway Saturn was a god of both growing things and dying things. He represented the power of time and the passage of seasons for those who were not members of the brighter cults of Demeter/Ceres, Flora, Maia, Persephone/Prosopine and Artemis/Diana. Saturn had power oever everything but the air, the water and death because those three were his children who overcame him and bound him in Tartarus.

Chronus/Saturn survives in our culture today as the figure of Father Time and still carries the sickle he used to castrate the god of the sky and stars (Uranus).

#152: john

Saturn was hardly a god of agriculture

Cronos in Greek, Saturn in Roman mythology, the ROMANs worshipped him as god of harvest. See here, here and here.

Resignation, now!

more demonization of Sharon

second picture down

[Link: news.bbc.co.uk...]

I'm not jewish, but if there were anything that could make me a friend of the jewish people for all time it is this kind of filth. I can hardly understand how such anti-semitsm, how such unreasoned hatred, can still exist in europe.
To Brown I say, I'd like to punch you in the face. You are a dishonor and a discredit to mankind.

OK guys (humble smile) I guess I should've said...

"Saturn /Chronos was hardly just a god of agriculture..."

I don't know, I've always thought of the Titans as the progeniters of the Greek/Roman gods, and when I did a little research, (I was not familiar with the Goya painting "Chronos Eating his Children" refered to earlier in this string) I was struck by the belief that Chronos/Saturn was the father of Zeus and therefore the father of the entire pantheon of Greek/Roman gods.

#158: You're right there, it is rather a minor and less known characteristic of Saturn to be the Sower/agriculture God. It rather has been derived from his role as master of time. If interested, here is a nice article linking the mythological strands of Cronus/Saturn (even though #153 provides excellent overview).

thanks hans

#142 complains about my "anonymous" comments about an NPR editor and her husband. I post under a real e-mail address; not really anonymous.

Sorry, I don't see the appellation "hard-line" as representing anti-Israel bias. The mainstream press is liberal and broadly hostile to Jewish and Christian fundamentalism.

There are biases at work in the use of these labels, but they are not anti-Israel. Look at what you wrote. Being pro-Meretz and pro-Labor is not being anti-Israel. Sharon wants Labor in his coalition government, not the far-right parties. Is Sharon anti-Israel?

I did not hear Peter Kenyon's report, but if you thought it was skewed why don't you send him a polite but firm email describing your objections. You will almost certainly hear back from him, and you might influence his future reporting.

Rabbi Saperstein may be ultra-lib, but as you note he is a real rabbi (he's got no congregation but I've heard him give a D'var Torah from time to time and they have always been insightful and non-sectarian) and definitely not part of the anti-American, anti-Israel left.

I say again, I am often appalled by NPR's Middle East reporting, but some of its work is stellar, and I think that NPR's on-line archive of Middle East reporting is a valuable historical resource. So I listen. But if it makes you happy, it has been quite a few years since I've sent them any cash.

This is from the country (ENGLAND) that committed genocide against its indgienous celts the Cornish and Welsh. This country still commits human rights abuses today. ENGLAND and the CROWN should be taken to the ICC for war crimes - replacing an occupied territoriys people with their own. This goes on all the time and totally transformed Cornwall. They make it hard for people from the colonies they created to return to their ancestors land by saying "an English person must not be available to fill it" - yet they don't allow the celts to apply these laws to them - the fuckin hypocrites.

#41 Del,

Just caught up.

(I hadn't seen this till now but as it happens The Independent was the only paper in the shop today, which needless to say I didn't buy. ie The only paper not sold.)

No, I think it suggests Jews are a picture of sweetness and light, waddya think...

...but to those that can't take it (and I really, really do hate this) don't spew it.

Dom, Dom, Dom.

Always with these "atrocities on both sides of the fence" remarks.

Hey Dom u occupier what part of Britain do u live - i think i will kill 25% of your english population (like u did to mine in 1549) and then I can say - "If u can't take it...don't spew it".

Really Crusade Now, 1549, now who's being silly?

So, Ariel is re-elected by a biggest margin ever, while the Jews for Arafat crowd suck an egg.

Needless to say that the commrades at the Independent are enjoying the generous helping of crow this morning. Washed down with warm beer, no doubt a tasty treat by any measure.

#162 Crusade Now

And how precisely did the Celts arrive in Britain?
Was Britain already populated by any chance?
Did the Pre - Celtic (the real Ancient Britons) people want the Celts there?

With you’re endless ranting of victim hood, cries of Genocide, and living in the dark ages, you’re becoming to sound just like the muslems.

So fuck off back to Oz.
This wouldn't be some kind of displaced guilt for being a ‘white colonist' yourself by any chance?

The shameful cartoon is a result of the trendy leftist chasing the nazi through the distorting prism of the Trotskyite vision until he catches up with him... Its dangerous because there are idiots out there who warm their weak intellects on this stuff, and run off to blow up their shoes, their cars, their neighbours and any unsuspecting poor devil who gets in the way.

I sent the following letter to the editor, and another to the pcc. Everyone should do the same, FLAME the bastards.

Quote:
I noted with horror your cartoon of Monday, drawn by Dave Brown.

I cannot imagine, whatever your opinions, which may be pro-arab, pro-arafat, and even pro-saddam, that a British newspaper can accept to become a vehicle for the hate propaganda in caricature, in cartoon form, which is way down the slippery slope to the gross violation of the rights of its citizens to respect.

It so happens that yesterday night Mr. Sharon, who seems to have convinced a quite sceptical electorate that he should represent them, in his first speech talked of national unity, of necessary concessions, and of the World.

My grand parents arrived here in Britain in ’39, to receive their British citizenship by act of Parliament. I cannot imagine the hurt your cartoon would have caused those peaceful people, eternally grateful to Britain for taking them in, making an honest living, devoting all their excess resources to charity, and watching with tears in their eyes the development of Israel.

Shame on you for bringing Britain into disrepute. Shame on you for insulting the liberty and democracy which so many of OUR ancestors (yes yours also) suffered and died for.

Unquote

Dom...

maybe you can point out to us, in the cartoon, a representation of

"atrocities on both sides of the fence"

or does it look like, there are NO arab atrocities.?

#156 ploome – you are on the money with that photo. That is so overtly demonic and their intention by selecting it for publication is transparent. It is my view that the vast majority of photos that BBC chooses to publish vis-à-vis Israel are unflattering at a minimum, and frequently malicious. Yech!

Here's a caroon from the Memri archive that is the same genre.

Westoner - fuck off back to Germany.

That's funny - guilt ??! for what - u kicked my ancestors out.

Celts - pre celts all the same people - I would be suprised if any "celts" came to Cornwall at all. The Cornish have always been there.

This 'cartoon' (I wouldn't actually call it one, as it's not funny) is disgusting. I have been listening to a bunch of liberals talking for 40 minutes, and after I saw this, I felt like throwing up.

Ever heard of the non-celtic Silures - the tribe of south Wales???

Sorry buddy then I am pre-celtic as well. As most of the original people in the west are.

It seems everyone is missing the delicious "faux pas" of this cartoon. We have noted that at some level it derives from "Cronos eating his children." Perhaps as #141 points out, the cartoonist wasn't consciously aware of the background of the painting. But somewhere in his twisted mind the truth tried to squeeze out. While he labels the "Cronos" figure as Sharon and Likud we who know the truth realize it is actually and factually Arafat and PLO.

Has this cartoon been discussed in any news media? Has the Independent issued any kind of apology?

This disgusting caricature is another sign of the demise of the great British culture, and as an Israeli, and now past Anglophile, after the first shock (a shock indeed, the Independent, however its small circulation, is respectfull and reflecting parts of the rulling class in Britain), I feel pity to a society which is capable of producing such monstrous act despite her own history and her response his indifferent. Some points to consider:

The baby eating metaphore appeared in a famous satire by Swift in which he advised the starving Irish people to produce and eat their babies. Israel need another 1000 years of wars with the Arabs in order equalise the deads brought on Irish by the British rule in Ireland.

Some hardlines Israelis, in their despair, are suggesting to depict some of the British methods in which they repressed the Arab mutiny in 1936-1939 in Eretz Israel under the Mandate, for example, mass deportations, killing every tenth male standing in raw in the village square, summary executions, and massive hanging after a courtmartial, and air bombing of suspected villages. All justified since the Arabs wanted London and Kent, and installed bombs in the London tube...

Of course, no one here take it seriously, you could not even find a anti-Arab caricature in the Israeli papers close to this horrible picture.

#143, Forkum, thanks!! Yeah, I agree, the question mark after "Re-Opening Soon" would be a good addition.

I'll get work on it!!

Ben F,

You sound ridiculously naive about NPR. First of all, I don't care how many rabbis they are affiliated with, or how nice, or Jewish, their editors are. Their coverage of the Middle East is a disgrace. Also, their online archive is really just a way to disseminate their anti-Israeli views. And it's highly selective. They don't put everything the say online...like when they called Palestinian terrorists commandos.

And when you say...

The mainstream press is liberal and broadly hostile to Jewish and Christian fundamentalism.

...is that the best you can do?

In UPI's report on overall Jenin reporting during the IDF operation, one of the news outlets that scored lowest was NPR. Not just because it swallowed the myth, but because its retractions after the fact were either incredibly lame or non-existent.

Also, the use of the word "hard line" has much more nefarious intentions in the overall context of NPR's reporting. I have yet to hear them call the P.A. "hardline". And while I'm no fan of the settlements or Israel's far right, I could understand judgements like that pissing off #142.

After the Hebrew University bombing, some prick at NPR made a commentary about how sorry he now felt for the PALESTINIANS attending Hebrew university, because it would put them in a bad light. No mention of the murdered Israelis.

NPR is a sick rag whose politics are just a small step above Radio Pacifica. Frankly, I'm surprised you'd defend them.

Susan: If you draw that cartoon, I'll put it up. Happily, and proudly.

Ben F...

Sorry if I sounded a little bellicose. I know you're a regular here and respect your opinions. I just think your defense of NPR is a little naive.

#183 davesax

Maybe it is just me, but I don't think that NPR is a monolith any more than I think that Islam is a monolith, or Israel, or the Palestinians. I think that NPR is the sum of its parts, and that the parts are people, and that the people see themselves as professionals, but like everyone else they have their flaws and their biases.

I have had what I consider to have been useful and constructive e-mail exchanges with NPR correspondents, which is why I suggested above that someone upset with a Peter Kenyon report open a line of communication.

Note that sometimes a correspondent will file a 90-second report that gets cut down to 60 seconds for broadcast, and what gets cut is some of the set-up, the context, and that makes all the difference. If you find out that this is what is going on, then you can escalate with, say, the NPR ombudsman, and have a very specific, constructive complaint.

Have you tried to work within the system? If not, then maybe I'm not the one who is naïve.

#176 Crusade Now

Why should I fuck off 'back' to Germany. Is that where you assume everyone who's not 100% pure Celt™ comes from?

"u kicked my ancestors out"

Did I? I wasn't aware I kicked anybody out of anywhere. Well that’s the dark ages for you. All that raping and pillaging. Life was so much better before under the Romans.

"Ever heard of the non-celtic Silures - the tribe of south Wales???"

But you just said there's no difference between Celts and pre-Celts so how can they be non-Celts???

Droning on and on about pre-Roman tribes makes the followers of allah seem like post modernists by comparison. They only drone on and on about the Crusades.

Keep taking the tablets...

#159 Hans -

I guess the next cartoon of Sharon in The Independent will show him castrating his father?

This cartoon proves that the entire population of the UK are vile turds who need to be nuked immediatley.

This is the society that not only produced the bastards that published this cartoon, but also Fisk, Chamberlain, Chomsky, Michael Moore, Ted Rall, Hitler, Pol Pot, buggery and, er...communism.

Nuke the UK now before it's too late and their troops get to the Gulf in time to help invade Iraq. Dammit.

dont forget the LOATHESOME Pilger...

who has a new piece of dreck out today in the Mirror.

Well I guess you could say that it represents the old hard line Israelis devouring their leftist offspring in the sens that the older more bellicose party has swallowed all the smaller younger more moderate parties and thus has dealt woth all of his competition and towers as the monstrous great God who knows no opposition.

It also looks a bit like a King Kong movie to me with all the copters buzzing the gargantuan "Kaiju" storming the city.

I do know that the Chronus devouring his children has been used in illustrative regards to other subjects such as the Europena legends of lycathropy and wild men or even to illustrate the part of the Volsung saga when Sigmund puts on a wolf shirt with one of his sons(Sinfjotli I think) and they turn into wolves and run around killing innocent people for while and when they think they've killed enough they turn human and burn the skins but not before Sigmund wounds Sinfjotli fatally and then heals him.

So anyway it may have found it's way to the artist without him haveing made the Goya Chronus connection. That's not to say that it did.

In anycase it protrays Sharon as a monsrously cruel personification of unstoppable violence(a Stalin or Pol Pot at the very least) and even if it isn't truly anti-semitic and is a purely political or personal attack it still meets the criteria for being a vile overstepping of the bounds of taste and temperence and a libel all on it's own.

Methinks the artist was a bit too clever and "sophisiticated" to hide his true intentions.

#189: Yeah, you might be right about swallowing leftist offspring, but maybe not: why the gunships hovering the background other than to convey that it is Palestinians Sharon whom destroys? And, indeed, that is precisely the conclusion drawn by the complaint that launched this thread: "... depicting Prime Minister Ariel Sharon biting the flesh of a Palestinian baby."

The baby as Palestinian is sufficiently redolent of blood libel to make further discussion unnecessary. But what if Sharon is supposed to be swallowing Israeli (why leftist, though?) offspring? In that case, the enterprise is thematically incoherent. Again: why the gunships, except to convey Palestinian suffering? What does the "vote Likud" fig leaf have to do with devouring Israeli young? (This is a transparent adoption of Palestinian propaganda that Sharon has launched brutal and unprovoked attacks for vote-getting purposes. Against this backdrop, how can "Vote Likud" suggest a devouring of Israeli young?) Why would anyone think that any Israeli would be Sharon's offspring?

But grant the artist his incoherence. It's still striking how deep the blood libel must run in his subconscious, how easily it's called to service. An atavistic bias, run amok. That, I think, is the real story.

This cartoon definitely is anti-Semitic, without a doubt. I fail to see what the cartoonist was getting at by plagiarising Goya's painting of Saturn devouring one of his sons, what is the point behind it? The referencing of a great art work in a superficial manner says a lot about the debasement and decline of European civilisation. They are so entranced by the limp psychobabble rhetoric of multiculturalism and Islamophilia that they don't even understand their own culture and history anymore. They have definitely forgotten their history of anti Semitism. If they understood it at all a cartoon like this would never have see the light of day in the year 2003.

[Mark Steyn said this year a European leftist would probably refer to the holocaust as the 'alleged' deaths of six million jews. At the time I thought his prediction was a bit extreme, now I suspect he will be proven right.]

#185

Westoner,

That was prety funny, I particularly like the trademark. :)

Reminds me of all the bitching and moaning in the Balkans, particularly amongst the Greeks, Macedonians and Albanians...who f-ing cares who was where 3,000+ years ago?!

A particularly famous quote about the Balkans seems apt here, "The problem with _____(*insert your area here*) is that everyone claims the lands they held at the apogee of their empires." It's a paraphrase but valid enough. Personally, I've staked claim to the Parthenon, I'm sure that at some point someone raped someone else that I was related to who was probably Greek so my claim is as valid as any.

I actually read a study a while back that said that any population of a given area, Europe in this example, can statistically trace their heritage to one person about 800-1,000 years prior. That means that we're all descended from some schlub who was tilling a field in Transylvania circa 1000AD. Hello my long lost siblings!

In regards to the Germans, they've been there since before Christ, I think that's long enough ago to let bygones be bygones.

Well. ...the Gunships would be an example of Sharon's new orgiasticly cruel and ruthless military order. Israels only future is as a burned out ruin(a lah Lebanon) patrolled by his I dunno..."furies/eumenades/enrinyes".

As for the "Vote Likud" badge... it's covering his privates which might be a shot at his alleged financial misdealings being covered up by his campaign slogans about national security.

Anyway in my view it's supposed to convey to the like minded viewer that Sharon is a towering carnivorous insatiable grotesque Aztec wargod figure who has just done away with the last hope of stopping him. He's a fascist imperialist racist abomination(fatcat right winger) who thoughtlessly destroys everything to sate his own Napoleonic appetite for empire and tribute. What's worse is that according to the cartoon he seems to think he and his actions are beyond criticism. The message is that this base pagan god is now completely unrestrained to bring about the chaos seen in the frame of the cartoon. Moloch has returned.

It's probably NOT supposed to PRIMARILY convey that at heart the Jews as a people are monstrous perverted cannibals who are hunting the palestinians to extinction in observance of the protocols of the elders of Zion. I think it's aimed at a party and an individual rtaher than a whole people.

It is STILL monstrously unfair. It is aimed at the ususal emotionally retarded college age scenery chewers who think that Israeli doctors routinely posion palastinian wells and that the speed limit is fascist and that LSD makes you smarter the more you take it.

That said...it's still pretty damned horrible even when you take out any question of anti-semitism. I think it damns it's author sufficiently regardless.

I am not sure that the child is in fact a palestinian child, the Palestinian Authority, peace, the palestinians in general, stupid goy dupes in general, Buddy Lee from the Lee jeans commercials, or what have you.

I am also not sure that it isn't. All I'm saying that is that regardless of perhaps slightly strained ties to the blood libel it's still a sad example of unfair and sick hyper-political paranoid leftist shit that ought to bring shame on both it's creator and publisher. Even if it's NOT anti-semitic there was a clearly uncalled for, dehumanizing offense commited here.

I regard it to be just as sickening as the "Ultra Phophets of the Psychic Revolution" CD and it's song about Richard Nixon's cannibal barbecues.(Hows that for Obscure?)

The point wasn't really that Nixon ate human flesh. It's that he was (according to the song) an uncaring robotic war monger. The point was false and the song was a libel in and of itself. What's worse it was part of not very creative movement in the late 70's, 80's and 90's to blame Nixon for virtually everything that had ever gone wrong in politics or America, or the cold war or even human history and make him a demoniacal anti-Christ of sorts. It was emotional(and highly irrational) kangaroo court stuff just like this stupid disgusting cartoon.

It obscures any real issue with it's grandiose frivolity and exageration and out right dishonesty regarding what it is supposed to comment upon.

In short the people who made this cartoon and the people who are meant to consume it are very dangerous unbalanced people whether they are motivated by anti-semitism or not. They are a threat either way and must be challenged either way.

Westoner#31 celts and non-celts I am just using your ideas. You were the one who said that the celts invaded the iron age people not me. The celts of today are in Ireland Wales etc. This is a name for a people who languages are described as celtic. Here is a thought for you - they DNA tested the body of a 400BC celt from Czech Rep and compared his DNA with the "celtic" populations of today and they were nothing alike. Here is why: Because the closest people to the Irish etc are the Portuguese. Tell me who ever settled in Portugal??? That is where all the people of western Britain migrated from 10,000 years ago. Like i said we have always been here unlike vikings (even a lot of Irish) anglos etc Who invaded Cornwall before the 1950s - answer no one. We have always been here and I would be willing to undergo any Y chromosome test going.

Also Westoner - Leaving aside genetics why are there continuing human rights abuses and governement over these seprarate people by the English?
Who are u to flood their lands?

Like I said want me to fuck off back ot oZ - u can fuck off back to Germany. Answer this question - why have you broken the treaty of 1508 - the treaty that gives HRH Price Charles the right to his 7mil pa? Why can't cornish people control who emigrates into their land? Sorry we are a separate people and this has been acknowledged since at least 1000 AD.

Bad news for Ariel and Davesax!

John,

I know u mean well, but my position about Israel, and the US, is not that there are atrocities on both sides. Just that here on this website it is very hard to say anything in defense of a European country without coming in for high-strung, offensive rebuttals. I specifically said I wouldn't buy The Independent and this is an evil cartoon. Ploome, you've quoted John saying I said that and I didn't, so as for loads of people here, just calm down with the European-bashing.

I honestly always felt one lesson of the holocaust was not to make radical generalisations, even about Germany, noch. But if I'm on my own, don't stress.

Incidentally I apply this to myself - I catch myself becoming pretty anti-Islam and I do know the score but I still have to tailor what I say to who I'm talking with. Surely, same for Europeans, and the threat is less. As for why people specifically attack the Jewish Europeans here, which is not the same as a call to action, I can only guess those people are a bit unhinged, The Independent notwithstanding.

The Independent is running a series of articles addressing the firestorm triggered by this cartoon, including the cartoonist's lame [IMO] defense. Or, considering the source, his lame defence.

Ben, you're right - it's totally lame.

Either Brown is deliberately and disingenuously attempting to paper this crap over with an analysis invented after the fact, or his anti-Jewish attitudes are so deeply ingrained in him that he doesn't even realize how absolutely disgusting and offensive his work is.

What is clear, however, is that neither he nor the paper has any intention of apologizing for anything.

BTW, #187 - Completely idiotic. Write something that makes some sense or go away.

this cartoon was clearly aimed at mr sharon and not the jewish people. it used the familiar goya image to make the point that israel's most recent incursion into palestinian territory in which children were killed was grotesque electioneering.

sh

To argue that Israeli voters favor wanton murder of Palestinians, as this cartoon does, is an attack on the Jewish people, not on Sharon. It is a vicious lie and an inversion of the truth. It is the Palestinians that dance in the streets, hand out sweets, and ululate when word breaks about atrocities against Israelis or Americans.

Oh, by the way, the dozen Palestinians killed in the Gaza incursion, according to the IDF, were all gunmen who initiated firefights with Israeli troops. So even if the incursion was electioneering, it was all about taking the war to the terrorists, not about what the cartoon shows, which is Sharon and the IDF raining murder and destruction on a populace.

To me it doesn't matter if it's anti-semitic or not. Either way it is suffienceintly dishonest and revolting to mark the one who made it as an asshole. You wouldn't want the bastard around your kids either way. He should be condemned and has been.

It is most definitely anti-semitic, but the particular semite in question is ariel sharon who if anybody deserves it.

for a satart just look at the man what single facial chareteristic strikes you? he's fat and has a larger than average nose, the PM makes no fuss at all when he is drawn day after day with large ears or as happened today (in the independant) yet again as a poodle.

In britan we have a long and glorius history of caricture in the press and we know precisely how to interpret them, as just another peice of valid journalism and more than a bit of fun, i must admit that i often leap through the pages of the broad sheets until i find the visual critique of the day often causing everyone to look round when I laugh out loud in my college common room.

The single worrying thing about this page is that the argument degernarated into a dispute over the make and model of the helicopers in the background.

Yours faitfully,
Paul Graham Baxter-Palmer
Dr_baxter@msn.com

#204

Dr. Baxter-Palmer,

It is most definitely anti-semitic, but the particular semite in question is ariel sharon who if anybody deserves it.

That statement is more than debatable. It's obviously meant to mean something very sinister about Sharon and through him the entire Israeli state. You don't have to be a Zionist to realize that, just rational.

I hope that your doctorate is not in the humanities, your spelling is simply atrocious.

Yours sincerely,

Bez

I have come here late via a Tim Blair link. All I would like to add is "What a revolting, despicable cartoon".

To Maccabbee- in case you missed the memo from the Nazis, buggerers were provided the same accommodations as Jews. I think we're getting just a bit tired of being vilified in this fashion.

Excellent cartoon. The more disgusting and ridiculous the loons from the left get, the more sensible people will unite against them. Don't complain about this stuff, encourage it and watch the people who oppose this disgusting crap grow in numbers.

The cartoon is foul, disgusting and witless - it is not just anti-Zionist but clearly anti-semitic. The Independent is not a newspaper but a shitrag.

Britain has a free press - it can publish what it likes. The Independent no more represents the British mass than the obnoxious Driesers, Kennedys, Lindberghs and other Nazi sympathisers/appeasers represented the US in the ‘30s. The Independent is not British; it's owned by Tony O’Reilly, an Irish national and supporter of Fianna Fail (the more nationalistic of the 2 mainstream parties in the Irish Republic).

Some of the anglophobic turds who have contributed to the above commentary need to acquire an elementary education. References to pogroms in the C13 century are pathetic. There has been broad tolerance of Jews in Britain since Cromwell’s encouragement of their settlement here in the C17. Benjamin Disraeli, arguably Britain’s greatest Prime Minister, was an ethnic Jew (and in his early years fully practising). A considerable proportion of Thatcher’s cabinet (including most of her best ministers and advisors: Lawson, Britten, Young, Joseph et al) were ethnic Jews and all practising. A large proportion of politicians, business people and other great contributors to our nation’s welfare have been Jewish. The current British foreign minister, Jack Straw, is half jewish. And most British Jews are a damn sight more patriotic than non-Jews (OK I’m excluding Will Self, but then he’s half American).

Burn down London in 1812? - I’d like to have seen you buggers try. The day the US military can match our fellows man-for-man will be the day I take out French nationality (and the Frogs had to bail you out in both your scraps with us, so you must owe them something).

RDP "The Muslims won’t shoot a Limey in battle now". Well, they certainly won’t shoot RDP. His is the comment of a jelly-bellied flag waver who’s never had to fight for so much as a restaurant table. And who does he think is the principal ally of his country? Australia?

public school? My grandfathers dug coal out of the ground. And the US is the world capital of gaydom (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

I’ve spent the last 18 months slapping down every yankophobe in sight….. and then I come to this site and encounter dimwits like RDP and co. I’ll exclude Maccabee because his apology seemed genuine (well, the second one at least was without irony - I think).

The cartoon is foul, disgusting and witless - it is not just anti-Zionist but clearly anti-semitic. The Independent is not a newspaper but a shitrag.

Britain has a free press - it can publish what it likes. The Independent no more represents the British mass than the obnoxious Driesers, Kennedys, Lindberghs and other Nazi sympathisers/appeasers represented the US in the ‘30s. The Independent is not British; it's owned by Tony O’Reilly, an Irish national and supporter of Fianna Fail (the more nationalistic of the 2 mainstream parties in the Irish Republic).

Some of the anglophobic turds who have contributed to the above commentary need to acquire an elementary education. References to pogroms in the C13 century are pathetic. There has been broad tolerance of Jews in Britain since Cromwell’s encouragement of their settlement here in the C17. Benjamin Disraeli, arguably Britain’s greatest Prime Minister, was an ethnic Jew (and in his early years fully practising). A considerable proportion of Thatcher’s cabinet (including most of her best ministers and advisors: Lawson, Britten, Young, Joseph et al) were ethnic Jews and all practising. A large proportion of politicians, business people and other great contributors to our nation’s welfare have been Jewish. The current British foreign minister, Jack Straw, is half jewish. And most British Jews are a damn sight more patriotic than non-Jews (OK I’m excluding Will Self, but then he’s half American).

Burn down London in 1812? - I’d like to have seen you buggers try. The day the US military can match our fellows man-for-man will be the day I take out French nationality (and the Frogs had to bail you out in both your scraps with us, so you must owe them something).

RDP "The Muslims won’t shoot a Limey in battle now". Well, they certainly won’t shoot RDP. His is the comment of a jelly-bellied flag waver who’s never had to fight for so much as a restaurant table. And who does he think is the principal ally of his country? Australia?

public school? My grandfathers dug coal out of the ground. And the US is the world capital of gaydom (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

I’ve spent the last 18 months slapping down every yankophobe in sight….. and then I come to this site and encounter dimwits like RDP and co. I’ll exclude Maccabee because his apology seemed genuine (well, the second one at least was without irony - I think).

"Saturn", by Goya

Yeah, Tim Blair sent me here late too.

My obervation from having worked in the UK press for a long time while self-exiled from South Africa: there is a lot of what you might call unthinking or ingrained anti-Semitism -- imbibed early on as part of the set of attitudes that make up the obsession with class.

I expect those involved in calling the shots on publication of this cartoon have been amazed and disconcerted to find they stand accused of anti-Semitism.

Independent (and other UK papers) routinely find it necessary to add the word "Jewish", where applicable, when profiling some Brit achiever or whatever. It was used whether relevant or not and a similarly informative classification was not required for black British achievers, or Catholics, or Muslims (except where relevant) or any other I can think of offhand. But I don't think it ever occurs to them that this could be construed as a kind of reflex anti-Semitism.

The English have, by and large, a far better record than the rest of "Europe" on treatment of the Jews, a record which has already been detailed on this thread. But where leftish politics and Israel enter the battlefield, something less palatable tends to creep in.

And there certainly are more obvious anti-Semites among members of the former ruling or upper class. In London, many Jewish people are from working class backgrounds
and east London dialect is full of Yiddish derivations.

Hands up those who knew Princess Anne's hubby is from an assimilated (Christianised) Jewish family?

The Independent, in the end, needs to apologise, I believe, even if it is for inadvertent or clumsy judgment.

I find it seriously interesting as a curious outsider to see what vitriol would flow following this provocative cartoon.

What I would say is that what you see is in the eye of the beholder. You see what you want to see and you think what you want to think. I would like to invite you to critique a rather different point of view.

I think Ariel Sharon is one of the most hideous war criminals of the last 50 years. He has escaped justice since September 16, 1982 when he facilitated the massacres at Sabra and Shatila. No cartoon, however monstrous and vile, could come close to depicting that crime with any accuracy.

I also think that the very poor turnout in the recent Israeli election shows how the Israeli people are disaffected with the political parties that have not provided one day of true peace to their people in over 50 years. In such times, the extremists gain and the silent majority lose. I don't see an endorsement of Sharon in this election result.

It's not surprising they did not bother voting. For the past 20 years opinion polls in Israel have consistently shown a huge majority of Israelis wanting a complete withdrawal from settlements in the West Bank and Gaza recognising them to be the primary obstacle to peace. The politicians have failed to deliver - in fact, they have persued their own opposing agenda, even expanding settlements throughout the Oslo process and therefore contributing substantially to its failure.

I have very dear friends living in Jerusalem who have been within close proximity of suicide bombers and it really pains me to think that they have to live in real fear for their lives. There was a suicide bomb attack at a sea-front night-club in Tel Aviv where I had walked with these friends. A different day I could have been a victim or a witness too.

I don't know anyone living in the West Bank or Gaza however I can't imagine living under curfew and unable to move, like a caged animal in a zoo. It would drive me mad for sure. Maybe it drives people mad enough to be suicide bombers in the end. It takes madness to become a suicide bomber because it is so self-defeating and detrimental to the legitimate cause of self-determination.

In fact, I think it is so evil and vile that an artist could draw a cartoon about a suicide bomber almost identical to this cartoon about Sharon. Would you be complaining about that?

---

So for people who want to see anti-semitism, it's easy to see anti-semitism in this picture, or indeed in anything critical of Israel or of an Israeli. It's equally easy to call anything that is anti-Sharon, (or anti-settler) "anti-semitic" or "self-hating Jew" depending on who is saying it.

Really, however, it is a very convenient mechanism for stifling rational and intelligent debate on the very central issue of how the State of Israel conducts itself.

If you want to write letters to the Independent or the Press Compaints Commission then it's your perogative, however, you may do better to spend the time gaining an understanding of just why Sharon is so loathed in Europe and why this is evidently not the case in the USA.

I, for one, salute the IDF reservists who refuse to serve in the West Bank and Gaza. They are welcome in my home at any time.

Unfortunately, I would not be at all surprised if Sharon uses the "distraction" caused by a war in Iraq to inflict another major bout of pain and suffering on the Palestinians. Once a war criminal, always a war criminal.

If you want to flame me, feel free to do so, however please provide evidence as to where you believe my argument is flawed.

RP

Whatever your thoughts of Sharon, you must consider that his election and re-election by Israelis as the leader of their democracy is a response to the fact that the Palestinians are led by Arafat.

If you consider Sharon to be a war criminal for what you describe as his "facilitation" of a massacre of Palestinian Arabs by Phalangist Arabs, what then do you think of Arafat's "facilitation" of the murderous Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Al Aqsa Brigades, Tanzim, etc., etc., etc.?

Until Arafat is gone, Israel must fight the war that has been thrust upon it, and this fact would be so irrespective of who the PM would be.

If Sharon were a fringe politician, and Likud a fringe party, then Dave Brown's cartoon might be considered an attack on Sharon and Likud as bloodthirsty monsters. But Sharon is not a fringe politician, and Likud is not a fringe party. Likud under Sharon is a centrist party. Thus, the cartoon can only be understood as accusing the Israeli electorate of being bloodthirsty monsters for responding positively to Sharon's "election-eve ploy" in Gaza City.

P.S. Please provide your LGF readershi with any evidence you have regarding the thesis that any of Sharon's actions as Prime Minister have been motivated by a desire to increase the suffering of Palestinian noncombatants rather than to combat terror.

/flame off :-)

#213 RP

I think Ariel Sharon is one of the most hideous war criminals of the last 50 years. He has escaped justice since September 16, 1982 when he facilitated the massacres at Sabra and Shatila. No cartoon, however monstrous and vile, could come close to depicting that crime with any accuracy.

Well, you were not there. You have no idea of what happened. You did not enter those camps, neither before not after. Each investigation proves Sharon did not 'facilitate' anything. And you think you're still entitled to your opinion.

Listen up: you are not entitled to an opinion. An opinion, that's what you have when you don't know the facts. 'cause when you know the facts, you don't need an opinion, you know. And when you don't know the facts, you'd better shut the fuck up.

#214 Ben F

Thanks for your comments Ben. No, I don't think that the re-election of Sharon bears any relation to the continued 'leadership' of Arafat. It is due to the disaffection of the significant minority who decided not
to vote, whilst the vocal minority still voted and achieved a disproportionate result.

[Link: www.haaretzdaily.com...]

That said, the turnout was still higher than in USA or UK, for example. However, only 27% of the electorate voted for Likud. No real evidence for bloodthirsty monsters there!

Concerning Hamas et al, anyone associated with such a group and involved in attacking non-combatants is a terrorist and should be treated and dealt with as such. They are despicable. They undermine the legitimate grievances of the Palestinians and provide the excuse for Sharon to do whatever he likes.

You ask about my views on Arafat. As he was not the subject of the cartoon and the topic of discussion I did not think him relevant. Actually, I think that just about sums up Arafat. Not relevant. It seems he and his cronies embezzeled much of the funds they were given to the PA. As he now has no anthority or control (the IDF has the real authority and control) and only ever gets funds from the State of Israel (he can't raise taxes), it seems he is a convenient scapegoat for Sharon and Bush but really he is not relevant anyway.

Arafat's impotence was never demonstrated more pathetically than when he was holed up under house arrest in Ramallah by the IDF without even a working phone with which to give orders. At that point Bush said Arafat was not doing enough to prevent terrorist attacks. Just precisely what did Bush expect him to do in that situation? Demand that Hamas stop by sending messages via pigeon post?

Perhaps having a pathetically weak Arafat available as a scapegoat suits Sharon and his agenda. His agenda being to 'contain' the Palestinians and to continue to develop settlements and their infrastructure in the West Bank and Gaza, contrary to the wishes of the vast majority of Israelis.

As the IDF has assumed control of the whole of the West Bank and Gaza, and is therefore responsible for security, I think that Sharon should take responsibility and be held to account for allowing terrorist attacks to occur.

So long as Sharon can get away with deflecting responsibility for terrorism onto Arafat he has no need to address his self-evidently failing policy. It's a phoney war, and it serves Sharon by allowing him to take liberties he could not get away with otherwise. Don't forget it was Sharon's actions that precipitated the war.

Here's an example both of responsibility deflected onto Arafat and also of his impotence.

[Link: www.haaretzdaily.com...]

I like your spin on the cartoon. It's sort of the counter-spin to mine, involving the whole Israeli electorate, rather than just Sharon himself. It just goes to show you can make it mean whatever you want it to mean. Whatever suits your purpose or beliefs. Actually, the only explanation that appears to have foundation is Saturn by Goya. In that case, the cartoon is far too obscure for most readers of the Independent (myself included) and the Editor should have realised this and dropped it.

Regarding your postscript, Sharon is indeed clever to keep Arafat in place. By deflecting responsibility for terrorist attacks onto Arafat be assumes the right to retaliate. Retaliation is however often disproportionate - a good example would be the infamous account given by the bulldozer driver in Jenin. That undoubtedly caused increased suffering of Palestinian noncombatants. However, the continued disposession of Palestinians through the expansion of settlements and building of segregated roads in the West Bank is the largest long term contributor to the suffering of Palestinian noncombatants.

For the Israeli majority who recognise the need to get out of West Bank and Gaza, there is of course notinmyname.org where they can cast their votes :-)

You should not have to wait long to see if my suspicions about Sharon's plans for the West Bank and Gaza during the war on Iraq are vindicated.

Thanks.

#215 Caton

Don't tell me what I think, unless you can prove you actually can by telling everyone here what I'm thinking right now.

Since you chose to be abusive and personal about this point, I will be personal in my response but I won't join you in the gutter by being abusive.

Your assertion that Sharon did not facilitate anything at Sabra and Shatila makes you a disgraceful apologist. So where were you on September 16, 1982 that makes you think you know, and that I don't know?

The events relating to the massacre are very well documented. Sharon had control of West Beirut and was actually there, and allowed the murderous Phalangists in to the camps and allowed them to remain there butchering as long as they liked.

[Link: www.larouchepub.com...]

Unfortunately it seems your intellect was limited to flaming me on just one paragraph. Did you have anything intellingent to say about the rest of my post?
It seems not. Shame on you!

#216 RP

So where were you on September 16, 1982 that makes you think you know, and that I don't know?

On Sept. 16 & 17 I was near the Beirut airport. On Sept. 18 I was forcing Phalangists out of Chatila, then bringing whatever help we could, then burial detail for the 460 dead men and 35 women and children killed by the Phalangists.

Where were you on Sept. 16-18, 1982?

Idiot.

#217 Caton sez: idiot

Not just any idiot, either. An idiot who cites a Larouche website as authority. And who dismisses Arafat's creation of a terror infrastructure by referencing Arafat's impotence once Israel had begun to dismantle it. And who condemns Israel for wanton inflicting suffering on Palestinian noncombatants by using bulldozers to break down buildings in Jenin that Palestinian fighters had boobytrapped. As one IDF commander commented, A balanced person does not boobytrap his house with the intent to return to it.

#217 Caton

So you were precisely in the area where the militias gathered before entering west Beirut. I expect you wuld claim ignorance of the militias' intent as they were allowed through the Israeli lines, and also expect you would claim that you were following orders.

Enough said. You were a combatant in that combat zone. The implications of Sharon being indicted may not bode too well for you. No wonder you quote smaller numbers of dead than pretty much any other source I've read.

Where was I? A student at university seeing and reading about these hideous events. It motivated me to participate in non-violent protest - something I became deeply involved in in the years that followed.

#218 Ben F

Actually I was looking for references to BBCs Panorama documentary in 2001 which is the most comprehensive recent summary of the case against Sharon I am aware of. I just gave a link to one example. It's not an authoritative example and I did not cite it as such. If you want an authoritative example, go back to the journalist responsible for the documentary, and then back to all his sources. He wrote an article that appeared both on the BBC and in the same newspaper as that cartoon.

[Link: news.bbc.co.uk...]
[Link: www.independent.co.uk...]

Since you wrongly assumed that I thought I was quoting an authoritative source it would be fair for me to assume that you consider your sources on Jenin to be authoritative. You could hardly choose a more biased and selective source than the IDF. It's self-evident that Sharon and the IDF prevented a proper investigation by refusing to let the UN inspectors in. The resulting UN report was thus discredited even before it was written.

Your source talks of 'passageways' being made by the bulldozers but IDF reservist Moshe Nissim's testimony in Yediot Aharonot clearly shows he was hell bent on creating a 'football stadium'. I don't read hebrew but if you do you can probably find the original version on [Link: www.ynet.co.il....] A surviving translation can be found at:

[Link: vredessite.nl...]

However, self-evidently, the IDF in Jenin were combatants and therefore a legitimate target for booby traps. Conversely, however, the indiscriminate use of the bulldozer involving noncombatants is a war crime.

With hindsight it is clear that Arafat sold out the Palestinian people when the PA got created. The PA was never more than semi-autonomous and Arafats cronies abused the limited power they had. I don't think you can credit Arafat with creating a terror infrastructure. It would be fairer to say he never had effective control or authority over his cronies, some of whom persued their own terrorist agendas.

Arafat and Sharon are both part of the problem. Neither is part of the solution.

Shame on you for lowering yourself into the gutter by choosing to be abusive and personal. I evidently over-estimated you following your first reply, however I didn't join you in the gutter. I'm pleased to have discussions with people who have different perspectives and I'm pleased to change my mind if provided with compelling argument. However, what you choose to call me is a reflection on you, not me, and is self-defeating.

RP sez:

I don't think you can credit Arafat with creating a terror infrastructure. It would be fairer to say he never had effective control or authority over his cronies, some of whom persued their own terrorist agendas.

Not fairer. Blind. You will only acknowledge Arafat's transgressions against Palestinians, not his intentions and actions against Israel and Jews. For you to assume a malicious intent on the part of Sharon in operations against Palestinian fighters and an innocent intent on the part of Arafat with respect to terror attacks against Israelis bespeaks either ignorance or bias. You appear to be sufficiently well-read that I must assume the latter. You are approaching evidence with a predisposition to see what you want to see, and to reject what does not square with your preconceptions.

I could point you to this analysis, written over four years prior to the outbreak of the Al Aqsa War, or to this piece, which reviews how the Israeli intelligence apparatus managed to convince itself that Arafat was operating as a peace partner despite abundant evidence to the contrary, but I think you would waste your time reading them. Based on both the sources and contents of these pieces, I have to predict that they will not affect your thinking.

Oh, BTW, RP, I read the account of Kurdi-Bear. I see no Israeli war crimes there. The man was crazed, but he followed orders and did not go after civilians who did not represent a threat. As opposed to Palestinian operations in the Al Aqsa war, which target civilians more often than not.

Just curious, but do you know what Beitar is? Not the football team, but in Jewish history?

The war crime in Jenin was that the Palestinians had converted a refugee camp into a military target by using it as a terrorist base. The Geneva Convention does not allow what the Palestinian fighters were doing in running their war out of Jenin. No country is required to follow "the laws of war" when attempting to defend itself against an enemy that seeks to gain an advantage from wilfully violating those same laws. It was the Palestinians themselves who had made the area not "civilian."

If Jenin was not a nest of terror, then I would probably take your side. The Israeli forces were the aggressors, and the Palestinians had the right to resist, even with boobytraps. I don't see it that way. I look at the account of how many known terrorists were captured or killed in Jenin, and how many bomb factories and the like were discovered and destroyed, and I say this was unquestionably a justified military operation.

As usual, where you stand depends on where you sit.

#219 RP

So you were precisely in the area where the militias gathered before entering west Beirut.

Wrong. The Phalangists did not gather near the airport. Check the cesspoll you use as 'sources'.

I expect you wuld claim ignorance of the militias' intent as they were allowed through the Israeli lines, and also expect you would claim that you were following orders.

Ignorance? Of course. Had I known, I would have gone with them. 460 men out of thousands of Arabs, and it took them two whole days! Typical goy job. I could have done better in two hours.

Following orders? Not exactly. See, I was off-duty those two days, actually I was supposed to be off-duty for five days, and the Lebanese people really welcomed us all, and there was this Lebanese woman and... Huh. I don't want my wife to read this. Forget it. Let's say I was 'following orders' to unwind and have fun.

Enough said. You were a combatant in that combat zone.

Ah... this description of what I did those two days is a clear indication that your sex life reflects your reasoning abilities. I pity you.

The implications of Sharon being indicted may not bode too well for you.

Wanna bet?

No wonder you quote smaller numbers of dead than pretty much any other source I've read.

I don't doubt it. You probably didn't read anything but propaganda. The official Lebanese bodycount is 459 total. The official Syrian report is 460. My numbers are higher -- but that's how I remember the events.

Where was I? A student at university seeing and reading about these hideous events. It motivated me to participate in non-violent protest - something I became deeply involved in in the years that followed.

Really? You sound more like in 1982 you were an ache in your father's loins.

Hmmm. I don't want to offend zulubaby... but I suddenly have a pretty good idea of how you were conceived.

Two headlines in Ha'aretz right now.

Palestinian Authority resumes efforts to prevent Qassam launches in Gaza

For the first time in many months, Israeli intelligence officials say they are seeing signs that the Palestinians are taking steps against terrorist groups. In the last two weeks, a Palestinian Qassam rocket cell was arrested in Gaza, and PA security groups have disrupted the activity of several other cells in Gaza.

Israel transfers NIS 280M to PA

Israel yesterday handed over NIS 280 million in taxes to the PA - the largest payment of its kind since the outbreak of the intifada. A survey has indicated that Palestinians are increasingly feeling the economic pinch of the conflict.

To me, the juxtaposition of these two stories is not accidental. What do you think, RP?

Caton (#222)

Nicely done.

Hmmm. I don't want to offend zulubaby... but I suddenly have a pretty good idea of how you were conceived.

LOL. Yeah, I still haven't got over it. If I had been forced to ask my co-worker about that, I'd never have forgiven you ;-)

#224 zulubaby

Nicely done.

Yeah, sometimes feeding the trolls can be fun :-)