Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Taking the settler's "hate" seriously

David Seaton's News Links
First this from Haaretz:
Asked by Israel Channel Two Television reporter Shai Gal what would happen if Israeli forces tried to evacuate Havat Gilad, Arele replied, "At most, they'll demolish one measly shack, so they'll have something to show - that Kushon [a Hebrew slur equivalent to the "N" word] in the United States, in order to have an Etnan [the biblical term for a fee paid to a prostitute] to give him - if you [secular] guys know what an Etnan is."
I ask myself the following question:

If an Israeli wingnut was able to kill the prime minister of Israel and has received a lot of support in Israel for doing so, why should anyone think that an attempt on "Kushon" Obama would be out of the question? One of the drunk kids in the video, "Feeling the Hate" even says he would like to kill the president. OK, so he is just a drunk kid, but there are a lot of settlers, who aren't drunk, but are very dangerous and are American citizens.

What I am really afraid of is that one of these settlers, who is an American citizen, who can enter the US without any restriction, who can blend into an American crowd without being noticed as "foreign looking", who has had military training, will try to kill Obama the same way they killed Yitzak Rabin... Then the shit will really hit the fan.

I think this is a real problem and perhaps the only way to keep it from happening is to talk about it. Normally this would be putting ideas into people's heads, but I think the ideas are already there.

Let me make myself crystal clear: I am not talking about the drunken American louts in the video and I am not talking about wingnuts and sons of the wild jackass in general. There are always lone crazies around in the USA like the guy who shot Reagan. I am talking about the Israeli settlers "movement".

We are talking here about a group of people which is not only messianic and fanatical like Al Qaeda, but which also is closely connected to the Israeli establishment. We are talking about people who practice racist violence on a daily basis, who have weapons and have been trained to use them and who have used them, not just had fantasies about using them.

It also happens that some of the most fanatical and violent settlers are Americans of dual-nationality, who have many connections and admirers in the USA; these are people who can enter and reside anywhere in the USA without restriction, speak the language without a "foreign" accent and blend into the landscape without calling attention to themselves. In short "ordinary" Americans.

So what I am saying is that we have a climate of hate and group of well-connected, armed fanatics that consider themselves "on a mission from God", who are also native Americans. This has all the ingredients for a history making disaster. DS

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Except for the muderer of yitzhak Rabin, can you name another Jewish terrorist in the past say, 50 years? Anything is possible, but that doesnt make it very likely. They dont really gain anything from it, as Obama will probably shift to the right on Israel just like he has on other foreign policy decisions. He's to practical to completely abandon Israel. I would think the Israelis would be more clever than that.

If you want to talk about racism, why dont you talk about all of the black people being slaughtered by Muslims in Sudan? Muslims arent calling him the Arabic word for nigger because he has a Muslim name.


Adam

Unknown said...

David, you've probably seen this..

Tail attempts to wag dog. Letter leaked how Israel wants to sanction US...

http://news.antiwar.com/2009/06/09/israeli-minister-eyes-sanctions-against-us/

Kurz said...

Adam,

"all of the black people being slaughtered by Muslims in Sudan" also happen to be Muslim. The situation in Sudan isn't as simple as big, bad Muslim men killing nice, black non-Muslim farmers.

Diane said...

Adam:

If that’s a serious question, start with the names Menachem Livni, Shaul Nir, Uzi Sharbav, Yehuda Etzion and all the other members of the Gush Emunim Underground; then perhaps Noam Friedman; Gershon Hershkowitz & Ze'ev Wolf; Shlomo Dvir & Yarden Morag; Eden Natan-Zada; Asher Weisgan; Baruch Goldstein. The actions of all those people would automatically be considered terrorism if they were anything other than Israelis; undoubtedly so if they were Palestinians.

But it’s a bit of an odd question in the first place, because it treats terrorism as a context-less phenomenon. Terrorism is the way some people make war when they face a state actor that has overwhelming conventional military superiority. So of course in the context of the I-P conflict most “terrorists” are going to be Palestinian. People who have the IDF to impose their will on the other side are generally not going to feel the need to use to "terrorism".

Forensic Economist said...

To Adam:

Okay, it was more than 50 years ago: 1946, the bombing of the King George Hotel. 1948, Deir Yassin. In 1967, the bombing and strafing of the US Liberty. In 1982, Sabra and Chatilla. In 2006, the bombing of refugees in Cana, where Jesus turned water into wine. Last December, 400 dead Gazan women and children (that is the Israeli count)etc etc. You will note that these were all (after 1947) government sponsored. The King George bombing was done by the Irgun, a terrorist militia absorbed into the Israeli army after independence.

If you want lone terrorists, in 1994 Baruch Goldstein massacred palestinians in the Tomb of the Patriachs mosque in Hebron. You can find many other such incidents.

Yes, as you point out, Muslims can be racists and murderers, too. That doesn't justify racism or murder by anybody else.

Actually, I haven't heard of Muslims calling him N--- or the Arab equivalent. They have been calling him no different from Bush. You will note that Obama has not called for a return of land illegally seized up until now, just that no more land is illegally seized. Among Zionists this is apparently considered shockingly pro-Arab.

There is no political gain for him in the US to do anything against Israeli interests. I doubt anything will change.