The Inhumanity of the Liberal Left
Aug. 14, 2002
The 'human rights' inhumanity, By YISRAEL MEDAD
In the Hebrew-language press, a B'tselem advertisement was published on August 2, which sought to decry, in part, Arab terror.
The text of B'tselem (The Israel Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories) reads: "Attacks against civilians in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, or Emmanuel undermine every human, moral, and legal principle. Since September 2000, 370 Israeli citizens, including 72 minors, have been killed in Israel and the territories. Premeditated killing of civilians is a war crime."
At first glance, I was amazed that B'tselem took the step of noting that persons living beyond the Green Line have human rights, including the most important one: recognizing their right to live. As B'tselem has never devoted previously any of their myriad reports, supplements, newsletters, and occasional papers to the suffering of Israeli civilians, this seemed to be a form of "coming out of the closet" a closet of liberal progressivism.
However, the holes in B'tselem's presentation quickly revealed themselves.
The ad, after all, appeared only after Amnesty International had declared such Palestinian activities to be war crimes. B'tselem, although close to the scene and ostensibly an Israeli human rights organization, was not the initiator of such a declaration. Over a year ago, B'tselem released to the press a statement couched in similar terms but not, as now, in the form of a paid advertisement, one of maybe dozens that have been published in the past months. In addition, as a group close to Palestinians and quite supportive of their position in the past, it could be argued that if B'tselem had been more forthrightly "public" on this issue earlier, perhaps its influence could have been effective in preventing at least some of the killings of civilians.
In December 2000, a B'tselem report, among several other conclusions, noted that "the Palestinian Authority does almost nothing to prevent Palestinians from attacking Israeli civilians. The establishment of settlements is a violation of international law and therefore illegal; however, this does not justify attacks on settlers or on settlements. Intentional attacks on civilians are absolutely prohibited, regardless of the circumstances."
This is the sole other reference on their website to the subject of the rights of Israeli citizens out of over a hundred publications, not including the many dozens of ads they have published over the years. For a human rights organization, this level of concern would seem weak, pro forma, and totally inadequate in regard to the real problem of the death of innocents.
AND THEN I paid attention to the number of dead they cited: 370. Three hundred and seventy? But over 600 Israelis have been killed. One need not be a mathematical genius to figure out that soldiers and police personnel had been deducted from the total. Nevertheless, not all of those in uniform were on active duty. Many of those soldiers were killed by homicidal suicide bombers on Egged buses or at caf tables, along with the civilians who were the main targets; others were crushed by a bus driven by an Arab. Others were killed when civilian targets they were guarding, such as a playground, were hit with mortar rockets.
Of course if B'tselem, an Israeli organization even though it accepted funding from the British Foreign Office can justify the deaths of security personnel by terrorism, we can thus understand the inclusion in other ads signed by B'tselem, in conjunction with various radical groups, of the names of the suicide bombers and terrorist gunmen among the Palestinian victims of violence. This is a new approach to the championing of a human rights cause.
B'tselem appears to be schizophrenic. Its morality and standards of ethics sway with the wind. In essence, though, its human rights banner is actually a cover for ideological inhumanity. B'tselem's goal, first and foremost, is to provide an ancillary reason for forcing Israel to yield the areas of the Jewish historic homeland, gained in a war of self-defense. To that end, it has mobilized the human rights' sphere and has been bashing Israel, its army and, earlier, its civil administration.
B'tselem refers to itself as the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. The political orientation of B'tselem as reflected in this ad and others belies its true intent and agenda. Of course, better late than never is an admirable stance, even human.
The writer, who resides in Shiloh, comments on political, social, and cultural affairs.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1028814707617
The 'human rights' inhumanity, By YISRAEL MEDAD
In the Hebrew-language press, a B'tselem advertisement was published on August 2, which sought to decry, in part, Arab terror.
The text of B'tselem (The Israel Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories) reads: "Attacks against civilians in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, or Emmanuel undermine every human, moral, and legal principle. Since September 2000, 370 Israeli citizens, including 72 minors, have been killed in Israel and the territories. Premeditated killing of civilians is a war crime."
At first glance, I was amazed that B'tselem took the step of noting that persons living beyond the Green Line have human rights, including the most important one: recognizing their right to live. As B'tselem has never devoted previously any of their myriad reports, supplements, newsletters, and occasional papers to the suffering of Israeli civilians, this seemed to be a form of "coming out of the closet" a closet of liberal progressivism.
However, the holes in B'tselem's presentation quickly revealed themselves.
The ad, after all, appeared only after Amnesty International had declared such Palestinian activities to be war crimes. B'tselem, although close to the scene and ostensibly an Israeli human rights organization, was not the initiator of such a declaration. Over a year ago, B'tselem released to the press a statement couched in similar terms but not, as now, in the form of a paid advertisement, one of maybe dozens that have been published in the past months. In addition, as a group close to Palestinians and quite supportive of their position in the past, it could be argued that if B'tselem had been more forthrightly "public" on this issue earlier, perhaps its influence could have been effective in preventing at least some of the killings of civilians.
In December 2000, a B'tselem report, among several other conclusions, noted that "the Palestinian Authority does almost nothing to prevent Palestinians from attacking Israeli civilians. The establishment of settlements is a violation of international law and therefore illegal; however, this does not justify attacks on settlers or on settlements. Intentional attacks on civilians are absolutely prohibited, regardless of the circumstances."
This is the sole other reference on their website to the subject of the rights of Israeli citizens out of over a hundred publications, not including the many dozens of ads they have published over the years. For a human rights organization, this level of concern would seem weak, pro forma, and totally inadequate in regard to the real problem of the death of innocents.
AND THEN I paid attention to the number of dead they cited: 370. Three hundred and seventy? But over 600 Israelis have been killed. One need not be a mathematical genius to figure out that soldiers and police personnel had been deducted from the total. Nevertheless, not all of those in uniform were on active duty. Many of those soldiers were killed by homicidal suicide bombers on Egged buses or at caf tables, along with the civilians who were the main targets; others were crushed by a bus driven by an Arab. Others were killed when civilian targets they were guarding, such as a playground, were hit with mortar rockets.
Of course if B'tselem, an Israeli organization even though it accepted funding from the British Foreign Office can justify the deaths of security personnel by terrorism, we can thus understand the inclusion in other ads signed by B'tselem, in conjunction with various radical groups, of the names of the suicide bombers and terrorist gunmen among the Palestinian victims of violence. This is a new approach to the championing of a human rights cause.
B'tselem appears to be schizophrenic. Its morality and standards of ethics sway with the wind. In essence, though, its human rights banner is actually a cover for ideological inhumanity. B'tselem's goal, first and foremost, is to provide an ancillary reason for forcing Israel to yield the areas of the Jewish historic homeland, gained in a war of self-defense. To that end, it has mobilized the human rights' sphere and has been bashing Israel, its army and, earlier, its civil administration.
B'tselem refers to itself as the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories. The political orientation of B'tselem as reflected in this ad and others belies its true intent and agenda. Of course, better late than never is an admirable stance, even human.
The writer, who resides in Shiloh, comments on political, social, and cultural affairs.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1028814707617
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