If only the Australian government were as concerned that its citizens may engage in terrorist activity:
The South African government has asked anyone who knows of South Africans serving in the Israeli Defence Force to report this to the South African authorities so they can investigate them.
Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad said this at a press briefing in Pretoria on Tuesday when asked if the South African government was aware of South Africans fighting for Israel. He said the South African government was often accused of countenancing its citizens fighting with the Israeli military but that he was not aware of any.
But he appealed to anyone who knew of any to inform the South African authorities.
“We are, however, very anxious to ensure that South Africans, in any guise, are not involved in military activities abroad. We are opposed in principle.” Pahad stressed that the South African government also opposed South Africans going abroad to fight in foreign liberation struggles.
“Any such involvement of South African citizens poses a serious problem and a danger because it might make us the target of terrorist actions.”
When a dual Australian national was recently killed in Lebanon fighting for the IDF, he was virtually hailed a hero by Foreign Minister Alexander Downer. While his death was tragic, he was fighting illegally in a sovereign nation. He had no right to be there.
Because so many Israeli appologists deny it even happened.
When I raised this event with Captain, he called it a Blood Libel. This goes to the heart of the mindset of the Israeli amen corner, that Israel can do no wrong, or when confronted with irrefutable evidence, that it was perfectly justified.
Time Magazine reported that 2 graves had been found containing over 120 bodies.
http://www.time.com/time/international/1995/951002/middleeast.html
Very little doubt in your mind perhaps- but that conclusion does not follow from
Which is a bare statement of fact. Pahad is bemused at how a military action purportedly designed to weaken/destroy Hezballah has not only not diminished their capacity to launch rockets but somehow, has necessitated the destruction of massive amounts of civilain infrastructure the displacement of 1 million people, and the deaths of at least 1000 civilians.
He is bemused and so am I- perhaps you have some insight? Is this the most incompetent (not to mention inhumane) military action we have yet seen outside of Iraq or was perhaps the destruction of Lebanon a primary motive- you tell me?
edwin
Ah yes the far-left antisemitic Jews of the pre-WW2. What happened to them? They tended to end up in Mexico with ice picks in the back of their heads. Way to go.
Now, what is YOUR excuse?
Addamo
Left-wing “thought” is rooted in Jewish self-hatred and Christian mysticism. Exhibit A? Karl Marx.
orang
Actually he was fighting the Iranians. At least he wasn’t spending his dole money on Hezbollah services and then demanding to be an Australian to get out of there when their champions Hezbollah bit off more they can chew.
Addamo
One thing that surprises me about your 24/7 trawl of the world’s media looking for deaths of Israel’s enemies is that I keep expecting you to post some links and some outraged commentary about Darfur, Mumbia rail commuters, the 50,000 victim of Iraqi Shi’ite splodies and so on. But no. I suppose they aren’t Jewish enough, eh?
AHH the famous “look they’re much worse than us go pick on them” argument. I don’t know if you’ve noticed but AL’s book is about Israel, Palestine and the role of the diaspora. Maybe you should write your book about Iran.
Suze
Well actually Addamo changed the subjexts to so-called atrocities. My argument that in the list of 20th century evil, Israel and the Pals do not even rate a footnote. Now, when we include the biggest oppressor and killer of the Pals – other Muslims – they’re plight looks a little worse, but still hardly worth even mentioning.
South Africa and Israel were numerically speaking small fry but that didn’t stop the world imposing sanctions on the former and urging a political settlement for the latter. (and you will notice that in each case the indigenous peoples engaged in armed struggle for the right to live on and govern in their own land)
That should of course, read South Africa and Ireland- freudian slip
Suze
They have no “right” to any israeli war. none whatsoever.
Now ladies and gentlemen, THIS is what you call a debater!
“At least he wasn’t spending his dole money on Hezbollah services and then demanding to be an Australian to get out of there when their champions Hezbollah bit off more they can chew. ”
deserves the response,
Oh yeah well you stink!
Rigth on Orang,
Say John Wayne Gacy, after being nabbed for raping and killing 33 young men, 29 of whom he buried under his house and on his property, told police that he could have killed 50, 100, or 375, if he had wanted to. But the fact that he murdered only 33 proved his restraint, if not his humanity, and should be taken in consideration when pressing charges.
Think that defense would fly? Well, many of Israel’s online supporters buy into this reasoning, and flog it after each new round of aerial aggression.
“If Israel wanted, it could turn Lebanon into a fuckin’ parking lot!”
And should Hamas, or any group related to them, begin blowing up buses at busy Israeli intersections, all their supporters need to say in defense is that they could have exploded 27 buses, if they wanted to. The key is to imply that you can always butcher more than you already have, which gives you added space to do just that. Or to put it in shampoo bottle terms: lather, rinse, repeat. It’s the sanitized way to kill.
Viva,
Oh I don’t know abotu that. I think that most people start of as left leaning at heart, seeing as it is the more humanistic of the two. Those that move to the right are usualy prompted by indctrination, some major dissapointment or trauma in life.
Most right wing people I have met harbour a major chip on their shoulder, an inferiority complex or have some bone to pick. Subsequently, they are more prone to considering militarism as the solutino to everything. As right wing nut David Frum has said, “war is the great clarifier.” It poses the question point blank: which side are you on?
Flinging around the term anti-semitism so loosely only serves as a ‘boy who cried wolf’ scenario, the more you use it, the less it will mean when someone ACTUALLY IS anti-semitic. You have stopped nobody’s resolve here by calling us anti-semitic and with the expense it does to the word (and indeed the jewish community seeings as their self-proclaimed mainstream voice uses it to death aswell) why persist?
Just for statistical records, the Jewish Virtual Library has a web page “The Jewish population of the World (2005)” and shows 90,406 Jews in Australia as 0.45% of the population.
The figure of South Africa is 88,688 Jews as 0.2% of the population. This is down from the maximum of 120,000 Jews just after the end of WW 2 and just before the declaration of the state of Israel in 1948.
Hundreds and hundreds of Jews set off to make aliyah in Israel and no doubt with citizenship laws in apartheid South Africa being what they became, most of the Jews who went to Israel became Israeli citizens, like that scumbag Goodman, recently interviewed on Australian tv. South Africa had at one stage before the arrival in Israel of Jews from middle east countries the highest rate of Jews arriving from the diaspora. Australia had comparatively a very much smaller number, and the number of Jews in Australia has been increased dramatically by those South African Jews who left, fearing a black revolution. The Jewish populations of Canada, the USA and the UK all benefitted from the exodus of so many South African Jews, a very small proportion of whom went to Israel in the 70s, 80s and 90s.
So to recap, most South African Jews now fighting in the Israeli army are probably children of South African migration to Israel from the early days and are therefore legitimately fighting in their (now) country’s army. So Pahad’s comments become a little irrelevant.
What is not irrelevant is the fact that politicians such as Ronnie Kasrils, a South African Jew opposed to the zionist regime, are vehemently attacked by a still very strong zionist lobby in South Africa. Antony would by now know all about this sort of attack!
And just to complete the statistics for the moment, the USA, with about 5.9 million Jews, has 40.5% of the world’s Jews, Israel has 5.02 million, 34.4%, Australia has 0.62% and South Africa has 0.61%.
So why aren’t they running off to help fight the war so many believe in on this blog?
Thus endeth statistics lessons for tonight!