Israel is disappointed, but not surprised. European citizens too are disappointed with the EU and their leaders ...
Source: The Jerusalem Post
Sweden supports the Goldstone Commission's report into Operation Cast Lead, the country's foreign minister, Carl Bildt, said Thursday.
Bildt told reporters in Stockholm that South African judge Richard Goldstone was a person with "high credibility" and "high integrity" and that his report carries weight. He said the probe, which alleged that both Israel and Hamas committed war crimes during last winter's Israel offensive against Gaza, is worthy of consideration. He added the right place for deliberations about the report was the UN Human Rights Council.
Earlier Thursday, Bildt told Swedish Radio that Israel made "a mistake" by not cooperating with the probe, which he called "independent" and "serious."
Sweden currently holds the rotating 6-month presidency of the European Union.
An Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman called Bildt's remarks "disappointing," and said they demonstrated his "lack of reading comprehension skills," since anyone who read the report would know that it was biased. [...]
More on Sweden : here
Showing posts sorted by date for query Sweden. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query Sweden. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Thursday, 8 October 2009
Tuesday, 6 October 2009
Europe & Israel: Points East & West: Beyond the Pale?, Emanuele Ottolenghi
Source: Transatlantic Institute
Does Europe have a problem with Israel? In a new book, A State Beyond the Pale (Weidenfeld & Nicolson), Robin Shepherd writes that Israel is being treated unfairly in the quantity and quality of attention it receives in Western Europe. Shepherd does not focus on all criticism of Israel — only the steady slide towards demonisation and the occasional use of old anti-Semitic tropes.
Shepherd's well-documented, elegantly written and powerfully argued book is a must-read for anyone interested in this subject. Two recent instances of Israel-related press coverage and the political response they elicited suggest he is spot on.
First, the mass-circulation Swedish tabloid Aftonbladet published a story by Donald Bostrom which alleged that the Israeli Army had systematically harvested organs from the bodies of dead Palestinians. The only established fact was the death of a Palestinian youth whose family had claimed that his corpse had undergone an autopsy without their authorisation. Bostrom later confirmed that he had no conclusive evidence to back up his story.
When Israel protested, asking the Swedish government — the current holder of the EU presidency — to distance itself from what many saw as a 21st-century blood libel, Sweden barricaded itself behind the absolute principle of press freedom. Instead of criticising Aftonbladet, it reprimanded its ambassador to Israel for having dared condemn the article without prior co-ordination with Stockholm.
In mid-September, however, Sweden's government asked a Stockholm museum to remove a display of swastikas and female genitalia to avoid hurting sensitivities during an EU foreign ministers' meeting. What's the Swedish for "consistency"?
A few weeks later, the Spanish newspaper El Mundo also had a little spat with Israel. On 5 September, it published an interview with the Holocaust denier David Irving as part of a string of articles marking the 70th anniversary of the start of the Second World War. When the Israeli ambassador protested, El Mundo flew the flag of press freedom, implying that Irving's views — while not those of the paper — might be of public interest as long as they were not inflammatory. The ambassador was accused of having a Manichaean view of the world. The editor must have missed the irony of rejecting the Israeli ambassador's claim that El Mundo was delving into moral relativism by calling his view "Manichaean".
Ultimately, what Irving said in the interview was irrelevant. An interview in a prominent publication is a place in the sun and El Mundo gave him one.
It is worth noting that, in contrast to his Swedish colleague Carl Bildt, who chose silence in the wake of Aftonbladet's piece, the Spanish FM, Miguel Moratinos, took a robust view: "The Foreign Minister, while maintaining the most absolute respect for freedom of expression, regrets that space was given to an historian who denies one of the biggest tragedies for humanity in modern history," said a spokesman.
Bildt, who was scheduled to arrive in Israel on official EU business on the same day that Irving's interview was published, had to cancel his trip. Moratinos, whose country will assume the EU presidency after Sweden, visited Israel as scheduled a week later.
It appears that for European editors no doubt familiar with the significant restrictions on press freedom that exist in our heavily regulated continent, Israel is an exception. To smear and slander Israel — or the historical record of the Holocaust — is an absolute right. The Aftonbladet story was less about press freedom and more about a journalist relinquishing any pretence of fairness when a chance to promote a cause to which he is sympathetic came up. A journalist writing such lurid accusations without evidence against any other government would lose face with his colleagues. In this case, Bostrom's colleagues rallied to defend him instead of criticising the likely long-term damage he caused to their profession.
Even when bad taste does not stand in the way of editorial choice, freedom of the press is not the same as the obligation to give a platform to every crank. El Mundo's editor, while waving the flag of press freedom, deleted the Israeli ambassador's letter's last and most damning paragraph, which suggested that his choice to publish Irving was dictated by sensationalism.
El Mundo and Aftonbladet both crossed a red line — making the outrageous legitimate and the extreme mainstream. The thread that runs through their stories is the singling out of Israel to apply a principle they follow less strictly elsewhere. Perhaps, in the editors' minds, Israel is indeed "beyond the pale".
- 'The Spanish are not anti-Semitic'
- Report: Anti-Semitism on Rise in Spain
- Aftonbladet: behind the banner 'freedom of press'
- Spanish paper calls Holocaust denier Irving 'expert' on WWII
- Swedish author Henning Mankell on Israel apartheid
- Kristoffer Larsson, a Swedish theologian, backs Israeli organ theft claim
- Into the twilight zone: Swedish editor says “I’m not a Nazi” as he publishes second round of allegations that IDF harvests Palestinian organs
Does Europe have a problem with Israel? In a new book, A State Beyond the Pale (Weidenfeld & Nicolson), Robin Shepherd writes that Israel is being treated unfairly in the quantity and quality of attention it receives in Western Europe. Shepherd does not focus on all criticism of Israel — only the steady slide towards demonisation and the occasional use of old anti-Semitic tropes.
Shepherd's well-documented, elegantly written and powerfully argued book is a must-read for anyone interested in this subject. Two recent instances of Israel-related press coverage and the political response they elicited suggest he is spot on.
First, the mass-circulation Swedish tabloid Aftonbladet published a story by Donald Bostrom which alleged that the Israeli Army had systematically harvested organs from the bodies of dead Palestinians. The only established fact was the death of a Palestinian youth whose family had claimed that his corpse had undergone an autopsy without their authorisation. Bostrom later confirmed that he had no conclusive evidence to back up his story.
When Israel protested, asking the Swedish government — the current holder of the EU presidency — to distance itself from what many saw as a 21st-century blood libel, Sweden barricaded itself behind the absolute principle of press freedom. Instead of criticising Aftonbladet, it reprimanded its ambassador to Israel for having dared condemn the article without prior co-ordination with Stockholm.
In mid-September, however, Sweden's government asked a Stockholm museum to remove a display of swastikas and female genitalia to avoid hurting sensitivities during an EU foreign ministers' meeting. What's the Swedish for "consistency"?
A few weeks later, the Spanish newspaper El Mundo also had a little spat with Israel. On 5 September, it published an interview with the Holocaust denier David Irving as part of a string of articles marking the 70th anniversary of the start of the Second World War. When the Israeli ambassador protested, El Mundo flew the flag of press freedom, implying that Irving's views — while not those of the paper — might be of public interest as long as they were not inflammatory. The ambassador was accused of having a Manichaean view of the world. The editor must have missed the irony of rejecting the Israeli ambassador's claim that El Mundo was delving into moral relativism by calling his view "Manichaean".
Ultimately, what Irving said in the interview was irrelevant. An interview in a prominent publication is a place in the sun and El Mundo gave him one.
It is worth noting that, in contrast to his Swedish colleague Carl Bildt, who chose silence in the wake of Aftonbladet's piece, the Spanish FM, Miguel Moratinos, took a robust view: "The Foreign Minister, while maintaining the most absolute respect for freedom of expression, regrets that space was given to an historian who denies one of the biggest tragedies for humanity in modern history," said a spokesman.
Bildt, who was scheduled to arrive in Israel on official EU business on the same day that Irving's interview was published, had to cancel his trip. Moratinos, whose country will assume the EU presidency after Sweden, visited Israel as scheduled a week later.
It appears that for European editors no doubt familiar with the significant restrictions on press freedom that exist in our heavily regulated continent, Israel is an exception. To smear and slander Israel — or the historical record of the Holocaust — is an absolute right. The Aftonbladet story was less about press freedom and more about a journalist relinquishing any pretence of fairness when a chance to promote a cause to which he is sympathetic came up. A journalist writing such lurid accusations without evidence against any other government would lose face with his colleagues. In this case, Bostrom's colleagues rallied to defend him instead of criticising the likely long-term damage he caused to their profession.
Even when bad taste does not stand in the way of editorial choice, freedom of the press is not the same as the obligation to give a platform to every crank. El Mundo's editor, while waving the flag of press freedom, deleted the Israeli ambassador's letter's last and most damning paragraph, which suggested that his choice to publish Irving was dictated by sensationalism.
El Mundo and Aftonbladet both crossed a red line — making the outrageous legitimate and the extreme mainstream. The thread that runs through their stories is the singling out of Israel to apply a principle they follow less strictly elsewhere. Perhaps, in the editors' minds, Israel is indeed "beyond the pale".
- 'The Spanish are not anti-Semitic'
- Report: Anti-Semitism on Rise in Spain
- Aftonbladet: behind the banner 'freedom of press'
- Spanish paper calls Holocaust denier Irving 'expert' on WWII
- Swedish author Henning Mankell on Israel apartheid
- Kristoffer Larsson, a Swedish theologian, backs Israeli organ theft claim
- Into the twilight zone: Swedish editor says “I’m not a Nazi” as he publishes second round of allegations that IDF harvests Palestinian organs
Wednesday, 30 September 2009
Ford Foundation, European governments among those funding organization seeking to arrest Israeli Defense minister, Tom Gross
"It seems that these NGOs and European governments are responsible for this latest attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the state of Israel and to aid those who would seek to destroy it." Tom Gross writes in NRO :
"Following up my earlier item, Westminster Magistrates court in central London on Tuesday evening rejected a petition to issue an arrest warrant for Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak on the grounds that he committed "war crimes" by defending Israel from Hamas attack. The British government intervened on Barak's behalf, submitting legal briefs to the court, and thus avoiding what would have been the most serious clash between Britain and Israel since 1948.
The Jerusalem Post reports that Al Mezan is the organization behind the British arrest efforts. Al Mezan had instructed expensive London law firms to carry them out. [1]
As noted by NGO Monitor, Al Mezan is funded by Sweden (1.1 million SEK), Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, the Ford Foundation, the International Commission of Jurists, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Netherlands Representative Office, the International Human Rights Funders Group/co Mertz Gilmore Foundation, the Open Society Institute, Medico International and the European Commission, among others." [2]
It seems that these NGOs and European governments are responsible for this latest attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the state of Israel and to aid those who would seek to destroy it.
[1] "The petition was brought by a Gaza-based human rights group, al-Mezan, on behalf of a group of 16 Palestinians from the Gaza Strip. Al-Mezan, in turn, instructed two London law firms - Irvine Thanvi and Natas (ITN) and Imran Khan and Partners - to represent the group. During the proceedings, the two firms applied for an international arrest warrant, claiming that Barak had committed war crimes and breaches of the Geneva Convention during Operation Cast Lead."
[2] "Donors include the NGO Development Centre (NDC - Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands), Norway, Open Society Institute (OSI), Medico International, Ford Foundation, Diakonia, Trocaire, European Commission."
Tuesday, 29 September 2009
Norway has decided to teach Israel a lesson
"Norway is trying to send us messages on different fronts through its talks with Hamas and intolerance toward settlements. [...] They are tough Vikings and are not intimidated, not even by Lieberman." (Alon Liel)
Source: The Jerusalem Post
FM accuses Norway of anti-Semitic policy
Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman accused Norway last week of upholding anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli policies, Army Radio reported Tuesday.
Lieberman fiercely criticized the Norwegian government during the UN General Assembly in New York, demanding answers from Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre regarding talks Oslo had been holding with Hamas. He then brought up what he termed Norway's quiet support of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, stating that Norwegian representatives to the UN did not leave the room during the Iranian leader's New York speech.
Lieberman also mentioned the Norwegian Culture Ministry's commemoration of Nazi-affiliated author Knut Hamsun, who had once eulogized Hitler in the Norwegian daily Aftenposten as a "warrior for mankind." In response, Støre denied the allegations of anti-Semitism, explaining that the commemoration was not political in nature and that a distinction was made between Hamsun's work and his world view.
However, former Foreign Ministry director-general Alon Liel told Army Radio that "Norway is trying to send us messages on different fronts" through its talks with Hamas and "intolerance toward settlements."
"They are tough Vikings and are not intimidated, not even by Lieberman," concluded Liel. "[Norway] is an ideological opponent who has decided to teach us a lesson."
Lieberman first voiced his criticism of Norwegian policies in August, after a newspaper in neighboring Sweden published a controversial article accusing Israel of organ harvesting.
For more on Norway, please click HERE
Source: The Jerusalem Post
FM accuses Norway of anti-Semitic policy
Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman accused Norway last week of upholding anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli policies, Army Radio reported Tuesday.
Lieberman fiercely criticized the Norwegian government during the UN General Assembly in New York, demanding answers from Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre regarding talks Oslo had been holding with Hamas. He then brought up what he termed Norway's quiet support of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, stating that Norwegian representatives to the UN did not leave the room during the Iranian leader's New York speech.
Lieberman also mentioned the Norwegian Culture Ministry's commemoration of Nazi-affiliated author Knut Hamsun, who had once eulogized Hitler in the Norwegian daily Aftenposten as a "warrior for mankind." In response, Støre denied the allegations of anti-Semitism, explaining that the commemoration was not political in nature and that a distinction was made between Hamsun's work and his world view.
However, former Foreign Ministry director-general Alon Liel told Army Radio that "Norway is trying to send us messages on different fronts" through its talks with Hamas and "intolerance toward settlements."
"They are tough Vikings and are not intimidated, not even by Lieberman," concluded Liel. "[Norway] is an ideological opponent who has decided to teach us a lesson."
Lieberman first voiced his criticism of Norwegian policies in August, after a newspaper in neighboring Sweden published a controversial article accusing Israel of organ harvesting.
For more on Norway, please click HERE
Thursday, 24 September 2009
Ahmadinejad did not cross EU 'red line' with UN speech, says Sweden (EU presidency)
"Earlier this week, the European Union presidency issued a statement condemning Ahmadinejad for his statements on the Holocaust and on Israel, saying such remarks "encourage anti-Semitism and hatred"."With such lack of coherence, no wonder there is huge disapppointment in Europe with the EU. It is impossible to know what Europe really stands for.
STOCKHOLM (AFP-EJP)--- Sweden, the country which chairs the EU, Finland and non-EU Norway stayed in the room when Ahmadinejad spoke at the UN.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did not cross the "red line" that would have prompted a walkout by all EU states in his speech at the United Nations, the Swedish foreign ministry said Thursday. "There were certain criteria set for when the EU would leave the room and those criteria were not fulfilled," spokeswoman Cecilia Julin said.
Sweden currently holds the rotating EU presidency. The criteria agreed in New York before the Iranian leader spoke included denying the Holocaust and calling for the annihilation of Israel, which Ahmadinejad avoided doing this time. Even so, a number of EU states did walk out when Ahmadinejad attacked Israel, including Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary and Italy.
"We're not commenting on who left or who didn't leave," Julin said. "I think there were other reasons for other countries that decided to leave."
In his address, Ahmadinejad again took aim at Israel but without mentioning the country or Jews by name, referring only to the "Zionist regime." He accused Israel of "inhumane policies in Palestine," including genocide, and seeking to "establish a new form of slavery, and harm the reputation of other nations, even European nations and the US, to attain its racist ambitions."
Suggesting there was a Jewish conspiracy, Ahmadinejad added: "It is no longer acceptable that a small minority would dominate the politics, economy and culture of major parts of the world by its complicated networks." He accused Jews of seeking to "establish a new form of slavery and harm the reputation of other nations, even European nations and the US, to attain its racist ambitions."
Israel had called for a boycott of the speech, and was not present when the Iranian leader spoke.
Canada heeded the boycott call, while delegations from Argentina, Australia, Costa Rica, New Zealand and the United States also left the room as Ahmadinejad began to rail against Israel, a European source said.
Earlier this week, the European Union presidency issued a statement condemning Ahmadinejad for his statements on the Holocaust and on Israel, saying such remarks "encourage anti-Semitism and hatred".
Tuesday, 22 September 2009
Swedish author Henning Mankell on Israel apartheid
"The comparisons to apartheid - or, more radically and these days more typically, to the Nazis. The comparison to the Nazis began to emerge in the 1970s in Western Europe and also in the Arab world, and by now it is pretty much everywhere you look." (Paul Berman, Z Word) "What we are now experiencing is a repetition of the despicable Apartheid system that once treated Africans and coloured as second-class citizens in their own country. [...] those who advocate a two-state solution have not got it right." (Henning Mankell, Swedish writer, 2009)
Source: Swedish newspapaer Aftonbladet's cultural section (Stoppad av apartheid)
"About a week ago, I visited Israel and Palestine. I was part of a delegation of authors with representatives from different parts of the world. We came to participate in the Palestinian Literary Festival. The opening ceremony was supposed to take place at the Palestinian National Theatre in Jerusalem. We had just gathered when heavily armed Israeli military and policemen walked in and announced that they were going to stop the ceremony. When we asked why, they answered: You are a security risk.
To claim that we at that moment posed a viable terroristic threat to Israel is absolute nonsense. But at the same time, they were right. We pose a threat when we come to Israel and speak our minds about the Israeli oppression of the Palestinian population. It can be compared to the threat that I and thousands of others once were to the Apartheid system in South Africa. Words are dangerous.
That was also what I said when those who organized the conference had managed to move the whole opening ceremony to the French Cultural Centre: – What we are now experiencing is a repetition of the despicable Apartheid system that once treated Africans and coloured as second-class citizens in their own country. But let us not forget: that very apartheid system no longer exists. That system was overthrown by human force in the beginning of the 1990’s. There is a straight line between Soweto, Sharpeville and what recently happened in Gaza. [...]
What I saw during my trip was obvious: the state of Israel in its current form has no future. Moreover, those who advocate a two-state solution have not got it right."
Read the whole piece HERE
____________
Norway, Israel and the Jews write about Swedes:
"Swedes think Norwegians are a bunch of undisciplined cowboys. Meanwhile Norwegians see Swedes as being overly prim-and-proper and obsessed with going by the book. This prejudice is not entirely unfounded. Norway was never feudal the way Sweden was, neither was Norway industrialized, nor was Norway ever a military power as Sweden was. In short, Obedience was never beaten into Norwegians the way it was in Sweden. The political consequence is that Sweden does not challenge its political establishment but sticks to the Social Democrats (and every now and then the Moderates). Meanwhile in Norway’s 2009 election (Yesterday) the Progress Party got 22,9 percent of the votes. Troubling as the situation in Norway may be, it is generally worse over in neighboring Sweden – they are fearful of questioning authority.
____________
Israeli video pokes fun at Scandinavians' sense of self-righteousness
Abba in Latma's Studio (English Subs)
- Kristoffer Larsson, a Swedish theologian, backs Israeli organ theft claim
- Aftonbladet: behind the banner 'freedom of press', by Lisa Abramowicz
Monday, 21 September 2009
Kristoffer Larsson, a Swedish theologian, backs Israeli organ theft claim
"Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman managed to tacitly draw the attention to—you guessed it!—the Holocaust [...] Lieberman’s Swedish counterpart Carl Bildt blatantly refuses to cave in [...] Ostensibly, Israel is using the article to get a message across: Sweden is an anti-Semitic country. They are set to pressure the Swedish government until it condemns the ‘blood libel accusation’. All of a sudden everyone is discussing good old anti-Semitism instead of Israel’s state terrorism and its apartheid policies towards the Palestinian people."Source: article "The Organ Theft Affair" by Kristoffer Larsson (Kristoffer Larsson is a Swedish theology student occasionally commenting on political issues. He works with the Bethlehem-based International Middle East Media Center and is a Director of Deir Yassin Remembered.)
"Swedish photojournalist Donald Boström has really infuriated the Israelis and its supporters. On August 17, Sweden’s most widely circulated newspaper, Aftonbaldet, carried an article by Boström entitled "Our sons plundered for their organs."1
The usual suspects immediately cried "anti-Semitism," claiming that the old blood libel accusation has been brought to life again.2 The Israelis have even threatened to sue him. Such reactions were anticipated, however. Innumerable hate mails have found their way into Mr Boström’s inbox since the publication, including death threats. More surprising is that Sweden’s ambassador to Israel, Elisabet Borsiin Bonnier, issued a condemnation of the article. It was "as shocking and appalling to us Swedes as to Israelis," the ambassador claimed in a press release that was later withdrawn, having attracted criticism from the Swedish foreign ministry as well as from the government.
On top of that, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has demanded that the Swedish government renounce the article, something which would be unconstitutional in Sweden. A statement from Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman managed to tacitly draw the attention to—you guessed it!—the Holocaust: "It is regrettable that the Swedish foreign ministry does not intervene when it comes to a blood libel against Jews, which reminds one of Sweden’s conduct during World War II when it also did not intervene." (I would urge Lieberman, himself a hard-core racist, to read Lenni Brenner’s excellent 51 Documents: Zionist Collaboration with the Nazis.)
Lieberman’s Swedish counterpart Carl Bildt blatantly refuses to cave in: "As a member of the Swedish government, acting on the Swedish constitution I have to respect freedom of speech, irrespective of the personal views that I might have." His boss, Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, also rejects commenting on the article. Bildt is expected in Israel in about a week’s time, but Israelis are threatening to cancel his trip.
Despite all the fuss, this isn’t the first time Donald Boström publicly vents suspicions about Israelis stealing organs from Palestinians. One chapter of the book Inshallah: konflikten mellan Israel och Palestina ("Inshallah: the Conflict between Israel and Palestine"), edited by Boström and first published in 2001, was an account of what happened to a 19-year-old Palestinian boy. It includes the photo now published in Aftonbladet. Donald Boström decided to shed new light on the affair following the mass arrest in New Jersey of people involved in illegal organ trade that included a shockingly high number of Rabbis.
Read the whole piece here
SMEAR CAMPAIGN AGAINST SCANDOS! ISRAELIS POKE FUN!
Friday, 11 September 2009
Sweden: 2004 State subsidized anti-Israel and pro-terrorism conference
"At a time when the world mourns the terrorist massacre in the Russian town of Beslan, the Swedish state agency for foreign aid, SIDA, is subsidizing a conference aimed at finding ways to fund Palestinian terrorism. The "Palestinian Solidarity Conference", scheduled to be held in the Gothenburg municipality Culture House starting September 7, culminates in a celebratory party on the night of September 11 – while the rest of the world finds other more sober ways of marking the anniversary of this turning point in the impact of terrorism."
Source: Norway, Israel and the Jews blog
Remember the 2004 "Palestinian Solidarity Conference" in Gothenburg, Sweden ? When you examine what the Palestine lobby says and does, and then look back a bit in time and see what they have said and done in the past, you quickly find that there is no real difference. Operation Cast Lead didn’t really change anything – the Palestine lobby were just as critical of Israel before. The 2006 war in Lebanon, which upset our dear Jostein Gaarder [Norway up in arms after author asserts Israel has lost right to exist] so, didn’t really change anything – the Palestine lobby was just as furious before that again.
Here’s a snippet from 2004, on the "Palestinian Solidarity Conference" in Gothenburg, Sweden. Read the whole piece here. Now 2004 is five years ago now. Yet hate-mongers have been hard at work for a long time, 2004 was just yesterday.
Swedish state agency subsidizes Gothenburg terror conference
Lisa Abramowicz and David Frankfurter
At a time when the world mourns the terrorist massacre in the Russian town of Beslan, the Swedish state agency for foreign aid, SIDA, is subsidizing a conference aimed at finding ways to fund Palestinian terrorism.
The "Palestinian Solidarity Conference", scheduled to be held in the Gothenburg municipality Culture House starting September 7, culminates in a celebratory party on the night of September 11 – while the rest of the world finds other more sober ways of marking the anniversary of this turning point in the impact of terrorism.
One of the main conference agenda items is action to remove the PFLP, Hamas and other terrorist organisations from the EU’s terror list, so that these organizations can resume collecting money in Sweden and other European countries. Another agenda item is promoting a total boycott of Israel and other sanctions against the Jewish state. A third is developing strategies to explain the need for "armed resistance" (i.e. terrorism) in the struggle.
The conference is being organized by the Revolutionary Communist Youth, and the Proletären FF (Football Club), together with the Palestinian Progressive Youth Union (PPYU). The first two are associated with the most extremist and Stalinist of communist parties in Sweden. The PPYU ascribes to the most uncompromising Palestinian positions in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute.
So, what else is new? There are plenty extremists around. They hold conferences and demonstrate for all kinds of outrageous causes - all part of a democratic, open society.
True, but not every public outburst is deserving of government support. In fact, supporting these EU blacklisted terrorist organisations is illegal – something even recognised by the conference agenda. Notwithstanding this, the conference has been subsidized by the Swedish International Development Aid Agency, SIDA – which has donated over 5,000 Euro in support. SIDA has also given 16,000 Euro to conference co-organizer Proletären FF. When challenged, SIDA chose to ignore information about the conference objectives published by the organizers at www.rku.nu, and claimed that it is a "get-together for youth to be able to discuss Human Rights issues".
Continue reading here
Dear Foreign Minister Bildt, David Harris
Source: Norway, Israel and the Jews blog
Remember the 2004 "Palestinian Solidarity Conference" in Gothenburg, Sweden ? When you examine what the Palestine lobby says and does, and then look back a bit in time and see what they have said and done in the past, you quickly find that there is no real difference. Operation Cast Lead didn’t really change anything – the Palestine lobby were just as critical of Israel before. The 2006 war in Lebanon, which upset our dear Jostein Gaarder [Norway up in arms after author asserts Israel has lost right to exist] so, didn’t really change anything – the Palestine lobby was just as furious before that again.
Here’s a snippet from 2004, on the "Palestinian Solidarity Conference" in Gothenburg, Sweden. Read the whole piece here. Now 2004 is five years ago now. Yet hate-mongers have been hard at work for a long time, 2004 was just yesterday.
Swedish state agency subsidizes Gothenburg terror conference
Lisa Abramowicz and David Frankfurter
At a time when the world mourns the terrorist massacre in the Russian town of Beslan, the Swedish state agency for foreign aid, SIDA, is subsidizing a conference aimed at finding ways to fund Palestinian terrorism.
The "Palestinian Solidarity Conference", scheduled to be held in the Gothenburg municipality Culture House starting September 7, culminates in a celebratory party on the night of September 11 – while the rest of the world finds other more sober ways of marking the anniversary of this turning point in the impact of terrorism.
One of the main conference agenda items is action to remove the PFLP, Hamas and other terrorist organisations from the EU’s terror list, so that these organizations can resume collecting money in Sweden and other European countries. Another agenda item is promoting a total boycott of Israel and other sanctions against the Jewish state. A third is developing strategies to explain the need for "armed resistance" (i.e. terrorism) in the struggle.
The conference is being organized by the Revolutionary Communist Youth, and the Proletären FF (Football Club), together with the Palestinian Progressive Youth Union (PPYU). The first two are associated with the most extremist and Stalinist of communist parties in Sweden. The PPYU ascribes to the most uncompromising Palestinian positions in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute.
So, what else is new? There are plenty extremists around. They hold conferences and demonstrate for all kinds of outrageous causes - all part of a democratic, open society.
True, but not every public outburst is deserving of government support. In fact, supporting these EU blacklisted terrorist organisations is illegal – something even recognised by the conference agenda. Notwithstanding this, the conference has been subsidized by the Swedish International Development Aid Agency, SIDA – which has donated over 5,000 Euro in support. SIDA has also given 16,000 Euro to conference co-organizer Proletären FF. When challenged, SIDA chose to ignore information about the conference objectives published by the organizers at www.rku.nu, and claimed that it is a "get-together for youth to be able to discuss Human Rights issues".
Continue reading here
Dear Foreign Minister Bildt, David Harris
Thursday, 10 September 2009
Diaspora Affairs Minister to virtually 'meet' with Swedish Jews
Source: article by Haviv Rettig Gur in TJP
Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein expects the diplomatic crisis over an incendiary Swedish newspaper report to take center stage next week when he meet s with Swedish Jewry in a video conference with community representative.
During the diplomatic crisis, which culminated with the cancellation of the upcoming visit to Israel of Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, many Swedish Jews said they felt trapped between the arguing parties.
"I'm sure no one in the community has any doubt that Israel is a free and democratic country that is not capable of doing the terrible things that have appeared [in the Swedish media] recently," Edelstein will tell the community leaders, referring to the Aftonbladet report alleging soldiers had harvested Palestinians' organs.
"Jews in Stockholm, and in every other community, should remember that IDF soldiers are not an abstract idea for us. They are our children, brothers, sisters, neighbors. They are not capable of doing the things unfortunately ascribed to them," he said.
But the meeting won't be an argument, he adds. "Any Jewish community should always remember Israel as a state is a partner and friend," he said.
The meeting is a joint initiative of Edelstein's ministry and the European Jewish Congress' leadel.NET project, an online initiative to foster European Jewish identity through online media. It is headed by Vladimir Kantor, son of EJC president Moshe Kantor.
Edelstein will hold an online conversation facilitated by leadel.NET's infrastructure with a different Jewish community each month. In October, he will speak with the community of Sofia, Bulgaria, and in October with Milan, Italy.
The "conversations" will focus not only on communal leaders, but will seek to attract young people to discuss Israel with Israeli public figures. Edelstein will invite such figures from academia, the media, government and the military to participate in the discussions.
"The congress is working hard to connect communities in Europe to Israel using modern technology. It's time to learn how to use the technology to build new bridges," said Tomer Marshall, managing director of leadel.NET, of the online gatherings.
- Aftonbladet: behind the banner 'freedom of press', by Lisa Abramowicz
- Sweden: Aftonbladet's accusations are anti-Semitic according to Council of Europe and OSCE classification
Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli Edelstein expects the diplomatic crisis over an incendiary Swedish newspaper report to take center stage next week when he meet s with Swedish Jewry in a video conference with community representative.
During the diplomatic crisis, which culminated with the cancellation of the upcoming visit to Israel of Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, many Swedish Jews said they felt trapped between the arguing parties.
"I'm sure no one in the community has any doubt that Israel is a free and democratic country that is not capable of doing the terrible things that have appeared [in the Swedish media] recently," Edelstein will tell the community leaders, referring to the Aftonbladet report alleging soldiers had harvested Palestinians' organs.
"Jews in Stockholm, and in every other community, should remember that IDF soldiers are not an abstract idea for us. They are our children, brothers, sisters, neighbors. They are not capable of doing the things unfortunately ascribed to them," he said.
But the meeting won't be an argument, he adds. "Any Jewish community should always remember Israel as a state is a partner and friend," he said.
The meeting is a joint initiative of Edelstein's ministry and the European Jewish Congress' leadel.NET project, an online initiative to foster European Jewish identity through online media. It is headed by Vladimir Kantor, son of EJC president Moshe Kantor.
Edelstein will hold an online conversation facilitated by leadel.NET's infrastructure with a different Jewish community each month. In October, he will speak with the community of Sofia, Bulgaria, and in October with Milan, Italy.
The "conversations" will focus not only on communal leaders, but will seek to attract young people to discuss Israel with Israeli public figures. Edelstein will invite such figures from academia, the media, government and the military to participate in the discussions.
"The congress is working hard to connect communities in Europe to Israel using modern technology. It's time to learn how to use the technology to build new bridges," said Tomer Marshall, managing director of leadel.NET, of the online gatherings.
- Aftonbladet: behind the banner 'freedom of press', by Lisa Abramowicz
- Sweden: Aftonbladet's accusations are anti-Semitic according to Council of Europe and OSCE classification
Friday, 4 September 2009
Aftonbladet: behind the banner 'freedom of press', by Lisa Abramowicz
"Is there any other country in the world that has been as demonized and delegitimized as Israel in Aftonbladet during the last 30 years?" Source: article by Lisa Abramowicz, Secretary General of the Swedish Israel Information Center in Stockholm, in EJP
On August 17 Sweden's largest-circulation newspaper, Aftonbladet published an article on a two-page spread on its culture pages which included a disturbing photo of, among other things, a person who had been the subject of an autopsy, Bilal Ahmed Ghanem.
In the article the Israeli army is accused of stealing organs from dead Palestinians for use in Israel. Indeed, the article even insinuates that the Israeli army is killing Palestinians for the very purpose of using their organs for Israeli patients.
Israeli officials have commented on the picture of the dead man, a wanted Palestinian resistance fighter. According to the IDF, the photo is of an ordinary autopsy. The photo was taken in 1992 (!). Ghanem was killed in a firefight between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militia. The photograph is the same as the one found in Boström's book Insh'allah from 2001. No new evidence of organ theft has surfaced.
Donald Boström says that he doesn't know whether or not any organs where stolen, but that he was told by the family that they believe that to have been the case. According to Jerusalem Post reporter Khaled Abu Toameh on August 25, the Ghanem family hadn't spoken to any foreign journalist of their suspicions at the time of their son's death, only that a foreign journalist was taking pictures during the funeral and then disappeared. (Palestinian family: We never told ‘Aftonbladet’ organs were taken)
This is a very important detail in the context, as Boström has pointed out in interviews that he is not the one suspecting organ theft, but the family he has been speaking to. He assumes the role of mouthpiece for the family. Clearly Boström is lying when he says that the Ghanem family has spoken to him about this. No further autopsies have been performed on Ghanem or any of the other Palestinians allegedly killed. There are no witnesses. Nothing at all to indicate that any crime of organ theft has taken place.
Then why was Ghanem autopsied by Israel when the cause of death was clear, Boström asks? Certainly to determine the cause of death and whether he had been killed by Israeli or Palestinian fire. Something which isn't always completely obvious. A lot of people are in fact killed by so-called "friendly fire" in the war between Israelis and Palestinians. (Most of the Israeli soldiers killed during the Gaza war this winter fell to friendly fire.)
The accusations are unreasonable for medical reasons since the organs of people who have been injured or killed by gunshots are unsuitable for transplantations. Per Gahrton, president of the Palestine Solidarity Association of Sweden, told Expressen that he chose not to include the rumors of organ theft in his book "Palestinas frihetskamp", which was released last year: "There isn't enough support? But if the Palestinians are to continue with spreading rumors of the Israelis gathering organs they'll have to show a body that is missing organs", Gahrton says.
The head of human rights organization Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group, Bassem Eid, is one of the foremost human rights activists in Israel and the Palestinian territories. He, too learned of the rumors of organ theft. Eid could find nothing to support the information. "I have never seen an article like this in any Arab newspaper. No one has reported on this subject - because it is just a rumor", Bassem Eid says.
Boström writing and Aftonbladet publishing is certainly due to them their feeling that this is an opportune moment, after the Gaza war and with Israel’s new right-wing government.
A corruption scandal has erupted in New Jersey, in which, among many other things, an American rabbi is charged with being involved in the transporting of Israelis to the US in order to sell and donate their organs there. Ergo, it is likely that the state of Israel is party to this foul affair and that these matters are somehow interconnected. Hence the publication value, apparently.
Boström and Aftonbladet want a legal investigation into the matter of organ theft. But in a society where rule of law reigns, something both Israel and Sweden are, a prosecutor will only press charges if he/she has enough evidence to convict the accused. Anything else would be a waste of society resources. A court - including the International Criminal Court in The Hague - is not supposed to investigate rumors in a propaganda war. As for the cases invoked by Boström, it's not a matter of "insufficient evidence"; but of "absolutely no evidence".
Jesper Svartvik, president of the Swedish Committee Against Anti-Semitism, comments that "the text is an example of criticism of Israel alluding to and mixing in ancient anti-Semitic myths, in this case the medieval myths of ritual murder. Shakespeare’s Shylock can also be sensed in the background, wanting his pound of flesh at any price." Therefore, it is not so strange that Jews in Sweden, Israel and all over the world have taken offence at the article in Aftonbladet.
Åsa Linderborg, chief cultural editor, admits that she has never heard of the historical anti-Semitic myths of ritual murder, despite holding a Ph. D. in history ! Now, editor-in-chief Jan Helin would prefer discussing the matter of freedom of speech and the press as well as the forceful Israeli reaction to discussing the veracity of the article or how appropriate it was to publish it. I can understand that, as it enables him to portray Aftonbladet as a victim of Israel's "aggression".
Ref. Aftonbladet August 28, with the war headline "Israel attackerar Aftonbladet (Israel attacks Aftonbladet)" at page 1 and references to pages 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Did anyone say "Exaggerated backlash"?
The freedom of information legislation is part of the constitution. No preliminary censoring is to be used. But if you publish a text that is of a dubious nature, you will have to suffer being criticized and questioned. Freedom of speech is not absolute. There is also a law against hate speech, and incitement, although judicial tolerance is extremely lenient. For chief cultural editors and editors-in-chief there is also something called press ethics and standards. The heads of Aftonbladet do not seem to take those very seriously.
It is worth studying the publication policy of Aftonbladet regarding Israel over a period of time, and that goes for all of its pages. Is there any other country in the world that has been as demonized and delegitimized as Israel in Aftonbladet during the last 30 years? It is clear that Aftonbladet’s policy regarding freedom of speech and of the press has been completely different concerning, for example, the Danish Muhammad cartoons or Lars Vilks' roundabout dogs (which weren't published in Aftonbladet) a few years ago. AB declined because they didn't want to offend Muslims. But offending Jews and Israelis is apparently fine.
I don't think that either Linderborg or Helin were unaware of the ruckus that would be caused by publishing this lousy and poorly substantiated article. I think that they were consciously attempting to push the boundaries of what can be written about Israel and Jews and hide behind the banner - freedom of the press.
Thursday, 3 September 2009
Norway: divest in Israel, invest in Turkmenistan
While it is unethical to invest in Israeli compay Elbit Systems, it is ethical for State-owned Norwegian oil company StatoilHydro to invest in Turkmenistan (Norway suspects Israel unethical, invests in Turkmenistan) Nigeria, Angola and Azerbaijan. And feel good about it.
Source: article in TJP
Norway's finance minister on Thursday announced that the Israeli company Elbit Systems Ltd. has been dropped from the Nordic country's pension fund due to ethical concerns.
A major optics and electronics manufacturer,the company supplies surveillance equipment used to monitor the security barrier between Israel and the West Bank.
"We do not wish to fund companies that so directly contribute to violations of international humanitarian law," said Finance Minister Kristin Halvorsen [see below]. She said the shares were sold secretly ahead of the announcement.
Halvorsen said the security barrier has unacceptably restricted the movements of Palestinians on the West Bank, so that an investment in any company involved in the project causes "unacceptable risk of contribution to particularly serious violations of fundamental ethical norms." [...]
Since 2004, a national Council of Ethics has routinely reviewed investments by the fund, and periodically recommends dropping some shares based on a range of ethical issues, including human rights, labor rights, environmental issues and production of nuclear weapons and cluster bombs.
_________
- Norwegian Minister of Finance marches with thugs
- Kristin Halvorsen and the demonstration on January 8th
- Minister of Finance sticks to her guns
- Norway: Israel is unethical but investments in Turkmenistan are fine
- Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
Source: article in TJP
Norway's finance minister on Thursday announced that the Israeli company Elbit Systems Ltd. has been dropped from the Nordic country's pension fund due to ethical concerns.
A major optics and electronics manufacturer,the company supplies surveillance equipment used to monitor the security barrier between Israel and the West Bank.
"We do not wish to fund companies that so directly contribute to violations of international humanitarian law," said Finance Minister Kristin Halvorsen [see below]. She said the shares were sold secretly ahead of the announcement.
Halvorsen said the security barrier has unacceptably restricted the movements of Palestinians on the West Bank, so that an investment in any company involved in the project causes "unacceptable risk of contribution to particularly serious violations of fundamental ethical norms." [...]
Since 2004, a national Council of Ethics has routinely reviewed investments by the fund, and periodically recommends dropping some shares based on a range of ethical issues, including human rights, labor rights, environmental issues and production of nuclear weapons and cluster bombs.
_________
- Norwegian Minister of Finance marches with thugs
- Kristin Halvorsen and the demonstration on January 8th
- Minister of Finance sticks to her guns
- Norway: Israel is unethical but investments in Turkmenistan are fine
- Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
Sunday, 30 August 2009
WWII: Norway received 37 Jewish children
Source: Norway, Israel and the Jews blog
From the paper edition of Norway’s largest daily Verdens Gang (VG). Notice how the Ministry of Justice Section Chief feared that taking in more children would encourage anti-Semitism. Oddly reminiscent of Dagsavisen’s Mr. Iversen, who the other day warned that Israeli reaction to Daniel Boström’s blood-libel story was rabid and might encourage anti-Semitism. Mr. Iversen even had the audacity to remind that Israel needs friends in Europe now more than ever, and should be careful not to push them away.
Oh Norway, beloved Norway, we deserve better than this.
"Few children to Norway
BERGEN (VG) Just before WWII broke out England generously received 10 000 Jewish children who were sent to safety by nervous parents in Germany and neighbouring countries.
Norway received only 37 children, a number limited due to the fears of prominent Norwegians that there would be too many jews here.
Section chief Carl Platou in the Ministry of Justice was afraid that the children with time could awaken a sprouting anti-Semitism. The danger of getting stuck with the children, as he wrote, was large:
"We must take into account that a larger number of them will remain in Norway and will constitute a Jewish strain in the people and in commerce", he wrote."
Sweden: Aftonbladet's accusations are anti-Semitic according to Council of Europe and OSCE classification
From the paper edition of Norway’s largest daily Verdens Gang (VG). Notice how the Ministry of Justice Section Chief feared that taking in more children would encourage anti-Semitism. Oddly reminiscent of Dagsavisen’s Mr. Iversen, who the other day warned that Israeli reaction to Daniel Boström’s blood-libel story was rabid and might encourage anti-Semitism. Mr. Iversen even had the audacity to remind that Israel needs friends in Europe now more than ever, and should be careful not to push them away.
Oh Norway, beloved Norway, we deserve better than this.
"Few children to Norway
BERGEN (VG) Just before WWII broke out England generously received 10 000 Jewish children who were sent to safety by nervous parents in Germany and neighbouring countries.
Norway received only 37 children, a number limited due to the fears of prominent Norwegians that there would be too many jews here.
Section chief Carl Platou in the Ministry of Justice was afraid that the children with time could awaken a sprouting anti-Semitism. The danger of getting stuck with the children, as he wrote, was large:
"We must take into account that a larger number of them will remain in Norway and will constitute a Jewish strain in the people and in commerce", he wrote."
Sweden: Aftonbladet's accusations are anti-Semitic according to Council of Europe and OSCE classification
Wednesday, 26 August 2009
Diakonia, a Swedish Christian NGO's anti-Israel obsession
"Diakonia is more a lobby group with a clear political agenda for the Middle East than a Christian aid organization. [...] In one single month, October 2008, Diakonia sponsored 10 articles in the Swedish media, nine of which dealt with the world's only Jewish country." (Ilya Meyer, Equal value of all human life?, Jerusalem Post, December 6, 2008)
NGO Monitor's "was sent to officials in Diakonia and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA). Diakonia responded that they would provide no comment; SIDA did not reply."
Diakonia is Sweden’s largest humanitarian NGO, receiving most of its budget from the Swedish government. Some of the organization’s programs appear to be genuine and important humanitarian projects. Diakonia’s Civil Society and International Humanitarian Law (IHL) programs overtly promote the Palestinian narrative, and fuel the conflict. Attributes "structural problems" in the conflict solely to the "continuing of the occupation," the "building of the Wall," and "the fragmentation of the Palestinian territory." The IHL website promotes a so-called "right to resist" and delegitimizes Israel’s right to self defense.
* Diakonia is Sweden’s largest humanitarian NGO, founded in 1966 by five Swedish churches. It receives most of its budget from the Swedish government (SIDA, SEK 332 million, ~$47.2 million).
* By promoting a "right to resist" (meaning terrorism) and delegitimizing Israel’s right to self-defense, the Civil Society and International Humanitarian Law (IHL) programs exploit and misrepresent international law.
* The IHL Program’s International Advisory Council is populated almost entirely with PLO advisors, Palestinians, and anti-Zionist Jewish activists.
* While some of the organization’s programs appear to be genuine and important humanitarian projects, the vast majority of resources are devoted to political campaigns, including a submission to the Goldstone Commission vilifying Israel and delegitimizing its right to defend itself against rocket attacks.
* Diakonia’s repetition of the Palestinian position refers to the "continuing of the occupation," the "building of the Wall," and "the fragmentation of the Palestinian territory" as "structural problems” behind the conflict. The pre-1967 history of terror, war and rejection of Israel’s right to exist are erased.
* The tendentious international law activities, including the Humanitarian Policy & Law Forum at Harvard University, receive more funding than any other program related to the region, and represent the only such political example in Diakonia’s worldwide activities.
* Many of Diakonia’s partners (Alternative Information Center, Sabeel, Al Haq, Al Mezan) are among the most extreme anti-Israel NGOs operating the region, employing inflammatory and, at times, antisemitic rhetoric.
* Enactment of NGO Monitor’s recommendations will provide more balanced coverage of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Diakonia will also better serve the interests of the Palestinians, who deserve real help, not radical posturing.
* This report was sent to officials in Diakonia and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA). Diakonia responded that they would provide no comment; SIDA did not reply.
"Diakonia is more a lobby group with a clear political agenda for the Middle East than a Christian aid organization.... In one single month, October 2008, Diakonia sponsored 10 articles in the Swedish media, nine of which dealt with the world's only Jewish country." (Ilya Meyer, Equal value of all human life?, Jerusalem Post, December 6, 2008)
Read the full NGO Monitor report on Diakonia here
- "Are we using European tax money to promote peace or hatred?", asks ECI director
- Sweden: Aftonbladet's accusations are anti-Semitic according to Council of Europe and OSCE classification
- Swedish government funds NGOs and anti-Semitism
- Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia's anti-Israeli activities
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia totally obsessed with Israel
- Conservative Swedish FM Carl Bildt likens Netanyahu to Hamas
- Sweden: when incitement against Jews is allowed
- Swedish government funds fuel Mideast radical NGOs
- Nina Witoszek: Europe has learned little from history
- Al Haq: Europe funding anti-Israeli NGO
- European funding for the narrative war, Gerald Steinberg
- Swedish journalist looks for Swedish extremist Jews
Friday, 21 August 2009
Sweden: Aftonbladet's accusations are anti-Semitic according to Council of Europe and OSCE classification
"Now a leading evening newspaper in Sweden, Aftonbladet, is openly fabricating medieval myths of Jewish blood libel by running articles accusing Israeli soldiers of stealing and selling the organs of Palestinians. According to the Council of Europe and the OSCE such allegations classify as traditional anti-Semitic rhetoric’s and were widely spread in the Middle Ages and during the pogroms in the 19th and 20th century."ECI (European Coalition for Israel) expresses concern over rising anti-Semitism in Sweden and election victories of racist parties in the European Parliament
Brussels 21 August, 2009 - A growing number of anti-Semitic incidents and a general hostility towards the state of Israel in parts of Swedish media have caused the European Coalition for Israel to send an official letter to the Foreign Minister of Sweden Carl Bildt, currently the holder of the EU-presidency, to call for an EU-emergency summit in Stockholm to combat rising anti-Semitism and racism in Europe.
This would not be the first time that the government of Sweden would take the lead in combating anti-Semitism in Europe. In January 2000 the Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust was organized by the Swedish government to raise awareness about the Holocaust and to prevent it from happening again by educating new generations about the deadly virus of anti-Semitism.
Recent reports from Sweden seem to indicate that the need for education is now more urgent than ever. In March 2009 a Davis Cup match in tennis between Israel and Sweden had to played before an empty stadium due to a decision by the mayor of the host city of Malmö to give in to anti-Semitic threats of violence instead of ensuring public safety at the sports event. Later remarks by the mayor have confirmed that his decision was not primarily made out of security concerns but were mainly politically motivated. The tennis match, nevertheless, drew together violent anti-Israeli demonstrations but a peaceful solidarity rally for Israel was stopped by the police, also for "security reasons".
Now a leading evening newspaper in Sweden, Aftonbladet, is openly fabricating medieval myths of Jewish blood libel by running articles accusing Israeli soldiers of stealing and selling the organs of Palestinians. According to the Council of Europe and the OSCE such allegations classify as traditional anti-Semitic rhetoric’s and were widely spread in the Middle Ages and during the pogroms in the 19th and 20th century.
According to NGO Monitor, an Israeli organization following the activities of NGO's in Israel, the article in Aftonbladet is not an isolated aberration but rather the result of a long campaign of anti-Israeli demonization based on manufactured "evidence" repeated by "Palestinian eyewitnesses".
Earlier this summer it was revealed that the Swedish government was one of several EU countries which were financially supporting a report by an anti-Israeli group called "Breaking the Silence", which accused the Israeli army of war crimes during the Operation Cast Lead.
Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) has a long history of supporting anti-Israeli groups while at the same time being the single largest contributor to the Palestinian authorities. Many of the NGO’s which receive Swedish government funding routinely accuses Israel of "genocide", "ethnic cleansing" and "apartheid" and some compare Israeli military officials to Nazis. These false accusations also fall in to the category of anti-Semitism as defined by OSCE and the Council of Europe.
This rise of anti-Israelism and anti-Semitism in Sweden comes at the same time as the government of Sweden has taken over the rotating presidency of the EU and is in the centre of international media attention. But anti-Israeli incidents are not isolated to the events mentioned in Sweden but are also spreading in other parts of Europe though the case of Sweden is of a particular concern.
The recent victories in the European Parliament elections of openly racist and anti-Semitic parties is another reason why the European Coalition for Israel now calls upon the Swedish EU-presidency to organize an emergency EU-summit in Stockholm with the aim of combating this current tide of anti-Semitism, racism and xenophobia in Europe.
"A new Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust will be needed to find new and effective European strategies of combating the demons of anti-Semitism and racism", writes ECI director Tomas Sandell in the letter to the Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt and concludes that "there can be no better way to mark the tenth anniversary of the Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust than to renew the pledge to fight anti-Semitism and to commit to educating the new generations about the tragedies of the past. The Holocaust did not happen over night but started with demonization and false accusations of the Jews. Now it is time to stop the tide in Europe while there is still time".
- Swedish government funds NGOs and anti-Semitism
- European Coalition for Israel director calls for broad coalition against anti-Semitism
- "Do not let Israel become the Sudetenland of today", Hanna Orgonikova (ECI)
- European Coalition for Israel warns against surge of anti-Semitism in Europe
- Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia's anti-Israeli activities
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia totally obsessed with Israel
- Conservative Swedish FM Carl Bildt likens Netanyahu to Hamas
- Sweden: when incitement against Jews is allowed
- Swedish government funds fuel Mideast radical NGOs
- "Are we using European tax money to promote peace or hatred?", asks ECI director
Wednesday, 19 August 2009
Swedish government funds NGOs and anti-Semitism
"Many of these NGOs routinely accuse Israel of "genocide," "ethnic cleansing," and "apartheid," and some compare Israeli military and political officials to Nazis. This propaganda warfare is waged through the façade of "research" reports which routinely quote Palestinian "testimonies," taken and repeated without question. The path from this demonization to the blood libels of Aftonbladet is short and direct."
Swedish PM Office: "On 1 July 2009, Sweden took over the Presidency of the EU. This means that for six months, Sweden is leading the EU's work and is responsible for moving important EU issues forward." How ironic that Sweden is at the helm of the EU and acts with unique arrogance : "When NGO Monitor sent the draft report to the Swedish embassy in Tel Aviv and government officials in Stockholm, they refused to comment or to engage in a discussion of the implications of these reprehensible activities."
__________________
Gerald Steinberg is not surprised - neither am we.
Source: article in the JPost
The article in Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet accusing Israeli soldiers of stealing and selling the organs of Palestinians is not a surprise or isolated aberration, but rather the result of a long campaign of anti-Israeli demonization, based on manufactured "evidence" repeated by Palestinian "eyewitnesses".
Applying the strategy adopted at the NGO forum of the 2001 UN Durban conference, the well-financed network of radical non-governmental organizations (NGOs) plays a major role in this demonization, and the Swedish government is a major source of funding. Expressions of modern anti-Semitism and blood libels are the logical results of this activity.
An NGO Monitor research report on Swedish government funding, published on June 29 2009, documented this pattern in detail, and warned of the incitement and anti-Semitic language being used routinely by these organizations. This systematic study examined over 20 major NGOs funded through the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), Diakonia [which is Christian], the multi-national NGO Development Center (NDC), and the Swedish Mission Council (SMR). Many of these NGOs routinely accuse Israel of "genocide," "ethnic cleansing," and "apartheid," and some compare Israeli military and political officials to Nazis. This propaganda warfare is waged through the façade of "research" reports which routinely quote Palestinian "testimonies," taken and repeated without question. The path from this demonization to the blood libels of Aftonbladet is short and direct.
The Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS), run by Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi, and receiving funds from the SMR framework, is a prominent example. Barghouthi referred to the Gaza conflict as a "horrendous massacre," and used terms like "ghetto," and "apartheid" on a radio program. PMRS refers to the security barrier as the "apartheid wall," and claimed that Israel employs a "racist ideology" and inflicts "collective punishment" on the Palestinians.
Similar language is found in the publications and statements of the radical Israel-based Alternative Information Center (AIC), which received 300,000 Krona ($42,000) in 2008, Palestinian-based Al Haq (SEK 3 million, as part of Diakonia's IHL program), and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (SEK 900,000). The central role of PHR-I officials in the campaigns accusing Israeli doctors of torture and other forms of heinous immorality, resulted in a decision by the Israel Medical Association to sever relations.
SIDA money also goes to the Women's Affairs Technical Committee (WATC), Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS), and Jerusalem Center for Women (JWC), which demonize Israel with the rhetoric of "apartheid," "ethnic cleansing," and "massacres." This language is repeated in NGO reports and and press statements, which are then reprinted in the media and amplified in the United Nations Human Rights Council.
NGOs supported by Sweden are also among the leaders in the effort to rewrite the history of the conflict in order to portray Israel as an "evil empire" and the world's worst violator of human rights. The Palme Center, run by the Social Democratic Party and leading trade unions, accuses Israel of "provok[ing] the al-Aqsa rising and the 'Second Intifada,'" and "disproportionate violence against civilians, unlawful executions and torture." The fighting in Gaza is also blamed solely on "the provocative Israeli occupation," rather than on the over 8,000 rockets launched by Hamas, or other forms of terror. The history of Arab rejectionism, the wars designed to "wipe Israel off the map", and the decades of massive Palestinian terror, are erased as part of this demonization.
Similarly, a Sabeel project [which is Christian], "The Nakba Memory, Reality and Beyond," used SIDA funding (SEK 540,000) "to commemorate the Nakba of 1948". Sabeel is a leader of the church divestment campaign, and its director, Naim Ateek, employs anti-Semitic themes and imagery in sermons promoting "Palestinian Liberation Theology."
Diakonia's "International Humanitarian Law" project and other Swedish government funding are behind the abuse of legal frameworks to demonize Israel. The "lawfare" movement uses courts in Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand to accuse Israelis of war crimes and similar charges. While all of the cases heard to date have been dismissed, the main purpose of this effort is to reinforce the incitement and hatred directed against Israelis through the rhetoric of morality and human rights. Using Swedish funding, lawfare cases are promoted by Al Haq and the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), which, like other such groups, accuses Israelis of "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity."
When NGO Monitor sent the draft report to the Swedish embassy in Tel Aviv and government officials in Stockholm, they refused to comment or to engage in a discussion of the implications of these reprehensible activities. Perhaps now, after the Aftonbladet report has highlighted the results of this demonization, they will reconsider and stop this destructive misuse of public funds.
Gerald M. Steinberg heads NGO Monitor and is a professor of political science at Bar Ilan University
A screen capture showing the article in Aftonbladet, with a picture of a dead Palestinian next to a picture of a New Jersey rabbi.
- Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia's anti-Israeli activities
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia totally obsessed with Israel
- Conservative Swedish FM Carl Bildt likens Netanyahu to Hamas
- Sweden: when incitement against Jews is allowed
- Swedish government funds fuel Mideast radical NGOs
- Nina Witoszek: Europe has learned little from history
- Al Haq: Europe funding anti-Israeli NGO
- European funding for the narrative war, Gerald Steinberg
- Swedish journalist looks for Swedish extremist Jews
- "Are we using European tax money to promote peace or hatred?", asks ECI director
Swedish PM Office: "On 1 July 2009, Sweden took over the Presidency of the EU. This means that for six months, Sweden is leading the EU's work and is responsible for moving important EU issues forward." How ironic that Sweden is at the helm of the EU and acts with unique arrogance : "When NGO Monitor sent the draft report to the Swedish embassy in Tel Aviv and government officials in Stockholm, they refused to comment or to engage in a discussion of the implications of these reprehensible activities."
__________________
Gerald Steinberg is not surprised - neither am we.
Source: article in the JPost
The article in Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet accusing Israeli soldiers of stealing and selling the organs of Palestinians is not a surprise or isolated aberration, but rather the result of a long campaign of anti-Israeli demonization, based on manufactured "evidence" repeated by Palestinian "eyewitnesses".
Applying the strategy adopted at the NGO forum of the 2001 UN Durban conference, the well-financed network of radical non-governmental organizations (NGOs) plays a major role in this demonization, and the Swedish government is a major source of funding. Expressions of modern anti-Semitism and blood libels are the logical results of this activity.
An NGO Monitor research report on Swedish government funding, published on June 29 2009, documented this pattern in detail, and warned of the incitement and anti-Semitic language being used routinely by these organizations. This systematic study examined over 20 major NGOs funded through the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), Diakonia [which is Christian], the multi-national NGO Development Center (NDC), and the Swedish Mission Council (SMR). Many of these NGOs routinely accuse Israel of "genocide," "ethnic cleansing," and "apartheid," and some compare Israeli military and political officials to Nazis. This propaganda warfare is waged through the façade of "research" reports which routinely quote Palestinian "testimonies," taken and repeated without question. The path from this demonization to the blood libels of Aftonbladet is short and direct.
The Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS), run by Dr. Mustafa Barghouthi, and receiving funds from the SMR framework, is a prominent example. Barghouthi referred to the Gaza conflict as a "horrendous massacre," and used terms like "ghetto," and "apartheid" on a radio program. PMRS refers to the security barrier as the "apartheid wall," and claimed that Israel employs a "racist ideology" and inflicts "collective punishment" on the Palestinians.
Similar language is found in the publications and statements of the radical Israel-based Alternative Information Center (AIC), which received 300,000 Krona ($42,000) in 2008, Palestinian-based Al Haq (SEK 3 million, as part of Diakonia's IHL program), and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel (SEK 900,000). The central role of PHR-I officials in the campaigns accusing Israeli doctors of torture and other forms of heinous immorality, resulted in a decision by the Israel Medical Association to sever relations.
SIDA money also goes to the Women's Affairs Technical Committee (WATC), Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS), and Jerusalem Center for Women (JWC), which demonize Israel with the rhetoric of "apartheid," "ethnic cleansing," and "massacres." This language is repeated in NGO reports and and press statements, which are then reprinted in the media and amplified in the United Nations Human Rights Council.
NGOs supported by Sweden are also among the leaders in the effort to rewrite the history of the conflict in order to portray Israel as an "evil empire" and the world's worst violator of human rights. The Palme Center, run by the Social Democratic Party and leading trade unions, accuses Israel of "provok[ing] the al-Aqsa rising and the 'Second Intifada,'" and "disproportionate violence against civilians, unlawful executions and torture." The fighting in Gaza is also blamed solely on "the provocative Israeli occupation," rather than on the over 8,000 rockets launched by Hamas, or other forms of terror. The history of Arab rejectionism, the wars designed to "wipe Israel off the map", and the decades of massive Palestinian terror, are erased as part of this demonization.
Similarly, a Sabeel project [which is Christian], "The Nakba Memory, Reality and Beyond," used SIDA funding (SEK 540,000) "to commemorate the Nakba of 1948". Sabeel is a leader of the church divestment campaign, and its director, Naim Ateek, employs anti-Semitic themes and imagery in sermons promoting "Palestinian Liberation Theology."
Diakonia's "International Humanitarian Law" project and other Swedish government funding are behind the abuse of legal frameworks to demonize Israel. The "lawfare" movement uses courts in Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand to accuse Israelis of war crimes and similar charges. While all of the cases heard to date have been dismissed, the main purpose of this effort is to reinforce the incitement and hatred directed against Israelis through the rhetoric of morality and human rights. Using Swedish funding, lawfare cases are promoted by Al Haq and the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), which, like other such groups, accuses Israelis of "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity."
When NGO Monitor sent the draft report to the Swedish embassy in Tel Aviv and government officials in Stockholm, they refused to comment or to engage in a discussion of the implications of these reprehensible activities. Perhaps now, after the Aftonbladet report has highlighted the results of this demonization, they will reconsider and stop this destructive misuse of public funds.
Gerald M. Steinberg heads NGO Monitor and is a professor of political science at Bar Ilan University
A screen capture showing the article in Aftonbladet, with a picture of a dead Palestinian next to a picture of a New Jersey rabbi.- Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia's anti-Israeli activities
- Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia totally obsessed with Israel
- Conservative Swedish FM Carl Bildt likens Netanyahu to Hamas
- Sweden: when incitement against Jews is allowed
- Swedish government funds fuel Mideast radical NGOs
- Nina Witoszek: Europe has learned little from history
- Al Haq: Europe funding anti-Israeli NGO
- European funding for the narrative war, Gerald Steinberg
- Swedish journalist looks for Swedish extremist Jews
- "Are we using European tax money to promote peace or hatred?", asks ECI director
Sunday, 9 August 2009
Behind the Humanitarian Mask: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland
"Sweden is the Scandinavian country where anti-Semitism is thriving, where there is a scathing and poisonous anti-Israelism and demonization of Israel. This trend, which has its beginning at the end of the 1960s in the days of the radical Prime Minister Olof Palme, continued into the days of those who followed him and, at times it even intensified. Sweden, a seemingly secular country, has a very active partner in these negative trends - the Lutheran Church. How strange that this church runs the "Swedish Theological Center" in Beit Tavor on "The Street of the Prophets" in Jerusalem, where the study plan, the atmosphere and its leaders are so anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian."
Source: Norway, Israel and the Jews blog
Here is a book review by Moshe Yegar, a former Israeli ambassador to Sweden, printed in Israel Today, a scholarly journal.
Behind the Humanitarian Mask: The Nordic Countries, Israel and the Jews [in pdf]
Sweden
The Scandinavian countries - Sweden, Norway, Denmark - as well as Finland enjoy a very positive image in the world. Many people are convinced that these democratic countries aim for peace, that their policies are based on justice, concern for human rights and moral humanitarian considerations, and that they help the underprivileged of the world as well as those suffering in regimes of oppression. Apparently the first person to question this, at least in regard to Sweden, was the British researcher, Professor Roland Huntford, of Cambridge University. In 1972 he published a profound study of the Swedish regime under the Social-Democratic Party, which has ruled the country since the early 1930s till now, with short interruptions. The title of his book, The New Totalitarians, as well as it contents, is very informative.
The name of the book before us now, Behind the Humanitarian Mask, and its content as well, are equally instructive. Its editor Dr Manfred Gerstenfeld is one of the most outstanding experts on Western anti-Semitism today. This is the fourteenth book he has written or edited, either alone or with partners. This time he has concentrated on the three Scandinavian countries and Finland, with an interesting chapter on Iceland.
It is no surprise that this book reveals that Sweden is the Scandinavian country where anti-Semitism is thriving, where there is a scathing and poisonous anti-Israelism and demonization of Israel. This trend, which has its beginning at the end of the 1960s in the days of the radical Prime Minister Olof Palme, continued into the days of those who followed him and, at times it even intensified. Sweden, a seemingly secular country, has a very active partner in these negative trends - the Lutheran Church. How strange that this church runs the "Swedish Theological Center" in Beit Tavor on "The Street of the Prophets" in Jerusalem, where the study plan, the atmosphere and its leaders are so anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian.
Besides the government itself, there are many important groups within the ruling Social-Democratic party, as well as other active Leftists and journalists who are responsible for the anti-Semitic activity and the anti-Israeli demonization propaganda in Sweden. They all hide behind a self-righteous appearance, hypocritical declarations about concern for human rights and anti-Semitic hypocrisy expressed as moral superiority. These trends, sometimes inconsistent, go hand in hand in Sweden as well as in the neighboring countries. Since outward anti-Semitism is not very fashionable in the world today, since the Nazi regime in Europe, these poisonous ideas are masked as anti-Zionist or anti-Israel, and are much more acceptable today in Leftist circles, as well as in the Right, among the Lutheran clergy, academics and media personalities. All of these have been active in the last generation, together with fundamentalist Muslim clergy within the ever growing Muslim communities, which are strongly involved in promoting Islamic anti-Semitism.
One prominent example of typical hypocritical Swedish policy is its attitude toward the fate of Raoul Wallenberg, the greatest of the righteous Gentiles. As is well known, he was active in Budapest at the end of the Second World War and succeeded in saving many thousands of Jews. With him was a young Swedish diplomat named Per Anger. After the war Anger returned to Stockholm and continued to work in the foreign service until his retirement. He devoted many years to researching the fate of Wallenberg and to attempt to free him from the Soviets. After he retired, he published a book - a sharp and serious accusation of his government - in which he brought out details and proof that Wallenberg had been knowingly abandoned by the governments of Sweden throughout the years, due to their fear of the Soviets. For many years Sweden did nothing to bring about Wallenberg’s release or to find out what had happened to him. A major role in this was played by the well-known Swedish ambassador Gunnar Jarring, (who is best known in Israel because of his UN peace mission to the Middle East) during his term as Sweden’s ambassador to Moscow. Only around 1990, at the time of the disintegration of the Soviet Union, did Sweden begin to think of Wallenberg as an asset, to memorialize him, to turn him into a national hero and to recognize his work, as if that had been an official Swedish undertaking.
The successive governments of Sweden have contributed their share to the anti-Israel atmosphere by expressing anti-Israeli ideas in various spheres, and by giving money to Palestinian groups, through under-cover organizations and also up-front organizations. Part of this financial aid has been used for anti-Israeli propaganda, and perhaps even worse than that.
Included in the book is a very interesting interview with Zvi Mazel, who was Israel’s ambassador in Stockholm between December 2002 and April 2004. Mazel tells how he found a country whose hate for Israel is nurtured by ruling groups, which has an extremely hostile press, and which tends to preach morality in a superior righteous and boastful tone. He paints a picture which is not known to many. Dr. Mikael Tossavainen, a Swedish historian, publishes a study of Arab and Muslim anti-Semitism in Sweden, including acts of violence against Jews, which have occurred as a result of the large Muslim immigration.
In his article, Professor Gerald Steinberg of Bar-Ilan University tells of the plots of the Swedish Agency for Foreign Aid, a branch of the Swedish Foreign Office, which distributes general financial support to Palestinian organizations which, under the mask of humanitarian aid, is used for anti-Israeli activities. These are official Swedish actions. It is hard to understand how the Government of Israel seems to be totally indifferent to these activities and does not find a way to react. In view of what has been said till now, it is not difficult to understand how Sweden refused to bring Nazi criminals to trial, and even offered them immunity. Among them are Swedes who had volunteered for the SS, just as in Norway and Denmark, and there were many thousands of such volunteers.
Norway
The situation is not much different in Norway, another country which enjoys a very positive image in the world, but which also stands out in the level of anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism in the country, among the same types of groups as in Sweden, including government ministers, heads of the Lutheran church, trade unions, academics, etc. A particular Norwegian "specialty" is publishing anti-Semitic cartoons in the manner of the Nazi Stürmer. One article in the book deals with this issue. The radicalization of the extreme anti-Israelism stood out especially during the First Lebanon War (1982-1984), and has continued till now. There was no other country in the West where Israel was attacked - in an anti-Semitic way - so strongly as in Norway and its media. Here too there is a strong connection between extreme Leftist groups and Muslim groups in the distribution of anti-Semitic propaganda material. And to these we can also add neo-Nazi groups and Lutheran clergy.
Denmark
In Denmark as well there are waves of the "new" anti-Semitism and hatred of Zionism and Israel amongst the same groups, although there it seems to be a bit less malicious. Everyone remembers to compliment the Danes for good work during the Second World War and for their saving 7,000 Jews who were transferred in small boats to the Swedish coast in October 1943. It is only in the last decade that some very problematic and unpleasant facts hitherto unknown regarding the behaviour of Denmark during that period have come to light, including the degree of its cooperation with the Nazis. Facts about handing Jews over to the Nazis, as well as other unpleasant information about the treatment of Jewish refugees, have been uncovered. This subject is covered in this book in a special article written by two Danish researchers.
Another fact unknown until now is that about 6,000 Danish volunteers fought in SS units and even participated in the murder of Jews in eastern Galicia, together with Norwegian and Swedish volunteers. Since the War the governments of Denmark have done their best to keep this information secret, as well as the story of the cooperation between Danish food industries with contractor companies which worked for the German army, using slave labour and of course benefitting financially.
In another article negative information about the "white buses" affair is brought to light, as the Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte was connected to this. The first to expose this issue was the British historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, who was criticized for publishing his findings, yet he was revealing the truth. The great wonder was how Yad VaShem fell into this Swedish propaganda trap and erected a "white bus" on its premises. The management of Yad VaShem should have known that there are many question marks surrounding this issue.
Finland
Little is known about Finland’s behaviour during the Second World War. Finland has won great sympathy in the world, including from Jews, due to the "White War" she fought so valiantly against the Red Army, and because her leader, Marshall Gustaf Emil Mannerheim did not allow the Jewish-Finnish soldiers to be harmed. There were those in his government who wanted to hand them over to the Nazis. But Finland did also give up Jews to the Gestapo, especially Jewish soldiers in the Red Army who were taken prisoner. In a short essay, Professor Steinberg gives illustrative details of significant current Finnish financial help to Palestinian organizations, supposedly for humanitarian purposes, but actually it goes to less honourable use, especially anti-Israeli propaganda, much like the financial support from Sweden, Norway and Denmark (according to various rumors there are some organizations in Israel generally referred to as the "Peace Camp" which are also benefitting from these funds - a subject worthy of examination).
Iceland
The editor of this book, Dr Gerstenfeld, has done well in adding a very interesting article on Iceland, although this is an unusual issue and Iceland cannot be put in the same category as the other Scandinavian countries. This article examines the history of anti-Semitism in Iceland - an island where Jews arrived only in the 1930s- from 1625 till 2004. We have learned from other countries that Jews don’t have to be present in a place in order for anti-Semitism to develop. Anti-Semitism and anti-Semites existed in Iceland long before the arrival of a few Jews. The authorities of the island always made it difficult for any Jews who wished to settle there. It is hard to believe, but even in Iceland, before the Second World War, there was a small Nazi party. And several volunteers from Iceland also found their way into service in the SS. After the war, even in Iceland there were Holocaust deniers and those who distributed anti-Israel propaganda. And now, here we have an irony of history - the president of Iceland is married to an Israeli woman - Dorit Moussayef!
Dr Gerstenfeld has gathered very valuable material for this which must be brought to the attention of a wide audience. It is especially important that this book be distributed, as widely as possible, in the Scandinavian countries themselves. It would be good for those communities to see this book as the mirror it is, to see their picture without a mask, and perhaps this could lead to the birth of some positive groups who will be strong enough to bring about change.
Moshe Yegar
Source: Norway, Israel and the Jews blog
Here is a book review by Moshe Yegar, a former Israeli ambassador to Sweden, printed in Israel Today, a scholarly journal.
Behind the Humanitarian Mask: The Nordic Countries, Israel and the Jews [in pdf]
Sweden
The Scandinavian countries - Sweden, Norway, Denmark - as well as Finland enjoy a very positive image in the world. Many people are convinced that these democratic countries aim for peace, that their policies are based on justice, concern for human rights and moral humanitarian considerations, and that they help the underprivileged of the world as well as those suffering in regimes of oppression. Apparently the first person to question this, at least in regard to Sweden, was the British researcher, Professor Roland Huntford, of Cambridge University. In 1972 he published a profound study of the Swedish regime under the Social-Democratic Party, which has ruled the country since the early 1930s till now, with short interruptions. The title of his book, The New Totalitarians, as well as it contents, is very informative.
The name of the book before us now, Behind the Humanitarian Mask, and its content as well, are equally instructive. Its editor Dr Manfred Gerstenfeld is one of the most outstanding experts on Western anti-Semitism today. This is the fourteenth book he has written or edited, either alone or with partners. This time he has concentrated on the three Scandinavian countries and Finland, with an interesting chapter on Iceland.
It is no surprise that this book reveals that Sweden is the Scandinavian country where anti-Semitism is thriving, where there is a scathing and poisonous anti-Israelism and demonization of Israel. This trend, which has its beginning at the end of the 1960s in the days of the radical Prime Minister Olof Palme, continued into the days of those who followed him and, at times it even intensified. Sweden, a seemingly secular country, has a very active partner in these negative trends - the Lutheran Church. How strange that this church runs the "Swedish Theological Center" in Beit Tavor on "The Street of the Prophets" in Jerusalem, where the study plan, the atmosphere and its leaders are so anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian.
Besides the government itself, there are many important groups within the ruling Social-Democratic party, as well as other active Leftists and journalists who are responsible for the anti-Semitic activity and the anti-Israeli demonization propaganda in Sweden. They all hide behind a self-righteous appearance, hypocritical declarations about concern for human rights and anti-Semitic hypocrisy expressed as moral superiority. These trends, sometimes inconsistent, go hand in hand in Sweden as well as in the neighboring countries. Since outward anti-Semitism is not very fashionable in the world today, since the Nazi regime in Europe, these poisonous ideas are masked as anti-Zionist or anti-Israel, and are much more acceptable today in Leftist circles, as well as in the Right, among the Lutheran clergy, academics and media personalities. All of these have been active in the last generation, together with fundamentalist Muslim clergy within the ever growing Muslim communities, which are strongly involved in promoting Islamic anti-Semitism.
One prominent example of typical hypocritical Swedish policy is its attitude toward the fate of Raoul Wallenberg, the greatest of the righteous Gentiles. As is well known, he was active in Budapest at the end of the Second World War and succeeded in saving many thousands of Jews. With him was a young Swedish diplomat named Per Anger. After the war Anger returned to Stockholm and continued to work in the foreign service until his retirement. He devoted many years to researching the fate of Wallenberg and to attempt to free him from the Soviets. After he retired, he published a book - a sharp and serious accusation of his government - in which he brought out details and proof that Wallenberg had been knowingly abandoned by the governments of Sweden throughout the years, due to their fear of the Soviets. For many years Sweden did nothing to bring about Wallenberg’s release or to find out what had happened to him. A major role in this was played by the well-known Swedish ambassador Gunnar Jarring, (who is best known in Israel because of his UN peace mission to the Middle East) during his term as Sweden’s ambassador to Moscow. Only around 1990, at the time of the disintegration of the Soviet Union, did Sweden begin to think of Wallenberg as an asset, to memorialize him, to turn him into a national hero and to recognize his work, as if that had been an official Swedish undertaking.
The successive governments of Sweden have contributed their share to the anti-Israel atmosphere by expressing anti-Israeli ideas in various spheres, and by giving money to Palestinian groups, through under-cover organizations and also up-front organizations. Part of this financial aid has been used for anti-Israeli propaganda, and perhaps even worse than that.
Included in the book is a very interesting interview with Zvi Mazel, who was Israel’s ambassador in Stockholm between December 2002 and April 2004. Mazel tells how he found a country whose hate for Israel is nurtured by ruling groups, which has an extremely hostile press, and which tends to preach morality in a superior righteous and boastful tone. He paints a picture which is not known to many. Dr. Mikael Tossavainen, a Swedish historian, publishes a study of Arab and Muslim anti-Semitism in Sweden, including acts of violence against Jews, which have occurred as a result of the large Muslim immigration.
In his article, Professor Gerald Steinberg of Bar-Ilan University tells of the plots of the Swedish Agency for Foreign Aid, a branch of the Swedish Foreign Office, which distributes general financial support to Palestinian organizations which, under the mask of humanitarian aid, is used for anti-Israeli activities. These are official Swedish actions. It is hard to understand how the Government of Israel seems to be totally indifferent to these activities and does not find a way to react. In view of what has been said till now, it is not difficult to understand how Sweden refused to bring Nazi criminals to trial, and even offered them immunity. Among them are Swedes who had volunteered for the SS, just as in Norway and Denmark, and there were many thousands of such volunteers.
Norway
The situation is not much different in Norway, another country which enjoys a very positive image in the world, but which also stands out in the level of anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism in the country, among the same types of groups as in Sweden, including government ministers, heads of the Lutheran church, trade unions, academics, etc. A particular Norwegian "specialty" is publishing anti-Semitic cartoons in the manner of the Nazi Stürmer. One article in the book deals with this issue. The radicalization of the extreme anti-Israelism stood out especially during the First Lebanon War (1982-1984), and has continued till now. There was no other country in the West where Israel was attacked - in an anti-Semitic way - so strongly as in Norway and its media. Here too there is a strong connection between extreme Leftist groups and Muslim groups in the distribution of anti-Semitic propaganda material. And to these we can also add neo-Nazi groups and Lutheran clergy.
Denmark
In Denmark as well there are waves of the "new" anti-Semitism and hatred of Zionism and Israel amongst the same groups, although there it seems to be a bit less malicious. Everyone remembers to compliment the Danes for good work during the Second World War and for their saving 7,000 Jews who were transferred in small boats to the Swedish coast in October 1943. It is only in the last decade that some very problematic and unpleasant facts hitherto unknown regarding the behaviour of Denmark during that period have come to light, including the degree of its cooperation with the Nazis. Facts about handing Jews over to the Nazis, as well as other unpleasant information about the treatment of Jewish refugees, have been uncovered. This subject is covered in this book in a special article written by two Danish researchers.
Another fact unknown until now is that about 6,000 Danish volunteers fought in SS units and even participated in the murder of Jews in eastern Galicia, together with Norwegian and Swedish volunteers. Since the War the governments of Denmark have done their best to keep this information secret, as well as the story of the cooperation between Danish food industries with contractor companies which worked for the German army, using slave labour and of course benefitting financially.
In another article negative information about the "white buses" affair is brought to light, as the Swedish Count Folke Bernadotte was connected to this. The first to expose this issue was the British historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, who was criticized for publishing his findings, yet he was revealing the truth. The great wonder was how Yad VaShem fell into this Swedish propaganda trap and erected a "white bus" on its premises. The management of Yad VaShem should have known that there are many question marks surrounding this issue.
Finland
Little is known about Finland’s behaviour during the Second World War. Finland has won great sympathy in the world, including from Jews, due to the "White War" she fought so valiantly against the Red Army, and because her leader, Marshall Gustaf Emil Mannerheim did not allow the Jewish-Finnish soldiers to be harmed. There were those in his government who wanted to hand them over to the Nazis. But Finland did also give up Jews to the Gestapo, especially Jewish soldiers in the Red Army who were taken prisoner. In a short essay, Professor Steinberg gives illustrative details of significant current Finnish financial help to Palestinian organizations, supposedly for humanitarian purposes, but actually it goes to less honourable use, especially anti-Israeli propaganda, much like the financial support from Sweden, Norway and Denmark (according to various rumors there are some organizations in Israel generally referred to as the "Peace Camp" which are also benefitting from these funds - a subject worthy of examination).
Iceland
The editor of this book, Dr Gerstenfeld, has done well in adding a very interesting article on Iceland, although this is an unusual issue and Iceland cannot be put in the same category as the other Scandinavian countries. This article examines the history of anti-Semitism in Iceland - an island where Jews arrived only in the 1930s- from 1625 till 2004. We have learned from other countries that Jews don’t have to be present in a place in order for anti-Semitism to develop. Anti-Semitism and anti-Semites existed in Iceland long before the arrival of a few Jews. The authorities of the island always made it difficult for any Jews who wished to settle there. It is hard to believe, but even in Iceland, before the Second World War, there was a small Nazi party. And several volunteers from Iceland also found their way into service in the SS. After the war, even in Iceland there were Holocaust deniers and those who distributed anti-Israel propaganda. And now, here we have an irony of history - the president of Iceland is married to an Israeli woman - Dorit Moussayef!
Dr Gerstenfeld has gathered very valuable material for this which must be brought to the attention of a wide audience. It is especially important that this book be distributed, as widely as possible, in the Scandinavian countries themselves. It would be good for those communities to see this book as the mirror it is, to see their picture without a mask, and perhaps this could lead to the birth of some positive groups who will be strong enough to bring about change.
Moshe Yegar
Friday, 31 July 2009
By attacking Israel, Europe commits suicide, Fiamma Nirenstein
"The representatives of almost all the European countries were actually mirroring the image of what was happening in the European squares, where marches took place, sometimes so incredibly aggressive to choose as slogan "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas", as it has happened in the Netherlands.""In general, through the Barcelona Process, Europe fuels the conflict by funding all the organizations that call Israel a regime of apartheid and accuse it of war crimes."
Key-note speech at the inaugural event of the European Forum of the Knesset, by Fiamma Nirenstein, Vice President of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Italian Chamber of Deputies
Jerusalem, July 28, 2009
"[...] Europe is today damned by an incredible increase of anti-Semitism episodes, only in England the Community Security Trust, that provides security for the Jewish community have recorded 609 anti-Semitic crimes from January to June, while last years in the same period they were 276. The worst happened during the operation Cast Lead; the bias on Israel, I don’t have to tell you this, are the basic reasons of the growth either of anti-Semitism and political parallel positions against Israel in Europe. Nathan Sharansky has written about the double standards that show the anti-Semitism inside antisraelianism. [...]
In my fresh experience as a member of the Italian parliament and as a deputy president of the Foreign Affairs Committee, I found myself delegated as a member of Strasbourg’s Council of Europe, precisely at the Political Committee and its derivate, the Middle East Committee. The first plenary discussion about the Middle East that I have attended was for me a real shock. It was held at the end of January about Operation Cast Lead. I expected a generic sense of pain toward the civil population involved in the war, accompanied by the understanding of the unbearable situation of the people bombed by Hamas from Gaza; and therefore I imagined that there would have been a thoughtful, problematic discussion about the question of asymmetric war, an army fighting against the terrorist Hamas’ decision of aiming at civilians hiding beyond civilians. Nothing of this kind. I heard a long string of speeches, from the Swedish to the Spanish, from the British to the Russian representatives, who chose to focus not on the clash in itself, but rather on the supposed Israeli war crimes, the Palestinian suffering, and the occupation - as if Gaza were still occupied. I think that only the Canadian observer and myself voiced a different opinion. The rest expressed a deep antipathy toward the Jewish State, even beyond the expected. The representatives of almost all the European countries were actually mirroring the image of what was happening in the European squares, where marches took place, sometimes so incredibly aggressive to choose as slogan "Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas", as it has happened in the Netherlands.
In Italy, I will say it with pride, the Italy-Israel parliamentary friendship association, that counts a membership of more the 200 MPs, has been able on the contrary to organize a spectacular, courageous exit toward the square to support the Israeli right to self-defense; thousands of citizens were waiting for us in the square with Israeli flags, and the President of the Parliament, Gianfranco Fini, came out to greet us. The same attitude Italy has had about the Durban 2 conference in Geneva: our Parliament has been the first to vote unanimously for deserting the Conference, and our Minister of Foreign Affairs, Franco Frattini, has guided the little group of European countries (Germany, Holland and Poland) that declared the impossibility of joining the so called antiracism conference. But we cannot ignore that while standing and making a nice exit from the hall where Ahmadinejad was again calling for the extermination of the Jews, the European nations, except the Czech Republic, came back quickly into the Geneva assembly after he finished his speech.
The estrangement of Israel from Western Europe in my view is one of the most outstanding moral and diplomatic markers of our era. On the disintegration of any moral sympathy toward Israel, you can read the disintegration of Europe. The relations between Europe and Israel, do not only constitute a geostrategic axis that is aiming at the survival of a plurimillenary construction of democracy, and also at the physical survival of our civilization. It’s also the indicator, with other markers like low birthrate, aging population, fear and surrender in front of imported values that dismantle the conquers connected to the status of women and of sexual and cultural minorities, of the profound lassitude, the end of civilization weariness that holds in its grip the EU nations. It is also, as Ambassador John Bolton has written, the desire of being liberated forever from conflicts, war, from any problem that will recall the disgust and horror for itself that Europe felt after the Second World War. Since that time onward, Europe considers like a mistake anything connected to its own culture, to its own most intimate structure, its economic, familiar, national, juridical structure, its own civilization. Israel, felt as Europe rib, is a refused member of the family.
Moreover, the fact that religion has become a questionable, sometimes even laughable motivation, makes the State of the Jews become only an annoying incident. The Old Continent has a fantasy of having moved beyond history, and nowadays this attitude is enhanced by the USA new attitude. Sweden, which took over EU presidency on July the first, has been financing, according to “NGO-Monitor”, a precious watchdog organization of NGO activities, a radical NGO in the guise of human rights and humanitarian aids. Its activity is very relevant: Diakonia, Sweden’s largest humanitarian NGO, receives 9,3 million Euros and it distributes this money to some of the most radical centers, like the Alternative Information Center ("working with Peres Center for peace is morally disgusting") and Sabeel ("Israel places Jesus on the cross again, with thousands of crucified Palestinians everyday") [Swedish Christian NGO Diakonia's anti-Israeli activities, Swedish government funds fuel Mideast radical NGOs]. In general, through the Barcelona Process, Europe fuels the conflict by funding all the organizations that call Israel a regime of apartheid and accuse it of war crimes.
The Palestinians Center for Human Rights receives funds not only from the European Commission, but also from single countries like Norway, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland. This and a lot of other foundation program their appearances in public with booklets and researches so as to feed in coordinated times, always through funds that should encourage a peace culture, the culture of hate and war. I see this problem as a field of hard work for parliaments: discuss here where the citizens’ money go.The greatest confusion reigns in allocations of European programs, the names and possible conflicts of interest are hidden, the European Union deleted data in giving information to NGO Monitor. Lately a protest of the Israeli Ambassador to the Netherlands has brought the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs to claim they will stop funding the organization "Breaking the silence", that we know is financed also by England and Spain: just one of the many organization of opposition on the Israeli soil financed by European nations. Here I cannot but underline, with respect with every opinion, how much whenever any intellectual, NGO, famous writer speak against the morality of Israel this become an enormously amplified argument, widely used for extreme and damaging statements all over the net, the media, the political spectrum of power and public opinion: sometimes you really have the impression that no sense of responsibility seems to be taken in consideration in front of the need of expressing one’s opinions and sometimes even simple impressions.
This attitude is perfectly consonant with a sort of categorical European imperative to help the Palestinians, however and whatever: in spite of the international boycott called on when Hamas won the elections, aid to Palestinians grew from about 1 billion in 2005 to more than 1.2 billion in 2006, and billions of dollars are arriving now, after three billion dollars have been raised at the conference of Sharm el Sheik following the war of Gaza. Arab country promised 1.65 billion dollars, the US 900 millions, the EU 436 millions. Now, after a conference on the 12th of July, held between the UNDP, the UN Agency that supervises the distribution, and the UNRWA, it came clearly out that several mechanism permit the funds to arrive in the hands of Hamas itself. Actually, I don’t think that all this generates more than a formal eyebrows rise.
Europe was stopped by watering down the Quartet’s three condition for dealing with Hamas and making the dialogue possible, only by the speech of Netanyahu at Bar-Ilan on June 14th. The same happened with a Belgian proposal that was about to introduce a EU clause in its resolutions saying that East Jerusalem should be the capital of a future Palestinian state. Nowadays, Europe is fascinated by the "settlement complete freezing" way chosen by Obama and feel encouraged on its traditional way, again expressed by Javier Solana last surprising speech that saw in the Israeli "occupation" the source of almost all the troubles of war, much more than Iran and Afghanistan. [...]
The dramatic diffusion of hate against Israel is directly connected with the loss of the most important principles of freedom, a Judeo-Christian conquer. You cannot forget it while working with Europe."
Source: Fiamma Nirenstein blog
Europe Reimports Jew Hatred, by Daniel Schwammenthal
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