Thursday 10 June 2010

............A Post From One Of Australia's Papers / News Sites On Helen Thomas......

.......................interesting is all I wil say................ 2 Centers??????

They say the older you get, the less you care about what people think. The physical reason for elderly insouciance may be frontal lobe degeneration resulting in a loss of inhibition and social judgment.
But that's no excuse for the vile anti-Semitic outburst by Helen Thomas, America's "dean" of the White House press corps, who said Jews should "get the hell out" of Israel and "go home" to Poland or Germany.


Facing a barrage of well-deserved criticism, Thomas resigned on Monday from her job as a columnist with the Hearst News Service, just a couple of months before her 90th birthday. The doyenne of presidential press conferences going back to John F. Kennedy's days thus ended her 70-year career in disgrace.But her outburst was no aberration. She held her honoured status in the front row of the briefing room with the blessing of colleagues whose benign tolerance of her extreme utterings is a testament either to their belief in free speech or their relief at having her say the things they were too polite to ask.

In one press conference she prefaced a typical tirade by calling then president George Bush "the worst president in all of American history". However debatable that statement was, such ideological sloganeering didn't belong in a White House press conference and reflected poorly on the press corps as a whole.

Thomas's latest comments were videotaped two weeks ago by Rabbi David Nesenoff of RabbiLive.com who was interviewing people at a Jewish heritage celebration at the White House. They only came to prominence when posted on the Drudge Report website last weekend, at the height of world condemnation of Israel for the botched raid on the Gaza "peace" flotilla. They make for illuminating reading.

"Any comments on Israel? We're asking everybody today," asks Nesenoff, who is clearly Jewish, and is wearing a yarmulke, as do his 17-year-old son and his friend.
"Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine," says Thomas.
"Oh. Any better comments?" asks Nesenoff, a bit taken aback.
Thomas: "Remember, these people are occupied, and it's their land, not German and not Polish."
Nesenoff: "So where should they go? What should they do?"
Thomas: "They should go home."
Nesenoff: "Where is home?"
Thomas: "Poland. Germany."
Nesenoff: "So you're saying the Jews should go back to Poland and Germany?"
Thomas: "And America, and everywhere else."


It's such an extraordinarily stupid and shameful statement for anyone who has any knowledge of World War II history, let alone someone who lived through it. But Thomas, the daughter of Lebanese migrants, never made a secret of her anti-Israel sentiments. At one point a White House press adviser sarcastically thanked her for putting the "Hezbollah view". This time, she was just indiscreet enough to express the view that so many of her left-wing Hamas-sympathising ilk in the media do more subtly.

In fact, Thomas should be lauded for her honesty, because her solution is the realistic endgame of the chorus of condemnation of Israel the world has been indulging in ever since the "peace" flotilla of terrorist sympathisers, useful idiots and friendly media sailed for Gaza.
How can a deliberate act of provocation be an act of peace?


Some in the flotilla thought breaking Israel's blockade was a noble humanitarian mission but that doesn't mean hard-core Islamists among them weren't bent on violence, which resulted in nine deaths.

A few facts: Israel's occupation of Gaza ended in 2005. Gaza is under the control of Hamas, the Iranian-backed militant Islamic group declared a terrorist organisation by the United States, Canada, the European Union and Israel. In Australia, only its military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, is so designated.

In Hamas's charter is the destruction of Israel and its replacement with a Palestinian Islamic state. Hamas has fired thousands of rockets at Israeli civilians.

The reason for Israel's blockade of Gaza is self-defence. It doesn't want Hamas to bring lethal weapons into Gaza to fire at its neighbour. Humanitarian aid already goes into Gaza, where the reality is more complex than the flotilla story of bringing medicines and food.

The Washington Post correspondent in Gaza reported last week: "Grocery stores are stocked wall-to-wall with everything from fresh Israeli yoghurts and hummus to Cocoa Puffs smuggled in from Egypt. Pharmacies look as well-supplied as a typical [US chain store]."

During a typical week in May, the Post reported, Israel allowed in 637 truckloads ferrying 14,069 tonnes of food, medicine and other supplies, but it said joblessness was rampant, the economy broken and infrastructure falling apart.

There is no easy option here. Israel either allows Hamas to bomb it into oblivion or it keeps the blockade and hopes Gazans eventually become disillusioned with Hamas.

Strategically, according to impartial analysts inside and outside Israel, such as Stratfor's George Friedman, Israel blundered in not anticipating the violence its commandos would meet when they were lowered from helicopters onto the flotilla vessels. It allowed itself to be provoked and further alienated from the global community.

Certainly, the initial analysis in much of the media was hysterical and unfair. Since then, coverage has been balanced by footage of the "peace" activists attacking Israeli commandos with iron bars and knives as they landed on deck.

Reuters news agency has been criticised for cropping two photographs to remove knives shown in the hands of activists surrounding bloodied Israeli commandos.

But the logic or fairness of Israel's position will never matter to Helen Thomas and her fellow appeasers, who see Israel as the sacrificial lamb.

There were 6 million Jews murdered in Germany and Poland whose silence is an eloquent answer to Thomas's solution to the Middle East's problems.

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4 comments:

Martin said...

While I thought Ms Thomas's suggestions were insensitive and uncalled for, this reply of yours is as insensitive of the facts as they come. Talk about being taken in by propaganda!

Damien said...

Hi Martin,

Firstly - welcome to the blog :) - I love it when new people come to the blog and comment - comments / feedback / suggestions - all welcome ;)

Secondly - This article was not written by me. Hence was I said it was posted in one of Australia's Papers - Please read the whole blog post :)

Third - I notice you basically posted anonymously with no recourse of an email or a blog of your own ... with that in mind .... please have some manners when you visit my blog. When you make a comment that appears to be ill-informed, it makes me wonder if you read the whole article.

It is - after all - the little things that keep us civil in a world where it is anything but :)

Anonymous said...

Good on her resigning.... what an insensitive cow.

Martin said...

Thanks for your reply, Damien. I read the full post but I did misunderstand the context. I take back "this reply of yours", substitute "the post" and add that the poster is either a propagandist or well taken in by propaganda.