PETTY CASH

The Melbourne Age yesterday published a vile excuse for a cartoon by one of its resident scribblers who goes by the very appropriate name of "Petty". It makes little sense but it's clearly a pro Hamas piece and is typical of the uninformed and ignorant rubbish that could only emanate from a newspaper edited by someone who once published an opinion piece that suggested Israel and the Mossad were behind the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington.

Hamas is in power by virtue of a democratic election in much the same way as Hitler and Mugabe were democratically elected but Petty would never dare to put together a comic little piece in support of the thuggery that has forced Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangarai out of Friday's Presidential poll, would he?

Quite apart from the historically incorrect and the odious nature of Petty's daubing, what makes the publication of his racist attack on the Jewish State and its people even more incrdible is its timing.

Now, in the early days of the truce between Israel and Hamas, when Israel is living up to the terms of its agreement and allowing in a promised 30 per cent increase of food and commercial goods into Gaza which it said it would do when the violence against its citizens stopped.

Now, when people of goodwill seek to bring about peace by negotiation in this troubled region.

Then again, his cartooning work leads one to to doubt whether Petty knows or understands the broader issues of the conflict and the difficulties involved in achieving a peaceful two state solution when you have a thug movement which advocates the destruction of one of those states and genocide against the Jews.