NO TREE WILL SHELTER TALI FAHIMA

Jewish anti-Zionists have been around since the day when Imperial Rome banished the Jewish people from their own homeland. They don't fit the normal description of a "Jew" but then, what's normal about the Jews?

Ami Isseroff looks at "The future of Jewish anti-Zionism - a Zionist analysis) and concludes that "the social contradictions of the Palestinian movement must lead to the exclusion, if not the annihilation, of the anti-Zionist Jews" and that "it is far better for them if it happens sooner, rather than later. "

"There is no getting around the problem. Anti-Zionist Jews are still Jews. What is the point of getting rid of one type of Jew, if at the end of the day, the Arab Palestinians are to be controlled by a different type of Jew? The problem is highlighted by the rise (or rather the recrudescence) of Islamist ideology among Arab Palestinians. As the Hadith observes, before the end of days, the Muslims will kill all the Jews. It doesn't exempt anti-Zionist Jews. A Jew is a Jew and remains a Jew. A Jew is liable to support outlandish and evil notions like the right of Jews to settle in Palestine, or to oppose time honored customs like wife beating or honorable pursuits like suicide bombing. The Jews will try to hide behind trees. But no tree will shelter Tali Fahima or Ilan Pappe or Jeff Halper."

Many of those Jews who question Israel's right to exist may soon have to confront their own right to exist as Jews - if that's what they really were in the first place.

HUNGER IN PALLYWOOD

Full marks to Elder of Ziyon for raising the one about The Independent (UK)'s story written by Patrick Cockburn in Gaza about staving Gazans - 'Gaza is a jail. Nobody is allowed to leave. We are all starving now''.

According to Cockburn:

"Gaza is dying. The Israeli siege of the Palestinian enclave is so tight that its people are on the edge of starvation. Here on the shores of the Mediterranean a great tragedy is taking place that is being ignored ...

A whole society is being destroyed. There are 1.5 million Palestinians imprisoned in the most heavily populated area in the world. Israel has stopped all trade. It has even forbidden fishermen to go far from the shore so they wade into the surf to try vainly to catch fish with hand-thrown nets ...

There are signs of desperation everywhere. Crime is increasing. People do anything to feed their families ...

'It is the worst year for us since 1948 [when Palestinian refugees first poured into Gaza],' says Dr Maged Abu-Ramadan, a former ophthalmologist who is mayor of Gaza City. 'Gaza is a jail. Neither people nor goods are allowed to leave it. People are already starving. They try to live on bread and falafel and a few tomatoes and cucumbers they grow themselves.'"

This article was published 18 months ago. In the meantime, no one can point to a single Gazan who has died of starvation since that date because the story was mostly lies and exaggeration then as it is now. The only thing about it that remotely approximates reality is the claim made that a "whole society is being destroyed" and the only reason why this is so close to the mark is because it's Hamas that is doing the destroying.

The rest of Cockburn's piece was meant to be swallowed by the gullible in an attempt to make readers hate Israel, sympathise with the Palestinians and provide convenient cover for those who were firing missiles at Israeli schools on a daily basis well before the "siege" began. Of course, people like Cockburn expect the Israelis to turn the other cheek whenever those missiles are fired and whenever Jews in the region are under attack from those who seek to destroy them.

THE TRUE NATURE OF HAMAS

Hamas is a racist movement dedicated to destroying the State of Israel and to killing Jews. No amount of posturing by deceitful commentators and supporters in the west can hide away this fact because its true nature is contained within its own charter of hatred. New York Times reporter Steven Erlanger (who has often been critical of Israel in the past) has seen the ugly face of the movement and reports here on how its systemic racism is harming moves towards peace between Israel and the Palestine Authority - Hamas’s Insults to Jews Complicate Peace Effort.

"Since Hamas took over Gaza last June, routing Fatah, Hamas sermons and media reports preaching violence and hatred have become more pervasive, extreme and sophisticated, on the model of Hezbollah and its television station Al Manar, in Lebanon.

"Intended to indoctrinate the young to its brand of radical Islam, which combines politics, social work and military resistance, including acts of terrorism, the programs of Al Aksa television and radio, including crucial Friday sermons, are an indication of how far from reconciliation Israelis and many Palestinians are."

Readers of the Melbourne Age won't have the opportunity to read about Hamas' ugly face thanks to the work of Fairfax Middle East Bureau chief Ed O’Loughlin who is expert at whitewashing Hamas' nefarious activities including its cynical manipulation of the minds of children who it controls through its media. Age readers have already missed the sick psycopathic TV mouse, TV bee and TV rabbit - all practiced in the art of killing Jews. These have now been superceded by a nasty, disgusting little TV puppet which teaches little Palestinian kiddies how to murder George Bush - Hamas TV puppet 'kills' Bush as revenge for U.S., Israeli actions.

Hamas kills off Bush and the Age kills off the story - that what the cycle of violence in this region is all about!

AT THE ZOO

A biker was riding by the Melbourne Zoo, when he saw a little girl leaning into the lion's cage. Suddenly, the lion grabbed her by the cuff of her jacket and tried to pull her inside to slaughter her, under the eyes of her screaming parents.

The biker jumped off his bike, ran to the cage and hit the lion square on the nose with a powerful punch. Whimpering from the pain the lion jumped back and let go of the girl. The biker then took her to her terrified parents, who thanked him profusely.

A reporter from a big city newspaper who was in town after a long stint in an overseas posting saw the whole scene, addressed the biker saying, "Sir, this was the most gallant and brave thing I saw a man do in my whole life."

"Why, it was nothing," said the biker.

"Really, the lion was behind bars. I just saw this little kid in danger, and acted as I felt right."

"I noticed a patch on your jacket," said the journalist.

"Yeah, I ride with an Israeli motorcycle club," the biker replied.

"Well, I'll make sure this won't go unnoticed. I'm a journalist and tomorrow's paper will have this story on the front page."

The following morning, the biker found a broadsheet newspaper in his favourite little coffee shop and read all about his previous day’s heroics. The front-page headline read:

"ISRAELI GANG MEMBER ASSAULTS AFRICAN IMMIGRANT AND STEALS HIS LUNCH"

DISSENTERS SHOOT THEMSELVES IN THE FOOT

The Independent Australian Jewish Voices is in tatters but what remains of the rump of this bitterly anti Zionist lobby continues to trot out that highly overused line about dissenters in the Jewish community not being heard. So for the 100th time, Messrs. Peter Slezak and Antony Loewenstein have today lodged their complaint in the Melbourne Age in the form of an Op Ed article about that hoary old chestnut - the fact that, as dissenters fighting against the so-called "Israel lobby", their voices are being silenced.

The truth of the matter is that a little over a week ago, the pair were given the opportunity in the Australian Jewish News of all places to voice their opinions on their scandalous attempt to align the rank and file of IAJV signatories with the notorious Nakba Advertisement that co-incided with the bipartisan resolution in Federal Parliament congratulating Israel on its 60th Anniversary.

So much for being silenced!

As if that's not enough, Slezak and Loewenstein go on to again demonstrate how little they understand about the conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbours. It's one thing to be critical of individual actions of Israelis in the past but they really shoot themselves in the foot by citing a largely discredited book on the "lobby". This is what they have to say:

"In their controversial book The Israel Lobby, John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt point out that the popular image of David confronted by Goliath, cultivated to maintain Jewish support, is the reverse of the truth."

Mearsheimer and Walt's thesis on this aspect of the Israel/Arab narrative was demolished soon after their views were first published by no less eminent an historian than Benny Morris. Slezak and Loewenstein cannot dispute Morris' credentials because they quote him later in their own Op Ed article and they call him a "leading Israeli historian".

In order to appreciate the enormity of the howler Slezak and Lowenstein have committed by slavishly following the Mearsheimer/Walt fantasy line, I commend you to an article by that leading Israeli historian Benny Morris in which he completely shatters the very foundations of their argument - THE IGNORANCE AT THE HEART OF AN INNUENDO. And Now For Some Facts. His opening paragraph gives an insight of what follows:

"John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt's "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy" is a nasty piece of work. Some of what they assert regarding the terrorist tactics of certain Zionist groups during the 1930s, and the atrocities committed by Israeli troops in the War of 1948, and the harsh Israeli measures against the Palestinians during the second intifada, and certain activities of the pro-Israel lobby in the United States over the past decades--some of this is correct, and I realize as I write this sentence that it will henceforth be trotted out by the Mearsheimers and Walts of the world, as by their Arab admirers, while they omit the previous sentence and all that now follows. But what these distinguished professors have produced is otherwise depressing to anyone who values intellectual integrity."

Exactly the same thing can be said about Slezak and Loewenstein's sloppy efforts although one should add that while they once might have been able to claim that their views had the support of 0.05% of Australia's Jews, the number has fallen to 0.005% and still heading south.

WATCHING HUMAN RIGHTS AT THE U.N

Roz Rothstein, CEO and International director of StandWithUs, spoke before the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland last week. It seems the Egyptians and Iranians protesteth too much ...

HOT HOUSES AND A MASS MURDERER

The following comes with greetings from Jerusalem on behalf of Keren Malki and written by Frimet and Arnold Roth:-

The New York Times carries a review of a film called 'Hot House' that goes inside Israeli prisons and examines the lives of Palestinian prisoners. We're not recommending the film or the review ... but we do want to share our feelings with you about the beaming female face that adorns the article.

The film is produced by HBO. So it's presumably HBO's publicity department that was responsible for creating and distributing a glamour-style photograph of a smiling, contented-looking young woman in her twenties to promote the movie.

That female is our child's murderer. She was sentenced to sixteen life sentences or 320 years which she is serving in an Israeli jail.

Fifteen people were killed and more than a hundred maimed and injured by the actions of this attractive person and her associates.

Neither the New York Times nor HBO are likely to give even a moment's attention to the victims of the barbarians who destroyed the Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem and the lives of so many victims.

So we would be grateful if you would pass along this link to some pictures of our daughter whose name was Malki. She was unable to reach her twenties - Hamas saw to that.

Though she was only fifteen years old when her life was stolen from her and from us, we think Malki was a beautiful young woman, living a beautiful life.

We ask your help so that other people - far fewer than the number who will see the New York Times, of course - can know about her.

Please ask your friends to look at the pictures - some of the very few we have - of our murdered daughter.

They are at: http://www.kerenmalki.org/photo.htm.

And remind them of what the woman in the Israeli prison - the woman smiling so happily in the New York Times - said last year.

"I'm not sorry for what I did. We'll become free from the occupation and then I will be free from prison."

With so many voices demanding that Israel release its terrorist prisoners, small wonder she's smiling.

TIMELINE - 27 MARCH 2002

Today is the sixth anniversary of the Passover massacre, a suicide bombing carried out by Hamas terrorists in the Park Hotel in the Israeli coastal city of Netanya. The attack occurred on a night when the traditional Jewish holiday of Passover was being celebrated. The Park Hotel was holding a Passover dinner for its 250 guests in a ground-floor dining room when a Palestinian suicide bomber entered the room and detonated an explosive device carried in a suitcase. Twenty-eight people were immediately killed, and about 140 were injured, of whom 20 were seriously injured. Two of the injured later died from their wounds. Many of the victims were Holocaust survivors.

The attack triggered Operation Defensive Shield, an operation in which Israel was falsely accused by many in the mainstream media of carrying out massacres against the Palestinians. The fiercest fighting in that period took place in Jenin where investigations later ascertained that 52 Palestinians died, 45 of who were combattants. Thirteen Israeli soldiers were also killed, most of them in a booby trapped building.

Yesterday, Omar Jabar, the Hamas mastermind who planned the attack and dispatched the suicide bomber to the Park Hotel, was captured - Israel: Hamas mastermind captured - and the world yawned.

DOING IT HIS WAY...

The word is out that Ed O'Loughlin is packing up his desk in preparation for his long awaited departure from Fairfax. This is possibly the reason why there's been such a reduced output from his neck of the woods of late. Last week for example, the Melbourne Age had just one report from Jerusalem and it was a nice sympathetic piece about the visit to Israel of German PM Angela Merkel - Holocaust fills Germans with shame, says Merkel. It was written from Jerusalem by Richard Boudreaux of the New York Times and represented a marked departure from the style of reporting we have become used to from Fairfax when it comes to matters Jewish. Not surprisingly, the Jerusalem Bureau Chief had nothing at all to do with the article.

O'Loughlin might have been on assignment elsewhere, perhaps in Gaza where he has been in the past when important stories have broken in Jerusalem but that doesn't make sense because if that were the case he would have picked out some of the following:-

Hamas militias attacked the Egyptian embassy in Gaza City. The embassy officially moved to Ramallah but it still seemed to maintain a skeletal presence in Gaza and according to Palestine Press Agency, Hamas assualted a guard and ransacked the building, taking down the Egyptian flag.

Humanitarian aid coming into Gaza was plentiful with one hundred truckfuls of food entering Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing, including ten trucks from Egypt. Israel also sent some 61,000 animal vaccines to Gaza and is coordinating their distribution and the analysis of blood samples.

Hamas abducted more Fatah officers in Gaza. [Hat Tip for these: Elder of Ziyon].

And where was Ed while all this news was breaking?

Doing things his way, no doubt.

DEFENDING THE INDEFENSIBLE

I promised a while ago that I would refer back to Australian Jewish News columnist Tzvi Fleisher as soon as his response to Ed O'Loughlin's embarrassing self-serving article was available (THE LAME DUCK QUACKS - READERS HAVE THEIR SAY). Events overtook me somewhat but better late than never:-

ED O’ LOUGHLIN’S JOURNALISM: DEFENDING THE INDEFENSIBLE

When responding to critics, it’s always a good idea to get your facts right!

COMMENT: Why should he get his facts right when responding to critics if you can't get them right in the first place?

Krystallnacht, USA. Could it happen here?

A disturbing piece from debbieschlussel.com. It's happening there, it's happening in Britain and there is evidence of it stirring in Australia.

AND JUSTICE FOR ALL

Late last month the United States Congress recognised the suffering and terrible injustices visited upon the Jewish refugees of the Middle East.

Jews and Jewish communities existed throughout the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf region for centuries and although they were rarely accorded equal rights by their hosts, they generally lived peacefully until the rise of Arab nationalism saw the emergence of a widespread pattern of persecution and the mass violations of the human rights of Jewish minorities.

With the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948, the status of Jews in these Arab countries deteriorated. Many were uprooted from their homes and others became "political hostages of the Arab-Israeli conflict." The end result is that only handful of more than 850,000 Jews resident in the Arab states at the turn of the 20th century remain there today. The great majority have been absorbed as citizens of Israel.

Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) who introduced the resolution in Congress, Jerrold Nadler said: "It is simply not right to recognize the rights of Palestinian refugees without recognizing the rights of Jewish refugees, who, in fact, outnumbered their Palestinian counterparts. By any definition, these displaced Jews are refugees, and we should recognize them as such."

The Resolutions are the strongest declarations adopted by the U.S. Congress, on the rights of Jewish and others refugees that were forced to flee Arab countries.

TOGETHER FOR ISRAEL

TOGETHER FOR ISRAEL

PALESTINIAN PURIM PARADE

The Palestinian propaganda machine together with its friends in the west have been ripping off the Jewish people for decades. They seek to revise our history in the most devious and underhand manner with the concept of Nakba (a 'catastrophe' for them because they lost a war to exterminate us) and with odious comparisons between the suffering of Jews in the Holocaust and the way they perceive they have been treated in the six decades since Israel became an independent state.

Palestinian refugees are kept in squalid camps and are refused basic human rights by their hosts so that for generations the people have been used as political pawns in a war against the Jews. The war is fought from inside populated areas and they attack non-combatants but when Israel creates a security barrier to keep these murderers out they cry 'apartheid' - yet another one of their nasty untruths. Israel is in negotiation with the Palestine Authority to resolve all differences between the sides; it ended its occupation of Gaza two and a half years ago and its citizens were attacked from the territory it left. But that's not enough for some people.

The latest rip off is the traditional parade held by Jews to celebrate the Festival of Purim which takes place tomorrow. In the photographs displayed here, local Palestinians and their supporters are shown lining up outside the Crown Casino on Tuesday evening in true Purim spirit and parading as a travelling freak show. The award for the best and freakiest in the parade would go to the bearded people in the photographs below.




These people are rabid in their senseless attacks on Israel and the Jews. Some in the crowd openly yelled out anti-Semitic comments at arriving guests while presumably, the few Jews among them stood shtum - silent. And their banners, like the one below make no sense to anyone (unless they happen to be the therapists of the sad individuals carrying them). The ludicrous comparison of Israel with Apartheid has been well and truly debunked here: Franchising Apartheid




I am reliably informed that a small number of those who took part in the parade are or were once Jews. This fits in nicely with the concept of betrayal that lies within the story of Purim. One price they are paying for the betrayal of their people and the attempted theft of its history is the fact that they find themselves part of this obnoxious parade of freaks.



FOOTNOTE: At least one of the small number of Jewish protesters on Tueday night was Alex Nissen (I'm not sure if it's a he or a she) and it would come as a surprise to nobody that this person is one of the signatories to the infamous Nakba Advertisement which appeared in last week's Australian. Two of her co-signatories are co-authors of a letter in the current edition of the Australian Jewish News which will go down in history as one of the worst attempts to backflip and regain face in the history of the Jewish community in this country. LAntony Loewenstein and Peter Slezak along with James Levey are all of Sydney but really, they would have been right at home with this crowd in Melbourne last Tuesday night.

THE DEATH SEEKERS

Visitors to Melbourne's Crown Casino last night must have wondered about the handful of protesters who congregated vainly with their hateful and fraudulent posters decrying Israel while 1,200 supporters of that country were inside listening to the Prime Minister giving a glowing tribute to the Middle East's beacon of democracy.

One bystander told me she had little difficulty identifying the problem with the protesters and the reasons why they and their cause lacks credibility - the hatred inherent in their message. It's a message that will not assist the Palestinian people who continue to suffer under the jackboot of their rejectionist, terrorist leadership.

In the video 'We seek death like you seek life' Palestinian MP Hammad, a leader of the Izzedin al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, admits his group uses women and children as human shields for its murderous attacks on Israeli schools, kindergartens, hospitals and homes.

"[The enemies of Allah] do not know that the Palestinian people has developed its [methods] of death and death-seeking. For the Palestinian people, death has become an industry, at which women excel, and so do all the people living on this land. The elderly excel at this, and so do the mujahideen and the children. This is why they have formed human shields of the women, the children, the elderly, and the mujahideen, in order to challenge the Zionist bombing machine. It is as if they were saying to the Zionist enemy: 'We desire death like you desire life.' "

Hammad is also director of Al-Aqsa TV, which aired his comments on February 29. The same hatred and racism clearly evident in his voice was rife among the 30 or so demonstrators in the parking area outside the Crown Casino. Their mood and their sentiments provide ample reason why their cause garners so little support among decent men and women in this country.

SOMETHING IN THE WATER

A Right-wing protester is hit with an elbow as he is arrested by police in Jabel Mukaber Sunday.Photo: AP

On Sunday, hundreds of right-wing activists stoned Arab homes in East Jerusalem in an attempt to raze the house of the family of Ala Abu Dhaim, murderer of eight students in the shooting spree at Mercaz Harav Yeshiva - 22 nabbed in right-wing Jebl Mukaber protest. In doing so the protesters were behaving no better than those of their neighbours who throw stones and worse at Jews in different parts of the country and in the Palestinian territories. Such behaviour is reprehensible and must not be condoned.

The comments of some Arab MK’s have not been helpful either. Hadash Chairman Muhammad Barakei described the attacks as "pogroms" and blamed not only the protesters but also the "government's policies, which nurtures these groups and sabotages any progress towards peace and calm." Someone should suggest to Barakei that perhaps the murders themselves, the reaction of thousands of Palestinians who celebrated them and the incitement on Palestinian media both from the PA and from Hamas are also likely to hamper progress towards peace?

HAMAS AND THE IRA - A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE

It's St. Patrick's Day and the topic of conversation is whether the Israelis should talk with Hamas in the same way as the British and the IRA eventually resolved their conflict by peaceful means after negotiation.

This is the argument against as put by Israel's ambassador to Ireland, Zion Evrony - Hamas is not the IRA.

"While there are some similarities between these two complex and protracted conflicts, and indeed some lessons can be learned, it is a dangerous exercise to conclude that they are the same because of their largely different historical, geopolitical and cultural circumstances. Especially, the different importance attached to religious beliefs in the IRA's and Hamas's political platforms ...

"Such expectation is rooted in the assumption that when two parties with diametrically opposing views engage in a dialogue, the dynamic created changes the chemistry of the conflict, moderates the positions of both sides and makes a compromise possible. Although this theory may be valid in some cases, unfortunately it is not in the case of Hamas."

GRAND PRIX JOURNALISM

Melbourne is gripped by Grand Prix fever today and, although I live some kilometres away from the Albert Park track, I can hear the cars warming up for practice. We've also been treated in recent days to some Grand Prix journalism here from our national daily, The Australian. There's a selection of it here, here and here.

The Weekend Australian's editorial forcefully puts the case why Australia cannot be bullied out of backing Israel and describes it as an "island of hope in a sea of darkness":

"The Weekend Australian supports the bipartisan goodwill shown to Israel in parliament this week that acknowledged the unique relationship that exists between the two countries and the shared commitment to democracy, the rule of law and pluralism. We share the Government's belief that the establishment of an independent and economically viable Palestinian state must remain a key objective in the Middle East peace process, just as Israel deserves the right to exist within secure borders. As Brendan Nelson told parliament, in a region of the world that is characterised by theocracies and autocracies, the state of Israel is the custodian of the most fragile yet powerful of human emotions, and that is hopeful belief in the freedom of man, freedom of speech, freedom of religion and freedom of assembly."

In stark contrast we have the shrilling tomes of incessant Israel basher, the Sydney Morning Herald columnist Alan Ramsay who complains about the one sidedness of Wednesday's motion congratulating Israel on attaining its 60th Anniversary in Blinkers off for the other side of story.

Ramsay lauds right wing Liberal MHR Sussan Penelope Ley who spoke on the subject in Parliament on Wednesday evening:

"When Ley got the call 7½ hours later, at 7.38pm, to speak on the adjournment, there were five people in the public gallery, four Labor MPs and two Coalition MPs in the chamber, and one journalist in the press gallery."

Ley's message was nowhere near as rabid as that which Ramsay usually spouts on and on about but what the hell - anything to bash the Jews around the head will do when it comes to the spitefulness of his kind. That way, the Canberra Times can cover a story about 100 MP's voting overwhelmingly on a motion in terms of those missing MP's who are automatically assumed to have snubbed it (even though in most cases, the absences were for entirely unrelated reasons) but when 6 MP's are on hand to listen to Ley, Ramsay can only rant about the message being delivered by the speaker and the fact that "the other side of the story" isn't being covered properly.

Which is all a real hoot coming from a writer for the Fairfax organisation whose Jerusalem Bureau chief has a consistent record of failing to cover one side of the story for six years and Ramsay hasn't, to my knowledge, complained about it even once in all that time!

DOUBLE TALK

The majority of the Independent Australian Jewish Voices have disowned him and the Australian Jewish News has labelled him a "fraud". He supported the Nakba Advertisement in this week's Australian - the one that conveniently ignored most of the historic events of 1948 and concentrated solely on a warped narrative of the Palestinian revision of history.

We know that Loewenstein’s knowledge about the history of the conflict is rather limited and he confirmed this ignorance by his support of the Nakba Advertisement in this week's Australian.

The advertisement failed to mention the UN vote in November 1947 that favoured the establishment of a Jewish state alongside an Arab state, its rejection by all Arabs including the Palestinians and the subsequent invasion of the area by surrounding Arab nations with the stated aim of pushing the Jews "into the sea". It ignored Israel's Declaration of Independence in 1948 which gave equal rights to all citizens in the land including full voting rights and recognition of Arabic as an official language of the state. And it did a blank page job on the current malaise of Palestinian terrorism with its callous disregard for innocent human life on both sides and which seeks to perpetuate conflict and avoid a peaceful outcome.

That's why the only democracy in the Middle East has the unqualified support of the leadership of both major Australian political parties.

But far worse than his knowledge of 1948 is Loewenstein’s understanding of the here and now. This is his letter published in the Sydney Morning Herald last Thursday (13 March, 2008) headed "Many Jews feel shame about Israel's actions":-

Robert Goot and David Knoll (Letters, March 12) round on Alan Ramsey for suggesting that Palestinians will not be celebrating Kevin Rudd's parliamentary motion on the 60th anniversary of the Jewish state.

They use the armoury of Israeli Foreign Ministry talking points to portray the Palestinians as bloodthirsty terrorists out to obliterate all Jews. Many Israelis do not agree, a majority recently telling a Haaretz-sponsored poll that they believed in talks between Hamas and the Israeli government. Despite the rhetoric in the Western media, many in the Hamas leadership have consistently offered a long-term ceasefire and accepted a two-state solution.

After unilaterally disengaging from Gaza in 2005, Israel has maintained an economic blockade. Israel targeted civilians at the end of the 2006 Lebanon war by dropping cluster bombs in the last days of its botched campaign. Mr Goot and Mr Knoll paint Israel as a robust democracy in the heart of the Middle East, conveniently ignoring the ever-expanding illegal occupation in the West Bank and racially discriminatory policies in Israel proper.

Many Diaspora Jews, myself included, remain ashamed at Israel's behaviour. It does not speak in my name.

Antony Loewenstein Petersham

The outrageous claims about Hamas offering ceasefires and of its so-called support for a "two- state solution" is Loewenstein's hallmark - it's all double talk. A Hamas ceasefire is one which permits it to rearm and permits other terrorists to continue fighting with its support. There is no evidence whatsoever of any Hamas acceptance of a "two-state" solution but even if it were true, then it's worth knowing that Loewnstein's "two-state solution doesn't mean a Jewish State and an Arab State living side by side together in peace as contemplated in United Nations Resolution 181 of 1947. What he really means is this:

"Mr Loewenstein ... said he supported Israel's right to exist but did not believe in the idea of a Jewish state that discriminated against non-Jews." - Jewish voices in discord after Israel ad. Now, that's what I call "double talk" and it's why his former allies are running away from him at a rate of knots.

CELEBRATING SIXTY

On Wednesday 12 March 2008 a motion was moved in Australia's Parliament by PM Kevin Rudd to commemorate Australia's role in the establishment of the State of Israel and to commend Israel's commitment to democracy, the rule of law and pluralism. It reiterated Australia's commitment to Israel's right to exist and to finding a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

Here are some photographs taken at the Israeli Ambassador's Reception held in the Mural Hall of Parliament House after the Motion was overwhelmingly passed with bipartisan support from both sides of the House of Representatives: -