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Forum Post: If Obama can Win Nobel Peace Prize, Why Not IDF? By Robert Fisk

Posted 9 years ago on Aug. 11, 2014, 8:47 a.m. EST by flip (7101)
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Now I know that the Israeli Defence Forces are famous in song and legend. Humanitarian, courageous, self-sacrificing, restrained, willing to give their own lives for the innocents among their enemies, etc, etc.

Leon Uris’s Exodus – a racist, fictional account of the birth of Israel in which Arabs are rarely mentioned without the adjectives “dirty” and “stinking” – was one of the best pieces of Socialist-Zionist propaganda that Israel could have sought. Even Ben Gurion agreed, claiming that it was “the greatest thing ever written about Israel”, although he correctly dismissed any literary qualities this nonsense might have possessed.

But when the Israeli ambassador to the US told us (after almost 2,000 Palestinians had been slaughtered, most of them civilians) that the Israeli army should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for its “unimaginable restraint” in the Gaza war, I had to glance at the calendar. Was it 1 April, perhaps? Was this some kind of gargantuan joke, so obscene, so grotesquely inappropriate, that it contained some inner meaning, some kernel of truth, which I had missed?

The Nobel Prize for “unimaginable restraint”, according to Ron Dermer, should have been solemnly handed out to an army which much of the world believes guilty of war crimes.

Now of course, Ron was talking to a Washington summit of Christians United for Israel, and his audience, despite a bit of heckling, was receptive enough. After all, Christian fundamentalists in the US believe all Jews must convert to Christianity after the Battle of Armageddon, so they could certainly support a Nobel prize or two for the Israeli army’s “unimaginable” restraint.

Oddly, I find myself more in awe of the word “unimaginable” – what does this mean, for heaven’s sake? – than the “restraint” which the West always begs of Israel when it is flattening villages and cities (along with their occupants) in its various civilisational wars. Besides, if the Nobel Peace Prize can be awarded to Obama – presumably for public-speaking – why not hand the wretched thing to the IDF after another bloody war?

But seriously. Is Dermer, one of Benjamin Netanyahu’s most trusted advisers, simply delusional? At one point in his extraordinary address, he even referred to the RAF’s carpet-bombing of German cities in the Second World War – as if this was the template for Israel’s “restraint”. It was like the old Blair refrain that whatever mistakes we made in Iraq, we weren’t as bad as Saddam.

Well, I should hope not. But then Dermer went on: “I especially will not tolerate criticism of my country at a time when Israeli soldiers are dying so that innocent Palestinians can live.” These soldiers, according to Dermer, were being sent “into the hornet’s nest of Palestinian terror” – but WERE TRYING TO SAVE “INNOCENT” PALESTINIAN LIVES!

Is the man delusional? Well, don’t jump to this conclusion too fast. At the height of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza two weeks ago, its embassy in Dublin posted images on its official Twitter feed of the statue of Molly Malone in Dublin’s fair city – dressed in a niqab, the long black Muslim headscarf! (excuse the exclamation mark) – but this was either racist or monumentally childish. Over the image – Malone’s statue stands outside my old university, Trinity College in Dublin – were plastered in capitals the words: “ISRAEL NOW, DUBLIN NEXT.”

In case you think this was only for Irish consumers, another picture, addressed to Paris, depicted the Mona Lisa in a hijab and holding a missile. For Italy, the Israelis provided a picture of Michelangelo’s David with a skirt made of explosives. Denmark received a picture of the Little Mermaid holding a huge gun. “Israel is the last frontier of the free world,” was written on each.

This is surely beyond delusional. This is insane. A week earlier, the Israeli embassy in Dublin tweeted a picture of Hitler with the words “Free Palestine Now!”. These insulting tweets were taken down, but not before the Israeli ambassador to Ireland, Boaz Modai, had uttered the imperishable remark that “we are now in the middle of a war and I have other things to deal with”.

Well, you would have thought so, wouldn’t you? But alas, Modai, who has been a diplomat in London and the Holy See, was ambassador in Dublin more than two years ago when, at Christmas, his embassy’s Facebook page carried a post which said that if Mary and Jesus were alive today they would “probably end up being lynched by hostile Palestinians”. Accompanied by a picture of Jesus and Mary, the embassy’s comment read: “A thought for Christmas… If Jesus and mother Mary were alive today, they would, as Jews without security, probably end up being lynched in Bethlehem by hostile Palestinians. Just a thought…”

Among the comments condemning this outrageous message was one which read: “Have you no regard for honesty whatsoever? If Jesus and Mary were alive today, they would be protesting against the Israeli occupation of Palestine, along with all the Palestinian Christians living in Bethlehem.”

The embassy later took down the Facebook post, explaining that it was made “without the consent of the administrator of the page”, and cheerfully adding: “Apologies to anyone who may have been offended. Merry Christmas!”

I personally know several Israeli diplomats, one of whom – an experienced and retired ambassador whose family champion Palestinian rights – must be appalled at this tomfoolery. So are these ambassadors delusional? On balance, I fear not. I suspect they accurately represent a truly delusional government which is shaming the State of Israel.

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8 Comments


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[-] 7 points by ShadzSixtySix (1936) 9 years ago

“ISRAEL NOW, DUBLIN NEXT” and “Israel is the last frontier of the free world,” .. are the kind of reality detached, extreme hasbara propaganda memes .. that just don't cut it any more and get traction only with Fux Spews, Sean Insanity and Bill O'Really type right-wing loons. Irish people know their history and have huge solidarity with Palestinians. For an alternative perspective from voices of real integrity, please see :

fiat lux ...

[-] 4 points by flip (7101) 9 years ago

i am afraid that obama, powers and kerry are all too close to believing this nonsense - while they may be more civilized in their speaking (barely) their actions tell the story. what a sad comment on elite education - does teh phrase "best and brightest" ring a bell

[-] 6 points by ShadzSixtySix (1936) 9 years ago

The ''best and brightest'' in American politics and policy making, are all too often those who do not stray from 'The (One) Party Line' and who don't question the establishment's shibboleths re. Empire and the parasitic / symbiotic relationship of The USA with The Zionist Apartheid Entity and The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Further consider :

''Already the aftermath of Israel’s invasion is being prepared for. A massive rebuilding effort will have to take place and life and death health emergencies proliferate. The injured need medicine. The dead need burial. Food and water? Electricity? Israel has decimated Gaza’s infrastructure – sewage facilities, electric plants, hospitals – the very lifeblood of any society. Was this Israel’s plan all along, to once again set Palestinian life back, to keep Gaza and the Palestinian people picking up their pieces so their long sought freedom would be permanently delayed ?''

ad iudicium ...

[-] 4 points by flip (7101) 9 years ago

sounds all to familiar no? iraq, libya, syria - all the same story with the complicity of obama and the west. my turkish friend told me that syrian rebels were allowed safe haven in border towns in turkey long before the story was news. the west is complicit in the destruction of much of that part of the world. and why - can it be that they want to create more terrorists - if that is not the reason they must be pretty stupid because that is what they are doing.

[-] 4 points by ShadzSixtySix (1936) 9 years ago

Your Turkish friend has it right. The major Jihadist training bases are just a few miles from Incerlik in Turkey & the other US base in Northern Jordan (whose name escapes me right now). Furthermore, I append fyi :

The USA, KSA, ZAE (Zionist Apartheid Entity), Turkey, Jordan & most of the Gulf States .. all on same side it seems - when it comes to Syria, Iraq and thus probably ultimately - Iran. It's a li'l bit scary, imho.

multum in parvo ...

[-] 1 points by MattHolck0 (3867) 9 years ago

it would not be OK to slaughter arabs if terrorists weren't create either

[-] 2 points by flip (7101) 9 years ago

true we have slaughtered brown and black people (red and yellow also) for hundreds of years - none of it was ok but the rulers still do it - including our nobel peace prize winner

[-] 2 points by MattHolck0 (3867) 9 years ago

Nobel created the piece prize from it's dynamite production profits

because of the use of dynamite in wars