I didn’t write that title, WaPo did. They are suggesting that the Arab leaders are focusing the anger of the Arab street on Israel. But what upset me is that the article points out everything Israel is doing wrong and nothing the Arabs are doing wrong to Israel. Thus the editors at WaPo are also scapegoating Israel.Ted Belman
By Editorial Board Opinion, WaPO, Tuesday, September 13, 2:34 AM
ISRAELIS WORRY that the Arab Spring is turning from a popular movement against dictatorship into another assault on the Jewish state, and their worry is not unfounded. Last week in Cairo a mob attacked the Israeli Embassy, forcing the evacuation of the ambassador and most of his staff; the previous week the Israeli ambassador to Turkey was expelled. Later this month Palestinians are expected to introduce a resolution on statehood at the United Nations, and Israel could be further isolated if, as expected, a large majority of the General Assembly votes in favor of it.
There’s little doubt that plenty of Arabs and Turks are angry at Israel. But it’s worth noting that, as often is the case in the Middle East, those passions are being steered by governments.
The assault on the embassy in Cairo has been condemned by the leaders of Egypt’s popular revolution and by some leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood. Both they and Western diplomats blame the ruling military for failing to secure the embassy, and they suspect the omission may have been part of an effort to divert rising public unrest toward a familiar target.
In the West Bank, polls have shown that President Mahmoud Abbas’s U.N. statehood initiative is regarded as a low priority by the majority of Palestinians, 60 percent of whom said the better option was resuming direct negotiations with Israel. But Mr. Abbas fears he may be the next target of popular uprising; the U.N. gambit appears aimed in part at preempting that.
This is not to say the trend is benign. Israel is looking more isolated than at any time in decades. It is more than a hapless bystander: Mr. Netanyahu’s government could have avoided a crisis with Turkey had it been willing to apologize for the deaths of nine Turks during the interception of the flotilla, which the U.N. panel rightly judged to be an excessive use of force. An incident in which five Egyptian guards were killed when Israeli forces pursued terrorists crossing the border helped to trigger the upsurge in tensions with Cairo. And Mr. Netanyahu’s slowness to embrace reasonable parameters for Palestinian statehood provided Mr. Abbas with a pretext for his U.N. initiative.
It nevertheless is in the interest of Western governments, as well as of Israel, to resist the counterproductive and irresponsible initiatives of Mr. Abbas and Mr. Erdogan. In Egypt, the military has cited the attack on the Israeli Embassy as a pretext to apply emergency laws and censor the media; those, too, are steps in the wrong direction. The core demands of the Arab Spring have nothing to do with Israel: They are about ending authoritarian rule and modernizing stagnating societies. Scapegoating Israel will not satisfy the imperative for change.
You have really interesting blog, keep up posting such informative posts!
yamit82, please learn to read actual news stories before threatening to assault people. The reality is that the girl was not paying attention and the professor was talking about the dangers of certain opinions. The facts of this story are concrete and have been reported. She also questioned his heritage and said “no one will ever know” if he is truly Jewish.
Read the story here: http://www.theatlanticwire.com/national/2011/09/listen-accusing-your-professor-anti-semitism/42469/
If you have any interest in seeming like a productive citizen of the world and not someone who threatens violence when they haven’t taken the time to understand an issue, feel free to take back your earlier comments.
Anonymous Coward says:
Well Coward ( you chose well your screen name) Seems like you and those Jewish wusses bought the good prof. explanations!
I understood the context and I disagree with his premise. Everyone IS entitled to his/her own opinion but if one states an antisemitic remark in my presence, you betcha I would assault him. I don’t buy his disclaimer that he chose to use a vile anti Jewish sentiment because he himself is Jewish. He could have said all women, liberals, leftists should be sterilized, all Muslims, Catholics or Christian fundamentalists, Queers, Blacks, Japs, Native Indians, Eskimos to make his point or he could have used a non generic, non ethnic,gender or religious example as examples. He didn’t he chose Jews. He wanted to be offensively shocking so he picked what he thought for him would be the safest group, The Jews!
As I said I believe he used Jews because he believed he would not incur the wrath of any in the class and because he probably is a self hating Jew to begin with. I’m tired of being used as a Jew in others agendas.
Professor Cameron Johnston was talking about how everyone is *not* entitled to their own opinions and gave “All Jews should be sterilized” as an example of an unacceptable and dangerous opinion. (Morality aside, in the Canadian context, this argument is literally, legally true.)
Sarah Grunfeld was too busy trying to get on Facebook to listen to the lecture. Not only did she get the context of the quote wrong, she got the lesson of the lecture EXACTLY backwards. She is, in other words, a both an idiot and too despicably dishonest to admit when she has made an error.
You would have assaulted someone for saying the OPPOSITE of what he had really said and proved his argument true: everyone is *not* entitled to their own opinions.
Sources:
Jewish prof forced to defend himself against anti-Semitism claims at the Toronto Star.
Statement on the Recent Controversy at York University by The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs
Statement on the recent controversy at York University at Canada-Israel Committee
Is she or are you the idiot?
Was she? If I had been in the class, I would have agreed that he was entitled to his opinion but so was I and I would have put him in the hospital for a long time to think about it.
Notice he didn’t use Muslims as an example or gays, Blacks or Eskimos. etc. He chose specifically Jews knowing that the Jewish wusses would not challenge his attempt to shock his students,ostensibly to make a point. Apparently only one was shocked (Sarah Grunfield), who was at least and offended enough to make an issue of the #$%^&* professor.
Even and maybe especially if he is Jewish, (Cameron E. Johnston)? I would consider him an ignorant lowlife insensitive self hating SOB. So he hides behind academic freedoms but anyone with a brain and it ain’t you Beastor T , would grasp the wider dimensions and underlying programed forethought of this professor. Let’s see how PC Canada handles this compared to anti Muslim slurs.
Musical intermission to prove a point”
Some Tea-party Favorites
They Aint Makin Jews Like Jesus Anymore
Oh, and the Egyptian guards wouldn’t have been killed had they not have either looked the other way or possibly aided the terrorists outright who murdered Israelis.
In the name of “fairness” and politically correct moral equivalence, WAPO couldn’t simply have condemned the actions of Turkey and Egypt in its editorial without finding fault with Israel also.
First of all Israel doesn’t owe Turkey an apology since Turkey was clearly the aggressor which committed an act of war against Israel by sending the jiihadist IHH aboard the mavi marmara with the purpose of deliberately provoking Israel. Secondly, IDF commandos boarded the ship with paintball guns. How is that amount to the use of “excessive force”? The commandos only used deadly force after their own lives were in danger from being beaten with lead pipes, knives and whatever else they were attacked with upon descending the Mavi Marmara. Why is it so difficult for the liberal media to admit that Israel is in the right, her enemies are wrong, period? Why is it that they ALWAYS equivocate? Why does the liberal media muddle these situations and find it impossible to see Israel’s conflicts with her enemies as what it actually is, an issue of black and white? Israel being the victim of her enemies attempts to destroy her while Israelis only want to live their lives in peace. There is no “cycle of violence” and there is not fault with both sides. There is aggressor and victim. Israel being the victim of constant arab and muslim aggression. One has to be morally deficient not to see the situation in those obvious terms.
Sarah Grunfeld is an idiot. She was too quick to make unfounded accusations against a FELLOW JEW.
http://sassywire.wordpress.com/2011/09/13/york-u-prof-cameron-johnston-did-not-make-an-anti-semitic-comment-in-his-class/
Yam, You and Israel have my prayers; and God hears and answers me.
In listing the signs of the times, you didn’t mention the BUS CAMPAIGN in Europe last year. The signs say, in big, bold letters,
THERE IS NO GOD.
If Erdogan has declared war against Israel, the rest of NATO has fired a shot across the bow of the Almighty. In other news, an atheist blogger is looking forward to the day when all believers are annihilated, so the atheists can begin their, in his very words, “Utopia of Reason”. That reminds me of the “Cult of Reason” during the wild, murderous, head-rolling time of the French Revolution — the event which, not coincidentally, marked the “coming out” of Atheism.
Concerning Egypt, Ezekiel 29:
Concerning Turkey, Ezekiel 38:
The Muslims have a bad habit of leading with their lips, inviting a knockout punch. Egypt will come to nothing, despite all its expensive American military hardware; and Turkey will be forced by its Muslim pride, along with Iran and a couple of others, into a futile attack against Israel. Israel will then spend seven years burying their dead.
THEN the rest of NATO will attack, probably led by the US.
The time to speak against them is now, so that some might find God. We’re all gathered in Sampson’s temple. My prayer for Israel, is that they turn to God and find eternal life. I pray the same for my family and myself. The real battle is within. One way or another, this body perishes; what matters, is how we use it.
God bless and keep you, Yam.
York U prof: “All Jews need to be sterilized”
Posted on September 12, 2011 by Sassy| 21 Comments
Student, Sarah Grunfeld writes:
Pray for the Jewish people
Check out the links in each item
Barbarians at the gate:
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has dispatched 3 warships to the Eastern Mediterranean to ‘defend against Israeli vessels’.
Saudi Arabia threatens the U.S. if they veto palestinian state bid.
KAPOS trying to prevent Israel from defending itself from upcoming violence.
Jordan’s Abdullah: “Jordan and the future Palestine are stronger than Israel is today. It is the Israeli who is scared today”.
Russia supports Palestinian bid to win UN statehood.
The era of Egypt-Israeli peace is over.
Iranian nuclear plant steps up operations.
Erdogan says flotilla raid was ’cause for war’.
That says enough in itself, not to mention that Turkey has resisted with genocide on a grand scale, attempts by its own Kurdish population to come to a “two state solution” in Turkey.
Bring him on! Let’s see how he performs in the ring, the wimpy turd.