German parliament declares Israel boycott campaign antisemitic

It isn't just Germany but it does seem to be quite strong there and Germany seems to be getting a lot of the criticism

https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/how-israeli-influence-squashing-free-speech-germany

In Germany it is that, it the UK it is ongoing false claims of antisemitism trying to get rid of Corbyn so that there will not be a social democratic party in the UK.

https://anotherangryvoice.blogspot.com/

and sadly in both it is a strong assault on democracy.

 

con t'd.
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/...anys-anti-bds-law-limiting-freedom-expression

It does of course add that if antisemitism among some people arise that is to be condemned.

So let's see where Germany goes. Will it allow its citizens free conscience and the Democratic liberty of freedom of political thought or will it keep it a criminal offence to protest Israel's colonisation of Palestine.

 

Naturally.

I'd like to know that myself.

We (the west in general) went wrong somewhere along the line and we don't know when to draw that line. I think it might be the U.S. that started the ball rolling and now it's a snowball.
1. In the U.S. the "N" word is illegal ... and so it should be.
2. But then "black" became a bad word too ... unnecessary.
3. Calling a person of Polish descent a "Polack" is considered an insult in the U.S. despite the fact that the term "Polack" is the Polish word for ... wait for it ..... a Polish person.
4. Referring to someone as a "Jew" is also frowned upon and I don't understand why you have to say "Jewish" instead.

If calling some black or a Jew or a Polack offends someone then who is it who is the racist/anti-Semite? I say the racist is the one who thinks of those terms as being offensive, ie. singling people out as something undesirable. And the line is now blurred in the extreme by the pseudo-non-racists' guilt so that criticizing Israel is making its' way into the modern definition of anti-Semitism. And ain't it funny that the Palestinian/Arab/Moslems are also Semites? Beam me up, Scotty!

 

I think they are two different situations. Israel and if the UK is anything to go by some of her right wing Jews, will do anything to get criticism of Israel called antisemitism. They do not care about genuine antisemitism which comes in massive majority from the extreme Right. They are determined to get criticism of Israel called antisemitism in as many countries as they can. They started first in the UK managing to get Theresa May to ban councils being involved in BDS. They contiued. They were taken to court and the court ruled that as we were a demcoracy, people had the right to an Independent position to the government on political things - which is what talking about Israel is. This is a big problem in the US as well with many States making practising BDS illegal and of course in Germany and France. I am sure I heard Boris saying he intends on managing what May did not. So far English Courts have refused to label what is a political decision - not supporting Israel apartheid/colonisation etc as antisemitism. They understand the difference but this is becoming a problem for most supposedly democratic countries. In this case the UN is dealing with it with regard to Germany, Is Germany going to criminalise German people for their position on Israel's treatment of the Palestinians and their take over of their land. Any country which accepts this has given up the right of Free Political Thought. The public is told what it should think.

I am not sure about the others. I believe in the UK we call people of colour Black and I understood that was what they wanted to be called. The only one I have a suspicion I know the reason why, is calling someone Jewish rather than 'a Jew'. I think this is because of history that it reminds Jews of when people saw them as 'a Jew' rather than a human being. However you bring up another interesting point here in that sometimes people accidentally say or do something which is racist or antisemetic when they do not know it is and then get called names. Britain's left wing Jews understand this and try to get people to understand what antisemitism is and what is not without trying to ruin their life for making a genuine mistake. This allows people to know what genuine antisemitism is and avoid it while understanding criticism of Israel is not antisemitism. They do it as well. The same I think with other odd words. If they are used to steriotype the person as I understand calling someone 'a jew' then they would certainly be being racist. Obviously if they do and you don't know that, it would be better if someone let you know before blaming you for being racist when you are making an honest mistake.

 

I had to look up "BDS".

It's no wonder the Palestinians hate us which brings me to another misconception of our own doing. We (the west, although the U.S. in particular) boast of our Democratic principles. We want the world to see us as Democracies. So here we are, a self-professed Democratic people with our freedom of speech - freedom of expression, and most important ..... 'DEMOCRATIC VOTE'. And there sit the Palestinians, the Irakis, the Iranians watching as "we" make up lies about WMD's - illegally invade (without UN sanction) - murder, maim, torture, and destroy one country after the next ... all in the name of gifting the world with our glorious, 'Democratic Principles'. I may never forget that newsreel when the Yankee trucks rolled into Iraq and that poor sod of a young, American soldier sitting at the rear of one lorry, looking at the camera and proudly proclaiming, "We brought Democracy to Irak!" Have you seen that?

Now, I wonder why it is that so many Arabs spit to the floor when the term "Democracy" passes their lips and why it is they think we are all to blame for the atrocities committed by the likes of Bush & Blair? After all, we have Democratic vote, so we (all of us collectively) must have wanted it this way, right?

 

I didn't know Palestinians hated us...I don't think they are too keen on the US though. People have been saying we are not democracies since really about the beginning of Neo Liberalism, The UK had a group called Charter 88 - Here is the beginning of their first Charter

https://unlockdemocracy.org.uk/resources-index/2016/07/04/charter-88

John Smith, then Labour Leader with a 20 point lead in the polls was a lawyer who firmly believed in Democracy and was determined if he got into power that he was going to make the foundations of Democracy in Britain so strong that it would be as near as impossible as possible for any Government to destroy them. These things included, a written constitution, human rights, Freedom of Information, a Federal Britain where every part had an equal say in what happened and changes to our courts to make the as Independent as possible. John Smith died and Tony Blair took over. He had some responsibility to carry this through as he went with Smith to Charter 88 and agreed this would be done but what he did was muted. A Parliament for Scotland and National Assembly for Wales but that was it. There was a vote for a National Assembly in Northern England but they were told all it was about was getting more money from them so it voted no and that was the end. There was some work to improve the courts independence and on some of the other things but it was half hearted and their was no work on a written Constitution. The final belief was that Blair chose Neo Liberalism over British Democracy.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/op...ew-epoch-for-democratic-resistance-has-begun/


At the time of his death, Smith had a twenty point lead. It is impossible to imagine how different not just the UK but the world would have been if he had not died. He would not have agreed to the Iraq war.

I see the Ban on BDS as the final seal on the end of Democracy in the West. If this goes through then we have agreed that Government rules what we believe in and that protest, and independent thought are totally the preserve of the Government. Recently when I think of 'Democracies' in other countries which we used to be encouraged to look down on I am in no way sure who has the more democracy. Western Liberal Democracy is certainly dead. Trump is saying good bye to International law - he has said that he is going to act disproportionately, he has illegally murdered a General of Iran and I think the Iraqi one he also murdered was also a General, he has made it clear he is prepared to destroy world heritage sites for fun, he is warning Iraq he will destroy them if they demand his military go and his mate Pence has said according to Zarif, that if the Iranian Government does not do what the US wants it is going to starve the people of Iran. We shadow this. I see it nearer world war 2 Germany than any democracy. We still have a vote. There is a little hope in that...but look what happened when someone wanted to give the people of the UK genuine democracy and rights again. The media all turned against him calling someone who had worked all his life against racism including antisemitism a racist and antisemite. Pence, I think it was him but one of them was caught saying on a secret recording to a Jew that if he managed to get through the grinding (what the press was up to with all the lies) they would make sure he never became PM - presumably they would have killed him.

and yes, the damage we have been involved in in destroying the ME is a crime against humanity. The UN is only now daring to call to account the West. In large Part we, who invented it have given up on its intentions.

No we are no longer democratic. We worked hard to become genuinely so during the 50's to 79 but Mags and Reagan and their friends who did not like Democracy pulled a fast one on us.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/john-smith-and-path-britain-did-not-take/

 

The BDS movement against Israel is led by Palestinians and other Arabs who are sympathetic to their cause. It is partly motivated by their hatred toward the Jews who persecuted them for over 50 years since the founding of the Jewish state. The majority of Koreans also support anti-Japan boycotts to address their historical grievances. It is illegal for any Arabs to visit Israel, while South Koreans are currently prohibited from travelling to Japan under the government-run boycott campaign.

 

I am a stalwart believer in Democracy and have been since I was old enough to understand what it means. I think though that we have had our run, a damned good one, that is now waning and morphing into Fascism with our media & government rhetoric resembling slowly but surely that of Stalin's USSR. We are witnesses to Cold War “Good Guys and Bad Guys” exchanging their places with one another. It took nearly 70 years for meaningful corrupted Communist reform to be sanctioned from within. What is in store for us and how long will it reign?

 

Where I think we mainly disagree is I do not believe that we have changed places.

 

Anything specific?

 

Well do you believe that Russia is now a democratic country with the kind of values we aspired to?

 

The left does not like Jews. Even left wing Jews don't like Jews. The cadres may say that they aren't anti Semitic, just anti Zionist but the bottom line is that the comrades don't like Jews.

The left does not like success. It likes well meaning failure and the chance to patronise life's victims. It does not like anyone who climbs off the bottom by their own efforts. Which is the story of a lot of Jews. And that cuts out the left, which hates the Jews accordingly.

 

Well you are following the Israeli thing of calling Israel Jews aren't you. Interestingly it is rightfully considered antisemetic to blame all Jews for what Israel
does. The British left have the least antisemitism in the UK. The British far right have the most as they always have done but I get we are living in the world of post truth. You would appear to stereotype everyone.

https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.or...ire-the-myth-of-a-labour-antisemitism-crisis/

 

I believe that the U.S. is now NOT a democratic country with the kind of values to which it professes to aspire and is moving ever further in the opposite direction of those aspirations while Russia is moving step-by-step towards an appreciation and improvement with those aspirations in mind. One is getting better, the other is getting worse.

 

Well I am not expert on Russia but I understand it to be authoritarian run by fantasies. Indeed a few weeks ago I read a marvellous article on that and that being connected with Putin and what happens when the fairy tale is no more. Russia appears to have gone through several phases and when it started adopting Dugan was pretty much down in the dross. At that time it started supporting the European far right trying to destroy the EU in order that Europe without disintegrate into Ethnic Nationalist States who would join Russia's Eurasian Union instead. They had a whole blueprint. France and Germany were to be given special powers. They were quite happy for the UK to be out as they believed being an island the UK would always be liberal which they cannot stand. Their hope was that the US with the UK hanging on would become isolated in the world and Europe would change its allegiance from the US to Russia. Given how the US as been acting one would think it had been in on it.

I don't see Russia as a democracy any more than us. Indeed when John Keane, Political Theory Prof at Sydney University, was talking about the West being taken over by a new form of despotism, if I remember correctly, Russia was the one who was already there.

I will grant you that Russia has not acted as bad as the US on foreign policy - but then there are things like all those Russians being killed in their flats or the cineaa and it being blamed on the Chechens when there are suspicions that it was the Putin himself to get his war with Chechyna. I don't trust either of them.

 

BDS is truly anti-Semitic and a sign of people being easily duped by the nation that produces chess grandmaster after grandmaster after grandmaster!


https://www.tldm.org/news9/russianinfluenceonmideast.htm

 

I am a Jew and I have no problem with people boycotting products from the settlements. I think boycotting all Israelis and Israeli institutions is stupid and unwise as you may also end up boycotting allies, but I'm not ready to make the leap to suggest that all of BDS is anti-Semitic.

 

Israel only fights to defend !!
As an American and Jewish my support lies with Trump and Israel

 

You better wise up because this BDS garbage is all about destroying Israel and nothing else
. Pick a side

 

You Germans have not learned your lessons from two wars .

 

Thinking that one german user on this board represents a nation of 83 mill. and making this a WWI/WWII related topic shows that someone has probably never learned anything and is, sad to see, completely unfamiliar with german domestic politics.

 

Germany has been destroyed from wlthin by Marxist Merkel
She has destroyed Germany more than any US Air Force bomb .
Man did we turn your cities into ash lol

 

Man, are you clueless and dumb. Lol.
Painfully clueless, but that's to be expected when talking to most 'mericans.

 

Germany is a 2nd rate nation

 

I am sure glad that you did not write 3rd rate, that would have been devastating.