"War on Want" Wages War on Israel
The British charity organization "War on Want," which is ostensibly dedicated to fighting global poverty, has just published a glossy, 15-page pamphlet [pdf] outlining global strategies for “boycott, divestment and sanctions” against Israel.
According to the Jewish Chronicle (JC), some British MPs are not too happy about it:
Liverpool Riverside Labour MP Louise Ellman said the publication was “very questionable” for a charity. Ilford North Conservative MP Lee Scott found it “disgraceful. I’m going to ask the Charity Commission to look into it”.
A government spokesman said that War on Want had received backing of £1.1 million from the Department for International Development, but none of this was for projects in the Middle East.
A War on Want representative told the JC: “ We helped fund [the booklet] and we are happy to promote it.”
Um, ok...is the Department of International Development aware that money is fungible?
Anyway, the JC offers this take on the pamphlet:
Turgid text filled with references to economies driven by “transnational accumulation” and “the fusion of local capital into the global circuits of ownership” is lightened only by images of Jaffa oranges dripping (presumably Palestinian) blood. It is hard to understand how such tedious academic drivel is supposed to further the cause of peace and understanding in the Middle East — even if anyone bothered to read it.
Indeed, my "favorite" part of the pamphlet is where it encourages readers to draw lessons from the Arab League's boycott of Israel:
The decline of the boycott in the 1980s was a reflection of the splits in pan-Arab co-operation and growing regional disunity. It also stemmed from the numerous occasions when League states continued to trade with blacklisted companies,
in line with sovereign or elite interests and to the detriment of boycott unity. Egypt’s treaty with Israel in 1978 had already sharpened the regional fractures and as pan-Arab cooperation declined the boycott gradually relaxed from the early 1980’s. Many companies that had previously stayed out of the Israeli market began to invest including Toyota and Nestlé. The Oslo Accords and normalization appeared to land a final blow to the boycott, and today bar a few exceptions, trade and links with Israel are developing across the Middle East.
Peace treaties? Normalization of relations? Oh, the tragedy! It speaks volumes about War on Want that they characterize these as negative developments for the Middle East.
posted by Judeosphere @ 8:53 AM
3 Comments/Kvetches
3 Comments:
Presumably the War on Want folks never bothered to read the UN report of a year or so ago that showed the economic impact of the 2nd Intefada on residents of the PA, and the relative prosperity of Israel's Arab citizens when compared to fellow Arabs and Muslims in nearby oil producing countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran. Israel's Arab citizens enjoyed a standard of living that was twice the average for the KSA and the ISI.
Asshats!
This is very much off topic (I hope you do not mind too much but I thought readers here may find the following comments box exchange highly amusing.)
Every now and then (well more often than I care to admit) I get involved in debates on strange anti-Zionist sites - often with Jewish anti-Zionist - they are a funny bunch.
The latest exchange was, in my opinion, hilarious. It can be seen in the comments section to the following post
http://jewssansfrontieres.blogsp...-one- about.html
The thread is quite long - but the relevant bit is that on the 08.19.07 at 8.46pm a poster by the name of Luther Blissett misquoted David Ben-Gurion as saying "We must expel the Arabs and take their places." This was a complete fiction but the quote is all over the internet - most probably originating from Benny Morris's book. At 9.48pm that evening - I point this out to him - but the fun really started at 08.20.07 at 6.17pm when Stephen Marks decides to get involved and challenge me.
For those of you who do not know who he is, Stephen Marks is a UK based anti-Zionist Jew who associates himself with Jews for Justice for Palestinians.
Anyway the thread gets increasingly involved as of course I am able to back up my case but meanwhile Stephen Marks and the site owner Mark Elf resort to hysterical abuse and call me a liar and all of other names under the sun until they eventually ban me.
If you are bored and interested in this sort of nonsense you may find reading it as hysterical as I found writing it.
Warm regards and sorry for the intrusion,
Mikey
Ah yes, War on Want; Gorgeous Galloway's old stamping ground.
It became insolvent, was wound up but re-started in the early 90's.
Now that its well established again with a fairly solid reputation, it looks like the old, ticks, lice and leeches have begun to climb back on board.
We can expect more of the same from them in the future I fear.
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