Merciful Jews forgive Nazi Grave vandal - no word on SA

A very heartening article, and a move I support

The Jewish community has taken pity on one of the youths who desecrated graves at a cemetery in Auckland with Nazi symbols - causing worldwide outrage - and is even offering to pay his university tuition fees so he can turn his life around.

What an amazingly positive step.  I always felt that the perpetrators would be young and stupid, rather than evil.  This is a great show of compassion.

Meanwhile, Socialist Aotearoa still continue to support murder.  Sigh.

Inside Auckland Anti-Israel Protests

Quite predictably, as soon as any event occurs within Israel or Gaza, we see demonstrations from pro Palestinian groups.

Now I support freedom of speech, and I definitely believe they have a right to protest peacefully.

Lets have a look at the official text promoting the protests in Auckland:

Global Peace and Justice Auckland is organising a march this Saturday to protest Israel’s assassination of a Palestinian leader in the Gaza strip and the deadly rocket attacks in which many Palestinians have lost their lives.

Global "Peace" and Justice.  Most would assume this means rejecting violence

The protest will gather at Aotea Square from 2pm and march to the US Consulate in Customs Street

What has the US Consulate got to do with any of this?  Nothing.  But they don't have anywhere else better to protest, so how about the "Great Satan".

where a protest rally, including the throwing of old shoes will take place. (Throwing shoes is a traditional way of showing disgust at US/Israeli policies in the Middle East following the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at the then US President George Bush in a 2008 media conference)

Throw shoes.  Fine.  But why flag burning?  This comment is from the public facebook page of the event:

 No - burning flags symbolises Violence.  You are symbolising burning a country, and it's people.  It is not a peaceful symbol.  See also the comment regarding media.

These latest Israeli attacks continue the brutal victimisation of the Palestinian people of Gaza who are effectively locked in the largest open air prison in the world and treated like animals through an inhuman Israeli blockade.

Remember that one border of Gaza is actually on Egypt's side.  Hamas has total control of Gaza, and even state that it is no longer occupied.  I would have thought dragging bodies through the streets of Gaza from motorbikes is the most inhuman thing we will see

Israeli justifications for the attacks are hollow. It is Israel’s racist policies and vicious mistreatment of Palestinians which are at the heart of this conflict. Israel policies alone pose the greatest threat to peace in the Middle East and in the world.

The "greatest" threat.  This is an unmeasurable and unjustifiable position.  It is code for "Israel is a demon and must be destroyed".  If you are talking about bad threats, how about Syria - 38,000 people killed there!

One of the posters on the even facebook page agrees:

Actually the hippies are hardly in attendance any more.  Just the extreme left.  Hippies that want peace have realised how pro-war these rallies are.  I talk more on the facebook page below

As well and blockading Palestinians in Gaza Israel maintain a military occupation of the West Bank while destroying Palestinian homes and farms to make way for Jewish-only settlements - all in defiance of international law and numerous UN resolutions.

The organisers do not need to justify this with any facts or links.  No need to define "International law" or remind us that the resolutions are from the defunct UNHRC. It's also interesting to note that no other organisations are brought to account by this group, such as Hamas' abuse on civilians and use of civilian areas for military purposes.

Israel still tries to use the Holocaust as some sort of justification for their brutal treatment of the Palestinian people and in doing so the Palestinian people have become the second victims of the Holocaust.

There is no reference to the "justification" they refer to, and in doing so they make an offensive comparison.  There are no gas chambers or concentration camps.  The only ones using this imagery is the protesters

GPJA applauds the Palestinian fighters who organise to resist the destruction of their right to self determination.

This is a clear support call to violence.  Clearly acknowledging that offensive missile attacks beyond the borders of Gaza are not just condoned, but are applauded.

Saturday’s protest will focus on the US consulate because the US has supported Israel every step of the way in its brutality towards Palestinians.

Now, back to the facebook page.  Up front the protesters state that "racism" will not be tolerated.  I think they may have been embarrassed by comments like these:

Promoting the destruction of all Israel, is of course, OK:

This is why so many of the protesters hold Union "approved" billboards.  Too often the blatant anti-semitism shows through, which is highly embarrassing to the organisers.

Back to Syria, Joe Carolan was not so happy - calling the Syrian Guy "Mossad" and "Mysogynist"

But he has a point.  Does Joe support Hezbollah or FSA?  Apparently both.  And now they are calling Assad an Israel supporter!

Then it starts getting quite confusing.  This poster is determined that supporting Iran, Hezbollah and Assad is a bad thing (at least I think that is what he is saying).

He goes on to say that Palestine needs an "Islamic" solution:

This conveniently ignores the plight of Christian Palestinians (or other denominations), that are being pushed out or persecuted by hardline Muslims like Hamas.

I find it interesting that the protesters also have complaints about the media.  The "Zionist controlled" media:

That's interesting when you consider the dominance of left wing journalists. 

At the end of the day, I support the rights of the protesters to free speech.  Ironically it is much more than the rights that Hamas give to those they are protesting for.  I do get concerned when they are promoting violence, not just in Israel, but to would be terrorists throughout the world, such as we have seen in the UK, France, Turkey, Argentina, USA, Thailand, etc etc etc.

I'm very glad the numbers were small, and they can hardly muster any support from MPs who are seeing through their insane obsessions.

Counter Protest to Racism by Socialist Aotearoa

A counter-protest to Friday's cemetary desecration was held the following day.

The Article in Stuff was labelled "Activists against Intolerance"

It was run by Irishman, Joe Carolan of Socialist Aotearoa and attracted about 30 people.

From Socialist Aoteroa's own website:

Socialist Aotearoa makes a clear distinction between the political acts, policies and opinions of the secular state of Israel, which isdisputed, and the security of the persons  of  Jewish people, the sanctity of which may not be disputed or endangered.

Of course, if you scroll down on this same page, you will see these links (among others):

Two links which promote violence, and do not advocate a peaceful settlement.
So the sanctity and security of Jews is fine, provided they don't live in Israel, or presumably support Israel.


This is the same Joe Carolan, who has no problem protesting outside Jewish houses of worship:

This is an interview with Joe Carolan, after protests in 2010 (which attracted small people), A protest which included burning flags and chants "Hamas, Hezbollah".

According to Joe, this isn't racism.  Is burning a representation of Jewish people contradictory to "security of the persons  of  Jewish people, the sanctity of which may not be disputed or endangered"?

Joe was one of the organisers of the tiny protest against Shahar Peer competing at the Auckland Tennis Open against 

Here is a photo from one of Joe's protests, stating that Zionists are Nazis:

Joe Carolan and SA support the BDS movement.  No comment from Joe on the racists inside those ranks?

No comment from Joe on Hamas, who vow to kill the Jews?  No comment from Joe when BDS activists quote "The invention of the Jewish People"?  No comment on the Iranian Holocaust denial conferences.

The protest was conveniently held on a Saturday, where Jewish involvement would be small.  It would have been funny to see what would have happened if someone had turned up wearing an Israeli flag - would Joe have consoled them?  Or burnt the flag?

One of the Graffiti messages on a grave said "F*** Israel".  I was half expecting Joe to come out and say "We oppose all the swastikas, but we support this message".

With friends like Joe, who needs enemies!