Alan Hart

Israeli democracy fades to black (the black of the blank screen at the end of a film). That was the headline over a recent article by Lawrence Davidson, an American professor of Middle East history. He argued that the suppression of the democratic rights of non-Jews in Israel is coming full circle with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s Likudniks and settlers now targeting the rights of Jews as well. Events in Cairo provoked this question: Are we witnessing the fading to black of the prospects for freedom and democracy in Egypt, or, is resurgent people power going to make it impossible for the military to maintain its controlling grip? (Presumably there would be limits to how many Egyptian civilians Egyptian soldiers were prepared to kill even if the generals, desperate to protect their wealth and privileges, ordered the suppression by all means of protests and demands for real democracy).

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In advance of the formal burial of the Palestinian Authority’s bid for state recognition at the UN, BBC Radio 4′s flagship Today programme was on the right track. In his introduction to a quite revealing report, presenter John Humphrys said reporter Kevin Connolly had gone to Israel to find out “what hopes there are, if any, for the establishment of a Palestinian state.”

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Good examples of the extent to which many (most?) Israeli Jews have been brainwashed by Zionist propaganda and are as a consequence beyond reason and only capable of seeing themselves as the victims instead of what they actually are, the oppressors, were on display in all their naked glory in BBC Radio’s documentary of the week first broadcast last Saturday with the title The State of Israel (meaning, as the programme made clear, the state of things in Israel).

Some 18 months after the end of his posting as the BBC’s Middle East correspondent, Tim Franks returned to Israel to discover how much things had changed there. As he noted on the flight in, “There was the same right-leaning government, the same absence of peace talks with the Palestinians. But all around, the region had transformed, as the winds of the Arab Spring had blown.” On the subject of this summer’s social protests in Israel, he said this (my emphasis added): “They appeared to share, with many western countries, the rage at capitalism’s inequalities. And yet Israel’s economy is growing apace – 5% a year – thanks to its world-beating hi-tech sector. And the protestors took a vow of silence on the most contentious issue of all – the conflict with the Palestinians.”

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After UNESCO voted to give the Palestinians full membership, the words of State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland contained a hint that the Obama administration at the highest levels is quite seriously concerned about the possible consequences for America of cutting off funds to the UN agency as required by Zionist lobby driven law enacted by Congress. (The U.S. funds about 22 percent of UNESCO’s budget or roughly $80 million annually; and $60 million was scheduled to be sent this month).

Most of Nuland’s shortish statement would have been sweet music to the Zionist lobby’s ears.

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Last Saturday in his radio address to his own people and over the internet to those around the world who still think he is worth listening to, President Obama said, “This week we had two powerful reminders of how we’ve renewed American leadership in the world.” That made me wonder which of the two d’s should be applied to him – duplicitous or deluded. (I won’t argue with any readers who might say that he is both because being duplicitous eventually makes you delusional. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is best proof of that).

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