Because I am the only one who gets the Wall Street Journal
As a member of this blogging community, a fairly lefty one at that, I am sure I am the only person who got the hard-copy of the Wall Street Journal today. So I am taking on a personal responsibility to report to all of you that the Simon Weisenthal Center has provided all WSJ readers with a very important supplement to their papers:
“2010 Top Ten Anti-Israel LIES”
You can download the seven page document for yourself, but here are some of the highlights.
In the We Have a Better Claim to the Land than the Arabs Department:
“Jerusalem is mentioned in the Hebrew Scriptures 600 times – but not once in the Koran. Throughout its 2,000-year exile there was a continuous Jewish presence in the Holy Land.” (Never mind the Christian Arabs or the fact that there were more Arabs than the “continuous presence” of Jews for nearly all of that 2000-years.)
The Plans to Build in East Jerusalem, were in fact not in East Jerusalem but in North Jerusalem. So calm down you anti-Semite.
In the Israel is Good to its Arab Population Department:
“[Israel’s] 20% Arab minority enjoys all the political, economic and religious right and freedoms of citizenship, including electing member of their choice to the Knesset.” (Yup. True. And the allocation of funding to these citizens of Israel is also totally equal and fair… Never mind the question of the millions of Palestinians who live under Israeli military rule.)
In the Goldstone Must be a Self-Hater Department:
“Richard Goldstone, a South African Jewish jurist, signed a document prepared by investigators whose main qualification was rabid anti-Israel bias. He accepted every anonymous libel against the IDF. ” (Yup, a South African and an activist judge. He must feel guilty about his Judaism and role in Apartheid so he is going to make those who wage “defensive wars” pay for his guilt…)
“Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz denounced Goldstone’s Report as a modern ‘blood libel’ accusing Israeli soldiers of crimes they never committed.” (Well that should end all debate.)
Not to be totally dismissive of this piece of poorly written propaganda, I will say there are a few points that are well made and do deserve serious attention. World-wide anti-Semitism is on the rise and that is bad for everyone, well espscially bad for the Jews. Iran really shouldn’t get the bomb regardless of Israel having one of its own. Everyone should care about that issue, especially the Jews, because President AhmadinaIhateJewsejad doesn’t like us so much.
However, when you put out a bright red and yellow pamphlet of “Lies”, people tend not to take you so seriously, even if your story should be taken seriously. I wonder how many of these bad boys were passed out on the True Freedom Flotilla to the UN today?
It came out with the Jewish Week a few weeks back. I threw up in my mouth. Thanks for reminding me… Running to bathroom now.
It came out with the canadian jewish news-all across Canada a few weeks ago
As I understand, your main complaint is either about the marketing instead of the content, or about the very idea that somebody would write text in support of Israel.
Eric, did you read the thing? I agree with most of the points they make, but they do such a terribly clumsy job of presenting them that it’s positively embarrassing–especially when the Wiesenthal Center (which operates the Museum of Tolerance ®) is the one putting it out.
If you’re going to spend millions of dollars to distribute propaganda, at least make it something that might be at least a little bit convincing to people who don’t already agree with you. Because the way this thing is written, it’s just going to piss off anyone who even remotely disagrees with the authors’ positions. What a waste.