"supporters of ethnic cleansing"

Explain yourself, "Redscibe." I am no supporter of ethnic cleansing and I object to being lied about by an antisemitite like you.

Jim Denham is opposed to the Palestinian Right of return and thus in favour of ethnic cleansing.

Denham's anti-Arab racism and Islamophobia has been a distressing feature of the comments sections of left-wing websites.

His alcohol-fuelled trolling has shamed the AWL Trotskyite sect of which he is one of the few remaining members.

Denham needs professional help, it's a pity his so-called comrades don't do anything to provide it.

I'm just still a bit amazed by this piece, Owen.

Have a think of it in this light.

Let's say that you were in favour of - say - limiting immigration to the United Kingdom. You genuinely thought that this was an important thing to do.

Now, obviously, many people would say that to argue for immigration control raises suspicions of racism.

Imagine that a prominent Tory MP who was in favour of limiting immigration made a clear and nasty racist comment - perhaps about Jamaicans and crime.

What would you say about an article that essentially argued that the REALLY bad thing about making the racist remark was that it would provide ammunition to supporters of liberal immigration, who said that opponents of immigration were racists.

That's kind of missing the point, isn't it?

"Jim Murphy MP, member of Labour Friends of Israel would do well to look after UK interests..."

Why should one think that the liberal democratic United Kingdom doesn't share interests with the liberal democratic state of Israel?

Tiny Israel, in addition of being a major contributor in a variety of disciplines to world technology, science, agriculture and medicine, Israel is also at the forefront of the liberal democratic world facing Islamism that is eager to spread its hegemony throughout a region vital to Europe and North America.

The mutual benefits that exist between the UK and Israel exceed by far the amount of hostility some have towards this tiny nation-state of the Jewish people.

So was Ancient Athens a democracy, but they didn't extend the vote to slaves.

Why should I explain myself to someone who flings about lies about anti-semitism but complains about accurately being called a supporter of ethnic cleansing?

He is a proud supporter of Israel, a state whose very foundation is the expulsion of the Palestinian people from their own homeland, so as far as I am concerned he is as much a supporter of ethnic cleasing as Radovan Karadzic who is on trial at the Hague. End of!

You're an ignorant imbecile, Dave Darlan. The FO has been influenced by Arabists for decades. You might remember that a senior diplomat (ambassador to Syria, or Libya?) questioned the independence of the Chilcot enquiry because there were two Jews involved with it.

And I notice that maxinemf hasn't responded to Jehudah's post a couple of days ago, where he challenged her to give an example of another state in the region that comes close to Israel for tolerance of race, religion, gender or sexuality.
I'm not Jewish, and I've been pretty indifferent to Zionism-but I believe in free and progressive societies. Israel is the only state in the region within a mile of the degree of tolerance we take for granted, and I simply can't understand why people like maxinemf foam at the mouth whenever Israel is mentioned, but don't have a damned thing to say about the racism and the religious, sexual and political intolerance characteristic of much of the rest of the middle east.

The obvious point about racism being the bigger story here notwithstanding, the "Livingstone formulation" (pre-empting criticism by postulating that accusations of antisemitism are used in bad faith to shut down legitimate criticism of Israel) has about as much credence as what one might call the "Clarkson formulation" - that a humourless "PC brigade" uses pearl clutching about racism to shut down legitimate discussion of, say, Mexican cuisine.

Wake me up when either the PC brigade or the Zionist Lobby have actually managed to shut anybody up.

Does Paul Flynn also have a problem with Ed Miliband? He is after all Jewish. His parents escaped the Holocaust. He has relatives living as 'settlers' in Judea and Samaria (the 'west bank') and he told Labour Friends of Israel that he supports Israel recently. Is there a conflict here with 'Jewish loyalty'?
And whilst on the subject, does Flynn have concerns about Moslems employed by government, the civil service, the Foreign Office, the media, the universities etc? Can we investigate Moslems and see whether they are loyal to Britains liberal-democratic values or that death cult known as Islamism which believes that women should be stoned and Gays crucified?

Flynn should resign or get booted out of the Labour Party. He will be much more welcome in the BNP or George Galloway's Respect islamists.

Lox
"In 1945 a bunch of European Jews had survived an attempt-by what had seemed fifteen years before to be one of the most cultured and advanced nations in the world-to wipe them out completely. And you draw a parallel between their reaction and the German occupation of the Sudetenland?"

Two wrongs don't make a right my friend

Would Britain ever have appointed a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain to be ambassador to the Soviet Union? Or a member of the British Union of Fascists to the Rome embassy?

But you don't tiptoe around Israel for fear of being accused of being anti-semitic, maxinemf: you make it quite clear that you don't like Israel-or rather, the Jews who live there.
Israel is a democracy, just as much as you are an obsessive.

My post laboriously replying to Lox seem to disappear, and I am too tired right now to type it all out from memory over again. Oh well.

The Craig Murray stuff is priceless. Shame that Paul Flynn appears to have been bullied into an apology by Israel's Labour Party 'friends'. It is distinctly disturbing though, this kind of thing repeatedly happens in the US, but now it looks like it has made it over here as well. Fox-Werrity's operation 'Atlantic Bridge' seems to have been well-named.

Sensible article, mostly loopyt comments. I can only assume Dan et al have no previous knowledge of Israel-Palestine-Zionism or wouldn't ask for examples of the commonplace.

Fair enough, so let me just say that for the 40 years since I stopped being a Zionist of any shade, any critique of Israel has been met by many Jews and Israelis with accusations of being a self-hating Jew and/or traitor and/or Arab lover and of being anti-semitic.

On You tube you can watch a video of Israeli settlers attacking peaceful demonstrators very violently while chanting "death to arabs! death to leftists!" (a leftist in this context being anyone who sympathises with the suffering of occupied people or questions the ever growing settlements at the expense of the local population).

See http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2011/oct/19/From-the-west-bank-part... for report

"In what sense is the state of Israel democratic. The last time I read the Haaretz paper..."

The very fact that the poster read the English edition of Haaretz is indicative of Israel's democracy, one that permits such a newspaper to be published in the first place...!!

More fundamentally, Israel is indeed a liberal democracy in which all citizens: black and white, men and women, Arab and Jew, religious and secular, short people and tall people are all equal before the law.

And, all are entitled to elect and be elected, and serve in every branch of Israel's government: in the legislative, administrative and judicial.

Furthermore, one find citizens of Israel of all walks of life active in civil society as well advance themselves in economics, academic life, government, military, etc.

I challenge the poster to share with us a name of a country in the region that comes even close to Israel's liberal democratic nature!!

Paul Flynn is anti-semitic, a position historically espused by the left because bankers are Jews and bankers are wicked bloodsuckers. Ergo...

Soovey

"Zionism expresses the right for self-determination of the Jewish people. It's only controversial if you don't agree that the Jews of all peoples have such a right, which makes you, what?"

Yes, but in 1945 a bunch of American and European jews self-determined to seize a middle east country already occupied by people, on the grounds that their ancestors use to live there 2000 years ago. This is the same self-determination that Germany used to occupy Sudetenland in 1938. The Palestentians are now embarked on the self-determination to have their own country in the land they were usurped from. Nobody can turn the clock back and uncreate Israel but Zionism now is the belief that Israel should have everything it wants and make no concessions to the indigenous people. That IS controversial

Nice to see you avoid generalising, Mark.

In 1945 a bunch of European Jews had survived an attempt-by what had seemed fifteen years before to be one of the most cultured and advanced nations in the world-to wipe them out completely. And you draw a parallel between their reaction and the German occupation of the Sudetenland? You expect that argument to be taken seriously?

Redscribe. Can I assume that you don't see human rights abuses elsewhere in the world in the same way as those you believe are perpetrated by Israel?

I wouldn't try to be clever if I was you. It doesn't suit you.

'"If you find me with half my brain missing, the whips will have had their grubby, blood-stained hands on it." Witty and -- as I say -- a bit wacky.'

If Newport City Council finds a frail elderly person with half her brain destroyed by a stroke they'll get their grubby hands on her assets alright even if this involves making her daughter homeless so they can seize the house. You see, Mr Flynn, I'm told that although I have lived there all my life, because my mother is still the householder I have no right to live there. And this disposession of poor people's homes is going on in your own constituency Mr Flynn - not the West Bank. Yet you and the rest of the political establishment are silent when this happens to your own constituents; that's assuming you haven't forgotten we exist, that is.

Storm in a tea cup - the only Quote misssing is the one where he APPARANTLY added something. I believe that's called hearsay.
And come off it Newport Woman - Saunders Lewis was no Fascist. He was rather conservative in his views, and All the alleged "Fascism" in his thinking ammounts to the sort of beliefs many founders of the Labour Party held (The Webbs, HG Wells, and George Bernard Shaw for example). Like Paul Flynn, and most educated Welsh Speakers I admire Saunders Lewis as a Poet, Novelist, Literary Critic and Political Activistand Intellectual. I also Admire the works of TS Elliot. It doesn't mean I share either's Politics.
Please don't make sweeping statements about things you haven't read.

"Paul Flynn is anti-semitic, a position historically espused by the left because bankers are Jews and bankers are wicked bloodsuckers. Ergo..."

One can't argue that Mr. Flynn is not an anti-Semite, but anti-Semitism, and its present manifestation of anti-Jewish racism, is not unique to people of the "left" vs. people on the "right".

Sadly, this age old phenomenon has been traveling with us, Jews, for centuries, and for no good rational reason, just as certain physical illnesses manifest themselves without us knowing the actual cause, so is this social/psychological illness that has affected nearly every society on earth, with or without knowing any Jews.

Paul Flynn an anti-semite. Get a life Owen Jones you stupid man. Britain's ambassador to Israel should represent Britain's interests to Israel and be seen to be so doing not the other way round. In actual fact Britain shouldn't have an ambassador to this vile state of any description.

1) The name is Jehudah Ben-Israel

2) The JNF (Jewish National Fund) is not an Israeli entity. Qeren Qajemet L'Israel is. And this non-government organization is a private entity, not a governmental one.

3) All governmental laws, or state laws if you will, are applicable to all citizens, or, if you will, all citizens of Israel are equal before the law. This is a major building block of liberal democracy, of which Israel of course is one.

Redscribe, the point I was making wasn't whataboutery-it was about the selectiveness of most of Israel's critics: I could be wrong, and perhaps you devote as much passion to criticism of China, or Congo, etc, as you do to condemnation of Israel. But I doubt it.

And don't try to imply that I don't like non-whites. It's clumsy and stupid. You know that my comment on the behaviours of governments in Congo or Zimbabwe is again related to the moral selectiveness of Israel's critics.

Is Israel above criticism? Of course not. The Oslo Accord was undermined from the word go by people like Netanyahu. But, perhaps if Hamas recognised Israel's right to exist things might have been different, and perhaps if Arafat had been less interested in cementing in place his own inept and corrupt regime that would have made a difference too.

Israel disposessed Palestinians in 1947, but they've been shafted since then by a combination of corrupt men like Arafat, a hyper-cynical elite in other Arab states using them as a lightning rod to deflect internal criticism from their own mis-government, and a bunch of bigoted Jihadis. All aided by dupes like you.