Tuesday 12 August 2014

Letters to Israeli Ambassador in Ireland no 8

Your interview with Pat Kenny this morning
11 August 2014
Dear Boaz

I've just listened to your interview from Israel with Pat Kenny.

I noticed that at the beginning of the interview you hesitated as you were telling Ireland that Israel is now going to "help" the people of Gaza.  The hesitation occurred when you were searching for a word to describe what Israel recently did in Gaza.  After hesitating, you called it "the conflict". The word you were looking for was "holocaust". Or "massacre".

You excel in turning facts on their heads and turning everything to the advantage of your own arguments.

For a long time, you didn't mention in your propaganda that Hamas was elected by the whole complement of the Palestinian people in 2006.  Instead you designated them as terrorists.

Today, unbelievably, you said that they were elected but you used this  fact to blame them for the most recent holocaust (the third holocaust within six years) perpetrated by the state of Israel - which state you represent in Ireland. 

Hamas were elected, you said, therefore responsible for Israel's murders of the innocents.  First of all, Israel and only Israel is responsible for its own carnage and repeated massacres in Gaza.  Just as Hitler's Nazis were responsible for the repeated massacres of Jews in Europe in the last century.     No-one shouted STOP to those massacres then. But we, the demonstrators whom you denigrated in your interview, are shouting STOP now.

After mentioning that Hamas were elected, you didn't remind the Irish people that Israel, in a piece of monumental arrogance, vetoed that free and democratic election. Just imagine that for provocation of a people - a perfectly legitimate election, monitored independently, praised internationally - but the results vetoed by Israel with shameful international support.  How would you react if it was your country?  On that pretext alone, would you have fired a rocket at Israel?

I know that you are insensitive to the suffering of mothers, fathers and children in Gaza, but you are not ignorant.  You know the facts.  Israel has made innumerable incursions into Gaza shooting fishermen, children and others on an ongoing basis.  How would you react if this was happening in your country?  If  you were completely defenceless against the fourth most ruthless army in the world, would you lie down and accept it as inevitable? If the invader/occupier was a nuclear power of unknown strength, powerful enough to say No to international inspections of its nuclear armaments, would you just accept its "right" to treat you and your people as it wished? If your country was blockaded, how would you react?

Throughout the whole of Palestine, which Hamas was elected to represent until Israel vetoed the election, Israel's army continually harasses Palestinians in their homeland. I have seen this harassment myself on roads in the West Bank where laughing soldiers hold up Palestinian-registered cars for hours in searing heat while Israeli registered cars glide by.  Israel has stolen Palestinian land for biased settlers who throw down feces on Palestinian homes in Hebron. In B'ilin and N'ilin and other villages, unarmed protestors are shot at, many killed or seriously injured. Settlers and the Israeli government have stolen and continue to steal their land. Palestinian homes are raided in the middle of the night [Youtube evidence].  Mairead Maguire, a Nobel Peace laureate, a very good friend of mine, was shot while she was attending a protest in B'ilin [Youtube evidence].Gaza has been under siege, blockade for years.  What would you do if this was happening in your own country?  Would you have done nothing?

Ever since the first holocaust in Gaza (Cast Lead) we have been listening to Israeli ambassadors to Ireland having free air time on Irish radio and television, disproportionate column inches in Irish newspapers, to misrepresent Israel's crimes in Palestine and Gaza and laying blame on the victims of your crimes.

We are sick of hearing you and other Israeli apologists not referring to the murders of children in their beds as a holocaust or massacre but as "Israel's right to defend itself".

You said in the interview that we who protest your crimes are on the wrong side of history.  But today, it is you who are on the wrong side of history.  Your grandchildren will have a hard time getting a reply from their own parents to the question: "What did Grandpa and Grandma do when the bad people in our country were butchering hundreds of children at night in their beds in Gaza?"  They will have to reply: "They were in Ireland, supporting the butchery in every way possible".

On your website you bemoan the trauma of children in Israel wetting the bed, vomiting, having "disturbing thoughts" etc. because of Hamas rockets.  Do you know, I truly and sincerely sympathise with these children and their parents.  It is truly horrific for small children to know that rockets are in the sky, that some have in the past struck homes, that they and the people around them have to run to shelters because of these rockets, not knowing when or where they may fall. No children should have to endure such trauma. Israeli children, as Mr Lieberman said, should have the right to enjoy their holidays just as other children do.  Everyone deserves a holiday.  
I sympathise with the children who are so traumatised.  They are children.  They are innocent little children who have no part in any conflict except what they are taught.  They are not responsible for Israel's actions.  Even if their parents are part of the IDF, the children are not responsible for their parents' actions or beliefs. They should not have to suffer this terrible trauma.

How much more then do I sympathise with those children of Gaza, those who are still alive, because of the trauma - multiplied hundreds of thousands of times - that they have been suffering. 
 The daily and nightly blasts, the monstrous flashes and thunder of IDF bombs against which they have no protection.  Attacks from the sky that they know are sure to kill their parents or themselves or their neighbours or neighbours' children as they have been doing for weeks. Seeing death and destruction within the sanctity of their homes. Going out in the morning to see the destruction of other homes, shops, schools, offices, government buildings, hospitals, refugee centres, mosques and whole streets and districts.  Picking souvenirs from their erstwhile beautiful homes, now rubble. Mourning their dead. Burying their dead. Being interrupted by more killings while mourning and burying.
These are innocent little children who have no part in any conflict except what they are taught, except what they witness with their own eyes.  They are not responsible for the trauma suffered by Israeli children when Hamas fires rockets at Israel. These children of Gaza suffer much more severe trauma than vomiting and bed wetting. They suffer from missing limbs, horrific flesh wounds, disfigurement, brain damage, extreme post traumatic disorders, - as well as all of the disorders suffered by Israeli children. 
Hundreds of Gazan children have been murdered over the past month. No children should have to endure such a massacre and the traumas attached. Gazan children should be free to enjoy a holiday just as other children do.  Mr Lieberman did not think about Gazan children.

I could hardly believe the callousness in your voice this morning when you said that you were "flattered" that so many of us could spell your name correctly.
You have killed 1900 people in Gaza, mostly civilians and children, and you answer criticism by being "flattered" that we can spell your name!

What chance have the children of Gaza?

And, come to think of it, what chance have the children of Israel with an ambassador such as you to represent them?

Once again I protest with all my strength the holocaust you have perpetrated on Gaza.

I will continue to call for your expulsion and the closure of the embassy as long as this and other holocausts are not redressed by Israel.  I know you cannot bring back the dead but you can apologize as Germany has been doing to Jewish people since 1946.  You can withdraw from Palestine, acknowledge Palestine as a State, make what reparations you can, make peace with your neighbours, stop the belligerence, refuse military aid from the USA, be an independent nation.

If that happened with your cooperation, I would gladly consider welcoming you back

Justin Morahan 

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