Peter Catapano's "Dead in the Water?": The Mendacity (and Cowardice) of Dopes

In a New York Times "Opinionator" column entitled "Dead in the Water?" (http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/01/dead-in-the-water/?hp), Peter Catapano attempts to present the opinions of those favoring and opposing the Gaza flotilla. Needless to say (this is, of course, The New York Times), Catapano provides more space to those in favor of the flotilla (Max Blumenthal, Alice Walker, Juan Cole) than those opposed (Howard Jacobson).

There is no mention by Mr. Catapano or those opposing the flotilla of:

• abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held by Hamas without Red Cross visits for five years and without a sign of life for almost two years (http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/news-release/2011/israel-palestine-news-2011-06-23.htm);
• "honor killings" perpetrated against women in Gaza;
• persecution and murder of Christians in Gaza;
• persecution and murder of homosexuals in Gaza;
• incarceration and murder of dissidents in Gaza;
• the thousands of mortar shells, rockets and missiles fired from Gaza at Israeli civilian targets in recent years;
• the repeated attempts by Hamas to smuggle advanced weaponry int Gaza (e.g., the attempt to smuggle ship-to-shore missiles aboard the "Victoria" in March);
• the Hamas charter, which calls for the obliteration of Israel and the murder of all Jews (not just Israelis).

Also no mention by Mr. Catapano or those favoring the flotilla of:

• the two luxury hotels opening in Gaza later this month;
• the gourmet restaurants (e.g., Roots, Carino's) to be found in Gaza;
• the three-story, $2 million wedding hall under construction in Gaza;
• the Mercedes and hot tubs that passed into Gaza last week via Israel;
• the hundreds of BMWs and pickup trucks that have been imported into Gaza in recent months;
• the opening of a second new shopping mall with escalators from Israel next month;
• the abundance and widespread use of cell phones and personal computers throughout Gaza;
• that all 130 engineering firms in Gaza are busy with work;
• that hundreds of new homes are being built;
• that two dozen new schools are about to go up;
• that unemployment has fallen dramatically to 25% according to Hamas's economic minister, Ala al-Rafati (compare with over 21% in Spain);
• that statistics for literacy, live births and longevity are better in Gaza than in Turkey or in most of the surrounding Arab countries;
• that health conditions are far superior to most of the developing world.

In 2010, 18,000 people and their companions passed from Gaza into Israel to receive medical treatment; 80 percent of those who requested treatment in Israel were allowed to enter. Six thousand tons of goods are trucked into Gaza from Israel every day, and as acknowledged by Robert Serry of the UN, there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/136180).

Among the many hateful statements by Alice Walker which did not find their way into Mr. Catapano's piece:

• "I think Israel is the greatest terrorist in that part of the world. And I think in general, the United States and Israel are great terrorist organizations themselves." (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/06/23/interview_alice_walker?page=0,1)

• "I gave her [a Palestinian woman] a gift I had brought, and she thanked me. Looking into my eyes she said: May God Protect You From the Jews. When the young Palestinian interpreter told me what she’d said, I responded: It’s too late, I already married one." (http://www.voiceseducation.org/node/744)

Walker has repeatedly compared Israel with Nazi Germany (http://www.camera.org/index.asp?x_print=1&x_context=2&x_outlet=7&x_article=1932):

"I feel that the Israel that many Jews dreamed of having – that one is gone. That's demolished. I think it's time for people to accept that. Because what you have now is something that is so frightening. Israel is as frightening to many of us as Germany used to be."

Moreover, her remarks before the left-leaning congregation of Rabbi Michael Lerner in San Francisco in 2009 during the High Holy Days, were deemed blatantly anti-Semitic by some worshippers, who walked out of her "talk" (http://www.beyttikkun.org/article.php/20090930114030409).

Although there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza, there is indeed a humanitarian crisis in Syria, where thousands of persons have been murdered, imprisoned, tortured and forced out of their homes in recent weeks. Yesterday, Assad's security forces killed 24 more civilians (http://www.haaretz.com/news/mideast-in-turmoil/report-assad-forces-kill-24-civilians-in-violent-protests-across-syria-1.370806). Why does the flotilla not sail to Syria? Because they know that in Syria they will be arrested, brutalized and thrown into prison.

So much for the idealism of Walker and these would-be freedom fighters, who combine tourism with safe-protest.

Does Alice "The Color Purple" Walker Care About Gilad Shalit?

As observed in my prior blog entry (http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2011/06/alice-walker-why-im-sailing-to-gaza.html), Alice Walker, the 67-year-old author of "The Color Purple," seeks to explain her participation in the latest Gaza flotilla in a CNN piece entitled "Why I'm Sailing to Gaza" (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/21/alice.walker.gaza/). Walker, invoking the names of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, would have us believe that she is a martyr in the making:

"Our boat, The Audacity of Hope, will be carrying letters to the people of Gaza. Letters expressing solidarity and love. That is all its cargo will consist of. If the Israeli military attacks us, it will be as if they attacked the mailman. This should go down hilariously in the annals of history. But if they insist on attacking us, wounding us, even murdering us, as they did some of the activists in the last flotilla, Freedom Flotilla I, what is to be done?"

Letters to the people of Gaza expressing solidarity and love? Very touching. But where is Walker's love for the Israeli children living in the proximity of Gaza, who have been forced to endure thousands of mortar shells, rockets and missiles fired from Gaza at their homes?

Also, where is Walker's love for Gilad Shalit, who was abducted from Israel on June 25, 2006 by Hamas, and who has been held hostage ever since in Gaza without visits from or contact with the International Committee of the Red Cross in violation of international law?

Notwithstanding Walker's apparent indifference to Shalit's plight, White House spokesman Jay Carney on Friday called upon Hamas to free this young man:

“Nearly five years have now passed since Hamas terrorists crossed into Israel and abducted Gilad Shalit. During this time, Hamas has held him hostage without access by the International Committee of the Red Cross, in violation of the standards of basic decency and international humanitarian demands. The United States condemns in the strongest possible terms his continued detention, and joins other governments and international organizations around the world in calling on Hamas to release him immediately.”

The U.S. has now joined France, the European Union and Ban Ki-moon of the UN in calling for Shalit's immediate release on humanitarian grounds.

Walker and her friends from the far left, however, are too busy pretending that they are heroines and heroes to acknowledge this travesty. This is not surprising given Walker's position that Israel, because of alleged human rights abuses, should not exist as an actual land for the Jewish people, but should be theoretical "in our minds" (see: http://www.beyttikkun.org/article.php/20090930114030409).

Alice Walker: "Why I'm sailing to Gaza": What Color Is Evil?

In a June 21, 2011 "Special to CNN" (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/21/alice.walker.gaza/), Alice Walker, the 67-year-old author of "The Color Purple," seeks to explain why she is participating in the flotilla to Gaza planned for later this month. In a cynical message in which she struggles to interject the names of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, James Cheney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman (Schwerner and Goodman were Jews who were murdered in Mississippi when they drove south with Cheney to protest racial discrimination in the U.S. - yes, Walker would have us believe that she's participating in the flotilla in memory of these Jews), Walker writes:

"And what of the children of Palestine, who were ignored in our President's latest speech on Israel and Palestine, and whose impoverished, terrorized, segregated existence was mocked by the standing ovations recently given in the U.S. Congress to the prime minister of Israel?

. . . .

As adults, we must affirm, constantly, that the Arab child, the Muslim child, the Palestinian child, the African child, the Jewish child, the Christian child, the American child, the Chinese child, the Israeli child, the Native American child, etc., is equal to all others on the planet. We must do everything in our power to cease the behavior that makes children everywhere feel afraid."

So bottom line, we are to understand that Walker will be participating in this flotilla for the benefit of the world's children, including Jewish and Israeli children. Sorry, Alice, but I don't buy it.

Naturally, there is no mention in Walker's piece about the advanced anti-tank missile, which was smuggled into Gaza and fired at a yellow Israeli school bus two months ago, killing one Israeli child.

And what about the some 12,000 mortar shells, rockets and missiles fired from Gaza at Israeli civilian targets in recent years, many timed for when children in southern Israel traveled to school in the morning? No mention by Walker of how Israeli children living in the proximity of Gaza preferred to wet their beds at night rather than risk leaving a "safe room" in their homes in order to relieve themselves, thus avoiding the need to find shelter within 15 seconds if a rocket was launched.

No mention, either, of the countless Palestinian suicide bombers, who took great efforts to detonate themselves at the entrances to shopping centers, where young women and their children congregated (see, for example: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3179915,00.html).

No discussion, of course, by Walker of Gilad Shalit, who was abducted from Israel into Gaza by Hamas, which over the course of five years has refused to allow the Red Cross or anyone else to see him (see: http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=226409).

But wait, there's more. Walker's CNN piece refers us to her blog (http://alicewalkersgarden.com/blog/), where she further describes her experience of waiting on line to enter the West Bank from Jordan and being questioned by an Israeli at the border:

"At some point I said to him, seeing him really as I might have seen my own (misguided) son: Don't you realize this behavior, of making old men, mothers, little children, wait in long lines pleading with you to visit their families is wrong and is bad for you? I couldn't bring myself to use the "N" [Nazi] word, but I did say: Don't you think this behavior - insulting, threatening, humiliating - makes you all seem German-esque? I meant the old German-esque, of the late Thirties and Early Forties, not the current German-esque."

So here we have it again: Walker waited in line (she didn't make use of the lounge), the passport control persons were not nice (sometimes they're not nice to me), and she was questioned at length, and on this basis Israelis are being compared with Nazis, although Walker makes certain not to disparage Germans of today.

I wonder if Walker had ever seen the aftermath of a Palestinian suicide bombing and had been forced to retrieve the limbs of "old men, mothers and little children," whether she would persist in this vein. Afterall, it was Palestinian suicide bombings which resulted in the closure of the border between Israel and Gaza, through which thousands of Palestinians workers once passed each day on their way to jobs in Israel.

But let's examine Walker's Nazi analogy a bit further. In the 1933 German democratic federal elections, the Nazis emerged as the largest party and came to power. In the 2006 democratic elections in Palestine, Hamas, whose charter calls for the murder of all Jews (not just Israelis) and the obliteration of Israel, swept to power in Gaza. No mention of the Hamas charter or even Hamas in Walker's blog entry.

In addition to Jews, whom else did the Nazis persecute? Answer: among others, homosexuals. The attitude of Hamas toward homosexuals? According to Mahmoud al-Zahar, a co-founder of Hamas and a member of the Hamas leadership in the Gaza Strip, who was asked whether homosexual marriage would be permitted in Gaza (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article575744.ece):

"Are these the laws for which the Palestinian street is waiting? For us to give rights to homosexuals and to lesbians, a minority of perverts and the mentally and morally sick?”

Needless to say, there is no mention in Walker's blog item of Palestinian persecution and murder of gays.

And if that is not enough, Walker also doesn't bother to mention how women in Gaza and the West Bank are repeatedly the victims of "honor killings" by male relatives, who have been punished with sentences of six months or less for such atrocities.

I favor a two-state solution to the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis along the 1967 lines with land swaps, but I also have no illusions about the intentions of Hamas. And whereas I want the Palestinians to live in dignity and independence in their own land, neither Fatah nor Hamas is prepared to acknowledge the right of tiny Israel (nine miles wide at its waist) to exist within any borders whatsoever.

This upcoming voyage to Gaza by Walker is not about Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Cheney, Schwerner or Goodman, as Walker would have us believe. Rather, this is about the blind refusal to seek balance and acknowledge evil, which is to be found aplenty in Alice's beloved Gaza.