Barenboim hardens his line on Hamas
NewsIn an essay in the Sueddeutsche he calls out Hamas as terrorists:
Nach dem barbarischen Terror der Hamas und anlässlich des Krieges in Nahost mag es naiv klingen, das ist es aber nicht: Genau jetzt müssen wir alle im Anderen den Menschen sehen.
Our message of peace must be louder than ever
After the barbaric terror of Hamas and the war in the Middle East, it may sound naive, but it is not: right now we all have to see the other person as a human being.
That’s stronger language than the BBC’s.
Hamas is not just a terrorist organisation, it’s aim is to exterminate all Jews in Israel. Not only did it rape, torture and kill 1000 jewish civilians. It did the same to Muslim Beduins. Given a chance, they will do it again. There is no way to distinguish between Hamas and Gazza civilians, just as there was no way to distinguish between Nazis and Germans. Now Israel will have to save the hostages and curtail Hamas millitary power. This will take time and blood – and many will argue that Israel uses unproportional power. This is off course absolut nonsense. What will be “proportional”? And how can there be proportionallity when Hamas kills civilians intentionaly, and Israel is attempting to kill sadistic terrorist?
As for peace: Gazza will have peace once it throw out it’s elected Hamas leaders. Gazza can choose peace, Israek can not.
Yaron, respectfully, as the descendent of non-Jewish Europeans murdered alongside Jews in the genocide of the Nazis, I am watching the situation unfold now with tremendous scrutiny.
My ancestors were slaughtered in the camps just as yours were. Yet, today, simply because they were not Jewish, they are forgotten victims. Worse, they are often accused of being complicit with Hitler’s crimes.
Financial restitution, sympathy, a new land to inhabit, those all went to your people, not mine. The Nazis left millions of non Jews dead, displaced. I am a descendent of that diaspora. My ancestors receive no acknowledgement, no financial compensation, no sympathy on the world stage. Shockingly, they are often accused of the very crimes which killed them.
The Palestine-Israeli conflict is not just about suffering Israelis. It is a now a humanitarian crisis affecting 2 cultures. There’s another side. There was during Hitler’s genocide as well – several other sides, in fact. Yet once again, you and western media are making this only about your people.
Enough. I want to hear the Palestinian side. I want to understand both sides & to know what provoked this crisis. I would like to know the stories of the innocent Palestinians who seem to be forgotten and even blamed, just as my ancestors were in Europe decades ago.
Yes, some of my relatives were killed in WW2 as well. 55 million lost their lives. As did those Germans and Austrians who opposed the Nazi regime – before the war even started!!! The actor Conrad Veidt was imprisoned because he defied the Nazis and he wasn’t Jewish. Some of his gay friends were murdered – and this was in 1935.
But they weren’t killed BECAUSE they were Jewish, but killed nevertheless they were. The Third Reich never needed an excuse.
Sue, it was a genocide. Jews were killed because they were Jews, Romani were killed because they were Romani. Catholics because they were Catholic. Gays because they were gay. Blacks, political prisoners, Catholics, ethnic Poles & Slavs & more were also targeted & killed. This genocide target many more groups than just the Jews.
Yet somehow the world only knows this tragic event as the Holocaust of the Jews. Millions of non-Jews were massacred as well. These are the forgotten victims.
Well said Yaron. Could not agree with you more
Hamas is not made up of “human beings” in the normal definition. They must, and will, be eradicated like the vermin they are, with maximum prejudice. We are living in a time that rhymes with the 1930’s, and we mustn’t allow it to become the 1940’s
“Eradicated”? “Vermin”? Where did you learn your English, Nazi Training School? We have heard these terms before. And we didn’t like them then.
(German original below.) “Both sides must recognize their enemies as human beings and try to empathize with their perspective, their pain and their distress. Israelis must also accept that the occupation of Palestine is incompatible with this.”
“Barenboim once again clearly condemned the attack on Israel. ‘There is no justification for Hamas’s barbaric, terrorist acts against civilians, including children and babies.'”
“Beide Seiten müssen ihre Feinde als Menschen erkennen und versuchen, ihre Sichtweise, ihren Schmerz und ihre Not nachzuempfinden. Israelis müssen auch akzeptieren, dass die Besetzung Palästinas damit nicht vereinbar ist.”
Barenboim verurteilte erneut klar den Angriff auf Israel. “Die barbarischen, terroristischen Akte der Hamas gegenüber Zivilisten, darunter Kinder und Babys, sind durch nichts zu rechtfertigen.”
Hamas must be destroyed, not recognized as “human beings”.
Bravo. #IstandwithIsrael.
Be good enough to remember the Palestinian people voted for Hamas. No excuses; oh, but, no, but…we didn’t know…they were different then…bla bla bla
They voted in 2007. They have not been given an opportunity since. 16 years is almost enough time for a whole new generation of voters to emerge. Who knows? We are aware of “elections” (once in a blue moon) in various totalitarian states, and the amount of wiggle room citizens have to oppose such regimes (very little).
The last time there was a group refusal to see another group as human beings, you know what happened. Now you are suggesting, including using words like “vermin,” which have an echo, that the victim group from last time turn to the tactics of the oppressor group. Civilised people did not like it then, and they do not like it now.
This is no way minimises the obscenity of what Hamas did last Saturday, has done before, and has done since. But if some people in Israel and their supporters elsewhere take the position that Palestinians have no right to live, they forfeit the right to sympathy.
It is not the BBC’s job to use strong language. it is its job to provide a forum for those who are in positions of responsibility, those who are directly affected, or those who wish to comment on their own or their organisation’s behalf, to use the language (within the law) that they choose. The BBC is a MEDIUM. Historically it is meant to be impartial. It may fail occasionally but that it still tries is essential and important.
Being in Canada my access to BBC news coverage is spotty. But in recent years it has been better than it was a couple of decades ago. I did not see BBC’s coverage of Bush’s “War on Tair,” so I do not know if they called AQ “Tairists.” But I have read John Simpson’s eloquent argument for their not referring to Hamas as terrorists, and I do find the almost round-the-clock coverage BBC is providing to the colonies on its website to be pretty comprehensive and pretty frank. Let those who wish call either side whatever they want. The BBC is not the judge here, it is the messenger.
MSNBC in the United States had surprisingly allowed a Muslim perspective on their network until they suspended their shows headed by three progressive Muslim anchors. Well, so much for sustaining diversity in the corporate media.
Word. CNN is basically a pro-Israeli platform at this point. Nearly every news anchor has ties to Israel.
I’ve been watching coverage on PBS. PBS giving good historical background and perspective from both Palestinian & Israeli leaders.
Yeah, we know about ‘historical perspective, but here’s your rockets because we hate you!!
Can you imagine the foaming hatred and fulminations if Israel was an impoverished, barren wasteland rather than an economically progressive, innovative nation!!!???
Sue, we’re speaking here about how different media sources are presenting this issue, not the issue itself.
You’re like a rabid dog.
Some see the other person the way a cannibal sees.
‘Twas ever thus and ever thus will be.
The problem for the Jews is that, in the eyes of the woke Left, they’re not the right kind of victims.
The BBC serves us with its reporters and reporting of the situation. It has not spared the details of the terrible Hamas atrocities but it also shows us the situation in Gaza. It is doing its job.
It’s not for the BBC to take sides when it is a big international public broadcaster all around the world via its valuable unbiased World Service. Sky News can do what it likes. One death on all sides is simply one too many. As a species we are very good at butchering our own, either by physically killing people off or by our words and other deeds.
In 2004, the BBC commissioned the Balen Report on its coverage of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict following large numbers of complaints.
So far it has ignored numerous Freedom of Information Act requests and resisted all demands to release it.
Why?
The BBC is completely discredited because of its left wing groupthink. I’m surprised anybody would quote that execrable organization.
“because of its left wing groupthink.” – This is absolutely laughable. See how lenient the BBC have ben on the many blunders committed by the Tories in recent years. If anything, they’re nondescript mainstream.