Khazars, The Far Right And Dubious History.

[This particular post will be sticky for a while, I might, all things being equal, post below it]

I didn’t want to post for a while, but after reading a truly appalling post at Socialist Unity blog by Ger Francis, I felt I had to comment.

The body of the Francis’ article is about a meeting held by George Galloway in Birmingham, but as I am not terribly interested in him or his views I wasn’t too concerned with that. Rather I was interested in the references within the post and in the comments box to the new book by Shlomo Sand, The Invention of the Jewish People.

Part of Sand’s work retreads a well-trodden path from Arthur Koestler, to any number of dubious Far Right web sites, that push the notion that “Jews aren’t really Jews, they are Khazars”.

Why Sand, as a historian of French history, decided to venture into the complex and contested area of Jewish history I can’t say, perhaps it was for the fame? The money or even notoriety? Whatever reason, it is unimportant and I shall leave it to academics in that field to critique his work.

Anita Shapira has reviewed his book [PDF download] for the Journal of Israeli History and Israel Bartal is highly critical. Simon Schama reviewed it in the FT.

I am more concerned with this very nasty line of reasoning, from an antifascist point of view and where it leads, to the delegitimization of Jews.

I think anyone remotely familiar with the limited range of thoughts and debates found on neo-Nazi and Far Right web sites will recognise that particular “Khazar” argument and understand why it is pushed. I won’t provide any links to those neo-fascist web sites, but readers can find them on Google by using the keywords: Khazars Jews white power or David Duke khazers.

The Far Right is populated by Jew haters and such like, they need, for the sake of their own beliefs, to delegitimize Jews, to denigrate them, to eradicate their very existence, politically, historically, socially, and physically. That is why Holocaust denial is so important to them, it is a form of racial incitement against Jews, and in their on-line web activities that means the Far Right manufacture, use fake quotations and dubious historical sources, and above all push the myth of the Khazars.

All of this is not coincidental, the Far Right view Jews as the ultimate enemy and any opportunity to disparage them is used, so conscious anti-racists and antifascists should be aware of the Far Right’s tactics, and certainly avoid emulating them.

However, as the post at Socialist Unity blog showed a wider problem is evident, which is that many modern political activists in the West seem to erroneously assume that they have to be anti-Israeli or anti-Jew to be pro-Palestinian.

Nothing could be further from the truth, saddling the cause of the Palestinians with the Far Right’s argumentation and method is the quickest way to discredit it.

Moreover, feeble attempts to try and delegitimize Jews, as a people, as a group with a deep sense of history, a bitter history, does not achieve anything. Quite the contrary and it is rather insulting and degrading.

Not only that, but it shows an almost complete ignorance of the Far Right’s methodology and activities, combined with a monumental lack of sensitivity which in the end only fosters anti-Jewish racism.

Copying the Far Right’s arguments is not something that socialists or antiracists should do, or seek to imitate.

I would hope that authors on Socialist Unity blog would take the time to read, and reread, Andy Newman’s guide to David Duke’s racism, and hopefully they would see their own mistakes in this area and avoid them.

Update 1: The CST blog covers many issues on Sand’s work.

Children Of The Empire.

The recent news of forced migration of children to the colonies will come as a surprise to most people, particularly the British, who probably haven’t heard of this appalling practice until now.

The Australian Prime Minister’s apology, after much external pressure, is also soliciting change within the British government.

Despite the fact that forced migration had gone on for some three and a half centuries the British government adopted William Pitt’s maxim, let sleeping dogs lie.

Notwithstanding the horrendous ramifications for the people concerned, nothing much was said. Until the politician’s arm was forced up their back and even then they dragged their feet.

The Common’s Select Committee on Health reported on this issue in 1998, 11 years ago, and here’s a small extract :

”Introduction

1. “It was barbaric; it was dreadful. We look back on it in our organisation with shock and horror.”[1] This was the comment on the child migration programmes made by the Chief Executive of Barnardo’s when he, along with representatives of other sending agencies, gave evidence to us on 11 June 1998. Child migration was a feature of British social policy for many years. Legislation allowed children in the care of voluntary organisations to be transported to Commonwealth countries. In total it is estimated that some 150,000 children were dispatched over a period of 350 years—the earliest recorded child migrants left Britain for the Virginia Colony in 1618, and the process did not finally end until the late 1960s.[2] Exact statistics are difficult to come by. Today many former child migrants continue to face serious difficulties in establishing their actual identities and contacting members of their natural families who are still alive. The absence of a medical history is also a significant problem for some. In many cases child migrants suffered emotional and physical hardship and abuse, of a kind which has had damaging consequences for their health and well-being for the remainder of their lives.

2. Responsibility within the British Government for matters relating to the welfare of former British child migrants now rests with the Department of Health (DoH). This is therefore an issue which falls within the Health Committee’s order of reference. At our first meeting in the present Parliament, in July 1997, we decided to inquire into aspects of child migration, a subject which until recent years has received shamefully little attention. One explanation for this seeming disregard is that until the advent of the Child Migrants’ Trust in 1987, individual former child migrants had no organisation to represent their interests or co-ordinate their activities. They were, and are, widely dispersed across Australia and other Commonwealth countries, and often lack any ready means of gaining access to opinion-formers or to the media. Mr Tom Luce, Division Head of the Social Care Group at the DoH, commented that:

“We have a very strong impression that before the middle to late 1980s there were very few inquiries, complaints, applications for records”.[3]

The agencies involved in child migration appear at this time to have been less than co-operative in dealing with requests for information. Former child migrants were a group whose fate had largely been forgotten.”

So next time someone talks about British greatness and the Empire, remind them of the real history, the real Empire, and what it consciously did to small children.

Update 1: The Child Migrants Trust is a useful resource.

Update 2: BBC radio covered this issue in 2003, their programmes are available (as Real media), Programme One – Children of the Empire, Programme Two – Good British Stock, Programme Three – Nobody to Trust and Programme Four – Searching for Identity.

Update 3: Again from the Beeb:

“Australia’s Roman Catholic Church publicly apologised on Thursday to British and Maltese child migrants who suffered abuse including rape, whippings and slave labour in religious institutions.”

Update 4: From 1999,

“British officials have been involved in a “top level cover-up” over the forced migration of vulnerable children, a Labour MP claimed on Wednesday.
David Hinchliffe, chairman of the Commons Health Select Committee, told the House of Commons that 150,000 children in care had been shipped to Australia and New Zealand as part of an experiment in child migration which he called “Britain’s most shameful secret”.

The practice of shipping orphans to Britain’s former colonies began in 1618 and only ended in 1967.”

Update 5: From the Australia’s Parliamentary Library, ‘Forgotten Australians’ and ‘Lost Innocents’: child migrants and children in institutional care in Australia.

“Under the Empire Settlement Act of 1922 and 1937, the British Government assisted private organisations to help people who wanted to settle in ‘His Majesty’s Overseas Dominions.’ Although not specifically aimed at assisting child migrants, this legislation allowed non-government organisations to send child migrants to various parts of the British Empire. The scheme intensified after the war when child migrants were sent under the Children’s Act 1948. Although non-government organisations had direct charge of most of the children at the recruitment stage, during their passage, or after their arrival in the receiving countries, they received encouragement and financial backing from British governments and governments in receiving countries. About 150 000 children with an average age of eight years and nine months emigrated from the United Kingdom, the majority to Canada, until the scheme ended in 1967.[4] A key motivation for child migration was to maintain the racial unity of the Empire and populate the Dominions of Canada, Rhodesia, New Zealand and Australia, with ‘good white stock’.”

Update 6: The Torygraph, 2001 “The Roman Catholic Church in Australia apologised yesterday to British child migrants who were sexually abused… “

A Dollar.

World Service had an interesting program from Namibia on a Basic Income Grant project:

“Thrown off nearby farms at the time of Namibia’s independence, the squatters of Otjivero lived a hand-to-mouth existence with no job prospects or land to farm.

Last year a scheme was established to give every inhabitant a basic cash grant of about US$10 a month, to spend as they wanted.

Believed to be the first no–conditions cash handout in the world, this small cash injection has made an enormous difference to their lives.

School enrolment has shot up, small businesses are springing up, and the nurse at the local clinic says malnutrition rates amongst the children have dropped.”

Facebook’s Anti-Roma Group.

A cautionary tale, as to how modern media and the web are being used to attack the Roma in the most disgusting of ways:

“Yesterday the daily Lidové noviny (LN) reported that the new racist group on the Facebook social networking site called “Every Fan Means One Less Gypsy! Let’s Clean Up the Czech Republic!” (“Za 1 fanouška…o 1 cikána méně! Pojďme vyčistit ČR!”), which incites hatred against the Roma and calls for their extermination, no longer has an administrator and cannot be contributed to. Some former administrators of the group claim to have had no idea they were even filling that role. The group was created on 4 November and almost 10 000 people have joined it. Detectives are investigating its creation and its members.

LN reports that the person who founded the group has not contributed to it. The group has had a minimum of four different administrators entrusted with excluding people from the group or erasing their contributions. Two such administrators claim they were assigned the role without asking for it.

“I accepted an invitation to the group without realizing it was racist,” Ondra Zugar told the paper. He left it after realizing what kind of group it was. “Then some people started writing to me saying I was its administrator and I should erase it,” he said, adding that he wants nothing to do with it.

“Police are investigating this Facebook group. However, I cannot publicize what specific steps they are taking at this time,” said police spokesperson Pavla Kopecká, who says police are able to determine who the group’s founder was even if the person is no longer active as its author.

LN reported previously that the commentaries posted by sympathizers of the racist group were very harsh because no administrator was erasing any submissions and contributors could write whatever they wanted. Participants in the discussion called for Roma to be shot or for people to take to the streets armed with brass knuckles and nightsticks.

The group is not the first case of a racist discussion on Facebook. Kopecká says police have already investigated a group called “Final Solution to the Gypsy Question” (“Konečné řešení otázky cikánské”) where similar statements appeared. “

Feck Off Friends of David Irving.

Every now and again, normally after I have posted something on David Irving my blog gets a boost, an unwelcome leap in posters.

These posters, like Michael Santomauro, are either neo-Nazis, Hitler lovers or their mates, and wrongly they assume that they should be allowed to spout their racialist filth all and every where. They never trouble to read my comment policy or understand the fact that I positively loath these Jew hating fascist scum.

So just in case, Michael Santomauro, did not get my message before, I’ll make it clearer:

Feck off friends of David Irving, you are not welcome here.

New Yorkers Against David Irving.

You’ve got to like em!

New Yorkers Against David Irving have managed to block part of his speaking tour in New York City, Infoshop news has more:

“Irving was scheduled to speak on November 14th at the Catholic Kolping Society at 165 East 88th Street. Along with several concerned citizens and citizen’s groups, New Yorkers Against David Irving made calls to the venue, explaining who David Irving is and why he was hiding behind a fictitious name in order to reserve space at their facility. Further, they demanded that the event be canceled.

New Yorkers Against David Irving firmly believes that Holocaust revisionists and deniers and neo-Nazi sympathizers have no place in NYC – or anywhere else for that matter! We will always take action to ensure our city stays clean from the likes of David Irving and other fascist scum.”

(H/T: Entdinglichung )

Update 1: New Jersey Residents Against David Irving (NJ-RADI) managed to do the same, great!

Update 2: A few neo-nazis want to gloat about Irving in the comments box, I would refer them to my post.

Betas To Come?

Firefox 3.6 is coming shortly, beta 2 just released.

Kindle and PCs. Not a good start.

Glenn Beck and the First Amendment, which he likes when it suits him.

Skype might have some serious competition, from Google.

DistroWatch Weekly makes interesting reading.

Nice, short guide to dealing with M$ malware.

Flawed fox ?

Bing’s security problems.

PCs for us oldies.

Microsoft hates those chippers, might turn out to be a PR disaster, eventually.

Murdoch’s mistake, I think he hasn’t quite understood the web or modern technology, as he thinks he can charge for content from his papers, more likely is that most people will stop sourcing their material from News International titles.

Twitter the wisdom of the ages?

Rather funny.

Who’d own an Iphone?

Home Secretary’s misplaced photo-op with McKinnon’s mum.

Intel Reader, good idea, stupid price.

More on Iphone’s own goals at Facebook.

Kindle DX rejected.

Devils in the detail? The Vatican uses Linux!

Epiphany moves to Webkit.

James Bond’s Phone MK II.

Around The World In A Few Clicks.

France told to back off.

I like the idea of a blogging donkey.

In Germany, a Russian racist is jailed for the appalling killing of Marwa al-Sherbini.

Swine flu politics in the Ukraine.

Refugees flee Saudi-Yemeni conflict, the UN expresses concern.

China’s Free Trade Agreement with Costa Rica is on the horizon?

Neo-Nazis detained in Italy.

A world of barriers, biggest in the world.

Over 135,000 Tamils stuck in camps, still.

Vaccination used as bait in the Congo.

Racists attack synagogue in Florida.

Great Wall damaged.

No Wisdom In Nuclear Power.

Left Foot Forward presents some interesting facts to contradict the British Government’s statements on Nuclear power.

Far Right In The EU.

The CST blog has more on how the Far Right are organising within the EU.

Stealing Money.

Most people have a low regard for politicians, and even more so if they are perceived to be on the take, so the fate of the fiddling UKIP MP is all the more funny:

Former UKIP MEP Tom Wise faces up to seven years in jail after being convicted of false accounting yesterday. Wise embezzled £36,000 of taxpayers’ money into a secret bank account – £3,500 of which was spent on two bottles of wine.

The funds were from his £3,000-a-month secretarial allowance, of which only £500 was actually paid to his secretary, the rest being spent “in support of his own interests”. “

The Times has more.

Update 1: He got only 2 years in jail, according to the Beeb. Mr. Wise was a former copper!

Update 2: The ukipwatch site might prove to be handy in keeping track of UKIP.

Danish Neo-Nazis And The Royals.

See Norfolk Unity on Danish neo-nazis. Not forgetting MEP’s glowing report.

Bits and Failures.

10 failures in computing.

Intel’s strangle-hold on the chip business.

49 goodies.

Tighten up your Java, not the coffee.

Smart phones and the people that use them.

Moblin looking good.

How Google uses Linux.

Roll your own Ubuntu.

More on the Skype and Ebay saga.

A Koala fan.

Firefox fixed again.

Hezbollah – Unbelievable.

Read more at Coatesy’s.

Withdrawal And Then What?

The politics of a withdrawal from Afghanistan are firmly on the British political agenda, the recent comments by Gordon Brown’s office indicates that, even Nick Clegg is hedging his bets.

Combined with the removal of the United Nation’s western officials, the situation in Afghanistan is looking bleak, despite the urgency of the McChrystal’s request for extra troops the White House is dithering.

There is a distinct possibility that NATO forces and aid agencies could withdraw completely from Afghanistan within the next few years, or before, and despite what some “anti-imperialists” suggest such a course of action would not be a victory, as ultimately the Afghans will suffer a terrible fate.

I think it worthwhile pondering the possible outcomes of a precipitous withdraw of NATO troops.

These preliminary points should not need stating, however, I think they provide a wider context from which we can draw some conclusions.

• Firstly, the Taliban is engaged in a war of conquest, it wants to control Afghanistan at all costs, the whole country as it did years ago.
• Secondly, it will use any means to achieve that end, it would gladly kill thousands, if not tens of thousands, or more, that’s what the Taliban will do.
• Thirdly, the years of neglect and misgovernment have taken their toll and finally, that the joint NATO and Afghan forces are having a real difficulty subduing the Taliban.

All of these points are fairly obvious, but they point to wider problems, should NATO forces leave abruptly then the remaining Afghan forces would have serious difficulties overcoming the Taliban.

Again, if the combined resources of both Afghan and NATO forces can’t readily defeat the Taliban, at the moment, then the Afghan forces on their own probably would not be able to do it. What follows from that is very important, because as far as I can see there are two conceivable outcomes of a hasty withdrawal of NATO forces:

1. Civil war in Afghanistan.

2. A Taliban victory and conquest of the country.

Should a civil war occur in Afghanistan then potentially hundreds of thousands of Afghan civilians could be slaughtered, as neither side would pull any punches and use all and any available methods to subdue the other side.

Either with, or without, a civil war a Taliban victory is highly probable.

In victory they will show no mercy, in the past they have deliberately attacked other ethnic minorities in Afghanistan, etc. I am not sure that we need to dwell on what type of society that the Taliban would reconstitute, but 13th century medievalism would be their starting place. Women in Afghanistan would be repressed and made the chattel of men. Girls education would be banned. Most modern innovations, even chess and music, would be made illegal

Under the Taliban the cult of the gun and the bullet made the dominant ideology, all that and much more. Aid agencies would be banned, as they were before, from the country as foreign “interlopers”, the Afghan economy would atrophy and millions of potential refugee’s seek shelter in neighbouring states. Starvation will return to Afghanistan.

Once that has occurred Western states will find any number of reasons not to intervene, as blood drips down the streets and alleyways of villages in Afghanistan.

That is certainly probable, in light of a Taliban victory, and in the West we will hear such nauseating variants on the “they are savages, let them fight it out” theme or “we shouldn’t split a drop of British blood for those Afghans” etc

In such an eventuality, a typically Western mix of isolationism, xenophobia and realpolitik would be used to justify inaction and passivity in the face of a Taliban victory.

All of that, is certainly a possibility, and more probable than many in the West would readily admit. A Taliban victory and the consequences for the ordinary Afghans does not bear thinking about, the result will be untold amounts of bloodshed and parsimonious hand-wringing in the West.