Save us from the crackpots who see Zionist conspiracies in everything

[T_i_B]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1843569,00.html

Within minutes of the airports being closed, angry emails arrived at our 'Comment Is Free' blog. 'Is it such a coincidence that this happens just when Zionists, UK and US are aiding and abetting mass murder in Lebanon?' asked one. 'Funny how these terrorist "threats" seem to knock other more important stories off the news agenda,' railed another.

There was much more in the same vein. All shared the assumption that the Islamist 'threat' (always in scare quotes) is a phantom menace used by the government to distract the credulous masses from Lebanon, Iraq or wherever abroad and panic them into abandoning their civil liberties at home. In this scenario, Islamists are little more than puppets jerking about to the commands of Western governments and the international Jewish conspiracy, which time their arrests to bury bad news.

Since modern technology allows every fool with an internet connection to broadcast his or her ravings, I would be making too much of the emails if they didn't exemplify a wider culture of denial. It holds that the threat is manufactured, and when exploding bombs or the arrest of alleged bombers shows that it is not, it insists that the 'root cause' must be the behaviour of Western governments rather than the logic of a fascistic ideology.

I think it is fair to say that a deep malaise has taken hold. Because it is so prevalent, not nearly enough attention is paid to its psychological appeal to millions of people. In part, it is popular because it corresponds with everyday life in the rich world. If they think about fascism at all, the majority of people in rich countries believe it died in the Forties. The idea that people will murder without limit for the impossible dream of an imperial caliphate still makes no sense to them. Within living memory, Europeans murdered without limit in the name of the equally impossible dreams of the 1,000-Year Reich and New Roman Empire, but modern Europeans can't see that the fevers they incubated have infected others.

[CJCRANE]

1. The Islamist threat is not a phantom menace

but Bush and Blair are exacerbating it out of all proportion.

If anyone thinks Bush is serious about combating islamic fundamentalism answer me this one question:

BIn Laden's primary demand was to rid Saudi Arabia of US troops. After 9/11 the Bush administration removed American troops from that country. How is that not capitulation to terrorism?

[drduffy]

2. If you believe that OBL orchestrated 9/11 then

you really are drinking koolaid. And if you only 'see' the terrorists as Islamists then you are truly deluded. I would say that the author is in 'denial'. The big cry from Washington is 'Islamofascism' ..... be very afraid...... But you ignore the neocon corporatist fascists of Washington and the transnational corporatists at your peril. And 'Zionism'? Fast losing any semblance of credibility.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Cohen could do with listening to Hoffmann, instead of slagging him off

Since modern technology allows every fool with an internet connection to broadcast his or her ravings, I would be making too much of the emails if they didn't exemplify a wider culture of denial. It holds that the threat is manufactured, and when exploding bombs or the arrest of alleged bombers shows that it is not, it insists that the 'root cause' must be the behaviour of Western governments rather than the logic of a fascistic ideology.

No, arrests of alleged bombers do not show the threat is not manufactured. They are the first step of a legal process which, if it works properly, eventually tells us whether there really was a threat. But the things Blair proposed (indefinite detention without trial of foreign suspects, detention for 90 days without charge of British suspects, home arrest without trial of suspects) try to get round that process, and show us nothing - only who the government feels like victimising. Hoffmann would have been right to say "the government was engaged in an unwarranted power grab", but that was actually twisting his words. Here's what he really said, in his ruling on the indefinite detention without trial of foreigners in Belmarsh:

Freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention is a quintessentially British liberty, enjoyed by the inhabitants of this country when most of the population of Europe could be thrown into prison at the whim of their rulers. It was incorporated into the convention in order to entrench the same liberty in countries which had recently been under Nazi occupation. The United Kingdom subscribed to the convention because it set out the rights which British subjects enjoyed under the common law.
...
Of course the government has a duty to protect the lives and property of its citizens. But that is a duty which it owes all the time and which it must discharge without destroying our constitutional freedoms. There may be some nations too fragile or fissiparous to withstand a serious act of violence. But that is not the case in the United Kingdom. When Milton urged the government of his day not to censor the press even in time of civil war, he said: ‘Lords and Commons of England, consider what nation it is whereof ye are, and whereof ye are the governors’.

This is a nation which has been tested in adversity, which has survived physical destruction and catastrophic loss of life. I do not underestimate the ability of fanatical groups of terrorists to kill and destroy, but they do not threaten the life of the nation. Whether we would survive Hitler hung in the balance, but there is no doubt that we shall survive Al-Qa’ida. The Spanish people have not said that what happened in Madrid, hideous crime as it was, threatened the life of their nation. Their legendary pride would not allow it. Terrorist violence, serious as it is, does not threaten our institutions of government or our existence as a civil community.

I said that the power of detention is at present confined to foreigners and I would not like to give the impression that all that was necessary was to extend the power to United Kingdom citizens as well. In my opinion, such a power in any form is not compatible with our constitution. The real threat to the life of the nation, in the sense of a people living in accordance with its traditional laws and political values, comes not from terrorism but from laws such as these. That is the true measure of what terrorism may achieve. It is for Parliament to decide whether to give the terrorists such a victory.”

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200405/ldjudgmt/jd041216/a&oth-5.htm

Hoffmann was talking about specific attempts by Blair to ignore established British and European law. But Cohen left out the bit about "in the sense of a people living in accordance with its traditional laws and political values" and claimed Hoffmann "allowed no room for argument about the balance between liberty and security".

Cohen was wrong about the Iraq war, and he's even more wrong here. He's smearing his opponents, by tying them to people he describes as "crackpots", "fascists", "raving fools", and he's siding with an authoritarian government, tooling up to get 90 day detention without charge right now. His journey from the left makes him the archetypal British neocon.

[T_i_B]

4. There's a reason why I didn't use the Hoffman parts of the article

Because that part of the article is a bit muddled, as Cohen ties himself in knots over whether to abandon his previous pro civil liberties stance. Something which he can't quite bring himself to do in the article.

Hoffmann might have said that the liberties of Britain must be protected even at the price of allowing preventable atrocities to take place. This is a principled position that I believe in, but one which honourable people oppose for honest reasons.

It wouldn't surprise me if Cohen did perform a U-turn on civil liberties but that would involve a bout of mental gymnastics even greater then that which he has performed over the war on terror. It would be a HUGE U-turn, given the bile he has already hurled at the people who he now claims oppose pro-civil liberties groups "for honorable reasons". Mind you, it is a trait of Cohen's to hurl abuse at his opponents rather then debate them properly, a trait that has become increasingly pronounced since he decided that invading Iraq was actually quite a jolly good idea.

Mind you, I did post the article for a reason, which is that I do think that some valid points are made. The left does have a huge problem with kooky conspiracy theorists, who have leapt to the conclusion that the current alert is manufactured without even the slightest shred of evidence other then their undying hatred for Bush and Blair. And the conspiracy kook problem is in turn linked to the problems that the far left has with anti-semitism.

And this isn't the first time we have had problems with this. The same people were spouting the same nonsense over the July 7th bombings and the death of Al-Zarqaui. We have to stand up to these idiots if we are to keep what little credibility we have left.

[CJCRANE]

6. The diatribes about "Zionism"

are not necessarily from LW commentators. I'm a resident "conspiracy theorist" here on DU but I have never mentioned anything about "Zionism" or Israel or Mossad being involved. If anything I try to highlight B*sh's links to fundamentalist muslim countries like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.

NB: And let's have an independant inquiry into 7/7 before we come to any conclusions (not that will necessarily lead to the truth, as we found with the 9/11 Commission).

[fat dad]

5. Fascinated with airline bombings only?

It holds that the threat is manufactured, and when exploding bombs or the arrest of alleged bombers shows that it is not, it insists that the 'root cause' must be the behaviour of Western governments rather than the logic of a fascistic ideology.

If the "Islamofascists" really wanted to kill us, there are a whole slew of easier and far more terrifying ways to go about it than blowing up airlines.

I mean, they could learn from Baruch Goldstein, the fanatical, right-wing Israeli settler who opened fire on a group of praying Muslims, killing 50, in a Hebron mosque, on Feb. 25, 1994. Just when peace seemed to be closer in sight. Was not this what triggered the beginning of the Palestinian suicide bombings, two months later?

Or they could assasinate a leader committed to peace, like right-wing Israeli extremists assassinated Yitzhak Rabin, killing the Oslo Accords, just when Arafat had agreed to recognize Israel, and to self-police the PLO, ending the violence. That would really stir up the terror pot.

Hell, they could hang out in upper Michigan and steal a Ryder truck.

But I guess the Arab right wing extremists must not be as 'creative' as their counterparts in Israel and the US.



(Edited Spelling)

[cali]

7. What silliness.

Are you actually claiming that there have been no mass casualties caused by those who claim they're killing in the name of Islam? Bali, London and Spain come to mind, even if you don't believe that 9/11 was done by a group of mostly Saudi men (I do).

In any case, a quick trip to wiki informed me that Goldstein murdered 29, not 50. In any case, though that was indeed a heinous act, it hardly stands as a template for creating mass deaths. Hell, Timothy McVeigh killed many more than that.

As for Rabin, let's not forget that Sadat was also murdered by fundamentalists.

This DU refusal to deal with the fact that for complex reasons, there really are Islamic fundamentalists dedicated to violent actions against the west, including civilians, is baffling. Why is it so difficult to acknowledge the bad acts of bushco and Israel AND the bad acts of certain Islamic fundamentalists? Really, entertaining two thoughts isn't that difficult.

[fat dad]

8. I do acknowledge both

This DU refusal to deal with the fact that for complex reasons, there really are Islamic fundamentalists dedicated to violent actions against the west, including civilians, is baffling. Why is it so difficult to acknowledge the bad acts of bushco and Israel AND the bad acts of certain Islamic fundamentalists? Really, entertaining two thoughts isn't that difficult.

Of course I acknowledge that Islamic fundamentalists have been guilty of "bad acts." Hell, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting another story informing us of Islamofascism's "bad acts."

I guess the point(s) I was making is that if they really wanted to kill us, they could do so a lot easier than constantly going after airliners. I also have a problem with people who ignore the underlying (and justifiable) reasons for the hatred Muslims feel towards Israel and the US. And if America and Israel want terror to stop, maybe both of these countries ought to stop perpertrating terror themselves and stop demonizing the enemy as some mindless evil, instead of people just like us. Takes two to tango and our hands aren't clean, either.