Campbell's beliefs fail to reveal themselves in print

From Seán MacCann

Israeli Defence Forces volunteer Ms Campbell stated in your paper that she "stands up for what she believes".

What exactly does she believe in, then?

I read the article twice, but could find nothing about her beliefs.

Perhaps she's a committed Zionist who believes God gave Palestine to the Jews a couple of thousand years ago? Or could it be that she's just another brainwashed, ill-educated grunt, too silly to see past a western cartoon version of history.

If the government had any spine, they'd revoke her passport; assuming of course that her new friends haven't already stolen it.

Seán Mac Cann,

Co Tyrone

August 15, 2010

Comments

#1 nrs commented, on August 19, 2010 at 6:37 p.m.:

Seems to me that Ms Campbell stands up for the right to make her own opinions based on her own experiences. Sorry you missed that, but from your remarks, not terribly surprised. Where I come from, nobody gets a passport revoked for thinking differently from someone else. Glad you're not here.

#2 Andrew Brehm commented, on August 19, 2010 at 7:29 p.m.:

I assume we have ruled out that she simply believes that middle-eastern Jews have a right to survive?

"Death to the Jews" is not just a good slogan for so-called "peace protests", it's also the call most middle-eastern Jews remember from a few decades ago when they fled the Arab countries and resettled in Israel.

How ill-educated does one have to be to resist the urge to walk the easier path of condemning everything Israel does and everything Israel is? How brainwashed does one have to be to look past what the media say about Israel and visit the country and see with one's own eyes?

Perhaps she is a committed Zionist and supports secular democracy, women's rights, and doesn't want to join the camp of Hamas supporters who have little regard for Jewish or Arab lives.

Who knows?

Standing up for what you believe is easy if your belief is compatible with "Death to the Jews". No anti-Israel protester has anything to fear, unless they attack people or announce that they will sail into Israeli territory to break a weapons blockade.

I am proud to support Israel. And I think Israel is right to fight against the forces of evil. And even if I were convinced that Israel is wrong I still would refuse to join the huge number of people who points fingers. As a Jew and as a Zionist, I _have_ to support whomever everyone hates, because they are the ones who need me.

#3 Andy Gill commented, on August 20, 2010 at 11:01 a.m.:

Good for Ms Campbell, and shame on those who are attacking her. She seems a remarkably compassionate and clear-sighted young woman. And she certainly has the courage to stand up to the Irish bullies.

#4 Abu Zibby commented, on August 20, 2010 at 1:31 p.m.:

The hateful responses to Ms Campbells report are simply shocking and show that Israel seems to be right on track while Europe will face a grim future reminiscent of the horrors the last century. I want to personally thank Cliona for her determination to stand up against prejudice and libel.

#5 GARY commented, on August 20, 2010 at 3:58 p.m.:

To balance Cliona's article, in addition to protecting Israel, the IDF use chemical weapons, cluster bombs and practice collective punishment on civilians, they are not heroes.

If anyone wants to criticise Cliona for publishing her unquestioning support of the IDF they have every right to. If she cant handle criticism then she is choosing the wrong profession.

Its the clowns that claim all critics of the IDF are anti-semitic that are the bullies.

#6 Michael commented, on August 22, 2010 at 12:48 a.m.:

Gary ( comment #5). What is your evidence that the IDF use chemical weapons, cluster bombs and ptactivecollective punishment on civilians? Just because you say so doesn't make it so. The Israeli constitution gives more protection to those living within its borders on a whole range of human rights than any of its neighbours. That protection covers legitimate and peaceful political activity, the practice and promotion of religion other than Judaism and deep respect for females from childhood to adulthood. But Islamic terrorists have launched thousands of rockets blindly into Israel and have sent suicide/homocide bombers consisting of children and women into Israeli territory murdering innocent civilians -those civilians were not exclusively Jewish and did not exclude those professing Islam as a religion. The worst oppressors of Palestinians and people of the Islamic faith are those of their own faith. Do you know what percentage of Jordan is made of of Palestinians? Since it is quite large why doesn't Jordan cede territory to them and thus create the nucleus of a Palestinian state? The objective of Israel's neighbours has been and is to push the Jews into the sea - in other words the extermination of the Jews. Indeed the aim of radical Islam is to impose Sharia [ That is Islamic law ] worldwide. Democracy is not a fundamental principle on which any of Israel's neighbours based their forms of government. Most of them are semi-democratic or are downright autocratic. President Mubarak of Egypt has been in undisputed power since 1981. As for Saudi Arabia - need I comment? Public beheadings which foreigners living there are forced to watch. But should radical Islamists gain worlwide domination I think you will get a rude wake-up call and your blinkered vision as regards Israel's right to exist and your failure to recognize the nature of radical Islam in a fundamentalist Islamic world will be drastically revised.

#7 Eugene commented, on August 22, 2010 at 3:36 p.m.:

If you are so sure that "Palestine, the country, goes back through most of recorded history", it expected you to be able to answer a few questions about that country of Palestine:

When was it founded and by whom?

What were its borders?

What was its capital?

What were its major cities?

What constituted the basis of its economy?

What was its form of government?

Can you name at least one Palestinian leader before Arafat?

Was Palestine ever recognized by a country whose existence, at that time or now, leaves no room for interpretation?

What was the language of the country of Palestine?

What was the prevalent religion of the country of Palestine?

What was the name of its currency?
And, finally, since there is no such country today, what caused its demise and when did it occur?

You are lamenting the "low sinking" of a "once proud" nation. Please tell, when exactly was that "nation" proud and what was it so proud of?

And if the people you mistakenly call "Palestinians" are anything but generic Arabs collected from all over -- or thrown out of -- the Arab world, if they really have a genuine ethnic identity that gives them right for self-determination, why did they never try to become independent until Arabs suffered their devastating defeat in the Six Day War?

The truth should be obvious to everyone who wants to know it. Arabs have never abandoned the dream of destroying Israel; they still cherish it today. Having time and again failed to achieve their goal with military means, they decided to fight Israel by proxy. For that purpose, they created a terrorist organization, cynically called it "the Palestinian people" and installed it in Gaza, Judea, and Samaria. How else can you explain the refusal by Jordan and Egypt to unconditionally accept back the "West Bank" and Gaza, respectively?

The fact is, Arabs populating Gaza, Judea, and Samaria have much less claim to nationhood than that Indian tribe that successfully emerged in Connecticut with the purpose of starting a tax-exempt casino: at least that tribe had a constructive goal that motivated them. The so called "Palestinians" have only one motivation: the destruction of Israel, and in my book that is not sufficient to consider them a nation" -- or anything else except what they really are: a terrorist organization that will one day be dismantled.

In fact, there is only one way to achieve peace in the Middle East. Arab countries must acknowledge and accept their defeat in their war against Israel and, as the losing side should, pay Israel reparations for the more than 50 years of devastation they have visited on it. The most appropriate form of such reparations would be the removal of their terrorist organization from the land of Israel and accepting Israel's ancient sovereignty over Gaza, Judea, and Samaria.

That will mark the end of the Palestinian people. What are you saying again was its beginning?

#8 zkharya commented, on August 22, 2010 at 7:32 p.m.:

a) that is a highly inaccurate and prejudiced misrepresentation of Zionism, which is rooted on the same principle as Palestinian Arab Muslim and Christian nationalism: right of return whither whence one was originally dispossessed.

b) revoking passports for expressing sympathy for Israel? What would that mean for the majority of Irish Jews, who also sympathise with Israel?

This is exactly how anti-Zionism becomes anti-Semitism.

c) the assumption that Cliona is hiding her views suggests Mac Caan she is hiding something illicit.

What could that be?

That she is really Jewish?

That she is the kind of Christian of which Mac Caan disapproves?

Mac Caan's words drip with the paranoid hatred that characterise the prejudice with which such as he viewed Jewish, Jewishness and Judaism, long before any state of Israel existed.

Shameful.

#9 Cityca commented, on August 22, 2010 at 9:58 p.m.:

As someone who has done the same programme as Cliona, it saddens me to see the hostility she has met with in Ireland.

Israel is a democracy that adheres to the rule of law. Is it perfect? No more so than Eire or the UK or the US, but it is not the tyrannical state that typifies so many of its immediate neighbours.

If you really want to know why the Palestinian people live as they do, you should ask why they remain stateless refugees, 63 years after they lost their homes during wartime. No other people have been allowed to remain refugees for six decades.

At the same time as they became refugees, 850,000 Jews from Arab states also became refugees. Not one is still a refugee now. They were absorbed by Israel as a normal response to a humanitarian crisis.

What did the Arab League do about their brother Arabs? They issued a policy document, still in place today, that said no Palestinian could be given statehood or a passport of any Arab state. They would be used as a stick with which to punish Israel, until such time as Israel was destroyed.

So what Cliona did, and what many other Irish people and others from all over the globe do, is go to Israel, a country the size of Wales, and help to maintain a defensive force to try to keep all Israelis, Jews, Arabs, Muslims and Christians, safe in this tiny sliver of a country.

Most Israelis want an end to 63+ years of conflict and to live in harmony with their neighbours. The Arab League, comprising over 2 million square kilometres (to Israel's 20 thousand sq km), and with oil revenues in the trillions of dollars, have been unable to find a place in their lands, or their hearts for a people they publicly call 'brother'.

Israel is not perfect, but neither is it the demonised state some would have you believe, as those with an open mind can discover for themselves. Thank you Cliona and others for having just such open minds.

#10 Julius commented, on August 26, 2010 at 5:55 p.m.:

Reading about what Cliona Campbell has done brings to mind the adage "One person with courage makes a majority." There appear to be some people in Ireland, including many in the press, who have a herd mentality and are too morally weak to examine facts and history objectively and reach independent conclusions. Rather, they blindly follow what their left-wing intellectual buddies, whether artists, journalists or politicians, say. And the most fashionable thing of all among these elites is anti-Zionism, which is nothing more than the latest incarnation of anti-semitism. Interesting that it took a 19-year-old student to show what moral and intellectual courage really is. This young woman is a gem.

#11 Stephen commented, on August 27, 2010 at 2:31 p.m.:

An interesting contrast to this story is the story of Omer Goldman, the Israeli daughter of a Mossad chief who is facing jail for her refusal to complete her conscription in the IDF.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news...

The IDF stands accused of serious war crimes, for the 2006 assault on Lebanon, for the 2009 attack on the people of Gaza, and in the massacre aboard Mavi Marmura. These are not actions of self-defense. When PIRA was exploding bombs in London and other British cities, did the British government launch rocket attacks on West Belfast, or even Dundalk? Would people like Eugene and Michael have supported the British right to self-defense if they had done so? Yet they support similar actions when committed by IDF!

#12 cityca commented, on August 27, 2010 at 6:02 p.m.:

Stephen writes that, "The IDF stands accused of serious war crimes, for the 2006 assault on Lebanon, for the 2009 attack on the people of Gaza, and in the massacre aboard Mavi Marmura. These are not actions of self-defense."

On the contrary. The 'assault on Lebanon', was in response to years of rockets falling on northern Israeli towns, culminating in the breaching of the border by Hez B'Allah and the kidnap and killing of Israeli soldiers. The attack on Gaza again followed the launching of more than 10,000 rockets from Gaza into southern Israel by Hamas, and the kidnapping of Gilad Shallit, a young conscript soldier who has now spent 4 years in Hamas captivity, without access to anyone including the International Committee of the Red Cross. The 'massacre' aboard the Mavi Marmara which is still being investigated by notables such as David Trimble was in rsponse to brutal actions by a small and committed group of violent activists on that boat, committed to provoking confrontation with the IDF who were initially armed with nothing more deadly than paintball guns but who had to resort to deadly force when their own lives were put at risk.

Stephen, it is telling that you consider none of this was self defence. Israel has had to do nothing but defend itself against attacks from a broad range of Arab attackers for over 63 years, now supplemented by attacks from people like Stephen and the artists who have aligned themselves with Hamas and Hez B'Allah, two fascist, theocratic, anti democratic and specifically anti-Semitic organisations who would, wre they to get their worldwide caliphate, ban much of the artistic activities of the artists who here seek to support them.

I take my hat off to Cliona once more for her courage in standing up for what she believes in, rather than following the left wing herd.

#13 Michael commented, on August 27, 2010 at 6:27 p.m.:

Stephen ( Comment #11 ) writes " The IDF stands accused . . . . ". There is key word in this statement and that word is " accused ". Has the IDF - or Israel as a state been found guilty yet? I think not - so the accusation remains just that, an unproven accusation. What of the Mavi Marmura? It was supposed to be taking humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza. But since when did people taking humanitarian aid to others carry offensive weapons having the potential of killing others? So when the IDF boarded they were attacked with deadly weapons. Had the IDF not responded they would have been killed. But the truth is that those killed had expressed a desire for martyrdom and their killing has been promoted as such since then. They certainly would not have died had they refrained from attacking the IDF. Who was it that indiscriminatly launched from Gaza hundreds if not thousands of rockets into Israel- a strategy that could have killed civilian of any race, religion or political point of view. They could have killed women and children at any time. On the boarding of the Mavi Mamura I think the IDF should have had, if possible, tactics that could have produced an outcome without fatal consequences. As a Christian I am totally opposed to all violence, but the values of the world condone offensive and defensive acts of violence and my opposition to such values will not change them. Stephen, I still find it interesting how many people who condemn the democratic state of Israel remain silent on the human rights abuses inflicted on people in the semi-democratic and autocratic countries that are Israel's sworn enemies. The difference between what is happening between Israel and its neighbouring enemy states and the Irish Republic and Great Britain is that the various governments of the Irish Republic were not supporting overtly or covertly the terrorist actions of the Provisional IRA, although it is true they could have done more to combat the IRA by introducing extradition much sooner than they did. On the other hand the enemy countries surrounding Israel have overtly and covertly assisted terrorist acts against Israel and have launched several wars against Israel. The ultimate objective of Israel's enemies is for its destruction - or, as some of them have put it, to push all the Jews into the sea. Finally I will say that I dread to think what would happen in this country or any western nation if the Islamic fundamentalists somehow attained power. I think you and I would find that our rights to freedom of speech, practising the religion of our choice, participating in free political activity if one chooses to do would be supressed. As for the rights of women - well, I think we all know too well where that would end up.

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