Thread: Ex-Israeli prime minister heckled on San Francisco visit

Ex-Israeli prime minister heckled on San Francisco visit - San Jose Mercury News

SAN FRANCISCO — Protesters heckled former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert during a speech in San Francisco Thursday, denouncing him as a war criminal and demanding his arrest.
As soon as Olmert took the stage at the Westin St. Francis Hotel — and following a warning by the discussion's moderator that no disturbances would be tolerated — a woman and man rose from their seats and shouted: "war criminal," "mass murderer."
Minutes after they were pushed out by police, another person stood up and yelled, "Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"
All in all, more than 20 people interrupted Olmert's 90-minute appearance, during which he answered questions on Middle East peace, Iran, the Lebanon War in 2006 and last winter's Gaza offensive, which was the point of attack for the protesters.
A United Nations report has accused Israel and Palestinian militants of committing war crimes during the three-week operation aimed at halting years of Palestinian rocket fire. Each side has rejected the allegations.
Some 1,400 Palestinians, including civilians, were killed, according to human rights organizations and the Palestinian government. Thirteen Israelis, including four civilians, also died.
Olmert, who was prime minister during the offensive, was unfazed by the jeers, even saying that one of the protesters likely traveled from Chicago, where Olmert was greeted similarly last week.
"He was unsuccessful there,"

Olmert said as the man was dragged away by police. "Let him shout. Who cares." After another interruption, Olmert said he was "impressed by the amount of energy that some of them have," but added, "they know nothing about the facts."
Olmert rejected the report, calling it distorted, because, he said, it failed to address the background of the war.
"To come to Israel ignoring the fact that for 8 years Israel was attacked almost on a daily basis by rockets and missiles, and to talk only about the reaction of Israel is unfair, is unjust, is unacceptable, is intolerable and Israel will not cooperate with it," he said.
The protesters inside were part of a bigger demonstration that took place outside the hotel in downtown San Francisco.
On one side of the street, people carried placards with the names of children who they said were killed during the Gaza war and signs that said "Let Gaza Live" and "Israel X-prime minister Ehud Olmert mass murderer."
Jim Harris, of Berkeley, said Olmert should be "held accountable" for his actions.
"He should be facing the Hague," he said.
On the other side of the street, less than a dozen counter-protesters carried Israeli flags.
Marshall Schwartz, a board member of "San Francisco Voice for Israel," said his group was there to show their support of Israel.
"There certainly was no plan except to protect the people of Gaza as much as possible while achieving the goal of stopping relentless rocket fire," he said of the offensive.

former NATO commander, Col. Richard Kemp, who recently addressed the UNHRC:

http://www.nationalpost.com/todays-paper/story.html?id=2113307

|| I served with NATO and the United Nations; commanded troops in Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Macedonia; and participated in the Gulf War. I spent considerable time in Iraq since the 2003 invasion, and worked on international terrorism for the U.K. Government's Joint Intelligence Committee.

|| based on my knowledge and experience, I can say this: During Operation Cast Lead [the 2009 Israeli operation in Gaza], the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.

|| Israel did so while facing an enemy that deliberately positioned its military capability behind the human shield of the civilian population.

|| The IDF faces a challenge that we British do not have to face to the same extent. It is the automatic, Pavlovian presumption by many in the international media, and international human rights groups, that the IDF are in the wrong, that they are abusing human rights.

|| The truth is that the IDF took extraordinary measures to give Gaza civilians notice of targeted areas, dropping over two million leaflets, and making over 100,000 phone calls. Many missions that could have taken out Hamas military capability were aborted to prevent civilian casualties. During the conflict, the IDF allowed huge amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza. To deliver aid virtually into your enemy's hands is, to the military tactician, normally quite unthinkable. But the IDF took on those risks.

Good on them.

Israel needs to be called out on their shit.

Originally Posted by callippo

the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) did more to safeguard the rights of civilians in a combat zone than any other army in the history of warfare.

What an absolute crock. Phosphoros bombs in civilian areas.... Cluster bombs that will continue to explode in the rubble.... !400 Palestinians killed VS 13 Israelis. Those humanitarian Israelis sure know how to take care of civilians.

Originally Posted by callippo

Israel did so while facing an enemy that deliberately positioned its military capability behind the human shield of the civilian population.

No civilieans on either side should be targeted, but look at the reality. Israelis are sitting on occupied land. The Palestenians are in their own cities. And don't forget, Israeli occupiers hide behind their populations when they bring their children to illegal outposts they call settlements.

Originally Posted by callippo

The truth is that the IDF took extraordinary measures to give Gaza civilians notice of targeted areas, dropping over two million leaflets, and making over 100,000 phone calls.

Phone calls...leaflets. My, how extrordinary. So if Hamas sends leaflets into Israel before sending in a suicide bomber, does that cover the action...? Does that make it legitimate?

Originally Posted by callippo

During the conflict, the IDF allowed huge amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza.

After the conflict they stopped allowing food and medical supplies for weeks. Stopped a ship in international waters and took prisoners of humanitarian workers (one a US Congresswoman...maybe former Congresswoman) to do what...to show how much they care.

Israel has been hiding behind it's Poor-me, everybody hates me act for too long. The posture that God gave this land to me and we have this squater problem is not holding up under the pile of facts.

Originally Posted by Capp

Good on them.

Israel needs to be called out on their shit.

Little critique regarding Israel {and related} is brought to the attention of the masses....I wonder why???

Didn't think the americans had it in them
Israel has been coming out with lies for years about how the world persecutes them
PS Like I said before if mossad are watching I'm in chum phea

Surprised Olmert didn't mention the Holocaust. That always manages to rally some support for Zionist war crimes.

Its good to see at least some American people seeing through the Zionist media and condemning Israeli war crimes. And even better to see that it was reported in the media at all.

Americans should have a voice in what the Israel military does since it is their tax dollars that go to fund the Zionist war machine and enable these war crimes.

So if Hamas sends leaflets into Israel before sending in a suicide bomber

pretty big if. No warning has ever been issued prior to any terrorist attack in Israel, either before Hamas came along or after.
Israelis are sitting on occupied land.

as the 'Zionist media' like the Independent, Guardian, etc keep saying. Except they don't know, just like I don't know, and you don't know, where Israel begins and Palestine ends. The only times when a border was on the table, the Arabs have always rejected it, in 1947, and in 2000. There never was any kind of entity called 'Palestine' until the British established the Mandate in 1918 with the specific intention of re-establishing the Jewish homeland where Jews have lived, continuously, for a period of at least 3,300 years. There never was a Palestine or other country that Israel 'invaded'. Th so-called 'Green Line' is not any sort of international border or territorial division at all. All it is is the line agreed in the 1949 armistice agreement that followed a war in which the Arabs violently rejected partition and peace and began a war which they lost - a pattern which has been endlessly repeated ever since.

the cycle goes like this :

1. Reject peace and seek Israel's destruction

2. Express willingness to "sacrifice" and attack Israel

3. Lose and pretend that (because your aggression failed) you are the victim (look how much we sacrifice and suffer!)

4. Demonize Israel for beating you (look how we sacrifice/suffer) when you attack it and thus... (return to 1 and start again)

This applies to 1947-48, 1956, 1967, 1973, 1977/1982, 2000, 2006 and today.

or like this:

1. steal land.

2. build settlement

3. if any critisism, mention pogrom/holocaust. (back to 1)

This applies from about 1935 to the present day.

'occupied' or 'stolen' my ass. The territories are disputed, not occupied.

1) the territories never belonged to Palestinian Arabs in the first place. Prior to 1967 they were under the control of Jordan and Egypt, which had seized them illegally following aggressive war.

2) the Palestinian Authority was given control of the areas as part of the Oslo accords.

3) the only reason Israel continues to exert control is in reaction to Palestinian Arab violence. When the violence eases up, Israeli control does too, as is the case in today's West Bank, which has been relatively quiet for quite some time.

^ you clearly have no sense of justice whatsoever..

what is it this time? same imaginary friend?

Originally Posted by callippo

No warning has ever been issued prior to any terrorist attack in Israel, either before Hamas came along or after.

So what. The whole point is that dropping leaflets is meaningless, be it Israeli terrorism or Hamas'.

Originally Posted by callippo

never was any kind of entity called 'Palestine' until the British established the Mandate in 1918 with the specific intention of re-establishing the Jewish homeland where Jews have lived, continuously, for a period of at least 3,300 years. There never was a Palestine or other country that Israel 'invaded'. Th so-called 'Green Line' is not any sort of international border or territorial division at all. All it is is the line agreed in the 1949 armistice agreement that followed a war in which the Arabs violently rejected partition and peace and began a war which they lost - a pattern which has been endlessly repeated ever since.

The Balfour Declaration - In November 1917, before Britain had conquered Jerusalem and the area to be known as Palestine, Britain issued the

Balfour Declaration. The declaration was a letter addressed to Lord Rothschild, based on a request of the Zionist organization in Great Britain. The declaration stated Britain's support for the creation of a Jewish national home in Palestine, without violating the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities. The declaration was the result of lobbying by the small British Zionist movement, especially by Dr. Chaim Weizmann,

http://www.mideastweb.org/briefhistory.htm
Palestinian Arabs have lived there continuously for the same amount of time, peacefully, I might add, with their Jewish neighbors. So why does it suddenly become santified as an exclusivly "Jewish Homeland", open to Jews all over the world but not anyone else, including the people who were already living there? They took it, by force, kicking people who had lived there for generations off their land and claiming it for themselves, all nicely sanctioned by Western Emperialists who decreed the right to do so on themselves. The State of Israel continues to do the same.

Ever since the 1967 Israeli War of Aggression claimed the West Bank, Gaza and Sinai, Israel has populated seized territory against international law, removed indigenous people from that land against international law, and committed war crimes against that population that far, far surpass the crimes of the paltry rockets and terrorists attacks that Hamas and others send up in response to Israeli terrorism from the sky. No terrorism is justified, but the scale of horror that Israel commits on those people is sickening.

It's interesting that victims of the Nazi's have appealed to international courts to possess objects that were taken from them by Hitler's thugs (I'm thinking of very valuable works of art) because they are the rightful owners, but when it comes to Palestinians getting back what's theirs, the response is "F--- Off, Wog. It's ours now". In the naivate (sp) and misplaced sympathies of my youth, I once excused Israels existance as justified. My head was turned around when I lived there for 6 months, long enough to witness people removed from their homes in Jerulsalem justified by Israeli racist theocracy not unlike the Jim Crow "terrorism" that went on in the United States against African Americans.

You can take their side if you want, but the only way to justify it is by declaring "Might Makes Right". Israel chooses to claim special priveliges from God instead, but most of the world recognizes it as the militant thuggary that it is.

^^

'occupied' or 'stolen' my ass. The territories are disputed, not occupied.

You've been listening to too much American Press. They call it disputed to appease the Israeli lobby. It's occupied land according to International law.

So why does it suddenly become santified as an exclusivly "Jewish Homeland"

20% of Israeli citizens are Arabs, with equal rights under the law.

Ever since the 1967 Israeli War of Aggression

Where'd you dig that one up from mate? A Pakistani maddrassah? 1967 was a DEfensive war. Sure, Israel launched a pre-emptive strike to take out the Egyptian airforce, but there's nothing illegal about that. Even Nasser's blockading the Tiran strait, to say nothing of massing thousands of troops in Sinai and throwing out the UN peacekeepers, was ample cassus belli for Israel to attack.

Israel has populated seized territory against international law

care to explain which international laws these are?

Fourth Geneva Convention, perhaps, which the Arabs only started to invoke (unsuccessfully) after 1997, thirty years after the 6-day war, despite it having been passed in 1949?

how about the Oslo Accords? Can you find a single sentence in them that prohibits settlements?

UNSCR 242? Um, no. It just seeks a just resolution of the conflict and calls for withdrawal (from just 'territories' not 'the territories', meaning 'all the territories') and mutual recognition in tandem, but it says nothing about legality.

how about UNSCR 338 passed after the 1973 war in which again several Arab nations attacked Israel? It requires Israel and the Arabs to negotiate peace. By insisting that the Palestinians negotiate with Israel, Resolution 338 basically a
grees that the occupation itself does not violate international law. Later Security Council resolutions often trotted out by the Arabs - 446, 452 and 465 - do indeed condemn Israel's policy of building settlements in the disputed
territories and declare that these settlements have "no legal validity." But this is just a blanket statement, not a reasoned legal analysis. The Resolutions are not binding on Israel and do not of themselves create illegality.




hint : Wikipedia isn't good enough. Like the Guardian and the Independent, they just say that settlements are 'illegal under international law', without bothering to explain exactly which or what international laws they are supposed to contravene. The best you will be able to find is things like 'international consensus'

Israel chooses to claim special priveliges from God

80% of Jewish Israelis are secular and not religious.

Palestinian Arabs have lived there continuously for the same amount of time, peacefully, I might add, with their Jewish neighbors.

by no means always that peacefully. There were numerous pogroms and massacres of Jews from the period after the Arab/Muslim conquest and imperialist colonisation of the Jewish homeland from the 7th century AD onwards.

And as for 'Arabs living there for the same amount of time' perhaps you would like to explain why Arabs are called Arabs? Because they come from Arabia, perhaps? Who do you think invaded the holy land in the 7th century AD, roughly 23 centuries AFTER the genesis of the Jewish people there? Genghis Khan? Or the Arabs? And why do you think Jews are called Jews? Perhaps because unlike Arabs, they originally come from Judea, i.e. the holy land, rather than modern day Saudi Arabia? The name was changed from Judea to Palestine by the Romans in the 2nd century AD, following a failed Jewish revolt in which 600,000 Jews were massacred by the Emperor Hadrian. 'Palestine' is a Latin/European word that Arabs cannot even say and Palestinian Arabs have only used to refer to themselves in the past few decades - there is no 'P' sound in the Arabic language.

Three ways the future can go-

1- a two state solution, based on the 1967 borders.

2- a one state democracy, with Israeli & Palestinian citizens.

3- The occupation continues, as does Israeli belligerence in the region (a function of it's insecurity), until one day Israel is wiped out or at least decimated by it's regional neighbours. This would be a massive human tragedy- and not just for Israel- but the Israeli government mainly to blame.

The Palestinians have shown considerable restraint in recent years, given their grievous circumstances. It has been about six or seven years since the last suicide bombing I believe. Yet to see any meaningful reciprocation from Israel. Settlement expansion continues, East Jerusalem is being 'ringed' by illegal Jewish settlements in a deliberate policy, large scale eviction of Palestinians, and seperation of their homes from their land by walls in several areas, the brutal 'incursion' into Gaza, the somewhat humilating invasion of Lebanon to take on Hezbollah. Real 'partners for peace', Not.

Originally Posted by callippo

'Palestine' is a Latin/European word that Arabs cannot even say and Palestinian Arabs

Nonsense- 'Palestine' sounds much the same in English, Hebrew or Arabic. The term was first coined during the reign of emperor Hadrian- yes, it is from Latin- 'Palastina'.

Originally Posted by sabang

1967 was a DEfensive war. Sure, Israel launched a pre-emptive strike to take out the Egyptian airforce, but there's nothing illegal about that.

Pre-emptive strike...? Interesting term. Israel launched first strike. That's starting a war. An aggressive war that took land and has occupied it for the last 42 years and that it is slowly incorporating into itself. That's called usurpation of occupied land. That's illegal.

Originally Posted by callippo

Later Security Council resolutions often trotted out by the Arabs - 446, 452 and 465 - do indeed condemn Israel's policy of building settlements in the disputed territories and declare that these settlements have "no legal validity." But this is just a blanket statement, not a reasoned legal analysis. The Resolutions are not binding on Israel and do not of themselves create illegality.

Then what does "...no legal validity..." mean? Something to the effect of "not validly legal". If something is not legal, it is...?
The resolutions against Israel are not binding because it's Big Brother USA keeps vetoing anything of substance that comes out of the Security Council. Basically sanctioned any attrocity Israel committed. Since Arabs on the street identify US with Israel, Arab states can use the US to whip up young terrorists. Israeli society is broadly secular, but the Israeli political parties and State use the biblical mythology in every aspect of political life, and it is there to whip up support. Just like God and Country is here.

But like Sabang said so well, Israel's time as it exists today is limited. The concern is how much damage it will do in a paranoid tantrum with Iran.

Do your own research. Lots of resources out there.
http://www.un.org/en/law/index.shtml

^Israel. Growing like a malignant cancer on Palestinian land.

And some people still wonder why the Palestinians trying to defend themselves.

Originally Posted by sabang

The term was first coined during the reign of emperor Hadrian- yes, it is from Latin- 'Palastina'.

Learn something everyday. All along I thought it was derived from the much maligned Philistines of biblical fame.

Hmm, a pity Europe has done nothing for Israel. No wonder things are as they are.

Originally Posted by Jet Gorgon

a pity Europe has done nothing for Israel.

Huh? The very establishment of Israel in the UN was supported by nearly all European countries.

All along I thought it was derived from the much maligned Philistines og biblical fame. Learn something new every day.

always glad to be of service. It's one of the myriad of common misconceptions on this subject.

the Romans renamed the land from 'Judea' to 'Syria/Palestina' precisely to rub salt in the Jews' wounds following the eventual failure of the massive Bar Kockhba revolt in AD135 - by naming it after their ancient enemy, the Philistines.

what causes the confusion is that Arabs call Palestine - a Latin/European word, which they have never used to refer to themselves or the land until recent decades - Filastin because there is no P sound in the Arabic language. Hence, also, 'Pakistan' becomes 'Bakistan' in Arabic.

Arabs often seek to claim that 'Palestinians' are like modern-day 'Philistines' and claim a direct lineage, because it gives creedence to their case that they, rather than being the foreign invaders and colonisers that they were, have some kind of ancient biblical-era connection with the land like Jews do.

there is no relation between the ancient Philistines and today's Palestinian Arabs (who mostly descend from immigrants in recent centuries). In fact, it is likely that the Israelite nation formed when Canaanite and other regional migratory tribes coalesed to fight the Philistine invaders, who were a sea-going people whose homeland was Crete and the Aegean islands. Though the etymology is uncertain, it is believed that 'Philistine' derives from 'Phlistm' - the Semitic root of which actually means 'invader'.

it has been about six or seven years since the last suicide bombing I believe.

LOL. Dreaming again are we?

Why don't you just put 'list of suicide bombings Israel' into google and see what happens?

you'll find there's been something like twenty or thirty in the past six years despite the vigilance of the Israelis in preventing many more.