Half-hearted valedictory

fretting

Before I throw in the towel, (I haven’t quite made up my mind yet) I have to relieve myself of some of the things I’ve been fretting about.

First of all, a number of worrying articles have popped up recently concerning potential Labour Party candidates, which reveal depressing indications that the Islamisation of this country is inevitable

Although ‘racism’ is deemed a crime beyond the pale, and antisemitism (unfortunately for some) is universally accepted as racism in its purest form, I can’t understand how the BBC gets away with - not just turning blind eye to antisemitism, but actively promoting individuals with antisemitic views. Everyone colludes in this charade, all the time. Let’s pretend it isn’t there. Massive elephant.

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As regular readers will know, I enjoy reading the once-upon-a-time left-wing, pro-Israel website Harry’s Place. The current left-wing antisemitism issue has put the kibosh on HP’s default pro-Labour position, but this radical swing could be purely down to the Corbyn factor since enthusiasm for Conservative politics isn’t really there either. 

Personally, I believe the Labour Party’s antisemitism and Islamisation have already gone too far. It’s endemic, at least as fas as its outright and vote-winning opposition to Israel and Zionism is concerned, and the potential resignation or abdication of Jeremy Corbyn, with or without the shadow chancellor, will make very little difference. It’s irreversible - and it still will be even if the antisemitism factor itself manages to creep back under the stone for another while.  

If you follow the links on our sidebar you will have noticed these posts. 

“Labour’s Crank Candidates – Salma Yaqoob, Ali Milani, Jo Bird, Luke Cresswell” and the debate about Shaista Aziz, which is particularly interesting because she styles herself as a modern Muslim who “dabbles” in stand-up comedy. (Mind you, going by the clip I’ve seen my advice would be not to give up the day job) The fact is that any headscarf-wearing person has a lot to overcome before she can win me round. Is that bigotry?

There are several other 'openly anti-Jew' individuals standing (or who wish to be selected) in the forthcoming ‘generalection’ as it’s known, and you can quite easily find them by looking at various strands and sub-strands of Twitter.

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A conundrum I’ve been wrestling with a bit is this piece in the Spectator by Qanta Ahmed. The terrifying reaction to a panel debate on Islamophobia. It’s a good article, and she’s bang-on about Sayeeda Warsi - but I’m struggling here with a question that seems pretty obvious to me. Why is Qanta Ahmed still a Muslim? 

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There are some outstanding pieces online. I admire Stephen Daisley for his  brave and forthright piece in the Spectator “A Vote For Labour Is A Vote for Antisemitism”  but I always dread looking at the comments, as articles like this attract hostility from the same handful of right-wing antisemitic stalwarts that inhabit the btl ‘community’ that lurks around the conservative blogosphere, (including The Conservative Woman, the Spectator and The Times)

A link within that article takes you to a detailed and lengthy study by Ruth R Wisse; National Affairs. The Functions of Anti-Semitism was written in 2017,  and due to its length and depth it’s not for everyone, but for those of us who are interested in this topic, it’s well worth the effort. One sentence that seemed particularly apposite (for this blog as well as this post) is:

"What we require is less a law to punish discrimination than a commitment to foster awareness of the facts." (emphasis mine)

The steady stream of ahistorical and politically biased misinformation peddled by the BBC plays a huge part in fuelling the problem. 

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Oh yes, and before I sign off for the day, I’d like to recommend a sympathetic and sensitive review of a book I haven’t yet read, by Norman Lebrecht “a British commentator on music and cultural affairs, a novelist, and the author of the classical music blog Slipped Disc.” 

I used to look at that blog quite a lot, especially when alleged bullying and abuse, sexual and - I don’t know - coercive (?) at music colleges and conservatoires was topical. (We knew some of the individuals concerned.)

One of the things that struck me then, which I’d gleaned from the odd comment on the blog and from personal experience, is that on the whole, many musicians of the ‘millennial’ generation have been sucked into the anti-Jew animus that goes along with left-wing thinking. (Not that Norman Lebrecht went along with that, but he seemed to me to be ‘keeping out of it’ if you know what I mean) 

I was pleased to read about his book (a taster can be seen here) Genius & Anxiety; How Jews Changed the World 1847 -194J. The first review I read was in the Spectator, titled: Is there no field in which the Jewish mindset doesn’t excel? by David Crane, but the one that I wish especially to recommend is by Tanjil Rashid in The Times:

Jewish Makers of the Modern World   The review is generous and respectful and - go on, I’ll say it - tonally unIslamic.

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I can’t praise Margaret Ashworth enough for the fabulous series about Jewish composers that have been appearing in The Conservative Woman over recent weeks. The Melody Makers etc. Her enjoyable, readable posts about hymns and music are gems, packed with video clips and biographical information, they’re jewels in the www crown

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 Incidentally, I see David Collier hasn’t updated his blog for a while and in the vacuum, a stubborn infestation of Jew-haters has taken hold. Now we’re on that subject, it seems that Collier’s tenacious approach has borne fruit. For those of you without access, I reproduce the Telegraph report by Camilla Turner, education editor (£) over the page in full

"The UK’s biggest education company has launched an urgent review of a GCSE textbook after complaints that it “whitewashed” Jewish history.
Pearson, which owns the exam board Edexcel and published the book, said it is prepared to “take action” following accusations that the book is “full of errors, lies and distortions” about the Israel-Palestine conflict.
The textbook, titled The Middle East: Conflict, Crisis and Change 1917-2012, was published in 2016 for students taking Edexcel's re-vamped international GCSE in History.
“The central messages are those that you would find inside an anti-Israel propaganda book,” according to David Collier, who carried out an analysis of the book which has been sent to Pearson.
“It is carefully constructed and far more subtle, but the longer you read – the angrier you become.  How many children inside state funded schools have been exposed to this type of indoctrination?”
Mr Collier, an investigator who previously revealed that Jeremy Corbyn was a member of a Facebook group containing anti-Semitic messages, compiled a report detailing the textbook’s omissions.
His report highlights how two timelines from 1900 to 2010 - one of the Middle East and one the rest of the world – both  fail to mention the Holocaust.
“The biggest of the omissions concerns the 1930sand 1940s,” Mr Collier wrote in his report. “There is no room to mention the refugees desperate to escape the Nazi grip nor is the Holocaust itself considered a milestone.”
In another instance, he notes that the massacres of Jewish communities by Arab mobs in British Mandate Palestine in 1929 are described by the textbook as “Arab / Jew clashes”.
Mr Collier says that “describing the massacre of ancient Jewish communities as a ‘clash’ is disgraceful”, adding that the majority of Arabs were killed by British soldiers as they attempted to restore order. Elsewhere, the textbook states that 850,000 Jews “moved” from Arab countries to Israel.
“This is a cover-up of one of the worst, and most overlooked, human rights violations of the 20th century,” Mr Collier writes.
“Leading up to and following the establishment of the State of Israel, Arab countries pillaged, massacred and expelled their Jewish communities, some of which were thousands of years old, and these Jews had nowhere else to go but Israel.”
Mr Collier examines the textbook’s treatment of the Oslo peace process, a set of agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation in the 1990s.
“The description of the Oslo process is one of the more inexcusable elements inside the text,” he says.
“Nowhere is the Oslo period terrorism mentioned in these pages. The only violence explicitly mentioned is the assassination of [the former Israeli Prime Minister] Rabin.”
Mr Collier concludes that the book “rewrites history” and “whitewashes anti-Jewish violence”.
The Sunday Telegraph understands that Pearson has received multiple letters of complaint about the textbook in addition to Mr Collier’s report.
The Zionist Federation has launched a petition addressed to the Education Secretary complaining that children are being exposed to “politically-driven bias”, adding that “whilst the bias is carefully constructed and subtle, it is nonetheless toxic”.
Pearson said they always welcome feedback on their textbooks, adding that they “understand this is an important subject for students with difficult topics being explored”. 
A spokesman said: “Pearson content is always written within the parameters of a rigorous global editorial policy ensuring quality. 
“However, we will immediately launch an independent and impartial review, and will take action if necessary."
 Pearson said that Edexcel is “the only awarding body that tackles this subject matter and we do it as we think it is an important topic, even though it is likely to provoke emotive responses. 
“We do not follow any ideological agenda and always aim to present impartial, objective content. Inevitably when difficult issues such as this are addressed, it is likely to generate debate."