Friday, March 20, 2015

New York Times Censors Netanyahu’s Racism

Mine comes through the mouthpiece of the Bo$ton Globe:

"New York Times published piece about Netanyahu’s racism, then rewrote all of it

by Ben Norton on March 18, 2015



On March 17, the day of the 2015 Israel election, Prime Minister Netanyahu warned Jewish Israelis that Arabs were voting “in droves” (alleging, in a conspiratorial manner reminiscent of white supremacists in the US Jim Crow South, that “Left-wing organizations are busing them out”). Second-class Palestinian citizens voting is supposed to be a very bad thing in Israeli democracy.

The New York Times published an article about the incident—and more generally about Netanyahu’s bigoted, jingoistic, far-right tactics to attract more votes—titled “Netanyahu Expresses Alarm That Arab Voter Turnout Could Help Unseat Him.” The piece was written by Isabel Kershner and Rick Gladstone. At least, for the moment, that was the case.

Several hours later, the NYT published a rewrite of the article—a rewrite not just of parts of it, but of all of it. According the the website NewsDiffs which tracks edits to “highly-placed articles on online news sites,” between 5:13 pm and 9:08 pm on March 17 100% of the article was re-written to mostly erase the focus on Netanyahu’s racism.
he new title? The much more innocuous “Deep Wounds and Lingering Questions After Israel’s Bitter Race” (itself a modification on a previous headline of “Deep Wounds in Bitter Race”)—now, with just one author, Isabel Kershner. - See more at: http://mondoweiss.net/2015/03/published-netanyahus-rewrote#sthash.3N84FExF.dpuf

The new title? The much more innocuous “Deep Wounds and Lingering Questions After Israel’s Bitter Race” (itself a modification on a previous headline of “Deep Wounds in Bitter Race”)—now, with just one author, Isabel Kershner.

The former article used the words “racism” (twice), “racist,” and “racial fearmongering.” The second line of the piece read “Opponents accused Mr. Netanyahu of baldfaced racism that smacked of desperation.” It included statements and quotes such as:

  • The Zionist Union alliance denounced Mr. Netanyahu’s language as racial fear mongering.
  • “No other Western leader would dare utter such a racist remark,” Shelly Yacimovich, a senior member of the bloc, wrote on Twitter. “Imagine a warning that starts, ‘Our rule is in danger, black voters are streaming in quantity to the polling stations.’”
  • “A prime minister who conducts propaganda against national minority citizens is crossing a red line of incitement and racism,” said Dov Hanin, a Joint Arab List candidate. “Such a message, voiced by a prime minister on the very day in which citizens are supposed to be encouraged to go out to vote, is testimony to a complete loss of compass and his preparedness to smash all principles of democracy just for the sake of his own leadership.”

The latter article removed the quotes from Netanyahu’s opponents, leaving only the line “Opponents accused him of baldfaced racism.” And, no longer at the beginning of the piece, this sentence is now buried in the middle, where studies show most readers will not see it.

Netanyahu is quite simply whitewashed in the second article. This new draft—doubtless penned when NYT editors realized Netanyahu would likely be the next prime minister—is significantly kinder. Its thesis is essentially that Netanyahu is not actually a racist and that he does not truly unequivocally oppose the two-state solution. It features lines such as:

  • Mr. Netanyahu has a long history in power and has in the past demonstrated that he can change positions from campaigning to governing. His record is as a pragmatist, analysts said.
  • “I am sure that Netanyahu, with his broad historical perspective, if he is prime minister again, will be thinking long and hard about what legacy he will want to leave behind with regard to the demographic makeup of the country and its standing in the world,” said Gidi Grinstein, founder of the Reut Institute, an Israeli strategy group. “In the end I would not rule out his going back to the two-state solution.”

Euphemistically, the esteemed publication writes “In the final days of a closely fought election race, Mr. Netanyahu threw all political and diplomatic niceties to the wind.” That is one way of saying that, in order to attract votes, the right-wing Israeli prime minister resorted to base racism, fear-mongering, and—in what Ali Abunimah pointed out is strikingly reminiscent of early-20th-century anti-Semitic tropes—conspiracy theories about powerful foreign interests supposedly conspiring to unseat him.

In the end, the New York Times, doubtless the most well-respected US newspaper, is notorious for its pro-Israel slant. It scarcely hides it. And even when it tries, it’s found out.

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It's really not surprising that the NYT reports are being censored when it comes to Israel.

I did find this surprising in today's Globe:

‘‘Speaking to the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned that the world must accept that Iran possesses the technology to enrich uranium, which he said could accelerate without a possible nuclear accord. "Like it or not, Iran has mastered the [nuclear] fuel cycle,’’ Blinken said. ‘‘We can’t bomb that away, we can’t sanction that away.’’

What was a surprise but should not have been:

"Netanyahu denies reversing stance on 2-state solution" by Jodi Rudoren and Michael D. Shear, New York Times  March 20, 2015

Believe it or not, my printed byline is by Rudoren only.

JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Thursday tried to backtrack from walk back his preelection declaration that no Palestinian state would be established on his watch, but his new assertions appeared to do nothing to assuage an infuriated Obama administration.

Infuriated, huh?

In a series of interviews with US broadcasters On MSNBC, Netanyahu also said he had not been trying to suppress the votes of Arab citizens Arab vote with an Election Day video warning they were being bused to polling stations in “droves,” remarks that had also caused outrage at the White House and around the world heading to polling stations in large numbers.

Netanyahu said he still wants a sustainable, peaceful, two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and that he had not intended to reverse his endorsement the position he took endorsing that in a 2009 speech at Bar-Ilan University.

“I haven’t changed my policy,” Netanyahu said in an interview with MSNBC, his first since his resounding victory Tuesday, which handed him a fourth term. “What has changed is the reality.”

Despite this rhetorical reversal, Netanyahu did not say he was ready to return to negotiations or present any new ideas for achieving peace. He cited reiterated longstanding positions that  ]the Palestinian leadership’s refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, and its pact with the militant Islamist Hamas movement, as well as the rise of Islamic terrorism across the region, made an agreement impossible right now.

“I want a sustainable, peaceful two-state solution, but for that, circumstances have to change,” he said. “I was talking about what is achievable and what is not achievable. To make it achievable, then you have to have real negotiations with people who are committed to peace.”

He's not one of them and never has been. What an asshole!

The White House and European leaders had expressed alarm over Netanyahu's pre-election statement, on the eve of what seemed like a close race, that there would never be a Palestinian state as long as he remained in office.

A day after other White House Obama officials said Wednesday that in light of that statement, they suggested that the administration might now support a Security Council resolution calling for the establishment of a sovereign Palestine roughly along the pre-1967 lines that divided Israel from the West Bank and Gaza.

Earlier On Thursday, the White House all but ignored Netanyahu's new comments, focusing instead on what he said before the vote.

It means that the United States is in a position to reevaluate our thinking, ” the White House press secretary, Josh Earnest, said, adding that regardless of the prime minister’s clarifications, his preelection statements demonstrated that he was “no longer committed to a two-state solution,” which that Netanyahu's comments backing away from support for a two-state solution “do have consequences for actions that we take at the United Nations and other places.” 

It's what they call an empty threat for public consumption purposes to maintain the image and illusion of USraeli bickering.

Washington has long questioned Netanyahu's commitment to a two-state solution and his seriousness about negotiations toward that outcome, like the talks led by Secretary of State John F. Kerry that collapsed last spring. 

Those suspicions seemed confirmed on Tuesday when Netanyahu answered "correct" after being asked directly in a video interview with a right-leaning Israeli news site. "If you are prime minister, a Palestinian state will not be established?"

Earlier on Thursday, President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority also seized on Netanyahu’s original repudiation of a two-state solution to say he would continue his unilateral strategy of seeking full UN recognition and using the International Criminal Court to press war-crimes charges against Israelis.

This is the rest of the rewrite found on the web:

A two-state solution remains the best outcome, and the Israeli prime minister’s about-face is no reason for President Obama to follow suit.

President Obama waited nearly two days before making a congratulatory phone call to Netanyahu on Thursday evening, as his administration was still seething over the Israeli leader’s preelection comments.

If they were really seething he doesn't make the call at all.

In a striking indication of how bitter tensions remain between the two, Obama told Netanyahu directly that the United States would have to “reassess our options” after the prime minister’s “new positions and comments” on the two-state solution, according to a White House official who spoke without authorization to detail the private conversation.

Obama better watch out. That's the kind of thing that gets a president disgraced or assassinated.

The formal White House account of the call made no mention of the criticism, although it noted that Obama had “reaffirmed the United States’ longstanding commitment to a two-state solution that results in a secure Israel alongside a sovereign and viable Palestine.”

Tired of the $hit show fooley from the propaganda pre$$ yet?

The statement also said Obama reiterated his intention to reach a deal with Iran on its nuclear program — another sore point with Netanyahu, who angered the White House this month by criticizing the negotiations in a speech to Congress.

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Who has all the answers:

"Netanyahu’s flip-flop over Palestinian statehood shouldn’t deter peace efforts" by The Editorial Board  

At least one good thing came out of the election in Israel on Tuesday, when voters appeared to return Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to power. Going forward, there will be a lot fewer illusions about the hawkish prime minister, who once supported a two-state solution with the Palestinians but explicitly rejected it during the campaign. It turns out that what Netanyahu’s critics have been saying about him all along was true: He is not a peace-maker, he’s purposefully undermined the viability of a future Palestinian state, and he’s willing to inflame racism to get elected.

The Globe just admitted what I remarked yesterday: the critics were right all along!

It was in the final days of the campaign, in a desperate appeal to right-wing voters, that Netanyahu dropped the mask, and he can’t very well put it back on now by reversing himself again. The Israeli prime minister disavowed what has been American policy for two decades: that the only long-term solution for the region is two states, one Arab and one Jewish, coexisting side by side. Netanyahu once claimed to support that outcome too, while he and his supporters attempted to blame the Palestinians for the lack of progress toward achieving it. Plenty of Palestinians did oppose peace, and still do. But there’s now no way to point the finger entirely at them.

Startling statement from the Globe. Finger was always pointed at Palestinians until now. They almost seem like they are bumming.

Still, a two-state solution remains by far the best outcome, and Netanyahu’s about-face can only mean a continuation of the status quo.

And that is fine by Israel.

That would keep Palestinian Arab land under Israeli military occupation while continuing to deprive its residents of fundamental political rights.

Notice the Globe is only concerned about political rights and not the human rights of Palestinians?

And it would keep both Israelis and Palestinians on a pathway to a dismal future: As the number of disenfranchised Palestinian Arabs living under military occupation grows, Israel’s democracy weakens step by step.

For the United States, Netanyahu’s flip-flop on the Palestinians forces it to recalibrate its diplomacy. For instance, in the past the United States has resisted efforts to address the conflict in the United Nations, calling instead for the two sides to reach a deal through direct negotiation. That was a credible argument, but only as long as the two sides actually shared the same goal. It’s no longer possible to believe that Netanyahu does. Many of the anti-Israel resolutions that go before the United Nations are ill-considered, and deserve the American veto, but the United States can no longer justify blanket opposition to international involvement by calling for a negotiated settlement instead.

Netanyahu’s opposition to a Palestinian state is premised on the belief that Israel can never be secure with a hostile country on its doorstep, able to lob rockets into Israeli cities. But the Palestinians have legitimate needs too, and keeping them in a state of semi-permanent military occupation has its own dangers.

Like Israel's war criminal assaults, Globe?

It contradicts the basic values that the United States champions elsewhere in the world, and also feeds anti-Western and anti-American sentiment.

As if the U.S. had any standing to trumpets values after the torture and war lies (enabled by this same $hit media) that have resulted in the deaths of millions. Talk about an arrogant, out-of-touch elite..... !!!!!

Netanyahu, it’s clear, disagrees. But the United States now has to find a way to work around him....

PFFFFFFT!

How they gonna do that when he apparently controls the U.S. Congre$$!?

--more--"

Gee, that wasn't rewritten at all -- even if the Globe tried to hide it! 

Time for me to go into hiding for today.

NEXT DAY UPDATES:

"After Netanyahu’s victory, US must reconsider relationship with Israel" by Michael A. Cohen  March 19, 2015

Honestly, nothing against this guy personally or Jews in general, but I really am sick of the Jewish perspective being constantly presented in the propaganda pre$$ and ma$$ media. 

As an example, I tuned into that horrific show "Real Time" with that piece of crap Bill Maher as a break from basketball and got a full dose of Zionist and Jewish control of AmeriKan ma$$ media. The complete silence and acceptance of the Zionist narrative by all parties was stark, as was the hysteria surrounding Israel and Iran

First of all, that piece of Zionist-owned shit Kingston suggested Iran bombed the Shia mosques in Yemen immediately discredited him. Before that he was saying Israel is under existential threat and all the other crap we here all the time over here. The acceptance of CIA-created, directed, and funded ISIS as an enemy has gotten old. The Bush c*** on the show was even worse. Her solution was "bomb the hell out of them." 

The false debate and narrow range of discussion based upon the Zionist view of the world has reached the point where it is so obvious it is disgusting and I was screaming at the set. 

Not much was different during the games, either. The advertising was dominated by militarism and corporations. One ad that stuck out in my mind was a Marines ad about all walls falling before they break through on that looks like sand. My only thought was Israel's apartheid wall exempt, of course. 

I'm not complaining, mind you. I'm just recognizing what is so undeniable and in-your-face once you know it is there. Most Amerikans do not. They buy in to the Zionist narrative of the world and accept the framing of issues and narrow range of debate -- if they even bother to follow what is going on in the world and not being driven down the path of agenda-pushing diversion.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has proved once again why he is perhaps the best politician in Israeli history.

Deeply unpopular, trailing in public opinion polls, and facing an electorate frustrated by the rising cost of living and his seeming indifference to their plight, Netanyahu shamelessly used racist and nationalist appeals to mobilize his right-wing base and rally for a stunning six-seat victory in Tuesday’s national election.

Or they stole it in an incredibly brazen steal!! Won by a newer landslide totally opposite the polls! 

Hey, the bigger the lie..... (remember hearing that somewhere)

It was an unlikely and unexpected rise from what appeared to be the political ashes, but his win came with a major cost. Netanyahu has left in his wake a trail of political wreckage that will haunt Israel for years to come — and, in the near-term, must force the United States to reconsider its relationship with the Jewish state.

Really?

The first and most obvious casualty from Netanyahu’s scorched earth campaign is the remnants of Arab-Israeli peace process — and perhaps the two-state solution altogether.

What two-state solution, and what about all the Palestinian casualties of Israel war crimes all these years? Literally scorched earth!

Sorry I don't even like the self-internalized values leading to the $tyle of writing, folks -- although I mu$t remember, this paper I read is of and for the elite of Bo$ton, not me.

******************

As long as Netanyahu remains in power, there is virtually no chance the Palestinians will sit down with him for serious negotiations. It would be equally pointless for the United States to try to restart a peace process for which there is zero interest on either side.

Didn't he read the Globe editorial yesterday? Obama gonna go around him.

This leads to the second casualty: the US-Israel relationship. For more than two decades, the United States has taken the position that the Arab-Israeli conflict should be resolved through direct negotiation — not unilateral measures. But if there are no talks, if there is no peace process, if the Israeli prime minister rejects the foundational right of the Palestinians to self-determination, then the United States has no leg to stand on in opposing efforts to pressure Israel.

They -- I do not wish to associate myself with this goddamn government that has ignored us -- haven't had one for a long, long time.

Netanyahu has adopted a stance that flies in the face of more than a decade of US policy, namely to support the creation of two states (one Israeli and one Palestinian) living side-by-side. This of course is not the first time that the Israeli government has taken actions that run counter to US policy. It’s been happening for decades — every time Israel builds or expands a new settlement in the West Bank.

Oh, and nothing has changed, blah, blah. Why should we believe it will now? This is more Jewish deception and $hell game garbage, that's all.

This time, however, is different, and the United States has little choice but to respond accordingly.

Really?

In the absence of a peace process or an Israeli commitment to a two-state solution, the United States can no longer justify its opposition to efforts at the United Nations to recognize Palestinian statehood. There can be no justification for the United States to continue to shield Israel from international opprobrium for its provocative and illegal settlement building in the occupied territories.

He almost sounds like.... that's what I have been typing for years and years and years.

*******************

This doesn’t mean the United States should abandon Israel or the security relationship that exists between the two countries. The links between the United States and Israel are enduring and real; and for millions of Americans, Israel’s security is a matter of vital concern.\

Sigh.


Supporting Israel, however, cannot mean subsuming US national security interests to those of Jerusalem. If Israel is acting in ways that go against those interests, and it is, Washington must make its views known. 

It does, Israel ignores them, and that's that. The aid checks are signed, the armaments flow, and the $tatu$ quo rules as Israel gobbles up more land, kills more Palestinians, and generally gives the world the finger.

More important, Tuesday night’s electoral results were an endorsement of a status quo in Israel and Palestine that will, in time, spell the end of the Israeli experiment in democracy, and perhaps the Zionist dream altogether. 

OMG, he sounds like the misquoted Ahmadinejad saying the Zionist entity will vanish from the pages of time!

And how rare to SEE the WORD ZIONIST in any format here in AmeriKa's ma$$ media. Wow!

The United States would be the worst kind of friend if it did and said nothing as Israel drives full speed ahead into a dark future where the term “apartheid state” may no longer be an epithet hurled by Israel’s opponents, but rather Israel’s new normal.

Been that way for a long, long time already, and it is only getting worse.

--more--" 

I'm sure this will help:

"Boehner planning trip to Israel, despite leaders’ frayed relations" by Deb RiechmannAssociated Press  March 21, 2015

WASHINGTON — House Speaker John Boehner said he will travel to Israel as already strained relations between the White House and newly reelected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hit a new low this week.

On the surface, the Republican leader’s announcement Friday that he will visit Israel looks like a jab at the White House.

But a congressional aide insisted that Boehner’s trip — during the two-week congressional recess that begins March 30 — was planned before new rifts developed because of Netanyahu’s address to Congress and the prime minister’s remarks this week about the peace process. The aide spoke on condition of anonymity.

He's just returning the favor, the treasonous sob.

President Obama bristled when the Ohio Republican invited Netanyahu to address lawmakers this month about his fears that an emerging nuclear agreement would pave Iran’s path to nuclear weapons.

Relations took a hit Monday when Netanyahu made hard-line statements against establishment of a Palestinian state.

Speaking on the eve of his reelection, Netanyahu said there could be no Palestinian state while regional violence and chaos persist — conditions that could rule out progress on the issue for many years.

That ruffled the Obama administration, which views a two-state solution as a top foreign policy priority and had dispatched Secretary of State John Kerry for months of shuttle diplomacy in an effort to reach an Israeli-Palestinian peace pact that has never materialized.

Blah, blah, blah, pffffft!

On Thursday, Netanyahu seemed to backtrack, saying in a TV interview that he remains committed to Palestinian statehood — if conditions in the region improve. Netanyahu told MSNBC that he had not changed his policy and that he remained committed to the two-state vision.

(The chutzpah defies description and leaves me speechless. That's beyond hypocrisy or deceit.)

Obama called Netanyahu to congratulate him on his reelection, and told the Israeli leader the United States is reassessing its approach to Israeli-Palestinian peace in light of his comments about a Palestinian state.

He called to congratulate, huh? Probably envious of the blatant steal! Sort of takes the air out of all the tension hot air between the two though.

A White House official said Obama also raised Netanyahu’s critical comments about Israeli Arabs ahead of the election, which the White House has denounced as a cynical effort to mobilize voters.

Asked whether Obama got a better understanding of Netanyahu’s position on a Palestinian state after talking with him, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday: ‘‘That was not the result of the call.’’

Earnest said the administration has not decided what a reassessment in policy might mean. But he noted that in the past, the United States has often fought UN resolutions to create a Palestinian state by arguing that such a two-state arrangement should be negotiated between the parties.

The furor will die down and nothing will be done. The US administration will do whatever Israel says.

‘‘What has now changed is that our ally in those conversations, Israel, has indicated that they are not committed to that approach anymore,’’ he said.

Republicans have seized on the strained ties. Senator Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican and possible presidential contender, said in a floor speech Thursday that the rift between Obama and Netanyahu needs to be worked out privately to avoid empowering US and Israeli enemies.

‘‘This president is making a historic mistake,’’ Rubio said. ‘‘Allies . . . like Israel, when you have a difference with them and it is public, it emboldens their enemies.’’

Another Zionist slave slinking around the halls of Congre$$.

--more--"

I'm told there will be make-or-break talks next week for a deal with Iran. 

May God help us all.

  • The Zionist Union alliance denounced Mr. Netanyahu’s language as racial fearmongering.
  • “No other Western leader would dare utter such a racist remark,” Shelly Yacimovich, a senior member of the bloc, wrote on Twitter. “Imagine a warning that starts, ‘Our rule is in danger, black voters are streaming in quantity to the polling stations.’”
  • “A prime minister who conducts propaganda against national minority citizens is crossing a red line of incitement and racism,” said Dov Hanin, a Joint Arab List candidate. “Such a message, voiced by a prime minister on the very day in which citizens are supposed to be encouraged to go out to vote, is testimony to a complete loss of compass and his preparedness to smash all principles of democracy just for the sake of his own leadership.”
- See more at: http://mondoweiss.net/2015/03/published-netanyahus-rewrote#sthash.3N84FExF.dpuf--MORE--"
The New York Times published an article about the incident—and more generally about Netanyahu’s bigoted, jingoistic, far-right tactics to attract more votes—titled “Netanyahu Expresses Alarm That Arab Voter Turnout Could Help Unseat Him.” The piece was written by Isabel Kershner and Rick Gladstone. At least, for the moment, that was the case. - See more at: http://mondoweiss.net/2015/03/published-netanyahus-rewrote#sthash.3N84FExF.dp--MORE--"