Friday, April 28, 2006

Go, Go Guardian

The anti-Semitic image at left is the cover of four-page insert commissioned this week by The Independant (UK) on the widely discredited "Lobby" paper by John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt. ("A nasty piece of work," said the New Republic. "'...slightly but unmistakably smelly" said Chris Hitchens on Slate. And, Harvard removed its logo from the cover page of the essay on its Web site to make clear that it contained the professors' opinions and analysis, not the school's.)

In fact, the only people anywhere who seem to be taking the paper seriously are the British. It was the London Review of Books, which finally published it, after it was first rejected by the Atlantic Monthly, and now we have the Independant's praise. All of which make this angry protest from the Guardian (UK) all the more noteworthy. Money quote:
There is no doubt what the image used by the Independent of the Jewish Stars and Stripes says. It says that Jews control America. Its premise is that Jews are not real Americans and not patriotic Americans; Jews care only for themselves and not for their community. Follow these links to see the same image in its more familiar incarnations. The Stars and Stripes taken over by Jewish Stars of David is an image long used by neo-Nazis, conspiracy theorists and Jihadi Islamists.

The Fisk article is hollow. There is no evidence to back up the strong version of the thesis that is illustrated by the flag and there is no evidence to back up a weaker or more nuanced version that the "Zionists" tricked or coerced the US to spill the blood of its citizens in a war that was against its own interests.
Takeaway points? Never let it be said that the media - even the British media - is reflexivly anti-Israel.

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