The American Apologist

According to the NY Daily News, a Norwegian diplomat by the name of Trine Lilleng doesn’t understand the concept of Reply-All.

Caught in Web: Diplomat’s email comparing Israel actions in Gaza to Holocaust causes controversy

BY ELLIOT OLSHANSKY
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Updated Wednesday, January 21st 2009, 6:08 PM

Apparently, email horror stories of the dreaded inadvertent ‘Reply All’ or unintended ‘Forward’ haven’t circled the ranks of the Norwegian diplomatic corps.

Trine Lilleng, a first secretary at the Norwegian embassy in Saudi Arabia has come under fire for using her Foreign Ministry email account to circulate emails likening the Israeli offensive in Gaza to the Nazi Holocaust, the Jerusalem Post reports.

“The grandchildren of Holocaust survivors from World War II are doing to the Palestinians exactly what was done to them by Nazi Germany,” the email, obtained by the Jerusalem Post, states.

The missive, which contained asked recipients to forward it, also contains over forty attached pictures juxtaposing images from “Operation Cast Lead” with iconic Holocaust photography.

Lilleng told the Jerusalem Post the email was a “private email” sent to “a few friends”.

When asked whether it was appropriate for her to use a ministry account for such purposes, she responded, “I am not interested in saying anything about that.”

Upon learning of the e-mail, the Oslo-based Center Against Anti-Semitism filed an official petition with Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, which was hand-delivered to the ministry in Oslo.

Noting that Norway is among the European countries looking to help mediate the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, center director Erez Uriely wrote, “We fail to see that the distribution of anti-Semitic pictures is compatible with such a role.”

For its part, Norway’s Embassy in Tel Aviv did not initially respond to the Jerusalem Post’s request for comment.

According to a profile posted on the professional networking site LinkedIn, Lilleng, 38, has been with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for 11 years, and has been in Riyadh since 2007 after previous stints in Islamabad, Pakistan (2003-06) and Washington (2001-03). She’s also served as a radio operator for the Royal Norwegian Navy and as a peacekeeping soldier for the United Nations, and is scheduled to remain in Riyadh through 2010.

In a perfect world, Ms. Lilleng’s diplomatic career would have just ended…

H/T: E.M. Zanotti — The American Pricess

UPDATE: this falls under the Homer Simpson “Doh” category — this post is from the Israel News Network:

:

Eye for an Eye: Arab Attacker Killed by his Own Rock

by Maayana Miskin

(IsraelNN.com) A Palestinian Authority Arab who stoned cars in Samaria was killed by one of his own rocks, police have concluded. A Jewish man held in connection with the death has been released.

The Arab teenager hurled heavy stones at Israeli-owned vehicles along a Samaria highway last Tuesday evening. He managed to hit one car, which was driven by a resident of the nearby town of Emmanuel.

Fearing further attacks, the driver fired a single shot in the air to frighten away the stone-thrower. He then contacted local security officers to report both the attack and his own response.

A short time later, Israeli paramedics received a report of an Arab teen found unconscious and badly wounded next to a highway. The teen suffered a serious head injury that appeared to be a bullet wound. Medical personnel rushed to the scene but were unable to save the young Arab, who died a short time later.

Police originally believed that the resident of Emmanuel who reported firing in the air had in fact fired at his attacker, killing him. The man was arrested and questioned. However, an initial forensic report showed that the attacker had not been killed by a bullet, and the detainee was released.

A final forensic report, released over the weekend, showed that the attacker was killed when a stone he threw hit the car driven by the man from Emmanuel. The stone hit the car’s tire and bounced back at high speed, hitting the attacker and leaving him with a fatal head injury.

Thanks to LindaSoG for the update on this event.

I am beginning to think there is no hope for western-based democracies with a Judeo-Christian foundation such as Israel and the United States. It seems that much of Europe has now become a quasi-Muslem state — if not in direct government policy, then certainly in social standing. Just look at Europe — I am shocked to see how Shia Law has influenced the cultures of France, Belgium, Britain, etc. in the last 50-60 years. Don’t get me wrong. I would never have called Britain a pro-Israeli state — after all, the Brits did ally themselves with the Arabs during the post-World War II era. Once Israel was established in 1948, recreating a Jewish homeland in the Middle East for the first time in modern history, the British seemed angry at the Jews.

That being said, I was still saddened when I ran across this posting in The Independent in the U.K.  The post is written by Yasmin Alibahi-Brown, an award winning journalist,  who asks the world:

How many Palestinian Anne Franks did the Israelis murder, maim or turn mad? Unless the Israeli state can see that equivalence there is no future for Palestine and even less for the moral health of Israel where racist attitudes towards Arabs are as dangerously pathological as the anti-Semitism of many Muslims.

Unbelievable… Yasmin is evoking a powerful and highly-emotional image there… Palestinian Anne Franks… images of a young Arab girl, hiding fearfully in an attic cupboard of her father’s factory come to mind. Never mind that it is journalistic falsehoods crap.

Let examine the so-called similarities between the late Anne Frank and her fictitious Arab counterpart — Hannah Hamas:

• Hannah Hamas doesn’t hide in the cupboard of her father’s factory. She is used as a human shield to protect the mighty Hamas terrorists…
• Hannah Hamas wasn’t put on a death train and sent the gas chambers — no, Israel routinely holds ceasefires to allow humanitarian aid to get into the Gaza Strip — unfortunately, there is repeated evidence of Hamas selling that humanitarian aid and not allowing it get to Hannah.
• Hannah doesn’t have to wear a yellow star (or cresecent moon) on her clothes to identify herself as a second class citizen — no, Hannah and her friends may be viewed with distrust (and rightly so in some cases), but she doesn’t have to wear a “badge of shame” does she?
• I have yet to see “The Jews” smash and loot Arab stores or factories in the region. I haven’t seen them burn hundreds of mosques in a single night. I haven’t seen them stone Arabs in the street while chanting “Arabs are the cause of all of the evils in our world”. You may have forgotten KrystallNacht, Yasmin, but much of the world has not.
• Furthermore, I don’t recall Anne Frank — the real Anne Frank, the one who died at the hands of anti-semitic Nazis –  or her fellow countrymen firing mortars or rockets at German civilians in another country.
• Lastly, Hannah Hamas and her fellow countrymen have allowed Hamas to gain control and create this chaotic war — firing rockets from mosques, firing mortars from schools, building tunnels under homes — I don’t remember Anne Frank and her family doing any of this…

No, Yasmin, the differences are monumental and your emotional imagery, although powerful, is crap. How dare you attempt to taint the memory of a Holocaust victim with your pathic attempt to gain sympathy for the Palestinians!

Examine the facts:

• Hamas is a terrorist organization. They have fired thousands of rockets and mortars into Israel in the last few years and they target civilian targets in order to create fear and terror among the population.
• Hamas is the recognized governmental authority of the Palestinian people since Fatah ceased to be in control and the Palestinian People support Hamas — so much so that they use themselves as (or are forced to be) human shields for these terrorists.
• Israel has warned civilians IN ADVANCE to planned attacks on military targets (something the Hamas cowards could not conceive of doing).
• Israel has routinely stopped offensive actions in order to allow humanitarian aid to enter the war zone — EVEN THOUGH they know that Hamas uses these lulls in the fighting to rearm itself.

No, Yasmin, Hamas has no Anne Franks in their midst. They are terrorists and as history has shown, they must be dealt with decisively or they will kill again — unlike Anne Frank.

Joe

P.S. — Yasmin Alibhai-Brown’s summary on The Independent says “Known for her sharp commentary on issues of multiculturalism, race and religion, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown won the George Orwell Prize for political journalism in 2002 and the Emma Award for Journalism in 2004. She is also a radio and television broadcaster and author of several books including the acclaimed No Place Like Home and Who Do We Think We Are? Imagining the New Britain.”

I recently became aware of a retired Sociology professor by the name of James Petras who has written a number of books on the evils of Israel and “The Jewish Lobby” — from what I can glean, his works are typical “conspiracy theory” rants by a neo-socialist from the realms of academia. I happened to see his latest rant here in which he opens his diatribe with this dynamic sentence:

Because of the unconditional support of the entire political class in the US, from the White House to Congress, including both Parties, incoming and outgoing elected officials and all the principle print and electronic mass media, the Israeli Government feels no compunction in publicly proclaiming a detailed and graphic account of its policy of mass extermination of the population of Gaza.

First of all, one can hardly claim that the press coverage has been predominately pro-Israel in this battle. Most of the limited coverage that I have seen has been focused on the pro-Arab stance of providing humanitarian aid to the human shields within the Gaza Strip. (This is, of course, a tried and true method the terrorists use to resupply their weapons under the guise of a cease fire.)

Secondly, Israel has gone to great lengths to show military and/or intelligence video detailing the terrorist activities in the region — clear images of Arab terrorists launching rockets into Israeli civilian target areas from UN schools, thermal images of terrorists loading rockets onto trucks just prior to meeting their ultimate reward, and so on.

Thirdly, their “mass extermination of the population of Gaza” seems… just… a tad… bit… exaggerated to me.

Who am I kidding? It’s complete and total fabriaction. It’s propaganda. It’s unadulterated spin. It’s Bull Sh*t.

To claim that Israel is following a “policy of mass exterminantion” is riduculous! We’ll all heard of their warning cell phone calls to civilians in the area — advance warning of an impending military strike — does THAT seem like a policy of mass extermination to anyone… any reasoning human being? No.

[breath, Joe,  breath]

[OK]

In response to Dr. Petras’ call for sanctionas against Israel (he calls them war crimes, of course) I would say this:

You can debate the point of view (who’s the aggressor vs. who’s the victim) for a multitude of incidents and you’ll always get a multitude of personal perspectives. But when you examine the underlying ideology of each side, you’ll see that radical Muslims groups (like Hamas) have repeatedly called for the total destruction of not only Israel, but of all Jews. Israel/Judaism has no such doctrine in their dogma, and that makes the terrorists, such as Hamas, to blame — period.

If they (Palestinians, Hamas, PLO, Iran, et al) would behave like civilized human beings and negotiate a peaceful coexistence with Israel, you might have a foundation for your claims of outrage, but while they continue to terrorize Israelis, call for the genocide of the Jews, and hide behind civilian shields, neither you nor they will not get my sympathies.

Joe

So what do you think — is he nuts, an arab shill, an anti-semite, or all of the above?

Joe

UPDATE: In one of his recent rants, James Petras calls Barack Obama “America’s First Jewish President”. It is not a title he created — he admittedly borrowed it from someone else (we call that academic freedom) and he ends his Dec 12th posting with this gem:

The election of an Israeli-fascist regime will up the ante in Washington. Does Obama’s embedding in the Zionist apparatus include support for Jewish fascism , the total ethnic cleansing of Palestine and their unilateral decision to ‘nuke’ Iran? Three weeks into his presidency Obama will face his biggest Middle East challenge, which will define the nature of US policy in the region.

Obama has recently suggested that Washington would nuke Iran to protect Israel –which has never yet signed a treaty with the US – to which the Bush Administration replied contemptuously that it would be very hard to convince American parents in Kansas that their sons should risk nuclear incineration for the sake of a small country in the Middle East. Clearly Obama is a greater war monger on issues involving Israel then even Bush: It comes with being a “Jewish President”