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Bishop Tutu called 'bigot' and 'anti-Semite': Petition in defense please sign
January 17, 2011 - 2:24pm
Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu Slandered - Concerned South Africans Circulating Petition
http://josephdana.com/2011/01/archbishop-emeritus-desmond-tutu-slandered...
"A new petition initiated by concerned South Africans is quickly gathering widespread support nationally and internationally. The petition is a pledge of support for Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, who has recently been the target of slanderous attacks by those who reject his principled and fair-minded stance on Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories..."
Please sign peition and pass on to others
Signed it.
Rather strange that a group that Is not very well known for their own tolerance would deign to cast such a slanderous label on an Individual of tutu's character, he Is many things, but an anti-semite Is stretching the truth beyond breaking!!
"by slandering the name of the heroic champion of human rights, Kadalie, Hersch and the Israeli Ambassador..."
Oh. I stand corrected.
If Bishop Desmond Tutu is an anti-Semite - What Hope For the Rest of Us?
http://blogs.aljazeera.net/africa/2011/01/13/if-bishop-desmond-tutu-anti...
"South Africa's first black Anglican archbishop was a tour de force against the Apartheid leviathan. When one of the great moral sages of our time is called an anti-semite, there probably isn't any hope for the rest of us. Strange times indeed..."
I think the mods would be wise to change the title of this thread. It is not Israel that has called Tutu an anti-Semite but a South African Zionist organization.
As it stands the title is at best mis-leading and at worst a lie.
No kidding; it isn't as if the Israelis have any influence with Zionists anywhere.
Mods - Please change to:
Bishop Tutu Called 'Bigot' and 'Anti-Semite': Petition in Defense Please Sign
I think that this thread title should be changed as well before we continue with this discussion
Thread title changed.
To me this is not surprising. If being even vaguely pro palestinian means you are an "anti-semite", which doesn't even make sense since palestinians are semites, then according to the zionist definition, he is an anti semite. The problem is the use of the word is thrown about so casually these days it's completely lost any meaning. The definition has changed from being bigoted against jewish people to being anyone who even questions israeli policies.
it's like being called a liberal or anti american etc.
Desmond Tutu is not an anti-semite.
The "Arabs are also semites" argument is completely silly. Yes, they are, but the word has become commonly accepted as a term denoting anti-Jewish bigotry. "Homophobia" would literally mean "fear of the same" but it's now pretty much universally understood to denote anti-gay bigotry.
Sure, but if you actually look at the evolution of the word, you will actually see that it begins its life as a word used to desctibe "easterners" and foreigners of the east, especially the middle east, so, even though what you say is true, the racist connotations have a certain amount of spill-over regardless of what western conceptions of the word entail.
i guess the point is that they are manipulating language. Whether it is to say that only jewish people are "semite" (because they know most people don't know what the word actually means) or misusing the term "anti-semite" in reference to someone who questions israeli government policy...either way they are just manipulating language to suit their own goals, even if the usage is completely wrong, much the same way "anti american" means taking a position supported by most american people, just contrary to corporate/government power.
I don;t think it's silly to point it out though, because too many people are still ignorant of that fact, and it pretty blatantly exposes how propagandistic and hollow the claim is.
Especially to Jews who don't want to acknowledge their kinship with Arabs.
What "kinship", Al-Q? Do you really think European Jews (to take but one example) have any ethnic or historical connection with Arabs, or the Middle East, or "semites" for that matter? Have you seen any non-Zionist evidence for that proposition? I'm of European Jewish descent, and I don't believe it for one second. My kinship with Arabs is less than that of Desmond Tutu with Jesus Christ - at least those two shared some modicum of common religious belief.
My only "kinship" with Arabs is my support for the anti-imperialist and anti-apartheid struggles of the Palestinian and other Arab peoples. It is a political kinship - one between human beings - having nothing to do with ethnicity or language or faith.
He didn't say "European Jews", Unionist. There are also the Mizrahim, Jews who have lived in the Arab/Muslim world as long as that world existed. Their main language, Mahgrebi, is a mixture or Hebrew and Arabic(as Yiddish is a mixture of Hebrew and various European languages).
Mizrahi Jews have a lot of cultural commonalities with Arabs, far more, in fact than they have with the Ashkenazim immigrants to Palestine who organized the Zionist movement.
I realize that, Ken. I simply wanted to debunk the notion that "Jews" (a religion) have something to do with "Arabs" (an ethnic category). There are Arab Jews and non-Arab Jews. There are Arab Muslims and Arab Christians. There are Arab atheists. We wouldn't talk about the "kinship" between atheists and Arabs. I think you understand my point. I wasn't claiming that no Jews were of Arab descent.
OK.