"The leather SS jacket makes my blood go cold it is so COOL!”
We heard about the most recent Human Rights Watch kerfuffle involving one of their star military "experts", Marc Garlasco. He is an aficionado collector of Nazi memorabilia and an enthusiast whose Internet name is flak88, accompanied by a screen logo of German badge with a swastika.
In a 2005 comment, responding to a posting of a photo of a leather SS jacket, Garlasco wrote, “That is so cool! The leather SS jacket makes my blood go cold it is so COOL!” The jacket owner replies, “Great feedback mein Freund! . . . Gott mit uns [God is with us]!]. (Source)
This barely suppressed giddy admiration for a piece of military uniform came into my mind when, a couple of days ago, as I was looking for some information about Golda Meir, I happened upon this quote from her:
"We have been obliged to become good soldiers, but not with joy," she said. "We are good farmers with joy. It's a wonderful thing to go down to a kibbutz deep in the Negev and remember what it was--sand and sky, maybe a well of brackish water--and to see it now green and lovely. To be good soldiers is to our extreme necessity, but there is no joy in it."
She said this many years ago, but the sentiment has not much changed. To be a good soldier is to be a disciplined being, in control of one's body and emotions, in the service of a future and defense of life. The life of family, friends, nation. It is a duty and an honour to be undertaken with motivation and readiness. Israeli boys and girls do their military service, wear their uniform, carry out their duties. When they come home, the first thing they do is take off the uniform. They would much rather forget for a day or two that they are soldiers. Mom washes the discarded uniform, irons them with all creases in the right place so as not to get her precious baby in trouble. The army has rules about everything. The feeling of pride that Israeli parents get from looking at their offspring in army uniform has to do with the realization that these are already adults, that they do their duty and do not whine about the hardships.
David Mamet captured that special kind of pride when he wrote this (#7):
He is Michael Oren, the Horensteins' cousin, author of the piece on Wingate and, incidentally, of "Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East." He is a scholar and saw the eponymous war (1967), and several others, as a paratrooper in the IDF. With him is his son, Yoram, an 18-year-old on half-day leave from his unit, an ultra-elite helicopter rescue squad in the IDF. The young man leaves, and Michael says, "When he came home last night, he was short one of his uniform shirts, so I lent him one of mine." This offhanded statement is the greatest expression of parental pride I have ever heard.
The uniform is not an object of admiration. Once the military service is done, the uniform goes into the back drawer, to be taken out only when reserve duty calls or a war has broken out. There is nothing playful or awe-inspiring about these uniforms.
What a military uniform is not, and should not be, is a source of joy. Joy should not be inspired by the sight of a military uniform, certainly not the kind of nearly orgasmic pleasure that flak88 (Marc Garlasco) feels when he looks at a leather SS jacket. There is something seriously disturbing about such a gushing over such an object.
Garlasco, of course, is no longer a soldier. The US Military should congratulate itself on that. Imagine, after the disgrace of Abu-Ghraib, if it were revealed that one of its finest warriors nearly faints with delight whenever he sees a leather Nazi-uniform.
posted by The Contentious Centrist @ Monday, September 14, 2009
37 comments
37 Comments:
Thanks for the link. Garlasco, meanwhile, is suspended. Which is good, but will it keep? Dunno.
One thing that amazes me is that nobody commented yet on how *childish* Garlasco's behaviour is (at least as reflected by his comments on the blogs). One would expect such comments from a teenage boy, and not a military expert.
" The feeling pf (sic)pride that Israeli parents get from looking at their offspring in army uniform has to do with the realization that these are already adults, that they do their duty and do not whine about the hardships."
"War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the stamp of nobility upon the peoples who have courage to meet it. All other trials are substitutes, which never really put men into the position where they have to make the great decision -- the alternative of life or death.... "
Benito Mussolini,1932
Please Omar. Enlighten me. How is Mussolini's quote relevant to what I said?
I can guess what you want to say but I wouldn't want to put words into your mouth which you did not intend.
A fan of Garlasco, are you? Do you share his fondness for Nazi symbols?
SO cool it makes my blood run cold? Ha, Mr. Garlasco. Why should I, as a horror movie fan, watch Hostel again when HRW is such a real life horror show?
"Please Omar. Enlighten me. How is Mussolini's quote relevant to what I said?"
Just illustrating the parallels between sentimental, militaristic, modern -day Zionism and classic Fascism. And no ,Noga, I'm one of those people who believes in locking up fascists and destroying their symbols. Try limiting your preconceptions a bit.
"Just illustrating the parallels between sentimental, militaristic, modern -day Zionism and classic Fascism"
What you illustratd, Omar, reveals more about the slovenly quality of your understanding and thinking, than it does about anything I said here. According to Orwell, "The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable".
And the way you rush to Mussolini indicates that in your own romantic self-perception, the idea of Israeli soldiers is simply not a desirable thing.
This is hardly surprising, considering your political vision for the Jewish population in Israel, which I quoted here:
"As for the vision of what should exist: a shared homeland for both people with a majority Palestinian govt reflecting the real demographic make-up of the area's population and a return of property to those Palestinian families who lost theirs during the creation of Israel."
http://contentious-centrist.blogspot.com/2009/08/i-found-this-blog-calling-itself.html
Of course, without the presence of Israeli soldiers, this vision would actually become a real possibility, wouldn't it? Isn't it the Palestinian fantasy, that Jews would be rendered defenseless so that the previous state of affairs would return to its normal existence, with Jews in their right place as dhimmis and Arabs are the all-ruling effendies?
Well with all due respect to George, in your role as a propagandist you are so anxious to gloss over unsavoury aspects of Zionism and Israeli extremism that you cannot see your own slovenly thinking.
Like Fascism, Zionism is a racial-nationalist movement. It also has a quasi- mystical undercurrent( based on religious writings) it uses to justify it's expansionism and repression of non-Jews. Mussolini also employed quasi-mysticism when attempting to gloss over the inconsistencies of Fascist "theory." Both claim lineage to an heroic, grandiose past ( Roman Empire or the Two Kingdoms) that also helps to justify their contemporaneous claims . Both are obsessed with an endless procession of assumed enemies with which they must forever be at war with not only for the defense of the race , but to fulfil it's supremacist destiny.
If you'd have stuck around to continue the debate at Hitchenswatch you would have seen that I could conceive of a two-state solution but, given that said solution would have to include Israeli land , that may be a difficult issue to resolve. I don't know what "Palestinian fantasy" you are on about. I express my own opinions on the subject and don't claim to speak for all Palestinians. But the way you express the relationship between the two peoples as being only conceivable as a dominant/ submissive one ( as many Zionists do) again reveals the parallels with fascism. The second-class status of darker, non-Ashkanaze Jews within Israel is also a good illustration of the quintissentially European, racialist roots of Zionism. The way this vulgar philosophy collides with the great Jewish traditions of intellectualism and humanism is like two iron blocks coming together and creating such a discordant clang that all rational discourse is drowned out. It's no secret that, socially and psychologically, all is not well in the Promised Land at the moment
due, not to rocket attacks or suicide bombings, but to the creeping feeling that the preservation of the Zionist state is ever-more reliant on unleashing the forces of darkness ( a darkness that many older Jews recognise) and supressing the light.
Finally, Noga, you should take a look at yourself. The way you trawl the net looking for something, indeed anything, that helps reinforce the stereotype of Ay-rabs/ Muslims as being inherently violent, untrustworthy, backward ( and by implication, rendering Palestinians as unworthy of stewardship of the land of their birth) indeed marks you out as someone considerably Right of the "centrist" position you claim.
Propaganda can be easily detected through its reliance on cliches. Cliches are a sign of stunted thinking and self-referential morbidity. Your latest comment is so full of the Indecent Left's clichoid speak it practically caricaturizes itself. And as it is always with such thinking, the antisemitic impulse cannot be suppressed, when the "non-Ashkanaze Jews" are inserted for some reason, and the mandatory lament is provided for "the great Jewish traditions of intellectualism and humanism". Nothing more banally antisemitic than the attempt at this "fair minded" exceptions. As Himmler famously said:
"It is one of those things that is easily said: `The Jewish people will be exterminated,' a Party comrade said, `quite clearly, in
our Program. Elimination of the Jews, extermination, let us do that.' And then here, you all come along, the good 80 million Germans, and each has his decent
Jew. It is clear, the others are swine, but this one is a first-rate Jew."
We have been there, seen that, heard that. I change nothing about my perception of you or your goals, which you don't even pretend to conceal.
Omar, your comments at this blog have displayed a serious lack of knowledge about the Zionist movement, the historical development of the Yishuv and the founding of the state of Israel.
Not only is your sense of chronology seriously flawed (as I mentioned in a previous comment) but when you write:
"Like Fascism, Zionism is a racial-nationalist movement. It also has a quasi- mystical undercurrent( based on religious writings) it uses to justify it's expansionism and repression of non-Jews."
You repeat a common myth held by many people on the radical left. In fact, the early Zionist movement was primarily secular in orientation, not religious or "mystical." I refer not only the left-leaning Labor Zionists but the Revisionist (right-wing) movement as well. For example, take a look at Jabotinsky's writings. The man was a nationalist, but a liberal secularist as well. He was not religious. Don't take my word for it, read his writings for yourself.
Also, someone who has ever been to Israel--or even had some basic understanding of the situation--would not write the following:
"The second-class status of darker, non-Ashkanaze Jews within Israel is also a good illustration of the quintissentially European, racialist roots of Zionism."
I am not expert on the Middle East or Israel. But I have been to the country and participated in organizations founded on the interests and grievances of Mizrahi Jews. Most are critical of Zionism, some even view themselves as "post-Zionists" and "Arab Jews" but none of them view themselves as "second-class citizens" or view Zionism as a racist ideology. Not one. Here is the organization I worked with:
http://mizrach.org.il/en/
See what they have to say.
Israel is not the way you think it is. It is an incredibly vibrant, free and interesting place.
I will check them out TNC. You may wanna check some links that don't quite jibe with your rosy portrayal of Israel:
http://www.scottishpsc.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2680
or:
http://www.avigailabarbanel.me.uk/gaza-2009-01-04.html
or:
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE48R1CD20080928
And while I'm well aware Zionism predates Fascism, it's 20th century incarnation bears a striking similarity, whether you and Noga choose to acknowledge it or not:
http://www.palestineremembered.com/Articles/General/Story2289.html
As for you Noga, it's clear that you aren't capable of rational discourse on the matter. The closer to the bone one cuts the more hysterically blinkered your response. The truth hurts but I'll always endeavour to remind you about the people you and your ilk wish to erase from history. As I said , "an endless procession of assumed enemies..."
Yes, Omar, I guess it is very uncomfortable to find that what you say bears a remarkable resemblance to what Himmler said, when he made that famous speech of his. You are not all that apart in your goals, too. Except that he is much more honest about it.
Let me remind you of what you yourself said:
"As for the vision of what should exist: a shared homeland for both people with a majority Palestinian govt reflecting the real demographic make-up of the area's population and a return of property to those Palestinian families who lost theirs during the creation of Israel."
Omar, read Jabotinsky's writings. He is the one radical leftists associate with "fascism" yet he was a liberal nationalist.
As to your links, I have not spent any time in the Ethiopian Jewish community. But I have spent a decent amount of time with Jews from Arab countries.
I recommend going to Israel and checking it out for yourself. You seem to have a lot of misperceptions about the place.
Somehow ,TNC, I don't think I'd get in! Part of my point about about the fascist parallels of Zionism is precisely that the attempt to synthesize it with progressive politics is a non-starter because of the contradictions between the two.
And Noga the only similarity to Himmler my views have are in your own mind. When you lack a decent defense I suppose emotionally- charged subjects like the Holocaust are a reliable standby. It's ironic you characterise me as cliched when you throw out that and the old, reliable "antisemitic" (sic) jibe ,so frequently and lazily do you sling it about that you don't even bother to capitalise it anymore. Astonishing!
P.S.- I've only ever heard about this Decent Left thing in the last couple of months but from what I've so far read by their leading lights, they are neither.
"Somehow ,TNC, I don't think I'd get in!"
Why not? Do you have links to terrorists?
A signature on a pro-Palestinian petition would probably qualify as a terrorist link, I'm sure.
TNC: A couple of more links re Mizrahi/ Shepardic status in Israel:
http://www.meforum.org/707/post-zionism-and-the-sephardi-question
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/apr/01/middle-east-israel-mizrahi
Isn't it the height of irony, then, that Israelis of Sephardic and Mizrahi origins never call themselves Arab Jews and their vast majority are Hawkish and vote for the Right wing parties like Shas and Likkud? I guess their opinion does not matter, being merely working class people who have no understanding at all of what kind of reality their parents had fled from...
Mizrahi Jews like oriental music and Middele Eastern food, which is probably all they carried over from their centuries of experience in Muslim lands.
My father, who was born and raised in Turkey (and who has a Muslim brother in law and nephews and nieces) knows intimately what it means to live among the Muslims. Nice people, but shhhh... just don't speak Ladino in their vicinity lest you be recognized for the Jew that you are and get to be treated with the contempt that such identity merits. When I told my father about a Turkish friend of mine, who converted to Judaism, he was simply incredulous. This will never be accepted there, he said.
Yep. I am really persuaded by this piece of drivel written by someone named Wurmser about "The Mizrahi Rejection of Zionism".
A joke, really.
"A signature on a pro-Palestinian petition would probably qualify as a terrorist link, I'm sure."
A signature on a pro-Palestinian petition would have disqualified Naomi Klein from entering Israel yet she had no problem getting in to sell her anti-Israel book.
But I'm sure it makes your blood boil just at the right temperature to believe that you are so important and unique in your anti-Israel animus so as to merit the attention of the Shin-Bet. You are more likely to be extensively searched and questioned due to your bearing an Arab name. Arabs are scrutinized more closely at the airport. Guess why?
"...their vast majority are Hawkish and vote for the Right wing parties like Shas and Likkud?"
A parallel that can be compared to white, working class support for parties like the the BNP. The reason? A lack of opportunity and belief that they are second-class citizens in their own land!
And weren't you the one who lectured me about anecdotal "evidence?"
This is "andectotal"?
50% of Israelis are of Sephardic and Mizrahi origins. Their vast majority are hawkish. Even when they vote for Labour, they are hawkish. And yet you dismiss them as "anecdotal"? Do you even know what your words mean? One would be pardoned for thinking you really have no idea what you are talking about.
This is a nice short history of welcoming new waves of immigration to Israel:) Watch it, you might learn something valuable...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjDx2ZwLUs0
I was referring to your "my dad said..." story.
Thanks for the link but I can't access Youtube.
"You are more likely to be extensively searched and questioned due to your bearing an Arab name."
This was kinda my point to TNC. Fairly obvious I thought.
TNC: I recommend going to Israel and checking it out for yourself. You seem to have a lot of misperceptions about the place.
Omar: Somehow ,TNC, I don't think I'd get in!
CC: Why not? Do you have links to terrorists?
Omar: A signature on a pro-Palestinian petition would probably qualify as a terrorist link, I'm sure.
CC: A signature on a pro-Palestinian petition would have disqualified Naomi Klein from entering Israel yet she had no problem getting in to sell her anti-Israel book.
But I'm sure it makes your blood boil just at the right temperature to believe that you are so important and unique in your anti-Israel animus so as to merit the attention of the Shin-Bet. You are more likely to be extensively searched and questioned due to your bearing an Arab name. Arabs are scrutinized more closely at the airport. Guess why?
Omar: This was kinda my point to TNC. Fairly obvious I thought.
_______________
It was fairly obvious that you thought you would not be able to get entry into Israel because you signed in the past a pro-Palestinian petition.
I corrected you on that score. I also added that you would be likely to “be extensively searched and questioned due to your bearing an Arab name.”
So what did you mean to tell TNC? That you wouldn’t be able to get into Israel because you had signed a pro-Palestinian petition, or that you would encounter some enhanced attention to your good self and your luggage before you entered Israel?
These are two very different scenarios, you know. Or do you?
Evidently it's a slow day in Noga land but just to keep this silliness going my point to TNC was the latter. As for Naomi Klein, she is one of the most popular political writers on the planet so the furore had they barred her entry would have been a spectacular PR blunder by Israel.
Here's someone without Klein's profile who's activism indeed cost her:
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/starhawk/2008/04/denied_entry_into_israel.htmling
so even small- fries like me have a right to be concerned, geddit?
So let me understand: When you said that you would not be able to get entry into Israel because you signed in the past a pro-Palestinian petition, you actually meant to say that in trying to enter Israel, you would encounter some enhanced attention to your good self and your luggage?
I must be pretty stupid since I really do not see how the two scenarios are comparable at all. In the first scenario, you would be turned away. In the second scenario you would go in a bit later than the other passengers.
BTW, your link doesn't lead to any article about Starhawk. The accounts I found on google comes from two sources: hers, and some Palestinian propaganda outlet. Neither of them provides sufficient information to understand why she was turned away.
Norm Finkelstein was also turned away. There was a good a reason for it. So what was the Israeli "pretext" for not alowing the author of one of the most boring novels I ever had to read to help some poor Palestinian villagers learn about ecosystems or whatever?
"As a Jew, there are many things I can be faulted for. Reviving the Old Religion of the Goddess may be my worst theological transgression, although in the eyes of my family it barely counts against my far worse failures: to marry a Jewish man and produce a Jewish child. Yet none of these were at issue on the day I was denied entry.
The reason I was given was that my past work with the International Solidarity Movement, a group that supports Palestinian nonviolence."
Fairly clear, actually.
No, it's not. She does not explain what was Israel's rationale for considering work with the ISM as grounds for banning her.
There are many ISM activists endangering IDF soldiers with
their dangerous meddling and they are there, not banned. So why was Starhawk banned?
Finkelstein, when asked why he was banned, cited his past "criticism" of Israel's policies as the reason. But the real reason was his recent meeting with enemy agents (Hizzbulla) in Lebanon.
If you have not been in touch with Hizzbulla or Hamas, agents, or active in ISM, or made donations that went to the purchase of arms to be used against Israeli civilians, then you would have nothing to worry about in trying to enter Israel, would you?
"Canadian and American citizens with “Palestinian-sounding names” are now routinely denied entry into Israel at Ben Gurion National Airport, and told to use the Allenby land bridge from Jordan into the West Bank. But once they get there, their passports are stamped “Palestinian Authority only,” and entry into Israel is still denied."
http://globalvoicesonline.org/2009/09/09/palestine-travelers-say-israel-is-illegally-denying-access/
As for the "...donations that went to the purchase of arms to be used against Israeli civilians..." , given how wide open and difficult to prove such an allegation is and considering it is being made by a regime that wishes to silence it's critics, one could be forgiven for examining their entry criteria with a bit of scepticism.
From your own quote, one learns that Israel does not impede the entry into the Palestinian territories, where, presumably, all ISM activists
and their ilk think human rights abuses are taking place by the hour. So where do you see Israel acting as "a regime that wishes to silence it's [sic] critics,"?
And, as for "...donations that went to the purchase of arms to be used against Israeli civilians..." being "difficult to prove", I don't think so. All charities keep open lists of their donations. A charity that has been tainted with the suspicion that its funds were diverted towards financing terrorism (Like The "Holyland charity") would be well-known in international law enforcement systems and matching a name to a donor, with the availability of the information and computers, should be easy enough to do.
What, and there's nothing within Israel proper that could be used by Palestinian-rights campaigners or anti-Zionists? Don't be ridiculous. Anyway, the link was referring to North-American Palestinians. You still have not answered why they are denied entry to Israel. Well they're Ay-rabs so they must be terrorists, I guess.
"International law enforcement systems" are far from reliable, as you are well aware.So this "..donations that went to the purchase of arms..." point still sounds like a ( deliberately) vague red-herring.
I wonder if you and other Zionists are as vigilant about OTHER countries like apartheid South Africa or former Latin American dictatorships that received ( and in some cases, like Colombia, still do) Israeli weapons and "counter-insurgency" training for use against their populations?
Many of the people who were opposition activists are now in government in these countries and if they were to employ the same ( more easily provable) standard to Israeli travellers ( many of whom surely must be employed by the country's large arms industry), I could imagine the cries of anti-Semitism shrieking from here to Tel Aviv.
Omar: I understand that you do not have reliable information for your accusations. That you cannot answer my questions.
Poor Omar:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/lenin/8981416020732373708/?a=45319#460671
:)
"I understand that you do not have reliable information for your accusations. That you cannot answer my questions."
Au contraire ,my smug little propagandist. Suck on this:
http://www.muzzlewatch.com/2009/08/08/netanyahus-attempts-to-silence-breaking-the-silence/
or: http://www.grandestrategy.com/2009/04/online-censorship-by-israel.html
(a bit of a whackjob site but they seem reasonably firm
with this article)
Additionally, the numerous boycotts and attempts to slander critics of Israel over the years and the lack of anti-Zionist input into news and debate oriented television as a result of Israeli pressure is ample illustration of a regime that wishes to supress criticism.
"Poor Omar:"
Hey, I'm honest about it. Having to contend with you, Migreli and TNC is time I don't have available.Some balance is needed at this hate-site.
As for Starhawk, given the link was via Newsweek/Washington Post ( have they been added to the list of enemies, too?) I suspect they would have looked into her story fairly thoroughly before publishing it so ,unless you're
privy to knowledge they aren't,there's probably little suspicious about her activities in Israel.
"I suspect they would have looked into her story fairly thoroughly before publishing it so"
Yes, I'd like to remind you of this wholesome trust in the mainstream media when they publish something that does not quite jive with your fantasies. Which I suspect is often.
My blog is a hate site, is it?
Would you like to furnish an example for such a slanderous accusation?
"Having to contend with you, Migreli and TNC"
Migreli has not made even one comment in this thread.
TNC made 2 comments and decided, wisely, to disengage.
Most of the conversation has been between you and me.
When I participated in the HW thread, I had to deal with you and well as two others, throughout the "discussion".
So what are you whining about? If you cannot support your allegations with good information from credible sources you should not make them in the first place. And when the hollowness of your beliefs is exposed, you should have the intelligence to realize that something may be wrong with your thinking.
Invective and slander are not arguments.
"If you cannot support your allegations with good information from credible sources you should not make them in the first place."
Uh, I just did.And I suffer from no hollowness of belief. Throughout my comments here I have furnished plenty of arguments, links to "credible" sources ( which seems to consist of only those approved by you and your ilk) and common sense. You have largely ignored this or attempted to dismiss or minimise the significance of their content.
"Yes, I'd like to remind you of this wholesome trust in the mainstream media when they publish something that does not quite jive with your fantasies. Which I suspect is often."
Considering how much time you and your ilk spend trashing reports by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, The U.N.,etc, this is a laughable case of the pot-calling-the kettle-black.
" Invective and slander are not arguments."
Right, and comparing me to Himmler is rational discourse, is it?
As to whether your blog is a hate-site, call it an instinct. But I shall continue despite your provocations. As I said there needs to be SOME balance.
"And I suffer from no hollowness of belief."
This is very self-evident.
"As to whether your blog is a hate-site, call it an instinct."
The correctness of your instincts can be glimpsed in the accuracy of your earlier complaint:
"Having to contend with you, Migreli and TNC"
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