Ronan L Tynan

Unprovoked salvo I received from Roseanne Barr……

My reply – polite and to the point? – and Roseanne blocked me………

And my reflection on our brief exchange:

“Look it up toad” – you could imagine the well known comedian Roseanne Barr screaming  in a sitcom. But when she directed such fire at me on Twitter for simply praising the remarkable courage of a young Palestinian girl in seeking to overcome loosing her legs in Netanyahu’s murderous assault on Gaza it was not so funny!

Mind you it did bring forcefully home to me she is a member of that misinformed community in the United States who believe Israel can do no wrong. However, it is equally clear that people like Ms. Barr in defending Netanyahu’s warcrimes are boltering an increasingly racist political culture that is turning Israel relentlessly into an apartheid state. A case made in the Guardian in very convincing terms by none other than two of Israel’s most distinguished former diplomats Alon Liel and Ilan Baruch (September 9, 2015).

Indeed, the article was alarming because it was written by two distinguished Israelis who have spent their whole lives defending Israel. So when they write that the advocates of peace, equality and democracy “have been horribly dispirited of late” every so called friend of Israel should take notice? And it is worth quoting at length the source of some of that depression – what they describe as “a period of real bleakness:”

“Forced evictions of Palestinian farmers from their land in the Jordan Valley and from the Hebron district – to make room for more settlements – clashes between settlers and soldiers, the burning of a church, the stabbing of a 16-year-old girl at the Jerusalem gay pride parade, and the murder of 18-month-old Ali Dawabshe, along with his father and mother, as a result of a deliberate arson attack by extremist settlers in the Palestinian village of Duma”

The article was written prior to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s visit to London, and presumably to press Prime Minister Cameron to impress on Netanyahu the urgency of reviving peace talks and moving swiftly towards the only formula that guarantees Israel’s future – the Two State Solution. In particular, they urged Cameron to formally – and swiftly – recognise Palestine as a sovereign state. Cameron of course did no such thing. Like Roseanne Barr he offered what looked like blind support, which Liel and Baruch clearly indicate is the reason we are now “racing towards a single Israeli-Palestinian state that will end up as the apartheid state of Israel.”

Ronan L Tynan

Twitter: @RonanLTynan

Web:  www.esperanza.ie
The full text can be found here: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/09/british-palestine-sovereign-state-netanyahu-israel