By Roy Tov
May 14th, 2012
Israel’s failure to implement censorship
Kahanist burning a Palestinian flag during an event to
commemorate the Nakba at Tel Aviv University on May 14, 2012. Hundreds of
right-wing Israel nationalists, many of whom openly identified as followers of
Rabbi Meir Kahane's racist ideology predicated on the need to
"transfer" Palestinians out of the land, descended on Tel Aviv
University to protest an event to commemorate the Nakba, the displacement of
hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in the war which led to the establishment
of the state of Israel.
Photos by: JC/Activestills.org
Kahanist showing copies of Im Tirzu's pamphlet "The Nakba
lie" during an event to commemorate the Nakba at Tel Aviv University on
May 14, 2012.
Can a democracy censor?
Despite Western-propaganda, the answer is yes.
However, unlike the situation in totalitarian regimes, democratic censorship is invariably disguised as something else; in this aspect, totalitarian regimes are more honest than what nowadays is wrongly referred to as democracies.
The sign reads "When I arrived to this land there were no Palestinians" by Golda Meir
The events surrounding 9/11 and the wars against Afghanistan and
Iraq are a good example of that.
Despite American media sanctimonious claim of being balanced,
one won’t find a balanced report on these issues.
When was the last time the Taliban’s leader got the Times’ front
page?
How can censorship in a democracy be achieved?
Let’s answer this question by illustrating the topic with a
current event. In the case of Israel, how can the state censor events linked to
Nakba Day? Oddly enough ~ and I would be accused of anti-Semitism if I were to
add the obvious ~ Israel does that through the Ministry of Finances.
This sign reads: "Israeli Arabs say NO to the lie of the Nakba" ~ HUH????
PALESTINIAN
PR VICTORY"
Nakba Day is the “Disaster Day” on
May 15, when Palestinians remember Israel’s Independence declaration.
.
.
Israelis celebrate it at a different
date. Formally, civil affairs in Israel are conducted using the Hebrew
calendar, thus official events change in their Gregorian date because the Hebrew
calendar is lunar in nature, meaning it wobbles in cycles of 19 years.
On all official documents issued by
Israel, the Hebrew date is proudly stated; however, since this calendar
wobbles, everybody uses the Gregorian calendar as the main reference calendar.
This includes offices from the Israeli Administration; all appointments with
them are arranged using the Gregorian calendar.
Most of the calendars sold in Israel
show the Gregorian date in large digits and the Hebrew date in small ~ almost
illegible ~ digits. Actually, most Israelis would fail if asked to list the
names of the Hebrew months in their correct order. “Independence Day is in
April or May” they’ll say hesitantly, mixing up the Hebrew and Gregorian
calendars.
Since the Palestinians stick to Gregorian
dates, they have an easy job promoting Nakba Day, a much easier task than
Israelis face with the wobbling Yom Haatzmaut, Independence Day (see Is this Israel’s last Independence Day?).
THE ZIONISTS’ DEEPEST FEAR
“Yom Hanakba” Nakba Day Logo
by Zionist Channel 7 note the Hebrew letters styled as Arabic ones
The extent of mind-control the
Israeli administration attempts on the population it rules is astonishing.
Prime Minister Golda Meir claimed
Palestinians do not exist, and expected the people to answer: “amen!” Things
didn’t improve much since her departure; for many years possessing a
Palestinian flag ~ even if hidden in a dark drawer ~ was a punishable crime in
the state claiming to be “the only democracy in the Middle East.”
The Zionist leaders’ deepest fear is
that their people will realize they have been deceived by them; they fear that
the people will realize that the Zionist dream is nothing but a hollow,
meaningless dream built atop solid Palestinian structures.
Police arrest a Palestinian student after the attack of the right wingers.
After all, most of the Israeli towns had been built by Palestinian workers. Thus, the attempt to suppress the commemoration of events like Nakba Day was to be expected. Considering the extent of the protests taking place on that day across Israel, the task was herculean even for roughish Zionist administrators.
The logo below belongs to the
Settlers’ Channel 7 (see “Juden Raus!” says Israel) and was
featured in their articles covering the Nakba Day this year. Even the settlers
~v who often draw maps of the West Bank which ignore Palestinian cities ~ cannot
ignore this event.
BEGINNING ADMINISTRATORS’ ERROR
On paper, the Israeli administration
gave a “proper Zionist Answer,” (“tshuva tzionit olemet” in Hebrew). This is a
popular phrase used in Israel against any event that is perceived as a threat.
It implies violence, though nothing specific is said.
In this case, the implied violence
came in the form of state censorship of an event it dislikes; beginner
administrators as they are, they thought that by controlling the people’s
pockets, they will gain control of their minds. On Monday 14, 2012, they woke
up into their worst nightmare.
Today, Tel Aviv University ~ a perceived stronghold of the Jewish establishment ~ commemorated Nakba Day.
Tel Aviv University’s dean of
students had previously approved a ceremony to commemorate Nakba Day in the
plaza adjacent to the “Naftali” social sciences building. However, University
security services decided that due to the “possibility of disturbances,” the
event will be held at “Antine Square,” located next to the University’s main
entrance.
The pictures brought here are from
the protests; the distinctive buildings of the university dormitories across
the street can be clearly seen.
“Every year different political bodies organize events focusing on the Nakba, in an attempt to make it the focal point of relations between Jews and Arabs in the area. What has never been done, and the time has come to do it, is to commemorate the Nakba in an alternative way, accessible to and created for the Israeli public ~ an event to remember the tragedy and great loss that befell the people who were here before ’48, many of which still live here,” said Noa Levy, a law student and organizer of the Nakba Day ceremony.
The pictures are incredible.
The fact that 400 participants
crowded the small plaza and that they read an alternative version of Yizkor,
the Jewish prayer of mourning is even more so.
The names of pre-1948 Palestinian
villages inside what is today Israel, were read and the event included a moment
of silence.
Left-wing
Israeli and Palestinian students take part in a ‘Nakba Day’ ceremony held
outside the Tel Aviv University on May 14, 2012 in Tel Aviv, Israel. Generally
commemorated on May 15, the day after Israeli Independence Day, Nakba Day or
“day of the catastrophe” is an annual event that Palestinians hold in honor of
the estimated 700,000 displaced that followed the 1948 Palestine War. (Uriel
Sinai/Getty Images)
Could the contrast between these two groups, the Nakba Memorialists and the right wing extremists be any greater than these photos show?
Following this, the horrified
Israeli government might declare a new Holocaust Day to commemorate the
defiling of its Independence Day by its own citizens.
Said the minster’ spokesman, while
referring to the university’s decision to allow the event,
“The education minister is of the opinion that the decision is wrong and infuriating.”
Beginners and unprofessional as they
are, the Israeli administrators forgot to cover in their censorship law
spontaneous events that come out of people’s warm hearts and not out of cold
government’s budgets.
However, if expanding on this one
may be denounced as anti-Semite by the censoring, undemocratic, Israeli
government. Isn’t that so, Mr. Netanyahu?
I asked a young man (wearing an Israeli flag as a cape) why he
came to disrupt the event and what bothered him. “If they want to protest they
should do so in their universities in Bir Zeit and not at my university.” He added
that his problem is not so much with the Arabs here but with the Jews showing
solidarity with them. When asked why not respect the right of these citizens of
Israel to conduct their ceremony in peace without disruption, he and others
responded that it is a democratic country and he can scream and shout all he
wants. “We came here with the specific goal of disrupting the event,” he said.
1948 IDF Soldier Tells Nakba Truth - The occupation of the Negev villages - ROTHSCHILD ZIONISM
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