But by damn, don’t they just do their best to punish him who tells it?
Israel is withdrawing its ambassador to Venezuela as a row grows between the two countries over the war in Lebanon.
At the weekend President Hugo Chavez recalled his envoy to Israel and described the Jewish state’s campaign in Lebanon as a “new genocide”.
On Monday Israel said it would be flying its ambassador back for “consultations”.
“Consultations” is diplomatese for “we’re hauling you home so we can send you back with a riot act to read to that uppity SOB who doesn’t know his place”. Last time that happened to Venezuela, it was Donna Hrinak, then US ambassador, who got recalled by the new BushCo State Dept. after Chavecito dared to point out that the bombing of Afghanistan was state terrorism, only to be sent back with marching orders that Chavecito refused to take. The result? The Great Failed Coup of ’02, a.k.a. the Carmonazo, in which BushCo tried unsuccessfully to replace the uppity injun-niggruh with a whiter, more pro-business old fart who wouldn’t dream of standing in the way of BushCo, or its cronies (of which he himself is one, and a very rich one at that.)
And now history is repeating itself once more. Now, as then, Chavecito’s critics are accusing him of terrorist sympathies for nothing more than the simple act of criticizing the indefensible. But rather than actually deal with what was said, they’d rather play guilt-by-association with a little help from good ol’-fashioned false information:
Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said Israel was concerned that Mr Chavez had allied itself with “the most extreme elements in the region”.
“We have a Venezuelan president who embraces the Iranian leader who just a couple of days ago called for Israel to be wiped off the map,” said Mr Regev.
Now, this is just bullshit. Ask Juan Cole if you don’t believe me: Ahmadinejad, whatever else one may think of him, did not say that. He may not be fit to wipe Mohammed Khatami’s boots, but he said nothing about wiping Israel out, and to see that lie repeated–as the basis for a spanking of Hugo Chavez, who is innocent in any event–is simply inexcusable.
Frankly, Israel can keep its ambassador. If they want to be childish as well as fascistic, they frankly deserve all the criticism this is going to get them. The Muslim world is largely taking Chavez’s side in all this, and it’s not just because of all that oil under their sands. They have a long history of unaddressed grievances with Israel, and an even longer history of being taken less than seriously by the West. So when a western leader stands up and tells the truth, naturally they applaud him.
And it’s not their fault, or his, if Israel and its apologists can’t handle the truth.
I have to agree with Chavez. Hezbollah, which all the Israeli apologists keep saying started this, only acted within the rules of war by attacking and capturing legitimate military targets i.e. soldiers, that were inside Lebanon territory, to be exchanged for Hamas and other Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. The story that Hezbollah crossed the border to capture the soldiers is not very credible since Hezbollah has never invaded Israel and its only reason for being was to remove Israel from Lebanon. Israel responds with an all out attack on Lebanon including civilian centers and infrastructure that results in hundreds of civilian deaths. The IDF even had the gall to say the bombing of the Lebanese power plants was to keep Hezbollah from moving the prisoners out of Lebanon. As if getting them out in the darkness was harder than getting them out with the street lights on. The Hezbollah rocket attack only started after it was clear Israel was attacking and killing Lebanese civilians. While this should be considered and is an act of terrorism, comparing the dozens of Israeli civilian deaths to the hundreds of Lebanese civilian deaths should be its own context.
And as always, there is the ever-present undertone that if you are against Israel you are an anti-Semite. By that logic cats are dogs. Cats have four legs, dogs have four legs therefor cats are dogs. Israel is mostly Jewish, we criticize Israel for its attacks on civilians therefor we are anti-Semites. When put that way, it sounds as stupid as it is, but the Israeli apologists seem to think it is sound logic.
Chavez trading with a country that has not invaded another country or violated the nonproliferation treaty is a danger? Sure, Iran has a bad track record on human rights, but so does China and America trades with China. Hell, China still occupies Tibet, would like to take over Taiwan and has nuclear weapons to boot. Besides, you don’t get countries to become freer at the end of a gun, as we should know now from our Iraq adventure. Trade is the way to get positive change and Chavez knows this. How much better off would Cuba be if it were not for the embargo?
For that matter, the US’s own record on human rights isn’t exactly sterling. Especially when you factor in how much of its intervention in Latin America led directly and deliberately to human rights abuses. Particularly in Guatemala, which the US is now pushing as the “alternative” to Venezuela for a non-permanent UN security council seat.
Glass houses.