Harringay online

Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

For HoLiners who would like to sign and support this Petition.

It asks the Council to support the call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and

to divest its pension fund from companies complicit in the illegal occupation of Palestine and the ongoing military onslaught in Gaza. Thanks. 

https://www.change.org/p/haringey-council-stop-supporting-genocide-...

Note: this Petition is for people who live, work or study in Haringey.

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P.S.
My link above takes you to a conversation between Owen Jones and Israeli journalist Gideon Levi. As often, Owen Jones fidgets and talks fast sometimes gabbling words.

And while the sound quality is poor at Levy's end, I hope you persist. He has some valuable things to say. Perhaps the most important in this conversation is Levy's view that allegations of appalling treatment of (alleged) Hamas prisoners in Israeli jails is not only legally wrong but is likely to pose a threat to Israeli hostages held in Gaza.


As leading U.S. academics have pointed out, a carceral State can brutalise prisoners, prison guards and nearby communities.

Hi Alan.

The only way to end the war is to destroy Hamas militarily. If they surrender unconditionally before then and return the hostages that would be better, quicker and less costly in terms of human lives. However, given that Hamas again today rejected the conditions for a ceasefire I suspect that they will not surrender until they have no other choice. Hamas must be destroyed once and for all (as does Hezbollah and Islamic State and it's variants). Otherwise they just melt away into the civilian population, regroup, re-arm and start attacking Israel's citizens again or even us and our allies (the recent terrorism in Russia by IS is an example of what that might look like).

There was an interesting but chilling survey/report released today by the Henry Jackson Society showing that large percentages of the Muslim population in the UK do not believe that Hamas killed women and children on 7 October and that those atrocities which started the war were fabricated.

Regardless of whether you agree with the HJS on political grounds or if you disagree with the methodology of the survey there is no disputing that if even half the number of people reported to hold those views actually do then we have a very big problem! 

Of course not all Muslims in Britain think that way. It's also true that a lot of non-Muslim people unfortunately do.

Nonetheless, it's scarey that such views are so prevalent in our society. Those who hold them are ripe for radicalisation irrespective of their religion. They are the ones at the protests (the minority) who glorify Hamas and call for the eradication of Israel and it's peoples. They are the fifth column we will have to somehow deal with if the conflict continues too much longer or escalates further.

Hopefully, Hamas will surrender or be defeated before then with as few civilian and IDF casualites as possible.

Gordon Farcas my thanks for your full reply and frankness. I'll try to be equally frank.

You write: "The only way to end the war is to destroy Hamas militarily."
I would ask you and others who share this view to consider why you may be mistaken. The short reason why is because revenge follows upon revenge. It may wait until another generation grows up and makes their own attempt to right the wrongs and injustices.

I assume you know the factual arguments from history. If others reading this thread don't know that history I again recommend Israeli historians such as Ilan Pappe and Avi Shlaim. Yes and even Benny Morris's early work.
If people are curious about Gaza in particular the US historian Norman Finkelstein has a highly detailed book called Gaza. (Though his videos are shorter.) 

People might also want to view a video by Professor Haim Bresheet. His parents were refugees and the family were allocated a Palestinian home. Its owners were expelled into nearby Gaza as refugees. They left belongings behind which his mother looked after. As a small boy he remembers two women - the previous residents - coming to the house. His mother welcomed them.

Hamas won't "surrender unconditionally". I agree with you in hoping they make a deal. Probably exchanging hostages for Palestinians held by the Israelis.

About the Henry Jackson Society report, I haven't seen a copy. But even the Times of Israel queried its figures. Dubious exaggerations by Israeli spokespeople have been exposed by independent journalists making their own judgements. I and readers of this thread, don't have to be Muslim to be highly dubious about - for example - the "explanation" of the Israelis for the killing of the Aid workers from World Central Kitchen.

Nor is it a a matter of whether or not I "disagree with the methodology of the [Henry Jackson] survey", It's what the questions asked and how it was framed. The view I hold is that killing and maiming thousands of civilians - half of them children - appears to be a potential war crime. Is it "scarey that I hold such views"?  Is it scarey that thousands of people holding such views march in protest?  I'm not able to march at present. But I would be scared if nobody in our society marched to protest murder and maiming both by Hamas and the Israeli Government.

I don't find Jon Stewart scarey either. Though he does make some scarey points about the U.S. policy on the Daily Show.  Using humour to illustrate how Biden & Co "condemn" some actions by Putin but only express "concern" if Netanyahu's government  does something similar.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkwgnlPRdHg&t=353s

My embarrassed apology for misspelling the name of Professor Haim Bresheeth. Let me make amends by adding two online links.
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xi0efl9d1i4 Interview a month ago.
  https://icahd.org/2022/01/28 ; /icahd-uk-interview 2022

More useful pieces in the wider and complex jigsaw which the internet makes it possible to access.

Well it looks like the iron dome held up and destroyed the majority of Iranian rockets directed at Israel and its people.

Partial thanks is due to the US and our own RAF who accounted for some of the defensive work. Now it remains to be seen how the fifth column will react here. Unfortunately we don't have an iron dome to protect us and the enemy is already within the gates.

Gordon Farcas, there is no "Iron Dome". . .  over Israel and its people". There are batteries of hi-tech weapons which attempt to shoot down the bombs sent by another heavily armed regime. This time it seems the Iranian weapons damaged an airbase and killed a Bedouin girl. Another stupid and needless death.

"Unfortunately" you write, "we don't have an iron dome to protect us'. Is that really how you want the UK to live?

You end with a cryptic phrase: " ... and the enemy is already within the gates". Added to your comment about a "fifth column", I realise that I now have no idea what you mean.

The term "fifth column" comes from the Spanish Civil War. It referred to unnamed Fascist supporters of General Franco.
The "enemy within the gates" was Cicero critiquing his own Roman society's love of luxury, its folly, and its criminality.

A news item this morning spoke about the increased numbers of children in the UK living in poverty. To my mind that's an enemy within out gates which needs defeating. Though perhaps we should all scale down the metaphors and be a lot clearer?

Alan Stanton, there is indeed an iron done. That is the name for the network of ground to air defences designed to intercept incoming rockets and missiles. It's there and it worked fortunately. Had it not there would have been thousands of Israelis dead including children just like the one you mentioned. 

The fifth column as its most commonly understood refers to a sub group of the population working against the country to progress the aims of its enemies.

I expect the 'fifth column' you are referring to will reduce in number as the penny drops for the naive students and demonstrative middle classes who have been waving 'Palestinian' flags about and they realise that the undeniably fascist Iranian regime has been pulling the strings of Hamas, Hezbollab, the Houthis and Islamic State all along. They"ve been fed a lot misinformation to date. 

That will leave a small, hard-core rump of nutters who the police and security services can focus on to prevent the sort of risks we are all worried about.

I'm unaware of the specific
"sort of risks we are all worried about".
This of course, may indicate that I'm one of the "small, hard-core rump of nutters" that you refer to.

But it's hard to tell. Because it seems to me that - from what I see and hear on TV, and online, and from my wider reading and conversations - the genuinely angry, fearful, tearful, and terrified passions on view are entirely understandable. Among all the parties involved in demonstrations against further pointless and unneeded killing.

Yes, a demo might spoil someone's weekend stroll. Although not if they had set out to join a counter-demonstration.

         *   *   *

"ON THE WALL WAS CHALKED:
They want war.
The man who wrote it
Has already fallen"
--Berthold Brecht

Another apology, this time for not checking news corrections and updates. The Bedouin girl I mentioned is actually in hospital in Beersheba [ Be'er-Sheva ] the largest city in Southern Israel. Amina - age 7  - was reported as in intensive care.
Link: https://www.yahoo.com/news/anger-among-israeli-bedouins-girl-210058...

I know next to nothing about the Bedouin people
s. Except:
#1 A personal snapshot Many years ago, two of my brothers - one who seems to have liked driving high powered cars too fast - were rescued by some passing Bedouins after spinning off a road in the Negev desert.
#2 From time to time I read and am full of admiration/fascination for the practical and theoretical work of the research agency Forensic Architecture [F.A.]  Founded by the Israeli Eyal Weizman, Professor at Goldsmiths University of London.
My knowledge of FA's work is neither thorough nor systematic. But at least two of their investigations I read were about Bedouin Arabs wrongly accused by the Israeli Government agencies.

F.A. also carried out a detailed investigation into the killing of Mark Duggan by police in Ferry Lane, Tottenham on 4 August 2011. His death was the catalyst for the Tottenham Riot days later. I saw the film but to my regret didn't attend F.A.'s highly informative presentation. (It seems nobody thought to invite the elected ward councillors. At the time I was one of them.)
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/ng-interactive/2020/jun/10/mark...

For anyone more generally interested in F.A. there's lots of free stuff online.
This is from 2016 but gives a flavour.
https://www.academia.edu/64953645/On_Forensic_Architecture_A_Conver...

More recent: from December 2020
https://www.robertboschacademy.de/en/perspectives/introduced-eyal-w...

A newly posted video adds another peek into the creativity of Forensic Architecture.
Ash Sarkar from Novara Media interviews Professor Eyal Weizman (FA). She asks thoughtful questions which gets long insightful answers.
For example take this Q & A
https://youtu.be/fhn51LDDavY?si=GZ3r7SBQydsh6_2g&t=627

Consider applying its insights to blending different professional skills within a team aiming to work together in, say, some London Borough such as Haringey. It's still shoving up residential towers with the illusion that these are just "benign buildings". Instead of acknowledging that they are "a political act".  (I borrow these phrases from Prof Weizman.)

Consider also his view that certain problems require a "community of practice" to solve them.
https://youtu.be/fhn51LDDavY?si=ub3oGg0VnJdTzFnC&t=842

Gordon Farcas, you may have left out mention of the children of Gaza.

I read your last posted comment and of course you are right that the barrage of Iranian missiles and drones could have murdered thousands of people in Israel. Including very many children. That it didn't appears to be due not to some fantastical "iron dome" but the "telegraphing" by Iran and co-operation between - at least - Israel, the USA, the UK, and Jordan. And, according to the BBC, Iran notifying other countries about missiles and drones due to pass over their territory, They in turn shared this warning, which enabled military preparedness. Including - it seems for Jordan to shoot down slow moving drones.

Very occasionally I read the Israeli journalist Anshel Pfeffer and find he says perceptive things. He wrote an article claiming that: "the war in Gaza ended without anyone even noticing".  So obviously Mr Pfeffer doesn't read the U.S. journalist Chris Hedges who was a war correspondent and now posts a regular report.  On 3rd April 2024 Chris Hedges posted a piece called: "The Death of Amr".

Here's the link. The posted text is read by Eunice Wong, a Chinese Canadian actor.
https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/the-death-of-amr-read-by-eunice-...

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