Ignored by David Ward

Recently, David Ward, Liberal Democrat MP for Bradford East was suspended from the Party Whip until the eve of Conference in Glasgow over tweets which under some interpretations could question the right of the state of Israel to exist.

On their own, they would probably have sparked an email rebuke from Chief Whip Alistair Carmichael. Sadly, though, this is the latest episode in a long running saga, ever since David's ill-considered comments about "the Jews" on Holocaust Memorial Day this year. He was wrong and subsequently apologised and agreed to work with Simon Hughes and Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel to agree proportionate language, although there were news reports of him refusing to undergo such training. The papers were full of it at the time and Nick Clegg was confronted with a "what are you going to do about this?" question every week on his Call Clegg show on LBC.

Ward's July tweets and subsequent suspension therefore came at the end of a six month process. I felt that there had been a huge effort on the part of Alistair Carmichael to sort this out without resorting to such drastic action. More than anything, I felt that he had made it more difficult for those of us who feel that the Israeli Government has a great deal to answer for. We have to be very careful about how we criticise them. . It's to the advantage of that Government if they can frame the debate around the alleged anti-semitism of its critics rather than its own actions. Giving them wiggle room plays their game the way they want it played.

There is also the very obvious point that until both sides are actually talking to each other, nothing is going to change. Any solution is going to require a real commitment from both sides to make peace. And I do believe that it can be done. Who ever would have thought that South Africa could get to where it's got? When I was growing up, a brutal regime committed terrible atrocities. Nelson Mandela had every reason to hate them, but he worked with them to build a new South Africa.It took both sides to show willing. Look at Northern Ireland, with all its history. Again as a child growing up watching violence followed by intemperate language and hatred, it was hard to imagine how that could ever be sorted. Where there's a will, it can happen.

Liberal Democrat Voice asked its members' forum what they thought of the situation and their response was, to me at least, a clear message from a majority of respondents that they want David back in our parliamentary party AND that they want him to moderate his language. That's kind of where I am and that's why I decided to try to strike up a conversation with David on Twitter the other day, in response to another tweet on this vexed subject:

It's good to know who hates you and it is good to be hated by the right people
— David Ward (@DavidWardMP) July 27, 2013

I thought that that was a strange comment. David Ward is in a position to do so much good. It's a huge privilege to be in Parliament and to be able to influence national and international affairs. Why would you spend your time, then, simply inflaming an already heated situation. Why not try to sort it? What good does that sort of comment put into the world. So I waded in.

It's good to know who hates you and it is good to be hated by the right people
— David Ward (@DavidWardMP) July 27, 2013

@DavidWardMP if you make it about whether they are whatever you called them, we'll never get anywhere towards freedom for Palestinians.
— Caron Lindsay (@caronmlindsay) July 28, 2013

@DavidWardMP if you look at the likes of Mandela, they kept to issues, focused on progress & reconciliation & got much further.
— Caron Lindsay (@caronmlindsay) July 28, 2013

@DavidWardMP I want you back as a Lib Dem MP & I really hope you can find a way to achieve that. It's just about more careful language.
— Caron Lindsay (@caronmlindsay) July 28, 2013

He didn't reply. He doesn't have to. Who the hell am I after all? But the comments I had from other people showed that it actually was possible to discuss Israel/Palestine on Twitter in a way that illuninates.

It takes a special person who can build up a seat like Bradford East and win it for the Liberal Democrats. His biography on his website speaks of decades of service to the community. I've never met him, but I know plenty who have and they think he's fantastic. I want to see him fight and hold that seat for the Liberal Democrats in 2015 because he's done very many things that I agree with, not least rebelling on those aspects of the welfare reforms that many of us find difficult and unjust. He has a petition against that ghastly spouse's visa income requirement, too.

So, please, can we have the solution that's best for the party? That's David Ward back properly in the Liberal Democrats and using language which will move things on rather than hold them back. Nobody's expecting him to stop criticising the Israeli government, but he just needs to be a bit more careful about how he does it.

What if Iran talked about holocaust and returning somewhere to the Middle Ages?

Can you just imagine the outcry if Iran's President Ahmadinejad came out with comments like wanting to send somewhere back to the Middle Ages.

What if he talked about inflicting a holocaust on a particular people? And then had his ministers scuttling around saying he didn't quite mean it like that. He really only meant "disaster". Yeah, because inflicting disaster on people is just fine.....

Well, there would be resolutions and murmurings and outrage and endless condemnation. And these things wouldn't be unjustified. That's absolutely no way to talk about anyone. Military objectives driven by destructive emotions are not a good thing.

Except it's not Iran saying these things. It's Israel. About the Palestinians in Gaza. Sure, Hamas shouldn't be firing rockets into Israel, but nor should Israel have such scant regard for the dreadful suffering its disproportionate response is causing.

So, where's the international condemnation? These comments by two Israeli ministers are unacceptable and I want to see Obama, Clegg, Cameron, the EU and the UN calling them out. I won't be holding my breath.

Update: There is, however, something useful you can do. Save the Children say that children are suffering the biggest impact of the Israeli bombardment. They've set up an emergency fund and are making sure that kids in Gaza have clean water and something to eat. Please give here if you can.

Just stop the killing in Gaza

Ok, I've had enough. Will somebody please take Israel by the scruff of the neck and get them told that bombarding Gaza, causing immense suffering and a humanitarian crisis, is just not on. I'm looking at you, Barack Obama and William Hague. Then can they just get all the key players together and not let them out until a peaceful way forward has been found?

Israel needs to understand how its actions have contributed to the current situation over many years. There's no evidence that they are learning anything. If any member of our Government said that our forces wanted to return anywhere to the Middle Ages, then I'd hope they would not only be unequivocally sacked, but made to resign from Parliament as well. That's not the case for the Israeli Minister of the Interior who still appears to have a job after making such a shameful comment about Gaza.

That says to me that the agenda goes way beyond defending Israel from Palestinian violence. In the Middle Ages there was no electricity, technology, antibiotics, surgery to speak of, hospitals, hygiene, education if you weren't rich. How could anyone wish a return to that sort of society on any other human beings? Talking about them with such obvious hatred is not remotely acceptable and surely it should be dawning on the Israeli Government  that treating these people badly is counter-productive. Israel has been getting away with way too much over the last 40 years with impunity because its powerful mates let it. Enough is enough. I just don't want to watch this tortuous cycle of the people of Gaza suffering blockade, bomardment, picking themselves up only for more innocent lives to be lost.

We're not going to get any sort of lasting peace in the region without Israel giving some stuff up and they are going to have to be made to do it. And the only way they will be made to do it is if people like you and I lobby our governments to drive this forward. Write to your MP, to William Hague, take to the streets if there's a protest march near you. It's time to sort this troubled region's problems out once and for all.

Guest Post: Hugh O'Donnell MSP's final report from the Middle East

This is my last from the Middle East, Amman Airport to be exact. 

Jericho where the Israelis will rebuild the wall

If I have learned anything from this trip it is that the Israeli Government and the Quartet have no real interest in the 'Two State' solution. In East Jerusalem and the West Bank/Palestine they are guilty of what I can only describe as ethnic cleansing (think native Americans or even the Clearances). I've seen people's land, homes, religious centres, economy and culture slowly destroyed by a regime that seems determined to drive them out of their own land. I know that sounds hard but sadly it seems to be true. 

The wall. For Israeli students the walk to university is a mere 500m, for Palestinians, it's 4 km and 6 checkpoints

They are implementing an apartheid system where the Palestinians are third-class citizens and cannot even use the best roads. The Israelis have even built tunnels for them to use to reach their towns, villages and farms. To top it all they have constructed a monstrous apartheid wall to divide and isolate Palestinians from almost every means of economic prosperity and even education. This wall often means that a journey of 40 minutes can now take 2 hours if you are not Israeli or a tourist. 


The wall goes right round Bethlehem where we visited last night. The Palestinian watchman opened the courtyard of the Nativity Church for us to view. Now there are few tourists staying un the town,  as 80% of tourists are bussed to the Israeli colonies for overnight stays.  Mary and Joseph would have no problem getting a room in Bethlehem these days!! 

The Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem

I'm sad and depressed at what I've seen here and what is being done to this warm and friendly people who deserve better after over sixty years of oppression at the hands of Israel with the tacit approval of most of the Western world-it's just wrong and almost certainly is criminal.

Guest Post: Jordan and Israel Visit Day 2 by Hugh O'Donnell MSP with photos

Central Scotland Liberal Democrat MSP Hugh O'Donnell is currently visiting Jordan and Israel with an international delegation. Yesterday he sent a report and photographs. This is his account of what he's seen today.

Al-Aqsa Mosque

Day two ends and we have just finished at 10.30pm local time!! Talk about a Cook's Tour.

Today started with a breakfast at 7.30am and a tour of the Old City of Jerusalem and a visit to the Al-Aqsa mosque, A real privilege because unlike local Palestinian men (between the ages of 16-45 years) the Israelis did not stop us going into the holy place.  How ironic that they allow 3 Catholics, one Orthodox and assorted atheists and yet local men can't go there to pray to their God!!!

The one thing this trip has taught me in such a short time is the difference in the economic resources available to the two communities.  it is very noticeable that by far the poorer of the groups is the Palestinian, in every way. Their wages are 60% of the Israeli workers but the cost of living is exactly the same for both. The Palestinian areas are much poorer looking, except where the houses have been taken over by Israeli squatters.


I'm trying to persuade folks to stop using the term settlers as it is not the right image for what is being done. We challenged a squatter in East Jerusalem this morning and asked why he had moved into this house of a Palestinian family who were living in a tent on the other side of the road. He smiled sweetly and said in RUSSIAN "because we can" and then something which I can't repeat, but which basically meant "go forth and multiply" before walking away. No wonder people are angry here. 

Palestinian evictees outside the house they shared with 17 relatives in total. It is now occupied by 4 Russian Israelis

Media interviews after visit to evicted Palestinian women

In Hebron we met the PLA members who had been arrested and imprisoned after the elections in 2006. No charges,  just locked up for up to 4 years, including Dr Aziz. He guided us to the mosque in Hebron which is alleged to house the tombs of Abraham and his wife Sara. The Israelis have converted half of this 1400 year old building into a synagogue and protected the Israeli squatters who use it with an armed guard, checkpoint and other restrictions. This is the mosque where 30+ people were massacred  at prayer a few years ago, just like those terrorists did in Iraq the other day. What are we doing to our world?  When we toured the old city of Hebron we were watched from a nearby building by two IDF snipers and the children of the Israeli squatters threw garbage down onto the market place.

The nets are to protect shoppers from garbage and other objects thrown by Israelis

We also visited the prisoners who had been held by the Palestinian Assembly in Palestinian jails who claimed to be tortured and showed some signs of it too. There is much much more, but tomorrow we go to Ramallah to meet with the PA and maybe even Mr Abbas. 

A prisoner of the Palestinian Authority alleges torture. His mother is in the foreground

Hugh O'Donnell MSP's Jordan and Israel Picture Diary

So, I was lying in bed at 7:30 yesterday morning, dosing away, like you do on a Sunday, when I was roused from my semi consciousness by my phone beeping at me.

The message was one of a stream of photos I received during the course of the day from Hugh O'Donnell, Liberal Democrat MSP for Central Scotland, who's currently on an international delegation to Jordan and Israel. You can read his first report of his visit -which to me is pretty harrowing - here.

Their day started in Amman, Jordan's capital, yesterday:

Says Hugh: So, here we are! No problems at Jordan and watched the sunrise over Amman before we set off for the border.


For the next few hours I waited patiently to see if the delegation would be allowed into Israel. Every so often he'd post an update to Facebook, each more pessimistic than the last. He was worried that his visit to Gaza 18 months ago would mean he was refused entry.


Here's a picture of some of his fellow travellers, an interesting mix of delegates, led by 80 year old Sir Gerald Kaufman,13 in total,Swiss, Portuguese, Polish, Palestinian, English and one Scot

 After a couple of tense hours at the Israeli border, the Delegation was allowed in and headed for Jerusalem  passing Jehrico in the West Bank, and through the Jerusalem desert - a de-millatarised zone with only a few Israeli settlements.

In Jerusalem itself, here's Hugh on the Mount of Olives with Sir Gerald Kaufman

And Hugh was glad to find that he wasn't the first Scot to show support for the Palestinian people

I'm really grateful to Hugh for sending me these photos. I'm hoping that there will be more to come as the visit progresses.

Guest Post: Hugh O'Donnell MSP in Jerusalem

Central Scotland Liberal Democrat MSP Hugh O'Donnell is currently in Jerusalem as part of a  delegation led by Gerald Kaufman MP. Here he writes about what he's seen today.


So we come to the end of day one here in Jerusalem, and what an eye opener it has been!! Of course most people know about the issues in Gaza, BUT THE REALITIES OF DAY TO DAY LIFE IN AN OCCUPIED CITY LIKE JERUSALEM ALL TOO OFTEN PASS US BY. As well as the usual round of handshakes, speeches and rhetoric we actually had the chance to see the more subtle acts of occupation in the city itself and they are pretty scary. 


I had wrongly assumed that the settlements were taking place in rural or semi rural communities but what's happening here in East Jerusalem is much more deadly than that and often means trying to change the demographic of the city by illegally taking over or demolishing houses owned and occupied by Palestinians, often for hundreds of years. The best example is in Benton where they are attempting to demolish 88 homes of 123 families comprising almost 1500 souls and replacing them with apartments for less that half that number of Israelis, all to undermine the Clinton protocol to have the different communities be governed by their own choice of politicians-change the demgraphic and you change the power base. Gerrymandering of the worst kind in my view.


I also discovered that the Palestinians are 'residents' and not citizens, despite paying their taxes and obeying the laws of Israel,  if they leave to go to work somewhere else they can be refused the right to come back to their own homes. Many families are split up this way, and of course when they go the houses are occupied by Israeli settlers and.....well you get the picture!!!


 This is just a shocking state of affairs and an outrageous way for a so called liberal democracy to behave-it's cleansing by any definition you like.

A thoughtful persepctive on the Gaza situation

An old friend of mine, Adrian Cruden, posted the article below on Facebook last night. I thought it was brilliant and deserved circulating to a wider audience. I first knew Adrian through Scottish Young Social Democrats back in the day. He's now with the Greens and stood in a Council by-election for them a couple of months ago in Dewsbury.

"they will bring upon themselves a bigger shoah (holocaust)", by Adrian Cruden

A tiny area, packed with tens of thousands of people in cramped, inadequate, decaying buildings; with no one allowed in or out; water supplies cut and barely enough food allowed in; with one of the highest rates of infant mortality and deaths in childbirth…packed in together, with a mighty army surrounding this place to keep its inhabitants incarcerated, the head of the army proclaiming that soon he will unleash a holocaust on that place.

Where is this? The Jewish ghetto in Warsaw in 1941? Or Vilnius in 1942?

It could have been – but it is neither. It is Gaza, squeezed between Israel and Egypt. And the time is…now.

Gaza is a strip of land 25 miles long and 4 miles wide, with 1,600,000 people squashed into its confines. They are nearly all refugees or the children and grandchildren of refugees – the Palestinians thrown out of their lands in what is now Israel in 1948.

After the peace accords signed in 1993, the territory fell under the administration of the Palestinian National Authority, which also has jurisdiction over various enclaves in the West Bank. In both areas, however, the Israeli Defence Force (IDF), retained military control and withdrew from Gaza only in 2005.

Elections to the Palestinian Parliament in 2006 brought Hamas, a fundamentalist Islamic religious party, to power, its electoral triumph defeating the previous regime of the PLO-Fatah party of the late Yassir Arafat. Although if I was a Palestinian I think I'd not want much to do with Hamas, it was nevertheless the clear choice of the Palestinian electorate (under the title "Change & Reform" http://psephos.adam-carr.net/countries/p/palestine/palestine2006.txt ). Yet the EU and USA joined Israel in refusing to recognise or deal with them – democracy it seemed mattered to the West only as long as it produced the right result. After clashes between supporters of Hamas and Fatah, the Palestinian lands fractured, with Hamas in control of Gaza and Fatah in control of the West Bank territories.

Israel began a blockade of Gaza, restricting food and water and medicine. The densely populated territory suffered greatly as a result, and a UN report just a few weeks ago found massive addiction to painkillers and antidepressants among all age groups as the only things which helped the inhabitants cope with day to day life. Gaza is a ghetto just as much as the ones the Jews of Poland were crushed into ahead of their deportation to the gas chambers.

Under the circumstances, it seems of little surprise that some Gazans resorted to firing homemade rockets with fertiliser incendiaries into Israel. Over the last six years, this led to 19 Israeli deaths. Hamas encouraged this, and Israel responded – with massive raids by its airforce and its army, the fourth largest in the world. Several thousand Palestinians have been killed over the same period (around 2,300 in Gaza alone, including nearly 400 children). Past Israeli tactics have included bulldozing rows of houses in the close quarters of Gaza, often with little or even no notice to the residents. Now, tonight, their army has launched a land assault.

Earlier today, like thousands in cities around Britain, I joined about 350 others to march and protest in Leeds City Centre to call for peace in Gaza. Under a steel grey sky, in the bitter chill of an early January afternoon, we walked along the Headrow as shoppers watched, most of them seeming mildly bemused by this interruption to their post-Christmas Sales shopping, a few more hostile, shouting abuse, especially at the Muslim women in their headscarves. The police filmed us carefully every step of the way.

Why should it matter? Why does it matter, what happens hundreds of miles away?

Aside from the moral and ethical case, if these are not enough, there is the self-interest of stopping violence between humans: what happens there could happen anywhere, given the right (or wrong) conditions. And with its arms supplies to Israel, the UK is more involved than probably any of these shoppers might imagine.

The USA bankrolls both the Israeli army and pumps a huge economic subsidy into Israel - some estimates as high as $5.5 billion pa. ( http://www.hotpolitics.com/tax4israel.htm ) In addition, the UK is one of the IDF’s arms suppliers ( http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2006/apr/06/israel.armstrade ). Both could exert a huge influence on what is happening if they chose. But both Bush and Brown (and of course the Middle East Peace Envoy, Tony Blair) have at best equivocated, somehow putting the puny rocket attacks on a par with the assault launched by the fourth most powerful army in the world; more than that, they have effectively backed Israel to the hilt, leaving little room for hope they might broker true and just peace.

US President, George Bush, has claimed this latest bloodshed is the inevitable and justified Israeli response to Hamas terrorism: Barak Obama, by his craven silence at this critical time, has in effect endorsed this view, even although the first shots were fired several weeks ago by Israeli forces and although as far back as 29 February, the Israeli Defence Minister was promising to unleash a “shoah”, a holocaust, on Gaza.

http://www.counterpunch.org/cook03082008.html

That the Israeli elections are only a few weeks ago and the poll ratings of the two Government parties – Kadima and (shame on them) Labour – have soared since the offensive began is clearly more than coincidence. Likewise, this can be seen as Bush’s last anti-Muslim hurrah, a proxy assault by his allies rather than the no longer possible assault on Iran he dreamt off, just as his dad, Bush senior, invaded Somalia at the equivalent point in the dying days of his Presidency in 1991/92. Just as Clinton was incapable of sorting out the mess in Mogadishu, it seems hard to see how Obama will ever draw peace out of the Palestinian pyre.

But then perhaps that would suit some of these scheming politicians – for Hamas is very much the creation of the Israelis. Back in the 1980s, PLO-Fatah, a vaguely socialist, wholly secular party led by Yassir Arafat, was in the ascendancy among Palestinians and recognised around the world as their legitimate voice. Israel decided on an approach of divide and conquer and so began to sponsor, fund and train Hamas as a religious alternative for Palestinians in order to undermine Fatah and Arafat. That Hamas went on to win the elections and subsequently for the Palestinian Authority to be effectively divided in two is something that will suit those who wish no peace that involves Israel surrendering an inch of land. It may bring no peace or security, but the low grade incursions Hamas makes into Israel may well be seen as a price worth paying by those who seek endless confrontation.

(US article - "Hamas: Son of Israel" - http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8449 )

Today, one speaker hit the nail on the head for me: when he saw children weeping amid the ruins of their homes, he thought of his children; when he saw an old woman bleeding in a hospital, he thought of his own mother; when he saw houses turned to rubble, with people trying to dig their neighbours out, he thought of his own neighbours. I think it is this, the commonality of suffering, that should bind us together in campaigning for peace - by marching, by writing to MPs, emailing newspapers, by talking to any who will listen.

Only by accident are we born where we are born; but we are all part of humanity, and there is only one earth. What happens anywhere should concern us all – enough at least to stop shopping and start shouting.

The land attack has begun – there will be more demonstrations in the UK and around the world in the days to come. These will all be chances for us to make our voices heard to save Gaza, and all of us.


When the Nazis came for the communists
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I was not a Jew.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.

- Pastor Martin Niemoller

Shout loud - peace and justice almost happened before; we can make it happen again...

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Clegg calls for EU action against Israel over Gaza

Glad to see that our leader, Nick Clegg, is urging the EU to suspend a proposed co-operation deal with Israel.

It would be a start and a major signal that a significant body of international opinion opposes Israel's continued and disproportionate action in Gaza.

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