Your tax Francs at work: Foreign Ministry calls on Swiss government, city of Zurich to withdraw support from Breaking the Silence exhibition
Israel's Foreign Ministry is urging the government of Switzerland and the City of Zurich to
withdraw support from an exhibition being put on by
Breaking the Silence, a
European-funded Israeli NGO that has made
false accusations against the IDF in the past. The withdrawal of support would apparently lead to the exhibition not taking place. This is from the first link.
A senior official in the Foreign
Ministry in Jerusalem said Israel's ambassador to Switzerland, Yigal
Caspi, called the head of the Middle East and North Africa Division in
Switzerland's Department of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday to issue a formal
complaint, and request his government quit funding the NGO's
exhibition.
The Israeli
official, who asked to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the
matter, noted that Caspi "vigorously protested" Swiss support for the
exhibition, which, he emphasized in his conversation with the Swiss
official," serves to slander Israel." As such, he said, the Israeli
government is concerned by the fact that Switzerland is financing it.
The exhibition, which is due to open in June in
Zurich, would include photos and testimonies of Israel Defense Forces
soldiers alleging human rights violations in the West Bank.
Two weeks ago, the Israeli news website NRG reported
that Switzerland's Foreign Ministry contributed 15,000 Swiss francs
($16,100) to support the exhibition, and that the Zurich municipality
contributed an additional 10,000 Swiss francs ($10,700).
If the formal complaint doesn't work (and it probably won't), maybe Hotovely should instruct the ambassador to show up at the exhibition. That's
worked pretty well in the past.
Labels: Binyamin Netanyahu, Breaking the Silence, European anti-Semitism, human rights, Palestinian terrorism, Swiss anti-Semitism, Switzerland, Tzipi Hotovely, Zurich
OMG: Iranian reporter covering nuke talks defects, says US mainly speaking on Iran's behalf to other P 5+1 countries
Shavua tov, a good week to everyone.
An Iranian reporter covering the nuclear talks in Lausanne, Switzerland has defected, saying that there is no point to practicing his profession in Iran, because he can only write what he is told anyway. The same reporter had some
choice words to describe the United States' role in the talks.
He then appeared on an opposition television channel based in London to
say he no longer saw any “sense” in his profession as a journalist as
he could only write what he was told.
“There are a number of people attending on the Iranian side at the
negotiations who are said to be journalists reporting on the
negotiations,” he told Irane Farda television. “But they are not
journalists and their main job is to make sure that all the news fed
back to Iran goes through their channels.
“My conscience would not allow me to carry out my profession in this
manner any more.” Mr Mottaghi was a journalist and commentator who went
on to use social media successfully to promote Mr Rouhani to a youthful
audience that overwhelmingly elected him to power.
But he was also subject to the bitter internal arguments within the
Iranian regime. One news website claimed he had been forced in to report
to the ministry of intelligence weekly, and that he had been tipped off
that he might be subject to arrest had he returned to Tehran.
He is said to have been a friend of Jason Rezaian, the Iranian-American reporter for the Washington Post who has been detained in Tehran, and to have campaigned privately for his release.
...
In his television interview, Mr Mottaghi also gave succour to western critics of the proposed nuclear deal, which has seen the White House
pursue a more conciliatory line with Tehran than some of America’s
European allies in the negotiating team, comprising the five permanent
members of the UN security council and Germany.
“The US negotiating team are mainly there to speak on Iran’s behalf
with other members of the 5+1 countries and convince them of a deal,” he
said.
Meanwhile, the Obama administration continues its fight for
truth, justice and the American way Islam.
Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, freedom of the press, Iran sanctions regime, Iranian nuclear threat, P 5+1, political asylum, Switzerland
Actually, it's kind of hard to get a gun in Israel or Switzerland
The Washington Post's Ezra Klein interviews SUNY Downstate Professor Janet Rosenbaum - who unlike the rest of us has actually
researched it - who tells him that it's actually
not so easy to get a gun in Israel or Switzerland (as I wrote in an
earlier post regarding Israel). This is from the second link.
Ezra Klein:
Israel and Switzerland are often mentioned as countries that prove that
high rates of gun ownership don’t necessarily lead to high rates of gun
crime. In fact, I wrote that on Friday. But you say your research shows
that’s not true.
Janet Rosenbaum: First of all, because they don’t have high levels of
gun ownership. The gun ownership in Israel and Switzerland has
decreased.
For instance, in Israel, they’re very limited in who is able to own a
gun. There are only a few tens of thousands of legal guns in Israel,
and the only people allowed to own them legally live in the settlements,
do business in the settlements, or are in professions at risk of
violence.
Both countries require you to have a reason to have a gun. There
isn’t this idea that you have a right to a gun. You need a reason. And
then you need to go back to the permitting authority every six months or
so to assure them the reason is still valid.
The second thing is that there’s this widespread misunderstanding
that Israel and Switzerland promote gun ownership. They don’t. Ten years
ago, when Israel had the outbreak of violence, there was an expansion
of gun ownership, but only to people above a certain rank in the
military. There was no sense that having ordinary citizens [carry guns]
would make anything safer.
Switzerland has also been moving away from having widespread guns.
The laws are done canton by canton, which is like a province. Everyone
in Switzerland serves in the army, and the cantons used to let you have
the guns at home. They’ve been moving to keeping the guns in depots.
That means they’re not in the household, which makes sense because the
literature shows us that if the gun is in the household, the risk goes
up for everyone in the household.
EK:
As I understand it, there’s a stronger link between guns and suicide
than between guns and homicide. And one of the really interesting parts
of your paper is your recounting of the Israeli military’s effort to cut
suicides among soldiers by restricting access to guns.
JR: Yes, it’s very striking. In Israel, it used to be that all
soldiers would take the guns home with them. Now they have to leave them
on base. Over the years they’ve done this — it began, I think, in 2006 —
there’s been a 60 percent decrease in suicide on weekends among IDS
soldiers. And it did not correspond to an increase in weekday suicide.
People think suicide is an impulse that exists and builds. This shows
that doesn’t happen. The impulse to suicide is transitory. Someone with
access to a gun at that moment may commit suicide, but if not, they may
not.
EK:
I was surprised by one statistic in your article: You said that Israel
rejects 40 percent of its applications for a gun, the highest rate of
rejection of any country in the world. And even when you get approved,
you say that “all guns must have an Interior Ministry permit and
identifying mark for tracing.” That seems like it might make people
think twice before they shoot from a gun they know the government can
track.
JR: That’s a requirement. I don’t know a great deal about the ballistics issue there. But that is in the regulations.
EK:
Israel and Switzerland are both small, highly cohesive countries. So
some say that the difference in gun crime shows that there’s something
about American culture that’s leading to these atrocities. Do you buy
that?
JR: Israel is not a peaceful society. If there were a lot of guns, it
may be even more violent. Israeli schools are well known for having a
lot of the kicking and punching type of violence. I don’t know that
Switzerland has that reputation. But Israel does, and it seems that the
lack of guns promotes the lack of firearm violence rather than there
being some nascent tendency toward peacefulness and cohesion. That
cohesion may or may not exist, but not having guns prevents guns from
being used in violence. People do still commit homicide and suicide but
they do it with less lethal means. The most common form of suicide in
Israel is strangulation, which is striking, because it’s not that common
elsewhere.
Hmmm.
Labels: gun control, Israel, Switzerland
They steal symbols, don't they?
We've talked before about Muslims stealing other religions' holy sites. Now, they're stealing symbols too. On Saturday, Muslims demonstrating in Bern Switzerland wore the yellow stars of ghetto Jews in a bid to try to draw equivalence with the Jewish plight. But the gesture seems to have backfired. At the very least, it was widely regarded as
distasteful.
The JTA reported Saturday that 2,000 people showed up for the October 29 demonstration in Bern initiated by the Islamic Central Council of Switzerland, a conservative Islamic organization, to protest anti-Muslim discrimination.
Protesters wore a yellow star sticker printed with the word "Muslim" reminiscent of the one that the Nazis forced Jews to wear during the Third Reich. Some protesters constructed a plastic model of a mosque with minarets, which are banned in Switzerland.
Edith Bino, president of the Jewish community in Bern, told the Basler Times that she found the use of the yellow star "so obviously wrong that it could not be taken seriously." And Yves Kugelmann, editor in chief of the Jewish newspaper Tachles, said he found the choice of symbols "simply idiotic."
"It is regrettable when legitimate concerns are raised using false comparisons," Kugelmann told the Basler Times. He said that discrimination against Muslims is a theme that must be taken seriously in Switzerland, "but not in this cheap way."
The choice of symbolism irked Muslim groups as well: Two mainstream Muslim organizations reportedly stayed away from the demonstration as a result.
Nicolas Blancho, head of the Islamic Central Council, defended his choice of symbols, telling the Tages Anzeiger newspaper that "Muslims are treated as second-class citizens and are discriminated against, for example because they wear a headscarf or because of their name when they look for an apprenticeship or are looking for an apartment."
Boo hoo. By the way, the guest of honor at this shindig was Tony Blair's ex-sister-in-law Lauren Booth, who has converted to Islam.
Labels: Lauren Booth, Muslim anti-Semitism, Switzerland
Wising up in Switzerland
Switzerland may be among the most anti-Semitic countries on earth, but they sure are learning how to deal with their Muslim problem.
You will recall that about a year ago, Switzerland passed a law
banning new minarets from being constructed in the country. Now, Switzerland has passed a law to
automatically deport foreigners convicted of crimes.
Swiss national broadcaster SF1 said 52.9 percent of voters backed the initiative in Sunday's referendum, a plan proposed by the nationalist Swiss People's Party (SVP).
A counter-proposal put forth by the Swiss government, which would make expulsion dependent on the length of a prison term rather on an arbitrary list of offenses, appears to have been rejected by most voters, according to preliminary results. Currently, decisions to expel foreigners convicted of serious crimes are made on a case-by-case basis.
The initiative, which would apply to foreigners convicted of crimes like murder, rape or trafficking in drugs or people, has been criticized by human rights groups and legal experts, who said it could disregard international anti-discrimination treaties and the free movement of peoples under European Union law.
Switzerland, while not an EU member, does allow EU citizens to take residence without special permission.
Foreigners make up more than a fifth of Switzerland's population of 7.7 million, and according to official figures are disproportionately charged with crimes.
The Swiss are not willing to allow themselves to be overrun by Muslims. Would that England and France and other countries in Europe had the same desire to decide to live in a western society before it's too late to decide.
Labels: Eurabia, Switzerland
