The Comment Factory

It seems that the Zionist pro-Israeli blackmailing tactics against the Royals have done the trick – again. Latest news reports from Israel are confirming that the Israeli embassy’s desperate begging for a knighthood title to be given by Queen Elizabeth to the Israeli President Shimon Peres during his visit to the UK this week has finally been answered. Another report published in the Daily Express earlier this month leaked information about the Queen’s rejection of the Israeli bidding for the honorary title. The report quoted a British Official stating, “It’s not going to happen. There is no knighthood.” It is, therefore, still too early to confirm the reliability of the Israeli reports, as they may simply be part of the campaign itself.

It’s no exaggeration to say Mr. Peres’ contributions to the Zionist project in Palestine and the sufferings of the Palestinians and Arabs have not stopped once since the Nakba, the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in 1947-1949. His record includes his role in searching for talented officers to join the Haganah terrorist militias — Ben Gurion’s military gang and the predecessor of the Israeli army — which has led to acts of terrorism, killing and forced expulsion against the Palestinians since 1947. Peres became a member of the Haganah’s high command in May 1947 where he was responsible for manpower and arms purchases and production. So to call Peres “Israel’s Dove of Peace” is the reverse of reality.

The most distinguished war crime of the 1994 Noble Peace Prize laureate was his direct responsibility as a Prime Minister for the shelling of the UN forces headquarters in the village of Qana in southern Lebanon in 1996. More than 800 Lebanese civilians sought refuge in the building to escape Israeli fire, yet the UN flag was not enough to stop the Israeli thirst for blood. 106 people were killed in the massacre and at least 110 were seriously injured. Despite the UN investigation conclusions that the attack could never be referred to a technical or procedural error, the International Community failed so far to prosecute Peres and bring him to trial as a war criminal. Instead, The UN General Assembly debated whether Israel should be charged for the repair of the attacked compound — and the vote almost failed!

The Israeli President is one of the strongest advocates for bringing the Iranian nuclear program to a halt at any cost even if military intervention is required. Since the first time I wrote about this issue two years ago many things have changed but one has remained the same: The Israeli military nuclear program remains intact, and the man who prides himself for making that program possible is still allowed to blatantly criticize Iran’s nuclear program and threaten to destroy it. “The president of Iran should remember that Iran can also be wiped off the map,” Peres once stated. If it hadn’t been for Shimon Peres convincing the French in 1957 to help build the Israeli secret nuclear reactor, Dimona, the Israeli nuclear program could have never seen the light of day. Apart from a few slips of the tongue, the Israelis still insist upon denying the existence of their nuclear program and their possession of hundreds of nuclear warheads. The world’s silence on Israel’s nuclear arsenal led the latter to safely conclude the following moral of the story: “We should be allowed to do whatever we want as long as we lie about it.”

I’ll go back to the word “exaggeration”. Questioning the dedication of Peres to the Zionist project in Palestine — all Palestine — does not stand as an option when we listen to the man’s statements echoing the racist evil nature of Zionism. Peres strongly criticized the International Court of Justice after its ruling that the construction of the Israeli apartheid wall/barrier in the West Bank was illegal. Nor was he ashamed of expressing his racist concerns about the “demographical danger” threatening Israel due to the fast growth of the Arab population compared to the Jewish population. “If a division of territory is not effected within a decade, the Arab minority will have become an Arab majority. Israel will no longer be a Jewish state – or (it will) stop being a democratic state,” Peres once said, arguing basically for the need of a Palestinian state to complete the unfinished job of cleansing the rest of the Palestinians from their land in 1948’s occupied Palestine. While the illegal settlements in the West Bank have been a major obstacle toward any peace agreement in Palestine, Peres was the first to fight for the implantation of the first Jewish settlement, Kedumim, in 1970s in the heart of the 1967 occupied West Bank as well as the set up of the security zone which makes up more than 45 percent of the West Bank.

If the Israelis’ knighthood news reports prove themselves right this week, Buckingham Palace will score a point for trying to resist the blackmail early on, but its reputation will also suffer for eventually succumbing.