What must be said

[SezMe]

What does Gunter Grass say about Iran's policies to destroy Israel for the last 30 years? Anything at all? Does he think maybe, just maybe, that policy is what makes Israel a bit leery of Iran?

Any policies that have been in effect for 30 years and have yielded diddly-squat are worthy of no more than derision.

 

[ddt]

Asking that Israel disclose it has a nuclear arsenal now is blood libel? Really, does the Israeli government still not understand that playing the antisemitism card to stifle criticism on its policies has since long become a losing proposition?

And Henryk Broder, who also joined the fray, doesn't belong in the limelight but rather needs gentle care between four padded walls. The guy sees antisemites on every street corner: even Hajo Meyer, chair of the Dutch organisation "Another Jewish Voice" is one according to him. See this blog post for some of Broder's own repulsive views.

 

[Eddie Dane]

I don't agree with Grass on this issue.

But I can see why people view the situation that way.

So Israel is the only guy on the block with a shotgun. All his neighbours carry knives and have vowed to kill him.
I don't excuse the fact that he often acts like a complete dick, but shotgun thing I understand.

The shocking aspect of this all is the pathetic knee-jerk response from Israel (or it's German embassy).

It comes across as if Israel is becoming some kind of cliché of itself.
It sound insular and detached. How do Israeli officials think this kind of rhetoric sounds to Europeans?

 

[Eddie Dane]

Asking that Israel disclose it has a nuclear arsenal now is blood libel? Really, does the Israeli government still not understand that playing the antisemitism card to stifle criticism on its policies has since long become a losing proposition?

The blood-libel retort should have gone out with communication strategies like 'Your doctor recommends you smoke Lucky Strike'.

Maybe it was a big PR success where and when it was still relevant.

Like in rural Russia pre-1910.

 

[Eddie Dane]

Ah, so the author has a problem with Germany supposedly being the world's 3rd largest arms exporter? Alleged depending on how you look at the purchases.

http://mikenagler1.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/deutschland-waffenexport-trade-register-2010-2011.pdf

Good resource:
http://armstrade.sipri.org/armstrade/page/trade_register.php

Maybe he has a problem with Germany giving stuff away fro free.

I read about the poem and understood he was against the hypocritical attitude regarding Israel's nukes.

Bat having read half the poem, I now suspect he tried to tried to confuse and bore people to death.

 

[WildCat]

Any policies that have been in effect for 30 years and have yielded diddly-squat are worthy of no more than derision.

You think arming, training, and funding terrorist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas who have collectively launched tens of thousands of high explosives into Israeli towns is "diddly squat"?

 

[Dcdrac]

criticising Israel does not make you an anti semite anymore than criticising Iran makes you anti-muslim.

 

[Pardalis]

But does it rime?

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

After top UN nuclear watchdog Mohammed El-Bareadi received the Nobel "peace" prize, my first thought was "I haven't done anything to stop Iran from getting the bomb either, where's MY medal?"

The Nobel committee still hasn't revoked Rigoberta Menchus fraudulently attained prize or properly awarded the 1944 physics prize to Lise Meitner. The Nobels have been a joke long before Barack Obama won it for doing the same thing 43 Americans before him did without winning an award.

The frakking Grammys are more important than that piece of junk.

 

[Pardalis]

The frakking Grammys are more important than that piece of junk.

Exactly, it's a freaking poem, in German, that may or may not rime, from a writer who is way past his prime. Who cares?

 

[Moss]

Today Günter Grass - famous German Nobel literate - published a poem callled "Was gesagt werden muss (What has to be said)" about the situation in the middle east, talking straight about the hypocrisy of blaming Iran for allegedly building a nuke while Israel has them stockpiled, unchecked for and is threatening war - with high-tech German submarines they get for free.

The press sycophants are already falling over themselves, they can't even write straight anymore:




A taboo indeed.




If you're so afraid of words, something is utterly wrong.

There certainly is a double standards when it comes to nukes. That might be something worth criticizing if the demand were to establish them for all nuclear powers.
But that is not just what this poem is about. It alleges that Israel is a threat to world peace (so is Iran in a number of more pro active ways including financing terrorists). It also alleges that by selling those subs Germany is complicit in a foreseeable use of nukes by Israel. I wonder what kind of scrying device Grass utilizes to come to that conclusion. There is no "might" there. It's a foregone conclusion in his opinion.
Why should Germany not be complicit in his opinion? Because of its horrific crimes against the Jewish Israelis's fellow coreligionists.
Furthermore he portrays the threat of a nuclear first strike by Iran as just the mouthing off of a single person (guess who...) instead of policy by Iranian hardliners.
In conclusion he portrays Israeli as a threat to all in the Middle East while Iran is just playing the big boy and is essentially harmless.
What utter tripe.

 

[Virus]

criticising Israel does not make you an anti semite anymore than criticising Iran makes you anti-muslim.

Iran actually does the stuff people accuse it of.

 

[ComsatAngel2017]

Does Herr Grass have anything to say about Syria or what's been happening there since March 2011?

Just curious.

 

[Pardalis]

The plight of the Tibetan people would make a great poem.

 

[angrysoba]

The plight of the Tibetan people would make a great poem.

There once was a land called Tibet,
Its flag showed a glorious sunset,
The Red Army appeared,
The Dalai Lama, he feared,
To China, Tibet is its pet.

 

[MG1962]

Iran actually does the stuff people accuse it of.

And two wrongs make a right in your little world

 

[shemp]

There once was a land called Tibet,
Its flag showed a glorious sunset,
The Red Army appeared,
The Dalai Lama, he feared,
To China, Tibet is its pet.

There once was a fellow from Lhasa
Who liked to take it up the...

I guess I'd better stop there.

 

[gambling_cruiser]

My mother tongue is german.
If Grass believes his polemic is a poem he should give back his nobel price.
His ignorance shows clearly in his believe Israel could completly wipe out the iranian population. He doesn't say how this could happen (accidentially by striking the iranian uranium facilities or as planned genocide), he just fears for whatever reasons.
I have seen an tv interview with Grass; he seems to believe a strike against the iranian uranium centrifuges could kill the whole population and trigger a multi-nation nuclear war.

 

[Eddie Dane]

My mother tongue is german.
If Grass believes his polemic is a poem he should give back his nobel price.
His ignorance shows clearly in his believe Israel could completly wipe out the iranian population. He doesn't say how this could happen (accidentially by striking the iranian uranium facilities or as planned genocide), he just fears for whatever reasons.
I have seen an tv interview with Grass; he seems to believe a strike against the iranian uranium centrifuges could kill the whole population and trigger a multi-nation nuclear war.

Well he's German isn't he.

Every time I talk to a German about anything nuclear, they think the apocalypse is near.
He probably thinks that a derailed radwaste train would trigger a world-wide nuclear holocaust.

(Don't want to insult the many rational Germans on this board. But I'm married to a German and the undercurrent of angst and guilt in German culture has become a pet peeve of mine.)

 

[bigjelmapro]

So how is displaying Grass's libelous claims wrong?

I'm sorry, but MG1962 and ddt's need to hide behind the term 'criticism' here is inapplicable, as it often is a pretty sad tactic. Grass is not critisizing Israel policies, nor is he 'asking to disclose' Israel's nuclear arsenal. Its simply fear mongering and paranoid delusion (as Gambling_cruiser and others touched up on) at its worst.

As if one should be embarrassed by using the term 'anti-semitism' (used once in that article, and with just cause) as well. I find it comical and a bit sad that there's people on this forum still trying to pretend as if the anti-semitism card is somehow stifling debate/criticism. Its the perpetual meatshield used as a rebuttal when someone tramples on one's arguments or criticisms that don't hold water.

Grass does somehow sound like those Islamist terrorists crying on how they'll march on occupied Tel Aviv. Oh, the sand dunes of Tel Aviv. I'm sure if you wish and say it hard enough, one can create an imaginary Arab town there too: