Dear Russell Brand – re Boycotting Israel

Dear Russell

Following a conversation with our mutual friend Ben Paul, I decided to write to you regarding your video calling for a boycott of businesses working with Israeli companies, in effect, promoting the so called BDS movement.

Before I say what I have to say however, please let me clarify my own position in regard to Israel and the Palestinians, which is this...

If you want to be truly and pragmatically pro-Israel, you need to be pro-Palestinian. Conversely, if you want to be truly and pragmatically pro-Palestinian, you need to be pro-Israel. The futures of our two Peoples are inextricably linked. There is no getting away from it. A brighter future and a win-win situation for all, must be and I believe can be achieved. It can only be achieved however through a considered and pragmatic approach to the seemingly irresolvable challenges we face.

Russell you are an individual with the power to influence a great many people and as such I expect you understand the responsibility which comes with such power. I have taken the liberty of assuming that your support for BDS stems from your humanity and your best intentions in the hope of ending the suffering of the people of Gaza.

Russell unfortunately, we both know where good intention can lead. I see you as an independent thinker, not prone to following the “mob”. Avaaz’s call to boycott Barclays Bank for working with the Israeli defence firm Elbit is just one more example of hypocrisy and double standards in regard to Israel.

Through its technology Elbit provides Israel with the means to defend itself from terror and attack and in so doing saves the lives of thousands of Israelis. There may indeed be many reason to question the general behaviour of Barclays Bank however in regard to Elbit, as a corporation in the international defence sector, it is no more deserving of boycott than any UK, US, French, Russian, Chinese or other international corporation in the defence sector. Singling out an Israeli company for action is highly suspect.

Avaaz has a severely skewed view of the Israel / Palestinian conflict with a highly partisan and anti-Israel bias. I would therefore venture to suggest that on this particular subject you Russell are very much on the wrong side of the argument and here is why...

In your own words, “if we are aware of the reality and what they do, then we have the power to influence them”.

In your call for action, you are essentially supporting the BDS movement, so let’s firstly look at the BDS movement.

The BDS movement was set up as an extension of the considerable Palestinian, or more accurately, anti-Israel; PR machine with the express purpose of delegitimising and demonising the State of Israel. Sadly, The BDS philosophy is highly bigoted, delusional and sociopathic, with its ultimate goal the elimination of Israel itself.

Unfortunately, the BDS movement along with what I term as the other false friends of the Palestinians have far more interest in the delegitimization and demonization of Israel, than they do with the future and wellbeing of the Palestinian people. In joining them you are joining a host of individuals and organisations dedicated to the destruction of Israel itself and far less concerned with the welfare of the people of Gaza.

These are the same individuals who have been demonstrating on the streets of London chanting “death to the Jews”, “Hitler was right” and other such “pro-Palestinian” declarations. These are the same people who stone and burn synagogues, attack Jews on the streets, vandalise Tescos and intimidate Sainsburys into removing all Kosher products from its shelves. Such behaviour has little to do with Israel and the Palestinians and everything to do with Jews and anti-Semitism.

Let’s look at Gaza itself, as it is the people of Gaza who are suffering most and where I understand your main concern lies...

Gaza is currently ruled by Hamas, a ruthless terror organisation, actually the Palestinian chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas has a history of oppression, torture and murder of its own people. This is documented fact.

If you really want to take action to help the people of Gaza, attack the flow of money to Hamas. You may want to look at boycotting Qatar, Turkey and Iran who finance the terror activities of Hamas and its oppression of the Gazan people. I understand you are a big football fan, so perhaps you might want to call on FIFA to strip Qatar of the World Cup in 2022, a “dodgy” deal if ever there was one. But I digress.

There is no occupation of Gaza! This is important to understand. In 2005 Israel left Gaza (as it should have, in my opinion). When Israel left Gaza, it left behind a significant agricultural infrastructure which it was hoped would provide much needed jobs for Palestinians as well as a platform which would play a part in helping the people of Gaza build a civil society and prosperous future for tis people.

At the time, there was no “siege”. The borders, were open with free movement of goods and people. The sea was open and there was an airport, even a Palestinian airline, with flights to Egypt and Jordan.

This all changed when rather than building a civil society, peace a prosperity, Hamas chose terror. Hamas destroyed all the agricultural infrastructure, took the minimal resources in Gaza along with the generous donations form the world community and set about building a massive terror infrastructure. It set about imprisoning or killing all political opponents, oppressing it population and attacking Israeli civilians with rocket fire, thus far amounting to in excess of 14,000 rockets fired at civilian targets. Remember that the Hamas charter states clearly the aim to destroy Israel in its entirety as well as to kill Jews, “wherever they may be”.

Under attack and in the knowledge that Hamas was smuggling weapons into Gaza, Israel closed the borders and began careful control of goods and people entering and leaving Gaza. There is no “siege” and contrary to popular belief the people of Gaza are not and have never been starving or anywhere close. Food and medicine and a wide range of goods have continued to flow in and out of Gaza, save those which might be used for military or terror activity.

In one example however, Israel was pressured into allowing concrete, cement and other building materials into Gaza. The world argued that Gazans desperately needed these materials. Israel reluctantly allowed the import of such materials. We now learn that rather than use these materials to build much needed schools, hospitals, factories and homes, they were used to build a massive underground network of military bunkers and tunnels.

The money donated by the US, UN, EU and others to benefit the people of Gaza, was stolen by Hamas and used to buy and manufacture rockets and other weapons in addition to the underground city it has built. The money also went to paying fighters and financing the luxury lifestyles of Hamas leaders.

A recent Channel 4 documentary highlighted the huge property “boom” no pun intended; in Gaza over recent years. The major profits are going to Hamas elite and Hamas linked individuals. Khaled Mashal the leader of Hamas is reputed to have a net worth of over $2bln.

Now as to the current conflict… I would hope that your humanity also extends to the people of Israel.

This is a conflict Israel did not want, tried desperately to avoid and ended up fighting reluctantly. It is also a conflict Israel cannot afford to lose. For ten days Israel asked Hamas to refrain from firing rockets stating clearly that quiet would be answered with quiet. The rockets kept coming.

Just to give you some perspective...

I am not sure if you were around on 7/7, when the bombs went off on the tube and on buses in central London, killing and injuring many. If you were in London, I am sure you will remember how London and the people of Britain were left traumatised that such a thing could happen in the UK. Despite years of IRA activity in the UK, nothing had prepared the brits for this new kind of terror.

That was four bombs on one day. You might also remember the attempted terror attack at Glasgow Airport, where thankfully no one but the terrorist himself was hurt however, again the people of Britain were alarmed.

Israel has suffered such attacks against its civilian population throughout its history. There is far too much to cover, so let’s just look at the current conflict.

Over a three week period over 3000 rockets were fired indiscriminately at civilian targets throughout Israel. That is the equivalent of 1000 attacks similar to those of 7/7 in London, and the attack on Glasgow airport; each week. Over 120 such attacks every day. Think of the trauma that 4 attacks in one day had on London, then consider how Brits would react to over 100 such attacks a day, every day for three weeks.

Understand, Hamas is intent on killing as many Israelis, men woman and children as possible. The relatively low casualty rate in Israel is due to the fact that almost 50% of the population of Israel sleep in or remain in close proximity to bomb shelters at all times. Imagine Brits hiding in the tube systems, cellars and make shift bomb shelters every day for a month as rockets rain down on London, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, Brighton, Nottingham, Leicester etc.

Add to this the possibility and abject fear that in certain towns, at any moment terrorists will appear from nowhere, out of underground tunnels in order to kill you and your whole family. It would be unthinkable in the UK, yet that is the reality for the people of Israel in the month of July 2014.

The Israeli government has not just the responsibility, but the obligation to defend its citizens from terrorist rockets and infiltrations via underground attack tunnels. And so it went to war once more with Hamas.

This has been a crazy and asymmetric conflict. While Israel has gone out of its way to minimise civilian casualties in the Palestinian side, Hamas has actively sought to maximise the casualties amongst its own civilian population. Hamas has used women and children as human shields. It has fired its rockets from heavily populated areas. It has stored and manufactured its rockets in schools, mosques, hospitals, other public buildings and private homes, firing form these same buildings. Hamas has also booby trapped such buildings throughout Gaza, using its own explosives in order to maximise the damage and carnage.

Misfired Hamas and Islamic Jihad rockets have been responsible for hundreds of civilian deaths in Gaza, where Hamas has sought to blame these deaths on Israel

While Hamas leaders and fighters have hidden from Israel attacks in their underground bunkers and tunnels, they have left their civilian population as vulnerable as possible. Hamas has shown not just a huge disregard for the safety of its own people, but a willingness indeed appetite to sacrifice as many innocents as possible.

Conversely Israel has taken unprecedented measures to avoid civilian casualties where possible. There is overwhelming evidence to support this fact. Sadly the number of deaths and injuries in Gaza in the course of the conflict has been lamentably high.

The argument that Gazan civilians had nowhere to go during Israeli attacks is just not true. Just as Hamas hide in safety in underground bunkers and tunnels, so too those same tunnels and bunkers, which extend to hundreds of kilometres; could have served as shelters for the civilians of Gaza. Hamas however saw fit to shelter its weapons, leaders and fighters while leaving the Israelis to worry about the wellbeing of Gazan civilians. It is an open secret that the Hamas headquarters is placed underneath and inside the Shifa hospital.

Ironically, Hamas do this in the certainty that Israel does all it can to avoid civilian casualties and that it will not attack the largest hospital in Gaza, despite it being the nerve centre of Hamas activity.

Think for a moment, if Israel is indeed intentionally targeting civilians, it is doing a really “shit” job. The Israeli army is either highly incompetent at killing civilians or as it claims it is doing everything in its power to avoid civilian casualties where possible. Admittedly it is far from perfect in what amounts to an impossible situation. However, how else can you explain it?

Surely through dropping thousands of tons of high explosive on such a densely populated area, where Hamas is actively looking to maximise the civilian death toll; the Israelis could have killed tens of thousands if not more. How could they fail to do so if their real intention was to kill civilians?

The casualty figures provide by Hamas are highly dubious and have been questioned by the UN, as well as the BBC, and Al Jazeera, to mention but two “not so great supporters” of Israel. The vast majority of dead are in fact men of fighting age, assumed to be fighters.

However there have also been too many innocent deaths and even one such death or injury is too much.

These civilian deaths however are down to Hamas and its reprehensible policy of sacrificing its women and children at the “alter” of media coverage, where it sees every dead body and injured child as a huge PR media asset. It sounds sick and unfathomable. But Russell, these are the kind of people running Gaza and with whom Israel is fighting.

I could go on, but I expect you get the idea.

I would urge you to take the time and avail yourself of the facts before going out and supporting highly suspect organisations and initiatives aimed against Israel. Ask yourself why these people are out on the streets so full of passion to condemn Israel, but remain silent and refuse to protest the hundreds of thousands of deaths and injuries throughout the Middle East and farther afield, none of which can be blamed on Israel.

The same people who have been demonstrating on the streets chanting “we are all Hamas” are the same people who were out on the streets in 2006, chanting “we are all Hezbollah” in response to Israel defending itself against rocket attack from Lebanon at the time. Like Hamas, Hezbollah is a terrorist organisation.

I wonder if those protestors from 2006 are “all Hezbollah” as it now actively engages in the wholesale slaughter of Syrian civilians, including Palestinians; as an ally of the Assad regime and a proxy of the Syrian regime’s main sponsor, Iran. Just as Hezbollah has gone to “bigger and better” acts of terror after receiving the support of the these protestors, so too Hamas will go on to increase its oppression and murder of its own people and attempt bigger and deadlier attacks on Israeli civilians in its aim to destroy the Jewish state.

As for Israel itself, ironically, the only country in the Middle East, where Arabs enjoy the full benefits of democracy (however imperfect), freedom of speech, thought, religion et al, is Israel. Ask Israeli Arabs if they would rather live under Palestinian control and even with the many problems of inequality and racism in Israel which need to be addressed, you will receive a resounding no.

Israel’s contribution to the world and humanity in its short history is quite remarkable. Please see the link I attached below. Excluding or shunning Israel will not help the Palestinians, It will only serve the interests of narrow minded bigots, encourage the terror regimes such as Hamas and in reality perpetuate the suffering of the Palestinian people in Gaza.

If you genuinely care about ending the suffering of the people of Gaza, you need to call for an end to the Hamas regime in Gaza. You need to call for a complete demilitarisation of Gaza. You need to call for the Palestinians to recognise Israel’s right to exist and for Israel to then act to open the Gaza borders, end the occupation of the West Bank (remember they ended the occupation of Gaza in 2005, got terror in return) and for the two parties to make the hard decision and compromises required to reach a just and equitable peace deal based on what is commonly known as the “two state solution”.

If you are interested, I invite you to visit Israel, where I will be happy to show you around, introduce you to people from all sides of the political and more importantly social spectrum. I can also arrange for you to visit the Palestinian territories if you like. You can have a good chat with them all, see and feel the situation for yourself, after which I would be very interested to hear your views and discuss the situation.

You are undoubtedly a highly creative individual. Maybe you will have some ideas that could help.

If of course, after all this you still choose to embrace BDS… It is not as easy as one might think, but if you are going to boycott Israel, make sure you do it properly!! …. Take a look at the link I have provided which I am sure will help.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Israeli_inventions_and_discoveries

Yours sincerely

Gary Cohen