Time for us to support the Jewish people by Richard Littlejohn richard.littlejohn@the-sun.co.uk http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2002180246,00.html April 22, 2002 Image, if you can, that the British ambassador to Washington wrote and published a poem praising the September 11 mass murderers. Or that the American consul in, say, Sydney paid public tribute to the Omagh bombers. How long do you think they’d stay in their jobs? The US and Australian governments would put them on the first plane out. They’d be drummed out of the diplomatic service pronto. So why the hell is the Saudi ambassador to Britain still here? Ghazi Algosaibi, Riyadh’s man in London, has just penned a poem eulogising the Palestinian bomber who blew herself up outside a supermarket, killing two Israelis and maiming many more. He lavishes praise upon her and other Palestinian terrorists and rubbishes America and a “White House whose heart is filled with darkness”. Algosaibi’s comments were published in a London-based Arab newspaper. Why do we continue to give house room to these vile, seditious anti-Western, anti-American, anti-Christian, anti-Semitic publications and the terrorist supporters who produce them? Why have none of the mad mullahs in this country preaching death to the Jews and death to the Americans been prosecuted? Why has that ridiculous E J Thribb character from the BBC’s arts review show not been charged under anti-terrorism laws for saying that Israeli settlers all deserve to be shot? If he’d made similar remarks about blacks, or gays, or Moslems, he’d be sharing a cell with Jeffrey Archer at North Sea Camp. Why do the race hate laws apply only to the knuckle-scraping scum of the BNP and not to those who peddle hatred and preach murder against the Jews, the Americans and the British? The Foreign Office says it plans to “rebuke” Algosaibi. Big deal. But the pro-Arab FO will only tick him off for saying it in public, not for believing it. If Jack Straw had any spine he would order Algosaibi out of the country. But we’re not talking Lord Palmerston here, are we? It’s time we stopped sucking up to the Arab world and Saudi Arabia in particular. Their oil wealth gives them a stranglehold. But it’s time the West weaned ourselves off the Saudi teat, used our own oil resources better, persuaded the Americans to downsize their monster SUVs and cut some deals with the Russians and Venezuela. The Saudis are corrupt and duplicitous and serious sponsors of terrorism. They even held a telethon to raise money for the families of Palestinian terrorists. (Can we please stop calling these murderers “suicide” bombers? I prefer the label given to them by Fox News in the US — “homicide bombers”.) The majority of the September 11 terrorists were Saudi Arabian, as is Osama bin Laden. Saudi money funds al-Qa’ida and other terror networks. The Saudi “peace plan” for the Israeli/Palestinian dispute is a sham. The same kind of deal was on offer a couple of years ago at Camp David. Ehud Barak gave the Palestinians 95 per cent what they wanted and Arafat spat in his face, stomped off and ordered a fresh intifada. Arafat is and remains a terrorist. He was hijacking planes when the September 11 killers weren’t even a twinkle in a virgin’s eye. He is happy to send brainwashed young people to their deaths. Life is cheap in the Arab world. The Palestinian Authority doesn’t want peace. In common with all other Arab countries it wants Israel wiped off the face of the Earth and all Jews killed. That’s the reality that Israel is having to contend with. That and the grotesque wave of anti-Semitism once more engulfing the world. Everyone with a shred of decency wants peace in the Middle East, but demonising and isolating Israel is not the way to go about it. The Colin Powell peace mission was well-intentioned but misguided. Let’s agree that the West Bank settlements are a bridgehead too far. But now explain how Israel is supposed to combat terrorism. The attacks in Jenin and elsewhere are not acts of aggression, they are acts of self-defence. If civilians are getting killed that is because the terrorists use civilians as human shields. It is a deliberate ploy. Why is the world so ready to denounce Israel and accept the Palestinian version of events? Why were those who demanded an end to the bombing in Afghanistan for the Muslim religious festival of Ramadan silent over the Palestinian outrages during the Jewish Passover? We expect no better from our European “partners”. Germany has plenty of previous. So does the Vatican. France is probably the most anti-Semitic nation on Earth outside the Arab world. If France wasn’t responsible for the Holocaust it’s only because the Germans thought of it first. And there were plenty of willing collaborators queuing up to load the trains to Auschwitz. Apres vous, monsieur. But I don’t get the anti-Semitism in Britain, especially on the Left. The Jewish community in this country is an enormous asset, punching way above its weight in business and the arts. British Jews are well assimilated, contribute hugely and ask for nothing from the state. The Jews are a model for all other ethnic minorities. They are right to be alarmed at the virulent anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic feeling growing in this country and elsewhere. And they are entitled to the same safeguards and protection as anyone else. Which means cracking down on those who peddle hatred against them and against Israel, their spiritual homeland. It’s time friends of the Jewish community and of Israel spoke out. We don’t all think Israel is a pariah. We might not agree with all its policies but we do recognise it as the only civilised democracy in the Middle East and one which has the right to defend itself. I was encouraged on my last visit to Ibrox to see the Israeli flag being flown behind the goal alongside the Union Flag, the Stars and Stripes and the Aussie flag. It was the first time I’d seen the Star of David flown at a football ground outside White Hart Lane. The Government should give a lead. Let’s start by rounding up the mad mullahs, such as Captain Hook from Finsbury Park, and kicking them out. And set an example to the Arab world by expelling the Saudi ambassador and his disgusting support for terror.