In 2009 Rev Stephen Sizer likened me to a Holocaust denier. This is what he
wrote.
Holocaust Denial?
I was saddened but not surprised to read Mike
Moore cynical ‘review’ of Professor Ilan Pappe’s ‘The Ethnic Cleansing of
Palestine’ in last month’s Evangelicals Now.
Don’t get me wrong. EN is a fine newspaper. I
subscribe, as does our church. I read it avidly. I even contribute occasionally
when asked. I just find it a little strange to read such a one sided and wholly
negative ‘review’ of a book by a Jewish author about the Palestinian Nakba
reviewed by a pro-Zionist Christian in an evangelical paper.
Thankfully it is a crime in some countries to
deny the Holocaust. It is a shame that it is not yet a crime to deny the
Palestinian Nakba, as Moore does.
The simple fact is that one in four refugees
in the world today, according to the United
Nations, is a Palestinian. Where did they come from? Over 500 towns
and villages erased from the map of Palestine in 1948-1949.
Far from ‘leaving no trace’ as Moore
suggests, there are over 5 million Palestinian refugees registered with the UN
today who still have the keys and title deeds to their homes in what is now
Israel. (see here and here for more information)
I took the liberty of asking Professor Pappe
to respond to the specific criticisms which Moore makes. He replied:
1. The interview in Germany. I gave a press
conference that was published also in that newspaper. On the day the interview
appeared there I published a special note to all the German press that I
deplore and rebuke the positions of this newspaper and have nothing in common
with its agenda and views.
2. I did not say that I am using oral
histories instead of military archives, half of the book is based on the
latter!, I am using them in conjunction. I do have my doubts on the reports of
the IDF, as one would and should have about them today.
3. The basis for the allegation of expulsion
in the first five chapters of the book are based on the Israeli military
archives not on a post modernist notions. I never declared myself to be a post
modernist and I am not a post modernist scholar.
4. Katz’s thesis is reliable but in any case
it is not the basis for the Tantura affair, which is only two pages in the
book, but my own research into the archives and oral history.
5. Finally, none of the professional Israeli
historians refute that the half of Palestine’s population was expelled, they do
not share the shame that I feel about it.
Evangelicals Now is highly regarded for its
factual reporting and balanced book reviews. Mike Moore’s review was neither.
You can read the review and decide for
yourself here
Stephen Lendman has written a much more
balanced review for Global Research here
Watch Ilan Pappe on the Ethnic Cleansing of
Palestine here.
Ilan Pappe’s website
And here is one of the best sites for maps showing the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
Because Stephen Sizer’s blog does not permit comments, I emailed the following:
Dear Stephen,
I was shocked to read your critique of my EN ‘review’
of Ilan Pappe’s The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine for a number of
reasons.
After our conversation at Starbuck’s in
Guildford High Street earlier in the year, I left feeling that your views on
the Israel/Palestine issue had mellowed a little. I realise now it must just
have been the excellent Starbucks coffee. That rich, dark roast always leaves
me feeling that all is well with the world.
Knowing your strong convictions about Matthew
18:15ff, I wonder why you didn’t contact me before going public and suggesting
to the entire world that Mike Moore is a virtual Holocaust denier. But don’t
worry, I’m not going to set the police on you. Thanks to your blog, I’m now nearly famous. A number of
people have brought the blog to my attention.
Do you seriously believe that because I
reject Ilan Pappe’s revised history of the tragedy that befell the Palestinian
people as a result of the establishment of the state of Israel, I ought to be
prosecuted and sent to prison? I do not deny that for the Palestinian people
who lost their properties and livelihoods, the establishment of the state of
Israel was indeed a nakba. I do deny, however, that the
Nakba was the direct result of a
deliberate policy on the part of the Ben Gurion government to ethnically
cleanse the land. To equate the Nakba with the Holocaust is a gross insult to the
memory of the six million European Jews who were systematically exterminated
through starvation, hard labour and gassing.
There is plenty of documentary evidence from
the time that Israel was established to prove that the Nakba was caused by the Arab leaders and not by
the Zionists. Here are just a few quotes:
‘The
fact that there are these refugees is the direct consequence of the act of the
Arab states in opposing partition and the Jewish state. The Arab states agreed
upon this policy unanimously and they must share in the solution of the
problem.’ (Emile Ghoury, secretary of the Palestinian Arab Higher Committee in the
London Telegraph, August 1948)
‘The
most potent factor [in the flight of Palestinians] was the announcements made
over the air by the Arab-Palestinian Higher Executive, urging all Haifa Arabs
to quit... It was clearly intimated that Arabs who remained in Haifa and
accepted Jewish protection would be regarded as renegades.’ (London Economist,
2 October 1948)
‘It
must not be forgotten that the Arab Higher Committee encouraged the refugees’
flight from their homes in Jaffa, Haifa, and Jerusalem.’ (Near East Arabic
Broadcasting Station, 3 April 1949)
‘The
mass evacuation, prompted partly by fear, partly by order of Arab leaders, left
the Arab quarter of Haifa a ghost city... By withdrawing Arab workers their
leaders hoped to paralyze Haifa.’ (Time, 3 May, 1948)
‘The
Arab civilians panicked and fled ignominiously. Villages were frequently
abandoned before they were threatened by the progress of war.’ (General John
Bagott Glubb (Glubb Pasha), Daily Mail, 12 August 1948)
‘The
Arabs of Haifa fled in spite of the fact that the Jewish authorities guaranteed
their safety and rights as citizens of Israel.’ (Monsignor George Hakim, Greek
Catholic Bishop of Galilee, New York Herald Tribune, 30 June 1949)
You did not have to give EN the benefit of
the doubt as to whether the review was commissioned or sent unsolicited (as you
think likely). An e-mail to John Benton or me would have satisfied your
curiosity. It seems that you and I are both bad at guessing the psychodynamics
of the other.
Ilan Pappe, according to your blog, denies
that he gave an interview with National-Zeitung but, rather, that he
simply ‘gave a press conference that was published also in that newspaper’.
Either Ilan Pappe is telling porkies or else National-Zeitung is,
because National-Zeitung states in an introductory paragraph (pardon
my poor German):
Original:
Im Gespräch mit Erhard Düvel von der National-Zeitung meinte der Autor, dass
der 14. Mai 1948 für die Völkergemeinschaft kein Grund zum Feiern sei.
My
poor translation: In conversation with Erhard Düvel of the National-Zeitung,
the author meant that 14th May 1948 should be no reason for the celebrations
for the people partnership.
Pappe claims that he did not say he was using
‘oral histories’ instead of military archives but he then tells you that, in
the case of the alleged Tantura massacre, he researched ‘the archives and
oral history’. Furthermore, he says on page xv of the book that he
distrusts written Israeli military reports and prefers, instead, Arab
sources and oral history. He has his doubts about the written reports of
the IDF, ‘as one would and should have about them today’ (my emphasis). Why should
one doubt reports written at the time but have no doubts about oral accounts
sixty years after the purported events? I am of the conviction that, as a
general principle, the faintest ink is more reliable than the best memory.
Pappe states, furthermore, that his
allegations of expulsion in the first five chapters of the book are ‘based on
the Israeli military archives not on post modernist notions’. Then he should
have made that plain in the book.
Although Pappe may not have declared himself
to be a postmodernist and denies that he is ‘a postmodernist scholar’, he
certainly speaks as a postmodernist. In February 2007, you recommended that I read
The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, adding that it was ‘emotive but also
accurate language’.
I responded by pointing out that your choice of Pappe was
most unfortunate, as he was probably the very worst of the ‘new historians’.
Most anti-Israel writers, I said, at least claimed to base their findings on
documentary evidence but in the introduction to his A History of Modern
Palestine, Pappe admitted to personal bias and political partisanship:
My bias is apparent despite the desire of my peers that I
stick to facts and the ‘truth’ when reconstructing past realities. I view
any such construction as vain and presumptuous. This book is written by one
who admits compassion for the colonized not the colonizer; who sympathizes with
the occupied not the occupiers. [My emphasis].
Furthermore, in the
Spring 2001 issue of the Journal of Palestine Studies, Pappe published
an article defending Teddy Katz’s Tantura thesis, insisting that Katz’s
conclusions were correct, even if his facts were not, since historical
research need not be based on facts!
If
that is not a postmodernist speaking, I have never heard one.
Pappe told you that Katz’s thesis ‘is not the
basis for the Tantura affair, which is only two pages in the book, but my own
research into the archives and oral history.’
Really? First of all ‘The Massacre at Tantura’
takes up five pages of chapter 6, not two. Secondly, Pappe says the chapter is based
on his ‘own research into the archives and oral history’. Which archives? Those
Israeli archives he avowedly distrusts? However, as I pointed out in the EN
review, the section features about a dozen quotes and citations, only three of
which are sourced, one of them to a previous book by Pappe himself.
Professional Israeli historians may not ‘refute’
(sic) that the half of Palestine’s population was expelled’ but few of them
share his ideas about the reason they were ‘expelled’.
I’m grateful to you for allowing readers of
your blog to read my review and to judge for themselves whether it is ‘balanced’;
I’d be most surprised, however, if any disagreed with you. But what do you mean
by ‘balanced’? And what do you mean when you say Evangelicals Now is ‘highly
regarded for its factual and balanced book reviews’? If by ‘balance’ you
mean my review should have contained some praise for Pappe, then you fall short
yourself because I’ve seen some very unbalanced reviews by your good self. In
an EN review, you dismissed one of Julia Fisher’s books on Israel as ‘inflammatory’
because you interpreted her concern for the Palestinians as a statement that
they should get off their backsides and do something to make a better life for
themselves (or words to that effect). You have written off Paul Wilkinson’s For
Zion’s Sake even though his research was based on primary documents, as
well as summarising Barry Horner’s 400+-page Future Israel as a ‘nasty little
book’ (my emphasis)?
Contrary to what you claim, Stephen Lendman’sreview of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine is not ‘a much more balanced
review’ than mine. His review is as totally positive as mine is almost totally
negative. I say ‘almost totally negative’ because I at least acknowledge the
possibility of barbarism on the part of the Israelis. Lendman, however, has
nothing but praise for Pappe and nothing positive to say about Israel in his
review.
Neither Lendman nor the website which hosts
his review is ‘balanced’. The Global Research website speculates whether 9/11
was an inside job’ (which, incidentally runs counter to the theory to that the
Israelis were responsible for the collapse of the twin towers, a theory that
you brought to the attention of readers of CZ. Lendman has numerous articles on
Ziopedia, a website whose raison d’être includes the following unbalanced
statement:
'We consider Israel to be the most racist and evil country
on this planet, an illegal political entity, controlled and protected by a
Mafia-like criminal network with a 19th century style colonialist and
social-Darwinist agenda. We fight for Israel’s replacement with a free, united,
egalitarian and secular Palestine.
'The "Holocult"
'We refuse to believe in
self-evident truths and known
facts, promoted by psychopathic liars like the Zionist masters of
deception and enforced by criminal codes. We refuse to believe in dogmas that
have become such a taboo that
mentioning even the slightest doubt in some of their most non-sensical [sic]
beliefs, leave alone in their three core dogmas - a plan to kill most, if not
all European Jews, 6 Million Jewish victims, and the use of chemical slaughter
houses - is treated like medieval heresy, punished by job loss, financial ruin,
social shun, and - in thousands of cases - even prison.'
In conclusion, Stephen, I’m very disappointed and
dismayed that you chose to critique my review in this manner. I do not
understand your almost pathological aversion to Israel nor your willingness to
embrace anyone, however extreme and however anti-Christian, who shares your
negative opinion of the only democracy in the Middle East.
After we met in Guilford earlier in the year, I shared
with some interested friends that I thought you had become more reasonable.
After reading your blog, I find myself regretting my naivety.
With best wishes as ever,
Yours for the salvation of Israel,
In
response, Stephen wrote the following brief reply.
Dear
Mike,
I
did not accuse you of being a holocaust denier. Come on now. . . I have not
knowingly changed my views since we last spoke. I do believe the Nakba and
ethnic cleansing of over 500 villages listed in my pre-1948 Time Atlas and UN
documents leading to over 5 million displaced Palestinian refugees registered
with the UN today is historical fact.
By
the way – I am working closely with the police and Leeds university authorities
identifying those associated with Seismic Shock and his/her campaign of
harassment that is now putting lives at risk.
If
Zionists are going to insist on the right of return for Jewish people worldwide
then I equally identify with those who insist on the right of Palestinians to
return to their homes or receive compensation.
I
simply believe the Zionist cause is not served by rubbishing the integrity or
credibility of academic research through this kind of book review.
I
hope you have a good Summer.
Shalom,
This was my reply.
Thanks Stephen.
I didn’t say you had accused me of
being a Holocaust denier. I wrote that your had ‘suggested’ I was a ‘virtual
Holocaust denier’.
After all, your blog is headed ‘Holocaust
Denial?’ and you state, ‘Thankfully it is a crime in some countries to deny the
Holocaust. It is a shame that it is not yet a crime to deny the Palestinian
Nakba, as Moore does.’
If the English language means
anything, your title suggests that my review is tantamount to Holocaust denial
and the sentence I quoted implies:
a) You approve of criminalising
Holocaust denial
b) The Palestinian Nakba was an
event similar to the Holocaust
c) so similar, in fact, that denying
it should be a criminal offence
d) Mike Moore denies the Nakba
e) Therefore it is a shame Mike
Moore cannot be prosecuted for his review and EN for publishing it.
As I said, I didn’t deny the Nakba.
What I deny is that the Ben Gurion government was responsible for it. The blame
for the Cataclysm lies squarely with the leaders of the Arab nations.
I hope your summer is good too.
Best wishes as ever,
Yours for the salvation of Israel,
