Christian Democrats
Christian Democrat Inger Lise Hansen caused a huge uproar when she recently displayed a list of seven items which she believed would draw a larger proportion of the electorate – a full three of the four points consisted of being less supportive of Israel. It is difficult to imagine what is more scary – that a Christian Democrat might actually believe such a thing or that she might be right.
Ms.Hansen now says in DagenMagazinet that she is “a friend of Israel“, pointing out:
I believed among other that one may be a friend of Israel even if one criticizes what the authorities in Israel are doing. It cannot be that one must praise all what Israeli authorities do in order to qualify as a friend of Israel. I also felt it was wrong not to be able to talk about the miserable conditions of the Palestinians, says Hansen.
– I am still a friend of Israel. I have just as much of being so, she says.
Ms.Hansen is of course right in that nobody in any party should feel obliged to applaud any and all decisions of any foreign government. But isn’t the problem in Norway today that far too many focus far too much on precisely Israel?
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As an ex-Scandinavian Israeli I have hard time to follow Ms. Inger Lise Hansen’s logics. When Israel says to the Norwegian government that your country is the most anti-Semitic country in Europe, the Norwegian government dismisses such claims instantly and ridicules them.
Can the Israeli remark also be understood as the reciprocal of how Ms. Hansen puts it: “I believed among other that one may be a friend of [Norway] even if one criticizes what the authorities in [Norway] are doing.”? Could it really be so that only the Norwegians are able and capable to honest, sincere and accurate criticism and it is only the Israelis that are always wrong in their criticism?
I can say as a fact that the Norwegian criticism is patently wrong, which obviously (hopefully) results from the practically non-existing Norwegian understanding of the realities in the Israeli-Palestinian (or more correctly, Israeli-Islam conflict). I, for one, find the Israeli criticism of Norway extremely justified. If you can show me another country in the world that Norway criticizes like it does Israel, I withdraw my opinion of non-justified criticism. The selectivity of the criticism is way beyond reasonable statistical distribution.
What comes to Ms. Inger Lise Hansen’s indication of friendship, I’d like to point out that when Israel criticizes Norway, it does not organize Norway boycotts, divestments, anti-Norway demonstrations, promote UN anti-Norwegianism etc. Norwegian friendship seems to say that Norway is such a good friend of Israel that it feels free to hit Israel on every opportunity.
Dear Stefan
I could not agree more. Criticism of Israel has become almost mandatory throughout large parts of the political spectrum. The worst thing is that people like Ms.Hansen probably truly believes that criticizing Israel is something a Norwegian politician ought to engage in on a regular basis.
C.T
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Hi there,
I just found this site, looking for info on Scandinavia and Jews.
Needless to say I am horrified by the garbage coming out of Europe.
However I wonder if you (admin) have heard of a document/strategy called the euro Arab Dialogue? Written by Bat Ye’Or – she discusses the EU bargain to receive oil from the Arab/Muslim world and in return swamp EU with ASrabs and Msulims and adopt their views and attitudes to Jews/Israel.
it’s at dhimmitude.com, or Google it, you’ll find it.
It will explain much about the situation in Europe. As well, it’s been revealed that Labour in UK decided to swamp UK with Islamic immigrants as well, basically to get back at the right-wing in England!! Crazy and malevolent. This was written in the Mail Online, by James Slack.
If you already know about this oh well.
Hi!
Just to get one thing straight: one does not have to be anti-semitic just because the person criticises Israel’s military actions in the Middle East, which I personally believe are disgusting and in violation of the rights of the Palestinian people. Again, I do not preach of anti-semitism, and the fact that some Israeli politicians use this as an arguement everytime some foreign state (Norway, United States, UK) criticises their superiority in the conflict, such as bombing Palestinian schools, hospitals and mosques, is highly unethical and a way to systematically create an asumption that is not there. Perhaps this strategy is a political move to overshadow the military takeover of the Gaza Strip, where thousands of civilians have been killed, or maybe the terrible wounds of the Holocaust will never really heal.
Either way, by international law, one have to be able to criticise Israel without being labeled anti-Jewish, and that some Israelis continue to dismiss this as anti-semitism is becoming extremely boring. When it comes to Norway, where I am born and where I reside, I can honsetly say we openly criticise the United States repeatedly in school, television debates and in newspapers, which is why I believe this blog, in which you call Christian Democratic Party member Inger Lise Hansen anti-semmitic, is completely filled with unnecessary statements and facts by people claiming the Norwegian nationalism is filled with anti-semitism. There is no other agenda here than simply criticising the Israeli government for violently overstepping the killing of Palestinians, destruction of their homes and cities in their own land, as well as systematically supressing the Palestinians as a people and Islam as a religion. That is genocide, and believe it or not, that is exactly what’s happening. The only difference is: this time you are not victims, but you are actually the ones executing it. Ironic? Sad? I really don’t know.
Anyway, I hope you do not carelessly read my statement and recognise me as an anti-semmit. I’m not! In fact, very few in the world are today, but I agree that the conflict with Islam has escalated long-lost feelings with some people who may or may not want the best for Israel or the Israeli people. All I know is that I am one of those who ridicule your government’s comments of how Norway encourages antisemmitism, however, I am also one of those who find George W. Bush being the worst president in United States history, and that the worldwide hatred towards America (which greatly overcomes the hatred towards Israel btw) is the result of a recent US foreign policy. So aditionally, I must be preaching anti-Americanism.
Greetings;)
Dear Johannes
I and Sophie are both Norwegians. And as for allegations of anti-Semitism, we hardly ever make them and especially have not done so in the case of Inger Lise Hansen. We do get a lot of e-mails and comments from Norwegians who believe, as you do, that we are Israelis and have called them anti-Semites, but so far we have always been able to agree that this has not been the case.
Criticism of a nation does not of course not automatically imply that one holds racist attitudes against the predominant ethnic group of that country. For instance, one might well criticize Saudi-Arabia for human rights violations without being a racist. When someone imposes a set of double standards however, and consistently criticizes shia-muslim states for transgressions but not sunni-muslim states – for the same transgressions, then one must be allowed to have a second look at that person and ask: “Hm, what’s up here?” Which is basically what we are doing here at NIJ.
A conspicuous number of Norwegians are very eager to criticize Israel, while showing little or no interest at all for similar and worse transgressions taking place in other countries. Our history taken into consideration, this is something worth taking note of.
Best regards
Christian T