Department of ‘Huh’:
So long as there is one Jew left on earth who still needs money to end his life in dignity, the Germans should pay, because they alone are to blame.
Can someone please explain the above sentence for me?
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November 15, 2007
Blame The Germans?
Comments
from the haaratz comments
You can pay compensation either collectively or individually. Not both.
Israel decided in the fifties to be compensated collectively for the holocaust. They used the money to build a modern, western-style country which offered a safe place to live for every Jew, holocaust survivors included.
With accepting collective compensation Israel should assume responsibility to care for its old and needy citizens (again: holocaust survivors or not).
Anything else is begging.
as for my own views, i guess some people just can’t move on. there is a reason this wound stays fresh and alive. people keep picking the scab. why? this attachment to victimhood is too precious, too ingrained.
Posted by: annie | Nov 15 2007 17:18 utc | 1
What if it read:
So long as there is one Jew Palestinian left on earth who still needs money to end his life in dignity, the Germans Israel should pay, because they alone are to blame.
Don’t mean to be a broken record, but this might help whomever wrote that sentence see the absurdity of it…
Posted by: Bea | Nov 15 2007 17:57 utc | 2
very strange phrasing. first thing that comes to mind when hearing of one ending their life w/ dignity would be this. but that hardly requires minimal overhead.
Posted by: b real | Nov 15 2007 18:05 utc | 3
this attachment to victimhood is too precious, too ingrained.
“There’s no business like Shoa business …”
Posted by: Anonymous | Nov 15 2007 18:07 utc | 4
The Haaretz article also says:
“None of this changes the fact that the Germans treated Holocaust survivors more fairly than did the Israel government, especially in recent years. Unfortunately, Israel’s attitude toward people in distress is not a worthy example to other countries: not after the Olmert government proposed raising the allowances survivors receive by NIS 83 a month.”
also:
“Too many survivors did not get what they deserved, because Israel plucked some of their money for itself.”
All true.
This article is an absolute mess. I don’t understand what point it is trying to make.
Posted by: Tangerine | Nov 15 2007 18:48 utc | 5
jesus b real, your link made be spit up on the keyboard.
i know, i shouldn’t laugh, or admit to it.
ok, on a more serious note. cough. this one is a REAL shocker. it’s not everyday we get surprised like this…
Israel won’t be included in new genocide probes
The newly formed Genocide Prevention Task Force indicated Tuesday night that it will not be examining whether Israel has committed genocide in the West Bank and Gaza despite earlier statements that it would be addressing the subject.
Though one of the co-chairs, former US Defense Secretary William Cohen, originally said that the situation in the West Bank and Gaza would be considered, the task force later clarified that such an inquiry would be beyond the scope of the panel.
“Its task is not to determine which situations, past or present, including the West Bank and Gaza, constitute genocide, but to develop policy recommendations that enable the United States to prevent future genocides from occurring,” Cohen, along with co-chair Madeleine Albright, said in a statement issued Tuesday night.
why concentrate on the present when we can prevent the future?
Posted by: annie | Nov 15 2007 20:30 utc | 6
If the phrase read “Holocaust survivor” instead of “Jew”, it might make a bit of sense.
On the other hand, any German born after 1915 (which would mean they were still a minor when the Nazis came to power in 1933) cannot be held accountable.
They themselves are victims of a sort, having had their minds corrupted by a perverse ideology and sent to fight its wars.
Which means that we will have to lean on those 93+ year-olds for compensation…Geld her, Opa!!!
Posted by: Anonymous | Nov 16 2007 7:58 utc | 7
I am still wondering what the author, Tom Segev, of the above quote was thinking when he wrote it. What are the Germans to blame for? Not killing enough jews?
—
Homes in illegal Israeli settlements for sale at London expo
Israeli companies are using UK property shows to sell housing in illegal Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, Guardian Unlimited can reveal.
At the Israel Property Exhibition at Brent town hall, North London last Sunday, one company, Anglo-Saxon Real Estate, was offering for sale properties in Maale Adumim and Maccabim. Both West Bank settlements lie on the Palestinian side of the so-called green line, the pre-1967 boundary and often cited as the border between Israel and a future Palestinian state.
…
I think there will come a time when modern day Germans refuse to tell the Israeli Govt what the PIN number for the “Holocaust” ATM is, they will scream “anti-semetic”.
One wonders if they will turn their attentions to Prescott Bush and other American bankers who bankrolled parts of the Nazi regime, notwithstanding the billions bankrolled to have a stationary aircraft carrier in the ME.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Nov 16 2007 17:18 utc | 9
“Holocaust” Jews in Israel (whomever, whatever, are poor, elderly, and probably mostly only DPs, but that is not an issue here) are are being screwed over by Israel.
The article, may I insist, says that plainly, referring to, amongst others, the demos that took place some weeks ago when the Olmert and co offered to pay something like 10 / 20 dollaris extra per month from 2011 or whatever (I forget the details, it was disgusting….) I was surprised that ppl even noticed. The national victim stance does not include actually taking care of the still living ‘victims.’
More Jews, from the ex-USSR, and from Israel itself ! emigrate to Germany than to Israel. Israel has even tried to scotch the advantages Germany offers, trying to curb the principles, raise objections, stop it all, etc.
(They want warm body settlers in Isr.)
The stats are somewhat opaque and secret. That Germany must “pay” attitude is a confused reaction to competition for those living bodies. Who are of course of no account except as numbers etc.
The German Govmt. cannot now, or in the future, stand up against these attacks. They can’t react in any way, can only bow down, which actually, on the ground, means refusing Jews! to send them to Isr…
DPs – displaced persons.
Posted by: Tangerine | Nov 16 2007 17:55 utc | 10
The article reflects the confused thinking around racism caused by propaganda such as ‘the entire world is judeoophobic’ stance put out by those seeking to argue Israel’s ‘right’ to destroy Palestine and the people in it.
Racism is a function of the racist not the object of his/her racism, but, when someone says ‘as long as there is a Jew left on earth who still needs money to end his life in dignity, the Germans should pay, because they alone are to blame’ they have turned that around and made racism a function of the the object of racism.
In a weird way the Ha’aretz article that says this is arguing that the fault lies with Jews and their inherent state of victimhood.
By denying Jewish people the power or ability to get into the shit financially on their own, unaided by some malevolent Nazi force, the article makes Jewish people out to be a perpetually prone to oppression sub-species of humanity.
Posted by: Debs is dead | Nov 17 2007 10:25 utc | 11