PieFed DKUK arrests 83-year-old priest for backing Palestine Action and opposing Gaza genocide
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The Reverend Sue Parfitt, from Bristol, was detained for holding a placard that read: “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.” She was among more than 27 people arrested on Saturday for acts of defiance against the proscription.
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I am lost for words. Labour should be ashamed of themselves.
tetris11If you are in the UK and thumbing up this post, is that considered a terrorist action. Be careful out there...
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A very proactieve protestor and spunky woman of the cloth, who seems to have been arrested 27-28 times already. According to this profile publication she claims she "has militant dna, as a maternal ancestor was accused of sedition in the 18th century".
What a Fucking Legend!!! People such as her should be our icons. Not the plastic ridiculous people that the legacy media and the algorithimc social media keep pushing out like clowns to the circus floor to keep people distracted.
Sue Parfitt. Let's remember her name. In fact I'm gonna save this post.
And while I'm not one to support religion, between her and the reverend that gave that sermon to Trump's face in church, I would say "Lady Priests" (apologies for the reductionism) are having a moment and showing the cloth that apparently only the women in it seem to remember what "their calling" is supposed to be all about.
If anyone knows the name of the woman that gave that sermon, tag it under. Please.
It's not about supporting the church, it's about giving credit where credit is due.
In fact, we should start making a record of the people who are raising to the occasion these days all over the world, and taking the moral stand and give them the space and the limelight, instead of allowing everything to be about the shitty people doing their shitty deeds. That takes so much of the bandwith as it is, and makes us feel alone in the face of it all.
Be it about the atrocities being committed in Gaza, Ukraine, the U.S. or in any place where wrongful actions are occurring, let us make visible the people that raise to face it. Let us put forward the faces and voices of the ones who still truly give the word "humanity" some of its supposed meaning back.
PS: A lot of people here might not be able to read Spanish. But I do and I really liked the article you linked. It was a really nice complement to the one linked in the post. So, thank you for sharing it.
Great pickup up and I fully agree.
I saved your post about saving a post because it makes me less depressed and more warm and fuzzy inside. You are a good person and you clearly care <3
Oh, thank you so much. I wish I let myself believe that I am what you just described. You do seem to fit the description you assigned me very well from this very brief interaction.
Let us all keep spreading warm and fuzzy feels on and on to as many people as we can.
The world certainly needs an antidote to spread against the vile current that is dragging us all into a hole of despair.
We can't let that happen!
Unfortunately, I often do let myself go in that direction.
So thank you for pulling me the other way.
100% agree and yes doubt does eat away at you sometimes! Don't let it ! :)
"One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these - to be fierce and to show mercy toward others; both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity."
From a letter by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, https://www.awakin.org/v2/read/view.php?tid=2195
Thank your for such reply and the link as well. The text you linked shares a lot of inspiration for these trying times.
And oh, how we definitely need it.
Praising a good priest is not much different than praising a good republican. You can be a good person without associating yourself to corrupted political parties or bigot cults
I understand your anger. I really do. But may I remind you that the Republicans were the ones who took a stand to abolish slavery and even died for it not that long ago really. And look at where they are now.
It's people like this woman that are fencing any movement from turning corrupt and vile. Unfortunately all too often there's not enough of them to stop it from happening.
She most likely saw the cloth as a way to reach and help people in need. As it is one way of doing it. And given her very advanced age, when she was young, it was probably one of the very few that existed at her disposal. Especially as a woman.
And you shouldn't conflate the identity of individuals with the institutions they're a part of or with their social descriptors. That is precisely what you hate about these groups you brought up. So don't play for the opposite team and act the same way they do.
And by the way, you were downvoted but I wasn't one of the ones who did it. As I do think your anger towards these institutions is absolutely warranted and justified. I feel the same way. Just don't let that keep you from recognising a decent human being when it is very much the case. Otherwise, you allowed them to turn you into what we both hate about what these institutions represent.
This woman is on everyone's side because she's fighting for everyone. Even though I'm not religious, I recognise that I aspire to the same as her.
I'm gonna try it again maybe this time you will understand: praising a good priest is not much different than praising a good scientologis, you can be a good person without associating yourself to a cult that threat people to believe in ghosts
Why this level of vitriol and condescension in this exchange?
I'm also going to repeat... Taking your stance to an extreme, and you have yourself a reductionist view of the world with nothing but intolerance or hatred for those who don't share it. Sounds familiar?
I don't know what's going on in your life, you could be going through something and I don't want to add more to the pile of what you're already dealing with. So I'm just gonna leave this here, because I suspect that even my concerning tone right now will read as passive aggressive to you. It isn't. But I can't control that.
So take care.
They're calling these people terrorists for holding signs calling for the end of Israel's genocide. They're not calling the people who have been committing genocide every day terrorists: they're valuable allies. This is the UK Government's morality. I hope it's not shared by the British people.
Polling consistently shows disapproval for Israeli actions in Gaza.
Technically it's because some members of the group trespassed in a military base and vandalised an airplane. Which is trespassing and vandalism. Not terrorism. Unless Starmer has been watching too much Thomas & the Friends and Pixar's Cars and believes that the poor planes can't sleep at night anymore, because they are terrified.
Also, even if a few members organize themselves to do that, that doesn't mean the entire organization supports it or is behind it.
"We're civilised people, we can excuse genocide, but throwing paint and saying mean words is a step too far."
Some definitions of Terrorism also include property damage
Well definitions can include anything and everything. They can also be debased to the point of being useless, or in the case of crimes of being the engine of witch hunts.
I do not believe inanimate objects can experience terror, so I also don't agree with the definition. But I don't write the laws.
Oooh, waaah, muh paint!
On the outside of the engine I agree.
On the inside there are moving parts that probably don't like increased friction, so they probably have to take the whole thing apart to remove the paint.
It's still not really destruction of property.
Big deal. The UK has billions of pounds from selling arms to the genocidal apartheid zionist state.
Big deal. The UK has billions of pounds from selling arms to the Apartheid Zionist state
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It is not
What if it is an excuse to put people that openly oppose colonialism and authority under control and fear? They maybe don't care that much for Israel but why miss this opportunity?
No they're not. There's a difference between "Palestine Action" (the group) and "actions and other stuff in favour of Palestine". The former has been banned, the latter has not. Protesting is legal in the UK; vandalising Air Force equipment is not.
Damaging equipment that is being used to conduct genocide is not vandalism, it's human fucking decency.
True, but I wasn't aware that the RAF are currently flying sorties into any ongoing genocide.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ceqg440v0gxo
They are not doing the bombing in Gaza. They are protecting the ones doing the bombing in Gaza.
You might want to re-read that article. It doesn't mention Gaza once. Here are some quotes:
"fighting between Israel and Iran"
"protect UK personnel and bases in the Middle East"
"we've never been involved in attacking with Israel"
"we've got assets out there they need to be protected given Iran has suggested they might be under threat"
Oh I'm sorry, I thought the recent moves deepening the existing framework was proof enough. You want to go back instead.
Let's try this one: https://aje.io/78f3r5
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how dare you bring logic to a circlejerk
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Yes, that is vandalism by definition.
"Vandalism is the action involving deliberate destruction of or damage to public or private property.[1]
The term includes property damage, such as graffiti and defacement directed towards any property without permission of the owner."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vandalism
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That's sounds like vandalism, which confirms what the other guy said.
And there's no need for insults.
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That's the definition of vandalism. Feel free to open a dictionary and educate yourself.
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Please tell me where you park your car and your number plate. I will then throw red paint on it. If a bit of paint can damage your car, why did you spend 40.000€ on it?
Just listen to yourself - of course throwing paint into an aircraft engine will damage a plane. This is exactly why this group did it. And there is nothing to prevent this - throwing paint will destroy every engine and esp. jet engines. If you do not believe me, throw a bucket of paint into your car engine. You can support Palestine, but please use your brain and try to think about some things before posting. You can do better than this.
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Does Israel have dirt on all these people? Its wild how everyone just supports genocide so willingly.
Politicians only care about being elected.
How exactly does supporting genocide get them elected? I don't get the impression that Labour voters want to see Palestinians murdered.
Money
It's been proven that most of the time, whoever spends the most wins.
The UK has spending limits which mitigates that. https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/party-spending-and-pre-poll-donations-and-loans-uk-parliamentary-general-election/spending-limit
Does this include quid-pro-quos like being invited to speak somewhere or providing lip service to a certain political party? Not all transactions can be measured in terms of monetary values. Think of 'we don't mind supplying you with state-of-the-art spyware, but we can't do that if you make life hard on us and speak out against the genocide we're committing'.
The fact that labour is propping up and financially supporting this is awful, we are somewhat complicit in this genocide too. Didn't fucking vote for this.
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The care about holding the power. They don't give a shit about elections. It's just that they need them to legitimize their regime.
And their donors
The entirety of the current Government owe their jobs to Israel, as the last leader of their party - Jeremy Corbyn - was kicked out opening the way for these ones to get power after a campaign of slanders of anti-semitism backed amongst others by Israeli-linked Jewish groups in the UK which was so extreme that at one point a Jewish Holocaust Survivor was said to be an anti-semite for what he said in a conference for Palestine in order to taint Jeremy Corbyn by association, as he was sitting in the same panel in that conference and "didn't rise up to dispute it".
Since Britain also has First Past The Post like the US, getting the leadership of that party was a guaranteed path to Government since that party was the next in line in the power cycle over there.
So these people were basically bought by Israel.
The west strongest countries are neocolonial powers supporting a colonial power
the strongest countries, period.
China and Russia are colonial powers, too.
Crazy how tankies think it's only ok if you do it to your neighbours.
To be fair, China does it all over, especially in Africa. Russia probably would too if they could.
The Russian Federation is de facto a Moscowite empire. And they are trying their best to annex more countries into their "Federation".
Oh, for sure. I just meant they'd be doing it overseas if they could. Right now they're only able to do it locally, and are currently not able to continue because Ukraine is holding them off.
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I don't know if you just don't know how conversations work, but it follows pretty reasonably. It didn't come from no where. First someone complained about "the west" doing colonialism. Then someone corrected that all major powers do it. Finally someone points out that tankies only complain about "the west" and never China or Russia who do the same things.
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Every western government is scared of opposing Israel since WW2. It's absurd.
What makes you think they are backing israel only because of blackmail? They are arresting a 83 year old for opposing a genocide, our governments are shit and always have been, can't you see it?
Yeah, Epstein was just the tip of the iceberg.
Look at that diabolical criminal. I hope they reopen London tower just to hang her from it. After she bakes everyone cookies with afternoon tea.
Has anyone affiliated with the other two groups been arrested since this went into effect?
This is a good question, apparently they'd rather lock up 83 year old women than violent facists and warmongers
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As a German I sincerely apologize for people like this guy here
danke schön, brudi
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MY WORD *clutches pearls*
Funny, I wasn't aware vandalism is a synonym to terrorism.
oh no, not -*gasp*- property damage!
sending military equipment to explode brown children: 😊
vandalizing military equipment so that you can't send them to aid the genocide: 😨😠
I support Palestine Action - illegal
I support Action for Palestine - legal
I support P.A.
gets arrested
I said I support Pennsylvania, the US State!
I'm honestly impressed that a left wing organisation lasted long enough to get themselves banned.
They usually split into a dozen warring factions within a month.
As a Brit I still support Palestine Action and will be getting involved in more direct action.
One at me piggies.
Why is the UK against people backing Mandatory Palestine?
I dont know exactly but they are quite fond of bringing the iran monarchy back. Maybe something something oil
Because they helped set israel up and have to be allied with them.
The joke is that Mandatory Palestine was the name of the British colony before they gave the land to Israel
Oh, thank you for explaining!
the UK is against backing "Palestine Action" which is a group that has sabotaged British military equipment. Surprisingly, the British government doesn't take kindly to that sort of thing.
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Charming.
There is such a thing as context. Red paint on a street is an annoyance (and may make for very visible and effective protest). Red paint on hi-tech equipment is sabotage (and makes for very unpleasant reactions by the owners of said equipment).
It's sabotage. It's not terrorism. The gov is wrong to proscribe this group, you must see that? Regardless of your stance on the issue, this is an anti democratic move by Labour.
I do think that arresting people for voicing their support is counter-productive, unnecessarily heavy-handed and at the very least controversial from a freedom-of-speech point of view.
But I don't see how the government should not ban a group that resorts to sabotage to achieve their political goals? Any state – democratically legitimized or no – will be very twitchy about stuff that touches national security.
Am I missing some nuance here?
The nuance here is that they've been proscribed as a terrorist group. They are a direct action group but they don't hurt people, just damage property. That's a crime, but it's not terrorism. They can and should be tried for criminal damage, B&E, damage to government property etc, but this is a freedom of protest issue, and now freedom of speech, too, since I can no longer say things like "I think Palestine Action went too far, but they're fighting for a just cause", for example, because I'd be expressing support for a terrorist group and therefore committing a crime.
Compare to e.g. the suffragette movement who bombed buildings and all kinds to get the vote for women: they're now lauded by the same person who proscribed this group. Or more recent examples like just stop oil or the protesters that threw the Edward Colson statue into the River Avon. They were tried for criminal damages. Then recently, some protesters have been starting to get tried under the far, far harsher anti terrorism laws, usually when it involves protesting Israel's war crimes. These are the laws that allow things like extended detention in solitary without charge or phone calls, massively longer sentences and all manner of nasty punishments. It's clearly a power grab to reduce the will to protest.
Sabotage can absolutely be terrorism. In this case probably not, but the British government has a valid reason to oppose this specific group.
I didn't mean to say say sabotage could not be terrorism in general, I'm agreeing that this is absolutely sabotage, but in this case it is not terrorism.
The govt do not have a valid reason to proscribe them as a terrorist organisation. There are other available methods of opposition.
Terrorism is generally linked with a risk to personal safety at the very least, not mere property damage. These people are criminals, not terrorists.
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If she were in the US, she would be pushed to the ground and beaten by a bunch of white guys in riot gear and masks.
What a nice silver lining
Uh, I've had enuff of shitty news; let's switch to another timeline.
"Are we the baddies?"
-Said exactly 0 of the cops
Just wondering, if I would hold up a sign with 'go isreal, continue the amazing work you do!', would that get me arrested? Surely i'd get beat up but i mean what would the lawmakers think of that? Would it be different if the sign would say 'go isreal, murder those innocent families' or 'go isreal, your genocide rules!' (am i allowed to call it a genocide if i'm not against it?)
in some countries even holding empty sign would lead you to arrest
make is sarcastic, the British way.
go on the telly, then show them a mirror to themselves. talk how excited you are for how many humanitarian volunteers are being slaughtered, how clever is it to stave children so they can take their land....
None of those signs would lead to your arrest in the UK.
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What really happened here: Members of this Palestine Action group sneaked onto a military base and attacked the aircrafts there. This act of politically motivated vandalism resulted in this group being officially banned by the government. Which is totally ok, no state in the world will and can tolerate some group doing acts of terrorism and/or doing sabotage.
Supporting banned terrorist organizations is of course also not allowed (which really makes sense) and yeah, this priest totally did that on purpose. You are therefore totally fine holding up a sign supporting Israel and you are also totally fine holding up a sign supporting Palestine, but you are not fine holding up signs supporting banned organizations.
Nah, Labeling them as "terrorists" is disproportionate.
Criminals, yes. Terrorists, no.
The definition of terrorism under british law can apply to basically any protest group and if applied retroactively would drag things like the suffragette movement under the umbrella of terrorism.
This move is an assault on all of our freedom of speech
You're equating vandalism to terrorism, you might want to look up the meaning of those words.
The British House of Commons voted by 385 votes to 26 to add Palestine Action to the list of terrorist groups proscribed under the Terrorism Act. Maybe you want to tell us why your definition of terrorism is different from the one in the British parliament?
Because they are unfairly biased in favor of Israel. The U.S. has shown its bias by denying the war crimes that every serious scholar has agreed is happening. The state of Israel itself has tried to shoehorn "criticism of the state of Israel" into the definition of antisemitism.
Governments will stretch and distort definitions to suit their purposes.
Because i'm not a hypocrite, unlike the british parliament.
That vote just shows us the British House of Commons is full of racists. Nothing new there.
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Attacked aircraft? By smacking it with her walker?
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Please inform yourself: People of the Palestine Action group have sneaked upon a british military airfield and sprayed paint into the jet engines of several RAF planes.
So? Did the paint damage the planes? The RAF should give them an award for exposing the vulnerabilities in its security measures.
Yes, putting paint into a jet engine damages a jet engine.
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What really happened is already in the article, my questions are about how lawmakers would respond if you openly support the same side they are supporting. That is especially relevant as r i don't expect regular folk to let me walk around showing the same kind of support for genocide. This has nothing to do with the Palestine Action group and what they did or didn't do.
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Why are you talking about Hamas in a thread about Palestine Action? The two groups are not related at all and use totally different tactics (Palestine Action is explicitly non-violent).
the IOF is a terrorist organization. much bigger, more prolific and active than Hamas as well. literally a war criminal organization. funny how you never hear people getting arrested for supporting the IOF though.
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So you assume by default that there's either an explicit or implicit support for Hamas by protesting against Israel?
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Where did they show support for Hamas?
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Yeah, they're the ones arguing in bad faith 🙄
"Stop arguing in bad faith" *proceeds to immediately make the most bad faith argument I have seen in this thread*
trying to stop delivering arms to a terrorist group commiting genocide: terrorism
commiting genocide and deliberately killing, maiming, starving and playing cruel games with the lives of civilians and literal children: not terrorism
talk about bad faith... fuck off with all that.
OK but where is the explicit support for Hamas that this woman was allegedly demonstrating. "Hamas" doesn't appear in the article.
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What the fuck even is this comment, lol
Oh, I see, you think that just because the UK labeled Palestine Action a terrorist group, they actually are?
…
Hey, come on over, I got a bridge to sell you!
ICE is a terrorist organization. MAGA is a terrorist organization. You must be really against both of those things, eh? They use fear tactics and scaremongering, and when that doesn't work, they get violent real quick. And they are based on both political and religious ideology to boot!
So support for Palestinians is only ok if you don't support the one thing Palestinians could actually do to stop the senseless slaughter of more Palestinians- armed revolutionary action?
So basically one can only wave a flag and cheer against the slaughter of Palestinians by Israel while vilifying the group that Israel deems it’s enemy for checks notes dealing back the same damage dealt to Palestinians for over a century now since Zionist terrorist cells who would become the Israeli military intelligence apparatus and political elite, waged campaigns of massacres, bombings and assassinations all across British mandatory Palestine forcing the British to leave their occupation and the un to split the territory 55/45 in zionists favor. So essentially we are denied to cheer on reciprocal retribution by a population clearly wronged through decades of subjugation, brutal
Oppression and genocide because of the sensibilities of colonial capitalist imperialism?
Got it
There is only one context in which Palestine Action is "a terrorist organization such as Hamas" and that's the depraved legislation that the idiots in Westminster passed. The bravery of the 83 year old priest this article is about lays bare the depravity and stupidity of this absolutely idiotic legislation. Your comment on the other hand, by using this idiotic comparison buys into this aberrant degeneracy. Why do you do that?
How did this get 5 upvotes lol
I think more people have alts on lemmy than we'd like to admit. Particularly when they're accounts spewing hasbara propaganda.
Unidan is taking AIPAC money.
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But how would I telegraph my desire to murder the Jews if I did that?
Mohammed El-Kurd
Feckless cowards.
Genocide accomplices!
Everyone involved with this "law" should be tried and hung in the Hague for aiding and abetting crimes against humanity.
Let's not hang people in The Hague now
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Now I understand more closely Starmer's subservience to America's Donald Trump.
Zion Don inspired Kier to up his slobbering and bootlicking.
Arresting prominent protest figures has always ended well for the UK. /s
Well that was quick.
As someone stated... The police are not your friend. They are not there to serve and protect your interests. They are there to serve and protect the interests of the state you live in.
The other day my wife's car stopped at a busy road. The police quickly arrived and asked if she had crashed on to my car. Like how can we take this unfortunate event and turn it into a profitable situation where they can impound the car...oh it's just engine failure, well you're blocking the road so I'll call the most expensive possible tow truck. How can we make your day worse?
It's so sad that it comes to this in some area's of the world.
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Maybe change Germany to the country the post is related to after copy and pasting this, it's not they're the only one.
The Thought Police are now in your timeline
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Those innocent European priests never abused anyone…. Oh wait
Spotted Murican in the wild
Not even close, I mean you probably colonized my people good and tried to beat the Indian out of us, for which I hold a grudge, particularly to the church. But don’t let my criticism deflect from your attempt at a strawman rant. You probably wouldn’t even be able to find my country on the map, since it’s not a white nation.
P.s. the Americans are the bastard children of Europe, not of my people, so don’t put that on me.
"Criticism" :D
Hey what’s the difference between and American and a European? An ocean and some bicycles.
You’ll both fuck me equally while moralizing. Aside from that, you’re just as bad and pretentious and toxic as Americans
Go take some meds, you are delirious 🤗
You're right, she's 83 years old. I'm sure she saw many bad things in life and didn't speak up. Therefore, I think we can all agree it's best to ignore her now.
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Zionista not jews. Like in some proteats there was jews beaten for opposing israel in protests
What percentage of the Israeli Jews support the genocide of Palistinians?
Does it matter? I’m sure a lot of people in whatever country you live in support the genocide. There are idiots in every religion, country, group etc. does not always make the entire group rotten.
I'm more curious about non israeli jews because there also many arab israeli who are as blood thirstily and zionists as jewish israeli
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No it's not mincing words. One is antisemitic and the other is not. You should learn the difference tbh.
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Got a source for this? Ashkenazi Jews are eastern european. A lot of Jews are sephardic. I don't know the numbers but I'd guess that more Jews in Israel are sephardic.
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You again? Last time I came across you, you were being racist too. Your username is racist. Is racism just a hobby or a full-time job for you?
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Nobody wants to hear your antisemitic bullshit.
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Jews =/= genocidal zionist nutcases
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I'm drunk as a skunk so I don't quite see your point but aye
I'm half jewish, I've been all over Israel, what is going on there saddens me so much, to see my Jewish ancestors to escape the holocaust and then to do things like this... Again any self respecting Jew would reject this completely.
Jews =/= Israel
Israel =/= Jews
Criticising Israel =/= Anti-Semitic
And Netanyahu is a fucking war criminal. He deserves to be hung. I hope he gets the Gaddafi treatment
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then why are Jewish voices some of the loudest anti Israel voices?
you racist cunt