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Soccerdad has the right idea, but too narrow an angle. It’s not just the Palestinians who won’t acknowledge the Jewish history in Israel. Take a look at some of the comments from the Washington Post:

It was an idiotic comment, certainly, but an isolated one compared to the hateful crap that spews out of the Fox Network every day uncontested by mainstream journalists such as herself.

And:

I like Helen Thomas. So what if she made a frank statement. She’s made lots of frank statements before, and I love her for it.

And:

The Holocaust was a disgusting example of the ills that society and any human can unleash on others, but what of the unnamed holocaust unleashed on the Palestinians since the end of WWII? Does the suffering of one group of people justify the suffering of another group (not related to the suffering of the first group) at the hands of the formerly oppressed? Stop hiding behind the holocaust. It does not give Israelis the right to oppress the Palestinians, nor does it give Israeli sympathizers the right to blackball or muzzle those who speak out against their atrocities.

And:

I’ve been waiting for a long time for someone to have the courage to say what Helen Thomas said, for the Jews to get the Hell out of Palestine. The last time I looked, this country still had freedom of speech, or does that apply to everything except the subject of Israel/Jews? I’m sick and tired of our support of Israel. Israel is arrogant and they shove their religion down everyone’s throat. Just because their Bible says the land is theirs does not justify moving in and taking over someone else’s land, i.e., the Palestinians. I’ve got the guts to say what needs to be said — Israel, get the Hell out of Palestine.

Think those are one-offs? Nah. Here’s one that didn’t get through my comments moderation:

Thank you, Helen, for saying the truth even when no one wants to hear it. Israel is just the most recent Crusader colony of Europeans. How can so many of us fail to see the wrongness in the survivors of Hitler’s holocaust going on to commit lebensraum in someone else’s continent?

And another:

If we can question our president and our own government, why can’t we question and criticize Israel? What happened to freedom of speech?

Helen Thomas is true American and did what was right. I completely support Helen Thomas and all journalists who dare to speak out what we all fell about Israel. It might just be time for us to open up our eyes and stop US aid to Israel.

Note the theme. She was right. She’s just “criticizing” Israel. Jews don’t belong in the land of their origin. It’s the Palestinians’ land. Jews stole it. Israel is committing a “holocaust”. Where have I seen these before? Well, on all comment threads, all over the world, whenever Israel is discussed. Go take a look at the Guardian comment threads sometime for the best naked Jew-hatred this side of Stormfront. And while we’re on the subject of Stormfront, let me point out a few things. I read Stormfront’s message boards from time to time, particularly when something like this comes up. I’m familiar with their arguments, their [ahem] logic, and their resources.

I find no difference between comments like the ones above, and the typical Stormfront commenter.

When the Peter Beinarts and Leon Wieseltiers of the world tell us that we are exaggerating the threat to Jews, they are speaking from ignorance. As our current president told us not long ago: Words matter. The words against Jews have been rising exponentially since 2001. I’ve been reading them in media outlets from all over the world. I’ve documented them on my blog. Words. Matter.

So do events. The second intifada ended with the Palestinians’ utter defeat. The suicide bombings are now extremely rare. Terror attacks have dropped to their lowest levels since the invention of the suicide bomber by the Palestinians. Israel completely withdrew from Gaza. Israel completely withdrew from Lebanon. Palestinians in the West Bank have more freedom of movement and are governing themselves at the highest rate since they began the intifada.

None of that makes a difference to the commenters I quoted above. This article gives a great explanation of why Helen was fired, and what was wrong with what she said. It explains perfectly what was so awful about her words. And this commenter proves that the explanation simply doesn’t matter:

Israel DOES need to get the hell out of Palestine – and Germany hasn’t been exterminating any Jews for 65 years now, but the horrible conditions that Israel has been imposing on these people is inexcusable. Give them their land and move on in peace. The only other alternative is for Israel to declare genocide against the Palestinians, which makes THEM the Nazis.

The world does not like the Jews. It never did.

Update: This post was linked on AOL’s search. It was the second result for “What did Helen Thomas say exactly?” You would not believe the vile comments coming from AOL readers—even the ones who read the post.

Funny. The major news outlets did not cover Helen Thomas’ anti-Semitic remarks until she got fired for them. The Washington Post barely touched it. The wire services didn’t have anything on it, not even after Ari Fleischer called for her to be fired on Huffington Post. When I first started looking for it, I could only find it there and on a site called Hollywood News. The New York Daily News had a short piece, but I didn’t find anything else over the weekend.

Apparently, this wasn’t news:

Rabbi: Any comments on Israel?
Thomas: Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine [laughs]
Rabbi: Oooh. Any better comments on Israel?
Thomas: Remember, these people are occupied and it’s their land. It’s not Germany, it’s not Poland.
Rabbi: So where should they go, what should they do?
Thomas: Go home.
Rabbi: Where’s home?
Thomas:Poland, Germany, and America and everywhere else.

But the firing is. It’s all over CNN, AP, ABC, Newsweek, CBS—you name it, they’ve got it now.

It’s a rare person that actually came out and criticized Thomas without pretending that she made her remarks because she’s old or angry. The remarks are sheer Jew-hatred, nothing less. Jews’ millennia-old ties to the land of Israel are utterly discounted by Thomas, who chooses to use the fiction that Israel was a country created specifically by and for Holocaust survivors. The fact that half of Israel’s population is descended from Jews that fled the pogroms in Arab nations that started right after Israel’s independence is ignored. As Soccerdad points out, Thomas is passing along the lies that the Palestinians thrive on, and that the Arab world believes wholeheartedly. These are the lies that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad tells reporters and is barely challenged in interviews.

But they made no stir on the news media. Not a single major media outlet ran a story on them—until Thomas was fired for them.

As for that “apology”: It wasn’t. Let’s see it again.

“I deeply regret my comments I made last week regarding the Israelis and the Palestinians. They do not reflect my heart-felt belief that peace will come to the Middle East only when all parties recognize the need for mutual respect and tolerance. May that day come soon.”

She regretted her comments? Why? Because they were videotaped and went viral on the internet? Do you see an apology in there? No, you don’t, because there isn’t one.

Buh-bye, Helen, you old anti-Semitic crone. Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on your way out. And please—don’t write, don’t call, don’t blog. We won’t mind a bit.

My prediction: She won’t go quietly. Watch the bile come out in a larger volume than the BP oil well.