Thursday, August 30, 2007

Anna Baltzer at the Berkeley Sabeel Conference

I'd never seen Anna Baltzer in action though I'd read about her. At the Sabeel Conference at St. John the Workers Church in Berkeley Ms. Baltzer gave a presentation in the main hall.

Baltzer is drop dead gorgeous and looks like a movie star, but she is also proof that beauty is only skin deep. Her presentation on behalf of the International Women's Peace Service was so dishonest and deliberately manipulative of an audience that it reveals an ugliness below the surface appearance of this woman. Innuendos, half-truths, manipulated photos and constant misrepresentations were the order of the day for her presentation, and most annoying was her voicing "I am a Jewish-American" to lend credence to her pro-PLO propaganda spiel; here was a Jewish woman content to lie by omitting facts and giving credence to hearsay to aid in the dispossession of and encourage attacks on Jews in Israel.

First, let me say the International Women's Peace Service is a communist organization that grew out of the communist-inspired International Women's League for Peace and Freedom in the 1920s and 30's. Back here in California, the IWPS tours schools, damning Israel in the eyes of schoolchildren just like Baltzer does and is led by another Jewess-communist named Kate Raphael. It's not particularly Jewish to be a communist whack job, but if one is, then it's useful to cite one's ancestry of Judaism that was long abandoned for the god of Marxism to attack the Jews in Israel and those who support them. Israel was founded and built by more than one Marxist who grew up during the Cold War, and the Soviet Union once supported the creation of the Jewish state because of the socialist nature of so many Zionist groups. The Torah teaches that every Jew is responsible for every other Jew, a form of socialism that has a beneficial group-think on the Jewish community.

But what frequently happens is it gets perverted among secular Jews who decide that Marxism is the way to go. They become about as Jewish as a ham sandwich, but nevertheless use their Jewish ancestry to lend credibility to attacking Jewish interests like Israel as they fall into the communist party platform that is anti-Israel. As the Soviet Union later aligned with the Arabs, Marxist groups like the IWPS became increasingly "anti-Zionist" (anti-Jew). Writer Paul Bogdaner has posited that "Martin Luther’s program of terrorizing Jews originated with a Jewish convert, Johannes Pfefferkorn; and that the myth of the Jewish world-conspiracy, which culminated in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, was assiduously promoted by a Russian Jewish author, Jacob Brafmann. We suspected that as the Pfefferkorns and the Brafmanns departed from the stage, the Finkelsteins and the Chomskys made their entrance."

As for the "peace" theme of the IWPS, Writer Bruce Bawer has explained that "use of the word 'peace' to legitimize totalitarianism is an old Communist tradition. In August 1939, when the Nazis and Soviets signed their nonaggression pact, the same Western Stalinists who had been calling for war against Germany did an about-face and began to praise peace. (After Hitler invaded Russia, the Stalinists reversed themselves again, demanding that the West help Stalin crush the Third Reich.) The peace talk, in short, was really about sympathizing with Communism, not peace. And it continued after the war, when Stalin’s Western supporters whitewashed his monstrous regime and denounced anti-Communists as warmongering crypto-fascists. 'Peace conferences' and 'friendship committees' drew hordes of liberal dupes, who didn’t grasp that their new 'friends' were not ordinary Russians but the jailers of ordinary Russians—and that the committees were about not 'friendship' but deception, exploitation, and espionage."

I'll write more about IWPS later and particularly Hannah Mermelstein, a member who for some reason the Israeli security services just can't stop from entering Israel to try and destroy it.

But back to Anna Baltzer's presentation.

Baltzer immediately claimed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was not about religion, but land. In other words, the Arabs, particularly the Muslims, have nothing against Jews per se, but their land is being stolen by them. This was the first lie. The settlements that Baltzer showed photos of were built on public Jordanian land after 1967. It's one of the deceptive lies of the ISM (as a front for the PLO) to claim that Jews just marched in and grabbed private Palestinian homes and property.

It's always fascinated me how in America we accept the right of anyone who can legally purchase his own property to live where he pleases. This was the basis of our Civil Rights Movement. But when the Arabs claim that land is only for Arabs or Muslims, the radical left rushes in to agree with them.

In any event, Baltzer pointed to a settlement and said "Only Jews can live there." This was the second lie of her presentation and it was deliberate, a variation on the Blood Libel stories (which Baltzer improved on later as we shall see).

What Baltzer should have said was only Israeli citizens can live there. Christians, Druze, Muslims with Israeli citizenship can live in those communities. Were the Palestinian Authority to arrest terrorists and stop killing Israelis, mainly Jews,
those communities might then become open to all Palestinian citizens in a viable Palestinian state. But for now, they are under the control of Israel for security reasons, and rightly so.

Baltzer commented about the land around the settlement in the photo and claimed it belonged to Palestinians. This was the third lie. The land belonged to the settlement. But to these ISM creeps, all land, trees, produce (olives) and just about anything a Palestinian tells them is theirs and not the Jews'; it all belongs to Palestinians.

Baltzer accurately explained the difference between economic settlers and the religious ones. Economic settlers moved to the West Bank for affordable housing whereas the religious came to resettle the Biblical land of Israel. But in true
radical socialist propagandistic form, Baltzer suggested that the economic settlers were only the oppressed in Israel,that is, the poor, the black Jews from Ethiopia, etc. In fact, Israel is so tiny that this is not true. Many people elect to live in the West Bank or east Jerusalem who are not impoverished but want a nicer home. Efrat is like Mission Viejo in California and only a 30 minute drive from Jerusalem (if you don't get shot by Arab terrorists on the way).

Baltzer then discussed the Security Fence (that the ISM loves to call the "Apartheid Wall"). Of course she doesn't mention the Fence became necessary because the Palestinian Authority refused to arrest or prosecute terrorists who murder Jews
(and still never has) despite their agreement to do so in the Oslo Accords. There hasn't been a bus bombing in Israel for two years since the Fence went up. The answer is simple; stop killing Israelis and the Fence will come down, it's mostly portable anyway. Baltzer relied on lying by omission throughout the presentation.

By the way, Baltzer kept reciting the trope of "occupation." Would she object to a Security Fence if it was on the 1949 Green Line? Probably so, because she wanted people to think she considers only the West Bank and Gaza "occupied" when in fact she means all of Israel.

I had to laugh when Baltzer showed a photograph of two cars with different colored license plates. She explained that somehow this reflected an apartheid situation
because the different colored plates for Israeli nationals (not just Jews) and Palestinian Arabs were "visible from far away to the checkpoints." In fact, it was the PA that demanded the different colored license plates, not the Israeli government, because it was demanded as a matter of sovereignty. But her audience would never know this.

Baltzer showed a staged photograph of a "bypass road" with another highway excavation site in the foreground. The manipulation of images was obvious.
She was honest at one point admitting Palestinians who are not Israelis can use the bypass roads after completing a security background check; the roads were created to stop Jews from being murdered on the highways. Somehow this was a terrible thing to her.

But Baltzer's theatrics really shone in discussing the checkpoints. I've been to Israel and checkpoints rarely take more than ten minutes unless a terrorist attack is being thwarted. Baltzer showed a line of Palestinian workers waiting to enter Israel. You can see such lines at our own airports. She implied this was part of the great suffering of the Palestinians due to those nasty Israelis having checkpoints to stop terrorists who kill Jew and Arab alike.

She got the audience of Christian anti-Semites, dried up 60's Berkeley radicals and the uninformed to emit a gasp when she told them a tale of a pregnant Palestinian woman who was taken by ambulance to one of the checkpoints that are normally open to traffic from 7 am to 7 pm. According to Baltzer, they arrived at the checkpoint before 7 am and the Israeli soldiers told the woman's family that despite her giving birth they could not let her through until 7 am. "They kept saying, 'We are just following orders. Just following orders,'" she announced, in a deliberate reference to Nazi army apologists over the Holocaust.

She went on to say the woman gave birth to twins in the ambulance, and after more waiting for hours, finally allowed to proceed at 7 am but both preemies died before she reached the hospital.

After her speech, I approached Baltzer. "Can you give me the name, the checkpoint,
the date and tell me what the IDF investigation of the incident showed?" I asked her.
"I didn't know the IDF investigates such things," she replied. "It's hard to imagine nobody complained, and the Arabs would never miss a sound bite like Israeli soldiers letting two babies die in the press, so there would have been an investigation," I told her.

Pressing on, I asked Baltzer for the woman's name. "Lamis," she said. But she could not give me a last name. "The village?" I pressed on. "Deir Balut," she said, but she could not provide a date. "It's in my book," she said, conveniently on sale in the church's vestibule. She grabbed a copy of Witness in Palestine, her "book" chronicling Israeli abuses and "apartheid." "I can't find the date, but I think it was the day before the date of this chapter," she said, being specific. "Were you there when this happened? Did you interview any of the soldiers?" I asked.

"No" she replied.

"So in other words somebody whose last name you don't know or remember told you this happened and it's listed as fact in your book?"

She drifted away into the crowd.

I should point out the last photo in her manipulated scenes at this event. Baltzer displayed a photo of a Palestinian teenager on a hill throwing a rock at some Israeli police officers at the bottom of the hill who were peacefully standing next to their vehicles. "I don't want to seem to be promoting violence," she said. "But this boy is in his village on his land and the Israeli police have no right to be there." She continued, "If someone broke into your home and invaded it, wouldn't you pick up a lamp and throw it at them to protect your home?" In other scenes where she claimed they showed Palestinians "nonviolently" protesting the "occupation," the Hamas flag was clearly visible in the rear. Hamas in its charter openly advocates the annihilation of Israel's Jews.

So much for the theme of nonviolence at this Sabeel event. Baltzer's remarks were little more than an excuse, a justification, for terrorism while trying to lie about phony Israeli atrocities. It was manipulated tripe, but the audience still gave her a standing ovation.

It was sick to see and hear in a House of Worship, of all places.

10 comments:

Dusty said...

I learned so much at this conference.

One of the reason the big oil folks fund these conferences is to get everyone on the same page with the new, improved Palestinian narrative. (Its a narrative, folks, not "history"- because it didn't actually happen, but we can't let the facts get in our way now, can we?)

The "powers that be" are introducing important changes in the "narrative" as to the origins of the Palestinian people.

For instance- were you told to claim that the Palestinians were the descendants of the Philistines? That didn't work too well, did it? The Philistines themselves were of European origins, and never expanded their kingdom beyond the Southern Mediterranean coast. They weren't Semitic, they were uncircumsized...too problematic....

So the folks in the myth and legend department of the Palestinian propaganda ministry have a new narrative now- better get on the same page, boys and girls.

The Palestinians are now descended from the Phoenicians. Remember that. Be consistent. Sabeel says so. And don't forget- you heard it here first, folks

Becky Johnson said...

BECKY JOHNSON COMMENTS ON SELECTIONS FROM ANNA BALTZER'S "The Forgotten Torture Chambers, Walls, and Economics of the Occupation" -- May 15, 2007

ANNA BALTZER WRITES: "Along our tour we met a farmer named Abu Hashem who used to be one of the richest landowners in Palestine.

BECKY: Does Baltzer have any independent verification of this? Or is she simply accepting his version on its face and reporting it as though its a fact?

ANNA BALTZER: "Of his 8,000 original dunums, only 70 are left after Israel built what Fathi calls, "the Forgotten Wall." East of the major settler highway is a barrier similar in shape and effect to Israel's better-known Apartheid Wall, this one built back in 1971 and reinforced in 1999. From his modest house, Abu Hashem can see past the Wall across the thousands of his dunums that he can never return to, spanning all the way to the Jordan River."

BECKY: If this Abu Hashem (or Father God) truly had his land taken by Israel for a security barrier, then this was done under the laws of eminent domain of the State of Israel. Landowners are compensated for land taken at fair market values. Most likely this farmer didn't really own the land, but was squatting. He should count himself lucky that he got to use the land for his own purposes as long as he did.


ANNA BALTZER: "Abu Hashem's sons alternate years going to university and working on the farm to support the family. Abu Hashem would hire Palestinian laborers so his sons could study full-time, but Israel prohibits Palestinians from bringing in outside workers.

BECKY: There is no such prohibition. However, the IDF does check permits and ID's of Palestinians passing back and forth. Those who present a security risk or are wanted by Israel, don't dare go thru the checkpoints.

ANNA BALTZER: "Another farmer we met said he needs 50 farmers to cultivate his land, but he only has 10, since so many locals have left. Settlements, on the other hand, are free to bring in as much cheap labor from the rest of the West Bank as they like, so long as the Palestinians head back west when they're done so as not to throw off the Judaizing demographic trend."

BECKY: Israel COULD have taken over the West Bank and kicked out ALL the Arabs in 1967 (As Jordan had done to all the Jews when they took over in 1948)but they didn't. Since the presence of employment is the largest incentive for immigration, it's mystifying why "so many locals have left." Baltzer blames Israel but it doesn't make much sense. The Jordan Valley was always a scarsely populated area.
As for a so-called "Judaizing demographic trend" Baltzer plays the race card.

Here she claims that because Jewish settlers hire Palestinian workers for seasonal labor, this "proves" that Israel bases all of its policies on "Judaizing" areas of Israel. This is disingenuous to a high degree. For its illegal to discriminate in Israel based on race or religion.

ANNA BALTZER: "Settlements are towns or communities built by Israel exclusively for Jewish Israelis on land outside the internationally recognized borders of Israel. Settlements are in violation of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibit an occupying power from transferring citizens from its own population to the occupied territory, in this case the West Bank and Gaza. In many languages, the word for “settlement” is the same as the word for “colony.” But in English and Hebrew, a more benign word is used—people living in Israeli settlements are referred to as “settlers,” not “colonizers.”

BECKY: There ARE no "internationally recognized borders." That is part of the reason the conflict never gets settled. Baltzer may be referring to the 1949 cease-fire lines which are not official borders. In 1948, Jordanian armies drove out all Jews from the West Bank and Jerusalem. In 1967, when the Israeli army took control of Jerusalem, the West Bank, and parts of Jordan, Jews re-entered the West Bank to repopulate ancient Judea with Jews per their religious teachings. This did NOT violate Article 49 of the Geneva convention because 1) Israel was not the aggressor in the 1967 war,but were ruled to be the defenders and 2) no resident Arab/Muslim population was transferred OUT nor internally displaced. These Jews started new communities in their ancestral homelands on uninhabited land displacing no one. 3) UN resolution 242 left the Israeli army in charge until a peace agreement could be reached. Israel has already reached a peace agreement with Jordan and Egypt. they tried to reach an agreement with the Palestinians with the Oslo agreement, but Arafat failed to stop Palestinian terrorism and in 2000, Arafat launched his bloody intifada.

READ BALTZER'S ENTIRE ARTICLE AT:
found at: http://annainpalestine.blogspot.com/

Anna said...

I hardly know where to begin to respond to all of the inaccuracies in Kaplan's post. Just about every quotation is incorrect, and I invite readers to view the same presentation online at YouTube to compare (there's even a DVD of the Sabeel conference coming out).

Along with my presentation, I provided a fact-sheet to back up all my statistics (I mentioned this at the end), using sources such as the UN OCHA, Amnesty International, Middle East Policy Council, and other human rights groups. I invite others to download the fact-sheet off my website as well. As I said in my presentation, I actually hope that people don't take my word for it, and instead do the research themselves, but from reliable sources.

Interestingly, I didn't see any references to Kaplan's assertions. For things on which we disagree I would happily refer to sources, if he'd provided any.

In terms of things not immediately refuted by seeing the presentation itself--and I'll skip the Communist hoopla since it has nothing to do with me or my work--I want to reassert to Kaplan, as I did after the talk, that I interviewed Lamis the day after the incident in which she lost her babies. I also wrote about it in my book and on my blog, and have verified that the entry date to which I referred Kaplan was correct (December 21st, 2003).

This should also be verifiable in the IWPS archives (if the ones online don't go back that far I'm sure you could write and request the human rights reports written that week). When Kaplan asked, I said that to my knowledge there had been no investigation conducted by the army on the incident (I didn't say they never investigate--in fact, I've written stories including such investigations).

That said, I hope I was wrong and invite Kaplan to send me the results of the investigation that he seems certain occurred.

I can only assume Kaplan will delete this entry, but thought I'd put it up for as long as it lasts.

Again, don't trust me. But don't trust Kaplan either. Find out for yourselves, and use reliable sources that exist to document the situation, not to advance an agenda.

Anna

Lee Kaplan said...

Reply from Lee Kaplan:

Anna, the ball is in your court: Provide me with Lamis's last name, the exact date and I will galdly research this incident with the IDF. The fact is, you are a serial liar for the PLO. Your presentation was pure propaganda
and designed to misinform those who attended. By the way, how do you account for the Hamas flags in those phtoos of "nonviolent" Palestinians you displayed? Read th Hamas charter.

I never said that you were a communist yourself, Anna, because I really don't know you. However, the organization you speak on behalf of is a communist front group dating back to the 1930s. I rather think you confirmed what I thought about you, but did not write: You are a young Jewish-American woman who has found a sinecure for herself and limited prestige as a published author by being a quisling for the Arabs against other Jews int eh Middle East. That, to me, is far worse than being a true believer as a communist.

Please note also I did not delete your entry. That is the style of the ISM creeps you work for, not me.

Dusty said...

Anna Baltzer made a return apperance to the Bay area
For a review of her talk see:

http://www.bluetruth.net/2008/07/anna-baltzer-out-of-middle-east.html

For more info, see:

www.solomonia.com/blog/archive/2007/11/anna-baltzers-one-virgin-show/

http://winnipeg.indymedia.org/item.php?19357S

arkansas.indymedia.org/newswire/display/22495/index.php

Unknown said...

Kaplan do you have any sources to back up your slander against Anna?

She made her presentation. We can all see it on YouTube. We can all check her sources.

Where are YOUR sources? You mention communism in a review of her speech and expect us to believe you are not trying to discredit her?

It's very cheap of you to make such lame insinuations. Stop with the ad homimem and critique her views empirically rather than in a biased and politicized manner.

andrew123 said...

I didn't see any references to Kaplan's assertions. For things on which we disagree I would happily refer to sources, if he'd provided any.
=================================
Andrew

Houses for sale in Berkeley, CA

MasterAr said...

The basic facts of the matters in the Middle East are a mystery to the world. The Arabs are successful in many decades of de-legitimization propaganda against the Jews, and numerous acts of fabricating “news”, to create this affect. Scrutinizing every little story and placing it in perspective is a complicated task, even for a professional historian.

Now try this – ask any Arab speaker

“What borders of Israel do you accept as legitimate?”

The answer depends on how manipulative he/she is… The fact is, Arabs do not accept ANY legitimacy of Israeli existent. In total defiance of international law (At the same time, they rush to make manipulative use of it to promote a cause which contradicts it in the first place…)

Arabs are consistent. They strive to achieve genocide of all Jews, long before the state of Israel was established. They were allies of the Nazis back in WWII, and after this plot failed, they “joined in” with the Soviets (Masking their activities as “freedom struggle” ,and used socialist terms) they trained in the USSR, and got full support there, in weapons & finance. Then when this failed, they join in with the Iranians…. (“Hamas” is fully financed & trained by the Shia of Iran).

Arabs are quick to demand “equality” in a Jewish state, masking their true goals in the false claim of “human rights struggle”. The very same Arabs have nothing to say to the fact Jews were second degree “citizens” under Islamic rule (“Dhimmies” ), and suffered immensely from Islamic fundamentalism which swept the Islamic world in waves throughout it’s history (no, it is not a new phenomenon…). I would recommend the book on Islam, by Prof. Karsh (head of Middle Eastern studies in the University of London), and watch this video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3pq1KIUZb4&feature=related

It speaks for itself.._

Zach said...

I agree with Kaplan's assertions, and additionally, if you view the UN data, and look at the percentage breakdowns of casualties in the conflict, you'll see that approximate Israeli deaths are 50-50%, indicative of attacks on unarmed civilian populations; Palestinian deaths are 97-3% men to women, indicative of attacks on ARMED COMBATANTS.

I just had to sit through Baltzer today--she never onced mentioned the many unprovoked attacks on Israel in 1948, 1967, 1973 by Arab countries, which allowed Israel to expand its territory legally. She also engages in the same rhetoric battle that the sides she opposes use, calling her grandparents "Holocaust refugees", not survivors, thus trying to group the Jewish struggles as the SAME as the Palestinian struggle. She also claimed that both the one state and two state solutions don't work. Seems to me she just wants Israel to not exist at all?

Lastly, as a Jew I have to say that I am repulsed by her positions. She may have Jewish blood, but her complete rejection of a)all religious conveyance of meaning to her ancestry and b)Jewish claims to the land show just how she can't claim to be Jewish. She uses Judaism to stamp herself as believable to her supporters, but she is a disgrace to my faith.

Dan Kelso said...

The Palestinians have nothing to do with the name Palestine.
The name Palestine is named after the Philistines, not the Palestinians or any Arab group.
The name Palestine was applied by the Romans against the Jews to destroy the name Israel.
It was certainly not directed or bestowed to the Arabs in this area.
The Philistines were from Crete and came to Israel 3000 years ago and were not Arabs or Muslims.
Delilah and Goliath were Philistines. (Philistines died out.) Philistine is the name the Romans renamed Israel as a chagrin against the Jews.
Yassir Arafat was not a Philistine, but an ARAB born in Egypt. Philistine originates from the Hebrew verb Palash, which means to invade. So the Arabs who started to call themselves Palestinians in the late 60's are invaders and they want to create an Invadia state.

There was never in history any state called Palestine governed by Palestinians.
Tell us when did it ever belong to Palestinians? Answer Never. It was never a Pal land to begin with, so your question is invalid.The Palestinians never governed or controlled any land before 1993. To make it simple, please tell me one Palestinian President before 1948? Keep thinking. The Palestinians want a capital, which they never had, in a country that never existed.