FATHER FRANK’S RANTS Rant Number 650 7 October 2015 NETANYAHU’S SHAME

THE ISRAELI PM SAYS NO TO SYRIAN REFUGEES. A SPITEFUL AND MYOPIC POLICY.
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‘Israel is a very small country that lacks demographic and geographic depth’, intoned hypocritically PM Bibi Netanyahu. It was a ruthless ‘Nein!’ to sheltering any Syrian refugees. Compassion for the suffering neighbours? Women, children and old people? The hard-hearted fellow does not care. They are Arab aliens. To hell with them!

‘Love the sojourner…for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt’, says the Lord in Deuteronomy. (10:19). Reinforced by ‘You shall not oppress a stranger or wrong him, because you were a stranger in the land of Egypt’, Israel’s God commands in Exodus (23:21). ‘I am wronging no one! I am looking after my own people’, I can hear Bibi’s squawks of protest. But some omissions as just as morally bad as some actions. If you saw a child drowning near you and you could save him but did nothing, you would be rightly execrated by all. It is shocking, disgusting that descendants of Jews who have been persecuted and massacred should refuse to help others human beings - literally neighbours - in the same predicament.

Compassion, actively exercised, is one of the noblest human characteristics. One that differentiates men from brute beasts. But I admit that compassion should not prevent a statesman from thinking, reasoning about the likely consequences of his political steps. Netanyahu’s reasons are faulty, however.

Geography is invoked to justify callousness. Israel is small. That is true. 8015 square miles. But so is tiny Lebanon. Even smaller. Only 4015 sq miles. Half Israel’s size. And it lacks the massive financial and military aid America gives to Israel. Yet Lebanon has given asylum to more than a million fleeing Syrians! Hence the geographic argument is arrant nonsense.

What about demography? I take it Israel’s PM is worried about the refugees ‘breeding like rabbits’ and offsetting the ethnic balance of the Jewish state. Again, rubbish. The Syrian civil war will not go on for ever. When, God willing, it is over, the refugees will gladly opt to go back to their own country. Why should they desire to stay in a foreign, not-so-amicable land? Besides, you can bet your boots Bibi would make damn sure they have little inducements to remain.

‘But their children meanwhile born in Israel will be entitled to citizenship’, another excuse goes. Fiddlesticks! No doubt Bibi and his ilk can pass laws to bar that. Where there is a will there is a way. Clearly, Netanyahu’s will is to shut the door, regardless of circumstances.

To be fair, the chief of Israel’s opposition, Herzog, has attacked the PM’s insensitivity. And so has the left-leaning Meretz party. Not all Israelis should be tarred over with Bibi’s rough brush. And there are many noble Jews who wish to abide by the higher ethical standards of the Jewish religion. Thanks God for that!

Israeli response to human suffering contrasts starkly with that of Germany. The former cradle of the III Reich, the nation historically associated with racial exclusivity and the attempt to create the Superman, has outdone all other peoples in welcoming lowly immigrants from the Middle East. Angela Merkel has offered to take in 800.000 this year and probably half a million a year thereafter. An unwise move, some opine (where are the infrastructures? What about, to echo David Cameron, social cohesion?), but still a hugely impressive policy. Never mind obvious differences in culture and religion, Germany has welcomed the refugees. Israel has not.

Although Bibi may not state it bluntly, most Syrians are Muslims. That must make them especially undesirable to the Jewish state. Odd, if you think about it. When the Inquisition threw out Jews from Catholic Spain centuries back, the nations in which they were given asylum and hospitality were Muslim ones. The Ottoman Empire was especially welcoming. Jews on the whole did very well under the Sultan’s rule. Indeed, financially well. The man who financed the Turkish conquest of Cyprus in 1571 was Don Jose’ Nasi, a wealthy Marrano, a Sephardi Jew of Portuguese origins. Similarly, many Jews fleeing intolerant Catholic Europe, prospered in Arab countries. Ironic that the Jewish state today should show itself so unwilling to repay the debt…

How many refugees should Israel take? I say as many as a million. Wot! Is the priest nuts? But the Zionist nation already puts up with 1.700 million Arabs within its borders, quite apart from those in the occupied West Bank. And Gaza is well 1.816 million people. One million refugees would not be impossible to accommodate – temporarily. And the Yanks might help.

Suicidal for the Jewish state? Self-destruction? On the contrary, it would be a fabulously positive message sent out to the whole Middle East, to Europe, to all the world. Generosity, hospitality, mercy and love. It would tremendously enhance Israel’s reputation among the Gentiles. That is what God sent the Prophet Isaiah to proclaim:

‘…I have called you in righteousness, I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out prisoners from the dungeons, from the prison those who sit in darkness’.

I pray that it may be so, despite spiteful Bibi.

Revd Frank Julian Gelli

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