Nick Cohen is paid a great deal of money for publishing hate speech, and he has just published his most hate-ridden piece yet. It is hate-ridden because it is about the question of Israel, without including one single word of concern for the plight of the Palestinians or one single mention of Israeli occupations, land grabs, shootings and bombings. Cohen shows massive concern for British Jews whose collective feelings he claims were terribly hurt by the election of Jeremy Corbyn. [No, honestly, he really does say that, read his article.] He shows no concern whatsoever for the Palestinian children who get shot or beaten by occupying Israeli forces every single week.
Cohen is hate-filled also in what he says about Stephen Sizer, the Anglican cleric who campaigns for the rights of Palestinians.
Cohen describes Stephen as “an Anglican cleric who linked to extremist sites that blamed Jews for 9/11, and his defence of an Islamist who recycled the libel that Jews dined on the blood of Christian children from the bottom of a medieval dung heap.”
But as Cohen in fact knows extremely well, the Islamic cleric in question, Raed Saleh, consistently denied saying anything of the kind, and a British court determined that he should not be banned from the UK. This was rather a campaign against Saleh by one of Cohen’s fellow pro-Israeli propagandists.
For Cohen to continue the campaign against Saleh is hate speech. It is deliberate Islamophobia. It is astonishing that he is allowed to do this in corporate media.
The other point he makes against Stephen Sizer is also a deliberate misrepresentation. Cohen says Sizer “linked to extremist sites that blamed Jews for 9/11”. Cohen knows that the article to which Sizer linked was perfectly respectable. Elsewhere on that website there was indeed objectionable material which Sizer had not seen. It is a mistake which every blogger has made, including me, and Stephen has apologised for it.
I know Stephen Sizer and travelled to Baghdad with him a couple of years ago. Stephen does not have a racist bone in his body and for Cohen to claim otherwise is absolutely disgusting hate speech.
Note that Cohen does not name Sizer and Saleh. He calls them an “Anglican cleric” and an “islamist”. This is because Cohen is not only a liar, he is a coward. If he named them he could be sued for libel.
Personally I do not believe Israel should exist. I do not want a two state solution. I see Israel pursuing the same policies as apartheid South Africa, only with more violence, and I view the “two state solution” as a repeat of the Bantustan policy. I wish to see a single state in Palestine where all who currently live there are welcome and all are equal, whatever their religion or race, in a single democratic and secular state.
Nick Cohen will tell you that is anti-Semitism. But then Nick Cohen hates me. He hates anybody who speaks the truth about Israel.
This post was updated more accurately to reflect the tribunal ruling