The Difference Between Settlements And Settlements

MainOpEdsThere Are Settlements and Settlements There Are Settlements and Settlements Contact Editor Gerald A. Honigman, 10/06/13 22:54 Share Gerald A. Honigman The author is an educator who has done extensive doctoral studies in Mid-East Affairs and has conducted counter-Arab propaganda programs for college youth. He gives lectures and participates in debates around the U.S. Read his new book to be found at http://q4j-middle-east.com. More from the author ► And then, there are settlements. Most people associate the word these days with Jews wanting to return to lands–beyond Israel’s 1949 UN-imposed, 9 to 15 mile wide armistice line existence–which they have called home, lived on, and owned property in for millennia but which much of the world now declares must once again become Judenrein. After the official breakup of the centuries old Ottoman Turkish Empire almost a hundred years ago, the Minutes of the League of Nations’ Permanent Mandates Commission and other solid documentation described a huge influx of Arabs coming into the original 1920, and later post-1922, Mandate of Palestine. The original area included all of present day Jordan as well as Gaza, Judea and Samaria (“West Bank”), Israel, and even the Golan Heights. Arabs poured in largely because of the explosive economic activity going on due to the Jews. While there were some Arabs living in the land earlier, the huge increase in their own population was no doubt related to this immigration from outside of the Mandate--Arab settlerssetting up Arab settlements in Palestine. Some critics of the return of the Jews from forced exile like to cite sayings of 19th century Christian theologians, “a land without a people for a people without a land,” as alleged “proof” of the unfairness of the Zionist endeavor. Certainly, while all national movements are flawed and come with their own blindspots, one thing is certain to anyone who has studied the conflict between Arab and Jew in the land. While there was some naiveté, Jews did not simply opt to deny the Arab presence and repeatedly tried to reach fair accomodation. What compromises has Arab nationalism–in its many assorted species–ever made with any of its own competitors? The most “right wing/hardline” of the Zionist leaders–the one which you might have expected the “worst” from–openly admitted Arab political rights in the region…but relative rights, not solely self-centered, absolute ones. Listen to these excerpts from Jabotinsky’s Evidence Submitted To The Palestine Royal Commission in London in 1937 on this very subject: “I have the profoundest feeling for the Arab case, in so far as that case is not exaggerated. I have also shown to you tha there is no question of ousting the Arabs. On the contrary, the idea is that Palestine on both sides of the Jordan should hold the Arabs and Jews. What I do not deny is that in that process the Arabs of Palestine will become a minority.What I do deny is that that is a hardship. It is not a hardship on any race, any nation possessing so many National States now and so many more National States in the future. One fraction, one branch and not a big one, will have to live in someone else’s State: Well, that is the case with all the mightiest nations of the world. That is only normal and there is no “hardship” attached to that. So when we hear the Arab claim confronted with the Jewish claim, I fully understand that any minority would prefer to be a majority. It is quite understandable that the Arabs would also prefer Palestine to be the Arab State No. 4, No. 5. or No. 6 (today # 22, ed.); but when the Arab claim is confronted with our Jewish demand to be saved, it is like the claims of appetite versus starvation.” Is it not a concern that the same scholars, diplomats, organizations, and other would-be sources of ethical enlightenment who enjoy taking Israel to task never seem interested in turning this issue around on the Arabs’ own nationalist agenda? After all, there is no doubt that Arabs have too often acted as if lands that they had no prior connections to–but conquered and forcibly Arabized (clear up to the present day) from scores of millions of native, non-Arab peoples– were lands without peoples (at least peoples deserving of any of their own political rights) for a people not without land–but claiming all other peoples’ lands in the region as merely additional Arab possessions as well. The following is a typical example of how the Arabs and Arabized explained this: The Sudan’s ex-president, Gaafar Muhammad al-Nimeiry, proclaimed “The Sudan is the basis of the Arab thrust into… black Africa, the Arab civilizing mission (“Arabism and Pan-Arabism in Sudanese Politics,” Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 11, no. 2, 1973, pp. 177-78). Now ponder that a moment. While many are quick to criticize Jewish nationalism (Zionism) for its real and fictional human flaws and who readily identify Rudyard Kipling’s late 19th-century poem, “The White Man’s Burden,” as typifying Western colonialist and imperialist attitudes towards the Third World, why are such blatantly Arab imperialist and racist attitudes and mindsets routinely given free passes? Is it that the Arab Man’s Burden is morally acceptable but that of the Jews’ and The White Man’s are not? Okay, let’s return to the Arab settlement issue in the post-World War I Mandate of Palestine. When the United Nations Relief Works Agency (UNRWA) was set up to assist Arab refugees, after a half dozen Arab states invaded a nascent Israel in 1948 to nip it in the bud and their attempt backfired, the very word “refugee” had to be redefined to assist newly arrived Arab settlers. So many Arabs were recent arrivals into the Palestinian Mandate that UNRWA had to adjust the very definition from its prior meaning of persons normally and traditionally resident to those who lived in the Mandate for a minimum of only two years prior to 1948. Please grasp the depth of what this is saying. Hamas’s own virtual “patron saint,” Sheikh Izz ad-Din al-Qassam (for whom the rockets and terror brigade are named), came from Latakia, Syria–along with numerous other newcomers. For more information on the much neglected Arab aspect of this settlement topic, please clickhere.  Leading contemporary politicians were aware of this huge increase in Arab population due to immigration as well. Before leaving the virtually ignored Arab angle on this timely subject, there is another twist, hinted to above, on the settlement issue which involves another rarely-discussed topic–the Arabs’ own internal imperial and colonial policies--ones which led to their conquest and forced Arabization of much, if not most, of the region in the first place. This is how Arabs get to claim over six million square miles of territory, in almost two dozen states, solely for themselves (“purely Arab patrimony,” in their own words)–not to mention the heavy Arabization of other non-Arab–but Muslim–states as well. Israel sits on less than one half of one percent of the region. As my own book documents in detail, such subjugation continues to victimize, to this very day, scores of millions of native, non-Arab peoples. In just one additional example, consider how a North African Amazigh (“Berber”) spokesman described this tragic situation. Unlike Arabs demanding a 22nd state on the ashes of the sole, minuscule, resurrected state of the Jews, he represents tens of millions of truly stateless people in the region. Follow excerpts from this Special Dispatch of MEMRI on May 3, 2007 written by Belkacem Lounes of the World Amazigh Congress. He was responding to Libya’s late Mu’ammar Qaddafi’s all-too-typical Arab denial of the very existence of the Amazigh people: “The people of whom you speak speak their own Amazigh language daily,live their Amazigh identity. What worse offense to elementary rights is there than denying the existence of a people? You menace the Amazigh, warning that whosoever asserts his identity will be a traitor (identical problems in Algeria and Morocco). There is no worse colonialism than internal colonialism–that of the Pan-Arabist claim that seeks to dominate our people. It is surely Arabism–an imperialist ideology that refuses diversity–that constitutes an offense to history and truth.” Substitute the Arabs’ “kilab yahud” (Jew dogs), Kurds, Copts, black African Sudanese, Assyrians, and so forth for the above victimized Imazighen and you will see the consequences and scope of the Arabs’ own far more serious, subjugating settlement problem. Perhaps even more disturbing than the highly selective Arab problem with the issue of settlements is the non-Arab approach to this topic. Besides the Arabs’ own internal imperial games noted above, nations external to the region also have a long history of imperial conquest, colonialism, and settlement of other peoples’ lands–often thousands of miles away from home. Beyond ironic, these are often the same folks who lecture Jews that they have no right to live beyond their earlier assigned post-World War II, nine to fifteen mile-wide ghetto of a state in lands where not only Jewish kings were crowned, but Jewish patriarchs and matriarchs were buried, Jewish prophets preached, and Jews lived clear up to their slaughter by Arabs in the early 20th century. While others besides Great Britain have been indulging in such disturbing behavior (the Obama Administration’s love affair with the alleged Saudi “peace” {pieces ?} plan comes to mind, demanding Israel abandon UNSC Res. 242′s call for secure, more defensible borders and return instead to the status quo ante of June 4, 1967), it’s the Brits’ continuous blatant hypocrisy which has prompted this article. In a late May 2013 visit to Israel, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said that settlements have cost the nation support in Britain and Europe. My initial response was to laugh. Firstly, it was one of Hague’s earlier colleagues, back in 1967, who was the chief architect of the final draft of 242. Here’s yet more key excerpts--these from what Lord Caradon had to say about the issue of Jews being forced back into their sardine can: “It would have been wrong to demand Israel return to positions of June 4, 1967. Those positions were artificial, just places where soldiers of each side happened to be on the day fighting stopped in 1948--just armistice lines. That’s why we didn’t demand Israelis return to them.” Next, Hague represents the same Europe which has a legacy of almost two thousand years of demonization, dehumanization, ghettoization, massacre, expulsion, and genocide towards its Jewish population. In “enlightened” England, Benjamin Disraeli still could have never become Prime Minister had his father not converted him to Christianity as a boy. After dealing with the supreme chutzpah of the moment, however, I then contemplated how truly disgusting such hypocrisy was/is. I have dealt with this earlier, such as when comparing Great Britain’s claims over the Falkland Islands off the Argentine coast (over 8,000 miles from the British Isles) with its complaints about Jews living in Judea But the new pressure from the British Foreign Secretary (designed to assist Team Obama’s own attempts to squeeze the Jews since Arabs have repeatedly stated that, in any renewed “negotiations,” their task will simply be to accept what Jews will be forced to unilaterally concede) demands a further expose of just how outrageous such demands really are. Settlements ? The following is a list of Great Britain’s fourteen “Overseas Territories”–settlements, by another name. They form just a very small part of Great Britain’s current worldwide acquisitions and associations which exist via earlier British imperial conquests and colonial exploits. Many other territories (such as India) gained independence earlier: Akrotiri and Dhekelia, Anguilla, Bermuda, British Antarctic Territory, British Indian Ocean Territory, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Falkland Islands, Gibraltar, Montserrat, Pitcairn Islands, Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, Turks and Caicos Islands. Together, they include a land area of approximately 667,018 square miles (1,727,570 square kilometers). Israel within its pre-’67 war, United Nations-imposed, 1949 Auschwitz/armistice lines was 8,019 square miles or 20,770 square kilometers–about the size of New Jersey. Many other nations now demanding that Jews refrain from living in places like east Jerusalem–where the remains of the Jewish Temple of Solomon stand (with an Arab Muslim shrine of conquest deliberately built atop it) and where Jews have thousands of years of history linking them–have track records of foreign conquest and acquisition similar to, if not as extensive, as Great Britain’s. American Samoa–but no Jew in Samaria. Really ? The point to all of this, of course, is that, amidst all the barbarism and turmoil daily going on in the so-called “Arab” world, in any discussion of the settlement issue regarding Arab-Israeli politics, the Arabs’ own internal imperial and colonial settlement policies must also be taken into account along with those of Israel’s other external critics. And that rarely–if ever–occurs. www.geraldahonigman.com

Freedom Of Speech In Netherlands, Non-Existent

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No Justice in the Netherlands by Judith Bergman October 24, 2016 at 5:00 am https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9171/geert-wilders-justice Share81   Comment It is deeply troubling that the court already before the criminal trial has even begun, so obviously compromises its own impartiality and objectivity. Are other European courts also quietly submitting to jihadist values of curtailing free speech and "inconvenient" political views? If you are a politician and concerned about the future welfare of your country, you should be able to discuss the pertinent issues of the day, including problems with immigrants and other population groups. Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights states that: "Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers..." In its case law, the Court has stated that Article 10 "...protects not only the information or ideas that are regarded as inoffensive but also those that offend, shock or disturb; such are the demands of that pluralism, tolerance and broad-mindedness without which there is no democratic society. Opinions expressed in strong or exaggerated language are also protected". Wilders did not incite to violence or prosecution (or humiliation), nor did he jeopardize national security or public safety. Clearly, in the Netherlands, justice is no longer blind and the courts no longer independent and impartial state institutions. A court in The Hague decided on October 14 that the charges of hate speech against Dutch politician Geert Wilders, for statements he made in March 2014 at a political rally, are admissible in a court of law. It thereby rejected the Wilders' appeal to throw out the charges as inadmissible in a court of law on the grounds that these are political issues and that a trial would in fact amount to a political process. The criminal trial against Wilders will begin on Monday, October 31. While campaigning in The Hague in March 2014, Wilders argued the need for fewer Moroccans in the Netherlands. At an election meeting in The Hague, he asked those present a number of questions, one of which was "Do you want more or fewer Moroccans?" After the crowd responded "fewer" Wilders said, "We're going to organize that." Geert Wilders during his March 2014 speech, where he asked "Do you want more or fewer Moroccans?" (Image source: nos.nl video screenshot) Because of the "fewer Moroccans" statements, repeated again in an interview a few days later, Wilders will be prosecuted on two counts: First for "deliberately insulting a group of people because of their race." Second, for "inciting hatred or discrimination against these people." Wilders' defense attorney, Geert Jan Knoops, has argued that the trial amounts to a political trial against Wilders and his party, the PVV: "Sensitive issues must be judged by public opinion or through the ballot box,", Knoops said "The Prosecutor is indirectly asking for a ruling over the functioning of the PVV and its political program. The court must not interfere with this." As a politician, Wilders can say more than an ordinary citizen, Knoops said, arguing that Wilders used his statements to point out shortcomings in the Dutch state. "It is his duty to name shortcomings. He takes that responsibility and proposes solutions." Knoops argued that the prosecutor is limiting Wilders' freedom of speech by prosecuting him for his statements. The court's response was that although politicians are entitled to freedom of expression, they should "avoid public statements that feed intolerance" and that the trial would determine where the border lies between politicians' freedom of expression and their obligation, as the court sees it, to avoid public statements that feed intolerance. Other politicians, notably all from the Labour Party, have uttered the following about Moroccans without being prosecuted: "We also have sh*t Moroccans over here." -- Rob Oudkerk, a Dutch Labour Party (PvDA) politician. "We must humiliate Moroccans." -- Hans Spekman, PvDA politician. "Moroccans have the ethnic monopoly on trouble-making." -- Diederik Samsom, PvDA politician. The court discarded Wilders' defense attorney's argument that the failure to prosecute any of these politicians renders the trial against Wilders discriminatory. The court said that because of the different time, place and context of the statements of other politicians, they cannot be equated with the statements of Mr. Wilders and for that reason, the court considers that there has been no infringement of the principle of equality. The statements of those other politicians, however, were, objectively speaking, far worse in their use of language ("sh*t Moroccans") and what could be considered direct incitement ("We must humiliate Moroccans"). What other time, place and context could possibly make the above statements more acceptable than asking whether voters would like more or fewer Moroccans? And what circumstances render it legitimate to call someone "sh*t" because of their ethnic origin? It is deeply troubling that the court already in its preliminary ruling, and before the criminal trial itself has even begun, so obviously compromises its own impartiality and objectivity. To the outside world, this court no longer appears impartial. Are other European courts also quietly submitting to jihadist values of curtailing free speech and "inconvenient" political views? The Netherlands is a party to the European Convention of Human Rights. This means that Dutch courts are obligated to interpret domestic legislation in a way compatible with the ECHR and the case law of the European Court on Human Rights. Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights states: 1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers... 2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary. In its case law, the European Court of Human Rights has stated[1] that Article 10 "...protects not only the information or ideas that are regarded as inoffensive but also those that offend, shock or disturb; such are the demands of that pluralism, tolerance and broad-mindedness without which there is no democratic society. Opinions expressed in strong or exaggerated language are also protected". Even more important in the context of the trial against Wilders is the fact that according to the European Court of Human Rights' case law, "...the extent of protection depends on the context and the aim of the criticism. In matters of public controversy or public interest, during political debate, in electoral campaigns... strong words and harsh criticism may be expected and will be tolerated to a greater degree by the Court". [emphasis added] Let us review what Wilders said and the context in which he said it: "Do you want more or fewer Moroccans?" After the crowd responded "fewer" Wilders said, "We're going to organize that." He repeated that statement in a subsequent interview, where he said, "The fewer Moroccans, the better." The context in which he said it was an election campaign in March 2014 against the backdrop of considerable problems with Moroccans in the Netherlands. According to Dutch journalist Timon Dias: Statistics show that 65% of all Moroccan youths have been arrested by police, and that one third of that group have been arrested more than five times. Wilders emphasizes the inordinate costs associated with the disproportionately high number of Dutch Moroccans registered as social welfare beneficiaries and who are implicated in welfare fraud. Now, if you are a politician and concerned about the future welfare of your country, you should, logically, be able to discuss the pertinent issues of the day, including existing problems with immigrants and other population groups. This discussion will only make sense in a democratic society if it takes place in public, and certainly with voters at a political rally during an election campaign. Asking whether voters want fewer Moroccans in their city or country may seem crude to some and offensive to others. However, in the light of the case law of the European Human Rights Court, which specifically protects political speech with a very wide margin, especially that of political actors and political campaigns, it is very difficult to see, if not impossible, how the question Wilders posed could legitimately be covered by article 10 (2). According to article 10 (2), freedom of speech can be limited when "necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary." Wilders did not incite to violence or prosecution (or humiliation), nor did he jeopardize national security or public safety or any of the other concerns noted above. It is more difficult to see how the statement, "We must humiliate Moroccans" by Labour politician Hans Spekman, who was not prosecuted, could be legitimized, as it constitutes direct incitement to some form of humiliating action towards Moroccans. Then again, Hans Spekman is not Geert Wilders. Clearly, in the Netherlands, justice is no longer blind and the courts no are longer independent and impartial state institutions. This should deeply concern all Dutch citizens. Judith Bergman is a writer, columnist, lawyer and political analyst. [1] Monica Macovei: A guide to the implementation of Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, p 16, (Human rights handbooks, No. 2, 2004). © 2016 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

Palestinians Start War And Then Claim They Are Harmed! Trouble Is ICC Believes Them.

Palestinians Officially File Israeli 'War Crimes' Charges at ICC

 July 2, 2015   0 Comment

Author(s):  Diaa Hadid
Source:  NewYork Times.     Article date: July 3rd, 2015

Palestinians on Wednesday, July 01 2015 prepared to submit to the International Criminal Court what they called evidence of Israeli war crimes, a move that will saddle the beleaguered, overstretched court with a new and potentially long-running headache.

The effort is part of the Palestinians’ campaign to punish Israel in the international arena and to advance their push for a state. It signals Palestinian defiance against Israeli threats of retaliation and underscores the breakdown of peace talks.

It comes on the heels of a United Nations Commission of Inquiry report released Monday, which found that both Israel and Palestinian militants might have committed war crimes in last summer’s conflict in Gaza. Palestinians are likely to incorporate parts of the 217-page report into the files they submit Thursday to the court, based at The Hague.

“We offered information on Israeli violations to international law which could amount to war crimes, and the aim is to convince the chief prosecutor to open an investigation that could lead to her making charges,” said Ghassan Khatib, the vice president of Birzeit University in the West Bank and a member of the Palestinian committee tasked with following up at the international court.

The Palestinian foreign minister, Riad al-Malki, is to give the files to the chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda.

The files are expected to contain mostly information already in the public record and are unlikely to have any immediate impact. The documents are meant to help Ms. Bensouda continue the preliminary examination that she began in January after the Palestinians moved to join the court. The move gives her the authority to look into crimes that occurred on Palestinian land since last July, when the war in Gaza began between fighters for Hamas, the Islamist militant group that controls the territory, and Israel.

Ms. Bensouda has yet to open an official investigation, and any indictment, which international court judges must approve, is a long way off.

The Palestinian case presents a delicate challenge for the international court as well, both legal and political. Because Israel has said it will not cooperate with any investigation, the prosecutor could, in turn, be accused of being one-sided.

It comes as the court is struggling to maintain its own credibility. It has no capacity to enforce its judgments, depending instead on governments around the world to do so. That is why it has not been able to secure the arrest of Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, who has been indicted on charges of genocide, or most of the others it has charged with war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

The court has won very few convictions. And it has been accused of unfairly targeting Africans, a charge the prosecutor, who is from Gambia, has vigorously rebutted.

The Palestinians could offer the court a chance to show that it is able to go after some of the most powerful people in the world, including Israelis, if necessary. On the other hand, the Palestinian case is likely to engender the most vigorous resistance, including from the United States, said Mark Ellis, president of the International Bar Association. Joining the international court represents perhaps the sharpest pressure point on Israel, which is not a member of the court and disputes the notion that it should face charges in an international tribunal.

“The court is going to be asked to deal with the most complicated conflict we have seen,” he said. “I think that’s a big ask for the court.”

Israel’s most important ally, the United States, has already said it is unhelpful for the Palestinians to make “unilateral” moves.

And it places other supporters of the court, particularly Europeans, in a tough spot. Should any Israelis face indictment, every country that is a member of the International Criminal Court, including Israeli allies like Germany, France and Britain, would be legally obliged to arrest them if they stepped onto members’ territory.

Israeli officials this week rebuffed French overtures to restart peace talks with the backing of a United Nations Security Council resolution. No such draft is likely to come up in the Council anytime soon.

Israeli officials maintain that their own justice system is sufficient to investigate their military’s actions. It has released its own updates of investigations into attacks in the Gaza war.

Still, the United Nations report said Israeli forces in Gaza had acted with “impunity” and described Israel as having a “lamentable track record in holding wrongdoers accountable.” The court was established to take on the gravest cases in which a state is unwilling or unable to investigate or prosecute in its own courts.

An Israeli official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, said: “We see this as a hostile move. The I.C.C. was established to deal with cases where there is no functioning legal system. And that obviously is not the case when dealing with Israel.”

The files that the Palestinians will hand over name individual Israelis accused of committing crimes, the Palestine Liberation Organization said in a statement. The Palestinian officials would not name the Israelis they identified. The files will cover the period from April 2014 to April 2015, officials said.

“All violations were documented in this regard, including annexation, settlement displacement, house demolition and preventing Palestinians from using their lands,” said Walid Assaf, the head of a committee that monitors Israeli settlement activity for the Palestine Liberation Organization, speaking on Palestinian radio on Wednesday. “We are talking about 1,856 violations, in addition to violations by settlers under the army protection and support.”

Other documents cover the 50-day war with Hamas last summer. Hundreds of Palestinian civilians were killed in that conflict, the homes of tens of thousands were destroyed, and hospitals and other facilities were badly damaged by bombing and shelling.

To punish Palestinians for joining the court, Israel withheld millions of dollars in tax revenue that was meant to be transferred to the Palestinian Authority, causing sharp budget shortfalls.

The United States, which provides the Palestinian Authority with about $400 million annually, is unlikely to take any immediate steps. Its most immediate difficulty with Israel is generated not by the Palestinian move, but by a nuclear deal it is negotiating with Iran, which has infuriated the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel.

“Obama’s priority is to sell the Iranian agreement, full stop,” said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East adviser to Democratic and Republican administrations, “not to open another front with Congress and Israel over the I.C.C.”

Ayers: Try Obama For War Crimes

Want to read a strange interview, look the following post by Greg Richter. In it Bill Ayers of Chicago and Weather Underground fame says that he admires Obama but believes that he should be tried at the Hague for war crimes.

Has Ayers lost it or is just a crackpot?

Conservative Tom

Bill Ayers: Try Obama for War Crimes

Tuesday, 18 Jun 2013 09:20 PM

By Greg Richter

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Former Weather Underground leader Bill Ayers, who was involved in bombing the Pentagon and U.S. Capitol building in the early 1970s, says President Barack Obama should be tried for war crimes.

Appearing on Real Clear Politics' "Morning Commute,"Ayers said every president enters "an office dripping with blood and then adds to it."

Ayers had been asked by co-host Charlie Stone if Obama, as the sole authority for Drone use, was engaged in terrorist activity.

"Absolutely," Ayers answered.

"Do you think Barack Obama should be put on trial for war crimes?" Stone asked.

"Absolutely," Ayers responded. "Every president in this century should be put on trial" for war crimes in The Hague.

"Yes, I think these are war crimes," Ayers said. "I think they're acts of terror."

Ayers, who also is a retired professor of education, gave Obama a failing grade.

"I don't at all feel like Obama's let anybody down," Ayers said, explaining that throughout the 2008 campaign Obama consistently said "I am a middle-of-the-road, pragmatic politician."

Still, Ayers likes his former Chicago neighbor personally.

"He's a curious person," Ayers said. "One of the things I like about him is he's curious. He wants to know things. He asks questions. He's not just charming, he's also interested. He reads. … And I liked him personally. I mean, he's a really good guy."

During his race for the White House in 2008, Obama's associations with Ayers were questioned. GOP vice presidental nominee Sarah Palin accused Obama of "palling around with terrorists," for his connections to Ayers.

Obama denied any close ties with Ayers, calling him "just a guy who lived in my neighborhood."

Ayers admitted in an interview with The Daily Beast  that some of the things said about him and Obama, such as serving on boards together and Ayers holding a fundraiser for Obama in his living room, are true.

"Today, I wish I knew him better and he was listening to me," Ayers told The Daily Beast.
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