Tuesday, 8 December 2015

Israel vs. Sweden

A few days ago, the Swedish foreign secretary, Margot Wallström referred to the recent spate of stabbings of Israelis by Palestinians – which she called “terrible”, adding that “they must not happen” and that “Israel had the right to defend itself.” However, Wallström also said that the response can not be “extrajudicial executions.”

Israel reacted to the Swedish foreign secretary with fury: The Israeli press was soon filled by statements about anti-Semitism in Sweden and Netanyahu suggested that the Swedish foreign secretary in her “scandalous remarks…expects Israelis to bare their throats to those trying to stab them.” 

Despite Sweden’s attempt to explain that it had not accused Israel of extrajudicial executions, it is clear that Wallström referred to the fact that since the stabbings had started, Israeli soldiers, policemen and civilians have shot to kill the attackers. Israeli politicians, who called on every Israeli with a gun license to carry a gun, have also called for a shoot to kill approach.


So, why is it ok for Israeli politicians to support shoot to kill and wrong for a foreign politician, to refer to it as “extrajudicial execution” - which shooting to kill rather than shooting to disable, in fact is -?

2 comments:

  1. The recent terrorist attack in Paris had nothing whatsoever to do with Israel. Not even the terrorists themselves or their supporters claimed that.

    Nevertheless when Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom was asked about the terror attack in Paris, she responded, “To counteract the radicalization we must go back to the situation such as the one in the Middle East of which not the least the Palestinians see that there is no future: we must either accept a desperate situation or resort to violence.”

    The connection between "Paris" and Israel was entirely of Wallström`s making.

    Similarly she is content to refer to the stabbing - killing! - of Jewish cicilians routinely as "terrible", but she is much more concerned to warn Israel against "extrajudicial shootings" of the killers.

    This is exactly what modern European antisemites sound like.

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