(Telegraph-UK) Ian Austin - It is surely ridiculous to believe that a book could be translated into Hebrew, but only if it is done in a way which complies with a boycott of Israel. Why would a publisher pay for the translation but not then sell it in the only country where the language is widely read? But that is exactly what author Sally Rooney appears to think. No one would say that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not important, but with 200 territorial disputes around the world, why do so many only seem to campaign against the world's only Jewish state, a tiny country of just nine million people? Books are routinely translated into Mandarin and sold in China, a country accused of genocide against the Uyghurs. Few object to cultural ties with Russia, where the government imprisons opponents at home and murders them abroad. It is a grotesque slur to call Holocaust survivors who escaped Europe to establish a refuge from centuries of pogroms or the Jews who fled persecution in Middle Eastern countries "settler colonialists." The Israel obsessives hold Israel to standards never applied to other countries but utter not a word about the genocidal terrorists of Hamas who are opposed to any peace agreement, want to wipe Israel off the map, and murder the Jews who live there. Lord Austin is a former Labour MP and chairs the anti-extremism campaign Mainstream.
2021-10-21 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive