Following the murder at Itamar, Gilad Sharon, son of PM Ariel Sharon, published this piece on Israel’s most important tabloid, Yedioth Ahronoth. It pretty much speaks for itself. The only thing that needs to be added is that recently, the young Sharon has joined Kadima – a supposedly center-left party led by Tzipi Livni.
The article was translated and posted in English on the rightwing Israel National News (Arutz 7) site. bold is mine:
Gilad Sharon: PA Nationalism is Only an Offshoot of Zionism
by Gilad Sharon
Let us not forget with whom we are dealing here. You can take the wild Palestinian beast and put a mask on it, in the form of some fluent English-speaking spokesman. You can also put on it a three-piece suit and a silk tie. But every once in a while – during a new moon, or when a crow’s droppings hit a howling jackal, or when pita with hyssop doesn’t come out just right – the wild beast senses that this is its night, and out of ancient instinct, it sets off to stalk its prey.
They’ll explain to us, and we’ll also explain to ourselves, how nice and beautiful peace is. We will argue excitedly and with deep inner conviction whether there should be an immediate peace agreement, or perhaps a series of interim agreements. We will discuss these and other such questions, all based on the assumption that on the other side they also think like us and also want quiet and tranquility.
But such an assumption is a rape of reality. A society that can thus sanctify death, and whose best of its youth are baby-stabbers, is simply not like ours. Even their leaders… condemn these acts only by claiming that they “harm the Palestinian cause.” There’s no moral issue here; it’s just a question of harm to the cause. Their three-piece suit is sullied with blood stains, and the mask falls off… and the image of the beast they tried to hide is once again revealed.
They look at us. We are everything they never were and never will be. We have a history and culture thousands of years old, we have a functioning, developing society – while they are just the offshoot of our Zionism. Their entire national story was born in the wake of Zionism. Even their self-definition as a people has no subsistence without us.They look at themselves through our image. The more we succeed and progress, the more their hatred intensifies. We are the proof that it is possible to do it differently, that failures are not the result of destiny, but primarily of decisions and actions.
In any arrangement that might or might not come about, remember with whom we are dealing. Our security must always remain in our hands.
Update: here is a scan of the Hebrew original.
March 14, 2011
7:40 am
Do you have a link to the original Yediot article in Hebrew?
March 14, 2011
7:51 am
@Julian: Just added.
March 14, 2011
8:34 am
The mask is removed – revealing the reality of Zionism.
March 14, 2011
8:36 am
I think you people should learn to look under the surface of politicians and their public utterances. Remember, his Papa was persona non grata by the Left for many years because of the Lebanon I war, but today that has been forgiven and he is respected if not loved by them for the reason that he destroyed Gush Katif, stuck it to the settlers who helped bring him to power and it seemed for a while that he had destroyed the Likud. What more could the Left ask for? Give Gilad a chance. After all, he was one of the major forces behind getting papa to do what the Left wanted.
Sure he is making some “right wing” utterances. Shortly before Papa decided to destroy Gush Katif, he said “Netzarim is the same as Tel Aviv”. Sonny boy is learning from Papa, you play up to the Right in KADIMA, use them to get into power, and then once you are there, you don’t need them any and you can do what you (or more correctly) or the Left Establishment wants. Just have a little patience!
March 14, 2011
9:09 am
Ben Israel, where do you get the idea that we respect Ariel Sharon? He unilaterally withdrew 8,000 people from the Gaza Strip with no coordination with the Palestinian Authority, presumably so that it would be the catastrophe that it turned out to be, so that he could point at it and say, “Look, this is why we can’t withdraw from the West BAnk.” Who is this left that you know that respects him?
March 14, 2011
9:43 am
Richard Allen-
What you say is incorrect. Just before he collapsed, Sharon was telling everyone that he intended to carry out a further unilateral withdrawal to the security wall, expelling something like another 100,000 settlers. (I saw this reported on the blog of writer/journalist Matt Beynon Rees who spoke to Sharon something like two days before he collapsed). He didn’t want the withdrawal to be a disaster. This is the closest we every came to having a Palestinian state close to the pre-67 lines and it would have worked precisely because it was NOT coordinated. This is because the Palestinians would never have to make any concessions. They could still demand the right of return of the refugees and maintain their semi-state of war with Israel, leaving everybody happy. Olmert, for whatever reason, gave this approach and and went back to the fruitless negotiating track.
I am sure if you were to sit down and talk with Gilad Sharon, you would see his views on Zionism and the future of Israel is about the same as yours and 972′s. Yes, he says not nice things, but it is the results that count. For heaven’s sake, he joined KADIMA and not some right-wing party. That means he accepts the concessions that Olmert made to the Palestinians, including giving up the Western Wall and Jewish Quarter of the Old City. Remember that this is the party that MK Meir Shitreet says has no ideology. He feel he needs to be like his father and to shore up his right flank in order to get into power. Also recall that Rabin once said “break the bones” of the Palestinians and yet he became a personal friend of Arafat in the end. Barak swore he would never divide Jerusalem and then agreed to do so just a couple of weeks later at Camp David. Politicians say all kinds of things, so give Gilad a chance. I am sure he would carry out the policies the Left wants once he gets into the Knesset. There is no reason to think otherwise.
March 14, 2011
9:48 am
His father did become the hero of much of the Zionist “left”. A false left that abandoned its high stance on democracy and allowed for an undemocratic, immoral act to be done by Sharon. The same “left” that will sit on the sidelines, ignorning the fact that is was “left” wing governments, just as right wing ones that put the settlements there, and blaming the settlers and making them pay the price for their vanity and self rightousness. I for one will not be on the sidelines if and when that happens. I am ashamed.
March 14, 2011
10:49 am
What vile rhetoric. I have seen pictures of children killed by white phosphorus after Operation Cast lead, by bullets fired by the IDF, have watched them maimed on journalists film, heard testimony from others who were there when children were shot in the head. Is there really no such thing as compassion in Zionist culture?
Repugnant.
March 14, 2011
1:47 pm
Replacing “palestinian” with “jew” in the above text and publishing it in a Western European country almost surely would land you in jail. It would even be mentioned in Haaretz.
The text has the same atmosphere as Nazi propaganda movies. Only the victims of the propaganda change but the text is the same.
March 14, 2011
3:03 pm
i think that sharon is right….he got it on the button
March 14, 2011
3:37 pm
what is disgusting is to see bay area “ashamed” jews not expressing their disgust at seeing that a 4 year old child and his sibling and parents is brutally stabbed to death while asleep in his own home.
What is more racist is the support for the PA prerequirement policy that NO jewish group live in their territory. That “Judenrhein” policy is disgusting.
March 14, 2011
3:49 pm
[...] Cast Lead. (Note the use of the word “animal” in Soffer’s language and in the language of Israelis responding to the murders in Itamar; the word is essentially a signal to kill Palestinians [...]
March 14, 2011
6:15 pm
If you leave out just one word, the first paragraph sounds like an excellent self-description of Gilad Sharon. I wonder what cow droppings hit his jackal.
March 14, 2011
6:17 pm
In my previous comment, I meant the first paragraph of Gilad Sharon’s statement, of course, not the introductory paragraph of the article.
March 14, 2011
6:21 pm
lucy…..there is a big difference between war and a deliberate murderous knife attack on sleeping children ….hammas hid amongst children in order to use them as shields….as the taliban does…why do these militants go home and endanger their famliys..ride in cars …invite death opon their famliys and other innocents?
March 14, 2011
9:25 pm
I think the most ignorant sentence of that quote is not in bold: “A society that can thus sanctify death, and whose best of its youth are baby-stabbers, is simply not like ours”
Has he forgotten this horrific incident:
http://pakalert.wordpress.com/2009/01/06/gaza-horror-large-photo-gallery-of-gaza-massacre-by-israel/
March 14, 2011
10:35 pm
The site Adel Helal linked to has another article that’s header reads as follows:
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9/11 was a master plot, concocted by a handfull of Israelis and dual passport Americans and carried out by the resources of the Mossad.
———————————————–
I think that brings into question the veracity of anything that appears at that site.
March 15, 2011
2:56 am
If you hate somebody for the color of their skin, that’s racism. If you’re filled with rage at their behavior, that’s anger.
People sometimes react emotionally when babies are murdered. You can’t judge them on temporary intemperate reactions.
Should I call you foul-mouthed if you let off a few swear words after hitting your thumb with a hammer?
March 15, 2011
5:18 am
@BEN ISRAEL
So you think those images where fabricated?
Perhaps put together artfully in photoshop?
You can find many more images on many other sites. Just search “Gaza Massacre 2009″.
Its not that hard to see the images circulate.
Don’t get me wrong, what happened to the Israeli family on Friday is horrible, but lets not forget that the IDF is not impeccant when thousands more have also been victims.
Both incidents are horrible, but, while the Arab world say “sorry” when an isolated incident occurs, many right-winged Jews say “what about the Arabs” when war crimes are committed.
March 15, 2011
5:21 am
This statement is nothing new. There have been plenty of quotes in the past from the very founders of Zionism to the ministers who implement it in parliament:
hubofmiddleeastpolitics.blogspot.com/2011/02/quotes-from-founders-of-zionism.html
March 15, 2011
9:55 am
adel….that was war…in war children can die…especially when in this case the hammas fought from places with children right there…the hammas fighters were the ones to blame…just as they are to blame when they go home to sleep with their famlilys all around them…just as the taliban do..or ride in cars on public streets….the arab leaders say …sorry?..then pass candy to the cheering public….
March 15, 2011
3:01 pm
“Unbelievable racism, hate-talk, from Prime Minister Sharon’s son”
Nonsense, we know the Zionists; such racist talk is only too normal and acceptable for them. Just decency or something other than their disgusting master-race ranting would be “unbelievable”.
March 15, 2011
3:09 pm
@SEYMOUR ALEXANDER: It’s these kind of comments that make me wonder if I should be posting such stuff. Your generalizations regarding Israelis are not much different from Sharon’s son’s comments cited above.
March 15, 2011
4:53 pm
Im a zionist, and i recognise Sharons comments for what they are. racist, objectifying, orientalist, a false generalisation and fearfull.
the fact he can only view a palestinian as “a wild beast” proves, in his objectifying of arabs that he is simply a lazy racist.
as a zionist i abhor his racism. his fear and hate driven diatribe will surely give him a heart attack. good luck to him.
March 16, 2011
4:35 am
Noam, you should not be criticizing Mr Alexanders comments. Any normal person who reads the vivous crimes catalogued by 972 Magazine would come to the same conclusion. By providing this exquisite documentation and at the same time not supporting BDS and giving up your israeli citizenship, progressives like me are wondersing whether 972 Magazine is a Avigdor LIebermann front for claiming that israel is a democracy while taunting progressives simultaneously
March 16, 2011
11:00 am
Raed, you want Israelis to give up their citizenship? What a ridiculous expectation. Would you like Israelis to become refugees like so many Palestinians have been for years? I’d guess that the majority of Israelis are not dual nationals of another country. Most today have never lived anywhere else and I’d bet many do not have any family in or ties to other countries. Would you like to remedy the wrongs inflicted on the Palestinian people by making the Israelis stateless refugees? I’m not sure whether you are right to refer to yourself as “progressive.”
March 16, 2011
8:18 pm
A Thai worker has been arrested for this heinous crime. Now it is time for all of us here, to contact Mr. Gilad Sharon and ask him to issue a public apology, and to offer compensation and payment to those whose property has been destroyed, crops uprooted, homes bulldozed, and to the families of Palestinians who were killed in retaliaiton as a result of this tragedy.
March 18, 2011
1:29 am
I am sorry to say this but the last thing Israelis can claim they have is history and culture .Thats the only thing the will never be able to buy ,steal or invent.This is the weakest lie in the sea of Israeli lies .
When someone says “beast” just remember the barbaric settlers .And burglars have to stop stealing others cultures and cuisine , if you arent a middleastern you will never be
March 19, 2011
9:33 pm
For “hyssop,” read “za’atar.” Yum.