Obama and the Road Out of Iraq: Author Joshua Frank on FRSC Thursday June 19th 6:30 PM

I'm dismayed that Robert Norse has chosen to have Joshua Frank on his radio show. His articles are filled with misinformation, incendiary claims, and errors of omission. Here are a few examples from one of the articles Robert linked to:

"[Any] negotiated peace between Israelis and the Palestinians is going to have to involve the Palestinians relinquishing the right of return as it has been understood in the past," he averred. "And that doesn't mean that that there may not be conversations about compensation issues." --- Barack Obama

FRANK: How gracious, but what does Obama plan to do with the over 1.4 million non-Jewish Arabs that live in the country? Continue to treat them like second-class citizens or just boot them out?

BECKY: There is no anti-Arab discrimination encoded into Israeli law for Israeli citizens. Arab-Israelis have the absolute same rights and privileges as Jewish Israelis do. The ONLY difference encoded into law is that Muslim citizens of Israel are exempt from compulsory military service. This was done so they wouldn't be conflicted and have to wage war on "their Muslim brothers." They, however, can enlist if they choose to. There IS anti-Arab discrimination in the general population of Israel. But then there is anti-black discrimination in Santa Cruz. Racism exists everywhere.

FRANK: Obama has called Israel a "democracy," but as the former editor of the Harvard Law Review you'd think he would know what the term actually means. Sure Israeli Arabs can vote, but they can't hold office if they are democratic secularists who want civil rights for all of the country's citizens.

BECKY: False!! They cannot vote to support legislation that will undo legislation that declares that Israel is the homeland for Jews anywhere in the world. They can vote, run for office, serve in office, and propose legislation on any other issue. Note, that if this was the ONLY evidence of "lack of democracy" then the author has flunked making his case.

FRANK: They have no constitutional protections (Israel has no formal constitution) and can only own land in certain locales as a consequence of unfair laws that grant special treatment to Jewish residents.

BECKY: False again!!! The only 'land' that they cannot own is land that was purchased by the Jewish Agency prior to 1948. In the mission statement of that organization, they told those donating funds that the money would be used to buy land in Palestine for the Jewish People. MOST government land in Israel is former Ottoman Crown land, and open to occupancy or purchase by any person of any religion or ethnicity, as is all private land. This author is being deliberately deceitful by the claims he is making. It's true that Israel has no Constitution, but that doesn't mean they don't have any rights.

FRANK: Simply put, as Jimmy Carter took so much heat for rightly observing, Israel is an apartheid-ridden country where the Arab population is not exactly welcomed with open arms."

BECKY: Jimmy Carter said that there was no "apartheid" within Israel proper. He referred to Israel's treatment of the Palestinians as "apartheid-like". However, his only evidence of that was the presence of Israeli-only roads. Note how Joshua Frank never mentions the suicide bomb attacks, the daily rocket attacks, or the kidnapping of Private Galid Shalit. He does not share with his reader a proper report of both sides in his efforts to villify Israel.

Writers who practice double-standards, demonization, and de-legitimization are considered anti-semites---and in Frank's case, the shoe fits.