[[{"content_id":"125936","domain_id":"0","lang_id":"en","portal_id":"2","owner_id":"29","user_id":"1","view_accesslevel_id":"0","edit_accesslevel_id":"0","delete_accesslevel_id":"0","editor_id":"0","content_title":"Netanyahu quick to exploit Paris attacks","content_number":"0","content_date_event":"2015-01-12 22:05:23","content_summary":"Netanyahu evidently could not resist the publicity given that it is election season in Israel","content_summary_fill":"0","content_body":"Electronic Intifada:\r\n\r\n\tAfter hesitations reportedly over cost and security, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finally decided to attend the “solidarity” march in Paris on Sunday, ostensibly in support of “free expression” and other “Western values.”\r\n\r\n\tThe march had been called in the wake of the attacks in Paris last week in which two gunmen murdered twelve people at the offices of the magazine Charlie Hebdo, and a third murdered four people at a Jewish grocery store.\r\n\t\r\n\tNetanyahu evidently could not resist the publicity given that it is election season in Israel, and he would not want to risk being upstaged by political rivals who had announced their attendance, including such violent racists as foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman and economy minister Naftali Bennett.\r\n\t\r\n\tIsraeli media are reporting that Netanyahu gatecrashed the march, defying a request from French President François Hollande that he stay away.\r\n\t\r\n\tMany people circulated images of world leaders linking arms with Netanyahu, noting the perverse irony of a march for such things as “freedom” and against “terrorism” being led by such figures, including the man who ordered the bloodbath in Gaza last summer.\r\n\t\r\n\tAs people in the Gaza ghetto continue to die of cold as a direct consequence of the destruction and ongoing siege.\r\n\t\r\n\tWhile Netanyahu was certainly playing to a domestic audience, his presence in Paris is also part of Israel’s swift move to capitalize on the horror in France on a number of fronts: to attack the Palestinians, to sharpen the dangerous discourse of a “war of civilizations” and to speed up the population transfer of Jews from Europe.\r\n\t\r\n\tIsrael has a long-term goal of transferring France’s half-million-strong Jewish population to Israel as part of its effort to counter the so-called “demographic threat” from Palestinians.\r\n\t\r\n\tNetanyahu immediately seized on the attacks to press the message home, tweeting: “To all the Jews of France, all the Jews of Europe, Israel is not just the place in whose direction you pray, the state of Israel is your home.”\r\n\r\n\tIf French President François Hollande said that France is not the home of the Jews and they should leave to their “real” home, people would correctly understand that as anti-Semitic. But when Netanyahu makes the same declaration, it is called Zionism.\r\n\t\r\n\tAn Israeli official source told Israel’s Channel 2 that the French had wanted Netanyahu to stay away from Paris precisely out of fear that, as Haaretz put it, the Israeli prime minister “would take advantage of the event for campaign purposes and make speeches, especially about the Jews of France. Such statements, the Elysée Palace feared, would hurt the demonstration of solidarity the French government was trying to promote as part of dealing with the terror attacks.”\r\n\r\n\tNetanyahu’s defiance, according to Haaretz, has deeply angered Hollande, who “got up from his seat and made an early exit” when Netanyahu rose to speak at a memorial ceremony at the Paris Grand Synagogue.\r\n\t\r\n\tIsrael’s dangerous and exploitative antics recall the words of Netanyahu on 11 September 2001, when asked what the attacks on the United States that day meant for US-Israeli relations.\r\n\t\r\n\t“It’s very good,” he said, hoping that the unfolding horror in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania would “generate immediate sympathy” for Israel.","content_html":"

\r\n\tElectronic Intifada:<\/strong><\/p>\r\n

\r\n\tAfter hesitations reportedly over cost and security, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finally decided to attend the “solidarity” march in Paris on Sunday, ostensibly in support of “free expression” and other “Western values.”<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\tThe march had been called in the wake of the attacks in Paris last week in which two gunmen murdered twelve people at the offices of the magazine Charlie Hebdo, and a third murdered four people at a Jewish grocery store.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tNetanyahu evidently could not resist the publicity given that it is election season in Israel, and he would not want to risk being upstaged by political rivals who had announced their attendance, including such violent racists as foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman and economy minister Naftali Bennett.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tIsraeli media are reporting that Netanyahu gatecrashed the march, defying a request from French President François Hollande that he stay away.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tMany people circulated images of world leaders linking arms with Netanyahu, noting the perverse irony of a march for such things as “freedom” and against “terrorism” being led by such figures, including the man who ordered the bloodbath in Gaza last summer.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tAs people in the Gaza ghetto continue to die of cold as a direct consequence of the destruction and ongoing siege.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tWhile Netanyahu was certainly playing to a domestic audience, his presence in Paris is also part of Israel’s swift move to capitalize on the horror in France on a number of fronts: to attack the Palestinians, to sharpen the dangerous discourse of a “war of civilizations” and to speed up the population transfer of Jews from Europe.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tIsrael has a long-term goal of transferring France’s half-million-strong Jewish population to Israel as part of its effort to counter the so-called “demographic threat” from Palestinians.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tNetanyahu immediately seized on the attacks to press the message home, tweeting: “To all the Jews of France, all the Jews of Europe, Israel is not just the place in whose direction you pray, the state of Israel is your home.”<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\tIf French President François Hollande said that France is not the home of the Jews and they should leave to their “real” home, people would correctly understand that as anti-Semitic. But when Netanyahu makes the same declaration, it is called Zionism.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tAn Israeli official source told Israel’s Channel 2 that the French had wanted Netanyahu to stay away from Paris precisely out of fear that, as Haaretz put it, the Israeli prime minister “would take advantage of the event for campaign purposes and make speeches, especially about the Jews of France. Such statements, the Elysée Palace feared, would hurt the demonstration of solidarity the French government was trying to promote as part of dealing with the terror attacks.”<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\tNetanyahu’s defiance, according to Haaretz, has deeply angered Hollande, who “got up from his seat and made an early exit” when Netanyahu rose to speak at a memorial ceremony at the Paris Grand Synagogue.
\r\n\t
\r\n\tIsrael’s dangerous and exploitative antics recall the words of Netanyahu on 11 September 2001, when asked what the attacks on the United States that day meant for US-Israeli relations.
\r\n\t
\r\n\t“It’s very good,” he said, hoping that the unfolding horror in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania would “generate immediate sympathy” for Israel.<\/p>","content_source":null,"content_url":null,"content_columns":"0","content_date_start":"2015-01-12 22:05:23","content_date_finish":"2015-01-12 22:05:23","content_date_register":"2015-01-12 22:05:23","content_date_last_edit":"0000-00-00 00:00:00","content_show_img":"1","content_show_details":"1","content_show_related_img":"1","content_show_slider":"1","content_show_title_slider":"1","content_comment":"0","content_score":"0","content_recorded":"0","content_confirmed":"1","content_status":"1","content_kind":"0","old_id":"124191","tag_id":null,"tag_word":null,"tag_service":null,"tag_total":null,"tag_soundex":null,"attach_token":"1163144816","attach_date_register":"2015-01-12 22:05:26","attach_id":"125453","attach_file_ext":"jpg","attach_file_header":"image\/jpeg","attach_img_type":"2","attach_img_width":"390","attach_img_height":"250","attach_file_media":"1","attach_show_watermark":"0","score_average":null,"score_count":null,"score_date_last":null,"visit_count":"214","visit_date_last":"2025-05-10 14:12:10","attach_title":"Netanyahu quick to exploit Paris attacks","node_title":"Commentaries","ot_node_left_right":"[{\"node_id\":134, \"left\":25, \"right\":26}]"}]]