Reading PCG's Article, From Hero to Outcast (2006)

PCG has a very simplistic stance regarding the Israeli-Palestinians conflict. PCG, like many highly controlling groups, loves using black and white reasoning to explain many things. This is also true with PCG's stance regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

One side is good. One side is bad. One side is viewed as part of the white race and is good. One side is excluded by PCG from the white race and is bad. Instead of renouncing racism PCG has simply redefined Jews as white using the discredited dogma of British Israelism. PCG supports the State of Israel for the same reason they banned interracial marriage: to advance white supremacy. PCG supports the State of Israel for racist reasons.

It is irrelevant in PCG's view whether or not Israeli Jews identify themselves as part of the white race, they are viewed as such by PCG. This is a view that PCG have concocted themselves based largely on HWA's teachings. This is an identity PCG have unilaterally imposed on Israeli Jews without their permission.

PCG's stridently pro-Israel view regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be clearly seen in Ron Fraser's article, "From Hero to Outcast" (May 2006). It was later made available as a reprint article.

What is glaringly apparent to the careful observer of the Israeli-Palestinian scenario is that it is extremely hard to obtain a truly balanced view of its reality. In particular, it’s difficult to grasp how, in little less than 40 years, the nation of Israel has gone from widely acknowledged hero status, following its overwhelming victory in the Six Days’ War of 1967, to being a global outcast. (p. 12.)

Fraser euphemistically calls it "the Israeli-Palestinian scenario" as though it is not a deadly conflict that so often leads to the deaths of human beings. What a chilling euphemism to describe the severe situation that exists at present. Alas, the latest round of violence in this conflict appears to be still ongoing at present.

After Allied victory in World War I, the League of Nations assigned Palestine to the United Kingdom as a mandated territory. The Palestinian mandate was based on the terms of the Balfour Declaration, which promised the creation of a national Jewish homeland within the mandated territory. Initially, Arab leaders were prepared to give Palestine to the Jews if the rest of the Arab lands in the Middle East remained free. However, the mixed tribes of Arabs living in Palestine strenuously opposed Jewish immigration into the territory and the idea of the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. This local resistance began to morph into a movement to create a Palestinian nation out of these disparate, stateless Arabs. Thus the early seeds of that which was to become Palestinian terrorism were sown. (p. 12.)

The Palestinians were not stateless at that time. Before World War I the Palestinians were part of the Ottoman Empire. And after World War I the Palestinians were citizens of Mandatory Palestine. They were citizens of that state. They got passports. It was their beloved home.

That is not to say that things were ideal at the time. There were many problems. But at this time they were citizens of a state. Mandatory Palestine was ruled by the British but the Palestinians belonged to that land, were ruled by that state and were its citizens. It is wrong to say those Palestinians were stateless.

Fraser also presents the Palestinians' distinctive national identity as being essentially about "terrorism". What if Fraser were to speak of any other nationality (American, Australian or any other) as being essentially terrorist in nature for many decades? Would that not be racist? Would it not rightly offend the people of any nationality to be vilified in such a way?

During World War II, due to immigration controls, many Jews who tried to flee Nazi Germany were turned back at the borders of free countries they tried to enter. Returned to Germany, masses of them were systematically murdered in Nazi death camps. (p. 12.)

Alas, this is true. Various nations that had the opportunity to save Jews fleeing the horrors of Nazism refused them entry and those innocent Jews were not protected by those who could have done something about those people. This shameful fact is indeed true.

After the war, when the horrors of the Holocaust were revealed, this catalyzed the need for a homeland for displaced Jews.

Unable to come up with a solution that would satisfy either Arabs or Jews, the British handed the problem over to the newly founded United Nations. The UN ratified a partition plan in 1947 separating Palestine into Jewish and Arab regions. With expiration of the British mandate on May 14, 1948, British troops pulled out. The Jews promptly declared the creation of the State of Israel, gaining immediate recognition by a number of Western nations.

The Arab nations surrounding Israel reacted by initiating a year-long war. Under-manned, ill-equipped and largely unprepared, the gallant, fledgling Jewish nation held out, not only gaining eventual victory, but also gaining additional territory in the process. (pp. 12-13.)

What Fraser fails to mention is that this particular war began in late 1947 shortly after the United Nations presented its partition plan in November 1947. This plan pushed tensions within Mandatory Palestine to boiling point and armed conflict soon broke out. That is when the Israeli War of Independence (1947-9) began. Not May 1948 as is inaccurately insinuated here.

Also there is no mention of the fact that many Palestinians happen to be Christians. They are simplistically stereotyped as Muslims and thus not like PCG members and those favored by PCG's version of British Israelism.

This positive opinion of the nation of Israel was even strengthened as a result of the famous Six Days’ War in June 1967. In that brief and triumphant defense of Israel, once again facing overwhelming odds, the Jews were seen as the heroes, vastly outnumbered, gallantly staving off the surrounding enemy nations and throwing them clear back beyond their prior borders. (p. 13.)

Note how Fraser obscures the Israeli Jews' distinctive national identity. Instead of saying that "Israeli Jews" triumphed in the Six Day War he simply says "the Jews". It is as though all the Jews in all the world were in the State of Israel when most Jews lived outside of it in 1967. And that is still the case today.

Fraser then says that in the West there was up till 1967 widespread support and sympathy for the State of Israel within the West but that now to a great extent this is dissipating away. Why is this? Fraser blames this development on the media. But could there be some other reason to explain this development?

Fraser then cites a book, The Other War by Stephanie Gutman (2005), to say that the media is biased against the State of Israel. Since I have not read it I will not comment any opinion regarding Gutmann's book. This post is about Fraser's article.

Gutmann’s case for the media distortion of the situation in Israel is dramatized most effectively with a simple comparison of statistics: fatalities in other current international crises over the past decade, compared to those in the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. Consider: The first Russo-Chechen war—50,000 fatalities in two years. The Darfur genocide—300,000 in three years. The second Congolese civil war—3.5 million in five years. Compare these with Israeli-Palestinian fighting— 4,500 fatalities over the past six years. (pp. 13-14.)

Fraser fails to mention that the majority of those fatalities are Palestinian. The Second Intifada (2000-5) killed about 1010 Israelis and up to 3354 Palestinians. Palestinians endured about three times as many fatalities as Israelis. No wonder "the media" pays so much attention to the State of Israel. Most of the violent deaths in the Second Intifada were of Palestinians. This important and most relevant fact is never mentioned by Fraser in this article.

Also note how Fraser minimizes the scale of violence of the Second Intifada calling it "Israeli-Palestinian fighting" using an ambiguous word that could be used to describe a mere schoolyard brawl instead of the severe conflict that was the Second Intifada.

Is Fraser saying people should just ignore the violent deaths of 4500 beautiful and unique people over six years and just wait for 45,000 beautiful and unique more people to violently die before focusing our attention on this conflict? That is horribly callous and cruel. That is no way to deal with any issue of such import.

The world sees the nightly images beamed in from Israel, while remaining largely ignorant of the effects of other major crises on the world scene which, by comparison, pale the skirmishes in Israel into relative insignificance. This is due in large part to the inability of news services to establish themselves within the extreme-level danger zones of these other largely closed societies. So images of the gruesomeness of these major crises never reach the living rooms of the masses. (p. 14.)

Then why does PCG so often discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict themselves? How often do they talk about Chechnya or the Congo or Darfur?

How dare Fraser insinuates that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is relatively insignificant. PCG never treats it that way themselves. What duplicity Fraser shows here.

Perhaps when Fraser dares to denigrate the violence of the Second Intifada as being of "relative insignificance" he is thinking of the violence endured by the Palestinians.

Fraser then assets that most media images come from just three news outlets and he claims these three news agencies are manipulated by the Palestinians into portraying the State of Israel in a bad light. Fraser ignores how the much higher death toll of Palestinians might influence media coverage. The possibility that the media coverage just might reflect reality is never mentioned.

Fraser then cites Gutmann to relate three instances when supposedly the Palestinians manipulated the media. One concerns Nablus and 9/11 but with this anecdote Fraser ignores the fact that most Palestinians were appalled and horrified by 9/11. Another concerns the mob killing of two Israeli soldiers and how a reporter fled because of fear of reprisals because that ghastly killing was filmed. Inconsistently Fraser presents this as somehow causing Palestinians to be portrayed favorably by "the media." And the third anecdote concerns a fake funeral. This anecdotes is presented by Fraser to ignore the fact that over 3000 Palestinians did in fact die violently during the Second Intifada, over three times as many Israeli Jews.

The problem (for Fraser) is that reality itself is biased against his wishes. The Palestinians endured a death toll over three times as high as Israeli Jews during the Second Intifada. It is in vain for Fraser to somehow blame "the media" for reflecting that fact.

Fraser then accuses "the media" of concocting "grand deceits" to turn Europeans against the State of Israel.

However, these grand deceits have a deeply serious side to them. ... For it is the backlash in Europe against those Israelis caught in the turmoil of the Palestinian crisis that is most disconcerting. Indeed, it is the increasingly prevalent anti-Semitic reaction across this continent, known through its 20th-century history for the prevalence of gross persecution of the Jew, which is deeply troubling. (p. 14.)

Armstrongism have been insisting for decades that Europe, particularly Germany, is fated to be united. Often it has been insinuated that the Nazis would return to power in Germany. Fraser is alluding to those lurid failed prophecies that Armstrongism has spread over the decades.

PCG often boasts that they support Israeli Jews. But PCG is quite selective in their support for the State of Israel. PCG so venomously despises the left that PCG have often condemned and denounced former Prime Minister Shimon Peres for trying to make peace with the Palestinians. In one venomous article in 2001 Ron Fraser dehumanized Peres as like a fox ("foxy old Socialist") and a worm ("Shimon Peres is set to worm his way back into prime focus...") and insinuated that he was a traitor. Just how paper thin is PCG's "support" for the State of Israel when they could call a prominent politician as him in such a way? 

Fraser then ends the article by promoting a booklet by his boss and paymaster, Gerald Flurry.

That this magazine has, for the past 16 years, been predicting such a mood swing against the nation of the Jews will be obvious to many of our long-time subscribers. What may not be so obvious to our more recent readers is why we could be so accurate with this prediction, even spelling out in detail where it is heading, and its ultimate ending.

[Fraser then advertises a booklet by Gerald Flurry which was mentioned in a previous post.] ... It is an eye-opening account that goes far beyond Stephanie Gutmann’s exposé of the massive media manipulation surrounding Israel. It is a stirring analysis that really gets to the heart and core, the true cause, the impending dramatic effect and the final, ultimate solution to this rapidly reviving phenomenon of anti-Semitism! (p. 14.)

Considering how PCG has been so wrong about so many things for so many years there is no need to worry if these dire things will come to pass. PCG are false prophets.

How dare Fraser had hypocritically called the Second Intifada as being of "relative insignificance". It just shows how little value human life has for those who exploit violent events to concoct false prophecies to get peoples' tithes money.