Even today, its apologists denounce the ‘murderous assault on …
Gaza!
Even in the Gaza Strip, not everyone supports the terrorist group Hamas — but 58% do. If Hamas supporters in Madison WI are not a majority, they are loud and indefatigable — with friends in high places.
Madison came damn close to awarding sister city status to Rafah, a center of terrorism in Gaza, 19 years ago. The president of the Common Council in 2004 introduced the resolution to admit Rafah to the roster of other sister cities like Oslo, Norway. Co-sponsoring the effort with Brenda Konkel were alders Jean MacCubbin, Matt Sloan, Austin King, Brian Benford, Robbie Webber, and Judy Olson. (Memories!)
The resolution actually attracted a majority of alders voting that night (9 to 8) but lacked the 11 votes needed to pass after an eight-hour council session that ended at 2:30 a.m in July 2004. Madison’s Jewish community was outraged; then-mayor Dave Cieslewicz vowed to veto if necessary.
Today the seemingly undead Madison-Rafah Sister City Project is denouncing “the murderous assault on Gaza.” Its 444 followers on social media speak not one word of condemnation for the beheading of babies, the slaughter of civilians, or of Hamas’s vow to kill all “Zionists.”
“The mainstream U.S. media is using the word ‘hostages’ to describe the Israelis who Hamas militants have captured and taken into Gaza. Analyzing this usage is a good way to introduce how the mainstream is distorting this latest crisis.”
— Madison-Rafah Sister City Project
I will go to Gaza (with Omar & Tlaib)!
Which brings us to Madison’s member of Congress. Mark Pocan is a smart cookie, able to work both sides of an issue — but he works Palestine’s side harder. In January 2022 House debate, Pocan “organized an hour-long special session that would amount to an extraordinary rebuke of America’s closest ally in the Middle East … before yielding the microphone to 10 House Democrats who took turns castigating Israel’s actions,” the publication Jewish Insider reported 01-13-22.
The Rafah group co-sponsored a pro-Palestinian rally at Christ Presbyterian Church in October 2019 at which the Congressman vowed to go to Gaza — but not without fellow members of the House Progressive Caucus (which he chaired at the time) Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar.
→ Rep. Rashida Tlaib said she grieved the loss of “Palestinian and Israeli lives” but did not mention Hamas, while calling for “ending the occupation, and dismantling the apartheid system.” (Read & Weep)
→ U.S. Rep Ilhan “Omar condemns Israel’s military response to Hamas, says ‘solution’ is ‘negotiated peace’” (Read & Weep)
→ Noon Friday 10-13-23 Madison’s WORT radio will interview two guests who “amplify the voice of Palestinians.”
“How can it be, Israelis have begun to ask, that they allowed a genocidal terrorist group to reign for so long in Gaza, the fiefdom next door? There was no mystery about Hamas’s intentions. It seeks to kill Israel’s Jews any way it can.”
— “Peace, deterrence, and other gods that failed,” Wall Street Journal
Blaska’s Bottom Line: How can it be, Blaska asks, that U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan could have been such a useful idiot? There was, after all, no mystery about Hamas’s intentions.
15 responses to “Madison is the Gaza of Wisconsin”
One can also be horrified at Hamas’ attack on Israel, but reject your concomitant embrace of the lunatic far right wing Netanyahu government, like Ben Gvir, whose members are, on the moral scales, frighteningly similar to Hamas.
To be clear, that most certainly does not justify the slaughter, in regard to which I share you repulsion, but, again, it does preclude me, as a Jew, from joining you in any way supporting the monstrous Israeli government, which Netanyahu deliberately formed to protect himself from the pending legal charges.
You quite sure that “as a Jew” that you’re not confusing frighteningly similar monstrous lunatics on the moral scales like Orange Man Bad and Ben Gvir with Emmanuel Goldstein, ehhhh?
Nutz. Hamas wants to eliminate Israel, plain and simple.
Don’t Hamas and Hezbollah want to make an Islamic State after they expel/kill all the Israel’s? Doesn’t Rep. Mark Pocan know what Islamic States do to LGBTQI+++ people?
A (Re)gressive being a useful idiot? Say it aint so!
[…] This post originally appeared at https://davidblaska.com/2023/10/11/madison-is-the-gaza-of-wisconsin/ […]
Thanks for reminding me of what the city council did right after I got off.
Are you going to post this on Facebook? If not, do you care if I do?
I post all my blogs on F-book but it helps when others do. Have you been off that long? That crew of alders I named are worse than the current cast!
Hamas must now see justice, just as the leading Nazi perpetrators did at Nuremberg – Eddie Worth/AP
Bravo Indigo November Golf Oscar!
Funniest thing; both Hopeless Changey and the Former Serial Sexual Predator In Chief waited over a full two (2) days before ISSUING CONDEMNATIONS.
Moistened fingers held to the wind outside the Overton Window not suggest an immediate response…?
The Gotch
So it begins:
HoR Shri Thanedar (D-MI) RENOUNCES membership in the despicably hateful Anti-American/Anti-Semitic (d)emocrat Socialists of America.
Thanedar: ““Today, I am officially renouncing my membership in the Democratic Socialists of America. After the brutal terrorist attacks on Israel, which included the indiscriminate murder, rape, and kidnapping of innocent men, women, and children, I CAN NO LONGER ASSOCIATE WITH AN ORGANIZATION UNWILLING TO CALL OUT TERRORISM IN ALL ITS FORMS” (bolds/caps/italics mine)
Odds the despicably hateful Anti-American/Anti-Semitic bLack LIES Matter DONATIONS dry up, too…?
The Gotch
Biden gave Hezbollah $6.000,000,000 and another $252,000,000 to Hamas shortly before the rockets flew. Trump gave zero dollars to Hamas and put a Hellfire missile down the throat of of Hezbollah’s number 2 man.
See the difference?
not lately….
The scariest thing about this for me is how quickly many here jump to hate mode. Orwell was a prophet.
No one wondering how the ‘Iron Dome’ was so easily pierced by an enemy that is far less sophisticated?
Who benefits from this? Netanyahu would be at the top of my list. And if you think governments aren’t willing to sacrifice their own people, you have no understanding of the history of the 20th century.
I support all *citizens* on both sides of this travesty.
Gaza is an open-air prison:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/06/14/gaza-israels-open-air-prison-15
and Hamas uses their own people as shields.
SNAFU.
Iron dome interceptors cost 100 times that of the simple home made missiles Hamas are overwhelming them with. THAT is their strategy. A few get threw. But, it was the rockets who murdered families in the kibbutzes. And it is not Israel holding the Palestinians prisoner in Gaza–they left many years ago. And it was Israel who offered Palestine their state, which Arafat rejected. Get smart. Palestinian leaders won’t accept anything as long any Jews remain in Palestine.
[…] Caucus Democrat representing Madison in the U.S. Congress because voters are beginning to notice his long history of support for Israel’s […]