the settlers whom many Americans mythologize at Thanksgiving as peace-loving pilgrims were, just a generation later, issuing official government orders putting a price on the scalps of Indigenous children, women and men.

The reward: about $12,000 in today’s dollars for the scalp of a man, half that for a woman, and a bit less for a child. It was nearly as much as a soldier would earn in two years. Sometimes bounty hunters were granted the land of the people they scalped – thousands of acres, which scalpers used to found towns that they named after themselves, like Westbrook, Maine; Shirley, Massachusetts; and Spencer, Massachusetts, to name just a few.

…

In 1755, the lieutenant governor of the province of Massachusetts Bay, Spencer Phips, issued an edict declaring the Penobscot people a target of extermination and commanding “his Majesty’s Subjects of this Province to Embrace all opportunities of pursuing, captivating, killing, and Destroying all and every of the aforesaid Indians.”

…

The legacy of those wrongs manifest today in a range of forms: the epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls; the fact that Indigenous people have the highest rate of death at the hands of police, the highest suicide rate among veterans, a disproportionate rate of death from Covid-19, and the highest incarceration rates in the US; continued violations of Indigenous sovereignty by state and federal authorities and private extractive industries; the continued use of Indian mascots; and the celebration of national holidays, like Thanksgiving and Columbus Day, that dishonor Native peoples.

New England once hunted and killed humans for money. We’re descendents of the survivors

and now that Amazon has killed comments on reviews, they can go unanswered.

Yes that has irked me too, but now I don’t trust Amazon reviews of products given their known stealing of ideas and churning copies out in their own Chinese factories.

Indeed, Jeffh. Also among them is Jimmy Carter. People praise him now that he’s 97 and still, to the best of his ability, doing the good works his Christian faith requires.

But that’s only because most have forgotten when he stood up for the Palestinians in his 2006 book Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid. The architect of the Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt (1978) was vilified for criticizing Israel in any way. It’s a knee-jerk reaction that continues to this day, when any critic of Israel’s policies is called an anti-Semite.

Former President Carter’s book gets a rating of 4.7 on Amazon. But the one-star reviews (numbering 152) are typical of those directed against a book merely because its author presents a view the reviewer dislikes. One writes:

“You don’t have to read this book to know Carter is an antisemite. The title says it all[.]”

To me, that eighteen-word “review” tells me all I need to know about the reviewer. It tells me he doesn’t care about the details of government policy or even the contents of the book. Amazon reviews show me there are far too many of such people in America — and now that Amazon has killed comments on reviews, they can go unanswered.

No problem Jeffh.

I linked to an image made up of book covers of texts pertinent to the topic of the Israel-Palestine conflict. I have now reworked that into another version to contain a few of the other books I mentioned. Finkelstein’s ‘This Time We Went Too Far’ takes its title from that statement from Gideon Levy author of ‘The Punishment of Gaza’ also well worth a read being slim and inexpensive.

I knew Lambert was clueless recently when he described agricultural landscapes as having ‘robust ecologies’. A totally vacuous, empirically bankrupt comment. And now he attempts to defend a wretched, right wing think tank (FIRE), funded by all kinds of climate-change denying conservative foundations, by baselessly claiming that cancel culture is a liberal phenomenon. Garbage.

Folks, we have a new RickA here.

https://www.theroot.com/an-open-letter-from-the-woke-mob-to-aaron-rodgers-1848018949

So,

I won’t go further into your antisemitic and ridiculous screed…

You don’t have valid arguments to counter the valid accusations of Israeli use of brutish and disproportionate force. I must have touched that nerve of humbug. Denial is difficult and painful for sure. I have more accounts of IDF members who have turned against their own government for the slaughter of thousand of children. That you refuse to acknowledge the well documented actions of terror against an almost powerless people is sickening. That you should miss my pointing out, twice, that Palestinians are also a Semitic people indicates that you are not rational on this subject.

That would be the same Ilan Pappe who admits he doesn’t write history for truth but rather for politics? Birds of a feather. In case anyone is wondering, Finkelstein calls the IDF “Nazis”.

I won’t go further into your antisemitic and ridiculous screed which conflates Israel with the blood-thirsty God of the Hebrews. It speaks for itself. Ethnic cleansing indeed! “Their land”! It is to laugh.

Nice to know the quality of commentator here on the topic. Here is a tip: Try educating yourself on the other side of the question. You’ve got the bullshit Palestinian propaganda points down pat. Learn something new.

A bunch of statements presented without context or explanation. What does Kendi mean when he says “The remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination”? Having a discriminating taste in food is a good thing — as is having a discriminating FM radio.

And perfectionism equals objectivity now?

Norman Finkelstein, OTOH, has (mis)spent his entire career aspersing Jews, the state of Israel, and anyone who disagrees with his historical assertions. This includes even the historians he misquotes and takes out of context.

Oh, answering that part emphasised, the likes of Alan Dershowitz I suppose who is totally dismissed in ‘Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History’ which book explains the manner in which anti-Semitism has been weaponised to cow even valid criticism of Israel’s inhuman actions in Gaza and the Westbank. Actions including the deliberate slow, from the end of WW2 to the present, infiltration of settlements in lands designated Palestinian by international laws and conventions. If Israel does not like being called out on its murderous terror agenda vis-a-vis Palestinians (also a Semitic people BTW) then its leaders know what to do.

I find Finkelstein a fair commentator, who like Ilan Pappe who I will also mention, happens to be a retired IDF member.

I suppose the accusations by Finkelstein of ethnic cleansing (see also Ilan Pappe, ‘TheEthnic Cleansing of Palestine’), use of disproportionate force (an invasion using top of the range weapons against a people that used the equivalent of a few fireworks) including the use of banned weapons such as white phosphorus munitions, Cast Lead, and commando attacks at night on humanitarian relief vessels in international waters, Mavi Marmara are made up according to you.

The inhuman treatment of Palestinians, turning Gaza into an ever shrinking with infrastructure destroyed is a crime against humanity. Many Israelis hide behind dehumanising rhetoric from their leaders, leaders who should be indicted for war crimes or crimes against humanity.

It is not only Norman Finkelstein who has described the horrors of Gaza for Ilan Pappe has also in his book ‘The Biggest Prison on Earth’. Noam Chomsky has teamed up with Ilan Pappe in producing, ‘Gaza in Crisis’ and ‘On Palestine’. Pappe has also traced the many ways in which Palestinians have been persuaded to leave their land, land allowed under the mantle of the UN. Palestinians were bulldozed in their homes to make way for wall of separation to allow the strategic placing of Israeli settlements. Is pointing out the barbaric nature of all this ant-Semitic? No.

Other authors who have chimed inb to criticize the actions of the Israeli state are Susan Mendus ‘Politics and Morality’, Gideon Levy ‘The Punishment of Gaza’.

As for historical claims on the land then these can be of dubious provenance given the revealed archaeological evidence which has resulted in narratives such as the following from ‘The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Civilizations’ page 42.

According to the Bible, the Hebrews or Israelites were a nomadic people who migrated into the land of Canaan sometime around 1200 BC, settling in scattered tribes under chieftains called ‘judges’. The need to organise more effectively to resist the Philistines and Canaanites [who just happened to have prior claim on the land], with whom they were at war, eventually led the tribes to unite under a monarchy.

At this juncture it may be worth mentioning the historical novel, ‘The Source’ by James A Minchener which is a fascinating chronological journey of one site of ancient settlement.

Continuing from ‘The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Civilizations’ page 42.

Jericho had been uninhabited for centuries by the time the Bible claims it was captured by the Hebrews and there were no walls to be brought down by Joshua’s trumpets.

Those familiar with the Biblical account will recall the slaughter that was authorised by the god of the Hebrews, maybe the template for Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians, i.e. ethnic cleansing. Handy having a god who gives you carte blanche is it not.

If you are in any doubt about the heinous actions of Israeli forces I offer the selection of books depicted by their covers in this image columns of covers repeated across an A4 page to be sliced up as bookmarks if required.

I have other titles not depicted there, including Finkelstein’s ‘This Time We Went too Far’ and ‘Method and Madness: The hidden story of Israel’s assaults on Gaza’.