[S.T.D.]

It's just that simple.

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/201...gilantism.html

In a mind-blowing verdict, a British jury acquitted people who admitted that they purposefully caused damage to an arms factory - because, they said, the arms were being used by Israel:
Five activists who caused £180,000 damage to an arms factory were acquitted after they argued they were seeking to prevent Israeli war crimes.

The five were jubilant after a jury found them not guilty of conspiring to cause criminal damage to the factory on the outskirts of Brighton.

The five admitted they had broken in and sabotaged the factory, but argued they were legally justified in doing so.

They believed that EDO MBM, the firm that owns the factory, was breaking export regulations by manufacturing and selling to the Israelis military equipment which would be used in the occupied territories. They wanted to slow down the manufacture of these components, and impede what they believed were war crimes being committed by Israel against the Palestinians.

They are the latest group of peace and climate-change activists to successfully use the "lawful excuse" defence – committing an offence to prevent a more serious crime – as a tactic in their campaigns.

They had decided to act last January after three weeks of Israeli military manoeuvres against Gaza in which many Palestinians were killed.

In his summing up, Judge George Bathurst-Norman suggested to the jury that "you may well think that hell on earth would not be an understatement of what the Gazans suffered in that time".

The judge highlighted the testimony by Caroline Lucas, the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, that "all democratic paths had been exhausted" before the activists embarked on their action.Meaning that the judge pretty much told the jury to acquit them. Unbelievable.
Hove crown court heard the activists had broken into the factory in the night. They had video-taped interviews beforehand outlining their intention to cause damage and, in the words of prosecutor Stephen Shay, "smash-up" the factory.

These statements were posted on the Indymedia website shortly after they were arrested.Apparently, according to British law, Israel has no right to defend itself from Qassam rockets. Period.

I guess that synagogue bombings can be defended next, because Jews provide material and emotional support for Israel which does all of these war crimes. Then they can go after Melanie Philips.

It turns out that the judge was born in Arab Jaffa, and was brought out of retirement to hear this case, as a jubilant anti-Zionist notes. Which would explain his directing the jury as to what their verdict should be.

[Fegasderty]

Good luck to them ... that's exactly what happened when the PLO first started airline hijackings. They first started hijacking Israeli planes El Al. Israel quickly managed to put a stop to it by installing Air marshals and improving the security arrangements of all El Al planes.

Initially, Britain behaved exactly the same way as this so called British judge behaves now. On one occasion, when Israeli air marshals killed some Arab hijackers and captured another (a woman by the name of Leila Khaled), the Brits in their "wisdom" chose to release her after the El Al plane landed in Heathrow ... The rest is history. The Arabs got the message and started hijacking non Israeli airlines as well. That's exactly what happened with Arab terrorism, it started against Israel first and since then ...

The actions of this "British" judge will have repercussions too, just wait and see ...

[PhillipHer]

Fun stuff. Euros are a bunch of racists. Always were.

[Drugmachine]

http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/33...factory-damage

[Drugmachine]

He wants them to get a medal.

http://thejc.com/news/uk-news/34718/...ould-get-medal
From news article:

The judge in the trial of seven activists acquitted of damaging an arms factory suggested that their leader should be awarded the George Cross for his campaign.

The seven were cleared after they successfully claimed they had acted to prevent Israeli "war crimes" when the broke into the Brighton factory on January 17, 2009.

Hailed a great victory by pro-Palestinian activists, the seven from "Smash EDO" were acquitted of causing £180,000 worth of damage to the EDO MBM factory in Brighton - which denied ever having supplied Israel with arms equipment.

In his summing-up speech, in which he attacked both Israel and the United States, Judge George Bathurst-Norman told the Hove Crown Court jury: "You may well think that hell on earth would not be an understatement of what the Gazans suffered at that time."

This case may have disturbing implications

He also said of group leader Christopher Osmond that "The jury may feel his efforts investigating the company merit the George Cross."

Mr Osmond, 30, Elijah Smith, 43, Robert Nicholls, 52, Tom Woodhead, 25, Harvey Tadman, 44, Ornella Saibene, 50, Simon Levin, 35, from Bristol, Brighton and London were all acquitted last week. The verdict was welcomed by Caroline Lucas, Green Party MP for Brighton Pavillion.

Tony Greenstein, a veteran pro-Palestinian Jewish campaigner in the city, said: "The judge gave a summing up so favourable that some supporters were worried that the jury might react to what they perceived as an attempt to bounce them into a not guilty verdict. We need not have worried."

A court observer, who asked not to be identified, told the JC: "Israel's actions were not the point of the trial - all that mattered was that the protesters genuinely believed in what they were fighting against."
Jewish lawyers and jurists said it was unorthodox for judges to air their political allegiances in court.

London solicitor Jonathan Lux, Board Member of the International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists, said: "This case appears to have disturbing implications and thought will need to be given to what the wider consequences are."

Barrister Oliver Mishcon said: "Judges must be careful about showing support for political causes."

But Professor Graham Zellick QC, the former chair of Leo Baeck College, said the judge was entitled to express his opinion. He said: "It is not what the law, strictly applied, should lead to; but some would argue that it is one of the virtues of the jury system that the strict law can be moderated."

Israeli ambassador Ron Prosor sharply criticised the judge's comments. He said: "This is not a great era for the British justice system. I assume that Sderot's children, who have lived under thousands of missiles for years, will be able to enlighten the judge as to the meaning of 'hell on earth.'"
Jon Benjamin, Chief Executive of the Board of Deputies, said: "The acquittal was clearly a result of the skewed narrative around Cast Lead, the judge's comments and the appearance of the local MP, who is known for her anti-Israel bias." The ZF also released a statement calling for the government to censure Judge Bathurst-Norman.

The defence argued that criminal damage is excusable if the damage occurs while trying to prevent greater damage to other properties - in this case, homes in Gaza. But Stephen Shay, prosecuting, argued that the factory was so small that even if it had been supplying Israel, it would have made no difference to the war in Gaza.

[S.T.D.]

http://cifwatch.com/2010/07/14/the-j...fence-counsel/

Some ten days ago I wrote here about the acquittal in the UK of seven defendants who admitted to causing £187,000 of criminal damage at the EDO MBM armaments factory in January 2009, at the time of Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza. The factory was exporting military equipment to Israel. Until today I did not have the 87 page transcript of Judge Bathurst-Norman’s summing-up in the case (Lewes Crown Court, 28/29 June 2010). Remember that these are his comments to the Jury, prior to their deliberation in the Jury room which acquitted all seven defendants.

Earlier, many people suspected that the Judge’s comments were biased and this transcript proves the case conclusively. On the evidence of his summing-up, Bathurst-Norman was a member of the defence’s legal team, rather than the Judge.


See also:

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/201...ael-redux.html


Now, Jonathan Hoffman at CiFWatch went through the 87-page transcript of the judge's comments/instructions to the jury before deliberations. Here are some examples of what the judge said:



..Now you may be wondering what on earth has the actions of the Israeli air force to do with this country. The short answer is that if the Israeli Air Force was committing crimes in the way that the agreed evidence outlines in the unlawful killing of Palestinians in Gaza and in the unlawful causing of damage to property in Gaza, then under the War Crimes Act and other legislation any member of the Israeli Air Force who set foot in this country and who acted in that way would be liable to arrest and prosecution, as is anyone within this country who knowingly helps the Israeli Air Force to commit such war crimes.

...Democracy would not exist unless there were reporters and members of the public who were prepared to stand up for what they believe to be right, and sometimes, as in the case of the suffragettes, even to go to prison for their beliefs. As Edmund Burke says: “For injustice to flourish, all that is needed is for good men to do nothing.” Indeed, people like Mr Osmond [Christopher Osmond, the leader of the seven who admitted causing £187,000 of damage to the EDO factory] who put themselves in harm’s way to protect others may, in fact – there may be much to be admired about people like that. Perhaps if he had done it in this country in the last war he would probably have received a George Medal.

... He [Osmond] knew of the Philadelphi corridor, the corridor made around the boundaries of Gaza by the illegal demolition of Palestinian homes by the Israeli army, during which Rachel Corrie, one of the International Solidarity Volunteers bravely stood in front of a bulldozer which was being driven by an Israeli soldier and was effectively murdered when he drove the bulldozer over her in 2003.Read his whole analysis. It proves a simply appalling use of a judge's position to twist justice and to preach hate and lies. This is perversion.

[radikal]

http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/35...ocking-summing

The full transcript has been revealed for the first time of a judge's summing-up in the trial of seven anti-Israel activists acquitted of damaging an arms factory.
Judge George Bathurst-Norman had told the jury at Lewes Crown Court that the group's leader should be awarded the George Cross for his campaign.
The group were cleared last month of causing £180,000 of damage to the EDO MBM factory in Brighton after they claimed they had acted "to prevent Israeli war crimes".
The company denied ever supplying Israel with arms equipment.
In his summing-up speech, Judge Bathurst-Norman told the jury: "It may be as you went through what I can only describe as horrific scenes, scenes of devastation to civilian population, scenes which one would rather have hoped to have disappeared with the Nazi regimes of the last war, you may have felt anger and been absolutely appalled by them, but you must put that emotion aside."
He said Christopher Osmond, who had led the "Smash EDO" group, should be rewarded for his efforts: "People like Mr Osmond, who put themselves in harm's way to protect others… there may be much to be admired about people like that. Perhaps if he had done it in this country in the last war he would probably have received a George Medal."
Judge Bathurst-Norman also criticised the British and US governments, telling jurors: "You must put aside any feelings of being thoroughly ashamed of our government, of the American government and the United Nations and the EU in doing nothing about what was happening."
Jonathan Hoffman, vice-chair of the Zionist Federation, obtained the full 87-page transcript.
He said: "Judge Bathurst-Norman behaved more like the defence counsel than the neutral officer of the court that he was supposed to be. The role of a judge – far from advancing his own political agenda – is to clarify points of law to the lay members of the jury.
"Bathurst-Norman's comments reveal that he has an extreme anti-Israel agenda."
Mr Hoffman said the case should be declared a mis-trial and retried under a new judge. He encouraged supporters of Israel to complain to the Office for Judicial Complaints and to write to Justice Minister Ken Clarke.

[Beerinkol]

Now the Judge may face charges:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...rotesters.html

http://www.solomonia.com/blog/archiv...be/index.shtml

[radikal]

This begs the following two questions:

1. Even in the event that they find that the judge behaved with bias (is that likely in the UK?), what can they do to a retired judge? And what difference will that make to the judgment?
2. Even more importantly, as one of the reference articles asks; Who is the party responsible for recalling this judge specifically for this case and will that party be held accountable for that decision?

[Raj_Copi_Jin]

Judicial misconduct doesn't die with leaving the bench.

[TorryJens]

And what are the usual consequences of judicial misconduct? I am asking because I genuinely don't know ...

[Beerinkol]

See also the possible costs of Jew baiting

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/the-hid...ng-in-england/

London is an amazing place, full of vitality, intensity, foreign tourists and residents, a patchwork of pluralism. Talk to the average person, and nothing seems amiss: this cab driver, having driven in London for 40 years, sees no significant change in the neighborhoods he travels through; this financier sees no signs of intimidation; this shopper, this tavern-hopper, this man on the bus, lives in an interesting and relatively normal world. A superficial walk through the [Regent’s] park gives the distinct sense of normality.

But talk to the Jews, and you get a different story. The International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists held a conference here this week. The topic: Democratic and Legal Norms in an Age of Terror. Panels discussed everything from the Goldstone Report, to the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement, to “universal jurisdiction” (lawfare against Israelis brought in foreign courts). Here, in the Khalili Lecture Theatre of the SOAS (School for Oriental and African Studies), Jewish lawyers discussed a grim reality whose only public appearance on an everyday basis is the drumbeat of calumny that a boisterous elite — NGOs, journalists, academics — rain down on Israel.

Perhaps the most startling of the sessions concerned the BDS movement. Jonathan Rynhold, from the BESA Center at Bar Ilan, and Anthony Julius, author of Trials of the Diaspora: A History of Anti-Semitism in England, both presented a picture of British anti-Zionist activity whose intellectual and moral foundations were profoundly irrational, a dogmatic will to stigmatize and destroy Israel that responded to no argument about proportion (what about other places?) or reason (you make no moral demands of the Palestinians).
And behind that lies a much weightier volume of negative feeling, a kind of unthinking animosity that expressed itself in its most banal form when a woman explained to Julius: “We all know why the Jews are hated: you marry among yourselves and live in ghettos like Golders Green and Vienna [sic].” In so doing, she put her finger on the most widespread subtext for hostility to Jews – “they think they’re the chosen people.”

Daniel Eilon, an English barrister, explained to me one of the mechanisms. It isn’t real anti-Semitism. In fact, most of the stuff that comes out against Israel is intellectually hopeless — phony narratives based on fantasy “facts.” This is really just good old-fashioned Jew-baiting. It’s saying things in all righteous innocence that you know will hurt the Jews to whom you address the criticism. The problem for the Brits (and the Europeans in general), he pointed out, is that historically, there’s never been a particularly high price to pay for Jew-baiting. Now there is.

What my friend referred to with this last remark is lucidly analyzed by Robin Shepherd in his recent book, A State Beyond the Pale: Europe’s Problem with Israel. The elephant in the room, of course, is radical Islam — the people who interpret being “chosen” by Allah as a charter to dominate the world and submit everyone, willingly or not, to Islam. They’re the people no one dares bait; and they’re the folks who take full advantage of every deference to press for more. Daily aggressions from violent gangs constantly expand the territories where the Queen’s writ does not run. In tempo with the retreat of British law and enforcement, Sharia advances from internal community affairs (explicitly on the model of Jewish religious courts) towards the policing of community boundaries and claims on the state for special treatment. The British — like so many other Western nations –mainstream the extremists and marginalize the moderates. As Nick Cohen put it: “The world faces a psychotic movement and won’t admit it to themselves.”

A documentary filmmaker reveals a double assault on freedom of speech: on the one hand, everyone is terrified of peers calling them Islamophobes; and on the other, anyone who does something negative on Islam puts his or her life in danger. When I respond animatedly to her point, she looks around nervously and signals for me to lower my voice. How often did my British informants tell me in hushed tones about being intimidated!

News agencies send their journalists to special courses in self-defense for how to deal with hostile situations. How much of this responds to the pervasive dangers of doing journalism in Muslim countries, and how often does it come up in those areas where the Queen’s writ does not run? One such journalist who works for the BBC reports that when a mob turns ugly, they are told to stand back to back, palms open, pointing down and out — a posture of non-threat, but also one of subjection.

And of course, the best protection is positive coverage. Most of the time, “but we’re from the BBC” works to allay Muslim hostility: it’s code for “we’re on your side.” But for some crowds, even that’s not enough.

The result of this pervasive intimidation that comes from both peers and enemies is a body politic that feels no pain. Like a victim of CIP (congenital insensitivity to pain), the British public receives only vague hints of the assaults on its body. A widespread omerta operates in the mainstream news media, guaranteeing that many, if not most aggressions go unreported, or in a code — Asian street gangs — that only those looking for clues will notice. Aggregator sites online offer deeply disturbing collections of news items.

As a result, Brits look away while their Muslim communities are taken over by fascist zealots who enforce dress and behavior codes, who silence dissent, and who mobilize a resentful youth with violent hatreds. For these men, infidels are by definition guilty, deserving rape and lethal assault, as part of Allah’s justice. Douglas Murray’s study of twenty-seven Muslims, targeted by zealots, reveals the workings of a community hijacked by thugs.

[doctorzlo]

The trials and tribulations of Afshan Azad, the Bengali Muslim-born actress in the Harry Potter films, beaten and threatened with death by her family, illustrate the depth of the community pressures. Her brothers’ failures to bring her to heel (or kill her) endanger their lives: “We are going to get trouble from the community now. It is bad news for our safety, her safety. My younger brother is going to get harassed at college. All our family is going to be harassed by the community because of this.” The tribal community rules, even in college.

So while a large and growing population falls under the grip of a Mafioso culture with an imperialist ideology of world conquest, the British look away. The “prestigious” London School of Economics disinvited Douglas Murray from speaking, lest his presence provoke violence. Paralyzed by an inability to discuss the problem, they become a train-wreck in slow motion. The lavish expenses that the government has paid out to immigrant families, which has at once increased their numbers and stilled their rage, is now run out. Budget cuts of up to 40% across the board will only exacerbate the frictions, and if the government pours money into appeasing the Muslims, they will alienate the British working class losing their benefits.

Which brings us back to Jew-baiting. As Shepherd explains in his chapter on Islam in Europe, this is a European-wide phenomenon that is directly related to the fear of criticizing Muslims. Anti-Zionism is the key extremist discourse by which jihadis radicalize communities and mobilize warriors for Allah’s armies. The disturbing figures for how many British Muslims support terror, think Muslims did not commit either 9-11 or 7-7, think the law should punish people who insult Islam, and think that apostates from Islam should die should not be read the way we read political polls in the West. These minorities are the dominant voices in their communities, if only because they use their terror tactics against fellow Muslims far more readily than against outsiders.

So while their enemies advance, the British elites are like deer in the headlights, incapable of speaking up for even their own principles of free speech and tolerance. Intimidated into silence about Muslims, somehow, they find their voice in denouncing the “real” genocidal evil empire: Israel. Thus some wax eloquent, like the Methodists with their thinly-disguised, resentful supersessionism; and others wax violent, like the anti-Zionist vandals, who damaged hundreds of thousands of pounds of property and got off scott free to the cheers of a Green MP.

Of course, every sin these brave ideologues accuse Israel of committing is done a thousand-fold by the very people who generate their demonizing narrative — the radical Muslims. It is these zealots who interpret their chosenness as a warrant to rape and massacre, to dominate and humiliate infidels. They are the toxic communitarians who believe in their side right or wrong, to the death — not the Jews, who can’t stop publicly beating their breasts about all their sins. Indeed, one of the mysterious factors in this madness is the role played by Jewish anti-Zionists, who, in Julius’ memorable phrase, are “proud to be ashamed to be Jewish.”

Instead of taking note of such sobering perspectives, Western anti-Zionists shy away from the dangerous and painful but legitimate and necessary criticism of Muslim radicals. They prefer the easy, cost-free baiting of any Jew proud enough to feel that his or her own people deserve a state. Instead of turning to the Muslims and saying “why can’t you express a fraction of the self-criticism of the Zionists?” they prefer to repeat the most toxic accusations against the Jews and claim: “I’m not saying anything that Jews haven’t said.”

They are the true Islamophobes — afraid to criticize Islam, eager to join in its chorus of hatred.
And in this act of demission before the Islamist challenge, British opinion makers and shapers also submit to their own bullies, their own zealots who push the Jew-baiting beyond the weekend sport of the salons, into the professional arena of anti-Zionist activism. When the founders of Hamas in 1988 penned their genocidal charter that explicitly targeted all infidels, little did they suspect that within twenty years, those infidels would chant “We are Hamas!” in the streets of London. Who could hope for a more useful infidel than that?
In the European past, Jew-baiting may have seemed relatively cost-free. After all, humiliate a Jew and the worst he’ll do is hector you. Sure, sometimes the sport got out of hand, and killing Jews en masse, or forcing them to convert, or kicking them out may have deeply damaged the economy and empowered repressive forces, like the Inquisition, to go after other religious dissidents. But who really noticed?
Today, however, the situation has changed dramatically because Europe doesn’t just run the risk of internal failure, but getting vanquished by an implacable and merciless foe. By failing to denounce toxic Muslim communitarianism and instead adopting its shrill discourse of demonization about Jews, Brits feed the monster that devours them. If it continues apace, if the British do not make Muslim civility towards Jews the shibboleth of assimilation to a free and democratic culture, they risk losing that civil polity entirely. As always with real anti-Semites, the Jews are only their first target.

Can Britain wake up in time? And if and when it does, can it swallow the painful price of giving up its addiction to Jew-baiting? Or will it be, as some close observers think, the first country in Europe to succumb to Islamism? Walking through the delightful streets of London, watching a brilliant performance of Henry IV Part II at the reconstituted Globe Theatre, passing by a multi-cultural mass of dancers by the embankment at night, viewing the vibrant energy of the city, one has little clue to the problem.

Or is watching this joyful celebration akin to seeing a fat man with a serious cholesterol problem dine on his deep-fried fish-and-chips and wash down those tasty truffles of moral Schadenfreude that so grieve the Jews and comfort the resentful?

Richard Landes is a Professor of History at Boston University. He blogs at The Augean Stables, and maintains The Second Draft as an archival site for all matters pertaining to Pallywood and al Durah. The Second Draft has recently been reorganized and relaunched with new features.