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Israel - our ally

Extract from Spectator online - "Will no one acknowledge how Mossad helps Britain?"Jake Wallis Simons21 November 2025, 11:24am'Let’s imagine that an international jihadi network, with cells in London and Europe, had just been busted, with dramatic arrests in Britain, Germany and Austria. Let’s imagine that the group had been planning a string of atrocities, with a weapons cache discovered in Vienna.Let’s imagine that security services had unearthed ‘tens of thousands of Euros in cash, numerous data storage devices and mobile phones, gas pistols, firearms, ammunition, knives, and related literature’. You’d have expected such a story to make the news, right?Wrong. On Monday, the Israeli prime minister’s office announced that this precise scenario had unfolded, with Mossad handing intelligence to MI5 and European agencies that enabled them to bring the jihadis to justice and foil their murderous ambitions. The name of the gang? Here’s a clue: it coordinated with leaders in Qatar and Turkey. You guessed it.In a statement that would chill the heart of any Briton or European were they to have heard it reported, Benjamin Netanyahu’s office warned: ‘Since the October 7 massacre, the Hamas terrorist organisation has been working with renewed vigour to build infrastructure and recruit terrorist cells in Europe and other arenas, similar to the Iranian regime and its proxies.’When people talk of Iranian ‘proxies’, they are referring to groups such as Hezbollah, the Houthis and less well-known terrorist gangs in Syria and Iraq. Over the decades, Tehran built these up into a ‘ring of fire’ around Israel, which was only dismantled after the Mossad pager operation last year, followed by Israel’s airborne humiliation of the Iranian regime during those fateful 12 days in June.That is what the Israelis are saying that we are starting to face here. A network of proxies. A nascent ring of fire, preparations for a 7 October of our own, awaiting activation.'Why does our MSM not report this ?Why don't we wake up and smell the coffee (Turkish ?) and be forearmed as well as forewarned.

John Hawkes ● 15d24 Comments ● 21h

The Party's Over

People vote Labour for several reasons. One is tribalism, as in 'My family have always been Labour'. It is difficult for such individuals to to change their allegiance as voting for another party would seem like a betrayal of their family or community. Another is self-interest. Workers in the public sector, for example, are more likely to vote Labour since this is the party committed to state rather than private enterprise. So why would they vote for any other party? But there is also a class of people, to which I suspect several of the contributors to Putney Forum belong, who vote Labour because of what they would call a social conscience. They believe that Labour is the party most likely to help the disadvantaged.  Their party allegiance is  part of who they are. Voting Conservative would be tantamount to going over to the dark side. Some individuals, of course, are motivated by all three considerations at once.What these groups have in common is that they are on the whole impervious to rational argument. When presented with evidence contrary to their beliefs they employ various strategies. One is silence. So far example, there has been comparatively little discussion on the thread  about the Budget, which has dominated the News over the past two days.  Another tactic is to blame the Conservatives for everything that has gone wrong since Labour came to power, whether it's Brexit, or Boris Johnson or  Liz Truss (though, oddly, Rishi Sunak is never mentioned, perhaps because he actually got inflation down to 2% as opposed to its current level of 4%). A third strategy is to pretend that things are going in the right direction e.g. net migration is falling (mainly due to the last government's visa restrictions), even though 36 000 unauthorised migrants have crossed the Channel this year..The elephant in the room is the enormous level of debt which costs the government over £100 billion each year to service. This burden is simply unsustainable and will eventually bankrupt the country. Unfortunately Labour's decision, under pressure from its backbenchers, to adopt a tax and spend policy will only make the problem worse. Spending money you haven't got obviously increases indebtedness while increased taxation slows growth and reduces revenues. Tax and spend, which I suspect several contributors to the Forum support, was just about possible under Gordon Brown in 2000 when the ratio of public sector debt to GDP was 29%. But now under Rachel Reeves it stands at over 95%. The party's over but unfortunately the revellers won't go home.

Steven Rose ● 9d89 Comments ● 2d

Why is it only Israel that daily makes the news re 'genocide'?

Jews and many living in or are associated with Israel are the race that suffered the greatest genocide in modern times.For those that might have forgotten, some 6,000,000 were murdered on an industrial scale in Nazi Germany in WWII.This naturally has made them at least wary of how they are considered and treated in the West and the Middle East.Palestinians in their conflict with Israel are not experiencing such a fate.It is claimed that Israel has killed 52,000 Palestinians in Gaza.These are figures put out by the 'Gazan Health Ministry' (unelected).This is known to be run by Hamas  which itself murdered and sexually assaulted numerous women, children and the elderly in October 2023 and still hold many hostages as well as the corpses of those it murdered.It does not distinguish between civilian deaths and those of its fighting forces that imbed themselves amongst the general Populus.And of course Hamas is attempting to enact its Charter Declaration which calls for the annihilation of the state of Israel and its Jewish citizens.But we should not forget there have been and still are many conflicts raging around the world that have resulted in many deaths and claims of genocide.They received and get little attention by the anti-Israel bien pensants and fellow travellers.All the focus is on Israel.For example note the deaths resulting from the following -2023 Masalit, West Darfur Sudan - 15,000 deaths2020 Tigray Ethiopia 162,000 deaths2016 Rohingya, Myanmar - 9,000 deaths2016 China - Uyghur birth rate drops 24% because of genocidal persecution2014 Ukraine - 12,000 deaths by Russians2014 Iraq Turkman 3,500 deaths (by ISIS)2014 Iraq/Syria (Yazidis) - 2,100 deaths (by ISIS)2003 Darfur, Sudan - 98,000 deaths2002 North Kivu, DR Congo - 60,000 deaths1996 Kivu, Zaire - 200,000 deaths (Hutus)1994 Rwanda - 491,000 deaths (Tutsis)1992 Bosnia - 31,000 deaths (by Serbs)All inter-tribal as is the conflict initiated by Hamas against Israel.Cut Israel some slack.

John Hawkes ● 196d134 Comments ● 2d