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Like confidence tricksters who manage to fool multitudes with their snake oil type smooth talk current developments bear an uncanny resemblance to these fraudsters. There is a saying that a fool is born every minute but given what is happening around us at the moment I would venture to suggest that fools are born every second.
First of all the illusionists:
The greatest confidence trick in recent memory has just occurred with the announcement that Fatah and Hamas have been joined in unholy matrimony and have consummated a poisonous union which will spawn more bastard offspring dedicated to terror and murder. The illusion spun by the spin machines in Ramallah is that this new unelected governing body is composed of squeaky clean technocrats who wholeheartedly embrace democracy, human rights, brotherly love, religious freedom and acceptance of Israel’s right to exist. The truth of course is that most of the same old faces from the previous administration have been recycled plus an addition of some new individuals with Hamas sympathies. Touted as technocrats the illusion is created that here are a bunch of people, untainted with any hint of terror association or rejection of Israel as the Jewish State. Nothing could be further from reality because all you have to do is read their past declarations and you will see that nothing has changed. Well, actually lots of things have changed and it’s all for the worse because now that Abbas and Fatah have climbed into bed with each other the clauses inscribed in their respective charters have become fundamental to future policies.
However as any good illusionist can tell you, especially when they are trying to sell a bill of tainted goods, it all depends on how you bamboozle your willing audience. Using every trick in his vast array of illusory tools of trade, Abbas employs them to create the fiction that a new era has dawned in the sordid history of Arab/Moslem rejection of Jewish legal and historical rights to our land. Unlike the late unlamented Arafat, Abbas looks the part of a penitent saint whose every utterance deserves to be embraced with unrestrained joy and gratification. Buried in all this illusionist hype is the stark fact that by joining with an internationally declared terrorist group, he and his cohorts are complicit in signing up to an agenda of terror. No amount of illusionist contortions to the contrary should confuse anyone.
The delusionists:
As any snake oil salesman can tell you there are always plenty of willing customers out there keen and eager to buy even the most outrageous product, provided it is packaged prettily and accompanied by glib sales talk. This is how it was in the old wild west of the USA and how it survives today in the international community.
As soon as the very idea of a joint Fatah/Hamas terror authority was mooted it was guaranteed that those, whose previous ill considered schemes for a flawed peace deal had collapsed in a heap of hate, would leap at the first opportunity to embrace and purchase this new bag of illusionist tricks. In Australia and New Zealand we call it being sucked into a con job and this latest manifestation of shady wheeling and dealing merely proves that when it comes to Israel, anything goes.
At first the US State Department assured everyone that no hasty decision would be made and then as if by magic less than 24 hours later the Obama administration announced that US recognition was forthcoming and it was business as usual. Trying to justify their complete summersault, John Kerry asserted that as only “technocrats” were ministers and assurances had been received that all agreements would be honoured, there was no reason to oppose this new Fatah/Hamas arrangement. He added that a close eye would be kept on developments. Well we all know how successful his close eye has been at preventing North Korea from developing nuclear weapons, the great success he has had in preventing Iran from racing towards the same goal and the outstanding achievement of preventing genocide in Syria. If these “triumphs” are anything to go by we can guarantee that his close eye will be more like calculated blindness in the face of Fatah/Hamas continuing terror and hate incitement.
Following the latest US demonstration of how to stab one’s friends in the back, the EU and the United Nations rushed to recognize the Fatah/Hamas terror government. After all they could hardly be seen to be less appeasing of terror groups than the so called leader of the democratic world. Trailing not far behind were the usual motley collection of those enlightened people whose delusional hallucinations blind them to the looming danger of fanatical Islamic terror.
None of the above actions by the delusionists should have come as any surprise to those who have any sense of reality. There is a straight line between the appeasers of terror in the 1930’s and those who practice the same policies today.
The greatest illusionist act since Houdini will play out at the Vatican when our soon to retire President, embraces Abbas who has just consummated his marriage with an internationally designated terror group. With the Pope urging them on, these three “wise” men will perform a delusional media event as the non religious
Peres and the Moslem denier of a Jewish State, Abbas, mouth meaningless prayers. If ever there was a ritual of non spiritual deception this is going to be it.
As the media and the international choir sing hallelujah we can only brace ourselves for more truth defying contortions.
Michael Kuttner is a Jewish New Zealander who for many years was actively involved with various communal organisations connected to Judaism and Israel. He now lives in Israel and is J-Wire’s correspondent in the region.
