Roger Waters is not happy. Not happy at all. After unsuccessfully trying to turn Alan Parsons to the dark side, Alan Parsons responded with this:
He then ripped Waters for not honoring his request to keep the issue private, followed by performing like a boss to adoring Israeli fans.
So Waters has now responded. With an attack on Israellycool.
Dear Alan,
It was with profound disappointment that I saw you posted this link on your Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/alanparsons/posts/10153127029387958
It is painful to see an important debate lowered to this level of unhelpful mudslinging. To be clear, despite this blogger’s claim, I do not hate Israel – or Israelis or Jews. Along with my many Israeli, Palestinian, Jewish, and Arab colleagues, I seek ways to make sense of the current deadly debacle and to encourage a solution that gives equal rights to all the peoples of these troubled lands. The end of the occupation, a primary aim of BDS, is generally acknowledged in the wider debate as a pre-requisite to any peaceful, just, and lasting solution.
Your resorting to posting ad hominem attacks against me from an obscure extremist website informs the conversation not at all and serves only to muddy the already muddy waters. I continue to hope that while in Israel you took the time to take a look at the Separation Wall – from both sides and to educate yourself further on the injustices Palestinians are routinely subjected to by Israeli military forces. I refer often to a just and lawful resolution of this conflict to the benefit of all the people of the“Holy Land” to provide an environment where all their children, regardless of race or religion, could prosper, equal under the law. I know you have stated that your last words were your final words on these subjects. So be it. Those of us who still dare to dream of peace will continue the conversation without you. For us, “Not to talk is not an option”.
Peace
Your colleague,
Roger Waters
PS: For those of you still interested in the conversation:
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) is also castigated in the cited article. I would like to note that its director, Raji Sourani, is a Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award laureate and has been recognized around the world for his efforts, including with theRight Livelihood Award or “alternative Nobel Peace Prize.” For the record, The New York Times cites nearly 2200 Palestinians killed (a number close to that of PCHR). If you dispute the facts, as the website Alan linked to does, I would encourage you to read the devastating reporting of Anne Barnard and Tyler Hicks.
Here’s my response:
Dear Mr Waters,
I found it quite laughable that you would post your displeasure about so-called ad hominem attacks against you in my post linked to by Alan Parsons, and then immediately follow that up by characterizing my site as “obscure extremist.” For the record, the site receives hundreds of thousands of hits every month, and has been cited by the mainstream media a fair bit (here, here and here are just a few examples), so it is not really that obscure. As for extremist, we believe that Israel has a right to exist – unlike many of your fellow BDS advocates who are on record as wishing for no Israel and calling for one state “from the River to the Sea” (heck, even noted anti-Israel academic Norman Finkelstein opposes BDS for this reason, as does the palestinian ambassador in South Africa). Oh, and we do not oppose the notion of peace with palestinians. Just the idea that we need to commit suicide or be eliminated to achieve this goal. So if that makes us “extremist”, so be it.
But speaking of extremist websites, I’m sure you’d agree antisemite David Duke has one. Right?
You speak of “injustices Palestinians are routinely subjected to by Israeli military forces”, but not of the terrorism perpetrated by palestinians against Israelis which necessitated these measures to begin with. Nor do you mention the injustices Palestinians are routinely subjected to by their own, whether it be those murdered in honor killings, palestinian Christians persecuted by their Muslim brothers, or Gazans restricted at the hands of the Hamas virtue police.
Your final point about the PCHR is entirely irrelevant. Yasser Arafat won a Nobel Prize; this does not make him anything but the arch terrorist that he was. But more to the point, I attacked the statistic you cited – 2,200 palestinians killed – because that number lumps in the terrorists with the civilians! As if Israel’s killing of terrorists firing rockets at her civilians is a crime and not self-defense.
The PCHR published that of the palestinians killed, 76% were civilians. This is an outright lie. They counted people like this guy, and this one, and this 17-year-old, as civilians.
The number was closer to 45%, making the civilian to combatant casualty ratio closer to 1:1, unprecedented in modern warfare. Just ask someone who would know better than you or me – your fellow Englishman Colonel Richard Kemp, former Commander of British Forces in Afghanistan, who noted.
The UN estimate that there has been an average three-to one ratio of civilian to combatant deaths in such conflicts worldwide. Three civilians for every combatant killed.
That is the estimated ratio in Afghanistan: three to one.
In Iraq, and in Kosovo, it was worse: the ratio is believed to be four-to-one. Anecdotal evidence suggests the ratios were very much higher in Chechnya and Serbia.
(the inaccurate PCHR number would have the ratio at 3:1, the UN average)
Mr Waters, I believe you are an Israel hater. I base my opinion on a number of things, including your selective outrage against Israel, your selective use of information from vehemently anti-Israel sources, your turning of a blind eye to palestinian terrorism and the statements of fellow BDS advocates who want Israel’s destruction.
Unlike you, Alan Parsons is a man of integrity who knows how to critically think and not accept blindly the lies you are trying to sell him.
.
