An Idiot In Search of Fame

On A Ship of Fools

We in New Zealand were treated recently to a right, royal display of hypocritical tomfoolery.  One of our political representatives has taken the cake for hypocritical cant.

Said representative, Green MP Marama Davidson has been taken to task in an opinion piece in one of our daily newspapers.  The occasion was Davidson's trotting off to Israel to protest that country's application of international law in patrollingl its seas to protect itself from water borne attacks by Islamist mujaheddin.

Now, it does not need too much intelligence to sense just the slightest whiff of hypocrisy here.
 New Zealand, as is the case with all sea bounded nations, has an internationally recognised exclusion zone around its coast, referred to as the territorial waters of New Zealand.  Davidson--a Green MP--is the ultimate hypocrite.  She would keen and rant--long and hard--against any idea that we should give up on our sovereign waters, thus allowing big commercial fishing boats to decimate fish and marine life around our coasts.

But Israel protecting its sea-facing borders by excluding Palestinian boats, crewed by citizens of a nation which actively attacks Israel by rockets and suicide bombers, is a grave injustice--according to our Green prophetess.

Actually, it was just a cheap publicity stunt by a second grade wannabe activist.  The rest of the nation, apart from her half-a-dozen mates, cringed at the self-seeking publicity stunt.  Davidson is every which way a fool, a jester.

The following article appeared in one of our daily e-newspapers:

The sovereign integrity of states is one of those building blocks on which the modern world operates.  It is a guiding tenet of international law, and one of the founding principles of the United Nations.  In the case of Israel's protection of the waters on the southern end of its country, these principles are confirmed by the Oslo Accords and more recently by the UN Security Council.

So when a New Zealand politician openly and unashamedly decides to violate international law and another country's sovereignty for the sake of a media stunt, that act will inevitably reflect poorly on that politician, the party they represent, and sadly, even on our Parliament.

What made matters worse in this case was that the politician concerned – Green MP Marama Davidson – participated in a breach of Israel's sovereignty for no apparent purpose. When the protest ended more mundanely than expected, she was forced to resort to melodramatic language to dramatise events.

Ms Davidson described the Israeli Navy's female crew taking her and the other activists to safety as a "kidnap," and herself as a "hostage."  Both terms are wildly inaccurate, and seem designed more to achieve provocation than reconciliation.

Women do suffer in Gaza, at the hands of the governing power  Hamas, an Islamist organisation. But Hamas' honour killings, persecution of gays, genocidal charter, and state-sanctioned misogyny do not rate a mention by these activists on the "women's peace boat".

The "peace activists" include a woman who created a video game that encourages kids to shoot as many Israelis as they can and another who accused Israel of orchestrating the recent terrorist attacks in Munich and Nice. Are these aligned with Green party or Kiwi values?

What about the impact of such stunts? Apart from the attention-seeking achieved for the individuals involved, the flotilla is unlikely to contribute anything at all for the Palestinians.  . . .

And the final irony to this embarrassing episode is that while the Israeli Defence Forces were taking these anti-Israeli protesters to safety, Palestinians in Gaza launched a rocket attack against Israeli civilians.

Authors David Cumin and Juliet Moses are members of the New Zealand Jewish Council.  Paul Moon is Professor of History at Auckland University of Technology

Whatever integrity that remained amongst the Greens and the rest of the radical Left has been stripped away.  What a national embarrassment.  To add insult to injury Davidson's trip was funded by the New Zealand taxpayer.  As an MP she gets the perk of "free" taxpayer funded travel.