The Israeli Embassy in London had invited Mr. Gavri Bargil to give a speech/conference/lecture/ at the LSE (London School of Economics) on 13th May 2010.
According to the information around (in the internet) "Mr. Bargil is or has been the Secretary General of the Kibbutz Movement since 2000. A member of Kibbutz Ramot Menashe, during the years 1996-1999 Bargil was the head shaliach (emissary) of the Kibbutz Artzi in North America. He previously served as the Executive Director of Peace Now and as a brigade commander holding the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 1994 Bargil received his M.A. in Political Science, from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem since June 2004."
My friend called me yesterday and told me about this speech that was going to take place at 18:00 at the LSE - Holborn - London. I got very excited and decided to come with her, as both of us were actually expecting to hear something refreshing from our beloved Eretz ha'kodesh.
We arrived a little early, but waited until Mr. Bargil arrived, which by the way was 30 minutes late. And since we were not informed that the room used for this spech would have to be vacated by 19:00, we were expecting a good flow of conversation.
There were only 10 of us there, including Mr. Bargil, who politely introduced himself, did not fail to mention over 15 times (during the mere 30 minutes) that he was working with Peace Now for the last 20 years (as if we did not hear the first time, and yes, I did count), and spent the remaining 30 minutes spouting an absurd and unsupported version of the Israeli people's opinions and even claimed to "know" the mentality of the Palestinians. I kid you not!
Ah, notwithstanding his complete disregard for Israel and her people, he also alleged to have spoken/and having been negotiating directly with the Palestinian leaders regarding a treaty for peace, although he failed to tell us the name of these Palestinian leaders he spoke to, failed to tell us what this "peace treaty" entailed both for the Israeli and the Palestinian people, and failed to tell us on whose authority he was negotiating. What he did instead, and very orchestrated at that, was to completely change the subject, behaving somewhat like some sort of politician.
Mr. Bargil, also gave a very disturbing, erroneous, biased, and very ignorant view of the situation not only in Israel but also in the Palestinian territories, made opinions that did not and do not reflect even 30% of the opinion of Israelis, and failed miserably to acknowledge modern and historical facts, such as the terminology PALESTINIAN being used to refer to JEWS, before the Arab invasion of our lands. In fact he looked quite puzzled when I reminded him of this detail.
After the pathetic 30 minutes of his speech, I tried to approach him to ask him what he thinks will happen if his plan works, and we cut our minute land in half, giving away this half to our mortal enemies, the Muslim Palestinians, which are not really Palestinians, but Arabs from Syria, Iran, Libya, Egypt and Lebanon. Mr. Bargil simply replied that he HOPED the Palestinians would "behave", and commit to their peace agreement.
After that extremely naive and somewhat childish reply I was taken aback, repulsed and angry.
I also asked Mr. Bargil if after this so-called peace deal, I would for example, be able to buy a house in Gaza. He looked astounded and surprised with my question, and in return questioned me why I would want to buy a house there. I said: "Maybe I may wish to live there, after all it will all be peaceful, no?" Then he said I could live there, but at my own risk, which clearly and doubtlessly means that it had all been a show. He could not have contradicted himself better than that.
To my friend and I the message was clear; he is willing to allow Israel to be raped and plundered by the Arab Muslims. The very land that gave birth to him.
I am also posting here below my friend's comments regarding the lecture:
"We entered the lecture room early and found one student waiting the lecture. I asked him some questions about Mr Bargil, for instance, was he pro- or anti-Israel, what was his background. The student smiled and said Mr Bargil was pro-Israel, had served in the army as a commander and was now involved in Peace Now. As I personally do not believe Peace Now knows what it is doing and certainly has not contributed to peace of any kind, I became skeptical. Nevertheless I wanted to hear this man's views as he was an Israeli. The student also told us the Israeli embassy had encouraged the visit and asked him to find a room for him to speak. When I asked if the talk had been advertised, the young man told me "no". When I asked why, he could not tell me.
We thought there was only going to be 3 people at this talk but eventually there were about 10, gathered it seems, in the last minutes before Mr Bargil arrived late. They all seemed to be Jewish students, one girl announced she was Spanish, but she appeared more arab.
We did not realise we only had half an hour to listen and question Mr Bargil.
Mr Bargil seemed confused and kept contradicting himself. Also he got annoyed with a question I asked him and nearly lost his temper. Having visited Israel and stayed on a kibbutz I was puzzled by the man's lack of forthrightness, clarity and enthusiasm about Israel. He did not answer any questions either me or my friend put to him directly; he was very vague and confused.
His main point seemed to be that the "palestinians" were good partners for peace. When I mentioned that land-Gaza - had been given up for peace and no peace had ensued, he could not explain why. When I said that from my personal research I was convinced that Hamas and Fatah were both dedicated to the same end, ie pushing all Jews into the sea, all the students, barely 20 years old, all laughed patronisingly as if to say, "we know better". Mr Gavril was probably expecting to give is talk to a group of credulous, unthinking, programmed students. And he did but he was not expecting 2 people who refused to toe the propaganda line and wanted real answers to real questions.
Unfortunately there was not enough time to question Mr Gavril on recent statements by Hamas about Fatah members joining them and the contents of the Hamas charter, the gathering of Hezbollah on Israel's northern border and their digging of tunnels there.
If this was sanctioned by the Israeli embassy, I can only presume it was for propaganda purposes. They wanted to let, through LSE students, people know that Israel is committed to peace. Unfortunately, he proved convincingly and probably without intention, that Israel has without a doubt, no partners in their search for peace.
If this man was meant to show the intellectual power of the Israeli pro-peace discourse, he was a pathetic and abject failure."
To us, Mr. Bargil sounded nothing but a traitor to his country and his people.
-Morrigan-
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