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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 1, 2021 15:59:36 GMT
Many people who strongly support the Palestinian cause also think both Jenny Tonge and David Ward forfeited the right to be LibDem parliamentarians. Just putting that out there. Then they are in both cases misinformed. In my view.
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 1, 2021 16:01:59 GMT
I'd very much agree with that, while at the same time observing that Netanyahu's leadership of Israel has made it tough to declare oneself a wholehearted friend of that state. And although not a Labour member or socialist of any kind, I hope I can suggest that any socialist pledging any kind of allegiance to a bunch of theocratic thugs like Hamas has forfeited the right to be taken seriously as a socialist. This applies to J Corbyn, G Galloway and any of their sycophants and other hangers-on. There is a difference between "allegiance" and being prepared to talk to people. Just as was the case with the IRA and Sinn Fein, anyone who wishes to work for peace in Israel/Palestine needs to talk to Hamas. And some other undesirables on all sides.
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Post by johnhemming on Jan 1, 2021 16:17:50 GMT
I once when Deputy Leader of Birmingham went to Lyons to meet local government leaders from Israel and Palestine. It was an event called Mayors for Peace. One of them made the point that there are some on both sides whose desire for vengeance is so great that they don't want peace, because they want some revenge. I found that quite a significant comment. It demonstrated that there are conflicts where the emotions are so strong that external parties who would like to see peace have a difficulty understanding what is driving people.
It sits behind the challenge of achieving a negotiated peace.
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Chris from Brum
Lib Dem
What I need is a strong drink and a peer group.
Posts: 9,163
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Post by Chris from Brum on Jan 1, 2021 16:37:50 GMT
And although not a Labour member or socialist of any kind, I hope I can suggest that any socialist pledging any kind of allegiance to a bunch of theocratic thugs like Hamas has forfeited the right to be taken seriously as a socialist. This applies to J Corbyn, G Galloway and any of their sycophants and other hangers-on. There is a difference between "allegiance" and being prepared to talk to people. Just as was the case with the IRA and Sinn Fein, anyone who wishes to work for peace in Israel/Palestine needs to talk to Hamas. And some other undesirables on all sides. There's a difference between talking to this or that body, and shilling for them, and certain notables have signally failed to see the difference. There was never any doubt about why Jeremy Corbyn was "talking" to SF, while never meeting the UDA/UVF, and the same applies to his approach to Hamas. He was their advocate, not an honest broker.
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Post by johnhemming on Jan 1, 2021 16:57:32 GMT
There's a difference between talking to this or that body, and shilling for them, and certain notables have signally failed to see the difference. There was never any doubt about why Jeremy Corbyn was "talking" to SF, while never meeting the UDA/UVF, and the same applies to his approach to Hamas. He was their advocate, not an honest broker. There is in a sense a difficulty with a sort of Trotskyite position which is that in an asymmetric conflict one should support the weaker party. I remember that floating around decades ago and I have seen that sort of policy outcome. That can result in supporting terror type attacks (or at least facing both ways on them). A practical problem with that is seen on the 3.5% thread which is that unjust acts (of which terrorist acts are an extreme example) are the sort of thing that creates a desire for revenge. Hence the situation whereever it may be gets into a bigger mess.
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Post by Merseymike on Jan 1, 2021 18:19:38 GMT
Many people who strongly support the Palestinian cause also think both Jenny Tonge and David Ward forfeited the right to be LibDem parliamentarians. Just putting that out there. Oh yes, the sort who think you can be a member of both Friends of Israel and Friends of Palestine. Tonge and Ward were proper advocates for Palestine and critical of Israel
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peterl
Green
Monarchic Technocratic Localist
Posts: 8,045
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Post by peterl on Jan 1, 2021 18:25:02 GMT
I'd join a "Friends of Peace". Far more important that people in Israel and Palestine stop killing each other than whose is right and who is wrong.
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Chris from Brum
Lib Dem
What I need is a strong drink and a peer group.
Posts: 9,163
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Post by Chris from Brum on Jan 1, 2021 20:01:06 GMT
Both sides need candid friends, not cheerleaders. And even the cheerleaders need to be careful who they cheer for.
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Post by timrollpickering on Jan 1, 2021 20:28:51 GMT
I think it was Matthew Parris who put it best when he suggested the best thing the wider world can do with Israel & Palestine is to stop providing an audience.
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 1, 2021 20:33:25 GMT
I suppose it was inevitable that this discussion went off topic and on to Israel/Palestine issues. In itself shows some of the problem! On the matters of 1970 (!) all I will say is that there was a well-attended annual YL conference at Skegness (several hundred attenders) which held a full-day "commission" (as we called break-out sessions in those days) which was attended and addressed by high-powered representatives of both the Israeli authorities and Fatah. There was then a long session in the full conference which (from memory but I may be wrong about the number of options) had ?three main options to debate and some amendments as well. The conference voted for the most pro-Palestinian option. I think it was possibly the first such full and informed debate within any mainstream British political party - I had not been involved in it but was suddenly flung into something of a furore within the Liberal Party. That was the conference where I was elected as Chair defeating the outgoing Chair Louis Eaks, rather against my own better judgement, and certainly not something I had contemplated doing until about three weeks previous! In retrospect I rather think the fact that I took over averted a fatal split between the Liberal Party and the YLs though it didn't always feel like that at the time!
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 1, 2021 20:35:30 GMT
I think it was Matthew Parris who put it best when he suggested the best thing the wider world can do with Israel & Palestine is to stop providing an audience. and weapons...
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 15, 2021 17:29:14 GMT
Some dates for the introduction new new members.
Monday 1st Feb: Dean Godson CON Tuesday 2nd Feb: Richard Benson CON Tuesday 2nd Feb: Peter Cruddas CON Monday 8th Feb: Stephanie Fraser CON Monday 8th Feb: Gillian Merron LAB Tuesday 9th Feb: Andrew Parker XB Tuesday 9th Feb: Jacqueline Foster CON Thursday 11th Feb: Simon McDonald XB Thursday 11th Feb: Syed Kamall CON
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 15, 2021 17:36:49 GMT
CURRENT ELIGIBLE MEMBERSHIP (before the aforementioned introductions)
CON 257 LAB 177 LD 87 DUP 5 GREEN 2 UUP 2 PC 1 Oth 4
XB 182 N/A 49 Bish 26
Plus the Speaker
TOTAL 793
The Non-affiliated peers are mostly persons with a political background or agenda who don't want to take a party whip (or in one or two cases were kicked out). Overall they lean to the left. The "Others" are similar odds and sods: Ind Lab, Ind SD, Lab Ind, Con Ind.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 16, 2021 13:49:21 GMT
CURRENT ELIGIBLE MEMBERSHIP (before the aforementioned introductions) CON 257 LAB 177 LD 87 DUP 5 GREEN 2 UUP 2 PC 1 Oth 4 XB 182 N/A 49 Bish 26 Plus the Speaker TOTAL 793 The Non-affiliated peers are mostly persons with a political background or agenda who don't want to take a party whip (or in one or two cases were kicked out). Overall they lean to the left. The "Others" are similar odds and sods: Ind Lab, Ind SD, Lab Ind, Con Ind. Yes I’ve never quite understood why people who are Non-Affiliated don’t just become Crossbenchers. Or vice versa. Aren’t they effectively the same thing?
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Post by Davıd Boothroyd on Jan 16, 2021 13:50:19 GMT
I think the Crossbench Peers do have a degree of quality control, and don't necessarily accept everyone.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 16, 2021 13:53:06 GMT
I think the Crossbench Peers do have a degree of quality control, and don't necessarily accept everyone. Oh, I didn’t know that.
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timmullen1
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Post by timmullen1 on Jan 16, 2021 14:08:03 GMT
I think the Crossbench Peers do have a degree of quality control, and don't necessarily accept everyone. Oh, I didn’t know that. Didn’t someone say at the time of his suspension that Maginnis had once applied but been rejected by the Crossbench grouping?
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 17, 2021 23:11:18 GMT
I think the Crossbench Peers do have a degree of quality control, and don't necessarily accept everyone. 20 years ago there were three party groups, one or two other political people (Tim Beaumont was a Green by then) and the Cross-benchers who were everyone else, including the Ulster Unionists. But more and more people switched to the crossbenches either because they had fallen out with their party or got a job running a quango or whatever, and the XBs got increasingly peeved that they were just being used as a dustbin by people who came and went. So a "year or two" back - perhaps about five? - they made a rule that anyone wanting to defect to the cross-benches had to do probationary year in a sort of void, sitting with them but not actually being taken into the fold. Hence the invention of "non-affiliated". More and more politicians now prefer that status and title when they don't want to take "their" party whip (or any other). The system was changed so that new crossbenchers were chosen by the HoL Appointments Commission not the PM. Might have started with the "People's Peers" so-called. The present PM has invented the practice of appointing Non-affiliated peers, hence the crop of recent non-Tory Brexiters who have appeared under that label. In effect he is using it to breach the settled convention on XB appointments and get in some new people he hopes will vote with the Tories. (Some are doing so consistently others picking and choosing.)
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 18, 2021 12:19:18 GMT
I think the Crossbench Peers do have a degree of quality control, and don't necessarily accept everyone. 20 years ago there were three party groups, one or two other political people (Tim Beaumont was a Green by then) and the Cross-benchers who were everyone else, including the Ulster Unionists. But more and more people switched to the crossbenches either because they had fallen out with their party or got a job running a quango or whatever, and the XBs got increasingly peeved that they were just being used as a dustbin by people who came and went. So a "year or two" back - perhaps about five? - they made a rule that anyone wanting to defect to the cross-benches had to do probationary year in a sort of void, sitting with them but not actually being taken into the fold. Hence the invention of "non-affiliated". More and more politicians now prefer that status and title when they don't want to take "their" party whip (or any other). The system was changed so that new crossbenchers were chosen by the HoL Appointments Commission not the PM. Might have started with the "People's Peers" so-called. The present PM has invented the practice of appointing Non-affiliated peers, hence the crop of recent non-Tory Brexiters who have appeared under that label. In effect he is using it to breach the settled convention on XB appointments and get in some new people he hopes will vote with the Tories. (Some are doing so consistently others picking and choosing.) Aaah, interesting. Thank you.
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Post by tonygreaves on Jan 22, 2021 22:29:38 GMT
Some dates for the introduction new new members. Monday 1st Feb: Dean Godson CON Tuesday 2nd Feb: Richard Benson CON Tuesday 2nd Feb: Peter Cruddas CON Monday 8th Feb: Stephanie Fraser CON Monday 8th Feb: Gillian Merron LAB Tuesday 9th Feb: Andrew Parker XB Tuesday 9th Feb: Jacqueline Foster CON Thursday 11th Feb: Simon McDonald XB Thursday 11th Feb: Syed Kamall CON Daniel Hannan also lined up for 1 February. None this coming week which is odd. Perhaps Garter is self-isolating.
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