But the main issue I have with the Apartheid libel is that your mudslinging achieves nothing to bring about peace and reconciliation between Israel and her neighbours. I do a lot of work in the dispute resolution field and I can tell you that engaging in malicious attacks blaming one side is detrimental to achieving a successful outcome.

So what are you really trying to achieve?

As for South Africa, I think I’ve had enough direct experience of South Africa and close reading of Sth African history to know that Israel and SA are not the same, thank goodness, but there are disturbing signs in Israel of deliberate and institutionalised discrimination. If you actually read what I have said in my galus article, I had a got at a number of other countries as well. Ethnic pride doesn’t justify endemic discrimination and inequality.

It is as irrelevant that NIF does good deeds like striving for equality in schools, as it is that Hamas conducts welfare activities among its poor; poor hangers on, tht is.

The poing is that it is a foreign funded organisation which in turn funds left wing ati-Israel/anti-Zionist groups and undermines the security and reputation of the country. Im Tirtzu validly criticises NIF’s sedition.

The problem with left wing ideologues is that they see themselves a part of a humanity and as long as they have it easy and are accepted by the “lovies”, they could not give a damn about fellow Jews or their own past. They are more than happy to destroy an Israel that does not live up to their standards. And influenced by “the movement”, they blind themselves to the utterly horrible jihadists that have been waging war on the Jewish state for over six decades. The unconditional Christian love and forgiveness that they show to the mohammedans, they withhold from Jews fighting an existential battle, a state in the front lines of jihad against the West and the 21st century. A jihad, that if lost, would deny them the freedoms they misuse in denigrating Israel.

As for Stillman’s scurrilous comments about Israeli apartheid, I suggest that he learns a bit more about the SA system before misapplying that term to Israel. There are inequalities is all societies and when only the Jewish state is criticised for those, then such a description is antisemitic. About par for the course for Jews proud to be ashamed to be Jews.

You are referring to my piece in Galus Australis I assume, in which I said. I can only summarize my article in a couple of sentences.

I am very uncomfortable in using the word apartheid, and that is what I say in the article. I wish there was another term. If you want, we could say ’separate and unequal’, which has strong historical resonance in the US dues to the ruling of the Supreme Court there in the late 1890s, but nowhere else. All the evidence is that that there is a terrible trend towards the legitimization of ’separate and unequal’, that has less to do with matters of security, and more to do with dominance of one group over another. This flies in the face of a human rights approach to citizenship.

There is also concern that if the far right had its own way, the situation would certainly resemble if not South Africa, a pretty terrible place. I am looking for more nuance here. I am not saying it is exactly like South Africa, but it is showing disturbing signs of a permanent, legislated separation of peoples into deliberately unequal populations. Some would claim it has always been like that. I don’t make that claim, but rather, this is the outcome of a policy of occupation and colonization on top of a Zionism that never really came to terms with the historical rights and presence of another people.

Where I differ, I think, with anti-Zionists/Israel people is that I recognise that population movements are part of history, and we see the effects in particular, in places like the Balkans and Palestine. Jews came to Palestine (some would say back to Palestine) for all sorts of reasons, and have met resistance ever since. The solution has to be compromise, and I wish this for both Israeli Jew, Israeli Palestinians and Palestinians in the Territories, as well as the Palestinian Diaspora. It also means moving down the path of reconciliation (as has happened in a number of countries, though the path has been tough. This will also require comprises on the part of Diaspora Jews Diaspora Palestinians for the sake of peace. The other great factor is whether or not the US will keep bankrolling Israeli.

Institutionalizing separation, whether whatever it is labelled is an affront to Jewish history and human rights.

I am concerned however, with the politicisation of the NIF issue and the name calling and finger pointing on both sides. I believe that most of us are concerned that funds donated in good faith to Israel do not end up in the hands of those who seek to deligitimise the Zionist dream and who wish to endanger Israeli lives by weakening the state.

These are questions that have rightly or wrongly been posed by this controversy and which I believe deserve an answer. I don’t believe you have done this in your otherwise excellent piece.

I also hold a great deal of respect for Naomi Chazan and have done for some time. However, I believe that in the current circumstances, her visit was untenable. The good news is that it’s been postponed, not cancelled and there is every chance that we will have the opportunity to see and hear her in person some time soon.

However the NIF is an important body in trying to correct many of the wrongs in our society- it should not be silenced by people whose knowledge of its activities and functions are superficial at best.

We hope this “new” information will lead to a re think by the Melbourne community as Nathan expressed it is veery important that the diaspora supports Israeli society as a whole and not just those on the far right right as the current actions appear to suggest. We are struggling here to support a fully democratic society do not let Melbourne become the voice of those elements that endevour to stifle debate in our country.

Rachel and Mark Spigelman

Kol ha kavod. Unfortunately, I believe that you will be attacked too, for not being a patriot, by people who have been captured by an increasingly scary, right-wing agenda that belongs in the former Balkans, but also, by a community that is kept in a deliberately stoked state of anxiety.