Progress Pond

Bibi Netanyahu Stands By Song Wishing Death to President Obama

Boes Bibi Netanyahu in his incitement for hate always rely on an “Amir ” to do his assassin’s work? What a disgusting politician, what a shame Israel’s “democracy” calls on him to lead the nation. Bibi Netanyahu is feeding the beast …

Amir Benayoun Walla Culture: Obama is like Hitler
Week’s headlines: Ayelet Shaked and Amir Benayoun

Bibi Invited Pop Star Who Called for Obama’s Death to Sing HaTikvah on Election Night | Tikun Olam |

Amir Benayoun is one of Israel’s most famous Mizrahi pop stars.  The closest thing to him here might be Bob Seger, if Seger had remained hugely popular and sang songs calling Pres. Obama Hitler and wishing for his death.  For that’s what Benayoun, a darling of the political far-right, has done.  

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Benayoun along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Photo: Ruben Castro)

He wrote a new song, Enemy of the State, about Pres. Obama.  It’s an execrable song, not just the lyrics.  He sings it like a soporific dirge, which I suppose is meant to offer it some portentous sense of meaning, which it entirely lacks.  This is a translation of the lyrics, found here in Hebrew:

    I bought a crow with a cute little mustache
     Even though there are many like it you can buy free in the street
     Because of my love for Obama I will only say
     That I called the crow by the name of that disgusting President

    The reason I bought this cruel crow was to try
     to inject into this traitorous creature a few drops of heart
     In the meanwhile, I lost an eye, I suffer from stupidity and an evil crow
     I wish for the death of this wicked creature.

    That’s why it was so hard for me to choose a special name for him
     There have already been a few other crows who’ve tried to wipe us out forever
     That’s why it was so hard for me to choose an original name for him
     To illustrate just what disgusting garbage he is.

    He pesters me at home, caws, pesters the neighbors
     His pals vandalize the street and terrify the pigeons
     The crow is a betrayer from the days of that terrible Flood
     Even then he refused to be Noah’s messenger and bring news.

    …That’s why it was so hard to choose a name for this creature
     I have no idea why he lives and breathes…

In subsequent interviews he’s further “clarified” his views and defended the song, though he removed it from his Facebook page where he originally published it.  In this interview, he acknowledged he wished for the death of all haters of Israel, among which he included Obama, but says he can’t understand where anyone got the idea he wants Obama to die:

“I long for the death of the wicked one, who currently represents the peak of evil in the world, which for me is Obama,” said Benayoun. “It is not specifically Obama. I mean the death of the creature who wants to kill us all the time, and the one who currently works hardest at this is Obama.”


You can imagine that the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv isn’t terribly happy with this news.  It released the following statement:

    “We were sorry to hear the repulsive descriptions. We condemn any provocative
    and racist language, whether it is against the president of the United States or
    against anyone else, and we believe that most Israelis think like us.”

The settler publication, Arutz Sheva, in covering the story made this remarkably clueless comment:

    “How the song constitutes “racist language” as phrased by
    the embassy’s condemnation remains unclear.  

Continued below the fold …

Israel’s president revokes invitation to Israeli singer after inflammatory song

Israel’s president Reuven Rivlin has revoked an invitation to a popular Israeli singer to perform at a high-profile public event after the pop star released an inflammatory new song about an east Jerusalem Palestinian who imagines stabbing Jews.

The song “Ahmed Loves Israel” was released at the weekend in the midst of concern over a wave of racist incidents that have targeted Palestinians. Those in turn have been fuelled by recent violence, including a spate of deadly attacks targeting Jews including an assault on a Jerusalem synagogue last week that left four rabbis and a Druze policeman dead.

The song, written and performed by Amir Benayoun, includes the words: “Salam aleikum, my name is Ahmed, I live in Jerusalem. I study at the university. Who better than me enjoys both worlds. Today I’m moderate and all smiles like a cherub.

“Send a Jew to hell. It’s true I’m scum, an ingrate, but I’m not to blame, I wasn’t raised on love. When you turn your back on me, I’ll shoot you in the back or stick an axe in you.”

The performance at the president’s house was cancelled after the song was initially posted on Facebook. The track – viewed over 100,000 times over the weekend – sparked a furious debate, with some commenters accusing the singer of racist incitement.

In an interview on Army Radio, Benayoun at first refused to apologise for his lyrics, raging at the host: “Enough with this hypocrisy; I get my inspiration from the latest [synagogue] murders. You’re murderers yourselves, your words lead to murder – you should be ashamed of yourselves!”

Kerry blames Jerusalem synagogue attack on ‘incitement’ by Palestinian leaders

Feeling the loyalty to the Jewish state | Mondoweiss |

(Sept. 16, 2010 ) – The Israeli Knesset is debating a bill proposed by David Rotem of the extreme right Yisrael Beiteinu party that would require all Israeli citizens to swear loyalty to Israel as a “Jewish and democratic state.” This bill is targeted at increasing pressure on the twenty percent of Israelis who are Palestinian citizens while forcing the ultra Orthodox Jewish minority who reject the legitimacy of any state not based on Jewish biblical law to accept Zionism. If passed in its proposed form, citizens unwilling to take the loyalty oath would be at risk of losing citizenship.

Israeli leaders committed to a classic secular political Zionist platform have always fought at all costs to guard Israel’s “Jewish character,” even while they reveal their inability to properly define exactly what it is. The loyalty oath and push for a two-state solution are the most profound examples of the insecurity that has roiled beneath the surface in Jewish Israeli society since the state’s inception. Without a Jewish majority exhibiting clear legal and political dominance over the non-Jewish or non-Zionist minority, the Zionist movement becomes meaningless. So as the Palestinian-Israeli minority actively resists its dispossession and the ultra-Orthodox stubbornly reject the concept of a Jewish state, the Israeli establishment feels increasingly compelled to seek draconian measures to salvage its vision of Zionism.

The loyalty oath was one of the main platform issues for Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s far right Yisrael Beitenu party when it campaigned in 2009. “No citizenship without loyalty,” was among Lieberman’s most effective campaign slogans (his other slogan: “Only Lieberman speaks Arabic”), helping guide his party to an astonishing third place, with 15 of the 120 seats in Israeli Parliament. The draft bill currently debated in the Parliament would allow the Interior Ministry to strip even native Israelis of their nationality if they refused to swear allegiance to the Jewish state and “its symbols and values,” and failed to profess their willingness to perform military service. Abraham Foxman, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League, has explicitly endorsed the bill.

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