Although Denmark has withdrawn its threats to arrest Israeli Ambassador-designate Carmi Gillon if he arrives in Israel, the issue is still making waves in Israel. President Moshe Katzav said this morning that Denmark\'s threat to arrest Gillon was \"astonishing.\" Danish groups object to the use of physical force during the interrogation of terrorists that was utilized by the Israeli GSS, headed by Gillon. President Katzav noted that Gillon acted in accordance with government decisions and under court supervision while he directed the GSS. \"To my regret,\" Katzav said, \"Denmark did not protest, as required, when Palestinian terrorists were blowing up crowded shopping centers, discotheques, and railway stations in which dozens of citizens were killed, including women and children. I did not hear that Denmark undertook any international initiative when Palestinian terrorists used stones to smash the skulls of two 14-year-old boys or when two innocent soldiers were brutally lynched. Carmi Gillon and his colleagues did not succeed in preventing these events, but they did succeed happily in preventing dozens of similar brutal terrorist attacks.\"
Arutz-7\'s Shai Ben-Tekoa asked former Israeli Ambassador to U.S. Zalman Shoval today: \"First it was Belgium\'s charging Prime Minister Sharon with war crimes, and now Denmark with Carmi Gillon - what is going on there? These are countries that are traditionally friendly with Israel.\" Shoval replied:
\"I think we have made a mistake of ignoring the fact that anti-Semitism is a very strong force being used by our enemies very cleverly and sophisticatedly... They say they are anti-Israel or anti-Zionist, but basically it\'s all anti-Semitism. The trend today is to delegitimize the entire existence of the State of Israel - and some would say of the entire Jewish people as a nation - and although countries like Belgium and Denmark cannot be described as all-out anti-Semites, they have been touched by these arguments. There was an article in the Guardian in England saying that maybe the establishment of the State of Israel was too high of a price to pay for what the Europeans did not do during the Holocaust...
\"I think we have been at fault for not sufficiently emphasizing the heart of the matter: the right of the Jewish people to their country, the shape this land was in when we came back, and the debilitated state of the few hundred thousand Arabs when we came here. Most people in modern liberal societies do not know this; we are instead portrayed as aggressors and occupiers...\"
Ben-Tekoa: \"I find your response breath-taking and astonishing, in that I don\'t recall an Israeli politician and diplomat ever speaking so plainly about old-fashioned anti-Semitism. Do you detect a shift in thinking towards this direction?\"
Shoval: \"Yes, I think there is. At a forum of the Jewish Agency a few weeks ago, for instance, I heard speakers talk this way. The upcoming Durban conference, where [some UN people] are trying to revive the Zionism-is-racism equation, should wake some people up. There is an increase in Holocaust denial, and there must be a worldwide information effort to explain the Zionist effort and the Jewish people.\"
Rabbi Dov Lexner, Chief Rabbi of Denmark, downplayed the Danish reaction: \"It\'s just a question of two different worlds and cultures. We live here in Denmark without major problems - we have to deal only with issues such as what hours of the day the sun shines, and the like... it\'s hard for people here to understand the existential problems facing the Israelis. But then two things happened: Gillon himself said that the policy of moderate physical force should continue, and also the B\'tzelem civil rights organization asked the Danish government to object to the appointment.\"
The Torch, a non-partisan magazine published by a group of Danish university students, has published a list of 20 articles in the United Nation\'s Universal Declaration of Human Rights of which Denmark is in breach. For instance, Article 3 of the Declaration states, \"Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person,\" but in fact asylum seekers who arrive at Denmark\'s ports without identification papers can be imprisoned in isolation indefinitely. In 1998 alone, The Torch reports, there were 5,044 legally-innocent asylum seekers imprisoned for shorter or longer periods as a result of this policy.
Arutz-7\'s Shai Ben-Tekoa asked former Israeli Ambassador to U.S. Zalman Shoval today: \"First it was Belgium\'s charging Prime Minister Sharon with war crimes, and now Denmark with Carmi Gillon - what is going on there? These are countries that are traditionally friendly with Israel.\" Shoval replied:
\"I think we have made a mistake of ignoring the fact that anti-Semitism is a very strong force being used by our enemies very cleverly and sophisticatedly... They say they are anti-Israel or anti-Zionist, but basically it\'s all anti-Semitism. The trend today is to delegitimize the entire existence of the State of Israel - and some would say of the entire Jewish people as a nation - and although countries like Belgium and Denmark cannot be described as all-out anti-Semites, they have been touched by these arguments. There was an article in the Guardian in England saying that maybe the establishment of the State of Israel was too high of a price to pay for what the Europeans did not do during the Holocaust...
\"I think we have been at fault for not sufficiently emphasizing the heart of the matter: the right of the Jewish people to their country, the shape this land was in when we came back, and the debilitated state of the few hundred thousand Arabs when we came here. Most people in modern liberal societies do not know this; we are instead portrayed as aggressors and occupiers...\"
Ben-Tekoa: \"I find your response breath-taking and astonishing, in that I don\'t recall an Israeli politician and diplomat ever speaking so plainly about old-fashioned anti-Semitism. Do you detect a shift in thinking towards this direction?\"
Shoval: \"Yes, I think there is. At a forum of the Jewish Agency a few weeks ago, for instance, I heard speakers talk this way. The upcoming Durban conference, where [some UN people] are trying to revive the Zionism-is-racism equation, should wake some people up. There is an increase in Holocaust denial, and there must be a worldwide information effort to explain the Zionist effort and the Jewish people.\"
Rabbi Dov Lexner, Chief Rabbi of Denmark, downplayed the Danish reaction: \"It\'s just a question of two different worlds and cultures. We live here in Denmark without major problems - we have to deal only with issues such as what hours of the day the sun shines, and the like... it\'s hard for people here to understand the existential problems facing the Israelis. But then two things happened: Gillon himself said that the policy of moderate physical force should continue, and also the B\'tzelem civil rights organization asked the Danish government to object to the appointment.\"
The Torch, a non-partisan magazine published by a group of Danish university students, has published a list of 20 articles in the United Nation\'s Universal Declaration of Human Rights of which Denmark is in breach. For instance, Article 3 of the Declaration states, \"Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person,\" but in fact asylum seekers who arrive at Denmark\'s ports without identification papers can be imprisoned in isolation indefinitely. In 1998 alone, The Torch reports, there were 5,044 legally-innocent asylum seekers imprisoned for shorter or longer periods as a result of this policy.