Lib Dem health spokeswoman sacked after comments on IDF in Haiti

[Octavariable]

Lib Dem health spokeswoman sacked (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8513662.stm)

The Liberal Democrat leader has sacked his health spokeswoman in the House of Lords after comments she made about alleged organ trafficking in Haiti.

Jenny Tonge told the Jewish Chronicle there should be an inquiry into claims that Israeli troops sent there after the earthquake were trafficking organs.
Nick Clegg said the comments were "wrong, distasteful and provocative" and dismissed her from her post.
He said she apologised "unreservedly" for any offence she had caused.
The peer is a patron of the news website, the Palestine Telegraph, which printed the allegations.
It claimed that members of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), sent to help with the humanitarian effort after Haiti's devastating quake, were selling human organs.

'Highly offensive'
Baroness Tonge told the Jewish Chronicle: "To prevent allegations such as these - which have already been posted on You Tube - going any further, the IDF and the Israeli Medical Association should establish an independent inquiry immediately to clear the names of the team in Haiti."

In a statement released on Friday evening, Nick Clegg said the allegations were "highly offensive".
"The comments were wrong, distasteful and provocative and I recognise the deep and understandable distress they have caused to the Jewish community," he said.
"While I do not believe that Jenny Tonge is anti-semitic or racist, I regard her comments as wholly unacceptable.
"Jenny Tonge apologises unreservedly for the offence she has caused."
It is not the first time that Baroness Tonge has been dismissed from a party post.
In 2004, when she was still an MP, then Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy asked her to quit as children's spokeswoman following remarks she made about Palestinian suicide bombers.
She told a pro-Palestinian lobby group: "If I had to live in that situation - and I say that advisedly - I might just consider becoming one myself."
She retired as an MP after the incident, but entered the House of Lords.
In 2006, she was reprimanded by Lib Dem whips after saying the party was "probably in the grip" of the pro-Israel lobby.


Should have shut her yaphole

[CMNot]

lol

How do people that dumb get that far? Baffling.

[California Joe]

So wait, she's making official comments based on stuf she saw on the interwebs? Nice.

I can't wait for the law against selling cups to 2 girls at the same time.

[Panchito12]

WOW! What a comment!! While I'm probably the last person on Earth to throw the "anti-semitic" accusation around, this is clearly a person who, due to her prior history, can be safely labeled as "anti-semitic".

Is there an avenue for expulsion from the Lords?

[tyovan]

I believe she's anti-Semitic based on her comments, now and in the past. She should be removed from the House of Lords..

[gazell]

Trafficking organs seems to be the Jewish libal of the times. How embarrassing...

[Wahnsinn]

lol

How do people that dumb get that far? Baffling.

Being a Liberal Democrat MP is hardly getting far in life to be fair.

Glad she got sacked, you can't just spout stuff like that without evidence.

[GiladS]

Trafficking organs seems to be the Jewish libal of the times. How embarrassing...

In the Middle Ages it was the claim that Jews were harvesting Gentile blood and today it's the harvesting of Gentile organs, just shows how little human nature has changed.

[3rdMillhouse]

She deserves a cvnt-punt, for being such a cvnt. The bad thing about this world is that you have to share with stupid people, it's unfair that they get to breathe the same air we do.

[KSingh77]

What a bitch

[Octavariable]

**** attracts flies, but I'm not sure who's the **** here, Tonge or PressTV


Sacked Tonge slams Israel's 'attitude' in Palestine
Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:26:19 GM (http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=118615&sectionid=351020601)T


A February 14, 2009 grab shows Baroness Jenny Tonge during an interview with Press TV's Face to Face show.
Baroness Jenny Tonge, who was sacked from the British House of Lords over the weekend for alleged 'anti-Israeli comments,' has criticized “the Israeli attitude towards the Palestinians.”

The Liberal Democrat health spokeswoman, an outspoken critic of Israel's inhumane conduct against the Palestinians, was promptly removed from her post on Saturday for comments she made to the Jewish Chronicle about Israel's role in human organ trafficking from the quake-stricken Haiti.

Tonge had called for an inquiry into claims that the Israeli troops and aid workers deployed in Haiti were involved in trafficking human organs.

Tonge said in an interview with Press TV that she saw people humiliated on a daily basis in the West Bank during a “life-changing” visit to the region in 2003, as if the attitude was to “make them crawl, make them suffer whenever you can.”

She said witnessing the injustices there had made her very angry, adding that she did not believe the Balfour Declaration had ever envisaged Israeli soldiers driving people away at gunpoint.

Asked about her controversial comments in 2004, when she expressed an understanding of a suicide bomber after being subjected to the constant humiliations the Palestinians go through, she ridiculed media allegations that she was inciting acts of terror.

“The constant humiliation that has gone on for decades in Palestine….Even after a week, I was feeling depressed and angry, humiliated myself. And I thought that if I was in that situation trying to bring up my family and that happened every day…, I might, if I had been a Palestinian and a Muslim, which of course I am neither of those, I might have considered being one [suicide bomber] myself actually."

“It is absolutely useless condemning acts of terror, like cold suicide bombing without actually going to the roots and understanding why they do it.”

She stressed that she had never regretted that statement and that she had received thousands of support letters.

She added that she had received a telephone call from the then-Liberal Democratic leader, Charles Kennedy, and had been told that unless she withdrew her comments she would be removed from the frontbench.

Tonge believes she was under pressure from the Israeli lobby, which were very active in all British politics, while “practically running American foreign policy.”

She said that the Israeli lobby had a lot of influence with all of the country's three major parties, all of which are inevitably linked to a huge organization called 'the Friends of Israel.'

She was also asked what she thought about the fact that Cherie Blair, the wife of the former British premier Tony Blair, had retraced similar comments about understanding the impulse of a suicide bomber.

Tonge responded that she believed it was very sad that the freedom of speech was often undermined in the political circles concerning the Palestinian resistance.

She also expressed disagreement with the British policy over the Gaza blockage and that the iron ring alone had caused “a whole generation” to suffer from malnourishment, stunted growth, bed-wetting, and attention disorder.

Tonge was elected to the House of Commons in 1997 and in the same year she was also elected as the Shadow Secretary of State for International Development. She was elevated to the UK House of Lords in 2005.


If you want to skip the anti Israel bias, just read the bold part.