Tommy Robinson, the 'Jihadi Bride', the IDF & ISIS...

So what’s with the whole Shamima Begum or ‘ISIS bride’ media storm?

Why is the teenage girl’s situationbeing so blown up in the media, while other individuals – including ISIS fighters – had been allowed to return to the UK without any media scrutiny?

I have also previously questioned the role of British intelligence in the exodus of these various kids to Syria in the first place, the role of someone like Anjem Choudary in that same context, and whether Shamima Begum was simply being made a media scapegoat in order to deflect focus from the real ‘controversies’, conspiracies and questions.

I have always assumed that British intelligence did play a role in facillitating the movement of those various kids from the UK into Syria: and and the likelihood of this can be inferred from something like the case of the Manchester bomber, Salman Abedi – who was allowed by British intelligence to go to Libya in 2011 and take part in the armed uprising against Gaddafi and then allowed to come back and settle back down in Manchester (read that whole saga here).

In addition to that, I thank Info Hub Blogger for pointing me also to this additional piece of the equation, just to reinforce the point. British historian and investigative radio journalist Tony Gosling asked, in a 2016 article, ‘Did Canadian taxpayers foot Islamic State’s recruitment bill?‘

That’s the case presented in the article, which highlights that the particular facillitator who helped British schoolgirls get into Syria (via Turkey) was in fact working for Canadian intelligence: and that, over the two year period, he may have smuggled some 150 British kids (as well as Australians, Nigerians and others) into ISIS territory.

Gosling’s piece raises questions about the British intelligence role, as well as the wilful blindness of British journalists and media, and also rather sadly highlights the plight of some of those brainwashed (or psy-opped?) kids who found themselves in the ‘Islamic State’ nightmare: such as 17-year-old Austrian girl, Samra Kesinovic, who found herself horrified by the reality of what ‘ISIS’ was doing and was allegedly beaten to death when she tried to leave.

But while everyone’s outrage and attention is on Shamima Begum, Syria, the Islamic State, etc, mainstream focus is generally diverted from a similar business that exists in regard to a different Middle-Eastern country and conflict.

Coincidentally, just as I was putting down notes for this, Info Hub Blogger happened to publish a long, comprehensive article, which started by highlighting an item that happens to reinforce the rest of this article perfectly: specifically, a recent online video of everyone’s favorite Alt-Right/Mossad actor and agent-provocetuer ‘Tommy Robinson’: in which a seemingly intoxicated ‘Robinson’ boasts that, should war ever break out between Israel and Palestine, he would be on the front line, taking up arms for his Zionist sponsors.

“If there was a war – and it kicked off,” says the man with four passports, “I would be there on the front line fighting for Israel”.

Tommy Robinson with the Israeli military on Syrian border

Which is not a shock. Here is, after all, the famous picture of a rifle-wielding ‘Robinson’ with the IDF in the occupied Golan Heights.

The irony is that ‘Robinson’ has – naturally – been only too keen to chime in on the whole Shamima Begum affair: but, as ever, irony always soars over the heads of ‘Tommy’ supporters.

Read more: ‘#FREE TOMMY: The Bullshit Psy-Op for Dummies‘…

Question is: is there really any difference between a ‘Robinson’ wanting to go take up arms for Israel in a foreign country and a British jihadi wanting to go over to the ‘caliphate’?

To be clear, I’m not making any moral equivalency between the IDF and the Islamic State group: they’re clearly not similar types of entities. But Robinson seems in part to be an advert for an Israeli brand of jihadism, not unlike how his counterpart Anjem Choudary was a walking, talking advert for Islamist jihad in Syria and Iraq.

It is reported that thousands of young people from various countries, including the UK, travel abroad to fight for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on an ongoing basis.

Yvonne Ridley wrote a recent piece raising this point and highlighting the disparity in coverage and judgement.

Baroness Sayeeda Warsi has argued that British citizens who go to serve in the IDF should be prosecuted the same way as any others who join foreign forces in conflict zones. As explained in The Independent, Warsi – former Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs – argues that people should only be allowed legally to fight for another country’s forces if they are registered there as a citizen.

As Ridley points out in her piece, ‘IDF recruits don’t necessarily have to be born in Israel or even hold dual citizenship. Anyone can join through the so-called “Mahal” programme if they meet specific background and age requirements. While British citizens fighting for some foreign forces have faced prosecution on their return to Britain, those who temporarily join up with the IDF have not…’

She continues, ‘Israel’s Mahal initiative is for men under the age of 24 and women under 21. Applicants don’t have to hold Israeli citizenship or even be practising Jews. If they can prove that they have at least one Jewish grandparent they can sign up for 18 months in the IDF…’

For the record, Baroness Warsi resigned from the Foreign Office in 2014 in protest of Israel’s military assault on Gaza: and has been more or less ostracised from the Conservative establishment since that time. As previously discussed, even Labour’s then leader, Ed Miliband, was condemned by some Jewish groups in the UK for his criticism of the IDF operation in Gaza – despite Miliband himself being a descendent of Holocaust survivors.

The article also highlights that Labour’s Shadow Chancellor, John Macdonald, in fact wrote a letter to the then Home Secretary Theresa May back in 2014, asking why British citizens going over to Israel to serve in the IDF weren’t being treated the same way as those going into other conflict areas.

Wrote Macdonald, ‘I am aware of the Government’s policy of detaining and prosecuting those British citizens travelling to fight in the current Middle East conflicts… Will you be warning any British citizens considering engagement with the IDF that, in line with established British Government practice (e.g. the deprivation of British citizenship from, to date, at least 40 UK passport holders who have been involved in the Syrian civil war), such engagement may put their British citizenship in jeopardy…’

Certainly, it seems as if the rules or standards imposed on those misguided, bloodthirsty idiots who went to fight in Syria (even though they were, theoretically, fighting ‘on the side’ of the Western intelligence community in terms of being anti-Assad fighters) are not applied to those who go to fight for the IDF.

It’s interesting, because we’re in an era – as explored here and here – where foreign fighters and mercenaries are all the rage. We could talk about the Columbians and Nepalese being trained by Israeli intelligence to fight in Yemen, or the Columbians brought into the U.A.E by Erik Prince, or various Europeans going to fight with the Neo-Nazi Azov Batallion in Ukraine, and so on and so forth. We could talk about the scores of foreign Islamists sent into Libya to fight against Gaddafi (lots of them shipped there by the CIA or even sent over from Britain by MI5).

This business of foreigners going to fight in other people’s conflicts is such a muddled, sticky area in legal terms: especially because, in many cases, the intelligence agencies (such as in the UK or, as referenced above, Canada) are clearly facillitating that movement as part of ‘unofficial’ foreign policy adventures.

Sure, the Islamic State is a particularly disgusting, evil group – but it’s not as if the Neo-Nazi Azov Batallion was a bunch of nice guys either.

And let’s be honest: the IDF, in relation to the Palestinian situation, is an armed force engaging in a permanent state of conflict, while Israeli forces have stood accused of human rights abuses and war crimes (and are an illegal occupying force in some specific territories), which raises questions about people from Britain or elsewhere who go over into that foreign land to participate in those operations.

Really, it’s got nothing to do with whether said ‘volunteer’ has whatever percent Jewish blood – it’s to do with citizenship. If they’re, for example, British citizens and not Israeli citizens, then their ratio of ‘Jewishness’ is irrelevent. If being whatever percent Jewish justifies the activities along the lines of some kind of religious or racial duty, it’s worth saying that most of brainwashed idiots who went over to fight with ‘ISIS’ would say it was their religious duty too (as did the scores of Muslims from various countries who, for example, in the 80s, went over to fight the Soviet Union as ‘Mujahideen’ under US and Saudi patronage).

I had a look at the IDF volunteers website, which comes across more like a version of the Boy Scouts, and boasts that ‘Thousands of young people from more than 40 countries have already joined the IDF through its exciting programs for overseas volunteers...’ However, it’s clear – the further you read – that these ‘volunteers’ are signing up for serious business, including weapons and conflict zones.

Funny enough, the site also includes a link to a speech by British elite/Neo-Con propagandist Richard Kemp (former commander of British forces in Afghanistan), in his ‘salute to the IDF’ and its foreign volunteers: ‘You may think that you’re simply defending your country,’ says the headline, ‘but in fact you are defending mine too‘.

Presumably then, Kemp would be all for ‘Tommy Robinson’ and people like him going over to Israel to fight for the IDF.

I acknowledge entirely that there are various differences (including moral differences) between sometihng like the IDF and the Islamic State group: but in terms of the legal ramifications, as well as the vastly different way politicians and media treat one scenario as compared to the other, it’s obvious that heading off to do your jihad (religious duty or holy fight) for the IDF is broadly seen as fine.