Expect a raucous debate in Tromsø Norway

It’s a wonderful thing: The United Nations Association in Tromsø is hosting International Week, where participants “among other things … will learn how to make a wallet out of a milk carton, learn Esperanto or origami, and go bird-watching.”Of course, the whole Israel thing will get attention, too, so there will be a debate with the following participants:

Line Khateeb, the head of the Palestine Committee in Norway, which is to say the far left wing of the anti-Israeli crowd.

Mads Gilbert, local to Tromsø, who has made Israel famous for co-inventing the horrors of war, along with the other great evil, the United States. (The same dude who thought New Yorkers had it coming on 9/11 for being Americans)

Gunnar Nerdrum, who wants to arrest Israeli officials and prosecute them for protecting Israeli citizens


...and Bent Andresen (not the famous Danish Quaker, who died a while ago), who apparently is an attorney with nothing published on the matter, but who will still give an introduction on international law and Israel/Palestine. I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that he will focus primarily on Israel’s culpability and not so much on Israel’s defense.

The debate should ensure that participants get a fair and balanced view of the conflict, in the Fox News sense of the term. In fact, some people might have concerns that these four might have difficulty debating anything, as they seem to be on the same page on all central issues. You know, that any decent person would denounce Israel in the strongest possible terms.

So here are some suggestions for issues to discuss that there might be some disagreement about:

• Is it more accurate to characterize the Zionist enterprise as: colonial? imperialist? racist? Or should all three count equally? If so, what is their order of preference in speeches, etc.?
• What is is about Israeli policy that has caused Hamas to be more radical organization than Fatah?
• Have we reached the point where Israel is more like Nazi Germany in 1944 than 1939?
• Who is the closest comparison to Netanyahu? Mussolini, Pinochet, or George Bush?
• Which is a greater violation of international law? Israel protecting its border, Israel responding to rocket attacks, or Israel wanting to have its own capital?
• What is the right protocol for addressing the Iranian delegation to Durban III?via israelwhat.com