Questions that the Barnet Conservatives have to answer about the HAMAS boss's council house in Colindale

 I was amazed to wake up on Saturday and read a story on the front page of The Times (Metro picked up on the story, which is not behind a paywall), stating that a HAMAS boss was living in Colindale. Not only that, but he was living in a former council house that he'd bought without even needing a mortgage, saving himself £112,000 through the right to buy scheme. He'd been housed in the property by Barnet Council in 2003, a year after the Tories took control of Barnet Council. There are many levels on which this story is mind boggling, but there are a few points that must be asked of Barnet Council.

Lets put aside the rights and wrongs of whether or not the person should be here in the first place. That is an emotive issue and I have no idea about the background to his case or why the Home Office granted him a passport and residency. If he has a legal right to be here, then that is where we are, whether people like it or not (and I'm sure there will be strong opinions). What I am interested in is the spotlight this shines on the due diligence that Barnet Council are doing in regards to housing applications.

1. If a man is rich enough to buy a property outright after five years, without a Mortgage, why was he in a Council House in the first place? I know dozens of people who have been unable to secure a council house for decades, despite having proven need. Recently, I've been trying to help a man with learning difficulties in a private dwelling that has been deemed unsafe by Barnet Council's own housing department three times in the last year, to secure a council house. Thus far completely without success, despite medical support as he is deemed a suicide risk. 

2. What vetting did the council do of his application? Did they check his background? If not why not. Having seen the hoops a young man with all of the paperwork to convince any reasonable authority has to provide, I cannot understand how this occurred. Was the paperwork correctly and honestly filled in?

3. Was the Conservative leaderr of the Council or anyone else at the Council made aware of the background of this character by the Police or security services? Was he on a watch list? 

4. Do the council run anti money laundering checks on transactions involving council homes? If someone is able to pay for a council house without a Mortgage, has the council satisfied themselves that the cash has been acquired legally? 

There must be a lot of people who desperately need a council house in Barnet, who will have read this and be totally perplexed. I note that Tory Mike Freer MP has notably silent on the matter on his website. He was leader of the Council from 2006-2009 and must surely have been made aware of the situation. 

Defiance: Israel, Hamas, Rockets & RAF area bombing

I spent a nice quiet evening in with the family watching DVD's last night. We've had a busy week and to be quite honest, an evening in was pleasant. As I had to pick eldest daughter up from Luton airport at midnight, returning from Swim Camp, it was also a good reason not to drink. One of the films chosen was Defiance. This stars Daniel Craig and tells the story of the Bielski brothers, who set up a camp for Jews fleeing Nazi extermination in Belarus, in the USSR during the Nazi occupation. It is a very good film. Not being familiar with the story, I don't really know how accurate it was, but I think that anything which reminds us of sheer evilness of the Nazi regime is clearly something to be applauded. Tuvia Bielski is clearly someone who's name should be known more widely. The generally accepted image of the Jewish people under Nazi occupation was one of passive compliance. This was clearly not the case with Bielski or his band. They are an example to the whole world of why it is vital to fight tyranny when sometimes it seems hopeless.

After the film, as I drove up to Luton Airport, I was thinking about the situation in Israel, in light of the film. Given that many of the residents of Bielski's camp ended up as citizens of Israel, it is worth giving the matter some consideration. As I drove along, I pondered the thought that last year, the story of the war between Hamas & Israel was lead news item for many a day. The Israeli justification for the attack was the daily rocket attacks by Hamas on Israeli towns. The thought occurred to me that I hadn't seen a news report about a single Rocket attack since the end of the Israeli attack. Was this due to the story not being newsworthy any more, or have Hamas changed their tactics & decided to use political means rather than violence to further their aims. I did a quick google and it certainly seems the case that Hamas is still firing rockets. It must be said that the reports are few and far between, since the end of the conflict (although how much of this is due to the story not being "hot", I know not). According to the report I've linked to, Israel maintains a policy of Tit for Tat attacks. The question I have is whether this will ever truly deliver the results which the Israeli generals hope.

I firmly believe that every sovereign country has a right to defend itself from attack. Israel is clearly being attacked, therefore it cannot be disputed that it is within it's rights to mount actions necessary to defend it's population. If I were an Israeli, the question I'd be asking is whether the current political and military strategy will work. The precident of history does not really bode well. The leader of bomber command during WWII, Arthur Harris, claimed that the Nazi's could be bombed into submission. My dad flew a Wellington bomber for 40 squadron, part of 205 bomber group as part of this offensive. I've taken a keen interest in the subject, to decide whether the sacrifices he and his comrades made were worth it. As part of the campaign lead by Harris, nearly a million tons of bombs were dropped on Germany. Over 60 towns were decimated, 595,000 civilians were killed. At the end of the war, the RAF set up a group to review the findings and see whether the policy of area bombing of cities, with no military value assisted the Allied war effort. The results were inconclusive. German morale did not crack. Until the final weeks of the war, production held up. The policy of hitting oil targets had a far more profound and devastating effect than wiping out cities such as Dresden. One of the most successful campaigns was mounted by my fathers squadron, in mining the Danube. This prevented barges loaded with oil & other supplies from Rumania reaching Germany. As the Nazi's didn't care about their civilian population, the attacks made little difference to the leadership. Apologists for the campaign claim that huge resources were tied up defending German cities. This is nonsense. If the RAF had purely attacked targets in Germany with military or economic value and concentrated their tactics on these targets, the effects would have been more damaging, the same resources would have been tied up and the war may well have ended sooner. 55,000 air crew were killed. RAF bomber command had the highest attrition rate of any service in the war with a 40% casualty rate. The tours of duty were set such that a crew had a 50/50 chance of surviving their tour. Bomber command was comprised of volounteers.

Which brings us back to the Israeli campaign against Hamas. If the RAF could fail so spectacularly against the Nazi's, with a campaign to undermine German morale, how do they expect their campaign to succeed against Hamas. Hamas have a similar disregard for their people, treating them as human shields and cannon fodder. Like the Nazi's in 1944 they have no prospect of defeating Israel on the battlefield, but this will not prevent them from sacrificing their citizens. This brings us back to Israel. How should they respond to rocket attacks? I've got to say that I really don't know, but they should certainly change their tactics. If they put the energies they've expended on military campaigns into more subtle approaches, could they have been less successful in stopping the attacks?

As to Hamas? Well in the unlikely event that anyone from Hamas would read this blog or listen to reason, I'll ask this question. What have all of the rockets you've launched achieved? How have the Palestinian people benefitted? With my Irish Catholic roots it is quite clear to me that the population of Northern Ireland's lives are far better now than during the troubles. They may not have everything they want, but ordinary people can lead their lives in peace, without fear. If I were a political leader, that would be my very minimum first objective. Unlike Bielski's partisans, the Palestinian people will not be carted off to death camps if their leaders lay down their weapons and engage in political dialog. They will merely achieve a better quality of life.

I used to argue long and hard with my Dad about area bombing. My mum once butted in and told me that what I should realise is that after the Blitz, it cheered the population of London up no end to here that German cities were being destroyed. I suspect that if the Israeli government were honest, this is the primary reason for the tit for tat attacks. It is clear that they have little effect in stopping the attacks.

I wonder how Tuvia Bielski would have approached the issue?

Israel, Hamas, Death & Destruction &Gaza,

Anyone who's followed my blogs will know the one thing I despise most is moral cowardice. Mike Freer's latest leader listens blog brought home to me the fact that the effects of events in Gaza have implications here in Barnet, so I feel I have to let the readers of my blog know my views. I suspect a fair few of you won't like what I have to say.

Firstly I'd just like to pass comment on the stance of many of our local politicians. Barnet has a large and rather infuential Jewish population. One of the largest outside of Israel. As such the local politicians, whether of Jewish extraction or not have to take account of the sensibilities. I suspect that many of our professed Christian councillors spend more time in Synogogues than the average semi-secular Jew does. I've received a few emails over the life of my blog alleging all sorts of rubbish about this pratice, but to me it's just politicians grubbing for votes and not disturbing or overly worrying. I don't believe that too many of them really have a deep rooted commitment to Zionism and if they moved to Romford or somewhere with a different demographic make up would probably find a different group to suck up to.

Which brings us to the situation in Gaza. My father was working in Palestine before the creation of the state of Israel. He was present when the "Zionists" were viewed by the British establishment as terrorists and when Menachim Begin was a member of the Stern Gang. Friends of his were killed in the terror campaign. As he had major business interests in the region at the time, when Israel was created he departed. As Arab countries would not allow people with an Israeli stamp to enter, he didn't return until 1966, when he went on a Pilgrimage with the Metropolitan Police to the Holy Land. On returning he was impressed by the progress. Areas of desert had been transformed and Soceity had been modernised. He contrasted this with what happened in Libya when the British evicted the Italians in 1943 and how that had developed, despite huge oil wealth. A year after his visit, there was a war between the Arabs and Israeli's. This was followed by a further war in 1973. Both of these wars were brought about by the stated Arab intention of destroying the state of Israel, created by a United Nations Mandate. By the time of his 1976 visit, many holy places had bullet and shrapnel marks. As a result of these two wars, the Arab nations realised that they couldn't achieve their aims through conventional war.

It is also worth remembering that one of the notorious Palestinian terror groups, Black September took their name from the Jordanian purge of Palestinians, not from any Israeli atrocity. The sad truth is that whilst many Arab nations pay lip service to the Palestinian cause, they've never welcomed the Palestinians or given them any real support other than in the armed struggle. States like Saudi Arabia have huge wealth, but what have they done to help Palestinians in refugee camps?

After the 1973 war, Israel was seen as too powerful a foe for the Arabs to fight head to head. In truth the Israeli army started to get complacent. This reached a head when they invaded southern Lebanon and fought Hizbollah. Hizbollah is a Shia faction backed by Iran. They were ready and waiting for Israel and Israel suffered it's first major military setback.

With the creation of the Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza, various Arab and Iranian groups saw an opportunity to repeat this success. Hamas was built up with Arab and Iranian support and became the predominant power in Gaza. This densely populated strip of land houses an urban and impoverished population. Billions of dollars has been poured into it, but rather than raising the living standards of the residents, it's funded a campaign against Israel. Rockets are fired on a daily basis into Israel, not at military targets, but randomly at civilian areas. The aim is to provoke the Israeli military into a response. As Gaza is so tightly packed, any military action will result in civilian deaths. Israel eventually fell for the ploy and we have the current offensive. Huge numbers of civilians are being killed in Gaza and many capitals around the world are seeing anti Israeli protests. The Israeli line is "what would you do if you were under daily attack".

Which brings me to my point. There are not two parties involved in this - Hamas and Israel. There is a third darker aspect. The backers of Hamas who supply rockets and are sitting back, safe in their distant palaces, letting the poor and the dispossessed fight their battles. Israel cannot defeat Hamas, Hamas cannot defeat Israel. All that can happen is the two parties will make each other's lives hell. Every death spawns a new batch of Martyr's. Every Rocket spawns a new batch of reprisals. Whilst all this goes on, the backers of Hamas sit back and happily watch the death toll rise and use their influence and oil wealth to ferment trouble at the UN.

The unpalatable truth is that Hamas and Israel will have to talk to each other and reach an accomodation. Just as Menachim Begin went from terrorist to statesman, so will the leaders of hamas eventually. The Israeli policy of killing the leaders is counter productive as new, unknown and even more hardline leaders emerge. Someone has to break the cycle. It won't be Hamas, so it has to be Israel. The US has a vital role to play as it can not only influence Israel, but to some degree it can also influence the wealty, fat cat backers of Hamas. I'm a pacifist, I don't agree or believe in war as a solution, in all but the most extreme cases. I don't think war will solve the problems of Gaza or Israel. Israel has to cease it's campaign and the UN has to apply pressure to the backers of Hamas. The thing that saddens me most is that every Martyr has been a futile waste of life. Every rocket has been paid for with money that could have improved Gaza. Every Israeli soldier watching his back in Gaza today, could be building a better world.

Violence is not the answer and violence will not work in Gaza. For anyone