And then they came for James O'Brien... and I laughed because it was James O'Brien

Looks like James O'Brien has found himself in a spot of bother. He recently shared an anecdote from a listener about how his Jewish wife was sent to a sabbath school and taught to hate all Palestinians. She was taught they are cockroaches to be crushed, language not dissimilar to that of Israeli politicians. O'Brien implied this attitude might be part of the problem and he was right.

The anecdote absolutely rang true, with data showing 82% of Israeli Jews believe there are no innocents in Gaza, but, of course, it's antisemitic to point out what Zionists really think of Palestinians. We're supposed to pretend Zionists love the people they are genociding.

The surprisingly bold move from O'Brien came with predictable results. A storm of criticism came O'Brien's way and he issued a mealy-mouthed apology which was nowhere near enough for his critics.

O'Brien's critics want blood. They want him to be taken off the air. I'm not sure if you're aware, but you can't practice journalism in the UK unless you meet the approval of Stephen Pollard who has been calling for O'Brien's head.

Zionists have a long and proud history of getting journalists sacked for telling the truth about Israel and James O'Brien is in their sights. All I can say to that is "Oh well, never mind."

O'Brien spent years winning brownie points with Zionists by demonising Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters as antisemites. Attacking the left from the left is lucrative business if you're a journalist. In fact it's the only way to be openly left in British journalism. Your role as a left-wing journalist is to delegitimise what you're supposed to believe in while maintaining the pretence of plurality. Your job is to say "it's fine to be left wing, but not like those left wingers. They're all cranks."

I remember finding I had been blocked by James O'Brien at a time when I didn't know much about him. He later stated he had used a mass blocking tool to block supporters of Jeremy Corbyn. It's a bit weird to claim to be on the left and then block everyone on the left, isn't it?

O'Brien is not on the left, of course, he is a centrist, but anyone left of Trump is considered left wing in the corporate media. O'Brien decided that Corbyn and his supporters were "cranks" for being right about Israel several years before he was.

Sensible politics means not being correct about an issue at a speed that makes centrists uncomfortable. It's only when centrists can safely talk about an issue without being fired that it becomes acceptable. And James O'Brien thought the situation in Gaza had reached that acceptability point.

In O'Brien's defence, he is not as monstrous as some of his colleagues in the corporate media and I've no doubt the situation in Gaza has pricked his conscience, but he made the calculation that he can't defend what Israel is doing so he must call it out in an acceptable way.

The acceptable way for O'Brien to call out the horrors in Gaza was to say, "Yes, it's horrible, but all those Corbyn supporters who called this out from the beginning, they're still antisemites."

O'Brien could not resist sticking the boot in. It was a desperate attempt to win the approval of not just his employer LBC, but genocide supporters in general. It was his way of saying, "Look, I'm criticising Israel in a non-antisemitic way because I'm sticking the boot into all the people you dislike."

O'Brien went even further and threw his colleague Sangita Myska under a bus when she was fired from LBC for holding Israel to account during an interview. O'Brien showed sneering contempt as he insisted Myska was fired for poor ratings and anyone suggesting otherwise was being antisemitic. Myska was unable to defend herself because of a non-disclosure agreement.

O'Brien is now learning a hard lesson. He is learning there is no acceptable way to criticise Israel. No matter how much you pander to Zionists and try to meet their approval, once they've picked off everyone else, they will pick off their useful idiots.

O'Brien has one of two options: he can either issue the most grovelling apology, promise never to speak the truth again, and hope he is allowed to keep his job. Or he can leave LBC and hope he can make it in independent media like Mehdi Hasan. If he attempts the latter and suddenly starts talking like a Gaza freedom fighter, don't fall for it for one second. The man is a complete and utter fraud.

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