More on Norway's targeted divestment
The compendiously smart and well-informed blogger Profco has a lot of great background about Israeli-Norwegian relations over at TPM Cafe today.
S/he wrote it, of course, in light of Norway's recent decision to divest itself of previous investments in the company Elbit, which produces electronics for Israel's illegal Wall.
Profco notes that Haaretz has put a new lead onto its story about this, noting the following:
- The director general of the Foreign Ministry, Yossi Gal, on Thursday summoned the Norwegian ambassador to Israel, Jakken Bjørn Lian, to protest Norway's decision to pull all of its investments from the Israeli arms firm Elbit.
Following the meeting, the Foreign Ministry relayed that, "Israel will consider further steps of protest in the future."
Maybe the Israelis will unleash dirty tricks, or an invasion and occupation, or a suffocatingly tight siege against Norway?
Um, maybe better not, since Norway is not only a pretty darned exemplary western democracy but also a member of NATO.
Gal's spluttering threat looks really childish, all in all...
So now, when will other western investment institutions start following Norway's excellent lead?
"Maybe the Israelis will unleash dirty tricks, or an invasion and occupation, or a suffocatingly tight siege against Norway?"
Is this journalism?
Michael W., this is a BLOG. Get it? A BLOG. It is not a newspaper, or even a TV news program. So no, it is not journalism. It is not supposed to be journalism.
Next nonsensical question.
Of course, theese Norvegians - like their scandinavian brethern from Sweden (see Aftonbladet story about organ stealing by IDF from Palestinians) are confirmed antisemites.
Arabs are Semites, too. How can it be claimed that the Norwegians are against Arabs (and Jews)?
This is journalism at its best . Bloggers give us real news, unfiltered , they are not payed, they cannot be black mailed .
Today I was just thinking the BDS movement is gaining momentum, similarly to the momentum the Palestinians were building prior to 911, and boom!! the infamous day that labeled all resistance movement with terrorism .
May we be spared another BAHHAAhaa.. 911 was great for Netanyahu then as he went on babbling with his usual one sided shortsighted gibberish .
We can all remember the honourable Norwegian Doctor in Gaza during the barbaric leveling of one of the most crowded cities in the world .
He was called a terrorist, propagandist and antisemitic ..why ? he said it as he saw it . White phosphorous..banned weapons, weapons of mass destructruction to penalize a people whom decided to elect a party the other did not approve .
Pirouz like some Christopher Columbus with the novel observation:
Arabs are Semites, too. How can it be claimed that the Norwegians are against Arabs (and Jews)?
Antisemitism has a very well defined meaning regardless of the make up of its letters or syllables, and that observation does not exonerate anything.
White South Africans are Africans, does that nullify the expression African American as equal to black?
Pirouz, you already used the line about having Jewish friends, now the semite thing, what is next in the playbook? Do you rehearse the list at the local mosque? Or with your family at the dinner table?
titus , your comment is neither funny nor clear .
Titus is right about one thing. The term anti-Semite was coined specifically to refer to hatred of Jews, and that is its true meaning. The "Arabs are Semites too" argument is a purely semantic one, is seriously flawed even as a semantic argument, and does not address anything of substance.
If Norway objects to Israeli wall building, it's certainly right that they divest rather than pocket dividends from Elbit's work. But it isn't likely to hurt Elbit very much. They're shareholders, not clients. Selling shares into a secondary market doesn't impact a company's costs in the least. And sorry to rain on your parade but Elbit's shares are up today, close to their all time highs. the norwegians sure picked an opportune time to get out... how long has this wall thing been around again?
Well this is interesting. i just checked Elbit's market cap, thinking "what percentage of the company did they hold?" Turns out it's around 3 BNUSD, not as big as I thought it might be. But then it turns out that Norway only ever owned 5 million in shares , ie a paltry .2% of the company's value. So is this really anything more than a token gesture?
If Norway were really serious about changing Elbit's ways, they'd buy a controlling interest in Elbit and appoint their own board that would refuse to bid on any wall-related project (something it sounds like they could easily afford.) This is a PR stunt.
Wow, Profco -- eye-popping quotes from the Segev book too. (Thanks for the catch Helena)
Sorry world peace, I will try harder. Thanks Shirin for the clarification, your words were more eloquent than mine.
"they sure picked an opportune time to get out": I wouldn't worry too much about Norway and its investments, Vadim, the Norskies are pretty well-off economically (generally considered to have the highest standard of living in the world), not quite as easy to kick around as the poor, half-starving Gazans.
The hasbaristas are consoling themselves that the norvegian gesture is PR and posturing, but they cannot dismiss that this may be a beginning of the avalanche around the civilized world and they are afraid of this, they want to diminish its importance; symbols - like letters of alphabet - convey knowledge and power. So, if they want to believe that this is nothing - let them.