In the days of the Clinton era, Helen Thomas reacted to former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleisher’s statements to the press concerning arms shipments to Israel.

“Helen Thomas: Where do the Israelis get their arms?

Ari Fleischer: There’s a difference Helen, and that is—.

Helen Thomas: What is the difference?

Ari Fleischer: The targeting of innocents through the use of terror, which is a common enemy for Yasir Arafat and for the people of Israel, as well as—.

Helen Thomas: Palestinian people are fighting for their land…I think that the killing of innocents is a category entirely different. Justifying killing of innocents for land is an argument in support of terrorism”.

But sadly Helen Thomas never got the message. The 89-year-old journalist and author, Dean of the White House Press Corps has retired, leaving behind her a front row seat and a legacy as one of the strongest anti-Israel stances observable in mainstream America, say, right up there with ol’ Jimmy Carter.

On May 27, 2010, outside the Jewish Heritage Celebration Day event at the White House, the following conversation happened between Thomas and Rabbi David Nesenoff:

“Nesenoff: Any comments on Israel? We’re asking everybody today, any comments on Israel?

Thomas: Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine.

Nesenoff: Oooh. Any better comments on Israel?

Thomas: Remember, these people are occupied and it’s their land. It’s not German, it’s not Poland …

Nesenoff: So where should they go, what should they do?

Thomas: They go home.

Nesenoff: Where’s the home?

Thomas: Poland. Germany.

Nesenoff: So you’re saying the Jews go back to Poland and Germany?

Thomas: And America and everywhere else. Why push people out of there who have lived there for centuries? See?”

Well, hearing such a powerful American journalist speak such nonsense, these days, is about as shocking as reading José Maria Aznar, former Spanish prime minister, publish an open-editorial in the London Times, saying that the global community needs to support Israel because “if it goes down, we all go down”. Is it flip-flop day?

About the floatilla raid, Aznar writes:

“Anger over Gaza is a distraction. We cannot forget that Israel is the West’s best ally in a turbulent region…In an ideal world, the assault by Israeli commandos on the ‘Mavi Marmara’ would not have ended up with nine dead and a score wounded. In an ideal world, the soldiers would have been peacefully welcomed on to the ship.”

“Israel is a nation with deeply rooted democratic institutions. It is a dynamic and open society that has repeatedly excelled in culture, science and technology…62 years after its creation, Israel is still fighting for its very survival. Punished with missiles raining from north and south, threatened with destruction by an Iran aiming to acquire nuclear weapons and pressed upon by friend and foe, Israel, it seems, is never to have a moment’s peace.”

Aznar says the real threat to the region is extreme Islamism, “which sees Israel’s destruction as the fulfillment of its religious destiny and, simultaneously in the case of Iran, as an expression of its ambitions for regional hegemony”.

He added:

“Both phenomena are threats that affect not only Israel, but also the wider West and the world at large…It is easy to blame Israel for all the evils in the Middle East…Some even act and talk as if a new understanding with the Muslim world could be achieved if only we were prepared to sacrifice the Jewish state on the altar. This would be folly.”

Moral of the story: Europe is not made up of nothing but anti-Semites and likewise America is not 100% friendly or trustworthy for the Zionist State. We will pray that Helen Thomas’ retirement marks the end of an era and that such fearless friends as José Maria Aznar will create a new trend in support for the Jewish Country, a trend which really needs to begin in Aznar’s own country first.