GayandRight

My name is Fred and I am a gay conservative living in Ottawa. This blog supports limited government, the right of the State of Israel to live in peace and security, and tries to expose the threat to us all from cultural relativism, post-modernism, and radical Islam. I am also the founder of the Free Thinking Film Society in Ottawa (www.freethinkingfilms.com)

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

An olive farmer causes OXFAM to question UK foreign policy...

Shame on Oxfam.
A British charity has said that its country's policy on Israel and the Palestinians is among the errors in foreign policy that has damaged the country's reputation in the world and undermined its status as "an international force for good."

In a report published on Wednesday, Oxfam, a British charity with a mandate to overcome poverty and suffering in the world, has questioned their country's foreign policy, asking if the UK can do more to protect civilians around the world.

While the report focuses on the UK's role in Iraq and impact or policy around the world, saying the lesson is that "the wrong policy can make a bad situation worse," Oxfam attacks the British government for failing to pressure Israel for an immediate cease-fire in the Lebanon war last year.

The charity uses an account of a Lebanese farmer to make its point. "Around the world, Oxfam sees the impact of British foreign policy on the people with whom it works. In Lebanon in 2006, for example, Abdullah Bakin, an olive farmer in the village of Siddiquine, was typical in blaming the UK, not only Israel and the US, for the destruction wrought on his farm, because the British government had failed to press Israel for an immediate cease-fire."
Couldn't Oxfam just concentrate on hunger?

2 Comments:

Blogger Brian in Calgary said...

The trouble with OXFAM is that is not a charity. It is an advocacy group - and a leftist one at that - that masquerades as a charity. That is why I have never donated to them.

7:35 PM  
Blogger Elliott said...

Good post, and I agree with Brian's comment too. If you asked Oxfam why they don't just "concentrate on hunger", they'd reply that they can do a lot of long term good by influencing western policy. Unfortunately, in real life this entails posturing along the lines of the "Make Poverty History" campaign which makes good headlines but accomplishes little.

If you're interested, Oxfam's own pathetic prescription for British foreign policy makes it somewhat difficult to take them seriously on the subject ...

7:33 AM  

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