Andrew Sullivan scolds the organizers of a gay pride parade in Madrid for withdrawing their invitation to an Israeli float:
Barring an Israeli float in Madrid’s gay pride parade seems perverse, exclusive and pernicious. They think they could have a pride parade in Gaza?
No, I’m pretty sure they don’t think that. I think it’s entirely possible that gay Spaniards are, you know, Spaniards – and as such are a little peeved at the Israeli government for assaulting civilian ships that carried some of their countrymen. Had Sullivan bothered to read more than one report on this story, and from somewhere other than Ynet, he might have learned that this wasn’t just a float with some random Israelis on it (though even Ynet noted that the Israeli delegation included representatives of Avigdor Lieberman‘s Foreign Ministry). This took five seconds to find on Google:
The float was sponsored by the municipality of Tel Aviv but Spain’s Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Transsexuals and Bisexuals withdrew the welcome mat after learning that the mayor of the Israeli city has not condemned last week’s naval raid, which killed nine pro-Palestinian activists.
“After this attack and taking into account that there has been no condemnation on the part of the mayor of Tel Avi we decided not to allow the float to participate,” the federation’s president, Antonio Poveda, told AFP.
“We see nothing wrong with Israeli organisations which are clearly in defence of human rights, taking part privately in gay pride,” he added.
So maybe they’re not fans of Hamas so much as people of principle.
