Iraqis wrestle with Jewish factor
The Asia Times discusses Iraqi antisemitism and the nature of Arab hostility towards Jewish people. Also check out this related op-ed in Haaretz.
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Reform Leader Condemns Settlements
“Rabbi Eric Yoffie, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, has issued a call to American Jews to exert their political influence in the U.S. in order to make the American administration prompt Israel to freeze all settlements immediately, regardless of what the Palestinians are doing.”
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Israeli Human Shields Bring Hope to Palestinian Olive Farmers
Cybercast News Service joins Rabbis for Human Rights on a mission to protect Palestinian Olive Groves.
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The Death of Zionism
The Zionist revolution has always rested on two pillars: a just path and an ethical leadership. Neither of these is operative any longer. The Israeli nation today rests on a scaffolding of corruption and on foundations of oppression and injustice. As such, the end of the Zionist enterprise is already on our doorstep. There is a real chance that ours will be the last Zionist generation. There may yet be a Jewish state here, but it will be a different sort, strange and ugly.
— Avraham Burg, speaker of the 15th Knesset, in The Baltimore Sun.
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Bination or No Nation
“The state of Israel exists, nobody can throw us into the sea. The Palestinian people exists, nobody can push them out into the desert. Our Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, wants to turn all of Palestine into a Jewish state. Muslim fundamentalists, like the Hamas and Jihad movements, want to include all of Palestine in a Muslim state. That is the direct route to catastrophe.”
— Uri Avnery, accepting the Lev Kopelev prize last week in Cologne.
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Ortho Vandalizes Own Home To Inflate Threat, Motivate Police
A [Sleepy Hollow] woman who reported finding swastikas on her front door three times this month was responsible for at least one of those incidents, police said yesterday.
Sharon Miller, who initially told police that someone left swastikas on her door on Nov. 3, 10 and 17, later admitted that she put the swastikas there herself on Nov. 17 and “wasn’t sure” if she did the same thing on Nov. 10, Detective Sgt. Paul Hood said.
Nice going dipstick. Make it worse, why don’t ya. In related news, two Lakewood teens have been arrested in connection with a string of crimes in which swastikas were painted on the homes of Orthodox Jews.
The threat of antisemitism—is it overstated, or not? What’s up with the Jewish schizophrenia?
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Likudnik Fascholes
The granddaughter of Italy’s World War II dictator, Benito Mussolini, said the whole world should “beg forgiveness” from Israel.
Wow.
Alessandra Mussolini, a member of Italy’s neo-fascist National Alliance party, is touring Israel with Gianfranco Fini, who also this week “condemned his country’s fascist past and said lessons must be learned to deal with racism and anti-Semitism today.”
It’s a very peculiar apology, and one that raises some historical questions. For example, how bad did the Jews have it in fascist Italy, that such an apology should be warranted? According to one source (cited in The Jewish Press),
Italian Jews, among the most highly assimilated in Europe, did in fact survive in greater numbers than their brethren in other countries, but it cannot be denied that nearly 8,000 Jews out of a 1939 population of 35,000 never returned from the concentration camps. While it is true that Italians found racism, on the whole, repulsive, Mussolini did succeed in pushing through the notorious 1938 racial laws as a nod to Hitler. And while the Italian army was often humane in its behavior towards Jews, the fascist squads in Florence and elsewhere were infamous for their murderous cruelty.
Well, that settles that. Il Doucheneck murderers.
But still, other questions persist. What of Vlad Jabotinsky and his Revisionist party? Often called “the Jewish Hitler,” Jabotinsky was a proud fascist, and a friend of Mussolini’s. It should be noted that today’s Likud party, of which Ariel Sharon is a member, is in fact the remnant of Jabotinsky’s Revisionists. And just like the Revisionists, Likud advocates a militaristic, expansionist, ethnocentric political platform. If Likud is a watered down fascist party, its relationship with Italian neofascists should be unsprising, as should its relationship with the Bush administration. Unsuprising, sure, but alarming nonetheless.
[Updated] Forgive me for the transgression of linking to something published by Lyndon Larouche, but these pieces on Jabotinsky are rather thought provoking. I wouldn’t swear by ‘em, but most of their sources are Jewish ones.
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No popular support, huh?
The JTA reports, “A majority of Israelis and Palestinians back an unofficial peace proposal, a new poll said. Fifty-three percent of Israelis and 56 percent of Palestinians back a summary that was read to them of the ‘Geneva accord,’ which was drafted by out-of-office Israeli politicians and Palestinians close to Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat. Last Friday, thousands of Palestinians demonstrated in Gaza against the proposal. The plan would give the Palestinians a state in the entire West Bank and Gaza Strip, divide Jerusalem and give the Palestinians control of Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. The plan is vague on the demand for a ‘right of return’ to Israel for millions of Palestinian refugees and their descendants.”
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Coulter Blasts Dems & The Jews Who Love Them
Liberal-baiting, woman-hating, McCarthy-loving, “We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity”-espousing Ann Coulter hates liberal Democrats so much, that she wants us Jews to “wake up” and realize that the Democrats are just taking advantage of us. In a recent column, Coulter writes,
In addition to having a number of family deaths among them, the Democrats’ other big idea – too nuanced for a bumper sticker – is that many of them have Jewish ancestry. There’s Joe Lieberman: Always Jewish. Wesley Clark: Found Out His Father Was Jewish in College. John Kerry: Jewish Since He Began Presidential Fund-Raising. Howard Dean: Married to a Jew. Al Sharpton: Circumcised. Even Hillary Clinton claimed to have unearthed some evidence that she was a Jew – along with the long lost evidence that she was a Yankees fan. And that, boys and girls, is how the Jews survived thousands of years of persecution: by being susceptible to pandering.
She goes on to say,
The Democrats’ urge to assert a Jewish heritage is designed to disguise the fact that the Democrats would allow the state of Israel to perish as Palestinian suicide bombers slaughter Jewish women and children.
Right. Joe Lieberman wants to destroy Israel. John Kerry, Wesley Clark, Dick Gephardt—these people want to destroy Israel. Yeah right.
Like we should’ve supported Nixon, Reagan, and Bush, as if they’re any better. Please.
Ann should take a queue from her buddy Bill O’Reilly and SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP! The slightest scrutiny of her arguments make them collapse beneath the weight of reality. Girl talks more shit than Roto-Rooter, and smells just as bad to me.
Would someone kindly order one of these Republican Bimbo Barbies for me, so I can do vile things to it? Thanks.
[Update] Dave Johnson offers an alternate take on the issue.
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Too little, too late
When a wave of anti-Semitic attacks grabbed headlines last year, [Chirac] downplayed the problem. Now, against the deadly background of the Nov. 15 synagogue bombings in Turkey, he showed a sense of urgency that, for many French Jews, has been far too long in coming. Statistics show a marked rise in anti-Semitic acts from the autumn of 2000 to late 2002, and a considerable dip over the last year or so. There’s been better security at Jewish institutions. And, until recently, fewer people speaking up. “People felt there was no response from the government, and even stopped reporting attacks because it led nowhere,” says Pauline Bebe, a rabbi in Paris’ 18th arrondissement. “Now they feel there’s a will to stop this.” Chirac is determined to swing the full weight of the French state at the problem. Good for him. But he may find that it lies beyond his reach.
Time magazine explores French antisemitism.
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Hey baby, wanna wrestle?
All of which is not to say that Zionism was inherently unjust, a flawed movement from the start. Nor it is to claim that Israel is a state born in sin and destined for oblivion, undeserving of our support and recognition. But a relationship with Israel and the Zionism that birthed it must include a wrestling with the moral and political calculations inherent in its history, and their impact on the Judaism Theodor Herzl sought to save. Wrestling With Zion, in that context, is a major contribution to Jewish American thought on the subject.
Brad Pilcher discusses Tony Kushner’s new anthology Wrestling with Zion in this week’s Jewsweek. We’ll be having in interblog discussion about the book sometime next week, involving Brad, Jewschool, and Protocols. Be sure to pick up a copy to join us in the comment threads.
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Nazis Love Jewschool
Well, it was bound to happen. A white power Nazi hate site has discovered Jewschool and is beginning to rack up points in our referral log. Traffic is being directed from this page, which in the midst of its racist tripe and drivel, reads,
Subject: threnody of the tweezermani, a rotten little tribe just east of the midomarHere an izzy dawg who be kickin’ it wit his own “blog” and – YO – invitin’ y’all to stop by and give up some shaloms, homes
I’d be concerned but the material on their site is so comical I find it hard to stop laughing long enough to be appalled. Their movie reviews, for example, are a riot. Who needs to watch Dave Chappelle parody these idiots when they do a good enough job making themselves look ridiculous?
Anyhow, lemme offer a few words I’m sure these folks are familiar with, perhaps having offered them themselves at one time or another: “Your kind ain’t welcome round these parts.” Now goin’ git back to yer trailer before yer sister misses ya. If you’re fightin’ a racewar I think you lost already, shitheads.
Say, anyone from the Internet Haganah wanna do me a little favor?
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Israel Bounces Check to Wounded ISM Activist
The Voice of Judea reports, “Israel bounced a check to a British man badly wounded by Israeli army fire. The Defense Ministry sent a check for nearly $14,000 to the family of Thomas Hurndall, 22, an activist with the pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement, who was shot in the head by an Israeli soldier in the Rafah refugee camp in Gaza last April, the Israeli daily Ha’aretz reported. The check was returned for insufficient funds. In a note with the check, Israel said the payment was for repatriating Hurndall, but did not constitute an admission of liability in the shooting.”
Late last month, Hurndall’s family announced his life support would be turned off. Despite whatever disagreement one may have over Hurndall’s positions, this is literally just adding insult to injury.
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The Gall of Rall
Generally speaking, I love Ted Rall. Of course, I’m a whacko LLL by the standards of most, but regardless, he’s usually spot on in his political commentary as far as I’m concerned. However his most recent cartoon is just a tad misleading, if not wholly ignorant of history and the culture of shiadhis in the Middle East. It’s disappointing, really. Anti-Israelism is so trendy, people’ll take a jab at the state without even knowing what the hell they’re talking about.
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EU Report On Antisemitism Kept Under Wraps
The JTA reports, “A study on anti-Semitism in Europe was not released, reportedly because of political concerns. The study commissioned by the European Union was reportedly shelved early this year because it found that Muslims, as well as right-wing extremists, were mainly responsible for anti-Semitic incidents committed during May and June 2002, British news reports said. In addition, there may have been problems in separating anti-Israel activity from anti-Semitism. A spokesman for the European Monitoring Center on Racism and Xenophobia said the findings would be included in a larger study to be done next year.”
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Uncovering the Jewish Roots of Flamenco
“The sound of whiskey-voiced singers and the sight of soulful women with snaking arms and electrifying footwork epitomize the fiery Gypsy art of flamenco. But few people realize that flamenco emerged not only from Gypsy passion, but also from Sephardic Jewish roots. In fact, the word ‘flamenco’ means ‘Flemish’ in Spanish, probably because Jews and other minorities targeted by the Spanish Inquisition fled to Flanders to avoid persecution. Their religious songs were referred to as ‘flamenco,’ a term later applied to anything noisy, flashy or scandalous.”
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Bad-ass Frum Girls
From the ardently religious young woman who longs for the life of a male scholar to the young rebel who visits a strip club, smokes pot, and agonizes over her loss of faith to the proud Lubavitcher with a desire for a high-powered career, Stephanie Wellen Levine provides a rare glimpse into the inner worlds and daily lives of these Hasidic girls.
A new book by Stephanie Wellen Levine takes an intimate look at the lives of Lubavitcher girls in Crown Heights.
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