Wednesday, October 08, 2014
On Many Campuses, Hate is Spelled SJP
Students for Justice in Palestine patently fails, in fact refuses, to advocate anything resembling peace or a just solution to the Middle East conflict. It does not advance Palestinian human rights or the human rights of anyone. In fact, it consistently violates the human rights of pro-Israel and Jewish students. It demonizes Israel, often in racist terms, and thus perpetuates division and conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. It opposes any and all cooperation or dialogue with Israelis or indeed anyone who disagrees with its radical ideology. It has shown itself disturbingly undisturbed by terrorism and those who support terrorism. It engages in and propagates anti-Semitic racism. And its members engage in acts of intimidation and physical violence, often with impunity.Blackballed Jordanian Author: ‘Jews Have a Right to the Land of Israel’
Contrary to its own claims, SJP is not a voice for the Palestinians. In fact, through its “anti-normalization” ideology, its goal is to shout down the many Palestinians and Jews who do seek a peaceful future, and instead manipulate the Palestinian cause in order to promote an atmosphere of hatred, intimidation and radicalism on campus. The result is that rather than contributing to debate and dialogue, SJP seeks to destroy these bedrock values of the modern university.
The coming year, therefore, will pose a test for university leaders, both students and administrators: Will they stand for the values of free discussion and open inquiry and fulfill their role as guardians of a safe environment for students, free of bullying and intimidation? Or will they continue to allow an organization that promotes terror to terrorize our campuses under the guise of free speech? The answer they choose will have a huge impact on the nature of our campuses for many years to come.
Despite being arrested, fired from his job, called “crazy” and an “infidel” and being left destitute, Jordanian writer Jihad Ali Alwan, 42, has no intention backing off his full-throated support of Israel, and from every possible platform, Israel’s NRG News reported Monday.Pro-Israel Arab Activist Dragged Off Stage During Silent Protest Against Palestinian Solidarity Movement (VIDEO)
“I don’t care what price I’ll pay. I will not apologize for my beliefs,” Alwan said, writing on his personal blog, “I suggest the Arabs normalize relations with Israel,” he wrote in October of last year.
The striking statements by the married father of four were read by some eight million readers, including the Jordanian Writers Association, who called him in for a clarification.
But after refusing to appear before the committee, the guild revoked Alwan’s membership. Which also prompted an irate blog post by the man known in the Hashemite Kingdom, as “The Normalizer.”
Orim Shimshon is a man with a mission.Watch how Anti Israel campaigners react to a peaceful silent protest
A British citizen of Arab origin, Shimshon says he was born in Baghdad and raised as a Muslim after moving to the UK as a child. Over the last year, he’s become a familiar – and unwelcome – figure at pro-Palestinian events and demonstrations in London.
At a recent rally in solidarity with the Syrian people in central London’s Trafalgar Square, Shimshon turned up waving an Israeli flag and holding a sign thanking Israel for treating victims of the brutal civil war raging throughout the territory of its northern neighbor. When another demonstrator told Shimshon that Israel was an “apartheid state,” Shimshon good-naturedly challenged him, underlining the fact that he is a pro-Israel Arab in the process.
This week, Shimshon was even more daring, attending a pro-Palestinian meeting in north London where he attempted to stage a silent protest. For his pains, he was dragged off the stage and shoved by the organizers of the event. Afterwards, Shimshon explained that he went to the meeting to protest against Jenny Tonge – a Liberal Democrat member of the House of Lords with a long record of anti-Israel and anti-Semitic statements – although in the end, she didn’t turn up.
Watch Shimshon’s latest encounter with the Palestinian solidarity movement:
Has Argentina Turned Against its Jews?
If there is any lesson to be learned from this sad tale, it is that in order to fight terrorism you have to want to fight it. That is something the Kirchner governments have shown no interest in doing, and they have suffered the consequences of moral degradation and national humiliation as a result. They appear to think that making ringing declarations of concern for justice while winking at the likely perpetrators of a terrorist massacre is a better policy. It is difficult to imagine that any future government will vary this line in any significant way.Suspect held for planned attack on Jewish center in Buenos Aires
Such a policy is not difficult to pursue in the case of an attack against Jews, who are not fully Argentine in the eyes of many. And if there were any remaining doubts about the current government’s intentions, the president buried them last month with her attacks on the Jewish community and its institutions at the United Nations.
For the victims of the AMIA attack, their survivors, and the Argentine Jewish community in general, it is unlikely that justice will ever be served. Abandoned by successive governments, rebuked by their own president, and regarded with suspicion and contempt by some of their own compatriots, they have suffered the double tragedy of an atrocity compounded by injustice.
Terrible as it is to say, were I a terrorist leader, the conclusion I would draw is that I can carry out another mass casualty attack against Argentine Jews and very likely get away with it, clean.
Argentinian anti-terror police on Wednesday arrested a man suspected of planning to attack a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires.Anti-Zionist Church of England Vicar Issues Veiled Threat to Christians, Jews in Iran
Argentina’s national security secretary, Sergio Berni, said that police received an alert a week ago from Interpol of a possible plot to attack the Sociedad Hebraica. “A week ago we received from Interpol offices in Manchester an alert about a possible attack against Sociedad Hebraica (Jewish community center) in Buenos Aires City,” Berni said to reporters.
The suspect, 57, was arrested Tuesday at an Internet cafe in Buenos Aires by the Anti-Terrorist Division of the Federal Police.
Berni declined to provide additional details other than to say that 1,500 security personnel had been deployed to 99 sites in the last week, which coincided with the Jewish High Holidays season. After a bomb threat posted on Facebook last week, the Sociedad Hebraica was evacuated last Thursday night (October 2) and was closed the following day (on the eve of Yom Kippur) for security reasons.
On his return to the UK, Sizer defended his presence at the conference following a sharp attack from Jonathan Arkush, the Vice President of the British Jewish Board of Deputies, who declared that the vicar’s “appearance at a conference sponsored by a regime that actively persecutes Christians and other minorities is inexplicable.”Over 1200 Scholars Sign Petition against Academic Boycott of Israel
In response, Sizer told The Daily Telegraph newspaper: “Jesus called his followers to be ambassadors of reconciliation – and ambassadors work on foreign soil.”
Ominously, he added: “Those who criticise this kind of conference must think very carefully of the consequences of their words for Jews and Christians in countries like Iran.”
“Stephen Sizer has no credibility to act as an ‘ambassador for reconciliation’ between Christians and Jews,” Dave Rich, Deputy Director of communications for the Community Security Trust, the official security body of the UK Jewish community, told The Algemeiner. “His suggestion that the well-being of Iranian Jews relies on him attending conferences with Holocaust deniers and conspiracy theorists would be laughable, were it not for the sinister implication that they may come to harm as a result of people raising legitimate concerns about his activities.”
We previously mentioned that a pro-Academic Freedom Petition was circulating among faculty and researchers, specifically objecting to the academic boycott of Israel passed by a small number of groups, such as the American Studies Association.At Yale: Embrace Assad But Boycott Israel?
The Petition has now passed 1200 signatures, mostly from faculty at universities in the United States, but including some international faculty, researchers and scholars.
This is an important development, as some anti-Israel activist groups misleadingly attempt to portray academia as stifling speech hostile to Israel. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, there is a pervasive campus climate of hostility to Israel led by pro-boycott faculty, concentrated in the Humanities and Social Sciences.
The anti-Israel academic boycott covers Israeli institutions of higher education, and demands termination of exchange programs, terms abroad programs in Israel, academic cooperation, and any attempt at normalization of relations among scholars. The comprehensive boycott of these institutions by its nature includes a boycott of the faculty and staff at such institutions.
That the academy today has become a source of moral inversion is, unfortunately, becoming ever more clear. There are any number of examples, with the latest involving anthropologists who have announced their boycott of Israeli universities. A number of anthropologists from very prominent schools have signed the call to boycott. But are these anthropologists really motivated by a desire to advance human rights and social justice?Jewish studies scholars shouldn’t whitewash campus Israel-bashing
Take Harvey Weiss, a professor of archaeology at Yale who signed the boycott statement. Weiss has worked for decades inside Syria, not only during the so-called “Damascus Spring” that occurred subsequent to Bashar al-Assad’s rise to the presidency, but also during the dark days of his father Hafez al-Assad’s murder of tens of thousands of civilians in Hama. None of this stopped Weiss from interacting with Syrian academics or working with Syrian universities which, for what it’s worth, are not independent from the government like the Israeli universities the good Yale professor seeks to boycott.
Then, of course, there’s Narges Erami, an anthropologist who focuses on Iran, a country which has repeatedly purged Baha’i students and professors from universities simply because of their religion, and a regime that takes pride in executing homosexuals. No boycott there. But interact with Israeli academics?
I am confused. Forty top Jewish Studies professors recently signed a petition “deplor[ing]” a threat to “the kind of spirited academic exchange that is the lifeblood of the university.” What so infuriated these academics? It wasn’t Israel-apartheid weeks. It wasn’t epidemic classroom anti-Israel bias. It wasn’t the fears many Jewish students have of being bullied this fall for supporting Israel.Top UC Administrator Addresses Jewish Concerns; Protects Jewish Students
No, the professors were criticizing a group called the Amcha Initiative, the purpose of which is to “monitor centers for Middle Eastern studies on American campuses.... Amcha has also circulated a list of more than 200 Middle Eastern studies faculty whom it urges Jewish students and others to avoid because, it asserts, they espouse anti-Zionist and even anti-Semitic viewpoints in their classrooms.”
As a lowly American historian, I am not as smart as these petitioners. But does the big threat to academic freedom come from a minor organization fighting campus anti-Semitism too passionately? Their worries seem misplaced, like warning firefighters confronting a 12-alarm fire that leaking hoses cause water damage.
From the AMCHA Initiative, indefatigable advocates for Jewish students on campus: Proof that advocacy can make a difference.South Africa Tells Dalai Lama: No Visa, No Cry
Top UC Administrator Addresses Jewish Concerns; Protects Jewish Students
Provost Dorr Affirms that UC Policy Prohibits Graduate Student Instructors From Bringing Hateful Antisemitic Propaganda or the Boycott of Israel Into the Classroom
AMCHA Initiative was joined by 11 Jewish advocacy groups in applauding University of California (UC) Provost Aimee Dorr and UC administrators for protecting the well-being of Jewish students by affirming that, according to University policies, graduate student instructors may not bring political propaganda and advocacy, including the promotion of a boycott of Israel, into UC classrooms. This is the first time that University administrators have publicly acknowledged such policies and their intention to enforce them!
The South African government asked the Dalai Lama to withdraw his application for a visa to visit the country, for reasons “in the national interest,” according to Guy Lieberman, a Tibetan activist who helped organize the three previous visits by the Dalai Lama to South Africa.Roger Cohen, the “Nakba,” and the Falsification of History
The government had said that the Tibetan leader, who was scheduled to attend the Nobel Peace Laureates world summit this week, changed his mind about attending, “thus effectively cancelling his visa application.”
The event has since been suspended.
What Cohen is saying here, implicitly, is that the Palestinian narrative of the “nakba” is correct. But with an especially offensive twist: that the Jews expelled the Palestinians in much the same way the Jews themselves have been expelled from countries for thousands of years.BBC News website coverage of Operation Protective Edge: part one
It should go without saying, but apparently it does not, that for Cohen to sit in a synagogue in Europe and decide that the Palestinians are the victims of what Europe did to the Jews is not run-of-the-mill historical ignorance: it’s malicious falsehood and it’s repulsive. But it’s also nonsensical to equate the pre-Israel Jews “without a land to go to” with the Palestinians in Gaza (or the West Bank, for that matter). In fact, the Palestinians are sitting on land that they govern, and for which Israel has offered recognition of Palestinian statehood and practically begged them to accept it.
The Palestinians are not a people without a land, and they don’t have to be a people without a state. But the Palestinians would have to accept their statehood and all the responsibilities that come along with it. They’ve thus far chosen not to, and no amount of slandering of the Jewish people on the High Holidays is going to change that.
Over the next few days we will be taking a look at the BBC News website’s coverage of Operation Protective Edge and examining the corporation’s claims of equal coverage of the two sides of the story.After effects 3: BBC accuracy failure still being used against Israel
Content on the BBC News website included written news reports and written ‘Features and Analysis’ articles as well as filmed items presented as stand-alone reports and additionally often embedded into written articles. Those filmed items also appeared on BBC television news programmes and hence give us an idea of what worldwide audiences were indeed “seeing on their television screens” – as well as what they were not seeing.
In part one of this analysis we will look at the content appearing on the BBC News website’s Middle East page during the first ten days of Operation Protective Edge: from its commencement on July 8th until the beginning of the ground operation on July 17th. A small amount of content which appeared on the BBC News website at the time has since become unavailable but below are the vast majority of the reports offered to the website’s visitors. We are not including here the many reports concerning demonstrations relating to the conflict in Europe and elsewhere which appeared on the Middle East page: that topic will be covered separately.
With the subject of that sentence being “Israel’s attacks”, one might have expected that the image chosen would have some sort of connection to that topic. However, the photograph selected actually shows a Palestinian father holding the body of his infant son who was killed in November 2012 by a rocket misfired by one of the Palestinian terrorist organisations in the Gaza Strip.Too little, too late: BBC website feature tries to ‘balance’ Gaza reporting
So why would that Guardian staffer believe that the picture showed the aftermath of “Israel’s attacks”? Well, like other members of the BBC’s audience, he or she was for months mistakenly led to believe by the BBC that Omar Masharawi was killed by an Israeli airstrike.
Six weeks after the ceasefire which brought the summer’s conflict in Israel and the Gaza Strip to an end came into effect and three weeks after the publication of Yolande Knell’s big feature on Shuja’iya ( “Gaza: Life amid the rubble” – September 15th), the BBC News website published an article titled “Israeli families scarred by Gaza war” on October 6th.Anti-Semitism has always been here
The article – which appeared on the website’s main homepage as well as on its Middle East page – is specifically introduced to readers as ‘balance’ to Knell’s earlier feature.
There are countless "Free Palestine" posters hanging in the streets of Oslo. They can be seen mainly in Muslim areas, but they are elsewhere as well, sometimes with an added insult directed at Israel: "Baby killers."Met Opera Cancels Scheduled Talk for Death of Klinghoffer
But this inherent hostility cannot be attributed solely to the anti-Israel Muslim population.
"Only one of 500 respondents in the [anti-Semitism index] poll were Muslim. The participants were mainly native Norwegians," Kohn says.
Despite what many may think, the Muslim population in Norway is relatively small -- less than 2.5 percent of the population. Most of the country's Muslims are from Pakistan and tend to show little interest in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is not the Islamization of Norway that has prompted anti-Semitic sentiments. Anti-Semitism has simply always been here.
"Norway is proof that there can be anti-Semitism even if there aren't any Jews," Kohn says. According to recent estimates, only some 1,500 Jews currently live in Norway. Several hundred of them belong to the community in Oslo, and the rest have independent communities or do not belong to any community.
According to Playbill, The Metropolitan Opera has canceled its scheduled talk for “The Death of Klinghoffer”, the play about 69-year-old New Yorker Leon Klinghoffer, who was killed by terrorists of the Palestine Liberation Front (PFLF). The event was slated to have featured directors and stars of the production, which premiers later this month.Brooklyn cafe owner apologizes for calling Jews ‘greedy infiltrators’
In an e-mail obtained by Arutz Sheva, the Met wrote, "We regret to inform you that, because of a scheduling conflict, the MetTalk for The Death of Klinghoffer, planned for October 15, has had to be cancelled. There are four additional MetTalks throughout the season. For a full schedule, visit metopera.org/mettalks. We appreciate your understanding. Thank you, The Metropolitan Opera."
October 20 will mark the first night “The Death of Klinghoffer” will be aired, and Rabbi Avi Weiss and a group of Rabbinical leaders will hold a fast and vigil across from the Met beginning at noon in memory of Leon Klinghoffer's soul, being desecrated by the opera.
A Brooklyn coffee shop owner who called Jews “greedy infiltrators” on social media has apologized.Jews, Christian capitalists will control Malaysia if sedition law repealed, Muslim group warns
Michael Avila, owner of The Coffee Shop in the Bushwick neighborhood, offered “deep and sincere apologies” on Monday to anybody he may have hurt with his rant published last week on his sites. The rant reportedly went viral.
He told DNAinfo New York that his mother’s best friend, who is Jewish, and other friends showed him how he could better choose words to make his point and not offend.
Malaysia’s national policies will be exposed to intervention from “Jewish and Christian capitalists” if the government goes ahead with its proposal to repeal the Sedition Act 1948, Islamist group Ikatan Muslimin Malaysia (Isma) claimed today.French security official: If I were Jewish, I’d leave and join the IDF
The group, whose leader will face trial under the colonial-era law next Monday, insisted that the Act must be kept and even strengthened with a provision that defends the sovereignty and position of Islam in the Federal Constitution.
“Firstly, its abolition will allow certain parties to debate core and conclusive issues which thus far cannot be challenged … It will give a serious and major implication involving the social contract and the structure of the country’s future,” Isma president Abdullah Zaik Abd Rahman said in a statement here.
…“If the abolition of the laws in the package happens in our country, we will see a widespread liberalisation without borders … It can expose the country to foreign intervention where the Jewish and Christian capitalists can decide and influence national policies…
A senior official with the police department of Marseille in southern France said that if he were Jewish, he would leave for Israel and join its army.International Federation of Christians and Jews planning new aliyah program
Gilles Gray, who is the secretary of the city’s prefect of police, made the statement on Thursday at the prefecture during a conversation with Kurdish activists protesting what they describe as insufficient action to save Kurds in Syria and Iraq from assaults by the fighters of the ISIS jihadist group.
“Your brethren are there, but you are here, causing trouble in Marseille,” Gray told the activists in the conversation, whose recording was obtained by the Marsaillase daily and published on its online edition Tuesday.
“It’s like with the Jewish community. Me, if I were a Jew in Marseille who cared about my people and country, I would be in the Israeli army, not in Marseille.”
The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews on Monday announced that it will be establishing a private immigration and absorption program. The initiative is set to be headed by Eli Cohen, the former head of the Jewish Agency’s Aliya Department and the deputy CEO of the Mekorot national water company.20 Pro-Israel Christian Lawmakers to Gather in Jerusalem
IFCJ president Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein has a history of clashing with the agency over immigration, dating back to his time as the head of the agency’s aliya committee.
The IFCJ has donated millions to the agency budget but has scaled down its commitments over disagreements with the body’s 2009 strategic road map, which emphasized a focus on Jewish identity- building in the Diaspora.
A group of 20 lawmakers from Israel allies caucuses from around the world will gather in Jerusalem for a three-day visit as part of a conference organized by the Knesset Christian Allies Caucus.World’s biggest thermal imaging firm to do R&D in Israel
The lawmakers will attend Israel Allies Foundation’s annual Jerusalem Chairman’s Conference, which is being co-sponsored by the World Jewish Congress (WJC) and International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ) at the Mamilla Hotel from Oct. 12-14.
At the conference, the lawmakers are expected to urge an investigation of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) following the discovery of weaponry in U.N. schools in Gaza during this summer’s war. They are also expected to speak out against the persecution of Christians in the Middle East.
Another US giant is coming to Israel for its Next Big Thing. FLIR Systems, the world’s largest maker and producer of thermal imaging cameras, components and imaging sensors, is opening an R&D facility in Israel.Israeli start-up makes 1st commercial smart glasses app
The facility will be set up and managed by Zemingo, an Israeli company that is a major player in the app industry. Zemingo, in business since 2008, has created thousands of apps for hundreds of customers, from universities to stockbrokers to health organizations — and, of course, hundreds of games.
Israel has just scored a string of firsts in the smart glasses sector. Mekorot, Israel’s water company, is the first firm in the world to equip a large number of its field workers with smart glasses – Epson’s Moverio BT-200 devices. It’s also the first to be deploying an app to provide assistance and conduct monitoring of the workers. They will wear the smart glasses to receive specific guidance and instruction when they repair high-tension electricity installations at Mekorot facilities.Despite Gaza war, UK-Israel trade up 28%
And yet another Israeli first — the app that Mekorot workers will be using for field-service assistance developed by FieldBit, an Israeli start-up – the first such app to be used commercially.
Trade between the UK and Israel is at a record high, in spite of concerted efforts by campaigners to push for an Israel boycott during the Gaza conflict this summer.Report: Microsoft to buy Israeli start-up for $200 million
At a time when anti-Israel campaigning and activity has been at a peak, figures released by the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics show that bilateral trade between January and August increased by 28 per cent on the same period last year.
Trade between the two countries is now worth a record £2.5 billion.
Exports from Israel to the UK have risen by over 38 per cent to £1.6 billion.
Microsoft has signed a letter of intent to buy Rosh Haayin-based Equivio for around $200 million, according to a Wall Street Journal report on Tuesday.Seagate invests $15m in Israeli disk management start-up
Equivio develops text-analysis software, which organizes groups of related documents and emails based on sets of rules meant to mimic human intuition. The software's machine-learning algorithm continually adjusts itself to improve its results.
Microsoft and Equivio have yet to release an official statement on the report.
Storage giant Seagate Technology is pumping $15 million into Israeli start-up Reduxio, which has found a way to blend hybrid disk systems comprising “traditional” optical disk drives, flash drives and others. Along with Seagate, Jerusalem Venture Partners, Carmel Ventures and Intel Capital participated in the funding round.More Shameless Israeli Water- washing
The funds will accelerate Reduxio’s product development and support its go-to-market plan, the company said. As part of the deal, Seagate will obtain a seat on Reduxio’s board of directors.
Solid-state flash drives (SSDs) have become more popular in recent years. They’re faster and more stable than the traditional spinning mechanical hard disk drives (HDDs) most computers use. SSDs have no moving parts, “they use less power, and they won’t die if you bump or drop them, like HDDs,” Reduxio CEO Mark Weiner told The Times of Israel.
South by South West Eco 2014 (SXSW Eco) features three days of informative panels and workshops, inspirational speakers, intensive mentor and coaching programs, workshops, networking events, and much more. Visualize our local Green festival, but without the irritating politics we’ve come to expect from any Global Exchange- sponsored venture.The Sabras of Silicon Valley
Arie Brish, Brewster McCracken, Kevin Wagner, Michael Ben-Eli, Michael Webber spoke on Lessons from the Negev: Allaying Water Scarcity at the Austin Convention Center as part of the SXSW Eco festival . Tiny Israel is the world’s leading water recycler- reusing nearly all of its grey water. As we enter our fourth year of drought, California ought to pay close attention.
Considering the strength of Israel’s homegrown tech industry, it does seem odd that so many Israelis have come to the Bay Area. Israel’s version of Silicon Valley is referred to as “Silicon Wadi,” after the Arabic word for “valley.” Stretching up Israel’s central coastal plain from Tel Aviv to Haifa, it’s ranked as the world’s second-best startup environment. It has more companies listed on the NASDAQ exchange than Africa, Germany, France, the Philippines, Japan, Russia, Singapore, Korea, and India combined—the most startups per capita anywhere in the world.In Mamshit, even the poorest family had a 500-meter home
So, why do Israelis leave?
They aren’t leaving because of a hostile environment. They are less pushed out then pulled in. It is not that Silicon Wadi is bad, but that Silicon Valley is better. Silicon Valley, after all, is the world’s best startup environment; the number one, the original. Companies located in Silicon Valley have access to more funds and more talent, not to mention better access to the largest and most important consumer market—the United States. For the most part, Israelis come here for one reason: To improve and expand their companies.
Nabateans: A Semitic people who thrived in the Negev between the third century BCE and the seventh century CE. They accumulated great wealth by transporting spices across the desert and built six cites in the Negev.Hostage to politics, glorious Sarajevo Haggadah languishes in crumbling museum
Unlike Israel’s five other Nabatean cities, Mamshit was situated well away from the famous Spice Trail – an arduous route that extended over 2,000 kilometers from the Arabian Peninsula to the Mediterranean Sea.
Despite its seemingly out-of-the-way location, however, its inhabitants were extraordinarily wealthy. One house at Mamshit was over 1,500 square meters in size — and even the poorest family could boast a dwelling of at least 500 meters. Some people were so filthy rich they apparently “forgot” where they hid their money: archeologists found an incredible hoard of over 10,500 silver coins in one of the homes.
The city may have been off the Spice Trail, but the people of Mamshit dealt in commerce just like their fellow Nabateans. Mamshit was an important crossroad along trade routes leading towards the Dead Sea and the Arava. It was too hot to live in the Dead Sea valley and no cooler in the Arava, so Nabatean merchants built their homes at a comfortable location several hundred meters above sea level.
One of the most magnificent Jewish manuscripts, a book that survived two inquisitions and a Holocaust, is sitting trapped behind closed doors in Bosnia’s slowly crumbling National Museum, held captive by the dizzyingly convoluted politics of the Balkan nation.
The Sarajevo Haggadah, the most elaborately decorated codex remaining from Spanish Jewry’s Golden Age and today a keystone of Bosnia’s Jewish and gentile heritage, has been kept for the past two years from both the local community and tourists, despite grassroots and international efforts to put the treasure back on display.
The Bosnian government, experts say, is seemingly content to let the Haggadah continue to languish behind closed doors.
The book, which contains the story of the Israelites’ Exodus from Egypt — retold each year on Passover — is remarkable not only for its beautiful design, exquisite illuminated text, master-craftsmanship, and rare drawings from pre-Inquisition Spain, but also for its own remarkable exodus story.
