Tuesday, July 25, 2023
Elder of Ziyon
The meeting was supposed to focus on recent controversial remarks on Israel by one member of San Diego County’s Human Relations Commission. Instead, they were overshadowed when another commissioner made new, inflammatory false comments about Jews.Now, local Jewish leaders are calling for dramatic changes to the commission they believe are needed to ensure it improves human relations, and doesn’t incite hate.While coming to the defense of a fellow commissioner who had drawn outrage for earlier comments on Israel, Khaliq Raufi made offensive remarks of his own, falsely asserting that Judaism teaches Jews to kill.
Raufi said he’d read a few verses in Deuteronomy, the fifth book of both the Torah and Christian Old Testament. “It states ‘Go kill Palestinians. Wipe them all out,’” Raufi said Tuesday. “So it’s a teaching that they, on a daily basis, teach their followers in their synagogues.”Audible surprise came from those in the audience. Among them was Sara Brown, regional director of the American Jewish Committee of San Diego, who could be heard saying, “Are you serious right now?”
He then went on to supposedly quote Deuteronomy, where he said that God commanded the Israelites to wipe out all of the residents of Canaan.
You can see the meeting here.
The meeting was discussing an earlier statement by another commission member, George Khoury, who in May described Israel as a "racist, fascist state."
The purpose of the human relations commission is "to promote positive human relations, respect, and the integrity of every individual regardless of gender, religion, culture, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, or citizenship status."
But Jews are fair game - even for those whose very job is to promote tolerance.
The official response from the local ADL, AJC and Federation said, "This statement is representative of the historical and false accusation of modern blood libel/antisemitic tropes, which have led to horrific violence, destruction, persecution, and massacres of Jewish people and communities."
There were some Jewish representatives there. I bet that none of them could effectively answer either the "racist, fascist" state slur nor the slander from the Torah.
Jews need to educate our own leaders so they con confidently and quickly demolish these slanders.
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