There is no problem, of course, with the FBI having a file on the famous antisemitic Russian forgery, nor in their making those files public.
There is a serious problem with them tweeting out these copies without any context.
It included a number of different copies of the book, all of which had been sent to the FBI by either informants or US citizens who either wanted the FBI to know about the secret plot of Jews to control the world, or who were asking whether the book was true.
Here is part of a 1949 letter by a Clarence Fausett, typed up for the FBI from a handwritten original, where he wanted to make sure that FBI director J. Edgar Hoover was aware of this Jewish/Communist conspiracy.
The FBI replied in Hoover’s name:
As with all of the copies of the letters that the FBI sent, at the bottom are notes about whether the FBI has any information on the correspondent.
The FBI continued to receive similar letters from the 1940s through the 1970s, not only about the Protocols only but also with copies of other antisemitic tracts, covered in this file.
The responses, by not mentioning that the book was a lie, can be construed as a tacit support for their contents.
Here’s a 1968 letter where the correspondent is pretty convinced that Jews are controlling the government already, and he hopes that J. Edgar Hoover can clean things up.
This portion of a 1964 letter to the head of the Senate Judiciary Committee was copied to the FBI. It was written by a woman who wanted to know if the Talmud says the horrible things that the antisemites claim it says.
On one occasion, a special agent sent a copy of the Protocols to FBI headquarters asking about it, and they responded with a reference to a book that discredits the work.
The file is an interesting slice of history of American antisemitism as seen through the letters of concerned, often anti-communist citizens. It is reasonable to ask whether the FBI should have answered the letters of those who honestly wanted to know whether the antisemitic works were legitimate – it would require the FBI to become a fact-checking organization for the entire country which is not its purpose, but its refusal to answer the questions may have contributed to antisemitism itself.
Since January, I’ve been participating in a daf yomi program. That means that every day, 7 days a week, I study a page (actually, two facing pages), of Talmud.
The fact that someone like me, who grew up in a secular home and did not have a Jewish education, has the opportunity to do this is a new development. The Talmud itself, for those who don’t know, consists of passages from the Mishna, the Oral Law first written down around 200 CE in Hebrew, and the Gemara, a much larger body of commentary on the Mishna that was compiled over a period of several hundred years afterwards. The Gemara is written in Aramaic, a language close to Hebrew, but the writing is condensed and elliptical. It also includes notes by Rashi and others commenting on and explaining the text. Until recently there was simply no way a modern reader could approach this without a great deal of preliminary study with knowledgeable teachers.
But in the last three decades, scholars have produced translations of the Aramaic texts along with detailed commentary to fill in the gaps for ignoramuses like me. In particular, Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, z”l, who died earlier this month, created a monumental translation of the entire Babylonian Talmud (there is also a Jerusalem Talmud, but the one compiled in Babylonia is considered more authoritative) into modern Hebrew, which in turn has been translated into English. More than just a translation, Rabbi Steinsaltz interpolated explanations and context into the text, so that it’s possible to read it almost like a novel. There are even diagrams, which my wife says remind her of computer games.
The Talmud is not an orderly exposition of Jewish law. Rather it is a record of the deliberations and conversations of generations of sages, in which arguments are given for multiple interpretations of the Mishnaic texts, which themselves are an attempt to elucidate the commandments of the Torah and apply them to everyday life. Sometimes the Gemara will say “the halacha is such-and-such” but most of the time, all you have are the arguments. There are also stories, ridiculous medical advice, superstitions, insults – including some passages that have been used by Jew haters throughout the years as evidence for our evil ways. During the Middle Ages, non-Jewish authorities sometimes ordered printed copies of the Talmud to be censored or even burned.
The seven years it takes read the whole thing are daunting. When I started the daf yomi program, I didn’t believe that I would last more than a few weeks. But I’ve become more and more interested and involved as time goes by. I have even learned a few useful expressions in Aramaic, for example in yesterday’s daf, pok t’nei l’vara! (“go, take that teaching outside”). I’m convinced that if I live long enough (b”h), I will finish the project. I will never be either a scholar or very observant, but this study brings me closer to Judaism and Jewish history.
I think that this would not have happened if I still lived in a non-Orthodox community in the USA. In Israel, Judaism and Jewish history are in the air. I am continuously made aware of who I am, by the language, the holidays, the symbols of the state, the biblical geography, and the fact that I am surrounded by Jews. There are neighborhoods in Brooklyn in which I would also be surrounded by Jews; but even there, the consciousness of living as a small minority in someone else’s country is inescapable (not to mention the reminders provided by the growing number of antisemitic incidents). And I would miss the diversity of Israeli Jews, Jews of every color and culture.
But don’t I know that one of five Israelis is an Arab? Of course. There is room for an Arab minority. Nevertheless, there are also dangers – not directly from the presence of the Arabs, but from those that want to use their presence as a reason to weaken the Jewish state. Meir Kahane believed that the Arab citizens of Israel posed a demographic threat. Their birthrate was higher than that of the Jews, and so he predicted that the Jewish majority would ultimately be eroded. Today the birthrates of Jewish and Arab citizens are not far apart (I think the high Haredi birthrate is a greater threat to a functional state).
The real problem is an ideological one, posed by those (Jews and Arabs) who want to replace the state of the Jewish people with a state of its citizens. 62 members of the Knesset understood this when they passed the Nation-State Law to guarantee the continued Jewish character of the state. Right now there are attempts to weaken the law by inserting language to guarantee “equal rights.” We should be aware that the Basic Law: Human Dignity and Liberty is already interpreted to guarantee equal civil rights to individual Jews and Arabs; and it is not necessary or desirable to weaken the provision of national rights that is made by the Nation-State Law to the Jewish people alone.
I am also not at all diffident about calling for Jews everywhere to make aliyah, despite the difficulties. You can certainly study Talmud in the diaspora, whether by subscribing to the daf yomi or by studying at one of the numerous yeshivot or other institutions of Jewish learning there. But you cannot, even in deepest Brooklyn, breathe Jewishness with every breath, as you can in the Jewish state.
The Democratic National Convention utilized two of the former leaders of the Women's March, both of who faced allegations of anti-Semitism during their time on the board.
Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour participated in separate convention events on Monday and Tuesday, respectively. Mallory spoke on Monday at a virtual meeting of the Democratic Black Caucus while Sarsour addressed the convention’s Muslims and Allies Assembly.
Joe Biden's presidential campaign, in response to an attack from President Trump's reelection campaign, reaffirmed the former vice president's stance on Israel and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement, which calls for a boycott of Israeli goods in order to pressure the country's government to improve the quality of life for Palestinians.
“Joe Biden has been a strong supporter of Israel and a vehement opponent of anti-Semitism his entire life, and he obviously condemns [Sarsour's] views and opposes BDS, as does the Democratic platform,” Biden spokesman Andrew Bates said, according to CNN’s Jake Tapper. “She has no role in the Biden campaign whatsoever.”
Bates also pointed to the official Democratic platform, which includes the declaration: “We oppose any effort to unfairly single out and delegitimize Israel, including at the United Nations or through the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions Movement.”
Prominent anti-Israel activist Linda Sarsour appeared on Tuesday on the live stream of the Democratic National Convention’s Muslim Delegates Assembly.
Sarsour — who acted as a surrogate for Bernie Sanders during the primaries — remarked, “The Democratic Party is not perfect, but it is absolutely our party in this moment.”
Following Tuesday’s event, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden repudiated Sarsour, with a spokesman for his campaign stating, “Joe Biden has been a strong supporter of Israel and a vehement opponent of antisemitism his entire life, and he obviously condemns her views and opposes BDS, as does the Democratic platform.”
“She has no role in the Biden campaign whatsoever,” the spokesman added.
Dozens of members of the New York State Assembly have condemned the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) for issuing what they called a “blatantly antisemitic litmus test” to prospective City Council candidates.
The DSA’s questionnaire to candidates included the line, “Do you pledge not to travel to Israel if elected to City Council in solidarity with Palestinians living under occupation?”
“Even though foreign policy falls outside the purview of municipal government, gestures like travel to a country by elected officials from a city the size and prominence of New York still send a powerful message, as would the refusal to participate in them,” the questionnaire added.
The next question was an aggressive near-endorsement of the antisemitic BDS campaign, reading, “Do you support the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement? If not, why?”
Sovereignty, or the application of civil law to Judea and
Samaria, has been hereby suspended,
in favor of a peace accord with the UAE. How long that suspension will last is
anyone’s guess. Some think it’s a done deal—that the subject of sovereignty is
permanently off the table—while others think Bibi will make good his electoral promise
of sovereignty, doing the right thing at the right time, in good time. But was
sovereignty ever really on the table in the first place?
“Peace for peace,”
said Netanyahu in his remarks
to the nation about the accord, emphasizing that this would not be a cold
peace, but a peace in which Israel and the UAE would be equals and friends. But
the prime minister’s words also suggested that Israel traded not sovereignty for peace, but peace for peace: that Israel got something so huge in the exchange that it was worth it—worth giving up Israel’s sovereignty. But are sovereignty
and peace commodities that might be traded, one for the other, even
Steven? Is peace somehow bigger and more important than sovereignty? More worthwhile?
A reasonable person might ask: is "peace for peace" only more Netanyahu oratorical sleight of hand? For how is peace made, if not by sovereign
entities as equals? And if Israel is robbed of the right to self-determination
in parts of its lawful, indigenous territory, one might argue that it has no power to make an accord. That the right to make accords belongs solely to
sovereign countries.
Giving up sovereignty is unfortunate in many ways, not least for creating a gap between the UAE and Israel, removing any semblance of parity between the two. Suspending sovereignty at the behest of the U.S. turns Israel
into a vassal state, tied to Uncle Sam’s apron strings. It means that America
decides the fate of the Jews and the land God gave them. Or rather, in agreeing to suspend sovereignty, Israel has ceded its rights, making America sovereign over the Holy Land.
This is what Netanyahu did in agreeing to suspend
sovereignty. But who knows, perhaps sovereignty was never really on the table at all. Perhaps the suggested parameters of sovereignty were only meant to suggest the borders of a “Palestinian” state.
I put the question to Nadia Matar, co-chairman of Women in Green with Yehudit Katsover. The
two have lately gone on to create the Sovereignty Movement (Ribonut), which serves as a forum and a
campaign for the application of sovereignty in Judea and Samaria. Matar’s
response to my question regarding partial sovereignty was succinct: “Bibi is on his
way to create a PA state. He has to go.”
The same question put to Professor Efraim Inbar, however, president
of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and
Security, yielded a surprising response, one that is brimming with optimism for the
future, “The Americans got cold feet and Bibi got an agreement with UAE. Not so
bad. Sovereignty remains for better days. History does not end in 2020.”
Inbar sees Bibi and Israel as the
big winners here. A different picture emerges, however, in a recent interview of
Finance Minister Yisrael Katz (Likud) on Kan Bet, where Katz said that sovereignty had been frozen before
the agreement with the United Arab Emirates. The MK was frank in stating that
there actually is no connection
between the peace accord with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the decision
to suspend sovereignty. That it was simply “more convenient” for the Arab
nations to present the accords as if they had brought about the suspension of sovereignty.
In this light, freezing sovereignty is akin to Israel freezing construction in Judea and Samaria, or what hostile elements call “settlement expansion.” It was canny of
the UAE to squeeze this concession from the Jews. In theory, if not in application, the suspension of sovereignty makes the UAE a hero to
the Arab people for staying Israel's hands in applying its land rights in the Holy Land, land that is coveted by the Arab people.
President Trump announces the agreement on August 13, 2020
Jared Kushner, however, asserts that the entire question of
sovereignty is moot, “That land is land that right now Israel quite frankly
controls. Israelis that live there aren’t going anywhere. There shouldn’t be
any urgency to applying Israeli law. We believe they will respect their
agreement.”
With this statement, Kushner betrays his lack of
understanding of a very basic issue: that the territories have been under martial
law since 1967, and living under martial law, is no way to live.
Sovereignty means bringing civility to Judea and Samaria. For the wild, wild “West
Bank” is a lawless place, where anything might happen when
tensions flare, and the only thing to stop it is soldiers.
This is not a proper or humane state of affairs for Jews or Arabs. Asked if the application of
civil law to the territories stood to benefit the Palestinians, Khaled Abu Toameh,
an Israeli Arab journalist and Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Gatestone Institute, responded, “I
believe they would prefer any law to the existing set of laws, which includes
Israeli military law, Jordanian law and Palestinian law. These laws have
complicated the lives of Palestinians and created much confusion for many.”
The Point of the Deal: A Palestinian State
The Trump peace plan doesn’t factor in that confusion. It’s not
the point or the focus of the deal. The purpose of the Deal of the Century, is to create a Palestinian
state on 70 percent of Judea and Samaria through the application of Israeli
sovereignty to just 30 percent of that land, effectively giving up another huge chunk
of Jewish land to the Arabs for good, land that now legally belongs to Israel
under international law. The normalization agreement with the UAE, however, puts a stopper into that idea, stipulating that Israel suspend its plan to extend Israeli law to these areas.
Kushner was frank about all this in his public remarks on the accord,
in which he stated that Prime Minister Netanyahu had agreed to a map
dividing Judea and Samaria into a Palestinian state with a part that would
belong to Israel, calling it “the first map ever agreed publicly to by one of
the parties.”
This, it appears, was the intent of partial sovereignty from the beginning. In giving up
sovereignty over most of Judea and Samaria, Israel gives up more land to the Arabs for a state. Hence Trump’s peace plan
turns the application of civilian law into another Israeli land giveaway, yet more
land for peace. The plan actually turns sovereignty into something that is
anathema to the world: annexation, by making Israel the thief in asserting its rights to a mere 30
percent of Jewish land, when in fact it is Israel, giving away yet more of its God-given land,
more lifeblood, to the Arabs.
The Deal of the Century gives the Arabs license to encroach on yet more Jewish land, in the very same sort of creeping annexation of which Israel stands accused. Make no mistake: this is an Arab land grab going all the way back to the British Mandate for Palestine, when responding to Arab entreaties, Britain
reneged on its promise to the Jews, and created Transjordan on 78 percent of
the Mandate. It is the same creeping Arab annexation of Jewish land that was Oslo, the same creeping Arab annexation of Jewish land that resulted from the expulsion
of the Jews from Gaza. And yet it is Israel that is the enabler of this state
of affairs, in which the Arabs get more Jewish land over time, as the Jews are squeezed into borders that shrink over time, inching ever closer to the sea.
We have lots of ideas, but we need more resources to be even more effective. Please donate today to help get the message out and to help defend Israel.
A most interesting tweet from PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">We should respect the national symbols of the UAE. The UAE flag is a national symbol that must be respected and honoured , so should other Emirates national symbols . <a href="https://t.co/OITcIjTdQS">https://t.co/OITcIjTdQS</a></p>— Dr. Saeb Erakat الدكتور صائب عريقات (@ErakatSaeb) <a href="https://twitter.com/ErakatSaeb/status/1296071978328227841?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 19, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
If national symbols must be respected, then Israel’s flag must not be burned by Palestinians – but that happens every day and Erekat remains silent.
So it must be that Erekat does not consider Israel to be a nation.
Trump’s Vision offered the PLO Gaza and possibly 70% of Judea and Samaria for a second Arab State in former Palestine - in addition to Jordan.
Abbas – who has been demanding 100% for the last 25 years – made his displeasure known in terms that must not have endeared him to Trump:
“I say to Trump and Netanyahu: Jerusalem is not for sale; all our rights are not for sale and are not for bargain. And your deal, the conspiracy, will not pass … We say a thousand no’s to the deal of the century,”
Trump’s offer – spurned so dismissively by Abbas - now seems destined for the dustbin of history.
The UN and European Union’s insistence that the “two-state solution” was the only solution that could end the Jewish-Arab conflict has been debunked as Israel and the UAE begin the path to peaceful co-existence.
Jordan and Egypt’s involvement after a 53 years absence becomes increasingly possible.
Israel’s planned application of sovereignty in the 30% of Judea and Samaria designated in Trump’s plan has been placed on hold – as Trump pointed out in his carefully worded White House statement:
“As a result of this diplomatic breakthrough, and at the request of President Trump with the support of the United Arab Emirates, Israel will suspend declaring sovereignty over areas outlined in the President’s Vision for Peace and focus its efforts now on expanding ties with other countries in the Arab and Muslim world. The United States, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates are confident that additional diplomatic breakthroughs with other nations are possible, and will work together to achieve this goal”..
The operative word is “suspend” not “abandon”
Once again Israel has made a major concession in pursuing peace by suspending its extension of sovereignty into the Jewish People’s biblical heartland – specifically designated for reconstitution of the Jewish National Home by the Mandate and preserved until today by article 80 of the United Nations Charter.
A bigger picture beckons as other Arab states could shortly follow the UAE’s decision and establish diplomatic relations with Israel.
Trump’s incredible efforts over the past three years to achieve peace between Jews and Arabs should see his most trenchant critics eating humble pie.
As far as most Democrats are concerned, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is one of their least favorite world leaders. Though not all of them go so far as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who scorns him as a "reactionary racist." But even those who consider themselves pro-Israel stalwarts draw the line at expressing support for Netanyahu.
Their allies in the media and the foreign policy establishment agree. Most pundits and so-called Middle East "experts" believe the Likud Party leader and his policies to be the principal obstacle to peace with the Palestinians. Many American Jews also deprecate him as a foe of liberal values whose refusal to compromise and alleged corruption is a threat to Israeli democracy.
But in the wake of the historic agreement reached last week between Israel and the United Arab Emirates to begin negotiations to normalize relations between the two countries, it's time for Netanyahu's detractors to acknowledge a truth they'd rather deny or ignore. Far from being a hard-liner or an obstacle to peace, Netanyahu is the most skillful and successful diplomat in Israel's history.
Few would dispute that as the longest-serving prime minister in Israeli history, Netanyahu is a master politician whose ability to stay on top is nothing short of remarkable.
It's also true that despite his truculent reputation, Netanyahu has been the most cautious of Israeli prime ministers when it comes to the use of military force. Unlike virtually all of his predecessors, he has been reluctant to use the Israel Defense Forces in all-out campaigns to silence attacks in the south, from Hamas-run Gaza, or in the north, from Hezbollah. Indeed, domestic critics from the left and the right have often criticized him for being too soft on terror, rather than being the warmonger depicted in the international press.
But the greatest misnomer about Netanyahu is the claim that his bluster is isolating his country.
In answer to critics on both sides of the spectrum, Netanyahu penned an op-ed on Monday to “remind [readers] that in the current agreement, not only has Israel not withdrawn from so much as one square meter, rather the Trump plan includes, at my request, the application of Israeli sovereignty over extensive territories in Judea and Samaria. It was I who insisted on including sovereignty in the plan, and this plan has not changed. President Trump is committed to it and I am committed to conducting negotiations on this basis.”
He went on to say, “At the U.N. in 2013, I said that for years, many believed that Israeli-Palestinian peace would advance a broader reconciliation between Israel and the Arab world. I said that I was of the view that peace would be achieved in the opposite fashion: It was expanding reconciliation between Israel and the Arab world that would likely advance an Israeli-Palestinian peace.”
There is no question that Netanyahu was right all along that the root of Middle East strife was not a lack of Palestinian statehood. Only liberal Jews continued to believe that fallacy, to which even most Arabs have stopped paying lip service. Proof that they only used the Palestinian “cause” to bash Israel lays in the appalling treatment of Palestinians in their own countries.
This is something that members of the Israeli right never doubted. Many, however, have cast serious aspersions on Netanyahu’s convictions where preserving Jewish rights in the land of Israel is concerned. They see the UAE deal as a form of capitulation to foreign pressure.
They are wrong to perceive his actions in this light. He is not caving to Washington. Rather, he is buying time and creating optimal conditions for Israel’s road ahead. As Movement for Governability and Democracy managing director Daniel Seaman so aptly put it in these pages on Sunday: “While most politicians are busy playing checkers, Netanyahu has always been playing three-dimensional chess.”
The Peasants' Revolt was an 1834 rebellion against Egyptian conscription and taxation of Arabs in Palestine. Egyptian general Ibrahim Pasha attempted to take over all of Palestine, but at one point he went to Jaffa and the Arabs of Jerusalem started their revolt.
As I made continual excursions among the Arabs, and they conversed with me without reserve, I discovered that they were very discontented with the Pacha's government, particularly with his taking their young men for soldiers. They informed me that a widely extended conspiracy was on the point of breaking forth into rebellion, and that I should do well to quit Palestine. I accordingly made preparations for my -departure ; but, in spite of all my diligence, I was too late. No sooner did the Pacha depart for Jaffa than the revolution commenced. …The Arabs from Samaria and Hebron marched on Jerusalem. The Pacha had left only 600 men in Jerusalem, and the assailants were more than 40;000. 'As, however, the walls were furnished with a few cannon, and the Arabs were armed with nothing but lances and muskets, we could have held out forever, had not the Arabs discovered a subterranean passage.
They entered at midnight, and: the soldiers, after a gallant defence, .were obliged to retire to the castle. All the Christians fled to the different convents and thus, saved their lives: For five or six days the city was given up to plunder, and never did I witness such a heart rending spectacle.
The Jews, who had no place of safety to which they could retire, suffered very much; their houses were so,pillaged that they had not a bed to lie on, many were murdered, their wives and daughters violated &c.; in fine, barbarities were committed too shocking to relate.
Ibrahim Pasha returned to Jerusalem with 5000 soldiers and conquered the city again. He then went on to Hebron in August, where he attacked the Arab rebels hiding there – and the Jews.
From an 1851 account of "The Revolt and Earthquake of Jerusalem in 1834."
The Pasha, after taking Nablus, remained there three weeks to disarm the people, and took fifteen thousand guns. The sheikhs . having fled to Hebron, ,where they were determined to make their last stand, the Pasha marched thither. After twice defeating the rebels in the field, he took the town by assault and gave it over to the soldiers to plunder. They killed all the Muslim inhabitants they could find and, some of them fleeing into the Jewish quarter, the soldiers carried on the work of plunder there also, and completely stripped the Jews, their houses, and even their synagogues.
Arabs fought Arabs – and used it as an excuse to attack the Jews.
Last October, during a debate, Tunisian presidential candidate Qais Said said, “Normalization [with Israel] is high treason, and those who are dealing with an entity that have displaced and annihilated an entire people must be brought to trial. The word normalization is an inherently wrong word, we are in a state of war with a usurping entity.”
Qais Said won the election and is now president of Tunisia.
And he hasn’t said a negative word about the United Arab Emirates plan to normalize relations with Israel.
This is similar to the silence of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, both of which would routinely issue anti-Israel statements for years and both of which are now silent, much to the frustration of the PLO which used to be able to dictate to them what to do:
The State of Palestine summoned its ambassador to the UAE and demanded the UAE to retract its position. The leadership called on other Arab countries might take a similar step and called upon the Arab League to respect the will of its people; to put an end to such a unilateral and irresponsible behavior and to abide by its charter based on the foundations of Arab solidarity and the joint and unified Arab position. The leadership called for immediate emergency sessions of the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation to address this matter.
Dr. Abbas Shoman, a member of the Supreme Council of Senior Scholars of Al Azhar Al Sharif, expressed his astonishment over a fatwa forbidding Emiratis’ prayers at Al Aqsa Mosque, issued by the Mufti of Jerusalem after the announcement of the UAE-Israel peace treaty.
Dr. Shoman said: “I refuse to issue Sharia fatwas that are not based on sharia rules, and I do not know as a specialist in Islamic jurisprudence that there is a justification that annuls the prayers of an entire people of a Muslim country in a mosque on the grounds of a political position taken by their state.”
He added: “Indeed, the fatwa is selective and not based on Sharia….As far as I know, there has never been a fatwa in our Islamic history that prevents a person or a group from praying in a mosque for Muslims.”
This actually is similar to another dispute from 2012 when a former Mufti of Jerusalem Ekrima Sabri criticized Egypt’s Grand Mufti visiting Jerusalem. He used bizarre logic:
Sheikh Sabri said from a political perspective Gomaa’s visit implied the recognition of Israeli’s occupation. “Recognition is a form of normalization because no one can enter Jerusalem without an Israeli visa or without proper coordination with the Israeli security forces.” But if Muslim citizens of Europe or America visit Israel, their visit would not be considered as an act of “recognizing the occupation,” Sabri said. “If German or French Muslims visit Jerusalem, this is not normalization since their countries already recognize Israel. “Some Arab governments might not boycott Israel, but their people do and they reject normalization.”
Another dispute over whether Muslims can visit Jerusalem erupted in 2010 when an Egyptian soccer team planned to play a friendly match against the Palestinian team in the West Bank, and Egyptian extremist clerics issued a fatwa against it.
Similarly, major Muslim Brotherhood cleric Yusuf Qaradawi once issued a fatwa against non-Palestinian Muslims visiting Jerusalem:
He stressed in remarks published yesterday in Doha, "We should feel that we are deprived of Jerusalem and fight for it so that Jerusalem is ours, and that the responsibility to defeat the Zionist aggression is the responsibility of the Islamic nation as a whole and not the responsibility of the Palestinian people alone," he said, adding: "It is not reasonable to leave the Palestinians alone in the face of the Zionist state with a large military capabilities." He said that "Jerusalem will not return except through resistance and jihad, and the combined efforts of the Arab and Islamic nation."
Muslim clerics like to use Jerusalem as a political football, just like Muslim politicians do. Indeed, there seems to be little distinction between Islamic jurisprudence and politics based on how Muslim clerics have issued contradictory (and sometimes self-contradictory) fatwas on Jerusalem in ways that happen to align with their political positions.
Here is a photo of Yasir Arafat together with Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine leader, Nayef Hawatmeh and Palestinian writer Kamal Nasser at press conference in Amman in 1970.
Notice the poster behind them with the Star of David?
This poster, as seen in the Palestine Poster Project, is the one Arafat chose to pose in front of.
Four hundred years ago this month, the Mayflower set sail for the New World. On board was William Bradford, who would serve for decades as governor of Plymouth Colony and whose memoir is still the central source of knowledge about the colonists’ triumphs and travails. His grave is in Plymouth as well, an obelisk marking the spot and bearing his name. But above the engraved English words three words appear, etched in Hebrew: Adonai ezer hayai, the Lord is the help of my life. To most tourists, the Hebrew words are gibberish, but to Jews who come upon them, they are a source of fascination—and a reminder, 400 years after the Mayflower set sail, of the remarkable tale of America itself.
The origin of the intriguing epitaph can be found in Nick Bunker’s fascinating book on the Pilgrims, Making Haste from Babylon. There he reveals Bradford’s fascination with Hebrew, and how, at the end of his life, he began to study what he saw as a sacred script. “I have had a longing desire,” Bradford reflected, “to see with my owne eyes, something of that most ancient language, and holy tongue … and what names were given to things, from the Creation.” With paper scarce, Bradford “copied out his exercises on blank pages at the front of the manuscript of his history of the plantation. He covered the white space with nearly 900 Hebrew words, starting with eight names for God.” Bradford’s Pilgrims, like the Puritans who would follow him, “wished to swim back up the stream of learning, and to absorb the wisdom of the Bible from as close to the source as possible.” They sought out Christian exegetes with interests similar to theirs, who “read with sympathy the rabbis of the Roman Empire, Egypt, and medieval Spain, authors whose books were preserved by the Jews of Germany or Venice.”
Bunker further reveals that Bradford’s engagement with Jewish tradition began on the Mayflower itself. One book he carried with him was a commentary on the Psalms by the Hebraist Henry Ainsworth. While Ainsworth was interested in the vastness of rabbinic tradition, he was in love with Maimonides, whom he called “the wisest of the Hebrew Rabbins.” Ainsworth cites Maimonides in explaining how Psalm 107 serves as the source for Jews to express gratitude to God after successfully crossing a wilderness or a treacherous body of water. Bradford’s brethren could certainly identify with this teaching, and his memoir, which references the words of this Psalm, recounts that upon arriving safely at Cape Cod, the Pilgrims expressed their own gratitude to the Almighty. The feast that we annually commemorate today would not come until 1621, but, as Bunker reflects: “If we could ask William Bradford to define the first Thanksgiving in America, he would point to something else. He would say that it took place at the instant of arrival, at the moment on Cape Cod when the Pilgrims fell on their knees to say the Jewish prayer.”
Bradford’s Hebraism set the stage for what would follow. The Puritans who arrived after the Mayflower were equally obsessed with the people of Israel. This was succinctly and sublimely described by George W. Bush in remarks to Israel’s Knesset: The alliance between our governments is unbreakable, yet the source of our friendship runs deeper than any treaty. It is grounded in the shared spirit of our people, the bonds of the Book, the ties of the soul. When William Bradford stepped off the Mayflower in 1620, he quoted the words of Jeremiah: “Come let us declare in Zion the word of God.” The founders of my country saw a new promised land and bestowed upon their towns names like Bethlehem and New Canaan. And in time, many Americans became passionate advocates for a Jewish state.
In 1790, the United States of America was a new nation, but Moses Seixas was already living what would come to be called the American Dream. The son of Sephardic Jews who had migrated from Lisbon, Portugal, to Newport, R.I., Seixas took advantage of the opportunities his state and nation offered to civic-minded entrepreneurs of all faiths. He would become a leading town merchant and cofounder of the Bank of Rhode Island. He would also become the warden — or lay leader — of Congregation Jeshuat Israel, which had built a beautiful synagogue with a domed ceiling and Greek-style ionic columns at the center of town. (The synagogue, later called the Touro Synagogue, still stands at the center of Newport’s downtown.)
Though Seixas and other Jews of Newport had achieved prosperity, they were worried that their freedom to worship and participate in civic life wouldn’t last. Given what had happened to Jews throughout the old world, they had reason to worry. Jews had been kicked out of various European countries through the centuries, “expelled from England as early as 1290, forced to leave Spain in 1492, and kicked out of Portugal four years later.”
But Moses Seixas and many Jews in the new United States, numbering only around 2,000 in a total U.S. population of 2.5 million when the American Revolution began, found hope in the words of George Washington and the Founding Fathers on religious liberty and equality under the law. And when he learned that Washington would be visiting Newport — as part of a visit to Rhode Island in celebration of its becoming the final original state to ratify the U.S. Constitution — Seixas saw it as an opportunity to ask Washington to confirm explicitly that the Founders’ promises applied to Jews.
Soon after Washington arrived in Newport in August 1790, Seixas presented him with a letter from the members of Congregation Jeshuat Israel. Accounts differ as to how Seixas delivered the letter. An entry on Founders Online, a digital repository of letters maintained by the National Archives and University of Virginia, speculates that “Seixas probably presented it to GW on the morning of 18 Aug. 1790 when the town and Christian clergy of Newport also delivered addresses to the president.” Yet articles in the authoritative Mount Vernon Digital Encyclopedia say Washington actually visited the synagogue during that trip.
What is undisputed, however, are the powerful messages of religious freedom and equality under the law from the Jewish congregation’s letter and Washington’s swift response. The letter dated August 17 states: “Deprived as we heretofore have been of the invaluable rights of free Citizens, we now (with a deep sense of gratitude to the Almighty disposer of all events) behold a Government, erected by the Majesty of the People — a Government, which to bigotry gives no sanction, to persecution no assistance — but generously affording to All liberty of conscience, and immunities of Citizenship.” The letter implicitly asks Washington to affirm that the views of the promise of the new nation held by Seixas and the congregation were correct.
Between those two massive forces vying for America’s future, it appears that at least some Jews have become convinced that the survival of Jews in America would be better served by the success of this universalist coalition—and if the price of that be forswearing Zionism and Jewish self-determination, so be it. It has become a matter of urgency to reassure members of the self-proclaimed universalist coalition of “the left” that American Jews can be counted upon to support the universal vision across the board and not succumb to their tribal instincts when it comes to Zionism and Israel. Where the left celebrates a multiplicity of groups asserting their own identities, American Jews are required to shed their identity in order to be, perhaps, counted.
Knowing that the vast majority of Jews, including in America, are not so ready to give up their support for Israel and Zionism as the price of admission, a new “gateway vision” has been concocted that would serve to steer Jews away from Zionism. The Israel/Palestine imagined recently by Peter Beinart, for example, is designed to sound very much like the state American Jews inhabit, or believe they inhabit—one of equality, diversity, pluralism, and most importantly, the ability to live life freely and safely as a Jew in a non-Jewish majority country. That all experience from failed multiethnic states points to the fact that this Israel/Palestine country cannot exist peacefully and safely (certainly not for Jews), and that it would descend (yet again) into bloody civil war, makes no difference. The democratic deficit across the Arab world is conveniently ignored. So is the historical record of persecution and pogroms and second-class citizenry of Jewish minorities that eventually resulted in the ethnic cleansing of Jews and Jewish culture from the Arab world.
To help Jews move away from Zionism, Zionist history, Arab and Islamic history, and the contemporary politics of the region, all of these must be distorted beyond recognition. The simple fact that the overwhelming share of Zionists envisioned a state from the beginning, and only called for a more ambiguous “national home” for reasons of feasibility and attainability, especially when facing the empires that controlled the land, is also ignored. Thus, the argument that statehood is not inherent to Zionism has about the equivalent validity of arguing that voting rights are not inherent to feminism because women once were content to fight for elementary school education. Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, whose plea to have Yavneh and its sages Beinart seeks to emulate, asked for Yavneh when Jerusalem was all but lost and destroyed. Beinart, on the other hand, calls for the effective destruction of Jewish sovereignty in order to get to an impossible Yavneh.
The Yavneh Beinart truly seeks to secure is not in Israel, but in the United States. Beinart could ignore fact, history, and evidence because his essay is not really about how to solve the conflict between Jews and Arabs in the Holy Land, but rather about how to secure the future of Jews, especially like himself, in America. To get there he would use the Jewish state as a sacrificial lamb. This is the reason why Beinart’s essay and numerous one-state essays and proposals published over the years have found no audience in Israel. Israeli Jews recognize none of their concerns in those visions of a magical one-state solution that is the product of narcissistic neocolonialism that draws borders to serve its own needs.
Ultimately, it is up to Jews in America to choose their allies, struggles, and vision for their life as individuals and as a community. It is up to them to decide whether their life in America is better secured by support of Zionism and the Jewish state or not, and whether the spirit of America is more in line with that of Zionism or anti-Zionism. Most Jews in America still believe that Zionism is deeply entwined both with their Jewish and American identities, and that Zionism incorporates both the particular and the universal, and we believe they are right on both counts. But either way—it is their choice. Jews in Israel will continue to celebrate the fact that they finally live in the sovereign nation-state of the Jewish people and can therefore walk this Earth knowing that someone has their back. Jews in Israel viscerally know exactly how fragile is this so-called privilege, that so many nations share, and have absolutely no intention of checking it at anyone else’s door.
Thank you @BenShapiro for hosting me to discuss @Twitter’s double standards against Jews and the Jewish State that were exposed in our Knesset hearing.
Hey Alma has yet another article about how young Jews who attended Zionist summer camps are unaware of the complexities of the Israeli/Arab conflict.
As is typical in these articles, the assumption is that the newly anti-Zionist Jews have been cheated out of real knowledge, and now they know better, and must “unlearn” the hasbara/propaganda they were force fed by evil former IDF soldiers.
For example:
My Jewish education at camp heavily involved learning about modern-day Israel and the reason why it was so central for Jews to have their own homeland. I remember first learning about Theodor Herzl at camp, along with famous Israeli prime ministers like David Ben-Gurion and Golda Meir. We had Hebrew lessons every day which often came with education about Israeli culture, and a section of our madrichim (counselors) were Israeli, young and usually fresh out of the IDF. They would teach us about where they grew up and put on a week-long celebration of Israel’s independence every summer. Posters with facts about Israeli culture and history were commonplace in camp buildings: Did you know that the average Israeli consumes 22 lbs of hummus each year?
I loved learning about Israel and felt a spiritual connection to this country I had never lived in or been to. When I was told by my counselors that Israel was the only democracy in the Middle East, that it had every right to defend itself from missile attacks coming from the West Bank, I believed them — why would I not? I was never told about the nation that existed before the formation of Israel or the native Palestinians who lived there. I was never told about the occupation and what it means for Palestinians living under Israeli rule.
So they are “unlearning” that Israel is a democracy and “learning” that there was a Palestinian nation on the land beforehand. Isn’t that great? Myths are replacing a vacuum.
It is way past time (if it isn’t happening already) for Jewish kids to be taught an accurate version of modern Israeli history, one that is proud and unapologetic. There is no reason to demonize ordinary Palestinian Arabs but there is a need to describe the antisemitism of their leaders, of the Hadassah Hospital convoy massacre, of how the Arabs attacked immediately after the partition vote, of how the Zionists waited for months before finally fighting back, of the drama of the UN vote and the declaration of the state, of the Palestinian Arabs who fled from Jaffa after their leaders abandoned them. It can all be taught accurately in a way that kids can understand.
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Thursday, August 20, 2020
Elder of Ziyon
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