WHO: Z STREET, new unabashedly Zionist pro-Israel organization
WHAT: EXPOSES “NEW” J STREET PEACE PLAN AS SMOKE AND MONEY
WHERE: Univ. of Pa, Hillel Building, 1st floor, 39th & Walnut Streets, Philadelphia
WHEN: Thursday, February 4, 2010  7:00 p.m.
CONTACT:    Lori Lowenthal Marcus  18zstreet@gmail.org WWW.ZSTREET.ORG
********

Two new organizations have entered the arena to claim title to the label “pro-Israel.” One of them is J Street, the multi-million dollar entity that sprang from the bosom of George Soros the billionaire enemy of Israel, and like-minded people.  J Street’s novelty and unlimited dollars have enabled its manufacturers to put out a product branded “Pro-Israel and Pro-Peace,” when its real goal is to appease Israel’s enemies and have the current US administration impose an immediate Palestinian State in the region – because that’s what they think is best for the Palestinians.

The other new organization, Z STREET, is a young start-up with little money but with a sword that slices through J Street’s mellifluous phrases and falsehoods – the truth.

Using its unlimited bank account including contributions from enemies of Israel, J Street will be webcasting from Philadelphia to its satellite “locals.”  This corporate roll-out builds on the base J Street acquired when it completed its takeover of Brit Tzedek V’Shalom – an older and poorer organization, one much less slick but at least honest about its commitment to give Israel’s terrorist enemies what they want.

Z STREET, the unabashedly Zionist group, is also having an event at the same time and in the same building.  According to Z STREET founder Lori Lowenthal Marcus, “Our event, in contrast, isn’t intended to seduce people with smoke and money.”

“Instead,” Marcus explains, “Z STREET will expose the “Presto Palestine” peace plan, advocated by J Street, as a foolhardy disaster which would, if acted on, spell catastrophe for Israel, further destabilize the Middle East, and encourage the enemies of the West throughout the world.”

Dr. Mitchell Bard, author of “Myths and Facts” and director of the “Jewish Virtual Library” will be the featured Z STREET speaker.
###

Lori Lowenthal Marcus
Z STREET
WWW.ZSTREET.ORG
18zstreet@gmail.com
P.O. Box 182
Merion Station, PA  19066

How many flaws can one person have?  Blogger Richard Silverstein has built a “career” out of trying to discredit Zionism, Israel, “the right-wing,” and anyone who challenges aggressive hateful liberalism.  In a recent character-assassination, Silverstein, in English Pro-Israel Cyberbullying Alive and Well condemns fellow blogger Joseph Wiseman for “cyberstalking” Israel-critic Stephen Sizer (an Anglican vicar).   Here is the Tikun Buffoon, uncensored and unfulfilled, taking his anger out on anyone who doesn’t agree with him.  Meanwhile he is guilty of the very transgression that he is so eager to find in others.  In his own words:

“This is the same cyberstalker who had the audacity to write about Sizer:…”

“As I have periodically done when vexed by a persistent comment troll or cyberstalker, Sizer noticed that the IP address Wiseman used to post comments to his blog traced back to the University.  As you know, most companies, government agencies and universities have rules governing the use of their telecommunications (including computer) equipment.  These rules usually preclude the use of such facilities for engaging in illegal, abusive or stalking behavior.”

“Let me throw a little cold water on the party: no one has the right to use public computer facilities to smear the reputation of others and lie about them.”

“As for the police “knock in the middle of the night” (as Wiseman melodramatically portrays it), I’ve had multiple commenters threaten my life and abuse my child as well (not to mention the lawsuits and threats of lawsuits) and the police in my town could care less.  The FBI as well.  So I’m glad the local police force took this issue seriously.  People like Wiseman should know there are red lines they can’t cross (if they don’t know it already).”

“Let’s get a grip, folks.  Stop shilling for Joseph Wiseman.  The pity and melodrama is misplaced.  He’s a big boy.  If he wants to play rough, his victims can give as well as they get.  Or does Joe think they have to lay down and enjoy it?  Joseph Wiseman is a semi-professional character assassin.  A nasty piece of work.  Don’t cry for him, Argentina or anyone else.”

No one has a right to use a public computer to smear someone else?  But, a private computer, yes?  You want to explain the logic behind that?  Lashon hara is only performed by using a public computer?  Silverstein says he was raised in the Conservative movement.  No wonder that institution is breaking apart!  Is this what they are teaching Jewish kids?  Silverstein spends all of his time analyzing other people’s flaws and none of his time analyzing his own!   There is nothing passive about his philosophy.  Here is another Western loud-mouth bully going after everyone else because he cannot resolve his own issues.  Right Richard?

Speaking of hypocrisy and cyberbullying, on his own blog, in the same month (January 2010), Silverstein guns for Ephraim Khantsis, a young religious immigrant (oleh) to Israel:

With some key help from the intrepid Sol Salbe, I’ve learned quite a bit about our Kahane-wannabe.

Richard confesses that he has his little Tikun minions out and about trying to incriminate and slander other Jews.  Furthermore, as I can testify to personally, Silverstein uses his blog as a weapon against anyone who doesn’t agree with him, and refuses to allow those people to defend themselves properly.  Perhaps if the Conservative movement disintegrated, it wouldn’t produce people like Richard Silverstein.  Without “Tikun Olam,” there would be one less problem in the world to fix!

Sunday, January 24, 2010

The Anti-Leftist Grogger

1.     The anti-Leftist “Grogger”

By Steven Plaut

For months now, every Friday in Zion has seen noisy screaming violent leftist rioters attacking Israeli soldiers, engaging in hooliganism, and breaking the law.   The thugs are a mixture of foreign pro-terror “anarchists” that Israel foolishly lets into the country, joined by some members of Israel’s own “Leftists for the Extermination of Israel.”  For months they have demonstrated in the West Bank towns of Bil’in and Nil’in to show their support for terrorists mass murdering Israeli Jews.  They oppose Israel having a security fence because it makes it harder for the suicide bombers to reach Israeli children.

These past few weeks they have shifted their noisy activities to the Simon the Righteous neighborhood in Jerusalem.  The demonstrators demand that no Jews be allowed to move into the homes they legally own in that neighborhood because the neighborhood “belongs” to Arabs.  They closely resemble the Ku Klux Klan marchers who try to prevent black folks from moving into neighborhoods where they “do not belong.”

Now while I personally would prefer loading the noisy violent protesters onto a one-way bus for Gaza, or perhaps a one-way plane for Somalia, Israel insists on dealing with these thugs as “protesters.”   But now Israeli science and the ingenuity of the “Yiddishe Kopf” have come up with a new weapon that can be used to disburse these noisy cheerleaders for terror.

Israel plans to fight their noise … with noise.

That is correct.  Israel is about to take a lesson from Jewish history and adapt that weapon of mass destruction that we all use every year against Haman!   Just in time for upcoming Purim, Israel is going to employ an anti-leftist Purim grogger. And it really works!

Popular Science magazine on January 19, 2010 reported that Israel has developed a new “weapon” against terrorist cheerleaders and against pro-terror “Solidarity” rioters.  It is a “sonic cannon.”   It makes loud noises that sound like the sonic booms of jets.  It was developed by PDT Agro, a small company in Israel that had been previously building “sound cannons” that scare away pests from Israeli farms.  The new invention will be used to scare away leftist pests trying to assist Palestinian mass murdering genocidal terrorists.

The report in Popular Science is a delicious take-off on the science fiction classic “Dune,” in which the desert fighters (called “fedayeen,” of all things) battle the barbarians using sound weapons:  “A desert people have developed a new weapon that uses sound instead of bullets. But this time, it will be used to control crowds instead of fighting giant worms or devious members of House Harkonnen. The Israeli Defense Ministry has contracted for the production of sonic-boom stun-guns called ‘Thunder Generator cannons,’ which they hope to use in crowd-control situations.”

The new contraption fights noise with noise as a sort of way to fight fire with fire.   Here is the Popular Science explanation: “The weapon runs on LPG, a common cooking gas, which mixes with oxygen to generate powerful bursts of sound. Each sound burst lasts around 300 milliseconds, and generates a shockwave that travels from the cannon at almost six times the speed of sound.”

You realize what all this means?  If Israel has invented ONE cure for leftist hooliganism, just imagine what could lie ahead?  Perhaps an anti-leftism pill, which – when swallowed – raises the IQ by 50 points?  How about a special rubber bullet that electronically hones in on marijuana?  How about a special TASER that can only be discharged against the unbathed?

Be that as it may, this new real invention represents a giant scientific step forward for Israel.  As you may recall, Israel had been using Pepe Le Pew to help control the violent hooligans and anarcho-fascist thugs who pogrom weekly in the West Bank against Israel’s security fence.  A while back it was reported that Israel has decided to keep them in line by using “skunk bombs.”   These “bombs,” actually just a canister spray, apparently are so smelly that even an anarchist who has not bathed in 18 months is capable of being offended and repulsed by the odor. The Jerusalem Post reported:  ‘The skunk bomb is a foul-smelling liquid which is sprayed on the rioters.  “The smell is so strong that people flee immediately.”  Some news reports are claiming that the spray smells remarkably like a mixture of, well, Number One and Number Two.   At least one web site referred to it as Zionist Death Dung.

I am wondering whether the new sound cannon can be combined with other forms of anti-leftist music.  We all recall the Apocalypse Now movie, where the choppers come in firing while playing Wagner music.  So why not wheel in the new Israeli anti-leftist sound cannons while loudspeakers play loud Shlomo Carlebach songs in the background, or perhaps even Avraham Fried singing Chassidic songs?

And then we can all just sit back and watch the leftist varmints scurry!!

(Full news story here:  http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-01/israeli-sonic-cannon-control-rioters-scare-birds)

The entire world has been watching the coverage of the recent disaster in Haiti. Then I get an email telling me that Tikun Buffoon Richard Silverstein has been “covering” the events himself (see below). Low and behold, I found:

Didn’t know there was anything particularly Zionist about providing disaster relief? You learn something new every day. This is a story of exploiting the suffering of poor, defenseless Haitians on behalf of Israeli triumphalism.

Does someone have issues? Who would criticize Israel, even in a backhanded way, for giving this kind of humanitarian aid? We see what kind of fringe crackpot we are dealing with in “Tikun Olam.” Talk about desperation-frustration. Silverstein next quotes Yoel Donchin, who he describes as a former Israeli disaster relief worker:

Generally speaking, we start preparing for such a mission within hours of the announcement of a natural disaster. Most often the Israeli mission team is the first one to land in the area. Like those who climb Mount Everest, it plants its flag on the highest peak available, announcing to all and sundry that the site has been conquered. And in order to ensure that the public is aware of this sporting achievement, the mission is accompanied by media representatives, photographers, an IDF spokesman’s office squad and others.

If that weren’t enough, the comments section feature a reader complaining about Sol Salbe’s (friend of Richard) translation:

Jon says:
January 20, 2010 at 1:16 AM

This is quite a bad translation. Whole sentences are missing. I’ll deal with this tomorrow, I have productive activity ahead of me.
*
Richard Silverstein says:
January 20, 2010 at 3:40 PM

When you can translate Hebrew as well as Sol Salbe then you can talk. Till then shutup.

I have productive activity ahead of me.

That’s it. You’re done. I’ve had about as much snark as I can take. If you ever mature enough to actually write comments w/o snark & all the other infantilisms you introduce into yours you may let me know & I can reinstate you. Till then you’re toast.

Keep in mind that Silverstein was born in 1952. That puts him at around 58 years old! What man at that age behaves this way? Later on another commenter criticizes the control-freak leftist only to be censored:

Steven says:
January 20, 2010 at 3:30 PM

Silverstein is an absolute bigot. The truth is that he couldn’t give two hoots about Tikkun Olam. He just cares about attacking his brothers.
*
Richard Silverstein says:
January 20, 2010 at 5:05 PM

Actually, I couldn’t give two hoots about you. As for, Tikun Olam, I’ll lv my readers to judge whether I honor the standards of that concept. As for attacking, I’d say you did it first since I don’t know you fr. Adam.

You’ve violated my comment rules & are banned.

Perhaps we should let Richard himself have the closing statement on this issue:

And why is a country 5,000 miles away the first to establish a field hospital when the U.S. has far more such facilities & is far closer?

It’s wonderful to watch evil crumple up and wilt!

Little Dickie claims Israel is “Zionizing” Haiti

The whole world is amazed at the courage and tenacity of the Israeli medical team in Haiti. But not our favorite little kapo.

That is right – Little Dickie is complaining that Israelis saving lives amounts to the “Zionization” of Haiti. Hell, Dem Joos will next be building settlements in Haiti! He also carries an item from the UK whining about how the US is “occupying” Haiti under the guise of saving Haitians. You can see Haitians being occupied by Zionists in the photo.

Dickie himself thinks those Haitians are nothing but mud people who do not deserve to be rescued by any smelly Yids! He whines that if Israel REALLY wanted to help, it would send port-a-potties and food instead. He knows this by asking thousands of Haitians what they need most … not.

So just what exactly has Little Dickie sent to Haiti out of his own pocket? By which of course we mean – from out of his wife’s pocketbook? (Dickie does not work so he can sit around and gripe about the sort of aid that Israel sends to Haiti without having to donate a nickle of his own!)

Dickie prefers to help the poor Haitians with YOUR nickles and dimes!

_______________________________________________________________________

Update (1-26-10):

Bradley Burston of Haaretz has written a wonderful article about this subject matter.  Ironically in the comments section, Silverstein has his own opinion about Burston’s article!

Bashing Israel for saving Haitians

By Bradley Burston

I’d like to say a word of honor and thanks and, yes, pride for the Israelis, paramedics, physicians, nurses, midwives, and medical imaging technicians, who went to Haiti to save lives.

That’s it.

I believe that they are people, individuals, who went there to save limbs from gangrene and amputation, stanch internal bleeding, relieve crushing pain. To deliver babies. To risk their lives, using jackhammers and hydraulics and their hands to make crawl spaces under tons of concrete and silt, going in themselves to pull children and adults to safety.

For all the time that they’ve been working, however, people far away, snug in the comfort of their laptops, have been furiously busy as well, people who are enraged to the boiling point by news reports of the Israeli rescue mission. People who see it as their mission to tell the world exactly what’s wrong with all of this.

Over the past week, the work of the Israeli medical team has become a kind of Rorschach for how people view Israel and Israelis. Most of the comment, it must be said, is supportive. Even on the part of those who cast the humanitarian misery in Gaza in contrast.

But for a shocking number of others, the bottom line is simple: Israel, and Israelis, can do no right.

In its most extreme form, there are those who have accused Israel of using the Haiti catastrophe as a new reservoir for harvesting organs.

But even many of those who shun blood libels, have seized on the Haiti mission to bash Israel, revealing in many cases a hatred – and a bigotry – that borders on the visceral.

“I guess giving Israel credit for good deeds in Haiti,” wrote reader John Smithson on the widely read Mondoweiss site, “is like watching a serial killer or other sociopathic type mow an old woman’s lawn (or some other charitable thing).”

The contention is that Israel sent aid to Haiti on purely cynical motives, harnessing public relations to divert attention from the Goldstone Report, to divert attention from Gaza, to divert attention from its never-ending, always expanding internal crises.

The implication is that Israel, and Israelis, are constitutionally incapable of doing good for its own sake. Or that whenever they appear to do good, people of conscience should recognize that the evil designs behind it render any good that may be done, complicit in wrongdoing.

True, it is willful blindness to contend that Israel can do no wrong. But it is nothing short of racism to maintain, in Haiti and in general, that Israelis can do no right.

Israel, like all countries where war is endemic, like much of the unfortunate world, and like Palestine, is a nation whose people have been ruined, distorted, permanently traumatized, emotionally stunted. Yet Israelis, like people in all countries where war is endemic, and like Palestinians, have demonstrated enormous reservoirs of humanity under inhuman stresses.

As Palestinian-American journalist Ray Hanania wrote of the Israeli aid effort this week: “200,000 Haitians died in an earthquake. They sent doctors and supplies to help. That is a good thing. Just because we are fighting with Israel doesn’t mean we should sneer at that assistance to people in need. YES, I wish Israel could show the same compassion for Palestinians. But Israel and Haiti are not at war and Israelis and Palestinians (mainly Hamas and the settlers) are.”

People who truly know this place as more than a moral cartoon, also know that there is no such thing as a clear conscience in the Holy Land. Either your conscience is conflicted, or it is no conscience at all.

No one knows better than Israelis – not even their worst critics abroad – how flawed and wrongheaded their country’s behavior, and that of their countrymen, so often is.

No one knows better than Palestinians and their supporters, what it is to be tainted by bigotry, take missteps in conflict, and be dismissed by hatred.

I’d like to say a word of honor and thanks for the Israelis, paramedics, physicians, nurses, midwives, and medical imaging technicians, who went to Haiti to save lives.

Israelis, and Jews in the wider world, should not be forced to recite a catechism over how terrible, how flawed, how often mistaken they already know Israel to be, just in order to earn the right to feel and express their admiration, their gratitude, and yes, their pride.

Comment #187:

Title: Brad Burston…

Name: Richard Silverstein

City: Seattle

PEP (progressive except Palestine). Sad really.

I know Greg’s brother from Yeshiva days.  This is quite an article about our experience as American immigrants to Israel.

Gen-X Zionist

The epic of aliya can be characterized by the transformation from idealist to ideologue to tired man. As the voyage taken transforms from army to school to employment, all-encompassing clarity becomes fogged with obligation and chore. With time and acclamation, the dreams that were the impetus for the journey become less vivid, and principle is replaced with responsibility.

Of course each immigrant’s story is different. Perhaps qualification is necessary – this epic is personal, and mine.

Although raised on the seldom-told tales of my grandparents’ escape from the czar or whoever else was trying to snatch up a Jew, the idea of a connected past was abstract. My family had made it. We were Americans. So red-blooded was I that in the early 1980s, my friends and I played “fight the Russians” games on the playground. At 13 I put a yellow ribbon on our apple tree. Later, I flirted with joining Bill Clinton’s military – the papers to be signed were in front of me.

I spoke one language.

Without telling the story I’ve told so many times, I found my origins, my ancestral people and my place in life. Yes, I am a Jew. Yes, Zionism is cool. Yes, I want to be an IDF soldier.

Upon becoming Israeli, the mind at first struggles with the awesomeness of receiving that national ID card to carry on our person at all times. Each step on each cracked or poorly paved road in Jerusalem, with the sunlight reflecting off its stone-faced buildings, is a personal achievement, a testament to predecessors’ prayers.

They ran to America. I chose to come here.

I may not have walked thousands of miles from Africa or run from a dictator, but hey – I left the US Constitution, economic opportunity, entrepreneurship, customer service and order behind. That’s gotta count for something.

And it does. For a while. But the coolness eventually wears off.

After completing a three-year Israeli degree following a few years in the army, the ideals involved in making aliya and becoming part of something bigger, of living that dream, withdraws into some corner of the soul. Each day of life becomes routine.

Everything is an extension of the army. A truer understanding of the Israeli system, of university bureaucracy, National Insurance, banking, taxes and life as a not-so-special former lone soldier recasts the memory of “the old country” as an easier place, a more organized place, a place of comfort.

No more are the relaxing two-day finales of hectic schedules. Six-day weeks are common. Friday may be a day off, but Shabbat is coming and shopping must be done. Saturday may belong to us, but coming from over there, it just never feels right as the week’s final day of rest. That extra day of repose so loved, so enabling and empowering for the week to come, is just another manic start to the usual, over here.

Sundays are truly gone.

Terror attacks and reserve duty help form the basis of political views. Coffee can’t be shared without sharing personal narrations of frustration and injustice, resentment and corruption. Yet there are jokes and laughs and smiles in that round of brewed Turkish. What’s remembered is subject to choice.

We go to work. The “cuteness” of a car parked on a sidewalk has become irritation and then anger as someone justifies leaving a child in a car while he runs into a kiosk. A bus increases speed toward a crosswalk as it plays Are You Faster Than a Pedestrian?

The ideals are overcome by reality, and ideology is subdued by exhaustion.

The dream becomes tangible and, finally, it can be grasped that the daily concerns of all people everywhere are constant here, too. Bills, taxes, politics, road rage and on and on are ours as much as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

Yes, this place is a place of reality.

But then someone walks up, smiles, and says, “Hello, dear Jew,” wishing a Shabbat shalom even though it’s only Wednesday. An old man in a line at some old Mandate-era office building goes wide-eyed in amazement and showers praise as he hears the story of a young Jewish man from the place where so many dream of going, who came here of his own free will and on his own, to make a new life.

Native-born Israeli friends who can’t pronounce the letter “R” declare you one of them, an honorary Kurd or Iraqi or Yemenite. And when some people talk of running if there’s a war – The War – the thought of abandoning the nation is unfathomable.

Friends get mad you’re not around for coffee.

And then one remembers all those people who came here shouting assertions of “Zionism forever!” after making the same journey from back West, promising to join the army and make the desert bloom, only to become disenchanted after failing to learn the language and being unable to find that job. They return to comfort. Gone.

Aliya is rebirth. In that sense, we are all young, learning and trying to make it. Tired is something we all learn to deal with. Being tired is part of being. It can be lived with.

And yes, the fatigue that led to collapse only moments earlier evaporates and a smile creates itself with the realization that all these little problems, inconveniences and daily aggravations belong to me as much as anyone else.

In an instant, endorphins of romanticism are released from some long-dormant Zionist gland and you recall that over there, the same historical connection to the ground simply doesn’t exist. Over there, not everyone encountered has a connection to you that transcends appearance, accent or degree of faith.

You’ll always be from over there. It’s just the way it is, and thank God for that. A wonderful place, that, offering the ability to reach beyond the voluntary acquiescence of precedent and prayer, allows for the capacity to see beyond the next hurdle. How many people are so blessed to be raised on the ideals of republican government, with heroes like Washington, Franklin and Bo Jackson?

But home is here now. And home is good.

The strings of memory may never stop tugging from time to time. Post-idealist weariness is part of growing up. All that is required to end the turmoil is release and acceptance.

Yes, being a capitalist is hard in a country with a socialist history. Yes, love and admiration of the Constitution and separation of powers can continue even when the system of governance here is a jambalaya of executive, legislative and judicial cramming together inside the overlaps of some Venn diagram detailing the party-bolting, coalition-concerned and proportional-(un)representation of the Knesset and its chosen courts.

And yes, it’s okay to contemplate what could be in our war-torn tiny land that has brought us all together.

The army will be calling for another month of my life. There will be another election. Each day builds strength for the next. Our poets, singers, bartenders and cops all share what you feel. Nothing is easier over there, not in that respect.

Breathe. Release. Accept.

And then, and only for a moment, as the last words of this essay are penned, there is nothing more wonderful than living in Israel, freedom-loving, separation-of-powers-believing, line-wanting, falafel-eating American that I am.

The writer is an internet editor at The Jerusalem Post.



Israel’s population at 2010 is 7.5m

On the eve of a new decade, Israel’s population stands at 7.5 million, according to figures released Wednesday by the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS).

Published ahead of the secular New Year 2010, Israel’s population has continued to grow at a steady rate of 1.8 percent over the past seven years, with 160,000 new babies born since last January 1 and some 14,500 new immigrants arriving over the past year.

In terms of ethnic divisions, Israel’s Jews now make up 75.4% of the population or 5,664,000 people; Arabs, 20.3% or 1,526,000 citizens and the remaining 4.3% (319,000) are those registered as “others” by the Interior Ministry.

According to the CBS’s population report published ahead of the Jewish New Year in September, Israel is still a fairly young nation with nearly 30% of its population under the age of 14, compared to 17% in most other Western countries. Only 9.7% of the population is over the age of 65 in Israel, whereas in other Western countries this figure is closer to roughly 15%.

The report also showed that the average Jewish family size increased since 2008 from 2.8 children per household to 2.96. In the Muslim community, the average number of children per mother was 3.84, a drop from the previous two years where it had reached 3.97 children per household. Among Christian families the average number of children was down to 2.11 in 2008.

The ratio of men to women continues to be consistent, with the number of women in the country still slightly above the number of men, especially in the more advanced years of life. According to the statistics, there are 979 men for every 1000 women. In the under-37 age bracket there are more men than women, but the imbalance in the over-75 age group offsets this with some 673 men for every 1000 women.

Writer Akin Ajayi, in the Jerusalem Post, has written an autobiographical op-ed concerning conversion to Judaism.  Being a convert myself, I thought it would be interesting to see what Mr. Ajayi has to say.  He begins:

Every so often, I’m asked-by friends, by acquaintances and even by complete strangers-whether I’ve converted to Judaism.  Actually, I should reword that:  I’m asked occasionally, by friends and acquaintances abroad, if I’ve converted to Judaism.  I’ve been asked twice in Israel-quite aggressively, and by complete strangers-why I haven’t converted to Judaism yet.

Ajayi doesn’t explain what his relationship to Israel or Judaism is.  Although Israelis aren’t known for their manners, you can see why they would ask someone this-especially someone who comes regularly to Israel.  The author never explains what he is doing here, in the first place.  He goes on to say:

Seriously, though, I’m always a bit bemused by the vague suspicion with which Christianity is treated by some in the Holy Land.

Seriously, this is a stupid statement.  How many books have been written about the cruelty of the Christian “faith” towards Jews?  Try Why The Jews? (Prager/Telushkin) for one.  Finally, Ajayi gets to the point:

I was not entirely surprised to read last week about a humorless organization that calls itself the Lobby for Jewish Values. According to news reports, members of this group – who, I’d bet, would welcome my past interrogators with open arms – have been handing out fliers condemning Christmas. The fliers propose a boycott of restaurants and hotels in Jerusalem that put up Christmas trees. After lecturing sternly about “Jewish Values” and the “Jewish Identity,” the fliers instruct the good Jewish residents of Jerusalem to “continue to follow this path of the Jewish people’s tradition, and not give in to the clownish atmosphere of the end of the civil year. And certainly not help those businesses that sell or put up the foolish symbols of Christianity.” Charming.

The phrases “Jewish Identity” and “Jewish Values,” I think, are often used as a catch-all to encompass a vast, confusing and at times out-and-out contradictory range of objectives. I’m clearly not best placed to try and define what exactly “Jewish Identity” is – hey, in the eyes of these charmers, I’m actively seeking to subvert it – but I can’t help but think that the less confident one feels about a particular concept, the more aggressive one becomes in defending it. These guys from the Lobby for Jewish Values seem just a tad too defensive to be really credible. To be honest, I feel a little sorry for them.

That said, it may not be fair to suggest that they are representative of broader public opinion about Christmas. As was reported in The Jerusalem Post last week, the Jerusalem Municipality and the Jewish National Fund decided to distribute Christmas trees to the city’s Christian population – and, presumably, to anyone else interested in having a pine tree shedding needles willy-nilly all over their carpet – during the week before Christmas.

Is an organization that supports religious values supposed to be full of humor?  Are they supposed to drive around the neighborhood ringing a bell, selling ice cream to little kids?  Jews have endured 2,000 of “Christian kindness” and now we are supposed to pass out the ornaments of your pagan worship?  What’s next?  We are to supply Israeli kids of Molech worship?  This article is a sly way to question the Jewish nature of Jerusalem.  It’s a good thing the author doesn’t take conversion seriously-perhaps that’s the only bright part of this editorial.

Following the article, several people had some interesting comments:

3. Unlike Christianity and Islam

john – (12/27/2009 20:01)

The Torah is unique in that it does not require a person to be Jewish. The Torah is very clear that anyone who keeps the Seven Laws of Noah is a perfectly good person. Of course, such a person should be supportive of a Jewish State. So what is the big deal that the author chooses to remain outside the full scope of the Torah. This is his right. All he should do is keep the universal laws of Noah. And, I suspect he does. What a wonderful world we would live in if other religions were so tolerent.

I’d have to say I agree with this comment.  Another comment I like is:

4. typical “half-pregnant” mentality

Eron Silva – Israel (12/27/2009 20:28)

Neither hot nor cold, the types like the author revel in their mediocrity and lack of conviction – while justifying and expecting others to be as wishi-washy like them. It does not cost a true Jew any effort to believe in Rambam’s 13 principles of faith. It all makes perfect sense for us. In earnest, human mind is unable to grasp anything measured by the millions: stars, grains of sand, earth’s age. So it is a sign of humility to stick to a count of roughly 6,500 years, see a “creation day” as an era, and make good on self betterment. Does the author keep the 7 Noahide laws? hmmm…

Yet another I like:

7. Pedantic ? Moi ?

Sherlock Holmes – England (12/27/2009 21:00)

I really hate to be pedantic but do three religions center on Jerusalem ? Islam centers on Mecca and Medina; Christianity centers on Rome, Canterbury and Bethlehem. Only Judaism has centered on Jerusalem for these past three thousand years. Only Jews pray thrice daily for the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the Messiah, son of David, who will rebuild the Temple and restore the Kingdom of David. The New Testament does mention Jerusalem and Jesus’s life there; the Koran never once mentions the city by name.

The following is a brilliant observation:

8. Have we got conversions for you !

This article could have been a lot worse. I was expecting an attack on the Rabbis who keep revoking each other’s conversions. From a Jewish point of view all people who believe in G-d and observe the Seven Laws of Noah have a place in the world to come. We have a split personality in Israel. We want Israel’s Russian non-Jews who have no official religion to consider conversion to Judaism; on the other hand we don’t believe in conversion without genuine belief, which many of these Soviets really can’t seem to muster.

Danny – GB (12/27/2009 21:07)

9. There is no such thing as converting to Judaism

Instead of thinking about converting, maybe the author should 1st read the Torah. There is no procedure to convert and even if one intermarries with an Israelite the children would not be considered as Israelites until the 4th generation (about 160 years). So if the Torah says it takes 160 years, how can one convert in 12 months with a rabbi? Furthermore, if you read the Book of Ruth you will see that nowhere is she referred to asa Jew and, even after her “your God is my God speech” she is still referred to as a Moabite. Finally, when Obed is born the people say: “A son was born to Naomi”

Dror Ben Ami – Israel (12/27/2009 22:04)

Deuteronomy 10:19

Love you therefore the stranger; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

ספר דברים פרק י

יט) ואהבתם את הגר כי גרים הייתם בארץ מצרים

The following Gemara (Yevamoth 77a) discusses the very issue of Ruth’s “Jewishness:”

I have this tradition from the Beth din of Samuel the Ramathite: An Ammonite but not an Ammonitess; A Moabite, but not a Moabitess’!6 Could he, however, be trusted?7 Surely R. Abba stated in the name of Rab: Whenever a learned man gives directions8 on a point of law, and such a point comes up [for a practical decision], he is obeyed if his statement was made9 before the event;10 but if it was not so made he is not obeyed! Here the case was different, since Samuel and his Beth din were still living.11

(6) V. supra p. 517, n. 17. [On the political issues involved in this controversy v. Aptowitzer, Parteipolitik der Hasmonaerzeit pp. 31ff. He regards the attack on the legitimacy of David as a movement inspired by the Sadducees to support the Hasmoneans’ right to the throne against the challenge of their opponents. V. Kid. Sonc. ed. pp. 332ff].
(7) In such circumstances.
(8) Basing his ruling on traditional law which he claims to have received from his teachers.
(9) In the course of his discourses and studies.
(10) Before the point of law assumed practical importance.
(11) Had not the statement been a true on, he would not have ventured to make it when its validity could be so easily tested.

תלמוד בבלי מסכת יבמות דף עז/א
כך מקובלני מבית דינו של שמואל הרמתי עמוני ולא עמונית מואבי ולא מואבית ומי מהימן והאמר רבי אבא אמר רב כל תלמיד חכם שמורה הלכה ובא אם קודם מעשה אמרה שומעין לו ואם לאו אין שומעין לו שאני הכא דהא שמואל ובית דינו קיים

Referring to:  “Furthermore, if you read the Book of Ruth you will see that nowhere is she referred to asa Jew and, even after her “your God is my God speech” she is still referred to as a Moabite. Finally, when Obed is born the people say: “A son was born to Naomi”:

R.Hanina says this is derived from the following: And the women her neighbours, gave it a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi.28 Was it then Naomi who bore him? Surely it was Ruth who bore him! But Ruth bore and Naomi brought him up; hence he was called after her [Naomi's] name.

(28) Ruth IV, 17.

תלמוד בבלי מסכת סנהדרין דף יט עמוד ב
רבי חנינא אומר: מהכא ותקראנה לו השכנות שם לאמר יולד בן לנעמי. וכי נעמי ילדה? והלא רות ילדה, אלא: רות ילדה ונעמי גידלה, לפיכך נקרא על שמה

Baba Batra 91b

There they dwelt occupied in the king’s work, refers to Ruth the Moabitess who saw the kingdom of Solomon, the grandson of her grandson; for it is said: And [Solomon] caused a throne to be set up for the king’s mother,’36 and R. Eleazar said, ‘to the mother of the dynasty’.37

(36) I Kings II, 19.

(37) I.e., Ruth the mother of the dynasty of David. Cf. Ruth, IV, 10, 21-22.

It is obvious that Dror Ben Ami is not familiar with Torah Judaism.

Even the most popular book in history has it’s faults.  Aside from being a questionable translation of Jewish scriptures (Tanach), the Bible is fundamentally flawed in another respect:  the order of its books.  As seen in the picture above, the order of the “Old Testament” doesn’t follow the original order of the Tanach.  The Tanach is ordered according to holiness (kiddusha).  The books are stacked one on top of the other according to their holiness, as all Jewish religious books are.  Thus, the Bible has mixed up the correct order of the Tanach.  Ironically, the word Bible sounds quite familiar to the Hebrew word bilbul (a mix up).  This is the same word as the Tower Of Babel-which became mixed up after the people creating it tried to rebel against G-d’s kingship.  And so, the world’s most famous holy book is merely an attempt to mix-up or confuse the meaning of Jewish scriptures.  Another way this can be seen is in the gematria (numerical value) of Moses, Our Teacher (613, the number of commandments contained in the Torah) and Jesus (316).  We see that 316 is similar to 613, except the order has been switched-the first and last number have been swapped.  The Holy Bible is, in actuality, holey (full of mistakes)!

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Update: The Reform Movement’s List

On the Reform Movement’s list of the books of the “Hebrew Bible,” there is yet another surprise: 13 of the books are missing!  How is that for a new perspective on Judaism!

Books of the Tanach

Our biggest resource for making Jewish choices: our writings!  The Tanach!
Here’s a list of the books of the Tanach for future reference—most of us may know the first five books, the Torah, but the N’vi’im (Prophets) and K’tuvim (Writings) may seem a bit blurry.  Here’s the breakdown:

Torah – Five Books of Moses

Genesis, Beresheet, retells the story of creation, Noah and the flood, and the selection of Abraham and Sarah and their family as the bearers of God’s covenant. Stories of sibling conflict and the long narratives of Jacob and his favorite son Joseph conclude with the family dwelling in Egypt.

Exodus, Shemot, tells of how the family of Jacob grew and then was enslaved in Egypt. The baby Moses, born of Israelites but adopted by Pharaoh, becomes God’s prophet who, after bringing 10 plagues down upon Egypt, leads the Israelites through the Red Sea to freedom and to the revelation at Mt. Sinai. The story of the Israelites worshipping the golden calf, which follows soon after the revelation at Mt. Sinai, is almost obscured by lengthy materials on the building of a sanctuary in the wilderness.

Leviticus, Vayikra, deals mostly with laws of Israelite sacrificial worship. Related rules include the basis for Jewish dietary laws ( kashrut) and issues of purity and impurity. The holiness code, which describes a sanctified communal life, is a highlight of the book.

Numbers, Bamidbar, begins with a census of the Israelites and the tribe of Levi. A group of Israelites spy out the land of Canaan; their discouraging report sends them back into the desert for an additional 38 years, during which the Israelites continue to behave badly, rebelling against the authority of Moses and his brother Aaron, and having illicit relations with Moabite women.

Deuteronomy, Devarim, is Moses’s final message to the people of Israel before they cross over the Jordan River into Israel. Moses reminds the people of how God has redeemed the people from Egypt and of the details of the covenant between Israel and God. In stark language, Moses describes the rewards for observance of the laws of the covenant and the punishment for disobedience. Finally, Moses passes along his authority to Joshua who will lead the people into the land.

Nevi’im – Prophets

Joshua – 24 chapters describing the victorious battles in which Israel reclaims the promised land from the people who occupied it while Israel languished in Egypt. Israel is led by Moses hand-picked leader: Joshua. The book begins immediately following the departure of Moses, and ends with the death of Joshua.

Judges – In Judges, the case is made for the fickleness of Israel. The powerful impression of past miracles is fading away. Israel loses its commitment to God Almighty and his prescription for the good and Godly life. It rather allow sitself to follow the cultural glitz of its neighbors. And each time this happens God strengthens one enemy or another, and only when Israel cries for Godly help, does it get a successful judge to save it. The Book of Judges ends with a terrible story of a civil war.

I Samuel – A chronicle of the persistent belligerence between Israel and the Philistines. Israel becomes a kingdom, Saul is the first King of Israel.

II Samuel – The Story of King David, the second King of Israel. A warrior, a poet, a gangster of sorts, a sinner, a brave hero, and a most obedient servant of God: complex and galvanizing, humanly weak, and humanly strong — an everlasting attraction to Bible readers for generations. David became king when he was only 30 years old, and he was king for 40 years until his natural death.

I Kings – The end of King David’s era. The Kingdom of his wise and celebrated son King Solomon, and the sorry division of the Solomon’s kingdom into two petty states: Israel and Judea: each ruled by their own succession of kings, while the people in both states are weakened morally and physically, slipping into their defeat and destruction.

II Kings – 25 chapters chronicling the deterioration and destruction of the two splinter kingdoms — remnants of the Great State of Israel established by Kings David and Solomon. The Assyrians conquer Israel, and soon afterwards, Judea falls under the sword of the Babylonians. (The year 3340, or 591 B.C.E.).

Isaiah - 66 chapters of poetic warnings which the people of Israel ignore. The latter part of the book of Isaiah is different in style, opening up suggestions that two prophets by the same name have been confused into one.

Jeremiah – A tormented figure who tried so hard, and failed so miserably, to prevent the destruction of Judea by stirring Israel towards the ways of God. 52 heart wrenching chapters.

Kethuvim – Writings

Psalms - 150 poetic chapters where the author, King David in most cases, writes personal intimate prayers, pens lamentations, hope, sadness, fear, and above all an expression of a steadfast belief in God’s wish, and the goodness of God’s plan.

Proverbs – 31 chapters of universal wisdom in a form of a father (King Solomon) teaching his son. The lessons, for a change, are not based on the history of the people of Israel. It matches the social wisdom of the best of East and West. Proverbs discusses family matters and social wisdom. It addresses the timeless issues of man with himself and his Creator, people in any family, and every society. The book, has no events to tell, no lingering stories. It is a basket full of wise sayings, apparently without any clear order.

Job – 42 chapters focused on one issue: is the fear of God a contract in which God in return is bound to guarantee the believer a good life? Job, a God fearing, well to do man is tested with a growing string of disasters, and his worship of the Almighty does not waive. God concludes the experiment by rewarding Job for his steadfastness. Three sages exchange mysterious words of philosophy throughout the book.

The Song of Songs – The story it tells is of a passionate love relationship between a beautiful peasant maiden and a shepherd. Like every real love story, this biblical Romeo and Juliet have to deal with disapproving family and neighbors. There’s even another man, the king himself, who falls violently in love with the heroine and tries to dislodge her love for her humble shepherd. But true love wins out, if not always in reality, at least in this biblical story.

Ruth - The Book of Ruth offers a striking contrast to the Book of Judges, but its story is associated with the same period. In Judges, national sin and corruption portray a dark picture. The story of Ruth the Moabitess and her loyalty and devotion to Naomi, her Hebrew mother-in-law, presents the reader with a picture of the nobler side of Hebrew life in the days of the judges.

Lamentations - The book is composed of five poems, lamenting the siege and destruction of Jerusalem (586 B.C.). The poet also makes sincere confession of sin on behalf of the people and leaders, acknowledges complete submission to the will of God, and finally prays that God will once again smile upon God’s people and restore them to their homeland.

Ecclesiatstes - Traditionally held to have been written by Solomon, this book is now almost universally recognized as about him rather than by him. The author’s purpose is to prove the vanity of everything ” under the sun”. This truth is first announced a fact, then proved from the “Preacher’s” experience and observations. Finally, the author shows that the fullness of life is found only in the recognition of things ” above the sun”, things spiritual as well as material.

Esther – The Book of Esther, in the form of a short story similar to the Book of Ruth, has its setting in the palace of Shushan, or Susa, one of the three capitals of the Persian Empire. The story gives us a vivid picture of the Jews in exile, of the hostility of their non-Jewish enemies in Persia, and of how Esther became the queen of Ahasuerus (Xerxes), subsequently risking her life in order to save her people, the Jews, from total destruction. God’s providential care of God’s people is magnified throughout, though the word “God” never appears in the book.

Daniel - Traditionally considered as the work of the Prophet Daniel in exile in Babylon during the 6th century B.C., many modern scholars classify the book as an “apocalypse” that was the product of a pious Jew living under the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes (175-164 B.C.E.). In a series of events and visions, the author presents a view of history in which God rules and prevails over men and nations to achieve ultimate victory for the “saints” of God.

Ezra - 10 short chapters describing a wondrous occurrence: Koresh, King of Persia develops insight and fear of God, and wishes to rebuild God’s Temple in Jerusalem, to which end he expedites the Israeli Diaspora in his country. Ezra and Nehemia lead Israel on its way.

Nehemiah - Nehemiah leads the people of Israel back to Jerusalem, following orders to that effect from Koresh King of Persia (the Israeli place of exile). Nehemia defeats inertia and self serving reluctance, and shows supreme leadership by insisting on devotion to God’s commandments, the lack of which led to the fall of the former Kingdoms.

I Chronicles – A summary of Israelite history through the reign of David.

II Chronicles – A continuation of the history up to the Babylonian exile containing further information than what is in Kings.

Enough said?

Plucky Bradley Burston has written a spirited commentary on the current state of Jerusalem in the Arab-Israeli conflict:

This is where the war ends.

It begins here.

It begins in a city which practices what Jerusalem preaches

And what Jerusalem, with its vicious holy men, betrays:

God’s work.

The city which practices what Jerusalem preaches?  You mean like the drug addicted prostitutes, the public bathrooms reeking of feces and urine, the ego-maniacal “I don’t give a damn” Tel Aviv attitude, the loitering foreign workers, the pig heads nailed to the door in the Carmel market?  That Tel Aviv?  The holy men I know in Jerusalem are teaching scriptures to their students and helping the less fortunate.  Perhaps you don’t understand Tel Aviv and you certainly don’t understand Jerusalem, Bradley!

The article continues:

As we pass, the woman on the sidewalk asks “Are you people trying to kill my country?”
My 15-year old daughter answers without hesitation. “Has v’shalom.” Heaven Forbid.

This is what every smug leftist in Israel contends.  Who…MEEEE?  This girl was taught to hate real Torah Judaism and Jerusalem and everything that entails-except…being chosen.  Nope, that perk is too perky to let go.

The siege of Jerusalem continues:

This is where it begins.
Not the Jerusalem of murderous faith and a vengeful God
But in a city which faces God because it faces the world.
“This is a taste of the World to Come,” my wife says, the crowd swaying to music, other peoples and their own.

Murderous faith?  Vengeful G-d?  That’s not what Little Miss Secular Zionism was touting fifty years ago (or even twenty years ago).  Yes, the world to come for Tel Aviv is pretending to be gentile, but being remaining chosen simultaneously.  Whatever is comfortable at the moment.

Lastly, in an eruption of half-cocked patriotism Burston exclaims:

“This country is too young to die.
I declare the war is over.”
Next year in Tel Aviv-Jaffa.

Which war?  You actually mean the Jewish identity crisis, right?  The war over what a Jew should be.  In sneaky leftist fashion you don’t explicitly say that, but that is certainly your intention.  Next year in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, here Jews and Arabs “get along” because Jews have complete control over the political demographics and Arabs are separated from the wealthier, elitist Jewish Tel Aviv?  You really mean next year in Tel Aviv for the Jews and the Arabs and stay in Jaffa where they couldn’t possibly complain in their segregated Israeli paradise.  No thanks, Bradley.  Keep your smug, secular, contagious lies on your artificial mound of sand-Tel Aviv.