thisisbabylon.net

21,700 people have been nominated for the "Righteous Gentile" award given by the Israeli Holocaust Museum Yad Vashem since the award's inception. Sixty of those have been Muslim.

But up until this week, no Arab Muslim from an Arabic-speaking country had ever been nominated as a Righteous Gentile for their actions during the Holocaust.

Until now, that is.

From The Jerusalem Post:

At the height of the Second World War, Khaled Abdelwahhab hid a group of Jews on his farm in a small Tunisian town, saving them from the Nazi troops occupying the north African nation.

More than six decades later, Abdelwahhab has become the first Arab nominated for recognition as "Righteous Among the Nations" by Yad Vashem, Israel's official Holocaust memorial. The honor is bestowed on non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews from Nazi persecution....

"I asked, did any Arabs save Jews in the Holocaust?" [Washington Institute For Near East Policy Head Michael] Satloff said. "If they did, these are stories about which Arabs could be proud. It would also entail accepting the context, because it would mean there was something to save Jews from."

That search led Satloff to Abdelwahhab, the cosmopolitan son of an aristocratic family who was 32 when German troops arrived in Tunisia in November 1942. The north African nation was home to some 100,000 Jews at the time.

According to Yad Vashem, the Germans instituted anti-Semitic policies in Tunisia, imposing fines on Jews, forcing many to wear Star of David badges and confiscating property. More than 5,000 Jews were sent to forced labor camps, where 46 are known to have died. Around 160 Tunisian Jews who happened to be in France were dispatched to European death camps. Most Tunisians, according to the material compiled by Yad Vashem, did not attempt to intervene.

Abdelwahhab, an amateur archaeologist and architect with something of a hedonistic bent, served as an interlocutor between the population of the coastal town of Mahdia and the German occupation forces, Satloff said. He was also a country farmer, a sometime Tunisian civil servant and an avid traveler.

When he heard one evening that German officers were planning to rape Odette Boukris, a local Jewish woman, he gathered her family and several other Jewish families in Mahdia - a total of around two dozen people - and took them to his farm outside town. He hid them for four months, until the German occupation ended.

Mr. Abdelwahhab should be counted among the Righteous of the Nations of the World and his soul should be elevated by the recounting of his deeds. Ken yirbu kamohu.

Posted by Y-Love at 02:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From YNet:

Adolescents burn Israeli flag, mezuzahs

Six youngsters between ages of 12 and 15 from coastal town Bat-Yam, south of Tel Aviv, arrested for burning Israeli flag and mezuzah parchments torn from doorposts. The boys, not all Jewish, explain 'We loath anything related to Judaism'

"We loath Jews and anything related to the Jewish faith," six adolescent said, stunning police investigators.

The boys, aged 12 to 15, were arrested Monday night on suspicion of burning an Israeli flag and mezuzah parchments torn from doorposts. They were released on Tuesday morning and placed under house arrest.

The principal of a Bat-Yam school reported to the police on Monday morning that students had burnt an Israeli flag. Police investigators and detectives from the Central District arrived at the school and located the six students who are all new immigrants but not all Jewish. They admitted to burning the flag.

The boys were handed over to the juvenile department for further investigation where they described their recent acts of vandalism and claimed to be Satanists. They say they had stolen at least eight mezuzahs from apartments in one street then lit the parchments in one of the school structures. The structure burnt down as a result.

There is no shortage, unfortunately, of Jewish kids in America who also hate Judaism. But this happening in Israel incenses me for a different reason.

Check the comments on that YNet article for where I'm going with this:

4. Beautiful law of return and fake convertions as its best (End)

5. Pride of Secular Israel - How appropriate, just a day after the Zionists decided to "get tough" with those damn settlers. Now you've got the mezuzas burning in the street - I guess your next step is the Final Solution for all us pesky Dossim. Herzl would be proud.

No conversions from Chutz la'Aretz, they said. No funding for charedi schools, Yuli said. No funding for religious initiatives. Separate church and state and allow for civil marriage, they said. Pray to G-d to save you from the religious, Meretz's election ad said.

And now you have this. You wanted to allow for as many people who would have been affected by the Nuremburg Laws to be able to come to Israel, and now you have vehement non-Jews as part of Israeli society. Kids who self-identify as Satanists vandalizing Jewish articles.

Teenage rebellion is universal, but these kids obviously had never had a positive interaction with Judaism. And how could they? The media is anti-Judaism, and Tel Aviv is not a good place to be religious, socially. Haifa's mayor attributed Haifa's relative peace and coexistence to their lack of religion.

Lack of Judaism equals good in many parts of Israeli society -- Xmas observance is even up. When Judaism is so derided and religious people are treated as such pariahs, what should make a kid even think, "whoa, this is taboo, shouldn't burn this, it's Jewish and so am I"?

For the sake of World Jewry, Israel needs to take its Jewish identity more seriously and with a little more respect. How many American Jews consider Israel to be important and central to their Jewish identity?

And without religious education, without attaching significance to Judaism and things Jewish, how many Jews in central Israel would throw away that identity to just be American?

Posted by Y-Love at 04:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Jerusalem Post today tells us of both Shas and United Torah Judaism MKs expected opposition to the ousting of President Moshe Katsav after his charges for sexual misconduct.

The Katsav camp had hoped that there would be no rape charges in light of there being no "smoking gun" and all of the evidence against Katsav consisting of "letters and tapes" and no "stain on the dress" of Lewinsky fame.

But in the end, there was an official rape charge levied by Attorney General Mazuz and calls began to circulate around the Knesset for his impeachment.

And now Charedi Orthodox parliament members are opposing his ousting. But before any anti-haredi prejudice starts to foam at the mouth of any secularists, let's examine why they're opposed. And, why, in principle, I agree with them.

MK Avraham Ravitz (UTJ) said Wednesday night that he would not join the initiative to collect the 90 MK votes needed to force Katsav out of office.

"As long as the attorney-general has not indicted the president, he has no obligation to resign," said Ravitz, who said that the spiritual leaders of UTJ would not be involved in the decision.

"Even before there was such a thing as liberalism, the Torah taught that a man is innocent until proven guilty," Ravitz continued....

In a related story, Rabbi Ratzon Arussi, a member of the Chief Rabbinate's Governing Council and Chief Rabbi of Kiryat Ono, said Wednesday night that according to halacha (Jewish Law) Katsav was not obligated to resign.

Quoting a halachic decision written by Maimonides, Arussi, who was interviewed on the religious radio station Kol Chai, determined that Katsav was entitled to wait until he was convicted by a court of law.

"In the case of a synagogue cantor who was plagued by vicious rumors, Maimonides said that the community could not dismiss the cantor," said Arussi, drawing a parallel between the cantor and the president.

"Maimonides pointed out that this was particularly true if the cantor had known enemies who had an interest in seeing him removed." Arussi also said according to the halacha, if Katsav were punished privately and repented completely he would be expiated and be allowed to remain in his position as president.

Arussi prefaced Maimonides's opinion with the following statement: "Halacha's approach to the Katsav case is radically different from a liberal democracy's."

No trial, no indictment. Only charges. The halacha states that he does not have to be removed from office without an indictment, and why should UTJ be expected to just go ahead and gather these signatures when the halacha says otherwise? I'm not suggesting that the UTJ is being currently led by Moses and Joshua bin-Nun, but there is this implied assumption that they should lead the charge for impeachment.

A Shas spokesman said that Industry, Trade, and Labor Minister Eli Yishai (Shas) would meet with Rabbi Ovadia Yosef after morning prayers at the rabbi's home to determine Shas's position.

The secular "ethicist" elite in the Israeli media routinely comes down on charedi "unethical conduct". And, to our chagrin, there has been no shortage of material as of late. But when things like halachic due process are called to be thrown away, in exchange for the "moral high road" of railroading someone out of office without even an indictment, this is when one really has to honestly ask if theocracy (and not an oligarchy of clerics), as a political option, really is so invalid.

Posted by Y-Love at 11:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Poor Neturei Karta.

They just keep getting the fallout from their appearance at the Holocaust conference sponsored by Mr. Holocaust Research himself, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and it doesn't seem to be ending.

After one rabbi's wife left him, after being thrown out of a hotel in Boro Park, now there's tires being slashed and even stronger condemnations.

From the Associated Press via the Boston Globe:

"We know what we have done, we know the value of what we have done, and we think that in the course of time that will come out clearly," said Rabbi Ahron Cohen, a Neturei Karta member from Manchester, England.

When Cohen returned from Iran, he needed police protection. His house was barraged by hundreds of eggs, his window smashed by a brick and a billiard ball and he continues to be pelted with pebbles, eggs and insults in the street, he said.

Last week, two tires on his Volvo were slashed, he said, and his synagogue has closed its doors to him...

Jewish communities around the world were furious.

An Israeli chief rabbi called for banning Neturei Karta from synagogues. In New York, where several members of the delegation live, hundreds protested against them and they were repeatedly harassed with prank phone calls.

The Satmars, a Hasidic, anti-Zionist group seen by some as their spiritual cousins, lamented in a statement that "the unavenged blood of the millions of Jewish victims cries out in pain and abhorrence, to these reckless outcasts, 'How can you sink so low?'"

The Jewish community in Vienna expelled Moishe Arye Friedman, who traveled with the Tehran delegation but does not belong to Neturei Karta...

Rabbi Avi Shafran, director of public affairs for the ultra-Orthodox Agudath Israel of America, said Neturei Karta's trip to Tehran was the last straw.

"They have overstayed their welcome in the community. No one has patience for them," he said. "Their actions are beyond the pale."

Overstayed their welcome in the Orthodox Jewish community? Whoa. While slashing tires is in direct violation of laws of nezek (property damage), I can't say that I disagree with at least the sentiment -- Neturei Karta can not just be, carte blanche, assumed to speak for all of Torah Judaism.

Posted by Y-Love at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

The Australian ITWire reports:

A report from MSNBC and the Financial Times says that Norway is the first country to make iTunes illegal because the songs it sells can’t be played on other mp3 players.

In what is obviously one of the dumbest decisions of all time, Norway has declared that iTunes is illegal because songs sold on iTunes can’t be played on other mp3 player.

While I wish that iTunes would work with any mp3 player, I also wish that Blu-ray discs would work in existing DVD players and HD DVD players. I also wish I could use Gilette blades in Shick razors, and I wish I could legally run Mac OS X on my PC.

It’s also be nice to have a GSM phone running on a CDMA network, Nintendo Wii games playing on a PS3 and an Xbox 360, and it’d be nice if I could use much cheaper liquefied natural gas in my petrol/gasoline or diesel engine without needing any modifications.

While we’re at it, why doesn’t government mandate that all coins be exactly the same size, so you could use them in any vending machine anywhere in the world? Heck, why not make the Zune store sell songs that can be played on any mp3 player, too?

I’m equally annoyed that games I buy for the PSP can only be played on a PSP. It’d be nice to pop them into my Nintendo DS, and vice versa. And surely the decision to release songs on the CD format discriminated against anyone owning an audio cassette player. I mean, where was the Government action then? How dare music companies release music in a format that, at the time, couldn’t be played on the vast majority of the world’s music players?

I am going to take a completely different approach. You can't blame Norway for wanting to do this.

And here's why you can't blame the Norwegians: what are they trying to do? Create a level playing field.

A proprietary format (and the coin thing, the PSP thing, none of these are valid parallels) on a uniform media means that MP3-Players-R-Us will never be able to cater to the clientele you have earmarked for yourself. The more artists which release songs on iTunes (and many do exclusively, due to its ease of use) means the more people who will have to endure either a steep learning curve to learn how to use (potentially illegal) audio converters or else go without until a CD comes out, at which time, of course, they've gotten other mp3s and/or forgotten about the artist.

Imagine, for instance, that System of A Down or Talib Kweli's CD wouldn't play in your CD player, but it would play in an Apple CD player. However, Pantera's and Mos Def's CD would. Why would this be cool?

While I'm not saying I agree with the lawsuit -- let the people buy what they want (same with the iPhone) -- can you blame them? This doesn't even resemble a potential monopoly?

Posted by Y-Love at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

**BREAKING STORY**

A zealous haredi Orthodox person or group of people is currently involved in flyering Boro Park. A group of leaflets was left today at a synagogue on 13th Avenue, a house of prayer well-known throughout the charedi community for its round-the-clock prayer services and free Chassidic food in the basement.

The letter, typed in serif font and spell-checked and looking as if it emerged from a laser printer, is penned with the ominous title "ALERT: by Gedolei Hador (the leaders of the generation)", and is self-touted to be "modified by Rabbi Weinstein from essay 'Souls on Fire'." This mysterious "Rabbi Weinstein" has yet to be identified at time of writing.

The letter, unsigned, says that by "examining" the pamphlet of Matisyahu's new CD, "Fire Of Heaven", one can find "disguised, (the) stain of the gospel" and says that Matisyahu's "partner" on the CD, "Josh", gives a shout out to the founder of Christianity.

It even goes so far as to say that the word "cross" in J-Dub's byline, "event production company for...cross-cultural dialogue" is a reference to the crucifix.

It accuses the printers of thinly veiled references to Christianity in their reprinting of Psalm 27, and concludes with the caveat: "Those devoted to steal our faith (ostensibly they're still referring to Matisyahu, JDub Records, or Jewish Music Group) are aware...that the human mind can be controlled...with music. We denounce those that wrap their objectives in an implied righteous[ness] with the target of setting our souls on fire."

Download the PDF of the Matisyahu missionary activity alert here.

And here's why this story matters to me, personally.

I'm not claiming or doubting the veracity of this statement. Maybe "Josh" did make a reference to JC in the CD cover, maybe not. Was it assur/forbidden if he did so? Maybe, maybe not. This is not the point.

One has to wonder what "Rabbi Weinstein"'s objective was with writing this flyer. Did he intend to incite the charedi public in a fit of rage against perhaps the only successful (Y-LOVE excluded) Jewish crossover artist to date? What could "the Rav" want to accomplish here?

To me, this strikes me as the attempt of a desperate person to forbid Matisyahu's music completely. In absence of any actual inappropriate musical content, just find something -- anything -- to render the artist a source of impurity.

Matisyahu has unfortunately been subject to unheard-of scrutiny since first he decided to open his mouth to sing for Hashem -- first it was accusations that he was really Snow, the ill-fated reggae artist of "Informer" fame. Then it was objectionable videos, and then it was accusations of drug use, and now it's this. When it comes from haters trying to make a name for themselves in the reggae world, it's one thing -- it's understandable and a lamentable by-product of success.

But when it comes from the religious world, especially when it's a world you weren't born into and that you joined out of a love for its principles and ideals, it hurts infinitely more. Should a kid growing up in the shtetl of Williamsburg listen to reggae l'chatchila? Probably not. But without Matisyahu, who should he listen to, Damian Marley?

This past Chanukah, I had a conversation with a religious rebbitzen (wife of a rabbi) in Flatbush. I was discussing the Chanukah video I had found and featured on my Myspace blog. I was impressed by the choir director's choice of a contemporary Hebrew song to teach his non-Jewish class, and I was impressed by the childrens' enunciation in Hebrew. The rebbitzen looked at me quizzically and asked almost suspiciously, "Why would a group of [non-Jewish] children want to sing a song in Hebrew for Chanukah?" I said adamantly without missing a breath, "To show peace and love and unity!" She said "Aha..." and changed the subject.

Perhaps there is a phobia that even positive one-way (sharing Judaism with others, and not being shared with) contact with the non-Jewish world will lead to assimilation or anti-Semitism.

But whatever it is, it's horribly counterproductive.

We have a growing "XO" (ex-Orthodox) movement, formed largely of people fed up with rabbis or families which were unsupportive or intolerant of differences -- and now is the time to legislate musical conformity? R' Kamenetzky (I believe) already said that there is no da'as Torah with music, and my rav, Rav Avraham Ga'on, has already said that music's permissibility is determined by the emotions it evokes. Fans of Matisyahu's music never cease to say how positive it makes them feel, how "needed" his voice is in the world right now, how uplifting the shows are. It's making people feel closer to Hashem, and this "Rabbi" feels the need to assur it.

"Rabbi Weinstein" -- showing his own ethnomusicological ignorance by calling reggae a form of music "originated in African-American churches" -- is attempting to make an artist's entire repertoire assur for the charedi world. But let's be realistic. Mordechai Ben David was also criticized years ago when he began to use innovative techniques in his music, and now he's already considered a traditional choice for every simcha. Without a doubt, mark my words, this entire argument is going to seem passe one day, even in Boro Park.

Does anyone even know who this "Rabbi Weinstein" is, anyway?

All charedim who hold true to the word of Torah, like R' Chaim Ozer, have one over-reaching purpose in mind, the good of Klal Yisra'el (and by extension the world), both physically and spiritually. So I wonder what Rabbi Weinstein expects when he dies at the end of 120: does he expect to hear a bas kol (Heavenly voice) saying, "My son, by leveling accusations against Matisyahu in the Orthodox world, you have done a wonderful good for My world?"

If this really is assur because of the sin of avoda zara, then this can be no worse than Marilyn Manson. His "Holywood" CD was rendered assur/forbidden because of his blasphemous use of the Holy Tetragrammaton (G-d's 4-Letter Name). The cover had to be thrown out and the Divine Name disposed of; the CD was forbidden. His music was not, and certainly his entire style of music was not (and this was by the rabbis in Ohr Somayach yeshiva in 2000).

And that was from the man who said he wouldn't be a slave to G-d (ch"v).

Should we treat more harshly the man who pleads with his Creator, Hashem Elokai yagi'ha chashki (Hashem, My G-d, may He enlighten my darkness)?

Don't get me wrong, I'm no Matisyahu fan. But I highly doubt they'll be playing his music in Gehinnom.

Posted by Y-Love at 06:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBacks (0)

First it was Goode, now it's Hargrove.

A certain variant of Bigots' Foot-in-mouth syndrome is apparently affecting some politicos in the Virginia State Legislature. Not only do bigots in this particular legislature seem unable to conceal their prejudice, but they refuse to back down.

The Washington Jewish Week reports:

A Virginia legislator under fire for comments regarding slavery and Jews said this week that "the New Testament does say the Jewish people crucified Christ."

But Del. Frank Hargrove (R) assured a reporter that "I don't fault you for it" or blame any Jews of today.

Hargrove made his comments Monday in a phone interview in which he was asked to explain why, in a discussion involving whether Virginia's legislature should apologize for slavery, he had said, "Are we going to force the Jews to apologize for killing Christ?"

(...)

"I don't know who killed Christ I wasn't there," said Glen Allen's Hargrove, 79, adding that all he knows is what the Christian Bible says. Asked later what the Bible does say, the delegate said that "the New Testament does say the Jewish people crucified Christ."

John Schol, bishop of the UMC Washington Episcopal Area Baltimore-Washington Conference, said that while the church doesn't have an official teaching on the death of [JC], "most Methodists understand that the death of Jesus came about in large part because of the very challenging stances that [Christ] took in his day that created conflict for people of his day and religious leaders of his day."

Apparently Christian scholars are not on the same page as Mr. Hargrove.

Mr. Hargrove needs some sensitivity training, and perhaps some good old-fashioned Bible study.

Posted by Y-Love at 02:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

From Yahoo!News this past Monday:

Seventy-nine percent (79%) of American voters say they're willing to vote for an African-American presidential candidate. However, the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that just 55% believe their family, friends, and co-workers are willing to do the same.

...Seventy-eight percent (78%) say they'd vote for a woman but just 51% said their peer group would do the same.

These questions assume a special relevance in Election 2008 as the top two candidates for the Democratic Presidential nomination are Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Barack Obama ...Clinton has consistently led the competition, but Obama is viewed more favorably by American voters.

As with the question about women, younger Americans are more likely to vote for an African-American President than their elders. While 73% of voters under 30 say that their family, friends, and co-workers would vote for an African-American, just 35% of those over 65 say the same.

Eighty-two percent (82%) of American voters believe it is at least somewhat likely that an African-Americans will be elected president in the next 25 years. For women, that figure is 79%.

Thirty-nine percent (39%) believe a woman will be elected President before an African-American. Thirty-eight percent (38%) take the opposite view, while 23% are not sure.

Seventy-one percent (71%) of African-American voters say their family, friends, and co-workers would vote for an African-American President. Just 51% of White Americans say the same.

Posted by Y-Love at 02:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A quote from the American Muslim (not a contradiction, see his blog) blogger Delicto Aquinas:

Another issue you and I will disagree on; I believe that secularization is destroying Judaism faster than anything else could. Through 2000 years of exile and persecution, faith has held Jews together. Not ethnic custom, not racial identity, but a faith in the god of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses.

Were it simply a matter of eating matzos and making smartass comments, would anyone have died for it? Who among them would not have chosen to assimilate?

They can cause fires of unity and coexistence without prior notice.

(Update: It hit me that this may potentially be quite offensive to some readers. First of all, let's examine what Mr. Aquinas said, exactly. Firstly, the subject at hand is the secularization of Judaism, not of Jews themselves.

A sign I once saw in a rabbi's office summarized the point succinctly. In huge, white, bold sans-serif letters, it had text like: "We are in danger of 5,000 years of Jewish tradition being reduced to this:" above a picture of a bagel with lox on it. This is the secularization of Judaism. Especially in a consumer-driven culture such as America, the Judaism of the Torah is imperiled by those who would like to, b'yadayim (with their own 2 hands), have Judaism go the way of Hallmark© or American Greetings©. A collection of symbols signifying "family times", or "special days", far removed from the holy-days of their ancestors, instituted by the Sages to commemorate Divine miracles.

What is the secularization of religion? It is Hosanna candy and "Christian" cosmetic lines. It is Elmex toothpaste saying "The biggest thing to come out since the Exodus" in Israeli ad campaigns. And with Jews, it is also Judaism being reduced to Jewish humor and "Yiddishisms".

While every person with an ounce of sensitivity can see its offensiveness, how many people know the origin in Leviticus for the word shiksa or shaiggitz? Or even goy? A readily-recognized "Yiddishism", but devoid of its religious significance -- and the removal from the Torah often contributes to its offensiveness (e.g., how "goy" meaning "nation" came to be an epithet for non-Jews).

The secularization of Judaism, reducing 5 millenia of a Divinely-instituted tradition to "smartass comments and eating matzo", is a real danger indeed. It does not do justice to Judaism or to any individual Jew. Jewish tradition and practice is a precious thing, a chain not to be broken, and if faith kept the Jewish people together in hardship, it follows logically that not having faith could drive us apart. G-d forbid.)

Posted by Y-Love at 09:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Plans for permanent housing for Jewish settlers removed from Gaza, after over ten months of bureaucracy, are now beginning to come to fruition, the Jerusalem Post reported yesterday.

As JPost reports:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert pledged on Tuesday to start building new homes for 400 Gaza evacuee families in the Lachish region, between Jerusalem and Beersheva within six months.

"There is no limit to the area's potential," said Olmert as he visited the empty construction site in the South.

"I would like, not in one year, but already within six months to come here again to see the tractors working and to breathe in the dust, to see the foundations being poured and the buildings rising," he said. "There is no reason that this will not happen."

Government plans call for creating seven new communities in Lachish with approximately 4,600 housing units. About 400 of the units have been earmarked for Gaza evacuees still living in temporary homes.

However, one can not gloss over the glaring discrepancy in numbers:

According to the Disengagement Authority, only about 200 of the 1,350 Gaza families who plan to build new homes have received building lots from the state. The lots in Lachish have yet to be formally assigned.

And, remember, we are talking about lots, not one new home has been actually built for the evacuees.

Some residents want to be relocated into communities resembling the communities they left -- they want to be relocated with their neighbors, leaving social ties intact. It is highly unlikely that all residents with such feelings will have their requests met.

Housing and Construction Minister Meir Sheetrit adjoined his own feelings to PM Olmert's pledge for housing:

"There is absolutely no justification for this. With all due respect, this is not the way to run things. This could have all been approved in a day," he said.

In addition, even with these new construction plans, many of the evacuees' needs will still be left sorely unfulfilled. Disengagement Administration head Zvia Shimon noted that while the construction is welcome, "alongside construction we need to find solutions for employment, education and welfare." "Still need to find a solution for education" -- does this mean that hundreds of kids are still without permanent schools?

Is Olmert's "new vision" too little too late for the relocated settlers?

Posted by Y-Love at 04:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Today's article from the Jerusalem Post should have the Islamophobes shaking in their boots.

Islam converts change face of Europe

As many as 100,000 French and British citizens have converted to Islam over the last decade, according to a new book by an Israeli historian.

The figures cited by Hebrew University Prof. Raphael Israeli in his upcoming book The Third Islamic Invasion of Europe are representative of the fast-changing face of Europe, which the Islamic history professor says is in danger of becoming "Eurabia" within half a century.

He noted that about 30 million Muslims currently live in Europe, out of a total population of 380 million., adding that with a high Muslim birthrate in Europe, the number of Muslims living in the continent is likely to double within 25 years.

Break out the Paxil, y'all, it's wrist-slitting time!

More sad than the way this is being billed ("Muslim Invasion of Europe"? Add a few typecast characters and a 50-foot-robot and you've got a B-movie) is how relevant its Islamophobia-overlaid nomenclature really is to the European populace:

European concerns over a fast-growing Muslim population is at the center of opposition to Turkey's entry into the EU, he said, as the inclusion of Turkey into the EU will catapult the number of Muslims to 100 million out of a total population of 450 million. "The sheer weight of demography will produce a situation where no Frenchman or Dutchman could be elected to parliament without the support of the Muslim minority," he said Monday in an interview with The Jerusalem Post.

"Muslims will have a more and more decisive voice in the makeup of European governments."

The 50,000 French and 50,000 British who have converted to Islam over the last decade, including many from mixed marriages, did so for personal convictions, romanticized notions of Islam, as well as for business reasons, while others see Islam as the wave of the future at a time when Christianity is on the wane, Israeli said.

When Mrs. Desjardins leaves her house in Lyon and decides to become Fatima Umm Ahmed it is no one's business but her own, and what her conversion does is not a destruction of European culture, but a reinvention. And for the better -- European Christendom is rife with secularism, and instead of secularization theory, a number of educated first-world Europeans are choosing Islam.

They are choosing a connection to a culture professing ties to G-d, instead of a culture professing ties to American media networks. This sentiment should be encouraged by every person of faith alive, whether Muslim or not. And if the problem is terrorism, say so -- the problem is not and has never been Islam, regardless of what language the terrorists speak.

Why is Muhammad not a valid role model for Europeans? What, all Europeans should aspire to emulate Winston Churchill, the racist?

Posted by Y-Love at 03:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Ha'aretz reports:

Jews in Yemen flee homes following extremist threats
By Yoav Stern

Some 45 Jews in Sa'ada in Yemen have left their homes after being threatened by radical Muslims and are seeking the president and government's help, the Saudi daily Al Wattan reported yesterday.

The extremists reportedly told the Jews to leave their homes within 10 days, and threatened that those who stayed would be killed or their children abducted and their homes looted. The Jews moved into a hotel in the city of Sa'ada, north of the capital Sana. A formal complaint was submitted to Yemenite President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the report said.

A Jew named Yihya Yosef Musa told Al-Wattan that one of the Muslim leaders said he wanted no Jews to remain in the Sa'ada region.

"We have been driven from our homes, our money has been lost, we cannot feed our children. We came to plead with the president and government to treat us properly because we are Yemenis," he said.

The threats are attributed to followers of Shi'ite religious leader Hossein Bader a-Din al-Khouty, who was killed in clashes with government forces in 2005. The Jews have received letters alleging that they have been acting "first and foremost to serve global Zionism" and are working ceaselessly "at corrupting people and making them abandon their moral and religious values."

Hardly global Zionists. Obviously this is yet another anti-Semitic libel, akin to "blood in the matza" or "killing Christian children".

Mr. Al-Houthi (as his name is more commonly Anglicized) was found to be complicit in an insurgency against the Yemeni government in 2004. His followers have never been pro-Saleh administration. They have already been accused of running a "guerrilla war."

Two al-Houthi followers, one of whom is a cleric, were released in 2005, with their release touted as something that would "further enhance the human rights record and basic liberties" in Yemen at the Human Rights and Renewal of Religious Discourse conference in Alexandria, Egypt. 627 more al-Houthi followers were released in 2006. I wonder if this is what these people are doing in lieu of rallying the populace up against President Saleh, rallying people up against Jews.

In any event, President Saleh will be with Yemen until at least 2013. How many more people need to die before his "balancing act" is reined in?

Posted by Y-Love at 08:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Florida Sun-Sentinel reported on Friday:

New edition of Encyclopaedia Judaica casts doubt on existence of Moses

No figure in Jewish annals compares with Moses.

He "changed the course of human history all by himself," Rabbi Norman J. Cohen writes enthusiastically in Moses and the Journey to Leadership, one of those inspirational books built around biblical personalities.

"He is the founder of the nation, a revolutionary, a lawgiver, a priest, a judge, a politician, a teacher, a prophet, a comforter and a guide -- all rolled up into one. He is the paradigm for all subsequent leaders, for all of us."

But a Cohen colleague at Reform Judaism's New York City seminary, Rabbi S. David Sperling, isn't certain that Moses even existed or, if he did, whether the Bible provides much reliable information about him.

Sperling contends that if traditional accounts of the origins of Judaism had not recorded a founder, "analogy would have required postulating him; and that is probably what happened" when ancients wrote the Bible.

The introduction to Moses' life (from another writer) says "we cannot really reconstruct a biography of Moses. We cannot even be sure that Moses was a historical character."

...Sperling, however, writes that the biblical story of Moses' birth "contains generic elements that are discounted by historians" and echo pagan legends. He deems passages on early adulthood "historically unverifiable" and says the exodus account was "dramatically woven out of various strands of tradition."

Obviously I find, as a Torah-believing Orthodox Jew, "Rabbi" Sperling's assertion to be appalling. However, his personal views would not concern me -- if he were not a contributor to the Encyclopedia Judaica.

Now, he speaks for Jews. Now, he is writing down the definition of my faith in a reference text for the world to see, for all of humanity's posterity to retrieve on digital media ad infinitum potentially. And this is what some scholar is going to see. And maybe he will sit to write, "Judaism may have been started by the Biblical figure Moses, though this is disputed" in a paper, and that paper will be given an A by a professor, and this will be taken as fact by a student of theology some day.

It disgusts me that if I object to sitting down at a table with "Rabbi" Sperling, I am derided as being wrong and backward. If "Rabbi" Sperling does a conversion, anyone who fails to recognize it is blasted internationally in the media, and potentially slung through the mud. If I declare "Rabbi" Sperling as anything less than a co-religionist, with an equally valid viewpoint, something is seen as remiss in me, my viewpoint is stuck in a bygone era and must be flexible to encompass "all views of truth."

I find "G-d-Optional Judaism" hard to stomach as a denomination of the religion which introduced monotheism to much of mainstream humanity.

This has no bearing on my love for, and unity with, my fellow Jews -- but "Jew" transcends religion (as we see that even the most prolific idolater never ceases to be a "Jew") and ethnicity and nationality. "My fellow Jew" may be the Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of Israel, or an Asian woman taking communion at Mass in the Vatican (Rahmana litzlan) -- I feel no less love nor is there any weakening of the familial link.

But I find it truly difficult to call the Moses-optional "Rabbi" Sperling a teacher of Judaism.

Can I draw the line at doing so? Am I allowed to? Is anyone allowed to?

Posted by Y-Love at 07:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

Are you serious?

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said at a conference that, "including Hamas", all Palestinian groups which would recognize Israel's right to exist are potential partners for peace:

Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz said Monday that the radical Islamic Hamas movement would be a partner for peace if it accepted Israel's right to exist.

'I see a partner for negotiations in every Palestinian element which recognizes the state of Israel, including Hamas,' Peretz told a conference in Herzliya, north of Tel Aviv.

His remark came as the ruling Hamas and the opposition Fatah party of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had resumed talks on the formation of a unity government.

Abbas held much-anticipated talks with Hamas political bureau leader Khaled Mashaal in Damascus late Sunday, their first meeting since July 2005.

So let's see how long this one lasts.

Posted by Y-Love at 11:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Let me introduce you to Hatchet Jack.

Hatchet Jack is an "Alaskan fisherman and outdoorsman" with links to anti-Semitic sites such as "Jew Watch" on the front page of his blog. While there is quite a bit of White Nationalist filth scattered throughout the site, this particular article (with a hat tip to the Anarchist Rabbi) caught my interest because it illustrates a Jewish ethical teaching beautifully.

Izzy is his slang for Israel.

Only racial (not converted) jews allowed in Izzy

Hatchet jack:

The Israeli law of return has always been aimed at keeping Israel a "jewish" state. A former member of the Israeli Supreme Court, Haim Cohen, described the system that applies to Jews and Palestinians in Israel as similar to the Nuremberg laws of Nazi Germany: "...the bitter irony of fate, which has led the same biological and racist laws propagated by the Nazis and which inspired the infamous Nuremberg laws, serves as a basis for the definition of Judaism within the State of Israel." Badi, J. (1960). Fundamental Laws Of The State Of Israel. New York. p.156....

Now Israeli jews don't have to worry about shunning goy converts. The law of return has excluded Gentile converts, closing the loophole which threatened Israel's apartheid objectives.

Who can blame Israel? I cannot. I would like to see mother Europe and her colonies, including North America, preserved as an homeland exclusively for White people. That means people of wholely European descent. Thus, this doesn't bother me.

What does disturb me are the jews who advocate open borders in America, and interracial marriage. Quite often they preach one thing for Israel, and something entirely different in the United States.

The Nation of Israel is given the Divine charge in the Torah to be a nation set apart from the other nations of the world, distinct "b'shmam, b'malbusham u'v'lshonam", in their names, their style of dress and in their language. We are supposed to -- and if we choose not to, G-d forces us to -- be different in the way we call ourselves, the way others see us, and the way we communicate.

The commentator Rash"i in Daniel 11 tells us that Antiochus, the Greek king of Chanukah infamy, would kill anyone who called themselves a Jew. The end of the Book of Esther tells us that many people called themselves Jews following the Purim incident. Never do we find that the word "Jew" was tied to familial lineage -- as it is written in the Torah, "There shall be one Torah for the convert and for the native-born."

When a convert is not given said status, by default, one is establishing a de facto anti-halachic genetic premise for who can be called a "Jew." If this is to be codified in Israeli legislation by the Rabbinate, this will be not only a slap in the face to the Divine Law which says otherwise, but it will also give creedence to the Neo-Nazi racialist philosophy.

That Jew is a race, and that lands are set up for races of people.

Instead of the pan-racial, international identity of "Jew", Israel, through this legislation, if it passes (Rahmana litzlan) , will have chosen to define itself by the racial identity of "Semite" or perhaps "Israelite". A secular Israel defined by Hitler, which defines Jews contrary to the way the Torah does.

The Talmud tells us in Tractate Bava Metzia that converts' insult is prohibited up to 36 times by G-d in the Torah, yet somehow a labor issue makes all of these Divine exhortations play second-fiddle.

Conversion to Judaism is a unique process -- conversion to Islam does not make one an "Arab", conversion to Hinduism does not give one a similar link to the Vedas. But conversion to Judaism, in every classical text, in effect changes one's very DNA: the DNA in the cells of the convert has become "Jewish DNA" and they are now a "Jew", affected by anti-Semitism and only differing from their co-religionists by an ethnic prefix ("black Jew", "Asian Jew"). One has their own personal portion of Torah (cheilek ba'Torah) which was predestined for them from time immemorial. The convert to Judaism becomes part of the Jewish people, a child of Abraham -- literally.

Instead of sticking with the Torah definitions of our ancestors, the Israeli Rabbinate would instead choose to utilize a non-Torah mindset utilized by Nazis?

Israel is the only "Jewish state" -- but can it please start acting more like a goy echad ba'aretz, a unique nation? Importing American and European fashion is enough -- don't import the racism, racialism, and elitism.

Posted by Y-Love at 01:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Today from CNN:

When we reported the unprecedented suicide bombings of the London underground trains and buses in 2005, we were shocked beyond words that young British Muslims, born and bred here, would go to that extreme.

We could not understand what would drive them to kill themselves and their fellow citizens.

And so we started to investigate what we call "The War Within."

What struck us most was how deeply the Iraq war has radicalized today's generation of young Muslims in Britain. Whether extreme or mainstream, they are angry about the war, angry that their country so devotedly follows U.S. foreign policy, angry at what they see as a worldwide war against Muslims and Islam.

Before we go any further, one should keep in mind that all of these are recent developments. There is not this long-standing feud or bad blood between British Muslims and Christians. A group of people have been motivated. They have been given a rallying cry that they are responding to in large numbers.

What is fueling the sentiments that could drive one to not only listen to such rhetoric, but to be driven to violent direct action?

Answer is, there is none. At least not on a large scale anyway. There are 13 million Muslims across Europe, and there is no large scale jihad being brewed up to wreak havoc across Western Christendom. Instead,

"But then now you've got another threat," Hanif Qadir told me.

"The new threat is radicalism. It's a cause. Every young man wants a cause."...

Some mosques in Britain, while publicly agreeing to cross-cultural tolerance, in fact sometimes host preachers from both Britain and abroad who rail with hatred against "kafirs" (infidels), against homosexuals, against democracy and even against women.

Extremists and radicals are very adept at playing the media's game. Even though they are a minority, a small number of them can gather on a corner, hold a protest or demonstration and get a massive amount of media attention and air time. That's because today's mostly tabloid media culture in the UK has sensationalized the "Muslim issue" and focuses only on the extremists, rarely finding the facts, context and texture beneath the surface.

Lately, as I've been attempting to book my speaking tour, I've come to see a recurring theme in dealing with religious nonprofit organizations: budgets are strapped, so whoever they bring in has got to bring in either tickets or members, because each quarter can be sink-or-swim, financially. If I'm not as valuable in a certain market, even the most righteous rabbi or imam is not going to book me, it just does not make sense financially for their institution.

Why would these mosques book these people? Obviously Imams who book such speakers think they will be a draw, that they will draw many Muslims to the walls of their masaajid or at a minimum, get people on their mailing lists, etc. Assuming sublime motives (as opposed to just trying to amass a fortune from membership dues), each speaker must provide a return on investment, otherwise, the masjid in question could be in dire financial straits come next quarter or next fiscal year.

What gives a speaker added value? A deluge of media attention and photo ops.

So it comes out, that the media is actually contributing to the booking schedules of these mosques. Why is the message of extremism getting out to the youth? Because it's all over the TV and the newspapers!

However, one can't absolve the extremists themselves of responsibility, especially considering:

We found a deep sense of Islamophobia on the rise here in Britain and across Europe. The European Monitoring Center, which tracks religious and ethnic bias, says Muslims regularly face abuse, threats, attacks and misunderstanding.

And as we discovered talking to a cross section of Muslims around Britain, many of Europe's 13 million Muslims said that since 9/11 they have been made to feel like terrorists. More than ever they feel like second-class citizens in their own countries.

[Extremist] hate-speech and the attempt by extremists to recruit young disaffected Muslims on London's deprived streets and even on university campuses is beginning to motivate the "other voices of Islam" to try to seize back their religion, which they say has been hijacked.

So shall we brush this off and say that it is a journalist's responsibility to report whatever he or she finds significant?

I applaud all mainstream Muslims (not "moderates", but "mainstream") and all true Muslim fundamentalists who want to bring back the ideals of peace and co-existence to Islam.

If Islam is "the religion of peace" it must have been declared to be so by Muhammad, and if that is the case, is emulation of Muhammad not going to make one, at a minimum, not a terrorist?

Posted by Y-Love at 11:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

An article I picked up from Stratfor.com (from Strategic Forecasting, Inc):

U.S.: The White Supremacist Movement's Metamorphosis

Since Dec. 22, 2006, three white supremacist leaders have been arrested on sex-related charges. Two of them -- Matthew Downing, National Vanguard's Boston unit leader, and Gordon Young, former leader of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and current member of the National Socialist Movement -- have been charged with sexually assaulting minors. The third, Kevin Alfred Strom, founder of the National Vanguard organization, has been charged with possession of child pornography and witness tampering.

It has clearly been a hard month for the self-appointed defenders of white virtue...

Since the 9/11 attacks, the white supremacist movement in the United States has undergone a huge change. One of the factors driving this change has been the generational transition that resulted from the deaths of older white supremacist leaders respected within the movement, such as William Pierce and Richard Butler. Their deaths left a leadership vacuum, and with no clear emerging leader to replace them, the movement has seen much infighting and splintering, as seemingly everyone in the movement seeks to be "the fuhrer."...

The leadership vacuum within the white nationalist movement has created a need, an to fill this need, the movement has had to reinvent itself. And the new monster is much more insidious, and I fail to see the inherent distinction between them and al-Qaeda.

As Stratfor.com continues to elucidate:

Law enforcement's success in infiltrating white supremacist groups has led many white supremacists to embrace the "leaderless resistance" organizational model. The bickering within and among organized groups and the obvious shortcomings of leaders like Strom, Young, Gliebe, Downing and Herrington are further strengthening this sentiment in the minds of many activists.

This shift toward leaderless resistance conducted by lone wolves and small cells has long been advocated by white supremacists such as former Ku Klux Klan leader Louis Beam because it makes it far more difficult for law enforcement and watchdog groups to identify radical individuals and monitor their plans and activities. The leaderless resistance model has been adopted by the radical environmental rights movement Earth Liberation Front, which has a Web site but no real membership. The Web site serves to inform and unite, but individuals and small units plan and conduct actions on their own.

"Leaderless resistance" conducted by small cells. If this is referring to armed resistance or other form of physical direct action, precisely how is this intrinsically different from a Moqtada al-Sadr-led offensive? The distinction of "leaderless" makes me think we are not talking about letter-writing campaigns. The word "resistance" makes me think we are not talking about rallies or sit-ins.

As the article concludes, "law enforcement and watchdog groups are going to have to change the way they do business" with white supremacist organizations.

Perhaps that change should involve Gitmo.

How else should we treat domestic terrorists?

Posted by Y-Love at 03:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From the JTA:

VIENNA, Jan. 16 (JTA) — Every Sunday and Monday evening, some 90 Jewish university students in Vienna get paid to learn about Judaism from the Orthodox perspective.

At first glance the Nefesh Yehudi, literally Jewish soul, program launched by Rabbi Nechemia Rotenberg sounds suspiciously like a bribe. Paying students to attend religious classes? Is that kosher?

Running around his office trailed by several Chasidim helping him with Chanukah party preparations, a smiling Rotenberg is at ease with such questions.

"Most students need to do some part-time work to get through university," said Rotenberg, 30, a Jerusalem native who is fervently Orthodox, or haredi, but not affiliated with any group. "So say you give them a small stipend to replace that work? That gives them time to discover or rediscover what being Jewish is all about."

Ken yirbu.

Posted by Y-Love at 05:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

This is just disgusting.

A hat tip to my boy, from the usually putrid FOX News:

RICHMOND, Va. — A state legislator said black people "should get over" slavery and questioned whether Jews should apologize "for killing Christ," drawing denunciations Tuesday from stunned colleagues.

Del. Frank D. Hargrove, 79, made his remarks in opposition to a measure that would apologize on the state's behalf to the descendants of slaves.

In an interview published Tuesday in The Daily Progress of Charlottesville, Hargrove said slavery ended nearly 140 years ago with the Civil War and added that "our black citizens should get over it."

The newspaper also quoted him as saying, "are we going to force the Jews to apologize for killing Christ?"

Black lawmakers swiftly denounced Hargrove's comments. "When somebody tells me I should just get over slavery, I can only express my emotion by projecting that I am appalled, absolutely appalled," said Del. Dwight C. Jones, head of the Legislative Black Caucus.

Del. David L. Englin also criticized Hargrove's remarks, recalling that his grandparents were driven from their homes in Poland "by people who believed that as Jews, we killed Christ."

Really, he is:

Hargrove tried to explain his comments, saying nobody respected slavery or would ever advocate its return.

"On the other hand, not a soul in this legislature had anything to do with slavery," he said, adding that he thinks it is "harmful to society in general to keep recycling this thing which we all know and all despise and all have no respect for."

In yesterday's Daily Progress, Hargrove was quoted as wondering how far such apologies should go, saying, "Are we going to force the Jews to apologize for killing Christ? Nobody living today had anything to do with it. It would be far more appropriate in my view to apologize to the Upper Mattaponi and the Pamunkey" Indians for the loss of their lands in eastern Virginia.

He told Jewish delegate Englin that his skin was "too thin" and:

When Englin sat, Hargrove reached over and softly patted Englin on the arm. Then, Hargrove rose to speak and, looking down at his seatmate, said, "I didn't even know you were Jewish, I had no idea of what your religion, (and) I don't care what your religion is. I don't care."

Is it really like Doug Thompson says over at Capitol Hill Blue? Is Virginia really "overrun by racists, bigots, homophobes and knee-jerk conservatives who want to drag the Commonwealth back into the era when white men ruled everything and blacks and women knew their place"?

People really need to be conscious of who they vote for -- on all levels of legislature.

Posted by Y-Love at 12:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From the expatriate portal Expatica.com:

Jewish Community of Vienna bars radical rabbi
16 January 2007

Vienna (dpa) - The Jewish Community of Vienna barred a radical ultra-orthodox rabbi who participated in December's Holocaust conference in Iran.

Moshe Aryeh Friedmann, who rejects the state of Israel, was accused by the Jewish Community of Vienna of harmful conduct, particularly through his contacts with "revisionist-historical, anti- Semitic circles."

The community also denied his status as a rabbi.

Posted by Y-Love at 12:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

92% of Canadians -- over 9 in 10 -- claim to have witnessed an act of overt racism, according to a recent survey printed in the Calgary Sun. However, a plurality of Canadians, 56 percent, turn a blind eye and prefer to "mind their own business".

The Calgary Sun reports:

OTTAWA -- Lashing out at minorities is commonplace in Canada, but most turn a blind eye to ugly acts of overt racism.

A Sun Media poll conducted by Leger Marketing reveals 92% of Canadians have witnessed a bigoted remark or behaviour. Yet just one-third actually took action to intervene or inform authorities, while another 56% chose to look the other way.

"This is evidence that we're discounting it -- or trying to avoid it," said Leger VP Dave Scholz....

Yet despite these alarming statistics, almost half the population -- 47% -- doesn't see racism as a problem in Canada.

The Sun Media survey also shows that while most Canadians refrain from uttering racial slurs, they often crack derogatory ethnic jokes. More than a fifth admit they've lobbed a slur, compared to 66% who claim to have done it in jest.

"I think people forget that an ethnic joke is a potential racial slur," Scholz said. "We're not giving the same importance to it."

I asked the rhetorical question once on MySpace -- there is an assumption that everyone should be "able to take a joke", but why should anyone have to? Why should there be an intrinsic license given to all of humanity to offend anyone we want?

And it's not just ethnic minorities, almost a third of whites say they, too, have been victims of bigotry.

So 92% of Canadians watched someone get offended, but it's not really a problem -- 66% of the time, it was just a joke.

Posted by Y-Love at 12:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I'm sure this article has value.

I'm sure that the rental of the old Histadrut building on Strauss Street in Jerusalem has historical significance and is representative of a shift in the Israeli zeitgeist. And, journalistically, one would be remiss not to note an event of such significance.

Nevertheless, it still strikes me as the same old virulent anti-charedi prejudice that plagues many secular Israeli journalists. The inflammatory language and spin-inducing choice of quotes serve to make at least this journalist's mentality readily apparent to any reader.

From YNet:

J'lem: Haredim 'conquer' Histadrut stronghold

Under the banner "Blessed be He who uprooted idol worship from our land," a haredi journal over the weekend praised the great victory of the Old Yishuv in Jerusalem over the harbingers of socialism in Israel , namely that three floors of the Histadrut building in Jerusalem were rented out to the girls' seminar Mishkan Sarah, in which 350 haredi girls study.

The Histadrut building on 17 Strauss Street in Jerusalem has for many years been considered a symbol of the strength of the Mapai presence in Jerusalem.

Or, as the haredi journal put it: "The great house… which was essentially intended to form a wall against the spread of the haredi public and to be an assembly place for all kinds of manifestations of destruction and uncleanliness, may such a thing never befall us, will from now on become and be used as a new seat for this pedigreed and splendid seminar."

But this article goes further. Further into anti-Orthodox prejudice, and further into a mindset overlaid with a thin, yet glistening layer of secular paranoia:

The spot where the building is situated represents essentially the last secular stronghold in the area...[Histadrut Jerusalem District Chairman Danny] Ben-Sheetrit added that the section in which the Hisadrut offices are located today are not included in the rental agreement. Other secular strongholds in the area of historical and sentimental value that have recently gone haredi include Edison Movie Theatre, which was purchased by Satmar haredim, and Lemel School, which is currently being used as a Talmud-Torah by the Radzin hassidim.

"With the perspective of many years," admitted [Former MK Uzi] Baram, "the effort my father made didn't succeed. The step that was taken didn't succeed in stemming the tide. Jerusalem has undergone a demographic revolution."

Secular strongholds? Are we talking about fortresses which fly Playboy magazines at half-mast whenever a yarmulke is found inside the barracks? MK Baram's quote sounds akin to the end of a martial arts flick: "My father's efforts were to no avail...and now it is up to you, grasshopper..."

I almost can't fathom it.

In the mind of this journalist, there is not only a war, but a "save yourself" situation in play on the streets of Jerusalem.

It seems some would rather move Xs around the giant RISK board and divide, re-divide, re-re-divide, and conquer -- rather than even attempt to work toward piyus/reconciliation and unity.

Posted by Y-Love at 06:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Get a load of this little piece of news I found from Charlottesville, Virginia's Read The Hook.com:

Indecent future: White supremacist charged with kiddie porn
Published January 11, 2007 in issue 0602 of the HooK.

By LISA PROVENCE [LISA@READTHEHOOK.COM]

The message on the National Vanguard's voicemail notes the organization's objective: "We want a decent future for white children."

Kevin Strom, founder of the neo-Nazi group dedicated to protecting the rights and racial purity of white people, was indicted on January 3 in federal court in Charlottesville on charges of possession of child pornography and for intimidating a witness. Two days later, a grayer, jailstripe-clad Strom pleaded not guilty to child porn possession, which carries a sentence of up to 10 years with no parole and a $250,000 fine, and witness tampering, which carries a sentence of up to 20 years and a $250,000 fine. Strom is being held without bond.

According to the indictment, Strom has been into the kiddie porn since at least October 17, 2005, up until August 4, 2006, and kept it in a computer file called "Karen."

The Southern Poverty Law Center notes that up until Strom's second marriage to Elisha Strom, his personal website "carried a gallery of alluring photos of young girls, many of them scantily dressed, and running to shots of a teenage Brooke Shields atop a horse."

But a plurality of rapes, and the majority of sexual assaults (the majority of which happen on girls between 12 and 18) is not being done by us ethnic minorities (52.2% of rapists and 73.9% of sexual assaulters are white, 67.8% of rape victims are white, 76.4% of sexual assault victims).

And 72% of Black American Christians (the far-reaching majority of African-Americans) -- just to pick an example -- are going to church at least once a month, 41% are going every week. (Overall, in America, 38-44% of Americans worship every week.)

If these allegations are true, Mr. Strom is the immoral one -- and how dare he accuse his black neighbors of any wrongdoing without deleting "Karen".

Posted by Y-Love at 11:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)