Plaut's Purim Spoof

Steve wrote me:

Life in Israel is often stranger than parody. As you know, I often post sarcastic spoof pieces to make fun of the Far Left and of the Israeli government. I usually assume that everyone will understand that the piece is a spoof. Sometimes though people take the sarcastic piece literally (it happened when I wrote that Israel had arrested Salman Rushdie for offending Islam, and in a few other instances).

Well, there are two far-leftist faculty members at my school, the University of Haifa, who fill up the professors' chat board with their anti-Israel spam postings. They are also very abusive. One, let us call him ML, demanded that I be forced to resign for insulting Neve Gordon and called me a bowel movement in two distinct languages on the list. The other, let us call him YY, denounced me for being a fascist, a mad dog, and (gulp) homophobic. Both regularly participate in pro-terror anti-Israel protests (mainly with the Arab students) on the campus.

Saturday night I posted the following posting:

To: segel-plus@list.haifa.ac.il
Sent: Saturday, March 08, 2008 9:17 PM
Subject: [Segel-plus] Big Protest Planned Monday


You are all invited to join ML and YY, together with the campus chapter of HADASH and Taayoush-North, to attend the University of Haifa campus protest planned for Monday that will mourn the untimely tragic death of the East Jerusalem Palestinian protester Alaa Abu Dhein, who was gunned down for no reason after entering the Merkaz Harav Yeshiva this past Thursday, without so much as a Miranda warning. The Palestinian was protesting occupation and Israel's homophobic clericalist bigotry when he was set upon by a group of religious settlers for no reason at all and murdered in cold blood in the library of the yeshiva, which sits in Kiryat Moshe on occupied Palestinian land. ML and YY have asked campus officials to lower flags to half mast in honor of the martyred Palestinian protester.

So all lovers of peace should attend the Monday protest with Hadash and Taayoush.

Bring your own Hamas flags

***

That would have been the end of it, except that someone from the list leaked it to the outside. I have been getting hysterical phone calls and emails all morning from University officials. It seems that many irate phone calls are coming in to express outrage at the planned pro-terror protest. Zionist student leaders were mobilizing to confront the pro-terror protesters. Some politicians called the university in outrage. Even the Chief Rabbi called in to protest.

Strangely no one noticed it is Adar Bet and close to Purim.

So to set the record straight, the posting was a spoof. But it is a sad commentary on the nature of Israel's Far Left that so many people actually believed the posting was for real. The gap between parody and reality keeps narrowing!