An "Intelligent" (?) Dialogue

American: No body else is what I read. I wish things were very different in both of our nations. I see Olmert is set to have his way about the borders also Kadima party officials told the Likud coalition negotiating team that Kadima plans to implement its convergence plan to uproot dozens of Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria by 2008. He will be doing it before new elections here so Bush must be in agreement.

Palestinian: aha

American: Perhaps he fears waiting until we have a new president.

Palestinian: I believe there will be hardship, difficulty and no progress in the peace process.

American: I wish many things but I think you are right. Israel will take the land and water she wants and no one will stop her now.

Palestinian: Palestinians and Israelis will both suffer a lot.

American: If she can kill off Palestinians or make them leave running for their lives he will take all of the land. Yes?

Palestinian: There will be too much resistance and no one can live without water, so they will fight and do their best to live.

American: Both will suffer and both will fight. And the settlers he plans to move will be fighting also.

Palestinian: Sure.

American: Everyone wants Palestine I guess.

Palestinian: Of course, we want Palestine for us.

American: It will be a mess for years more.

Palestinian: Of course

American: And you should have Palestine - at the least you should have back to the pre 1967 borders.

Palestinian: Palestine is Palestine

American: It seems always it is Palestine who suffers and is robbed of more and more. I hate that my nation here has any part in that.

Palestinian: So giving them up to 1967 borders is too impossible to leave?

Want more?

Here.

"Shoshana, Shoshana, Shoshana..."

The title comes from a familiar Hebrew folksong.

The association?

From the New York Times' wedding section:-

Shoshana Berger and Tony Saxe

THE projects in ReadyMade, Shoshana Berger's do-it-yourself magazine for the MTV generation, are rated according to difficulty, with instructions that should be easy to follow. But sometimes it's easier to build a chandelier from old wine glasses — an idea from a 2005 issue — than it is to build a relationship. Just ask Ms. Berger.

When Ms. Berger met Tony Saxe eight years ago through a mutual friend, she recalled that he had registered as a faint ping on her future boyfriend radar screen. But she was busy incubating her magazine and, as she put it, "flogging a six-year on-and-off relationship to death."

The two crossed paths in the Bay Area several times over the next few years but never dated, partly because Ms. Berger was intimidated by what she perceived as the "glamorous" lifestyle of Mr. Saxe, a financial analyst turned documentary film editor.

The clincher for Ms. Berger, now 36, was when Mr. Saxe, 35, sent her an e-mail analysis of one of her favorite poems, Wallace Stevens's "Restatement of Romance," which emphasizes lovers' maintaining separate identities even while together. For Mr. Saxe, who says he spent his time at Barclay's "formulating a critique of global capitalism," the moment of truth was when Ms. Berger told him about her childhood dog.

"We had a German shepherd, and as Berkeley families are apt to do, we named her after a radical Marxist revolutionary," Ms. Berger said. And since her family is Jewish, she added, "we picked a radical Jewish Marxist feminist named Rosa Luxemburg. Tony got a real kick out of it because he had been reading all this Marxist theory."

Ms. Berger and Mr. Saxe's wedding on April 2 in a barn at Bar-or Ranch in Point Reyes Station, Calif., was true to their ReadyMade taste, which is to say, more funky than refined, with a ranch theme that included cowboy-printed tissues and dark chocolate horseshoes — not to mention the outhouses rented for the occasion. Guests kept their sweaters on in the unheated barn, sipping mojitos out of Mason jar mugs as they listened to a local bluegrass band called the Jewgrass Boys

And yes, there really is a Jewgrass Boys.

Did the Pope Really Say This?

Pope: Judas a greedy liar

Well, this publication claims so.

Judas was a greedy liar who put his desire for money ahead of his relationship with Jesus and his love for God, Pope Benedict XVI said.

Exactly a week after the National Geographic Society put the sympathetic Gospel of Judas on display, Pope Benedict reasserted the traditional Christian view that Judas betrayed his friend and Lord after the Last Supper.

The document that went on display in Washington April 6 is a third-century Coptic translation of what had originally been written in Greek before 180. The text portrays Judas as Jesus' closest disciple and says Jesus asked Judas to hand him over to the Roman authorities so that he could fulfill his mission.

But during his April 13 homily at the Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord's Supper, Pope Benedict said Judas is the clearest example Christians have of someone who refuses God's saving love.

For Judas, the pope said, "only power and success are real; love does not count."

"And he is greedy: money is more important than communion with Jesus, more important than God and his love. He also becomes a liar, a double-crosser who breaks with the truth," Pope Benedict said.

Purposefully ignoring the truth, he said, Judas "hardens, becoming incapable of conversion ... and throws away his destroyed life."

=============================

UPDATE

On Good Friday, the preacher for the papal household denounced theories which he said made huge profits in denying the teachings of the Catholic Church.

"Christ is still sold, but not any more for 30 coins, but to publishers and booksellers for billions of coins," Rev Raniero Cantalamessa said in a homily at St Peter's Basilica.

Someone Not Disengaged from Reality

Sever Plotzker (who spells his name Plocker for some strange reason) published a reappraisal of what was "disengagement" entitled Disengagement Lessons which appeared here.

In it he claimes that flawed pullout predictions should make Olmert rethink his plan.

Some excerpts:-

Eight months after the withdrawal from Gaza, or what was referred to as a "unilateral disengagement," things are not developing according to the early scenario marketed to the public. Almost nothing has materialized in the way pullout supporters promised us would happen.

The Gaza Strip did not calm down and the Palestinian Authority did not take matters there into its own hands in order to establish the Middle Eastern Hong Kong. Gaza is a no-man's land, the country of nobody. The Strip lacks a civilian regime, no currency, no enforcement of law and order, and most of the system tasked with providing the population with basic services is paralyzed, aside from the one run by the United Nations.

The handing over of the border crossing with Egypt to Palestinian control also failed to lead to the expected results. The border is rather porous, checks are inadequate, and smuggling is rampant. There too, the Palestinians failed to implement their sovereignty.

We didn't disengage: What is happening, and particularly what is not happening, in Gaza, continues to haunt us.

Even the removal of the settlements is no longer perceived as such a huge victory by the Palestinian people. The thousands of good jobs at the settlements have disappeared, and instead unemployment and poverty grew. The ruins of Israeli communities were not cleared, even though the Israeli government pledged (or rather, was forced to) pay for the clearing. It's unclear who the guilty party is, the PA, or Egypt, or International groups.

Did Israel gain from the disengagement? Less than what its planners hoped. The United States didn't grant us even one cent in economic aid, even though in various phases of preparation for the withdrawal and upon the pullout, much was said about a special USD 2 billion grant. As of today, there's no grant.

For a short while, Israel enjoyed international sympathy, with the pullout perceived as the start of a large-scale unilateral withdrawal.

Was there a disengagement? Was there a (Gaza settlement of) Netzarim? The fact that the post-disengagement reality does not resemble the earlier scenarios and predictions should make Ehud Olmert rethink his diplomatic plans.

Would Israel really be able to unilaterally set its border vis-a-vis the Palestinians, a border they or the world would not accept? Would Israel be able to "converge" into "settlement blocs" in the West Bank and annex them? Who would finance such a move, which would cost tens of billions of shekels and not be perceived as a solution to anything? Who would prevent a tragic rift among the people? And what would be left behind in Palestine following a pretend-Israeli-withdrawal coupled with pretend-annexation?

A Bete Noir Film

While the searching for, and the burning of, chametz is over and done with, this film is worthwhile looking at.

An "arty" approach to the subject.

A Better Term

Many are uncomfortable with the extrajudicial killings of terrorists and more are uneasy about the proper English term.

Here's a suggestion:-

public service murder

n. the killing of a person who is perceived to be bad for a community or society. Categories: English. Crime & Prisons. Law.

How Much?

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert says

he intends to finalize plans for a large pullout from parts of the occupied West Bank within the next 18 months, and that he will travel to the U.S. next month to try to secure Washington's support as he sketches the plan's contours.

In an interview yesterday at his Jerusalem office, Mr. Olmert said his planned meeting with President Bush in Washington will mark the onset of efforts to secure international support for the pullout, including financial assistance. Under his plan, Mr. Olmert intends to evacuate as many as 70,000 Jewish settlers from their homes -- a move that some rough estimates say could cost more than $10 billion -- while annexing large chunks of disputed Palestinian territory.

I am thinking of finding a MK who will sponsor a bill to assure that in any future retreat and yielding of territory which would entail expelling people out of their homes and businesses adequate and equivalent recompense be arranged, including coming to terms with community village needs.

More on this later.

Fooey FIFA

The latest Qassam attack at Israel hit a sports stadium in a kibbutz in southern Israel Friday night, causing damage but no casualties.

So?

Well, will FIFA protest?

To remind you:-

FIFA to pay for rehabilitation of Palestine Stadium in Gaza

Zurich, 11 April 2006 - In order to show its strong commitment to the development of football as a unifying tool in the region, FIFA will cover the costs of the rehabilitation of the football pitch of the Palestine Stadium in Gaza after it was damaged in a recent bombardment.

"In the world of today, which is disrupted by long-lasting disputes and violence, football is one of the very few universal tools mankind can use to bridge gaps between nations and peoples, and to symbolise what unites our planet over what divides it. FIFA's role is not to reprimand, but to help create bonds and ensure that the young people of the region have hope and the possibility to enjoy the school of life that football represents. Therefore, I call on the relevant authorities to do everything they can to allow Palestinian and Israeli football to develop," commented the FIFA President.

FIFA, a non-political organisation, has as one of its main objectives the promotion of friendly relations between its members and in society for humanitarian objectives, as stated in the FIFA Statutes. The defence of the right of both Israeli and Palestinian football to develop has been unequivocal on the part of FIFA in the past and will remain so in the future.

In 2003, FIFA adopted a very strong stance to ensure that Israeli football could develop and play international matches at home. Whereas in some competitions Israeli clubs and the national team were not allowed to play at home because of a series of terrorist atrocities, FIFA made sure that Tel Aviv was able to host qualifying matches of the Israeli national team for the 2006 FIFA World Cup™.

Similarly, FIFA has defended the right of Palestinian football to grow, play internationally, enjoy good infrastructure and organise unified competitions between the West Bank and Gaza.

To implement this philosophy, FIFA has awarded Goal projects to the Israeli FA in order to lay a new pitch in Nazareth, and to the Palestinian FA so as to construct headquarters in Bayt Lahya and to finance the installation of three artificial turf pitches in Gaza, Ram and Ramalla.

Further information from:
FIFA Media Department
media@fifa.org

The "Holy" Spark?

Muriel Spark died Friday at a hospital in Florence, Italy. She was 88.

Ms. Spark's death was announced Saturday, The Associated Press reported, by Massimiliano Dindalini, the mayor of the Tuscan village of Civitella della Chiana, where she had lived for almost 30 years.

But what's my interest in this?

Well...

She was born Muriel Sarah Camberg in Edinburgh on Feb. 1, 1918, the daughter of Bernard Camberg, an engineer whose Jewish family had settled earlier in Scotland, and his wife, the former Sarah Elizabeth Maud Uezzell, a Protestant from a country village near London.

Later in her life, the issue of her religious heritage became a persistent irritant.

The AP skips the Jewish parentage of the father.

And...

In 1965 she published "The Mandelbaum Gate," a heftier book and one that seems overstuffed by her standards. Set in Jerusalem against the backdrop of the war-crimes trial of Adolf Eichmann, "The Mandelbaum Gate" tackles questions of religion, memory and history superimposed on a torturous plot.

The Mandlebaum Gate is a novel by Muriel Spark set in the territories of Jerusalem and Jordan during the Eichmann Trials. Within the novel there is a character "Barbara Vaughan" who is a Gentile Jewess (oh, really?). She travels within Israel and Jordan on a pilgrimage to see the holy shrines and has various adventures and encounters during her trip. It is clear from the first few pages of the novel that Jewish identity is a key theme and continues to be as such throughout.

But, there's more...

In her later years it became clear that she and her son, Robin, were irreconcilably estranged over various issues, including what he referred to as her abandonment of him, as well as her opinions about his ability as an artist and his public statements about their heritage.

Ms. Spark was harsh in her public criticism of his work and open about their estrangement. She told a newspaper: "He can't sell his lousy paintings, and I have had a lot of success. He keeps sending them to me and I don't know what to do with them. I can't put them on my wall. He's never done anything for me, except for being one big bore."

Robin Spark, an Orthodox Jew, survives her. Their public feud spilled into letters to newspapers and became a part of her literary history when she donated letters from her son to the National Library of Scotland. The issue was whether Ms. Spark's mother was a Jew. If she was, then Robin Spark's matrilineal inheritance would make him a Jew by birth. Ms. Spark maintained that she was half-Jewish and that she had nothing to prove.

======================

UPDATE

Muriel Spark was born Muriel Sarah Camberg in the genteel Edinburgh suburb of Morningside. Her father, Bernard Camberg, an engineer in a rubber factory, was a Jew whose family had settled in Scotland. Her mother, Sarah Uezzell, was an English Presbyterian from Watford, who was later to take to drink.

The religious divide in her parents’ marriage was to influence Spark’s imagination considerably. In her only long novel, The Mandelbaum Gate, set in Jerusalem during the trial of Eichmann, a Roman Catholic woman finds herself in peril because of her part-Jewish ancestry.

In later life Spark was to become involved in a bitter feud with her son Robin (a painter) about her Jewishness, and the quarrel snowballed in a blizzard of birth and marriage certificates, claims and counterclaims. (Spark’s relationship with her son was not improved by her comments about his paintings: “He always wanted me to say they were good but I didn’t think they were”, she said. “Art is important to me and I’m not going to commit perjury

.”

Metzger Satire

Here is an Israeli TV program's view of the Rabbi Metzger affair. [Hebrew listening skills necessary]

No, not this affair.

No, and not this one either.

There are a few others but this is the one the satire refers to.

In The Face of Terrorism

The EU Observer reports:-

'Islamic terrorism' phrase to be banned from EU lexicon

The EU is working on a public communication lexicon which blacklists the term 'Islamic terrorism.' The 'non-emotive lexicon for discussing radicalisation' should be submitted to EU leaders who will meet in June, according to press reports. EU officials drafting the guidelines hope that the European Commission and the European Parliament will also endorse the linguistic code of conduct, which will be non-binding.

The aim of the guidelines is to avoid the use of words that could unnecessarily offend Muslims and spark radicalisation. 'Jihad' is another term under review, said an EU official, explaining: 'Jihad means something for you and me, it means something else for a Muslim. Jihad is a perfectly positive concept of trying to fight evil within yourself.'

The lexicon initiative comes in the wake of a row over Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Mohamed, which led to outbreaks of anger and violence throughout the Muslim world. The European Commission currently employs 20 terminologists, one for each official language, to advise translators how to handle not only EU policy jargon such as 'subsidiarity,' but also sensitive words like 'terrorism.'

Those Europeans are so helpful when it comes to defending its citizens from the viciousness of terror.

So sensitive.

The Olmert That Used To Be

Here's what he once thought:-

...we Israelis are painfully aware that we have achieved little in these 10 years of direct negotiations with the Palestinians...

...Like most of my former Likud colleagues, then in the opposition, I was fearful of the swift diplomatic path the government of Yitzhak Rabin had embarked upon. Giving recognition to the terrorist PLO, turning over land to armed guerrillas and shaking Arafat's hand, seemed at best to be a perilous and naïve endeavor. In my own private conversations with the Labor party leaders, I expressed my serious concerns over the dangers the Oslo Accords would bring to Jerusalem and to Israel, the lives and security that were being gambled with. Yet they assured the Israeli public that the entire process was reversible; that if Arafat and the PLO did not live up to their obligations, Israel reserved the right to take the necessary measures against the Palestinian leadership and the Israel Defense Forces would re-enter the conceded territory...

...The Oslo process wasn't the path I'd have led the country toward, but faced with a fait accompli we Israelis had no choice but to pray that the government showed wisdom in attempting it.

...The continuous march of peace initiatives from Cairo to Sharm al-Sheik to Wye to the Red Sea, from Zinni to Mitchell to Tenet, haven't succeeded.

At the recent Red Sea Summit, in which I participated as a negotiator, we told our Palestinian counterparts that they had to choose between Hamas or us. They would have to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure or we would be forced to do it ourselves...On a national level, we can no longer allow ourselves to believe in the myth that the moderates on the Palestinian side will be capable of mustering the political power and military support necessary to assert control over the terrorist groups...

...The latest round of failed diplomacy has shown that an enduring peace agreement cannot be built on the rotten foundation that is the current regime. Palestinian leaders will neither dismantle the terrorist infrastructure nor allow anyone else to do it...

...Oslo has taught us that there are no proxies to fight in our stead. If we are not prepared to undertake the task of dismantling the terrorist groups that infest the Palestinian Authority, our civilian population will continue to be targeted for murder...

...But for the moment we will place our trust in our own ability to confront the terrorists directly...The Oslo decade has shown us what is the incorrect and foolhardy way to try to make peace between Arabs and Jews. Armed with this new clarity, we can now attempt to rectify our errors--and set out down a safer, better-calculated road.

Where was this printed?

End of the Road Map
BY EHUD OLMERT
Monday, September 15, 2003

The Problem with being a Jewish Feminist

This story I came across at The New Republic and the original post is here.

It was to be Torcuil Crichton's journalistic transfiguration...Crichton had gone there to interview the American feminist author Naomi Wolf, on tour for her new book, The Treehouse: Eccentric Wisdom from My Father on How to Live, Love, and See...Hoping to draw her out on her recent divorce, he spouted about his own breakups, a tactic that only yielded clichéd sympathy. As his time drew to a close, Crichton remembered Wolf's radio appearance, and he asked if any of Greer's insults had wounded her. Staring off into the distance, Wolf replied that critics' barbs no longer mattered, because now she answered to a higher authority.

"Are we talking about God?" Crichton asked.

"Yeah, God," Wolf said. She elaborated: "I actually had this vision of--of Jesus." And that, needless to say, is when the interview really began.

Wolf's story went like this: Several years ago, while in therapy for writer's block, Wolf was asked to try a classic deep relaxation technique, where she imagined walking down a flight of stairs. When she reached the bottom and opened the door, there he was: Jesus, with a holy light radiating out of him, the light of absolute perfection and powerful love. In the vision, Wolf wasn't her usual zaftig, constantly commented-upon physical self, but rather a 13-year-old boy. The vision taught Wolf several lessons: that God cares about each and every one of us; that we are born with knowledge of our own soul, which, like Plato once taught, we forget and have to re-remember in order to realize our life's mission (in her case, to spread the gospel of feminism). That we can all, if we try, be like Jesus--radiant, loving, perfect. The revelation made tears run down her face, she confessed to Crichton...

...Though Wolf apparently remains a Jew, at least by her own reckoning, Crichton predicted that her admission might even "trigger a theological battle between the American Christian right and the Jewish lobby over the ownership of her soul."...Most inscrutable is the vision itself. In her 1991 breakout book, The Beauty Myth, Wolf was a traditional, rigorously academic, angry feminist polemicist. Now she is a bar mitzvah-age boy visiting with Jesus. What the hell happened?

Gee, this is really weird.

Is it being Jewish in a non-Jewish world?

Being Jewish and feminist?

Being Jewish and not wanting to be Jewish?

Moses Jewish? Hebrew?

Jack Englehard has a great blog on the new multi-cultural Moses of ABC.

Excerpt:-

As played by Dougray Scott (Charlton Heston, not), Moses has been homogenized, pasteurized, sanitized and dry-cleaned so as not to offend any race, religion or creed. This Moses (as opposed to the Moses of the Bible and even the Moses of Cecil B. DeMille) is not Hebrew, and in fact he’s not anything but multi-cultural.

Along both parts of this series (new and improved over DeMille!!!) that ran Monday and Tuesday, April 10 and 11, the word “Hebrew” never came up, neither attached to him or to his people, yes, the Hebrews. The best this fat-free, low-calorie script could do was refer to Moses as a “slave” and later, as the “leader” of a “people.”

What people?

Getting in Backward at The Forward

One Vita Bekker published a story on the Kfar Chabad vote for Baruch Merzel ("Kahane Activist Wins A Big Vote") in the April 7 edition of The Forward.

It is a bit puzzling that the story ran as it did - big vote?! - (well, not really, but bear with me).

As she herself notes there, Merzel's support dropped from 73% in the last Knesset elections to about 30% last month.

In other words, the real journalistic theme was that he lost big among his potentially most enthusaistic advocates.

Why was this fact misreported?

Was she or her editor trying to fool the readers or just plain malign Chabad?

NPR Interview

Linda Gradstein's NPR program on the future of Shiloh:-

As many as 70,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank could be forced from their homes if Prime Minister-Designate Ehud Olmert goes ahead with his plan for more unilateral withdrawals from occupied territory. West Bankers say that, unlike their counterparts in Gaza, they will fight to stay in their homes.

Listen here to hear my wife, my neighbor Yaakov Yarden and myself.

Update on Dr. Yossi Olmert

Update report on one of his appearances.

If They Did this in Israel, There'd Be No More Media

If they eliminated gossip reporting, as the NYTimes is doing, most of Israel's media would collapse.

You see, gossipping is the main structure of all, I repeat, all reporting in Israel and not only the social, entertainment, scandal-mongering that goes on.

Neturei Karta Follow-up

I am a member of the MailJewish list since 1990, I think.

Recently there was some discussion about the theological and political underpinnings of those Jews calling themselves Neturei Karta.

Since I have related to them recently, I figured the following would be interesting for some people reading this blog.

From: Yisrael Medad
Date: Fri, 07 Apr 2006 15:04:31 +0200
Subject: Neturei Karta

SBA provides us with the source for the claim that:

>>the Satmar Rebbe in the abovementioned sefer CLEARLY writes against any
>>idea of handing Israel over to the Arabs

which can be found in
>>"the Hakdomo [p. 8 column 2 - at the bottom]" of "VaYoel Moshe"
{here's a selection of it}

I checked. And yes, this appears (original Hebrew followed by my translation):

"elah sh'tzrichin l'rachamei shamayim sh't'chalah ota hamalchut ach v'rak al y'dei koach m'l'malah m'et Hashem Yitbarech Shmo, lo al y'dei ha'umot ki im chas v'chalila yihyeh al y'dei ha'umot hi sakan g'dola l'yisrael kamuvan, v'Hashem Yitbarech Shmo y'rachem aleinu v'al kol ami Yisrael"

[however, we need the grace of heaven that would do away with that regime but only through the power of G-d, not by any of the nations for that, G-d forbid, would be a great danger to the Jewish people certainly, and G-d should have pity on us and all of Israel]

On the face of it, quite clear. Of course, just a few lines above, Reb Yoelisch notes that the extistence of the state of Israel is delaying Redemption and the coming of Mashiach, which would seem to be a very serious charge of guilt. He further stipulates that we Jews have no right to leave the Galut to attach ourselves to that state which is linked to the Samech-Mem. Nevertheless, I am not quite sure that someone could not interpret his words as that the danger is not specifically to Jews living in the land of Israel but foremost for the all of Jewry, which someone could take to mean Satmar Jews living in Brooklyn and Stamford Hill and Antwerp but I leave that up to the listmates.

If, though, we turn to page 126, first column, Reb Yoelisch becomes ambiguous again. There he defends the right of his followers to protest, fociferously, the existence of the state of Israel even by involving other nations. This, I would suggest, comes close to granting permission for NKers to assume that they can go to Iran and Durban, etc. After all, all is in the hands of Hashem.

Here's the source (he is referring to protesting over the monies that the state gets by raising funds for the Bonds that is done in all the countries and we might fear to protest publicly because of the nations and that all parties, including the religious ones, receive and therefore all partake in the abomination) I am starting from the 17th line from the top with necessary skips:

"v'zeh mo'il lifamim...v'chol ha'umot yodin sh'b'yisrael ein Torah v'ein Emunah...v'lachen k'shyesh tza'aka u'mech'ah bachutz neged zeh ad sh'shom'in gam ha'umot...v'ein chashash klal sh'yagi'ah eizeh nezek mizeh...v'ein safek sh'yesh lachshov efsharut sh'yiyeh ulai ktzat to'elet b'mech'ot ka'eleh".

[and this, at times, can be helpful...as all the Goyishe nations know that in Israel there is no Torah nor Faith...and therefore, when there is a shout and protest outside against this (fundraising) until even non-Jews become aware...and there is no concern that there will evolve any damage as a result of this...and there is no doubt that one can presume that there is perhaps some benefit in activities such as these]

In addition, on page 338, 5th line of second column, RY writes, alluding to the Talmud that one who can protest but doesn't, is called Wicked.

In my very humble opinion, any average NKer and even a few Satmars could easily presume that going to Iran, in addition to demonstrating on the streets of Manhattan, is sanctioned by Reb Yoelisch's thinking and philosophy. After all, all they are doing is arranging for HKBH to destroy the state of Israel and He will probably save all the Jews anyway, as long as those non-Jewish nations before whom the NKers shout and protest won't do anything about Israel that has no Torah nor Faith.

I Don't Know About the Music But...

...the picture of the Temple Mount is great!


Explanatory note:

What is Kosher-Gospel?

A lot of confusion arises from this seemingly dichotomous name. Some think, incorrectly, that this maybe some how linked to the Jews for Jesus movement, but it is not. In fact, the soul in Gospel Music, as it is known today, pre-dates the Christian religion. African tribes have carried soul for generations and Jews have been no strangers to this. A visit to a Yemenite synagogue or perhaps an Egyptian or a Moroccan synagogue, and rhythms indigenous to some of the people who inhabit the great continent of Africa will be heard. Before slaves were transported to the so-called New World , they had soul. Many of these Africans spoke many different languages, and represented a plethora of religions and musical styles including Muslims, Bantu, Jews etc…

Many of these slaves would try to communicate as best they could with each other until they had a common language. They developed what would be called a work song, a preamble to the blues. As they were introduced to Christianity, they incorporated this soul into the new hymns that they learned from their slave masters as well as the spirituals. Spirituals were also a form of communication, since slaves were not allowed to talk while they worked. However, the slave owners did like to hear them sing. For instance, “Down by the Riverside ” was a spiritual that the slaves used to communicate a location where they could meet secretly.

From the 1750’s until the mid 1800’s the term applied to this a cappella soul music was spirituals. And, in the 1800’s it developed into jubilee songs. It was not until the late 1930’s early 1940’s that people termed the new bluesy sounds of the urban religious life, gospel music. This was the style spear-headed by Thomas Dorsey, the former pianist for Ma Rainey. The word, gospel, is a Greek word meaning, good news. It is a wonder that later on in history; many descendants of the slaves remained Christian. Especially when many slave owners tried to use the Bible to validate their belief in the slave system. However, there was a number of blacks who returned to Islam and there also was a small wave who return to Judaism, the religion of their ancestors.

Joshua Nelson has spear-headed a new revolution in Jewish liturgical music. Like Thomas Dorsey, Joshua has taken the dull melodies of Jewish liturgical music and added the sounds of soul. But Joshua does not take full credit for this phenomenon. He acknowledges that the black synagogues organized in the late 1800’s and particularly The Commandment Keeper’s Synagogue organized by Rabbi Wentworth Matthew in the early 1900’s has had a long tradition of soul Jewish music. Located at 1, 123rd street in Harlem , NY , It is still a functioning synagogue. Like Mahalia Jackson did in the Christian world of gospel music, Joshua has taken the sounds of soul in Jewish liturgical music to the broader community.

SO… Hashem is the soul and nefesh in our Jewish Gospel Music. The soul of suffering speckled with joy from Hashem above. Jews of European background are no stranger to suffering, as well as Jews from around the world. And although we shall never forget Slavery, the Holocaust, prejudice, or injustice, we cannot continue singing sad songs. As it is said in the book of Psalms: “Weeping may endure for a night, but Joy comes in the morning.”

So let the singing begin…Gospel style!

Bon Appetite!

The trailer for the new Hollywood Pesach movie, "When Do We Eat?".

"When Do We Eat?" is the story of the "world's fastest Seder" gone horribly awry. It's about an old school dad (Michael Lerner) who's as tough on his sons as his father (Jack Klugman) is on him. On this night, however, one of the boys (Ben Feldman) slips Dad a dose of special, psychedelic Ecstasy in order "to give him a new perspective."

Meanwhile, Mom (Lesley Ann Warren) brings a handsome stranger to dinner and the kids take sides. By the end of the night, however, Dad's visions turn him into a modern day Moses intent on leading this hungry group to the promised land of family forgiveness.

Of course they're all so stubborn, it'd be easier to part the Red Sea.

A Blonde Moment

Tzippi Livni, dauughter of a senior Irgun freedom fighter, had this to say to Israel Radio and "Nightline":-

Palestinians who target soldiers are not terrorists, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told Israel Radio on Tuesday.

Livni said in a "Nightline" interview that attacks specifically against soldiers could be seen as "more legitimate" than attacks on Israeli civilians.

When asked if she was justifying killing or kidnapping soldiers, Livni said that she had spent years attempting to convince the international community to stop portraying terrorists as "freedom fighters."

[eventually, it should be here]

[oops. it's here actually and costs money.]

Oiy vey.

The difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter is not only in who they are attacking and in their methods but in the justness of their cause.

And the "Palestinians" do not, just do not have a just cause.

Therefore, when they go up against a member of the armed forces (which they very rarely do and if they do, it is not in a battle and not even an ambush of the like), they are still terrorists if the use terrorist tactics. Their whole essence is terror because their claim to statehood and national status is incomparable to that of Jews over this land.

They were offered territory. Zionist in pre-state Israel compromised on almost everything. Arabs utilized terror before the so-called "occupation" in 1967 and when offered some 97% of the "conquered" territories, they refused.

They had numerous chances to achieve much of what they wanted but their essence is to negate Zionism and deny Jews a state, anywhere in whta they call "Palestine". But for us, this land is not Ishmael's but Israel's.

A Political Limmerick

Ehud Olmert is intent on convergence;
A policy causing much divergence.
The Arabs are so pleased
That the Jews are thus squeezed,
Their terror will result in Israel's submergence.

No Clear Majority

Well, it's official.

On the point I made in the NYT and Jerusalem Post, there is substantial confirmation by the same outfit that all the media quote when they want to prove Israel is going Left, the March 2006 Peace Index of The Evens Program in Mediation - The Tami Steinetz Center and Conflict Resolution for Peace Research.


Here:-

As for the implications of the election results for the vital interests of the state in the political- security, social, and economic spheres, it turns out that only regarding the social field does a clear majority believe the elections were beneficial (41%, vs. 21% who claimed they were harmful or will have no impact), while for the other two fields opinions are equally divided.

Twenty- nine percent think the elections will be beneficial from a security standpoint, 28.5% say they will be harmful, and 24% do not expect them to change anything. As for the economic sphere, here the numbers are 29%, 29%, and 21%, respectively.

There'll Be A Brit, Right?

The news:-

It's a boy for actress Gwyneth Paltrow and Coldplay singer Chris Martin. Moses Martin, the couple's second child, was born during the weekend in New York City, the office of Paltrow publicist Stephen Huvane said Monday. No other information was being released.

So, there'll be a Brit?

Why not?

Okay, mother's a shiksa but 33 Rabbis?

SoHo or Ho, So!

I read Tova's letter in the NYT and realized I missed the article.

So, here first is her letter and the article follows.

Re "With Yoga, Comedy and Parties, Synagogues Entice Newcomers" (front page, April 4):

Though I consider myself a with-it and modern Orthodox Jewish teenager, I was perturbed when reading about the efforts of rabbis and synagogue leaders to come up with innovative ways "to bring Judaism to the cool and hip."

Judaism is not meant to be primarily cool and hip; its history is one of thousands of years, and its beauty lies in its age-old traditions and deep-rooted legacies.

If yoga sessions and comedy night are now the main attractions of synagogue worship, I can only wonder, What would Moses think?

As for any comparison between synagogues and the evangelical megachurches, it must be noted that any rabbi who knows his stuff can tell you that Judaism strongly discourages any attempts at proselytizing.

Tova Stulman
Brooklyn, April 4, 2006

April 4, 2006
With Yoga, Comedy and Parties, Synagogues Entice Newcomers
By MICHAEL LUO

Correction Appended

A hipster synagogue grows in SoHo, drawing large crowds with its "Torah cocktail parties" in fancy loft apartments and user-friendly prayer services designed especially for the uninitiated.

A group of New York-area congregations, along with others across the country, refashion their synagogues into religious multiplexes on the Sabbath, featuring programs like "Shabbat yoga" and comedy alongside traditional worship.

Several synagogues on Long Island — as well as in Seattle, Tucson and elsewhere — station volunteers in supermarket aisles as part of a national program that started several years ago to reach out to Jews who are buying matzos for Passover but do not belong to a house of worship.

These are just some of the ways that Jewish religious leaders, driven by fears about shrinking numbers, are becoming increasingly sophisticated and aggressive about marketing Judaism, turning to the same kinds of outreach techniques that evangelical Christians rode to mega-church success.

In some cases, Jewish groups are explicitly borrowing from the evangelical playbook to reach those who do not attend synagogue; in others, the parallels have been largely coincidental. Although the efforts to market Judaism have drawn criticism from some corners, Jewish leaders across the theological spectrum are realizing what evangelicals have long concluded, that the faithful are easily distracted in America's spiritual marketplace and religious institutions have to adjust if they hope to survive.

"I think what's going on is a product of the consumer-driven nature of this culture and the need to compete for people's time and attention," said Jack Wertheimer, provost and professor of American Jewish history at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. "Christians do it from the imperative of evangelizing. Jews are doing it far more because they see their community shrinking."

The evangelical pastors who built the mega-churches that rose to prominence in the 1980's and 90's absorbed lessons from the secular marketplace to repackage church services to appeal to people who found traditional church boring or intimidating. In a similar fashion — although their goal is not necessarily to produce "mega-synagogues" — Jewish leaders are revamping worship in their synagogues to make the experience more lively and participatory; they are reconfiguring their sanctuaries to make them less intimidating; they are rethinking how to welcome newcomers; and they are getting increasingly creative about getting people in the door.

"There's a feeling that all the old structures aren't working," said Rabbi Richard Jacobs of Westchester Reform Temple in Scarsdale, N.Y., who was part of a group of synagogue leaders that gathered recently in Los Angeles at the University of Judaism to get advice from the Rev. Rick Warren, author of "The Purpose Driven Life" and the evangelical pastor of Saddleback Church in Orange County, Calif., which draws more than 20,000 on weekends.

The event was organized by leaders of Synagogue 3000 — formerly Synagogue 2000 — a national effort to revitalize Jewish congregations. The program, which has attracted about 100 synagogues across the country, has sought to learn from both the evangelical and corporate worlds.

"The world is a different world," said Rabbi Jacobs. "There's a greater marketplace of spiritual options for people. If synagogues are not compelling places, who's going to bother to join and be involved?"

Jewish leaders are grappling with the vast numbers of Jews who do not belong to a synagogue, along with shrinking numbers over all. According to the 2000-1 National Jewish Population Survey, 5.2 million Jews live in the United States, a drop of 300,000 from 1990 despite a wave of Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union. The survey also found that a majority of Jews do not belong to a synagogue. Those who fail to affiliate with synagogues or other Jewish organizations are much more likely to intermarry, according to researchers, and much more likely to have children who do not identify themselves as Jewish.

As a result, with Passover, one of the most significant holidays on the Jewish calendar, coming next week, subtle and not so subtle efforts to lure Jews, especially members of the younger generation, back to services are in full swing.

The Town and Village Synagogue on East 14th Street in Manhattan, affiliated with the Conservative movement, is organizing a coffeehouse for Friday night, with people sharing poetry on the Passover theme of freedom. Attendance on Friday nights has increased to 150 from 50. The National Jewish Outreach Program, an Orthodox organization best known for its heavily advertised Shabbat Across America project, which has become a national phenomenon with its radio jingles, toll-free numbers and billboards, is helping synagogues across the country advertise and put on seders geared to those unfamiliar with the holiday's rituals.

Volunteers from Congregation Beth David in Saratoga, Calif., are setting up tables at two nearby supermarkets before Passover.

"The idea is, 'Listen, everybody goes shopping,' " said Rabbi Aaron Schonbrun of Congregation Beth David. "Even your average Jewish person that may be vaguely aware that it's Passover, or may not be aware it's Passover, or is just in the supermarket."

The pioneers of outreach to secular Jews are the Chabad-Lubavitchers, members of an Orthodox Hasidic sect that is based in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn. Although their tactics have sometimes drawn controversy, their work has become a model for many Jews.

Dovi and Esty Scheiner, a young Lubavitch couple who moved from Crown Heights to TriBeCa several years ago, are trying to bring Judaism to the cool and hip in Lower Manhattan.

In order to reach the downtown audience, it was necessary to rethink the traditional synagogue approach, said Rabbi Scheiner. "This is a very anti-establishment, anti-organized-religion type of community."

Instead of holding religious services, they gave fancy cocktail parties in art galleries and lofts. In the middle of the events, Rabbi Scheiner would offer a few words of Jewish teaching.

The parties have now given way to the SoHo Synagogue, which they believe is the first Jewish house of worship in the neighborhood. About 250 people attended a dedication party last month for the synagogue's first home, on Varick Street near Canal Street. It is a stylishly decorated 5,000-square-foot space, complete with chic couches, a lacy flora-and-fauna-patterned curtain that functions as the mechitza separating the sexes and an avant-garde sheet-metal ark to store the Torah.

"We wanted it to be a place where somebody who had never been to synagogue before, or someone who went to synagogue as a child and had a bad experience, would come," Mrs. Scheiner said.

The Manhattan Jewish Experience, an Orthodox outreach organization for young Jewish professionals on the Upper West Side, offers slickly advertised social events, including a regular "Monday Night Lounge" that features music and a lecture on topics ranging from dating to kabbalah.

Once inside the organization's orbit, people are encouraged to attend a beginners' worship service. There are also classes for the more advanced. Amy Gitlitz, 33, started attending the organization's events two years ago. At the time, she was working 90 hours a week at a law firm. Today, however, she does not work from Friday evening to Saturday evening. She does not turn on the lights. She does not answer her cellphone. And she keeps kosher. She attributes her transformation to the Manhattan group'scontemporary approach.

"Everything in the world nowadays is about marketing," she said. "If Judaism is really slow and boring and doesn't try to do anything to compete with the parties and the music and the movies, it's going to lose."

Some 50 synagogues across the country have been experimenting with "Synaplex Shabbat," a national program that began in 2003 that encourages congregations to enhance their Sabbath services by offering an array of nontraditional extras.

The Society for the Advancement of Judaism, a Reconstructionist and Conservative synagogue on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, for instance, has organized Sabbath programs around tai chi and nature walks. Others have tried yoga classes and stand-up comedy as a means of Sabbath observance.

The program borrows in some ways from the mega-church concept because it offers people "multiple entry points" into synagogue life, said Rabbi Hayim Herring, the program's executive director.

But just as critics have charged the purveyors of the mega-church movement with peddling a watered-down, consumer-oriented brand of faith, Jewish religious leaders experimenting with new ways to reach the nonobservant have been accused of promoting Judaism-lite.

"A lot of times these marketing approaches fool themselves," said Rafael Guber, a Jewish researcher who wrote a recent column in The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles entitled, "Selling Judaism: Let's Make It Harder." "They say, first, we'll make it easy and get them in, and then after they get in, we'll get the discipline and structure. The problem is nobody ever gets to Step 2."

But Synaplex's impact has been remarkable, doubling and tripling Friday night or Saturday morning attendance in many places. Although it is unclear whether people have gone deeper in their religious observance, for many rabbis it is enough for now that they are there at all.

"Truthfully, I'd rather have people in shul on Friday night, hanging out at the synagogue, than out at a bar," said Rabbi Laurence Sebert of the Town and Village Synagogue and a Synaplex participant. "It's all small steps."

And We Have a Peace Treaty with these Guys

The Jordanian Press Association (JPA) has threatened to punish member journalists who visit Israel in violation of its decision to bar normalisation of ties with the Jewish state, according to local newspaper al-Rai.

The JPA council was responding to local press reports that 40 Jordanian journalists, most of whom work for the state broadcaster, planned to travel to Israel to attend a three-week training course at Haifa University designed to spread a 'culture of peace' in the region.

The association recalled its members that both the JPA and the Arab Press Federation prohibit any formalisation with the Jewish state.

And Jews?

The report out is that:-

Syria's first comprehensive field study of violence against women has concluded that nearly one married woman in four surveyed had been beaten. The study was released last week as part of a report on Syria by the United Nations Development Fund for Women.

The findings have been published in local news media, helping to draw attention to topics, like domestic abuse and honor killings, that have long been considered taboo in this conservative society.

The study was carried out under the supervision of the quasi-governmental General Union of Women, which oversees the welfare of Syria's women. The study included nearly 1,900 families, selected as a random sample, including a broad range of income levels and all regions. The men and women in each family were questioned separately.

Twenty-five per cent. At least.

And how many Jews used to be beaten when they lived there?

A Neturei Karta Disappreciation

What? You like this picture better?

Kotel Online

If you ever get bored (gosh!) reading my assertions, check out a triple Kotel Web Cam
site.

Here.

(Kippah tip: HaMikdash)

Arab Resistance

One way to resist arrest, I guess.

Between Bet Sira and Amona

At Amona, the police went wild.

At Bet Sira, as these pictures and accompanying story tell, the protestors were not attacked.

As I have suggested to my colleagues, non-violent demos are an art. And sometimes, you have to place yourself in situations that you might feel is degrading or unworthy. But they do carry a powerful PR value. If only we can learn.

This One Got Lost (I Think)

I don't think I put this item up at the time:

Request to Investigate Haaretz for Incitement Filed With AG
13:54 Mar 07, '05 / 26 Adar 5765

(IsraelNN.com) A request has been filed with the Attorney General to investigate the publisher of a caricature in the Haaretz newspaper for incitement. The request followed the publication of a caricature of a female settler pointing a gun at the head of an Israeli. The caricature was published by the 'Yahad' movement alongside the daily paper's headlines.

Yisrael Medad, a resident of the Shomron community of Shilo and the educational director of the Begin Center, petitioned State Attorney General Menachem Mazuz, asking that he announce the opening of an investigation on suspicion of criminal incitement against the Yahad/Meretz Party, the paper's illustrations editor Uri Zakai, and Haaretz itself.

The petition joins a similar one filed by MK Aryeh Eldad (National Union) last month.

Quip Quotes

I am trying a new joke style.

Funny quips from Biblical quotes.

Like:

1. David, you'll stay away from Goliath?

I won't get closer than a stone's throw.

2. Yitzhak you busy?

Yeah, I am all tied up.

3. Solomon, decide already!

Alright, we'll make it a split decision.


LK added these:

4. Awww, Delilah, cut it out...

5. Moses, how expensive could it be to get to the other side?

Who cares, let's split it.


Anybody want to contribute?

Klein Klonks 'Em

Morton A. Klein, National President of the Zionist Organization of America, had a letter of his published in today's New York Times. And it goes like this:-

Your April 6 editorial "The Semantics of Mideast Peace" stated that the Palestinians "crave and deserve" a "viable state." If they really "crave" a state, why didn't they accept the offer of Israel's prime minister, Ehud Barak, to Yasir Arafat six years ago to establish one on 95 percent of the West Bank and all of Gaza? And why did they vote to be led by the terrorist group Hamas, whose call for Israel's destruction and the killing of Jews by "armed resistance" make Palestinian statehood less likely and more dangerous to a stable Middle East? Palestinian polls also show substantial support for suicide bombings and the return to Israel of the so-called refugees and their children and grandchildren, which would end Israel as a Jewish state. Does support of such policies and leaders make them deserving of a state? Hardly.

I would have added, as I have on these blogpages, that Israel and the pre-state Zionist Organization had consistently adopted a yielding policy on territory which has never satisfied the Arabs. I would not hesitate to suggest that they really don't want a state - just that we shouldn't have one. That is the essence of "Palestinianism" - the negating of Zionism and the Jewish national concern.

^

He's So Optimistic (gulp)

Robert Baer, who was a C.I.A. officer in the Middle East and elsewhere for two decades, told Seymour M. Hersh that

Ahmadinejad and his Revolutionary Guard colleagues in the Iranian government “are capable of making a bomb, hiding it, and launching it at Israel. They’re apocalyptic Shiites. If you’re sitting in Tel Aviv and you believe they’ve got nukes and missiles—you’ve got to take them out. These guys are nuts, and there’s no reason to back off.”

No further comment necessary.

Screwball Siegman

Since I've met the man and discussed political issues with him (in the lobby of the then Laromme, now the Inbal) the headline above, believe me is appropriate.

If you don't trust me, read this:-

The possibility of an Israeli–Palestinian agreement that enjoys comparable—indeed, perhaps even greater—legitimacy than Arafat could have conferred on it may have been revived by Hamas's entry into Palestinian political life.

and

On the other hand, an Israeli and Western policy of engagement and negotiation with Hamas could encourage fundamental changes in Hamas's policies, and eventually in its ideology. One great advantage of a strategy of engagement with Hamas over a strategy of isolating and undermining it is that Israel would be able to move from a policy of engagement to one of confrontation if it becomes clear that engagement has failed.

The whole long article is here.

Making a (Not-So-Kosher) Seder in Berlin

This I found interesting, from a gastronomical point-of-view:-

You would think it would be easy to pull together a Seder in Berlin, since many typically Jewish foods are mainstream German fare too: potato pancakes with applesauce, poppy-seed cake, rye bread. Sauerbraten looks and tastes a lot like brisket. Even matzo balls bear a striking resemblance to Knödel, starchy balls that are usually served as a side dish with gravy. But the devil is in the details. Knödel, for instance, are made with bread. While many variations are available — whole wheat, spelt, potato flour — unleavened meal of any kind is impossible to come by. (Conversely, when my husband made a traditional German Christmas meal for my family in Cambridge, Mass., last year, duck breasts and red cabbage were easy to find, but when he asked for Knödel mix at Whole Foods, he was led directly to the wide range of matzo meal in Aisle 4. But that's another story.. . .)

And so, in the spirit of potluck, my Seders involve more than a little improvisation. One year, as a symbolic gesture, I ordered a frozen kosher lamb bone for the Seder plate from Munich, but that was overdoing it. We use nonkosher meat from the local organic butcher. The tsimmes is made from sweet potatoes tracked down at a Thai market near our apartment. In the States, chopped liver is made with schmaltz, which poses a problem here: Jewish schmaltz is made from rendered chicken fat, German schmaltz from pork; I use olive oil. One friend makes great horseradish with beets from scratch. Another, who comes from five generations of Jews in Atlanta, makes haroset with grape juice instead of kosher wine. My friend Patricia glazes the roast lamb with Turkish pomegranate syrup. (Berlin has one of the biggest Turkish populations of any city outside of Istanbul, so Turkish products are widely available, and many of them, including freshly baked macaroons, are perfect for Passover.) Handmade chocolate-covered walnuts and an incredible array of dried-fruit delicacies come from the Greek store across the street from me. What appears to be a jewelry store behind KaDeWe, Berlin's largest department store, turns out to be an Israeli food depot selling delicious baba ghanouj and, yes, matzo.

And then came this sledge-hammer addition:-

After we bought our apartment, my husband and I had all the wallpaper stripped and the original walls replastered. In our daughter's room, we found paintings of characters from fairy tales: a blue Puss in Boots, Hansel and Gretel, a grandmother and her gingerbread house. Based on the last layer of wallpaper removed, we were told that these paintings were made around 1930. I went downstairs and asked my oldest neighbor, a man who was born in the building, about the people who lived here then. "A Jewish family," he said. "Almost everyone in our building was Jewish before the war." Then he told me how they had been rounded up in the courtyard and taken away. He didn't remember the event himself, he said, but his mother had described it, and the image had always stayed with him.

[Hmmm. My second Holocaust posting today]

A New "Holocaust" Work of Fiction

Paul Gray has written a book review of "Suite Francaise".

It's author, Irène Némirovsky was born in the Ukraine and had lived in France since 1919. She established herself in her adopted country's literary community having published nine novels and a biography of Chekhov. She composed "Suite Française" in the village of Issy-l'Evêque (located here), where she, her husband and two young daughters had settled after fleeing Paris. On July 13, 1942, French policemen, enforcing the German race laws, arrested Némirovsky as "a stateless person of Jewish descent." She was transported to Auschwitz, where she died in the infirmary on Aug. 17.

The two short novels that comprise this book were rediscovered and now have appeared in English.

What caught my eye was this section of the review:

But Némirovsky had more plans for "Suite Française," as an appendix to this volume makes clear. In her notebook, she sketched the possibility of a work in five parts. "Storm in June" and "Dolce" were to be followed by: "3. Captivity; 4. Battles?; 5. Peace?" The question marks punctuate Némirovsky's peculiar problem; she was trying to write a historical novel while the outcome of that history remained unknown. The fourth and fifth parts of the book "are in limbo," she observed, "and what limbo! It's really in the lap of the gods since it depends on what happens."

We now know what happened. Némirovsky lost her life in what she foresaw as "Captivity." The improbable survival of her two novellas is a cause for celebration and also for grief at another reminder of the horrors of the Holocaust. She wrote what may be the first work of fiction about what we now call World War II. She also wrote, for all to read at last, some of the greatest, most humane and incisive fiction that conflict has produced.

And I am left with the question just how Jewish, if at all, was the author? Did it make a difference in the end? And her daughter - any Jewish feeling? Was her Jewishness expressed in her fiction? Did the Holocaust destroy all that too?

What Reporters (Can) Do

There's a flap over at the gossip columns of the New York Post's Page Six.

What concerns me is this statement, recorded surrepitiously, made by the main villin, a Jared Paul Stern:-

Mr. Stern spoke of Page Six's power.

"We know how to destroy people," Mr. Stern said, according to a person reading a transcript of the meeting. "It's what we do. We do it without creating liability. That's our specialty."

Well-Meant Intentions on the Way to Hell

The New York Times reports that:-

Barely a week in office, the Palestinian prime minister from Hamas faces not only diplomatic isolation and a bankrupt treasury but also an intense rivalry with Fatah, the longtime Palestinian power, over control of the heavily armed security agencies.

Heavily armed?

This is what Menachem Begin had intended:-

A strong local police force will be established

(see here, too)

Well, the road to hell is paved with well-meaning intentions.

Ah, But What Else is There?

The newly revealed Gospel of Judas elicited a few interesting responses.

Here's a great one from a Catholic:-

Father Senior, president of the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago and a member of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, which advises the pope, said the Vatican was unlikely to regard the Gospel of Judas as a threat. He said that the Roman Catholic Church's likely response would be to "affirm the canonical texts" in the New Testament, rather than seeking to refute each new discovery.

"If the Gospel of Judas suddenly became something that hundreds of thousands of Christians were claiming as their revelation and scripture, perhaps the church would come out with some kind of statement," Father Senior said in an interview. "But mostly I think it's just not even on the radar screen."

He added, "I'm just glad it wasn't found in a bank vault in the Vatican."

So, what is really in that vault?

Not Being That Noble

The Forward reports on a Jewish fella, an academic lecturer, who, while Jewish, is very much against cancelling classes for the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur at his university in Toronto because it discriminates against non-Jews.

Here are some of the details:-

A York University professor has lodged a complaint with the Ontario Human Rights Commission, alleging that the school discriminates against non-Jewish students because it cancels classes for three days annually during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

David Noble, a Jewish professor at York, filed the human rights complaint with the quasi-judicial commission after failing to convince university administrators that they should either cancel classes on all religious holidays or eliminate the practice. Noble, who teaches social and political thought in the Arts Faculty plans to hold classes on the High Holy Days in defiance of the current policy. According to Noble, this policy is in violation of the York University Act of 1965, which forbids the school to impose religious observances on any of its members.

About 10% of York's 50,000-member student body is Jewish, the largest Jewish presence on any Canadian campus. York is the only university in the country to cancel classes on any religious holidays other than statutory holidays such as Christmas. Students of any faith can be exempt from classes on their holidays without penalty if they speak with their professors in advance.

But what about any other cancellations, if they exist?

Noble insisted he is equally opposed to the cancellation of classes for Christmas and for the Friday before Easter. "But those are statutory holidays, and it's not within the purview of York University to act on it," he said. "The reason I'm focusing on Jewish holidays is because York is."

Ah, statutory. Like when the state forces religious holidays on you. That's okay?

And what about the very special observances of those three High Holidays? Going to synagogue. Not riding. Not writing.

And Noble is very Jewish:-

Asked whether he is a secular or religious Jew, Noble said: "Those are not categories that interest me. I have a certificate of my circumcision... if you want to see it."

Actually, I wouldn't want to see anything connected to Noble. Not his certificate nor his...

Even Amira Hass Knows

As I and others have been saying for years, territorial withdrawal has one major problem.

Arabs who term themselves "Palestinians" do not accept any "Israeli/Zionist" presence anywhere in "their" territory. Hamas is not extreme in this conviction (see here, especially Article 11).

So, along comes Amira Hass and writes thisagainst the idea of Olmert that Israel can diminutate [that's a new word I fashioned] unilaterally and without agreement and that the Arabs will be agreeable to this solution:-

But the invisible Palestinians see and feel...

...That is an illusion - like the illusion that reigned at the time of Oslo - that the Palestinians would accept the expansion of the settlements...The convergence plan, which coagulates the violence of occupation in densely populated Palestinian areas, will bring forth and intensify three types of Palestinian rage: national rage due to the sabotage of the Palestinian project for a state, development and independence; economic rage of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who lost their land, property and livelihood to the Jews who prosper on the other side of the barbed wire; and religious rage, of those who turn for solace to the Koran and Allah, where they can find explanations stating that's the way Jews are.

The supporters of convergence and its architects are deceiving themselves by thinking that all these forms of rage won't burst out, or that it will always be possible to suppress them. Indeed, it is difficult to predict when and how the rage will erupt, but sooner or later, they will be back disrupting the dreams of comfort and convenience at the expense of another nation.

Hass, of course, is deceiving herself into thinking that any two-state solution will be amenable to these Arabs.

A Pagan Israelite

You don't understand the title?

Read on:

Soon after he learned how to box, Shemuel Pagan gave his father a bloody lip. He smashed his dad's mouth with a wicked uppercut, turning a sparring session into a mess, and setting the stage for what would become one of the most incongruously entertaining marriages between a boxer and a trainer.

Shemuel is boxing in the final of the 119-pound open division against Earl Edwards on Thursday. The Pagans belong to a religious organization called the Hebrew Israelites, which precludes them from training or fighting on the Sabbath, from Friday sundown to Saturday sundown.

They make up for lost training time at Gleason's Gym in Brooklyn, where the father yells instructions; the son tries to explain himself, and the trainers who mill about in the gym gossip about their escapades the very next day.

To make him move his feet faster, Robert uses a cane made of bamboo that he flicks at Shemuel's legs. To make Shemuel move his head, Robert uses a tennis ball taped to a towel that he waves around the ring like a lariat. When Shemuel resists, Robert and his co-trainer, Michael Kozlowski, a former Israeli and Russian national team coach, descend on him like boxing's version of Oprah and Dr. Phil, giving lots of encouragement.

Shemuel, a 5-foot-6-inch sparkplug with fast hands and fast feet, scrunches his face and glowers, but he never stops moving.

As a 16-year-old in the 119-pound novice division last year, Shemuel knocked out 20-year-old Richard Acevedo with a terrific left hand in the Golden Gloves finals. The fight was endlessly looped on the Madison Square Garden Network, turning Pagan, who is left-handed into a local hero.

The "Commie" Chickens Out

Yeshiva University's campus student newspaper, The Commentator, ("Commie" for us oldies), chickened out.

In their report of YU's week-long activities in Israel, the fracas caused by Rabbi Meir Goldwicht's faux pas, for which he was asked to apologize, was left out of the paper's report.

Here's the relevant section:-

The Semikhah ceremony came on the heels of the kickoff of the weeklong string of events across Israel starting on March 17. These included a yom iyun at the Gruss Institute's beit medrash earlier in the day and a widely-attended Shabbaton the day before at Jerusalem's Ramada Renaissance Hotel. The programming, which mainly comprised of panel discussions in topics involving the Yeshiva graduate schools, is a manifestation of President Joel's Administration's to further utilize the Jerusalem campus - both for alumni and current Yeshiva students' interests.

reported by Ben Ehrenkranz [who] is currently studying at Torat Shraga on the S. Dnaiel (sic!) Abraham Israel Program.

Well, I see freedom of expression and conscience is dead at my old alma mater.

So I sent the paper this letter:

Ben Ehrenkranz's report on the YU week in Israel activities left out one item: Rabbi Meir Goldwicht's apology for remarks he made at the Seudah Shlishit of the Shabbaton. Since almost 700 persons were present, I'm sure this qualifies as being in farhesia. I am not asking that sides be taken for or against the remarks or whether the content be detailed. But that the incident would be glossed over entirely indicates that freedom of expression seems to be a liberty The Commentator still needs to assure for itself.

You can send a letter, too.
Click here.

And How Was Your Bar Mitzvah?

Anyone see the movie?

(click "Trailer")

Shmuel Katz's Opinion on the Elections

I'm glad Olmert didn't do as well as expected, but I'm afraid that what the people of Israel are saying is very disturbing. There is a definite listlessness - as seen from the low voter turnout. Nobody seemed to be very concerned which way the race would go. No one expressed strong opinions about anything. All the while, Olmert never really spoke about what he expected from the Arabs - only what the Jews would give up.

The listlessness I referred to reminds me of 1933, the year Hitler was elected, and the Oxford Union passed a resolution that "this house will not fight for king and country." Has that become our attitude as well?

I had no suspicion that the Pensioners' Party would do so well. Many young people (probably left-wing) seemed to have found a way out of not voting by supporting the pensioners.

As for the Likud, it should hide its head in shame! I had advised Uzi Landau to leave the Likud. He's a man of principle and doesn't belong there.

The national camp has no Churchill. But it must nevertheless take a line straight from Jabotinsky: Tell the people to prepare for war with the Arabs, because the enemy is thinking of war all the time. And we need to go back to the basics and explain - to the West and to ourselves - what this struggle is about.

Jerusalem Post, March 30, 2006

Relevant to Israel?

More Autonomy Approved for Catalonia
Friday March 31, 2006 5:01 AM

MADRID, Spain (AP) - Spain's lower house of parliament approved a divisive proposal Thursday to grant greater autonomy to Catalonia and boost the wealthy region's tax collecting and judicial powers.

Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega, said in Congress the charter would help modernize the Spanish nation. ``This text builds a stronger Spain,'' she said. The Popular Party, however, maintained its opposition to the charter, with party leader Mariano Rajoy describing it as ``a time bomb'' that could lead to the region's secession from Spain.

The charter, which refers to the north eastern region as ``a nation,'' provides that Catalonia will get a larger share of income tax revenues, valued tax and taxes on gasoline and tobacco. Regional authorities would also have a greater say over the court system, which in the rest of Spain is under the jurisdiction of the Spanish government.

Is this idea workable for Judea and Samaria?

Would Menachem Beginhad approved of it?

========================

UPDATE


My neighbor who originates from Catalonia sent me this comment:-

The monopolies (electricity, telephone, gas, railway, software and Internet, movies, television, mail...) and almost all American companies have their headquarters in Madrid and pay their taxes there (but making their business most in Catalonia). Yet, for instance, the control over Barcelona's airport should continue being held by a centralized state-owned company (a unique case in today's Europe!). And so and so...

This new statute is aimed to maintain the current Spanish control over the Central Catalonia's region (the one ruled from Barcelona: Majorca and Valencia are not considered part of Catalonia by Spain and France -- thus and obviously, Margalit or Rav Nissan are not Catalan people accordingly to them).

By the way, Catalan people are no nationalist. They prefer peace to independence. They seem much German Jewish people as are showed in The Pity of It All (a wondrous essay by Amos Elon, a book I should translate into Catalan, G-d willing).

The news about Catalonia are controlled by Madrid's and Barcelona's Spanish-nationalist press, as well. There are no foreign reporters living in Catalonia and writing from there, or being able to read and speak in Catalan.

Best regards.

Ariel

Graphic Words

Seems someone took a few "in-your-face" remarks I made a few years ago and made them quite graphic.

But really graphic.

Looking for something else, I scrolled across this:

take a look.

Schick Gets Socked; Cops Get Rocked

Hundreds of Hasidic Jews surrounded a Brooklyn police station Tuesday night, chanting "No justice - no peace," lighting bonfires, and eventually torching a police car.

They were protesting the arrest of Arthur Schick, owner of Schick's Bakery, who was pulled over for talking on his cellular phone while driving. According to police, Schick became uncooperative and was arrested. Two men who intervened as he was being put into a police van were also arrested.

Sariel Widawsky, co-owner of Schick's Bakery, said that as soon as Schick stepped out of his car, police officers pushed him up against the vehicle and placed his hands behind his back. "People saw what the police were doing to a 70-to-80-year-old man and started screaming at police to leave him alone," she told the New York Times.

"They literally threw him down into the van," Mr. Widawsky continued. "He fell on the first step. They picked him up and manhandled him into the van."

Police refused to comment on the accusations of excessive force.

News of the arrests spread quickly through the tight-knit Hassidic community, and residents took to the streets to protest.

Riot police officers dispersed the crowds, which were largely calm by 9:30 p.m.

Protesters created two large bonfires out of discarded cardboard, and later torched a police car.

That was from The Jerusalem Post.

Here's the NY Daily News:-

Two men tried to interfere with the bust - one allegedly jumping on a cop's back - and ended up under arrest themselves. Witnesses said enraged Hasidim surrounded a nearby squad car, and cops in riot gear quickly swarmed in.

As rumors spread through the crowd that Schick had been beaten, tensions escalated and hundreds of people in traditional black garb poured onto 16th Ave. from 46th to 50th Sts. They set fire to old magazines, fruit boxes and other trash up and down the avenue.

Firefighters raced to put out at least seven blazes and water down the streets.

Demonstrators smashed the windows of one police cruiser and torched another by throwing a gasoline-soaked rag into its backseat. A helicopter searchlight swept the street, and riot police formed lines along 16th Ave., hollering, "Back on the sidewalk!"

Here's the NYPost:-

At one point, more than 1,000 people flooded onto 16th Avenue between 45th and 48th streets in Borough Park, many pushing and shoving police.

Cops in riot gear struggled to hold back the mob as a firetruck shot water into the air to douse the many small trash fires.

Schick, 75, was talking on his cellphone as he got into his car and started driving away, prompting officers to stop him, the witnesses said.

A cop asked for his license, but Schick, who's hard of hearing, couldn't understand and got out of the car, the witnesses said.

But luckily:-

Schick, whose nephew Avi is an assistant to state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, according to sources, was released late last night.

Wow. We could use some of these revived Maccabean freedom fighters in Israel, as long as we point them in the right direction.

==================
UPDATE
Click here for the existing video.

Kippah tip to Yeshivah World.

Big Bold Bad Israelis

This sounds really terrible:-

An Israel Air Force aircraft Tuesday bombed the northern Gaza Strip soon after Palestinians fired four Qassam rocket into southern Israel, wounding at least two people and leaving deep craters in the ground, rescue workers said.

The aircraft fired three missiles into Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' presidential compound. The missiles landed at the Ansar 2 compound about 100 meters from Abbas' office. Abbas was at his main office in the West Bank at the time of the attack.

What, attacking the PA Presidential Compound? Like the White House? Like Whitehall?
Who do those Israelis think they are?

Until you read the very next sentence:-

The compound, formerly used by Palestinian security forces to store equipment, has been abandoned due to previous Israeli attacks.

So, it was a big, bold, bad nothing.

I'm in the New York Times, Again

In a story published in the New York Times
on Othniel Schneller, resident of Ma'aleh Mikhmas, who was elected an MK on the Kadima list, thereby working against his own best interests by promoting a further withdrawal plan, I am quoted in this context:-

Meanwhile, the settlers, who have wielded considerable political clout for years, now find themselves on the defensive, after the evacuation of settlements from the Gaza Strip last summer and the prospect of an even larger West Bank withdrawal.

The settler leaders say that they believe public support for Mr. Olmert is lukewarm, and that he will have difficulty maintaining a stable coalition in a country where governments crumble with regularity.

Yisrael Medad, a spokesman for the Yesha Council, the body that represents settlers, urged Mr. Olmert to focus initially on social issues, rather than push an evacuation plan that is certain to face resistance and create division among Israelis.

"We should say to Olmert: hold off for two years, fix up the economic and social problems, and then let's see where we are," said Mr. Medad, who lives in Shiloh, a settlement that is also beyond the separation barrier. "If you start to move against the communities here, you will get demonstrations and protests."

My point, lost a bit here, is that Kadima most certainly did not achieve a sweeping mandate to move decisively on disengagement and that many more votes went to parties that promoted social welfare issues.

Judaism-Islam Cooperation

This story has finally gained big-time media attention:-

Israel’s kosher mobile tweaks Arab interest
Cell phone blocks text messages, sex lines for ultra-Orthodox

The Associated Press
Updated: 5:27 a.m. ET March 31, 2006

JERUSALEM - It sounds like the setup for a punch line: What do you get when you cross an ultra-Orthodox rabbi with a mobile phone?

But the “kosher phone” is real and its developers are serious about looking beyond the religious enclaves of Israel. Some Arab companies even have inquired about the phone’s main feature: keeping out sex lines and other worldly temptations.

“There’s interest out there in a conservative phone,” said Abrasha Burstyn, the chief executive officer at Mirs Communications Ltd., an Israeli subsidiary of Motorola Inc. and pioneer of the kosher mobile that debuted last year.

The phones — carrying the seal of approval from Israel’s rabbinical authorities — have been one of the most successful mergers of technology and centuries-old tradition in the ultra-Orthodox community, which is most widely recognized by the men’s black garb based on the dress of 19th century European Jews.

The kosher phone is stripped down to its original function: making and receiving calls. There’s no text messaging, no Internet access, no video options, no camera. More than 10,000 numbers for phone sex, dating services and other offerings are blocked. A team of rabbinical overseers makes sure the list is up to date.

- - - -

Some saw the phones as a non-threatening convenience. Others believed the sophisticated “third generation” phones offered an unhealthy freedom: the ability to download pornography or allow young people to make furtive contact with the opposite sex — which is highly restricted in ultra-Orthodox society. The conservative magazine Family called the multitasking new phones “a candy store for the evil impulse.”

The rabbis’ solution — find a cell phone that’s only a phone.

“They saw the future and were frightened,” said one of Israel’s most prominent attorneys, Jacob Weinroth, who was asked by the rabbis to approach Israel’s four main cellular companies with the idea of the pared-down phone. “In 10 years, we may have commercials coming over the phone. Maybe gambling, dating. The community wanted to keep the cell phones, but not allow this commercial world to enter their communities through them.”

Israeli Arabs — about 20 percent of the population — have also taken notice of the phones as a possible option for those trying to protect conservative Islamic sensibilities.

Some Arab cell phone providers see the same attraction. They have sought information from MIRS via envoys from Jordan, which has a peace treaty with Israel, said Burstyn, who declined to give further details of the contacts.

- - - -

“If you think about it, the (ultra-Orthodox) religious community is not going to movies and other things. These days, the kind of phone you carry is part of who you are,” said Shalom. “Some rabbis didn’t like it, but that’s the reality.”

Aren't we clever?

Pesach - The Culinary Version

From an item in the NYT:-

For Passover, which starts on April 12 this year, Simply Divine, a glatt kosher caterer, is selling prepared dishes like gefilte fish ($6.50 a person), tender brisket in a rich mushroom and wine sauce ($22 a person) and a dark chocolate cake with chocolate sauce ($40, to serve 10).

There is a four-serving minimum. A complete four-course dinner is $50 a person. Pickup is available from 623 11th Avenue (46th Street); delivery is $40 in Manhattan and $45 in other boroughs.

Ah, Gallus (that's "Exile" in Ashkenazi pronounciation, not Latin).

Mark Gets It Right

Mark Levenson gets it right in a letter the New York Times published Saturday:-

You write that by unilateral withdrawal, "Israel can start to rid itself of its self-created problem in the West Bank" (editorial, March 30). Israel has "rid itself" of Gaza, but anti-Jewish attacks from there have only escalated.

Those who think that Israeli control of the West Bank is "the problem" should recall that Palestinians committed themselves to Israel's destruction in the P.L.O. Charter, three years before Israel gained control of the West Bank in a defensive war.

Unless the Palestinians were prescient, the then-nonexistent occupation had no role in sparking Palestinian enmity

.


This is such a simple argument point but all ignore it.

What is the focus of Palestinian enmity?

Territory or Jews?

Oppression or Zionism?

Geography or Existence?

"Olmert's unilateralism is a recipe for conflict"

Here's Haniyeh's op-ed:-

A just peace or no peace

Israeli unilateralism is a recipe for conflict - as is the west's racist refusal to treat Palestinians as equals

Ismail Haniyeh
Friday March 31, 2006
The Guardian

Do policymakers in Washington and Europe ever feel ashamed of their scandalous double standards? Before and since the Palestinian elections in January, they have continually insisted that Hamas comply with certain demands. They want us to recognise Israel, call off our resistance, and commit ourselves to whatever deals Israel and the Palestinian leadership reached in the past.

But we have not heard a single demand of the Israeli parties that took part in this week's elections, though some advocate the complete removal of the Palestinians from their lands. Even Ehud Olmert's Kadima party, whose Likud forebears frustrated every effort by the PLO to negotiate a peace settlement, campaigned on a programme that defies UN security council resolutions. His unilateralism is a violation of international law. Nevertheless no one, not even the Quartet - whose proposals for a settlement he continues to disregard, as his predecessor Ariel Sharon did - has dared ask anything of him.

Olmert's unilateralism is a recipe for conflict. It is a plan to impose a permanent situation in which the Palestinians end up with a homeland cut into pieces made inaccessible because of massive Jewish settlements built in contravention of international law on land seized illegally from the Palestinians. No plan will ever work without a guarantee, in exchange for an end to hostilities by both sides, of a total Israeli withdrawal from all the land occupied in 1967, including East Jerusalem; the release of all our prisoners; the removal of all settlers from all settlements; and recognition of the right of all refugees to return.

On this, all Palestinian factions and people agree, including the PLO, whose revival is essential so that it can resume its role in speaking for the Palestinians and presenting their case to the world.

The problem is not with any particular Palestinian group but with the denial of our basic rights by Israel. We in Hamas are for peace and want to put an end to bloodshed. We have been observing a unilateral truce for more than a year without reciprocity from the Israeli side. The message from Hamas and the Palestinian Authority to the world powers is this: talk to us no more about recognising Israel's "right to exist" or ending resistance until you obtain a commitment from the Israelis to withdraw from our land and recognise our rights.

Little will change for the Palestinians under Olmert's plan. Our land will still be occupied and our people enslaved and oppressed by the occupying power. So we will remain committed to our struggle to get back our lands and our freedom. Peaceful means will do if the world is willing to engage in a constructive and fair process in which we and the Israelis are treated as equals. We are sick and tired of the west's racist approach to the conflict, in which the Palestinians are regarded as inferior. Though we are the victims, we offer our hands in peace, but only a peace that is based on justice. However, if the Israelis continue to attack and kill our people and destroy their homes, impose sanctions, collectively punish us, and imprison men and women for exercising the right to self-defence, we have every right to respond with all available means.

Hamas has been freely elected. Our people have given us their confidence and we pledge to defend their rights and do our best to run their affairs through good governance. If we are boycotted in spite of this democratic choice - as we have been by the US and some of its allies - we will persist, and our friends have pledged to fill the gap. We have confidence in the peoples of the world, record numbers of whom identify with our struggle. This is a good time for peace-making - if the world wants peace.

· Ismail Haniyeh is the new Palestinian prime minister and a Hamas leader. Email: ihaniyyeh@hotmail.com