Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on July 17, 2020

We thought maybe wed have it ready before High Holidays, Rabbi Shlomo Zarchi said about the renovation of his San Francisco synagogue, Congregation Chevra Thilim.

The project, launched a year ago, was delayed for a few months at the onset of the pandemic. But work has started again, and Zarchi now feels confident that it will be finished in 2021.

When the project is completed, at an anticipated cost of $3 million to $4 million, the main sanctuary of the Orthodox synagogue in the Richmond District will have had a thorough face-lift, including what Zarchi calls a very grand set of skylights. He is also excited to carve out a new library and beit midrash (house of study).

A new facade featuring Jerusalem stone will be added on 25th Avenue, including a new main entrance where the street is less sloped (and therefore more user-friendly for people with mobility issues). Also in the interest of increased accessibility, the building will for the first time have an elevator to the second floor.

Though the current work began last year, its really the second phase of a complete reworking of the facility that began about seven years ago, said Zarchi, who is in his 22nd year at the 128-year-old shul with 150 to 200 member-units.

The first phase was almost everything besides the actual sanctuary. It was an old facility with a lot of deferred maintenance, he said.

In that first phase, the social hall, kitchen, bathrooms, offices and classrooms were overhauled.

Both phases were funded entirely by donations from the Chevra Thilim community.

Chevra Thilim, located in two downtown locations in the years after its 1892 founding, moved to South of Market after the 1906 earthquake and fire. The current location, two blocks from Golden Gate Park, was purchased piecemeal starting in 1932 and built in stages throughout that decade.

In its present form, it was dedicated in the early 40s, said Zarchi. Since then, I think nothing has been done.

Though the look of the building will have changed significantly when the work is done, steps are being taken to preserve some historic elements. Existing stained glass, for example, will be removed and reincorporated elsewhere.

And then theres the mural. Everybody wants to know about the mural, Zarchi said.

Above the ark, spanning the full width of the bimah, the Chevra Thilim sanctuary sports a dramatic painting of a green sky filled with rolling clouds, dramatic mountains and rays of heavenly light that shine down on the two tablets of the Ten Commandments.

We did a lot of research to find out the history of the mural and where it came from, he said. But that research turned up little to nothing; the year it was painted and the name of the artist remain unknown.

It always got different reactions some people loved it, some hated it, Zarchi said. Either way, its coming down. That wall of the sanctuary is being moved and theres no way to save the mural. But if youre in the love it camp, dont fear. It has been professionally photographed so that an image can be displayed elsewhere in the building.

Zarchi credits his wife, Chani, with keeping costs under control and the project moving forward. He came to Chevra Thilim in 1998 and married her two years later.

I didnt think I would be here this long, the rabbi said. Looking back, my whole rabbinic career has been in San Francisco, and we wanted to build something for the next 100 years, for the next generation.

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Renovation of historic SF synagogue slowed but not halted J. - The Jewish News of Northern California

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Posted By admin on July 17, 2020

The Scriptures teach us Jesus was not always welcome when He came to town. This time He came from Capernaum to Nazareth, and it was the second visit He made to His hometown during His earthly ministry.

Luke tells us Christs first visit to Nazareth came after He was tempted by the devil. He went into the synagogues throughout Galilee in the power of the Spirit. Luke said Jesus taught and He was glorified of all. He went to Nazareth, and on the Sabbath He went to the synagogue and read from the prophet Isaiah.

When He finished reading and speaking, the people in the synagogue were so filled with wrath that they forced Him out of the town to the edge of a cliff where they would have thrown Him over head first had He not escaped.

The second visit about which we read in Mark was a visit of grace. He would give them another opportunity to believe in Him, and so again He taught in the synagogue as every Jewish man had the right to do.

They were, as Mark tells us, astonished. How did He know so much about the Scriptures? This fellow grew up here, and we know He had no education. He is just one of us, they said. He has wisdom, they admitted, but who gave Him wisdom?

In their rejecting Jesus, the people were asking if His wisdom came from God or the devil? He did no miracle in Nazareth, but they heard of miracles He performed elsewhere. Were these miracles really divine in origin or did the devil make them possible?

Wasnt He the son of Mary? She was a poor widow who lived in Nazareth. They found Jesus only to be offensive.

A prophet is not without honor, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house, Jesus said in reply to their rejection of Him. So why did they reject Him? Perhaps they were jealous of Him. The poor hometown boy has grown up and become famous. They, like other people, believed no good thing could come from Nazareth.

Mark said, he could there do no mighty work, save that he laid his hands upon a few sick folk, and healed them. There were a few who believed in His power and He graciously healed them, but He did no mighty work as He could have had the people believed in Him. Jesus was amazed at the people of Nazareth because they had no faith. He left town never to return.

The Lord Jesus Christ has come to town. There is no lack of churches in our county. It is about at the point that a person cannot throw a rock without hitting a church building. Has the Savior become so familiar that people look on Him with disregard? Are we to assume that just because people are members of churches they are saved? We are not to simply accept that.

Jesus is in town. The issue is what we will do about it. There was a time when He left and did not return. May it not be so with us.

The Sunday School Lesson is written by Ed Wilcox, pastor of Centerville Baptist Church. [emailprotected]

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Jesus came to town and He was rejected - Laurinburg Exchange

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Posted By admin on July 17, 2020

The COVID-19 crisis has changed the way we conduct ourselves in so many ways especially now as the country may enter another lockdown. We must think and plan before going anywhere. Spontaneity has gone to the wayside, for now at least.

My most vivid memory, while growing up in Brookline, MA, was shul-hopping on Simchat Torah. What a thrill to start at Maimonides, dance down to the Bostoner Rebbe and the icing on the cake was watching, as the Rav, Rabbi Soloveitchik danced with his mechutan The Talner Rebbe. The shul was packed, with barely room to move, let alone breathe. We were literally on top of one another. We were so carefree as we sang, held hands and danced with one another.

Since coming on aliyah 27 years ago, my family and I have had the luxury of deciding where to go to shul based on our mood, what time we woke up, special chazzan or special dvar torah. Within a 15 minute walk from our home, we can choose from at least a dozen synagogues to attend. Synagogue attendance is not just about the davening. Synagogue, whether in Chutz lAretz or Israel, represents community. Attending synagogue, as opposed to praying at home, means that you want to be part of the minyan. You want to join together with others in prayer.

Encyclopedia Britannica defines Synagogue as:

Synagogue, also spelled synagog, in Judaism, a community house of worship that serves as a place not only for liturgical services but also for assembly and study. Its traditional functions are reflected in three Hebrew synonyms for synagogue: bet ha-tefilla (house of prayer), bet ha-kneset (house of assembly), and bet ha-midrash (house of study). The term synagogue is of Greek origin (synagein, to bring together) and means a place of assembly. The Yiddish word shul (from German Schule, school) is also used to refer to the synagogue, and in modern times the word temple is common among some Reform and Conservative congregations.

Whether we call our place of worship a synagogue, Beit Knesset, temple or shul- the meaning is the same- it is a place of assembly, a place for people to gather together, to catch up with friends, in addition to praying.

All of that has changed during this time. COVID-19 has forced us to protect not just our physical being but our social being as well. Today closeness has been replaced by social distancing.As we hide behind masks, it is hard to recognize or even hear others. I feel as though I am constantly judging others; is he too close to me, why isnt she wearing a mask, his nose isnt covered, I dont think she washed her hands

Synagogue, once a refuge, is now a place of fear and uncertainty. It is no longer the warm and welcoming place we have been so familiar with and yearn for. Gabbaim and Rabbis are forced to count the number of participants and ask the extras to leave-when did they ever have to ask a congregant to leave their shul before?The after shul kiddush, once the nice social gathering is no more, along with the opportunity to socialize with friends. Many shuls can no longer welcome new comers- it is now a members only club-with a sign in before Shabbat, temperature check and Corona police checking to make sure you are masked and gloved. Forgot to bring your own siddur or chumash-too bad. The door to the shul is locked and we cant share ours with you.

What can we do as a community to maintain the cohesiveness during this time, without alienating our friends?

As we approach the 17th of Tammuz and 3 weeks later 9 Av, we can use this time to reflect upon the effect of the virus on us personally and our community. By following a few simple rules we can overcome this and hopefully return to our synagogues.

Debra Weiner-Solomont is the coordinator of the Pardes Institute Community Education Program. She received her MSW from Wurzweiler School of Social Work. Debra along with her husband and sons came on aliyah from Brookline, MA, 27 years ago.

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The changing face of our relationship with synagogue - The Times of Israel

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Posted By admin on July 17, 2020

So many times, both for joy and for sadness, we wanted to reach out and give each other a hug, says Rabbi Jacob Blumenthal. And instead, we need to remain physically distant so that we can ensure everyone stays healthy. (Photo by David Stuck)

In a pandemic, Conservative synagogues are all pretty much in the same boat, whether in Washington, D.C., or Washington State. Thats the view of the head of two of the movements major institutions, Rabbi Jacob Blumenthal, of Gaithersburg.

On July 1, the 53-year-old chief executive of the movements Rabbinical Assembly took on the additional role of CEO of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism.

We asked Blumenthal how the movement is weathering the pandemic and what its plans are in the months ahead.

What challenges are Conservative congregations facing that other denominations are not?

Im not sure that theres anything unique among the different denominations. I will say that synagogues have a diverse set of programs, everything from early childhood to worship to adult education to lifecycle events. That means that the decisions that we make about which activities we might restore first become more complicated. So its not just about worship, its about all of the different ways that we support and connect community.

Do Conservative congregations in Greater Washington face any unique challenges?

I think were all in the same boat. I think one of the most difficult pieces is that so many aspects of public health have now become politicized. So, some people see the decisions we make around restoring physically proximate activities, wearing masks and other basic health measures, as making a political statement, rather than a statement about what we believe about following best health practices.

How do Conservative synagogues feel at this moment?

I think everyone is frustrated. I think we all miss each other very much. That so many times, both for joy and for sadness, we wanted to reach out and give each other a hug. And instead, we need to remain physically distant so that we can ensure everyone stays healthy. Weve seen throughout the country that when cities or institutions restore physical proximity too quickly, it creates a huge resurgence in the virus. And our advice to all of our congregation has to proceed with caution.

How have Conservative congregations been handling the pandemic?

Im very proud of the flexibility and creativity of all of our leadership. We have taken synagogue life and completely transformed it to meet the needs of the moment in congregation and after congregation. Its really remarkable to see the creativity. We are creating new Jewish law to meet this moment, adapting Jewish tradition to meet the needs of our communities.

Has maintaining revenue been an issue for congregations?

Were waiting to see. Government programs like the PPP program have been very helpful to synagogues. Many of our synagogues depend on certain kinds of program revenue, like early childhood centers and facility rentals and things like that. And that revenue is definitely down, as we cant provide those services in person. And then were waiting to see High Holidays are often the time when people think about their membership dues, when some congregations sell tickets to services, and were waiting to see how that translates to an online experience.

How do you think congregations will handle the High Holidays?

Well, I think that communities will find some ways to do things in person. So they may be able to create small group experiences outdoors. They bring the shofar to particular neighborhoods, and announce that folks can come out and gather in a physically distant way and hear the shofar in person. They might be able to create opportunities to do tasks with small groups and families. They will create materials for people to use at home to be able to celebrate the holiday. But, I think that many of the prayer experiences will probably be through some sort of virtual technology.

What are your thoughts on the use of technology in synagogue life?

Our communities and our rabbis are very diverse in terms of their approach to Jewish tradition and Jewish law. And whats fascinating is to see how each community makes decisions about how they will use technology. And we support that diversity. We dont believe theres any one way to meet the needs of this moment. So we admire congregations that do not use technology on Shabbat and we admire congregations that have adapted technology in ways that are appropriate within Jewish law.

[emailprotected]@EricSchucht

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Conservative leader Jacob Blumenthal looks at how his movement has adapted to COVID-19 - Washington Jewish Week

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Posted By admin on July 17, 2020

Pittsburgh Steelers offensive tackle Zach Banner posted a video late last week in response to Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver DeSean Jacksons anti-Semitic screed against Jews.

After describing his horror at the2018 Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, Banner preached that as important as the work of Black Lives Matter may be, its achievements cannot come by stepping on the backs of other people or by vilifying Jews.

In Banners own words, We cant preach equality but in result were just trying to flip the script and change the hierarchy Change your heart, put your arm around people, and lets all uplift each other.

In the days since, Jackson has both issued an apology and begun to engage with the Jewish community.

This is not the first time Steel City sports has given Black-Jewish relations a much needed shot in the arm.

The year was 1947. Hank Greenberg, the legendary Jewish slugger and longtime Detroit Tiger, had been traded due to the reserve clause to the Pittsburgh Pirates for what would be his final season. Throughout his career, Greenberg had been subjected to just about everyanti-Semitic insultimaginable.

Playing first base that day for the Brooklyn Dodgers was Jackie Robinson, the rookie who had recently broken Major League Baseballs color line. Days earlier, according to theJournal of Sport History, Robinson and his family had received threats on his life and that his infant son Jackie Jr. would be kidnapped. Members of opposing teams sat in their dugouts pointing baseball bats at him simulating machine gun noises. The hotel in which the Dodgers stayedrefused to admitRobinson. Not surprisingly, Robinsons batting average had slumped and he was contemplating quitting.

After laying down a perfect bunt early in the game, Robinson collided with Greenberg, who was also playing first base. The following inning, Greenberg was walked and, arriving at first base, asked Robinson if he had been hurt in the earlier collision.

According to a New York Times report, Robinson assured Greenberg that he hadnt been, at which pointGreenberg said to Robinson, Dont pay any attention to these guys who are trying to make it hard for you. Stick in there. Youre doing fine. Keep your chin up. Following the game, Jackie told The New York Times, Class tells. It sticks out all over Mr. Greenberg.

Robinson was deeply moved by the supportive words of Greenberg, who was praised in the African-American press. The two men would remain friends into the years ahead both giving testimony in Curt Floods 1972 historic Supreme Court case on the aforementioned reserve clause (the mechanism used by teams to hold on to the rights of players even after their contracts had expired).

Bias operates in every direction sometimes at the same time.

Who would have imagined that some 70 years after the Greenberg-Robinson exchange, it would be an African-American athlete Zach Banner who would call out his own community on prejudice against Jews?

Bias operates in every direction sometimes at the same time and the pressures of the pandemic run the risk of bringing out the worst, not the best, in people. The examples of Greenberg and Banner are instructive because both men would have been well within their rights to be bystanders, carrying on with their business as athletes. Instead, both chose to be upstanders allies in fighting prejudice.

In the years ahead, Greenberg would leverage his stature as Clevelands general manager, refusing to let his team stay at any hotel that denied admittance to all his players, remembering when he as a ballplayer had been denied to stay at hotels because he was Jewish. On and off the field, the examples of Greenberg and Banner show the power of ones personal example to prompt much-needed dialogue and societal change.

In his 1963 opening address at the National Conference on Religion and Race, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschelsaid, To think of man in terms of white, black or yellow is more than an error. It is an eye disease, a cancer of the soul. In calling out racism as an eye disease, Heschel signaled that as important as sit-ins and freedom rides or, in our own day, Black Lives Matter, police reform and tearing down Confederate monuments the first step in fighting racism is for people to identify prejudices within, dismantle them and set a personal example for others to follow. Some may be more guilty than others, as Heschel taught, but all of us are responsible.

Confessions of bias need not be damning; they are opportunities to acknowledge the work yet to be done. When it comes to building an inclusive society, it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If we do not want the next generation to inherit and internalize deeply ingrained notions of race, then we must work to eliminate the structures that serve to perpetuate them.

It is simply not enough to consider oneself to be one of the good guys and go about ones business. One must check ones implicit biases, live intentionally knowing they are present, be willing to publicly model behavior for others to follow and work together toward effectuating much-needed societal transformations. The fact of our flawed humanity reminds us that we are all capable of doing better.

In simpler terms, we must do what Greenberg did in 1947, what Heschel taught in 1963 and what Banner posted the other day. Change our hearts, put our arms around people and uplift each other. Its not everything, but it is something, and its certainly better than nothing. It is, one might say, first base. Maybe from there we will round the bases together, creating a world worthy of our hopes and dreams for our children and grandchildren.

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Hank Greenberg, Jackie Robinson and DeSean Jackson - The Jewish News of Northern California

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Posted By admin on July 17, 2020

We have enough grief this year, so mourning is canceled

Jews are now commemorating what is known as the Three Weeks. It is when Jews express grief for the destruction of the Holy Temple in ancient Israel. The Temple was breached by the Romans in 69 C.E. The mourning period concludes with a fast to remember when both Holy Temples were set aflame. Thus, Tisha BAv (Ninth of Av) is the saddest day of the Jewish calendar.

Between the two fasts (the 17th of Tammuz which passed last week) and Tisha BAv is called the three weeks of mourning. During this period, we dont listen to live music (taped and the radio is ok according to some) eat meat or drink wine (except on Shabbat, when we are not to mourn), and reduce our joy.

Hershel Schachter (born July 28, 1941) is an American Orthodox rabbi, posek (religious law authority), and rosh yeshiva (dean) at Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary (RIETS), part of Yeshiva University (YU) in New York City.

Schachter is a halakhic (Jewish law) advisor for the Orthodox Union, and has rendered notable decisions in a number of contemporary topic areas.

Rav Schacter says in the pdf attached, that because of the trauma of the virus, the entire world is in a state of uncertainty and concern. He, therefore, says that if one needs to listen to live music so that they are not depressed, this year is different.

The Rav doesnt say it, but I will, this obviously applies to the rest of the mourning procedures that Jews follow during the three week period. The world has suffered tremendously from the loss of their income and jobs to the loss of their freedom to travel freely. Even at home, the buses are not running at night, they pass you by in the heat if they have over 20 people (happened to me last week -after waiting 30 minutes in the heat for a bus in Safed, the bus passed me right by, with no concern that the next bus might be just as full). The world has changed this year and if we cant go to our synagogues as usual, which is a big sacrifice, anyone who is suffering doesnt have to suffer anymore.

As I wrote yesterday, One doesnt have to be more religious than G-d. The Jews job is to follow the Bible as the Rabbis tell us what it means. Going to the hospital when you are hurt IS keeping Shabbat, and eating on a fast day, so that your resistance doesnt drop when you are over 60 is keeping the three weeks.

It will be very strange for people who are in jeopardy (and the medical experts say that anyone over 60 is at much higher risk as well as younger people with pre-existing conditions) to skip the fast of Tisha BAv this year, but they must to protect their health. Someone can be machmir (strict) on something that doesnt affect their health, like reading more Tehillim or doing more prayers, but if they put themselves at risk by reducing their resistance, they are breaking the Torah not keeping it.

It was for this reason, even on Yom Kippur, which is not a rabbinic fast but a biblical one, Rabbi Salanter CANCELED YOM KIPPUR FAST.

Now let us turn to the current issue, not just of health, but of an epidemic condition (Bibi has told us enough times in the Paper that this is an epidemic Condition-good enough for me).

Following Shacharit on Yom Kippur of 5610, in September 1849, Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, the famous and pious Vilna rabbi -founder of the Mussar Movement, dedicated to injecting the pursuit of ethical excellence into traditional Jewish observance, ascended to the bimah of the Vilna synagogue.

He explained to the congregation that because of the raging cholera epidemic in Vilna, they must not spend the day gathered together in the synagogue, but should leave the building and walk outside. Fresh air was believed to prevent the spread of the disease. (My oh My nothing seems to have changed-same advice today!)

Furthermore, he said, it was imperative that everyone maintains their strength so that they would not fall, victim, to disease. And so, on that Yom Kippur, Rabbi Yisrael Salanter explained, everyone should break theyre fast, eat and drink so that they could protect their health and survive the disease.

Cholera is a horrific disease. It is painful, terrifying, and deadly. The Hebrew word for cholera- sounds similar to cholera but more literally can be translated as evil disease.

Over the course of the 19th century, modern medical science learned how to prevent the spread of cholera, and also how to effectively treat cholera. We dont yet know how to treat the coronavirus, but we do know that people with preexisting conditions or being over 60 makes them at higher risk.

Now, when a person doesnt fast on a fast day, they are supposed to eat and drink in private and not celebrate. This year if you are over 60 or have pre-existing conditions, you dont have to apologize if you are eating, but it is still better to it in the privacy of your home, to respect those that are fasting.

Hershel Schachter opinion used with permission

Miriam Feinstein decided to take up meditating and she was always preaching its benefits to her husband Moishe. Thats why when he suddenly started asking some questions about it, seemingly expressing interest, she got excited that they could share this experience together.

You dont have to close your eyes, Moishe, Miriam explained. You can keep them open and focus on something like a candle or a spot in front of you.

Moishe nodded thoughtfully. Could it be a TV?

Yehuda Lave writes a daily (except on Shabbat and Hags) motivational Torah blog at YehudaLave.comLoving-kindness my specialty.Internationally Known Speaker and Lecturer and Author. Self Help through Bible and Psychology. Classes in controlling anger and finding Joy. Now living and working in Israel. Remember, it only takes a moment to change your life. Learn to have all the joy in your life that you deserve!!! There are great masters here to interpret Spirituality. Studied Kabbalah and being a good human being with Rabbi Plizken and Rabbi Ephraim Sprecher, my Rabbi. Torah is the name of the game in Israel, with 3,500 years of mystics and scholars interpreting G-D's word. Yehuda Lave is an author, journalist, psychologist, rabbi, spiritual teacher and coach, with degrees in business, psychology and Jewish Law. He works with people from all walks of life and helps them in their search for greater happiness, meaning, business advice on saving money, and spiritual engagement

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We have enough grief this year, so mourning and Tisha B'Av fasting is canceled - The Times of Israel

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Posted By admin on July 15, 2020

COLIN SHINDLER: Mainstream UK Jewish organisations have put out a tepid welcome to Tzipi Hotovely the first Israeli woman ambassador to the UK

IT IS THE RESPONSIBILITY of an Israeli ambassador to maintain intimate links with his fellow Jews, in whatever country he serves. If you have a Jewish heart and soul, how can you not want to be an integral part of a Jewish community when you are representing the Jewish state?

So spoke Yehuda Avner, a much-respected former Israeli ambassador to both the UK and Australia in the 1990s. Originally from Manchester, Avner understood Diaspora Jewry Jews who live among non-Jews. He was an old school, affable diplomat who served Israeli prime ministers as diverse ideologically as Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Rabin.

It was, therefore, with some incredulity that British Jews greeted the announcement last month by Israels Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, that he had appointed Tzipi Hotovely, the sharp-tongued doyenne of Israels religious Right, to be the next ambassador to London.

In January, Netanyahu divested himself of numerous portfolios after he was indicted on various charges by the Attorney-General and Hotovely was appointed Minister of Diaspora Affairs. She was also asked to establish the new Ministry of Settlement Affairs. Several hundred British Jews have since signed a petition to the British Foreign Office opposing her appointment as ambassador; a considerably smaller number has welcomed the appointment.

Several hundred British Jews have signed a petition to the British Foreign Office opposing her appointment as ambassador; a considerably smaller number has welcomed the appointment.

Mainstream Jewish organisations have put out a tepid welcome to the first Israeli woman ambassador to the UK, but clearly, whether publicly or in private, British Jews are jittery.

Hotovely does not have a traditional Likud heritage. Her background is national religious Bnei Akiva, the teachings of Rav Kook and Midreshet Lindenbaum (Bruria) seminary. She first became politically aware when former prime minister Ariel Sharon initiated a unilateral disengagement from Gaza in 2005.

Sharons successor, Ehud Olmert, promoted the possibility of evacuations of West Bank settlements and a peace agreement with the Palestinians. Noticed for her celebrity status and strident performances on television, Netanyahu put her on the Likud list of candidates for the 2009 election.

He was clearly struck by Hotovelys ability to explain an issue in easy, black-and-white terms. And she was a fluent English speaker. Following Netanyahus victory in the 2015 election Hotovely was made Deputy Foreign Minister. After the public relations fallout from Israels Gaza offensive in 2014, she was called on to mount a counterattack against growing sympathy for the Palestinian cause in the wider world.

Hotovely did this, however, by promoting her views rather than those of Netanyahu. For her, Netanyahus governments had tried too hard to appease international opinion. She spoke about Israels national cause and Jewish history. She accepted Golda Meirs dual projection of Israel as a Shimshon Samson the Heroic and as a nebech small and weak.

Shortly after her appointment, Hotovely told the Knesset: The Land is ours. All of it is ours. The Melbourne-born Mark Regev, the outgoing Israeli ambassador to the UK and then a spokesman for Netanyahu, declined at the time to comment publicly. However, a few months later, in October 2015, she said her dream was to see the Israeli flag flying over the Temple Mount. This earned her a rebuke from Netanyahus office and the comment that her statement was not government policy.

All this is rooted in the national religious belief that Zionism is biblical rather than originating in the aftermath of the French Revolution, fashioned by the Haskalah, the Jewish Enlightenment, and modern European national liberation movements. For Hotovely, Hebron is both older and more important than Tel Aviv.

For her, there is no such entity as a Palestinian people and so no rational basis for a Palestinian state. Shortly after being elected to the Knesset, she endorsed the idea of a one state solution Israel and the West Bank without Gaza. Jews would be the 60 per cent majority and all would have the right to a vote. Mass immigration of Diaspora Jews, it was argued, would resolve any potential demographic problem.

In 2017, in a speech to the Knesset, she provoked its Arab members by recommending that they read Assaf Volls A History of the Palestinian People. Holding it up before them, every page was blank. Such gimmicks complemented those of Netanyahu on the international stage but, crucially, her opposition to a two-state solution are not the views of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the main American Jewish leadership group AIPAC and Australian Zionist organisations.

Netanyahu may have seen in Hotovely a younger Bibi, belonging to the same club as other Americanised Israelis, Ron Dermer, David Bar-Ilan, Moshe Arens close to the Republican party and irritated by the liberalism of the vast majority of American Jews. When Princeton Universitys Hillel House withdrew its invitation to her in 2017, Hotovely angrily spoke about the suppression of free speech under a liberal dictatorship.

When interviewed on US television, she told viewers that unlike Israelis, American Jews have quite convenient lives and did not have to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan.

When interviewed on US television, she told viewers that unlike Israelis, American Jews have quite convenient lives and did not have to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Chief of Staff of the US Air Force, General David Lee Goldfein, might possibly disagree with that sentiment.

Moreover, the UK is not the US and despite the embittered debate about Brexit, it has not prostrated itself before a Trump-like figure. It may be the same language, but it is a profoundly different political culture. Britain has been the refuge of many fleeing political repression from Italian revolutionary Giuseppe Mazzinis sojourn in the 1840s to a plethora of exiles from apartheid South Africa in the 1960s.

Hotovelys 2018 comment about African refugees in Israel South Tel Aviv is terrorised by infiltrators who are driving up crime rates and sexual harassment and making the streets unsafe for Israelis may not endear her to a multicultural Britain in the aftermath of the George Floyd affair.

When Hotovely was Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, she attacked Breaking the Silence (BtS), a group of ex-soldiers who presented public testimony about the conduct of troops in the West Bank. She branded them traitors from within and blamed them for internationalisation of the propaganda war against Israel and attempted to cut off foreign funding for an exhibition BtS held in Zurich, which the Swiss Foreign Ministry gave US$16,000 towards because it assisted in dialogue and the cause of human rights. Netanyahus government formally complained to the Swiss in June 2015.

Shes a politician, when she becomes the Israeli ambassador, she will cease being a politician and will become a civil servant and part of Israels diplomatic corps Mark Regev

When members of the US House of Representatives who held hostile views towards Israel were barred entry to the country, she spoke out in support of the ban even though she contradicted the view of the Israeli ambassador to Washington, Ron Dermer. Senator Joe Biden said of the affair: No democracy should deny entry to visitors based on the content of their ideas even ideas they strongly object to. And no leader of the free world should encouragethem to do so.

In 2004, leaders of the Board of Deputies of British Jews privately met then prime minister Ariel Sharon to express their concerns that Zvi Hefetz, a man with little diplomatic experience, poor English, a third choice for the post and a friend of Sharons son, Omri, should not be appointed Israels ambassador to London. It made no difference.

Similar concerns are being expressed today about whether it is appropriate to appoint Hotovely to a Jewish community that, according to several scientific surveys, overwhelmingly opposes the settlement drive on the West Bank.

British Jews also worry that Hotovelys political baggage will prove to be a goldmine for the genuine enemies of Israel in Britain.

In his last interview as ambassador, Regev was asked by the BBC about Hotovelys political record. He replied: Shes a politician, when she becomes the Israeli ambassador, she will cease being a politician and will become a civil servant and part of Israels diplomatic corps.

Perhaps.

British Jews will extend a polite and generous welcome to Madame Ambassador, but that will not make them less nervous about the future.

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UK Jews nervous that Israel's new envoy has too much of the Right stuff - Plus61 J Media

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Posted By admin on July 15, 2020

(JTA) The municipal council of Moissac sometimes calls itsplacid French town overlooking the Tarn River, near Toulouse, the city of the Righteous Among the Nations.

Its a reference to how hundreds of locals during the Holocaust helped resistance activists rescue about 500 Jewish children an occurrence that Yad Vashem, Israels national Holocaust museum, has defined as an exceptional episode in the history of World War II. Righteous Among the Nations is the title that the State of Israel gives to non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust.

In 2013, Yad Vashem helped inaugurate a Righteous Among the Nations square with plaques in the center of the town of 12,000, which the museum has trumpeted and has been featured in the French press.

Now Moissac is again making headlines, but for a much different reason: Its new mayor, Romain Lopez, has been accused of making anti-Semitic statements and is part of the far-right National Rally party founded by the Holocaust denier Jean-Marie Le Pen.

Late last month, Lopez won a whopping 62% of the vote. In 2015, he wrote on Twitter dismissively about figures on anti-Semitism presented in the French parliament by a Jewish scholar and Holocaust survivor, Serge Klarsfeld.

The apostles of the persecution complex dont know what to invent next, Lopez wrote.

Lopez, who is only 31, has denied the comment reflected any anti-Semitic bias but nonetheless apologized for its dismissive tone.

His victory was part of a showing that Marine Le Pen (Jean-Maries daughter, who made it to the final round of the French presidential election in 2017)hailed as a breaking-of-the-glass ceiling for her party. On the same day as Lopezs win, National Rally won its first mayoral race in a big city since 1995: Marine Le Pens ex-partner, Louis Aliot, was elected in Perpignan, a city near the Spanish border with a population of approximately 120,000.

Reflecting the growing polarization and erosion of the political center in France, the municipal elections also were a boon for the left-of-center Green Party, which won the mayoral races in Lyon, Bordeaux and Strasbourg along with districts of Marseille and Paris.

The Socialist Party narrowly avoided defeat in Paris where Mayor Anne Hidalgo was reelected with just over 50% of the vote and in Lille. The Republicans, the center-right party of former president Nicolas Sarkozy, did not make any significant gains.

President Emmanuel Macrons party, The Republic Forward, experienced what is widely seen as a defeat, losing multiple former bastions and having poor showings in major municipalities.

Gaby Cohn-Bendit, a Holocaust survivor who was kept in hiding in Moissac with his brother Danny, told Liberation that the National Rallys victory is unreal.

Jean-Yves Camus, a well-known political science analyst and president of the Observatory of Political Radicalism think tank, concurred.

Its especially astounding considering that there are people who lived through the war still alive in Moissac today, and children of people who hid those Jewish children in their homes, Camus told Liberation. It raises questions about the preservation of memory.

HuffPost called Lopezs victory a true symbol of the times, and Liberation profiled the southern France town in an article titled Moissac, the town of the Righteous, conquered by the far-right. The city has had only left-wing mayors since World War II.

Most Moissac voters probably did not opt for Lopez for any reason connected to Jews. The rural city has been hit hard by seasonal workers from Bulgaria, many of them Roma, who work in the agricultural sector for cheaper rates than the minimum sought by locals. This reality did not produce a favorable political environment for pro-EU Republicans and Socialists, and even less so for The Republic Forward party of Macron, who is on record as referring to himself as a globalist.

During World War II, Moissac briefly became the center of an international rescue movement. Shatta and Eduard Simon, a Jewish local couple, greeted hundreds of Jewish children from Poland, Romania, Hungary and beyond at a school they opened there in 1933. The children had been smuggled in, sometimes with help from resistance fighters, so they could survive the genocide in which most of their family members were murdered.

In 1943, local police tipped off the Simons that a raid had been ordered. But the Simons were able to distribute about 500 children among the villages residents ahead of the raid. None of the children, who quickly learned French and became citizens after World War II, were deported or caught, and there is no record of any resident from Moissac informing authorities about the rescue operation.

Europe has multiple far-right parties that are opposed to immigration and the European Union. But National Rally, which was formerly known as National Front, distinguished itself for its rhetoric against Jews while it was led by Jean-Marie Le Pen for 39 years, until 2011.

He has been convicted of Holocaust denial or minimization by a French court and a German court for calling the gas chambers a detail of World War II. He has also said he did not think 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust. Le Pen is currently on trial for saying that his party would put a Jewish singer in the oven for criticizing National Rally.

His daughter has tried to rehabilitate the party, vowing to punish anti-Semitic rhetoric and even kicking her own father out of the party in 2015. These steps and the partys focus on individual liberties and womens rights have sent its popularity soaring. Marine Le Pen clinched a third of the presidential vote in 2017 a record for the party.

National Rally has even made inroads among French Jewish voters, a minority of little electoral weight but plenty of symbolic significance, at least for the party. It is estimated that 10-16% percent of French Jewish voters, particularly those who fear the effects of Muslim immigration and radical Islam, now vote for National Rally under Marine Le Pen, whereas next to none voted for her father.

Marine Le Pen has seized on their anxiety, telling Jews to vote for her so she would serve as their best shield against radical Islam.

The leaders of the institutions of the French Jewish community are not buying the National Rallys makeover. The CRIF umbrella group of French Jewish communities and groups are boycotting the party, as well as the far-left Unbowed France party, calling them vectors for spreading hatred.

See more here:

This French town is known for saving Jews during WWII. It just elected a far-right mayor who has been accused of anti-Semitism. - JTA News - Jewish...

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Posted By admin on July 15, 2020

The municipal council of Moissac sometimes calls itsplacid French town overlooking the Tarn River, near Toulouse, the city of the Righteous Among the Nations.

In 2013, Yad Vashem helped inaugurate a Righteous Among the Nations square with plaques in the center of the town of 12,000, which the museum has trumpeted and has been featured in the French press.

Now Moissac is again making headlines, but for a much different reason: Its new mayor, Romain Lopez, has been accused of making antisemetic statements and is part of the far-right National Rally party founded by the Holocaust denier Jean-Marie Le Pen.

Late last month, Lopez won a whopping 62% of the vote. In 2015, he wrote on Twitter dismissively about figures on antisemitism presented in the French parliament by a Jewish scholar and Holocaust survivor, Serge Klarsfeld.

The apostles of the persecution complex dont know what to invent next, Lopez wrote.

Lopez, who is only 31, has denied the comment reflected any antisemetic bias but nonetheless apologized for its dismissive tone.

His victory was part of a showing that Marine Le Pen (Jean-Maries daughter, who made it to the final round of the French presidential election in 2017)hailed as a breaking-of-the-glass ceiling for her party. On the same day as Lopezs win, National Rally won its first mayoral race in a big city since 1995: Marine Le Pens ex-partner, Louis Aliot, was elected in Perpignan, a city near the Spanish border with a population of approximately 120,000.

The Socialist Party narrowly avoided defeat in Paris where Mayor Anne Hidalgo was reelected with just over 50% of the vote and in Lille. The Republicans, the center-right party of former president Nicolas Sarkozy, did not make any significant gains.

President Emmanuel Macrons party, The Republic Forward, experienced what is widely seen as a defeat, losing multiple former bastions and having poor showings in major municipalities.

Gaby Cohn-Bendit, a Holocaust survivor who was kept in hiding in Moissac with his brother Danny, told Liberation that the National Rallys victory is unreal.

Jean-Yves Camus, a well-known political science analyst and president of the Observatory of Political Radicalism think tank, concurred.

Its especially astounding considering that there are people who lived through the war still alive in Moissac today, and children of people who hid those Jewish children in their homes, Camus told Liberation. It raises questions about the preservation of memory.

HuffPost called Lopezs victory a true symbol of the times, and Liberation profiled the southern France town in an article titled Moissac, the town of the Righteous, conquered by the far-right. The city has had only left-wing mayors since World War II.

Most Moissac voters probably did not opt for Lopez for any reason connected to Jews. The rural city has been hit hard by seasonal workers from Bulgaria, many of them Roma, who work in the agricultural sector for cheaper rates than the minimum sought by locals. This reality did not produce a favorable political environment for pro-EU Republicans and Socialists, and even less so for The Republic Forward party of Macron, who is on record as referring to himself as a globalist.

During World War II, Moissac briefly became the center of an international rescue movement. Shatta and Eduard Simon, a Jewish local couple, greeted hundreds of Jewish children from Poland, Romania, Hungary and beyond at a school they opened there in 1933. The children had been smuggled in, sometimes with help from resistance fighters, so they could survive the genocide in which most of their family members were murdered.

In 1943, local police tipped off the Simons that a raid had been ordered. But the Simons were able to distribute about 500 children among the villages residents ahead of the raid. None of the children, who quickly learned French and became citizens after World War II, were deported or caught, and there is no record of any resident from Moissac informing authorities about the rescue operation.

Europe has multiple far-right parties that are opposed to immigration and the European Union. But National Rally, which was formerly known as National Front, distinguished itself for its rhetoric against Jews while it was led by Jean-Marie Le Pen for 39 years, until 2011.

He has been convicted of Holocaust denial or minimization by a French court and a German court for calling the gas chambers a detail of World War II. He has also said he did not think 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust. Le Pen is currently on trial for saying that his party would put a Jewish singer in the oven for criticizing National Rally.

His daughter has tried to rehabilitate the party, vowing to punish antisemetic rhetoric and even kicking her own father out of the party in 2015. These steps and the partys focus on individual liberties and womens rights have sent its popularity soaring. Marine Le Pen clinched a third of the presidential vote in 2017 a record for the party.

National Rally has even made inroads among French Jewish voters, a minority of little electoral weight but plenty of symbolic significance, at least for the party. It is estimated that 10-16% percent of French Jewish voters, particularly those who fear the effects of Muslim immigration and radical Islam, now vote for National Rally under Marine Le Pen, whereas next to none voted for her father.

Marine Le Pen has seized on their anxiety, telling Jews to vote for her so she would serve as their best shield against radical Islam.

The leaders of the institutions of the French Jewish community are not buying the National Rallys makeover. The CRIF umbrella group of French Jewish communities and groups are boycotting the party, as well as the far-left Unbowed France party, calling them vectors for spreading hatred.

See the rest here:

French town that saved Jews in WWII recently elected antisemtic mayor - The Jerusalem Post

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Posted By admin on July 15, 2020

Will Wilkinson last week offered a thoughtful tweet storm about social penalties for making claims that are out of bounds:

Wilkinson insists that he favors free speech, in the sense that he believes that the government should not proscribe speech (outside of narrow categories, such as slander), but that all reasonable people exact social penalties for at least some speech. And indeed, while I consider myself as about as in favor of free speech as anyone, I can imagine some extreme statements that a dinner party guest might make (say, holocaust denialism or white supremacy) that would make me less likely to invite the guest to another party, in part because I am convinced that a person announcing such views is seeking to get a rise our of listeners, exhibits serious defects in reasoning ability, or has profound prejudices, or maybe all three.

The danger, though, is that once we accept that it is acceptable for there to be social penalties for making out-of-bounds claims, people who make claims that ought to be in bounds, maybe even claims that are correct, will be found to be out of bounds. Moreover, people will not make claims that they think plausibly might be out of bounds.

Indeed, Wilkinson confesses that he has "opinions I rarely share because I fear social blowback." What are these opinions? Wilkinson doesn't say. That is actually a bit surprising, because Wilkinson argues that "[w]e should just directly debate what claims ought to be unutterable by decent liberal people." How are we to have this direct debate if we can't report our own out-of-bounds opinions? Wilkinson appears to recognize this problem, acknowledging that "it's hard to say that an opinion ought to be in-bounds without confessing that you hold an out-of-bounds opinion." But he doesn't offer a solution.

Maybe Wilkinson's view is that one ought to be able to debate what opinions should be in bounds so long as one doesn't advance the underlying opinions. But imagine the following claim: "I'm not a holocaust denier, but I think holocaust denial should be in bounds, because a lot of those photographs do look like they could have been faked." It's hard to imagine a world in which this claim receives substantially less opprobrium than the claim following the "because." Indeed, the natural reaction of any listener would be to assume that the speaker is in fact a holocaust denier but is trying to avoid social opprobrium while still expressing denialist views, just as we may infer that someone who begins a sentence with "I'm not a racist, but" probably believes the potentially racist sentiment that follows. And of course, one would receive even more opprobrium if one admitted, "I have a view that has been designated out of bounds, but I'm going to explain why I think it's in bounds."

If the debate about what is in bounds were limited to issues such as holocaust denialism and white supremacy, maybe it wouldn't be worth worrying too much more about the problem. But Wilkinson strikes me as a reasonable, thoughtful person. I would be very surprised if he secretly were a denialist or a supremacist. But I know that there are mainstream opinions (like Steven Pinker's) that are now the target of cancellation campaigns.

The knowledge that thoughtful people are self-censoring troubles me, not so much because it will lead me to censor myself, but because it makes it much harder for me and others to generate justifiable beliefs. Most of what any of us believes isn't based on careful reviews of the literature. I believe in anthropogenic climate change and have even written about possible remedies for climate change, but I have not personally reviewed the models that predict global warming. My opinion is based on the declared opinions of others, who themselves may not have reviewed all the relevant models but may well be friends or friends of friends of people who have. I am, in other words, engaging in an exercise in social epistemology, trying to determine what is a justified true belief based on the announced beliefs of others.

But this exercise is a lot more difficult when one suspects that certain opinions are self-censored. If hypothetical climate scientists who have a view that differs from the consensus feel that they are better off staying quiet, then it is hard for an outsider to know whether the absence of such statements is because the climate change evidence is so strong or because there has been an information cascade. (The concern can push in the opposite direction as well. Because government climate scientists worry about stating their honest views, I would not place much epistemic weight on a government report about the state of climate science.) I still feel that I know enough about the culture of academia to determine with high confidence that climate change skepticism is largely unjustified. But I don't have a very good answer to someone who, engaging in his or her own exercise in social epistemology, concludes that climate change is a hoax. I could tell this person that 97% of published papers that express a position on anthropogenic global warming conclude that it is occurring, but I don't have a good answer to the objection that papers that say the opposite won't get published and that scientists who claim such unorthodox views will harm their careers.

What I would like to be able to say to someone who raises a climate change hoax argument (or some other claim that I believe to be incorrect) is that the culture of academia encourages heterodoxy, and so where it is absent, a genuine consensus exists. I would like to be able to point to academics who raised heterodox positions (and by this, I mean something more radical and more likely to be wrong than anything Pinker would say, but probably not something so insupportable as holocaust denialism or white supremacy) and say, "That professor made a crazy argument, and received plenty of counterarguments but no public opprobrium." But that is not possible today. Sure, academia is much better than most employers, because tenure remains a significant protection. Academic institutions censure without censoring, but that too can effectively silence those whose views are outside some range of permissible discourse, whether on the right or the left. And that makes it more difficult for observers, especially those outside the academy, to determine whether official socially acceptable positions are worthy of justified belief.

Academia should be a place where nothing is viewed as out of bounds, so that if everyone in academia seems to agree with proposition X, people who are outside academia but understand its culture believe with high confidence that X must be correct. I would not mind the occasional loony paper if the absence of condemnation for that paper improved the credibility of all the non-loony things that academics write. In my view, a culture that encourages debate is more likely to lead to wide social acceptance of propositions that are so clearly justified that they should not be controversial. This is an empirical claim, and I can't be sure about this. Maybe allowing people to defend the indefensible makes it easier for outsiders to find at least one person who agrees with whatever they would like to believe. But I believe that creating institutions in which heterodox views are encouraged means that outsiders are more likely to trust orthodox views. If it really were not possible to tell the difference, orthodox views could be elicited through means such as surveys.

How can we make universities more tolerant of dissent? A start would be for universities to commit to the Chicago principles: "It is for the individual members of the University community, not for the University as an institution, to make those judgments for themselves, and to act on those judgments not by seeking to suppress speech, but by openly and vigorously contesting the ideas that they oppose." So, no more letters from the university president disagreeing with views of a professor in a discipline the president may not know much of anything about. But universities can do much more to encourage open expression. Professors can encourage students to take positions that they don't actually believe, both as an exercise for their own benefit and as a way of providing plausible deniability for others who take positions that they do believe. Professors too might be encouraged to write articles that take the best position that they can muster againstwhat they actually believe. Sponsors of panels and workshops should always make sure to invite those with dissident views, or if no one is available to express such views, at least someone who will attempt to express disagreement to the best extent possible. We can be more confident in our own conclusions if we know that the arguments that we have heard are the best available on all sides of any debate.

Ideally, our commitment to free expression should extend beyond universities. Anyone trying to make good faith, thoughtful arguments, whether the speaker ultimately would endorse those arguments or not, should receive no social condemnation. If we are to condemn at all, it should be outside the spheres in which debate is vital, and what we should condemn even there should be not conclusions but incorrect premises and faulty logic, including ad hominemarguments or calls for cancellation. An approach that makes even Will Wilkinson thinks he should keep his mouth shut makes it too hard to determine what we are justified in believing outside our immediate domain of expertise.

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Where Everything Should Be In Bounds Reason.com - Reason

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