The Vicious Babushka

Chabad of Thornhill Convinced to Cancel Appearance by Hateblogger Pamela Geller

Rabbi Mendel Kaplan as Toronto police chaplain

Toronto Sun reports:

TORONTO - York Regional Police threatened to remove a rabbi as one of the force’s chaplains if he hosted a controversial anti-Islamist speaker at his Thornhill synagogue.

Insp. Ricky Veerappan, of the force’s diversity, equity and inclusion bureau, confirmed he and officers from the service’s hate crimes unit met with Rabbi Mendel Kaplan of the Chabad Flamingo Synagogue on Tuesday.

They expressed concern about an upcoming talk to be given by Pamela Geller, a vocal critic of radical Islam. She protested past plans to build a mosque near Ground Zero in New York City, and has posted anti-Jihad messages in that city’s subway system.

Subsequent to his meeting with police, Kaplan cancelled Geller’s May 13 talk, which was sponsored by the Jewish Defence League (JDL) — a hard-line advocacy group that had rented space in Kaplan’s synagogue for the event.

“I think the police are turning a blind eye to who they should be keeping an eye on,” said the JDL’s Meir Weinstein, referring to radical Islamists. Weinstein said another location will be chosen for Geller’s appearance.

Veerappan said he told Kaplan that Geller’s speech “would not be endorsed by York Regional Police” and that the rabbi’s role as a force chaplain would be thrown into question if he were to permit the event.

“If he did (host Geller), then we’d have to reassess our relationship with (Kaplan),” Veerappan said. “We serve the needs of the entire community. Some of the stuff that Ms. Geller speaks about runs contrary to the values of York Regional Police and the work we do in engaging our communities.”

Veerappan said a member of York Region's Muslim community, whom he wouldn’t identify, brought Geller’s scheduled talk to the attention of police.

York Regional Police enlist eight chaplains of different faiths to counsel police officers and their families. Among them is a Muslim chaplain, Imam Abdul Hai Patel.

Read more at Toronto Sun.

Pamela, of course, is shrieking that this is "Sharia' suppressing her "Free Speech" even though Canada has no First Amendment.

Kudos to the Toronto police for their prompt action in warning the clueless Mendel Kaplan about the piece of poison he was about to ingest.

*FACE PALM* Michigan Mom Complains "Diary of Anne Frank" is PORNOGRAPHIC

NY Daily News reports:

A mother in Northville, Mich., has filed a formal complaint against her daughter’s school district, stating that some passages in the definitive edition of “The Diary of a Young Girl: Anne Frank” are too graphic for seventh graders.

As Detroit’s Fox 2 reports, parent Gail Horalek says the unedited version of the diary, published in 1996, is too graphic for her daughter’s seventh grade class at Meads Mill Middle School. In the book, Frank describes in some detail the discovery of her genitalia. 

 

Horalek told the Northville Patch that the school should have asked for parents’ permission before assigning seventh graders a book that she describes as “pornographic.”

“The problem is the school is giving the seventh graders inappropriate material and not explaining it to the parents,” Horalek told the Patch.

Horalek said the school should have sent a letter home to parents, as it has with similarly sensitive material.

“If they watch any kind of movie with a swear word in it, I have to sign a permission slip," Horalek said.

Horalek also claimed that every parent she spoke to was unaware of the passages in the unedited version. Her daughter brought them to her attention when she told Horalek that reading the book made her uncomfortable.

Given that the book is a firsthand account of Frank’s experiences during the Holocaust as a young Jewish girl, Horalek originally thought her daughter’s discomfort was due to the book’s depressing nature. It wasn’t until her daughter pointed out the book’s allegedly graphic passages that Horalek became concerned.

Now Horalek says she wants the unedited version of the diary, which became part of the school’s curriculum last year, removed from classrooms.

Read more at NY Daily News.

The paragraph in question is reprinted at Fox News Detroit. This passage did not appear in any of the previously published editions, it was edited out by Otto Frank for a reason. The unedited diary should be studied by historians and academics, but school children can read the classic.

20 Photos That Will Change the Way You Look at the Holocaust

Buchenwald survivors toast their liberators, 1945

Victims. Helpless. Downtrodden.

That’s the narrative that’s been spread about Jews for the last 70 years since the Holocaust. We’ve embraced it to our detriment. We can’t seem to address antisemitism without running to the world and screaming that we’re being persecuted, rather than standing up strongly in defiance, aware of our own inner strength.

The Holocaust has scarred us, a yetzer hara (sneaky bastard of a voice in our heads), that keeps trying to tell us how we are defined by our past, controlled by events that happened to us, instead of using those moments as points of growth.

And, in a weird way, that’s why all those images of us looking so helpless, so gaunt, in heaps of nameless bodies, have become a morbid fascination for us. We, and by extension the rest of the world, has chosen to define the Holocaust with these images.

But there are other images. Images that show a more subtle, more true, story. A story that shows our inner power, our inner turmoil in dealing with a situation we cannot comprehend, our attempts to gain justice, and our final steps into moving above and beyond our past and into a new future.

View the gallery at PopChassid.

Polish Academic Claims Jews Were Responsible for the Holocaust

KRAKOW – Krzysztof Jasiewicz, a professor at the Polish Academy of Sciences and a well known expert on Polish-Jewish relations, has caused outrage by claiming in an interview with Polish magazine Focus last week that Jews took an active part in the murder of other Jews during WWII.

The interview appeared in a special edition of the magazine focusing on the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising this week.

In the interview, titled “Are the Jews themselves guilty?” Jasiewicz shared views that sound like they were taken from a Nazi propaganda bulletin.

“This nonsense about Jews being killed mostly by Poles was created to hide the biggest Jewish secret. The scale of the German crime was only possible because the Jews themselves participated in the murder of their own people,” Jasiewicz said.

Jasiewicz also said that the Jews brought the Holocaust on themselves.

“For many generations, the Jews, not the Catholic Church, worked to bring the Holocaust about. It looks like the Jews haven’t learned their lesson and haven’t come to any conclusions yet,” he said.

He continued, accusing the Jewish people of harming their relations with Poles.

“The Jews have a problem because they are convinced they are the chosen people.

They feel that they are entitled to interpret everything, including Catholic doctrine. They will always criticize whatever we did or will do. It will never be enough, it will always be wrong and not generous enough. I am convinced that there is no point in a dialogue with the Jews, because it leads nowhere,” said Jasiewicz.

Read more at Jerusalem Post.

HOW did this colossal douche bag become an "expert on Jewish-Polish relations"?

"Are There Still Jews in Germany?" Museum Puts Jews on Display.

Ido Porat, the Jew in the Exhibit Case

BERLIN -- "Are there still Jews in Germany?" ''Are the Jews a chosen people?"

Nearly 70 years after the Holocaust, there is no more sensitive an issue in German life as the role of Jews. With fewer than 200,000 Jews among Germany's 82 million people, few Germans born after World War II know any Jews or much about them.

To help educate postwar generations, an exhibit at the Jewish Museum features a Jewish man or woman seated inside a glass box for two hours a day through August to answer visitors' questions about Jews and Jewish life. The base of the box asks: "Are there still Jews in Germany?"

"A lot of our visitors don't know any Jews and have questions they want to ask," museum official Tina Luedecke said. "With this exhibition we offer an opportunity for those people to know more about Jews and Jewish life."

But not everybody thinks putting a Jew on display is the best way to build understanding and mutual respect.

Since the exhibit - "The Whole Truth, everything you wanted to know about Jews" - opened this month, the "Jew in the Box," as it is popularly known, has drawn sharp criticism within the Jewish community - especially in the city where the Nazis orchestrated the slaughter of 6 million Jews until Adolf Hitler's defeat in 1945.

"Why don't they give him a banana and a glass of water, turn up the heat and make the Jew feel really cozy in his glass box," prominent Berlin Jewish community figure Stephan Kramer told The Associated Press. "They actually asked me if I wanted to participate. But I told them I'm not available."

The exhibit is reminiscent of Holocaust architect Adolf Eichmann sitting in a glass booth at the 1961 trial in Israel which led to his execution. And it's certainly more provocative than British actress Tilda Swinton sleeping in a glass box at a recent performance at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Eran Levy, an Israeli who has lived in Berlin for years, was horrified by the idea of presenting a Jew as a museum piece, even if to answer Germans' questions about Jewish life.

"It's a horrible thing to do - completely degrading and not helpful," he said. "The Jewish Museum absolutely missed the point if they wanted to do anything to improve the relations between Germans and Jews."

But several of the volunteers, including both German Jews and Israelis living in Berlin, said the experience in the box is little different from what they go through as Jews living in the country that produced the Nazis.

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/03/29/3313042/exhibit-of-jews-in-germany-raises.html#storylink=cpy

Happy Passover!

HAPPY PASSOVER!

13 Annoying Things Most People Assume About Orthodox Jews

Because Juice are scary!

You likely base your knowledge of Orthodox Jews on ridiculous caricatures which were dreamed up in Hollywood and the headlines that capture the worst in our community. It's time to straighten things out.

By JewintheCity

1. You guys have sex through a hole in the sheet, right?

No, but I've been asked this numerous times — once even by my cleaning lady. Which is pretty funny because she's SEEN my sheets. I'm thinking,"Hey, lady, you make my bed! Ever seen any hole anywhere? Nuh-uh? It's cause we don't got 'em!" People assume that because we're outwardly modest that our modesty continues behind closed doors. It doesn't. (News flash: We also shower like regular people!) It's a big mitzvah for a husband and wife to be together — and not just for procreation. A wife's sexual satisfaction is actually part of her marital contract, and if her husband doesn't fulfill his end of the deal, it's grounds for divorce. Don't assume that because you don't see us being overtly sexual we aren't doing so in private places. That's the point: We believe these matters are *private.*

2. You wear a wig? Oh, so then you shave your head, right?

No, actually, I don't. And none of my friends who cover their hair do either. It's only a small segment of the Hasidic community that does. Why do I cover my hair in the first place, then, and with *gasp* a wig that makes me look beautiful? Well, that's a longer discussion than we have time for in BuzzFeed land, but I'll keep it simple: Jewish modesty is not about looking unattractive, it's about keeping certain parts of yourself private. The wig creates a barrier between me and the rest of the male population, and there's only one man who can cross that barrier. Again, there's no space to do the topic justice, but let's get one thing straight, folks: If you see a wig, assume there's hair underneath, because there usually is.

3. You're a woman, so you're subjugated, right?

No. I'm not, and I don't think any of the women in my community are either. But of course there are SOME subjugated Orthodox women in the world because there are jerky men everywhere including in the Orthodox world. Orthodox Jews have many shared values with second-wave feminists, and the vast majority of Orthodox women that I've come across feel respected and are choosing their way of life. Does Judaism consider men and women to be different physically, emotionally, and spiritually? Heck, yeah! But different in a yin-and-yang sort of way, not a in a Coke-Pepsi sort of way (Coke clearly being the superior of the two). Orthodox Jews are second-wave feminists. We believe in celebrating women's unique womanhood, not trying to make her more like a man.

But don't take my word for it! Go out and meet some Orthodox Jewish women yourself and see directly from them how they're treated. You can come to us for Shabbos, if you'd like. (Did I mention that my husband is an excellent cook?! ;) )

4. You're a woman, so you don't work, right?

Actually, I do. And most of us do. I once literally had a fight with a reporter from a major news outlet about this because she wouldn't believe me. She had no real knowledge of the Orthodox community, yet she INSISTED that Orthodox women don't (and can't) work. She noted at one point that "maybe my secular bias is getting in the way." (Ya think?!) When she finally conceded that Orthodox women could work, she asked, "Well, what do they do — run shops?" *Eye roll.* "Well," I began, "Some run shops, and some run companies" (like Rickie Freeman, CEO of Teri Jon). "And some run hospital departments" (like Dr. Laurel Steinherz, director of pediatric cardiology at Memorial Sloan Kettering.) "And some run legal cases at major law firms" (like Lydia Kess, a Hasidic Jew who was the first *female* partner at Davis Polk — one of the most prestigious law firms in the country). And frankly, there's more Orthodox Jewish woman - from all walks of Orthodox life — excelling in so many more professions than I even have space to mention. [Such as Vicious Babushka, who works in the auto industry--VB]

Read more at Buzzfeed.

Kosher Wine Evolves From Cheap Syrup to Collectible Vintage

Napa vineyard

The syrupy kosher wines of the past are now the exception to the rules: in recent years, a number of producers have begun making classic red and white kosher wines; a pioneer was Herzog Wine Cellars in Southern California, and there also is a growing wine industry in Israel.

If you remember when kosher wine meant mostly cheap and sweet, you probably also know that the second part is no longer true. Today, there are plenty of quality kosher wines being made around the world.

But did you also know that kosher wine has come so far there now are even super-premium bottles that go for more than $100 a bottle?

"It's absolutely amazing how it's evolved," says Michael K. Bernstein, owner of The Cask in Los Angeles, which stocks and sells exclusively kosher wines and spirits. "It's mind-boggling how many different kosher wines there are."

The syrupy kosher wines of the past stemmed mainly from economics. Jewish immigrants to America needed wine, a crucial part of their religious traditions, but didn't have access to high-quality grapes. So they used the Concord grapes that grow in the Northeast, producing wines with an unpleasant character, usually describe as "foxy," which was masked by adding sugar.

But in recent years, a number of producers have begun making classic red and white kosher wines. A pioneer was Herzog Wine Cellars in Southern California, and there also is a growing wine industry in Israel.

Making wine kosher isn't particularly hard, says Jeff Morgan, winemaker at Covenant, a winery in the Napa Valley that makes a kosher cabernet sauvignon that goes for $90 a bottle. The ingredients in wine are kosher; the trick is to keep things that way.

The basic requirement for doing that is to make sure that the grape juice and fermented wine is only touched or handled by Sabbath-observant Jews, which is what happens at Covenant, where associate winemaker Jonathan Hajdu is a Sabbath-observant Jew.

Read more at Haaretz.

Senate Confirms Jack Lew as Secretary of the Treasury

WASHINGTON — The Senate confirmed Jacob Lew to be Treasury secretary, affirming President Barack Obama’s choice of a budget expert at a time when Congress and the White House are at odds over sharp government spending cuts.

The Senate voted 71-26 to support the nomination.

Lew, 57, had most recently served as Obama’s chief of staff. He succeeds Timothy Geithner, who completed a tumultuous four-year term in which he helped lead the administration’s response to the financial crisis and recession.

He takes over just before automatic spending cuts are set to take effect. He’s likely to take part in any negotiations to reverse the cuts, and also in key budget talks next month to continue funding the government.

Lew began his government service in the 1980s as an aide to House Speaker Tip O’Neill. He brings nearly three decades of government service to the job, including two stints as White House budget director.

“Mr. Lew is well-qualified to be the nation’s next Treasury secretary,” said Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus of Montana. “He has demonstrated time and again that he has the knowledge and expertise” to deal with the country’s budget problems.

But Republican Sen. Jeff Session of Alabama, who opposed the nomination, said Lew is the architect of the Obama’s administration’s budget. Sessions said that budget doesn’t reduce the deficit enough.

During his confirmation hearing, Lew signaled no major economic policy changes. He advocated a balanced approach to reducing the long-term budget deficit through spending cuts and additional tax revenue.

Read more at Washington Post.

Jack Lew is the first Orthodox Jew appointed as a Cabinet member.

First Sign Language Megillah Reading

Sign language interpreter at Tel Aviv megillah reading

The Institute for the Advancement of the Deaf and the national-religious rabbinic association Tzohar joined together on Purim to hold for the first time a sign-language megila reading for the deaf and hard of hearing.

More than 600 people turned up to the Tel Aviv International Synagogue on Saturday night for the unique reading of the Book of Esther, one of the central customs of Purim.

As the megila was read aloud, a designated translator provided a simultaneous translation into sign language from atop a raised platform at the front of the synagogue.

The event was broadcast live over the Internet by Ynet.

Rabbi Ariel Konstantyn, the founder of the Tel Aviv International Synagogue and head of the community, said that it was important on Purim to include all members of society in the megila reading.

“We were saved on Purim because the Jews came together as a people and through that merit, God acted to deliver us from our enemies,” Konstantyn said.

“This unity is important and we can’t have an element of society missing out on an important experience of the Purim holiday, so this was the motivation behind the megila sign language initiative.”

Yael Kakon, director of the institute, also noted the importance of helping “the deaf and hard of hearing to enjoy the special experience of the Purim megila reading.”

The Purim celebrations at the Tel Aviv International Synagogue also included a Jewish rock concert, an open bar and a communal version of the traditional Purim meal.

In addition to the sign-language reading, Tzohar helped stage 192 megila readings around the country in 100 cities, towns, villages and kibbutzim.

Read more at Jerusalem Post.

Putin Suggests Compromise With Chabad

Russian Chief Rabbi Berel Lazar and President Putin

MOSCOW — Russian President Vladimir Putin is suggesting that a vast collection of Jewish books and documents that is the focus of a dispute between Moscow and Washington be given a permanent home in the Russian capital’s new Jewish Museum.

A U.S. judge in January ordered that Russia be fined $50,000 a day until it turns over the so-called Schneerson Collection to Chabad Lubavitch, a Hasidic movement within Orthodox Judaism headquartered in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Russia claims the collection is state property. Putin on Tuesday criticized the ruling, saying “discussion of this problem has taken on elements of confrontation,” Russian news agencies reported. The collection is now held at the state library and military archives.

Putin said he would consider ordering the collection be placed at the Jewish museum, which opened last year.

Read more at Washington Post.

If Putin has offered a compromise I think they should take it. 

Activists Try to Save Old Warsaw Ghetto Building

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — It was the place where Jewish women did their ritual bathing. It was a tuberculosis clinic. It survived the German onslaught and became a gathering point for Holocaust survivors.

Now "the white building," the headquarters of the Jewish community and one of the few surviving remnants of the infamous Warsaw Ghetto, could be torn down to make way for a multistory tower that would fit seamlessly into a modern city skyline.

The building's fate will soon be determined by the Culture Ministry, which has been asked by advocates of historic preservation to declare it a historical monument, a classification that would ban its destruction. It's not yet clear how officials will decide, though previous rulings by other state offices had declared the building not worth saving. Now those for and against destroying the old building are anxiously awaiting a verdict.

What is perhaps unexpected in this case is who is fighting for what: Warsaw's Jewish community, which owns the dilapidated three-story building, is making the case for its destruction. The community leaders argue that a bigger building is needed to accommodate a Jewish community that is re-emerging in the young Polish democracy after the Holocaust and decades of communist repression.

The white building, in the heart of the city's business district, is the place where the Jewish community gathers for lectures, Shabbat dinners, holidays, even sports. Jewish leaders argue that it is too cramped, bleak and fungus-infested to continue serving the needs of a community that has roughly tripled in number in the past decade.

Today, it can no longer accommodate all those who want to join Shabbat dinners after Friday evening prayers. There is no room for festive celebrations on the holiday of Purim. And a new Reform congregation, which embraces a modern style of worship different from the Orthodox services held in the Nozyk synagogue, must meet across town in rented rooms.

Read more at NPR.

Yiddish is Not a Dying Language (Forward Targets Yiddish-Speaking Hasidim)

The fate of Yiddish is something of a question mark — perhaps fitting for a culture famous for answering questions with questions.

Its use is popularly believed to be fading as Holocaust survivors and the people who learned Yiddish at the kitchen tables of their immigrant parents die off.

But scholars say not to write off Yiddish just yet. Many contend it has a brighter future as young people take up the language in some 30 college programs and institutes around the country. More significant, the ranks of ultra-Orthodox Jews, for whom it is the lingua franca, continue to mushroom.

It is this more sanguine outlook that explains why The Forward, the 115-year-old Jewish newspaper, is expanding its ambitions. Three decades ago, the paper trimmed back the schedule of the Yiddish-language newspaper from a daily to a weekly, and in 1990 it tried to win new readers by printing an entirely separate paper in English.

Now, encouraged by what it sees as renewed interest in Yiddish among younger people, The Forward will introduce a rejuvenated and enhanced Yiddish Web site (vebzaytl in Yiddish) on Feb. 4, complete with blogs and links to Facebook (Face-bukh). Because of a declining readership, however, the publication schedule of the print version of the Yiddish-language newspaper will be cut back to every other week.

In addition to featuring articles from the Yiddish newspaper, which the bare-bones Web site already does, the remodeled site will have a daily podcast of about 10 minutes rotating among Yiddish-speaking correspondents in Moscow, Jerusalem, Paris, Warsaw, Melbourne, Buenos Aires and New York.

There will be a blog called Vayter (Further) geared to students studying Yiddish, which will offer folk tales and Yiddish phrases, intended to provide lively reading matter and allow students to connect. By clicking on an unfamiliar Yiddish word, students can see a pop-up translation, something they cannot do in the newspaper.

There will also be a blog for Hasidim and other Haredim — ultra-Orthodox Jews — written by Haredim who will probably use pen names. (Haredim are discouraged from reading secular newspapers, though many privately read news on the Web). It will be called “Yiddish mit ayn Aleph” — a reference to the distinctive way Hasidim spell the language’s name.

“We’ve always had a minority of Haredi readers,” said Sam Norich, publisher of the English and Yiddish newspapers. “Some of them read the printed edition underneath the Haredi newspaper. But online there’s greater participation.”

The new Web site will continue some old traditions, like featuring videos on how to cook East European delicacies, like stuffed cabbage, and on international travel, but these will now have English subtitles. A new blog called “Yidishe parnose” (“It’s a living”) will consist of conversations with Yiddish speakers working in various professions, from cobblers to investment bankers.

Read more at NY Times.

Considering the Forward's anti-Orthodox bias, it has a tough hill to climb before it will be able to attract Hasidic readers. Maybe if they would write something nice about us once in a while I might become a subscriber. 

Obama to Name Jack Lew for Secretary of the Treasury

Jack Lew and President Obama

President Obama plans to nominate White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew as his next Treasury secretary, choosing a trusted adviser with deep experience in the nation’s budget challenges and in the legislative warfare that will test Obama’s second term, according to people familiar with the matter.

The selection of Lew, 57, is an acknowledgment that at least the next several months will involve a sustained conflict with congressional Republicans over the nation’s finances. The government is likely to face a deadline to raise the federal debt ceiling no later than March 1 — as well as a series of deep and automatic spending cuts set to begin around the same time.

Lew’s appointment signals continuity between Obama’s first and second term and suggests that the president would not be taking a significantly different approach to governing. Lew has served as Obama’s budget director and the No. 2 State Department official. He also was budget director during the Clinton administration and has been negotiating compromises over taxes and spending since the 1980s, when he was a top aide to then-House Speaker Thomas P. “Tip” O’Neill Jr. (D-Mass.).

Lew’s appointment would finally allow Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner to depart — something he has wanted to do for over a year. Geithner, the president’s longest-serving economic adviser, stayed on after a personal plea from the president.

The nomination is subject to confirmation by the Senate, where many Republicans do not like his negotiating style. But there has been no groundswell of opposition in recent weeks, since Lew was reported to be a candidate to lead the Treasury Department.

The White House on Wednesday did not confirm Lew’s nomination but did praise him.

“Jack Lew has been and continues to be an extremely valuable adviser to the president,” press secretary Jay Carney said. “Over the past quarter of a century, Jack Lew has been integral part some of most important budget and fiscal agreements in Washington.”

While Geithner came into office amid a financial crisis and recession, Lew’s challenges would be of a different type. He would start off as part of a team trying to lift the $16.4 trillion debt ceiling. He would also be trying to raise taxes to shrink budget deficits and avoid deep spending cuts that could crimp the nation’s economic growth or threaten the social safety net.

Read more at Washington Post.

Now what are all the people going to say who screamed that President Obama is an "Anti-Semite" because he named Chuck Hagel ("an Anti-Semite!" because he once said something about AIPAC or something) for Defense.

What could they say: "This proves he's an Anti-Semite because only an Anti-Semite thinks that Jews are good with money!1!")

When was the last time an Anti-Semite appointed a Jew as Treasurer? Oh yeah, Pharoah.

President Obama Wishes Jews a Happy Hanukkah

President and Michele Obama at White House Hanukkah party in 2011.

Michelle and I send our warmest wishes to all those celebrating Hanukkah around the world. 

This Hanukkah season we remember the powerful story of the Maccabees who rose up to liberate their people from oppression. Upon discovering the desecration of their Temple, the believers found only enough oil to light the lamp for one night. And yet it lasted for eight. 

Hanukkah is a time to celebrate the faith and customs of the Jewish people, but it is also an opportunity for people of all faiths to recognize the common aspirations we share. This holiday season, let us give thanks for the blessings we enjoy, and remain mindful of those who are suffering. And let us reaffirm our commitment to building a better, more complete world for all.   

From our family to the Jewish Community around the world, Chag Sameach. 

From Whitehouse.gov.

The photo is from the White House Hanukkah party in 2011, where kosher food was served much to the chagrin of M.J. Rosenberg. (CORRECTION: MJ actually had a meltdown over the White House serving kosher food at a Passover seder which is actually even more of a sad FAIL) This was the first of many reasons that Babushka decided to vote for Barack Obama last Election Day.

Happy Hanukkah from Israel!

About Those Maps of "Disappearing Palestine"

"Disappearing Palestine" as sent around all over Twitter

Yaakov Lozowick comments:

Anyone who deals with the Israel-Palestine conflict will probably have come across the nasty four-map series purporting to show how Israel is eliminating Palestine step by step. Recently some fellow in the NY area hired space on local billboards to expose them to commuters. I contacted him and asked if he’d be willing to listen to a critique; when he said he would I sent him the following analysis. You can see his brief response - and mine - at the end.

According to what I’ve read on Mondoweiss, you seem to be of the opinion that the series of four maps showing the disappearing Palestinian presence in what was once Mandatory Palestine are factually accurate. I suggest we take a closer look.

There are various problems with the series, the most obvious being that it compares apples with oranges and also with screwdrivers, meaning that the different maps present different data-sets. Some of the data-sets themselves are inaccurate.

Judging by the picture above, your version of the maps is even more problematic than some of the other versions which are out there. I’ll relate to your version as presented on Mondoweiss.

First, the map from 1946. Even standing alone without the series, it’s misleading in that it contains two distinct types of information. The outline is of the territory controlled by the British, commonly known as Palestine. Being a map of a political entity, however, the whole thing should be the same color, green in this case, since the entire territory was ruled by the British, the white parts and the green. If one wished to show privately owned land under the sovereignty of the British according to ethnic identity, the green would have been replaced by a hodgepodge of colors. Some of the land was owned by Jews, some by Arabs (today we would call them Palestinians), some by Arab absentee landlords of other nationalities (Lebanese, Syrians, Egyptians and so on), some by European churches – Catholic Protestant, Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox and others, and finally, the largest section by far would have been land registered by no-one and thus belonging to the government, i.e the British.

As far as I can see, your version has omitted the Jewish ownership of property in Jerusalem (where there was a majority of Jews), and in various pockets such as the Etzion Block, Neve Yaacov, settlements on the Dead Sea, Hebron, Safed, Naharia and its hinterland, Kfar Darom in Gaza, and so on. But the main problem with this map isn’t its omissions of Jewish property, but rather the implication that any land not owned by Jews was “Palestine”. Not true. If it’s land ownership you’re trying to depict then most of the territory was owned by the British government; if it’s political sovereignty then the entire area was British.

The second map drops the issue of land ownership, and the series never returns to it. This map is a reasonably accurate depiction of the partition plan adopted by the United Nations on November 29th 1947, with one glaring omission: the Jerusalem-Bethlehem area, which was very clearly not allocated to either side, but designated as a Corpus Separandum. I emphasize: Jerusalem and Bethlehem. So the cartographer has allocated to a notional Palestine a very important piece of territory which it never had.

Of course, this map never depicted a reality. At the time it was rejected by all the Arab states which had a vote, and also by the local Arabs themselves who did not generally call themselves Palestinians at the time, but we can agree to call them that now. I’m not going to get into the question of who foiled the UN partition plan, but I think we can agree that all sides played their roles; the Jewish Yishuv, Husseini’s Palestinian forces, Kaukji’s forces, and the Egyptian, Jordanian, Syrian, Iraqi and Lebanese forces which participated in fighting in territory which had previously been under British rule.

Read the rest at Yaakov Lozowick's blog.

Heads Explode as Orthodox Jews Vote Overwhelmingly for Obama

Scary Jew Shadow in Line to Vote

As election results have been confirmed and statistics from national polls emerge, showing that American Jews overwhelmingly supported Barack Obama - with 70% of the Jewish population voting for Obama - questions emerge about the the true sentiments of this population towards Israel and the disconnect between Jews in Israel and those abroad.

David Bedein, founder of the Israel Resource News Agency and Director of the Center for Near East Policy Research finds the disconnect between the religious in Israel and the U.S. particularly startling, saying many Republican supporters were shocked by the refusal of Orthodox leaders to throw their support behind the pro-Israel Mitt Romney.

“Those who think that orthodox Jews supported Romney and secular Jews supported Obama are wrong. This is simply not true,” said Bedein. “In New Jersey they established the organization ‘Rabbis for Romney,’ and they turned to all sectors of Orthodox Jews, and there are a million Jews like that, but their rabbis refused to join.”

In his opinion, Jewish support for Obama indicates a grave detachment from the land of Israel. “We approached the Young Israel organization, which represents hundreds of synagogues, we approached the Council of Rabbis in the U.S., the Chabad organization, Agudath Israel, all of them refused - they told us they wanted to protect their ties to the current government. We need to understand that the difference (in votes for) Obama and Romney was very slight in the key states, and if those rabbis and leaders would have done something, if they would have emphasized how dangerous Obama is for Israel, it would have changed the entire picture and Romney would have been put in the White House.”

More bitter, bitter tears at Arutz Sheva.

Obama is Good for Israel!

Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Obama

The outcome of the elections will be determined by the voters' decision as to which of the two candidates is good for America. But if any of them are vacillating in their vote over whether Obama has been a good president for Israel, the answer is yes.

Tens of millions of Americans will go to the polls on Tuesday to vote for a president and vice president. It will be an important day for American democracy. This will be the Americans' day, but the outcome of the elections will impact the entire world.

For Americans in general, and American Jews in particular, the United States' attitude toward Israel is just one of many factors to consider - among internal and foreign affairs, the economy and defense - when casting their vote.

But for various reasons, Republican candidate Mitt Romney has made incumbent President Barack Obama's policy toward Israel a hot-button issue in the campaign. One of those reasons is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's open support for Romney, who like him enjoys the patronage of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. Obama has been accused of taking a cool and hostile stance in relation to Israel on several issues, from Iran to Palestine. Romney promises a warmer, more supportive approach./p>

Indeed, one would hope the realization of Romney's wishes would further advance Washington-Jerusalem relations, in the tradition of all recent U.S. administrations, both Republican and Democrat. But a deeper examination of the core issues comprising the two countries' relations - devoid of political and personal interests - reveals no grounds for portraying Obama in a negative light.

Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, assisted Israel's defense by toppling Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq and deterring, albeit for a limited period, Iran's accelerated progress toward attaining nuclear weapons. Bush contributed to Israel's peace, even if partially, by being the first president to adopt the two-state solution. His support even enabled the evacuation of settlements from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank.

Obama continued this two-way track vis-a-vis Iran and the issue of Palestinian statehood. Under his pressure, Israel suspended for the first time - for a while - construction in the settlements. Relations between the two countries' armed forces have never been so close. Obama's challenge in his second term, if he wins the elections, is to lead the region to a stable arrangement of peace and security.

The outcome of the elections will be determined by the voters' decision as to which of the two candidates is good for America. But if any of them are vacillating in their vote over whether Obama has been a good president for Israel, the answer is yes.

Editorial from HAARETZ.

Babushka does not normally agree with many of the editorials published by Haaretz but in this case they are right on target, unlike many other Jewish and Israeli publications who have attacked the incumbent President for dubious reasons that have no basis in fact.

 

EPIC FAIL: "Free Gaza Movement" Goes Past Holocaust Denial, BLAMES JEWS for the Holocaust

The Free Gaza Movement, a U.S.-based activist group known for provisioning ships to run the Israeli-Egyptian blockade of Gaza, was hit with charges of anti-Semitism on Wednesday after posting a tweet claiming that Jews were responsible for the Holocaust.

“Zionists operated the concentration camps and helped murder millions of innocent Jews,” read a Tweet posted Sunday to @freegazaorg, the official Twitter feed of the group, which includes Canadian author Naomi Klein and Bishop Desmond Tutu on its board of advisors.

An embedded link led to a video of a speech by known conspiracy theorist Eustace Mullins claiming that the word Nazi is an amalgam of the words “National socialism” and “Zionist.”

“[Hitler] allied with the Zionist Party, and the mission of the Nazis was to force the anti-Zionist Jews to accept Zionism — and this is what the concentration camps were about,” said Mr. Mullins, who died of a stroke in 2010.

Read more at National Post.

Avi Mayer, who captured the screen grab shown at the top of this post, documents the entire "Downfall" of Greta Berlin and her merry band of Holocaust deniers.

 

EPIC FAIL: Zionist Organization of America Loses 501(c)(3) Tax-Exempt Status

ZOA Chairman Morton Klein with BFF's Glenn Beck and Michele Bachmann.

The Zionist Organization of America’s tax-exempt status has been revoked after the group missed three consecutive years of filings to the Internal Revenue Service, the Forward has learned.

The 115-year-old Zionist group has not been allowed to accept tax-deductible donations since February.

ZOA spokesman David Drimer, the group’s executive director, said that the sanction was the result of a ‘technical misunderstanding,’ and that since it happened, the ZOA has ‘never intentionally’ misrepresented itself. He said that the group is nearly ready to apply for a retroactive reinstatement of its tax exemption.

In an email provided to the Forward, ZOA tax attorney Tyler Korn wrote that ‘serious failures by the ZOA’s accountants, management and Board’ led to the loss of the group’s exemption.

Drimer, who previously was associate publisher of the Forward, said that the lost exemption is no secret and that he talked ‘with numerous individuals about it every day.’ But Drimer cited a memorandum prepared by Korn saying that the group has no obligation to broadly publicize the sanction.

That opposition to publicizing the lost exemption has been a cause of dissent on the group’s national board. Steven Goldberg, a vice chairman of the national board and the chair the ZOA’s Los Angeles chapter, has argued for broader public disclosure.

‘I believe we have a fiduciary responsibility to disclose,’ Goldberg told the Forward. ‘I don’t understand not telling people.’

Read more at Forward.com.

I must say this was breathtakingly stupid. How many officers do they have making 6-figure salaries? I have my own 501(c)(3) and I have automatic reminders to update every year with the IRS. And I don’t pay myself any salary, much less 6 figures.