The Humanitarians of the Mavi Marmara

Voice of the Humanitarians I: "Shut up, go back to Auschwitz .... don't forget 9/11"

Voice of the Humanitarians II: "Kill the Jews"

The name Khaibar mentioned in battle cry was the last Jewish village defeated by Muhammad's army in 628. The battle marked the end of Jewish presence in Arabia.
There are Muslims who see that as a precursor for future wars against Jews. At gatherings and rallies of extremists, this chant is often heard as a threat to Jews to expect to be defeated and killed again by Muslims. -- Palwatch

click here for Memri's page on the "flotilla"

The Mind of Ms. Helen Thomas of the White House Press Corps

Of What Use is the New Israel Fund ?

Ms. Naomi Chazan

President, New Israel Fund

It is almost thirty years ago that the French scholar Georges Lavau published his memorable study A quoi sert le parti communiste français ?, "Of What Use is the French Communist Party ?", with the question mark on its cover five times as large as the rest of the title. (Click here for a French-language review). No, Lavau found, the CP does not in any way live up to its declared aims of proletarian revolution, human brotherhood, or social betterment. But nevertheless, he says, the Party has its functions -- mainly one of providing a venting place for the dissatisfied in the larger society; in this way, according to Lavau, the CP promotes social stability.

The idea of piercing behind professed aims to examine the reality of a social institution did not originate with Lavau. Nor did it originate with the American sociologist Robert K. Merton (1910-2003, born Meyer Schkolnick), who introduced the terminology of "manifest" versus "latent" functions. But Merton's terminology is useful as a handle. I am using it here to ask: what is manifest, and what is latent in the New Israel Fund ?

The manifest content of NIF is its self description, for instance this passage from its website:

The New Israel Fund (NIF) is the leading organization committed to democratic change within Israel. Since 1979, NIF has fought for social justice and equality for all Israelis. We believe that Israel can live up to its founders' vision of a state that ensures complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants, without regard to religion, race or gender.

Widely credited with building Israel's progressive civil society from scratch, we have provided more than $200 million to more than 800 cutting-edge organizations since our inception. What's more, through our action arm, SHATIL, we mentor, train and lead Israeli civil society in an ongoing struggle to empower the underprivileged.

Democratic social change. Social justice. Equality. Sound familiar ? And ah yes, "progressive civil society" -- we've looked at that one in the previous posting. As for the "cutting-edge" organizations that NIF has financed, these are better known for their accusations of Israeli "war crimes" and, in effect, their work to demolish Israel (see my postings of 2/11/10 and 4/8/10). Are any of these eight hundred groups, over and above the demonstrated anti-Israel agitation of at least some of them, involved in any discernible efforts for "complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants, without regard to religion, race or gender" ? I would not rule that out, but I am skeptical. The politics of NIF-supported groups are clear, their humanitarian impact, if any, is not clear to me.

In the meantime, there are many groups in Israel that do indeed work "to empower the underprivileged" and who do so without the political baggage of NIF. Two of these come to mind immediately: the Tel Aviv Foundation and the Jerusalem Foundation. Both are well established and have long records of work among the poor, both Arabs and Jews, work that they have done without fanfare and without public grandstanding. I would urge the reader to consult the websites of each. Moreover, the UJA-Federation of New York supports numerous groups in Israel devoted to the needy there, some of which are specifically organized for Arabs and other minorities.

About a year ago my wife Rita and I visited the Bialik - Rogozin School in Yaffo, which is supported by the Tel Aviv - Yaffo municipality. We found young children of many backgrounds studying in this very modern, well equipped Israeli institution. I was particularly struck by the many black faces from Africa -- six and seven-year olds -- all speaking Hebrew like sabras. They were children of African refugees, some of whom were in the country as undocumented immigrants. "This is the only place on earth where refugees from Darfur and other African countries are treated like human beings," a woman there remarked. While I was at the school and witnessed the colorful array of faces, I kept thinking of Jimmy Carter, who had just written his strange assessment of Israel as practicing "apartheid." I kept asking myself, is Carter just ignorant or is he malicious ?

So, well, no, we do not need the NIF to "empower the underprivileged" in Israel.

The NIF may or may not be helpful to underprivileged people in Israel, but it is well documented that it is definitely helpful to another group -- the extremely privileged. According to the group's 2008 IRS Form 990, it paid top salaries to at least two of its US-based officials: $228,331 to Larry Garber, then its CEO, and another $235,408 to Aaron Back, listed as "independent contractor." These payments are not much when compared to incomes of bank executives or even to those of executives at certain other Jewish groups. But these NIF salaries are more than twice as high as those of full professors of major universities. It places the recipients in the upper two percent of American households, assuming that they are sole wage earners. These are 2008 figures, the last that the group has provided to the IRS. Mr. Daniel Sokatch, the current CEO of NIF, has not responded to my request for the current salary structure at his organization.

So we know that NIF money goes to support Arab campaigns against Israel; it goes to pay for upper-middle class lifestyles of its officials. What else does it buy ? Nothing that can be definitely documented, but I would not dismiss feelings of satisfaction to donors whose political proclivities coincide with those of the NIF leadership. Whatever else may be said about the NIF, it is obviously far more political than eleemosynary. For prospective donors whose motivations are charitable, NIF is a good group from which to stay away.


Read the important Im Tirtzu report on the NIF

Read the NGO Monitor report on the NIF

Read the NGO Monitor's Ethical Guidelines for the NIF

UPDATE, May 14, 2010: NGO Monitor ad re. NIF

"Civil Society" -- the Shell Game of the New Israel Fund

Ms. Naomi Chazan

President, New Israel Fund

I first ran across "civil society" in this context when I looked into the agitational work of a Mr. Jeff Halper, an American immigrant to Israel who devotes himself to abolishing the Jewish state. He claims to have the support of "international civil society" because people from various countries, including the American Friends Service Committee, support his cause.

Now there is a public controversy surrounding the New Israel Fund, a far less radical group than Mr. Halper's, but one that devotes itself to similar objectives -- less stridently, much less directly, and probably less deliberately. As I have shown in a previous posting, NIF has financed a number of groups that work for the dismantlement of Israel. With all that, NIF claims, repeatedly and insistently, that it represents and supports "civil society" in Israel. That, in its self-description, is its raison d'être.

That sounds grand. But what, exactly, is "civil society ? As it turns out, NIF has a number of answers, each different from the next.

First, here is Daniel Sokatch, NIF's current executive director:

A)

At a time when the organizations that safeguard Israeli civil society are under assault by those for whom openness, equality and pluralism are anathema, the NIF family of organizations has come together like never before to push back, and to stand up for justice. (Sokatch)

And here is NIF's form 990 submission to the IRS:

B)

NIF works with civil society organizations to accomplish social and economic justice.

And here is Adalah, one of NIF's most strident anti-Israel beneficiaries, a group that accuses Israel of "crimes against humanity":

C)

In 8/09, Adalah and Al-Haq held a symposium in Ramallah where research team members presented the findings of the study and discussed potential next steps with around 150 representatives of civil society, political parties, and international organizations who attended the event. (2009 Ann.Rpt.)

The many meanings of "civil society"

So we see that sometimes NIF uses the term as equivalent to democracy itself (example A) while at other times (examples B and C), the term refers to one or another of non-governmental organizations; there is a basic equivocation about this "civil society" in NIF usage.

But even when employed in the more narrow sense -- i.e. non-governmental organization -- there is yet a further ambiguity. If NIF and the groups it finances can be said to be "civil society," what about all the other voluntary groups of Israel ? Dare one mention, say, settler organizations on the West Bank ? No, NIF never mentions groups it does not like as being "civil society;" it seems that only the left-wing and Arab groups that it favors qualify.

In brief, the use of the term "civil society" by NIF is a shell game. When convenient, it means no more than voluntary or non-governmental groups. At other times it means the NIF-financed groups. At still other times, the term means democracy itself. By shifting back and forth, without keeping the spectator informed where the pea is hidden, NIF can deflect any criticism of itself or of one of its beneficiaries (B and C "civil society") as an attack on democracy itself (A "civil society") Such deflection is usually accompanied by a characteristic ultra-left barrage of vilification: McCarthyist ! Fascist ! Reactionary !

The use of "civil society" to characterize the left-wing groups that NIF favors also emboldens NIF to suggest that somehow the society as a whole is behind its cause. Since it's very simple to multiply friendly organizations, if necessary through overlapping memberships, one can seek to create an impression of substantial public support. But this procedure is obviously misleading. No matter how many organizations one claims as supportive, the total numbers of sympathizers can be minuscule. And that, as it happens, is the case here: all the groups trotted out by NIF, all of them together, represent but a very tiny slice of Israeli public opinion. How do I know this ? Well, Israel is a democratic country, and the voice of the people is heard in elections.

Ms. Chazan, NIF President, is a former member of the Knesset as member of the Meretz political party and Meretz, in a sense, remains the political arm of NFI. At one time Meretz commanded a respectable number of votes, but in the last (2009) election it felt constrained to run together with another small party to improve its chances. This combination, New Movement-Meretz, obtained ... guess how much of the vote ? It received all of 2.95% ! So by any meaningful accounting for "civil society" in Israel, 97.05% of it will have nothing to do with Ms. Chazan and her NFI.


Read the important Im Tirtzu report on the NIF

Read the NGO Monitor report on the NIF

The Odenwaldschule

Amelie Fried

The Odenwaldschule, a residential school in Germany's countryside not far from Frankfurt, will be 100 years old this year. Started by progressivist educationalists, under the influence of the youth movement of those years and not without the anti-Semitic overtones common at the time, it became famous among the left-leaning enlightened both during the Weimar republic and after WWII. Klaus Mann was a pupil there, as was Daniel Cohn-Bendit in a later period. Among the educational practices: children and teachers lived side by side in the dorm; they were "friends" and used the "du" when speaking to one another; all, the pupils, the teachers, the administrators, all these were far more enlightened and morally advanced than the bourgeois circles from which they came (and which, in fact, provided the money).

And now there is a huge sex scandal. It seems that for more than a decade, ending in about 1985, boys were sexually abused by the director and other teachers. Young teen-age girls were abused by other teachers and their friends. Both boys and girls, together with staff, showered communally in the naked; the staff pressured youngsters to play strip poker .... All this was well known to one and all, but authorities were not brought in until the strict German statute of limitations kicked in to protect the then-director and his staff.

The well known German writer Amelie Fried, herself a pupil in those years, has now written an unsparing piece for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. She tells of the excitement of being an adolescent in that atmosphere, but also of the shame that will not go away. (The FAZ has recently published quite a number of other good articles on the case, but, obviously, all is in German. I think that there should be a book in English.)

If this were another Catholic institution, say, none of this would have come as surprising news. As a matter of fact, more such sad news came from German Catholic schools in the same week. But the Odenwaldschule is one of the internationally best-known establishments of modern, progressive, "anti-bourgeois" education, highly accredited by UNESCO and similar authorities (whether there was a UNESCO connection during the critical years is not clear). So the staid German press is in a paroxysm of -- well, the Germans have a word -- Schadenfreue. Who can blame it for that ?

Josef Goebbels and Adolf Hitler, Feb. 1933

"The Jewish press lies," opines Dr. G.

The Ghost of L. Ron Hubbard

Tom Cruise

John Travolta

So here we have yet another report/exposé of Scientology -- this time it's an excellent article in the New York Times by Laurie Goodstein, March 7: financial irregularities, physical violence, blatant exploitation of brain-washed followers, and -- new to me -- the outrageous barriers that prevent members from leaving the cult. Nevertheless, the cult continues its merry old way. I first came across it when, back in the 1950's, L. Ron Hubbard appeared at City College in New York to lecture on "engrams" and all the other contributions he had made to the culture of unreason. Now it's sixty years later, and Hubbard's folks are still around. What gives ?

Usually cults of this kind die when their founders die. But in this case the group persists. It's very small, but it does persist. Goodstein reports poll data showing only about 25,000 Americans as Scientologists. National polling organizations have trouble estimating very small groups, as I pointed out in a different context, but Scientology, whatever its true strength, is not very large and would hardly justify the amount of ink lavished on it by mainstream media.

If -- a big if here -- it weren't for the curious presence of famous movie stars among its adherents. Of course other stars have graced equally kookie causes. At least one is said to be among the "truthers" who say that the US government commissioned 9/11, and at least another among the folks who maintain that Jews are the cause of all evil. But the contingent of Scientology stars is much larger and much better known than these.

When I was young, (some) movie stars could still shock by engaging in serial polygamy. Now that this charming practice has gone mainstream, what's a poor star to do to get a little extra exsposure in the ever-compliant press ? Enter the ghost of L. Ron Hubbard.

Wespac Executive Director: Hamas is Right

Nada Khader, the Executive Director of the Wespac Foundation, excoriates not only Israel but also President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, who, Ms. Khader says, is a "collaborator." And yes, Hamas is right in sending rockets into Israel.

Wespac collects contributions, illegally, from like-minded people and issues tax receipts under IRS regulation 501(c)(3). [See previous posting]

for my complaint to the IRS, please click HERE

Anti-Israel Groups Find Ways ....

A number of anti-Israel groups have found ways -- all illegal -- to get US taxpayer money.

A "Wespac Foundation," apparently based in Westchester County north of New York City, is registered with the IRS as a 501(c)(3) entity. Not only does it conduct its affairs under federal and local tax exemptions, but it also hands out receipts to its contributors which these then use to claim income tax exemptions. Which makes Uncle Sam, and you and me, financial contributors to Wespac's manifold anti-Israel activities. And these activities are largely devoted to demonizing Israel. " In particular," it says on its website, "we support the call by over 200 Palestinian civil society organizations for punitive measures including boycotts, divestment, and sanctions...."

One interesting aspect of Wespac is that it serves as the "501(c)(3) fiscal sponsor" for other anti-Israel action groups: it collects funds from donors, issues tax receipts, and then distributes the money to others who are like-minded. (In law, the "sponsor" and the recipient, in this kind of relationship, are held to be one legal entity, each being responsible for the actions of the other.)

One of these recipients is Adalah-New York, shown demonstrating in the picture above. A-NY advertises its financial relationship with Westpac on its website, where the visitor is invited to "Support Adalah-New York through our 501(c)(3) fiscal sponsor, Wespac."

On February 21, 2010, A-NY -- some forty young folks, lily-white -- demonstrated at Brooklyn College, urging the public to boycott the Israel Ballet. A-NY describes its demonstration:

Protesting ballerinas dressed in blue and white tutus (Israel's national colors) and wearing masks performed a waltz that transformed into a military drill march. As the orchestra switched to a two-beat march, the dancers lifted their masks to reveal camouflage on their faces.

Another group for which Wespac acts as "fiscal sponsor" is "Israeli Apartheid Week," whose aims and activities are similar to A-NY. IAW, too, advertises its relationship with Wespac on its site.

In its Form 990 submission to the IRS, Wespac describes its mission as follows:

HUMAN RIGHTS AND CURRENT AFFAIRS EDUCATION AND INFORMATION PROVIDED TO MANY HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE THROUGH PUBLIC MEETINGS EVENTS, CONFERENCES AND NEWSLETTERS

"Education" here is the key. The IRS Code does indeed grant tax exemptions and other privileges to entities devoted to "education." But the IRS is also careful to delineate "education" from the kind of propaganda practiced by Wespac and the groups that it finances. Here are the relevant portions from the IRS guidelines (Rev.Procedures 86-43) that describe prohibited behavior by entities claiming to advance "education":

1 The presentation of viewpoints or positions unsupported by facts is a significant portion of the organization's communications.
2 The facts that purport to support the viewpoints or positions are distorted.
3 The organization's presentations make substantial use of inflammatory and disparaging terms and express conclusions more on the basis of strong emotional feelings than of objective evaluations.
4 The approach used in the organization's presentations is not aimed at developing an understanding on the part of the intended audience or readership because it does not consider their background or training in the subject matter.

Update, March 2: a Google search "Wespac, Fiscal Agent" reveals still a number of other anti-Israel entities for which Wepac acts as "fiscal agent." Among these there is the Palestine Freedom Project

for my complaint to the IRS, please click HERE

READ: Lee Kaplan's article on how anti-Israel terror groups defraud the IRS

READ: Gerald Steinberg's up-to-date (7/11/10) op-ed piece on how anti-Israel groups receive funds through IRS-registered organizations.

The Radical Chic of Ms. Naomi Chazan; or Pride Precedeth the Fall

Ms. Naomi Chazan
President, New Israel Fund

Mada al Carmel, another group funded by the NIF, authored the "Haifa Declaration." Here are a few gems from that document: "Towards the end of the 19th century, the Zionist movement initiated its colonial-settler project in Palestine. Subsequently, in concert with world imperialism ... it succeeded in carrying out its project, which aimed at occupying our homeland ... The Zionist movement committed massacres against our people ... the State of Israel enacted racist land, immigration, and citizenship laws [a reference to the Law of Return] ... Israel carried out policies of subjugation and oppression in excess of those of the apartheid regime in South Africa." Israel Harel, Haaretz correspondent

Old Leonard Bernstein had a funny thing going -- a spot of radical chic -- with muscled Black anti-Semitism. More recently, a Jewish American university and a Jewish American college president did it with an anti-Israel Palestinian group in Jerusalem.

But now a new radical chic scandal has exploded in the Israeli press. It seems that the New Israel Fund , an ostensible pro-Israel charitable group, has diverted substantial funds to a number of radical anti-Israel groups. The details are given in a long, detailed, sober Report issued by the Zionist organization Im Tirtzu. (The IT report includes only groupings that contributed to the notorious Goldstone Report but does not mention other anti-Israel groups supported by NIF, for instance Mada al Carmel.) In turn, Im Tirtzu is being denounced, almost comically, by the NIF and its political supporters: McCarthyism ! ... Fascism !

[OK -- I cannot resist a small aside on the idiocy of these two epithets. 1) Those who use "McCarthyism" today, generally ignorant of the historical context of 1950's Soviet espionage and the crude backlash against it, imagine that the "victims of McCarthyism" had been totally innocent, totally loyal Americans. 2) Those who use the term "Fascism" here: what in fact do they think ? That right-wing Israelis today, like the Italian confederates of Hitler in WWII, are out to destroy democratic government ? It is true that some criticism of NIF has crossed the borders of good taste, but this hardly amounts to the capital crimes alleged by the extreme Left ]

Pride goes before ruin, arrogance before failure... (Prov. 16:18, new JPS translation)

But back to the NIF and Ms. Naomi Chazan, its current president. Some ten years ago I sat in an audience of American Jews whom she addressed in Jerusalem. Her message, as I recall it, was that Israel alone is to be blamed for the failure to achieve peace with the Arabs. She was impatient with us. At one time she explained that she is a political science professor and that therefore she can tell us a thing or two about how things really are. Nobody was much impressed with that argument, but the academics in the audience could hardly keep from laughing out loud.

Now, after much criticism of her handling of NIF funding, the consequent cancellation of her visit to Australia, and her dismissal from the Jerusalem Post, she again insists on her professorial authority: "As a politics professor, I know how to read reports," she says to Haaretz, denouncing the IT study. But in the same interview she also makes an assertion that completely destroys her credibility, as it destroys the credibility of those of her supporters who make the same argument: "We really don't support every single thing these organizations say, but we support their right to say it."

The reference here is to Voltaire, who is often thought to have said, but apparently never did, that “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Voltaire or not, this is a noble sentiment which is more often quoted than followed. And it is sometimes used disingenuously, as it was by Chomsky in his connection with the Holocaust-deniers. It is used disingenuously here by Ms. Chazan:

1) There is nothing in the tradition of Voltaire, nor in that of the First Amendment, that suggests an inherent right to be financed by those who disagree with you. Does the right to free speech involve a right to receive money from your opponents ? Surely a professor of political science knows the answer to that one ? The Voltaire principle, in other words, cannot explain NIF financing of kooks.

2) If the Voltaire principle demands, as Ms. Chazan tells us she believes it does, the financing of unpopular viewpoints, she would be obligated to finance right-wing viewpoints as well. But where in the list of NIF recipients are there groups of right-wing settlers on the West Bank ? Where are the followers of the late Rabbi Kahane on NIF lists ? Again, it is obvious that the Voltaire principle, pace Ms. Chazan, cannot in fact be what motivates her or her followers.

Then there is the business of NIF financing by the Ford Foundation. Millions go from the FF to NIF each year, five million in 2008 alone. Part of this money is (indirectly) US taxpayer money, which the FF receives in great quantities through a variety of tax benefits. It is obvious to me that without such US-based funding, many of these far-left groups in Israel could not exist at all.

Ms. Chazan won't like me for this, but I do think that old Henry Ford, wherever he may be up (or down) there, might not be altogether unhappy to see where his money is going today. Long before Adolf Hitler was heard from, old Henry published "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" in his Dearborn Independent.

UPDATE (Feb. 17, 2010) The Organization "NGO Monitor" calls on the New Israel Fund to draw "red lines" to prevent the financing of anti-Israel propaganda. See the NGOM request HERE

UPDATE (February 24): Read the comprehensive report by David Bedein in the Jewish Week on the NIF scandal. Click HERE

READ: Professor Gerald M. Steinberg's analysis: NIF And the Addiction to Power

Dr. josef Mengele and other happy Nazis

Please click here to see a remarkable video.

David Irving's "frisson" and "secret thrill"

"You're a Reactionary Fraud, Alex"

Rancor, hate, resentment. Like the poor, they are always with us, but, praise be to God, they do not dominate all of our lives.

Unless ... unless we are members of a group dedicated to the celebration and perpetuation of these emotions. Examples, unfortunately, easily come to mind. The terrorist groups that train suicide bombers and killers of all kinds are the most obvious. But there are also groups that are less violent (and less well-known) that cultivate such emotions, and, the democracy that we are, they ply their trade close to us. The interesting thing is that more often than not the participants in these groups direct their rancor less upon the outside world than at their own close comrades in arms.

This rancor-turned-inward has long been known and described for religious groups such as the Exlusive Brethren. And now we have a remarkable description in the New York Times of January 16 concerning a Marxist band of (self-described) revolutionaries that operate the government-regulated radio station WBAI in New York. These comrades get their regular kicks from bitter, vicious (and often comical) denunciation of one another. Nominally they are committed to denouncing the capitalist and imperialist enemy, of course; some wear Chilean sweaters and Palestinian scarves to attest to that. But their most most fervent hatreds, it seems, are directed to the people sitting next to them at WBAI board meetings.

[For many of these rancor groups, there are bodies of ex-members and dissident members, eager to expose and tell all. For the Exclusive Brethren, for example, see peebs.net]

Dostoevsky, describing the Nineteenth Century Russian terrorists ("The Devils"), knew about the hatreds for one another among such people. It seems to be one of the unwritten laws of all extremist movements. And obviously, this tendency to self-destruct among the crazies is something for which must be grateful.

Jews Who Hate Israel

Some well-known Jewish writers -- Noam Chomsky being the best known -- do not just criticize Israel, but they hate Israel. Hate is a strong emotion, and we do not expect it in print a great deal, and certainly not when it is directed toward one's own people, one's own family. But here it is: a few dozen writers, a few thousand signers of petitions, all claiming to be Jews, all asserting a strong hatred for Israel. Why ?

I have written an essay that I call "Prolegomena to the Study of Jews Who Hate Israel" that seeks, not easy answers, but answers nonetheless, but mostly tries to point to ways in which we could come to a better understanding of these interesting folks. Click on the link and let me know what you think, won't you.

Thanks.

Werner

Al-Quds University and Radical Chic

The Arab name for Jerusalem is Al-Quds. Al-Quds Day, for example, is observed in Iran and some other countries as a day for denouncing Israel. And then there is an Al-Quds University (AQU) in Jerusalem which is dedicated to ... well, all kinds of things, but, in my interpretation of its website, primarily to pushing an anti-Israel political agenda.

But wait, is that a fair description ? AQU has influential and powerful connections to Western institutions which would seem to foreclose any crude or hateful stance on Israel or on peaceful solutions to the Israel-Arab conflict. For example, AQU has agreements of collaboration with the Jewish Brandeis University in Massachusetts, and also with Bard College in New York, under its Jewish president Leon Botstein. ( Bard's interest, I have been told, is in building bridges with the Palestinians, in helping to improve the education of Palestinians, etc. , all aims with which I find myself in full agreement. And I suppose Brandeis would have the same kind of objectives in mind when it shares its resources and lends its good name to the promotion of AQU.)

So what gives here ?

The AQU website, unfortunately, leaves no doubt about the strident political commitments of the institution. The site's central "General Information" is a lengthy, rambling history of Jerusalem from an anti-Israel point of view. The establishment of Israel in 1948 is described as "the 1948 Nakba," using the Palestinian nationalist term meaning "Catastrophe." Beyond that, there are references to various writers and scholars all of whom seem to say that the Jews have not had a historical connection to the land of Israel, that there was no such thing as King David, that the Western Wall could not have been related to a Jewish Temple, etc. etc. Obviously, one could make some sort of reasonable case for some of these assertions. But this General Information is a piece of special pleading; it is all tied together with propagandistic glue. Whatever writings fit the parti pris is carefully adduced; whatever scholarship tends in a different direction is carefully ignored.

About two years ago there was a controversy at Barnard College about an anthropologist, Nadia Abu El Haj, whose politically-inspired writings, similarly, held that Jews have no historic claim to the land of Israel. Professor Alan Segal, also of Barnard, is an expert on the relevant archaeology and wrote a trenchant criticism of Abu El Haj. This article can also serve as a criticism of AQU's scholarship.

Over and above AQU's unfortunate and unscholarly politicization of the history of Israel, I am also worried about how it might deal with certain other matters of Jewish history. In particular, what kind of teaching is done at AQU about the Holocaust ? It might be a problem for them, judging by how they treat the issue of Jerusalem. There is a revealing article by Mikael Tossavainen on the place of the Holocaust in Arab political thinking. It sheds a great deal of light on the matter at hand.

Has either Bard or Brandeis looked into any of this ? Has either of these institutions tried to restrain their protégé in any way ? Not as far as I was able to find out. On the contrary, both Bard and Brandeis, is their public pronouncements, have nothing but praise.

That seems curious considering what we must assume to be the ordinary, customary criteria for scholarship at these institutions. It would be insulting to think, and wrong, that anything less than a critical weighing of evidence and dispassionate scholarship can win acclaim at either Bard or Brandeis. Obviously no institution is perfect, and it would be naive to think that the ideals of scholarship are always attained even in our most elite institutions. But on the other hand, no, the propaganda-as-scholarship that emanates from AQU surely could not be tolerated in our best colleges and universities, and not at B & B, on any matter other than Al-Quds. So why, why, do both Bard and Brandeis "collaborate," as they say, with this sorry institution ?

The answer, I suggest, lies in the title of this posting: Radical Chic. Of course the reference is to Tom Wolfe's classic description of the relationship between Leonard Bernstein and the Black Panthers. Bernstein catered to people that he knew, or should have known, to be brutes. Why ? He did not, fundamentally, regard them as his equals, but he wished, in his vanity, to be associated with the frisson of Black Power. He obviously did not employ standards that he would employ for educated white people when he patronized the Black Panthers with his money, his connections, and his fawning condescension. Something like that, mutatis mutandis, I see as the heart of B & B's relationship to AQU.

The French Left and Islamist Anti-Semitism: A Dilemma

Olivier Besancenot: Mail Carrier, Recent Candidate for the French Presidency, Leader of the (Trotskyist) New Anti-Capitalist Party, and Anti-Israel Activist

For the Left in France, both traditional and new, there is a bit of a dilemma: one the one hand, its politics have historically been defined by a strict secularism (religion being the opiate of the people, and all that). But on the other hand, at least since 1967, the Left (except perhaps for some groups within the Socialist Party) has also been pledged to work against Israel. Now the most anti-Israel political force of them all is that of the religious, militant Islamists. What is there for a poor leftist do: make common cause with the Islamists and be considered soft on secularism ? Or denounce the militant Islamists and be considered soft on Zionism ?

Obviously, this being a French matter, and more particularly a matter for the much-fissured French Left, there have been a number of ways in which the dilemma has been faced. A very revealing article by Jean-Yves Camus, The French Left and Political Islam: Secularism Versus the Temptation of an Alliance, surveys the field.

The Gory "La Marseillaise" -- Why ?

www.institut-destree.eu/images/Publications/r..

Americans, in their national anthem, seem to worry most of all whether their flag is "yet" to be seen. The English hope that their Queen will be "happy" (and, of course, glorious). But the French, the French, they sing about bloody banners, about throats being slit, and, most dramatically, they hope that the "impure" blood of (unnamed) enemies will fertilize their countryside.

This is what I find puzzling: the French, judged in any other way, have as humane, as liberal, as tolerant a public life as any country on earth. But how did these bloody, anachronistic, sadistic sentiments remain in their official national anthem over the centuries ?

It isn't that the gore has been unnoticed. More than a hundred years ago, Jean Jaurès, father of the French Left, protested against it. But now in 2009 the text is still with us, an official monument to ancient hatreds and ancient rancor. Why ?

Allons enfants de la Patrie,	Come, children of the Fatherland,
Le jour de gloire est arrivé !	The day of glory has arrived!
Contre nous de la tyrannie,	Against us, tyranny's
L'étendard sanglant est levé, (bis)	Bloody banner is raised, (repeat)
Entendez-vous dans les campagnes	Do you hear in the countryside
Mugir ces féroces soldats ?	Those ferocious soldiers roaring?
Ils viennent jusque dans vos bras	They come up to your arms
Égorger vos fils, vos compagnes !	To slit the throats of your sons and wives!
Aux armes, citoyens,	To arms, citizens,
Formez vos bataillons,	Form your battalions,
Marchons, marchons !	Let's march, let's march!
Qu'un sang impur	May an impure blood
Abreuve nos sillons !	Water our furrows!

Stirring Songs II: from the religious traditions

Adon Olam -- from London



Ya'ase Shalom, a wonderful rendition by Angelica Primero, apparently a Mexican Christian



Abide With Me



Amazing Grace (by Mahalia Jackson)



Onward Christian Soldiers



In The Sweet Bye and Bye



The Old Rugged Cross



Last, but best (strictly musically, I mean): J. Bach (& Martin Luther), Ein' Feste Burg Ist Unser Gott

Stirring Songs of the 20th Century

Political commitments and political passions have found expression in what is known as "stirring songs." To what extent does such music contribute to causes ? The question also comes up in relation to the use of music in religion, to which I may wish to devote another posting.

La Marseillaise



The Internationale:



Horst Wessel Song:



God Bless America !



Oh Canada



HaTikvah

There was no holocaust: Israeli Arabs

More than forty percent of Israeli Arabs do not believe that the Holocaust ever happened, according to a poll conducted by the University of Haifa.

Earl Browder, being interviewed by Mike Wallace, 1957

I have just discovered this fascinating video.

It's sort of long, but what an experience !

Earl Browder was the boss of the American Communist Party for fifteen years prior to his sudden expulsion in 1945. Why and how did this take place ? The issue is explored by John Earl Haynes: Moscow was displeased by some independent thinking on the part of Browder. He was warned by the Kremlin, ignored the warning, and was then unceremoniously kicked out.

German Neo-Nazi Agitates Against Jews

Udo Pastörs, member of the provincial parliament and head of the neo-Nazi NPD party in the German province of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern attacks Jews and the "Jew-Republic" (i.e. the present Germany), more openly and more directly than ever before (Feb. 2009). The video here is a documentation furnished by German TV.






And here, in a second video, Pastörs can be seen at greater length:

The Chomsky Network: Churchill, Finkelstein, and especially Shahak

chrisduffel.wordpress.com

Professor Noam Chomsky has very enthusiastic fans, and also detractors. A great deal is written about him, a very great deal. But in all this material, it is his enthusiastic endorsements that reveal the most about him. Here I mention but three such cases: Churchill, Finkelstein, and, most important, Shahak.

1) Professor Ward Churchill has been fired from the University of Colorado for a variety of misdemeanors, most conspicuously intellectual fraud. Vincent Carroll of the Denver Post gives a good outline of what needs to be known about Churchill. With all that, Professor Churchill enjoys the full support, albeit couched in Chomsky-speak, of Noam Chomsky (as reported on Churchill's website):

Without reservations, I support Churchill’s right to free speech and
academic freedom, and regard the attack on him as scurrilous - and by
now craven cowardice as well, as the state authorities and other critics
pretend that the issue is (suddenly) his academic credentials and ethnic
origins. That’s a real disgrace.

As for his work, I’ve never read this article [on 9/11] and have no
interest in doing so–in fact, would not do so as a matter of principle in the present context, for reasons that go back to the Enlightenment origins of defense of freedom of speech. I was interviewed by Colorado
newspapers, and told them basically what I’ve just written. I was then
asked what I thought of his earlier work, and told the truth: that I found it serious and important, stressing again that these comments have
precisely nothing to do with the outrageous events now underway.
I have no idea what the plagiarism and other issues are, [but] if the
charges were serious, they would have been brought up before. For what it’s worth, there’s no indication of that in anything of his I read–that is, nothing more than is standard in scholarship. . . . . Such matters are sometimes raised in the context of political persecution, by cowards who are desperately seeking to conceal what they are really doing. Seems pretty transparent in this case. Why now and not before?

2. Dr. Norman Finkelstein's academic record roughly parallels that of Professor Churchill: fired for academic incompetence and for confounding extremist rhetoric with scholarship. (Click here for Paul Bogdanor's review of one of his books; click here for CAMERA's review.) But here is Noam Chomsky, calling Finkelstein "an outstanding scholar":


3. Finkelstein and Churchill are familiar to American newspaper readers. Not so Israel Shahak (1933-2001). By himself, Shahak would not at all be notable. He was an obscure instructor of chemistry in Israel, a Holocaust survivor, who, nevertheless, took it into his head that it was the Jews in history who were responsible for most of the calamities that have befallen the human race. I have reviewed his major opus "Jewish History, Jewish Religion, The Weight of Three Thousand Years some years ago; click here for this review. While some of Shahak's assertions are just funny ("Jewish children are actually taught" to utter a ritual curse when passing a non-Jewish cemetery; "both before and after a meal, a pious Jew ritually washes his hands....On one of these two occasions he is worshiping God... but on the other he is worshiping Satan..."), the bulk of his book is viciously anti-Semitic, no less virulent than the Nazis. And, indeed, all the major anti-Semitic crackpots of our day have taken him up as one of their heroes, the only truly good Jew that they can find.

And Professor Chomsky ? "Shahak is an outstanding scholar, with remarkable insight and depth of knowledge. His work is informed and penetrating, a contribution of great value." Noam Chomsky. Whatever else there is to be known about Noam Chomsky (there is a lot), this endorsement of Shahak is, to my mind, the most revealing.

Read "The Jews Are Bad," my review of Shahak.

Professor Chomsky finds that Hamas promotes peace...

but Hamas itself has a different view: please see the video on my posting just below.

So it would seem that Professor Chomsky, at least on this particular issue, is mistaken. Well, nobody, not even at MIT, can be 100% right all the time.

Hamas on Hitler's Birthday: All Jews Must Die

Speech by Hamas cleric, April 20, 2009


And here is another speech, by an unknown cleric:

The Westboro Baptist Church

Members of this sect have been in New York City within the last week, picketing Jewish synagogues, among other places, declaring that "Jews Killed Jesus," "God Hates Israel," etc.

About a year ago the BBC had its film maker Luis Theroux go to Topeka to do this hour-long documentary on these folk.

The Derg

Norbert Wiener, photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt (Time Inc)

"Derg" is a Ge'ez word meaning committee, and was used by Ethiopian Marxists to describe their regime, some twenty years ago. But more than Karl Marx, it was Norbert Wiener (seen here in a portrait by Alfred Eisenstaedt) who inspired the characters in this story.

A Dove of Peace or a Pigeon of Death ?

http://www.somaliradio.dk/images/Suicide-Bomber.jpg

It is notoriously easy to claim to be "for peace." Adolf Hitler himself made this claim, but not many today give it credence. On the other hand there does seem to be a market for a claim scarcely more credible, viz. that the random killing of civilians can be an instrument not only of peace but of a "just peace."

In the city of Vancouver on the west coast of Canada, a place where I lived for more than thirty years, a small group of people call themselves "Jews for a Just Peace." Some of these people are personally known to me. Some of them are indeed Jews but others are clearly not. At any rate, this JJP grouplet is devoted to denouncing Israel and praising those Arabs who make war on Israel. All that is fair enough if it weren't for the group's truly remarkable endorsement of random killings of Israeli Jews.

For some four years now, and despite repeated complaints, these self-styled proponents of a "just peace" have called for random, terrorist attacks in the streets of Israel.

In an "Open letter to Jews in Palestine" (their term for Israel), signed Khalid Amayreh, JJP warns that all Jewish civilians deserve death; in particular, they maintain, there is no such thing as a "personally innocent" Jew who lives in "Palestine" (i.e. Israel).

You, the Jews or Zionists (whatever you like to be called) have narrowed our horizons so much that you have made us feel that only two "choices" are available to us; either to die as suicide bombers or be slaughtered as sheep.

Therefore, I can dare say that blood of the "personally innocent victims" of the bombing is primarily on the hands of Sharon, Benalizer, Peres and other members of your diabolic government of assassins and war criminals

....

I won't give you the benefit of the doubt. I would be an idiot if I did.

This "Letter" is emblazoned with JJP's logo: a stylized dove of peace. A picture of the pigeon of death would be more truthful.

Also read: The Lying Tactics of the Anti-Israel Movement

Lady Renouf Now at Heathrow

Sydney Morning Herald

The Australian Queen of Beauty (Ret.) has arrived at Heathrow to support +Richard Williamson. Read a full report from the folks Down Under.

The Latest on Richie Williamson and Davie Irving and Davie Duke and Michelle Renouf

Richie Williamson (left) and Davie Irving
Times of London

Soo... Richie has been expelled from Argentina. He's off to Heathrow to meet his friend, the former beauty queen (and Davie Duke friend) Michele (one 'l' only, please) Renouf.

Beauty Queen (Ret.) Michelie Renouf and American pal Davie Duke

Now Michelie Renouf has hired the Australian Holocaust-denying lawyer Frederick Toben to represent The Most Reverend Williamson in his various legal and ecclesiastic travails. Ms. Renouf and Dr. Toben were members of the renowned Fact-Finding Committee On The Holocaust, appointed by the 2006 Iranian conference that found that the Holocaust never happened.

Now, don't misunderstand this arrangement. It is definitely not true that all these nice folks are anti-Semites. Nothing could be further from the truth. Ms. Renouf, for example, has said that she is definitely not anti-Semitic, no way, but she does allow that Judaism is a "repugnant and hate-filled religion."

Read more in the Times of London

Read the e-mail correspondence between Davie Irving and Richie Williamson

German Prelates Distance Themselves from Vatican

Cardinal Karl Lehmann (Mainz)

At least seven high-ranking German Catholic prelates have distanced themselves publicly from the Vatican on the matter of the anti-Semitic SSPX. While all statements have been respectful of the Pope, as indeed they need to be, none left a doubt that these high-ranking bishops, and in one case a cardinal, were dismayed by the anti-Semitic implications of the Vatican's reaching out to the SSPX sect.

These are the seven whose statements I have seen so far:

1) Cardinal Karl Lehmann (Mainz)

2) Archbishop Reinhard Marx (Munich)

3) Archbishop Werner Thissen (Hamburg)

4) Bishop Joachim Reinelt (Dresden-Meissen)

5) Bishop Franz-Josef Bode (Osnabrueck)

6) Auxiliary Bishop Hans-Jochen Jaschke (Hamburg)

7) Bishop Gebhard Fürst (Rottenburg-Stuttgart)

The German news service Tagesschau carries most of the details. The particularly strong statement by Cardinal Lehmann, demanding an apology from the Vatican, is reported by swr.de.

UPDATE, Feb. 4: Yet another German cardinal, George Kardinal Sterzinsky, the archbishop of Berlin, has critized the Vatican: "To lift the excommunication of the four SSPX bishops is, for most people, incomprehensible and outrageous," according to the report by Bild.

Merkel, and Obama, about the Pope and the Holocaust

Tagesschau

The Europeans are up in arms about the Vatican's rapprochement with the Catholic anti-Semites of the SPXX. Not so the Americans.

The New York Times's expert on religious affairs, Peter Steinfels, reports that American bishops have kept mum on that SSPX affair, in which Pope Benedict has revoked the excommunication by his predecessors of the] SSPX sect (see NYT, 1/30/09).

In sharp contrast, European bishops, at least one cardinal, and many lay Catholics and Catholic publications have sharply criticized this Vatican rapprochement with the SSPX. And not only Catholics. Europe's most famous daughter of a Protestant pastor, Chancellor Angela Merkel, has weighed in courageously.

The French and German press brings more details and commentaries on a daily basis. Since I read only German and French, I cannot comment on what the press of Italy, Spain, etc. may contain. But from what I see in Le Monde of France and Tagesschau of Germany, it appears that many prelates in Europe were moved to distance themselves from the Vatican and to reaffirm their solidarity with the Jewish community. The liberal press in these countries, which is often highly critical of Israel, nevertheless seems unanimous not only in condemning the old-fashioned anti-Semitism of the SSPX crowd, but also in expressing surprise that the Vatican has taken this startling initiative to placate SSPX.

These European liberals, obviously, have agendas of their own. In France, for instance, some of the SSPX folks were found among the ultra-right Front National; historically, the sect has been identified with the Petainist right wing in French politics. Moreover, the Vatican has annoyed the liberals again this week by appointing a right-wing auxiliary bishop in Austria, a certain Gerhard Maria Wagner, apparently against the wishes of the Austrian hierarchy. European commentators also point out that Benedict, while showing great indul;gence toward his right-wing, remains resolutely hostile toward the liberal and left-wing forces in his Church. English-only readers may wish to consult the English-language version of Der Spiegel, which recently featured a background article.

But, as is the case with Chancellor Merkel, European reaction cannot be reduced to political or theological liberalism. She is, remember, head of the CDU, the conservative party of her country. Hers is now the most conspicuous criticism of the Pope. She has publicly demanded from Benedict XVI that he explain clearly: is it or is it not acceptable, to deny the Holocaust ? According to Tagesschau, the Vatican has responded as follows: we have nothing to explain.

Now President Obama --- has he said anything ? I actually don't know.

SSPX's Floriano Abrahamovicz: Jews are the People of the Deicide

So here we have yet another leader of the SSPX sect. He is Floriano Abrahamovicz, or Father Floriano Abrahamovicz to those willing to give credence to an SSPX's ordination. He is the spokesman for North East Italy of the sect. He says that he has Jewish origins on his father's side (may G'd help us).

Catholic Culture describes his charming opinions:

In an interview with an Italian newspaper yesterday, Father Floriano Abrahamowicz, spokesman for the Society of St. Pius X in northeastern Italy, called the Jews “the people of deicide.” Insisting that the Society is not anti-Semitic-- “it’s truly impossible,” he said, “for a Catholic Christian to be anti-Semitic”-- Father Abrahamowicz nonetheless came to the defense of Bishop Richard Williamson’s “imprudent” comments on the Holocaust. Father Abrahamowicz added that he does not know how many Jews died in the Holocaust and whether the gas chambers were used for purposes other than disinfection.

The priest added, “If Bishop Williamson had gone on television to deny the genocide of 1.2 million Armenians by the Turks, I don’t think that all the newspapers would have talked about his statements in the same terms they’re using now. Who has ever talked about the Anglo-American genocide in the bombing of German cities? … And the Israelis certainly can’t tell me that the genocide they suffered from the Nazis is less serious than that of Gaza, simply because they’ve taken out a few thousand persons, while the Nazis took out six million. This is where I fault Judaism, which exasperates rather than honoring the victims of genocide decently. It’s as if there were only one genocide in history, that of the Jews during the Second World War.” The Jews, he added, are “the people of deicide.”

What does the Pope think ? The Jesuit magazine America carries a disquieting article. It suggests that the Pope is preparing a full-fledged rehabilitation of the SSPX people, essentially on their terms. Its seems that the notorious anti-Semitism of the SSPX seems to bother the Pope less than their ultra-conservatism pleases him.

Read also: Deborah Lipstadt's coverage of the SSPX story

SSPX's Father Franz Schmidberger: Today's Jews are Guilty of Deicide

Mit dem Kreuzestod Christi ist der Vorhang des Tempels zerrissen, der Alte Bund abgeschafft, wird die Kirche, die alle Völker, Kulturen, Rassen und sozialen Unterschiede umfasst, aus der durchbohrten Seite des Erlösers geboren. Damit sind aber die Juden unserer Tage nicht nur nicht unsere älteren Brüder im Glauben, wie der Papst bei seinem Synagogenbesuch in Rom 1986 behauptete; sie sind vielmehr des Gottesmordes mitschuldig, so lange sie sich nicht durch das Bekenntnis der Gottheit Christi und die Taufe von der Schuld ihrer Vorväter distanzieren. Im Gegensatz dazu behauptet das II. Vatikanum, man könne die Ereignisse des Leidens Christi weder allen damals lebenden Juden ohne Unterschied noch den heutigen Juden zur Last legen (§ 4).

With the death of Jesus on the cross, the old covenant is abolished. The Church now encompasses all peoples, cultures, races, social classes. With that, not only are the Jews of our days not "our elder brethren in faith," as the Pope maintained in a visit to a Rome synagogue in 1986. They are, rather, guilty of the murder of God, insofar as they do not embrace the divinity of Christ and accept baptism, the only actions that would distance them from the guilt of their forebears. But Vatican II maintains, wrongfully, that the sufferings of Jesus cannot be attributed either to the Jews of His days nor to the Jews of our days (§ 4).

This is an excerpt from a letter sent by Fr. Franz Schmidberger to the Roman Catholic bishops of Germany in October 2008. Fr. Schmidberger is the German head of that very Society of St. Pius X (SSPX -- see previous posting) whose members have now been re-admitted to full communion in the Roman Catholic church by Pope Benedict.

Hamas Speaks !

MEMRI: New Iranian book denying Holocaust

MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute, has released the following information about yet another Iranian Holocaust-denial initiative:

On September 26, 2008, the Iranian news channel IRINN reported on the publication, in Iran, of a 100-page book of cartoons on the Holocaust, which it billed as "tak[ing] a critical look at the great distortion of the historical event called the Holocaust, using the art of satire." The report included comments by an Iranian university chancellor, the book's cartoonist, and an Iranian cultural expert.

The news story also explained that the book "is an effort to expose the need to research the event of the Holocaust."

The following is the transcript of the report.

To view the clip, click here.


Voiceover: "The book Holocaust takes a critical look at the great distortion of the historical event called the Holocaust, using the art of satire. The book describes the history of the Holocaust and its obvious contradictions, by means of cartoons and satirical writing. It raises questions about the Zionist claims that six million Jews were murdered by the German Nazis during World War II."

Mohammad Saeed Jabalameli, chancellor of Iran University of Science and Technology: "In order to question the Holocaust, experts needed to conduct studies, but the important thing is that fundamental questions have arisen in recent years: If the Holocaust is indeed a historical event that really took place, why don’t they allow this issue to be investigated? Why don’t they let academic circles investigate this issue? This alone is an indication that it is a fabrication, with no historical validity."

Mazyar Bijani, the book's cartoonist: "[The book] contains 52 cartoons, accompanied by historical satirical writing, regarding the way the Holocaust issue arose and became connected to Palestine. The way they managed to link Palestine to the 'genocide' of the Jewish people in Europe constitutes, in our opinion, dark satire. There is no connection between them."

[…]

Voiceover: "The 100-page Holocaust book has been released in 7,000 copies."

[…]

Parvin Pour, Iranian cultural affairs expert: "Mr. Mazyar Bijani, our country’s talented cartoonist, drew the cartoons in the book, and the writing is by Mr. Omid Mehdinejad, one of our talented poets and satirist."

Voiceover: "The Holocaust is a pretext of the Zionists to occupy the land of the oppressed, fighting people of Palestine. The Holocaust book is an effort to expose the need to research the event of the Holocaust."

How to Become a Clergyman in the United States

Rabbi Michael Lerner

Would you like to become a minister of the Gospel ? Would you like to have a license to perform marriages ? Plus, perhaps, a Ph.D. to make it all more legit ? No problem, it seems. Google "ordination," and, with just a few more clicks on the computer (and the payment of suitable fees, it goes without saying) and voila, you are the Rev. SoAndSo. To get a Ph.D., in apparently any subject, google "Ph.D." There are plenty of businesses out there to help you. "Earn a degree in 7 days, pay in installments." What could be simpler, what could be more legit ?

The rabbinate is no more difficult to obtain than the Christian ministry. There is, to cite just one example, the Rabbinical Seminary International, which will ease you into that honor. The Seminary does, it seems, require a full day of "intensive" attendance; well, nothing is that easy.

Rabbi Michael Lerner, well known for his espousal of Good Causes and Palestinian demands, was ordained as follows, according his own website:

For ... nineteen years he pursued a course of study that intensified his knowledge of Jewish texts and Jewish mysticism, until he received rabbinic ordination in 1995 from a Beyt Din (a religious court) of 3 rabbis (each of whom had received orthodox smicha).

It would be interesting to interview those three rabbis, but their identities have never been disclosed, as far as I know.

Cyntia Ozick has examined the bona fides, or otherwise, of Rabbi Lerner. Her essay appeared in a pamphlet "Israel's Jewish Defamers," published by CAMERA just now. She has kindly made it available to our readers here.

UPDATE May 28, 2010: Rabbi Lerner bestows his Human Rights prize on (Israel is a war criminal; Hang Blacks) Richard Goldstone. Click here.

Ms. Cynthia McKinney

Here is Ms. Cynthia McKinney, former Congresswoman, now presidential candidate for the Green Party:

Sabeel and Halper and Ellis

A group of Christian anti-Israel people, "Sabeel," has the support of two Jewish opponents of Israel in this video: Mr. Jeff Halper of Israel, and Mr. Marc Ellis of the United States. To hear Mr. Ellis's noteworthy oration, be sure to watch the video to its bitter end. For material on the American friends of Sabeel, see an earlier posting.

Ellis is employed by Baylor University. He has descriptions of himself as professor there and also as provost. He has furnished yet another description for his post as Director of the Center for Jewish Studies. All stress his many accomplishments, and give details of the praise he has received from famous men like Noam Chomsky and Edward Said. There are also "downloadable publicity shots of Dr. Marc H. Ellis." A more critical appraisal of him is furnished by Steven Plaut.

Update, 9/9/09: Read Plaut's new material about Ellis, Tony Judt, etc.