Here are two interesting reactions to the Salute to Israel parade that Antony Loewenstein reported on for us yesterday. The first is a reaction to Loewenstein’s piece, and the second is an oped by Rabbi Sidney Schwarz in The Jewish Week entitled “This Is Zionism?“:
First, Mondo reader Rob Browne sent the following in reaction to Loewenstein’s report:
As a father and uncle of Jewish Day School students and a member of a very Zionistic extended family, I have great troubles with the parade every year. I have not gone to the parade since I have been more educated about the conditions in Israel. After many difficult discussions, my immediate family has avoided it, as well, in the last two years.
The schools, synagogues, and affiliated families I know view this parade with great pride. No one in these groups has been willing to listen that the parade supports a fantasy “Leon Uris-like” view of Israel. The reality is that the parade is completely exclusionary to certain religious and ethnic communities of Israel. Antony’s comment that “They may have loved Israel, but it wasn’t a real country, rather an abstract nation in the Middle East that defended democracy, human rights and freedom.” is completely correct, not only in reference to the participants beliefs about the parade, but to Israel in general.
If more people, like Antony and Max Blumenthal, can continue to show how the “mainstream” insitutional elements of the Jewish community educates people in a naive and dangerous manner, the better it will be for all concerned communities.
Next, Rabbi Sidney Schwarz expresses his dismay at a concert in Central Park that followed the parade in his Jewish Week oped “This Is Zionism?“:
Then a band launched into a rousing rendition of Am Yisrael Chai. I spent more than 25 years as an activist for Soviet Jewry. This was our theme song signaling solidarity both with the history of our people and with all those oppressed Jews in the world whose cause we championed. A group of young men in their 20′s with kippot and tziztzit were right in front of me dancing in a frenzy. But they alternated the verse that meant “the people of Israel lives” with “all the Arabs must die.” It rhymed with the Hebrew. Given the way all joined in, it was clear that this was not the first time it was sung.
I leaned over to a young man who was next to me, also wearing a kippah and tzitzit. I nodded at the dancers and asked: “Does this song bother you?” He looked at me with a suspicious look and replied: “This is Zionism.”
Sort of recaptures the utopian New Germany coffee table books distributed in the 1930's, all over the world.
Here's an NPR Q & A by Obama just before he goes to make his speech in Cairo. Obama is earning his bread, considering all the issues brought out in this Q & A. Time will tell if Obama is all rhetoric. That may mean, is he more about just getting re-elected, or more about actually making change? Geez, even those questions overlap as a practical matter… http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?stor...
Uber nationalism and racism are the bitter fruit of Israel's non compliance to international law and not withdrawing from the territories post 1967. the seeds were planted with the dream of "greater Isreal" and not the satisfaction of having established itself in the land of their ancestors. they keep throwing up the excuse of being attacked by the arabs, but they were not attacked by the villagers of palestine who paid the price.
"This is Zionism." … stripped off it's mask? Sad, isn't it. Exactly how different (and how similar) are WW2 nazi ideas of volk and ethnic pride and being better than those untermenschen polen, and Jewish ideas about those goy polaks and animal Arabs?
Anti-semites just lap this shit up with their mother's milk.
Jacob, do you think all Arabs must die?
obama is a patsy the very same as the rest of the patsys, he will be a good *&))(*_*(( and do as he is told by his chief zionist and the treasury well aipac had 437,000. members approx five years ago which have infiltrated all the positions to keep all people at bay and hungry…sound similar to the barbarians who ate the dead…yes the zewish barbarians
by land of ancestors you mean Russia and Germany cause the small number that existed on the mounds or mountain tops was never much to worry about in jerusalem. Why is it that a people would want to broaden their horizons on murder and lies and crayness that god gave them over the rest is just plain stupid and if you believe it I sell you some swamp land in florida
truth hurt you jaycobb, we at present are not in the olden days but will be soon enough. Do you think they would just go out of their way to take time and kill the jews, you would like to believe that but the jews are and have been doing themselves in for a long time…..see they could not have the arm and eat it too as they did in the past, the % of people aware of the true face of hatefull zews is out there, where the hell do they plan to run and how will they get there with no planes and no electric, go by boat is the only way that is going to be availible. The stage is set and this is not a play. I wonder how the native american indians will react to the loss of the controls once used against them, will they take full advantage of it or stay put …what do you think? if at all.