Today I received an amusing letter from Sara Ehrman of Americans for Peace Now, promoting a “What Would Liebel Do?” awards dinner in Boston in honor of the late great Leonard “Leibel” Fein. Ehrman is a battler for the holy grail, the two-state solution, a friend of Hillary Clinton’s, and an owner of a SodaStream seltzermaker from the occupied West Bank; and she is obviously very charming, but the letter reads like a plea for irrelevance. There is zero political messaging in it, along with a reference to retirement. Not a word about the coming crisis in Israel, the wicked Netanyahu and the virtuous Herzog, or the unending settlements, let alone the Gaza slaughter; and I sense from this that the old center is collapsing, and Peace Now is doing like Reform Jewish congregations and avoiding all talk of the issue lest liberal Zionists and non-Zionists begin to tear out one another’s hair. When the truth is, as liberal Zionists Shaul Magid and Peter Beinart (who is speaking at the Boston dinner) have both stated, the Jewish state faces a huge crisis, and now is the time for liberal Jews to be discussing these subjects, and maybe even hearing from anti-Zionists? The letter:
Dear Phil,
Back around Purim time, earlier this year, APN asked me to write a letter trying – rather brazenly I might add – to raise funds around my turning 95. Now that Sid Topol is turning 90, they’re throwing him a dinner and APN still asked me to write another letter. Chutzpah!
But after all, it is APN and Sid the Kid – and I love them both.
I’m not quite sure what Sid has done. Something along the lines of inventing cable TV. At least he thinks he did. And there’s nothing good to watch either. Thanks Sid. And they’re throwing you a dinner?
Sid, who sits on the APN Board, is actually an innovator. Whether inventing advances in microwave technology or promoting peace, Sid’s done it all. From Raytheon to APN, from Scientific Atlanta to Israel, he’s seen it all and probably donated money to it too. Unrelenting in his pursuit of peace and justice, Sid is truly someone who deserves our respect and support.
But I have to say, what was APN thinking having this dinner in Boston in the middle of winter? Feeling okay, Sid? What’s the rush? I hear Miami is nice in January.
In spite of this mishegoss (look it up), I hope everyone can come. Jim Klutznick, chair of APN’s Board, is on the program and he’s a hoot. You know, he develops retirement homes, so there are more of these dinners in APN’s future. Peter Beinart is on the program too– I guess Tom Friedman was booked.
But I have to say, if you can’t make it, please for crying-out-loud, let’s ALL say Happy Birthday to Sid and let’s donate at least $90 to the cause. APN, being the sports that they are, will put your name in the tribute book they are handing out at the rubber-salmon dinner in the middle of winter in Boston.
Send $90 (or more)—put “Topol” in the comments box and it is tax-deductible. You can pay now or when I turn 100 when they better give me a dinner.
Sara Ehrman
P.S. Here’s the invitation. Just in case. And if Sid isn’t enough to make you go, there’s Rabbi Toba Spitzer who is also being honored. Okay, she didn’t invent cable TV, but she’s a mensch. That’s enough.
Phil, did you hear about this former Peace Now activist? It was on the Arutz Sheva site.
“Dr. Anat Roth used to be an activist with the leftist Peace Now organization and an advisor to former Labor leaders Ehud Barak and Amram Mitzna, but now has had a “change of heart”.
Roth announced on Saturday night that she would be running for the Knesset with the Jewish Home party.”
It says she has now “seen the light.”
“According to Dr. Roth, “The Labor movement and the Israeli left have stocks in the creation of Israel and the Zionist enterprise, but the facts have changed and reality has set in, and the Labor party cannot handle them. The last decade shows us that the desire for peace was and remains a thing of the Israeli side only, and that the processes in the Palestinian Authority and around us show that an Israeli withdrawal from land will lead to the establishment of a terrorist state.”
The comments are pretty funny. Most are saying that this is a good move but she will need careful watching to ensure her ideological purity. Very Soviet of them.
There’s something endearing to Peace Now’s total irrelevance.
The 1SS is the new 2SS, but like the 2SS, it also has two versions. The democratic version and the Apartheid version.
I’m guessing a lot of liberal Zionists will end up as Mrs. Ehrman, simply blocking out reality when it gets too painful and keep doing events and dinners where they are praising a ghost, a phantom which has never existed but it does exist, they tell themselves, so long as it is alive in their minds.
I pity these people. They are truly lost and scared.
“Peace Now is doing like Reform Jewish congregations and avoiding all talk of the issue lest liberal Zionists and non-Zionists begin to tear out one another’s hair.”
You were expecting something like the Trefa Banquet?
Very silly letter, bordering on the pathetic.
All zionists are the same……. left, right, center, or anywhere else in between. They are all united in one goal: greater israel. they just go about it in different ways, with different words, and different faces. But the bottom line is the same.
zionism is evil. zionism is racism. zionism is genocide. zionism is violent. zionism is wrong.
1S1P1V, the one and only way forward.
this letter is pathetic “Peter Beinart is on the program too– I guess Tom Friedman was booked.”
??? where’s the oversight committee! lol.