Shabbat shalom.
Today is Veterans Day, so a tip of the kipah to all our service men and women who help protect us and our democracy, such that it is. Your vote for any Democrat in every election is the greatest act of patriotism you can commit to that will help maintain our democracy going forward.
And another tip of the kipah to the brave men and women of the IDF, who are at this moment putting their lives on the line to defend Israel’s right to exist. Based on reports from journalists embedded with the IDF, they are moving methodically and successfully into northern Gaza, and just in one civilian area visited by the journalists, they have dismantled or destroyed 28 rocket launch sites and 91 tunnels. They even found a tunnel under a child’s bed in a home with a swimming pool on the Gaza coast.
Meanwhile, Israel has also agreed with the demands from Biden/US to increase the amount of time it is allowing for a “humanitarian pause” in order to facilitate the evacuation of civilians in North Gaza. Israel’s success on the ground has enabled them to create a safe corridor for their passage, hence, on Wednesday over 50,000 used the corridor to flee the area, and that number continues to grow every day. Where they go and how they survive in the South is a good question, but at least we should see a dramatic decrease in the amount of collateral damage to civilian life and limb, and hopefully no more videos of dead or wounded Palestinian children being carried out of the rubble and debris.
Those images have helped ignite the knuckleheads on campus and around the globe supporting Palestinian justice and contextualizing the horrors committed by Hamas. These misled morons have been abusing the “genocide” term to describe the pain inflicted on the Palestinians, a term which Andrew Sullivan ranted about in his Weekly Dish:
Israel is far from perfect, and has made some hideous mistakes alongside its spectacular achievements. But Israel is not committing genocide in any way, and the accusation, given History 101, is a knowingly despicable one. If you want to organize a march to protest genocide, you don’t have far to find it in 2023 — in Darfur, Azerbaijan, Xinjiang, and Burma. Or better still: march against Hamas, not in defense of it. “Free Palestine — from Hamas!” would be a nice sign to see. But it would take a long, long time to find one.
Here at the offices of the JNR, we are showing our support of Israel in a number of ways. We tied a blue ribbon around our trees, and placed a lawn sign, both of which you can pick up at your local temple/synagogue if you so chose. Also, there is a march being organized in Washington DC on November 14th in support of Israel. Several weeks after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis banned Students for Justice in Palestine from the state’s public universities, Brandeis became the first private university to enact such a ban on its campus in Waltham, Mass. Also, in what could be a silver lining in these very dark clouds, Jews seem to be reconnecting to their faith and communities. Attendance at shabbat services across the country are up significantly, and there is now a global supply shortage of tefilin and mezuzahs!
Despite all this positivity, the lame stream media continues to demonstrate bad judgment and biased journalism in their coverage of the war. Hence, I fear that as Israel continues to make progress on the battlefield, we are losing the important PR war taking place in the main stream media and social media platforms. For example, just this week, the Washington Post decided to remove a cartoon mocking Hamas (not Palestinians writ large) after readers and staffers complained that it was offensive, racist, unfair, inaccurate, etc. The editor of the opinion page, David Shipley, explained his reasoning thus: “Our section is aimed at finding commonalities, understanding the bonds that hold us together, even in the darkest times.” Weird that the newspaper which still insists that “Democracy Dies in Darkness” on its home page doesn’t have the guts to keep the democratic lights on terrorism.
And the PR war has created a whole new genre of bullshit now being referred to as “open letters”. These performative screeds try to help the signatories feel like they are doing something, but usually end up embarrassing, doxxing, and sometimes getting them fired. Of course everyone is free to sign whatever the hell they want, but the slew of nonsense spewing from these rants is beyond me. The most recent example is one signed by over 750 “journalists” condemning Israel’s killing of reporters in Gaza and criticizing Western media’s coverage of the war. Most strikingly, the letter argues that journalists should use words like “apartheid,” “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide” to describe Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. Really? Journalists? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
The journalists’ letter follows several other open letters in recent weeks, most expressing solidarity with Palestinians. The New York Review of Books published one signed by well-known writers including Ta-Nehisi Coates calling on the “international community to commit to ending the catastrophe unfolding in Gaza.” A letter signed by hundreds of Jewish writers that was published in N+1 magazine said, “we are horrified to see the fight against antisemitism weaponized as a pretext for war crimes with stated genocidal intent.” Holy shit.
So, while the IDF continues its success in eradicating the subhuman species knows as Hamas, we need to continue the battle on the PR front, and the JNR is up for the challenge. Are you?
Now, for your weekly roundup of news for the Jews across the Jew S of A and beyond:
- Special report: What’s it really like to be Jewish on campus right now? Conflict over the Israel-Hamas war has sent shockwaves across American campuses, with Jewish and Muslim students alike feeling newly unsafe, and universities’ ability to manage complex political situations while preserving fundamental academic values coming under sharp scrutiny. To get beyond the now-daily headlines chronicling the latest alarming incidents, we dispatched reporters to 11 campuses around the country to learn what students are really experiencing: “What emerged,” we found, was “a portrait of unease and anxiety, of a shifting landscape in which many of the nation’s brightest young people find themselves lonely, confused and concerned about what is unfolding around them.” Read the story ➤
- Latest from campuses…
- A gunman fired at two Jewish schools in Montreal overnight on Wednesday, only days after a synagogue and Jewish center in a city suburb were reportedly targeted with Molotov cocktails. Separately, a pro-Palestinian protest planned for Montreal’s McGill University on Thursday, the 85th anniversary of Kristallnacht, was advertised with photos of broken glass, a move the university’s president deemed “antisemitic.”
- Twenty Jewish Brown University students were arrested after occupying a campus building in a protest advocating for a cease-fire.
- Harvard President Claudine Gay, who had previously announced initial plans for a new campus effort to combat antisemitism, released some details about the strategy, and announced an Antisemitism Advisory Group including writer Dara Horn and Rabbi David Wolpe.
- Second gentleman Doug Emhoff visited Cornell to meet with Jewish students still reeling from violent antisemitic threats allegedly issued by a junior last month.
- A student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst was arrested by university police Friday after punching a Jewish student and spitting on an Israeli flag during a vigil for hostages. According to both the school’s administration and the UMass Hillel, the attack occurred at a solidarity walk organized by the Hillel, which had set up empty Shabbat tables symbolizing the more than 200 Israeli hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza.
- Latest from campuses…
- Gal Gadot’s newest movie screening — featuring Hamas atrocities — is drawing criticism. Gadot has organized screenings of a 43-minute video compiled by the Israel Defense Forces to document Hamas’ Oct. 7 atrocities. But the actress’ advocacy for her native country has been criticized, with some activists even suggesting that a screening she organized at LA’s Museum of Tolerance was intended as a “trap” to paint protesters as antisemitic. Read the story ➤
- Latest on the war…
- U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken pushed back on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s suggestion that Israel would assume an “indefinite” security role in Gaza after the war, saying Gaza should be united with the West Bank under the leadership of the Palestinian Authority.
- The IDF said troops have destroyed some 130 tunnel shafts in Gaza since the war began, as Israeli forces engaged in street battles and tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians fled to Gaza’s south using a humanitarian corridor opened by Israel. The Gaza Health Ministry said more than 10,000 people had been killed in Gaza in a month of war, and more than 25,000 injured.
- Israel and Hamas are negotiating the release of 10-15 hostages, including six U.S. citizens, in talks brokered by Qatar. Separately, Arab and Western officials say a deal to release 50 hostages had been near completion before Israel invaded Gaza in late October, but talks broke down after troops entered the strip.
- The U.S. conducted its second airstrike on an Iranian target in Syria since the war began, as the White House seeks to combat increased attacks on U.S. troops in the Middle East. Separately, Iran-backed Houthi rebels reportedly shot down a U.S. drone off Yemen’s coast, and the U.S. suggested that Jews in Iran were being “coerced into staging anti-Israel protests.”
- Candidates at the third Republican presidential debate — which former President Donald Trump, the frontrunner, skipped — were united in advising Israel to “finish” Hamas.
- This week was the 85th anniversary of Kristallnacht, when Nazis murdered 100 Jews, sent thousands to concentration camps and destroyed synagogues, Jewish businesses and other sites. Some Jews rethought plans to commemorate the anniversary because of safety concerns related to the war. “We don’t think the synagogues and other Jewish institutions would be comfortable with a physical demonstration of support that highlights their locations,” said one Brazilian Holocaust educator.
- Three stories that may lighten things up a bit:
- A viral video seemingly shows captured Hamas terrorists being subjected to a novel form of torture — a “Baby Shark”-style children’s song being played in a loop for eight hours. The purported prisoners are seen blindfolded and bound as they sit on the ground amid the blaring strains of “Mamtera Im Matara,” which translates to “Sprinkler With A Target,” the Israeli news site Walla reported.
- This “Open Letter from Scholars of Antiquity” in support of Israel was just published. Reading the list of signees, one notable name stands out: Prof. Dr. Ricardo Eichmann, Berlin. Ricardo is one of Adolf Eichman’s 4 sons.
- After migrant parent pressure, Anne Frank daycare center to be renamed – The move was driven by parents who found it difficult to explain Frank’s significance to their children. According to Apollo News, a German news site, in a small town in Saxony-Anhalt, a daycare center has become the center of a local scandal.
Let me close with another great song from Playing for Change, a bluesy version of CSNY’s Teach Your Children, with lead singer and my new heart throb, Israeli Tula Ben Ari.
You who are on the road
Must have a code that you can live
by
And so become yourself
Because the past is just a
good bye…..
So, teach your children well, and let’s be safe out there.
Brad out.
Jew News Review 