Eretz Israel is our unforgettable historic homeland...The Jews who will it shall achieve their State...And whatever we attempt there for our own benefit will redound mightily and beneficially to the good of all mankind. (Theodor Herzl, DerJudenstaat, 1896)

We offer peace and amity to all the neighbouring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate with the independent Jewish nation for the common good of all. The State of Israel is ready to contribute its full share to the peaceful progress and development of the Middle East.
(From Proclamation of the State of Israel, 5 Iyar 5708; 14 May 1948)

With a liberal democratic political system operating under the rule of law, a flourishing market economy producing technological innovation to the benefit of the wider world, and a population as educated and cultured as anywhere in Europe or North America, Israel is a normal Western country with a right to be treated as such in the community of nations.... For the global jihad, Israel may be the first objective. But it will not be the last. (Friends of Israel Initiative)

Saturday 21 January 2017

Kol Hakavod!

JFK, LBJ and Clinton were "unqualified" by the same criteria!
'As we enter 2017, the legacy of the year gone by gives us little room the be comforted. In the so-called "Brexit" referendum, in the rise and strengthening of fascist parties in France and Italy, and in the election of Donald Trump as president of the United States, we have witnessed events that should generate within any student of history - let alone a Jewish student of history - a sense of foreboding.
While I believe we should be careful not to make exaggerated comparisons with 1930s Europe, the return of white supremacy and minority scapegoating should rightly concern us all.'

Thus wrote a senior Australian rabbi in an op-ed piece in the Australian Jewish News a fortnight ago that made Trump and support for Trump the main focus of his ire, and attributed a dark racist motive to ordinary men and women who are thoroughly fed up with the duplicity and stupidity of the political elites whose enactments and attitudes are eroding traditional freedoms and putting in jeopardy the Western way of life.

I can only suppose that the above-quoted rabbi, along with certain rabbis in the United States who  expressed similar views, and decried the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Rabbi Marvin Hier's agreement  to recite a prayer at the presidential inauguration, are ignorant of the external and internal dangers Western societies face and view the world not as it actually is but how they would like it to be.

They seem unwilling or unable to grasp the fact that today's fascists and antisemites are drawn largely from sources other than the far right.  (Indeed, we see Leftist fascism in action, with the outbreaks of violence and hooliganism in America that greeted Trump's swearing in.)

How very heartwarming it was that Rabbi Marvin Hier not only spurned calls for him by certain wet liberal co-religionists to boycott the ceremony but based his prayer upon Psalm 137, with its overt references to Zion and Jerusalem. 

 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nxAi9WEf5g)

Kol Hakavod!

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.