Night Falls On Europe

I had a beloved ten-volume set of children’s encyclopedias when I was growing up. First appearing in the 1930s, they were edited by a fine, fair-minded English journalist called Arthur Mee, and were reprinted a number of times. Each volume had sections on various subjects ranging from literature from various nations through art and history to astronomy and science and even basic French lessons; the level of the entries rose in sophistication with each volume number. Thus, when I was six I began by devouring all the stories and “verses for very little people”, but I was still learning from the volumes when I was in my teens.

What I didn’t realize at the time, but can clearly see now, is that Mr Mee was a classical liberal of the honorable, old-fashioned type. He was on the side of Parliament versus the Absolute Monarchy of Charles I; he was on the side of the abolitionists of slavery and the slave trade; he admired the Hebrew prophets and biblical heroes; and he was demonstrably pro-Jewish. I recall that one of his chapters regarding the Norman Conquest was entitled “The Castle and the Jew”: it explained to young readers that the great castles that dot the English and Welsh landscape today were the work of the conquerors, and it noted that with the Normans came Jews, about whom it spoke in decidedly favourable terms (I seem to recall him describing Jewish civilization as “great and glorious”), and he deplored the fact that Jews were – remember, Mee was writing in the 1930s – “a race yet despised”. I also clearly remember that the title of another chapter (Mee had a flair for the picturesque and the dramatic) was “Night Falls On Europe”. It concerned the coming of the Dark Ages.


When I read just now, in a report from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA), of the fears expressed yesterday by European Jewish Congress President Moshe Kantor regarding the imperilled future of small Jewish communities in parts of this continent that are beset by the “grave danger” of antisemitism, some of it officially sanctioned, I immediately thought of Mee’s “Night Falls On Europe”.

Although night hasn’t fallen yet, it will do, if things continue to go in the direction described by Mr Kantor. Here is part of the JTA’s report:

‘Among the recent incidents he [Kantor] cited were a "Palestine Day" at a Catholic school in Antwerp, Belgium, during which children were invited to throw replicas of Jewish and Israeli soldiers into two large tanks. The game was called “Throw the soldiers into the sea.”

In another incident, a gang shouting "Heil Hitler" and "Jewish pigs" attacked a Jewish children's event in Malmo, Sweden, last weekend. Many Jews reportedly have been leaving Malmo this year due to an increase in anti-Semitic incidents.

Kantor also pointed to recent anti-Semitic statements by German former Central Bank board member Thilo Sarrazin and other public figures.

Citing a feeble official response, Kantor said that "anti-Semitism is at best actively promoted and at worst ignored by some officials in Europe. Due to this intolerable situation, small Jewish communities, like Malmo, are teetering on the brink of extinction,” threatened by extremists on the left and right.’

Later this month, Kantor will be hosting a conference in Dubrovnik on how best to combat racism and xenophobia. He warns that the European Union and European leaders should "launch a campaign against intolerance and anti-Semitism to remind European citizens that the new Europe was established after the Second World War on the concept of 'Never Again.' '' And he adds: “If they [threatened Jewish communities] can’t receive protection or respite from mainstream officials, then we are entering a very dark period for the Jews in Europe.”

An Australian Trade Union Chief Speaks Up for Israel against the BDS Movement

In a speech on Sunday to the annual conference of the Zionist Federation of Australia, held  in Melbourne, the young Vice-President of the Australian Council of Trades Unions (ACTU), Paul Howes, who is also National Secretary of the Australian Workers’ Union, has made an admirable, forceful attack on the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement (hat tip: Matt Pryor, over at Thejc.com blogs). I’m reminded of how staunchly supportive of Israel the ACTU has been – Bob Hawke, ACTU President from 1969-80 and Prime Minister of Australia from 1983-91, was one of the firmest friends Israel has had in Australian public life, and so is politician Simon Crean, ACTU Vice-President from 1981-85 and President from 1985-91, who resigned to go into federal politics and led the Australian Labor Party from 2001-3.

Here’s most of Paul Howes’s speech, reproduced courtesy of J-Wire:

'I can’t see how any unionist can back the international BDS movement.Now I know there has been a lot of talk in the media, both here and abroad, about trade unions backing the BDS movement.But let’s take a step back from the headlines. Take an overview of the global situation.The reality is that despite the headlines most of the trade union movement in Australia, and across the globe, has not backed BDS.The bulk of the international trade union movement, and in particular unions in countries like the USA, Germany and Austria, are rock-solid in their support for Israel.Let’s remember just a few months ago,in Vancouver, Canada, the World Congress of the global union movement, the International Trade Union Confederation – the ITUC – stared down attempts to label Israel an apartheid state.The international trade union movement delivered a stinging rebuff to advocates of the campaign to boycott Israel. In an even-handed response – this was supported by both the Palestinian and Israeli trade unions – the World Congress praised the landmark agreement between the Histadrut and the PGFTU on the rights of Palestinian workers.The ITUC – now led by my former ACTU colleague Sharan Burrow – of course played a key role in delivering that Palestinian-Israeli agreement. The ITUC Congress statement declared: “This agreement and other actions to promote decent work and end discrimination is crucial to building the basis for just and equitable economic development.”

Most importantly – in a stunning blow to BDS activists in some unions – the Israeli national trade union centre, the Histadrut, was honoured by the global trade union movement.Its leader, Ofer Eini, was elevated to the ITUC’s 25 member Executive Board, as well as its General Council.Mr. Eini was also elected as one of the global union groups Vice Presidents.And now we are seeing a range of new, admittedly small at the moment, initiatives by global unions in different industrial sectors supporting co-operation in defence of workers’ rights in Palestine and Israel.None of this means there are not real threats; that the social movement traditions of the union movement will not be turned against Israel using the language of the international BDS movement.ut the majority of unions are with Israel. We should use this majority to maintain support for a peace process which delivers security to Israel and justice to the Palestinians.

I know later this month there will be a conference here in Melbourne to build the BDS movement in Australia – and especially to create strategies to get Australian unions backing BDS. We have to be clear-eyed about this conference. I’ve looked through the speakers list. There is not one person of significance in the Australian union movement speaking here. There is not one person from the 50-plus ACTU Executive speaking here. That should give you an indication of the status and importance of the Melbourne meeting, at least as far as Australian unions are concerned. But yes we do have to be keep a watching brief if we are to stop that movement gaining strength in Australia. We must know our arguments against the international BDSers. The BDS movement likes to compare themselves to the boycott campaign against apartheid South Africa. We have to explain to people why the two are just not comparable. The South African boycott apartheid movement was home grown, it originated in South Africa and was run and controlled by Nelson Mandela and his ANC and the peak South African trade union organization COSATU.  Australian unions played a major role in backing the South African boycott. Nelson Mandela travelled to Australia soon after his release and told a union rally here in Melbourne that he specifically wanted to thank the ACTU, and its affiliates, for their work. Most importantly we must explain that the BDS movement, as it relates to the Palestinian struggle, is not really a home-grown initiative.

Today’s international anti-Israel boycott movement is largely an initiative imposed on the Palestinian body politic by outside agitators who run so-called solidarity groups. These solidarity groups have little or no institutional connections or support from within the Territories – especially not the West Bank. The person credited for founding this international BDS Movement, Omar Barghouti, was born in Qatar, grew up in Egypt and moved only relatively recently to Ramallah.  Omar Barghouti is actually now a post-graduate student in Israel at Tel Aviv University. He is due to complete his PhD this year I believe.  When Israeli students at the university raised a petition to protest his presence on campus, and demand he be expelled, the university authorities rejected the petition and announced they would not expel him.  They were not going to boycott Mr. Barghouti because of his ideas – even though Omar Barghouti himself promotes and supports an academic boycott of Israeli universities.  When Omar Barghouti was asked about this irony he told the media “my studies at Tel Aviv University are a personal matter and I have no interest in commenting.” 

My Palestinian acquaintances have pointed out to me a number of times that, unfortunately, the Palestinian Diaspora are by far bigger agitators for the BDS cause than the people who actually live in the Territories. My Palestinian acquaintances also point out that there always has been a difference, a disconnect, between the Palestinians in the Territories, and those in the Diaspora.  The Palestinian Diaspora is less willing to compromise, more willing to keep the fight going, because they don’t have to actually live the oppressive life suffered by those in the Territories.

Living comfortably in Australia, Canada, USA, UK or Europe these Diaspora activists are happy to fight to the last blood of Palestinians who actually have to live under the Occupation. ( Now some of my Jewish friends say that this ‘ hard-line’ anti-compromise phenomena is sometimes also reflected in the Jewish Diaspora – but in their view it is not the dominant trend, as it seems to be in the Palestinian Diaspora.) It is interesting to note that that all three featured Palestinian speakers at the upcoming Melbourne International BDS conference, whose names I have seen – Rafeef Ziadah; Samah Sabawi and Yousef Alreemawi – all live in the Palestinian Diaspora. It is easy to promote the international anti-Israel BDS cause if you don’t have to live through the practicalities of the day-to-day lives of the workers in the Territories. It is easy to oppose the compromises that both sides will have to make to achieve security, justice and peace. Now even if you have only a passing knowledge of Palestinian politics you will know that the Palestinians who actually live in the Territories are only just now – and ever so slowly – backing a limited boycott campaign. The Palestinian Authority talks about a boycott against the West Bank settlements – not Green Line Israel. On the other hand the solidarity groups stress an international BDS against all of Israel. No differentiation at all between Green Line Israel and the West Bank.

If you read closely, between the lines, you will also see that the PA, and its instrumentalities, place many, many qualifications, and adjectives, in front of their boycott statements because they are aware of the pain it will cause their own people. The Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions – who are also late, and in my view reluctant, boycott backers – have been at pains to limit their calls to a boycott only of goods produced by companies which operate in the West Bank. The PGFTU have said they only want the BDS implemented by the Palestinian Authority if alternative jobs can be found for the thousands of Palestinians who daily work in the Israeli West Bank settlements. The PGFTU has been explicit in their rejection of any call for a general BDS, or one that extends to companies which operate only in Green Line Israel and not the West Bank. The leader of the PGFTU, Shaher Saed, is respected around the globe for his street smarts. People tell me that he is a realistic, pragmatic trade unionist – who knows when to compromise to achieve a deal. Now in my view they’re the types of trade union leaders who best succeed in representing workers. The reality is that after the peace process is finally settled Israelis and Palestinians, in a region which is a third of the size of Tasmania, will have to learn to live together, work together. 

Ask Us No Questions and We’ll Tell You No Lies – Al Beeb, Israel, and the “Pimply Loners”

The scandalously feather-bedded and wasteful BBC (employer of dodgy Middle East Editor Jeremy Bowen, pictured here at a CoJo function in party mood) squandered over £270,000 of licence-payers’ money on legal fees in order to keep out of the public domain the 20,000-word internal report (2004) prepared by senior staffer Malcolm Balen regarding allegations of anti-Israel bias in Al Beeb’s coverage of the Israel-Palestine issue. Under the Freedom of Information Act, Al Beeb was forced to disclose some weeks ago that it spent £264,000 on barristers’ fees and £6,156 fighting (all the way to the House of Lords, no less ) a thwarted attempt by Jewish solicitor Steven Sugar to force the release of the Balen Report under the same Act. “If we are not able to pursue our journalism freely and have honest debate and analysis over how we are covering important issues, then our ability to serve the public effectively will be diminished”, sniffed an Al Beeb spokesperson in relation to the suppressed report.

Since the Freedom of Information Act reached the Statute Book in 2005, Al Beeb has paid, using licence-payers' money, of course, for external legal advice regarding sixteen requests under the legislation, including “advice in relation to the publication of the register of interests for senior staff”. Al Beeb failed to respond to no less than fourteen of the total of seventeen requests about Jews and Israel made under the terms of the Act. These unanswered requests included five regarding the involvement of Jews with the running of the Corporation at top level (such as “How many Arab people does the BBC employ in a senior capacity, including directors, compared with Jewish employees?” and “How many people of the Jewish faith make up the BBC Trust”) and several relating to Operation Cast Lead. (To be fair, it seems to be a reasonable assumption, given their nature, that not all these questions were asked by supporters of Israel, but rather by Israel’s critics and foes.)

That Al Beeb holds the hard-pressed public who fund its biases and excesses in something approaching contempt is suggested by one of its highest-paid and best-known political pundits, Andrew Marr (the man who’s on record as admitting that Al Beeb “is not impartial or neutral. It's a publicly funded, urban organisation with an abnormally large number of young people, ethnic minorities and gay people. It has a liberal bias not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias”.)  He’s dismissed most “so-called citizen journalism” as “the spewing and rantings of very drunk people late at night”: “A lot of bloggers seem to be socially inadequate, pimpled, single, slightly seedy, bald, cauliflower-nosed, young men sitting in their mother’s basements and ranting”, says Marr (pictured).

I agree with him that “Terrible things are said on line because they are anonymous. People say things online that they wouldn’t dream of saying in person.” But that sort of thing seems to come from anonymous commentators on unmoderated or poorly moderated internet forums, rather than from bloggers themselves. The folk who run the superb website Biased BBC certainly don’t fit Mr Marr’s stereotyping. It’s lucky for us all that they devote so much time monitoring Al Beeb – in all its flagrant arrogant bias in all sorts of ways, not least Israel. More power to ‘em!

Murder, Mayhem, and a Strange Case of Mandate Inertia

On the afternoon of 11 July 1938 Lily Tobias (née Shepherd, 1887-1984), from a Yiddish-speaking immigrant family in the Swansea valley, was at home in Mount Carmel putting the final touches to her novel The Samaritans. An aunt of the future famous Welsh-Jewish poet Dannie Abse and his flamboyant politician brother Leo, she was already a published writer. Her The Nationalists, and other Goluth Studies, a book of short stories, had appeared in 1921; her novel In My Mother’s House, which tells of a Welsh-born Jew who rejects, and then reclaims, his heritage, in 1931; her anti-war novel Eunice Fleet, about a conscientious objector, in 1933; and The Tube in 1935.

Lily had made aliyah in 1935, the year before the eruption of Arab disturbances in Palestine, with her husband Philip Vallentine Tobias, who was originally from South Africa, and her widowed father, a retired furniture dealer from Poland. Philip Tobias, who had been active in the Cardiff Jewish community before moving with Lily to London, where he was a founder and leading member of the Finchley Hebrew Congregation, ran a glass company in Palestine. And on that afternoon, as Lily was at work on her latest novel’s closing chapter, he was alone in his car en route to Haifa.

Philip knew that Palestine was in the grip of what an official report covering 1937 termed "a campaign of murder, intimidation, and sabotage conducted by Arab law breakers", a "terrorist campaign" which entailed "isolated murder and attempted murder; of sporadic cases of armed attacks on military, police and civilian road transport; on Jewish settlements and on both Arab and Jewish private property". He knew of such violent incidents as an assassination attempt on the Mayor of Haifa and another in Jerusalem on the Inspector-General of Police; of the brutal murders near and in Beisan of a young Jewish agriculturalist and a Jewish doctor; of the slaughter by marauding livestock-stealers of five Jewish shepherds in hill country to the south of Lake Tiberias, and of two others near Nazareth; of an unsuccessful attack on a crowded passanger train on the Lydda-Haifa line; of a series of attacks on Jews’ vehicles on the Jerusalem-Jaffa road in which one Jewish passenger lost his life. And so forth.

Nevertheless, alone on that drive, Philip Tobias had no firearm or other weapon. He seems to have been confident that, going about his lawful business in British-administered Palestine in broad daylight, he would personally encounter no danger. The assumption proved deadly. For, all of a sudden, in Haifa, his car was surrounded by a 30-strong mob of young Arab men in their teens and early twenties. They dragged Tobias from his car and stoned and stabbed him to death. According to a pressman, who accordingly described “the circumstances” of the murder as “intolerable”, the killing of Philip Tobias “it is reliably reported”, took place in plain view of “a police patrol led by an officer who witnessed the whole outrage but did not go to the rescue”.

By an eery coincidence, the book on which Lily was working when her husband met his end in cold blood was on a similar theme. Published the following year, The Samaritans proved to be her final book, although she continued to write articles for Jewish papers and to lecture on Israel and literary matters.

Tobias was the second British civilian killed in Palestine that year (the first was J. L. Starkey, director of the Marston-Wellcome Archæological Expedition to the Near East, murdered by Arabs on the evening of 10 January, when he was on his way from his camp at Tell Duweir to Jerusalem) and the first British Jew slain during Arab disturbances in Palestine since the murder of Levi Billig in 1936. Billig, born in London’s Whitechapel in 1897 to a cigar/cigarette maker and his wife, both from Russia, was a Cambridge graduate who in 1926 had been appointed Lecturer in Arabic Language and Literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He was at home at his desk working on a book based on his recent research, in Persia, into early Sh’ite texts, when an Arab gunman opened fire through the window and killed him. Ironically, Billig was an advocate of Jewish-Arab reconciliation. His An Arabic Reader (1931, reprinted 1963) remains a highly regarded introductory text. (Coincidentally, his co-compiler of that work, Avinoam Yellin MBE, of the Palestine Ministry of Education, was also a victim of Arab violence; shot near his Jerusalem office on 21 October 1937, he succumbed to his wounds two days later.)

The murder of Philip Tobias was symptomatic of a crisis that had gripped Haifa since the opening days of the month; in a report filed 15 July the Jewish Chronicle’s stringer wrote of the eruption nine days earlier of what was “the complete usurpation of authority by unruly elements and the virtual handing over to what amounts to mob rule in the Eastern Quarter, main artery to the Hospital and industrial zones of Haifa and principal lines of communication between Emek Zebulon and Emek Jezreel”. Noting that the authorities seemed “powerless in spite of increased forces at their disposal” and that police and marines landed from HMS Repulse seemed oddly inert in the face of Arab hooliganism, he contined:

“What is most surprising about this situation is that the numerous outrages day after day happen at almost the same hour and the same places, so much so, that the Haifa correspondent of a Palestinian newspaper for some days on end ordered a taxi at the same time to go the rounds and ascertain what was happening! On one occasion he helped to take an injured Jewish passer-by to hospital, having arrived on the scene within a couple of minutes of the assault. It seems strange, to say the least, that the authorities could not have been as far-sighted and placed heavier patrols in that area to break up the mobs and hooligans. Today’s issue of Davar, the Hebrew Labour daily of Tel-Aviv, declared that the continuing lawlessness in Haifa represented a riddle. There were hundreds of troops, marines, and supernumerary constables available, yet in a busy street, within a few yards of the Central Police Station, a man was battered to death in broad daylight; shots were fired and bombs thrown at vehicles; knives were thrust into the backs of passersby; shops were looted, and houses set on fire.”

How Sweet It Is! Judge Bathurst-Norman Reprimanded

Remember George Bathurst-Norman, the retired judge who this summer at Hove Crown Court, after an 87-page summing up containing a tirade about Israel's counter-terrorism operations in Gaza, presided over the acquittal of anti-Israel protesters who had smashed up a Brighton armaments factory suspected of supplying Israel and who had claimed as their defence the principle that they were breaking the law in order to prevent a greater breach of law (i.e. by Israel)? Well, the old gentleman has been formally reprimanded by the two most senior law officers in the realm, the Lord Chancellor and the Lord Chief Justice.

In a statement released a few hours ago, a spokesperson for the Office for Judicial Complaints said: “At short notice, the judge assigned to try a politically sensitive trial at Hove Crown Court on 28 and 29 June 2010 was unable to sit. To avoid an adjournment, His Honour Bathurst-Norman agreed to replace to him.

A number of complaints were made about some of the observations he made during the trial and summing up. An investigation found that a number of these observations did not arise directly from the evidence at trial and could be seen as an expression of the judge’s personal views on a political question. This was an error.

The Lord Chancellor and Lord Chief Justice considered the conclusions of the investigation and H[is] H[onour] Bathurst-Norman was formally reprimanded.”

In many respects, this outcome is a tribute to the tireless persistence of Jonathan Hoffman, co-Vice-Chair of the Zionist Federation, who took the trouble to acquire a full transcript of Bathurst-Norman's summing up, and a vindication of Mr Hoffman's sometimes unappreciated zeal.  The full transcript, which proved that Bathurst-Norman's remarks had been even more scandalous than had been immediately imagined, was publicised by the doughty Mr Hoffman http://cifwatch.com/2010/07/14/the-judge-who-thought-he-was-defence-coun...
with the result that the Office of Judicial Complaints received numerous protests over the judge's conduct.
 
Here's how today's development is reported in the London-based Standpoint magazine (a highly recommended fairly new right-of-centre political journal) by that doyen of law correspondents, Joshua Rozenberg:
http://standpointmag.co.uk/node/3462

Jonathan Hoffman responded to today's news thus: "As a result of this politically biased Judge, thousands of taxpayer pounds have been wasted and the criminals who vandalised the EDO factory walked away scot free. Let the disgracing of this Judge be a lesson to any other Judges who similarly encourage the delegitimisation of Israel. The Judge or magistrate who tries the case of the vandals who committed aggravated trespass at the Ahava shop in London on Saturday must punish them with the full force of the law."


"Hear, hear!" to that!

Snatched Memories: A Daughter of Zion on Yiddishkayt in the old East End

Beth-Zion Abrahams (1902-1990), who grew up in a big East European immigrant family in London’s East End, was a sister of Israel Meir Lask, who settled in Eretz Israel in 1930 and became an acclaimed translator of Hebrew poetry. She was married to award-winning poet Abraham Abrahams (1897-1955), a former editor of the Jerusalem daily Ha-Yarden, who at one time headed the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA), and was Chairman of the Zionist Revisionist Organisation of Great Britain at the time of his death. Beth-Zion wrote on aspects of Anglo-Jewish history and translated into English the Yiddish memoirs of Glückel of Hameln. Her father, Joseph Chaim Cohen-Lask , was a Polish-born melamud who moved in 1890 to London. His mill and shop in Bell Lane, Aldgate, provided the East End with buckwheat. He was a Yiddishist and a stalwart of the Chovevei Zion (‘Lovers of Zion’) movement; following his death in 1937 his family donated his fine collection of Yiddish and Hebrew volumes to the Tel Aviv Municipal Library, but, heart-breakingly, later discovered that the collection had largely gone missing. Beth-Zion’s reminiscences of the Jewish East End, given in the course of an interview, appeared in the London Jewish Chronicle (11 January 1980). Her parents’ home, she recalled, was a hub of lively debate on various topics of Jewish concern, above all Zionism. Here’s what she had to say, without further comment from me, apart from the clarifications in square brackets:

“The names of the regular attenders at these gatherings was numerous. They included Joseph Brenner [Yosef Chaim Brenner, 1881-1921], later to be killed in the Arab riots in Palestine; journalists Suwalsky [Isaak ben Samson Suwalski, 1863-1913], Brill and Frumkin [probably Elias Ephraim Frumkin, c1880-1958]; Professor M. H.Segal [Moshe Zvi Segal, 1875-1968, who moved to Israel in 1926 and taught at the Hebrew University], and Gelberg, the Hebrew poet. All of them benefited from the ever-ready hospitality of my mother, who provided endless glasses of pale amber Russian tea with thin slices of lemon floating on top.

People tend to forget this cultural side of the old East End and remember only the ‘sweat shops’. The whole atmosphere was rich, colourful, and intensely Jewish, even though it was a time of great poverty, and the work of the Board of Guardians had to compete with that of the converting missionaries.

There were three basic divisions within the community. There were the Dutch Jews, with their Netherlands Club in the Tentergrounds. They were known as ‘chuts’ because of the way they pronounced ‘chut morning’ and similar phrases so gutturally. Then there were us Jews of East European stock who always spoke Yiddish. And there were the English Jews.many of whom looked down on the Yiddish-speaking foreigners in their midst.

Nevertheless, Yiddish was the lingua franca of the East End in those days. I was reminded of this many years later when speaking to Rev Balleine, a former curate of Whitechapel Church, who recalled to me with amusement a sign reading ‘English spoken here’ placed over one of the counters in the old Osborn Street post office. There was even an old Yiddish street singer called Solomon Levy.

Yiddish concerts in the local community halls were always crowded. One song which never failed to make all the women cry was A brevel di mame (a little letter to mother). In those days, you see, leaving der heim could often mean a lifetime’s separation from one’s family....

Petticoat Lane had an atmosphere of its own – typified by the ice-cream seller with his cry of ‘okey pokey, penny a lump!’ – and especially so as Shabbos and Yomtov approached. People would come in from all parts of town to do their shopping and then all the stalls and shops would close and peace would descend. Queues would form for the municipal baths in Wentworth Street, and I can still remember the formidable woman attendant with her turnkey would come and turn you out if you stayed too long.

After Yom Kippur, it was customary for many years for crowds of mostly young Jews to march from London Hos[p]ital, Whitechapel, through Aldgate as far as the Bank. Always on the right hand side of the road and chanting, ‘To the bank, to the bank, to the bank, bank, bank!’

At home we girls had a busy time of it before Shabbos, polishing the candlesticks and the cutlery, cleaning rooms, and so on. Cooking, a ritual common to every household, was something the children would love to watch. Everything was homemade. For lockshen dough the women used to roll out egg and flour in sheets on the kitchen table. Then it would be smoothed out on the bedspread ready to be folded and cut into thin strips. This was invariably accompanied by the regular ‘tap, tap, tap’ of the sharp knife on the table top.

Kneidlach, kreplach, chopped liver – all were prepared in similar routine fashion. Chickens were usually called ‘fowls’ then, and you could buy a whole fowl or a portion from one of the many stallholders lined up on either side of Wentworth Street and Cobb Street. You could buy a live fowl from a crate. And if you were intending to eat it rather than keep it for the eggs, you’d take it to the nearby schecht house for it to be ritually slaughtered and handed over to be plucked by one of the women regularly employed for this purpose.

Pesach brings back particularly happy childhood memories. Father, being a wholesaler, used to get tons of nuts, and as children we played a game using hazel and tiger nuts which made us much in demand in the street.

Mothers stood in the doorways beaming proudly at all the bonny children. Although we were living in what was technically a slum, we were extremely well cared for.

One of our favourite locations was ‘Itchy Park’, a churchyard frequented by tramps whose constant need to scratch themselves gave rise to our name for the place. But it was always safe. Despite living in one of the roughest parts of London, the children could run free without any fear of being molested.

....Everyone would be in and out of each other’s houses. There were no arranged visits. And people used to look after each other. I remember when one woman’s husband died, the neighbours set her up with a stall in the market from which she was able to bring up her family.

I think the regular, hard way of life we had gave us more backbone. And we were all strongly aware of our Jewishness. I very much regret seeing today the well-educated Jew who knows so much about many things but little or nothing about his Jewishness. He is even ashamed of it.

On the other hand, I don’t mind the diversity of affiliation across the community. This is a positive thing on the whole. We’re not all cut to pattern. And, after all, the only place you can be sure of unanimity is the graveyard!”

A Little Light Reading About Hamas

I freely admit it! I’ve purloined the idea for this post (I have an excuse, I’m laid low with flu!) from the always interesting Matt Pryor, a regular commentator over at Thejc.com blogs. On there today he draws attention to a blog called “Son of Hamas”, and more especially to two current sequential posts entitled “The furious insignificance of Hamas”. The blogger “Son of Hamas”, as Matt explains, is former Shin Bet operative Mosab Hassan Yousef, whose father, Sheikh Hassan Yousef, helped to found Hamas. A convert to Christianity, Mosab Hassan Yousef recounted his experiences in a book, Son of Hamas (co-written with journalist Ron Brackin and also available in CD format), and was recently granted political asylum in the United States.


Here’s a taste of those two highly recommended posts on the “Son of Hamas” blog, which in their entirety can be accessed here: sonofhamas.wordpress.com/.../the-furious-insignificance-of-hamas/

‘When I was in the Israeli prison at Megiddo, Hamas behaved like a mini-regime, controlled by thugs and tyrants. The maj’d, its security wing, tortured men until they made up anything, denounced anyone to make the pain stop. And the maj’d were so stupid that they believed the confessions. I read those confessions. They were ridiculous, and virtually all of them were eventually disproved. I remember wondering what it would be like if Hamas ever gained control of the government in Palestine.

I don’t wonder anymore.

Nearly five years ago, they won the elections. When the international community refused to recognize the legitimacy of their victory, a furious Hamas soaked the streets with Fatah blood.

And what have they done with Gaza since then? Nothing. They have built no infrastructure and formed no government departments. They have not advanced Palestinian culture or improved Palestinian society. Prime Minister Ismail Haniya was responsible for the maj’d in prison, and he rules Gaza the same way today.

Everyone is gagged and crippled by fear. For my people in Gaza, Hamas police are like Hitler’s Wafen-SS, Mao’s Red Guard, the Kremlin’s KGB or Ceaucescu’s Securitate. Anyone can be kidnapped and tortured into confessing that they are collaborating with Israel.

.....

In addition to governing by kidnapping and torture, Hamas controls hundreds of tunnels that admit goods through Egypt into Gaza. Hamas gives the best to its own and sells the rest at black market prices to Palestinian families, half of whom are unemployed. It steals international medical aid and sells it in its own pharmacies. Hamas even bulldozed the homes of nearly 200 families and stole their land to build an Islamic religious center, similar to the proposed 9/11 mosque in New York City.

Last year, the UN was forced to stop all aid to Gaza because Hamas stole blankets and food meant for my people. This summer, Hamas broke into the offices of nongovernment charities, including United Nations partner organizations, and shut them down, cutting off resources to 80 percent of Gaza’s residents.’

Nice guys, Gilad Shalit's hosts, eh?  And to think former Aussie Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser (to cite only a single individual who should know better) excoriates Israel for refusing to negotiate with them!