HERITAGE FLORIDA JEWISH NEWS, JUNE 6, 2014
When goose-stepping and Israel-bashing go together
By Moshe Phillips and
Benyamin Korn
The thin line dividing
criticism of Israel from anti-
Semitism just got a little
thinner.
BBC journalist Chris Rog-
ers this week was revealed
to have amused himself by
giving the Nazi salute and
strutting about in a Hitler-
style goose-step while film-
ing a documentary--on,
of all things, anti-Semitic
soccer fans in eastern Eu-
rope. The British Daily Mail
newspaper first reported on
PAGE 5A
Rogers' vile actions on their
website on May 19.
Rogers' "defense" was that
his behavior was "intended as
a joke." Humor can be very
revealing.
Is it just a coincidence
that when he is not saluting
Hitler, Rogers keeps busy by
bashing Israel? In 2007, he
and fellow-British journalist
Deborah Turness produced
a short documentary called
"Too Young to Die: Children
of the Frontline." Its theme
was that Israel is mistreating
Palestinian Arab children
by arresting them when
they commit terrorist acts.
Evidently Rogers and Turness
believe that if you are below
a certain age, you have the
right to murder and maim
with impunity. Well, murder
and maim Israelis, at least.
If challenged, Rogers and
Turness would no doubt point
to the fact that an Israeli
spokesperson appeared in
"Too Young to Die" as proof
that the film was evenhanded.
In fact, the Israeli appeared on
screen for exactly 14 seconds.
Nobody should be surprised
to learn that Rogers and Tur-
ness were given an award by
Amnesty International for
"Too Young to Die." Amnesty
has a long and well-docu-
mented record of hostility to
Israel. No wonder Amnesty's
leaders are so fond of Rogers
and Turness. Birds of a feather
do flock together.
What makes all of this
especially troubling is that
Turness is now in a position
to do serious harm to Israel's
good name: last year, Tur-
ness was named president of
NBCNews. Her"credentials"
for the job included years of
anti-lsrael programming as
the news director for British
Independent Television's ITV
News.
Among other notable
broadcasts was ITV's 2002
screening of the documentary
"Palestine is Still the Issue,"
by veteran Israel-basher John
Pilger. It portrayed Israel as an
evil terrorist state that bru-
tally persecutes Palestinians.
Pilger is so extreme thathe has
claimed the 9/11 attacks were
a response to America suppos-
edly "rejecting outright the
hope of a Palestinian state."
Pilger, .incidentally, has
compared Israel's anti-terror
policies to "Nazi Germany's
invasion of Poland," and
likened Israeli and American
leaders toAdolfHitler. Perhaps
Turness should introduce him
to her good friend, the goose-
stepping Chris Rogers.
Not all critics of Israel are
anti-Semites. But some are.
Some move all too easily and
comfortably from calling
Israelis "Nazis" to "jokingly"
making Nazi salutes. And
when they manage to secure
influential positions in the ma-
jor news media--watch out.
The authors are members
of the Board of the Religious
Zionists of America.
Poofl Magical settlements stopped 'peace process'
By Morton Klein
When Mahmoud Abbas'
Fatah/Palestinian Authority
(PA) signed a reconciliation
agreement with Hamas, a
recognized terrorist group
that calls in its Charter for
the destruction of Israel
and the murder of Jews, the
State Department's spokes-
woman, Jen Psaki, observed,
"It's hard to see how Israel
can be expected to negoti-
ate with a government that
does not believe in its right
to exist."
Despite the obvious truth
of this statement, Secre-
tary of State John Kerry
blamed Israel. As he told
the Congress, "700 settle-
ment units were announced
in Jerusalem. And poof!
That was sort of the mo-
ment." Again the claim is
that "magical" settlements
can "magically" destroy a
major peace negotiation.
Somehow, the PA promot-
ing hatred and violence, not
arresting terrorists, allying
By Andrew Silow-Carroll
During the wedding scene
in Fiddler on the Roof,
Perchik, the student revo-
lutionary, breaks with tra-
dition by crossing from the
men's side to the women's
side to dance with Tevye's
daughter Hodel. On stage
it plays like a breakthrough;
even the rabbi joins in the
mixed dancing.
So each time I see the
film, why do I want to yell,
"Don't do it, Perchik!"
I should explain. I am
not an Orthodox Jew. I am
a committed egalitarian. I
belong-to a synagogue where
men and women have the
same opportunities on the
bima, in the pews, and in
the study hall. I am com-
mitted to and have even
engaged in--gasp--mixed
dancing. I am indebted to
the thousands of Perchiks
and Hodels who tore down
the mehitza.
So who am I to criticize
Perchik? I suppose I have
absorbed some of the criti-
cism of Fiddler as well as
some of the critiques of
American Jewry--namely,
that in their eagerness to
assimilate, Jews caused an
irreparable rupture with
their own traditions. The
rupture begins, symboli-
cally, with Perchik crossing
that once uncrossable line.
The next thing you know,
"kosher-style" dells in Hal-
itself with Hamas, refusing
to accept Israel as a Jewish
state are not the destroyers
of peace. It is the announce-
ment of the construction of
Jewish homes within the
boundaries of settlements
that existed when Oslo be-
gan-specifically, in Gi!o, a
southern Jerusalem neigh-
borhood of 40,000, which
would remain part of Israel
under any conceivable peace
agreement.
Apparently, an alleged
Palestinian desire for peace
and statehood alongside Is-
rael magically evaporated--
poof!--at that moment.
Yet, if Palestinians' Urgent
objective was to end settle-
ments, they could do no bet-
ter than rapidly negotiating
with Israel the establishment
of a Palestinian state from
which they could exclude
Jews. But this is precisely
what they won't do, because
the price is acceptance of the
Jewish state of Israel and an
end of claims and conflict
with it.
landale are serving pastrami
with cheese.
Fiddler is as much a
portrait of the era in which
it was produced as of the
time period it depicts. In
the 1960s, the Reform and
Conservative movements
were well on their way to
egalitarianism, and most
of the religious rituals and
folkways in the musical
were already seen as quaint
and old world. Fiddler was
meant to comfort its Jewish
audiences for the choices
they made, not rebukethem
for the customs they left
behind.
Still, I find myself feeling
protective of fervently Or-
thodox Jews in pop culture.
Believe me, it hasn't been
easy lately. An awful lot
of articles repor[ haredim
up to no good, from politi-
cal and religious coercion
in Israel; to their leaders'
underwhelming and some-
times obstructive response
to charges of sex abuse, to
the reluctance of some ha-
sidic movements to abandon
the dangerous practice of
metzitza b'peh.
But I also know that the
haredim are a diverse com-
munity with a deep sense of
dignity and integrity, and
that they deserve better
than the treatment they get
from the media that depict
them as exotics, eccentrics,
or anachronisms.
I wasn't prepared for the
Thus, for virtually all
of the past five and a half
years, Mahmoud Abbas' Pal-
estinian Authority (PA) has
refused to even participate
in negotiations with Israel,
When, in 2009, Israel froze
Jewish construction in
Judea and Samaria for 10
months--something never
agreed to by Israel in the
Oslo agreements--the PA
refused talks until almost
the end of the 10-month
period. It now demands that
Israel free convicted, blood-
soaked terrorists--again,
something not required of
Israel in any past agree-
ment and an anti-peace
demand in itself--efore
agreeing merely to talk to
the Israelis.
The PA has neither moder-
ated one iota of its refusal
to accept Israel as a Jewish
state (Mahmoud Abbas" "I
do not accept a Jewish state,
call it what you will") nor
its demand for a Jew-free
Palestinian state (Abbas:
"when a Palestinian state is
established, it would have
no Israeli presence in it")
nor even its partiality for
violence (Abbas: "I turned
to the Arab States and I
said: 'If you want war, and
if all of you will fight Israel,
we are in favor'"). Only last
week, the PA intervened to
have six Israelis removed
who were participating in
a "peace run" to promote
Israeli/Palestinian coexis-
tence organized by Austra-
lian athlete Pat Farmer.
Abbas' PA has not fulfilled
its commitments under the
Oslo agreements to arrest
terrorists, outlaw terrorist
groups and end the incite-
ment to hatred and murder
in the PA-controlled media,
mosques, schools, and youth
camps that helps fuel the
conflict. Thus, the naming
of streets and1 schools in
honor of Jew-ki]ing terror-
ists, publicizing false claims
that Israel intends to destroy
Jerusalem's A1-Aqsa mosque,
PA clerics reviling Jews as
destroyers of humanity,
Crossing the line
odd haredi subplot in John
Turturro's current film,
Fading Gigolo. Turturro
plays a kindly florist who,
at the urging of an elderly
bookstore owner played by
Woody Allen, allows himself
to be turned out as a male
prostitute. The incredibly
implausible plot is played
for whimsy, although, like
Pretty Woman, another
comedy about prostitution,
its lighthearted surface
masks a foul reality.
In the film, Allen's pimp
character meets a lonely
Satmar widow, Avigal, living
in a Brooklyn walkup with
her mostly teenage children.
Whether Allen senses her
loneliness or a business
opportunity is not clear.
Either way, he convinces
her to visit Turturro's apart-
ment in Manhattan for some
unspecified "therapy."
Creepy, right? I'm a fan of
Turturro's work and honest-
ly don't know what he is get-
ting at here. His character
gives the widow (played by
the striking French actress
Vaness Paradis) a gentle
massage, nothing more,
and comforts her when she
begins to weep. Later their
professional relationship
blossoms into something
more, sweetly enough.
Perhaps a haredi mother
would feel tempted to escape
her circumscribed life in
Brooklyn for a chaste walk
on the mild side, just as
a pair of gorgeous society
women played by Sharon
Stone and Sofia Vergara
would feel the need to pay for
sex from an unremarkable
middle-aged florist. What
made me uncomfortable was
the filmmaker's assumption
that, for a deeply religious
woman, liberation is only
possible according to the
terms of the secular world,
and in its most debased form
(in some ultra-Orthodox
commfinities, seeking men-
tal health care comes with
a stigma. If the movie was a
statement on this, it could
only have been by accident).
The real lives of haredi
Jews are interesting enough
without the sort of voyeur-
ism that borders on ridicule.
Recent Israeli films like
Fill the Void and Ushpizin
squeezed drama and real un-
derstanding out of the lives
of haredim without forcing
implausible encounters with
the "outside" world.
Maybe I feel protective of
the haredim because I am
protective of Jewish obser-
vance. Kashrut can seem
silly and obsessive, but it's
my silly and obsessive. When
audience members hope a
character crosses a line, it's
my line they are crossing.
Or maybe I don't like what
films like Fading Gigolo
say about us. Perchik's and
Avigal's rebellions represent
a rupture between the old
and the new.But it is also
teaching Palestinian chil-
dren that Israel has no right
to exist and to aspire to be-
coming terrorists continues
unabated.
Unsurprisingly, this is
reflected in Palestinian
society. A September 2013
Pew survey found that 62
percent of Palestinians
justify the use of suicide ter-
rorism. According to a July
2011 Palestinian Center for
Public Opinion (PCP) poll,
an astonishing 73 percent
of Palestinians agree with
the Islamic teaching about
the need to murder the
Jews cited in Article 7 of the
Hamas Charter. The same
poll showed that 61 percent
of Palestinians reject the
idea of a peaceful Palestin-
Jan state living alongside
Israel as the solution to the
Arab/Israeli war, as against
only a third (34 percent) who
accept it. Hardly a Palestin-
ian record of peace-making,
moderation, or flexibility.
Against all this, the Is-
raeli Government acceded
in principle to Palestinian
statehood and, as men-
tioned, even unilaterally
froze Jewish construction
in Judea and Samaria for 10
months in an effort to have
the Palestinians merely re-
sume negotiations. In 2000
and again in 2008, the PA
refused without counter-
offer Israeli proposals of
Palestinian statehood on
virtually all of the territory
it is officially demanding.
Last year, Israel
freed scores of convicted
Palestinian murderers, de-
manded by Abbas as a pre-
condition of the PA merely
turning up to negotiations
and yet the PA contimtes to
refuse talks, their alibi being
"settlements," even though
they comprise only 3 percent
of all of Judea and Samaria.
That reason is totally false
and irrational - yet people
believe it. It must be magic.
Morton A. Klein is the
national president of the
Zionist Organization of
America (ZOA).
a rupture among Jews--
namely, the haredim and
the rest of us. Both sides are
implicated in an estrange-
ment that keeps us Prom
seeing each other--or keeps
us from seeing eachother
as anything but oddballs,
sinners, and stereotypes.
There's a void between us
and our haredi brothers and
sisters, and both sides fill it
with contempt.
Andrew Silow-Carroll is
editor-in-chief of the New
Jersey Jewish News. Between
columns you can read his
writing at the JustASC blog.
Dry Bones
