Birthday Wishes and a New Jersey Gangster's Threats

by Alan Edelstein

 

I celebrated my birthday last week.  With friends and family visiting from the U.S., it seemed more like an all-week affair rather than a one-day celebration.  Out for jazz one evening, several evenings out for dinner and dessert, a walk through the Old City and some time at the Wall, an afternoon of wine tasting in the Jerusalem hills.  All and all, a fun time and a nice reminder of the delights of contemporary Jerusalem and the surrounding area.

My birthday wish?  Easy:  I wish that Ministers Bennett and Yaalon and a few others would stop throwing personal barbs and insulting Secretary of State John Kerry, and I wish that Secretary Kerry would stop giving them every excuse possible to do so.

 

Bennett and Yaalon?  They are just beyond any sense of respect and dignity when it comes to how one addresses the chief of foreign affairs, even one you might vigorously disagree with, of the greatest power on earth and the one country that Israel so critically depends on.  Express your disagreements?  Sure.  Personally insult and make insinuations about motivations?  Beyond stupid. 

Kerry?  Needs to take some courses in diplomacy and in psychology.  Telling Israelis that they take the good life for granted, that they've grown complacent, that they don't know what is in store for them, that they are living in an illusion, is no way to influence or motivate them to take risks.  One doesn't have to be a genius, or even Secretary of State, to know that. 

Lately the Secretary has begun to resemble a low-level New Jersey gangster a la a James Cagney movie.  He never says he is going to burn down the building, or blow-up the car, or, God-forbid, harm the kids, but he seems darn close to saying that we'll have what's coming to us if we don't cough up the dough by Friday:

COMEDY CENTRAL, MRS. ARAFAT, AND THE RESURRECTION OF ANDY KAUFMAN

by Alan Edelstein

Israel doesn't have SNL.  It doesn't have Jon Stewart and the Daily Show.  Sadly, it doesn't have Colbert.  But, we've got something even better:  We've got the Middle East, and it doesn't get any more entertaining than in our very own neighborhood.  Think I'm kidding?  Try these:

According to Hamas and its allies, Israel and Jews are evil incarnate, to blame for virtually every wound, even those self-inflicted, suffered by the Arab world.  Hamas keeps calling for the Zionist entity's destruction.

Yet the Hamas Prime Minister, Ismail Haniyeh, who is often the first in line to declare how murderous and mean the Israelis are, apparently had  no problem having his granddaughter transferred to the "Zionist entity" to be treated in an Israeli hospital for a life-threatening condition.

 In a clear case of "babywashing," Israeli doctors attempted to treat the one-year old for an infection of her digestive system. 

About two years ago Haniyeh's brother-in-law came to Israel for life-saving heart surgery. One wonders if the Haniyeh's health insurance has a provision that includes Zionist Entity/Occupier providers. 

Given that the Hamas government regularly pressures the tens of thousands of Gazans who cross the border to receive treatment in Israeli hospitals (often at no cost) to not go, one wonders what the public would think if word got out that his family seems to make a habit of the Israeli health care system. 

No worries there.  No press reports in Gaza.  The baby's father,  Haniyeh's oldest son, did post on  Facebook that the baby had "crossed the green line" to receive the treatment.  That post came down fast. Not sure how many "friends" he still has.

IT'S THE BOMB!

By Alan Edelstein

In my October 20 post, I wrote about how the latest thing amongst some in the American Jewish community is to spend inordinate amounts of time discussing and debating what it means to "support" Israel and, in the course of twisting and turning, to conclude that "support" can mean lots of things that are anything but.

It seems that the appetite for this seemingly endless discussion is unabated.  Even someone at my own hometown Sacramento synagogue, Mosaic Law Congregation, long a bastion of the unabashedly pro-Israel crowd, with a lot of smart people who always seemed to know what supporting Israel meant, now seems to think the congregants need assistance on figuring out what it means.

It's upcoming program is entitled "How Best to Support Israel," and its publicity invites one to an "intriguing discussion on how best to support Israel at this challenging time in its history."  The organizer sent out an e-mail saying "'No one has a stronger voice in this than the American Jewish community.' So said Secretary of State John Carry [sic] in a speech to the American Jewish Committee, refereeing [sic] to the renewed peace negotiations." 

Really? Apparently Secretary Kerry and the organizer of the program forgot about the voices of the Israelis and Palestinians whose lives and futures are involved.

Just 15 minutes west in the university town of Davis, the Israel Matters Committee of the local Reform synagogue, Congregation Bet Haverim, seems to have figured the puzzle out with no discussion necessary.  They advertise that they are "beginning a year-long project to raise funds for portable bomb shelters in southern Israel--especially for kindergartens in Israeli communities along the Gaza border. In the last week alone, more than 15 rockets and mortars have been indiscriminately fired at southern Israeli men, women, and children."

How did the folks in Davis figure out this question of what "support" means so easily and quickly, while folks in Sacramento seem to be devoting countless hours to exploring the meaning of the word.  Could it be all of those PhD's? 

HERE, THERE. . . AND TRANSYLVANIA?

by Alan Edelstein

The garbage that is Jew-hatred is truly amazing.  It seems to be everywhere these days, and if the consequences of not taking it seriously had not proven so tragic over the centuries, it might actually be amusing.

First up is CNN International.  CNN International pretty much admits to being a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Arab world.  Many of its broadcasts announce up front that they are "in cooperation with" a company based in an Arab country, an Arab country's tourism or trade development office, or with the country directly.

The content of the network's broadcasts confirms the bonds.  The most glaring example is the weekly Marketplace Middle East program. Through this and other programs, CNN International focuses, or fixates, on the purportedly robust, free, creative, impressive, unbelievable businesses and business opportunities in the welcoming marketplace of the Middle East, particularly the Gulf States.

Somehow in all of the gushing regarding the Middle East's tremendous business environment, CNN International manages to completely ignore Israel.  This, despite the fact that Israel has become a hotbed of technology, start-ups, IPO's, and the like.  Think Waze and SodaStream.  Multiply by a lot.

Just about every hi-tech firm imaginable has bought an Israeli start-up or two or three and/or opened R&D centers here.  Think Google, Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, and, just recently, Facebook.  Multiply. 

WORD GAMES

by Alan Edelstein
(originally published in The Times of Israel)

There are about 14 million Jews in the world.  My guess is that about nine or 10 million are not connected, not involved, or just otherwise busy, unless they are Israelis, in which case being Jewish means for most just living, paying taxes, working, raising kids, arguing about the country, and all the other mundane but important activities of daily life. 

So, by my figuring, that leaves about four or five million who are connected in some way or another.  For only four or five million people, we Jews seem to have more organizations, institutes, think tanks, museums, you-name-it, than anyone else in the world.  It wouldn't surprise me if every connected Jew could have his or her own organization. 

And we seem to study, think, discuss, and debate every angle of being Jewish that one can possibly imagine.  Just when I thought we had done all that are possible, a new one has popped up.  The latest craze in organizations and subjects is dedicated to discussing what you can discuss about Israel and still be "pro-Israel" or in "support" of Israel. That's right.  We Jews have to have a debate about what it is we are debating. 

My own hometown of Sacramento has gotten into the act.  First, there was a program on "Civil Discourse." Reports that I received indicate that it was basically a session stacked with anti-Israel folks saying that we should include them in our community conversations and that we should be nice when talking with them.

Dear Bashar. . .From Barack

(Originally published in The Times of Israel)

Dear Bashar:

Hi.  I hope the family is doing well, given the circumstances.  We're doing fine.  The girls are growing into fine young ladies and Michelle, well, I'm sure you've seen those pictures of her in sleeveless dresses (is there any other kind?).  She keeps pumping iron and sure has the results to show for it.  I'm not bragging.  Just sayin'. 

I won't even ask how you are doing.  I know this isn't easy. You have sure created a mess.  I mean, really.  This is not what we expected at all.

 You went to medical school in England and became an opthamologist.  My God, we all thought you wanted to keep people healthy.  You married an upper-crust, refined woman raised in England, the product of the finest schools.  She seemed so interested in keeping people healthy and happy.  She bled on-screen for those poor kids of Gaza suffering at the boot of the Zionist entity.  Ha, ha, I'm guessing Gaza is looking like Club Med to most Syrians these days. 

So, we all thought you would never do what you're doing.  I mean, take John Kerry.  When old John was a senator, he spent more time meeting and eating and drinking with you than just about anybody else.  I couldn't turn on the TV without him popping up coming out of a meeting with you and declaring what a reformer you are.  Boy, those days sure seem like a long time ago now, don't they, Bashar?

BUSTIN' OUT

(Originally published in The Times of Israel)

I have never had much sympathy for Jonathan Pollard. No matter that his actions were motivated by concern for Israel.  No matter that he leaked information to an American ally.  No matter that what he leaked should have been given to Israel in any event.

I don't generally feel that people who break pledges to their country deserve much sympathy or support and, despite the circumstances mentioned above, I have not felt that Pollard deserved the time and attention he has gotten from Israel and some leaders in world Jewry over the years.

However, in recent years it has become clear that Pollard has suffered a grave injustice of which Americans should be ashamed.  He made his plea based on assurances that were then disregarded by the judge.  We know that the Secretary of Defense, Caspar Weinberger, out to make an example of Pollard and perhaps reaching to put an exclamation point on his repudiation of his Jewish heritage, grossly misled the court as to the supposed damage done by Pollard.

In recent years, former secretaries of state and other former State Department figures, former Justice Department officials, and many more public and private leaders from both parties have taken on Pollard's cause, arguing that he has suffered a miscarriage of justice and that his 28 years of imprisonment is far beyond what others convicted of similar crimes have served.  Some have characterized his further imprisonment as inhumane.

So, I came around to thinking that Pollard should be released.  Still, I have argued that Israel should not have to deal for him, to put it crassly.  Israel should not have to give up bargaining chips for him.  His release should not be a debit on Israel's account.