Jewish; Genealogical Society of Oregon Welcome Speaker

Our steering committee met with tomorrow night's speaker, Daniel Horowitz, at Portland's beautiful waterfront restaurant, McCormick and Schmicks for dinner. Daniel comes to us from Israel. An asset in Israel who is able to speak English and Spanish as well as Hebrew, Daniel works for My Heritage Ltd. in Bnei Atarot, Israel, so he is a professional genealogist. Thursday at Ahavath Achim Synagogue he'll speak about a face recognition technology that is helpful in photo work.

Gilad Shalit

We can't give up hoping for the best for Staff Sergeant Gilad Shalit, IDF soldier being held by Hamas terrorists for the past four years today. John McCain was held for five and a half years by the North Vietnamese and survived. When he returned to the states he became a senator and then even ran for President of the USA. Such a good outcome should only happen to Gilad.

Hamas still will not let Gilad see the International Red Cross or his family while in captivity. They're afraid a visit would give away the location where he is being kept. Gilad was only 19 when he was captured after being injured by the terrorists, who had killed two other soldiers in a surprise attack. He has never been allowed medical attention. It's interesting to note that Fatah (Abba's party who now resides in Judea and Samaria (West Bank) was in charge of Gaza at the time Gilad was taken as a POW.

Besides taking or killing soldiers, Hamas has arrested and kidnapped journalists. No one is safe with Hamas in this seat of power.

Reference: The Israel Project: http://www.theisraelproject.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=hsJPK0PIJpH&b=3587015&ct=8452565&notoc=1&tr=y&auid=6545042
Fox News: Glen Beck Program-bottom on tickertape 2:55pm PST.

Anti-Semitic Attacks in Europe from Arabs

Arabs are attacking Jews in Holland and Germany. At a recent program of Jewish dancers, 5 Arab youths started stoning the dancers before they even started dancing. The attackers ranged from age 9 to 19. One German youth also was in the group of stone throwers.

In Amsterdam, Rotterdam and other cities in Holland, Moroccans were attacking any Jews they spotted. Jewish men have to cover their kippas (yalmulkas-head coverings) with hats to avoid detection, but this in itself could be a giveaway.

It looks like we Jews are have become fair game for some Muslims from various countries. It's a religious war.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2010/06/dutch-police-may-use-decoy-jews-to-stop-attacks/1?csp=obnetwork

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2010-06-24-arab-attack-jewish-germany_N.htm?csp=YahooModule_News

Boycotting, Divesting, Sanctioning Israel

Anti-Israel divestment campaigns have been going on in dozens of colleges, many comparing Israel to anti-Apartheid activity. This is including inflammatory street demonstrations causing tremendous stress to Jewish students. This is being seen in Seattle now, but has been going on in Portland State to a degree for some time. Campuses have been noticing a problem ever since the 60's. Jews were seen as the white successful people against the dark skin people. In Europe, a robust campaign to boycott Israeli academics continues to be parroted by a handful of N. American academics. Noam Chomsky and Michael Finklestein have been leaders against Israel.

Anti-divestment has been going on in Portland in which activists have tried to stop Israeli products from being sold in stores. We noted this happening way back in December before the holidays. Evidently its still happening in Seattle.

BDS (Boycott-Divest-Sanction) is like a viral and pathological communicable disease. We ignore it at our peril. We have been trying to educate churches such as the Methodist as to the history and position Israel finds itself in . Now the Presbyterians have adopted a resolution in 2004 declaring Israeli actions to be at the "root of evil acts: committed on both sides of the conflict and calling for "phased selective divestment" of companies operating in Israel. They have replaced the call with a more general endorsement for socially responsible investments. The Methodist has rejected divestment resolutions as have other denominations now. Virulent anti-Israel campaigns continue in several denominations. Internationally, the World Council of Churches and the Anglican Church in England have embraced BDS.

Civic: Some city councils have rejected calls for municipal divestment of Israel but in Europe there have been repeated efforts in labor unions. Thank goodness our labor leaders have publicly condemned BDS.

Corporate: A longtime BDS effort has focused on Caterpillar, Inc. Other efforts have been against companies who sell to Israel's defense forces, construction industry, and retailers that sell Israeli products or have operations across the "green line ".

Now culture is being affected. The newest campaign of BDS are artistic, athletic and other activities. A film festival in Toronto highlighted 10 films from Israel and celebrated Tel Aviv's centennial though a BDS campaign was going on. There have been protests of Israeli entertainers. Israeli athletes and teams have been ostracized in several national tournaments. I think that is very telling and reminds us of the 30's in Germany.

The Goldstone Report has caused innumerable harm to Israel's reputation, as if we really needed more mud in our eye.

The latest development in our country is that Rabbi David Nesenoff, the man who had innocently interviewed Helen Thomas at an Israel rally, has received death threats. As the next Oprah replacement (?): Rosie O’Donnell Says Helen Thomas is Right. What can be worse? Helen told the rabbi that Jews should get the hell out of Palestine and go back to Poland and Russia and the States. Is this what we all want?
A book recommended to read is START UP NATION by Elias.

Resource: CRC Israel Advocacy Committee
http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/bighollywood/2010/06/09/the-next-oprah-rosie-odonnell-says-helen-thomas-is-right/

Helen Thomas Tells Us to Get Out of Palestine

Helen Thomas, 89 year old White House press reporter let her hair down and we saw another side of Helen. She blurted out to Rabbi David Nessenoff that "Israelis should get the hell out of Palestine and go back to Poland and Germany and USA and wherever!" The world now can see her for what she really is; an anti-semitic bigot. Not only did she say it, but her facial expression showed her hatred of Israelis in a remarkable way. Helen is of Lebanese descent. She went on to say that the land belongs to the Palestinians. It's occupied.

Immediately many people let it be known that they are no longer working with her in any way because of this outburst.

I was watching the Huckabee program when that news was shown. Huckabee did a tremendous job of defending Israelis both then and before in another segment of his program. He said that Israelis are home, and that perhaps she should now go home.

She is a nationally syndicated columnist. Here's one reason why we've been getting such a bad rap. Thank goodness there are brave people out there like Huckabee that are not afraid to speak up and defend Israel and Israelis.

PS 6/7/10 : from Camera: As of this writing the New York Times and other major papers have ignored the story. Contrast this to the reaction to Don Imus’s slur in April 2007 targeting African American players of the Rutgers University women's basketball team. It took little more than a week before he was fired by CBS and MSNBC, losing both his radio program and his television show. The mainstream media gave the story prominent attention for weeks, including updates on the controversy and opinion pieces denouncing the talk show host.
In this case, the mainstream media have been silent, with only a few outlets thus far covering it, including FoxNews, Politico and the Daily News.
The story has been driven by blogs, in particular the Drudge Report.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/06/06/ari-fleischer-helen-thomas-fired/

THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GOLDFOOT by Nadene

We're now living in a Chelm-like state. So much of the world is against Israel that it's like we're back in the 30's in Germany again.

Here's where's Chelm comes in. Israel has been fighting in wars and terroristic attacks since its rebirth in 1948. When it tries to protect itself, even while using far more restraint than many other nations would, its condemned, even by a few of its own fellow Jews living safely in the diaspora!

Right now it was just embraced with a 9 ship flotilla of media mischief makers bent on giving Israel a bad name again, and they managed to do so easily. It's gotten to the point of no matter what we do to defend ourselves, we get a bad rap. That isn't all that's going on. In the North in Lebanon sits terrorists ready with chemical weapons to shoot into Israel causing the government to arm each citizen with gas masks, just in case. Besides that, Iran has said so many times I've now lost count that they will destroy Israel and all the Jews. They already have the makings for two atomic bombs. Guess where they might want to drop them. Besides that, rockets keep on coming in from Gaza. They haven't stopped!

We have a country where the government is not backing Israel as previous people have. In fact, they're treating us in a shockingly disrespectul manner while saying at the same time we are friends. I don't think Israelis feel that friendship anymore at all. The climate has changed 180 degrees, I'm afraid.

USA is even training some of our unfriendly neighbors in warfare!

In our own USA there is a campaign to deligitimize Israel. Several large denominations of churches have been campaigning to boycott and divest from Israel and have voted on sanctions against Israel. They will not buy any goods from Israel and encourage others not to do so. We're the scapegoats for the ills in the world once again. Not only has this entered the realm of churches but it's permeating on campuses of universities, and in our civic, corporate, labor and cultural world as well.

What hurts me the most is to see so many of our own Jews throw their hat into the ring of these accusers and hurl more insults than others. Instead of reading and studying and learning about the issues they simply give up and have joined the pack. They've turned their back against this one in a 2,000 year opportunity to have our own state back again and not be wanderers on the earth anymore who have gone through the cycles of being invited and then disinvited into countries as well as extinction of the holocaust .

If you care at all about Israel's existence and do not care to be a part of the whirlwind that's killing it, you can do the following:

1. Confront boycott campaigns by buying Israeli goods.
2. Respond swiftly to false or distorted media statements about Israel. Become informed! Speak up! Be brave!
4. Educate professional and lay leadership and students in high school and college about the nature and dangers of this BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) movement. It isn't just a matter of replacing items on the shelf. It's harming! Makes me angry. We've invented and shared so much with the world in our short period and this is the slap in the face we get.
5. Be vigorous in combatting slanderous attacks, including the anti-Semitic fabrications levied against Israelis that are reminiscent of the ancient blood libel. Whatever, arm yourselves with knowlege. It's time to learn about our history.

Remember when David Ben Gurion commented that it was nice to meet the American preident who was president of 30 million people. His job was very hard, though. He was prime minister of 3 million presidents. We all have answers to the problems and think only our answer is the best solution. Let's get together. This has become a life or death situation. We Jews are less than 1% of the total population on earth. We're a family. We've got to support this family or it's existence will be no more.

Former Ambassador Edward Peck was just interviewed by Greta on Fox News. He was Ambassador from 1956 to 1989 in the Middle East but not in Israel. He was on a Greek ship that was part of the Gaza flotilla. Greta was fantastic with her questions of him.


Peck has been highly critical of U.S. policy toward Israel, arguing through the Council for the National Interest (CNI) in which he plays an active role, that the U.S. should be more even handed in its Middle East policy. He argues that while Hezbollah could be considered a terrorist organization, it is no more terrorist than Israel or the U.S. itself. He supports a dialogue with Hezbollah. He claims that in 2000, at the Camp David talks, Israel offered the Palestinians "12 little Bantustans [see December 22 interview link below]." (Wikipedia).

Now I see why he joined this flotilla. To me his answers showed an amazing naivety towards his behavior on this ship and his part in the breaking of the barricade. As a former ambassador he should know better.