Hadassah Picnic in Lake Oswego, Oregon

Hadassah had a picnic today at the George Rogers Park in Lake Oswego. We had a good turnout of all ages. Hadassah furnished the kosher hot dogs and attendants brought parve salads. There were yummy desserts on hand also, plus lots of canned drinks. At the event we donated money to help children in Israel under the Hadassah's Youth Aliyah/Child at Risk program. It was also a time to see old friends and get to gab.

Obama and Rashid Khalidi

The Oregonian's article about Obama's trip to the Middle East and Europe contained another friendship to have worries about. Another one of Obama's friends who has close ties with the Palestinian sympathy is Rashid Khalidi, an adovcate of "Palestinian rights and the director of the Middle East Institute at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. "

Khalidi is a Palestinian, born in 1950. His birth comes two years after Israel was created. He is said to be the Edward Said of Columbia University, and Said is very much anti-Israel. Khalidi glorifies anti-Israel Palestinian violence and said it contributes to "political enlightenment", and even admires those who carry it out. He dedicated his 1986 valentine to the PLO, Under Siege, to "those who gave their lives...in defense of the cause of Palestine and independence of Lebanon." He does not see Israel as a democratic ally of the USA but an "aparatheid system in creation" and a destructive "racist" state. He makes up accusations such as his claim that Israel's army has "awful weapons of mass destruction that it has used in cities, villages and refugee camps." This is an outrageous lie.

Bobby Lopz-Albright, 75 years old in Philadelphia, saw reason to be worried about his influence on Obama. Khalidi is only one of many that cause me concern.

Starting with the fact that Obama's father is Muslim and that his beginnings were of a Muslim nature, he chose for 20 some years Reverent Wright to be his pastor, a man who was finding fault with Jews and Israel many times. Couple that with Wright's involvement with Louis Farrakhan, a known anti semite, and then finding that Obama was also friendly with other anti-Jewish anti-Israel people and I'm really concerned.

David Edward Bonior is his right hand man and is against Israel.
Zbigniew Brzezinksi and General McPeak were closely involved as advisors, and just recently let go. They were outspoken against Israel.
Robert Malley and Samantha Power are advisors who are anti-Israel.

By having so many people in is sphere of influence that are biased against Israel makes me believe that he has also been influenced against Israel, but to gain votes is hiding it rather well.

After giving that wonderful speech to AIPAC convincing everyone of his support of Israel, he caved in within less than 24 hours when reminded by a Palestinian of their aims. He didn't hold up to what he said in the meeting. He caved in. He makes nice talks when not attacked, but if confronted, bends to their will. To me, he did not believe in what he was saying in the first place. It was just rhetoric.

All this pales after seeing him speak in Berlin yesterday and gathering an audience of immense proportions. It was as if the Messiah were speaking to the masses. Obama can sway people with his words. Hitler was able to do this, also. One has to look into their hearts to really hear the message clearly. His message of tearing down walls that separate people made me stiffen. Was he thinking of the wall in Israel built to protect Israelis from the killers coming from the Palestinian side? Did he not understand the need for this particular wall? He saw the wall, then spoke about walls. How can I not connect the dots? Oh Obama, it's not what you say that will sway me; it's what you have been doing and how you react. It's how much you have been brainwashed by your past and your present advisors.

Reference: Oregonian 7/25, 2008, A4
http://noquarterusa.net/ article by Larry Johnson, More on Rashid Khalidi
past articles in my blog on Obama and advisors

Saudi Arabia and the Abu Dubai Investment Council: Hatred of All Peoples

Nadene Goldfoot

Unless you’re like the Saudis, Sunni Muslims, you’re on their hate-list. They demonstrate their hatred in their school text books.

Jews and Christians are their enemies. Even non-Wahhabi Sunni Muslims are not tolerated. They do not believe in tolerating others, as shown in Muhammad’s teachings.

They also teach intolerance against homosexuals in an extreme way. Their 10th grade textbook says it is permissible to murder homosexuals, and recommends doing so by burning them alive, or stoning them, or throwing them off a high building.

Nina Shea, director of Religious Freedom, thought our state department should consider sanctions against Saudi Arabia. Two years ago they said they would revise their textbooks, but haven’t. They are even used in a school in northern Virginia.

What kind of sanctions would go over with a country that we are dependent on for oil, and whose king is a good friend of our president? They will ignore our criticism and continue to teach religious intolerance.

At the same time, Arabs are buying out pieces of America businesses; Citibank, Barclays, and even New York City’s Chrysler Building skyscraper. The lastest buy is Anheuser-Busch beer brewers. Banks that are collapsing are continually being bought up by them. The Abu Dhabi Investment Council is one group that is doing so much buying. They are also a Sunni Muslim island country. This same group owns 9% of Reuters News Agency, known for it’s open anti-Israeli bias. I’m afraid that this is what’s going to happen to America; a bias already against Israel getting stronger with so much of America belonging to Arabs.

Resource: http://www.israelunitycoalition.org/news/article.php?id=2950
The New York Sun-ELI LAKE

Hadassah Goes to Dinner and Theater

Hadassah had an evening of laughs at the Coho Theater tonight while watching two Jewish female comics of Portland who did stand-up comedy. They called themselves the Jewish American Princesses of Comedy. Wendy Westerwelle and Francine Raften put on a wonderful night telling great jokes, some of which were a little raw, while honoring the old time queens of Jewish comedy, such as Belle Barth, Totie Fields, Pearl Williams and others. We were able to appreciate them with on screen videos of their acts.

Some of the Hadassah ladies started out having dinner together and then going to the theater. In the picture you see Lily Jameson, Diana Lindmann and her sister, Tamara next to Lily and two friends of Diana's. There was mandelbrat passed out to the audience along with Manischewitz wine in the 2nd act, and afterwards another Hadassah member brought cheese, crackers, and fruit to nosh on while kibitzing about the acts. We definitely didn't starve. A great time was had by all. One- fourth of the cost of the ticket went to our Hadassah fund as a donation.

Hadassah Sponsors "Around the World on Two Wheels"

The author, Peter Zheutlin spoke at Congregation Beth Israel tonight about his book, "Around the World on Two Wheels". It's about the first woman to cycle around the world, and did it on a bet. She happened to be Jewish and was his great grand Aunt, Annie Cohen Kopchovsky. This occurred in 1894. Can you imagine a woman on a 54 pound bike with no brakes and one-speed who traveled with a change of underwear and a pistol?

The author was a lawyer who had a fantastic ability to search and find records about this aunt that was not talked about in his family. He did a fantastic job of finding facts, but it took him over four years to collect enough data to write his book. Every genealogist in town should have been to his program. He used foreign and domestic newspapers, found personal leetters and family artifacts. In his search he found the only granddaughter of Annie who happened to have much of her aunt's things.

This woman was far ahead of her time. She didn't like staying at home with children and had so many things to accomplish. She was into her own publicity, created businesses after her adventure, and was an amazing storyteller. I'm so glad that Hadassah sponsored Zheutlin's talk.

In the picture above is a childhood friend of Peter Zheutlin. It's Barbara Hershey, program director for Jewish Genealogical Society of Oregon. Peter had obtained the help of the head of Jewish Genealogical Society of all the states in finding material for his book.

Most of us just stop after finding names and dates of birth and death. Peter wanted to flesh out the life of this great grand aunt that he never knew about, and he found out enough to make a most interesting story.

2008 Letter in Oregonian on Pro and Con Portlanders

Today I was pleased to see that my letter to the editor was printed in the Oregonian. I was commenting on the article written by a Reed College student that was calling "discrimination" when she went to Israel to attending a college on the "West Bank". She was a Palestinian American, and had to go through a thorough check and interview before being on her way and she couldn't understand why.

The Oregonian did a good job today of printing mine along with another supportive letter for Israel and also published two very strong letters against Israel's treatement besides being highly critical of Israel.

One of the letters, written by a man , was even Jewish and said so in his letter. I found out why he was so anti-Israel. He heads or used to head a local group called "Jews for Global Justice", which seems to be a group of self-hating Jews who do not think Israel has the right to exist. He is also a co-host on an anti-Israel talk show on Fridays on a local radio station. So this man is on a platform speaking out against Israel. He even cited Norman Finkelstein's being barred from entering Israel anymore. Norman is an outspoken professor, Jewish, but against Israel and identifies with the Palestinians. He's not popular in Israel due to his anti-Israel behaviors and work. He must be on their undesirable list. He certainly is on my list.

The other letter, written by a woman, turns out to be a lady who has waved an anti-occupation sign at the door of two AIPAC dinners here in Portland. She's outwardly very hostile towards Israel.
I find it hard to understand Jews that are so against their own people that they don't seem to study the situation at all, but only react with hatred. I can understand how it can happen to other people. So many people have been prejudice against Jews for so long. This just carries over into being prejudice against Israel. But Jews? Whatever has been going on in their life that they don't live in the real world. The expression, "Get real!" is something I'd say to them.

7/9/08: Two more letters made it into the Oregonian today. One is complaining about Israel, and the other is defending Israel. See: http://www.oregonlive.com/letters/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1215559516298160.xml&coll=7&thispage=3
http://www.oregonlive.com/letters/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1215559516298160.xml&coll=7&thispage=2
To Read the original opinion article: http://www.oregonlive.com/commentary/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/121503571770900.xml&coll=7
Reference: Sunday Oregonian Opinion article by Celia Hassan

Tuesday's letters in reply to the article: http://www.oregonlive.com/letters/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/121547670923590.xml&coll=7
7/8/2008 Letters to the Editor in Oregonian

Incensed Reed Student About Detention in Israel

Today’s Oregonian printed an opinion from a Palestinian Reed college student who had gone to Israel to attend Birzeit University to the "Palestinian West Bank." I note that she is already calling it Palestinian, though I don’t remember hearing that it has become Palestine as yet. To Israelis it is still Judea and Samaria, though newspapers refer to it as "The West Bank".

She was angry because she was detained and questioned, and then told to make this her "last trip to Israel." She was put out because she was an American and thought that because of this, shouldn’t have been treated as other Palestinians living in the area.

I guess the word isn’t out at Reed College that Israel and the Palestinians are at war with other. Gazan Palestinian terrorists have been firing rockets at Israel for the past seven years. Palestinians from East Jerusalem have twice lately attacked a Jewish school and now one rammed two buses and ran into pedestrians and cars in Jerusalem in a terrorist frenzy about two days ago.

On the front page of today’s Sunday paper was an article called "Detainees’ fingerprints reveal prior US arrests. In other words, many people abroad who have been detained have been found to have lived in the US and got into trouble in one way or another and have their fingerprints on file. This is more evidence that a Palestinian American is a possibility of being a terrorist. Even women, young women and older have been known terrorists. The very fact that she was also a Palestinian made her suspect. She couldn’t understand that.

That’s why three crossings between Israel and Gaza were reopened today, three days after they were shut after rockets were fired from there. Hamas terrorists rule from Gaza. They fired even though there was a two-week truce in place. They can’t go very long without firing, so Israel has to continue to be on guard, truce or no truce. That means that Palestinians walking through Israel that are new are going to be checked out.

No, Israel isn't exactly like America. Americans are not putting up with rockets fired into their neighborhood. I don't believe that any neighborhood would put up with being attacked for seven years, either. That's because America is a powerful and free country. Israel hasn't obtained that luxury yet. It's still fighting for it's independence and freedom to pursue life and freedom from terrorism and hatred.

Reference: Oregonian newspaper, July 7, 2008; front page, editorial page
AFP via Yahoo News, UPI, Fox News