August 25, 2008: One of the worst hate-sites on the Internet is Jewish

By Michael Regenstreif

Much has been made in recent years about efforts to stop the spread of hatred on the Internet. We’ve had articles in the Bulletin, for example, about Richard Warman, an Ottawa-based lawyer and activist who has been successful in having a number of antisemitic hate-sites on the World Wide Web shut down.

One of the vilest hate-filled sites I’ve come across recently is actually a Jewish site located at masada2000.org. The site, which refers to all Arabs as “a cancer” who should be removed from Israel and from the territories – which it considers to be part of Israel – is run by followers of the late Meir Kahane, the Brooklyn rabbi who founded the extremist Jewish Defense League in New York in 1968 before moving to Israel where he formed the Kach political party.

Kahane ran for election to the Knesset as leader of Kach in 1976 and 1980, but failed to win enough votes for even one seat. In the 1984 election, Kach finally garnered enough votes for that single seat and Kahane became an MK. Over the next four years, Kahane’s racist rhetoric so offended most Israelis that he was banned from running in the 1988 election and Kach was outlawed. Kahane, who was jailed several times in both the United States and Israel for his activities, met his end in 1990 when he was murdered in New York City following a speech.

Although Kahane was killed, his movement has survived on the fringes of Israeli and Diaspora societies. Baruch Goldstein, the American-born doctor who massacred Muslims praying at a mosque in Hebron in 1994, was a follower of Kahane. So, too, was Yigal Amir, the Israeli assassin of Yitzhak Rabin. Both Goldstein and Amir are regarded as heroes by Kahane’s followers. Since the mid-1990s, both Kach and its offshoot, Kahane Chai, have been designated by both Israel and the United States as terrorist organizations.

One of the most despicable sections of masada2000 is something called the Self-Hating and/or Israel-Threatening List. You can figure out the acronym the site likes to use for itself from the capitalized letters in its name.

The list, more than 7,000 names in length, is McCarthyesque in the way it designates “self-hating” Jews. Virtually every leftist you’ve ever heard of is on the list. Names you’d expect like Norman G. Finkelstein and Noam Chomsky. But one need not be anti-Zionist like Finkelstein or Chomsky to be on the list. It overflows with the names of prominent Zionist Jews, including many North American rabbis and Israeli politicians, who are listed because they have advocated peacemaking with the Arabs. Shimon Peres, the president of Israel and a former prime minister is on the list. So is Ehud Olmert, the current prime minister. Dalia Rabin-Pelosoff, a former deputy minister of defence and the daughter of Yitzhak Rabin, is there. So is Yuval Rabin, her brother.

Thomas Friedman, the astute New York Times op-ed columnist is on the list along with several Canadians including Rabbi Dow Marmur, rabbi emeritus of Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, and Victor Goldbloom, the first Jewish cabinet minister in Quebec, a former federal commissioner of official languages and the current Quebec regional president of Canadian Jewish Congress.

And if it weren’t enough to be slandered as a self-hating Jew just by having one’s name on the list, many of the entries are annotated with disgustingly racist and/or homophobic commentaries.

The whole masada2000 site is shameful. What it truly exposes is the Kahanists themselves. They are Jews with a philosophy as ugly as the Ku Klux Klan’s.

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I’m very excited about Mira Sucharov’s new column – Values, Ethics, Community – making its debut in this issue of the Bulletin. Mira, an associate professor of political science at Carleton University, has lately been one of our book reviewers and was assigned to review a collection of essays for this issue called Righteous Indignation: A Jewish Call for Justice. Her review – which is on page 28 – gives us much to think about as a community, as segments of the community, and as individuals. I invited Mira to use the review as a starting point for a new Bulletin column. She accepted and her initial column appears opposite the review.

There is no one way to respond to most, if not all, of the issues, questions and concerns that Mira raises, and will raise, in this and future editions of the Bulletin. While we’re always open to letters about anything that appears in our pages, we’re particularly interested in your response to the issues Mira will be raising. E-mail is the best way to send your letters. My address is mregenstreif@ ottawajewishbulletin.com.

Another new feature we’re beginning in this issue of the Bulletin is a series of community volunteer profiles being written by Benita Siemiatycki of the Jewish Ottawa InfoCentre.

Finally, this edition of the Bulletin marks the final appearance of Saul Silverman’s Global Shtetl column. For the past eight years Saul’s column has explored the often-fascinating Jewish Internet. On behalf of everyone at the Bulletin, I’d like to express our deep appreciation to Saul for his columns and insights as we continue to learn our way around the global shtetl the Internet has turned our world into.

July 21, 2008: Nothing good came of the Second Lebanon War

By Michael Regenstreif

By the time you read this, there is a good chance that Israel will have repatriated the two soldiers, Ehud (Udi) Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, whose kidnappings from within Israel on July 12, 2006, precipitated the Second Lebanon War with Hezbollah.

For almost two years, the Goldwasser and Regev families, indeed all Israelis and supporters around the world, held out hope the two soldiers would come home alive. Sadly, that does not seem to be the case.

“As far as we know, the two soldiers – Udi Goldwasser and Eldad Regev – are no longer alive. As far as we know, they were killed during the kidnapping or died from their wounds soon after the incident,” said Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert late last month when it was announced that a deal had been reached, through German intermediaries, for the return of the pair.

In return, Israel will release a number of Hezbollah terrorists, including Samir Kuntar, who brutally murdered four Israelis in 1979. That Israel has agreed to release Kuntar is seen as a concession that Israel has given up on recovering airman Ron Arad, who has been unaccounted for since being captured in Lebanon in 1986. Kuntar had long been considered a bargaining chip that Israel would use to bring back Arad.

The heads of Mossad and Shin Bet both opposed giving up Kuntar as it would indicate that Israel has given up on Arad. However, the Israeli cabinet overwhelmingly voted, 22-3, to release Kuntar in return for the remains of Goldwasser and Regev.

Two years of not knowing whether their loved ones were alive or dead; or, if alive, under what circumstances, has been a terrible ordeal. Last November, I spoke with Omri Avni, Goldwasser’s father-in-law, about the families’ very difficult dilemma.

“You don’t know if your son, or husband, or son-in-law is alive, or not; if he’s being fed, or not. You can’t return to the routine of a regular life,” he told me.

Hopefully, a funeral and period of mourning will bring some sense of closure for the Goldwasser and Regev families.

The apparent loss of Goldwasser and Regev is yet another tragic reminder that there were no good outcomes from the war in Lebanon two summers ago.

And what about Gilad Schalit, the other missing soldier? Schalit was kidnapped by Palestinian terrorists who had crossed over into Israel on June 25, 2006. They took him to Gaza where he has remained a Hamas prisoner ever since. Unlike Goldwasser and Regev, there has been evidence that Schalit is still alive.

There have been numerous rumours – all of which have turned out to be false – that Schalit’s release was imminent.

Many, including Schalit’s family, felt that the current ceasefire with Hamas should have been linked to Schalit’s release. Barring a breakthrough in the week between when this column was written and when it appeared in your mailbox, the ordeal of Gilad Schalit in Gaza and of his family at home in Israel, continues.

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Under the pressure of a continuing corruption investigation, it appears that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s time in office might run out in the next couple of months. He has been forced to agree to the holding of a leadership election in the Kadima Party he inherited from the stricken Ariel Sharon.

Labour Party leader, Ehud Barak, the minister of defence, had threatened to pull his support from the governing coalition unless Olmert agreed to a leadership election. Although Olmert, who professes innocence of wrongdoing, has yet to indicate whether he will contest the Kadima leadership, most observers think Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is most likely to win. Israel could have its second female prime minister.

Livni’s possible ascension to the Israeli prime ministership, like Senator Barak Obama’s possible election to the American presidency, signals a generational shift with tremendous potential for the future. Will such a leader emerge from Palestinian society, a leader with a vision for peace and prosperity with the ability to inspire Palestinian society to embrace such a vision?

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On a lighter note, a much lighter note, I saw Adam Sandler’s latest movie, You Don’t Mess with the Zohan, a couple of weeks ago. I’ve never been much of an Adam Sadler fan and have never bothered to see many of his movies. But, there I was on a hot Saturday night in July, laughing hysterically at the antics of an Israeli superagent, the greatest counterterrorist agent of all time, a man who can catch bullets in his teeth and twist his opponents into human pretzels.

“How long can the fighting go on?” Zohan asks his parents over dinner. His father’s war, after all, only lasted six days while he’s been fighting for years and years.

“It’s been going on for 2,000 years,” answers his mother, “so it should be over soon.”

Zohan fakes his death and heads to New York to pursue his dream of being a hairdresser. The film overflows with nonstop crude jokes, sight gags and all manner of Israeli and Palestinian stereotyping. But it’s funny; much funnier and much more entertaining than I expected it to be.

I don’t want to give away too much of the plot except to say that, ultimately, the film does have a message that embraces peace and love.

June 16, 2008: How would Ruth have fared at Bet Din Elyon?

By Michael Regenstreif

Last week was the Festival of Shavuot, which commemorates the receiving of the Torah at Mount Sinai. During Shavuot, the Book of Ruth, one of the books of Ketuvim – Writings – from the Jewish Bible is read at synagogue services.

Ruth was a Moabite woman – the biblical Land of Moab was located in what is now Jordan – who converted to Judaism. One of Ruth’s great-grandsons was King David, one of the most revered figures in Jewish history.

A lesson we learn from the Book of Ruth is about the imperative to fully accept those who, while not born to Judaism, have embraced it. Conversion is not a modern phenomenon. It has been part of our religion since ancient times. And were it not for conversion, David would not have been Jewish as the tradition dictates matrilineal descent. If he weren’t Jewish, he certainly wouldn’t have been king, Jerusalem would not have become his capital, there would have been no King Solomon and the Temple would not have been built. We could speculate endlessly on the what-if consequences of Ruth not having converted to Judaism.

It’s not only because we’ve just celebrated Shavuot that I’m thinking about the story of Ruth. I’m thinking about Ruth because a recent high rabbinical court ruling in Israel has called non-haredi conversion into question. The ruling grew out of a messy divorce case in Ashdod. The wife had been converted, 15 years before, by Rabbi Chaim Druckman. The Orthodox rabbi is the head of an Israeli yeshiva and has been the director of the Israeli government’s Conversion Authority for years.

The husband in the case argued that because his wife was not living a strictly Orthodox lifestyle, her conversion was illegitimate and, therefore, the marriage never really took place. The haredi – or ultra-Orthodox – rabbinic court agreed and so ruled. The couple’s three children, having been born of a woman now considered a gentile, were also stripped of their Jewishness.

The case was appealed to the Bet Din Elyon in Jerusalem, Israel’s highest rabbinic court, where the ruling was upheld. The ruling went further and declared that all conversions performed by Rabbi Druckman, or under the authority of his office, were nullified.

In Israel, there are no provisions for civil marriage. All marriages there are under the aegis of the religious authorities. Thus, all marriages involving couples where one of the partners was converted by Rabbi Druckman, or under his authority, were similarly nullified. The ruling, written by haredi Rabbi Avraham Sherman, further said that when converts from other countries come to Israel to be married, the marriage must not be allowed to take place if they did not “look” religious. Conversion papers from a religious court in, say, Canada or the United States would not be enough if they didn’t “look” religious enough.

The Rabbinical Council of America (RCA), a body that represents more than 1,000 Orthodox rabbis in North America, issued a statement that said, “The ruling itself, as well as the language and tone thereof, are entirely beyond the pale of acceptable halachic practice, violate numerous Torah laws regarding converts and their families, create a massive desecration of God’s name, insult outstanding rabbinic leaders and halachic scholars in Israel, and are a reprehensible cause of widespread conflict and animosity within the Jewish people in Israel and beyond. The RCA is appalled that such a ruling has been issued by that court.”

One article I read recently, written by Rabbi Martin Lockshin, a modern Orthodox rabbi who teaches Jewish studies at York University and who is currently on sabbatical in Jerusalem, spoke about modern Orthodoxy having to fight back against the religious fundamentalism being imposed by haredi rabbis on religious life in Israel and beyond.

The contemporary Jewish world is pluralistic. Some of us are very religious, others of us not at all. In communities like ours, we respect all Jewish denominations – ultra-Orthodox, modern Orthodox, Conservative, Reconstructionist and Reform – as equally legitimate. As the homeland of all Jewish people, I believe Israel needs to do the same.

In most arenas, Israel is among the most modern countries of the world. As a democracy, I think its democratic principles should be extended to the religious affairs of the state and that Israel should recognize the legitimacy and equality of all of our Jewish denominations.

I wonder how Ruth would have fared at the Bet Din Elyon.