100 shofars to be blown in Manhattan
Received via email:
100 Shofars to be blown in Manhattan
A Demonstration/Rally
April 29, 2014
UJA-Federation Building
130 East 59 Street (Between Park & Lex)
New York City, 5pm to 7pm : Shofars to be blown at 5:30 pm
The largest number of Shofars ever blown in Unison to take place
in Manhattan by a Coalition of Jewish groups; to protest the inclusion
of Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions against Israel in the Israel Day
Parade.
Join Us and Bring Your Shofars!
I will not be in New York on the 29th, but if you will be, you know what to do.
Labels: B'Tselem, BDS, JCC Watch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Manhattan JCC, New Israel Fund, New York Jewish Federation, progressives, Salute to Israel Day Parade
Rally at UJA-Federation headquarters takes BDS issue to the door of the American Jewish establishment
There was a rally outside the UJA-Federation offices in New York on Tuesday to protest the scheduled presence of groups supporting the BDS (Boycott Divest Sanction) movement in the Salute to Israel Day Parade on June 1.
Here's a press release I received about the rally.
NEW YORK, April 8, 2014 – A rally held today at the headquarters of the UJA-Federation spoke truth to Jewish power in no uncertain terms.
Speaker after speaker called on the UJA and JCRC to disallow three BDS-supporting Jewish organizations to march in the upcoming Celebrate Israel Parade, and brought forth compelling evidence that the three offending organizations deserve not only to be barred from marching in the parade, but also deserve to be kept out of the “big tent” of Jewish communal life.
Organized by JCC Watch, National Conference on Jewish Affairs, and Americans for a Safe Israel, the days leading up to the event sparked discussion and controversy that has spread from New York to Los Angeles, London and Tel Aviv. Helen Freedman of Americans for a Safe Israel introduced many of the speakers.
She spoke about the fact that all of the protesters respect and admire the humanitarian and social service work of the UJA and JCRC, but that it is also vital to Israel's survival and the well-being of the Jewish People that the BDS issue -- including Jewish support for BDS -- be addressed publicly.
Mark Langfan spoke of his respect and admiration for the protesters who came out to the rally. He discussed many of the security concerns of Israel, and how the BDS movement harms the Jewish State and puts Jews in jeopardy.
Rabbi David Algaze spoke at length about the skewed values of those in the Jewish community supporting anti-Israel activities and the Hamas-backed BDS movement, and also strongly took to task those in major Jewish organizations who are not vocal enough to speak out publicly and clearly against the BDS movement. "The decision by the JCRC and UJA is neither democratic nor Jewish. It is not democratic because the organizers in allowing these boycotters to March they are ignoring the feelings of the predominant majority of those who participate and attend the Parade. It is not Jewish because Judaism has many values but suicide and self hatred are not among them."
Beth Gilinsky, president of Jewish Action Alliance and founder of the National Conference on Jewish Affairs, an umbrella of pro-Israel, pro-America Jewish leaders, gave a rousing speech about not just the parade controversy, but also about the BDS movement in general. She addressed the real-life impact of BDS here in the United States and England on college campuses, across Europe where Jews are being targeted in violent attacks, and in Israel.
She asserted that while some people believe BDS is just a grassroots effort of a few Arab activists who desire a Palestinian Arab state, in reality it is linked to and driven by radical Islamist organizations such as Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood that are bent on Israel’s destruction. After asserting that BDS attempts to denigrate and demonize Israel and is, in fact an anti-Semitic movement aimed at dehumanizing Jews, she addressed establishment accusations that opposition to Jewish BDS groups in the parade was pitting Jew vs. Jew, firing back with: “Jewish participation in the Hamas-backed BDS movement is the epitome of Jew vs. Jew! “
Responding to assertions that criticizing the establishment organizations creates “disunity” in the community and hurts Israel, Gilinsky stated: “In the name of unity, we are being asked to allow destructive forces to threaten our fellow Jews. NO, we are Jews FOR Jews. We are here to proclaim that we stand in solidarity with Israel, and that includes Judea and Samaria, and we are here to fight FOR the victims being targeted by BDS aggression.”
A Member of the Israeli Knesset was present, MK Nissim Zeev, and he spoke with full support for all of Yehuda and Shomron and spoke of the Yehuda and Shomron being the heart of the Jewish people and Eretz Yisrael.
Richard Allen, founder of JCC Watch, took on the UJA directly, calling out “DO NOT SUPPORT BDS!” to UJA-Federation employees and leaders as they left the building, and saving particular criticism for John Ruskay. “Under John Ruskay’s leadership of the UJA-Federation, the Celebrate Israel Day Parade has invited groups to march that actively call for a Boycott of Israeli Companies. Under front names like Partners for Progressive Israel, New Israel Fund and B'Tselem these groups organize and work against the Jewish State.
"It is shameful that the UJA Federation and the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) are supporting the New Israel Fund in their efforts to delegitimize and fund Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions against Israel," continued Allen, an active member of the Pro-Israel Parade Committee. "It's time the UJA Federation stop supporting radical groups that work for BDS against Israel. If the BDS supporting groups are allowed to march, we will call for posters and leaflets on the day of the parade.”
Coalition for Israel founder Howard Weber, spoke eloquently about BDS and the peace process. “For those passers by asking what "BDS" stands for, it means "Blind, Deaf and Stupid’--"Blind to the fact that the reason Mr. Kerry can't obtain a peace agreement has nothing to do with the Jews living on less than 3% of the West Bank, but rather, as Mr. Abbas bluntly put it, the non-recognition of Israel as a Jewish State. "Deaf" to the pleadings of the Palestinian Authority and Mr. Abbas who urge BDS not to boycott Israeli goods since the factories producing them employ West Bank Arabs who enjoy much higher wages and standard of living than their Arab brothers. And finally, "Stupid" because they have decided the best way to put forth their political ideology is by economically crippling Israel.
He continued: “Is this the ‘Celebrate Israel Parade’? or is it the ‘Denigrate Israel Parade’? ”
Dr. Paul Brody of the Great Neck-based Jewish Political Education Foundation (JPEF), said that there is a difference between "opinions and destruction." "Our group is opposed to Israel's relinquishing sovereignty over any of our Biblical Land. But, in terms of marching in the parade, there are individuals and groups who support all sorts of solutions with which we disagree. However, calling for boycotts, divestments and sanctions should be a redline."
Buddy Macy, a founder of Never Again is Now, spoke of his family’s involvement with raising funds for Federation, and stated, “It is called the Celebrate Israel Parade. However, 364 days a year, Partners for Progressive Israel, B’Tselem and the New Israel Fund not only do not celebrate Israel, they lambast and work against her by promoting the boycott of products produced by Israeli companies and/or fund organizations that boycott Israeli products. In other words, these three organizations embrace the narrative created by Israel’s enemies, who are intent on destroying the Jewish State.
What is equally absurd and potentially more dangerous, is that the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, under the watchful eye of the UJA-Federation of New York, provides a platform for those organizations to gain respect and esteem among the hundreds of thousands of parade goers. Make no mistake about it: we will not permit enemies of Israel to become role models for the Jewish people…especially, for our youth.
Julian Rapaport, from the Russian Jewish community, stated: “We are joining the voices of protest against the participation of BDS-connected groups in the Celebrate Israel Parade. We know from history that the Nazi Holocaust began with the boycotting of Jewish stores. Our group sticks tightly to the principle: NEVER AGAIN! We are calling on the UJA to modify and clarify its controversial policy and guidelines to make sure that participation in the Israel Day Parade, as expected, means to strengthen the State of Israel and the Jewish community, not weaken them.”
Rabbi Aryeh Spero, whose two hard-hitting articles in Jewish newspapers created a stir this past week, stated today in response to the rally: “Promoters of BDS do not love Israel, and through their boycotts wish to harm Israel and its people. And the acceptance by the establishment Jewish community of these groups reflects a perverse form of Jewish suicide. “
The rally organizers expressed special thanks to the National Council of Young Israel for their endorsement of the rally. A representative of Endowment for Middle East Truth addressed the crowd, emphasizing the importance of continued activism and pressure on the UJA and JCRC to do the right thing, as well as the importance of bringing the community’s attention to the truths about BDS in America and abroad.
Endorsing organizations of this rally were: JCC Watch, Jewish Action Alliance, AFSI, Z Street, National Conference on Jewish Affairs, Endowment for Middle East Truth, Americans for Peace and Tolerance, Ha-Emet, Coalition for Israel, National Council of Young Israel, International Committee for the Land of Israel, Jewish Political Education Foundation, IsraelLives.org, Amcha Initiative, and Never Again is Now.
I could not agree more.
Labels: B'Tselem, BDS, JCC Watch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Manhattan JCC, New Israel Fund, New York Jewish Federation, progressives, Salute to Israel Day Parade
What if they had a Salute to Israel parade and no supporters of Israel showed up?
The New York 'Jewish' Federation - apparently dismayed by the number of real Jews who participate in the Salute to Israel parade - has decided to allow the
Jew-hating BDS'ers to join the parade, thereby leading the real Jews to
consider boycotting.
Several groups are organizing a protest rally for April 8 as part of a
campaign to have the parade sponsors remove their invitations to the
controversial groups. Further, unless the groups are pulled, several
local rabbis, including day school and yeshiva principals, are
considering boycotting the event, thereby significantly reducing the
number of participants.
"Partners for Progressive Israel" lists Israeli products to boycott on its website; the New Israel Fund (NIF) has supported BDS and reportedly been encouraging Arab riots; volunteers with B'Tselem have taken part in Arab riots.
NIF and B'Tselem have also been implicated in pro-BDS activities,
including via subsidiaries, videos and statements. All three are
currently set to march in the parade under their own banners.
More on those three organizations
here.
There are supposed to be 35,000 participants in this year's parade, so why let a few evildoers rain on it? Rabbi Aryeh Spero explains.
"Boycotting is an action that far exceeds disagreement. At its core,
it is a public venue designed to demonize, ultimately to make something,
in this case, the State of Israel, illegitimate. It is a form of
anti-Semitism,” the rabbi noted.
“These BDS groups work every day to isolate Israel and make her a
global pariah, announcing to the world the names of specific
Jewish-owned companies operating in Judea and Samaria that they want
punished," charged Rabbi Spero.
Rabbi Spero adds that "these ‘Jewish’ groups are being invited to
infiltrate the Parade, either because of agreement with their tactics or
as a way of affirming what the UJA-Federation calls ‘an open tent.’ UJA’s desire for an ‘open tent’ should not devolve into the destruction of the tent."
Referring to the BDS claims that they target only areas east of the
1949 Armistice line, the rabbi noted "to the world, a boycott is a
boycott, east of the Green Line or west of it. Approving one leads to
the other. Boycotting Israel will spur future boycotting of those ‘bad’
Jews, for example, in Brooklyn or London."
The rabbi added that the boycotting groups "never boycott Arab or
Muslim businesses, despite the ubiquitous terrorism coming from PA
neighborhoods and their violations of human rights. Their outrage is
only against the Jewish state and its Jews."
At least one rabbi has already announced that the four organizations that he controls will not march if the BDS'ers do.
Showing the widespread fallout the groups' opposition to the parade
may bring about, Rabbi Elie Abadie has threatened to pull the support
and float of his Edmond J. Safra Synagogue. He also represents the Moise
Safra Community Synagogue, Congregation Magen David of Manhattan, and
the Sephardic Academy of Manhattan.
Rabbi Abadie warned he would be “urging every rabbi and leader of
every Sephardic organization—as well as many others—in our community" to
boycott the parade if the BDS groups were not pulled.
The rabbi decried the BDS-supporters for harming a fellow Jew's
ability to earn a livelihood, citing the Jewish legal precept from the
Torah "not to stand idly by the blood of your brother."
And the real reason why the BDS'ers are being allowed to march is... wait for it... money.
Jeff Wiesenfeld, a member of the Jewish Community Relations Council
(JCRC) which organizes the parade, revealed the decision process that
led to the groups' inclusion.
While a majority of JCRC's leadership would have opposed the
"detestable" BDS groups, according to Wiesenfeld, "there was no debate.
It was a decision handed down from ‘above’ because, I think, it was
determined that, financially, the UJA stood to lose more from the left
if the BDS groups were excluded than they would gain from the right."
And you're not opposing this,
Jeff?
Say it
isn't so! You're going to condone
Tony Kushner's BDS friends marching in the Salute to Israel parade? Weren't you one of the founders of
JCC Watch precisely because it was meant to call out the Manhattan JCC for supporting BDS? What a disappointment!
Silly me, it's all about money, isn't it? Have to keep supporting those
Alice Walker events at the 92nd Street Y going.
Sorry but if the New York 'Jewish' Federation is going to support a boycott of Jewish businesses in Israel, it has no right to exist.
For those of you who want to do something about it, a reminder....
Organizers of the rally against the BDS groups' inclusion call on
those who cannot attend the protest rally, which will be held on
Tuesday, April 8, between 4:00-7:00 pm, outside the UJA-Federation
headquarters at 130 E. 59th St. in Manhattan, to send protest letters to
the UJA and JCRC.
Peter Kohlmann, executive producer of the parade can be reached at
212-983-4800 ext 162 (kohlmannp@jcrcny.org), while Michael Mittelman,
director of the parade, can be reached at 212-983-4800 ext 487
(mittelmanm@jcrcny.org).
“Let the directors of the UJA and other Jewish organizations know of
your concerns," called Rabbi Spero. "Real Jewish leaders should not be
indifferent, silent, nor lend support to boycotters and others wishing
to tear us down."
The rabbi added "directors of our Jewish organizations proved their
fallibility during the 1930s and ‘40s, teaching us that blind obedience
is foolish and leaving our destiny and safety to those who claim they
‘know best’ can be devastating. This time in history, we must not make
the same mistake."
And I invite all of you to send those two gentlemen links to this post.
What's left unsaid here is that the person who is really behind this is the Chairman of the New York UJA, John Ruskay. Ruskay is a
long-time supporter of the anti-Israel Left, going back to the days of
Breira in the
1960's and 1970's.
Ruskay's email address is ruskayJ@ujafedny.org.
UPDATE 3:14 PM
I was probably a bit too harsh on Jeff Wiesenfeld. His heart is definitely in the right place, even if I disagree with him on how to handle this. And it sounds like there wasn't even a vote on this....
Labels: B'Tselem, BDS, JCC Watch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Manhattan JCC, New Israel Fund, New York Jewish Federation, progressives, Salute to Israel Day Parade
Jeffrey Wiesenfeld begs Ed Koch to come clean and stop supporting Obama
I trust that many of you remember Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, the courageous City University of New York trustee who
attempted to deny an honorary degree to anti-Israel playwright (and college classmate of Carl in Jerusalem) Tony Kushner.
Wiesenfeld has written a letter to former New York City Mayor Ed Koch, a prominent Obama supporter who at one time
defected from Obama's camp due to Obama's lack of support for Israel. I received the letter from
Ricky G, and have been asked to share it with you.
Editors - Kindly publish as you see
fit:
Friends – Circulate.
Dear Friends, Fellow voters and supporters of Israel –
I am sharing an open letter which I have written to Ed Koch, whom I have
known since before his first campaign – in which I was involved early in 1977 –
in other words, quite well for 35
years.
Dear Ed –
You’re a lost cause on this
one– but I do feel a change in the wind.
We’ll win without
you.
I’d have preferred for you that
you be with the winner. But it’s not just about winning – far from it. For me,
it’s about America, Israel and the West.
Note how your commentary
yesterday has no substance whatsoever – rare - very rare – for Ed Koch. And all
that you proclaim about “solvency, stability” and the like – you can’t possibly
believe that. Here is the purest effect of “charm” ever seen: the “charm” that
Barack Obama has showered upon you. And why shouldn’t he? He’s desperate. The
superfluous use of the yellow fowl proves it. You mention Obama’s
“intelligence.” However, his entire administration has been about intellectual
dishonesty, equivocation and worst of all, weakness in the international sphere.
You support him despite your continuous admonitions of distrust for him on
Israel.
To paraphrase: “In his heart,
he (Ed) knows he (Romney) is right.”
All those who have admired you
since the 1970’s – the same time during which we admired another of the great
Democrats, Henry “Scoop” Jackson – will not be with you this
time.
This should have been a
pinnacle of positive and intellectually honest influence for
you.
I still love you and I tell you
so right here, and can never forget the early opportunities I had from you and
your administration, but to believe that you are sincere in your professed
advocacy for REELECTION of President Obama is to stop believing in Ed Koch. I
prefer not to do that.
Jeffrey
S. Wiesenfeld
Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, Ed Koch, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld
Shocker: Support for Wiesenfeld from academia
The only place from which I expected less support than among academics for
Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, in his dispute over Tony Kushner's honorary degree from City University of New York, was from Hollywood. Now that Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, (SPME) a group which represents 55,000 scholars, researchers and students on 3,500 campuses across the world, has
come out in Wiesenfeld's favor, will Hollywood and the theater be far behind?
But now, finally, a group has dared to stand up to be counted.
Before this letter was released, those scholars who did not agree with the glamorization of Kushner as the victim and the demonization of Wiesenfeld as the bully kept silent as did the entire organized Jewish world.
This battle for the soul of the Western campus is part of the larger battle for western civilization which is currently under profound attack. Proponents of hate speech and Big Lies are demanding academic freedom and free speech rights while, at the same time, they are denying these same rights to anyone who tells the truth about Israel (if it happens to be positive), or about Islam (if it happens to be negative).
I am reprinting this letter in full here. I hope that other journalists and bloggers will print it and perhaps also interview the spokesmen for SPME: Board member Awi Fedegruen (af7@columbia.edu) and Director Dr. Sam Edelman (spmeexecdir@gmail.com).
Here is the text of the letter:
Read it all.
Labels: City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Scholars for Middle East Peace, Tony Kushner
No good deed goes unpunished
I was originally sent an internet version of this article to which I was going to link, but it turned out that version was incomplete. The entire article was then sent to me by email, and I was asked to publish the entire article, which I am now doing.
The article was originally published in the Friday, May 13 edition of the Great Neck News under the title
Great Neck's Wiesenfeld right on CUNY honorary degree, and was written by
Liz Berney, who was a Republican candidate for Congress in New York's 5th Congressional district.
The adage “no good deed goes unpunished” has a new victim - Great Neck resident Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, who serves as a member of the Board of Trustees of the City University of New York (CUNY). Mr. Wiesenfeld bravely stood up to oppose an outrage about to take place at CUNY’s John Jay School of Criminal Justice – and now Mr. Wiesenfeld is being subjected to a slew of attacks.
For those of you who have not been following this story, here is some background:
If the world’s greatest physicist stated that “it would have been better if blacks never existed,” there isn’t a single university in America that would even consider bestowing an honorary degree on such a hateful, bigoted individual.
Yet, CUNY’s John Jay School is about to award an honorary degree to a mediocre, propagandizing playwright, Tony Kushner, who has made a career out of spewing similar hateful statements at Israel, and who serves on the board of radical leftist organizations such as the so-called “Jewish Voices for Peace” which promote anti-Israel boycotts, divestment and other campaigns aimed at destroying the State of Israel. Playwright Kushner called Israel's founding a "mistake" (Ha’aretz, 4/7/04) and stated "it would have been better if Israel never happened" (NY conference reported in NY Sun (10/14/02). Kushner also falsely accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing" and "behaving abominably towards the Palestinian people" (Yale Israel Review, winter 2005), falsely accused the Israel Defense Forces of “brutal and illegal tactics” (London Times, 5/7/02), and blamed Israeli policies for the PLO massacre of Israeli athletes at Munich. Another Tony Kushner “gem” was: "The biggest supporters of Israel are the most repulsive members of the Jewish community and Israel itself has got this disgraceful record.” (Ton Kushner in Conversation, ed. Robert Vorlicky, Univ. of Michigan Press, 1998, pp. 83-84.) Kushner also edited a book of essays, Wrestling With Zion: Progressive Jewish-American Responses to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (2003), condemning every aspect of Israeli life and law including Israel’s right to defend herself from attack.
Kushner’s screenplay for the movie “Munich” was atrociously inaccurate. The film was criticized by Professor Alan Dershowitz, former U.S. Holocaust Museum Director Dr. Walter Reich, CAMERA (the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting), and a slew of others. Kushner’s “Munich” falsely depicted Israelis as bloodthirsty, money-obsessed, unjustified, sloppy, guilt-ridden avengers, morally equivalent to terrorists. The film falsely blamed Israel for “dispossession” and “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinians, and portrayed Palestinian terrorists sympathetically, as, for example, middle-aged poets, teachers and ordinary family men. According to former Mossad director Ephraim Halevy, Kushner's screenplay for the movie Munich "had no relation to the truth or the facts." Leon Wieseltier wrote that “Munich” equated counter-terrorism with terrorism. (The New Republic, 12/19/05)
Senior editor Gabriel Schoenfeld’s thorough analysis called Kushner’s Munich “pernicious” in its espousal of a “cycle of violence” theory and “the most hypocritical film of the year.” (Commentary, Feb. 2006) Schoenfeld also noted that Avner Kauffman, the real Mossad agent in the counter-terrorism effort, remained a patriotic Israeli afterwards, certain that the counter-terrorism mission was necessary. In reality, Kauffman and the other Mossad agents felt much like the Navy SEALs who were involved in the bin Laden operation must feel. Yet, Kushner falsely portrayed Kauffman as guilt-ridden and so disgusted and tormented by the “treatment” of Palestinians that he abandoned Israel. (In Kushner’s world, America’s SEALs should be so tormented and guilt-racked about having killed bin Laden that they will reject America.)
Schoenfeld also explained that the movie never gave any inkling that the PLO’s massacre of Israeli athletes at Munich was preceded by decades of unrelenting Palestinian terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians, abetted by Arab governments – including the PLO bombing of a Swiss Air flight bound for Tel Aviv in 1970 (killing 47 passengers), hijackings and attacks on passengers at European airports, and PLO sub-group PLFP’s attack on passengers at Israel’s Lod airport (killing 26 passengers) five months before Munich. Instead, Kushner made it seem as if Israel did something horrible prior to Munich which instigated the PLO terrorism there. Nor did the movie reveal that the post-Munich counterterrorism operation was also necessary to prevent future attacks. Instead it portrayed counterterrorism as encouraging future attacks.
As bloggers have noted, Mr. Kushner’s anti-Israel, pro-Arab propagandizing is downright bizarre in light of the fact that Kushner is a self-proclaimed gay Jewish socialist. He would probably be murdered on the spot if he stepped foot into the homophobic Palestinian / Arab territories whom he lauds over the tolerant State of Israel.
To return to our brave fellow Great Neck citizen: Mr. Wiesenfeld (whose parents are Holocaust survivors) was rightly outraged when he learned of plans to confer an honorary degree on anti-Israel propagandist Kushner. At a CUNY Trustees’ meeting on Monday night, May 2, 2011, Mr. Wiesenfeld spoke up about Mr. Kushner’s anti-Israel views and the growing acceptance of anti-Israel views on CUNY campuses and elsewhere. (Hurling false accusations at Israel is the current form of the ages-old scourge of anti-Semitism.) In the ensuing vote, Mr. Wiesenfeld and four other trustees (Judah Gribetz, Peter S. Pantaleo, Deputy Mayor Carol A. Robles-Roman and Charles A. Shorter) voted against the Kushner nomination, thereby defeating it. (Nine out of the 12 trustees must approve an honorary degree nomination.) The CUNY Trustees also voted overwhelmingly, 10 to 2, to table any further discussion of the Kushner nomination, rather than to take it up again. (NYT, 5/5/11 & 5/6/11)
Unfortunately, the story did not end there, as it should have. Kushner “defended” himself by issuing a statement claiming that he “supports” Israel while reiterating his false anti-Israel views and justifying them on the basis that other Jews (the ill-informed and/or self-hating variety, no doubt) share his “outrage, grief, terror” and “moments of despair” that the “brunt” of the “ongoing horror in the Middle East . . . has been born by the Palestinian people.” (Tell that to the Israeli Fogel family – including the 2-month-old baby girl and two little boys who were brutally murdered in their sleep last month by Palestinian terrorists. And tell that to the Chasids returning from praying at Joseph’s tomb two weeks ago, who were gunned down by Palestinian policemen shouting “Allahu Akbar.”)
Kushner also claimed that he is not an extremist, while Jeff Wiesenfeld rightly pointed out that accusing Israel of “ethnic cleansing” crosses the line and constitutes an extremist blood libel against the Jewish people. Wiesenfeld asked, if Kushner is correct that Israel is guilty of ethnic cleansing, then why are one million Arabs living in Israel, under better conditions than in Arab countries? Mr. Wiesenthal’s statement read:“All of us on this board have voted for hundreds of honorary degrees since I've been on the board; people of all persuasions, and quite a few critics of Israel. The qualitative difference with Mr. Kushner were his claims that it would have been better had Israel not been created, a denial of Jewish nationhood that he would deny to no other people and his accusations of ethnic cleansing by Israel. The Jewish people and the State of Israel are among the few peoples of the world never to have had a policy of ethnic cleansing. Ethnic cleansing is Nazi Germany, Bosnia, Darfur, Rwanda and the like. The accusation is a blood libel against the Jewish people for which they've paid dearly through history. A million Arabs live in Israel in conditions better than in virtually any Arab state; were they subject to ethnic cleansing like Christians in Arab lands, they would not be there.
As for Mr. Kushner's "support for Israel", I do not know of many people who support Israel and lament her creation, nor do I know too many people who charge her with ethnic cleansing who celebrate her creation. Were Mr. Kushner to renounce just these libelous statements, which cross the line, even I would cast my vote for him. Why? Because then he is like any other critic of Israel, expressing views with which I greatly disagree, but not accusing Israelis in a libelous manner of a universally unforgivable crime.”
Certain groups insisted that Tony Kushner should still be honored, and that Jeffrey Wiesenfeld should be thrown off the CUNY Board of Trustees! According to the respected New York Academy of Sciences: “A campaign against Wiesenfeld has been launched by the PSC-CUNY faculty union, almost entirely dominated by members of the extreme Left, who have never been shy about their anti-Israeli and anti-meritocratic sentiments.” A writer for the Guardian (a paper that is always ready to viciously attack Israel) compared Wiesenfeld and the CUNY Trustee’s vote to the McCarthy era. (No one is impinging on Kushner’s first amendment rights; the vote merely reflected the fact that Kushner does not deserve discretionary accolades for his hateful propaganda.) A one-sided New York Times blog (5/6/11) claimed that the vote stifled “freedom of thought and expression” at CUNY and spoke of Kushner’s supposed “extraordinary talent,” without mentioning any of Kushner’s extreme anti-Israel statements.
Incredibly, pro-Israel former Mayor Ed Koch wrote to CUNY Board Chairman Benno Schmidt, demanding Wiesenfeld’s removal from the Board of Trustees, and demanding that, despite the vote against him, Kushner should receive the honorary degree. Koch stated that Kushner’s personal views should have nothing to do with honoring him, and asked, “What does Kushner receiving an award have to do with criticism of the State of Israel?” (Id.) Similarly, Chairman Schmidt publicly stated that political views were irrelevant to the granting of an award.
Really? Hateful views don’t matter? Would CUNY ever confer an honor on David Duke, even if Duke invented a cure for AIDs? And, here, Kushner is being honored for the same written work which espouses and is permeated by his false and hateful views!
Shamefully, as of the writing of this article, it appears that the Chairman of the CUNY Board of Trustees will capitulate to Koch’s misguided letter and the leftists’ campaign. Chairman Schmidt scheduled a meeting of the 7-member Trustees’ Executive Committee (which he is believed to control) for Monday evening May 9, to apparently overrule the full Board vote and to grant Kushner the award.
I hope our community will support Mr. Wiesenfeld for standing up for what is right. Feel free to write to The New York Times, or to CUNY Chancellor Matthew Goldstein (535 East 80th Street, New York, NY 10075) or Inside Higher Education (on the web) or any other appropriate publication. If a college trustee such as Great Neck’s Jeff Wiesenfeld is removed from his post for refusing to honor an anti-Semite, we are all in trouble.
Indeed.
Labels: City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Liz Berney, Tony Kushner
The lessons of the Tony Kushner affair
Alex Joffe does a nice job of summarizing the
lessons we should derive from the Tony Kushner affair.
At least three lessons may be learned from this affair. The first is that for the New York cultural elite, which may be caricatured in this case as an interlocking directorate of playwright, pundits, and professors, the presumption of impunity is absolute. Academia, in particular, has a "sacred mission," to be defined solely by the faculty and under no circumstances to be questioned. That the faculties themselves tend to be monolithic in their political and ideological orientation may help to explain their wild overreaction in the present instance and others like it. Delusions of infallibility combined with well-deserved insecurity and profound authoritarianism make for a potent brew.
Then there is the key role played by the media, and preeminently by the Times, which no longer bothers to make even a pretense of dividing news from opinion, or opinion from insult, misrepresentation, and naked advocacy. On certain subjects, anyone getting the "news" from such a source might as well be reading leaflets handed out by the crank on the street corner. Only through a constant process of reading and tacking among multiple sources can one establish even the basic facts of who said what to whom.
But by far the most important lesson is the degree to which the state of Israel has indeed become the third rail of American cultural and intellectual politics. An individual wishing to be considered respectable by the interlocking directorate and its ancillary institutions and adjuncts is permitted only an extremely narrow slice of views on the Jewish state: the spectrum ranges from, roughly, seeing the country as basically legitimate but uniquely flawed to seeing it as wholly illegitimate and irretrievable. To wander from these parameters is to court the dreaded epithet of "right-wing," and to question the playwrights and professors who hold such views, or even to decline to honor them, puts one decisively beyond the pale.
In the end, the Kushner brouhaha also shows exactly who is responsible for placing the Israel "question" at the forefront of the American agenda. The answer is not evangelical Christians, or AIPAC, or "neoconservatives." It is the academic and cultural Left, along with its bedfellows on the isolationist Right, for whom the demonization of Israel is the cause of the day. There is cause for gratitude that, outside those precincts, the Kushner affair seems to have had no resonance whatsoever. There is cause for profound anxiety that the demonization has proceeded so far and infected so many in positions of power and influence.
Indeed.
Labels: Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, liberal academia, liberal media bias, radical Left, Tony Kushner
CUNY to fly 'Palestinian' flag at commencement
But
of course....
The City University of New York, which has already outraged Israel supporters with its decision to honor anti-Israel playwright Tony Kushner, will also be taking the unusual step of flying a Palestinian flag at the upcoming commencement for City College, a spokesperson for the university told me today.
“The City College flies all of the flags that are flown at the United Nations,” the Vice President for Communications Mary Lou Edmondson told me. “It has nothing to do with foreign policy.”
But there’s one problem—the United Nations doesn’t fly the Palestinian flag. It only flies the flags of its 192 member states.
Then what prompted the college’s decision?
Read the whole thing.
I suppose that one could argue that if the
President of Israel flies the 'Palestinian flag,' why shouldn't CUNY?
What could go wrong?
Labels: City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Palestinian flag, Tony Kushner
Freedom of speech for me but not for thee
Now that the PC thought police have ensured that Tony Kushner will get his honorary degree from the City University of New York, they're going after the other side of the equation and trying to
shut down Jeffrey Wiesenfeld by kicking him off CUNY's Board of Trustees (Hat Tip:
Dan F). The CUNY faculty union renewed its calls for the trustee, Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld, to step down, while CUNY officials said they had received dozens of e-mails — including some form letters — demanding his removal.
Barbara Bowen, president of the union, the Professional Staff Congress, which represents 22,000 faculty and staff members, said the honorary degree was the latest episode in which Mr. Wiesenfeld had inserted himself inappropriately in university activities.
In 2001, he called participation in an October “teach-in” sponsored by the union about the 9/11 attacks “seditious.” In 2006, he blasted a book that Baruch College had chosen for its freshman reading, “War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning,” by Chris Hedges, calling it “deeply offensive” and “anti-Semitic.”
“That’s overstepping one’s role as a trustee,” Dr. Bowen said. “There’s a consistent pattern of vilifying students and particularly faculty whose political views he objects to. He is entitled to his political views, but to use those views to interfere with academic freedom is not acceptable.” Jeffrey Goldberg suggests that the people at CUNY need to
learn to get along.
Perhaps everyone in the CUNY universe should simply learn to live with objectionable views. And perhaps the CUNY board should consider whether it wants to turn Jeffrey Wiesenfeld into a free-speech martyr, just as Wiesenfeld tried to turn Tony Kushner into same.
That drew this response from one James Fallows:
The obnoxious guy at CUNY is not having his "freedom of speech" threatened.
He's having his presence on the board called into question. Freedom of speech is a right; membership on the board is a privilege. FWIW.
Silly me. I thought that getting an
honorary degree was a privilege and not a right too.
Labels: City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Tony Kushner
Jeffrey Wiesenfeld's 'mistake' on Tony Kushner
I can't find him in my college yearbook, but Wikipedia reports that Jew-hating
Tony Kushner was a classmate of mine at Bir Zeit on the Hudson in 1978. The picture at top of left was taken at graduation, and while Kushner looks familiar (and I just figured out why), I don't believe he was the guy who was 2-3 seats over from me who went storming out with the protesters in the middle of graduation. (The guy sitting next to me - a good Republican - tried to trip that guy on the way out).
The Wall Street Journal weighs in on what it calls Jeffrey
Wiesenfeld's mistake (full column for those without online access
here). They're spot-on.
Mr. Wiesenfeld’s “mistake” was not appreciating that hostility to Israel has become such a deeply embedded principle of the modern academy that objecting to it earns you denunciation as a censor and philistine. The only greater uproar might have come if CUNY’s trustees had voted to award an honorary degree to, say, the CIA interrogators of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Sad, but true.
By the way, when I reported the story of the meeting on Monday night to '
reconsider' Kushner's rejection, I mistakenly thought that the Board of Trustees was being reconvened. The Journal reports that is not the case.
So now Mr. Schmidt wants a subset of the board to overrule a decision taken by the ostensible overseers of CUNY. If there was ever definitive proof that university officials see their trustees as mere check-writing rubber stamps, this is it. Even on the symbolic matter of conferring university prestige, the trustees get put in their place when they don’t meet the politically correct standards of the faculty.
People get put on the Board of Trustees of a university by donating money. It's time for those people to start fighting back. I hope that if Kushner's degree is upheld later this evening, Mr. Wiesenfeld will close the book on his service as a CUNY trustee - and his wallet on supporting them.
Labels: BDS, Benno Schmidt, City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Jewish Voice for Peace, temper tantrum, Tony Kushner
Tony Kushner to get that degree after all?
Tony Kushner's
tantrum is apparently going to result in him getting his way. The Board of Trustees of the City University of New York, which had not planned to meet again until after graduation, is going to meet on Monday night to reconsider last week's vote rejecting Kushner's honorary degree (Hat Tip:
Dan F). I have embedded the invitation to the Board of Trustees meeting below (it is apparently open to the public for those of you in the New York area who want to attend). I especially call your attention to the statement by Chairman of the Board of Trustees Benno Schmidt (the last page), which went out on Friday, which accompanied the notice regarding the meeting, which makes it clear that the meeting's goal is to reverse last week's decision.
Notice of CUNY Board of Trustees Meeting to Reconsider Tony Kushner degreeBy the way, if you go
here, you will see that the person at whom we should be targeting our anger is Jeremy Travis, the President of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
Labels: BDS, Benno Schmidt, City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Jewish Voice for Peace, temper tantrum, Tony Kushner
Jeffrey Wiesenfeld rips Tony Kushner again
Jeffrey Wisenfeld, the CUNY trustee who kept that honorary degree out of Tony Kushner's grubby little hands, hangs to to
rip Kusher again.
If his libelous statements against Israel were made by anyone outside the Jewish community, that person would be correctly labeled an anti-Semite. When you hold the State of Israel – a nation in a struggle for its survival from the beginning, a target for the misogynist, racist, anti-western, dictatorial regimes which surround it – to a standard you would hold no other nation under normal circumstances, let alone under such exigencies – and when you spew libel against our sole regional democratic ally for “crimes” concocted by delegitimizers, you are an anti-Semite.
I would no differently oppose a racist for an honorary degree who personifies himself by calumny against a people. If Mr. Kushner were a CUNY student degree candidate, or even more extremely, if he were David Duke or Lynne Stewart or Sonny Carson or any other detestable individual, no trustee or administrator would have the right to deny him or her a degree if requisite requirements were fulfilled .
To the contrary, an honorary degree is wholly within the absolute discretion of the board to grant. It identifies the University with accomplished, generous citizens or public figures. It is also a tool which highlights the University and enhances its image in the educational marketplace. Every year, there are candidates that some trustees may not particularly favor. We can all express dissent where we warrant it – it is our right. However, every nominee that has been brought before the board, during my 12 years at least, has been approved by the full board. Mr. Kushner, however, was opposed because he is an extremist. No extremist from any quarter is a good face for any University – from far left or far right. Honorary degrees are public declarations of esteem by the university community conveyed to the honoree; for the university, they are image-building, advertising and publicity as well.
Read it all.
Labels: Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, moonbats, Tony Kushner
Tony Kushner has a tantrum
Tony Kushner is one of those Jews who loves to hate Jews and Israel. In 2006, Brandeis University conferred an honorary doctorate on the anti-Israel playwright, Tony Kushner, whose
screenplay for the film
Munich was widely condemned by numerous critics as being grossly inaccurate in ways that were hostile to Israel and inappropriately sympathetic to Palestinian terrorists. Kushner has made numerous egregious statements viciously condemning Israel and decrying its very existence, saying on one occasion that Israel’s founding a “
mistake,” and that it “it would have been better if Israel never happened.” Kushner has also repeatedly blamed Israel for supposed “ethnic cleaning” and “dispossession” of Palestinians, supported boycotting Israel and attacked Jewish supporters of Israel as “the most repulsive members of the Jewish community.”
Kushner was scheduled to pick up another honorary degree from the City University of New York this month. But CUNY's Board of Trustees met on Monday and decided not to honor the self-hating Jew.
Kushner's not getting the honorary degree.
The City University of New York has voted not to honor playwright Tony Kushner with an honorary degree at its commencement after a board member objected, citing the Pulitzer Prize winner's statements on Israel.
The New York Jewish Week reported that the request by CUNY's John Jay College to recognize Kushner was turned down at a board of trustees meeting Monday after board member Jeffrey Wiesenfeld objected. Kushner would have been eligible to speak at the graduation ceremony.
The decision could be the first time in the university system's history that a proposed candidate for an honorary degree has been vetoed, the newspaper reported.
Kushner has gone ballistic. Below is the three-page letter he sent to CUNY's Board of Trustees.
Tony Kushner Letter to CUNYOriginally, this was a story that only concerned the Jewish community. But Kushner's letter has busted it out into the open. The
New York Observer,
Salon and the
New York Times have all picked up the story. This is from the Times:
According to a podcast of the Monday meeting and accounts from two CUNY officials who attended it, one of the 12 trustees present, Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld, objected to John Jay College’s submission of Mr. Kushner for an honorary degree. Mr. Wiesenfeld described viewpoints and comments, which he ascribed to Mr. Kushner, that he had found on the Web site of Norman Finkelstein, a political scientist and critic of Israel.
Mr. Wiesenfeld, an investment adviser and onetime aide to former Gov. George E. Pataki and former Senator Alfonse M. D’Amato, said that Mr. Kushner had tied the founding of Israel to a policy of ethnic cleansing, criticized the Israel Defense Forces and supported a boycott of Israel.
“I think it’s up to all of us to look at fairness and consider these things,” Mr. Wiesenfeld said. “Especially when the State of Israel, which is our sole democratic ally in the area, sits in the neighborhood which is almost universally dominated by administrations which are almost universally misogynist, antigay, anti-Christian.”
...
Support from 9 of the 12 trustees was needed to move forward a full slate of honorary degrees, including Mr. Kushner’s, according to state law. Seven trustees indicated support for the full slate, and five opposed. After that, Mr. Kushner’s name was removed from the slate of degrees, and it passed overwhelmingly. The trustees then voted, 11 to 1, to table the Kushner degree. The board chairman is Benno C. Schmidt Jr., a former president of Yale.
Jay Hershenson, CUNY’s senior vice chancellor for university relations and secretary of the trustees, said that since 1961, no other honorary degree nomination had been tabled after reaching the board.
Regarding the Kushner degree, Mr. Hershenson said, “The CUNY board of trustees acted independently and exercised its authority.” Responding to Mr. Kushner’s charge of slander, Mr. Hershenson repeated his comment.
I'd love to meet up with Mr. Wiesenfeld the next time he's in Israel or I'm in New York. Among other things, he deserves to be reading better blogs. Heh.
By the way, you can find a podcast of the CUNY trustees meeting
here and
here. The relevant portion starts about ten minutes from the end.
Labels: BDS, City University of New York, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, Jewish Voice for Peace, Tony Kushner
