Anti-J Street documentary screened in Philadelphia
I want to show you the trailer for a documentary (which I still have not seen) about the 'Jewish' J Street group, which calls itself 'pro-Israel, pro-peace.' J Street is currently seeking admission to the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, and the fact that this documentary was shown in Philadelphia last night will not help J Street's cause.
The J Street Challenge is an important and timely documentary about a significant issue facing the American Jewish community.
Since
it was founded in 2008, J Street's idealistic message has attracted
many Jews, young and old, who are frustrated by the Middle East conflict
and sincerely want peace between Arabs and Jews. J Street has been a
subject of controversy. Critics claim that J Street has divided the
Jewish community and weakened American Jewish support for Israel. "The J
Street Challenge" lets viewers hear both sides of this important debate
over the elusive solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. The film
explores the reasons for J Street's appeal, as well as the diverse and
at times contradictory motivations of its leaders and followers. The
film is being released at a critical time for the American Jewish
community given the intense efforts by the United States to resolve the
conflict and influence the community's leadership to support these
efforts. The Kerry peace initiative has further divided the Jewish
community, with J Street working to weaken the influence of AIPAC while
strongly backing the administration.
The film includes distinguished
scholars and writers from a wide political spectrum, including Harvard
professors Alan Dershowitz and Ruth Wisse, Rabbi Daniel Gordis of the
Shalem College in Jerusalem, Caroline Glick, Managing Editor of the
Jerusalem Post, Professor Richard Landes of Boston University, Lenny Ben
David -- former Israeli diplomat and author, and Bret Stephens,
Pulitzer prize winning columnist for The Wall Street Journal.
Let's go to the videotape. More after the video.
At issue is a March 27 event sponsored by the Jewish Federation of
Greater Philadelphia and by the local Hillel, titled “What It Means To
Be Pro-Israel.” The answer to the question, at least in the eyes of the
organizers, is revealed in the event’s content: It will feature a
screening of a full-length anti-J-Street documentary and a panel made up
mainly of critics of the organization.
The upcoming event has sparked an angry debate within
the Philadelphia community, the nation’s fourth largest, and has
brought to the surface accusations against the Jewish federation’s
leadership and its decision-making process. “Political views on the
right are listened to more, because the few people donating large
amounts of dollars are on that political side,” said Jill Zipin, a
community activist who has protested the decision to sponsor the event.
“The Jewish federation shouldn’t be a tent of one Jewish donor.”
Panelists at the event, which will take place on the
University of Pennsylvania campus, include Harvard law professor Alan
Dershowitz, a staunch defender of Israel and just as staunch a critic of
J Street; Charles Jacobs, who heads the group that produced the
anti-J-Street film, and Sara Greenberg, a Harvard University graduate
student who has been active in fighting attempts to boycott Israel.
Supporters of J Street have taken issue with the
makeup of the panel and, more importantly, with the movie that will be
the evening’s centerpiece. The J Street Challenge,
released earlier this year, is a documentary aimed, according to the
film’s official synopsis, at “examining and debating J Street’s message
and its leaders.” It does so through clips from speeches of the lobby’s
leaders and a series of interviews with experts, almost all of them
known as leading critics of the group. Speakers in the movie
accuse J Street of “dividing the Jewish community,” of being
“imperialistic” and of manifesting “arrogance” in their views on Middle
East peace. The J Street Challenge was produced by Americans for Peace
and Tolerance, a not-for-profit organization devoted to fighting Islamic
extremism.
On Thursday night, the University's Hillel branch featured Breaking the Silence, the venomous group that travels around the world seeking to smear the name of the State of Israel.
In yet another example of academia succumbing to a flawed battering
ram of freedom of speech, the Hillel of Greater Philadephia was
outsmarted by J Street U which guilted them into providing a home for an
event the sole purpose of which is to indict and delegitimize the
defense forces of the Jewish State.
On Thursday evening, March 28, Steinhardt Hall - the Hillel building
at the University of Pennsylvania – provided the platform for the
pro-Palestinian J Street U to defile the integrity of the Israel Defense
Forces through a well-funded delegitimization organization known as
Breaking the Silence.
The “silence” that the group supposedly “breaks” is the unspoken
criticism of Israel and Israel’s military. Yes, that’s right – without
Breaking the Silence, one would never hear a negative word about the
IDF, because the New York Times, the United Nations Human Rights Council, the EU, the Guardian, the Iranian regime, the Arab League, the Huffington Post, CNN, El Mundo, El Diario or just about any other entity with a microphone or a media outlet never criticizes the IDF.
Well, that’s what the young whippersnappers at J Street U were able
to convince the grownups on the board of the Hillel of Greater
Philadelphia.
...
Even the indefatigably leftist Haaretz expressed disdain for the repeated claim by Breaking the Silence that it is a human rights organization:
“Breaking the Silence…has a clear political agenda, and
can no longer be classed as a ‘human rights organization.’ Any
organization whose website includes the claim by members to expose the
‘corruption which permeates the military system’ is not a neutral
observer.
The organization has a clear agenda: to expose the consequences of
IDF troops serving in the West Bank and Gaza. This seems more of
interest to its members than seeking justice for specific injustices.”
And yet, the board of the Hillel of Greater Philadelphia was conned into believing that Breaking the Silence, whose sponsors include not only J Street U, but also the New Israel Fund, the European Union, the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, NDC (funds from Sweden, Switzerland, Netherlands, Denmark), and George Soros’ Open Society Institute
was needed to amplify the tintinnabulation of hatred already ringing
across U.S. campuses from such groups as the BDS movement and the annual
Israel Apartheid Week hate fiestas which vilify every move taken by
Israel and the IDF to protect Israeli citizens – Jewish, Muslim,
Christian and others – from Arab Palestinian terrorism.
Although the HGP several years ago crafted and approved a policy that
explicitly stated it would not lend its space for events or
organizations the primary goal of which was to delegitimize Israel, J
Street U succeeded in persuading the board that their point of view –
that is, explicitly and simply, that the IDF is a terrorist,
expansionist militaristic entity – does not get enough play at the
University of Pennsylvania. While the HGP board initially refused to
allow the event in the building, the board members’ hesitation was
eventually drowned out.
Working in the interdisciplinary field of American studies, Amy Kaplan's scholarship and teaching focus on the culture of imperialism, comparative perspectives on the Americas, prison writing, the American novel, and mourning, memory and war. A past president of the American Studies Association, Kaplan received her Ph.D. from The Johns Hopkins University, with a specialty in late-nineteenth-century American literature. Her first book was The Social Construction of American Realism (U Chicago P, 1988). She co-edited, with Donald Pease, Cultures of U. S. Imperialism (Duke, 1993). In her book The Anarchy of Empire in the Making of U.S. Culture (Harvard UP 2002) Kaplan shows how imperial expansion abroad--from the US-Mexico War of 1848 to the First World War--profoundly shaped key elements of American culture at home. She has received an NEH Fellowship and the Norman Forster prize for the best essay in American Literature in 1998 for "Manifest Domesticity." A wide-ranging critic of American culture and policy and of the language of empire today, Kaplan has published recent essays on academic life in occupied Palestine, the discourse of “homeland security” in response to 9/11, the place of Guantanamo Bay in American history, and analogies between the American and Roman Empires, as well as articles on Mark Twain and Herman Melville. She is currently exploring the persistent and powerful working of Zionism in American culture and politics.
And here’s information on the man behind her endowed chair if anyone wants to follow this further.
This professorship was established through a gift from Edward W. Kane, C ’71, to recruit or retain a preeminent scholar and teacher in the Department of English.
This professorship was established through a gift from Edward W. Kane, C ’71, and Martha Wallace, parents. Mr. Kane is a founder and senior managing director of HarbourVest Partners, LLC, a global private equity investment firm. He graduated cum laude from Penn and earned an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School in 1975. During his term as a University trustee, from 1996-2001, he worked on a project to help distribute faculty books to alumni.
Another name under which the organization does business. Also used for trade names, chapter names, or local numbers for subordinate organizations of group rulings.
Secondary Name
KANE EDWARD W TTEE
Section 501(c) of the federal tax code defines and explains what type of organizations is eligible for tax exemption. There are more then 25 classifications of nonprofit organizations,
Nonprofit Classification
Charitable Organization
Affiliation
Independent
Organization Type
Trust
Deductibility Code signifies whether contributions made to an organization are deductible.
Deductibility Code
Contributions are deductible.
Purpose
An organization has a purpose, which is generally known as its mission or goal.
I wouldn't blame Ed Kane for this. Harbourvest sounded like a familiar name, so I looked up their SEC filing for the end of 2010, and they have (or had then) at least one investment in Israel that I recognized.
But if someone can explain to me what Professor Kaplan's scholarship has to do with English Literature, I'd really appreciate it. It sounds more like History or Political Science to me.
Video: Penn professor explains how to demonize Israel in every class
When I was a student at Bir Zeit on the Hudson, I had a number of friends who were an hour and a half south at Penn. I would never allow any of my children to go there today. Penn teaches Jew-hatred.
At the PennBDS conference last weekend, there was a breakout session on the "Academic Boycott of Israel."
One of the panelists was Amy Kaplan, professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania.
At the Q&A session, another teacher asked Kaplan how to incorporate the BDS memes of demonizing Israel into college courses, even when the course has nothing to do with "Palestine."
If your children are studying at most universities in the United States or Israel today (not to mention Europe), this is what they are being taught even if they don't take a single political science course. I'd think about sending my kids elsewhere.
Think about it.
Penn's President really did look comfortable with that guy dressed as a suicide bomber, didn't she? Let's have another look at the top of this post. That's Penn President Amy Gutmann with a 'Palestinian' kid dressed as a suicide bomber. The picture was taken on Halloween 2006, but Gutmann is still the President. Do you have kids at Penn? Are you an alumnus of Penn? Are you angry enough about this to do something about it (like at least stop donating money)?
A version of this article is going to be printed in the Great Neck News this weekend. Liz Berney has run for Congress on the Republican ticket twice in the third district of New York (currently represented by Gary Ackerman(D)).
It's Time To Take Our Campuses Back by Elizabeth (Liz) Berney, Esq.
Twenty-eight years ago, intending it to be a joke, the members of a fraternity at the University of Pennsylvania dressed up as ku klux klansmen, in white sheets. The university's president was so outraged by this that she closed down the fraternity house, forcing all the fraternity's members off campus.
Fast forward almost three decades: This coming weekend, the very same University of Pennsylvania is hosting a major national three-day "Penn BDS" (boycott, divestment and sanctions) conference aimed at dismantling the State of Israel. Speaker after speaker will spew non-stop anti-semitism and anti-Israel hatred. From Friday morning (February 3rd, 2012) through Sunday evening (February 5th, 2012), a veritable "who's who" of anti-semites, including radical Muslims, Israel-bashing and Jew-bashing bloggers, far left professors, and some self-hating Jews, will depict Israel as an "occupation" which has no right to exist, falsely accuse Israel of "ethnic cleansing," and urge participants to wage economic war (boycotts, divestment & sanctions), "lawfare" and other war against Israel. The many featured speakers include "Electronic Intifada" website co-founder Ali Abunimah (an old Obama buddy) and Columbia University Iran studies professor Hamid Dabashi, who accuses Israel of "global terrorism" and "a half century of systematic maiming and murdering."
And what is the reaction to this of the University of Pennsylvania's president, Amy Gutmann? So far, she has just made excuses for doing nothing.
Great Neck's brave Jeff Weisenfeld recently attempted to contact President Gutmann. A college official wrote back, babbling about recognizing "student groups," being "content neutral" and the "free exchange of ideas." Free exchange of ideas? Since when is a professionally-organized 3-day hate-fest filled with the world's leading anti-semites an acceptable event at an academic institution? There is a big difference between the "free exchange of ideas" and a nationally orchestrated barrage of outright false propaganda to incite hatred against Jews. Can you imagine the outcry if a university hosted a conference to delegitimize, boycott and ostracize black-owned businesses, or gay-owned businesses, or any other country in the world? Of course, it would never happen. Even a tasteless joke that was hurtful to a racial group was stopped. Yet, declaring open season on Jews and Israel is apparently no problem.
As Mr. Weisenfeld wrote to University of Pennsylvania's officials about the Penn BDS conference: "This is a corruption of academia based on pure and unadulterated anti-Semitism which would not be tolerated against any other ethnic group."
Sadly, the University of Pennsylvania is not the only campus where hate-filled weekends (and week-long) anti-Israel "conferences" have been taking place. Anti-Israel activities on college campuses, organized by national radical Muslim groups, are rampant. A few recent examples: UC Berkeley's "Israel apartheid week"; the "occupation" of a campus building in "solidarity" with Gaza at the University of Rochester; and Brandeis University's "Israeli Occupation Awareness Week." In addition, the same radical Muslims and their co-conspirators who run anti-Israel events also violently stop Jewish and pro-Israel campus events and speakers. Apparently "free speech" does not apply when pro-Israel students and speakers try to say something. This all creates a dangerous and extremely uncomfortable atmosphere for Jewish students studying at the University of Pennsylvania and at other universities throughout the country.
It's time that we start taking America's campuses back from the anti-semites and Israel-bashers. Jews have given hundreds of millions of dollars to the University of Pennsylvania. If a university allows anti-Israel boycott events, perhaps the university should be "boycotted" when the university asks for more contributions. I hope that readers of this article and their friends (especially the many University of Pennsylvania alumni in the local area) will cut their contributions off to U of Penn (and let President Guttman know why), and will contact the University of Pennsylvania to demand cancellation of this weekend's outrageous, malevolent national "Penn BDS" conference. We all know the rconsequences of silence in the face of hatred. University of Pennsylvania President Amy Gutmann's telephone number is 215 898-7221, and her email is presweb@pobox.upenn.edu.
And it's not the first time that Penn President Amy Gutmann has been involved in an anti-Semitic, anti-Israel 'joke.' That's her in the picture above, and for those of you who weren't reading this blog in November 2006, you can find the full story here.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
