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Updated 11/08/09 @ 03:17PM EDT
- The alleged Fort Hood shooter is a conservative Muslim, not an extremist, says an uncle who lives in the West Bank.
- A pro-Palestinian group is staging a weeklong protest at two British supermarket chains to force them to stop selling Israeli products.
- A leading Kadima Party member presented a plan to establish a Palestinian state within one year.
- President Obama called on Israelis to continue to pursue peace with the Palestinians in a video message screened during a memorial to Yitzhak Rabin.
- The United Nations secretary-general said he will send the Goldstone report to the U.N. Security Council "as soon as possible."
- Alleged Fort Hood shooter has West Bank relatives
- Op-Ed: President Obama needs to revisit Israel
- Palestinian group staging supermarket boycott
- Mofaz proposes Palestinian state in one year
- Obama calls for peace in Rabin rally address
- Security Council to receive Goldstone ‘soon’
- Yoffie to Reform Jews: Eat less meat, blog more
- Wagner great-grandson objects to Berlin Wall event music
- Obama’s Nobel, Israel’s problem?
- Jews of color come together to explore identity
- FBI: Alleged spy wannabe asked for Israeli citizenship
- Family likely murdered by professional killer
- New signs that Ethiopian aliyah will resume
- U.S. appetite for Israeli food grows
- Female Orthodox scholars helping women talk about sex
- Attacks on J Street as parley approaches
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Posted in: The search for Wallenberg
03/05/09 01:50 AM
According to the documentary on his life, I Have Never Forgotten You, in response to a plea for assistance from Mr. Wallenberg's mother in 1977, Simon Weisenthal raised the issue, publically and privately, at every available opportunity. Mr. Wallenberg was made an honorary American citizen so that the American government could press his case with the Russians/Soviets. It would be an honor to Mr. Weisenthal's memory, and simple justice, if President Obama were to press Mr. Putin on this issue. Whatever they did to him will have been no worse than what the world suspected was done, so it could be presented to Mr. Putin as a matter of honor.
Posted in: Rabbi: Kick Madoff out of the Jewish people
02/06/09 07:34 PM
I, too, am not Jewish, but I grew up within a large, vibrant Jewish community, and my parents had many friends, other couples, with whom they spent much of their socializing time, and I had many Jewish friends during my childhood--before I moved thousands of miles away. Perhaps this is the reason that Rabbi Hammerman's near-final comment, "Our own children are watching us," jumped out for me. All of us who are parents know that young people listen to what you do for a long time before they decide if they are going to listen to anything you say. For this reason alone, I believe that some sanction (I am not familiar with Judaism's ecclesiastical measures that could be brought to bear) that would impress upon the children, who are indeed watching, that would call out what must be called "sin." A failure to act could have very serious consequences for their formation as Jews, for their self-understanding and their connection, and commitment, to their Jewish community and congregation (I am Catholic, so I ask forgiveness for not knowing how one refers to the congregation with whom one gathers on the Sabbath). In her very flippant comment, ("magdalyn c. prossii") said, "If you guys excommunicate Madoff, please point him toward the nearest Catholic Church. We Catholics are pretty good at forgiveness." It is true that, to put something rather complex in simple terms, we are taught that "what cannot be excused must be forgiven." But this is not the sort of forgiveness that Dietrich Bonhoeffer called "cheap grace." (Bonhoeffer was a clergyman who openly opposed Hitler; he spent years in one of the camps, and one of Hitler's final orders before going into "the Bunker" was that Bonhoeffer be hanged--and he was.) If you've heard the term "sack cloth and ashees," you will have had an inkling of what "penance" was sometimes required before the penitent's sin was absolve. I have a bedrock conviction about the Jewish community which leads me to conclude that any member who perpetrated such a transgression would be called to account if the victims were Jewish or if they were not. But I believe that Mr. Madoff should be called to account by whatever means are set out in the sacred sources of the Jewish people. I'd like also to express my personal regret that so many people and worthy organizations and foundations have been decimated by this man's actions. Avarice attempts to work its way with us whether we are of modest or lavish means, and this is a particularly good "teachable moment" for demonstrating this to our children. Mary Wagner
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