The May 3rd Edition of New York Jewish Life

Violent Attacks Against Jews Decrease, but Hate Speech Spikes, Tel-Aviv University Report Says

Gabby Giffords and Mark Kelly Bring Tikkun Olam Message to Roslyn Heights

The New Yorker’s Seven Best Jewish Cartoons

VOL. 1, NO. 9 | MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NEWS THAT MATTERS TO JEWISH COMMUNITIES IN THE NEW YORK CITY METROPOLITAN AREA | NYJLIFE.COM | FREE

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Publisher’s Note News that matters to Jewish communities in the New York City metropolitan area

BUSINESS Celebrity activist Linda Sarsour should not have been invited to give the commencement address at the City University School of Public Health.

Whoever first came up with that idea, and whatever board approved it, made a tremendous, offensive misstep that has done a disservice to actual progressive activism (rather than Ms. Sarsour’s self-referential brand).

Let me be clear, before inappropriate comparisons are made in defense of her speaking: This is not the same as firebrands’ being invited to college campuses by sympathetic student groups in order to provoke debate, nor is the issue one of regulating free speech. As an attorney—in fact a graduate of the same City University system’s law school—and a publisher, I wholeheartedly support the rights and protections afforded to and by free speech. The more uncomfortable and confrontational the argument, whether in reporting, art, activism, literature or politics, the better. Free speech doesn’t need permission.

The issue of Linda Sarsour as a CUNY commencement speaker is about the decision of a government actor—in this case, a creature of city and state government—to provide an official platform for a voice that discredits other activists who disagree with her ideological litmus tests, a voice allied with anti-Israel violence, a voice committed to actions abhorrent to large parts of New York City’s diverse population, a voice seemingly interested more in self-promotion than in stirring truly open debate.

This isn’t about free speech; it’s about CUNY’s promoting a message.

This is about the public officials who have been slow to respond to calls for their thoughts on CUNY’s invitation

to Ms. Sarsour, including calls from this paper. This is about those who feel forced to defend her, speaking out of concern about their own standing in a Democratic party resistant to learn the lessons of President Trump’s election. This is about the dangers of intersectionality, the connecting of activism focused on different issues, taken too far. This is about censorship in the form of political correctness among protesters.

Ms. Sarsour states that Zionists cannot be feminists, as the struggles of Palestinian women are the concerns of all proper feminists. “Anyone who wants to call themselves an activist cannot be selective,” she said in an interview. I completely disagree.

By insisting that activism must connect with all efforts against systems of inequity everywhere, Ms. Sarsour is placing herself, and those who agree with her brand of professional worldwide protest, as the judge of who is “pure” enough to speak out on issues.

This sort of intentionally divisive intellectual bullying should not be peddled as CUNY-supported rhetoric.

Of course there is much to protest.

America is split, the Trump-Clinton election evidence of deep divisions.

Our foreign-policy misadventures, started under President George W. Bush and heightened in some cases

by President Obama, have produced massive upheaval worldwide. Domestic policy—whether tax or healthcare or environmental or social services—is obviously a scattershot mess of poorlythought-out giveaways. Women’s health and privacy are particularly at risk.

Communities must organize to protect these vital rights. Now is not the time to disqualify those who, following Ms. Sarsour’s thinking, support Israel and

Planned Parenthood.

Though she was co-chair of the successful Women’s March on Washington, Ms. Sarsour should not be given a pass on earlier venom, nor should she be encouraged in recent offenses. Protesting Trump is not a disinfectant. Her false outrage over being held accountable for hateful statements and actions is undercut by her own media-savvy moves to promote those same actions and beliefs, an effort CUNY should not be a part of.

Remember this also: At the height of the protest movement against the war in Vietnam, with college campuses and cities roiled in violence against the White House, President Nixon overwhelmingly won re-election.

America, and New York, is more than its cities and protests. Linda Sarsour does not speak for everyone, and certainly not for New York’s diverse, organized and active Jewish communities.

Those who invited Ms. Sarsour to give a CUNY commencement address, those defending that decision and those failing to speak out against it mischaracterize what this controversy is really about, and misunderstand the political risks they’re taking. Whatever short-term benefit her New York Democratic defenders—those speaking up for her and those complicit through their silence—may get in left-leaning primary elections, the wider electorate they eventually face in a November general election will have the final say.

Michael Tobman, Publisher

Michael Tobman PUBLISHER

Andrew Holt SENIOR PUBLICATION ADVISOR

Liza Kramer DEVELOPMENT ASSOCIATE

EDITORIAL Maxine Dovere NYC BUREAU CHIEF

Lucy Cohen Blatter Jenny Powers Tammy Mark CONTRIBUTORS

Marjorie Lipsky COPY EDITOR

LETTER7 DESIGN

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CANDLE LIGHTING

Friday, May 5 Candles: 7:38 p.m.

Shabbat Ends: 8:47 p.m.

Friday, May 12 Candles: 7:46 p.m.

Shabbat Ends: 8:54 p.m.

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 3

SCHUMER IN THE NEWS

Direct Fed Investment in Big Infrastructure Projects Is a Bridge to a Stronger Economy & More Jobs in NY MODERN BRIDGE REPLACING DECREPIT ONE BUILDS THE CASE FOR SENATE DEMOCRATS’ INFRASTRUCTURE PLAN TO INVEST $1 TRILLION AND CREATE 15 MILLION JOBS UPGRADING ROADS, BRIDGES, MASS TRANSIT, WATERSEWER, SCHOOLS AND MORE

BY STAFF

U.S. Senator Charles Schumer says the opening of the new Kosciuszko Bridge this week is proof that Congress should get behind the $1 trillion infrastructure plan Senate Democrats are advancing. In a press release, Schumer highlighted that federal funding paid for 80 percent of the

construction costs for the new bridge, which is a vital link in the regional and national transportation system over which hundreds of thousands of vehicles pass each day and which provides passage for countless goods, services and labor that bolster the nation’s economy. The total cost of the

PHOTOS BY KEVIN P. COUGHLIN OF GOV. ANDREW CUOMO’S OFFICE

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bridge project was roughly $555 million, and $444 million came from federal funds.

“The bottom line is that the achievement we are touting today, one that will help keep our regional and national economy buzzing, is exactly the kind of critical construction project that would still be sitting on the shelf without federal investment,” said Schumer.

“The Kosciuszko Bridge is a prime example of what can be accomplished with direct and substantial federal investment in infrastructure, and the Senate Democrats’ infrastructure plan—that we sent to the president over three months ago—would energize thousands more projects like this to be built across the United States of America creating 15 million new jobs.

The president and Republicans should get on board with our plan and allow

America to get to work rebuilding our infrastructure,” he added.

Schumer said the Senate Democrats sent over a comprehensive infrastructure plan to the White House more than three months ago, but have yet to hear back from the administration.

“So far, no real plan has been proposed by this administration to build the many thousands of Kosciuszko bridges and roads and schools and watersewer systems we must modernize and build in every state in this nation.

What we have heard relies too much on private investment to build vital public infrastructure—and that approach just won’t get the job done. Too many communities, especially rural ones, will be left high and dry. It will reward big banks and investors, leave thousands of projects sitting on the shelf, and saddle everyone else with a lifetime of high tolls to pay for it,” Schumer said.

Schumer is also concerned that the budget proposed by President Donald Trump would defund many programs essential to New York City’s infrastructure. Specifically he mentions New Starts and TIGER. The Senate Democrats’ plan— Blueprint to Rebuild America’s Infrastructure—includes a $1 trillion investment for essential road and bridge improvement projects, expanding broadband in rural communities, repairing critical rail systems in major cities, modernizing VA hospitals, rebuilding public schools, expanding port and waterway infrastructure, and rehabilitating water and sewer structures. Senate Democrats project the spending would create more than 15 million jobs over the next 10 years.

Specifically, the blueprint proposes $210 billion to repair crumbling roads and bridges, saving the average American family more than $1,700 per

BDSWatch

British Student Union Votes Out President Who Backed Boycotts, Ridiculed Zionists

New York City Councilmen Robert Cornegy of Brooklyn and Jimmy Van Bramer of Queens joined Gov. Andrew Cuomo for the official opening of the new Kosciuszko Bridge.

year. Reconstructing roads and bridges would create 1.3 million new jobs and would provide federal funding to repair structurally deficient bridges in the federalaid highway system to ensure efficient shipping and passenger travel. The blueprint also proposes $200 billion for a new, vital infrastructure-projects program that would direct major federal investments to the most critical national projects, creating 2.6 million new jobs.

(JTA) — A Muslim activist who supports boycotting Israel and favors Palestinian resistance to the Jewish state has lost in her bid to be re-elected as president of the United Kingdom’s National Union of Students (NUS).

Jewish groups welcomed news that Malia Bouattia, who once described Birmingham University as a “Zionist outpost,” lost Wednesday to Shakira Martin, who received 402 votes to Bouattia’s 272.

“Shakira’s election demonstrates a rejection of the divisive rhetoric used by the current president, Malia Bouattia, whose past anti-Semitic comments have remained problematic for Jewish students for over a year,” a spokesperson for the Union of Jewish Students told The Jewish Chronicle. “The overwhelming majority of Jewish students across the U.K. will be grateful that NUS will soon be led once again by a capable leader who is genuinely committed to ensuring that the student movement stands up for all its members.”

Bouattia’s election last year divided campuses

across Great Britain, with several cutting ties to the National Union of Students in protest of her antiZionist rhetoric.

NJ University Students Vote Down BDS Resolution (JTA) — The student government at Montclair State University reportedly voted down a resolution calling on the school to boycott Israel.

The measure was defeated Wednesday by a vote of 11-1, with six abstentions. An earlier survey aimed at gauging student support for the measure found that 64 percent of students at the New Jersey school were opposed.

The defeat of the resolution, which was initiated by the university’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, was commended by the pro-Israel group StandWithUs, which is active on college campuses.

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 5

Choose Life:

Gabrielle Giffords Perseveres for the Public Good

BY MAXINE DOVERE

At a Temple Sinai evening in Roslyn Heights with with Rabbi White, fielded questions. Her ability former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords and her to respond, considering the massive trauma she husband, four-time space traveler astronaut Capt. endured as a result of the assassination attempt, was Mark Kelly, Rabbi Michael White emphasized the extraordinary. Asked about her recovery, Giffords congregation’s mission to pursue tikkun olam— said, “I’m optimistic; I want to make the world a repairing the world, finding what is broken, healing better place.”

Kelly concurred: “Gabby is the most optimistic and “an absolute obligation to rescue human life.”

As he introduced the evening’s speakers, the person I know. We’ve learned from fate and faith.” He rabbi anticipated that “we will be touched and further shared that Giffords’ rabbi, Stephanie Aaron, inspired by their lives, resiliency and commitment to had told them, “When things appear darkest and eradicating gun violence by stressing the importance bleakest, you have to have faith and hope.”

Gabrielle Giffords, descendant of 13 generations of overcoming the evil, immoral political opposition of Lithuanian rabbis, went to Congress to make a to gun control.”

Mark Kelly has a smooth, humorous speaking style. difference. During a “Congress on Your Corner” With a touch of localized comment—“good to be on event in January 2011, she was shot in the head by a Long Island, where gravity works most of the time”— deranged gunman. “Gabby nearly lost her life serving he told stories of aircraft carrier landings and being her country,” said her husband.

“My spirit,” said the former congresswoman, “is tracked by missiles during wartime flights, as well as a personal tale about U2 frontman Bono. “Gabby loves as strong as ever.” She said she has “learned to live both of us!” laughed Kelly, referring to the worldwide every day to the fullest...trying to become a better, stronger, tougher person rather than trying to reclaim activist Irish singer.

Kelly described his mother’s determination, which my former self.”

Kelly proclaimed that she “inspires me each and underscored the power of having a goal and a plan.

His presentation conveyed optimism and a dose of fatalism: “How good you are at the beginning is not a good indicator of how good you can become...practice, persistence and just not giving up....Life is a set of challenges….We have to focus on the things we have some control over.”

Giffords’ formal presentation was brief. “Be passionate. Be courageous,” she advised. “Be grateful for friends and family and live every day to the fullest.”

Drawing inspiration from the assembled crowd of dedicated Roslyn neighbors, she concluded by encouraging everyone, “Get involved in your community.”

Immediately following, she Former Rep. Gabby Giffords and husband Capt. Mark Kelly speak about the and Kelly, sitting center bimah importance of serving your community at Temple Sinai in Roslyn Heights.

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PHOTO COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Gabrielle Giffords is the only living female to have a U.S. Navy ship carry her name. Giffords attended the keel-laying ceremony of the U.S.S. Gabrielle Giffords in April 2014. The littoral combat ship is 419 feet long and able to travel faster than 40 knots. It was delivered to the Navy in December 2016.

The ship was “sponsored” by Roxanna Green, the mother of nine-year-old Christina Taylor-Green, the youngest of the six murdered during Giffords’ Congress on Your Corner.

every day.”

As a congresswoman, Giffords was a fan of America’s space program, said Kelly. She served on the House Armed Services Committee during her three terms. “She controlled NASA’s budget,” said her astronaut husband, a 25-year Navy veteran.

Four months after she was shot, he flew his fourth and final space shuttle mission. Kelly’s description conveyed excitement with an undercurrent of danger: “It is an amazing, fragile machine—the best space ship, but the worst airplane. It’s like a runaway train at 1,000 miles an hour, going 25 times the speed of sound until it gets into orbit, and then circling the earth every 90 minutes.”

Gun control is an obvious and major component of the Giffords-Kelly agenda. Following the murders at Sandy Hook Elementary School, the couple founded Americans for Responsible Solutions to “bring balance and level the playing field” and “be part of the solution to a problem that should have a solution.”

Gun control, said Kelly, “has become a political problem.” Noting that the National Rifle Association (NRA) has five million supporters and Americans for Responsible Solutions has only one million, Kelly urged people to “sign up.”

“There are,” said Kelly, “very powerful corporate interests involved with the sale of firearms—a significant problem.” He continued, “One of the things that is broken in Washington is our ‘gerrymandered’ congressional districts. Fixing that will be the single most difficult thing. Only about 40 of the 435 congressional districts are really competitive.” As a result, “we are paralyzed in the House.” He stressed the importance of getting corporate money out of politics.

“Everybody should find a way to serve their community. Get involved!” said Kelly. “The best days of the country are certainly ahead of us.”

Thomas LopezPierre is a candidate for City Council

Anti-Semitic City Council Candidate Says More Anti-Semitic Things

say ‘Italian,’” he said. “We live in neighborhoods based on race, class and religion. It’s a fantasy to believe otherwise. There are Jewish neighborhoods, there are Puerto Rican neighborhoods, there are Jamaican neighborhoods, there are Indian neighborhoods.”

Lopez-Pierre alleged that there was a scheme among Jewish landlords in Harlem to take investment money from Israel, buy apartment buildings in the historically black neighborhood and push tenants out.

“These Jewish landlords are using their ownership to engage in ethnic cleansing of black and Latino tenants,” he said. And he added that Jewish journalists choose not to report on it.

“Your colleagues in the Jewish media, they don’t want to talk about this,” he said. “But maybe you have a pair of balls. I’d be impressed.”

Lopez-Pierre says he’s a licensed real-estate broker. He’s also behind a series of apparent business ventures in Harlem to promote African-American patronage of African-American–owned businesses, but it’s unclear how active

any of them is.

One venture was the “Harlem Restaurant Book,” a guide to black-owned restaurants in the neighborhood. But now, the website harlemrestaurantbook.com is the homepage for the Harlem Family Eviction Prevention Fund, a tenants’ rights group also chaired by LopezPierre. The fund has an empty events calendar, and its record of “bad landlord news” ends in 2015. Lopez also created a site for the Harlem Real Estate Fund, where he’s the only employee.

At least one venture of Lopez-Pierre appears to have netted him some cash. According to the New York Post, he raised more than $5,000 with a crowdfunding campaign by pretending it was an effort to oppose him.

Lopez-Pierre dismissed the idea that he was engaging in anti-Semitic bigotry.

“If Jewish doctors are angry with me because I’m attacking greedy Jewish landlords, if Jewish social workers are upset with me because I’m attacking greedy Jewish landlords, too bad; I don’t care,” he said. “It’s not my job to care about their feelings.”

BY BEN SALES

(JTA) — Thomas Lopez-Pierre says he’s not an anti-Semite.

He just believes a cabal of “greedy Jewish landlords” is conspiring, funded by money from Israel, to conduct “ethnic cleansing” of black and Latino residents from Harlem. He believes the Jewish media are covering it up.

And if his rhetoric makes Jews upset?

“Too bad,” he says. “I don’t care. Only now am I realizing that Jewish people can’t seem to separate themselves from each other,” he told the JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency) in an interview Friday. “An attack on greedy Jewish landlords is perceived to be an attack on all Jews. And you know what? Too bad.

If that’s the way the Jewish community wants to take it, too bad.”

Lopez-Pierre is running a primary campaign against Democratic City Council member Mark Levine, who since 2014 represents a district covering

much of West Harlem in Upper Manhattan. Lopez-Pierre previously ran for the seat in 2013, unsuccessfully.

His screed against Jewish landlords is at the center of his campaign. His Twitter bio reads, “Jewish landlords OWN 80% of private rental buildings in Upper Manhattan; GUILTY of GREED for pushing Black/Hispanic tenants out.”

The Anti-Defamation League released a statement calling LopezPierre’s statement a “deeply offensive anti-Semitic stereotype.”

During a 20-minute conversation, I tried to extract why Lopez-Pierre thought the landlords’ religion was important. He repeated the 80 percent figure—but wouldn’t provide any evidence for it—and launched into a lecture on what he called “group economics,” or how members of a certain ethnicity or religion work together for their mutual benefit.

“If they were Italian, I would

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 7

Commencement Controversy CUNY IS UNDER FIRE FOR INVITING CELEBRITY ACTIVIST LINDA SARSOUR TO SPEAK AT GRADUATION CEREMONY

BY MAXINE DOVERE

“This is nuts!” Assemblyman Dov Hikind told radio host John Catsimatidis. “She is someone who associates with and supports radical Islamists.”

The “she” in question is Linda Sarsour, who speaks of “Zionist trolls,” says “nothing is creepier than Zionism” and calls children who throw rocks “the picture of courage.” She is a BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) proponent and vocal supporter of Sharia law. And she has also been invited to present the June 1 commencement address at the City University of New York School of Public Health & Health Policy by its dean, Ayman A.E. El-Mohandes.

He describes her as “a leader who has been successful as a community organizer, recognized by national leaders and who has emphasized women’s health issues.”

At the commencement ceremony, Sarsour is set to join honorary-doctorate recipient Chirlane McCray, first lady of New York City; and Dr. Mary Bassett, commissioner of the New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, who will receive the CUNY School of Public Health (SPH) Champion of Public Health citation.

Dean El-Mohandes has defended the invitation of Sarsour, noting that former President Barack Obama nominated her as a “champion of change,” and pointing out that she supported efforts

by Muslims in St. Louis to raise funds for a vandalized Jewish cemetery.

New York Jewish Life (NYJL) was given access to a letter sent from the

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dean to “SPH Faculty, Students, and Colleagues.” He defended his choice of Sarsour, saying his central focus in choosing commencement honorees was New York women who have provided leadership and inspiration.”

This has done little to quell the outrage expressed by many prominent Jews. In a recent interview, Abe Foxman, director emeritus of the AntiDefamation League (ADL) and head of anti-Semitism education at New York’s Museum of Jewish Heritage, described Sarsour as the “champion of equal rights, except when it comes to Jewish rights.” He went on to say, “She plays that game, ‘I love Jews; I don’t like Zionists,’ what I would call a throwback to 1948.” Foxman called Sarsour “an enemy of Jewish sovereignty and Jewish liberation...a bigot.”

While Foxman opposes CUNY’s decision to invite Sarsour, he acknowledged that rescinding her invitation could engender more controversy by “turning Sarsour into a free-speech martyr….CUNY would be better off learning about her views and distancing itself appropriately.”

Foxman is also concerned about the politicization of anti-Semitism, which increased during the election and persists. “Stop blaming Trump for the increase [in anti-Semitism],” he said.

“The increase is out there because of instability, hypernationalism, anxiety, because of the internet.”

Also upset with CUNY’s decision is Rabbi Meyer May, executive director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

PHOTO BY MAXINE DOVERE

“For a champion of hate to be speaker at a commencement is intolerable— Sarsour is an outrageous choice,” he said, while suggesting that CUNY officials encourage students to use critical thinking when listening to her speech.

Sarsour does have many vocal supporters in this controversy.

Assemblyman and former Obama staffer Michael Blake, currently a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), has threatened “anyone who dares to expose Sarsour and criticize her hateful views,” effectively raising the Brooklyn-born activist above criticism by members of the Democratic party.

Blake tweeted, “Making it real clear. If you keep coming after [Linda Sarsour], we’re going to respond directly, consistently, and with all heart and soul.”

Republican assemblywoman and

potential 2017 New York City mayoral candidate Nicole Malliotakis was not scared off by Blake’s tweet. In a statement to New York Jewish Life she said, “Linda Sarsour is not a suitable commencement speaker for the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Public Health and should be disinvited. CUNY is a publicly funded institution and as such should take greater care in choosing its speaker to ensure a platform is not given to someone divisive or inciting. Unfortunately, Linda Sarsour is both.”

In 2012, Sarsour was designated a “champion of change” by President Barack Obama for her strengths “in the areas of community development, youth empowerment, community organizing, civic engagement and immigrants’ rights advocacy.” Sarsour arrived on the national stage as an

organizer of the Women’s March in January of this year. She shared the position with several co-organizers including convicted murderer and terrorist Rasmea Odeh.

Sarsour has been raised above criticism by many prominent media outlets as well. Time magazine called her a “suffragist of our time” in naming Sarsour one of the 100 Most Influential People of 2017. U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York wrote about the march, saying, “It was a joyful day of clarity and a lightning bolt of awakening for so many women and men who demanded to be heard…and it happened because four extraordinary women—Tamika Mallory, Bob Bland, Carmen Perez and Linda Sarsour [Gillibrand excluded Odeh from the statement]—had the courage to take on something big, important and urgent, and never gave up.”

Gillibrand continued, “The images of Jan. 21, 2017, show a diverse, dynamic America—striving for equality for all.” Fortune magazine also included Ms. Sarsour and her National Women’s March co-organizers on its list of 2017’s 50 World’s Greatest Leaders.

The New York Times said she “is loud, strident and inflected with both street smarts and the tropes of intersectionality, the trending term.

That means Ms. Sarsour has sought in the Jewish community is taken to speak not only for those who for granted,” he said. share her religion, but also for othRichard Allen, founder of JCC ers: women, gays, prison inmates, Watch, echoed this sentiment. It is victims of racial profiling facing the “amazing that people are not strong problems that concern her.” enough to speak out against Sarsour.

Not all media have been kind The fact that she “is speaking at the to Sarsour. The New York Post deHenry Street Settlement is sad,” he scribes her as “NYC’s Queen of said. “Good organizations are being Hate.” used to ‘kosher’ someone who is “Radical and leftist supporters anti-Israel and anti-Jewish. may say the invitation is a freedom- City University of New York School “This is not a matter of freedom of-speech issue. It is not,” said Jeff of Public Health & Health Policy of speech. It is a question of what Wiesenfeld, a former trustee of the Dean Ayman A.E. El-Mohandes is proper. Would we give a platform City University of New York. He said to a member of the Klu Klux Klan?” this is not the same as if a student or faculty member Allen asked. “There must be a border that cannot be invited a speaker to campus. Commencement speak- crossed. Being honored for what she represents is not ers and honorary degrees are used as a marketing tool, appropriate at City College of New York, a public inwhich makes the invitation to Sarsour worse. “It is de- stitution. We seem to have lost our moral compass.” spicable that CUNY would invite someone who...calls Some of the harshest criticism came from Kenneth Zionists creepy.”

Abramowitz, a leader in the healthcare industry. “It Asked to comment on the praise given to Sarsour by makes no sense to have speakers at universities who Sen. Gillibrand, Wiesenfeld said the senator is “gener- don’t believe in American values or goals. The job of a ally absent in the Jewish community. Apparently, she university is to teach American values to the students. has decided to make her mark with an endorsement Linda Sarsour doesn’t believe in the Constitution or for a vile, anti-Semitic individual.” the Bill of Rights. What is she doing here?” he said.

He went on to say he thinks Gillibrand and many Abramowitz continued, “Every country has rules. If other politicians tend to take the Jewish community you don’t believe in the rules you should not be here.” for granted. Politicians “do things to us that would be He said Sarsour seeks to use American rights to unacceptable to any other ethnic group. It is an insult destroy American values. Acknowledging that “as to our intelligence. Kirsten Gillibrand can no longer an individual, she has a right to her ideas,” he asked, get a free ride,” he said.

“Why would a taxpayer want to finance a speaker who Weisenfeld also said he was “deeply disappointed” doesn’t believe in American values at a publicly supby the lack of response from the Jewish community ported American university? If so, the university is opin this case. “If there were someone expressing an erating under a false narrative, and those behind this opinion similar to Sarsour’s against any other ethnic event should be terminated.” group, would there not be people protesting? Civility Abramowitz said he is alarmed by Sarsour’s support

of the Muslim Brotherhood, a political organization he said is not unlike Communists or Nazis. “Would we invite an advocate of Communism or a Nazi to speak at a publicly funded university commencement?....Of course we should have speakers of different views— unless they are disloyal to America. Our enemies seek our destruction,” he emphasized. “We don’t want to finance in any setting that receives taxpayer funding or subsidies.

“She can claim she has the right to destroy America as we know it. But, she has no right to say it in front of an audience at a taxpayer-funded institution,” Abramowitz said, underlining that anti-Semitism and racism are illegal.

“She a racist. If the administration of CUNY will not stop her, it should be fired!”

Sarsour’s rise to prominence has become a political hot-button issue. Many elected officials have tried to steer clear of weighing in on this dispute. One who did speak with NYJL was Congresswoman Carolyn B. Maloney, who represents parts of Manhattan and Queens.

She told us that “while I support any effort to empower women and was delighted to see the massive crowds who turned out for the Women’s March, I am troubled by Linda Sarsour’s strong rejection of the state of Israel and the people who proudly identify as Zionists. She has testified before the New York City Council in support of the BDS movement; tweeted a picture of a Palestinian child with a rock in each hand that she captioned ‘The picture of courage. #Palestine’; and tweeted, ‘Nothing is creepier than Zionism.’ These positions do not build good will, friendship or peace in the world. Can’t [CUNY] do better?” the Congresswoman questioned.

Perhaps the Congresswoman’s calendar has an opening June 1?

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 9

OUR CIVIC LIFE

TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY REPORT:

Nyla Jenkins, a firstgrader at KIPP STAR Harlem College Prep Charter School

Violent attacks against Jews declined worldwide in 2016, but anti-Semitic hate speech spiked, especially on U.S. college campuses

BY STAFF

TEL AVIV – Violent attacks on Jews dropped for a second straight year, but other forms of anti-Semitism are on the rise worldwide, in particular on U.S. college campuses, according to the annual report by Tel Aviv University’s Kantor Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry.

The annual report, published last week, found that assaults specifically targeting Jews, vandalism and other violent incidents fell 12 percent last year, from 410 incidents in 2015 to 361 incidents in 2016. However, general anti-Semitism is on the rise: AntiSemitism on U.S. college campuses increased by 45 percent, and the incidence of anti-Semitic hate speech, particularly online, rose dramatically.

“It has been a year of contradictions,” said Prof. Dina Porat, head of the Kantor Center and chief historian of Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem.

“On the one hand, an overall decline in violent anti-Semitic attacks; on the other, a dramatic rise in online manifestations of anti-Semitism— and Twitter is the worst for antiSemitic hate speech. This, along with concern over the possible impact of the refugee crisis and extreme-right nationalist groups striving for power, is causing growing anxiety among Jewish communities around the world.”

The Kantor Center’s annual report, a global overview of anti-Semitic incidents, is based on surveys conducted by recognized watchdogs from dozens of countries, including nearly all European Union member states. The full report is available at http://www. kantorcenter.tau.ac.il/sites/default/files/ Doch_full_2016_230417.pdf.

The study found a 60 percent drop in anti-Semitic incidents in France

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PHOTO BY CASSI FELDMAN

and a similar decrease in Belgium, sites of violent attacks against Jews in the past few years. According to Porat, the decline can be attributed to government-sponsored protection for Jewish centers and institutions that have “special security needs”; improved intelligence on terrorist cells perpetrating attacks on Jews; no specific military operation involving Israel in the past year; and “the fact that more Jews avoid appearing in public spaces with identifying attributes such as a yarmulke and a Star of David.”

Although there has been an overall decrease in violent anti-Semitic attacks around the world, this has been “counterbalanced by a sharp increase in verbal and online attacks and a sharp increase in anti-Semitic incidents in countries historically friendly to Jewish communities,” said Porat.

According to the report, the year 2016 saw a 10 percent increase in general anti-Semitism in Australia and an 11 percent increase in the U.K. Moreover, “campuses across the U.S. continued to be a hotbed for antiSemitism, especially when disguised as anti-Zionism.”

Higher-education leaders expressed a deepening concern about the report.

“We must restore civility and tolerance to politics and the national discourse.

On college campuses, it is critical that administrators foster an environment that promotes collaboration among those who disagree and a forum for students to truly hear the perspectives of others. We need to lobby our leaders aggressively to fight anti-Semitism and we must partner with non-Jewish leaders to fight against hatred of all kinds,” said Dr. Alan Kadish, president of the Touro College and University System.

At NAACP Hearing on CharterSchool Moratorium, Foes and Fans Find Common Ground

BY CASSI FELDMAN

When the NAACP called for a moratorium on charter schools last fall, the group’s president and CEO, Cornell Brooks, said the group wanted a “reasoned pause,” not a “doomsday destruction” of charters.

Still, it ignited a firestorm among charter-school supporters and sparked a series of hearings nationwide, the last of which was held Thursday in New York City. But rather than a heated debate, the panelists and public speakers took pains to find common ground.

“We cannot have a situation where schools are pitted against each other,” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, told the packed auditorium at Harlem Hospital Center.

Many panelists said the problem wasn’t school choice, but the fact that too many parents felt compelled to seek alternatives to struggling district schools.

“If you go into communities where education is working, you don’t see people scrambling around, trying to figure out what school to put their child in,” said Lester Young, a member of the state Board of Regents. “We have communities in New York City right now where parents say there is not one middle school I can place my child in.

Now, that’s the issue.”

Still, many of the speakers also acknowledged problems with charter schools, particularly in states where the laws governing them are more lax than

they are in New York.

“We want to make sure that those schools are going to accept students that have special needs,” said Rebecca Pringle, vice president of the National Education Association. “We want to make sure that we do not create separate systems that are unequal.”

The charter-school advocates on the panel seemed to agree that some charters weren’t working. They were quick to denounce for-profit charters, for instance. “For-profit operators have no business in education,” said Katie Duffy, CEO of Democracy Prep Charter School. Our children “are not assets and liabilities and they shouldn’t be treated as such.”

Rafiq Kalam id-Din II, who founded a charter school in Bedford-Stuyvesant, spoke about the need for more schools like his, founded and staffed by black and Hispanic community members.

Without naming names, he called out charter schools that believe “if you don’t sit a certain way, you can’t learn” or are using suspension as a “first response” rather than a last resort.

“Criminalizing the behavior of our children—there should be a moratorium on that,” he said.

But it was Nyla Jenkins, 7, a firstgrader at KIPP STAR Harlem College Prep Charter School, who drew the most applause of the night when she took the microphone and declared herself a junior lifetime member of the NAACP. “Let’s find a solution for all of us,” she said.

Celebrate Israel— By the LITTLE BLUE

Etan, the Man in the Box: For almost a century, Jews have placed coins in “the Blue Box,” a JNF fundraising tradition that continues in support of Israel.

BY MAXINE DOVERE

At its third annual community-wide commemoration/celebration of Israel’s Memorial Day and independence, the Jewish National Fund (JNF) gathered a “congregation of congregations, united by love of Israel,” at Temple Emanu-El in Manhattan. Senior Rabbi Joshua Davidson welcomed an overflowing crowd to an evening of memory and hope, song and celebration. He noted that the realization is that dreams are born out of sacrifice.

“We honor the moment of memory before the celebration,” he said.

At the event, a group of Americans and American Israelis led a musical blue-and-white celebration and the consul general of Israel in New York, Dani Dayan, spoke of the 600,000 people who have welcomed a new life in Israel.

“The Jewish state,” he said, “is an economic miracle.

Our enemies want to exterminate us. Despite that, we strive and live.”

He spoke of the might of Israel’s military, saying, “We worship peace, not war. We want to give life. We

Box

will always have the values of Jerusalem, and the ability to defend ourselves by ourselves. Israel is a string of miracles.”

Clergy and leaders of the Upper East Side Jewish community added words and thoughts. Rabbi Neil Zuckerman of the Park Avenue Synagogue spoke of the restoration of the freedom of the Jewish people as they re-established themselves in their ancient homeland—a people loving peace but knowing how to defend themselves.

Rabbi Maurice Salth of Central Synagogue noted “the right of the Jewish people to return to their own country” and the historic connection between the Jewish people and their ancient homeland.

Joel Mosbacher, Rabbi of Temple Shaaray Tefila, spoke of the dignity of the immigration to Israel. He stressed that the people of Israel have contributed to the right to be among the founders of the United Nations, a right that is irrevocable: the right of the Jewish people to be masters of their own sovereign state.

Rabbi Scott Bolton continued the reading of Israel’s Declaration of Independence, as pronounced by the state’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, at the Tel Aviv Museum in 1948. “We declare this moment of the 5th of Iyar, May 14, 1948, establishing the provisional government of the Jewish State.”

Rabbi Ben Skydell of Congregation Orach Chaim continued the reading of the declaration and the Jewish state’s promise to safeguard the holy places of all nations.

Temple Shaaray Tefila’s cantor, Todd Kipnis, recalled the state of Israel’s entry into the family of nations.

Cheryl Bier, director of Bnai Zion, intoned the

Joan Muss, whose family founded the Muss School in Kfar Saba, is the creator and sponsor of the blue and white floral decorations. The Jewish National Fund is now a partner in the school. Its programs bring high school students to Israel for a semester-long study program.

call for peace: “We appeal to the Arab citizens to participate,” he said. “We extend our hand in peace.”

In 69 words (representing Israel’s 69th anniversary), seven teens, visitors to the state and members of Israeli Scouts in New York gave quick survey impressions.

Said Elena Messinger, “The first word I think of about Israel is ‘home.’” Adam Israelovitz recalled his bar mitzvah at the Western Wall as rockets flew above; Arielle Geisner called Israel “the land of my people,” with a shout out of am yisrael chai—the Jewish People live!; Rachel Fruchman spoke of “a country like no other”; Gabbi Hatu expressed gratitude; Emily Janenover spoke of the love of the Israeli people and willingness to share their homeland; and the final speaker spoke of “a certain feeling that is Israel.”

And it rained blue and white balloons, abundant falafel was enjoyed by all, and the blue box danced.

The Jewish National Fund commemorated Yom HaZikaron—Israel’s Memorial Day—and celebrated Yom HaAtzmoot—Israel’s Independence Day—at a fun- and falafel-filled event at Temple Emanuel in New York.

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 11

CULTURE & EVENTS

A New Yorker Editor Picks 7 of His Favorite Jewish Cartoons

BY GABE FRIEDMAN

Cartoonist Bob Mankoff at the Crosby Hotel in New York City, Feb. 9, 2016 CINDY ORD/GETTY IMAGES FOR AMAZON STUDIOS

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(JTA) — Bob Mankoff has been the cartoon editor at The New Yorker for 20 years. But he’s been a Jew for 73.

The celebrated cartoonist, who is stepping down from his prestigious perch this month, has therefore had a long time to formulate his thoughts on Judaism and Jewish humor. For example, he once wrote an essay about how Jews have become the “People of the Joke,” as opposed to the “People of the Book.”

“The Jews of the Bible aren’t funny,” he told the JTA (Jewish Telegraphic Agency). “[Judaism] is a decent first draft of how to behave. It’s a really good try for 4,000 years ago.”

Mankoff mined his Jewish experience for many of the 900plus cartoons he has published in the magazine, such as one with this caption: “I’m not arguing, I’m Jewish.” (His most famous cartoon might be one with a man on the phone saying, “How about never—is never good for you?”)

Born to parents who understood Yiddish (his mom spoke it fluently; his dad, not

quite) on New York’s Lower East Side in 1944, Mankoff grew up in Queens in an age of Jewish assimilation into white American culture.

“Assimilation has a tension to it, to maintain who you are but to change,” he said.

“That’s a great mix for comedy because humor always has a double perspective—on what appearances are and what reality actually is.”

Mankoff, who has written a memoir and been the subject of an HBO documentary, doesn’t plan on slowing down after leaving The New Yorker this month. He will teach a class at Fordham; continue to lead the Cartoon Bank, which licenses New Yorker cartoons; and work on a new project called Botnik Studios, which aims to inspire better jokes through computer algorithms.

The JTA asked Mankoff to pick his favorite Jewish-themed cartoons from over the years, and he was happy to oblige. (The first one is a Mankoff original).

Read on and enjoy.

CULTURE & EVENTS

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 13

CULTURE & EVENTS

A Miracle Retold

BY MAXINE DOVERE

When “Der Nes in Geto”—“A Miracle in the Warsaw Ghetto”—was produced in 1944, the ashes of the Warsaw Ghetto had hardly cooled. The play, which commemorates the courage of the fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, was first presented in New York in October 1944, while the war against the Jews raged on.

For four weeks, the Ghetto fighters fought the Nazis. Information on which the play is based was conveyed to author H. Leivick mostly by the Polish Underground; very little was known at that time about what had happened behind the Ghetto walls.

The author, who had escaped Siberian exile and arrived in America in 1913, was a prolific writer, producing dramas and many articles about Jewish life for newspapers and journals.

“Der Nes in Geto” was produced by the National Yiddish TheaterFolksbiene on April 19 in a concert reading at the Museum of Jewish History—a Living Memorial to the Holocaust. The date marked the 74th anniversary of the uprising. The play is a portrayal of the courage and resolve of a small group of survivors determined to decide their own fate.

Some 400,000 Jews had been forced into the Ghetto of Warsaw. Three years later, illness and starvation, deportations and killings left only about 37,000 alive. When it was realized that the Germans planned to liquidate the entire population, Jews revolted for the first time in that war. They faced the unlimited power of the Nazi war machine with handguns and “Molotov cocktails.” The final results were no surprise; the amount of effort and time the Nazis needed to defeat this poorly armed band was.

The concert reading was emotional, full-bodied and engrossing. The play was produced in the original Yiddish; a bilingual English and Russian “crawl” ran behind the performers. One could feel a mother’s anguish, understand a young man’s fear, and be impressed by the courage of the fighters and their

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Polish compatriots who ferried guns and potatoes to those who remained alive. The love of Yisrael was tender and deeply sad. There were few dry eyes in the audience as the cast sang the “Partisan’s Song.”

A few Jews managed to escape the Ghetto. Some joined bands of partisans hiding in the woods. The Bielski brothers and almost a thousand survived for several years, fighting the Germans from behind their own lines.

The National Yiddish Theater recently celebrated its 100th anniversary. Established in 1915, it was the first “socially minded” production company. It served the language and cultural needs of an immigrant population—both of artists and audiences. Its productions explored life in “The Goldeneth Medina”—the Golden Land. It currently produces both traditional and new productions, playing in front of more than 100,000 patrons annually.

Zalmen M’lotek, artistic director of the National Yiddish Theater-Folksbiene, with his son Avram M’lotek following the April 19 performance of “Der Nas b’ Geto” (“A Miracle in the Warsaw Ghetto”)

M’lotek with the youngest member of the company, eleven-year-old Saul Ferholt-Kahn, a student of the Yiddishe Shoole of the Worksmen’s Circle

IN OUR COMMUNITY

Assemblyman Cymbrowitz looks at a first-place intermediate school project.

Inna Stavitsky, president of the Holocaust Memorial Committee, lights one of the six memorial candles.

Assemblyman Cymbrowitz Hosts Ceremony Honoring Winners of Holocaust Memorial Creative Arts Contest

BY STAFF

Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz (D-Brooklyn) honored the student winners of his 17th annual Holocaust Memorial Creative Arts Contest on Sunday during a ceremony at Kingsborough Community College’s Marine Academic Center.

The ceremony featured remarks

by Michelle Anderson, president of Kingsborough Community College.

For this year’s contest, student had to respond to the following quote by Elie Wiesel: “There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.” The writer and Nobel laureate died in 2016.

In his opening remarks, Cymbrowitz spoke about some of the winning projects, including a suitcase filled with a teddy bear and other meager belongings of a young, orphaned Holocaust survivor who was headed to a displaced persons’ (DP) camp after the war. Cymbrowitz noted that his own parents, Sam and Sonia, spent five years in a German DP camp; his brother was born there as well.

“My parents were fortunate to have each other, but they too were forced to

rebuild their lives amid terrible loss and devastation,” he said.

After the war, just as now, there were refugees who had nowhere to go and countries that were unwilling to take them, Cymbrowitz said. He spoke about one student’s project, which presented a three-dimensional depiction of W.H. Auden’s poem “Refugee Blues”: “Once we had a country and we thought it fair,/Look in the atlas and you’ll find it there:/We cannot go there now, my dear, we cannot go there now.”

Assemblyman Cymbrowitz presents Holocaust Remembrance Month resolutions to survivors who give their time as volunteers at the Kings Bay Y.

“I’m proud that the Assembly district I represent includes many thousands of immigrants—people who came to the U.S. to escape countries where they couldn’t vote, couldn’t practice their religion and where they feared for their physical safety,” he said. “Blind hatred offends all of us deeply. We’re united by our respect for people of all religions and ethnic backgrounds. Our strength lies in our desire to treat each other with decency and kindness, and to speak out whenever we see people being mistreated.”

Addressing the sharp rise in antiSemitic incidents over the past year, Cymbrowitz told the audience, “AntiSemitism is still alive and well, and that’s the reality we’re living with today.

It’s a frightening reality, but being afraid won’t help us. What will help us is using our voices to stamp out hate; using our words to make the world a better place.

“Sadly, the number of survivors who bore witness to this tragic time

in our history is getting smaller. The survivors need all of us—everyone in this room—to carry on their mission,” he said. “So it’s critically important that you continue to learn, to read, to watch videos of Holocaust survivors talking about the war—and, if you can, to talk to our survivors in person.

“They’ll tell you how they lived in a house very much like yours with parents and siblings. They went to school, laughed with their friends, played sports, had dreams about the future. And then one day the Nazis came and their childhood came to an end. Many of these children never saw their families again,” he said.

Cymbrowitz sponsors the contest with the Manhattan Beach Jewish Center, Holocaust Memorial Committee, Lena Cymbrowitz Foundation and Project Witness to honor the six million who perished and also to teach students that antiSemitism and bias-motivated violence remain painfully relevant issues.

The ceremony included musical performances by the Edward R. Murrow High School orchestra and senior chorus. The contest attracted entries ranging from essays to artworks to original dramatic performances, all conceived by third- through 12thgraders in public and private schools throughout Cymbrowitz’s district.

Also on display was an exhibit called “Producing Silence: Hollywood, the Holocaust, and the Jews,” provided by the Harriet and Kenneth Kupferberg Holocaust Resource Center and Archives at Queensborough Community College.

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 15

OUR WORLD

Jewish Israelis and Palestinians at a coexistence meeting in the West Bank, July 22, 2015

NATI SHOHAT/FLASH90

Arab Israelis Are More Positive than Jews About Israel, Survey Finds (JTA) — Arab Israelis are more likely to describe Israel’s “overall situation” as good than their Jewish counterparts, a survey found.

Some 66 percent of Arab Israelis said their country’s situation was “good” or “very good,” according to a survey released Sunday by the Israel Democracy Institute and Tel Aviv University. Only 43.9 percent of Israeli Jews agreed with that statement.

Arabs were also more likely than Jews to assess positively Israel’s performance in different fields and on various issues. In the fields of medicine and health, economic stability, and education and science; and on the issues of the state’s attentiveness to the needs of its citizens and reduction of social gaps, a larger percentage of Arab Israelis assessed the country’s achievements as “very good” or “moderately good.”

For example, 93 percent of Arabs and 67 percent of Jews had a positive view of Israel’s achievements in medicine and health, and 46 percent of Arabs and 19 percent of Jews had a positive view of their country’s achievements in reducing social gaps.

Only in one field—national security—did a higher portion of Jews, 83 percent, assess the state’s achievements in a more positive light than Arabs, at 74 percent.

However, the Arabs were less likely to show national pride than their Jewish counterparts, with

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51.1 percent and 86.1 percent, respectively, saying they are proud of their Israeli identity.

A majority of both groups—61 percent of Arabs and 73 percent of Jews—are optimistic about Israel’s future.

The survey was released a day ahead of Israel’s Independence Day, which commenced on Monday evening. The survey was conducted over the telephone by the Midgam Research Institute on April 18-19 and included the responses of 600 adults, with a margin of error of 4.1 percent.

ON THE ISSUES Maintaining security: Eighty-one percent of the Israeli public sees Israel’s ability to maintain the country’s security as “moderately good” or “good.” Only 2.6 percent see it as “not good at all.”

Maintaining economic stability: Here, too, Israelis are confident in their state. Some 62 percent of Jews and 75 percent of Arabs see the situation as moderately good or good.

However, when it comes to reducing social gaps, more than one third (35.6 percent) of the public sees the situation as “not so good” or “not good at all.”

Attentiveness to what citizens want: Only 2 percent of Jews and 5 percent of all Israelis think Israeli leadership is doing a moderately good or very good job at paying attention to what citizens want. In fact, a majority of Jews believe the situation is not so good (47.9 percent) or not good at all (28.7 percent).

Source: The Israel Democracy Institute

site of the Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam, a structure completely destroyed by the Nazis. “AntiSemitism never dies. It is today alive and well—on the internet; through physical aggression, murder, destruction of property and cemeteries.”

In one of his most powerful statements of the evening, the Secretary General labeled anti-Semitism “absolutely unacceptable. It is proof that the worst things that have been done in past centuries can return.”

Waxing philosophical, Guterres questioned the inherent contradiction between anti-Semitism and the Age of Enlightenment. He then said what this audience had come to hear: “You can be absolutely sure that as secretary general of the United Nations, I will be in the frontline of the struggle against anti-Semitism. The United Nations will condemn

BY MAXINE DOVERE anti-Semitism.”

The secretary general went on to acknowledge that The World Jewish Congress (WJC) held its 15th Secretary general of the United Nations Antonio bias against Israel clearly exists in the United Nations: plenary assembly in New York April 22-25, gathering Guterres addressed the delegates. He began his “The United Nations is complex. Member states act some 600 Jewish community leaders from almost remarks by acknowledging that the Holocaust was according to their own interests. It is my role, as 90 countries worldwide. President of the Congress “the culmination of centuries of anti-Jewish behavior secretary general, to guarantee that we abide by the Amb. Ronald S. Lauder opened the plenary with a stemming from the Romans.” Still, “Jews were one of charter....I consider that the state of Israel needs to be call to remember the Six Million—six million Jews, a the reasons Amsterdam became the global economic treated as any other state.” million and a half of them children, who died from powerhouse of the medieval world.”

He assured the assemblage that he would abide by indifference and silence. “The Jewish people paid the Prior to his appointment at the United Nations, that principle “even when it is uncomfortable....It is highest price for silence,” said the ambassador. “We Guterres was prime minister of Portugal. He noted clear that it is the absolutely undeniable right of the will never be silent again.” that he had worked with very distinguished Israeli state of Israel to exist and live in peace and security “Tonight is a meeting of memory,” he continued, statesmen including Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin with its neighbors.” noting that the organization was the first to cry out and President Shimon Peres. Guterres stated that his “The world would not be the same without the against the Holocaust, calling the attention of the commitment was “to find peace—a fair peace for both Jews,” concluded Guterres, noting “the extraordinary world to the horrors committed by the Nazis. “The Israel and Palestine.” contribution of the Jewish people to world loss was incalculable.”

The Portuguese diplomat described a visit to the civilization.”

In a taped message to the plenary, President Donald Trump said, “We must stamp out prejudice and antiSemitism everywhere it is found….We cannot ignore Iran….America stands strong with the state of Israel.”

Rabbi Arthur Schneier, a strong supporter of the World Jewish Congress, is a Holocaust survivor.

As he prepared to say the haMotzi prayer (blessing over the bread), he emotionally recalled that “today is the opening of a wound from childhood—a scar is reopened. We must tell the painful story….And the world was silent—except for those who had the courage to say, ‘We will not tolerate.’”

Amb. Lauder returned to the podium to offer a warm and personal tribute to Elie Wiesel, calling him the “conscience of the world.”

Lauder recalled Wiesel’s penetrating statement, “The opposite of love is not hate, but silence. The silence was Hitler’s advance to continue his The New York Congressional delegation at the 15th plenary of the World Jewish horrors.”

Congress included (clockwise from bottom left): Democrats Carolyn Maloney, Eliot “May the memory of Elie Wiesel Engel and Nita Lowey; and Republican Lee Zeldin. be a blessing,” said Lauder. “He was, above all, a mensch and my friend.”

Lauder, WJC Call for a Stand Against Dangerous Silence

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 17

Zionists Respond to UNESCO Attack on Israel

BY STAFF

The United Nation’s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s resolution was met with forceful words of condemnation from many prominent groups around the world. Among those angered by the action was Richard D. Heideman, president of the American Zionist Movement, which is a federation of 25 American Zionist organizations and youth groups.

UNESCO Votes to Condemn Israel’s Sovereignty in Jerusalem NEW YORK (JTA) — The United Nations’ cultural agency voted to condemn Israel’s sovereignty in Jerusalem.

UNESCO—the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization— passed a resolution called “Occupied Palestine” by a vote of 22-10, with 26 countries abstaining or absent, on Tuesday.

The resolution calls on Israel to rescind any “legislative and administrative measures and actions” it has taken to “alter the character and

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status” of Jerusalem. It rejects the idea of a “basic law” in Jerusalem, based on a 1980 Knesset law, that implies that the city is one unified whole and governed solely by Israel.

Submitted by Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Qatar and Sudan, the resolution also sharply criticizes Israel’s construction in eastern Jerusalem’s Old City and “deplores” the Jewish state’s “continuous” closure of the Gaza Strip.

The vote was taken on Israel’s Independence Day and follows a highly

controversial UNESCO resolution passed last October that ignored Jewish ties to the Western Wall and Temple Mount sites.

Hillel Neuer, who heads the watchdog group UN Watch, tweeted that despite the outcome, Israel won a “moral victory” in the voting process. He noted that the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Greece, Italy and the Netherlands all voted no, and that India abstained.

“The UNESCO resolution regarding Jerusalem today rejects history and undermines the international community’s stated commitment to achieving a negotiated twostate solution with secure borders,” Heideman said. “By claiming that Israel has no jurisdiction over any part of Jerusalem, countries who supported this resolution have adopted the rejectionist and maximalist position of Hamas and other extremist and terrorist groups. International institutions like UNESCO are wrongfully working to erase Jewish history and the inalienable rights of the Jewish people to their ancient national homeland in a form of cultural imperialism which is anti-Semitic by any definition of the term. We call on all people of good will who believe in equality for Jewish self-determination and indigeneity, as envisioned by Zionism, to unequivocally reject this resolution and call on the United Nations secretary general to make good on his promise to rein in the anti-Israel bias that for decades has plagued the United Nations and consign this resolution to the junk heap as he did with the ESCWA report.”

Heideman went on to say that the timing of the resolution, on Israel’s Independence Day, further demonstrates the bias of the UNESCO member nations who put forth the measure.

OUR NATION

No One Is Assigned to Jewish Outreach at the DNC.

Who Ya Gonna Call?

BY RON KAMPEAS

WASHINGTON (JTA) — You’re a Jewish donor or macher and you need to talk to someone at the Democratic National Committee, stat. Who’s most likely to return your call?

Tom Perez, the party chairman, according to Jewish and Democratic insiders.

Perez is also pretty much it—no one else is handling Jewish issues right now.

For a party that prides itself on cultivating an array of constituencies, the absence of a dedicated Jewish staffer seems anomalous to many Jewish Democrats, especially considering that DNC liaisons are available to a range of other minority groups.

“It’s of the utmost importance to have a DNC staffer handling this vital DNC constituency,” said one Jewish Democratic activist, who, like many others, asked that his identity not be revealed because of the sensitivity of criticizing a party seen as under siege since the devastating November elections.

“There are plenty of good operatives who are available after the disappointing performance in the presidential election, and it’s puzzling they haven’t found one yet and it’s concerning they haven’t got someone doing this full time,” the Jewish Democrat said. “I like Tom Perez, but they’re really dragging their feet.”

Perez, who was elected in February, named liaisons to other communities two weeks ago.

Eric Walker, a DNC spokesman, says Perez sees cultivating Jews as key to revitalizing the party.

“Jewish Americans have always had a home in the Democratic Party, and part of Tom’s agenda is to reestablish our constituency outreach efforts with a big focus on constituencies of faith,” said Walker.

“The Jewish community will continue to play a vital role in the Democratic Party, particularly as Jewish community centers and schools are being targeted, and as the Trump administration seeks to divide us,” he added.

Jews have long been a key constituency for Democrats, and not just because their donations make up a third to a half of the DNC’s support. They are also a key vote in swing states like Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio, and have proven to be among the most dedicated organizers over the decades.

The issue came to the fore on April 19, when

Business Insider posted the DNC’s assigned roles for its officers. Liaisons were included to blacks, women, Latinos, Asians, the LGBT community, farmers and various regions—but not the Jewish community.

DNC officials and those close to them outlined various reasons why the party was slow to name a dedicated staffer or officer to deal with the Jews.

Among them: • Perez has cleared out much of the DNC staff, wanting to dismantle the perception lingering from the primaries that the committee was a redoubt of the establishment, and to reconcile the camps loyal to candidates Sen. Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton.

Perez is still in the slow grind of hiring replacements.

• The liaisons listed by Business Insider were elected officials who happened to have close ties to the communities they were assigned. Jewish candidates ran in the most recent DNC elections, but none won. Had a Jewish candidate been elected to the DNC executive post, he or she likely would have been a liaison to the community. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the last DNC chair, fulfilled that role although she—like most of her predecessors—also employed a dedicated full-time Jewish liaison.

• The whole party increasingly embraces Sanders’ argument during last year’s campaign that identity politics is alienating white working-class males; minority liaisons are not the priority they once were.

• Perez, who launched his political career in Montgomery County, Maryland, which has a disproportionately large Jewish population, is intimately acquainted with Jewish issues.

• Jews still reliably vote Democratic. Clinton received 71 percent of the Jewish vote in November, according to exit polls.

That attitude frustrates Rabbi Jack Moline, who in 2014 directed the National Jewish Democratic Council. Even with such overwhelming support, there are always ways to get out the Jewish vote, he said.

“If we are indeed a dependable constituency for the Democratic Party, it would seem the Democrats would want to mine that for other opportunities,” Moline said.

The absence of a dedicated Jewish liaison comes at a sensitive time, posing challenges and opportunities for Jewish Democrats:

• Perez’s closest rival in the DNC election, Rep. Keith Ellison, is among the Congress members most critical of Israel, and decades ago worked with the anti-Semitic Nation of Islam movement. He has long since apologized to Jews for that association.

• What it means to be a pro-Israel Democrat is in flux, with much of the party and most of its lawmakers— among them nearly all its Jewish caucus—alienated

by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s outright hostility to former President Barack Obama.

• Israel remains the key issue for many babyboomer Jewish Democrats, while younger Jews in the party are more preoccupied with confronting President Donald Trump and his associations with the far right.

• Trump’s closeness to the “alt right,” the loose assemblage of hypernationalists who induce a visceral revulsion in liberal Jews, should be an opportunity to cultivate Jewish donors and voters.

The unnamed Jewish Democratic activist said a dedicated and skilled Jewish liaison would understand how and when to massage the diverse constituencies within the Jewish Democratic community.

Donors, for instance, are known to make anxious calls when criticism of the party’s Israel posture hits the papers. A skilled liaison would know whether the criticism was serious or was right-wing trolling, and would be able to explain the difference to the donor, the activist said.

“You have to be able to differentiate between genuine constructive criticism that’s coming from a good place and the noise from people who wouldn’t support you in the first place,” he said.

Another concern is that the party could revert to a model used in the past, when a single senior staffer handled all faith outreach, supervising junior staffers assigned to the Jews, Catholics, Protestants and Muslims.

A Jewish Democrat who has held multiple roles within the party said that model did not adequately address a community that saw itself as more than simply a faith.

“It’s not like Christianity or Islam, a faith; it’s a peoplehood or an ethnicity,” said this Democrat.

“To make that distinction is important to the Jewish community.”

Rabbi Moline, who now directs the Interfaith Alliance, an advocacy group, said the reflex in the party to treat Jews as just another faith frustrated him.

“It was indeed a challenge to persuade the folks I was interacting with that Jewish self-identification was not the same as Christian or Catholic or Muslim self-identification,” he said. “I would explain that the Jewish community was more motivated by issues than by faith. Speaking the language of faith was not going to have the same impact to communities organized around the federation rather than the church.”

MAY 3 – 9, 2017 | NYJLIFE.COM | 19

OPINION

Radiohead’s singer Thom Yorke performing at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in Indio, Calif., April 21

KEVIN WINTER/GETTY IMAGES FOR COACHELLA

Why Radiohead’s Israel Show Matters

BY GABE FRIE

(JTA) — It may be the 20th anniversary of Radiohead’s seminal album “OK Computer,” but for some Jewish fans of the band, like me, all is not OK. You might even say I’m feeling “Let Down.”

Here’s why: In February, the British band announced that it was playing Tel Aviv in July as part of its world tour. These days it’s a big deal whenever a band of that stature decides to play in Israel amid the political climate in the Middle East, and as a supporter of both the band and the country, I was excited.

But earlier this week, an open letter to Radiohead signed by dozens of high-profile artists was published, urging the band to cancel the show.

“We’d like to ask you to think again—because by playing in Israel you’ll be playing in a state where, UN rapporteurs say, ‘a system of apartheid has been imposed on the Palestinian people,’” the letter reads. (The U.N. report has since been retracted and criticized by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio

20 | NYJLIFE.COM | MAY 3 – 9, 2017

Guterres.)

Reading the letter was like a punch in the gut. It was signed by many artists I respect, such as the director Mike Leigh and the screenwriter James Schamus, but it was the first signatory who hit me the hardest: Tunde Adebimpe, the lead singer of TV on the Radio.

TV on the Radio may be one of my all-time favorite bands. Radiohead may actually be my No. 1 all-time favorite band. Having them pitted against each other is like watching my best friends get into an afterschool scuffle.

The letter was the most recent action in a long series of cultural boycotts called for by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which seeks to exert economic and political pressure on Israel for its policies toward the Palestinians. Roger Waters, the former frontman for Pink Floyd, who also signed the letter, has become a poster boy for the cultural boycotts—or attempts to discourage artists

from performing in Israel and working with Israeli institutions.

Other famed musicians, such as Lauryn Hill and Elvis Costello, have followed his lead.

Adebimpe’s signing of the letter is a big win for the BDS backers. While Waters may be an old-timer whose music hasn’t been particularly relevant since the 1970s, Adebimpe’s band—which arguably hit its peak with its 2008 album “Dear Science”—is still a cultural force and the object of adoration for millennials.

Which is why his critique seemed particularly damning. After all, what if you support Israel’s right to thrive—culturally, at least, whatever you think of its current right-wing government—and love TV on the Radio (or, for that matter, Waters’ recent music)?

Boycott attempts like this one pose uncomfortable dilemmas for Jewish music fans of all ages.

If this were a letter criticizing Israel’s current government, or even an impassioned plea to bring about a two-state deal that would meet the legitimate aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians, liberal Zionists and even casual supporters of Israel’s right to exist would not be so put off.

But the BDS movement has long denied Israel’s very legitimacy, and it calls for Jewish withdrawal from Palestinian “lands”—not just the territories that came under Israeli control after the Six-Day War, but presumably the entire country established in 1948.

The letter offers shallow accusations, comparing Israel to apartheid-era South Africa and calling out Radiohead for ignoring a call to “stand against the denial” of Palestinian rights—painting the Jewish state as the only side to blame in the conflict. It fails to

OPINION

mention the decades of Palestinian terrorism that has helped swing Israel’s populace to the right, the rejected peace deals that turned hopeful Israelis cynical, or even the robust Israeli NGO (nongovernmental organization) human-rights sector that advocates for Palestinian rights.

As for the efficacy or justice of a cultural boycott, the people who would actually be affected by a Radiohead concert boycott are young, liberal Israelis who are most likely to sympathize with the Palestinian cause. Rather than engage with Israel’s cultural sector, whose members can actually bring their tools and talents to bear on shaping public opinion, boycotts leave them ever more isolated.

Furthermore, boycotts strengthen the very forces in Israel who are least likely to support an accommodation with the Palestinians.

“See?” they say. “Our enemies grow by the day!”

With those frustrations in mind, should I look at TV on the Radio any differently? A pro-Israel colleague of mine, who used to be a big Pink Floyd fan, now says Roger Waters is as good as dead to him. (He often uses less family-friendly language.) So should I not listen to TV on the Radio’s music? Should I boycott its concerts?

The awful part of this whole ordeal is that the decisions of these artists are breeding bitterness and divisiveness—the opposite of what music should be doing today (something with which I’m sure Adebimpe would agree).

Radiohead has yet to comment on the letter. If the group keeps its concert on the tour schedule, I’m not sure how I’ll feel about TV on the Radio, but I’ll probably end up loving Radiohead even more. That’s because its Tel Aviv performance gives some love to its fans in Israel and helps cultivate the culture scene there.

The band, which has garnered critical acclaim for over two decades and won multiple Grammy awards, is also bringing along two Israeli acts on its world tour, which has taken it from Europe to Mexico and many places in between. Both Israeli bands promote cross-cultural expression. Shye Ben Tzur, who collaborated with a band of Indian musicians and Radiohead’s lead guitarist Jonny Greenwood on the album “Junun”—a collection of songs with Hebrew lyrics inspired by Muslim prayer music—will open for some of Radiohead’s upcoming shows in Europe.

Dudu Tassa and the Kuwaitis, led by the Iraqi-Jewish Tassa, revives music written by his grandfather and great-uncle, the Al-Kuwaiti brothers. As the Times of Israel noted, Haifa-born Muslim Nasreen Qadri, who sings in Arabic, will join the group on the U.S. leg of Radiohead’s tour.

“You may think that sharing the bill with Israeli musicians Dudu Tassa & the Kuwaitis, who play Jewish-Arabic music, will make everything OK,” the BDS letter reads. “It won’t, any more than ‘mixed’ performances in South Africa brought closer the end of the apartheid regime.”

Well, no one act will make everything OK. But if music is about building bridges, Radiohead is on the right track.

The Miracle of the Jewish People’s Endurance Through the Centuries

BY RABBI JOSEPH POTASNIK

I recall seeing a terrific ad on the back of a Jewish magazine a number of years ago. It read, “Why is this flight different from all other flights?” As you may have guessed, this was an ad for El Al—Israel’s flag carrier airline—during the Passover season.

And so, in the spirit of the Haggadah and on this eve of the 69th anniversary of the state of Israel, I would like to pose four questions: Why is this site different from all other sites?

Why is this might different from all other mights?

Why is this right different from all other rights?

Why is this light different from all other lights?

The answer to these questions is one and the same.

Exactly 3,329 years ago, as is recorded in the Bible, with a mighty “arm” God took the Jewish people out of Egypt. God parted the waters of the Red Sea and performed awesome miracles on their behalf. The Torah tells us that the Lord performed these acts in accordance with the four terms of “Redemption”: V’hotzeiti (“I will bring you out.”), Vehitzalti (“I will save you.”), V’Gaalti (“I will redeem you.”), V’Lakachti (“I will take you.”). The Bible notes a fifth term as well, an emphatic promise: “Not only will I redeem you from Egypt, but—V’Heveiti Etchem….” (“I will bring you into the Promised Land.”)

Indeed, G-d brought us there via Joshua, the disciple of Moses. He directed His beloved nation to build two temples there in the land, and ever since they have enjoyed a continued Jewish presence in the land of Israel.

Sixty-nine years ago, Jewish sovereignty was renewed in the land. Israel was granted independence.

Once again Jews were led by Jews, and after two millennia, a mass return to the Jewish homeland ensued.

Several years ago, we were blessed to have a son born to us just a few days before Passover. At the time, I used to lead the seders at a nearby restaurant, so that year my wife stayed home with the baby and our eldest son. To give my wife some assistance, we arranged to have a babysitter there as well.

So there was my wife quietly conducting a seder and there looking on was this young woman from the island of St. Vincent. They were sitting together at the table and the young woman turned to my wife and said, “You know, my mom told me that the Jewish

people are the chosen people.” My wife asked her why her mother said that, to which she answered, “My mother told me that they are the only people to have endured through the centuries.”

For me this is such a powerful story. Of course, so many of us marvel at the story of the Exodus. And many of us muse about what it would be like if there were such miracles today. But maybe we just need to look in the mirror and appreciate that the greatest miracle in history is right before our eyes—the miracle of the existence of the Jewish people! After all that we’ve endured, the fact that we are here is testimony to God’s guiding hand.

The gift of the land of Israel is something that we must never take for granted.

People are visiting the Holy Land in record numbers. And whose spirit doesn’t soar every time he/she steps off the plane in Israel? The anniversary of Israel’s independence should be a reminder that just three years prior to its founding, a third of our people were being exterminated in the crematoria of Poland and Germany. Every day that we continue to bear witness to the blessing of the Jewish State is reason for sincere thanks, prayer and song.

Pesach always occurs during the month of Nissan.

The name “Nissan” comes from the word “Nes,” which means “miracle.” For in the month of Nissan the greatest of all miracles occurred: The Jewish people were liberated from Egypt and led on a journey to the Land of Israel. Nissan is G-d’s reminder to us that the existence of the Jewish people and the founding of the modern state of Israel is not a natural phenomenon, but is essentially miraculous.

Our sages teach us, B’Nissan Nig’alu, U’vNissan Atidin LeHiga’el. In the month of Nissan the Jewish people were liberated—and in the future, during the month of Nissan, they will once again be redeemed.

How privileged we are to live in a time when the beginning of the redemption is clearly underway.

May we merit witnessing the culmination of this redemption with the arrival of the Mashiach and the Third Temple.

L’Shana Ha’bah B’Yrushalayim. Happy Birthday, beloved Israel.

Rabbi Joseph Potasnik is executive vice president of the New York Board of Rabbis.

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