Posts tagged Israel
Indigenous Christians of Israel
Jun 17th
By Shelley Neese
Visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and you are bound to notice a short ladder resting on a second story window ledge. You can also see it in century old photographs and art in the exact same position it is today. On the surface the ladder bears testimony to the disunity of Israel’s Christian community, but scratch the surface and the ladder becomes a symbol of something altogether different—a story of endurance.
There are many legends concerning the origins of this immovable ladder but the general agreement is that the ladder was placed there by the Armenians in the early 19th century. In 1852 the Ottoman Sultan enforced the Status Quo, a rigid division of rights and property between the Church’s six competing denominations. With the Status Quo—which is still enforced today—every stair, icon, and corner and every menial chore has a designated custodian that possessively guards their turf and privileges. Under the Status Quo no part of the designated “common ground” can be changed even slightly without the consent of all the denominations. Windows and ledges fell under “common ground,” leaving the ladder untouched until the religious orders agree—for the sake of the Church façade—on moving the eyesore.
Another example of denominational rivalry at this Holy Shrine is the 12-inch iron key that controls the Church’s single entrance. For the past 816 years the owners of this key have been two neighboring Muslim families. These families meet at an exact time twice a day with the key in hand to lock and unlock the massive wooden doors. The Church can only be locked from the outside. This arrangement was originally assigned by Saladin in 1192. By allowing a neutral party to assume control of the key, the Sultan hoped to bring peace between the jealous factions whose disputes commonly turned violent.
As the Church of the Holy Sepulchre vividly demonstrates, talking about the “Indigenous Christians of Israel” is hardly referring to a monolithic group. They neither speak with one voice nor act as one movement. Israel’s Christians maintain a strong degree of heterogeneity along ethnic, cultural, and denominational lines. The Christians of Israel—consisting of at least 20 ancient churches and 30 Protestant denominational groups—are a microcosm of Christianity at large.
Survey of Christians in Israel Christians constitute 2.1 percent of Israel’s total population, putting their numbers around 148,000. This statistic does not include Christians under the rule of the Palestinian Authority in Judea and Samaria. The great majority (around 80 percent) of Israel’s Christians are Arabic-speaking and indigenous to the region. They are Christian Arabs who after Israel’s War of Independence in 1948 stayed inside Israel’s new borders and became citizens of the new Jewish state.
Many of these indigenous Christians have lineages that go back to the early periods of Christianity. The Greek Orthodox have historical roots in the region from the days of the Byzantines. The Armenians have had a heavy presence in Jerusalem since the 5th century. The Syrian Orthodox claim an unbroken presence in Jerusalem since the 6th century. The Egyptian Copts built churches near the Holy Places in the ninth century. Roman Catholics came over with the Crusaders in 1099. The Protestant churches did not come to Israel until the 19th century when the Western powers revived their interest in the Holy Land.
Most Christian Arabs in Israel are affiliated with one of the traditional Christian confessions. 42 percent are Greek Catholic; 32 percent are Greek Orthodox; and 16 percent are Roman Catholic. Other confessions in Israel include the Armenian Orthodox, Syrian Orthodox, Ethiopian Orthodox, Armenian Catholic, Syrian Catholic, Maronites, Melkites, and Egyptian Copts. Of Israel’s 7,000 resident Protestants, the largest group by far is the Anglicans (4500). There are a host of other Protestant denominational groups including Lutherans (700), Baptist (900), and Evangelicals (400).
State of Affairs
In 1949 there were 34,000 Christian Arabs living inside Israel. Over the last 60 years the population has more than tripled. This stands in stark contrast to the Christian communities in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza where Christians have been emigrating at alarming rates, particularly after the establishment of the Palestinian Authority. There Christians have dropped from 15 percent of the population to just 1.3 percent today. Bethlehem, the place of Christ’s birth, has gone from 80% Christian to 80% Muslim. From 1997 to 2002, the Christian population in the West Bank declined 29 percent and in the Gaza Strip it went down 20 percent. In roughly the same period from 19952003, the Christian Arab population in Israel grew 14.1 percent (CAMERA, Dec. 24, 2004).
Almost everywhere else in the Middle East the Christian community is in decline. In the Middle East as a whole 2 million Christians have fled in the last 20 years. Given current trends, many Church leaders are concerned that in a matter of decades Christians in the Middle East will be on the verge of extinction. Israel—the only place in the region where the Christian community has grown in the last half century—is the exception.
Rights and Freedoms
Christians in Israel enjoy the inherent advantages of living in a democratic pluralistic society where they are guaranteed many rights and freedoms. The different religious communities are free to observe their own holy days and days of rest. They have freedom of worship and access to the Christian Holy Places.
Christians in Israel vote and are active in the political arena. They receive compulsory education and attend Israel’s public universities. Israel’s Christians are characterized by low levels of unemployment (even lower than the Jewish population) and high levels of education. They are generally middle class and live in urban areas. 70% of Israel’s Christian Arabs are concentrated in the Galilee, chiefly Nazareth where they make up over a quarter of the population.
On statistical analysis, the Christian Arabs of Israel more closely resemble the Jewish population than the Muslim population. This is true economically and educationally and it is also the case in their birth rates and housing patterns. According to Daphne Tsimhoni, an expert on Christians in Israel:
“The average number of births for a Christian woman is 2.6, a little lower than that of a Jewish woman (2.7) and far lower than that of a Muslim Arab (4.8 per woman). In 1998 the average Christian household had 3.6 members per unit, a little higher than the Jewish 3.2 and by far lower than the Muslim household (5.4 per family). The average Christian finished twelve years of schooling, compared with the average Muslim who finished nine.”(1)
Concerns and Dilemmas
After acknowledging the ways Christians are flourishing in Israel, it would be amiss to overlook their unique dilemmas as well. For the Christian Arabs in Israel, they are a minority within a minority in a majority Jewish state. Many Christians in Israel say their community struggles to maintain their identity. Being Christian, they will always be viewed suspiciously by Muslim Arabs as potential collaborators with Israel. Being Arab, they will never fully integrate into the Jewish state. Being Christian Arab, they often feel rejected by the wider, particularly Western, Christian world.
Christian Arabs generally find common ground with their Muslim counterparts in their support for Palestinian nationalism and resentment of Israel’s identification as a Jewish state. The most critical Christian spokespeople are the Arab church notables, like Rev. Naim Ateek and the Latin Patriarch Michael Sabbah. The public utterances of these church leaders and their persistent condemnations of the “occupation” are intended to embarrass the Israeli government. Israel has on more than one occasion asked the Vatican to restrain Sabbah’s rhetoric but to no avail. The lay Christian Arabs choose to express their discontent through political and legislative channels. From 1950 until the mid 1970s, Christians accounted for about 50 percent of the Arab members of Knesset, far exceeding their proportion in the population (2).
As for Christian Arabs relations with their co-citizens in Israel, tensions between Christians and Muslim have mounted since the 1980s but particularly over the last eight years. The second intifada and its emphasis on violent resistance alienated Christians operationally. Though many Christian Arabs speak critically of Israel they do not engage in political violence. There has never been a Christian suicide bomber in Israel (3) nor are there any Christians in Israeli jails suspected of terrorism (4). With the electoral victory of Hamas and its takeover of Gaza, Christians are also put on the defensive ideologically. The Palestinian national movement has become an Islamic movement where at best Christians are merely tolerated and at worst they suffer the same fate of Rami Khader Ayyad, owner of Gaza’s only Christian bookstore who was murdered in October. The intentions of the Islamic movement are uncomfortably clarified in the common Palestinian grafitti: “First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people.”
In regards to Christian-Jewish relations, despite Christian Arabs’ often pro-Palestinian stance, they tend to have a low level of social conflict with Jews. They coexist well in mixed Jewish-Arab towns like Haifa where Christians often prefer to live because of the stronger Western influence. While there is no formal segregation, there are obvious patterns of self-segregation. Christian Arabs speak Hebrew as a second language and have adapted to Israeli culture.
Most importantly, Christians may sympathize with Palestinians under the Palestinian Authority but they believe their own future is tied to Israel. This was best demonstrated in 2004 when the Sharon government was flirting with the idea of ceding the Galilee Triangle, which is mostly Arab, to the Palestinian Authority; 90% of the Arab residents (Christian and Muslim) said they wanted to stay in Israel.
Future
Christians have been a permanent fixture of the religious landscape in the region for 2,000 years. From the preaching of Peter at Pentecost through the successive foreign occupations to present day in the Jewish state, Christians have shown enormous staying power in the Holy Land. Though the outlook for Christians in the rest of the Middle East seems bleak, Christians in Israel are slowly growing and thriving. Christians in Israel who do not admit as much and publicly criticize the state at least acknowledge that they are only able to do so because they enjoy so many rights. One can only hope that one day Christian Arabs overcome the pressure exerted on them by their Muslim counterparts and come to appreciate their status as the Middle East’s freest Christians.
When tour guides bring Christians to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, they inevitably point out the ladder on the second story window and the one-way lock on the Church doors. As they speak of these legends, the Christian groups blush from embarrassment at such petty examples of denominational dissension. But what they often do not appreciate is that the ladder and key have had such permanence because Christians are still there, still fighting, and creating workarounds. When that wooden ladder rots it is actually replaced with a new one. Once a year, the largest denominations at the Church submit an official request to win back the iron key. The ladder and key are actually symbols of stability that characterize the unbroken tradition of Christians living in the Holy Land.
(1) “Israel and the Territories Disappearance Disappearing Christians of the Middle East” by Daphne Tsimhoni. Middle East Quarterly (Winter 2001).
(2) Ibid.
(3) There were three Lebanese Christian Suicide Bombers during Lebanon’s Civil War in the 1980s. George Habash, leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, is often cited as an example of a Christian terrorist but Habash was more Communist than Christian.
(4) Archbishop Hilarion Capucci of the Greek Catholic church is the exception. He was caught smuggling arms for terrorists into Israel from Lebanon in the early 1970s and was imprisoned in Israel for three years.
Shelley Neese is managing editor for the The Jerusalem Connection Report.
Educating Biden?
Mar 18th
By Victor Sharpe, Family Security Matters
Vice President Joseph Biden was apoplectic in Jerusalem. Was it because of another Palestinian suicide atrocity against Israeli civilians, or that Mahmoud Abbas, the Chairman of the Palestinian Authority, had yet again announced that he would never accept the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state?
No, it was because those wicked Israelis announced preliminary tenders for planning and zoning permission to the Jerusalem Municipality for the construction of apartments in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo (Solomon’s Heights).
Building houses for young Jewish couples and families? Terrible! Shocking! How can such aggression be allowed to continue? Biden’s angst exposed the Kafkaesque and groveling acceptance by the Obama administration of Arab and Muslim demands that Jews not be permitted to live in the eastern suburbs of Jerusalem or, for that matter, anywhere in land once conquered by Muslim armies in the name of Allah – and for the Palestinian Arabs that ultimately includes every square inch of Israel.
No matter that Jewish patrimony precedes Islam itself and Muslim occupation by millennia. The Arabs, who call themselves Palestinians, demand that the world, and the United States in particular, ignore history. For them, as always, myths matter more than facts.
Obama’s Vice President, Joseph Biden, came to sweet talk Israeli leaders into thinking that President Obama would not countenance Iranian nuclear threats against the Jewish state. But the Biden visit to Israel, far from meeting its avowed goal of smoothing over the differences between the Obama administration and the Jewish state, left Jerusalem and Israelis more distrustful than ever of Obama’s intentions.
Of course, the same Obama administration has done little or nothing to stop the relentless drive by the mad mullahs of Iran to build nuclear bombs or the missiles to deliver them. Nor, in all reality, does this administration ever intend to use truly effective means to stop Ahmadinejad in his quest to unleash nuclear hell upon everyone in order to usher in the perceived Islamic messiah, the twelfth imam.
So now Israel, for daring to add one brick upon another, is excoriated in the national, international and state run medias as endangering the so-called “peace process.”
There was no mention by Biden of the ceaseless Arab aggression against the very existence of Israel or of the terror and destruction Israel has been forced to endure from the Palestinian Arabs. Instead, Biden tells Abbas, while embracing this unrepentant Holocaust denier, that these same Palestinian Arabs, despite all their violence “deserve a state.” Nor did he mention that it would be carved out of tiny Israel and created in the very biblical and ancestral Jewish heartland: Judea and Samaria (the West Bank). No mention either that Jews would be forbidden to reside in the new Arab state. Apartheid-Arab style.
Of course, Biden, clueless as ever, expressed displeasure at the decision by Israel to build houses in the East Jerusalem suburb, while failing to disclose that the land, as with other suburbs in “disputed” parts of East Jerusalem, was originally home to many Jews who were driven out in 1948 by the British-officered Jordanian Arab Legion.
This territory was finally liberated by Israel from its Jordanian Arab occupiers during the defensive June, 1967 Six Day War Israel was forced to fight, 19 years after the Jordanians had illegally annexed it.
In those 19 years from 1948, during which the Jordanians occupied the region, they never remotely considered it as anything but Jordanian. Certainly they never thought it belonged to another Arab people who later called themselves Palestinians. As it was, Jordan’s illegal occupation of East Jerusalem, as well as of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), was recognized by only two countries: Britain and Pakistan.
But nevertheless, the Obama White House and the relentlessly anti-Israel State Department decided that they will echo the demands of the Palestinian Authority and call for Israel to stop building homes – not only in Judea and Samaria, but even within the very suburbs of Israel’s capital city, Jerusalem.
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu reluctantly agreed to the Obama enforced freeze on home building for a 10 month period throughout biblical Jewish Judea and Samaria – but not in Jerusalem.
Meanwhile, Arab settlement building has continued unchecked and at a feverish pace without a murmur from President Obama. Double standards? To quote Sarah Palin: You betcha! It matters not to Obama or Biden that Jerusalem – east, west, north and south – has been described as the eternal city of the eternal people.
Rabbi J.H. Hertz, Chief Rabbi of Great Britain, who spoke in 1918 at the thanksgiving service for the British liberation of Jerusalem from the Ottoman Turks, referred to the nearly 4,000 years of history that bound the Jews to every part of their spiritual and physical capital city and of their fate in defending it against its many would-be conquerors. He said:
- “Like the Jew, this Holy City of Israel is deathless; fire and sword and all the engines of destruction have been hurled against it in vain. The Babylonians burnt it and deported its population; the Romans slew a million of its inhabitants, razed it to the ground, passed the ploughshare over it and strewed its furors with salt; Hadrian banished its very name from the lips of men, changed it to Aelia Capitolina and forbade any Jew from entering it on pain of death. Persians and Arabs, Barbarians and Crusaders and Turks took it and re-took it, ravaged it and burnt it; and yet, marvelous to relate, it ever rises from its ashes to renewed life and glory.”
Rabbi Hertz was talking on the very day on which, 2,080 years earlier, Judah Maccabee, the legendary Jewish hero, led his warriors against the Greek-Syrians to liberate the Holy City from its heathen occupiers, whereupon he entered the Temple and re-dedicated it to the glory of the One and Only God. Rabbi Hertz ended his speech by proclaiming the prophetic teaching of the Maccabean Festival, which we know as Hanukkah, in Zechariah, 4:6: “Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord of Hosts.”
Now the Palestinian Arab mufti in Jerusalem denies that there ever were Jewish Temples in the Holy City or that Judah, Israel and Judea ever existed or that Jews even lived throughout the Land for millennia. In doing so, he also denies Christianity’s early history and theology. But, sadly, such fantasies are all too common for most members of the “religion of peace.” Even Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan, who is rapidly Islamizing once secular Turkey, has denied that the Tomb of the Jewish Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, in Hebron and the Tomb of Rachel in Bethlehem, are Jewish. Erdogan parrots the Islamic myths by calling them Muslim.
Now there is a government and a Prime Minister in Israel under assault by President Obama, who demands that Israel abandon parts of eternal Jerusalem and give it away to those who hate the Jewish people and who have set their face against accepting any Jewish independence or sovereignty in the Land of Israel.
It is instructive to dwell on what has been said by both Jews and non-Jews in the past about Jerusalem, for Jerusalem and Zion are interchangeable. Perhaps, Vice President Biden will come to understand that one can go back for such affirmation through the mists of time to the towering words in Isaiah 2:1 and Micah 4:2: “For out of Zion shall come forth the Torah and the word of God from Jerusalem.”
These are just two of the 821 times that Jerusalem and Zion appear in the Jewish Bible: Jerusalem 667 times, and Zion 154 times. The words also appear in the Christian bible, though fewer times. They do not appear at all in Islam’s Koran.
According to the much-loved correspondent for the Jerusalem Post, the late Moshe Kohn: “Jewish sources speak of the seventy names by which Jerusalem is referred to in the classical Jewish sources. These include Ariel/lion of God (Isaiah 29:1); Kirya Neemana/Faithful City (Isaiah 1:25); Ir Ha’emet/City of Truth (Zechariah 8:3); Klilat Yofi/Paragon of Beauty (Lamentations 2:15); Yefay Nof/ Beautiful Panorama (Psalms 48:3); and the ancient commentary of Rabbi Akiva in Sanhedrin 58a on 1 Chronicles 29:11 Hanetza/Eternity.”
But what of now? The modern State of Israel endures a world willing, even anxious, to divide Jerusalem again – even as it still celebrates the reunification of Berlin – and force it to give away ancestral and biblical Jewish lands to an enemy led by a Holocaust-denier, Mahmoud Abbas, whose own Fatah organization, alongside Hamas, continues to gleefully take credit for murdering Jews.
Israeli leaders may yet, foolishly and tragically, permit Jerusalem to again be divided with barbed wire and pill boxes marking a new and hateful border, just as it was before 1967 when Jordanian Arab snipers made life a living hell for the Jewish residents, with ancient synagogues destroyed and Jewish gravestones on the Mount of Olives desecrated and used as latrines for the Arab Legion.
If Barack Hussein Obama has his way, and his Vice President continues to do his bidding, the ancestral Jewish homeland in Judea and Samaria will also be lost – not by the ravages of an enemy host, but, to its eternal shame, by an Israeli government acquiescing in its own national suicide; its borders reduced to a mere nine miles wide at its most populous region from the Mediterranean Sea to the foothills of the Judean mountain range – a border, which the late Israeli statesman, Abba Eban, once described as the “Auschwitz borders.”
Victor Sharpe is a freelance writer and author of Volumes One and Two of Politicide: The attempted murder of the Jewish state. This article originally appeared in Family Security Matters (www.FamilySecurityMatters.org).
Israel’s “Non-Jewish Jews”
Mar 2nd
By Shelley Neese
When new immigrants (olim) arrive to Israel, the first step in the absorption process is attending ulpan—an intensive Hebrew language course for adults. It is an Israeli right of passage. When I moved to Beer Sheva in 2000 on a student visa, I electively enrolled in an ulpan at the local Mercaz Klita (absorption center). In a class of twenty-one students there were eighteen from the former Soviet Union states, two from Venezuela, and myself. Everyone except me had immigrated to Israel as a Jewish citizen.
For a field trip the class visited the old port city of Jaffa, just south of Tel Aviv. After an organized tour and Hebrew lesson we broke off on our own to sightsee. I wandered over to the beautiful Franciscan St. Peter’s Church where, much to my surprise, three of my Russian-speaking classmates were already kneeling in prayer and making the sign of the cross. When they noticed my wide eyes, they gave me an amused shrug as if to say “this is no secret.” These classmates were my gateway into the complex world of Israel’s Russian-speaking Christians. But they were by no means my last.
The Influx
Israel has seen several waves of Russian immigration as Jews, under the Soviet Union, were cut off from Jewish learning and were regularly subjected to state-sponsored anti-Semitism. Zionists were accused of treason and denied the right to relocate to Israel. In 1970, a window opened as the Soviet Union briefly bowed to international pressure, lifting their tight quotas on exit visas. Jews clamored to get out, thousands moving to Israel, before the window closed again. The floodgates opened completely, however, with the collapse of the Soviet Union. From 1989 to 1993, 800,000 immigrants came to Israel—the largest aliya movement since the creation of the modern Jewish state. (Aliya, literally meaning “going up,” is the Hebrew word for immigrating to Israel.)
In 2008, there are 1.3 million Russian speakers in Israel, out of a total population of 6.5 million. As it stands, more Jews have immigrated to Israel from the former Soviet Union than from any other country in the world. A significant portion of these olim—as many as 500,000—are not considered Jewish according to orthodox laws (halacha) and are ignorant of Jewish tradition. In my ulpan class this was exemplified by the stunned silence when our teacher asked about the holiday of Passover.
The exact number of Christian olim is complicated because many maintain a low religious profile. According to the Israeli Bureau of Statistics, 23,000 Russian-speaking immigrants are self-classified as Christian. Thousands of others, who are probably Christian, declare their religion as “unclassified” or “other.” The unofficial count of Christian Russian immigrants is around 80,000.
The Controversy
The Law of Return in Israel states that any Jew can become a citizen of Israel. Under the “grandchild clause” in the Law of Return, anyone with a Jewish grandparent also qualifies for aliya. The idea is that since the Nazis targeted someone who was one-quarter Jewish for extermination, he or she should be granted protection by the Jewish state. In accordance with this clause and its extension to non-Jewish family members, Israel’s Ministry of Interior says that 15% of all Russian immigrants during the 1990s came as non-Jews. In recent years this percentage has risen to 58%.
Restricting the Law of Return to curb non-Jewish immigration is a controversial topic in Israel. Orthodox proponents, like the political party Shas, believe it is time to cancel the “grandchild clause.” They worry that Israel will lose its Jewish identity if it does not stop the entry of immigrants who are not Jewish by halacha. Opponents to any change in the Law of Return argue that it is the foundational principle of the state and that the law should not cater to the Orthodox. Plus on a practical level immigration helps tilt the demographics of the region in Israel’s favor.
The Israeli authorities hope most of the immigrants who are not halachically Jewish assimilate into the Jewish majority or participate in one of the several conversion programs for olim. Shuvu is the nationwide school system with an enriched Jewish curriculum that teaches young immigrants Jewish traditions. The IDF has its own “friendly” conversion process for Russian-speaking soldiers. They offer courses in Judaism and Zionism and have seen over a 15% conversion rate among immigrant soldiers. Outside the military, however, the conversion process is much more restrictive with only half of one percent of immigrants converting each year.
The Jewish factor
Immigrants from the former Soviet Union—be they Christian or secular—have in a short period dramatically changed the cultural and religious backdrop of Israel. It is no longer difficult to find grocers selling pork, and at Christmas there is an abundant selection of tacky Santas and plastic ornaments. The IDF is currently providing no small number of New Testaments at the request of Christian immigrants who prefer it to the Hebrew text for their swearing-in.
Russian Christians have created a new religious minority in Israel. Like any immigrant population the first generation has struggled to assimilate, but the second generation has been absorbed into the flexible definition of what it means to be Israeli. They speak Hebrew, watch Israeli television, serve in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), and marry other Israelis. Some have converted to orthodox Jewry but many have integrated socially while retaining their Christian faith. Though they are unaffiliated with Judaism, they do affiliate with the Israeli-Jewish culture and do not oppose Judaism’s place in public life. They are sometimes referred to by Israelis as the “non-Jewish Jews.”
For many of these “non-Jewish Jews,” serving in the IDF is an opportunity to prove their patriotism. The casualty rate for Russian immigrants is around three times higher than the norm because many of the immigrants volunteer for the more dangerous army units. In the Second Lebanon War, nearly one-quarter of those who received medals of valor were Russian-speaking immigrants and almost the same proportion received military burials.
Despite their patriotism, the Christian olim experience a certain level of institutional discrimination. Israel’s Orthodox Chief Rabbinate controls issues of “personal status,” such as marriage, divorce, and burial. There is no option for a civil marriage ceremony if citizens are not halachic Jews. They have to leave the country if they want to marry or use an approved Christian clergyman. Furthermore, non-halachic Jews are not supposed to be buried in Jewish cemeteries, even if they are IDF soldiers who died in combat.
The Sensitivities
The subject of Russian Christian immigrants in Israel is a sensitive one that most are hesitant to discuss because there are still many obstacles to overcome. But for a country that prides itself on its complicated ethnic makeup, Israel is certainly capable of finding that delicate balance that will protect the Jewish character of the state and still ensure the religious freedoms of this new Israeli Christian minority. After worshiping in a two-thirds Russian speaking congregation in Beer Sheva for several years I rejoice in the vibrancy the olim have brought to the Israeli-Christian community. Personally, I can no longer imagine an Israel without the extra cultural religious layer that the Russian immigrants provide. I have my ulpan classmates to thank that I still to this day speak Hebrew with a hint of a Russian accent.
Shelley Neese is managing editor for the The Jerusalem Connection Report.
God will curse the EU
Dec 1st
“Now also many nations have gathered against you,
Who say, “Let her be defiled,
And let our eye look upon Zion.”
But they do not know the thoughts of the LORD,
Nor do they understand His counsel;
For He will gather them like sheaves to the threshing floor.
“Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion;
For I will make your horn iron,
And I will make your hooves bronze;
You shall beat in pieces many peoples;
I will consecrate their gain to the LORD,
And their substance to the Lord of the whole earth.” (Micah 4:11-13)
“May God curse the European Union.”
This was my instinctive, furious response to the news that broke in Israel today, that Europe plans to call next week for the redivision of Jerusalem.
According to Ha’aretz: EU foreign ministers are expected to issue an official call next week for Jerusalem to be divided, in order to serve as the capitals of both Israel and a Palestinian state. The paper said it has obtained a draft document authored by the current holder of the rotating EU presidency, Sweden, and implying that the EU would recognize a unilateral Palestinian declaration of statehood.
December 1 saw EU member states celebrate – with fireworks, music festivals etc. – the official coming into force of the Lisbon Treaty.
The recently-ratified agreement – which will effectively turn the EU into the United States of Europe – is not yet fully in play, and already the Continent’s leaders are flexing their muscles and making it clear just which way things will go if they have their way.
As Spanish Prime Minister Luis Zapatero insisted in an interview with Der Spiegel on November 23 – when asked whether he “truly believe[d] that this new Europe can be a player in the same league as the United States and China:”
“But we are already playing in the top league.”
Europe has long vied with the America for a more influential role in the Middle East land-for-peace process. Tuesday saw it muscling its way right on in there.
It will start by putting its weight behind the Palestinian Arab effort to steal Jerusalem from the Jews; and it stands poised to recognize the Arab theft of Israel’s historical and biblical land.
In the draft statement obtained by the Israeli paper, the EU Council calls on “all parties to refrain from provocative actions,” even as it, with extreme prejudice, emphasizes that is has “never recognized the annexation of East Jerusalem,” and demands that Israel “cease all discriminatory treatment of Palestinians in East Jerusalem” and permit them to reopen their institutions in the city.
The EU, it continues, welcomed PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad’s recently floated proposal to unilaterally declare the establishment of “Palestine” and would “be able, at the appropriate time, to recognize” this state.
It’s been spelled out countless times before: The Palestinian Arabs have never had a state in any of this land, whereas the Jews’ claims to and history in all of it stretches back thousands of years.
Before being held at terrorism’s gunpoint and hijacked by states that hate Israel, many in the international community recognized that this land in its entirety – was rightfully the Jews’.
And when it comes to Jerusalem:
No other nation – least of all the non-nation called the Palestinians – has ever had this city as a capital. Jerusalem has never been the capital of any Arab state or of any Muslim state. It is not mentioned once in the Quran and exhaustive historical records show that the founder of Islam himself literally turned his back – and ordered his followers to turn their backs – on Jerusalem. Those parts of the city that suffered under Arab occupation did just that – suffered. When Arabs were in control Jerusalem was a run-down, dilapidated slum – its Jewish quarter vandalized and left to rot.
Since the reign of the Jewish King David, who established his throne in Jerusalem in around 1000 BC, Israel has considered this city the capital of the nation. Since their forced expulsion from Jerusalem 2000 years ago, every Jew who has ever prayed in accordance with his faith has daily petitioned the Almighty for the return of the Jewish people to the city and the return of the city to the Jewish people.
There is no contest here. The Bible and History concur: This land and this city belong to the Jews. The Arabs have no claim or right to either.
Those supporting this “Palestinian” piracy are accessories to the crime of land theft and worse, because they are aiding and abetting the Arabs in their genocidal goal, which remains the destruction of Israel.
They are calling the wrath of Heaven down on themselves:
And it shall happen in that day that I will make Jerusalem a very heavy stone for all peoples; all who would heave it away will surely be cut in pieces, though all nations of the earth are gathered against it. (Zechariah 2:3)
May God Yet Bless America
Nov 26th
Christian Americans, my friends over there tell me, are on the move. Like soldiers emerging shell-shocked from a battle where they have been bombarded with round after round of high explosive, they are starting to shake off the stupor created in the ten months since the US became the Obamanation.
Today is Thanksgiving. And today, as with Jacob and Esau in the womb, it appears as if two nations are struggling together inside the borders of that great country in a way some see as portending another civil war.
Millions are thanking Father God for founding and building and keeping and using America – a city set on a hill.
Millions of others are thanking mother nature; liberal humanism; their lucky stars; Hollywood – anything but the Creator – for the headway they have made in steering America away from its Christian roots, especially now that they have in the White House a man who champions their vision.
From the expressions of outrage, shock, anger and rejection that have come from enormous numbers of patriotic Americans these last months, it seems the Obama administration has most effectively employed political blitzkrieg against them. The president and his democrats on the hill have stunned and overwhelmed many.
Will they win, or will the very enormity of the negative impact they are making on their Christian countrymen generate a backlash strong enough to unseat them and to reverse the destructive policies they are trying to force upon America?
In Israel, we are watching keenly. Washington has been squeezing the Netanyahu government mercilessly to stop building homes for Jews in the Jews’ homeland. President Obama does not have many friends here.
And there are those of us who see the connection very clearly between the way America’s leaders deal with Israel and what happens internally in the United States.
I am a Christian with American roots going all the way back to the Mayflower. For years I have been concerned (for America’s sake, not only for Israel’s) about the ever-widening rift between these two countries. On my own, and with my family, I have traveled across the US to appeal to Christians not to allow their government to impose a “two state solution” upon the people of Israel. Still the attempt to do so continues; today more intensely than ever.
And yet, on this Thanksgiving, I thank God for America. I thank God for the enormous good America has contributed to mankind all across the globe, and for the many ways in which America has blessed Israel.
I thank God too that there ARE millions of God-fearing Americans who will not lie down and let their country be taken away from them. Together with non-American friends of the United States around the world I pray that God will remember what He has always purposed that country to be, that through His people He will move to roll back the darkness and restore His light from one side of America to the other.
It’s a big prayer, but it’s not too big.
As I finished writing this, a “US Warrior” in Augusta, GA, emailed me.
“This is running on all the blogs over here in America,” she said. “We are going to get our country back, very shortly! We are going to rally!”
She’d attached the following:
On October 3, 1789 President George Washington released this proclamation:
By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation.
Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor– and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.
Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be– That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation–for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war–for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed–for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted–for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.
And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions– to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually–to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed–to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord–To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us–and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.
Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.
Two hundred and twenty years ago, the President of the United States wrote those words.
Untold numbers of American citizens are invoking them today.
May God hear the prayers of His people. May God bless them.
And may God YET bless the United States of America.
Arabs to Israel: Juden raus
Nov 4th
By Victor Sharpe
In a recent article in the Wall Street Journal titled, The Ugly Premise of Settlement Opponents, James Woolsey, former director of Central Intelligence under President Clinton, pointed out that the charter of the Fatah party – which is that of Palestinian Authority Chairman, Mahmoud Abbas – foresees a “Palestine free of Jews.” He referred to the recent Fatah demand that:
Israel must give up all of Jerusalem before it would begin negotiations on a two-state solution.
Mr. Woolsey also referred to President Obama’s embrace of the Palestinian Arab’s judenrein policy in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) as well as in the eastern half of Jerusalem.
The judenrein policy was employed by the German Nazis to ethnically cleanse areas of Jews throughout Europe, which the Wehrmacht had occupied. The chilling words, “Juden raus” (Jews out) were barked by German soldiers as they perpetrated the terrifying expulsions and massacres known as aktions.
Last June in Cairo, President Barack Hussein Obama further embraced the PA’s anti-Jewish policy by announcing that Jewish neighborhoods in eastern Jerusalem are settlements.
In East Jerusalem, according to Israel National News:
300,000 Jews live in the neighborhoods of Gilo, French Hill, eastern Talpiot and Ramot, among others.
I have long urged Israelis and pro-Israelis alike to stop using the term, settlements, in English when describing Jewish communities in Israel and, instead, begin calling them what they are; villages, towns or cities.
After all, Arab communities are always referred to as villages, not settlements, even though many have existed for fewer years than Jewish villages. This is a double standard.
This word, settlement, in English has now become a pejorative term indicating that the Jewish communities are an alien and colonial presence imposed upon another people’s land.
This is a blatant falsehood for it is the Arabs who are largely the alien presence within the biblical and ancestral Jewish homeland and particularly in its very heartland known as Judea and Samaria (the West Bank). For over 3,000 years there has been a continual Jewish presence in the Land; small at times but with never a break in its continuity.
But, unlike the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, which reject the rights of Jews to live in Arab occupied territory, Arabs live within Israel as citizens with more democratic rights than they enjoy in most Arab countries.
During the British Mandate of Palestine, Arab immigration, mostly illegal, was condoned by London. Over 100,000 Arabs entered the Mandatory territory from neighboring Syria, Egypt and Transjordan with the connivance of British officials.
Indeed, if we look back at what the British Governor of Sinai from 1922-36 wryly noted in his contribution to the Palestine Commission Report, we find the following:
This illegal immigration was not only going on from the Sinai, but also from Transjordan and Syria, and it is very difficult to make a case out for the ‘misery’ of the Arabs if at the same time their compatriots from adjoining states could not be kept from going in to share that misery.
Sadly, Arab propaganda has been so effective that it has succeeded in framing the Arab imposed conflict in erroneous terms of Jewish settlement displacing Arabs.
The thousands of Arabs who illegally flooded into British Mandatory Palestine effectively destroyed the opportunities for continuing Jewish legal immigration. The descendants of these Arabs now call themselves Palestinians.
The PA claims that there are 2.5 million Palestinian Arabs in the West Bank but, according to Israeli Ambassador (Ret) Yoram Ettinger, in an article dated October 16, 2009 titled, The Case For Demographic Optimism, there are in reality 1.55 million Arabs. He writes:
An audit of Palestinian and Israeli documentation of births, deaths, school and voter registration and migration certifies a solid 67% Jewish majority over 98.5% of the land west of the Jordan River (without Gaza), compared with a 33% and an 8% Jewish minority in 1947 and 1900, respectively, west of the Jordan River.
The audit exposes a 66% distortion in the current number of Judea & Samaria Arabs – 1.55 million and not 2.5 million, as claimed by the Palestinian Authority. In 2006, the World Bank exposed a 32% bend in the number of Palestinian births. Inflated numbers have provided the Palestinians with inflated international foreign aid and inflated water supply by Israel.
Today there are still scores of Jewish properties, illegally occupied by Arabs, scattered throughout areas of east Jerusalem. They have remained in legal limbo because of international pressures against successive Israeli governments. This has led to endless delays in the return of the land and properties to their rightful owners.
But that truth is not acceptable to President Obama who joins an unholy chorus around the world in describing Jewish villages and homes in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem as illegitimate. This, while turning a blind eye to the massive illegal Arab settlement expansion, which is continuing apace.
Be assured, if Israel made the catastrophic error of abandoning its biblical heartland, it would not be long before the same unholy world chorus began referring to Jewish villages, towns and cities within the so-called 1949-1967 green line as illegitimate. James Woolsey continued:
The Obama administration seems committed to stopping growth of any kind in all Jewish settlements in the West Bank. This policy implies acquiescence in the banning of Jews from a future Palestinian state.”
He then went on to ask if 20% of Israel’s population is Arab, why is it so unacceptable for Jews to live within a proposed Arab state called Palestine? Why should such a Jewish minority be forbidden in Palestine?
Mr. Woolsey answered his own question by pointing out:
The Obama administration essentially urges us to accept that, because Palestinians will kill unprotected Jews, Jews cannot be permitted in a Palestinian state.
Any child will tell you that the Arabs, who call themselves Palestinians, are not interested in living side by side in true and lasting peace with a Jewish state. All territory they gain from Israeli concessions immediately becomes a launching pad for ever more terror and aggression against what is left of Israel.
In 1929, the Arabs massacred the Jewish community in Hebron while Britain occupied Mandatory Palestine. Hebron is one of the four holy Jewish cities, the others being, Safed, Tiberias and, the jewel in the crown, Jerusalem.
There was no reconstituted Israel in 1929 or the existence of any so-called Israeli occupied territories, yet the Muslim hatred of non-Muslims existed then as it exists today, and will tomorrow.
My earlier published article in the March 2009 edition of American Thinker magazine referred to the earlier British dismemberment of Mandatory Palestine in 1922 and the loss to the Jewish people of land east of the River Jordan. I wrote:
It is instructive to remember that upon the granting of the Palestine Mandate to Great Britain, an eminent British celebrity and supporter of Zionism, Josiah Wedgwood, addressed a Jewish audience of thousands at the Royal Albert Hall in London in which he urged them to stand up for Jewish rights in its homeland.
According to the late Shmuel Katz in his groundbreaking biography of the great Zionist leader, Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky, titled The Lone Wolf, Wedgwood, a Christian Zionist, said:
… This lesson I want the new Jewish nation to learn and to get by heart: Stand up for your rights. Let us have more of the spirit in the Jewish movement of my good and gallant friend, Jabotinsky.
I then went on to write:
Sadly, Israeli governments have become notoriously fearful of rejecting outright the deadly trap inherent in the so called two-state solution. Their muted responses have merely encouraged world leaders to repeatedly breathe new life into the discredited plan. The searing tragedy is that the two-state solution may presage for the Jewish people another Final Solution.
But one thing is for sure, Man Child in the White House, Barack Hussein Obama, will not be listening any time soon. Nor will Hillary Clinton. Sadly for them, political expediency trumps historical justice and simple morality.
Victor Sharpe is a freelance writer and author of Politicide: The attempted murder of the Jewish State. www.lulu.com
Defining moments in American Black-Jewish relations
Feb 27th
By Shelley Neese
Jews and Blacks came together naturally out of shared experiences of persecution and perseverance. Like any complex relationship there were periods of cooperation and of conflict. The 1950s and early 1960s are known as the Golden Years when Black and Jewish communities joined hands to take the lead in improving national race relations. But Jews played a major role in the development of civil rights organizations decades before. With the end of the long costly years of fighting racial discrimination in the courts and on the streets, the two communities experienced a marked break down in their relationship. With the rise of Black Power, race riots, and Israel’s wars, Blacks and Jews saw less mutual concerns and both turned inward. This timeline is not a comprehensive narrative of Afro-American history, American Jewish history, or the Civil Rights Movement. It is simply a retelling of the moments in history when Blacks and Jews crossed paths in meaningful ways that shaped their relationship and individual destinies.
1619 and 1654 (Entry to America)
The first black Africans arrive in the American colonies in 1619; the first professing Jews in 1654. Africans are forcefully shipped over as indentured servants; Jews are fleeing from persecution in their home countries and seeking a better life. A conservative estimate of the number of Africans who perish during the centuries of the slave trade is 15 million.
Note: Though the first official Jewish immigrants to America came in the 17th century, groups of Marranos (Jews who were forcefully converted to Christianity during the Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions) fled to the New World two hundred years earlier.
1619-1865 (Imagery of the Exodus)
Racial slavery is legalized within the boundaries of the United States soon after the founding of the first colonies in Virginia. Between 1619 and 1807 approximately 645,000 Africans are shipped to what is now the U.S. By the Civil War, the slave population grows to 4 million.
The bondage of slaves is maintained by slave masters’ violent punishments. If slaves slow in their labor or try to escape they are brutalized and beaten or even murdered. As family members are sold at will, slaves live under the constant threat of families being torn apart. Under these terrorizing conditions, slaves look to the Bible for hope of salvation. Slaves, exposed to biblical teaching in the Protestant South, cling to the story of the Exodus. The imagery of God rescuing his people out of bondage in Egypt provides inspiration for slaves seeking freedom. Black slaves await their Moses and dream of a Promised Land.
Evidence of slaves’ affinity for stories of the Children of Israel is found in the many Gospel spirituals and freedom songs. For example, by 1790 slaves are singing, “Go Down Moses, Way down in Egypt’s land. Tell ole Pharaoh, Let my people go.” Another example of Afro-Americans early feeling of connection to the Holy Land is the use of “Zion” in the names of Black churches from the earliest times (i.e. Mount Zion, Zion Baptist Church).
1619-1865 (Early Jewish positions on slavery)
Like their Christian neighbors, the majority of the Jewish community in the South support slavery, or at least do not speak out against it. The percentage of Jews in the South involved in the slave trade (buying, owning, or selling) is comparable to the percentage of other whites (5-7%).
The Jewish population of the South by 1860 is estimated at 15,000. Given this miniscule number their influence on the slave system is insignificant. Jews play no big part in pro-slavery or anti-slavery movements. Jewish slave owners, like white Christians, willfully ignore their spiritual traditions that had long stressed the obligation to help the oppressed “because you were once strangers in the land of Egypt.”
Before the Civil War there are only a few examples of Jewish antislavery activities. Moses Elias Levy, a Jewish sugar planter in Florida, published in 1828 “A Plan for the Abolition of Slavery.” Levy was one of the few elite Southerners to propose emancipation.
1780-1860 (Abolition Movement)
After the American Revolution, support grows for the emancipation of slaves and abolition of slavery. As the Abolition Movement gains momentum, emancipation acts pass in every Northern state, New Jersey being the last to pass in 1804. Southerners, however, still rely greatly on slave labor and are very resistant to see it end.
Many of the Jewish revolutionaries and intellectuals fleeing Germany for America in 1848 join ranks with American Abolitionists. The most known of these immigrant Jewish abolitionists are August Bondi, Theodore Weiner, and Jacob Benjamin. The three men respond to a New York Tribune editorial in 1855 urging Americans to “hurry out to Kansas to help save the state from the curse of slavery.” Based on the Kansas-Nebraska act of 1954, the residents of both new states are to decide whether they will expand or end slavery, which then determines if they enter the Union as a free or slave state.
Bondi, Weiner, and Benjamin move to Kansas to help support the anti-slavery forces. All three men join ranks with the Kansas Regulars under the leadership of John Brown—an active abolitionist. On 2 June, 1856 the Kansas Regulars clash violently with pro-slavery forces in the battle of Black Jack Creek. Shortly after the battle, Kansas abolishes slavery and enters the Union as a free state. This battle is a contributing event leading up to the American Civil War
1861-1865 (Civil War)
Jews, like the nation as a whole, are divided on the slavery debate. The majority of Jews in the North favor emancipation and the majority of Jews in the South—tied to the plantation economy—side with the Confederacy. Leading Rabbis participate in the antislavery debate. From the pulpit, they preach the social evils of slavery. When the war starts, many Northern rabbis urge Jews to volunteer in the army and support the Union.
Lincoln’s call for troops is met with an enthusiastic response from the Jewish community. More than 9,000—a high proportion of them volunteers—fight in the Union ranks, an extremely large number considering the fact that less than 150,000 Jews resided in the U.S. at that time. 2,000 Jews fight on the Confederate side.
Seven Jews are awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for their bravery in fighting with the Union army. Lieutenant Abraham Cohn of the 6th New Hampshire Volunteers who fought in eleven major battles and was twice wounded is awarded this hallowed distinction.
1860-1890 (Jews and African Americans as second class citizens)
With the end of slavery comes a new system of injustice. Former slaves are “free” but they face segregation, disenfranchisement, and discrimination in housing, employment, and education. In the Black Press, Jews alone among American whites are seen as sharing the status of second-class citizenship. In 1867, The Christian Recorder, official organ of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, condemns the persecution of Jews by Gentile whites: “How cruel, how unjust the spirit that mocks this unfortunate people [Jews], a people of your own color.” The Recorder goes on to call upon white America to put an end to this “narrow-minded prejudice against an honorable people.” In 1889, The New York Age, a leading Afro-American weekly, says flatly: “There is a similarity between the Jews and the Negro. One is despised almost as much as the other.”
1881 (Tuskegee University)
Tuskegee Institute is founded in 1881 during the Reconstruction period following the Civil War. In Alabama, like the rest of the South, former slaves are illiterate with few employable job skills. The Tuskegee school provides freed slaves with an education so they can support themselves. The 25-year old Booker T. Washington is selected as the first principal at Tuskegee. Washington is an aggressive fund raiser for the school and he attracts many Jewish supporters.
In 1904, Paul Warburg, a Jewish investment banker, joins Tuskegee’s board of trustees at Washington’s behest. Julius Rosenwald, son of Jewish immigrants who rose to the presidency of Sears, joins the board in 1909 after being impressed with Washington’s autobiography.
Rosenwald is a creative philanthropist who enlists the help of other distinguished and wealthy friends, many of them also Jewish. Between 1911 and 1948, Rosenwald gives $22 million to support Afro-American education. Washington and Rosenwald develop a matching program for developing new schools in counties where white school authorities refuse to provide school facilities for Afro-Americans. They eventually establish and operate over 5,000 small community schools on the Tuskegee Institute model. This work is a major part of Dr. Washington’s (and Rosenwald’s) legacy.
1896 (Plessy v. Ferguson)
The U.S. Supreme Court upholds the constitutionality of racial segregation, even in public accommodations, under the doctrine “separate but equal.” This is a landmark decision upheld by Southern states and many local governments outside the south until 1954.
Jews in America concerned for the safety of their co-religionist in Russia do not ignore the parallels between the plight of Afro-Americans in the South and persecution of Jews in Russia. Jewish newspapers on more than one occasion refer to lynchings and anti-Black riots as “pogroms.”
1909 (Founding of NAACP and National Urban League)
Racial violence is rampant, segregation is institutionalized, and Afro-Americans are disenfranchised. In this setting, The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is founded out of necessity. The NAACP acts as a civil rights organization to eliminate race prejudice and ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of minority groups in the U.S. The NAACP is started by a diverse group of Black, White, and Jewish Americans. Among the founders are thirty-two Afro-Americans, including W.E.B Du Bois and Ida Wells-Barnett. Early Jewish co-founders are Henry Moskowitz, Julius Rosenthal, Rabbi Emil G. Hirsch, and Lillian Wald.
By 1920 the NAACP is heavily reliant on Jewish financial and staff support. Many prominent Jews also assume leadership positions in the NAACP. Joel E. Spingarn, a Jewish professor, serves as NAACP board chairman. Spingarn recruits other Jewish board members such as Jacob Schiff, Rabbi Stephen Wise, Jacob Billikopf, and Arthur Sachs.
In its early years, the NAACP uses the courtroom to overturn Jim Crow statutes and other social injustices. In 1913, the NAACP fights President Woodrow Wilson’s introduction of segregation into the Federal Government policy. The NAACP also devotes much of its time bringing public attention to the problem of lynchings.
One year after the founding of NAACP, prominent Jewish and Afro-American leaders create the National Urban League. The League is a community-based movement devoted to empowering African Americans to enter the economic and social mainstream. In 1911, the American Jewish Committee (AJC) is created to combat anti-Semitism.
1913-1915 (Lynching of Leo Frank)
On 26 April 1913 the bloodied body of Mary Phagan, a 13-year old white female, is found in the basement of the pencil factory in Atlanta, Georgia where Phagan worked. The Atlanta police force has few suspects. Leo Frank, the manager of a pencil factory in Atlanta and an active member of Georgia’s Jewish community, is charged with Phagan’s murder based on shaky evidence. Days after Frank’s arrest, Jim Conley, the pencil factory’s Afro-American janitor, is caught washing blood out of a shirt. When confronted, Conley comes forth with an elaborate story of how he had been paid by Frank to help move Phagan’s dead body. This is the first instance in the postbellum South that the testimony of an Afro-American man is used to convict a white man.
The Leo Frank trial becomes a national obsession as newspapers have a field day reporting on the criminal proceeding. The Atlanta newspapers compete in circulation wars as they sensationalize every detail of the murder trial in largely racist terms. The Frank case is the first incident of intense national interest in which the needs of Afro-Americans and Jews seem in direct conflict. Afro-Americans believe Frank is guilty and Jews want to see Conley stand trial. Despite the gross inconsistencies in Conley’s story, on 24 May, a grand jury finds Frank guilty after deliberating for only four hours. Crowds outside the courthouse chant “Hang the Jews.”
After two years of failed appeals and legal haggling, the Georgia Governor reduces Frank’s death sentence to life imprisonment based on inconclusive evidence and additional testimony. Outraged, one night an angry mob calling itself “The Knights of Mary Phagan” decide to take justice in their own hands, kidnapping Frank from prison and publicly hanging him.
The Jewish community is traumatized by Frank’s lynching. Half of Georgia’s Jewish community leaves the state. The Frank case also generates the founding of the Jewish Anti-Defamation League.
1920s (Rise of KKK)The new Klan differs from the original in that its influence grows all over the country and is not just concentrated in the South. At its peak in the 1920s, Klan membership exceeds 4 million. The reorganized Klan now extends its hateful agenda to include Jews, Catholics, Communists, and immigrants as victims.
A wave of anti-Semitism, racism, and nativism breaks out in the U.S. Racial violence mushrooms. This is largely engineered by the Klan and fueled by Henry Ford’s Dearborn Independent, a sensationalist newspaper that publishes the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. With this turn for the worse, Jewish involvement with Afro-Americans greatly intensifies and they form an alliance of resistance to bring down the racist and anti-Semitic activities of the Klan.
1920 (In the Courtroom)
The NAACP’s civil rights strategy is to use litigation, law suits, and lobbying to challenge the U.S. to live up to its democratic values. One problem the NAACP faces, however, is a lack of Afro-American lawyers. Given the limited opportunities Afro-Americans have been given, there are only eleven hundred Afro-American lawyers in the entire country. Most of them had little experience. Jewish lawyers volunteer to fill the void. Jews on the NAACP legal counsel in these early years include Louis Marshall, James Marshall, Nathan Margold, Charles Studin, and Arthur B. Spingarn. Together they win a string of significant courtroom battles.
1933 (Rise of the Third Reich)
On 30 January, 1933 Adolph Hitler is appointed chancellor of Germany. While the European nations and the U.S. hesitate in denouncing the Third Reich, Jews in the U.S. look for any possible ally. Afro-Americans are among the first to denounce Nazism outright. Black-Jewish relations enter a new era of closeness as they coordinate their opposition to Fascism.
For Jews, the danger of Nazi ideology is clear. Jews in Germany are stripped of their citizenship, removed from their jobs, and forced to live in ghettos. This is just one step in Hitler’s plan to ultimately remove Jews from German society. Afro-Americans sympathize with the severe oppression of European Jews, but Nazi ideology with its theories of white supremacy has racist implications that threaten them as well.
The outrage white Americans feel towards Nazis provides an opportunity to highlight similarities between the treatment of Jews in Europe and Blacks in America. Both groups are disenfranchised. Both are excluded from parks, playgrounds, and beaches. Both endure restrictions on their travel, education, and employment. Afro-Americans support U.S. intervention in Europe, but they question how long they must continue to suffer in America.
1941 (Fair Employment Practices Act)
On the eve of World War II there are ample work opportunities for Americans looking to lift themselves out of the Great Depression. U.S. defense plants are resistant to hiring Blacks. Jews, as well, face serious employment discrimination.
On 25 June, 1941 President Roosevelt signs Executive Order No. 8802—The Fair Employment Practices Act. The Fair Employment Practices Committee (FEPC) is created to oversee enforcement. The Act prohibits discrimination in government offices and all companies doing war-related work based on “race, creed, color, or national origin.” It is the first presidential action to prevent employment discrimination. This is a significant breakthrough for Afro-Americans, Jews, and women on the job front.
Enforcing and expanding the order brings Afro-American and Jewish agencies into frequent collaboration. They work together to push states to enforce their own Fair Employment laws. When Congress threatens to dissolve the FEPC at the war’s end, Blacks and Jews together form the National Council for a Permanent FEPC. This is the beginning of the organized Jewish community’s full involvement in the Civil Rights Movement.
1943 (Detroit race riots)
From 1933-1943, the number of Afro-Americans in Detroit doubles from 100,000 to 200,000. The influx of newcomers puts a strain on housing and public facilities making racial tensions run thick.
On 20 June, 1943 rumors spread about interracial fighting at Belle Isle. One story is that white police on Belle Isle threw an Afro-American woman and her baby off a bridge. Another is that a white woman was raped and murdered by Blacks. These rumors quickly ignite anger and fear among Detroit residents. Black and White gangs swarm the streets of Detroit and virtual guerrilla warfare begins. People are beaten getting off street cars. Angry youth run down Hastings Street, where most stores are Jewish owned, breaking windows, assaulting merchants, and looting stores. The 36 hours of rioting claims 34 lives, 25 of them Afro-American. More than 1,800 are arrested for looting and other incidents.
The Hastings Street Riot ironically serves to bring Afro-American and Jewish agencies together. Blacks and Jews participate in ‘unity committees’ established by the city and state in response to the riots to examine the status of race relations and find ways to come together. Jewish shopkeepers form the East Side Merchants Association to become more involved in the Black community. The Association draws praise from Detroit’s Black leaders for its work with needy families and its support of Afro-American defense workers in their quest to secure public housing—something Blacks have heretofore been excluded from.
1945-1948 (Fight against Restrictive Housing Covenants)
In 1945, an Afro-American couple is imprisoned for violating a restrictive covenant on their small home in Los Angeles. Restrictive covenants are pledges made by property owners not to sell housing to certain racial or religious groups. Both Afro-Americans and Jews are prohibited from renting or buying real estate in areas whose residents have signed a restrictive covenant. With a severe postwar housing shortage making the few houses on the market off limits leaves working-class minorities homeless.
The NAACP brings three cases to the Supreme Court to bring awareness to these racist and anti-Semitic housing laws. ADL, AJC, and the American Jewish Congress boost the campaign by giving the NAACP advice and briefs based on their own experience with fighting restrictive covenants. In 1948, the Supreme Court decides restricted covenants are in violation of the 14th amendment. The fight for better housing has a direct benefit for both Afro-Americans and Jews. Since mutual action proves effective in an issue of shared concern, both groups are encouraged to continue cooperating on other issues.
May 1948 (Creation of the State of Israel)
Afro-Americans are sympathetic to the Jews’ quest for a nation since they too have known the pain of dispersion and longing for a homeland. In Israel’s strive for independence, the majority of Afro-Americans staunchly support Jewish rights to the Holy Land. Many Afro-American leaders play an active role in their support. Most notably is Walter White, the Afro-American head of the NAACP. White helps lobby the Liberian and Haitian delegations to the UN to vote in favor of the partition.
1950 (Leadership Conference on Civil Rights)
The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR) is founded by three leaders in the American Civil Rights Movement: NAACP executive secretary Roy Wilkins, Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters founder A. Philip Randolph, and National Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council leader Arnold Aaronson. The LCCR is based on the belief that social justice can best be achieved through coalition. The coalition focuses on promoting civil rights legislation at the Congressional level, testifying before Congressional committees on hundreds of bills protecting civil rights and civil liberties. LCCR is instrumental in lobbying for the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968.
1951- 1954 (Brown v. Board of Education)The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund work overtime preparing briefs, recruiting plaintiffs, and writing and pleading cases. On every level of the legal work Afro-Americans and Jews work together. The team is made up of notable Afro-American and Jewish lawyers, including Thurgood Marshall (Black) and Jack Greenberg (Jewish). Jewish organizations involved with the Brown Case file supporting briefs, as they do in every other significant civil rights case.
On 17 May, the U.S. Supreme Court decides unanimously that “separate education facilities are inherently unequal.” The court orders steps be taken to destroy unequal education in 21 states with segregated classrooms. This is a major victory paving the way to full integration and a landmark of what the Black-Jewish alliance can achieve.
1955 (Montgomery Bus Boycott)
Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat on a public bus after being told by the bus driver to move for a white passenger. Parks action starts the Montgomery bus boycott. The civil rights struggle switches battlefields from the courts to the street. The masses are mobilized for direct action: bus boycotts, sit-ins, freedom rides, and other acts of civil disobedience. Martin Luther King becomes the voice of the movement and his method of nonviolent resistance the strategy.
1956 (Suez Crisis)
During Israel’s 1956 war with Egypt, Martin Luther King Jr. offers his support to Israel. He delivers a sermon in New York comparing the experience of the Israelites in Egypt to that of Blacks in America. King says “there is something in the very nature of the universe which is on the side of Israel in its struggle with every Egypt.”
1958 (Synagogue Bombings)
As the Civil Rights Movement gains momentum and Jews’ activity in the movement becomes more known, there are a rash of synagogue bombings all over the South. Ten percent of the bombings by white supremacists from 1954-1959 have Jewish targets. The bombings are meant to send a warning to Rabbis active in the Civil Rights Movement. One such incident happens in October 1958. White supremacists dynamite Atlanta’s oldest Jewish synagogue because the Rabbi, Jacob Rothschild, is an outspoken advocate for integration and equality.
1960-1961 (Sit-ins and Freedom Rides)
The Civil Rights Movement gains national attention with the start of “sit-ins” across the South. The sit-in technique is a form of nonviolent protest where student demonstrators sit quietly at segregated lunch counters. They are often violently removed and arrested. Demonstrators are forced to endure terrible conditions but refuse to post bail, sticking their jailers with the burden of prison space. The activists form the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) to take these tactics of nonviolent confrontation further.
Some activists go on to participate in Freedom Rides to protest the segregation of public transportation despite a Supreme Court ban. There are around 440 Freedom Riders total, half of which are white and half of these being Jewish. Also more than half the civil rights lawyers that come south to make their services available to arrested demonstrators are Jewish. This is remarkable considering that just 2% of the entire population in the U.S. is Jewish.
On 4 May, 1961 the first group of thirteen Freedom Riders leaves Washington, D.C. for New Orleans. They are met by violent white mobs as are all the subsequent Freedom Riders. The Freedom Riders gain national sympathy and support, forcing President Kennedy to order the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to issue a desegregation order and ensure compliance.
1961 (Interfaith Clergy Freedom Ride)
Rabbi Martin Freedman organizes the Interfaith Clergy Freedom Ride which brings together four rabbis and fourteen ministers. In June, the clergy board a bus in Washington D.C. and head toward Tallahasse, Florida with the aim of integrating facilities along the way. At the Tallahasse airport restaurant on their way home the clergy are denied service because they refuse to serve Afro-Americans. The clergy refuse to leave until they are served. They sit and wait for two days without eating before the local police arrest them for unlawful assembly. Jailed for four days, the group refuses to post bail.
1962 (Prayer Pilgrimage to Albany)
Dr. King requests clergy to join him in Albany, Georgia for a ‘prayer pilgrimage’ with the goal of ending segregation. 75 rabbis and ministers meet outside Albany’s city hall, praying, singing hymns, and reading scripture. In a short time the clergy are placed under arrest to the cheers of angry crowds. It is the largest incarceration of clergy at once in American History.
1963 (March on Washington)
Plans are made for a March on Washington to demand President Kennedy and Congress to support legislation granting Blacks full rights. Jews like Rabbi Joachim Prinz are important to the march’s behind-the-scenes preparation. The AJC endorses the march and encourages all its members to attend. Despite external pressure to call the march off, on 28 August, 250,000 white and black Americans from all over the nation gather on the mall. The march is credited as a major factor leading to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the National Voting Rights Act of 1965.
1964 (Defense of Soviet Jewry)
Under Premier Nikita Khrushchev, the situation for Jews in the Soviet Union is worsening as they are singled out for extraordinary punishments. In April, the American Jewish Conference on Soviet Jewry is formed to highlight the Soviet mistreatment of Jews and spearhead a national campaign on behalf of Soviet Jewry. Many Afro-American leaders take time out of their busy schedules for their own movement to participate in the conference and voice their solidarity (e.g. Dr. King, Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph). Roy Wilkins, the executive director of the NAACP, notes parallels between Blacks’ struggle in the U.S. and Jews’ struggle in the Soviet Union. Dr. King commands Blacks to not be silent on the issue: “I cannot stand idly by even though I live in the United States and even though I happen to be an American Negro, and fail to be concerned about what happens to my brothers and sisters that happen to be Jews in Soviet Russia. For what happens to them, happens to me—and to you, and we must be concerned.”
1964 (March in St. Augustine, Florida)
In the summer of 1964 civil rights leaders rally to St. Augustine, Florida, a town known for overtly ignoring integration laws. Each night, for several months, protestors meet at a local church and march peacefully to the old slave market. They gain national sympathy as the world watches chain-wielding Klansmen beat the marchers who refuse to strike back. At the time of the St. Augustine marches, the Central Conference of American Rabbis is in a meeting. They receive a telegram from Dr. King asking rabbis to join him. Sixteen leave the conference for St. Augustine to march in solidarity with their Black brothers. They are promptly arrested and taken to jail with Dr. King. In July, President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law, outlawing segregation in any public accommodations. The law is a direct result of the civil rights protests and demonstrations in the South.
1965 (Selma to Montgomery)
1966 (Emergence of Black Power)
1967 (Jews turn inward)
In reaction to Israel’s Six-day war the Black-Jewish alliance breaks down further. Now it is Jews who are turning inward and changing their agenda to focus on self-preservation. Threatened with extinction by Arab armies on all sides, American Jews fear the worst only to rejoice in the dramatic victory of Israel as she dramatically beats back her aggressors. The victory reenergizes Jewish pride and support for Israel.
Senior civil rights leaders like Dr. King and Randolph rush to Israel’s defense, denouncing the Arab attack and issuing declarations of support for Israel’s independence and freedom. The Black Nationalist leaders however articulate the opposite since they more easily identify with dark-skinned Arabs than the white Israelis. The SNCC, under Carmichael’s leadership, jumps on the opportunity to denounce Zionism and assume a pro-Palestinian position. a
1968 (Ocean Hill – Brownsville School Controversy)
In the Ocean Hill-Brownsville section of Brooklyn the schools are made up of all Afro-American or Puerto Rican students and mostly white teachers. In an effort to decentralize control of the area’s public schools, community leaders are placed in charge of their own school district. The new school administration promptly fires 18 white teachers in violation of their union contract. The United Federation of Teachers calls for citywide strikes and for 55 days, 900 schools are closed and over 1 million pupils are without teachers. The strike severely divides the city. Black parents are against the Jewish teachers and union leaders because they feel they are not willing to share control of the schools. Because most of the fired teachers are Jewish, the Jewish community feels the incident is evidence of black anti-Semitism. The controversy pushes Afro-Americans and Jews into full retreat.
1968 (Assassination of Martin Luther King)
1975 (BASIC)
1978 (Afro-American support of PLO)
American Ambassador to the UN Andrew Young has an unauthorized meeting with a representative from the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). President Carter forces Young to resign from his post because the Ambassador broke with U.S. policy. As the highest ranking Black man in the U.S. and a hero in the Afro-American community, Young’s forced resignation angers Blacks. Young’s supporters believe Jewish organizations pressured Carter into firing him even though Young assures them they did not. Jews believe the Black community sold out Israel by supporting the PLO even though none of the major civil rights groups did anything openly hostile towards Israel. Dangerous generalizations further weaken the once fruitful Black-Jewish relationship.
1984 (“Hymietown”)
In an interview with a friend at the Washington Post Rev. Jesse Jackson refers to Jews as “Hymies” and to New York City as “Hymietown.” When the racial slurs are made public the Jewish community is deeply hurt. Jackson later apologizes for the remark but the damage is already done. Many in the Jewish community remain deeply suspicious of Jackson and withdraw their support for his presidential bid.
1985 (Rebuilding the alliance)
On 6 February, twenty-four Black and Jewish Congressional leaders meet on Capitol Hill in a closed conference. The purpose of the meeting is to hold a frank dialogue on the state of Black-Jewish relations.
1985-1990 (Apartheid)
American Jews are prominent in the struggle to end apartheid in South Africa.
1991 (Crown Heights Riots)
In the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, an orthodox Jewish man looses control of the wheel and hits two Afro-American children, killing one and injuring the other. Mistaking the accidental killing as purposeful, Afro-American onlookers pull the man out of his car and beat him. For three days, angry Black mobs shouting “Get the Jews!” roam the streets attacking Jewish residents, setting fire to cars, and looting stores. One group of angry teens stabs to death an Orthodox Rabbinical student. The police are finally able to calm the situation. Though the riots are not replicated elsewhere and seem to be unique to Crown Heights, the event is burned into the memories of Black and Jewish communities.
2006 (FIBA)
Glenn Plummer Ministries allies with The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews to form Project FIBA (Fellowship of Israel and Black America). FIBA’s purpose is to nurture, develop, expand, and call the Afro-American community into its natural friendship and alliance with Israel and American Jews and vice-versa.
To the dismay of pro-Israel Christians and Jews, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice compares the Palestinian cause to that of Blacks in the segregated South. Rice says as a Black child who grew up in Alabama, “I know what it is like to hear that you cannot go on a road or through a checkpoint because you are Palestinian … I understand the feeling of humiliation and powerlessness.” Rice also compares Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to Reverend Martin Luther King as a man committed to peace for his people.
Conclusion
Afro-Americans and Jewish Americans have analyzed the status of their relationship for the past three decades, trying to determine the ultimate source of its deterioration. Claims of an irreconcilable split are over exaggerated. Nonetheless, there is no doubt the condition of Black-Jewish relations now is but a remnant of the former alliance. For a new coalition to be rebuilt two things must happen. Younger Afro-Americans and Jews who were not around during the Golden Age must hear of the genuine partnership the two communities once had. For those who remember all to well the bitter incidents that drove the communities apart, it is time to heal the wounds and reopen dialogue. There is still plenty of cooperation Blacks and Jews can rally around, one of them being Israel. If the two groups come together to stand for Israel, they do not have to look far in their own history for a productive model of collaboration.
Shelley Neese is the Managing Editor of The Jerusalem Connection Report which published a Special Issue on The Black-Israel Nexus.