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It’s on Video: The Vice Tightens on Jewish Life in Boston
A Hanukkiyah, a candlestick used during the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah, stands on the remains of a burnt windowsill, following a deadly infiltration by Hamas terrorists from the Gaza Strip, in Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel, Oct. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
Anyone who has any doubts about the success enjoyed by the Islamist-led campaign to squeeze Jews out of the public square in the US needs to watch the video of the Boston City Council meeting that took place on February 14, 2024. The success of this campaign was on full display when District Six City Councilor Ben Weber, the only Jew on the council, withdrew a “negotiated ceasefire” resolution from the agenda. It was yet another moment when the Tikkun Olam agenda of “repairing the world” was handed its head by Islamist activism in the United States.
Weber’s resolution was pretty straightforward and “balanced.” In addition to highlighting the suffering of both Israelis and Palestinians and calling for a negotiated ceasefire between Hamas and the Netanyahu government, Weber’s resolution asked councilors to call on Hamas to return the hostages it took on October 7, and work for the safe return of Massachusetts residents stuck in Gaza.
Before announcing that he was withdrawing the resolution from consideration, Weber declared that while writing the resolution, he sought input from fellow councilors, officials from Boston’s Jewish Community Relations Council, and a prominent Boston-area Palestinian-American lawyer working to get Massachusetts families safely out of Gaza. Weber didn’t say which councilors he spoke to, but The Boston Globe subsequently reported that Weber had spoken with former council president (and Israel supporter) Ed Flynn and anti-Israel zealot Tania Fernandes Anderson.
The dialogue was to no avail. “It has come to my attention that the language of the resolution I drafted may cause more division, which is the opposite of what I hope to do,” Weber said. “So out of my respect to my council colleagues and members of the Boston community, I withdraw this resolution to have further conversations.” In short, Weber, a first-term city councilor, didn’t want to force his colleagues to declare their response to the October 7 massacre openly, because to do so would make him a one-term city councilor.
After the meeting, Weber told me that he felt obligated to withdraw the resolution after unnamed people expressed concerns that it was promoting the involuntary departure of Palestinians from Gaza and that it appeared to promote “one side over the other.” The notion that Weber’s resolution promoted the involuntary evacuation of Palestinians from Gaza is an intentional misreading of the text. Weber’s resolution says nothing about the expulsion of Palestinians. And as far as “taking sides,” the resolution was clearly written as an attempt to mollify “pro-Palestinian” (anti-Israel) activists, including Fernandes Anderson, by highlighting the suffering in Gaza without acknowledging it was Hamas who was responsible for this suffering. The logic is simple. If there would have been no October 7 massacre (and no terrorism from Gaza before that), there would never have been any conflict in Gaza.
If Weber had been paying attention, he would likely have spared himself the humiliation of having to withdraw the resolution by not submitting it in the first place. It’s not as if Boston isn’t in bad need of some Tikkun Olam.
But beyond these problems, speaking openly about Hamas’ October 7 massacre and its aftermath is becoming increasingly out of bounds for Israel and its supporters, Jews especially, in American civil society. Jews on college campuses have been bullied and harassed for years and this bullying has only become more intense in the aftermath of October 7. Jewish students have been forced to seek shelter in libraries and classrooms, as Hamas supporters, campus Islamists, and their progressive allies recreate the modern-day equivalent of the “ghetto bench,” which drove Jews into hiding in Polish colleges and universities in the 1930s.
A good metaphor for the decline of the Jewish condition in American society, which was so evident at the Boston City Council’s February 14 meeting, is that of a shrinking apartment in which the walls move imperceptibly inward — just a centimeter or so — every day, reducing the space available for occupants to move about. The ceiling descends as well, forcing tenants into a crouch upon entering. And as the room gets smaller and smaller, the ceiling lamp is no longer a source of illumination, but a tool of surveillance, scrutiny, and judgement of the increasingly isolated, confined, and stooping inhabitants. Looking out the window, which offers a view of hateful protesters screaming out obscenities against Israel, provides no relief. The inhabitants of these rooms sit fearfully on their sofas listening as the chants, which began in the late afternoon as gentle calls for peace, morph into hateful accusations of genocide and calls for Israel’s destruction once the sun goes down.
Counter-protests by Jews and their allies have become, by fits and starts, less prevalent in Boston and other cities in the US in the years since the Palestinian wave of terrorism know as the Second Intifada, which ended in 2005. Jews and their allies stood their ground during the Gaza War in 2006, and there was some pro-Israel activism during the 2014 Gaza War. But these days, Jews count themselves as lucky if they are to post images of kidnapped children without them being harassed; protesting the perpetrators of these crimes is not allowed.
Anyone who denies that public space for Jews is shrinking needs to compare Weber’s submissive behavior with that of his colleague Tania Fernandes Anderson. Like many elites in Western democracies, Anderson, the first Muslim elected to Boston’s City Council, has surfed the excitement generated by the October 7 massacre like a wave. Soon after the attack, she put forth a ceasefire resolution of her own that called Hamas’ massacre a “military operation.” The resolution failed to pass, but upon leaving the chamber, she was fawned over by green- and purple-haired women in the lobby outside the council chambers.
In early November, she spoke at an an anti-Israel march from Boston Common to the Federal building. At this rally, where Fernandes was a featured speaker, she wept openly for the Palestinian children killed as a result of the conflict, but said little, if anything, about the loss of Israeli life. The following month, she brought two high school students to a City Council meeting to receive a commendation from the body. During the ceremony, the two students started chanting “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” to the dismay of then Council President Ed Flynn. And later that month, she got a resolution passed on the city council’s consent agenda praising Abdullah Faaruuq, the imam of a local mosque who has advocated for a convicted terrorist and engaged in virulent anti-Israel and anti-American radicalism over the years. And as reward for her anti-Israel activism, she was invited to speak at a fundraising gala being held at Faaruuq’s mosque on January 13, 2024, the 100th day after the October 7 massacre.
And while at the gala, Fernandes Anderson spread a patently false narrative of everything being fine between Muslims and Jews in the Holy Land before Israel’s creation.
The massacre that took place in Israel on October 7 — where Jews were slaughtered just for being Jews — hasn’t convinced Israeli Jews to abandon their rights as a sovereign people, but thanks to people like Tania Fernandes Anderson, it is driving American Jews into the shadowy margins of American society. And thanks to the Boston City Council, it’s on video, just like the October 7 massacre.
Dexter Van Zile, the Middle East Forum’s Violin Family Research Fellow, serves as Managing Editor of Focus on Western Islamism.
The post It’s on Video: The Vice Tightens on Jewish Life in Boston first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Russian Drone Strikes Jewish School in Kyiv, Causing ‘Significant Damage’
A Russian drone struck the Chabad-run Perlina school in Kyiv, Ukraine, Oct. 30, 2024. Photo: Jewish community JCC in Kyiv, Kyiv municipality, and Yan Dobronosov
A Russian drone struck the main Jewish school in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv early on Wednesday, causing “significant structural damage” but resulting in no injuries at the school.
The drone hit hours before students were expected to arrive, but officials reported several injuries in a neighboring residential building. The drone caused heavy damage to several areas within the school, including classrooms, the student lounge, and a school shuttle, but spared a gas station located just 50 meters away.
Part of the Russian drone landed in the playground of the Chabad-run Perlina school in Kyiv, Ukraine, Oct. 30, 2024. Photo: Jewish community JCC in Kyiv, Kyiv municipality, and Yan Dobronosov
“The school’s reinforced windows, equipped with protective film, prevented further harm to the interior of the structure,” said a statement from the Or Avner Chabad educational network, which runs the Perlina school.
Damage to the Chabad-run Perlina school in Kyiv, Ukraine caused by a Russian drone, Oct. 30, 2024. Photo: Jewish community JCC in Kyiv, Kyiv municipality, and Yan Dobronosov
Perlina’s principal, Elena Vasilivna, noted that the school also doubled as a home for some of its students.
“Some of our students are refugee children from other cities, and sometimes they have to sleep at the school; we have rooms specifically for such cases,” she told The Algemeiner.
Vasilivna noted that she had updated all the parents, “assuring them we would do everything to resume classes as quickly as possible.”
More damage caused by the Russian drone that hit the Perlina school in Kyiv, Ukraine, Oct. 30, 2024. Photo: Jewish community JCC in Kyiv, Kyiv municipality, and Yan Dobronosov
“Throughout the war, we made sure to continue the school routine to provide the children with stability, a supportive atmosphere, and a place where they can play with their friends,” she added.
Kyiv’s Chief Rabbi Yonatan Markovitch also pledged the school would remain open, despite the attack. “Just as the school has remained operational throughout the war, so too will we continue to nurture our children’s souls, even in these challenging times,” he said.
Kyiv’s Chief Rabbi Yonatan Markovitch holds a fragment of a Russian drone that damaged the Chabad-run Perlina school in Kyiv, Ukraine, Oct. 30, 2024. Photo: Jewish community JCC in Kyiv, Kyiv municipality, and Yan Dobronosov
Markovitch hailed the “tremendous miracle” that students were not in the building at the time of the strike.
He visited the site of the impact, accompanied by several city officials, including Kyiv mayor and former boxing world champion, Vitalyi Klitschko.
Jewish communities in the embattled country, many of which are run by Chabad, maintain good relations with Ukrainian authorities.
President Volodymyr Zelensky even called Markovitch last week to wish him a happy birthday, gifting him a signed copy of his book with a personal dedication.
To mark 30 years since the passing of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Ukrainian Postal Service recently issued a commemorative stamp featuring the famous 770 Chabad building located in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, in his honor and as a tribute to the Chabad movement and its activities in Ukraine.
Picture of the stamp.
Wednesday’s strike marked the 19th such assault on Kyiv by Russian forces in October alone, with more than 60 Iranian-produced Shahed drones launched across Ukraine that morning.
The post Russian Drone Strikes Jewish School in Kyiv, Causing ‘Significant Damage’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Lebanon, Israel Could Agree to Ceasefire Within Days, Lebanese Prime Minister Says
Smoke billows over Khiam, amid ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as pictured from Marjayoun, near the border with Israel, Oct. 29, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Karamallah Daher
Lebanon’s prime minister expressed hope on Wednesday that a ceasefire deal with Israel would be announced within days as Israel‘s public broadcaster published what it said was a draft agreement providing for an initial 60-day truce.
The document, which broadcaster Kan said was a leaked proposal written by Washington, said Israel would withdraw its forces from Lebanon within the first week of the 60-day ceasefire. It largely aligned with details reported earlier by Reuters based on two sources familiar with the matter.
Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said he had not believed a deal would be possible until after Tuesday’s US presidential election. But he said he became more optimistic after speaking on Wednesday with US envoy for the Middle East Amos Hochstein, who was due to travel to Israel on Thursday.
“Hochstein, during his call with me, suggested to me that we could reach an agreement before the end of the month and before Nov. 5,” Mikati told Lebanon’s Al Jadeed television.
“We are doing everything we can and we should remain optimistic that in the coming hours or days, we will have a ceasefire,” Mikati said.
The draft published by Kan was dated Saturday, and when asked to comment, White House national security spokesperson Sean Savett said: “There are many reports and drafts circulating. They do not reflect the current state of negotiations.”
But Savett did not respond to a query on whether the version published by Kan was at least the basis for further negotiations.
The Israeli network said the draft had been presented to Israel‘s leaders. Israeli officials did not immediately comment.
Israel and the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah have been fighting for the past year in parallel with Israel‘s war in Gaza after Hezbollah struck Israeli targets in solidarity with its ally Hamas in Gaza.
Since Oct. 8 of last year, one day after the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel, Hezbollah has been attacking northern Israel almost daily with barrages of missiles, rocket, and drones. The relentless attacks have forced about 70,000 Israelis to flee the northern part of the country, and Israel’s government has vowed to push Hezbollah away from the Lebanon border to ensure the displaced citizens can return to their homes.
The conflict in Lebanon has dramatically escalated over the last five weeks, with most of the 2,800 deaths reported by the Lebanese health ministry for the past 12 months occurring in that period.
Hezbollah did not immediately comment on the leaked ceasefire proposal.
But the Iran-backed group’s new leader, Naim Qassem, said earlier on Wednesday that it would agree to a ceasefire within certain parameters if Israel wanted to stop the war, but that Israel had so far not agreed to any proposal that could be discussed.
The post Lebanon, Israel Could Agree to Ceasefire Within Days, Lebanese Prime Minister Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Latest Pro-Hamas Faculty Group Formed at George Washington University
A statue of George Washington tied with a Palestinian flag and a keffiyeh inside a pro-Hamas encampment is pictured at George Washington University in Washington, DC, US, May 2, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Craig Hudson
Anti-Israel faculty at George Washington University have founded a Faculty for Justice in Palestine (FJP) chapter, according to an op-ed written by several professors who initiated the endeavor.
“As we pass one year of a genocide funded by the United States and US universities that has expanded to bombing campaigns in Syria, Lebanon, Iran, and Yemen, we and other conscientious members of GW’s faculty and staff have recently established a chapter of Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine,” professors Peter Calloway, Helen DeVinney, Amr Madkour, Sara Matthiesen, and Dara Orenstein wrote in the piece, which was published on Monday by The GW Hatchet. “Though our chapter includes many more faculty in solidarity with the students who are unable to be named publicly for fear of retaliation, we want students, community members, and the administration to know that there are faculty at GW who are aligned with the movement for a free Palestine.”
A spinoff of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), a group with numerous links to Islamist terror organizations, FJP chapters have been opening on colleges since Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7. Throughout the 2023-2024 academic year, its members, which include faculty employed by the most elite US colleges, fostered campus unrest, circulated antisemitic cartoons, and advocated severing ties with Israeli companies and institutions of higher education.
As The Algemeiner has previously reported, in May, Harvard University’s FJP chapter published an antisemitic cartoon depicting a left-hand tattooed with a Star of David, and containing a dollar sign at its center, dangling a Black man and an Arab man from a noose. FJP members have also fostered unrest to coerce university officials into accepting their demands, and attempted, in some instances, to prevent police from dispersing unauthorized demonstrations and detaining lawbreakers.
According to an AMCHA Initiative report published in September, titled “Academic Extremism: How a Faculty Network Fuels Campus Unrest,” the group’s presence throughout academia is insidious and should be scrutinized by lawmakers.
“Our investigation alarmingly reveals that campuses with FJP chapters are seeing assaults and death threats against Jewish students at rates multiple times higher than those without FJP groups, providing compelling evidence of the dangerous intersection between faculty activism and violent antisemitic behavior,” AMCHA said in a press release. “The presence of FJP chapters also correlates with the extended duration of protests and encampments, as well as with the passage of [boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement] resolutions on their campuses.”
The BDS movement seeks to isolate Israel on the international stage as a step toward the Jewish state’s destruction.
FJP, the report added, also “prolonged” the duration of “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” protests on college campuses, in which students occupied a section of campus illegally and refused to leave unless administrators capitulated to demands for a boycott of Israel. It also said that such demonstrations lasted over four and a half times longer where FJP faculty were free to influence and provide logistic and material support to students. Additionally, professors at FJP schools also spent 9.5 more days protesting than those at non-FJP schools.
Monday’s op-ed discussed extensively the disciplinary charges the university has filed against pro-Hamas protesters who occupied school property for several weeks during spring semester and committed other severe violations of school rules prohibiting unauthorized demonstrations and vandalism.
“Indeed, as GW faculty and staff, we bear witness alongside brave and visionary students — who are committed to disclosure and divestment and who call for our administration to treat students with dignity and respect using their voices, bodies, and organizing skills to fight for a better world for all,” they continued. “We urge the administration to drop the criminal disciplinary charges against students … and agree to students’ demands for disclosure of GW’s investments and divestments from entities enabling Israel’s war crimes in Gaza and beyond.”
The op-ed did not mention any antisemitism emanating from the anti-Zionist movement, nor the racist behavior and rhetoric of pro-Hamas students — a subject which The Algemeiner has covered since it began last semester, when US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield visited George Washington’s campus to discuss the benefits of a career in foreign policy with African American students.
In a pamphlet distributed to everyone who showed up to Thomas-Greenfield’s event, the GW Student Coalition for Palestine (GWSCP) accused the ambassador of being a “puppet,” alluding to the fact that she is a Black woman holding a distinguished presidential appointment. GWSCP, in addition to comparing Thomas-Greenfield to enslaved overseers, appeared to suggest that the color of Greenfield’s skin excluded the possibility that she is an agent of her own destiny. Later, GWSCP encircled GW Dean of Student Affairs Colette Coleman while a member of the group began “clapping in her face” and others screamed that she should resign.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post Latest Pro-Hamas Faculty Group Formed at George Washington University first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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