RSS
Mighty But Moral
JNS.org – The Children of Israel were caught, quite literally, “between the devil and the deep blue sea.” Pharaoh and his chariots were in hot pursuit of the newly freed Israelites and caught up to them as they reached the sea. With nowhere to turn, panic and pandemonium broke out.
But Moses told the people to calm down: “Have no fear! Stand fast and see God’s salvation that He will perform for you today! You may be seeing the Egyptians today, but you will never see them again! God will do battle for you and you shall remain silent.”
As Moses raised his staff over the water, the sea split, and in arguably the greatest of all Biblical miracles, the Jewish people crossed the sea on dry land. Then the waters came crashing down on the pursuing Egyptians and they drowned.
A few verses earlier we read: “And the Children of Israel marched out of Egypt triumphantly.” Literally, the words are b’yad ramah: “With hands held high.” Rashi interprets this to mean “with exalted power” or “triumphantly.” Not only with “hands held high,” but with heads held high.
So, our first message from this week’s parsha, Beshalach, is that Jews should always be strong and proud and not feel that we owe anyone any apologies—not the Palestinians, not the United Nations, not even the United States and certainly not The New York Times. Our cause is just; our response to the Oct. 7 massacres and atrocities is legitimate and necessary; and those who don’t understand what genocide means should consult the dictionary before they run to the Hague.
But there is an additional message in our parsha. After their mortal enemies are drowned in the sea, Moses and the Israelites sing “Az Yashir,” the famous Song of the Sea, in thanksgiving and praise to God for His miraculous deliverance. According to the Talmud, when the Jews sang, the angels above joined them in song. But the Almighty Himself intervened and stopped them from singing.
Why? Because “the work of My hands are drowning at sea, and you are singing?”
In other words: It’s one thing for the Jews to sing over the supernatural salvation from their pursuers and captors; but you angels, what do you have to sing about? Rather, show some sensitivity to the fact that the human beings I created are dying.
From this we learn the profundity of the Jewish moral ethos. Even though the Egyptians had tortured their Jewish slaves mercilessly for many decades, when they die there is nothing to celebrate and we may not sing with gay abandon.
We can rejoice over our own deliverance from danger. We may sing about our salvation and tout our triumphs. But Jews do not take delight in the death of even our most vile enemies.
This is, in fact, one of the reasons why we recite only the abridged Hallel on the last days of Passover, which commemorate the Splitting of the Sea. We sing God’s praises, but our praise is somewhat muted because of the deaths of the Egyptians, evil as they might have been.
The origins of our moral compass long precede the Splitting of the Sea. Our patriarch Jacob expressed these values centuries earlier. His twin brother Esau was coming to exact revenge for what he perceived as the injustice of Jacob’s purchase of Esau’s birthright from him, which led to their father Isaac blessing Jacob and not Esau. As they prepared to meet, Esau approached with 400 armed desperadoes. There was no doubt that he had murder on his mind.
“And Jacob was very frightened and pained” over the impending confrontation with Esau. Jacob was afraid with good reason. But he was also “pained” because, as Rashi says, “he may be compelled to kill others in self-defense.”
This holds true today. Despite all the criticism of Israel’s so-called “disproportionate” war in Gaza, the IDF is still the most moral army in the history of the world. Jews may be tough and tenacious in battle, but we remain moral, ethical, sensitive and compassionate human beings. All of human life is sacred to us, including Palestinian lives and, believe it or not, even the lives of those who butchered our children. Yes, it is a challenge to be tough and moral. Most armies fail miserably. The IDF deserves the praise of the world, not treacherous and hypocritical condemnations.
I remember well the screaming headlines in 2002 condemning Israel for the so-called “Jenin Massacre” that never happened. Israel correctly denied it outright as a blood libel. Yet the late then-Secretary General of the UN Kofi Annan asked, “Can it be that the whole world is wrong, and Israel is right?” The answer, as so many times in history, was yes. The whole world was wrong and Israel was right. The Palestinians had made up the “massacre” out of whole cloth. It was just another Big Lie in the Middle East’s tapestry of falsehood. It took a few months, but eventually the UN itself issued an official report that admitted that there was no massacre whatsoever. Annan never apologized.
Arab blood is worth infinitely more to Jews than Jewish blood is to Arabs. I’ll go further: Arab blood is more sacred to a Jew than it is to an Arab. As Golda Meir once famously stated, “Peace will come to the Middle East when the Arabs will love their own children more than they hate ours.”
We are witnessing a stunning example of this in Gaza today. The IDF does its best to protect the children of Gaza while Hamas keeps putting its own children in the line of fire.
The twin teachings of our weekly parsha are: Be proud and walk tall. Hold your hands and heads high with no apologies. But at the same time, remain moral, ethical and sensitive to the losses of our enemies. This is the Jewish way.
The post Mighty But Moral first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Change in the Middle East? Don’t Hold Your Breath
One year after Hamas’ October 7 massacre, I noticed a cluster of articles in various sources referring to strategic realignments among some of the players in the Middle East.
For example, Zvika Klein interprets the muted responses from Egypt, the UAE and Saudi Arabia to Israel’s latest bombing of military sites in Iran as indicating that, while each country continues to give lip service to the Palestinian cause, their primary attention has shifted to restraining Iran.
Maria Abi-Habib and Ismaeel Naar come to the opposite conclusion. Noting what appears to be a possible rapprochement between Iran and rival Saudi Arabia, they see a Middle East shift in which Saudi Arabia’s interest in a normalization deal has passed, and Israel’s profile as a regional player is diminished.
An article by Aida Chávez reports that after the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, US Congressional leaders such as Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) discussed wide-ranging Middle East scenarios, including US guarantees of Saudi security along with Saudi and Gulf State help in reconstruction and governance of Gaza.
Meanwhile, Neville Berman reminds us of the success of the Marshall Plan in rebuilding Europe after World War II, suggesting something similar for Gaza — but only after the release of the Israeli hostages and after the people of Gaza reject Hamas and the “pyromaniacal aims of Iran.”
Finally, Fahad Almasri, President of the National Salvation Front in Syria, a group opposed to the Assad government, believes that Israel’s battles with Hezbollah and Iran have won the hearts of a majority of the Lebanese and Syrian people. Almasri argues that an Arab version of NATO, led by Saudi Arabia, would reduce foreign involvement in the area (especially Iran’s) and support peaceful relations with Israel.
While these proposals may be well intentioned, I am skeptical. We have seen this movie before. Previous starring roles, for example, involved Egypt under Nasser and Syria. Who remembers the late United Arab Republic?
In 1958, when John F. Kennedy was a senator, the world was dealing with the aftermath of the Suez Crisis. America was not Israel’s close ally. In fact, the US continued to enforce an embargo on arms sales to Israel. That year Kennedy wrote the following:
Even by the coldest calculations, the removal of Israel would not alter the basic crisis in the area. For, if there is any lesson which the melancholy events of the last two years and more taught us, it is that, though Arab states are generally united in opposition to Israel, their political unities do not rise above this negative position. The basic rivalries within the Arab world, the quarrels over boundaries, the tensions involved in lifting their economies from stagnation, the cross pressures of nationalism — all of these factors would still be there, even if there were no Israel.
What was true 66 years ago is still true today.
The prominent actors in the region are the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia, all authoritarian regimes that rank far down on The Economist’s democracy index. Their influence is due to oil and gas revenues. Only 12 percent of the three million people living in Qatar, for example, are Qataris. (The same percentage applies to the UAE.) The vast majority are support workers from abroad. Qatar has been compared to a good airport terminal: pleasantly air-conditioned, lots of shopping, a wide selection of food, and people from around the world.
The Abraham Accords may yet lead to peace between Israel and all her neighbors, and adding Saudi Arabia to the Accords is laudable, but don’t get your hopes up.
Jacob Sivak, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, is a retired professor, University of Waterloo.
The post Change in the Middle East? Don’t Hold Your Breath first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
NYT’s ‘65 Doctors’ Essay Crumbles as Evidence of Embellished Testimony Mounts
The New York Times recently defended its guest essay, in which 65 medical professionals recounted their experiences working in Gaza.
The essay included graphic accounts suggesting that the IDF deliberately targets civilians, including women and children. It also featured X-ray images that were later scrutinized by medical experts for inconsistencies, casting doubt on their authenticity.
Six days after publication, amid growing questions about the credibility of these accounts and the evidence provided, The New York Times issued a statement asserting that the essay had been “rigorously edited” and standing by the contributors’ credentials. The statement further insisted, “Any implication that its images are fabricated is simply false.”
Despite this defense, more evidence soon surfaced, challenging the essay’s claims.
In The Jurist, two physicians and medical ethicists described allegations that Israeli forces intentionally targeted children’s heads in Gaza as “highly implausible,” citing ballistic evidence, medical imaging analysis, and the realities of combat. They emphasized the ethical imperative for healthcare workers to provide impartial, fact-based accounts in conflict zones.
In addition to concerns about the X-rays, HonestReporting can now reveal inconsistencies in at least one of the accounts given by a doctor featured in the essay.
Dr. Khawaja Ikram, an orthopedic surgeon from Dallas, Texas, describes treating two children, aged three and five, who he alleges were shot in the head by an Israeli sniper as they returned with their father to survey their home in Khan Younis:
However, this is not the first time Ikram has spoken to a media outlet about his experience in Gaza.
In a February interview with NBC Dallas-Fort Worth, more than six months before the New York Times essay, Ikram recounted a strikingly similar story — though with several key differences.
He described treating a man who arrived at the hospital carrying his five-year-old daughter, claiming she had sustained a “single bullet wound to the head.” According to Ikram, the father said, “We thought the troops were pulling back, so we went to check on our home. There were snipers waiting. My five-year-old daughter was shot. She’s my only daughter, please save her.”
The narrative is nearly identical to the one Ikram later gave to The New York Times, but in his earlier account, no mention was made of the additional three-year-old child who was allegedly shot. If his later testimony is accurate, we must ask why this significant detail was omitted in the earlier interview.
Despite The New York Times’ vigorous defense of the essay, mounting evidence continues to discredit both the accounts and the purported evidence within the piece.
It raises serious questions about how thoroughly the Times vetted the doctors involved. Did they even check if these individuals had shared their stories before, and whether there were discrepancies in the details?
As the credibility of the 65 doctors’ essay unravels, The New York Times cannot continue to ignore the cracks.
The author is a contributor to HonestReporting, a Jerusalem-based media watchdog with a focus on antisemitism and anti-Israel bias — where a version of this article first appeared.
The post NYT’s ‘65 Doctors’ Essay Crumbles as Evidence of Embellished Testimony Mounts first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
RSS
Actress Ellen Barkin Calls for Nazi Persecution of MSG Owners, Death of Trump Supporters After New York Rally
Actress Ellen Barkin said on Sunday she wants the owners of Madison Square Garden (MSG) to face the same persecution Jews experienced from the Nazis during the Holocaust because the famous New York City venue held a rally for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump during which several racist insults were made.
The “Ocean’s Thirteen” actress, whose parents are Russian Jews, also called Trump a “Nazi” and called for the death of those who attended what she called the “Nazi rally” in several posts on X, formerly know as Twitter.
“Madison Square Garden is owned by James Dolan,” Barkin, 70, wrote. “A major supporter of Nazi trump. His accomplice is one Irving Azoff. A Jew. A shonda for the goyim if ever one lived. May they suffer the pain of all who suffered at the hands of the Nazi regime.” Shonda means disgrace in Yiddish while goyim means non-Jews.
In separate posts on X, the former “Animal Kingdom” star advocated for a boycott of MSG. “Justice would be served if athletes and artists refused to play the Garden,” she wrote.
The actress compared Trump’s Sunday night event to a Nazi rally held in MSG in 1939 and also wrote, “I don’t wish death on anyone … except pedophiles and Nazis. The gangs all here at MSG.”
“I’m thinking biblical,” she added. “May the good earth beneath MSG open its fiery jaws and hurl them all straight into the burning cauldron of the 9 circles. Going down maggots?”
Dolan is the executive chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) of Madison Square Garden Entertainment Corp. (MSG Entertainment). In 2018, MSG and Azoff, a music industry tycoon, signed a joint agreement that led to the formation of The Azoff Company, which helps run the media and music venue in New York City. MSG has previously hosted both the Democratic National Convention and the Republican National Convention. US President Joe Biden held an event in March at Radio City Music Hall, which is owned by the Dolan family.
Dolan, who is reportedly a registered Democrat, is a longtime friend of Trump’s and got married at the latter’s Mar-A-Lago resort in Florida. During his speech at the rally on Sunday, Trump thanked Dolan, saying: “He’s been incredible. He’s been just incredible. The job they’ve done. The job they’ve done. Thank you.”
During the Trump rally in MSG on Sunday, stand-up comedian Tony Hinchcliffe made racist and offensive comments about Latinos, Jews, and Black people, just a little over a week away from the US presidential election. Hinchcliffe, who hosts the podcast Kill Tony, joked about a Black person in the audience, saying he had “carved watermelons” with the audience member instead of pumpkins for Halloween.
He additionally said during the rally: “I don’t know if you guys know this, but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico.” That comment sparked backlash from several Puerto Ricans in the entertainment industry, including singers Jennifer Lopez, Marc Anthony, Ricky Martin and Bad Bunny, and “The View” co-host Sunny Hostin.
Also while on stage, he said of Latinos: “[They] love making babies. They do. There’s no pulling out. They don’t do that. They come inside. Just like they did to our country.”
Trump campaign adviser Danielle Alvarez said in a statement reported by The Hill that Hinchcliffe’s joke about Puerto Rico “does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign.” An MSG Entertainment spokesperson told The Hollywood Reporter on Monday: “As a business we are neutral in political matters. We rent to either side. We don’t censor artists, performers, or speakers.”
Hinchcliffe took to social media to defend his joke about Puerto Rico. He responded to a clip on X of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) criticizing his remark, and wrote that his joke was “taken out of context to make it seem racist.”
“These people have no sense of humor,” he said. “I love Puerto Rico and vacation there. I made fun of everyone … watch the whole set. I’m a comedian Tim … might be time to change your tampon.”
The post Actress Ellen Barkin Calls for Nazi Persecution of MSG Owners, Death of Trump Supporters After New York Rally first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login