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New Discovery/Max reality show ‘Survive the Raft’ features a Messianic ‘rabbi’ who says ‘I’m Jewish, too’
(JTA) – Even amid the motley crew with whom he is trying to survive at sea, Jonathan Dade’s introduction as a reality TV contestant makes a splash.
“As a Black rabbi who’s also conservative, if we can’t discuss race, religion or politics, I can pretty much never talk,” Dade tells viewers on the new Discovery/Max series “Survive the Raft,” about nine people from diverse backgrounds forced to work together for 21 days at sea.
In the first episode, which premiered Sunday, Dade says he works as “a senior rabbi in a synagogue in Georgetown, Texas.”
Dade explains his biography as one of conversion. “I grew up Christian and a lot of my friends when I was in the Navy were Jewish,” he tells the audience. “And by me listening, I learned and then before you know it, I’m Jewish, too.”
But the photo montage introducing Dade also includes images of him wearing a tallit, a Jewish prayer shawl, while performing a baptism — a Christian ritual.
The juxtaposition had at least one viewer confused. “I was genuinely excited to see the rabbi, so you can imagine my dismay when the little montage showed him performing an obvious baptism,” one Jewish Reddit user wrote after watching the episode. “Do you think the producers didn’t know the difference?”
The viewer was right to be surprised. Dade is actually a Messianic Jew — someone who believes Jesus was the Messiah, a belief that is antithetical to Judaism. His congregation, Messiah Echad, advertises itself as serving “Hebrew Christian, Torah Observant, Messianic Jewish, and Non-Religious Believers.”
Messianic groups often have ties to explicitly Christian organizations, and none of the mainstream Jewish movements consider them Jewish. As with many mainstream Christian denominations, missionary work is part of Messianic practice.
But the distinction between Judaism and Dade’s Messianic faith isn’t made apparent on the show, making Dade the latest example of a Messianic being countenanced as Jewish in public life.
Pictures on Echad Messiah’s Facebook page suggest it is not the first time: He’s posted photos of himself at Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s mansion for Hanukkah parties and a celebration this May of Israel’s 75th birthday, and he can also be seen conducting a public menorah lighting in the center of Georgetown, a small city in central Texas, north of Austin.
Messianics are sometimes selected to offer the appearance of Jewish inclusion, which happens with some regularity in politics. For example, Pennsylvania’s Republican gubernatorial candidate concluded his unsuccessful run last year with a Messianic’s performance of a “Fiddler on the Roof” parody.
In one especially prominent incident, Jewish groups were outraged when a Messianic “rabbi” appeared onstage at a campaign rally attended by then-Vice President Mike Pence in 2018 to offer a prayer for the victims of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting.
“There are deep theological differences between Jews and Christians regarding exactly who is a Messiah, what a Messiah should do and even how central a Messiah should be to their traditions,” Ingrid Anderson, associate director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies at Boston University, wrote at the time, explaining why Pence’s selection was so objectionable to many Jews.
Anderson noted that most Messianic Jews consider it part of their mission to evangelize to Jews, a practice that is “very painful and damaging” for Jews because, historically, “Christians did not believe that Jewish scriptures contained truths claimed by another religion.”
Dade, who holds a masters in theology from Colorado Christian University, also unsuccessfully ran for mayor of Georgetown in 2020 and again earlier this year; he said he is preparing another campaign for 2026. During his first campaign local media identified him as a “rabbi”; promotional videos for his congregation identify his wife Melinda Dade as a “Rebbetzin,” a term typically employed in Judaism to refer to the wife of a rabbi. Neither he nor Messiah Echad responded to a Jewish Telegraphic Agency request for comment.
“Survive the Raft” is a “Survivor”-esque show that takes its inspiration from a 1973 social experiment by Mexican anthropologist Santiago Genovés, which itself included an Israeli doctor as one of the ship’s crew. The contestants are described as “nine Americans handpicked to disagree about everything,” and include a hunter, a vegan and a conservative mom shown holding an anti-mask sign.
“We do not comment on the religious beliefs of show participants,” a spokesperson for parent company Warner Brothers Discovery told JTA. Requests for comment to Critical Content, the show’s production company, were not returned.
Georgetown has an actual synagogue: Congregation Havurah Shalom, which follows Reform practices but does not affiliate with any movement. Its co-president, Ellen Silverman, told JTA that Dade is a “lovely person,” but added, “We do not recognize the Messianic congregation as Jewish as they believe in Jesus and Jews do not.”
At the same time, Silverman added, “Rabbi means teacher and Jonathan is a teacher for his congregation.”
Whether and how Dade planned to infuse his Messianic ministry into his “Survive the Raft” appearance may never be known: He (spoiler alert) doesn’t stay on the show long enough for anyone else to drill into his faith. He has an on-camera seizure midway through the first episode and is airlifted to a hospital in Panama. At the end of the episode, the show’s host informs the rest of the cast that Dade won’t be returning to the raft.
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The post New Discovery/Max reality show ‘Survive the Raft’ features a Messianic ‘rabbi’ who says ‘I’m Jewish, too’ appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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‘Serve the Nation, Kill a Jew’ Graffitied on Buenos Aires Monument Just After Oct. 7 Anniversary
The antisemitic slogan “Serve the nation, kill a Jew” was graffitied on a prominent monument in Buenos Aires on Wednesday, just two days after the one-year anniversary Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre across southern Israel.
The timing of the vandalism was intentional, according to the executive director of Argentina’s Jewish umbrella organization, the Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA).
“It is no coincidence that these antisemitic demonstrations appear 48 hours after the first anniversary of the Hamas attack against the State of Israel, because they express the same terrorist ideas: eliminating the Jewish people,” Victor Garelik said in a statement.
Jews in the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires marked the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack with an event organized by the DAIA that drew 15,000 attendees, according to the Israeli embassy in Argentina.
Two days later, however, “Serve the nation, kill a Jew” was written onto a column of a monument to Simon Bolivar, historically considered “the Liberator” of South America, in Parque Rivadavia in Buenos Aires. A Jewish star replaced the final word of the slogan, which has a long history in Argentina.
La DAIA manifiesta su preocupación frente a la aparición de una grave pintada antisemita en el monumento a Simón Bolivar, ubicado en el Parque Rivadavia de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires.
La entidad presentó la denuncia en el Ministerio Público Fiscal de la Ciudad con el objetivo de… pic.twitter.com/UxJN6HlE0l
— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) October 9, 2024
As the Jewish Telegraphic Agency noted in a report on the graffiti, a close variant of the antisemitic phrase was used by the Nationalist Liberation Alliance, a World War II-era Argentine movement affiliated with the Nazis. It was later used by Tacura, a fascist movement that was active in Argentina in the decades following the war.
Then about 10 years ago, residents in the town of General Paz received tax bills with the slogan printed on them. The city official responsible was sentenced to a suspended jail term and ordered to apologize and learn about the Holocaust.
The DAIA, which condemned the “serious antisemitic graffiti,” said it filed an official complaint with the City’s Public Prosecutor’s Office “in order to find those responsible for this anti-Jewish act.” The local government quickly cleaned up the graffiti after it was discovered.
This week’s incident came less than a month after the DAIA presented a report to the Buenos Aires City Legislature showing Argentina experienced a 44 percent increase in reported antisemitic incidents last year, mostly after the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel and amid the ensuing war in Gaza.
According to the report, a total of 598 complaints of antisemitism were registered in 2023, and a staggering 57 percent of all such antisemitic cases occurred in just the three months after the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7.
“There was a significant rise in Judeophobia in universities, and anti-Zionist rhetoric increased by 380 percent compared to 2022, across the country,” the DAIA said in a statement.
Meanwhile, the report found that some 65 percent of antisemitic acts occurred in the “digital space,” while the remaining number of incidents in the “physical space” marked a significant increase from the prior year.
“The [Oct. 7] massacre increased the number of [antisemitic] complaints, far from generating empathy and condemnation,” Garelik said during the presentation, according to Argentine media.
The DAIA report found that visceral hatred of Israel was a major source of the surge in antisemitism, causing 40 percent of last year’s antisemitic incidents in Argentina compared to just 11 percent the prior year.
Twice as many in-person antisemitic cases occurred after Oct. 7 in Argentina last year than during the prior nine full months of 2023. One such incident after the Hamas massacre was a building that hung a sign reading, “Zionists out of Palestine. This did not start on 7/10. Hitler fell short.”
The uptick in anti-Jewish outrages appeared to have continued unabated. According to the DAIA, this week’s graffiti was one of more than 500 antisemitic incidents the organization had recorded this year.
Amid such a surge in anti-Jewish acts of hate, Argentina has become a key player in organizing efforts to combat antisemitism in recent months. In July, for example, more than 30 countries led by the United States adopted “global guidelines for countering antisemitism” during a gathering of special envoys and other representatives from around the globe in Argentina.
The gathering came one day before Argentina’s Jewish community commemorated the 30th anniversary of the 1994 targeted bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires. Argentine President Javier Milei, a vocal supporter of the Jewish community, promised to right decades of inaction and inconsistencies in the investigations into the attack.
In April, Argentina’s top criminal court blamed Iran for the attack, saying it was carried out by Hezbollah terrorists responding to “a political and strategic design” by Iran.
Iran is the chief international sponsor of Hamas and Hezbollah, providing the Islamist terrorist group with weapons, funding, and training.
Argentina has a Jewish population of nearly 200,000, the largest in Latin America.
The post ‘Serve the Nation, Kill a Jew’ Graffitied on Buenos Aires Monument Just After Oct. 7 Anniversary first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Kamala Harris Vows to Do ‘Whatever Is Necessary’ to Prevent Iran From Acquiring Nuclear Weapons if Elected
US Vice President Kamala Harris on Friday vowed to ensure that Iran never obtains nuclear weapons if she wins the White House in November.
“Make no mistake: As president, I will never hesitate to take whatever action is necessary to defend American forces and interests from Iran and Iran-backed terrorists, and I will never allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon,” Harris said in a conference call with Jewish American supporters marking the Jewish High Holidays, according to a White House transcript of the conversation.
“Diplomacy is my preferred path to that end, but all options are on the table,” she added.
Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, also lambasted her opponent, Republican nominee and former US President Donald Trump, arguing that he was not tough enough toward the Iranian threat.
“I am clear-eyed. Iran is a destabilizing and dangerous force,” Harris said. “When Donald Trump was president, he let Iran off the hook. After Iran and its proxies attacked US bases and American troops, Trump did nothing. And he pulled out of the nuclear deal without any plan, leading to an unconstrained Iranian nuclear program.”
“On the other hand, our administration struck Iranian proxies in Iraq and Syria when they attacked American troops, and we are the first administration to ever directly defend Israel,” Harris continued, referring in part to the Biden administration in February ordering strikes against Iranian proxies in Iraq and Syria in response to a drone strike attack on American soldiers. The strikes successfully neutralized over 85 targets.
The administration also helped Israel defend itself against Iran’s unprecedented direct attack on the Jewish state in April.
When Trump was president, he withdrew the US from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which placed temporary restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions, and reimposed harsh economic penalties on the regime.
The US sanctions levied on Iran under the Trump administration crippled the Iranian economy and led its foreign exchange reserves to plummet. Under Trump, the US also killed Qassem Soleimani — who was the head of the elite Quds force, which is responsible for Iran’s proxies and terror operations abroad — in a US drone strike in Iraq in 2020. Soleimani is revered by the Islamic Republic as a martyr and is commemorated across the country.
Trump and his Republican supporters in the US Congress have criticized the Biden administration for renewing billions of dollars in US sanctions waivers, which had the effect of unlocking frozen funds and allowing the country to access previously inaccessible hard currency.
US intelligence agencies have for years labeled Iran as the world’s foremost state sponsor of terrorism, noting it devotes significant sums of money and weapons each year to supporting proxies across the Middle East such as Hamas and Hezbollah. Many observers have suggested that the unfreezing of Iranian funds allowed the country to ramp up its funding of terrorist groups, potentially facilitating the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel.
“And then, of course, last week, on Oct. 1, I was in the Situation Room for more than three hours coordinating in real time with our military leadership as our forces intercept missiles over the skies of Israel,” Harris said during her call, referring to Iran’s most recent missile barrage targeting Israel.
Since launching her presidential campaign in July, Harris has scrambled to shore up support among Jewish voters, repeatedly vowing to defend Israel if elected in November. While accepting the Democratic Party’s nomination for president, Harris reaffirmed her commitment to ensuring Israel’s security. She has also denied rumors that she would impose an “arms embargo” on the Jewish state.
Though Harris has repeatedly issued nominal support for Israel, supporters of the Jewish state have raised concern that she might not defend the Jewish state as vigorously as previous administrations.
Harris does not have the decades-long relationship with Israel that US President Joe Biden does. Harris also harbors close ties to the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, which has become increasingly hostile toward the Jewish state. The vice president has been under pressure from pro-Palestinian activists to break with the Biden administration by adopting a more adversarial posture toward Israel.
Harris previously urged the White House to be more “sympathetic” toward Palestinians and take a “tougher” stance against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to a Politico report in December. In March, White House aides forced Harris to tone down a speech that was too tough on Israel, according to NBC News.
Later, she did not rule out “consequences” for Israel if it launched a large-scale military offensive to root out Hamas battalions in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, citing humanitarian concerns for the civilian population.
Harris initially called for an “immediate ceasefire” before Biden and has often used more pointed language when discussing the war, Israel, and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Harris has also expressed sympathy for anti-Israel protesters on US university campuses. In an interview published earlier this year, Harris said that college students protesting Israel’s defensive military efforts against Hamas are “showing exactly what the human emotion should be.”
Iran is Hamas’s chief international backer.
The post Kamala Harris Vows to Do ‘Whatever Is Necessary’ to Prevent Iran From Acquiring Nuclear Weapons if Elected first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Top US Lawmaker Threatens to Revoke Federal Funding From Harvard University Amid Campus Antisemitism Crisis
US House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) cautioned Harvard University and other elite institutions of higher education that their official accreditation could be in jeopardy if they did not do more to combat surging antisemitism on their campuses.
“Your accreditation is on the line,” Scalise said last week in a meeting in Washington, DC with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), an influential pro-Israel lobbying organization, according to recordings acquired by The Guardian and reported on Wednesday. “You’re not playing games any more or else you’re not a school any more.”
Scalise reportedly singled out Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia University, all of which have come under scrutiny for not doing more to combat increasing antisemitic incidents and rampant anti-Israel demonstrations since Hamas’s massacre across southern Israel last Oct. 7. The lawmaker’s threat could potentially saddle the embattled Ivy League institutions with another crisis as they grapple with simmering antisemitism controversies.
Scalise added that conservatives in the US government are considering targeting the federal funding of Harvard and other schools, indicating that the relationship between the Ivy League institutions and US federal officials could continue to worsen if former President Donald Trump were to retake the Oval Office in November.
“We’re looking at federal money, the federal grants that go through the science committee, student loans,” Scalise continued. “You have a lot of jurisdiction as president, with all of these different agencies that are involving billions of dollars, some cases a billion alone going to one school.”
Six US congressional committees have continued investigating Harvard as part of their probe into campus antisemitism in higher education. The committee chairs have warned that the university’s federal funding could be imperiled if it does not provide a safe environment for Jewish students.
“The House of Representatives will not countenance the use of federal funds to indoctrinate students into hateful, antisemitic, anti-American supporters of terrorism,” the committee chairs wrote to Harvard in June.
Trump has repeatedly threatened to install accreditors who would revoke accreditation of universities that do not handle campus antisemitism seriously.
In the year following Hamas’s brutal slaughter of roughly 1,200 people in southern Israel, Harvard has become a hotspot for protests against the Jewish state. In the immediate aftermath of Oct. 7, a slew of campus groups issued statements blaming Israel for the massacre and rationalizing Hamas’s atrocities, which included systematic sexual violence. In addition, anti-Israel protests immediately erupted across Harvard and other elite universities.
The anti-Israel statements and protests drew the ire of elected officials, causing lawmakers to summon former Harvard President Claudine Gay to testify in front of the US Congress in December. Gay resigned from her post in January amid uproar over her congressional testimony, in which she said calls for genocide against Jews may or may not violate campus conduct policies depending on the “context.”
Rep. Elise M. Stefanik (R-NY) released a statement this week condemning Harvard for not doing more to tackle campus antisemitism.
“Harvard University has once again refused to condemn and discipline the pro-Hamas mob on campus, instead inviting another school year filled with antisemitism and anti-Israel hate,” she said.
Harvard isn’t the only university at risk of having its accreditation threatened by Republican lawmakers. Columbia and the University of Pennsylvania are among those that could face funding cuts over their response to anti-Israel campus protests, which have included threats of violence against Jewish students.
The post Top US Lawmaker Threatens to Revoke Federal Funding From Harvard University Amid Campus Antisemitism Crisis first appeared on Algemeiner.com.