Suppose someone has the nerve to build a combined Jewish/Arab school with the goal of teaching tolerance in a southwest Jerusalem neighborhood. Then suppose you’re a kabbalist currently being groomed for the unofficial title of Israel’s leading mekubal in the wake of Rav Kaduri’s death. How would you react? No idea? Doesn’t seem like one follows the other? See how it goes down in a bright, cheery and encouraging report in today’s Jerusalem Post.

The State Attorney’s Office ordered police to open a criminal investigation of Rabbi David Batzri and his son, Rabbi Yitzhak Batzri, on Tuesday on suspicion of committing incitement to racism during speeches they made protesting the establishment of a mixed Jewish-Arab school in Jerusalem’s Patt neighborhood.

The complaint was based on a news report about a rally against the school at the neighborhood’s community center on January 9, which appeared on the Jerusalem Internet news site 02net.

The report quoted from speeches by several rabbis including Batzri, a well-known kabbalist, and his son.

“The establishment of such a school is an act of abomination and impurity,” the report quoted David Batzri as saying. “You cannot mix pure with impure. Of course we have to keep apart from all the other nations. You must stand in the breach and prevent this. One cannot mix light with darkness. The people of Israel are pure.

“The Arabs are a nation of donkeys. They are an evil plague, an evil Satan, an evil pestilence. One may ask, ‘why did God not create them to walk on all fours?’ for they are donkeys. The answer is that they have to build and clean, but they have to understand that they are donkeys. There is no place for them in our schools.”

His son, Yitzhak, was quoted as saying, “The Arabs are donkeys and beasts. They are inferior. What do they want? To take our women. They say we are racists. The truth is that they are the evil ones, the cruel ones. They are bestowed with the filth of the snake. There is purity and there is impurity, and they are the impure.”

Considering how long ago this happened, I’m surprised it’s only starting to appear in the news now.

What does one even say? Opposition to a Jewish/Arab school in and of itself would be grossly inappropriate. But to use such a harmless (and even encouraging) event as a launching pad for shockingly racist and triumphalist declarations demeaning an entire ethnic group (which, by the way, outnumbers ours by a hell of a lot) is insane. And even worse, these are not the words of the sort of gun-toting Arab-hating Kahanists that inhabit the far fringes of normal Israeli, or settler, society. This is a supposedly holy man, a man about to become the leading kabbalist in Israel, a man who one might be mistaken into believing would be a walking kiddush Hashem.

And yet, he’s not. Listen, we’re all Jews. We know our history. And every one of you knows as well as I do exactly what and who language like “they are donkeys” or “the filth of the snake” or “one cannot mix light with darkness” or “our people are pure” sounds like. We demand that the world that stood by and did nothing learn its lesson, why do we not demand the same of ourselves?

The fact that so many people appear to respect Batzri worries me greatly. This is not a spiritual leader, this is a man who should be shouted down every time he speaks, no matter how advanced his Jewish learning. If this is the stance of authentic Judaism, and I certainly hope it’s not, then we should all be atheists.

And to preempt the inevitable rejoinders, I’m fully aware that attitudes like these do not characterize the general attitudes of many religious Jews. And I’m also fully aware that similar language spews out of the Arab world on what seems to be a daily basis, and I think it’s disgusting and should be fought against. But the way to fight against it is not to denounce the small efforts in favor of the peace we all desperately need. We as Jews, or Zionists for that matter, like to tell ourselves that we’re better than the worst elements of the nations of the world, that we have some sort of enlightened mission to fulfill. If we are going to continue to regard ourselves in this way, it is our collective responsibility to make sure that everybody knows that fascists like Batzri do not speak in the name of the Jewish people. Because if speeches like his are part of our enlightened mission, count me out.

Latest posts by michael (see all)

About the author

michael

54 Comments

  • Rabbi Batzri, meet Khaled Meshal, you two are going to be gooooood friends.

    If these statements you quoted were made by these two rabbis, they represent the worst side of the Jewish people. They sound, well, like religious fanatics not unlike triumphalist Iranian imams.

    What a disgusting thing to read on my first visit to Jewlicious today. Next time, Michael, your job is to entertain me before you give me something this horrendous to digest for the rest of the day.

  • There’s always been a dark sinister underworld in one form or another in Israel. So what. every little utterance has to be copy/pasted and disected. It’s a way of getting attension for all.

  • Sorry TM. It just really needed to be blogged. I mean, I swear, I tried to find something funny in it, but hell, even I have limits.

  • While on the topic, here are some unsavoury tidbits from a recent poll in Israel:

    Sixty-eight percent of Israeli Jews would refuse to live in the same apartment building as an Israeli Arab

    Forty-six percent of Jews would refuse to allow an Arab to visit their home while 50 percent would welcome an Arab visitor.

    Forty-one percent of Jewish support the segregation of Jews and Arabs in places of recreation and 52 percent of such Jews would oppose such a move.

    Forty percent of Jews believe “the state needs to support the emigration of Arab citizens” and just 52 percent don’t agree with the statement.

    Thirty-four percent also agreed with the statement that “Arab culture is inferior to Israeli culture.” Fifty-seven percent did not agree with the statement.

    Half of Israeli Jews express fear or discomfort when hearing people speaking Arabic. Eighteen percent of Jews said they feel hate when hearing Arabic speakers.

    From Ha’aretz. Muffti is not one to take polls too seriously, but the numbers are a little discomforting. Or, perhaps for some readers, extremely comforting.

  • I hate to burst your self-righteous bubble, folks, but the Batzris are not spouting racist, fascist, evil lies. They’re spouting TORAH. The Talmud says very clearly that Ishmael and his descendants are – get ready – “A nation that is similar to donkeys.” Just read Rashi in Parshat Vayera. If one is to believe the Midrash, Abraham said to his servant, Eliezer, “You [and your family] are cursed, and my son is blessed. A cursed [person] cannot attach himself to a blessed [person].”

    Also, I hate – HATE – when Jews immediately paint Jewish racism as nazism. The Batzris would never in a million years advocate genocide. They said very clearly that Arabs are good for construction and janitorial work. They’re just NOT good for socializing and mixing with Jews. This is the traditional Torah perspective, boys and girls. Deal with it.

  • Uh, yeah, stoning was traditional too and do you notice how we don’t do that any more?

    Muffti, those numbers are discomforting but we should also consider the context carefully both in terms of the war with the Palestinians and the vocal antagonism that has become one of the features of the Israeli-Arab population (some of it quite justified and some of it unfortunate but not so justified).

  • JABBERWOCKY
    Lewis Carroll

    `Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
    Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
    All mimsy were the borogoves,
    And the mome raths outgrabe.

    “Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
    The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
    Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
    The frumious Bandersnatch!”

    He took his vorpal sword in hand:
    Long time the manxome foe he sought —
    So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
    And stood awhile in thought.

    And, as in uffish thought he stood,
    The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
    Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
    And burbled as it came!

    One, two! One, two! And through and through
    The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
    He left it dead, and with its head
    He went galumphing back.

    “And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
    Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
    O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
    He chortled in his joy.

    `Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
    Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
    All mimsy were the borogoves,
    And the mome raths outgrabe.

  • @ Rel

    The post was about racism, so of course the author chose the German language for the title…
    Isn’t the logic obvious to you?

    (Still, I like the irony of “Jawohl, mein Rabbi.”)

  • Oh, yeah:

    I think when Arabs stop blowing Jews up and threatening to drink their blood, and when Israeli Arabs stop going out of their way to trumpet their solidarity with Hamas and stop supporting MKs who are all obviously traitors to Israel, I think Jewish attitudes towards Arabs might change a wee bit.

  • A declaration that your birth group is by birth and/or god superior to all other groups is a two edged sword other groups can just as correctly and with just as much scientific authority (why does anybody claim that religious “leaders” are wise men?)that your “special seperate race” is by
    birth and/or god evil and inferior. The winner of such an argument is the one that wipes out the other one. The end result of such declarations of superiority are at the very least unfair oppression and at the very worst etnic cleansing of the labeled inferior group.
    Stupidity and ignorance practiced by one group against another is still stupidity and ignorance when practiced by another group. How is it not possible to reflect on Nazi Germany any time a so called represenative for a birth group claims racial superiority, wether by genetics or “scripture”, the extreme end result of such foolishness is germanys history and example. The good rabbi is welcome to practice and preach his racial/religious exclusiveness all he wants, for my part, but others can and should point out that he is a dangerous and stupid racist playing the same game as all the other racist idiots (muslim, christian and survivalist) who are grouped against his birth group. Donkeys indeed!

  • Once again, I find myself in agreement with Ephraim. Rhetoric aside, a mixed school is one of the worst ideas I’ve heard in a long time. As if we didn’t have enough trouble with intermarriage and assimilation, lets cozy up with our lifelong enemies! No thank you, take your self-hate somewhere else, and away from our innocent kids. Jewish kids belong with Jewish kids. Period.

  • I cannot believe what some of you are saying. “Jewish kids belong with Jewish kids.” If that isn’t racism than I don’t know what would be. What is the one thing that fuels hate and intolerance more than anything? Ignorance. How do you fight ignorance? By educating people about another people’s customs. Maybe little Mohamed would think twice about becoming a suicide bomber if he remembers going to school with a being friends with little Moses. What this Rabbi is saying is irresponsible as well. People look to their Rabbi’s and clerical leadership in any faith to guide them and help to clarify certain issues. As long as radical cleric (Muslim, Jewish, Christian, whatever) continue to speak with hate and intolerance in their words, we will never have peace. Only more little dead Moses’and Mohameds.

  • “The Talmud says very clearly that Ishmael and his descendants are – get ready – “A nation that is similar to donkeys.” Just read Rashi in Parshat Vayera. If one is to believe the Midrash, Abraham said to his servant, Eliezer, “You [and your family] are cursed, and my son is blessed. A cursed [person] cannot attach himself to a blessed [person].””

    Ah yes, of course. Because some guy 1000 years ago in France commented on the ~2500 year old compiled national myths of a xenophobic Semitic tribe, we should all be drooling fascists.

    Gosh. What a light we all are.

  • Danielle- Most likely little Mohamed would not think twice. Last year, I knew a Jewish Israeli who helped a little Mohamed. Little Mohamed was going to go blind if he didn’t get surgery, a surgery he could only get in Israel.

    Little Mohamed knew that if he got the surgery, he would be all the more able to be a successful homicide bomber. Little Mohamed told this to the Jewish Israeli, and yet they went through with the surgery. As far as I know, this particular little Mohamed never did end up blowing himself and others up, but even having a Jewish Israeli help him in such a valuable way didn’t really change his perspective.

    Things are much more complex than calling people ignorant and saying education will solve everyone’s problems. There is a specific reality on the ground and in the streets in the Middle East. I don’t claim to know how to fix things.

    And Michael, please, give me a break. The way the entire world lives today is based on what some guy was saying thousands of years ago. That’s the way the world is. And either you can live by what the Jewish guys said thousands of years ago, or what the other guys said. One is a Jewish way, and the other is something else. But don’t pretend that the very fabric of the culture you surround yourself with isn’t deeply rooted in a specific history. And if it makes you feel better to believe it’s a falsified history, I guess more power to you.

  • G-d Squad,
    None of what you have said allows a Rabbi and community leader who has sway over other Jews to incite baseless racial hatred. If this truly is a part fo Judaism as you see it then maybe you should be questioning what you are willing to believe in. Also, your anecdote doesn’t prove any point because the only way to truly ethically give to another person is unconditionally (otherwise you set yourself up as inherent superior to the person you are giving to which is unethical). Maybe this exact case didn’t end with the Islamic person seeing that Jews are moral people but that doesn’t mean we should stop those efforts or that we should prove Muhamed right by supporting someone who thinks that Muslims are donkeys.

  • G-d Squad,
    Maybe things will not change in this generation, but if the next generation is educated and tolerant than maybe some of the violence will stop. Don’t you see what is happening? All this anger and hate just makes the state of Israel weaker, not stronger. Maybe I am an idealist, but think of all the great things that have been thought of by clueless little idealists. Even the existance of Israel itself was once a idealistic idea 100 years ago. But it is there now. Democracy, rights for women, all things that came from an idealist who thought the world could be a better place. You have to have blind faith in G-d; you have to have blind faith in people too. Maybe little Mohamed will still follow a violent path, but maybe not. Isn’t that a chance anyone should be willing to take?

  • “The white race deems itself to be the dominant race in this country. And so it is in prestige, in achievements, in education, in wealth and in power. So, I doubt not, it will continue to be for all time if it remains true to its great heritage and holds fast to the principles of constitutional liberty. But in view of the Constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law. The humblest is the peer of the most powerful. The law regards man as man, and takes no account of his surroundings or of his color when his civil rights as guaranteed by the supreme law of the land are involved . . .
    The destinies of the two races in this country are indissolubly linked together, and the interests of both require that the common government of all shall not permit the seeds of race hate to be planted under the sanction of law. What can more certainly arouse race hate, what more certainly create and perpetuate a feeling of distrust between these races, than state enactments which, in fact, proceed on the ground that colored citizens are so inferior and degraded that they cannot be allowed to sit in public coaches occupied by white citizens. That, as all will admit, is the real meaning of such legislation as was enacted in Louisiana.”

    Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896) Harlan, J., dissenting).

  • Tom, I see nothing in there about donkeys. Please stick to the subject.

    Seriously, I have just reread that paragraph 3 or 4 times and I want to say that while our society has made great strides, we are not quite there yet. On the other hand, the ideals of America that the justices identify in this passage are what makes this society a great one.

  • Just so there is no misunderstanding, I think what Bazri and his son said is shameful and indefensible. They should be unequivocally censured. I most certainly do not share their views.

    Hating Arabs because they are Arabs is one thing. Distrusting them because of their proven hatred of Jews and Israel and their track record of violence is quite another.

  • It’s reality check time, folks:

    1. This is POLITICAL, not religious speech. Batzri may have ordination, but he is a political creature, and this is politically motivated speech.

    And most posters here do not have the knowledge/experience to parse the many layers of North African animosity towards their oppressors – both Arab and Ashkenazi – that are interleaved in this political move, and in the equally politicized decision to prosecute him.

    2. For Danielle and all those who think we just have to *understand* each other a bit more: remember the female suicide bomber who received extensive treatment for burns in an Israeli hospital – and then returned with a bomb-belt in an attempt to blow up that same hospital?

    It doesn’t work, folks. Kindness is perceived as weakness. As the cartoon controversy shows, the Muslim world assigns absolutely no value to understanding others.

    3. There is nothing at all racist about Jews wanting their kids to attend Jewish schools – any more than it’s racist for American Jews to set up their own private schools.

    5. Not many Americans would have been thrilled to have their kids study with large contingents of German or Japanese kids in the decades following WWII – well in this case the Arabs are still attacking us, and the “Israeli” Arabs have clearly established themselves as a fifth column.

    Sorry – you reap what you sow out here in the real world. Although victimology politics assigns static, perpetual nobility to certain groups no matter how they act, in the real world violent, rejectionist actions have consequences.

  • Well Ben-David, what do you suggest the answer is? Just keep blowing each other up? Cuz that’s really working for us now. It makes me angry that people lump all Arab’s into a category of terrorists. One of my friends at work is a very devout Muslim and her and I sit and talk about these issues for hours. Most Arab’s are good people, just like most Israeli’s are good people. You just have these extreme religious fanatics (And they aren’t just all Muslim, who killed Yitzak Rabin? May his memory be a blessing.) Until both sides decide that this kind of behavior is intolerable, this will continue and more innocent people will die. I don’t think kindness is weakness either. Unconditional kindness is the bravest act…you don’t know what will happen in the end, but you do it because it is right.

  • i’d like to start by saying to Danielle that idealists rarely get anything done. The women’s movement of the 20th century was only taken seriously because of the world wars. And I’m sure you’ll agree there is still room for improvement in terms of equality. Anyway, I’m basically an optimist, but bleeding heart naïveté and oversimplification does not make for an honest discussion. As several people have stated, the situation is much more complicated than little Muhamed and little Moses overcoming their cultural differences and holding hands. That having been said, there are plenty of Israeli Arabs that I’ve met personally who have no desire to murder Israelis. They want to live in a society where they aren’t looked at with suspicion as second class citizens. They also understandably want to live in an Israel that has a non-Jewish flag and national anthem, and that’s something that many, including myself, are not comfortable with.

  • Trust me, I am no bleeding heart. There are definately instances where a little retaliation goes a long way. But, as my brother always reminds me “An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.” I don’t think it’s an issue of over-simplification, rather, it’s over-complication. I understand that some of you I’m sure have dealt with horrible acts of violence that have deeply affected you personally. For that I am deeply sorry, but the answer to the problems is very simple. It just requires compromise on both sides and not tolerating this crap from “holier than thou” clerics. Peace takes compromise; it always has and always will.

  • Agreed, Danielle.

    Tell that to the Arabs.

    Oh, wait, they just elected a gang of Nazi terrorist thugs to be their “government”.

    Never mind. My bad.

  • can everyone please stop comparing every person or group they don’t like to the Nazis?

  • Ever read the Hamas charter, ofri? These guys really are Nazis. They just don’t have the power to achieve their goals, and the Jews now have an army to prevent them from doing that.

    But the fact that they will not be able to do what they want does not make them any the less what they are.

  • um, no they’re not. they’re hateful, anti-semitic, murderous even, but they’re not Nazis. you know that very well.

  • No, I don’t know that very well at all. They may be two-bit Nazis, frustrated Nazis, lacking-a-real-army Nazis, incompetent, weenie Nazis, but they are Nazis nonetheless.

    The only thing that separates them from the Nazis is the fact that they do not have the power to do what they want. The Nazis are only monstrous in hindsight, now that we know what they did. Before they embarked on their program, no one thought they were the monsters they turned out to be. But anyone with eyes to see can see that Hamas would do to Israel just what the Nazis did to the Jews if they had the power to do so.

  • Muffti isn’t sure of this, Ephraim. Anyone who read Mein Kampf should have had at least a vague idea about Hitler’s long term plans.

  • Yes lets just continue to live in the “real World” where corect and fair treatment of all people just doesn´t give any results; the only thing they understand is the iron fist. Humanism is for sissies and losers. Lets continue to live in the “real world”.
    Don´t you just love it?
    Isn´t it just working just fine?
    Don`t you just feel more and more secure every day?

  • You nailed it, and I’m glad to see more people saying it.

    He should be called down everytime he speaks, and it was a gesture that disgusts me to my very bones.

    My greatest complaint towards moderate Muslims is how few of them stand up and decry the fanatics and bastards in their midst. We can do no less.

  • Ephraim,

    Hamas = Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei? I guess i did’nt realize Hamas had such German nationalist fervor. Huh.

    There is some blatant hatred being spewed here, including standing up for this douche bag calling another group people DONKEYS.

    I guess in the 5 minutes before Shabbos starts her in Berlin, i would hope our thoughts could be on some hippy shit like peace, love, oh hell..understanding. Things this school could very well produce.

    Gut shabbos.

  • Muffti:

    People who were aware knew what Mein Kampf meant and what Hitler’s plan was. Yet they negotiated with him anyway. It was just that most people (those that didn’t secretly agree with Hitler, anyway) didn’t take it seriously. We know better now. So when you have a group of people who are sworn to the destruction of Israel and who call Jews monkeys and pigs elected to government by popular vote, you shoud start adding two and two and drawing the correct conclusions. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.

    Anybody who insists that Hamas is not really like that or that they will turn moderate now that they have been elevated to being a “government” is either incredibly stupid, wilfully blind, or just whistling past the graveyard. Like I said, the fact that Hamas does not have the power to do what it wants doesn’t mean that it doesn’t want to do it.

    Elon:

    If you read what I wrote carefully, you will see that I am on record as condemning what Batzri said.

    Also, you should stop being a pedant. Of course Hamas is not the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, nor are they imbued with German nationalist fervor. But they are Nazis where it counts: in their attitude towards Jews and their plan for “solving” their “Jewish question”.

  • the only person being willful is you, Ephraim. no one is saying that Hamas are namby-pamby nancy boys, or even that they are redeemable in any way. all I’m saying is they’re not Nazis in any way. What, like Nazis have a monopoly on anti-semitism and the desire to kill Jews? some people, believe it or not, are offended at the comparison to the Nazis, and I’m not talking about Hamas.
    Also I’d argue with your interpretation of the reaction to Mein Kampf. I think plenty of people knew what Hitler was capable of very early on, and during the war certain parties knew what was being done to the Jews and didn’t give a shit.

  • Who, in the name of G-d, would be offended at the comparison of Hamas to the Nazis? And why?

    And if you are offended at me calling a bunch of Jew-murdering terroists Nazis, why would that be? Are you afraid of hurting their feelings or something? Or that real Nazis would be insulted by the comparison? And would that bother you?

    You seem to agree that Hamas are irredemable anti-semites who want to kill Jews; is that not enough? I mean, after all, as far as Jews are concerned, what defines a Nazi more than anti-Semitism and a desire to kill Jews? Do we need anything else?

    What separates Hamas from the Nazis? Their economic program? The infrastructure to commit mass murder? Keffiyehs instead of swastika armbands? No spiffy uniforms only an S&M freak could love? Level of organization? That they don’t sing the Horst Wessel Leid? Race? Hair color? What?

    In the only thing that matters to Jews, there is little or nothing to distinguish the “Jewish policy” of Hamas from that of the Nazis. I really am totally mystified by your dudgeon over this issue.

    Or do you think this is just a form of crying wolf? That people will roll their eyes and yawn and say “There go those hysterical Jews again, panicking about Nazis” and ignore us?

    This is precisely the problem: the term “Nazi” has been so devalued by promiscuous use that when real Nazis whose whole raison d’etre is the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews jump up and down and say “Yoo hoo! Here we are! We think Jews are monkeys and pigs and we are going to murder them if we can!”, people cannot understand wht is staring them in the face.

  • i’m equally mystified by your opaqueness on this issue. yea, i’m really offended on behalf of Nazis and hamasnikim. you just said it yourself! when you compare everyone and everything to the Nazis it’s a desensitization of the “term” Nazi. I’m not the one using it “promiscuously,” you are. The mitnachlim called the IDF and its supporters Nazis when they were being resettled, and I didn’t much care for that use either. A lot of Jews don’t like it when people compare their tragedies and travesties to the Holocaust, I know I don’t, so why do we do it ourselves? And sorry to be pedantic, but a Nazi is not an abstract idea. Nazis were specifically located in a historic period and they’re not around right now. Hamas is, and that’s too bad. Personally I feel like Hamas isn’t even the biggest threat to the Jews right now, but that’s neither here nor there.
    “In the only thing that matters to Jews, there is little or nothing to distinguish the “Jewish policy” of Hamas from that of the Nazis.” obviously, I disagree, and I’m Jewish. I’d appreciate if you didn’t speak for a whole people.

  • I didn’t realize you were such a pedant, ofri. I thought you had a little more imagination than that. Saying that Hamas can’t be Nazis because they aren’t Germans who lived during a specific historical period is pointing out a distinction without a difference.

    My point is precisely because everything that one doesn’t like is referred to as “Nazi” that when the term is actually deserved, people think it is inappropriate or alarmist.

    Personally, I do not see how applying the term “Nazi” to a group of people that wants to exterminate Jews is inappropriate or trivializes anything.

    When you are offended by my use of the term to descibe a group that we both seem to agree is anti-Semitic and genocidal, is it because you think this demeans the suffering of those who went through the camps? This seems a somewhat strange way to honor the dead from the Shoah, to say that a Jew killed by a Hamas bomb did not suffer as much or for the same reasons as someone who perished at Auschwitz.

    But if you like, I can call them Amalek just as easily. Again, a distinction without a difference. The essence is the same.

    Regarding threats to the Jewish people, I am not sure that Hamas is the biggest threat either, so at least we agree on something. When the inevitable war comes, I am sure that Israel will handle them quite easily.

  • i just don’t have the energy to argue this anymore. the war won’t come, it’s already come. and it’s not really that easy. Israel has never easily defeated anyone, but it’s always survived. i just don’t feel like there’s any validity to the comparison. there is no shortage of hatred and genocide (or genocidal ambitions) in the world, and it’s not all the same.

  • Ephraim,
    You said (in italics):
    Also, you should stop being a pedant.

    I´ll stop being a pedant, when you make it unneccesary

    Of course Hamas is not the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, nor are they imbued with German nationalist fervor. But they are Nazis where it counts: in their attitude towards Jews and their plan for “solving” their “Jewish question”.

    Right, thats the whole point. Hamas hates Jews, but so do plenty of groups, and in similarily structured ways troughout the ME and Europe. However, the Nazis were a political party with a political mission that ranged beyond the scope of just exterminated the unerwuenschte, especially Jews. Hamas leaders aren´t nazis, they are anti-semitic assholes. Dangerous? Yes. Threatening? Also. Nazi? Nope. Which leads me to my next point…

    This is precisely the problem: the term “Nazi” has been so devalued by promiscuous use…

    My point exactly. That´s what this pedant was trying to get at.

  • I can agree that there may be many different flavors of anti-Semitism in the world and that not every anti-Semite is necessarily a Nazi. It is also true that the Hamas economic program may not bear any relationship to the Nazi economic program. Shrug. That’s sort of like saying that the fact some dude killed some other dude not because he wanted to rob him but because he was, say, black or gay or something makes the dude any the less dead. I don’t think the dead guy is going to care why he got killed.

    I still say, that in the ways that matter to Jews, Hamas is enough like the Nazis to actually deserve the epithet, unlike a lot of other people to whom the term is indiscriminately applied.

    Does Hamas believe Jews to be untermenschen? Yes.

    Is their movement based on the hatred of Jews? Yes.

    Do they profess to believe that the Jews are the root of all evil? Yes.

    Do they believe that the “Jewish problem” (in this case Israel) can only be solved by killing Jews? Yes.

    Is their movement and all of its energies and resources dedicated to this purpose? Yes.

    Is the professed aim of their “government” the eradication of Israel? Yes.

    The list could be expanded, I’m sure. Again, my point about how the promiscuous use of the term Nazi had devalued it still stands: finally, when there is a political party that actually seems to embody in the modern world everything the Nazis stood for, and which is now in a position to actually try to put this plan into action, the term Nazi has been so overused that even though the shoe fits nobody thinks anyone should wear it.

    What is different now is that the Jews are strong and the would-be Nazis are weak. This fact, as welcome as it is, does not change what Hamas is and what they would do if given the chance.

  • “Is their movement and all of its energies and resources dedicated to this purpose? Yes.”

    wrong. Hamas does plenty of social welfare work in the Palestinian territories, which is why they were elected. the rest, I don’t deny. in fact that statement is wrong in regards to the Nazis as well. If you’ll recall, they were also engaged in a few military operations in Europe. Besides which the Nazis put plenty of time and effort into robbing every country they occupied and killing people other than Jews. Not that this does anything for my argument, but I just thought I’d point out the glaring oversimplifications in your line of thinking. My position remains the same. Maybe we’re not talking about apples and oranges here, but oranges and tangerines at best.

  • Jesus, you don’t mean to tell me that you fall for that “they were elected for their social work program, not for their anti-Semtisim” booshwah? If you believe that I have a nice bridge out here in SF that I could sell you.

    Even if that’s true, which I don’t believe it is, it doesn’t mean diddly squat. Hell, Hitler built the autobahns, gave people jobs and made the trains run on time and people voted for him in droves. But he was still a Nazi.

    All I have been saying is that in the way that matters most to Jews, Hamas are like the Nazis. I don’t particularly care if Hamas has any designs on Jordan or Lebanon.

    Oranges and tangerines? Close enough for me.

  • and all I’m saying is that in the way that matters most to YOU, perhaps, Hamas are like the Nazis.

  • For a person who doesn’t ant to argue about this any further, you sure like to argue.

    You’ve pretty much agreed that Hamas is to the Nazis as tangerines are to oranges; that is, pretty damn close. Violent anti-Semitic genocide-mongers, right? I think we agree on that.

    Let me turn this around: in what way that matters to you are they not like Nazis?

    And don’t tell me it’s because the name of their group is “Hamas” and not the “Nazi Party” and they speak Arabic instead of German.

  • Ofri, Ephraim, for God’s sake, stop! Ephraim, you agree that Hamas aren’t LITERALLY nazis. Ofri, you agree, the Hamas is an antisemitic group that would not shy away from extermination.

    End of discussion!

  • Well, that was sort of my point, O Muffti Grande de Tutti Muffti Grandiosi. A Nazi can be a Nazi without a swastika.

    But, hey, go ahead and close the thread if you want. No skin off my nose.

  • Szanowni Panowie
    Mam jedno pytanie, czy można porozmawiać na temat rekonstrukcji pierwotnej wersji 10 Słów:
    – Bereszit Micwa
    – Leszon ha Kodesz
    Dziękuje za poświęcenie swojego cennego czasu mojej sprawie.
    Ed z Gateshead