Letters

Courage saluted

Yeshar ko'ach to Rabbi Lavey Derby (April 22 j.) for his piece celebrating his daughter's upcoming marriage to the woman of her dreams. I salute his courage in coming out as the proud father and as a rabbi endorsing full-fledged same-sex marriage in the Jewish community.

May all other parents of gay, lesbian and transgender Jews, especially those in position to lead and inspire, raise their voices so our community can hear and celebrate them.

Rachel Biale | Berkeley




'Blaming the victim'

Jeff Blankfort (April 29 letters) downplays the number of attacks on Jews in Europe and implies that they are caused by "Israeli occupation of Palestinian land." This is a case of both blaming the victim and ignoring the history of the conflict.

Interestingly, Blankfort has written extensively on alleged Jewish control of the government and media. His articles have included the claim that the United States attacked Iraq in order to serve Israeli interests. His writings are widely available on extremist, anti-Israel Web sites.

While Blankfort is certainly entitled to freedom of speech, it is difficult to understand why j. would offer another platform for such an individual to blame Jews for anti-Semitism.

Andrew Gross | Union City




A few facts

I want to add a few facts to a Flame ad in j. a while ago, which I have just seen.

• The British 1917 decision to make Palestine a "homeland" for the Jews was reaffirmed by the League of Nations in 1922, which is a much stronger argument than the British decision alone. Also, it casts doubts on the legitimacy of the British cessation of Transjordan from the original mandate.

• You should have mentioned the recommendations of the Peel committee in 1936 and the Anglo-American committee in 1945, both for partition of the land; both were rejected by the Arabs.

• Another argument against the term "occupation" is that the conquest of the West Bank and Gaza Strip was authorized by the original League of Nation resolution, since the Arabs had rejected all partition compromises.

• You could have emphasized that Jerusalem was supposed to be accessible by both nations according to the United Nations resolution, which was ignored by the Jordanians.

• You could have mentioned that had there been real peaceful intentions by the Palestinians, one solution could be that the 200,000 West Bank settlers become Palestinian citizens, just as 1.2 million Arabs are Israeli citizens.

Arieh Strod | Cupertino




Name supplied

Yehuda Sherman correctly wrote in his April 22 letter that the Palestinian violence that began in fall 2000 was not set off by Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount. He asked for "the name and date of the Arab leader who made public the fact that the Arab violence was planned well in advance."

The individual he has in mind is probably Palestinian Minister of Communications Imad Al-Falouji, who was quoted in many sources.

Dan Fendel | Piedmont




Basic courses

An April 22 letter by Howard Strassner requests basic/introductory courses on Judaism here in San Francisco (he and his wife engaged in one on a recent visit to Savannah, Ga.).

Howard, Congregation Sherith Israel has not one but two. This past fall and winter, we offered a three-session "A Taste of Judaism" program (jointly sponsored by Project Welcome and the Union for Reform Judaism) followed by a 12-week Introduction to Judaism course. Both were free, with only a course-materials fee for the latter. Serving Jews as well as non-Jews, they were well attended and enthusiastically received.

These courses were offered in addition to our regular Saturday morning Torah study, as well as lifelong learning courses on early relations between Christians and Jews, non-Israelites' encounters with God in the era of Abraham, the music of Sherith Israel, Maimonides and our current program on Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai. All are open to visitors.

We will again offer "A Taste of Judaism" and Introduction to Judaism in the fall. Consider this an open invitation to join us.

Rabbi Lawrence W. Raphael




letters policy

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