Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on August 8, 2017

Politics

01:47 08.08.2017(updated 08:53 08.08.2017) Get short URL

Radio Sputniks Eugene Puryear of By Any Means Necessary spoke with Roger Waters, founding member of the legendary Pink Floyd, about the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement and exercising free speech even when it comes to the inflammatory Israel-Palestine conflict.

Pink Floyds Roger Waters stopped by Radio Sputniks Washington offices todiscuss the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement onMonday morning withBy Any Means Necessary, amidcharges fromthe Jewish Community Relations Council that Waters activism has "crossed the line intoanti-Semitism."

"Here we have a non-violent movement steeped deeply in [the methods pioneered by] Martin Luther King, Ghandi, so many people who are so revered worldwide. But when you put BDS and Israel together the vitriol towardit seems so outof whack withhow were taught toremember non-violent civil disobedience," By Any Means Necessary host Eugene Puryear said.

The backlash againstthe 12-year-old BDS movement stems from completely understandable bitterness that followed the way the Jewish people were treated innorthern Europe and western Europe inthe 1930s, 1940s and Second World War, Waters said. This justified sentiment, however, has been diverted intoan exceptionalistic extremism that knows no boundaries ofbehavior, the songwriter pointed out.

As it gains strength, BDS is emerging asone ofthe most divisive movements acrossthe global political landscape. In the pastseveral years, some US churches, students and teachers organizations and high-level academics have made pledges todivest fromIsraeli businesses and institutions; onSaturday, the fast-growing Democratic Socialists ofAmerica, a party associated withformer presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, passed a resolution endorsing the movement atits national convention inChicago.

Meanwhile, the bipartisan Israel Anti-Boycott Act introduced intothe US Senate inMarch, would make support forinternational boycotts againstIsrael a felony.

Proponents onboth sides ofthe issue are running forthe garrisons, preparing forpolitical war.

"On the altar ofZionism, they want totear upthe Constitution," Waters said, pointing toFirst Amendment free speech rights that would be "scratched out" if the Israel Anti-Boycott Act becomes law.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is terrified that public discourse will stray too far fromthe status quo ofsupporting Israel almost withoutquestion, Waters noted ofthe powerful Washington lobbyist group. Particularly, AIPAC and its kin are wary ofword getting aroundabout the oppression ofPalestinians inoccupied territories, the artist said. If somebody suggests there might be an alternative narrative, they want them silenced."

On June 5, Waters wrote an open letter toRadiohead toprotest that bands crossing the BDS picket line earlier inthe year toplay a show inTel Aviv. "Today is the 50th anniversary ofthe occupation ofPalestine byIsrael," the bassist and songwriter wrote. "Fifty years living undermilitary occupation, 50 years fora people withno civil rights, 50 years ofno recourse tothe law, 50 years ofapartheid."

The BDS picket line "exists toshine a light onthe predicament ofthe occupied people ofPalestine, both inPalestine and those displaced abroad, and topromote equal civil rights forall the people living betweenthe Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea no matter what their nationality, race or religion," Waters letter reads.

Another prominent pro-Israel lobby inWashington, the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) ofGreater Washington, released a video ahead ofWaters shows inWashington overthe weekend, criticizing the musician for using music todivide people.

JCRC executive director Ron Halber called Waters "an embarrassment" duringan interview withthe Washington Post published ina Saturday column. "I advise him tostick tomusic and stop talking aboutthings he knows nothing about," Halber said.

Benjamin Balthaser, a Jew who joined DSA last year, told the Intercept the Israeli government says it represents all Jews inthe world I think its very important forthe Jewish community tosay, 'We dont feel represented byan apartheid government. We dont feel represented bya military occupation.'"

Regarding the intersection ofthe BDS movement and pending legislation that would criminalize the boycott, the legendary musician said, Were arriving ata fundamental crunch point where your civil liberties are being attacked bywhat is essentially an agent ofa foreign government.

Tel Aviv toWaters: Wish you were here.

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Posted By simmons on August 8, 2017

In early July, I sat in a room at a retreat center in Northern California, listening with rapt attention to a group of queer elders telling stories. It was the second to last night of Queer Talmud Camp, a weeklong Talmud-study intensive for LGBTQ people and allies, put on by SVARA, a traditionally radical Yeshiva based in Chicago.

Elder was a relative term in this context, with panelists ranging from their 40s to their 70s, but all had lived long enough to see a space like Queer Talmud Camp go from outside the realm of the possible to the very real indeed. They told us about coming out, to themselves and to others. They shared stories of being told they would never succeed as rabbis, as camp directors, as teachers. They spoke about mourning friends during the AIDS crisis and gathering with surviving friends to resist and heal. They spoke of protest marches and the births of their children. They spoke about what it took to create the world that us youngsters have inherited.

I listened to these stories mere weeks after my own rabbinic ordination from Hebrew College, thinking of the first chapter of Pirkei Avot. It begins by telling us that Moses received the Torah at Mount Sinai and transmitted it to Yehoshua and Yehoshua to the elders and the elders to the prophets and the prophets to the people of the Great Assembly. This shalshelet hakabbalah, this chain of transmission, is said to carry through the years, into the present day. There have been times, both during rabbinical school and beyond it, where I have experienced the chain, understood myself as part of its forging.

At Queer Talmud Camp, that feeling was amplified exponentiallybecause there, the chain of transmission was immediate in a way I hadnt experienced before. The people in that room, the stories they had lived, were quite literally part of the reason that I could be the person I am today: a queer, trans, non-binary rabbi. A teacher of Torah, a student of an ancient tradition, a link between the Jewish past and the Jewish future.

After the panel, I sat with my friend, colleague, and former Hebrew College classmate Rabbi Mnica Gomery, and she named what shed felt during the panel as gratitude and grief. Grief for whats been lost, for what has been and continues to be hard and painful for queer folks living inside a tradition that so many say doesnt belong to us. Grief for queer pain and struggle in the wider world. Gratitude for the fact that we get to be part of this work, for the knowledge that our tradition has always been built this wayfriend to friend and generation to generation. Gratitude that queer people are fierce and resilient and gorgeous beyond words. Gratitude that we have elders to tell us about their past and wonder at how those stories help us imagine our own future. Because most queer young people are not born into families with queer elders already present. Because LGBTQ communities can be generationally narrow, valorizing youth and beauty as an unconscious attempt to hold at bay the vulnerability and trauma that institutionalized homophobia and transphobia bring about. Because so many people in todays world are split off from each other along lines of age, making it harder to build meaningful intergenerational relationships.

As we talked, I noticed the bittersweet feeling the stories stirred up and I thought: Ive heard this teaching before.

In this weeks Torah portion we read: Heres how it will be: if you listen to My mitzvot that I command you todayto love God your God, and to serve God with all your heart and with all your soulI will give you the rain of the land in its time.

It could just as easily read: If we listen to each otherlovingly, tenderly, with all our hearts and soulsthen we will be able to build together. Our tears and our joy will come in their appointed times. We will multiply upon this earth. We will grow in numbers and strength, spreading the truth that you can be exactly who you are and love the Torah and be a part of the Jewish tradition.

This verse, which God taught to Moses and the Israelites as they reached the end of their wandering in the wilderness, might continue: But if we ever lose sight of how much we owe each other, if we are cut off from the generations whose lives made our lives possible, if we worship only the present moment and neglect our eldersthen we will not be able to imagine a real future for ourselves. We will not be able to imagine who we could become if we dont learn who has been here before us.

The night after the panel of queer elders, it was time for the annual camp dance party. We traveled there in flocks. We turned on the rainbow lights. We turned up the music.

Hours later, many of us would go over to the Beit Midrash next door, finding it as full of people at 1am as the dance party had been. We would return to parsing Hebrew and Aramaic words, finding the roots, teasing out the meaning.

The following day, camp would end. We would gather in the Beit Midrash for one final session, hanging on the words of each camper who rose in turn to recite from memory part of the section of Talmud we had been studying. We would cheer uproariously as they finished, as even the newest beginnerswho only days before had been puzzling over their Aleph Betowned that room, owned those ancient, sacred words.

Rabbi Elliot Kukla would come up to me and say, I was the only out trans rabbi for five whole years. Then, for what seemed like ages, there were two of us. Now theres this fabulous double handful, more people than I even know. Im amazed to live in a moment when I could imagine my child growing up in a shul with two nonbinary trans rabbis! Its more than I could have dreamed of.

My friend Sara Sandmel, about to start rabbinical school, would say to me, Listen. Watching you and the other queer and trans people in our community doing what you do made it possible for me to imagine myself as a rabbi.

And then, we would scatter back into our daily lives. We would gather up the sparks of queer Torah wed collected at camp and bind them as signs upon our hands, keep them as signs before our eyes. We would speak of them in our homes and when we traveled on the way. They would be with us when we rose in the morning and with us when we lay down at night.

But right then, we danced. Elders and youngsters, Talmud novices and Talmud teachers, rabbis and rebels and seekers. We danced with gratitude and grief filling our every movement. We danced together, as if our collective past and our collective future depended on it.

Rabbi Gray Myrseth was ordained in 2017 by the Rabbinical School of Hebrew College inNewton, MA, and is currently serving as School Director at Kehilla Community Synagogue in Piedmont, CA.

Interested in a possible career in the rabbinate? Read Rabbi Dan Judsons article Jewish Lessons on Meaningful Work. Rabbi Judson teaches history, oversees the professional development program, and serves as the placement director for the Hebrew College Rabbinical School. He has a PhD in Jewish history from Brandeis University.

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Signs Upon Our Hands (Parshat Eikev, Deuteronomy 7:12-11:25) - HuffPost

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Posted By admin on August 8, 2017

Miami Herald

Fluent in English and Spanish? A synagogue preschool wants its students to be, too Miami Herald The Margaux Early Childhood School of Temple Judea will begin a Spanish immersion program this fall for children 18- to 35 months old. All lessons and interactions between students and teachers will be in Spanish during the year-long program, which ...

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Posted By simmons on August 8, 2017

WASHINGTON (JTA) The government of Cape Verde listed the island nations Jewish cemeteries and some other structures as heritage sites.

A Washington-based group, the Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project, announced the June 29 designation of the sites as part of the countrys National Historical Patrimony this week in an email to its members. The designation means that the cemeteries may not be destroyed and that a number of buildings with Jewish associations may not be altered, the groups president, Carol Castiel, told JTA.

CVJHP will continue to work hand-in-hand with the government based on our memorandum of understanding (Protocolo) signed in September 2016, to identify, restore, preserve and maintain these important monuments to Jewish heritage, the statement said. Castiel told JTA that the sites may eventually be marked as a Jewish heritage circuit for tourists to the island.

The islands Jews have all but disappeared, although many of its families are aware of their Jewish ancestry, as are some Cape Verde emigres who have settled in New England.

There were two waves of Jewish immigration to the former Portuguese colony about 300 miles off Africas west coast. The first was of secret Jews who came with Portuguese colonization in the 15th century.

That immigration is difficult to track because of the Jews secrecy, and the cemeteries and other sites are relics of a wave of Jewish immigrants to the island from Morocco and Gibraltar in the mid-19th century.

The Cape Verde Jewish Heritage Project has been working since 2008 with municipalities particularly Praia that are known to have had a Jewish presence. King Mohammed VI of Morocco has been a benefactor of the project.

Earlier this month, Cape Verde announced that it would no longer vote against Israel in the United Nations. The announcement came following a meeting two months ago between Israels Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Cape VerdesPresident Jorge Carlos Fonseca on the sidelines of theEconomic Community of West African States conference in Liberia.

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Cape Verde lists Jewish cemeteries as heritage sites - Jewish Telegraphic Agency

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Posted By admin on August 8, 2017

With the war between mainstream and independent media heating up, YouTube has weaponized a new content censorship program, calling it an effort to fight terror content online. With standards set by groups like the Anti-Defamation League, political agendas are sure to intrude.

(Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg)

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA Ever since fake news found its place among the various explanations used by the Clinton campaign and supporters to account for their candidates loss, there has been a quiet but concerted effort on the part of establishment media, technology, and telecommunications companies to thwart the surging popularity of independent media.

The rise of the independent media has been hugely detrimental to the once privileged position of the mainstream media, who have now lost the trust of the vast majority of Americans and along with that trust their ability to control political and social narratives.

Chief among the groups seeking to clamp down on independent media has been Google, the massive technology company with deep connections to the U.S. intelligence community, as well as to U.S. government and business elites.

Since 2015, Google has worked to become the Internets Ministry of Truth, first through its creation of the First Draft Coalition and more recently via major changes made to its search engine that curtail public access to new sites independent of the corporate media.

Related |Newly Declassified Documents Detail CIAs Relationship With Media

Google has now stepped up its war on free speech and the freedom of the press through its popular subsidiary, YouTube. On Tuesday, YouTube announced online that it is set to begin censoring content deemed controversial, even if that content does not break any laws or violate YouTubes user agreement.

Misleadingly dubbed as an effort to fight terror content online, the new program will flag content for review through a mix of machine algorithms and human review, guided by standards set up by expert NGOs and institutions that are part of YouTubes Trusted Flagger program. YouTube stated that such organizations bring expert knowledge of complex issues like hate speech, radicalization, and terrorism.

One of the leading institutions directing the course of the Trusted Flagger program is the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). The ADL was initially founded to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all but has gained a reputation over the years for labeling any critic of Israels government as an anti-Semite.

For instance, characterizing Israeli policies towards the Palestinians as racist or apartheid-like is considered hate speech by the ADL, as is accusing Israel of war crimes or attempted ethnic cleansing. The ADL has even described explicitly Jewish organizations who are critical of Israels government as being anti-Semitic.

Related |Googles War On Indy Media: Plan To Punish False News By Halting Ad Revenue

In addition to its labeling of Palestinian rights activists as extremists, the ADL has also given numerous U.S. conservatives the same label, including Mike Cernovich and Gavin McInnes. Cernovich and McInnes, though controversial, are extremely popular figures among conservatives and Trump supporters on YouTube and social media. Cernovichs website, Danger & Play, gets nearly 150 million views every month. McInnes, co-founder of Vice Media, also enjoys a wide viewership, with many of his videos boasting millions of views.

The ADL is also known for being quite selective in identifying what it terms extremism.

While it consistently labels pro-Palestinian groups and those critical of the Israeli government as extremists, it has avoided that label with respect to the right-wing Israeli groups and figures that openly call for the murder or even genocide of Palestinians.

In addition, although it has flagged figures of the so-called alt-right, the ADL has not done the same for similar left-wing groups such as Antifa, a group some states have listed as a domestic terror organization. With the ADL at the helm, YouTubes new censorship policy is likely to selectively target those critical of Israels government, as well as conservative voices.

Even more unsettling, YouTubes new policy doesnt stop with merely censoring content.

According to the announcement, any user who searches for keywords or terms deemed controversial by YouTubes chosen authorities will be redirected to a playlist of curated videos intended to directly confront and debunk the content sought by the user.

Critics have warned that the mix of censorship and redirection to curated propaganda videos would create a PC, extreme-left, propagandizing echo chamber with consequences that would go far beyond combatting online terrorism. Indeed, given that Googles Jigsaw once created tools intended to bolster the ranks of al-Qaeda in Syria, Google and YouTubes desire to fight the spread of actual terrorism is dubious, making it all the more likely that this latest move is instead targeting free speech and expression.

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Posted By simmons on August 8, 2017

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Why did the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a self-described civil rights organization with a mission to secure justice and fair treatment to all, issue a scathing attack against JVP and our Deadly Exchange campaign which aims to do exactly that?

Our campaign challenges police exchange programs that have facilitated trainings for thousands of high-ranking police, FBI, ICE, and border officials, and Israeli police and military over the last 20 years, reinforcing both governments oppressive tactics and ideologies. And the ADL is one of the primary leaders of these exchange programs.

Sign our petition: Tell the ADL to end their deadly exchange programs.

BMW R1200GS Israeli Police (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The ADL markets their police exchange programs as a chance for U.S. law enforcement to learn from Israeli expertise on counter-terrorism. Expertise here is a synonym for Israels decades of enforcing a brutal military occupation, policing Palestinian communities as enemy combatants. The trip features visits to Israeli checkpoints, airports, prisons, illegal settlements, and secret service offices all sites with long records of Israeli human rights abuses. We want to end Israeli oppression of Palestinians, not valorize it.

Stephanie Fox, Deputy Director Jewish Voice for Peace, pro-Peace civil rights group

The lessons that U.S. officials bring back from these trips are part of a larger trend in policing since 9/11. The importation of counter-terrorism tactics and technologies into domestic policing and immigration policy is evident in many dangerous developments: from the growth of an unprecedented deportation machine premised on the linking of immigration and homeland security policies, to the pervasive surveillance Muslim communities face on the basis of their religion, to the military tactics police and private security use to violently repress Indigenous-led movements like the water protectors at Standing Rock. The frame of counter-terrorism allows police to further criminalize entire communities solely on the basis of race, religion, political activism or immigration status.

At the same time, Israeli police have started adopting a broken windows approach from U.S. law enforcement. The idea which has been thoroughly debunked by activists, lawyers, and advocates is that constant policing of low-level disorder, through the targeting of communities of color, with constant police surveillance, harassment, and arrest, will somehow deter serious criminal activity. This adds yet another dimension of discriminatory policing and detention to the arsenal of paramilitary and spying practices that Israel has always used against Palestinians.

These programs facilitate an exchange of dangerous worst practices. Join us in asking the ADL to stop supporting this exchange.

No one is surprised that such programs are run by right-wing organizations like AIPAC or JINSA, a hawkish pro-war lobby with ties to the defense industry and the Islamophobia network. But it is particularly upsetting to find in their ranks an organization whose stated mission is promoting civil rights.

In this frightening time of increased antisemitism, Islamophobia and racism, many people are turning to the ADL for leadership. At the same time, the organization is dispatching high ranking police, ICE and FBI agents to exchange ideas with Israeli police and soldiers. Far from protecting civil rights, these programs endanger already marginalized communities in Israel/Palestine and the U.S.

As a Jewish organization, we feel a special obligation to call specifically upon the organizations in our communities who run and fund these programs.

Join us in asking the ADL to stop leading deadly exchange programs.

These programs are not the root of police violence or occupation, but they are clearly branches, supporting and exacerbating the dangerous policies of both governments.

We believe in a world where all people have safety and freedom, and reject the notion that the safety of some communities requires the oppression of others. And we believe Jewish institutions who claim to fight for civil rights must stand for the rights of everyone.

If you agree, join us.

Stefanie Fox Deputy Director

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Ray Hanania is an award winning political columnist and author. He covered Chicago Politics and Chicago City Hall from 1976 through 1992. Hanania began writing in 1975 when he published The Middle Eastern Voice newspaper in Chicago (1975-1977). He later published The National Arab American Times newspaper which was distributed through 12,500 Middle East food stores in 48 American States (2004-2007).

Hanania writes weekly columns on Middle East and American Arab issues for the Arab News in Saudi Arabia at http://www.ArabNews.com, and for TheArabDailyNews.com, and TheDailyHookah.com.

Palestinian, American Arab and Christian, Hananias parents originate from Jerusalem and Bethlehem.

Hanania is the recipient of four (4) Chicago Headline Club Peter Lisagor Awards for Column writing. In November 2006, he was named Best Ethnic American Columnist by the New American Media;In 2009, he received the prestigious Sigma Delta Chi Award for Writing from the Society of Professional Journalists. He is the recipient of the MT Mehdi Courage in Journalism Award. Hanania has also received two (2) Chicago Stick-o-Type awards from the Chicago Newspaper Guild, and in 1990 was nominated by the Chicago Sun-Times for a Pulitzer Prize for his four-part series on the Palestinian Intifada.

His wife and son are Jewish and he performs standup comedy lampooning Arab-Jewish relations, advocating for peace based on non-violence, mutual recognition and Two-States.

His Facebook Page is Facebook.com/rghanania

Email him at: RGHanania@gmail.com

Visit this link to read Ray's column archive at the ArabNews,com http://www.arabnews.com/taxonomy/term/10906

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Jewish Voice for Peace denounces ADL - The Arab Daily News (blog)

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Posted By admin on August 8, 2017

Adonis Glaude, who is known as Ahlazar BanLawya or Guerilla Hebrew.

The Anti-Defamation League condemned a Hebrew Israelite group as anti-Semitic and racist in a report last week, highlighting an incident this summer where a passerby walking near the group on a street corner was punched to the ground.

Sicarii is a small but active California faction within the much broader Hebrew Israelite movement. While all Hebrew Israelites identify as genealogical descendants of the biblical Israelites, there is a diversity of positions on the question of how they should relate to whites and Jews. It is a topic of debate and disagreement. Sicarii belongs to a branch of the movement that promotes the idea that whites and Jews are imposters or usurpers of their true biblical identity. The group, which numbers no more than 20 core members, is led by a man named Adonis Glaude, who goes by the names Ahlazar BanLawya and Guerilla Hebrew.

Like other Israelite groups, Sicarri states that they are dedicated to uplifting disenfranchised blacks, Latinos and Native Americans by teaching that they are the true descendants of the ancient Israelites. White people, according to the groups tenants, are descendants of the biblical character Esau, the twin brother to Jacob. Sicarii calls white people deceivers or devils.

The group conducts regular street-corner outreach in San Diego. The ADL report details a confrontation that took place at a June rally during which a man, who was white, apparently argued with Sicarii members and was hit to the ground by someone in the crowd. Members of the Sicarii were arrested the next month in connection with the altercation, though no charges were filed.

In an online video responding to the ADL report, Glaude said that it was not a member of his group who hit the passerby and that his group did not directly advocate physical violence towards the man.

Glaude lashed out at the ADL for spinning certain facts about the altercation and leading what he saw as an adversarial campaign against his group. The white man, the devil that wrote this article, and you so-called Jews who are not the Jews youre the devil, Glaud said in a video response. This is why we say what we say.

Email Sam Kestenbaum at kestenbaum@forward.com and follow him on Twitter at @skestenbaum

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ADL Criticizes Hebrew Israelite Group For 'Spouting Hate' At Street Fight - Forward

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Posted By simmons on August 8, 2017

Less than a month after William Scott Planer was arrested in Colorado Springs for putting an anti-Semitic sticker on the door of Chabad Lubavitch Jewish Center, a second synagogue in the city,Temple Beit Torah,has been the target of hateful vandalism via Nazi graffiti. And while there's no evidence of direct linkage between the crimes,Jeremy Shaver, associate regional director for the Anti-Defamation League, says such incidents appear to be escalating in the Springs and beyond.

"We're definitely seeing an increased level of this type of activity in Colorado generally," Shaver maintains.

This past December, as we've reported,the blogspot for Rocky Mountain Antifa (slogan: "Never Give Fascists the Streets") warned about the residents of a house on the 1400 block of Ogden Street.

Vandalism on the sign of Temple Beit Torah in Colorado Springs.

One line from the piece makes reference to "a neo-nazi nest of sloppy drunks who regularly harass, intimidate and sometimes attack people walking by." Planer is specifically mentioned in the item, and he also appeared on fliers that were on view throughout Capitol Hill around this period.

More recently, on the morning of June 10, a security camera captured video of two individuals affixing stickers reading "Fight Terror, Nuke Israel" to the door of the Chabad Lubavitch Jewish Center. The clip was subsequently released to local news agencies, and the publicity was likely key to the vandalism arrest of Planer on July 14.

In its own post about this development, Denver's ADL branch provided more background on Planer's California troubles; he faces an assault-with-a-deadly-weapon beef for a June 2016 clash in Sacramento.

William Scott Planer doing the Nazi salute, as seen on the Wilhelm Van Panzer Facebook page.

Facebook

The ADL also noted that Planer has been associated with the Traditionalist Worker Party, attending a TWP rally in Kentucky this past April during which he wore a T-shirt with the organization's logo while repeatedly giving "the Nazi salute." He also attended an anti-Muslim March Against Sharia event in Denver, where he was captured in photos by Westword's Kyle Harris.

While the stickering of the synagogue led to Planer's arrest on a misdemeanor, he was ordered held on a $500,000 bond owing to the Sacramento charges.

That prompted supporters to create an online fundraiser, whose introduction portrays his actions in Cali as having been motivated by self-defense a dubious assertion given video of his Sacramento actions. Nonetheless, more than $14,000 has been donated at this writing toward a goal of $50,000.

William Scott Planer's Colorado Springs booking photo.

Colorado Springs Police Department

Then, last Thursday, August 3, a swastika and other graffiti was scrawled over a sign atTemple Beit Torah. The community responded the following Sunday, August 6, with a gatheringat which such exhibitions were decried, and Shaver cheers the effort.

"The rally is exactly the type of response we need," he emphasizes. "We need our communities to stand up and say, 'We will not tolerate this type of behavior. We want an open, inclusive, accepting city, and we'll stand together in opposition to this type of hate speech.'"

According to Shaver, "We have no information that would suggest targeting [of Temple Beit Torah] in retaliation for William Scott Planer's arrest." But, he adds, incidents like the last two aren't limited to Colorado Springs "and these activities range from vandalism to harassment and beyond."

Michael Roberts has written for Westword since October 1990, serving stints as music editor and media columnist. He currently covers everything from breaking news and politics to sports and stories that defy categorization.

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More Nazi Vandalism in William Scott Planer's Latest Strike Zone - Westword

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Posted By simmons on August 7, 2017

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani (R) and Lebanons Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri meet in Tehran on August 6, 2017. (Photo by president.ir)

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani says Zionism and terrorism are two majorthreats to the Middle East, calling for resistance against the duo.

In a meeting with Lebanons Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Tehran on Sunday, Rouhani added that the Islamic Republic would always stand by the Lebanese government, nation and the resistance movement.

He hailed the recent victories made by the Lebanese people against the Zionists and terrorists and said the Arab nation has managed to repel such threats through resistance.

He added that unity among Shia and Sunni Muslims as well as Christians in Lebanon can serveas a good model for the reinforcement ofunity and coherence in other countries.

The Iranian president also said Tehran and Beirut have always enjoyed cordial and friendly relations and stressed the importance of further strengthening of cooperation in all fields.

Iran, strong country in Middle East: Berri

The Lebanese parliament speaker, for his part, said Iran is a powerful country in the region andcannot be isolated.

Berri, who has traveled to Tehran to attend the swearing-in ceremony of President Rouhani, added that high turnout of the Iranian nation in the recent presidential election displayed the Islamic Republics power to the world, particularly the US.

Terrorists likely seek tospread out in region: Rouhani

Meanwhile, in a meeting with Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan, Rouhani warned that the terrorists are likely to seek to spread out in the region after their complete defeat in Syria and Iraq.

He said all countries must remain vigilant in the face of the spread of terrorism in the region, particularly in the Caucasus and Central Asia.

The Iranian president urged all regional countries to boost close cooperation to counter such a dangerous phenomenon.

He also emphasized that the Islamic Republic seeks to expand relations with its neighboring states, including Armenia, and said Tehran and Yerevan can take positive steps to serve their bilateral and regional interests given their numerous cultural and historical commonalities.

Sargsyan, for his part, said Iran and Armenia have the potential to bolster cooperation in economic, energy, trade and transportation sectors.

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Zionism, terrorism pose major threats to Mideast: Rouhani - Press TV

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Posted By admin on August 7, 2017

Nazi Swastika. (photo credit:REUTERS)

Antisemitic messages and a swastika were spray-painted on the building and sign of a synagogue in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

The messages were discovered on Friday morning at the Temple Beit Torah. In addition to the synagogue, nearby cars, homes and buildings also were vandalized, the Colorado Spring Gazette reported.

In addition to a swastika, the words sig heil, a misspelling of the Nazi salute sieg heil, was painted on the synagogues sign, according to the report.

There has been a significant increase in antisemitic acts in Colorado in the past two years, the local office of the Anti-Defamation League told the newspaper. An unnamed spokesman said that there were 18 acts of antisemitism in the area in 2015, and 45 last year.

In June, two men were caught on surveillance video putting a sticker with an anti-Israel message on the door the Chabad Lubavitch of Southern Colorado in Colorado Springs. The message read Fight terror, nuke Israel. One of the men took a photo of the sign before leaving the scene.

A neighbor who lives across the street from the synagogue told local media that he tried to scrub off the hateful message, but could not remove everything. His wifes car also was vandalized with the spray-paint.

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Antisemitic graffiti painted on Colorado Springs synagogue ... - The Jerusalem Post

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