Who is Amalek?Shabbat Zachor and Hamas—In memory of my father, Rabbi Dr. Willaim Weinberg, z”l.

 

Shabbat Zachor and Hamas—In memory of my father, Rabbi Dr. Willaim Weinberg, z”l.

Link to video

https://youtu.be/rMRWp15fqgo?si=3xE9cuJlAEDWFcVV

 

 

 

Who is Amalek?

 

“There are 3 kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”^, that’s what is attributed to Mark Twain. Apparently, he was not a good numbers cruncher- but I now see that besides Marcelo [PhD in mathematics] and Geoff [ math teacher], nobody else is.

Here’s my example. In the current War against Hamas, there is an understandable outcry against the wholesale destruction of all of  Gaza. That’s what it sounds like. So, as we should do our fact checking, I searched on Google to ask how much of Gaza has been blown up.

I see this statistic:

Wow- 70 % of the housing, 50% of all the buildings: Well, Al Jazeera is the Cheering Squad for Hamas, but the Wall Street Journal reports the same, so it must be right.

Except: 

So, this is about the same time period: 50% to 61%. BBC- it must be right!

Except:

 

Reuters is a reliable agency-only 18%, not 50%, not 75%, in the time period!

By February, we would have assumed that nothing is left standing BUT, according to the UN:

Satellite images show 30% of Gaza destroyed, UN centre ...

Reuters

https://www.reuters.com › world › middle-east › satellit...

Feb 2, 2024 — Satellite imagery analysed by the United Nations Satellite Centre shows that 30% of Gaza Strip's buildings have been destroyed or damaged in ...

Satellite Images Show 30% of Gaza Destroyed, UN Centre ...

U.S. News & World Report

https://www.usnews.com › News › World News

Feb 2, 2024 — GENEVA (Reuters) - Satellite imagery analysed by the United Nations Satellite Centre shows that 30% of Gaza Strip's buildings have been ...

At least 30% of Gaza is destroyed, UN Satellite Centre says

Global News https://globalnews.ca › gaza-israel-destruction-photos

Feb 2, 2024 — Satellite imagery analyzed by the United Nations Satellite Centre shows that 30 per cent of Gaza Strip's buildings have been destroyed or ...

Not 70%, not 50%, but as low as 18% and as high as 30%-- a month or more after the reports of 70%!

Now, since this can be tracked by simple satellite imagery, available to all news agencies, how can we get to the number of actual casualties on the Gazan side:

If 70% of the buildings were destroyed, and let’s say, half the people were killed in indiscriminate bombing, then , my numbers crunchers, one half of 70% is 35%, 35% of 2 million is 700,000. Now, the accusation is that Israel has killed 30,000, not 700,000.

If that were an attempt at genocide, then the Israelis are enormously incompetent. Afterall, the German Einsatzgruppen wiped out 1.5 million Jews in the space of a few months with simple machine guns, and much less destruction. In Rwanda, 20 to 30 times as many people were brutally slaughtered in less time.

Or is it that when blacks are killed in Africa, no one did anything, just as the world turned a blind eye to what was happening to us Jews until it was too late?

I raise this to show how our perceptions are distorted.

In this current conflict, many Israeli leaders have used the Biblical account of Amalek as a call to take out Hamas. If course, this reference to Amalek has been used as an excuse to denounce Israel’s actions, as if it were a call to genocide of the Palestinians.

Is that really the analogy?

Who is Amalek?

This is our reading for this Shabbat, a reference to the first battle of survival by the children of Israel as they left Egypt :

Remember what Amalek did to you on your journey, after you left Egypt—

how, undeterred by fear of God, he surprised you on the march, when you were famished and weary, and cut down all the stragglers in your rear.

Therefore, when your God grants you safety from all your enemies around you, in the land that your God is giving you as a hereditary portion, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget! ( Deut 25:17ff)

 

We then have the event, centuries later, as Saul is called upon to finish the job:

I Samuel 15.

 

“Thus said the LORD of Hosts: I am exacting the penalty for what Amalek did to Israel, for the assault he made upon them on the road, on their way up from Egypt.

Now go, attack Amalek, and proscribe all that belongs to him. Spare no one, but kill alike men and women, infants and sucklings, oxen and sheep, camels and asses!”

 

Certainly sounds like genocide, but we know, in fact, that the genocide was botched, and the Amalekites continued attacking Israel  for years later.

 

So, how is it resolved? That answer is hinted at in the Story of Esther, which we must read as a highly stylized rendition of an ancient war.

 

“Mordecai, son of Jair son of Shimei son of Kish, a Benjaminite.” Esther 2:5. Kish of Benjamin is the father of King Saul!

Against whom?

Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite- Agagi- a descendent of Agag, the king who was spared by Saul, and we see here-unfinished business.

 

But who here is plotting the genocide? NOT the Jews, but by Haman, who convinces the Persian Shah to eliminate an enemy in their midst:

 

“Accordingly, written instructions were dispatched by couriers to all the king’s provinces to destroy, massacre, and exterminate all the Jews, young and old, children and women, on a single day, on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month—that is, the month of Adar—and to plunder their possessions.”3:13

 

We know that Mordecai and the Jews take up self-defense, as the King is unable to withdraw his call for genocide but:

 

Here is the King’s decree for the right of self-defense:

 

“The king has permitted the Jews of every city to assemble and fight for their lives; if any people or province attacks them, they may destroy, massacre, and exterminate its armed force together with women and children, and plunder their possessions.”8:11.

 

 A quid pro quo.

 

Do the Jews carry it out?

NO!

 

“ So the Jews struck at their enemies with the sword, slaying and destroying; they wreaked their will upon their enemies. In the fortress Shushan the Jews killed a total of five hundred men. 9:5

And the ten sons of Haman son of Hammedatha, the foe of the Jews. But they did not lay hands on the spoil.9:10

Not much of a massacre, not much of a genocide.

 

And again, the next day , in Shushan, 9:15

“and the Jews in Shushan mustered again on the fourteenth day of Adar and slew three hundred men in Shushan. But they did not lay hands on the spoil.

 

Finally, across the entire Persian empire,

9:16

The rest of the Jews of the kingdom gathered together, stood up for their lives ,and found respite from their enemies and killed their haters-75,000, But they did not lay hands on the spoil

 

Considering the size and range the Empire- from India to Ethiopia, not much of a massacre--- note- it  is in self defense, and they did not attack the women and children which had been devised by Haman and authorized by the King against them!

 

 

But, once again—numbers can be twisted: So this week, in LA Times, an op-ed by Jane Eisner, a former editor of Forward, a leading Jewish media piece, and someone who should know better, writes:

March 21, 2024:

  But as we relate to the victimhood, we need to also acknowledge and relate to the revenge taken by the Jews. The ninth chapter of the Book of Esther, often read quickly as if an afterthought, details a violent episode of state-sanctioned retaliation, when Jews murdered 75,000 Persian “enemies” including women and children, and rejoiced afterward.

 

 She should know better!  

It evokes Shylock, demanding our pound of flesh, and she, like Portia, evoking , The quality of mercy”. It is much more a channeling of classic anti-Judaic stances by Christian preachers, such as Martin Luther, who wanted to eject the Book of Esther from the Bible.

However, any simple reading of the text would show that it tells just the opposite. When push comes to shove, the Jews do no exact their” poind of flesh.”!

 

  The text states very much the opposite of her point. There is no word of revenge here, rather, as a straight translation of a very clear Hebrew shows: “stood up for their lives”,” found respite from their enemies” repeated emphatically, “ did not lay hands on the spoil.”

What about “women and children”. Although that was the enemies plan, and although the king authorized it, the text specifically OMITS it!.

 

Haman is Hamas, killing women and children wantonly and taking the spoils, and the Jews are like the Israelis today—defending for their lives, not intentionally killing women and children, and taking no spoils of war!

 

Why this repeated emphasis? To show the spirit of this new generation of Jews- although, under Saul, the people took spoils of war, and although the King authorized it, this new generation did not make war for plunder and gain!

 

Ms Eisner has intentionally read into the text what is not there and has thereby committed a crime of false accusation against her fellow Jews!

 

There is an unusual discussion in Midrashic lore, surrounding the account of King Saul and the Amalekites, reflecting the moral quandry about the extent of bloodshed.

( for a full analysis, go to my published research paper on Saul in the Midrash https://www.academia.edu/23395001/KING_SAULS_FORTUNE_AT_THE_HAND_OF_THE_HOM_ILISTS )

 

Based on a discussion in Talmud Yoma 22b and other sources:

“

 Rav Shimon ben Lakish said, “Whoever is merciful instead of cruel will in the end be cruel when it is time to be merciful” as he reflected on Saul’s sparing the King of the Amalekites and in  the end, as he degenerates morally, exterminates the men, women , and children of the priestly town of Nob.

In other words, there is a point in which innocent people do die for the sins of others, whether we like it or not, as in Dresden ( 25,000 killed) or Tokyo ( 100,000).

The alternative to that ugly fact would have been the final killing of every last Jew in Europe, or the continued mass killing of other Asians ( in the millions!).

The alternate in war is worse.

Finally, though, for those who claim the reference to Amalek is a call to genocide, I post this picture:

 

 

 

This is the rededication of the synagogue in Salzburg, Austria—the Salzburg of Mozart and beautiful music—now, a center of DP camps.

Standing at the Bimah is my father, Rabbi Dr Wilhelm/ William Weinberg, then head of adult education and jobs training for the survivors under the Joint.

This week is his yahrzeit ( Shushan Purim), so it is an appropriate reminder.

The slogan on the wall is our Torah reading: Zachor et Asher Asah Lecha Amalek:

Remember what Amalek did to you!

Followed by the German paraphrase:

Jude vergiss nicht das Ka Zet!

Jew, Do Not Forget the Concentration Camps!

 

There is no call for revenge upon the German people, no call for genocide, though the sentiment might have been there. My father  shortly after wards, decided he had enough of bloody Germany and bloody Europe and left. 

I leave this land with bitterness, but one may never slam closed the shutters upon any people. The future is with God and not with humans. But may it not be long, that Jews in German become once again the bearers of a world civilization and with the German language of a Lessing, Kant and Goethe.”

  

The call against Amalek is not against innocent women and children. It is a warning for all  humanity, that the ability to unleash hatred upon any group of people is a sin against God.

 That is what has happened against us in our day and time again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Red Hand at the Oscars

 

Red Hand at the Oscars

 

Jonathan Glazer, director of the winning documentary film , Zone of Interest, made a statement, prepared in advance, that , at best, makes no sense, and at worst, makes a banality of evil by its act of equation:

https://variety.com/2024/film/awards/zone-of-interest-director-jonathan-glazer-oscar-speech-israel-hamas-war-gaza-controversy-1235940637/

the current conflict in Gaza that was difficult to decipher given the audience applause and his own mumbling. 

“… Right now, we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people. Whether the victims of October — whether the victims of October the 7th in Israel or the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims of this dehumanization, how do we resist?” 

First of all, he would have failed the English exam at High School entry tests- because he uses what is called a “ dangling modifier”, thus:

“as men who refute their Jewishness”—do they refute their Jewishness?

“Holocaust being hijacked”—is this in addition to their refutation of their Jewishness?

Or “their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked” are together being refuted? Refuted by themselves? By “occupation”?

“Occupation”- which? The one by Egypt and Jordan preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state from 1948-1967? Or the occupation that ended in parts of the Palestinian Authority that were agreed upon in Oslo? Or the occupation that was ended in 2006, when Israel left Gaza? Or the occupation of Gaza by the Muslim-Brotherhood affiliate, Hamas.

Words must be clear. Otherwise, you can never get accepted into a top high school, let alone, an Ivy League school! A certainly not passable as The King’s English.

It turns out that the two others on the stage with him were equally flabbergasted:…

https://www.commentary.org/seth-mandel/glazers-partners-refute-glazer/?vgo_ee=1XVdNiK4FnAZvbB6mV7MyWi4Yp3Mrsf%2BBehTqrsC4E1NSha%2B0Q%3D%3D%3AjOguJtcavmsGWeCCBYuksV8861d%2BePQa

Danny Cohen, the executive producer of The Zone of Interest, has publicly repudiated the director Jonathan Glazer’s atrocious Holocaust statement at the Oscars….“I just fundamentally disagree with Jonathan on this,..”

 

Then, there were the red buttons worn that night:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In and of itself, it sounds lovely

 

BUT

But- what’s in a hand?:

 

Such as bloody hands raised for Gaza?

Remember this?

 

https://voz.us/the-dark-story-that-could-be-behind-the-symbol-proudly-worn-by-several-artists-at-the-2024-oscars/?lang=en

During the lynching of the soldiers, Salha was filmed by an Italian television crew proudly showing his hands bathed in the soldiers' blood, inciting the massacre. It is impossible to separate that image from the one captured in the symbol the movie stars proudly wore this Sunday. Mark Ruffalo, Billie Eilish, Ava DuVernay, Cate Blanchett, Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez, Bradley Cooper, America Ferrera and Ramy Youssef proudly wore the pin

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13192179/israel-slams-oscars-gaza-red-hand-pins.html

·        Israeli public figures have slammed A-list celebrities at the Oscars for wearing red hand pins symbolizing support for a Gaza ceasefire by 'Artists4Ceasefire'

·        The image on the pin evokes memories of the gruesome 2000 Ramallah lynching of two Israeli men who accidentally entered Ramallah 

·        Palestinian rioters stabbed and beat the soldiers to death before ripping out their organs and posing for a photo with bloody hands in front of cheering crowd

 

 

So, what is in a hand?

The Red Hand of Ulster is a symbol used in heraldry to denote the Irish province of Ulster and the Northern Uí Néill in particular

Or

The Red Hand is an alert to consumers that the nursing home has been cited for abuse, neglect or exploitation in the past year that led to harm of a resident in the past year ( Colorado)

Or

Red hand dripping blood - Protest symbol - stand against violence

Will you stand with us? Merch to show and stand in solidarity with our missing murdered indigenous sisters. Suitable for raising awareness, protests and active campaigning. Missing murdered indigenous women (MMIW) awareness -

https://www.amazon.com/Blood-red-hand-drip-indigenous/dp/B08S6KZDP9

Actually, if the statement had been about the mass rape of Israeli women on Oct 7, this would have been appropriate.

 

or

 

BLACK HAND-

SYMBOL: BLACK HAND. Symbol of Black Hand, a secret terrorist society in the early 20th century https://www.granger.com/results.asp?image=0098307

 

 Let’s think in a better sense, for all, of another hand,

Hamsa, five fingers of protection common to Jews and Arabs in the Middle East, the color blue, protection against evil:

Or

The hand of the Cohen, with his blessing of “Shalom”, as used by Leonard Nemoy/AKA Spock for the alien greeting of peace. This is the hand we long for.

 

Thoughts on Down Under      March 7 2024

For video recording:

https://youtu.be/aMgc4rCARtI?si=AsyL9vmESj7-EYcx

 

    3 weeks of quiet, away from the daily news. Ofra’s brother & wife from Houston, Dror & Helene Zadok , took Ofra’s sister & husband, Ilana & Yitshak Birger, to get them out of Israel for some peace & quiet after the loss of their grandson in combat and us along with them, to  Australia & New Zealand. Sargeant Nadav Issachar Farhi.

No sooner do I come back to LA, and in my email box, a notice about a swastika drawn in front of the home of a Jewish resident , Leah Grossman, of West Hollywood.

Here’s the report by LA Times: ( Follow the link)

Jewish woman says camera caught neighbor drawing swastika on her seltzer

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-03-05/woman-says-neighbor-drew-what-appeared-to-be-swastika-on-groceries

 

Bizarre, as he draws the swastika, is caught on camera, and is then caught on camera denying he did it.

 

Equally disturbing is that the man in question is a respected Methodist Minister, who had a position with the region as a superintendent. The Church leadership apologized for his actions ( sent to the Board of Rabbis)

***********To my community,
On behalf of the California-Pacific Annual Conference of The United Methodist Church, I reaffirm our commitment to antiracism, including antisemitism. I am praying for peace and healing to those in our communities and beyond, who have been hurt by the recent actions of the Rev. Mark Nakagawa. …As we do our work of the supervisory process, I remind us all that acts of hate and racism should not be a part of our response, particularly to Jewish communities and Japanese communities.  I pray for healing for all those impacted and call us to live in life-giving support for one another.
We remain committed to stand with and be in service to all our neighbors. Please pray with us for all who are in pain.Grace y paz,Bishop Dottie Escobedo-Frank,Resident Bishop of the Los Angeles Area

The Swastika is a weird one, neither Nazi, facing right, nor Buddhist, facing left, but going in both directions! It’s not some other symbol in Japanese, as I can tell.

We can assume that the minister, who should have known better, was afflicted with some mental imbalance, as was the US serviceman who self- immolated in protest of the Gaza War. Yes, unbalanced people do unbalanced acts, but it is very balanced movers and influencers who drive the  Useful Idiots.

Here is the bigger atrocity around the corner:

https://www.wfp.org/news/sudans-war-risks-creating-worlds-largest-hunger-crisis-warns-wfp-chief#:~:text=Over%2025%20million%20people%20across,interference%20by%20the%20warring%20parties.

“The war in Sudan risks triggering the world’s largest hunger crisis,” warned the Executive Director… today, the people of Sudan have been forgotten. Millions of lives and the peace and stability of an entire region are at stake.”Over 25 million people across Sudan, South Sudan, and Chad are trapped in a spiral of deteriorating food security. …

Will anyone be self-immolating when the world’s largest planned mass starvation begins?

 Will there be marchers blocking the 101 in protest?

More about useful idiots later.

 

So, our trip starts in Sydney, Australia.

Friday night, we had a delightful Shabbat dinner at a local Chabad in Paddington, with Rabbi Danny Yaffe and his Rebbetzin, Sara Tova. 26 visitors all crammed into a small living room, but with plenty of good food and good spirits—and all of us still reeling from Oct 7. One was a survivor of the Nova Festival, who had just been away when the attack took place, one from England, a professor of Medicine, who reported on what Jews in England were feeling.

On Shabbat Morning, Dror & Helene, got to the main synagogue for services and a delightful Kiddush lunch. They could get it because they read the instructions for visitors, which requires a valid passport loaded on to the synagogue’s website in advance. It’s ironic that we could get into a synagogue in Muslim Morocco on Shabbat, without such security clearance

 

As you can tell, not really packed. Most of Sydney’s Jews live elsewhere near Bondi Beach.

 

This is something you can’t miss seeing in Sydney:

It is the Sydney Tower, towering above the Westfield Mall and the name, Westfield, in huge letters at the top. Just about every mall in the US today is operated by Westfield, a company created by two Holocaust survivors, Frank Lowy and John Saunders( Schwartz). It is a reminder, that when you have gone through the worst that humanity can imagine, survive it, and have nothing to start with, then you have the drive and inner strength to achieve just about anything, as our own Joe Alexander can affirm!

From Sydney , we hopped on to a cruise ship and made our way down south. The first Friday evening, the cruise line, Princess, set up a room for Shabbat service, and a third of the crowd were a group of Israelis who had survived the October 7 massacre and were now getting out for some fresh air. Their group leader led us in a tribute to those who were no longer alive, our sister in law  read a poem about her grand-son, and I was volunteered to lead  Shabbat service for Anglo Jews who spoke no Hebrew and Israeli secular Jews, who almost never set foot in a synagogue.

We headed on to Melbourne.

 

Melbourne has a larger Jewish community, and here I was able to meet my long-lost grand-daughter to my mother’s cousin. She, Tony Platus, her brother and her father, and their cousins, are the closest living relatives on my mother’s side, family that I had made contact with only after my mother had died. The entire clan is in Australia! How they found me is a long story and I will retell it some day in the future.

 

I am not giving a travelogue- suffice it to say, we continued to Hobart to visit Kangaroos and Tasmanian devils, on to New Zealand fiords, and some of the coldest summer weather, beating a San Francisco summer. On, around to Dunedin, Wellington and Taurunga for the geysers.

Clearly, no visit is complete without visiting the Maoris.

Australia Aboriginal – 3% of Australia

Native Americans-2%

But Maoris-17%. This gives them a great amount of political clout, something that Aboriginals and Native Americans lack. Furthermore, there is a great deal of intermarriage, almost half of Maoris reporting European or other ethnic heritage as well. Maoris were also quick to pick up key elements of Euro culture, and now, there is a reverse process. There is a prevalence of use of Maori names and even common phrases , and Maori language is an official language, alongside English. I found this same self-identification in Morocco, there, with the Berber, or Amazigh, indigenous peoples, and with it, with ‘ indigenous” Jews who settled that region over 2000 years ago, long before the Arab conquest.

This brings me to the topic of “ Indigenous”.

Aboriginals of Australia are the record holders, having arrived from eastern Asia about 65=70,000 years ago. Native Americans came here from north east Asia perhaps 14,000 to 30,000 years ago. In that sense, the Maoris are Johny-come lately. Arriving in New Zealand from other Polynesian islands, by their own accounts, around the 1300’s, beating the Europeans by some 500 years, not much more.

This now brings me to the topic of indigenous, and why only Jews are not allowed to identify as indigenous, despite a continued Jewish presence, and continued attempts at return, going back longer than the Arab conquest, longer than the Roman conquest, back to the early Israelite tribes over 3000 years. But we are also a diaspora, and hence in a precarious position always.

Here is an indirect Maori tie-in:

Greeks and Jews: Two Diaspora Peoples

The histories of these two groups reveals the sinister implications of an ideology that holds that some people are more “natural” to a place than others.

 

 I assume, from the author’s name, that she is Greek indigenous.

Katherine Kelaidis

https://quillette.com/2024/03/01/not-being-indigenous-doesnt-mean-you-dont-belong/

 

While many groups considered indigenous have lived within the same territory for thousands of years, others have not. Likewise, many ethnic groups that are not considered indigenous have lived in their ancestral regions for millennia. For example, the Māori did not arrive in New Zealand until around 1200 CE, which is roughly the time of the Fourth Crusade. By contrast, the Parsis, usually considered a Persian diaspora group, arrived in India before 800 CE. The Diné (Navajo) people arrived in the American Southwest around 1400 CE, around the same time as the Byzantine Empire fell to the Ottomans. Meanwhile, the Han Chinese can trace their ancestry to populations who arrived in the Guanzhong and Yellow River basins around 4,500 BCE.

No human population has been anywhere forever. 

One of the hallmarks of the history of diaspora people is their often-outsized influence. It would be difficult to think of two cultural traditions that have contributed more to our global culture than those of the Greeks and the Jews. …

The other hallmark of diaspora histories is persecution. As visible minorities who resist complete assimilation, diaspora people have always been easy targets. They are society’s resident outsiders. It is no surprise that it was the Jews and Romani who died in the greatest numbers during the Holocaust and who continue to be subject to violence and discrimination today. There is evidence to suggest that Hitler took inspiration from the Armenian Genocide, during which the nascent modern Turkish state persecuted Armenians, as well as Pontic Greeks, Christians, and non-Turkish Muslim minorities. The treatment of Greeks in Turkey, Northern Cyprus, and Egypt also follows this pattern.

In some regions, the presence of a Greek, Jewish, or Armenian community predates the arrival of the majority population. But because these peoples have a history marked by diaspora, they are not regarded as indigenous. In fact, they are often accused of practicing “colonialism” in places they have called home for longer than many people identified as “indigenous” have lived in their homelands. For example, Greeks arrived in Egypt in significant numbers with the armies of Alexander the Great around 332 BCE, while Arabs did not arrive in Egypt until the Middle Ages. But that did not stop Arab nationalists of the 1950s from marking them out as “foreigners,” a stigmatization that eventually led to the expulsion of that ancient community. Egyptian Jews and Armenians were similarly targeted and expelled.

To be frank, the world is Had Gadya-the British occupied Moghul India; the Muslims occupied Hindu India; the Indo-European language Indians themselves may have been the result of a gradual occupation of the earlier people of the Indus Valley. The prophet Amos may have been one of the first to recognize that no one is indigenous—the Philistines from Caphtor ( Crete) or the Arameans from Kir ( across the Euphrates).

Now, I turn my thoughts to the anti-Zionist and often anti-semitic protests, around the world, and what we saw in Australia and New Zealand:

I found this notice from the Guardian about anti-Semitic chants at a pro- Israel rally. The blood was still wet on the ground in Israel when this happened:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/oct/10/pro-palestine-rally-sydney-opera-house-protest-australia-leaders-condemn-anti-jewish-chants   Just 2 days after Oct 7 massacre! ..

 

Australia’s prime minister, Anthony Albanese and the foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, have condemned pro-Palestine protesters who were filmed chanting anti-Jewish sentiments in Sydney….

Chants heard at the rally included “f*ck the Jews” and “f*ck Israel”. On Monday evening, pro-Palestine protesters marched from Sydney Town Hall to the Sydney Opera House, which was lit up in white and blue in solidarity with Israel. Parliament House in Canberra was also lit up in the colours of Israel’s flag.

So, we too saw some of this in Sydney, probably a crowd of about 1000, maybe 2000 at most, or so marchers, going up and down the main fashion street.

I see one person with a flag of Palestine, then Aboriginal, then Turkish. Ironic mix, as the Turks, central Asian invaders, overran the indigenous Greeks of Anatalia and just a century ago, massacred the Armenian natives and have been fighting the indigenous Kurds, denying them a nation.

 

 

I spied one carrying a sign: Australia for the Aborigines. Since the bearer of the sign was  clearly “ white bread” or commonly here, a “honky”, I wondered if she intended to force all the 30 million European and Asians to repatriate en mass.

I saw a similar protest near the old Post Office building of Auckland. Only a few hundred, but this one much more gruesome and gory:

 

I listen to the speakers rattle off the number of those killed by Israeli forces.  So I hear a number of 400 children killed just in the West Bank in this period . Yet, when I go online to Palestinians sources, I find it much smaller, by a factor of ten.

This is the playing of number tricks that we have to deal with constantly. ( for the mathematicians among you, here is a statistical analysis of the numbers  https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/how-gaza-health-ministry-fakes-casualty-numbers )

Then, another speaker openly states that it was the Israel Defense Forces that killed , burned, raped and pillaged all of these kibbutzim and villages along the border.

We have all of these verified video recordings made by Hamas terrorists themselves, the testimonies of the actual hostages, yet there is no lie too big for our speakers at these rallies.

So, to finish with a feeling of support, I have this Maori Haka dance answer to the Palestinian protestors:

https://youtu.be/4uxPvrgoo1o?si=VM6HegYL7aSSiixh

 

and a pro -Jew rally in Sydney ( which began just as we had to leave to board the ship):

‘Never again’ pledges as Jews and Christians rally together

Posted on 19/02/2024 by John Sandeman

https://theothercheek.com.au/never-again-pledges-as-jews-and-christians-rally-together/

A rally in solidarity with Australia’s Jewish Community, opposing anti-semitic activity, drew a crowd of about 10,000 to Sydney’s Domain on Sunday February 18, featuring speakers Scott Morrison, Warren Mundine and a message from Sydney’s Anglican Archbishop, Kanishka Raffel….

Former Prime Minister Scott Morrison focused on the October 7 terrorist attack by Hamas, as the reason to stand with the Jewish community. “

“We say never again in relation to October 7th, because on October seven the free world failed in its promise that there would be a never again. We said there would be never again after the Holocaust. But in one single day, an atrocity was committed on the people of Israel and at a level that we had not seen since the Holocaust.”