Showing posts with label JNF-KKL. Show all posts
Showing posts with label JNF-KKL. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Saturday, March 22, 2014
I DISAGREE WITH RABBI SIDNEY SCHWARZ WHY “LIMITING DEBATE ON ISRAEL WILL ONLY HURT US” IS WRONG Russell F. Robinson - CEO, Jewish National Fund
Rabbi Sidney Schwarz, a senior fellow of the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership (CLAL), and author of Jewish Megatrends: Charting the Course of the American Jewish Future (2013) is someone I deeply respect. However, his latest opinion (“Limiting Debate on Israel Will Only Hurt Us” The Jewish Week, Feb. 4), is a perspective, if acted upon, that has the potential to actually hurt our community.
In his desire to encourage more open dialogue on Israel, Rabbi Schwarz would like the college campus organization Hillel to reform its guidelines and allow overtly anti-Israel groups the opportunity to speak under the Hillel banner. Otherwise, Schwarz believes that by preventing such contrarians to talk will actually drive young Next Gen Jews away from us.
Such a notion is not only unbelievable, it is just plain irresponsible!
While I can understand the rabbi’s ongoing challenge of engaging and retaining the faithful, perhaps what we need from our spiritual leaders is a clearer understanding of identity and community to market to Next Gen Jews in the era of the Internet.
One of the ideals I am most proud of as a citizen in our democracy is having the ability to freely speak on any topic, including Israel. It is in our very nature as Jews to question, discuss, debate, opine and challenge. The comedian Jackie Mason will tell you in no uncertain words that we are an opinionated people.
Yet, when we talk about opening our Hillel chapters to include debate from groups extremely opposed to Israel, what sort of debate are we talking about? Should Hillel chapters be used as a forum for others to express agendas and positions that are antithetical to our basic beliefs?
As leaders we have a moral imperative to stand by our religious tenets and customs to preserve our heritage and community, not create more avenues to splinter it.
I was raised in a very liberal household where great emphasis was placed on progressive issues. Today, I consider the home I have made with my wife and children equally liberal and also guided by strong concern for social justice. Yet, some far reaching and impactful statements by ‘leaders of the left’ drive me crazy.
Hillel has been a safe haven for Jewish students on both friendly and unfriendly campuses for decades. Its core principles and mission remain the same: to be “a place that welcomes Jewish students of all backgrounds and fosters an enduring commitment to a Jewish life of learning and Israel.” It is not intended to be an extension of the college where it is located as merely an organization (like so many others) that offers minority students a place to socialize and enjoy the academic experience.
Why then, should Hillel provide for speakers unsympathetic to Israel to promote the politics of destruction and tear down our Next Gen Jews under the roof meant to safeguard them? Such diatribe would not be intelligent honest debate and only open the doors for more negative anti-Israel propaganda to be fostered. Thankfully, Hillel’s agenda is clear, and beating up Israel is not part of it.
As a member of CLAL, Rabbi Schwartz usually brings great wisdom to American Jewry. If he’s in search of a new social experiment to promote greater interaction between the faiths, perhaps he should bring a speaker to his synagogue to preach on Christianity and Jesus Christ and open the floor to debate? To draw a good crowd I suggest he host the forum during Shabbat services. Sounds foolish and offensive, right? Of course it does. Likewise so does the notion of a Jewish organization sponsoring anti-Israel lectures. When held successfully, inter-religious councils, be they local community-based or on college campuses, bring people together to share their commonalities, not facilitate hostility by stressing what makes them different.
Nor should Hillel allow for “Open Hillels” as he recommends. I have witnessed time after time, speakers that condemn Israel do so without being properly vetted and fact- checked. Often listeners absorb every word as though it were based on facts when it is nothing more than biased opinion and misinformed rhetoric. Many of the websites representing the face of such groups to the public make statements that are unfounded, unchecked, extremely prejudicial, and purely meant to mislead viewers. Quite simply, they promote an agenda of hate by craftily “wordsmithing” speeches and utilizing social media tools to cast negative stories and images of Israel and her people.
Similarly, I’m not fooled when anti-Israel groups feign concern on social justice. Where are those same groups to comment when:
· Israel physicians treat Syrian civil war casualties in Israeli hospitals? Is that not social justice?
· IsraAID helps people around the world during times of extreme crisis. Is that not social justice?
· A Palestinian fish farmer brings food home to the family table because of water technology developed in Israel. Is that not social justice?
A hallmark of democracy, free speech is a right, but it does have great personal responsibility attached to it, especially when it violates the civil and constitutional rights of others. The thought of promoting speech that would tear down rather than build up is a formula for disaster. Instead, let’s share the wonderful experiences of our Jewish nation with our young people. Our roles as leaders are best used when we manage to create better and stronger connections to Israel, and highlight the strength of our Jewish community for today and tomorrow.
There is historical evidence that supports how championing Israel abroad has made us stronger at home. Prior to 1967, Jewish life in America was floundering. Since then, with the revitalization of the current Zionism movement and our growing connection to and investment in Israel, we have grown JCC’s throughout the country, built new synagogues and strengthened Jewish communities throughout the United States. Rather than being excluded from formerly elitist country clubs and considered undesirable in many neighborhoods, we are now sought after to be included. Our Jewish identity and connection to our community, local synagogue and Israel is stronger today because we embraced Israel, not because we spoke out against the State. Smart, responsible and forward thinking leadership guided that.
Each year 50,000 students go to Israel on Birthright missions. Witness the growth of Jewish day schools and people speaking Hebrew, all happening now because we have embraced working for and with Israel as part of our unique identity. The fact that more people make Aliyah from North America in greater numbers than ever before is testament to Israel being a desirable place to settle down. Indeed, the “megatrends for the future” are about this positive, strong connection, interwoven in our Jewish life.
Yes, there are blemishes. We all have them. However, that is not the issue here. To promote true dialogue, let’s talk about how Israel makes the world a better place for everyone. Let’s embrace our heritage with a sense of pride, strength and a winning attitude. That is the megatrend for our future.
Friday, May 17, 2013
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
BDS = BULLY, DISRUPT, SHOVE? BDS Attacks JNF Concert Goers in Berlin (Video)
Ten members of BDS interrupted a JNF fundraiser in Berlin. The protesters helped up signs, yelled “Free Palestine”, shoved old women, and knocked people down.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Anti-Semitism in West Los Angeles - The Friends of IDF v. Shangri-la Hotel
THE CARDOZO
SOCIETY*OF THE JEWISH
NATIONAL FUND
and THE SANTA MONICA
are pleased to invite you to join us for a light evening
nosh, congenial company and an enlightening one-hour (1) of general Lawyer’s M.C.L.E.
credit.
FORUM PROGRAM: Anti-Semitism in
FEATURED SPEAKER: James H. Turken, Esq., Plaintiff’s Counsel
DATE: Thursday,
October 25, 2012
LOCATION: Santa Monica 1448 18th St. , Santa Monica 90404
TIME: 6:30PM Registration
and Networking, 7:00
– 8:00 PM Program
James H. Turken was the trial attorney who handled
the plaintiff’s lawsuit against the Shangri-La Hotel in Santa Monica on behalf
of individual members of The Friends of the IDF. He won a verdict in excess of $1.6 million,
including punitive damages against the hotel’s owner.
Please feel free to invite
your friends and associates.
DAVID CHUDNOW
& ROBERT RING
Cardozo Society
Co-Chairs
*The Cardozo Society of JNF is a State Bar of California M.C.L.E.
approved provider. It certifies that this activity has been approved for one
(1) hour of general M.C.L.E. credit, as appropriate to the content of the
activity. Jewish National Fund (JNF) is
a 501 (c) (3) charity.
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
JNF: The time has come to show how Israel makes the world a better place.
Through hard work and determination, this young, desert nation is a global leader in renewable energy, agricultural innovation, and medical breakthroughs that improve quality of life around the globe. This is the conversation that the world must have about Israel. And it starts with you.
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Positively Israel is a brand new initiative focused on changing the conversation to enlighten the world about the unbelievable strides that Israel is making in technology, agriculture, medicine, and many other fields. We need your involvement to make this campaign take off. Join the movement to spread the word about how Israel is making the world a better place:
- Donate to Positively Israel to help bring speakers to college campuses, fund the production of Positively Israel merchandise, and fund future advertising campaigns.
- Take action by writing a letter to your congressperson, hosting a movie screening, or inviting a speaker to your campus or synagogue.
- Explore Israel’s innovations around the world with our interactive map that highlights Israeli technology being utilized internationally.
- Travel to Israel to experience first-hand all of the innovations taking place, from agricultural research & development centers to the world’s first fully-electric car.
Israel is making the world a better place. Spread the word and together, we can change the conversation.
Monday, February 6, 2012
Planting Trees is Racist?!
An international campaign wants to stop a non-profit environmental organization that has been functioning for more than 100 years by purporting fallacies and anti-Israel propaganda.
The Jewish National Fund (JNF) was established with the hope to help the birth of the State of Israel. JNF plants trees for forest development in Israel, creates parks, battles forest fires, is responsible for soil conservation, pioneers innovative solutions to help Israel's water supply, among other notable work.
The "Stop the JNF Campaign" alleges that the Jewish National Fund "was instrumental in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in the 1948 Nakba, and continues to play a central role in maintaining Israel's regime of apartheid." It calls for the revocation of JNF's charity and to isolate the group by breaking all ties with it.
The campaign posted an action alert on its website last Friday asking its readers not to support JNF's "Green Sunday" on Feb. 5. "Don't be taken in," the alert reads. "The JNF's tree planting is a cover for ethnic cleansing."
Despite its shrill and nonsensical premise, the "Stop the JNF Campaign" has garnered support from organizations across the United States, the United Kingdom and other countries around the world. It also has spread to American and Canadian college campuses.
Vilifying labels such as "ethnic cleansing" and "regime of apartheid" are used by anti-Israel activists to demonize the State of Israel. Hebrew University Professor Emeritus Gideon Shimoni has explained that the false equation between Israel and apartheid in South Africa is a "deceptive device [which] functions much like use of the term 'holocaust' to describe any and all human disasters. It obscures apartheid's constitutive core, racism, as well as its actual historical context, South Africa."
The false notion that Israel engaged in "ethnic cleansing" of Palestinians cheapens actual cases of ethnic cleansing, including the Bosnian genocide committed by Bosnian Serbs, the ethnic cleansing of Armenians during World War I, Nazi Germany's persecutions and expulsions of Jews which culminated into the Holocaust, the Sudanese campaign against black ethnic groups in Darfur, among many other examples.
A look at the founders of the Stop the JNF Campaign helps explain its outrageous agenda. It was started by the Habitat International Coalition (HIC), the InternationalJewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN), the Scottish Solidarity Campaign (SPSC) and the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National Committee (BNC).
IJAN is a radical organization that advocates the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state. The organization was a sponsor of last year's "Never Again For Anyone" tour across the U.S. and in Toronto, Canada, which featured speakers who equated Israel's treatment of the Palestinians to that of the Nazis' treatment of Jews during the Holocaust.
The Scottish Solidarity Campaign (SPSC) is a fringe anti-Israel organization that repeatedly uses the Holocaust to demonize Israel and has served as a platform for Holocaust deniers and Hamas supporters. The chairman of SPSC, Mick Napier, tried to justify a horrific terrorist attack in Israel by spewing lies about the school that was targeted and writing, "Palestinians continue to resist and we should be inspired by their courage, fortitude and endurance against an enemy that threatens them openly with a 'Holocaust'." In March 2008, a terrorist entered the Mercaz Harav yeshiva in Jerusalem and opened fire, killing eight students and wounding nine more. Themassacre was praised by Hamas and supported by 84% of Palestinians, according to a poll taken shortly after.
BNC is the Palestinian coordinating body for the worldwide Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign. BDS is a worldwide initiative to encourage companies, consumers, universities, cultural centers and more to boycott and divest from all Israeli interests and bodies. On college campuses, BDS often takes the form of student groups and professors pushing for universities to divest from companies that have holdings with Israel or do business with Israel.
The Stop the JNF Campaign is one initiative of the worldwide BDS campaign. Its launch last March was announced on the BDS website. BDS leaders, such as Omar Barghouti, single out Israel, apply double standards to the state, and often use the "apartheid" myth and false "ethnic cleansing" charge.
Canadian Foreign Minister John Bard criticized "the constant barrage of rhetorical demonization, double standards and delegitimization" of Israel as the "new anti-Semitism" on Monday during a conference in Israel. "Harnessing disparate anti- Semitic, anti-American and anti-Western ideologies, it targets the Jewish people by targeting the Jewish homeland, Israel, as the source of injustice and conflict in the world, and uses, perversely, the language of human rights to do so," he added. "We must be relentless in exposing this new anti-Semitism for what it is."
Last July, Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd visited an Israeli-owned business in Melbourne after it was attacked by demonstrators. "I don't think in 21st-century Australia there is a place for the attempted boycott of a Jewish business," Rudd said. "I thought we had learned that from history," he added.
Unfortunately, the BDS campaign is gaining ground among youth in the United States. This weekend, the 2012 National BDS Conference is being held at the University of Pennsylvania. The conference is organized by PennBDS, a recognized student group at the University. The university is not sanctioning nor sponsoring the conference.
BDS tactics have not achieved many practical results, and seem more symbolic in nature. This holds true for the Stop the JNF Campaign. Just last week Israel's Ministry of Environmental Protection in cooperation with the Jewish National Fund held aninternational conference on Climate Change & Forest Fires in the Mediterranean Basin: Management & Risk Reduction. The conference drew approximately 150 participants including lecturers and guests from Jordan, Kosovo, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Canada and the U.S. Additionally, JNF maintains partnerships with government and professional organizations in the United States, Egypt and Jordan.
If planting trees has become an act of evil, it may be time to re-evaluate your thinking.
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
IDF recruits trees for home defense; Army launches new program in conjunction with Jewish National Fund to make targeting Israeli homes homes harder for Gaza terrorists.
In recent months though, the IDF has decided to install a new defensive system – trees.
“The idea is simple,” a senior officer from the IDF’s Gaza Division explained. “Trees are planted around Israeli towns and communities that are close to the border, making it more difficult for terrorists to accurately target homes and residents.”
The project was launched several months ago in conjunction with Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael (KKL) – Jewish National Fund, which has been planting eucalyptus trees 16 kilometers outside communities located along the border with the Gaza Strip.
The IDF is concerned Palestinian terrorists will tryto target residents of the communities with sniper fire or by launching anti-tank missiles at the homes.
In April, for example, Hamas fired an anti-tank missile at a school bus, killing 16-year-old Daniel Viflic and just moments after it dropped off a group of schoolchildren.
KKL said the eucalyptus was chosen since the trees reach heights of about eight meters, high enough to protect borderline communities. Next month, KKL plans to plant additional trees along main roads near the border in conjunction with the holiday of Tu Bishvat, marking the beginning of the new year for trees.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Plant a Tree for Gilad Shalit!
Plant a tree for FREE in honor of Gilad Shalit’s release from captivity and send a personalized certificate to the Shalit family!
Gilad Shalit’s long-awaited homecoming is testament to the value that we as a Jewish people place on the sanctity of life and to Israel's staunch dedication to its citizens.
Jewish National Fund recognizes the pain that the prisoner exchange is causing many. Our thoughts and prayers are with them as well.
Send a tree to Gilad Shalit to welcome him home.
Or call 800-542-TREE
Show the world we will not leave anyone behind.
Courtesy of Ronald Lauder and Stanley Chesley, JNF’s Chairman of the Board and President, and its Board of Directors, in celebration of Gilad Shalit’s release after 5 ½ years of captivity.
Limit one per person. Free tree offer expires Sunday, October 23.
Please remember to pass this offer along to friends and family.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Not Stealing Palestine, but Purchasing Israel The real history of Israel’s founding, and why it matters, by Daniel Pipes
Zionists stole Palestinian land: That’s the mantra both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas teach their children and propagate in their media. This claim has vast importance, as Palestinian Media Watch explains: “Presenting the creation of the [Israeli] state as an act of theft and its continued existence as a historical injustice serves as the basis for the PA’s non-recognition of Israel’s right to exist.” The accusation of theft also undermines Israel’s position internationally.
But is this accusation true?
No, it is not. Ironically, the building of Israel represents almost the most peaceable in-migration and state creation in history. Understanding why requires seeing Zionism in context. Simply put, conquest is the historical norm. Governments everywhere have been established through invasion and nearly all states came into being at someone else’s expense. No one is permanently in charge; everyone’s roots trace back to somewhere else.Germanic tribes, Central Asian hordes, Russian tsars, and Spanish and Portuguese conquistadors remade the map. Modern Greeks have only a tenuous connection to the Greeks of antiquity. Who can count the number of times Belgium was overrun? The United States came into existence after the defeat of Native Americans. Kings marauded in Africa, Aryans invaded India. In Japan, Yamato-speakers eliminated all but tiny groups such as the Ainu.
The Middle East, due to its centrality and geography, has experienced more than its share of invasions, including the Greek, Roman, Arabian, Crusader, Seljuk, Timurid, Mongolian, and modern European. Within the region,dynastic froth caused the same territory — Egypt for example — to be conquered and re-conquered.
The land that now makes up Israel was no exception. In Jerusalem Besieged: From Ancient Canaan to Modern Israel, Eric H. Cline writes of Jerusalem: “No other city has been more bitterly fought over throughout its history.” He backs up that claim, counting “at least 118 separate conflicts in and for Jerusalem during the past four millennia.” He calculates Jerusalem to have been destroyed completely at least twice, besieged 23 times, captured 44 times, and attacked 52 times. The PA fantasizes that today’s Palestinians are descended from a tribe of ancient Canaan, the Jebusites; in fact, they are overwhelmingly the offspring of invaders and immigrants seeking economic opportunities.
Against this tableau of unceasing conquest, violence, and overthrow, Zionist efforts to build a presence in the Holy Land until 1948 stand out as astonishingly mild, mercantile rather than military. Two great empires, the Ottomans and the British, ruled Eretz Yisrael. In contrast, Zionists lacked military power. They could not possibly achieve statehood through conquest.
Instead, they purchased land. Acquiring property dunam by dunam, farm by farm, house by house, lay at the heart of the Zionist enterprise until 1948. The Jewish National Fund, founded in 1901 to buy land in Palestine “to assist in the foundation of a new community of free Jews engaged in active and peaceable industry,” was the key institution — and not the Haganah, the clandestine defense organization founded in 1920.
Zionists also focused on the rehabilitation of what was barren and considered unusable. They not only made the desert bloom, but drained swamps, cleared water channels, reclaimed wasteland, forested bare hills, cleared rocks, and removed salt from the soil. Jewish reclamation and sanitation work precipitously reduced the number of disease-related deaths.
Only when the British Mandate of Palestine gave up power in 1948, followed immediately by an all-out attempt by Arab states to crush and expel the Zionists, did the latter take up the sword in self-defense and go on to win land through military conquest. Even then, as the historian Efraim Karsh demonstrates in Palestine Betrayed, most Arabs fled their lands; exceedingly few were forced off.
This history contradicts the Palestinian account that “Zionist gangs stole Palestine and expelled its people” which led to a catastrophe “unprecedented in history” (according to a PA twelfth-grade textbook) or that Zionists “plundered the Palestinian land and national interests, and established their state upon the ruins of the Palestinian Arab people” (writes a columnist in the PA’s daily). International organizations, newspaper editorials, and faculty petitions reiterate this falsehood worldwide.
Israelis should hold their heads high and point out that the building of their country was based on the least violent and most civilized movement of any people in history. Gangs did not steal Palestine. Merchants purchased Israel.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
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