Rabbis Gone Wild: Boston Edition
Boston is famous for Harvard, Paul Revere, and now for 70 loony liberal rabbis, each blessed with an ego bigger than the Green Monster at Fenway Park, and wisdom smaller than a baked bean.
Already, their noxious stunt of June 10 is legend, astounding Jews from Boston to San Francisco, Israel and beyond. For on that day, the rabbis finally managed to bestir themselves about the notorious, Saudi-funded mega-mosque in Roxbury. Its founder, MIT graduate Abdurahman Alamoudi, is currently serving a 23-year sentence for al-Qaeda-linked terrorist pranks. Its trust president, Osama Kandil, is the director of an Islamic charity designated as terrorist by the U.S. government. Its trustee, Jamal Badawi, is an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial.
So what did these genius rabbis do? Did they demand an investigation into why Mayor Thomas Menino gave away $2 million of precious public land to the Islamic Society of Boston on which to build the mosque? Did they launch a public awareness campaign of the mosque’s terrifying link with Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the wart-faced “spiritual leader” of the Muslim Brotherhood who’s banned from the U.S. but served as the mosque’s trustee? Did they picket outside the home of Governor Deval Patrick, singing rousing protest songs and demanding he give back a $50,000 check he publicly accepted from a jihad-spouting imam for the purpose of training Massachusetts police in “Muslim cultural sensitivities”?
Of course not! These are far-left Reform and Reconstructionist rabbis we’re talking about and they worship only the progressive creed: putting barbarians first.
Instead, what these wise and wonderful rabbis chose to do was issue a public “Jewish fatwa” against Dr. Charles Jacobs, Boston’s heroic one-man truth squad about the mosque’s radical leadership. Yes, the Saintly Seventy all loudly signed their names to “An Open Letter to the Jewish Community,” published in the Jewish Advocate, in which they demanded that “Mr. Jacobs discontinue his destructive campaign against Boston’s Muslim community, which is based on innuendo, half-truths and unproven conspiracy theories. We call upon members of our community to reject the dangerous politics of division that Mr. Jacobs fosters.”
The rabbis then applauded their own “commitment to interfaith dialogue and cooperation. We stand together in our commitment to a community in which neighbors seek to know one another and join together for the common good.”
Finally, they closed with a reference to the Torah portion in which Israelite scouts are struck by fear: “Because they succumbed to their fears, God condemned this generation to die in the wilderness. We refuse to allow Mr. Jacobs to spread his calumnies and paralyze our community in fear.”
I’ll pause a moment to let the fumes of the rabbis’ galloping smug-itis clear the room.
Dr. Charles Jacobs is a morally serious man. We’re talking about a man who was given the Boston Freedom Award by Coretta Scott King for helping to emancipate enslaved black Africans in Sudan, in his work as founder of the American Anti-Slavery Group.
In 2007, Jacobs was named by The Forward as one of America’s top 50 Jewish leaders. He not only co-founded Boston’s branch of CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America), to expose media bias against Israel, he also founded The David Project in 2002. This powerhouse organization trains college students to advocate for Israel and fight back against the demonization of Israel on campus.
Today, Dr. Jacobs heads Americans for Peace and Tolerance, an interfaith group he started in 2008 to safeguard American values from attack by radical Islamists and to support moderate Muslims.
This is the fine, brave man that 70 Boston rabbis defamed and tossed in the trash — and even potentially endangered by targeting him and his family for attack by vengeful Islamists.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the trashcan. It turns out Boston’s Jews did not relish the discovery that their spiritual leaders are preening ignoramuses.
משןגע
I object to you calling these lunatics rabbis. They are more accurately described as cultists, members of some bizarre sect only very vaguely associated with Judaism.
Repulsive attitudes like Terry’s say volumes about why the overwhelming majority of American Jews have voted and will continue to vote “progressive” — i.e., Democratic.
Since when did telling the truth become “repulsive”?
Then again, most liberals quake in fear of any truth.
I think the term you are looking for is “deceived” as to why “…the overwhelming majority of American Jews have voted and will continue to vote “progressive” — i.e., Democratic.”
By the way, do you have a COEXIST sticker on your car?
Repulsive is the idea of any rabbi defending an ideology that advocates the genocide of our people. Hey, why not have a ”dialogue” with Nazis? How’s that for ”progressive”??? On second thought, it’s not repulsive, it’s nauseating.
By the way, I apologize to any who understood my comment to refer to Reform Jews -the ”cult” I was referring to was Leftism.
Terry, perhaps this pathetic attempt by the 70 “cultists” could join up with the “pro-abortion nuns” and form their own little community. They can all hold hands and sing “this little light of mine…” leading the muslims to their vulnerable utopia…where they will be forced by the imams to adhere to shi’ria law. Curtains for Mary and last call for Saul…
Their position and attempt to smear Jacobs is reprehensible. However – yes, they are rabbis, yes they are Jews. Jewish rabbis doing really stupid reprehensible things to their fellow Jews..
As a Jew, I vehemently object to fellow Jews deciding who is or is not a Jew based on politics. Halacha is pretty clear on how to define a Jew. If you are a posek challenging this, I want to see your reasoning based on Jewish law, and your smicha.
Aren’t these the same people who are Barney Franks’ constituents? You have got to love those Progressives.
These 70 Rabbis are sinply a continuation of J Street. They’re anti Israel and I have a funny feeling that if you’ll check their funding and backers you’ll find Soros somewhere in the back ground. It should be evident to all by now that Radical Islam and their plan for world domination is one of the greatest dangers the world is facing today and these 70 so called Jewish Rabbis will be amongst the first to be eradicated by them unless they convert to Islam which is not a very far fetched idea.
Their idiocy in using the Israelite scouts is ludicrous. The truth is that their own fear is what will be the downfall of us all. People like them voted for B Hussein the worst president the US has ever had and the biggest enemy Israel’s ever had in the White House bar none and that includes peanut brain Carter.
Shame on them. They should b removed from their positions and ostracized by the community.
The unfortunate use of Biblical quotations to prove the point of these social worker rabbis indicates that they do not understand. The Torah, the topic about which they were supposed experts has eluded them. The condemned spies of the Biblical narrative spread fear among the Jews on their way to Israel and made them incapable of engaging in the physical battle that needed to be fought. For that fear, the Jews needed to spend 40 years wandering about, continuing to live off God’s largess, rather than becoming independent citizens and masters of their own fate. They remained children who would not grow up and take responsibility for themselves. These blind leaders lack the courage to stand in opposition to people who can and do seek to hurt them. Rather, they stand naked before the doors of the crematoria still believing they are de-lousing showers. If they cannot lead, at least let them get out of the way.
Terry: I agree with you that these alleged rabbis are lunatics. But, if you are referring to their “cult[ism]” as being of the Reform sect, I disagree with you. We Jews do not need this sort of division in these times. Such arguments are best saved for times when we can afford the luxury of such arguments.
Friendly Grizzly.
I’m completely secular myself, I haven’t been in a synagogue since my Bar Mitzva.
At the same time, Í can’t say I’m a fan of Reform Judaism.
But, no, that is not what I meant – the ”cult” I was referring to was Liberalism or Progressive or Leftism or whatever you care to call it.
I can see how my comment would be misunderstood, my fault for not being clear.
If one has ever wondered how Hitler managed to get 6 million Jews to calmly go the slaughterhouse, this story might be helpful.
Sad but true.
In Hannah Arendt’s book Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, she describes how the Jewish leadership in Eastern Europe largely failed when it counted. These leaders actually participated in the deportations of their own people. It’s not fully explained, probably because it couldn’t be. However, we can understand it by seeing the words and actions of these 70 rabbis.
Note also that the ancient Sanhedrin was also 70 plus a tiebreaker, so this number is meant to add weight to their edicts. And it wasn’t just fear that turned the ten spies and others like them into the destroyers of their generation; it was unbelief and hardness of heart. From Psalm 95, the writer of the psalm speaking as G-d:
Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,
as you did that day at Massah in the desert,
where your fathers tested and tried me,
though they had seen what I did.
For forty years I was angry with that generation;
I said, “They are a people whose hearts go astray,
and they have not known my ways.”
So I declared on oath in my anger,
“They shall never enter my rest.”
Just one more bit of evidence that the American people are beginning to wake up. The future is going to be more interesting than anyone can imagine.
I live in DC, but even here Charles Jacobs has supporters. The Sanctimonious Seventy are nothing but useful idiots. Real Jews who have eyes open will reject their multi-culti nonsense.
There must be something in it for them, the Rabbis. There is a reason that they hear the words of the enemy calling to the followers to fight the Jews until the end of time, destroy Israel until even the memory of that nation is no more, and to wipe the Jewish People from the face of the earth, and still they refuse to see.
The enemy must know this about them and they recognize each other and a common agenda, because they shout out their words of hatred and destruction openly and with impunity proudly passing the mission on to their children. The world hears them, sees them, yet continues as if they are meeting in secret while we are unaware, and then we feign surprise when they act on their words, or take another step closer to covering the earth with the desolation they have wreaked in the Middle East and beyond.
I know, I know!! Watch the gentiles pile on. But hey, if you throw a hanging curve. Somebody is going to go yard with it.
American Jews are their own worst enemy. This is not merely ideological. Is the condition of the rabbis pathological-not necessarily rhetorical? I am sure they are in agreement with the NY Jews favoring the NYC mosque. They and their hollyweird counterparts and those in the MSM share the same deep-seated mind-dissolving disease.
Unfortunately that disease affects us all. That is why gentiles pile on.
This frightens me. When Jews start acting as though we are our own worst enemies, the Master of the World tends to send us someone else to remind us that we aren’t.
Blotto, define “pile on” and tell me why we gentiles can’t do that if Jews take liberal (i.e., stupid) positions. Is “piling on” something that gentiles do a lot to Jews? If a Jew does something insanely stupid, can we all “pile on” in an uncoordinated fashion or do we gentiles have to appoint a spokesman to get the job done? Do Jews ever “pile on” gentiles or is it only gentiles who do that to Jews?
The commenters here sure look like they’re piling onto the 70 rabbis under discussion. And what exactly is wrong with that? The issue is, “Are they right?” We know the answer to that question.
Speaking as a Gentile, I am not of the disposition to “pile on” any Jew, just for being Jewish. I feel as though I have a right to be frustrated with the more foolish (and perhaps suicidal) elements within the Jewish community. The reason for this is that they are aiding and abetting people who would kill me and mine as well — and the friend of your enemy is, well, your enemy. However, we Gentiles have a fair share of the same sort of people — Jews who feel the same as I do are more than welcome to “pile on” them as well.
Now is really not the time for any sort of squabbling among us all — people who value even a small bit of personal liberty and freedom are hemmed in by ideologies that are very opposed to those concepts, and which are not afraid to use violence to meet their ends. If we don’t stand together, then we really do risk falling separately.
So, anyone who feels as I do, that personal freedom and liberty, being able to chart your own course through life without fearing any retribution merely for being who you are, they are my brothers and my sisters, and I will never desert them, try my best to always support and defend them.
All I would ask from someone such as yourself would be: try to think a little better of people like me from now on — even if we are Gentile, or non-Jewish even.
What fries my cookies is that these arrogant Amelak-light turncoats would dare to use the meaning of Tishah B’Av in a pernicious, hypocritical, and entirely inappropriate manner, trying to catch some of the radiance of G-d’s decision about that generation being chicken-s*** (which the people were when confronted with being asked to fight their own battles); and losing the self-esteem, determination, and presence that should have been in their hearts, based on faith in the G-d that had delivered them to Sinai. That loss of personal ambition and divinely inspired strategy toward taking on the enemies of Israel is exactly what these pompous rabbinical avatars portrayed. In fact, their action is wholly in keeping with the fractious attitude displayed in the desert on the 9th AV – and for which the Hebrew people have been paying for generations. I see it is not yet wholly purged from our collective [sic] mentality, almost 3,000 years later.
Perhaps the secular Israeli Knesset has a place for these pillars of arrogance, along with the other secular Jews. They already seem well-versed in the ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
I do not live anywhere near Boston, but my little brother lives there. I am glad Charles Jacobs is getting the word out. One man can make a difference. Good.
As a Jew myself, NO-ONE has ever said that we (jews collectively) have a great deal of sense. Just like every other ethnic/religous group, we have our idiots and nuts. They make the rest of us look stupid, but we can’t do much about them. This sort of makes me think of the Jews in Germany before the rise of the Nazi’s who thought they “could work with them” for the future of Germany…
Here’s an anology, as a child, I believed that all lawyers were very smart people. Once I grew up, I quickly learned that there are lawyers who are in fact idiots, but still managed to pass the bar exam. So, while many Rabbis have gained some measure of wisdom and depth of thought, there are in fact some who are idiots…and these 70 Rabbis surely fit that bill to a “T”.
As an American (first and foremost) I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s not really possible to make an accomodation with Muslims in modern western society. Most of those that I meet believe firmly that Sharia must be established as the “law of the land” and that ALL must follow it, whether or not they’re muslims. That belief doesn’t mesh with the liberal democratic background of the west at all. I think the finding “moderates” in the muslim world just isn’t possible, because non exist.
2+2=5
I am with Charles Jacobs. I am a proud Reform Jew, so people should not automatically assume all Reform Jews have the lack of backbone as is displayed by these Rabbis.
I consider myself just as Jewish as any Orthodox or Heredi Jew. Reform Jews wear kippaot and tallitim, and I as a woman wear them too – it is my right. We keep kosher, and many of us choose to be Shomer Shabbat, and while we do reach out to the wider community, we have definitely not assimilated, neither do we take on the “nebbish” characteristics these Rabbis display towards Islam. I have studied Islam, not to be a Muslim, but to KNOW what I am up against. There are thousands like me in the Reform Movement who are not prepared to be subservient to any religion or cult which would deprive us of the right to hold our heads up as Jews.
What is needed by Reform Jewish communities – is to speak truth to “power” – to speak against these Rabbis and distance ourselves from them. I just have – is there anybody else out there?
There appears to be only “One” Rabbi! Seventy sold their souls to the progessive movement, the latest name for “Communists” Those who believe “They” have more wisdom and can make better choices than people themselves. They are and always will be paryahs! They undermine the teachings of the Torah! which puts Gods children as individuals who God will care for, these so called “Rabbi” claim to be wiser than God! For they are better adapted to making choices for others. Sounds like blasphamy! In ancient Israel they would be stoned.
Moral weaklings, these 70. May their congregants awake and their congregations dwindle. Money so much better spent if sent to support Mr. Jacobs efforts.
As Joseph told his brothers in Egypt, what they intended for evil – the selling of him into slavery – God used for good. These 70 rabbis intended to silence Mr. Jackobs but instead provided him with a forum. Funny how God confounds the plans of the wicked.
“Mayor Thomas Menino gave away $2 million of precious public land…” Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,….
Does the donation of public land fall under the Establishment Clause? In my mind, it does.
Oh yeah. Members of the Tribe! Be tolerant of the eventual undertaker one more time. In the name of tolerance, continue to tolerate the intolerant. That worked out well for very well for Jews in Austria and Germany in the late 19th through the middle of the 20th century…
It looks as though it doesn’t take a brain to be a rabbi.
I think these particular gentlemen are suffering from a reality problem.
They are not seeing it as it is but as they wish it to be.
They Rave… (from the Book of Thomas Covenent the Unbeliever).
Perhaps they are demon possessed. It must be so. Let us intervene and cast the
demons out. For their own good and ours.
Stella:
It was not long ago that Ahmadinejad convened a conference to “prove” that the Holocaust is pure fabrication. A Haredi rabbi chose to offer support by participating in this abject travesty.
The Boston “Gang of Seventy” are in the same class. They are dupes of their politically correct ideology in which looking the other way for the sake of polishing their “progressive” credentials matters “uber alles.”
Thank you for alerting us to the shenanigans of “The Gang of Seventy.” Without you and Dr. Jacobs, we would have missed this latest act of submission to the charms of Islam. Is it possible to publish the names of these wise men? I have friends in Boston who may be congregants and want to know about this shameful sell-out to the most destructive forces in our country
The complete text of the rabbis’ letter, as well as their names and congregations, can be found at the link below.
http://www.solomonia.com/blog/archive/2010/06/when-rabbis-attack-standing-up-for-charl/
As for these 70 rabbis, to quote Harlan Ellison’s (a Jew, by the way) colorful phrase, “may 10,000 syphilitic camels puke in their couscous”.
Thank you Stella Paul. Two thoughts: 1) I think Lenin called people like 70 “rabbis,” useful idiots; 2) they have traded in the Torah of Moses (which they quote when convenient for them) for the Torah of “liberalism.”
I know of no group that has so many self-hating people as the Jews.
How many times do you see public displays of Muslims defaming their own?
They’d have their balls cut off if they did.
Now we have the NY Times at work again.
Robert Wright, a left-wing apologist writing in the NY Times, has questioned why anyone would reject a mosque at the site where 3,000 Americans were murdered in the name of Islam and the rule of Mohammad.
Mr. Wright’s next step is to call for a picture of Bin Laden on the ten dollar bill.
He, like our president, believes that if we keep telling our enemies that we really like them in spite of their calls for our extermination, then they will play nice.
The 911 mosque idea is just the latest anti-Christian, anti-Jewish provocation that is dividing this country. Meanwhile, it is a crime to be a Christian in Saudi Arabia and Israel is being daily attacked by the left and their gun totting brethren around the world.
There is a war going on. Islam is the enemy. Get used to it. It will get much worse before it gets better. Ultimately ,the good guys will win but at what price?
http://jewishdailyreport.wordpress.com/2010/07/21/no-911-mosque/
Well, if you consider the level of muslim-on-muslim factional violence in Iraq, and the number of muslim Afghanis killed by other muslims…I’d say they skip the defamation and just draw their knives, so to speak. I do realize it’s factional, and there are differences in belief between sunni, shi’ite, etc, etc, but for a religion of peace, they sure kill an awful lot of their breathren under Allah. At least the Christians mostly got it out of their collective system (catholic vs protestant, etc)…
Please go to the Web site http://www.PeaceAndTolerance.org for information about the good work that Charles Jacobs is doing. He is working hard to safeguard our freedoms in America. You are welcome to support his organization through a tax deductible contribution.
Great piece!
Charles is our ‘modern day Paul Revere’ – warning us of what is already here and what is to come – and these ‘in-denial’ outreach Rabbis are doing great harm to their congregants by covering up the dangers and holding hands while singing Kumbaya….
But it has backfired because thanks to them, Charles is finally getting the word out!
Carol
These bogus “rabbis” have done their best to sap their title of its traditional, positive meaning. They would use some other title if that had as much power to disguise their radical socialism.
Sound of nail being hit on the head!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWejPVvylNA
As an active and participating Reform Jew, I find it harder and harder to understand many of the clergy and their incredible lack of comprehension of the Muslim World. In the race to “get along” they have surrendered their conscience and intellect. Are we living in Germany in 1936 again? Will we willing go along and even support those who mean to kill us? Read the Koran.
It’s spelled out in easy to comprehend language. Just like Mein Kampf. Wake
up you sleeping Liberals, the world isn’t pretty and reality requires tough
decisions and hard choices.
Thanks for the great article–
Charles Jacobs is a true hero and we need more like him!
Modern day elijah vs the priests of baal?
Great article. Glad to see these smug,cowardly,dhimmie halfwits exposed (maybe halfwit is too generous a ratio) and elated to hear of Dr Jacobs response and the response of the community.
These rabbis, and those like them speak, less and less for Jewish people. They represent the still substantial but dwindling number who are yet drinking the cool aid. More and more of us understand exactly what we are facing both abroad and at home with this Administration.
Jews who remember Washington Senator Henry Scoop Jackson remember a Democratic party before it stuck its collective head up its political behind and betrayed the values of ordinary Americans who love and treasure the exceptionalism of this country and who taught, and still teach, their children to respect and defend this last bastion of freedom. American vitality has not vanished nor has it succumbed to the effete mandarins of the left whether Jewish or Christian, professors or politicians. News Week was recently sold for one dollar. I expect the New York Times will go for a pig foot and a bottle of beer.