Rabbi Eric Yoffie's Remarks Sharpen Differences Between Jewish Leaders and Youth Over Human Rights

 "But as a grandchild of four Holocaust survivors..."

 You people are awfully pushy with that stuff. 

Let the record show that the Jews offered to split Jerusalem in half, and the Arabs responded with the 1948 war.

By the way, Egypt is also blockading Gaza. If Israel blocked Gaza's access to Israel and the sea, but Egypt was open to Gaza, then there wouldn't be much of a blockade, would there? 

I was raised singing the Adon Olam to the tunes of Kumbaya and Imagine. my "Lets love the whole world into everlasting peace" is in conflict with the reality I see aro. Israel fears the Palestinians capacity for hatred. the Palestinians are not like European Jews who responded to oppression with Compliance. The Isrealis are not like the American Jews, who  yeild their first ammendment rights to bear arms. we americans who don't make aliya can only impact Isreal's politics with out dollars. and if you are religious ,with our prayers. 

I'm with Dan on this one, all the way. Yoffie was asked a direct question by Rabbi Ellen Lippman of Rabbis for Human Rights-North America: "What will you do to support human rights in the region." Yoffie spoke for another 5 minutes at length on his seemingly favored topic, trashing Goldstone, and never answered. I think that slap in the face to her. Yoffie's responses to Dan show that he's not in sync with the langauge we're using here: human rights.

I wrote so much on Jewschool, but I think Yoffie is undermining care for human rights. It's only through a concern for the human rights of both sides (against terror, for self-determination) that we're going to arrive at an amiable solution, and a Jewish state without human rights is not going to last very long.

But more personally, if Israel and Yoffie don't care for human rights, well, I'm not interested in supporting either of them. They've both thrown out the baby with the bathwater, meaning thrown out Israel at the same time as universal values.

Israel does not control all of Gaza's borders. The border with Egypt is not controlled by Israel. Therefore, Israel is not under siege. Explosives and viagra flow freely into Gaza thru the Sinai peninsula. Sieradski is symptomatic of Jews who are tormented by their Judaism, and want to blend in with their progressive friends. They see Judaism as kind of a cleft palate that disfigures them and scares progressive anti-Semites away. To Dan and those who think like him, please disaffect yourselves from the Jewish people and Israel. You never wanted to be part of us anyhow

I was involved with a Jewish student group that sent him a petition againt the war in Lebanon. And then later I emailed him to support J Street when he criticized it so harshly. He responded with a very angry email to me -I was surprised to get a personal response at all. He accused me of closing the debate by declaring that his generation's viewpoint is fading. He seemed totally oblivious to just how much AIPAC and others have policed the Israel debate. J Street and the Jewish center-left has never participated in so much suppression of open debate at has the right and center-rigth Jewish establishment.

 I don't get the point of being Reform. It's being flexible on matters of ritual tradition, but generally rigid on issues of political dogma. So, you end up with a bland religion lack any ritual or authenticity but still grasping to backward ideology. Conservative actually seems less knee-jerkishly hawkish in foreign policy, and it actually has some continuity with tradition. I can tolerate some strange communal politics from the Orthodox, since they resist change, but Reform is pointless if it can't get on the right side of this issue, or at least stop being on the wrong side so forcefully.

Very good observation about Conservative. It's the best fit for me for the reasons you describe.

Help me understand why no one cried "oppression" or "occupation" when the territories were occupied by Egypt and Jordan. Help me understand why 60+ years of proposed compromises are met with resounding "no's" and it's Israel's fault. Help me understand why it's ok to continue to have specific language about the destruction of Israel in the charters of the 2 main palestinian governmental/representative organizations.  Help me understand how a people/group/nation repeatedly start wars, repeatedly lose those wars, are somehow allowed to dictate the terms of peace. Help me understand where 100's of millions of in foreign aid to the PA have gone.  Help me understand what's so wrong about saying to your neighbor, 'hey, we'd really not like our kids to have to man those roadblocks, (an example of the "boot on their neck" you refer to) so we'd like to take 'em down.  all you have to do is please stop blowing up busloads of people!. I mean, seriously, you don't have to do that.  Just work with us here a little'. Help me understand how that is somehow an inappropriate question to ask.  Help me understand how the 'massacre of thousands of innocent civilians' rings out from PA headquarters and then through the world press, who find out a few days later the 'massacre' was just a goat, a watermelon, and a guy who was actually wearing a suicide vest.  And then nobody says 'uhhh, yeah, sorry about reporting that massacre thing'.  Help me understand why nobody says that.  And why they think it's OK.  And why it's OK to teach their children hateful lies about their neighbors.  Please help me understand...I thought getting 99% of what you've wanted most in life for you and your children would be a pretty good thing.  Lots of hard-fought concessions won.  But yet, it's not.  Help me understand the thinking.  Help me understand how my Israeli family, extremely pro peace, extremely left of center, working literally for decades on one project or another to bring the two peoples together, are done.  They're beaten and defeated.  They believe there is simply no credible partner for Israel to negotiate with.  No one will stand up and say 'I'll take the 99% '  I just don't  understand how no serious negotiations can ever take place, no arab MLK has come forward to march or sit so as to pay the ultimate complement to the very name "Islam".   And I just don't understand why that is somehow Israel's fault.  It was 'the boot' to which you refer that came off of gaza, painfully removing people from their homes, and leaving behind millions in equipment, housing, and agricultural capabilities, but according to your narrative by not getting a 'negotiated settlement' (from people who have made clear that they're not in this to really negotiate)...that's what's caused the rocket atttacks.  

[is it any wonder that young American Jews like myself are increasingly
repulsed by the organized Jewish community when three years of sporadic
rocketfire from an occupied people is touted as a greater tragedy than
decades of their oppression and dispossession?]  

Help me understand how that passage sounds exactly like the rebellious outburst of a tempestuous teenager.  A teenager who just can't believe what his parents believe, because that goes against 'the code',  a teenager who's doodling the hammer and sickle on his trapper keeper because he just finished reading Das Capital for the first time and is moving on to the biography of Malcolm X next, who thinks he was the first one of his peers to really 'get' A Hard Rain's (a-gonna fall),  Please help me understand how 'sporadic rocketfire' on civilian populations is acceptable under any conditions?   Please help me understand how 'decades of oppression and disposession' could have ended decades ago with a simple 'ok, we'll split it', or even a simple, o'k, let's work on this nicely'. 

help me understand why people pay thousands to their therapists over years and i can see through your schtick for free in about 10 seconds

No one cried "oppression" or "occupation" when the territories were occupied by Egypt and Jordan because many Israeli-bashers are racist against Jews. It is not oppression they hate; they hate Jews. If they cared about oppression, they would show concern for the countless gay Arabs and Pali's murdered, tortured, and imprisoned just for being gay. If they cared about violence against innocent people, they would sympathize with Jews living in Sderot who live in constant fear of terrorism.

Israel committs atrocities of its own, and it's awful that Israelis elected a reactionary, right-wing government that will get us nowhere. But while anti-Israelis show so much "understanding" and "tolerance" for the Arabs who want Hamas in charge, they refuse to admit that Israelis were driven by the same fear-based politics as any group that leans right. Because to the anti-Jewish Left, Hamas and Hezbollah are somehow "leftist" groups.

"J Street welcomed Yoffie's participation in the conference, exemplifying the group's desire to engage those with whom it disagrees, in the greater interest of promoting more open dialogue within the Jewish community about Israel's policies towards the Palestinians."

 "I admit, I was among the booers."

Great way to have a dialogue, Dan.  Shout down the people who don't spout your own opinions back at you.  I'm not a big fan of Yoffie, but he had a point to make about the Goldstone hatchet job, and it was a fair one.  Your reaction, and that of many of the bien-pensants at J-Street was infantile and hardly conducive to the serious dialogue that you claim to want.  Moreover, your visceral (and rudely expressed) defense of a blatant attack on Israel by a UN organization famed for bias against the Jewish state speaks far more about J-Street's real agenda than your silly sloganeering about how you're "pro-Israel, pro-Peace."

@Morganfrost You might want to try learning the difference between vocally dissenting and "shouting down" those with whom you disagree. Neither I, nor any other participant in the conference, silenced Yoffie. No one jumped up chanting and shouting, rushing the stage, barricading doors, making a spectacle of themselves, or anything of the like. We simply let our voices be heard. When I spoke 1 on 1 with Yoffie, I did so peaceably and respectfully, despite our serious disagreement.  Rather, he was the one who was ratcheting up the snark.  As for serious dialogue, your response to this article consists almost entirely of an ad hominem attack against me. If that's what you call "serious dialogue," you're the last person to be lecturing me on anything. Finally, the official positions of J Street and the personal opinions of its individual supporters should never be confused for one and the same thing, lest we should decry, say, the entire of the government of Israel for the reprehensible views of one Avigdor Lieberman.

@lanskymob Perhaps the reason "no one cried 'oppression' or 'occupation' when the territories were occupied by Egypt and Jordan" is because my generation was born at least 13 years after Israel began its occupation of the territories. But that aside, I do not criticize Israel because I am here to emptahize with Palestinians, I criticize Israel because I care about Israel, Jews, Jewish values and Jewish morality, and the occupation's cost to each of them.  I won't even dignify your personal attack against me.

@herbertkaine Funny, nearly all of my friends happen to be Jewish. Jewish and progressive. And none of us are tormented by our Judaism, we're tormented by our parents' and grandparents' generations defense of the indefensible.  We're tormented by the organized Jewish community speaking and acting in our names without bothering to check with us first.  We're tormented by an Israel that we were taught to believe embodies the righteous aspirations of the Jewish people and our discovery, upon visiting there, that the reality doesn't match the myth.  And, it's a shame you weren't at Eli Valley's show Monday night, because, per your final remarks wishing me to desert the Jewish people, he had some wonderful words for you.

Daniel Sieradski
http://danielsieradski.com

Screaming "boo" at a speaker you invited is your idea of "vocally dissenting?"  That's a cute term for it.  If I publish scandalous speculations as to your wife's fidelity, would you call it "a written critique," or would you just call it offensive?

As to your alleged one-on-one discussions with Yoffie, those were not the subject of your post.  You and your (reprehensible) organization were obviously enthusiastic in your defense of a lopsided UN-sponsored attack on Israel.  Your defense of this document (as articulated in your article) consisted of screaming "boo" at a guest of yours who objected to it (and stated reasons for his objections).  And the report itself?  The Democrat-dominated U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to condemn this report.  Israel roundly rejected it as hopelessly biased.  Moreover, any supposedly "pro-Israel" organization would be skeptical of criticism of Israel coming from the UN Human Rights Commission, which pretty much specializes in condeming Israel (and nobody else).

So, yes, I feel amply qualified to lecture you and your fellow-travelers on the idea of serious dialogue. 

Here's Lecture #2 in its entirety (it recaps a point in Lecture #1 which seems to have eluded you): Serious dialogue never involves yelling "boo."

Lanskymob- The Autobiography of Malcom X is a really good book.

Perhaps former mayor Ed Koch, trying to cover for the fact that Jewish liberals are simply insane, was the first to say that he wanted to be a liberal with sanity.  As he might say: "is that so wrong?"

Now Eric Yoffie, a commited liberal knows there is shame in actively campaigning for the destruction of Israel.  For him, it lacks some sense.  Even Yoffie agrees that it is better that the Jews of Israel live--fine, even a man like Yoffie can be brought to decency.  This is heartening.

Far less, is the fad of a group of Israel bashers named "J Street" (isn't it interesting that anyone can be instantly famous, without accomplishing anything at all, only if they are Jewish and hate Israel??) and supporters like idealistic young Daniel who has penned this feature on Jewcy.  Idealism is truly wonderful--so I ask you Daniel--do you have any for the Jewish people in its struggle for survival?  Most of the world truly believes there will be no Israel in 20 years--if not for the reality of Hashem, I might heartily agree.  As for these rabid Arabs seeking to destroy everything in front of them, there is  no doubt concerning their security and their collective future.  This is the way of our modern world--we face more and more ugliness.  And you are here to stand in solidairity with that eventuality.  It is a horrible choice. Even Eric Yoffie has enough sanity to say that he really hopes Jews remain in Israel when the odds are against us.  And you have enough contempt to say that he has gone beserk.

Please put down your sword, Daniel.  Defend Jewish life in the state of Israel--the one and only Jewish state.

Interesting that you bring up the Holocaust to say that Jews owe something to the international community - the older generation has a different perspective. They saw the international community stand by and do nothing while the Holocaust was starting, and during the war refuse to allocate any resources to stopping the genocide (as opposed to just winning the war) - the latter was arguably the right decision, but it doesn't make the older generations very sympathetic to arguments about the international community as the guardian of justice and human rights. (not to mention '67, where the Israeli view of it was that while the Arabs built up for war the UN and the international community did nothing.) Might be wrong, but using the Holocaust to argue for the UNHCR isn't going to convince someone like Yoffie.