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What happened to IAW at Portland State? [Israeli Apartheid Week]

Wednesday, February 29th, 2012

A regular fixture in the student union stairwells until recently.

The level of anti-Israel discourse at Portland State University is a “5.” What I mean to say is that pro-Israel students needn’t avoid the random keffiyah, but at the same time, a campus-wide Am Yisroel Chai party isn’t in the works either.

The stairways of the student union are usually peppered with the latest BDS effort but the posters haven’t made their way unto the “official” student billboards, yet. That’s why I was surprised to see absolutely nothing around campus for Israel Apartheid Week.

Just like any West Coast state school, Portland State has a healthy mix of Arab and Muslim student clubs (MSA included) as well as a sometimes-boisterous but mostly civil pro-Palestinian student group, Students for Palestinian Equal Rights (SUPER).

And yet, a quick run through campus last week produced not one of the famous posters comparing Israeli with the South African apartheid state. Even more mysterious was the series of emails unreturned to this reporter querying Israel Apartheid Week, sent to SUPER last week.

In fact, SUPER is having an event next week, but it’s not about Israel Apartheid Week – or even the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. Next week SUPER is hosting a panel titled “Arab Spring: A Year that Changed the World.” Not exactly a reason to rally the counter-protestors, unlike at many universities that feature disruptions, mock checkpoints and assaults.

Contrast this back-and-forth (between IAW and its counterpart, Israel Peace Week) with the atmosphere at Portland State and it’s clear the there is something “different” going on at the university.

It seems the answer to the question of IAW’s absence at PSU is couched in the nature of discourse between Palestinian, Arab and Muslim groups and the Jewish student groups on campus. Last year, several Muslim and Arab student groups joined with the JSU and PDXHillel to bring StandUp for Peace – a comedy duo featuring a Palestinian and Jewish American – to campus.

Max Werner, a Portland State student and JSU officer said, “The relationships that were built during the planning and production of the event, I believe, were more meaningful than the event itself.”

Even more so, politics seem to take a decisive back-stage to more common celebrations of ethnic or religious culture. Identity is even an important difference in the officers’ core of several PSU student groups.

JSU officer Mehdi Sianaki is neither interested in Israel Apartheid Week – nor Jewish. Nevertheless, Sianaki is an integral part of the JSU at the university.

His views on cooperation between Arab, Palestinan, Muslim and Jewish campus groups seem to sum up the culture at the school: “the officers of both groups (JSU and the Arab-Persian Student Organization) are very close and have strong bond. APSO and JSU both agree that one cannot be judged on what takes place politically.”

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Posted in Israeli Apartheid Week | No Comments »

Discussing the analogy of the week [Israeli Apartheid Week]

Wednesday, February 29th, 2012

“Israel – Worse Than Apartheid?” was written on the whiteboard of an American University classroom yesterday during a “Discussion on the Israeli Apartheid Analogy,” part of AU Students for Justice in Palestine’s roster of events for Israel Apartheid Week.

Being an SJP-organized event, opinions in the room tended to be favorable toward the pro-apartheid analogy preference, the clear exception being one Schuyler Polin, an Israeli-American, who will serve in the Israeli Defense Forces when he graduates from AU.

The event started off rather amicably, but tensions did rise between Polin and the rest of the group as they discussed the validity of the apartheid analogy, Israeli identity cards, the wall separating Israel proper from the territories, racism, the future identity of Israel and more.

Right from the start, Polin argued that the apartheid analogy was dangerous, saying, “This is no longer focused on ending the occupation but the deconstruction of Israel. That’s exactly what it’s calling for.”

Polin argued that the apartheid analogy depended on the right of return. If all Palestinians were allowed to return to their previous homes in Israel proper, Israel would no longer be a Jewish state.

Members of SJP disagreed, instead saying that Israel could not continue to be a democracy while also remaining Jewish. The two identities together were an “oxymoron,” as AU student Damian Fontanez said. Students argued that Israel’s identity would have to change for the sake of human rights. After all, South Africa was still South Africa after the end of apartheid, said Sammi Abdul-Ghani Al-Iryani, who is from Yemen.

“When you talk about apartheid, you’re talking about the lived reality of Palestinians on a day-to-day basis,” Al-Iryani said.

Noora Said, a Palestinian and a student at AU, echoed those concerns, saying she has had to live with the wall while living in the West Bank.

Students also focused on discussion of the difference between social apartheid and legal apartheid. While students were in agreement that Arab Israelis (which SJP member Emily Floyd described as “an offensive term”) faced racism in Israel, students couldn’t reach an agreement on whether Israeli policy discriminated against non-Jews.

Students for Justice in Palestine will continue to hold Israel Apartheid Week events over the next few days.

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Posted in Arab Israelis/Israeli Arabs, Campus, Israel, Israeli Apartheid Week, palestine | 1 Comment »

School is for ‘snobs’ [Politics]

Wednesday, February 29th, 2012

Yup. You know all that debt you’re getting into paying your tuition? You better just drop out now, says presidential candidate Rick Santorum.

Not really, but pretty close. Santorum, who has a BA, an MBA and JD, criticized President Barack Obama for saying in the State of the Union that everybody should go to college, saying he is a “snob.”

Santorum also did not want students to get an education to be taught by “liberal college professor who’re going to indoctrinate them.”

“I understand why he wants you to go to college: He wants to remake you in his image,” Santorum said.

Obama said in his State of the Union that he wanted all Americans to commit to one year at a trade school, apprenticeship, or a four-year college. At a meeting of the National Governors Association, Obama repeated those remarks, saying, “When I speak about higher education we’re not just talking about a four-year degree.”

Felicia Sonmez at the Washington Post posited that Santorum was catering to Michigan voters without college degrees. But GOP governors visiting Washington this week for the National Governors Association weren’t pleased with the comments. Among those governors, according to the Washington Post, were:

  • Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell
  • Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal
  • Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant
  • Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer
(Unrelated note on Brewer: protesters mic-checked her at American University, where I go to school, on Friday).

Jon Stewart on the Daily Show put it best: “Why Is It Mitt Romney Hasn’t Crushed This Guy Already?”

Either way, Sonmez’s prediction seemed to come true: Santorum won 42 percent percent of the non-college graduate vote in Michigan, the most of any voting block there, according to CNN exit polls

But that was not enough to stop former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney from picking up 29 delegates on Feb. 28 in Arizona (Santorum got none). In Michigan, Romney’s third home (behind Massachusetts and ahead of Utah), Romney and Santorum both walked away with 11 delegates.

In Arizona, Romney still trounced Santorum, gaining 47 percent percent of the vote compared to Santorum’s 27. In Michigan, Romney’s victory was only slightly above that of Santorum.

Ron Paul, true to form, was able to gain early support from college age students. By the end of the night, 37 percent of voters between 18 and 29 years old in Michigan had joined Paul. In Arizona, Romney garnered a whopping 52 percent of college-age vote, way ahead of Santorum’s 20 percent and Paul’s 18 percent.

In all fairness, let’s mention Newt Gingrich … He was there, and he got votes…

But going back to Santorum for a second. We should also talk about what he thinks about college students’ favorite activity: sex. Check out the Huffington Post’s round-up of Santorum’s positions on all things sexual (pun intended). One of the highlights? Santorum, in an interview with the Associated Press, implied that oral sex should be illegal, saying, “We have laws in states … that has sodomy laws and they were there for a purpose.”

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Posted in Campus, humor, journalism, politics | No Comments »

Don’t lick the Lubavitcher Rebbe; artsy synagogues; and more. [Required Reading]

Wednesday, February 29th, 2012

Up close and personal in the Gaza Strip [Vice News]

After a failed attempt in 2007 to make it into Gaza, during a violent conflict there, Vice News finally makes it in, sharing their insights and experiences on one of the most hotly debated geographic regions on Earth.

Licking the Lubavitcher Rebbe…? [Jerusalem Post]

A set of commemorative stamps featuring the visage of the late Chabad leader known as the Lubavitcher Rebbe would have been released in Israel were it not for the efforts of Chabad itself, which characterized licking the stamp with their former (and beloved) spiritual leader on it as “disrespectful.” Instead, it seems a compromise has been reached:

“While the Lubavitcher hassidim opposed the issue of a stamp showing the face of the first in the line of Chabad rebbes – Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi – for the same reason, his visage now appears on a new first-day cover (official envelope). But the stamp, released recently by the Philatelic Service, depicts an open copy of the Tanya, Zalman’s main work that was published in 1797.”

Meet the man behind the new Times of Israel [Forward]

Seth Klarman, the American Jew who has financed the establishment of a new Web-based Israeli newspaper, may be as “softspoken” as The Jewish Daily Forward describes him. But he also has a vision for better coverage of Israeli news. The Forward writes:

“The surprising background fact is that Klarman’s involvement with Israel is basically new. He took his first trip to Israel only seven years ago. But the wealthy investor defies simple categorization. His statement on the paper’s launch seems to toe a familiarly hawkish pro-Israel line. But Klarman also describes himself as an opponent of Israel’s policy of establishing exclusively Jewish settlements on the occupied West Bank, calling it a mistake ‘from the beginning.’”

The ‘King of Avant-Garde’ talks making art with Jewish themes [Zeek]

Richard Kostelanetz, often described by his peers in the art world as the “king of avant-garde,” sat down with Zeek Magazine to discuss pushing the boundaries of creativity, the role of Jewish identity in his creative process (and that of others), and the best Jewish communities for the artistic mind.

“Founded to serve Tribeca workers, when that downtown neighborhood still had factories and offices, it recently changed its name from the Civic Center Synagogue to the Synagogue for the Arts, no joke. Though I know some artists who go there, they don’t recommend the rabbi; it also has an art gallery whose exhibitions I’ve found trivial.

To one and all, I recommend Beth Simchat Torah, ostensibly gay and lesbian, for its rabbi Sharon Klienbaum, at once more profound and funnier than most, and its congregation, which culturally reflects downtown Manhattan, where I’ve lived most of my life. About its Yom Kippur service, traditionally at the magnificent Crystal Palace at the Javits Center, a friend comments it was the first she ever attended that ‘wasn’t a fashion show.’”

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Posted in Abroad, Arts and Culture, Blogs, community, Culture, Diaspora, Interfaith, Israel, journalism, New Voices Magazine, opinion, Orthodoxy, palestine, politics | No Comments »

Students on hunger strike in solidarity with Palestinian prisoner

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012

Students for Justice in Palestine members at American University protested the administrative detention of Khader Adnan, who was arrested last December by Israeli police forces, by going on their own hunger strike for five days. Israel believes he is an Islamic Jihad terrorist, but has been unable to produce any evidence.

Authorities never formally charged Adnan, making him one of over 300 prisoners held in Israel without charges filed against them. AU students decided to hold a hunger strike in solidarity with Adnan, who went 66 days without food before the Israeli government announced on Feb. 21 that he would be released. Some did not eat at all, and others severely limited their caloric intake.

AU’s student newspaper, The Eagle (which I also work for) reported that one student who participated in the hunger strike said:

Adnan is very adamant about taking opposition to this [Israeli] policy called administrative detention, where in issues of national security, they reserve the right to hold you with no charges indefinitely…. We wanted to support his initiative by taking up a hunger strike of our own.

Read the full story about the AU hunger strike at The Eagle, written by contributing writer Emma Jackson. The video was created by Diana Bowen, The Eagle’s multimedia editor.

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Posted in activism, Israel, palestine | No Comments »

Modern vs. Orthodox [Religion]

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012
David H. Zysman Hall at Yeshiva University

Is Yeshiva University an oxymoron? Simi Lampert weighs in | photo by flickr user Alan Cordova (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

I’ve reached a point in my personal musings on Modern Orthodoxy that I’ve started to wonder whether such a thing is even possible: the merging of modern life and religious Judaism. Is Modern Orthodoxy a contradiction in terms?

The Modern Orthodoxy ideal is living and engaging in the modern world while maintaining a lifestyle committed to halacha and Torah. No balance is 100% possible, of course; when you get down to it, halacha will always trump modernity. A job with work on Shabbat wouldn’t fly, and so on. This is the natural consequence of trying to harmonize a secular society with a religious life, and something I’ve always innately understood, if not mulled over completely. But recently I’ve realized something else: the open- mindedness that we Modern Orthodox Jews pride ourselves on, especially in relation to Hareidi Jews, may be a lot more theoretical than realistic.

Yeshiva University, often called the “flagship of Modern Orthodoxy” (and rarely in a facetious tone, unless invoked by myself), is another one of those contradictions in terms. Can a school really be both a yeshiva and a university? It would seem not. At some point along the way, one or the other needs to fall by the wayside, and more often than that, that straggler is the university end. Yeshiva comes first, much like Orthodox comes first.

An article that was recently published on my newspaper, The Beacon, sparked a bit of controversy within the Modern Orthodox community, leading to angry, childish yelling instead of mature discussions. True, the article was not written as sensitively or articulately as it could have been, but I’m also starting to think that open conversation is something the Modern Orthodox community is not ready for. New ideas, or ideas that run counter to tradition, are rejected out of hand, or viciously attacked. This is a disappointing realization for a Modern Orthodox woman who fancies herself forward-thinking, like myself.

Open dialogue is the first step to effecting change. Without discussing ideas, there can be no revolution, and every group at every time could use some sort of revolution, be it small or large. How can Modern Orthodoxy keep up with the times if it refuses to allow new thoughts into its collective mindset?

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Posted in Modern Unorthodox, Orthodoxy | 2 Comments »

Different ways of coping with IAW… and Brits fling water ‘missiles’ [Israeli Apartheid Week]

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012

I’ve got two items of note on the Israeli Apartheid Week front today:

  1.  Tablet Magazine has a nice selection of opinions on how to deal with IAW
  2. And Brits throwing water balloons.

I’ll leave the water balloons aside for a minute and focus on the Tablet piece, which brings together a variety of people all combating IAW in their own ways. The gist of a few of parts of it:

  • David Bernstein of the David Project continues his media blitz on the subject of his organization’s new strategy. His bit in this Tablet piece is titled, “Don’t Go Negative.”
  • David Fine, a friend of New Voices and the editor of Columbia’s undergrad Jewish journal, says the best thing to do is “Publicly Confront Pernicious Arguments.” Recalling a panel he once sat on at a campus event, he writes, “It was the moment I had been told to fear—the dreaded campus debate about Israel—and yet no lightning struck. It turns out that it was fairly easy to expose this person’s despicable worldview.”
  • Yoav Schafer, a Harvard student and former IDF soldier, points out “that about 65 percent of the coverage of last year’s Israel Apartheid Week was in Israeli or Jewish publications.”

The rest of the piece is well worth reading. So go do that. Their illustration for it is also super-cool.

Now, on to this water balloon incident. In the US, IAW is happening right now, but in other parts of the world it was last week. At the London School of Economics, one of the infamous mock checkpoints appeared. But then, according to YouTube user davidsmithsonian201′s description, things went horribly awry as “ four students threw numerous water bombs.” Bombs! Bombs, I say!

He continues: “The balloons hit our members, with several of these missiles hitting these students directly in the face, who were as a result incredibly upset by the incident.” I’ll bet they were.

 

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Posted in Israeli Apartheid Week | No Comments »

Not just another “Facebook marriage” [Activism]

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012

Can Facebook spell a change in Jewish justice? | Photo by Flickr user MoneyBlogNewz (CC BY 2.0)

Facebook is a source of endless procrastination for college students, a place for middle schoolers to explore their burgeoning sexuality via pictures taken in mirror reflects, and occasionally, a place for political and social activism. This is one of the latter stories.

As Rabbi Jason Miller commented in this Jewish Week blog post, Facebook is being utilized as a place for wives to put pressure on deadbeat husbands who refuse to grant them a get, or the Jewish legal equivalent of a divorce. A member of Republican congressmen David Camp (not to be confused with Camp David)’s staff has been charged by the Rabbinical Council of America for refusing to give his wife a get.

In response, a Facebook outcry has arisen, charging Rep. Camp to put pressure on his staffer to do the right thing. Whether or not cajoling the man’s employer will have the intended effects remains to be seen, but it is an interesting way of conducting affairs nonetheless. As a Congressman up for re-election, Camp will want to do anything within his power to save face with his constituency. What influence he can have on the man’s obduracy is up in the air, but when Jewish law and social media intertwine, the results are bound to be interesting.

Social networking was prominently used to organize the Arab Spring protests last year, and it will be fascinating to see whether Americans and Jews can take the next step into using Facebook and Twitter to promote social justice everywhere.

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Posted in politics, Religion | No Comments »

Israeli Apartheid Week continues; Obama’s Jewish fundraiser; Agunot and Facebook, and more [Required Reading]

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012

Sen. Barack Obama smiles

President Obama raised over $800,000 at a 'Jewish' fundraiser last night | photo By SEIU Walk a Day in My Shoes 2008, edit by Matthias.kötter (CC-BY-2.0), via Wikimedia Commons

Training to be a Jew [Tablet]

Jake Kohlman, a Jewish soldier in the American armed forces, reflects on how his basic training enabled him to connect to his religion.

“At that Sunday service, for the first time, I started to understand. The chaplain’s words lifted my spirits. I remembered why I had joined in the first place, to the shock of my family and friends. My mother is slightly to the left of Keith Olbermann, and no one in my social circle was in the military. I’d never doubted my decision, but right then, after just four days in the Army, I needed that reassurance that this was a higher calling.”

 How to Cope with Israeli Apartheid Week [Haaretz]

Josh Mintz on why not to take IAW so seriously.

“College is the birthplace of exaggerated emotions and extreme ideologies. Thankfully, it is also normally their graveyard. It’s the place where people go to learn that ideas exist, and it normally takes them nearly all of their time there to realize that most of those ideas are only any good if, like beer and whisky, they are taken in moderation. If not, then you just get drunk on them and do stupid things. Since getting drunk on beer and whisky and doing stupid things is pretty much the hallmark of most people’s college experiences (especially in the progressive, predominantly liberal-arts schools where Israeli Apartheid Week takes place) then why do we get so upset when they do the same thing with their ideas as they do with their Bud Light?”

 He said she said? Just check their statuses [The Jewish Week]
The battle over men who elect not to grant their wives a get, thus making them still legally married under Jewish law, has come to the internet. Rabbi Jason Miller weighs in.
“This might be the first example of how social media can help get a recalcitrant husband to end the marital legal war and present his wife with a get, but it likely will not be the last. Prior to the immense growth in popularity of social networking sites, recalcitrant husbands were compelled to give a get through ads in local Jewish newspapers and boycotts of their business. Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and other social media will be the weapon of choice in future agunah cases.”
Obama Courts Jewish Voters [Politico]
An Obama fundraiser held last night targeted the president’s Jewish constituency. The event raised nearly a million dollars, leading one shrewd Politco commentator to ask “how much do kosher appetizers cost?”

Israeli Apartheid Week? Je Ne Veux Pas [Ynet]

A Paris University cancelled a conference entitled “Israel: an apartheid state?” that was scheduled to be held by a pro-Palestinian group yesterday.
“The university accused the organization of taking a radical stance on the issue and said that after offering the group an alternative option to the radical anti-Israel conference  – such as holding a study day for a pluralistic public debate – the group refused.”

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Posted in Reading List | 1 Comment »

Post Oscars [Academy Awards 2012]

Monday, February 27th, 2012

There is a God, after 30 years and 17 nominations, Meryl Streep has won another Oscar. I say this because she is by far the finest actress of our time and yet every Oscar season it is a debate whether she will win the Oscar she easily deserves. This was a surprise considering her competition, most notably Viola Davis who starred in the well-loved movie “The Help”.

It seemed as if Woody Allen got all dolled up for nothing – he was nominated for directing “Midnight in Paris,” a film also nominated for best picture – because of the threat posed by “The Artist”. A newcomer winning five well deserved Academy Awards meant that several veterans weren’t going to win. “The Artist” was a surprising splash at the Oscars which typically progresses as a line of predictability. Last night, a small artsy French film dominated the Oscars.

The pageantry led by Oscar host champion Billy Crystal was a posh display of golden age of film architecture and set design. The opening number by Circ du Soleil was a spectacular display of skill and beauty. Crystal himself wasn’t supposed to be a controversial pick but it seemed as if he was straddling the divide between retired bubbes in Florida, baby boomers named Harry and Sally, as well as young adults who know him best as the voice of Mike Wazowski in “Monster’s Inc.” How well he navigated that divide will be determined next year when The Academy picks an Oscar host.

 

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Posted in Culture | No Comments »

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