Letters (January 15, 2010)
A selection of letters published in the AJN print edition of January 15, 2010
Community cries out for kosher competition
The issues mentioned in your article regarding Rabbi Moshe Gutnick and the Melbourne Adass Kashrut (AJN 08/01) should have underscored the sad situation that many people who would like to accommodate the needs of their observant relatives and friends at their simchas simply cannot afford the cost of Sydney’s kosher caterers.
Two of my family members were such people and because of the exorbitant charges by the Kosher Authority (KA) approved caterers, they had no choice but to have non-kosher weddings.
On the other hand, my non-religious friends in Melbourne always have kosher affairs. Upon enquiry, it shows that a wedding catered by the Melbourne Adass caterers costs between $60-$120 per person as compared to Sydney, where I believe costs can be at least $180 per person.
Additionally, in Sydney we are also forced to pay the KA charge of up to $6.60 per person (plus all mashgiach costs) as compared to $1 per person that Adass charges.
Is the NSW KA a money-making enterprise or is its charter to advance kashrut observance in Sydney? If the latter, why does it seem that preference is given to caterers whose charges cannot be met by the average Jewish family?
I discussed this with my rabbi, who surprisingly informed me that there are indeed many Chabad families here who actually have their children’s weddings in New York -— where, despite the travel and hotel costs, the total bill is far less than a Sydney kosher wedding.
It is time for Sydney’s kosher consumers to stand up for themselves. There must be competition in both kosher catering and kashrut supervision. Melbourne has four kashrut organisations and their charges are a fraction of Sydney’s.
The AJN should undertake to lead this campaign on behalf of the community. The first step must be to ensure free trade in Sydney for Melbourne kosher caterers.
Lea Weiss
Bondi, NSW
Questioning Israel’s moral authority
The Australian Jewish Democratic Society’s (AJDS) Larry Stillman, Steve Brooks and Les Rosenblatt wrote a letter to The Australian (04/01), claiming that “because of this ( i.e. collective punishment, siege of Gaza, illegal occupation, etc., etc.) Israel itself becomes more cocooned and devoid of any moral authority”.
Really? Why does Israel have to be the only nation in the world to have to have “moral authority” to defend itself? Who gives the AJDS the “moral authority” in Australia to judge another country’s security concerns in the Middle East?
As another writer, Craig Merriman, in the same paper notes: “The West is forced to carry the burden alone of confronting the terrorism while Islamic states who keep telling us Islam is a religion of peace, sit on the sidelines and do nothing.” He concludes with “hypocrites”.
No, it is Israel that has carried the burden of confronting terrorism on a daily basis for the past 60-plus years. But then the AJDS seems to think Hamas and its followers are also trustworthy, neighbourly, peace-loving people with the right “moral-authority” to be granted “the opportunity to live in two independent and viable states without permanent militarisation”.
What hypocrisy!
Malvina Malinek
South Yarra, Vic
Sri Lanka comparison is not advisable
Perhaps Mr Arthur Hurwitz (AJN 18/12) should think more carefully before he makes any more suggestions as to how peace can be achieved in the Middle East. Yes, the war in Sri Lanka has been marked by atrocities on both sides and, like any war, it is the innocent civilian who suffers most.
But having won the military war, the government of Sri Lanka has now embarked on a war of terror against Tamil civilians, which has seen thousands of people herded into concentration camps. The deliberate murder of unarmed civilians has also been documented and authenticated.
Surely Mr Hurwitz, you are not advocating similar ethnic cleansing in the Middle East? Please tell me you are not.
Russell Bancroft
Sandringham, Vic
Facts and figures regarding Palestinians
Regarding Mr Freedman’s letter (AJN 11/12), settlements, as the US and Australian government have made clear, are one of a number of key issues that are prejudicing negotiations.
From a negotiator’s perspective, to whose advantage does a stall in the negotiations favour?
In the case of settlements, it is to Israel’s advantage. “Getting facts on the ground” is a sure way to make a claim for land (and to prejudice future claimants; i.e. Palestinian claims to that land). His is the lesson of history as advocated by settler states, be they from the likes of Jabotinsky or the squatters in NSW; property is nine-tenths of the law!
Point 2. Mr Freedman stated that “Palestinians currently have the second-highest GDP (gross domestic product) per capita.”
Checking the Arab Human Development Report 2009 and the CIA World Factbook will quickly dispel this statement. The Gaza Strip and West Bank in 2008, according to the CIA World Factbook, had a GDP per capita of $US2800 (2008 est.).
Compare this to Qatar, $US111,000; Kuwait, $US57,500; United Arab Emirates $US44,600; Australia, $US38,200; Bahrain, $US37,400; Israel, $US28,600; Saudi Arabia, $US20,500; China, $US6000; Egypt, $US5800; and Iraq, $US3200.
Mr Freedman also stated “Palestinians [had the] third-highest life expectancy in the Arab world”.
However, it is the ninth longest in the Arab world at 72.9 years. Compare this to Israelis with an average life expectancy of 80.7 years.
Finally, can I urge caution with statements like “the Arabs simply can’t bear the thought of a tiny Jewish state existing in what they perceive as their God-given part of the world”.
Certainly, we are both well aware of anti-Semitism that exists in various parts of the Middle East; just as anti-Arab feelings are clearly articulated in Israel and in the settlements in the occupied territories.
But can I suggest that our failure to understand the deep psychological and physical impact the wars of 1948 and 1967 had on Palestinian Arabs (and vice versa on Jewish Israelis) will only jeopardise future negotiations and generations of young people from all sides.
For those of us who seek peace, is it not wise to use some humility and grace to seek to understand the other, rather than vilify and demonise someone who could quite easily be our friend?
Stewart Mills
Balmain, NSW
Celebrities should stick to showbiz
In Hollywood, there many Jewish actors and comedians who have Left-leaning views of the world and it reflects in their advocacy of political parties.
Inadvertently, they oppose Israeli policies -— for instance, comedian and satirist Jon Stewart on his hit cable show didn’t stop criticising President George W Bush for his war on terror.
President Bush could be counted as Israel’s greatest supporter to ever have sat in the Oval Office. His backing of Israel, especially during the 2006¬† Second Lebanon War, showed 100 per cent support for Israel.
These celebrities, such as Stewart and Barbra Streisand, were the most vocal anti-Bush opponents in Hollywood, thereby lending their support to Barack Obama’s campaign in 2008. He has used White House pressure to get the Israelis to yield sacred Jewish land.
These celebrities should understand while they are US citizens, they are also Jews and their support for Obama has left Israel in a more vunerable state than if Republican candidate John McCain would have won the presidency.
They should stick to showbiz rather than the realpolitik world they know little about that affects the lives of their fellow Jews in Israel.
Uri Butnaru
North Bondi, NSW
Intermarriage rate is not alarming
Sam Lipski (AJN¬† 25/12) — where he draws on the data from the Jewish Population Study by the Australian Centre for Jewish Civilisation -— is worried that the 42 per cent of 25 to 35-year-old Australian Jews who intermarry are the not-so-thin end of the wedge in a community where 30 per cent overall -— and rising -— of its members “marry out”.
Perhaps he shouldn’t worry so much?
As Shlomo Sands, the Tel Aviv University historian, points out, “Abraham, Isaac, Joseph, Moses, David and Solomon are all shown as lovers of gentile women who never bothered to convert their chosen spouses,” despite the Book of Deuteronomy (7:3) insisting that “Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto your son ‚Ķ”
Speaking personally, as an Australian Jew with a non-Jewish partner, and as one who has many Jewish friends and acquaintances with “gentile” partners or spouses, I have not observed any weakening of Jewish identification among them. On the contrary, it seems to me that many of us actually take our Jewishness far less for granted than in the more endogenous confines of the “community”. It can actually be refreshing for Jewish identity to wrestle with the cultural, religious, and political simplicities that make up so much of the sclerotic core of local Jewish conservatism.
Les Rosenblatt
Elwood, Vic
Don’t condemn Metzger over Yasuf
How audacious of Paul Winter to be telling former Israeli army captain and now Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger to not meddle in politics for comparing the arson attack on the Yasuf mosque by alleged extremists to Kristallnacht.
For starters, Rabbi Metzger wasn’t meddling in politics but rather providing support to the victims of the attack, as were some representatives from the settler movement. Additionally, if there is anyone who should not be meddling in Israeli politics, it’s Winter living here in the comfort of his Chatswood home (AJN 08/01).
Winter also reckons that Rabbi Metzger’s extreme language echoes that used by extremists leading to Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination. The extremists who¬† allegedly burnt down the mosque were opposed to the peace process Rabin tried to get going: that is why he was murdered.
Israel is facing an enormous threat from its own extremists who could very well destroy the foundation of the state, as further indicated by the death threats to Israel’s Defence Minister, Ehud Barak (AJN 08/01), while here in Australia we have these so-called Zionists attacking people like Rabbi Metzger who are trying to avert such a catastrophe.
Henry Herzog
St Kilda East, Vic
Jews must tackle climate crisis
Terry Davis (AJN 18/12) is, deliberately or ignorantly, misquoting the facts and denigrating the science of climate change, apparently with no more than a perfunctory glance at the tabloid newspaper coverage as a basis for his claims.
Surely, after the Copenhagen conference, it is impossible not to recognise worldwide climate change as an urgent and real threat to the long-term survival of the affluent developed countries, and an immediate threat to millions in poorer countries.
There are indeed some few sceptics remaining who argue that it is not human-induced, but these are akin to those who say there is no proof that smoking increases the likelihood of cancer.
Nevertheless, this is to miss the point. Whether we have been part of the cause is immaterial -— we clearly need to be putting all our efforts into helping to solve the problems.
God has given us the creativity, the ingenuity and the abilities to do so, and indeed we are God’s tools to do this work.
We must do it because we believe that every human being is truly created in the image of God, and is equal in God’s sight, even if not in the sight of some blinkered human beings themselves!
God has put us here to be care-takers of the globe, and of all its inhabitants.
That is the message of Bereshit.
But the parshah that follows it, Noach, is a stark warning of what will happen if we fail.
It is clear that as Jews, we should be voting for whoever has the most serious and effective plan to curtail emissions and support a humanitarian aid and climate refugee resettlement program the likes of which the world has never seen -— including opening the gates of Australia wide, and working to provide water, food, energy and housing, health care and education for the new immigrations.
That is the Jewish response.
Rabbi Jonathan Keren-Black
Vice-president, The Jewish Ecological Coalition
When the Left isn’t right
On reading Michael Visontay’s resolutions list (AJN 08/01), especially items 7 and 9, he surpasses his usual left-wing observations in combining the lamest kind of cognitive egocentrism, which he presents as a courageous challenge to Israeli (Jewish) society.
The idea that Israeli treatment is the cause of Palestinian behaviour, that somehow we need to understand their hatred and violence as a direct function of our deeds, is a nice illustration of masochistic omnipotence syndrome. We can change it all by changing our behaviour.
These Palestinians created their hellhole and they deserve to face the consequences of their actions.
He is someone who doesn’t begin to fathom his own people or even himself.
To talk about giving away Jerusalem to a shared sovereignity is against all the principles of the Jewish faith.
Where is the still living “Palestinian Visontay”? Too smart to open his or her mouth.
Jack Freeman
Caulfield North, Vic
If you would like to submit a letter, email letters@jewishnews.net.au
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