Letters (September 4, 2009)
A selection of letters published in the AJN print edition of September 4, 2009
Vindication, not victory
I REFER to your headline “Rabbi claims victory in Mizrachi dispute” (AJN 28/08). I said I was vindicated, I did not claim victory. There are no victors in a dispute such as this, which has seen a synagogue divided.
What has transpired is a tragedy that could and should have been avoided.
Rabbi Moshe D Gutnick
Sydney, NSW
Life tenure fine
I WAS very surprised and disappointed at your editorial, “Lifetime decisions” (AJN 28/08). It appears you are advocating the abolition of life tenure for congregational rabbis.
Indeed, you write: “Rabbis should understand that times and circumstances can change and it seems that burdening a congregation with an overwhelming financial obligation as a hedge against future options is decidedly unrabbinical.”
Life tenure is actually accepted throughout advanced societies for all positions where intellectual freedom is an essential requirement for carrying out the duties of these positions.
Two kinds of positions come to mind: university professors and judges. Tenure has been found to be the only way to ensure appointees to these positions are free from the threat of financial sanctions if they do not toe the line that their employers would like.
It is true that tenure carries the danger that some appointees may turn out to be unsuitable. Their employers may then have the unpalatable choice of going on living with them or negotiating a heavy compensation.
But experience in society at large has shown that when the appointee is chosen with suitable caution by a qualified committee, the proportion who turn out to be unsuitable is extremely small.
Is it reasonable to advocate the removal of intellectual freedom from all or most our religious leaders, leaving them at the mercy of boards that may sometimes include some unprincipled members, just because a small minority might cause trouble? I find this idea totally unacceptable.
Emeritus Prof A M Hasofer
Melbourne, Vic
Debunking myths
ONE of the revelations of the Jewish Population Survey was that 80 per cent of Jews support Israel. As editorialised in The AJN, this debunks the “absurd notion pushed by the likes of Antony Loewenstein and Jews Against the Occupation that there is a large silent group of Australian Jews who don’t support Israel”.
Another myth pushed by these anti-Zionist Jews -— that their views are being silenced and the current Jewish leadership and representation doesn’t represent all the Jewish community -— is equally absurd.
This view is also pushed by left-wing bloggers such as Yvonne Fein’s Sensible Jew, a perennial critic of The AJN and Jewish Community Council of Victoria.
Our sole national Jewish newspaper consistently publishes views and editorials from all parts of the political spectrum, and the letters column is certainly not censored (I can attest to that).
A day doesn’t go by when Fairfax, Crikey, ABC or SBS don’t offer a platform for these dissident Jews to attack the mainstream Jewish community and Israel. In fact, far from being silenced, the views of these minority Jews seem to be heard the loudest in our media and universities.
There are not a lot of Jews queuing up to take leadership positions, a thankless task in our Jewish community organisations, which anybody can join and eventually stand for election in.
It is very easy to criticise those Jews who volunteer their time from the safety of blog sites and letters to the editor.
It’s time for these people who do nothing to offer the Jewish community to put up or shut up.
MICHAEL BURD
Toorak, Vic
Diaspora and Israel
THE population study that was published (AJN 28/08) shows that about 80 per cent of the participants define themselves as “Zionist”, which shows that Israel plays a significant role in the identity of Australian Jews.
However, I doubt whether Israel will be able to play that role for long.
Israel and Israeli society are changing, and in two directions that question the ability of most Jews of the Diaspora to identify themselves with it and its people, and vice versa.
Research published in the Israeli media shows the rate of students (years 1-12) in the Arab and ultra-Orthodox schools — both non-Zionist groups — rose from 39 per cent in 2000 to 48 per cent in 2009, due to high birth rates in these groups.
This means that within one generation, most Israelis in their 20s will belong to a group that is outside of the Zionist core of Israeli society, and in the long run, they will become a majority in Israel. In such a situation, Israel will become either an ultra-Orthodox theocracy -— I wonder whether an Australian Jew who is not ultra-Orthodox will identify with such an Israel -— or cease to exist.
On the other side, there is a process of disengagement of Zionism among the Israeli elite.
Within this group, there is an increasing demand to abolish Israel’s identity as a Jewish state (or the state of the Jewish people) in favour of a multi-national state, which may or may not include the Palestinians who live in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
There is also disengagement from Judaism, which is reflected, for example, in an increasing number of young Israelis who define themselves as “non-Jewish” and in the way Israeli media refers to intermarriage; it is either indifferent or supporting, and condemns those who feel regret about it.
Due to these trends, I wonder whether Australian Jewish identity should rely on Israel and on related activities — donations, youth delegations, political support, etc. – as a major component. Empathy with Israel may lead in the to a great disappointment, even betrayal. Maybe the time has come to get ready for a post-Israeli era.
RON BURDO
Melbourne, Vic
Sweden’s poor record
SWEDISH newspaper Aftonbladet did it again. This left-wing publication has published many anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic articles ever since the Yom Kippur War.
It is associated with the left-wing unions, student organisations and fringe groups that always question Israel’s right to exist.
After the end of the Vietnam War, Israel became a new target for the paper’s gutter journalism. Instead of the Vietcong, the Palestinian Liberation Organisation, Fatah and Hamas are the new heroes. Israel is always demonised in Aftonbladet and irrespective of the deadly terror attacks on innocent civilians, the PLO, Fatah and Hamas are always described as freedom fighters.
No wonder, because the Swedish Social Democrat PM, the late Olof Palme, was the first western leader who visited Yasser Arafat in Tunis in the 1970s and his foreign minister, Sten Anderson, was one of the first western politicians who criticised Israel for “disproportional use of force”.
A few years ago, the Swedish social democrat government refused to take action against the mufti of Stockholm who incited his followers to kill Jews. The excuse was freedom of speech.
Now the Swedish conservative government is refusing to take action. I’m very disappointed with Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt because his party, the conservative Moderata Samlingspartiet, always supported Israel.
Sweden is the country that pretended to be our friend but in reality they just pretended when it was advantageous for them. We will never get an apology from Sweden for the blood libel allegations until they need Jaffa oranges more than oil.
GABOR UJVARI
Caulfield, Vic
Peace prize to Balibo Five
I HAVE been following the debate over the status of the recipients of the so-called Sydney Peace Prize, and it occurred to me that it would be most appropriate to award the prize posthumously to six Australian-based journalists who were murdered by Indonesian invading forces in East Timor in 1975.
The so-called Balibo Five, namely Greg Shackleton, Malcolm Rennie, Tony Stewart, Brian Peters, and Gary Cunningham, and subsequently Roger East, epitomised all the courage and fortitude that is so necessary in exposing human rights violations by rogue regimes.
They lost their lives in attempting to expose Indonesia’s murderous invasion and occupation of its neighbour. How disgraceful that successive Australian governments colluded with Indonesia’s denial of culpability.
More than 100,000 innocent Timorese were murdered and displaced by Indonesia. Despite this, time will not erode the memory of the Timorese victims and the great journalists who asked the question why the world, including the UN and Australia, stood back and allowed these atrocities to occur.
At long last these fine journalists would get the recognition they deserve, and the Sydney Peace Prize would do much for its own credibility in the process.
IAN KATZ
Caulfield, Vic
Goot wrong on Pilger
I WAS dismayed to read comments attributed to Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Robert Goot SC (AJN 14/08) regarding John Pilger winning the Sydney Peace Prize.
If Pilger was a working journalist in 1940, he would have been the lone voice demanding attention for the plight of Jews in Germany and Poland. And the rich and powerful in the land would have used precisely the same words to denigrate him that Goot used.
I have known of John Pilger since I was a teenager in the 1960s when he reported firsthand on the disaster that was Vietnam and later Cambodia and everywhere else.
I am proud to say that I have known John personally for 20 years and have reviewed his documentaries for the Fairfax press, as well as UK media, and the accusations against him are simply wrong and defamatory.
“Awarding a peace prize to John Pilger is bizarre and disgraceful,” Goot said. “Pilger does not promote peace, but is a polemicist, a distorter of facts and history, and he promotes an extreme Palestinian narrative at the expense of Israel’s narrative and objective analysis.”
If Israel was not the occupier, it would not be on Pilger’s radar. He seeks out inequality and exposes it. He has said nothing that is not reported daily in Ha’aretz, Ma’ariv and The Jerusalem Post.
I am saddened that Goot doesn’t understand that Pilger’s life is dedicated to spotlighting inequity. He has spoken against Australia’s treatment of Aborigines, he has documented poverty in Britain, exposed the horror of Cambodia and was on the case of East Timor a decade before it became popular. Pilger’s track record is impeccable.
Goot has made a mistake and owes Pilger an apology.
DAVID LANGSAM
Flemington, Vic
Defending Bush, Bibi
JULIE Szego’s essay on American-Israeli foibles (AJN 28/08) assures us President George W Bush is chiefly responsible for a few intifadas, and the rise and madness of Hamas, and that Binyamin Netanyahu hasn’t got a clue about securing a strong and viable Israel.
The king hit is the political/ethical dialectic between the “conflicting” notions of democracy and a Jewish state. According to Ms Szego, you cannot have both. There is reason to wonder about certain Jewish states of mind.
OTTO WALDMANN
Bondi Junction, NSW
Attacks on gays
WE are writing to express the growing concern of the Victorian Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (LGBTQ) community over increasing levels of vilifying and hateful material on local community websites and in letters.
We are concerned that any part of the Jewish community (itself a community that has faced and continues to face discrimination) can stand idly by and watch other communities face discrimination.
While it is neither the role nor purpose of any community organisation to police the views of all its members, it is the role of community leaders to set an example. To allow these views to continue, to not denounce them, is to be complicit in the effect they have.
Recent studies within the LGBTQ community have found that it is the ongoing and systematic discrimination of LGBTQ people that has the most devastating and long-lasting effects. To simply say that if we ignore it, it will go away is not enough.
It is essential that LGBTQ members of the Jewish community are not subjected to persecution by an ignorant and vocal minority, while the leadership (who may well be sympathetic) remain silent in the hope that it will go away more quickly.
HAYLEY CONWAY, SALLY GOLDNER
Victorian Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby, Melbourne
Support tolerance
THE Australian Jewish community needs to fully support policies of tolerance for homosexuals in conjunction with policies on anti-Semitism and any other forms of intolerance.
Some comments by extreme Orthodox Jewry impinge on the rights of homosexuals to live in the Jewish community with the tolerance that is the right of all Australians.
There is a perception by some in the Jewish community that Orthodox Judaism has a manifested intolerance toward homosexuals and publicly relays this intolerance via the letters pages of The AJN through some rabbis and other extremist individuals, with the full support and knowledge of its editorial management.
This is a public act and is capable of breaching the NSW Anti-Discrimination Act and its anti-vilification provisions, which state that it is unlawful for a person, by a public act, to incite hatred towards, serious contempt for, or severe ridicule of a person or group of persons on the grounds of their homosexuality.
The difficulty with freedom of expression is it must not incite ridicule, contempt or hatred against homosexuals. Racial provisions of the act are similar. Orthodox extremism may be inciting hate against homosexuals by way of its words and oral expression.
If we are ever going to dismantle hate and intolerance, we must firstly show some tolerance toward our own community members of difference. As an anti-discrimination campaigner, it is very important for me to ensure the war on intolerance and prejudice is overcome.
We must not let people hurt and suffer pain because some choose to echo God’s word in reasoning that shuns homosexuals as perverted and sick community outcasts.
I ask the Jewish community to please consider this message and show tolerance to homosexual members in your community.
GARY BURNS
Woollahra, NSW
If you would like to submit a letter, email letters@jewishnews.net.au
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