Why the silence on heartbeat abortion ban?
Controversial remarks by U.S. Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) are anti-Zionist, and as such may or may not be construed as anti-Semitic (“Hoyer defends Tlaib on Holocaust comments,” May 16).
By way of contrast, the heartbeat abortion ban signed into law in Georgia on May 7 — the state where Leo Frank was lynched — and which is under consideration in 16 other Republican-controlled states, is unequivocally anti-halachic, and therefore anti-Jewish, and thus irrefutably anti-Semitic. Not to mention a blatant violation of Jewry’s First Amendment right to religious freedom.
The rabbinic principle is that silence is acquiescence. Why the silence on this issue by the Republican Jewish Coalition and the Zionist Organization of America, otherwise so strident in such matters?
WOJO COHEN
Severna Park, Md.
Tlaib’s ‘calming’ is damaging no matter the cause
Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) was firm in the belief that Tlaib’s statement was taken out of context regarding the Holocaust’s “calming” effect on her (“Hoyer defends Tlaib on Holocaust comments,” May 16).
If we believe that the statement was taken out of context — I make no judgement on that account — we must consider that her “calming” was due to the fact that the Palestinians offered refuge to the Jews fleeing from Europe.
Of course, this is a bunch of nonsense and either shows Talib’s insincerity or total lack of historic knowledge. Even if Tlaib’s comments were taken out of context as Hoyer insists, Tlaib’s attempt at revisionist history is no less impactful.
IRA REESE
Olney
Chabad re-explained
The May 2 article “Chabad explained” was misleading and contained numerous inaccuracies. For one thing, Chabad, sadly, is no fan of the State of Israel. The Lubavitcher rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, forbade his followers from singing “Hatikvah,” the Israeli national anthem.
Continuing this legacy of opposition to Zionism, in 2008, when the bodies of their emissaries were flown to Israel after the terrorist attack in Mumbai, Lubavitch protested when the coffins of the deceased were wrapped in the Israeli flag.
As regards Jewish unity, Schneerson rejected the legitimacy of non-Orthodox Jewish denominations (especially their clergy), and even the kashrut of the non-Lubavitch Orthodox. Meddling in Israel’s internal affairs, Schneerson, from his perch in America, was the behind-the-scenes mastermind of the Israeli Knesset’s 1989 “Who is a Jew?” legislation and campaign aimed at delegitimizing the Reform and Conservative movements, whose rabbis Lubavitch regards as guilty of spiritual malpractice, if not religious fraud.
RACHMIEL GOTTLIEB
Pikesville, Md.
Criticism of Israel is reckless
I am dismayed at the program held by Sixth & I on the eve of Yom Hazikaron (“Yom Hazikaron,” Editorial, May 16), in which planners remembered deceased terrorists as equal to our own Jewish martyrs, lost at the hands of those same terrorists in some instances.
I believe the current wave of anti-Israel rhetoric in our country can be directly traced to the actions of the New Israel Fund, J Street and others, who have made it acceptable to disparage Israel in public. They have demonstrated that if Jews themselves can criticize Israel, it must not be anti-Semitism to do so.
These groups must understand the harm to our people and our homeland which can follow from this reckless behavior.
MANDY BROOK
Fairfax
Don’t leave anyone out
I was surprised to see the photo of the otherwise very informative May 16 article “Hate is our brain’s way of trying too hard to keep us alive, researcher says” lacked a full caption, as two of the persons shown were not identified. On the left of speaker Michael Niconchuk was Rabbi Jonah Layman of Shaare Tefila.
On the right was program organizer Lisa Hedgepeth, head of Shaare Tefila’s Social Action Committee.
MILTON GOLDSAMT
Shaare Tefila Publicity Committee
