Wow. Only Monday, and already it's a busy week. The Senior Son is home for the weekend and will stay at lease long enough to play at the
blues jam at the Midway Saloon tonight. I have a great soft spot for Moses Oakland who runs the jam. He was Ziggy's friend, and dad to Senior Son's friends. I like having the Senior Son home. I like being Mam even if it's just for the weekend, after which I go back to being,
oh, mother! I don't mind; I'm just glad he wants to come home every so often.
Tuesday, my cousins come for an overnight before heading to Duluth for a couple of days, and then back to me for Shabbat. Since the overnight is Tuesday, there will be tacos....made with Impossible Beef because I want to serve cheese and sour cream and all sorts of stuff and if they were made with meat, most of that is off my very kosher table! I'm kinda excited about this, by the way. I haven't made tacos since Ziggy left the building. But all this vegetarian cooking for my vegetarian cousins is not what has me so excited about this visit.
See, the cousin whom I lovingly call Perdita, is, in reality, Barbara Mazor, champion of the fight against BDS at the Park Slope Coop in Brooklyn. In the past few weeks, the debacle at the Coop has made a whole lotta newspapers. This is not the first time I've written about the demonization of Israel and Jews at that august institution. Barbara started a blog, Stop BDS At The Park Slope Coop, about the fight. Back in March, 2012, I wrote an episode about it: When The Coop Is In The Balance. At that time, they were able to beat back the BDS movement, and she even changed the name of the blog to We Stopped BDS At The Park Slope Coop. But like all pernicious diseases, it percolated in the background. And now it's back.
The City Journal did a better job of explaining the issue than either the New York Time or The Guardian. They also quoted Barbara:
Barbara Mazor, who opposed the boycott movement alongside Maislen, told City Journal that the vote was “a lost opportunity to build a politics of co-existence.” The purpose of a co-operative, she said, is to “put your difference aside” to work on something collaboratively. Many members stressed that their ability to do so, even when they did not agree on everything, contributed to the Brooklyn neighborhood’s unique social fabric....
...In evaluating the vote, it is hard to ignore the influence of the wave of anti-Semitism and religious intolerance that has erupted in New York City since the October 7 attacks. Though many of the boycott’s leading figures are Jewish themselves—including Alyce Barr, who led the push to divest—Mazor suggested that the move “provides a lot of validation for people” who dislike Jews more broadly. “It provides encouragement for the most extremist actors, and it’s a permission structure for attacking Jews,” she said.
Mazor’s suggestion is borne out by members’ reports. Those who opposed the boycott were likened to antebellum “pro-slavery” supporters. When a member declared “Jewish supremacy is a problem,” 50 people applauded, Maislen told City Journal. One Israeli member working a shift who requested anonymity was told by a customer that she smelled “of Palestinian blood” and that “Jews are rejoicing in raping and killing Palestinians.”
This is not some tempest in a teapot. That the anti-BDS side was not permitted to present their side at the meeting speaks volumes to those of us watching this fight, ostensibly because of technical issues. Regardless, this was shutting down the opposition and screams of a variety if messages to whatever side you're on.
But here's the thing: how did we (meaning all Jews) become the genocidal maniacs in the court of public opinion after Hamas raped, murdered, decapitated, mutilated, and kidnapped over a thousand people attending a music festival on October 7th, 2023? What if those same terrorists did that at Coachella? What if they did it at Wembley Stadium? What would the response have been then?
People usually fixate on Jewish tragedy...why is that? They're fascinated with death camps, gas chambers, and ghettos. Why can't they see the benefit of live Jews? The ones who invent stuff and make medical devices and apps and desalination plants that bring water where there wasn't any? Not to mention their boycotts are selective. I don't see them advocating the removal of messaging from their phones or WAZE from their cars. I cannot speak or think for anyone else, but I gotta wonder what their end-game really looks like.
I am fascinated by the colonization part. What do they think the Muslims were doing during their conquest period? Bringing free press to Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Algeria, Tunisia, or Libya? What do all those kind hearted protestors think were happening to the indigenous populations or, for that matter, all the Christians that lived there? And what about, in recent years, the plight of queer or gay communities living in those countries? Especially in places like Gaza? Are they holding Gay Pride Month parades there? Yet, those communities are silent on those issues. Dead silent. And that's not meant to be a pun.
How is it that millions of Israelis sheltering against bombing attacks that have been ongoing for decades makes them aggressors? And the ultimate question: why isn't Israel allowed to defend itself? Like this is news. Not.
In his Morning Musings on Substack, Peter Himmelman digs deeper into the heart of that question:
And on the other side we do not see
merely opposing viewpoints. There are states, media networks, political
movements, universities, NGOs, influencers, bots, and vast oceans of money
invested in the creation and dissemination of anti-Israel—and often overtly
anti-Jewish—sentiment. There is the propaganda machinery of Iran. There is
Qatar's immense financial reach and its state-sponsored media network, Al
Jazeera, arguably the most influential anti-Israel media platform in the world.
There are Russian and Chinese information operations—coordinated networks that
seed anti-Western narratives across social platforms, for which the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a reliable accelerant. There are social media
algorithms that reward outrage and flatten complexity. There are hundreds of
millions of people predisposed to see the conflict through ideological,
religious, or historical lenses that Israel has little power to alter.
With a PR machine like that, it's amazing Israel has lasted this long.
Or maybe it isn't all that amazing. Israel takes defense seriously. Citizens are not used as human shields, nor are they told death is a desirable outcome. The rest of the world never sees that part, thanks to the PR machine, but we know better. What other ancient civilization has survived intact the way we have? Same language, same culture, same religion despite exiles, persecution, and a real attempt at genocide? And what other people have welcomed others into the safety tent expecting nothing more than community...not conversion, not extra taxes, not assimilation...the way Israel has. Look at the demographics: nationality is ISRAELI. Not Jewish. Over 20% of the population is Arab and they, too, are ISRAELI. As is the almost 6% of other population segments like Druze or Baháʼí; they, too, are ISRAELI. And the official language may be Hebrew, but the street signs are all in Hebrew, Arabic, and English. Is that asking anyone to relinquish their cultural heritage or identity?
Does anyone actually care about the lives and livelihoods of the Palestinians? No one gave a damn about the billions funneled into Gaza that built the murder tunnels and paid for the bombs, many of which never made it across the border and fell on their own people while they huddled in tents and watched Hamas commandeer their food supplies. The only things all those Greta-Thunberg-wannabes care about are the creative optics designed to provide sheeple with a scapegoat on which to vent their self-righteous and misplaced fury. In the end, no matter what happens to Israel, Gaza will still be occupied by terrorists who are in it for the money and the chance to spill blood...even if it's the blood of their own people. They'll just find another group to victimize.
Just ask any gay or trans Gazan.
President Felon: Your elections
are crooked and you’re crooked, and Meet the Press is crooked.
Kristen Welker: But Mr. President–
President Felon: And so is
ABC and CBS and CNN.
Kristen Welker: But Mr. President--
President Felon: You’re a
one-sided crooked network. Sorry. Let’s call it quits because I’ve had enough.
Thank you, darling. Have a good time.
Kristen Welker: Mr. President, let’s — please, I traveled all
the way to Wisconsin.
President Felon: I’ve sat in
the rain with you--
Kristen Welker: I traveled all — I know. I traveled all the
way--
President Felon: I sat
in the rain with you for an hour.
Kristen Welker: --to Wisconsin.
President Felon: On and off
in the rain, and I’ve given you enough time. You ought to straighten out your
press, because you know what?
Kristen Welker: Mr. President--
President Felon: A country
can never be great with a dishonest press.
Kristen Welker: – we traveled all — listen. We traveled all
the way to Wisconsin for this interview.
And then he got up and walked out. Wanna know what I wanna know? If a country can never be great with a dishonest press, what are we supposed to do with a dishonest president? Read the transcript of the interview for yourself. The lies per square minute are astounding.
The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week:
Whatever happened to fair dealing?
And pure ethics
And nice manners?
Why is it everyone now is a pain in the ass?
Whatever happened to class?
The Wifely Person's EXTRA SPECIAL BONUS Tip o'the Week
If you are interested in hearing Barbara speak about the Coop,
drop an email to thewifelyperson[at]gmail.com.
