Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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The 78 percent figure frequently referred to by Democrat apologists as if it were The Holy Grail, is based on entry or exit polls whereas many Jews are reluctant to identify themselves as conservatives and risk peer pressure. In many synagogues, there are both rabbis and congregants who have a knee-jerk reaction to political issues denigrating conservatives and Republicans as reactionaries or anti-Semites, yet even if the real figure is “only” 70 percent, it is tragic and signifies the Jewish vote is of little strategic importance in the pocket...
Shortly after the Nazis assumed power, discussions within the German Ministry of the Interior led to proposals of a new citizenship law that would distinguish between formal "state citizenship" and a soon to be created "participatory citizenship" that could only be acquired through service to the state in such Nazi organizations as the NSDAP, SA, SS, and "Deutsche Arbeitsfront"-a Nazi-run union and would by definition exclude "non-Germans" (understood as "Non-Aryans, ie. Jews) Severe measures...
The 75 or 78 percent figures frequently referred to by Democrat apologists as if they were the Holy Grail, are based entirely on entry or exit polls but many Jews are reluctant to identify themselves as conservatives and risk peer pressure. During the past two presidential election cycles, in many synagogues, there have been rabbis and congregants who have openly demonstrated a knee-jerk reaction to political issues denigrating conservatives and Republicans as reactionaries or anti-Semites, yet even if the real figure is “only” 70 percent, it i...
Although "The Moldau" (Czech Vltava), is immediately recognized by most lovers of classical music as the work of composer Bedrich Smetana evoking the flow of the Vltava River from the forests of Bohemia through the Czech countryside to the city of Prague, it holds out a special appeal for many Jews and especially Israelis who hear in its opening bars a melody quite similar to the Israeli national anthem and Zionist hymn "HaTikvah" (The Hope). This seems to symbolize the long tradition of...
More than a generation ago, the passion to be the first to report the news led to the Chicago Tribune's banner headline of Nov. 3, 1948: "DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN!" President Truman delighted in posing with the paper and beaming a smile from ear to ear. The Tribune had accepted as gospel the previous Newsweek's monthly cover story of an imminent Republican landslide: "Fifty Political Experts Unanimously Predict a Dewey Victory" (Oct. 11, 1948). Even worse in the history of American journalism was...
Eliza Grey, writing in TIME magazine in October 2015 and commenting on the democratic primary debate between Senators Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders had this to say. “There is no question about who came out strongest in the debate, Denmark!” Both candidates, exclaimed how much they and all Democrats love Denmark, the ideal model of so many “Progressive Americans,” many of whom would be hard pressed to reveal how little they actually know about the country, and yet still regard it as an iconic model to which the United States should aspire....
Few books in the last decade have aroused the controversy and public debate, at least in Europe, as Michel Houellebecq's "Submission." Still at the top of the charts in France, the novel, "Soumission" in its original French, has now conquered Germany, shooting to the top of the charts in its first week in shops, with more than a quarter of a million copies now in print in German. The novel, which drew controversy over its topic even before publication, was released in France on Jan. 7, the day...
The arts, sciences, technology, literature, architecture, navigation, mapmaking, mathematics, astronomy, philosophy and art that flourished in Medieval Spain are often credited to Islam but this is a distortion of the role played by adherents of all three religions. The United Visigothic kingdom of Spain prior to the Muslim invasions had inherited five centuries of Roman civilization and had made use of the achievements of the Greeks and earlier Carthaginians as well as the Assyrians in...
Many American Jews, who are at least 95 percent Ashkenazi by origin, also find it hard to relate to those Jews in Israel whose cultural background is so different. By origin, approximately 50 percent of the Israeli Jewish population identify themselves as "Edot HaMizrah" (The Eastern communities) and are generally distinguishable by the many factors that are attributable to a different cultural heritage and separation by many centuries from the Ashkenazim-in their genetic make-up (often but not...
Two non-Jewish minority communities in Israel, the Druze (a deviant Shi’a Muslim group) and Circassians (Sunni Muslims whose ancestors were exiled to Palestine from the Caucasus), are subject to mandatory conscription to the IDF. Additionally, members of several Bedouin tribes volunteer as well as a growing number of individual Muslim and Christian Arabs. The decision of the first two groups to accept obligatory service in a special “minorities unit” the Israeli military forces was made at their own request. As early as the summer of 1948,...
Kaj Munk, a Danish cleric, identified as a rightwing political and cultural figure in the Denmark of the 1930s, became the center of moral and intellectual resistance to the Nazi occupation. He was murdered by the Gestapo and Danish traitors in January 1944 as an attempt to silence the growing resistance on the part of ordinary Danish citizens who found in their church a source of moral strength to resolutely oppose the evils of the Nazis. No other clergyman has better explained why Christians...
Lost amid the absurd denial of the Holocaust and a result of any ideological current, is a widely believed unintentional myth due largely to Hollywood, Leon Uris (author of the best-selling novel "Exodus"), minor Danish diplomatic personnel, wishful thinking, the BBC's research methods as well as to several prominent but sloppy historians who have written widely about the Holocaust but lacked adequate knowledge of the relevant languages, especially Danish. It is set amidst the rescue story of...
The Virgin islands is a favorite tourist spot for Caribbean cruises. For Jewish tourists, there is an extra added attraction in the historic synagogues, cemeteries and active Jewish communities. The former Danish West Indies sold to the United States in 1917 has had a fascinating and little known Jewish presence to the point that in the 1830s some visitors coined the expression that the islands should properly be called “The Jewish West Indies.” Alone of all the Nordic countries, Denmark aspired to become a great maritime power with a col...
For at least four decades, black-Jewish relations have soured and whatever platitudes may be uttered by recognized leaders of both groups, the rank and file among both groups often hold aggressive and condescending views of each other. Few remember or care to celebrate the heyday of the close, cordial and fraternal relations in the 1940s that differed from the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s when Liberal Jewish activists were often in the forefront, sometimes to the chagrin of many young...
Over the past 100 years, Portugal has made sudden, somewhat fitful, unplanned, and as it turned out, cynical proposals accompanied by dramatic announcements of its intention to carry out “historic justice” and make reparations to the descendants of its Jewish population expelled in 1497. Following a previous example set by Spain in 2013 guaranteeing a “Jewish right of return” by descendants of those expelled in 1492, observers have struggled to understand what if anything is at stake other than a cosmetic attempt to assuage a conscie...
When Antonio de Oliveira Salazar, Portugal's authoritarian ruler since 1932, finally was unable to rule effectively and his regime subsequently deposed by a military coup in 1974 (The Carnation Revolution), there was universal agreement that he left Portugal the poorest and most backward nation in Western Europe. Reporters on the scene in Lisbon reported signs of jubilation equaling V-E Day in London or Paris. How is it possible then that when a Portuguese television program ran a survey in...
Dr. Norman Berdichevsky will be speaking on the topic of Hebrew vs. Yiddish on Wednesday, Nov. 18 at Southwest Orlando Jewish Congregation at 6:30 p.m., and at Temple Israel in Winter Springs on Sunday, Nov. 22 at 4 p.m. The community is invited to these events. Visitors to Israel can scarcely appreciate the enormous difficulties that were involved in the restoration of Hebrew as a living language. The Hebrew-Yiddish conflict in Palestine took three generations to resolve. One hundred and...
Excerpt from “Modern Hebrew, The Past and Future of a Revitalized Language,” McFarland Publishing, July 2014. As in other cultures and their respective languages, the favorite topics of Hebrew slang are differences in behavior between the sexes, dating, marriage, family relations, money, politics and politicians. Additional favorite topics in Israel for satire are exasperation with the bureaucracy and ultra-orthodox establishment, the kibbutz way of life, class differences and the income gap, crime, undesirable behavior in public places, and...
A central tenet of Zionism is that Jews share a common heritage and destiny. Nevertheless, the reality of Jewish society in the state of Israel is marked by four prominent social and geo-cultural divisions: Orthodox observant vs. secular, veteran settlers vs. new immigrants, the haves vs. the have-nots and geo-cultural origin (European vs. Middle Eastern or Oriental). The last dimension has often been the source of ethnic humor—gefilte fish vs. shish kebab, but is in fact, a serious ”kulturkampf” over the image of the country. Left wing criti...
