- 30 Jun 2017 04:35
#14819636
It's happened before in 1926, now again in 2017.
Now the Israeli Right are turning on American Reform Jews, etc, diverting attention from Netanhayu's govt. for producing this rubbish
Haaretz
Now the Israeli Right are turning on American Reform Jews, etc, diverting attention from Netanhayu's govt. for producing this rubbish
Haaretz
“Inappropriate and insolent.” That’s how Rabbi Abraham Gordimer, a member of the Rabbinical Council of America and the New York Bar, dubbed Reform Jewish protests against the government’s decision to freeze plans for a pluralistic prayer space at the Western Wall.
Rabbi Gordimer’s comments, published on the right-leaning Arutz Sheva website in English, were mild compared to the wave of bile heaped upon the followers of Reform Judaism in Israel’s right-wing Hebrew press. Readers would have been forgiven for forgetting that the government itself had approved the plan last year after four years of negotiations brokered by Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky.
Far-right lawmaker Betzalel Smotrich (Habayit Hayehudi) accused the Reform movement of “dragging Diaspora Jews into a fight.” He said responsibility for the crisis lay with “a small fringe group of a few dozen activists in the Israeli Reform movement. They don’t care about the right of an individual to pray according to his beliefs.”
A profile of Reform leader Rick Jacobs in Israel's Maariv daily newspaper and the NRG website portrayed him as an “extreme left,” pro-BDS “gangster” as one of the many Israelis who circulated the story on social media described him. A commentary on Channel 20 accused him of being a “selective Zionist” and creating a platform for anti-Semitic propaganda.
In its full coverage of “The Reform storm,” Arutz Sheva offered Hebrew readers a broad range of insights into just how beneath contempt the Reform movement should be held. “Their struggle at the Western Wall is against not just the establishment, but the majority of the Israeli people,” opined one contributor. A video clip was accompanied by the suggestion that “Patriots are wondering whether the Reform movement is religious or political.”
"Why is it always the innocents who suffer most, when you high lords play your game of thrones?" Lord Varys, Game of Thrones.