Sefardi or Ashkenazi? Who calls Ashdod & Ashkelon home?

 

It would be interesting to see who lives in Ashdod and Ashkelon; who are in the majority.

I'd wager that the majority of the residents are from - or descended from Jews who once lived in - Moslem-dominated countries; e.g., North Africa, Syria, Iraq and Iran, Egypt.

Most of the people I know here in the States who claim Ashdod or Ashkelon as their home are Sefardi.

At the same time, most of the people who bewail the efforts of the mayors of these two Israeli towns to protect their citizens are Ashkenazi. Those criticizing the mayors include the Ashkenazi prime minister, the Ashkenazi mayor of Jerusalem - one must wonder about his position given the terrorists attacks in his city - the president, and others none of which are Sefardi.

Why is this?

Perhaps because the Sefardim understand the Moslems, and because they know the reality of Israel's "talk the talk but don't walk the walk" government that, if you would poll the pols, is mostly Ashkenazi.

I'm not going to suggest that all Ashkenazim are fools or appeasers; Begin was neither and he was Ashkenazi.

And I am not going to suggest that all Moslems - Israeli Moslems or otherwise - are planning terror attacks against Israeli Jews and non-Jews.

I AM suggesting that the Sefardim are better equipped to deal with Moslems.

My Father-in-Law (ע''ה) grew up in Morocco. He worked with Moroccan Moslems; he competed with Moroccan Moslems; he co-existed with Moroccan Moslems. He showed them respect and it was returned.

My Father-In-Law was a big man, physically. He would not be pushed around.

When the family made aliyah in the 1960s, he was settled in Bet Shean, a town in the Jordan Valley that was too hot for the Ashkenazim - besides, Bet Shean is on the Jordan border so if attacks came from that direction, the Sefardim could buffer the Ashkenazim farther from the border.

If you think that is a "sepur Savta," I suggest you look at all of the places the Ashkenazi governments settled immigrants from Moslem countries.

Moslems have an Eastern mentality, akin to the Chinese and Japanese. Sefardim, having lived with Moslems for centuries, understand that mentality. Understanding it means being able to deal with it.

The Ashkenazi, with his European mentality cannot comprehend the Moslem mind and lacks the ability to deal with the Moslem mentality. The Ashkenazi simply wants to do what is "politically correct "and damn the consequences" - the murders on the streets and in the synagogues, the rockets raining down on civilians.

At one time several Moslems invaded Bet Shean and killed several residents.

The residents and the Army killed the terrorists. The residents, 90% of whom were from North Africa, doused the Moslems' bodies with gasoline and set them afire. Moslems believe they won't get their promised 70 virgins if the body is burned. It was decades before another Moslem tried to attack anyone in Bet Shean - and he was caught as he rode an Egged bus toward the town.

Burning bodies is not "politically correct" and I am certain the Ashkenazim in government "tisked-tisked" and rung their hands over what the cruel Sefardim did to those poor Moslem terrorists - but it sent a message that kept Bet Shean "terrorist free" for decades.

My personal, American, attitude is similar to my Father-In-Law's: if you push me, I'll push you back - harder. I won't start something, but I intend to finish it.

It's time the Ashkenazi leadership realized that its threats to act against terrorists and its promises to protect Israel's citizens are just words with no value; the Moslems know that between the Ashkenazis' desire for "political correctness" and Europe's (and, unfortunately North America's) bleeding hearts will protect them from justified retribution.

It's time the Ashkenazi leadership learned a lesson from the Sefardim and became more concerned with Israel's citizens and less concerned with "political correctness."

What's in a word? "Gay" marriage

I have two problems with "gay marriage"; both are semantic.

I'm not sure when the word "gay" got high jacked to mean "homosexual" but I want my word back. "Gay" meant, and should mean, "happy." Even Merriam -Webster's on-line dictionary agrees.

"Marriage" back in the day meant a sanctioned carnal relationship between one man and one woman, Mormons excepted.

Now we have "gay marriage."

I am unequivocally against "gay marriage."

I am not opposed to giving homosexuals the benefits extended to heterosexual married couples, nor am I opposed to giving unwed heterosexual couples the same benefits (and Disadvantages), assuming there is come type contract/binding agreement between the individuals. Perhaps states could consider cohabiting homosexuals as common law spouses as they do cohabiting heterosexuals.

Just don't call it "marriage."

Call it a "civil union" with each party identified as the other party's "significant other." For homosexuals, that neatly eliminates the question of who is the "husband" and who is the "wife."

If one partner is hospitalized, the other partner should be able to visit "as if" they were a married couple. If the couple has a conjugal contract of any type, inheritance laws should treat the survivor "as if" the survivor was the deceased spouse.

When I was in grammar school, "queer" meant "unusual, strange." Then it morphed into a term for homosexuals because, years ago, homosexuals who came out of the closet were "different, strange." "Queer" was a convenient term; it included both male and female; now we have distinctions: gay and lesbian (bi-sexual for people who aren't sure, and transgender for folks moving one way or the other) - GLBT.

By the way, it should be "trans-sexual" rather than "transgender." Gender relates to plants and words; "sex" is limited to human beings - it's better that way. 'Course the slang "tranny" eliminates the "sex" problem . . . and also moves the thought from automotive transmissions - trannys - to homo sapiens.

But "queer," unlike "honky" is not "PC" and we must be PC. 'Course intra-group, all labels are acceptable; rather like a non-Jew telling a Jewish joke - it's not "PC" no matter that the non-Jew heard it first from a Jew's mouth.

I know most languages - except maybe French - are "living languages" subject to change.

The problem with the redefining of words such as "gay," "marriage", and "queer" is this shows a lack of vocabulary skills on the part of redefiners. Where are the Bill Buckleys, Gore Vidals, Winston Churchills, Abba Ebans, or even a Howard Cosell to either enlighten us with extant words for "this and that" or to coin words for "this and that"? Only people ignorant of their language highjack words to redefine them in their own narrow provincialisms.

Interesting aside. In Hebrew, "vocabulary" is אוצר מלים.

מלים (me'leem) means "words" while אוצר (ot-zer) means "treasury" - I can't think of a better description for "vocabulary." It's a pity that some people's "treasuries" are so bereft of words.

Political Correctness

 

REALLY?

 

Some folks, I suspect mostly white liberals, forced Walt Disney's company to shelve Song of the South, otherwise known as Uncle Remus Tales.

According to one source I found online, Joel Chandler Harris, the "author" of the Uncle Remus stories simply recorded morality tales told by slaves and ex-slaves, black Aesops if you will. According to Snopes (http://www.snopes.com/disney/films/sots.asp:

Harris grew up in Georgia during the Civil War, spent a lifetime compiling and publishing the tales told to him by former slaves. These stories — many of which Harris learned from an old black man he called "Uncle George" — were first published as columns in The Atlanta Constitution and were later syndicated nationwide and published in book form. Harris's Uncle Remus was a fictitious old slave and philosopher who told entertaining fables about Br'er Rabbit and other woodland creatures in a Southern Black dialect.

Like Aesop, the Uncle Remus tales use animals to deliver the message.

The 1946 movies Song of the South included a series of "firsts," including the first combination of human actors and animated characters. The humans included James Baskett as Uncle Remus, Disney's first live actor ever hired by Disney. (See http://www.songofthesouth.net/movie/index.html for a list of all the characters in the movie.)

I saw Song of the South as a child and thought it wonderful; like most kids, I went around singing Zippidy do dah ; I still sing it many years later.

TO THE POINT, while the movie is available only overseas, you might be able to find a CD with four Uncle Remus tales. (The CD, if anyone is interested, is called Brer Rabbit and the Wonderful Tar Baby. There also are a number of books with Uncle Remus tales; check your local library Reference Desk.)

My Local Lending Library, hereafter LLL, had access to the CD and several Uncle Remus books. "Access" since the books were found in other libraries and shipped, albeit indirectly, to my LLL. I've been getting books this way for years.

The interesting thing about the CD is not the stores but the person telling the tales and the person providing the "mood" music.

Two gentlemen of - ahh - color are Danny Glover who reads the takes and Taj Mahal who provides the background music. (The "weasel words" are used since, in my lifetime, they have been called negro, colored, Afro-American, and black; I'm not sure what the term-du-jour will be when this is read; hopefully, "just folk.")

If, then, Song of the South and the Uncle Remus tales are so offensive to people of color, why are these two famous people involved with the CD?

Granted, "different strokes for different folks"; when the replica of the slave ship La Amistad was offered to Tampa FL, the locals rejected it; the folks of New Haven CN gladly accepted the chance to host the ship. (Read about the boat at - among other sites - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Amistad.)

Mr. Glover, who voices all of the characters on the CD, does does not use " Southern Black dialect" - no "dis 'n dat" but the story comes through just fine.

Still, I think maybe some folks are a little too sensitive to dialects; they are too quick to assume they are a "put down" yet those accents are very much a part of Americana. I have an accent, my wife has an accent, my neighbors all have accents; those accents make life interesting, colorful, and as long as they are mimiced in a kind way, no one is offended.

I think Disney's capitulating to a few, most likely Caucasian, liberals is a pity. Kids today need the morality lessons of Uncle Remus as much, if not more, than I did when I was a youngster.

Maybe I'll ask some of my acquaintenance overseas if they can get a DVD copy of the movie. My grand-daughter deserves to see it with her grandfather.