Sunday, January 30, 2011

It's revolting

 

Tunisia's dictator runs to Saudia.

Egypt is revolting,

Algeria, Morocco, and Jordan may be next.

Who will replace the "leaderships"?

In Egypt, it's almost certainly the Islamic Brotherhood, Moslem extremists that Egypt's dictator put down before.

In Algeria, again, Islamic extremists that were once thought crushed by the nation's military after winning a democratic election.

Does the U.S. know anything about the people in the streets? Who are the leaders; are there any leaders who are not extremists? In a word: No.

Someone suggested in an article that the U.S. should have been in contact with the people who want change. Offering them quiet support while urging the despots in power to be aware of their people's needs.

The U.S. did not do that.

But even if it did, could, should, the U.S. be trusted? Remember Hungary in 1956? The U.S. promised Hungary support - support that never materialized and Communist tanks quashed the people who took to the streets. A little more than a decade later, the U.S. promised support to Czechoslovakia ; support that never materialized. For the record, Republican Dwight D. "Ike" Eisenhower was president when the Hungarians revolted, Democrat Lyndon B. Johnson was president when the Russians quashed Czechoslovakia's effort at freedom.

It's reasonable that the mass of Moslems taking to the streets will gravitate to the extremists simply because the extremists - in particular Egypt's Moslem Brotherhood - have provided services to the poor that the governments failed to provide, specifically education, health care, and bread.

The U.S. foreign aid budget funnels about a billion dollars-a-year to Egypt. It also provides more than a billion-a-year in military aid. Where did it go? We know that the money designated for "Palestine" went into Arafat's pockets before being spent on his wife in France. His successors seem to have followed in his financial footsteps since most of the funds never reached the man in the street.

While the world currently focuses on the Moslem-dominated states, Moslems in Europe are preparing the same for their democratic hosts. They demand special schools and special considerations. What's the difference between Jews demanding special schools and Moslems with the same demand? The Jews pay for their own schools - and pay taxes to support public schools open to all.

I'm not sure democracy is necessarily a good thing for everyone.

The U.S. has on several occasions given Cuba "democracy" only to see it over turned and the island returned to a dictatorship. Some people simply cannot handle democracy. Strangely, Puerto Rico, populated with people one would think have the same mentality as Cubans, seems to thrive on democracy.

What will become of the Moslem states currently in turmoil is anyone's guess; I suspect things will get worse for non-Moslems in the region - an example is the Christians' plight in Gaza.

Meanwhile, Israel must remain alert and constantly aware that her friends are less than trustworthy. The Islamists can - and do - terrorize politicians into inaction or support of terrorism.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Yithro - A father-in-law's wisdom

 

Yithro is one of my favorite parashot since, like Moses a"h I learned a great deal from my father-in-law Elihu Laheani a"h.

I dislike it, then, when I read a drash that denigrates what Yithro told his son-in-law. I read one commentary the other day that said Moses didn't implement what Yithro suggested regarding judges until HaShem told him sometime later.

According to The Source (Exodus/Shemot 18:24), Moses apparently did immediately implement what Yithro instructed. Yithro did include the caveat (Exodus/Shemot 18:23) "If you do this thing and G-d command you so, but there is no indication that Moses conferred with HaShem or vice versa on this subject.

We understand that Moses implemented Yithro's suggestion before Yithro left came, since "they (judges) judged people at all seasons" (Exodus/Shemot 18:26)

Rabbi Ya'aqob Menashe in his A Torah Minute (http://www.atorahminute.com/2011-01-20) focuses on "And Jethro heard everything that G-d did for Moses and His people" (Exodus/Shemoth 18:1).

The Gemara of Zebahim asks, "what did Yithro hear?" The answer is that he heard about the splitting of the Red Sea and the war against 'Amaleq. These two events are two complete opposites.

The reason Yithro came was to better comprehend this apparent contradiction. Moshe Rabbenu, 'a"h, explained to him;the explanation clarified the matter in Yithro's mind he declared, "Now I know that G-d is greater than all the other gods".

From this, continues Rabbi Menashe, we see that there are two levels of comprehension. When it says Yithro heard (Exodus/Shemot 18:1), it refers to acceptance at face value, through the faith of the heart. But when he says "now I know" (Exodus/Shemot 18:11), this refers to understanding through investigation and inquiry. The former is weaker because doubt can creep in, but knowing as a result of study, reasoning and understanding, is unshakeable.

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Can you see US now?

 

Skype™ is promoting a new feature - group (multi-party) video calls.

That's great news for Skype users.

But unlike the limited one-to-one Skype option, the multi-party "premium" version is fee-based (http://tinyurl.com/2cuaptd).

For the computer phobic, Skype's $9.month charge is a small price to pay for conference video calls with up to 25 people (http://tinyurl.com/3x7z282). One Skype subscriber must have the premium version; the remainder can have the free Skype installed.

The new Grandmother uses Skype to chat with her Daughter and coo at her new Grand-Daughter on almost a daily basis. Even with a medium speed DSL connection on Granny's side, quality is satisfactory.

But Number 2 Son, a/k/a The Geek, told me about a free - correct, no charge, gratis - option called Tiny Chat (http://tinychat.com/.

It's a tad more complicated that Skype, but not all that much.

With TinyChat the call originator creates a "video chat room" on the Internet (a simple enough task). Then the originator invites (via email or phone or ? ) as many as 400 others to join. All for free. There also is a two-party, Skype-like option (http://tinychat.com/about.html.

Unlike Skype, there is nothing to install on any computer.

Skype DOES offer a greater number of supported interface languages, including Hebrew. TinyChat has 9 language options, including Russian, but no Hebrew. Skype also is Linux-friendly; apparently there are some problems on Linux with TinyChat (http://tinyurl.com/5sv7a96).

It's nice to know that there are options to not only talk to the mispahah but to see them as well.

Now if only Savata Raba could be brought into the 21st century . . .

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

AvMed member "services?"

 

Sometimes I'm left scratching my head when dealing with "customer service" folks.

I recently sent a copy of a complaining letter to my insurance carrier; the original went to the physician with whom I am less than happy.

The electronic copy went to the insurer's Member Services Department. Like the paper copy, it contained details "by the numbers," details that could get lost or overlooked if I called the insurer's 800 number. Besides, I don't care to listen to elevator music-on-hold for 20 minutes while my call is ignored.

My email to AvMed generated the following scripted and totally useless response.

Dear Mr. Glenn,

We have received notification of your concerns regarding your physician services. Member satisfaction is of utmost importance to AvMed Health Plans and we regret any inconvenience this situation has caused. Please contact Member Services at the telephone number below if you would like to file a formal complaint.

If you have any further questions, please email us or contact Member Services 24 hours a day, 7 days a week at 1-800-782-8633.

Sincerely,

{name hidden to protect innocent}
Correspondence Coordinator
Member Services Department
Phone 1-800-782-8633

I would have thought a written message would qualify as a formal complaint.

There's always next November 15 (when I can change providers).

Friday, January 14, 2011

CAMERA: Too Many at Once

 

When they came for the Jews, I was silent . . . (y.g.)

The following ws published by CAMERA: Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (http://www.camera.org/)

November 12, 2010
By Dexter Van Zile

When Zairian President Mobutu Sese Seko spoke to a group of government officials about the problem of corruption in his country in 1976, he didn't come right out and tell them to quit stealing altogether. He just told them to dial it back. “If you want to steal, steal a little cleverly, in a nice way. If you steal so much as to become rich overnight, you will be caught.”

Somebody is probably offering similar advice to Islamist terrorists in Iraq in light of the murder of more than 50 Christians by Al Qaeda terrorists in Baghdad on Oct. 31. By killing so many Christians at once, they overwhelmed the ability of Western intellectuals and religious leaders to sweep the problem of Islamist violence against Christians under the rug.

Mobutu's advice, if it were translated from the context of corruption to terrorist violence, would go something like this: “Keep the murders to a dull roar. Don't kill too many Christians at once, because if you do, you'll force intellectuals and religious leaders in the West to admit that we are not merely a liberationist movement opposed to foreign troops in our country, but killers intent on perpetrating an ethnic cleansing of Christians in Iraq — and throughout the region."

Even if Al Qaeda were to dial it back and reduce the death toll of their attacks to several at a time, it's too late. Media outlets in the West have woken up to the problem of anti-Christian violence in Iraq and are starting to connect the dots about the violent eliminationist ideology that motivates it.

Carnage too much to ignore

The carnage and the depravity were just too much for people to ignore. In an article published on Nov. 11, USA Today described the attack in chilling detail:

Priest Wasseem Sabeeh was halfway through Sunday Mass, in Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad, when an explosion shook the church. Suddenly men with guns yelling Islamic prayers burst into the church. They fired at the priests, congregants, even murals of Mary and the saints.

Some parishioners screamed and ran out. Sabeeh, 27, and another priest, Thaer Saadallah, 32, hastily directed dozens of others into a room near the altar, then turned to plead with the men in suicide vests to stop the killing.

They shot Sabeeh at point-blank range, then shot Saddallah in the face. He fell on the steps of the altar, his vestments stained with blood.

Leaders from the Vatican, the World Council of Churches and the Presbyterian Church (USA) seem unable to acknowledge exactly who perpetrated the violence, but they did issue statements condemning it. Their inability to name names and shame the perpetrators of this violence and condemn the ideology that motivates it is clearly troublesome, but in the age of the Internet, the story is getting out.

It got out in the pages of the Chicago Tribune. On Nov. 7, the paper published a profile of Natasha Shino an Assyrian activist who explains why she and her family have fled Iraq and live in Chicago: “"We're going through a silent genocide," Shino said. "We are near extinction."

It got out in the pages of London's Globe and Mail, which on Nov. 10, 2010 reported about anti-Christian violence in the days after the attack in Baghdad:

A slew of attacks on homes and shops of Christians in the city killed six people and injured 33 injured since Tuesday evening, according to an Iraqi defence official.

These latest attacks, small-scale by Iraqi standards, came just 10 days after a devastating Oct. 31 hostage-taking in which 44 Christian worshippers, two priests and seven security personnel were killed when Iraqi forces stormed Baghdad's Syrian Catholic Cathedral that had been seized by several Islamist gunmen.

The Islamic State of Iraq, an organization affiliated with al-Qaeda, announced it carried out the cathedral attack to force the release of Islamic converts allegedly being detained by the Coptic Church in Egypt. The group later declared Christians everywhere to be “legitimate targets.”

The Globe and Mail even quoted a France's Ambassador to the UN Gerard Araud as stating there is “a deliberate will to destroy the Christian community” in Iraq.

It got out in the pages of Time, which on Nov. 11, acknowledged the onslaught of anti-Christian violence in Iraq. It reported that Iraq's remaining Christians want to stay in Iraq and that Muslim leaders are working to bring an end to the violence. Nevertheless,

There has been no let-up, however, in the campaign against [Christianity]. On Wednesday, synchronized bombings struck at least 11 Christian locations across in Baghdad, killing at least six people and wounding more than 30. The strikes appear to be directly connected to a vicious October 31 church invasion that left at least 50 people dead after gunmen overran Sunday services, shooting down the attending priest and acolyte at the altar before spraying automatic gunfire on the congregation and detonating explosives vest. The Halloween murders at Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad's middle class, mixed Karada neighborhood were followed by an announcement by the Islamic State of Iraq, an al-Qaeda proxy, promising "We will open upon [the Christians] the doors of destruction and rivers of blood." (Emphasis added.)

On Nov. 11, AFP reported on the U.S. State Department's condemnation of the attack (which unlike some Christian institutions, mentioned the perpetrators by name) and reported that “[a]n estimated 800,000 Christians lived in Iraq before the US-led invasion of 2003 but that number has since shrunk to around 500,000 in the face of repeated attacks against their community and churches.”

The story made it onto the Web site of the Christian Science Monitor, which on Nov. 10 quoted an Iraqi Christian who asked that his name not be used as saying: "What's happening to us is what happened to the Jews."

The CSM provides some necessary detail when it reports “Iraqi Jews, once an integral part of society here with a history dating back to Babylon, began fleeing in the 1940s. Now only stories of their once vibrant community remain.”

The publication fails to provide any explanation as to why the Jews disappeared from Iraq – they were being murdered – but even the most obtuse readers can figure that out for themselves.

Christians Not the Only Victims In Iraq

Christians and Jews are not the only victims of this type of violence. This reality was underscored on April 23, 2010 when terrorists hijacked a bus in Mosul, Iraq, ordered all the Christians and Muslims on board to leave and then killed 23 remaining passengers, members of the Yazidi religious sect.

A few months later, Sunni terrorists murdered more than 500 members of this group with multiple car bombings in two villages near Iraq's Syrian border. After the attack, one Yazidi told Reuters “Their aim is to annihilate us, to create trouble and kill all the Yazidis because we are not Muslims.” (Reuters, Aug. 17, 2007).

Taken together, these stories help illuminate a troubling reality that journalists and intellectuals have a tough time acknowledging: Religious and ethnic minorities are treated terribly by Muslim and Arab majorities throughout the Middle East.

Minorities in the Middle East who lack an army and a security barrier to keep would-be murderers at bay are victims of regular violence (such as the Copts in Egypt) or worse, potential victims of ethnic cleansing (such as the Yazidis and Christians in Iraq).

Minority Rights Achieved in Israel

There is, however, one minority group in the Middle East that has been able to achieve a modicum of safety in the face of Muslim and Arab enmity – the Jews. With Israel's creation in 1948, Jews from Europe and the Middle East were able to achieve what no other minority in the region has been able obtain in the region – territory in which it can express its cultural identity and protect itself from Muslim and Arab hostility and oppression.

On this score, Israel's creation represents a breakthrough for minority rights in the Middle East. Mordechai Nisan, author of Minorities in the Middle East: A History of Struggle and Self-Expression (McFarland, 1991) puts it succinctly: “In the 1948 breakthrough, one Mid-eastern people achieved independence and majority status as no other people had done.” (Page 234) Jewish independence in the Middle East represents a serious challenge to Islamic hegemony in the region and has in numerous instances served as an inspiration for minorities suffering from oppression at the hands of Muslim majorities to long for homelands of their own.

Instead of directing the world's attention to the mistreatment of religious minorities at the hands of Muslim and Arab majorities in the Middle East and acknowledging that Israel's creation in 1948 was a powerful and legitimate response to this oppression, a significant number of Western intellectuals and religious leaders have portrayed Israel's creation as a cause of (and not a response to) minority suffering in the Middle East.

The irony is this. Instead of condemning the violence against religious and ethnic minorities in the Middle East (and the ideological and theological beliefs that foment this violence) human rights activists and peace activists in the West have facilitated this violence by focusing the vast majority of their attention on Israel – a country founded to prevent the destruction of a minority in the region. And to make matters worse, prominent Western journalists have cooperated with this process.

The church invasion in Baghdad and the ongoing exodus of Christians from Iraq is part of a terrible price ethnic and religious minorities in the Middle East must pay for journalists, intellectuals and religious leaders in the West to come to their senses. One can only wonder how many more innocents will die before an honest account is given to the world.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Never prepared

 

A person with whom I was close died of cancer on January 11.

She knew her days were numbered.

I knew her days were numbered.

Yet, on the 12th of January I find it difficult to accept the fact that she is no more.

We shared lots of memories; some good, some not so good. The former we recalled fondly; the later we acknowledged and moved on.

I've known her since 1970, but from 1974 until about 2008 we were "out of touch." Parting was hardly "sweet sorrow" back in '74.

Still, during the relatively brief time we were initially close we created a book full of shared experiences, experiences we had been reliving - avoiding none - since '08.

When I try to analyze my feelings it seems it is "all about me."

I won't be able to continue my correspondence with her.

I won't hear any more about her life in the snow belt.

I won't be able to share any more photos of my kids and grandkids with her.

I won't be upset when my emails go unanswered - or she responds with one line to my 50.

As I write my frustrations, kadish comes to mind.

Kadish is not a "prayer for the dead." It actually has nothing to do with death. It affirms our faith when it is most challenged. Kadish, then, is for the living; the people who have to go on without a loved one, a special person.

I can't - perhaps "shouldn't " is the better word - recite kadish for my friend; we are not related and she's not Jewish. In a sense, that makes the loss even harder to take.

While it most assuredly is not like a parent burying an infant, the loss of a 70-year-old non-Jewish friend leaves me with the same feeling of "non-closure." There needs to be something within Judaism for those close to people for whom kadish is "discouraged."

Life goes on, albeit slightly diminished.

I've lost other friends, all of whom were of retirement age or more. Each loss hurt, but life went on. It will go on even now.

But diminished.

Monday, January 3, 2011

Schnorers

 

You always can tell its winter in the north when the snow birds and schnorers come south.

Being a member of an "orthodox" congregation, we can expect a Schnorer du Jour -sometimes several - every weekday.

Some are like snapdragons, they turn up every year about this time.

We get Mizrachi schnorers, Ashkenazi schnorers, and an occasional Sefardi schnorer.

We get ones asking for money for yeshivot, for families in Israel down on their luck, for boys who are taking a wife and for girls who need a dowry.

I know these folks, almost exclusively Black Hats and most with an orange "certificate of schnorering" from some rabbinical board, hit all the orthodox congregations in town; we have quite a few. The only ones that may be missed - once - are new minyans.

Many of the schnorers come from Israel. Who pays for the round-trip airfare? Is there a special schnorer rate? Then they need to rent a car to get around, and a place to stay between appeals. All this costs money, even when some of the schnorers manage to schnor a place to stay and a place at the table.

I don't mind putting something in the envelope for someone who needs medical attention Israel's health care system is denying the patient, but I can't bring myself to support talmedai yeshiva who neither work nor do any military or national service.

I generally keep my wallet closed when a schnorer shows up in time for services and then elects to ignore us - we start early in the morning; a Jew would be hard-pressed to have completed his prayer before we started. It's crude and callous, but with me, it's "Pray for Pay."

I wonder if these people also visit non-orthodox congregations - they often are richer. Maybe they drop in on the rabbi and take from the synagogue contingency fund. Saves them from having to mingle with the less observant.

It seems to me that there ought to be a better way, a way to cut out the middle man and get the funds to the people in need; like my family in Israel. No airfare to reduce the take. No car to pay for out of the donations.

I feel for the poor boy who can't marry until he gets funds from "hul" - but consider this; the lad marries and now there are two people - with more on the way - who will need our support. Pay to help the boy get job training, you bet, but only if he will go to work.

Many - most - of the religious luminaries of old had jobs - Yohanon the sandal maker for example. Other were in business - Meir was the Anheuser-Busch of his day. A modern rabbi I know is an electrical engineer; when I met him he was the only jump-rated rabbi in the U.S. Army,

So why, someone tell me, should a yeshiva boy spend all his time staring at the Talmud when he could be getting a few hours' fresh air at a job earning money to (help) support his wife - who probably is working with children clinging to her skirt.

Would it hurt a yeshiva boy to do some national service? No one insists he join the Golani Brigade, but maybe he could work in a hospital or institution?

My family is in Israel and I have some idea of the situation there.

My son-in-law has a productive job; likewise his parents. My daughter hopes to get her degree and teach, so she, too, will be productive (as well as reproductive). All my brothers-in-law are productive members of society, even the ones with a yeshiva background..

I'm afraid I have a serious problem with schnorers who come south with the snow birds.

I feel, as Edward Bear. a/k/a Winnie-the-Pooh, feels as he comes bump, bump. bumping down the stairs "that there really is another way."