28 Responses to “Cleveland Public Square Rally for Israel, 1/12/09, 12noon”

1. 1 John Ettorre on January 8th, 2009 2:59 pm

   Sure, Rabbi. Poor, pitifully weak and defenseless Israel is the victim here, as always. And I have news for you: non-Jewish American defenders of Israel’s hyperagressive military policies are called right wingers.

2. 2 Jill Miller Zimon on January 8th, 2009 3:19 pm

   John – the rabbi doesn’t read this blog w/any regularity – you can check the synagogue’s website and email him directly, or the Jewish Community Federation – they are putting the rally together.

   http://www.jewishcleveland.org/page.aspx?ID=191286

   There’s a long list of sponsors there to whom you can write in protest.

3. 3 John Ettorre on January 8th, 2009 3:22 pm

   Thanks, Jill, though I suppose I was not really speaking so much to him in particular as to those who might agree with his position.

4. 4 Jill Miller Zimon on January 8th, 2009 3:25 pm

   Then you should go to the rally. But if you take a sign, make sure it doesn’t have a pole or stick – I received some email saying that that’s not allowed.

5. 5 John Ettorre on January 8th, 2009 3:29 pm

   No, I’m afraid we Catholic guys tend not to be the types to crash someone else’s rally. Just not my style (and writers of all persuasions tend to prefer letting their voices be heard not so much in person as through our writing). I say let them rally and make their joyful noise, however politically misguided it might seem to me.

6. 6 Neil on January 12th, 2009 10:42 am

   I find it sad that although Israel has been sitting by idly for 8 years while Hamas terrorists have been firing rockets into Israeli population centers, some still think of this as a “hyperagressive military policy”. Such a statement is either ignorant of anti-semetic. Since I don’t know Mr. Ettorre, I will leave it up to him to decide which it is.

   I wonder what Mr. Ettorre would do if missiles were raining down on his neigborhood for 8 years? Turn the other cheek? Where were people of good conscious such has him for the last eight years? I guess onlyn when Jews defend themselves is it wrong, but when Moslems or Christians attach Jews, that is considered acceptable?

   Oh, and BTW, Israel completely evacuated th Gaza Strip in 2005, and has kept the border crossing open for trade.

   NO OTHER NATION IN THEN WORLD WOULD SIT BY IDLEY WHILE A TERRORIST GROUP WITH THE EXPLICIT GOAL (read Hamas’ charter) OF DESTROYING YOUR RELIGION AND PEOPLE ARE FIRING MISSILES INTO YOUR POPULATION CENTERS.

7. 7 John Ettorre on January 12th, 2009 10:48 am

   You’re free to label Hamas as a “terrorist group,” but others may note that it’s been democratically elected, just like the government of Israel. So perhaps we should also refer to that government as a terrorist group? And yes, everyone who criticizes Israel’s policies is anti-Semitic, an easy thing to sling around, though it’s been slung around so easily and with such lack of discrimination for so long that it’s long since lost all its ability to cow critics of Israel. We’ll continue to call things as we see it, despite the boring and silly robotic repetition of pro-Israel-at-all-costs talking points propagated by people like you.

8. 8 Neil on January 12th, 2009 11:08 am

   Palestinian Authority and Egypt Blame Hamas for the War:

   Egyptian political analyst Magdi Khalil said he shared the view of the Palestinian Authority and Egypt that Hamas was responsible for the war in the Gaza Strip. “Ever since Hamas seized control over the Gaza Strip in 2007, they turned the area into hell,” he said. “They imposed restrictions on the people there and even prevented them from performing the pilgrimage to Mecca”.

9. 9 Neil on January 12th, 2009 11:10 am

   Democratically elected, seized control buy force, and murdered thousands of pro Palestinian Authority activists.

10. 10 Neil on January 12th, 2009 11:18 am

    Critizing Israeli policy is fine. You should read the FREE press in Israel. The political debate is always lively regardless of what is going on.

    However, to deny Israel the right to defend itself when its population centers are targeted by a group (whose charter specicially calls foer the murder of Jews, everwhere), and remaining silent for eight years while those attacks are going on, is, by definition bias against Israel, and by proxy,

    either anti-semetic (or just ignorate) as stated above.

11. 11 Neil on January 12th, 2009 11:22 am

    If missiles where fired on the U.S. by a democratically elected “group” from over the border, would you call it knee jerk for America to defend itself?

    Would you suggest we “turn the other cheek” if American woman and childred had to live their lives no more that 15 seconds away from a bomb shelter?

    At what point would you call this intolerable? Would eight years be enough before you said “enough is enough”? Or would you allow this to go on forever, as their weapons got stronger, and their range kept increasing, and more and more Americans came withing range of this democratically elected enemy?

12. 12 John Ettorre on January 12th, 2009 11:26 am

    By your definition, pal, not mine. And go back and read the original conversation. No one, least of all me, said anything about turning the other cheek or not defending oneself. You’re doing what all debaters with a weak position tend to do, erect their own straw men and debate those, rather than the points made by the other side. I merely said that Israel’s response must bear some kind of proportionality to the other side’s actions. That’s a fairly straightforward argument, with which you’ve yet to engage.

13. 13 Neil on January 12th, 2009 11:35 am

    Quote: “Israel’s hyperagressive military policies” John Ettorre

    So, you define Israel sitting idle for 8 years, without retaliating, and evacating terriroty during this period as a “hyperagressive military policy”?

    Wow, who is making trying to make the straw man argument? It seems incredibly bias to defend a group who murderd its own people and uses woman and children as human shields.

14. 14 John Ettorre on January 12th, 2009 11:40 am

    I hope the ADL has a big budget to continue to take out those ads in the NYT, which it wouldn’t have to do if Israel was on firmer footing on this whole episode. I’m done talking about this today.

15. 15 Neil on January 12th, 2009 11:43 am

    Look John, Hamas broke from the Palestinian Authority, seized control of Gaza, refuses to abide by or accept any of the Agreements reached between the Palestinian Authority and Israel, refuses to accept Israel’s right to exist, calls for the murder of Jews everywhere and the destruction of the State of Israel, and is funded by Iran.

    The Arabs themselves have condemed Hamas.

    As to proportionality, what would you call proportianate? That Israel shoot one missile indiscriminately into Gaza population centers for every one missile Hamas shoots into Israeli population centers?

    What do you do when your enemy doesn’t wear uniforms, hides and fights from within densely populated civilian areas, and does not abide by the Geneva Convention or abide by the rules of modern warfare? The fact is that if Israel was interested in fighting the way that most of the world would fight (or the Arab armies for that matter), they would just make a parking lot out of Gaza in a few simple air raids instead of sending their young boys to fight house to house trying to limit civilian casualties. Ask anyone who served in a combat infantry unit in any army and this is an insane way to fight. Friends of mine in the U.S. Airborne have told me that Israel risks their own soldiers lives to save civilians with this tactic.

16. 16 John Ettorre on January 12th, 2009 11:47 am

    I do sympathize with all that, and you make some good points. After awhile, the Middle East just feels like some of the same dynamics at work as dealing with teenagers as a parent: they frustrate you so much at times and seem so intractable (only occasionally with teenagers, but chronically with the Middle East) that you just want to ignore the underlying problems in hopes it will all just go away.

17. 17 Neil on January 12th, 2009 1:53 pm

    John, thank you, and I apologize if I came off harshly.

    We too are frustrated. There seems to be a hair trigger/knee jerk reaction in the world to blame Israel for everything without consideration the facts. Israel does a terrible job explaining its side of the story (another big critism of the government from within Israel).

    BTW, I just returned from that rally. It was a very civil demonstration, mostly calling for peace for all. There were christian clergy and several rabbis who prayed together with everyone for peace.

    In contrast, there was a counter demonstration and they were screaming “death to the Jews”, “death to Israel”, waving swastika’s etc. Such a shame…

    There is a saying in Israel, that goes like this:

    “If the Arabs put down their weapons, there would be no more violence. If Israel put down her weapons, there would be no more Israel”…

    Peace

18. 18 davis on January 12th, 2009 6:47 pm

    I too just came back from the rally a couple hours ago and read this convo while searching for any news articles about the rally itself. i agree that it was very well done and all the speakers made good points and did a good job saying that we hope the conflict ends peacefully, with minimum casualties on BOTH sides. the fact of the matter is, you cant blame Israel for their actions, because they are 100% justified, as mentioned above. On the other hand you cant really argue against the people calling for the Gazan citizens to be saved. Its not entirely the gazans’ fault (although they did ELECT Hamas as their leaders) but there is nothing they can do to escape safely. The whole situation is really a shame and I think the only thing we can really do is pray for a peaceful end to this meyhem.

19. 19 Sue Simmons on January 12th, 2009 8:09 pm

    I would point out that our community….meaning the rest of the democratic world… does not allow religious leaders implore publicly in this manner lest they risk their tax-exempt status–also the rallies of note were organized by social organizations rather than religious ones. In a democratic society the distinction is not a small one.

20. 20 curious on January 12th, 2009 10:52 pm

    Supporting any country when its doing the wrong thing is a violation of human rights and Israel is as much responsible as Palestine is, you have made it impossible for your own children to live in peace because you harbor anger for each other, you try to justify Israel’s actions but 919 palestinians have died in the pas 16 days, 300 or so were children, what was their crime? you are not bent on stoping terrorism you are bent on destroying the race of Palestinians as a whole, and when you start to be a real Jewish person you may realize that your own religion as well as the Muslim and Christian religions do not support these types of actions. You are becoming a disgrace to your own religions on both sides, you are fighting for land that DOES NOT BELONG TO ANY OF US, IT IS GOD’S LAND NOT OURS. We die and become the dirt no one can lay claim on a piece of earth and in fact a lot of the land we try to lay claim on we wind up destroying and exploiting, so do the right thing and stop supporting such actions or countries who commit such actions BE A REAL JEWISH PERSON!

21. 21 davis on January 12th, 2009 10:55 pm

    im not sure what you are trying to say. the rally was lead by one of the leaders of the Cleveland Jewish Community. Several Jewish schools had bus loads of people come to the rally. At public square i was able to see the rabbis of most Synagoguse in cleveland.

22. 22 Jill Miller Zimon on January 12th, 2009 11:06 pm

    Wow – take a kid to an annual check-up and look what I miss! That’s the last time I make a scheduling conflict like this again.

    First – John – I only want to comment on one thing that you wrote early on:

    “And yes, everyone who criticizes Israel’s policies is anti-Semitic, an easy thing to sling around, though it’s been slung around so easily and with such lack of discrimination for so long that it’s long since lost all its ability to cow critics of Israel.

    Nothing could cow me from being a critic of Israel because of the stability of my love for it. It’s precisely how I feel about the United States as well.

    When you make a comment like that, John, you’re heading into Michele Bachmann territory – she was the Minnesota GOP congressional incumbent who told Chris Matthews that the media needs to investigate all members of Congress to determine which ones are anti-America and which ones are pro-America.

    There is nothing that would cow me from criticizing the USA or Israel – despite the fact that I love and feel lucky to live in the USA and I love and feel lucky to be a Jew.

    Now – there are a couple of blog posts I’d really love for the readers of this thread to read, because I think they do an excellent job of highlighting how someone can love Israel and criticize it as well and, even if someone wants to call me an anti-Semite for that, I – along with many, many others – will reject it every time, just as I will reject being told I’m anti-America because I voted for Obama or because I think Bush completely $&@%ed up this country and so on.

    Here’s the first post, written by an Israeli-Canadian journalist who lives in Tel Aviv. It is long but worth reading ALL of it, please.

    The second thing I’d like you to read is the latest news about how some members of the Knesset want to ban the Israeli Arab parties from participating in elections. This is the kind of thing that drives left of center Jews who love Israel (having lived there by the way), absolutely CRAZY.

    It is late and there is always more to say except so few people take the time and effort and stamina to stick with this. I know, I know. Just today I was called for comment by The Jewish Week – a friend who is a professor in NYC didn’t want to talk to them because he said that he just can’t care anymore about it – he is Jewish.

    We are responsible for turning off people from engaging in a meaningful way – and part of the reason for that is the polarization. We must not allow that to happen – we must keep bringing it around, not only to the facts and the specifics, but also to the future and reality. Even people who talk in the lingo “60 year occupation” (and often end up going into a push for a one state solution) can often be heard to say that they recognize that Israel isn’t going anywhere, so there must be an end to the violence.

    But people are so afraid. The region has been so dependent on the threat of violence to keep things in check. We must replace that threat with trust – knowing that it’s difficult is never an adequate response.

    Finally, if you didn’t already read my piece from earlier today, please read it now (here)- it is about the complete failure of Hamas at leading, which is in fact what it was elected to do. On that basis alone, Hamas can be seen as not speaking for or acting on behalf of and certainly not acting in the best interests of the Palestinians.

    Thank you all for engaging. You can lob the salvos at me now.

23. 23 davis on January 13th, 2009 8:19 pm

    jill, i want to thank u for your elequence and bravery to ’say it like it is’ i read some of the artilces you cited (it was really long but i read most of it) and that also very good, and presented both sides of the fighting. A for ‘curious’ what you said that:
    “you try to justify Israel’s actions but 919 palestinians have died in the pas 16 days, 300 or so were children, what was their crime? you are not bent on stoping terrorism you are bent on destroying the race of Palestinians as a whole” that is not true. yes many innocent Palestinians have suffered as collateral damage, and it is really unfortunate, but they were not the targest of the attacks, as is the case in Sderot and Ashkelon. The Hamas militants are firing rockets indiscriminately at Israelis from behind human shields, thus making it impossible for the IDF to stop them without hurting or killing civilians as collateral damage. If you want to blame someone for those deaths you can blame Hamas for firing rockets from their backyards and mosques.

    As for what you said later:
    “You are becoming a disgrace to your own religions on both sides, you are fighting for land that DOES NOT BELONG TO ANY OF US, IT IS GOD’S LAND NOT OURS.” If you really believe in God that usually means you believe in the Bible, and according to the Bible GOD gave the land to the Jewish people. He commanded them to settle and inhabit the land.

    One last note regarding what you said that they are being bad Jews: it is not your place to judge them! If you are saying that what they are doing is wrong ethically, then say that. That point has been argued in discussions above and seems to have been disproved. But if you are saying that they are violating the word of GOD, and being bad Jews, you will either have to bring some really good proof for that or hold your religious beliefs to yourself.
    thank you

24. 24 davis on January 13th, 2009 8:21 pm

    now that I am reading over what I wrote, i apologize for the grammatical mistakes.

25. 25 curious on January 13th, 2009 9:16 pm

    To Davis
    When I made the statement of bad, if you do not think that killing people at large numbers regardless from what side it is happening is not a bad thing then maybe you should think about what is good and what is bad. If you did not notice I stated that their are people on both ends and all religions who have issues and need to really follow their religions instead of letting emotions decide their fate and their choices in the future. And as far as passing judgment, our religions forbid this kind of killing, their is a difference between defending yourself and invading another country and causing a holocausts. And if you feel that I am defending Hamas I AM NOT DEFENDING HAMAS. Face the facts of how many people have been killed in this and if you still feel that this is ok to do then do not complain about what went on during the Holocaust either because that was mass genocide and this is nothing different.

26. 26 davis on January 13th, 2009 9:34 pm

    look, i do not mean to say that it is OK to kill innocent civilians. Last week my synagogue invited several other synagogues and jewish organizations to recite psalms for a quick and successful war with minimal casualties on BOTH sides. However, calling this a Holocaust is a harsh overstatement and even a blatant lie. What made the Holocaust so evil was that the Nazi regime intended to exterminate the Jewish race. Their intention was to completely wipe out every Jew no matter how innocent they were. If one was to compare this to the situation in the Middle East, it would be the Islamic Extremists, such as Hamas, Fatah, and Hezbollah, if anyone, who is acting most like the Nazis. The Palestinians who unfortunately are living and dying in such horrible conditions are not he subject of attacks by the Israelis. The Israeli government has said that this is not a war against the Palestinian or any Muslim people. It is an effort to stop the Hamas terrorists who has said explicitly that their goal is to wipe Israel off the map. They claim religious obligation to kill all Jews. They have called upon all arabs in Israel and in the world to rise up and exterminate the Jews. So do not even try saying that the Israelis or Jews are commmiting genocide. This is the complete opposite: it is self-defense against an violent enemy that swears to never back down. So i apologize if i made u sound like a Hamas sympathizer, but next time u make harsh accusations or tell me to check my facts, u have to do a little research yourself.

27. 27 curious on January 14th, 2009 12:12 am

    40% of the people dead right now are children Israel bombed a children’s pediatric hospital and do not tell me that Hamas was hiding their. This is not just a war anymore this is genocide same as Hitler did so yes it can be compared because killing 930 people in 17 days cannot be considered anything less, Hitler’s reason and hatred toward the Jews was horrible and he murdered many people, We do not agree with Hamas but when it becomes this intense it can be compared to the holocaust because the result of both events is the same and that is massive loss of lives.

28. 28 davis on January 14th, 2009 12:19 pm

    the reason it isnt comperable b/c the Israelis have no intentions to wipe out the Palestinians or Gaza. In fact, israel is the only country to go so far out of their way to SAVE PALESTINIANS from the attacks. Before their air raids they dropped leaflets warning civilians to flee from specific places they were going to attack. They are the only army in history to make thousands of phone calls and text messages to Gazans urging them to move to safety so they aren’t harmed by the attacks. If they were doing a genocide, why would they be going so far out of their way to save palestinian lives? they are also one of the only countries that have accepted injured palestinians into their hospotal to treat them. hamas has launched close to NINE THOUSAND ROCKETS INTO ISRAEL since the year 2000, and you are saying that the Israelis are causing a holocaust?

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