Larry Levine – No Words, First Reaction hearing about the murder of Jews in Pittsburgh
No words,
That was my reaction in the first minutes after hearing about the murder of Jews in Pittsburgh. However, after a few minutes the words came to me …. in droves.
Having 5 children with 2 brit Milah, and 3 baby naming ceremonies it certainly wasn’t hard to imagine the horror of this happening. However, I AM NOT SURPRISED IN THE LEAST BIT. Antisemitism has been with us since the time of the Pharaohs. It was only a matter of time before we as a community experienced what other communities in our country have, the horror of a movie theater being shot up, the hate towards a Black Church, the gunning down of a church filled with mostly white people praying.
Jews have been easy targets. This deranged person who railed about the all-powerful Jews bringing invaders in to kill “our people”. A lunatic spewing holocaust conspiracy theories. The same people who perpetrated the biggest crime against humanity in history are the same ones that deny that it happened.
The irony of this is that these delusional racists usually go after the least powerful, women, children 80-year old’s praying in a service Our services speak of peace, love, responsibility yet to this demented person who harbored such hate viewed them as part of his paranoid views of Jews and Judaism.
Now the hard part. A big part of my anger is the response by many to this senseless tragedy.
Pete Beinart: The Special Kind of hate that Drove Pittsburgh Shooter – And Trump.
Jane Eisner also of the forward “What has Trump Done to Us, America?
The Washington Post: How much responsibility does Trump bear for the synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh?
Then there are the many cable pundits, guests and Democrat leaders who spoke of the “environment of hate” fomented by the President. How ironic that statement is since the Democrats have never accepted him as President and have been fomenting hatred since a minute after he won the election.
It is utter nonsense that Trump had anything to do with this on any level. This man was a pure unadulterated Nazi, and a Trump hater.
Did any of you blame Obama for the shootings that occurred at the Jewish Community Center of Kansas City in 2014?
Did you see any of these people criticize Bernie Sanders when one his supporters shot up a baseball game of Republicans?
Where was and is the criticism of Maxine Waters who said ”
“Let’s make sure we show up wherever we have to show up. And if you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd. And you push back on them. And you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere.”
Where is the criticism of Hillary Clinton who recently said, “Democrats can’t be civil right now”?
Where is the criticism of Eric Holder who said ‘When they go low we kick them? That’s what this new Democrat Party is about.’
All these statements are in context of violence against specific Republicans, people wearing Making America great hats, harassment of administration officials wherever they are, in airports, in restaurants.
There was NO criticism of these statements and actions by the Democratic leadership. In short, they created an environment of hatred, of violence and of harassment.
Most importantly WHERE ARE THESE PARAGONS OF VIRTUE WHO HAVE VIRTUALLY SAID NOTHING ABOUT LOUIS FARRAKHAN’S CONTINUED SPEWING OF
ANTISEMITISM?
UNLESS YOU ALL THINK THAT CALLING JEWS, TERMITES IS NOT A PROBLEM.
It is disgusting for these people to use this tragedy for political purposes. There was plenty of anti-Semitic attacks, mass shootings during the time of Obama did anyone blame him for creating the “environment” for this to happen? I would add that in my opinion Obama purposely fanned the flames of hatred during his many speeches against the 1 per-centers and corporate jet owners. What about Obama’s use of local cases like Michael Brown in St Louis and others to suit his narrative about white hatred and police brutality? Gee where did all of those go since Trump became President?
Hate is Hate is Hate. Whenever you demonize any group whether it is Jews, blacks, the wealthy, Muslims Republicans, Trump they are dehumanized, made into caricatures, and they become targets especially for the mentally disturbed.
I know what some of you are thinking. President Trump is a racist didn’t he say that there are good Nazis? NO, HE DIDN’T, IT IS A LIE, TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT. ANYBODY WHO ACTUALLY TAKES THE TIME TO SEE THE NEWS CONFERENCE IN THE LOBBY OF TRUMP TOWER KNOWs WHAT HE WAS SAYING. He was responding to a flurry of questions. What about some context here? He criticized the Nazis, then criticized Antifa who are violent anarchists. He CLEARLY was referring to there being good people on both sides of the CONFEDERATE STATUE ISSUE. He said, “where does this stop do we take down the Jefferson memorial because he had slaves?” I personally have mixed feelings about the statues, yes some should be removed because they were political statements about Jim Crow etc. however there are historical statues that should remain. Does that make me a Nazi? I DON’T THINK SO.
The President gave a clear unequivocal heart-felt statement about what happened in Pittsburgh, about the scourge of Antisemitism, and about the Jewish people. More importantly did ANY OF YOU ACTUALLY WATCH THE REACTION OF THE CROWD TO WHAT HE WAS SAYING? THEY WERE APPLAUDING WHAT HE WAS SAYING. SO MUCH FOR HIS BASE BEING ANTI SEMITIC. Pence’s speech on the subject received the same applause.
The Forward and the left have been calling him an anti-Semite since he ran for President. That is the default answer to anyone that they disagree with. You are a racist, and or an anti-Semite. It is nonsense. If you disagree with unfettered illegal immigration to our country, YOU ARE A RACIST. If you want common sense answers to this problem that every President prior to Trump had to deal with YOU ARE A RACIST. Even though most of our “courageous” current leadership like Schumer, Hillary Clinton, Pelosi, Feinstein all spoke out vociferously against ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION.
Trumps immigration action calling for restricting refugees from certain Muslim countries was BASED ON A PLAN BY THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION. Yes, these were the countries that Obama felt were dangerous.
This President has done more for Jews and Israel than any of our “friends” like Roosevelt (who was an anti-Semite and did nothing to help the Jews. Roosevelt knew that Jews were being slaughtered in Germany). Even worse Roosevelt wanted to disperse the survivors after the war to different ends of the earth. Look it up, it is true.
The “first Jewish President” as the New Yorker called Obama was the most hostile to Israel, and I would argue to Jews ever. Yet the progressive Jewish community loved him. In case you didn’t notice Progressive Jews ISRAEL IS MADE UP OF JEWS.
This President has done what no other President has, he and his surrogate Nikki Haley spoke truth to power at the UN, treated terrorists and terrorists’ entities like they should be, with disdain and publicly defended Israel. His actions speak louder than his words.
Now let’s talk about his words. I don’t defend everything that he does and says. Like many I often feel that his tweets are not Presidential, however in his own ingenious way he communicates directly to his base without the filter of a very left leaning media.Really did he need to call Stormy a “horse face” ?
There is a rally today at the Jewish Center. It should be a cathartic feel good event for our community, but the reality is that it will also be a time of bashing the President calling for gun control (which didn’t stop the pipe bombs that the other demento sent) and ending up doing nothing for our community.
What we really need is to clamp down on social media like twitter, Facebook. We need to profile and remove real threats to our community without disrupting real political speech. That includes shutting down sites like storm-front. We need to remove every page that espouses hatred, antisemitism. Yes, Anti-Israel hate speech should be removed as well without removing true criticism.
We need our community leaders including Rabbis to stop being political and call out anti-Semitism wherever they say it even if it is from the progressive community and Democrats.
We need to publicly shame and criticize places of business like the Haunted Hoochie a local haunted house that opens every Halloween. They host a swastika Saturday where anyone who wears a swastika gets in free. Where is the public condemnation from our leaders? In our OWN BACK YARD?
As long as there are human beings on earth, you will have hate.
Our community is not the vulnerable community of the 1930s. Wake up and get protection at every synagogue. We are not Europe, there is no major influx of people who hate us, at least not recently.
Jews need to get their concealed carries, train and protect themselves.
Fight back, zero tolerance for antisemitism, in all forms including harassment of our children at Universities.
That is how we win, we live.
This is what Israel must live through every day.
Free societies and its most vulnerable need to realize that we are all human beings and that we need to stick together.
Hate is Hate is Hate, on both sides.
Am Yisroel Chai
Israel, and Jews Live
Larry M Levine
