Big Questions – Gerald Scarfe's Cartoon and 'anti-Semitism'

Rabbi Schochet - cultivates an air of liberalism but is a prominent member of a religious sect that justifies genocide against non-Jews and Arabs and excuses child abuse.  The mask slipped as he couldn't conceal his outrage at having to deal with Jewish anti-Zionist opponents and opposition to gay marriage

Tony Greenstein - despite being outnumbered by a gaggle of Zionists made the issue of Palestinian oppression the key issue - many members of the audience came up afterwards to express their agreement

Although the actual question was 'Is Criticising Israel anti-Semitic' the debate was entirely about the cartoon of Gerald Scarfe, that was falsely accused of being 'anti-Semitic'.

On Sunday I spent the morning in Leicester courtesy of BBC1’s Big Questions.  The Sunday Times last week published a cartoon by Gerald Scarfe showing Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s Prime Minister, with a trowel dripping in Palestinian blood cementing Palestinians into the Apartheid Wall.  Sure enough the predictable calls came that this was ‘anti-Semitic’.  It was the medieval blood libel no less! 

Letter to The Independent from 28 Jews who Reject Zionist Libel of anti-Semitism

This was a bogus and wholly artificial debate about nothing.  Even dedicated Zionists like Howard Jacobson accepts that there was nothing anti-Semitic about Scarfe’s cartoon.   And Rupert Murdoch, who as proprietor, apologised for the cartoon, presides over newspapers like the Sun which are virulently hostile to refugees, asylum seekers, Roma and any other minority they can get their hands on.  Murdoch himself has been caught using anti-Semitic comments such as ‘Why is Jewish owned press so consistently anti-Israel’.

Even ardent Zionist Howard Jacobson agrees that Gerald Scarfe's cartoon was not anti-Semitic.  To Lubavitch's aptly named Rabbi Schochet (a slaughterer in Hebrew!) it was 'pure unadulterated anti-semitism' or maybe pure unadulterated hype

As was pointed out by another member of the audience, traditional Jewish stereotypes, as per Julius Streicher’s Der Sturmer, show fat hooked nose Jews with duping the non-Jews out of their worldly wealth or debauching someone.  Scarfe’s cartoon did none of these things.  It merely told the truth is the form of a visual metaphor.  And the truth is what the main Zionist spokesperson, Rabbi Schochet and his minions wished to suppress in yesterday’s Big Questions.  It was one of the programme’s 3 debates.
Bogus Charges of ‘anti-Semitism’

Enjoying seeing Rabbi Shochet lose his cool as his bland assertions about Scarfe's cartoon being 'pure unadulterated anti-Semitism' fell as flat as a (kosher) pancake

When Zionists use the term ‘anti-Semitism’ what they really mean is ‘new anti-Semitism’ i.e. not hatred of Jews but opposition to Israel, the ‘Jewish’ State. And what is a ‘Jewish’ state but a state that gives privileges to Jews above non-Jews.  The old anti-Semitism manifested itself in things like beating up Jewish children if they walked down the wrong street in the East End of the 1930’s.  The new ‘anti-Semitism’ is manifested in opposition to the United State’s guard dog in the Middle East and the world's fourth strongest military power!

The Medieval Blood Libel

For those not aware, the Blood Libel was the invention of Christian anti-Semitism.  Every Passover and Easter, Jews were accused of kidnapping and killing non-Jewish children or babies in order that their blood could be used to bake unleavened bread (Matzot) on Passover.  It led to many hundreds if not thousands of deaths.  Its first appearance in the Middle East was in 1840 in the Damascus Affair when 13 Jews were accused of having murdered a Franciscan priest.  The French Consul and Franciscan monks whipped the population into a fury and arrested and tortured 13 Jews, 4 of whom died.  The Affair was subject to the vigorous intervention of Sir Moses Montefiore, the famous British Jewish philanthropist.  It is noticeable that the Blood Libel was only introduced to the region via French imperialism and its reactionary church.  Previously it had been unheard of in the Middle East.

The accusation that Gerald Scarfe’s cartoon was reminiscent of the blood libel is itself a libel.  If I was Gerald Scarfe I would be issuing a writ for defamation.  Unfortunately Gerald was placed under an enormous amount of pressure and forced to apologise.  

The accusations of the Zionists are based on the absurd idea that the depiction of blood in a cartoon is an anti-Semitic blood libel! A child could see that that is ludicrous.  Not so the Lubavitch Rabbi of Mill Hill synagogue, Rabbi Schochet, who was the principal Zionist spokesperson on Big Questions, arguing that it was ‘pure unadulterated anti-Semitism’.   Clearly Shochet has led a very sheltered life.

Zionist McCarthyism

What we have really seen is an exercise in McCarthyism.  An attempt to close down free speech by the Zionists.  So weak is their case that they are forced to resort to cheap, unsubstantiated jibes of ‘anti-Semitism’.  On American campuses many Zionist activists spend most of their time trying to silence opposing points of view.  So when Gerald Scarfe’s cartoon was published in a Murdoch newspaper (the idea of freedom of the press, as opposed to freedom for the proprietor is unknown to this far-right racist warmonger).

Lubavitch and Rabbi Schochet

Schochet himself is a thoroughly disingenuous fellow.  Despite an apparent aura of liberalism (which let slip over gay marriage and in his references to Jewish traitors in his tweet over the Scarfe cartoon) he is a member of the fanatically racist Lubavitch sect which believes non-Jews have animal souls  and that Jewish life is sacred when compared to non-Jews.  As the site of the former Lubavitch member and whistleblower, Shmarya Rosenberg's Failed Messiahexplains, the Tanya, the foundational religious document of Lubavitch, ‘contains some of the most virulent anti-Gentile statements ever printed in the name of Judaism, and that the author of the Tanya, the first rebbe of Chabad, Schneur Zalman of Liadi, did not consider non-Jews to be fully human.’ 

In Sholom Rubashkin Prints A Tanya Rosenberg, cites how

The souls of the nations of the world, however, emanate from the other, unclean kelipot [husks] which contain no good whatever מו שכתוב בע׳ חיים שער מ״ט פרק ג׳: וכל טיבו דעבדין האומות לגרמייהו עבדין as is written in Etz Chayim, Portal 49, ch. 3, that all the good that the nations do, is done out of selfish motives. 

Since their nefesh [soul] emanates from kelipot [husks] which contain no good, it follows that any good done by them is for selfish motives. וכדאיתא בגמרא על פסוק: וחסד לאומים חטאת — שכל צדקה וחסד שאומות העולם עושין אינן אלא להתייהר כו׳

The Gemara [Babylonian Talmud] comments on the verse, “The kindness of the nations is sin”  that all the charity and kindness done by the nations of the world is only for their self-glorification

In Rabbi Schochet of the Racist Lubavitch - Big Questions Panellist and Guardian Columnist , which I posted at the time of my last acquaintance with Schochet on Big Questions, I noted how he had failed to dissociate himself from the racism of Lubavitch, to say nothing of Zionism.  I described how Lubavitch Rabbi Yitzhak Shapira, who lives in Israel, had written a book, Torat HaMelech (The King’s Torah) which explicitly justified if not urged the murder of non-Jewish children and infants since they were the seed of the Jews’ historical enemy, the Amalekites.

Indeed beneath the liberal image he cultivates is a die-hard Lubavitcher, whose father and grandfather were also Lubavitch rabbis.  Perhaps this explains why he tried to persuade the London Beth Din - orthodox rabbinical court to call a halt to all conversions of non-Jews.  Since Israel's rabbis have got into the habit of not recognising some Orthodox conversions abroad (they have previously reversed conversions if the person left the State of Israel!) Shochet proposed to overcome the problems of non-recognition of conversions by putting an end to them!  What was of more concern to Shochet was the purity of the Jewish people/race and not being contaminated by non-Jews.  [London Beit Din Rejects Chabad Rabbi's Call For Worldwide Conversion Ban -The beit din said it took “exception” to Rabbi Yitzchak Schochet's comments].

Lubavitch's Rabbi Shapira was not an isolated voice.  He was volubly defended in Israel by hundreds of rabbis, Lubavitch and non-Lubavitch.  In one meeting there were 250 rabbis.  Hundreds signed a letter in Shapira’s support.  It says in his book that

‘It is permissable to kill the Righteous among Nations even if they are not responsible for the threatening situation. If we kill a Gentile who has sinned or has violated one of the seven commandments - because we care about the commandments - there is nothing wrong with the murder [either].'

See Max Blumenthal and ‘How to Kill Goyim and Influence People: Israeli Rabbis Defend Book's Shocking Religious Defense of Killing Non-Jews’

Rabbi Manis Friedman - another Lubavitch Rabbi on Child Abuse and the Killing of Non-Jews 

Child abuse is not damaging.  In fact it teaches you an important lesson as to who your friends are!

Another prominent Lubavitch Rabbi, Manis Friedman from America, where Lubavitch is based, is an all-round bigot.  Whether it is women, children, Arabs or non-Jews they are each in their own way inferior – some more than others.

Friedman’s views on the indigenous population of Palestine and the Arabs are best described in an article in Ha'aretz of 9th June 2009 ‘Chabad rabbi: Jews should kill Arab men, women and children during war (see below) 

‘Child victims of sex abuse – ‘they are not damaged’’

Rabbi Manis Friedman not merely sanctions child abuse but he blames the child for the abuse. He told one such victim that they had no need to tell anyone about what had happened to them, anymore than they’d want to tell anyone about having diarrhoea!  The event itself was unimportant, what mattered was the lesson it taught.  But Rabbi Friedman was only saying aloud what Chabad (Lubavitch) believes internally.  It has a long history of  trying to cover up child and sex abuse within the Lubavitch community.  Indeed to report an incident of rape or abuse to non-Jews is itself a sin. In another instance, where a Chabad vigilante group beat up 5 Yeshiva (religious school) students, Chabad Rabbis Avrohom Osdoba, Shlomo Yehuda Segal, and Yitzchok Raitport issued a summons which talked of “the terrible sin informing on Jews to the secular courts.”  This 'terrible sin' equally applies to those who report child abuse, rape and sexual assault. SeeCrown Heights Beit Din Rules Vigilantes Attacked By Other Jewish Vigilantes Violated Mesira Law By Pressing Charges

See below New York Rabbi Manis Friedman Filmed Comparing Child Abuse to Diarrhoea. 

Chabad Lies that Rabbi Manis Friedman Is Not A Chabad Emissary
In order to escape the embarrassment of Friedman’s comments condoning child abuse, the Chabad Yeshivah Centre, headquarters for Australia and New Zealand in Melbourne, issued a statement denying that Rabbi Friedman had anything to do with them.  This was yet one more lie.  Shmarya Rosenberg, a very reliable source on the crimes and misdemeanours of Chabad, demonstrated quite easily through the use of screenshots, that Friedman was prominently advertised on the Chabad website as the Educational Director of Lubavitch House in St. Paul's, Minnesota! See Chabad: "We Vehemently Disagree" With Rabbi Manis Friedman.  Rosenberg writes about 'The massive scandal surrounding Chabad's Yeshivah Centre (which) has been national news in Australia where police have openly condemned Chabad community leadership for what we would call in the United States obstruction of justice... for their roles in the coverups of this child sexual abuse and for attempts to intimidate victims and their families.

According to followers, the late Rebbe Schneersohn was either the messiah or god or perhaps both

It would take a whole chapter to point to the madness of Lubavitch, who believe their late leader the Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, was the new Messiah.  Indeed some believe he was god himself.  Which from my perspective, being an atheist, he could of course have been!   See A Historian's Polemic Against 'The Madness of False Messianism' by David Berger , [The Forward 19.10.01] which argues that the Lubavitch sect, with its Messiah Now chants and its belief that the Rebbe was the Messiah, has effectively collapsed into Christian messianism.

For more on the genocidal anti-Arab comments of Rabbi Manis Friedman, see: Chabad rabbi to Moment: “Destroy [Muslim] holy sites”  [June 01, 2009] and also Chabad rabbi aims to clarify remarks on killing civilians  (see below)

Shmarya Rosenberg wrote that ‘I've known Manis for 25 years. I used to live around the corner from him. I heard Manis say the same thing many times. I also heard many other Chabad rabbis say it – even I said it.’ What is unusual is to have a Chabad rabbi say it for non-Chabad consumption. The theology is the theology of two people: The late Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson and the late Rabbi Meir Kahane.'

This is a very crucial point.  Chabad (Lubavitch) is a mainstream Orthodox group.  Kach is seen as belonging to the fringe.  Led by the late Rabbi Meir Kahane it was quite rightly seen, even by other Zionists, as a Jewish-Nazi group.  It called for the imprisoning of Arab males who had sexual relations with Jewish women, echoing the Nuremburg Law for the Protection of German Honour and German Blood of 1935 which outlawed sexual relations between Jews and 'Aryans' as part of the drive for 'racial hygiene' and the prevention of Rassenschande (racial defilement/pollution).


'Chabad and Kahane shared much with regard to Israeli politics and inner city Jewish community security.  The only real difference is that Kahane was theologically Zionist while Chabad is not.  By that I mean Kahane saw messianic portent in the Jewish state, while Chabad does not.
In day to day life, there is no real difference between the two positions except in religious matters. … That means Chabadniks and Kachniks can and do stand side by side in the dusty outposts and remote settlements of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank). But on days like Yom HaAtzmaut, they make two minyans instead of one.’ Chabad Rabbi Tries To Clarify Remarks On Killing Muslims, Destroying Muslim Holy Places

Why do I concentrate on this Chasidic sect?  Because it is very powerful within the Jewish and Zionist community.  Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks is very close to them.  The 3rd President of the Israeli state, Zalman Shazar, was a supporter.  Rabbi Schochet himself was talked about as a future Chief Rabbi. See Rabbi Schochet of the Racist Lubavitch - Big Questions Panellist and Guardian Columnist
 
Chabad however are not stupid and someone like Shochet, although a religious maniac who exhorts his congregation to chant ‘Moshiach (Messiah) Now’ in order to hasten the Messiah's arrival, itself held to be blasphemous in Jewish religion circles historically, cultivates the air of a liberal with all the rhetoric of diversity at his disposal.

New York Rabbi Manis Friedman Filmed Comparing Child Abuse to Diarrhoea

A leading rabbi has compared child sex abuse to diarrhoea and said it teaches victims an important lesson.

Rabbi Manis Friedman, a New York-based leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, was filmed making the comments in a lecture.

In it, he discusses a child abuse victim who asked him about discussing the abuse with a new girlfriend: "They ask me, 'do I have to tell her I was molested?'

"I said 'do you have to tell her you once had diarrhoea?' It's embarrassing, but it's nobody's business.
"What's wrong with him is that he mentioned it."

Friedman, who was born in Australia, suggested that the damage caused by child abuse was mainly psychological in that it results in "loss of trust".

"It's not the event itself, it's the loss of trust, the feeling of weakness or vulnerability," he explained.
However, the acclaimed Torah scholar also asserted that "being molested is the same as having teachers you don't like.'

"The event itself - 'I'm damaged from molestation' - no you're not. In fact you've learned that not every uncle is your best friend. You've learned an important lesson."

He goes on to discuss how we are all damaged people by events that occur in our lives and that such issues "are real for almost everybody", not just child abuse victims.

Manny Waks, an anti-sex abuse campaigner, has now launched a lawsuit against Friedman in the Jewish court, or Beth Din, in Sydney and Crown Heights in Brooklyn.

He says Friedman is doing "untold damage" to the entire Jewish community and that he is perpetuating a negative perception of the orthodox community in particular.

"Most concerning, he is having a direct, damaging impact on victims and survivors of child sexual abuse and their families," Waks said.

Rabbi Padwa - it is a Mesira - forbidden - to inform the Police or any non-Jew about Jewish child abuse.

The film of Friedman follows a similar video which showed Rabbi Ephraim Padwa, who leads the Charedi community in north London's Stamford Hill, telling an abuse victim not to go to the police -  ‘Child Abuse Hidden in London's Strict Orthodox Jewish Community, Claims C4's Dispatches 

Rabbi Padwa says that by going to the police would constitute mesira - meaning it is forbidden to report a Jew to a non-Jewish authority.

Rabbi Manis Friedman clarifies his controversial comment as quote from Torah permissible in case of self-defense.

Ha'aretz 9th June 2009 The Forward and Nathaniel Popper

Like the best Chabad-Lubavitch rabbis, Manis Friedman has won the hearts of many unaffiliated Jews with his charismatic talks about love and God; it was Friedman who helped lead Bob Dylan into a relationship with Chabad.

But Friedman, who today travels the country as a Chabad speaker, showed a less warm and cuddly side when he was asked how he thinks Jews should treat their Arab neighbors.

"The only way to fight a moral war is the Jewish way: Destroy their holy sites. Kill men, women and children (and cattle)," Friedman wrote in response to the question posed by Moment Magazine for its "Ask the Rabbis" feature.

Friedman argued that if Israel followed this wisdom, there would be "no civilian casualties, no children in the line of fire, no false sense of righteousness, in fact, no war."

"I don't believe in Western morality," he wrote. "Living by Torah values will make us a light unto the nations who suffer defeat because of a disastrous morality of human invention."

Friedman's use of phrasing that might seem more familiar coming from an Islamic extremist has generated a swift backlash. The editor of Moment, Nadine Epstein, said that since the piece was printed in the current issue they "have received many letters and e-mails in response to Rabbi Friedman's comments - and almost none of them have been positive."

Friedman quickly went into damage control. He released a statement to the Forward, through a Chabad spokesman, saying that his answer in Moment was "misleading" and that he does believe that "any neighbor of the Jewish people should be treated, as the Torah commands us, with respect and compassion."

But Friedman's words have generated a debate about whether there is a darker side to the cheery face that the Chabad-Lubavitch movement shows to the world in its friendly outreach to unaffiliated Jews. Mordecai Specktor, editor of the Jewish community newspaper in Friedman's hometown, St. Paul. Minnesota, said: "The public face of Lubavitch is educational programs and promoting Yiddishkeit. But I do often hear this hard line that Friedman expresses here."

"He sets things out in pretty stark terms, but I think this is what Lubavitchers believe, more or less," said Specktor, who is also the publisher of the American Jewish World.

"They are not about loving the Arabs or a two-state solution or any of that stuff. They are fundamentalists. They are our fundamentalists." 

Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League and a regular critic of Arab extremists, said that in the Jewish community, "We are not immune to having these views. There are people in our community who have these bigoted, racist views."

But, Foxman warned, Friedman's views are not reflective of the Chabad rabbis he knows. "I am not shocked that there would be a rabbi who would have these views," Foxman said, "but I am shocked that Moment would give up all editorial discretion and good sense to publish this as representative of Chabad."

A few days after anger about the comment surfaced, Chabad headquarters released a statement saying that, "we vehemently disagree with any sentiment suggesting that Judaism allows for the wanton destruction of civilian life, even when at war."

The statement added: "In keeping with Jewish law, it is the unequivocal position of Chabad-Lubavitch that all human life is G-d given, precious, and must be treated with respect, dignity and compassion."

In Moment, Friedman's comment is listed as the Chabad response to the question "How Should Jews Treat Their Arab Neighbors?" after a number of answers from rabbis representing other Jewish streams, most of which state a conciliatory attitude toward Arabs.

Epstein said that Friedman was "brave" for stating his views so clearly.

"The American Jewish community doesn't have the chance to hear opinions like this," Epstein said, "not because they are rare, but because we don't often ask Chabad and other similar groups what they think." 

The Chabad movement is generally known for its hawkish policies toward the Palestinians; the Chabad Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, rejected peace accords with the Palestinians. Rabbi Moshe Feller, the top Chabad rabbi in Minnesota, said that the rebbe taught that it is not a mitzvah to kill, but that Jews do have an obligation to act in self-defense.

"Jews as a whole, they try to save the lives of others," Feller told the Forward, "but if it's to save our lives, then we have to do what we have to do. It's a last resort."

Lubavitch Rabbi Manis Friedman - a big for all seasons

Friedman is not a fringe rabbi within the Chabad-Lubavitch movement. He was the English translator for the Chabad Rebbe, and at the rebbe's urging, he founded Beis Chana, a network of camps and schools for Jewish women. Friedman is also a popular speaker and writer on issues of love and relationships. His first book, "Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore?" was promoted with a quote from Bob Dylan, who Friedman brought to meet the rebbe.

On his blog and Facebook page, Friedman's emphasis is on his sympathetic, caring side. It was this reputation that made the comment in Moment so surprising to Steve Hunegs, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council: Minnesota and the Dakotas.

"Rabbi Friedman is a best-selling author who addresses some of the most sensitive issues of the time," Hunegs said. "I intend to call him and talk to him about this."

But Shmarya Rosenberg, a blogger and critic of Chabad who lives a few blocks from Friedman in Minnesota, says that the comment in Moment is not an aberration from his experiences with Friedman and many other Chabad rabbis.

"What he's saying is the standard normal view of a Chabadnik," Rosenberg said. "They just don't say it in public."

For his part, Friedman was quick to modify the statement that he wrote in Moment. He told the Forward that the line about killing women and children should have been in quotes; he said it is a line from the Torah, though he declined to specify from which part. Friedman also said that he was not advocating for Israel to actually kill women and children. Instead, he said, he believed that Israel should publicly say that it is willing to do these things in order to scare Palestinians and prevent war.

"If we took this policy, no one would be killed - because there would be no war," Friedman said. "The same is true of the United States."

Friedman did acknowledge, however, that in self-defense, the behavior he talked about would be permissible.

"If your children are threatened, you do whatever it takes - and you don't have to apologize," he said.
Friedman argued that he is different from Arab terrorists who have used similar language about killing Jewish civilians.

"When they say it, it's genocide, not self-defense," Friedman said. "With them, it's a religious belief - they need to rid the area of us. We're not saying that." 

Feller, the Chabad leader in Minnesota, said that the way Friedman had chosen to express himself was "radical."

"I love him," Feller said. "I brought him out here - he's magnificent. He's brought thousands back to Torah mitzvah. But he shoots from the hip sometimes." See also Chabad rabbi aims to clarify remarks on killing civiliansJewish Telegraph Agency – Ben Harris 2.6.09.