“The essence of Jewish ethics is the development of sensitivity for one’s fellow human beings, and the ability to see every person as a vehicle for the image of G-d in which he or she was created. In fact, this is the ‘reason’ the Jewish people ended up in Egypt in the first place. Because if ten brothers could sit down and have lunch while their brother languished in a pit, then something was dreadfully wrong.”

So sayith Rav Binny of Isralight fame. If you know him, your life is probably richer for it. If you don’t, read what he wrote about this weeks parasha (disclaimer: it’s long, but I think it’s worth it) and see if you get something out of it, like I do every week.

It’s covers the concept of Journeys, the narrative development of empathy in the character of Moses, and the very very strage circumcision incident.

Shabbat Shalom

(more…)

Somebody who lives in Canada please explain what this means.

Thanks.

By the way, do Muslims already have their own Sharia courts in Canada or has this not happened yet?

Long time reader js sent me a link to this odd photo. It’s of a Thai nurse identifying Tsunami victims. What’s with the Chanukah shirt?? Hmmm… and the usually uh… sober Allison from An Unsealed Room makes this interesting connection between Israeli luncheon spam and disaster relief. Oy. Now onto serious stuff. For those of you with any heart and a few extra shekels please visit Katie-Yael’s Aliyah blog for a list of places where you can help. Elohim yishmor.

The Mullahs are not happy

The Washington Post Times reports that living circumstances are so dire in Iran that some Muslims there are contemplating conversion to Judaism and aliyah. You just can’t make up stuff like this. Now, not only is Madonna more Jewish than you are, but masses of Iranian Muslims are both more Jewish and more Zionist than you.

Thanks to Lisa and Israelicool, we have this story from an Israeli survivor of the Tsunami, Delian who is the wife of Ran.

This is the first chance I have had to either call or email. As you can imagine, it is/has been quite traumatic and chaotic here right now. It has been for days. We are now in the centre of the island in Kandy – away from the ocean. I’m sorry I didn’t call you, but we only managed to call on someone esle’s cell-phone and I wasn’t sure if you would have heard the news (remember you always say you avoid the news) and I didn’t really know exactly how big this tsunami was.

We are ok physically. I am pretty traumatised though. When the tidal wave hit, we were having our last surf lesson and so were in the water when everything first happened.

(more…)

Every once in a while we get people asking “who the hell are you guys anyway?” Even more often, people we know are surprised to find out that we are the folks behind Jewlicious. We’re not coy really, at least most of us aren’t, we’re just not big into self-promotion I guess. Also and more importantly, we’re not big famous Jewish celebrities or academics. With the exception of one blogger, none of us are Jewish community professionals, and even that one professional, Rabbi Yo, is very unconventional. We’re basically the Jews that you meet, when you’re walking down the street, we’re the Jews that you meet each day…

If after having read this, you want to drop us a line or whatever, just go to our contact page and do so.

aaron
aaron grew up in the san fernando valley, but living with israeli parents guaranteed seeing much of the world before he finished yeshiva day school. he writes short stories, poems, and viral videos. he blogs at life in samsonite, where he rants about his love life, ecology and sustainability, jewish stuff, and technology, and those special people that bring everything together.

Arielle
4 years of synagogue pre-school, 12 years of Religious School, 2 semesters of college Hebrew, 6 years (and counting) of Jewish communal work and now…writing for Jewlicious. My parents are so proud. Originally from a diverse and welcoming suburb of Philadelphia – I’m a single Jewish girl living and working in a nameless two-horse town in the Northeast. That’s my cat in the picture; my neurotic attempt at semi-anonymity,at least until you want my autograph and digits.

3 random facts about Arielle:
-I fall somewhere in between “neo conservative” (what? everyone else said it!) and bleeding heart liberal, depending on the issue.
-I wrote a college essay about Ramona Quimby (google her, if you must)
-I have a penchant for bagels & lox, Yuengling, DSW and 80s music, especially Europe’s Final Countdown

beth
Beth is just eager to find a nice group of Jews with which she can gossip about other more famous Jews. She’s a celebrity monger but also loves to dish about tv, music, films (mostly indie movies she forces her husband to watch on Netflix and any movie that contains subtitles, which doesn’t exclude OJ Simpson 70’s flicks) She loves pop culture trivia and spent her college years at the University of Michigan playing 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon in the cafeteria and only registering for classes she could show up to in her PJs. It was a limited selection so she majored in French. In 2004, she published a book called “10 Secrets I Learned From The Apprentice.” Unfortunately she never met Donald Trump, but if she did would ask him if his hair were really orange. She likes orange very much, but her favorite color is Magenta cause it rhymes with blue placenta.

ck
I have a love / hate relationship with Jews. Don’t even get me started. I am the product of 11 years of Hebrew day school, a year at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and far more University education than is healthy. I have this never ending fascination with Judaism, similar to a little kid who derives endless pleasure from contemplating his belly button.

I love Israel, and I especially love Jerusalem. Love begins and ends in Jerusalem. I’ve led 9 Taglit birthright israel trips, the next one in January will be with Heeb Magazine and Oranim, and I’ve been to Israel more times than I can count currently live in Jerusalem. I’ve been involved in any number of Jewish and Israel advocacy organizations but I have always felt that grass roots stuff I’ve been involved with has been more effective and satisfying. I’m kind of a shit disturber that way.

Currently working for DrummerWeb, where we host and design Web sites for a wide range of clients, including a number of Jewish groups, most of whom have no idea of my involvement in Jewlicious. I’ve lived in Jerusalem, Paris, New Orleans, New York and Boston.

dahlia
Choosing as her namesake a famous Jewish warrior queen, dahlia is a proud Jew and Zionist, now residing in the Great State of Israel. She is working on her Masters at Tel Aviv University, and is a self-proclaimed expert on the Middle East. She likes chocolate, M-16s, ballroom dancing, and long walks on moonlit beaches. Fun fact? She’s sort of a nerd and likes Israeli folk dancing. But don’t let that fool you, she still has a black-belt.

dani
You can’t get any Jewier then growing up in Brooklyn, but advocating for Israel on campus and authoring a kosher travel blog, Dani has managed that feat. He spends his days directing his minions of pro-Israel campus zombies, and moonlights by traveling the world… kosher style.

Dani was somehow chosen to the Jewish Week’s “36 Under 36: The Next Wave of Jewish Innovators”… and we’re very proud of him.

Networking at over 50 Israel related conferences, Dani is connected to every Jew on Facebook. He is going for an MBA in International Marketing so he can write witty bios for himself. Go find him on Facebook, Twitter, on one of his blogs, or on Gchat.

Dani is busy. You may be interrupting.

esther
The author of beloved blogs My Urban Kvetch and JDaters Anonymous, and senior editor of new magazine PresenTense, esther is also a singles columnist with the New York Jewish Week. She also recently began writing Good For the Jews, a new blog at the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Typically, our bloggers write their own intro but Esther’s been busy spreading the Kvetch across America. Thus this will have to do until she submits something. This also gives us a chance to gush about how cool we think Esther is and how thrilled and flattered we are that she would share her unique take on things with Jewlicious. Mamish flattered. We are not worthy. And yes, I am indeed currently sober. [Esther's note, 9/06: I was supposed to submit my own bio, but this paragraph that CK wrote was so flattering and captured such a memorable moment that I'm hesitant to change it. So if you want more info about me, you can see the articles and bio on my professional website, EstherK.com.]

froylein
European mix with a love for silly puns just as for warm vanilla pudding & tomato soup (in that order), languages hardly anyone knows, healthy doses of kitsch, Brooklyn, interactive pop-up books, warm socks on winter days; tends to forget birthdays, anniversaries, names, faces, calling back; avoids celery; would donate for hip-replacements to hipsters; whistles in the shower.

* The photo above is not of froylein. But it’s the closest we could find.

grandmuffti
Just goes along with any damn fool idea ck comes up with. This has included starting a Web design firm, being one of the leading harassers of Nazis online, torturing the congregation of the 3rd oldest synagogue in the US and other stuff that can’t really be discussed right now.

The product of Toronto’s finest Hebrew day schools, grandmuffti is currently completing his PhD in Philosophy. [He's done! He's done! He's Dr. Muffti to you, fools!] This explains his rigorous logic and often unintelligible ramblings (unintelligible to you. Trust me, if you were smart, you’d totally understand).

Grandmuffti hates continental philosophers, loves the band Tool, plays guitar and used to have hair below his shoulders. One day soon, he will actually write his own profile, and put up a photo …

Jamie Kirchick
Jamie works for The New Republic and is a columnist for the Washington Examiner and the Washington Blade, the former owned by a major supporter of the Christian Right and the latter being the biggest gay newspaper in the United States. He blogs for both TNR’s “The Plank” and produces much neo-conservative bile for Commentary’s “Contentions”. He writes regularly for The New York Sun and his opinion pieces run in newspapers ranging from the Los Angeles Times to the Wall Street Journal Europe. He is a lover of Israel and the Ramallah gay scene in particular. He knows his Bubbie must be proud that her grandson is affiliated with a website called jewlicious.

Leah
Leah Stern grew up in Miami Beach, and graduated from the University of Miami. She is a freelance journalist who has been published in The Miami Herald, Miami Sun Post, Detroit Jewish News, New York Jewish Week, Jerusalem Post and Haaretz. Stern resides in Jerusalem, where she is a correspondent for the Israel Broadcasting Authority English News. She is also producing a documentary on Israel’s Disengagement from Gaza. Leah has toured across the United States speaking about her experiences living as a new immigrant and working in Israel as a Journalist, She is also an ROI120 alumni.

phoebe
Phoebe enjoys the Zabars cheese counter, “Yossi and Jagger,” and fin de siècle Zionism. Her goals in life are to understand French Jews and French-Israeli relations, to become fluent in Hebrew, and to own several large and furry dogs. She thinks Alfred Dreyfus was sort of good-looking, and would have had an affair with him if given the opportunity. She considers herself a neoconservative mugged by reality, a social liberal, and a Jewish nationalist. Phoebe has her own blog, appropriately titled “What Would Phoebe Do?” Well, uh… join Jewlicious apparently. Bienvenue Phoebe!

harry
Harry is a prophet, sent by Ha-Kadosh Baruch Hu to illuminate His People Israel with the light of Rock. However, since a prophet is never appreciated in his own city, Harry was forced to flee Jerusalem for the greener pastures of Modi’in, where he produces one of the first Israeli blogs, The View From Here, doesn’t produce a well-loved podcast, collects Vietnamese kitchen utensils and battles zombies. In addition to his passions for Rock and hummus, Harry enjoys firing tank-mounted mag machine guns and makes a mean cholent. He intends to grace Jewlicious with much-needed Israeli cultural content and paeans to the many fine culinary establishments of this most Zionist of Entities.

rabbi yonah
Chasidic Zionist, tree hugger, save the whales, meat eating, music loving, baal teshuva, stand up proud yid. If you want more see my bio here. And how did this Rabbi come to mash-up with Jewlicious?

Got into blogging as an addiction with ck in the summer of 2004. He helped us design and create BeachHillel.com which broke ground for being well, a Hillel Blog. In DC they hadn’t even heard what a blog tastes like….

Happily got ck to agree to fly to Long Beach, having never met me, for Jewlicious@TheBeach 1. They actually believed that we had made a conference! Imagine if it had just been an elaborate plot by a gang of rival bloggers to lure them into the open and take away their wifi connections. This was clearly before the days of Blogger Protection Teams, and Secret Blog Service. Oh and I love every Jew, especially the ones that I argue with here. There are my closest cousins. Oy, luv em so!

Stop on by for Shabbat Dinner if you are in the LA/LB hood.

Sarke
The new bloggirl in the class. Try to make her feel welcome, kids. She’s never sure whether the journalist / writer / editor / webcontent consultant / startup junkie part of her resume ought to be mentioned before or after the mother of four boys part. Having lived in Israel for her entire adult life as a wedded dweller of religious suburbia…nay!…an active (although at times rather subversive) participant thereof, it may be surprising to find the likes of SarKE on this hip urban mockathon. She is truly honored to have her worlds collide in this fashion.

Catch her between loads of laundry and conference calls – being by turns sentimental, self-indulgent, and overly-serious – at www.the-word-well.com. Make sure to comment on it.

steve
Steven H. Pollak has written for the Baltimore Jewish Times, the Atlanta Jewish Times, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency and American Jewish Life magazine. In addition, Steve’s writing has appeared in numerous legal and business publications. Steve enjoys hunting wild boars which he then donates to non-Jewish orphanages. Prior to his current gigs he enjoyed a brief but lucrative career as a pirate on the Barbary coast. Ok. Those last two things were lies. Sorry. He can be reached at steve@jewishliteraryreview.com

the_middle
Wishes to remain anonymous. Has been acquainted with ck for years and yet, ck has no idea what he looks like. But amongst the things ck does know and can share is that he has been a tireless advocate on behalf of Israel and Jews, jousting with all manner of neo-nazis, anti-Israel propagandists and ignorant folk in general. He is relentless and thorough but still possessed of an open mind and pleasant disposition.

ck forgives him for his unhealthy obsession with the infamous French Hill spitting incident and his Haredi fetish. Oh and the_middle has an interest in falafel making utensils.

spawnof6
Spawnof6 is the daughter of Rabbi # 6 on the Big Jews list in Newsweek. How much does that say about me? Absolutely nothing. I’m the product of Jewish Day School, was raised in New York, Los Angeles, and Jerusalem, and yet, I still don’t hate Arabs. I currently live on the Upper West Side, go to school in Boston (Go Wellsley!), and am waiting to move to Jerusalem. I love good hummus but it’s hard to find it out in the Diaspora, hence the appeal of Aliyah. I have glasses but I only wear them when I want to look smart. Luckily, I was wearing them when I met ck and he thought I was smart/cool enough to write for Jewlicious.

vicki
Vicki was born in Russia and raised on vodka and cynicism. In the United States, she really began to feel Jewish around the time she went on March of the Living to get away from a bad breakup and has since organized more Israel festivals than Golda Meir. She believes her two-month internship in Tel Aviv gives her the right to be a smug and discerning shakshuka critic. Currently she’s sold her nerdy soul as an international trade analyst, and muses frequently about how she’s the cheap man’s Shalom Auslander, except minus the religion, at her blog, vickiboykis.com.

Wendy In Furs
Hi! I’m Wendy. I’m new to JBlogging, and am quite fascinated by it. My job does not even remotely allow me to do this sort of thing publicly and so I, with great hesitation, join The Middle as Jewlicious’ second anonymous blogger. Where I live and what I do are not as important as what I know. I hope you will be entertained from time to time and I do look forward to being a member in good standing of the Jewlicious community. Some people say blogs are no longer relevant today, I say you must be in old media. Or boring. Or both. And no, I don’t actually wear furs. Ever.

Y-Love
Y-Love is a black orthodox rapper, who won “Best Jewish Hip Hop” over Matisyahu in the 2006 JMA’s. He rhymes in Aramaic so there isn’t much competition, but that doesn’t yetzer hara him into just getting by. He is a brilliant MC who weaves Kabbalistic themes into the many languages in which he spits. Y-Love has performed with Lou Reed, DJ Spooky, Hadag Nachash, Matisyahu, & Steinski at venues ranging from Princeton to Irving Plaza. He is a contributing editor to Jewlicious.com, the web’s leading Jewish blog, as well as to his own site Thisisbabylon.net, a site already beginning to gain notoriety for its unabashed critiques of Antisemitism, racism, and Islamophobia.

If you’ve ever met Israelis, chances are high that they had a cell phone attached to their ear or hip. It’s like an addiction, like an added appendage. Now, in a brave new effort to never, ever have to turn them off, Qualcomm Israel has invented technology that allows cell phones to be used while in-flight. You may now add THIS dubious achievement to the long list of Jewish contributions to the betterment of the world.

Israelis. Figures.

UPDATE: Case in point; these Israelis, escaping the Tsunami in Thailand, ran for their lives, crawled up a collapsing hill in their bathing suits, and in all this and the terror they felt they were still somehow “able to hang onto their cell phones.” Of course.

UPDATE: (by ck) This is getting ridiculous… the dissemination of porn via cell phones in Israel has gotten so ubiquitous that Israel’s Communications Ministry is now forcing mobile phone operators to restrict access to pornographic services because too many children were exposed to erotic material. How erotic can something that small and blurry be??

After what is easily the most disastrous event in recent memory, the Vatican, never much of a friend to the Jews, was quick to point fingers;

The Vatican Newspaper denounced what it called a decision by the IDF to deny emergency help to disaster victims in Sri Lanka.
Calling for “a radical and dramatic change of perspective” among people “too often preoccupied with making war.”

Which, of course, was total bullshit.

The Defense Ministry Tuesday night sent a plane loaded with 80 tons of supplies, (worth $100,000) including medicine, water, food, blankets and generators, to Sri Lanka.”

Not only that, but we tried to send more help, and were actually turned down:

The plan original called for a delegation of 150 people, including doctors, IDF rescue workers and journalists, to fly there as well, but this idea was shelved when the government in Sri Lanka informed the Foreign Ministry that it does not have the wherewithal to logistically provide for all the aid workers pouring into the devastated country from around the world.

So where are they getting their information from? Is Mel Gibson running the Vatican Newspaper now or something?

Well, the worm died and now his picture graces campaign stops by Abu Mazen, Fatah’s new leader and the probable winner of the upcoming Palestinian elections in early January of 2005. Everybody is viewing this as an opportunity to develop a new relationship between Israelis and Palestinians, and perhaps even a dialogue leading to, I dunno, leading to something.

So Mr. Abbas is on the campaign trail and has made it clear that he is either a lying politician telling the Palestinian public and opposing factions what they expect to hear, a firm negotiator laying down his opening position, or else he is ensuring the conflict only becomes worse (although he has publicly stated that the “violent” struggle by the Palestinians needs to end).

So let’s see what his list of demands is:

1. No settlements – at all

2. No separation barrier – at all

3. East Jerusalem – all

4. Areas from before ‘67 outside the Green Line – all

5. “Right of return” of Palestinians into Israel – yes, all

Welcome the new king, same as the old king…

The Muffti has a question. Kenny recently turned Muffti’s attention towards a book called Who Wrote the Bible by Richard Elliott Friedman. Let the Muffti give credit where credit is due: Friedman’s work is lucid, comprehensible and decidedly not written merely for consumption by the members of the ivory tower. Friedman makes several claims that I was curious about so I’d like to poll the Jewlicious nation on a couple of them.

First, Muffti noticed that Friedman claims that “…At present, however, there is hardly a biblical scholar in the world actively working on the problem who would claim that the Five Books of Moses were written by Moses – or by any one person.”(p. 28) The Muffti, a product of (rather shoddy) hebrew school upbringing never had even heard so much as a suggestion that the author of the written tradition wasn’t given directly to Moses and put to paper. What he is curious about is whether or not others are privy to this information about serious biblical scholarship or not? Is it common coin amongst our people that the bible is multi-authored or is do the lay people (like Muffti) only know of the single author hypothesis?

(more…)

Shalom Bayis and Concubinage

There’s an article from the Washington Post, reproduced at JewishWhistleBlower about the resurrection of Jewish concubinage. It discussed a necessarily shady organization called Shalom Bayis whose aim was to promote kosher, permissible extra-marital sex for Orthodox men through the biblically established institution of concubinage. Far from being prostitutes, concubines would be Orthodox career women who are “unmarried, monogamous, and observes Jewish laws of female purity — which means abstaining from intercourse during menstruation and monthly dips in a ritual bath.” The article was a bit shocking, to say the least. And of course, the fun was limited to the men – no similar facility was offered to women (although apparently they have other acceptable options).

Too bad it was total bullshit. Concubinage was banned over 1000 years ago, along with polygamy and this organization, Shalom Bayis is some kind of elaborate media stunt aimed at discrediting Orthodox Judaism. As reported in an article published in Moment magazine and reproduced at Frum.org, the concubine story was reproduced everywhere from the New York Times, to the BBC, to the JTA to Marie Claire… despite the total lack of corroboration. The “Yossi” in the Washington Post story also managed to convince mainstream news publications the year before that Orthodox men were marrying off their pre-teen girls for leverage in divorce cases. That turned out to be crap too. Anyhow… thanks for wasting an hour of my life Jewish Whistle Blower dude. I totally hate you, but for some odd reason, I can’t stop reading your blog.

Peh is for Pelephone!

Israel’s Ministry of Absorption has plans to launch a new TV station “dedicated solely to teaching Hebrew to new immigrants – a move unprecedented in any other country.”

The programming will include lessons on Jewish and Israeli culture, and news broadcasts using simple Hebrew will be broadcast periodically. Interactive features such as crossword puzzles and logic games that can be filled out using special remote controls are also going to be included.

Imagine the programming possibilities! Lessons in Israeli culture? Like what? How to stiff shoulder people when out in public? How to spend 15,000 shekels a month while still only earning 13,000 and still managing to take that yearly trip overseas… to shop? How politics in Israel is like sex in America; your either doing it or talking about it?

Still, the language stuff might come in handy, when you can argue with an Israeli and win, you know you’ve made it.

Do yourself a favor, click here and watch The Daily Show clip of This Week in God: Holiday Edition, which deals with Blood Libels, Israel’s shabbos credit card, Kwanzaa, and hallucinogenic tea.

Oy, don’t ask.

I still can’t figure out whether this is very well done creative writing or a real woman pouring her heart out to the universe. The blogging world has given us Marneyshayne who gives her location as the “United States.” Marney is either some acne-ridden Columbia Creative Writing grad student, or is the frum mother of four children who has recently stopped cheating on her husband and in lieu of afternoon trystes with her lover (frum, also married with four children), is bestowing us with unusually open and thoughtful posts about her recovery from the affair. I find the posts to be engaging and interesting, as are some of the comments, like this one from a married frum man (or a Yale, acne-ridden, basement-dwelling, creative writing grad student who may become President one day) who claims to have had adulterous mind blowing sex with a 5′10″, 115 lb. (what else) non-Jewish beauty.

However, nobody has yet come down hard on this woman for what she has done. Everybody is a little too forgiving of her actions…

Anyway, on her Chanukkah post, she provided some of the details of the affair. Jewels like this one make this post and comments worth reading:

I remembered my feelings towards xMM. I had never gotten over them. I searched for him on the internet and found his work email. I emailed him and confessed my former feelings. I explained that breaking off our friendship had nothing to do with him having done something wrong, as he had feared. He responded that he forgave me, he was glad for the contact, and that I had opened a can of worms. He wondered if we could make a relationship work.

I was nervous, giddy, beside myself. I didn’t know what to do. My head left me. We continued email correspondence and graduated to instant messenging. We would set up times to IM at night after our spouses were asleep. We would stay up until 2-3am talking and joking and flirting and catching up on the past 8 years or so. It was established that we were both unhappily married and wanted to find happiness elsewhere.

I suggested a meeting one night. I had to kiss him to see if the sparks were real.

Edit: the blog author removed comments because she didn’t like the bickering over the man’s truthfulness, so the man’s story about the affair with the tall woman seems to be gone. What a shame. I’ll leave the link in case she puts it back up.

Yup. It turns out Michael Dell is not the only nice Jewish boy to grace the pages of Forbes. Read all about Joe Cohen, Brooklynite of Sephardic descent who at 17 is a veteran businessman with a thriving and profitable business.

I’m kvelling.

Osama Bin Laden will be captured, Saddam Hussein will be executed, both Abu Mazen and George Bush will be assasinated, an attempted assasination of an Iraqi Muslim cleric will plunge the region into warfare, Donald Rumseld will resign as a result of an Iraq-based scandal and Israel and Syria will be at war. So predicts “noted” Tunisian astrologer Hassan Al Sharibi, who shot to fame by predicting the deaths of both Princess Diana and Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. He also predicted when the Gulf War would start.

The Jerusalem Post reports that as a result of these predictions, security around Abu Mazen has been increased. For real.

“Abu Mazen is in danger. That is why he is being kept away from the public,” a senior Palestinian official told The Jerusalem Post over the weekend. “The people closest to him are highly concerned about his safety.”

The official, a member of Fatah for the past 30 years, characterized the threat emanating from Sharibi’s charts as “very serious.” The source added that Abbas’s aides put a “great deal of credence” in the Tunisian soothsayer.

Good grief.

Strange to find an article about Jews caring for the dead, but there it was in the New York Times on a Shabbat Christmas Day. It seems there is a national movement wherein volunteers care for deceased Jews and prepare them for burial.

At the funeral home, the volunteers, women from Congregation B’nai Jeshurun’s hevra kadisha, or holy society, prepared Ms. Freireich’s body for burial by gently cleansing it of the remnants of medical intervention, ritually washing it and then clothing it in simple white shrouds before placing it inside an unadorned wooden coffin.

I just had the….joy of spending Christmas in North America for the first time in a few years. My Jewish friends here were encouraging me to go experience to novelty of walking through downtown, closed in the middle of the day. To watch people pouring out of their places of worship, and families walking through near empty streets to where they will gather with friends and family over a festive meal.

And it felt somehow familiar. Then I realized it was not because I grew up in hotz l’aretz, its because I see this every week in Jerusalem; Christmas is essentially the once a year shabbos for goyim.

So umm, Christmas shalom everyone?

Just an observation.

Settlers bow to almost universal outrage

The LA Times reports:

On Thursday, faced with an outpouring of revulsion and anger from across the Israeli political spectrum, Gaza settler leaders acknowledged that it might have been a mistake to try to appropriate an image of such iconic power in service of their cause.

“We had decided to wear an orange Star of David in protest of the prime minister’s plans to expel us from our homes,” Motti Sander, a leading activist from the main Gaza settlement block of Gush Katif, told Israel Radio. “But we are attentive to the feelings of the people of Israel … and have therefore decided to stop this campaign.”

The Gaza activists’ capitulation came after leaders of the main Jewish settler group, the Yesha Council, moved late Wednesday to disassociate itself from the orange badge movement.

One prominent settler leader, Yehoshua Mor-Yosef, who until now has enthusiastically supported all protest measures employed by the Gaza activists, branded it an act of “craziness.”

Well, I’m glad that’s over. Wish I could say the same thing for our busy, busy thread on the subject. 48 comments and counting. Quality stuff too. Even I learnt a thing or two …

Folks, you just can’t make these stories up. I’m not sure how ABC News got a hold of this lovely lady before The Jerry Springer Show did, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if they’ll be nominated for a Pulitzer for this report.

“I have entered the bowels of hell and I’m going to be here forever. And I’ve only been married seven months. I’ve got a terrorist in my house.”

Maybe we should nominate them for something as well. Too bad the Buffoons of the Year Award is gone.

Everything you always wanted to know about sex in Nablus tehina but were afraid to ask.

The traditional manufacturing methods are the secret to the charm of tehinas from Nablus. Yehuda Litani, an Orientalist, journalist and author of the book, “Not By Hummus Alone,” agrees.

“They use 100 percent sesame seeds,” says Litani, “and their grinding methods are ancient, stone-grinding that produces a totally different flavor from the sesame.”

I thought I’d share this interesting article about Daniel Pipes. It seems to be a fair, relatively unbiased look at him and his work.

“It is a mistake to blame Islam, a religion 14 centuries old, for the evil that should be ascribed to militant Islam, a totalitarian ideology less than a century old. Militant Islam is the problem, but moderate Islam is the solution.”

Well, it’ll be X-Mas eve tonight, and as Jews we’ll have all kinds of things to deal with. Like for starters, this Chrismukkah thing and the concept of the Chrismukkah – Chrismukkah Yarmuclaus, brought to you by the fine folks at Fox’s OC. There’s a bit of a tussle going on between the show and the dumbasses at Chrismukkah.com. Not only that but given Jewish support for the separation of Church and state, we’re being blamed for wrecking Christmas, by a dumbass Jew no less. All indications so far are that Christmas, I mean, the Holidays, are going forward strong as ever. Damn. Oh well, we’ll have to try much harder next year I guess! Shabbat Shalom!!

Oh… probably not what you think

But this story does involve an archaeologist, and some ancient miracle jugs that were found in Israel. But the photos attached to the story were kind of boring, so I put in Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft (an archaeologist) in Israel, contemplating these very important pottery shards.

See, they figure they found the site of where Jesus turned water into wine (although of course we know that never really happened). This was based on the discovery of these pottery or jug shards which could have been the same kind of vessels the Bible says Jesus used in his first miracle. Which never happened. Yeah. Well, just read the story. It’s very interesting, even though really, Angelina Jolie has nothing to do with it.

Well, well, well, look who is donning orange stars of David on their clothes to demonstrate against the disengagement plan. That’s right, the settler movement has decided that it would not only create “civil” disobedience to complicate the pullout from Gaza, but they are also going to paint themselves as equal to Holocaust victims – which, of course, means that the Israeli government and the IDF are the Nazis.

Yup, a disengagement plan, according to these self-righteous, short-sighted, selfish buffoons, is the same as genocide.

Ladies and gentlemen, Arafat, in his grave, is laughing hysterically, as are all of the rest of the Palestinian propagandists and their supporters in the Arab world and the West.

Do you suppose the settlers will make their Thai workers wear the orange stars as well?

Runner up for Buffoon of the Year would be Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairead Corrigan Maguire.