Secession Question,
Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles, October 11, 2002
"Secession, in this instance, referred to the referendum calling for the San Fernando Valley to separate from Los Angeles and become an independent city of 1.35 million ... In an earlier day, everyone in the audience would have known why he wanted to slide away from the good-for-the-Jews question. It was not 'cool' to be public about Jewish interests or preferences. The non-Jews might hear, and who knew what consequences might follow. Certainly nothing good. But this is the 21st century and, for better or worse, the Jews are central players in Los Angeles. Jews are at the heart of the city’s cultural life. The garment industry is crowded with Latino workers, but many owners are Jewish businessmen. Real estate and development are identified with major Jewish entrepreneurs. Local politics has a strong Jewish presence, and in terms of fundraising for statewide and national political office, Los Angeles in particular and California in general are essential to the nation’s political life. I haven’t even mentioned Hollywood with its Jewish agents, corporate lawyers and moguls. If you start compiling names of L.A. influentials — Frank Gehry, Steven Spielberg, Eli Broad, Haim Saban, Bruce Ramer, Rob Reiner — it becomes evident that the Jews, on the basis of influence, per capita income and education, are the Brahmins of Los Angeles."

Pro-Israel Activists Seeking Allies Among Immigrants From India AIPAC, Others Stress Threat of Muslim Extremism in Outreach Bid to America's 1.6 Million South Asian Hindus,
[Jewish] Forward, October 11, 2002
"Mirroring close ties between India and Israel, Jewish organizations have begun assisting Indian-American groups in their efforts to become a potent force in both domestic and foreign policy. Leaders from the two communities have been coming together in recent months to discuss hate-crimes legislation and political activism. A major catalyst for the cooperation, however, is the perception that both communities face a common enemy in Muslim extremism ... India and Israel have built a close economic and strategic relationship in recent years, with bilateral trade reaching $2 billion annually ... 'We're fighting the same extremist enemy,' said the capital region director of the American Jewish Congress, Charles Brooks, referring to Jews and Indian Americans. 'We want to help them become more effective in communicating their political will.' Brooks is working closely with the Indian American Political Action Committee, or INAPAC, a new organization that has just been formed, primarily by Indian Americans from New Jersey. Brooks is helping the new organization develop relations with the U.S. Congress and other political leaders. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee and the American Jewish Committee are also drawing on their considerable lobbying experience in helping Indian groups, representing a community of some 1.6 million, to learn how to flex their political muscle."

Sharpton Parley With Israelis Turns Focus to 2004,
[Jewish] Forward, October 11, 2002
"The Rev. Al Sharpton hosted a delegation of Israeli students at his Harlem offices last week in what many saw as a bit of image-polishing ahead of his intended run for president in 2004. The controversial civil rights leader, who antagonized many Jews and others in the past decade with his comments during several racially fraught episodes in the Empire State, welcomed the two Ethiopian-born and two native Israeli students at his National Action Alliance headquarters in a meeting arranged by the Israeli consulate. They discussed how terrorism had changed life in Israel and America, while the reverend showed the students some gifts he had received at an absorption center for Ethiopians during his trip to Israel last year. The consulate billed the meeting as 'another show of solidarity with the people of Israel' and a 'look at the human price of terrorism' ... Sharpton's relations with New York Jews also have ramifications for national Democratic politics ... Sharpton's consultant Ramirez said the minister had not yet decided to make a presidential run ... The Jewish vote is a crucial factor in Democratic primaries in New York and California. Dismissing any political concerns, the Israelis, for their part, professed themselves to be pleased with the Sharpton meeting. David Nekrutman, the consulate's director of community relations, said the consulate had staged two previous events with Sharpton: a meeting before his trip to Israel and a September 11 memorial prayer service six months ago. As far as Israel is concerned, such meetings serve to 'bring a face of Israel not shown in the media... meaning a black face' to the attention of Americans, Nekrutman said."

Argentine Exposé Prompts Probe of Israel's Ex-Envoy,
[Jewish] Forward, October 11, 2002
"The Israeli Foreign Ministry has launched an internal investigation into the activities of its former ambassador to Argentina, Yitzhak Aviran. In the coming weeks, a ministry fact-finding mission will travel to Argentina to try to assess allegations made by the investigative television program 'Puntodoc' last month that Aviran was involved in shady business deals during his tenure between 1993 and 2000. The program, which was aired on national television, alleged that some $17 million of Argentine government money was granted for projects in which the Israeli embassy played an intermediary role. The documentary alleged that one intermediary close to Aviran, Oswaldo Schvartzer, was awarded most of those projects and that several of them were not completed, leading to suggestions that Schvartzer, and possibly Aviran, pocketed some of the money."

Who's your daddy!,
News 24, October 11, 2002
"Tel Aviv - An Israeli man suffered a heart attack when he summoned a call-girl to his hotel and opened the door to his daughter, a newspaper reported Thursday. The 48-year-old businessman was treated in hospital in the Red Sea port of Eilat before returning home to northern Israel, where he confessed the traumatic experience to his wife, the Maariv daily said. His wife burst into tears and vowed to put their daughter back on the righteous path. Then she demanded a divorce from her errant husband. There was no word on the fate of the young woman."

A Jewish Demographic State,
by Uri Avnery, rense.com, October 11, 2002
"A few days ago, the National Demographic Council [in Israel] was revived, after being condemned to inactivity for some years. This is an institution that is supposed to deal with what many Israelis consider the state is most important problem--more important than the war with the Palestinians, Saddam's weapons of annihilation, growing unemployment and the economic crisis. The demographic problem is being pondered in universities, talked about in the media, expounded by politicians and commentators. Experts with computers are calculating what will be the percentage of Jews in Israel in 10, 25, 50 or a hundred years time. Will they be less than 78%? Or--God forbid!--only 75%? Will the womb of the orthodox Jewish woman, in addition to expected immigration, balance the production of the Arab uterus? And if not, what can be done? ... In reality, this is not a Jewish democratic state but a Jewish demographic state. Demography overcomes democracy in all fields of action. An Arab citizen feels at every turn, since childhood, that he has no part in the state, that he is, at most, a tolerated resident. In every government office, police station or place of work, even in the Knesset, he is treated differently from a Jew, even in times of quiet. True, apart from the Law of Return, which gives a Jew and his family (but not to Arab refugees) the absolute right to come to Israel, no law discriminates between a Jew and a non-Jew. But this is only make-believe: numerous laws accord special privileges to persons ìto whom the Law of Return applies, without mentioning Jews specifically. This is so self evident, that all state officials act accordingly without even being aware of it. The Israel Land Authority distributes land to Jews, not to Arabs. All state development projects include Jews only. Among the hundreds of new towns and villages set up since the founding of Israel, not a single one was established for Arabs. There is no Arab minister in the Government, no Arab judge on the Supreme Court bench."

Security — Israeli Style,
Jewish Journal of Greter Los Angeles, October 11, 2002
"For a nice Jewish boy who grew up on Beverly Hills’ Whittier Drive, Aaron Cohen has an unusual skill: He can kill people. He’d prefer not to, but if he must, he will. And it’s not a joking matter. It’s part of the training that he picked up in three years in the counterterrorism unit of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). It’s part of the package he delivers if you sign up to work with his year-and-a-half-old company, IMS (Israeli Military Specialists). 'There’s definitely a respect not just in the Jewish community but elsewhere for the IDF," Cohen said. "That gets you in the door' ... Cohen, 26, likes to tell people he was "born and raised here, but grew up in Israel.' After graduating Beverly Hills High School in 1995, he went to Israel, volunteered for the IDF and was selected for counterterrorism work. He won’t give details of training or assignments, which adds to the mystique. He will say he spent three years undercover in the disputed territories, then he came home. He started his company in October 2000. Jackie Chan was one of his first clients from the showbiz world, one of the few famous ones Cohen will talk about, because they’ve been seen in public together."

Daschle's anti-Israel past,
Jewish World Review, October 11, 2002
"New questions are being raised about the anti-Israel past of Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD). In the 1970s, Daschle was a top foreign policy advisor to then-Sen. Jim Abourezk (D-SD), very well the most anti-Israel member of the U.S. Senate at the time, a role that could now come back to haunt Daschle. With Congress voting to authorize the use of military force against Saddam Hussein, thousands of Jews and Christians rallying in the nation's capital this weekend in support of defending Israel, and mid-term elections just weeks away, now is not a good time for Daschle to be on the defensive. But there he finds himself, nonetheless ... Whether he wrote every anti-Israel screed or just a handful of them, Mr. Daschle apparently never challenged his boss's views -- or did anything else to upset the senator, for that matter. Bottom line: Sen. Daschle has some explaining to do, with just weeks before his political fate may be decided."

Dershowitz: Divestment Petitioners Are ‘Bigots’,
The Harvard Crimson (posted at Front Page), October 11, 2002 "Frankfurter Professor of Law Alan M. Dershowitz is known for holding feisty debates on hot-button issues. Last night his only opponent was an empty chair, but he still managed to spark fireworks. The Harvard Law School professor had publicly challenged Winthrop House Master Paul D. Hanson to a debate over the Israel divestment petition that Hanson signed last spring. Last night, saying Hanson had turned down his offer, Dershowitz staged a solo debate in the Winthrop Junior Common Room. Standing beside a chair with a copy of the petition taped to it, he said students and professors who had signed the petition were anti-semitic and knew 'basically nothing about the Middle East.' 'Your House master is a bigot and you ought to know that,' he told the crowd of about 200 students. 'Everyone else who signed that petition is also a bigot.' Hanson’s knowledge of the Middle East 'ends with the death of Moses,' Dershowitz said. Hanson declined to comment last night. Several students in Winthrop, who did not attend the debate, said they were offended to learn how Dershowitz had referred to their House master ... The petition, which calls for Harvard and MIT to divest from Israel and from American companies that sell arms to Israel, also calls for the U.S. government to stop supplying weapons until four specific conditions are met by the Israeli government. Hanson signed the petition as a professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, along with 73 other Harvard faculty members and 56 from MIT. In total, nearly 600 faculty members, staff members, students and alumni of the two schools had signed the petition as of early this month."

Mayor Bloomberg Should Disinvite Members of 'The Sopranos' Cast,
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, October 11, 2002
"New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has angered the Columbus Citizens Foundation by inviting members of the HBO-TV series, 'The Sopranos,' to march in New York’s Columbus Day Parade. Officials of the foundation maintain that the TV show portrays an 'extremely negative and ugly stereotyping of our people' ... Catholic League president William Donohue spoke for the league today: '... The Catholic League takes no position on the merits of 'The Sopranos.’ But we do take a position on the merits of private-parade organizers to maintain their autonomy free of government meddlers. At stake is the First Amendment right of freedom of association ... If the organizers of the Columbus Day Parade don’t believe that ‘The Sopranos’ projects a fair image of Italian-Americans, then that is good enough for us. Why it isn’t good enough for Mayor Bloomberg needs to be explained.”

Selling anti-Semitism; The "new anti-Semitism", whether real or imagined, is the only sales pitch Israel has that still works, writes Jonathan Cook,
Al-Ahram (Cairo), October 10-16, 2002
"Hardly a day passes in Israel without another lengthy feature in the Hebrew press documenting the rapid reemergence of anti-Semitism in Europe, with France and Britain invariably singled out as the worst culprits. For many months Israel's liberal daily newspaper Haaretz has included a special compilation of reports on the 'New Anti-Semitism' on its website. Some commentators have pointed out that Israel's current preoccupation with anti-Semitism dangerously conflates two separate, and very different, trends: the first a harsher ideological climate in Europe towards Israel's military assault on the Palestinians; and the second a wave of attacks on synagogues and Jews, often committed by Muslim youths angry at what they see as Western indifference to this assault. The blurring of one, legitimate criticism of Israeli actions, with the other, illegitimate retaliation against Jews, serves a useful purpose for Israel. It makes it difficult, at times nigh impossible, to give voice to the daily suffering of millions of Palestinians under occupation without invoking the label "anti-Semite" from a muscular Zionist lobby in Europe and the United States."

German Court Halts Book on Catholics and Third Reich,
Deutsche Welle (Germany), October 10, 2002
"The Catholic Church says Daniel Jonah Goldhagen's new book is inaccurate. A German court has issued a temporary injunction against publication of a new book by controversial American author and historian Daniel Goldhagen about the Catholic Church's history in Third Reich Germany. The regional court in Munich responded to a demand by Munich's Archdiocese that the book be withdrawn from publication over a factual error. The district court issued its ruling on Tuesday based on evidence that information contained in the publication implied false association of a member of the Catholic Church with Hitler's Third Reich in World War II."

FED ‘BUG' HELPS NAB DRUG RING,
New York Post, October 10, 2002
"The feds said yesterday they busted three members of an Israeli drug-smuggling ring, derailing a plot to slip 1.4 million 'ecstasy' pills into New York by hiding them in diamond-polishing tables. The scheme began to unravel in August when workers in an Antwerp, Belgium, warehouse spotted two men, Ofer Lebar and Ofer Weizman, putting $42 million in pills into compartments in the tables, which were being stored prior to shipment to New York."

NBC Changes Top Executive at 'Today,'
Yahoo! News (Associated Press), Oct 10, 2002
"NBC's top-rated "Today" show is replacing its top executive, Jonathan Wald, amid reports of behind-the-scenes friction, according to an NBC executive who spoke on the condition of anonymity. A former producer at the competing ABC show, 'Good Morning America,' is one of the top candidates to replace Wald. Wald, former producer of NBC's 'Nightly News,' joined the morning show in May 2001, replacing the highly regarded Jeff Zucker, who was promoted to president of NBC entertainment."

Kertesz Wins Nobel Literature Prize,
Yahoo News (from Associated Press), October 10, 2002
"Imre Kertesz, a Hungarian who survived Auschwitz as a teenager, won the Nobel Prize in literature Thursday for writing that 'upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history.' The Swedish Academy singled out his 1975 debut novel, 'Sorstalansag' ("Fateless"), in which he writes about a young man who is arrested and taken to a concentration camp but conforms and survives ... 'There is no awareness of the Holocaust in Hungary. People have not faced up to the Holocaust. I hope that in the light of this recognition, they will face up to it more than until now,' he added."

Old Money Wants Iraq Back,
Newsday, October 10, 2002
"The limousine was so long it looked like a small, mobile country of tinted glass. It was escorted by four Nassau County police cars. When Ahmed Chalebi stepped from it at the Mineola courthouse to speak to the media yesterday, correction officers stood guard. They wore bullet-proof vests. Chalebi wore a nice suit. He is an Iraqi-born, Western-educated investment banker and head of an organization calling itself the Iraqi National Congress. The members of this group are all exiles, and all opponents of Saddam Hussein. They want him out. They want parliamentary democracy in. The occasion for this visitation to the grubby courthouse by Chalebi, a patrician-looking, soft-spoken man, was a little obscure, to be honest. It seems Chalebi is friendly with a Long Island man named Mark Broxmeyer, who is in the real estate business, and who also is chairman of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, and who also happens to be a member of the board of trustees of Hofstra University. Through whatever association it was, Broxmeyer apparently arranged for Chalebi to give a lecture about Iraq yesterday at Hofstra. An hour before that, Chalebi spoke to the media in Mineola about the great historic homeland to which he would like to return."

Study: Israel leads in ignoring Security Council resolutions,
Ha'aretz (Israel), October 10, 2002
"Israel holds the record for ignoring United Nations Security Council resolutions, according to a study by San Francisco University political science professor Steven Zunes. On the eve of a possible U.S.-British assault on Iraq, Zunes decided to examine in depth one of the main arguments used by the Bush administration to justify changing the Baghdad regime - Iraq's deliberate refusal to implement UN Security Council resolutions. He systematically went through all the states given instructions by the security council to find out how common a phenomenon it was. His results were somewhat surprising: 'Some of the countries are considered and are known to be friendly to the U.S.,' he told Ha'aretz yesterday. 'In the vast majority of cases I examined, the governments violating UN Security Council resolutions are countries that receive significant military, diplomatic and financial aid from the U.S.' Israel leads the list. Since 1968, Israel has violated 32 resolutions that included condemnation or criticism of the governments' policies and actions."

Lawyers Seek to Sever Bombing Trial Courts: Defense team says jurors will be prejudiced if two JDL leaders are tried together for alleged plot,
by David Rosenzweig, Los Angeles Times, October 10, 2002
"Attorneys for Jewish Defense League leader Irv Rubin said Wednesday that jurors will be severely prejudiced if he is tried alongside his longtime associate, Earl Krugel, on charges of conspiring to bomb a mosque in Culver City and a congressman's field office in San Diego County. In papers filed in U.S. District Court, Rubin's lawyers asked that the defendants' Nov. 12 trial be severed. Rubin contends he had nothing to do with the alleged plot to bomb the King Fahd mosque in Culver City and a field office of U.S. Rep. Darrell E. Issa (R-Vista), an Arab American, last year. Krugel's defense is that he was illegally entrapped by a former league member turned government informer. To counter Krugel's entrapment claim, prosecutors are expected to present evidence that he was involved in at least two previous bombing plots. Any such evidence is likely to rub off on Rubin and prejudice him in the eyes of a jury, defense attorneys Peter Morris and Bryan Altman argued in their severance motion ... Rubin's defense also contended that jurors will be prejudiced during a joint trial because of the 'many disgusting racial remarks' that Krugel made during secretly recorded meetings with the government informant, Danny Gillis. According to a partial transcript of one meeting, Krugel and Gillis traded racist quips about Arabs and blacks."

Patricia Wanniski Is Not Anti-Semitic. To: Mortimer Zuckerman, Very Important Jewish Leader. From: Patricia Koyce Wanniski Re: How Much of a Zionist Must I Be?,
Polyconomics, October 10, 2002
"I believe myself to be fair-minded. So, it was quite a shock when I began writing websites that were critical of Ariel Sharon's Likud government, that I received extremely angry feedback accusing me of anti-Semitism. This has led me, over time, to ponder the question of what is anti-Semitism, exactly? I believe this is a legitimate question, and one that needs to be addressed in a post-9/11 world ... Mr. [Morton] Zuckerman [Jewish owner and editor of U.S. News and World Report and founder of the Zionist Forum], you seem to also equate anti-Semitism with any criticism of the Israeli government, calling it 'anti-Zionism.' Is this the new standard?"

Spammers Hit HNN,
History News Network (George MasonUniversity, October 9, 2002
"On Wednesday, HNN's website at George Mason University was hacked. The hackers, operating from multiple remote computers, succeeded in commandeering the HNN service which allows readers to send an article to a friend. Acting in the wee hours of the morning, the hackers emailed an HNN article to some 18,000 people. The emails bore the return addresses of the so-called 'Campus Watch 8,' the professors who have been targeted by [Jewish professor] Daniel Pipes's Campus Watch website for allegedly harboring an anti-Israel bias. Across the top of the article was the statement: 'Terrorist lovers burn in Hell.' The article the spammers sent? An HNN breaking news bulletin from September 23 about spammers who had inundated the mailboxes of the Campus Watch professors with up to 1,400 unwanted emails a day."

Choking on the stench of journalists worldwide,
by Chana Katz, Jewish Star Times (Miami), October 9, 2002
"I'm ready for the first stage of our long-awaited redemption. Why? Because our sages say then Israel will be free from the yolk of the nations. In the meantime the opposite is happening. The world is tightening its grip. For example, this morning's news brought us America's warning to immediately end the seige of Arafat's compound. By the evening news -- Israel had already stepped back. Only 40 yards so far -- but still . . . we had to punt ... And the head of the United Nations Kofi Anan -- (kof, in Hebrew, means monkey) [JTR notes the subtext of this slur: Kofi Anan is of African descent] -- who made a call heard around the world for Israel to withdraw from 'occupied territories?' Is this man who heads one of the world's most politically powerful organizations really so ignorant of Jewish history? ... Yet sadly, some leaders in Israel's own government are also calling for an end to the 'occupation.' Our sages have also predicted this -- that there would be a time in Jewish history when the leaders of Israel would declare an open war against God and His Torah. I have no doubt at all who will win that war. So, bring on the redemption. And let the nations of the world drop their choking grip around our neck faster than a burning coal. And, if they wouldn't mind, bring me a cup of coffee with one sugar, and take out the garbage." (Chana Katz grew up in Miami Beach and is currently raising her own family in Safed, Israel).

Investigation: Elections Official Accused Of Anti-Semitism Community; Relations Coordinator's Background, Beliefs Questioned,
Channel 10 (Florida), October 9, 2002
"An employee working for the Broward County supervisor of elections may find himself having difficulty with more than helping manage the election, Channel 10 News has learned ... Channel 10 reporter Jeff Weinsier has been looking into [African-American Jimmy] Davis' background and performance. Here's a sample of Davis' writing that Weinsier found in the Westside Gazette published in late 2000: 'How dare the Jews ask or have the nerve to demand an apology or compensation from their oppressors.' 'The Jews must turn that money over to blacks because they accumulated their wealth through the slave trade.' And later: 'It is difficult for me to find sympathy for what the Jews are calling a holocaust' ... Channel 10 News has learned that soon after Davis was hired, there were problems on the job. Elections officials found what they describe as anti-Semitic e-mails on Davis' computer in the supervisor's office. After less than two weeks on the job, personnel records show Davis' pay was cut, he lost his supervisor's position, and he was demoted. Weinsier was told that the reason Davis was not fired was because the evidence against Davis was 'second and third hand.'"

Treason Still Shadows J.R. Oppenheimer,
Insight on the News, October 9, 2002
"Vladimir Putin's attendance at a reunion of KGB veterans at the notorious Lubyanka prison, and his embrace of Vladimir Kryuchkov — the former KGB chief who led the August 1991 coup against Mikhail Gorbachev — has coincided with yet more disclosures about the successes achieved by Soviet spies during the Cold War ... [A Soviet memo] confirmed that in 1942 [the Jewish head of the American nuclear bomb project, J.R.] Oppenheimer, as an unlisted member of the Communist Party, 'informed us about the beginning of work' on a U.S. atomic bomb and then 'he provided cooperation in access to research for several of our tested sources, including a relative of Comrade Browder ... Clearly this memo is important in that it serves to confirm Oppenheimer's covert membership in the CPUSA, although by 1954 the FBI had accumulated a mass of evidence from informants, listening devices and wiretaps to prove that at the very least several senior CPUSA officials in California had regarded the physicist as a covert member. But what about the other assertions, that Oppie had alerted the Soviets to the existence of the Manhattan Project and that he had enabled other Communists to penetrate it?"

Woman Says Einhorn Attacked Her,
Find Law (Associated Press), October 9, 2002
"A woman testifying in the trial of a hippie guru accused of murdering his girlfriend 25 years ago said the defendant smashed a bottle over her head and nearly strangled her in 1966 after she told him their relationship was over. Prosecutors rested their case on the same day that Judith Sabot described the March 1966 attack at a friend's apartment, where she had agreed to meet Ira Einhorn. 'Ira came out from behind the door and smashed me over the head with a bottle; I was bleeding and I reeled across the room,' she testified Tuesday. Sabot, who was 20 at the time, needed stitches to close her head wound. She said Einhorn 'came at me with his hands and started to choke me with his thumbs over my windpipe.' 'I felt and believed I was dying,' she said, choking back tears ... Einhorn is charged with bludgeoning Holly Maddux in 1977 because she wanted to break up with him. Her mummified corpse was found in a steamer trunk in his closet 18 months after he said she went to the store and never returned. The 1970s counterculture figure fled on the eve of his 1981 trial and was tracked down in 1997 living in a French village."

For man overseeing Sept. 11 fund, terrorist tragedy hasn´t gone away,
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Oct. 9, 2002
"It´s been more than a year since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and many people no longer think about the tragedy every day. Kenneth Feinberg does. As the special master overseeing a congressionally mandated compensation fund for victims´ families, Feinberg is constantly reminded of the relatives´ pain and grief. Feinberg, a Washington attorney and Georgetown University law professor in his mid-50s, approaches his task with pragmatism and a philosophical outlook ...Working with such an emotionally charged issue and with grief-stricken families takes its toll, and Feinberg reaches back to his Jewish roots to keep himself grounded ... At last week´s annual meeting of the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington, Feinberg told several hundred attendees how important the work of charities has been to many families. 'I have renewed faith in charities,' he said, praising the federations and calling them essential to the functioning of the Jewish community. Feinberg has won praise from victims´ families for his sincerity and his willingness to help. He has years of experience in resolving disputes in class-action tort cases, having overseen a program for Agent Orange litigation after the Vietnam War. He also serves as an arbitrator for the allocation of legal fees in Holocaust slave labor litigation."

Larry Ellison's Golden Age; Profiteers of the Warfare State,
Chronicles Magazine, October 2002
[Jewish mogul] Larry Ellison has an idea. The relentlessly self-promoting CEO of Oracle Corp., a Silicon Valley software company famous for its ability to grab government contracts, envisions post-September 11 America as a country where everyone walks around with a 'smart card.' Days after the terrorist attacks, the opportunistic Ellison was all over the media claiming that 'We need a national ID card with our photograph and thumbprint digitized and embedded in the ID card.' Naturally, it would all be backed up by an Oracle database. And, of course, he will do it for free—at least until the first inevitable 'upgrade.' The only way to protect ourselves from terrorists is to 'ensure that all the information in myriad government databases was integrated into a single national file,' says Ellison. Oh, and we should not worry about the government intruding where it is not supposed to, because privacy is so pre-September 11: 'Well, this privacy you're concerned about is largely an illusion,' Ellison told news anchor Hank Plante of San Francisco's KPIX-TV shortly after September 11. 'All you have to give up is your illusions, not any of your privacy. Right now, you can go onto the Internet and get a credit report about your neighbor and find out where your neighbor works, how much they [sic] earn and if they [sic] had a late mortgage payment and tons of other information.'"

Leading Montreal lawyer facing fraud charges Harry Bloomfield: Accused of aiding in US$17M 'pump and dump' scheme,
National Post (Canada), October 9, 2002
"A prominent Montreal lawyer and philanthropist, who served on the board of the Business Development Bank of Canada, is on trial in New York on 22 counts of criminal conspiracy. Authorities in the United States allege Harry Bloomfield, 58, helped organize a complex international stock fraud that used dummy offshore companies to bilk unsuspecting investors out of US$17 million ... . A senior partner in the law firm Bloomfield Bellemare, Mr. Bloomfield acts as a director to a number of banks and other companies, including Heller Financial Canada Ltd. and the Vermont Telephone Co. A member of the Progressive Conservative party who ran, unsuccessfully, in the 1980 federal election in the Montreal riding of Mount Royal, he was appointed to the Business Development Bank of Canada in 1987 by then prime minister Brian Mulroney. Mr. Bloomfield was chairman of the BDBC's audit committee from 1987 to 1991 ... . A fixture on Montreal's social circuit, he is renowned for making large public donations on behalf of his family and the charitable foundation that it manages. A number of Canadian public institutions and buildings are named after his family, including a wing of the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal and a student centre at St. Francis Xavier University in Nova Scotia. He holds many titles, including Knight of Justice of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem and Queen's Counsel. He is also the former national vice-president of B'Nai Brith Canada, and Canada's current consul general to Liberia, a position formerly held by his late uncle, Louis Mortimer Bloomfield."

OBITUARIES, Zvi Kolitz, 89; Produced Israel's First Film, Wrote Fictional Holocaust Story,
Los Angeles Times, October 9, 2002
"Zvi Kolitz, eclectic Jewish writer and producer who penned a fictional personal account of the Holocaust so moving that it was accepted as fact for many years, has died. He was 89. Kolitz died Sept. 29 of causes associated with aging in Manhattan, where he wrote a column for the Yiddish newspaper Algemeiner Journal for the last 32 years ... Kolitz was best known for a short story he wrote in 1946 for a Jewish newspaper in Buenos Aires titled 'Yosl Rakover Talks to God.' Based in Warsaw, the story's doomed title character challenges God in a final conversation about the Holocaust. For some two decades, the little story was considered an authentic first-person account by a Holocaust victim dated April 28, 1943, presumably found in a bottle in the charred ruins of the Warsaw ghetto. It was reprinted anonymously in numerous anthologies of Holocaust literature and even as a meditation in Jewish prayer books."

White House offers Israel unprecedented warning of attack on Iraq; Move intended to keep Israel on sidelines,
Marine Corps Times, October 9, 2002
"To keep Israel on the sidelines of a possible war against Iraq, the Bush administration has offered Israel unprecedented notice of at least 24 hours before hostilities begin, and pledged priority attacks against mobile missile launchers, aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles threatening Israel from western Iraq, according to top officials. Formal approval of the bilateral political-military coordination pact is expected during a planned Oct. 16 White House meeting between President Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon."

U.S. Academic Mafia Targets Truth-teller [Daniel] Pipes,
Jewish World Review, October 9, 2002
"American Jews have spent a lot of time worrying about the difficulties facing college students in recent years. As a result, American Jews have put their money and ingenuity to work on behalf of programs would combat assimilation on campus. We have poured more funds into Hillel organizations. The Birthright Israel project was created to bring students to Israel for their first trip to the Jewish state. And philanthropists have endowed Jewish studies and Holocaust-education programs that have proliferated across academia. All of these initiatives have had positive effects on Jewish college life. But despite this, we have witnessed an upsurge in anti-Israel activity across North American campuses that has mixed traditional anti-Semitism with the vicious protest tactics of the far left. While academia has long been a stronghold of the left, the main focus of collegiate extremists has rarely been on Israel in the past. But Jewish students, parents and concerned citizens are only just now coming to realize that there is no greater stronghold for hatred of Israel than American colleges and universities."

Opposition To Anti-Semitic Conference At University Of Michigan,
Israel National News, October 9, 2002,
"An anti-Semitic conference at an American university is arousing groundswells of objections. The University of Michigan has agreed to allow a three-day 'Palestinian Solidarity' conference to be held on its grounds, beginning this coming Saturday. The conference supports a campaign to urge divestment from Israel, while its web site condemns Israel for 'occupation,' 'colonization,' and 'apartheid,' and claims that 'racism and discrimination are inherent in Zionism.' Pro-Israel groups have organized opposition to the conference, including a "Shabbat Against Hate" at the University of Michigan this weekend with Rabbi Avi Weiss. In addition, buses will be leaving New York on Saturday night to hold a counter-demonstration."

'Lude Behavior,
City Paper (Philadelphia), October 3-9, 2002
"The 'Matzoh Ball Mafia' is what some police investigators are calling a multistate drug ring which operated in Lower Merion until earlier this month, when 17 people in Miami, New York and Lower Merion were arrested and charged with selling $700,000 worth of Quaaludes. The gang earned its nickname from some cops because a large number of the defendants are Jewish ... [T]he alleged ring leader, Lawrence Weinmann and his chief lieutenant, Neil Smilen, were New Yorkers. Weinmann, investigators claim, was getting some pill shipments from Switzerland ... The two were constantly flying back and forth between Miami and New York City, buying large quantities of Quaaludes and allegedly reselling them to Alan Chernick, a Penn Valley resident. The Montgomery County D.A.'s office alleges that Chernick was a big-time distributor who resold the drugs to other dealers on the Main Line. Chernick has an arrest record and has done state and federal time in prison, according to the indictment. Some of Chernick's associates allegedly involved in the drug ring include: Robert Spear, the owner of several Philadelphia parking garages; Stewart Cohen, a real estate agent; his brother, Fred Cohen, who owns a computer company in Merion; and Craig Ira Yusem, a close friend of Craig Rabinowitz. You may recall that Craig Rabinowitz murdered his wife Stefanie in April 1997. He then tried to disguise her death as an accidental drowning in an attempt to collect a million-dollar life insurance policy that would wipe out his staggering business debts and finance Rabinowitz's clandestine love affair with a Philly stripper who performed under the alias 'Summer' ... 'Most of these guys involved in the lude ring know one another,' a law enforcement source told City Paper last week. 'We call them the Matzoh Ball Mafia. Many of them live in Lower Merion. They come from wealthy Jewish families but wanted to make money the easy way.'"

Jews Open TV Ad Campaign to Burnish Israel's Eroded Image,
Ha'aretz (Israel), October 9, 2002
"One hundred leading cable TV stations in the U.S. this week began broadcasting paid advertising by two U.S. Jewish groups trying to get Israel's message across to the American public. Believing that Israel is losing the media war, the American Jewish Committee and Israel 21C, a Silicon Valley group, decided to take the unusual step of paying for TV ads instead of traditional public relations methods, such as interviews and print newspaper advertising. Beyond the change in the medium, the ads are also a change in the Israeli message. The emphasis in them is on the similarity between Israel and the U.S., the alliance between the two countries, and most importantly, the fact that Israel is a democracy while its neighbors are not ... The TV ads infuriate James Zogby, head of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee. He said the ads are latently racist, telling Americans that Israelis 'are like you Americans and they (meaning the Arabs) are not,' and that the emphasis on the differences is a form of support for continuing the conflict and distancing peace."

UN Official Says Israeli Attack May Violate Geneva Conventions,
ABC (Australia), October 9, 2002
"The United Nation's top human rights official has voiced concern to Israel over the killing of Palestinians in Gaza, saying it appears to be a violation of the Geneva Conventions. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Sergio Vieira de Mello, handed over a letter to Israel's ambassador in Geneva addressed to Israel's foreign minister Shimon Peres. The letter expresses Mr Vieira de Mello's 'extreme concern' over the deaths of 14 Palestinians in an Israeli military raid in the southern Gaza Strip town of Khan Yunis on Monday. In the letter, the high commissioner describes the killings as an unacceptable loss of civilian life that appears to constitute violations of the Geneva Conventions."

Survey: Israel is Number 2 Threat to World Peace, Just After Iraq,
Ha'aretz (Israel), October 9, 2002
"Israel was ranked number two, just after Iraq, on a list of countries that threaten world peace, according to a recent survey conducted by French newspapers. Syria, Iran and Libya also appear on the list, albeit after Israel. The survey was conducted jointly by five local dailies in northwest France, which have a combined readership of about 175,000."

Ten die as Israeli helicopter fires on Palestinian crowd,
Guardian (UK), October 8, 2002
"The worst came just as the residents of Al-Katiba thought they were safe. A little before 4am yesterday, hundreds of Palestinians spilled on to the streets to check on their neighbours and vent their anger as dozens of Israeli tanks withdrew after a gruelling three-hour raid on the Gaza strip ... Fawzi survived with shrapnel wounds to a leg and both arms. But at least 10 people did die, including a 15-year-old boy and a middle-aged woman, and about 130 were wounded after an Israeli helicopter fired a missile into the crowd of several hundred people. Two of the dead and 22 of the injured were from a single family, the al-Astals. More bloodshed followed. Altogether 14 people died in the Israeli raid on the Khan Yunis district of southern Gaza, a Hamas stronghold which includes Al-Katiba. Another was killed and three were injured when the Israeli army opened fire on the hospital where many of the wounded from the night's attacks were taken. The Israeli military claimed that someone 'in the vicinity" had fired mortars at a nearby Jewish settlement.'"

Accusations against Davis resurface,
Sacramento Bee, October 8, 2002
"In a move that could renew charges that [California] Gov. Gray Davis engaged in improper campaign fund-raising tactics years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to hear an appeal in the case that would have forever kept the accusations against him secret. The decision lets stand a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that a federal judge in Sacramento must release documents containing allegations about Davis' conduct when he was an assemblyman in the 1980s and later state controller ... Sources have told The Bee that the letters indicate Nathanson had accused Davis of seeking campaign donations from people who, with Nathanson's cooperation, would get favorable treatment by the commission. But Karlton ruled that the letters 'contain no newsworthy information' and that the accusations against the politician could harm that individual's reputation. The 9th Circuit overturned Karlton in December 2001, ruling that there was 'no adequate justification' for withholding the documents. But the letters were not released because an unnamed 'private citizen' appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to keep the names from being revealed."

Faces Of The Week,
Forbes, Oct. 8, 2002
"[Israeli citizen and] billionaire Haim Saban, looking to invest his newfound wealth, is in talks to buy Muppet-maker Jim Henson Co., at a steep discount to what Germany's EM.TV & Merchandising AG paid for it, according to people close to the situation ... Jim Henson produces movies, such as 'Muppets in Space,' and its world-famous creature shop makes well-known puppets such as Miss Piggy and the Cookie Monster, and creates special effects ... Saban, impresario of the popular and successful children's characters 'Mighty Morphin Power Rangers,' landed a $1.4 billion windfall last year when he and his partners sold cable station Fox Family Worldwide ... Saban is also bidding for insolvent German media group KirchMedia, Leo Kirch's eponymous--and insolvent--German media empire."

Human Rights Wrongs,
American Prowler, October 8, 2002
"A new entry for the don't-let-this-happen-to-you file: the case of Kane v. Alberta Report, decided, last April 30, in favor of one Harvey Kane of the Jewish Defense League. The conflict should serve as a parable for what happens in modern politics when negative and positive (group) rights collide. One of the first casualties is free speech. The three-judge Alberta human rights tribunal examined charges that an article in an October '97 issue of the Edmonton-based newsmagazine Report, 'A Canmore mall project ends in a bitter feud,' had engaged in negative stereotyping of Jews and had therefore violated the very Canadian sounding Alberta Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Act (hereafter, just 'Human Rights Act'). The judges found the Report 'guilty' of publishing, and the writer of expressing, an impolitic opinion. Maybe it's the fact that it emanates from Canada, home to one of the world's most dysfunctional politics, but it would be difficult to make up material this good. The judges' ruling reads like a parody of modern fuzzy-headed liberalism run amuck. After traipsing through past rulings on the subject of discrimination -- some of which are absolute howlers (e.g., the 'Sambo's Pepperpot' case) -- the judges held that 'freedom of expression, while a fundamental value in our society, is not absolute' and that there can be 'no social interest served in tolerating the free expression of such material.' 'Such material' means expressions of sentiments that the judges do not agree with; or, in this case, the quotation of a sentiment ('North American commercial real estate is dominated by firms that often happen to be Jewish-owned…') that they find distasteful. They found said quotation to be so offensive, in fact, 'that it warrants limiting freedom of expression in this case.'" [The sinful quote in the Alberta Report in 1997 is here, and this is its context: "One professional planner comments on the failed project: 'North American commercial real estate is dominated by firms that often happen to be Jewish-owned [e.g., Oshawa and Canmore Development]. The retail sector is much the same. Like cliques everywhere, some of these people tend to deal with each other, and Mr. Schickedanz is an outsider.'"]

Lautenberg Picked in New Jersey; Familiar and Beloved Face for Jews,
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Oct. 7, 2002
"The Senate’s minyan could soon welcome a familiar face. Former Sen. Frank Lautenberg was named Oct. 1 to replace Sen. Robert Torricelli as the Democratic candidate in New Jersey. Lautenberg, 78, is now expected to face Republican Douglas Forrester in the Nov. 5 election. Lautenberg, who served three terms in the Senate from 1982 to 2000, cleared a major legal hurdle to his candidacy Monday, when the U.S. Supreme Court, without comment, upheld a New Jersey decision that allowed his name to be placed on the ballot ... [Local Democratic Party chairman Ben] Dworkin believes Jews will give their 'overwhelmin' support to Lautenberg because of his positions on Israel and on domestic issues such as the environment, gun control and abortion rights ... A staunch supporter of Israel, Lautenberg has actively embraced Judaism and Jewish causes. In 1974, at age 50, he became general chair of the United Jewish Appeal, the youngest person to hold the title. Lautenberg 'has a long history of standing in the right place to support the strongest U.S.-Israel relationship,' said Lonny Kaplan, a former president of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee who is involved in New Jersey politics ... . Also of importance to the Jewish community was Lautenberg’s work to assist immigrants, resulting in a 1990 bill requiring immigration officials to take into account historical persecution when judging an applicant’s refugee status. The Lautenberg Amendment allowed some 350,000 to 400,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union to gain entry into the United States without having to prove they were individually persecuted."

Suicide of Jewish Official in Poland Accompanied by Fraud Accusations,
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Oct. 7
"The recent suicide of a prominent Jewish community leader in Poland has drawn unwelcome publicity to alleged fraud in the restitution of prewar Jewish property. Feliks Lipman, an Auschwitz survivor who was chairman of the Jewish community in the southern city of Katowice and a vice chairman of the Union of Polish Jewish Religious Communities, shot himself in the head at the end of August ... An article late last month in the Polish daily Rzeczpospolita implicated Lipman in real estate fraud involving restituted buildings. The report described alleged shady dealings related to the restitution of prewar Jewish communal and private property ... According to media reports and Jewish sources, police are investigating several restitution cases in which Lipman was involved. One of these, according to Rzeczpospolita, is that of a certain Chana Goldfeld from Israel, who apparently gave power of attorney to a lawyer from Katowice in 1997 ... Despite the lack of cohesive legislation, many individuals have begun to obtain their former property or their ancestors’ property through existing legal mechanisms. The allegations about Lipman came in the wake of earlier accusations involving fraud connected with these private restitution requests ...'I’m afraid it will have an effect,” said Eve Anderson, CEO of the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Poland, which was set up to administer restituted communal property. 'I’m afraid it will affect the psyche of Polish officials.'”

Lanner is sentenced: seven years in prison,
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, October 7, 2002
"From a corner of the jury box in room 246E of the Monmouth County Courthouse in Freehold, Rabbi Baruch Lanner turned to face the gallery, fixing his gaze on his sobbing, teary-eyed mother, Guzi. 'What did she ever do to deserve this — the total social demise of her own son?' he asked, tearfully. In a few moments, the disgraced rabbi — who was once regarded as a role model for Jewish youth — would be sentenced to seven years in prison for sexually abusing two former students when he was principal of Hillel Yeshiva High School in Deal."

N.J. Gov. Seeks Authority to Fire Poet, Newsday, October 6, 2002
"Gov. James E. McGreevey is seeking the power to fire the state's poet laureate, who has refused repeated calls to resign after writing a Sept. 11 memorial poem criticized as anti-Semitic. Legislation giving the governor the authority to end Amiri Baraka's two-year term could be introduced as early as Monday, McGreevey said Sunday. Last month, McGreevey demanded Baraka's resignation after the poet read 'Somebody Blew Up America' at an August festival. Then he tried to fire him, but the attorney general ruled he did not have the authority. The poem, written in October 2001, refers to an oft-repeated but long-discredited rumor, saying: 'Who told 4,000 Israeli workers at the Twin Towers to stay home that day? Why did Sharon stay away?'"

'Biased' Professors Posted On Web Site,
Washington Times, October 6, 2002
"An Internet site invites college students to cite the names of Middle Eastern studies professors who criticize Israel or in their view offer 'biased' views or make 'biased' classroom remarks about the Middle East, Islam and foreign policy issues. The Web site — www.campus-watch.org — so far cites eight professors and 14 universities. The site was created by the Philadelphia-based think tank Middle East Forum 'in defense of U.S. interests on campus, which includes the continued support of Israel.' ... Muslim-American groups and the American Civil Liberties Union say the Campus Watch site is an assault on academic freedom and amounts to a blacklist of professors and threatens to suppress discussions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict ... The director of the Middle East Forum is a [Jewish] journalist and scholar, Daniel Pipes, who has argued that Americans have not paid sufficient attention to militant Islam. The forum's site includes short biographies of the professors and reprints of articles written about them or letters to the editor and essays they wrote. Some of the notes include the professors' photographs, e-mail addresses and office telephone numbers."

120 Homes under threat of Demolition,
ICAHD, October 6, 2002
" Israeli courts have upheld an Israeli Army order to demolish 120 newly built Palestinian homes in Beit Sahour, a Palestinian town adjacent to Bethlehem. Residents today demonstrated against the order and launched an international campaign to save their homes. The new homes were built by a group of limited income Palestinian Christian families who banded together as the Arab Orthodox Housing Project to build a new life. They obtained a 99-year lease from their Church, the Greek Orthodox Church, 22 years ago and then began the agonizing process of organizing and saving enough money to start construction."

Tolerance Plea Is Stirring Contention,
New York Times, October 4, 2002
"On Monday, the American Jewish Committee will release a statement calling for 'intimidation-free' campuses, signed by more than 300 university and college presidents. But because the statement, which has circulated quietly among nearly 1,900 college presidents since August, specifically mentions only intimidation against Jewish students, it has become the latest focus of the Middle East tensions unfolding on the nation's campuses. The signature gathering effort, first reported yesterday by The Chronicle of Higher Education, was led by James O. Freedman, a former president of Dartmouth College, and six other signers. One of the original six, the president of Emory University, has withdrawn from the effort, deciding that it was too one-sided. Although the statement calls for campus debates to be 'conducted without threats, taunts, or intimidation,' it mentions only Jewish students as the targets of harassment ... Joan W. Scott, leader of the American Association of University Professors' committee on academic freedom, was troubled by the statement on different grounds. 'I thought it was great till I got to the paragraph about the Jewish students,' Ms. Scott said. 'Then I was appalled because it was, to put it nicely, so asymmetrical. If you count it up, there have been far more attacks and harassment of Muslims and people expressing pro-Palestinian views than on those who support Israeli foreign policy.'"

University Faculty Deny Allegations Of Anti-Semitism Group Issues Rejection Of Harvard President’s Claims,
Daily Californian, October 4, 2002
"Twenty-one UC Berkeley faculty members signed a statement this week rejecting allegations that they support an anti-Semitic policy. The statement responded to remarks by [Jewish] Harvard University President Lawrence Summers, who implied that divestment proponents, who call for an end to university and national investments in Israel, are anti-Semitic. In an address to a Massachusetts church two weeks ago, Summers said 'profoundly anti-Israel views are increasingly finding support in progressive intellectual communities,' adding that 'serious and thoughtful people' are advocating anti-Semitism. But UC Berkeley faculty members who support divestment denied their positions were motivated out of anti-Semitism."

9/11: What Did Israel Know? - And When Did They Tell Us?
antiwar.com, October 4, 2002
"Israel had foreknowledge of 9/11 – that was Carl Cameron's explosive contention, made last year in a blockbuster series of reports on Fox News exposing an Israeli spy ring in the U.S. New evidence confirms his story ... This was denied up and down by the U.S. and Israeli governments, and the story was derided as an 'urban myth,' denounced as an 'anti-Semitic' canard, and subsequently banished from the pages of the 'mainstream' media. But evidence began to pile up: reports of hundreds of Israelis descending on U.S. government facilities, and a massive round-up of these operatives claiming to be 'art students,' began to leak out. The story refused to die ... The Israeli 'art student' story has come a long way since the days when it could be airily dismissed: the whitewashers have been forced back to their second line of defense, which is admitting that, yes, there was an Israeli spy ring in the U.S., but they had no foreknowledge of 9/11."

Was This Network Worth Saving? Pacifica Caves In To Smear Campaign,
Counterpunch, October 4, 2002
"On April 17, a program titled 'Jewish Voices' [JV] aired on KPFT, a Pacifica radio station in Houston, Texas. Just a few months into Pacifica's 'renaissance' after a California court victory had apparently returned the network into progressive, and thus safe, hands, KPFT had aired many shows that were absent in previous years. I myself had been on several times in the first months of 2002, interviewing Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Phyllis Bennis, Amy Goodman, Juan Gonzalez, Ed Herman, and Dan Coughlin (the Executive Director of Pacifica), to name a few. Before that, for two years I had been the co-host of 'Progressive Forum,' a weekly show hosted by Wally James and dedicated to covering world affairs and local politics. But the JV show was something quite different. Just moments after it began, it became apparent that this show was pressing an aggressive Zionist message. The guests included an official from the local Israeli consulate, a Rabbi, and the executive director of the local chapter of the American Jewish Committee, Donna de la Paz. The show was being produced by Stan Merriman, an operator in KPFT politics and a local activist in the Democratic Party. In the course of this program, it became clear that the hosts were strident apologists for the Sharon government. The worst part, however, was their treatment of callers. They cut off people trying to disagree with them and would not allow opposing viewpoints to be heard. I can't think of anything more antithetical to the Pacifica mission than censoring callers who challenged the type of Zionist propaganda that was being aired on that show ... Within hours, Merriman, Geiselman, and other Zionists, particularly Edwin Johnston and Dan Jones, political rivals and well-known disruptive elements in the KPFT community, had placed messages on every internet message board relating to Pacifica [and some that weren't even directly Pacifica-oriented] from New York to Los Angeles claiming that I had used a racial slur and that I was anti-semitic [a good chronicle of the whole episode and supporting documents can be found at http://www.acksisofevil.org]."

Diller family's $5 million will boost Jewish studies: Grant to level playing field for Israel,
Jewish Bulletin of Northern California, October 4, 2002
"Pro-Israel elements on the U.C. Berkeley campus have 5 million new reasons to believe the university is listening to them. A grant from the Helen Diller Family Fund -- at $5 million, far and away the largest donation ever received by the university's Jewish studies program -- will ensure a permanent Israeli presence on the U.C. Berkeley campus. Starting in the fall, the grant will be utilized to bring an Israeli professor to the university every year. The funding will also enhance graduate studies and research within the program. In addition to the grant to U.C. Berkeley, Diller gave a matching $5 million to Ben-Gurion University of the Negev toward a building to house its humanities departments. Diller felt compelled to make the grant to U.C. Berkeley because, as an alumna, she was disturbed that the campus has been the scene of some of the most fervent pro-Palestinian activism in the nation. She views the donation as a vehicle for change. 'You know what's going on over there. With the protesting and this and that, we need to get a real strong Jewish studies program in there,' said the Woodside philanthropist, who met her husband, Sanford, at U.C. Berkeley in the 1950s. 'Hopefully, it will be enlightening to have a visiting professor and it'll calm down over there more.'"

Israel's arms inspector,
The Guardian (UK), October 4, 2002
"Sixteen years ago this week, an agent of the Israeli secret police, Mossad, enticed the Israeli nuclear technician, Mordechai Vanunu, to Rome. The holiday ended abruptly when Mordechai was kidnapped and taken to Israel, where he was charged with espionage and treason and given a prison sentence of 18 years. His crime? In 1986 he had blown the whistle on Israel's nuclear weapons ... In the absence of any international inspection of Israel's nuclear capacity, Vanunu was our unofficial, DIY arms inspector. He is now held in Israel's highest security prison, having spent 12 of his last 16 years in solitary confinement. Neither the UN nor any individual member of the security council has questioned his imprisonment or demanded that Israel's nuclear capacity be opened to international inspection. His story reads like a tragic thriller. But it's real life. As real as the fact that the Dimona nuclear weapons factory where Vanunu worked, together with the biological and chemical weapons factory in Nes Zion, is still not open to international inspection. In 1994 Jane's Intelligence Review, the world authority on the arms industry, confirmed that Israel has 200 nuclear warheads, making it the world's sixth largest nuclear power. The same politicians who now threaten military invasion of Iraq because of suspected nuclear weapons capacities, have not demanded inspection of Israel's known nuclear weapons. The double standards that scream at you whenever you see the words 'weapons of mass destruction' cannot be excused on the grounds that Israel is abiding by international regulations. Israel refuses to sign any treaty regulating the use of nuclear weapons. All correspondence concerning the nuclear non-proliferation agreement, the nuclear test ban treaty and other copiously negotiated agreements on weapons of mass destruction go into the Israeli government's rubbish bins. Yet Israel receives $3bn (£2bn) of aid, annually, from the US. This is despite legislation, the Symington Accord, to prevent US governments from granting aid to countries who develop nuclear weapons outside of international control and agreement. Sharon claims that, until there is peace in the Middle East, Israel will do what it likes with its weapons. Sharon's policies of occupation, past and present, of all surrounding territories, Palestinian, Syrian, Egyptian and Lebanese suggests that what he likes is aggression. And, unlike in 1991, he has already threatened a nuclear response to any Iraqi attack."

Mo' Better Exhibitions at MoSex,
Wired, October 3, 2002
"The director of the newest museum in this culture-packed city is surveying the prizes of his permanent collection: leather straps, condom boxes, video porn playing on large screens. He stops and points at a 1940s Wonder Woman comic book cover. 'Just look at her,' Daniel Gluck says. 'The cinched waist, the high heels, the rope ... She's always tying people up.' Wonder Woman is among the tamer attractions at the Museum of Sex, which opens this weekend in Manhattan and aims to catalog American sexuality, from 19th-century brothels to turn-of-the-millennium sex parties. In a city that has affectionately shortened the names of its culture hubs --MoMA, the Met -- the new museum has already been dubbed MoSex. And it has stirred opposition from those who say it is merely a celebration of smut. The state rejected an early attempt by Gluck to create a tax-sheltered foundation to support the museum."

The Sovereign of Smut A Tribute to the Life and Work of Gershon Legman, Scholar of the Dirty Joke,
Spectator,
"The fat old man was Gershon Legman, the world’s greatest scholar/collector of the dirty joke. Legman's death last year attracted little attention beyond a brief obituary in the New York Times. His books never became especially popular, and his writing was rarely taken seriously by academic folklorists, mainly because he attacked scholarship with skill, wit, and a perverse glee. Academics, for their own part, were scornful of Legman's tendency to lapse into vulgar asides, his virulent homophobia, and his constant groundless swipes against anyone or anything he happened to dislike. He had very few real friends, numerous enemies, and died, just as he lived, on the poverty line. But for those, like me, who found themselves fascinated and compelled by his unorthodox ideas and violent polemic, Gershon Legman will remain the Sovereign of Smut. I first came across Legman's work in the summer of 1995 in a second-hand bookstore in Madison, Wisconsin. There I stumbled upon a huge book bound in a dark brown cover with the intriguing title No Laughing Matter. This book, I soon discovered, was a mammoth collection of outrageously filthy and obscene jokes, divided into various categories including 'Urinating on Others,' 'Bend Over,' 'Self Castration,' and 'Fecal Meals.' In fact, even Legman himself admits in the introduction -- and not without a touch of pride -- that 'this book is full of material so disgusting that it will make any decent, clean, healthy person want to throw up.' It was also the most unfunny book of jokes I'd encountered since reading Freud's Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious, which Legman claims to be his primary model. Legman, however, takes Freud's already depressing hypothesis even further, suggesting that the tendency to tell jokes is not only a manifestation of sexual neurosis but actually a symptom of psychopathology."


The Palestinians Are No Longer Alone; Israel, Despite the Craven Intimidation of Some of its Supporters, Has Ceased to Be Immune From Truthful Media Criticism,
by John Pilger, ITV, Oct 3, 2002
"The 'quiet of power' is no more; the Palestinians, having fought back, are no longer alone. Last Saturday, up to 400,000 people filled much of central London calling for justice for them, and in opposition to the proposed criminal attack on Iraq. The two are linked; only the vintage of the imperial regime in Whitehall is different. At the Israeli Ministry of Truth on Palestine, and its branches in America and this country, there is panic, which is understandable. Until recently, a Zionist narrative has dominated much of the region's historiography in the west; and Israel's immunity from truthful media criticism has been almost guaranteed. Tim Llewellyn, for many years the BBC's Middle East correspondent, has described this, accusing the BBC of 'continuing to duck' its public service duty to explain 'the true nature of the disaster [of the occupation] and Israel's overwhelming responsibility for it.'"

New Hampshire Attorney Unleashes Catholic 'Witch Hunt,'
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, October 2, 2002
"Mark A. Abramson, a New Hampshire attorney, has gone into court seeking all Catholic clergy personnel and probation files, archives and complaints of sexual abuse made to the Diocese of Manchester. The names of the alleged victims are not being released by Abramson. This, in turn, has led diocesan lawyers to file a motion forcing the release of the names. Catholic League president William Donohue opined as follows: 'Mark A. Abramson has shown no interest in obtaining the personnel files of ministers, rabbis, imams, teachers, social workers or psychologists. Just priests. His sense of fairness also allows him to oppose due process rights of Roman Catholic priests: they have no right, in his mind, to know the identity of their accuser ... For his ‘witch-hunt’ efforts, we are including Mark A. Abramson in our 2002 annual report on anti-Catholicism. Indeed, we are mailing him a box of our 2001 annual reports today so he can get an idea what his entry will look like. Unlike Abramson, the Catholic League likes to name names.”

THIS WEEK'S JEWISH NEWS: continued