Home » History
→ 6 December 2023
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

My Meeting with Young Progressive Jews – Aish

We have failed to properly educate the next generation about Jewish history, Jewish values, and the Jewish connection to the Land of Israel.

[NZFOI: Thought-provoking. The same could be said by most of us in the Western world! We haven’t taught the next generation about our history, values and what made the freedoms we cherish today, possible.
Where did we get the idea that all people are equal? We didn’t get it from the Greeks or Romans! Where did we get the idea that there should be a rest day in every seven? Where did we get the idea of freedom of speech? Where did we get the idea that slavery was wrong?]

I recently spent an evening conversing with a group of left-wing progressive Jews in Brooklyn who are deeply bothered by what is happening in Gaza. They blame the conflict squarely on Israel and its treatment of the Palestinians. They were open to meeting a rabbi and having a heated exchange of ideas.

They all identify as politically progressive, and as one person told me, “Everyone I know is anti-Zionist.” I gained a number of valuable insights from our encounter which I am still mulling over. Here are a few of the key takeaways.

Read more

Filed Under: Opinion Tagged With: , , , ,
→ 26 May 2021
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

SHEIKH JARRAH: THE FACTS | CAMERA

A long-simmering controversy over the fate of Jewish-owned land and Palestinian tenants in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of Jerusalem has once again become frontpage news after yet another court decision reaffirming the pre-1948 Jewish ownership of the land and the obligation of the Palestinian tenants to pay their rent or be evicted.

At the same time, false claims have been made that the Israeli laws are unfair because Jews can recover property in the West Bank, but Palestinians can’t recover property in pre-1967 Israel.

Read more

Filed Under: Resources Tagged With: ,
→ 2 March 2021
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

A Promised Land: Obama’s Memoirs Malign Israel | CAMERA

“Facts,” the English philosopher and writer Aldous Huxley once observed, “don’t cease to exist because they are ignored.” Yet, in his recently released memoir, A Promised Land, Barack Obama both ignores and omits key facts about the Middle East. In particular, the former president gets relevant Israeli history wrong.

Perhaps most disturbing, however, is Obama’s tendency to minimize Palestinian terrorism. For example, he refers to Hamas as merely a “Palestinian resistance group.” Yet, Obama doesn’t tell readers what exactly Hamas is “resisting.”

Obama’s inability—or perhaps unwillingness—to see Hamas for who they are is part and parcel of a broader trend evidenced in his memoirs. The United States’s 44th president repeatedly strikes a false equivalency between Israel and the terrorists who seek the Jewish state’s destruction.

Obama’s tendency towards striking false equivalency between Israeli security measures and Palestinian terrorist efforts is buttressed by an understanding of relevant history that is rooted in inaccuracies and false assumptions.

And contrary to what the 44th president implies, Jews didn’t take the land. Rather, most of the “settlements” were purchased—and often from the Arabs themselves. As the historian Benny Morris noted in his 2008 book 1948: “A giant question mark hangs over the ethos of the Palestinian Arab elite: Husseinis, as well as Nashashibis, Khalidis, Dajanis, and Tamimis … sold land to the Zionist institutions and/or served as Zionist agents or spies.” These families, many of whom would lead opposition to the existence of Israel and the right of Jewish self-determination, secretly sold land to the very movement that they denounced.

Read more

Filed Under: Opinion, Resources Tagged With: , , ,
→ 14 October 2020
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

The War of Return — A review | Quillet

[NZFOI has recently acquired this book for the members’ library.]

In a story that may be apocryphal, the late Christopher Hitchens claimed that he had once seen legendary Israeli diplomat Abba Eban comment that the most striking aspect of the Israeli-Arab conflict is how easily it can be solved: It is simply a matter of dividing the land of Israel into a Jewish state and an Arab state. The only thing standing in the way of this solution is the intense religious or nationalist attachment of both sides to the idea of an undivided nation between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea. Indeed, this assumption that partition alone can bring peace has been the foundation of all of the international community’s peace efforts since the 1967 Six Day War. The only difficulty, it is believed, is persuading the two sides to agree to it.

Read more

Filed Under: Opinion, Resources Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
→ 9 June 2020
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

The Holy Six day War | Arutz Sheva

NZFOI: June 2020 marks the 53rd anniversary of the Six Day War when for the second time, Israel’s Arab neighbours illegally invaded the country in order to destroy it.

During the annual Yom HaAzmaut celebration at Yeshivat Mercaz HaRav in Jerusalem, some three weeks before the Six Day War, the Rosh Yeshiva, HaRav Tzvi Yehuda HaKohen Kook, gave a powerful and prophetic speech to the students and gathered guests, describing his initial anguished reaction when he had heard the news, some twenty years previously, that the United Nations had voted to partition the Land of Israel in approving the creation of a truncating Jewish State. While joyous Israelis danced outside on the streets, he sat at home, stunned by the announcement that the Inheritance of Hashem and Jerusalem had been cut into pieces and divided. Raising his voice, he shouted, “THEY DIVIDED OUR LAND!” Everyone in the hall was silent. “AND WHERE IS OUR HEVRON? AND OUR SHECHEM? WHERE IS EVERY METER OF THE LAND WHICH HASHEM BEQUEATHED TO US ALONE?! HAVE WE FORGOTTEN THAT ALL OF THE LAND IS OURS?!”

One of the yeshiva’s students, the late HaRav Yehuda Hazani wrote down his teacher’s words. “Yehuda had a phenomenal memory,” his wife, Hannah, told the Jewish Press. “After he made a neat copy of his scribbled writing, he showed it to HaRav Tzvi Yehuda for final editing and then arranged for its publication in the HaTzofet newspaper. At the time, no one in the country spoke about our returning to Judea and Samaria, nor about capturing the Temple Mount. The idea was like science fiction. Then, three weeks later, it came true.”

Read more

Filed Under: Opinion Tagged With: ,
→ 19 December 2019
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

Why you should know San Remo | IFF

League of Nations Delegates who attended the San Remo Conference, April 1920

Many people know the Balfour Declaration of Nov. 2, 1917 and the U.N. Vote on the Partition Plan on Nov. 29, 1947 as the two main international political events that led to Israel’s Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948.

On December 11, 1917, which was the eve of Hanukkah, General Allenby led the British troops into Jerusalem. Allenby was hailed as the savior of the Jews, especially in light of the fact that one month earlier Britain had issued the Balfour Declaration.

However, there is a misconception that the Balfour Declaration was just a letter of intent, and not a binding legal document. The reason for this misconception is that most people are not aware of the San Remo Conference which took place on April 19, 1920, lasted for seven days and published its resolutions on April 25, 1920. These seven days laid the political foundation for the creation of the 22 Arab League States and the one and only Jewish State of Israel.

The full text of the Balfour Declaration became an integral part of the San Remo resolution and the British Mandate for Palestine, thereby transforming it from a letter of intent into a legally-binding foundational document under international law.

Did the Arabs oppose the creation of a Jewish State at San Remo? The answer is a resounding NO!

Emir Feisal and Chaim Weizmann, 1918.
Dr Chaim Weizmann (left) and Emir Faisal of Iraq

At that time they were focused on the creation of independent Arab states and had no objection to the establishment of a tiny Jewish state in Palestine. This was formalized in the Weizmann-Feisal agreement which led to the League of Nations recognizing the Land of Israel (then Palestine) as the homeland of the Jewish people.

Read more

Filed Under: Resources Tagged With: , , ,
→ 31 July 2019
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

The Red Sea Diving Resort | Netflix

Now streaming on Netflix is a dramatization of the remarkable story of Operation Brothers, the evacuation of Ethiopian Jews from Sudan.

The film draws its name from the hotel that Mossad purchased as a front for a portion of the operation.

Led by a stellar cast including Chris Evans (Captain America), Ben Kingsley, Greg Kinnear, and Haley Bennett, it is an engrossing story of courage and chutzpah.

Check it out.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: ,
→ 16 July 2019
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

Liquid Knowledge: On Israel and Palestine | Salient

Victoria University of Wellington

NZFOI: Here, Caitlin Hicks has produced a potted history of the Middle Eastern conflict for readers of the Victoria University of Wellington weekly student paper, the Salient. The self-described “objective” history omits some key data. These omissions will inevitably skew the naïve reader toward concluding that Israel is the “bad guy” and is inflicting an injustice on the “Palestinian” good guys. Can you spot the omissions?

Israel—Palestine

This week’s column returns to its roots in attempting to simplify the trickiest of global issues. This week, I’ve attempted to summarise what has been described as the most “intractable” conflict in history. Two pages barely scratch the surface of a heavy issue, but in any case, I’ve departed from my typical jovial tone to deliver an objective and (very!) brief outline.

Two Groups, One Land

Although ‘Palestinian’ encompasses anyone with roots in the land now referred to as Israel, it is commonly used to reference Arabs. Israelis are predominantly Jewish.

The Israeli–Palestinian conflict as we know it today began in the early 20th century. At its core are two groups who lay claim to the same land. Jews, fleeing persecution in Europe, hoped to establish a homeland in what was then a British-controlled territory. This territory wasn’t a country, but an area called ‘Palestine’, occupied by Arabs and Jews: both hoped to claim the land as their own state.

Jews occupying and immigrating into this territory considered it a return to their ancestral homeland, and hoped to establish an independent Jewish state. Palestinians resisted, claiming the land as rightfully theirs, asserting that it was a state by the name Palestine. In 1947, the UN attempted to avoid disputes by apportioning the land to both, but this failed and lead to conflict—the consequences of which still linger.

1948 Israeli War of Independence

In 1948, Israel was declared an independent state by the Jewish Authority. This began an Arab–Israeli struggle rendering 700,000 Palestinian civilians refugees. By the end of the war, Israelis possessed 77% of the disputed territory. Each side views the events of 1948 differently—Palestinians recount a premeditated Israeli ethnic cleansing campaign against Arabs, and Israelis claim that the mass exodus was owed to spontaneous Arab fleeing, exacerbated by collateral wartime tragedies. Today, over seven million Palestinians (those originally displaced and their descendants) remain uprooted. A Palestinian right to return remains a critical condition of any future settlement.

Read more

Filed Under: News Tagged With: , , ,
→ 15 May 2019
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

Rashida Tlaib Has Her History Wrong |The Atlantic

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) listens during a House Oversight and Government Reform hearing on the “Trump Administration’s Response to the Drug Crisis-Part II” on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., May 9, 2019. REUTERS/Leah Millis

Many people, Rashida Tlaib, believe the myth that the Palestinian Arab unfairly paid the price for providing a safe haven for Jews after the Holocaust.  In fact, Benny Morris sets out the case that the Palestinians also had a hand in promoting, aiding and abetting the Nazi’s Solution.  

On Friday, Representative Rashida Tlaib was attacked by President Donald Trump for a “horrible and highly insensitive statement on the Holocaust” and for having “tremendous hatred of … the Jewish people.” Trump’s off-base attack distracted from the actual problems with Tlaib’s account of the Arab-Israeli conflict, in which she deployed deliberately imprecise language, misleading her listeners about the early history of the conflict in Palestine and misrepresenting its present and possible future.
Tlaib told the hosts of the Yahoo News podcast Skullduggery that when she remembers the Holocaust, it has a “calming” effect on her to think that “it was my ancestors, Palestinians, who lost their land, and some lost their lives, their livelihood, their human dignity; their existence in some ways had been wiped out … all of it was in the name of trying to create a safe haven for Jews, post the Holocaust, post the tragedy and horrific persecution of Jews across the world at that time.” She was, she said, “humbled by the fact that it was [my Palestinian] ancestors that had to suffer for that to happen.”
But the historical reality was quite different from what Tlaib described: The Palestinians indirectly, and in some ways directly, aided in the destruction of European Jewry.

Read more

Filed Under: News, Resources Tagged With: , , , ,
→ 24 April 2019
→ By
→ Leave a Comment

Anne Frank’s Diary translated into te reo Māori | Stuff

Boyd Klap has led the project to have Anne Frank's diary translated into te reo Māori. Te Rātaka a Tētahi Kōhine will be published in June 2019.
ROBERT KITCHIN/STUFF
Boyd Klap has led the project to have Anne Frank’s diary translated into te reo Māori. Te Rātaka a Tētahi Kōhine will be published in June 2019.

Parihaka felt like the right place to speak about discrimination.

That’s what Dutch businessman Boyd Klap reckoned.

His visit in 2017 to the settlement that symbolises peaceful resistance was to talk about Māori involvement in the Anne Frank travelling exhibition, to show the parallels between discrimination during the war and what Māori faced in colonisation.

At question time during that Parihaka visit after his talk at a marae there one woman asked if  Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl had ever been translated into te reo Māori.

The story of Anne and her family, who were hidden in an annexed apartment in Amsterdam by non-Jewish friends for three years during the Nazi occupation of Holland during World War II, has been translated into more than 70 languages and published in 60 countries.

But translated into te reo? He didn’t know.

So began his next project for the diary which has been the subject of two exhibitions, both accompanied by a focus on discrimination in the modern world.

Read more

Filed Under: News Tagged With: , ,
Next Page »