In 1980, for the umpteenth time, someone asked the Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal whether “it could happen again” — “it” being the Holocaust. “You take hatred and technology and you add in a crisis, and anything can happen,” Wiesenthal replied. Last week, something tragic, horrific, almost beyond words happened.
In Barcelona’s Old City, there’s a narrow street off the well-trod tourist path that leads to what was once the Jewish quarter. In 1391, 100 years before the official start of the Inquisition, Barcelona massacred many and expelled the rest of its Jews, who historians say made up as much as 20 percent of the population. The City Hall in Plaça Sant Jaume was built on land taken from some of these families.
The scariest conversation I’ve had recently was with a college counselor at a local high school.
When the thousands of delegates, journalists and observers drive to the United Nations this September for the General Assembly, I’d like to suggest that on their way they swing by the intersection of 10th Avenue and 35th Street.
It was Saudi Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal who finally convinced me to buy the Nissan Leaf. Almost a year ago, I heard about the car — an all-electric production vehicle that would deliver 100 miles per charge, had all the room of a Prius and cost, after $16,000 in government rebates and subsidies, less than a cheap Kia. I immediately logged on to the Nissan Web site and plunked down a $99 deposit.
Every week, an e-mail circulates among hundreds of Jews in Los Angeles calling for my immediate firing. The subject line of a recent one was, “The L.A. Jewish paper needs a new Editor-in-Chief.” I know when this happens, because the author is always kind enough to copy me on the campaign. The author is usually one of a group of people who reads my editorials, or another essay or headline in the paper and decides that the fate of the State of Israel depends on ridding the Jewish community of what another anti-me organizer called my “über-left anti-Israel perspective.”
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