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November 19, 2015

Declare War on ISIS

Leave a Comment / Blogs /

Don’t declare war on Islam. Declare war on ISIS. Prominent American Muslims have just declared that ISIS is “an extremist group that has declared war on us all.” Give them an opportunity to be in the vanguard of the war effort.

Don’t declare war on Syrian refugees. Declare war on ISIS, and give the men of fighting age among them the opportunity to reclaim homelands and vindicate Muslim honor in the tradition of Saladin.

Don’t declare war on the Iranians or Putin. Declare war on ISIS, and give them the opportunity to join the crusade—or face the consequences of opposing or sabotaging it.

Don’t give the shell-shocked French lip service only. Declare war on ISIS, and mobilize NATO to fight it.

Don’t leave Israel feeling isolated and alone. Declare war on Isis, and recognize Israelis’ unheralded contributions to the anti-terror cause.

Don’t castigate President Obama for being petulant and partisan. Declare war on ISIS, and give him in his last year a challenge to lead in the tradition of Woodrow Wilson and FDR, great Democratic presidents who overcame initial hesitations to lead global crusades for freedom.

Don’t deride Republicans as troglodytes and wingnuts. Declare war on ISIS, and challenge them patriotically to put up or shut up.

The American people, according to the polls, are leery of a third Mideast war. No doubt true. But they were also initially wary of World War II and the Cold War. Declare war on ISIS and give them the opportunity to finish the job in the Middle East, and then reduce U.S. involvement to the minimum necessary to make the region no threat to global security. There's even an historical model for this unconventional war: Jefferson's on the Barbary Pirates.

Bury today’s morbid hyper-partisanship.Unite against a common threat to humanity as Americans did during “the Good War,” but this time avoid mistakes like Japanese American internment and callousness toward Jewish refugees.

DECLARE WAR ON ISIS!

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Clinton urges stepped-up fight against Islamic State in Syria

Leave a Comment / United States /

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Thursday urged a tougher approach to fighting Islamic State militants than President Barack Obama has pursued, with an intensified air campaign and more U.S. special forces and trainers.

Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, the former secretary of state offered her most expansive view to date on how to counter a growing militancy that launched attacks in Paris last Friday in which 129 people died.

“Our goal is not to deter or contain ISIS, but to defeat and destroy ISIS,” she said, using a common acronym for the group, in what amounted to an implicit criticism of Obama, who said days before the Paris attacks that it had been contained.

[CLINTON: Saying ‘radical Islam’ plays into hands of ISIS]

Clinton, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination for the November 2016 election, outlined an approach that is more hawkish than Obama. She said the United States would be prepared to increase air strikes and send more special forces to spot targets and get local forces combat-ready.

However, she opposed deploying large numbers of U.S. troops, saying “local people and nations have to secure their own communities.”

“Like President Obama, I do not believe that we should again have 100,000 American troops in combat in the Middle East, that is just not the smart move to make here,” she said. 

Clinton said it is time for a “new phase” in the fight against Islamic State: A more effective U.S.-led air campaign that will “have to be combined with ground forces actually taking back more territory” in the area.

“We should be sending more special operators, we should be empowering our trainers in Iraq, we should be … leading an air coalition, using both fighter planes and drones,” she said. 

Obama has come under heavy criticism in the wake of the Paris attacks for his reliance on air strikes with no capability on the ground to control whatever territory might be cleared of enemy fighters through the use of air power.

The United States currently has 3,400 troops in Iraq and is sending more than 50 more who are special operations forces.

“What we have done with air strikes has made a difference, but now it needs to make a greater difference,” Clinton said.

Her speech came a day after Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said more U.S. ground forces will be needed in Iraq in the wake of the Paris attacks. 

Presaging how Republicans plan to take on Clinton, an aide to presidential candidate and Ohio Governor John Kasich said it is hard to take Clinton seriously on the issue because conditions in Iraq and Syria worsened on her watch.

“You have to ask yourself what was her role when this was all coming together during the first administration. It's a little difficult to distance yourself from something that you were basically present at the creation for,” said Charles Mallory, national security director for Kasich's campaign.

Clinton also called for an “intelligence surge” in the region involving more Arabic speakers with expertise in the area and technical assets.

There also should be no-fly zones over Syria and safe zones for people fleeing the violence, she added. These are options that Obama has not taken.

Clinton also said the United States will need help from American private industry to counter Islamic State's propaganda abilities.

Silicon Valley companies, she said, must not view government as its adversary when it comes to formulating counter-terrorism policies, adding that social media companies can help stop terrorism by “swiftly shutting down affiliated accounts.”

“Now is the time to solve this problem, not after the next attack,” Clinton said.

Clinton, who sometimes struggles to relate on the campaign trail, seemed in her element at the Council on Foreign Relations, spoke for an hour, including answering questions.

While parting ways with Obama to some degree, she hewed closely to his decision to resettle as many as 10,000 Syrian refugees as part of the traditional U.S. welcoming role.

Many Republican candidates and more than two dozen state governors have called for a pause in the resettlement program out of fears militants might sneak into the country.

“We cannot allow terrorists to intimidate us into abandoning our values and our humanitarian obligations,” she said.

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Where is the Muslim shame?

Leave a Comment / David Suissa, Opinion /

If it were Jews who had massacred people in Paris last Friday night, I would be drowning in shame right now. I would be writing about that shame. I would be shaming my murderous Jewish brethren for dishonoring my religion and dragging me down in their gutter of darkness.

Here’s what I would not do: I wouldn’t defend Judaism as a “religion of peace.”

Maybe it’s a Jewish thing. Maybe it’s that old saying that Jews are responsible for one another. Whatever it is, when Baruch Goldstein murdered innocent Muslims many years ago, Jews didn’t stand up to defend Judaism. We condemned the act, certainly, but we also hung our heads in shame at the horror committed in our name.

Many of us asked: Where did we go wrong?

Jews have been asking that question, in fact, for millennia: Where did we go wrong? What can we do better? The holiest day of the Jewish year is devoted precisely to that task, not just personally but communally. We lay bare our flaws, our weaknesses and our sins—because that’s the only way to improve.

That works for our religion, too. The holy men of our Bible were never afraid to challenge God. Jews have continued in that tradition. We're encouraged to challenge and question. If there are problematic texts or stories, we're encouraged to take them on.

Every religion has its good and bad. In an ideal world, we would share the good with others. Judaism is far from perfect, but it has this one “good” it ought to share with the world: Brutal self-criticism. The instinct to look inward.

I thought about that when I read statements from Muslim organizations in response to the Paris massacres.

There was plenty of condemnation, but no self-criticism. Essentially, the message was, “This is not Islam.”

The first statement, from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), condemned “these horrific crimes,” which is expected and appropriate. But what about recognizing that Islam may have had something to do with these crimes?

The second statement was more scholarly but in the same spirit. It came from more than 120 Muslim scholars from around the world, who wrote an open letter to the “fighters and followers” of the Islamic State, denouncing them as “un-Islamic.”

As reported in the Huffington Post, the 18-page letter “picks apart” the extremist ideology of the militants.

I read the letter. Indeed, it challenges and picks apart the interpretations of the Quran that ISIS uses to justify its violent acts.

As I read it, though, I didn’t just hear the voices of scholars. I also felt the voices of brilliant defense lawyers. The writers admitted no flaws. They defended everything.

This has been the pattern in recent years from the moderate Muslim community: Condemn the violence vigorously, but defend Islam at all cost. If there are deeply problematic or violent texts in the Quran, if there are gross abuses of sharia law, explain them all away so that Islam comes out looking squeaky clean. And if people can’t see that Islam truly is the religion of peace, well, that’s their problem.

That kind of noble and assertive defense might work once or twice, but after 27,295 deadly acts committed under the name of Islam since 9/11 (according to Jihad Watch), it starts to get old. After a while, you feel like asking the defenders: “How long do you expect us to buy your argument that there is no connection between Islam and these violent acts?”

Instead of constantly trying to defend Islam, moderate Muslim leaders should consider a more difficult approach. Face up to the problematic texts of your tradition. Criticize them. Admit that they can be used to justify violent acts. Recognize that your religion, just like any religion, needs constant self-criticism in order to grow and stay humane.

It doesn’t cut it anymore to condemn violence and just say, “This is not Islam.” For too many Muslim preachers, this is Islam. At some point, you must take responsibility for what is done under the banner of your religion. Instead of doubling down on defensiveness, double down on self reflection.

As Rabbi Chaim Seidler-Feller once said to me, “Every religion has an obligation to clean out the negative teachings that accrue over time.”

Interfaith programs with other religions are fine, but innerfaith efforts within the Muslim community are even more important to “clean out” the negative teachings infecting the faith. This can only be done by Muslims.

Islam doesn’t just have an image problem. When so many violent acts are committed under its name, it is neither crazy nor bigoted to ask: “What’s wrong with Islam?” In fact, it’s only human, and it’s certainly useful. 

David Suissa is president of TRIBE Media Corp./Jewish Journal and can be reached at davids@jewishjournal.com.

Where is the Muslim shame? Read More »

Reform movement should take a page from Chabad playbook

Leave a Comment / Opinion /

Charles Bronfman and the other kings, queens, princes, dukes, duchesses, lords and ladies of the American-Jewish community need to wake up to the impressive accomplishments of the passionate, strategic and creative serfs and vassals of Chabad, who serve the Jewish people globally with all their hearts and souls. 

It is outrageous that Mr. Bronfman told the attendees of the Reform movement at its convention two weeks ago to “take back Birthright from Chabad.” Imagine if the tables were turned what kind of indignant outcry there would be by the liberal Jewish world. 

Too bad that Chabad runs circles around the Reform movement and has managed to send thousands of young Jews on your Birthright program. 

There is a reason for this. And it’s not that Chabad is doing something wrong. It’s that the Reform movement and nearly the entire Jewish world aren’t doing something right. And the fault can be attributed to all you funders who claim Jewish royalty.  The Jewish professional world is scared to death of your power and, as a result, doesn’t take the risks that Chabad does. 

Two years ago, I spoke to a packed breakout room at the Rabbinic Assembly of the Reform movement in Long Beach. Following my lecture, leaders of the movement wanted to talk with me about urgent marketing issues. It took them about three months to organize a breakfast in New York. At the breakfast, I explained to them that in order to market effectively these days, they needed to take risk, to think critically, to create big, bold ideas of engagement. Every risk and idea I tossed at them during the breakfast was met with the same stone-faced response: “Our lay leaders and funders would never go for that.” Over and over, I saw the looks of near panic on their faces in response to my ideas. The group couldn’t get rid of me fast enough. 

That evening, I had a meeting with the leaders of Chabad on Campus at Lubavitch headquarters in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Seated around the table were about 15 Chabad rabbis working on campuses across America. I explained my same philosophy to them. Every risky, big idea I threw out was continually met with, “How do we do this? How can we make this happen?” They probed and pushed my brain for more and more. They jumped into thinking about implementation. The meeting began at 7:30 p.m. and ended at 1:30 a.m. 

As I walked out in the wee hours of the morning, I contrasted my two Jewish meetings that day. The morning one was boring, frightening, paralyzing and lifeless. The evening one was vibrant, pulsing, exciting, passionate and fun. It was a creative person’s dream. I asked myself, “Who is going to win here? Who is going to succeed?” The answer was obvious. 

The Jewish community needs to take a lesson from Chabad. They have become the McDonald’s of the Jewish world. They are everywhere, with Jewish spiritual retail outlets, attracting and engaging the masses, the grass roots, the people — AMCHA. The rabbis live on a shoestring budget and work their brains to exhaustion raising local money for each of their locations and programs. They move their families to the hinterlands — Tashkent, Guangzhou, Caracas — sometimes very dangerous places, to blend in with a Jewish community and build its soul. 

Chabad, through chabad.org, has invested in and cracked the complex digital challenge of social marketing, having created the most visited Jewish website on the planet. In a boiler room at their Crown Heights worldwide headquarters sit about 25 young Brooklyn hipster Lubavitchers, who know more about the digital universe than all the professors and students who surround me at USC’s Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, where I teach. When I am stumped by a social marketing challenge for my clients or students, I call them and gather some of the best practices and insights on all the evolutions of Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat and Periscope. 

Yes, Chabad chases people down with tefillin and they give out lots of tiny Shabbat candles. But they also give out something else: love. As I have told my wife, “God forbid something should happen to us, the next morning there will be 300 Chabad rabbis at our door.” 

I don’t believe in everything Chabad thinks or does. Some of it drives me crazy. I, too, can argue their Orthodoxy, practices and beliefs. But who in the Jewish world isn’t arguing Jewish issues of practice and belief with every other Jew? We don’t dare say in the end, “Take this back from the Reform, Conservative, Sephardic, Persian, Russian or Israeli Jews.” 

To Mr. Bronfman and every other member of self-declared Jewish royalty: 

Chabad doesn’t have a heavy, empowered lay structure. They, too, have mega donors like you. But their rabbis are respected and revered by their donors. The rabbis of Chabad have the ultimate power in the organization. This is a very different construct from the Jewish world that you know. In that Jewish world, where I spent so many years working as a marketing consultant, I witnessed a constant and overwhelming fear and intimidation of many intelligent, savvy, capable professionals who were loath to make themselves vulnerable to donors who had the ultimate say. As a result, that Jewish world doesn’t take enough risks. Professionals are scared of the rebuke of the lay people. They are hesitant to make decisions and take risks and put themselves at the mercy of their committees and funders. It is an unhealthy environment and a construct that keeps the Jewish world back. 

With all the millions of dollars the Jewish community spends on studies each year, they need to study Chabad. And then, different from writing about all those studies in the Jewish press and hauling them out to meetings and conferences, the results of this study need to be implemented. Because Chabad’s successes are undeniable.

Mr. Bronfman, you are simply jealous. And another thing: No one can intimidate Chabad. It will forge ahead with great success no matter what you say about it. 

Gary Wexler is the executive manager of the Third Space Thinking initiative at the USC-Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, where he is also the adjunct professor of both advertising and creativity, as well as nonprofit advocacy.

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Welcome the refugees

Leave a Comment / Opinion /

In the 1940s, politicians and the State Department saw the war ravaging Europe and said only Christians could enter this country as refugees, and only a select few at that. No Jews welcome here. A favorite argument for turning away Jews fleeing Europe was that they somehow had been infiltrated by Nazis.

With ISIS on the rampage and war devastating Syria, among other places, many politicians today are singing a similar tune. Only a select few refugees can come in, and they must all be Christians, say Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush.

“No Muslims welcome here” is the theme frequently invoked in the name of national security.

No Syrian refugees in my state, said 26 governors — all but one Republicans — who refuse to admit any Syrian refugees, whatever god they worship. That includes Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, Ohio’s John Kasich, New Jersey’s Chris Christie and Florida’s Rick Scott, whose states have some of the country’s largest populations of Muslims and Arab-Americans.

Christie said not even “orphans under the age of 5 should be admitted.” Taking care of them would be too much of a burden, he complained.

Jewish-American leaders are struggling with the question of refugees. Many organizations have been raising money for humanitarian groups, particularly in Jordan, helping Syrian refugees, reports New York-based The Jewish Week, but when it comes to admitting them to this country, they urge caution.

Rabbi Mark Dratch of the Orthodox movement’s Rabbinical Council of America told The Jewish Week that Muslim countries should be pressured to take greater numbers. He’s right. Jordan and Turkey are overwhelmed with refugees, but the others could and should do a lot more.

But that does not mean our own doors should be slammed in their face, and Jewish leaders, more than most, should know that.

HIAS, formerly the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, is virtually alone among Jewish organizations supporting President Barack Obama’s decision to admit 10,000 refugees by the end of 2016.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that although Israel has treated some 1,000 wounded Syrians, it will not take in any Syrian refugees because the country is “too small.” Opposition leader Yitzhak Herzog disagrees. “Jews cannot be indifferent while hundreds of thousands of refugees are looking for safe haven.”

Some Republicans who aspire to be the leader of the free world sound like bigoted xenophobes. Most conspicuous are ones whose own parents were refugees from brutal dictatorships or are married to immigrants.

Their rationale is that some jihadi terrorists may sneak in with the refugees (one apparently who did was among those in the French attacks on Nov. 13), so all refugees should be banned. 

Critics like to point to the 9/11 hijackers to justify anti-immigration attitudes. Sen. Marco Rubio, who favored immigration reform before he was against it, said “some” of the hijackers “had overstayed [their] student visas.” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has said all 19 were here on expired student visas.

Neither presidential wannabe did his homework. All 19 had entered the country legally; only one on a student visa, which he did not overstay, and the others on tourist or business visas, according to Factcheck.org.

The only Jew running for president, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), pledged to stand against Islamophobia and racism and backed Obama’s decision to admit some 10,000 refugees. So have his two Democratic rivals, Hillary Clinton and Martin O’Malley, both of whom suggested raising the number to 65,000.

Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.) said, “We can protect our safety and our humanitarian values,” and we shouldn’t “slam the door on them.”

But that’s exactly what Republicans want to do.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) would shut down the government in order to keep them out. Presidential candidates Ben Carson and Mike Huckabee have written to Speaker Paul Ryan demanding he block all funding for Syrian refugee resettlement.

Donald Trump, warning that Syrian refugees could be ISIS’ “Trojan horse,” said if he were president, he’d consider closing American mosques that have radical clerics and limiting civil liberties for all Americans.

Sen. Cruz (R-Texas), the son of a Cuban immigrant, said we should permit only Christian refugees because, “There is no meaningful risk of Christians committing acts of terror.”

Has no one told Ted or Jeb about Dylann Roof, who killed nine worshipers at the Emanuel AME church in Charleston, S.C.; neo-Nazi Frazier Glenn Cross, who got the death penalty last week for killing three people in 2014 in Kansas who he thought were Jews; Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, who bombed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City; or the Unabomber?

Or about those law-abiding folks of the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Nation, the Army of God and the Phineas Priesthood?

And what about the mass murderers responsible for shootings at Newtown, Conn.; Virginia Tech; Aurora, Colo.; Centennial, Colo.; and Roseburg, Ore., to name only a few?

Ted and Jeb, there wasn’t a foreigner among them. No Muslims, as far as I could learn. All Christians.

Obama said, “We don’t have religious tests to our compassion. That’s not who we are.” He may not, but many of those who want his job do, and that should scare a Jewish community that remembers — or should — what it’s like to be shut out when the alternative is discrimination and maybe death. 

Douglas Bloomfield is a syndicated columnist; Washington, D.C., lobbyist; and consultant. He spent nine years as the legislative director and chief lobbyist for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

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Hate Crimes at Record Lows

Leave a Comment / Blogs, Books, Culture /

Over the past several months, in no small measure because of the Black Lives Matter movement, it is now widely believed that race relations in this country have soured.  It is almost gospel that “micro aggressions” are rampant (especially on college campuses) and that the gains in inter-group relations that marked the past few decades have all but evaporated in a sea of insults, police murders, and insensitive behavior. If “micro” aggressions are rampant, one is left to imagine what's happening with full-fledged “macro aggressions.”

National polls on attitudes on race suggest just how pervasive the belief in regressing attitudes has become. A CBS News poll from July of this year found that only 37% of Americans think that “race relations in the US are good”. That compares with 66% endorsing the “good” analysis in April 2009—three months after Barack Obama was inaugurated. A glimmer of optimism is revealed in the datum that 71% of Americans still believe that there is “real progress in getting rid of discrimination”—an overwhelming majority, but that is down from a high of 78% believing in “real progress” in 2014.

With that as a backdrop, it is instructive to look at the “>Newsweek on-line was the most prominent outlet to make mention of the report). You can bet that had the report indicated increased hate crimes—a finding that fits today’s narrative of rising tensions— it would have received far more prominent coverage.

We should savor it nevertheless.

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Tel Aviv terrorist’s mother is ‘proud’ that son stabbed Jews to death

Leave a Comment / Is Featured?, Israel, Mobile, Mobile-Homepage /

The mother of a Palestinian terrorist who stabbed two Israelis to death called her son a “source of pride for Hebron and Palestine.”

Raid Halil bin Mahmoud, 36, who also moderately injured a third man during a prayer service in a Tel Aviv building, attributed his actions to the “pain” he felt for the situation of the Palestinians. He was overpowered by civilians and then arrested by Shin Bet officials.

Mahmoud’s mother made her comments Thursday on Hamas television, the Times of Israel reported.

Mahmoud, a father of five from the West Bank town of Dura, near Hebron, was given a permit to find work in Israel just four days ago after a background check that found he did not have a concerning criminal record.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a strong response following Mahmoud’s attack and the subsequent shooting attack hours later near the West Bank town of Alon Shvut that killed three, including an 18-year-old American yeshiva student, Ezra Schwartz of Sharon, Massachusetts.

“There is no immunity for terrorists,” Netanyahu said. “We will hold them to account, we will exact a price from their families, we will destroy their homes, and we will cancel their citizenship.”

He said that Israel is a victim of the same “radical Islam” that carried out the recent terrorist attacks in Paris.

“Whoever condemned the attacks in Paris need to condemn the attacks in Israel. It’s the same terror,” he said. “Whoever does not do this is a hypocrite and blind.”

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