Netanyahu rejects ‘expressions of panic’ over missile defense aid
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65 Israeli lawmakers sign letter requesting pardon of Ethiopian who killed his alleged abuser
More than half the members of the Knesset want Israeli President Reuven Rivlin to pardon an Ethiopian man who murdered his alleged rapist and abuser.
In 2010 Yonatan Heilo, now 29, killed Yaron Eilin, a powerful member of the Ethiopian community in Netanya who allegedly had abused him emotionally, physically and sexually for years. Eilin also allegedly raped and blackmailed Heilo on multiple occasions.
Convicted of murder and sentenced to 20 years in prison, Heilo has served five years. The Supreme Court last month rejected an appeal claiming he acted in self-defense but, according to Haaretz, downgraded his charge from murder to manslaughter and reduced the sentence to 12 years.
Yoel Hasson, an lawmaker with the Zionist Union party, organized a letter to Rivlin on Heilo’s behalf, collecting 65 signatures, according to Haaretz.
The letter notes that Heilo had no previous criminal record. It acknowledges that Heilo “committed a very serious act” and “should be punished.” However, it continues, “in no way is it possible to compare the killing in his tragic case and other cases of evil criminals.”
Heilo’s story, the letter says, “reflects the reality of the difficult lives of many members of the Ethiopian community, people whom the state and welfare authorities neglect, whom the police sometimes harasses, and in some cases many prefer to suffer in quiet simply because they feel that they have no one to turn to.”
According to Haaretz, the signatories represent all the parties in the Knesset.
20 senators urge posthumous Medal of Freedom for Rabbi Abraham Heschel
A slate of 20 senators urged President Barack Obama to posthumously award Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the nation’s highest honors.
The letter made public Wednesday, spearheaded by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, cited the role of Heschel, who fled Nazi-era Germany, in advancing the cause of civil rights through his friendship with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
“In 1963, Rabbi Heschel met Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the two forged a deep friendship sharing theological and political ideas —Dr. King even came to refer to Rabbi Heschel as ‘my rabbi,’” said the letter. “Before an interfaith gathering on ‘Religion and Race,’ Rabbi Heschel declared that ‘racism is Satanism, unmitigated evil.’ Later that year, he sent a telegram to President Kennedy, asking him to declare a state of ‘moral emergency’ of racial inequality in the United States.”
Heschel, a scholar at the Conservative movement’s Jewish Theological Seminary, joined King for his third attempt at a march in 1963 between Selma and Montgomery, Alabama, to protest segregation. Police viciously beat marchers in the first attempt, and King stopped the second march, fearing a repeat. Heschel had led a demonstration at FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., demanding protection for the marchers.
A photograph of Heschel carrying a Torah scroll while marching alongside King immortalized the third march.
“I felt my legs were praying,” Heschel later wrote.
King was scheduled to spend the Passover seder with Heschel in 1968; he was gunned down days earlier. Heschel died in 1972.
Among the senators who signed the letter, all but one — Johnny Isakson, a Republican from Georgia — caucus with Democrats. Among the Democrats is the body’s entire Jewish caucus, which includes Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., a Democratic candidate for president. Others are Sens. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein of California; Al Franken of Minnesota; Brian Schatz of Hawaii; Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut; Charles Schumer of New York; Ron Wyden of Oregon, and Ben Cardin of Maryland.
“In considering his significant contribution to the Civil Rights Movement, his work to advocate for racial equality and justice across all faiths, and his work to encourage interfaith dialogue, we believe Rabbi Heschel exemplifies the best of American values,” the letter said. “We urge you to consider honoring his life by awarding Rabbi Heschel with the Presidential Medal of Freedom posthumously.”
The initiative has the backing of Heschel’s daughter Susannah, who is also a scholar of Judaism.
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Wife of Orlando gunman knew of plot on Pulse, investigators say
Investigators believe the wife of Orlando gunman Omar Mateen reportedly knew in advance about her husband’s plans to mount a mass shooting attack on Pulse, according to an unnamed official briefed on the progress of the case.
Investigators are “reluctant” to charge Noor Zahi Salman, 30, only on the basis that she had prior knowledge of the attack on the gay nightclub in the central Florida city, the official told The Associated Press.
The early morning attack Sunday left 49 people dead and 53 wounded. Mateen, 29, was killed in a shootout with police.
Salman, the daughter of Palestinian parents, rode with Mateen to pick up ammunition and a holster for the attack, and she drove him to Pulse to look it over before the attack, according to NBC News. She reportedly was not a religious Muslim and did not wear a hijab.
NBC News cited sources in law enforcement who said Salman is cooperating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and may have tried to dissuade her husband prior to the attack.
She and Mateen met online and were married in September 2011; they have a 3-year-old son.
Salman grew up in Rodeo, California, but her parents were born in what their naturalization papers call “Palestine.” The naturalization papers for Salman’s parents were approved in 1984.
She had a first failed marriage arranged in the West Bank to a Palestinian man living in Chicago. The marriage did not work out in part because of cultural differences stemming from the fact that Salman grew up in the United States, AP reported.
Salman reportedly has been in seclusion since the attack. She reportedly visited her parents’ home on Monday night to retrieve some fresh clothes.
Salman’s mother told a neighbor that Mateen did not allow her daughter to drive and prevented her from seeing her parents, including when her father was ill.
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Me, my dad and his prostate
It’s midnight in the waiting room at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, and my dad’s catheter is malfunctioning. He’s doubled over in pain I can compare only to the male equivalent of childbirth. It doesn’t look pleasant.
Let’s back up to why I’m discussing a 71-year-old’s urology in the first place. The reason is simple: If you happen to possess male genitalia, then this is your ultimate fate — if you’re lucky.
If you live long enough, the truism is that you don’t have to wonder if your prostate will begin to malfunction. The question is when.
My dad has walked me through a number of life’s pleasant and unpleasant realities, everything from how to navigate romantic misadventures to how to unclog a shower drain with a paperclip.
Asher Arom is a man who is totally open about all topics. My Israeli-born father has a story for every occasion, and nothing is taboo, nothing off limits — least of all his prostate, which is a frequent and cherished topic of conversation.
So, if you’re a man or intend to marry one, he wants you to know about his recent struggles.
Two weeks before I took him to the emergency room, my dad underwent what’s called a transurethral surgery. If you didn’t gather more information than you wanted from that illuminating piece of medical jargon, I won’t go into much more detail, except to tell you how he explains it in conversations with friends and perfect strangers: “I got a Roto-Rooter for my prostate.”
The midnight incident at the hospital, we’re told, is a perfectly normal outcome of the operation, an unpleasantness that doesn’t even rise to the level of a surgery complication. I’m happy to report that my dad now urinates like a man not half his age.
But back at UCLA, the situation looked dicey. Brace yourself for more transurethral fun.
About an hour after he was doubled over in the waiting room, he was lying on a hospital bed while a slight, unimposing urology resident prepared to perform a procedure called “irrigation,” a word I once thought applied only to agriculture but, as I learned, can also be applied with zeal to the human penis.
Multiple times, I was asked if I wouldn’t like to leave the room before “this next part.” Half out of solidarity with my dad, and half out of the understanding that to see is less traumatic than to imagine, I chose to stay.
And so it was that I watched the urology resident pumping fluid with perfect stoicism in and out of my father as if she was filling a tire with air while he writhed in discomfort.
If it feels like I’m being confrontational with my language here, it’s because I am. If my dad’s urology confronted me with an ugly reality — and I sincerely believe I’m the better for it — then it won’t do you too much harm either.
If I’m lucky, this is an unpleasant reality I’ll one day have to deal with, hopefully later than sooner. Watching my dad writhe in pain was a metaphorical ripping off of the Band-Aid — though perhaps ripping out of the catheter is more apt as a metaphor.
My male friends wince when I tell them what happened to my dad. I understand the reaction. Catheter talk once made me wince. It doesn’t anymore.
Leave it to dad to have his prostate turn into a life lesson.
So let this serve as a reminder: We should appreciate our fathers not just for the warm and fuzzy things they do for us, the roofs they put over our heads, the educations they pay for and all the fringe benefits like working light bulbs and a ceiling that doesn’t leak.
Let’s also appreciate the unpleasant stuff, the details that act as a roadmap for how to and how not to live our lives. The crotchety, hard-line politics. The herbal infusions and dietary supplements. The fascination with discount stores. And yes, the grapefruit-size prostates.
Thanks, Pop, as always, for showing me the way.
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