Why Would Anyone Move to Israel, Especially Now?

FD and I are at Gate B14 to board a flight to Fort Lauderdale. 

No, it is not a vacation. This is the first stop. We are moving—intending to spend the rest of our lives in Israel. 

(I’m sorry, you know who you are, that I never had the chance to visit your farm). 

 

See, we're finally going. Not a vacation, not a Sabbatical. Not to visit the kids. 

We love America, the old America, the tolerant America. Not that we are leaving because the old America has changed, that melting pot, although it really has changed. And we're not leaving because of antisemitism, although that is not a bad reason to leave if one is a Jew. We get it. The Age of Jewish Enlightenment/tolerance is over. Hate has been in the air for decades and it reigns.

We'll be flying El Al, perhaps the only airline flying to Israel, the only armed airline. We leave tonight. 

 

Yes, we know that Iran vows retaliation for the assassination of a beloved leader, read murderer, a plotter and a planner of the destruction of the State of Israel and the annihilation of all Jews. That's the plan for all of us, everywhere, in the Palestinian-Hamas-Arab playbook.  

 

FD reminded me recently that there exists an entire generation of young people who know nothing about September 11, 2001. They weren't born or weren't cognizant of what happened here in New York. The deaths, the collapse of the Towers. This explains at least partly, why they might support the Palestinian people over the Jews. They don't get it that that other team, the one that isn't into Democracy, intends to come for them, too.

 

The culmination of this war is obviously in G-d’s hands, not President Biden's, although we appreciate his support, and it is not in Bini Netanyahu's. G-d seems to have empowered the Jewish people with intellect and talent and most important, a Torah that is true, and a Talmud, a compilation of books that include prophecies indicating that we will be, in the end, victorious. There will be blood, unfortunately, there will be pain and suffering and violations (read the book of Zachariah) but in the end the Jews will prevail. 

 

We believe this. That we belong there not here. This has been a lifelong dream beginning well before a massacre on October 7 that took thousands of Jewish lives and hundreds of hostages, many of whom are unfortunately gone, martyrs. The dream is inextinguishable in the Jewish soul, it is thousands of years old, precedes all pogroms and massacres. It precedes children and women and men young and old, brave soldiers and soon-to-be soldiers. Such cowards, these Palestinian/Hamas (they are one in the same, people, don't believe what you read) hoodlums honestly. Gangsters. Stealing babies. Mutilating babies, women, men. 

 

There are a few psalms, Tehillim, we say daily, psalms that literally mention Hamas by name. Take a look at Psalm 140. I’m not telling Jews anything they don’t know. 

Hamas is a word that means violence. They named themselves VIOLENCE. Wow.

Enough politics, let's talk about me. 

The response from the community to our move? Only heartfelt well wishes, so many of them, so much love, such an incredible atmosphere of hope and even, shall I say, jealousy because in the Jewish community Aliyah, becoming an Israeli citizen, is the goal. It is NOT a better you than me These are sincere people, people who truly wish that they could do this, too, that they could muster the finances (no small task, there's never enough). The decision not to move is also about family obligation. My demographic is a sandwich generation. How does one leave elderly parents, many with serious health problems, or children? HOW DO YOU LEAVE PRECIOUS GRANDCHILDREN? Most do not. 

 

But living in Israel is the ultimate commandment, the most important mitzvah. 

Many, maybe a third of the commandments of the Torah are about what one must do when living in the Holy Land. The land of Israel, let's just say it, not Palestine. Palestine is for Palestinians. Israel is for Yisraelim. Jews. 

 

Rabbi Cohen said it in one of many beautiful vorts (a vort is a short speech to the congregation, good luck with that). He said that many years ago, in line at Ikea, everyone looked up at a TV at the aftermath of an explosion, a bomb set off in Jerusalem, a pe-gu-ah, a terrorist attack in Jerusalem, perhaps on a bus or a packed downtown restaurant —Orthodox Jewish people searching for remains, bones and skin, heads, legs and arms, pieces of human beings, innocent civilians, blown to bits by a bomb.

 

What did Rabbi Cohen hear from the shoppers nearby? WHY WOULD ANYONE EVER WANT TO LIVE THERE?    

 

Well, because this is the land of milk and honey. This is the land that Heaven sent and this lovely land is mine. You land, you look around, and you marvel and don't stop.

It is in our blood, it is in our spirit, and many of us long, literally long for Jerusalem. You can’t buy this feeling, it is in our collective DNA or memory, ask a Jungian.

 

We become citizens of Israel soon after we land on Israeli soil, when an agency, perhaps the Israeli consulate, presents us with ID cards, assuming the office is still staffed. There’s this war going on, you know. 

FD's mother, 99, is coming with us. She is already an Israeli citizen but had to come back to the States for a few years, a terrible loss, my sister-in-law. How does one lose a child?  But now my mother-in-law is ready to come home, and so are we.

 

There isn't a person in the community I haven't hugged goodbye. If I missed you I’m sorry. I've been crying for three weeks, sadness, joy, a compote of emotions. This is crazy-making, and as you all know that's a DSM diagnosis.

 

I’ll post pictures next time.

 

As we say (as you chutzniks, ha ha) say, having not yet subscribed to this modifier of craziness quite yet. Next Year in Jerusalem. 

Come see me.

 

Blessings, 

therapydoc

 

Natan Sharansky and Antisemitism and Universities, College Campuses

 Hidden Heroes: One Woman's Story of Resistance and Rescue in the Soviet Union, Pamela Braun Cohen

My friend Pamela Cohen wrote the book Hidden Heroes: One Woman's Story of Resistance and Rescue in the Soviet Union. Pam knows quite a bit about Jewish refuseniks and Natan Sharansky, one of the many held in Soviet prisons. He lives in Israel today. I had to share his important analysis of antisemitism on college campuses.  

Tablet Magazine

October 31, '23

Never Again Is Now

A call for a mass rally in Washington in support of Jewish students and Israel

BY NATAN SHARANSKY

Twenty years ago, upon returning to Israel from a trip to American university campuses as the minister in charge of combating antisemitism, I reported my opinion to then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that U.S. colleges had become the beachhead of the battle for the next generation of American Jewry. For the first time, in an atmosphere of growing political opposition to the state of Israel, more and more Jewish students at leading universities—Harvard, Columbia, Rutgers, and others—told me in private conversations that they were afraid to voice their sympathy with the Jewish state, out of concern that doing so would damage their academic success and future careers.

At the time, I was startled and deeply concerned to see such self-censorship—not in the Moscow of my youth, but in the most powerful country in the free world. I was also surprised then that few Jewish organizations felt a responsibility to get involved in the life of students on campuses.

Much has changed since then. Today, practically every serious American Jewish organization runs programs designed to prepare Jewish students for campus life, including giving them the tools to fight against antisemitism, and to strengthen their connection to Jewish identity and Israel while they are there. In addition, Israeli shlichim, or fellows, have been added to strengthen Hillel teams at almost a hundred universities across the country.

Nevertheless, anti-Zionism—the new antisemitism—is a permanent feature of daily life at American colleges. What is more, Israel’s opponents are equipped with new intellectual weapons: postcolonialist and other “critical” theories, wokeness, microaggressions, and various other ways of conveying the simplistic neo-Marxist idea of a permanent struggle between oppressors and oppressed, in which the oppressed are always right and oppressors wrong, and should be silenced and attacked by any means possible. In this narrative, “white colonial” Israel is always the oppressor, while the Palestinians are always oppressed.

There were many efforts over the past two decades to fight the expressions of this pernicious narrative at universities. They included opposition to the constant flow of resolutions supporting BDS and a push to recognize the connection between anti-Zionism and antisemitism. There were ups and downs, successes and failures, but the struggle continued.

Despite these long-standing realities, however, no one was truly prepared for the reaction of leading American universities to the horrific events of Oct. 7, when Hamas sent its jihadi terrorists into Israeli territory to kill some 1,400 people, mostly civilians, and take over 230 more hostage. Just as Israelis were shocked by the failure of our intelligence and political leadership to anticipate and prevent such a catastrophe, American Jews and their allies have been shocked by the failure of university leaders to unequivocally condemn the rape, torture, mutilation, and brutal murder of innocent children, families, and elderly people by an organization that has made no secret of its genocidal intentions against the Jewish people.

Instead of unanimous condemnation, what we have heard from college campuses is the full justification of this pogrom—the worst in modern memory—in statements by campus organizations and in demonstrations celebrating Hamas. According to the worldview that guides these deplorable responses, voiced repeatedly by students and their professors, Israel must be blamed for everything because fighting against the Zionist oppressor is how the worldwide struggle against colonialism begins.

With this, the parallel between these contemporary critical theories and the Marxism-Leninism of my Soviet youth has received new proof. Recall that the major pogroms in Eastern Europe started in 1881, when Tsar Alexander II was killed and his murder blamed on Jews. The organization behind the murder, Narodnaya Volya (the People’s Will), was a predecessor of the Communist Party, with both an extremist wing responsible for the killing and a more moderate wing that spread propaganda to the people. When the awful pogroms started, the latter tried to defend these aggressions by explaining that this was how the social movement of the masses—and with it the worldwide revolution—would begin. They argued that their target was not the Jews per se, but an entire oppressive system, which their movement sought to overthrow in the name of justice and liberation.

The rationalization of today’s Hamas sympathizers on campus are remarkably similar to these. And if the connection seemed largely theoretical before, today it is practical, articulated and even acted upon not by extremists but in the heart of the academy. While Jewish organizations were busy fighting tactical battles against BDS and other localized affronts, we failed to see that terrorism received an intellectual rehabilitation in the most prestigious segments of American society. Consider the words of prominent feminist scholar Judith Butler, who in 2006 proclaimed at the University of California, Berkeley, that “understanding Hamas [and] Hezbollah as social movements that are progressive, that are on the left, that are part of a global left, is extremely important.”

Even the presidents of leading universities—unlike the president of the United States—have refused to denounce Hamas’s evil, speaking instead about violence on both sides. Those who protest microaggressions are unable or unwilling to differentiate between the most awful forms of pogrom and the legitimate self-defense of the attacked.

As a result, if 20 years ago to be openly and proudly pro-Israel was bad for students’ careers, today it is a threat to their physical safety. The number of antisemitic events, including physical assaults, has skyrocketed since Oct. 7, and campuses are now flooded with the slogan “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” For those unfamiliar with geography, this means that there is no place for a Jewish state on the world map.

Israel is currently fighting a war for its survival. We realize that Hamas crossed a red line on Oct. 7 and that for the state to continue to exist, we have to win. In fact, we know that we are fighting not only for ourselves but for the future of the free world, to preserve the values of democracy and freedom in the face of an organization that would destroy them completely.

In a different way, the United States is also fighting a war for its survival. American universities crossed a red line in the aftermath of Oct. 7. The struggle for campuses is therefore a struggle for America and its values—for an America that is liberal, that supports free speech and human rights, and that protects all of its citizens, regardless of race or creed, from vicious, lawless assault.

In 2015, following the terrorist attacks on the Charlie Hebdo newspaper and on Jewish targets in Paris, I asked the French philosopher Alain Finkielkraut whether he thought there was a future for Jews in Europe. He responded that he could not answer my question directly, since he was not part of the organized Jewish community, but that he worried there may not be a future for Europe in Europe—that is, for a Europe that cherishes liberal values and is willing to defend them in the face of barbaric assault.

If there is to be a future for America in America, it is time to step up in defense of its core values, and in this American Jews can play an important role. Let us start with a March of One Million: students, parents, Jewish organizations, and allies coming together in support of academic freedom and against a primitive ideology that silences truth and justifies murderous rampages as a form of liberation.

We have done this before: In 1987, hundreds of thousands of Jews marched to Washington, D.C., to support their brethren in the Soviet Union, chanting the slogan “Let my people go.” In 2002, thousands rallied in front of the U.S. Capitol in opposition to terrorism and support for the Jewish state.

Only this time we will be fighting not only for our own people, but for America as well—for the values it represents and for its continued role as a beacon of light around the world.

therapydoc

All reaction

You and\

Taking a Side

 I think we can sum it up like this, regarding what happened on college campuses last week and the week before: 

If you don't condemn it, 

   you condone it. 

therapydoc

More on antisemitism, Kanye West, Ky

 

Well, this feels like hate. 

No fear that Hitler would want to eliminate this kind of Jew, I suppose. But he would have put them on the top of his list. 

The Wiesenthal Center issued a special report about this yesterday. I'm going to copy and paste directly from the Wiesenthal Center Special Report.  It sent me directly to the mint chocolate chip ice cream. Go to the website for better pictures.

therapydoc

The full text from the Wiesenthal Center:

OVERVIEW

This short report will outline the ideology of the extremist Black Hebrew Israelites (BHI) in the US. During October and November 2022, multiple anti-Semitic attacks by US rap artist and major social media influencer, Ye (Kanye) West and a tweet from NBA player Kyrie Irving’s providing a link to an anti-Jewish film, Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America, have thrust radical BHIs into the national spotlight.

It is important to note that the BHI movement is not monolithic. There exists a diverse spectrum of beliefs and practices. This report will only focus on the extremist elements that espouse anti-Semitic, anti-LGBTQ+ and misogynistic rhetoric. This radical subgroup of Black Hebrew Israelites should not be confused with Black Jews or other Jews of color.

CORE BELIEFS OF BLACK HEBREW ISRAELITES

BHI supporters reject the history of Christianity, Judaism and the Jewish people. Its adherents claim that Black Americans are the true descendants of the 12 Tribes of Israel, and therefore, are God’s “chosen people”. Some BHI groups believe that Native Americans and Hispanics are also included.

BHI adherents contend the true children of Israel were scattered across the globe, driven into slavery, and forced to accept other religions such as Christianity. They believe the Bible prophesizes that the “true” Israelites were displaced from their homeland and cursed to suffer atrocities. They trust they will eventually receive salvation as the chosen people if they return to their Hebrew roots. Adherents point to Deuteronomy 28 as evidence for this prophecy and consider it their duty to inform other true descendants of their lineage. These beliefs can be traced back in the US to the 1890s.1 However, there are Black Hebrew Israelites who promote militant, extremist interpretations of biblical religious texts, fueled by and fomenting anti-Semitic and anti-white rhetoric.

ANTI-SEMITISM

Often, BHI extremists claim they cannot be anti-Semitic because they believe themselves to be the true Semites. They argue the people who present themselves as Jewish today are in fact, imposters. The 2018 pseudo-academic film Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America posits that Sephardic, Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews are just religious converts with no blood connection to the ancient 12 tribes of Israel. It also promotes Holocaust denial and claims Hitler believed that “negroes” were the real Jews.

The assertion that BHI believers cannot be anti-Semitic is often followed by a series of anti-Semitic tropes. In a recent video from Bishop Nathanyel, the leader of Israel United in Christ (IUIC), one of the most extreme BHI groups currently operating in the US, he accuses Jewish people of always playing the victim in any situation, raising his hands in a mocking manner stating Jewish people claim that - “I am a victim, but I run society.”2

The extremist fringe of BHI promotes a litany of anti-Semitism in numerous ways. The most extreme believers argue that today’s Jewish people, including Israelis, are not descendants of biblical Jacob, but actually descendants of Esau (also known as Edomites). As a result, BHI considers them to be the enemies of the “true” Israelites. They believe that these false Jews are just white people who have deliberately usurped or stolen the true identity of people of color. This incendiary allegation spawned traditional anti-Semitic tropes promoted within BHI.

Another video from IUIC titled “Jewish Fables”, argues that the imposter Jews stole the land of Israel using the Balfour Declaration, because “we’ve been duped by Jewish fables”.3 They also argue that today’s Jews are descendants of converts to Judaism and are descendants of the Khazars (a long-debunked conspiracy) – “they have established the vision of being us”, they argue. One of the videos from the Sicarii Hebrew Israelites features a discussionbetweenaJewishmanandstreetpreacherstitled“AmalekconfoundedbyGRLAHebrewinPhilly”.4 The Amalekites mentioned in the Bible, descendants of Amalek, were the first nation to seek the total destruction of the Israelites after the Exodus from Egypt, and are viewed as the genocide-seeking enemy of the Jews.

Often extremist BHI groups reference New Testament Revelation 2:9 and 3:9, passages taken out of context to “prove” that the Bible indicates that a group of imposters will masquerade as Jews in the future – “I know the slander on the part of those who say that they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.”5 The use of this passage, to refer to all Jews as a synagogue of Satan, was a cornerstone of medieval Christian theological anti-Semitism and mirrors the beliefs of the white supremacist Christian Identity movement. Adherents of Christian Identity allege that white Aryan people are the true Israelites, and like extreme BHI believers, contend that today’s Jews are imposters, and are the “children of Satan”. Similarly, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan has also charged that the Jews are “not real Jews.... you are deceiving and sending this nation [USA] to hell.”6 This anti- Semitic trope runs through all three movements, despite their otherwise conflicting ideologies.

IT GETS BETTER

In November 2022, IUIC hosted a livestream on Twitter titled “Satan on Mt. Sinai NWO” (NWO – New World Order referring to the anti-Semitic conspiracy that Jews control secret governments who run the world).7 It features a video of a religious Jew wearing a yarmulke and sidelocks, who walked past IUIC demonstrators outside the LA Lakers’ basketball home, the Crypto Arena, in Los Angeles in November 2022. The video was edited to make the Jewish man’s eyes glow red as the voice-over references “the synagogue of Satan”.

In December 2022, a video circulated of another BHI demonstration held by members of the Sicarii Hebrew Israelites, outside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. This followed Ye’s appearance alongside fellow anti-Semite Nicholas Fuentes on long-time conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ InfoWars show, where Ye praised Hitler. The Sicarii speaker also states in the video agreed with Ye, claiming that “Hitler knew who the real Jews was” and that the Jewish person speaking to them in the video is “the seed of the devil”. The speaker also states that “fake Jews” will go into slavery, and that he was glad that the Holocaust happened.8

A music video released in November 2022, titled “Death Con 4” by artist Natazab, features members of The Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge (ISUPK) and spews numerous anti-Semitic tropes. Natazab is a Sacramento- based rapper. The title is inspired by a recent outburst by Ye, who tweeted he was “going death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE.” Lyrics for Death Con 4 include “You’re the synagogue of satan with them black hats, your whole nation sitting ducks”. Natazab’s lyrics also charge that “they making millions off our culture and black people suffering from it”, another reference to the belief that Jewish people are imposters.9

Another anti-Semitic trope promoted by extreme BHI adherents insists that Jews are afforded a level of protection because of alleged control they have over society. One video from an Australian branch of Great Millstone, another extremist BHI group, insists that “them small hat people are being protected worldwide... they’re the ones who is in power right now.”10

Some adherents of extremist BHI believe that those who present themselves as Jewish today are actually Europeans (rather than Israelites), and as a result, these extremists promote anti-white beliefs portraying white people as the devil. This is particularly evident in several videos uploaded to YouTube by the Sicarii Hebrew Israelites, where the street preachers refer to white people as devils. Similarly, in an interview with the Chicago leader of ISPUK, he states that “There is nothing that gives me more pleasure, you know what I’m saying, on earth than saying that the white man is the devil... because it is the absolute truth.”11 He also goes on to claim white people are responsible for allowing homosexuality to proliferate across the earth.

A screenshot from an ISUPK TikTok account featuring part of Natazab’s “Death Con 4” music video, including a caption of some lyrics, referencing the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust as “$6,000,000”.

SIMON WIESENTHAL CENTER SPECIAL REPORT WIESENTHAL.COM

6

ANTI-LGBTQ+

The extremist BHI adherents believe that members of the LGBTQ+ community are evil. One member from ISUPK Killeen (Texas), compares a child-friendly drag event to the murder of children in an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, in May 2022, stating “it is the spirit that wants to hunt and murder children”. He insists that the oppressor is trying to drag children into this “wicked” culture which they consider to be an “abomination”.11 Another video from ISUPK Staten Island refers to the LGBTQ+ community as a “plague” intended to “destroy the Lord’s chosen people”.13

MISOGYNY

The extreme BHI religious doctrine places God above man, and man above a woman. One video from ISUPK features a street preacher advocating for polygamy, because there are only “weak men” left, so they have to “go and marry seven or eight women so... that our women can have a strong man.” He goes on to argue that women are made to be “soft and delicate”. The video is titled “ISUPK Turns LGBTQ Member Straight”, implying sexual identity is a choice and that their rhetoric is some sort of remedy.15 Another video from IUIC in Queens, New York, refers to the Bible as asserting that women who wear pants are an abomination against God, and that men should make the rules in a household. They also claim that a husband takes the role of the Lord in the house over a wife. Another video claims that households in Europe are dysfunctional because women take a role in leading them, against the will of God.16

BHI EXTREMIST GROUPS

It is hard to gauge the number of people that belong to extreme BHI movements.17 Many extreme BHI host groups for learning that they refer to as schools or camps but the number of members within each is difficult to assess. Social media statistics are useful in assessing the reach of their preaching, but cannot be relied on as evidence of membership numbers. Public displays, such as a recent protest outside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, to support Kyrie Irving, was attended by hundreds of individuals who appeared to be connected with IUIC.

One of the most prominent organizations promoting extremist BHI ideology is Israel United in Christ (IUIC), founded by Bishop Nathanyel in Coney Island, New York, in 2003. His goal is to resurrect the “Children of Israel”, and “rebuild the nation of Israel according to bible prophecy.”18 IUIC preaches that Black, Hispanic and Native Americans are the true descents of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They refer to themselves as the true Israelites and the 12 Tribes of Israel. They claim that today’s Jewish people are Edomites, the enemies of the true Israelites, and descendants of Esau who was cursed by God. The IUIC argues that these Edomites financed the slave trade from Africa, and were responsible for the genocide of Hispanics and Native Americans. Several YouTube videos reference the anti-Semitic screed, “The Synagogue of Satan”, contending that the New Testament states that Jews are imposters stealing the identity of the true Israelites.

The IUIC has approximately 70 different YouTube channels with hundreds of thousands of subscribers, representing multiple regions in the US, as well as the UK, Germany, Belize, Liberia and Jamaica. The IUIC dismisses criticism of their movement as part of a wider conspiracy to prevent unity within the black community.19 They also have a channel available for free on Roku, a media device and streaming platform that provides over 63 million monthly active users with access to media content.19

A promotional image for an upcoming IUIC livestream on YouTube titled “The End of the Fake Jews”.21

The Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge (ISUPK) is based in Pennsylvania and was established in 2006. They appear to be a registered non-profit in multiple states including New York, California, and Michigan.22 They have several TikTok channels with 10,000s of followers.

The Sicarii Hebrew Israelites are an extreme Black Hebrew Israelite group based in San Diego, California. They are led by Adonis Glaude, also known as the “Guerilla Hebrew”. They have over 50,000 subscribers to their YouTube channel and have raised over $88,000 using GoFundMe since 2015.

Great Millstone is a loosely organized US-based extreme BHI organization that also believes Black, Hispanic and Native Americans are the true Israelites and descendants of the 12 tribes of Israel. Their street preaching videos are extensive, with hundreds of hours of content uploaded to multiple YouTube channels, representing branches in a multitude of places including various US states, the Virgin Islands, and Australia.23

SIMON WIESENTHAL CENTER SPECIAL REPORT WIESENTHAL.COM

8

CONTEMPORARY EXTREME BHI ATTACKS

Extreme BHI followers have been responsible for several attacks and murders in the US in recent years, most notably in December 2019. In Jersey City, New Jersey, four people were killed at a kosher supermarket after being targeted by two individuals who were motivated by anti-Semitic beliefs fueled by extreme BHI ideology.24 Later that month, five Jewish people were wounded in a stabbing attack at the home of Rabbi Chaim Rottenberg in Monsey, New York, during a Hanukah celebration. Rottenberg later died of his injuries. The perpetrator was deemed incompetent to stand trial and was hospitalized in a mental health facility but had expressed extreme BHI beliefs in his journals and internet searches leading up to the attack.25

CONCLUSION

Whenever an individual or group, whatever its size, endorses anti-Semitism, celebrates Adolf Hitler, and the Nazi mass murder of 6 million Jews in a public display of hatred against the Jewish people, they must be taken at their word. When such hatred is expressed in the heart of New York City, home to the 1.6 million Jews, the largest Jewish community in the world (outside of Israel), then everyone should take notice—elected officials, faith leaders, social media influencers, and neighbors.

When American Jewry is targeted, there also needs to be action from law enforcement to ensure the community’s safety. A recent statement from FBI director Christopher Wray shared the alarming statistic that while Jews make up only 2.4% of the US population, anti-Semitism is the motivating factor in 63% of all religious-based hate crimes.26 Additionally, social media platforms must be held accountable for their role in spreading anti-Semitism and hate, particularly the use of YouTube to host thousands of hours of anti-Semitic street preaching archives from extreme BHI groups, and livestreaming on platforms such as Twitter.

Tragically, this brief report presents an overview of a worldview, ideology, and rhetoric of extremist elements in the Black Hebrew Israelite movement. They fan the flames of anti-Jewish hate and like some white extremist movements, literally present Jews as the devil incarnate, spawning targeted violence, mayhem and even murder of Jews.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center will continue to bolster our relationships and alliances with Black Americans, who in 2022, remain the #1 target of race-based hate crimes in the US and will continue to fight against anti-Semitism, bigotry, and racism, whatever the source and whoever the target.

SIMON WIESENTHAL CENTER SPECIAL REPORT WIESENTHAL.COM

9

1For more information on the history of Black Hebrew Israelites in the USA: Jacob S. Dorman, “Black Israelites aka Black Jews aka Black Hebrews: Black Israelism, Black Judaism, Judaic Christianity”, Volume 5: African Diaspora Traditions and Other American Innovations, in William M. Ashcraft (Editor), Eugene V. Gallagher (editor), Introduction to New and Alternative Religions in America (2006)

2 ”#IUIC | Message to the ADL, SPLC, & the Media”, YouTube, uploaded by IUIC Events, 11/23/2022 [https://youtube.com/watch?v=_Qo1CxDxv - accessed 12/8/2022]

3”#IUIC | 15 Minutes with the Captains | Jewish Fables”, YouTube, uploaded by IUIC Captains, 2/15/2021 [https://youtu.be/V2Aw5g-CVwQ – accessed 12/6/2022]

4“AMALEK CONFOUNDED BY GRLA HEBREW IN PHILLY”, YouTube, uploaded by Sicarii, 6/11/2022 [https://youtu.be/W6nGN5HHqlo – accessed 12/6/2022]

5To read the verses in isolation, visit: https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Revelation-2-9/ and https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Revelation-3-9/ [accessed 12/6/2022]

6Dr Harold Brackman, Simon Wiesenthal Center, Louis Farrakhan – Four Decades of Bigotry in His Own Words (June 2020) [https://www.wiesenthal.com/assets/pdf/new-swc- report-farrakhan.pdf - accessed 12/6/2022]

7Israel United in Christ (@IUICOfficial), “Satan on Mt. Sinai NWO”, Twitter, 11/19/2022, [https://twitter.com/IUICOfficial/status/1594084039245598721?s=20&t=rhij4CG4k0oS1- S0JA764A - accessed 12/6/2022]

8Michael Rapaport (MichaelRapaport), “This was in Brooklyn outside Barclays yesterday. These dudes have been doing this since I can remember but now they have some famous spokespeople #kyrie #Kanye”, Twitter [https://twitter.com/MichaelRapaport/status/1599387610471768064 - accessed 12/6/2022]. The Sicarii Vice City (Miami, Fl.) branch of Sicarii Hebrew Israelites tweeted a link to their livestream of the demonstration on YouTube before subsequently making the video private.
Sicarii Vice City (@SicariiViceCity), “SICARII LIVE FROM THE BARCLAYS CENTER IN BROOKLYN NY! - FLUX FRIDAY https://youtu.be/4-5ht3dNqAs via @YouTube APTTMH TAP IN!! #LIKE #SHARE #SUBSCRIBE #SUPERCHAT #LIVE #ISRAELITES #BLACKJEWS #YE24 #KYRIEIRVING @GRLAHebrew”, Twitter, 12/3/2022, [https://twitter.com/SicariiViceCity/ status/1599234769044504576?s=20&t=6wbwQRWBw2pQBvWG95BPIA - accessed 12/6/2022]

9“Natazab – Death Con 4”, YouTube, uploaded by Natazab, 11/14/2022 [https://youtu.be/YAv8VcYPyvU – accessed 12/6/2022]
10“Esau is about to bring a new law January 2023, to protect the small hat in Australia”, YouTube, uploaded by GMSDOWNUNDERAUSTRALIA, 11/15/2022 [https://www.youtube.

com/watch?v=Eve6wQrR7jQ – accessed 12/6/2022]

11“Is The White Man The Devil? Captian Mawaqad Of I.S.U.P.K | 290 Moe Podcast”, YouTube, uploaded by Salo Hommie Moe Presents, 8/7/2022 [https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=ExqsWCCPrtw – accessed 12/6/2022]

12“Both Old and Young....The Sin of Sodom #ISUPK”, YouTube, uploaded by ISUPK Killeen, 6/22/2022 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIJyiWyFAGQ – accessed 12/6/2022] 13“THE CRAFTY GENOCIDE OF A NATION-#LGBTQ #ISUPK #STATEN ISLAND”, YouTube, uploaded by ISUPK Staten Island, 10/13/2022 [https://www.youtube.com/

watch?v=6xaWKw7YK_U – accessed 12/6/2022]

14“#IUIC | The Writings On The Wall Radio Show | The Sodom Agenda | Exposing Pride Month”, YouTube, uploaded by IUIC TALLAHASSEE IN THE CLASSROOM, 6/27/2021 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7J56wsREh0&t=88s – accessed 12/6/2022]

15“ISUPK Turns LGBTQ Member Straight #ISUPK”, YouTube, uploaded by ISAPK Killeen, 8/21/2022 [https://youtu.be/BYhUQpS9iYs – accessed 12/6/2022]
16“The Israelites: The Black Woman Must Be Taught”, YouTube, uploaded by IUIC Queens Camp, 10/3/2013 [https://youtu.be/8wGWTWXjodU – accessed 12/6/2022]

17Andrew Esenstein, “How many Hebrew Israelites are there, and how worried should Jews be?”, The Jewish News of Northern California, 11/28/2022 [https://jweekly. com/2022/11/28/how-many-hebrew-israelites-are-there-and-how-worried-should-jews-be/ - accessed 12/6/2022]

A 2019 poll conducted by LifeWay Research, a branch of a Christian media publishing company, sampled approximately 1,000 African Americans, 4% of whom said they identified as Black Hebrew Israelite (this is not reflection of how many adhere to extremist ideology within this movement), available at: https://research.lifeway.com/wp- content/uploads/2019/11/The-Philos-Project-African-American-Attitudes-Toward-Israel-Report.pdf

18http://israelunite.org/about-iuic/history/

19“Let’s Talk: Israel United in Christ”, YouTube, uploaded by Rave TV Channel, 2/16/2020 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11yGu24QMYo – accessed 12/6/2022]

20IUIC TV available on Roku: https://channelstore.roku.com/details/39edf3e0e19b9f995ea00f922f795d71/iuic-tv

21“IUIC | Q&A | The End Of The Fake Jews | A Study Of Balaam”, YouTube, uploaded by IUIC TALLAHASSEE IN THE CLASSROOM, premiers 12/12/2022 [https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=MXX5PkeRH7g – accessed 12/6/2022]

22ISRAELITE SCHOOL OF UNIVERSAL PRACTICAL KNOWLEDGE (I.S.U.P.K.) – registration information available at: https://opencorporates.com/companies/us_il/CORP_73055644 [accessed 12/6/2022]

23GMS Houston Texas, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/@gmshoustontexas/videos [accessed 12/6/2022] GMS Virgin Islands Strait Gate, YouTube, https://www.youtube. com/@gmsvirginislandsstraitgate1733/videos [accessed 12/6/2022]
GMSDOWNUNDERAUSTRALIA, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-9qvsUZYFE4ffqjzp6lfXg [accessed 12/6/2022]

24Derick Waller, Jersey City shooting was planned for months, based on hate, investigators say”, Eyewitness News ABC 7 NY, 1/13/2020 [https://abc7ny.com/new-jersey-city- supermarket-attack/5844233/ - accessed 12/6/2022]

25https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1230906/download

26Times of Israel Staff, “FBI director says US Jews under threat ‘from all sides’ amid rise in antisemitism”, Times of Israel, 11/19/2022 [https://www.timesofisrael.com/fbi-director- says-us-jews-under-threat-from-all-sides-amid-rise-in-antisemism/ - accessed 12/6/2022]

Antisemitism, Inglourious Basterds, and Hate Crimes

Honestly, I don’t like Thanksgiving, I know, sacrilege but the holiday has always seemed so hard on my patients and frankly it isn't a blast for me, either, sitting around the table for hours.  Tough on the back. And I eat more and more and more, which I realize is the point, but still.  

This one was wonderful. in fact I don’t remember a better one in decades. FD and I enjoyed it pretty much because we hadn’t seen this branch of the tree in six months, which is a long time not to see your kids and grandkids if you have a relatively functional family. I know that during Covid folks have had it worse. 

In Chicago few people mask anymore, I don't, yet I sported an ugly white N-95 in the airport and on the plane to avoid the triple threat, Covid, flu, and RSD. As predicted the airport was MOBBED Sunday night, crazy full of over-stuffed humans ready-to-get-home. Exhausted, wide-eyed, very well behaved children pointed to puppies in purses. 

 

Over the weekend my son brought up the movie Inglourious Basterds, which I had never seen but found on Delta’s entertainment interface. Too long to finish, but still worth the time, Christoph Waltz is absolutely chilling as a Jew hunter colonel in France doing his Nazi thing, eliminating Jews from Europe, seeking out those hiding places. I believe that here in America there may be like-minded people, still, like the fictional colonel's, adults who want to do this, rid the world of the people who brought you all of the following and much, much more. 

Brought to you by Jews--a very, very, very short list:   

the polio vaccine, antibiotics, first Big Bang Theory and quantum physics, gasoline fueled cars (Sigfried Marcus), the cardiac pacemaker, ballpoint pens, fertilizer, color photography, the film industry, condoms (yes, condoms), the first reactors for NASA rockets, remote control pacemakers, the first laser, LED technology, Duracells, videotape, no, most of us don’t use that anymore but we did play the first videogames on the first Jewish conceived/developed game consoles, USB memory (an Israeli company, ScanDisk), microprocessors to prevent our computers from overheating, Facebook, WhatsApp, GettyImages, Nivea cream (that one is important), Heineken’s beer yeast formula, Mattel and Toys “R” Us, Sears, Macy’s, Marks & Spenser, the first Mercedes-Benz cars, Estee Lauder, Revlon, Faberge, Helen Rubinstein, Ralph Lauren, Haagen Dazs, Dunkin’ Donuts, Proust, Kafka, Joseph Roth, Arthur Miller, Saul Bellow, Billy Wilder, Fritz Lang, Kubrick, Spielberg, the Coen brothers and hundreds more, Mahler, Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, Mark Knofler, Jascha Heifetz, Yehudi Menuhin, Amy Winehouse, Billy Joel, hundreds of Nobel prizes, the creation of the Pulitzer Prize, UNICEF, the NBA, the AHL (American Hockey League), the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 written by Rene Cassin, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and of course, Marvel. 

Feel free to add contributions in the comments. 

I didn't scratch the surface when we talk about the Yiddin. But enough about stuff we take for granted, i.e, all the good that most everyone gives and wants to give, let's get back to hate and violence. 

 

Inglourious Basterds  (spelling intentional) is arguably Quentin Tarantino’s most popular film. Apropos of something, perhaps, Mr. Tarantino is not Jewish but did marry in and lives in Israel. His popular 2009 film is a fictional alternative to historically correct events in World War II. Many of the main characters in the film are based upon real people. Not Brad Pitt, who leads an American squadron of scalping (literally) Nazi hunters. His band of basterds terrify Hitler, the Germans. 

A lovely scene, that..

Brad Pitt as a Nazi hunter

 

It is a violent film which means I covered my eyes during violent scenes making it hard to read closed captions. But that behavior, trauma avoidance, is worth 20 of exposure therapy when you're me. (Although I spend a good chunk of my life teaching exposure therapy). But not to have bloody flashbacks, that is the key for me watching film. And really, who doesn’t love a good war movie? I do. 

 

The story behind Tarantino's alternative script, the true one, is that there did exist vigilante Jewish volunteers during the war, men who sought out Nazis to torture and kill them. A secret British intelligence unit, X-Troop (like X-Men, hmm, which came first?) organized D-Day. Volunteers for X-Troop had already experienced the horrors of antisemitism in Europe and they didn't intend to let the Nazis win the war.  X-Troop soldiers did not glorify themselves with nicknames like Bear Jew in the movie, Bear Jew is memorable for mercilessly beating a Nazi to death with a bat (I only saw the first blow and still I think about it. In the war, not the alternative, fighters with no claim to fame at all did request to be dropped over enemy lines from airplanes to carry out their missions of vengeance. 

Tarantino had plenty of history to draw upon. The movie took 10 years to make.  (Read Quinn Hough at ScreenRant for more).

 

Which brings me to why I am writing about this now, other than I saw the film on an 8" x 6" screen on an airplane, a perk of Delta. Yay Delta for finding good films.  

The date November 9-10, 1938 marks a stepping up of the regime of terror against the Jews, Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass. In those terrifying, horrifying 24-hours the Nazis smashed storefronts of Jewish owners, violently stormed Jewish homes, and ransacked synagogues. We call this a POGROM in my parts.

The day to commemorate that, a German pogrom, a day set aside to never forget it, always precedes Thanksgiving. 

Kristallnacht pogrom, the Aron Kodesh

Kristallnacht pogrom a terrorist attack

The world watched, certainly heard, about how what the Nazis did, how they planned extermination of an entire people. The world said nothing. We didn’t have Twitter. 

 

FAST FORWARD: 

From the Anti-defamation League: 

In 2021, ADL counted a total of 2,717 antisemitic incidents across the U.S. This represents a 34 percent increase from the 2,026 incidents recorded in 2020 and is the highest number on record since ADL began tracking antisemitic incidents in 1979. 

 

Not in every neighborhood, not in every city, not yet, but antisemitism is revving up in many a Jewish local. We want to think that it is the squeaky wheel that gets the press and that this is a very tiny group of Ungrateful Idiots, but it isn’t so small, and negative attitudes freely expressed on campuses across the nation about Israel on campus have added to anti-Jewish sentiment in America. (I am not good at debate so when anyone tells me that Israel should be more open to Palestinians freely living/visiting Israel proper, I tell them that in Gaza, where they chose to live, which they destroyed to create a military zone instead of the thriving agricultural economy it was when they 'occupied' it as their own (I was there. Gaza was gorgeous and rich, lush with vegetation, thriving), children are taught that the only good Jew is a dead Jew. This sounds so familiar. Never forget. Children are taught this message in school, earlier even. It is in the mothers milk, we say. Do we grant visas to seekers who say that the only good American is a dead American? I don't know, actually, but think not.

 

This blog is not about politics but it is about the seeds of fear and appropriate caution versus panic. When we hear stories like I'm about to tell you, true stories, Jews grieve immediately and some of us panic. We have children in Israel. We have children in the army. But this is life in Israel. In the back of the mind there is anticipatory anxiety, rational, the mind waiting for the next explosion, 

(1) November 23, 2022, terrorists exploded bombs (nails in a backpack I think I read). Two buses at two different bus stops in Jerusalem killed at least one teen, Aryeh Schupak, 16 years old, of Canadian-Israeli citizenship, leaving 22 injured. 

Aryeh Schupak

Soldiers in Jerusalem following a terrorist attack

And 

(2) Yesterday: A female IDF soldier in her 20s was struck by a car at the Migron-Kochav Yaakov intersection in the West Bank in a terror attack on Tuesday morning.  The alleged attacker: identified as 45-year-old Rani Mamoun Faiz Abu Ali from Beitounia. Married and the father of five children, he had an Israeli work permit and was employed at the Rami Levy supermarket at the Sha’ar Binyamin industrial zone.

 

So we have that to put a damper on our happiness, the relentless hatred of cousins. 

But back to antisemitism in America, the home of freedom and free speech, and a good deal of hate, too. Psychologically people who are down, depressed, desperate and hopeless find that hate feels okay, The negative thinking summons the negativity emotion to leave the brain, come out of the mouth. Look, look what I am doing. Thoughts in my brain, a bit on the negative side, coming out of my mouth via my keyboard. Do I feel better? A little. I want antisemitism to be out of the closet. I want people to know that there are haters and these people have to be stopped, put behind bars when they commit hate crimes. That is the purpose of this post. Writing, like this is not a crime. Swastikas on synagogues are a whole other level.

But back to hate. Hating others, hating the self, is a sign of a negative affective state. We talk in therapy about hate and how it doesn’t change anything, only makes the hater feel worse, ultimately because it is not a positive identity, being a hater. Unfortunately, those who are spewing antisemitism so they can bring themselves up by putting other people down, are not getting psych consults. They are just out there creatively spewing hate just like the Nazis did in the twentieth century.

 

Camaraderie in depression, camaraderie in failure, violent goal-oriented behavior directed towards a target that has everything they do not.  

 

Will there be a time—in my lifetime— I can’t help but wonder— when strong, young, Jewish men, men who already have weapons (what do you think, Jews don’t carry?) will see the need to use them here in America? Will we be forming cells like Inglorious Basterds, like those we see in the movies? 

 

Because Never Again really does mean Never Again. 

 

therapydoc