Shraga Stern is a Charedi (Orthodox) Jewish activist who helped to coordinate a letter signed by thirty-four leading rabbis of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations in London in support of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and condemning ‘irresponsible’ smears against him.
The letter was immediately attacked as fake, but media were forced to first row back on the claim and subsequently to publish information they had sat on for days after the SKWAWKBOX informed them that it would be published here.
But when Stern informed the Board of Deputies (BoD) – and this blog – that Charedim would be protesting at the board’s annual dinner in November at the BoD’s claim to represent all UK Jews, things took a worse turn.
Mr Stern says that he and other activists began to receive pressure from the BoD to abandon the protest – but that he also began to receive calls conveying thinly-veiled threats. He told the SKWAWKBOX:
People call me and warn me that the IDF (Israeli Defence Force) is after me or make other ‘warnings’ to be careful. A couple have explicitly said that the BoD is a powerful body and I shouldn’t go against them.
I’ve told them I’d rather die with the truth than live with a lie. But not all of the messages have been threatening. Some just ask what I want in return for stopping the demonstration. I replied that if they tell the truth that they represent maybe twenty percent of pro-Israel Jews then there’s no need to protest.
Mr Stern has been advised to vary his routine as a precaution, but he remains defiant.
BoD President Marie van der Zyl was asked whether she would condemn the threats against Charedi Jews if they do not abandon their protest plans. No response was received by the time of publication.
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I have so much respect for Shraga Stern.
This tells you everything you need to know about the Isreali Defense Force and the Board of Deputies… Yet *they* claim the moral high ground.
And I doubt we’ll see berger go running to her mates in the MSM over this, neither. It hasn’t happened by now, and berger’s invariably like a greyhound out the trap on this issue.
Unbelievably biased interview on Today this morning with a female rabbi supposedly a Labour supporter who told Nick Robinson Labour should be moving on from AS to concentrate on fighting Tories before launching into a diatribe about Mr Corbyns lack of action on the issue. When it was put to her that Mr Corbyn might say the attacks were because some in the party didn’t want him as leader she dismissed that saying it just showed what a massive ego he must have as it wasn’t all about him! This after the weeks of personal attacks.You really couldn’t make it up.
Nick Robinson who posed for a smiley selfie with the two leaders from Britain First.
But…but…but…
Poor old ‘nasty nick’ didn’t know who they were – and nor did evan davies. They can’t be expected to recognise who are the extreme far right figureheads; after all, they’re just people who misrepresent Corbyn as first secretary of the politburo.
To be honest, Jim, what’s more surprising to me is that other interviewers are asking the same question (RE: Trying to destabilise Corbyn rather than antisemitism) with steadily increasing frequency.
It’s almost as if they’re cottoning on to what’s REALLY going on…
… almost as if they’re starting to think maybe hedging their bets might be wise… just in case Corbyn turns out NOT to be unelectable… or endlessly patient, tolerant and forgiving 🙂
Nobody with the slightest knowledge of the Jewish community could imagine the Haredim being intimidated by threats of violence. On the other hand, short of dissolution the BoD have nothing to offer that the Haredim want.
The only possibility is that the Haredim themselves, who are fundamentally quietist, will feel they are getting too much limelight and draw in their horns.
Either way the MSM will ignore it, or just take pictures of any honkies who turn up and spin it as an antisemitic pro Corbyn demo.
‘Honkies’? Clarify, please, as otherwise that comment’s going to have to be deleted
I use it in the dictionary sense. Consult your dictionary. Wow! you really do have a down on me, don’t you Skwawk?
The last thing the plotters want is for the leaders of a section of the Jewish community to speak out in support of Jeremy Corbyn and, as such, put doubt in the minds of Jewish people who have been deceived into believing that A/S is rampant in the Labour Party that it IS. But, ironically, making threats against one of them to try and frighten and intimidate them into silence will backfire and, as such, open the eyes of an increasing number of the Jewish community and beyond to just what the plotters are capable of, and just how abhorrent and despicable they are.
When Mr Stern says that he would “rather die with the truth than live with a lie”, he can be 150% certain that there are many of us that stand with him.
Whilst doing some research a bit earlier, I came across an Israeli ‘media network’ website called Arutz Sheva, which I have never come across before – and an article that I will come on to shortly – but I just this minute did a search and found the following information on wikipedia:
Arutz Sheva (Hebrew: ערוץ 7, lit. Channel 7), also known in English as Israel National News, is an Israeli media network identifying with Religious Zionism. It offers online news in Hebrew, English, and Russian, including 24-hour updated text news, live streaming radio, video and free podcasts. It also publishes a weekly newspaper, B’Sheva, with the third-largest weekend circulation in the country.
Anyway, on it’s website it has a title under which all the (fake and phony and contrived) allegations of A/S against Jeremy Corbyn and the (left of the) Labour Party appear – ie Eye On Anti-Semitism – and the article I came across earlier has a link – along with a bunch of other links linking to fake stories of A/S – to a story I hadn’t come across before, and obviously missed at the time (there are so many it’s almost impossible to keep up with them all!), and it appears to have been widely covered by the MSM. And it relates to a ‘salute’ that JC gave when he visited a mosque, and a photo of such. This is from the Daily Mail:
Labour has insisted Jeremy Corbyn was just ‘standing up for democracy’ by making the salute of a controversial Muslim movement.
Mr Corbyn was seen making the Rabbi’ah four-fingered gesture popularised by the Muslim Brotherhood – the political movement condemned as ‘counter to British values and democracy’.
The shot, which emerged in the Daily Telegraph, shows Mr Corbyn standing alongside a man in a Muslim Association of Great Britain badge at Finsbury Park Mosque in the MP’s Islington North constituency.
(Ends)
So After reading the article – if one can call it that – I then did a search re the Muslim Assosiation of Great Britain, and the following is some of what it said in a wikipedia discription of the organisation:
In 2005, the MAB took control of Finsbury Park Mosque and expelled followers of the extremist cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri whom they accused of “promoting hatred”
In early 2015, MAB’s vice president, Mohammed Kozbar, urged the government to acknowledge that British foreign policy is a contributing factor to radicalism and that marginalising and criminalising young British Muslims is actually more likely to push them towards terrorist groups like ISIS.
On 27 February 2016 MAB joined the CND rally against Trident.
(Ends)
Ah, so that would explain why they were condemned! They believe in peace and are anti-war!
Here’s a link to the DM article/distortion/smear (as with most of the rest of the MSM):
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6061705/Photo-emerges-Corbyn-making-hand-gesture-linked-controversial-Muslim-movement.html
And here’s a link to the Arutz Sheva article I initially came across:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/252089
Correction: It was in fact the Muslim Brotherhood that was condemned (according to the Mail article), but given the conflation by the DM…….!
I got banned from the Guardian this morning – they disabled my commenting when I posted a link to these two pages. Get the feeling that someone is worried. Do please read … and if you think appropriate, retweet.
https://www.academia.edu/37460435/Black_and_White_and_Red_All_Over
Excellent article well worth a read.
On Sunday, two orthodox Rabbis drove all the way up from London to the conference in Liverpool to distribute leaflets they had produced in support of Jeremy Corbyn. They stayed there all day in the wind and rain before driving back the same day to London.
On Tuesday night another orthodox Rabbi will drive from Manchester to Liverpool to attend a fringe meeting at the Liverpool Hilton hotel 7pm/10pm to speak along side Miko Peled against the antisemitism smears being aimed at Jeremy by Zionists.
It proves that there is more than one voice among Jews and that the Board of Deputies does NOT speak for all of them.