Threats are not OK
The president of San Francisco State University’s General Union of Palestine Students (GUPS) didn’t just threaten an Israeli female soldier’s life. He threatened all Israelis and supporters of Israel (“SFSU student allegedly threatens Israeli soldier,” Dec. 13).
The Palestinian student allegedly posted a picture of himself holding a knife, with the caption: “I seriously can not get over how much I love this blade. It is the sharpest thing I own and cuts through everything like butter and just holding it makes me want to stab an Israeli soldier.”
In another post, he named an Israeli female soldier and wrote: “the only ‘peace’ I’m interested in is the head of this [expletive] scum on a plate, as well as the heads of all others like her, and all others who support the IDF.” He also called for “the destruction and decimation of this Israeli plague and it can’t possibly come soon enough.”
Moreover, on Nov. 7, GUPS provided SFSU students with stencils for making signs saying: “My heroes have always killed colonizers,” meaning Israelis.
SFSU President Leslie Wong has condemned the stencils’ “glorification of violence.” However, further action is necessary to demonstrate that anti-Israel hate won’t be tolerated.
Stephen A. Silver | San Francisco
‘Weird’ editorial on Mandela
The editorial in J. on Dec. 13 (“Mandela’s legacy resonates with all of us”) demonstrated the Jewish left’s mysterious compulsion to curry the favor of Israel bashers.
J. whined about Bibi’s decision not to attend Mandela’s funeral, or, at least send, Shimon Peres. J. complained that a mere Knesset delegation was an insufficient sign of respect.
Of course, J. chose to disregard Mandela’s hatred of Israel. He loudly supported all of Israel’s enemies (Ahmadinejad, Arafat, Chavez, Gadhafi, Hussein, Khamenei and Khomeini, to name just a few), and never missed an opportunity to endorse whatever was the then current calumny against Israel (which he called “a terror state”) and, in particular, the IDF.
The editorial was weird, but, sadly, not surprising.
Tod Zuckerman | Daly City
ID error
Last week, an op-ed written by Gayle Donsky (“Exposing the dark reality of poverty as the new normal,” Dec. 13) about poverty and the underlying causes identified her as serving on the board of the S.F.-based Jewish Community Relations Council.
Gayle is a valued member of JCRC’s Metropolitan Council, which represents a broad cross-section of the organized Jewish community (but not a member of the board, as indicated in the tagline).
JCRC is very concerned about poverty in America. However, the viewpoints expressed in the article were the author’s and not those of the JCRC.
Rabbi Doug Kahn | San Francisco
Executive Director, JCRC
Spectrum of opinions
As a participant at JCRC’s “Celebrating Civil Discourse,” on Dec. 8, my perception of the afternoon differs from the
perspective presented by Anna Rogers in her letter (“All voices deserve to be heard,” Dec. 13).
Attendees included synagogue leaders and lay congregants expressing a prismatic spectrum of views from AIPAC-sympathetic to JVP-empathic.
May the Year of Civil Discourse organizers, including Rabbi Doug Kahn, Abby Michelson Porth and especially Rachel Eryn Kalish, progress from strength to strength as they continue to instill within us the practice of dialogue with mentshlekhkeyt.
Marc A. Lipschutz | San Francisco
Alleviating suffering
Thank you for the informative information (“Light-Up Nation: What Israel can teach the world about medical marijuana,” Dec. 6). It is high time (no pun intended) medical cannabis is being given the positive attention it deserves.
I recently learned that Moshe Feiglin, an Israeli parliament member, advocates the use of medical cannabis due to him personally witnessing how it relieves his wife’s suffering from Parkinson’s disease after she smokes it.
When it comes to helping human beings reduce their physical pain, all means should be sought to alleviate their suffering. Just because cannabis carries with it a social stigma should not translate into holding back a substance which has historically, and is proving again in the 21st century, to be a potent means of alleviating suffering.
Don Zusya Goodman | Brooklyn, N.Y.