Thumbs-up for new film ‘Denial’
“Denial” is a remarkable film, which, contrary to your reviewer’s assessment, defies the clichés of many courtroom dramas (“Hackneyed ‘Denial’ doesn’t do justice to Lipstadt trials,” Oct. 7).
The casting, screenplay and plotline direction by Mick Jackson all project that the best antidote to the bloated theatricality of anti-Semitism can often be the painstaking written word and the “still, small voice.”
Rachel Weisz’s spot-on Queens-accented Deborah Lipstadt learns not only the métier of the British court system, but also the sweet justice that outlasts the media’s curtain calls. We, the viewers, learn to rethink barrister Richard Rampton’s dispassionate gestures at Auschwitz not as British steel but as a durable, strategic wisdom.
Rabbi Raphael W. Asher | Walnut Creek
God’s ‘choice’ of Jews is moot point
Martin Wasserman’s Oct. 7 letter to the editor (“Unilateral action by Israel? More like unilateral surrender”), arguing in favor of Israel keeping the territories captured during ’67 war, was sincere and touching, but nevertheless futile and quite pitiable.
His argument is based upon his belief that there are promises made by God to his chosen people, Israel, recorded in the Bible, and that these promises are presently being fulfilled. How sad. I’m sure he must realize that among American Jews, half don’t believe in God at all, and if they do believe in God, they don’t believe that God “makes promises.”
I think that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict cannot be resolved until the fundamental, religious problem is resolved. The problem will remain unresolved until the Islamic world finally removes the buildings which they arrogantly built upon the Temple Mount as a symbol of the ascendance of Islam over Judaism.
We Jews are much too prone to accepting insults, but the mosque and the Dome of the Rock are truly unacceptable insults, and peace cannot be established under these conditions. However, I believe if the Islamic world will make a sincere apology and offer to have those holy places be converted into “a house of worship for all the peoples” (Isaiah) then our search for peace might finally be successful.
Aaron Blumenfeld | Richmond
UNESCO has it in for Israel — again
In a remarkable confluence, on the very day UNESCO approved a document that vilifies Israel and denies Jewish history, the Nobel Prize went to a renowned critic of anti-Israel hypocrisy.
UNESCO’s “draft decision” on “Occupied Palestine,” passed 24-6 by the executive board of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, with 26 cowardly abstentions, denies the Jewish people’s 3,000-year-old attachment to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem by referring to Judaism’s holiest site exclusively as the “Al-Aqsa Mosque/Al-aram Al-Sharif” and deeming it “a Muslim holy site of worship.”
It similarly labels the holiest place where Jews may pray the “Al-Buraq Plaza” while adding “Western Wall Plaza” in sarcastic scare quotes.
It ignores the destructive use of bulldozers by the Jerusalem Waqf (an Islamic religious trust) to remove 350 truckloads of Temple Mount earth to a dump, as well as the recovery by Temple Mount Sifting Project archaeologists of thousands of Biblical-era Israelite antiquities from the excavated earth, further attesting to the site’s ancient Jewish heritage.
Finally, the document blames Israel for Palestinian terror while ignoring Palestinian hate-incitement and its Israeli and American victims.
Interestingly, UNESCO approved the document the same day the Swedish Academy awarded Bob Dylan the Nobel Prize for literature. In 1983, Dylan penned “Neighborhood Bully,” a scathing satirical attack on world hypocrisy toward Israel: “Well, the neighborhood bully, he’s just one man; His enemies say he’s on their land; They got him outnumbered about a million to one; He got no place to escape to, no place to run … [H]e destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad; The bombs were meant for him. He was supposed to feel bad …”
Perhaps “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” but “Like a Rolling Stone,” the United Nations continues to unfairly attack Israel.
Stephen A. Silver | San Francisco
Are Jews safe on campus? Professor made good points
I read professor Diane Wolf’s Oct. 7 opinion piece (“Is campus safe for your kids? Yes”) twice, because I know I have a visceral negative reaction to campus anti-Israel activity. I wanted to make sure I was considering her assertions carefully and fairly.
At first I was skeptical that Jewish students feel comfortable to openly identify themselves as Jews and supporters of Israel in the classroom and at various social justice meetings. I know that Jewish students feel very uncomfortable at “Israel Apartheid Week” events and when there are demonstrations against a possible speaker who represents Israel. I’m sure many Jewish students do feel uncomfortable under these circumstances.
But, I did feel that professor Wolf made some very good points and that because she is there, in the trenches, at U.C. Davis, she most likely knows more than I do.
One point that she made that really resonates with me is that U.C. Davis has a very vibrant and full Jewish studies department. She is right to point out that there are many courses that teach about Jewish history and that by providing education, students can feel free to discuss issues concerning Israel in a safe class environment.
We are fortunate that U.C. Davis has such a fine Jewish studies department. When Jewish students have a clear and reasonable voice like professor Wolf’s on the faculty, we can at least feel that perhaps someone is looking out for the rights of all students. I do trust her good sense and her deep commitment to scholarship.
Gail Taback | Oakland