Great insight by young Maya
I am writing in amazement at the intelligence and critical thinking exhibited by 14-year-old Maya Mazin — in her opinion piece about her trip to Austria (“My family trip to Austria was a rude awakening about Holocaust education,” Oct. 18).
Would that our political leaders have half as much insight and perception as she does. Kudos to her and shame on those who continue to downplay antisemitism.
Reggie Griner
San Francisco
Would KKK on campus be OK?
Erwin Chemerinsky’s nuancing around free speech on campus is another version of “it depends on context” (“Berkeley Law dean on antisemitism, the campus climate and what free speech is, and is not,” Oct. 15).
One filter is the “what if” they were pro-Klan or neo-Nazis? Berkeley owes them a right to march through the campus?
The United States recognizes Hamas as a terrorist group which has killed Amercians and would gladly kill more. Imagine if a pro–al-Qaeda student group wanted to march through the campus on 9/12. Those students would be expelled, arrested, deported or, at minimum, put on a watch list. So normalization of Palestinian terrorism gets a pass?
Through the “time, place and manner” lens, why are pro-Hamas protesters tolerated at all? Let’s try, college campuses are not the “time, place or manner” to ever have pro-terrorist protests.
Like Hamas and Hezbollah, the ideology displayed by these protesters overtly targets fellow Americans and students by race, religion or national origin (remember those?). Let’s be real. If caring college students, on a humanistic level, cared about Gazans and even wanted to yell “Genocide!” that’s one thing. Protesters who ripped down posters of Israeli hostages on Oct. 10, 2023 are not those well-meaning protesters that, according to Joe Biden, “have a point.”
While we’re all nostalgic for the anti-war protests from the ’60s, how does this compare? Those protests were targeted at the government, not fellow-students. And when Chemerinsky lectures us that just because Jewish students don’t “feel safe” when walking by masked protesters chanting pro-Hamas slogans and celebrating Oct. 7, that doesn’t mean they’re in danger. Let him have that discussion with Rep. Elise Stefanik and see how his case holds up.
Alan Zorfas
Foster City
The threat against Israel
What exactly does military and political expert Rabbi Amy Eilberg (“Why I couldn’t pray this Yom Kippur,” Oct. 18), comfortably ensconced in Los Altos, actually know about what is required to counter the existential threat against Israel by those who, like Ghazi Hamad of Hamas’ political bureau, inform us that Hamas would carry out Oct. 7 assaults repeatedly in the future with the goal of eliminating Israel?
Asked whether this meant the complete annihilation of Israel, Hamad replied “Yes, of course,” according to the Times of Israel.
Former U.S. presidential candidate Nikki Haley has advice Rabbi Eilberg might wish to consider: “Believe terrorists when they tell you who they are. This is why there should be no ceasefire until Hamas is destroyed.”
To everything, there is a season, Rabbi Eilberg.
The Jewish fighters of the Warsaw Ghetto understood this. Jews in Israel also understand this.
Consider the wisdom of Ecclesiastes regarding imperfectable human nature, Rabbi Eilberg, along with the incredible courage of young Jews fighting, yet again, to prevent the promised destruction of our people. Maybe you should have prayed for them on Yom Kippur.
Julia Lutch
Davis
Rabbi’s Israel stance is proper
Rabbi Paul Steinberg affirmed what many in the Jewish community have been yearning for in our leaders (“I am an unapologetically pro-Israel rabbi, no matter what some of my other Bay Area colleagues say,” Oct. 24)
In his Rosh Hashanah sermon, in his statement at an Oct. 7 commemoration at the Osher Marin JCC (where he received a standing ovation) and in his J. op-ed, he said what so many other rabbis could not bring themselves to say out loud: Israel is in an existential war with deranged, radical, theological Jihadists who are committed to the destruction of Israel and the Jewish people.
For rabbis who equivocate, ingratiate and convey moral equivalence between Israel and the forces of evil arrayed against them, their dishonor and diffidence will not bring them honor or respect. To speak about Palestinian suffering without reference to Hamas and Hezbollah is misguided. This is affirming solidarity with our Israeli family in their crucible for existential war.
May Rabbi Steinberg’s stance inspire those who want to stand with Israel with respect and empathetic solidarity.
Jeff Saperstein
Mill Valley
Political opinion, not an ad
As a decades-long subscriber to J., I am saddened and appalled that J. would accept and publish a full-page “paid advertisement” on Oct. 18 asking “Fellow Jewish Americans to leave the Democratic Party.”
This is the political opinion of this obviously wealthy Republican man, Brett M. Kingstone, and in my opinion has no place being accepted and published in J.
Advertising in J. is to promote and make readers aware of various businesses and services of which they can avail themselves. That is not remotely what this “advertisement” was.
Harriet Fernandez
San Jose