A dirty job
Israeli attorney Nomi Levenkron has a dirty job: She has made it her life’s work to fight for the rights of over 3,000 women sold into sexual slavery in Israel (j. March 4).
Levenkron and Rebecca Schwartz of Shalom Bayit spoke recently to a group of 35 women and five men at a private home on the Peninsula. We heard Levenkron describe how Israeli traffickers from the former Soviet Union smuggle poor women, most between 19 and 23, across the Egyptian border. Once in Israel, these “Natasias” are sold to pimps at auction. One can buy a woman for $2,500. She can be resold many times.
What then? The women are forced to work 15 to 17 hours a day, servicing 25 to 30 men. The “johns” are Israeli Jews, Arabs and migrant workers.
Levenkron, through the Hotline for Migrant Workers, funded by the New Israel Fund, is working to free these women and to change the laws in Israel. In 2000, the Knesset made trafficking a crime.
I can think of no better commitment to Jewish values than supporting Nomi Levenkron’s brave work.
Caryn Huberman Yacowitz | Palo Alto
Backing equal rights
We want to commend you for including the March 11 Dan Pine column that urges the Jewish community to “celebrate, not tolerate gay and lesbian rights.”
This past December, we criticized your editorial decision to print a letter to the editor in the Dec. 17 issue that we considered homophobic and deeply offensive. We are very pleased now to see such a strong statement in j. in support of full and equal rights for gay and lesbian people.
On behalf of all people concerned with human dignity, we would like to thank you for bringing this positive perspective on LGBT lives to the community at large.
Howard Steiermann | San Francisco
LGBT Alliance board chair
Bonnie Feinberg | San Francisco
alliance director, Jewish Community Federation
Not gloating
I winced when I saw my words concerning Congregation Sherith Israel in the March 11 article about Beth Sholom’s capital campaign, and I probably deserved the blow delivered by Diane Green in her March 18 letter.
But the truth is, I had absolutely no intention of either gloating or sniping at Sherith Israel, and I think this would have been clear had the reporter chosen to include a few of the complimentary things I said about Sherith Israel during our interview.
The statement that did make it into print was merely an attempt on my part to dismiss the absurd and disrespectful suggestion that my congregation, a vital and extremely viable synagogue, should give up its existence just to help Sherith Israel out of a jam.
This suggestion has been made repeatedly ever since word of Sherith’s problems began to surface months ago, and has often been accompanied by inaccurate and potentially damaging rumors about our own capital campaign.
These were the reasons I felt compelled to speak out, however much I may now wish I had chosen my words more carefully. I have nothing but admiration for Sherith Israel and I wish them success in their effort to rebuild.
Rabbi Alan Lew | San Francisco
Old news?
While I always welcome books on the Italian protection of Jews during the Shoah, I’d like to correct an error made by Mary Doria Russell during Dan Pine’s March 11 interview.
Apparently sure she had discovered something entirely new, she asked why it had taken “60 years and some American chick to bring the subject to light.” The fact is, the subject was brought to light long ago by other American chicks. Among them, historians Nora Levin in “The Holocaust” and Lucy Dawidowicz in “The War Against the Jews” recorded this history in 1968 and 1975, respectively.
After extensive research here and in Italy, I reported on it again in an article titled “Rescue Italian Style,” published in the B’nai B’rith Monthly in May 1986 and reprinted by the National Italian American Foundation in their magazine, Ambassador.
As for fiction, in 1988 W.W. Norton published four of my stories on this in a collection of my stories, and in 1991 Norton published my historical novel, “The Tree Still Stands,” again on this subject. Both of these were reported on by the Jewish Bulletin, j.’s predecessor, and much more can be found today through simple research.
Mae Briskin | Palo Alto
A fabrication?
The hit piece on Howard Dean by Matthew Brooks of the Republican Jewish Coalition is extraordinary in the extent of its disregard for reality (Feb. 18 j.).
Saddam Hussein, despot though he was, never paid terrorists to attack Israelis or Americans, any more than he was poised to attack us with nuclear missiles or biological bombs.
It was a Bushian fabrication, and it has tragically brought to fruition whatever empty dreams Saddam had of harming Americans.
At least 13,000 brave soldiers and Marines killed and wounded so far, over 250,000 American families disrupted, and the U.S. economy bankrupted to the tune of $300 billion — that’s a toll America’s worst enemies could only have fantasized about.
Brooks’ accusation of Democratic “indifference” to the war on terror also founders on the rocks of reality. The world’s most despicable terrorist, the one who took 3,000 lives in our nation on 9/11, walks free and happy today — and continues to publicly plan and sponsor terrorism against Americans — because of George Bush’s indifference.
The war on terror has been wrapped in lies by Brooks and his ilk, and it has been used to promote a craven political agenda. Therein lies the truth.
Mike Gaynes | Moss Beach
Across the divide?
I am deeply touched by Matthew Brooks’ concerns for Jewish Democrats and for Israel’s well-being (Feb. 18 j.). It is so kind of him to reach across the partisan divide, and I would like to set his mind at ease.
The quotes he cites were completely taken out of context, and Brooks conveniently leaves out any mention of his many Jewish — and very much pro-Israel — supporters, as well as his clear statements of support for Israel. (“Israel is not just an ally but a beacon of hope for people who were abandoned 2,000 years ago and who are afraid of being abandoned again. I will not abandon Israel, ever.”)
Would a former president of AIPAC like Steve Grossman have gone to work for Howard Dean’s campaign if he doubted Dean on that score?
But I do appreciate Brooks’ care for Jewish Democrats and the Democratic Party in general. In that same spirit, may I also make a suggestion about his party’s national chair? That nice Ken Mehlman seems a little too, well, boring. Perhaps they should consider replacing him with someone more dynamic — Alan Keyes, perhaps?
Katherine Falk | Oakland
Timely cover story
Having just returned from visiting four of the nine synagogues in Bombay (Mumbai), we found your Feb. 25 cover story, “A Tribe of Many Colors,” very timely.
According to one of the chazzans, most shuls manage to get a daily minyan. We were fortunate to have Shabbat dinner at a Jewish Indian family’s home. They spoke warmly of growing up in a close-knit Sephardic community.
How special for us to be in a far away place and connect with our Jewish brethren.
Fran and Joel Teisch | Hillsborough
Evangelical Zionists
The Feb. 25 opinion column by Rabbi Shmuel Goldin tells us much about the rabbi’s discomfort at the national Congressional prayer breakfast in Washington, D.C., but it says very little about the breakfast itself.
It tells us that Goldin does not know the meaning of the word “evangelical,” which is Greek and means “good news,” with the good news being the belief that the Jewish Messiah had come in the person of Rabbi Yeshua ben Yoseph of Nazareth, (whose name got mangled when it went through the Greek, and came out in English as “Jesus”).
As for myself, I have felt very comfortable living among evangelical Christian Zionists on four of their “solidarity missions” in Israel. They refer to us Jews as “God’s people” because God has told us Jews repeatedly, “I will be your God, and you will be My people.”
I suggest Goldin try living among the evangelical Zionists, preferably in Israel, instead of just eating one breakfast with them.
Yehuda Sherman | Lafayette
Avoiding defensiveness
I was pleased to read your recent story about BlueStar PR. Since its inception, BlueStar has served an important role bringing to the “Israel-neutral” and anti-Israel community a nuanced, thoughtful image of Israel’s strengths and accomplishments as a nation committed to democratic principles and coexistence.
Through compelling visuals, humor and sparse, clear text, BlueStar has succeeded where most “pro-Israel” material fails with a younger audience. It has done so by avoiding defensive images and language. In this way it has captured a “market sector” previously uninterested in and un-impacted by nuanced messaging about Israel.
I was only sorry that one individual quoted in the story was critical of BlueStar PR’s work.
BlueStar has simply — and to great effectiveness — used powerful images to contextualize the landscape in which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict takes place. All concerned with the conflict could benefit from more of such work.
Adam Weisberg | Berkeley
BlueStar PR board member
letters policy
j. the Jewish news weekly welcomes letters to the editor, preferably typewritten. Letters must not exceed 200 words and must be dated and signed with current address and daytime telephone number. j. also reserves the right to edit letters. The deadline is noon Monday for any given week’s publication. Letters should be sent by e-mail to [email protected] or by mail to j., 225 Bush St., Suite 1480, San Francisco, CA 94104.