From: eshneken@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (Edward A Shnekendorf)
Subject: Re: Antisemitism(?!)
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 04:25:49 GMT

wmcguire@world.std.com (Wayne McGuire) writes:

>To: Ron Evans

>In answer to your question about whether theocratic forces are
>gaining ground in Israel, I offer you the following:

><knotes>

><o>#clip

><des>

><author>Getzler, Dvorah
><title>License for Violence
><newspaper>The Jerusalem Post International Edition
><date>Week ending July 29, 1989
><pages>11-12

><note>

>Moshe Lissak and Ehud Sprinzak were both Hebrew University
>professors at the time of the article.

><excerpt>

> 
>     " ... Properly used the word ["primitive"] has to be applied
>     to those who see the world in simple primitive terms of
>     black and white, to those who hate what is foreign to them,
>     who fear the unknown and the strange.  Regrettably, that
>     definition can be applied to too many rabbis and their
>     followers...."
> 
>     Taking the point further, Lissak charges that no rabbi has
>     taken up Kahane's challenge to refute the halachic
>     underpinning of his racist hate message.  To the contrary,
>     some--in particular the head of the yeshiva at Joseph's tomb
>     in Nablus and others in Hebron--preach revenge as a
>     religious precept, insisting that Halacha does distinguish
>     between Jewish and non-Jewish blood. True, he concedes, most
>     rabbis have been careful to stop short of that; but none has
>     risen publicly to offer an explicit refutation of that ugly,
>     racist interpretation of Judaism.
> 
>     As to those who doubt the political role of the rabbis,
>     Lissak recalls that Israeli politics in the 1980s has
>     undergone a sea-change.
> 
>     "Political life has--to coin a phrase--become theologized.
>     Where once we witnessed the politicization of religion,
>     which incidentally drove many away from the religious
>     parties, now we are witnessing a theologization of politics,
>     in which political parties seek the approval and advice of
>     the rabbis even on totally secular matters; that gives the
>     dictates of the rabbis a quite new authority which, in turn,
>     has led to a radicalization of certain Orthodox groups."
> 
>     That development, combined with the rise of fervent
>     religious nationalism, he believes, is central to the growth
>     of political violence.
> 
>     Sprinzak categorizes Kahane as "the ideologist of violence,
>     a man who believes that violence against the enemies of the
>     Jews, avenging Jewish blood, is _kiddush
>     Hashem_--sanctification of the Name of God.  For Kach,
>     violence as revenge is a goal, rather than an instrument....
> 
>     Important to an understanding of Kach is that it makes no
>     pretence of affirming its loyalty to the institutions of the
>     State of Israel.
> 
>     On the contrary, it specifically states that the government
>     lacks all legitimacy, Sprinzak says, offering a glimpse into
>     the powder-keg that such a movement may be....
> 
>     For Leibowitz matters are starkly simpler.
> 
>     "Since 1967, Israel has been sliding steadily downward; we
>     are moving from humanism, through nationalism, to
>     bestiality.
> 
>     "Our problem is not one of human relations.  It is that
>     since 1967 the State has become the instrument of violent
>     Jewish domination over another people.  Everything that has
>     happened since derives from that."
> 
>     Those who vent their rage against Arab passersby are "wild
>     beasts," Leibowitz says.  But their actions are to be
>     understood as "an expression of the political lead given by
>     the State."

I just love how you rant and rave about the bias of the "Israeli right", but
accept the word of the Israeli left as law.  The people mentioned in this 
article, especially Leibowitz, are clearly a couple cans short of a six pack.
Just quoting leftist sources won't prove your point automatically.

></o>

Ed.