Free Republic

In an unbelievable display of stupidity, Ferguson protesters are now blaming "the Jews" for the unrest in Ferguson, the grand jury decision not to indict Darren Wilson, and even the death of Michael Brown. How the Jews are involved at are is not really mentioned; these protesters just assume that other people think the same way they do: that Jews control everything, from the government to law enforcement. Some of the stunning ignorance can be seen below:

Jewish life in New York is dominated by ritual. Holidays. A pastrami reuben on a hero at Katz’s. The reading of holy books in cycles that take a year (the Torah) or seven and a half years (the Talmud). And just as reliably, there’s the ritual of presidential candidates sniffing around for dough right after the midterm elections. That last one got going in earnest yesterday and today, with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas making a whirlwind tour of power Jews in New York City. Last night, Mort Klein’s Zionist Organization of America dinner featured Mr. Cruz, known for his...

In a move likely to further inflame tensions with Israel's Arab citizens, the Israeli Cabinet on Sunday approved a bill to legally define the country as the nation-state of the Jewish people. The decision, which set off a stormy debate that could bring down Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's brittle coalition government, followed weeks of deadly Arab-Jewish violence and was denounced by critics as damaging to the country's democratic character and poorly timed at such a combustible moment. It now heads toward a full parliamentary vote on Wednesday....

Muslims are committing atrocities around the world, killing innocent people with abandon in the name of their holy war and while they do Jews and Christians are forbidden to pray on the Temple Mount The Palestinians never lose an opportunity or excuse to kill Jews. What is feared is a new intifada or holy war in Israel, specifically in Jerusalem, where attacks on its civilians and soldiers have been occurring. The present grievance has to do with the Temple Mount, the holiest place in Judaism, but one that was taken over by Muslims when they invaded in 638 A.D. Muslims...

Ukrainian Jewish leaders claim anti-Semitism is much worse in France and even UK, suggest Russia playing it up as a political ploy. Anti-Semitism is on the rise in Ukraine, Russian officials have insisted over the past several months - but local Jewish leaders say that life for Ukrainian Jewry is actually "safer and easier" than in the West. Shmuel Kaminetsky, a rabbi in Dnipropetrovsk, noted that anti-Semitism in Ukraine is much lighter than in Britain or France, where the threat of radical Islam is palpable. The VAAD has stepped up its public campaign to dismiss rumors of rampant anti-Semitism in...

In this year's midterms, Jews voted for Republican candidates more than they have in any election in the last decade. First, some raw facts. In the 2006 midterm elections, 87 percent of Jews voted for Democratic candidates for the House of Representatives. Last week, in the 2014 midterm elections, 66 percent cast ballots for Democrats. That's a 21-point drop in eight years—and, it might seem, a major cause for celebration among the likes of the Republican Jewish Coalition and philo-Semitic political strategists everywhere. But while Jewish support for Democrats has definitely declined over the last decade, the context is important....

The 'Pew Research Religion & Public Life Project: A Portrait of Jewish Americans' created shockwaves, as the shrinkage of (non-Orthodox) American Jewry and its impact and role were ominously documented and further forecast. Far fewer Jews, far less support for the State of Israel, far less religious affiliation and practice, and an overall disappearing American Jewish public presence are starkly indicated and are already occurring. Unless non-Orthodox Jewry returns to its traditional posture and makes a radical, sweeping commitment to intra-marriage and fortification of Jewish identity, its termination as a major religious-ethnic group is almost certain. This would obviously not...

Strong Jewish support for an Iran nuclear deal was a surprise finding of a poll of American Jews who voted Tuesday. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned against any deal that leaves Iran with an enrichment program. [snip] In Tuesday’s elections, American Jews voted for Democrats over Republicans by a decisive margin of 69 to 28 percent.

Wherefore also now, saith the Lord, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning: And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil. Who knoweth if he will return and repent, and leave a blessing behind him; even a meat offering and a drink offering unto the Lord your God? Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: Gather the people,...

This week, the world was treated to yet another embarrassing display of the Obama administration’s incompetent foreign policy. According to The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, various anonymous officials referred to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as both “a chicken****” and “a coward.” While these indefensible comments have received the lion’s share of media attention, the substantive remarks about Iran were even more troubling. Goldberg wrote that another senior official claimed that due to their pressure on Netanyahu, it is now “too late” for Israel to stop Iran from amassing an “atomic arsenal.” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told the White...

What does the Obama administration hope to accomplish by trashing Israel in the press? This is the most important question after an apparently coordinated wave of anonymous quotes welled up in Tuesday’s press. Relations with Israel have steadily worsened over the course of Obama’s presidency, and little of what was said was out of step with some views being expressed in broader policy circles. But why say it, and why now? The wave began Monday night, with Foreign Policy’s Gopal Ratnam saying that the White House was “undermining” Israeli defense minister Moshe Yaalon during his recent visit to the United...

“The United States administration is planning to throw Israel under the bus,” Jewish Home chairman Naftali Bennett said on Tuesday night, responding to harsh words against Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu which were attributed to senior officials in the Obama administration. “Israel is stronger than all those who curse it,” said Bennett, after Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic quoted officials in Washington as having described Netanyahu as “chickens**t”, among other things. “The prime minister is not a private individual, but the leader of the Jewish State and the Jewish world as a whole. Serious curses such as these against the Israeli...

Chaya Zissel Braun was murdered on her first trip back from the Western Wall where the indigenous Jewish population of Israel continues to pray in the shadow of the shrine established there by the Muslim conquerors from which the racist Muslim settlers rain down rocks on the Jewish worshipers.

Nine years as chaplain of an 800 bed state mental hospital taught me that one can be mentally ill and highly intelligent. Talking with the patients often was more interesting than talking with their psychiatrists. Mad men are not mindless. They just do not distinguish between delusion and fact. Chesterton summed this up by aphorism: “The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is the man who has lost everything except his reason.” This explains why it is often hard to distinguish university faculties from mental wards, save for the latter being kept under...

This past weekend, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called Jews who dared to visit one of the religion’s most holy sites, known as the Temple Mount, a “herd of cattle.” Israeli authorities, on the other hand, allow free passage for Muslims to pray at the site Palestinians refer to as the Dome of the Rock. Jews are largely restricted from praying at that site, for fear that their presence alone may enrage Muslims, and that sharing a holy site with Jews may incite them to commit acts of violence. On Friday, the Palestinian President said that the Jewish community does not...

A Nazi-themed beauty pageant for Russian women who hate Jews which has been dubbed 'Miss Hitler 2014' has sparked outrage on social media. Attractive female Nazis who enjoy taking steamy 'selfies' are being encouraged to apply to the competition on social media site, VKontakte. They have been asked to post a Nazi-themed selfie and write under their photo why they 'love and revere the Third Reich of Adolf Hitler' - a regime that killed more than six million people...

Prominent leaders of major Jewish and Christian global organizations announced a "historic" joint initiative on Monday, calling on world leaders to take urgent, determined actions to halt the brutal persecution of Christians in the Middle East in a Jerusalem press conference. Video The joint initiative was unveiled at the Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles) celebration sponsored by the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, with some 4,500 Christians from 80 nations in attendance. The alarming situation for Christian minorities across the Middle East continues to worsen even while world leaders have largely ignored this on-going human rights tragedy, laments a letter recently sent...

Kurds and Jews shared a common history. No nation has come to their aid when they have been under attack. Both have asked “Where is the world?” Watching the events affecting the Kurds in Kobani, Syria, under attack from the Islamic State (ISIS), it occurred to me that they have much in common with Zionists, Jews who established Israel in 1948. Turkey’s president Recep Tyyip Erdogan dislikes Kurds and Jews with equal fervor. The Kurds, estimated to be some 30 million in the Middle East, are spread out between a large enclave in northern Iraq, virtually an autonomous nation, and...

Last month, I read a truly fascinating book, written by John Entine, titled: "Abraham's Children: Race, Identity, and the DNA of the Chosen People". Entine is a genetics expert, and a fellow of the American Enterprise Institute. http://www.amazon.com/Abrahams-Children-Identity-Chosen-People/dp/0446580635 It mentions that Jews have genetic markers, that can be detected by DNA tests. Of course, genetic markers also exist for Irishmen, Chinese people, Indians, etc. The Mizrahi Jews from the Middle East and the Ashkenazi Jews from Europe, have very similar genes. Genetics research and Archaeology are proving that many of the accounts in the Old Testament are true. Jews have...